Representative Lizzie Fletcher

Dear Neighbor,

I returned to Washington this week with a full legislative agenda and some uncertainty about finding agreement to keep the government funded after today. I am glad to be able to report to you that the House and the Senate passed a continuing resolution to fund the government until early next year, and I am thankful to be home for the Thanksgiving holiday before the House reconvenes again.

As I wrote to you last week, government funding was set to expire today if Congress did not act. Speaker Johnson announced an unusual approach to an extension of government funding—the Further Continuing Appropriations and Other Extensions Act, H.R. 6363—and on Tuesday afternoon, the House considered and passed it. On Wednesday night, the Senate passed it.

The resolution continues to fund some federal agencies at current levels through January 19, 2024 (including the Department of Energy, the Department of Veterans Affairs, the Department of Transportation, and others), through February 2, 2024 (including Department of Homeland Security, Department of Justice, Department of Health and Human Services, and others).

The short version: there won’t be a government shutdown this week. And I am glad. As someone who took office during a partial government shutdown, I have seen firsthand how it would hurt our economy, our national security, and our neighbors at home and across the country. I do not believe that shutting down the government should be on the table in any negotiations, spending or otherwise.

I remain concerned, however, that in January and February, when this resolution ends, we will be facing the same threat. And that is because of how this resolution (and the one before it) came to be as well as how the other legislation we considered this week fared in the House.

The resolution to continue funding the government passed with 95 members voting against it with no reasonable, or even identifiable, alternative in sight. And even many members who voted for it have said they will not vote for another extension. But again this week, the House demonstrated the challenges of passing the appropriations bills as drafted. Of the two bills slated for consideration this week, one was debated but was not brought up for a final vote because it didn’t have the votes to pass and the other did not have enough votes to begin debate.

I agree that it is reasonable and important to pass FY2024 appropriations bills and we should have the time to do it before this resolution expires. But the bills that are coming up for consideration are not designed to do so.

This week, for example, the House considered the Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2024, H.R. 5894. Once again, this bill violates the Fiscal Responsibility Act—the bill we passed earlier this year and is now law—which established spending levels for appropriations bills for Fiscal Year 2024 in exchange for lifting the debt ceiling. It not only fails to meet the spending agreement, it cuts funding for programs by nearly 30 percent on average. That includes cuts to education and medical research important to our district and to all Americans. It also includes a prohibition on all funding for Planned Parenthood and the elimination of funding for the entire Title X family planning program (which, I always am proud to point out, was born in Texas 7, introduced on Congress by then Congressman George H.W. Bush). For a detailed list of the cuts, see this summary prepared by the Democratic members of the House Appropriations Committee.

Again this week, I offered an amendment to the bill. Again, it was refused for consideration. My amendment removed a section the bill that would ban federal funding from any program, contract, health care provider, or facility that provides information on abortion care, even in states where abortion remains legal. Instead, the Rules Committee accepted more of the same kind of amendments that we spent hours debating on and voting on last week, including, for example:

Reducing the salary of Education Secretary Miguel Cardona to $1.
Reducing the salary of Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra to $1.
Reducing the salary of the Education Department’s Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights to $1.
Reducing the salary of Assistant Secretary of the Mine Safety and Health Administration to $1.
Reducing the salary of Assistant Secretary of Labor for Occupational Safety and Health to $1.
Reducing the salary of the Chief of the Virus Ecology Section at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases to $1.
Prohibiting the use of funds to pay for the salary and expenses of Office of Refugee Resettlement Director.
Prohibiting funding for the CDC’s firearm injury and mortality prevention research.
Reducing the funds provided to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) to $0.
Prohibiting funding for the World Health Organization.

You get the idea. After this bill, the House was slated to consider the Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2024 (H.R. 5893). This bill funds important agencies that empower our communities and assist state and local law enforcement to keep us safe, including the Department of Justice. It had its own set of troublesome cuts and silly amendments, but it did not have enough votes to be considered.

The House considered several other pieces of legislation early in the week, including a privileged resolution from Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA-14) to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. House Democrats brought a motion to refer this resolution to the Homeland Security Committee rather than take up a resolution that had not been considered by the committee and for which there had been no investigation or process for consideration. The motion to refer the resolution to the Homeland Security Committee passed by a vote of 209-201, and I voted in favor of referring it.

As we do each week, the House considered several bills under suspension of the rules, including the Debbie Smith Act, H.R. 1105, to reauthorize the Debbie Smith DNA Backlog Grant Program, which provides state and local law enforcement agencies with resources to complete forensic analyses of crime scenes and untested rape kits, through Fiscal Year 2029 and the Warrior Call Resolution, H.Res.848, which encourages Americans to connect with members of the Armed Forces and veterans to provide support and promote mental health treatment and solutions.

