Floor Statements

Let me thank my colleague from Florida for yielding me this time.

Madam Speaker, I rise today with a very heavy heart to honor the memory and service of our dear friend and colleague, Bill Young.

Bill served in this House and he served this country for decades with compassion and distinction. I have not known this institution without him--most of us are in that same situation--and I believe it will take a long time to fill the hole that his absence has left. As an appropriator, he was a role model for all of us. When I became chairman of the committee, I knew I had some very large shoes to fill in following in the footsteps of Chairman Young, among others. He fought with determination and enthusiasm to make this country a better place.

Bill was a champion for our troops and veterans especially, both in the Halls of the Congress and outside. His fierce determination and dedication to our troops and veterans never wavered. As we all know, he and his dear wife, Beverly, were to be found very frequently at Bethesda or at Walter Reed in the city or at a hospital overseas where troops were sick, and they spent hours and hours helping those who were injured.

He was, of course, the chairman of the Defense Subcommittee on the Appropriations Committee for many years. He also served on the Military Construction and Veterans' Affairs Subcommittee, and his thumbprint is very visible in the improved medical care and in the quality of life of our troops, among the many other issues that he held dear to his heart.

Bill was a leader in this House who was able to make his mark with grace and fortitude. He was a lion about the things that he cared about; but he was a gentle lion, and he did things with grace and with a quiet voice until you crossed him on the betterment of our troops. Then Bill Young would let you know where to get off.

I will miss Bill Young greatly as I know all of us will. My prayers are with his family, with Beverly, with his many friends, and with all of those who had the privilege of knowing and working with Bill Young. He will be greatly missed.

Madam Speaker, pursuant to the previous order of the House, I call up the bill, (H.R. 2775) to condition the provision of premium and cost-sharing subsidies under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act upon a certification that a program to verify household income and other qualifications for such subsidies is operational, and for other purposes, with the Senate amendments thereto, and ask for its immediate consideration.

Madam Speaker, I have a motion at the desk.

Madam 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 the further consideration of H.R. 2775.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume, and I rise today to present H.R. 2775. This legislation will raise the Nation's debt ceiling to avoid default, reopen the doors of the Federal Government, and end this unfortunate shutdown.

The legislation before us is Senate amendments to H.R. 2775. The Senate has just passed this bill, and now it is up to the House to send it to the President for his signature. It is the product of a final agreement between Republicans and Democrats to help put us back on stable ground with an open government and without the threat of default as we look to find a long-term comprehensive solution to our multitude of fiscal problems.

First and foremost, it provides critical funding for operating the Federal Government at the current annual rate of $986 billion through January 15 of next year to end the government shutdown.

The resolution includes a limited number of noncontroversial or technical changes called ``anomalies.'' Many have already been passed by the House and the Senate. A few are new, such as provisions to ensure the smooth reopening of the government, to provide due compensation for Federal employees and other funding for shutdown costs, to provide funding for the FAA to continue current operations without interruption, and so on. These have been included to prevent irrevocable harm to vital government programs, to continue critical services, and to ensure good governance.

To be clear, Madam Speaker, the CR portion of this resolution is virtually clean and is essentially identical to the legislation I introduced in the House in early September.

Secondly, this legislation will increase the debt limit until February 7 of next year. By extending our borrowing ability, these amendments will avoid the damage a default would cause to our recovering economy, to businesses large and small, and to our people who desperately need a stable economy and continued job growth.

Lastly, the resolution before us will help protect against fraud and abuse by requiring income verifications for individuals seeking subsidies under the ObamaCare act.

Essentially, this bill before us tonight allows us to move on. It deals with the Nation's immediate short-term problem and allows time for Congress to address the broader picture: what the real drivers of our debt are, how we can keep from reaching the debt limit in the future, and how we avoid staggering from fiscal crisis to fiscal crisis.

After 2 long weeks, it is time to end the government shutdown. It is time to take the threat of default off the table. It is time to restore some sanity to this place. To do this, we have all got to give a little.

Clearly no one on either side has received everything they wanted, but I believe that now we all should act for the greater needs of our Nation. If we want to get anywhere, we must be willing to negotiate, and we should be willing to put partisanship aside and govern for the greater good.

The House must realize it is just one-half of one-third of this government and that no laws can be made without the consent of the Senate and the President, just as they can't enact laws without us. We must also acknowledge the profligate spending and borrowing that is driving us into unsustainable debt and hurting this Nation and the people who call it home.

