[Congressional Record Volume 151, Number 154 (Friday, November 18, 2005)]
[Senate]
[Pages S13326-S13329]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
CHILD SUPPORT ENFORCEMENT
Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I talk about two subjects that are very
near and dear to my heart. The first is the matter of child support
enforcement. My colleagues might wonder how does that issue arise. The
fact is, last night, the House of Representatives passed their version
of the Deficit Reduction Act of 2005. As each of us knows, the purpose
of that Deficit Reduction Act of 2005 is to actually bring down the
Federal deficit by finding cuts in the Federal budget, the Federal
budget that currently comprises something in excess of $2.5 trillion a
year.
This is a very important exercise. This represents the first time, I
believe, since 1997 when we have seen real and meaningful cuts in
Federal spending. The challenge, of course, is that about a third of
the money the Congress spends is discretionary spending. Half of that
third is defense spending, and the rest of it is homeland security and
other discretionary programs. But some of that you can tell by the mere
description is hardly discretionary because it is important to our
national security.
My point is that two-thirds of the Federal budget is not, even under
any conception or definition, discretionary spending. It is Medicaid,
Medicare, and Social Security, and we simply have to come to grips with
that so-called entitlement or nondiscretionary spending in order to
draw the reins in on a Federal Government that continues to grow day by
day in its scope and size and expense.
I am here to say I think there are some cuts that make more sense
than others and some cuts make no sense whatsoever. I consider child
support money that goes to assist the States in collecting child
support to fall into that last category--cuts that make no sense
whatsoever. Let me explain.
The House bill will cut $5 billion in Federal funds from the child
support program over 5 years--$5 billion over 5 years. It will cut
$15.8 billion, almost $16 billion, over 10 years. This translates into
a 40-percent reduction in Federal spending for the child support
program. My State of Texas would lose $258 million over 5 years and
$824 million over 10 years.
I ask unanimous consent that a chart prepared by the Center for Law
and Social Policy which lays out the proposed cut to Federal child
support funding State by State be printed in the Record.
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in
the Record, as follows:
TABLE 2.--PROPOSED CUTS TO FEDERAL CHILD SUPPORT FUNDING
[$ millions]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
10-Year
State 5-year Cut Cut, 2006-
2006-2010 2015
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Alabama -187 -59
Arizona -188 -59
California -1,006 -3,211
Connecticut -71 -228
Dist. Columbia -15 -49
Georgia -105 -334
Idaho -19 -61
Illinois -161 -514
Indiana -61 -194
Iowa -49 -157
Kansas -47 -151
Louisiana -55 -176
[[Page S13327]]
Maine -22 -72
Maryland -94 -299
Massachusetts -88 -282
Michigan -249 -795
Minnesota -133 -425
Mississippi -23 -72
Missouri -82 -261
Montana -12 -40
Nebraska -42 -134
Nevada -38 -121
N. Hampshire -15 -48
New Jersey -173 -554
New Mexico -37 -119
New York -303 -967
North Carolina -106 -339
North Dakota -11 -35
Ohio -288 -918
Oklahoma -44 -139
Oregon -49 -156
Pennsylvania -188 -602
Rhode Island -11 -35
South Carolina -33 -105
South Dakota -8 -25
Tennessee -75 -238
Texas -258 -824
Utah -34 -110
Vermont -11 -36
Virginia -80 -256
Washington -130 -415
West Virginia -36 -114
Wisconsin -96 -308
Wyoming -10 -31
Nationwide -$4,962 -$15,846
------------------------------------------------------------------------
CLASP calculations based on preliminary estimates by the Congressional
Budget Office of the total cut in federal child support funding under
the House Ways and Means Committee budget reconciliation chairman's
``mark,'' The total cut was distributed by state based on each state's
share of total child support administrative expenditures in 2004, as
reported by the federal Office of Child Support Enforcement
Preliminary Report FY 2004, table 7.
Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, those are the cuts, $5 billion over 5
years, $16 billion roughly over 10 years.
What is the impact of these cuts on child support collected? This
will reduce child support collections by $7.9 billion over 5 years and
$24.1 billion over 10 years.
