[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 49 (Wednesday, March 21, 2007)]
[House]
[Pages H2807-H2813]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
30-SOMETHING WORKING GROUP
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of
January 18, 2007, the gentleman from Connecticut (Mr. Murphy) is
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.
Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. Mr. Speaker, it is an honor to be here
again to spend a small amount of time on behalf of the Speaker's 30-
something Working Group. I thank the Speaker of the House for allowing
us this opportunity to come and share with our colleagues and share
with the American people some, I think, very important thoughts on what
is happening today.
It was interesting, I got to hear the end of our colleagues' remarks
from across this side of the aisle; and one of the things they have
asked of this Congress, and you hear it over and over again as we talk
about this war in Iraq, is that we have to finish the job. And I think
there is a question that has to come before that subject. We have got
to start asking a little bit more in this place what that job is. I
think that is what this debate is about, in part, this week, and the
debate that we have renewed here since we have brought the House under
new leadership. What is the job that we need to be doing in order to
keep this country safe?
The answers to that have come in piecemeal fashion, in dribs and
drabs over the past year. But maybe the most substantial piece of
information, new information that helped us decide what that job is,
was when we got last summer evidence through the National Intelligence
Estimate that started to tell us that if our job is what we think it
is, which is to do everything we can to keep this country safe, then
our own Intelligence Community, the dozens of intelligence officers and
organizations that contributed to that report came up with one
unfortunately startling conclusion, and that was that our efforts in
Iraq are on more days making us less safe as a Nation than making us
more safe.
Why? Because we have not only destabilized the region, but we have
created what that report called a cause celebre in that country, where
extremists and terrorists around the world now see Iraq as their
proving ground, as their training ground, and as their breeding ground.
So what we are debating here today is, I think, exactly the question
that is posed by the other side of the aisle: Let's start talking about
finishing that job. That job is ridding this world of fundamentalism
and terrorism and extremism that poses a threat to us no matter where
it is. It is not confined by the borders of some country in the Middle
East that we occupy today. It doesn't know the borders of nation
states. It poses a threat to us in all forms and from all places.
And so this debate this week, the supplemental bill which this House
will vote on shortly, is about refocusing our mission, starting to deal
with the realization and the reality of a conflict against terrorism
that goes far beyond the borders of Iraq.
Part of what this bill is going to do is not only redeploy our
forces, but also bring our troops out of harm's way in that country.
You can't ask them to be a referee in what has become a religious
conflict in that country, one that military leader after military
leader, our own commanding general on the field there, General
Petraeus, has said himself just earlier this month that there is no
military solution to what has become a civil and religious conflict on
the ground.
Job number one is to recognize the limits of our brave men and women
in Iraq. They do an unbelievably admirable job every day. We are so
grateful, especially those of us in the 30-something Working Group who
consider those men and women our contemporaries, that they have chosen
to defend this Nation so that others of us are able to serve this
country in a different way. In order to honor them, in order to support
those troops, we need to bring them out of a fight that our military
forces cannot win alone.
But this is also about refocusing that effort, and I think that is
what we have to keep on coming back to here, is there are fights still
worth fighting in other parts of the world, such as Afghanistan, where
we are on the verge of losing control of that country back to the very
forces that gave cover and umbrage to the people who attacked this
Nation on September 11. Remember, it was not Saddam Hussein that flew
planes into tall buildings in New York, it was Osama bin Laden's
organization called al Qaeda that used Afghanistan and the Taliban as
its place and center of operation. And that country, as we have shifted
more forces away from Afghanistan into Iraq, is now falling back into
chaos, and part of our mission here has to be a realization that there
are places worth fighting, and there are places in which military
forces cannot quell ongoing violence. Afghanistan is still a fight
worth fighting.
But it is also about focusing our efforts back here at home. And one
of the secrets starting to come out, and thanks in part to the work of
Representative Wasserman Schultz and
[[Page H2808]]
Representative Meek and Representative Ryan, the work they did here on
the late nights on the floor of the House, we were able to hear a
little bit about this in the past year, was that this Congress over the
last several years wasn't doing justice to the issues of homeland
security, wasn't doing everything that we should be doing in order to
protect our own people and our own borders here at home.
So this supplemental bill that everybody hears about that the
Congress is going to vote on is not only going to finally do exactly
what the will of the people have asked for in the election of last
November, which is set a new course in Iraq, but it is also to start
refocusing and redoubling our efforts back here at home.
The $2.6 billion in this bill will be rededicated to the efforts to
make sure that terrorism does not find harbor on the shores of this
Nation. Over $1 billion for aviation security, $90 million for advanced
checkpoint explosive detection equipment, $160 million to increase air
cargo screening, $1.25 billion for new port transit and border
security, $150 million for nuclear security. We can go on and on and
on. We are going to finally step up to the plate as a Congress and make
sure that we are spending money to win the fight that matters to finish
the job.
That job, Mr. Speaker, Ms. Wasserman Schultz, has to be done with the
recognition that Iraq has become now a place that, on more days than
not, presents a greater danger to this country by creating a hotbed, a
training ground, a proving ground for terrorists. We need to start
refocusing our efforts on fights that matter.
