[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 149 (Thursday, October 28, 1999)]
[Senate]
[Pages S13363-S13365]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




        ACROSS-THE-BOARD SPENDING CUTS: IRRESPONSIBLE BUDGETING

  Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, we are almost a month into the new fiscal 
year and Congress still has not passed an appropriations bill for the 
Departments of Education, Labor, and Health and Human Services. The 
work of these Departments touches the lives of nearly every American, 
yet the Republican leadership has been unable to work out an acceptable 
budget for them which will enable them to carry out their 
responsibilities fully and effectively.
  The majority has used an extraordinary array of gimmicks, such as 
bogus emergency spending designations, and an unprecedented level of 
advance fundings. But even those budgetary slights of hand were 
insufficient to do the job.
  They considered reneging on Congress' commitment to provide TANF 
moneys to the States but backed off under pressure from the Republican 
Governors.
  They proposed increasing taxes on the working poor by changing the 
reimbursement rules for the Earned Income Tax Credit. Even the leading 
Republican Presidential candidate denounced that as ``balancing the 
budget on the backs of the poor.'' Again, the Republican leadership was 
forced to retreat from an outrageous proposal. The fact that these cuts 
were even considered shows how out of control the budget process is.
  In desperation, the Republicans have now proposed that we 
indiscriminately cut all Government programs by 1 percent across the 
board. In other words, they would treat essential health and education 
programs no differently than special interest pork barrel projects. 
They ignore the reality that some of the programs are far more 
important than others. This type of mindless cut is an admission of 
total budgetary failure.
  They pretend such a cut will not have any impact on the programs, but 
they are terribly wrong. The human cost of such an across-the-board cut 
would be very high. It would hurt many of our most vulnerable people:
  Some 5,000 fewer preschoolers in Head Start;
  2,800 fewer children in the child care programs;
  74,000 fewer babies receiving nutritional supplements;
  2,775,000 fewer meals brought to the elderly and disabled;
  120,000 fewer disadvantaged students helped;
  6,000 fewer job opportunities for youth;
  10,000 fewer work-study grants for college students;
  10,000 fewer children helped to read;
  3,000 fewer children immunized;
  20,000 fewer homes for low-income families.
  Each one of these is an unacceptable price to pay for the 
Republicans' inability to produce a fair and fiscally sound budget.
  That was with a 1% cut. Now CBO has made available to us a letter 
that was sent to the Honorable John Spratt, who is the ranking 
Democratic member of the Committee on the Budget in the House, with 
copies also to Mr. Kasich and Mr. Domenici.
  The conclusion of these letters is that the 0.97% cut that will be 
included in the conference report, which perhaps we will consider 
later, is going to be insufficient, according to the 
latest calculations of CBO, to avoid tapping social security funds this 
fiscal year. Their estimate is, it would have to be not 0.97 percent 
but a total of 5.8 percent. If you were to eliminate defense, military 
construction, veterans programs, it would be in excess of 11 percent.

  So here on this chart are the cuts with 1 percent. And the CBO says, 
if you are going to do the job and follow the pathway that is being 
recommended by the Republican leadership, it will have to be a 5.8 
percent cut.
  So you can multiply all of the cuts to programs needed by our most 
vulnerable citizens by 5.8, which yields a much more devastating 
impact. Those are the circumstances we are in.
  The fact is that the President and the ranking Democrats on the 
various committees say: Why don't you go back and cut out the pork you 
put in and cut out the excesses you have added, and send us something 
that is responsible? Then we can have true negotiations.
  But that isn't the way the Republican leadership is moving. They are 
just favoring across-the-board cuts, which will cut valuable, helpful 
programs that are indispensable to needy people, for infants and for 
children, for education, and for health--the same amount as the pork 
programs that have been added by the Republicans.
  These consequences are all the more deplorable because they are 
unnecessary. President Clinton and the Democrats here in Congress have 
proposed fiscally responsible measures to keep our hands entirely off 
Social Security money even while we make the critical investments 
needed to strengthen our Nation in the coming year.
  But the Republicans repeatedly said ``no.'' ``No'' to a cigarette tax 
that would prevent teen smoking while paying for children's health 
initiatives; ``no'' to making oil companies pay royalties they owe the 
Federal Government; ``no'' to reducing corporate welfare; ``no'' even 
to military officers when they ask to defer or delay programs the 
Republicans want in their districts.
  By consistently declining opportunities to reduce a balanced budget, 
Republicans are on a course to raid Social Security, regardless of this 
proposed 1 percent cut.
  Why have Republicans proposed this latest gimmick? To avoid using 
this year's Social Security surplus to pay for this year's Government 
spending, they tell us. But what Republicans don't say is that the 
gimmicks they have already voted for guarantee that the Social Security 
money will be used in the budget this year. That is what the latest CBO 
report that has been given to the leaders today has indicated.
  I have but one simple question for anyone who would disagree: Where 
will the money come from to pay for the census, which Republicans have 
suddenly declared to be an emergency? This money must be paid to 
contractors and staff this budget year, yet it cannot be found anywhere 
except in the Social Security trust fund.
  By simply calling a $4 billion entirely foreseeable program an 
``emergency,'' Republicans cannot escape the fact that they will 
certainly spend Social Security surpluses this year, regardless of 
whether there is an across-the-board cut. The census gimmick is but one 
of many instances in which Social Security funds have already been 
spent by Republicans this budget year. When all the smoke and mirrors 
produced by the Republicans are removed, we can see that the true goal 
of their 1-percent cut is not to preserve Social Security surpluses but 
to gut Government spending on core education, health, and criminal 
justice programs. Republicans in this Congress are returning to the 
time of Speaker Gingrich when they proposed abolishing the Department 
of Education, only now they are dismantling it piece by piece.
  Today's Republicans have proposed a $288 million cut for the 
Department of Education--continuing their longstanding assault on our 
children's futures. Let's not forget that when Republicans first 
assumed the control of Congress in 1995, their top agenda item was to 
rescind $1.7 billion in education funding that had already been enacted 
into law by the Democratic Congress. Then, in the first full funding 
cycle subject to Republican control, their appropriators in the House 
socked the Department of Education with a $3.9 billion proposed cut--
almost 20 percent. They tried again in the budget year 1997 when Senate 
appropriators sought a $3.1 billion cut to the President's request for 
education programs.

