[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 193 (Monday, December 17, 2007)]
[House]
[Pages H15729-H15735]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
FISCAL IRRESPONSIBILITY
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of
January 18, 2007, the gentlewoman from Tennessee (Mrs. Blackburn) is
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the recognition, and I
appreciate the opportunity to be here this evening to speak with our
colleagues and certainly to have a conversation with the American
people about what has transpired on the floor of this House today.
I know most families are beginning to look toward the Christmas
season, and they are looking toward a winter holiday and spending time
with family and with friends. And many of them have worked diligently
to meet their deadlines to be certain that they have time set aside for
such an observance.
Mr. Speaker, I wish I could say that the leadership of the House has
worked that diligently and is focused on meeting those deadlines so
that we would all be spending that time with our families. But indeed,
we have found that is not the case. In unusual moves and through an
unusual process, we are still at work, because we find that a budget
has not been passed that should have been done before the 1st of
September but didn't.
So, what happens with this the process when you don't get your work
done, when you don't meet your deadlines, when you disregard what you
are charged to do and the duty that you are to fulfill? You find that
you get backed into a corner. And, Mr. Speaker, when that happens, then
you have to start working your way out of it.
Well, in the House of Representatives, when we are backed in that
corner and we are unable to fulfill our work in a timely manner,
instead of passing our appropriations bills and funding our government
one bill at a time, we decide we are going to roll it all together, and
then we have what is called the omnibus. And it is a great big spending
bill, a great big spending bill, Mr. Speaker, where you throw
everything into this that your heart could possibly desire. It is
better than any Santa sack in town.
Now, Mr. Speaker, I would like to be certain that everyone realizes
this big bill, this 3,565 pages of bill that weighs 34.4 pounds is
indeed a Santa's sack loaded with pork and with earmarks, over 9,200
earmarks.
In addition to that, Mr. Speaker, I think that it is fair to say that
this also is a symbol. It is a symbol of the broken process that this
House has gone through in arriving at a budget. It is a symbol of the
broken priorities that exist. And, indeed, it is a symbol of the broken
promises of the leadership of this House to not only the body of the
House but the American people.
I have some colleagues joining me tonight to talk a little bit about
what we find in this 34.4 pounds, 3,565 pages. And, Mr. Speaker, I know
we are going to talk about energy and the environment. I am saddened to
know that we have had a lot of trees give their life to print these
bills this week.
I would like to recognize the ranking member of the Budget Committee,
Mr. Ryan of Wisconsin, for some remarks on this legislation.
Mr. RYAN of Wisconsin. I thank the gentlelady for yielding, and I
thank her for her leadership on this.
As we take a look at this bill that just passed the House not 20
minutes ago, I think it is important to know what is in this piece of
legislation. This piece of legislation weighs about the same amount of
weight as my 4-year-old son does. This piece of legislation is 3,565
pages. It is 9,200-plus earmarks, 300 of which we just found out about
today.
[[Page H15730]]
This bill costs $515 billion. This bill does a lot for a lot of
Federal workers in the holiday season. It makes sure that all those
Federal workers working at all the different government agencies have
their budget for the year.
But what this bill does not do going into this holiday season, it
does not give those soldiers in Iraq fighting for our freedom on the
frontline of the war on terror, it does not give them one penny. It
does not give them 1 minute's worth of comfort so that they have the
resources, the tools, the body armor, the bullets, the gasoline, the
rations, the support that they need to keep us safe and to fulfill our
mission in fighting the war on terror where the epicenter is in Iraq.
{time} 2300
It is a shame that we spend all of this time putting all of this
money, all of this pork for all of these government agencies, making
sure that bureaucrats here in Washington are comforted during this
Christmas season, but not a penny to support our troops in harm's way
in Iraq. That is a shame.
What is also a shame is this bill was dropped on the table today and
passed today. Not a single Member of Congress read this entire bill;
yet it passed and is on its way to becoming law.
It is also a shame that it is putting our Nation on a dangerous
fiscal path. It is the beginning of the week, and we are going to put
10,000 earmarks into law. At the end of the week, we will pass more
legislation that will cost billions more. I am worried we may not
actually patch the AMT because the majority here is insisting on having
permanent tax increases to pay for that.
So while we have already seen the delay in Congress is costing people
a 2-month delay in their refund checks from the IRS, if this Congress
keeps on the track they are on, they will raise taxes on millions of
Americans and businesses just to try to provide for a temporary
prevention of a tax increase on 19 million additional taxpayers, 19
million taxpayers who already, because of this delay, will see a delay
in their refunds.
