Where are the appropriations bills?

In February we told you that the federal government’s fiscal year begins October 1, giving Congress eight full months to write, read, and pass the bills needed to fund government departments.

It’s almost September, and not ONE appropriations bill has passed. It’s probable that NONE will pass on time. And it’s a certainty that no member of Congress will read any of them.

This is just the latest evidence that Congress is broken. Fundamental change is needed.

The Read the Bills Act (RTBA) is that change. Please send Congress another letter urging them to pass DownsizeDC.org’s Read the Bills Act.

You may borrow from or copy this letter . . .

How can you be trusted to regulate me, when you can’t even regulate yourselves? This year proved that Congress is broken.

• You passed a $26 billion spending bill but forgot to name it
• You didn’t bother passing a budget resolution because you were afraid of the bad publicity of a huge deficit
• And you haven’t passed even one of the 12 departmental appropriations bills that are due on Oct 1

Yet somehow the House found time to pass 261 bills this year, and the Senate passed 137. That’s not counting the dozens of resolutions both chambers passed. You passed everything EXCEPT the bills that keep the government running, which should be your top priority!

• I know these departmental funding bills, totaling some $3.8 trillion won’t pass on time
• I know that when you do finally pass them, you won’t have read them
• Which means you won’t even know how you spent MY money
• And the bills will be full of secret deals, corruption, and waste

I am thoroughly disgusted and out of patience. A real, working Congress would make the budget a top priority at the beginning of each year. I insist you do one thing to fix yourself. Taking this action will also help your re-election chances. Introduce DownsizeDC.org’s Read the Bills Act. The RTBA will . . .

• Force Congress to prioritize, so you won’t wait until the last minute to pass needed legislation
• Keep Congress accountable
• Create shorter, understandable bills

Introducing the RTBA will show me that you know Congress is broken and needs to be fixed. Introducing this bill will make you a part of the solution, instead of the problem.

You can send your letter using DownsizeDC.org’s Educate the Powerful System.

We also invite you to add your website or blog to the Read the Bills Act Coalition. Membership will help build awareness about RTBA, and in return we will list your site on our main page and mention it to our over 30,000 subscribers. You can learn more at the DownsizeDC.org site.

Finally, this month the Senate passed 23 bills totaling 773 pages, and the House passed two bills totaling 62 pages. You can see descriptions of the bills on our blog.

James Wilson
Assistant Communications Director
DownsizeDC.org, Inc.