Secure the Southwest Border Act of 2014
Floor Speech
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Mr. HOYER. I thank the gen tle lady for yielding.
Madam Speaker, I was going to ask my friend from Pennsylvania whether he had talked to the Senate and thinks this has any chance of moving this week; and the answer I think I would give is no, it does not. So I agree with him. It would be tragic not to act.
It is tragic that we are acting in a partisan fashion, which almost ensures inaction on this, the last day that we are going to be here. We should be acting in a bipartisan fashion, as I have urged the majority leader to do.
What is a bipartisan fashion?
A, considering the emergency need today and funding the resources necessary to respond to that; B, taking under consideration the substantive legislative changes that can be affected that will help this issue, will send the messages that the gentleman wants to send.
He is my dear friend and a good Member of this body, but I will tell you, this bill has had no hearings, no committee consideration. Yes, there was a partisan task force, but this has had no consideration in this legislative process.
The majority leader, last week told me that there would be no bill that did not get 72 hours' notice. The gentleman knows you have a bill on the floor, which is contingent, of course, on the passage of this, which has had a few hours' notice, at best. Last night, I think at 10 o'clock the Rules Committee met on DACA.
So I will tell my friend that, had we acted in a bipartisan fashion, A, at whatever level of funding we could agree, pass a bill to meet the immediate crisis, B, have hearings on the ramifications of the law that passed with only two votes in opposition--over 405 Members voted for the 2008 legislation. We are changing that without a hearing either in subcommittee, committee, or full committee. That is not the way we ought to be working. That is not good for our country. It is not good for this institution. It is not fair.
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Mr. HOYER. I believe, once again, we find the Republican Party divided. Because they are divided, they are trying to cobble together some of their hardest-line Members so that they can get them to vote for this supplemental.
And they put on a bill which has had no notice to the American people or to Members of Congress. It is ironic that people are supporting this who demanded that we read the bills. There was no bill to read until this morning.
How sad for the American people. We have a humanitarian crisis that must be addressed without delay, and the way to address it without delay is to give the resources necessary and then pursue the legislative process, not together. It will slow it down, and I predict it will not pass the Senate. I think the gentlemen and ladies on this side of the aisle know that the Senate is not going to pass this bill.
So if you really think we ought to act now, do so in a bipartisan fashion, and then let us debate the legislation before us.
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