Mr. Speaker, this is not a good moment for the fiscal policy of our
country. This is not a proud day for the House of Representatives to
thump a 34-pound, 3,565-page bill on the desk and vote it out. But
worst of all, it is not a good day for our soldiers, sailors, airmen
and marines who are in the fight, who are on the front lines, who want
our support, who deserve our support. That should have been taken care
of before any single Member of Congress got their pork. Unfortunately,
it wasn't, and that is what passed the House here this evening.
I see we are joined by several other colleagues who want to make
comments on this. We have leaders here in the House of Representatives
on fiscal conservatism, on fiscal responsibility, and I thank the
gentlewoman who is controlling the time and thank her for her tireless
leadership.
Mrs. BLACKBURN. I thank the gentleman from Wisconsin for coming and
speaking. We are members of the Republican Study Committee. If you want
to find out a little more about what is in this bill, you can go to our
Web site, which is House.gov/hensarling/RSC, and find out a little bit
about the details in this bill.
As the gentleman from Wisconsin pointed out, this is serious
business. We are responsible for the budget process of the House. The
House holds the purse strings for the Federal Government; and it is a
duty that we, many of us, take very, very seriously.
Mr. Speaker, it is of tremendous concern to us when a bill is filed
at 12:30 a.m., the dark of night, this bill gets filed and within 24
hours this 3,565-page bill is voted out. And as the gentleman said,
there is no funding for our troops on the ground in Iraq who have been
making steady, consistent progress. What a disservice to the troops and
to the American people.
I want to recognize the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Hensarling), who is
chairman of the Republican Study Committee. His Web site, House.gov/
hensarling/RSC, that is where you can get a copy of what is in this
bill; the $515 billion that is contained in here, plus you can find out
where some of those gimmicks, budget gimmicks are; plus, you can take a
look at some of the emergency/nonemergency spending that is also in
here just so that the majority can spend a little bit more money.
But I would like to yield to the gentleman from Texas who chairs the
Republican Study Committee, Mr. Hensarling.
Mr. HENSARLING. I thank the gentlewoman for yielding. And, again, I
thank her for her leadership in this institution, a very clear,
concise, conservative voice on this House floor, particularly when it
comes to trying to save the family budget from the onslaught of the
Federal budget.
As my colleague from Tennessee has pointed out, the House is
completely broken. It is completely broken and felled under this new
Democratic leadership. They said they would do better if they were in
charge. So what do they bring us today? Today they bring us a 3,565-
page spending bill which people have been able to see beside my
colleague's speaking position over here, weighing in at 34.4 pounds,
roughly the weight of my 5-year-old daughter.
It spends $515 billion of the people's money, and the Democrat
majority brought it to the floor tonight and devoted less than 1 hour
of floor time debating this omnibus bill. This body spent about a
minute debating every $9.1 billion being spent in this bill.
Now, that is money if left in the hands of the families of America
and the small businesses of America, who make the jobs and have to work
hard to send their kids to college and put food on the table and put
roofs over their heads, that money is coming from them; and we spent
less than a minute debating $9 billion. The minutes went by, and all of
a sudden this House passed a $515 billion bill.
Now, Mr. Speaker, when the Republicans were in charge, unfortunately,
my party occasionally brought an omnibus bill to the floor, and I
personally voted against each and every one because I don't believe
that was the vision of the Founding Fathers. It is not the way we
should run this government. In fact, I was at a town hall meeting in my
district not too long ago and a gentleman from the Athens, Texas, in
the 5th Congressional District of Texas, said: Don't you think we would
have a much better government if Members of Congress were actually
required to read the legislation before they vote on it?
What human being can read 34.4 pounds, 3,565 pages in one day? That
is right, Mr. Speaker, this bill was just given to us today. In the
early morning hours, this bill was laid upon this institution.
So there is no transparency here. It is interesting to me that when
the majority party was in the minority, they screamed to the rafters
about this process. Listen to what Speaker Pelosi, then minority Pelosi
had to say about this process: ``The Republican leadership forced
through a so-called `martial law' rule that required a same-day vote
preventing Members of Congress from having enough time to read
legislation. They spent hundreds of billions of dollars and it was
thousands of pages long. This arrogance of power is part of a pattern
of abuse.''
Now that is what Speaker Pelosi said 3 years ago when she was in the
minority. Now that she is the Speaker, does this mean she is imposing
martial law on this House with this process that she decried 3 years
ago? Is she now bringing a spirit of arrogance to this institution
which she decried 3 years ago? Is she part of the pattern of abuse that
she decried 3 years by forcing Members of this institution to vote on
this monstrosity?
So on process alone, this bill ought to be rejected. But it really
ought to be rejected because it puts us on a path of extreme fiscal
irresponsibility. Already today this government is on automatic pilot
to force the largest single tax increase in American history on working
families all across America. It was included in the Democrat budget.
More spending fosters more taxes. And that's just the start, Mr.
