On the recordJanuary 30, 2019
I thank the chairman for yielding. I do agree that the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Meadows) has tried mightily to work with us on various issues. He is not a bad man, he is just wrong on this one issue, in my opinion. First of all, I rise in support of this very, very modest cost-of- living increase for Federal workers. My wife has a habit of reminding me from time to time. She says: When we first met, you were an ironworker. Then you went to law school and became a lawyer. Then you ran for office and became a politician. You know, it has been one disappointment after another. But I want to say, as an ironworker I was in a much better position than our Federal workers. When I was an ironworker--and I eventually became president of the union--if my job was unsafe or if the employer refused to pay my workers, as a union president, I would pull my men and women off the job. Under Taft-Hartley 1947, we changed that law for Federal workers, everybody in the Federal Government. We said, ironically, that these jobs are so important that we can't have the government shut down. We can't have the government shut down. So even though we have a President now in the White House who not only shut the job down, forced the workers to work without pay, and then--that was on the 22nd of December--on the 28th of December he signs an executive order that says no pay increase for all of 2019 for our Federal workers.…
