Department of the Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2018
Floor Speech
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Mr. Chairman, I want to thank Chairman Frelinghuysen for his support and his team for bringing us to this point today and this week to do what many thought couldn't be done, and that is, getting all 12 of our appropriation bills done in a timely fashion.
But today it is a privilege for me to present the Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Act, and this wouldn't be possible without Ranking Member Quigley's effort and his team, and I appreciate their work as we have been through many months of effort together.
But I believe this is the prosperous part of the Make America Secure and Prosperous Appropriations Act, and I will explain why that is.
Because this bill includes many of the reforms that were found in the CHOICE Act, which we passed earlier this spring in the House, which eliminated many of the harmful Dodd-Frank regulations, streamlining outdated agency processes, and reining in those rogue agencies that we have heard so much about, while allowing the economy and the markets to begin working for American families. And we will also restore the financial freedoms that help Americans earn a living and achieve their American Dream, of which we have all been hearing about over these last weeks in August.
But this bill also invests in small businesses. It invests in the small businesses through the SBA by $1 billion, nearly $1 billion of new investment to the Small Business Administration, with significant funding for small business loans and particularly to those veterans of ours who are out there working hard and starting their own businesses.
But this bill also carries the entire Financial Institution Bankruptcy Act, which passed this House earlier this year, as well, on a bipartisan vote.
But IRS funding, again, is kept at a 2009 level, actually a little bit below that, but allowing targeted investments in consumer service and cybersecurity. But this bill maintains our commitment to the IRS oversight that we have been working on so hard over the last couple of years by prohibiting the harmful regulations that we have seen from them that have impacted our 501(c)(4) organizations.
It prohibits them targeting these groups based on their political beliefs or their exercising of their First Amendment rights, but it also allows for many of the other protections for taxpayers that we have been longing to do.
To combat the opioid crisis, we include more than $360 million to aid Federal drug control programs like drug courts and drug free communities.
But it is also important to note that we carry the pro-life provisions that have been a pattern and a custom and a privilege that this House has done for so many years over the past, but we have added to that. We have expanded it by including the Harris amendment that prohibits funding from being provided through multi-State plans that cover abortion, and we also included a provision that repeals the District of Columbia's assisted suicide measure.
Now, this bill comes in at about $20 billion, and that is a big number. But let me point out that is over 6 percent less. That is a 6 percent cut just from last year, so we are making a difference.
Now, when crafting this bill, I took my direction straight from the Members of this House, Republican and Democrat. This is a result of your interests, interests of your constituents included in this in a bipartisan fashion with a bipartisan vote out of committee.
Now, many tough decisions were made.
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Mr. Chairman, now, many tough decisions have been made across all these bills, but this one as well, with a strong focus on financial freedom for all Americans. Now, I believe this bill will make America prosperous again.
So I want to thank Chairman Frelinghuysen, all the subcommittee chairs, the full committee staff, the minority staff, and ranking members. This whole team has been great to work with, but it is important to thank my subcommittee. They have been through a lot of hard work with me, Mr. Chairman, and they have done a great job working with me and the many hours of hard work and weekends that they put in.
Mr. Chairman, I strongly urge every Member to support this bill.
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