Political Quotes

“Mr. President, I rise to highlight the importance of voting yes to proceed to the Department of Homeland Security appropriations bill for 2015, H.R. 240. This bill, which has passed the House, is necessary to protect our borders, fight terrorism, and defend communities under threat from natural disasters. The list of national security-related programs this bill provides resources for is long, but before I speak to those programs in greater detail, I will reinforce the importance of proceeding to this DHS appropriations bill. DHS's funding expires on February 27. To my colleagues on the other side of the aisle who do not want to proceed to this bill, I would just point out, we need to take up this DHS appropriations funding bill and debate it--to let the Senate do its work. We just passed a Keystone bill after the consideration of more than 40 amendments. At the end of the day, we were able to produce a bill that garnered 62 votes. I urge my colleagues to let the Senate do its business. Vote yes on cloture on the motion to proceed. Now I would like to walk through some of the things this bill funds. I want to remind my colleagues how critical these DHS operations are to the economic prosperity, public safety, and security of the American people. The bill provides $39.67 billion in net discretionary appropriations plus $6.4 billion in disaster funding. Let's take a look at some of the critical security functions this bill provides.…”