Homeowner Energy Freedom Act

Floor Speech

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Maryland for standing and speaking today about something that should be a bipartisan effort, a unanimous consent effort to make sure that those public servants who fight every single day, come to work, and play by the rules are funded. In this body, there is agreement that we need to fund TSA. We need to fund the Coast Guard. We need to fund FEMA, the Secret Service, and cybersecurity. Those are integral parts of our government. They serve a great purpose to the American people.

There is not a shred of difference between Democrats and Republicans on those issues. Why then can we not by unanimous consent say let us fund these agencies through the rest of the year?

Where we have serious disagreements with ICE or CBP, we can, on a parallel track, be able to address those issues.

I could not be more proud to have worked on a bipartisan basis, to pass 11 appropriations bills, 11 of our appropriations bills, reclaiming the power of the purse for the Congress, as it should be. That is what we are doing here with making sure that we can fund these agencies through the rest of the year.

There are serious difficulties with ICE. The American public gets it. They understand it. This is a marauding band of masked and armed agents all over our streets, terrorizing our communities and being responsible for the killing of Renee Good and Alex Pretti. It is unconscionable.

The Democrats have made reasonable demands for reform, reforms that have been in the public view now for a very long time. How about we don't detain and deport American citizens? How about we unmask? How about we use body cameras? How about we obtain a warrant before you knock on somebody's door? How about we train officers, serious training, not 47 days of training?

These are absolutely bedrock reforms that can be done, and we can overhaul an agency, make it run as it is supposed to be run. Do we need to have border enforcement? Yes, but this is out of control.

That is the debate that we should be having and the negotiation that we should be having, not on the agencies that play such a role. Look, we just had serious snowstorms all over the country. My State of Connecticut declared an emergency. Aren't we going to indicate that we are going to deal with FEMA and help people out?

Very simply speaking, it is a simple premise. Let's take the Department of Homeland Security bill where we have major agreement on the bulk of the bill, let us pass the bill in that context and fund those agencies, take care of those folks, and fight for demands on reforming ICE and CBC.

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