[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 155 (Thursday, October 22, 2015)]
[House]
[Pages H7101-H7107]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
PROVIDING FOR CONSIDERATION OF H.R. 3762, RESTORING AMERICANS'
HEALTHCARE FREEDOM RECONCILIATION ACT OF 2015; WAIVING A REQUIREMENT OF
CLAUSE 6(A) OF RULE XIII WITH RESPECT TO CONSIDERATION OF CERTAIN
RESOLUTIONS REPORTED FROM THE COMMITTEE ON RULES; AND PROVIDING FOR
CONSIDERATION OF MOTIONS TO SUSPEND THE RULES
Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I
call up House Resolution 483 and ask for its immediate consideration.
The Clerk read the resolution, as follows:
H. Res. 483
Resolved, That upon adoption of this resolution it shall be
in order to consider in the House the bill (H.R. 3762) to
provide for reconciliation pursuant to section 2002 of the
concurrent resolution on the budget for fiscal year 2016. All
points of order against consideration of the bill are waived.
The amendment printed in the report of the Committee on Rules
accompanying this resolution shall be considered as adopted.
The bill, as amended, shall be considered as read. All points
of order against provisions in the bill, as amended, are
waived. The previous question shall be considered as ordered
on the bill, as amended, and on any further amendment
thereto, to final passage without intervening motion except:
(1) two hours of debate equally divided and controlled by the
chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on the
Budget or their respective designees; and (2) one motion to
recommit with or without instructions.
Sec. 2. The requirement of clause 6(a) of rule XIII for a
two-thirds vote to consider a report from the Committee on
Rules on the same day it is presented to the House is waived
with respect to any resolution reported through the
legislative day of October 23, 2015.
Sec. 3. It shall be in order at any time on the
legislative day of October 22, 2015, or October 23, 2015, for
the Speaker to entertain motions that the House suspend the
rules as though under clause 1 of rule XV. The Speaker or his
designee shall consult with the Minority Leader or her
designee on the designation of any matter for consideration
pursuant to this section.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Georgia is recognized for
1 hour.
Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the
customary 30 minutes to the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Slaughter),
pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During
consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose
of debate only.
General Leave
Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members
may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentleman from Georgia?
There was no objection.
Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I want to start with the end of what our
Reading Clerk read before I get to the excitement in the beginning.
At the end, what you heard was some blanket authority to consider
what I will call housekeeping measures here in the House, and not
because Republicans say so, not because Democrats say so, but because
Republicans and Democrats come together, consult with one another, and
try to find those issues on which we agree to bring forward.
I sit on the Rules Committee, Mr. Speaker. The best thing that
happens in this institution is when a bill comes through the Rules
Committee, because my colleague Ms. Slaughter and I always make it
better. We always make it better.
But we include authority to avoid the Rules Committee for some of
these issues that are going to come to the floor fast and furious. Here
we are, at the end of a cycle. We are in a leadership change here in
the House. You don't know what might happen. What the Rules Committee
did last night was to create a pathway to allow the House to continue
its business at a moment's notice, and I am glad that we included that
provision in here. We also include same-day consideration authority.
[[Page H7102]]
Mr. Speaker, one of the things that happened when the big freshman
class that I was elected with in 2010 came is we said, for Pete's
sakes, we need time to read the bills. We need to follow the rules and
make sure that all Members have a chance to get deep into the
information and legislation.
That persists still today. We have a process today that allows
Members to get involved in that legislation. But we still have those
emergency times here in this Chamber where something has to happen in a
hurry. Whether we are talking about borrowing authority, spending
authority, whether we are talking about something for our troops,
something for our veterans, things still happen on a moment's notice.
What we have included in here is the ability to bring things more
quickly to the floor here in the next short period of time. That is
important from a housekeeping perspective, Mr. Speaker, but that is not
what is important about this rule today.
What is important about this rule today is that 4\1/2\ years ago, the
people of the great State of Georgia, its Seventh District, sent me to
Congress. I was placed on the Budget Committee in this Congress, the
Budget Committee, the committee that writes the framework by which the
entire $3.5 trillion Federal Government is funded. We got together and
we worked hard here in the House, Mr. Speaker, and we produced a
budget, but the Senate did nothing.
I came back that second year, 2012. We worked hard here in the House.
Together, we produced a budget, but the Senate did nothing. We came
back again 2013, worked hard here in the House, produced a budget, but
the Senate produced nothing.
Mr. Speaker, what we are here today to do--what we are here today to
do--is made possible for one reason, and one reason only. That is
because, for the first time since 2001, Republicans and Democrats came
together in the House; Republicans and Democrats came together in the
Senate. We passed a budget; they passed a budget. We conferenced a
budget, and America has a balanced budget which it lives under for the
first time in 15 years--for the first time in 15 years.
Now, what does that mean?
It is not all that exciting to read the budget, Mr. Speaker. I
recommend it to you if you haven't gotten into the details. I recommend
it to anybody who hasn't gotten into the details.
But that is not what is exciting. It is not the numbers in the budget
that are exciting. What is exciting is that, because we came together,
not because we had our ideas and they had their ideas, but because we
came together, we have triggered a process called reconciliation.
