Ted CruzVerified account

To be sure, this bill could have been even worse. I am happy to say that I was able to fight to keep out even more egregious proposals.

I'm proud we successfully blocked a bailout of Obamacare. There were voices in DC who wanted to funnel billions of taxpayer dollars directly to insurers, so they can maintain their Obamacare policies. We promised Americans we would repeal and replace Obamacare, not prop it up.

Lobbyists in Washington also almost got a new Internet sales tax added to the bill, which would have been catastrophically foolish.

This proposal would have applied to virtually every transaction on the Internet, pouring cold water on the benefits of the bold tax cuts we achieved last year. Americans need more permanent tax relief, not additional tax burdens.

I also worked to prevent an increase in the passenger facility charge; another tax increase that would have driven up the cost of every airline ticket purchased by consumers and inflicted a significant burden on the Texas airline industry, which supports thousands of Texas jobs.

Finally, although this bill overall is truly a monstrosity, it does contain a few positive elements for which I gladly advocated.

First, it fully funds our military, providing an additional $61 billion for national defense over FY 2017 levels, the largest year-to-year increase in base funding for the Department of Defense in 15 years.

The bill will also increase our security here at home by providing resources for new border security infrastructure and personnel.