National Intelligence Program Operations Continuing Appropriations Resolution, 2014

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 371 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to my good friend, the gentlelady from Rochester, New York (Ms. Slaughter), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.

General Leave

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks.

Mr. Speaker, yesterday, the Rules Committee met and reported a rule for the consideration of 10 different joint resolutions, all of which demonstrate House Republicans' continuing commitment to reopen necessary portions of our government.

The rule is a closed rule, which provides for 40 minutes of debate between the chairman and ranking member of the Committee on Appropriations for each joint resolution. Additionally, the rule provides for 40 minutes of debate between the chairman and ranking member of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform for H.R. 3223, the Federal Employee Retroactive Pay Fairness Act. The rule also provides for a motion to recommit for each bill or joint resolution.

Additionally, the rule extends same-day authority for resolutions reported by the Rules Committee through the legislative day of October 21, 2013, thus continuing to allow the House the flexibility to continue to address the government shutdown. Finally, the rule permits the Speaker to entertain motions to suspend the rules until October 20.

Here we are again, Mr. Speaker--day four of a government shutdown. Unfortunately for the American people, not much has changed. The Senate is still recalcitrant, unwilling to consider legislation that would reopen parts of the government. I do want to add an exception, though, and thank our friends in the upper Chamber for actually agreeing with us to exempt our military from these cuts, both civilian and uniform. The Senate, however, is still unwilling to go to conference to discuss the very serious fiscal issues facing this country. The Senate is also unwilling to consider any of the five pieces of legislation the House passed in the last 2 days, which will reopen parts of our government. Even so, House Republicans continue to bring legislation to the floor to meet the needs of American citizens.

Today's rule will allow for the consideration of resolutions that reopen the Bureau of Indian Education, the Bureau of Indian Affairs, the Indian Health Service, the WIC program, the National Weather Center, FEMA, our intelligence agencies, Impact Aid, Head Start--and the list goes on and on.

In addition, Mr. Speaker, this rule makes clear our commitment to the 800,000 Federal workers currently furloughed that they will, indeed, be paid. It is not their fault that Washington is dysfunctional in that Congress can't agree on the size and scope of government. Yet they are caught in the crossfire, wondering if they will be able to afford their mortgages and pay their utility bills. Mr. Speaker, that simply isn't fair. H.R. 3223, of which I am a proud cosponsor, would codify what we have done in every previous government shutdown: pay our Federal employees from the date on which the government shut down.

I particularly want to compliment in a bipartisan fashion our friends Mr. Moran and Mr. Wolf, who worked together on this measure, who brought it forward and gathered many dozens of cosponsors from both sides of the aisle. Quite frankly, I think their example of bipartisanship and working together is something that we could all learn from.

Mr. Speaker, Democrats and Republicans alike agree that that's the responsible thing to do. House Republicans are working to deal with the real-world problems of our constituents. Republicans are working to reopen the government. However, we lack a willing partner in the Senate and in the President. Every time we have attempted to negotiate with them, they have told us to accept their plan. They have even rebuffed our attempts to go to conference. Therefore, House Republicans have been left with little choice except that of passing a number of smaller bills to see if the Senate would be willing to accept those. Again, I remark on one occasion, with respect to the military, that they

did, indeed, accept one, so I would urge them to do that with the others.

I urge support for the rule and the underlying legislation, and I reserve the balance of my time.

I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I want to address a couple of points that my good friend raises; but before I do, I want to agree with her in that I think we all think the government ought to be open. I, actually, don't think there is much division about that, and folks have actually tried to do that. On our side of the aisle, every single piece of legislation we've brought to the floor during this period has either kept the government open in whole or in part, and I suspect we will continue to try and do that. So it's not the aim of either side here to shut down the government.

In terms of the Affordable Health Care Act, I certainly don't support it--I voted against it, and voted multiple times to repeal it and delay it--but I'll agree with my good friend on that, too, in the sense that there are times when we have actually worked together on both sides of the aisle to change it. My friends like to quite often mention there have been 41 or 42 efforts to repeal, delay, defund the bill; but they usually forget to add--and, quite frankly, some people on our side of the aisle forget to add--that seven of those have actually succeeded, that is, a Democratic Senate and a Democratic President agreed with them.

