[Congressional Record Volume 151, Number 116 (Thursday, September 15, 2005)]
[House]
[Pages H8079-H8085]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
30 SOMETHING WORKING GROUP
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania). Under the
Speaker's announced policy of January 4, 2005, the gentleman from
Florida (Mr. Meek) is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the
minority leader.
Mr. MEEK of Florida. Mr. Speaker, once again, it is an honor to come
before the House of Representatives; and, also, we would like to thank
the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Pelosi), the Democratic leader;
and also the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer), the whip; and the
gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Menendez), the caucus chairman; and the
gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Clyburn) who is our vice chair, and
all of the hardworking Members of this Congress.
I think it is important for us to remember, and I think in a few
short minutes the President will address the country from New Orleans
and the French Quarter, about the Federal commitment to the hurricane-
devastated areas. He will be in Louisiana, but I would assume he will
also be addressing Mississippi, Alabama and some of the other
surrounding areas that were affected by Katrina.
I will tell you, Mr. Speaker, that I think it is important that we
look at the contrast of what exactly the Federal commitment will be.
There has been a lot of words, a lot of Federal jet fuel burned of the
President and the Vice President going down to the affected area. There
has been a lack of organized congressional visits for us to even
understand what those people are going through in the South.
We are going to be talking a little bit about, the 30 Something
Working Group, the Federal commitment and the response not only to
rescue and recovery but also the response to a national tragedy.
There have been some good statements and some very disturbing
statements, and I think the Members need to realize what has been said,
what has been done and what has not been done.
I think it is important, if we are going to follow through on some of
these statements that have been made here on this floor, if we are
going to follow through on what the President would say tonight in
another 20 minutes to the country, are we going to be here for the long
haul or are we going to give the people affected in the South what we
call here in Washington, D.C., the Potomac two-step?
Are we going to try to ride this media cycle out?
Are we going to allow big-time contractors to go down, make a bucket
of money on the back of tragedy and cut the wages for those very same
people that were victims? Are we going to allow that to happen?
Are we going to allow this House, in a vote that we took today, that
I voted against, not that I am not in solidarity of the reason why we
wanted to put together a select committee of the oversight of what
happened in Hurricane Katrina, but the fact that the people of the
South are not getting what the 9/11 families got and the American
people got after 9/11.
So there is a reason I think why we are heading off, and there are
strange votes that are taking place. We say we do not want to
politicize the process, but we step out on politics. We say we want to
get to the truth, either it be city or parish or State or Federal
Government, but, better yet, we take congressional action that does not
even carry the language to allow us to get to the truth, does not have
the bipartisan not only flavor but bipartisan language.
If we are going to do something in the Congress to find out where
government failed, where nonprofit failed and not have a 50-50
relationship with the majority side to be able to get to the truth, we
are going to see partisan votes on that select committee.
I stand with the Democratic leader and I know many of the 30
Something Working Group stand with the Democratic leader as it makes to
not even making an announcement now, even if we are going to appoint
Members to that select committee because I will tell you 710 lives that
have been lost. Better yet, we are going to appoint a committee just
like it is regular business here in the Congress. Also, the largest
supplemental, I must add, in the history of the Congress and this
country, outside of a war supplemental. Some are saying it will go to
$200 billion.
{time} 1945
Well, if it goes to $200 billion, what will be the Federal commitment
in the end? A, we know the people that will be working in the
rebuilding process that are victims of this hurricane will not receive
the prevailing wage because Davis-Bacon has been waived. They will not
receive what other Federal contractors will receive using Federal
money. We know that from the beginning. We are going to shortchange
them from the beginning. We know they need money to rebuild, yet we are
going to do that.
The whole issue, when it comes right down to it, I say to my
colleague from Ohio, is that the Federal commitment is about tomorrow,
a national day of prayer over at the cathedral, and that is fine, we
can pray for them. But we are the Congress. We are supposed to act on
behalf of those individuals that cannot stand for themselves. So I want
to come out tonight and say that individuals that are in the affected
area, I believe the country needs to rally around them and demand a 9/
11-like commission.
We are going to let politicians stand in judgment of politicians? We
are going to let a majority party stand in judgment of the majority in
the executive branch? The same party that says, oh, we will get to the
bottom of this, even if it is embarrassing? Well, people have lost
their lives, yet we are going to sit around here as though it is
another day at the office? I think not.
There are individuals right now that have mold in their homes, and
individuals right now that still do not have even the simple
opportunity to bury their dead. There are children right now that are
lost in the hundreds, and yet it is just another day at the office?
Excuse me, but I have a problem with that.
Over in the other body across the hall yesterday there was a vote
that went down on a partisan party line. One individual from the State,
one of the affected States, did not even vote on the amendment, and
that amendment called for, down to the last sentence, a 9/11-like
commission.
It is very, very unfortunate that partisan politics has found its way
into this national tragedy. The only reason why this Congress is
getting away with it is the fact that these individuals who have lost
their lives are poor. The individuals' homes that are still under water
are poor. That is the reason why. So who are we, as a country, to go
somewhere else and start talking about what other people should be
doing when we are not doing it?
