[Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 86 (Wednesday, June 9, 2010)]
[House]
[Pages H4271-H4274]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




  DIRECTING CLERK OF THE HOUSE TO ENSURE THAT CBO COST ESTIMATES ARE 
                           PUBLICLY AVAILABLE

  Mr. BRADY of Pennsylvania. Madam Speaker, I move to suspend the rules 
and agree to the resolution (H. Res. 1178) directing the Clerk of the 
House of Representatives to compile the cost estimates prepared by the 
Congressional Budget Office which are included in reports filed by 
committees of the House on approved legislation and post such estimates 
on the official public Internet site of the Office of the Clerk, as 
amended.
  The Clerk read the title of the resolution.
  The text of the resolution is as follows:

                              H. Res. 1178

       Resolved,

     SECTION 1. INTERNET POSTING OF CONGRESSIONAL BUDGET OFFICE 
                   COST ESTIMATES.

       (a) Internet Posting.--The Clerk of the House of 
     Representatives shall ensure that cost estimates prepared by 
     the Congressional Budget Office are available to the public 
     by including a link to the official web site of the 
     Congressional Budget Office on the official public Internet 
     site of the Office of the Clerk.
       (b) Regulations.--The Clerk shall carry out this resolution 
     in accordance with regulations promulgated by the Committee 
     on House Administration.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Brady) 
and the gentleman from California (Mr. Daniel E. Lungren) each will 
control 20 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Pennsylvania.


                             General Leave

  Mr. BRADY of Pennsylvania. Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent 
that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and 
extend their remarks and to include extraneous material on the measure 
now under consideration.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Pennsylvania?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. BRADY of Pennsylvania. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as 
I may consume.
  The American people are increasingly interested in the nuts and bolts 
of the legislative process. Americans are especially interested in the 
Congressional Budget Office's estimates of how pending legislation may 
increase or decrease the budget deficit.
  Under House rules, CBO cost estimates are included in committee 
reports which are printed once filed with the Clerk and later made 
available online, but the cost estimates in committee reports are not 
particularly easy to find online within those committee reports, even 
if one knows where to look. The gentleman's resolution will make it 
easier to find cost estimates by having the Clerk link her Web site 
directly to the CBO public site. This excellent proposal will make CBO 
spending-related information more widely available than it is now. I 
have consulted with the Clerk's office, which supports the idea and has 
assured me the cost will be minimal.
  Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. DANIEL E. LUNGREN of California. Madam Speaker, I yield myself 
such time as I may consume.
  Madam Speaker, I rise in opposition to H. Res. 1178, directing the 
Clerk of the House of Representatives to ensure that cost estimates 
prepared by the Congressional Budget Office are available to the 
public. Shouldn't we be spending our time perhaps having the Budget 
Committee meet and giving us a budget this year? I mean, the 
distinguished chairman of the Budget Committee, Mr. Spratt, whom I hold 
in

[[Page H4272]]

