[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 27 (Friday, February 18, 2011)]
[House]
[Pages H1202-H1227]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
FULL-YEAR CONTINUING APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 2011
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Price of Georgia). Pursuant to House
Resolution 92 and rule XVIII, the Chair declares the House in the
Committee of the Whole House on the State of the Union for the further
consideration of the bill, H.R. 1.
{time} 0910
In the Committee of the Whole
Accordingly, the House resolved itself into the Committee of the
Whole House on the State of the Union for the further consideration of
the bill (H.R. 1) making appropriations for the Department of Defense
and the other departments and agencies of the Government for the fiscal
year ending September 30, 2011, and for other purposes, with Mr. Bishop
of Utah (Acting Chair) in the chair.
The Clerk read the title of the bill.
The Acting CHAIR. When the Committee of the Whole rose on the
legislative day of Thursday, February 17, 2011, a request for a
recorded vote on amendment No. 466 printed in the Congressional Record
offered by the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Poe) had been postponed, and
the bill had been read through page 359, line 22.
Amendment No. 575 Offered by Mr. Rehberg
Mr. REHBERG. I have an amendment at the desk.
The Acting CHAIR. The Clerk will designate the amendment.
The text of the amendment is as follows:
At the end of the bill (before the short title), insert the
following:
Sec. __. None of the funds made available by this Act may
be paid to any employee, officer, contractor, or grantee of
any department or agency funded by title VIII of division B
of this Act to implement the provisions of Public Law 111-148
or title I or subtitle B of title II of Public Law 111-152.
[[Page H1203]]
Point of Order
Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chairman, I rise to make a point of order on the
amendment.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentlewoman will state her point of order.
Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chairman, I make a point of order against the
Rehberg amendment because it violates clause 3(j)(3) of House
Resolution 5 by proposing a net increase in budget authority in the
bill. According to a cost estimate received from the Congressional
Budget Office, the Rehberg amendment would increase net budget
authority in the bill by $2 billion in fiscal year 2012 and a total of
$5.5 billion over 10 years. Let me repeat that. That is adding $5.5
billion to the deficit. And I have, in my hand here, the CBO estimate
of the budgetary effects of amendment 575 to H.R. 1, a CBO document.
The House rules package, adopted at the beginning of this Congress in
House Resolution 5, includes the following rule in section 3(j)(3):
``It shall not be in order to consider an amendment to a general
appropriations bill proposing a net increase in budget authority in the
bill.''
According to the CBO estimate, the Rehberg amendment does, in fact,
produce a net increase in budget authority and is, therefore, not in
order.
The majority have raised a point of order on all other amendments
that violate this rule in section 3(j)(3) because they increase net
budget authority; yet on this amendment by Mr. Rehberg, that is not the
case. It would seem that on the question of health care, the majority
is not abiding by its own rules to reduce the deficit.
I ask a ruling from the Chair.
The Acting CHAIR. Does any other Member wish to be heard on the point
of order?
Mr. REHBERG. Mr. Chair, I wish to be heard on the point of order.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from Montana is recognized.
Mr. REHBERG. I have been advised by the chairman of the Committee on
Budget that my amendment complies with all applicable rules of the
House. The point of order that my amendment violates clause 10 of rule
XXI, known as the cut-go rule, is inapplicable in this case. The cut-go
rule does provide a point of order against amendments to appropriations
bills that cause an increase in mandatory spending over the 5-year
scoring window. However, that rule contains an important exception. The
point of order applies only to provisions that are modifications to
substantive law. My amendment does not constitute such a modification;
rather, it is a temporary provision limiting the use of funds in this
act for the implementation of the law in a particular fiscal year.
As the chairman of the Committee on the Budget stated, my amendment
does not make a modification to substantive law in a year after the
year for which the bill makes appropriations. Accordingly, the
prohibition contained in clause 10 of rule XXI does not apply to my
amendment, and the point of order should be overruled.
And I respectfully ask the Chair for a ruling.
The Acting CHAIR. Does anyone else wish to be heard on the point of
order?
Mr. ANDREWS. Mr. Chairman, I wish to be heard on the point of order.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from New Jersey is recognized.
Mr. ANDREWS. The gentlelady from Connecticut's point of order should
be sustained, and, frankly, the chairman's arguments are deficient in
two respects:
First, he notes that the chairman of the Budget Committee's opinion
is that the point of order should not be sustained. Although I realize
that the chairman of the Budget Committee's opinion by custom is given
some sort of special gravity on these kind of questions, with all due
respect, the Chair is the Chair. The Chair is the authority here, and
the Chair's responsibility is to follow the rules of the House which
very clearly state that a piece of legislation that has a net increase
in budget authority is out of order under these circumstances.
Secondly, the chairman makes the argument that this is not a change
in substantive law. One first would wonder why it's then being offered.
But secondly, it seems to me that if agents of the executive branch
have a responsibility and that responsibility includes discretion as to
how to carry out a certain law, prohibiting them from carrying out that
responsibility and limiting their discretion is, in fact, a significant
change in substantive law.
On those grounds, I would urge that the point of order be sustained.
The Acting CHAIR. Does any other Member wish to be heard on the point
of order?
Mr. PALLONE. I rise to be heard on the point of order, Mr. Chairman.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from New Jersey is recognized.
Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Chairman, I just find it incredible what I am
hearing on the other side of the aisle here because we've gone through
several weeks now where basically the rules have been changed so that
the Budget Committee chairman basically does whatever he pleases and
has the authority almost like equal to the rest of the House, the way
the Republicans have given him this authority. It's sort of like a one-
man dictatorship. So I'm not sure that I am particularly interested in
his opinion on this one.
But beyond that--and I will follow up on my colleague from New
Jersey--when you talk about substantive changes to the law, the whole
purpose of this amendment is to basically gut the health care reform
and make sure that it never takes place. And if it were to become law,
if it were to be adopted, that is exactly what would happen. This has a
major substantive impact.
And beyond that, what we're highlighting here is the fact that here
we have the Republicans saying that they are trying to save money or
cut spending when, in reality, what they are doing with this amendment
is increasing the deficit and actually making it more difficult to
create jobs.
I don't see how we could ever argue, frankly, that this amendment is
in order. It clearly increases the deficit. It clearly increases the
budget authority. It will kill the health care reform, and that's its
purpose. So I would ask that the chairman rule that this is certainly
out of order.
The Acting CHAIR. Does any other Member wish to be heard on the point
of order.
Ms. DeLAURO. Yes, Mr. Chairman, I would like to make a comment on the
point of order.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentlewoman from Connecticut is recognized.
Ms. DeLAURO. The chairman has argued--with all due respect to the
chairman--that the amendment does not violate clause 10 of rule XXI.
But that is not the point of order that I raised. The point of order
was section 3(j)(3) of H. Res. 5, and I will repeat what that says.
{time} 0920
``It shall not be in order to consider an amendment to a general
appropriations bill proposing a net increase in budget authority in the
bill.'' This clearly, clearly proposes an increase. And we have the
documentation from CBO.
So I am asking that this amendment be ruled out of order.
The Acting CHAIR. Is there anybody else who wishes to be heard on the
point of order?
Mr. REHBERG. Mr. Chair, if I may respond.
The Acting CHAIR. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Montana.
Mr. REHBERG. It doesn't matter which clause they want to draw from.
The chairman said there is no impact.
My amendment scores at a savings of $100 million in the current
fiscal year. That is substantive savings, and I again ask for a ruling
from the Chair.
The Acting CHAIR. Does any other Member wish to be heard on the point
of order?
If not, the Chair is prepared to rule.
The gentlewoman from Connecticut makes a point of order that the
amendment offered by the gentleman from Montana violates section 3(j)3
of House Resolution 5.
Section 3(j)3 establishes a point of order against an amendment
proposing a net increase in budget authority in the bill.
The Chair has been persuasively guided by an estimate from the chair
of the Committee on the Budget that the amendment, which proposes a
limitation on funding in the instant bill for the instant fiscal year,
does not propose a net increase in budget authority in this bill.
[[Page H1204]]
The point of order is overruled.
Pursuant to the order of the House of February 17, 2011, the
gentleman from Montana (Mr. Rehberg) and a Member opposed each will
control 30 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Montana.
Mr. REHBERG. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Chairman, my amendment is simple and straightforward. This
amendment denies any funding provided by this bill to be used by the
department or agency funded through the Labor-HHS title of the bill to
support ObamaCare. It will create a firewall so that funds from this
bill cannot be used for that purpose.
ObamaCare included mandatory funding for several provisions normally
funded through the discretionary appropriations; for example, a $1
billion implementation fund. So, unfortunately, resources will be
available to Health and Human Services. This amendment can slow but not
completely stop the process.
I have tried everything within my power to write an amendment that
would completely defund implementation yet withstand a point of order.
This is the best I can do today. I liken the situation with this bill
to trying to drive a car to the moon. A car is the wrong vehicle for
that purpose, but a car can take us on the first leg of the trip. It
can get us to the launching pad. And I will continue to do everything I
can to finish the journey.
My goal, and the goal of the majority of Americans, is to repeal the
new health care law. Until then, my objective is to defund it entirely
and stop its implementation.
It is impossible at this time to describe the many reasons that
justify defunding and repeal. Let me begin with my belief that the law
is unconstitutional. It runs contrary to our most fundamental concepts
of limited government and individual liberty and responsibility. It's a
law designed by those who wish to control every health care decision
made by health care providers and patients, by every employer and
employee, by every family and individual. It will control every aspect
of one-sixth of our economy.
This unaffordable program will cost $2.6 trillion in the first 10
years if fully implemented. Ninety percent of that cost is for Medicaid
expansion and insurance subsidies. Roughly half of the Federal
Government's costs will be paid through new taxes, penalties, and fees
on individuals and businesses. The other half is covered by cuts in
Medicare benefits.
The tax increases and regulatory burdens will be a significant drag
on economic growth and job creation, and other costs to States,
businesses and individuals are not included in the $2.6 trillion
figure.
This is a job killer. How foolhardy to create a new entitlement
program when we cannot pay for the ones we already have and cannot meet
our current operating expenses without borrowing beyond our ability to
repay. This is madness.
The structure of this bill was built on a foundation of multiple
mandates, the individual mandate that requires people to purchase
insurance whether they want to or not, mandates on States to create and
operate insurance exchanges and to expand Medicaid dramatically,
mandates on employers to provide insurance or be penalized, mandates
regarding the precise terms of insurance policies that everyone
ultimately must purchase, and on and on.
Our forefathers would be appalled to see the power over our health
and lives that we are surrendering to government. They had firsthand
experience with unfettered government control, and they carefully
designed a Constitution to limit the government's power. We've learned
nothing from them. Never has there been such a complete transfer of
power to our government with such blind faith and hope that government
will get it right when our experience in every other context is so
totally to the contrary.
This is an experiment, a huge gamble imposed on us by those who did
not read the legislation or fully understand its consequences. We are
already catching glimpses of how government power will be exercised.
Large corporations and unions have been granted waivers for mandates
they cannot meet; large corporations with armies of lawyers and unions
who hold a special place in the hearts, minds, and political campaigns
of those who enacted this bill. Will Government be so accommodating to
you?
There are problems with the existing health care system, but this law
only makes matters worse. The law must be repealed so that it can be
replaced with incremental, market-oriented, affordable measures to
improve, rather than transform, our current health care system. In the
meantime, implementation must be stopped.
There's a second reason to defund implementation. The law's
individual mandate has been declared unconstitutional by two Federal
judges. Judge Roger Vinson has written a powerful opinion that strikes
down the entire law. The administration and Congress are on notice of
the substantial risk that the Supreme Court will uphold Vinson's
decision. If that occurs after a year or more of litigation, billions
of dollars spent by the Federal Government to implement the law and by
States, businesses, individuals, and taxpayers to comply with the law
will have been completely wasted, thrown away. In light of the crisis
created by our ballooning debt and anemic economy, it is fiscally
irresponsible to go forward with implementation until the court
challenge is finally resolved.
For these reasons, I urge you to support my amendment.
I reserve the balance of my time.
Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentlewoman from Connecticut is recognized for
30 minutes.
Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 5 minutes.
The American people want us to work together to address their top
priorities--creating jobs, turning the economy around, and reducing the
deficit. The Republican majority told the American people, Vote for me,
that's what we are going to do. This is a classic case of bait and
switch.
Their first order of business was to repeal health care reform, the
results of which would add to unemployment, add to the deficit, and
delay the economic recovery. And today, by denying funds for the
implementation of health care, they are at it again.
This amendment would take away the consumer protections of the
Affordable Care Act and put the insurance companies back in charge, a
further demonstration of the majority's special interest priorities and
an hypocrisy on job creation and deficit reduction.
Repealing health care will destroy jobs in the health professions. It
will slow growth by 250,000 to 400,000 jobs a year. It will increase
medical spending and add nearly $2,000 to the average family insurance
premium. And according to CBO, repeal would add $230 billion to the
deficit in the first 10 years and $1 trillion in the second 10 years.
And let me repeat that. This amendment adds billions and ultimately
trillions of dollars to the deficit, and it starts next year with $2.2
billion.
While my colleague will say that for the rest of this year that that
isn't the case, one needs to just look at what the CBO says overall on
the $5.5 billion in deficits that this would create. This is not what
they promised the American people.
This amendment will allow insurers to charge women 48 percent more
than men for exactly the same coverage. It allows insurance companies
to once again discriminate against Americans with preexisting
conditions, even children with preexisting conditions. Women may again
be denied coverage because they survived breast cancer or because they
were a victim of domestic violence or because they had a c-section. It
will deny up to 4 million small businesses $40 billion in tax credits.
This amendment will increase drug costs for seniors. It will take
away the 50 percent discount on brand name drugs for those who have
found themselves in the doughnut hole. It will increase, also, seniors'
health care costs, making lifesaving preventive services like
mammograms, colonoscopies, wellness visits, blood pressure screenings,
and diabetes screenings more expensive. This amendment will cost money
and it will cost lives.
In Connecticut 191,000 children with preexisting conditions benefit
from the health care reform law. More than 540,000 seniors with
Medicare coverage no longer have out-of-pocket expenses
[[Page H1205]]
for recommended preventive services, and up to 15,400 small businesses
in my district alone will benefit from these tax credits.
{time} 0930
If this amendment passes, what will happen to children with
preexisting conditions, to seniors in the doughnut hole, to small
business owners trying to help their employees find quality health
insurance?
I urge my colleagues to vote against this irresponsible amendment.
I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. REHBERG. Mr. Chair, I am pleased to yield 5 minutes to my good
friend from Texas (Mr. Burgess).
Mr. BURGESS. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
As was so eloquently put forward by Mr. Rehberg, the chairman of the
Subcommittee on Health and Human Services Appropriations just a moment
ago, this is a temporary limiting amendment on the appropriations for
implementation of the Patient Protection Affordable Care Act.
``Bait and switch,'' that term was used by the other side just a
moment ago in their arguments. Bait and switch. Think back to where we
were just a little over a year ago in this House of Representatives
when the Democrats' version of a health care bill passed. Where is that
bill today? Somewhere in the dustbin out in the halls outside the
office the former Speaker now occupies.
Bait and switch. What happened on Christmas Eve of last year of 2009?
The Senate passed a bill, a bill that was never intended to become law.
It was a placeholder. It was a vehicle to simply get the Senators home
for Christmas Eve ahead of a snowstorm so that then everyone can come
back to the Capitol in January 2010 and work on the bill that would
ultimately become President Obama's health care reform. But it didn't
happen. The Democrats lost an election in Massachusetts for the Senate
seat, and that changed the paradigm, that changed the narrative, that
changed the debate.
And then what happened? The House took up the bill passed by the
Senate, conveniently, a bill that had been passed by the House of
Representatives the summer before as a housing bill, H.R. 3590. Look it
up on Thomas at home if you doubt. 3590 passed the Senate.
Why would Senator Reid--why would the other body take up a previously
passed House bill and turn it into a health care bill? Because it
wasn't a health care bill; it was a tax bill. It was a tax bill that,
by constitutional authority, had to originate in the House of
Representatives.
So then the other body had the perfect vehicle: Take this housing
bill, strip out the housing language, put in the health care language,
pass it on Christmas Eve, and then we'll all gather back after the New
Year's Eve festivities and create a conference committee and pass the
President's signature health care legislation. But it didn't happen
that way.
And then the elimination of opponents on the Democratic side began in
sequential form such that by March 23 of last year enough Democrats had
changed their votes and would support the Senate-passed House bill. And
the question, Will the House now agree to the Senate amendment on 3590?
was answered affirmatively.
But was that the end of the story? No. This was extensively litigated
in the political arena last fall. And what was the judgment of the
American people after the litigation in the political arena? The answer
was: We don't want it. We don't want any part of it. Fix it. Do
something.
So Chairman Rehberg is doing exactly that today. Within the limits
that he is constrained by in a continuing resolution, he is providing
the vehicle, the floor by which the implementation of this very flawed
process, this very flawed law can now be contained.
It was important before, but 3 weeks ago it became critical. It
became critical because of Judge Vinson's ruling. And why is that? And
I encourage my colleagues to go to Judge Vinson's ruling. It's
available on the Internet. It's not hard to read. It's about 75 pages.
Judge Vinson's ruling, page 76 of 78: ``Because the individual
mandate is unconstitutional and not severable, the entire act must be
declared void.''
Pretty clear language.
Now, why is it necessary to approach the funding? Because earlier in
his opinion Judge Vinson observed: There is a longstanding presumption
that officials of the executive branch will adhere to the law as
declared by the court. As a result, declaratory judgment is the
functional equivalent of an injunction.
Well, that should be good enough for members of the executive branch.
They had the Federal agencies. But apparently that is not so, because
what we see today in our committee hearings, in the headlines in the
newspapers is that this administration is proceeding at light speed
with implementation.
The previous health care czar is now the Deputy Chief of Staff in the
White House. What does that tell you about their plans for
implementation? In fact, the plans for implementation were going so
fast that one of the chief architects of implementation was hired 1\1/
2\ months before the bill was signed into law, and that's testimony
that we heard in our committee in Energy and Commerce this past week.
I sent a letter to Secretary Sebelius this week asking her to provide
for us what direction she was going to take in light of Judge Vinson's
ruling.
In closing, I thank the gentleman for bringing this limiting
amendment to the floor today. It is critically important that this
Congress act to limit the implementation of this very flawed health
care law. Let's get back to the work the American people asked us to do
in the election.
Congress of the United States,
House of Representatives,
Washington, DC, February 11, 2011.
Hon. Kathleen Sebelius,
Secretary of Health and Human Services,
Washington, DC.
Dear Secretary Sebelius: I write to inquire of the
Department of Health and Human Services your response to and
specifically subsequent implementation decisions made by the
Department in the wake of Judge Vinson's ruling in The State
of Florida v. United States Department of Health and Human
Services. As you are well aware, the plaintiff sought
declaratory judgment that the Patient Protection and
Affordable Care Act is unconstitutional as well as an
injunction against its enforcement.
In his opinion, Judge Vinson relied on precedent in
Committee on Judiciary of U.S. House of Representatives v.
Miers to determine that when a court issues a declaratory
judgment against federal officials, the ``declaratory
judgment is the functional equivalent of an injunction.'' He
quoted a previous United States Court of Appeals decision
which further addressed his point, ``that officials of the
Executive Branch will adhere to the law as declared by the
court. As a result, the declaratory judgment is the
functional equivalent of an injunction. . . There is no
reason to conclude that this presumption should not apply
here. Thus, the award of declaratory relief is adequate and
separate injunctive relief is not necessary.''
