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Congress Needs to Slow Down and Be Careful

Washington, D.C>, March 13, 2020

To call this reckless and irresponsible would be the understatement of the week. You all need to understand just how foolish Democrat leadership in the House is being right now.

Remember last week, we passed $8.3 billion in emergency funding to help various agencies (federal, state and local) combat the Coronavirus. This week in Congress, we’re working on another bill that would help Americans affected by the disease.

On that front, Democrats introduced a huge spending bill late Wednesday night that was simply unacceptable. There were some major problems with it, not the least of which was that the cost of abortions would have become reimbursable by the federal government as a “healthcare expense.” In what universe does paying for abortions have to do with helping Americans affected by the Coronavirus?!

Not only that, but we were asked to rush a vote on that version of the bill the very next day (Thursday). Fortunately, that version fell apart and the conversation started over. But just a couple of hours ago, I received a new version of this bill – not through any legitimate channels but instead… wait for it… from a lobbyist!

With negotiations and meetings still in progress, there’s a good chance we haven’t even seen the final version of this legislation yet. It’s wrong that lobbyists are somehow receiving advanced copies of documents before Members of Congress see anything.

Additionally, this bill is NOT something we need to rush. We don’t have months or even weeks, of course, but we certainly can afford at least a few days to “slow our roll” and make sure this bill is wise and would be effective.

Next week is supposed to be what’s called a “district work period” where Members of Congress are back home. I’m calling on Nancy Pelosi to cancel that if necessary and keep us up here on Capitol Hill for however long it takes to get this right.