Political Quotes

“Madam President, there is, I believe, overwhelming bipartisan support for repeal of the recent changes to the 1099 reporting requirement. Small businesses in my State and across the country have told us that the new reporting requirements they face under the Affordable Care Act will create an unnecessary burden that can make already tough times even tougher. I believe there may even be a consensus among our colleagues that we should act, but I strongly oppose one of the methods proposed to address this problem. That method would undermine Congress's role in the constitutional scheme of separation of powers among the branches of government and it would abdicate Congress's responsibility to decide on the spending of taxpayer dollars. We can and we should remove the 1099 burden on small businesses. We can and we should do so without abandoning our role in determining Federal spending. The power of the purse should not be handed to the President, any President. The challenge we face is that repealing the section 1099 provision carries a cost of about $22 billion over 10 years. The mechanism that some support to meet that cost would empower the Director of the Office of Management and Budget to decide by himself which funds we have appropriated but that have not yet been obligated--which of those unobligated funds should be cut to pay the cost of repeal. To some this may be a convenient way to relieve Congress of its responsibility to make difficult choices.…”