Tuesday in an appearance on NPR’s “Morning Edition,” Rep. Bradley Byrne (R-Fairhope) slammed his U.S. Senate counterparts for an inability to fund the federal government on a permanent basis and accused Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) of hijacking the process to gain leverage in negotiations on immigration policy.
Byrne explained House Republicans were seeking the passage of another continuing resolution that would fund the military on a permanent basis and allow for continued talks on funding for the rest of the government without impacting national defense.
“[W]e are going to send the fifth continuing resolution for this fiscal year over to the Senate,” he said. “But we’re going to include in it an appropriations bill for the defense of the United States of America so that that will be permanently funded through the rest of this fiscal year. Now, why is that important? That’s important because the military can’t do the things they have to do to defend this country on continuing resolutions. You can’t buy ships and helicopters and jets and major munitions. We can’t do the readiness training that our troops need. So it’s critically important that we get at least that part done. And in addition to that, we’ve got to break this process that we’re in right now. The fifth CR is ridiculous.”
Byrne told National Public Radio host Rachel Martin this version of a defense appropriations bill will be the fourth one sent to the Senate and claimed the Senate was not living up to its constitutional responsibilities by allowing military funding to be used by Democrats as a bargaining chip.
“At some point, the Senate’s got to start acting like the body they’re required to be under the Constitution,” he said. “This is one of the most fundamental things that Congress does, which is to fund the government. And the problem we’ve got over there is that Senator Schumer is trying to hold up funding the government, particularly the military, to get some leverage on these talks on immigration. It’s totally inappropriate.”
Martin noted this tactic had been used by the GOP under similar circumstances in the past and asked if this cycle of the politics of government funding would ever end.
“This is my fifth year here,” he replied. “So, you know, I’ve been seeing these CRs over and over again. I don’t care which side does it. It’s bad for the government. And it’s particularly bad for the United States military. The House passed every one of our appropriations bills before the end of the last fiscal year, sent them over to the Senate. And we keep doing that, and the Senate does nothing. The breakdown, the dysfunction is in the Senate. Until they get their act together, I don’t know what else we can do in the House but keep trying to find new and different ways to send things over to them that they can use to fund the government on a permanent basis.”
Jeff Poor is a graduate of Auburn University and works as the editor of Breitbart TV. Follow Jeff on Twitter @jeff_poor.
