The American People Deserve Responsible Governing

Floor Speech

Mr. QUIGLEY. Mr. Speaker, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has described the Republican House and Senate as a ``responsible right-of-center governing majority.'' But how responsible is it that we are about to start a new fiscal year with no plan for how to fund our government? We are hours away from a shutdown, and Congress has yet to even begin budget negotiations.

Instead of doing the job the American people sent us here to do, we are celebrating that maybe we have found a way to keep the government open for 2 months--2 months. That is what we consider a bipartisan victory these days. Now, we may prevent a shutdown today, but let's be clear. Doing the bare minimum to keep the government from closing is not responsible. It is hardly governing at all.

The American people sent us here to take on the big issues and to get things done. They want us to fight for infrastructure, for education, for jobs, not just to keep the lights on. We are letting partisan games get in the way of governing, and it is not only hurting our government, it is hurting our constituents.

Unreliable, unpredictable short-term funding prevents the government from operating effectively and efficiently, and it costs taxpayers money. We are short-term funding, and we are ignoring changes in our policy priorities and restricting agencies from shifting dollars around to meet emerging challenges.

Defense officials recently warned that forcing the Pentagon to operate on a short-term CR would hurt our national security by restricting our ability to respond to new threats. Moreover, a CR severely limits the government's ability to plan ahead or start new projects. That is because there is no guarantee the money will be there in 2 months.

How do agencies manage this uncertainty? By freezing hiring and training, shortening terms for grants and contracts, forgoing maintenance, and delaying scheduled pay raises. In addition, agencies have to waste countless resources preparing for contingency plans for shutdowns that may or may not happen.

Republicans like to talk about running government more like a business. Is this how they would run a business? What successful business budgets 2 months at a time?

What we need and what Democrats have been demanding is for Republicans to sit down with us and craft a long-term, bipartisan budget so we can finally get rid of the harmful, across-the-board spending cuts of sequestration so we can reprioritize and restore funding in areas like education, R&D, infrastructure, and national security in a fiscally responsible way so we can plan for the future.

The best way to do that is to return to regular order. That means offering pro-growth budget resolutions that address our long-term fiscal challenges in a responsible way. No partisan austerity plans that keep the indiscriminate and harmful sequestration in place. It also means bringing appropriation bills to the floor free of ideological policy riders. There is a time and place to debate controversial issues. That is why we have authorizing committees.

I am confident that, as long as we can put partisan politics aside and ignore obstructionist demands, we can get back to passing budgets under regular order, not a partisan budget that fails to address the sequester, not a CR that operates to keep agencies from planning more than 2 months out, and definitely not the threat of another shutdown.

My hope is with the new Republican leadership will come a renewed effort to bring back long-term budgeting under regular order. That is the kind of responsible government the American people expect of us. That is the kind of responsible governing that the American people deserve.

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