[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 150 (Thursday, October 4, 2007)]
[House]
[Pages H11298-H11299]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
LEGISLATIVE PROGRAM
(Mr. BLUNT asked and was given permission to address the House for 1
minute.)
Mr. BLUNT. Mr. Speaker, I yield to my friend from Maryland, the
majority leader, for the purpose of inquiring about the schedule for
next week.
Mr. HOYER. I thank my friend for yielding.
It is Thursday, 3:15 p.m., and we have finished our business. A lot
of people have talked to me about that, and I just thought I would note
it.
On Monday next, the House will not be in session in observance of the
Columbus Day holiday. On Tuesday, the House will meet at 12:30 p.m. for
morning-hour business and 2 p.m. for legislative business, with votes
rolled until 6:30 p.m. next Tuesday. We will consider several bills
under suspension of the rules. A list of those bills will be announced
by the close of business tomorrow.
On Wednesday and Thursday, the House will meet at 10 a.m. for
legislative business. We expect to consider H.R. 2895, the National
Affordable Housing Trust Fund Act; H.R. 2095, the Federal Railroad
Safety Improvement Act; and H.R. 3056, Tax Collection Responsibility
Act.
On Friday, there will be no votes in the House.
That is a change in the schedule so everybody will want to note that.
That means we expect to have no votes on any Friday for the balance of
the month.
Mr. BLUNT. I am sure that will be well received. While we are on that
topic, I wonder if my good friend has any sense of the anticipated
November schedule, if we are working in November.
Mr. HOYER. If the gentleman will continue to yield, I thank my friend
for asking that question.
The expectation for November is that we will be in until November 16.
I don't mean straight through, but we will come in usually Monday
nights and we will see about the Fridays because we don't know what the
Senate is doing. Obviously we need to do the appropriations process and
fund government. The CR runs through the 16th of November.
I want to tell all Members and the distinguished whip, my friend,
that the Speaker and I would both like to conclude the business of the
first session of this Congress by November 16. I don't want to
represent that I think that is probable at this point in time, but that
would be our desire and that is what over the next 5 weeks we are going
to try to work towards.
We will not be in session either of the last 2 weeks of November,
which would mean that Thanksgiving week, which is the week following
the 16th, the week of the 19th, and the week following that, we would
not be in session. Obviously, it would be my hope we would have
concluded our business and would not, therefore, need to come back in
December. I don't want to make that representation, however. The
gentleman is well familiar with the fact it is too far out and the
appropriations process is still not as sure as I would like it to be at
this point in time. But the last 2 weeks of November we will not be
here.
Mr. BLUNT. I thank the gentleman for that information. That is
incredibly helpful, as is the notice on the Fridays this month. With
that kind of notice, our Members have the kind of time they need and, I
know, appreciate on both sides of the aisle to take advantage of that
time. Like you, I hope we can find a way to be done by November 16, but
I am very appreciative of knowing the schedule for the next two weeks
in November if we aren't done.
In the process of getting done, I asked last week when you couldn't
be on the floor, and I will just ask again, is there any anticipation
with four Senate appropriation bills completed, and in fact the Senate
having named conferees on those four bills, is there any anticipation
we can go to conference on one or all of those bills in the near
future?
I yield to the gentleman.
Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
Mr. Obey and the leadership have met. It is our hope we will be able
to go to conference on a number of these bills, and there has even been
some discussion on some of the bills that have not yet passed. We
passed all 12 of our bills, of course. It is our desire to go to
conference on these. I can't say when exactly that will be, but I can
tell you that I am in the process of discussing
[[Page H11299]]
this with the chairman of the committee to see how quickly we can get
that accomplished.
Mr. BLUNT. That would be helpful, and I appreciate the information on
that.
On the Military Quality of Life bill, I think we have had that the
second longest, the Homeland bill, and then the Military Quality of
Life has been here about a month, and that bill has contained
substantial increases for veterans and for military personnel and their
families for a long time. This year I think those increases amount to
$18.5 million a day, and I just advance the thought that the sooner we
can get that bill finalized, a bill that all Republicans in the House
voted for, a bill that all Democrats in the House voted for, they can
begin to benefit from those new changes and new benefits. All four of
the bills are important, but that bill, I think, particularly is a bill
that has an easy path to a moment when veterans and people currently in
the military would benefit from the changes in that bill. So whether it
is Homeland or Military Quality of Life or the other two bills sent
over, I would be eager to see us move forward on those, but
particularly on the Military Quality of Life bill.
Mr. HOYER. Would the gentleman yield?
Mr. BLUNT. I yield.
Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
We obviously want to have all 12 of the appropriation bills signed.
They all passed with an average of 285 votes in this House. There has
not been less than 81 votes for any one of the Senate-passed
appropriation bills to date. These bills have enjoyed broad bipartisan
support.
Very frankly, the MILCON Quality of Life bill is $4 billion over what
the President requested. We believe, and obviously the vote reflected,
that it is at an appropriate level to ensure that our veterans and our
active-duty military have the medical care that was promised to them.