The proposals that we have on the table now in terms of the Affordable Health Care Act are immanently sensible and overwhelmingly popular. To put it quite simply, we just don't think that political appointees and elected officials ought to be treated differently

than other Americans. Now, we can get into a big fight about health care; but the reality is, right now, under the law, Members of Congress and their staffs can bring subsidies with them onto the exchange. No other American can do that. We can do this either way as far as I'm concerned. I could leave them back as Federal employees, and they could be treated like every other Federal employee--that's the acceptable solution to me at least--or we could allow other Americans to bring subsidies onto the exchange just like Members of Congress; but the underlying principle is that we ought to treat them all the same. Washington political appointees shouldn't be treated differently than the average American.

The second thing is, I think, very simple. We're not talking about delaying all of ObamaCare; but if we are going to allow big businesses to wait a year before they implement what they're required to do--if we are going to allow 1,100 organizations and many labor unions to do it-- why shouldn't we allow the average American, at his choice, to delay it as well?

They don't want to delay. They can go onto the exchanges. The subsidies are still there. The tax programs are still there. Why shouldn't the average American have the same privilege that we've bestowed on Big Business, Big Labor, and countless organizations? That's what we're talking about.

To my friend's point here--and I suspect this is true of the debt ceiling a little bit further down the road--the Democratic approach is very simple: do everything I want, and then I'm willing to negotiate. We would like to sit down and talk now and see if we could find some common ground. We've got negotiators, conferees--the technical title-- available to sit down and find common ground. We're not asking for something that is unreasonable, in my view. We're certainly not proposing something that is outside the scope of the type of things we've been able to agree on before.

The President, I want to add, is taking the same approach that the Senate has taken with regard to the continuing resolution with the debt ceiling. He has just simply said we have to raise it unilaterally. That's not a particularly popular vote, probably on either side of the aisle. It's certainly not on my side of the aisle.

I'm willing to work with the President on the debt ceiling. I did it in 2011. And I want to note for the record, that is something he never did when he was a Member of the United States Senate. He didn't vote to raise the debt ceiling when he had the opportunity to do it. Instead, he engaged in a lecture about debt. It probably was a lecture that was needed. Regardless, he did not do for George Bush what he's asking us to do for him.

I'm willing to do that. I'm willing to work with him on the debt ceiling. If you voted for the Ryan budget, you envisioned the debt ceiling as being something that has to be raised while you deal with the underlying deficit. I do want to do something or be in a negotiation with the President about what to do on that deficit. I don't think that's an unreasonable position.

I think the real central issue in this is not the Affordable Care Act, not the debt ceiling, and, frankly, not even the government shutdown, as serious as that is. The real issue is whether my friends and the President of the United States will simply come to the table to negotiate. Will they put a counterproposal out there, or is it simply going to be: We insist in getting our way, in full, all the time? I don't think that's an acceptable way to arrive at common ground, and I don't think it's likely to succeed.

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

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

Just a quick point. My friend is always quite eloquent, and I know, frankly, very passionate and very well-meaning and very expert when he talks about nutrition programs, where he spent a great deal of time.

For the record, it's worth noting that we have increased nutrition programs broadly by 400 percent since George Bush became President. We doubled them, roughly, when Bush was President. Doubled them again since President Obama has been in office. What the Republican program is talking about is a 5 percent cut after a 400 percent increase based on reforms. I think it's maybe not quite so dire.

Again, I recognize my friend's good work in this area and hope that we have an opportunity to get to conference, have that discussion. I suspect the bill, if it comes back, may be closer to his liking than the bill that went out.

I yield to the gentleman from Massachusetts.

Reclaiming my time, the rolls have been going up in a period we're supposed to be recovering. I think we have some genuine problems in this program in terms of reform. Again, that's the initial proposal. It's not out of bounds considering a 400 percent increase to have a 5 percent cutback. We'll wait and see what comes out of the conference committee.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Woodall), my good friend and fellow member of the Rules Committee.

I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Georgia.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to my good friend from the great State of Florida (Mr. Mica).

I yield my friend from Florida an additional 1 minute.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to my good friend from Kentucky, the Honorable Hal Rogers, the distinguished chairman of the Appropriations Committee.

Certainly.

Will the gentleman yield?

Mr. Chairman, we schedule a conference, we go to conference, and we try to negotiate our differences.

If the gentleman will yield, no, Mr. Chairman, I do not. I would just highly recommend to my friends we do, since it seems to be a good way to resolve our differences.

