As the government shutdown looks
and more likely, House Speaker
Kevin McCarthy says he hopes
the mounting pressure
might force members to compromis
One of those members is here wit
Republican Congressman Tim Burch
Thank you so much, sir, for join
We're now less than a week away
from a potential shutdown.
You just heard me
talk about the House speaker
trying to get a short term compr
or at least a short term
bill for 45 days through the Hou
with.
Is that something that you would
No, ma'am.
I have not voted for a C.R.
I didn't continue resolution.
I didn't vote for one
under President Trump.
And I haven't voted for any in t
I think it's just completely
I want to weigh our duties.
You know,
we have a duty to pass a budget.
We've got a budget committee.
And the last
I think 30 years that
we haven't even passed a budget.
Can you imagine,
you know,
your church
or synagogue or your temple
or your charitable organization
or your business or even our sta
All 50 states pass a budget that
We can't seem to.
We just don't do it.
And part of the reason is it's e
And part of the reason is
it hides a lot of things from th
I want you
to listen to
something that your fellow Repub
Congressman Garret Graves of Lou
Louisiana, said yesterday.
The arsonists have lit their hou
on fire.
They're whining
about their house burning.
They're going to want credit
for putting the fire out
and then they're going to set up
fund me to get paid for what hap
This is a fellow House Republica
not only
are you unreasonable,
you're like an arsonist.
Well, Garrett,
he's close to the speaker
and I get that he's a buddy of m
But, ma'am,
we take in $5 trillion
a year
and folks like Garrett
want to continue
spending over $7 trillion a year
I don't know where
that ever works anywhere.
Only in Washington, D.C.,
and the status quo from East Ten
I know you're a Jersey girl.
Hardworking people, ma'am.
And they have budgets
and we ought to get a budget
and stick to it.
So if that's this
this dysfunctional Washington.
Go ahead. I'm sorry.
No, no, I didn't mean to interru
Please go ahead.
I didn't mean anything.
No, I was just going to say
that this dysfunctional Washingt
cannot continue.
The American public knows
what we're up to
and they're sick and tired of it
That's why folks like me,
you know,
we're sticking to our guns
and all of a sudden we're the ba
because we want to balance our b
I mean, imagine that
that we've we've come to Washing
We represent our constituents.
We say what we're going to do,
and then we come to Washington.
And do it.
Now you have folks
that come to Washington and say,
I'm going to be a fiscal conserv
I'm going to be tough on this.
And then they're not.
You closed those doors, ma'am.
The only color they see is green
They look
you know,
that's why
they love an omnibus package,
because it's like Speaker Pelosi
we got two passes.
No. What's in it? 2000 pages.
They read down to
they find their district
and they see the funding
for all their special pet projec
and then they stop.
Let me ask you about that
in 1995 other pages in 20, 20 an
You said President Trump's budge
had achievable,
reasonable priorities for Americ
That budget came
with a $966 billion deficit.
Why was President Trump's
budget reasonable?
But you can't get behind anythin
that you've seen so far
with President Biden in the Whit
Well, because those
were attainable goals
and the growth of the government
And and and I dare say that
that any of my colleagues would
since since the COVID, you know,
if we could just go back to pre-
spending levels for goodness sak
that we would balance the budget
Now, can you name
anything that's been added to ou
since COVID
that you could not live without?
And, you know, it's just reasona
There's 15 or 16 of us
it looks like,
what even get in the room
with us and talk to us about it
until and until this all broke.
We were
we had the whole month of August
to deal with this yet they sent
and I get it,
I work harder and back in East
Tennessee here than I did
in Washington, D.C., any day.
But the reality is
we had the whole month
September 30th came upon us.
And it happens about this time
every year, ma'am.
And and yet we
we had our head in the sand
and we didn't do anything about
And now we're up on that.
And now the folks
that want to keep their word
to their constituents,
we're the bad guys.
And all we want to do
is have a responsible government
Ma'am, you cannot keep spending
you can't keep spending $7 trill
when you're only taking in 5 tri
That just doesn't work.
And it's completely dysfunctiona
And we got it.
We can't continue.
And it just passed
I know that you think that you'r
being portrayed as a bad guy, bu
there are leaders in the House
and the Senate in both parties
who want to try
to avoid some real world effects
for American service members.
Federal law enforcement won't ge
You just heard
Secretary Boudreau
talk about the effects
on air traffic controllers
TSA agents,
small business loans
and federal infrastructure proje
would stop.
Even Speaker McCarthy says that
and your fellow Republicans,
you're going to
get the blame for that pain.