That is right, for a $5 billion cut, it eliminates $7.9 billion in
child support collections. For a $16 billion cut, it eliminates $24.1
billion in collections over 10 years. In my State of Texas these cuts
will reduce child support collections by $411 million over 5 years and
$1.25 billion over 10 years.
At this point, I ask unanimous consent that a chart also prepared by
the Center for Law and Social Policy, which states the projected impact
on child support collections State by State, be printed in the Record.
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in
the Record, as follows:
TABLE 3.--PROJECTED IMPACT ON CHILD SUPPORT COLLECTIONS
[$ millions]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
10-Year
State 5-year Cut Cut, 2006-
2006-2010 2015
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Alabama -93 -285
Alaska -31 -95
Arizona -94 -286
Arkansas -61 -185
California -1,601 -4,884
Colorado -104 -316
Connecticut -113 -346
Delaware -35 -108
Dist. Columbia -24 -74
Florida -366 -1,115
Georgia -166 -508
Hawaii -15 -45
Idaho -30 -92
Illinois -256 -782
Indiana -97 -295
Iowa -78 -239
Kansas -75 -230
Kentucky -85 -258
Louisiana -88 -268
Maine -36 -109
Maryland -149 -454
Massachusetts -140 -428
Michigan -397 -1,210
Minnesota -212 -647
Mississippi -36 -110
Missouri -130 -397
Montana -20 -61
Nebraska -67 -204
Nevada -60 -183
N. Hampshire -24 -74
New Jersey -276 -842
New Mexico -59 -181
New York -482 -1,470
North Carolina -169 -516
North Dakota -18 -54
Ohio -458 -1,396
Oklahoma -69 -211
Oregon -78 -237
Pennsylvania -300 -915
Rhode Island -18 -54
South Carolina -53 -160
South Dakota -12 -37
Tennessee -119 -363
Texas -411 -1,253
Utah -55 -167
Vermont -18 -55
Virginia -128 -390
Washington -207 -631
West Virginia -57 -173
Wisconsin -153 -468
Wyoming -15 -47
Nationwide -$7,900 -$24,100
------------------------------------------------------------------------
CLASP calculations based on preliminary estimates by the Congressional
Budget Office of the projected effect of funding cuts on collections
under the House Ways and Means Committee budget reconciliation
chairman's ``mark.'' The total cut was distributed by state based on
each state's share of total child support distributed collections in
2004, as reported by the federal Office of Child Support Enforcement
Preliminary Report FY 2004, table 7.
Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, in the year 2004, the child support
program collected $ 21.9 billion, while the program costs were $5.3
billion. Let me make this clear for my colleagues. In other words, for
every $1 spent by the Federal taxpayer $4.38 in child support was
collected for the children who need it. This is not the typical Federal
program. This is not money that once spent we see no real benefit from.
Rather, this is one that for every dollar that is invested $4.38 in
child support is collected for the children who need it and who are
legally entitled to it.
The President's 2006 budget cites the child support program as ``one
of the highest rated block formula grants of all reviewed programs
Governmentwide.'' This high rating is due to its strong mission,
effective management, and demonstration of measurable progress toward
meeting annual and long-term performance measures.
Even there, the numbers and these sort of accolades about this
program do not tell the whole story. The story is completed by the fact
that many children who receive child support are thereby prevented from
drawing down other Government programs. For example, child support
enforcement reduces reliance on Medicaid, temporary assistance to needy
families, and other social service programs. It is estimated that more
than 1 million Americans were lifted out of poverty through child
support programs in the year 2002 alone.
So in addition to money that is a good return on investment, $4.38
for every dollar, this money actually avoids additional expenditures of
tax dollars by creating individuals who are qualified for other
Government programs at a lot more expense to the Federal taxpayer.
The problem with these cuts is that they are likely to reverse
dramatic improvements in the child support program's performance over
the past decade, and they may well force many families back on the
welfare caseload. This means former welfare families and working
families of modest income will lose an important source of income that
now enables them to maintain financial self-sufficiency and thereby
having to draw on Government resources through public assistance
programs.
The reason I feel so passionately about these particular cuts and the
effectiveness of the child support enforcement program is that for 4
years before I came to the Senate I served as attorney general of
Texas. It was my job, on behalf of approximately 1.2 million children,
to see that they got the child support that they deserved, that they
needed, and that they were legally entitled to.
