[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 153 (Thursday, September 21, 2023)]
[House]
[Pages H4443-H4451]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




    PROVIDING FOR CONSIDERATION OF H.R. 4365, DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE 
  APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 2024; PROVIDING FOR CONSIDERATION OF H.R. 1130, 
  UNLOCKING OUR DOMESTIC LNG POTENTIAL ACT OF 2023; AND PROVIDING FOR 
CONSIDERATION OF H.RES. 684, CONDEMNING THE ACTIONS OF GOVERNOR OF NEW 
MEXICO, MICHELLE LUJAN GRISHAM, FOR SUBVERTING THE SECOND AMENDMENT TO 
  THE CONSTITUTION AND DEPRIVING THE CITIZENS OF NEW MEXICO OF THEIR 
                           RIGHT TO BEAR ARMS

  Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I 
call up House Resolution 712 and ask for its immediate consideration.
  The Clerk read the resolution, as follows:

                              H. Res. 712

       Resolved, That at any time after adoption of this 
     resolution the Speaker may, pursuant to clause 2(b) of rule 
     XVIII, declare the House resolved into the Committee of the 
     Whole House on the state of the Union for consideration of 
     the bill (H.R. 4365) making appropriations for the Department 
     of Defense for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2024, and 
     for other purposes. The first reading of the bill shall be 
     dispensed with. All points of order against consideration of 
     the bill are waived. General debate shall be confined to the 
     bill and shall not exceed one hour equally divided and 
     controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the 
     Committee on Appropriations or their respective designees. 
     After general debate the bill shall be considered for 
     amendment under the five-minute rule. The bill shall be 
     considered as read. All points of order against provisions in 
     the bill are waived.
       Sec. 2. (a) No amendment to the bill shall be in order 
     except those printed in part A of the report of the Committee 
     on Rules accompanying this resolution, amendments en bloc 
     described in section 3 of this resolution, and pro forma 
     amendments described in section 4 of this resolution.
       (b) Each amendment printed in part A of the report of the 
     Committee on Rules shall be considered only in the order 
     printed in the report, may be offered only by a Member 
     designated in the report, shall be considered as read, shall 
     be debatable for the time specified in the report equally 
     divided and controlled by the proponent and an opponent, 
     shall not be subject to amendment except as provided by 
     section 4 of this resolution, and shall not be subject to a 
     demand for division of the question in the House or in the 
     Committee of the Whole.
       (c) All points of order against amendments printed in part 
     A of the report of the Committee on Rules or against 
     amendments en bloc described in section 3 of this resolution 
     are waived.
       Sec. 3.  It shall be in order at any time for the chair of 
     the Committee on Appropriations or her designee to offer 
     amendments en bloc consisting of amendments printed in part A 
     of the report of the Committee on Rules accompanying this 
     resolution not earlier disposed of. Amendments en bloc 
     offered pursuant to this section shall be considered as read, 
     shall be debatable for 20 minutes equally divided and 
     controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the 
     Committee on Appropriations or their respective designees, 
     shall not be subject to amendment except as provided by 
     section 4 of this resolution, and shall not be subject to a 
     demand for division of the question in the House or in the 
     Committee of the Whole.
       Sec. 4.  During consideration of the bill for amendment, 
     the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on 
     Appropriations or their respective designees may offer up to 
     10 pro forma amendments each at any point for the purpose of 
     debate.
       Sec. 5.  At the conclusion of consideration of the bill for 
     amendment the Committee shall rise and report the bill to the 
     House with such amendments as may have been adopted. The 
     previous question shall be considered as ordered on the bill 
     and amendments thereto to final passage without intervening 
     motion except one motion to recommit.
       Sec. 6.  At any time after adoption of this resolution the 
     Speaker may, pursuant to clause 2(b) of rule XVIII, declare 
     the House resolved into the Committee of the Whole House on 
     the state of the Union for consideration of the bill (H.R. 
     1130) to repeal restrictions on the export and import of 
     natural gas. The first reading of the bill shall be dispensed 
     with. All points of order against consideration of the bill 
     are waived. General debate shall be confined to the bill and 
     shall not exceed one hour equally divided and controlled by 
     the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on 
     Energy and Commerce or their respective designees. After 
     general debate the bill shall be considered for amendment 
     under the five-minute rule. The amendment in the nature of a 
     substitute recommended by the Committee on Energy and 
     Commerce now printed in the bill shall be considered as 
     adopted in the House and in the Committee of the Whole. The 
     bill, as amended, shall be considered as the original bill 
     for the purpose of further amendment under the five-minute 
     rule and shall be considered as read. All points of order 
     against provisions in the bill, as amended, are waived. No 
     further amendment to the bill, as amended, shall be in order 
     except those printed in part B of the report of the Committee 
     on Rules accompanying this resolution. Each such further 
     amendment may be offered only in the order printed in the 
     report, may be offered only by a Member designated in the 
     report, shall be considered as read, shall be debatable for 
     the time specified in the report equally divided and 
     controlled by the proponent and an opponent, shall not be 
     subject to amendment, and shall not be subject to a demand 
     for division of the question in the House or in the Committee 
     of the Whole. All points of order against such further 
     amendments are waived. At the conclusion of consideration of 
     the bill for amendment the Committee shall rise and report 
     the bill, as amended, to the House with such further 
     amendments as may have been adopted. The previous question 
     shall be considered as ordered on the bill, as amended, and 
     on any further amendment thereto to final passage without 
     intervening motion except one motion to recommit.
       Sec. 7.  Upon adoption of this resolution it shall be in 
     order without intervention of any point of order to consider 
     in the House the resolution (H. Res. 684) condemning the 
     actions of Governor of New Mexico, Michelle Lujan Grisham, 
     for subverting the Second Amendment to the Constitution and 
     depriving the citizens of New Mexico of their right to bear 
     arms. The resolution shall be considered as read. The 
     previous question shall be considered as ordered on the 
     resolution and preamble to adoption without intervening 
     motion or demand for division of the question except one hour 
     of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and 
     ranking minority member of the Committee on the Judiciary or 
     their respective designees.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Oklahoma is recognized 
for 1 hour.
  Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the 
customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. 
McGovern), the ranking member of the Rules Committee, 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. COLE. Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may 
have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks on 
House Resolution 712.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Oklahoma?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, last night the Rules Committee met and 
reported out a rule, House Resolution 712, providing for consideration 
of H.R. 4365, the Department of Defense Appropriations Act for Fiscal 
Year 2024, under a structured rule.
  It provides 1 hour of general debate equally divided and controlled 
by the

