[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 53 (Wednesday, April 2, 2003)]
[House]
[Pages H2689-H2695]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           REPUBLICAN BUDGET

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Chocola). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of January 7, 2003, the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Cummings) 
is recognized for 60 minutes.
  Mr. CUMMINGS. Mr. Speaker, tonight I come with a heavy heart and come 
with members of the Congressional Black Caucus and some members of the 
Congressional Hispanic Caucus.
  We come, Mr. Speaker, at a time when our country is at war; and we 
want to say from the outset that we support our troops with all our 
heart and that we spend our days and our prayer time praying that they 
will be kept safe.
  At the same time, Mr. Speaker, on next Friday, it will be my sad duty 
to be with a gentleman named Michael Waters as he parts with his son 
Kendall Waters-Bey, Sergeant Kendall Waters-Bey for the last time. His 
son was one of the first young men to die in the Iraq war. As a matter 
of fact, Mr. Speaker, I was supposed to be meeting with the father of 
Kendall Waters-Bey tonight; but he, I am sure, would have preferred 
that I join the Congressional Black Caucus this evening in not only 
lifting up the name of his son but also lifting up the names of all of 
our people who are in our military who are giving their blood, sweat 
and tears and, in his case, his life.
  So our sympathy goes out to all of those families who have lost loved 
ones. Our prayers go out to all of our military personnel and others 
who may have been harmed. Our prayers go out to all of those who find 
themselves in harm's way.
  As I sat here, Mr. Speaker, listening to the previous hour, I could 
not help but think about the fact that the Republican budget cuts $28.3 
billion in veterans benefits over 10 years, compared to the amount 
needed to maintain purchasing power in at the 2003 level. It hurts my 
heart. Of this $28.3 billion, $14.2 billion are cuts in health care, 
and there is a 3.8 percent cut in overall benefits.
  Mr. Speaker, I ask how we could possibly, with a clear conscience, 
deny the tens of thousands of veterans that we just heard about. They 
will be veterans, too. How can we deny them these benefits?
  So it gives me great pleasure to yield to the distinguished 
gentlewoman from the great State of Texas (Ms. Eddie Bernice Johnson), 
who has been a fighter with regard to standing up for what is right and 
has consistently been a conscience for this Congress and for the United 
States of America.
  Ms. EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON of Texas. Mr. Speaker, let me express my 
appreciation for our Chair of the Congressional Black Caucus for 
organizing this hour tonight.
  Mr. Speaker, sometimes when I hear the comments about the troops that 
we all strongly support, we forget that if they survive this war they 
will be veterans; and it is the veterans that we owe a great deal to 
for our freedom, but we really have left them behind in this budget.
  So I rise to express my opposition to the Bush budget, because 
despite President Bush's pledge to leave no one behind, the budget has 
proposed leaving out over half of African Americans and Hispanic 
families; and this really is not compassion with conservatism, 
conserving resources for a very, very few.
  Can my colleagues just imagine in less than 2 years, 2.5 million 
private jobs have been lost since January 20, 2001? The unemployment 
rate for African Americans has climbed 28 percent from 8.2 percent 
indicating really how African Americans will be disproportionately 
impacted by this budget. The employment rates for Hispanics is up by 33 
percent.

  I am from Dallas, Texas, where we have lost many jobs because we are 
very high tech in our employment. For every job lost in the high-tech 
field, there are three other jobs lost in low-income jobs because they 
are hired for cleaning homes, doing the yards, keeping the children; 
and we have a record number of foreclosures, not of poor people, but 
working people because they have lost their jobs.

[[Page H2690]]

