Political Quotes

“I thank the gentleman for his question. I want to put it in context. For the first time in history, we started this Congress with a government shutdown. For the first time in history. The business was not completed, the government was not fully funded, and it was necessary for us, as we began this session, to have numerous votes to open up the government. We didn't get a lot of help from your side of the aisle on doing that, and it was not about a debate; we had considered six bills that essentially had been agreed to. There was clearly a disagreement on Homeland Security. But let me remind you, on H.R. 1, the largest bill that we considered during the last Congress, you brought that to the floor and you had no committee hearings. Not a single committee hearing. You had no witnesses. No member of the public was able to testify. It was a closed rule, and zero amendments were made in order. Now, let me make a comparison for you on H.R. 1, the bill we just passed. This bill had five hearings across several committees, 19 witnesses testified, the primary committee of jurisdiction had markup, and 72 amendments were made in order. Now, H.R. 1, last Congress, zero Democratic amendments made in order. Now of course there were no Republican amendments made in order either because it was a closed rule, no amendments at all, no hearings, no committee hearings, no witnesses.…”