This is going to be one of the more important pieces of legislation
that will come before this Congress, and I think it will honor that job
that we are entrusted with, which is to protect this Nation from those
that would do harm to it.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Thank you so much to my friend from
Connecticut. It is a pleasure to join you in the 30-something Working
Group once again.
And we need to remind our colleagues on the other side of the aisle,
Mr. Speaker, that, on November 7, the American people sent us a very
loud message. They sent us a loud message that they wanted us to move
this country in a new direction. We began to do that. We heard them,
and we began to do that in implementing our 100 hours agenda, our Six
in '06 agenda, by adopting a bill that would establish an increase in
the minimum wage, by having the student loan interest rate, by making
sure that we hold pharmaceutical companies' feet to the fire and ensure
that, for Medicare part D prescription drug beneficiaries, that we
negotiate for lower drug prices. We wanted to make sure that we expand
the research into uses of alternative energy.
So what do we do? We repealed the subsidies that were given away by
the Republicans to the oil industry so that we can use that money more
appropriately to fund alternative energy research. We passed
legislation that would implement fully the 9/11 Commission
recommendations.
And, on top of that, the other piece of the new direction pie was
clearly the message sent by the American people, Mr. Murphy, that they
want a new direction in terms of the war in Iraq. They are sick and
tired of the rubber-stamp Republican Congress that we used to have
giving the President a blank check, allowing the administration to go
unchecked in terms of its utter lack of accountability, allowing
contracts to be let with no questions asked; no hearings during the
course of the years. We have now completed 4 years of this war, and up
until the time when Democrats took over this Congress no questions, no
hearings about the direction that the administration was taking this
country and this war. A total shift from the war of necessity, which
was the war in Afghanistan, which really was in direct response and had
the widespread support of the American people, that really and truly
was a response to the 9/11 attack; instead, a shift to a war of choice
in the war in Iraq. And that was utterly unacceptable when Congress was
misled and was given a set of facts on intelligence 4 years ago, when
they misled Congress into voting for this war.
Now, we are still mired in chaos there. The administration has
allowed Afghanistan to descend back into chaos when we had brought them
democracy, and we had beaten the Taliban, and women had been given an
opportunity to have freedom. Girls could go to school again. It was a
new day in Afghanistan. And that has essentially been squandered. In
favor of what? In favor of civil war in Iraq? In favor of us
intervening and trying to resolve a civil war between the Sunnis and
the Shiites that has gone on for hundreds if not 1,000 years?
When is this administration going to recognize that when we say the
word, when we refer to the troops, Mr. Speaker, it is very easy to
think, let's examine the term ``troops.'' I think it is very easy to
look at that word and not see it in a personal way. I think that we
throw the word ``troops'' around so much that we forget that troops, a
troop is a person.
{time} 2100
We are talking about individuals who are fighting for this country
and who are doing their duty. And most of them that are over there are
on their third tour of duty, Mr. Murphy.
I know I have told this the last few times that I have been here with
my 30-something colleagues, but I went to Walter Reed. I cannot get it
out of my mind, because I have two 7-year-old kids and a 3-year-old,
and I can't imagine what this family has gone through.
But one of the soldiers that I visited when I went to Walter Reed
before we voted on the escalation resolution and rejected the
President's policy, when we voted to adopt that resolution, rejecting
the President's policy on escalating this war, I went to Walter Reed
before we voted on that. And one of the soldiers I met was with his
wife and with his young child, who was 6 years old, this beautiful 6-
year-old little boy. And that 6-year-old little boy was so excited that
his dad's tour was going to be done in August, and he said, my daddy is
coming home forever in August.
His dad was sick in Walter Reed. He had contracted a mysterious
illness. But he had been through three tours of duty. Each were a year.
And his only son, his only child was 6 years old. And that meant that
he missed half of his son's life already.
So when we refer, you know, without thinking to the troops, the
troops, if it is a brigade or any one of a number of military terms
that we use for individual troops or a collection of troops, we are
talking about people.
And if we do not make sure that this supplemental passes, the choice
is a plan to get our troops home and provide them with the equipment
that they need and an exit strategy and benchmarks to ensure that the
we and the administration hold the Iraqi government accountable to meet
those benchmarks. The alternative is a continued blank check and a
directionless war that has no end in sight.
It is a pretty stark contrast. We can eventually see our way clear
and had there been a light at the end of the tunnel and adopt the
supplemental and, in addition to that, provide the support that our
troops need, the equipment that they need, the plan to get them home,
and support for our veterans, which is incredibly important; $1.7
billion in this bill for health care for our veterans.
We have this glaring, horrific problem at Walter Reed that went
ignored by this administration. And thank God we had those, the heads
that have rolled. But would they have rolled if Democrats weren't in
charge of Congress? No. We know they wouldn't have, because, yet again
another scandal would have been swept under the rug. The administration
would have tried to ride it out, keep their fingers crossed, squeeze
their eyes shut tight and hoped that they could endure until the next
media news cycle went through.
