Legislative Program

Floor Speech

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Mr. SCALISE. Mr. Speaker, I rise for the purpose of inquiring of the House majority leader the schedule for next week.

But before I yield, I will just say that I know the gentleman from Maryland, the distinguished majority leader, has recently decided that he would not seek election to House Democrat leadership.

I know he will be staying in Congress, but I thank the gentleman for all of his years of service in leadership, which, of course, takes a lot of extra time, in addition to the general duties of being a Member of Congress from Maryland, to help run the institution of Congress. He has served as majority leader, served as whip, served as chair and vice chair of the Democrat Caucus, and served in many different capacities. I recognize and thank the gentleman for that service.

I am sure the Appropriations Committee eagerly anticipates his return there. As I yield, I thank the gentleman for his years of service and leadership.

I yield to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer).

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Mr. SCALISE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman.

As we look toward next week, we will still have continued colloquies, at least one more colloquy. I have enjoyed these as well, and we will have time to talk about that later.

If I could ask about the schedule for next week to the majority leader.

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Mr. SCALISE. Mr. Speaker, we noticed the Committee on Rules has scheduled a hearing on Monday for the National Defense Authorization Act. We still don't have any text for that bill. Obviously, the NDAA is a very important bill to laying out the priorities for our Nation's defense, and there has always been a lot of negotiation as it is leaving the House, as it goes to the Senate, as it has been in this conference. There are some issues that are well known that have been debated that, hopefully, will get resolved in that bill, but there is also talk that there may be non-related issues.

What I would ask is when will we be able to get text on this bill?

The bill is very important to our Nation's defense, but if Members are going to be asked to vote, maybe early next week on the bill, we surely wouldn't want a situation where they don't even see the text until early next week to then be asked to vote on that bill.

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Mr. SCALISE. Mr. Speaker, I just would strongly encourage that as the text gets filed, if it is not some time in the next few hours, that when the gentleman is scheduling the floor vote on that bill, that there is enough time between when it goes to the Committee on Rules, when the text is filed, to when the actual vote happens, so Members have ample time to review the final product.

I yield to the gentleman.

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Mr. SCALISE. The final question would be on government funding. We are hearing there are negotiations. When we talk to appropriators on our side, they haven't indicated that they have been included in those negotiations.

Do we know where those negotiations are? Are all sides going to be included on a final negotiation on how government would be funded for the remainder of the fiscal year?

I yield.

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Mr. SCALISE. A broader discussion for another day. Clearly, as we look at next year, we would hope to pass all 12 appropriations bills out of the House, but as the gentleman points out, at some point the Senate is going to have to start moving appropriations bills, too. It can't just be this game of chicken where the clock is going to strike midnight and the Senate waits to start doing their job until it is already the midnight hour as opposed to it would be nice if there was some kind of shot clock they had after we send them a bill where they would actually act on that bill so it is not just an onus on the House to do our job, whether it is a partisan or bipartisan bill, and we have seen both that come out of the House.

At some point, the Senate has also got to do their job in a legislative body where you have a House and a Senate, if we are going to be able to conduct business that is not always waiting until the midnight hour to finally get a resolution on something as important as this. I yield to the gentleman.

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Mr. SCALISE. I share the gentleman's concerns there. One of the reasons we put the calendar out for next year this early and built time in during those months before the summer so that there is ample time to get all 12 appropriations bills through the House, give the Senate time to do the work well in advance of the deadline, and then at some point the onus has to be on them to do the job they have to do before the midnight hour. I yield to the gentleman.

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Mr. SCALISE. It is a good suggestion and something we can get back to, hopefully, in the new year, try to make this process work better. I appreciate the suggestion.

Again, we will have this conversation more next week. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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