Now, I am not saying the American people are not doing it. I am
saying the leadership here in this Congress is not doing it. And if
they can sleep well by doing that, so be it. But I will say this, that
I believe the American spirit will rise on behalf of these individuals
who are living in shelters right now and who do not even know what is
happening to them.
I think the reason why people are saying, well, we are moving
expeditiously and we are trying to do this, that and the other, and we
want to make sure people get accountability, is that these are poor
individuals, who, by the way, work every day but who may not have the
education that the brokers and the stock folks and all of those folks
had in 9/11. Now, I supported that 9/11 Commission, and we are better
because of it. We are better because there was a 9/11 Commission.
There were families that came to this Congress. It was not the first
idea of
[[Page H8080]]
the Congress or the administration to have a 9/11 Commission, but thank
God that those family members on behalf of their families who had lost
their lives took whatever money they had, came to this Congress and
made it happen. The only difference between the 9/11 families and these
families down south is the fact they had a little more money and had a
little more influence. And God bless them for having it.
But I will say right now, Mr. Speaker and my colleagues, that we have
to stand for these individuals that cannot stand for themselves. That
is why we are here. We are not here to represent the haves and haves
more; we are here to represent the individuals that cannot afford to
come here. We are here to represent those who got up early one Tuesday
morning voting for representation so that they would be represented in
this House, so that Democrats and Republicans alike would be
represented in this House and Independents would be represented and
those that are too young to vote would be represented.
We come here and stand as though it is business as usual while the
body count still goes up, the death toll and the misery. So I do not
know how long this media cycle is going to go on. I just do not know. I
do not know how long the press will stick with this issue to keep it in
the forefront, but we cannot leave these individuals behind. We have to
be resilient; and we have to make sure, even if it costs criticism from
individuals who may say, well, what do you want us to do? We want you
to do the right thing. We want you to pass a resolution that has some
teeth in it.
Mr. Speaker, this resolution 437 is a select committee that we cannot
even get people to come and talk to us. We have to ask them to come
talk to us. So I say to my colleague that this is going to be one of
those things, like the Committee on Ways and Means, with partisan votes
up and down; like the Committee on Armed Services, partisan votes up
and down; like the Committee on Appropriations, partisan votes along
party lines. We cannot allow that to happen.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. MEEK of Florida. I yield to the gentleman from Ohio.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I think my colleague is exactly right.
What happened here today, H. Res. 437, is a tragedy. What happened
right here on this floor today is a tragedy for the exact reason the
gentleman just mentioned.
Now, for those people who are at home and who may not completely
understand the whole situation, this body is run by the majority party,
which is the Republican Party. And the majority party appoints to the
committees members to the Committee on Ways and Means, the Committee on
Appropriations, the House Homeland Security Committee, the Subcommittee
on Foreign Operations, Export Financing, and Related Programs, and all
these different committees and subcommittees. The majority appoints
more people to the committee than the minority, so they basically
control the committee process in the House of Representatives.
Now, some committees have subpoena powers and they can subpoena
witnesses. But they will only subpoena witnesses that the majority
party wants to subpoena. If the minority party would want to subpoena
somebody, they could not because they could not get the power out of
the committee without majority party votes. So the majority rules.
What is happening in this Congress and in the House and in the Senate
is that the Republican Party controls both Chambers. So the Democrats
in the minority have no subpoena power. And what has happened over the
past few years here, and the great example is the later Clinton years,
with Ken Starr, with the House Committee on Government Reform, the
Republican Party that controlled this Chamber, they were the ones
conducting the investigation into President Clinton because they had
the subpoena power and they had the opportunity to do it.
So what we were trying to say, what the minority party was trying to
say, the Democrats were trying to say with H. Res. 437, is this select
committee that will oversee and look at how the screwups went about
down in the gulf coast should be equal. It should be Democrats and
Republicans both having equal subpoena power to oversee the process,
because the record for the majority party over the past few years has
been atrocious.
Now, let us look at a couple of things. We have talked here many,
many times regarding the war, with the weapons of mass destruction, all
the prewar intelligence. Has anybody looked into this in a real way, in
depth? Subpoenaed witnesses? Anybody? No. Has anybody been fired? No.
How about the Medicare bill that we passed at 3 in the morning.
Everyone was told here it was $400 billion. It ends up being 700 or
$800 billion after we already voted for it.
This majority party does not have the credibility, I say to my
colleague, the credibility to oversee what is going on here because
they are going to do nothing but whitewash this thing. Get out the
Brillo pads because we are going to scrub this thing clean, and nothing
is going to happen and the country is going to be worse off for it. So,
my colleagues, H. Res. 437 is a joke. It is a joke. And there will not
be proper investigation.