  This budget does not help because it is cutting adult training 
programs, the dislocated workers programs and the employment service 
State grants by $60 million below the 2003 enacted level, while 
freezing funding for youth employment activities at the 2003 enacted 
level. That is leaving most of the American people, the workers, the 
real taxpayers behind.
  The budget leaves Americans behind on education. Vital programs like 
Head Start are taking tremendous cuts. Many more children should be 
enrolled in Head Start because we have said over and over again that 
education is so important for the future. The proposed budget provides 
$9.7 billion less than the amount promised in Leave No Child Behind.
  The Bush budget proposes to cut the maximum Pell grant from $4,050 in 
2003 to $4,000 in 2004, when he promised, in my presence, to some 
college presidents that the Pell grants are key to helping low-income 
young people to get to college. In fact, more than 45 percent of the 
African Americans and 40 percent of Hispanic students in 4-year public 
colleges and universities depend on Pell grants to make college 
affordable.
  The budget essentially freezes the funding for the historically black 
graduate institutions to $53 million, and for Hispanic-serving 
institutions to $94 million at the 2003 enacted level, at a time when 
we encourage minority students, with everyone else, to get a better 
education. They have to get a better education in order to have a job. 
We are still the last hired and the first fired. So education really is 
essential, not just for jobs, but also to understand each other and to 
be able to relate to our diversity now.
  It leaves our seniors very vulnerable, exhausting the Social Security 
trust fund over the next 10 years to try to fill in for this deficit 
that is, I cannot believe that we went from almost over a $1 trillion 
surplus to over a $1 trillion deficit in less than 3 years.
  African American and Hispanic seniors are even more likely than 
others to rely solely on Social Security as their source of income upon 
retirement. The proposed budget does not even address Medicare 
increases for seniors, and yet I hear billions and billions being 
talked about, going out of the country, while we leave the American 
people at risk.
  I am not opposed to foreign aid; but I do think homeland security is 
very, very important, and this is a part of homeland security. The 
American people want to feel safe, and safety has a lot to do with 
employment and education, but this budget does not seem to understand 
that.
  Our college young people are coming home because parents have lost 
jobs, and they have to drop out of college, and they get home and find 
that the house has been foreclosed as well; but the President's budget 
makes many cuts in public housing, even though these funds are critical 
to making it possible for 1.7 million low-income families to have 
homes, and this is not all African Americans and all Hispanic. This is 
low-income Americans.
  More than 45 percent of these residents are African American, and 
nearly 20 percent are Hispanic; and it is growing. So that is according 
to HUD's multifamily characteristics report.
  The proposed budget eliminates funding for the HOPE VI program which 
replaces distressed low-income housing with new strong community 
housing. That also provides opportunities for homeownership. All of us 
know that when one invests in a home it brings about pride. It brings 
about new wealth, and it also brings about a good deal of safety 
because crime goes down, children are stable in homes. When they are 
using rental property, some young people, some kids, change schools 
three times in one school year. They cannot be caught up because every 
time somebody offers a month of free rent, the parents move to get that 
one month of free rent; but they are dislocating children, 
inconveniencing and handicapping our teachers, and disproportionately 
burdening our school systems because they cannot plan when we have a 
moving population at all times.
  So, sadly, in a democratic Nation, we have also witnessed Americans 
being left behind with a vote. We worked from January 2001 until 
November last year, 2002, trying to get some kind of election reform so 
we can be sure of who we elect to office. The proposed budget offers 
$500 million in funding for election reform, undercutting the Help 
America Vote Act authorized at the level of $1.5 billion. That is how 
we distinguish what a democracy is. It is whether someone can speak out 
for whom they want as their leaders and make sure it is counted. The 
Help America Vote Act must be fully funded to ensure that every 
citizen's right to vote is protected. Every citizen, every citizen.
  In fact, the Civil Rights Commission found that minorities, 
particularly African Americans, were the Americans most impacted by the 
loss of voting rights. They were the ones who were not counted well in 
Florida. If they had been, we might have a better economy, because it 
sure would not be the President that is over there now. It would have 
been the President that got elected; and unfortunately, this Bush 
budget does not address any of these concerns.
  So homeland security involves a lot of things; but most importantly, 
it also involves our first responders. Firefighters, police, emergency 
medical personnel, all are in jeopardy because the Bush budget includes 
$4 billion less than what is required for them to do their jobs 
adequately.
  We are in dismal shape in this country and everyone should be feeling 
it; and if they have not felt it yet, they will. We cannot afford to 
leave the Americans and their agenda without adequate security through 
education, housing, and a means to economically sustain themselves and 
their families.
  As lawmakers, we have the responsibility to ensure that all 
Americans, including minorities, are able to move ahead to achieve the 
American dream: life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
  We must reject this budget. It is clear that if the President's 
budget office has given out negative information about this budget, we 
know that others see it, feel it, and will never forget it.

                              {time}  2030

  Mr. CUMMINGS. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentlewoman for her 
statement.
  Mr. Speaker, a lot of people have asked the question, why is it that 
members of the Congressional Black Caucus have decided to address the 
budget issues while the war is going on? And it is very simple. It is 
what the gentlewoman from Texas just said. Life goes on in this 
country. We believe very strongly that not only must we protect our 
country from outside forces, and, sadly, some home-grown forces, but we 
also realize that at the same time we have to make sure that we keep 
America strong.
  As the gentlewoman said, when we talk about our children and a 
program like Head Start, it is so very, very important with this budget 
that so many of our children will be denied the opportunity to get that 
head start. When we look at an issue like the $215 billion of cuts in 
the House Republican's budget for Medicare and Medicaid, for school 
lunches and student loans, in agriculture and veterans programs, that 
is major. Major.
  So while the war goes on, as the gentlewoman from Texas said, we have 
to make sure that when our veterans come home that they come home to a 
very strong America.
  And speaking of a very strong American, it gives me great privilege 
to yield to the gentlewoman from the great State of California (Ms. 
Lee).
  Ms. LEE. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman from Maryland 
(Mr. Cummings), our outstanding and very dedicated and very brilliant 
chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus, for his leadership and for 
his vision and for organizing once again this Special Order to really 
discuss the disastrous Republican budget and to examine the terrible 
toll it will take not only on communities of color but on our entire 
country as a whole.
  As we support and pray for our troops, for their speedy and their 
safe return, I have to ask tonight what kind of America, what kind of 
opportunities and support will we provide for them upon their return? 
Our troops and our veterans deserve a sense of economic security. This 
Republican budget, however, demonstrates nothing less than a very 
profound disregard for the majority of Americans and for the future of

