Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, I rise to strongly oppose this piece of legislation, the conference report. This is a bad bill. It is a bad bill for several reasons. First, we have to understand this is not foreign aid. This is a budget for the State Department, USAID, our own agencies. Under the Constitution, the President is empowered to conduct the U.S. foreign policy. This bill hamstrings the President in the exercise of that responsibility. First, it abolishes an agency indiscriminately. They do not tell us which agency. They do not say why. They do not indict the agency for malfeasance or any other problems. They just say abolish an agency. It is not real reform. It is reform purely for the sake of saying we had reform. It does not make any sense. We cannot manage a foreign policy by these kinds of arbitrary changes, moving boxes around without any meaningful purpose. Second, is deep and unreasonable cuts. This budget, this program, will hamstring the President in terms of his ability to retain qualified people. This budget and the cuts they propose will result in RIF's, layoffs, and the loss of highly talented people. We cannot run a foreign policy without qualified people. We have international responsibilities as a world leader.”