[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 58 (Wednesday, April 9, 2014)]
[House]
[Pages H3133-H3136]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           PROGRESSIVE CAUCUS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 3, 2013, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Pocan) is recognized 
for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
  Mr. POCAN. Mr. Speaker, I am glad to be here on behalf of the 
Progressive Caucus Special Order hour. We are going to be talking about 
the budget. Everyone is talking about the budget, the Paul Ryan 
Republican budget, the Democratic budget, the Progressive Caucus 
budget, and other budgets that we have had before us.
  We have our own version of a budget. The Progressive Caucus has the 
Better Off Budget. It is a budget that invests in the economy, creates 
8.8 million jobs, and does a tremendous job of dealing with issues that 
are at the forefront of what America needs to deal with.
  But we have a huge contrast in the budget that we have in this body 
before us that the Republicans have introduced that we will be voting 
on this week, tomorrow, in this very body. Tonight we would like to 
have a little talk about that.
  As you look at the Better Off Budget in blue versus the GOP budget, 
the Better Off Budget creates 8.8 million jobs by investing in 
infrastructure, investing in our schools, and investing in energy, and 
a number of programs across the country.
  On the contrast, the Republican budget actually costs the economy 3.1 
million jobs. That is as many people as the entire workforce of the 
State of Wisconsin getting fired in a simple budget.
  One of the biggest issues about the budget is what we are doing about 
jobs and the economy. We have been told by the Congressional Budget 
Office that the number one issue this year, the number one thing that 
causes our deficit, three-quarters of the deficit in 2014, is caused by 
economic weakness, in other words, unemployment and underemployment. 
Our budget directly addresses that, and the GOP budget does just the 
opposite. It is an austerity budget.
  I would like to yield some time to one of my colleagues, a strong 
member of the Progressive Caucus, an outstanding Member of our 
California delegation. I would like to yield some time to Mr. Alan 
Lowenthal.
  Mr. LOWENTHAL. I want to thank the gentleman from Wisconsin for his 
work on the Congressional Progressive Caucus budget, the CPC budget, 
and for just being an all-around good guy.

                              {time}  1900

  The nondefense discretionary side of the budget has taken a beating 
in recent years with extreme cuts to its programs. The Ryan budget 
continues this damage with even deeper cuts to discretionary programs.
  Now, what do I mean by discretionary programs? We are talking about 
education, public safety, clean drinking water, food safety, roads, 
bridges--our transportation system--air traffic controllers, medical 
research to find cures for diseases, among others.
  The question I ask is: What is discretionary about any of these basic 
needs? What is discretionary about making sure that children can read 
or about making sure that drinking water is safe or that bridges don't 
collapse? There is nothing discretionary about these programs.
  I think part of the problem is simply the word ``discretionary.'' We 
need to stop calling this discretionary, and we need to start calling 
this beleaguered side of the budget what it is, essential. These are 
the essential non-defense programs.
  My dear friend, the main difference between the Ryan budget proposal 
and the CPC budget proposal is that Mr. Ryan believes that the 
government funding of these essential programs is a drain on the 
economy and a drain on taxpayers.
  The CPC, however, recognizes that the investment in these essential 
programs is fundamental to the vitality of our country. It moves us 
forward, and as you pointed out, it creates millions of jobs--over 4.6 
million jobs in the year 2014, almost 3 million in the year 2015 and 
close to 1.3 million in the year 2016.
  It moves us forward, this investment in essential programs. It drives 
innovation. It creates jobs. It stimulates the economy. It puts our 
government and our country on a sustainable path to prosperity.
  My friend Mr. Ryan's economic model of austerity contrasts sharply 
with our model of investment and progress in a fiscally responsible 
way. We believe that educating our workforce, building our 
infrastructure, ensuring access to a safe and healthy environment, 
which includes water and food safeguards, is the ticket to a secure 
future for our country. That is the difference between the Ryan budget 
and the CPC budget.
  Mr. POCAN. Thank you, Mr. Lowenthal, for those wise comments about 
the word ``discretionary.'' I think, all too often, people don't 
understand what we mean when we talk about discretionary. Those are 
hardly discretionary programs.
  Mr. LOWENTHAL. That is exactly right. They think that you can cut 
these because these are nonessential. These are not nonessential. If 
you tell a child that his education is nonessential or if you tell a 
family that public health or health research to those families is 
discretionary or if you tell those scientists who are trying to find 
cures for some of the worst diseases that they are just discretionary, 
we will lose the momentum that this country has, and we will no longer 
be the world leader in democracy and also no longer in innovation and 
job creation.
  No, these are not discretionary programs. These are essential 
programs that are different than defense programs. To call them 
discretionary does a great disservice to the great importance and to 
the centerpiece of our budget that they really occupy and should occupy 
and that all Americans should understand.
  Mr. POCAN. Again, thank you, Mr. Lowenthal, for your service, for 
your hard work on this budget, and for all you do for the people of 
California.
  When we talk about those discretionary funds, it is interesting 
because, when we had the sequester that made a huge cut to these 
programs and that affected people in all of our States, the Paul Ryan 
Republican budget doubles down on these sequester cuts, and it makes 
even deeper cuts in a number of areas.
  I just want to go through a little bit of a chart. Unfortunately, I 
found out

