Border Security and Enforcement 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, pursuant to House Resolution 371, I call up the joint resolution (H.J. Res. 79) making continuing appropriations for certain components of the Department of Homeland Security for fiscal year 2014, and for other purposes, and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on H.J. Res. 79, and that I may include tabular material on the same.

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

I rise to present the House with a bill that sustains our critical border security and enforcement operations within the Department of Homeland Security.

Right now, at this very moment, there are brave men and women patrolling our borders, manning our ports of entry, and conducting border enforcement, drug interdiction and investigative missions, but they are not being paid.

Right now, at this very moment, border security and enforcement operations are being conducted but with minimal essential personnel.

Right now, at this very moment, the National Targeting Center, at which Customs and Border Protection officers check traveler watch lists and ensure that dangerous criminals and cargo never reach American soil, is operating, but its personnel are not being paid.

Right now, at this very moment, the E-Verify system is not operating, making it impossible for employers to check the lawful immigration status of potential employees.

So this bill before us provides for continuing appropriations to ensure that frontline agents along our borders receive their pay and that certain components of DHS can carry out their border security and enforcement missions at full strength.

Let me remind my colleagues that our border is not secure. In fact, our border is constantly under siege from smugglers and traffickers alike, and it is our duty to ensure that sufficient resources are provided to carry out the necessary security, enforcement and interdiction efforts. That is precisely what this bill does.

This bill ensures that Border Patrol can fully conduct its operations from San Diego to Brownsville and all along our northern border as well. This bill ensures that ICE can fully conduct its investigations. This bill ensures that the Coast Guard can fully conduct interdiction in both the source and transit zones and off the coasts of California, Texas, Florida, and all maritime approaches to the United States. This bill ensures that our immigration verification and biometric identity systems are up and running. This bill also takes steps to turn on our E-Verify system.

Mr. Speaker, all of us are aware that the government is shut down despite the numerous attempts to move forward. We have repeatedly offered versions of continuing resolutions to sustain the government's operations, but to no avail. Furthermore, we have offered to negotiate, to convene a conference and work out the differences in a professional and orderly manner, but such offers have been refused out of hand.

This bill is yet another offer to the other side of the aisle to at least fund vital components of the government. We have a duty to ensure our borders and coastlines are safe and secure and that our laws are being enforced. This bill does this without increasing the rate of spending and in a manner entirely consistent with the text of the noncontroversial H.J. Res. 59. In short, the bill before us is about getting our priorities right.

It is my hope that the passage of this bill will not only support our border security and frontline agencies but will also lead to the reopening of the entire Federal Government.

In closing, I urge my friends on the other side of the aisle to lower their partisan blinders, to come to the table and work out the current impasse so that we can get on with the business of fixing our Nation's budgetary mess.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Rogers), the chairman of the Appropriations Committee.

Mr. Speaker, at this time, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. McCaul), the chairman of the authorizing Committee on Homeland Security.

Mr. Speaker, at this time, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Michigan, Candice Miller, vice chairman of the House Committee on Homeland Security and the chairperson of the Subcommittee on Border and Maritime Security and a member of the great class of 2002.

Mr. Speaker, at this time, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Culberson), my colleague, the chairman of the Military Construction and Veterans Affairs Subcommittee of the Appropriations Committee and a hardworking member of our subcommittee.

Mr. Speaker, may I inquire if my colleague has any more speakers.

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

Mr. Speaker, if anyone has been watching what has gone on in this House for the last couple of weeks and this week, it reminds me of the movie ``Groundhog Day.'' The alarm rings, and we stand up and we do the same thing and we hear the same arguments consistently. I mean, you could have just heard this argument, and that is the argument that has been made throughout the entire almost-2 weeks now. So maybe it is time to talk about something that is called regular order in this House of Representatives.

We have something called the appropriations process. We divide up the funding of the government into 12 sections, and we have classification of those sections and each subcommittee presents a bill to the committee for the funding of a certain Department. In our case, Mr. Price and I deal with Homeland Security. That bill is then brought to the floor and passed by the floor after it passes out of regular committee, and then it is sent to our colleagues in the Senate on the other side of this great building. At that point in time, normal procedure would be for them to deal with the appropriations process on their side.

So I can't speak for all of government, but I certainly can speak for Homeland Security, and Mr. Price, I don't think, would dispute this: we passed our bill out of the House. So we don't even need to be here today, and we shouldn't even have needed to be here last week when we were here because, quite frankly, we have given a bill to deal with the problems of financing and supporting those people who defend our borders and all of the other things that we take care of in Homeland, and it has been sitting on the desk of Mr. Harry Reid in the Senate since June of this year, a long time before this so-called crisis arose. We could have it completely passed and signed by the President if the Senate

had just done regular order. But they haven't.

So as it relates to the issues we discuss here today, the reason these issues even come up is that the Democrat-controlled Senate has not done their job, and they have not dealt with the appropriations process.

Today, as last week, we are dealing with an important portion of this process. It is so important that the very security of our Nation depends upon a secure border. The great debate that has gone on for 3 or 4 years, recent years as we look at the overall immigration crisis, is: What about the security of our borders?

