Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies

Madam Chair, thank you for presenting the Military Construction and Veterans Affairs bill today. I appreciate the work that you and Ranking Member Carter have done this year to fund many projects important to our Members.

Unfortunately, just like the other bills we marked up earlier today, this bill is based on a funding level that passed the House without Republican support. In addition, we disagree with policy provisions that were dropped from, and added to, this particular bill.

This bill fails to include long-standing language prohibiting the transfer of detainees currently at Guantanamo Bay. These detainees are the worst of the worst, and we need assurance that they will never be moved to the United States.

Mister Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 2471, a bill that will provide funding for the Federal Government through the end of this fiscal year.

While it has taken us far too long to get here, I am glad we were able to produce a bill that includes many funding priorities that I support.

Since last summer, I have made it clear that House Republicans wouldn't oppose appropriations bills unless they:

• Increase defense spending,
• Restrain non-defense spending,
• Include all long-standing policy provisions, and
• Do not include any poison pill riders.

After months of negotiations, we reached a deal that meets all four of these criteria.

The bill before us:

Thank you, Madam Speaker.

I rise today in strong opposition to H.R. 4502, a package of seven fiscal year 2022 appropriations bills that will be considered by the House this week.

I wish the circumstances were different and I could support this important piece of legislation that funds critical programs.

Unfortunately, after months of committee hearings and markups, this year's bills have too many fatal flaws.

First, there is no agreement between Republicans and Democrats on the topline spending level for appropriations.

Second, there is no bipartisan agreement on the funding level for each individual bill. To put it simply, non-defense spending is too high and defense spending is too low.

Third, our colleagues on the other side of the aisle have included the most alarming policy changes I have ever seen.

Thank you, Chairman McGovern and Ranking Member Cole, for allowing me to testify on H.R. 4502, a package of seven fiscal year 2022 appropriations bills.

I wish the circumstances were different and I were here speaking in favor of this important piece of legislation.

Unfortunately, there is not bipartisan support, so I am here to ask the Rules Committee to allow amendments to H.R. 4502, so that it can be improved.

I want to begin by acknowledging the tireless efforts of our full committee chair, Ms. DeLauro, and the subcommittee chairs and ranking members who will be testifying today.

In addition to having a rigorous hearing schedule, in just ten days we held twenty-four markups. It is quite an accomplishment to be sitting before you with all of our bills reported out of committee.

Madam Chair, thank you for yielding.

The revised spending allocations presented today contain only technical corrections to the initial allocations, which were adopted on a party-line vote two weeks ago.

Because there are no substantive changes from the initial allocations, I must once again oppose them.

They do not change the topline spending levels for any of the subcommittee bills – even though Members on my side of the aisle have consistently asked for bipartisan cooperation on funding levels.

These spending levels continue to short-change our national defense, while providing huge increases to domestic programs. Non-defense spending would increase by nearly 17% overall, and some agencies would receive unprecedented 30-40% increases above fiscal year 2021.

Underfunding our national defense while giving such extreme increases to domestic programs is unacceptable to Members on my side of the aisle.

Thank you, Chair DeLauro.

I appreciate the work that Chair Wasserman Schultz and Ranking Member Carter have done this year on the Military Construction and Veterans Affairs bill. Thank you for reaching across the aisle to fund many projects important to our Members.

Unfortunately, this bill is based on a funding framework that the Majority Party developed without Republican support.

This difference of opinion on both funding priorities and policy positions could slow down our appropriations process this year.

There is nothing more important than funding our nation's military and veterans, and we must try to resolve these disagreements so that important bills like this one can be signed into law.

One area that is particularly concerning in this bill is that it fails to include long-standing language prohibiting the transfer of detainees currently at Guantanamo Bay to the United States.