Mr. Speaker, I have some good news I want to announce here just shortly.

But I want to note, for the record, my friends quite often make the point that they don't like a piecemeal approach. The reality is, if you look at actions, sometimes they do. They like it until they don't.

I would point out we had, of course, H.R. 3210 here, which funded the military, by our good friend from Colorado (Mr. Coffman). I think, in a very bipartisan way, we voted overwhelmingly on both sides to fund the military and most of the contracting and civilian employees.

There is a little disagreement with the administration about that right now, but that's half the discretionary budget taken care of in a ``piecemeal approach.''

Today the administration just announced, and I commend them for doing it, and I commend my friend because she announced she was going to be supportive of this too, and I think we all are. It was very evident in the Rules Committee, H.R. 3223, the Federal Employee Retroactive Pay Fairness Act.

The administration's just announced that they're going to support that legislation. The President looks forward to signing it, and that's a bipartisan agreement between both sides and, frankly, a product of the work of our mutual good friends, the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Moran) and the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Wolf), who found common ground and, in a piecemeal approach, moved us closer to a solution.

So I think that's maybe not the greatest news in the world, but on a day where there's not as much good as we would all like, some good news. And I would hope my friends would look at the individual pieces of legislation that are coming, where we mostly agree, and accept those.

We don't have to agree on everything, as the point's been made by several, to agree on some things. Those are areas that we do agree. And if we can fund our military in this fashion, and if we can make sure that our Federal employees are not going to lose any pay, retroactively, certainly, one step at a time, we can walk in the right direction and turn back on critical parts of our government. I hope that's what we're moving toward, Mr. Speaker.

So my friend knows, I'm quite prepared to close whenever she wishes to close.

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

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

I want to thank my good friend from New York. She's always a terrific, frankly, counterpoint and debater, and we agree on some things. We both agree that the government shutdown's not a good thing.

Frankly, there's a strong bipartisan agreement. It's not something that either side wished to achieve, and it's something we ought to be working together, step by step, to try and undo; and, frankly, we've made a little bit of progress.

Again, the idea that it never works to work piecemeal, it certainly did with respect to the United States military, civilian defense force, and contractors. That's exactly what we did.

We passed something out of here; and the Senate, which said it wasn't going to agree to anything, magically did.

Now we're going to, hopefully, eventually pass H.R. 3223 out of here to guarantee back pay. I think most people on both sides of the aisle will support that. The President's indicated he'll sign it, which suggests to me that the Senate will probably take it up and move on it. So, voila.

Once again, just working through the process, we've found something that we can agree on. The differences here should not be so great that they can't be bridged.

Just to remind everyone of the history, we have placed multiple offers concerning the Affordable Care Act before the Senate. The last offer seems to me something that we ought to be able to agree on, or certainly be willing to sit down and discuss. It only has two points, and it's basically a question of fairness.

Why should Members of Congress and high appointees in the executive branch and our staffs go into the exchange and be able to bring subsidies with us, when no other American can do that?

It's just not fair.

Now, we could amend the law and let everybody come into the exchanges with subsidies. That would be fair. Or we could say, you know, really, Members of Congress and their staff are at a fundamental level employees of the Federal Government and they ought to be in that, and that would be fair. But let's treat everybody the same.

More fundamentally, currently, the President has unilaterally decided to exempt 1,100-plus organizations. He's unilaterally, in a questionable measure, constitutionally, decided to suspend parts of the law for a year and exempt Big Business.

We think, gosh, if you're going to do that, shouldn't every single American have the right to decide whether or not they want to participate in this for just 1 year until everybody is actually operating under the same system?

That too is a question of fairness. Give every individual American the same relief from a mandate that you're giving Big Business and Big Labor. It just seems to me commonsensical.

It doesn't mean you have to stop the exchanges.

You don't have to undo the program. Just treat everybody the same. Be fair. That's the Republican proposal in front of the Senate right now, and, frankly, I think they probably don't want to discuss it because it's a hard one to say ``no'' to because it's fundamentally fair. And that's all we've asked, is that the Senate, which has rejected it, at least come to conference and talk about it.

The real issue here beyond the questions of policy is whether the Senate is going to be allowed to dictate unilaterally what the House does. Is it just going to say, no, you've to do it our way? We're not going to negotiate. We're not going to go to conference. We're not going to deal with you. You have to do it our way. That's not the way the system was set up.

