[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 59 (Thursday, April 10, 2014)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E575-E576]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




        CONCURRENT RESOLUTION ON THE BUDGET FOR FISCAL YEAR 2015

                                 ______
                                 

                               speech of

                           HON. FRANK R. WOLF

                              of virginia

                    in the house of representatives

                         Tuesday, April 8, 2014

       The House in Committee of the Whole House on the state of 
     the Union had under consideration the bill (H. Con. Res. 96) 
     establishing the budget for the United States Government for 
     fiscal year 2015 and setting forth appropriate budgetary 
     levels for fiscal years 2016 through 2024:

  Mr. WOLF. Mr. Chair, I will vote for H. Con. Res. 96 because I 
continue to believe the Congress has a responsibility to produce a 
budget each year. As a longstanding member of the House Appropriations 
Committee, I feel it is important that Congress have an open and honest 
debate about the fiscal challenges our country faces, especially our 
out-of-control entitlement spending that continues to deplete the 
federal coffers of resources to invest in defense, infrastructure, 
education, science and research on cancer, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, 
ALS (Lou Gehrig's Disease), juvenile diabetes, multiple sclerosis, 
autism and other diseases. These investments are what made America 
great in the 20th century, but are on track to be completely overtaken 
within a decade due to unchecked entitlement spending growth.
  When I came to the floor to vote for last year's budget, we were 
$16.7 trillion in debt. Today, we are over $17.5 trillion in debt. 
That's a nearly trillion dollar increase in one year. It's projected to 
grow to over $27 trillion in 10 years, another $10 trillion increase. 
Our unfunded obligations and liabilities are now projected to be well 
of $70 trillion, and CBO's February 2014 budget outlook projected this 
year's deficit to be about $514 billion. These numbers get worse with 
each passing year.
  Equally troubling, this mounting debt is increasingly held by foreign 
countries. In 1970, 6 percent of debt held by the public was in foreign 
hands. In 1990, it was 19 percent. Today, nearly 50 percent of our 
publically held debt is in foreign hands--and it is held by countries 
like China and Saudi Arabia which certainly do not share our interests 
or values.
  My vote today reflects my desire to advance the congressional budget 
process to confront these serious challenges. While there are many good 
things in this budget, my vote should not be interpreted as a 
reflection of my satisfaction with the legislation itself. Simply put, 
I believe this is a flawed proposal that stands no chance of being 
adopted by both chambers of Congress this year. I continue to have 
serious concerns with several of the provisions and believe it falls 
short of being a plan that can garner the bipartisan support necessary 
to put our nation on a path towards fiscal responsibility.
  Most notably, this budget once again falls short in its failure to 
incorporate most of the recommendations of the bipartisan Simpson-
Bowles Commission. Regrettably, another year has gone by where the 
president and both the Republicans and Democrats in Congress have 
failed to advance the only bipartisan fiscal reforms that would address 
our debt and deficit in a manner that could result in real progress.
  As I have repeatedly said, I would much prefer to vote for a 
bipartisan budget modeled off the Simpson-Bowles plan. It could be 
improved by incorporating changes in existing law and other proposals, 
such as those produced by the discussions between the president and 
Speaker Boehner, and plans offered by Alice Rivlin and Pete Domenici, 
and Representative Ryan and Senator Wyden. Like the Ryan plan before us 
today, I do not agree with every line in the Simpson-Bowles plan. But 
only a budget based on this model can put our nation on a sustainable, 
long-term path to replace sequestration and reform our nation's 
entitlement programs so they will exist for future generations.
  As much as both sides might prefer that their party control both 
chambers of Congress and the White House, this is simply not the case. 
And it's unlikely to change until 2016 at the earliest. Either the 
Congress can get serious about adopting budget reforms that have 
bipartisan consensus and could be signed into law, or we can continue 
having these same quixotic debates, year after year, while our debt and 
deficit grow unabated. The debt and deficit numbers continue to get 
worse, and none of the actions taken by the Congress--including 
sequestration--have made a meaningful impact on our fiscal situation.
  For the last eight years I have been working toward finding consensus 
on bipartisan budget reforms based on the premise that all Americans, 
not just one group or another, will have

