Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. The second bill we are considering today from the Modernization Subcommittee is H.R. 7593, the Modernizing the Congressional Research Service's Access to Data Act, which aims to address issues regarding CRS' access to Federal data. As with the first bill, CRS itself has asked for this change, and it is a change that will again help the agency keep up with the times. When CRS' statute was developed in the 1970s, it stated that Federal agencies need to comply with data requests from Congress to serve congressional committees, and it mentions that CRS is responsible for otherwise assisting offices with informational requests, too. This stems from the committee-centric nature of Congress at the time. However, given the lack of explicit reference to personal offices, CRS indicated to the Modernization Subcommittee that they, at times, have struggled to access necessary information from Federal agencies to execute their mission of serving committees and individual personal offices alike. CRS should be able to update reports on nationally significant issues proactively and simultaneously respond to specific Member office requests. Additionally, their access should be on par with that provided to other legislative branch support agencies, like the Congressional Budget Office, for example.…”