Roy Blunt: “Mr. Chairman, the Vice President is a talented man. He is a former Member of this body, a former whip of this body. I…”

“Mr. Chairman, the Vice President is a talented man. He is a former Member of this body, a former whip of this body. I would like to think that any former whip of the body or current whip could confuse people as much as the Vice President appears to be able to do. Certainly my good friend from Illinois is a smart man. He knows what branch of government the Vice President is a part of. There are only three, after all. We know he is not part of the judiciary. We know he is not part of the legislative. So he must be part of the branch that is funded in the bill. This amendment may be lots of things, but it is not a serious amendment about really defunding the Vice President's office. It is an amendment about something other than that, and we know it. It has nothing really to do with moving this issue forward. This amendment is an amendment in search of a press release. In fact, let me take that back. This amendment is an amendment that is following a press release. We have already had the press release. We have already had the comments to the press about how we take advantage of a moment about who has access to what records. We all know that defunding the Vice President's office is not the way to do that.”