Political Quotes

“I have great affection and respect for my friend, the ranking member and formerly the chairman of the full Rules Committee. I will start where I began this debate. Remember, my friends, Democrats didn't finish the appropriations process on their side until December of last year, and Democrats controlled all three parts of government. They had the Senate, the House, and the Presidency, and they didn't get done until December. The year before that, they didn't get done until March of the year after. I wish the process went easier and smoother as well, but I don't think it goes much differently, regardless of who happens to be in control. I do think that we are trying to make some progress here. Now, my friends are worried about what is cut. They ought to be worried about what was spent. We are running a $1.7 trillion deficit. That deficit is bigger than the entire discretionary budget of the United States of America. It is not just bigger than the defense budget; it is bigger than everything. It got a lot worse when my friends controlled the executive branch and both houses of Congress. You did over $3 trillion worth of spending outside the normal appropriations process; $1.9 trillion for an unneeded American Rescue Plan when we were coming out of COVID, roughly $700 billion from the much-misnamed Inflation Reduction Act, which even the President now says was misnamed because it really had to do more with climate change.…”