[[Page H4444]]

chair and ranking member of the Committee on Appropriations or their 
respective designees. It also makes in order 184 amendments, more than 
75 percent of those eligible for consideration. Finally, it provides 
for one motion to recommit.
  The rule also makes in order H.R. 1130, the Unlocking our Domestic 
LNG Potential Act of 2023 under a structured rule. It provides for 1 
hour of general debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and 
ranking member of the Committee on Energy and Commerce or their 
respective designees. It provides for one motion to recommit.
  Finally, the rule makes in order H. Res. 684 under a closed rule. It 
provides 1 hour of general debate equally divided and controlled by the 
chair and ranking member of the Committee on the Judiciary or their 
respective designees.
  I rise today, Madam Speaker, in support of the rule and the 
underlying legislation.
  Madam Speaker, as Members are aware, the House has previously debated 
an identical rule covering H.R. 4365. This was a fulsome and passionate 
debate, and I said most of what was needed to be said from my point of 
view during that debate, but I will make a few key points about this 
bill again now.
  The bill before us provides full funding for our national defense. It 
appropriates $826 billion in new discretionary spending, which is a 
modest increase of $300 million over the President's budget request of 
nearly $29 billion or 3.6 percent over the FY 2023 enacted level.
  Madam Speaker, this truly is a good bill, one that I think the House 
can and should be proud of. It makes appropriate investments in the 
military and ensures that dollars are being directed where they are 
needed the most. It invests heavily in our servicemembers, providing 
them with a 5.2 percent pay raise. It provides continued funding for 
new advanced weapons systems, ensuring that the military has the force 
it needs to confront any foe anywhere in the world at any time, and it 
continues to expand the Navy to protect the freedom of the seas and 
invests heavily in Asia and the Pacific theater where China continues 
to expand its own military might in anticipation of a confrontation 
with the United States and our allies.
  Madam Speaker, providing funding for our national defense is both 
Congress' privilege and its responsibility. In order for our brave men 
and women in uniform to do their jobs, Congress must do its job. Today, 
we can take that first step toward doing so.
  The rule also provides for consideration of H.R. 1130, the Unlocking 
our Domestic LNG Potential Act of 2023. This bill removes regulatory 
barriers for the construction and licensing of new liquid natural gas 
or LNG import and export terminals.
  Madam Speaker, when the Republican majority took over in January, we 
committed to unleashing America's energy potential. For too long, 
regulatory roadblocks and active hostility of the Biden administration 
have made it difficult to expand production of America's abundant 
energy resources, but despite the Biden administration's hostility, 
America is today the top producer of natural gas in the world.
  From my home State of Oklahoma, this is not an academic point. 
Oklahoma is the fifth largest natural gas producing State in the 
country, with nearly 350,000 jobs in the State tied directly to natural 
gas production. It is a critical part of my home State's economy.
  In recent years, innovation and new technology have revolutionized 
and expanded the production of natural gas, both in Oklahoma and in the 
United States as a whole. The people of my district are very proud to 
be part of that revolution. There is still more to be done, and the 
passage of H.R. 1130 will help make it easier, cheaper, and quicker to 
bring new LNG export terminals online.
  It is no exaggeration to say that American natural gas is a critical 
part of the world's energy mix, particularly in Europe, which 
previously sourced much of its natural gas from Russia, and we are 
capable of achieving more. The end result will be a strong future for 
us as we create more high-paying jobs and maintain America's energy 
independence and a strong future for our friends and allies around the 
world who can source their energy needs from us rather than from 
vicious dictators like Vladimir Putin.
  Madam Speaker, all in all, this is a strong bill, one that I am 
certainly proud to support.
  Finally, the rule makes in order H. Res. 684, which condemns New 
Mexico Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham for her executive order 
attempting to subvert the Second Amendment rights of New Mexico's 
citizens.
  As Members are aware, earlier this month, Governor Grisham issued an 
executive order purporting to suspend the right of New Mexicans to open 
and concealed carry of firearms. Governor Grisham claimed that this was 
necessary in order to deal with a public health emergency.
  Of course, this claim is patently absurd, and there is not now, nor 
has there ever been, a public health emergency and exception for 
constitutional rights. The right of Americans to bear arms is protected 
by the Second Amendment to the Constitution, and a constitutional right 
cannot be subverted at the whim of an elected official.

                              {time}  0930

  Last week, a Federal judge in New Mexico agreed and issued a 
restraining order blocking implementation of this patently 
unconstitutional order.
  Governor Grisham has rightly received condemnation on a bipartisan 
basis for her actions. H. Res. 684 will give all Members of Congress an 
opportunity to do so officially and on the record.
  It is always appropriate for the House to take time to reaffirm our 
values as a country and to protect the constitutional rights that form 
the foundation of our Republic.
  Indeed, I urge all Members to do so and speak with one voice, 
reminding all Americans that when it comes to their constitutional 
rights, the House of Representatives has their back.
  Madam Speaker, I urge Members to support both the rule and the 
underlying bills, and I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Oklahoma for 
yielding me the customary 30 minutes, and I yield myself such time as I 
may consume.
  Is this Groundhog Day, Madam Speaker? Back again once more to debate 
a rule for bills that were considered and failed to make it to the 
floor.
  You can't make this stuff up.
  So what changed? Not the bill text, not the fact that we have less 
than a week before the government shuts down. Maybe the minds of a few 
of our colleagues across the aisle? I guess we will see later today.
  Look, none of my remarks are directed to the gentleman from Oklahoma. 
I respect him personally and professionally. I think the world of him. 
I don't envy the task he has of trying to defend these bills or this 
process, but what the hell is going on in his Conference?
  The truth is that under Speaker McCarthy's weak leadership, this 
Republican majority is a total failure; an unmitigated disaster.
  Those aren't even my words. That is what one of your own Members said 
on TV a few nights ago about the process playing out in this Chamber 
right now.
  First, we have this absurd nonbinding resolution condemning the 
Governor of New Mexico for trying to keep her constituents safe from 
gun violence.
  Just to explain to folks who may be watching, this resolution does 
nothing--not a thing.
  It is a press release. It doesn't go to the Senate. It doesn't go to 
the President. It does nothing.
  So we are doing that, and we are doing nothing right now to avert a 
government shutdown. This place is becoming a Chamber where we debate 
trivial issues passionately and important ones not at all.
  Then we have a ridiculous bill about liquified natural gas. The House 
has already passed this bill not once, but twice. Of course, it makes 
sense to waste more time passing it again when a shutdown is looming 
and Republicans have no plan to keep the government running, right?
  This rule will also bring to the floor the Republicans' Department of 
Defense appropriations bill. Yes, this bill

[[Page H4445]]

has horrible, harmful policy riders that strip people's rights and push 
MAGA culture wars. It also reaffirms the Pentagon's bloated budget at a 
time when the far-right wing nuts are holding up all other 
appropriation bills because they feel they don't cut enough money for 
programs that help everyday Americans. We still don't have a plan to 
fund the government.
  Madam Speaker, I know if some of my Republican colleagues had their 
way, we would pass their continuing resolution that contains mindless, 
across-the-board spending cuts.
  My colleagues on the other side of the aisle want to cut funding for 
cancer research, for our Head Start programs, for air traffic safety, 
for border security, and a 65-percent cut to heating assistance for 
families just as it is starting to get cold. Talk about cruel.
  Now, these cuts aren't just cuts, they cost us. Do people realize 
what Head Start does? It invests in kids from low-income families so 
they can have more opportunity in life. The return on investment is 
almost $10 for every $1 spent.
  Cancer research. Do Republicans realize that investing in cancer 
research saves us healthcare costs not just now but down the road, and 
it saves lives.
  Their appropriation agenda cuts all this and more.
  Madam Speaker, you know where Republicans refuse to cut from? This 
bill, the Pentagon, the biggest, most expensive bureaucracy in our 
Federal Government: the Department of Defense.
  So for whatever reason, it is okay to cut programs like WIC that help 
feed pregnant moms, but they can't find a single weapon system where 
there is any waste? I am happy to provide numerous articles and reports 
from my colleagues about the cost overruns in so many of these wasteful 
missile systems.
  The Defense spending bill, which is the most extravagant Defense 
spending bill ever, failed a rule vote on Tuesday because the 
Republican Conference is in absolute chaos. Best I can tell, no one on 
the other side of the aisle has any objection to the top-line number in 
the Pentagon bill, but yet they voted down the rule just the other day.
  I know that whipping votes can be difficult, but the number of 
backroom secret deals and late-night seances Republicans have had to 
hold this year to revive bills from the dead is astounding, and I am 
afraid things will only get worse as we near September 30.
  Republicans are acting like the end of the fiscal year just snuck up 
on them.
  News flash: The deadline to fund the government isn't some big 
secret. They have had months to prevent a government shutdown. The 
reality is that not once--not once--have Republicans given us a bill 
that could keep the government open.
  Republicans barely control one-half of one branch of government. Yet, 
they act like they are king of the hill, like it is their way or the 
highway, that nothing else matters.

