[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 70 (Wednesday, April 26, 2023)]
[House]
[Pages H1960-H1977]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
PROVIDING FOR CONSIDERATION OF H.R. 2811, LIMIT, SAVE, GROW ACT OF
2023, AND PROVIDING FOR CONSIDERATION OF H.J. RES. 39, DISAPPROVING THE
RULE SUBMITTED BY THE DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE RELATING TO ``PROCEDURES
COVERING SUSPENSION OF LIQUIDATION, DUTIES AND ESTIMATED DUTIES IN
ACCORD WITH PRESIDENTIAL PROCLAMATION 10414''
Mr. COLE. Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call
up House Resolution 327 and ask for its immediate consideration.
The Clerk read the resolution, as follows:
H. Res. 327
Resolved, That upon adoption of this resolution it shall be
in order to consider in the House the bill (H.R. 2811) to
provide for a responsible increase to the debt ceiling, and
for other purposes. 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 among and controlled by the chair and ranking
minority member of the Committee on the Budget or their
respective designees and the chair and ranking minority
member of the Committee on Ways and Means or their respective
designees; and (2) one motion to recommit.
Sec. 2. Upon adoption of this resolution it shall be in
order to consider in the House the joint resolution (H.J.
Res. 39) disapproving the rule submitted by the Department of
Commerce relating to ``Procedures Covering Suspension of
Liquidation, Duties and Estimated Duties in Accord With
Presidential Proclamation 10414''. All points of order
against consideration of the joint resolution are waived. The
joint resolution shall be considered as read. All points of
order against provisions in the joint resolution are waived.
The previous question shall be considered as ordered on the
joint resolution and on any amendment thereto to final
passage without intervening motion except: (1) one hour of
debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and
ranking minority member of the Committee on Ways and Means or
their respective designees; and (2) one motion to recommit.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Oklahoma is recognized
for 1 hour.
{time} 1215
Mr. COLE. Mr. Speaker, for purposes of debate only, I yield the
customary 30 minutes to my good friend, the gentleman from
Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern), the distinguished ranking member of the
Rules Committee, pending which I yield myself such time as I may
consume.
Mr. Speaker, during consideration of this resolution, all time is
yielded for the purposes of debate only.
General Leave
Mr. COLE. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may
have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and
insert extraneous material on House Resolution 327.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentleman from Oklahoma?
There was no objection.
Mr. COLE. Mr. Speaker, last night, the Rules Committee met and met
and met and reported out a rule providing for the consideration of H.R.
2811, the Limit, Save, Grow Act of 2023, and H.J. Res. 39, a joint
resolution of disapproval that ends President Biden's rule protecting
Chinese solar manufacturers that are illegally violating U.S. trade
law.
The rule provides for consideration of H.R. 2811 under a closed rule.
It provides 2 hours of general debate and one motion to recommit. The
rule also provides for consideration of H.J. Res. 39 under a closed
rule with 1 hour of general debate and one motion to recommit.
Mr. Speaker, earlier this year, the United States Government hit our
statutory debt limit of $31.3 trillion. That is an astonishing number.
It is over 120 percent of our annual gross domestic product.
This level of spending is simply unsustainable, and the American
people know it. Three out of every four Americans support taking action
on the national debt. They know that if we do nothing and keep moving
forward as we have been doing, the result will be leaving a huge burden
for our children and grandchildren; a pile of debt, a weak economy, and
a broken currency.
You would think, given all that, the staggering reality, that
President Biden and congressional Democrats would acknowledge the need
to do something to address this problem. You would think they would be
open to doing what we have done many, many times in the past: to couple
needed fiscal reforms with an agreement to lift the debt ceiling. You
would even think that President Biden, who himself personally
negotiated several debt ceiling increases over the years, would be
willing to sit down with us and talk.
Instead, we have heard none of this. No, we will not negotiate with
you. No, we will not talk about the Federal budget. No, we won't look
at commonsense reforms. No. No. No.
Instead, President Biden and congressional Democrats insist it is
their way or the highway. There will be no reforms, no changes to
Federal spending, not even clawing back the unspent pandemic relief
funds that are no longer necessary.
With the passage of the Limit, Save, Grow Act, the House will stand
with the American people who desperately want us to fix our national
debt problem. That fix starts here in today's bill.
Mr. Speaker, our second item for today, H.J. Res. 39, is a joint
resolution of disapproval of a Biden administration rule that would
suspend import duties on solar panels made with components from the
People's Republic of China.
Mr. Speaker, Communist China does not play by the same rules as the
rest of the world. Chinese leadership will do whatever it takes to
advance the Chinese Communist Party's interest to the detriment of the
American economy.
China has been unfairly subsidizing the production of solar cells and
modules and dumping them on the U.S. market at below cost. It should
come as no surprise that China is also attempting to get around the
existing import duties by routing their subsidized solar components
through four countries: Cambodia, Malaysia, Thailand, and Vietnam.
Instead of holding them accountable for their actions, President
Biden suspended the penalties for 2 years, presumably to appease
climate activists who have no interest in America's job creators and
manufacturers. If the House does not act, China's bad behavior will go
unchallenged, and American solar manufacturers will continue to get a
raw deal.
Mr. Speaker, we must stand up to Communist China. We must call out
their inappropriate behavior on the global stage. When it is called
for, we must protect American manufacturers against unfair competition.
H.J. Res. 39 will accomplish all of these goals and will do so in a
bipartisan manner.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to join me in supporting this rule
and the underlying legislation.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
[[Page H1961]]
Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr.
Cole), my good friend, for yielding me the customary 30 minutes, and I
yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, let's begin. We are dealing with this default on America
bill. It is a doozy, even by the measurements that we judge this
current majority in Congress. How did we get here?
I will tell you how we got here. The process is lousy. It stinks. We
heard promise after promise after promise about how great Republicans
would be when they were in charge; about how open and transparent and
fair things would be here. It is clear now that it was all a bunch of
talk, all phony. They never meant any of it.
There was no hearing, no markup, no amendments, no nothing. The CBO
score came out 5 minutes before the hearing started. The manager's
amendment released at 12:45 a.m. The Rules Committee met for 6 hours
and then we adjourned until 11:30 p.m. Democrats sat waiting in an
empty room for 45 minutes.
We were told to come back at 1:45 in the morning.
In the midnight seance that the Republicans conducted in the
chairman's office, out comes this new language that is supposed to
satisfy the extreme rightwing of the extreme rightwing.
Basically, some of my Republican colleagues had an objection that the
bill didn't screw people fast enough. Get this, after all their talk
about how horrible the Inflation Reduction Act was, we find out that
some of their Members actually love parts of the Inflation Reduction
Act and demanded that we protect it, even if it meant changing the bill
at 2 a.m. in the morning.
Let me tell everyone else, in case you missed it--because some people
go to sleep before 2 a.m.--this all happened at 2 a.m. Shhh. Secret.
Speaker McCarthy said himself that you just can't throw something on
the floor. Those were his words. But here we are and this bill is being
thrown on the floor.
Mr. Speaker, 25 of the 32 rules this Congress has done have been
completely closed. The Rules Committee has allowed to the floor only 91
amendments so far. When I was in charge, at this point we had allowed
to the floor 199 amendments.
Mr. Speaker, 92 percent of all Democratic amendments have not been
allowed to be debated. Republican Whip Tom Emmer told us yesterday
that the bill was closed. It is not getting changed, he said. And then
what did they do just a few hours later? They changed it.
Mr. Speaker, I asked Chairman Smith last night in the Rules Committee
if he liked the way this bill was being brought up. You know what he
said to me?
I am not in charge.
Well, it is his committee. Who is in charge of whether or not they
hold a hearing or a markup?
Just as a lesson for our new Members who demanded more regular order,
this is not it. I would like a single Republican to come down here and
defend the process that was used here. I bet they won't because they
cannot.
Here we are debating this bill, the default on America act. We are
happy to have a conversation on our spending priorities. Absolutely. We
welcome that conversation. This isn't a conversation. They handed us a
ransom note.
They say that in order to agree to pay our bills for 1 year, we have
to make 10 years of deep cuts that will hurt our constituents. This is
a ransom note. Then what happens a year from now? What is next? Do you
want our first-born children in exchange for paying the bills on time?
Republicans have said that unless we screw regular people, working
people, veterans, the environment--I could go right down the list--
unless we do that, Republicans are going to push this economy off a
cliff, damaging our credit rating, crashing Wall Street, resulting in
all kinds of job loss, and putting us into a recession. That is the
choice they are giving us here today.
Here is the deal, and this is what is really galling. Republicans are
telling us that in order to get our fiscal house in order so we can pay
our bills, not a single dollar can be saved at the Pentagon, that
billionaires can't pay another cent in taxes. To get our fiscal house
in order, we need to nickel-and-dime moms and dads, workers and
veterans, and regular people.
Billionaires and CEOs received trillions in tax cuts when Republicans
were in charge. Trillions. They want to screw the people that I came to
Congress to represent--it takes my breath away, Mr. Speaker--regular
people, working people, the farmers, and the veterans. They want to
kick people off healthcare. They want to cut funding to stop drugs from
coming into America. They want to fire teachers, and they want to take
food away from women, infants, and children. What is wrong with them,
Mr. Speaker?
I know my friend, Chairman Cole--and he is my friend--cares deeply
about programs like Head Start. In his own State, this bill would cut
3,300 children off of Head Start. These are real kids for God's sake.
Don't take my word for it. The National Head Start program says:
Make no mistake, the current debt limit and budget
legislation under consideration in the House of
Representatives will cause irreparable damage to Head Start.
It is not mathematically possible to make the cuts that they are
talking about without hurting our own constituents. All this so that we
can appease the extreme MAGA wing of the Republican Party.
The contempt that so many on the other side of the aisle have for
people who are poor, who are struggling, who are working hard but
having trouble making ends meet because the other side won't even raise
the minimum wage, it is stunning.
Mr. Speaker, we have a bill loaded up with all these new work
requirements and hurdles for people to jump through. It will result in
people losing SNAP, losing Meals on Wheels benefits, losing assistance
to pay for infants and children. Yet, there has not been a single
hearing on this topic. Not one.
Mr. Speaker, I asked: Who are these people in real life that you
claim don't work who are on SNAP? Who are the people you are talking
about?
The chairman of the Ways and Means Committee and the chairman of the
Budget Committee gave me a blank stare. I asked: What is the average
SNAP benefit? That is a pretty basic question if you feel strongly
about this program. They had no idea. Not a clue. Not even a guess.
Mr. Speaker, I asked: What is the average length that someone is on
SNAP? They had no idea. This is not about substance or reality, Mr.
Speaker.
By the way, the average SNAP benefit per person per meal is about $2.
The average time somebody is on the benefit is less than a year. This
is not about substance or reality.
The bottom line is if this is what the American people want, as the
Republicans say--many of them kept saying it over and over in the Rules
Committee, which I could not believe because I think most people in
this country are horrified about what they are trying to do here--if
they think that is what the American people want, then they should win
the White House and win the Senate.
They were supposed to win the House by a huge margin, but that red
wave turned into a pink splash. I don't think you are going to be
around in the leadership here much longer, quite frankly.
{time} 1230
Enough is enough, Mr. Speaker. America pays our bills. This is a
ransom note.
Republicans want to default on America, and all Democrats are asking
for is that you listen to Trump. You know him. He is the guy you are
all afraid of. He said: ``I can't imagine anybody ever even thinking of
using the debt ceiling as a negotiation wedge. . . . That is a very,
very sacred thing. . . . We could never play with it.''
That is the guy whom you are all afraid of. That is what he said.
Listen to Speaker McCarthy in 2015: ``When the United States makes
promises, it keeps them, which is why the House voted today to avoid
the threat of a debt default.''
That was Speaker McCarthy. I guess he forgot.
This is a simple, routine part of doing our job, something all of us
should be able to get behind.
If you want to have a conversation about spending priorities, that is
the
[[Page H1962]]
appropriations process or the budget process, but it is not holding our
Nation hostage. It is not a ransom note.
Don't default on America, Speaker McCarthy. Do your job. Do what you
said we would do: keep America's promises. Don't mess around with the
full faith and credit of the United States of America.
Mr. Speaker, I urge a ``no'' vote on this rule and a ``no'' vote on
the underlying legislation, and I reserve the balance of my time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Members are reminded to direct their remarks
to the Chair.
Mr. COLE. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
I have great respect for my friend, Mr. McGovern, but, of course,
most of the things he mentioned simply aren't in the bill.
What really happened last night is that we have been trying to get
you guys to negotiate for weeks and for months. We are going to raise
the debt ceiling, something we said we were going to do and do in the
legislation, and here is our opening offer.
Where is yours? We don't have one. We don't have one from the
President. We have a Democratic Senate that can't produce one. So, we
are going to put the ball over and see what you guys are actually going
to do with it.
I remind my friends on the other side of the aisle that the work
requirements we are including in this legislation are, in fact, less
strict than the ones that then-Senator Biden supported in the 1990s. We
should be helping people attain self-sufficiency as opposed to having
them simply depend on the Federal Government.
That doesn't seem like a radical idea. That seems like common sense
to me, and I think most Americans anyplace in the country would support
it.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from
Texas (Mr. Roy), who is my very good friend and a member of the Rules
Committee.
Mr. ROY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Oklahoma for
yielding.
Mr. Speaker, I never know who I am, whether I am a rightwing MAGA
extremist or a Ron DeSantis-supporting RINO. Today, where I am here on
the floor is--I would just say this: ``I cannot agree to vote for a
full increase in the debt without any assurance that steps will be
taken . . . to reduce the alarming increase in the deficits and the
debt.'' Those aren't my words. Those were Joe Biden's words in October
1984, when the debt was $1.5 trillion.
My colleagues on the other side of the aisle are hiding. They want to
hide behind process. What they don't want the American people to know
is that this bill has been available since last Wednesday; that of the
20 debt ceiling increases since 2000, only two have gone through
committee; that H.R. 1 in this bill went through regular order and
passed off the floor; that the REINS Act, which is in this bill in its
existing form, passed this very body on a bipartisan basis in 2017;
that the spending repeals that we have in this bill are clean cuts,
cutting the very things that this body with Democrat control passed
with 158 proxy votes in August, calling people back and forcing some of
us to have to fly back with the kind of process that we learned to
expect under Speaker Pelosi.
Instead, here, what did we have last night? Yes, we had an agreement
late at night. Do you know what that agreement was, Mr. Speaker? It was
a recognition of the deal that had already been constructed, which was
to say we are going to repeal the god-awful IRA subsidies destroying
our economy, which are absolutely going to enrich a handful of
corporate America, pushing their green subsidies, enriching themselves,
and destroying the American economy and energy freedom.
That is what we are doing: restoring exactly what agreement had been
reached that we had decided last week.
The simple fact is that the American people don't really care what my
Democratic colleagues have to say because it is more of the same scare
tactics.
They want to say that we are cutting spending to oblivion, yet the
reality is what we are dealing with, Mr. Speaker, is if you kept the
fiscal year 2023 defense level spending--last year's defense spending--
and add to it the nondefense level of that MAGA extremist Barack Obama
that he proposed in his last budget for fiscal year 2024, then you get
exactly the $1.471 trillion level we are proposing. That is the truth.
Proposing pre-COVID nondefense level spending; proposing a defense to
match China; proposing the kind of cuts the American people expect us
to do in upfront first-year cuts, to cut student loans that are unfair
to the plumber and making sure that they are biased toward kids who
rack up debt; we are going to make sure that we are increasing our
economic productivity by getting rid of the regulatory stranglehold
with the regulations that are in the IRA regulations; and then we are
going to make sure that we get rid of the COVID spending to $50 billion
of unobligated dollars, in addition to making sure that the American
people can carry out their business without constraint from
government--in short, we are going to shrink Washington and grow
America.
The American people are tired of the same. They want us to do our
job. They are tired of Chuck Schumer and President Biden doing
absolutely nothing.