My friend, Chairman Rogers, pointed that out quite succinctly. We've got a way to handle this. It's called go to conference, argue, and work out the differences. And I suspect we're going to see the same thing a little bit down the road from the President, who's told us and told the Speaker this week, I'm not going to negotiate with you on raising the debt ceiling in the United States. You just have to do it unilaterally. You have to put the country further into debt without any discussion of what we can do to change the trajectory of that debt.

Now, that's a remarkable change from where he was in August of 2011. A remarkable change. He was in a very different place and position and was willing to sit down and talk. I don't know why he would change that now.

So I think we should do something in this bill to build on this piecemeal approach. We should pass these different measures. We agree these parts of government ought to be open; and we should continue to work through, conference with our friends in the Senate and ultimately in negotiation with the President of the United States on the debt ceiling.

And so I urge the adoption of this rule.

In closing, I'd like to, again, say that one of the basic functions of Congress is to fund government. This rule would allow 10 or more pieces of that government to open again to provide for crucial services that they provide. I would urge my colleagues to support this rule and the underlying legislation.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the resolution.

Mr. Speaker, I thank my good friend for yielding me the time, and I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Unless the silent Members of the majority speak up, today's debate is a fait accompli.

For the last 2 days, Members of the majority have said publicly that they wish this government shutdown would end. In fact, a coalition of more than 218 Democrats and Republicans has publicly declared that it is ready to vote on the clean Senate CR. This 218 would be the majority, and we would pass it; and that's why the powerful minority, who has taken the government hostage, is doing all it can again today to prevent the Senate CR from coming to the House floor. It doesn't make any sense. Not only doesn't it make any sense; but, actually, were we to do that, we wouldn't have to be here today, trying to do these piecemeal pieces.

Last night, the Rules Committee proposed a rule for these 11 piecemeal funding bills before us today. They didn't go through a single meeting of a committee. At least, in the committee process, the subcommittees and committees would have given both Republicans and Democrats an opportunity to weigh in on these measures. Remember that half the population of the United States is represented by Democrats and that, in the last election, Democrat candidates for Congress achieved a million more votes than our Republican friends, but we are shut out of the process. Indeed, these bills were written yesterday afternoon and were brought straight to the Rules Committee, as so many are lately, in order to be rushed to the floor.

During our hearing, a colleague promised that the reckless approach would continue, even suggesting that we could see 150 more of these piecemeal bills before the majority agrees to end the government shutdown. That should take us to, maybe, October of next year. Yet, while they're willing to take 150 votes on bills the President would veto--and everybody knows the President would veto them--and the Senate would reject, they haven't allowed a single vote on the cure to the problem: bring up the CR, and put the government back to work.

Fortunately for the American people, no minority--no matter how powerful--can stop the will of the House if we exercise it. Unlike the Senate, a majority in the House can only be held back for so long. Thanks to the democratic spirit baked into our Chamber's rules, the majority will always succeed. For the more than 218 Members--a majority who has expressed a desire to vote on the clean CR--our most powerful tool is voting down the previous question and bringing the clean Senate CR to the floor to vote on.

Now, earlier this week, my Democrat colleagues and I urged the Chamber to vote ``no'' on the previous question so that we could bring the Senate bill to the floor. Not a single Republican joined our cause. Today, we are going to give you another chance. Following the debate on the rule, we will have a chance to vote down the previous question. While that may simply be legislative language to most people, what that will do is give us an opportunity--those of us who very strongly believe this government should work--to bring the CR, bring the shutdown to a close and put everybody back to work. I want to see by the end of this day that we can accomplish that, because words are no longer enough. Those Members of the majority who claim that they want to end the government shutdown get the opportunity today to stand up and vote. As I said the other day when we had the same opportunity, I would like them to put their voting cards where their mouths are.

Over the next hour, I encourage every Member of this Chamber to reflect on the damage that has already been wrought on our Nation because of the shutdown and on the damage that will ensue if we wait another day. The shutdown is costing the Nation $300 million a day, and more than 800,000 workers are furloughed without pay. Today, we are going to vote--and, I think, almost unanimously--to pay them when the shutdown ends. A logical person would say, Why don't you bring them back to work? If they're going to be paid anyway, let them work. There is no answer for that. There must be some reason here that is available to only a few people as to why the majority wants to keep the government shut down.

