[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 111 (Wednesday, July 16, 2014)]
[House]
[Pages H6333-H6338]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
MOTION TO INSTRUCT CONFEREES ON H.R. 3230, PAY OUR GUARD AND RESERVE
ACT
=========================== NOTE ===========================
July 16, 2014, on page H6333, the following appeared: MOTION TO
INSTRUCT CONFEREES ON H.R. 3230, VETERANS' ACCESS TO CARE THROUGH
CHOICE, ACCOUNTABILITY, AND TRANSPARENCY ACT OF 2014
The online version should be corrected to read: MOTION TO
INSTRUCT CONFEREES ON H.R. 3230, PAY OUR GUARD AND RESERVE ACT
========================= END NOTE =========================
Mr. GALLEGO. Mr. Speaker, I have a motion to instruct at the desk.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Clerk will report the motion.
[[Page H6334]]
The Clerk read as follows:
Mr. Gallego moves that the managers on the part of the
House at the conference on the disagreeing votes of the two
Houses on the House amendment to the Senate amendment to the
bill H.R. 3230 (an Act to improve the access of veterans to
medical services from the Department of Veterans Affairs, and
for other purposes) be instructed to recede from disagreement
with section 601 of the Senate amendment (relating to
authorization of major medical facility leases).
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 7(b) of rule XXII, the
gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gallego) and the gentleman from Florida (Mr.
Miller) each will control 30 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Texas.
Mr. GALLEGO. Mr. Speaker, we have all heard so much about the
challenges that the VA faces and how it has totally, thoroughly, and
completely failed many of our veterans.
This motion to instruct the conferees would be a motion to ask that
we essentially recede to the Senate provisions on leases per VA
facilities.
What this would do would be to provide and expand 26 VA facilities
from across the country and improve access to care for our Nation's
veterans, including the 1.7 million veterans from across Texas.
In the district that I represent, as an example, District 23, which
comprises about 24 percent of the land area of Texas, it is 800 miles
or so from one corner of the district to the other, and in that
district are a very large number of veterans. The challenge is, first
off, to be able to get the veterans who have served, who are from the
rural areas, to get them access to the nearest VA facility.
From my hometown of Alpine, for example, to El Paso, where there is a
VA clinic, it is some 220 miles. If you live further south in Brewster
County, that distance is longer. If you live here in Eagle Pass, in
Maverick County, for example, you have got to go all the way down to
the Rio Grande Valley before you find the nearest veterans facility--
actually, all the way down to Corpus.
The Senate provisions would allow for an additional 26 facilities,
including a new facility in Lubbock and improvements and consolidations
to facilities in San Antonio that are critical to veterans and their
families. New facilities will help address the wait times for medical
care where it is needed for veterans in our communities.
Frankly, these facilities will help open up appointment slots.
According to an internal VA audit that has been released, there are
more than 57,000 patients who have waited at least 90 days for their
first appointment. Unfortunately, some VA facilities in Texas have
among the highest average of wait times in the Nation, and that is
totally inexcusable. It fails the people who stood up and served their
country and did so much to maintain and protect our freedom.
While we need to explore all our options, including more contracted
care to address the backlog, we also have to make sure that the VA has
the capacity to fill the needs of our vets, and especially for those
who have unique health care needs.
I maintain that regardless of where you live in Texas or any other
State, you have as much right to health care as any veteran from any
other part of the State. And by creating an additional 26 facilities,
you would actually be creating more slots and giving more access to
more people.
For rural vets who face additional barriers--for example, if you are
driving from Alpine to El Paso, that is 220 miles, and you need a
driver, and that driver has to take time off from work; you need
probably to spend the night in El Paso, that is a hotel room; and you
have got to eat while you are there, so that is meals--all of those,
additional expenses.
The other thing, frankly, is that many of the rural vets tend to be
older, sicker, and poorer than the general population. These additional
facilities may very well be lifesavers for that population.
These new facilities will help address wait times for medical care
where it is needed, and they are crucial. Frankly, I know there has
been a conversation on the House side with my colleagues on both sides
of the aisle about creating more facilities than 26.