Now, I am saddened that reconciliation is now in the lexicon of the
American people. It is not an important word that folks need to know
except for the fact that it gives us access to do things on their
behalf that we wouldn't have been able to do before.
I am so pleased that the Secretary of the Senate sent that message
over right before we got up to say that the Senate has just acted on
two pieces of House legislation. One of those, enacted with no
amendments, is going to be on its way to the President's desk. One,
done with amendments, we are going to have to consider that again.
So often we do such good work, the 435 of us together in this
Chamber, and it does not get past a Senate filibuster. Mr. Speaker, the
filibuster is designed to protect the rights of the minority.
Republicans use it when they are in the minority; Democrats use it when
they are in the minority; but it prevents the people's business from
moving forward.
Not so today. Not so today. Because we got together in the House with
a budget and the Senate with a budget, because we brought a budget
together, we are now in the process of reconciliation, which allows us
to have the people's will be done. Fifty-one votes in the Senate now
will move legislation forward, as it relates to balancing the budget.
You remember, Admiral Mullen, he said, Mr. Speaker, the greatest
threat to American national security wasn't a military threat. He said
it was our Federal budget deficit.
We have done such an amazing job collaboratively in this Chamber
working on the one-third of the budget pie called discretionary
spending. That is the spending that we have to work on here every year.
What we have failed to do together is work on the two-thirds of the pie
called mandatory spending, where the real growth in those budget
programs occurs. But that failure ends today.
With the passage of this rule, we will move to consider the first
reconciliation package that has come to Congress in the 4\1/2\ years
that I have been here, made possible by the first balanced budget
agreement that Congress has come to since 2001.
Mr. Speaker, this is why--this is why--I came to Congress, and we are
doing it together here today.
Let me tell you what is in this bill. I have seen it described in the
press as a complete and total repeal of the President's healthcare
bill. That is nonsense. I would support such an effort if we could
bring such an effort to the floor, but that is not what this bill is
today. What this bill is today is a group of commonsense, budget-
saving, spending-reprioritizing measures.
I will give you an example. There is a medical excise tax that the
President's healthcare law put into effect. It is 2.3 percent. It is an
excise tax, a gross receipts tax on all medical innovation in this
country as it relates to devices. We all know the power to tax is the
power to destroy. There is not one Member in this Chamber who supports
destroying medical innovation, not one--not one.
But, back at the time when the Congressional Budget Office said the
President's healthcare bill was going to cost $1 trillion, the
President said: I am not going to spend a penny more than $1 trillion.
I am going to make sure it is paid for.
He was out there looking hard for money. Turns out, medical
innovation was a place he could look. We all see now, in retrospect,
that was a terrible idea, much like the other nine bills that we have
passed here in this House, that they have passed in the Senate, that
the President has signed into law to repeal various unworkable parts of
the President's healthcare bill. This is just yet another.
We can do this together here today, made possible by this first
budget agreement that we have had since 2001.
The Cadillac tax it is called, Mr. Speaker, another provision that
this bill will repeal. It is a Cadillac tax, Mr. Speaker.
As we all know, Cadillac is a fine American automobile. You get in a
Cadillac, you feel good. We call it the Cadillac tax because it is on
healthcare plans that are too good--too good. Turns out, Mr. Speaker,
there are some labor unions in this country that are taking too good of
care of their members. Turns out there are some businesses in this
country that are looking after the healthcare needs of their employees
too much. We want to keep that down. The last thing we want in this
country, apparently, is folks having health care that is too good.
I tell people all the time, Mr. Speaker, I can make everybody in this
country poor; I just can't pass a law to make everybody rich. We are so
good at dumbing down the system for everybody. Well, that is what this
Cadillac tax was designed to do.
The labor unions don't like it. Employers don't like it. We all know
it is not the right thing to do, and in a bipartisan way we have
introduced legislation to repeal it. This bill, this rule, gives us an
opportunity to actually send that to the President's desk.
Mr. Speaker, I won't go on and on about all the good things that are
in this bill. I am sure my colleague from New York is going to
highlight a lot of those herself, and I don't want to steal all the
thunder.
But we are here because 435 of us came together here, 100 came
together there, and America is operating under a conferenced budget,
and not just a budget, but a balanced budget for the first time since
2001.
A lot of disappointment has come out of Washington, D.C., Mr.
Speaker, but we are here on the floor today talking about one of those
things we get to celebrate, one of those successes on behalf of the
families back home, that we have done together.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I thank my good friend for yielding me
the time, and I yield myself such time
[[Page H7103]]
as I may consume. I really enjoy serving with him on the Rules
Committee because he is always so cheerful and puts such a good face on
everything, and heaven knows we can use that in the world.
But the truth is, Mr. Speaker, and my colleague knows it, that by
taking away the funding for the healthcare act, you are killing the
healthcare act. That means that people would go back to not having
preexisting conditions covered.
That means that women in eight States and the District of Columbia
would face the fact that their insurance companies consider domestic
violence to be a preexisting condition, which translates out, if you
are beaten up once, maybe they will cover you. The second time, it is
obviously your fault. You have that propensity.
We can't go back to the rising cost of health care with so many
Americans using the most expensive kind of health care in the world,
the emergency room. We are told that if this were to pass, 13 million
Americans would lose their health care.
