[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 46 (Monday, March 13, 1995)]
[House]
[Pages H3067-H3072]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


                        ON THE REPUBLICAN AGENDA

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 4, 1995, the gentleman from California [Mr. Miller] is 
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
  Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, I probably will not take the 
whole 60 minutes, much to your relief and others, but I would like to 
take some time here to discuss some matters that concern me, some of 
which will be addressed in the rescission this week and later those 
that will come before us in the welfare reform bill proposed by the 
Republican Members of this Congress.
  First of all, let me just say that it is pretty well documented now 
and I think people have come to understand that the welfare reform bill 
holds major, major cuts to populations that are very vulnerable in this 
American society and especially with those cuts with respect to 
nutrition programs for school children and for newborn infants and for 
children in child care settings. Specifically, some $7 billion are cut 
out of nutrition programs that serve the women's, infants' and 
children's program and the school lunch programs.
  Now, many of my colleagues on the Republican side of the aisle have 
come to the floor and suggested from time to time that they are not 
cutting anything, that they are simply slowing the growth, but the fact 
of the matter is that they are removing a little over $7 billion from 
these programs over the next 5 years, and that means that the people 
who are administering these programs at the local level, because that 
is where these programs are run, will have to decide whether fewer 
children receive a school lunch or whether they will receive a smaller 
school lunch or whether they will receive it fewer days a week than 
they would 
[[Page H3068]] otherwise, because this money is simply not sufficient 
to keep up with the current--the current--demand on these programs. And 
of course, if the economy should go into any kind of downturn, as more 
and more people become eligible for these programs because they have 
lost their jobs in the economic downturn, there will be no money to 
provide for those children and those programs.
  The program also, and you will start to see the linkage here, that 
the Republicans also cut the moneys for the women's, infants' and 
children's program. Again, they will argue it is block granted. Again, 
they will argue it can be used more efficiently, but the fact of the 
matter is that the funding is incapable of keeping up with the current 
demand with a case load that unfortunately, unfortunately in this 
country, continues to grow, and that is, women who are pregnant, that 
are certified to be at medical risk of either not being able to carry 
the pregnancy to term and thereby giving it very extensive risks to a 
low-birth-weight baby being born.
  We know from all of the academic studies and scientific studies that 
have been done over the last 20 years that should a low-birth-weight 
baby be born, a baby generally under 5.5 pounds, that that baby suffers 
a dramatic increase in the likelihood of mental or physical 
disabilities or other complications, medical complications at the time 
of birth. That baby can very easily cause the increase, because of the 
intensive and increased medical attention at the time of birth, that 
baby can cause an expenditure in the hundreds of thousands of dollars 
over a very short period of time to try to get the birth weight of the 
child up and to get the child functioning properly, to deal with the 
problems of the lungs, the respiratory problems that come from low-
birth-weight babies as they are born. If the baby is very low birth 
weight, of course the complications become much more dramatic and the 
costs much more dramatic.
  Interestingly enough, though, what we have found following these 
children over an extended period of time is that when you return them 
home from the hospital to the parents who now have a healthy child, a 
child that is up to par here in terms of its birth weight and it is 
looking healthy here, that many other problems continue to linger with 
these children, that these children now, as we track them, are 30 to 40 
percent more likely to come in and need special education, remedial 
costs all throughout the early years of education.
  So these problems do not end. Their problems do not cease, and yet we 
know that if we get them back up and if we were not cutting the WIC 
programs, that we have a dramatically, a dramatically increased 
opportunity of raising the birth weight of this child, of having this 
pregnancy go to term and having this child be a healthy, bouncy baby at 
the time of birth and not suffer all of these tragedies for the family, 
for the child, and eventually the expenses for the taxpayer.
  But what are we doing now after 20 years of treating this population, 
we have now decided that we are going to turn our backs on this 
population and cut the funding to this most vulnerable, vulnerable 
group of people in our society, and something that is clearly 
preventable with a matter of a few dollars a week, because what has a 
few dollars a week done? What it does is it provides for medical 
screening for the pregnant mother.
  At that time we try to tell them, do not engage in the use of 
alcohol, do not smoke during pregnancy because it can have a dramatic 
impact and unfortunately a bad impact on the fetus and the baby when it 
is born, and we also try to get them to understand nutrition.