tremendous regard, said a number of years ago when the Republicans were 
in charge, If you can't set a budget, you can't govern. So instead of 
us giving meat, we're giving what? I don't know what you would call 
this? It's not even broth.
  While I approve of measures that will help the American people know 
where their money is being spent, that really is the definition of a 
budget: a budget is the blueprint. In the mid-1970s, we passed the 
Budget and Impoundment Act for the purpose, purportedly, of making sure 
that Congress was required to come up with a blueprint that would guide 
it. Now, it's supposed to be a concurrent resolution, meaning that both 
Houses pass it. It doesn't go to the President for a signature, so it's 
an internal document to this institution, that is, the Congress of the 
United States. And its purpose is to set out markers that will 
establish the guidelines for spending for the year.
  That's one of the reasons we have a Rules Committee that would be 
required to give a waiver on a budget if an appropriations bill came 
here in violation of the budget. Well, we're not going to have that 
this year because we're not going to have a budget. Maybe what we're 
going to do is we're going to deem things. Remember that from the 
health care bill: we're going to deem it passed. And when the American 
people heard about that, they said, well, you can't do that. And 
finally the majority fell off on that one. But I suppose that's what 
we're going to do when we bring appropriation bills to the floor. 
They're going to be deemed to meet the budget that doesn't exist. So 
instead of us giving us meat like that, we're going to bring up this 
bill.
  What does it do? What does it do? It requires the Clerk of the House 
to have on her Web site a link to the CBO analysis. Well, that would be 
important if they weren't available already, but they're available both 
through Thomas.gov and the CBO Web site. So I thought maybe it's 
because the Clerk has some responsibility over the Congressional Budget 
Office, but that's not the case. If you look at all of the obligations 
that the Clerk of the House has, they have absolutely nothing to do 
with the Congressional Budget Office.
  So what are we doing here? We're bringing a bill to the floor which 
pretends, it seems to me, to do something about the budget; and it's 
nothing more than a distraction. The fact of the matter is we do not 
have a budget this year; we will not have a budget this year. The 
majority has said they don't want to bring a budget forward. Now, 
certain news reports have suggested the reason why we will not have a 
budget is that it will be too embarrassing for us to bring a budget to 
the floor, particularly before an election. Now, I don't know whether 
that's true or not, but that has been cited in the public press.
  We've been hearing a lot lately from our friends on the other side 
about the importance of disclosure. Section 301 of their highly touted 
DISCLOSE Act requires reporting organizations to post a link from their 
home page to the page where its financial disclosure information is 
available; yet in this bill there is no requirement for a CBO link for 
the House's home page or for the Members' home page or from the 
committee's home page or for Members who voted for the spending that 
will impact the budget, but just from the Clerk's. I really don't 
understand what this is really going to do.
  It is telling, while the majority attempts to pass measures like 
this, we're doing nothing to actually take less of the hard-earned tax 
dollars of the American people. I was home for the last 10 days in my 
district, or at least preceding yesterday, and I didn't hear a single 
person beg me to put a link on the Clerk's Web site for this 
information. They demanded that we do something about the budget. And 
when I told them at home we're doing nothing about the budget because 
the majority has decided we're not even going to bring a budget up--
this will be the first time since we passed that law in the seventies 
that the House has not passed a budget. Now I hear them say, When the 
Republicans were in charge we didn't have a budget. That is true. 
Sometimes the Senate and the House weren't able to reconcile it, but we 
always passed a budget document from the House of Representatives.
  So we will be making history this year: no budget for the American 
people. But they can get on a link and they can go to CBO and they can 
find out what it costs for a particular bill, but they can't tell 
whether it's in the budget or not because we don't have a budget. 
We don't even have to have budget waivers this year from the Rules 
Committee because there's nothing to waive. Where are the points of 
order against excessive spending? That's what this House is built on, 
rules that are supposed to protect the taxpayer. We now are exempting 
ourselves from our own rules.

  When I go home, people say, Why doesn't Congress work under the same 
rules that the rest of the world works under? And I have to agree with 
them. Now, when I go back to my district and I talk to folks, they talk 
about the budget for their household. I met with a number of small 
business people, all the way from a small community in my district 
called Copperopolis, which celebrated its 150th anniversary, to Folsom, 
where we celebrated the 150th reenactment of the Pony Express--
actually, they may have the Pony Express there, they also have Intel 
there--down to Citrus Heights in my district, talking to people all the 
time, and they kept saying, Why are you taxing so much? Why are you 
spending so much? Why are you busting the budget? Why are you putting 
all of this heavy debt burden on our kids? And I said, Those are the 
same questions I'm asking. When I go back, I'll ask them again. So I'm 
asking right here, Why are we doing it? And instead of us getting 
serious, we're going to have this: give you a link to the Clerk's 
office so that somehow you can find the estimate that's already 
available on two other Web sites.
  Now, what are we doing? Have we run out of post offices to name? We 
have rid the world of the scourge of unnamed post offices in this 
Congress, and now maybe we're going to start going link by link by link 
by link. I've been in this Congress for a number of years. I didn't 
realize it took us to pass a resolution to allow the Clerk to do this. 
Maybe that's something we have to do from now on.
  Madam Speaker, instead of wasting the time of this House, maybe we 
should actually lower the cost estimates produced by the CBO. That 
would be a good thing; we'll actually take an effort to try and lower 
them. But the first way you do that is adopt a budget where you debate 
it and we come to the floor and we say this is what we can afford and 
this is what we can't afford. We're not even doing that.
  It would be irresponsible for any family in my district to not have a 
budget. It would be irresponsible for any business in my district to 
not have a budget. It would be irresponsible for any local government 
in my district to not have a budget, yet we don't have a budget. So 
instead of dealing with that, we are here dealing with this bill.
  I don't question the gentleman's sincerity in offering this bill. I 
don't suggest he doesn't want more transparency. But, frankly, 
transparency over a system that doesn't have the essential foundation 
of a budget is really a wisp in the wind.
  Madam Speaker, I reluctantly oppose this.
  I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. BRADY of Pennsylvania. Madam Speaker, I am pleased to yield 5 
minutes to the distinguished sponsor of the resolution, the gentleman 
from New York (Mr. Murphy).
  Mr. MURPHY of New York. Thank you, Mr. Brady, for yielding.
  I rise today in support of my resolution, House Resolution 1178, 
requiring the Clerk of the House to make available Congressional Budget 
Office cost estimates for each bill considered by the House by 
including a link to the official CBO Web site on the Clerk's official 
Web site.
  For every bill that comes to the House floor from committee, there is 
included a cost estimate or a score. This estimate is included with the 
conference report. We here in the House all know this and we use these 
scores to make informed decisions about our votes every day. But the 
CBO score can be difficult to find for my constituents. I've had many 
complaints about this from people in my district looking to find out 
what we are spending our money on here.
  The Clerk's office keeps the official records of the bills that we 
are working