Well, I submit to them
that we're just
we're going to get the blame
because we're trying to do
our job is what the rest of them
we're supposed to be doing.
And now they're going
to take the easy route out by bo
by borrowing more money from Chi
And that just doesn't work
any stretch of the imagination,
even if it's temporary,
just to keep it despite
it. Okay.
And every year
we do
this, the temporary
we stay in
the right of strategy is to say,
let's not call it a continued re
The American public won't know i
That's ridiculous.
Or they say,
let's pass the C.R., continue re
so that we can
so that we can stop passing cars
That's like telling a crack addi
we're going to give you more cra
to keep you off a crack.
It doesn't work, ma'am.
It's the continue.
Here's what will happen.
We'll pass a 30 day
C.R., continued resolution,
then we'll pass
another continuing resolution,
and that will back us up
to the Christmas break.
And then guess what?
We'll pass an omnibus again,
and we will not do our duty
if they want to do their duty.
They all stuck on doing their du
Tell them to pass a budget.
Jodi Arrington out of Texas,
God bless him, chairman of that.
He's gone ahead with it.
They gave him 10 minutes in conf
to talk about a budget.
Nobody paid any attention.
But that's what we're supposed t
It's a ten year
plan to get us back on our feet.
And that's reasonable. We're out
Just one final question.
If Speaker
McCarthy ultimately allows a dea
to pass
with Democratic votes,
would you support ousting him
from the speaker's chair?
That would be something I would
strongly at, ma'am.
If we
if we do away with our duty
that we said
we are going to do their alterna
This promise
that he made with Biden a year a
I mean, Biden a year ago.
What about the promise
we made
to the American public
that we were going to be respons
Americans?
Ma'am, we are going to be
we are going to be governing
over a pile of rubble
if we're not careful.
Our financial ship is sinking
and the American public
needs to realize
all these fancy titles cars and
to confuse
the American public is not worki
the curtains off.
We need to do our duty.
We should be back in Washington
and dealing with it.
But what are we doing?
Well, they sent us home.
Thank you so much.
Appreciate your time this mornin
Now to the bipartisan
group that has a plan
they say, to try to avert this.
The Problem Solvers Caucus.
We have Democrat
Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey
and Republican Brian
Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania.
Thank you so much, both of you.
Congressman Gottheimer, I'm
going to start with you.
You are the Problem Solvers Cauc
You're trying to work
to solve this very big problem.
Is that even possible at this po
I think so.
It's why our caucus.
64 of us, half Democrat,
half Republican,
came together last week
and put out a solution,
including a continuing resolutio
to keep the lights on in the gov
and not hurt people,
not hurt our military,
not hurt our seniors, not hurt
our veterans.
Put resources aside for Ukraine,
which is critical,
is that as we all know.
Put resources aside for
who we need desperately
to deal with a lot of our disast
in this country
and have a fiscal and debt and d
commission, fiscal responsibilit
deficit commission.
It's something
that actually can get Democrats
and Republicans together,
which, as you know
right now
in a divided government
where you've got the House contr
by Republicans, in the Senate,
controlled by Democrats,
the only solution will be one
where both sides come together.
And I think our plan is reasonab
and it deals with the extremes
and says to them,
instead of burning the place
down, as Speaker McCarthy
said, of of the far right,
that actually provides
a reasonable, commonsense
solution, working
with with people
like Brian Fitzpatrick, who
who want to get things done.
And Congressman Fitzpatrick,
your fellow Republican, Congress
Mike Lawler of New York, says
if hard liners will not vote to
a shutdown in any way,
your your plan or another,
he and other moderates
will join Democrats
in what's called a discharge pet
to pass a bill and keep
the government open. Would you j
I think all options are on the t
to get our bipartisan Problem
Solvers Caucus bill on the floor
It was introduced Friday.
As Josh alluded to,
it represents
an intersection of where Democra
and Republicans agree.
That's what America wants us to
They want us to sit down in the
just like our personal relations
just like we manage our families
and our businesses
should sit down at the table
and you figure it out.
And that's what our caucus does.
We don't allow the perfect
to be the enemy of the good.
And we take the perspective
that we'd rather get 80% of some
than 100% of nothing.
That's what our bill
that we introduced,
equally balanced between Democra
and Republicans.
That was introduced on Friday.
The Keeping Open, Keep America O
We will do whatever it takes
to get that bill on the floor.
And if it doesn't.
Will you join Democrats to
keep the government running?
Well, that's
we're going to do whatever it ta
to get that bill on the floor.
And we have multiple options.
A discharge
petition is one,
not one of several options in
a group of us.
I met with the parliamentarian
this past week
to discuss all the options
we have to force a vote on our b