                              {time}  1445

  And in that light, we provide for them high-protein foods, foods high 
in iron and other supplements that we know can have a very dramatic 
impact on the likelihood that this nutritional risk that the woman 
suffers from can be reversed and we can have a healthy pregnancy at the 
outset.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from Colorado [Mrs. 
Schroeder].
  Mrs. SCHROEDER. I am delighted that the gentleman from California has 
taken this time, because I think there are a lot of myths going on. My 
understanding is that many offices are being flooded with phone calls 
because somebody on the radio told them that they were wrong.
  But you do not have to be a rocket scientist to figure out Members of 
Congress cannot say we are delivering all these savings, but of course 
we are not cutting anything. It does not figure.
  And I know the gentleman worked on the same reports that have seen 
when he chaired the Select Committee on Children, Youth and Families 
that showed constantly over and over and over again every dollar spent 
by the Federal Government for immunizations, for WIC, for child feeding 
programs, we got back over and over and over again. It was one of the 
best investments we can make.
  So I think the gentleman's point about cutting this, or even cutting 
the increase in this, without having it driven by the need I just think 
is outrageous, because it is very shortsighted and we are going to see 
very, very long-term spending.
  Mr. MILLER of California. I thank the gentlewoman. And we both had 
the honor to chair the Select Committee on Children, Youth and Families 
in previous Congresses. It is interesting that they try to portray to 
the public that there essentially will be no cuts in these programs 
affecting the children, what have you, and yet they are also telling 
everybody that they cut all this money out so they can afford a tax cut 
to the wealthiest 1 percent of the people in the country.
  If there are no savings and no cuts, how do you pay for the tax cut? 
They say that they pay for the tax cut by the savings that they have 
made. You serve on the Committee on Armed Services. If you were to say 
to Congressman Cunningham, who serves, I believe, on the Committee on 
Armed Services with you. And he says this is not a cut, we are simply 
reducing the growth in spending. If you were to tell him that you were 
going to take the armed services down to current services to maintain 
this current fighting force next year and the year after, taking into 
account inflation and mission growth and all the other things that are 
taking place, and you told him that you were going to take away the 
money that would allow that, would he say, ``That is a cut'' or would 
he say, ``That is not so bad; it is slowing the growth''?
  Mrs. SCHROEDER. You are setting me up. We would have to get a very 
large ladder and a scrapper and we would have to scrape him off the 
ceiling. He would be so angry that we would even think about cutting 
defense. In fact, they are yelling that defense is not high enough, 
even though defense is more than almost every other Nation on the 
planet is spending on defense added together, but that is still not 
enough. And, therefore, they are willing to go after these vulnerable 
populations.
  I must say in my district I have not found anybody who agrees with 
these cuts. I have not found anyone who thinks these cuts are a great 
idea in order to give some fat cats who can pay $50,000 a plate for
 dinner, to give them a break. They do not feel that you take it from 
the most vulnerable and give it to the guys who have done the best. 
That is not America.

  What I am hoping is that people who do agree with these cuts would 
not only write me but send me their picture. And I would hope that you 
would ask the same thing. I would like to have a board back here. I 
want to see what these people look like. They do not look like any 
Americans that I know.
  And, really, there is a lot of flimflammery and a lot of smoke being 
blown around here. But the bottom line is, as the gentleman from 
California is saying, when you blow away the smoke, the children are 
going to be hurt.
  Mr. MILLER of California. The gentlewoman is exactly right, because 
the fact of the matter is that if you take the cuts in school lunch 
programs, you are talking roughly about 2 million children that would 
have been served over that period of time, those 5 years, that simply 
will not be served because the programs will not have the money.
  The notion is to suggest, again, that somehow local school districts 
will make up that money. The fact is that 
[[Page H3069]] the local school districts do not have that kind of 
money. And in our State they have been taking money from the School 
Lunch Program to do other things with. That is why we have a National 
School Lunch Program, because we knew that the politics was the most 
difficult at the local level and moneys were diverted to other 
purposes.
  Mrs. SCHROEDER. Could I ask the gentleman another question? I think 
it is good to clear the airways that are cluttered with a lot of noise. 