[[Page H2691]]

this Nation. It sacrifices our children, our seniors, our security, our 
veterans, our environment, and our economy in order to advance special 
interests and promote tax breaks for the wealthy.
  This is a national mistake, and the repercussions of it will be felt 
in cities and rural communities and towns across America. They will 
certainly be felt in my district in northern California, where the 
high-tech economy has struggled, where housing costs are sky high, 
where seniors and veterans are struggling to pay medical costs and 
grocery bills, where seniors sometimes have to choose between their 
medication or buying food, where school infrastructure is crumbling, 
and where the State budget is reeling from the body blows struck by the 
recession.
  In the last year, we have seen rising unemployment, escalating 
housing costs, and a floundering economy. We have seen, however, tax 
cuts for the rich that the President wants to make permanent, forever 
protecting the richest 1 percent at the expense of the rest of us. That 
is wrong. And now we see $1.6 trillion in additional tax cuts for the 
wealthy. Those tax cuts and those misplaced priorities help explain why 
this budget falls $4 billion short of the money we need to invest in 
homeland security according to nonpartisan experts. They help explain 
why this budget underfunds education, shortchanging special ed, gutting 
after-school programs, freezing Pell grants and ultimately leaving 
millions of children far, far behind.
  With the struggling economy and millions of Americans unemployed, 
this budget cuts spending for job training and employment programs and 
does nothing, absolutely nothing, to create new jobs. It also cuts 
funding for environmental programs, including badly needed enforcement 
programs at EPA that will safeguard our water supply and our children's 
health. Communities of color will continue to pay the highest price for 
pollution. This budget will only increase environmental injustices and 
the health costs it exacts every day.
  In terms of energy, the budget reinforces our dependence on fossil 
fuels by cutting energy efficiency programs and assuming drilling in 
the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. In energy, in education, in 
security, and in so many other areas, we should be investing in our 
future rather than bankrupting our children. With this budget, we will 
be spending as much on defense as the rest of the world combined. But, 
Mr. Speaker, $400 billion plus for defense that underfunds homeland 
security will not make us any safer.
  We could put some of these resources, and we should put some of these 
resources into health care, but the Republican plan is not designed to 
expand health care access. For example, seniors would be herded into 
HMOs and forced to abandon their own doctors if they want prescription 
drug coverage. This budget threatens Medicare without offering real 
coverage. And again it will hit African Americans, Hispanic Americans 
and other minorities especially hard.
  We have enormous health disparities in this country and this budget 
just makes them wider. Most of the 9 million children who lack health 
insurance in this country are minorities, children of color. Under this 
budget they remain uninsured. It even cuts Medicaid coverage for 
children. Cuts it. And it slashes funding for minority health programs.
  Instead of spending billions on a faulty and unproven missile defense 
system, we should put more resources into housing, which is a national 
emergency and a national disgrace, but this budget cuts funding for 
public housing. It eliminates funding for the HOPE VI program to 
replace public housing structures that are in terrible condition. I ask 
you, without HOPE VI, what hope will those residents really have?
  The credibility gap between the administration's rhetoric and its 
budget grows each and every day. The President promises an economic 
stimulus but offers tax cuts for the wealthy that leaves small business 
out of the picture, even though small businesses are the real engine 
for economic growth in this country. The President promises to leave no 
child behind, but then cuts nearly $1 billion of funding, $1 billion, 
Mr. Speaker, for elementary and secondary education. The budget cuts 
teacher quality programs and after-school programs for our kids and 
slashes Pell grants and Perkins loans that can transform college from 
an impossible dream into an actual diploma.