I am optimistic that once this resolution is passed, the House and the Senate will come together in a budget conference to work out our broad fiscal and budgetary challenges.

It is my hope that a common, topline discretionary number for fiscal year 2014 will be established that will allow Congress to enact full- year appropriations bills and avoid shutdowns like this in the future; and it is also my hope that Congress can address head-on the problem of unsustainable growth in our mandatory and entitlement programs and work to reform our overly complicated growth-stifling Tax Code.

The resolution before us will buy us some time to accomplish this must-do list, and it will ensure that our people have access to the critical government services they rely on in the meantime. We must take actions that will help restore the people's confidence in their elected officials and in the economic future of this Nation. We must.

The sooner we pass this resolution, the sooner we can move on to the many tasks before us that the people have sent us here to work on.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Dent), a very hardworking member of the Appropriations Committee.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Bachus), the former chairman of the Financial Services Committee of the House.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Poe).

Madam Speaker, might I inquire of my colleague if she has further speakers and is prepared to yield back?

Madam Speaker, I urge passage of the bill, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for yielding me this time.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of the Nuclear Weapon Security and Non-Proliferation Act.

Yes, it is a narrow scope, but it is a terribly important piece of the government. Like the bill we passed yesterday, this legislation addresses matters of critical importance to our national security. The National Nuclear Security Administration maintains our nuclear deterrents here at home, but it also helps to ensure that nuclear weapons and materials don't fall into the wrong hands--those of terrorists and other enemies of our Nation.

H.J. Res. 76 provides funding for the NNSA to continue this vital work--to keep our nuclear arsenal at the ready and our Navy ships powered--and, ultimately, to keep this country safe and secure and protected.

This is particularly important at a time when we face multiple threats from unpredictable nations and groups. When our government shut down, it did not also shut down nuclear power reactors, research and testing in Iraq, Iran, or North Korea. Funding is provided at the current annual rate of $10.59 billion to sustain the national labs, to continue the work of skilled workers and scientists, to conduct ongoing nonproliferation intelligence operations, and to maintain the safety and readiness of our nuclear stockpile.

As with the prior 14 mini-CRs this House has passed in the last week, this language is essentially identical to what was included in my initial short-term continuing resolution. So this is a clean bill, Mr. Speaker, adhering to the Senate's demands in that regard. Also, as with the prior bills, this funding will last until December 15 or until full-year appropriations are enacted. It is my hope that the latter is what happens.

Our Nation deserves the certainty of an adequately funded government with appropriations bills that reflect current needs but also current fiscal restraints. To achieve this, we must come together with our Senate counterparts and have a meaningful discussion that establishes a single, common, top-line number for discretionary spending that Members of both parties and both Houses of Congress can work toward.

The ongoing standoffs are not productive. They aren't getting us any closer to reopening the government. While it is not the ideal path forward at this time, passing this funding bill does get us a step closer to ending the shutdown, which I know is the goal of my colleagues on both sides of the aisle.

So far, this House has voted on a bipartisan basis to reopen critical government functions, including the support for those who serve the country in the Department of Defense. Our nuclear security efforts are equally important to our defense and should have ongoing funding to keep the country safe and sound. So I urge my colleagues to support this bill, Mr. Speaker.

I thank the chairman for yielding, and I rise in support of his bill.

Mr. Speaker, this is around the 15th time that we have been trying to engage the other body in conversation about how we can reopen the government. They just simply refuse to talk about anything. We have sent over CRs. We have sent over amendments. We have sent over bills. This is the 11th of the many appropriations bills--CRs--at the sequester level that we are going to send to the Senate, and they just simply refuse to talk. I have never seen such a show of negligence and attendance to public duties.

Normally, the time-honored tradition in the Congress--since the founding of this great country--is that, when the House passes a measure and when the Senate passes a measure and they differ, we appoint conferees: the Senate picks out some Members, the House picks out some Members, and we send them off to the back room to work out the differences and to bring the bills back. That is the way it has operated for all of these years. Yet the Senate just simply refuses to talk anything about how to reopen the government.

This bill will help protect our homeland from terrorists, drug traffickers, smugglers, other criminals, and it facilitates legal immigration and ongoing investigations. Right now, our frontline operations are operating at a bare minimum. The men and women who are at work to protect our borders and our ports of entry are working without pay, and employers cannot guarantee the lawful immigration status of their prospective employees.

To reinstate these critical functions, H.J. Res. 79 provides funding for border security efforts at the current annual rate of $18.8 billion. This includes funding for the Customs and Border Patrol, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Coast Guard, Citizenship and Immigration Services, and the Office of Biometric Identity Management.

