Brian Bilbray: “as one of the freshmen who was proud to be sworn in this year, I do have to ask the gentlewoman from California to…”

“as one of the freshmen who was proud to be sworn in this year, I do have to ask the gentlewoman from California to recognize that the experience that this Member brings to this House is 20 years of representing the public directly. In 1976, when Jimmy Carter was elected, I was elected to represent the people of the city of Imperial Beach. I was elected to be mayor. I was elected to be a county supervisor of 2.6 million people. I have some experience. But most importantly in this is every one of those 20 years, Mr. Speaker, I, as an elected official, and the body I served on did something that California, the State of the gentlewoman from California, demanded; we passed a balanced budget for our government agency every one of those 20 years. And so when a Member stands up here and says somehow because we have not been on this House floor for more than 12 months we are inexperienced, the experience that this Member brings is 20 years of balanced budgets. I wish this House had 20 years of experience balancing the budget.”