Steve Womack: “I thank the gentleman for yielding. Mr. Speaker, let me say before I get to the contents of my remarks, not lost on me…”

“I thank the gentleman for yielding. Mr. Speaker, let me say before I get to the contents of my remarks, not lost on me is the work that Mr. Cole is doing today as a Rules Committee member and managing the debate that we just had, managing this debate with Appropriations. He is a real iron man today, and I just want to publicly thank him for the longstanding work that he is doing in support of our work here today. Mr. Speaker, here we are in the people's House debating nothing more than a real partisan grab bag, and it is an expensive one. What we see as a crisis, Mr. Speaker, the other side sees as an opportunity to exert leverage: no collaboration, no transparency, no Republican input. They can't even wait until the trillions of dollars we have already spent is completely out the door before coming back for more. Why? Because this is not about a response to the coronavirus; it is about implementing an agenda. Many of the items in this bill were already part of the liberal agenda before we could even say ``coronavirus.'' What does the federalizing of elections have to do with COVID-19? What does the SALT deduction that has been a source of contention with the other side have to do with COVID-19? How about forgiving $10,000 of student loan debt? How did that get in the conversation with our response to coronavirus? The Postal Service bailout, multiemployer pensions--are you kidding me? Mr. Speaker, the people deserve better.…”