These are functions of the Federal Government that are critical to our safety and well-being. They should not have to suffer the effects of this shutdown, but if we pass this bill today and if the Senate passes it and if the President signs it into law, it will stop any further adverse effects from befalling our border security while we work toward reopening the entire Federal Government.

Piece by piece, the Republican House has been working toward reopening the government over the past week. We have done this all with no help--no input--from the Senate. The only thing we have heard from the Senate is a resounding ``no''--``no'' to working with us on a task force or on a committee to reopen the Federal Government and ``no'' to talking with us about our concerns over the multitude of fiscal crises we face. Despite this, the House has passed 15 bills over the past week to fund the government. This is on top of the continuing resolutions we put forward prior to the end of the fiscal year and the regular appropriations bills the House passed. Imagine what we could do if the Senate would come to the table and work with us. We could solve the problem.

There is no question about it that we are never going to be able to get out of this mess if we don't come together, have a real, adult conversation, listen to each other earnestly, and negotiate in good faith. This crisis can't be solved by one party alone or by one body of the Congress alone. This bill is an effort to keep the ball moving toward our goal of ending the entire government shutdown.

The Senate has asked for a clean CR to achieve that end. The funding in this bill is clean and in line with the spending from the last fiscal year. It is essentially what I put forward in my initial, clean CR. So I hope, with that in mind, the House and the Senate will pass this bill in short order.

I thank the chairman for yielding me this time.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of this bill, the Honoring the Families of Fallen Soldiers Act. This bill, as has been said, will ensure that the families of U.S. military members who have given the ultimate sacrifice will receive the benefits they were promised in spite of this unfortunate government shutdown.

The House has voted to take care of our warfighters by ensuring that they will be paid during the fiscal crisis, but our responsibility to our soldiers doesn't end there by any means.

As they put their lives on the line on behalf of this Nation, our brave soldiers shouldn't be concerned about who will take care of their families. That's part of our Nation's agreement with our men and women in uniform: You take care of the United States, and we will take care of you and your beloved family.

To this end, the bill allows continued funding to guarantee that the government honors its commitments to our military families without delay. It allows funding to provide a death gratuity to families of fallen soldiers. This is a lump payment to assist them in one of their greatest times of need.

The bill also allows for the customary financial assistance for funeral costs, family travel and housing, back salary payments, and living expenses. It's certainly the least we can do for those who make the ultimate sacrifice for our country.

The reality is we are a Nation at war. Wars don't stop just because our government is not functioning properly, nor do our obligations to our soldiers get put on pause while we work to clean things up.

To the families who have lost a son, a daughter, a sister, a brother, a husband, or a wife to war, this bill is our commitment to you that you should not have to suffer even more heartache after such a significant loss.

This legislation is the right thing to do. It should be passed without delay. I urge a ``yes'' vote.

I thank the chairman for yielding me this time.

Mr. Speaker, we have heard from the other side of the aisle on all of these bills that attempt to reopen many aspects of the Federal Government. We hear them say, well, I am in favor of that program, but I want to vote against it until they bring the entire government funding bill before us.

I would love to do that. I would love to bring the entire budget here. In fact, we did, and we can't get the Senate to act on it. But in the meantime, the other side is saying, I will vote against this because I want to save and vote for the entire Federal Government.

That may work in some of the agencies, but this is safety. This is the safety of people flying the skies of this country and the world. You don't want to delay safety until you can vote on a bigger bill. I think it is irresponsible not to support the safety of our people in the skies.

This bill provides funding to resume operations within FAA that are critical to the safety of our skies and our aircraft fleet. It would bring back 7,000 aviation safety inspectors currently not working, restart aircraft certification activities, resume training for air traffic controllers, reopen the aircraft registry service, and continue air traffic control modernization.

Mr. Speaker, you don't want to mess around with the safety of our people. This bill cures that problem. I can't imagine anyone wanting to oppose this bill.

The sum total of these efforts will help guarantee safe, efficient, and reliable air travel for the American public.

This funding is provided at an annual rate of $12 billion and will last until December 15, or until the Congress enacts and the President signs full-year appropriations bills.

The language in this bill is yet again nearly identical to what was included in the CR I offered back in September--nearly a month ago.

Once again, we are calling on the Senate to consider and pass this bill. Our colleagues on the other side of the Capitol continue to call for a clean CR; yet they continue to act on these ``clean'' mini-CRs.