I would like to request information on how, in light of the
declaratory relief issued by Judge Vinson, the Department
plans to proceed in its implementation of the Patient
Protection and Affordable Care Act.
Thank you for your time and consideration on this issue and
I look forward to your response. Should you have any
questions, please contact me in my Washington office at
(202)225-7772.
Sincerely,
Michael C. Burgess, M.D.,
Member of Congress.
Ms. DeLAURO. I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr.
Miller).
(Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California asked and was given permission to
revise and extend his remarks.)
Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. I thank the gentlewoman for yielding
me this time.
The author of this amendment said a few minutes ago that this was a
very simple and straightforward amendment. And that's probably true for
Members of Congress who have government-paid health insurance, have
policies that are looked after by a PPO to make sure that we get
benefits. But if you are a member of the American public, this is not a
simple and straightforward amendment. If you are a member of the
American public, this amendment changes your life. For millions of
Americans and for millions of their children, for millions of their
parents this amendment changes their life. This isn't straightforward.
So many of our new Republican colleagues have come to town and said,
I'm just one of the folks back home. I'm not enamored with Washington.
I'm just one of the folks back home.
Vote for this amendment, and you won't be like the folks back home.
[[Page H1206]]
Vote for the amendment, and you will be very different than the folks
back home, because you will have insurance and they won't. You will
have coverage and they won't. You won't have lifetime caps and they
will. You won't lose your insurance when you need it for you, your
children, or your spouse, but your constituents will. You are not just
like the folks back home. You are doing grave damage to the folks back
home.
So you ought to think about this amendment before you vote for it.
Not only does it add $5 billion almost immediately to the deficit; it
adds $1 trillion to the deficit over 20 years, takes us in the wrong
direction. But this punishes people back home. Talk to your
constituents who now are the seniors who have that free physical
checkup and have been given medicine, have been told about things that
they are doing wrong with respect to their health and now can prevent
additional doctors' visits and hospital care because of that checkup
that they now get that this amendment would take away. Talk to the
parents. And you really ought to talk to the grandparents of the
children who now have coverage that didn't have it before. They are as
concerned about the coverage of their grandchildren as they are about
their Medicare coverage, which you will change with respect to the cost
of pharmaceuticals.
No, this isn't simple and straightforward, and this isn't just like
the folks back home. The folks back home are struggling every day to
pay their insurance premiums. Pass this amendment, and once again the
insurance companies can rip them off. Once again, they no longer have
to dedicate 80 percent of your premiums to your health care. They can
write themselves the bonuses, the advertising, the salaries, and forget
the health care.
There won't be that kind of protection for people who struggle every
month to achieve health care coverage, for the 9 million people who are
in the middle of getting rebates now because of the change in the law
to make sure that health insurance companies provide you health
insurance instead of a funding stream for the executives.
No, this isn't simple and straightforward, and you are not just like
the folks back home once you vote for this amendment. Is that clear?
Mr. REHBERG. Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to yield 2 minutes to a new
member of the Appropriations Committee, a great addition, the gentleman
from Georgia (Mr. Graves).
Mr. GRAVES of Georgia. I thank the gentleman.
You know, just listening to what we just heard from our colleague
across the aisle, he said, Go back and talk to your doctors, talk to
parents, talk to seniors.
You are missing the point. It's time to listen. That's what we've
been doing. We've been listening. And the American people in November
said it's time not only to defund this but to repeal this measure.
Again, the House has moved forward to do so. Maybe you should quit
talking to and start listening to.
Mr. Chairman, I'm here in support of this amendment because, simply
put, it defunds ObamaCare bureaucrats. If this amendment is adopted,
government bureaucrats cannot be paid so much as to lift a finger, move
a paperclip, send an email if it has anything to do with ObamaCare.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Parliamentary inquiry, Mr. Chairman.
The Acting CHAIR. Does the gentleman from Georgia yield for a
parliamentary inquiry?
Mr. GRAVES of Georgia. Sir, I would rather just finish my comments
here. They have plenty of time on their side.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman does not yield for that purpose and
continues to be recognized.
Mr. GRAVES of Georgia. And since today we're here to talk about
saving the taxpayer dollars, let's remember the cost of ObamaCare.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Mr. Chairman, I have a parliamentary inquiry.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from Georgia would need to yield for
a parliamentary inquiry.
The gentleman from Georgia is recognized.
Mr. GRAVES of Georgia. So we are here today to talk about the
taxpayers' money. Let's remember the cost of ObamaCare: $2.6 trillion
over the first 10 years once it's implemented, $560 billion in new
taxes on American families and businesses, unconstitutional mandates,
higher premiums, and, yes, lost coverage.
The law is so damaging that the Obama administration themselves have
granted at least 915 waivers for health plans and organizations.
{time} 0940
Now, think about that savings--2.5 million people from ObamaCare.
Mr. Chairman, let's save the rest of America here today and let's
support the Rehberg amendment and move on and zero out the payments to
those ObamaCare bureaucrats.
Parliamentary Inquiry
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Mr. Chairman, I have a parliamentary inquiry.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentlewoman will state her inquiry.
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Mr. Chairman, is it a violation of the House
rules wherein Members are not permitted to make disparaging references
to the President of the United States? In two previous gentlemen's
statements on the amendment, both of them referred to the Affordable
Care Act, which is the accurate title of the health care reform law, as
ObamaCare. That is a disparaging reference to the President of the
United States, it is meant as a disparaging reference to the President
of the United States, and it is clearly in violation of the House rules
against that.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentlewoman has stated a hypothetical. The
Chair will not issue an advisory opinion, but will inform all Members
that remarks in debate must avoid personalities, including
personalities toward the President.
Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 30 seconds.
To the prior gentleman, I would just say you didn't listen to the
people of this country; you sold them a bill of goods. You told them
you were going to create jobs, you were going to reduce the deficit,
and you were going to turn the economy around. You have done none of
this. You have been here 6 weeks, 8 weeks; and you have not done
anything. And with this amendment you will, indeed, by the CBO numbers,
increase the deficit as soon as next year by over $2 billion.
Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr.
Pallone).
Mr. PALLONE. How many times are we going to hear about repealing the
health care reform instead of having an initiative that actually
creates jobs? I go out. The gentleman from Georgia said, Are you
listening to your constituents? Yes, I listen to my constituents. They
tell us we should address job creation and the economy and not
constantly argue over and over again about repealing health care
reform, which we know is going absolutely nowhere. So when I listen,
that is what I hear: jobs, the economy, not this constant repetition of
repeal.
Now, I have a lot of respect for the gentleman from Montana, I have
to say, but he talks about completely stopping and defending
implementation. Well, the reason that the Republicans are saying that
they want to de-fund implementation is because this health care reform
is already working. Insurers now can't drop someone's coverage when
they get sick; seniors are saving money on prescription drugs; young
adults to age 26 are getting back on their parents' insurance; and
small businesses are receiving billions of dollars in tax credits to
provide health care coverage. This is moving along. This is working.
That is why they want to stop the implementation, is because they know
it is working.
Now, the defunding amendments will end all these benefits, putting
health insurance companies back in charge of America's health care. The
only person who benefits from defunding and repeal are the special
interest health insurance companies that want to charge more and
continue their discriminatory practices.
The gentleman from Montana talked about the cost. Well, the fact of
the matter is that if we pass these defunding amendments offered in the
guise of budget austerity, they are actually one step closer towards
repealing the largest deficit cutter passed in the last decade, and
that is the Affordable Care Act.
[[Page H1207]]
Health care reform helps tremendously in reducing the deficit. It
will save $230 billion over the next 10 years and over $1 trillion in
the 10 years after that. If we defund health care reform, there will be
no prohibition on discrimination against over 100 million Americans
with preexisting conditions, no prohibition on insurance companies
canceling your coverage when you get sick, no prohibition on lifetime
caps and annual limits, no required coverage for young adults on their
parents' policies, no assistance for seniors struggling to afford the
cost of drugs in the doughnut hole, no free annual checkups in
Medicare, and no tax credits for families and small businesses to pay
for health insurance.
Repeal, I stress, is a boon for the insurance companies, but an
enormous setback for American families. If we pass this amendment, the
insurance companies can raise their rates without review or
transparency, they can deny coverage to millions of Americans with
preexisting conditions, and they can cut off coverage when someone
becomes sick.
I urge all Members to vote ``no'' on these defunding amendments.
Health care reform is working. I go back home and people are pleased
with it because already in many cases they are able to get insurance
they weren't able to get before.
I am tired of hearing this over and over again. Concentrate on jobs
and the economy, not this charade.
Mr. REHBERG. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 1 minute.
I respectfully do refer to it as ``ObamaCare.'' You would think that
he would want his name attached to his signature legislation. But in
four quick years, this Congress and this President have made what is a
spending problem into a spending crisis. We wanted to create jobs. You
wasted time on the health care reform that did not control the costs.
They call it affordable health care. Unfortunately, all it did was
add people. It didn't control the costs of health care, and that is one
of the reasons it needs to be repealed. We wanted to build an economy;
they wanted to build government. So we call it what it is. It is
ObamaCare. It is a travesty. It is Big Government. It is not
controlling health care costs, and it needs to be repealed.
Today we are going to try to defund it, to the best of our ability;
and if we are not successful this time, we are going to try again and
again and again until we either have a Senate that is willing to pass
it or a President that understands that we cannot do this to the
American people.
At this time I yield 5 minutes to my good friend, the gentleman from
Iowa (Mr. King).
Mr. KING of Iowa. Mr. Chairman, I thank the chairman of the
Appropriations Subcommittee on HHS, Congressman Rehberg, for yielding.
I want to declare my support for this amendment, and I think he is
happy if I refer to it as the Rehberg amendment. I also want to thank
Denny Rehberg for the work that he has done on this. America will never
know, Mr. Chairman, how much work went into crafting this amendment to
get this fix that does a little bit to take us down the road. And, boy,
it is important to me to see $100 million cut out of the resources that
would be used to implement ObamaCare.
Mr. Chairman, I am also very confident in declaring it to be
ObamaCare. I listened to President Obama address it as ObamaCare on
February 25 of last year at the Blair House during the health care
summit. I thought that was the source of the moniker ObamaCare, was the
President himself, and if anyone thinks otherwise, I think they should
look back and check the record.
ObamaCare is this: It's not $1 trillion in deficit over 20 years if
we don't go through with this atrocity; it's $2.6 trillion in spending
in the first full decade, according to the chairman of the Budget
Committee, Paul Ryan--$2.6 trillion in spending.
We are here in this CR to cut spending. We know that we have to go
into a national era of austerity because of the overspending that has
taken place over the last 4 years in particular and the last 2 years in
a hugely significant way.
{time} 0950
We're looking at a budget now that has a deficit proposed by the
President of $1.65 trillion. And if you roll back to the full Federal
outlays in 1997, $1.6 trillion. The on-budget items in 2002, $1.6
trillion. And we have that much deficit proposed by the President. We
want to shut off $2.6 trillion worth of irresponsible spending. We want
to preserve the liberty and the freedom of the American people and the
best health care system in the world. That's why you see sheikhs'
planes landing in places like Rochester, Minnesota to get health care
that they can't get in other places in the world. If Michael Moore
thinks Cuba has the best health care system, I suggest he swim there.
This country, we need to preserve the system we have and expand it. The
Rehberg amendment helps slow down this implementation that is going on
in an aggressive fashion by the Obama administration.
I happen to have in my hand, Mr. Chairman, an excerpt from a CRS
report that tells you how duplicitous this bill once one picked it up
and read it, the 2,500 pages. And in here are multiple places, over 50
places where ObamaCare actually not just authorizes, but it also
appropriates--not completely unprecedented, but it is the largest, most
substantial effort to trigger automatic spending that goes on in
perpetuity, Mr. Chairman.
The number here is not $100 billion. The number on this CRS report is
$105.5 billion over the next 10 years. And in the balance of this
fiscal year, it's $4.95 billion that we're having trouble getting at.
Thanks to Denny Rehberg, we're getting at $100 million. I believe this
amendment will pass today and it will go on this CR and it will become
a significant leverage point over in the United States Senate.
Other components of this that need to be ripped out that--oh, wait a
minute, I forgot to remind you. Again, H.R. 2, full repeal of
ObamaCare. I was pleased to see language that I had worked on and
drafted for all those months went over to the Senate where every
Republican voted to repeal ObamaCare. Here we had bipartisan support
for the repeal of ObamaCare--three times the bipartisan support
described by then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi. And we sit here now with
Americans that have--two-thirds of them by the polling--rejected
ObamaCare.
In this bill, another piece that reads deceptively is this: ``The
authority for the Secretary of Health and Human Services to do
interdepartmental transfers in any amount greater than the 2008 budget
bill,'' which means slush funds all through that Department to
aggressively implement ObamaCare. The Rehberg amendment shuts off some
of that--probably not all of that, but it gets at it and it lays the
point out. And I hope that we can do better on some of the others into
the future.
We also need to understand that when America has rejected a piece of
legislation that so upsets all of our lives and takes away so much of
our liberty and freedom, takes away our ability to buy a health
insurance policy that is high deductible, high copayment, and low
premium, that we have many more good solutions that will unfold here.
This bill is unconstitutional in four places at least, two Federal
courts have ruled, so we know that it will eventually get to the
Supreme Court. And we can never say with certainty what the result will
be, but we know the certainty of the two Federal courts, Mr. Chairman.
We must have the Rehberg amendment so the American people are dealt
with respect and honor of their opinion. H.R. 1 cuts the funding; H.R.
2 repeals.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I thank the gentleman from Montana.
Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chairman, let me just reiterate again: This
amendment would not create jobs; it would not do anything to reduce the
deficit. In fact, by the CBO numbers, it would increase net budget
authority in the bill by $2 billion next year, a total of $5.5 billion
over the next several years. It increases the deficit. Let's keep
hitting it on that point.
I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Levin).
(Mr. LEVIN asked and was given permission to revise and extend his
remarks.)
Mr. LEVIN. If this amendment would become part of the CR, there will
be no CR, and that will be your responsibility, your responsibility.
[[Page H1208]]
This is an effort to repeal by paralysis, paralyzing the provisions
that have gone into effect--preexisting conditions for children being
covered, children under 26 having the ability to get insurance. It
would paralyze the efforts to begin to implement the 2014 benefits.
Instead of searching for common ground, this amendment intensifies
warfare. Instead of collaboration, this amendment would mean chaos.
The Republicans have become a wrecking crew, led by Paul Ryan and
wrecking Medicare. This amendment is a deeply dangerous prescription
for Americans' health. This prescription needs to be rejected.
Mr. REHBERG. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 1 minute.
Does anybody honestly believe in America that by repealing ObamaCare
it's actually going to cost the government money? It just doesn't pass
the smell test. Yes, the way the CBO is scoring it based upon the
questions that they are asked show it is. But nobody, honestly nobody
in this country honestly believes that when you repeal a piece of
legislation it's going to end up costing you money.
I now yield 5 minutes to one of the few people that clearly gets the
entire picture, a doctor, one of our Members from the State of Georgia
(Mr. Price), who understands that defensive medicine was entirely left
out of this, but, of course, we know why. And it's one of the issues
driving the cost of health care.
Mr. PRICE of Georgia. I thank my friend, and I appreciate him for his
remarkable leadership on this. Many of us tried to figure out how we
could bring this issue to the floor under this bill, and you have done
that.
Our friends on the other side of the aisle talk about jobs, that this
won't create any jobs. Well, I'll tell you some jobs that this will
save if we pass this amendment and that's the physicians in this land.
As a physician--and if folks in this body talk to their doctors back
home, they will understand the remarkable challenges and the number of
physicians who are throwing up their hands and saying, I can't handle
the hassles anymore; I can't believe the intrusion of the Federal
Government into my ability to take care of my patients in the way that
I deem best.
And so what are they saying? They're saying, well, there isn't any
way for me to uphold and live by the oath that I took, to do what was
best for my patients, and therefore I'm left in a remarkable moral
quandary. And for many of them it is to say, I'm sorry, I'm no longer
able to practice under this oppressive government.
The deficit. That's right, we ought to be talking about the deficit.
Here's the track right here of the folks who have been in charge for
the last 4 years. In 2006, they came in, and this is what the Federal
Government was spending down here, a little over $2.6 trillion. The
last year of their reign they're up in the $3.7 trillion, $3.8 trillion
range. The deficit is about a third of that, this year coming up, $1.6
trillion. So Mr. Chair, to have our friends on the other side of the
aisle tell us about deficit is a bit curious.
I'm reminded by my friend from Texas, a fellow physician who gave a
remarkable recitation of the history of the law that we have in place
now, the non-health care reform law that was enacted, and I'm reminded
of the jubilation on the other side of the aisle when they passed this
piece of legislation last March. At the time I had some serious
conversations with friends on the other side because we weren't allowed
to have this kind of robust debate. That wasn't allowed, it wasn't
allowed in committee, it wasn't allowed on the floor of the House. The
decisions had been made beforehand and the bill was shoved down the
throat of the House of Representatives and the American people.
But I remember talking with them and I remember saying, It's puzzling
to me why you're so enthusiastic and excited about this. There's no way
that this law can go forward because it is clearly unconstitutional.
And in fact now we've seen a Federal court in Virginia and a Federal
court in Florida agree that the individual mandate--that the notion
that the Federal Government can say to the American people, by virtue
of being a citizen you must purchase this product and this is exactly
what it must be. And that's what the law has done.
And so I believe that before we will hold another election in this
country this law will be determined to be unconstitutional, which
really is a shame because we will have missed a great opportunity.
My friend from Michigan who talked about bipartisan cooperation--of
which there was none over the last 4 years in this arena--but we have
missed a great opportunity, and hopefully we'll be able to enhance the
opportunities that we have over the coming 2 years to be able to work
together in a bipartisan way to address the challenges in health care.
Because the status quo, as a physician and as a Member of Congress, the
status quo is clearly unacceptable.
But when you look at the principles of health care--accessibility,
making certain that people have accessibility to health care, which
they don't right now and which this law actually harms; affordability,
which is becoming more and more of a challenge to the American people
and which this law actually harms--if you don't believe it, just ask
the employees in businesses across this land who are having to pay
higher premiums because of this law; the quality issues, all of the
quality sorts of things that we all believe in so strongly and which
this law actually harms because the only person who knows what's
quality health care for you and your family is you and your family and
your physician.
{time} 1000
What this law does is remove this decisionmaking power from you and
your family and your physician, and it replaces it with folks here in
town who believe they know best what kind of health care you ought to
receive. Then there is the responsiveness of the system and innovation
in the system and choices, Mr. Chairman--choices that have been
remarkably limited and will continue to be limited by this law.
So what Mr. Rehberg has done here is said that the only way that we
can begin to dismantle this, which is what the American people desire
in significant majority numbers, is to say you can't use resources that
you have in your department to implement the law, itself. If the States
and the Federal Government would listen to Judge Vinson in Florida,
then they would realize that it, in fact, is their responsibility, that
it is their responsibility not to implement this law.
So I urge adoption of the amendment, and I encourage my colleagues to
get to work on the principles of health care, which this law absolutely
ignored.
Ms. DeLAURO. The Rehberg amendment would increase net budget
authority in the bill by $2 billion in fiscal year 2012--that's next
year--for a total of $5.5 billion over the next several years.
Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr.
Andrews).
(Mr. ANDREWS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his
remarks.)
Mr. ANDREWS. Mr. Chairman, all across the country this morning,
millions of Americans got up for another day of searching the job
search Web sites or looking at the want ads, enduring another day of
courtesy interviews, pointless discussions with potential employers,
and dreading the arrival of the letter carrier today because he is
going to bring one more credit card bill or dunning letter for a bill
that they can't pay.