But the fact of the matter is, Mr. Speaker, this is not going to
pass, and we know that. As a matter of fact, I find myself saying over
and over again the very same things. I remember saying this is the 35th
vote, this is the 40th vote. This, Mr. Speaker, is the 61st vote, using
tax money and wasting time, to take health care away from people.
Now, I have asked many, many times in the Rules Committee: What is
this great urge to prohibit people from having access to health care?
{time} 1245
The best I can come up with is it is not particularly that they don't
care about those people, but they want to do something to upset the
President. There was a good deal of talk yesterday that, if we could
add a few amendments on here, it would really cause him grief.
It is not going to cause him any grief. If this should pass, if the
Senate should pass it, which is in control of Republicans--and, you
know, if you complain about not passing the bill, take it up with
them--what we are going to be doing is, if it gets to the President, he
is going to veto it, and you know very good and well that we don't have
the votes here to override. So we are wasting time.
We are just wasting time and wasting money. I don't know how many
millions of dollars of tax money it has taken with these 61 bills, but
then they throw in a little something else here.
They say: Let's defund Planned Parenthood for 1 year. Why? I don't
know. Three committees in the House of Representatives are studying
Planned Parenthood, and we have got to look forward to one of those
other new select committees which will go over the same thing over and
over again and come up with the conclusion that Congressman Chaffetz
came up with after they grilled the president of Planned Parenthood,
Cecile Richards, for 5 hours, that there was nothing there, that they
broke no law.
I don't know why the American public is not outraged over the fact
that none of their business is taken care of, but over and over and
over again we talk about taking health care away from people.
One in five American women and a lot of men have used Planned
Parenthood and do today. And then you add to that the 13 million people
that will lose their health care if this should become law, 3 million
of them children.
Now, what should we be doing? Well, how about the Export-Import Bank.
It doesn't cost the taxpayers a dime, puts money back into the
Treasury. It allows small companies in the United States to be able to
afford to export their goods to other countries.
The loss of that bank has already received from both General Electric
and Boeing words that they are going to take jobs out of the United
States because we don't have it. There is no earthly reason not to have
it. As I said, it doesn't cost us anything. It makes us money. It is
just that for some Members of Congress they just don't like it.
Now, this is the same majority that has produced no highway bill. We
really are on a road to nowhere. For the first time that I have been in
Congress--a highway bill was always something everybody joined. It was
always bipartisan.
But we have got roads and bridges crumbling. We have no high-speed
rail. Airports are overcrowded. Everybody needs help. But we are
working here to do something about the healthcare bill that is already
working and Planned Parenthood.
Now, this is the same majority that brought us the 7 legislative days
away from risking the full faith and credit of the United States. What
that means is that we are refusing--the majority is--to bring up a bill
here to pay the debt that they have already incurred. It is the
Congress that spends the money, and now they decided they don't want to
pay for it. So they are putting that off.
We have heard talks that tomorrow we are supposed to have a bill, but
we all know--because we all hear everything that is going on--that
there are only 170 votes for that bill, which won't pass it. So we may
not see it.
So what we are going to do today is give everybody in the House of
Representatives an opportunity to protect the full faith and credit of
the United States and not risk another downgrade of our credit rating.
To downgrade the credit rating of the United States was something that
all previous Congresses felt was an impossible thing for them to allow.
But while this is all festering out there and nothing is being done
about it, we are hurling toward another shutdown in mid-December.
So once again we find ourselves: Let's take away that health care.
Let's shut down that thing over there. But let's not deal with the
issues that we have been sent here, the things that we have been
elected to do.
And one of those has to be to protect the full faith and credit of
the United States of America, which has always been done and was a
responsibility of all previous Congresses.
Now, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, the
reconciliation bill before us will take health care away from 16
million people, 3 million children, and I might add most of them didn't
have any health care at all before the ACA was passed. As I said, it
would also defund Planned Parenthood and endanger the health of men and
women across the country. If I haven't said it enough, again, this
defunds Planned Parenthood.
A scant 3 weeks ago we stood on the floor as the House majority
threatened to shut down the government over the funding for Planned
Parenthood. The American public gave a very resounding message to
Congress: Don't do it. In fact, nearly seven in ten Americans oppose a
government shutdown over Planned Parenthood funding, according to a
Quinnipiac poll.
With this 61st vote to dismantle the ACA--and make no mistake about
it. It doesn't say in there we are going to kill this thing. We are
just going to take the money away from it.
And if you are smart enough to be a Member of Congress of the United
States, you know that, if you take the money away from it, you have
killed that bill. We all understand that. But as the majority continues
to beat their head up against the brick wall of health care, the
American people get the headache.
This budget reconciliation bill before us does two things. One, it
takes health care away from, as I said, 16 million Americans. Two, it
attacks women's health by defunding Planned Parenthood.
I believe that governing this body is a serious job with serious
consequences. The brinkmanship that this majority continues to display
is dangerous to our economy and unsettling to our Nation. The last time
the majority shut down the government over the debt limit, it took $24
billion out of this economy.
The consequences of this kind of brinkmanship are real. They are not
imagined. We have been through it once. Why in the world would we self-
inflict that wound on ourselves again?