The House has put forward a plethora of options to fund the Federal Government: first, the four annual appropriations bills to fund the government in regular order; then three different continuing resolutions prior to September 30; and now the short-term CRs to reopen parts of the Federal Government--in fact, more than a third of it so far.

But the Senate is committed to inaction. They didn't pass any regular appropriations bills; they will not pass our clean, short-term funding bills; and they so far have refused to join us at the negotiating table.

Mr. Speaker, that completely puzzles me. It goes against the grain of what has gone on in this country since we have been a country. When the two bodies differ, the Founding Fathers said, if you can't agree, appoint conference members from either body--both bodies--and let them go out and recommend a solution to the problem. It has always worked, except now the Senate refuses to do their duty.

I hope they will consider this bill as a steppingstone toward ending the shutdown. We need to come together in a productive way with open ears and open minds to find a way to clean up this mess.

I urge my colleagues to preserve the safety of American skies. Vote for this bill.

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 371, I call up the joint resolution (H.J. Res. 84) making continuing appropriations for Head Start 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. 84, and that I may include tabular material on the same.

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

I rise today to present H.J. Res. 84, the Head Start for Low-Income Children Act. This bill provides Federal funding at the current, post- sequester rate for the Head Start program, which millions of children across the country rely on to fulfill their educational and health needs.

As we work our way out of this government shutdown mess, we shouldn't let some of our most vulnerable citizens--low-income children with no recourse--suffer. In my home State of Kentucky, 20,715 kids rely on Head Start to provide a helping hand. If we don't do anything about this today, 2,800 kids in Kentucky will lose access to Head Start programs starting November 1.

This bill provides funding for Head Start at an annual rate of $7.586 billion. This funding will help reopen the doors to the more than 1,600 Head Start programs across the country. As before, the funding will last until December 15 or until we enact full-year appropriations.

This is another step the House is taking to alleviate the burden of this current fiscal dilemma and move us closer to ending the government shutdown.

The nine bills the House has passed since October 1 to reopen the government--this will be the 10th--constitute nearly one-third of the Federal Government's discretionary budget. These 10 bills fund very critical programs, cleanly, as the Senate has demanded, and have been supported on a bipartisan basis in this House.

So why are these bills still sitting on Harry Reid's desk?

Why is the Senate not making every stride it can to help our Nation's disadvantaged children, hungry families, and our veterans?

This method of funding the government is not my preferred way, Mr. Speaker, nor is it the standard, but while we work to find an end to the shutdown, we should fund those programs we can as soon as we can.

I hope that my colleagues in the Senate will take this opportunity to meet us at the negotiating table. We've got a great deal to work out, but this can't be done if we are not willing to talk and listen to each other.

It is the time-honored way, Mr. Speaker. When the two bodies disagree on something, each body passes a bill, and we send it to conference with the other body. That's what should be done here.

In fact, this body, several days ago now, appointed conferees on this topic and sent it over to the Senate, only to be met by a loud snore.

So, Mr. Speaker, I want us to get together and talk about ending this shutdown. Though I wish we were able to end the shutdown in its entirety, this bill will at least reopen one indispensable government program and lessen the toll that the shutdown is taking on the American people.

This Congress is facing a great deal of difficult choices in the near future, but taking care of our children should be a top priority. I urge my colleagues to support the bill.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Michigan (Mrs. Miller), who is the chair of the House Administration Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Kansas (Mr. Yoder), a member of the Appropriations Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I can't believe what I just heard. The gentlelady was describing the importance of the Head Start program in glowing terms, and yet she turns around and tells us she's going to vote against funding for the Head Start program. That's a puzzle to me.

I reserve the balance of my time.

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

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

I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I am really puzzled. We hear speaker after speaker on the other side tell us how committed they are to these poor children in the Head Start program, and yet here's the chance, Mr. Speaker, to continue this program. Yes, it does not include the entire government, but are we going to hold hostage these kids from poor families who are desperate for this program. Are we going to hold them hostage, or are we going to go ahead and approve this short-term funding for the Head Start program?

If you believe in Head Start, it seems to me you would stand in the well and say: I support this bill because it continues the Head Start program.

I reserve the balance of my time.

I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Nebraska (Mr. Terry).

Mr. Speaker, I have no further speakers, and I am prepared to close.

I yield myself the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, we have heard here today what we have heard in the last several days from the other side--that they will not vote for any of these individual bills because we are not bringing the entire continuing resolution before the House.

