WASHINGTON — The House has spent the past year hardly legislating or doing anything of substance, Democratic Whip Steny Hoyer said Tuesday.
“We have been involved for this year and for the last couple years, not exclusively, but primarily, in messaging,” Hoyer told reporters on Tuesday. “Not in legislating, not in substance.”
Hoyer was responding to a question about the appropriations bills that the House and Senate are beginning to take up in lieu of agreement on a budget. The House, this week, is considering a defense appropriations bill, and the Senate is considering an appropriations bill for Transportation and Housing and Urban Development.
“I think these appropriations bills are largely about messaging,” he said.
“I don’t take them particularly seriously,” he added. “I frankly don’t think Republicans take them very seriously.”