Joe Barton: “we are here once again on an issue that should have been solved, like, March of this year. An emergency meeting of the…”

“we are here once again on an issue that should have been solved, like, March of this year. An emergency meeting of the Rules Committee was noticed at 7:30 last evening to be commenced at 8:30. That meeting lasted until midnight. Dr. Michael Burgess, a member of the Energy and Commerce Committee, attended with me to represent the Energy and Commerce Committee in the negotiations before the Rules Committee. He offered an amendment to this bill and was told it was not in order because he didn't get it in time. Didn't get it in time. An emergency meeting that is noticed at 7:30, that starts at 8:30, that lasts till midnight, Dr. Burgess shows up with his amendment and is told, I am sorry, we can't have your amendment in order because it wasn't in time. We didn't even know there was going to be a meeting until 7:30. Once again, we have a closed rule, which means there are no amendments made in order. Once again, we have a bill that was not seen, at least by those of us on the minority side, until approximately 7 to 7:15 last evening. Once again, we have a bill where there have been really no bipartisan negotiations. There have been some consultations with certain members of the minority party, I have to admit that. I don't know what the distance is from here to there, but I am going to guess it's about 12 feet. Let's see. It's 18 feet. Now, if I really wanted to negotiate, and I was in the majority, I would say, let's get together and talk.…”