Roy Blunt

Mr. BLUNT

Mr. BLUNT. Well, I certainly hope so. And I think the time that this took, and the bill on hate crimes or thought crimes, whatever we decide to refer to it as in the coming days, the markup there would indicate a lot of interest. On the supplemental that we voted on last week, Mr. Leader, do we have a sense of when that will go to the White House or how quickly that bill will come back? And would you expect us to deal with a return? I mean, we all expect the President to veto this particular supplemental. Would it be your sense that we would likely deal with that next week as well?

Mr. BLUNT. This bill has been, of course, very widely debated, pretty divisive in our points of view on it. A couple of our Members voted with you. A number of your Members voted with us against the bill. But I am certainly in agreement with the gentleman's view that we should pursue whatever next steps are there as soon as possible. I'd also like to say to the gentleman that I, and I know others on our side, a significant number of others on our side, are eager to work with the majority and the White House both, and get this issue resolved so that our troops are appropriately funded. We can move on to the other appropriations work. And some of these issues, I am sure, are going to be available to the other appropriations bills as topics of discussion that don't necessarily need to be resolved immediately. On the topic of rules, on the bill that was considered on Tuesday, the science bill, we had an open rule on that. But the deadline to file an amendment, a potential amendment, was last Friday. Obviously, Friday was a travel day. Normally the deadline would have been sometime the day before the bill was taken up, and I am hopeful that we are not seeing that as a pattern; that we'll still give maximum time for Members to look at legislation, to be able to file a bill. And obviously, if you've got a rule that requires looking at the amendments, you have to have the amendments in before the Rules Committee can meet. But a Friday deadline, when no one was here anyway, on a bill to be handled on Tuesday, seemed to me to be outside of the norm. And I hope that the gentleman's response is that it is outside the norm and not a new view of a very limited, needlessly limited, time to file amendments. And I would be glad to hear your response to that.

Mr. BLUNT. I yield.

Mr. BLUNT. I think I am talking about the other science bill. Not the one that was scheduled on Friday, but the one that was the teachers bill also had a Friday deadline.

Mr. BLUNT. I believe that is the case. Maybe we could let our staff sort this out.

Mr. BLUNT. It was.

Mr. BLUNT. I would.

Mr. BLUNT. Mr. Speaker, I would say to my friend as long as the bill is available the full week before, and our opportunity at the end of the week to talk about what is going to be available, I think there is reasonableness there. On a bill that suddenly we just decide we have time to do it, that might be different than the normal procedure that my friend is suggesting.

Mr. BLUNT. I would.

Mr. BLUNT. On that topic of what may be out there, Mr. Speaker, I have just a couple of final questions. One is we are now approaching 4 weeks before another opportunity for a district work period during the Memorial Day time. I wonder if the leader has a sense of a couple of items, your sense of what you are hoping as major things to get done during that month, generally; and, specifically, if there is any information about a GSE bill. The committee voted a GSE bill out on March 28. That was a full month ago. I am wondering if there is a sense of when that might be on the floor. And anything else the gentleman has about an appropriation schedule that might involve the next 4 weeks would be helpful. And that would be my final question unless your answer prompts a question. I yield to my friend.

Mr. BLUNT. I think that is very helpful, and I thank the majority leader.

Mr. BLUNT

Mr. BLUNT. Madam Speaker, I rise for the purpose of inquiring about the schedule, and I yield to my friend, the majority leader, for information about the schedule, tomorrow, Monday and Tuesday.

Mr. BLUNT. I thank the gentleman for the information, and I think that is helpful to our Members.

