Political Quotes

“I rise today to lament a real missed opportunity here. I listened carefully to the Speaker's remarks and agreed with almost everything she said about this bill. This bill, on a bipartisan basis, recognizes that need, makes investments that are necessary in research, and on a bipartisan, in fact, on a unanimous basis came out of committee that way. But a funny thing happened on the way to House floor, which was that at the last minute, and not from any committee process that has jurisdiction over tax law, $10 billion in tax increases were added. So we are asked to take a bipartisan product that represents an important step forward in many ways for American agriculture and pay $10 billion in ransom. The tragedy of that long-term for American agriculture is that it is pitting 1.5 percent of the population that affords our Nation the safest, cheapest, most abundant food in the world, it is pitting those jobs against American manufacturing jobs. This is an unprecedented move to use a farm bill as a vehicle to increase taxes.”