I know that my friends from Oklahoma, for example, would like to see
an additional clinic in Tulsa that would serve Oklahoma. Oklahoma
veterans, as Texas veterans, as veterans across the board in every
State, deserve more access to health care and better access to health
care.
This week, in fact, the Acting Secretary of the VA, Secretary Gibson,
told members of the Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee that we need to
increase the internal capacity at the VA. And while we need to do a lot
more than just that, these additional facilities would help achieve
that goal.
One thing is clear. We have a growing demand for care. As we draw
down from all of the places where we are right now--Afghanistan, for
example--as we change the shape of our military going into the future,
we will have more and more veterans entering the health care system.
They deserve better treatment than the veterans in our health care
system have had.
Frankly, the entire system needs to be upgraded and to provide A-1
quality health care to each and every person who has served in uniform
and their families. We must grow the capacity. We must continue to
ensure quality and to meet the growing demand for our veterans.
These leases that I am talking about in some 18 States, they will
help address some of the underlying problems that lead to treatment
delays. If you look at it, we are funneling all of the veterans into a
very few health care facilities across the country. If we accede to the
Senate's suggestion for additional facilities, we will have community-
based outpatient clinics, for example, or primary care clinics or
specialty clinics. It will be a huge help to everyone, and that is
incredibly important.
As you look at this map, it gives you some idea of just one microcosm
in one congressional district in this country what difference
additional VA facilities would make.
Look at the distance from the nearest facilities. If you live here
along the Texas-Mexico border and you are trying to go up to the
nearest facilities, which are either in El Paso or in Big Spring or
over here in San Antonio, the distances are enormous. That is so much
to ask of a World War II vet or a Korean war vet who is getting older,
who is having to ask for help from somebody, for somebody to take time
off of work to take them for a basic appointment, and then, frankly, as
we have seen, to be unable to get the health care that he or she needs
and deserves.
There is no part of the population in this country that is more
deserving of health care than our veterans who have served in uniform
in any conflict; or, frankly, even if they haven't been in conflict,
they have stepped forward, they have put themselves at the Nation's
disposal, and they have protected our freedom each and every day that
they wore that uniform. They deserve much better than they have gotten
over the course of history.
And I would point out, this isn't a new issue. There were more than
15 reports at the VA that have indicated that care was substandard.
Congress has known about this for a long time.
The challenge with Congress is that it is a crisis management
institution. Whatever the crisis of the day is, that is what Congress
responds to. And if there is a subsequent crisis that takes the first
crisis off of the front page, then suddenly Congress is reacting to the
new crisis and forgets about the old one.
This is too important to forget about. This is too critical to our
veterans. It has to be taken care of; it has to be resolved; and it has
to be resolved once and for all so that there are not an additional 15
reports out there about problems at the VA, so that we don't hear every
day from the American Legion or the Veterans of Foreign Wars or any of
these other organizations that for years have been telling Congress
that the VA has problems.
Let's step forward. Let's fix it. Let's fix it now, once and for all.
And we can take that first step, as a body, Mr. Speaker and Members. We
can take that first step as a body by making sure that there are at
least--at least--26 new leased facilities across the country that will
take care of this issue and that will provide additional service to our
veterans across the country.
[[Page H6335]]
{time} 1615
I point out that these additional facilities are in places like
Texas, Louisiana, Florida, Puerto Rico, California, Connecticut,
Massachusetts, Missouri, Tennessee, Illinois, Nebraska, South Carolina,
Arizona, New Mexico, New Jersey, Georgia, Hawaii, and Kansas.
Whether you are a Democratic Member of this body or a Republican
Member of this body, you should be in favor of additional VA
facilities. You should be in favor of broadening up that funnel so that
it is not so clogged up and we are not trying to put so many people
through such a narrow slot and create all of these problems where
people don't get the health care that they need and deserve.
New facilities, as I said, will help address the wait times for
medical care where it is needed. And as a guy who represents a vastly
rural area but who also represents urban areas in El Paso and San
Antonio, I will tell you that this helps everybody. It helps every
single veteran, whether you are a rural guy or an urban guy, whether
you served in uniform in World War II or whether you are a serviceman
or -woman from the most recent conflict. You deserve, and America has
made a commitment to you, that you will get health care, and you will
get quality health care.