We have to also end this because our State Department and intelligence employees need to go back on the job. A hurricane is bearing down right now on the State of Louisiana while 80 percent of the FEMA workers are furloughed. NASA had to turn off the Mars Rover, which was giving us so much information about the universe--stopping all the space exploration in its tracks.

I think one of the best things I've read to describe what we are doing in this House was said by a Republican. Because there is no plan here--there is no end game here--he is saying that what they are doing is laying the track ahead of the speeding train as it bears down on them.

The majority started the shutdown because they were dead set on repealing the Affordable Care Act; and I think, by doing this piecemeal, they think they can still do that. Throughout the process, they have issued dire predictions about the health care law and have warned that the law would hurt American workers. It is absolutely turning out not to be true.

In the last week, two of our Nation's biggest companies have responded to the Affordable Care Act by giving tens of thousands of their part-time employees full-time jobs. Guess who they are? One is the largest employer in the United States--Walmart. They are raising 35,000 of their part-time employees to become full-time employees in order to make them eligible for health insurance. Walt Disney announced that 427 employees at Disney World who have been hired as full-time employees will be given access to the health insurance plan. We also hear all the time--and I've really got to research this--that Delta Air Lines has said, they tell me, that the affordable care plan would cost them $100 million a year. I surely would like to know how that's possible unless they plan to hire 70 million new employees, which would certainly be good for employment, but I see no earthly reason for them to do that. We need to know whether that's true or not since all of the rest of the dire predictions have turned out not to be.

The Affordable Care Act is working; but because of the majority, the government is not, and it's time for the majority to give up this losing game. I strongly urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on the rule and on the underlying legislation; and, so importantly, I urge a ``no'' vote on the previous question. Then, Mr. Speaker, we can bring the clean Senate CR to the House floor, as we should have done weeks ago, and end this government shutdown today.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I'm so pleased to yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern), our incredible member of the Committee on Rules.

Mr. Speaker, I'm delighted to yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer), the Democratic whip.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 45 seconds.

My colleagues have confused the fact that they have gone around saying how, indeed, throughout August and all the rest of this time, that they don't want to shut down the House, in some hope, I guess, that nobody would understand that when they shut down the House, that they had actually done it.

Now what my colleague is talking about from the Democrat side, what they are saying, let's do what we agree with, they are taking their word for it that you didn't want to shut down the House. So let's not do it. You cannot superimpose that notion onto the idea of setting up this government by dribs and drabs. None of us are for that. The Senate won't do it. You know this is an exercise in futility. But pretty soon, the previous question is coming up. You are going to have a chance to do what you said you didn't want to do, shut down the House. But I understand from what you have said that because of health care, because of health care and what you think it has done to people in your district, you are holding this country hostage.

I don't have the time. My time has been given out.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I am feeling quite badly. I didn't know how much time I had remaining.

I am happy to yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Mica), if he would like.

I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Danny K. Davis) a member of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.

Mr. Speaker, I just want to say that regular order has not been the order of business in this House for a long time.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Farr), ranking member of the Appropriations Subcommittee on Agriculture.

Mr. Speaker, I believe I've only got one more speaker in the room, so I wanted to inform my colleague that, after Mr. Andrews, I may be prepared to close.

I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Andrews).

(Mr. ANDREWS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

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

I am absolutely going to vote to retroactively fund the Federal employees because that's the best I can do, on that one issue. It is a matter of basic fairness, but it is not good enough.

The fact is that the Federal employees will not get paid their retroactive money until after all this charade is over. We have no idea when that's going to be.

Let me reiterate again what all my colleagues have said: we can do it right now, put them back to work and let them get their paycheck.

I'm embarrassed every time I pass the Capitol Police at what's happening to them. It bothers me terribly to hear my friends at the State Department say that they're working on fumes.

We cannot run the Government of the United States, which is the beacon of democracy, has been the pattern for countries all over the world, by saying we're going to fund this piece over there and that piece over there, and we don't care what happens to the rest of it. That's not what we are here for.

Certainly, we will fund that one piece; but I can tell you right now, the Democrats are not going to do any of the rest of it because the Senate is not going to take it up and the President is not going to sign it.

We are simply wasting time, and we're taking up valuable time, and we are worrying the country half to death.

For heaven's sake, when we do this previous question, let us do the right thing. Vote ``no'' and get all these folks back to work.

