Agoa Extension Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. ALFORD. Mr. Speaker, I thank Chairman Cole and Ranking Member DeLauro for their hard work in this endeavor.

Mr. Speaker, here we are again. I rise in strong support of this continuing resolution.

Last year, Senate Democrats manufactured a 42-day shutdown that punished troops, farmers, veterans, and working families. Airports were backed up and paychecks froze. Rural hospitals and local law enforcement felt the hit, and Missouri families paid the price for Washington games. We will not let that happen again.

This clean, short-term continuing resolution keeps the government open through early December. It pays our troops. It funds the Department of Veterans Affairs. It keeps SNAP and WIC operating for Missouri mothers and children. It sustains USDA programs our farmers and ranchers depend on. It funds disaster relief and surface transportation. It does not load the bill with poison pills that invite another crisis right before the American people vote.

House Republicans have already done the hard work. They have moved the appropriations bills. They have restored regular order. They fought for fiscal discipline and for real investments in rural America, including more than $20 million that was secured for Missouri's Fourth Congressional District in infrastructure, rural health, agriculture research, and public safety.

Mr. Speaker, a continuing resolution is not the finish line. Full- year bills are the finish line, but a shutdown is not a strategy. It is an abdication. It is a political stunt dressed up as principle.

The other side had a chance last year to help us fund the government, but they chose leverage instead. They chose chaos instead.

Yes, Mr. Speaker, the American people remember that.

Today, we choose competence and to keep the lights on. We protect the progress already made. We give appropriators the time to finish our full-year bills without holding servicemembers, farmers, and seniors hostage.

You see, Missourians did not send me here to shut the government down for talking points. The American people sent us here to fund the government, to cut the waste, to secure the country, and get results.

That is why, Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to pass this resolution to keep the government open and then finish the appropriations work the Constitution actually requires of us here in Congress.

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