Fiscal State of the Nation Resolution

Floor Speech

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Mr. WOMACK. Madam Speaker, my thanks to my colleague from Texas for giving me the opportunity to speak on this very important subject.

Madam Speaker, I rise in support of this resolution, though I have to admit that it is easy to be somewhat pessimistic about its potential effectiveness. But I am willing to try anything--anything--that might work in elevating the Nation's debt situation in the minds of the people we all represent.

The people I represent in Arkansas don't have a choice but to balance their checkbooks, and if they can't, then they are limited in how much they can borrow and for what. Sadly, the Federal Government doesn't play by the same rules.

Madam Speaker, we are $29 trillion in debt. We have budget deficits as far as the eyes can see. We are mortgaging the futures of our kids and our grandkids. And it is painfully obvious to me that the governing majority doesn't really care much about deficits and debt. But Third District Arkansans do.

I had the honor of co-chairing a joint select committee in 2018 that tried to address the budget and appropriations process that has tripped up the Congress every year since I have been here, and to think that we are only funded through the third day of December, with no assurance of a full year's appropriation by then, something has to be done.

A fiscal state of the Union is one of the recommendations that came from our joint select committee, but I will remind everyone that we need three more--count them, three more--Democrat votes to move those recommendations. And four, Madam Speaker, four Democrats voted ``present.''

So forgive me if I don't sound terribly optimistic that Congress will get its act together. But maybe, just maybe, something like this will force a rational discussion before we have what is coming: a sovereign debt crisis.

So, I am willing to try, and I encourage my colleagues to support it.

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