Does it literally make sense to anybody who either manages a household or their own business that we would say to everybody, go home and rest around here or there; we'll pay you later when we decide you can come back, for not being here. That makes absolutely no sense.

Let them go back to work. We're going to pay them. Pay them now for the work they're doing. Pay concurrently with work.

Doesn't that make more sense?

Does it really make any sense at all that we're saying to them, we have no idea what the end game is here. You may be sitting around for a very long time, while the country pays $300 million a day of the cost of the shutdown.

For heaven's sake, I would say once again that we have to do this previous question today. We have to stop this nonsense. It is humiliating us. We cannot go on with this another week.

We're only here today to try to make it look like we're doing something because the government's shut down, and we know it. Those bills that we're voting on today had no committee action, nothing. The Senate has made perfectly clear they're not going to take them up. They will not become law, as every school child knows.

Now, those who vote ``no'' on ordering the previous question will be giving this Chamber what the leadership of the majority has not, and that will be the real chance to vote this down so that we can put the CR on the calendar and stop the shutdown now, today.

It doesn't have to go back to the Senate. The President's waiting for it.

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.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues, I beg my colleagues, I do implore my colleagues, for goodness sakes, come to the floor, defeat the previous question. Vote ``no.''

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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

Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from the Rules Committee for yielding me the time.

Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest to what my friend, the minority whip, just said. He said, There are things that we agree on, why can't we get those things done? I would say that every single Member that the majority whip pointed out that said, I know they're going to vote for that, I know they're going to vote for that, I know they're going to vote for that--we have an opportunity today to vote to reopen parts of the Department of Homeland Security. I know we agree on that. Let's do that. We have the opportunity under this rule to go ahead and fund the WIC program. I know we agree on that. Let's do that.

I didn't come to that conclusion on my own, Mr. Speaker. I sit in the Rules Committee, and I listen to my colleagues. This happens to be a statement from the minority whip in a Rules Committee hearing. He said this: ``The American people are obviously deeply distressed. They are distressed that when they see agreement, that that agreement is not made into law. We don't have an agreement on everything, but we do have an agreement. Let's move forward on that which we agree.''

I agree. Every single provision that we are bringing to the floor today, I say, Mr. Speaker, is something on which we agree.

I would be happy to yield if I have time remaining. The gentleman knows I would be happy to yield, and I absolutely will.

Let us move forward on that with which we agree. There is not one provision in this rule on which we disagree. And Mr. Speaker, you will not hear anyone on this floor say otherwise.

But it's not just the minority whip, who I would very much like to yield to if I have time remaining; it's the minority leader. The same Rules Committee hearing: ``Here is a place where we are all in agreement. Whatever else we have, we can continue that conversation later.''

``We can continue that conversation later.'' Let's do what we all agree on.

I agree with my friend, the minority whip. I agree with the minority leader.

As I have said to my friend very respectfully, if I have time remaining at the end, I would be happy to yield. But at the moment, I do not. Very respectfully to my friend.

And it's not just my friend, the minority whip. It's not just the minority leader. It's President Barack Obama: ``I want the American people to urge Congress soon to begin the work we have by doing what we all agree on. We already all agree on making sure middle class taxes don't go up. So let's get that done.''

We did. Now some Republicans voted ``no,'' and some Democrats voted ``no.'' But the Chamber came together, and we got that done. We're in the same place today, Mr. Speaker.

If one of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle disagrees with any one of these provisions, believes any one of these provisions is not worthy of their vote, if they do not affirmatively want to see these programs reopen, I would like to hear that from my friends. But Mr. Speaker, they do.

I thank my friend for yielding.

I now yield to my friend from Maryland, the minority whip.

Reclaiming my time, I will say to my friend, I spent the entire month of August at every town hall meeting I could find, telling folks that government shutdowns were not the right plan for this Nation.

Reclaiming my time, Mr. Speaker, I would say to the gentleman that, no, we do not agree because the gentleman wants to continue to support those programs that are putting workers in my district out of work. They want to continue to support those programs that are taking health insurance away from families in my district. They want to continue to support those programs that we know are broken.

Folks, my constituency wants to do away with preexisting conditions. My constituency wants to ensure that every child has access to health coverage. But my constituency does not understand why we had to re- regulate the entire health care industry, destroying the 40-hour workweek, as my union friends have said, destroying quality health care plans that folks in my district have had but have now lost, breaking the promise the President made that if you like your health insurance, you can keep it. There's not a man or woman in this room that believes that promise has been kept. We were duped, Mr. Speaker, by that promise.