The other issue being the women, infants and children's programs. And I 
know that we have worked very hard to get the best deal on formula we 
have ever seen. And no one that I am aware of has been complaining that 
that program has been mismanaged or anything else. To now see it broken 
up and sent out to 150 different States, when I believe and the 
gentleman from California knows about this, we have saved about a 
billion dollars just in the contracting with infant formula people.
  Mr. MILLER of California. The gentlewoman is quite correct. What we 
found out, unfortunately, is that, this never ceases to amaze me, but 
we do have very upstanding members of our communities and corporate 
members of our community who are fully prepared to rip off the 
taxpayers.
  And what we found at one point was that a number of formula companies 
were charging very excessive rates for the formula for the newborn 
infants in this program, so we went to a program of bidding and making 
them compete on a national basis for these contracts and it 
dramatically lowered the cost of the formula about a billion dollars. 
And that was able to be plowed back into extending the number of 
infants that can be served.
  Interestingly enough, in the bill that we will be considering, 
although this was a proposal by, I believe, the now chairman of the 
committee, the gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Goodling], that we 
tried to make sure that this bidding would continue and that amendment 
was rejected in the committee.
  So now we have the ability to see people negotiate contracts and, as 
I said, unfortunately, one of the sad things in our job from time to 
time is that we find out that there are professional people, well-
educated people, and a lot of other people, who are fully prepared to 
rip the Federal Government off for their own narrow gains. And now the 
likelihood of that happening again is substantially increased and the 
loss of these savings and the loss of nutrition to the newborn infants 
and the babies.
  Mrs. SCHROEDER. Might I ask the gentleman another question, because I 
figure in a way maybe our dialog here can straighten out some of these 
things. There is so much disinformation around.
  While I chaired the Committee on Children, Youth and Families, I do 
not believe we ever had one person come in and complain, one person, 
about the management of the feeding programs for children and for WIC 
and for others. And I was wondering about the gentleman's experience 
when he was there. In other words, I am going through that old adage, 
``If it isn't broken, don't fix it.''
  Mr. MILLER of California. The gentlewoman is quite correct. There has 
been very few, if any, complaints about the management of this program. 
The WIC program is essentially run at the local level. We simply 
reimburse the States for the formula and for the food that they provide 
for the pregnant women and for the newborn infants.
  It is run by State WIC directors and local WIC people in the counties 
that come
 together for this purpose. And there is unanimity. People like the way 
the program is being run now. And that is why the Congress, even during 
the Reagan years and the Bush years, there has been a steady trend 
toward full participation, 100 percent participation in WIC, because 
both Republicans and Democrats and Governors and Senators and 
Congresspeople and local county health directors and medical directors, 
they all like the say this program is running.

  Now, we are using the issue of a block grant so we can slice the 
funding. It is a ruse, it is camouflage to cover up what is actually 
going on. It is interesting in the Committee on Education and Labor, 
the Republicans selected five witnesses. They selected the witnesses. I 
do not think we were allowed to have a witness from the Democratic 
side; maybe one. And all five witnesses said, ``Leave the program 
alone. Leave it alone.''
  The only problems we have had in this program is from time to time 
when people from the private sector have come in and ripped the program 
off with stale meals and old meals, bad food, mislabeled commodities, 
phony formula. Those kinds of problems; not from the public sector but, 
from people from the private sector who are trying to rip the program 
off and make ill-gotten gains at the expense of the children.
  Mrs. SCHROEDER. And we have aggressively gone after that.
  Mr. MILLER of California. And that is minimal at this stage; 10 or 15 
years ago it was a major problem, but because of the changes that have 
been made historically on a bipartisan basis with Senator Dole and 
Congressman Goodling leading the Republican efforts, this bipartisan 
effort on agriculture and on the education committees had worked out so 
that we have a program now which is the model throughout the world.
  The WIC Program is the model throughout the world on how to deal with 
high-risk pregnancies and all of the tragedies that can come from that. 
And going up front and providing a very strong prevention mode that has 
worked beyond people's wildest expectations.
