Meaningful debt reform possible in 2015

As you know, it has been a busy couple of weeks in Congress and we have made some bittersweet progress in fighting for our great state of Idaho. On the sweeter side, two of my bills combating federal land control are headed to the president and should become law.

The first bill is the Grazing Improvement Act that allows 20,000 ranchers to extend delayed grazing rights on over 250 million acres of federal land across the West. This helps improve the rural economies that rely on ranching in Idaho.

The second bill, the Idaho County Shooting Range Land Conveyance Act, will clear the way for the first public shooting range in Idaho County. This bill transfers 31 acres near Riggins from the Bureau of Land Management to Idaho County, filling an important need of our local law enforcement agencies.

These bills are good for our state and I have worked hard to get them passed. However — on the bitter side — while I voted for the bills when they first passed the House, I was unable to do so last week on their final passage. That is because these two natural resource committee bills were bundled into the 1,648-page National Defense Authorization Act.

I voted against the NDAA because I have never liked the D.C. practice of tying unrelated bills to must pass legislation. I also object to the NDAA on both foreign policy and civil liberties grounds. I oppose the NDAA’s authorization of $1.6 billion to arm and train Syrian rebels, and still have concerns about the NDAA’s failure to properly define the standards for the indefinite detention of U.S. citizens suspected of terrorism.

In this case, House leadership — in order to get support for NDAA bill — decided to lump together 96 other bills that were totally unrelated to defense. The Senate has since approved the NDAA, including the Grazing Improvement Act and the Idaho County Shooting Range Land Conveyance Act. President Obama is expected to sign it into law. Now, although I am happy that I have been able to achieve these positive changes for Idaho, I am saddened that they were passed in this manner.

I also recently voted against the fiscal year 2015 catchall appropriations bill that spends $1.1 trillion, up $88 billion from fiscal year 2014 levels. Once again, Congress has failed to take seriously its responsibility to squarely address the federal spending crisis. The process was driven by a handful of people behind closed doors. The result was a 1,603-page bill larded with “pork” and favors for special interests. The funding bill also failed to address the President’s unconstitutional immigration order.

When the people of Idaho’s First District elected me in 2010, I promised to stay true to my principles and not be changed by business as usual in Washington. I promised Idahoans I would do everything in my power to stem the growth of our now-$18 trillion debt, which Congress refuses to do. Next year, with both the House and Senate in Republican hands, my sincere hope is we enact meaningful spending reforms and go about doing the people’s business in an open and honest way.

In closing, please take 90 seconds to listen to Sen. Coburn’s farewell speech (http://dailysignal.com/2014/12/11/tom-coburns-stirring-message-fellow-senators-90-seconds.) He has always been an inspiration to me and I am proud to call him a friend. He reminded his colleagues in the Senate and the House that do not take an oath “to provide benefits to our states.” Instead, our oath is “to protect the United States of America, its constitution and its liberties.” We need more people like Tom Coburn serving in Congress.

• Republican Raúl Labrador represents Idaho in the First Congressional District.