Political Quotes

“Mr. President and colleagues, in my professional life I always considered myself to be a numbers guy. As I have sat back and listened to the debate over these past 17 days since the Justice for Victims of Human Trafficking Act was reported out of the Judiciary Committee, I decided I would maybe try a different take on the numbers we should be concerned about. As I said, it has been 17 days since the bill we are considering came out of the Judiciary Committee--56 days since the bill was first introduced on January 13th. Now, some of my colleagues on the other side have said that somehow between when the bill was introduced on January 13th and when it was reported out of Committee on March 10th, there was a provision placed in the bill that they were not made aware of. This is simply not the case. My colleagues had days to review this bill, but unfortunately, some of them are in the habit of passing something and then finding out later what they were actually voting for. It has been 39 years since the Hyde language we are currently discussing was first passed into law. It was so long ago I was even young--16 years old. The Hyde language was first enacted in 1976, and since then, has become known, well-settled law. Obviously, this is not some sort of new concept. It is language that everybody who is in this body--and every staffer who has served somebody in this body--should know about.…”