Supplemental Appropriations Act, 2008
Floor Speech
SUPPLEMENTAL APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 2008 -- (House of Representatives - May 15, 2008)
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Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
Mr. Speaker, we're dealing here with a bill that until today has never seen the light of day. This bill was concocted in the back room of the Speaker. We were not allowed to have input on it. We have not been allowed to have amendments. Jack Murtha's subcommittee on national defense was not allowed to have a hearing on this or discuss it with his subcommittee members. No subcommittee on appropriations was allowed to have a hearing and debate the issues.
Mr. MURTHA. Will the gentleman yield?
Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania.
Mr. MURTHA. We did have a meeting, and I explained the part of our bill to the subcommittee, and we had no dissension at all. We had a lot of suggestions. We spent a long time on the bill. We spent at least an hour, much more time than we usually spend on a bill.
Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. You say you met with the subcommittee and informed them about what's in the bill that the Speaker wrote? I agree with that.
Mr. MURTHA. Absolutely.
Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. That's what I'm saying.
Mr. MURTHA. Okay.
Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. And the full chairman of the committee did the same thing. He didn't draft this bill. This bill was given to him. And the Members of the minority have had no say in what's in this bill.
The people of this country deserve to have their representatives in Congress have a say-so in what comes before the House and what's debated on the House floor, and we have not been given that.
This is a dictatorship here. This bill has not seen the light of day. It has not been the subject of amendments. We have not been allowed to ask questions. We didn't know what was in it until yesterday, a bill this thick.
So the process here is flawed. And it's the first time that I recollect in my 28 years here of a bill coming to the floor, an appropriations bill, without the minority's having a say-so unless they had agreed to it. This is a new procedure we are having here.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman's time has expired.
Mr. LEWIS of California. I yield the gentleman 1 additional minute.
Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. That's objection number one. We did not have a chance to have a say-so on this bill. The American people have been shut out of a discussion of what's in this bill, until today.
Number two, this bill is loaded down with matters that are not related to helping the brave men and women on the battlefield on the other side.
Now, there are all sorts of amendments that you're hearing today that will be offered, one of which contains a lot of spending and a lot of spending that's not related to helping the troops overseas.
And so I am disappointed. I'm disappointed in the fact that the Appropriations Committee was bypassed, therefore the people were denied a voice, and this bill brought directly to the floor without ever having had a single day of hearings in the subcommittees and the full committee.
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