No more, not now that we have balanced government, that we have the
ability of this Congress to assert our oversight role and to reassert
what the founding fathers envisioned, which was our system of checks
and balances.
And I think we are all about third party validators here in the 30-
Something Working Group. And I noted what this Washington Post article
from Wednesday of last week, it was appropriately titled ``White House
Finds Trouble Harder to Shrug Off.'' And it goes on to talk about how,
in
[[Page H2809]]
the past, questions about its, meaning the White House's, actions might
have died down without the internal administration e-mails being made
public, referring to the U.S. attorney scandal.
There are many issues that would have just been swept aside by this
administration in the past, allowed to occur and ignored by the then
Republican leadership here. But not now that we have a democratic
Congress that is going to make sure that we hold this administration's
feet to the fire, and make sure that they are responsible for civil
liberties for all Americans, and fiscal responsibility.
I would be happy to yield to the gentleman.
Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. Ms. Wasserman Schultz, you are exactly
right. There is a new day here. And I don't have the comparative
experience that you do. I watched this place as an observer for the
last several years. One of the reasons that I ran was you sit around in
coffee shops and local community halls, and people generally don't pay
much attention to the division of labor down here. I mean, people
aren't necessarily talking about in their daily lives the co-equal
branches of government. They are not thinking too much about the
separation of powers. But you know what? They were forced to talk about
it in the past several years, because people didn't understand how, in
record numbers they were turning out, not only in elections, but in
community meetings, to tell their Members of Congress that they needed
a change in Iraq, because, not only did they have moral and
intellectual objections to what we were doing over there, but they were
talking to the families of those troops who were being sent over there
without body armor. 18 months it took until our forces over in Iraq had
the body armor that they needed. They were looking at statistics like
the one we just found out earlier this month which said that 88 percent
of the National Guard and Reserve troops are so poorly equipped that
they are rated not ready by the military; that we have not one active
duty reserve brigade in the United States that is considered combat
ready. And so people out there were hearing over and over again from
the families of the troops, the troops themselves, which was backing up
their own instincts about the backwards nature of our policy in Iraq.
And they wondered where Congress was. And they watched this place sort
of shut down for a number of years. And they couldn't understand why
their elected Members of Congress weren't standing up and asking some
questions. I mean, at the very least, asking some questions about what
this president was doing over there.
Mr. Speaker, there were six opportunities since this war began for
this Congress, on supplemental appropriations bills, to stand up and
try to perform some perfunctory oversight over this war; four
emergency supplemental bills, two emergency spending funds in the
Department of Defense authorization bills, six times this Congress,
under Republican leadership, had an opportunity to stand up and say,
you know what? We are going to give you some more money to conduct this
war, but we are going to put some strings on it. We are going to try to
check your authority in some even elementary way. Not once. All six
times this Congress stood down. Despite a lot of yelling and screaming
from one-half of this chamber, this Congress stood down and gave
President Bush virtually every single thing he wanted.
Now, listen. I understand you might have been lulled into a sense of
complacency here. This Congress heard from this president over and over
again that things were going well, things were going fine, everything
was going to be better. We find out now that all along this
administration knew that things weren't going well. In fact, they knew
things were pretty terrible on the ground and they were plotting this
new strategy, a very different one than I think the American people
intended on Election Day. They wanted a new course of direction in
Iraq. They didn't necessarily think that that policy was going to be
escalation. I think they were counting on de-escalation. It was a
slightly new direction, Ms. Wasserman Schultz.
But here is the thing, is that people in this country became
constitutional scholars over the last couple of years because they
started scratching their heads when they picked up the paper every
morning as this war was going nowhere but downhill, and there was
deafening silence coming from Congress. And so there is a lot of
commotion in here about this emergency supplemental bill because it has
got some policy in it. We are actually, instead of rubber stamping the
President's requests, we are actually saying, if we are going to give
you another dime for this war, then we are going to make sure that you
honor the will of the American people, that you step up to the plate
and listen to the foreign policy community that this Nation has
expressed through the Iraq Study Group; that you listen to your own
generals, many of which who will tell you over and over again, that
though there might be a political or diplomatic solution to what
happens on the ground in Iraq, that it cannot be a purely military
solution; that you start listening to the families of those troops who
have cried out for years to equip them when they go over, to make sure
that they are protected when they serve overseas, and to make sure that
their health care is taken care of when they come back; that we
actually conduct this war, redeploy our forces in a responsible manner.
For the first time, Ms. Wasserman Schultz, this Congress is stepping up
to the plate and actually conducting that type of oversight.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. You know, you are absolutely right. And in
addition to the oversight and accountability and new direction that the
supplemental on Iraq seeks to provide for the direction that the actual
conduct of the war is taking, it is really imperative that we focus on
the portion of the bill that relates to what it does for our veterans
because, clearly, this administration, and the former Republican
leadership of this Congress, did a disservice to them. They spent, in
the 2 years that I was here prior to your arrival, the careless
disregard that I noticed for veterans coming from the former Republican
leadership was just really unbelievable because so often, Mr. Speaker,
I heard our colleagues and friends on the other side of the aisle stand
on the floor and profess undying devotion to our Nation's veterans and
how it was imperative that we support them.
