Providing for Consideration of H.R. 4138, Executive Needs to Faithfully Observe and Respect Congressional Enactments of the Law Act of 2014, and Providing for Consideration of H.R. 2973, Faithful Execution of the Law Act of 2014

Floor Speech

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Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, somehow, against all odds, the Republican leadership of this House keeps coming up with new and creative ways to waste everybody's time. This is getting to be embarrassing, quite frankly.

Last night in the Rules Committee, I joked that I picked the short straw, so I am handling the rule today. The reason why I said that is because what we are doing today really is a joke.

This is not serious legislating. Even if there was some substance to the concerns the gentleman raised, the bills that have been written are written in such a way that they are purely political.

This is not about serious legislating, this is about political statements, this is about political press releases, and I think the American people, quite frankly, have had enough.

The Congressional Research Service says that it costs $24 million a week to run this place. I am going to tell you that what we are doing right now is wasting taxpayers' dollars.

With all that needs to be done--with all that needs to be done, this is another politically motivated week of let's go after the President. That is the way it has been since this President has been elected, and I think people are getting tired of it.

Week after week, month after month, and year after year now, this Republican majority continues to bring bills to the floor that have no chance of passing the Senate and have no chance of being signed into law that are just, again, political press releases.

What is worse, the bills that are being brought forward do nothing--absolutely nothing--to help rebuild our economy or put people back to work. My friend, the gentleman from Florida, talks about our responsibility as Members of Congress.

Well, our responsibility as Members of Congress is to help people, is to legislate, is to deliberate, is to debate serious issues passionately. That is what we are here to do, not this. This belongs in the Republican National Committee. This is a press conference that my friend should have outside of this great building, quite frankly.

Mr. Speaker, this economy is slowly recovering, but Republicans insist on doing nothing to actually strengthen that recovery. They refuse to consider any meaningful jobs legislation. We should have a highway bill to put millions of people back to work.

Putting millions of people back to work with the increased revenue and taxes, you could actually pay down the deficit and the debt, but they don't bring anything like that to the floor. They block every attempt to increase wages for workers.

We need to raise the minimum wage in this country. It is unacceptably low. People who work full-time ought not to live in poverty; yet we can't even get a minimum wage bill scheduled on the floor of the people's House. They won't even talk about it. We can't get them to even allow us to have an amendment on the minimum wage.

They continue to ignore the plight of the long-term unemployed in this country. Over 1.7 million Americans are unemployed. These are people who are looking for jobs and still can't find them. The answer to them from this Republican Congress is you are on your own.

I wonder sometimes whether any of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle have ever met somebody who is unemployed or have talked to anybody who have lost their long-term unemployment benefits.

Their answer is go ask daddy for a loan or go sell some stocks, that will take care of it. They have no idea what people in this country are going through; they have no idea how hard it is to struggle in poverty.

Somehow, they find the time to take 51 votes to repeal the Affordable Care Act, 51 votes. Now, I get it, you don't like it, so you vote to repeal it once; you can vote to repeal it twice, maybe five times, okay. But 51 times that we have wasted the taxpayers' money debating a repeal of the Affordable Care Act, it is ludicrous. It is unreal. People don't understand this behavior outside of the beltway.

Mr. Speaker, they also, quite frankly, find time to waste millions of tax dollars defending an antigay marriage law that is plainly discriminatory. That is okay for them to use taxpayer dollars to do that to stop

any kind of reversal of this discriminatory law.

Today's entry in the sweepstakes of useless legislation is the so-called Imperial Presidency of Barack Obama. Never mind the fact that President Obama is using the same kinds of executive authority that President Bush and others before him used.

Let me repeat that. President Obama is using the same kind of executive authority that President Bush and other presidents before him have used.

Never mind the fact that the people supporting this legislation were more than happy to let George W. Bush and Dick Cheney ignore and contravene Congress at every single opportunity.

In fact, they defended what I think is some really questionable behavior of the Bush/Cheney team, and never mind the fact that the last people on Earth who should be complaining about imperialism continue to vote for closed rules, continue to ignore regular order, and continue to shut Democrats out from the legislative process.

By the way, one of the bills that we are debating today was introduced the day before it was marked had no hearings--so much for the promise that Speaker Boehner made that we are going to go back to regular order--no hearings, introduced the day before, then going right to America.

Let's be honest, even if President Obama did everything in the world that the Republicans say they are asking him to do, they would still find a reason to complain. My friends on the other side of the aisle, you guys just don't like the President; I get it.

But do you know what? Get over it because, at this point in time, our job is to work with the Senate and with the President to move this country forward; instead, my Republican friends have spent every single second since this President was elected trying to obstruct every single initiative that he has put forward. Even when he puts forward initiatives that they originally proposed, they complain.