  The only way this slim House Republican majority can keep the lights 
on is if they get Senate Democrats and the President to agree, but they 
haven't even begun to reach across the aisle to negotiate because they 
are busy negotiating amongst themselves.
  Hell, at this rate, they might not even be able to get Senate 
Republicans to agree given how extreme their Conference has become.
  Madam Speaker, this majority is a failure. The clowns are running the 
circus. The day Speaker McCarthy handed his gavel over to the clown 
show, this was the inevitable outcome. There is a different path that 
we can choose right here and right now: Work with Democrats to prevent 
a shutdown; work with us to keep the government open; work with us to 
honor the deal you made earlier this year.
  It is time for the ringmaster of this circus, Kevin McCarthy, to 
stand up to the clowns and say enough with the extremism and the 
blackmail. Stop wasting time and work with us to get this done in a 
bipartisan way.
  Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Madam Speaker, I would again return my friend's compliments. I enjoy 
working with him on the Rules Committee. We have been there together a 
long time. There is nobody I have a higher professional and personal 
regard for than my good friend.
  Now honestly, Madam Speaker, I wish I had his talent for colorful 
rhetoric. I particularly like the ``Groundhog Day'' reference. I remind 
my friend, while there are some similarities, the movie had a happy 
ending. Everybody learned some lessons and they got to where they 
needed to be. I think we may be involved in a process something like 
that.
  I disagree with my friend that the issues being brought up in this 
bill are trivial. Defending the United States of America is not a 
trivial thing. You can agree or disagree with the bill, and I will talk 
about that in a minute. That is fair enough. I don't consider that 
trivial.
  Providing natural gas in abundance and at modest prices to Americans 
and having that resource to deal with our adversaries overseas, who 
often use energy as a weapon, and to be able to provide for our friends 
and allies reliable energy is not a trivial matter. It is an 
extraordinarily important matter.
  The 10 million Americans that work in the domestic energy industry 
think what we are doing here is the right thing to do. I don't consider 
their interests and their views trivial. I am just very privileged to 
represent many people that have that point of view and are involved in 
that particular profession.
  Finally, I don't consider standing up for the Second Amendment a 
trivial thing. We have a Governor that issued an order that a Federal 
judge immediately overturned and Democrats in New Mexico condemned--
elected Democrats, law enforcement officials. It is actually one of the 
areas that is usually a contentious issue that we had really strong 
bipartisan agreement. We think it is important to make my point.
  My friends have a different point of view. That is fair enough. Just 
express it, and we will move on. Again, we don't consider defense of 
the Constitution to be trivial.
  I agree with my friend about a number of things, and we have had this 
discussion, frankly, as friends in the Rules Committee.
  I agree with him about shutdowns. I do not think it is an appropriate 
tactic, and I hope that we are able to avoid one. There will be an 
appropriate time, I am sure, when we discuss with our friends how to do 
that, but we need a negotiating position. We are working toward that, 
and we hope we will get there.
  Believe me, I am well aware that we have a Democratic Senate. This 
House has done wonderful work on things like H.R. 1 to deal with 
energy, H.R. 2 to deal with our border. We send them over there and 
they are never picked up, never heard of again unless we can snatch 
pieces out of them here or there and attach them to one of these 
broader agreements, as we were able to do on the debt ceiling crisis 
over permitting of facilities, both for renewable and nonrenewable 
energy.
  Again, it is a difficult legislative process, and I agree it is going 
to be complicated, but our goal is to get to the same place; that is, 
to make sure that the government is funded, and also, that we advance 
shared values that we have and have an open and honest discussion with 
the United States Senate. When we do that, we have been able to find 
some agreement.
  My friend likes to point out--all my Democratic friends like to point 
out regularly--well, gosh, why are you passing appropriations bills 
that are less than to the letter agreed on? Well, gee whiz, where I 
come from, if you can do something for less money, that is usually a 
good thing to do. I am never going to apologize. If we see a different 
way to get to a policy objective that costs less money, that is a good 
thing to do.
  Now, I know when we discussed this last night, the Senate is 
consistently appropriating above the agreed-upon number. All the 
appropriations bills, or pretty much all of them that they have dealt 
with so far, are at higher levels. So guess what? We will get into 
negotiation. My guess is they will come down some. We will come up 
some, and we will find some sort of common deal. That is just the way 
politics work. I am never going to be critical of my colleagues for 
trying to do something cheaper and save money.
  I remind my friend of the condition in which the Democratic majority 
left

[[Page H4446]]

our fiscal finances. We are running a $1.7 trillion deficit this year. 
That is bigger than all the discretionary budget of the United States 
of America. We have not had a Democratic President submit a budget that 
comes into balance--not in a decade, but ever, since Bill Clinton.
  President Obama never did. President Biden never has. I don't think 
any future Democrat will.
  We used to have Democrats in the 1990s that we disagreed with, that 
we fought, but they said, well, let's try to get to a balanced budget 
within 10 years, and they managed to do that.
  My friends have basically abdicated that debate. They just let it go 
on and on out to infinity. Even President Trump submitted budgets that 
within a decade came into balance. I didn't always agree with some of 
the decisions. I don't think either party has done a very good job.
  My friend and I have had this discussion in dealing with the real 
drivers of debt: that is mandatory spending; that is Social Security, 
Medicaid, and Medicare. We need to have that debate. I hope the 
Presidential contest has it. I note at least some of the discussions we 
have been having in our caucus talk about having a debt commission 
attached to some of this, so perhaps we can make some modest steps.
  My friends heard me talk about my Social Security bill, which is 
really modeled after what was done in 1983 by Ronald Reagan, Tip 
O'Neill, and Howard Baker working together, a commission, then Congress 
voting--including, by the way, the President of the United States at 
that time who liked commissions, voting for the commission, for the 
deal, and it worked. It improved the fiscal solvency of the country. It 
extended the life of Social Security, a program I know that we both 
support.
  Again, you may think these are trivial issues. We don't. We think we 
have a long process in front of us. These are steps in the right 
direction on the appropriate end that won't be enough.
  Madam Speaker, the last point I will make--and my friend and I just 
disagree here--look, defense is a very different thing than any other 
part of the appropriations process. Most appropriations process is 
about things that are desirable and good.
  I have worked pretty hard on cancer research, so my friend's points 
are well made there. I think those are valuable investments.
  Defense is about threats. We had a peace dividend in the 1990s. You 
know why we had it? Because the Soviet Union had collapsed, and we 
could prudently save money in defense.
  I will tell you right now, I would go higher than the number here; 
but if the number we have on defense is outrageous, your first call 
ought to be to the White House because it is basically the President's 
number. We actually pulled back from where our defense appropriators 
wanted to go and a lot of our defense hawks wanted to go because we did 
think addressing the horrific deficits that were inherited from the 
last Democratic era meant we even had to make sacrifices here.