Republicans in the House are doing our job, and we are going to send
this over to the Senate.
Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record a report by The
Balance titled: ``President Trump's Impact on the National Debt.''
[From the balance, Jan. 26, 2022]
President Trump's Impact on the National Debt
(By Kimberly Amadeo)
The national debt increased by almost 36 percent during
Trump's tenure.
Republican candidate Donald Trump promised during the 2016
presidential campaign that he would eliminate the nation's
debt in eight years.
Instead, his budget estimates showed that he would actually
add at least $8.3 trillion, increasing the U.S. debt to $28.5
trillion by 2025. But the national debt reached that figure
much sooner. The national debt stood at $19.9 trillion when
President Trump took office in January 2017, and it reached a
high of $27 trillion in October 2020.
The national debt reached another high of $28 trillion less
than two months after President Trump left office. In
December 2021, Congress then increased the debt limit by $2.5
trillion, to almost $31.4 trillion, as debt rose again under
President Joe Biden.
How Did the National Debt Increase?
At first it seemed that Trump was lowering the debt. It
fell $102 billion in the first six months after he took
office. The debt was $19.9 trillion on Jan. 20, the day Trump
was inaugurated. It was $19.8 trillion on July 30, thanks to
the federal debt ceiling.
Trump signed a bill increasing the debt ceiling on Sept. 8,
2017. The debt exceeded $20 trillion for the first time in
U.S. history later that day. Trump signed a bill on Feb. 9,
2018, suspending the debt ceiling until March 1, 2019. The
total national debt was at $22 trillion by February 2019.
Trump again suspended the debt ceiling in July 2019 until
after the 2020 presidential election.
The debt hit a record $27 trillion on Oct. 1, 2020 before
reaching further peaks in 2021 that caused Congress to act
again to raise the debt limit in December.
Trump oversaw the fastest increase in the debt of any
president, almost 36 percent from 2017 to 2020.
Did President Trump Reduce the National Debt?
Trump promised two strategies to reduce U.S. debt before
taking office: He would increase growth by 4 percent to 6
percent, and he would eliminate wasteful federal spending.
Increasing Growth
Trump promised while on the campaign trail to grow the
economy by 4 percent to 6 percent annuallv to increase tax
revenues. Once in office, he lowered his growth estimates to
between 2 percent and 3 percent. These more realistic
projections are within the 2 percent to 3 percent healthy
growth rate.
President Trump also promised to achieve between 2 percent
and 4 percent growth with tax cuts. The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act
cut the corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 21 percent
beginning in 2018. The top individual income tax rate dropped
to 37 percent. The TCJA doubled the standard deduction and
eliminated personal exemptions. The corporate cuts are
permanent, but the individual changes expire at the end of
2025.
According to the Laffer curve, tax cuts only stimulate the
economy enough to make up for lost revenue when the rates are
above 50 percent . It worked during the Reagan administration
because the highest tax rate was 70 percent at that time.
Eliminating Wasteful Federal Spending
Trump's second strategy was to eliminate waste and
redundancy in federal spending. He demonstrated this cost-
consciousness during his campaign when he used his Twitter
account and rallies instead of expensive television ads.
[[Page H1963]]
Trump was right that there is waste in federal spending.
The problem isn't finding it. The problem is in cutting it.
Each program has a constituency that lobbies Congress.
Eliminating these benefits may lose voters and contributors.
Congressional representatives may agree to cut spending in
someone else's district, but they resist doing so on their
own.
More than two-thirds of government spending goes to
mandatory obligations made by previous acts of Congress.
Social Security benefits cost $1.2 trillion in Fiscal Year
2021. Medicare cost $722 billion, and Medicaid cost $448
billion. The interest on the debt was $378 billion.
Military spending must also be cut to lower the debt
because it's such a large portion of the budget. But Trump
increased military spending in Fiscal Year (FY) 2021 to $933
billion. That includes three components:
$636 billion base budget for the Department of Defense
$69 billion in overseas contingency operations for DoD to
fight the Islamic State group
$229 billion to fund the other agencies that protect our
nation, including the Department of Veterans Affairs ($105
billion), Homeland Security ($50 billion), the
State Department ($44 billion), the National Nuclear
Security Administration in the Department of Energy ($20
billion), and the FBI and Cybersecurity for the
eDepartment of Justice ($10 billion)
Only $595 billion was left to pay for everything else
budgeted for FY 2021 after mandatory and military spending.
That includes agencies that process Social Security and other
benefits. It also includes the necessary functions performed
by the Department of Justice and the Internal Revenue
Service. We'd have to eliminate it all to make a dent in the
$966 billion deficit.
You can't reduce the deficit or debt without major cuts to
defense and mandated benefits programs. Cutting waste isn't
enough.
Did Trump's Business Debt Affect His Approach to U.S. Debt?
Trump said in an interview with CNBC during his 2016
campaign that he would ``borrow, knowing that if the economy
crashed, you could make a deal.'' But sovereign debt is
different from personal debt. It can't be handled the same
way.
A 2016 Fortune magazine analysis revealed Trump's business
was $1.11 billion in debt. That includes $846 million owed on
five properties. These include Trump Tower, 40 Wall Street,
and 1290 Avenue of the Americas in New York. It also includes
the Trump Hotel in Washington, D.C., and 555 California
Street in San Francisco. But the income generated by these
properties easily pays their annual interest payment. Trump's
debt is reasonable in the business world.
The U.S. debt-to-GDP ratio was 129 percent at the end of
2020. That's the $27.8 trillion U.S. debt as of December
2020, divided by the $21.5 trillion nominal GDP at the end of
the second quarter this year.
The World Bank compares countries based on their total
debt-to-gross domestic product ratio. It considers a country
to be in trouble if that ratio is greater than 77 percent.
The high U.S. debt-to-GDP ratio didn't discourage
investors. America is one of the safest economies in the
world and its currency is the world's reserve currency.
Investors purchase U.S. Treasurys in a flight to safety even
during a U.S. economic crisis. That's one reason why interest
rates plunged to historical lows in March 2020 after the
coronavirus outbreak. Those falling interest rates meant that
America's debt could increase, but interest payments remain
stable.
The U.S. also has a massive fixed pension expense and
health insurance costs. A business can renege on these
benefits, ask for bankruptcy, and weather the resulting
lawsuits, but a president and Congress can't cut back those
costs without losing their jobs at the next election. As
such, Trump's experience in handling business debt did not
transfer to managing the U.S. debt.
How the National Debt Affects You
The national debt doesn't affect you directly until it
reaches the tipping point. It slows economic growth once the
debt-to-GDP ratio exceeds 77 percent, for an extended period
of time. Every percentage point of debt above this level
costs the country 0.017 percentage points in economic growth,
according to a World Bank analysis.
The first sign of trouble is when interest rates start to
rise significantly. Investors need a higher return to offset
the greater perceived risk. They start to doubt that the debt
can be paid off.
The second sign is that the U.S. dollar loses value. You
will notice that as inflation rises, imported goods cost
more. Gas and grocery prices rise. Travel to other countries
also becomes much more expensive.
The cost of providing benefits and paying the interest on
the debt will skyrocket as interest rates and inflation rise.
That leaves less money for other services. The government
will be forced to cut services or raise taxes at that point.
This will further slow economic growth. Continued deficit
spending will no longer work at that point.
Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, talk about spending. The national debt
increased by almost 36 percent from 2017 to 2020 during Trump's tenure.
I say to the gentleman who just spoke--a lot of yelling here. The
last time I heard that kind of tone was when he was yelling about the
need to have more regular order here. I guess he has forgotten about
that. Just because the gentleman yells doesn't mean he is right.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from the State of
Washington (Ms. Jayapal).
Ms. JAYAPAL. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this rule to
advance this cruel, extreme, and unworkable default on America act that
will throw us into a recession, that will crash our economy, and that
will throw 1.7 million women and children off of nutrition assistance
and seniors off of Medicare.
It is hypocrisy for my Republican colleagues to say that they somehow
suddenly care about the debt when they passed the 2017 tax scam that
increased the deficit by $2 trillion. Nearly half of those tax cuts
went to the top 5 percent, but now, all of a sudden, they care about
debt and want to cut nutrition assistance to nearly 3 million women,
children, and seniors.
Democrats cut child poverty in half, and we taxed the wealthiest
billionaires and corporations to pay their fair share. We are building
our economy while MAGA Republicans are threatening to throw us into
chaos, and that is on the pocketbooks of regular, working Americans,
who are going to suffer if we go into default, if we go into recession,
and if we lose millions of jobs.
This is a bad bill. Vote ``no.''
Mr. COLE. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from New
York (Mr. Langworthy), who is a distinguished member of the Rules
Committee.
Mr. LANGWORTHY. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of the rule, which
provides consideration of the Limit, Save, Grow Act. It is a bill that
is critical to our country's economic future.
President Biden characterized the Limit, Save, Grow Act as
``irresponsible,'' that this commonsense legislation was really asking
hardworking Americans, seniors, and children to shoulder an enormous
new burden. The only thing irresponsible would be to do nothing.
If we want to talk about a burden on the backs of hardworking
Americans, then let's actually talk about it. Let's dig into it.
Let's talk about how folks in my home State of New York had to pay as
much as 40 percent more this winter just to heat their homes while the
Biden administration halted new pipeline construction and new
exploration, and they brought the approval of new oil and gas
infrastructure to a standstill.
Let's talk about how seniors in rural communities across my district
living on fixed incomes can now afford less in an inflation-ridden
economy where the basic cost of goods and groceries has exploded and
crushed their budgets.
Let's talk about the $80 billion for the IRS to supply an army of new
bureaucrats ready to rain down audit after audit onto middle-class
families and small, mom-and-pop business owners.
These are the burdens shouldered by the American people for the
trillions of dollars in spending that Democrats have foisted onto their
backs and onto the backs of our children and grandchildren.
Mr. Speaker, if we care about the future that we would like to leave
our children and grandchildren, a future that isn't crushed by debt,
inflation, and paying the price for today's excesses, then we should
have no problem in supporting this critical step forward.
I strongly support the Limit, Save, Grow Act, a bill that saves
hardworking Americans from continuing to shoulder the burden of
Democrats' destructive spending policies.
Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, I want to debunk this talking point that I hear over and
over again from my friends. I just heard it right now when we were
talking about spending.
Let's remember a couple of things.
First, when Donald Trump was in charge, $8 trillion was added to the
national debt. That is a 39-percent increase. It is one-quarter of the
entire debt from all of American history. So, please, give me a break.
Second, let's be clear: Inflation is a global problem. Mr. Speaker,
if you think that the American Rescue Plan drove up prices in Italy or
the U.K., then I have news for you. If you think emergency rescue
checks are responsible for inflation in Brazil and Australia, maybe you
got your economics
[[Page H1964]]
degree from Trump University. That is not how things work. Don't take
my word for it. Look at the numbers. Actually, look at the research.
Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record a letter from the Social
Security Administration, which states that Republican spending cuts
would eliminate field offices, drive up wait times for initial
disability and retirement claims processing, lengthen phone wait times,
and create backlogs across the board.
Social Security Administration,
The Commissioner,
Baltimore, MD, March 17, 2023.
Hon. Rosa L. DeLauro,
Committee on Appropriations, House of Representatives,
Washington, DC.
Dear Ranking Member DeLauro: Thank you for your January 19,
2023 letter asking for information to help Members of
Congress understand the impacts of capping fiscal year (FY)
2024 discretionary spending at the FY 2022 enacted level,
which would be approximately a six percent cut from our FY
2023 enacted funding. Returning SSA to the FY 2022 funding
level or, more drastically, cutting funds by 22 percent from
the 2023 enacted level, would greatly harm our ability to
serve the public as we are already struggling to recover from
the effects of the pandemic.
We are actively using the funding increase we received in
FY 2023 to support our hiring efforts to increase staffing as
we work to restore sufficient staffing from our lowest
staffing levels in over 25 years, particularly in our field
offices, teleservice centers, processing centers, and State
disability determination services (DDS). Hiring new staff is
necessary to improve major workload challenges that affect
the public we serve, including people waiting far too long
for a disability decision. Funding cuts of the magnitude
described above would take us backwards and hurt our
customers.
If we return to FY 2022 funding levels in FY 2024, we
would:
Close field offices and shorten hours we are open to the
public, cutting off vital access to face-to-face service
delivery.
Increase the amount of time individuals wait for a decision
on their initial disability claim, leading to an average wait
time of 9 months, or up to 30 percent longer than today.
Implement a hiring freeze for the agency and the DDS, which
means a reduction of over 5,000 employees who are essential
to processing retirement claims, making disability decisions,
answering the National 800 Number, and issuing new and
replacement Social Security cards.
Furlough staff for over 4 weeks and lay off approximately
6,000 employees--producing even longer wait times than
customers experience today on our National 800 Number and in
our field offices, causing delays to decisions on retirement
claims and delays in processing Social Security cards and
verification of Social Security Numbers for individuals
seeking employment.
Eliminate overtime pay, reducing our ability to keep pace
with claims and other service requests.
As noted above, a cut to FY 2022 levels (a six percent cut
below current funding) would significantly affect our ability
to serve the public and undermine our core mission--producing
longer wait times for benefits and to reach SSA
representatives, as well as reduced access to in-person
service.
Congress expressed an expectation for continued
modernization of our IT by providing dedicated funding for
this purpose. A six percent reduction would support IT
funding only for basic operational requirements and would
halt our efforts to improve the customer experience, expand
our online services, and enhance our systems to improve
employee efficiency. We would have to drastically cut IT at a
time when we need it to help mitigate other cuts like office
hour reductions, a hiring freeze, and layoffs.
The impacts would be even more significant with deeper
cuts. If we are faced with a cut of more than six percent, it
would be catastrophic for the agency and for the people
depending on Social Security programs supporting their daily
needs. For every $100 million below the 6 percent reduction,
we would have to lay off an additional 1,000 people, further
undermining services to the public. Every 1,000 staff lay off
is the equivalent of closing over 40 field offices.
Cuts on this scale would dramatically undermine our ability
to function effectively. It would cut in-person access to our
field offices, drive up wait times for initial disability and
retirement claims processing, lengthen phone wait times,
prohibit development of online tools to compensate for the
difficulties to reach us by phone and in-person, and create
backlogs across the board. It would take years to recover and
restore services to levels the public expects.
Millions of Americans depend on Social Security programs to
provide income support essential to meeting daily needs, and
significant budget cuts prohibit us from providing people
with access to vital support. The payments and benefits our
programs provide are integral to the economic fabric of our
Nation. We appreciate the opportunity to explain the harm a
return to FY 2022 funding levels or less would cause for the
public we serve, as well as our employees.
Sincerely,
Kilolo Kijakazi, Ph.D., M.S.W.,
Acting Commissioner.
Mr. McGOVERN. Republicans are trying to make it harder for seniors to
access the benefits that they have earned.
Mr. Speaker, I urge that we defeat the previous question. If we do,
then I will offer an amendment to the rule to provide for consideration
of a resolution that allows the House to state unequivocally that it is
our responsibility to defend and preserve Social Security and Medicare
for generations to come and reject any cuts to these vital programs.
By the way, these two programs have come under attack by Republican
after Republican.
Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of the
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
gentleman from Massachusetts?
There was no objection.
Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentlewoman
from New Mexico (Ms. Stansbury).
Ms. STANSBURY. Mr. Speaker, I rise as a fierce defender from New
Mexico to support this amendment to defend our Social Security and our
Medicare.
As our colleagues across the aisle are trying to gut Social Security
and Medicare, Democrats are looking for long-term solutions not only to
expand these lifesaving programs but to ensure that they are solvent
for generations to come.
These programs are lifelines for people in New Mexico. In fact, in
New Mexico, we have the highest share of individuals who are on
Medicaid by population in the country. That is 873,000 New Mexicans who
depend on Medicaid. Our children in New Mexico depend on Medicaid. Over
half of our children are on Medicaid.