I just could not believe the debate on the floor today. The gentleman
from Mississippi (Mr. Taylor), a Democrat who lost his home, for God's
sake, was here. He is saying, should he not, as a representative of a
State in a congressional district that lost lives and homes and
property and everything else, should he not be able to subpoena
somebody, just like every other Member of Congress, if I am on that
committee? Or should the Democrats, who many lost constituents of the
700-some that we lost, and some of those people were actually
represented by Democrats, should the minority party not have the
opportunity to subpoena somebody?
But, no, this thing is going to get scrubbed. Where is the
transparency? Where is the equal opportunity? Where is the
bipartisanship? What this bill says is there is going to be nine
Democrats and 11 Republicans.
Mr. MEEK of Florida. It is a select committee. It does not have any
subpoena power. You cannot subpoena anyone.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. There is not even subpoena power.
Mr. MEEK of Florida. I mean, it is like, Will you please come and
talk with us?
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. This thing is a paper tiger. It is going to be a
song and dance. So let us get ready. Get out the music and the popcorn
because this is going to be nothing but a dog and pony show.
I do not think anything is going to happen here, and it is going to
be consistent with a lot of the other pieces of legislation that either
came through this body or did not get reviewed.
So I just want to say to my colleague from Florida how disappointed I
am, how disappointed the Democrats are, and I encourage the gentlewoman
from California (Ms. Pelosi), our minority leader, to continue her
stance and not appoint anybody to this committee. This is a toothless
tiger. It is a washing machine to clean up this mess politically. I
hope that our leader stands her ground and our leadership and our party
stand their ground and just say that this is a joke and to appoint
people to this committee would literally be contributing to the problem
and lending our credibility to this issue, which I think is a joke.
Mr. MEEK of Florida. Mr. Speaker, let me just say this in order to
clarify the whole issue on subpoenas. In section 5 it calls for joint
operations, and it comes down to the majority party. The majority,
basically, the bottom line, are the only people that can actually
subpoena. So your statement was correct, the minority view on the
committee or the Democratic view on the committee, if we wanted a
particular individual to be subpoenaed, could not be subpoenaed if we
are not in the majority to be able to do so.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Unless the majority wanted to help us.
Mr. MEEK of Florida. Of course. And that is in section 5 of the joint
operations. But let me just say this. If there was an equal 50-50 power
on the committee, then, obviously, there would be time for compromise.
Okay, if you want to subpoena this witness, we want to subpoena that
witness, and let us just compromise. Even though we do
[[Page H8081]]
not fully agree, we will get our members to vote for it.
But let me just say this. I think that it is important for us to
remember that this is not the only battle as it relates to making sure
that this never, ever happens again, especially after a 9/11 bill
passed through, Homeland Security given all this authority, FEMA having
the resources to pre-stage the equipment and to be able to move in for
it to ever happen again. Whether it is something the Governor did not
do in Mississippi or Louisiana or Alabama, or something that the mayor
did not do in the town, wherever it may be, Gulfport, New Orleans, what
have you, we have to get to the bottom of it.
Americans are pouring their hearts out and their money out, and we
are using their taxpayer dollars to send down to the affected areas,
and rightfully so, without the proper oversight and without any real
congressional review. If a Member of Congress wanted to go down and see
exactly what the Federal response was, you cannot go on what we call a
congressional visit, go down there on a CODEL. No, you cannot. You have
to find your own way down. Good luck, Charlie. You find your own way
down there. Catch a bus if you can, or hitch a ride with a friend, or
take money out of your own pocket and go.
I happened to get down there on the relief flight taking food and
necessities down. That is how I got into the affected area.
{time} 2000
The American people can take it for what it is. This is a coordinated
campaign. Unfortunately, I do not believe it as a campaign, I see it
preventing lives in the future from being lost. I cannot help but look
at exactly what is going on.
U.S. News and World Report, ``What went wrong?'' We will never know.
Another edition, U.S. News and World Report, ``Who Screwed Up?'' We
will never know.
Newsweek, ``Poverty, Race, Katrina, Lessons of a National Shame.'' We
will never learn because the majority does not want to learn.
Some may be saying that the 30 Something Working Group, they are on
the floor are talking about the majority party's failings with regards
to leading and this national tragedy. This is not an issue of being
partisan. This is an issue of telling the truth. The bottom line is we
always talk about what would be different if we were in the majority.
Well, the Democratic leader, the gentlewoman from California (Ms.
Pelosi), recommended with the council of ranking members said, let us
come back from our break and go into session and give FEMA what it
needs to be able to respond to this national tragedy. Number one, it is
a shame that FEMA was out of money.
What did they say? The House leadership said, no, we will be back; do
not worry about it.
A day later, the President got called out on it. Time was awasting.
That means maybe FEMA did not have what it needed to be able to respond
to people stuck in the Superdome and in shelters.
And in Mississippi, where I went, in Hancock County, they had
sanctioned looting. It was sanctioned because they had no food and no
water. It was not a situation where they said, fine, electricity is
off, we do not have a lot of law and order going on, so we are going to
go into this store and take things. These are individuals who work
every day.
