Washington D.C- House Energy and Commerce Republican Leader Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-WA) sent a letter to Energy and Commerce Chairman Frank Pallone (D-NJ) urging him to pause the partisan sprint towards a reconciliation package for one week and begin earnest, bipartisan negations for COVID relief.
In her letter to Chairman Pallone, she wrote:
“I request that you pause the partisan sprint towards a reconciliation package for one week and begin earnest, bipartisan negotiations on further COVID relief with Energy and Commerce Republicans. Using reconciliation for COVID relief abandons your promise to continue Energy and Commerce’s (E&C) rich tradition of bipartisan work and your commitment to regular order.
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“[T]he first major action of the 117th Congress at E&C is to eschew any attempt at bipartisan agreement for a sixth COVID relief package and ignore regular order by going right to a full committee markup without holding any hearings or allowing our subcommittees to weigh in on this legislation. This is a real contrast to the bipartisan COVID oversight hearings the Committee held last week. Instead of objecting because Democrats failed to notice those hearings properly, we worked with you to invite witnesses that brought important perspectives to our COVID work. This is a bad start to regular order, and it is a bad start to bipartisanship."
