Dan Webster
Dan Webster
Daniel Alan Websteris an American politician who has been a member of the United States House of Representatives since 2011. Webster, a Republican from Florida, initially represented Florida's 8th congressional district; since 2013, his district has been numbered the 10th district, located in the central part of the state. Previously, Webster served 28 years in the Florida state legislature...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionPolitician
Date of Birth27 April 1949
CountryUnited States of America
If you need a door kicked in, just call, and we'll kick it. Now, it may not always be the answer you want, but you will get an answer.
Principle says it's not who put forth an idea. It's not the position of the person who put forth an idea; it's not the longevity of the person or the party of the person. That's not what it is at all. In a power system, that's the way it works. But in a principle system, it's what it says.
I've never hidden my faith, but there are only a couple of issues I would die for. There are a few others I would dig my heels in on, and I've told my caucus that what they see is what they get.
Let's take up the most important issues first. Let's take up the reauthorizations first; let's take up the appropriations bill first, not wait until four days beforehand - no one has mentioned anything, and, all of a sudden, somebody looks at their watch and says, 'Hey, in four days, the government is going to run out of money.'
I will say this: I've had more pro-life bills, I believe, I ruled unconstitutional - but I tried - than the entire total membership of Congress together.
For most of my time in Tallahassee, I did a lot of transportation.
Do I like foreign aid? Sometimes, but not every time. Don't like giving money to our enemies, but I love giving money to Israel.
If you push down that pyramid of power and spread out the base, every member gets a chance to file their bill and have it heard and file their amendment and have it heard, as opposed to the system that we have now, which closes out, closes down bills, limits debate, and so forth.
I've been a speaker. I've been a majority leader. I've been a minority leader. Those are the sort of things I don't need any more.
You can think of all the things a Congress or a legislature does, and then you kind of overshadow that with the fact that a few people are going to make those decisions.
We passed a bill in 1997, signed by Democratic Gov. Lawton Chiles, which created a pilot program for a novel experiment called Florida Virtual School. The notion of children using a computer for a classroom and reporting to virtual teachers wasn't exactly mainstream thinking in those days.
We're a nation of immigrants - there's no question about that. But we're also a nation of laws. I think we have to honor both of those.
You have got to clean your own house first before you tell other people that they aren't doing it right.
When you wait to the last minute, you rush to get things done, and the closer you get to the deadline, the less options you have.