  The President praises our troops, as we all do, but then decimates 
veterans programs, enacting cuts that will reduce cost-of-living 
increases for the veterans who are with us and who have served our 
country well. What a shame and what a sham. Our veterans deserve 
better. Again, rhetoric versus reality.
  Look at the budget. It is about choices. We could choose to invest in 
our future, grow our economy, enhance our security, look out for our 
children, our senior citizens and those who are struggling 
economically, or we could, as the Republican budget has demonstrated, 
provide tax cuts for the multimillionaires and special interests.
  I hope it is not too late to wake up America to the damage that is 
being done to our country, to our children, and to our future. That is 
the choice that the Republican budget offers. Once again, America, wake 
up to what is going on in Washington, D.C.
  Mr. CUMMINGS. I want to thank the gentlewoman for that wonderful 
statement, Mr. Speaker, and I just want to emphasize something that she 
said, because we have heard so much about support of our troops. We all 
support our troops. But the fact still remains, and we need to say this 
over and over again, the Republican budget cuts $28.3 billion, billion, 
in veterans benefits over 10 years compared to the amount needed to 
maintain purchasing power at the 2003 level.
  The gentlewoman talked about veterans, and I just wanted to emphasize 
that because that is so significant. We do not want to be a Congress 
that says one thing and does another. I think that is what the 
gentlewoman was emphasizing.
  Ms. LEE. Well, Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman, and, yes, I think 
this really highlights the credibility gap, this increasing credibility 
gap of this administration.
  And as I say, with regard to our veterans, it is really a shame and a 
sham that this administration is cutting their benefits, cutting out 
their economic security that they so deserve. They have served our 
country well. Our troops deserve better upon their return, and we are 
going to fight this to the end, Mr. Chairman.
  Mr. CUMMINGS. It is very painful when we go to the American Legion 
meetings and we see our veterans in parades and they meet us at the 
shopping centers, or wherever they see us, and so often they come to us 
with their concerns. I agree with the gentlewoman, if we are going to 
support our veterans, we have to support them with everything that we 
have. Clearly, when we are cutting $28.3 billion, and I emphasize that 
``b,'' over a 10-year period, I do not know what kind of message that 
sends.
  Ms. LEE. Mr. Chairman, I do not know what kind of message it sends, 
and also I do not think this administration remembers that we have many 
homeless veterans now who are just seeking shelter and a place to live. 
That, again, is a disgrace that we need to address in this budget. We 
need to address their access to health care and to housing and to all 
of those support services which they need. They fought for us and they 
deserve a decent life. They do not deserve to have their funding cut, 
as the President intends to do in this budget.
  Mr. CUMMINGS. I thank the gentlewoman. It is my pleasure now, Mr. 
Speaker, speaking of veterans benefits and speaking of standing up for 
veterans over and over and over again, to yield to the gentlewoman from 
Florida (Ms. Brown), who has been an 11-year veteran of the Committee 
on Veterans' Affairs.
  Ms. CORRINE BROWN of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the 
gentleman from Maryland for his leadership in organizing this Special 
Order, and to the members of the Congressional Black Caucus for 
participating.
  Mr. Speaker, I have served on the Committee on Veterans' Affairs for 
11 years, and I do not think I have ever been as outraged at the 
shameful act of this Republican leadership as I am today. On the same 
day that this House voted to commend our troops and the work that they 
are doing in Iraq, this same Republican leadership pushed through a 
veterans budget that cut the VA budget by almost $30 billion. Let me 
repeat that. Thirty billion dollars.

[[Page H2692]]

  Republicans can talk the talk, but they do not walk the walk. Or as 
one veteran group says, they do not roll the roll. It is not what you 
say, Mr. Speaker, it is what you do.
  Our troops today are tomorrow's veterans. These cuts mean the loss of 
almost 20,000 VA nurses at a time when we are already experiencing a 
nursing shortage. These cuts mean the loss of 6.6 million outpatient 
visits. These cuts mean the disenrollment of over 160,000 veterans in a 
1-year period from the VA health care system.