[[Page H3134]]

that I can't use a marker on the House floor because that is against 
the rules, so we are going to use this in a little bit of a different 
way, to try to have you take a look at this and decide where the 
difference is and who winds up winning on the side of the GOP Paul Ryan 
budget and the Congressional Progressive Caucus Better Off Budget. I 
just want to go through a few examples of programs that would matter.
  Let's start with unemployed workers. Let's take a look at the two 
budgets. When you look at the Better Off Budget, as I showed before, 
8.8 million jobs are created by the Better Off Budget. In the 
Republican budget, according to the Economic Policy Institute, it would 
cut 3 million jobs by the year 2016.
  If you are someone who is unemployed, the Better Off Budget would 
make sure we extend emergency unemployment benefits. The GOP budget is 
silent--crickets. There is absolutely nothing to help people who--in a 
tough economy and who have worked hard all of their lives and who have 
played by the rules--have lost their benefits.
  SNAP, for people who are getting help on the Supplemental Nutrition 
Assistance Program, or food stamps, by and large, two-thirds of those 
people are children, seniors, and people with severe disabilities.
  If you add the working poor, you are at 92 percent of the people who 
receive these benefits. The Democrats restore the cuts that happened 
this year in the farm bill and previous cuts to the program. $31.50 a 
week is what someone was making on the SNAP program to help him in 
getting by with food. We know this program is one of the best programs 
to help lift people out of poverty, and we restore that funding.
  What does the Paul Ryan budget do? You may remember the debate that 
we had on the farm bill. Originally, the Republicans wanted to cut the 
SNAP program by about $20 billion, and they couldn't get enough votes 
because Republicans wanted to cut it even more, so they finally cut it 
by $39 billion.
  Now, when we got to the conference committee with the Senate, we were 
able to get that down to $8 billion of cuts, but these are cuts to, as 
I mentioned, children, seniors, people with severe disabilities, and 
the working poor--two-thirds of whom are seniors, children, and people 
with severe disabilities.
  What does the Paul Ryan budget do? Does it cut the $20 billion that 
they couldn't pass originally? No. Does it cut the $39 billion like the 
Republicans ultimately passed? Oh, no, as it was not nearly enough.
  There is a $125 billion cut to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance 
Program in the Paul Ryan Republican budget.
  Let's take a look at that for jobs. It costs 3 million jobs. It does 
nothing for the long-term unemployment extension, and it cuts 
assistance to the needy by $125 billion. I would say that the 
Progressive Caucus Democratic budget, by far, would win out in that 
category.
  Let's next look at education. We have got pre-K, K-12, and college 
students. Let's look at each of these areas. The Better Off Budget 
invests $100 million into a stimulus for teachers and schools, so that 
we can help do what we need to in order to be competitive globally.
  We need to be investing in our students through our teachers and our 
schools. We provide funding to rehire teachers who have lost their jobs 
through the bad economy in the last several years. We invest in early 
childhood development, which is crucial for someone to get a fair start 
in life, and we invest in job training. That is what the Congressional 
Progressive Caucus Better Off Budget includes.