Life has become a nightmare for 15 million unemployed Americans--and
here we are in the House of Representatives. I don't think many of them
got up this morning and said, I really hope that Congress for the
second time in a month debates the repeal of the health care law. I
think what our constituents said was, Why don't they get to work,
working together to create jobs in this country?
Instead, the Tower of Babel that the House of Representatives has
become this week has produced yet another meaningless debate on the
repeal of the health care law, which followed on the heel of defunding
Planned Parenthood last night.
Now, it's not bad enough what this bill doesn't do in having us work
together to create jobs for the American people; it's bad in what it
does do. It's very important that the Members understand the real-world
consequences of the chairman's amendment.
[[Page H1209]]
If his amendment passes and if the parents of a child with juvenile
diabetes wake up one day to discover that an insurance company won't
sell their son or daughter insurance because that child has juvenile
diabetes or that an insurance company will charge them four or five
times the amount of the premium because the child has juvenile
diabetes, the person at the Department of Health and Human Services who
can step in and stop the insurance company from doing that won't be
able to, because this amendment says, let's tie the hands of the people
here to enforce the law.
If an insurance company says to a family who is grappling with a
malignancy or a brainstem injury for their son or their daughter,
``You've run out of coverage. You've hit your lifetime limit. Too bad,
so be it,'' the person who would be in a position to do something, to
require an insurance company to pay those hospital bills, won't be able
to do that because this is happening.
With all due respect, we've had a debate about using names this
morning. I think we're using the wrong name for this amendment. This
should be called the ``insurance company bill of rights'' because what
it says is, anything any insurance must do at any time, so be it.
The American people deserve better than this. Members of the House
should vote ``no'' on the Rehberg amendment and get back to the
business of putting Americans back to work.
Mr. REHBERG. Mr. Chairman, may I inquire as to how much time remains
on both sides?
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from Montana has 6\1/2\ minutes
remaining. The gentlewoman from Connecticut has 15\1/2\ minutes
remaining.
Mr. REHBERG. I reserve the balance of my time.
Ms. DeLAURO. The Rehberg amendment increases net budget authority in
the bill by $2 billion next year, a total of $5.5 billion over 10
years. It increases the deficit, and it puts the American people back
in the hands of the insurance companies. Again, it's a classic bait and
switch.
Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr.
Waxman).
Mr. WAXMAN. I thank the gentlelady for yielding to me to participate
in this debate.
It's really quite amazing, Mr. Chairman, the alternative reality that
has been created on the Republican side. They never liked the health
care bill--I think people know that already--but it is the law of the
land. They tried to repeal it. They haven't been able to do it. But the
health care bill passed.
Under the laws of the United States, people have certain rights under
this legislation. For example, insurers cannot drop people's coverage
when they get sick. Seniors are saving money on prescription drugs.
Young adults to 26 are getting back on their parents' insurance, and
small businesses are receiving billions of dollars in tax credits to
provide health care coverage.
The Republicans said they like all of that. They like that. When they
give us a bill, they're going to have all that in it. Meanwhile, they
want to stop those things from happening under the existing law.
Defunding amendments will end these benefits, putting health insurance
companies back in charge of Americans' health care.
We should realize, when we have a law, it should be implemented in a
reasonable, responsive and efficient manner. States want it. Insurers
want it. Businesses want it. Health care providers want it. Trying to
starve a program so we cannot implement it in a reasonable manner is
irresponsible.
Defunding amendments offered in the guise of budget austerity is
actually one step toward repealing the largest deficit cutter passed in
the last decade, the Affordable Care Act. The Affordable Care Act, if
this amendment passes, will be stopped. There will be no prohibition
against discrimination for over 100 million Americans with preexisting
conditions; no prohibition on insurance companies canceling your
coverage when you get sick; no prohibition on lifetime caps and annual
limits; no required coverage for young adults on their parents'
policies; no assistance to seniors struggling to afford the cost of
drugs in the doughnut hole and no free annual checkups in Medicare; and
no tax credits for families and small businesses to pay for health
insurance.
The full impact of this legislation will happen in 2014, which will
require the Department of Health and Human Services to put into place
its implementation so that we can move on a clear, reasonable path to
accomplishing these goals.
The repeal or even this defunding proposal is a boon for insurance
companies, but it is an enormous setback for American families. That's
why I urge all Members to vote ``no'' on this amendment.
Mr. REHBERG. My Democratic friends using the deficit argument is
simply a diversion to draw attention from the real issue: the huge cost
of this program.
At this time I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from Texas, Dr.
Burgess.
Mr. BURGESS. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
Mr. Chairman, seeing the gentleman from California down on the floor
reminds me:
When this bill passed, the Congressional Budget Office told us there
would be $142 billion in savings over 10 years; but less than 30 days
later, the chief actuary at CMS, Dr. Foster, came forward and said the
bill was going to cost $318 billion additionally over that time.
{time} 1010
That's a $450 billion swing, and even in the United States Congress,
we ought to be able to get a little closer than that.
I filed a resolution of inquiry with Chairman Waxman, who was then
chairman of Energy and Commerce, who said let's sort this out. What did
they know, when did they know it? Was Congress given inaccurate
information before we voted on this very large bill?
I was never allowed to bring that forward. We could have solved that
last year and settled that part of the debate last year.
Ms. DeLAURO. CBO: Repeal of the health care bill would add $230
billion to the deficit in the first 10 years. The Rehberg amendment
would add $2 billion in 2012, a total of $5.5 billion over the next
several years.
I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Van Hollen).
Mr. VAN HOLLEN. I thank my colleague.
Another day on a bill that will not create one single job in the
United States of America; in fact, a bill that will cost thousands of
Americans their jobs. The response just the other day from our
Republican colleagues: So be it.
Now we have an amendment before us to strip away critical patient
protections for consumers, for our constituents. This is an insurance
industry dream amendment. We heard from our colleagues they wanted to
listen to the American people. They have not had one hearing, not one,
to listen to the people around this country who were already benefiting
from this bill.
The provisions to ensure that kids with diabetes, leukemia, asthma,
are not discriminated against by the insurance industry any more, not
one mom was heard from.
Provisions to make sure that our constituents aren't denied their
coverage when they need it the most. There are thousands of Americans
out there already benefiting from that. Didn't listen to one of them.
And now under the guise of trying to save the taxpayer money, they
are offering an amendment that, according to the independent,
nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, will increase the deficit over
the next 10 years by $230 billion. And when it's fully implemented, the
bill, and you strip it away, it will add $1.4 trillion to the deficit.
I just urge my colleagues to read the letter from January of this
year from the head of the CBO to the Speaker of the House. It's right
in there, plain and simple.
We had a hearing in the Budget Committee just the other day. I hope
your colleagues on the Budget Committee may have talked to you about it
because the head of CBO was before the committee and Members on the
Republican side. Surely you must have arrived at this deficit number
through double counting.
The head of CBO said very plainly there is no double counting. Read
the lips of CBO. This adds $230 billion to the deficit over 10 years,
$1.4 trillion over the next 20 years. So don't come to the floor here
and pretend that by
[[Page H1210]]
enacting this amendment it's part of an effort to save taxpayer
dollars.
This will add more red ink to this Nation's credit card, the same
kind of red ink that we saw being added over the years and years and
years of the prior administration. We are trying to turn the corner on
that.
But all this does is add more. The cost is not just in terms of
higher deficits; the costs are to the people throughout this country
who are going to lose the important protections that this bill has
provided them.
Shame on this House for spending time doing this rather than focusing
on jobs and getting this economy moving.
Mr. REHBERG. I reserve the balance of my time.
Ms. DeLAURO. The Rehberg amendment increases the deficit by $2
billion in 2012, $5.5 billion over the next several years, and does
nothing to create a single job.
I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Florida (Ms. Wasserman
Schultz).
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Thank you.
Mr. Chairman, I rise today to oppose the Republicans' latest cynical
and callous attempts to derail health care reform, and I think it's
quite interesting that the gentleman from Montana would be dismissive
of the issue of deficit reduction and that somehow that's now labeled a
distraction.
I think that adding $5.5 billion to the deficit when we should be
going in the opposite direction is far more than a distraction. It's a
moral imperative that we not do that. In the past 6 weeks, we have seen
the true face of the Republicans' legislative agenda. Rather than work
to create jobs and improve our economy, they have focused on baseless
attacks on American families.
With their repeal and replace bills, they have demonstrated that they
don't mind if insurance companies drop patients as soon as they get
sick, or that families wouldn't be able to save thousands of dollars by
keeping young adult children on their family plan. And with this
pernicious amendment, we now see their outrageous attempts to strip
funding from the implementation of the health care law.
Let's be clear: Our colleagues across the aisle want to yank funding
from a law that is already helping millions of Americans. This
amendment would seize funding from the agencies and workers who have
already been tasked with implementing the most essential tenets of the
Affordable Care Act, provisions which are already making a world of
difference in millions of lives.
If this amendment passes, seniors will be thrown back into the
Medicare part D doughnut hole coverage gap and be forced to pay
exorbitant costs for their prescription drugs. Women in desperate need
of an annual mammogram or a colonoscopy will once again face
prohibitive copays or perhaps face denial of coverage for the
preexisting condition of simply having ovaries, and our Nation will
once again return to the egregious practice of denying so many young
children coverage for their health history that they cannot control.
Rather than roll back the hard-fought consumer protections and
freedoms that unshackled Americans from the whims of private insurance
companies, Republicans should be working with us to build on and
improve the health care system. Instead, they wish to use this
amendment process to reverse the progress that we have made with these
vital health care reforms. I am glad the American people can see their
hypocrisy right out in the open.
Mr. REHBERG. I continue to reserve, Mr. Chairman.
Parliamentary Inquiry
Mr. WEINER. Mr. Chairman, I have a parliamentary inquiry.
The Acting CHAIR. What is the gentleman's parliamentary inquiry?
Mr. WEINER. Mr. Chairman, would it be appropriate under the rules in
the UC that have been suggested that we divide the question so that
Members of Congress can vote individually on whether to deny seniors
coverage for the doughnut hole, to deny coverage for pre-existing
conditions, to deny small businesses from getting the tax benefit in
this bill, all the different things--would it be appropriate to divide
the question that way so that all of the benefits that Americans get
they can see individually where my Republican friends stand on them?
The Acting CHAIR. Under the order of the House of February 17, 2011,
even if otherwise divisible, an amendment to this bill is not subject
to a demand for a division of the question.
Ms. DeLAURO. The Rehberg amendment would increase the deficit by $2
billion next year, a total of $5.5 billion over the next several years,
and that is the estimate of the nonpartisan Congressional Budget
Office. It increases the deficit and does not create any jobs.
I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from Illinois (Ms. Schakowsky).
Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Thank you. I would like to say to the Republicans, be
careful what you wish for. Your star is fading on this effort to
repeal, to defund the Affordable Care Act. Only about 18 percent of
Americans now are for full repeal of this bill.
And are you the ones that are going to go and tell the American
people that insurance companies can drop you when you get sick?
Children with preexisting conditions? Well, they can be denied
coverage.
You go and explain that insurance companies can impose devastating
annual and lifetime caps, and that pregnant women and breast cancer
survivors can be denied coverage, and that being a woman will continue
to be a preexisting condition. That's your mission if you were to
succeed.
In passing this legislation, the American people finally said, this
Congress said, that health care is a right, that it should not
impoverish individuals. Vote ``no.''
{time} 1020
Mr. REHBERG. I am pleased to yield 2 minutes to my good friend from
Georgia (Mr. Kingston).
Mr. KINGSTON. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
I stand in strong support of the Rehberg amendment. I do so because
of this very controversial health care bill which was passed through
strong-arm tactics last year during a time period when the American
public was crying out against it. This was a product of the backroom
deal-making in Washington, D.C. This is one reason why the Democrats
lost control of the U.S. Congress. It wasn't so much the bill; it was
the process.
But let's talk about the bill. An individual mandate that's already
been ruled unconstitutional by two judges, a mandate which the Governor
of Alaska is saying he is not even going to implement the rule. This is
hardly a law that's bringing America together. This bill needs to be
put on the back burner, and let us retool it and rework it. I believe
that's what the Americans want us to do.
It destroys the doctor-patient relationship. One thing that's
abundantly clear is people do not want the insurance companies telling
the hospitals and the docs how to conduct medicine. But they sure as
heck don't want government bureaucrats in Washington, D.C., and all of
the hundreds of new agencies and the IRS agents coming in and telling
the doctor how to conduct medicine. The cost of this--there is not one
credible report that says this will bring down costs.
And I keep hearing this hollow cry from Democrats, suddenly with 15
million people unemployed, that they are concerned about jobs. I
haven't met in the First District of Georgia or anywhere else I have
traveled in the country one business person who says this is a great
bill.
And I want to say this about 26-year-old children: As a father of
four, and I have three kids under 26 years old, they are old enough to
take care of themselves. They don't need the nanny state coming in. I
have raised them to be responsible. At the age of 21, I expect them to
go out and get their health care. You know, the average age in Vietnam
I think was 19 years old. World War II, probably the same. And we have
soldiers in harm's way all over the world who can take care of
themselves. But we are saying but come home to mommy and daddy, we will
take care of you until you are 26 years old.
The Acting CHAIR. The time of the gentleman has expired.
Mr. REHBERG. I yield the gentleman an additional 15 seconds.
Mr. KINGSTON. And let me say this, Mr. Chairman. If you talk to the
Nation's Governors, Democrat and Republican, one of the biggest drains
on their
[[Page H1211]]
expenses right now, on their budget, is Medicaid. Yet this bill
increases the Medicaid rolls by 16 million people without funding it.
If we want to break our States, we need to keep this bill. If we want
to help them, we need to repeal it.
Ms. DeLAURO. I remind the gentleman from Georgia that the taxpayers
pay for Congress' health insurance as well. And any children that we
have are covered under our health insurance. We are in a rarified air
in that regard. We have health insurance, as Mr. Miller pointed out. We
go to the head of the line if there is anything wrong with us. That is
not the case for millions of people in this Nation. And that's what the
other side of the aisle would like to continue, that millions of people
will not have the same kind of health care that we in the United States
Congress have.
With that, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from California (Mrs.
Capps).
Mrs. CAPPS. I strongly oppose this amendment because it is harmful to
the American people. It adds significantly to the deficit. And I have
listened to my constituents. And they tell me they are opposed to this
defunding stunt. Why? If health care reform is defunded, who will
ensure that seniors in the doughnut hole receive half-price medications
this year? Who will process the small business tax credits that
employers across the country are entitled to this year under the reform
law? Who will keep insurance companies honest, protecting Americans
from coverage denials and limits on care?
The Affordable Care Act is law. It's endorsed by the American Medical
Association. And attempts by my colleagues on the other side of the
aisle to repeal it have failed. Instead of fighting this same battle
over and over again and living in the past, Congress must turn its
focus now to what the American people really care about: creating jobs
and strengthening our economy.
Mr. REHBERG. Mr. Chairman, at this time I am pleased to yield 2
minutes to another physician who clearly understands the cost of health
care, the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Gingrey).
Mr. GINGREY of Georgia. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
Mr. Chairman, I rise wholeheartedly in support of his amendment to
repeal the funding of ObamaCare. ObamaCare, in not just my opinion, but
many others have expressed this, is possibly the worst piece of
legislation passed in the history of this Congress. In fact, it would
probably be better called ``patient pain and non-affordable care act''
because it has accomplished none of the goals that President Obama set
out to accomplish, especially not lowering the cost of health
insurance.
So we in this body, the Republican majority, in our initial week in
the 112th Congress, we passed a repeal of ObamaCare. Unfortunately, our
colleagues in the Senate, the Democratic majority, stopped that. It is
our obligation to the American people to defund this wrongful piece of
legislation. It is costing jobs all across this country.
Talk about things like who is going to solve the problem of the
doughnut hole, as the gentlelady from California just said. Well, I
will tell you who solved it, Big Pharma solved it when the President
and the Democratic majority in the last Congress broke their arm and
made them agree to cut their prices in half for their brand name drugs.
So there are other ways to solve the doughnut hole problem than having
the Federal Government take it over lock, stock, and barrel.
In regard to having children remain on the health insurance policy of
their parents until age 26, why are they going to have to do that?
Because they have no jobs. And why do they not have any jobs? Because
of the job-killing bills like ObamaCare, and stimulus, and bailout, and
I could go on and on and on. We have an obligation to defund this and
to replace it with the right kind of legislation that will accomplish
the goals of lowering health costs so that many more Americans can have
health insurance and have good health insurance.
Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from
California (Mr. Garamendi).
Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Chairman, it's often said that the facts are lost
in the fog of war. The facts are lost in the fog of this debate. We
should step back for just a few moments and see what this total picture
is all about. This is nothing about a class war assault on the working
men and women and the poor in this country, and literally around the
world.
Take a look at all of the provisions and add them all up. The
decimation of clinics that provide care to the poor and the unemployed.
The decimation and the significant reduction of Medicaid, providing
care to those who do not have high incomes, including the elderly and
the disabled. The decimation now in this of the health care proposals,
turning over to the insurance companies once again the opportunity to
go after working men and women and deny them the coverage that they
need.
Taken in total, and include the tax provisions for the great wealthy
who will ultimately have their tax breaks paid for by the working men
and women, put it all together, and this is class warfare by the
Republicans against the working men and women of this Nation.
Mr. REHBERG. I reserve the balance of my time.
Ms. DeLAURO. I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms.
Jackson Lee).
Ms. JACKSON LEE of Texas. I thank the gentlelady.
Eight hundred seniors gathered just a year or two ago, expressing
their horrific opposition to the idea of being overwhelmed by this
doughnut hole. My colleagues today are telling seniors all over America
we now will close the door on you again. We will ensure that you will
not have the money to pay for your rent or food because you will be
paying these ridiculously high costs for your prescription drugs.
That's what this amendment will do. It will close down potentially the
Affordable Care Act that is providing a lifeline for our seniors.
And then if you are laying on the sick bed in your hospital room and
you need more care and more care to restore yourself, you have a doctor
or an administrator come in and say, your insurance company called and
they're pulling the plug. Not the plug that the doctors are pulling,
but they are pulling the plug. You have no more money, get out and try
to do the best you can.
Two hundred and thirty billion dollars this amendment will cost us.
But more importantly, this bill is not, the Affordable Care Act,
unconstitutional. Only two courts have rendered that. And frankly, the
Supreme Court will speak. Don't do this to the American people.
{time} 1030
Mr. REHBERG. I continue to reserve the balance of my time.
Ms. DeLAURO. I yield myself 30 seconds.
Let me just repeat, to be absolutely clear, about what this amendment
does.
It does not create jobs. It adds to the deficit $2 billion next year,
$5.5 billion over the next several years. It does nothing to bring the
deficit down. It increases the deficit, and it puts the American people
back in the hands of insurance companies.
I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. REHBERG. Mr. Chairman, I am not the Speaker of the House. I am
not the majority leader. But you know what I do? I represent more
people in the United States Congress than anybody sitting in this body,
consistently. After every census, I have the most population. I
probably have more town hall meetings as well. I probably have more
hospitals, more highways, more of everything in my congressional
district. And I have had more town hall meetings, probably, than
anyone, 75. And in those 75, they all tell me the same thing: They do
need health care reform. They need to control the cost of health care.
But they get it. They understand, this does not do it. You would not
need waivers for unions and big businesses if it was working. You would
not need legislation to fix the 1099 on the penalty for the $600
purchases if it was working. You wouldn't have to cook the books, as
they attempt to do, by counting a $750 billion tax increase as a reason
to suggest that if we repeal it, it's going to cost the government
something. That's funny money. It's not true. Nobody in America
believes it.