We should not be pushed to the edge over and over again. We should be
planning what we need to do, follow regular order. My dear colleague
Mr. Woodall talked about how wonderfully well Democrats and Republicans
work together. I don't know where that is.
I know that the chair of the Benghazi Committee kept talking about he
had 7 members. There are actually 12 on there. But it just demonstrated
again
[[Page H7104]]
that the 5 Democrats on there did not signify with them.
We need to focus on the urgent needs of the Nation, not manufactured
crises that we are insisting on creating.
To address the real issues, we have got a plan to allow us to pay the
bills that this Congress has incurred and to protect the full faith and
credit of the United States. We always call for this on rules. We do
something called the previous question, which everybody sort of glides
over.
This today, what we are doing--when the previous question on this
rule vote is called, I hope that every Member who wants to do something
about the debt limit and the full faith and credit of the United States
will vote ``no'' so that our side can bring this up and give everybody
an opportunity to go home for a weekend without worrying about whether
this is going away.
By the time we get back here next week, there will be even fewer
legislative days to deal with it. But our troops, national security,
the whole Federal Government, and most of the people in the United
States are very much concerned with what will happen if it shuts down.
Let's relieve us of that burden and vote today to deal with the debt
limit. I invite all Members to vote for the Democrats' clean, simple
bill. It doesn't do anything about taking away regulations from the
government, nothing. It simply deals with the most important matter at
hand at this point, and that is the full faith and credit of the United
States.
I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
I confess. I was sitting over here going through my papers. I was
afraid I had come down here on the wrong bill here today, listening to
my friend describe it. I tell you that, if you listen to that
description and you believe it, you ought to vote ``no.'' But it is
just not true. It is just not true.
In fact, I will go line by line just a little bit. You will not find
a CBO document over there that says House Resolution 483 is going to
take health care away from 16 million Americans. We are not going to
find it.
In fact, you won't find a CBO document that says the underlying bill
of H.R. 3762 is going to take health care away from anybody because
such a document does not exist.
CBO did say that the President's healthcare bill would provide health
care for 16 million Americans. Yet, the President has joined with this
House and that Senate nine times so far to repeal errant provisions of
that healthcare bill, and that is what we are going to do here in this
legislation today.
You won't find any language that suggests that House Resolution 483
is going to deal with preexisting conditions to set back preexisting
conditions coverage in any way whatsoever, nor will you find any paper
that suggests the underlying bill, H.R. 3672, is going to set back the
conversation on preexisting conditions.
Why? Because the President led on the issue of preexisting
conditions, Mr. Speaker, much like a great Georgia speaker of this
House, Newt Gingrich, and Bill Clinton got together and did in 1996.
They got together and outlawed all preexisting conditions for federally
regulated plans.
What President Obama did in his healthcare bill has said: Well, as
States haven't done it on their own, we are going to do it for all
State-regulated plans, too.
This bill doesn't dial that back one iota, not one bit. The
President, I believe, won that debate in America. I don't think we are
ever going to revisit that debate.
I think that is a success story for families with preexisting
conditions and, again, something else we ought to be celebrating here
today, Mr. Speaker, not holding our heads low about.
Mr. Speaker, when the former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
tells you that the greatest threat to America's national security is
our budget deficit--and, at the time that I arrived here in Congress,
Mr. Speaker, in 2010, America was running its largest budget deficit in
American history, three times the size that they are today--I tell you
a bill like this that goes after those deficit numbers is a critically
important bill. It is the business that my constituents back home sent
me to be about here in this institution.
Now, of course, in the 4\1/2\ years that the folks in the Seventh
District have lent me their voting card, Mr. Speaker, we have brought
budget deficits down each and every year--each and every year--year
after year after year after year. But that has been primarily on that
discretionary one-third of the pie I talked about, Mr. Speaker.
There is so much more work to be done, and reconciliation is the tool
we use to get around the filibuster, to allow the people's will to be
done with simple majorities on both sides of the Hill.
Good news. If you don't believe what is in the underlying bill is
good for America, you can vote ``no,'' and if 51 percent of your
colleagues agree with you, this bill will not go forward. But that is
not going to happen because this is good policy.
And good news, Mr. Speaker. When it goes over to the Senate, if the
Senate does not believe this is good policy for America and 51 Senators
vote against it, this bill will not go to the President's desk.
But that is not going to happen because there is good policy in the
underlying bill. This will go to the President's desk.
As the President sits today, Mr. Speaker, contemplating vetoing the
National Defense Authorization Act--in fact, that may be happening even
as we are standing here now, that bill that provides authorized funding
for all of our troops--I can't possibly predict what he will do when
this bill arrives on his desk.
But what my friend from New York fails to mention every time she
mentions that 61 times in this House we have dealt with trying to clean
up the messes that the Affordable Care Act has created is that 9 of
those times the President agreed with us.
It is just so critically important, Mr. Speaker. We get wrapped
around the partisan axle in this body in ways that are tremendously
discouraging to me, as if it is always an us against them proposition.
It is not. It is just a proposition about us--about us--320 million of
us.
And nine times so far, Mr. Speaker, just in the short time that I
have been in Congress, the House, the Senate, and the President have
gotten together and said the Affordable Care Act is broken and together
we can begin to fix it.