  Democrats in the Congress, together with President Clinton, 
successfully resisted each one of these Republican cuts in education.
  So since 1997, Republicans have sought more modest education cuts of

[[Page S13364]]

$200 million or more below the President. Today's proposed $288 million 
cut is consistent with the Republicans' longstanding goal of decreasing 
support for education. It is wrong. It is shortsighted. It is not what 
the American people want or deserve.
  Of course, Senator Nickles and Representative DeLay want us to 
believe their 1-percent cut won't hurt a bit. It might not hurt the oil 
companies they want to protect from paying full royalties to the 
Government this year, but it will hurt the real people I described when 
I listed some effects of their proposed cut. The cut might not affect 
the tobacco companies, now that the Republicans have rejected President 
Clinton's plan to raise cigarette taxes, but it will hurt those who 
rely on the programs Republicans want to cut.
  In conclusion, I want to just point out--on this other chart--what 
the current situation is with regard to the Head Start Program.
  Today, we have, for the Early Head Start Program, only 1 in 100 
eligible children who are actually enrolled. This is what the Carnegie 
Commission and virtually all recent studies show is probably the wisest 
investment of funds of any other Government program because these are 
the earliest years of confidence building among children. And as all of 
the research has demonstrated, the earliest intervention in these 
years, in the first, second, third, and fourth years of life, has 
enormous consequences in the child's cognitive development and future 
education. Only 1 in 100 eligible children are presently enrolled in 
Early Head Start. In the Head Start Program, which has been tried and 
tested, evaluated and strengthened and improved, only 2 in 5 eligible 
children are enrolled now; 3 out of 5 are financially eligible, and 
cannot enroll in the program.
  The Child Care Development Block Grant program only assists 1 in 10 
eligible children. Education for the disabled, only 1 in 4 eligible 
children are assisted. This is the current situation. It is against 
that background we are going to see tens of millions, hundreds of 
millions of dollars in reduction in those programs because the 
Republican leadership, over the course of the year, have added a lot of 
boondoggle programs of their own in these other appropriations.
  I indicated what those reductions would be if they were going to be 1 
percent. Now we know it is going to be 5.8 percent, according to the 
CBO.
  The proposed cut is wrong. It is an abdication of their duty to state 
what they believe the nation's priorities should be. It is 
irresponsible. I hope our colleagues would vote in the negative on 
this.
  Mr. REID. Will the Senator yield for a question?
  Mr. KENNEDY. I am glad to yield.
  Mr. REID. I ask my friend from Massachusetts, is he aware, in 
addition to this latest scheme--that is what I call it--this across-
the-board cut, in this one-a-week program the Republicans have come up 
with, they also wanted to do a number of other things, such as extend 
the year a month? Are you familiar with that?
  Mr. KENNEDY. I am.
  Mr. REID. That didn't sell very well. Are you aware it was determined 
even by the very conservative Wall Street Journal they had two sets of 
books they were trying to keep in an effort to hide the spending of 
Social Security moneys? Is the Senator aware of that?
  Mr. KENNEDY. I remember the discussion on the floor, an article by 
Mr. Rogers, I think. It was an excellent article and a very accurate 
one. It was included in the Record. I hope our colleagues will read 
that.
  Mr. REID. In addition to having two sets of books, in addition to 
extending the year another month, as my friend from Illinois has said--
that is great, because in doing that, we will never have a Y2K problem; 
we just keep adding months to the year--are you aware also that the 
earned-income tax credit, the program Ronald Reagan said was the best 
antiwelfare program in the history of this country, they tried, as one 
of their schemes, to take that money away from the working poor in 
America so they could balance their so-called budget? Is the Senator 
aware of that?
  Mr. KENNEDY. I was aware of it. The particular need for that program 
is to provide help and assistance for low-income working families who 
have children. This is basically the children. That program benefits 
the children of working poor, to try to give some assurance they will 
at least have some measure of quality of life. That was the program 
targeted by the Republican leadership in the House of Representatives 
to be undermined, that program and the resources in that program, in 
order to offset the other benefits they had given to their special 
projects.
  Mr. REID. As part of their scheme-of-the-week program to have this 
blue smoke and mirrors, is the Senator also aware--I know he answered 
this question, as he so aptly pointed out--that now they want an 
across-the-board cut, saying they want to eliminate waste and fraud, 
but that across-the-board cuts are indiscriminate; it doesn't go to any 
one pocket; it cuts programs across the board? Is the Senator aware of 
that?

