Political Quotes

“Madam President, I want to thank Chairman Alexander as well as Vice Chair Leahy, Chairman Shelby, Chairman Boozman, and many other people who have made this minibus work. We are going to adopt it tonight. I hope that our work over the last week has set the tone for the Senate's consideration of the remaining appropriations bills. We have opened debate and considered a number of amendments, and we have avoided controversial issues that have too often torpedoed our work in prior years. Between rollcall votes and the managers' package, we have adopted 40 amendments, including 14 to the MILCON-VA appropriations bill. This speaks volumes to the bipartisan cooperation that I expect will continue as we try to get back to some semblance of the regular order as it relates to the appropriations process. I especially want to thank my colleague from Arkansas, Chairman Boozman, for managing a fair amendment process and for working to keep the bill bipartisan. I want to thank subcommittee staff Patrick Magnuson, Jennifer Bastin, and Joanne Hoff. And from my subcommittee staff, I thank Chad Schulken and Jason McMahon. They worked late nights reviewing hundreds of amendments. I also want to thank our counterparts on the Energy and Water and Legislative Branch Subcommittees, and their staffs, for their great work over the past few months to put together bills that I believe will pass overwhelmingly today.…”