The Awful Democratic Record on Amendment Consideration

Press Release

Toward the end of last night's hearing in the House Rules Committee, Ranking Republican Tom Cole (OK-04) pointed out the clearly partisan record regarding consideration of amendments this Congress.

Cole started by reviewing the facts:

With all due respect Mr. Chairman, the entire Congress last Congress Democrats got 45 percent of the amendments, Republicans got 38 percent, bipartisan 17 percent. So far up to the fourteenth of this month, we've gotten 14 percent of the amendments, your side has gotten 73 percent and there's been 13 percent bipartisan. Tonight will make that worse because we've got 27 amendments that you're going to propose to make in order: one Republican, one bipartisan, 25 Democrat. That's 92 percent of the amendments.

Over the same timeframe, Cole pointed out that the Republican majority last Congress and Democratic majority this Congress actually have a similar record on reporting closed rules:

You generally like to talk about closed rules as sort of the justification, so I asked my staff to check on that. In the 115th Congress through the fourteenth of May when Republicans were in the majority, there were 16 closed rules…and 20 structured rules. Through the same period of time, you've had 14 closed rules and 14 structured. So your record on closed rules is about what ours was.

Your record on amendments is awful, and it's going to get worse tonight. NINETY-TWO percent of the amendments.

Cole called on the Democratic majority to change course:

We've heard enough about the last two years…You've got enough of a timeframe here. When 73 percent of the amendments are yours and 92 percent tonight. I say that in hope that we can get some things changed…This rate of amendments can't continue. It just can't.

We should try to come closer to the last Congress when we actually gave the minority MORE amendments than we gave our own side. We aren't anywhere close to that.

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