I am proud to say that my State ranks second in the Nation in terms
of total collections, collections of about $1.8 billion in fiscal year
2005, and an increase of 83 percent of collections since fiscal year
2000.
Now, that did not happen by accident. The reason it did happen is
because of the great work being done by the men and women in the child
support enforcement division of the State of Texas. It also happened
because of the money that is provided by the Federal Government to help
fund this necessary function. Due to the good work of these hard
working men and women in the child support division, obligations, that
is court orders, establishing support have risen from 55 to 82 percent
of the qualifying population, and the cost-effectiveness in Texas has
gone from $4.96 to $6.81.
I mentioned the national average of $4.38 for every dollar spent. In
Texas, we now collect $6.81 for every dollar spent.
If the financial benefits, if the cost-effectiveness of this program,
and if the avoidance of other costs to the Federal taxpayer were not
enough, there are other intangible benefits to a strong and effective
child support enforcement program. I have seen with my own eyes that
too many families, when they divorce, reach a tacit agreement with
regard to their children. Moms who frequently are the ones who have
custody of the children sometimes
[[Page S13328]]
reach a tacit agreement with their ex-spouse, typically the father,
that if they do not exercise their visitation rights that the mother
will not press the father for the financial support to which their
children are legally entitled.
What happens is that these children become two-time losers. Not only
are they denied the financial benefits that the law says they are
entitled to, they are denied contact with both parents that every child
needs in order to have the best chance of success.
Indeed, one of the intangible benefits of an effective child support
program is not just the money collected, it is not just lifting
children who would otherwise be in poverty out of poverty, it is not
just avoiding the additional expenses of Government programs that would
otherwise be invoked if that support was not there, it is literally the
benefit of having a mother and a father both engaged, involved, and
committed to the welfare of their children.
I can think of no more important purpose that our efforts could serve
than to reunite mothers, fathers, and children in a collective effort
to improve the status of our children and their prospects for a bright
future.
So I hope in the conference on the Deficit Reduction Act of 2005 our
colleagues in the House will reconsider, and I hope our colleagues in
the Senate will persuade them that of all the cuts they might have
chosen these were the least deserving and that the money should be
reinstated. I am confident throughout the $2.5 trillion Federal budget
that there are other programs, other waste, other fat, other
ineffective programs that could be more effectively cut and with far
less damage to the most vulnerable among us.
PATRIOT Act
Finally, just for a couple of minutes, maybe 5, I want to speak about
another subject, and that is the USA PATRIOT Act. It has been more than
4 years since our country was hit on September 11 by terrorists who
care nothing for our way of life and nothing for the laws of war. They
have attacked, because they could, innocent civilians in their jihad
against those who have different ways of life and different views.
We know the PATRIOT Act has been largely responsible for making
America safer by bringing down the wall that prevented the sharing of
information between law enforcement and intelligence agencies, by
making available to our FBI and other intelligence-gathering bodies the
same sort of techniques that are currently used against organized crime
members and other criminals. Simply, what this body did in the PATRIOT
Act was make sure that we used every legal and reasonable means to root
out terrorism, to investigate it, and to stop it before it killed other
innocent Americans.
The PATRIOT Act was passed shortly after September 11 by a strong
bipartisan vote of 98 to 1 in the Senate and 357 to 66 in the House. As
I said, the PATRIOT Act enhanced law enforcement and intelligence
agencies' ability to gather and analyze intelligence information and to
use the most modern communications technologies, such as e-mail,
cellular telephones, and the Internet, and it strengthened criminal
laws and penalties against terrorists.
As always, we must be concerned with the right balance between the
need to protect innocent American lives and the need to preserve our
civil liberties. Despite the dire predictions of some groups, the
PATRIOT Act has not eroded any of our rights that we hold near and dear
as Americans. To the contrary, the PATRIOT Act has enabled the Justice
Department, the FBI, and the CIA and other Federal, State, and local
law enforcement agencies to cooperate and to share information and
thereby save American lives and protect what is perhaps the most
important civil liberty of all, and that is freedom from future
terrorist attacks.