The bills that the Republicans bring before us today are likely unconstitutional, violate the separation of powers, would result in scores and scores of frivolous lawsuits, and would be costly and impractical to apply.

They don't deserve to be on this floor, and they certainly do not deserve to pass. When you read the way they were drafted, as I said before, they are written in a very political partisan way.

Mr. Speaker, I consider myself an institutionalist. I love the House of Representatives. I am proud to serve here. It is a privilege to serve here. Our Founders created the Congress as a coequal branch of government, and this institution should never be overlooked or sidestepped.

There is a strong argument to be made that, over the past 30 years, Congress has allowed itself to become so bogged down in gridlock that it has allowed executive power to grow far too large. That is a worthy debate for us to have.

Now, that being said, the executive branch has the authority to make certain regulations and take certain executive actions, and this President--any President--has a responsibility to lead when Congress can't get its act together and do its job.

We are elected to legislate, but time after time, instead of tackling issues like immigration reform, climate change, jobs, the minimum wage, bringing our troops home safely from Afghanistan, feeding our hungry--we have 50 million people in the richest country in the history of the world that are hungry; we all should be ashamed of that--but instead of dealing with that or issues like ending poverty or rebuilding our infrastructure or helping the long-term unemployed, this Republican majority chooses instead to bring up partisan messaging bills that will justifiably die.

Mr. Speaker, the American people deserve so much better than this. We are wasting time; we are wasting taxpayer dollars doing this kind of stuff. They deserve a Congress that tries to improve the lives of every American, instead of placating an extreme right wing.

They deserve a Congress that actually does its job. I will say to my friends: this is not doing our job. The bills before us today go exactly in the opposite direction of what we should be doing.

I urge my colleagues to defeat this rule and defeat the underlying legislation, and I reserve the balance of my time.

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Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I would urge my colleagues to remember the words ``physician heal thyself.'' While my friends are complaining about the President of the United States, they should kind of look inward and look at the imperial Republican majority that has kind of taken over here in this House of Representatives.

We had the chairman of the Oversight Committee literally stop a member of the Democratic Party from engaging in legitimate and appropriate debate. In fact, he shut off the microphone and ended the hearing. I mean, is that what our Founding Fathers had envisioned for this Congress? Is that what upholding the Constitution is all about?

As someone who serves on the Rules Committee and who welcomed the statement by Speaker Boehner that we would return to regular order, I am still looking for it. We just saw the most closed session in the history of this Congress last year. We had the most closed rules in a single year, the most closed rules in a single week, the most closed rules in a single day. I mean, the Rules Committee I love to serve on because of the great history. My former boss Joe Moakley was the chairman of the Rules Committee. I have great admiration for my colleagues on the Rules Committee, but the Rules Committee is becoming the place where democracy goes to die. Serious issues are routinely cut out.

We had a Republican Member yesterday, Mr. Gibson of New York, who had a great idea about trying to hold the Executive accountable when it comes to the War Powers Act. It is an important issue. That is actually a legitimate issue for us to discuss. It was perfectly germane. On a party line vote, the Rules Committee voted that down. They said we won't have that debate here on the House floor.

The way this place is supposed to operate is that all of us--all 435 of us--whether we are Republicans or Democrats, ought to be considered important, and we all represent the same number of constituents. I understand that the party in control gets to kind of control the agenda, but that doesn't mean the party not in control gets shut out on a regular basis on very important issues. Yet that has become the pattern here. Not only that, but we have seen more and more instances where committees of jurisdiction are not even relevant anymore--where bills are introduced the day before there is a markup, where there are no hearings. Sometimes we have bills that just mysteriously appear in the Rules Committee.

My colleagues know that I have great difficulty with their approach to dealing with the SNAP program, formerly known as ``food stamps.'' They proposed a $40 billion cut on the poorest of the poor to pay for subsidies for rich agribusinesses. I thought it was a bad thing to do. I am also on the Agriculture Committee. That bill never even went to the Agriculture Committee. We never had a hearing on it. We never had a markup on it. It mysteriously appeared in the Rules Committee, and then it came to the floor.

This is the way this place is being run. So, when you talk about ``imperial'' anything, look in the mirror. We need to change the way we do business here. This place would operate a lot better if you would let the people's House work its will. If you brought the Senate-passed immigration reform bill to this floor, it would pass, but it is being blocked because a small group within the Republican caucus doesn't want to deal with the issue of immigration reform. Important issues are routinely being denied consideration on this floor. This is a place where trivial issues get debated passionately and where important ones not at all, and people are getting fed up with it.

This politically motivated piece of legislation is politically motivated because of Minority Leader Cantor's memo to, I guess, Republicans after their retreat. They talked about having an Imperial Presidency week to kind of embarrass the President. I guess that is what they call serious legislating, but this really is a joke. I urge my colleagues to vote all of this stuff down.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

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Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

It is funny. Again, I love that this all of a sudden has become an issue for my colleagues.

