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Floor Speech

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Mr. SCHMITT. Madam President, the Biden administration is constantly trying to sell Americans that the economy is improving. They offer miniscule morsels of improvement. The big picture shows an economy that is struggling mightily, and Americans are struggling along with it.

The Biden administration wants to tout Bidenomics as a success. Young Americans, families, elderly Americans, and everyone in between are being crushed under the weight of economic stagnation. According to the New York Times, 81 percent of Americans rated economic conditions as ``fair'' or ``poor.'' CBS News states that 66 percent of Americans rate the national economy as ``bad.'' ABC News has a poll that says 76 percent of Americans say the country is headed in the wrong direction. About two in three Americans say their household expenses have risen in the last year, but only one in four says their income has increased in the same period, according to an AP poll.

Higher prices, stagnant wages, and skyrocketing interest rates are hammering the American people across all demographics.

Typically, young Americans are looking to buy a house, condo, or property, and build some equity. It is a staple of building a fiscally healthy future and the foundation of the American dream. Not only can young people not afford homes with the current obscene interest rates, they can barely afford to keep their heads above water.

While Biden tries to distract young voters with his climate alarmism and that the Earth is going to boil, it is actually Biden's woeful mismanagement of the economy that is the real existential threat to the economy, the real existential threat to the American dream, the real existential threat to their future. Furthermore, it is Biden's insane energy policies that have stifled domestic energy production and made everything more expensive.

For families, it is even tougher in this economy. Household goods and food costs are more expensive now. Families are dipping into their savings and incurring more expenses and credit card debt, which is now at record levels.

Overall prices have risen 17 percent and are costing the average American household $940 more per month. For elderly Americans who are retired or who are about to retire, this economy poses a dire threat. Higher prices on everything doesn't bode well for those on a fixed income, and with people dipping into their retirement savings just to cover the costs, it doesn't bode well for those hoping to retire soon either.

It turns out that, when you spend trillions and trillions and trillions of dollars you don't have and declare war on domestic energy production, inflation runs rampant. The cost of everything goes up. That is what Americans are living through. They don't need slogans. They are not buying it. No matter how many times he says Bidenomics is working, the American people are struggling with higher costs, and they know it is not.

The antidote to the Bidenomics' poison is clear: Stop deficit spending. Become energy dominant to ease the burden on working families.

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