Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, for those of you who may not know and have not been following this process closely, I would like to bring you up to speed on how we came to consider this piece of…
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, for those of you who may not know and have not been following this process closely, I would like to bring you up to speed on how we came to consider this piece of legislation before us today.
On Friday afternoon, after everyone had gone home for the weekend, Republicans released a bill to extend government funding from September 30 through December 4. Republicans introduced the measure with no bipartisan negotiation, little advanced notice, and without any information from the government agencies as to what funding they will actually require to continue their operations for the duration of the bill.
The final Homeland Security bill that passed unopposed in April was bipartisan, and it was by a voice vote. And it was in that direction because it included a provision to remove all of the funding for the Border Patrol.
Chair Cole's bill does not continue that agreement. That prohibition is removed by this continuing resolution, which would allow Homeland Security Secretary Mullin to transfer billions of dollars to the Border Patrol.
We assumed that the removal of this language was a mistake--no harm, no foul--so before the bill was introduced, we reached out to our colleagues across the aisle, informed them of the error, and shared language to fix it. Yet, they refused to do so.
Instead, they chose to introduce a bill that would allow Secretary Mullin
to transfer billions more taxpayer dollars to the Border Patrol without implementing any of the protections that Democrats have sought since the killings of Alex Pretti and Renee Nicole Good earlier this year, a clear line in the sand that Democrats have drawn for months.
The American people support these protections, protections like mandating the use of body-worn cameras, not just taking the money for them and then refusing to turn them on; prohibiting operations at sensitive locations like schools, hospitals, and houses of worship; requiring agents to get a warrant from a judge before kicking in someone's door; allowing independent investigations into misconduct; ending racial profiling; and taking off the masks.
The need for these protections is as urgent as ever. In recent weeks, immigration agents have shot and killed residents in Maine and in Texas, neither of whom were targets of enforcement operations. We cannot in good conscience allow billions of dollars to flow to these agencies without major reforms to keep our constituents safe from further violence.
I want to say clearly and plainly that Democrats do not want a government shutdown. There would be no need for one. There are still 2 months before the funding deadline. There is no need to rush through an incomplete extension. We ought to take the time to gather the information we need to get it right the first time.
I might add that yesterday afternoon we received a list of the programs that have been compiled by the Federal agencies detailing the additional provisions the agencies believe are necessary to sustain their operations through December 4.
Mr. Speaker, we received this late yesterday afternoon. There are over 50 programs listed by the agencies to take some action so they can be protected during a continuing resolution, and many of these provisions are not included in the bill that we are considering today.
I asked my colleagues on the other side of the aisle to look through the list. There may be something in your community, in your district, that is very important to you, and it is not in this bill which you are going to potentially vote for today.
Among these efforts, there are changes to support wildfire suppression operations. They provide public housing agencies with funding to maintain housing assistance for tens of thousands of households, and they continue programs that provide utility assistance for rural communities.
If you ask people today what are the highest costs they are paying for today in an affordability crisis, it is the cost of utilities. That assistance is not in this bill.
It is no surprise that the measure that we are considering failed to include these provisions. After all, the bill was introduced 3 days before we had this information, but that is the problem. Rushing this bill to the floor haphazardly without carefully considering the various needs that must be met is no way to govern, and it is irresponsible.
This resolution was dropped on us on Friday afternoon without any bipartisan negotiation. Had we been consulted, there are several provisions we would have pushed for to strengthen the measure and to protect congressional prerogatives, including the reversal of a proposed Federal rule from the Office of Management and Budget that allows political appointees--political appointees in the Trump administration to unilaterally block or terminate grant funding if they deemed it not sufficiently in line with the President's policy priorities.
If we had taken the time to negotiate this measure, we could be here touting a bipartisan agreement with a plan to fully fund the government for the next fiscal year before the end of this Congress. Instead, we are scrambling--scrambling to jam through a one-sided, stopgap measure 2 days before everyone leaves for the August recess.
