Bob Inglis: “I rise in opposition to the conference report on both the criminal grounds and the civil grounds. On the criminal…”

“I rise in opposition to the conference report on both the criminal grounds and the civil grounds. On the criminal grounds, I find it very interesting that I was just today with the National Conference of State Legislators talking about unfunded Federal mandates and their fear of the federalization of everything in this country, and in particular the federalization of law enforcement. Mr. Speaker, I ask any supporter of this bill, why on earth would we turn this into a Federal crime? Why on earth would we have Federal folks come out and haul people off from clinics and then prosecute them? What logic would compel anyone to think that that makes any sense whatsoever? Surely there are State laws to handle this. Surely there are State law enforcement agencies to haul them off, and surely there are State courts to enforce the law. But, no, we want to grow this Federal Government. We do not have enough; $4.2 trillion in debt, let us add a little more. Let us build a few more courthouses, hire a bunch of DA's, hire a bunch of new judges so we can haul these protesters into Federal courts when they could be going into State courts. But, no, the sheriffs in the Congress, and we seem to have a lot of them, folks who forgot they were not elected to be sheriff of their town, they were elected to be Congressmen and women to serve here in Washington, not to do local law enforcement.”