Speaker, because after imposing the single largest tax increase in
American history in the Democrat budget, with their so-called ``mother
of all tax increases,'' they are going to once again make history by
imposing the single largest tax increase in American history yet again,
perhaps twice in a 12-month period. I am sure that will break some kind
of record here in the House of Representatives.
[[Page H15731]]
But don't take my word for it. Listen to the head of the
Congressional Budget Office, the head of the Government Accountability
Office, the Federal Reserve chairman. They are all going to tell you
the same thing, Mr. Speaker, and that is without changing the spending
patterns of the Federal Government of which this omnibus represents
some of the worst, we are on automatic pilot to double taxes on the
next generation. Double. And the average American family pays roughly
$22,000 a year in taxes. That will go to $44,000. How many American
dreams are going to be squashed by a tax burden of that magnitude,
represented by that 34.4 pound omnibus spending legislation which will
flatten the American taxpayer like a bus.
It is full of gimmicks from people who said they were going to bring
the most honest and ethical Congress in the history of mankind to this
institution. They take a rubber stamp and they stamp ``emergency
spending'' on anything that moves because they have this little clever
device that allows them to avoid any kind of budget discipline when
they do that. They have this gimmick called ``advanced appropriations''
that would make an Enron accountant blush, but they use it to once
again evade any spending discipline whatsoever in this institution.
They said they would clean up earmarks and this is chock full of
earmarks. Mr. Speaker, if you look closely, maybe some of these
earmarks pass the legal test. Maybe they even pass some ethical test,
but all too often the American people are seeing campaign cash going
into the institution on this end, and they are seeing earmarks coming
out the other end. It doesn't meet the fiscal responsibility test, and
it doesn't meet the American taxpayer smell test. And that bill is
chock full of it. Out of 3,565 pages, 692 pages are devoted to
individual congressional earmarks, which many of the American people
believe serve no other purposes other than to get Members of Congress
reelected.
Again, the Democrat majority said they would clean it up and there
would be transparency and accountability. We haven't even had time to
read the 692 pages. We don't know what is in there. Maybe there is
another museum to a Member of Congress, as the chairman of the Ways and
Means Committee managed to earmark $2 million to create a museum to
himself.
One final point before turning this over to some of my other able
colleagues from the Republican Study Committee. I want to harken back
to a point made by the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Ryan), ranking
member of the Budget Committee. Earlier tonight the Democrat majority
leader came to the floor and said, We have a responsibility to fund our
government.
Well, I don't know everything that is in that bill, Mr. Speaker, but
I know something that isn't in that bill. There is no funding for the
men and women fighting for freedom in Iraq. Not one penny. Now how do
you have a bill that ostensibly funds the United States Government and
somehow you leave out the men and women who wear our Nation's uniform?
They wear our Nation's uniform. They come from the small towns and
factories and fields from all over America. Their paychecks come from
the same United States Treasury that Members of Congress' do. Somehow
the Democrat majority managed to put into their 34-pound bill thousands
of earmarks. They managed to fund every single bureaucrat at the
Commerce Department, but they can't find one penny for our brave men
and women fighting on the front lines of freedom in Iraq.
Mr. Speaker, maybe they don't believe in the cause, but don't they
believe in the soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines?
{time} 2315
There is no way that any Member with any credibility can come to this
floor and say we are presenting a bill to fund the Federal Government
but, oh, we don't really consider members of our armed services
fighting in Iraq to be members of our government. I just don't know
what planet some of these people come from, Mr. Speaker, and that's
just shameful. It is a shameful moment this year in the history of the
House to present this spending abomination, chock full of earmarks that
ignore our men and women in harm's way in Iraq. And it's one of the
lowest points of this entire year for this Democrat Congress. And I
hope that the American people are paying very special attention to what
is going on here tonight.
I appreciate the gentlelady, again, for her leadership for taking the
time to help elaborate on really this heinous piece of legislation that
came to the floor earlier, and I want to thank her. And I want to thank
all the members of the House Conservative Caucus, the Republican Study
Committee, the largest caucus in the House, for always being ready and
vigilant to fight for freedom and to work for less government and more
freedom and more opportunity, and that's what the Republican Study
Committee is all about. And I appreciate the opportunity to share in
this Special Order, and I yield back to the gentlelady from Tennessee.
Mrs. BLACKBURN. I thank the gentleman from Texas. And again, Mr.
Speaker, if someone would like to pull down the summary and get the
information on this bill, house.gov/Hensarling, H-E-N-S-A-R-L-I-N-G, /
RSC, and they can pull down our summary here. H.R. 2764 is the omnibus.
Not a minibus. It is a great big omnibus, all 3,565 pages, and they can
see for themselves a little bit about what is contained in here and
what is not contained.