These programs save lives.
I ask my colleagues: What kind of cruel ransom note are they putting
forward that would gut these programs, that would gut programs that
feed our children, and that would gut our environmental programs in the
name of raising our debt ceiling?
Mr. Speaker, I ask: What is it that we are actually trying to do here
today?
That is why I oppose the underlying bill that we are debating today
and why I support this amendment.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to defeat the previous question and
to return to the work of the people who elected us.
Mr. COLE. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume for
a couple of points.
Mr. Speaker, my friend is concerned about the Social Security Act. We
have a bill on that, a bill very similar to what President Biden
himself voted for when he was in the United States Senate, both the
creation of a commission and its final results. I invite my friend to
look at it. Perhaps he would join it, and it would be inherently
bipartisan.
My friend made the point that inflation is a global phenomenon. I
agree. It absolutely is.
Mr. Speaker, if you screw up the greatest economy in the world, then
it has global consequences. That is exactly what my friends did.
Don't take my word for it. They were warned by Larry Summers, the
Secretary of the Treasury for Bill Clinton, a distinguished economist.
They were warned by Steve Rattner, who managed the auto industry under
President Obama. They were warned by Jason Furman, who was the Chairman
of the Council of Economic Advisers to President Biden.
If my friends pass something as large as the American Rescue Plan,
then we are going to have inflation within a year. We did.
If my friends would listen to their own economists, then we could
have avoided this, and we might not have had to take the drastic action
we are today.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from
Wisconsin (Mr. Van Orden).
{time} 1245
Mr. VAN ORDEN. Mr. Speaker, my favorite part of this building is not
the rotunda or Statuary Hall or even this Chamber. It is a simple quote
painted above a door downstairs. It is, ``When tillage begins, other
arts follow. The farmers, therefore, are the founders of human
civilization.'' It was written by
[[Page H1965]]
Daniel Webster in 1840. It is just simply time for some more truth-
telling.
It is disingenuous to say publicly that we are ``all of the above''
for American energy if we do not embrace biofuels.
Simultaneously, it is disingenuous to set policy that de facto
abolishes petrochemicals and yet admits that we will be dependent on
them for at least another decade. Both positions have been made in this
Chamber.
I find this to be either duplicitous or foolish, and I choose to be
neither.
Our first President, who overlooks this body, was clear about public
policy and agriculture. ``It will not be doubted . . . agriculture is
of primary importance. In proportion as nations advance in population
and other circumstances of maturity this truth becomes more apparent,
and renders the cultivation of the soil more and more an object of
public patronage.''
This was written 9 years after the signing of the Declaration of
Independence, and when Washington says ``more and more'' he
acknowledges that agriculture has always been an object of public
patronage and must always be.
The initial writing of this bill did not acknowledge that. It did not
stand with the farmers, and I will always stand with our farmers.
Early this morning, our Conference made great strides in recognizing
our farmers by including elements of my amendment that protect our corn
growers and biofuel industries.
With that said, if this final bill as returned from the Senate
includes further provisions that do not show the proper respect for our
farmers, our national security, or the future of nuclear energy, I will
not vote for its passage. There will be no further negotiations from my
office.
To be clear, I voted for Kevin McCarthy for Speaker because I
believed that he was the person called at this moment to lead this
Conference and this body, and I don't feel that my 15 votes were in
error. I have full confidence that he will take the opportunity to keep
his word to this body and to the American people, and this confidence
was earned by his willingness to remove several devastating provisions
from this bill.
I remind my friends, as Members of this body, we did not take an oath
to the Republican Party or the Democratic Party, we didn't take an oath
to the President. We all took the same oath to the Constitution. With
this oath came a responsibility to the people that we represent.
In reference to this current discussion on the debt ceiling, our
first President articulated this in a manner that for such a young
country can only be described as timeless: ``No pecuniary consideration
is more urgent than the regular redemption and discharge of the public
debt. On none can delay be more injurious or an economy of time more
valuable.''
By President Biden refusing to negotiate with this body, he is adding
to a growing train of usurpations of the constitutional authority
vested in us by the people that sent us here to represent them. This is
no more appropriate now than it was when Thomas Jefferson wrote it.
It is our obligation to get Speaker McCarthy to the table. It is
Speaker McCarthy's burden to get the President to a place that can both
meet our collective obligations articulated by George Washington and to
secure the future for both our progenitors and our progeny.
I will support this bill. I will vote in favor of it, and I encourage
all my colleagues to join me in doing so.
Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
I am a little confused after the last speech.
Mr. Speaker, with the way the gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. Cole), my
friend, has been talking, you might think that President Biden caused
inflation all on his own. That is just simply not the case, and
everybody here knows that.
Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record an article from the nonpartisan,
nonprofit Economic Policy Institute titled: ``Rising Inflation is a
Global Problem, U.S. Policy Choices Are Not to Blame.''
[From the Economic Policy Institute, Aug. 4, 2022]
Rising Inflation is a Global Problem. U.S. Policy Choices Are Not to
Blame
(By Josh Bivens, Asha Banerjee, And Mariia Dzholos)
key takeaways
An international comparison among OECD countries shows that
rising inflation is a global phenomenon, not unique to the
United States.
This fact argues strongly that high inflation in the U.S.
has not been driven by any unique American policy--not the
American Rescue Plan and other generous fiscal relief during
the pandemic recession and recovery nor anything else U.S.-
centric.
Some have argued that the global rise of inflation means
that many countries--including the U.S.--overstimulated their
economies and generated excess aggregate demand. But this
explanation is not supported by the data. The countries with
larger declines in unemployment over the past 18 months have
not seen larger inflation spikes.
Consumer price data for June 2022 showed another month of
rapid inflation, with overall inflation rising 9.1 percent
year-over-year and core inflation (which doesn't include
volatile energy and food prices) rising by 5.9 percent. This
level of inflation has obviously become a major political
issue this year. But however this issue resonates
politically, as an economic matter a common narrative that
blames the Biden administration and its policy choices for
causing the inflation is deeply misleading.
This is not simply a case for exonerating the Biden
administration's choices--how the recent inflationary
outbreak is interpreted will have huge consequences for how
policymakers respond. A loud chorus of economic analysts and
influential policymakers continue highlighting the need for
the Federal Reserve to continue raising interest rates
sharply to slow growth to ``rein in'' inflation. This
approach risks terrible consequences and threatens to cast
aside the amazing policy achievement of a full jobs recovery
from the pandemic recession. In the COVID-19 recession, the
economy lost over 22 million jobs. But by June 2022 (after 28
months), the level of employment in the U.S. matched the last
month pre-pandemic (February 2020). Compare this with job
growth after the Great Recession of 2008-09, when it took
more than six years (75 months) to regain the just under 9
million jobs lost and match pre-recession employment levels.
The far faster recovery from the COVID-19 recession was
significantly driven by a much more aggressive fiscal policy
response.
This more aggressive fiscal response is often blamed for
the inflation outbreak over the past 18 months. The most
persuasive evidence casting doubt on this interpretation is a
comparison of inflation between the U.S. and a large set of
other rich countries that undertook a wide array of fiscal
responses. Despite the different fiscal responses,
essentially all of these countries have experienced a rapid
acceleration of core inflation. This means that today's
inflation is not a uniquely U.S. problem, and therefore not
connected to the necessary and effective economic policies
that spearheaded the rapid economic recovery we see today.
In Figure A, we focus on core inflation (stripping out the
prices of energy and food) because that is widely considered
a better target for basing decisions about macroeconomic
stabilization. Energy and food prices are not just volatile,
they are also set on global markets, meaning that their price
changes carry very little information about whether the U.S.
economy specifically is currently experiencing macroeconomic
imbalances. It's also useful to highlight core inflation
because much commentary has claimed that inflation in other
advanced economies is overwhelmingly about energy and food
prices, and far less about core prices. This claim is not
supported by the data in Figure A.
As Figure A shows, all but one Organization for Economic
Co-operation and Development (OECD) country saw an
acceleration in core inflation. More significantly, this
international comparison tells us that the U.S. is not an
outlier in its experience with accelerating core inflation
(the one obvious outlier in this data--Turkey--is currently
experiencing inflation over 40 percent and is not included in
the figure). The U.S. is on the higher side of inflation
experiences, but far from the top and not that far above the
average (or even the median) for all other OECD countries.
The upshot of the figure is clear: A global phenomenon--
accelerating inflation--demands a global explanation, and
``Biden policies'' obviously do not provide that.
Some have argued that the global rise in inflation is
actually just evidence that the excess demand growth they see
as driving inflation is also global. Of course, even this
perspective provides some small bit of exoneration for
American policymakers: if every advanced country in the
entire world made similar policy decisions, then it seems
hard to argue that the American approach was an avoidable
mistake. But, another cut at the international data casts
doubt on a simple story of macroeconomic imbalances driving
the global inflation surge. Specifically, countries with
larger declines in unemployment over the past 18 months have
not seen larger inflation spikes.
In Figure B below, the vertical axis is the acceleration of
core inflation relative to pre-pandemic trend that we showed
previously in Figure A. On the horizontal axis, we subtract
the average unemployment rate of March-May 2022 from the
average unemployment rate that prevailed in 2018-2019. This
can be taken as an indicator of how much unemployment has
improved in a country in the
[[Page H1966]]
recent period relative to pre-pandemic conditions. The higher
the number on the horizontal axis, the lower is current
unemployment relative to pre-pandemic averages. If one
interprets unemployment that is lower today than pre-pandemic
times as evidence of strong demand growth, one would expect
to see a positive relationship between the improvement in
unemployment (horizontal axis) and the acceleration of
inflation (vertical axis). But there is no such significant
relationship (in fact, there is a weak relationship the other
way, with countries with higher unemployment relative to pre-
pandemic times seeing higher inflation).
This finding should further complicate the claim that the
``macroeconomic overheating'' argument should simply be
applied globally. And if there is not strong evidence that
today's global inflation is simply driven by excess global
demand, the payoff to strongly reining in demand could be
quite small, and the damage caused by this quite large.
Rather than the specific policies of the Biden
administration driving inflation, the roots of today's
inflation are a more complicated cocktail of other forces:
from the spike in raw material, energy, and commodities
prices due in large part to the Russian invasion of Ukraine,
to lingering supply chain disruptions and distorted consumer
demand patterns stemming from the pandemic. These shocks and
their unexpectedly large ripple effects are the global
explanation for rising inflation.
Again, this is not an academic exercise or simply providing
political cover for any particular policymaker. Instead,
there is real economic danger from misdiagnosing the
inflation problem. An engineered, unnecessary recession will
only cause more economic pain to those still just recovering
from the COVID-19 recession, and will undercut the strong
economic recovery underway.
Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record an article by Mark
Zandi of Moody's Analytics which states that Speaker McCarthy's radical
cuts would meaningfully increase the likelihood of a recession and
result in 780,000 fewer jobs by the end of 2024 compared with a clean
bill to avoid a default.
[From Moody's Analytics]
The Debt Limit Drama Heats Up
(By Mark Zandi and Bernard Yaros)
The political drama over the Treasury debt limit is
suddenly heating up. With April tax receipts coming in weaker
than expected, at least so far, it appears that the X-date,
when the Treasury will run out of the cash needed to pay the
government's bills on time, may hit as soon as early June.
House Speaker Kevin McCarthy's recent unveiling of proposed
legislation to increase the limit is thus none too soon. In
exchange for increasing the debt limit just enough so that it
will not be a problem again until about this time next year,
the Speaker wants to significantly cut discretionary spending
over the next decade, impose stricter work requirements on
healthcare, food and other assistance for low-income
households, and roll back much of the Biden's
administration's agenda on climate change and student
lending. In this note, we assess the macroeconomic
consequences of the Speaker's debt limit legislation.
The X-date
The Treasury debt limit--the maximum amount of debt that
the Treasury can issue to the public or to other federal
agencies--was hit on January 19, and since then the Treasury
has been using ``extraordinary measures'' to come up with the
additional cash needed to pay the government's bills. Nailing
down precisely when these extraordinary measures will be
exhausted, and Treasury will run out of cash and thus be
unable to pay everyone on time--the so-called X-date--is
difficult. It depends on the timing of highly uncertain tax
receipts and government expenditures.
Since Moody's Analytics began estimating the X-date early
this year, we have thought it to be in mid-August. But April
tax receipts are running 35 percent below last year's pace,
which is meaningfully weaker than anticipated. And despite
weaker tax refunds than anticipated, it appears that the X-
date may come as soon as early June. If not, and Treasury is
able to squeak by with enough cash, then the X-date looks
more likely to be in late July. That is because Treasury will
get a cash infusion from non-withheld tax payments around the
June 15 estimated tax deadline, and then another tranche of
extraordinary measures will become available, providing
Treasury with a few more weeks of cash.
Investors take notice
Regardless, time is running out for lawmakers to act and
increase or suspend the debt limit, and global investors are
suddenly focusing on the risks posed if they do not act in
time. Credit default swaps on Treasury securities--the cost
of buying insurance in case Treasury fails to pay its debt on
time--have jumped in recent weeks. At close to 100 basis
points, CDS spreads on six-month and one-year Treasury
securities are already substantially more than in 2011 when
that debt limit drama was so unnerving it caused rating
agency Standard & Poor's to strip the U.S. of its AAA rating.
This may overstate investors' angst as the CDS market for
buying insurance in the case of a Treasury default is not
actively traded, and it does not take much trading to push up
the cost of insurance. A few hedge funds speculating on the
CDS could drive up the cost since they are purchasing
something akin to a lottery ticket. Moreover, the current
spread remains far from signaling that investors are
attaching much of a probability on a default. For context,
during the European debt crisis in 2011, the CDS spread on
the sovereign debt of stressed countries in the periphery of
the euro zone, including Greece, topped out at 1,400 basis
points. Even the CDS for core euro zone countries such as
Germany and France were more than 200 basis points at the
time.
That said, the run up in Treasury CDS should not be
dismissed out of hand. The recent sharp decline in one-month
Treasury bill yields also signals mounting investor angst. As
it has become clear in recent days that April tax receipts
were coming in weak and the X-date may be just a few weeks
away, investors have piled into the safety of one-month
Treasury securities. Yields have plummeted, from 4.75 percent
at the start of April to less than 3.4 percent currently. At
the same time, yields on three-month Treasury bills have
continued to rise. The difference between one- and three-
month Treasury bill yields has never been as wide. Global
investors thus appear to be attaching non-zero odds that the
debt limit drama will end with a default sometime in June or
July.
House Republican proposal
It is thus none too soon that House Speaker McCarthy
unveiled the ``Limit, Save, Grow Act of 2023'' on April 19.
House Republicans hope the legislation will put political
pressure on President Biden to negotiate changes in fiscal
policy in exchange for an increase in the debt limit. The
president continues to reject these efforts, arguing for a
so-called clean debt limit increase--an increase in the debt
limit without substantive changes to policy. His position is
that increasing the debt limit is necessary to pay the
government's bills resulting from past fiscal policy
decisions, over which there can be no negotiation.
Speaker McCarthy's proposed legislation would increase the
debt limit by $1.5 trillion or until March 31, 2024,
whichever comes first. In exchange, it would cut government
spending by $4.5 trillion over the next decade and implement
a number of consequential changes to fiscal policy. The most
significant spending cuts would come by setting fiscal 2024
discretionary spending equal to fiscal 2022 spending levels.
Annual spending growth would then be capped at 1 percent for
the next decade. While not stipulated in the legislation,
Republicans would likely work to exclude discretionary
spending on defense and veterans' benefits from the cuts,
putting the burden of the cuts on nondefense, non-VA
discretionary programs. If nondefense discretionary outlays
were to bear the full brunt of the proposed budget cuts, they
would fall to 2 percent of GDP by fiscal 2033, the lowest
since at least the early 1960s.