                              {time}  2045

  Not only that, but these cuts also mean reaching into the pockets of 
our Nation's service-connected veterans and robbing them and their 
survivors of a portion of the promised compensation. And the veterans 
are not the only unlucky recipients of the Republican budget ax. 
Elementary and secondary education as well as teacher quality programs 
also get the ax. Head Start and school lunch programs get the ax. The 
Office of Minority Health and the Ryan White program all get the ax.
  Mr. Speaker, I do not have enough time here today to let the American 
people know about all the crucial programs that the Republican 
leadership does not think are more important than funneling money to 
their country club friends.
  Mr. Speaker, this budget dishonors the service of millions of 
veterans and our Nation's commitment to care for its defenders. Mr. 
Speaker, I cannot express it any better than the Disabled American 
Veterans did so appropriately in testifying on this budget, and I 
quote, ``Is there no honor left in the hallowed halls of our government 
that you choose to dishonor the sacrifices of our Nation's heroes and 
rob our programs, health care, and disability compensation to pay for a 
tax cut for the wealthy? `` Let me repeat that again. Somebody out 
there needs to hear what I am saying.
  The Disabled American Veterans, in testifying before the Committee on 
Veterans Affairs said, ``Is there no honor left in the hallowed halls 
of our government that you choose to dishonor the sacrifices of our 
Nation's heroes and rob our programs, health care and disability 
compensation to pay for tax cuts for the wealthy?''
  Mr. Speaker, I call on all of my colleagues who so vocally supported 
the troops 2 weeks ago on the floor to stand up today and put their 
money where their mouth is. This budget is one of the best examples of 
what I call reverse Robin Hood, robbing from the poor to give tax 
breaks to the rich. Wake up, America.
  Mr. CUMMINGS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from Florida (Ms. 
Corrine Brown) for her statement, and I want to thank her for 
emphasizing our veterans when the gentlewoman said today they are 
soldiers, and tomorrow they are veterans. When we see those soldiers 
parting from their families to go overseas, when we see their 
interviews over in Iraq, some of them with sand in their faces and hot 
weather, giving up their lives, blood, sweat and tears for us, it seems 
to me that we would not want to do this double talk thing.
  I am so glad the gentlewoman said what she said because a lot of 
times when we talk about the Congressional Black Caucus, people 
conclude that we are just talking about African American people, but we 
are talking about all veterans. I know that the gentlewoman has been 
fighting year after year, day after day. I have heard her so many times 
on this floor standing up for all of our veterans.
  Ms. CORRINE BROWN of Florida. Mr. Speaker, we talk a great talk here, 
and on Veterans Day we are all involved in the parade; but what is very 
discouraging is when we get in the closed rooms of the conference and 
they say, well, we do not have enough. Well, the Bible tells us, and 
many of my colleagues talk about the Bible and the poor will always be 
with us, but our job in Congress is to help raise the standards.
  How can we deny our veterans fighting for us today? They will come 
home tomorrow, they are going to need assistance and counseling, and 
yet we are cutting programs. It is a disgrace. I say, wake up, America.
  One last thing as far as our veterans are concerned. Many of them are 
African Americans. They are fighting for this country today when we 
have a Commander in Chief who says you are good enough to go fight, but 
you are not good enough to go to our universities, and that is a 
disgrace. Wake up, America.
  Mr. CUMMINGS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for mentioning 
that. Over and over tonight we have been saying we support our 
soldiers, our men and women in the armed services, and we want to make 
sure that they come back to an America that is strong, an America that 
will support their families, an America that will support them when 
they have health care needs. I can think of no better person than the 
gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Payne) to address those issues. The 
gentleman has constantly, like the gentlewoman from Florida (Ms. 
Corrine Brown), has stood up for veterans, but not only stood up for 
veterans, but stood up for people all over the world, traveling 
constantly to Africa and around the world trying to make sure that the 
entire world knows of the concern of not only the Congressional Black 
Caucus, but of the American people for people who may never even know 
all that he has done for them.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Payne).
  Mr. PAYNE. Mr. Speaker, I commend the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. 
Cummings) for the leadership the gentleman has shown in the 
Congressional Black Caucus in the short time he has been our Chair. 
Just this past weekend the gentleman conducted a housing summit in 
Florida where the gentlewoman from Florida (Ms. Corrine Brown) had 
close to a thousand people during the weekend coming to a housing fair, 
and his participation in Houston, Texas, where he and the gentlewoman 
from Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee) talked about the fight against the Bush 
plan to end affirmative action. I think the great work that you have 
been doing is commendable; and as was just indicated, affirmative 
action is supported by many of the Fortune 500 companies. I spoke at a 
Black History Program at Merck in New Jersey, and mentioned seven or 
eight of the companies that were supporting affirmative action, and I 
failed to mention Merck, and as I finished my speech and came off the 
platform at their home office, they said we are part of that suit that 
supports affirmative action.
  Our military generals, such as retired General Schwarzkopf, say we 
should keep affirmative action, especially because our troops need to 
see diversity in our leadership. As we talk about that, I would like to 
join with the gentleman in this question about the budget.
  I rise to join my colleagues in expressing my grave concern about the 
budget plan approved by the Republican-controlled House of 
Representatives. With our Nation engaged in a military conflict 
overseas, we are told that this is a time of sacrifice on the part of 
Americans. Unfortunately, both in the military conflict and on the 
domestic front, sacrifices are being asked mainly from those at one end 
of the income scale. The fact is that the sons and daughters of wealthy 
Americans rarely serve in combat while minorities and lower-income men 
and women serve in disproportionate numbers. It is a time we as a 
Nation renew the spirit of shared sacrifice. That is what made us so 
strong in World War II, shared sacrifice, rationing of food, rationing 
of meats, fuel, price controls, wage controls. Everyone came together, 
and that effort during World War II made us and saved the world and 
rebuilt Europe, and Asia then began to strengthen itself. Shared 
sacrifice is what is fair, not what we are seeing today.