Second point, the Democratic leader said we need to make sure that we
have a FEMA director that knows what he is doing. This one does not. He
needs to step down. Because, obviously, if he was there the day before
the storm and his administration was there before the storm and they
watched this come in, knowing what the National Weather Center has
done, and I am speaking from fact. I went down to Miami, just south of
my district in Miami, and met with the director of the Hurricane Center
last Friday. He was here before the Committee on Science this week and
testified. He told the officials that the levees would break. A
Category 4 or Category 5 storm, they will break, so it was not secret.
He called the mayor of New Orleans on Saturday night before the storm
and said, Mr. Mayor, your levees potentially will break. The mayor put
out the order early Sunday morning, mandatory evacuation. We knew there
would be massive flooding from the simulation pattern a year prior to
this storm. The officials all knew. They knew within FEMA. The State
and city folks knew. The levee board knew.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Everybody knew.
Mr. MEEK of Florida. And people died. I think it is important. I
think it is important that Mike Brown hung around. The President went
down and told Michael Brown that he was doing a good job.
Mr. Speaker, people died. I am not saying that he needs to wear that
on his back, but the bottom line is somebody appointed him to that
position with no experience whatsoever. It is like me leaving this
room, leaving this floor and saying to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr.
Ryan), well, you know, I am going to carry out open heart surgery. I
know nothing about it, but I stayed in a Holiday Inn Express last
night.
You do not get qualifications based upon we need to fill a position,
not a FEMA position. That played around, and finally the administration
took him out under pressure, not only pressure from the Democratic
leader but from the media who started focusing on him, saying things
were going poorly because we still do not have good leadership there.
He came back to Washington, and he resigned.
Then we called for this 9/11 Commission-like legislation to pass to
make sure that this never happens again, never happens again. Not
natural disasters, we have no control over that. That is an act of God.
But when it comes down to governance and responsibility and making sure
if you are poor, middle class or wealthy in this country that this
government will govern on your behalf, and that did not happen. The
response to that request was we are going to put together a select
committee, we are going to make sure that there is a majority influence
on it as relates to the Republican leadership side, and we will not get
to the bottom of what happened.
Will we have a lot of show and a lot of folks getting excited in the
select committee? I am pretty sure they will have it. But what I am
saying, independent individuals, I am talking about people who
understand emergency management, individuals who understand weather,
regular citizens from the affected areas. Regular citizens were on the
9/11 Commission, a Democratic and Republican appointment, co-chairs, to
look at this and professionalize our response on all levels. That will
not happen, not right now.
I think it is important that the American people, Members of
Congress, no matter what community you represent, if you believe in
making sure that people get the same representation, for us to have a
9/11 Commission, and I must add and say to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr.
Ryan), and we come to the floor to talk about what we should be doing
and how we should be doing it or what we are doing on this side of the
aisle, it is important for us to know the facts. This is the same
Congress in the majority that the 9/11 families came up here, and they
voted down two opportunities to set up a 9/11 Commission. This is the
same Congress, until it just became overbearing that there were major
mistakes in our intelligence, major mistakes and flags, and they are
still finding stuff because of the 9/11 Commission that could have
saved lives.
Better yet, we came to this floor, the 9/11 bill came to the floor,
and we have better intelligence, better communications between Federal,
local and State agencies because of their work. It is one of the best
pieces of legislation that has passed this floor. So now the difference
between the 9/11 families and what has happened down in the South is
the fact that these individuals are poor, that they are still in the
recovery process, and they have not been heard from yet. They have not
been heard from. I think it is important that we give those individuals
voice.
I am not saying just Democrats that are concerned about individuals
that are affected in affected areas. I am talking about Members of
Congress giving them voice to allow them to not ever go through this
again and also make sure that they do not become victims when we have
contractors with no restraints, no-bid contracts. They can run the tab
up to whatever they
[[Page H8082]]
can run it up to, and then the President is going to waive Davis-Bacon
which allow the people in the recovery process to receive minuscule
wages, not what they would ordinarily get from Federal procured work.
I think it is important. The differences:
A, coming back here in session, it would have happened without
hesitation if Democrats were in the majority.
B, Michael Brown would have gone to another job long before because
the pressure, and there probably would have been a vote to remove the
director, putting pressure on the White House to get someone more
qualified.
C, we would have a 9/11-type commission appointed today to start
pulling itself together to do the work and make sure this never
happened began.
D, the procurement issue, it would not be an issue because there
would be proper oversight. These are very serious issues.
The only reason I am saying Democratic leadership versus Republican
leadership, because that is exactly the direction we are going in now.
The votes that are going down here are partisan votes, not votes on
behalf of what we know. We are not talking about a Truman Commission or
something that happened 20 or 40 something years ago. We are talking
about a 9/11 Commission that is still doing its work, and it is the
same administration and the same majority side in Congress.
