On the recordMay 15, 2020
I thank the gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. Cole) for yielding. These are strange times. I saw my friend Alcee Hastings on the floor. I wanted to sit down beside him and whisper in his ear like we would have done when we gathered last year. I wanted to grab his hand and tell him I have been praying for him. Now, he is gone, back off the House floor and back into social distancing. No one denies that these are unusual times, even dire times, that require a substantial response. In many ways, what we are doing here today isn't unusual. We have a majority in the U.S. House of Representatives that will, in fact, jam through, on an almost party- line vote, its agenda. That is not unusual. We have a majority in the House that is going to implement its ideas for rules changes in the House, even without a minority amendment. That is not altogether unusual. But I have listened to colleague after colleague come to the House floor and talk about the unusual times that, I would argue, require an unusual response. I feel a little empty today in what I usually enjoy as a Rules Committee debate. I know how the Rules Committee goes, Madam Speaker. There are nine members of the majority and four members of the minority. The majority wins every vote, and not by a little, by a lot. Your job, as a minority member on the Rules Committee, is to lose. You go up there, and you lose every day.…