Well, words are nice. But that is all they were because every
opportunity that our colleagues had, in the time that I was here, when
I first got here as a freshman, to help our Nation's veterans, the
Republicans said no. No.
In January of 2003, which is actually prior to my getting here, the
Bush administration actually cut off veterans health care for 164,000
veterans. Don't believe me? You have only to look at the Federal
Register to see the documentation of that.
March 2003, the Republican budget cut $14 billion from veterans
health care that was passed by Congress, with 199 Democrats voting no.
That was H. Con. Res. 95, vote Number 82 on March 21, 2003.
Then we moved to a year later, March 2004. One would think that the
Republicans had a year to think about it and would have finally
realized that it was time to stand up for our Nation's veterans. They
certainly said it a lot. When it came to doing it, they fell short.
The Republican budget shortchanged veterans health care then by $1.5
billion. That was passed by Congress with 201 Democrats voting against
it.
In March of 2005, another year later, President Bush's budget
shortchanged veterans health care by more than $2 billion for 2005, and
cut veterans health care by $14 billion over 5 years, and passed with
201 Democrats again voting against it.
Now, let's go to the summer of 2005. And I was here by then. I could
not believe that this happened, because for months and months the Bush
administration denied that there was a shortfall, said that there was
no problem, stalled and pushed back. And finally, in summer of 2005,
Mr. Murphy, after democratic pressure, the Bush administration finally
had to acknowledge in Fiscal Year 2006 that there was a short fall in
veterans health care that was their error of $2.7 billion. And we had
to fight all summer to get it fixed and have an emergency supplemental
bill just to address the shortfall. It took pressure and cajoling and
shame to finally bring them to the table and get them to do that.
[[Page H2810]]
And then in March of 2006, President Bush's budget cut veterans
funding by $6 billion, Mr. Speaker, over 5 years. That was passed by
the then Republican controlled Congress.
Fast forward to January 31st of 2007. The new direction Democrats
increased the VA health care budget by $3.6 billion in the joint
funding resolution.
And now, I can tell you that in our supplemental that passed out of
the House Appropriations Committee last Thursday, on which I sit, with
none of the Republicans, zero voting for it, $1.7 billion to the
request for veterans health care, including $550 million, Mr. Speaker,
to address the backlog at the VA health care facilities so we can
prevent similar situations like what happened at Walter Reed because
certainly, if we didn't know what was going on in Walter Reed, we have
to make sure we address the needs of our veterans in health care
facilities across this country that are run by this administration's VA
agency.
$250 million for medical administration so that we can insure we have
sufficient personnel to address the rising number of veterans that are
coming back from Iraq, and that we have to make sure we maintain a high
level of services.
$229 million for treating the growing number of veterans. $100
million to allow the VA to contract with private mental health care
providers to provide veterans, including Guard and Reserve members who
so often are neglected, Mr. Murphy, with quality and timely care; and
$62 million so that we can speed claims processing for returning
veterans.
When I went to Walter Reed, and when I have gone home and talked to
my veterans, and I know that you have experienced this too, the
bureaucracy and the red tape that our veterans have to go through to
get care. It is like they put roadblocks, it is like the VA and this
administration puts roadblocks in front of our veterans on purpose.
{time} 2115
It is like they delight in stalling them. I mean, it is not their
money. I don't get it.
Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. Reclaiming my time for a moment, in
Connecticut we have the same problem that you talk about. It takes
hundreds of days for veterans simply to get qualified for the benefits
once they return. I mean, of all the benefit programs that this
government runs, it would seem that the veterans program would be the
easiest to qualify people for, right? Because what is the
qualification? You served in the military. You fought for this country.
There is a record of it. It is not hard to find. And yet we have
constructed so much bureaucracy and so much red tape.
And I understand that a lot of the folks in the Department are trying
to do a lot with not enough funding to do the job, but it is time that
we cut through it because we shouldn't be talking about a system that
is of inferior care or equal care to that of what you or I get or
people in this community get. Our veterans' health care system should
be the gold standard of care in this country. We should accept nothing
less than the best that our health care system can offer. And we know
not only through the recent revelations at Walter Reed, but also simply
in the conversations that we have door to door.
It was amazing to me in this last election, Ms. Wasserman Schultz, as
I went door to door over the summer and fall. I did it almost every
night, and almost without exception if you knocked on the door of a
veteran, someone that had served in World War II through the more
recent conflicts, almost without exception health care came up, whether
it was a personal problem they had had with the system or a problem
that a family member or one of their brothers and sisters in arms had
encountered when they came back. Almost every single veteran brought
that up because they have a notion, and it is exactly right, that when
they come back here, their community should be able to stand up for
them and make sure that they continue to be healthy, certainly make
sure that the injuries they received in defending this country are
treated expeditiously, efficiently, and with the best care possible.
And so it was remarkable to me how often this issue came up, Ms.
Wasserman Schultz, just as you talked to people door to door. It was so
real and so palpable because to the people who have served this
country, there is no greater dishonor, and I am speaking as someone who
has not served, but who has had the honor to know many that have, no
greater dishonor to them than to come back to a country that doesn't
express a deep and daily sense of gratitude for that service.