And as the gentleman from Texas said, the fact that we are a Nation
at war and we have men and women in the field in Iraq who are fighting
for our freedom, fighting for our ability to be here and to serve in
the U.S. House of Representatives, fighting for our security so that we
can safely and peacefully celebrate Christmas and the holiday season,
and we do not honor their service by funding that work. It is a serious
error. It is a serious omission.
At this time, I would like to yield to the gentleman from Arizona
(Mr. Shadegg), who has been chairman of the RSC in times past. He
serves on the Energy and Commerce Committee. He is one of the leading
fiscal conservatives in this body, and I yield to him for his comments
on the omnibus.
Mr. SHADEGG. I thank the gentlelady from Tennessee for yielding, and
I want to commend her for her work. You know, there is a story here
tonight. There's a story the Nation needs to know. There's a story of
an institution charged with protecting this Nation and carrying out the
responsibilities of this government, and it is a story of shame. It is
a story of failure. It is a story of an institution that's supposed to
be doing its job and isn't.
And I commend the gentlelady from Tennessee (Mrs. Blackburn) for her
efforts to bring that story forward, to point out the 3,565-page bill
that was laid on us less than 20 hours ago when we were given less than
20 hours to pass it.
But the real story here, I would suggest, is a story that some of my
colleagues have already commented on, and that is the story of 9,200
earmarks in this bill. Now, I suppose if you're an average American
you're sitting back at home and you flip through the TV channel and you
catch C-SPAN and you know generally what an earmark is. But let me tell
you what it is. An earmark is an effort by a Member of Congress to name
some little project that will somehow benefit, or they can make an
argument that it will benefit, them or their constituents in some way,
and yet, sadly, when you examine those earmarks, you find one thing is
true. Every single one of them is self-serving, designed to get that
Member of Congress re-elected, and every single one of them is put in
there with huge effort.
Now, in this bill, we have 9,200 individual Member projects,
earmarks, if you will, inserted in the bill. You heard my colleague,
Mr. Ryan from Wisconsin, point out that 300 of those Member projects or
earmarks were dropped in this bill just last night. That is to say,
they've never been seen before.
Now, my colleague from Texas, Mr. Hensarling, pointed out that none
of us could do what I was asked to do when I ran in 1994. When I ran
for the United States Congress in 1994, my constituents said to me,
Congressman, we want you to go back there and promise us you'll never
vote for a bill that you haven't read. Ladies and gentlemen, no one can
read a 3,565-page bill in 20 hours. It can't done be done.
[[Page H15732]]
I had a conservation with a constituent this weekend when I was home,
and he said to me, because I was complaining to him about earmarks,
about misspending, he said, Well, I thought that the Democrats cleaned
that up. I thought that practice ended. I thought they'd ended that. I
thought the reforms had changed that.
Well, the gentlelady from Tennessee and the gentleman from Texas and
my colleague from Wisconsin have pointed out the story of the night.
The story of the night is all the talk about reform was just that; it
was talk. Reform has not happened. If the American people believe that
they elected a new majority to this Congress to end wasteful spending,
it didn't happen. If they believe they elected a new majority to
Congress to get things done in regular order so we could review the
bills and read them before they were voted on, it did not happen. If
the people across America believe they elected a new majority, and that
new majority reformed the rules to end earmark abuse, it didn't happen,
because those earmarks are here.
Hillary Clinton's hippie museum, it's here. And God knows what else
is in this bill, because the 3,565 pages which sit right there cannot
possibly have been combed by all of us in this time.
What you have heard is that while Congress could find time to put in
9,200 earmarks in this bill, and combined with prior bills, take the
total earmarks for the year to 10,300, roughly, roughly $17.6 billion
in Member projects and earmarks, we could find the time to do that. All
the Members of Congress could, you know, write out their list requests
and say, I need this project and I need that project and I need this
project, and Hillary Clinton needs a hippie museum, and God knows what
else is in this bill. But we couldn't find time, as my colleagues from
Texas and Tennessee and Wisconsin have pointed out to you, we couldn't
find time to put money in there for our soldiers in Iraq.
Oh, we could find time to renovate the U.N.'s headquarters in New
York. We could find time to essentially overturn the Secure Fence Act
by making it almost impossible to build that fence. We could find time
to craft 692 pages of individual Member requests, little requests, fund
this so that I look good and I get re-elected. We could find time for
that. We could find time for 9,200 of those.
We could air-drop, that's right, you heard, air-drop earmarks. What
does that term mean? Well, an air-drop earmark is an earmark that is
inserted in a bill after it has left both the House and the Senate. How
many of those are there in this bill that nobody's ever seen, perhaps,
but the author of the bill? There are 300 of those. So we could find
time for 9,200 earmarks, 300 of them air-dropped, never seen before. No
American, no average American back home has had any chance to review
them. We could find time for that, but we could not find time to fund
the war in Iraq.