So we were pleased that that passed overwhelmingly, notwithstanding the
fact that is over what the President has asked for, and he indicated he
was going to veto bills if it was over what he asked for. What he
really meant, apparently, was if they were over what he wanted.
These bills passed very substantially in both Houses. We would hope
the President would come to the table. Mr. Obey and Mr. Nussle have had
some discussions. I will tell you, those discussions have not indicated
any movement at this point in time. They hope that will not be the
case.
We want to see the MILCON bill signed. Frankly, we want to see the
Labor-Health bill signed, which provides for a billion dollars more in
basic biomedical health research on cancer, heart, lung, blood,
diabetes and other diseases that inflict our citizens, and Pell Grant
increases.
I appreciate the gentleman's observation regarding the MILCON bill,
and I share his view. But I hope he also shares our view. Not all of
the bills have passed with as big a margin, but an average of 285,
indicating pretty good bipartisan support on all of these bills. And
the case has been in the Senate, the ones that they have passed, that
the President would discuss with us how we can get this process
completed at levels that we can agree on and not be told to do.
Mr. BLUNT. I appreciate that. And I also appreciate the sentiment
that the process works better if we agree on a process rather than
being told about a process.
On MILCON for several years now, whether it was health care to
retirees, starting a formula that ended the post-Civil War concurrent
receipt problem, we have come together and passed good legislation, as
I think we did this year, and this is a bill that had virtual
unanimity. I am not sure that anybody voted against this bill. I would
hope to get it done. I would hope to get all of our work done, and get
it done in a way that we talk to each other, that gets a product on the
President's desk that he can sign that we are all able to work together
on and get done.
I would also like to see that happen on the Child Health Insurance
Program bill. We believe that there is room for us in that discussion,
and hope to be able to get there. I would tell my good friend as the
whip on this side, I believe whether it would have been yesterday or
Monday or 2 weeks from yesterday, we will sustain that veto, but we
want to do that in a way that either now or later gets us in that
discussion so that we continue this important program so that it works
best for kids who don't have access to health care.
Mr. HOYER. I appreciate the observation and I appreciate the
gentleman's assertion that the veto will be sustained in this House. In
the other body, as you know, they have more than sufficient votes to
override the veto. There are senior leaders in the Senate, very senior
leaders in the Senate in the gentleman's party who believe that the
President has based his veto on incorrect information and incorrect
premises. Senator Hatch and Senator Grassley, both of whom are
conservative Republicans, leaders in your party, who believe this bill
does, in fact, accomplish what the President said that he wanted to do,
at your convention in 2004, that he wanted to add millions of children.
We are hopeful that we can convince some of your ranks not to vote as
Republicans or Democrats but to vote in a way that does reflect, I
think, what all of our priorities are on the health care of our
children. So we understand what your representation is and your
confidence level is, but in this case, we hope you are in error.
Mr. BLUNT. I appreciate the sentiment. If I am not in error, I hope
we don't just waste the 2 weeks, and instead begin the discussions that
we need to get to a bill that puts the health care of kids who don't
have access to insurance first.
On one more appropriations topic, two comments made this week by
Chairman Obey, and I was interested in more information from the
gentleman. One was that we won't do any supplemental funding for our
troops in Afghanistan and Iraq this year, and I believe he may have
said ``and potentially not next year,'' and then the other was the
question raised by him of having an income tax surcharge placed on
people who pay the income tax to the tune of about $150 billion.
I believe you and others have said that surcharge will not be coming
to the floor, and I wonder if you can verify that. And also any
information you have about the likelihood of how we sustain our troops
in the field between now and the end of the year.
I yield to my friend.
{time} 1530
Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
With respect to your latter question, sustaining our troops in the
field, under the continuing resolution, we think that the authority to
do that exists, and we've been advised that.
With respect to if we pass the Defense appropriations bill, it's our
advice as we understand it from the Pentagon that they will have
sufficient funds through the beginning of next year to fund their
needs. Mr. Obey, I'm sure, will be discussing with us and others on the
status of the supplemental.
I note that he's left now, but the chairman of the Appropriations
Committee was on the floor. He has indicated he thinks that they will
have sufficient funds if the Defense appropriations bill passes and is
signed by the President. That passed, as you know, in an overwhelming
vote here as well. We hope to see that bill get to the President. I
don't know exactly what's going to happen to it in the Senate, we'll
have to see that, but I hope that will pass.
With respect to the first question, there's no intention of bringing
a surcharge to this floor. What Mr. Obey was saying is that this war
was projected to cost $60 billion by the White House when it started.
We're going to be at $1 trillion before too long. That bill is going to
be paid by somebody. We talked about our children and grandchildren
will be paying this bill. And what Mr. Obey's point was is that the
people who are being asked to sacrifice are those going into Iraq,
those families who send people to Iraq, and that the rest of us really
aren't paying much of a price, but our grandchildren and children will
pay that price. I think that was his point.
But in answer to the gentleman's question, we have no intention of
bringing such a bill to the floor.
Mr. BLUNT. I thank the gentleman and I yield back my time.
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