Washington, Nov 8, 2007 - House Republican Conference Secretary John Carter (R-TX), a member of the Military Construction and Veterans’ Affairs Appropriations Subcommittee, late Wednesday night cosponsored the Military Construction-Veterans’ Affairs Appropriations conference agreement as a stand-alone bill (H.R. 4101) after Senate Republicans successfully split the Labor-HHS-Education and Military Construction and Veterans’ Affairs appropriations bills. Carter called on Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) to appoint conferees immediately and pass a clean veterans and troops funding bill so it can be sent to the President by Veterans’ Day. Carter made the following statement:

“After weeks of political tug-of-war, I hope the Democrat leadership will live up to their promise of funding our veterans and troops and finally pass this bill and get it signed into law. I was proud to be part of the bipartisan negotiations that produced this bill, but I am not proud to see it held up for political reasons. We need to do the right thing and pass this bill before Veterans’ Day. Our soldiers have fought and are still fighting for our freedom, and frankly, they and their families deserve better than what Congress has given them thus far.”

Note: Rep. Jerry Lewis (R-CA), Ranking Member of the Appropriations Committee, and Rep. Roger Wicker (R-MS), Ranking Member of the Military Construction and Veterans’ Affairs Appropriations Subcommitte, along with Reps. Carter (R-TX), Bill Young (R-FL), Ander Crenshaw (R-FL) and Kay Granger (R-TX), all members of the MilCon-VA Appropriations Subcommittee introduced legislation after the Senate Republicans successfully split the Labor-HHS-Education and MilCon-VA portions of the omnibus conference report legislation approved by the House on Tuesday. The new version contains the entirety of the MilCon-VA legislation included in the conference report. Wicker noted that the package has already won House approval once this week and could be taken up again as early as today, passed immediately, sent to the Senate and on to the President.