Political Quotes

“I thank my colleague from North Dakota for her continued leadership on this issue and for pointing out to our colleagues that we really could be just a short step away from reauthorizing a very important business tool for small businesses, manufacturers, and the agriculture industry by making sure that we reauthorize the Export-Import Bank. What my colleague is referring to is that it would take just a short agreement here this morning to go ahead and take the House-passed bill that, as she explained, was passed after colleagues got a discharge petition, but it is the same as the language that we have had over here in the Senate. The process to move forward on this reauthorization would be very simple. I am sure Senator Heitkamp pointed out before I got to the floor that a filibuster-proof majority of our colleagues approve of this legislation. I think 67 of our colleagues approve of this, and now we have this tremendous support--313 votes--from the House of Representatives. As Senator Heitkamp said, we are just a short step away. Why are we so emphatic about that? Why wait? When we look at what has just come out, the financial numbers show a 1.5 percent job growth. I think it is something like that. It shows very anemic numbers for our economy.…”