Providing For Consideration Of H.R. 1018, Restore Our American Mustangs Act
Floor Speech
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Ms. FOXX. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume, and I thank my colleague from Massachusetts for yielding me the customary time, and I'm looking forward to our having fun here this morning as he promised yesterday.
I am intrigued by my colleague saying that this is being done to correct something slipped into a bill in the middle of the night when the Republicans were in charge. It sounds like something very nefarious was done. This is sort of news to us. We didn't hear it in Rules yesterday, and I need to point out that there was something put in an appropriations bill in 2005, as my colleague says, but it certainly wasn't nefarious. And it's my understanding that our colleagues on the other side have modified that provision several times. So I don't think this is really trying to correct something that Republicans did some time ago in the dead of the night.
But be that as it may, I think I need to point out that we are bringing this legislation at a time when more than 2 million Americans have lost their jobs since the Democrats' $1 trillion stimulus bill became law and that it is somewhat of an insult to those people. We have a 9.5 percent unemployment rate and a budget deficit of more than $1 trillion which is predicted to go to $2 trillion before the end of the fiscal year.
Given those facts, it's a little unclear to know what exactly are the priorities of the Democrats in charge of this Congress. Small business and middle class families are struggling all across this country; yet, the Democrats in charge of Congress are poised to ask them to bankroll a $700 million welfare program for wild horses. This is just another example of how out of touch Washington Democrats are.
If Democrats want to join Republicans in focusing on job creation, then we should be dealing with our American Energy Act which will create new jobs, bring down energy costs, and pave the way for a cleaner environment. And we should scrap this job-killing health care bill Speaker Pelosi is seeking to rush to a vote before the end of the month.
Now, what this bill is going to do that's underlying this rule, which I'm going to urge my colleagues to vote against, it will establish a horse census every 2 years. It provides for enhanced contraception and birth control for horses. It makes available an additional 19 million acres of public and private land for wild horses. It covers a $5 million tab to repair damage done by horses to other property and mandates that government bureaucrats perform home inspections before Americans can adopt horses.
I hardly think this is what the American people expect us to be doing these days as they face the many challenges that they're facing.
And with that, Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
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Ms. FOXX. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
My friend is engaged in revisionist history again. We did have a good economy under President Bush. After he inherited a recession and after 9/11, things went south in our economy. The President asked the Congress to cut taxes. It was a Republican-controlled Congress. We had 54 straight months of job creation.
Then the Democrats took over the Congress in January of 2007--and we have charts to show it--all of the sudden the economy really went south. Things started going downhill when Democrats took control of the Congress and have been going downhill ever since. Now, we have a Democrat-controlled Congress and a Democrat in the White House, and things are really going badly.
I think that we can prove with historical facts, not revisionist history, that under the Republicans in the House and Senate and the Republican President that the economy was in pretty good shape.
I yield to my friend from Utah, Mr. Chaffetz, 5 minutes.
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Ms. FOXX. I yield myself such time as I may consume. As my colleague from California (Mr. Dreier) was saying, we are supposedly in the midst of an appropriations process, which is so time consuming and has to be so tightly controlled that we have not been allowed to offer amendments in an open process on the floor on the appropriations bills.
Yet, here we are today, handling a bill that obviously is not an emergency, obviously doesn't need to be dealt with now, and is only being put forward because the majority didn't have an excuse to keep us in town today, when people could be at home in the real world, meeting with their constituents, hearing what they have to say, and being able to learn more about the problems that are out there.
The Democrats in this House believe all the wisdom of the world is in Washington, D.C. We Republicans believe the wisdom of the world is out in our district, and that's where we ought to be spending more time, instead of here, creating problems for the American people.
With that, I yield such time as he may consume to my very distinguished colleague and former attorney general, the gentleman from California (Mr. Daniel E. Lungren).
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Ms. FOXX. Madam Speaker, there is so much to say in so little time. I don't think that Republicans need a lecture on how we should be spending our time and whether we should be in Washington 5 days a week. There is an old saying that nobody is safe as long as the Congress or the legislature is in session, and I think most Americans believe that. Being here in Washington is not necessarily meaning that Congress is being productive, and I think that is the point that we have made over and over again. Again, I will say, the wisdom of the world is not here in Washington; and I think with what's been happening, particularly in the last 6 months, the American people have found that out. I am going to be very interested to see how long our colleagues on the other side continue to defend their actions and the action of this administration as the year goes by.
In terms of looking after all God's creatures, I am a person--and my husband is--who are both owned by a dog and a cat. They live in our house. We have farmed all our lives. We have raised horses. We are very, very fond of animals. We give a lot of money to organizations that look after animals. In fact, there is one organization out West that keeps animals until they die a natural death. We feel very strongly about that. So questioning my feeling about how we should treat all of God's creatures is not going to go very far with me. This is also a group of people that wants to provide government-funded abortions and kill unborn babies at the same time we're talking about saving horses and spending money on that. That argument doesn't go very far with me.
What the difference is between our colleagues on the other side and us is that we don't believe in growing government. These are not the things the Federal Government should be about. The Federal Government should confine itself to the very narrow set of issues laid out for us in the Constitution. We should adhere to the 10th Amendment which says that if it isn't mentioned in the Constitution, then it's a province of the States; and that's what we should be doing. So I thought my colleague promised me fun today, but you brought up some issues where you've gone to meddling.
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