I am asking for the Members of this House on both sides of the aisle
and for the American people not to give up on these poor people. That
is the bottom line. Do not give up on them. They are not giving up on
us. The American people, community after community, are taking care of
the evacuees, taking care of these Americans, but we need to make sure
that the government that they pay taxes to, that their children are
fighting in a war for, making sure that they are not left behind
because they do not have the economic means to be able to come up here
to Washington and say we want a commission, we want it now, we want to
make sure this never happens for my husband, my neighbor, for my
family, for a family member or just someone who is unrepresented in
this process.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, The Washington Post reported, just to
support the gentleman's argument, five of the eight top Federal
management agency officials came to their posts with virtually no
experience in handling disasters and now lead an agency whose ranks of
seasoned crisis managers have thinned dramatically since 9/11. Five of
the top eight FEMA people had no emergency management experience at
all. What did we think would happen if we had this kind of tragedy?
I still say it had a lot to do with the number of electoral votes in
Louisiana and Mississippi than anything else. Because if it was
Florida, with all due respect, they would have been there with billions
of dollars prior to. If it was an election year, everybody would be
down there, and the President's brother would be running around
campaigning.
I think it is terrible that we have this kind of cronyism going on.
We understand. We are not simpletons. We know that a President appoints
his friends who make a lot of donations to posts in the executive
branch. We know that. That is how it goes. But to appoint these people
to FEMA? During a rise in hurricanes? Come on. It is irresponsible.
As far as the committee goes, as far as having a committee, CNN
Gallup Poll taken a few days ago, 70 percent of the American people
supported an independent panel to investigate our response to Hurricane
Katrina. That is 70 percent of the American people, 70 percent of those
responding. I think it is important for this body to recognize that
this toothless tiger, this paper tiger that we passed today, H. Res.
437, is not what the American people want. They want an independent
investigation, bipartisan, equal power among both parties to
investigate it so there is no coverups, no whitewashing going on. That
is what the American people want.
Mr. Speaker, I would like to start talking about something that I
think is very important. We are going to do this. This country is going
to make sure that we rebuild. The problem that we were talking about
with the administration is a big hurdle for us. The money is another
hurdle. I cannot believe that with all of the challenges that we have
right now in this country that this President cannot go to the
wealthiest Americans, his top campaign contributors, and ask them to
give back just a wee little bit of their tax cut that they got over the
past 4 or 5 years, just a wee little bit to help us fund Hurricane
Katrina, to help us fund the war.
We are giving millionaires hundreds of thousands of dollars back, and
our deficit is ballooning. Now, today, it is reporting we are going to
need another $50 billion to keep the war fund going. We are already
hundreds of billions of dollars into the war, and now we have Hurricane
Katrina. Hindsight is 20-20, but you do not get into elective wars that
bog you down because you just never know what is going to happen.
{time} 2015
We do not overextend ourselves, because we do not know when a Katrina
is going to happen, when a national tragedy is going to happen. That is
prudent leadership.
And now we are running budget deficits as far as the eye can see. We
are borrowing the money from the Chinese and the Japanese. We are
giving our country away, and we have got to pay interest on it. And one
would think, and I hope, as the President is talking right now, that
somewhere in his speech he has the guts to ask the wealthiest people in
the country to help us here because we need help.
I ask the President to take the leadership role that the American
people have given him and have the guts to ask the wealthiest people in
the Nation to help us rebuild the gulf coast, to help us fund this
elective war that he got us into. We pay them back. They have got their
tax cuts. We do not even have to take all of them back. We just need a
few hundred billion dollars to pay for the war and to pay for Katrina.
Have the guts to ask them for it. If they are in the health care
industry, I am sure they are doing okay. If they are in the oil
industry, I am sure they are doing just fine. Record profits as far as
the eye can see in the oil industry. The greatest quarterly profits,
billions and billions and billions of dollars for BP and a lot of these
other folks. The big money people are doing okay. But those little kids
on the covers of those magazines, those are the ones that we need to
help. And to not have the courage to ask the wealthiest people in the
country to help out, I think, is poor leadership.
So I think as much as we are talking about restructuring and trying
to figure out what we are going to do and how we are going to make the
government run more efficiently and how we are going to take care of
FEMA and fix the problems that we have been talking about here the past
few weeks, a component of that is what are we going to do with our
budget deficit. Because, again, this was something we have been talking
about with the 30-somethings for months and months and years even now.
So I ask the President to please ask these people to contribute. They
are the only ones doing really well in the country right now. Ask them
to help out.
I am sure in the gentleman from Florida's (Mr. Meek) district, as in
my mine, people who do not have a lot of disposable income are the ones
bringing the canned goods. And I am not saying that the wealthy people
are not doing it. Of course they are. But right now our government
needs funds, and we need the wealthiest in the country to contribute.
And we have got to have a President that is willing to ask them to help
out. And to see the disparity between those who have and those who do
not highlighted through this whole tragedy, I think, really is a call
for all of us in public office, especially those in high-ranking
leadership positions, like the President, to make the proper request;
and we need to ask those who have been doing very well to contribute to
this fund.