This is the first step in that direction. It is incredibly important
that, right, left, center, Democrat, Republican, or Independent,
whatever you think you are, you ought to be in favor of additional
facilities for the VA, you ought to be in favor of better health care
for our veterans, and you ought to be in favor of using the Senate
language.
Frankly, again, I know that there are some Members, my colleagues who
are from Oklahoma, who would like to see additional facilities and who
would want one in their State. I agree with that too. The more that we
can do to help our veterans and to meet our commitment, the more we
ought to do. And, frankly, we ought to do a lot more than we have been
doing.
Again, I move that we instruct the conferees on H.R. 3230, the
Veterans' Access to Care through Choice, Accountability, and
Transparency Act of 2014, to recede to the Senate provisions on leases
for VA facilities under title 6, section 601. It is incredibly
important not only to me, not only to the 23rd, but it is important to
435 Members of this body, and it is important to every single veteran
in every single one of our congressional districts.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. MILLER of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the
motion to instruct and yield myself such time as I might consume.
Mr. Speaker, while I can appreciate the work that has been done on
the other side of this building over in the Senate, I would remind the
House that it has been the House committee that has conducted the
oversight that has brought this issue to light. The corruption and the
arrogance that has taken root at the Department of Veterans Affairs did
not, as my colleagues say, did not happen overnight.
But I just want to tell my colleagues a little of the history about
what brings us here today. From the 9th of June to July 24, the House
Committee on Veterans' Affairs will have held 12 full committee
hearings highlighting the problems that exist at the Department of
Veterans Affairs. But beginning with the 112th Congress, the House
Committee on Veterans' Affairs has held 196 hearings, of which 126 were
oversight hearings, and in the 113th Congress alone, we have held 96
hearings to date. We are doing our work.
As a result of our work, both the House and the Senate correctly
moved to address the problems that exist at the Department. And as is
often the case, the bills we pushed through have reflected our good
intentions, but there has been a vacuum while waiting for the CBO to
score the bills.
It is important to remember that the current scandal at VA really
entails two issues: timely access to the health care that veterans have
earned, and accountability because of the culture of corruption that
exists among far too many senior leaders who have put their own welfare
ahead of those they are supposed to be serving.
The CBO finally provided us with a formal score on the Senate
amendment on the 17th of July. Since that time, and even prior to that
time, my staff has been in daily contact with our Senate counterparts,
and we are making progress on the conference report.
There are differences of opinion as to what the final conference
report, in fact, is going to say. That is the nature of our work. But
to my knowledge, there is no impasse that has been reached at this
point. Now, I am confident that the good will on both sides of the
aisle and both sides of the Hill will present a report that both the
House and the Senate can pass before the August recess, so it really
makes no sense to take the Senate position on the leases at this time.
In fact, some of the provisions in the Senate version are similar to
the House bills that have been waiting in the Senate for months, and
they could have been sent--any one of them--on to the President for his
signature.
That brings me to the specifics of the motion to instruct today. On
December 10, 2013, the House passed H.R. 3521 by a vote of 346-1. That
bill contained provisions to authorize 27 VA community-based outpatient
clinics. It includes the Tulsa, Oklahoma, clinic that my colleague
referred to as not being in the Senate bill. And like nearly a dozen
other House bills passed in a bipartisan fashion, they are stalled in
the Senate. The Senate could pass and send the 27-clinic bill that we
sent over to them in December today.
Mr. Speaker, I must point out that on a total of six different
occasions, Senator Vitter from Louisiana and others, both Republican
and Democrat, have gone to the Senate floor to request a vote on H.R.
3521 and have been blocked by the Democrats in the Senate. Perhaps the
motion to instruct today should be revised to instruct the majority
leader of the Senate or others in the Senate Democratic Caucus.
Again, Mr. Speaker, we are making progress on the conference report,
and to recede at this point to the Senate position would be premature
at best.
