Providing for Consideration of H.R. Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2023

Floor Speech

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Mr. LANDSMAN. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to encourage my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to support tonight's vote, a vote on the Bipartisan Budget Act.

There are three aspects of this bill, a bill that will avoid default and a bill that protects Social Security and Medicare that I hope my colleagues and fellow citizens take into account. One, we can't keep doing this. The brinkmanship around this question of default and paying our bills has to end. It is a terrible process.

Folks have been calling our offices. They are worried about their Social Security checks. They are worried about their healthcare. They are worried about whether or not the economy will crash. We cannot keep normalizing this behavior.

Two, the bill does represent the fact that Congress is divided. The President negotiated with Speaker McCarthy, and even though a majority of Americans want Congress to balance this budget by fixing the tax code, the majority has said----

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Mr. LANDSMAN. Mr. Speaker, the majority has said that is off the table. What I needed to see from this bill was that no veterans would lose their benefits and folks would continue to receive Social Security checks and no child would lose access to food through the SNAP program.

This bill does that, so I am voting ``yes.'' We need more bipartisan, pragmatic leaders to stand up and pass this bill tonight and to continue to work on behalf of the American people.

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