Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, I am so pleased to be here in the House. I am not pleased that we are considering a continuing resolution. To that extent, I presume that I share the opinion of the chairman of the committee, Mr. Frelinghuysen. I presume, as she has just articulated, that I share the opinion of the ranking member from New York. Mr. Speaker, we are now 7 months into fiscal year 2017. We have 5 months remaining, and the majority party has been unable to fund government for the balance of the fiscal year. They have over 218 votes in this body, and they have over 50 votes in the Senate. Now, you need 60 votes in the Senate, so it is more complicated. I understand that. But they now have a Republican President. As we did for the 2016 budget, which we passed in December of 2015 to the balance for September 30, 2016--I know all those dates run together--it was my desire and my advice, Mr. Speaker, that we do the same thing last December: pass an omnibus, take all the bills that the Committee on Appropriations has spent literally hundreds of hours hearing and making decisions on, make the compromises necessary in a democratic body so that 218 votes would be available. Now, the American public, if they have been watching closely, will see that not a single major appropriation bill has passed this House without Democratic help, so that everybody in this body knows that whatever is done in a major fiscal bill has to be done in a bipartisan way. The good news for this House is Mr.…”