Press Releases

Congressman Glenn Grothman (R-Glenbeulah) today released the following statement on H.J.Res.31, the government funding bill:

“Due to the short amount of time we had to read the bill, it would be impossible to know all of the provisions within it. New, bad provisions seem to be uncovered every hour. I can confidently say, knowing what I already do, I cannot, in good conscience, vote for such a bill.

While most public attention will focus on immigration provisions, that is actually a small section of the bill. One of my main concerns is that this bill spends too much money. America just exceeded $22 trillion in debt and we are borrowing about 22 percent of our budget. President Trump tried to bring some fiscal discipline to Congress, but they decided to spend 19 percent more than what the President proposed in this bill and overall two percent more than last year.

Since we must secure our border, one would hope this portion of the bill would make up for the spending described above. Actually, it makes things worse. According to President Trump’s border patrol expert, we need a minimum of $8 billion to build a wall that will make a meaningful, positive impact. The Democrats initially proposed $1.6 billion for wall funding and actually reduced that amount in the final draft of this bill to just under $1.4 billion. There are also provisions allowing local units of government along the border to drag out the process of building a wall.

Worst of all, gang members and criminals can stay in the U.S. if they find a child, any child, to accompany them. How immoral. I voted no because this bill is too free spending and doesn’t do enough to protect our country and children being used by the cartel.

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U.S. Rep. Glenn Grothman is serving his third term representing Wisconsin’s 6th Congressional District in the U.S. House of Representatives.