Mr. BLUNT

Mr. BLUNT. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding as this debate comes to an end. The legislation we have debated here tonight was at one point supposed to be an emergency supplemental spending bill for our troops, dispatched to them with urgency, resolution, and purpose. It was supposed to provide money and resources for our fighting men and women on the frontlines so that they had the tools and equipment they needed to finish the task at hand. Instead the majority turned this important funding package into an exercise in political theater, along the way, disregarding the testimony of our military commanders, the wishes of many in their own caucus, and basic and numerous dictates of our Constitution and our history. The result has been a final conference report, though we know it really won't be a final conference report. It has been a conference report that imposes artificial deadlines, ties the hands of our commanders in the field, and demotes those tasked with managing an active military engagement to the rank of administrative assistant, forced to check new boxes before exercising the authority they have today to execute their mission. And it would spend billions of dollars on things that should have been debated at another time. Some of those things have merit. Some of those things I agree with. Some of them I don't. But they shouldn't have been debated as part of this bill. Those who attended today's briefing with General Petraeus benefited from a clear and sober assessment of our chances for achieving success in Iraq and the consequences we can expect by declaring defeat. But not a single person in that room today, with knowledge of our progress on the ground, believes this war was lost or that our presence there was without merit. Unfortunately, too many in this Chamber seem convinced of the inevitability of defeat. However this vote turns out, I am hopeful that tonight's roll call will end this effort to undercut our mission by undermining the authority of our commanders in the field. Republicans are willing, and have been willing, to work with the majority on this bill. But we will not waver on our insistence that an emergency troop support bill passed by Congress actually be focused on supporting the troops. The legislation before us tonight fails to meet that most basic standard. I urge a ``no'' vote on this bill and ask my colleagues to join me tonight in standing up for the interests of our men and women in harm's way. And hopefully, very soon, we can join together in crafting a bill that will be considered quickly, as this one should have been, passed quickly, with help to the frontlines as soon as possible. It's time for the political theater to end and the real work to begin.

Mr. BLUNT

Mr. BLUNT. Mr. Speaker, I rise for the purpose of inquiring about next week's schedule, and I yield to my friend from Maryland, the majority leader.

Mr. BLUNT. Mr. Speaker, we will get our staffs together and look at the calendar later because they seem to be in disagreement on that, even at this moment as you give me that information. I am going to make one, hopefully, final comment on this issue for now, though I am sure it is going to be an issue we talk about in the future.

Mr. BLUNT. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend for that information. Last evening we did appoint conferees to the conference on the emergency supplemental for the war. Would we expect to have a conference report, do you think, sometime next week? I think it has been 94 days now since the President requested that, and I am wondering if we would anticipate a conference report anytime next week.

Mr. BLUNT. I would yield.

Mr. BLUNT. I thank the gentleman for that answer, Mr. Speaker. I hope we can. I think we do need to continue to talk about how we ultimately resolve this issue. Now, in the information that I am getting from both the Defense Department and our Members that have military installations is that while the war effort, itself, with lots of changing of categories of money and determinations of money around may be very well up through June, that the defense effort generally is impacted because money that would have been spent for National Guard training or money that would have been spent to pay obligations to a contractor are not available in this process. Now, the last time Secretary Gates, at least, who was not Secretary at the time, said that the spend-out was not quite as quick, and he also said that the need was not quite as critical. But the gentleman is absolutely right in pointing out that last time this process took a long time, and one of the reasons it took a long time was that the House leaders, the majority leaders at that time, were in conflict with the Senate about additional spending. I don't see any of those discussions, frankly, going on, but the additional spending last time at $14.5 billion did not occur because the House leaders wouldn't accept that and we passed the bill in the House last time a month after the President sent the request up, and then it was a number of months, almost 4 or 5 months, before we got a final bill because we were fighting that additional spending, and at some point we are going to have to also engage not just on the issues of deadlines and whether or not we are micromanaging the effort, but the additional spending was the real problem last time. I would like to think that there was some effort going on there. I don't know that there is. My next question, though, is that the gentleman's goals for the appropriations process really would require us to pretty quickly move on the budget itself. We missed a deadline that we often miss. I don't want to belabor that point, but that April 15 deadline we normally had to hit if we had a real opportunity to get the bills out of the House by the Fourth of July, which we did in the first part of the last Congress and all but one of the bills in the second part of the last Congress. What is your sense of where we are on the conferees for the budget and a final budget document?

Mr. BLUNT. For my friend to understand, it is not a concern about this bill. It is not a concern about what happened on that bill. It is the fact that the tabling addition may be within the rules, but extraordinary. If it is within the rules it has never been done before. The tabling addition changes the consequences of a Member's motion. When you change the consequences of a Member's motion, you take a right away from the Member that the Member previously had. We may have to discuss this. I can see we are still not quite on the same wavelength. It is not about this bill, Mr. Hoyer. It is not about this week. It is about doing something that has never been done before that has consequential impact, and I believe this does. I think you and I should continue to talk about it. I think our Members in the minority are justly concerned about it, as you would have been in the minority if we had done something we never did in the majority, which is change the consequences of your motion to recommit.

