David Jolly: “I appreciate the opportunity to address the House and to address the country this afternoon and to do so with colleagues…”

“I appreciate the opportunity to address the House and to address the country this afternoon and to do so with colleagues of mine from Alabama (Mr. Byrne) and from Illinois (Mr. Davis) to draw a contrast between the view of government represented by our side of the aisle and of that which we heard last night from our President, a President who seemingly ignored the will of the people as expressed by the ballot box in November and who, instead, doubled down on an agenda that we believe on our side of the aisle is the wrong view of government and the wrong direction for our Nation. So I rise with my colleagues today to talk about just a few of the very substantive points and to do so very constructively and to present why we have a different view of government and why we think that is important. I would start by suggesting this. If we think about what the President said last night, in his words, the President declared from the rostrum that no challenge poses a greater threat to future generations than climate change. Now, I understand the sympathetic position on climate change. I am from a coastal State, and, frankly, I am a member of the Republican Party who believes that, indeed, the climate is changing, but I do not believe that the greatest challenge facing our future generations is that of climate change. In fact, you can harken back to the words of Thomas Jefferson. He had a very different opinion than our President had last night.…”