  What does the Republican budget include? Let's start with pre-K. In 
pre-K, there is an $18 billion cut to early education programs. Right 
off the bat, are they investing more? There is an $18 billion cut. Once 
again, the Progressive Caucus budget leads us.
  Next, on K-12, in which we invest in the hiring of teachers and 
invest in our schools, what does the Republican budget do? In the 
Republican budget, if you have a child in K-12 public education in this 
country, there is an $89 billion cut.
  Again, $89 billion in cuts or investing in our teachers and schools? 
Once again, the Congressional Progressive Caucus budget outdoes the 
Republican budget.
  How about college students? This is where you are going to see some 
really big differences. We invest in the very financial aid programs 
that people need. We invest in higher education because, in order to be 
competitive in a global economy, we have to have the most talented, the 
smartest, the most innovative people we can possibly have in the 
economy to create the jobs we need to for the future.
  What does the Republican budget do? It cuts $205 billion in higher 
education services--$205 billion--and I am not even counting Pell 
grants. Pell grants, which help some of our neediest students get 
access to higher education, get a $145 billion cut. We are talking, 
overall, just in higher education, almost $350 billion.
  We invest more in those educational opportunities, and the Republican 
budget cuts over $350 billion. Overall, in those three areas in 
education alone, the Republicans cut $871 billion to education. That is 
what we do for middle class families and those aspiring to be in the 
middle class in the budget that this House will very likely pass 
tomorrow.
  Let's look at the next category, seniors. Seniors, you have put your 
entire lives into this country, and you have worked all of your lives. 
You expect to have a retirement that you have invested in, and you have 
put your hours in.
  What is the difference in the budgets? The Congressional Progressive 
Caucus budget does a number of things. One, we protect Social Security 
and Medicare. We make future investments in those programs. We protect 
funding in the Medicaid program.
  We allow Medicare to negotiate for better prescription drug prices, 
so that seniors can pay less on drugs that they have to pay a larger 
percent of their income on, so that they can get by in those years, and 
we help, overall, in putting America on a path towards offering a 
single-payer option.
  What does the Republican budget do when it comes to seniors? First of 
all, they end Medicare as we know it. Under the Republican budget, you 
now have a voucher program. You don't get Medicare. You get a voucher, 
something you can trade in, hopefully, for something in the future, 
which will very likely be a cut in the very health care that you have 
now and that you receive.
  They increase the costs for seniors on prescription drugs by 
reopening the doughnut hole, which is going to cost seniors $4.1 
billion extra on prescription drugs. Seniors are going to pay more for 
the prescription drugs they need.
  They raise the Medicare eligibility age to 67, and they put seniors 
who rely on Medicaid at risk because they are making big cuts to the 
Medicaid program, $732 billion in cuts to the Medicaid program.
  Once again, for seniors, it is cuts, it is paying more for 
prescription drugs, and it is putting you at risk through the Medicaid 
and Medicare program. The Democrats and the Progressive Caucus protect 
all of those programs that the seniors rely on so very much.
  Our next group, the vets; they have served our country with 
distinction. If it weren't for the veterans we have, we wouldn't be 
able to protect the very liberties and freedoms that we have as a 
citizenry.
  What does the Progressive Caucus budget do? We adopt a cost-of-living 
adjustment that takes into account realistic retiree expenses, and we 
fully fund veterans programs in advance.
  We are protecting the programs, so that they have the guarantee to 
the veterans, the guarantee that they have promised to them, as they 
have put their time in for this country. We protect those very programs 
to ensure that they will have those programs in the future.
  With the Republicans, we hear a lot of lip service about veterans and 
about protecting veterans, especially around Memorial Day and Veterans' 
Day, but the proof is in the budget.
  What do the Republicans do? By 2016, the Republicans actually cut 
funding for veterans by $1.7 billion. Now, we saw what they did back in 
the budget in December when they cut the pensions for families who are 
in the military, but now, in their budget in 2016, there is an 
additional $1.7 billion cut to veterans.

