***RELOJ: Senator Murray’s remarks***
Washington DC - Today—as the Senate Appropriations Committee kicks off its first fiscal year 2025 subcommittee hearings—Chair Patty Murray (D-WA) spoke briefly about the last year in appropriations, the urgent need for the Speaker to finally put the national security supplemental up for a vote and deliver aid to Ukraine, and the hard work ahead to write and pass fiscal year 2025 appropriations bills. Senator Murray delivered the remarks at today’s subcommittee audiencia on the President’s budget request for the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).
Senator Murray’s remarks, as delivered, are below:
“Thank you very much, Chair Coons—and thank you, Administrator Power, good to see you. Thank you for being with us today as we kick off our first subcommittee hearings for fiscal year 2025, and I hope my colleagues will indulge me for just a moment to go over some of my thinking about this as we start this process.
“First of all, I do want to acknowledge the success we as a Committee had in passing all twelve of our annual funding bills for FY24.
“It was not easy by any stretch, but we accomplished what many believed we could not do this Congress: we worked together—in an open, bipartisan process—and passed all of our funding bills.
“And it was the approach that we took here in the Senate—listening to each other, finding common ground, setting aside extreme partisan proposals—that finally allowed us to complete full-year bipartisan bills with the House after so many months wasted by House Republicans.
“But while we have now passed all our annual funding bills, we are not close to being done with FY24—and we won’t be until we pass the national security supplemental and provide desperately needed aid for Ukraine.
“The Senate passed that national security supplemental in an overwhelming 70-29 vote nearly two months ago.
“There is no reason for further drama, delay, or partisanship—it’s time the Speaker put this up for a vote.
“We cannot afford to give up on Ukraine and throw in the towel to dictators like Putin. Not when we know that our assistance is so consequential and has overwhelming bipartisan support. I will not stop pushing until we finish the job and get that bill to the President’s desk.
“I am also going to continue talking with my colleagues to make sure we address other needs—including working to ensure we reopen the Port of Baltimore and rebuild the Francis Scott Key Bridge.
“And at the same time, we are getting moving right away on FY25, and it’s no secret we have our work cut out for us.
“FY24 was hard; ‘25 will be harder.
“Spending caps from the FRA increase by just one percent for both defense and non-defense funding—that is an increase that is not nearly enough to tackle the challenges we face here at home and abroad. And we head into FY25 without many of the non-defense resources that were so important to passing workable bipartisan bills just a few weeks ago.
“So this Committee will again need to come together on a bipartisan basis to provide adequate resources for both defense and non-defense programs.
“And to make sure there’s no confusion about where I stand here: I will insist that any agreement take care of both non-defense and defense.
“I look forward to talking with all of our committee members in the coming weeks about how we’re going to do that.”
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