  You point out that we saved $3 for every dollar that we expend in WIC 
and $10 for every dollar that we spend immunizing a young child. That 
is just the immediate medical cost. That does not go to what you save 
in special education and remedial education and all of these other 
problems that, unfortunately, these children manifest many years later 
that have been separated from the time of birth when people are no 
longer concentrating on what happened, so that now Sally or Johnny has 
a problem in class or with attention span or all of these other 
problems that occur today.
  Mrs. SCHROEDER. If the gentleman would yield further, I guess I stand 
here absolutely stunned by all of this because my other committee, 
unlike yours, is Armed Services. And we certainly could not come to the 
floor and say, ``This has a been a model. This has been marvelous. No 
one has come in front of us and shown us any fraud.'' My word, it comes 
in by the ton over the transom every year in every Member's office. And 
no one is proposing to block grant the Pentagon. It is interesting, the 
systems that are having trouble, they are winking at and saying, ``No, 
we have to given them more money.''
  Mr. MILLER of California. It is not to block grant it. They make a 
big point about they give in the nutrition program 200 million more a 
year. But if the money is insufficient to meet the demand of the 
children that are eligible, the children who need this nutrition, then 
they are in fact cutting the program.
  If I said to the people in our Committee on the Armed Services: We 
will give you $500 million more a year every year for the next 5 years, 
they would say that is absolutely unacceptable. We have contingencies 
we cannot foresee. We do not know what is going to happen.
  Mrs. SCHROEDER. They are saying that it is threat-based. We must have 
it be threat-based.
  Mr. MILLER of California. We would like this to be family based and 
nutrition based and health based for the children of this country.
  Mrs. SCHROEDER. The gentleman is correct. And I think it is so 
important to remember why we got into this. We got into this for 
national security reasons and that is because during World War II they 
found so many of the people that they drafted, when they came in for 
their physical, they were suffering from so many things from 
malnutrition and decided that it was a whole lot better to have some 
nutrition programs and some feeding programs and, obviously, national 
standards.
  The idea to me that we are going to have 50 States having 50 
different nutritional standards makes me crazy. But I think all of 
these things started as a national security program. Maybe what we 
ought to do is put it in the defense budget. I do not know.
  [[Page H3070]] And then the other thing, and this I realize I should 
not ask anyone from California. I realize you are in a difficult 
position, but I think of our Nation's children as a national problem. 
And it seems to me that in the past this is how we reflected it and 
they is why these have been in the budget.
  And it seems that with these block grants we are saying, ``Do not 
bring your problems anymore.'' We will throw money to the State and 
quickly we will get bored with that problem and it will be easy to cut 
entirely.
  But another piece is we are saying that disasters have become a 
national problem, but not children. Part of the reason that we are 
hearing that we have to cut these is because of disasters.
  Mr. MILLER of California. I think it is very unfortunate that we see 
the situation where before the election, when we had the Northridge 
earthquake in California, again on a bipartisan basis, people believed 
that that was an national emergency and you should not cut other 
program to pay for that.
  I happen to have a little different view. I believe we should 
privatize the disaster system. We cannot have the ``Disaster of the 
Month'' here draining the Treasury. And I would have hoped that we 
would have done that with this California aid bill. The gentleman from 
Illinois, Congressman Durbin, had a proposal in to do that and then we 
would have a rainy day fund and an earthquake fund or hurricane fund so 
that we would build that money up so that we could pay it out.
  But that was not done, so now as we are halfway through taking care 
of people who were devastated in the earthquake, people who still 
cannot enter their houses or businesses or the universities because of 
the earthquake damage, all of a sudden we have decided it is no longer 
a national emergency and it is going to have to be paid for and the way 
to pay for it is to cut summer jobs for children, to cut drug-free 
schools and to cut the weatherization program to pay for the California 
aid.
  And at the same time, the California Governor wants to give the same 
amount of money back to the taxpayers of California for a tax cut. So 
you are telling people in our State of Colorado, or New Mexico, or 
Maine, or Texas, you have to cut all of your programs to pay for the 
California aid, but the people in California are going to get a tax 
cut. I think that is a little hard to sell.
  And I think that the Governor is doing a little bit of putting the 
pea under the walnut shell and seeing whether or not Congress can 
follow it. Apparently, the Republicans have lost the pea and they have 
decided they are going to go ahead and give them the money and he can 
give the tax cut and people all over the country will have those 
programs cut. It doesn't make any sense.
