Political Quotes

“Mr. President, I am very pleased to join Senator Inhofe, the ranking Republican on our committee, in bringing to the floor the agreement between the Armed Services Committees of the Senate and the House on the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2014. The House passed this bill last week with a vote of 350 to 69, and if we pass it in the Senate, which I am optimistic now that we will, it will mark the 53rd year in a row we have enacted this bill that is so essential to the defense of our Nation and to our men and women in uniform and their families. I wish to thank all of the members of the Armed Services Committee and our staffs. I especially want to thank our subcommittee chairs and ranking members for the hard work they have done to get us to the finish line on this bill. Of course, I thank Senator Inhofe for the close partnership we have had in leading this committee. We have both had the benefit of a strong relationship with the chairman and ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee, Buck McKeon and Adam Smith, in our endeavor. I share the disappointment of Senators with our inability to vote on more amendments when our committee bill was brought to the Senate floor a few weeks ago. Senator Inhofe and I spent a week on the Senate floor before Thanksgiving trying to bring up more amendments and to have them debated and voted on. We tried to reach agreement to limit consideration to defense-related amendments, but we were unable to do that.…”