I believe this is going to be one of those opportunities as well, Mr.
Speaker. It is going to be a tremendous vote, I hope, on passing this
rule, which will allow us to begin debate. Pass that underlying
resolution.
With that, I reserve the balance of my time.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 30 seconds.
I just say once again, no, they don't say: We are going to take away
preexisting conditions. They just say: We are taking away the funding
for the bill.
When the funding is taken away, it dies. I think almost all Americans
understand that.
I am pleased now to yield 3\1/2\ minutes to the distinguished
gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Conyers), the distinguished ranking member
of the Committee on the Judiciary.
{time} 1300
Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman.
Mr. Speaker, we are here today to discuss the rule for
reconciliation, which I believe we are wasting on a doomed attempt to
repeal ObamaCare for the 61st time. That we are doing this again for
the 61st time is a problem. But that we are wasting our one shot at
budget reconciliation on this is a tremendous shame. We should be using
this opportunity to avoid the Senate filibuster to actually make law,
not make a point to our bases. The way to do this is by focusing on a
bipartisan issue: canceling the sequester.
Mr. Speaker, the sequester is a unique problem in American public
policy, a program that is intentionally designed to be a bad idea. It
cripples the programs that made the 20th century one of unprecedented
progress, and it weakens the bravest military in the world. It is bad
for us at home, and it is bad for us overseas.
Its blundering destructive approach to deficit reduction was supposed
to push this Congress to compromise. Unfortunately, we have not gotten
there
[[Page H7105]]
because a few intransigents refuse to give up this hostage. But it
isn't this body that is paying the ransom for our inaction on the
sequester; it is the American people of all walks of life. It is the
millions of workers, businesses, public servants, and soldiers who are
facing uncertainty and inadequate support.
Mr. Speaker, I would encourage us to stand up and use this one shot
on something that matters and can pass, and canceling the sequester is
something that both sides could actually agree on. So I urge my
colleagues, please, to bring this theater to a close and to return to
something we can all support. Let's use reconciliation to cancel the
sequester once and for all.
Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman.
Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, if I could say to my friend from Michigan, I think there
is a lot of wisdom in what he had to say. My friend has been here, Mr.
Speaker, since 1965, I believe. I can't remember if he was elected in
1964 and began service in 1965. He has seen a lot of failures and a lot
of successes in this institution.
Reconciliation exists for one reason and one reason only, and that is
to do the really hard things that we can't get done in other times. I
would say to my friend, Mr. Speaker, that the die has been cast on
reconciliation for 2015. But as a member of the Budget Committee, I
will commit to you that we are going to come back, and we are going to
get a conferenced balanced budget next year as well. I hear that
drumbeat beginning around this institution: What is it that we can get
done together? I hope we get this done.
Make no mistake, I believe this is good underlying legislation. But
the past, well, three decades now since 1980, as I think of the big
reconciliation measures that have gone through have been things that
have changed America for the better forever, and I am grateful to the
gentleman for reminding us all of the power of this tool.
Mr. Speaker, 61 times we have had a vote on the President's
healthcare bill, that is true. But it is because there are real
problems there--again, nine times of which the President has agreed
with us about those real problems.
The folks who crafted the President's healthcare bill were smart. I
don't have any concerns about the funding that my friend from New York
has, Mr. Speaker, because the bill has funding buried in it in such a
way we don't have any access to it from this institution. That is why
we passed 4\1/2\ years' worth of legislation here without getting our
arms around that funding.
What we are talking about here, Mr. Speaker, are budget deficits.
What we are talking about here is an opportunity to move the needle on
mandatory spending. What we are talking about here is about $81 billion
in static scored money, closer to 130 in dynamically scored money,
moving the needle on the budget, as Admiral Mullen, then the Chair of
the Joint Chiefs of Staff, encouraged us to do.
I don't know where the vote is going to come out, Mr. Speaker. I feel
pretty good about it. I feel pretty good about it because it is good
underlying policy. I feel pretty good about it because we did this the
right way. We started in the Budget Committee. We conferenced it with
the Senate. We then sent those reconciliation instructions out to the
Energy and Commerce Committee, the Education and Labor Committee, and
the Ways and Means Committee. Each committee did its work, sent that
work back to the Budget Committee, and we then brought all that
legislation together. Mr. Speaker, if you want a textbook case of how
it is supposed to work around here, this is it.
Now, as a fellow who has been disappointed many times in 4\1/2\ years
in this institution, I am just going to tell my colleagues that if any
of my new colleagues believe they are going to have it their way every
day of the week, the answer is no. I was disabused of that notion in
week one.
But what we can do is bring the collective wisdom of the body
together, the collective wisdom of the body and the collective wisdom
from our committee structures, and this bill does that. There is only
one way to get to this bill, though, Mr. Speaker, and that is to pass
this rule today, House Resolution 483, and I encourage my colleagues to
do that.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 3 minutes to the
gentleman from Connecticut (Mr. Courtney).
Mr. COURTNEY. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the rule and the
underlying bill. I do so as somebody who comes from a State which,
unlike maybe the gentleman from Georgia, actually embraced this law.