Today, however, we have straightforward, narrow bills. Not 2,400 pages of legislation, Mr. Speaker, but one idea at a time. Stand up, Mr. Speaker. Who doesn't believe that the Department of Homeland Security, focused on our Nation's security, should be funded? Stand up, and vote ``no.'' But you believe that it should be, and you're going to vote ``no'' anyway.

Who doesn't believe that the Impact Aid Program from the Department of Education which helps children not just in my district but in every district, Mr. Speaker, who doesn't believe that ought to be funded? The truth is, everyone believes that ought to be funded. And yet they are going to stand up today and vote ``no'' anyway. They are encouraged to vote ``no'' by leadership. It's disappointing to me, Mr. Speaker.

I'm disappointed we can't agree on everything, but I recognize that we can't. I know that we agree on most things. Let's do those things on which we agree. Don't take my word for it. Take President Obama's word for it. Let's begin the work we have by doing what we all agree on. Take Nancy Pelosi's word for it--let's do what we all agree on. We can continue the rest of that conversation later. Let's do what my good friend, the minority whip, who just left the floor, said: We don't have an agreement on everything, but we do have an agreement. Let's move forward on that with which we agree. I could not agree more, Mr. Speaker.

I urge a strong ``yes'' vote for this rule and a strong ``yes'' vote for every single underlying provision.

Will the gentlelady yield?

Mr. Speaker, could the Chair tell me how much time the gentlewoman from New York has remaining?

Mr. Speaker, I again rise in strong opposition to the rule and the underlying resolution.

I oppose this rule because it is not a serious effort to end the government shutdown engineered by House Republicans by cherry-picking some programs to fund while leaving unfunded other programs critical to our nation and its future.

Both President Obama and Senate Majority Leader Reid have made it crystal clear that they will not accept this game-playing because the piecemeal strategy now being pursued by House Republicans is not an honest or serious option to reopen the government and will not end the impacts of this shutdown that extend across our country.

Mr. Speaker, USA Today said it best and I quote:

House Republicans who forced the government closure offered

to reopen some of the most popular programs, such as the

Department of Veterans Affairs, on a piecemeal basis. It's

like seizing a school bus full of kids then offering to

release the cutest ones. The mounting toll will increasingly

expose the shutdown's foolishness. The sooner the Republicans

free all their hostages, the better.

Initially, our friends across the aisle were content to take the whole nation hostage by refusing to fund the government unless the Affordable Care Act was defunded. That effort failed. Undaunted, House Republicans tried again. The effort failed again.

This past Monday, the House Republicans refused for the third time to take up and vote on the clean CR passed by the Senate last week, and which the President has stated publicly on several occasions he would sign.

Instead House Republicans voted to shut down the government.

Now faced with strong public backlash--more than 70% of Americans disapproving of the government shutdown engineered by the House Republicans, the majority is trying to extricate themselves from this debacle by bringing to the floor and passing ``mini-CRs'' providing minimal funding for the following programs that enjoy strong and broad public support:

(1) Nutrition Assistance for Low-Income Women and Children Act (H.J. Res. 75);

(2) Nuclear Weapon Security & Non-Proliferation Act, (H.J. Res. 76);

(3) Food and Drug Safety Act (H.J. Res. 77);

(4) Preserving Our Intelligence Capabilities Act (H.J. Res. 78);

(5). Border Safety & Security Act (H.J. Res. 79);

(6) American Indian and Alaska Native, Health, Education, and Safety Act (H.J. Res. 80);

(7) National Weather Monitoring Act (H.J. Res. 82);

(8) Impact Aid for Local Schools Act (H.J. Res. 83);

(9) Head Start for Low-Income Children Act (H.J. Res. 84);

(10) National Emergency and Disaster Recovery Act (H.J. Res. 85); and

H.R. 3223--Federal Employee Retroactive Pay Fairness Act (H.R. 3223).

Mr. Speaker, these ploys are a cynical waste of time giving false hope to innocent Americans who depend on the services provided by these programs. But House Republicans know they have no chance whatsoever of becoming law. The Senate will not pass them and the President would veto these piece-meal measures if they made it to his desk.

