On Capitol Hill, it's business as usual.

When Donald Trump won the 2016 Presidential Election, I believed that the Republican-controlled Congress would confidently pass the agenda that was responsible for dispatching Hillary Clinton and Company.  The issues that were most important to me- safe borders, immigration enforcement, rolling back unnecessary regulations, re-negotiating terrible Trade Agreements, and support for our veterans, were part and parcel of the platform that President Trump embraced during the election.  Given that those same issues are also traditional Republican concerns, I assumed that Majority Leader McConnell and Speaker of the House Ryan would have little difficulty corralling their respective Republican majorities and pushing aside the Democratic opposition.  Unfortunately, it just hasn't happened as I envisioned.  Although President Trump has been able to pass some of the agenda, he must be frustrated with the lack of urgency demonstrated by Congress.  Ten months into the Trump presidency, why hasn't Congress been more aggressive on implementing his agenda?

Most of the more prolific Republican members of Congress have voted in line with President Trump.  More accurately, they have voted as conservatives, which is what is expected by their constituents.  My Congressman, who has been in office over three decades, traditionally votes as a conservative, but I'm not ready to concede that his voting record this year is an indication of support for President Trump.  I think the same can be said for many of the more influential Republican Congressmen and women.  Voting conservative is something that is expected by their constituents, and not necessarily an indication of support for President Trump.  Since my district voted heavily in favor of Donald Trump, I expected my Congressman to take a leadership role in shepherding the Trump agenda through the House of Representatives.  He's been in Congress a decade longer than the Speaker of the House, and currently chairs the Science, Space, and Technology committee.  I can only assume that he wields enough influence to make a bold stand calling for unity behind our Republican President, and the issues that swept him into office.   On the contrary, since the inauguration, what I've observed is one Democrat member of Congress after another aggressively attacking President Trump and his policies.  Since the Republican Party has a forty-six seat majority in the House of Representatives, why is it always the Democrats who seem to control the debate?

For a Congressperson to be accountable to his or her constituents, it must take more than a positive voting record.  Our nation sits at a crossroads, and our elected officials must be ready to stand up and be heard, because the left has shown no hesitation in taking over the bully pulpit.  President Trump deserves a Congress that will use its majority to push aside the opposition and pass the legislation that will make our nation safer and our economy stronger.  For too many years, the polite, business-as-usual style of negotiating in the House of Representatives has allowed the Democrats to dominate the agenda, regardless of which party is in the majority, and every year, Congress seems to become less responsive to the people.  We need a Congress that tackles its responsibilities in a responsible fashion, and the last one to leave the Chamber turns out the lights.  Instead, we have a never-ending process of brokering, deal-making, behind-the-scenes negotiating, additional deal-making and still nothing gets accomplished.  This is not my idea of smaller government, folks, and any member of Congress who calls themselves a Conservative and has been in office more than a decade, needs to explain to me exactly what steps they have taken to make our government smaller, cheaper, and less intrusive on our lives.

The election of Donald Trump as the forty-fifth President of the United States was the first step taken by the American people in returning responsible, accountable leadership to Washington DC.  In order to provide President Trump with the legislative support he needs to make our nation safer, shrink the size of government, and grow our economy, we must elect a Congress which demonstrably supports the Trump agenda and is willing to toss aside convention when necessary and use the majority which was provided by the American electorate.  Its time to look beyond the Congressional voting record and ask the all-important questions, "what has my Congressperson actually accomplished, how dedicated are they to a smaller government, and just how aggressive is he or she willing to be in support of the Trump agenda?"