  I honestly believe, and said this during the Midwest flood crisis, 
that we have got to develop another means of this so that we do not 
reach out on an ad hoc basis when we have these horrible, horrible 
disasters that this country, given its geographic size, is never going 
to be immune from, no matter what we do.
  Mrs. SCHROEDER. I truly thank you for being a statesman, because that 
is what it is. If you are from California, it is difficult to say what 
you just said.
  Mr. MILLER of California. I just talked to my wife this morning and 
the sandbags are out. We are about this far from----
  Mrs. SCHROEDER. It is right at your front door. But I think you are 
absolutely correct, with the water at your front door, for which there 
would be a great temptation to say yes, the feds should pay for this 
and cut any program that there is, you are pointing out if we put cut 
these feeding programs, we are going to have a much bigger national 
disaster coming down the road.
  And it is not fair for the Governor to have it both ways. He can give 
back State taxes and then we are forced here to send our Federal taxes 
to him.
  Mr. MILLER of California. The word ingrate comes to mind.
  Mrs. SCHROEDER. It kind of comes to mind. I again thank the 
gentleman.
  Mr. MILLER of California. I thank the gentlewoman for joining me in 
these remarks and raising these points.
  The point is that when we look at the rescission bill that we will 
vote on on Wednesday, the cuts come from low-income housing, from 
elderly housing, low-income energy assistance. We are taking from the 
poorest people in this country to provide the disaster assistance so we 
can provide a tax cut. It just does not make sense and it does not add 
up. It sounds like Mexico. It sounds like those folks would not go for 
it over there.
  Mrs. SCHROEDER. It is going to go for tax cuts for the richest and 
disaster relief and it is going to create a huge disaster downstream.
  Mr. MILLER of California. I thank the gentlewoman for joining me and, 
again, for all of her involvement in these issues.
  I would just like to say now that it has been pretty well established 
that the Republican budget cuts and the welfare reform are prepared to 
turn their back on the issues of prevention with respect to disabled 
children and preventing these pregnancies that are high risk that we 
have identified.
  We know before the fact, we know that we can go out and change the 
course of these pregnancies. But yet somehow we are not going to 
dedicate those funds. And Wednesday we will be voting to cut 100,000 
women, pregnant women, pregnancies that are started. They do not know 
budget rescissions or balanced budgets or fiscal years. The pregnancies 
are launched, and yet we know if we can get there early, we can change 
the outcome of this pregnancy. One hundred thousand women will not be 
served this fiscal year because of these cutbacks. And that is what I 
mean by cutting the most vulnerable.
  But now let us move on to the next stage of the Republican plan. They 
have already decided they are not going to make the maximum effort to 
prevent a birth defect from taking place or prevent a low-birth-weight 
baby from being born or to prevent mental retardation or physical 
disabilities that occur for a whole host of reasons. They are not going 
to make that effort.
  But now what we find out is that they come back years later. And when 
we see low-income families, one of the facts about disabilities, mental 
disabilities and physical disabilities and birth defects, is they know 
no socioeconomic bounds.
  You can be living behind a gated community in a country club and you 
can have the sadness of the visitation of a birth defect come to your 
family. And you can struggle with this child and to work out and to 
create a life for the child and a community within your family, and a 
family setting for that child, or
 you can be the poorest person in town. It can happen.

  But what we see now is that they are going to take 225,000 children 
who are severely disabled, either mentally or physically, and they are 
going to take them off of the Supplemental Security Income Fund that 
was created to try and help these most disabled children. And they are 
going to take these children off because they believe that somehow some 
parents may be coaching their children to act like they are retarded, 
to act like they have learning disabilities, to act like they have 
mental disabilities so they can get $400 a month.
  I am sure somewhere out there some place there are parents who do 
this. But let us assume it is 10 percent. It is 10 percent of the 
parents, so it is 25,000 children. That still leaves you with 200,000 
children who are medically certified as severely disabled children. 
They are off the rolls. This low-income family now gets no fiscal help 
for the taking care of this child.
