Dear Friend,

This week, without my support, Congress voted to fund the government for another year. The 2,009-page bill negotiated behind closed doors was a bad deal for rural America and a bad deal for southeast and southcentral Missouri. Simply put, this legislation funded more priorities for the president, than for the folks back home.

The funding bill fell short in efforts to rein in the out of control EPA and to defund job killing regulations done by presidential order. Not reducing EPA funding by even $1 is simply unacceptable. The refusal to include efforts to defund the catastrophic Waters of the U.S. regulation, the President's new Power Plan, Ambient Air Quality regulations or new Washington rules on wood burning stoves are just some examples of concern. The EPA's disastrous combination of new rules and regulations place extreme burdens on Missouri families and job creators. These rules are simply going to force businesses to shut down and Congress should be using the power of the purse to fight back.

The EPA's proposed Waters of the United States rule could allow the EPA to regulate nearly every area of the ground that gets wet or has flow during rainfall. The new Presidential Power Plan sets new untested coal standards, drastically increasing the cost of power for the main source used to keep the lights on across Missouri. In our state, 83 percent of our energy comes from coal power. The EPA's new National Ambient Air Quality Standards is a regulation The Center for Regulatory Solutions is calling the most expensive regulation in U.S. history. Unfortunately with this government funding bill we missed an opportunity to address any of these new Washington regulations.

There is no doubt this legislation included both good and bad components - but in my judgement the bad trumped the good. I appreciated efforts within the legislation to repeal costly COOL requirements important to our nation's farmers and reforms made to our Visa Waiver Program, but I was hopeful for the inclusion of stronger pro-life language. Of additional alarm, there was a failure to include important provisions previously passed by the House which provided greater security to the residents of Missouri by certifying that proper screening is taking place before any new refugees are allowed into this country. Rather than waiting years for the courts to decide whether or not the president can grant national amnesty with the stroke of a pen, we should be using the fact that Congress appropriates all federal funding to put an end to those efforts right now.

Congress must use the power of the purse to reflect the priorities of the people. I voted 'NO' because this bill represented more business as usual in Washington - it did not live up to promises I have made to you of greater transparency, pushing back against a regulation happy White House and advancing priorities important to those back home.

Sincerely,

Jason Smith
Member of Congress