[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 161 (Monday, October 2, 2023)]
[House]
[Pages H4938-H4939]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                      45-DAY CONTINUING RESOLUTION

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
California (Mr. LaMalfa) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. LaMALFA. Mr. Speaker, Saturday, we cobbled together a 45-day 
continuing resolution. That is not my preferred way of doing business 
around here. Indeed, what I talk about to my constituents at home is 
the process that the House Republicans with our majority have attempted 
to put in place and are putting into place, a successful Appropriations 
Committee process.
  Now, this isn't just jargon, and it is inside baseball for a lot of 
people, but when people understand what it is they are trying to 
accomplish, the Appropriations Committee is going to be the 
transparency, the light of day, the sunshine on the spending process 
that D.C. has, and of which we need much more.
  We didn't quite get there this year. We got 70 percent of our 
spending--I hate to use that term, but that is the jargon here--
accomplished in four bills already. We still need to do eight bills as 
our budget is divided into about 12 pieces in the appropriations 
process. We have a little ways to grind out here.
  So what happened? We weren't able to come to agreement, even amongst 
all Republicans on getting all these bills done. We had a good start in 
getting a few things done last week, but we have much more to do.

                              {time}  1230

  We want to get through the whole process because we want transparency 
so the public can see what it is we are doing in this process, the 
Appropriations Committee, in the light of day, line-by-line, et cetera, 
so that we can then send documents over to the Senate and have them 
contemplate those bills. They are not going to like exactly what we do, 
but we will bring those bills back and hopefully achieve a consensus we 
can all live with in this era.
  I have to remind you, what we have laid out as our goals as House 
Republicans aren't necessarily shared by the Senate or the White House. 
It is a hostile environment to try and cut back to pre-COVID levels of 
spending, as well as secure our border, from the Senate Democrat 
majority and the Biden White House.
  These are our goals.
  We want to have a secure border.
  We had a document early last week that we thought was going to take a 
giant leap there, but we couldn't get all the votes we needed even in 
our own Conference to get it done. That is pretty frustrating.
  Now, we have this 45-day ability to buy time with what we passed the 
other day. I am not happy with continuing resolutions, especially long-
term ones. This is fairly short-term. It will enable us to do our work 
and get these appropriations done. That is what we are doing. Yes, it 
continues spending pretty much as it was, but we were up against a 
deadline.
  Now, what are the bad things? A government shutdown is what we were 
up against. That is a terrible way of doing business. I have been 
around a couple of them and so have my colleagues that

[[Page H4939]]

have been here longer than me. One of my friends who has been through 
five of them has said nobody ever wins politically or policywise on a 
shutdown.
  What happens?
  Our troops stop getting paid. Our loyal soldiers out there on the 
front lines stop getting paid, and they are already underwaged, so to 
speak.
  The contracts that we would have with Defense come to a grinding 
halt.
  Other Federal projects like construction, roads, infrastructure, what 
have you, come to a grinding halt.
  Now, what happens on that? When you demobilize construction crews or 
assembly lines like that, they don't just turn right back on and off 
like a light switch. People go home. They move their equipment to other 
projects. It is much more expensive to turn something back on that was 
already in momentum.
  Try shutting off a nuclear power plant. That is not the same as what 
we are talking about here, but you don't just turn these things on and 
off. That is what happens.
  Permitting. When folks have been waiting so long for EPA or Army 
Corps of Engineers or somebody else to get their freaking job done on 
getting permits out, and then they have an excuse to shut down--oh, 
this week-long shutdown, this 2-week shutdown, it is going to set us 
back 3 months. We have heard that sort of thing around here.
  Even though it might feel good to say, yeah, let's shut the mother 
down--because a lot of people don't like what government does, 
including me, in my real life as a farmer in northern California I see 
a lot of dumb stuff the government does--shutting things down in the 
middle of the stream here doesn't really work for anybody, 
unfortunately.
  The Federal employees will still get paid even if they are not at 
work, so it is a paid vacation. They will get their backpay. Congress 
will still get paid by the month. It doesn't really shut anything off 
that way. We don't gain a lot with a shutdown. We held our nose, and we 
are going to do this for 45 days to do a good process in the 
Appropriations Committee.
  I want to have faith in that, and I want the American public to have 
faith in an open process and doing it correctly because process is 
something that has been lacking a lot in Congress and in government in 
recent years. We have to cling to the process as something that is 
important so we can have things laid out constitutionally.

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