There is a Washington Post article from July 24, 2006. Let me read the first couple of paragraphs:

A panel of legal scholars and lawyers assembled by the American Bar Association is sharply criticizing the use of ``signing statements'' by President Bush that assert his right to ignore or not enforce laws passed by Congress.

In a report to be issued today, the ABA task force said that Bush has lodged more challenges to provisions of laws than all previous Presidents combined.

The panel members described the development as a serious threat to the Constitution's system of checks and balances, and they urged Congress to pass legislation permitting court review of such statements.

I can go on and on and on. The point is ``silence'' on the other side during all of that time. Then they said: Well, now we have got religion on this issue, and we want to hold everybody accountable. Yet, when Mr. Gibson had his amendment yesterday to actually bring up a legitimate focus where, I think, the Executive over the years has kind of abused its powers--and that is on the War Powers Act--he brought a germane amendment to the floor, and that was ruled out of order--we will deal with it another time--the translation of which means in this imperial Congress that it will never see the light of day.

This House is being run in the most imperial way, where anybody who has a different view is routinely shut out from debate, with more closed rules than any Congress in history. I think it is probably more avoiding regular order--never mind the closed rules--than any Congress in history. That is one of the reasons some of the stuff we bring to the floor here is so contentious. It is because it is written in such a flawed way.

I think it is a legitimate topic of discussion to talk about the appropriate powers of the Executive and the appropriate powers of the legislature, but to do that, I think, in a serious way means doing it in a bipartisan way, and there are ways for both Republicans and Democrats to come together. Again, this has never been about a serious attempt to deal with that issue. I mean this was one of their political talking points at their convention, at their retreat, that my friends had. This is not a serious attempt at anything. This is a political press release. We taxpayers spend $24 million a week to keep this place in session here, and this is how my friends use the taxpayers' money--to deal with these kinds of things?

The gentlelady from Alabama talked about her constituents all talking about this issue. Boy, I have got to tell you that, where I am from, what people talk about is: When are you going to pass a highway bill? They want to know when we are going to deal with the issue of jobs. My constituents and the people I meet all over the country want to know what we are going to do about raising the minimum wage. How are we going to deal with a pay equity bill so that women don't get discriminated against and get paid less than men do for doing the same job? They talk about global warming, which is like the worst thing you could talk about here because my friends don't even admit that it exists. They want to know what we are going to do to protect our planet and what we are going to do to help the long-term unemployed.

Those are real issues. Those are about helping people. This is politics, and I think people have had enough of it. So I would urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to say ``no'' to this stuff.

I reserve the balance of my time.

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Mr. McGOVERN. I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, just to make sure the record is correct, what I am understanding from staff is that while there were some hearings on the subject, one of the bills had no hearings. So, again, under regular order I think it would be important that the actual bill have a hearing.

The other thing, my colleague from Florida said that he would like a more open process. Let me make a suggestion: then vote for one. Because consistently in the Rules Committee, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle routinely vote for closed rules. They routinely vote against allowing amendments, including germane amendments, to be made in order, including what I think would be an amendment that has bipartisan support, the one by Mr. Gibson on the War Powers Act that could have brought us together. That is a legitimate subject.

The reason why this legislation before us is such a waste of time is because it does not reflect deliberative process. It does not reflect any kind of bipartisan cooperation. It is a political press release. It is a waste of taxpayers' money.

I will say to the gentleman from Pennsylvania, I, too, took a pledge to uphold and defend the Constitution, and part of that pledge is to make sure that I represent all of the people, not just some of the people, not just those who give big contributions to political parties, but all of the people.

The fact that we have nearly 2 million people in this country who are cut off from unemployment benefits, what does anybody say to them when you meet people who come up and say that they are looking for a job and they can't find one? Maybe my friends don't talk to those people.

I will tell you it is heartbreaking that this Congress, the people's Congress that is supposed to represent them too, has turned their backs on them. What do you say to people who get cut off of their food benefits, who see their food benefit getting slashed, who end up at food banks trying to make ends meet to put food on the table for their families.

We sit here and debate this, a partisan bill, and we don't do anything about that?

Or, increasing the minimum wage--if you want to help people get off of food stamps, increase the minimum wage. Millions of people would automatically get off of public assistance. We can't even get a vote on that. We are not even allowed to bring that to floor.

People are asking me, When are you going to pass comprehensive immigration reform? The Senate passed it in a bipartisan way. Why can't you bring it on the floor of the House? The answer is because the imperial Republican majority in this House has declared that no, we are not going to even talk about it, and the Rules Committee, again, has been used as a place to shut off democracy and to not have these kinds of important issues brought to the floor.