                              {time}  0945

  I am not really comfortable with it, but it is a step in the right 
direction. We might not even had to have that if you hadn't, through 
reckless spending, unleashed the worst inflation in 40 years. I 
actually have a 40-year-old son. He had never seen anything like what 
happened in the Biden administration because of irresponsibly passing 
the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan and another $700 billion much-
misnamed Inflation Reduction Act.
  We inherited a mess. We inherited inflation. We inherited record 
deficits.
  It is a pretty tough deal. My friends don't want to address it. Well, 
this majority is going to do its best to address those issues. We do 
struggle and disagree, and sometimes I get frustrated with some of my 
friends on my side of the aisle about tactics.
  My colleague is right about one thing, and I will agree 100 percent. 
There is no objection to this rule on the basis of the rule. There is 
nothing wrong with it. It has 184 amendments. You can agree or disagree 
with the bill, but it is a good rule.
  In my view, there is nothing wrong with the bill, other than I would 
like to have spent a little bit more money. Like any bill that spends 
this amount of money, everybody could do it a little bit differently.
  People are trying to make other points unrelated to the bill, and I 
will agree with my friend that that is unfortunate. I don't think that 
is a good way to legislate. I think my colleagues should look at the 
legislation in front of them. If they agree with the rule, they ought 
to vote for it. If they disagree, it is fair enough to vote against it. 
However, if they agree with the basic bill, don't relate it to 
something else and try to use it as a weapon. We don't have many 
Members who do that, but we have a few.
  As my friend knows, we have a very narrow majority. He has been here 
once or twice himself when they had narrow majorities. It is part of 
the legislative process. We will continue to work it.
  My hope today is we will advance this rule. It will open the way to 
advance what I think is a good Defense appropriations bill, and we will 
continue to move legislatively as rapidly as we can. We will work and, 
at the appropriate time, I am sure, work across the rotunda with 
Democrats in the Senate and probably in this Chamber with some of my 
Democratic friends. Hopefully, we will avoid a government shutdown.
  The most important thing today: Move the rule. Move the bill. That is 
what we are going to try to do.
  Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume.
  Before I yield to my next speaker, I want to clarify for the record 
because I don't want to be misunderstood or mischaracterized because I 
have great respect for the gentleman. I never said the Defense 
appropriations bill was trivial. I said the Defense appropriations bill 
was bloated and filled with the kitchen sink of MAGA culture wars.
  On the second bill, the LNG bill, I said it was repetitive because we 
have passed it twice already. It is going nowhere. We are going to pass 
it a third time, and that is going nowhere at a time when our 
government is about to shut down. To take up a bill that is repetitive 
and that is going nowhere seems like not a good use of our time.
  I did say that the nonbinding resolution on guns was trivial because 
it doesn't do a damn thing. We are living in a country where we have 
massacres occur on a regular basis, and we can't get any legislation to 
the floor. The only bill we get to the floor on guns is a nonbinding 
resolution that does nothing and that doesn't even go anywhere. It 
doesn't go to the Senate. It doesn't go to the President.
  I want to be clear on what I said because I think it is important. I 
do believe that this bill, this nonbinding resolution, is an example of 
how trivial issues get debated passionately here and important ones not 
at all.
  Madam Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Pennsylvania 
(Mr. Boyle), the ranking member of the Budget Committee.
  Mr. BOYLE of Pennsylvania. Madam Speaker, I thank my good friend from 
that other Commonwealth, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, for 
yielding.
  We are 9 days away--9 days and maybe call it 14 hours--from a 
government shutdown. It is completely unnecessary.
  In this Chamber just 3 months ago, we had a vote. We voted to raise 
the debt ceiling, and we also voted to set the parameters and the 
figures for what next year's budget would be. That vote was 
overwhelmingly bipartisan. Eighty percent of House Democrats and almost 
two-thirds of House Republicans voted for it. There was a similarly 
large bipartisan vote in the Senate, and it was then signed into law by 
the President.
  I thought at that point: Well, this is good news. Not only are we 
ensuring we didn't go over the cliff in terms of the debt ceiling, but 
it looks like we won't have another Republican-forced government 
shutdown.
  Yet, here we are. Why? Because the Speaker of the House reneged on 
that deal even though two-thirds of their side of the aisle joined 80 
percent of us in voting for it.
  Honor the agreement that we had and that you voted for. This is 
completely unnecessary.
  Yesterday in the Budget Committee, we marked up a completely 
partisan, one-sided budget resolution in an all-

[[Page H4447]]

day markup--$16 trillion worth of cuts, completely unrealistic. The 
Congressional Budget Office itself labeled it a cuts-only approach.
  During that hearing, I pointed out that in previous government 
shutdowns, the Republican government shutdown in 2013 cost the economy 
upward of $6 billion. There were more than 120,000 fewer jobs as a 
result of that government shutdown. A subsequent Republican-forced 
government shutdown also cost the economy billions of dollars and also 
cost us jobs.
  While it might be a game for some in Washington, D.C.--there are 
quotes from a number of Members on the other side of the aisle, by the 
way, saying they want a government shutdown. Don't take my word for it, 
just read the quotes of some of the Republican Members of the House 
cheering a government shutdown, saying that there will be no problem at 
all.