The Speaker's debt limit legislation also works to roll
back a number of President Biden's policy initiatives. On
energy policy, the legislation would focus on increasing
fossil fuel supplies through the enactment of House
Republicans' energy package, which aims to boost oil and gas
production and mining by cutting down on the time it takes to
greenlight energy projects. It would also end tax breaks for
clean-energy projects and qualifying electric vehicles
included in the Inflation Reduction Act.
On student lending, the legislation would prevent a couple
of key executive orders by the Biden administration,
including the White House's plan to provide up to $20,000 in
student loan forgiveness for some borrowers. That hit a
roadblock last year when it was met with several legal
challenges, and the Supreme Court is expected to decide its
fate later this year. An income-driven repayment plan rolled
out by the Education Department earlier this year is also in
the crosshairs.
The Speaker's legislation also imposes restrictions on
income support programs, including work requirements on
Medicaid recipients who do not have children, an increase in
the age limit for work rules under Supplemental Nutrition
Assistance Program (food assistance), and a requirement that
states report on work outcomes under the Temporary Assistance
for Needy Families program. It eliminates much of the
additional funding provided to the IRS last year to help
increase tax enforcement efforts and improve taxpayer
services, and it rescinds unspent COVID-19 relief funds. And
the legislation would also require congressional approval
before major regulations could take effect.
macroeconomic impacts
The Limit, Save, Grow Act of 2023 would cut into near-term
economic growth if passed into law. Compared with a scenario
that includes a clean debt limit increase and no other
significant changes to fiscal policy under current law, real
GDP in the year ending in the fourth quarter of 2024 would be
0.65 percentage point lower. That is, in the Clean Debt Limit
scenario, real GDP is expected to grow 2.25 percent in the
year compared with 1.6 percent if Speaker McCarthy's
legislation becomes law.
While the economy skirts recession in both scenarios,
recession risks are uncomfortably high, with a consensus of
economists and many investors and business executives
expecting a downturn beginning late this year or early next.
The timing of the government spending cuts in the Limit,
Save, Grow Act
[[Page H1967]]
is thus especially inopportune as it would meaningfully
increase the likelihood of such a downturn. Indeed, under the
legislation, GDP growth is so weak that employment declines
in the first three quarter of 2024, and the unemployment rate
rises by more than a percentage point to 4.6 percent by the
fourth quarter of 2024. Compared with the Clean Debt Limit
scenario, by year-end 2024, employment is 780,000 jobs lower,
and the unemployment rate is 0.36 percentage point higher.
The significant government spending cuts in the Limit,
Save, Grow Act are substantial headwinds to near-term
economic growth. The cuts reduce nondefense outlays by $120
billion in fiscal 2024 compared with the Clean Debt Limit
scenario, equal to about half a percentage point of GDP. The
multipliers on this spending--the change in GDP a year after
a change in spending--are estimated to be just over 1, as the
programs suffering budget cuts are essential government
services and tend to benefit lower-income households that
quickly spend any support they receive from the government.
Adding to the economic headwinds created by the legislation
is the considerable uncertainty created by having to address
the debt limit again a year from now. Given that 2024 is a
presidential election year, that future debt limit drama may
well be even more heated than the current one. This is sure
to weigh on investor, business and consumer confidence and
thus economic activity.
Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the distinguished
gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Deluzio).
Mr. DELUZIO. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the rule to advance
this bill. I am opposed to the bill.
This bill includes massive cuts to veterans' care, 30 million fewer
medical visits for my fellow veterans. We are going to see my fellow
veterans wait longer to have their claims heard. They are going to see
telehealth get worse, mental health services get worse, and
homelessness issues get worse. This bill is a betrayal of the
obligation this country has to everyone who served.
I have seen my fellow veterans used as props on folks' websites and
in their ads, people wrap themselves in the flag.
Guess what? You don't get to claim you are here for veterans,
standing up for veterans when you cut their care. That is what this
bill does. It is a disgrace. Everyone in the country ought to know it.
We ought to vote it down.
Mr. COLE. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself quickly such time as I may
consume just to correct my friend. I did not blame all inflation on
President Biden. He had a lot of help. He had a Democratic House and a
Democratic Senate that worked with him to get there, so he certainly
didn't do it on his own.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr.
McClintock), my very good friend, and a distinguished member of the
Budget Committee.
Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, for the first time in my 15 years in
Congress, I will vote for a debt limit increase because for the first
time we have a bill that is serious about controlling the reckless
spending that is destroying America's productivity and its prosperity--
$4.8 trillion in savings.
How could anyone who cares about the debt not vote for this measure?
The debt limit is there for a reason. If your family is living beyond
its means and needs to raise its credit limit, it better sit down
around the kitchen table and have a serious discussion over the
circumstances that have gotten it into this mess and what steps it
needs to take to get out. The debt limit is there to assure that we
have exactly that discussion as a Nation.
Now, the President and the Democrats across the aisle say they are
not willing to engage in that discussion. Well, to coin a phrase,
``Come on, man.''
When Bill Clinton lost the House in 1994, he reached across the aisle
to work with House Republicans. Together, a Democratic President and a
Republican House accomplished wonderful things. They reformed the
welfare system, as this bill does; they cut spending as a percentage of
GDP; they produced the biggest capital gains tax cut in history; but
most importantly, they balanced four budgets in a row and produced one
of the greatest economic expansions in our Nation's history.
By the way, Clinton was reelected.
Americans are soon going to ask themselves, are we better off than we
were 4 years ago?
Mr. Biden is going to need a better answer than doubling down on
policies that two-thirds of Americans are desperately trying to tell
him have put our country on the wrong track, and that answer is right
here before us today.
Mr. Speaker, I beg the Democrats to join us to set our Nation's
finances in order.
Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, I say to the gentleman, extortion is not a negotiation.
President Biden actually has a budget that will reduce the deficit. It
would be better if the Republicans actually came up with a budget, and
we could talk about that. We are willing to have a conversation, but we
are not willing to be extorted here.
Mr. Speaker, there is no doubt about the fact that this bill could
monumentally hurt our Nation's heroes.
Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record a letter from the Paralyzed
Veterans of America and a letter from the Veterans of Foreign Wars in
opposition to this bill.
[From the Paralyzed Veterans of America, Apr. 25, 2023]
Congress, Protect All Services and Programs Needed by Paralyzed
Veterans and Their Families
Washington, D.C.--Today, Paralyzed Veterans of America
Executive Director Carl Blake issued a statement in light of
the House' consideration later today of the debt limit
package (Limit, Save, Grow Act of 2023).
``Right now the House of Representatives is preparing to
take action on legislation that would couple raising the debt
limit with significant cuts in federal spending. PVA has
received assurances from some Republican leaders that
veterans' funding will not be a target of these cuts, and we
appreciate these assurances! But the pending legislation
provides no specific protections for veterans with
catastrophic disabilities, specifically the services and
supports they and their families depend on. Efforts to
address the federal deficit must provide concrete protections
for veterans, their families, and caregivers, which means
explicit direction that the Department of Veterans Affairs'
budget will not suffer significant cuts.
Although ensuring the VA will have the funding needed to
meet its fiscal year 2024 needs is our foremost concern, we
urge Congress to remember that veterans with significant
disabilities depend upon many other Federal services and
supports outside of the VA that protect their disability
civil rights, employment support, affordable accessible
housing, as well as provide benefits that help their families
and caregivers. Our responsibility as a nation is to ensure
that those who have already sacrificed so much for our way of
life are not forced to do so again.''
____
Veterans of Foreign Wars,
April 25, 2023.
Hon. Kevin McCarthy,
Speaker of the House of Representatives,
Washington, DC.
Dear Speaker McCarthy: On behalf of the 1.5 million members
of the Veterans of Foreign Wars and its Auxiliary, a
significant number of whom rely on U.S. Department of
Veterans Affairs (VA) health care and benefits, we write to
express our grave concerns with the proposed reports of
returning to Fiscal Year 2022 (FY22) funding levels for the
federal government and its potential effects on veterans
programs. Congress has championed monumental advancements in
veteran care and benefits in the past few years and we
believe we need to continue pushing forward instead of taking
steps backward in serving our veterans.
Plainly stated, the Honoring our PACT Act of 2022 did not
exist when funding levels were set for FY 2022. The VFW is
gravely concerned the Limit, Save, Grow Act of 2023 missed
the mark by not protecting the advances in care and benefits
for toxic-exposed veterans. This could set our collective
hard work back years and make veterans once again have to
fight for the care and benefits they have earned.
Through PACT Act reforms, we believe we are on the cusp of
resolving many issues that have plagued VA for decades,
thanks to the years of hard work from veteran advocates
around the country, as well as our faithful supporters in the
past few Congresses and across multiple Presidential
Administrations. Military Toxic Exposure claim denials, VA
processing backlogs, hiring delays, and unacceptable
appointment wait times will hopefully be a thing of the past,
and we will once again be able to point to VA as a world-
class provider of healthcare and benefits. These advancements
will fade away if they are not resourced properly, which is
why the VFW believes returning funding levels to FY22 would
likely jeopardize the care and benefits our nation's veterans
have earned.
Bills aiming to return the budget to FY22 funding levels,
without explicitly securing care and benefit programs for
veterans are intolerable to our organization. The service
members, veterans, and families we represent have seen the
true cost of more than 20 years of war, and it is
unacceptable to ask them to now pay the bill.
Mr. Speaker, the VFW understands your goal of fiscal
responsibility, but we respectfully ask that in the context
of Limit, Save,
[[Page H1968]]
Grow, that you provide explicit assurances on how Congress
will continue to properly invest in VA programming--
specifically, the reforms authorized through the PACT Act.
The members of the VFW and our Auxiliary hope you will
continue to honor the promise made to the men and women who
served our country by reinforcing your long-standing support
of those who stood in harm's way. Returning VA to FY22
funding levels will negatively affect millions of Americans
across the country and we look forward to working with you to
make sure this does not happen.
Sincerely,
Ryan M. Gallucci,
Executive Director, VFW Washington Office.
Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, it is clear our veterans are against this
bill.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Pennsylvania
(Ms. Scanlon), a distinguished member of the Rules Committee.
Ms. SCANLON. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in opposition to the rule and
the underlying bill.
This bill makes good on Speaker McCarthy's threat to hold the economy
hostage. Several of my colleagues have spoken about the draconian cuts
that this bill would make to our social safety net, to services for
vulnerable veterans, seniors, families, and children, but it also
jeopardizes critical investments that were just enacted as part of the
historic and long-overdue climate rescue measures that were included in
the Inflation Reduction Act, and those cuts have received less
attention.
If you didn't know that this bill gutted billions of dollars of
environmental measures, you are not alone. Those cuts were made in a
deal the Speaker negotiated with the extremists who control his
Conference sometime after midnight last night, around 2 a.m. this
morning. I am not surprised that they are trying to sneak this
provision into a bill that they are ramming through the House with no
hearings.
The Speaker and his far-right allies argue that Federal spending
poses the most significant threat to our country while blocking
legislation to address gun violence, healthcare concerns, and other
pressing concerns for all of our constituents, but climate change is an
actual existential threat to our children and to all future
generations.
I know the Republican Party isn't fond of looking at the science, but
without intervention, the facts are clear: Our children will be forced
to face more frequent climate disasters, new and devastating health
threats, and untold economic loss. The extremist bill before us
dismantles the clean energy climate rescue programs that we passed in
the IRA that are essential for our children to thrive.
This bill eliminates a billion dollars to promote energy efficient
construction, $5 billion for loans to back energy infrastructure
projects, $1.9 billion to improve access to public transportation in
low-income neighborhoods, and $5 billion to reduce climate pollution in
addition to gutting environmental review protections.
Mr. Speaker, I am appalled that the Republican Party would so
carelessly leverage our children's future, health, and safety to
satisfy political extremists. I am disturbed by the shadowy process
used to put this bill together.
I encourage all of my colleagues to vote ``no'' on this rule and the
underlying bill.
Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Madam Speaker, in response to my friend's statement, we are certainly
not trying to extort anything from anyone. Quite frankly, it is my
Democratic friends who are trying to extract something from us that
they can't get for themselves. If you believe a clean debt ceiling is
the way to go, pass one in a Democratic Senate. You can't do it. The
reality is there has to be a negotiation here. What we have said is:
Hey, we are in good faith extending the debt ceiling; we are doing it
in this bill. We have a lot of Members who have never voted to do that,
who are actually doing it.
Here is our opening position in the negotiation. What is yours? We
haven't heard that. It is just simply, well, give us what we want and
pass the President's budget. If they genuinely want to talk, we are
giving them the opportunity to actually do that.
I remind my friend, we look forward to discussion, but the first step
is to raise the debt ceiling. That is what we are going to do here,
then we will see what the Democrats do in the United States Senate in
response. Then we can all go to conference and talk this thing out and
hopefully come to a bipartisan solution.
The hysterics and theatrics might make good print. That is not the
reality of the process here. We are operating within the spirit of the
process. We hope our friends do the same.
Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the
gentlewoman from New Mexico (Ms. Leger Fernandez), a distinguished
member of the Rules Committee.
Ms. LEGER FERNANDEZ. Madam Speaker, I left the Capitol at 3 a.m. this
morning, after fighting Republicans' plans to default on America unless
we impose drastic spending cuts, cuts that are so severe they will hurt
farmers and ranchers, kids and families, and this beautiful place we
call home. Nobody in any State will be protected from their draconian
cuts.
When I asked how to explain the bill's drastic cuts to rural
communities in my district, the Republicans' response was, ``You should
tell them that we have to prioritize.''
The Rules Committee Republicans then blocked my amendment to protect
rural water, housing, and business development programs. In essence,
they said to rural America, you are not a priority.
The Republicans blocked my amendment to protect veterans' healthcare,
the Indian Health Service, and clean energy investments. Veterans are
clearly not their priority. Healthcare is clearly not their priority.
Addressing the climate crisis that is fueling disasters across America,
across the United States, and across this planet is clearly not their
priority.
Do you like knowing your food is safe?
The Republicans' bill could cut 1,800 USDA food inspectors and cost
our farmers, ranchers, and restaurants $89 billion in lost production
and $2.2 billion in lost wages.
The majority blocked my amendment to protect the Food Safety and
Inspection Service from cuts.
When Republicans now demand we cut spending on healthcare, safety,
and housing, what is it for?
To pay for the tax cuts for the rich that they pushed through in
2017. Protecting the rich and the wealthy tax cheats clearly must be
their priority.
{time} 1300
Through backroom dealings, the Republican majority has now settled on
a bill that backstabs working families. Their bill delivers poison, not
prosperity.
Congress must not default on America. America pays its bills. America
knows how to prioritize what is essential for our prosperity.
Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Madam Speaker, I think if you happen to be listening to the debate,
you might get confused. It is as if we are going to impose our will on
somebody.
The reality is the Democrats control the United States Senate. The
Democratic President of the United States has a veto that he can
sustain in either Chamber.
What we are saying is let's sit down and talk things through, and
here is our opening position. That is all that is going on here.
We are not in a position here to do what my friends did last time,
and that is both what they regret losing and fear might someday come to
pass.
The last time my friends didn't have to negotiate 2 years ago, what
did they do? An explosion of spending that generated the worst
inflation in modern American history; the worst inflation in over 40
years.
Looking around this Chamber, I think I am probably the only one here
old enough to remember it.
The reality is they took a crisis that was ending and used it to
justify $1.9 trillion worth of spending that many of their own
economists warned them would lead to inflation. They jammed it through
without a single vote.
The next year, they called something an Inflation Reduction Act that
we all know was a climate bill. They crammed through another $500
billion worth of spending.
That doesn't even include plussing up the regular discretionary
accounts of the United States. My friends own the inflation that has
impoverished every single American.
[[Page H1969]]
Every American family is worse off, not better off, given the
economic stewardship of this administration and, frankly, the
Democratic Congress.