[[Page H3135]]

  This is the sort of lip service that you get when a holiday comes up 
and when we show up. The reality is when we vote on it on this floor.
  Once again, for veterans, they lose money under the Republican 
budget, and in our budget, we protect programs that veterans deserve.
  The middle class, what does our budget have for the middle class, and 
what does the Republican budget have for the middle class?
  There are a couple of things around taxes. One of the things that we 
have been very careful to do is to get rid of some of the tax loopholes 
that benefit special interests.
  There are tax breaks for Big Oil and Big Gas and tax breaks that go 
to companies that send jobs overseas, which doesn't even make any 
sense, yet we incentivize those very companies that send those jobs 
overseas rather than create jobs in America.

                              {time}  1915

  We protect middle class taxpayers by going back to the Clinton-era 
tax rates for households who make more than $250,000, and we add new 
brackets at $1 million. That allows us to bring in revenues from those 
who can most afford to, but protecting the very middle class that are 
the backbone of this economy.
  By doing that--and protecting health care, seniors, education, 
investing in infrastructure for the very roads and services that people 
count on--we are doing everything we can to protect the middle class. 
This is one area where the distinction could not be more clear.
  The Republicans have given a lot of lip service about trying to 
protect the middle class. Once again, the proof is in their budget. The 
budget shows their real values.
  What does it do? It lowers the top tax rate down to 25 percent. Do 
you know what percent of taxpayers are in that top bracket? Less than 
one-half of 1 percent.
  So when Chairman Ryan described the budget in the Budget Committee, 
which I serve on--we spent 10\1/2\ hours last Wednesday debating the 
budget--he said the budget was a win-win.
  Well, if he meant it was a win for the top 1 percent and a win for 
the second percentile, I will agree. The other 98 percent of us pay for 
those two wins that are out there.
  By lowering that rate to 25 percent, that gives the average 
millionaire a $200,000 tax break. Millionaires get big, big tax breaks.
  How do you pay for that? Well, there is only one way: you are going 
to have to put the taxes onto the backs of the middle class. It is 
estimated it would be about $2,000 per middle class family to pay for 
those wealthiest few in the Nation.
  So when it comes to the middle class, there is no question our budget 
does more for the middle class, and the Republican budget is a direct 
attack on the middle class by what we are able to do by making them pay 
for the very tax breaks that the wealthiest have put out there.
  When you look at all this, there is one group that wins at the very 
bottom. I mentioned millionaires and billionaires. I have to give that 
edge to the Republican budget. You are going to get a great tax break--
a great big check from Uncle Sam--at the courtesy of the middle class 
taxpayers in this country.
  That is the only winner under the Republican budget. Clearly, in 
every other category, the Progressive Caucus and the Democratic budgets 
are superior to that budget introduced by the Republicans.
  You are going to hear how it balances the budget in 10 years. That is 
the only talking point the Republicans have. They don't want to talk 
about the specifics because they lose in every single category, but the 
one thing that they claim they have is that they balance the budget in 
10 years.
  They don't mention it is on the backs of the middle class, but they 
say they are going to balance the budget in 10 years. Well, I wish 
their math were only as accurate as their rhetoric because the math 
simply doesn't add up. Let me tell you why. Let me give you one big 
glaring example of why the budget doesn't add up.
  The Republican budget repeals the benefits of the Affordable Care 