But let me point out: with this bill--the 10th in this series that we brought out in a so-called piecemeal fashion--it will take us to about a third of the CR, the original continuing resolution. So we are passing the continuing resolution one piece at a time, but nevertheless we are passing a continuing resolution.

To say that I am not going to vote for this bill because you don't have all of the bills before us doesn't have much logic to it. It means that every bill that comes before the House could be argued the same way: I won't vote for that bill because it doesn't fund whatever or enact whatever piece of legislation that is waiting in the wings.

Now, Mr. Speaker, this is about Head Start. It is not about health care; it is not about procedure; it is not about whether or not this is piecemeal or full, or what have you. It is about Head Start. If you believe in the Head Start program and the hundreds of thousands of young children in this country--and families--that are depending on this program, it seems to me you would lay everything else aside and vote for that program, which I am asking our Members to do as I close.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve a point of order on the gentlelady's motion.

Mr. Speaker, I make a point of order that the instructions contained in the motion violate clause 7 of rule XVI which requires that an amendment be germane to the bill under consideration.

As the Chair recently ruled on October 2, 3, 4, and 7, 2013, the instructions contain a special order of business within the jurisdiction of the Committee on Rules, and, therefore, the amendment is not germane to the underlying bill.

Mr. Speaker, I insist on my point of order.

Mr. Speaker, I move to lay the appeal on the table.

I thank the chairman for yielding.

Madam Speaker, I rise in support of this legislation. This bill addresses a critical issue facing the Congress right now. It ensures that the essential personnel who've been working throughout this shutdown receive their hard-earned pay on time.

These diligent men and women are protecting our homeland; they're ensuring our safety and well-being; they're providing critical services for our people and shielding our economy. They've been by our sides as we have worked to find a way out of the mess that we find ourselves in. They've been guarding this very building, putting themselves in harm's way. It's our responsibility to these dedicated professionals that they receive due compensation for their service to this Nation.

In addition, the House will consider a second piece of legislation this afternoon which will be combined with this bill and sent to the Senate. The second bill will provide a path forward to bring all parties to the table to end the government shutdown.

For a week, this House has been toiling, working, trying to find a way to end the impasse or at least mitigate its effects as we work toward a solution to this very serious problem.

We've provided bills that would fund the entire government and avenues to reopening certain critical government functions. We even proposed a conference committee, hoping the Senate would finally agree to talk to the House. We heard nothing.

But a week later, we're still no closer to a resolution. The Senate has turned down nearly every bill we've sent them and rejected every compromise we've offered. They've flatly refused a conference committee to attempt to find some sort of solution. After 8 days of a shutdown, it's high time that we all start having real, adult conversations about how to get out of this mess.

This second bill will establish a working group, Madam Speaker, that will provide a framework to get the House and Senate together to hash out our differences on the myriad fiscal crises that we are currently facing. If enacted, it will require, by law, Members from both Houses to meet and work our way toward a final agreement. There is far too much at stake now to be stuck in our ways. We must work together in a productive fashion if we wish to get anything accomplished.

It's imperative that we get our fiscal house in order and put our budgets on an attainable and sustainable path. We must have a common, agreed-upon, top-line discretionary spending level with the Senate, which will allow our annual appropriations work to be completed this year.

To do this, we must enact meaningful, commonsense entitlement program reforms that will slow the monstrous growth of these auto-pilot programs. We need to ensure that they're sustainable in the future-- stop them from devouring the entirety of our Federal budgets--including funding for our domestic programs and our national defense, and prevent them from plunging our Nation further into debt.

I believe that the Members of this House and of the Senate are reasonable people, people of goodwill, people who wish to do right by this country. That's why I hope that this House will approve both of these bills today.

This is the right thing to do, to help find an end to this government shutdown, to tackle our spending problems and our debt limit, and to show the people of the United States that we are here to legislate, not to pontificate. They expect and deserve no less.

So I urge my colleagues to support this bill and this path forward.

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, this bill makes sure that, even during this shutdown, the Food and Drug Administration's critical safeguards remain in place to protect our food and drug supply. The health of our people should not be jeopardized. This legislation provides funding for the FDA at the current post-sequestration annual rate of $2.3 billion. This will provide funding to maintain protections for food, drugs, and medical devices, and allow the FDA to collect and spend user fees.

The length of this authority will last until December 15 or until we enact year-long appropriations that address the funding of the Federal Government in full.

As with each of the other individual bills we have considered this week, the language in H.J. Res. 77 is nearly identical to what was included in my clean continuing resolution filed back in September. This bill moves us a step closer to the finish line, but we've got to remember that we can get there much faster if we find a way to fund the entire Federal Government. This will require cooperation and conversation from both the Senate and the House.