Mr. MEEK of Florida. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, we have central
time in the affected area, eastern time. I know that the President is
going to be on 8 o'clock central, but he is going to be on at 9 o'clock
eastern. But, obviously, he will be coming on very shortly. But I think
it is important that it is not the words he is going to share with the
American people tonight. It is
[[Page H8083]]
the action. We have to look at the action or the lack thereof that has
been taken thus far.
Flying down, reviewing the devastation, talking to families, we have
to go far beyond that. We have to make sure that Members of this
Congress feel what we feel here on this floor tonight, having an
opportunity to touch these individuals.
And I just want to say, Mr. Speaker, this is a picture of, I may say,
very fortunate individuals. This is a FEMA trailer down in Hancock
County, Mississippi. I am standing there talking to one of the FEMA
part-time workers. And there is a row of people actually behind us.
There are maybe 10 phones in this trailer. But these individuals waited
about 2 hours, and that is the short line, to get the assistance. They
say that it should be 48 hours, 72 hours when it goes into their bank
account. Many of these individuals, some of them returned back because
they applied 3 days earlier and they still did not receive the
assistance.
But I think it is important for us to realize, Mr. Speaker, that he
mentioned the poll about putting an independent commission together.
Because it is one thing to be able to say I will do my investigation
and we will make sure that this never happens again and the gentleman
from Ohio (Mr. Ryan) is my good friend and I am going to make sure that
he did what he was supposed to do. I do not think we are going to get
down to the real truth about how we can avoid this from happening in
the future, the governmental response, also making sure that the
nonprofit agencies that we tie in with, that they did what they were
supposed to do.
As it relates to the evacuation of poor people, there was a bill
dropped down today on the Democratic side of the aisle that called for
a response plan, an evacuation plan for the poor, for the elderly, for
the individuals that need assistance the most, because what we saw in
New Orleans, what we saw in Louisiana, what we saw in Mississippi, the
individuals that were left behind were the individuals who did not know
where their next $5 was going to come from or were waiting on their
check to come in or did not have a car to get out, and it is
catastrophic.
So for us to be the last standing superpower, for us to have a
President that we call the leader of the Free World, and for us to
allow this to happen to Americans is shameful. That is not what I am
saying. That is what weekly periodicals are saying. That is what the
headlines on newspapers are saying. That is what everyday Americans are
saying.
Some folks say it has a lot to do with the fact that people just did
not listen to us. Well, there are a lot of people who did listen, and
there are a lot of people that are somewhere else, at a cousin's house
right now; but their homes are gone. Many of them did not even have
insurance because their homes were paid for or they could not afford
it.
Mr. Speaker, the bottom line here tonight is that we cannot allow
business as usual or ``the establishment'' to sweep this under the
carpet. We are not saying that blood is on anyone's hands. We are not
saying that. What we are saying is that we cannot afford for it to
happen again. That is the bottom line.
So I think, Mr. Speaker, before we leave here tonight, we need to
make sure that we give the e-mail address out. We need to make sure
that Members know on both sides of the aisle that we have a
responsibility to stand for these individuals. If somebody wants to do
something, I think they need to help these individuals in the South.
They need to help these individuals who do not have the means to come
to Washington to organize themselves and ask for a government-
sanctioned, funded independent commission to be able to make sure that
someone's husband or wife does not run out of oxygen because the levees
broke and because we could not reach them and that instead they sat in
their homes for 3 days and perished.
On their memory, on behalf of them, make sure that does not happen
again. Like in the charity hospital where 35 or 40 folks perished
because the levees broke and we could not do anything, and we come to
find out that those individuals did not even drown. They just expired.
They did not get health care. The power ran out. The generator was out.
All of this could have been avoided. All of this could have been
avoided with the proper oversight and governance. So we need
individuals that are professionals in this field to make sure that this
never happens again.
Mr. Speaker, I will just go ahead and say for those individuals that
felt that the resolution that we passed today was the best thing since
sliced bread and they are on the plane on the way back to their
districts or what have you, off for the weekend, that they did their
part, now they go home and do what they have got to do in their
district, that is fine. But I think they should have a conscience, a
conscience on the fact that these individuals are not getting their
just due, and they are not getting represented, and they are not
getting what they deserve as Americans.
They are not refugees. They are Americans; and I will tell the
Members right now, if we leave these individuals behind, if we leave
these individuals behind, because I am going to tell the Members right
now I do not think the American public will allow that to happen. I am
going to be positive on this. When one is a leader and they say, okay,
we thought we did something, maybe we need to revisit this thing one
more time, I think that is important. And if one is in power to be able
to make that happen, then so be it.
The 1964 Civil Rights Act, the 1965 Voting Rights Act never would
have been if it were not for the people out in the streets making it
happen. If it were not for black and white people of goodwill saying
that somebody like me can have an opportunity to come to the Congress
and give a Special Order to talk about the very individuals who cannot
represent themselves; if it were not for those individuals, white and
black, people in the North saying something is not right in the South
and we are going to risk our lives to get the attention of the
government that they pay taxes to allow them to have the kind of
representation they deserve, this is far deeper than the resolution on
the last day of a work week.
