It's Congress' job to keep an eye on the other agencies and the workings of the entire government. It is our constitutional duty.

As a government watchdog, I'm always looking for ways to make government smaller, more efficient, and fairer.

I think a fair amount of my votes were 'not-for-Ortiz,' votes and I'm going to have to work hard to earn the 'for Blake' votes.

My message on immigration is that the people who want to come to this country, by and large, even those who have done it illegally, are coming for the right reasons, not to take advantage of our welfare system.

I'm committed to voting to repeal Obamacare or defending it as much as possible.

My constituents feel betrayed by the promise that Reagan made, that if we grant amnesty, we'll then secure the border. We obviously didn't do that.

I think there's no problem getting through the House a pathway to legal status. A pathway to citizenship is going to be tougher, but I think it is potentially doable, if we can show the American people that the border is secure.

I actually enjoy having the Capitol view. We started referring to it as the trillion dollar view.

Every member of Congress has highways in their district.

Nobody likes to make a hard decision, because you're running every two years.

Sometimes you've got to make a hard decision, and there's a real reluctance to make hard decisions in Washington.

You've got to do the same sort of outreach to Hispanics that you do to any other group. They want to see their congressman.

Companies that are hosting Web sites or do a lot of teleconferencing need a lot of bandwidth going both ways.

If you are just using the service to look at Web sites and download e-mail, then a DSL line may be cheaper. It is when you have more data going out that wireless can make a difference.

In an urban area, you're not going to be an hour away from another post office.

Nobody in the Washington regulatory bureaucracy gets fired for saying no.

I went in with the youthful vigor that I could single-handedly change the world. But you fast come to the realization that you're 1/435th of one-half of one-third of the government.

I've been through several of his campaigns, and I can tell you nobody can out-campaign Rick Perry.

I don't need to air any differences of opinion in public.

The mission statement of the RSC is to foster a constitutionally bound limited government, it's to have a strong national defense, it's to protect private property rights and it's to support American values. That's what the mission statement is. There's nothing in the mission statement about trying to hold leadership accountable.

We feel that the Republican platform presents the best opportunity for the success of minority families. All minority groups seek the same opportunities in the United States that the settlers from Europe did when they came over.

I think we, the Republicans, have been mistyped as unfriendly to minorities and not receptive to minority views.

We've made it crystal clear to the American people what we're against. We need to talk about a couple of other things - what are we for?

I don't think 'nothing' is a good option.