TRANSCRIPT: Van Hollen Joins Federal Workers in Calling for Trump to be Held Accountable in Government Funding Bill

Last night, U.S. Senator Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) joined current and former federal workers at a press conference calling for a government funding agreement with meaningful guardrails to stop the Trump Administration’s lawlessness.

Video of the Senator’s remarks is available here and a transcript is available below:

I want to start by thanking you and all these amazing, dedicated federal employees. Let's give it up for all the federal employees here. These are true patriots. These are the people who deliver important services to the American people every day. They're the people who care for our veterans. They're the people who help develop treatments and cures to diseases. They're the people who help keep our food supply safe. They're the people who respond in cases of national emergency. The list goes on and on.

So, thank all of you for what you do for the American people. And thank you for being here to express your views – because as much as they like to do the work of the American people, they recognize that the people who will lose the most in a government shutdown are people all over America who are going to lose the benefit of their good work.

I just met, last week, with a man from Atlanta, Georgia, who had been part of one of the clinical trials that had been disrupted. And for a little while, his life was put at risk. He was able to get back in, but he told me the story of a woman who had been part of his clinical trial who – while it was being disrupted because of actions of the Trump Administration – developed complications that disqualified her from continuing to be in that clinical trial on cancer. She's in hospice right now.

So, what the Trump Administration has been doing to date has real consequences. They have disregarded and disrespected and gone after hardworking federal employees, and they've done it from day one. Elon Musk said he was going to take a chainsaw to important federal services. He went after federal employees at the Social Security Administration, Medicare, NIH, Department of Education – across the government.

And so I think the point Mark made needs to be emphasized, which is this lawless behavior has been ongoing since day one of the Trump Administration. They have been shutting down the parts of the government that they don't like and beefing up the parts of the government that they want to focus on. So this has been going on since day one.

Now, here we are, and Donald Trump is asking for a blank check from all of us to continue with this lawless activity. And this is a moment for members of Congress to say, “No – a lawless president does not get a blank check.”

So, none of us want to see the government shut down.

Apparently, Donald Trump's position is if he doesn't get a blank check, he will shut the government down. That's what he is saying.

We have presented an alternative. The Democrats in the Senate have presented an alternative to keep the federal government open. But it does include guardrails and safeguards to protect us against the illegal withholding of funds that have been put forward by the Congress through the constitutional process and to put up other safeguards.

It also turns off the ticking time bomb that Republicans left in place on Americans’ health care. Because at the end of this year, if we don't defuse that bomb, people are going to see their health care premiums go up in the Affordable Care Act exchanges. Four million Americans will lose health care altogether. Notices will start to go out in October – next week. And so, we want to keep the government open, but we want guardrails and safeguards, and we want to make sure we turn off this ticking time bomb. That's what we want.

And when Russ Vought – who, as we all know, infamously said that his goal was to inflict trauma on federal employees – when he threatens to use a shutdown to fire more federal employees, I think we all understand that a shutdown gives this Administration no more power to do that than they do today. Today, they are engaged in lawless activities. In fact, they're very good arguments to say, legally that it's more difficult for them to accomplish those goals during a shutdown. They certainly should not be accepted activities in a shutdown. But we are dealing with a lawless administration.

But the point is, they've been doing this from day one. We cannot be complicit in this ongoing assault on federal employees and ongoing assault on the American people – because these great patriotic Americans work for the American people. So when Donald Trump goes after them, he's going after the American public.

That's what's happening here.

We're here to say no more blank check. We need to make sure that what we do here in this Congress really does reflect the will of the American people.

And so thank all of you for being here. Thank all the federal employees for exercising your First Amendment rights, which they are also trying to destroy. But we will persevere – because what they want us to do is shut up and go away.

And all of you are here to say no. You're not going to shut up, and you're not going to go away. You're going to stand up for the Constitution. We're going to do what's right.

Thank you all for being here.