Providing for Consideration of H.R. National Apprenticeship Act of Providing for Consideration of H. Con. Res. Concurrent Resolution on the Budget for Fiscal Year and for Other Purposes
Floor Speech
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Mr. COLE. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my good friend, the distinguished Member from Texas, for yielding.
Today's rule sets in motion a process for considering H. Con. Res. 11, a shell budget for fiscal year 2021. I understand that the majority's stated intent in bringing forward this resolution is to pave the way for using budget reconciliation to push through a partisan COVID-19 relief package. Unfortunately, I think the majority's intent is misguided.
I want to remind us all that the only reason we are here today is that the majority failed to pass a budget last year. As of today, we are nearly 9\1/2\ months overdue for the passage of the budget for fiscal year 2021, and fiscal year 2021 is already a third of the way over. Hardly an auspicious start for an item as serious as the annual budget for the United States Government.
But the lack of expeditiousness that characterized the budget in the 116th Congress has been replaced by hastiness. The majority is now, in the 117th Congress, rushing forward with a new budget despite never bothering to convene the Budget Committee. Indeed, the Budget Committee has yet to meet in this Congress, much less conduct normal hearings that pave the way for the markup of the annual budget.
Rather than undertake the normal process through the Budget Committee, the majority is instead air-dropping a budget straight from leadership offices directly onto the floor. This is hardly the kind of process considered to be regular order, and it fails to give Members a chance to have their ideas considered in committee or to offer amendments on the floor.
Indeed, as a longtime member of the Budget Committee myself, I looked forward to our hearings on the budget and the markup. Through this process, Members had the opportunity to consider the budget, consider expert testimony, offer ideas, and propose amendments to be considered by the whole committee. That the majority is failing to do so makes a mockery out of the entire budgeting process.
Over the past year, Congress has shown it can work together to produce bipartisan legislation. In the last Congress, we actually passed five COVID-19 relief bills that appropriated nearly $4 trillion in relief funds. Not all of these funds have yet been spent. Not even close, Mr. Speaker. And the $4 trillion number is right around the annual budgetary outlays of the Federal Government in a normal year, covering both mandatory and discretionary spending.
Yet, the majority is moving forward with yet another bill and seems determined to ensure that this bill enshrines as many partisan policy priorities as possible.
To make matters worse, from looking at the actual budget before us, we do not know what these partisan priorities are. We know the budget includes instructions to committees to increase spending by certain amounts, but it does not offer any guidance on how they should do so.
Will it encompass only COVID relief matters, or will they enact progressive policy goals like Medicare for All or the Green New Deal? We have no way of knowing.
We do know that Senator Bernie Sanders, the socialist leader of the Senate Budget Committee, wants to use reconciliation to ram through a $15 minimum wage, a measure that would be a disaster for workers and businesses alike in my home State of Oklahoma. But what else may be included in the bill is a mystery.
Mr. Speaker, this process hardly befits the bipartisanship that we were promised by President Biden. It has been less than 2 weeks since the new President was inaugurated, and already we are seeing the majority abandoning any pretense at bipartisanship.
The House majority has failed to even propose a bipartisan COVID relief bill or to engage Republicans in serious negotiations. Instead, they have simply predetermined the outcome and are moving forward with their own partisan bill without even pretending to try to work with those of us on my side of the aisle.
This is hardly what we were promised, Mr. Speaker. It is hardly what the institution was promised. And on a matter as important as the annual budget of the United States, and during a pandemic as deadly and serious as the one we are currently living through, I know the institution can do better.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to reject this course and work together and pass real bipartisan legislation that will benefit all Americans.
Today's rule also adds a change in the House rules, imposing serious fines on Members who fail to go through the new magnetometers around the Chamber. Mr. Speaker, as I told my colleagues on the Rules Committee a short time ago, I don't disagree with the additional security measures to keep Members and staff safe. However, I do have concerns over how the new measures are being implemented.
Earlier this afternoon, I offered an amendment to this rule which would have instructed the House Committee on Administration to review the matter and make appropriate recommendations. I have no issue whatsoever with Members being subjected to the same requirements as staff and our constituents when they enter the Capitol, but I have serious concerns that the majority's proposed solution is untenable.
Requiring Members to pass through a magnetometer each time they enter the House Chamber, even if they haven't left the area, is a sure recipe for chaos. It is impossible for Members to socially distance when they are stacked up in a line to await their turn at passing through the metal detectors.
When Members need to leave the Chamber to make a phone call right outside the doorway, they have to reenter and pass through security again. And there are hardworking staff members who work just a few feet away from the House Chamber but must pass through these same magnetometers every time they need to run to their offices and then back to the floor. This is a clear recipe for disorganization and gridlock.
But this need not be the only option, Mr. Speaker. There are already existing metal detectors and X-ray machines at entrances to the building. Why can't Members be screened at those entrances instead? Why must it be right on the way to the very cusp of the Chamber in a location guaranteed to stack up Members outside the door waiting to get in?
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Mr. COLE. Mr. Speaker, we have better alternatives, and I urge that we empower the Committee on House Administration to look at that.
Mr. Speaker, I urge the rejection of the rule.
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