  If only that were so. It costs us billions of dollars. Nothing good 
comes out of it.
  Actually, I take that back. There is one thing that is good that 
comes out of it. Each and every time over the last 30 years that 
Republicans have forced a government shutdown, in the subsequent 
election, they are punished by the voters.
  That was the case back in 1995. It was the beginning of Bill 
Clinton's comeback. He was losing at the polls at that moment to Bob 
Dole. Then the government shut down, the Gingrich-Dole shutdown, and 
Bill Clinton came back and went on to win reelection by over 8 points.
  Similarly, in 2011, Barack Obama, at that moment, the polls showed 
him losing to Mitt Romney. Republican extremism forced the shutdown. 
Their extremism in playing around with the debt ceiling led to the 
first-ever downgrade in American history. Barack Obama ends up coming 
back and beats Mitt Romney a year later by 4 points.
  So maybe there is one good thing that comes out of Republican 
extremism.
  If there is anything clear over the last 9 months, it is that this 
side doesn't have a clue about governing. I keep hearing about the 
small majority. We know what it is like to have a small majority. We 
had the exact same five-seat majority last term. What did we do with 
it? We passed the most ambitious domestic policy legislation since 
1965.
  What has this side done? It takes them 15 votes just to elect their 
own guy Speaker. Now, they keep haranguing the poor guy, keep 
threatening him with the job day after day. Now, he is reneging on his 
own agreement that he brought here and voted for and that we passed in 
June.
  By the way, we all know the way this is going to end, whether it is 
before a shutdown or afterward. The only thing that can pass the 
Senate, pass the House, and be signed into law by the President looks a 
lot like that legislation that passed here in June.
  I hope that it doesn't take a government shutdown for the other side 
to finally get with it and learn these lessons.
  The reality is ordinary Americans will suffer as a result of a 
government shutdown. It is completely unnecessary, and if it happens, 
it is solely the blame of the House Republican leadership.
  Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  I want to respond to some of my good friend from Pennsylvania's 
points, and some of them I agree with. I do think shutting down the 
government is not an appropriate tactic. We agree on that.
  You know, linking them to election results is really an interesting 
exercise. The government shutdown that I think my friend thought was in 
2011, if I am correct, and I may be wrong, was really the one in 2013. 
We actually picked up seats in 2014. I don't think that is why we 
picked up seats. My friends always forget that they shut down the 
government in 2017, and they won seats in 2018. So you can pretty much 
play these numbers however you want.
  The important point, which my friend makes and I agree with, is that 
shutting down the government is bad for the American people. It is an 
abdication of our responsibility. It is something we should not do. I 
have never supported it in the past. I hope we manage to avoid one now. 
I think that is exactly what the Speaker is engaged in trying to 
accomplish, whether my friends agree with his methods or not.
  I will tell you, I am mystified by this concern about the agreement. 
Again, we agreed on top-line numbers. We didn't say we are going to the 
top-line numbers. This is the top-line number, and if we can do it for 
less and persuade the Senate that that is a good idea, then I don't see 
that as a bad thing.
  If my friends are concerned about keeping agreements, maybe they 
ought to call over to their friends in the United States Senate who are 
producing bill after bill that are above these numbers.
  Guess what? I suspect each side is positioning for a negotiation, and 
magically, we probably won't be too far off, if we come to an 
agreement, of the numbers that are laid out in the debt ceiling deal.
  I am not telling you this is the most efficient way to legislate, but 
I have seen it before, and we are seeing it from both sides right now.
  In terms of the budget, I tell you what, I am interested in the 
opinions my friends have on the budget because they didn't bother to do 
one for the 4 years they were in the majority. I am thrilled they are 
actually marking up a budget in the Budget Committee. I give Chairman 
Arrington a lot of credit for doing it. It is hard to do. My friends 
didn't do it for 4 years because they couldn't do it because they 
couldn't come to an agreement.
  As a matter of fact, I remember those 4 years I used to serve on the 
Budget Committee. You couldn't get a budget out of the Budget Committee 
that you controlled.
  Do you want to talk about dysfunction? The Budget Committee sets the 
top-line number for all spending. Maybe that is why we overspent so 
much. As a matter of fact, you deemed budgets in the rule.
  So I would agree with you. We should probably be sitting down and 
figuring out ways to run our fiscal affairs better and particularly do 
it in a more cooperative way because, as my friends point out, they do 
control the United States Senate and the United States Presidency.
  However, please don't lecture me on how you do budgets when you had 
the House, the Senate, and the Presidency and could not write a budget 
in 4 years and get it out of your own committee, let alone bring it to 
this floor. Some of those years you weren't operating with a five-seat 
majority. You just couldn't get the job done.

  We are trying. I commend the Budget Committee. I hope they bring one 
out here. I will be disappointed if they don't, but at least they are 
making the effort.
  Finally, again, to my friends, I can't figure out whether you want 
the Speaker to succeed or not because there are lots of expressions 
that you feel sorry for him in the job he has. Don't worry, he likes 
the job he has. He works hard at it every day.
  I think he is a good Speaker. He delivered on a debt ceiling deal 
that my friends even in the end came around and voted for. He delivered 
one that was a heck of a lot better because it had some genuine 
concessions in it, in terms of energy production and in terms of 
setting top lines.
  We are on the eve of another kind of negotiation, and maybe we can 
find common ground again. I genuinely, quite frankly, hope that we do. 
In that process, there will be plenty of people on both sides of the 
aisle who don't like what the end product is, and they will vote 
accordingly. That is fair enough.
  This is just kind of the way it works around here right now, and I 
think the Speaker is doing a terrific job of trying to work the 
process, trying to make sure legislation moves across the floor in 
regular order, and trying to get to numbers that begin to bring down 
this horrific deficit that my friends left the country with, with no 
plan to deal with it.
  Nobody in the White House has a plan. The President has never 
submitted a budget that comes into balance. He won't talk about 
entitlement reform. He rules it out.
  Sorry, if you are serious about the budget deficit, you do control 
two-thirds of this process. I know it is inconvenient when we bring up 
the fact that we are spending a lot more money and you have no plan to 
deal with it, but that is what we are going to do.

[[Page H4448]]

  We will see. The American people can make a choice in the next 
election about that, but I am not going to be critical of my friends. 
Even when I am critical of their tactics, and I am sometimes, I am not 
critical of people who are trying to lower the budget deficit and 
trying to restore a measure of fiscal sanity to this country. That is 
something the Democrats used to care about, did care about when I first 
got here. They totally abandoned it during the Obama Presidency.
  When my friends want to get serious, they will have a willing 
negotiating partner on the budget.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. DesJarlais). Members are reminded to 
direct their comments to the Chair.

                              {time}  1000

  Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, the concern we have over here on this side 
of the aisle is that there are Members on the Republican side who seem 
to be cheering on a shutdown.
  The other day, in an interview with ``PBS NewsHour,'' a fellow 
colleague on the Rules Committee, Mr. Norman of South Carolina, was 
asked how likely a shutdown is, and his response was: It is 100 
percent.
  Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to include in the Record a Truth 
Social post from yesterday by Donald Trump opposing the GOP's 
continuing resolution.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Massachusetts?
  There was no objection.
       A very important deadline is approaching at the end of the 
     month. Republicans in Congress can and must defund all 
     aspects of Crooked Joe Biden's weaponized Government that 
     refuses to close the Border, and treats half the Country as 
     Enemies of the State. This is also the last chance to defund 
     these political prosecutions against me and other Patriots. 
     They failed on the debt limit, but they must not fail now. 
     Use the power of the purse and defend the Country.
  Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, the twice-impeached, four-times-indicted 
former President is weighing in on the funding fights within his party, 
and ultimately he is endorsing actions that will shut down the 
government.
  Now, I have a strange feeling my Republican counterparts will gladly 
comply at the expense of the American people because everybody on that 
side of the aisle is so frightened of him.
  The gentleman from Oklahoma was talking about a shutdown in 2018. I 
don't disagree with my friend that there was a brief shutdown in early 
2018 that a lot of people don't remember because it was so short. I 
should point out that Republicans were in charge of the House and in 
charge of the Senate at the time. I know some Democrats were pushing to 
help Dreamers as part of a funding deal, but that brief, symbolic 
shutdown lasted less than 72 hours, mostly over the weekend and, if I 
remember correctly, had no lasting impact.
  Now, compare that to the 5-week Republican shutdown in 2018 which 
reduced economic output by $11 billion in the following 2 quarters, 
including $3 billion that the United States economy never regained. 
That was a partial shutdown. Then the 2013 full Republican shutdown 
reduced GDP growth by $20 billion, according to Moody's Analytics. $20 
billion. I think it is a little more than unfair to play both sides of 
the card here, because it doesn't apply.
  Mr. Speaker, Republicans claim that they are trying to save money but 
continually weaken the United States Government's creditworthiness at a 
cost to the United States taxpayers.
  In August, Fitch cited a decline in governance as a key reason for 
the United States' downgrade due to repeated battles over the past two 
decades that have led to government shutdowns or even taken the 
government to the brink of a debt default. Republicans need to get 
serious about governing and protect the United States' 
creditworthiness.
  Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to include in the Record an 
article from the AP titled: ``The U.S. government's debt has been 
downgraded. Here's what to know.''
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Massachusetts?
  There was no objection.