  During this time of rising unemployment rates, we should be 
concentrating on creating jobs for those out of work rather than giving 
the wealthy more tax breaks through a $1.3 trillion tax cut. Is that 
fair? Is that shared sacrifice? I do not think so from my math.
  Is it fair to approve a budget that cuts domestic appropriations by 
$244 billion over 10 years, below the amount needed to maintain 
services at the present level, and we know that services will need to 
increase, but at the present level cutting it $244 billion? All of the 
spending cuts will be used to finance the huge tax cut for the wealthy, 
for those at the country clubs, which most Americans say we should not 
do. Most Americans say we should not

[[Page H2693]]

have a tax cut at this time, but the Bush administration insists on a 
$1.3 trillion tax cut for the wealthiest of our Nation.
  As a former teacher and as a member of the Committee on Education and 
the Workforce, I am deeply concerned about the fact that the Republican 
budget approved by the House of Representatives cut education by $2.1 
billion in fiscal year 2004 and by $25.7 billion over the next 10 
years, and that is below the Bush budget which freezes spending for 
education by failing to keep up with inflation or increasing 
enrollments. His budget did not give any increase, but the House 
Republican-approved budget cuts $25 billion below what President Bush 
asked for.
  The House budget also fails to provide an increase for Head Start, 
despite the fact that the program is serving only 54 percent of those 
eligible 3- and 4-year-olds. We know there is a real problem with 
affordable housing in this Nation, and yet the Republicans drastically 
cut spending for housing. It is a shame. It is a disgrace.
  The Bush administration budget eliminates funding for the Hope VI 
program, which displaces distressed low-income housing with new 
community housing. It is hope, Hope VI. That is what people are looking 
forward to. So what did they do, cut it out. Funding is slashed for the 
public housing capital fund by $71 million below fiscal year 2003. 
Rents have increased for thousands of tenants who receive Federal 
housing aid through minimum rent requirements for public housing and 
section 8 vouchers. Section 8 vouchers are for the truly poor in our 
community. That has been cut.
  The Republican budget calls for $169 billion in cuts that could harm 
Medicare and Medicaid. By contrast, the budget put forth by the 
Congressional Black Caucus led by the gentleman from New York (Mr. 
Owens) and the Progressive Caucus led by the gentlewoman from 
California (Ms. Lee) and the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Kucinich) 
implements the Medicare For All Program. That is what our budget did, a 
single payer, universal health care plan that guaranteed access to 
health care regardless of income. There are close to 70 million people 
now. The number grew from 40 to close to 70 million who are uninsured 
today. Where are we going as a Nation? Our budget, the Congressional 
Black Caucus and the Progressive Caucus budget, provides an economic 
stimulus plan that provides $20 billion in extended unemployment 
assistance and $50 billion for Federal revenue sharing with States, as 
well as $50 billion for needed infrastructure investment.
  States need help. Our government has turned its back on our States. 
New Jersey has a $5 billion budget gap, Pennsylvania has one, as does 
California and New York. States are cutting budgets, and we are turning 
our backs on them. That is unfair.
  We need to restore fairness to our Nation's veterans in gratitude for 
their service to our country. Our budget provides $3 billion over what 
the Bush administration allocates. Our plan would provide a substantial 
investment in school construction, in our Nation's teachers, in student 
loan programs. We would also create a national housing trust and 
restore the reckless cuts in housing put forth by the Bush 
administration, including Hope VI and the Public Housing Drug 
Elimination Program which has been eliminated.
  Mr. Speaker, let us come together as a Nation and truly move forward 
in the spirit of shared sacrifice. Let us not continually target those 
who can least afford those severe cuts in order to fund a reckless, 
unfair tax cut tilted towards the wealthiest members of this society.
  Mr. CUMMINGS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman, and I want to say 
when the gentleman talks, as a former teacher I know he can appreciate 
our children getting where they are supposed to be. I sit on the board 
of Morgan State University, and every year now as it is right now, we 
have to let go some 600 to 700 students every year. Why, because they 
do not have enough money to go to school. It is so sad with the Pell 
grant cut situation; it is going to make it even worse.
  People ask me, why is the Congressional Black Caucus so concerned 
about this budget?