Act, so it repeals all the positive things like the fact that, when you 
go to get insurance, if you have a preexisting condition, you now can 
get access.
  You have got preventive care provided, so we can save long-term 
health costs. You don't have a lifetime cap on your insurance. Your 
children can stay on your policy until they are 26.
  All these benefits were incorporated in the Affordable Care Act, and 
we just saw the success from the enrollment numbers. Millions of more 
people have access to health care.
  It repeals those benefits, but get this: it keeps the revenues and 
the savings of the Affordable Care Act in order to make the numbers 
balance out for that allegedly 10-year balancing of the budget.
  It doesn't take much more than a fourth-grader to understand that 
doesn't work out. You can't repeal a program, but still keep the 
revenue and the savings from that program, but the Republicans are 
trying to pass that off. They are trying to sell you a bill of goods.
  Do you know how much that bill of goods is, that fuzzy math? Two 
trillion dollars is the amount that they are using in fuzzy math to try 
to claim their budget balances in 10 years. It doesn't take a lot to 
poke the holes in the fact that their budget doesn't balance out.
  If their budget doesn't balance out, it doesn't benefit the middle 
class, and it only benefits the wealthiest, we have a really bad budget 
that this House will be voting on tomorrow. We are going to do 
everything we can to make sure that that budget doesn't pass.
  I think one really important note that people have to realize from 
all that we describe that is in that budget is, even if it doesn't 
become the law of the land--thankfully, we have the Senate and the 
President still--it is the roadmap that the Republicans have if they 
were to take control.
  If they were to keep the House of Representatives, if they were to 
take the U.S. Senate, if they were to take the Presidency, this is the 
fourth year in a row they have laid out this essential roadmap--this 
roadmap that benefits the top 1 or 2 percent and that every other 
person--every other American has to pay to subsidize those people.
  We lose those important programs in health care and education, for 
veterans and for the unemployed and those struggling to get by in our 
society.
  There is a very clear distinction between what the Democrats and the 
Progressive Caucus have put out as our budget that we have put forth to 
the American people and what the Republicans are actually offering.
  They have warmed over austerity. Again, cuts, cuts, cuts will somehow 
make the economy work, and that is simply impossible to happen.
  What I would like to do, at this time, is introduce another Member of 
the Progressive Caucus who has been a very hard worker on behalf of the 
middle class, not just in his district in the State of Pennsylvania, 
but across the country.
  I yield to Representative Matt Cartwright from the great State of 
Pennsylvania.
  Mr. CARTWRIGHT. Thank you, Mr. Pocan.
  Madam Speaker, I rise not only in support of the Congressional 
Progressive Caucus budget, but in opposition to the abomination that is 
this Ryan budget.
  I am from Scranton, Pennsylvania. I represent the great northeast 
part of Pennsylvania in the 17th Congressional District.
  I wanted to talk this evening a little bit about a couple of guys 
that came from Scranton. The first one is the Vice President of the 
United States, Joseph Biden.
  I mention Vice President Biden tonight because it was Vice President 
Biden who intoned the phrase--and continues to do so--that there are a 
lot of people out there that love to talk about their values.
  They will tell you all day about their values--their values on this, 
their values on that. They will wear you out. They will give you a good 
ear beating about their values; but Vice President Biden says: look, 
don't tell me about your values. Show me your budget, and let me read 
it, and I will tell you about what your values are.

