"This is simply a case where Congress said we were pretty late getting our omnibus done."
"The budget makes hard choices, and they are hard, but they are responsible choices that have to be made."
"I listened very carefully to the response you gave Representative Clark and appreciate it."
"But, again it is Congress that puts the budget together. We have the Article I responsibility for funding the Federal government, and the President's budget is a recommendation only."
"I don't favor cutting NIH or Centers for Disease Control. You're much more likely to die in a pandemic than a terrorist attack, and so that's part of the defense of the country as well."
"If we don't get to a good number in the nondefense area, we will inevitably end up doing something that nobody on either side of the aisle wants to do."
"We are either going to have a continuing resolution or we are going to have a negotiated bipartisan agreement."
"Until we actually get the numbers where we can appropriate, things don't happen."
"Some of us up here have been concerned for a long time about the lack of a new Authorization for Use of Force."
"I think it is a constitutional issue as well. And I think it means a lot when people of your stature tell us that it matters to the men and women that we have put in harm's way to do difficult things ..."
"Having visited 2 of the 3 facilities actually before they were closed down on trips for the Interior Committee, you know, just finding places for professionals to live."