                              {time}  2100

  The reason why we are so concerned is because life has to go forth 
while we are also dealing with a war, and we also understand that a lot 
of these young people that I just talked about, and I am sure that the 
gentleman has them in his district, and I am sure that people who are 
watching this right now who do not have an idea of how they are going 
to pay for their college education, they may never, they may never get 
back in college, and their earning power is thus reduced. They cannot 
do for their families as well as they could have done if they had 
gotten the education, and it is so very painful to so many people.
  So I want to thank the gentleman for all the things that he 
mentioned. It just kind of stood out in my mind because the gentleman 
talked about the Governors in various States, State budget suffering 
and we had our Republican Governor come down to meet with our 
delegation, and he gave us a book about that thick of things that he 
wanted from Congress. And as I began to flip through the book, I had to 
tell him the President and the Republicans have slashed just about 
every single thing he wants. So States are suffering tremendously. As a 
matter of fact, in the State of Maryland, it looks like we are going to 
have to go into extra days of session beyond our 90-day normal session 
just to figure out how to deal with the budget, and a lot of it is a 
result of this budget that we are dealing with on this Federal level.
  Mr. PAYNE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman very much. As I met 
with our Governor, Governor McGreevey, a bright young man who for 2 
years in a row had to cut $5 billion each year, does not want to raise 
taxes, refused to raise taxes, but cut funding for arts, cut funding 
for hospitals, cut funding for all kinds of programs. The Governors 
deserve better, whether they are Democrat or Republican Governors. The 
people in the State are saying really do not tread on us, but bring us 
in. As a matter of fact, in the first 13 original colonies, New 
Jersey's flag was a flag with a snake that said, ``Don't tread on us.'' 
We are treading on our States. It is unfair. It is wrong, and I wish 
that all the Governors, Republican and Democrat, would tell the unfair 
Bush tax cut, cut the tax cut, help the States. I thank the chairman.
  Mr. CUMMINGS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman.
  I yield to the distinguished gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Scott). We 
have often heard and we heard on this floor earlier tonight of people 
being very upset that there were people who were concerned about this 
war and expressing their concerns, and the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. 
Scott) has been one who has consistently stood up for our 
constitutional rights and has been a conscience of this Congress; and 
so it gives me great privilege to yield to the distinguished gentleman 
from the great State of Virginia (Mr. Scott).
  Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from 
Maryland (Mr. Cummings) for yielding.
  We have heard a lot of adjectives and descriptions. Let me just show 
some charts that show where we are and why we have so much trouble in 
funding programs. And one cannot spin these charts. These charts show 
the numbers of the budget.
  This chart shows the deficit over the past few years starting with 
the Johnson administration, Ford, Carter. Reagan and Bush, as everyone 
knows, generated a great deal of debt. These are the deficits. When 
President Clinton came in, we passed a budget in 1993 without a single 
Republican vote, 218 to 216 in the House, 50/50 with Vice President 
Gore breaking the tie in the Senate and creating a straight line, 
straight up until we generated a surplus.
  The Republicans note that they were in the majority in much of this 
time. However, people will remember that their budgets were vetoed. 
They closed down the government. President Clinton would not sign their 
budgets because they were irresponsible. So the line kept going because 
President Clinton had enough Democrats to sustain the veto and those 
Republican budgets were not passed, were not enacted; and we have a 
straight line going up into surplus.
  In 1 year in the Bush administration, when there was no veto on those 
irresponsible budgets, we had the deficit coming right back worse than 
it ever was. This chart was developed before the recent budget that we 
will consider

[[Page H2694]]

tomorrow, $70-some billion with no way to pay for it. So this red line 
will go almost off the chart.
  What are the plans? The plans are we started with a surplus in 2000. 
In 2001 we spent all of the Medicare surplus. September 11 is 3 weeks 
before the end of the fiscal year; so there is nothing that could have 
been done in those 3 weeks. We had already gone into Medicare and 
almost into Social Security by September 10. In 2002 we are spending 
all the Medicare, all the Social Security surplus, and $160 billion in 
additional deficits. In 2003 it looks like we are going to spend all of 
the Medicare, all of the Social Security, and $300 billion in 
additional debt. As a matter of fact, we are going to spend Social 
Security and Medicare and hundreds of billions of dollars in debt as 
far as the eye can see.
  How did all of this happen with this tax cut? Who gets the tax cut? 
The blue is the 2001 tax cut. The green is the proposed 2003 tax cut. 
My colleagues will see, and take my word for it, the lowest 20 percent 
do get some. There is a little bar there. We can hardly see it. The 
second 20 percent, the third 20 percent, the fourth 20 percent, the top 
20 percent, what they get out of the tax cuts. This line right up to 
here shows the top 1 percent, the next 4 percent. So this is the top 5 
percent population. The top 5 percent gets this much of the tax cut. We 
were told we had to do that for economic growth. This is a chart of 
economic growth since the Truman administration. Average growth of the 
Presidents, the worst growth since World War II as a result of that tax 
cut.
  Most people who have any kind of retirement fund know what the stock 
market looks like. This is 2000, the average price on the Dow, the S&P 
and the NASDAQ collapsing right after we enacted those budgets. We ran 
up all that debt. My colleagues will notice that in the Clinton 
administration when he left, we had anticipated by 2008 paying off 
almost all of the debt held by the public so there would be almost no 
debt held by the public. Right now in 2008 it looks like we are going 
to have this much debt.

