Rep. Case Comments on End of Shutdown

U.S. Congressman Ed Case (Hawai‘i – District 1) welcomed the tentative deal to reopen federal agencies affected by the partial government shutdown and return more than 800,000 federal workers to full-paid work.

In his Jan. 25, 2019, response, he said:

“Like all Americans, I am relieved that this inexcusable stalemate has been suspended for three weeks. “This decision comes shortly after I joined several of my colleagues in urging the House and Senate leadership to negotiate and vote on border security—if government first reopened. I only regret that this commonsense solution took so long with so much unnecessary disruption.

“This continuing resolution, once it is enacted and signed into law, will give me and my colleagues breathing room to engage each other and the administration on the issue of border security without federal workers, and millions of others, being held hostage to any specific outcome.

“Over the last 35 days of this needless disruption, I voted 11 times to reopen our government. I was deeply disappointed at the impact the shutdown had on government employees and their families, as well as so many others, and I sincerely hope the hard lesson has been learned that policy disagreements should not be fought on the backs of critical federal programs and workers.

“I want to express my deep gratitude to those federal employees who were either furloughed or continued to perform their essential duties without pay. They, along with so many in our community who rallied to their cause, deserve our respect and appreciation.”