Political Quotes

“Mr. Chairman, I want to, first of all, before I enter into a colloquy with the distinguished chairman, thank the chairman of the subcommittee. Even before it was created, the leaders on this subcommittee were instrumental in helping our first responders. There has been a lot of rhetoric about this Congress not doing enough for the first responders. Let me say to my colleagues in this body that before 9-11 occurred there was no program to assist our first responders nationwide, nothing. And Congress has, over the past years, had plenty of opportunities, but never saw fit. And disasters were not new. We had them all during the history of this country. It was this Congress in 2000, with the leadership of the distinguished chairman of the full committee and the distinguished chairman of this subcommittee, who saw fit to create a grant program for our 32,000 fire and EMS departments in America. That was created in 2000, the year before 9-11. Initially, it was funded at $100 million. It went to $300 million, and this year, because of the leadership of the distinguished chairman from Kentucky and the support of the ranking member, the support for our firefighter grant program is at $715 million. Many of our colleagues have said it is the most popular and most successful program that Congress has created. We are doing good work on behalf of the Nation's first responders.”