Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children Continuing Appropriations Resolution, 2014

Floor Speech

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Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. Madam Speaker, I thank the chairman for yielding me this time.

Madam Speaker, I rise in full support of H.J. Res. 75. This bill ensures that the nearly 8.7 million women, infants, and children who rely on the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children will continue to receive critical nutrition assistance without interruption.

This bill provides funding for WIC at the fiscal year 2013 post-sequester rate of $6.5 billion until December 15, or until we can enact full-year appropriations legislation. That is the ultimate goal of this bill, Madam Speaker, to move us closer to ending this government shutdown by providing regular appropriations for all government programs. To achieve that, we've got to have an adult conversation about what this might entail and how we can get there.

And I've got a great suggestion, Madam Speaker. Monday night, the House passed an amendment to the CR over to the Senate and asked for a conference with the Senate. Then the Speaker named House conferees.

Now the normal traditions of this body, as all of us know, is that when the House and the Senate pass differing versions of the same bill, how do we resolve the difference? Well, we appoint conferees. We have some House Members and some Senate Members that are selected by their respective leaders. And they go up, and they argue and debate and amend. And they come up with an agreement that they then bring back to each body for approval, and that becomes the law.

That procedure is in play right now. I mean, the House has appointed conferees. We've got a table arranged downstairs for the Senators to join us in resolving the shutdown. And what does the Senate do? What do we hear from the Senate? A big loud snore, that they're not willing to come to the table and talk. Just talk. We may not be able to agree. But we can talk and try to work it out for the American people.

And as we work this out, we've got to be sure that our most vulnerable citizens don't fall victim to politics. This bill will take care of those who count on WIC to meet their nutritional needs--our women, our infants, our children. Because this language was essentially included in my original initial clean continuing resolution, I endorse it today. This House, I think, should support it today.

But our colleagues in the Senate should also support it. This would be the seventh bill we've sent them to help reopen the Federal Government in the last 3 days. The seventh bill. We've heard nothing from them. Altogether, these bills provide nearly a third of the discretionary funding that's needed to operate the entire Federal Government. So in the last 3 days, we've passed bills to fund a third of the government.

The Senate keeps demanding from us, and yet they won't vote on these bills that would be a part of that clean CR. The math just doesn't add up, Madam Speaker.

Though this piecemeal funding approach is not my preferred mechanism to move forward, it does move us incrementally forward. I would rather we fund the government with regular appropriations bills, so-called regular order.

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Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. This House passed four of those regular bills this year. Unfortunately, our colleagues on the other side of the Capitol passed none. For all of their talk on the other side of the Capitol about returning to regular order, it seems the Senate has made very little action to achieve that goal. We're in this mess today in part because of that. But passing this bill will help us get out of it.

So I urge my colleagues to support an end to this shutdown with this WIC program, support this bill, and pass it today.

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