At minimum, I cannot support this bill without the inclusion of the technical language regarding the Border Patrol that was agreed upon in April. Beyond that, the decision to pursue this path without any bipartisan negotiations gives me serious reservations moving forward.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.
Mr. Speaker, I might add, with all this concern about the folks who were out of work, who were waiting in long lines, about our folks in the Coast Guard and others, it was my proposal that said: Let's fund those agencies. Since there is difficulty about ICE and about Border Patrol, let's fund the agencies and move forward.
It took Republicans 79 days to decide that that was the good fix, and, therefore, we could pay those people. They kept them dangling in the wind for those 79 days, all because they would like to continue to fund rogue agencies that are lawless, that are putting at risk people in our communities--and more than at risk with, most recently, two people killed, one in Maine and one in Texas.
The Homeland bill passed--I am going to mention it again--unopposed in April, a voice vote, because it included the provision to remove all funding for the Border Patrol.
This continuing resolution doesn't continue that agreement. As I said, we viewed that there was an error that was made because it would allow Homeland Security Secretary Mullin to transfer billions of dollars to the Border Patrol, the same agency responsible for harassing and killing American citizens.
Again, what we tried to do was to reach out to our colleagues on the other side of the aisle in good faith. We crafted the language, informed them of the error, and shared the language to fix it. They have refused to do so and continue to refuse to do so.
One has to ask the question: Why? Who wants to shut down a government? I certainly don't. Democrats do not want a government shutdown. If I had my way, we would be able to fund the government on a bipartisan basis through the appropriations process, one bill at a time.
Unfortunately, it seems increasingly likely that, at some point, a continuing resolution will be necessary. That does not mean we must rush through an incomplete, hastily constructed, one-sided stopgap measure that fails to adequately meet the government's funding needs.
Agencies only came up with their needs yesterday afternoon, over 50 of these needs. I admonish my colleagues on the other side of the aisle: Read it carefully because something that may affect your community and something you care deeply about, and seeing that agency move forward during a period of a continuing resolution, may be in here, but not on what you will vote on this afternoon.
I am disappointed that the apparent error in this measure--which, again, allows the Secretary of Homeland Security to transfer billions of dollars, in direct contravention of the agreement--has not been corrected. I would much rather be standing before you to tout a bipartisan agreement that, in fact, moves us forward through the appropriations process on a bipartisan basis.
It is a partisan path that my colleagues have taken us on here, without all the information necessary to draft an adequate funding extension and without consulting anyone else on their proposal. This is a go-it-alone approach. You know what? That is not a way to govern. We know that, especially those of us who sit on the Committee on Appropriations. It is not a go-it-alone approach.
My colleagues have to engage. They have to be involved in a negotiation, which is what we were involved in in April, and we came to a conclusion. That is what we should be doing now: engaging in a negotiation, coming to a conclusion, and fixing what is an error in the drafting of the language of the continuing resolution.
Don't hold us up and pass a bill that doesn't meet the needs of the American people.
I strongly urge my colleagues to take the time. Let's get it right the first time. Let's come to the table. Let's negotiate an agreement we can all support. Let's work together to fully fund the government for fiscal year 2027. That is what we can do. There isn't any question in my mind that we can do that.
All of these obstacles that you want to put forward with arguments about who wants to shut the government down, let's get real: Fix the error that was made. Fix the error that was placed in that bill. We said no money for Border Patrol unless there would be the protections. There is an open door to Border Patrol, and there are no protections.
I believe the American people have sent us here to do the work on their behalf, to make sure that we address the issues that we care about. We can do that, and it wouldn't take very long. I don't know what the reluctance is to fix the error that would be made and set us on a path to be able to pass bipartisan bills and a continuing resolution that we can all support. It is what I am committed to doing.
Mr. Speaker, I encourage a ``no'' vote on this legislation in its current form. I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.