               [From the Associated Press, Aug. 2, 2023]

  The U.S. Government's Debt Has Been Downgraded. Here's What To Know

                        (By Christopher Rugaber)

       Washington (AP).--Late Tuesday, Fitch Ratings became the 
     second of the three major credit-rating firms to remove its 
     coveted triple-A assessment of the United States government's 
     credit worthiness, a move that spurred debate in Washington 
     about spending and tax policies.
       Fitch cited the federal government's rising debt burden and 
     the political difficulties that the U.S. government has had 
     in addressing spending and tax policies as the principal 
     reasons for reducing its rating from AAA to AA+.
       Fitch said its decision ``reflects the expected fiscal 
     deterioration over the next three years, a high and growing 
     general government debt burden, and the erosion of 
     governance'' compared with other countries with similar debt 
     ratings.
       The downgrade may have little impact on financial markets 
     long-term or on the interest rates the U.S. government will 
     pay. Here's what you need to know:


               HOW DID THE GOVERNMENT GET TO THIS POINT?

       Fitch's move comes just weeks after the White House and 
     Congress resolved a standoff on whether to raise the 
     government's borrowing limit. An agreement reached in late 
     May suspended the debt limit for two years and cut about $1.5 
     trillion in spending over the next decade. The agreement came 
     after negotiations approached a cutoff date after which 
     Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen had warned the government 
     would default on its debt.
       The Biden administration reacted angrily to the move. 
     Yellen said Wednesday that Fitch's ``flawed assessment is 
     based on outdated data and fails to reflect improvements 
     across a range of indicators, including those related to 
     governance, that we've seen over the past two and a half 
     years.''
       ``Despite the gridlock, we have seen both parties come 
     together to pass legislation to resolve the debt limit,'' 
     Yellen said.
       But Douglas Holtz-Eakin, president of the American Action 
     Forum and former director of the Congressional Budget Office, 
     said that Fitch's decision was the right one, given that 
     there are few efforts in Washington to address the 
     government's longstanding budget deficit.
       ``This is about a fundamental mismatch over the long term 
     between our spending growth and our revenue capabilities,'' 
     he said.
       Standard & Poor's removed its coveted triple-A rating of 
     U.S. debt in 2011, after a similar standoff over the 
     borrowing limit.
       Fitch said that the ratio of U.S. government debt relative 
     to the size of its economy will likely rise from nearly 113% 
     this year to more than 118% in 2025, which it said is more 
     than two-and-a-half times higher than is typically the case 
     for governments with triple-A and even double-A ratings.


            WHAT TYPICALLY HAPPENS WHEN DEBT IS DOWNGRADED?

       Ratings agencies like Fitch and its counterparts, Standard 
     & Poor's and Moody's Investors Service, rate all kinds of 
     corporate and government debt, ranging from local government 
     bonds to debt issued by huge banks.
       In general, when an issuer of debt has its credit rating 
     downgraded, that often means it has to pay a higher interest 
     rate to compensate for the potentially higher risk of default 
     it poses.


                WHAT COULD THAT MEAN FOR U.S. TAXPAYERS?

       Many pension funds and other investment vehicles are 
     required to only hold investments with high credit ratings. 
     If a city or state, for example, sees its credit rating fall 
     too low, those investment funds would have to sell any 
     holdings of those bonds. That would force the government 
     issuing those bonds to pay a higher interest rate on its 
     future bonds to attract other investors.
       If that were to happen to U.S. Treasury securities, the 
     federal government could be required to pay higher interest 
     rates, which would push up interest costs for the government 
     and taxpayers.


                    WILL U.S. BORROWING COSTS RISE?

       Few economists think that such an outcome will actually 
     occur. Instead, they think Fitch's downgrade will have little 
     impact. Few pension funds are limited to holding just triple-
     A rated debt, according to Goldman Sachs, which means the 
     current AA+ from Fitch and Standard & Poor's will be 
     sufficient to maintain demand for Treasurys.
       ``We do not believe there are any meaningful holders of 
     Treasury securities who will be forced to sell due to a 
     downgrade,'' Alec Phillips, chief political economist for 
     Goldman Sachs, wrote in a research note.
       Large U.S. banks that are required by regulators to hold 
     Treasurys won't see any changes in those rules just because 
     of the downgrade, Phillips added in an interview, because 
     regulators will still see them as safe investments.
       For most investors, U.S. Treasury securities are 
     essentially in a class by themselves. The U.S. government 
     bond market is the largest in the world, which makes it easy 
     for investors to buy and sell Treasurys as needed. The United 
     States' large economy and historic political stability has 
     led many investors to see Treasurys as nearly the equivalent 
     of cash.
       Rating agency downgrades typically have more impact on 
     smaller, lesser-know debt issuers, such as municipal 
     governments. In those cases, even large investors may not 
     have much information about the creditworthiness of the bond 
     and are more reliant on the ratings agencies, Phillips said.

[[Page H4449]]

       Yet that isn't really the case for Treasury bonds and 
     notes, he said. Large investment funds and banks form their 
     own opinions about Treasury securities and don't rely on the 
     ratings agencies, he said. Fitch's analysis also didn't 
     provide much new information, he added. Other entities, such 
     as the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, have made 
     similar projections about where U.S. government debt is 
     headed.
       ``Nobody's holding Treasuries because of the ratings,'' 
     Phillips added.


                 WHAT DOES FITCH MEAN BY `GOVERNANCE'?

       Fitch cited a decline in ``governance'' as a key reason for 
     its downgrade, a reference to the repeated battles in 
     Washington over the past two decades that have led to 
     government shutdowns or even taken the government to the 
     brink of a debt default.
       ``The repeated debt-limit political standoffs and last-
     minute resolutions have eroded confidence in fiscal 
     management,'' Fitch said.
       At the same time, Fitch is referring to the inability of 
     even compromise legislation to meaningfully address the long-
     term drivers of federal government debt. specifically 
     entitlement programs for the elderly such as Social Security 
     and Medicaid.
       ``There has been only limited progress in tackling medium-
     term challenges related to rising social security and 
     Medicare costs due to an aging population,'' Fitch said:

  Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, there are consequences to these games that 
people on the right are playing, and the consequences are detrimental 
to our economy, which in turn are detrimental to the American people.
  The gentleman from Oklahoma also talked about the Senate. I wish we 
were behaving more like the Senate than behaving like we are here in 
the House.
  In the Senate, the Chair of the Appropriations Committee, Senator 
Murray, is actually working with the Republican Vice Chair, Senator 
Collins. There is a statement from Senator Murray saying: ``Vice Chair 
Collins and I have discussed how best to address these concerns, and we 
have agreed to make use of additional emergency appropriations--just as 
we do every year, and is fully allowed under the debt ceiling deal--to 
address in a bipartisan way some of the pressing challenges our Nation 
faces.
  ``In order to take these concerns regarding our defense and 
nondefense needs seriously, and to ensure we deliver the strongest 
bills possible with the broadest bipartisan support possible, Vice 
Chair Collins''--a Republican--``and I agreed to add $13.7 billion in 
additional emergency appropriations, including $8 billion for defense, 
and $5.7 billion for nondefense spread across four subcommittees, 
including the State/Foreign Ops bill we are considering today.''
  This is in response to that.
  The bottom line is what they are doing in the Senate is what we 
should be doing here. Even though Democrats control the Senate, they 
are sitting down with Republicans and they are having conversations. 
They are trying to come to deals. They are trying to not only get a 
short-term bill done to keep our government from shutting down, they 
are trying to figure out a long-term way forward.
  The Senate has used the Fiscal Responsibility Act as a starting point 
for meaningful bipartisan dialogue and compromise. They reached an 
agreement to stay within the 1 percent of the Fiscal Responsibility Act 
and collaborated to report out 12 bills with near bipartisan unanimity.
  Meanwhile, House Republicans haven't taken a single meaningful step 
to engage Democrats on necessary compromise. They failed to garner a 
single Democratic vote for their bills in committee and haven't been 
able to bring two of their bills to the full committee for 
consideration because the cuts were too deep.
  Even moderates on your side don't want to vote for those things.
  This is about the Senate following a bipartisan, collaborative 
process versus House Republicans turning their backs on that process 
and negotiating amongst themselves to make their bills more partisan.
  There is a way to do this, but, unfortunately, you have a small group 
of the most extreme of the extreme calling all the shots. They are 
moving this place in the wrong direction. These are the people cheering 
for a government shutdown. These are the people who don't care how much 
they hurt the American people with across-the-board, mindless cuts in 
programs like Head Start and WIC and medical research and LIHEAP, 
cutting it by 65 percent.
  I come from a State up north, Massachusetts. Tell my constituents, 
who depend on LIHEAP to heat their homes, the thinking behind gutting 
LIHEAP by 65 percent.
  Talk about cruel. There are consequences to your actions. There are 
consequences to your words, the downgrading of our credit. If you 
succeed in getting some of these cuts, people are going to lose 
benefits that they not only rely on to do things like heat their homes, 
they need them to survive.
  Enough of the nonsense. Let's come together and let's stop wasting 
time bringing another extreme CR to the House Rules Committee to bring 
on this floor that makes the crummy bill you brought the other night 
look like it is reasonable. Come on. We are running out of time.
  Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Members are again reminded to direct their 
remarks to the Chair.
  Mr. COLE. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Missouri (Mr. Alford), my very good friend.
  Mr. ALFORD. Mr. Speaker, I want to get one thing straight for our 
Members on the other side of the aisle. The only shutdown that we are 
in favor of is a shutdown of the woke indoctrination in our military, 
the shutdown of the infection of socialism propagated by the other 
side, and a shutdown of the bloated government spending and the 
overreach of regulation in America.
  Now, on to my main point.
  Mr. Speaker, I rise today to condemn, in the strongest terms 
possible, the blatant attacks on the Second Amendment from the Governor 
of New Mexico.
  We saw with COVID unprecedented government overreach that infringed 
on the rights of millions of Americans.
  Let me be crystal clear, Mr. Speaker: There is no such thing as a 
state public health emergency exception in the U.S. Constitution.
  The Second Amendment is a God-given right to the American people. We 
will not sit idly by as the people of New Mexico have their rights 
trampled by an unhinged lunatic.
  Throughout history, countless populations have been rendered 
vulnerable due to their inability to defend themselves from both 
external and internal threats.
  Our Founding Fathers, with great foresight and understanding of 
history's lessons, enshrined the right to bear arms not only as a 
protection from foreign invaders but also as a safeguard against 
potential domestic tyranny.
  Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support H. Res. 684 and push 
back against the attacks on we the people's God-given rights.
  Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.
  I am not going to engage in the frivolous part of what this rule 
provides. I think Mr. Cole and I were having a serious debate about 
things that really matter here in terms of our economy and whether or 
not we can fund our government. I am not going to waste time talking 
about a nonbinding resolution that is nothing more than a press 
release.

  Mr. Speaker, let's be honest with each other. We are only a few days 
away from a shutdown, and we are in chaos because the Republican Party 
is in the middle of a civil war. That is just a fact.
  Speaker McCarthy cut a deal on spending levels back in May. That is 
what the Senate has acted on in a bipartisan way. The only people not 
holding up the bargain are House Republicans.
  Speaker McCarthy is breaking his word, and I get it. I mean, he 
handed over the gavel to the most extreme in his party. He put the 
patients in charge of the hospital, and now he is getting blackmailed. 
Good luck to him getting out of the mess that he has made.
  The American people deserve better, and they deserve to know that 
there is a difference here, a very clear difference. We may not always 
agree on every single issue, but Democrats come to this place every 
single day and we worry. We worry about making sure that people get 
better jobs. We worry because we want people to have better healthcare 
and we want people to have higher wages. We worry because we

[[Page H4450]]

want to make sure that people have clean air and water and great 
schools where we know our kids will make it home from school that day, 
they will be safe, and we want to make sure that everybody has access 
to affordable housing.
  Republicans worry, too, but it seems that this Republican majority 
worries mostly about their own power. They worry about fighting with 
each other, trying to shut down the government, impeach the President, 
and remove their own Speaker.
  The Republican majority in this House is a joke. They wasted weeks 
talking about gas stoves, weeks arguing about book bans, weeks telling 
kids what soccer team they can play on, and now we are on the eve of a 
shutdown and they are doing nothing to stop it. In fact, they are 
moving in the wrong direction.
  We have Members on the other side of the aisle who go on network news 
and say ``shut it down,'' telling people that it is 100 percent certain 
that there will be a government shutdown. Who cares, they say.
  Really?
  Earlier, I talked about a seance. After looking at what is happening 
on the other side of the aisle, I think what this place needs is an 
exorcism. The Republican Party has gone to war with itself, and it 
doesn't matter which side wins because either way, they are not worried 
about anybody but themselves.
  This is a serious consequential moment for this Congress. There are 
real impacts if there is a government shutdown. There are impacts to 
our credit rating. There are impacts to job creation. There are impacts 
to a whole bunch of things. Most importantly, Mr. Speaker, there are 
negative impacts for the people of this country. We have seen this 
movie before. It doesn't have a good ending.
  In these last few days that we have, rather than fighting amongst 
yourselves, why don't you try something radical, and that is sitting 
down in a bipartisan way and coming to a deal that will get a majority 
of votes in this House. It requires the Speaker of the House to stand 
up to the extremists. It requires him to demonstrate some leadership. 
That is what is needed.
  The Speaker of the House must lead. It is the obligation of everybody 
in this Chamber to, at a minimum, keep the lights on. This is the 
moment where we need some leadership, where the Speaker needs to stand 
up and tell the extremists no.
  I said before, it is like the clowns are running the circus, and 
there is no ringmaster. Enough of this. This is a bad movie.
  By the way, it is not just Democrats who are expressing concern about 
what is going on, and it is not just independents as well that are 
expressing concern, but I hear it from Members of their own Conference 
who have been on TV basically sounding the alarm bells saying, this is 
dysfunction, this is an unmitigated disaster. These are the words of 
Republican Members who are warning your leadership to get their act 
together.
  We will see how things work out this weekend, but if the reports that 
we are reading are true, we are going to see a CR come to the Rules 
Committee that is even more extreme than the extreme CR that we dealt 
with and that was pulled the other day.