[[Page H1212]]
Get out. Listen at your town hall meetings. Travel around my State.
Do the 75 town hall meetings like I did. And you will find you cannot
control the cost of health care if you leave defensive medicine out. We
gave an opportunity for people to join the Federal system. It was
turned down by the Democrats in committee. They voted it down on a
party-line vote.
This is not the way to reform health care. It was done very quickly.
In fact, the sponsor of the bill said I didn't need to read the bill.
That's what I have staff for. It was so large, it was done so quickly,
there was not enough input that the people of America know this is not
the right thing to do. It's a job killer. It's going to bust our
budget. In the end, it does, in fact, cost us $2.6 trillion to
implement in the first 10 years.
Please support this. Let's begin defunding ObamaCare.
The Acting CHAIR. The time of the gentleman from Montana has expired.
Ms. DeLAURO. I yield the balance of my time to the gentlewoman from
California (Ms. Pelosi), Democratic leader of the House.
Ms. PELOSI. I thank the gentlelady for yielding. I commend her for
her leadership on a very important issue, the health and well-being of
the American people.
Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment that is on the
floor today and also the underlying bill of which it is a part. The
American people are desperate for jobs. They have sent us here to work
together to create jobs; and in the 6 weeks of this new majority, not
one piece of legislation has come forward to create one job.
Showing the lack of ideas to do so, the Republican majority has
chosen, instead, to change the subject, taking up a bill of such
consequence without hearings, without really an open process to make
amendments to it, with the illusion of open debate. And now they come
before us, again without hearings, in amendment form to this bill and
say they want to have no funds go to enact provisions of the health
care bill which was passed before.
Let's talk about the consequences of your action here today. What
would it mean to people in our country if this amendment were to
prevail? It may prevail on this floor, which is driving itself into
irrelevance with the amendment process that is here, but that's another
subject. Let's talk about the subject of this amendment. Let's talk
about what this means to America's families. Let's talk about a family
that came before a hearing that we had earlier in January.
We heard from Stacie Ritter. She has 12-year-old twins. When those
adorable little girls were 4 years old, they were both diagnosed with
cancer and faced years of treatment and recovery. Imagine if that
happened in your family. Their mother said they were lucky that they
did have health insurance, but the additional cost of the care for
these children drove their family into bankruptcy. The children got
well, thank God, but they had a preexisting medical condition for the
rest of their lives--until this bill came along. And now their mother
was pleased to testify they are not to be the objects of discrimination
because they have a preexisting medical condition. They will not face
annual or lifetime caps on the benefits they receive. These healthy
young girls now will be able to proceed in a healthy way, not
discriminated against.
Or let's talk about Vernal Branch, a woman diagnosed with breast
cancer 15 years ago. Ever since, she has struggled to find health
insurance because even though she had cancer and for the moment is free
of cancer and, God willing, will be forever free of cancer, she had a
preexisting medical condition which meant that she would be
discriminated against in terms of getting health insurance--until this
came along. Vernal Branch told us that the Affordable Care Act
represents protection from the uncertainty and fear that came from
being diagnosed and being denied health insurance coverage because of a
past disease. Passing this amendment would stop the reform and mean
that 129 million Americans, like Vernal, 129 million Americans would
lose coverage because of a preexisting medical condition.
Do you understand what that means in the lives of these people?
And to our seniors, the subject has been brought up over and over
again about our seniors. Claudette Therriault and her husband, Richard,
are seniors on Medicare. Richard is a diabetic, and his insulin alone
costs nearly $1,000 a month. When they fell into the doughnut hole,
they were forced to choose between defaulting on the loan of their home
or paying for Richard's health. As Claudette put it, Well, we chose my
husband's health. But changes made, that we made in this bill, are
starting to change the doughnut hole so families aren't forced to
choose between paying their mortgage or paying for their medicine.
Passing this amendment would mean that over 2.7 million Medicare
beneficiaries would again fall into the doughnut hole, and Medicare
would no longer be able to pay for the annual checkup for 44 million
seniors in our country.
Mr. Kingston says that his children are old enough that they should
be able to take care of themselves, even though they are under 26 years
old. Bravo for you. But that's not the way it is for many young people
across the country, even if they do have a job. You say they don't have
insurance because they don't have a job. It may be news to you, but
there are many, many, many working Americans who do not have health
insurance. But they will under the Affordable Care Act.
If this amendment were to pass, if it were to become law, immediately
all of those children who can now be on their parents' policy, if their
parents are willing, would lose their health insurance.
{time} 1040
With a job or without a job, these young people coming out of school
are idealistic and ambitious. They want to follow their passions and
their pursuits. That is what our Founders told them they could do--
life, liberty and pursuit of happiness. These young people want a
healthier life to pursue their happiness, to choose a job not based on
the health benefits it may or may not provide, but to choose an
occupation which addresses their aspirations--not ours, theirs.
So I just want to repeat back to our colleagues something I heard
them say over and over again. They said, we didn't read the bill. Well,
we did. But clearly, you did not. And I urge you to read the bill,
because if you did, you would see that the bill puts medical decisions
in the hands of patients and doctors, not your favorite insurance
company. You would see that it brings down the cost of prescription
drugs for seniors. You would see that it ends the days of
discrimination based on preexisting conditions and lifetime caps on the
care of children and families. You would see that under this bill, no
longer would being a woman be a preexisting medical condition as it is
now as women are discriminated against in terms of price and access to
insurance.
You would see that it offers tax credits to millions of small
businesses who choose to do right by their employees and offer
insurance benefits.
It was for all of these Americans that we acted. It is for them that
we stand here today to oppose this amendment.
And if you read the bill, you will see contrary--contrary to
misrepresentations that were set forth by those who do the bidding of
the health insurance industry in our country, you would see what the
bill does. You would see that it is about innovation. It's about
prevention. It's about a healthier America, not just health care in
America. It's about using the technologies of the future. It's about
bringing health care closer to people where they live to lower the
cost, to improve the quality and to expand the access.
You would see that it is a bill about the future. Instead of the
misrepresentations about this, that, and the other thing which I don't
even want to repeat here, you would see that this is transformative for
our country because it gives people the liberty, again, to pursue their
lives.
So I would like to know how many of you read the bill? We read it
over and over again, to each other, drilling down on different parts of
it. So we know of what we speak when we come to this floor. And maybe
if you knew more about it, you wouldn't be so quick to say--we do not
want to allow children to stay on their parents' policies. We do not
want to end discrimination on the basis of preexisting conditions for
our children. We do not want to begin
[[Page H1213]]
to close the doughnut hole. We do not want to have preventive medicines
without cost and copay for our seniors. And the list goes on and on. So
that's what's happening here today.
This is again, yet again, another example of our friends standing up
for the insurance companies at the expense of the American people,
standing up for the insurance companies at the expense of the health
and well-being of our country. It is again an example of Washington,
D.C. holding on to the special interest status quo. It is again this
Congress saying to the American people, we are here for the special
interest, we are not here for the people's interest. To Stacie, we are
not here for your two daughters. For Vernal, we are not here for women
and having being a woman being a preexisting condition. To Claudette
and Richard, to say to them, too bad about your mortgage. If you can't
pay your mortgage because you have to pay your medical bills, so be it.
I urge my colleagues to vote against this amendment, which is another
manifestation of the ``so be it'' attitude of some in Congress at the
expense of many in our country.
Ms. FOXX. Mr. Chair, there are few policies passed in the past
several decades that could do more harm to our country than last year's
passage of the health care overhaul.
That is why I fully support the Rehberg amendment to defund Obamacare
and the McMorris Rodgers amendment to bar the IRS from spending any
taxpayer money on implementing the law. Not only will these amendments
save billions and billions in taxpayer dollars, they will also halt the
government takeover of health care dead in its tracks.
Mr. Chair, we cannot afford this misguided legislation that empowers
bureaucrats and insurance companies rather than patients and their care
providers. It creates constitutionally questionable mandates, raises
hundreds of billions in new taxes, and penalizes job creators, families
and businesses who do not comply with its draconian requirements.
In the middle of a nascent economic recovery, how can we allow this
job-destroying bill to take root? We can't. This body has a
responsibility to listen to the American people who are demanding that
we uproot this legislation. These two amendments help us do just that
and I am proud to support their inclusion in the continuing resolution.
The Acting CHAIR. The question is on the amendment offered by the
gentleman from Montana (Mr. Rehberg).
The question was taken; and the Acting Chair announced that the noes
appeared to have it.
Mr. REHBERG. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.
The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to clause 6 of rule XVIII, further
proceedings on the amendment offered by the gentleman from Montana will
be postponed.
Amendment No. 266 Offered by Mr. King of Iowa
Mr. KING of Iowa. Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk.
The Acting CHAIR. The Clerk will designate the amendment.
The text of the amendment is as follows:
At the end of the bill (before the short title), insert the
following:
Sec. __. Notwithstanding any other provision of law, none
of the funds made available in this Act or any previous Act
may be used to carry out the provisions of Public Law 111-
148, Public Law 111-152, or any amendment made by either such
Public Law.
Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chair, I reserve a point of order on this amendment.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentlewoman reserves a point of order.
Pursuant to the order of the House of February 17, 2011, the
gentleman from Iowa (Mr. King) and a Member opposed each will control 5
minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Iowa.
Mr. KING of Iowa. Mr. Chairman, amendment No. 266 is the amendment
that has had a lot of discussion around the Chamber and around this
country. And what it does is it recognizes the results of the CRS
report, Mr. Chairman, this report dated just last Thursday, February
10, 2011. It took a long time to put all the numbers together in an
official document that identified the money that is automatically
appropriated in ObamaCare. In digging that out, there are dozens of
locations that automatically trigger appropriations that go on in
perpetuity. And the total in this report is $105.5 billion. And here we
are in this continuing resolution that the CRS reports at $105.5
billion. I had been working on that for some months, and finally we
came with a total.
But if we are not able to shut off all of the funding that is
automatically appropriated in the ObamaCare legislation, both
components of it, the reconciliation package and the bill itself, then
forever this money goes forward, and the administration aggressively
uses it to implement ObamaCare.
I reserve the balance of my time.
Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.
The Acting CHAIR. Does the gentlewoman continue to reserve her point
of order?
Ms. DeLAURO. I do, yes.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentlewoman from Connecticut is recognized for
5 minutes.
Ms. DeLAURO. Very briefly, I yield myself 30 seconds.
This amendment--this amendment--will add to the deficit in the next
year--next year--$3.5 billion, and over the next several years $5.6
billion. It will not create a job and once again would put the American
people back in the hands of the insurance companies without the ability
to be able to get the kind of health insurance that they require to
deal with any illness that may befall them.
With that, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gene
Green).
Mr. GENE GREEN of Texas. Mr. Chairman and Members, I thank my
colleague from Connecticut for yielding to me.
Let me first say that I have read the bill. I was on the subcommittee
and the full committee and served on the Health Subcommittee for many
years. And I had many people ask me that. And believe me, when you
spend hours and hours literally in testimony and amending the bill, you
have the chance to read it.
And I would hope my Republican colleagues, and all of us, would do
the same thing, our appropriators, I would hope they would read the
appropriations bill if they are accusing us on the Energy and Commerce
Committee who drafted that bill.
What this amendment would do would take away the funding that the
Department of Labor and Health and Human Services would be able to
enforce that insurance can't drop someone from coverage when they
become sick.
{time} 1050
They would take away that funding. Seniors would be saving money.
They should enforce it, saving money for seniors for prescription
drugs. Young adults up to age 26 are getting back on insurance with
their parents. That would stop the Department of Labor and Health and
Human Services from enforcing that law. Small businesses are receiving
billions of dollars in tax credits to provide health care coverage.
This would stop it.
Defunding health care would end these benefits and put insurance
companies back in charge. The whole goal of the health care bill,
whether you call it ObamaCare--I wanted it to be called the Gene Green
bill. But I admit, I'm only one of 435 is to cut these benefits. That's
what this bill is about in this amendment. It will defund the great
things in the health care law.
Let's go back and talk about the things that we all agree that need
to be changed. But if you take away the money, we'll lose this for all
the folks in our districts.
Mr. KING of Iowa. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the
gentlewoman from Minnesota (Mrs. Bachmann).
Mrs. BACHMANN. I thank Mr. King for yielding.
Make no mistake about it--the effort on the part of Steve King is to
defund ObamaCare. This Chamber already passed a bill to repeal
ObamaCare, which the American people have asked. This is now an effort
to defund ObamaCare. Because as we have seen from the Congressional
Research Service, the ingenious nature of the ObamaCare bill was to
already put the funding in place so that if the majority lost the
gavel, which they did, the new majority would be unable to defund this
bill.
Speaker Pelosi said it well last year when she said we had to pass
the bill to know what is in it. We only found out recently that
literally tens of billions of dollars have already been appropriated to
fund ObamaCare. It was put in ``mandatory spending,'' spending
[[Page H1214]]
where this Chamber would not have access to be able to defund the bill.
If we are unable to defund the bill now, make no mistake, Mr. Chair,
this Chamber and the American people will do everything they can to
make sure they put into place a new President, a new Senate, and a
House that will have the requisite courage to finally defund the
government takeover of health care.
Ms. DeLAURO. I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Wisconsin (Ms.
Baldwin).
Ms. BALDWIN. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to this amendment and
in opposition to the underlying bill.
I fail to see how Republican efforts to eliminate all funds for
health reform will create jobs or help our fragile economy recover.
Instead, defunding health reform would leave behind thousands of whom I
represent in Wisconsin, thousands of Wisconsin families who have
already begun to experience the benefits of health care reform.
Should the Republican efforts succeed, tens of thousands of young
adults in Wisconsin would stand to lose their insurance coverage
through their parents. Once again, children would be refused insurance,
discriminated against because of preexisting conditions. And nearly
50,000 Wisconsin seniors would face higher prescription drug costs.
What's more, the efforts to defund the health care reform law come on
top of extreme cuts to community health care centers and family
planning clinics.
While I agree with my Republican colleagues that we must reduce the
deficit and bring the budget into balance, we must be smart about it.
And this amendment is not smart about it. This unwise bill jeopardizes
our Nation's health, our Nation's recovery, and our Nation's future.
And it's particularly troublesome to me this week because it falls on
top of efforts by Wisconsin's governor to cut health, education, and
public safety services, and to take away the rights of public servants
to provide them.
Mr. Chairman, today I stand in solidarity with my fellow
Wisconsinites as I fight for a better future for all Wisconsinites and
all Americans. I urge my colleagues to oppose Republican efforts to
defund the health care reform law and to oppose the underlying bill.
Mr. KING of Iowa. Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to yield 1 minute to the
gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Gingrey).
Mr. GINGREY of Georgia. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
Mr. Chairman, I stand in full support of the King amendment. I was at
the well just a few minutes ago in support of the Rehberg amendment.
But what this amendment does is eliminate and stop the funding, the
hundred billion dollars' worth of funding that was automatically put in
this bill to prevent, if we took over the majority of this House, Mr.
Chairman, as we have done, or try to stop us from stopping the worst
bill that's ever been passed in the history of the Congress. And we
have to do this.
This is a pledge to the American people. We can do it. We can start
over, we can make this bill right, we can enact health care reform that
truly does bring down the cost for patients so they can get access,
they have more control, and that we don't destroy the medical
profession in the process of continuing this wrongheaded, boneheaded
ObamaCare bill.
So I want to stand strongly with my colleague from Iowa in supporting
this amendment.
Ms. DeLAURO. I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Oregon (Mr.
Blumenauer).
Mr. BLUMENAUER. I appreciate that.
My friends on the other side of the aisle talk about the need for
listening to the American public. Well, I have been back home in my
district meeting with providers, people in the insurance industry,
hospitals, nurses, doctors and they are dealing with this plan moving
forward. Many are excited about the opportunities to take advantage of
it. The protections that are under way in the law right now are popular
with the public because they are important to the public.
My friends talk about listening to the American citizens. The
Associated Press pointed out in a poll last month that the overwhelming
majority opposed the notion of trying to defund health care. In fact,
in that same poll, 43 percent thought the protection should be
expanded.
We are in a situation now where we can make a profound difference in
improving the quality of health care in this country while we reduce
deficits.
Putting sand in the health care gears, arguing, trying to create
confusion is not moving us forward. Work with our hospitals, work with
our doctors, work with our citizens. Make health reform work for
America.
Mr. KING of Iowa. Mr. Chairman, this amendment No. 266, someone put
the moniker on it ``The Silver Bullet Amendment.'' And as much as we
have all worked here to try to find the right way to shut off all of
the funding to freeze in place the implementation and enforcement of
ObamaCare, many of us have worked in a number of different ways. This
is the amendment that looks at the pattern that was set, that I
understood, back in 1974, when there was a CR before the House of
Representatives that shut off all funding that would go to the Vietnam
War for offensive or defensive operations, in the air, over the land
of, the seas adjacent to, or the countries adjacent to it. That
language covered everything, and it stopped bullets on the dock from
going into the hands of people to defend themselves.
I disagree with the policy. But the foundation is here in multiple
places in the history of this Congress. This is the language that shuts
off the funding of ObamaCare until such time as H.R. 2 becomes law.
That's the repeal legislation that becomes law. This is H.R. 1. It's
completely appropriate--and H.R. 2 and H.R. 1 are married together--
that we shut off the funding for implementation of ObamaCare, all of
it, the entire $105.5 billion that was slipped into this report that we
just got back last February 10.
So I urge the adoption of this amendment.
I yield back the balance of my time.
{time} 1100
Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chairman, I urge my colleagues to oppose this
amendment. What we need to be doing is to focus on jobs to grow the
economy and to reduce the deficit. This amendment does none of the
above. Essentially what it does, it takes us back into the hands of
insurance companies when they had free rein to raise rates, to reject
claims and deny coverage to families and businesses who would have no
recourse. It protects their CEO bonuses and their corporate profits.
We need to be about the business of creating jobs. This amendment
does nothing to do that and increases the deficit. It should be
absolutely clear to everyone here and everywhere else what this
amendment does.
Point of Order
Mr. DeLAURO. Mr. Chairman, I make a point of order against the
amendment because it proposes to change existing law and constitutes
legislation on an appropriation bill and therefore violates clause 2 of
rule XXI. The rule states in pertinent part: ``An amendment to a
general appropriation bill shall not be in order if changing existing
law.'' It waives existing law.
I ask for a ruling from the Chair.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentlewoman from Connecticut has stated a point
of order against the amendment. Does any Member wish to be heard on the
point of order?
Mr. KING of Iowa. Yes, Mr. Chairman.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman is recognized.
Mr. KING of Iowa. Mr. Chairman, this is a point of order that has
been raised on my amendment that I referred to as the silver bullet
amendment. I think it does not consider a duty that we have here in the
House of Representatives, and that is we stand here and take an oath to
uphold the Constitution of the United States, each one of us. I bring
in my Bible to do that. And I take it very, very seriously when we take
an oath to uphold the Constitution.
We don't take an oath to uphold a rule, but we take an oath to uphold
the Constitution. And as I look into this Constitution and read through
it, Article I, Section 5 reads in pertinent part: ``Each House may
determine the rules of its proceedings.'' And because each House can
determine the rules of its proceedings here in this Constitution, you
have in your hands the gavel, Mr.
[[Page H1215]]
Chairman, and the power and the authority to determine those rules, at
least to make a strong recommendation to this body.
I would urge that we understand that two Federal courts have found
this bill, ObamaCare, to be unconstitutional, and it is immoral and
unjust and irresponsible to waive any opportunity to shut off the
billions of dollars that are automatically appropriated in a deceptive
fashion and continue for the implementation of ObamaCare because we
might think somehow that a rule would trump the very Constitution
itself.
