Authorization to Initiate Litigation for Actions By the President

Floor Speech

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Mr. NADLER. Mr. Speaker, the Speaker does not have a good record when it comes to wasting taxpayer dollars on frivolous lawsuits. When the Justice Department concluded that the Defense of Marriage Act could not be defended in court, the House wasted $2.3 million trying to defend the indefensible and lost in the Supreme Court.

Now, the Speaker wants to waste more of the taxpayers' money on a meritless lawsuit against the President for not ``taking care that the law be faithfully executed.''

What did the President do? In implementing the Affordable Care Act, which the Republican-led House has voted to repeal 50 times, he postponed implementation of one provision by a year, a provision the Republicans and the House opposed.

Now, they want to waste money to go to court to say the President had no power to postpone this provision for a year, although no one opposed President Bush when he postponed implementation of a provision of the Medicare drug act for a year.

It is well-settled that it is within the discretion of Presidents in implementing a law to postpone implementation of part of it in order to get it done right, but this leads to another absurdity of the case. Let's assume the Republicans get the House to go into court and somehow overcome the standing question--which they will not. What is the remedy they will seek?

By the time it got to court, the provision in question will have already been implemented, so the Republicans want to waste $5 million or $6 million in taxpayers' money to go into court and say, Judge, please order the President to implement what he has already implemented. Totally ridiculous.

So what have we got? We have a Congress that has passed no highway bill, no minimum wage bill, no unemployment extension bill, no pay equity for women bill, no action on campaign finance reform, no action to reduce the burdens of student loans, no action to make sure that women continue to have access to contraceptive services despite the Supreme Court's Hobby Lobby decision, no action on all the emergencies that face the American people, but we are going to waste money and time on a meritless lawsuit that will go nowhere, but will simply serve the single function of diverting attention from all the real problems the House Republicans want to continue to ignore.

This is not a proper use of the taxpayers' money. More wasted money for political purposes. For shame.

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