                              {time}  1015

  Mr. McGOVERN. I mean, at the end of the day, I think people need to 
know that, when you cut some of these programs, when you cut LIHEAP, 
that means there are people who will not be able to heat their homes in 
the wintertime.
  When you cut Head Start, that means there are countless kids who will 
not have an opportunity to succeed in the future.
  When you cut programs like WIC, it means that there are pregnant 
mothers and newborn babies that will not have access to good nutrition.
  When you cut medical research, you are not only putting farther off 
the day where we find a cure to some of these dreaded diseases that 
kill people, but you are also making it certain that the costs of 
healthcare will continue to rise.
  None of this makes any sense. I know that there are adults on the 
other side of the aisle that want to do the right thing. Again, I plead 
with my colleagues. We will go through this, whatever we are going to 
do, a bill that is nonbinding that means nothing, an LNG bill that we 
have done twice before that is going nowhere fast, and then we will do 
this Defense appropriations bill, again, that represents the kitchen 
sink of MAGA culture wars.
  We will go through all of that, but, while we are doing that, I hope 
that people are sitting down and getting serious to avoid a government 
shutdown, and then let's get together and do what the American people 
elected us to do.
  With that, Mr. Speaker, I urge a strong ``no'' vote on this rule.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
  Mr. COLE. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time. In 
closing, I urge all of my colleagues to support the resolution.
  The rule will make in order three bills.
  First, it makes in order the Department of Defense Appropriations Act 
for fiscal year 2024. It will provide full and complete funding for our 
Armed Forces and Defense needs and provides the resources necessary to 
defend freedom around the world.
  It makes in order H.R. 1130, Unlocking our Domestic LNG Potential 
Act. We think that is important.
  My friend had an interesting discussion about LIHEAP. I actually 
share my friend's view. It is an important program. I remember when I 
chaired the subcommittee on Appropriations, I had to actually reverse a 
cut ordered by President Obama of $300 million in his own budget, and 
we stopped that from happening.
  People throw out numbers, and then you work it through. I always call 
a Presidential budget a bargaining position. I think the same thing 
tends to be true of congressional budgets, but we will work that 
through.
  The real cause of lack of heating, though--let's be real about this--
is not LIHEAP and whether it is funded or not. It is whether or not 
there is natural gas to heat it in the first place. My friends have 
done everything possible to increase the cost and limit the 
availability of the very product that they want to provide with a 
government program.
  It would be better for every single American if you would just simply 
be pro-energy production in our country. It is okay to be for 
renewables. I am for renewables. My State is number one or two in the 
country in wind power, well ahead of a lot of other progressive States.
  We just think what works is what you ought to do. We have got a lot 
of wind in Oklahoma. It makes a lot of sense, so we use it, and, if it 
lowers emissions, we think that is good. Natural gas, by the way, has 
been the single biggest driver of lowering emissions. My friends have 
done nothing but make it harder in that industry. Frankly--and I mean 
this with all due respect--I hear people in that industry and companies 
in that industry vilified routinely. If I said those things about 
people in your respective States engaged in energy or in other kinds of 
production, you would be appalled, because you know those people.
  I have got millions of people in the energy industry. I have 
thousands of people in my district that go out and work on rigs. They 
go out and lay pipeline. They go out and find oil and gas. It is hard 
work. They do that, and they give many parts of the country that don't 
have energy production the cheapest energy in the world outside of a 
couple of petrostates, and the most secure product, and they have 
tripled production in petroleum since about 2006. Yet, the price of gas 
goes up--it is a lot less here than it is almost anyplace in the 
world--and then they say, oh, my gosh, they are profiteering. No, there 
are market forces out there. That is off the subject.
  I would just say my friends are worried about the cost of heating. 
LIHEAP is a good program. I support it. I have proven that over and 
over again. Please, let's make sure that we have the gas in the first 
place.
  Finally, my friends dismiss the importance of the Second Amendment 
because they disagree with it for the most part. That is fair enough. 
All we are saying is we want the opportunity to actually invest things.
  My friend made a couple of other points I just want to quickly 
address, because I want him to be under no--

[[Page H4451]]

and I don't think he is--under any illusion. I hold Senator Murray and 
Senator Collins in very high regard. I have worked with them both. I 
have worked with Senator Murray, in particular, for 8 years, either as 
chair, or ranking member of the Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human 
Services, Education, and Related Agencies when she held the same 
respective position. We came to a deal almost every year. The 
gentlewoman is a good legislator, and Senator Collins is legendary.
  What the Senate is crafting over there right now is well above the 
agreement that my friend thinks we are violating. It is pretty easy to 
declare emergencies. Yes, I would love to spend more money on defense. 
I have said that on this floor. I have said that during this debate. 
Let's call it emergency and heap it on.
  They are laying out a negotiating position. It is fair enough. My 
guess is we are going to end up pretty close to the numbers we agreed 
upon.

  My friends have been very critical of my leader, the Speaker of the 
House, and that is fair enough. This is politics. I will tell you this: 
You guys said he wouldn't get elected, and he did. You said he wouldn't 
get a bill across the floor to deal with the debt ceiling and then 
negotiate a deal, but he did. Let's wait and see how this plays out.
  My friends need to remember, when it comes to these fiscal issues, 
they are the ones that never passed a budget for 4 years. They are the 
ones that left us with a $1.7 trillion deficit, and they have got the 
White House and the Senate and have not produced any plan to address 
it, nor have they been willing to sit down and talk to us about, in a 
bipartisan way, how could we start dealing with what we all know is the 
big driver, and that is entitlement programs.
  We have a lot of problems in front of us. We can point a lot of 
fingers. Let's do the right thing today, though, and start addressing 
them.
  The right thing today is to move ahead and pass this rule, get onto a 
debate about what we think are important issues. Defending the country 
is certainly an important issue. Securing our energy future is 
important, and dealing with constitutional rights, and we will continue 
to discuss and work on these other matters.
  I will agree with my friend. I am not for shutting down the 
government. I hope we don't get there, and I always worry about that as 
we approach these kind of deadlines.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the 
previous question on the resolution.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on ordering the previous 
question.
  The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that 
the ayes appeared to have it.


 =========================== NOTE =========================== 

  
  On September 21, 2023, page H4451, in the first and second 
columns, the following appeared: Mr. Speaker, I yield back the 
balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the 
resolution. The previous question was ordered. The SPEAKER pro 
tempore. The question is on adoption of the resolution. The 
question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that the 
ayes appeared to have it.
  
  The online version has been corrected to read: Mr. Speaker, I 
yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous 
question on the resolution. The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question 
is on ordering the previous question. The question was taken; and 
the Speaker pro tempore announced that the ayes appeared to have 
it.


 ========================= END NOTE ========================= 


  Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX, further 
proceedings on this question will be postponed.

                          ____________________