The Acting CHAIR. Does any other Member wish to be heard on the point
of order?
Mr. WEINER. I do, Mr. Chairman.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from New York is recognized.
Mr. WEINER. Mr. Chair, I agree with the gentleman. His amendment is
clearly in order. But I know this because if this were legislating on
this bill, that would mean that they can legislate. They controlled the
House and the Senate and the Presidency; they were unable to legislate.
We've been here for 8 weeks; they're unable to legislate. It is
impossible to believe he is legislating in this bill.
The point of order, if I may speak to it, suggests that the gentleman
is legislating on an appropriations bill. I have watched those guys.
They're incapable. There is no way this is legislating. So I believe
the point of order should be struck down. It is impossible. After 8
weeks they haven't legislated. They had 8 years in the majority, and
they didn't legislate. How can it possibly be, Mr. Chairman, that the
point of order is correct?
The gentlelady from Connecticut is rarely incorrect, but if you think
they're legislating, impossible, almost metaphysically impossible for
the gentleman to legislate. He doesn't know how. How can we possibly
have the legislating in this bill?
I think the gentleman is absolutely correct. Let us have this debate
because if it is that moment, if lightning is striking, if it is chilly
in hell, then maybe this is the moment we have been waiting for--the
Republican majority is going to start legislating. Please, praise God,
maybe this is the moment.
So I think the gentleman is correct. He is not legislating in this
bill because it is impossible for them to do so because they simply
don't know how.
The Acting CHAIR. The Chair is prepared to rule.
The Chair finds that the amendment proposes explicitly to supercede
existing law.
As such, it constitutes legislation in violation of clause 2(c) of
rule XXI.
The point of order is sustained.
Amendment No. 267 Offered by Mr. King of Iowa
Mr. KING of Iowa. Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk.
The Acting CHAIR. The Clerk will designate the amendment.
The text of the amendment is as follows:
At the end of the bill (before the short title), insert the
following:
Sec.__. None of the funds made available by this Act may be
used to carry out the provisions of Public Law 111-148,
Public Law 111-152, or any amendment made by either such
Public Law.
The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to the order of the House of February 17,
2011, the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. King) and a Member opposed each will
control 5 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Iowa.
Mr. KING of Iowa. Mr. Chairman, this amendment No. 267 is an
amendment that is narrowed in its scope in anticipation of the point of
order that was raised by the gentlelady from Connecticut, and I can't
help but reflect on what it must have been like before in this body
before the invention of television. But my Amendment No. 267 says this
in pertinent part: ``No funds made available by this act may be used to
carry out the provisions of ObamaCare.''
So what this does is, for the appropriations that go on outside of
the scope of this continuing resolution, we have lost that point of
order. But this amendment goes to those funds that are appropriated
within it, down the exact same path as the Rehberg amendment, except it
goes to the outside of the particular Department of Health and Human
Services as the narrower scope of the Rehberg amendment. So this goes
broader than just HHS, but it does go directly to shutting off all
funds within this CR that would be used to enforce or implement
ObamaCare.
I have made my arguments, Mr. Chairman, on that.
I reserve the balance of my time.
Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentlewoman from Connecticut is recognized for
5 minutes.
Ms. DeLAURO. I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Connecticut (Mr.
Murphy).
Mr. MURPHY of Connecticut. Mr. Chair, poll after poll shows that
Americans oppose repealing or defunding health care. The latest one
says 62 percent of Americans oppose these efforts. Why? Because they
have figured out that the nonsense coming from Republicans over the
last several years about this being socialized medicine or a government
takeover is just that--it is nonsense.
What they figured out is that this is helping millions of Americans
all around this country, millions of Americans like a little 8-year-old
boy named Kyle McCollough who had the courage to walk into my office
yesterday and tell me about his battle with hemophilia. His family has
to put out $10,000 a month to pay for his medications, and repeal of
this legislation means bankruptcy for his family and for him a lifetime
of worrying as to whether he has a job that covers his illness or
whether he has the medications to stay alive.
That is why 62 percent of Americans oppose what the Republicans are
trying to do on this floor. And for anyone that votes for this, they
have to have an answer to them and they have to answer to little Kyle
McCollough.
Mr. KING of Iowa. Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to yield 1\1/2\ minutes
to the doctor from Louisiana (Mr. Fleming).
Mr. FLEMING. I thank the gentleman.
Mr. Chairman, one thing that is lost in this debate is this fact, and
that is there is a difference between coverage and access to care. I
have been a physician for 35 years. I can tell you that today, pre-
ObamaCare, we have 85 percent coverage, but we have 100 percent access
to care. Anyone who wishes can report to any emergency room in this
country and receive care. Now, they may receive a bill, but if they pay
that bill or not, they can still return for care.
Now let's move to Canada and the U.K. where they have supposedly 100
percent of coverage. Well, they oftentimes wait a year, maybe 2 years,
for a CT scan or an MRI scan, and then once they get the results back,
they may wait another year to get surgery.
{time} 1110
It's not unusual to be told, hey, we could have helped you had we
made the diagnosis in time.
It's perfectly acceptable in these countries to have a death rate
from lack of treatment. Look at the death rates from cancer, prostate,
breast cancer in our country versus others; a horrific difference. Why?
Because we diagnose it much earlier; we treat it much more
aggressively.
But if we go forward with this ObamaCare, then what we will have is
budgets coming up against the decision on what type of care our
citizens can receive. We'll be taking it out of insurance companies;
but, yes, we'll also be putting it in the hands of the government.
Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New
York (Mr. Owens).
Mr. OWENS. Mr. Chairman, I come before you today after spending 27
years in the health care industry representing my local hospitals, and
I can tell you that this bill was supported by them because it creates
care in our communities, and it creates jobs in our communities.
If we're going to focus on how to improve care and reduce cost, the
bill is replete with opportunity. We can support accountable care
organizations, we can support medical home pilots, we can support
community health centers, we can support electronic medical records, we
can support telemedicine, and we can support the Center for Medicare
and Medicaid Innovation. That is how we're going to improve
[[Page H1216]]
care, reduce cost, and deliver benefit to our constituents.
Mr. KING of Iowa. Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to yield 1 minute to the
gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Garrett).
Mr. GARRETT. Mr. Chairman, just earlier we heard the former Speaker
come to the floor just moments ago and say that she has now read the
bill. Uh-hmm. Of course we heard her famously saying before that we had
to pass the legislation in order for her to find out what was in the
bill.
We can tell you who has read the bill, and that is the courts of this
great country. And the most recent Federal courts said they have read
it, and they have found that the bill is unconstitutional. For this is
the first time in the history of this country that the price of
citizenship, this is the first time in the history of this country that
the price of freedom, this is the first time in the history of this
country that the price of being an American is that you have to buy a
particular product that some unknown, faceless bureaucrat here in
Washington ordains that you have to buy.
We have come to the time that liberty is being taken away from us,
that the strong hand of a Big Brother is reaching out and telling us
you have to do this and you have to do that as the price of freedom and
the price of liberty.
Yes, to answer your questions. Yes, we will legislate; yes, we will
address health care; yes, we will address the American people's
interests in this area. And I commend the gentleman from Iowa on this
amendment.
Ms. DeLAURO. I remind the gentleman that the courts are split two and
two.
Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from North Carolina
(Mr. Butterfield).
Mr. BUTTERFIELD. I thank the gentlelady.
Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to King amendment No. 266.
It has been said that we are the sum total of our experiences, Mr.
Chairman, and that is certainly true. My experience consists of growing
up in a low-income minority community whose history dates back more
than 150 years since slavery. I represent that district, the First
District of North Carolina, the fourth poorest district in the country.
My constituents, Mr. Chairman, overwhelmingly support the Affordable
Care Act. Why? My constituents know that their insurance costs are
soaring, exceeding more than 18 percent per year in increased costs.
For those constituents who don't have insurance, they know that they
will be able to qualify for Medicaid if their income is less than 133
percent of the Federal poverty line.
My rural hospitals, Mr. Chairman, know that finally when patients
walk into their emergency rooms, the hospitals will be paid for their
care, and they will not continue to face bankruptcy.
Mr. Chairman, this assault on the Affordable Care Act is unfounded,
it's unnecessary; and I ask my colleagues to defeat this amendment.
Mr. KING of Iowa. Mr. Chairman, may I inquire as to the amount of
time remaining for each side.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from Iowa has 1\1/4\ minutes
remaining; the gentlewoman from Connecticut has 2\1/4\ minutes
remaining.
Mr. KING of Iowa. I reserve the balance of my time.
Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from
Oregon (Mr. DeFazio).
Mr. DeFAZIO. Republicans seem to be pretending that emergency room
care is free. Every insured American is paying an extra 1,100 bucks
this year--$1,400 in Oregon--for those who are uninsured. We want to
begin to address that problem, get them in earlier, get them treatment,
less expensive, don't pass the costs on to other Americans. Personal
responsibility.
We outlawed the worst abuses of the insurance industry--canceling
your policy when you get sick even though you've been paying the
premiums, preventing people from getting health care because of a pre-
existing condition.
I heard from a dad whose young son with birth defects is finally
getting covered for those issues because of this law. And then the
students I met at Lane Community College--21, 22, 23 years old, getting
an education, wanting to get in the workforce--they thanked me for
their health insurance. They need that health insurance.
The Republicans said they were going to repeal and replace. Well,
they've been pretty darn silent on the replace side, maybe because it
upsets their patrons in the insurance industry who are so generous at
campaign time.
Mr. KING of Iowa. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of my
time.
Mr. Chairman, I really take issue with the gentleman that declared
this to be nonsense. This is not nonsense. This is very, very serious
business. This is the largest taking of American liberty in the history
of this country. And the shenanigans that went on to put this bill in
place, you could not have sent this bill out on the floor of the 111th
Congress and had it pass if it were all packaged up together in one big
stack. It was two pieces of bills. And we listened to Dr. Burgess
earlier about all of the things that took place to represent this bill
in one place or another, to put it together, including a promise of an
executive order that was designed to trump the very Congress itself.
And here we are, with the first opportunity to put the brakes on
ObamaCare--yes, we've passed the repeal, H.R. 2. This is H.R. 1. It's
here because it's more important to the Speaker than H.R. 2. And that
means that we must shut off this funding to ObamaCare.
This CRS report, $105 billion automatically appropriated over a 10-
year period of time that goes on in perpetuity, sending the tentacles
of this malignant tumor down. It is metastasizing as we speak, and
American liberty is being strangled off by ObamaCare. This amendment is
the amendment that shuts all of the funding within the CR. It must be
passed by this Congress to keep faith with the American people.
I yield back the balance of my time.
Ms. DeLAURO. May I inquire how much time I have remaining.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentlewoman has 1\1/4\ minutes remaining.
Ms. DeLAURO. I yield the balance of my time to the gentleman from
Washington State (Mr. McDermott).
Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Chairman, we've been here now the better part of 2
months, and we've seen political theater go on and on and on. Each day
we bring out something that looks like it might have some usefulness,
but it turns out it's just more political theater. We read the
Constitution in here. Well, that took us a day. Then we spent 9 hours
arguing about a bill that we knew wasn't going anywhere. Then we
brought out the health care bill. Then we keep doing this. Meanwhile,
the American people are saying--and Bill Frist--now, I wouldn't say Dr.
Frist was a good friend of mine, but he was the majority leader in the
Senate, a Republican, a doctor who said don't repeal this law, fix it.
There have been no hearings in 2 months about how you would fix the
bill, and yet the American people--the problems that my colleagues come
out here talking about one after another are multiplied by the millions
in this country. They know there's a problem, they don't want to repeal
it. The numbers for repeal have been dropping as the people have seen
more and more provisions of this law come into effect. They want you to
fix it, not political theater. It doesn't help them in the emergency
room or in the doctor's office.
The Acting CHAIR. The time of the gentleman has expired.
Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentlewoman from Connecticut is recognized for
5 minutes.
Ms. DeLAURO. I yield to the gentleman from New Jersey.
(Mr. ANDREWS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his
remarks.)
Mr. ANDREWS. If I could just get the attention of the gentleman who
is the author of the amendment, Mr. Chairman, I wanted to yield to the
gentleman from Iowa.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentlewoman from Connecticut has the time.
Mr. ANDREWS. I would ask her, at the appropriate time, to yield for
an answer.
Here is my question: Let's say we have a person who is on Medicare
who
[[Page H1217]]
has $100 a week on drug costs and they hit the doughnut hole in August
of the year.
{time} 1120
The way the law works right now is they will get help to continue to
pay for their prescription drugs in the form of either a cash rebate in
the past or a discount in the future.
I wonder if the gentleman could explain to us what will happen to
those Medicare recipients when they hit the doughnut hole if his
amendment becomes law.
I would ask the gentlelady to yield to him for an answer.
Ms. DeLAURO. I yield to the gentleman from Iowa.
Mr. KING of Iowa. I thank the gentlelady for yielding.
To the gentleman from New Jersey as to his question on the doughnut
hole, I understand. Under the current circumstances of the doughnut
hole, there are many people in the lowest incomes who are not affected
by it.
Ms. DeLAURO. Reclaiming my time, I think we want to try to answer the
gentleman's question.
I yield to the gentleman from New Jersey.
Mr. ANDREWS. The question was: What about someone who is in the
doughnut hole? What happens to him under your amendment?
Ms. DeLAURO. I yield to the gentleman from Iowa.
Mr. KING of Iowa. To compress my response, I think it's a bit unclear
because we don't know how the Secretary of Health and Human Services
may respond when the funding is shut off.
Ms. DeLAURO. Reclaiming my time, I yield to the gentleman from New
Jersey.
Mr. ANDREWS. With all due respect, Mr. Chairman, it is not unclear at
all.
What would happen under the gentleman's amendment is the prescription
drug price of this senior would go up dramatically, and he would have
to pay the entire cost of that prescription until he hit, I think, the
$5,100 limit. This is substantive legislation, the effect of which will
dramatically raise prescription drug costs for America's neediest
seniors.
I thank the gentlewoman for her time.
Ms. DeLAURO. I thank the gentleman.
Mr. Chairman, I would like to now yield to the gentleman from
California (Mr. Garamendi).
Mr. GARAMENDI. I thank the gentlelady for yielding.
Mr. Chairman, when you take a look at what is happening here, the
effort to repeal, to kill, to stop the Affordable Health Care Act is an
assault on the American public, and it would give back to the insurance
industry their opportunity to deny benefits, to deny coverage.
It is hard to understand how in this period of time when we should be
talking about building jobs that our colleagues would put before us
legislation that would, in fact, destroy over 800,000 jobs and destroy
the opportunity for millions upon millions of Americans to have health
care that they could afford. For small businesses to be able to provide
the health care to their employees and to receive a reduction in the
costs of that health care, it is hard to understand why they would be
doing this when we need jobs, when we need health care.
When you look across the broad impact of H.R. 1, it is an assault on
the working men and women of the poor in this country. When you take a
look at the tax proposals put forward by the Republicans, it is to
benefit the high and the mighty and the wealthy to the detriment of the
working men and women and the poor of this country.
This is flat-out class warfare against the working men and women of
this country. Plain and simple.
If you remove health care, you remove their ability to get health
care, and you remove their ability to be healthy and to work. If you
remove the clinics, you remove their opportunity to get health care. If
you cut back on Medicare and Medicaid, you remove their ability to have
health care.
It is an assault on the working men and women, on the elderly and the
poor in this Nation. That's what it adds up to.
Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chairman, I now yield to the gentleman from
Washington (Mr. Dicks).
Mr. DICKS. I would just say to the gentleman from New Jersey that I
was in almost all of the meetings in our caucus. This bill was read
provision by provision, sentence by sentence, and we had the staffers
there who wrote these provisions under the direction of our chairman at
that time.
This was carefully considered, and any idea from the gentleman from
New Jersey that it wasn't is just an outrageous statement on his part,
and he ought to be ashamed of himself.
Ms. DeLAURO. Reclaiming my time, Mr. Chairman, once again, as to what
we are doing here, this amendment just mirrors the prior amendment of
which we had a discussion. We keep saying it over and over again: Your
inability to come here, as you promised, to create jobs for the
American people, to lower the deficit for them, and to turn the economy
around has failed.
Ms. WATERS. Mr. Chair, I rise to oppose the King amendment.
Repealing or de-funding health care reform is part of the
Republicans' No Jobs Agenda. The Affordable Care Act will create jobs.
One study says that repealing the law will put in jeopardy the 250,000
to 400,000 new jobs this law will create each year.
More importantly, de-funding the Affordable Care Act will jeopardize
the many benefits this law provides to the American people.
1. The Affordable Care Act prohibits insurance companies from denying
coverage to people with pre-existing conditions, like diabetes, heart
disease, cancer, and HIV/AIDS.
2. Starting this year, the Affordable Care Act provides seniors in
the ``donut hole'' a 50 percent discount on brand-name prescription
drugs.
3. Also starting this year, small businesses may qualify for a tax
credit that covers up to 35 percent of the cost of providing health
insurance to their workers.
4. The Affordable Care Act provides $11 billion for community health
centers, which serve low-income and uninsured families in my district
and throughout the country.
5. The Affordable Care Act provides $15 billion for wellness and
prevention activities, such as cancer screenings and child
immunizations.
6. The Affordable Care Act provides funding to train additional
primary care doctors and nurses, who will be able to serve patients in
underserved parts of the country, like Los Angeles County.
7. Most importantly, the Affordable Care Act guarantees all Americans
access to affordable health insurance that covers essential medical
benefits and that cannot be taken away when they get sick and need it
most.
De-funding the Affordable Care Act will impact all Americans, but
especially harm the least of these--women, children, people of color,
the poor, the homeless--people who often lack a voice and whom I have
championed during my four decades in public service. People of color
are disproportionately impacted by a lack of access to health
insurance. According to the Department of Health and Human Services'
Office of Minority Health, 20 percent of African-Americans were
uninsured in the United States in 2007, and 32 percent of the Hispanic
population was uninsured.
Quality health care must be available for all Americans regardless of
race, level of income, gender, or the existence of a pre-existing
condition. That's why the Affordable Care Act specifically addresses
health disparities and protects the rights of people with pre-existing
conditions, and that's we must fully fund the Affordable Care Act.
I urge my colleagues to oppose this amendment.
The Acting CHAIR. The time of the gentlewoman has expired.
The question is on the amendment offered by the gentleman from Iowa
(Mr. King).
The question was taken; and the Acting Chair announced that the ayes
appeared to have it.
Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.
The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to clause 6 of rule XVIII, further
proceedings on the amendment offered by the gentleman from Iowa will be
postponed.
Amendment No. 268 Offered by Mr. King of Iowa
Mr. KING of Iowa. Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk.
The Acting CHAIR. The Clerk will designate the amendment.
The text of the amendment is as follows:
At the end of the bill (before the short title), insert the
following:
Sec. __. None of the funds made available by this Act may
be used to pay the salary of any officer or employee of any
Federal department or agency with respect to carrying out the
provisions of Public Law 111-148, Public Law 111-152, or any
amendment made by either such Public Law.
The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to the order of the House of February 17,
2011, the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. King) and a Member opposed each will
control 5 minutes.
[[Page H1218]]
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Iowa.
Mr. WEINER. Mr. Chairman, I reserve a point of order on the
amendment.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from New York reserves a point of
order.
Mr. KING of Iowa. I yield myself 30 seconds.
Mr. Chairman, amendment No. 268 goes to the end of the bill. It
simply says that none of the funds made available in this act may be
used to pay the salary of any officer or employee of any Federal
department or agency with respect to carrying out the provisions of
ObamaCare. It is that simple.
