Providing for Consideration of H.J. Res. Further Additional Continuing Appropriations Act, and Providing for Consideration of Motions to Suspend the Rules
Floor Speech
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Mr. GOLDEN. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding me the time.
Madam Speaker, this shutdown has been brutal on working people across the country. Many of them are my constituents, and I came down here to let their voices be heard.
Back home, a Border Patrol agent from my district said about all of us here in the House, in the White House, in the Senate: ``I blame all of you for the financial and emotional damage you are causing to the very people tasked with protecting your Nation and your homeland, but ultimately, this falls on the White House.''
Suzette from my district, her husband is an essential Federal employee working without pay. She asked me, ``to bring sensibility to this senseless power struggle that is currently going on. The Democrats,'' she says--and she is a Democrat, by the way--``need to back down from their `must punish Trump and deny him everything' stance and the Republicans need to get some control over the ill-equipped man who is running our country.''
Another Federal employee from Milford, Maine, tells me: ``I am very concerned with the furlough, lack of negotiations, and lack of pay. I do not know who is right or wrong. I just want to get back to work, complete my job, and receive my pay.''
We owe these people a solution that gets them back to work and gets them paid. I can only imagine that, back home, people are amazed to hear the ways in which both sides are right now talking past each other. I think it is wonderful that we expressed, on both sides of the aisle this morning, a desire to reopen the government and to secure our borders.
I would like to point out that the CR that will be voted on today does have border security funding: over $1 billion in new funding for new border security. I know that the Republicans say that they want to reopen government and secure our borders, I also know that my party has said the same, so let's do it.
Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support the rule, support the CR today, let's reopen government, let's put people back to work, let them work. They are public servants. They want to serve the people. Let's start securing our border. And with those extra billion dollars we can also move on to a more robust debate about border security that I look forward to.
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