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Thank you, Ladies and Gentlemen, for hosting these annual luncheons, which allow our entire community to come together to express our united support for the security of Israel. In the 11 years you have been kind enough to invite me to speak, one threat to the survival of Israel and the peace of the entire world has loomed above all others, and that is the illegitimate terrorist regime in Tehran. The mullahs have made crystal clear that they are determined to develop nuclear weapons and once obtained, to use them against Israel and against our own country.

This act prohibits U.S. withdrawal from NATO and commits perpetual American support. While I support NATO and our continued presence in it, this bill is unnecessary and appears deliberately aimed at undercutting the President’s efforts to get NATO countries to pay their fair share for its support. NATO was formed to provide security against the now-defunct Soviet Union; not to relieve individual European nations from their responsibility to maintain their own defenses at America’s expense.

This bill funds Interior and related agencies through the end of the fiscal year. Setting aside the current impasse over border security, the bill is ill-advised on its merits. It plusses up almost every request made by the administration, with the notable exception of PILT funding that compensates rural communities that are slammed by excessive federal ownership of land in their jurisdictions. It reduces funds approved by the Republican House last year for hazardous fuels reduction, national park maintenance, and water infrastructure...

Setting aside the impasse over funding border security, this bill is ill-advised on its merits. It continues to drain $9.9 billion of motorists’ taxes paid at the pump away from highways in favor of mass transit subsidies, continues to fund absurdly wasteful programs such as subsidized air service ($155 million), money-losing Amtrak routes ($1.9 billion), local grant programs which have been used to fund such nonsense as “Doggy Day Care” centers ($3.4 billion), and massive housing subsidies to ameliorate the affordability crisis caused by government restrictions and mandates on home construction ($30+ billion). But they couldn’t find any money for a border wall. Worst of all, it continues the irresponsible spending trajectory established by the so-called BBA (formally the “Bi-Partisan Budget Act” but more accurately the “Budget Busting Act”) that is quickly leading us to trillion-dollar annual deficits despite increased tax revenues.