Scott Perry

Mr. PERRY

Mr. PERRY. Well, the retiring Senate chief appropriator, Senator Shelby, happens to come from Alabama. I have got nothing bad to say about Alabama. I spent a fair amount of time down there. I love Alabama. Here again, I don't know why Pennsylvanians, Texans, North Dakotans, Californians, whoever, have to pay for this. What is the Federal nexus to this spending of money that we don't have? I am going to turn it back over to my friend here in a minute. We can just go back and forth because I have got plenty here. I know he does, too. How about $4 million for a Bahamian Museum of Arts and Culture, Florida? $1.4 million to restore an outdoor amphitheater in California. $1.7 million for an urban agriculture garden in California. Look, the list just--we are going to get into it, but, people, when are we going to start asking ourselves whose responsibility this is and when are we going to start asking ourselves, is this ever going to change? We haven't had the process here where the Senate and the House passed its own budget, its own appropriations bills, conferenced them, worked out their differences, and then had a vote on that, that process that I just described, how our government was set up to spend your money, that hasn't happened since 1996. It is 2022. What is it going to take for us to finally say, ``Man, we have had enough. I call uncle. I can't take anymore,'' and change this place? I would submit to you that the leadership that has allowed this to continue--and not only allowed it to continue, to ensure that it has continued--is derelict, irresponsible, and accountable to this tragic, epic, enormous failure. This is a failure, and there has got to be an accounting for it. Just because it is hours and days before Christmas, and it is real cold outside, and we have got worries about our children's schooling, being able to pay the bills, grocery bills, fuel bills, electric bills, don't think that we as the American people don't see what is happening here. We see it, and we see who is doing it. And we are not going to tolerate it. Mr. Speaker, I turn it back over to my good friend from Texas.

Mr. PERRY. You were talking about defense. Of course, as a citizen who has been honored to wear the uniform for over three decades, certainly the number one priority outlined in our Constitution is defending our Nation and its citizens. When we talk about spending for defense, are we talking about spending for the defense of the United States or is there anybody else here that you would like to discuss that we are spending on their defense?

Mr. PERRY. Is that what the President asked for?

Mr. PERRY. The President is the Commander in Chief, right?

Mr. PERRY. That is on our team, I get that. But how is it the people of Pennsylvania or Texas or Maine or anywhere across the country's job, why is it their responsibility to pay for that? I don't get it. $2 million for programs promoting career pathways into government service because, goodness knows, there is not enough people in government service. We need to find a way to get them into it. How about a $50 million endowment fund at the University of Alabama? Let's not stop there. How about $10 million for an Institute on Public Service and Leadership at the University of Alabama?

Mr. PERRY. Have we had any debate?

Mr. PERRY. Of course, I do. Of course, I remember.

Mr. PERRY. Will the gentleman yield?

Mr. PERRY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Texas, and I wish to offer him a Merry Christmas and a Merry Christmas to the people of the United States of America. Unfortunately, in your stocking is not going to be something you probably hoped for. I don't think it is going to be a lump of coal. It is $1.7 trillion that we don't have. $1.7 trillion, 4,155 pages plus, I don't know, a couple thousand pages of what is called report language that barely any of us had an opportunity to read, released in the--was it last night, Chip?