  Assume it is 20 percent. You have 175,000 children out there who come 
from low-income families, because you only get the 400 a month if you 
are very poor. You must be among the poorest to get the maximum 
payment. You are off of the rolls.
  So if your child has cerebral palsy, you are off of the rolls. If 
your child has other complications, such as the 6-year-old Jennifer 
Cox, who suffered from a congenital bowel malformation requiring a 
colostomy, and eye problems and lacks peripheral vision causing her to 
run into the walls.
  At 6, she is not yet toilet trained. But if you are the family trying 
to take care of your child with all of these problems, we are going to 
say we are not going to help you anymore, even if 
[[Page H3071]] you are low income. Somehow, that is not going to 
happen, because we are going to provide for a tax cut.
  Or Kendra Whalen who is 2 who suffers from a very rare growth 
condition in which one arm is twice as long as the other arm which 
means it causes her to lose her balance, motor impairment, spinal 
curvature and has lost lung volume because of this. Kendra is off the 
rolls if this goes through.
  And it goes on and on. To Mosha Smith who is 10 months old, requires 
a shunt in the back of her head to drain the cerebral spinal fluid from 
her brain into her abdominal cavity. She suffers partial paralysis of 
the legs, bowel and bladder and a condition that requires frequent 
catheterization.
  The family is struggling to take care of these children in their 
family settings. They love these children. And yet somehow what we are 
saying to these families is the Government cannot help you a little 
bit.
  And what is the help for? What is the help for after the child has 
been medically certified to suffer these disabilities of retardation, 
of physical impairments? A documentation that requires the person from 
Social Security to talk to child care providers; to talk to physicians; 
if they are school age, to talk to the school personnel; to talk to 
neighbors and playmates to make sure that this, in fact, this person is 
disabled to the extent to which it has been represented.
  If you are so fortunate to get this help so you can keep your child 
home, so you can keep your child out of an institution, so you can 
provide your child some semblance of a normal family life and a normal 
childhood experience, be they infant or school age, what are you doing 
with this money that you are getting?
  In some cases you are probably having the child's clothing altered, 
so instead of buttons it can be velcro because the child may not be 
able to button their clothes.
  You may be paying utility bills because a child at home may be on a 
respirator for 24 hours a day. You may have it to buy or rent a backup 
generator, because you worry that the loss of electricity for the child 
who is on the respirator.
  You worry about your ability for communication devices, so if 
something goes wrong you will be able to communicate to people.
  What about all the telephone calls you have to make? You are a low-
income person with a severely disabled child in your home. You are 
making phone calls to medical providers, pharmacists, to social 
services, to schools. We are not going to help you out with that.
  How about specially trained child care? You are trying to work. You 
are low income and you are trying to work, but most child care centers 
will not take these children. They are not equipped or trained. And if 
you do find a place for your child, it is much more expensive. But the 
Government is not going to help you anymore.
  Respite care. The taking care of these children is a 24-hour-a-day 
job. Husband and wife work it out together. They juggle their jobs. 
Most often what happens is one of them gives up income so that they can 
take care of the child. So you pay for respite care.
  What is respite care? It is a chance to have the child taken care of 
for 5 hours, 6 hours, 12 hours. Maybe a big thrill, overnight so you 
and your spouse can spend the evening together. That would be the big 
thrill. Twenty-four hours of respite care. The Government helps you pay 
for that now. No longer, when you have a severely disabled child.
  What about transportation? Additional transportation if the child is 
an older child? I mentioned adaptive clothing, the special laundry. The 
diapers for a teenage child that is uncontinent. You have to go through 
that for all those years.
  Adaptive toys. All of the repairs for the equipment that you have for 
your child. That is what the $400 a month goes for and that is what is 
going to be cut off in the welfare reform bill for these most severely 
disabled children.
  We cannot really be doing this in the name of humanity. We cannot be 
doing this because it is good for the children. We are simply doing 
this because the Republicans are on the march to round up money so that 
they can provide a tax cut, as we said, to some of the wealthiest 
people and corporations in this country.
  I am sure that each of those people who earn over $100,000, $150,000, 
$200,000, if they knew where this money was coming from would probably 
say, ``Why do you not take care of the children? Why do you not help 
out this family? Why do you not help these families who are financially 
poor and now have to deal with the problems of a disabled child in 
their family?''
