Protecting Hunting Heritage and Education Act

Floor Speech

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Ms. SINEMA. Madam President, I join the senior Senator from Texas in support of our commonsense bill today that ensures the administration follows the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act as we wrote it.

When we wrote this law last year, this was historic legislation to reduce community violence, improve mental health services, and save lives. When we wrote this bill, we were clear in our intent. We wanted to make our schools safer places to learn, our communities safer places to live, and our mental and behavioral healthcare system among the strongest in the world, and we did that with broad bipartisan support.

Our law prohibits the use of new Federal funding for weapons for school staff, but our law very specifically does not prohibit the use of funds for archery classes, hunting safety classes, or any other extracurricular activities of the sort.

What is at issue here is a misinterpretation of this section of our law by the White House, and it is a symptom of a larger issue: the alarming tendency of this administration to ignore the will and intent of Congress when carrying out the very laws that we pass.

Time after time, Congress has come together to pass historic legislation with bipartisan support just to see the current White House interpret provisions--repeated provisions of repeated pieces of legislation--not in line with congressional intent. We pass the laws; that is our job. The administration is supposed to follow and implement those laws; that is their job. But this administration routinely fails to do its job correctly. This creates distrust; it delays meaningful solutions for our constituents; and it wastes taxpayer money.

Enough is enough. We shouldn't have to be here today. We shouldn't have to pass a bill today telling the administration to do its job and follow the law, but here we are.

So, once again, Congress will come together in a bipartisan, bicameral way to pass a bill. We will hold the administration accountable, ensure the accurate interpretation and implementation of our Bipartisan Safer Communities law, and we will allow students in Arizona and all across the country to continue enjoying school-based hunting and archery programs, just as our law intended.

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