Source: United States Senator for Washington State Patty Murray
***WATCH: Senator Murray’s opening remarks***
Washington, D.C. – Today, U.S. Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), Vice Chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, delivered the following opening remarks as the committee meets to consider draft fiscal year 2026 Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies; Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies; and Legislative Branch appropriations acts.
Senator Murray’s opening remarks, as delivered, are below:
“Thank you very much Chair Collins, and congratulations to you on your first markup as Chair. I really appreciate the opportunity to work with you on this committee. I also want to thank Senators Moran and Van Hollen—our CJS subcommittee leaders; Senators Hoeven and Shaheen—our Ag Subcommittee leaders; and Senators Mullin and Heinrich for your work on the Leg branch—and for all the work that went into these bills today.
“We have an important job here today, to come together and work through our differences, so we can fund the government, help our families, and make our country safer and stronger. Help people, solve problems. That’s the job that I’ve been here for, for a long time.
“And over the past few years, we have—together in this committee, as Chair Collins alluded to—established a strong track record on this Committee of coming together, despite serious disagreements, to do just that with strong bipartisan bills.
“Now, the challenges we face—and the threats to this very process—are greater than ever before with a president and an administration intent on ignoring the laws that we write and seizing more power for themselves.
“And of course, for the first time ever, we are operating now on a partisan, full-year continuing resolution for all twelve of our funding bills, which turned over more say on how our constituents’ taxpayer dollars get spent to unelected bureaucrats than any of us should be comfortable with.
“In the face of these immense challenges and threats, I believe it’s more important than ever that we ensure our constituents’ voices are heard, by passing these bipartisan, full-year spending bills. We cannot afford another disastrous slush fund CR that lets political appointees and bureaucrats—who have never been to any of our states—call the shots.
“So, I’m glad we are here today taking an important step to do the hard work of finding common ground and advancing three funding bills that provide crucial investments to our country.
“These are not the bills I would have written my own. I’d like to do a lot more to help our struggling families and rural communities, and develop cutting-edge technologies and science here in America. And I will obviously keep pushing to do as much as I can, at every opportunity.
“But I also want to say that it is important that we do understand that we work together on this committee, do compromise, and pass our bills together.
“I also want to say at the top that I share Ranking Member Van Hollen’s outrage that this administration has—on a dime—attempted to reprogram funding secured for the FBI headquarters after this committee provided funds and a competitive selection process was run.
“It is emphatically not how things should work. But, yet again, we are seeing this President thumb his nose at Congress and do what he wants. This is really something that we should have been able to address in this bill—along with a lot else—and I am really disappointed that we could not.
“So, while I will be voting yes to advance this bill and keep the conversation going, and support this bipartisan process, it is an issue that I will continue to press on with Ranking Member Van Hollen.
“And I just say, I would caution this committee—if my Republican colleagues simply stand by and watch this, it doesn’t take a lot of imagination to envision a future Democratic President who decides we don’t need to fund an FBI agency or building in another state and change the funding around, so I hope none of us want to help set that precedent for future presidents or generations.
“But at the end of the day, I do believe these bills are all a good compromise starting point—delivering critical resources to continue key programs and make targeted new investments, rejecting some of the truly harmful proposed cuts by the President, and steering clear of the extreme partisan policies he’s requested and that we’ve seen in some of the House bills over the last few years.
“At the end of the day, there is no question in my mind: these compromise bills offer a far better outcome for families back home than the alternatives of either the House, or another disastrous CR.
“The three bills before us reject efforts to slash meals for hundreds of thousands of seniors, funding to keep people safe, investments in cutting-edge scientific research, and a whole lot more.
“And more than that—these bills make essential investments to keep our country strong: from funding that keeps our families fed, food supply secure, and farms flourishing to funding that drives cutting-edge scientific research that is happening in our states, or fuels growing industries and small businesses.
“There is also funding for our communities to keep our families safe.
“There is funding to help each of us serve the folks who sent us here—investments in staff who help with constituent services, experts who provide crucial insights into legislation, Capitol operations and security that protect everyone who works here and comes to visit, and important investments in member security, as well.
“In light of the tragic assassination and attack on lawmakers in Minnesota recently, it is painfully clear we must do more to address the threat of political violence that really tears at the heart of this democracy. So I’m pleased to see some progress and new investments there—it is clear we’ve got to do more, I will make sure we continue that conversation.
“Bottom line, what we are doing here today is how the process should work: members coming together, writing bills with bipartisan input—and I hope we can continue this process with all of our bills.
“The challenges that we face are really immense, and it is so important that we do the job that we were sent here to do.
“But for us to be able to work in a bipartisan way effectively, that requires us to work with each other. To not just write bipartisan funding bills—but to defend them from partisan cuts sought by the President and the OMB director.
“We need to make sure decisions about what to fund—and yes, what to rescind—are made here in Congress, on a bipartisan basis, and within our annual funding process.
“We cannot allow bipartisan funding bills with partisan rescission packages. It will not work.
“And that is why I will repeat my commitment to all of my colleagues: my colleagues and I on this side of the dais, we stand ready to discuss rescissions as part of these bipartisan spending bills—as part of these bills. And just as this committee has always done. Working together across the aisle to look where it makes sense to cut, or rescind, or reform. I believe that is the path to our collective success, and I hope my colleagues work with us on this offer and reject the rescissions package next week.
“So as we mark up this legislation today, I hope we all keep our eye on what comes next. We have nine more bills to get across the finish line, and these are decisions that will help us get there. And there are decisions that will make that task a lot harder—if not impossible.
“I spoke about this last week at the hearing with Director Vought.
“This mark up, these bills—they show the potential of this Committee when it works best.
“We have a powerful role here, where we can do a lot of good for the communities we represent.
“But I will warn everyone again, this Committee is not powerful just ‘because.’ It is powerful because we are able to work together to secure investments that actually become law.
“But if we choose to ignore that, this Committee can, and will, lose its power.
“If we start passing partisan cuts to bipartisan deals—how are we ever supposed to work together?
“That is not hypothetical—that is a real question that will be posed by any party-line rescissions package.
“There are two roads before us right now: there is the road we peered down at the last hearing. The road where this becomes the Rescissions Committee—looking at package after package of cuts, fighting over how much of the last deal that we will unravel, fighting over whose projects gets canceled, whose community gets robbed.
“And there is the road that we are taking a step down today—the bipartisan road. Where we actually work together—where we stand together—and get investments back home to the people who sent us here. I know where I want us to go.
“And so, as we vote on these compromise bills today, I hope all of my colleagues will not just join me in advancing these bills, but also join me in reflecting on how we got here, and how we can best move forward.
“We cannot take for granted the spirit of trust—the spirit of trust—that makes it possible for us to write bills together. It’s easy to damage, pretty hard to repair.
“Thank you, Madam Chair.”