The last vote we take, and folks go home like it is another day at
the office, I am sorry. If these individuals had the means to be able
to make the political contributions, maybe they would get the attention
of the majority of the House. I am talking about majority on both sides
of the aisle. Maybe it would be different. But all they did was they
voted for representation, and they salute the same flag that we solute
every day here in this House, and they deserve the representation.
I am disturbed, Mr. Speaker, I am disturbed, by the fact they are
partisan votes that are going on the other side of the Congress and in
this House as though it is just another piece of legislation. It is
something we disagree on. Americans have lost their lives. Americans
are displaced. Children are displaced. People ran out of oxygen. Folks
ran out of insulin. People are wrapped up on the side of the road, and
bodies are still floating; and we leave on our way to a picnic like it
is nothing.
Maybe all of us have made our contributions to the best 501(c)(3) or
the relief effort that we wanted to. I know I have. But I will tell the
Members this: it goes far beyond that. It goes far beyond that.
So I think the 30-something Working Group has to continue to do our
part. We have to continue to do our part.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will continue to
yield, he highlighted a point. This outfit that is in the executive
branch right now, it is all politics. It is all politics all the time.
It is not about policy. It is all about politics and trying to keep the
Republicans in the majority. And I think when we see that five out of
eight of the top appointments at FEMA are political hacks, I think when
we look at passing a drug bill that does not have any cost controls for
the drugs, does not allow for reimportation, all politics all the time.
Weapons of mass destruction, go through all the war information we had
before, all politics all the time. How do we sell this to the American
people? Whether it is true or not, irrelevant. We need to go to war,
and we are going to say whatever we have to say to get it done.
Now, as the gentleman mentioned earlier, talking about Davis-Bacon,
Davis and Bacon were two Republican Members of Congress who passed a
prevailing wage law that allows for when Federal money is being spent
in a certain area that the Feds will pay the
[[Page H8084]]
prevailing wage of that area for the workers. Because if they are
paying Federal money, then they should obviously be paying for whatever
the going rate is in that area.
So what the President did was he repealed the prevailing wage
provision, basically saying that we are not going to have any oversight
over the contractors. We are going to send them billions of dollars.
Halliburton is going to get their money. We are going to pay them
whatever we have got to pay them, $50 billion, $100 billion without any
oversight from a bipartisan commission here; and at the same time as we
are not overseeing what the contractors are doing. We are going to
repeal the basic provision that allows for workers to at least make a
decent wage in that area.
And today in the Hill newspaper, these gentlemen from Americans for
Tax Reform are saying that this repeal will make it obvious that Davis-
Bacon is nothing but dead weight. So here these guys are wasting all of
their time, all their energy on putting the screws to the workers, guys
in New Orleans that are now living in Baton Rouge or in Mississippi or
in Houston who want to go back home and help rebuild their community
and make the going rate in their community, the prevailing wage in
their community, and these guys are wasting all their time and energy
trying to screw them to the wall instead of overlooking and seeing what
Halliburton is doing.
{time} 2030
We are using the same administrative process with the reconstruction
of Katrina as we have been using in the war, which wasted billions of
dollars, no oversight of Halliburton, no oversight of all of these
people who make tremendous contributions back to the President; and to
have the audacity, with the great human tragedy that is there and the
human suffering there, to say that you are going to waste your time and
your energy making sure the workers do not get their fair share because
that is dead weight, that is wasteful government spending.
These are the people who are going to go back and be able to actually
do some work. It is tremendous. It is unbelievable. It is all politics
all the time with these guys, and this is just one more component of
that. They want to get rid of the unions, they want to get rid of
prevailing wage. This one gentleman in here, he says something along
the lines of it is a waste of money because the Federal money will go
to the worker and if it is a union worker, the union worker will pay
union dues per hourly wage. You have to be kidding me. These union
workers pay like 5 cents an hour to go for the union dues, 10 cents an
hour, it depends on what union you are in. But to say that this is
somehow going to bankrupt the government by paying a gentleman or a
woman the prevailing wage and, at the same time, billions and billions
and billions are getting wasted without any kind of oversight from a
select committee in Congress is a joke, and I think it just keeps
reinforcing ``all politics all the time.''
Mr. MEEK of Florida. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman is 110 percent right.
The gentleman from Ohio mentioned an issue about being nonpartisan and
being, I would say, third-party validators, I just want to make sure we
are clear. On the commission procedural vote here on this House floor
that was voted down, for us to have this week, voted down for us to
have a 9/11 kind of a commission, I believe that was today; and
yesterday, there is an article, and I will give it to the Members just
in case they were not watching the Senate, www.sfgate.com, there is an
article: ``Senate Kills Bid For Katrina Commission.''
Now, let me tell my colleagues something. This is nothing that we
did; this is something that the majority did. If they wanted to get to
the bottom of it and to make sure that it never happens again and to
make sure that Americans do not have to watch the horror, the horror of
people dying and bodies floating, not because of Katrina, but because
of lack of response, because the levee broke and because of a lack of
administrative duties and governance on all levels; if we do not want
that to happen again, why are we not passing a 9/11 kind of commission
for the people in the gulf States?
