Cord Byrd: “Mr. President, today marks the 136th day of the fiscal year. The fiscal year is over one-third complete. We will be…”

“Mr. President, today marks the 136th day of the fiscal year. The fiscal year is over one-third complete. We will be debating House Joint Resolution 20, a joint funding resolution for the nine remaining appropriations bills that were not completed during the 109th Congress. The Republican leadership during the 109th Congress left us with a great deal of unfinished appropriations business. Only 2 of the 11 appropriations bills were enacted into law; 13 of the 15 Federal Departments are struggling to cope with a very restrictive continuing resolution which expires at midnight this coming Thursday. As I noted last week, this was not the fault of the Appropriations Committee. Under the able leadership of Chairman Thad Cochran, all of the fiscal year 2007 appropriations bills were reported from the committee by July 20. All--a-l-l--all of the bills were bipartisan bills approved by unanimous votes. Unfortunately, the Republican leadership of the 109th Congress chose not to bring domestic appropriations bills to the floor before the election and then chose not to finish those bills after the election.”