Mr. PERRY. The shortest day of the year, the darkest day of the year, and now we are voting on it without-- Let's face it, let's talk about some of the things we know that are in it. We already know, as the gentleman from Texas told us, that your tax dollars, the dollars your Federal Government is spending, is prohibited from stopping people coming across the border illegally. Prohibited to be used for that. Here is what can be used: $400 million for the border security of Jordan, Lebanon, Tunisia, Egypt, and Oman. Think about that. Right now, while title 42 is on the verge of going away, they are estimating we literally have 18,000 people per day coming across the border illegally. We are going to spend $400 million in the Middle East to secure their borders, and we are going to say to the United States of America, you can't spend any tax dollars to defend your own border. That passed in the U.S. Senate today. $140 million on carbon dioxide removal technologies; $540 million on energy storage because the preferred sources of energy by my friends on that side of the aisle don't work. So we need that. $220 million on solar energy. I thought solar energy came of age and was supportive of itself without subsidy. $380 million for alternative modes of transport because, ladies and gentlemen of America, my friends on the other side of the aisle actually don't want you to drive a car or own a car. And if you do have the temerity to think you are going to go somewhere in your own car, it better be an electric vehicle that you are going to plug in and charge when they allow you to charge it. We need $380 million for that. I was at the grocery store a couple days ago with my family--my wife, our girls were there--having a conversation about what we are going to buy for Christmas for the in-laws and family coming over, and a lady was listening to the conversation, Chip, and she said, ``I am not paying $5 for a dozen eggs. I am not paying $5 for a dozen eggs.'' I don't see one darn thing in this bill that is going to solve that lady's problem. Whether it is the gas prices--right now the temperature is dropping all across the United States of America, and people are going to have to pay for the electricity, the heating oil, the propane, the natural gas, something to heat their homes, and they are going to be paying a lot. And there is nothing in here for that. But I will tell you what is in here: $1.3 million in an earmark for water storage tanks just outside of Washington, D.C. The wealthiest counties in the United States of America right here, but we have got an earmark for them because they need a water storage tank. How about $1.5 million for the Pasadena on-street dining project? $1.5 million for a student garden in Sacramento? I am not saying that these projects aren't worthy of discussion for somebody. If you live in Pasadena and you want on-street dining, God bless you. It is probably important to you. You tell me, Mr. Roy, when our country is at $31.4 trillion in debt and careening headlong into $32 trillion, how in the world is that a Federal project? The people in Pennsylvania, who would love to go to Pasadena, we would love to see our team in the Rose Bowl. That is on our team.

Mr. PERRY. That is exactly right. We all want to help, but you don't write a check that you can't afford. There is no money in your bank account to pay for somebody's house down the street while leaving your house unpaid for and your back door open where you know criminals are going to be walking in and taking your children out and leaving life- threatening drugs on your kitchen table; you would not do that.

Mr. PERRY

Mr. PERRY. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. PERRY

Mr. PERRY. Madam Speaker, I'm honored to recognize Retired Motor Machinists Mate 1st Class (MM) Richard Everett Martin on this most auspicious occasion of his 100th birthday. Growing up in the York Area, MM Martin attended William Penn High School, where he took a machinery and cabinet making course, while holding a job at Weaver Piano company. He split his months during his final high school year, between the factory and school, developing his love of machinery and honest labor. After high school, MM Martin felt a call to serve and use his newfound passion, enlisting in the Navy Reserve in 1942 at the age of 19. Studying at the University of Missouri, as well as traveling to Norfolk and New York City, he completed his training and education to become a Motor Machinist's mate 1st class. He was assigned to the USS LST-325, a landing ship for amphibious assaults. MM Martin was deployed to North Africa, where he would spend one (1) year training along the coast, before taking part in the invasion of Sicily. After a successful landing, during which MM Martin would receive The Purple Heart, the USS LST-325 was deployed to Great Britain to take part in D-Day, where MM Martin, along with thousands of Allied Soldiers, bravely served. MM Martin is the last surviving member of the original crew of the USS LST-325. His story stands as a testimony to true courage, bravery, and service. His service to our Nation reflects great credit not just upon himself, but also upon the Navy Reserve, as well as all those who served in World War II. As he continues to stand as an icon of selflessness, I wish him many more years of happiness and health.

