[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 77 (Wednesday, May 10, 1995)]
[House]
[Page H4674]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




              BALANCING THE BUDGET ON THE BACKS OF SENIORS

  (Ms. JACKSON-LEE asked and was given permission to address the House 
for 1 minute and to revise and extend her remarks.)
  Ms. JACKSON-LEE. Mr. Speaker, I rise this morning, as the Committee 
on the Budget is meeting and deliberating. But more importantly, as we 
are instructed to keep close to our constituents, I have come back 
recently from interacting with the constituents of the 18th 
Congressional District in Texas, and what I have heard most of all is 
that we should work together, that we should focus our issues not as 
Democratic or Republican, but as American issues, and yet, as the 
Committee on the Budget deliberates, they now talk about cutting 
Medicare spending between $270 and $280 billion over the next 7 years 
and $184 billion for Medicaid.
  Mr. Speaker, these are not working-class/middle-class issues. These 
are issues of the American working people who want to confront better 
health care for their citizens.
  My seniors have said to me, ``Don't cut Medicare, make it more 
efficient. Cut the waste, but don't cut Medicare.''
  Now we find that the new budget plan is on the backs of seniors in 
America. But it is not only on the backs of seniors. It is on our 
medical facilities, our community hospitals. It is on our physicians 
who dedicate their lives to serving American working people.
  We must confront this as an American issue, and we must not turn our 
backs on our seniors. I will not let Texas down. I will not let the 
citizens of the 18th Congressional District down by recklessly cutting 
Medicare and Medicaid for an ill-conceived budget.


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