We must stop the Tea Party before the United States Senate falls into the hands of extremists and ideologues who leave no room for reason or compromise, who dont recognize common ground even when theyre standing on it.

Legislation is the art of compromise.

We would be somewhat foolish to work out something on stopping us from going over the cliff and then a month or six weeks later Republicans pull the same game they did before and say, 'We're not going to do anything - unless this happens, we're not going to agree to increasing the debt ceiling.' I agree with the president, it has to be a package deal.

I don't know how anyone of Hispanic heritage could be a Republican.

I am convinced that I do not want to give up more power to the White House, whether it's George Bush or Barack Obama. And I'm going to fight as hard as I can against President Obama on these earmarks and my Republican colleagues who hate to vote for them, but love to get them.

For senators to complain that they didn't know this was happening, we had many, many meetings that have been both classified and unclassified that members have been invited to.

Enforcement alone does not work. Unless we address the gap between our immigration laws and reality, illegal immigration will not stop and the situation on the border will continue to be chaotic.