Political Quotes

“Mr. President, we are going to be moving to the highway bill. In fact, we are going to have the motion to proceed today at 2:15 p.m., and I think it is important that people realize the significance of this. We do a lot of work around here that is not really critical. There are some issues that are. If you would like to read the Constitution sometime when you have nothing else to do, it will tell you that what we are supposed to be doing are two things: defending America and roads and bridges. That is what it says in Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution. So anytime you are sitting around with nothing to do, you ought to read it, and you will realize that what we are going to do at 2:15 today is very significant. Passing a long-term transportation reauthorization bill has been my top priority since I resumed the office of the chairmanship of the Environment and Public Works Committee. It is probably the second most important thing we do, second only to the Defense authorization bill. In the first hearing we had in January, we had Secretary Foxx, the Secretary of Transportation, who is an outstanding Secretary. He is just as concerned about this as we are. Senator Boxer and I brought in Secretary Foxx as well as local government leaders to share the importance of ongoing Federal and State partnerships in maintaining the modern surface infrastructure system. Since that time, my committee has put forward a bipartisan bill called the DRIVE Act.…”