It is one additional way to slow down the implementation and the
enforcement of ObamaCare until such time as we see that day that the
full repeal is signed by, hopefully, the next President of the United
States, unless the one we have today has a reconsideration.
I reserve the balance of my time.
Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentlewoman from Connecticut is recognized for
5 minutes.
Ms. DeLAURO. I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from California (Ms.
Woolsey).
Ms. WOOLSEY. Mr. Chairman, this amendment and the underlying bill go
in precisely the wrong direction.
We should be talking about strengthening the historic reform that we
passed last year. We should not be tearing it apart, because we all
know that its repeal will leave millions out in the cold, stripping
them of access to affordable health care; and it will cost small
businesses the incentives and the tax breaks that they would get. It
all goes in the wrong direction.
The majority claims to believe in cutting government spending above
all else; yet the CBO has concluded that, over a 10-year period, up to
2021, their bill would add $230 billion to the national debt. Now, if
you're really serious about reducing our debt, you should have a robust
public option. That would save $68 billion.
Mr. KING of Iowa. I am pleased to yield 1 minute to the gentleman
from Georgia (Mr. Kingston).
Mr. KINGSTON. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
We keep hearing from the Democrats that we're here and that we're not
doing a jobs bill.
Why are we doing this bill? Why are we doing this bill now? It's
because you guys did not pass a budget. We are on FY11, as you know,
because you did not take care of your business. We are reaching back,
trying to finish up what you guys should have done by October 1 of last
year.
By the way, this does create jobs, because the small businesses do
not want government-mandated health care; and the folks back home don't
want bureaucrats coming in between the doctor-patient relationship,
which is what ObamaCare does. Now, we know the nanny state wants full
control from cradle to grave, but folks back home don't want it. That's
what November was about.
So what we're trying to do is finish up the unfinished business of
the Pelosi House from last year so that we can move forward on the
coming year, FY12. We will continue to have this debate, but we are
trying to protect the doctor-patient relationship, not create a doctor-
bureaucrat-patient relationship, which ObamaCare does.
{time} 1130
Ms. DeLAURO. I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Massachusetts
(Mr. Neal).
Mr. NEAL. I thank the gentlelady.
When you consider how rhetoric doesn't square up with reality in this
institution, the gentleman from Iowa started by saying this is the
greatest threat to personal liberty in history. Well, we have some
young people here today, and I guess he thinks that Plessy vs. Ferguson
and Dred Scott and Lincoln's suspension of habeas corpus, that those
didn't represent a threat to personal liberty.
Now, President Bush said that the best way to get health care, for
those who were outside the mainstream, was very simple. You could go to
an emergency room.
That is not health care. That treats the issue in front of the
individual. It denies preventive care. It doesn't offer assistance to
women who are in need of additional health care. This proposal that we
passed was modest, and it was market driven. It kept the private sector
alive and it put in place basic protections for the American consumer.
I wish that we could have a separate vote on the individual proposals
that we included in that bill, and I guarantee you we wouldn't be
talking about death panels; we would be talking about the idea of
extending health care benefits to all members of the American family,
including the 51 million who find themselves outside of the mainstream.
Just think of it today. This is more of a threat to liberty than
Plessy vs. Ferguson and Dred Scott and Lincoln's suspension of habeas
corpus.
Mr. Chair, I rise in opposition to the amendment offered today which
wold repeal the historic health care reform bill.
With passage of the new law last year, American families can take
back the control of their health care.
The law bars insurance companies from discriminating coverage based
upon pre-existing conditions, health status and gender.
The law caps the out-of-pocket health care expenses that have
bankrupted many American families.
The law allows individuals and small businesses to purchase
affordable insurance from competitive marketplaces.
And--the law contains the cost of health care while reducing the
deficit by $138 billion over the next 10 years.
We solved the dilemma so many Americans families face on a child's
22nd birthday by extending dependent benefits until age 26.
I am an ardent supporter of Social Security and Medicare. The new law
filled the Medicare prescription donut hole and provided new wellness
and preventive benefits seniors.
We made history last year with this new law. And yet, today, this
amendment seeks to undo all of this progress, all of these
achievements, all of these new protections and benefits for Americans.
I have visited the world-class hospitals of Massachusetts and spoken
with the administrators, doctors, nurses, and other health care
professionals. Massachusetts is way-ahead of the rest of the country in
requiring health insurance coverage for almost all of our citizens. And
I can tell you the state is better for it. The hospitals are better for
it.
I urge opposition.
The Acting CHAIR. The time of the gentleman has expired.
Mr. KING of Iowa. Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to yield 1 minute to the
judge and Congressman from east Texas, Mr. Louie Gohmert.
Mr. GOHMERT. Mr. Chairman, we heard Minority Leader Pelosi saying
earlier that we were here as Republicans siding with the insurance
companies. Revisionist history is great, but if you go back and look at
who was supporting the ObamaCare efforts, you had the insurance
companies lined up all out there, supportive.
You had the big pharmaceutical companies all out there supportive.
You saw the American Hospital Association out there supportive. You saw
the AMA out there supportive. You saw AARP. They were seen out there
encouraging all of the ObamaCare stuff. Naturally they stand to gain
with UnitedHealth more than anybody. They are the biggest sellers of
Medigap insurance.
So if you really want to look at history, who was it that was not
supportive? Well, folks, we heard from them in November. It was the
American people.
That's why we are here. We are with small business. They will create
the jobs. We are with the American people. That's why we are doing
this.
Ms. DeLAURO. I yield 1 minute to the gentlelady from Florida (Ms.
Wilson).
The Acting CHAIR (Mrs. Miller of Michigan). The Chair would note that
the point of order by the gentleman from New York continues to be
reserved throughout.
Ms. WILSON of Florida. Good afternoon. Madam Chair, somewhere in
America today a family is losing their home because they can't afford
the health care premiums for a diabetic dad and a hypertensive mom.
Somewhere in America tonight a child will die because they have been
denied health care because of a preexisting condition.
Somewhere in America tomorrow a family will go bankrupt because they
took care of a cancer-stricken family member.
Black, white, Hispanic, Asian, urban, rural Republican, Democrat,
independent, tea party, it doesn't matter.
[[Page H1219]]
At some time in our life we will all get sick. We need health care.
But you know what? We, as Members of Congress, are very fortunate. We
all get health care. We get the very best.
But what about Jennifer and Lisa and James and grandma and grandpa
and the Johnsons and baby Joshua? We represent them too. They deserve
what we get.
My constituents sent me to Washington to preserve the affordable
health care legislation. They are proud of the product that the 111th
Congress and Nancy Pelosi and President Obama produced. Long live
affordable health care legislation.
On behalf of the people of this Nation who depend on our leadership,
I call upon you to defeat this amendment.
Mr. KING of Iowa. Madam Chair, I am pleased to yield 2 minutes to the
gentlewoman from Minnesota (Mrs. Bachmann).
Mrs. BACHMANN. Thank you to the gentleman from Iowa for offering this
important amendment.
The liberal talking point in the debate thus far has gone something
like this: We can't defund ObamaCare today because we have to focus on
job creation.
Now, that is very interesting, coming from the liberals in this
Chamber who spent literally trillions of dollars out of the public
Treasury only to see 2 million jobs lost in the private sector because
of their failed policies on job creation.
ObamaCare will likely create the largest government bureaucracy in
the history of our country, filled with even more government jobs than
any other agency. There is one thing that ObamaCare will likely do
very, very well, and it's this: It will create the largest bureaucracy
of government workers in the history of the Nation.
It isn't that we will necessarily get more doctors; it isn't that
ObamaCare will necessarily give us more nurses or truly more health
care.
What we will get from ObamaCare, according to the Congressional
Budget Office, is increased costs in health care with a huge
bureaucracy, all designed for the purpose likely of saying ``no'' to
people when they need to have access to health care.
What a bargain, Mr. Chairman. Pay more, get less. That's the reason
why I believe the Rasmussen poll came out last week and said that 58
percent of the American people are begging this Congress to repeal
ObamaCare. Repeal we will, and defund we must.
Ms. DeLAURO. I yield 1 minute to the gentlelady from Texas (Ms.
Jackson Lee).
Ms. JACKSON LEE of Texas. Thank you very much to my dear friend.
This is a siege on the lives of innocent Americans. It is a siege by
undocumented claims of unconstitutionality.
When Justice Scalia said the relevant inquiry is simply whether the
means are chosen or reasonably adapted to the attainment of a
legitimate end under the commerce clause. It is. This bill is
constitutional.
What this gentleman wants to do is to literally shut down community
health clinics that are now under the Affordable Care Act. He wants to
make sure that children are not getting immunized. He wants to make
sure that HIV patients are not getting their medicine. He wants to make
sure that seniors who can come to these clinics are not able to access
them. He wants to make sure that families are getting no coverage. This
is the end result of this very, very dangerous amendment.
In addition, we have to respond to someone who got up and actually
said this is the worst bill that has ever been passed. What about the
slave laws? What about the fugitive slave laws? How dare anyone suggest
this is the worst bill when we give opportunity to all Americans.
This amendment should be denied. They should listen to Senator Frist,
who said this bill is a good bill. There are Republicans who believe we
should provide health care for America.
The Acting CHAIR. The time of the gentlewoman has expired.
Mr. KING of Iowa. Madam Chair, I yield myself the balance of my time.
Madam Chair, I recall back at the beginning of the Obama
administration when President Obama said that we are in an economic
calamity, an economic mess, and we couldn't fix our economic problems
unless we first fixed health care. And so his solution for spending too
much money was to spend a lot more money, $2.6 trillion on health care.
So if we couldn't first fix the economy unless we first fix health
care, let me take that philosophy and turn it this way. We can't fix
health care unless we first repeal ObamaCare. That's where this country
is today. We can't put the replacement in place, we can't put the fixes
in place until we pull this thing out by the roots.
And the only way to do this today is to shut off the funding. The
repeal is over there in the Senate. The House voted in a strong way to
repeal ObamaCare. H.R. 1 is the unfunding of ObamaCare. It is the
vehicle to do it. This amendment is one of the vehicles that
contributes to that cause.
Again, I thank Denny Rehberg and the people that did this work and
all those people that worked on this cause. I urge adoption.
I yield back the balance of my time.
{time} 1140
Ms. DeLAURO. Madam Chairman, the American people want us to focus our
time and attention on creating jobs. They want us to turn the economy
around. They want us to reduce the deficit. The total of the two
amendments that have just come before this body would increase the
deficit, increase it, the first one by $5.5 billion over the next
several years, and this one at about $5.3 billion over the next 5
years.
That's not what you told them you were going to do. You told them you
were going to create jobs and roll back the deficit. What you are doing
here is putting the American people in the hands of the insurance
companies again to make their decisions about health care. And we have
health care in this body. Millions in this Nation do not.
I urge my colleagues to vote against this bill, which doesn't create
jobs, doesn't turn the economy around, and adds to the deficit.
Point of Order
The Acting CHAIR. Does the gentleman from New York insist on his
point of order?
Mr. WEINER. Yes, I do.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman will state.
Mr. WEINER. Madam Chair, I make a point of order that the gentleman's
amendment is not in order because it results in a net reduction of
revenues to the Treasury, in violation of the rules of the House and in
violation of the rules stipulated in this bill. I explain that in the
following way:
As the gentleman surely knows, if his amendment is successful, the
checks that are going to small businesses today, the tax breaks that
they are getting to provide health care to their workers and the fact
that there are no burdens on those small businesses means that they are
going to have less money to spend, therefore less people they will be
able to hire, a reduction in the amount of jobs, a reduction in the
amount of revenue coming into the government, an increased burden on
government services.
In fact, the gentleman would say that anyone that would be writing
the check to give back to citizens, they can't do it. Anyone taking
that check, bringing it to them can't any longer do it. Anyone cashing
that check would be in violation of the law. This amendment says that
anyone getting a tax break under this bill would have to give it back.
That would provide a net reduction in the amount of economic activity
and job creation in this country, and therefore his amendment is out of
order.
The Acting CHAIR. Is the gentleman making a point of order under
section 3(j)(3) of House Resolution 5?
Mr. WEINER. I actually withdraw my point of order.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman withdraws his point of order.
The question is on the amendment offered by the gentleman from Iowa
(Mr. King).
The question was taken; and the Acting Chair announced that the ayes
appeared to have it.
Ms. DeLAURO. Madam Chair, I demand a recorded vote.
The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to clause 6 of rule XVIII, further
proceedings on the amendment offered by the gentleman from Iowa will be
postponed.
Amendment No. 83 Offered by Mrs. Emerson
Mrs. EMERSON. Madam Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.
[[Page H1220]]
The Acting CHAIR. The Clerk will designate the amendment.
The text of the amendment is as follows:
At the end of the bill (before the short title), insert the
following:
Sec. __. None of the funds made available by this Act may
be used by the Internal Revenue Service to implement or
enforce section 5000A of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986,
section 6055 of such Code , section 1502(c) of the Patient
Protection and Affordable Care Act, or any amendments made by
section 1502(b) of such Act.
The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to the order of the House of February 17,
2011, the gentlewoman from Missouri and a Member opposed each will
control 5 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentlewoman from Missouri.
Mrs. EMERSON. Madam Chair, I yield myself 2 minutes.
Madam Chair, this amendment will prevent the appropriation of any
funds in this act to implement or enforce the provisions within the
health spending law that require the IRS to verify that individuals
have health care coverage and impose penalties on those who don't
comply.
The fate of this mandate in the courts is uncertain, but we know that
it already has been ruled upon by the American people. They don't want
and shouldn't suffer a mandate from government to engage in specific
economic activity. As a matter of fact, my own State of Missouri passed
a ballot initiative last August by a vote of 71 percent not to enforce
the individual mandate.
This is the bright lights example of what's wrong with the health
care law. It compels Americans to give up their freedoms, to render
their choices, and part with their hard-earned money to support a
system of health care designed by and run by the Federal Government
through a maze of boards, committees, and bureaucrats.
No Americans should be forced to buy or purchase health insurance
they neither want nor can afford, and the Federal Government has never
based the purchase of a good or service as a condition of being a law-
abiding citizen. The American people need some form of protection that
the IRS will not begin to aggressively implement the individual
mandate, and this measure ensures that it won't be implemented prior to
the end of fiscal year 2011.
States, including my own, small businesses across the country, and
individuals of their own volition deserve the chance to speak on this
important matter in the courts before the law adds extraordinary new
burdens to the fiscal responsibility of the State governments, forces
small businesses to fire employees they value, and compels individuals
to spend money they would rather save. For all these disconcerting
reasons, I urge you to support this crucial amendment.
I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. SERRANO. I rise in opposition to the amendment.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from New York is recognized for 5
minutes.
Mr. SERRANO. I think before we go any further on this subject, we
really have to understand what is happening here. The majority party
would like to do away with the health care reform law, and the way to
do that is exactly that way, to try to do away with the law. But they
don't have the votes in both Houses to do that. So what they're trying
to do is not fund provisions that have to go into place.
So at this moment what Mrs. Emerson is trying to do is say that no
funds can be used to impose this mandate. Now, this particular part is
going to get played out in the courts. So let's be honest: the courts
will have to decide why it's okay to mandate that you have car
insurance but not this particular issue. And there are going to be a
lot of other issues that are going to be done. But the issue here is
that they would like to legislate on this bill the end of health care.
And that's just not going to happen.
Lastly, what this amendment does is speak to the larger issue, which
is that in this country now we have a law that provides access to
quality health care to all residents regardless of who they are, where
they live, or their income. The only people who are upset about this
bill, about this law, and have done a good job of telling the American
people that this is the end of the world, are the insurance companies
who now have to step up to the plate and follow the law.
So we know what this is about. We know what you are trying to
accomplish, but it's not going to work. It's not going to work this
way, and it's not going to work in rescinding the law.
Lastly, you know that every so often I give advice to the Republican
Party because I like you. If you keep calling it ObamaCare, you know
what's going to happen? It's going to make it through the courts, and
20 years from now you are going to have Social Security, Medicare, and
ObamaCare, and you would have cemented his legacy forever. So we thank
you for that, and I am sure the President thanks you.
I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Kind).
Mr. KIND. I thank my friend for yielding, and I rise in opposition to
this amendment. The reason I do is as a member of the Ways and Means
Committee, we had Commissioner Shulman before us talking about the IRS
role in the implementation of the Affordable Care Act. And he said
virtually all of the additional funding that they will receive will be
used for outreach efforts to inform small businesses of the tax cuts
that they are now eligible to receive with the implementation of this
law.
That means 16,000 small businesses in my district alone in western
Wisconsin are receiving tax credits under the Affordable Care Act,
making it more affordable for them to provide health care coverage to
their workers.
And if you look at the 50 million uninsured individuals in this
country every year, the bulk of them are working Americans, typically
in small businesses or family farms who have a hard time providing
health care coverage. And yet the IRS is going to be doing outreach to
them to let them know the benefits they are eligible for, along with
other individuals throughout the country, of what they are eligible for
in the Affordable Care Act to make sure they receive quality,
affordable health care coverage. That in essence would be the IRS role.
And I think for that reason we should vote against this amendment.
{time} 1150
Mrs. EMERSON. I continue to reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. SERRANO. How much time do I have, Madam Chair?
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from New York has 2 minutes
remaining. The gentlewoman from Missouri has 3 minutes remaining.
Mr. SERRANO. I would like to yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New
Jersey (Mr. Pallone).
Mr. PALLONE. Madam Chair, I would just like to point out, again, the
gentlewoman's amendment is just like the others we've heard before. It
is going to completely eliminate implementation of the health care
reform because the bottom line is that, if this amendment were to pass,
then all of the positive things that have already gone into place in
terms of eliminating discrimination against preexisting conditions or
the other discriminatory practices, like lifetime or annual caps, or
the requirement that young people up to the age of 26 be able to get
insurance coverage on their parents' policies, all of these things
essentially depend on the mandate, because without the mandate, what
happens is that insurance companies go back, again, to discriminatory
practices. This is nothing more but an effort essentially to eliminate
the health care reform. Whether it's defunded, whether it's eliminating
the mandate or the other amendments that we're going to see later today
because this is a package. And we all know, it's absolutely clear, that
without the mandate, it is going to be impossible to carry out the
coverage and the implementation of these important provisions that
eliminate discrimination.
Mrs. EMERSON. At this time, Madam Chair, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to
the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Poe).
Mr. POE of Texas. I thank the gentlelady for yielding.
The issue is, is this constitutional? It's not whether it's a great
idea, whether an individual mandate is going to save us all. The issue
is whether it's constitutional. Now I do not believe the Constitution
gives the Federal Government the authority to force an American to buy
anything, whether
[[Page H1221]]
it's health care insurance, whether it's a car, or whether it's a box
of doughnuts. And if we allow the Congress to go in and force Americans
to buy a product or be punished by paying a fee which is a fine, and if
you don't pay the fine, you could be prosecuted under the IRS code and
go to prison, then where does it stop? Where does Congress then stop
its nonsense of forcing Americans to buy products all in the name of
saving us all?
This portion is unconstitutional. We should not force Americans to
buy any product. And we should defund the individual mandate for the
simple reason it's unconstitutional. Let's talk about that issue in
this discussion and debate on the House floor.
Mr. SERRANO. I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from the great State
of California.
Mr. GARAMENDI. Madam Chair, the issue before us is whether the IRS
should be able to enforce the laws, in this case the health care laws.
During the first decade of the 2000 period, there was enormous Medicare
fraud going on. In the health care bill, additional agents were added
to the IRS and other agencies to enforce the Medicare laws against
fraud. This provision would defund that and make it impossible to
enforce the laws and prevent Medicare fraud. A very bad idea.