  I am sure that is what those people would say. But, apparently, the 
politicians whose represent them cannot get that message that that kind 
of cut is not necessary. This is not a cut about fraud and abuse. This 
is a cut about gathering up money that some people think that maybe 
families should not have.
  Now, you could get the money if you can show that but for that money, 
your child would not have to be institutionalized. So if you have the 
threat of losing your child into an institution, away from your home, 
even though you want to take care of it, even though it may be less 
expensive, that is what you would have to show.
  What about all the time and the effort and the money that these 
families put into these children already before they ever get to the 
Government for help? We have had hearings after hearings on these 
children and these families and what you see is a very loving child, a 
Down's syndrome child, a child with cerebral palsy, and a very loving 
family.
  But in this day and age, to hold that family together economically is 
very difficult with both people working. And if you are low-income, it 
is almost impossible. So what do you do? You risk losing your child. 
You risk having to give up your child, because you cannot get the money 
so that you can give up some hours of work to stay home with that 
child. And so, therefore, you must show that the child must be 
institutionalized. Somehow that does not seem to be fair. That does not 
seem to be fair in terms of putting families into that situation and I 
do not think it should be done.
  If there is some allegation of fraud, if there is some belief that 
out there somewhere, some parent is coaching their child, then why do 
we not make it a crime? It is a fraud. Well, it is crime. Do what you 
want to do.
  And the one random sampling of over 600 of these cases, I believe, in 
13 cases, no case did they find coaching. And in 10 or 13 cases they 
thought maybe that potentially there could be some coaching. And I 
think 10 kids were taken off, but that comes nowhere near the whole 
population or 5 percent or 2 percent of this population.
  And that is why we have to ask whether or not this is really where we 
want to cut the budget to these most vulnerable families and these most 
vulnerable children. We have had a history of commitment to these 
children. We have had a history of commitment to these children because 
we realized their situation.
  We have recognized the stress, the pain, the financial burden that 
this places on a family. And we have said we will try to help you where 
that help is necessary. And now we are saying we are going to withdraw 
that kind of support.
  I do not think that that is going to go over well in this country. I 
do not think that the people believe that that has a higher priority 
than a tax cut. I think that they believe that that is one of the 
missions of Government, to see that these families can stay together. 
To see that children are not taken away from their parents who love 
them, but are not able to care for them for the want of a couple of 
hundred dollars a month.
  And finally, let me say this. That should a family have to give up 
their child, and should a family be unable to care for that child, and 
if because of those special circumstances that child becomes eligible 
for adoption, cutting SSI makes the adoption of that child much more 
difficult. Because today, the adoptive families could get some 
financial help for taking a child with special needs, reaching out to a 
child with disabilities and saying, ``We will make this child a part of 
our family, but we don't have the financial wherewithal.'' So it is a 
better deal for the Government. A child gets a loving family.
  [[Page H3072]] But today, that assistance would be cut off under this 
provision. So now a family that wants to adopt this child with special 
needs is denied the opportunity. The child is denied the opportunity, 
so now the child is in foster care. High-cost foster care, because 
foster care for children with special needs is very expensive, very 
difficult to come by.
  So I want somebody to explain to me, when you get all done cutting 
the WIC program, the school lunch program, and the SSI benefits for 
disabled children, and the adoption benefits for disabled children, I 
want people to explain to me how the children are better off when the 
Contract With America is done.
  The children of this Nation are the first victims of the Contract 
With American. I guess these Republicans grew up hearing, ``Women and 
children first.'' They thought that meant to throw them out of the life 
boat. It meant to put them in the life boat first. It means to save the 
women and children.
  And yet, what do we see? We see that the contract now takes away 
prenatal care. It takes away health care for pregnancies because of 
nutritional risks. It takes away the care for a newborn infant because 
of nutritional risk and brain development; those first hours that are 
so important for the development of that child.
  And now we see later in life, when this family and child is in need 
of more help because of the birth defects that they suffered, because 
of the disabilities that they suffered, once again the Federal 
Government is walking away.
  So, clearly, I guess the policy is women and children first during 
the contract; that they will be sacrificed first in the contract's 
period on America's children and on America's women.


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