The Governor set up an exchange right away, and we have had what Forbes
Magazine has described as the highest functioning exchange in the
country. Our uninsured rate went from 8 percent down to 4 percent. We
have more insurers in the marketplace today than we did before the ACA
was passed.
On Labor Day, I was at a picnic with some friends, and there was a
gentleman there who was the head of HR for the second largest employer
in this community that I was at. It was about a 300-employee firm, a
trash hauler, who was actually quite concerned about the ACA's
definition of part-time and full-time in terms of raising his rates.
For the last 2 years, his rates have gone down. He yelled from the pool
where he was playing with his kids, splashing around in the water,
saying: Tell President Obama thank you for the Affordable Care Act
because our rates have gone down for the 275 people that worked there.
So, Mr. Speaker, then the question is: What does this bill do? The
fact of the matter is, by eliminating the individual mandate, by
basically destroying the financing of tax subsidies, which is precisely
the way that you broaden the insurance market so that you can implement
an elimination of preexisting conditions, you, in fact, are totally
capsizing the market.
I know that because the State of Connecticut insurance department and
the exchange have looked at what this bill is going to do to the
individual mandate, and that is precisely what they said the outcome
would be, that it would send rates through the roof and
basically shatter the success that our State has accomplished.
What is so ironic about this is that the design of this bill with an
individual mandate and tax subsidies for insurance came from the
Heritage Foundation. Stuart Butler was the mastermind of this back in
the 1990s. I was chairman of the Public Health Committee back then, and
I remember vividly that that was the Heritage Foundation, the
conservative alternative to healthcare reform, to the Clinton
healthcare plan. But, obviously, for political reasons, that is not
mentioned very much by the majority as we again debate this ad nauseam.
What is sad is that 2 weeks ago we passed a bill, H.R. 1624,
sponsored by my good friend, Mr. Guthrie from Kentucky, which amended
the Affordable Care Act. It changed the definition of ``small
employer,'' and it was done on a bipartisan basis, completely
unanimous. It sailed through the House, and President Obama signed it.
Why did that work? Because they did it surgically, because Brett was
smart enough to understand that if you want to get people to come
together, you don't load it up with a bunch of poison pills, that you
actually present an idea with focus and with logic behind it. Guess
what will happen. You will actually get bipartisan support, the
complete opposite of the bill that we have before us here today.
Now, I want to point out, though, that there are some signs of
intelligent life in this reconciliation bill.
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Marchant). The time of the gentleman has
expired.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. I yield the gentleman an additional 2 minutes.
Mr. COURTNEY. Mr. Speaker, section 305 does, as the gentleman from
Georgia points out, eliminate the excise tax on high-class plans.
It is interesting to note that 5 years ago it was the House Members
who pushed hard against that proposal with the administration, and we
delayed that tax for 5 years. H.R. 2050, which I am the lead sponsor
of, I am proud to say we have 166 bipartisan cosponsors. It is verbatim
the language that was incorporated into the reconciliation bill.
So I point that out because I do think that it, in fact, will
basically sharply increase people's out-of-pocket
[[Page H7106]]
deductibles because that is what actuaries tell us is the only way you
can respond to that kind of tax. It is true that 83 organizations,
including organized labor, business groups, and small-business groups
have said this is not a workable plan. I mention that here because
there is an opportunity here to do what Congressman Guthrie did, which
is to take an individual component, an idea, and not load it up with a
lot of other baggage which is going to capsize the insurance market,
which we know is going to happen if other provisions of the
reconciliation bill are passed, that we can actually get it done.
You are giving the White House a perfect excuse to veto this bill and
robbing us of the ability to actually address this real problem, which
section 305 does recognize, and H.R. 2050 is out there and is on
standby for us to move forward on. So let's get rid of the blunt
instruments, the baseball bats, and the butchering of this law, and
let's focus on bipartisan surgical fixes to real problems.
Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, I say to my friend from Connecticut that the point that
he made was made very well by the gentleman from Oklahoma last night
while we were in the Rules Committee. You only get to use this
procedure once--actually, you can use it three times; but for a variety
of different reasons, it is only going to come together for us once
this year--and you have to choose how to do that.
I am thrilled--thrilled--that the story that the gentleman from
Connecticut tells is of success for his constituents back home in
Connecticut. I think that is fabulous. I think that is fabulous.
Mr. Speaker, I don't get to tell as many of those stories. I tell
stories of folks who had plans that they liked, and those plans were
outlawed by their government. I tell stories about folks who have
doctors that they had had relationships with for decades, who were
promised that if they liked their doctor they could keep their doctor,
who lost access to their doctor because their government told them ``no
more for you.''
I tell stories of the small businesses in the district that were
doing the right thing by providing health care for their employees who
have now been priced out of that marketplace. They are not required by
law to do it, but rates have gone up so much they can't do it
themselves--not because of our efforts to provide health care to
people, but because of our efforts to tell people what kind of health
care is good for them and what kind isn't.
Mr. Speaker, you may not know, the chairman of the Budget Committee
is Georgia Congressman Dr. Tom Price. Dr. Tom Price, in H.R. 2300, has
a replacement plan. Dr. Tom Price wants to see preexisting conditions
out of the marketplace. Dr. Tom Price, in H.R. 2300, wants to see
individuals able to move their policies from business to business, from
place to place.