Mr. PERRY

Mr. PERRY. Mr. Speaker, how do you explain that to your constituents? How do you explain, Well, I voted for that because it is important that Washington, D.C., and all these programs needed your money, needed the money that you wake up every day and go to work for. They needed it, and you didn't. Mr. Roy, people in my district pack their lunch at night. They get up early while it is still dark. They kiss their little children that are in their beds asleep while it is still dark, and they leave for work. They count on us here to make sure that we are faithfully, adequately, appropriately, responsibly spending their hard-earned dollars. Mr. Higgins, you talked about this the other day in conference. Your paycheck. People work hard for it, and they depend on us. And what do we do with it? Mr. Roy, give us an example. You got like a thousand of them there. How do we blow it?

Mr. PERRY. Go ahead.

Mr. PERRY. Close to 60; but yet we need another 2 for unaccompanied minors. We don't need the extra 2. You just stop the unaccompanied minors, and you don't need the extra 2. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Higgins).

Mr. PERRY. Mr. Speaker, may I inquire as to how much time I have remaining?

Mr. PERRY. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Roy).

Mr. PERRY. Mr. Speaker, it is my understanding, I think that in the last year and three-quarters, the Biden administration has racked up more debt than the entire 8 years of the Obama administration. We found that unacceptable, but yet here we are. And yet, in this body, on this week, at this time, we are going to vote to just continue like nothing is happening, like that is not happening, like we don't care. We are going to go home and say, if you elect us, all this stuff is going to end. Yet, we have an opportunity in this body to stop it. All the things that the gentleman from Texas outlined, the things that I outlined: The Ukraine funding. The $3 billion for operation allies welcome. The COVID funding. Oh, by the way, the President of the United States said the pandemic is over, but we are going to add more COVID funding in here, right? Can't do without that crisis. Mr. Speaker, all that included, but hardly a whimper out of this town, because it is more important that this town keeps going than the American people get what they asked for, what they elected us for. Mr. Speaker, this is completely unacceptable. I would agree with my colleague from Texas, if Republicans aren't going to fight now-- understand, not one of us is a Democrat. We don't have any authority or majority in this House of Representatives; no majority by Republicans in the Senate. That is the complete legislature. There is no majority of Republicans in the executive branch. That is President Biden. Those are Democrats. How, for the love of the Lord, can Republicans be blamed for voting ``no'' on this tyranny? If Democrats want to continue tyranny, God bless them. They can go explain that to their constituents, to their bosses. But why would Republicans help them? And more importantly, why would Republicans help them when reinforcements are coming right over the horizon. We have an election in 40 days. As Mr. Higgins said, to pass a continuing resolution, to pass a bill that continues this tyranny into December after there is no accountability, people have lost their elections. There is no accountability to offer them yet another opportunity to continue the tyranny.

Mr. PERRY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for making the contrast. Here is what else it is more than: It is actually almost more than Russia's annual military spending. The United States alone, the United States taxpayer alone, is spending more in Ukraine to fight the Russians than Russia's total military budget--not just in Ukraine, their entire military budget. Yet, the budget that we are spending money on, on our border isn't meant to keep our country safe, our national security interest--it is not just national security. My good friend, the gentleman from Texas, lives right down there. He can tell you horror story after horror story about the unsafe conditions that his constituents, his bosses, have to live under every day because this little book, the Constitution of the United States, says that immigration and the border is the job of the Federal Government. But what do you do? What do you do when they don't do the job? What do you do when 53 humans are cooked in a truck in your town? I will tell you. I had lunch at a little diner on my way to Washington, D.C., this week. Good people, hardworking people--you can see the same people probably every day in that diner. I sat down. They are talking about the world's problems, talking about their own problems. They looked at me, complaining, and said: What does it matter? We can't do anything about it. I said: What do you mean you can't do anything about it? What are you asking me for? They said: You are in Congress, and you can't do anything about it. We stand here in this body today knowing all of these problems exist, every single one of them. We can all outline the problems. We all know the challenges our country faces. Yet, in this body, and in the body across the other side of the building, we just want to keep the clocks wound. We just want the trains to run on time. We don't care about all of this other stuff that is happening out there, as long as everything works here in Washington, D.C. Some of the richest counties in the country are right here. Everything is fine in Washington, D.C., but go 100 miles or 3,000 miles away and see how it feels. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Texas.