We have spent billions of dollars making it as secure as we can, and we will continue to secure those borders. All we think we should do is pay the people that are doing the job now and get the border secure. This is important to the future of our Nation.

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

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

Have we had enough yet?

The American people are fed up with partisan games and procedural gimmicks. They see right through them, and they are demanding that we come together and get the government back to work today.

If the Speaker of the House is so sure that the votes for a clean funding bill are not there, he should call the vote to prove it to the American people. But he won't do that, because everyone in this Chamber knows that the Senate-passed continuing resolution would clear this House in a heartbeat and end this Tea Party-fueled dream of government collapse.

Today, the majority has decided that the government function they want to give political cover to is border security. Border security, obviously, was not very high on their list. We have had to wait 10 days before they have gotten around to it.

Of course, the question remains: Why didn't they think more about border security or cancer research or the national parks or women's and children's nutrition when they were shutting the government down in the first place last Monday? Ten days late and billions of dollars short, you might say.

As someone who has worked for years in a bipartisan spirit to secure our Nation's border, I certainly appreciate that border security is one of the most sensitive and dangerous areas of the budget with which to play partisan political games. But I have to ask: What about the many other critical homeland security functions that this bill wouldn't do anything to fix, including protecting our Nation from cyber attacks, for example, or keeping our aviation and mass transit systems safe or funding the Secret Service or developing the next generation of explosive detection technology?

We cannot continue to pick winners and losers by providing temporary funding for government services, operations and personnel. This piecemeal approach to governing is failing our constituents and is failing our economy. The only solution is to reopen the entire Federal Government by calling up the clean funding bill passed by the Senate.

Mr. Speaker, last week, we were told by Republican leaders not to worry. Furloughed employees should stand by, they said, while the House votes to open the government one news cycle at a time. Americans' livelihoods can't wait for another news cycle. We are tired of waiting. We are tired of this charade.

Let's dispense with this political theater. Let's get back to our basic job description: to keep the government open, to pay the country's bills, and to negotiate a comprehensive budget plan that lifts sequestration, revives our economy, and secures our fiscal future. The first step is a clean continuing resolution. Let's do that today.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlelady from Texas (Ms. Jackson Lee), the ranking member of the Border and Maritime Security Subcommittee of the Homeland Security authorizing committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Roybal-Allard), an outstanding member of our Homeland Security Appropriations Subcommittee.

Mr. Speaker, I am glad to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Mississippi (Mr. Thompson), the ranking member of the full authorizing Committee on Homeland Security.

I yield the gentleman an additional 30 seconds.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from New York (Mrs. Lowey), ranking member of the full Appropriations Committee.

Mr. Speaker, could I inquire as to how much time remains on each side?

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Farr), another fine colleague from the Appropriations Committee.

I am prepared to close.

Mr. Speaker, our Republican colleagues today have spoken accurately of the time-honored tradition of passing a budget in this Congress and then passing appropriations bills, one hopes on budget and on time, in an orderly fashion, conforming to the agreed-upon budget resolution.

Now, for a while this year, we thought we were on the same page with regard to agreeing on a budget going forward. In fact, colleagues will remember that Republicans badgered the Senate in past years for not having passed a budget. This year, the Senate passed a budget. The Senate worked hard and passed a credible budget; we looked forward to a more normal process being resumed.

But we were soon disabused of that, because the Republican leadership of this House steadfastly refused to go to conference to work out a common budget with the Senate which, of course, is the normal process.

We have been urging that the House go to conference for months. Why did they refuse? We have thought a lot about that. One possible reason is that no comprehensive budget plan could possibly pass their conference, given the Tea Party influence in that conference these days. That is the explanation that is suggested, I have to say, by the failure of Speaker Boehner's ``Plan B'': remember that, back in December? They left President Obama's budget overture on the table, never taking him up on that comprehensive offer.

But then after a while, our Republican friends warmed up to the idea of stalling on this, and we gradually realized: They are running out the clock! The Republicans are running out the clock. Why are they doing that? Maybe they are looking for a crisis atmosphere, letting the government shut down, running up against the possibility of default. In a crisis atmosphere, maybe they think they can extract more. Maybe they can extract more, by demanding a ransom, a political ransom. the Affordable Care Act, whatever. Because now with the clock run out, you are talking not just about negotiating a budget; you are talking about demanding a ransom merely to keep the government open; demanding a ransom merely to pay the country's bills, basic constitutional responsibilities which this body should meet without any threat of extortion.

Meanwhile, of course, they understand the public doesn't like this. So we have the spectacle today of yet another bill seeking political cover, to fund piecemeal a function of government which has been in the news and which people value.

Well, this charade has to end. Yes, we need to get back to the normal budget process in this country. The first step is to pass a clean funding bill to reopen the government, and the votes are here in this body to do that this afternoon. We also must lift the threat of defaulting on the Nation's debt.

And then, sure enough, let's get on with the negotiating of a comprehensive budget agreement, a budget agreement along the lines of the budget plans of 1990 and 1993. These budget plans helped produce a robust economy, and eventually produced 4 years of budget surpluses. We paid off $400 billion of the national debt in those years. Those were comprehensive agreements, to be sure. They were politically tough. They did include revenues. They included all categories of spending. They were painful votes for many in this body, but I continue to think they were among the best votes I ever cast. That is where we need to go. We all know that.

