Quotes About Congress

I will continue to fight for legislation that forces Congress to read the bills! I will fight for a vote on my bill that calls for a waiting period for each page of legislation. I will continue to object when Congress sticks special interest riders on bills in the dead of night! And if Congress refuses to obey its own rules, if Congress refuses to pass a budget, if Congress refuses to read the bills, then I say: Sweep the place clean. Limit their terms and send them home!

I think if you look at yesterday's New York Times poll, particularly when you judge Democrats in Congress versus the Republicans in Congress, people put a little more faith, or even a little more than a little more faith in the Democrats in Congress.

It has now been over 7 years since Congress last raised the minimum wage to its current level of $5.15 per hour. Since that last increase, Congress's failure to adjust the wage for inflation has reduced the purchasing power of the minimum wage to record low levels.

In foreign affairs, the president can do what he wants unless Congress says no. In domestic policy, the president can't do anything unless Congress says yes.

It is not true that Congress spends money like a drunken sailor. Drunken sailors spend their own money. Congress spends our money.

A dictatorship would be a heck of a lot easier, there's no question about it. Dealing with Congress is a matter of give and take. The president doesn't get everything he wants, the Congress doesn't get everything they want. But we're finding good common ground.

For the first time in history, Congress has 100 women in it. Congratulations. Welcome to modern times, America. It's great having 100 women in Congress. Unless you're in line for the congressional bathroom.

Congress is furious at the Secret Service for consorting with hookers, which has traditionally been Congress's role.

State inspection laws, health laws, and laws for regulating the internal commerce of a State, and those which respect turnpike roads, ferries, &c. are not within the power granted to Congress. ... Inspection laws, quarantine laws, health laws of every description, as well as laws for regulating the internal commerce of a State, and those which respect turnpike roads, ferries, &c., are component parts of this mass. No direct general power over these objects is granted to Congress, and, consequently, they remain subject to State legislation.

The mistakes made by Congress wouldn't be so bad if the next Congress didn't keep trying to correct them.

I think Churchill is right, the only thing to be said for democracy is that there is nothing else that's any better, and therefore he used to say, Tyranny tempered by assassination, but lots of assassination. People say, If the Congress were more representative of the people it would be better. I say the Congress is too damn representative. It's just as stupid as the people are; just as uneducated, just as dumb, just as selfish.

I don't want to make a member of Congress do something that that member of Congress's constituents would not approve of, or would not agree to. So in that regard, I'm kind of the opposite of a lobbyist.

Yes, [I am accusing the CIA of] misleading the Congress of the United States, misleading the Congress of the United States. I am.

It's far from clear in general that Donald Trump is a guy who really thinks about the details of policy and is going to do the kind of heavy lifting you have to do as president to get those policies through in Congress. I think the hope is that Paul Ryan and his crew will push policies through Congress and Trump will just sign them. That's not really how policy works.

One thing I want to do is create something called Ring Around Congress. It would be a state deal and also a national thing, where the kids, as a field trip, will go and join hands around Congress and give the politicians report cards on how they're voting on hunger issues.

I don't think this is a situation where you can say that Congress was avoiding any mention of the tax power. It'd be one thing if Congress explicitly disavowed an exercise of the tax power. But given that it hasn't done so, it seems to me that it's - not only is it fair to read this as an exercise of the tax power, but this court has got an obligation to construe it as an exercise of the tax power if it can be upheld on that basis.

If I were in Congress in 1996, I would have voted for the Defense of Marriage Act, which used Congress's constitutional authority to define what official state documents other states have to recognize under the Full Faith and Credit Clause, to ensure that no state would be forced to recognize a 'same sex' marriage license issued in another state.

I doubt that I am the first member of Congress to tell off a reporter, and I am sure I won't be the last.

Our Congress is the finest body of men money can buy.

I do not have regrets. I believe I helped preserve the peace for this country. Why should I regret that? What I accomplished was approved by Congress -- which represents our people. All of you live in safety from domestic enemies because of security from the police. Likewise, you live in safety from foreign enemies because our military keeps them from attacking us.

...all members of Congress should be required wear NASCAR uniforms. You know, the kind with the patches? That way we'd know who is sponsoring each of them. I think he was kidding; they'd never be able to do it but it's a great idea and would wake people up in this country.

We are telling veterans they must sacrifice to pay for the pet projects and contracts to campaign donors of powerful members of Congress.

I think we've set the bar with respect to the notion that it is possible to provide health care for people. Now I know that the incoming Congress and administration talks about repealing it. But we've set a bar that shows that this can be done. And that core principle is one that the majority of Americans, including supporters of Donald Trump believe in.

