On the recordJune 10, 2015
The gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. Cole), my good friend and a member of our subcommittee, puts me in a very difficult position. I complained in my opening remarks that some of our colleagues in the Congress, as I said earlier in the day, delight every time a civilian employee is furloughed. So I certainly appreciate the gist of the gentleman's amendment. We have a much larger problem that we and the administration need to address, and I know he feels the same way. My concern with the particular amendment is we have other departments as well, whether it be the Department of Labor, Internal Revenue Service, EPA, Housing and Urban Development, and the list goes on, and ought not to select one agency over the other. I don't think it is the proper way to go. We ought to collectively understand that the government actually does many good things to help the people of this country. We ought to value the work of each of our Federal employees, and we ought to block the furlough of any of them in any agency, not a particular one. So I certainly do not disagree with the intent of the gentleman. I realize we are talking about the Department of Defense, but do believe that we ought to be looking at the broader question. I yield back the balance of my time.
