[Congressional Record Volume 165, Number 102 (Tuesday, June 18, 2019)]
[House]
[Pages H4703-H4704]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                     AMERICANS SUPPORT THE GI BILL

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Connecticut (Mr. Courtney) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. COURTNEY. Mr. Speaker, 12 days ago, the eyes of the world were 
focused on the beaches of Normandy, France, to observe the 75th 
anniversary of the D-day invasion. It was a solemn moment to rightly 
honor the sacrifice and courage of the combined Armed Forces of the 
Allied Powers, who, from that moment, launched the final, decisive 
assault that eventually destroyed the Axis Powers' murderous 
stranglehold on Europe and Asia.
  Mr. Speaker, another 75th anniversary surrounding the epic effort to 
save democracy will occur in 4 days, this Saturday, June 22. On that 
day 75 years ago, President Franklin Roosevelt signed into law the 
Servicemen's Readjustment Act, more commonly known as the GI Bill. That 
landmark measure would provide both college tuition and a stipend for 
returning servicemembers who, as FDR said at the time, ``have been 
compelled to make greater economic sacrifice and every other kind of 
sacrifice than the rest of us.''
  Even though the war would rage on for another year, leaders in 
Washington wisely recognized that millions of young soldiers, sailors, 
and airmen would soon be returning back into civilian life; and for 
their sake and for the sake of a healthy postwar economy, creating this 
educational pathway made tremendous sense.
  In the 75 years since the GI Bill was signed into law, it is now 
recognized as one of the most successful pieces of domestic legislation 
ever enacted. The postwar economic boom and the blossoming of the 
American middle class have both been attributed, in part, to the GI 
Bill.
  Many renown Americans, including Bob Dole, Johnny Carson, Harry 
Belafonte, William Rehnquist, and Clint Eastwood, were beneficiaries of 
the GI Bill.
  Economic studies have shown that, for every dollar the government 
spent on the GI Bill, our economy saw nearly $7 in return of additional 
economic output in tax revenues from income growth.
  Despite its stellar performance, the relative strength of the GI Bill 
deteriorated in the late 20th century. By 2008, it was clear that 
tuition assistance and living stipends had not kept pace with the 
rising cost of a college education.
  As a freshman Congressman in the House Armed Services Committee at 
the time, I heard from returning Iraq and Afghan vets who were forced 
to choose between dropping out of school or shouldering the burden of 
daunting student loans. To fix this decline, we passed the Post-9/11 GI 
Bill, which was signed into law by George Bush on June 30, 2008.
  The updated law boosted tuition to match the cost of a 4-year public 
university in servicemembers' home States and increased the living 
stipend to keep faith with the original law. It also allowed GI 
benefits to be transferred to a spouse or dependent child, a 
groundbreaking change which transformed the value of military service 
for families.
  After the bill signing, I flew to Iraq in late 2008 for a committee 
visit and vividly recall being surrounded by soldiers bursting with 
questions about when and how the new law would be implemented. Since 
then, it has become clear that the transferability of the GI Bill has 
been an enormous morale booster and a valuable incentive to enlist and 
remain in service.
  Unfortunately, Mr. Speaker, the Trump Department of Defense announced 
a new policy last July which would arbitrarily cut off servicemembers 
with more than 16 years of service from transferring their Post-9/11 GI 
benefits to eligible family members. We were told at the time that the 
Department viewed this as a shrewd cost-cutting measure.
  However, revoking transferability breaks our commitment to our most 
dedicated and seasoned servicemembers and their families. In addition, 
in a tight, lean labor market, it remains

[[Page H4704]]

critically important to attract and retain the best qualified 
individuals for military service.
  I believe it sends exactly the wrong message to some of our most 
seasoned servicemembers who may have married late in life or started 
their families later, to make them ineligible for incentives, to 
continue their service to our Nation.
  Two weeks after the Pentagon released this policy, 83 of my 
colleagues in the House joined me in a letter that I wrote to Secretary 
Mattis objecting to this change and calling for its reversal. So far, 
DOD has refused to budge.
  Mr. Speaker, I have some good news to report today. With the cutoff 
due to go into effect next month, the House Armed Services Committee 
last week unanimously passed my amendment to the 2020 National Defense 
Authorization Act, which would block the Secretary of Defense from 
restricting GI Bill transferability based on a maximum number of years 
of service.
  As Congress took action 75 years ago to create the GI Bill benefit, 
today it is our job to restore the hard-fought modernized GI Bill of 
2008. That is even more the case today at a time of an All-Volunteer 
Force. If a servicemember demonstrates that they are ready, able, and 
willing to continue their service to our Nation, we should uphold our 
end of the commitment.

  To paraphrase President Roosevelt's words 75 years ago when he signed 
the Servicemen's Readjustment Act, protecting transferability today 
``gives emphatic notice to the men and women in our Armed Forces that 
the American people do not intend to let them down.''

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