  We have to pay interest on that debt. Here is the difference in 
interest that we are going to be paying over these years. We add up the 
difference of what we anticipated paying and, because we have no debt, 
what we are going to pay. By 2010 we would have paid an extra $1.6 
trillion, with a T, trillion dollars in additional debt.
  Let us make this personal, a family of four. Add up the whole 
interest on the national debt, divided by the population, multiplied by 
four, and what do you get? In 2003 a family of four's share of the 
interest on the national debt, not the national debt, the interest, 
$4,500. As my colleagues will remember, it was going to nothing; but 
instead, by 2008 it will be almost $6,500; by 2013, almost $7,500 
interest on the national debt. We do not get anything for that.
  This chart shows where we are with Social Security. Right now Social 
Security is paying a surplus. We are getting more into Social Security 
than we are paying out. 2017 we will break even, and then it gets 
worse. We will be paying almost $1 trillion a year more out in Social 
Security than we have coming in.
  The thing about this chart that is interesting is the tax cut in 2001 
already enacted was twice as big as necessary to pay Social Security 
for 75 years. In other words, if we cut taxes half as much in 2001 as 
we did and the other half receive the taxes and allocate it to Social 
Security, that half would have been enough to pay for Social Security 
for 75 years. But, instead, we are paying more interest on the national 
debt, and what happens? We have heard about the cuts in veterans 
benefits, cuts in heating assistance for low-income elderly, cuts in 
education.
  The last 5 years or so, 4 or 5 years, average 12.3 percent increase 
in education, this year a cut in education, which means that we are 
going to be cutting school lunches. We are going to be cutting school 
loans and Pell grants at the time when States are increasing their 
tuition. With No Child Left Behind, the president went all over the 
country bragging about that authorization, but the money is not there 
to fully fund it.
  I just want to ask how bad it has to get before somebody realizes 
that the budget is not working and we have to do something. We are 
cutting veterans benefits, housing, health care, and education.
  Mr. CUMMINGS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for that excellent 
presentation.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield now to the distinguished gentleman from New York 
(Mr. Owens), who is a leader in the area of education and has 
consistently stood up for our young people.
  Mr. OWENS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for organizing this 
Special Order. I think all Members should be listening and should get 
the kind of education we have just gotten from the gentleman from 
Virginia (Mr. Scott).
  We have, the Congressional Black Caucus along with the Congressional 
Progressive Caucus, produced a budget, an alternative budget, to guide 
our people into understanding what the priorities should be. This is a 
budget which we call Leave No Family Behind because it addresses the 
needs of working families.
  The New York Times just this past Sunday said that the military, the 
people who are fighting in Iraq right now, mirrors a working-class 
America. New York Times, Sunday, March 30, 2003. I urge all Members to 
get it and read it. It goes into an analysis of who is in the military 
in great detail. It is working families, representatives of working 
families. Those are the people who are fighting for America. It is our 
country as much as it is anybody else's country, and certainly the 
budget that the Republican majority has put forward starting with the 
president does not mirror a concern for working families. The concern 
is not there.
  We have heard from my colleagues quite a number of examples of items 
that are being cut. I will not go through all of that again, but the 
fact that food stamps for low-income families are being cut 
drastically, temporary assistance to needy families is being cut. The 
members of these families are out there fighting. Student loans are 
being cut. Schools are going to have to close early in some States 
because the States are running out of money, and they should be the 
beneficiaries of revenue sharing which is proposed in our budget.
  The Federal Government would give the States money to help them make 
up some of the gap in their budgets. We need a budget which reflects a 
concern for the working families, members who are out there fighting in 
Iraq for our country. We need to let them know that this country cares 
about them and appreciates them and the benefits of the Federal 
Government certainly are going to be there for them when they come 
home. That is not true in the President's budget proposed by the 
Republican majority. We need to make certain that between now and the 
time we pass the appropriations, we correct this great injustice, this 
great gap between what is needed for working families and what is 
there.
  Mr. CUMMINGS. Mr. Speaker, I began this evening dedicating this hour 
to a young man from Baltimore, and I talked about how we wanted to make 
sure that we kept America strong for him although he has gone on, SGT 
Kendall Damon Waters-Bey. And the things that we have talked about 
tonight, Mr. Speaker, is about balance, balancing addressing our needs, 
for protecting ourselves from the outside, and for protecting ourselves 
from some home-grown enemies, and at the same time balancing our needs 
to take care of the American people.
  It is so important to us in the Congressional Black Caucus that we 
focus in on this budget which, while it addresses a year or two now, it 
addresses expenditures for now, we realize that those expenditures that 
are made today or those cuts that are made today will affect people for 
a lifetime. A child only has 1 year to be in the first grade or to be 
in pre-K. If that child is denied Head Start, that might affect that 
child until she or he dies.

                              {time}  2115

  When it comes to prescription drugs and things of that nature, when 
our seniors simply want medicine and they cannot get it, it can affect 
them today and can cut their lives short immediately.
  So we have come today to focus in on this budget. It is a budget that 
we have concluded is very unfair to the American people.

[[Page H2695]]



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