This will be the ninth bill the House has sent to the Senate to reopen the Federal Government. The ninth bill, Mr. Speaker. The House has voted to provide nearly one-third of the funding to reopen the government; but, unfortunately, the Senate won't even consider these bills, and so the government is still shut down. Our colleagues in the Senate say they want a clean CR, but when we've sent them these bills-- pieces of a clean CR with clean funding mechanisms, nonetheless--they won't even bring them up for a vote.

This is not my first choice of how to fund the Federal Government. My preference would be to have passed full-year appropriations bills for all the government before September 30. The House made great strides toward that goal with our committee approving nearly all of our annual bills and with the full House passing four of them, yet the Senate would not even pass a single bill off the floor of the Senate. But I still hope and believe that we can find a path forward. It will require both parties, both bodies, to find ways we can work together to end this shutdown.

As we work toward that end, we can pass this bill to ensure that nearly all of the Federal Government's food safety activities are funded during the shutdown. I urge support of the bill.

I thank the chairman for yielding me the time.

Mr. Speaker, this is a bipartisan bill, and I hope every Member in this House will be happy to support it.

I'm glad to see that, at the very least, the Senate has plans to take up this bill. Stop the presses. The Senate's going to take up a bill, even if they won't consider most of our other bills.

And as we wait for the Senate to come to the negotiating table on shutting the shutdown down, our Federal workforce should not wait to find out whether or not they'll be paid. This bill will provide backpay for those workers who have been furloughed in a fair, full, and timely manner after the shutdown ends. The House has made great strides toward this end. And in fact, as of yesterday, the House has approved 15 different options to fund the government. We have sent them over to the Senate. Sadly, the only response has been a loud snore.

I hope this bill, which I know is a priority for my colleagues on both sides of the aisle, will encourage this Congress to find that spirit of bipartisanship that seems to have evaporated over the last few weeks. It will demonstrate that we are able to let level heads prevail and that we can unite in our responsibility to care for the hundreds of thousands of people who serve this Nation day in, day out.

I want to thank the gentlemen from Virginia, Messrs. Wolf and Moran, two very fine members of our Appropriations Committee, for bringing this bill to the floor, and I salute them. I urge my colleagues to provide our workforce with some certainty for their futures and pass this bill.

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Might I engage in a colloquy with the gentleman?

What is the normal time-honored procedure in the Congress when the two bodies disagree?

I yield to the gentleman from Oklahoma.

That's the time-honored tradition. That's the way the place works. It's the way it should operate. That's regular order.

Now the Senate has passed the bill. The House has passed a bill, which disagree with each other. The House, two or three nights ago now, passed their motion to go to conference, and it passed the House. The Speaker of the House then appointed conferees from the House side and sent that to the Senate, waiting for the Senate to appoint conferees so that we can meet together, work out our differences, and bring that agreement back to each body, the House and the Senate.

Why aren't we proceeding on regular order in this case?

Do you have an answer?

Reclaiming my time, that's the way we've done it for 200 years or so, and that is, when we disagree with the other body, we each appoint our conferees. The conferees go off and haggle and amend and argue and debate until there's some agreement that can be brought back to each Chamber, which then can reject or accept that conference report.

The House has acted. We're waiting on the Senate to appoint their conferees so that we can go off and work, 24 hours a day, if necessary, to come to an agreement, which we can do.

And I would urge the other body to honor the age-old tradition in the Congress. When you disagree with the other body, you appoint conferees to work out the differences, bring it back to each body, and I would hope that the Senate would do that.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for yielding me this time.

And I say to my colleague from North Carolina, my friend, whom I've served together with on the Appropriations Committee and subcommittees for a number of years, I say to him, where is the bill for the Secret Service?

Stay tuned.

Where's the bill for ICE?

Stay tuned.

Where's the bill for Border Patrol?

Stay tuned and be ready to talk about those when they come up shortly.

Now, I rise in support of this bill, which will help ensure that our government can help prepare for emergency situations. As we well know, you can never be too prepared.

Over the past year, we've seen the damage natural disasters can wreak. From Hurricane Sandy in the Northeast, to the tornados in the Midwest, to the raging wildfires out West, no area is immune to Mother Nature's wrath.

And now, with a tropical storm brewing in the Gulf of Mexico, we are reminded, once again, that disaster can strike when you least expect it to, or when you can least stand it, though we hope that's not the case with Karen.