The question is, can we find the political will to get there? Let's muster that political will. We have had enough of the ransom demands. Let's reopen the government, let's lift the debt ceiling, and let's get on with serious negotiations, the kind of budget negotiations we should have been having all year.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I have a motion to recommit at the desk.

I am opposed.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to offer a motion to recommit to end this harmful and unnecessary government shutdown. I do this by offering a motion that would bring to the floor the continuing resolution that has already passed in the Senate and awaits consideration in the House.

I know that not everyone is thrilled with this level of funding. Many of us in the Democratic Caucus think it cuts too deeply into important investments, while many of our Republican colleagues feel it doesn't cut enough. The Senate bill is a compromise, but it is a compromise that is acceptable to the majority of us in order to continue the vital functioning of the government that all Americans pay for and that all Americans deserve.

Unfortunately, a small faction of the majority party continues to hold the entire government hostage while it tries to obstruct the Affordable Care Act. I understand they disagree with the Senate and the President on certain issues, but shutting the government down to try and achieve an ideological goal that could not be achieved through the legislative process, through the Supreme Court, or through the ballot box is beneath the dignity of this body. That is why I urge my colleagues to support my motion and allow us to get the government up and

running again. Then, and only then, can we resume debate and discussion on other critical issues like creating jobs, supporting our veterans, and, yes, improving the Affordable Care Act.

As of today, it has been 10 days since the government shutdown. That is 10 days where we haven't had studies going forward at the National Institutes of Health, 10 days where the Small Business Administration hasn't been lending money to entrepreneurs and small businesses, and 10 days where families haven't had access to the critical services to protect those who need it most.

In my own district, the Small Business Administration normally gives out an average of $237,000 in loans each and every day. That is a total of $2.37 million in loans that haven't been made to the small businesses of New Hampshire's First District.

The majority has failed my State and others. All the American people are asking for is for us to open the government. They would be happy with a clean bill. We could put people back to work with a clean bill. We could continue lending money to small businesses with a clean bill. We could fund cancer research with a clean bill.

But instead of putting an end to the government shutdown by passing the funding bill that the Senate has already agreed to, Republican leaders in the House are offering bills to open individual agencies and programs instead of the entire government. Make no mistake, that is not an honest attempt to open the government. These cherry-picked funding bills serve only to give political cover to the very people who caused the government shutdown.

As former Republican Presidential candidate and Senator Bob Dole said, along with my dear colleague, John Dingell:

Piecemeal or partial spending plans do not adequately

ensure that our veterans--and, indeed, all Americans--have

access to the system of self-government established to serve

and protect them.

Former Republican Senator Judd Greg, who was chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, said:

A small group of Republican legislators led by the junior

Senator from Texas decided to take as hostages government

operations and the raising of the debt ceiling. The price of

release was to be the death of ObamaCare. This approach never

had a snowball's chance in Texas of succeeding.

However, here we are still shut down 10 days after the start of the new fiscal year; and, instead of voting on legislation that if brought to the floor would pass and open the government, what are we voting on? The same little, tiny piecemeal appropriations designed for messaging and attack ads that we have been voting on all week. It is Washington politics at its worst.

It has been 10 days of this sort of chicanery, and it is time to give it up. Let's stop the gamesmanship; turn the lights back on; reopen the government; and address the actual critical problems addressing the country.

We need more jobs. We need to find ways to grow the economy, make education more affordable, and invest in our decaying infrastructure. All of these are problems that our constituents sent us here to deal with, and they are what they expect us to work on.

That is probably why, yesterday, when Gallup released polling on what Americans believe is the most important problem facing our country, it should come as no surprise to find that, for the first time in history, they picked dysfunctional government. It has always been either the economy, unemployment, or jobs that were the most pressing problems. In yesterday's poll, though, it was us. I can't say that I am surprised, because I agree with them. We need to fix this, and that starts by doing the basics like funding the government and raising the debt ceiling.

I will end with one final quote from my former Republican colleague, Senator Gregg. He said:

People who have no interest in governing cannot be allowed

to be the dominant voices in a major party.

I thank you for your support, and I hope you will support this critical motion.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Point of Order

Mr. Speaker, I wish to be heard on the point of order.

Mr. Speaker, doesn't the bill before us set up a commission to examine deficit reduction?

My motion to recommit would open up the entire Federal Government so that our taxpayers can receive the benefits they have already paid for, to recommit deals with government expenditures. And right now we are running a deficit. So isn't the amount the government is spending a relevant topic to the deficit reduction?

We have voted to pay workers furloughed during a shutdown. I supported that bill. But what sense does it make to have workers paid to sit at home and not be able to do their jobs? What kind of a strange House is this that would force this situation on our Federal workers?

Mr. Speaker, if you rule this motion out of order, does this not mean that we will not have a chance to keep the entire Federal Government open today? Can the Chair please explain why we can't keep the entire Federal Government open today?

Mr. Speaker, I appeal the ruling of the Chair.

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