I urge a ``no'' vote on the amendment.
Mrs. EMERSON. I continue to reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. DICKS. I rise to ask a question of the Chair. Who has the right
to close on this amendment?
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from New York has the right to close.
Parliamentary Inquiry
Mrs. EMERSON. Madam Chair, parliamentary inquiry.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentlewoman will state her parliamentary
inquiry.
Mrs. EMERSON. Is it not correct that I would have the right to close?
The Acting CHAIR. The manager in opposition would be entitled to
close.
Mrs. EMERSON. Madam Chair, I yield myself the balance of my time.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentlewoman from Missouri is recognized for 2
minutes.
Mrs. EMERSON. Number one, my colleague tried to make a comparison
between car insurance and health insurance. First of all, auto
insurance, if you will, deals with liability and the harm that you may
do to others. Health insurance has to do with a liability to yourself.
It's totally different. And I don't believe that any State actually
requires comprehensive insurance. The bottom line is, we do not want
the IRS implementing now regulations that may be overturned perhaps in
the near future in the courts.
At the end of the day, we do not know what the courts are going to
say about the constitutionality of an individual mandate. And as such,
it seems irresponsible for the Internal Revenue Service, when it has so
many demands on its time and on its employees, to implement something
that we don't know whether or not it's actually going to become the law
of the land. So with that, I believe very strongly that the IRS should
not be spending those moneys in FY 2011, and we will deal with 2012 at
the time when it comes up.
I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. SERRANO. Let me just very quickly in closing say that I was very
surprised and interested in hearing that the Republican Party is going
to move next on undoing the mandate on car insurance throughout this
country and other insurance. We know what this is. This is a way to try
to kill the law of the land. This should not be done. And I oppose the
amendment.
I yield back the balance of my time.
The Acting CHAIR. The question is on the amendment offered by the
gentlewoman from Missouri (Mrs. Emerson).
The question was taken; and the Acting Chair announced that the ayes
appeared to have it.
Mr. SERRANO. Madam Chair, I demand a recorded vote.
The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to clause 6 of rule XVIII, further
proceedings on the amendment offered by the gentlewoman from Missouri
will be postponed.
Amendment No. 552 Offered by Mr. Schrader
Mr. SCHRADER. I have an amendment at the desk.
The Acting CHAIR. The Clerk will designate the amendment.
The text of the amendment is as follows:
At the end of the bill (before the short title), insert the
following:
Sec. __. (a) Notwithstanding any other provision of this
Act (other than a provision relating to amounts required to
be made available by a provision of law), divisions A and B
of this Act appropriate for fiscal year 2011, for each agency
for which amounts were made available (with respect to
division A) in the Department of Defense Appropriations Act,
2010 (Public Law 111-118) or (with respect to division B) an
appropriations Act referred to in section 1101(a), such
amounts as may be necessary, under the authority and
conditions provided in applicable appropriations Acts and at
the level specified in section 1101(c), except that such
level, with respect to the following appropriations Acts,
shall be equal to the following percentages of the amounts
made available for such agency in such Acts for fiscal year
2010 (other than amounts required to be made available by a
provision of law), including transfers and obligation
limitations:
(1) The Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies
Appropriations Act, 2010 (division B of Public Law 111-117),
89 percent.
(2) The Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2010
(Public Law 111-118), 101 percent.
(3) The Department of Homeland Security Appropriations Act,
2010 (Public Law 111-83), the percentage required to bring
the aggregate amount appropriated in such Act for fiscal year
2010 (other than amounts required to be made available by a
provision of law) to $42,517,000,000.
(4) The Military Construction and Veterans Affairs and
Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2010 (division E of
Public Law 111-117), the percentage required to bring the
aggregate amount appropriated in such Act for fiscal year
2010 (other than amounts required to be made available by a
provision of law) to $74,682,000,000.
(5) All other appropriations Acts referred to in section
1101(a), 96 percent.
(b) Notwithstanding any other provision of this Act,
expenditures made pursuant to the Continuing Appropriations
Act, 2011 (Public Law 111-242), shall be charged to the
applicable appropriation, fund, or authorization provided by
division A in the same manner as provided by this Act with
respect to division B.
(c) Amounts appropriated by subsection (a) may be allocated
by the applicable agency head among agency accounts,
programs, projects, and activities, notwithstanding any other
provision of this Act.
Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. Madam Chairman, I reserve a point of order on
the gentleman's amendment.
The Acting CHAIR. A point of order is reserved.
Pursuant to the order of the House of February 17, 2011, the
gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Schrader) and a Member opposed each will
control 5 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Oregon.
Mr. SCHRADER. Madam Chair, colleagues, I have enjoyed seeing this
open process in this body for the first time in a long time, as far as
it goes. However, a real open process would allow for real alternatives
representing meaningful compromises in scope as well as in the
particulars. America needs and deserves a real bipartisan solution that
is more than political theater and actually has a chance of being a
viable compromise with the Senate and President.
I took two messages from the election last November: America wants
jobs, and they want to see their Nation's fiscal health restored. To
achieve these dual objectives, we need to have a careful balance
between ensuring this fragile recovery and beginning the march to
prudent fiscal reform. Expert economists and previous CBO directors
agree that $61 billion in reductions to the 2010 budget level, which we
are currently debating, representing a 14 percent hit to our domestic
spending on education, health care, public safety, and economic
development, would be a crushing, crushing burden on job creation and
our economic recovery.
Contrary to the lofty rhetoric surrounding the CR's role in
correcting our budget deficits and national debt, this deals with less
than 15 percent of our budget.
{time} 1200
I'm afraid this is merely a political exercise. America is begging
for more from its duly elected Representatives. The proposed CR does
not even get to the mythical $100 billion in reductions that were
talked about during the political campaign. This proposal was not even
considered by the Republican leadership as real. They opted for a more
reasonable $34 billion reduction target before being hijacked by
politics again. Where are the open committee
[[Page H1222]]
hearings? Where is the testimony from individuals, businesses or
agencies? We are operating with virtually no deliberation at all; and
oftentimes, Members have mere minutes to evaluate the amendments.
Members have literally been working day and night for a reasonable
compromise. We need a CR that gets us through these tough times and
sets the stage for real fiscal reform.
I have such a proposal before you here today. My alternative CR
requires a 4.7 percent, across-the-board reduction in domestic spending
for the remainder of 2011. The only exception is the Census Bureau. My
proposal strikes more appropriate reductions in military spending while
at the same time protecting our warriors in the field. As the Secretary
of Defense has stated, we need to eliminate costly weapons systems, way
over budget, out-of-control civilian contracting and achieve much
needed efficiencies in the agency. So rather than a 2 percent increase,
we talk about a 1 percent increase.
This proposal, which I hope is taken as a beginning for a bipartisan
compromise on the continuing resolution, makes real cuts of about $20
billion in our current level of spending, enough to be meaningful, with
7 months remaining in our calendar year, or our fiscal year, but not
enough to undermine the recovery. It's simple, it's serious, and it's
real.
I urge its adoption.
With that, I yield back the balance of my time.
Point of Order
Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. Madam Chairman, I make a point of order
against the amendment because it proposes to change existing law and
constitutes legislation in an appropriation bill and therefore violates
clause 2 of rule XXI, which states in pertinent part: an amendment to a
general appropriation bill shall not be in order if changing existing
law. The amendment attempts to create a legislative formula for
spending.
I ask for a ruling.
The Acting CHAIR. Does any Member wish to be recognized to speak to
the point of order?
If not, the Chair is prepared to rule.
The Chair finds that this amendment seeks to establish a legislative
formula for funding. The amendment therefore constitutes legislation in
violation of clause 2 of rule XXI.
The point of order is sustained, and the amendment is not in order.
Amendment No. 89 Offered by Mr. Kind
Mr. KIND. Madam Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.
The Acting CHAIR. The Clerk will designate the amendment.
The text of the amendment is as follows:
At the end of the bill (before the short title), insert the
following new section:
Sec. __. None of the funds made available by this Act may
be used to provide payments (or to pay the salaries and
expenses of personnel to provide payments) to the Brazil
Cotton Institute.
The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to the order of the House of February 17,
2011, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Kind) and a Member opposed each
will control 5 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Wisconsin.
Mr. KIND. I yield myself such time as I might consume.
Madam Chair, my amendment is very simple and straightforward. It
would save the American taxpayers $150 million a year by ending a new
American taxpayer subsidy that is going to Brazilian cotton
agribusiness. If this program sounds crazy, it's because it is. But
it's also the truth.
How did we get to this point? Well, Brazil had a successful WTO
challenge against our own cotton subsidy program under our own farm
bill. They prevailed; and you would think that the logical, reasonable
response from us would be to reform our cotton subsidy program. But
that's not what happened.
Instead, a new program has been created to the tune of $150 million
per year to buy off Brazil cotton agribusiness so they won't pursue
economic sanctions against our country. It's foolish, it's wasteful,
and it speaks to the need for us to get into serious farm bill reform,
especially under the title I subsidy commodity programs. We need to
eliminate this new subsidy and then get onto the tough lifting of
comprehensive farm bill reform.
I ask my colleagues to support the amendment.
I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. KINGSTON. I rise in opposition to the Kind amendment.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from Georgia is recognized for 5
minutes.
Mr. KINGSTON. I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Madam Chairman, in 2004, the WTO, the World Trade Organization, found
the United States guilty of illegal subsidies to American cotton
farmers. It's been a long process, but Brazil is a very important ally
of ours. We get along fine. They are very important to us strategically
in our own hemisphere, so we want to get along with Brazil. And because
of that, we worked out this settlement which kept Brazil from putting
retaliatory tariffs on us. That saved us money.
If we did not agree to this--which Mr. Kind has pointed out--$147
million, we would have to pay $829 million. This is less, and it only
is in effect until the farm bill is passed. In the 2012 farm bill,
we'll deal with that.
With that, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the chairman of the Agriculture
Committee, the gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. Lucas).
Mr. LUCAS. I rise in opposition to this amendment.
This transfer of funds was established as part of an agreement
negotiated between the U.S. and Brazilian Governments. As a result of
this agreement negotiated by the USTR and USDA, Brazil agreed to
suspend retaliation against U.S. exports. If this amendment passes and
the funds are not transferred in compliance with the agreement, then
the U.S. will be in violation of the agreement. Brazil would then have
the right to immediately impose punitive tariffs on U.S. exports. What
Mr. Kind's amendment does is invite a trade war.
The U.S.-Brazil agreement is in place only until the 2012 farm bill
is completed. This provides an opportunity for the U.S. to determine
what adjustments to current law are necessary as a part of the next
farm bill to bring the U.S. cotton program into compliance with the WTO
ruling. This amendment should not be on this bill. It is a policy
change.
Please join me in defeating this amendment.
Mr. KIND. Madam Chair, I respect my colleagues' position. The answer
is not to create a new $150 American subsidy program going to Brazil.
The answer is to reform our programs now in the United States.
And with that, I yield 1 minute to my good friend from Massachusetts
(Mr. Frank).
Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Madam Chair, I think if we were to have a
contest on your YouCut for the single stupidest thing the Federal
Government could do, it would be to take $120 million more of American
tax dollars and send it to subsidize Brazilian cotton farmers so we can
continue to subsidize American cotton farmers. That's what we're
talking about.
I find it somewhat ironic that my friends who are the great believers
in free enterprise and the free market think somehow there's an
exception for agriculture. But whether you do or you don't, sending
money to Brazilian cotton farmers at a time when we are making
fundamental cuts here is problematic.
It also illustrates my problem with the structure of this bill. I was
hard-pressed to find offsets so we could continue to fund enforcement
of securities fraud or consumer protection. Where could we have gotten
the money? Well, we could have gotten it from Brazil. Instead of
sending it to Brazilian cotton farmers, we could have used it for our
own law enforcement. But the bill is structured to protect this. At
least we cannot waste it.
So let's be very clear. To protect our right to continue to subsidize
American cotton farmers, we are going to subsidize Brazilian cotton
farmers. Lunacy.
Mr. KINGSTON. I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. KIND. Madam Chair, at this time, I would like to yield 1 minute
to my friend from Arizona (Mr. Flake).
Mr. FLAKE. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
I hope that nobody in this Chamber or watching here misses the irony
of this, that we are spending money to subsidize Brazilian agriculture
so that
[[Page H1223]]
we can continue to subsidize agriculture here. That is just incredible
when you think about it.
And what this amendment will do is to force us back to the table. It
won't spark a trade war. It will simply say, all right, stop
subsidizing your own agriculture in a way that violates your trade
agreements. That's what we want to do is force the issue where we can
actually get out of these subsidy programs. We cannot continue to send
money to Brazil so that we can continue to subsidize agriculture here.
It just makes no sense at all. This is a great amendment. I hope that
my colleagues will support it.
Mr. KINGSTON. Madam Chair, how much time do I have remaining?
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from Georgia has 3 minutes remaining.
The gentleman from Wisconsin has 1\3/4\ minutes remaining.
Mr. KINGSTON. Madam Chair, I yield myself 10 seconds. I just want to
point out that I understand and hear what the folks are saying, but we
are in a situation where we have an existing farm bill. If we do not do
this, it is going to cost American taxpayers $682 million. That was the
WTO agreement.
With that, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from California, the
ranking member of the Ag Subcommittee on Appropriations, Mr. Farr.
{time} 1210
Mr. FARR. I think that this is a problem. And I think Mr. Kind has a
way of looking at trying to remove the money, but it's not going to
make the problem go away.
I agree that this is a thing that needs to be addressed because
there's going to be retaliatory implications if this money is just
pulled, and those retaliatory implications are unknown to an awful lot
of other agriculture who may even support this amendment. So it is an
idea that we need to address. This is not the place to address it.
I oppose the amendment.
Mr. KIND. Again, the answer is not to invite a trade war. The answer
is to fix our problem here in America by reforming the long overdue
cotton subsidy program.
With that, I yield 1 minute to my friend from Oregon (Mr. DeFazio).
Mr. DeFAZIO. We've got everything but murder going on here.
We're being blackmailed by the Government of Brazil, and so we are
giving precious U.S. taxpayer dollars, $147 million, to Brazil for
their cotton farmers while I have got small farmers going broke. Now,
come on.
And now we hear from the gentleman from Georgia, well, that's what
the law says. Hey, you just repealed health care. You can change the
farm bill. We can do away with these obscene subsidies, $3.4 billion
bilked from U.S. taxpayers going to subsidize cotton farmers, who use
subsidized water on top of that, whose total crop value was $4 billion.
So $3.4 billion of it is our taxpayer subsidy. This is indefensible.
Take this step now, and then next week you can repeal the farm bill
and replace that.
Mr. KINGSTON. I would remind the gentleman from Oregon we are going
to reauthorize the farm bill next year, which is what this is all
about.
I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Conaway).
Mr. CONAWAY. Madam Chair, I rise in opposition to this amendment.
While far from perfect, this agreement was arranged by the Obama
administration and the country of Brazil. This will incite a
retaliatory trade war against the United States' intellectual
properties. It won't have anything to do with tariffs on U.S.
agriculture, but it will hurt other segments of our economies.
The 2008 farm bill was a contract with American farmers. They have
put business processes in place based on that 5-year contract. We will
renew and renegotiate that contract in 2012. It makes no sense to
unwind this on a piecemeal basis right now.
This is a smokescreen by the other side who wants to go after the
farm bill. Madam Chairman, they have gone after it time and time again.
But the contract with American farmers, which allows Americans to enjoy
the cheapest, most affordable, most abundant and safest food and fiber
supply in the world, is on the backs of this farm bill. Reopening it
now on an ad hoc piecemeal basis is the wrong policy for this country.
Voting for this is a vote to institute a trade war with Brazil, no
matter what the rhetoric is from the other side.
Oppose this amendment.
Mr. KIND. Madam Chair, what is really ironic in this debate is that
cotton prices are at an all-time high in the marketplace, and yet it
shows the built-up resistance in this institution to get to the hard
work of reforming these farm subsidy programs, which is long overdue.
They claim they are going to do it in the next farm bill, but there is
no assurance when that is going to come up. It could be 3 years from
now. That could be an additional half billion dollars from the American
taxpayer for subsidies flowing to Brazil. The answer is to do it now
rather than waiting next year or 3 years from now, or maybe never at
all.
I have been around here long enough to know the powerful special
interests that resist farm reform. We should do it and save taxpayer
dollars at the same time.
I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. KINGSTON. Madam Chair, I yield the balance of my time to the
gentleman from Texas (Mr. Brady), the chairman of the Trade
Subcommittee, who will explain why this saves $682 million and complies
with WTO laws.
Mr. BRADY of Texas. Madam Chair, I am sympathetic to this amendment.
The United States should live up to its WTO obligations, particularly
if we expect other countries to do the same.
Paying Brazil about $12 million a month rather than complying with
the WTO decision regarding cotton subsidies isn't the best way to
resolve this dispute. I acknowledge that. But this settlement is
necessary to prevent Brazil from imposing almost $1 billion in
retaliation against American goods and services, as it's entitled to
do.
This retaliation could take many dangerous and costly forms,
including high tariffs on our American sales abroad and allowing Brazil
to no longer protect American intellectual property rights. Such
retaliation would be devastating. It would cost U.S. jobs and harm
thousands of innocent workers who have nothing to do with this case.
As a result, I must oppose this amendment and urge its defeat.
The Acting CHAIR. The question is on the amendment offered by the
gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Kind).
The question was taken; and the Acting Chair announced that the noes
appeared to have it.
Mr. KIND. Madam Chair, I demand a recorded vote.
The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to clause 6 of rule XVIII, further
proceedings on the amendment offered by the gentleman from Wisconsin
will be postponed.
Amendment No. 88 Offered by Mr. Kind
Mr. KIND. Madam Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.
The Acting CHAIR. The Clerk will designate the amendment.
The text of the amendment is as follows:
At the end of the bill (before the short title), insert the
following:
Sec. __. None of the funds made available by division A of
this Act may be used to research, develop, test, evaluate, or
procure any of the following:
(1) Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle.
(2) Surface-Launched Advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air
Missile program.
The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to the order of the House of February 17,
2011, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Kind) and a Member opposed each
will control 5 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Wisconsin.
Mr. KIND. I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Madam Chair, my amendment is pretty straightforward and simple. It
would eliminate two weapons programs that the Defense Department,
Secretary of Defense, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the bipartisan fiscal
commissions all say are not necessary, they are not needed, they don't
go to improve military readiness, and they are redundant. It's the
Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle as well as the Surface Launch Medium
Range Air-to-Air Missile System, the SLAMRAAM for short.
Now, I am not going to get into the details as to why these weapons
programs should be defunded. Those serving on the committee have heard
these arguments for years. But what I want to make is a larger point
here today; that if we're going to be serious about true deficit
reduction, the defense aspect of the Federal budget also has to
[[Page H1224]]
be on the table. And what better place to start than by listening to
our own military leaders who continually tell this Congress: Stop
appropriating money for weapons systems we don't want, that we don't
want to use, that aren't necessary, they don't enhance military
readiness, and they are not going to support our troops in the field.
And these two programs fit that bill.
Now, we had a previous amendment from Ms. Woolsey in regards to the
EFV program. She laid out the reasons behind that, that I don't have to
get into. But the fact is defense spending is the second largest
spending category in the entire Federal budget after health care costs.
And if that is taken off the table, which I hear too often from too
many of my colleagues, it's going to make restoring the fiscal health
of our Nation that much more difficult.
And with just the elimination of the Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle,
Secretary Gates estimates it could save the American taxpayer over $12
billion. And then for the SLAMRAAM program, General Chiarelli estimated
that would save an additional $1 billion. When the budget is going to
be tight and there's inevitably going to be an increasing squeeze on
our military and military readiness, what better place to start than
these weapon programs that the military is not even asking for and
instructing Congress to stop the insanity?
