Mike Pence: “I come today to this Chamber having had an extraordinary morning in east central Indiana. At my side was the conference…”

“I come today to this Chamber having had an extraordinary morning in east central Indiana. At my side was the conference chairman for the Republican majority of the Congress, J.C. Watts, who is, among other accolades including Orange Bowl hall of famer, a football player and one of the best known members of this institution nationally. He is a man, as I learned today, deeply committed to the least of these and to coming alongside those in community, not sadly, Mr. Speaker, often associated with the Republican Party in this day and age, but a community that is nonetheless deeply in need of attention and, specifically, legislative attention by this Congress. Today J.C. Watts and I traveled to the west side of Anderson into, Mr. Speaker, a ramshackle house, dilapidated, the floors creaking beneath us, an old refrigerator humming in the back room full of Cokes and snacks. We stood before some 30 people, teenagers, largely minority young men and women, all of them from disadvantaged families, each of them from one degree or another in trouble with the law, in trouble at school.”