Now, let me spend a few moments talking about the VA budget needs. In
each of our annual budget hearings, Members have repeatedly asked the
Secretary of the VA: Do you have the resources that you need to get the
job done? And every single time, the Secretary has said ``yes.'' And
now today, suddenly because of the oversight of the House Committee on
Veterans' Affairs, Acting Secretary Gibson testified before the Senate
that they will need approximately $17.6 billion in additional resources
to meet current demand for the remainder of this year and into 2017.
In his testimony, Acting Secretary Gibson stated that about $10
billion of this money would go to purchase care and to hire 10,000 new
clinical staff. He further stated that the purchased care would decline
over time with a gradual shift back to reliance on internal VA care. He
also said about $6 billion would be spent on new infrastructure.
So, what the Acting Secretary is saying is, give us billions of more
tax dollars to continue reliance upon care that will continue to force
veterans to drive, as my colleague has said, in far too many cases
hundreds of miles for the care that they have earned, and, oh, by
the way, give us billions of more dollars to dump into our construction
program that has been shown to be so ineptly managed to result in major
projects being on average 35 months--not days--35 months behind
schedule and at least $366 million over cost.
Now, again, Mr. Speaker, why would we automatically stand up, salute,
and write a check when the inspector general and the GAO have both said
we cannot trust VA's numbers on multiple occasions? So the Department,
which Rob Nabors describes as having a ``corrosive culture,'' now asks
for nearly $18 billion.
Look, we can't allow the Department of Veterans Affairs to continue
to consider itself a sacred cow above serious oversight on how the
already significant resources we provide to the Department have been
spent. Decades of a kid-glove approach by Congress to holding VA
accountable has led us to the issues that confront us today. So I would
urge my colleagues to oppose the motion to instruct.
At this time, I would like to yield as much time as he may consume to
the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Jolly).
Mr. JOLLY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[[Page H6336]]
Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition, respectfully, to this motion not
because anybody here opposes expanded access to care. I believe we all
do. But I oppose it today because it interferes, I believe, with the
urgency of getting a clean bill out of conference.
Mr. Speaker, the chairman has done great work. There are bills over
there that the Senate could approve tomorrow. But if we encumber our
conferees and we encumber this conference committee any more, we risk
delaying final passage of a bill that is intended to get health care to
the veterans now to clear the wait list now. That is the urgency.
We all have ideas for long-term reforms. This Member has his own
ideas for long-term reform. We have to work those through the process.
I believe we should consider giving every veteran a Choice Card and let
them choose where they want to go. I believe we should consider
competitively awarding management contracts for many of our VA health
care facilities so that veterans who want to stay in the VA health care
system can do so but can rely on more efficient and more responsible
management. I think we should consider streamlining DOD health with
TRICARE, with the VA, and look for efficiencies there.
But those are all matters for another day, for another committee
hearing, for another bill, and for another piece of legislation.
Mr. Speaker, we should not encumber our conferees any more than they
already are in having to negotiate with the Senate. The fact is the
Senate bill is encumbered with labor provisions and directed projects,
and these labor provisions and these directed projects do absolutely
nothing--nothing--to get the veterans off the wait list now.
Let's have the conferees agree to what we can agree to, which is, if
you live more than 40 miles away from a VA facility, then give them
immediate access to private care. If they are on a wait list, give them
immediate access to private care. We can pass those now. The conferees
can agree to that.
And here is the absolute absurdity to all of this. I am a new Member
with a new perspective. I understand how this body works. But we have 2
to 3 weeks left before we go back to our districts for August recess.
We have a President who, every single day, demands that this Congress
provide funding for expanded health care to those who are coming here
illegally right now. We cannot honestly have a dialogue and suggest
that we need to immediately fund health care for those who are coming
here illegally if we have a VA bill that is stuck in a conference
committee and is encumbered by unnecessary provisions.
We should demand that our veterans receive the health care services
that they deserve before we begin to have a conversation with the
President about how we ever expand health care services to those who
come here illegally.
So I appreciate my colleagues' concern for expanded care, and I agree
with that. There is a bill that has been passed and is sitting in the
Senate. The Senate should pick it up and pass it. But encumbering the
conferees is not the right way to do this. Frankly, it complicates the
process and delays the process. We need a VA reform bill back here from
conference committee as quickly as possible to ensure that our veterans
receive the health care that, frankly, this House supported with 390
votes when this bill passed. This is not a controversial measure.
Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the chairman's work on this, and I know
that the chairman has the same dedication that my colleague does to
expanded care. We will continue to work these issues. But the immediate
need is to expand health care choices for our veterans today, and as I
mentioned, before we ever begin to talk to the President about
expanding health care for those who come here illegally.
Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman.
{time} 1630
Mr. GALLEGO. Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent to reclaim the
balance of my time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentleman from Texas?
There was no objection.
Mr. GALLEGO. Mr. Speaker, how much time remains?
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman has 18\1/2\ minutes remaining.
Mr. GALLEGO. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
I am in my first term as a Member, and growing up as a kid in Alpine,
Texas, I always heard the saying with respect to things that were
really, really hard, and that saying was it takes an act of Congress to
do that, and for the first time in my life, Mr. Speaker, I finally
understand what that means because part of our challenge as an
institution is that we are so wrapped up with who goes first, whether
it is the House or the Senate.
The House passed a bill by 390 votes. That is great. The Senate
version passed by 93-3, and here, we are discussing whether the House
version or the Senate version is better, and in the meantime, we are
failing our veterans.
My own view is that people across the political spectrum, veterans
and nonveterans alike, are tired of the political blame game and the
finger-pointing. Notice that not once did I ever really talk about the
differences between Democrats and Republicans because, frankly, there
are both Democratic veterans and Republican veterans and Libertarian
veterans and Independent veterans and apolitical and nonpolitical
veterans.
The issue of veterans should not be something that we pound each
other over the head on. The issue of veterans is something that should
bring us all together in a cohesive fashion, so that we can move
forward as a country and show the rest of America that Congress can
actually function as intended, that it can actually work its will as a
body and move a product forward.
The idea that we would have to wait for a clean bill, that we would
have to wait for procedure to take its course and for things to happen
is telling people we will get to it.
Along the border, there is a saying, and that saying is manana.
Manana seems to be the busiest day of Congress' week. Manana, we will
do it tomorrow. Tomorrow seems to be the day that Congress takes action
on every single issue, and veterans are too important to be left until
tomorrow.
The American people view Congress as an institution that is very full
of hot air, and they don't understand why we recess in August when it
is hot here because we would fit right in with the rest of the
environment in the month of August.
The approval ratings for Congress are lower than they have ever been
since the Gallup organization started taking polls, and it would appear
to me that there is good reason for that.
I have great respect for the chairman and the other Members of this
body. Their work, I admire. I don't admire, though, how much time it
takes for this Congress to move forward. Another day, another hearing,
another conversation, another headline--all of that while another
veteran waits, and another veteran waits, and another veteran waits.
My motion to instruct doesn't touch topside or bottom the rest of the
Senate bill. My motion to instruct talks about one particular provision
of the Senate bill, and that one particular provision deals with
additional space--additional leases for additional facilities.
It doesn't talk about choice cards or private pay or the rates or any
of those other things which are crucial issues and important. My motion
just deals with this issue that I talked about earlier, which is the
funnel. We have such a narrow opening in this funnel that we try to
channel all of our veterans through, and there is not enough space.
There are not enough resources there. We don't have adequate health
care providers in the mental health fields, for example. We don't have
enough specialists. We don't have enough places to put them. We don't
have enough facilities. People have to go too far in order to get their
health care, and as a result, they are not getting their health care at
all.
Mr. Speaker, manana isn't good enough. Manana, tomorrow, should not
be the busiest day of our week. This is not an issue or question that
should be left for tomorrow. This is an issue that Congress can decide
now, immediately.
We can instruct our conferees not on the rest of the aspects of the
bill because I understand that takes time and negotiation, but we can
come together on one part of the bill. We can come together to the one
part of the bill that
[[Page H6337]]
says we need additional facilities, not only in Texas--although Texas
needs them--but in other States as well. That serves all of our
veterans well.
This isn't about a Democratic position or a Democratic Senate versus
a Republican position and a Republican House. This is about our
veterans who served every day in uniform, who sacrificed every day, so
that 435 people here in this body and 100 people in the body across the
way could serve and do our jobs and vote and participate in the
American democratic experiment.
