U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) made the following statement after voting against the Senate Democrats’ partisan budget resolution.

“In the past 11 months, we’ve enacted a strong federal response to the coronavirus pandemic—matching a historic crisis with historic federal spending to address it. Just a few weeks ago, we passed even more resources to build on our support for families, small businesses and health care providers. We will certainly need to continue our work, but we can’t confuse that effort with partisan legislation that has been rushed and is jam packed with a liberal wish list.

“The budget resolution is an outline for future legislation, but it is also a marker for where Congress says it wants to spend taxpayer dollars. The past day made it clear – Democrats want to spend your dollars to implement their radical agenda.”

The budget resolution is designed to be a non-binding outline for future legislation, but it provides an illuminating look at the wrong-direction priorities of the new Democrat majority. Throughout the evening, Inhofe and Senate Republicans offered several amendments that highlighted important policy proposals and positions that would have a meaningful impact to families in Oklahoma – but too many were blocked by Democrats.

A few of the blocked amendments that Sen. Inhofe supported included:

• Reducing federal funds for any state or local government that prohibits local officials from working with federal officials to enforce federal law, also known as a “sanctuary city.” (Inhofe cosponsored this amendment and is a cosponsor of the standalone bill, the Stop Dangerous Sanctuary Cities Act).
• Protecting babies who have survived abortion attempts by guaranteeing that they receive medical care. (Inhofe cosponsored this amendment and is a cosponsor of the standalone bill, the Born Alive Abortion Survivors Act).
• Standing up for parents and students by cutting federal COVID-19 funds to schools that remain closed for in-person learning after all teachers are vaccinated. The CDC has said schools can safely reopen even without having all teachers vaccinated, so by blocking this amendment, Senate Democrats made it clear they stand with national unions who want schools to stay shut down and not with students and parents. Multiple studies have shown that all students benefit from in-person education.
• Requiring law enforcement to prioritize detaining and prosecuting illegal immigrants convicted of violent crimes. (Inhofe cosponsored this amendment and is a cosponsor of the standalone bill, Sarah’s Law).

Inhofe said, “These provisions shouldn’t be controversial. We should all agree that we need to enforce our immigration laws, protect all life and stand against infanticide and support the needs of students. Yet, Senate Democrats blocked each of these amendments.” 

In some instances, Inhofe and Senate Republicans successfully fought for provisions that will benefit American families. The Senate voted in support of provisions to:

·         Prohibits a ban against fracking. This vote demonstrated that there is still bipartisan support for the provision Sen. Inhofe secured in the 2005 energy bill.  

·         Ensuring no tax hikes on small businesses during the pandemic. Democrats have discussed using one-size-fits-all taxes on businesses in order to fund their liberal wish lists.

·         Supporting schools who have lost revenue because of the hasty, anti-energy Biden administration policies. When Biden ended responsible drilling on public lands, the immediate impact of his executive order meant a serious loss of revenue for schools across the country. Read more about this in the WSJ.

 Additionally, Inhofe’s amendment to protect the U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem passed overwhelmingly. Read more here.