So here we are debating a partisan bill that is purely partisan. You couldn't write it more partisan if my friends tried. Here we are debating this kind of bill while so many other things need to be addressed. This is a waste of time. It is a waste of taxpayer dollars. It diminishes this institution.

We are better than this. We should be talking about putting people back to work. We should be talking about helping to improve this economy at a more rapid pace. We should be talking about making sure that no one falls through the cracks; that we extend unemployment insurance benefits to people who need it.

We should be talking about those issues. We should be talking about global warming. Instead, we are doing this. Again, written in a very partisan way, which I regret very much.

Again, I urge my colleagues to reject this and reject the rule.

I reserve the balance of my time.

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Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

The gentleman says that this has nothing to do with President Obama. The committee report only cites President Obama, in terms of this issue, and their political document, the memorandum that came from Eric Cantor to the House Republicans, talks about the Imperial Presidency, and says President Obama has provided new clarity of what constitutes an Imperial Presidency. President Obama, President Obama, and on and on.

It just defies logic for anybody to think for one second that this isn't about trying to attack this President of the United States, because what we have seen time and time again from the time this President was elected has been nothing but obstructionism and attack, obstructionism and attack, obstructionism and attack. I get it. There are differences in philosophies between the two parties.

What is troubling to me is that in this imperial Republican Congress President Obama's ideas don't even get a chance to have their day on the floor, where we are routinely shut out.

In this imperial Republican Congress we cannot bring to the floor a bill to increase the minimum wage. We cannot bring to the floor a bill to extend unemployment benefits for those over 2 million long-term employed. We cannot bring to the floor a jobs bill. We cannot bring to the floor the bipartisan Senate-passed comprehensive immigration reform bill, which would do the right thing on behalf of a number of immigrants in this country, but would also, by the way, we are told, reduce our deficit.

We can't even bring those things to the floor for debate. Under this imperial Republican leadership, our hands are tried. So we try procedural motions. We are trying discharge petitions. We are trying whatever we can to try to be heard.

I think it is important for the American people to know where people stand. So if my friends on the other side of the aisle don't believe the American people deserve a raise, if they don't believe we should increase the minimum wage, vote against it. Go on record. Let the American people see where you stand. On immigration reform, if you don't want to reform the immigration system, fine. Vote against it when it comes to the floor.

When my friends on the other side of the aisle routinely and regularly deny us the opportunity to even consider these things, that hurts our democracy. It diminishes this institution.

If you want to talk about imperialism, what is that?

With that, Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

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Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I am urging my colleagues to defeat the previous question. If we defeat the previous question, I will offer an amendment to the rule to bring up H.R. 4209, Mr. John Tierney's bill that contains the historic bipartisan, bicameral agreement on a permanent fix to the sustainable growth rate of Medicare, which will ensure fairness to doctors and strengthen Medicare.

My colleagues on both sides of the aisle have heard from the medical community on this issue. My Republican friends, unfortunately, have proposed a ``poison pill'' amendment that would kill this bipartisan agreement with an offset attacking the Affordable Care Act.

Mr. Tierney's bill instead includes a commonsense pay-for that finances the bipartisan doc fix by putting limits on our spending on wars overseas. We already have these sorts of caps on spending for almost everything else in the budget, and it is time we capped our war spending as well.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of the amendment in the Record, along with extraneous material, immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.

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Mr. McGOVERN. This amendment simply caps the OCO. We give the administration 1 more year of the Overseas Contingency Operations spending without any contingencies, but beginning in 2016, OCO is subject to budget caps just like everything else.

Funding the war in Afghanistan is not emergency spending. We have been there for over a decade. We all know what the costs entail. The OCO is a so-called emergency account to keep the war in Afghanistan funded.

I don't know about you, Mr. Speaker, but the fact that we have troops in Afghanistan is no longer a surprise and is no longer an unexpected development.

In addition, the OCO has become a slush fund for Congress and the Pentagon to stick in goodies for procurement and operations and maintenance that it couldn't find room for in the Pentagon's half-trillion dollar base budget.

Now that Afghanistan President Karzai has made it perfectly clear that he doesn't want the United States or its military in Afghanistan, we should, at a minimum, cap the OCO and bring our troops home now.

So if we can find billions and billions of dollars to fund a war that nobody wants in a country where the government insults our troops every single day, then we can use those moneys to fund real needs right at home, like permanently fixing the SGR once and for all.

We talk about trying to find common ground. I think there is a lot of common ground on this issue amongst Democrats and Republicans. I think there are a lot of Republicans who are just as sick of this endless war and this over-the-top, unaccounted for spending in these wars as Democrats are.

So I think this is a sensible offset, and I would urge my colleagues to support our initiative.

I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' and to defeat the previous question, and vote ``no'' on the underlying bills for all the reasons I said before. We should be using the taxpayer dollars to do things to help people on this House floor, not to advance political agendas.

With that, I yield back the balance of my time.

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