We wouldn't be here participating in this American democratic
experiment, but for the service and the sacrifices of our veterans. If
we recognized that, if we truly recognized that, then we would step
forward now, not tomorrow. We would step forward now and admit that we
desperately need additional VA facilities.
We desperately need those 26 additional places. We could put off for
the conferees and allow the conferees the latitude to discuss all of
the rest of the bill, but we ought to be able to come together on that
one thing, and that one thing is those additional 26 facilities.
Waiting for a clean bill, I can't tell you, Mr. Speaker, how many
times in meeting with the VA or the VFW or the American Legion or any
one of the number of organizations like the Vietnam Veterans, I can't
tell you how many times they tell me they have been asked to wait
another day--wait, you will get your bill; wait, we will take care of
you; wait, we understand you are important.
They don't need a pat on the head. They don't need a pat on the
shoulder. What they need is what they have earned, and what they have
earned is health care. Those 26 additional facilities would help us get
them their health care and help us get them exactly what they need and
what our government has committed to them, regardless of party,
regardless of rhetoric, regardless of partisanship, regardless of
blame, regardless of whatever.
If I started by saying it takes an act of Congress to do this, this
is a great opportunity for Congress to step forward and say, through an
act of Congress, we understand how important the veterans are, and we
are not saving that until tomorrow--you will get your 26 facilities,
your 26 additional facilities.
We will broaden that pipeline, so that more veterans across this
country will have access to health care, and we will do it now.
Mr. Speaker, I don't think that is too much to ask.
I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. MILLER of Florida. Mr. Speaker, who has the right to close?
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Texas has the right to
close. The gentleman from Florida has 18\1/2\ minutes remaining, and
the gentleman from Texas has 10 minutes remaining.
Mr. MILLER of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may
consume.
It is curious to me that my colleague talks about not waiting, not
waiting, not waiting--manana.
The House passed a bill in December--in December. How much longer do
veterans have to wait before the bill that resides in the Senate is
passed? That is what we have been waiting for.
I cannot figure out what my colleague has against the veterans in
Tulsa, Oklahoma, because that is the clinic that is missing out of the
bill that he is wanting to instruct us to accept. Why would we not give
access for care to the veterans in Oklahoma? It doesn't make any sense.
So when my colleague says manana, saying that, for some reason, we
are trying to delay access to care, I say, oh, no--oh, no. What this
bill actually does is it expands care way beyond what VA has ever
purported to be able to do.
The clinics that we are talking about authorizing may not even be
necessary in future years--I am not talking about these specific
clinics--because veterans will be able to go out into the private
sector.
No longer will there be a bottleneck within the Department of
Veterans Affairs providing access to care for the veterans. You see,
that is what has happened with VA really since the 1940s.
They have been trying to force veterans to drive for hours to
facilities to get their care in places that they don't want to have to
get their care at, to get their care when VA says they will get their
care, not when the veteran says they want their care, so let's change
the formula a little bit. Let's give veterans their care where they
want to get it and when they want to get it.
So I say to my friend that if we truly want to service the most
veterans, you have got to ask the Senate to pass the bill that we
passed in December because, for some reason, the Senate doesn't want to
put a clinic in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
Mr. Speaker, we have no additional speakers at this time, and I urge
my colleagues to oppose the motion to instruct.
I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. GALLEGO. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.
Let me start by, in all sincerity, saying that I have the greatest
respect for Chairman Miller and the work that he has been doing. I
follow his comments and his remarks and his committee regularly because
the issue of veterans is an issue that is near and dear to my heart, as
it is to so many of us, and I have great respect for his views and his
expertise.
While I may differ in my opinion, I certainly would never, ever think
that his motives are impure because they are not. He is very sincere
and very driven to help, but here is what I don't understand. For
veterans across the country, they don't care, in my view, if the first
two letters on a bill are H.R. or S.
That makes no difference, topside or bottom, to any veteran that I
have ever talked to. I would urge my colleagues to talk to as many
veterans as they can and to ask them specifically: Does it matter to
you if this is a Senate bill or a House bill? I guarantee you that
every veteran across the country will say, no, it doesn't matter.