Mr. Speaker, it is a doctor-patient relationship. It is not a Federal
Government-patient relationship. It is not a Federal HHS, Health and
Human Services-patient relationship, and it is not an insurance
company-doctor relationship. It is about me and my physician, you and
your physician, our families and our family physician, 320 million
Americans at a time.
We have it right here in this institution. We have replacement
options right here.
Do not let it be said that in the name of trying to bring sanity to
our Federal spending, in the name of trying to fix the errors that were
created in the Affordable Care Act, do not let it be said that any
Member wants to trample on the healthcare opportunities that families
have back home. Our goal is to expand those opportunities, not to
contract them.
I celebrate what has happened in Connecticut. I only wish that folks
in Connecticut, New York, and elsewhere would support us in Georgia
with the challenges that we are having and help us get back to that
very personal doctor-patient relationship that we believe is the right
of every American.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.
Mr. Speaker, the budget reconciliation bill avoids the real problems
before us, including the debt limit, the Export-Import Bank, a highway
bill, a looming shutdown, and more. Instead of addressing the urgent
needs of the Nation, the bill doubles down on attacking women's health
and marks the 61st time that the House majority has voted to repeal, to
defund, or to undermine the Affordable Care Act.
Mr. Speaker, let's try to salvage something from the money we have
spent on this hour here at a time that we have literally wasted again,
for the 61st time. Let's salvage something from it by voting ``no'' on
the previous question. We can actually accomplish something then.
If the previous question is defeated, we will be able to vote to take
care of the issue of debt limit, the full faith and credit of the
United States of America.
{time} 1315
A simple vote ``no'' allows us to bring that up, vote for that, go
home this weekend not having to be chewing everybody's nails and then
everybody in the country wonders what in heck is going to be going on
here.
Why don't we for a change here on this day, on this Thursday, do
something positive, do something that needs doing, do something we know
sooner or later we will do. Do it today on a clean bill, no additions
of any kind, just to do it. It is an opportunity that I certainly hope
people will take advantage of. I urge them to do that.
Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of my
amendment in the Record, along with extraneous material, immediately
prior to the vote on the previous question.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentlewoman from New York?
There was no objection.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' so
that we can vote ``yes'' on a vote to deal with the debt limit issue
and a ``no'' vote on the rule.
I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, I firmly believe there is more that unites us than that
divides us not just in this Chamber, but in this Nation.
As I have listened to my colleague from New York talk about some of
the priorities that America has, I think she is spot on. I think she is
spot on.
I am missing votes in the Transportation Committee right now where we
are moving that long-term transportation bill so that I can be down
here on the floor moving this reconciliation bill.
Mr. Speaker, there is a lot of rust in the gears around here. There
is a lot of rust in the gears. It has been since the 1990s that
Congress--House and Senate combined--have sent all the appropriations
bills to the President before the end of the fiscal year. It has been
since the 1990s.
Newt Gingrich ran this institution the last time we did that. Bill
Clinton was in the White House the last time we did that. There is a
lot of rust in the gears that has accumulated under both Republican and
Democratic leadership in this place.
But this year we passed more appropriations bills earlier in the
fiscal year than at any point since 1974. This year we are moving the
first long-term highway bill that we have seen in almost a decade.
This year we have conferenced a balanced budget for America for the
first time in a decade and a half. That is not just a notch to put on
the belt of America to say this is what we have done. This is an
opportunity to move this budget reconciliation bill.
Mr. Speaker, I do. I am saddened that reconciliation is a word that
folks have to go and look up and learn, but it is the only way--the
only way--in divided government that the people's voice can be heard.
There is no other procedure in the United States Congress that allows
51 percent of America to prevail. There is no other ability in the
United States Congress for the majority of Americans who have lent
their power to Washington to express their views and change the law of
the land, save this one.
Mr. Speaker, budget deficits have gone down each and every year since
Speaker John Boehner stood right there where you are standing today
[[Page H7107]]
and Nancy Pelosi handed him the gavel--every year--from record high
levels now to the lowest budget deficit in the Obama administration,
and we have an opportunity today to do more.
I have heard my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, Mr.
Speaker, talk about those things that we can do together, and I agree.
I agree.
I have heard my colleagues on the other side talk about their
priorities in terms of raising the debt limit and not seeing the
government shut down. I halfway agree.
I don't want to see the government shut down either. We avoided a
government shutdown 2 weeks ago and got a little thank you note from a
young lady who was in the office.
She said: Dear Congressman, It was good to see you today. Thank you
for not letting the American History museum close down while my family
was in Washington.
There are real impacts to that. But the fact is the reason we are
having the conversation is not because anybody wants to shut the
government down. It is because folks want to borrow more money.
Mortgaging our children's future to the tune of $18 trillion apparently
is not mortgaging it enough. We are going to be back and make it $19
trillion or $19.5 trillion.
Mr. Speaker, we are not talking about a debt limit that is coming
around today. We are talking about one that came around in the spring.
The government has just been borrowing and borrowing and borrowing even
beyond that debt limit, and they are borrowing because we are spending
too much.
Mr. Speaker, look at the tax rolls right now. Do you realize, as we
are standing here today, not only is America collecting more in
constant dollars--not static dollars, but constant dollars adjusted for
inflation--we are collecting more money than at any time in American
history, any time.
