This is a Sad Day for American Democracy and the American People

Floor Speech

Mr. POCAN. Mr. Speaker, this is a sad day for the American people and for American democracy.

For weeks, I've told my constituents that I know things look bad, but the Republicans won't shut down the government. There's too many adults on that side of the room to let this happen.

And now, after watching what happened yesterday, I can barely explain this to myself. The best I can say is I feel like I'm serving in the Nation's largest kindergarten, only we're in charge of the Federal checkbook and the nuclear arsenal.

The fact that so many Republicans are holding their breath because they don't like the Affordable Care Act--Congress passed the Affordable Care Act. The President signed the bill into law. The Supreme Court has upheld the law.

And yet this body keeps voting to try and repeal the Affordable Care Act, not just once or twice, getting the message, but 46 times. And it's still operational today.

What happened last night, in the final half hour before closing down our government?

The Republicans came up with a last-ditch effort: let's go to conference committee.

I serve on the Budget Committee. We have been asking, for 6 months, to have the Republicans appoint conferees so we could have a budget in this country. The only obstacle between this country having a budget and not is the fact that the Speaker would refuse to appoint conferees to a budget.

Last night, with 15 minutes to spare, the best idea the Republicans have, after 46 votes to repeal the Affordable Care Act, is to have us go to a conference committee.

What are the results of what happened?

Well, one, government is shut down. Thank you, Republican Party.

Two, the Affordable Care Act is implementing today and is the law of the land.

And, three, I'm guessing the Tea Party had a pretty good fundraising week or two.

But here's what happens to the people in my district. People who are trying to get small business loans from the Small Business Administration are going to be halted; $1 billion a month that happens is halted right now, so we can't grow the economy.

People trying to get housing loans for rural families and low- and middle-income families are going to be put on hold.

The Women, Infant and Children program for low-income, pregnant women will be put on hold, after this Congress has already tried to cut $39 billion from food stamps.

We're going to block the Centers for Disease Control from tracking influenza, something that could potentially have devastating impact across the country.

And more than 800,000 Federal employees are going to be furloughed because some Republicans couldn't get their way on the 46th try.

I served in the Wisconsin legislature for 14 years before coming here, and we had our differences, but we always moved on. We did our jobs.

Now it's time for Congress to do our job. It doesn't matter what party you belong to. America deserves better.

The adults in the Republican Party need to take the keys back from the Tea Party before they have to call a tow truck to take the country out of the ditch. It's time for the country to act, and we need the Republicans to get behind something that gets a budget done.

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