Jack Kingston: “First of all, I want to thank my good friend from Tennessee for offering this amendment and her tireless work to try to…”

“First of all, I want to thank my good friend from Tennessee for offering this amendment and her tireless work to try to reduce spending in our country, and I absolutely agree with all the statements that she has made. I do want to point out, though, that the only budget that has passed either body is the Ryan budget. I supported, as I know she did, the RSC budget, which is actually more conservative, but it did not pass. At least we did get a budget passed on the House floor. The Senate was unable to do that. Even though the Democrats are the majority party over there, the Senate rejected the President's budget 97-0, and apparently now they've given up and they're not going to try to pass a budget. The only bill that we have an opportunity to move is under the Ryan budget, which is what this bill reflects. It is a 13.4--actually it's higher than that because we cut it last night a little bit more, or we did some across- the-boards, but it's about a 13.4 percent cut already. {time} 1020 Where the big money is--and I know my friend from Tennessee is as frustrated about this as I am--is in the mandatory spending. In fact, I have a chart over there. We don't have any pages or I'd bring it up here on the floor; but 86 percent of this budget is mandatory spending, and I use the word ``mandatory'' loosely because it's really on automatic spending. That's where the big money is. Unfortunately, we can't get to it.…”