A Quick Update

Statement

Dear Friends,

What a busy week I had in Washington!

After an eventful two weeks in Kansas, I returned to Washington on Monday for legislative business. We will be in session for the next two weeks until we break for another set of town hall meetings and other events with constituents.

On Tuesday, the House continued to fulfill our promise and passed two bills to repeal additional parts of Obamacare. Specifically, one will stop the Department of Health & Human Services from being given a blank check to set-up state-based exchanges. Repealing it will reduce the deficit by $14 billion. The other will repeal another $200 million of mandatory spending for construction of school-based health centers. I am fully committed to repealing Obamacare, and am fully supportive of health care reform that is patient-centered, consumer-driven, and geared toward protecting personal liberty and increasing personal responsibility.

On Wednesday, the House passed H.R. 3, a bill I co-sponsored to ban federal funding of abortion. Bipartisan supporters of the legislation affirmed the clear opposition of the American people to taxpayer-funded abortion. Requiring taxpayers to fund the taking of innocent human life is simply not right. And with the passage of ObamaCare, this Administration has greatly expanded taxpayer-funded abortion. You can read a letter I sent to my colleagues urging their support here and watch my floor statement here.

Shortly before becoming the Energy Secretary for President Obama, Steven Chu advocated for $5 gas prices, and his desire is now almost reality. Through a clear effort to limit both the domestic supply of oil and our refinery capacity, new regulations and executive orders have driven up our gas and other energy costs. In response to these bad policies, this week the House passed H.R. 1230, the Restarting American Offshore Leasing Now Act. This requires the Secretary of the Department of Interior to start all of the oil drilling leases that the administration has delayed. Allowing these leases to go forward would help gas prices to go down by increasing oil supply.

Just minutes after passage of this bill, I then joined a few of my colleagues in a news conference to discuss a separate energy bill, the Consumer Relief for Pain at the Pump Act, which offers additional measures by which the country can increase its supply of oil and gas. I discussed how rural Kansans in particular have little or no choice but to pay for these artificially high prices, and how this is unnecessarily hurting our families, businesses and the entire economy. We need more domestic production, not the higher taxes and more regulation pushed by President Obama. A video is available on my YouTube channel.

Visitors to the Office

This week, my staff and I had the pleasure of visiting with Natise Vogt with the Walton Rural Community Life Charter School; Angela Kreps with Kansas BIO; Catherine Moyer (Ulysses) and David Burlage (of Colorado) with CoBank; David Balzer (McPherson) and Tom Van Arsdall with the National Cooperative Refinery Association; Earl Watkins, Clare Gustin, and Stuart Lowry with Sunflower Electric; Bob Thesman (Overland Park) and Kimberly Howard (Wichita) with the Kansas National Education Association; Roger Holmes with Celsius Tannery (Leawood); Rich Bott with Bott Radio; Greg Akagi with WIBW 580; and representatives from the Kansas Electric Cooperatives, the Community Bankers Association of Kansas, and Kansas members of the National Association of Emergency Medical Technicians.

National Day of Prayer

On a final note, yesterday was the National Day of Prayer. I participated in events on Capitol Hill before heading back to the District. While it was an important day that reminds us that our nation's blessings are a gift from God, we also should not see this as just one day of prayer. We should acknowledge daily that America is a nation founded on eternal principles and with His providence. When people ask me what they can do for me, I simply ask them to pray for my family and all our leaders. Please pray for the Lord's guidance upon me as I represent you in the United States House of Representatives. Angela and I continue to keep all of you in our prayers and thoughts, and in the forefront of our minds as we strive to restore America once again.

Sincerely,

Congressman Tim Huelskamp

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