Congressional mistakes have dramatically increased immigration through a series of what I believe were ill-advised actions going back to 1965 when the basic notions of our immigration laws were revised. In 1990, Congress opened the floodgates by passing a 35-percent increase in legal immigration.

President Obama has repeatedly urged Congress to let the Bush tax cuts expire for those earning more than $250,000 a year. Increasing rates on top earners is an obvious way to raise revenue from those who can afford it most.

OK, so this pack - tax package includes about 50 tax breaks. None of them are new. They were all existing tax breaks. What this did was make them permanent. It gives some certainty for people when they're filing taxes that they don't have to wonder if Congress is going to renew them year after year.

The American people expect more from Congress. They expect fiscal responsibility and common sense. They expect us to return to the pay-as-you-go budget rules that we had enacted in the past that helped us establish a surplus, however briefly.

Man-made global warming was a potential serious threat, and NASA wanted Congress to fund new satellites to study the problem. It was a team effort to get that accomplished.

The failure of the White House and Congress to seriously address the nation's fiscal situation is certain to broaden the belief among many voters that the U.S. political system is broken.

I wanted to see my name on the cover of a book. If your name is in the Library of Congress, you're immortal.

My efforts in Congress are guided by the belief that environmental preservation and restoration are a critical part of the legacy we leave to future generations.

Obamacare is the nation's biggest job killer and stands in the way of our country's economic growth and prosperity. It should be defunded and repealed. President Obama should hear the pleas from the untold number of Americans who are losing their jobs, wages, and healthcare plans, and Congress should act immediately to stop Obamacare from inflicting any more damage on the country on our hard-working citizens.

I have also come to understand Congress' need for a bipartisan as well as a partisan capacity.

I could not do what I do without the kindness, consideration, resourcefulness and work of librarians, particularly in public libraries... What started me writing history happened because of some curiosity that I had about some photographs I'd seen in the Library of Congress.

I've learned the importance of changing people's minds at the grassroots level so that whoever does run will have a much better chance of encountering public opinion that reaches a critical mass and brings about a change not only in White House policies but in the Congress and in the state legislatures and all around the world.

When congress is in session no American is safe.

The Congress fights not with violent but with nonviolent means, however imperfect, however crude the nonviolence may be.

I think in politics, in Congress, you often do things that are Republican, or you do things because you're a Democrat. Sometimes that's good, obviously, and sometimes that's obviously bad. But in the news business, there's no such thing as Republican or Democratic news. News is news.

It's a shame that we have to use whatever leverage we have in Congress to get the president to deal with the biggest problem confronting our future. And that's our excessive spending.

Republicans have reached out so much to black Republicans because it's part of our tradition. Blacks have been in this nation longer than most other Americans with the possible exception of white Anglo-Saxon Protestant. The first blacks in Congress and the first black Governor were all Republicans. It was Republicans who fought the Civil War over slavery and who introduced the Civil Rights legislation over the next hundred years.

Back in the mid-1980s, congressional hearings were held after we brought this litigation, and held up the first experiment. At that time, I went in front of Congress, along with the major agencies involved with this.

Listen, we all have to agree that there is too much litigation going on in this world. But every year it seems to multiply tenfold. Why can't we stop it? Well, it's because the lawmakers in Congress and the Senate are almost all lawyers, too!

There's not an appropriations bill in the last 10 years that the-that Democrats passed in the Congress. We haven't spent any money of your taxes in the last decade.

I do think that Republicans are flirting with their tax cut, which has always been the narcotic of Republicans, that they in fact have to at some point, with any remote pretense of candor, abandon any pretense of a balanced budget.I mean, they talk about - because they are going to finance the tax cut by tax cuts. That's how they're going to do it. And I do think that the will is there right now in the Congress to act. I think they will be as close to unity as you will see on Capitol Hill this year.

We're half the people; we should be half the Congress.

The Congress has now become a fairly evenly divided entity.

We're an ignorant nation right now. We're not really capable, I do not think, the majority of our people, of making the decisions that have to be made at election time and particularly in the selection of their legislatures and their Congress and the presidency, of course. I don't think we're bright enough to do the job that would preserve our democracy, our republic. I think we're in serious danger.

There’s a need to perfect things in a writers’ room, and that can take a lot of fun out of a show sometimes. It’s a struggle. It depends on your personality. Some people love working with a writing staff. I had a great writing staff on Lucky Louie, but it sometimes felt like Congress or something.