Mr. BLUNT. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend for that response. And we would hope to see that bill next week on the floor or as soon as possible because there is some great likelihood from that White House meeting that the gentleman mentioned that there is going to have to be a second bill if we can't resolve these issues that lead toward a veto. On one of those issues we did yesterday, the House voted on the motion to instruct the conferees to sustain the House position. Does the gentleman have any information on the likelihood of the House or Senate view of the deadline issue that we discussed yesterday? I yield to the gentleman.

Mr. BLUNT. I thank the gentleman for sharing that with me. And certainly there were occasions where we had to do exactly what the gentleman is suggesting, and that is always one option. At some point, based on the meeting the deadlines we hope to meet and you hope to meet on the calendar, you have to decide whether that is the option you have to go to or not, as opposed to a conference report that we can agree to that lets us move forward that way. I would also like to repeat one of the comments the gentleman made simply because we don't get much credit here or didn't get much credit for efforts we did make to control spending. And you are absolutely right, a year ago at this time the fight was between the Senate, which was led by Republicans at the time, and the House that was led by the Republicans on that additional spending. And I just want to make the point that you already made once, but we don't hear it emphasized very often, but that was the fight. House Republicans did win, and we spent $14.5 billion less than our friends on the other side intended to spend, offered to spend, wanted to spend; and that is what that time frame was all about. We do, I believe, have more concerns in overall defense spending just because the spend-down has been quicker this year than last year, and Secretary Gates, not me, would be the source for that view of the difference in the 2 years. But clearly, the process, as the gentleman rightly pointed out, is never as easy as we want, as quick as we want, and there are obstacles there. I would like to, before we conclude today, ask a couple more questions. One is the concern that I have and many of our Members have on the rule that was used this week to waive PAYGO for the D.C. bill and to create a new obstacle for Members who hope to offer a motion to recommit. Twelve years and, now, a few months ago, when Republicans took control of the House, they extended the motion to recommit to the minority at that time and never failed to offer that motion to recommit under the traditions of the House. I believe, while it often was not allowed the minority in previous years, never in either previous times or the last 12 years was an actual tabling motion put in the rule, which creates a different circumstance intentionally, but a different circumstance than was ever created in this House before. And I wonder really two things: Would that tabling motion be something that we will see again? And also, would we expect to see the PAYGO effort in the future waived for the principal reason to be on the floor and handled in a separate vote and a separate piece of legislation, like we did this time? Is that now the anticipated norm for this process, Mr. Leader?

Mr. BLUNT. I would.

Mr. BLUNT. Well, I thank my friend for that. But I do think in that view of this that there is a significant restriction of the rights available to Members. Members have to defend what they do on the floor. Let me make a couple of points. One is, in the incident you mentioned when the gentleman from Texas offered a motion to recommit well within the rules, and, by the way, in that case and many other cases the only option that the minority has had has been the option of last resort, unless you take that away, which was the motion to recommit. All of our amendments were rejected; no matter how germane they might have been, they were not allowed. The Members of the House are the ones who have the opportunity to decide what is the right vote and what's not. And, in fact, stopping that vote offered under the rules by a Member in good faith I think was a violation of that Member's rights as a Member of the House. Now, you could have had that vote, it might have killed the bill, but you could have started a new bill just like you did anyway. The only difference would have been that the Member of the House that brought the issue to the floor would have had his full rights as a Member to have his issue not only debated, but voted on. And we were literally seconds from actually having that vote, which under the rules of the House would have sent the bill to the committee promptly. There may have been no way to leave the committee with that bill, but you could have started a new bill just like you did. The only difference would have been that the gentleman from Texas would have had his motion voted on, as I believe he had a right to. On the other issue, we did have PAYGO for 8 years of the 12 years we were in the majority. We complied with it. We still never took away the ability of your side to do just what you said we shouldn't be able to do.

Mr. BLUNT. Let me finish the thought, and then I will. I can give you many instances where not only did your side try to avail themselves of that right, which we never then took away, and it probably did create political concerns for our Members; but the House has been here longer than any Member has been here and will be here longer than any Member will be here. And beginning to change the rules in that way or change the rights of Members to offer their objections, their ideas, their improvements as Members always have is a bigger step than I think the gentleman may realize. And in terms of whether things are germane or not, I very well remember a bill to create the Homeland Security part of our government and the motion to recommit was about corporate inversions. Now, that is every bit as tangential as anything the gentleman just mentioned. But we didn't go back the next week and say, we're never going to allow the minority to have that vote again because it was troublesome for us. Troublesome for us and protecting the rights of Members as they relate to past Members and future Members I think are two different things. I will yield to my friend.