On the recordApril 6, 2022
I thank the gentlewoman for yielding. I completely agree that we should be trying to help small businesses who have gotten absolutely railroaded and run over by the power of government, which amounts to, essentially, a taking. They have had their livelihoods taken away through the sheer power of government, Federal, State and local. It is absolutely extraordinary. It is one of the reasons that I worked with my friend, Dean Phillips, on the other side of the aisle, on the PPP Flexibility Act 2 years ago. I would have preferred we not go down this road; that the government not go down and shut down our economy. But the government did. And I think that amounts to something akin to a taking. But now, here we sit and, yet again, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle have not met an issue that they can't make worse; and that is what we are faced with right now. Mr. Speaker, my colleagues are bringing forward a $55 billion bill which they say is paid for, which is paid for and relies on recaptured, fraudulent relief funds. We have fraudulent relief funds because you just dumped $2 trillion out in the economy when you came in here and did it by voice vote 2 years ago. So you have got these fraudulent funds that we may or may not recapture that is, allegedly, what is paying for this. This bill should be fully paid for out of existing COVID money that has not yet been spent. And that is what we are offering as an alternative.…
