Louie Gohmert is reportedly holding up a coronavirus funding bill due to ‘technical’ changes that were made to the bill after it was voted on:
NY POST – An urgent bipartisan coronavirus relief package is being held up in the House by a single Republican congressman who threatens to delay it for another week.
The billion-dollar package, which includes sick leave and free testing for affected Americans, was due to move to the Senate as soon as Monday night, but has since been met with objection from GOP Rep. Louie Gohmert of Texas.
The House passed the bill in the early hours of Saturday morning before it took a one week break amid the escalating pandemic, but it later emerged the legislation had technical issues which needed to be corrected.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy and White House point-person, Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin all agreed to the changes but Gohmert has since emerged as a surprise foil.
Gohmert has been tweeting about it, suggesting he isn’t holding up anything because Senators aren’t even back yet:
We still do not have a final draft of the negotiated changes being called ’technical corrections’ and some of us believe that the newly worded laws should be finished before we pass them. #CoronaVirus
— Louie Gohmert (@replouiegohmert) March 16, 2020
I'd like to know how I'm holding up a bill from going to the Senate that hasn't been written yet? Most Senators are not even back in DC yet. #FakeNews
— Louie Gohmert (@replouiegohmert) March 16, 2020
I cannot read the changes to a bill that haven’t been written yet. https://t.co/XY2e1Eg2cO
— Louie Gohmert (@replouiegohmert) March 16, 2020
Gohmert has since posted this statement on his website:
Congressman Louie Gohmert (TX-01) released the following statement regarding his request to read the revisions in the Families First Coronavirus Response Act:
“Last night some of the elected members of Congress heard that substantial changes were being made to H.R. 6201, the “Families First Coronavirus Response Act” that the House passed in the wee hours Saturday morning without being afforded the luxury of time to read the final bill before we voted. I read the 9pm version but was given no time to read or compare the midnight version.
Once again, because the Saturday morning bill was rushed so hysterically to passage, it requires more pages of changes, supposedly about 46 pages of ‘technical corrections,’ some of which are truly substantive and not just “technical” corrections to a bill that was 110 pages long. The last draft of the ‘technical changes’ I saw was 87 pages long. The Democrats are writing the so-called ‘corrections’ as we speak. Having someone here in DC prepared to object forces the Democrat leadership to at least have the law changes drafted before they are approved by a Unanimous Consent vote. I cannot in good conscience give my consent to something that has not been finished or made available to Members of Congress before it is up for a vote.
This coronavirus is doing enough damage to people without Congress compounding the problem to rush through a bill and another corrected bill just to say we did something. We should be attempting to minimize the damage, not piling on. My constituents did not elect the California delegation to represent them, they elected me—and that’s what I am trying to do.
I will not give my consent without first reading these very serious changes that will hopefully minimize bankruptcies caused by the virus rather than causing more. The final draft has still not been finished. I have spoken with Kevin McCarthy and the President who both understand my concerns. It’s easy to talk to the President when we completely share the same driving desire to make America even greater.”
Sounds completely reasonable to me, especially if the changes are substantive and not just technical.