Hoyer Opening Remarks at Full Committee Markup of FY26 Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies Bill

WASHINGTON, DC - Today, Congressman Steny H. Hoyer (MD-05), Ranking Member of the Financial Services and General Government (FSGG) Appropriations Subcommittee, delivered opening remarks at the House Appropriations Full Committee Markup of the FY26 Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies bill. Below is a video and transcript of his remarks:

Click here to watch a full video of his full remarks.

"Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. First, I rise and thank Mr. Rogers for his leadership on this committee for a very long period of time. His picture is right over that door, representing the fact that he was the Chairman of this committee and the leader of this committee for many, many years. I believe Mr. Rogers is one of the leaders of this committee who cares deeply about this committee, about its role, and about its independence, and its positioning under the Constitution of the United States and its obligations to the people of the United States. It is unfortunate that not only his subcommittee, my subcommittee on which I'm the Ranking Member, but many other subcommittees - and we heard it yesterday from Mr. Aderholt - saying we had limited resources. We do have limited resources. We need to be cognizant of our fiscal challenges that confront us. We need to bring down the debt. I'm one of those that has long felt that we need to be more fiscally disciplined. But in that context, we also need to understand that we need to invest in competing with the rest of the world, not to be competing to win [with] the rest of the world, but competing so that our people have the kind of economy and growth and quality of life that we want them to have, and that our national security is kept intact both abroad and here at home with our law enforcement personnel. All of that - many of these come under the purview of Mr. Rogers' committee.

"So, I rise, reluctantly, as I think all of Democrats will be, that ultimately, I will not support this bill. I'm hopeful that at the end, after we have a conference with the Senate or however that is going to work out, that I'll be able to support this. And I thank him, however, for his consistency in protecting this committee's integrity, and using a judgment of this committee, not simply of an Administration, whatever Administration it might be. Though I oppose this bill, I do believe that the Chairman has done what he could, within the context of the 302b allocation he was given.

"There are many, many, however, deficiencies, many cuts under Fiscal Year '25. One of those I'm concerned about, as the gentleman knows, is Goddard Space Flight Center. I have an article here written by a gentleman named Stephen Greenblatt, who's a physics - I believe it's physics - professor at Harvard University, and he talks about Sputnik. Now, Sputnik - most of you don't know what Sputnik was. I happened to be - I remember the exact other day I was driving in 1957; I just graduated from high school when Sputnik, in 1957, went around the globe. And in effect, it took America by the coattails and shook it because we were astounded that the Soviet Union had surpassed us in an objective that we had. And then John Kennedy became president, and John Kennedy said we're going to compete. Republicans said we're going to compete. Democrats said we're going to compete, and America competed.

"The professor points out that at that point in time - some 70 plus years ago - America, having had this shock, decided we would compete. How do we do it? We invested. We didn't disinvest. We invested. We invested in science, we invested in engineering, we invested in STEM, we invested in people going to college. Unfortunately, we are doing exactly the opposite now, while we talk about competing with China. At that time - at that point in time, of the top ten universities, China had one in the top ten universities. Now, eight out of ten [universities] are from China. Number one is China, [the] University of Science and Technology of China, in producing, as the gentleman in Georgia said, scientists, engineers, people who are going to make a difference ten years from now, 20 years from now, in the competition between China and ourselves critically important economically and critically important from a national security standpoint. So, when we see that, we see - Germany, by the way, in the United States are the other two. Harvard is the only college in the United States who's in the top ten of those who are contributing to major science journals.

"I don't have enough time, so I'll conclude by saying, we need to do better. I think Mr. Rogers would agree with that. I don't ask him to say it today, but we can do better, and we must do better. We must do better if America is going to be what we want it to be for our children, for our grandchildren, and in my case, for my great grandchildren. And I look forward to working with the Chairman to achieve those objectives as we continue through this process."