We look forward to the debate. We look forward to something my
friends aren't used to doing, that is actually negotiating, and that is
what we are talking about.
We are going to extend the debt limit, just as we said we would. Here
is our negotiation. Here are our ideas where we can save money. Do you
have any ideas where we can save money?
Let's talk about that because you can't get what you want. You can't
pass through a Democratic Senate a clean debt bill.
If you can't do it there, you are certainly not going to do it here,
so let's begin the discussion sooner rather than later.
Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may
consume.
Madam Speaker, my good friend from Oklahoma said that we are engaged
in theatrics. Well, let me put that to rest. I mean, we are dealing
with real numbers.
Last night in the Rules Committee, I asked the chairman of Ways and
Means and the chairman of the Budget Committee some basic questions
about the SNAP program. They had no clue.
People who don't have a clue shouldn't be writing legislation to
determine policy. They should do the hearings and learn about what the
facts are.
Madam Speaker, I include in the Record the following:
A letter from the Department of Energy, which states that reductions
of this magnitude in this bill would have significant setbacks on U.S.
competitiveness to adversarial nations like Russia and China;
A letter from the Department of Labor which states that these cuts in
this bill would prevent more than 4,000 veterans experiencing or at
risk of homelessness from receiving critical employment care;
A letter from the Department of Education, which states that under
these radical cuts, funding for more than 100,000 teaching jobs
nationwide would be eliminated, and it would reduce aid for more than
6.6 million Pell Grant recipients;
A letter from the Small Business Administration, which states that
Republican spending cuts would mean that almost 300,000 fewer small
businesses would be able to participate in their entrepreneurial
development program;
A letter from the Department of Housing and Urban Development, which
states that 286,000 families will lose rental assistance under the
Republicans' proposed budget cuts and thousands more would be at risk
for homelessness;
A letter from the Department of Homeland Security, which states that
the proposed cuts could lead to more illegal drugs entering our
country, including 350,000 grams of fentanyl. That is over 200 million
fatal doses of fentanyl that Republicans will be responsible for
letting into our country.
Madam Speaker, I also include in the Record a letter from the
Department of Agriculture detailing how these radical Republican budget
cuts would lead to more than a million new mothers losing WIC
assistance.
The Secretary of Energy,
Washington, DC, March 17, 2023.
Hon. Rosa L. DeLauro,
Ranking Member, Committee on Appropriations, House of
Representatives, Washington, DC.
Dear Representative DeLauro: I share the concern expressed
in your letter dated January 19, 2023, about potential
impacts of proposals that would cap fiscal year (FY) 2024
discretionary spending at the FY 2022 enacted levels. While
Congressional Republicans have not released a specific plan,
cuts on this scale would have very real and damaging impacts
on our families, our communities, our economy, and our
competitiveness--undermining a broad range of critical
services the American people rely on in their everyday lives.
President Biden's FY 2024 Budget, which he released on
March 9, details his plans to invest in America, continue to
lower costs for families, protect and strengthen Social
Security and Medicare, and reduce the deficit. Meanwhile,
Congressional Republicans have reportedly proposed
unprecedented cuts in FY 2024 funding for key services,
programs, and protections such as education, public safety,
research, nutrition and more. Such action would have serious
consequences for Department of Energy programs and
initiatives at the Federal, state, Tribal, and local levels,
and would jeopardize recent bipartisan gains targeted at
improving the lives of everyday Americans.
Impacts would be felt across the country and could rise to
the level of jeopardizing the Department's ability to do its
part in protecting national security interests from energy
security and nuclear security threats.
Capping funding at this level would also hamper our ability
to cut energy costs for families and businesses across the
country, reduce the number of everyday Americans that can
access tax breaks for clean energy, and reduce the impact of
the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.
Specific examples of potential impacts are listed below.
Scenario l. Across-the-board cap on FY 2024 discretionary
spending at FY 2022 levels. Example impacts are listed below:
A reduction to FY 2022 funding levels would delay all
National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) major
construction projects of at least one year, increasing
operational risks and the likelihood of cost increases. The
FY 2022 funding level represents a \1/3\ reduction from
planned execution in FY 2024.
The W93 and W87-1 warhead modernization programs would be
delayed at least 1-2 years, with significant risks for the
aging U.S. stockpile, DoD plans for delivery system
modernization, and U.S. support for the United Kingdom's
Replacement Warhead.
Hundreds of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy research
projects and 2-3 large infrastructure projects at national
labs would be cancelled or paused, resulting in up to one
thousand (1,000) layoffs within the labs, partner
organizations, and the local construction and support
workforce across the country. This would negatively impact
the ability of the national laboratories to continue to
advance cutting edge research.
Scenario 2. Across-the-board 22 percent reduction to
current enacted funding levels (FY 2023) for FY 2024. Example
impacts of this scenario are listed below. Scenario 1 impacts
would also be intensified:
At a minimum, research at Office of Science national
laboratories and universities would be reduced by about $700
million, resulting in substantial reduction of nearly 5,200
scientists, students, and technical staff.
Many of the Administration research priorities would
receive significantly less funding resulting in curtailed
research efforts in the areas of Climate Change; Artificial
Intelligence; High Performance Computing; emerging
technologies in Quantum Information Science,
Microelectronics, and Biotechnology; Fusion Energy; and
Isotope Production.
At a minimum, Office of Science facility operations funding
would be reduced, resulting in only 68 percent of operational
funding and a substantial reduction of over 6,000 users of
the over 38,000 annual users at the 28 scientific user
facilities across the national laboratories.
All facilities would have a significant reduction in force
of personnel, with loss of critical expertise. A review would
be required to determine which facilities to close to
maintain adequate operations at the remaining user
facilities. Facilities cannot operate safely at this funding
level. This action would result in major economic impact to
the United States, both in the short-term and in the long-
term as the U.S. will be subject to loss of scientific talent
and leadership.
At a minimum, thousands of low-income households (anywhere
from 4,400-8,800) would be deferred from weatherization
services, and reductions in state energy programs more
broadly would limit efforts to cut energy costs for families
and businesses, disproportionately affecting smaller states
and US territories.
Reductions of this magnitude would have significant
setbacks of U.S. geopolitical competitiveness to adversarial
nations like Russia and China.
This would include the reduction of the Idaho National
Laboratory operational status to the minimal allowable for
safe and secure support of DOE and national security programs
and research.
It would also include elimination of all efforts to support
the deployment of American nuclear energy technologies as the
preferred alternative to Russian and Chinese technologies in
countries looking to implement large scale power sources.
These are a few examples of the serious impacts of these
scenarios on ongoing efforts by the Department in the areas
of national security, safety of critical infrastructure,
threats to the Nation's competitive edge, and impacts on
consumers and industry.
Sincerely,
Jennifer M. Granholm.
____
U.S. Department of Labor, Office of the Assistant
Secretary for Congressional and Intergovernmental
Affairs,
Washington, DC.
Hon. Rosa DeLauro,
Ranking Member, Committee on Appropriations,
House of Representatives, Washington, DC.
Dear Ranking Member DeLauro: Thank you for contacting the
Department of Labor (DOL) with important questions about the
impact of capping discretionary spending levels at the fiscal
year (FY) 2022 enacted level on workers and their families.
The Department of Labor's mission is to foster, promote, and
develop the welfare of the wage earners, job seekers, and
retirees of the
[[Page H1970]]
United States; improve working conditions; advance
opportunities for profitable employment; and assure work-
related benefits and rights. This includes centering our work
on the most vulnerable and marginalized workers, those facing
barriers to employment, misclassified workers, and workers in
temporary jobs or other jobs that heighten their economic
insecurity and vulnerability.
On March 9, 2023, the President released his Fiscal Year
(FY) 2024 budget. The FY 2024 budget request builds on the
Biden-Harris Administration's successes, reinforces President
Biden's investments in America, continues to lower costs for
families, protects and strengthens Social Security and
Medicare, and reduces the deficit. The Department's role in
this effort is to ensure that all workers and job seekers in
America--particularly those from disadvantaged communities--
have access to high-quality jobs that can support a middle-
class life. That includes accessing training and finding
pathways to high-quality jobs as well as protecting workers'
rights and benefits, health and safety, and wages once they
are employed.
The potential cuts you describe in your letter would have
very real and damaging impacts on our families, communities,
economy, and competitiveness--undermining a broad range of
critical services the American people rely on in their
everyday lives.
These drastic reductions in spending proposed by certain
Congressional Republicans would be devastating--undermining
our ability to protect our nation's most vulnerable workers
and hindering our efforts to address critical issues like
exploitative child labor. These types of cuts would send an
unmistakable message that the workers who were essential
during the pandemic are expendable, diminishing the value of
their work and failing to honor them by ensuring their wages,
health, and safety are protected. Additionally, drastically
cutting funding levels would mean fewer resources for
workforce training programs designed to ensure there is a
workforce armed with the skills needed to fill high-quality
jobs in our growing economy.
Below please find specific examples of how funding cuts
would impact Department of Labor programs and the workers we
aim to serve. For each example, the Department analyzed two
scenarios: (1) FY 2024 appropriations equal to 22 percent
below currently enacted levels and (2) FY 2024 appropriations
equal to the FY 2022 enacted levels.
Limiting Access to Training for Job Seekers and Workers Across the
Country
The Employment and Training Administration provides grants
to states for running the Adult, Youth, and Dislocated Worker
employment programs, which provide training and job
assistance services. Reductions to each of those programs
would result in people losing critical services they need to
obtain and retain better jobs.
Workfbrce Development & Training: A 22 percent reduction
would prevent about 750,000 job seekers from accessing
services and training through ETA-funded programming. A
return to FY 2022 enacted levels would result in about
125,000 fewer job seekers receiving services and training
from the workforce development system.
Registered Apprenticeship: A 22 percent reduction would
lead to over 100,000 fewer workers being employed through
Registered Apprenticeships. A return to FY 2022 enacted
levels would lead to 76,000 fewer workers being employed
through Registered Apprenticeships.
Senior Community Service Employment Program (SCSEP): A 22
percent reduction would lead to almost 10,000 fewer low-
income older workers participating in paid community service
work.
Office of Foreign Labor Certification (OFLC ): If funding
levels were reduced by 22 percent, there would be significant
processing delays across the labor certification programs.
Labor certification decisions for nonimmigrant visas,
especially for seasonal nonagricultural businesses, would be
delayed. Employers would have to wait up to 2 additional
months for decisions on their ability to hire H-2B workers.
In the PERM immigrant program, labor certification decision
would increase 73 percent, from 188 days (FY 2022) to
approximately 325 days. Similarly, if funding levels reverted
to the FY 2022 level, and workloads continued to rise,
average processing times in the FLC programs would continue
to increase. OFLC would prioritize available resources to
address more time-sensitive H-2A and H-2B applications for
farmers and seasonal nonagricultural businesses.
Weakening Wage and Safety Protections for Workers
The Wage and Hour Division (WHD) promotes compliance with
basic labor laws and ensures that workers receive the
protections they are entitled to under the law. Last year,
WHD staff recovered more than $213 million in back wages for
nearly 153,000 workers--an average of $1.400 per worker.
These recovered wages make a real difference for workers
struggling to pay rent. buy food, pay for childcare, or cover
gas or transportation costs to get to their jobs.
Cuts to WHD funding levels would undermine the agency's
ability to ensure workers receive the wages that they've
earned. WHD would be forced to reduce the number of
compliance actions, investigations, and targeted inspections
that result in recovery for thousands of workers.
Specifically, a 22 percent reduction in funding levels
would result in about $156 million less in back wages for
135,000 workers or an average over $1,000 per worker. A
return to FY 2022 enacted levels would result in $24.5
million less in back wages recovered for nearly 21,000
workers.
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA)
works to assure safe and healthful working conditions. Every
worker deserves to return home safely at the end of the day.
Cutting OSHA's budget by one-fifth would mean fewer
inspections, fewer staff, less enforcement, and less safe and
healthy workplaces.
A 22 percent budget reduction would result in OSHA losing
at least 270 inspectors and conducting 10,800 fewer
inspections. This would be by far the lowest level of
enforcement in OSHA's 52-year history. Fewer inspections
would significantly reduce OSHA's ability to conduct
proactive and more complex inspections such as those
involving chemical exposure, heat, musculoskeletal injuries,
and workplace violence. A return to 2022 enacted levels would
result in 2,800 fewer safety inspections and 715 fewer health
inspections.
OSHA would drastically cut back on responding to worker
complaints and proactive inspections, including strategic
priorities like silica, heat, and fall protection. Reducing
OSHA's ability to conduct preventive inspections would result
in more workplace injuries and illnesses--allowing
unscrupulous employers to put workers in danger under a
weaker, more predictable, and less strategic OSHA.
The Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) works to
prevent death, illness. and injury from mining and promote
safe and healthful workplaces for U.S. miners. MSHA's
enforcement responsibilities--statutorily mandated
inspections, accident investigations, and responding to
hazard complaints, among others--have contributed
significantly to the reduction in fatal mining accidents.
Significant budget cuts would jeopardize the health and
safety of the nation's miners. For example, under a 22
percent reduction, MSHA would not be able to complete
approximately 4,400 mandatory inspections of surface and
underground mines. Fatal accident investigation activities
would continue but MSHA could not perform serious injury
accident investigations and could only investigate 75 percent
of hazard complaints in a timely manner. Targeted safety and
health initiatives that address hazards associated with the
leading causes of mining fatalities and occupational
illnesses would not occur. Approximately one third of coal
mine plan and addenda approvals, which are necessary for
operators to continue mining operations, would be delayed by
approximately a month.
At the FY 2022 funding level, MSHA would not be able to
complete approximately 2,200 mandatory inspections of surface
and underground mines. Fatal accident investigations would
continue, but MSHA would be limited in its ability to perform
any serious accident investigations and could only
investigate 50 percent of the hazard complaints in a timely
manner. Approximately 3,200 samples for respirable dust,
silica, diesel particulate matter, and other toxic substances
would not be taken, putting miners at risk of developing
preventable debilitating occupational illnesses like Black
Lung and silicosis.
Eliminating Critical Employment Services for Veterans
The Department's Veterans' Employment and Training Service
helps veterans transition to employment, protects their
employment rights, and promotes their employment
opportunities.
The Jobs for Veterans State Grants (JVSG) program provides
intensive employment and job placement services for eligible
veterans, and JVSG fund allow states to hire qualified
veterans to provide these services. There are currently over
1,800 JVSG staff at 2,300 American Job Centers (AJC)
nationwide. A 22 percent reduction would result in 4,282
fewer veterans experiencing or at risk of homelessness
receiving employment services through the Homeless Veterans'
Reintegration Program (HVRP). A return to the 2022 enacted
level would lead to a reduction of 16 staff serving veterans
at AJCs as well as 1,428 fewer veterans experiencing or at
risk of homelessness receiving employment services through
HVRP.
I have seen first-hand the positive impacts of the Biden-
Harris plan. 202 1 and 2022 were the two strongest years of
job growth in our nation's history. More than 12 million jobs
have been created since President Biden took office--
including nearly 800.000 manufacturing jobs. The unemployment
rate has been below 4% for more than a year, and a record
number of small businesses have started since President Biden
took office. Black Americans and Hispanic Americans have
near-record-low unemployment rates and people with
disabilities are experiencing record-low unemployment.
The Department stands ready and committed to continuing the
plan as laid out by the Biden-Harris Administration to build
an economy and a labor market that is more just and equitable
and creates opportunity for all.
Liz Watson,
Assistant Secretary, Congressional and Intergovernmental
Affairs, U.S. Department of Labor.
[[Page H1971]]
____
The Secretary of Education,
Washington, DC, March 17, 2023.
Hon. Rosa DeLauro,
Ranking Member, Committee on Appropriations,
House of Representatives, Washington, DC.
