Last year, Republicans made a commitment to the American people that we would restore fiscal responsibility, roll back costly regulations, and remove the woke garbage from the Biden administration. With that pitch, Republicans won the House majority, and we are the last firewall for freedom against the full force of the radical liberal agenda.
As the majority of only one of the three decision-making bodies – the Senate and White House are still controlled by Democrats – no law-making bills we pass will be signed by the president. Secure the Border Act? Dead in the Senate. Lower Energy Costs Act? Dead in the Senate. The list goes on.
The only tool the House has left is our Constitutional Power of the Purse. As a member of the Appropriations Committee that has authorization over government spending, I’m happy to report we upheld our Commitment to America.
There are 12 appropriations bills that fund different departments and agencies. The Appropriations Committee considers each bill, allowing Congress to approve, fund and defund every program. This is where Republicans have leveraged the Power of the Purse to cut spending and defund the woke.
Every committee session was like the Boston Tea Party, throwing boxes of Biden policy into the harbor. ESG in your retirement portfolio? Into the harbor. Ban on gas stoves? In the harbor. Sex changes for illegal aliens, the harbor.
Let’s look at two of the four bills the House will vote on this week:
Defense: Unlike Democrats, we think the DoD should be focused on warfighting, not culture wars. The bill is stacked with conservative priorities. It slashes government funding for sex-change operations and hormone therapy, diverts a billion dollars from climate activism to the frontlines, and gets rid of federally funded drag queens. There is also a long list of strategic investments that are mission-critical, especially with the rise in threat in the Indo-pacific. And if none of that was reason enough to support the bill, it includes a 30 percent pay raise for junior enlisted servicemen, many of whom only make about 11-bucks an hour.
Homeland Security: We are cutting Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas’ salary to $1 and forcing him to enforce the laws of the land, stop catch and release, end abuse of the asylum system, and allocate funds to finally finish the wall. This bill defunds amnesty and increases funding for more Border Patrol Agents, ICE agents, invests in stronger border security surveillance and anti-human trafficking, and combats fentanyl and the cartels who produce and smuggle it. It gives our frontline agents the tools and authority to do their jobs and protect the homeland.
These are Pro-America bills that conservatives should be proud to vote for.
And that’s just two of the bills. Other bills include cutting EPA spending by more than 40 percent, banning the IRS from amassing an armory larger than SEAL Team Six’s, and getting rid of every taxpayer-funded diversity and pronoun training.
We did what We the People demanded, and didn’t back down. We were teed up for the House to vote on all of it. Then we hit a wall last week.
About a half dozen “Republicans” sided with Nancy Pelosi to kill the defense bill and all the conservative wins it held. That brought the People’s business to a halt, stopped us from advancing Homeland Security, and all but killed Republicans’ chances to implement policy and negotiate spending levels from a position of strength.
The few did not vote “no” against the bill itself. They used a procedural sleight of hand to vote no on the “rule” and kill the bill before it was on the floor. They would not even allow the bill to be brought up for debate and amendments to the bill be voted on. There are more than 150 amendments on the defense bill, many of them excellent conservative wins like banning cluster bombs to Ukraine.
When I asked my colleagues what issue they had with the bill I got silence. When Republicans held a conference-wide meeting to hash out differences they didn’t attend. Instead, they were on television claiming the righteous high ground while 215 of us were getting the hard work of governing done.
Spending 23 years in the U.S. Navy SEALs taught me one of the most important lessons of my life: Teamwork matters. When you’re pinned down with the enemy combatants on all sides, you can’t have a sniper inside the perimeter. There is a difference between fighting and winning. Anyone can fight; leaders win.
To my colleagues who refuse to talk to us face-to-face, I hope you read this in the media and come back to the team. Help us pass these bills. We have the opportunity to pass four government funding bills this week and we can only do it if we work as a team. It’s what we committed to and what the American people sent us here to do.
Ryan Zinke is the senior Congressman from Montana, Secretary of the Interior under President Trump, and 23-year U.S. Navy SEAL veteran.
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