I commend the gentlelady for bringing these facts forward. I think it
is a story that America needs to know. They need to know that this
Congress, as the gentlelady from Tennessee pointed out, was supposed to
do this work clear back last August, last September, and be done with
it. But they couldn't find time to do it until now, almost Christmas
Eve. But by gosh, they could find time for their earmarks, their pet
projects. But no time for the Nation's defense.
I commend the gentlelady from Tennessee. I appreciate her yielding me
time. I think this is a story the American people know about, need to
know about, and I think it's worth saying here one more time. My friend
Tom Cole from Oklahoma said, ``Earmarks are a gateway drug to higher
spending. I suggest this bill proves that to be true. Once again,
earmarks pave the way for higher spending. And as my colleague from
Texas pointed out, that means higher taxes, less money in the
pocketbooks and wallets of the American people, more money in the hands
of the government to, frankly, misspend in ways to try to get
themselves re-elected. I think it's an important story. I think it's a
sad day, and I commend the gentlelady for asking the time, late at
night to take her time and to work hard to make sure that some
Americans know the abuse that's going on, the outrages, the hundreds of
thousands of earmarks and the hundreds of thousands of air-dropped
earmarks, special projects nobody has ever seen that are put into this
bill. And I commend you for the job you're doing.
Mrs. BLACKBURN. I thank the gentleman and I thank him for his
comments on this.
Mr. Speaker, I think that it is just one of these occurrences that
has happened tonight that you just find almost inconceivable, that the
majority could have filed a 3,565-page bill in the middle of the night
and then bring everybody back to Washington and vote it.
Now, as the gentleman from Arizona said, the fiscal year started
September 1. This is something that should have been done last summer.
But, instead, they wait until Christmas week. They file this bill in
the middle of the night. They don't give people time to read it. And
then, as we do begin to read it, we find what we thought at first was
going to be about 7,000 earmarks, read a little more, the number is
growing to 8,000. Then, Mr. Speaker, lo and behold, we get up to 9,000.
Then it goes to over 9,200. We find that 300 of those earmarks had not
been discussed by anybody. They just appeared out of thin air, like
magic. They just appeared and got written in to this bill that passed
the House tonight.
That is not fiscal responsibility. That, Mr. Speaker, is what you
call fiscal irresponsibility. It is the symbol of a broken process,
with broken priorities, and it is broken promises. That is something
that is very troubling to us as we are here this Christmas week hard at
work defending the American taxpayer. And the American taxpayer has no
better individual standing to defend them than the gentleman from
Georgia. Mr. Westmoreland has worked with and chairs the Floor Action
Team for us in the minority and does a wonderful job in that capacity.
He is an active member and a part of the leadership of the Republican
Study Committee. And I yield to him for his comments on the
legislation.
Mr. WESTMORELAND. I want to thank the lady from Tennessee for her
leadership in this and for her taking this late hour to come and be
part of a group, the Republican Study Committee, that believes in
fiscal conservatism, and are willing to stand up and fight, to be
called names in this body. In fact, I think the lady and myself and
others that have spoken here tonight have been called the fringe
because we stand up and want to debate these issues and want to bring
the truth to the American people. And to the lady from Tennessee, I
just, you know, I think that we need to clarify to the people and let
them understand what kind of position, not only us, but this whole
House was put in today because less than 24 hours ago, at about 12:30
this morning, this bill, over 3,500 pages was filed.
{time} 2330
Now, I don't know about the rest of you, and I'm sure the gentlelady
from Tennessee, but I was in the bed then, sound asleep, as I'm sure
most people were. I got up this morning and got dressed and got on a
plane and came to D.C., but the first time this bill was debated and
just the rule on this bill was about 5:30 tonight.
So put yourself in this position. Your financial officer for your
company comes in and hands you a bill like this and says could you look
at this and let me know if this is okay to finance this company for the
rest of the year, and I need to know by about 8 o'clock tonight. Now, I
think it would be impossible for them to do it. I think it would be
impossible for any of us to do that.
It's been impossible for us to take 3,500 pages, something that
weighs over 34 pounds, and try to consolidate that into information
that we can base a vote on. It's impossible.
Talking about $515 billion. Now, when I was in the Georgia
legislature, our State budget for 9 million people was a little over
$16 billion, and I thought I realized how much $1 billion was but it
was not until a friend of mine, Naomi Morgan, sent me an e-mail today,
in fact, and pointed out several things to me.
One billion, if 1 billion were seconds and we went back 1 billion
seconds, we would be in 1959. 1959 is 1 billion seconds from right now.
And when you're talking about that, we just got through
[[Page H15733]]
passing a $515 billion bill in less than 24 hours, that's scary, isn't
it? And.