Mr. PERRY. That is exactly right. I yield to the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Higgins), my good friend.

Mr. PERRY. The gentleman is absolutely right. I am looking at what else is in the CR: $3 billion for Operation Allies Welcome. You know what that is? That is Afghan settlement. For 20 years, for 20 years this country has bled its treasure of humanity, sending our best and brightest to the front, and, of course, your tax dollars. What did we do at the end? We just walked away and gave all that away. We dishonored those who lost their lives, those who came home irreparably damaged, and gave that country $85 billion of premier military hardware, we gave it to hardened terrorists and we gave them a country to operate out of. You know what you get for that? You know what thanks you get? Here is what you get: You get $3 billion for Operation Allies Welcome because we still have to bring people from Afghanistan because the people that we brought initially weren't vetted. We don't know who they were. They just got on the airplane, and now they are living in your community. We pray to God that you are going to be safe. We pray to God that not one of them is a terrorist. But we already know the answer to that, right? We are living on borrowed time. We already know because we have seen it. This is what my friend is talking about with Article I. The Founders gave us the power. You know what they didn't give us in the body? It comes from within. A little bit of courage. A little bit of courage. Right now, we all go out and say we should stop spending money on this and this and this: 87,000 IRS agents, a Department of Justice that is reigning tyranny over our citizens. You know what we did today? We just continued to fund them, hundreds of millions of dollars. To my good friend from Texas, and we are here joined by the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Higgins), another great friend, when I walk around my district, I see people that agree with me, that support me, and I see people that don't like me and would never support me. I have conversations with each one of them. You know what? Not one of them has said, I can't afford my groceries. My electric bill is sitting on the table because I don't have the money to pay for it yet this month. Here is what we need, here is how you fix that, Mr. Perry. Hire 87,000 more IRS agents. Give $250 million to the Department of Justice. That is going to fix my problems. Not one of my constituents has said that to me. How about you, Mr. Roy?

Mr. PERRY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Louisiana. One of the other things that is in this continuing resolution: $1 billion for increased home heating and cooling cost subsidies. Think about that, for subsidies. At the very same moment, the administration, through its policies, is driving your energy costs--electricity, gasoline, diesel--through the roof. They are making you pay more and then they are taking more of your tax dollars to give it out to people who can't afford to pay for it. And people in this body support this? Somehow with a straight face. You think that this is right? I will give you a statistic: The U.S. imports about 20\1/2\ million barrels a day. A tanker ship takes about 190,000 barrels. That is about 50 ships a day. The trip from Saudi to New York is about 6,500 miles. Looking at the burn rate, we are burning about 1 million gallons one way--1 million gallons one way. And this administration would rather do that, tankers from Saudi Arabia, tankers from Venezuela, my goodness, probably tankers from Iran. But heaven forbid, heaven forbid we open the pipeline, any pipeline. They will close as many as they can because somehow they feel good about that.

