Political Quotes

“I share very much the sentiments of my colleague from Louisiana, Mr. Vitter, but I would urge us to not support the amendment because the Senate has already ruled on this question. When we debated whether to take up this bill, we voted on a cloture motion in order to bring up an appropriations bill. Normally, we would want to pass a budget resolution before bringing up an appropriations bill, and it has been, I think, over 800 days since the leadership of this institution has even written and presented a budget. But I would put forward that this bill is rather unique because it conforms to the House Paul Ryan budget that passed the House on April 15. The legislation before us has come before the Senate because Chairman Johnson and I have agreed to put forward a VA-MILCON bill that is $1.255 billion in discretionary budget authority below the President's request. We are coming in $620 million below the 2011 enacted level. We all remember that the House of Representatives has already adopted the MILCON-VA appropriations bill under Chairman Culberson, and the Senate bill actually spends in budget authority on the discretionary side $2.5 million less than the House bill. Because we did that, 71 to 26 was the vote on cloture to bring up this bill, including the support of the Republican leader, Mr. McConnell, and our vice chairman on the Republican side of the Appropriations Committee, Mr. Cochran.…”