They do not want to hear a speech. They do not need to hear, oh, we
are going to do this, that, and the other. We are at war right now. We
have men and women right now with sand in their teeth and bombs blowing
up every day around them, away from their families, some have family in
the affected area. I just want to give credit where credit is due; some
of them had an opportunity to come back and check on their families.
But let me just say, we have to go far beyond allowing business as
usual.
I call on the Members and the American people again not to allow this
to be swept under the carpet, not to allow individuals to sit up here
and set the deck because these individuals are poor. We are better than
that, and I know that we are going to do it.
Mr. Speaker, I want the gentleman from Ohio to give our e-mail
address out. I know our hour is coming to a close. But I will tell my
colleague, I am encouraged. I am encouraged because the American
people, some 70 percent of them say they want an independent
commission, and it is not a partisan issue. Those are Democrats and
Republicans. I am encouraged that the democratic leader, the gentleman
from California (Ms. Pelosi) is willing to stand in there against the
wind for what the American people believe in and not allow business as
usual. I am encouraged. I am encouraged by the fact that people are not
only praying on behalf of these individuals, but the American people
have taken action on behalf of them, making sure that they have the
things that they need. Throughout the country people are bringing
people into their homes, paying rent for them as they are displaced at
this particular time. I am encouraged. I am encouraged by the fact that
these victims, many of them have praying grandmothers to make sure that
they are even able to stand up and go through the trials and
tribulations that they have gone through and they still go through. I
am encouraged by that.
So, I say that every time that we have an opportunity to come to this
floor and speak as free Americans in this democracy, we are going to
give those individuals voice. I am glad that there is some leadership
on this floor that sees the importance in that.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I am going to make a prediction. The
hour is late, but I am going to make a prediction. The American people
will not allow, will not allow the Republican Party to get away with
having another white wash. They are not going to allow them to scrub
this up and cover this up and clean it up without having proper
oversight. Seventy percent of the people in this country want an
independent commission to look at this, or a bipartisan commission to
look at this. And I think until that happens, the Republican Party will
continue to get pressure from the American people.
I think the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Pelosi) is going to
stand strong. And, quite frankly, again, we should not appoint anybody
to this commission. Eleven Republicans, nine Democrats, we do not have
an ounce of power on this thing, and we will get slammed just like we
do every day down here, and the end result will be a FEMA that
continues to be inept and inadequate in its response to natural
disasters.
So I say that the American people, that 70 percent of them who want
this independent commission will not let this go, will not let the
corruption and the cronyism continue. Mr. Speaker,
[email protected]., send us an e-mail. We will be back
here next week for a couple more nights and keep hammering away. We are
not going to let go until we get the kind of commission that the
American people want, that is only fair, and that will best fix the
problems that we have in FEMA right now, because it will have proper
oversight.
Mr. MEEK of Florida. Well said, I say to the gentleman. I thank my
colleague for joining me in this (special order) this evening.
LEAVE OF ABSENCE
By unanimous consent, leave of absence was granted to:
Mr. Cooper (at the request of Ms. Pelosi) for today after 2 p.m.
Mr. Tanner (at the request of Ms. Pelosi) for today on account of a
family funeral.
[[Page H8085]]
Mr. Istook (at the request of Mr. DeLay) for today on account of
observing relief operations from Hurricane Katrina.
Mr. Gary G. Miller of California (at the request of Mr. DeLay) for
today on account of illness.
Mr. Pickering (at the request of Mr. DeLay) for today after 12:30
p.m. on account of traveling to his district with the President of the
United States to survey hurricane damage.
Mr. Rogers of Michigan (at the request of Mr. DeLay) for today on
account of a family commitment.
SPECIAL ORDERS GRANTED
By unanimous consent, permission to address the House, following the
legislative program and any special orders heretofore entered, was
granted to:
(The following Members (at the request of Mr. DeFazio) to revise and
extend their remarks and include extraneous material:)
Mr. Brown of Ohio, for 5 minutes, today.
Mr. Schiff, for 5 minutes, today.
Mr. DeFazio, for 5 minutes, today.
Ms. Woolsey, for 5 minutes, today.
Ms. Wasserman Schultz, for 5 minutes, today.
Mr. Udall of New Mexico, for 5 minutes, today.
(The following Members (at the request of Mr. Gohmert) to revise and
extend their remarks and include extraneous material:)
Mrs. Myrick, for 5 minutes, today.
Mr. Norwood, for 5 minutes, today.
Mr. Bishop of Utah, for 5 minutes, September 20 and 21.
Mr. Gutknecht, for 5 minutes, September 22.
Mr. Poe, for 5 minutes, September 20, 21, and 22.
Mr. Nussle, for 5 minutes, today.
Mr. Franks of Arizona, for 5 minutes, today.
Mr. Gohmert, for 5 minutes, today.
____________________