Press Releases

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Congressman Sam Graves today announced that he, and a bipartisan group of tencolleagues from Missouri and Kansas, will serve on a five-state congressional working group that will provide lower basin river communities with a united voice when it comes to management of the Missouri River.

When the president signs an act of Congress into law, federal agencies are required to abide by it. However, this has not been the case with the Regulatory Flexibility Act, which federal agencies continue to ignore time and time again.

Created by Congress in 1980 to relieve the stress of onerous overregulation on small businesses, the RFA charges all federal agencies with examining the impact of their proposed and final rules on small firms. If those impacts are significant, the agency is required to consider less burdensome alternatives.

Last summer, the president lauded a supposed "recovery summer" initiative that celebrated the "success" of the administration's stimulus plan. However, during that span of time, the U.S. economy shed jobs for three straight months, and unemployment edged up to 9.6 percent.

Following the one-year anniversary of the "recovery summer" last month, let's re-evaluate Washington's economic growth policies of the last few years, and whether they have worked.

Here are the facts:

(Washington, D.C) U.S. Congressman Sam Graves' first amendment to the Energy and Water Appropriations bill passed on a 216-190 vote. The amendment transferred $1 million in funds from the Missouri River Recovery Program to the Operations and Maintenance Account to be used for levee maintenance. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers spends $73 million on wildlife rehabilitation along the river, but only $6 million to build and maintain levees.

Printed in Politico.

The clock has run out.

On July 1, the European Union-South Korea free trade agreement goes into effect. Then, on Aug. 15, the Colombia-Canada free trade agreement will take effect — leaving U.S. small businesses at a competitive disadvantage in the international marketplace.

There has been recent progress on three pending trade agreements with Panama, Colombia and South Korea — but time is of the essence.

(Washington D.C.) The majority of Missouri's Congressional Delegation today sent a letter to the President asking him to approve of Missouri Governor Jay Nixon's request for emergency assistance for those counties affected by flooding.

The affected areas include Andrew, Atchison, Boone, Buchanan, Callaway, Carroll, Chariton, Clark, Clay, Cole, Cooper, Franklin, Gasconade, Holt, Howard, Jackson, Lafayette, Lewis, Moniteau, Montgomery, Osage, Platte, Ray, Saline, St. Charles, St. Louis, and Warren Counties and the independent City of St. Louis.

Originally published in Politico.

By Rep. Sam Graves and Rep. Mike Mulvaney (SC-5)

Imagine you own a business that puts a new roof on the local high school. After you do the work, the school pays only 97 percent of what it owes you. Why? On the off chance you may not pay your federal taxes.

That is what a section of the Tax Increase Prevention and Reconciliation Act of 2005 does. It requires federal, state and local governments to withhold 3 percent from all payments for goods and services made to small businesses.

Originally published in The Hill.

On Tuesday, the National Federation of Independent Businesses (NFIB), a small business advocacy group, released their monthly small business optimism index. As expected, the index dropped for the third consecutive month. The report of more than 700 randomly sampled small businesses in NFIB's membership signaled that our nation's most robust job creators are struggling as they fight their way through our nation's sluggish recovery.