The other thing is 1 billion minutes, if we went back 1 billion
minutes from now, Jesus would be walking the earth. Jesus would be
walking the earth 1 billion minutes ago.
Sometimes we lose perspective. We've been up here too long when we
just throw around the word ``billion,'' but we were asked today to vote
in less than 24 hours on a 3,500 page bill, weighs over 35 pounds, and
contained $515 billion worth of spending.
You know, that shows me that the process is broken, and when the
process is broken, the product is flawed. This process has been broken.
Now, we were lied to or misled. I'd hate to think that they purposely
lied, but I think they misled us and the American people, the majority
party, on the first day when they talked about a new open process, a
new bipartisan spirit. See, I represent about 700,000 people, as every
Member in this body does, and those 700,000 people want to have some
type of input into the situation, and you know, unfortunately, I've not
had any input in this bill. There has not been any amendments to be
allowed.
We could not look at all the 9,000 or so earmarks in this bill to see
if they were justified, but I do want to tell the American people,
because one of the things other than spending too much of their money
has been illegal immigration. Now, that is a high topic, and I want the
American people, and I think this is very important because every town
hall meeting I have and I don't know about you, every town hall meeting
I have, every teleconference I have, the hottest topic that we have is
illegal immigration. Now, this should really at least let the public
know the priorities that the majority party has.
$10 million in this bill in that 3,500-page bill over there, $10
million of it went for emergency spending for defense attorneys for
illegal immigrants. $10 million of that bill goes for defense attorneys
in emergency spending for illegal immigrants; yet we did not fund our
troops in Iraq one dime.
Mrs. BLACKBURN. I think that this is such an important part of this
bill because we have talked a good bit about our troops in Iraq not
being funded in this bill, and then when we talk about the gimmickry,
and just I hate to even use the term. It's almost like a sleight of
hand.
Mr. WESTMORELAND. Smoke and mirrors.
Mrs. BLACKBURN. Smoke and mirrors, it is indeed, where they come in
and they're going to make it very difficult to build the fence.
You know, they have $2.7 billion for border security funds in the
homeland security accounts, and then they have another $225 million for
GSA related to the border fence. Then they turn around and there is
$10.5 million for defender services for illegal immigrants. And we know
that what they've done is to go in and make it very, very difficult.
The bill releases $650 million of this funding for the border fence
only after, and that is where they're setting up roadblock, only after
the Appropriations Committee is satisfied with the Department of
Homeland Security's expenditure plan and that 15 conditions listed in
the bill are met.
Now, as the gentleman knows, every time we do a town hall meeting
people are so concerned about the loss of this Nation's sovereignty,
about the loss of security in our communities. Because the illegal
immigration issue is not addressed, every State's a border State, and
every town is a border town, and now we see that they're playing
tricks. They're going to say, well, we're going to go under emergency
money and we're going to put it in here that it could be released if we
decided it was an emergency, and oh, by the way, we're going to release
part of it only after the Appropriations Committee is satisfied.
Well, what's satisfied one person's requirements may not satisfy
another because it is subjective, and that will be released at that
time. And then you have got 15 conditions. Well, you can make it
impossible to ever satisfy a list of conditions, Mr. Speaker, if your
goal is to block something. If your plan is to fail, you can develop a
plan to fail, and that is what we see in this 3,565 pages of a budget
document is how to fail.
And I yield back to the gentleman.
Mr. WESTMORELAND. I was going to say, and trust me, what you were
just talking about as far as meeting these requirements, trust me, this
$10.5 million that we're spending on these defense attorneys for these
illegal immigrants, trust me, they're going to law you up and keep us
from building that fence.
And you know, now when my constituents say, Congressman, why aren't
we building that fence, why aren't we securing the border, then I've
got something I can tell them now. I can give them that 3,500-page
bill, of course there's no telling what it would cost them to get a
copy of that, 35 pounds of paper there, and say it's in this bill that
we will build the fence but only under certain conditions.
And I think the gentlelady from Tennessee, or anybody that's had a
town hall meeting, would agree that these people do not care about the
conditions. The only conditions they want is they want a fence. They
want a border. They want a secure country because no country without
secure borders is secure.
And so that's what the American people want, not stumbling blocks and
not something big enough to hide $10.5 million in for defense attorneys
in emergency spending. Now, this is emergency spending for the illegal
immigrants. We've got some true emergencies, but it's not in defending
them. It's in allowing them to come here.
So I just hope that the American people, that tonight somehow that we
have made a difference or maybe had at least some eye opening with some
of the information that we've given them about this bill over here that
we were asked to vote on today, and I hope that they will understand
that this is not an easy process.