This bill will provide immediate funding for the Federal Emergency Management Agency at the current annual funding rate of $10.2 billion. As with the previous five short-term funding bills this House has passed in the last 2 days, this will last until December 15, but could end sooner if we can find a way to fund the entire Federal Government before that time.

And as with the previous five short-term funding bills, this language, for all intents and purposes, mirrors that of the clean CR that I offered several weeks ago.

Passing this bill today is important to fulfill our duty to the people of this country that their government should help communities prepare for disasters and be there in their times of greatest need.

However, our end goal isn't to fund each government program bit by bit; it's to reopen the whole Federal Government as soon as possible. I believe this bill inches us closer to that goal, but there's obviously much more to be done.

And let me point this out, Mr. Speaker: if this bill is approved today, this will be the sixth clean, short-term funding bill we send to the other side of the Capitol. These bills provide more than $300 billion in annual funding so far, and at the sequester level. That's one-third of the discretionary budget, and it's one-third of the original continuing resolution that we filed in September; one third of the way toward opening the entire Federal Government with clean funding bills.

This is what the Senate says they want. So why aren't they voting on these bills?

In addition to these clean bills, we've also sent over to the Senate seven other appropriations bills to fund portions of the Federal Government. The answer: a loud snore.

This House, since the Republicans took over in 2011, has been serious about trying to return to regular order; but it takes two to tango, Mr. Speaker, and the Senate has passed zero regular appropriations bills this whole year. Zero.

I say we must come together. On Monday night, the House passed another amendment, sent it to the Senate, that would have funded the entire government. And we asked for a conference with the Senate. We even appointed our conferees, the House, sent that to the Senate.

What have we heard from the Senate since that time?

Another loud snore. They will not agree to talk.

It's the time-honored tradition of this Congress, in the United States of America, that when one body disagrees with the other body, which is quite frequent, what happens, we appoint conferees to work out the differences.

The House appointed its conferees. The Senate has refused to appoint conferees. Otherwise, we could sit down and talk and solve this problem and put people back to work in the government and make sense of the mess that we're in. It just takes the Senate agreeing to go to a conference.

What's difficult about that?

That's as simple as pie. It's what we've done since we've been a Nation.

I would urge the other body to appoint conferees. Let's sit down and work out the differences. We've got a table waiting downstairs, or we can meet over there, whatever. We can meet in their conference room or ours. We can sit down, as gentlemen and gentleladies, and work out the differences between the House bill and the Senate bill as we normally do.

We've got to come together, Mr. Speaker, Senate, House, Republican, Democrat, Mugwump. We've got to have a meaningful discussion on how we can fund the entire Federal Government, first, to reopen its doors, then to fund it as it should be funded, with regular order, full-year appropriations bills.

The bill before us continues trying to make sense of the situation we're in, working toward ending the shutdown, and to ensure that from today forward FEMA has the resources it needs to prepare for whatever should come our way.

Madam Speaker, I thank the chairman for yielding me this time.

Madam Speaker, I rise in full support of H.J. Res. 75. This bill ensures that the nearly 8.7 million women, infants, and children who rely on the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children will continue to receive critical nutrition assistance without interruption.

This bill provides funding for WIC at the fiscal year 2013 post- sequester rate of $6.5 billion until December 15, or until we can enact full-year appropriations legislation. That is the ultimate goal of this bill, Madam Speaker, to move us closer to ending this government shutdown by providing regular appropriations for all government programs. To achieve that, we've got to have an adult conversation about what this might entail and how we can get there.

And I've got a great suggestion, Madam Speaker. Monday night, the House passed an amendment to the CR over to the Senate and asked for a conference with the Senate. Then the Speaker named House conferees.

Now the normal traditions of this body, as all of us know, is that when the House and the Senate pass differing versions of the same bill, how do we resolve the difference? Well, we appoint conferees. We have some House Members and some Senate Members that are selected by their respective leaders. And they go up, and they argue and debate and amend. And they come up with an agreement that they then bring back to each body for approval, and that becomes the law.

That procedure is in play right now. I mean, the House has appointed conferees. We've got a table arranged downstairs for the Senators to join us in resolving the shutdown. And what does the Senate do? What do we hear from the Senate? A big loud snore, that they're not willing to come to the table and talk. Just talk. We may not be able to agree. But we can talk and try to work it out for the American people.

And as we work this out, we've got to be sure that our most vulnerable citizens don't fall victim to politics. This bill will take care of those who count on WIC to meet their nutritional needs--our women, our infants, our children. Because this language was essentially included in my original initial clean continuing resolution, I endorse it today. This House, I think, should support it today.

