Ranking Member DeLauro Statement at the Full Committee Markup of the 2025 Commerce, Justice, Science Funding Bill

Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro (D-CT-03), Ranking Member of the House Appropriations Committee, delivered the following remarks at the Committee's markup of the fiscal year 2025 Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies bill:

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for yielding. And I thank Chairman Rogers and Ranking Member Cartwright, and the majority and minority staff for their work on this bill, especially Bob Bonner, Nora Faye, Faye Cobb, and Shannon McCully.

The majority’s Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies bill for fiscal year 2025 is dangerous, reckless, and makes Americans more vulnerable to violence and crime, in their homes and in their communities. The bill politicizes and defunds law enforcement by cutting FBI and ATF agents and analysts, and the bill defunds prosecutors that keep dangerous criminals off our streets.

The bill continues the majority’s relentless campaign of attacks on American women’s health and safety. This bill attacks law enforcement and threatens U.S. national security. It hurts rural communities, and it tilts the economic playing field against everyday Americans. And the bill is full of roughly one hundred inappropriate and harmful riders that do everything from loosen public safety laws, to regulate women’s health.

The majority’s bill defunds the FBI by nearly one billion dollars, inevitably leading to the loss of thousands of positions at the Bureau, and severely obstructing the Bureau’s ability to keep Americans safe and keep dangerous criminals off the streets.

I am baffled as to why the majority’s bill would obstruct federal law enforcement’s ability to keep the American people safe, and administer the rule of law. The FBI works day in and day out, year-round and around the world, keeping American families safe and bringing dangerous criminals to justice.

Just in the last week: Child predators in separate cases in Florida, Minnesota, New York, and California were brought to justice for distribution of child sexual abuse material, sextortion, and attempting to entice minors to engage in sexual activity; A Colombian national was sentenced to more than 15 years in federal prison for trafficking over $55 million of cocaine into our communities; Three former health care company executives were sentenced for their roles in a $1 billion fraud scheme; Nine Floridians were charged with schemes to defraud elderly and disabled care programs, including Medicare; A man in Montana pleaded guilty to assault with a dangerous weapon for stabbing a casino employee on the Blackfeet Indian Reservation; A gang member in New Haven, Connecticut, in my district, pleaded guilty to a racketeering offense related to a violent 2021 murder.

These criminals and many others were brought to justice, making our communities safer – communities in my district, in your districts, and across the country – since the calendar turned to July, thanks to public servants at the FBI, whose workforce will be reduced under this bill.

The FBI is helping to prosecute each of these crimes and take criminals off the streets, as they do across the country, every single day, without concern for politics.

And defunding law enforcement is not the only way this bill jeopardizes Americans’ safety – far from it.

The majority’s bill leaves schools, grocery stores, churches, concerts, and communities vulnerable to more devastating mass shootings by making it easier for dangerous individuals to get guns.

And the bill slashes legal services, and cuts agencies and programs engaged in early intervention and crime prevention in our communities: Violence Against Women Act grants, Juvenile Justice grants, hate crimes grants, and other resources that prevent violence are all cut, leaving communities more vulnerable to crime.

Finally, this bill is bad for the economy. It is bad for rural Americans, as the majority’s bill cuts Economic Development Administration programs that create jobs, predominantly in rural communities.

And, this bill is bad for the everyday, hard-working Americans across the country who cannot keep up with the high cost of living, by cutting funding for the Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division.

After years of mergers across industries allowed the biggest companies, from grocery and home goods stores to airlines, to acquire their closest competitors, these corporations have relentlessly and shamelessly pursued – and acquired – record profits by price gouging Americans out of every dollar they can.

Corporations have limitless resources for lawyers and lobbyists to fight for their interests. We must ensure that the Department of Justice can go toe to toe and fight to keep the economy fair for everyday Americans. 

Because this bill defunds and politicizes law enforcement, harms women, hurts the economy and makes our communities less safe from violence and crime, I cannot support this bill.

Democrats are at the table and ready to pass legislation that protects Americans’ safety. Please, I implore the majority to join us. It is time to govern.

Thank you, and I yield back.

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