But the process is broken, and I will be honest with you, it was
broken when we were in charge, but it's lost another wheel. We may have
only been one wheel short when we were in charge, but trust me, both
axles are broken right now, and it's just being drug along the ground.
It is broken. The product is flawed.
We need to start over. I would hope that the President would veto
this bill. I would hope that he would veto this bill and get us back to
the table so we can take some of these things back out, save the
taxpayers some money.
But I do appreciate, again, the leadership of the gentlelady from
Tennessee and her willingness to come here this late at night and try
to explain some of this to the American people so that they can have a
better understanding of some of the challenges that we're faced with
and some of the opportunities that the majority party is taking with
smoke-and-mirror bills like we passed today.
So I want to thank the gentlelady.
Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Georgia, and
you know, I think it is so important that, once again, I remind
individuals at house.gov/hensarling/rsc you can get a little bit of a
summary of the bill.
Of course, you know, it's one of these things where, Mr. Speaker, we
have had it for only a very short period of time because it was less
than 24 hours ago that it was even put up on-line for Members to be
certain that they had the chance to look at it. I was one of those
Members up. I was at home working away, trying to get things finished
to get some of my Christmas cooking done and my Christmas ironing done
and ready for the holiday season with my family. And I will tell you,
it is of such concern to me that we see the manner in which this has
been constructed and pulled together.
I do hope that the American people will sit down and look through
some of this and see where this money is going. My goodness, when you
see $11 billion for emergency designated spending and then you see that
the budget's criteria for emergency spending is sudden, unforeseen,
temporary, urgent, et cetera, and that is where you see some of the
gimmickry begin to come in.
Of course, these are things that we all agree with. There's money for
drought relief, which that's been very difficult, but $20 million for
farm service agency salaries and expenses, that should have been
something that was anticipated.
Eight million dollars for Department of Justice administrative review
and
[[Page H15734]]
appeals; $10 million for legal activities, salaries and expense; $7
million for U.S. attorneys, salaries and expenses; $15 million for U.S.
marshals, services, salaries and expenses; $143.5 million for FBI
salaries and expenses; $2 million for Drug Enforcement Agency, salaries
and expenses; $14.5 million for Court of Appeals, salaries and
expenses. Mr. Speaker, salaries and expenses should be something that
was anticipated. I'm not certain that meets the criteria of emergency.
Emergency should be something that is unforeseen, that we didn't know
was going to happen. Now, if we have people on our payroll and we do
expect them to get a paycheck, then that salary and the related
expenses and benefits are something that we should be planning for.
Then there's the $10.5 million that the gentleman from Georgia and I
have discussed where you set aside the money for illegal immigrants to
be able to have attorneys to defend them. And then there's the ruse of
the border fence with the money that's being appropriated but then you
can't get to it.
There's $300 million for wildfire suppression and $195 million for
the Minnesota bridge accident, which occurred many months ago.
{time} 2345
And here is $100 million for Presidential security at political
conventions.
Mr. Speaker, it may be a news flash. This may be totally new to many
people, but we have a political convention every 4 years. This is
something we should be planning for. It should not be an emergency
expense that we are going to have to have Presidential security at the
political conventions. Cities go to great lengths to bid to get these
conventions, to be able to hold them. We know that every 4 years we are
going to have a Presidential election. This is something that is
anticipated. It is not an emergency that is unexpected.
Mr. WESTMORELAND. Will the gentlewoman yield?
Mrs. BLACKBURN. I will gladly yield.
Mr. WESTMORELAND. You just told me something new when you were
reading out those salaries in there under emergency spending. So we are
paying district attorneys and judges and other people these salaries in
emergency spending, but yet we are not funding our troops in Iraq. Is
that what you're telling me?
Mrs. BLACKBURN. Reclaiming my time, that is what we have found. That
is all a part of the emergency spending component. That's why I think
it's so interesting when you go through and read the summary on this
bill because you find that in order to carry out the ability to spend a
little more on programs where they want to spend more, what they have
done is to shift the cost. And so if you can put it under emergency
spending and then not have to submit it to the PAYGO rules, then it
allows you to be able to spend a little bit more.
Mr. WESTMORELAND. So this is more smoke and mirrors, is what you're
saying?
Mrs. BLACKBURN. It is more of the smoke and mirrors, and I am sure it
was concocted in a smokefilled room. But it just doesn't make good
sense, and it's just not common sense in the way it ought to be done
when you look at your different allocations and your different lines.
And certainly there are many people listening to this who sit on county
commissions and city councils and they are in State legislatures and
they are listening to this and they are pulling down this budget
document and they are saying, We could never get away with something
like this.
Mr. WESTMORELAND. The funny thing is if we had corporate officers
that were running their companies like that, we would have them in
front of the Government Reform Committee and having a hearing on them.
