[Congressional Record Volume 155, Number 136 (Thursday, September 24, 2009)]
[House]
[Page H9919]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                 WHERE IS THE HEALTH CARE REFORM BILL?

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Deal) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. DEAL of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, Congress recessed on July 31 for 
the beginning of the August recess. On that day, H.R. 3200 passed out 
of the committees that had jurisdiction. That is the health care reform 
bill. It passed out of the Energy and Commerce Committee, on which I 
serve, late on that Friday evening, the last day in July. And everybody 
in this House went home for the August recess.
  During that period of time, I held town hall meetings, as did many of 
my colleagues. There were TEA parties. There were freedom rallies. The 
American public spoke out as they have not done in a very long time and 
much of their frustration centered around the bill H.R. 3200 that at 
that point in time had passed all of the committees of the House and 
was ready for action on the floor.
  But the American public sent a message, a message that they don't 
like the runaway spending that Congress has been engaged in. They don't 
like many of the programs that they think are jeopardizing the future 
of their children and grandchildren in terms of the repayment 
responsibilities. But more than anything else, they sent the message 
that they do not want their health care tampered with and taken over by 
the United States Government.
  Now, surprisingly, that message apparently has not been heard on the 
floor of this House.
  Yesterday in the committee of primary jurisdiction that has H.R. 
3200, the bill was, in effect, reopened for further amendments. Now, 
you would think that if the bill is going to be revisited that we would 
have heard not only from the American people but we would have heard 
from the President of the United States, who on September 9 spoke right 
here on the floor of the House. At the time he enunciated issues that 
he was in favor of. Republicans agreed with many of those things. But 
the question we had at the time was, where is the bill that embodies 
the things that you say you're in favor of? We did not see a bill then, 
and, unfortunately, we have not seen one since that time.
  So yesterday in the committee of primary jurisdiction, you would 
think that we would have seen a bill that embraced the principles that 
the President said he was in favor of even though they were not 
embraced in the bill that was the only bill before this House when the 
President was actually speaking. You would think it would have embraced 
many of the issues that the American public said they were concerned 
about.
  Republicans attempted to offer a bill that would have embraced those 
issues where there should be bipartisan support, but we were not 
allowed to have a vote.
  There are many issues that are encompassed in this debate. One that I 
have supported for a very long time is that if we are going to use 
taxpayer money, we should verify the citizenship of individuals who are 
going to receive the benefits of that taxpayer money because unless 
that is verified, there is no validity to simply saying that we are not 
going to spend taxpayers' money for people who have violated our law 
and are coming into our country inappropriately.
  So the question remains, Where are we on health care reform? The 
rumors now abound that Speaker Pelosi is about to introduce a bill that 
purports to address the issues she's concerned with. We haven't seen 
the bill. I would ask the question, Is that bill going to come before 
the committees of jurisdiction? Is there going to be a hearing on it? 
Are committees going to have the opportunity to amend it? Or is it 
going to go, as so many other things have gone in this body during 
these last few months, straight to the floor of this House with very 
little, if any, opportunity to have an input from the Representatives, 
who are the elected representatives of the people of this great 
country?
  Those are the questions that still remain. They are still unanswered.
  I would conclude, again, if there is something that we have gained 
from what we have heard from the President and, more particularly, what 
we have heard from the American public during the August recess, where 
is the bill that puts it in writing? We have yet to see it.

                          ____________________