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First District U.S. Rep. Diana Harshbarger, R-Kingsport, discussed the changes implemented by the Republican majority in Congress since the new term began in January during the Saturday morning Hawkins County Legislative breakfast.

“I can tell you with certainty that it is different being in the majority than in the minority,” Harshbarger said. “It may have taken 15 votes to get our speaker, but we got him (Rep. Kevin McCarthy, R-California).”

Harshbarger, along with State Sen. Jon Lundberg, R-Bristol, and state representatives Gary Hicks, R-Rogersville and Scotty Campbell, R-Mountain City, were among the speakers Saturday at the annual Rogersville/Hawkins County Chamber of Commerce Legislative Breakfast at the American Legion building in Rogersville.

A capacity crowd enjoyed breakfast provided by the Hale Springs Inn, as well as the singing of the National Anthem by the Cherokee High School Chorus and the CHS Junior ROTC Color Guard presenting the colors.

Harshbarger said that the House passed a rules package about amendments not being allowed unless it was part of the bill that it would be attached to.

“We cannot bring anything to the floor unless they’re single issue items,” she said. “There will never be a giant omnibus brought to the floor. Just single issues. Anybody can bring an amendment in off the floor before we vote on a bill. I think it was 54% of Congress that had never seen that happen. I think that’s remarkable.”

Members have 72 hours to review the bill to be voted on.

“The bills aren’t going to be 3,000 pages, they’re going to be short, succinct and sweet,” she said. “When you are authoring an amendment on the floor and it’s not germane to the bill that it’s about, it’s voted down.”

Among the issues Harshbarger discussed was the sale of oil in the strategic oil reserves to China.

“Who in their right mind sells oil from the strategic oil reserves?” she asked.

She named the current administration.

Congress lifted a nearly 40-year ban on most U.S. Crude oil exports in 2015, according to www.factcheck.org. adding the U.S. Dept. of Energy cannot dictate which companies – including U.S. subsidiaries of foreign companies – purchase the oil.

The site also noted the U.S. had been exporting at least some oil to China for years.

Next, Congress also passed the “Pandemic is Over Act.”

“Can you believe it?” she asked. “(The current administration) doesn’t want the pandemic to end. Why doesn’t the President want to declare the pandemic over until May 11? Because they have a lot more money to spend.”

The act will officially end the pandemic, at least legislatively.

According to the CDC, there were nearly 283,000 new cases of COVID reported nationwide last week and 3,171 COVID related deaths.

However, the legislative ending of COVID-related policies will require federal workers to show up for work instead of working from home.

“They don’t like that,” she said. “I’ve not seen an Internal Revenue Service agent since I’ve been there. Now they’re going to be forced to show up.

A resolution to condemn Socialism passed, but more than 100 members of Congress voted against it, most of them democrats, according to Harshbarger.

The Family and Small Business Taxpayer Protection Act also passed, establishing two committees, one the “Select Committee on Strategic Competition of the United States and the Chinese Communist Party” and “Select Committee on Reorganization of the Federal Government.”

Harshbarger cited that the interest on the National Debt will cost $8 trillion over the next 10 years.

She said that the debt is bigger than the U.S. economy.

“To me that’s a little bit worrisome,” Harshbarger said. “You have to live by a budget and I don’t understand why they keep wanting to spend, spend, spend. Seventy% is mandatory spending, 30% is discretionary income. It’s a travesty.

“There are things we have to do to get the debt crisis under control,” she said. “I’m all about helping the Ukraine, but they should have stepped in before the invasion occurred and get them what they needed to defend themselves instead of throwing money at something we have no way to measure the accountability of that money.”

According to Harshbarger, the House Energy and Commerce Committee, of which she is a member, has the broadest jurisdiction of any committee in Congress, whether it be House or Senate.

“You can get more done in that one committee bipartisan than any committee in Congress,” she said. “This is a job I have responsibility to the people I serve, in my state and my country to get the job done.”

Harshbarger also discussed the recent shooting down of a Chinese weather balloon that had spying on the U.S.

The balloon saga started on Jan. 28 in the Aleutian Islands, off the coast of Alaska. The balloon across of the U.S. before it was shot down last week in the Atlantic Ocean.

According to Harshbarger, NORAD didn’t view the balloon as an “immediate threat,” so NORAD didn’t have the authority to shoot down the balloon at that time because it was 16,000 feet above where airliners flew.

The balloon was shot in the Atlantic because it was 40,000 feet above the earth and in the path of airliners.