But our colleagues in the Senate should also support it. This would be the seventh bill we've sent them to help reopen the Federal Government in the last 3 days. The seventh bill. We've heard nothing from them. Altogether, these bills provide nearly a third of the discretionary funding that's needed to operate the entire Federal Government. So in the last 3 days, we've passed bills to fund a third of the government.

The Senate keeps demanding from us, and yet they won't vote on these bills that would be a part of that clean CR. The math just doesn't add up, Madam Speaker.

Though this piecemeal funding approach is not my preferred mechanism to move forward, it does move us incrementally forward. I would rather we fund the government with regular appropriations bills, so-called regular order.

This House passed four of those regular bills this year. Unfortunately, our colleagues on the other side of the Capitol passed none. For all of their talk on the other side of the Capitol about returning to regular order, it seems the Senate has made very little action to achieve that goal. We're in this mess today in part because of that. But passing this bill will help us get out of it.

So I urge my colleagues to support an end to this shutdown with this WIC program, support this bill, and pass it today.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for yielding me this time.

Mr. Speaker, the very distinguished chairman of this subcommittee has rendered invaluable service to this Nation and this body and certainly this committee, and I thank him for his wonderful service over a long period of time.

I rise today in support of the brave men and women of our military who stand at the ready to defend this homeland.

This legislation will provide the men and women of the National Guard and Reserve with due compensation for their service--on time and in full--throughout the government shutdown. Our intention with the Pay Our Military Act was to support all of our men and women in uniform. This legislation merely fixes a technical drafting error to amend that.

Once again, I believe this is an important action to get us on the path toward ending this crisis. This bill underscores the need to sufficiently and appropriately fund the entire Federal Government--to preserve our national security and get the Nation back on a stable economic footing. The House and the Senate must work together to flip the switch on this shutdown not only for our troops, but for everyone who calls this Nation their home.

It is our responsibility as Members of Congress to take care of our troops. Just as each of my colleagues in this body voted for the Pay Our Military Act, I hope they will do the same today to correct that act.

Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from Indiana, my friend, mentioned in his remarks about the other aspects of the Federal Government that need to be back in operation. I could not agree with him more on that. However, the route out of this mess--if you call it--is for the Senate to appoint conferees.

The House authorized and appointed conferees 2 days ago. We are waiting on the Senate to do the same. If they appoint conferees, we can work out the differences between the two bodies, as is the time-honored tradition of this place, and solve the shutdown problem.

So I ask the Members of the other body to go ahead and appoint conferees. Let's start talking. We can solve this problem. So far they refuse to even talk.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for yielding this time and thank you for bringing up this bill.

Madam Speaker, I rise in support of this bill.

This bill continues to provide our Nation's veterans with access to important benefits that they have earned in service to their country. To let these important health benefits slow or stop would be to renege on our promise to

our soldiers that, in exchange for taking care of this country, the Nation will take care of you.

This legislation continues funding for the processing and delivering of disability claims and other health benefits at the current annual rate of approximately $82 billion until December 15, or until we enact full-year appropriations.

Yesterday, when we considered this bill on the floor under suspension, Republicans and Democrats alike united behind the duty of this Congress to provide for our veterans. Frankly, I'm surprised it didn't pass with the vote of every single Member, but some of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle chose not to support the care of our former servicemen and -women.

But I believe that, given this second chance, where a majority will do, my colleagues will come together to pass this important bill. Not only is it important for the well-being of our veterans, but it's important for the well-being of the Nation as a whole. Every step we take to fund one section of the government is a step we can take toward reopening the entire government.

Even if we do not agree on much, we can agree, Madam Speaker, that we can't allow this government shutdown to persist much longer and continue to inflict harm on the United States. The clearest path forward is coming together on a bipartisan and bicameral basis to work out our differences, find a solution, and end this shutdown. And the way to do this is laying right in front of us.

The House passed the other night a motion to go to conference with the Senate on the differences that we have between us. It is the old, time-honored tradition of the House and Senate having a conference together to work out differences that is the way this place should be working; and yet the Senate refuses to sit down with us.

Madam Speaker, our conferees are waiting at the table downstairs, even as I speak. And if the Senate would just send over their conferees, we can work out the differences and the shutdown and solve the rest of the Nation's problems.

I urge my colleagues to provide for our veterans and help us get out of this shutdown disaster. Vote ``aye'' on this bill.