So the idea that we are stuck here at this point in the process
because the House wants a House bill and the Senate would like a Senate
bill, frankly, that is ludicrous, and it is offensive to the veterans
who have served our country.
Mr. MILLER of Florida. Will the gentleman yield?
Mr. GALLEGO. I am happy to yield.
Mr. MILLER of Florida. It is not a House bill or a Senate bill
question because this is a House bill that the Senate amended, so it is
not a matter of whether it is a House bill, House resolution, Senate
bill, Senate resolution, it is a House bill that the Senate has
amended.
I thank the gentleman for yielding.
{time} 1645
Mr. GALLEGO. Absolutely, Mr. Chairman, I am happy to yield.
I would point out that part of the conversation that we have had is
asking the Senate to take action on a bill that the House sent over,
when that is even a better argument for this motion, because the House
bill is already back from the Senate in the House, and we can settle
this question once and for all by instructing our conferees to accept
that language.
I would urge that we have 26 additional facilities. I would commit to
the chairman that I will do all I can to make sure that it is not just
26 facilities, that if it needs to be 27, I am happy to do that. I have
worked in a very bipartisan fashion with the Democratic and Republican
members of the Armed Services Committee, particularly the freshman
members of the committee, in order to do that.
Mr. MILLER of Florida. Will the gentleman yield again?
Mr. GALLEGO. Mr. Chairman, I am always happy to yield.
Mr. MILLER of Florida. Thank you very much.
The problem we are going to have is that a conference report is a
privileged report. It is not amendable. So you will not be able to add
an additional clinic in the conference report.
Even if we recede to the Senate position, we will be stuck with 26
clinics. That is why it is critical that the House bill that has been
languishing for 7 months that is over there be passed and sent to the
President today.
Mr. GALLEGO. Mr. Speaker, again, I am always happy. I love the
process, and I am a huge believer in the democratic system, but I will
tell you that
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the idea that we are stuck at 26 and we are stuck at 26 forever is not
a credible argument because there are other vehicles in the process
that would be just as rapid and just as fast if we would get over this
idea, this pride of authorship, and if we would all work together on a
bipartisan basis to fashion a solution that all veterans can live with.
That is incredibly important. For me, this is a starting point, not an
ending point.
It is important, it seems to me--and I hope to do that by example,
Mr. Speaker, that we stay away from the finger-pointing and the blame
game--that we not be guilty of the fiery rhetoric I have never
understood.
As a west Texan, my instinct is always to put fires out. It is never
my instinct to add additional fuel. So the partisan fires that rage in
this building, it seems to me, need to be put out, and the interest of
the American people and, in this case, the American veteran need to be
put first and foremost and at the front and center of everything that
we are doing.
We shouldn't stand and salute the VA, as the chairman has indicated--
I agree with that--but we should stand and salute every single veteran
who has served and every single veteran who deserves health care and
who doesn't get it.
We should apologize, Mr. Speaker, to every single veteran who has
stood in line for those months and months at the VA and not been able
to make it through that small funnel, and we should apologize to them
if we don't broaden that funnel to allow more people to get more care.
Yeah, there may be changes to the system, but those changes to the
system are further down the hall, further down the way, further down
the road, further down whatever. Today, here, we are talking about
additional VA facilities. That one question we can settle, we can
settle tonight or tomorrow, whenever the vote is on this, and we can
make sure that we expand that pipeline, so that we don't try to push so
many veterans through this really narrow pipeline, so that some of them
get squeezed out of the system.
We should make that pipeline bigger so that more people get served,
and each of us, each of us--Republican, Democrat, Independent,
Libertarian, agnostic--each of us should be proud of that vote.
Stand up and salute our veterans, stand up and salute our people who
served, and stand up and admit that they need access to health care.
That is what this motion does, Mr. Speaker.
On that note, I yield back the balance of my time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. All time for debate has expired.
The question is on the motion to instruct.
The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that
the noes appeared to have it.
Mr. GALLEGO. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.
The yeas and nays were ordered.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX, further
proceedings on this question will be postponed.
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