Ms. Wasserman Schultz, for all the bad news that I heard on the
campaign trail, the good news is this bill that we will vote on will
honor that service, one of the biggest infusions of funding support for
the veterans' health care system that this country has ever seen. And I
can just hope that when I go back out there this summer, when I am
going out just to knock on doors to check on people in a noncampaign
environment, that you will hear a very different story, that they will
feel finally their stories are being heard.
I yield to Ms. Wasserman Schultz.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Thank you. Because now they finally have
responsive government, Mr. Murphy. They finally know that the Members
who represent them collectively in this Chamber, the Members that are
leading this Chamber are hearing them, that it is not falling on deaf
ears; that this institution is not of the special interests, for the
special interests, and by the special interests any longer. Now we have
restored this to actually be the people's House, and our leadership and
our agenda is a reflection of the interests of the people.
And as much as they might like to say that that wasn't the case,
privately in their heart of hearts when they went to sleep at night,
our Republican colleagues had to lay down in the dark by themselves
when they went to bed and know that they weren't addressing the needs
of the American people.
I mean, I am not someone who lives and dies by polling, but look at
the polling. Look at the numbers towards the end of last year and how
the American people generally felt about the job that this Congress was
doing. That is a reflection on all of us. It is just appalling that the
American people would have confidence in the twenties in the likelihood
that Congress was going to be responsive to them. They would express
support for their individual Member of Congress, but collectively as an
institution they have lost confidence in us.
Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. Reclaiming my time just for one point.
Before coming over here, I was reading a really interesting front-page
article, and I think it was a recent Newsweek or Time, and it was
entitled, sort of, The Downfall of the Right, and it was talking about
how the sort of conservative ideology has really fallen by the wayside
in the past several years. And one of the things it had talked about
was that when the class of 1994 was ushered into office, there was a
sort of purity to their ideology. You disagreed with a lot of the
things they stood for, but they did come in here as reformers. I mean,
they did come in here and set a whole new bunch of rules for this
House, how this place was governed. They changed the franking rules.
They put in term limits. And you could have disagreements with some of
the results of that ideology, but they did come in here with some real
ideas rooted in some intellectual discussion about how you change
Congress.
And what this article was sort of pointing out was that over time,
over the last 12 years, the ruling party of this Congress became one
that was guided by a set of ideas to one that was guided by a
collection of special interests; that it was simply kind of an
amalgamation of different lobbyists and different industries that would
sort of pull and push for control over this place, and it stopped being
one that was guided by any real ideas about how to move this country
forward.
And it was an incredibly interesting survey on how the Republican
Party has changed over the years. And if you want to know why their
reign ended after 12 years, in part I think it is a recognition from
the American people that this place stopped being about ideas and in
the end started being about those special interests.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. I want to segue to the U.S. attorney matter
because what you just said brought something to mind. But before I do
that, I do want to throw out yet another example of the neglect, of the
[[Page H2811]]
just stark neglect, that this administration has and has had for our
veterans. I mean, take Walter Reed. I have a timeline in front of me, a
neglect timeline for the treatment of the soldiers that are housed at
Walter Reed and that seek services at Walter Reed, going back to July
of 2004.
First I want to just put up this Newsweek Magazine cover, Mr.
Speaker. This is a young woman who clearly has lost her legs, and I
think the picture speaks all that it needs to without words. But the
caption on the picture on the cover of Newsweek, which was the week of
March 5 of this year, says: ``Shattered in body and mind. Too many
veterans are facing poor care and red tape. Why we're failing our
wounded.'' And Walter Reed, there is no better example of what this
article spoke to, Mr. Speaker, than the neglect timeline at Walter
Reed.
If you go back to July of 2004, again, Mr. Murphy, in the summer
before I was elected, you had Major General Kevin Kiley appointed
Walter Reed Army Medical Center's Commander.
In mid to late 2004, you actually had our colleague from Florida (Mr.
Young) and his wife stop visiting the wounded at Walter Reed out of
frustration; Mr. Young, who has been a champion for veterans. Believe
me when I tell you that our colleague from Florida Mr. Young is a
legend, an absolute legend, that is revered in a bipartisan way in this
institution. But Mr. Young said he voiced concerns to commanders,
including Major General Kiley, over troubling incidents he witnessed,
but was rebuffed or ignored. He said, ``When Bev or I would bring
problems to the attention of authorities at Walter Reed, we were made
to feel very uncomfortable.'' And the source of that was the Washington
Post.
November of 2005, House Veterans' Affairs Committee Chairman Steve
Buyer announced that for the first time in at least 55 years,
``Veterans service organizations will no longer have the opportunity to
present testimony before a joint hearing of the House and Senate
Veterans' Affairs Committees.''
Now, talking about closing off access to the people that we are here
to serve, can you imagine that they wouldn't let veterans service
organizations testify in front of the Veterans' Affairs Committee? I
mean, it is just mind-boggling.
August of 2006, Army Major General George Weightman assumes command
of Walter Reed, replacing Major General Kiley.