  Because that is what a budget is, it is a statement of your values. 
It is a statement of your principles and priorities.
  When we see something like this Ryan budget that cuts everything, 
like

[[Page H3136]]

pre-K education, what does it say? That says you don't care that much 
about educating young kids, even though you know that, if you start 
kids off behind all the other kids, they are going to be struggling the 
rest of their academic careers.
  It is going to affect their self-confidence in their academic lives, 
and they are not going to go far in school. It has ripple effects. A 
higher percentage of them will get in trouble with the law. How much do 
we end up paying for all of those things?
  If you don't devote money to pre-K, it says you don't care about 
those things. Those things are not included in your set of values.
  I also want to talk about another fellow because, when you go and 
slash pre-K and K-12 and Pell grants for colleges and you turn your 
back on seniors and veterans and you favor the haves against the have-
nots--and even the middle class--when you do those things, you do that 
all in the name of austerity and cutting because you are worried about 
the deficit and you are worried about $16 trillion--$17 trillion is 
higher than anybody has ever counted in the history of mankind; and so 
therefore, we have to cut, cut, cut.
  A lot of that is well-intentioned--it really is--because people are 
afraid, but you have to look at the current debt of this Nation in the 
context of what the gross domestic product is.
  The truth is our national debt is not the highest it has ever been in 
connection with and comparison to the gross domestic product. It is not 
anywhere near the highest it has ever been. That is something pointed 
out by another fellow from Scranton, former Secretary of Labor Robert 
Reich.
  Robert Reich is all of about 5 feet tall on his tiptoes, but he is a 
giant when it comes to labor policy and economics. He points out 
forcefully, time and time again, that if you compare the national debt 
to the gross domestic product, the highest it ever was in that ratio 
was after World War II.
  It was after we defeated the Nazis, after we defeated the Axis 
powers, and after we had engineered the New Deal and brought this 
Nation out of the Great Depression, where upwards of 25 percent of 
people were unemployed, and we had done all of that.
  Robert Reich remembers vividly his father saying to him in the late 
forties, into the early fifties:

       It's this Roosevelt debt we have been left with. You are 
     going to be paying this off the rest of your life, and your 
     children will be paying that Roosevelt debt off the rest of 
     your life and your grandchildren, too.

  That is not what happened, though. Robert Reich happily tells the way 
it played out. The way it played out, what did we do? We believed in 
ourselves. We believed in the strength and the vision of Americans and 
we did things like the Marshall Plan, and we rebuilt Europe and Japan 
and built the interstate highway system in this country.
  We sent the GIs to college under the GI Bill. For crying out loud, we 
sent a man to the Moon. We did all those things because we were bullish 
on America. We need to continue that approach, which is something that 
Robert Reich likes to point out.
  He says that, by the late sixties, nobody could mention the Roosevelt 
debt with a straight face. So I am here to say, Madam Speaker and Mr. 
Pocan, that we need to do that again. We need to grow our way out of 
the debt.
  It is nowhere near as bad as it was after World War II, but we still 
have to grow our way out of it by believing in ourselves by being 
bullish on America.
  Mr. POCAN. Thank you, again, Mr. Cartwright. The work you have done 
on behalf of the people not just of Scranton--I have heard you mention 
Scranton many times on the floor--but for all of Pennsylvania and the 
entire country, thank you for all your efforts. I really appreciate 
that.
  In closing, for this part of the Progressive Caucus Special Order 
hour, I just want to hit the main point again when it comes to the 
budget.
  We all know that the top three issues facing this country are jobs, 
jobs, jobs. There is such a difference between what the Democrats and 
the Progressives have proposed and what the Republicans have proposed.
  Again, the Better Off Budget for the Progressive Caucus shows an 8.8 
million increase in the number of jobs in this country. We invest in 
our infrastructure. We invest in our schools. We invest in job 
training. We create 8.8 million jobs.
  The Republican budget, according to the Economic Policy Institute, 
would cost this country 3.1 million jobs. Those 3.1 million jobs are as 
many people as we have working in the entire State of Wisconsin. Think 
about firing every single person in the State of Wisconsin. That is the 
job loss that would come out of the Republican budget.
  So it is an honor tonight to talk on behalf of the Progressive Caucus 
and our budget and to highlight the many problems that we are going to 
have tomorrow when this body votes on the Republican budget.
  Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

                          ____________________