[[Page H4273]]

on; and by including this link, it will be much easier for constituents 
all over the country to get access to this important spending 
information and how these bills that we're working on will affect the 
bottom line of government finance.

                              {time}  1245

  The CBO score lets us know how this legislation will affect our long-
term fiscal solvency and whether it will increase our debt. Obviously, 
as we live in this time of very great debt, it is something that is 
very important to my constituents. Making sure that our constituents 
have the information they need to see how legislation will affect them 
and their families is not only good policy but good government. By 
promoting openness and transparency in everything we do here in 
Congress, we can begin to restore the public's trust in this body.
  For me, openness and transparency are things I've been working on 
since I got here just a year ago, and there are many opportunities for 
us in Congress to do this and to dialogue more effectively with our 
constituents so they know what we are doing here in Washington. For me, 
that includes posting my schedule online so that people can find out 
what I'm doing every day on their behalf. It includes posting 
appropriations requests online so that people can see for what money I 
am asking for my district. This is the kind of transparency that people 
tell me every day they want to see, and this resolution will do that 
with respect to CBO scores and making them available about the 
legislation we are considering here.
  This legislation is only one piece of the equation in increasing 
openness and transparency in Congress, but it is a critical component 
to ensure that our constituents have the information they need to 
accurately judge our actions here in Congress and to ensure that we 
continue to uphold the standards of our office. Beyond reforms like 
this, it is our responsibility as Representatives to do our own part to 
promote openness and transparency. It is the only way that we can 
restore faith in this broken system.
  Again, I would like to thank Chairman Brady and Ranking Member 
Lungren for their support in bringing this resolution to the floor.
  Mr. DANIEL E. LUNGREN of California. I yield myself such time as I 
may consume.
  Madam Speaker, I appreciate what the gentleman said. However, the CBO 
scores are already linked for the public to view through Thomas.gov as 
well as a large number of other House, Senate, and other private Web 
sites.
  To find out how many, we went and we did a Google search. It reveals 
over 1,180 Web sites which link to the CBO home page. 1,180 Web sites 
are already linked to the CBO home page. In addition, the estimates are 
already publicly available on the CBO Web site, so adding a link there 
from the Clerk's Web page doesn't make it any more available than it 
already is.
  Again, I would just say this: When I was home, not a single person 
said the way to solve the problem is to put a link on the Clerk's Web 
site to the CBO estimates that are already available on 1,180 Web 
sites. What people back home said is, Get a grip on reality. Stop 
spending too much. Stop taxing too much. Stop putting us into debt--and 
for God's sake, can't you at least spend time coming up with a budget?
  I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Walden).
  Mr. WALDEN. I want to thank my colleague from California for his 
comments.
  Madam Speaker, I guess the question I would have is: Is there 
anything in our rules that would prohibit the Clerk from just doing 
this without legislation, without a resolution? Has anybody just asked 
the Clerk to do this?
  Do you know?
  Mr. DANIEL E. LUNGREN of California. If the gentleman would yield, 
frankly, I don't know. That has not been presented to us at all.
  Mr. WALDEN. It would seem to me that the Clerk works for the House, 
and if the majority party just wanted to ask the Clerk to put a link on 
the Web site, it should be able to be done. It shouldn't be a problem.
  Besides that, I want to get to the real issue here, which is: Where 
is the budget?
  You know, taxpayers every April 15 are required by law to file their 
taxes, and this Congress is supposed to come up with a budget. If you 
go back to 1974, which is when the Budget and Impoundment Control Act 
was passed, every year, the House has had at least a vote on a budget--
not always on time, but at least you've always had a vote. We don't 
even have a budget. So we're spending time here arguing about whether 