As a reminder, you can always find a list of all of the votes I have taken for the district on my website.

Again this week, there was much discussion in Washington of global events and relationships. On Wednesday, President Biden held a bilateral summit with President Xi Jinping of the People’s Republic of China where they discussed a slate of issues important to global relations, including cooperation on countering the illicit narcotics market, resuming military-to-military communications, addressing the risk and safety of artificial intelligence, accelerating efforts to tackling the climate crisis, expanding educational, student, cultural, sports, and business exchanges, and increasing passenger flights between the two countries early next year. President Biden also reaffirmed the United States’ One China policy and reiterated U.S. support for Taiwan. The two leaders acknowledged the importance of responsibly managing competitive aspects of the U.S.-China relationship, preventing conflict, maintaining open lines of communication, and cooperating on areas of shared interest.

People in Washington continued to maintain their focus on developments in the Middle East. On Tuesday, I participated in a bipartisan classified member briefing on the war between Israel and Hamas and the situation in Gaza from representatives from the U.S. Department of State; USAID; the Department of Defense; the Office of the Director of National Intelligence; and the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

This week, I joined my colleagues in sending several letters on issues important to our community, including:

a letter to House and Senate leaders requesting legislation outlining President Biden's request to Congress for security and humanitarian aid for Israel, Ukraine, and Taiwan, as well as to address border security;
a letter to the House and Senate Committees on Armed Services urging the inclusion of New Democrat Coalition priorities for the 2024 NDAA;
a letter to President Biden urging the administration to finalize the proposed HHS rule to expand health coverage for DACA recipients, juvenile visa holders affected by parental abuse, and immigrant children; and
a letter to House leaders and the House Committee on Education and the Workforce ensuring legislation to create short-term Pell grants includes provisions implementing strong quality assurance protections and excludes predatory for-profit colleges.

On Tuesday, I participated in the Energy & Commerce Committee’s Communications and Technology Subcommittee hearing to discuss the powerful impacts of artificial intelligence (AI) in our communications networks. We already are seeing the impacts of AI throughout our society, and its expanded use provides many opportunities for innovation and many potential harms along the way. I had a chance to ask witnesses about AI bias, AI literacy, and what we should be thinking about AI when crafting digital privacy protections for Americans. To view our exchange, click on the video below.

This Education Week, I was glad to participate in a meeting with my colleagues in the New Democrat Coalition and U.S. Department of Education Secretary Miguel Cardona. I had the chance to meet in my office with a group of Canadian Senators and Representatives as part of the Canada-U.S. Inter-Parliamentary Group as well as with Nancy Northup, President of the Center for Reproductive Rights.

On Wednesday, the Regional Leadership Council met White House Senior Advisor and Infrastructure Coordinator Mitch Landrieu to mark the second anniversary of the signing of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA), which has already funded more than 40,000 projects across the country.

Did you know? The Houston region has already received allocations totaling nearly $1 billion in IIJA funding. The IIJA is the largest, long-term investment in the country’s infrastructure in nearly a century. The IIJA is helping us invest in our communities now to modernize our infrastructure, to spur economic growth, and to enhance our competitiveness for the 21st century—and we’re just getting started with these investments here in Houston. It is an investment in our future. I look forward to seeing even more investments from this law in our community, and to working with partners to secure them. Some funding highlights for our area include:

$165,315,000 for storm damage reduction projects, rehabilitation, and maintenance at the Houston Ship Channel;
$61,989,421 for Houston METRO to purchase no- and low-emission fuel buses and fueling stations, as well as the modernization of a bus maintenance facility;
$164,115,698 for infrastructure and terminal improvements at Sugar Land Regional Airport, Intercontinental Airport, and Hobby Airport;
$28,789,305 for the City of Houston to add sidewalks, protected bike lanes, and vehicle turn lanes and to improve crosswalks and intersections on Bissonnet Street from Hillcroft Avenue to South Dairy Ashford, which accounts for the highest number of fatal crashes on all city-owned streets;
$552,160 for the City of Houston’s 12-month study and community-driven planning process to design safe connections across high-speed roadways and strengthen pedestrian, bicycle, and public transportation options in Gulfton, Houston's most dense and transit-dependent neighborhood;
$460,000 for Memorial Heights Redevelopment Authority to study safety improvements and pedestrian and bicycle access to White Oak Bayou; and
$2,000,000 for a new research center at the University of Houston to research transportation cybersecurity improvements, in collaboration with Rice University.

