Political Quotes

“I thank the chairwoman of the Appropriations Committee Senator Mikulski for moving ahead to complete action on this, the Transportation, Housing and Urban Development appropriations bill. This is the first bill reported by the Appropriations Committee to be considered by the Senate on the floor. I believe it is important that Congress exercises constitutional authority over the funding of government. If we do not pass appropriations bills, the undesirable outcome is a government shutdown, which none of us wants. I believe, however, that the Senate is still on a precarious path. The majority is pursuing a top-line discretionary spending level of $1.058 trillion for the fiscal year 2014. This exceeds the Budget Control Act level by over $90 billion. The Budget Control Act is the law that establishes and enforces, through sequestration, limits on discretionary spending. In fiscal year 2013, most discretionary programs were forced to take arbitrary across-the-board cuts. We did not have to go in that direction for 2014. Over 1 month ago, all Republican members of the Appropriations Committee signed a letter to Chairwoman Mikulski calling for a top-line number of $967 billion that complies with the law. There could have been an alternative to sequestration. The Appropriations Committee could have written spending bills that adhered to the budget constraints of the law.…”