WASHINGTON – Congresswoman Lynn Jenkins (KS-02) released the following statement after she voted to prevent a default on our nation’s financial obligations. Under this bill, spending levels will not be increased, the government will be funded through January 15, 2014, the debt ceiling will be raised until February 7, 2014, and the House and Senate will go to conference to negotiate budget reforms to reduce spending and get the U.S. fiscal house in order:

“The past couple weeks have demonstrated just how dysfunctional Washington has become. I said from the start, I didn't come to Congress to shut things down; I came here to get things done. The president even said tonight that we cannot go from crisis to crisis in Washington, and I couldn’t agree more. However, the president and the Senate would not come to the table, would not meet us halfway and would not have a conversation to move this country forward. Partisanship was never going to allow that to happen in the context of a government shutdown.

“Historically, divided government has created opportunities for Congress to come together and develop real, bipartisan solutions to some of our nation’s greatest challenges. Unfortunately, this did not happen either. We needed to close that chapter, and open a new one, in order to address our nation's fiscal problems. I voted today to get our government back open, to prevent any default on our obligations, and get people back to work while our negotiators have a serious conversation about our debt crisis.
 
“I remain committed to doing everything I can in the days and weeks ahead to encourage my colleagues to put politics aside, sit down, and have a commonsense conversation to address the failures of the president’s healthcare law and fix our broken budget process.”

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