Providing For Congressional Disapproval of a Rule Submitted By the Corps of Engineers and the Environmental Protection Agency

Floor Speech

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Mr. President, first let me thank my colleague from Michigan for her outstanding remarks. I too want to talk about the budget. We have agreed to a bipartisan budget framework, and that has been very good. We have avoided a shutdown, and we have avoided defaulting on our debt. I am glad the brinkmanship that some on the other side of the aisle wanted to play did not prevail. That is a very good thing.

Now we have to move forward. I want to join my colleagues to ask our friends on the other side of the aisle to engage in a fair process on the omnibus that must follow. The budget, after all, is only a blueprint. Now it is up to Democrats and Republicans to fill in all the details and honor the agreements that both sides worked to pass together. Already we have some on the other side of the aisle threatening to insert policy riders that should have no business in an appropriations process, particularly a delicate one like this.

So first things first--let us be crystal clear. If folks on the other side of the aisle insist on inserting poison pill riders into the omnibus bill and the Republican leadership on either the House or Senate side goes along, they will be dragging us into another government shutdown. We are happy to debate any of these so-called poison pill riders but not to use the whole budget process as a hostage.

The only reason that our colleagues who want these riders want to use the budget process and hold, in fact, the whole rest of the American people hostage is because they know they can't win on their own. They can only do it by hostage-taking, by saying we won't fund the government or this part of the government unless we get our way on these nonrelated riders. Well, we Democrats, on both sides of the Capitol, at both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue, are totally united on preventing poison pill riders in riding along on an omnibus.

Yesterday, I was disappointed to hear Speaker Ryan, who I think is a fair man--and I have worked with him on a number of issues--say that he expects to use the power of the purse to push riders. Again, the power of the purse does not give anyone the right to jam through ideological riders that can't stand on their own merits. The power of the purse doesn't give anyone the right to hold government hostage until we repeal parts of Dodd-Frank or defund Planned Parenthood. That doesn't make any sense.

The power of the purse means, and has always meant in this grand Republic in our history, that Democrats and Republicans, House and Senate, work together to produce a fair budget that strengthens our national and economic security, free of poison pill riders.

Second, with respect to the timetable for these bills, I want to echo my friend Senator Stabenow in saying we have to see the whole funding picture up front before we move to any comprehensive funding legislation.

I understand our colleagues on the other side of the aisle want to do Defense first--sure. Then what about the rest of the budget? In 2010, we did Defense and then did a CR for the rest of the budget. And then it leaves the fight on riders undone.

Now, they say they need a vehicle. It is true. There are lots of vehicles. You don't need the Defense bill for a vehicle, No. 1, and, No. 2, you don't have to do that vehicle now. What should be happening now is the House and Senate, Democrats and Republicans, should be negotiating the whole picture, the whole omnibus. When they come to an agreement, we can then move them on the floor of the House and the Senate.

So we all agree the Nation breathed a sigh of relief when we agreed to a balanced framework that would see us lift the sequester caps for domestic as well as defense spending. We can't be goaded into passing an increase in defense spending without seeing the rest of the omnibus to make sure both sides are part of it, because 50-50 was always part of the deal. Let us see the 50-50, and let us see the details.

What we also believe has to be part of the deal is no poison pill riders, whether they be Democratic or Republican. Those should be for another day and not risk a government shutdown, which is still a very real possibility if some of the ideologues have their way and say it is my way or no way.

So for this budget agreement to work, we need to see each piece of the appropriations puzzle before we move forward on defense spending. That is not too much to ask. Democrats want a simple, fair process to fill in the blueprint we agreed on in the budget--no poison pill, no sleight of hand.

I yield the floor.

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