Dear Ranking Member DeLauro: Thank you for your letter of
January 19, 2023, requesting details regarding the potential
impact of proposed budget cuts on the economy, neighborhoods,
and other essential government functions that keep people
healthy and safe.
President Biden's FY24 Budget lays out a detailed plan to
invest in America, continue to lower costs for families,
protect and strengthen Social Security and Medicare, and
reduce the deficit. Meanwhile, Congressional Republicans have
proposed unprecedented cuts in fiscal year (FY) 2024 funding
for key services, programs, and protections such as
education, public safety, research, nutrition and more. Cuts
on this scale would have very real and damaging impacts on
our families, our communities, our economy, and our
competitiveness--undermining a broad range of critical
services the American people rely on in their everyday lives.
Your letter specifically references a plan to cap fiscal
year 2024 discretionary spending at the fiscal year 2022
enacted level. Your letter makes clear that the impact of
such a plan on agency appropriation levels is at this time
unknown, as the specifics of the plan have not been publicly
released. If we assumed that defense funding would be
shielded from budget cuts under this plan, it would equate to
a cut of about 22 percent to non-defense discretionary
funding. Accordingly, we analyzed impacts at two levels: 1)
FY 2022 enacted and 2) 22 percent below the currently enacted
level for FY 2023.
As you know, the Federal government has long played a
critical role in supporting States, school districts, and
postsecondary institutions in meeting the needs of students,
especially underserved students and children in under-
resourced communities, children with disabilities, English
learners, and those experiencing homelessness. While
representing but a small portion of overall education funding
nationwide, Federal resources help States and school
districts fill gaps in State and local support and meet
critical needs for our most vulnerable students. From
supporting additional staff positions and educational
materials, to expanding after school programming, providing
access to life-changing education and training, and helping
students afford college, the Federal investment in education
makes a positive difference in children's lives every day.
The Department of Education has examined several of our
most significant programs to assess potential impacts
resulting from 1) receiving FY 2022 funding and 2) receiving
funding 22 percent below currently enacted levels:
ESEA Title I Grants to LEAs--a reduction to the FY 2022
enacted level would cut $850 million in funding from this
program--a cut equivalent to removing more than 13,000
teachers and service providers from classrooms serving low-
income children; a 22 percent reduction from the currently
enacted level would cut approximately $4.0 billion in
funding, impacting an estimated 25 million students and
reducing program funding to its lowest level in almost a
decade--a cut equivalent to removing more than 60,000
teachers and related service providers from classrooms
serving low-income students.
IDEA Grants to States--a reduction to the FY 2022 enacted
level would cut $850 million in funding from this program--a
cut equivalent to removing more than 13,000 teachers and
service providers from classrooms serving low-income
children; a 22 percent reduction from the currently enacted
level would cut more than $3.1 billion in funding, impacting
an estimated 7.5 million children with disabilities and
reducing Federal support to its lowest share since 1997--a
cut equivalent to removing more than 48,000 teachers and
related services providers from the classroom.
Title II-A (Supporting effective instruction State grants)
and Title IV-A (Student support and academic enrichment
grants)--a reduction to the FY 2022 enacted level would cut
more than $35 million for these activities; a 22 percent
reduction from the currently enacted level would cut more
than $500 million in annual support for teachers and
students, curtailing learning opportunities for teachers and
school leaders, and hampering school districts' efforts to
promote a well-rounded education for students in safe
schools.
Pell Grants--a reduction to the FY 2022 enacted level would
likely have a minimal effect on students and parents, while a
reduction of 22 percent from currently enacted levels would
likely reduce the maximum Pell award by nearly $1,000,
decreasing aid to all 6.6 million Pell recipients and
eliminating Pell Grants altogether for approximately 80,000
students. Cutting the discretionary funding by 22 percent
without cutting the maximum award would eliminate the surplus
and create a $17 billion shortfall by 2026. The program
cannot function with a shortfall that large.
Administering Student Financial Aid--a reduction of 22
percent from currently enacted levels would cut $468 million
in federal support to determine, disburse, and service
student aid. This level of funding would have devastating
effects on student and parent interactions with the
Department, as well as on their ability to successfully apply
for and receive student aid. However, even if funding were
kept at the FY 2022 enacted level, more than 40 million
student loan borrowers would be impacted through decreased
service hours and longer turnaround times to make changes to
student loan repayment plans, or obtain a deferment,
forbearance, or discharge of student loans. More than 17 .6
million students and parents applying for student aid and
calling the Department for information could experience
multiple-hour wait times and reduced center hours, and
student aid applicants requesting specific assistance with
the FAFSA, student loan promissory notes, PLUS loan
applications, or other student aid applications could see
their requests take weeks longer to process. Additionally,
the oversight of the more than 5,500 schools and enforcement
of the Higher Education Act would suffer, putting taxpayer
dollars at risk.
Federal Work-Study Program (FWS)--a reduction to the FY
2022 enacted level would provide less aid for all program
recipients and eliminate FWS financial support for
approximately 11,000 students; a cut of 22 percent from the
currently enacted level would provide less aid for all
program recipients and eliminate Work-Study financial support
for approximately 85,000 students. Schools would be forced to
make impossible decisions around whether to cut essential
positions reliant on FWS funds or the amounts that students
are able to earn under the program.
Should you have additional comments or questions, please do
not hesitate to contact the Office of Legislation and
Congressional Affairs.
Sincerely,
Miguel A. Cardona, Ed.D.,
U.S. Secretary of Education.
____
U.S. Small Business
Administration,
Washington, DC, March 20, 2023.
Hon. Rosa L. DeLauro,
Ranking Member, Committee on Appropriations, House of
Representatives, Washington, DC.
Dear Representative DeLauro: Thank you for your January 19,
2023 letter to the U.S. Small Business Administration
(``SBA'') regarding plans by House Republican Leadership to
cap Fiscal Year (FY) 2024 discretionary spending at the FY
2022 enacted level. President Biden's FY 2024 Budget lays out
a detailed plan to invest in America and the small business
economy, continue to lower costs for families, protect and
strengthen Social Security and Medicare, and reduce the
deficit.
Strong Federal support and investments by Congress ensure
that America's 33 million small businesses have the resources
they need to create jobs across our nation. SBA offers access
to affordable capital, training, and technical assistance to
help small businesses grow and thrive. These resources have
been critical especially during the surge of new-start small
businesses over the past two years under the Biden
Administration. Congressional Republicans have proposed
unprecedented cuts in FY 2024 funding for key services and
programs. While Congressional Republicans haven't released a
specific plan, cuts on this scale would have very real and
damaging impacts on our small businesses, our communities,
our economy, and our competitiveness--undermining a broad
range of critical services the American people rely on in
their everyday lives. That is why I share your concern that
proposed budget cuts could have a negative impact on SBA's
ability to deliver important services to American citizens
and small businesses who rely on the SBA for guidance and
support and capital.
One example of the potential impact is to the SBA's
Entrepreneurial Development appropriation which funds
critical programs that served 1.2 million small businesses in
2022. If Entrepreneurial Development program funding levels
are capped at FY 2022 levels--a cut of $29.9 million from FY
2023 enacted funding levels--we estimate that up to 125,000
fewer entrepreneurs and small businesses would have access to
free business counseling supported by SBA, including the
Small Business Development Centers, that help bolster the
small business economy. If Entrepreneurial Development
Program funding levels were reduced by 22 percent from FY
2023 enacted, this would be a reduction of $70.4 million,
which would equate to nearly 295,000 fewer small businesses
being served. Either scenario would have a significant impact
on the agency's ability to ensuring that undeserved
communities such as Veterans, Women, and Native American
entrepreneurs receive the support they deserve. We estimate
that thousands of veterans and women entrepreneurs would be
impacted negatively as they look to start or grow their own
businesses. For instance, we would have fewer opportunities
to further expand equity efforts for underserved and
underrepresented small business communities, including
specific reduction to support Veterans, Women, Native
American entrepreneurs.
Additionally, reductions to SBA's Salaries and Expense
funding would be detrimental to SBA's operations. If funding
is reduced to FY 2022 enacted funding levels in FY 2024, SBA
will not have sufficient funding to fully support the
Service-Disabled Veteran-Owned Small Business Certification
program. A cut to funding in this program could significantly
impact SBA's ability to certify service-disabled veteran-
owned small businesses. This certification is crucial to the
35,000 veterans and service-disabled veterans that
[[Page H1972]]
compete for and provide integral services to the Federal
Government.
Reverting to FY 2022 spending levels would also shrink
SBA's staffing by up to 203 positions which has a direct
impact on the agency's ability to deliver and oversee
services for small businesses. Staff reductions will result
in SBA customer service degradation in loan processing, small
business outreach, training and counseling, processing
government contracting, and validating small business
certifications. Small businesses and resource partners will
likely experience longer wait times, and SBA may become to
network and cybersecurity infrastructure threats and attacks
at the risk of all SBA stakeholders.
A 22 percent reduction from FY 2023 enacted levels would
reduce Salaries and Expenses by nearly 385 positions, which
could not be attained without a reduction in force and
further reductions to services and outreach to small
businesses provided across the board. This would also reduce
Disaster Loan Program Administration by nearly $8 million, or
over 45 positions, hurting SBA's ability to respond quickly
when a disaster strikes to ensure access to capital for
disaster survivors.
Finally, maintaining SBA's Office of Inspector General
(OIG) funding at the FY 2022 enacted level would decrease
OIG's investigative and fraud enforcement capabilities by
over $25 million in FY 2024, and would undermine the SBA's
OIG mission to fight fraud and abuse, including in COVID-19
relief programs. SBA is committed to combating fraud, waste,
and abuse, and the taxpayers benefit greatly from the
Inspector General's ongoing efforts. We need to ensure that
we continue to build on that commitment.
I stand ready to provide Congress with any further
information to ensure the small business owners and
entrepreneurs can continue to be supported. Thank you for
your partnership in helping the American people and the
economy.
Sincerely,
Isabella Casillas Guzman,
Administrator.
____
U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, the
Secretary,
Washington, DC, March 17, 2023.
Hon. Rosa L. DeLauro,
Ranking Member, Committee on Appropriations,
House of Representatives, Washington, DC.
Dear Ranking Member DeLauro: Thank you for your letter
requesting the impact of the proposed House Republican
Leadership 2024 budget cuts on Department of Housing and
Urban Development (HUD) programs and assisted families. In
short, the reduced funding scenarios would represent the most
devastating impacts in HUD's history.
On March 9th, President Biden released his Budget showing
his plans to invest in America, continue to lower costs for
families, protect and strengthen Social Security and
Medicare, and reduce the deficit. Congressional Republicans
are reportedly planning unprecedented cuts in 2024 funding
for key services, programs, and protections such as
education, public safety, research, nutrition and more. While
Congressional Republicans have not released one specific
plan, cuts on this scale would have very real and damaging
impacts on our families, our communities, our economy, and
our competitiveness--undermining a broad range of critical
services the American people rely on in their everyday lives.
This letter will consider two scenarios, a reduction to 2022
enacted levels and a 22 percent reduction to 2023 enacted
levels.
Most HUD programs received modest increases in 2023.
Increases in the 2023 enacted budget levels relative to 2022
primarily serve to maintain existing programs, not to permit
program expansions. Except for targeted funding increases for
homeless assistance and tenant-based Housing Choice Vouchers
(HCV), almost all of HUD's programs remained at or near level
funding with zero or minimal increases. Consequently, any
cuts to the 2023 level do not eliminate ``extra'' funding
added in 2023 but translate to direct cuts to the 2022
baseline. These cuts, in turn, would reduce existing services
that families and communities rely on, including programs
housing low-income families.
Today's HUD rental housing programs' funding levels are
necessary to maintain existing rental assistance to keep
currently assisted families in their homes. Under the 22
percent potential funding cut scenario, it would be
impossible to stave off mass evictions.
If These Draconian Cuts Were Made--
Thousands Would Lose Housing Choice Vouchers
Nearly the entire increase in voucher funding between 2022
and 2023 (aside from small amounts for homeless veterans and
at-risk youth) supported renewal of existing assistance to
families in their current units. The dollar increase relative
to 2022 was necessary to match major cost increases in the
housing market. For example, between 2022 and 2023 the
national population-weighted average Fair Market Rent (FMR)
increased by nearly 10 percent, with 16 HUD Metro FMR Areas
increasing by 20 percent or more. Rents are expected to stay
high in 2024, even as growth slows down. Any cut to the 2023
funding level will not simply revert to the same number of
families that could be supported in 2022, but will put large
numbers of the most vulnerable and lowest income American
families at risk of losing their rental assistance entirely.
HUD rental assistance serves the most vulnerable low-income
families, with an average income of only $15,000 per year,
and includes older adults, persons with disabilities, and
families with children. The Housing Choice Voucher program
currently assists approximately 2.3 million families.
2022 flat--eliminates funding for 350,000 families.
22 percent cut to 2023 funding--eliminates funding for
640,000 families.
Families Living in Public Housing Would be Exposed to Unsafe Living
Conditions
The needs of public housing portfolio continue to grow, so
major cuts to this program threaten to remove important
affordable housing assets from the inventory. If there is a
22 percent cut, HUD calculates an expected 78 percent
proration for the Operating Fund. At this level, there would
be significant impacts to PHA operations. All PHAs would need
to drastically cut operations, including regular property
maintenance, services to families, and likely staff layoffs
to right-size operations to expected revenues. Deferred
maintenance would decrease housing quality, potentially
exposing families to unsafe living conditions such as mold
and lead-based paint. Finally, there would be the likelihood
of PHA insolvency or other program failures. The projected
$700 million cut from the capital grants would leave no
funding to address backlog needs and $2 billion in unfunded
accrual needs. Unmet capital needs mean the further
deterioration of the inventory and contribute to lower
occupancy rates, higher costs for utilities, less resilience
to climate change, and increased health and safety risks for
residents.
There Would be an Unprecedented Loss of Existing Affordable Housing,
Leading to Mass Evictions
HUD's Project-Based Rental Assistance (PBRA) program, which
serves approximately 1.3 million families, needed almost $1
billion above 2022 levels to just renew the existing owner
contracts for 2023. These increases are statutory and reflect
increased costs, and HUD cannot avoid them within the
contracts. As a result, any cuts to the 2023 level would
force HUD to short fund or cancel existing contracts between
the federal government and private property owners. The
termination of contracts with rental owners will likely lead
the owners to convert their housing to market-rate, leaving
currently supported tenants in units that are now
unaffordable to them, likely resulting in evictions. This
would represent an historically unprecedented loss of
existing affordable housing, a breach of federal contracts,
and a repudiation of decades of long-term bipartisan federal
investment.
2022 flat--eliminates funding for approximately 87,000
families
22 percent cut to 2023 funding--eliminates funding for
approximately 286,000 families
States and Localities Would Be Prevented from Making Basic
Infrastructure Improvements
In addition to rental assistance, HUD's programs also
include the most popular and effective funding programs for
states, cities, counties, and towns: Community Development
Block Grants (CDBG) and HOME Investment Partnerships. CDBG
and HOME provide flexible block grant assistance whereby
funding decisions are locally controlled.
CDBG: The median CDBG annual grant is $1 million provided
through a block grant allocation formula. Urban and rural
municipalities and counties rely on the funding for basic
housing-related infrastructure such as rehabilitation of
existing affordable housing, water and sewer connections,
sidewalks, as well as direct assistance for small businesses,
economic development, and essential services. The estimated
impact of the funding cut of 22 percent will reduce the
average grant by approximately $440,000.
HOME: As with CDBG, the vital HOME Program received zero
increase in 2023. Funding cuts to HOME would result in fewer
new affordable rental and homeownership opportunities for
low-income families, fewer grants for repair and
rehabilitation of existing affordable housing, and less
tenant-based rental assistance available, resulting in
increased risk of homelessness. This will directly exacerbate
the existing national affordable housing crisis. The
estimated impact of the funding cut of 22 percent from 2023
to the average HOME formula grant of $1.5 million will reduce
the average grant by $330,000 and will result in more than
6,700 fewer units of affordable housing produced.
