Political Quotes

“reserving the right to object, I certainly have a great deal of respect for my friends from Missouri and Oklahoma and their desire to increase transparency in government. I share that goal. But, respectfully, the legislation they are proposing, I believe, would undermine and potentially threaten important programs administered by the Federal Government. The idea of requiring the government to publish an inventory of Federal programs is not something I object to. As my friend from Missouri has stated, it is already required under the law, but it is such a cumbersome thing to do that for 7 years they have not published an inventory, not because it is lacking the provisions in the bill proposed by my colleagues but because it is virtually impossible to do in the way that you would do it in other far more different and simple things--in a factory that makes widgets. This bill would go further and make it even more difficult to publish the inventory they already haven't been able to publish. Neither the Director of OMB under President Obama nor the Director under President Trump has complied with the existing law. I further have serious objections with the reporting requirements. How can an agency, for instance--and this would happen on a thousand occasions under this law--quantify the number of individuals who benefit from the Community Development Block Grant Program? If one neighborhood is revitalized, maybe it benefits the neighboring neighborhoods.…”