September 2006, 13 Senators, 11 Democrats and 2 Republicans, sent a
letter to urge then-Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Thad
Cochran, Republican from Mississippi, and Ranking Member Robert Byrd,
Democrat from West Virginia, to preserve language in the House defense
appropriations bill that prohibits the U.S. Army from outsourcing 350
Federal jobs at Walter Reed. A similar provision, introduced by
Senators Mikulski and Sarbanes, was defeated by a close 50-48 vote
during the bill's consideration in the previous week.
Then in September 2006, Walter Reed awards a 5-year, $120 million
contract to IAP Worldwide Services, which is run by Al Neffgen, a
former senior Halliburton official, to replace a staff of 300 Federal
employees. Halliburton again. Who headed up Halliburton, Mr. Murphy? Do
you recall who headed up Halliburton?
Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. For a period of time, it might have been
the gentleman that currently serves as our Vice President.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Yes, I believe you are right. The gentleman
that is currently our Vice President.
In February of 2007, just about a month ago, the number of Federal
employees providing facilities management services at Walter Reed, Mr.
Speaker, had dropped from 300. There were 300 Federal employees that
were replaced with a $120 million private contract run by a former
senior Halliburton official, and the 300 dropped to fewer than 60. The
remaining 60 employees went to only 50 private workers; 300 to 50
private workers.
February 19, we know it was revealed by the Washington Post that
there was an expose detailing mistreatment of veterans at housing on
the grounds of Walter Reed Medical Center. And what has unfolded since
then is resignations of top generals, resignations of the Secretary of
the Army. Heads are rolling, Mr. Murphy, as they should be, because of
the profound neglect of our wounded veterans and our veterans that need
assistance from that very fine institution.
Not only did the heads roll, but it led the Appropriations Committee
last week to adopt an amendment offered by my colleague who sits on my
subcommittee, Mr. LaHood, to ensure that Walter Reed Army Medical
Center is not closed down because not only do we need to get to the
bottom of what is going on there, but we need to make sure that that
institution not only continues to serve our Nation's veterans, but
serves them well.
Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. Ms. Wasserman Schultz, you talk to Members
on the other side of the aisle, and I think they share that same
concern for veterans. I mean, they do. We are not suggesting that
anybody in this Chamber was sitting here intentionally deciding that
they were going to create the situations that happened on the ground at
Walter Reed. It is just a matter of choices. It is a matter of the
choices that were made here. And whether they were made consciously or
unconsciously, it resulted in an abysmal situation for veterans.
The choices that ended up getting made here when it came to the
fiscal situation in this country was to hand out massive, unprecedented
tax breaks to the top 1 percent of income earners in this Nation while
we were fighting a war. While we were fighting a war. It never happened
in this country. We have never asked this country to go into war
without asking the entire country to sacrifice in order to pay for it,
because here is the thing: The cost of the war isn't just the guns and
the troops and the tanks and the armor. It is the health care for the
people that come back here afterwards. The cost of the war is the whole
thing.
And so we ended up short-changing our troops and short-changing the
people that came back here because we decided that what was more
important was to hand out another round of tax breaks, this last one to
the persons in our districts, the rare folks who are lucky enough to
make $1 million a year. They got $40,000 back from that tax cut.
I know if I showed up at their door and asked them, if you had to
choose, if you had to choose as someone who is taking in income of $1
million or more a year, would you take the full value of that tax cut
if you knew that that was going to leave the decrepit conditions that
we have found at Walter Reed, that that was going to result in waiting
times of up to a year for services for the men and women that fight to
protect us overseas? I know what their answer would be, and it should
have been the answer of this Congress.
It now does get to be the answer. The answer now gets to be that our
priority is going to be making sure that those folks are taken care of
when they come home.
And do you know what? We have already voted for tax cuts in this
Congress. You can do both. You can still find a way to provide targeted
tax relief to people who need it, as the small business tax cut bill
here in the House a couple of weeks ago, and honor those commitments.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Mr. Speaker, it is essential that we honor
those commitments. And I was stricken by what our colleague from
Georgia said at the end of the last hour when he referenced the need to
be bipartisan, to come together and work on bipartisan solutions and
move forward together. I was really glad to hear him say that.
But the room was shockingly silent for the last 2 years that I served
here, that there really weren't calls for bipartisanship or locking
elbows together and finding the way to the best public policy on issues
of mutual concern.
But be that as it may, we agree that we should move forward in a
bipartisan way. And, in fact, the open government and ethics package
that we adopted as part of our New Direction agenda on the first day
that we were here was a commitment on the part of our leadership and on
the part of our Speaker Nancy Pelosi that we would have the most
inclusive, open, and honest Congress in American history. And we have
steadily been doing that every single day.
[[Page H2812]]
{time} 2130
Unfortunately, the administration doesn't seem to be buying into that
same concept of bipartisanship. Again, very nice words are said. I have
seen the President stand in the Rose Garden and stand on the South Lawn
and stand in lots of different really attractive camera shots talking
about the need for bipartisanship. And yet, again, when it has come to
light that there was a proposal out of the White House to fire 93 U.S.
attorneys and subsequently we have gone back and forth with the White
House about what the actual truth behind those suggested and then
eventual firing of eight of them was, we have not been able to get a
straight answer.
