Lawmakers take-on Capitol Hill for 114th congressional session

U.S. lawmakers are heading back to Capitol Hill on Monday to start yet another congressional session, but this year might prove to be more challenging than in the past.

Idaho Farm Bureau’s John Thompson said lawmakers have their work cut out for them since many of this past year’s issues will be passed-on to this year’s agenda.

“We want to see some progress, and we want to see some compromise,” Thompson said. “We want to see them reach across the aisle and do what’s right for the people.”

Early this week, the IFB released a statement showing strong disapproval of the 113th congressional session, saying “historians have labeled it the least productive in history in terms of bills passed with 203 pieces of legislation becoming law.”

According to the Pew Research Center, it estimated in late September Congress should have ended its term with 275 laws, but it came up short. Even if it met that mark, the study said this would still make it the fewest since WWII.

Some of the issues Thompson said he would like Congress to tackle for good this session would be: the budget, immigration reform, trade with Cuba, issues surrounding GMO’s, and smaller issues concerning the Farm Bill.

But, he said if the gridlock continues, we can probably bank on not seeing the progress people are wanting to see.

“Everyone just wants to bash everything the other side has to say and that’s not how Congress works. It just shouldn’t work that way, and that doesn’t represent the people. They’re not doing their job. So, we sent out that statement to try and flush them out and to try and let them know we’re frustrated.”

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