Thousands More Americans Would be Sleeping on the Streets
HUD received a targeted increase in funding for Homeless
Assistance Grants in 2023, which would sustain existing
resources for emergency shelter, increase availability of
permanent supportive housing, and continue to provide other
homeless assistance to the most vulnerable Americans. Undoing
this increase will severely curtail the services that
communities across the country would be able to provide to
those experiencing homelessness. Cuts to the Emergency
Solutions Grants (ESG) program from the 2023 baseline would
result in less emergency shelter, homelessness prevention,
and rapid rehousing. A funding cut of 22 percent would result
in over 24,000 fewer people receiving assistance, likely
leading to large increases in the number of people sleeping
on the streets.
In the Continuum of Care and Youth Homelessness
Demonstration Program, funding provides permanent supportive
housing for people with severe disabilities and illnesses,
and rapid rehousing and transitional
[[Page H1973]]
housing for youth and adults to help them achieve housing
stability and self-sufficiency. In recent years, HUD has
significantly expanded assistance to people fleeing domestic
violence. Providing funding at the 2022 level for CoC
renewals would result in at least 54,000 fewer homeless
people and domestic violence survivors receiving assistance
than in 2023, and a 22 percent cut from 2023 levels would
result in nearly 95,000 fewer people receiving assistance.
These cuts would eliminate new funding for the Youth
Homelessness Demonstration Program, an effort that has helped
reduce the number of homeless unaccompanied youth by more
than 25 percent since 2017.
Dire Housing Conditions in Indian Country Would be Exacerbated
Housing conditions in Indian Country are among the most
dire in the United States. Thus, any cuts to the 2023 formula
funding level would have a significant impact on the program,
which is the single largest source of funding for Indian
housing assistance. It would make it almost impossible for
most Tribal grantees to construct new affordable housing
units and a challenge to meet the basic operations and
maintenance needs of their existing housing. It would also
make it extremely difficult to leverage other non-Federal
resources to develop affordable housing. Funding for the
formula block grant component would be reduced by $173
million with a 22-percent cut, which would reduce funding for
Native American Housing Block Grants to its lowest level
since it was implemented in 1996 (adjusting for inflation).
Efforts to Abate Lead Hazards Would be Slowed
HUD's Lead Hazard Control and Healthy Homes programs to
reduce lead poisoning hazards for children in lower income
families, together with a variety of programs aimed at
reducing indoor home health hazards. Home health hazards are
scientifically proven to cause lifelong damage when ongoing
exposure occurs during childhood. For example, even low
levels of lead exposure during childhood have been linked
with lifelong impacts on intelligence, attention, and
academic achievement. Further cuts below the previous 2022
level would substantially slow and adversely affect the
Federal government's planned efforts to abate lead hazards
and prevent home health hazards from negatively affecting
child development.
Critical Research Would be Jeopardized
The Office of Policy Development and Research (PD&R)
enables the Congress, the Secretary, and other HUD principal
staff to make evidence-informed decisions on budget and
legislative proposals and strengthens housing and community
development policy. The total investment for research,
evaluation, and technical assistance was essentially level
between 2022 and 2023. Thus, any cuts would substantially
reduce HUD's ability to conduct research, program
evaluations, and provide critical technical assistance (TA)
and capacity building support, including, for example,
through the Distressed Cities TA program that supports small,
rural and underserved localities. A 22 percent cut to PD&R's
2023 funding would result in a $32 million cut to existing
activities and investments, placing major PD&R-funded survey
efforts at risk, such as the American Housing Survey,
jeopardizing critical research providing the next generation
of evidence on how HUD can most effectively support
affordable homeownership and quality rental housing.
Efforts to Combat Housing Discrimination Would be Severely Impacted
A 22 percent cut to Fair Housing Programs would severely
impact the ability of the Fair Housing Assistance Program
(FHAP) to support state and local agency enforcement of the
Fair Housing Act nationwide. FHAP agencies currently
investigate about 75 percent of all fair housing complaints
filed under the Fair Housing Act, and this level of funding
would jeopardize the FHAP agencies' ability to conduct
investigations, litigate complaints, retain staff, and keep
up with inflation. This level of funding would also hinder
the Department's ability to admit new FHAP agencies into the
program.
A 22 percent cut to the Fair Housing Initiatives Program
(FHIP) would significantly impact the geographical
representation of and activities performed by fair housing
organizations nationally. Last year, as usual, HUD was unable
to fund all Education and Outreach Initiative (EOI) qualified
applicants. A reduction would further limit HUD's ability to
fund organizations in underserved and unserved communities.
This also could prevent HUD from maintaining the current
maximum level of funding under the Private Enforcement
Initiative (PEI), which funds fair housing organizations to
conduct testing, investigations, and public education and
outreach on the rights and responsibilities under the Fair
Housing Act. Lastly, the Fair Housing Accessibility FIRST
program would be severely limited in maintaining a broad
scope of services, especially focused on addressing
accessibility compliance in federally-assisted affordable
housing programs.
Highlighted Impacts on HUD Operations
Salaries and Expenses (S&E)
If HUD's 2024 appropriation were equal to the 2022
appropriation, that would result in a reduction of $152
million from our current 2023 enacted level and require HUD
to absorb a staffing reduction of over 650 full time
equivalents (FTE), which would have devastating impacts on
HUD services in all Program Offices. A reduction of this size
would require an immediate hiring freeze and the potential
for at least some furlough days, which would cause HUD
services to the public to be suspended or delayed, including
providing assistance to existing FHA homeowners, increasing
homeownership opportunities for potential homebuyers,
processing fair housing complaints and conducting complex
closings of multifamily properties.
A 22 percent reduction from the 2023 enacted level would
reduce S&E by $390 million and require a staffing reduction
of more than 1,700 FTE. Given HUD is unable to attrit that
amount of FTE during a fiscal year, it would require either
implementing a Reduction in Force (RIF), incurring up to 60
furlough days, or a combination of the two, which would cause
HUD services to the public to be delayed or suspended.
Additionally, it would result in dramatic reductions in
contractor support services to include areas such as federal
protection services for building security and financial
oversight and audit support services.
Information Technology (IT)
Reducing the Department's IT resources to the 2022 level
represents a significant operational vulnerability. Such a
reduction will have agency-wide implications on HUD
operations and program administration. At this reduced
funding level, the current operations and maintenance
contracts will be scaled back resulting in a diminished
service level for software and systems across the Department.
While HUD will make every effort to keep public facing
systems operational and available for external partners and
the public, HUD cannot guarantee full functionality of these
systems with budget reductions of this magnitude.
A 22 percent reduction in IT resources creates an extremely
high level of risk to the Department's core technology
infrastructure and services. At this level, a portion of
HUD's existing operations and maintenance contracts will stop
work due to insufficient funds. The likely impacts include
prioritization of contractor support for existing major
systems and cancelation of support for systems within the
nonmajor portfolio. This diminished support will lead to
grantee and stakeholder interruptions due to inability to
access HUD grant systems and financial interfaces. Such
challenges may delay state, local, and non-profit partners
access to formula grant funding and rental assistance due to
service disruption in relevant IT systems and contractor
support. Local governments would face delays in implementing
the plans that they put in place to, for example, construct
affordable housing or provide support to Meals on Wheels, as
they waited for HUD's systems. New homebuyers and affordable
housing developers could experience delays in FHA and
multifamily loan processing to service disruptions to
associated systems.
All IT development will stop and existing contract support
for these and any new efforts will terminate. As you can see,
the proposed funding cuts would have a catastrophic impact on
the ability of HUD to provide quality, affordable homes for
all and to develop equitable, inclusive communities. Please
do not hesitate to reach out for any additional assistance.
Sincerely,
Marcia L. Fudge.
____
U.S. Department of
Homeland Security,
Washington, DC, March 19, 2023.
Hon. Rosa L. DeLauro,
Ranking Member, Committee on Appropriations,
House of Representatives, Washington, DC.
Dear Ranking Member DeLauro: Thank you for your January 19,
2023, letter to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
Secretary Mayorkas asked that I respond on his behalf.
On March 9, President Biden released his Budget for DHS
that equips our Department to address the threats of today
and prepare for the threats of tomorrow. The President's
budget invests in programs that protect us against the threat
of terrorism, strengthen the security of our borders, ensures
the swift response to and recovery from natural disasters,
and more.
As requested, DHS conducted an analysis of what capping FY
2024 discretionary spending at the FY 2022 enacted level
would mean to the services the Department provides to the
American people.
The entire Department and the critical services we provide
would be impacted, including but not limited to the
following:
A reduction in CBP frontline law enforcement staffing
levels of up to 2,400 agents and officers;
A reduction in our Department's ability to prevent drugs
from entering the country;
Cuts in federal assistance to state, local, tribal,
territorial, and private sector partners for disaster
preparedness; and
Reductions in TSA personnel that would result in wait times
in excess of 2 hours at large airports across the country.
The analysis in the enclosure provides additional details
on just some of the significant impacts that may occur.
Operational Impacts of Returning to FY 2022 Funding Levels--Department
of Homeland Security
U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP)
Sea and Land Ports of Entry: CBP's Office of Field
Operations (OFO) may need to reduce hours of service at all
sea and land ports of entry (220 ports in total) and would
[[Page H1974]]
deny landing rights at all 241 airports outside of core hours
of operation based on personnel availability. With reduced
hours, wait times would increase and some land ports of entry
may close with commercial and private traffic still in
queues, which would result in exacerbated supply chain issues
potentially impacting food stuffs and American manufacturing.
Staffing: CBP may be forced to implement a hiring freeze,
which would impact the agency's ability to hire the
additional 300 Border Patrol Agents (BPAs) provided for in
the FY 2023 budget and the 150 CBP Officers (CBPOs) and BPAs
requested in the FY 2024 Budget. A hiring freeze would also
result in attrition of frontline law enforcement officers by
perhaps as much as 1,000 CBPOs and 1,400 BPAs.
Fentanyl Impacts:
Any impacts on CBPO staffing levels, described above, would
negatively impact fentanyl seizures as well as other
narcotics seizures.
Impacts could also affect the operations at ports of entry
for lawful travel and goods presented for admission to the
United States. Approximately 90 percent of resources at ports
of entry go through these regular operations, which impact
the special operations teams responsible for targeting,
enforcement, and analysis. Reductions to these special
operations teams will result in a reduction in targeting
opioids for both inbound and outbound operations.
With limited resources, OFO would only be able to perform
enhanced inspections upon primary or threshold level targets.
Reducing or eliminating outbound operations will result in
more money not being interdicted leaving the U.S. and enable
more trafficking and deeper concealments, likely increasing
the amount of fentanyl entering the country.
Air and Marine Operations: CBP's Office of Air and Marine
Operations would experience 56 percent reduction in
operational capabilities equating to 45,833 unexecuted
aircraft hours and 11,448 boat hours. A reduction of this
magnitude would result in a reduction in our operations
equivalent to the following:
154,657 lbs. of cocaine not seized
859 lbs. of fentanyl and 1,948 lbs. of heroin not seized
17,148 lbs. of methamphetamine not seized
$9M in currency not seized
561 criminals not arrested, and 57,594 apprehensions not
made
361 people not rescued
Trade: CBP enforces trade laws and implements measures such
as penalties, suspensions, and debarment while enforcing
anti-dumping and countervailing duties as well as forced
labor laws. Decreasing the capacity of the Office of Trade
would result in unprecedented gaps in defending America's
economic security, resulting in revenue loss to the U.S.
government and economy. Additional impacts include
degradation of trade enforcement operations resulting in
increased violations of Intellectual Property Rights (IPR)
such as the production of counterfeit goods, duty evasion
through transshipment, misclassification, country of origin
claims, and use of forced labor in the production of goods
in U.S. supply chains.
Agriculture: Due to decreased inspectional staff and
capacity, these cuts would result in increased risk of
introductions of foreign animal disease, including African
Swine Fever, and plant pests due to significant increases in
cargo and passenger wait times.
Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA)
Cyber Resiliency: Budget cuts would stifle CISA's early
efforts to support cyber resiliency across state, local,
tribal, and territorial governments. This critical support
ensures resource-poor jurisdictions (or their management
service providers) are cognizant of threats and prepared to
face them, and are hardening the defenses of the national
critical functions under their stewardship (e.g., water
supply, wastewater treatment, and emergency communications).
Specifically, cyber resiliency provides support to
stakeholders and mission partners in their efforts to
predict, adapt, and dynamically recover from threats in high-
risk areas who are significantly underserved with current
resources. Without this funding, CISA will not be able to:
Design targeted assessments for highlighting cybersecurity
threats and vulnerabilities to emergency communications
systems nor identify mitigating actions;
Identify requirements, develop, and deliver curriculum that
improves cybersecurity and interoperability in the face of
evolving IP-hosted communications technology used during
responses of varying size/complexity;
Design specific assessments for urban areas to evaluate and
enhance cybersecurity; nor,
Expand Emergency Communications Coordinators' support to
stakeholders via CISA's regional service delivery model.
In addition, the reduction of funding would eliminate the
Supply Chain Risk Management (SCRM)/Federal Acquisition
Security Council (FASC) program. This would impact CISA's
execution of DHS's responsibility as the FASC's Information
Sharing Agency (ISA) and would terminate support on the
development of a doctrine required to respond to Federal
Government-wide supply chain risks and planning coordination.
Cyber Protection: CISA would not have the resources to
implement requirements of the Cyber Incident Reporting for
Critical Infrastructure Act of 2022 (CIRCIA). CIRCIA requires
CISA to develop and implement regulations requiring covered
entities to report cyber incidents and ransomware payments to
CISA. These reports enable CISA to rapidly deploy resources
and render assistance to victims suffering attacks, analyze
cross-sector trends, and quickly share information with
network defenders to warn other potential victims.
Implementation of this new congressional mandate will result
in an exponential increase in the number of incident reports
coming from critical infrastructure. If funding is held at FY
2022 levels, CISA would not have any dedicated funding to
respond to this new requirement and therefore would be unable
to collect and rapidly share information with critical
infrastructure owners and operators.
Cyber Incident Response: CISA's Operations Center would
lose the ability to ingest, triage, collate. record, and
visualize information from over 50,000 cyber incidents over a
one-year period. CISA would be unable to provide critical
infrastructure owners and operators with analyzed reports,
statistics, or trends, leading to a significant decrease in
their ability to proactively avoid known and emerging threats
and vulnerabilities to the nation's critical infrastructure.
State and Local Impacts: Budget cuts would lead to a 13
percent reduction in CISA's regional field forces. The
regional workforce is a critical component of CISA's service
delivery model. With reduced funding, CISA would have to
reduce assistance provided in response to ransomware and
other cyberattacks. It would also have to reduce security
assessments and chemical inspections, thereby impacting
businesses, healthcare providers, K-12 institutions, state
and local governments, municipalities, and critical
infrastructure entities. In addition, CISA would have to
reduce the number of engagements and support of pre-election
security assessments of polling places in communities
nationwide. This would result in limiting interactions with
local election officials where CISA helps to assure the
security of election offices, polling places, and election
infrastructure. The number of impacted jurisdictions would
vary by state, as some states have tens of election
jurisdictions, and some states have more than a thousand.
Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)
FEMA grant assistance to support and help state, local,
tribal, and territorial governments (SLTT) and the private
sector could be reduced by half. This would negatively impact
SLTT capabilities to implement preparedness strategies
successfully and reduce or eliminate longterm risks to people
and property from hazards and their effects.
Transportation Security Administration (TSA)
Passenger Security Wait Times and Aviation Security:
In FY 2024, passenger volume is anticipated to increase by
9.2 percent over FY 2022 levels. Fewer Transportation
Security Officers would increase passenger wait times from 10
minutes in FY 2023 to upwards of 30 minutes in FY 2024. At
larger airports, passengers would experience wait times in
excess of two hours where a steady influx of passengers makes
it impossible to recover without the necessary staffing.