In fact, we have had a concern that administration officials,
including the Attorney General, have come before Congress and been less
than forthcoming. I want to be careful about the words I choose, but it
has gotten to the point where we have been told so many different
things about what was behind those firings that we are at the-boy-who-
cried-wolf point now.
Again, speaking as a mom, I know I have talked to my kids, and
sometimes children will be less than truthful when they are concerned
that they might get in trouble. I know that my kids sometimes are
worried they are going to get in trouble and that the potential
punishment is worse if they tell me the truth than if they kind of
soft-pedal the actual facts, and maybe what happens to them will be not
the worst thing. But I always find out. I always eventually know what
really happened. And that is exactly what is going on here.
Any parent will tell you that they have sat their children down and
counseled them, ``You know, it is always better to just tell me the
truth, because I am going to find out anyway, and the consequences are
going to be far worse for you when I do find out than if you were just
up front with me in the beginning.''
Maybe we have to talk to the President and the White House and the
administration like moms talk to their kids.
Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. I feel like I should admit something to
you now.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Not to be your mother or anything now, but,
seriously, maybe an elementary back-to-basics conversation is what is
necessary, because clearly the process that they have been taking us
through has been less than honest. We have had a lot of misleading
excuses.
We have reached a point, and I sit on the House Judiciary Committee,
Mr. Murphy, where now our subcommittee has taken the step of feeling
like in order to get to the bottom of it, we had to authorize the
committee to issue subpoenas to bring the Attorney General and to bring
Karl Rove and the administration officials associated with this
scandal, with potentially being less than truthful to this Congress,
with covering up what actually happened, maybe a subpoena may be
necessary.
I think that is sad and unfortunate, but we cannot have less than
truth when we ask administration officials questions when they come
before this institution.
I am glad about the potential for bipartisanship. During the hearing
we had in Judiciary yesterday, a number of our Republican colleagues
indicated they were also unhappy with what was going on with this
administration. In fact, specifically on the issue of the attorney
firings, one of their top leaders, another good friend from Florida,
Congressman Putnam, actually said that he questioned the Attorney
General's ability to continue to serve. I will quote what he said in
the Washington Post.
He said, ``His ability to effectively serve the President and lead
the Justice Department is greatly compromised.'' During a lunchtime
interview with reporters, he said, ``I think he himself should evaluate
his ability to serve as an effective Attorney General.''
We are talking about the number four ranking Republican in their
leadership on that side. Believe me, I know Adam Putnam. He has served
with integrity in our legislature in Florida, and does so here. If he
is at that point, then you know there is something seriously wrong.
There is seriously something wrong.
Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. Ms. Wasserman Schultz, I think it serves
us well to sort of try to outline for people why this is such a big
deal. Why do you have a senior member of the Republican leadership
coming as close as you can come to calling for the resignation of the
Republican sitting U.S. Attorney General? Why do you have the papers
filled with this day after day? Why do you have the Judiciary Committee
going to the unfortunate but necessary step of actually having to
subpoena members of the administration to come before us?
It is pretty simple. If you are an average Joe out there, you want to
know that if the guy next door to you commits a really bad crime, that
he is going to go to jail, no matter who his political friends are, no
matter what political connections he has; that justice should be blind.
Justice should certainly be blind to politics.
Now, we can freely admit that when Bill Clinton came into office, he
sent out notices that he was intending to get rid of all of the
prosecutors and everybody was going to have to reapply.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. If the gentleman will yield for a second, when
then-President Clinton did that, correct me if I am wrong, he was
asking for the resignations of the Bush appointees, of the Republican
appointees of his predecessor.
Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. Correct.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Now, my understanding when this scandal
occurred, we are talking about a situation where the President, I
believe, was considering asking for the resignation of 93 of his own
U.S. attorneys. Subsequently, they decided maybe that was going a
little too far, so I think the number is eight, they only fired eight.
Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. That is correct.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. My recollection also is that there was some
interference and some questions about specific cases for each
individual U.S. attorney that were raised by some of our colleagues on
the other side of the aisle during this process before those firings.
Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. And there is the rub, Ms. Wasserman
Schultz, is that it is one thing to decide to clean house and say okay,
everybody goes. I am not going to examine all of your pasts and your
political connections and whether you have done what you have asked,
because I haven't served one day. I am just going to come in as a new
president, which is their prerogative, and just clean house.
That not what happened here. In fact, there is a reason why somebody
within the White House actually recommended that they fire everybody,
because they knew that if you are going to start firing prosecutors,
people that are given by the public and by this government the very
grave responsibilities of carrying out our system of justice, then you
better not inject any politics into it, because the worst thing that
can happen to the American justice system, and for all of the
inefficiencies of government, one thing we can stand very proudly by,
is our system of blind justice.
We do have a system of justice that by and large makes decisions
without political influence. If you are my neighbor and you did
something wrong, no matter who you know, now matter how powerful you
are, now matter how much money you have, you are going to pay for it.