Per capita in this country, Americans are paying more in taxes than
they have ever paid in the history of the Republic, not in inflated
2015 dollars, but in constant dollars adjusted for inflation. The real
impact on American families is greater today in taxes than ever before.
Mr. Speaker, the problem is not that we don't raise enough money. The
problem is that we spend too much money. I can't count the number of
good pieces of legislation that have gone to the Senate and failed not
on their merits, but because a Democratic filibuster would not even
allow the bill to be debated.
With this rule and with this underlying bill, we allow the people's
voice to be heard, we allow the American majority's voice to be heard,
and we have an opportunity to put a bill that will make a difference
for American families on the President's desk for the very first time.
I encourage all of my colleagues' strong support of the rule. Upon
passage of that rule, Mr. Speaker, I encourage their strong support for
the underlying reconciliation measure. We have an opportunity today
together to make a difference.
The material previously referred to by Ms. Slaughter is as follows:
An Amendment to H. Res. 483 Offered by Ms. Slaughter of New York
Strike all after the resolved clause and insert:
That immediately upon adoption of this resolution the
Speaker shall, pursuant to clause 2(b) of rule XVIII, declare
the House resolved into the Committee of the Whole House on
the state of the Union for consideration of the bill (H.R.
3737) to responsibly pay our Nation's bills on time by
temporarily extending the public debt limit, and for other
purposes. The first reading of the bill shall be dispensed
with. All points of order against consideration of the bill
are waived. General debate shall be confined to the bill and
shall not exceed one hour equally divided and controlled by
the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on
Ways and Means. After general debate the bill shall be
considered for amendment under the five-minute rule. All
points of order against provisions in the bill are waived. At
the conclusion of consideration of the bill for amendment the
Committee shall rise and report the bill to the House with
such amendments as may have been adopted. The previous
question shall be considered as ordered on the bill and
amendments thereto to final passage without intervening
motion except one motion to recommit with or without
instructions. If the Committee of the Whole rises and reports
that it has come to no resolution on the bill, then on the
next legislative day the House shall, immediately after the
third daily order of business under clause 1 of rule XIV,
resolve into the Committee of the Whole for further
consideration of the bill.
Sec. 2. Clause 1(c) of rule XIX shall not apply to the
consideration of H.R. 3737.
____
The Vote on the Previous Question: What It Really Means
This vote, the vote on whether to order the previous
question on a special rule, is not merely a procedural vote.
A vote against ordering the previous question is a vote
against the Republican majority agenda and a vote to allow
the Democratic minority to offer an alternative plan. It is a
vote about what the House should be debating.
Mr. Clarence Cannon's Precedents of the House of
Representatives (VI, 308-311), describes the vote on the
previous question on the rule as ``a motion to direct or
control the consideration of the subject before the House
being made by the Member in charge.'' To defeat the previous
question is to give the opposition a chance to decide the
subject before the House. Cannon cites the Speaker's ruling
of January 13, 1920, to the effect that ``the refusal of the
House to sustain the demand for the previous question passes
the control of the resolution to the opposition'' in order to
offer an amendment. On March 15, 1909, a member of the
majority party offered a rule resolution. The House defeated
the previous question and a member of the opposition rose to
a parliamentary inquiry, asking who was entitled to
recognition. Speaker Joseph G. Cannon (R-Illinois) said:
``The previous question having been refused, the gentleman
from New York, Mr. Fitzgerald, who had asked the gentleman to
yield to him for an amendment, is entitled to the first
recognition.''
The Republican majority may say ``the vote on the previous
question is simply a vote on whether to proceed to an
immediate vote on adopting the resolution . . . [and] has no
substantive legislative or policy implications whatsoever.''
But that is not what they have always said. Listen to the
Republican Leadership Manual on the Legislative Process in
the United States House of Representatives, (6th edition,
page 135). Here's how the Republicans describe the previous
question vote in their own manual: ``Although it is generally
not possible to amend the rule because the majority Member
controlling the time will not yield for the purpose of
offering an amendment, the same result may be achieved by
voting down the previous question on the rule. . . . When the
motion for the previous question is defeated, control of the
time passes to the Member who led the opposition to ordering
the previous question. That Member, because he then controls
the time, may offer an amendment to the rule, or yield for
the purpose of amendment.''
In Deschler's Procedure in the U.S. House of
Representatives, the subchapter titled ``Amending Special
Rules'' states: ``a refusal to order the previous question on
such a rule [a special rule reported from the Committee on
Rules] opens the resolution to amendment and further
debate.'' (Chapter 21, section 21.2) Section 21.3 continues:
``Upon rejection of the motion for the previous question on a
resolution reported from the Committee on Rules, control
shifts to the Member leading the opposition to the previous
question, who may offer a proper amendment or motion and who
controls the time for debate thereon.''
Clearly, the vote on the previous question on a rule does
have substantive policy implications. It is one of the only
available tools for those who oppose the Republican
majority's agenda and allows those with alternative views the
opportunity to offer an alternative plan.
Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I
move the previous question on the resolution.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on ordering the previous
question.
The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that
the ayes appeared to have it.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. 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.
____________________