Across Texas, the IIJA has provided critical funds for roads, bridges, roadway safety, and other major projects, including:

$16.6 billion to repair highways and bridges;
$3.3 billion through the Broadband, Equity, Access, and Deployment Program to provide access to high-speed internet throughout the state;
$1 billion to provide clean and safe drinking water, including $368.4 million for lead pipe and service line replacement, and $308.9 million for safe drinking water investments; and
$234.1 million to build a network of electric vehicle charging stations across the state.

The White House has developed an interactive website (Build.gov) where you can track these investments. Click here to search projects by state, see the projects by type, and see the work that is happening at home and across the country.

This week I met with Houstonians in Washington (technically off the Hill) for a bipartisan fireside chat with Congressman Randy Weber. I also met with Houstonians virtually to talk about issues important to our community, including developments around the world in the Middle East and in Pakistan as well as the development of hydrogen infrastructure made possible through the Inflation Reduction Act, connecting with the leaders of the Gulf Coast HyVelocity Hydrogen Hub for an update on their process and work with the Biden administration.

On Veterans Day last Saturday, I joined Mayor Turner and other community leaders at the City of Houston’s Veterans Day Ceremony at City Hall. I appreciated the opportunity to thank our veterans for their service to our country and their continued work in our community today.

In honor of Veterans Day, I also held a virtual roundtable conversation with veteran community leaders in our area, including Michael E. DeBakey Veterans Affairs (VA) Medical Center Director of Suicide Prevention Programs Elizabeth Kleeman; Houston VA Communications Director Maureen Dyman; Houston Veterans Chamber of Commerce President and CEO Dave Weaver; Houston Veterans Chamber of Commerce Government Relations Chair Amy Skicki; and Veteran Association of Real Estate Professionals of Houston Government Affairs Director Carlos Torres.

Our veterans have made sacrifices to serve our country, and it is our duty to ensure that when they return home, they have the resources and benefits they have earned and deserve as they transition back to civilian life. I was glad to hear from veteran community leaders about issues important to veterans and their families and to discuss how we can work together to help veterans and their families. I am committed to ensuring Congress honors its obligations to our veterans, and I am grateful to all the leaders in our Houston veteran community who participated.

Our team in Washington had a busy week of meetings with representatives from the Texas Farm Bureau, Harris County Flood Control District, Rystad Energy, and Running Start.

And in Houston, Team TX-07 joined Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Director Dr. Mandy Cohen at the Alief Community Center’s vaccination clinic.

The 1917 Houston Race Riot and subsequent military trial is a sad chapter in Houston's history. This week, the U.S. Army announced that it has overturned the convictions of 110 Black infantry soldiers stationed at Camp Logan–19 of whom were executed and 63 of whom were sentenced to life imprisonment–for defending themselves against racially motivated violence. The soldiers were members of the 3rd Battalion, 24th Infantry Regiment, an all-Black unit known as the Buffalo Soldiers. The records of these soldiers will be corrected, to the extent possible, to characterize their military service as honorable, they will be given proper gravestones acknowledging their Army service, and their descendants will be made eligible for benefits.

As Under Secretary of the Army Gabe Camarillo said in his statement this week, while we cannot change our past, this reversal is an important opportunity for us to learn from this difficult moment in our history, to address it, and to restore honor to these soldiers. For their families, for those who petitioned for clemency, and for our city, and I am glad to see this historic injustice addressed.

Again this year, we are collecting Winter Wishes to share with senior citizens throughout our district. We will be delivering cards that neighbors from across TX-07 will make. We are working with schools in the district, and welcome teachers, parents, and kids who would like to help to contact our office or sign up to participate by visiting bit.ly/WinterWishes2023.

On Monday, December 11, I will host a virtual town hall to provide a congressional update on all the work I have done in Congress on behalf of our district this year and to answer your questions. RSVP and submit your questions here.

Next week is one of my favorite weeks of the year—a chance to spend time with family and friends and to celebrate all that we are grateful for. I am looking forward to spending it back home in the district. I hope you have a wonderful Thanksgiving wherever you celebrate it!

Our offices will be closed Thursday and Friday to observe the holiday. And that also means that the Weekly Wrap Up will be on its own Thanksgiving break next Friday. But, I’ll be in touch, and I’ll send you a full report from Washington the following week.

I am proud to represent you and I am here to help you. Please call my office at (713) 353-8680 or (202) 225-2571 or email here at any time to ask for assistance or share your thoughts.

Best wishes,

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