Mr. PERRY

Mr. PERRY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the good gentleman from Texas (Mr. Roy). He is spot on. It is tyranny. We use euphemisms around this town. We call it loan forgiveness. You took out the loan, and we are going to forgive you paying it back using someone else's money. That is not loan forgiveness. That is socialism. Socialism is tyranny. Taking it, like you said, from some hardworking individual--maybe they wanted to go to college and didn't have the opportunity. Maybe they didn't have the opportunity because they didn't have the money, maybe because of their family situation. It doesn't matter. Maybe they chose not to go to college. They chose not to buy something they didn't want to pay for. Now, the President says we are going to use the Heroes Act. This is a fascinating example. I told my colleagues around here who want to keep on helping, we have to establish comity here--comity, not comedy. It is a comedy, unfortunately. But we have to work together. What will it take for them to understand that every step in good faith that we take is abused by the folks who hate this country and hate us? I hate to use that terminology, but that is where it is. They use the Heroes Act, enacted after 9/11, for those who were sent, who went to fight, who had to give up some of their time to pay for their student loans, pay for their education, use that to forgive these loans for other people who made the decision but apparently didn't intend to pay. That is the definition of tyranny. The good gentleman from Texas (Mr. Roy), my friend, mentioned the arrest in Bucks County. I just remind everybody that, today, this place voted on sending hundreds of millions of dollars to the Department of Justice, like they don't have enough, right? The Department of Justice raided this pastor's house--not just a father of seven but a pastor--at 7 o'clock in the morning, beating on the door. When you don't answer fast enough because maybe you are upstairs in bed and it takes you awhile to figure out what is going on and get your clothes on and get down the stairs because you don't want to be standing out on the front lawn in your skivvies in front of the neighborhood--that is what the FBI does. If you don't get there fast enough, they are going to break down your door. These agents all rush in, arms drawn, pointed at this poor individual. Kids are up on the stairs crying. I don't know how many. Mr. Roy says 25, 24, something. Maybe it was that. Whatever it was, here is what I know it wasn't. It wasn't a phone call to the magistrate. Understand that the court, the State court, already threw this thing out. This gentleman, this individual, was exercising his First Amendment rights. Somebody made a claim. The State court and the police said there is nothing here. The Federal Government said: Look, you people are all domestic terrorists who disagree. You disagree with us, so now you are domestic terrorists. Instead of calling the guy up and saying: Look, the Federal Government wants to arrest you for this. You have never had a record. You are nonviolent. You are going to have to show up at the magistrate's office to be arrested, or we can do it the other way. Which way would you like? Offer the opportunity. The guy is not a convicted drug felon, not a murderer. He has nothing violent in his record. But they break into the house as a show of force, as a show to make sure everybody else in the country knows if you have a differing opinion, don't you dare say it. Don't you dare. That is the definition of tyranny. That is exactly the definition of tyranny. What else can it be? Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Texas.

Mr. PERRY

Mr. PERRY. Mr. Speaker, I would just ask my colleagues, how many more times do we need to see it, the abuse of power by the Department of Justice? I am sure, just like I do, you travel your district, you talk to people. Some agree with you; some don't agree with you. You know what not one person has said to me? Agree or disagree, not one person has said to me: You know what we need, Perry, we need more money for the Department of Justice. Not one. I don't know why that is, but maybe it is because of the abuse of power. I appreciate my colleagues that want to do something with Big Tech. I sure want to do something, too. In about 3 months, the folks who are destroying this country are not going to be in charge around here, and then we can do something meaningful. We don't have to take the bad to get a couple good things. We can just do the good things and leave the bad things out in 3 more months. We do a lot of things in good faith around here, Mr. Speaker. We do a lot of things in good faith. I am tired of having those things abused. People will say: Well, what are you talking about, Perry? I will give you an example. President Biden used the HEROES Act--the HEROES Act made after 9/11 to support people that were called to duty to go and get their education, but they were called to duty. He used that to forgive the loans of all these people that incurred student debt. It is an abuse. First of all, it is not forgiveness. It is Marxism, right? Because you are not forgiven, you are paying for it. It is not forgiveness. How many more times do we need to see it? In good faith. In good faith. In 3 months, Mr. Speaker, under new management here, we can get a great bill instead of some mediocre thing where we have got to accept something terrible, $280 million a year, $1\1/2\ billion more for the abuse of power. Two dozen agents raid a guy's home, a pastor, 7:00 in the morning in Bucks County. Oh, yeah, DOJ needs more money for that, right? You know what they could have done? They could have saved a lot of money. They could have picked up the phone, called the magistrate. The magistrate could have called the pastor and said, You know what, the Federal Government is going to charge you. Show up down here at the office, we need to charge you. And I bet he would have shown up. The guy is not a criminal. More money for that? No way, Mr. President. I urge a ``no'' vote.