But I was also proud in the last session of Congress that the
Democratic majority moved forward on another important area of defense
reform, and that's the weapons procurement program. A recent General
Accounting Office report indicates that current weapons programs in the
pipeline today are over $300 billion over budget.
So this blank check that defense contractors expect from the American
taxpayers has got to end, or we will spend ourselves into oblivion and
we won't get a good bang for the taxpayer dollars and we won't be doing
right for the American fighting soldier.
So the point of my amendment is simple. It's going to be tough making
the type of budget decisions that we have to make in a bipartisan
fashion to get these structural deficits under control. The defense
budget should also be fair game for scrutiny and transparency and cost
savings. And what better place to start than where our own military
leaders are instructing us to go: weapons programs they don't need,
will save money, reduce the redundancy, and help deal with the budget
deficits that we're facing.
I reserve the balance of my time.
{time} 1220
Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Madam Chairman, I rise in opposition to the
amendment.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from Florida is recognized for 5
minutes.
Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Madam Chairman, we had a long discussion on the
EFV program, and this legislation provides for an agreement that we are
just about to reach where it is a win-win situation. It is a win for
the taxpayer. The taxpayer is not going to have to pay $145 million in
termination costs. The same money can be used to complete the program
as it stands.
The Marine Corps is satisfied with this. I have been discussing this
with Secretary Gates for quite a long time now. Too often the military
starts a program, a great idea, spends a lot of money in the conceptual
design, research and development, only to cancel the program, get
nothing for it and lose the money. Here is a case where we win. Three
billion dollars has already been spent. We get to take advantage of
completing that program with the money that we would pay to terminate
the program anyway.
SLAMRAAM is basically a similar program, much smaller than the EFV
program, but SLAMRAAM is similar. They are just about to complete the
development stage and have SLAMRAAM on the shelf in the event they need
to go to procurement immediately for an immediate need.
So I am opposed to this amendment. It doesn't do good for the
taxpayer or the military.
I want to compliment Mr. Kind, because we have had several
opportunities to work together with his constituents, wounded
constituents and their families, and he has been very, very helpful. I
want to thank him for having worked on those issues.
I am happy to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Washington (Mr.
Dicks), the distinguished ranking member of the Appropriations
Committee and the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee.
Mr. DICKS. I rise in reluctant opposition to this amendment for the
same very reason. The Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle is coming to an
end. I agree with the chairman. It makes me cringe that they have spent
$3 billion on this, but for an additional $34 million, we can finish
the R&D phase of this program. That is what the chairman was talking
about. Then we don't have to pay $145 million, as I understand it, in
termination costs. I think it is just wise to get the final research
done. So I would reluctantly have to oppose this amendment because it
would take away our opportunity to get this better agreement that the
chairman is talking about.
SLAMRAAM is an AIM-9 missile that is ground-based, and this program
is coming to an end. It is being terminated as well, and we support
that.
Again, I think we should reject the gentleman's amendment, but the
outcome of what he is talking about will be achieved in the very near
future.
Mr. KIND. Madam Chairman, I am just going to conclude my statement
with this. I have great respect and admiration for the two gentlemen
who have been serving on the Defense Appropriations Committee for years
and I am not going to stand here and pretend that I know more about the
defense budget than these two gentlemen do. I don't. But I do tend to
listen carefully to our own military leadership at the Pentagon.
Secretary of Defense Gates said about the Expeditionary Fighting
Vehicle that over two decades the program is going to consume half of
the Marine Corps procurement funds and nearly all of the ground vehicle
budget, something they are trying to avoid. Even though the Marine
Corps Commandant General James Amos has supported the EFV in the past,
he has now recognized that this is ``an onerous fiscal program.''
So if we can't start here with these programs, where are we going to
go in defense for cost savings?
I yield the balance of my time to the gentleman from Massachusetts
(Mr. Frank).
Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. As I understand the arguments of the
chairman and the ranking member, it is we are going to get rid of these
eventually, but let's not do it too quickly because we might save money
prematurely. I have never heard a weaker defense for continuing to
spend money, that at some point we are going to stop. So why not stop
now? So I think the gentleman from Wisconsin ought to be supported.
Mr. YOUNG of Florida. Madam Chairman, I will conclude this debate.
This is probably a very well-intentioned amendment, but it just gets
in the way of working out solutions that are a win for the taxpayer and
a win for the military. We should take advantage of every opportunity
that we have to save the money for the taxpayer and get them something
for it. That is what this amendment would prevent from happening.
We had a lengthy discussion on the EFV earlier in the debate
yesterday, and I am more convinced than ever, as well-intentioned as
the amendment might be, it is just not a good idea and it is not in the
best interests of the taxpayer or the military.
I yield back the balance of my time.
The Acting CHAIR. The question is on the amendment offered by the
gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Kind).
The question was taken; and the Acting Chair announced that the noes
appeared to have it.
Mr. KIND. Madam Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.
The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to clause 6 of rule XVIII, further
proceedings on the amendment offered by the gentleman from Wisconsin
will be postponed.
Amendment No. 48 Offered by Mr. Polis
Mr. POLIS. Madam Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk.
The Acting CHAIR. The Clerk will designate the amendment.
The text of the amendment is as follows:
At the end of the bill (before the short title), insert the
following:
[[Page H1225]]
Sec. ___. None of the funds made available by this Act may
be used to enforce section 75.708 of title 34, Code of
Federal Regulations, as it relates to section 5205 of the
Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C.
7221d).
The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to the order of the House of February 17,
2011, the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. Polis) and a Member opposed each
will control 5 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Colorado.
Mr. POLIS. Madam Chair, this amendment would help increase the
ability of the administration to leverage the resources they already
have to support expansion and replication of charter schools that have
shown to be effective.
Basically, this amendment will remove a regulation that prevents
subgranting and doesn't allow charter school grants to be done through
intermediaries, which are generally venture philanthropy organizations
like New Schools Venture Fund and Charter School Growth Network. These
organizations have proven that they can help guide charter schools and
CMOs, organizations that manage one or two charter schools and help
build them into successful, multisite organizations that support
student success.
These venture philanthropy organizations use the same model in the
nonprofit sense--I want to emphasis they are nonprofits--as venture
capital does in the private sector and support excellence in the
charter schools that are part of their portfolio. They encourage
rigorous evaluations. They provide strategic guidance to board
membership.
One of the issues we frequently have with charter schools is lack of
quality governance. These intermediaries actually can help establish
quality governance, which is such an important determinant of whether a
charter school is successful or not. They can provide flexibility and
provide specific interventions as needed. When something isn't working,
they can help.
Finally, it will empower the administration to help be able to work
through venture philanthropy organizations to better leverage Federal
funds. If you have X dollars in Federal funds, they can combine that
with two-X or three-X in private philanthropic capital they have raised
to have a more meaningful impact on student achievement, to help expand
and replicate what we know works with regard to charter schools.
Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Will the gentleman yield?
Mr. POLIS. I yield to the gentleman from California, ranking member
of the Education Committee.
Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. I thank the gentleman for yielding
and thank him for this amendment. I would hope he would withdraw this
amendment so we would have an opportunity to go through exactly what
the thresholds would be for the Department to award this right to the
grantors to make these subgrants.
Obviously, you have been a leader in the effort of improving the
quality and number of charter schools, but this is a $50 million pool
of money that could rightfully be used for this purpose, but I think we
want to make sure that we have some assurances as to accountability and
the kinds of subgrants that would be made to expand the universe of
high-quality, high-performing charter schools.
I know that Congressman Kline is also supportive of this amendment,
but I think it would be best if we had an opportunity to walk through
it and then either approach the Department to rewrite the regulation or
to have legislation from the committee.
Mr. POLIS. I thank the gentleman and look forward to working with the
chair and the ranking member to ensure that the administration has all
the tools they need to make sure that the limited resources they have
for expansion or replication of models that we know work are used in
the highest-leveraged way possible.
Madam Chairman, I ask unanimous consent to withdraw my amendment.
The Acting CHAIR. Without objection, the amendment is withdrawn.
There was no objection.
{time} 1230
Amendment No. 400 Offered by Ms. Jackson Lee of Texas
Ms. JACKSON LEE of Texas. Madam Chair, I have an amendment at the
desk.
The Acting CHAIR. The Chair notes that the amendment proposes to
amend portions of the bill already passed in the reading.
Does the gentlewoman from Texas seek unanimous consent to offer the
amendment at this point in the reading?
Ms. JACKSON LEE of Texas. I do.
The Acting CHAIR. Is there objection to the request of the
gentlewoman from Texas?
Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. I object.
The Acting CHAIR. Objection is heard.
Mr. DICKS. Madam Chair, I move to strike the requisite number of
words.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from Washington is recognized for 5
minutes.
Mr. DICKS. I am very sorry that the gentlelady cannot offer her well-
thought-out amendments on a technicality, but I will yield 3 minutes to
her to explain what her amendments would have done if they had been in
order.
Ms. JACKSON LEE of Texas. It's unfortunate that Republicans want to
issue a point of order. We asked unanimous consent for amendments that
have been placed timely into the Record against jobs. And that is what
my amendment is about. It clearly is about restoring the $5 billion
that the Republicans want to take out and block American jobs.
You can clearly see how long we've been here, and there have been
actually no jobs being created by Republicans. This amendment does
simply one thing: It restores the $5 billion in stimulus dollars that
have created thousands upon thousands of jobs. It has created this
housing for low-income housing. It has created this kind of map that
shows that stimulus jobs have been all over America and created 585,653
jobs, 253,000 projects.
It is interesting that our friends can support President Obama on
agricultural subsidies, but they can create no jobs, and they want to
oppose restoring the $5 billion in stimulus dollars--and I might call
them reinvestment dollars.
In addition, our friends want to ignore the fact that by taking away
$5 billion they close what we call community health clinics. Yes, this
is where Americans are now getting their good health care, in community
clinics.
So I would argue that it is a shame that we have a situation where
you cannot present this amendment. Jobs, the idea of infrastructure
investment, the idea of low-income housing that is being created, and
as well, projects like housing for the elderly in Minnesota, Kawana
Village Apartments that are in the Washington area, Father Murphy Phase
III, 10 new rental duplexes in Shawnee, Oklahoma. Blackfeet housing,
223 homes, again, in Montana. Mount View Village Lodge, again in
Alaska. And of course Pueblo Housing in El Paso, Texas. Can you tell me
why you want to eliminate the idea and the ability for individuals to
work by taking away the moneys that have been invested in America? That
is what this has done.
In Houston alone, Center Point has been able to improve their grids
to provide more energy for our community. We have gotten $849 million
that has put people to work and has provided health care, has improved
the environment. I would ask my colleagues to take away the point of
order, to not say I'm out of order.
You're putting a point of order on American jobs. And I think it is
insane to not be able to allow a Member to stand and say that the
moneys that you're taking away have proven themselves to be moneys that
have been legitimate and have called upon the American people to rise
up and to be employed.
There are people who are now at their 99th level of not being able to
get employed and get unemployment insurance. They need these jobs. The
$5 billion that will be taken away will be impacting projects yet to
come that will help rebuild America's infrastructure.
I thank the gentleman from Washington for allowing this explanation,
but I hopefully will be heard at least by the colleagues and the people
of the United States on this amendment, restoring simply $5 billion.
There was a second amendment that was going to make the point that we
don't want Americans to know how much great work the Recovery Act has
done by taking money away for signs
[[Page H1226]]
that have been put up. I'm willing to withdraw that amendment because
$5 billion is $5 billion to put Americans to work. I am simply appalled
at the fact that we don't have the opportunity to share with the
American people their tax dollars to make sure that they have the
opportunity to work, to have good health care, to have housing, and to
have good energy relief to make sure that our environment is safe and
that we expand our independence by having the kind of energy efficiency
that seniors are in need of.
So to the gentleman from Washington, I do want to acknowledge that
the Recovery Act moneys have been an effective tool for building jobs.
And frankly, 1,000 jobs were created in Houston.
Mr. DICKS. Will the gentlewoman yield?
Ms. JACKSON LEE of Texas. I yield to the gentleman from Washington.
Mr. DICKS. Many economists today say that if we had not had stimulus,
unemployment would be at 13 percent. I hear so often over on the other
side that it didn't work.
The Acting CHAIR. The time of the gentleman has expired.
Mr. DICKS. Madam Chair, I move to strike the last word.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from Washington is recognized for 5
minutes.
Mr. DICKS. I hear so much talk on the other side that the stimulus
program didn't--reputable economists say the unemployment rate would be
at 12.5 to 13 percent if we hadn't had the stimulus package. And again,
that's why we're so worried about the magnitude of the cuts here having
a countercyclical effect. So I appreciate the gentlewoman's work on
this.
Madam Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.
Amendment No. 104 Offered by Mrs. Blackburn
Mrs. BLACKBURN. Madam Chair, as the designee of the gentleman from
Ohio (Mr. Jordan), I offer an amendment.
The Acting CHAIR. The Clerk will designate the amendment.
The text of the amendment is as follows:
At the end of the bill (before the short title), insert the
following:
Sec. __. (a) Each amount made available by the following
provisions of division B of this Act (other than an amount
required to be made available by a provision of law) is
hereby reduced by the following percentage:
(1) Section 1101(a)(5) and title IX, 11 percent.
(2) All other provisions of such division (except as
provided by subsection (b)), 5.5 percent.
(b) Subsection (a) shall not apply to amounts made
available--
(1) by section 1101(a)(3) and title VI;
(2) by section 1101(a)(6) (with respect to division E of
Public Law 111-117) and title X; and
(3) for Israel, by section 1101(a)(6) (with respect to
division F of Public Law 111-117) and title XI.
The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to the order of the House of February 17,
2011, the gentlewoman from Tennessee (Mrs. Blackburn) and a Member
opposed each will control 15 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentlewoman from Tennessee.
Mrs. BLACKBURN. Madam Chair, the American people spoke loud and clear
in November, and they have continued to speak and hold us accountable.
Their message is clear: They are overtaxed, this government is
overspent, and they have had enough of Washington passing bills,
regulations, rules and programs they can't afford and do not want. They
have said stop the out-of-control spending.
Washington does not have a revenue problem; Washington has a very
serious spending problem. They are ready for us to change the way the
system operates. They want the fiscal house in order, and there is a
systematic way we can approach this.
In the past couple of years, 26 different States have used this
method--indeed, even Tennessee, my State, used it during a time of
fiscal crisis. They have replaced billions of dollars in deficit
spending and projections with spending cuts, and now it is time for the
Federal government to follow the States.
The Republican Study Committee amendment makes an 11-percent cut on
our legislative branch spending and a 5\1/2\ percent cut in other non-
Defense, non-Veteran, non-Homeland Security accounts. This amendment
will save $22.2 billion for the balance of this fiscal year and from
this year's deficit. I know not everyone is a fan of across-the-board
cuts, but many of us are and so are our constituents.
This is a concept that should be implemented at the Federal level.
And indeed, it has been used before. President Roosevelt used it during
World War II, and from 1942 to 1944 they cut 20 percent. President
Truman, with the Korean War, they cut 28 percent in 1950. It is used.
It works. It has a history of working. It is imperative that we get the
spending cut. And across-the-board spending reductions are a very
responsible way for us to do this.
Madam Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. DICKS. Madam Chair, I rise in opposition to the amendment.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from Washington is recognized for 5
minutes.
(Mr. DICKS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his
remarks.)
Mr. DICKS. Let me remind my colleagues what the underlying CR does to
existing programs even before we consider the additional across-the-
board cut offered by Mr. Jordan:
A cut of $107 million from food safety inspections. This amendment by
Mr. Jordan would take an additional $5.6 million. The CR also already
cuts $400 million to the Food and Drug Administration, and this
amendment would take an additional $22 million. Cuts to State law
enforcement assistance of $1.3 billion, 35 percent compared to the
current rate; the Jordan amendment would cut an additional $68 million.
The original version also completely eliminated the Cops Hiring
Program, but an amendment passed by the House this week from our side
prevailed, reinstating some of that funding.
{time} 1240
It cut $661 million below the current rate from the Army Corps of
Engineers, leaving hundreds of communities without critical flood
control and navigation work. The Jordan amendment would cut an
additional $35 million.
The CR also completely eliminates weatherization in State energy
programs.
It cuts $648 million from the Nuclear Nonproliferation program,
increasing the likelihood of bomb grade material entering the United
States. The Jordan amendment would cut an additional $37 million.
The CR cuts safe drinking water and clean water State funds by 56
percent, or $1.7 billion. The Jordan amendment would cut an additional
$167.2 million.
The CR cuts the maximum Pell Grant amount by $845. These grants help
more than 8 million students afford college. The Jordan amendment
exacerbates that reduction by taking an additional $962 million from
the program.
The CR cuts Head Start by more than $1.1 billion, which is $500
million below the 2008 level. The Jordan amendment would cut an
additional $338 million, meaning that individual students would lose
their right to Head Start, that the teachers would be fired, and that
people would be unemployed because of this amendment.
Then Transportation and HUD, which already saw a cut of nearly $14
billion, would be cut by an additional $3.7 billion, impacting critical
funding for roads and bridges and infrastructure across this country.
This is a meat ax approach on top of a meat ax approach--it's a
double meat ax approach. It is an amendment that we should defeat and
defeat soundly.
I reserve the balance of my time.
Mrs. BLACKBURN. I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr.
Walsh).
Mr. WALSH of Illinois. I rise today in support of amendment No. 104.
You know, we have spent the past few days talking about billions
here, billions there--real programs, real people. But the American
people have got to be shaking their heads.
We are broke. We are $14 trillion in debt, and we know it's more than
that. By 2014, in interest on the debt alone, we will spend more than
we will on all non-discretionary spending except for defense. By 2014,
every citizen in the United States will spend $2,500 just to pay
interest on the debt.
I appreciate the leadership the Republican leadership has provided in
being as bold as they can be on necessary, important spending cuts; but
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my colleagues, we've got to have faith in the American people. They are
ahead of us on this. They are ready. This is one of those rare moments
when the American people are asking us to be bold, when they are asking
us to go one step further.
I have a brother who has been in the financial services industry for
20 or 30 years. He sent me a text last night, which read: Keep the cuts
coming, baby.
The lack of leadership the White House is providing on this issue is
stunning. You have to lead. The American people are ahead of us. To get
back to real FY08 spending levels, to actually get $100 billion in
cuts, my colleagues, don't be afraid of that. That's what the American
people want.
Mr. DICKS. I yield 1 minute to the distinguished chairman of the
House Appropriations Committee, the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr.
Rogers).
Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. I thank the gentleman for yielding time.
I am in opposition to this amendment, Madam Chairman. The House
Republican package that we have before us already represents the
largest reduction in discretionary spending in the history of the
Nation. It is a historic package with much needed spending cuts and
reductions that meet and exceed the pledged goal of cutting $100
billion.
In this package, there is $106 billion in cut spending, including the
termination of 150 programs. These reductions were tough, thoughtful,
and were made by the people who know those programs best. They went
through the budget line by line, cutting or eliminating programs that
don't work or that we can no longer afford. The subcommittee chairs,
the staff, and our Members worked around the clock to make it happen.
They did the hard work of getting deep into the weeds, making the best
possible choices of exactly where and how to make these cuts.
In contrast, rather than make careful decisions on specific programs,
the Jordan amendment hits everything indiscriminately and in a heavy-
handed way. We were elected to make choices, not run on automatic
pilot.
The Acting CHAIR. The Committee will rise informally.
The Speaker pro tempore (Mr. Kline) assumed the chair.
____________________