[[Page E576]]

to give something towards reducing our debt and deficits. Starting in 
2006, during the Bush Administration, I began advocating for a 
bipartisan commission--the Securing America's Future Economy (SAFE) 
Commission--to identify budget reforms that could win the support of 
both Republicans and Democrats. The Simpson-Bowles Commission, 
appointed in 2010, was formed largely in response to efforts in the 
House and Senate to advance the SAFE Commission. The commission's co-
chairs, former Senator Alan Simpson and Erskine Bowles, ultimately 
produced a package of bipartisan reforms that was serious and 
effective.
  Unfortunately, President Obama and congressional leadership have 
spent the last three years running away from the Simpson-Bowles 
recommendations. When my colleagues and I have brought legislation to 
the floor of the House based on these recommendations, the efforts have 
fallen short due to a lack of support from both Republican and Democrat 
leadership. I believe their misguided opposition represents a failure 
of leadership that they will come to regret in the years ahead, as our 
budget challenges grow more and more dire.
  To date, we have instead been presented with tepid proposals that 
fail to meaningfully impact our debt, or proposals, like this budget, 
that embrace a vision for budget reform that stands little chance of 
passing and becoming law.
  This year, President Obama has retreated from even modest budget 
reforms that he has proposed in the past, such as chained CPI. I 
believe history will not look kindly on his failure to lead efforts to 
bring both parties together around meaningful reforms to address this 
existential national threat. His failure to lead over the last five 
years is directly reflected in the budget that the House has passed 
today, which reflects a conservative blueprint for budget reform rather 
than reforms based on bipartisan consensus.
  There's a certain irony that the budget approved today continues to 
draw from only one section of the Simpson-Bowles framework: making our 
federal workforce contribute more towards its retirement and taking 
steps towards ending the defined benefit retirement plan. Yet again, 
the Congress is targeting just one group of Americans for additional 
sacrifice--just as has been done for offsets in past budget agreements. 
This flies in the face of the Simpson-Bowles vision of shared sacrifice 
among all Americans in fixing our debt and deficit and, as I have said 
many times, is just wrong. To cite the Simpson-Bowles recommendations 
as an excuse to single out additional cuts to federal employees is 
disingenuous and inappropriate.
  My colleagues often forget that while there are many federal 
employees in the capital region, it is worth noting that more than 85 
percent of the workforce is outside of Washington. They also may not 
realize that more than 65 percent of all federal employees work in 
agencies that support our national defense capabilities as we continue 
to fight the War on Terror.
  The first American killed in Afghanistan, Mike Spann, was a CIA agent 
and a constituent from my congressional district. CIA, FBI, DEA agents, 
and State Department employees are serving side-by-side with our 
military in the fight against the Taliban.
  Federal employees include the Border Patrol and Immigration and 
Customs Enforcement agents who are working to stop the flow of illegal 
immigrants and drugs across our borders.
  They are the medical researchers at NIH working to develop cures for 
cancer, diabetes, Alzheimer's and autism. They are the VA doctors and 
nurses treating veterans from World War II to the present day. They are 
the NASA astronauts and engineers working to support the International 
Space Station and build our nation's exploration program. These are 
just a few examples of the hardworking people that serve our country 
each day that this budget unfairly targets.
  I am also concerned with a provision in the budget that would only 
replace one federal employee for every three vacancies. Do we really 
want to cut the number of FBI and Border Patrol agents and VA doctors 
by two-thirds? This proposal amounts to an indiscriminate sequestration 
of the federal workforce. While there may be some agencies where 
reductions are necessary, I do not support this indiscriminate approach 
of doing so. Taken together, these proposals on federal employees may 
very well undermine the federal workforce.
  It is often said that budgets are about choices, and I fear that yet 
another year will go by where we fail to make the tough choices--yet 
tough choices that members from both parties can support--to make real 
progress in confronting our debt and deficit. Until the president and 
congressional leadership start to incorporate the Simpson-Bowles 
recommendations, or a bold plan like this that gets control of the debt 
and deficit, into their budgets, we will likely never address the 
structural reforms that must be made to responsibly get our nation's 
fiscal house in order. This should be done in a manner that involves 
shared sacrifice from all Americans, not just certain groups of 
Americans.
  I am proud to have served on the House Appropriations Committee for 
most of my tenure in the Congress, where each year we produce 
appropriations bills that make tough choices, yet the bills often pass 
with bipartisan support. Over the last several years, the full 
Appropriations Committee has made more than $100 billion in cuts to 
discretionary spending. The Commerce-Justice-Science Appropriations 
subcommittee, which I chair, has contributed more than $12 billion 
towards those cuts. But we approached these cuts in a responsible 
manner and I am proud that we have often had bipartisan support for the 
bills we produce. It can be done, but it requires leadership.
  Mr. Chair, this budget is constructive for advancing the debate about 
our nation's fiscal challenges, and my vote today reflects my support 
for the process. But until this Congress passes a budget based on the 
bipartisan reforms recommended by the Simpson-Bowles recommendations, 
it is unlikely we will ever make real progress towards reducing our 
debt and deficit in a substantial way. It's time for leadership--from 
the president and both Republicans and Democrats in Congress--to deal 
with this issue.

                          ____________________