It's embarrassing that we are running our government the way we are
running it, and yet we are having hearings about these corporate
officers that are doing things in the dark of night and in smoke and
mirror, phony documents that they're doing.
Mrs. BLACKBURN. Yes. Reclaiming my time, the next segment that I have
here is after the emergency spending, which I was reading through, then
we get into the budget gimmicks, and you see how they have pulled in
$10.2 billion in gimmicks that are being used to artificially lower the
cost of the bill. And it goes through this with some transportation
funds; the crime victims fund; advanced appropriations, which sounds
just a little bit sneaky there. It increases some funding for the BRAC
account, and there's a way that's kind of shifted and moved around.
And then following that we get into each of the individual
Departments, each of the appropriations bills, with the Agriculture
bill, Commerce-Justice-Science, Energy and Water. We go through each of
these and list where some of the provisions are and some of the
increases. There is an increase in here for salaries and expenses at
the Food and Drug Administration from $1.57 billion to $172 billion. An
increase for conservation programs. The Legal Services Corporation, the
LSC, it gives $350 million for them, $1 million over the fiscal year
2007.
Now, the Legal Services Corporation is free legal aid. They represent
individuals that sue the government. So we are going to increase their
funding, but we are not going to fund our troops, and we are not going
to get that fence built and secure that border. So in here is increased
funding for energy efficiency and renewable energy programs from $1.47
billion to $1.72 billion.
Mr. WESTMORELAND. Fuzzy math.
Mrs. BLACKBURN. And there again you see that we are increasing that.
We are increasing the Department of the Interior programs, but we are
not funding our troops. We see increased funding for the IRS. They are
going from $10.60 billion to $10.89 billion, and it is an increase of
$295.3 million or 2.8 percent over their fiscal year 2007 numbers. So
we are going to increase money for the IRS, but we are not going to get
that money to our troops.
Mr. WESTMORELAND. Will the gentlewoman yield?
Mrs. BLACKBURN. I will gladly yield.
Mr. WESTMORELAND. I don't know how your constituents are going to
feel about that, but when I go home and tell my constituents that we
increased the IRS spending more than the normal 4 percent, or whatever
it is, we have increased it double, and yet we didn't want to give any
money to our troops in Iraq, they're going to be kind of mad about
that. But then when I tell them they put up roadblocks about building
the fence and we didn't fund our troops in Iraq, they're going to be
upset about that. And then when I tell them about the $10 million in
emergency spending for defense attorneys, I think they are really going
to be mad about that.
I hope the American people get a good grip on this.
Mrs. BLACKBURN. When I go back and say they were going to increase
funding to the IRS and it would be $10.89 billion, my constituents are
going to say that's why you need to get rid of the IRS, and that's why
we need to have a fair tax.
Mr. WESTMORELAND. Absolutely.
Mrs. BLACKBURN. And that is what we will hear from our constituents.
And the list goes on and on, as you can see. I have got plenty of
pages that we could flip through. We even have title X and family
planning money that is increased by $300 million. And I find it so very
interesting that they go in and they increase the title X and the
Family Planning money, but guess what? What they didn't do was to
increase the money for the abstinence education program. Now, how about
that, Mr. Speaker? That funding was held level. It was held level. And
Family Planning and Planned Parenthood will get big increases, but
abstinence education will not.
Well, Mr. Speaker, as I have said several times tonight, budgets are
about priorities. Budget documents tell you where you want your
emphasis to be. And what we see from this majority is a budget process
that is broken, with priorities that are broken, and promises that are
broken. And we have a 3,565-page bill that weighs 34.4 pounds when you
print it out. It contains over 9,200 earmarks. There are lots of pet
projects, lots of pork in this big Santa sack. What is missing is
funding for the troops on the ground in Iraq.
I find it very sad, very sad indeed, that it is the men and women who
defend this great Nation who are left out in the cold this
Christmastime. They are the ones that should be at the very
[[Page H15735]]
top of the list, Mr. Speaker. We should think of them first. We should
honor them in the way that we do our jobs. We are a Nation at war. We
know that. That is something I think most people in this body agree
with. And we pass a budget that does not include them and does not
include the funding to meet their needs.
Mr. Speaker, you and I would not be able to stand in this Chamber and
have this debate if it were not for the men and women of the U.S.
military. We should honor them. They should have been Title I, Page 1.
And instead they are nowhere to be found in 3,565 pages. That is a
serious oversight.
And, once again, we can talk about all the other things. We can talk
about the illegal immigrants being able to get funding for attorneys.
We can talk about roadblocks to having the borders secured, things that
are purposely placed there; but the most egregious oversight is the
fact that it does not fund our troops.
As I close, I will say God bless those troops. God bless their
families. And, Mr. Speaker, my prayer is that this House will reverse
itself and will put them first in this budget document.
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