Press Releases

Remarks from the floor on September 30, 2013:

I thank the gentleman for yielding me the customary 30 minutes and I yield myself such time as I may consume.

M./ Speaker, once again, the Republican Majority is back on the House Floor trampling upon regular order and eliminating any possibility of a fair and transparent legislative process.

When the Majority assumed control of this chamber in 2011, they promised to adhere to regular order. On March 10, 2010, National Journal reporter Major Garrett asked Rep. John Boehner: “If you are speaker, will you ever bring a bill to the floor that hasn’t been true to the three-day rule?”  Congressman Boehner replied with one-word: “no.”

In the same interview, Congressman Boehner said, “We need to stop writing bills in the speaker’s office and let members of Congress be legislators again…We have nothing to fear from the battle of ideas.”

Those promises seem a million miles away today.

Sadly, since that time the Majority has repeatedly violated their own promises of openness and transparency. Thirty-three times the Majority has violated its own three-day promise, and rushed legislation to the House Floor. They have avoided the committee process and brought legislation straight to the House Floor 48 times. And despite promising to let the House “work its will” the Majority has approved 157 closed or structured rules, and just 31 open or modified rules.

In short, the Majority has shut out Democrats and Republicans alike and shut down the democratic process.

Why have they done this? Not because they are letting the House work its will. They have abandoned regular order because an extreme faction of their party is so uncompromising that they are willing to shutdown our government or implode our economy unless they get their way.

As a potential government shutdown looms – just a few days from now – we still don’t know what the Republican Majority is planning to do.  What we do know is that whatever they propose will have been written behind closed doors in an attempt to appease the most extreme elements of the Republican Conference.

M./ Speaker, time is running out.  Now more than ever, the American people deserve a fair and transparent legislative process so that we can keep our government open and our economy on track. Implementing martial law, as this rule would do, would be a step in the wrong direction.

I urge my colleagues to reject today’s rule, and protect our democratic process. I reserve the balance of my time. 

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I thank the Ranking member for the time.

M. Speaker, here we go again.  As we look up at the clock, we see there are only hours to a completely unnecessary and economically harmful government shutdown.

I don’t see the junior senator from Texas on the floor, but I presume that he has signed off on this latest feeble Republican strategy, since he seems the one to be calling the shots around here.

I say to my Republican friends:  Enough.

Enough of the gamesmanship.  Enough of the legislative ping-pong.  Enough of the high-fives and cheers from the floor.

It’s time to put on your grown-up pants and do your jobs.

It’s a job, by the way, that should have been done months ago.  The House passed a budget and the Senate passed a budget.  But instead of going to a conference committee to hash out the numbers, the Republican Leadership REFUSED to appoint conferees.  They refused to negotiate.

And as a result, we are here on the edge of the cliff. 

Here’s the irony, M. Speaker – it’s clear to me at least that there is a majority in this House – Republican and Democrat – for passing the clean CR sent to us by the Senate.

Here’s another irony – that clean CR contains the numbers of my Republican friends’ beloved sequester!  Numbers that I believe are far too low.  For the life of me I don’t understand why the Republicans don’t declare victory and let us get on with the business of governing. 

And part of that governing is ensuring that the Affordable Care Act works as well as possible for the American people.  It’s the law of the land.  It’s going to stay that way.  Neither the Senate nor the President is going to accept any changes.

And let me say a word about the so-called Vitter amendment that is included in this bill.  Unlike what my Republican friends say, the Vitter amendment doesn’t make the people who work for us live like everyone else. In fact, it singles them out for special punishment.

It says to the people who help us draft legislation, who answer the phones in our offices and respond to constituent mail, who help a veteran get his benefits or a high school student apply to the military academies that unlike every other federal employee, their employer will not contribute a share toward their health insurance.  It’s a lousy thing to do. 

I say to my colleagues, if you want to see an exodus of smart, dedicated people away from Congress, if you want to see this place get even dumber, then by all means pass the Vitter Amendment.  Otherwise, we should treat it like the cynical talking point that it is and vote it down.

Again, M. Speaker, it’s time for my Republican friends to put on their grown-up pants and do the right thing.  I urge my colleagues to reject this rule, reject the underlying bill and pass a clean CR.