All we are doing is wasting time when we should be helping people.

We need to pass the clean CR approved by the Senate so we can keep our promises to our veterans, as well as the doctors, nurses, and hospital workers who take care of our wounded and healthy warriors.

We need to pass the clean CR approved by the Senate so we can fund our engineers and technicians who maintain all of our critical military equipment to keep our troops safe and take care of national security infrastructure.

We need to pass the clean CR approved by the Senate so we can fund our IT security folks who protect us from cyber-attacks, and our astronauts who risk their lives to push the technical boundaries of knowledge for all mankind.

These exceptional Americans, and the people who depend on them and benefit from their work, do not deserve to have been locked out of their workplaces since Tuesday.

These exceptional Americans deserve a Congress that does its job and keeps America open for business.

For these reasons and Tore, I oppose this rule and the underlying amendments it makes in order and urge my colleagues to join me in urging the passage of H.J. Res. 59 as amended by the Senate so that the federal government will reopen for business to serve the American people and end the disruption in the lives of 800,000 dedicated workers who take pride in the greatest jobs in the world: serving the American people.

I thank the distinguished ranking member for the time.

Mr. Speaker, here we are on day 4 of the Republican shutdown of the people's government.

The other day after meeting with the President at the White House, Speaker Boehner said:

At some point, we've got to allow the process that our

Founders gave us to work out.

Mr. Speaker, I've studied American history, too, and what the Republican leadership is doing with this rule is a million miles away from what the Founders had in mind.

I'm comforted that Speaker Boehner has said privately that he wants to extend the debt ceiling. He also said he didn't want to shut down the government, yet here we are. I don't know what Senator Cruz is saying privately, which is important, because he's apparently calling all the shots around here.

The rule before us today extends martial law rule until October 21. They have decided that they have the right to throw the rules and traditions of this House into the trash can for the next 2\1/2\ weeks. That's 4 days after we default on our obligations. That should make all of us very nervous.

The rule also makes in order 11 separate bills--many of which were never considered in committee or on the House floor--under a closed process with no amendments. I've been on and around the Rules Committee for quite a few years, Mr. Speaker, but I have never seen a rule like this.

I find it astounding that the Republicans have suddenly found religion on the need to go to conference on the budget, because for months and months and months and months they have refused to appoint budget negotiators. Suddenly, as the American people rise up in outrage over their tactics and their poll numbers fall off a cliff, my Republican friends all of the sudden now want to negotiate.

There's a very easy way to get past this: bring up the short-term clean continuing resolution that has already passed the Senate--at Republican sequester numbers, no less--and we will pass it with a bipartisan vote and end this unnecessary, harmful Republican shutdown. It is simple.

Mr. Speaker, not only is this process awful, so are many of the bills made in order under this rule. I want to talk about one in particular, the one that provides funding for WIC, the Women, Infants, and Children Nutrition Program. After months of trying to cut $40 billion from the SNAP program, after months of demonizing poor people, after months of trying to slash food assistance programs across the board, Republicans would like us all to believe that they care about hunger in America all of the sudden.

Give me a break. Give me a break, Mr. Speaker. I say to my Republican friends: Where have you been? Where have you been on this issue?

Because of the sequester, we've already seen WIC clinics close and participation in the program fall. That means that fewer and fewer low- income women and children are getting help, the nutritious food that they need. This bill does not fix that.

The National WIC Association urges the House to oppose H.J. Res. 75, calling it ``a cynical ploy to use low-income, nutritionally at-risk mothers and young children as political pawns for political ends.'' They are right, Mr. Speaker, this is a cynical ploy.

Enough is enough. I urge my colleagues to defeat this rule, pass the clean CR, and let the American people get on with their lives.

I would say to the Speaker of the House that all you need to do is schedule a vote. You don't even have to vote for it. If you schedule it, it will pass in a bipartisan manner and we can end this shutdown once and for all.

Please, Mr. Speaker, practice a little democracy in the people's House. Please, Mr. Speaker, give us a vote.

Will the gentleman yield?

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

My objection with the Republican approach to the SNAP program is that 3.8 million people will lose their benefits, 170,000 veterans would lose their benefits, and we have a problem with hunger in America. We have close to 50 million people who are hungry, and 17 million are kids. We should all be ashamed of that. We should be coming together to solve the problem and not making it worse. That's where my frustration comes from.