[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 89 (Tuesday, June 17, 2003)]
[House]
[Pages H5445-H5446]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




              TIME TO GO TO CONFERENCE ON CHILD TAX CREDIT

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentlewoman from California (Ms. Pelosi) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Speaker, today is Day Five of the House Republican 
leadership's campaign to kill the extension of the child tax credit.
  The issue is very simple: The Senate has passed the child tax credit, 
the President says he will sign it, twelve million children in America 
need it, but the House Republicans want to kill it. The chairman of the 
Committee on Ways and Means says there is not enough time to meet in 
conference with the Senate. That reveals his true intent. He does not 
want this bill to become law.
  A conference with the Senate could take just 5 minutes. The House 
Republicans could simply stop their delaying tactics and accept the 
Senate bill in the House-Senate conference. The conference report would 
be quickly approved by each House and sent to the President, who, as I 
mentioned, has said he will sign it.
  But let us be clear, the House Republicans do not want this bill to 
become law. In the 12 days since the Senate passed its bill by a 94 to 
2 vote on June 5, a strong bipartisan vote, 94 to 2, the Republican 
majority in the House has voted six times not to accept the Senate 
bill. Instead, the Republicans voted to send a bloated $82 billion bill 
to conference, which they know the Senate will not accept. It is not 
paid for, it is reckless, it is irresponsible.
  The Republican leadership in the House simply does not want to expand 
the child tax credit, which corrects the unfair omission of nearly 12 
million children, including 250,000 children of our active duty 
military personnel.
  Mr. Speaker, we are here because our constituents have entrusted us 
with serious responsibilities. We have the responsibility to our 
veterans and our military to make sure we honor their sacrifices and be 
true to the resolutions that we make honoring them here in this House 
almost on a daily basis. That is appropriate, to honor them, to respect 
their patriotism, their courage, and to recognize the sacrifice they 
are willing to make for our country. How then can we say to them that 
their children are not worthy of this extension of the tax credit?
  We also have a responsibility to our parents and grandparents to 
improve and strengthen the Medicare program they know and trust, and we 
have a responsibility to future generations to leave them with a 
country that is even better and stronger and more secure than the one 
we inherited from our parents.
  Providing the tax credit to working and military families is not 
something that we do not have time for. If children are a priority for 
us, then we make them a priority, and that means we have time for them. 
It is not something that we can cavalierly shrug off with phrases like 
``It ain't gonna happen,'' to quote my colleagues. It is not something 
that ``we should only consider if we get something for it,'' to quote 
my colleagues.
  This is a central question of fairness and of responsibility to the 
children and 6.5 million families who are waiting, still waiting, for 
us to fulfill a promise we made to them.

                              {time}  1730

  We are saying to those children, wait until next year, or the check 
is not in the mail. Whatever it is, it is bad news if you are a family 
working full-time, but do not make over $26,000 a year; and it is bad 
news for our children of the military.
  These working and military families pay taxes, just like everyone 
else, and are struggling to make ends meet in today's stagnant economy. 
On behalf of the families of 12 million children now waiting for this 
tax relief, we must correct this callous omission as quickly as 
possible.

[[Page H5446]]

  The Senate tax credit bill is fiscally responsible, it is paid for, 
and it costs $10 billion compared to the $82 billion in the House bill. 
The Senate bill is supported by Democrats and rank-and-file Republicans 
in the House, and it would immediately provide the tax credit to 
millions of working and military families let out of the final tax cut 
bill approved last month. We can pass the bipartisan legislation and 
send it to the President today.
  It is interesting that after the vote on the tax credit last week, 
where the Republicans' reckless and callous policy prevailed, that on 
the motion to instruct which followed, 12 Republicans joined the 
Democrats in a motion to instruct the conferees to take up the Senate 
bill. We did that because we know we can invest in our children or we 
can indebt them. That is the choice that the Republicans have put 
before us.
  Mr. Speaker, President Kennedy said, ``Children are our greatest 
resource and our best hope for the future.'' I urge my Republican 
colleagues to do the right thing and accept the Senate bill and, in 
doing so, support the value we place on our children. We cannot say 
that some children are our greatest resource and our best hope for the 
future, but not if your parents make the minimum wage or if they are 
risking their lives on active duty in the military. We recognize our 
children as our messengers to a future many of us, most of us, will 
never see. We want them to take forward a message of respect for 
children, all children in our country. We want to show them that they 
really are our greatest resource and our best hope for the future.
  There is no excuse, Mr. Speaker, for the Republican majority not to 
go immediately to conference and send this bill back to the House for 
approval and to the President's desk before the end of the month so 
that every child in America can take advantage of the tax credit whose 
parents qualify.

                          ____________________