The Spending Control Act. It would recreate President Reagan's grace commission to have a bipartisan commission on how we reduce spending.

I've been thinking, in an age of Trump where you don't know the direction of the country, the person you need most is a steady conservative hand like Mark Kirk in the Senate to be advising the president, especially on national security topics ... which is my particular expertise after 23 years in the Navy.

It's okay to take the food out of the mouths of the citizens from a government that's plotting an attack directly on American soil.

I've always backed energy independence policies, but I've heard from people on this issue like no other. The energy interests of Illinois are far broader and deeper than my North Shore district.

Donald Trump is kind of a riverboat gamble. He won the Illinois primary; in this case, we have seen the Republican vote up and the Democratic vote down, so it looks like it's a net benefit.

The tough thing about these senatorial jobs is you get 'yes' or 'no' votes. Your whole job is to either say 'yes' or 'no' and explain why.

Every American born today owes $43,000 to the federal government the day she or he is born. And we are transferring a tremendous amount of debt to the new generation, much of it owed to overseas creditors who expect to be repaid by our children with interest.

We should all be neo-abolitionists here to make sure that there is no right in America to enslave others using the Internet.

Same-sex couples should have the right to civil marriage. Our time on this earth is limited, I know that better than most. Life comes down to who you love and who loves you back- government has no place in the middle.

I want to make sure we have elected people constantly looking at helping the African-American community.

Over time, the federal government should move the nation to a single standard, clean-burning gasoline.

And taking more money out of the private economy and having the government perform as it has poorly done with the stimulus I don't think is the right way to go.

I'm pretty disappointed in Sony Pictures' decision to pull 'The Interview' under pressure from North Korea.

I've got a chart here that shows our debt-to-GDP ratio. And while we did run deficits in the past, we now number our debt in trillions rather than in billions. And I think that represents a long-term danger, especially to the, the American dream.

The biggest challenge I have with Washingtonians is they think Illinois is exclusively a Democratic state.

I would say that I definitely became much more religious. They say there are no atheists in foxholes, and this stroke put me into a very deep foxhole. Yet that feeling of faith sustained me, so I have no feelings of anger or regret.

Alexi Giannoulias' top aide was a longtime BP lobbyist.

There's a new role that I see for myself with the new Republican majority running the Senate. I am now the premiere ambassador for the state from the Republican majority.

The best thing that we can do on climate change is make sure that China converts to a more nuclear future to limit those -- that one coal-burning plant coming on a week that we expect -- that would really help the planet. We need to work cooperatively with developing countries to make sure they emit less.

It's the only way that Democrats can win in Illinois, is to say, 'Oh, Kirk has health problems, he's going to retire.' For Democrats looking at a minority life and seeing that they cannot win in Illinois is so frustrating that they will just assume away any issue. They'll just say to willing reporters, 'I think Kirk is going to retire.'