the Clerk should link to the CBO site when we ought to be having a real 
debate on America's future and on a budget.
  When I was home over this break, I talked to a lot of Oregonians who 
are fearful and angry about the runaway deficit spending. They 
understand the implications on their kids and on their grandkids. They 
don't believe Washington is listening, and I think this is an example 
of that. We're having a debate on something which, I think, the Clerk 
could probably do of her own volition. Certainly, the Speaker could ask 
her to, and I don't think anybody would object. It just doesn't make 
sense to me. So you don't have an appropriations bill moving. You don't 
have a budget coming. We can name post offices and we can honor sports 
teams, but we can't address the very problem that is costing us jobs in 
America.
  I was a small business owner for nearly 22 years. The pressure from 
this government on the back of small business is killing jobs, and it 
is keeping people away from creating jobs. The high taxes, the high 
regulations, the uncertainty in the marketplace are costing the economy 
and jobs.
  Mr. BRADY of Pennsylvania. I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. DANIEL E. LUNGREN of California. If the gentleman has no more 
speakers, I will yield myself the balance of my time.
  Madam Speaker, again, the point is that there are 1,180 Web sites 
already linking to the CBO. If anything would add to the frustration of 
the American people, it would be in response to their complaint that we 
are spending too much, taxing too much, putting them in too much debt, 
and we don't even have a budget, but we're going to give them a link. 
Maybe Patrick Henry said, ``Give me a link or give me death,'' or 
something like that. I don't know.
  All I'm saying is we almost make ourselves silly here. I know that's 
not the intent of the gentleman, and I wouldn't suggest so, but back 
home, this would be considered laughable.
  With that, I would ask for a ``no'' vote on this resolution, and I 
yield back the balance of my time.
  Mr. BRADY of Pennsylvania. Madam Speaker, I heard that what we have 
to do is ask the Clerk.
  Why are we doing this? We make laws. We are making a law here now. We 
are telling the Clerk. We are not only telling this Clerk. We are 
telling any Clerk that we want to put a Web site on the Clerk's page 
for our constituents to see.
  Then I hear that we're spending time arguing. We're not spending time 
arguing. You're spending time arguing over something that doesn't 
pertain to this bill. We're not spending time arguing. We would have 
gotten done in 5 minutes, but because you wouldn't let me speak and 
because you're allowed to, you're arguing, not us.
  So, with that, I thank the gentleman from New York for his great 
contribution to transparency. Transparency, transparency, transparency. 
When we go a little step further, we get a rebuttal. I thank the 
gentleman for his sunshine--for making people see easily without 
looking through all of the other Web sites, rather just on the Web site 
of the Clerk of the House, and we're getting that. So I thank the 
gentleman from New York for his contribution to transparency and to 
sunshine in government.
  I urge an ``aye'' vote, and I yield back the balance of my time.


                Announcement by the Speaker Pro Tempore

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Members are reminded to address their 
remarks in debate to the Chair and not in the second person.
  Ms. McCOLLUM. Madam Speaker, I rise today in support of H. Res. 1178, 
which directs the Clerk of the House of Representatives to compile the 
cost estimates prepared by the Congressional Budget Office which are 
included in reports filed by committees of the House on approved 
legislation and post such estimates on the official public Internet 
site of the Office of the Clerk.

[[Page H4274]]

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion offered by the 
gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Brady) that the House suspend the 
rules and agree to the resolution, H. Res. 1178, as amended.
  The question was taken.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. In the opinion of the Chair, two-thirds 
being in the affirmative, the ayes have it.
  Mr. BRADY of Pennsylvania. Madam Speaker, on that I demand the yeas 
and nays.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX and the 
Chair's prior announcement, further proceedings on this motion will be 
postponed.

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