State Sen. Jon Lundberg

Lundberg praised Harshbarger for her efforts in Washington.

“She has carried the flag for Tennessee,” he said. “I really hope one day that she will be able to tell us that they’re doing nationally what we’re doing in Tennessee. That we have a balanced budget.”

Lundberg said that the issues in the State Senate include what taxes should be cut.

“The governor proposed a three-month sales tax holiday on grocery sales,” Lundberg said. “We’re doing so well that people are moving here. We have no income tax, a balanced budget and a AAA bond rating. We are a pay as you go state which means our road debt is zero. (In comparison), Texas has a $52 billion in debt service at the end of the year just to pay the debt on their roads.”

Lundberg, R-Bristol, said that there are issues and the legislature is “moving toward them.”

“We changed the formula to fund education from the Basic Education Program to the Tennessee Investment in Student Achievement,” he said. “It’s a major change. A billion dollars went into grades K-12.”

This year, it’s followed up with a huge investment in Tennessee Colleges of Applied Technology.

“We’re going to build half a dozen new colleges,” he said. “We’re going to renovate another half-dozen colleges and put a huge amount of money into those because that is where we go from K-12 to the workforce.

Lundberg also talked about the controversial third-grade retention law that is being revisited this session.

“It’s not about retaining students, it’s about setting them up for success,” he said. “Across the state, one thing that is unacceptable is 67% of our kids can’t read at third to fourth grade level. From kindergarten to third grade one is learning to read. From third grade, one is reading to learn.”

Lundberg claimed that 80% of the inmates in state jails are functionally illiterate.

He also praised State representatives Gary Hicks and Scotty Campbell for their work for Hawkins County.

“These are the hardest working fellows in Nashville,” Lundberg said. “They are there early and there late.”

State Rep. Gary Hicks

State Rep. Gary Hicks, R-Rogersville, talked about the $55.6 billion budget that is proposed for the state for fiscal year 2024.

“You’re going to continue to see the budget go down,” Hicks said. “A lot of the federal money has been spent. Hopefully you’ll see it go down to where it was pre-pandemic, around $42-$44 billion in 2020.

Hicks said that he knows what comes up must eventually come down.

“While I hope the economy stays with the good numbers and revenues, it just doesn’t work that way,” Hicks said. “The good thing about our state is that we’ve positioned ourselves to make sure we have a good fiscally conservative budget.”

The state has been able to put money in its “Rainy Day” fund, to fund capital projects

“We come back here and are asked about the bills,” Hicks said. “Folks are paying attention. You’ve got to be on your toes. I want to be held accountable to the folks I represent.

Hicks said that money allocated for the Tennessee Department of Transportation

“It’s going to put a huge, significant amount of money back to our local highway funds,” Hicks said. “Right now, that state aid fund is $94 million. The money allocated for TDOT will get it around $300 million. As you can see, we’re serious about what we’re trying to do. That’s going to be a huge undertaking for the local and state roads. We’ve got to do something.”

Hicks said that a trip to Nashville that should take three hours and 45 minutes to travel ends up taking five hours due to gridlock along the interstates.

Last year, around $300 million was cut from taxes. This year, around $400 million will be cut, according to Hicks.

Appropriations of $109 million will be given to the Department of Children’s Services, including raises to keep DCS workers employed.

“It’s time that we get that house in order,” Hicks said. “The time of kids coming in to DCS and having them sleep in offices, that’s ridiculous. Of our DCS workers, there’s not a crew who works harder to make sure that our kids are taken care of. It’s time that we make sure that money is well spent and it gets right where it needs to be, and that’s to help families.”

Adoption laws are being changed to allow more adoptions of children in foster care.

“These kids deserve a good home,” Hicks said. “We’ve got good people who are willing to give them that home.”

State Rep. Scotty Campbell

Campbell, R-Mountain City, who represents the Hawkins County residents of Kingsport, said that the state budget is $3 billion less than last year.

Gov. Bill Lee’s “Smart Lanes” proposal is designed to alleviate gridlock in the bigger cities of Tennessee.

“I was very skeptical about this, but I’m getting a little bit more comfortable with it,” Campbell said. “The Governor’s Transportation and Modernization Act will most of that through choice lanes. When I first heard that, I thought it was a toll road.”

A toll road is a road that one has to pay money to travel on. Choice lanes are lanes that won’t cost any extra. Each region will receive $750 million specifically for transportation requirements.

“There are a lot of things in play and in flux all of the time,” Campbell said.