[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 80 (Tuesday, June 10, 1997)]
[House]
[Page H3638]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  2000
                        NO WAY TO RUN A CONGRESS

  (Ms. DeLauro asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute.)
  Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Speaker, it has now been 83 days since the President 
first asked this Congress for disaster relief legislation. Flood-
stricken families in the Midwest are desperately waiting for these 
funds. Yet the majority has loaded up this bill with provisions the 
President has said that he cannot accept in an effort to embarrass him.
  Let me quote from today's Wall Street Journal that says Speaker Newt 
Gingrich has privately indicated that he never expected the President 
to sign the bill sent to him. Let me also mention what Republicans are 
privately conceding, that this is more of a rhetorical attempt to 
embarrass Mr. Clinton, put themselves in a better light after helping 
to provoke shutdowns in the last Congress.
  Mr. Speaker, we are talking about people's lives. There are literally 
tens of thousands of people unable to make basic decisions about their 
lives until this bill is enacted. Yet the majority refuses to send a 
bill without these provisions to the President. This simply is no way 
to run a Congress.
  Mr. Speaker, providing Federal assistance to the victims in times of 
crisis is one of the fundamental roles of the United States Congress, 
yet my Republican colleagues would abdicate this basic responsibility 
in order to score political points.
  I implore the majority to stop playing politics with people's lives. 
Send the President a clean disaster bill today.

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