You are going to be held accountable for it.
But if prosecutors throughout this country start having to look over
their shoulder every time that they decide to try that rich guy or that
influential guy or politically powerful guy, and they have to wonder
whether the consequence of that decision is going to be the political
boss somewhere decides their job shouldn't be their's anymore, then
that has immense, immense consequences for our system of government and
our system of justice.
I know it is just eight. I know it is just eight. But if that message
that those eight guys, men and women, those eight men and women, who
for some reason displayed some act of political disloyalty to the
President, don't get to hold their job anymore, then that has an
unbelievable chilling effect on the rest of our prosecutors, and I
think it has dire consequences for our system of justice.
[[Page H2813]]
So it is a big deal, and it should be a big deal. I hope that the
President sees the light of day and decides to put the people that were
responsible for this decision before Congress so that everything can be
aired out.
His offer now is obviously certainly not acceptable. As the chairman
of the Judiciary Committee today said, Representative Conyers, said we
might as well go down to the bar down the street and have this
conversation, because that is about as much meaningful information as
you are going to get out of that conversation.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. If the gentleman will yield, we should point
out the President believes he magnanimously offered was to offer that
the officials associated with this scandal to speak with, essentially,
the Judiciary Committee, not under oath, that there be no transcript,
and that Congress would not subsequently subpoena them.
That is when Mr. Conyers said, yes, we could just go have a drink and
have that kind of private conversation which reveals nothing, which has
no accountability whatsoever.
Mr. Murphy, the other thing that I think is important to note is that
the first answer that we were given about why, and these people do
serve at the pleasure of President. Again, that is why I drew my kid
analogy. Because I never understand when I ask my kids, and,
fortunately, I have very honest children, so this doesn't happen often,
but little kids, when they are learning as they are growing up, they do
dumb things.
What brought this to mind was the first answer that the
administration gave was that, well, you know, we were concerned. We
lost confidence in their ability. They weren't up to snuff, they
weren't very good attorneys and they weren't doing a very good job.
As you might imagine, these are eight pretty capable people who
thought they were doing a good job. When they had their ability
questioned, a bunch of them got mad. We are talking about very loyal
Republicans here, some who had been long-standing supporters and
contributors to the Republican Party. They went out there and defended
themselves and said, wait a second. I am pretty darn qualified
individual. How dare you.
Then we dug a little deeper. It turns out, well, it is not that they
were not qualified. It is more that they weren't aggressively pursuing
Democrats who were being investigated in their jurisdiction.
The bottom line is we really don't know. And then they started
pointing fingers at each other inside the administration. First, it was
really Karl Rove. No, it wasn't Karl Rove, it was Harriet Miers that
called for the firings.
The bottom line is to restore the confidential of the American people
in their government, which is what we absolutely need to do, and that
is our goal. Because it was badly shaken by the Republican leadership,
we need to get to the bottom of scandals like this.
I know we are getting closer to our end time and we want to make sure
we have an opportunity to encourage people, if they have any questions
or want to see the charts more closely we have seen tonight, we will
give out the Web site.
Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. I think, Ms. Wasserman Schultz, it is part
of a pattern. Political influence in the judiciary, we are finding that
prosecutors are being fired for not being loyal to the President. We
find it in some of our scientific agencies, where basic scientific
accepted data is being suppressed by the administration because it
doesn't meet their political goals within some of our medical approval
agencies and boards. Decisions are being made based on ideology, rather
than on science.
We have had hearings on a lot of these subjects in the committee that
I sit on, the Government Reform Committee, and you actually get some
indignation expressed, as you said, from both sides of the aisle, from
Republicans and Democrats on this issue. I think there is a bipartisan
frustration at the administration's willingness to inject politics into
a lot of places where politics have no business.
But at the same time that I accept there is criticism coming from
both sides, I also note that there were a lot of things we probably
would never have found out about unless we were asking the questions,
and the questions weren't getting asked for a very long time. They are
getting asked now. Maybe the answers are terribly palatable.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Or forthcoming.
Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. Or forthcoming. When we get them, they are
not the ones we want necessarily, but at least we are starting to get
them, because we are asking them. And if you want to talk about
restoring people's faith in government, we have to open it back up
again. I hope that is something we can engage in on both sides.
I yield before we give the contact information.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. It has been a pleasure to join you, Mr.
Murphy. I have to tell you how thrilled I was that we expanded the 30-
Something Working Group and we have now given ourselves a new chapter
to talk about the issues that are important to the American people, and
we have now the ability to hold the administration's feet to the fire
and exercise Congress' oversight role which the Founding Fathers
envisioned.
I would be happy to yield back to the gentleman to close us out.
Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. I am happy my application was accepted,
Ms. Wasserman Schultz.
The 30-Something Working Group, we were given this opportunity by the
Speaker of the House, who has been so generous to allow us time on the
floor to talk about issues that affect folks not only in their
thirties, but issues that affect people throughout this country.
You can e-mail the group at [email protected], and you
can always visit us on the web at www.speaker.gov/30something.
Ms. Wasserman Schultz, it was a pleasure to share this hour with you.
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