Jeff Miller: “I am opposed to the agriculture appropriations bill. This is a difficult issue for me as a member of the Committee on…”

“I am opposed to the agriculture appropriations bill. This is a difficult issue for me as a member of the Committee on Appropriations to stand before this body and advocate opposition to an appropriation bill. Unfortunately, I have such great respect for our chairman of the Subcommittee on Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies the gentleman from New Mexico (Mr. Skeen) and the chairman of the full committee is my colleague from Florida who is just across the Skyway Bridge from me. But unfortunately this conference report when we sent it over to the Senate, it was a total of $60.7 billion. It has now grown to over $69 billion. There have not been any hearings on this. $8 billion. We are trying to live with a budget that was agreed to back in 1997 with the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Kasich) to live within some constraints. What are we doing but spending $8 billion more without the hearings? They are saying it is the disaster. I am not opposed to supporting disasters in agriculture, if we have floods, if we have drought. I think we have a responsibility to step forward. But that is not most of this money. Most of this $8 billion in more spending is going to help destroy what Freedom to Farm created, which was the marketplace. That is what is unfortunate about this bill.”