I serve on the Judiciary Committee, and we have held 25 oversight
hearings to date within the Judiciary Committee to ensure that we have
both the tools we need and that we struck the right balance between
civil liberties and our need to be secure. As all of our colleagues
know, several sections of the PATRIOT Act are set to expire, sections
203 and 218, on December 31, 2005. These are the very provisions that
have been instrumental in bringing down this wall that has previously
separated different agencies of the Federal Government in getting
information that is needed in order to save American lives and to stop
terrorist attacks.
I would just read briefly from recent testimony before the Senate
Judiciary Committee by Peter Fitzgerald, the U.S. attorney for the
Northern District of Illinois, who has recently been in the news. He
has recounted from personal experience how this wall between law
enforcement and intelligence personnel have operated in practice. He
said:
I was on a prosecution team in New York that began a
criminal investigation of Usama Bin Laden in early 1996. The
team--prosecutors and FBI agents assigned to the criminal
case--had access to a number of sources. We could talk to
citizens. We could talk to local police officers. We could
talk to other U.S. Government agencies. We could talk to
foreign police officers. Even foreign intelligence personnel.
And foreign citizens. And we did all those things as often as
we could. We could even talk to al Qaeda members--and we did.
We actually called several members and associates of al Qaeda
to testify before a grand jury in New York. And we even
debriefed al Qaeda members overseas who agreed to become
cooperating witnesses. But there was one group of people we
were not permitted to talk to. Who? The FBI agents across the
street from us in lower Manhattan assigned to a parallel
intelligence investigation of Usama Bin Laden and al Qaeda.
We could not learn what information they had gathered. That
was ``the wall.''
Well, people who remember the hearings before the 9/11 Commission
will remember that there were a number of high-profile witnesses from
Janet Reno, the former Attorney General of the United States, to former
Attorney General John Ashcroft, who served during the first term of the
Bush administration, and FBI Director Mueller. Witness after witness
testified that that wall between criminal investigators and our
intelligence-gathering communication prevented the sharing of
information that has been absolutely critical in protecting innocent
American lives and preventing future terrorist attacks.
It is that same wall that will be resurrected on December 31, 2005,
unless the U.S. Congress acts. It is absolutely critical that we look
at this with cold-eyed clarity and not be swayed by scare tactics or
emotional appeals.
I am astonished, when I look at the reality of how the PATRIOT Act
has made our Nation safer, that there are those who would use scare
tactics to try to convince them that America's civil liberties are
somehow imperiled. In fact, the American Civil Liberties Union, time
and time again, through fundraising appeals and elsewhere, has
misrepresented the PATRIOT Act in a way that I believe has frightened
the American people. They happen to use it to raise money in their
direct mail campaign, but it has had the disservice of breaking
American resolve and confusing the American people about exactly what
is at stake and what the benefits of the PATRIOT Act are.
Perhaps the most telling manifestation of the effectiveness of their
scare tactics and their misinformation campaign is that approximately
300 different municipalities across America have passed resolutions
calling for the repeal of the PATRIOT Act. I think we have to mark that
off to a lack of good information, or perhaps the gullibility on the
part of some of these city councils and others. Because, as the Senate
Judiciary Committee has found out, when you ask the American Civil
Liberties Union to detail a single violation of American civil
liberties as a result of the passage and implementation of the PATRIOT
Act, they have been able to come up with none, zero, zilch, nada.
Senator Dianne Feinstein, with whom I am honored to serve on the
Senate Judiciary Committee, who always does a very diligent job on
behalf of her constituents and on behalf of the Senate, asked the ACLU
to search the records and come up with a single instance that they
believe demonstrated or proved that the PATRIOT Act imperiled the civil
liberties of the American people, and they did not come up with a
single example.
I hope, as we continue to work on a conference report to reauthorize
the PATRIOT Act, that the Members of the Senate will do our jobs with a
clarity of mind based upon evidence and not yield to the scare tactics
by those who want to create a disinformation campaign and perhaps
confuse the American people about the importance of the PATRIOT Act. It
is absolutely critical that we reauthorize this act, that
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we not allow that wall to be resurrected because the truth is, we owe
it to the American people and we owe it to those whose lives will
literally be lost unless we do our job and reauthorize the PATRIOT Act
before provisions of that act expire on December 31, 2005.
Mr. President, I yield the floor.
____________________