117th Congress

This week, Congress reconvened to consider yet another massive spending bill – this one in the neighborhood of more than $300 billion. Speaker Pelosi has billed the legislation as a package needed to better compete with China – but as has often been the case this Congress, the bill is a hodgepodge of special interest spending provisions and ideological policy riders, many of which have little or nothing to do with China or US competitiveness. In fact, a lot of them are simply recycled elements of President Biden’s big spending “Build Back Better” plan that the Senate has already rejected.

The House of Representatives did not convene for legislative activity this week, so I spent time traveling around the district holding listening sessions and hearing from folks on the issues that matter most to them.