  Mr. KENNEDY. The Senator is absolutely correct. It does not, for 
example, even give the military, give the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs 
of Staff and the commanders, the range of options they could have in 
order to meet their responsibility. We are up to 270-odd billion 
dollars in terms of defense appropriations; 1 percent is $2.7 billion. 
As a member of the Armed Services Committee, we heard from the Joint 
Chiefs that it would be a devastating cut in terms of personnel and in 
terms of readiness. They don't give the flexibility to any of the 
administrators to be able to do it. They are just mandating the 
requirement right across the board. That is the most inefficient way of 
doing it.
  Mr. REID. I ask the Senator, is he aware that instead of their scheme 
of the week, they have now done two schemes this week? So maybe next 
week they will use one of the old ones. Is the Senator aware that one 
of the latest schemes is to withhold money from the National Institutes 
of Health for 11 months of the fiscal year so all the money comes in 
the 12th month? It helps their bookkeeping. Is the Senator aware of 
this scheme they are floating around here?
  Mr. KENNEDY. Well, I had heard that, that they were going to hold 
some $7.8 billion. Maybe they could, with $1 billion, hold for some 
period of time. NIH might be able to deal with that. They are talking 
about $7.8 billion, effectively undermining the most significant and 
important basic research that is taking place any place in the world at 
a time of extraordinary possibility and breakthroughs in terms of 
health, in order to fund a number of military pieces of equipment that 
were never requested by the military and other special projects that 
were never requested by the administration. They don't want to cut 
those out, but they want to tamper with the greatest research center in 
the world, which is the NIH, doing so much on so many of these diseases 
that affect every family in America, whether it is cancer, whether it 
is on the issues of Alzheimer's, whether Parkinson's disease, you name 
it, lupus, whatever it is, osteoporosis that affect our senior 
citizens. They are tampering with those funds. I have seen a lot of 
shenanigans in the budgeting of the Federal budget, but I would 
certainly agree with the Senator that tampering with the NIH funds in 
the way this is done would have a dramatic adverse impact in our whole 
basic research programs at the NIH and would cause enormous harm. I 
welcome the Senator's observation, because, if there weren't other 
problems in this report, that in and of itself would justify the 
rejection of it.
  Mr. REID. If the Senator is going to yield the floor, I would like to 
claim the floor.
  Mr. DORGAN. I would like to ask the Senator a question.
  Mr. REID. I wanted to ask the Senator from North Dakota a question, 
but please proceed. I have the floor, and I yield to the Senator from 
North Dakota.
  Mr. HOLLINGS. If the Senator will yield, we have been going back and 
forth. So please be short, if you can. We want to have that comity 
continue.
  Mr. REID. I ask my friend from South Carolina, are we in a hurry 
around here?
  Mr. HOLLINGS. It is the comity and not the time. Please talk until 
tomorrow, when we vote.
  Mr. REID. The Senator from Massachusetts still has the floor then.

[[Page S13365]]

  Mr. KENNEDY. I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Nevada.
  Mr. REID. I have the floor. We will speak very shortly so the Senator 
from Illinois can be recognized.
  Mr. DORGAN. The Senator from Illinois should be recognized. If I 
could ask forbearance, I wanted to ask the Senator from Massachusetts a 
question. Since he doesn't have the floor, let me at least propound the 
question.
  Mr. FITZGERALD. Mr. President, I would like to have unanimous consent 
to speak for a couple of minutes on our departed colleague, John 
Chafee, after which I have to preside. I will just take a couple 
minutes.
  Mr. REID. I say to the Chair, I am happy to yield my time for 2 
minutes to the Senator from Illinois. I will reclaim the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, the Senator from Illinois 
is recognized.

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