These high wait times would also result in large crowds of
unscreened people in the checkpoint queues, increasing
potential soft targets.
Transportation security equipment maintenance would have to
be reduced, impacting equipment reliability and increasing
passenger wait times while resulting in costly actions to
modify contracts.
Furloughed positions would impact transportation security
now and in the future as TSA would see fewer staff at
checkpoints. Additionally, TSA would have a greater gap
between experienced staff and staff with minimal experience.
u.s. Secret Service (USSS)
Cyber Fraud Task Forces: Secret Service would eliminate or
severely reduce the capacity of the 42 Cyber Fraud Task
Forces across the country that partner with private industry,
state, local, tribal, and territorial law enforcement
agencies and federal and state prosecutors to prevent,
detect, and mitigate complex cyber-enabled financial crimes.
Cyber Forensics Training: Secret Service would shut down
the National Computer Forensics Institute (NCFI) and
eliminate training for state, local, tribal, and territorial
law enforcement, prosecutors, and judges used to combat cyber
threats. NCFI graduates conduct cyber forensic exams across
the USSS, completing over 150,000 exams in FY 2022 that were
for cases involving murder, rape, and child exploitation.
COVID-19 Fraud: Cuts would reduce the ability of Secret
Service to combat COVID-19 related crime by over 50 percent.
USSS is currently focused on four broad areas of COVID-19
related crime and to date has arrested over 500 criminals,
recovered $1B and responded to over 5,000 investigations and
inquiries.
U.S. Coast Guard (USCG)
The United States Coast Guard would immediately cease the
advancement of acquisitions, procurement, and construction
resulting in a reduction to operational readiness along the
maritime borders. Specifically, the inability to progress the
Coast Guard's two highest acquisition priorities, the
Offshore Patrol Cutter and the Polar Security Cutter, would
create an operational gap and further delay of the U.S.
presence in the polar regions and reduce the ability detect,
deter,
[[Page H1975]]
prevent, and disrupt terrorist attacks and other criminal
acts in the U.S. maritime domain as well as our National
Defense Strategy.
____
USDA,
Office of the Secretary,
Washington, DC, March 17, 2023.
Hon. Rosa L. DeLauro,
Ranking Member, House Committee on Appropriations, House of
Representatives, Washington, DC.
Dear Ranking Member DeLauro: Thank you for your letter of
January 19, 2023, requesting an analysis of the impact of
potential non-Defense spending cuts on the American people
that the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) serves. I am
very concerned about the unprecedented cuts in FY 2024
funding that Congressional Republicans have proposed. While
Congressional Republicans haven't released a specific plan,
cuts on the scale suggested would have a very real and
damaging impacts on our families, our communities, our
economy, and our competitiveness--undermining a broad range
of critical services the American people rely on in their
everyday lives such as food and nutrition security,
protection of life and property from catastrophic wildland
fires, a safe food supply, and more. President Biden released
a Budget on March 9th that demonstrates his commitment to
invest in America, continuing to provide the critical
services the American people depend on, and reducing the
deficit.
USDA analyzed two possible House Republican Leadership plan
scenarios. One assumes a funding level equal to that of
fiscal year 2022 and while the other assumes a 22 percent
reduction in funding for Government programs, which would
mean a reduction of about $6.15 billion for USDA in FY 2024.
A decrease of that magnitude would threaten the safety and
well-being of tens of millions of Americans, raise the risk
of homelessness for tens of thousands of Americans, and lead
to thousands of farm families not having access to the credit
and help they need to continue to farm.
The attachment provides a few examples of impacts but does
not capture the entirety of the detrimental effects should
the House Republicans' plan come to fruition. I would be
happy to meet with you to discuss further or, if requested,
provide more information in writing.
I deeply profoundly hope that Congressional leaders will
reach an agreement that will does not result in these
draconian reductions to USDA. I look forward to working with
Congress to preserve the many priorities of rural America.
Again, thank you for writing.
Sincerely,
Thomas J. Vilsack,
Secretary.
Additional Analysis of Potential Spending Cuts
Bureau: Food and Nutrition Service
Program: Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women,
Infants, and Children (WIC)
Reduction Amount: Up to $1.4 billion
WIC is a federally funded nutrition assistance program with
an average monthly participation currently projected to be
6.5 million in fiscal year (FY) 2024. Under both reduction
scenarios (FY22 level and a 22 percent reduction), State WIC
programs would have to reduce participation and establish
waiting lists using the priority system provided in
regulation. In the first scenario, nearly 250,000 monthly
participants would not receive benefits. A 22 percent
decrease would only allow the program to support about 5.07
million participants--a reduction of approximately 1,180,000
participants from the FY22 monthly average and 1,500,000
participants from current FY24 participation projections.
Since the late 1990's, the appropriations committees'
bipartisan practice has been to provide enough funds for WIC
to serve all eligible applicants. When funds are not
sufficient to support caseload, WIC agencies implement a
priority waiting list of individuals. The first to lose
benefits would be non-breastfeeding postpartum women and
individuals certified solely due to homelessness or migrancy,
followed by children. This means some of the participants
needing benefits the most would be cut off.
In addition, Nutrition Services and Administration funding
provided to States would be reduced, which would hinder State
agencies' ability to provide services in a timely manner and
result in losses of WIC-related State and local jobs.
Bureau: Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS)
Program: Salaries and Expenses
Reduction Amount: Up to $250 million
Drastic changes to the FSIS' funding level would result in
an across-the-board furlough of as many as 400 and 1,800 Food
Safety inspectors at the FY22 and 22 percent reduction
scenarios, respectively. Since, Federal law mandates
inspection of meat, poultry, and egg products, approximately
6,800 establishments nationwide would experience production
impacts. At the higher threshold of the cut, USDA estimates a
lost production volume of more than 11.5 billion pounds of
meat, an additional 11.1 billion pounds of poultry and over
590 million pounds of egg products. Together, the industry
would experience a production loss of over $89 billion with a
total extended loss including distribution and retail of $416
billion. Consumers would experience a shortage of meat,
poultry, and egg products available for public consumption,
and the shortage may result in price increases for these
products. Restaurants, grocers, local merchants, and others
who rely on FSIS-inspected products would suffer multiplier
effects from the shortfall in production. The impact could
force smaller businesses and merchants out of business.
Industry workers would also be furloughed, resulting in over
$2.2 billion in lost wages. The livestock industry would also
incur additional costs for disruption of the pipeline from
farms to production establishments as farmers and livestock
producers would have to feed and store animals longer than
anticipated.
The FSIS would also eliminate export inspections, resulting
in losses for U.S. producers and causing additional storage
costs and or loss of product. Export inspections could
adversely affect other nations since the volume of products
would decline. Furthermore, public food safety could be
compromised by the illegal selling and distribution of
uninspected meat, poultry, and egg products. Because the FSIS
is also responsible for verifying the safety of imported
products, cutting import inspections would result in a
reduction of 1.1 billion pounds of imported meat, poultry,
and egg products entering the country, in addition to the
lost production capacity within the United States. Cutting
import inspections might be construed as an international
trade issue. Moreover, there is limited storage space
along the border so unless foreign countries stopped
shipments, chill/frozen storage capacity and refrigerated
truck/train/ship capacity would be compromised.
Bureau: Rural Development, Rural Housing Service
Program: Rental Assistance
Reduction Amount: Up to $325 million
The Rental Assistance Program helps eligible low-income
tenants, in the USDA-financed multi-family housing, pay no
more than 30 percent of their incomes for rent. Approximately
288,000 tenants receive the benefit of rental assistance in
almost all the apartment complexes financed by Rural
Development. The House Republican leadership's planned
reduction would cause between 40,000 and 63,000 current
recipients to lose rental assistance. The average annual
income of families and individuals receiving rental
assistance (generally female-headed households, elderly, and
the disabled) is approximately $12,501. These Americans are
the least able to absorb any increase in the rent due to the
loss of rental assistance. Loss of this rent supplement may
cause property owners to increase rents, making the units
unaffordable to the very low-income residents who have few
options for decent, affordable housing.
With the loss of rental assistance, or higher vacancies
resulting from very low-income Americans being unable to
afford higher rents, many properties would be unable to pay
all their operating costs. Owners may be unable to maintain
the property and allow it to fall into despair, or the
properties may become delinquent in their loan payments.
Currently, the USDA has 160 multifamily properties in the
foreclosure process, which may increase with reduction in
rental assistance. Ongoing delinquencies will lead to
defaults and foreclosure and may result in long-term loss of
affordable housing in rural communities in future years.
Bureau: Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS)
Program: Conservation Operations
Reduction Amount: Up to $225 million
Most of the NRCS' funding is appropriated for the
Conservation Technical Assistance (CTA) which is the agency's
primary program to work with private landowners across the
country through the USDA's unique delivery system of local
field offices. Working one-on-one, NRCS helps producers use
new technologies and implement conservation practices such as
organic production systems, on farm energy management, air,
soil, and water quality improvement, and enhancement of
pollinator populations.
A reduction of up to $225 million would reduce Technical
Assistance Support, resulting in up to 84,000 fewer producers
(54 percent) receiving conservation planning assistance
(impacting up to 54,000,000 acres). These reductions will
have a deleterious impact on landscape-scale conservation,
water quality improvements, wildlife habitat protection, open
space protection, as well as natural infrastructure
restoration, carbon sequestration, weather prediction
capacity, plant material development and other programs and
services that support extreme weather and climate change
adaptation and mitigation.
Funding cuts of this nature will hurt farm programs and
rural America. The Administration is committed to working
with Congress to improve options and better target farm
programs, saving money for the Federal Government while
maintaining a robust farm safety net. Program improvements
can level the playing field by ensuring payments and
technical assistance support the farmers and ranchers
who need them most--not wealthy people, passive investors,
or large and profitable agribusinesses. We can strengthen
program integrity by excluding non-farmers and investors,
addressing duplicative payments and improving the
efficiency and effectiveness of the USDA's risk management
and mitigation tools.
Bureau: Farm Service Agency (FSA)
Program: Farm Loan, Salaries and Expenses, and Grant Programs
Reduction Amount: Up to $370 million
Funding cuts would drastically impact service levels
currently provided by the FSA.
[[Page H1976]]
At the upper level of the proposed cut, there would be 5,100
fewer direct farm operating loans and 1,500 other farm loans
(Emergency Loans, Guaranteed Operating Loans, Highly
Fractionated Indian Land, Heirs' Property Relending Program)
that could be made. The reduction of farm loan funding could
result in a loss of up to 26,250 private sector jobs (plus
the hundreds of farmers that would be forced out of farming
and into the off-farm job market), reduce the Gross Domestic
Product (GDP) by more than $1.6 billion, and reduce household
income by more than $1.3 billion.
Bureau: Forest Service
Program: Wildland Fire Management
Sequestration Amount: Up to $515 million for Wildland Fire
Management Salaries and Expenses, and Preparedness, and
Hazardous Fuels
Funding cuts under either scenario would place the United
States Forest Service (USFS) wildland fire fighting mission
in a decreased state of readiness and reduce agency capacity
to protect life and property. At the FY22 funding level,
efforts to modernize the workforce through pay reform and
additional hiring will virtually stop, and the strategy for
aerial wildland firefighting resource procurement and usage
will need to be significantly revised. The number of
firefighters, helicopters and airtankers will all need to
decrease which could lead to more fires that escape initial
attack and yield more large fires take weeks to contain,
endanger nearby communities, damage watersheds and diminish
other forest ecosystem services, and increase suppression
costs. At a 22 percent reduction, 2,200-2,700 wildland
firefighters would be furloughed. For both funding scenarios,
fewer firefighters would also reduce performance of hazardous
fuel treatments and maintenance of acres already treated,
including new priority acres that are at high and very high
fire risk (as high as 350,000 acres annually).
Mr. McGOVERN. These are actual numbers. These are real statistics
compiled by real experts. When we talk about the fact that no one needs
to worry about what is being debated here, this is why we are worried.
This is the impact of what they are trying to do. What they are
trying to do will hurt regular people, will hurt veterans, will hurt
people who are struggling to put food on the table, will hurt teachers,
will hurt the people that we represent. It will hurt children.
This is unconscionable, what is going on here. We cannot just sit by
while everybody on the other side says: Oh, don't worry, be happy. It
will all just work out. No, it won't.
We don't share these values of these cuts. We have a separate set of
values if my friends think that it is okay to cut these programs and
hurt these people.
Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
My friend and I have had a very long day and have spent a lot of time
together.
Madam Speaker, I have no further speakers, and I reserve the balance
of my time.
Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, may I inquire as to how much time is
remaining?
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mrs. Spartz). The gentleman from
Massachusetts has 6 minutes remaining.
Mr. McGOVERN. Madam Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.
Madam Speaker, what we have heard on the floor today is incredible,
astounding, unbelievable, unconscionable contempt for the people that
we are supposed to be here to fight for.
When people tell me that both parties are the same, that both parties
are equally bad or believe the same things, watch this debate and then
tell me what you think.
Democrats have different values than Republicans. They have no
problem racking up $2 trillion in debt when it comes to tax giveaways
for Wall Street and CEOs.
Nobody on the other side is talking about having billionaires pay one
cent toward reducing our deficit. Maybe that is why Speaker McCarthy
went to Wall Street to announce his plans essentially to screw Main
Street.
Now they want to demand--and I say demand because this is a ransom
note--demand 10 years of cuts unless we stick it to our own
constituents, unless we take away food from hungry people, unless we
kick people off of healthcare.
They didn't win the Senate, they didn't win the White House, and they
didn't win a big majority as they wanted in the House.
To get what they want, they want to default on America so they can
push through their radical MAGA agenda.
I have to be honest with you. I was disgusted by the debate in the
Rules Committee last night and even what has been said here on the
floor today.
This is unconscionably bad. This is not who we are. If you want to
have a discussion on the debt, let's have that discussion, but this is
an extortion.
You are saying if we don't agree to all these draconian cuts that are
going to hurt people that we fight for every day on this side of the
aisle, if we don't do that, you are going to run this economy off a
cliff.
That is just an all-time high in recklessness and stupidity, Madam
Speaker. We cannot accept that. The people we represent are the people
who will be impacted by these cuts that I just mentioned by including
in the Record all of the letters from the various agencies in our
government. Those are our people.
Billionaires don't need us, but regular people do. People who are
struggling to put food on the table are counting on us to be on their
side, not to be making their life more complicated or more difficult.
Yet, this represents kind of the antithesis of everything that I
believe is right. This is so wrong. It is so wrong.
I am not going to sit back and say, oh, well, let the process work
its will, and maybe it won't be so bad at the end of the day.
This is bad. This is unconscionable. This is not deserving of a vote
on the House floor today. People should reject it.
I urge my Republican colleagues on the other side of the aisle:
Reject this. You represent these same people too. They deserve to have
you on their side, not working against them.
Wall Street, they have enough support. They have enough people
rooting for them to succeed. Regular people, people who are struggling
in poverty, they need us. They are counting on us.
I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on this rule, ``no'' on the
previous question, and ``no'' on the underlying resolution. We have to
do better than this. This is beneath the dignity of this institution.
Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.
I begin by thanking my friend for engaging, as he always does, in a
spirited debate. We don't agree on a lot of things, but I admire my
friend's passion and appreciate his partnership on the Rules Committee,
both when I was in the minority and now that I am fortunate enough to
be in the majority.
We do look at the world a little bit differently. My friend worries
about a $2 trillion tax cut which, by the way, was stretched out over
10 years, much of which paid itself back in economic growth, but
forgets about a single bill that spent $1.9 trillion last year that
they managed to do.
Look at the results. When the President walked in pre-COVID, the
economy had the lowest unemployment rate in 50 years, growing.
Even after going through that, the Biden administration walks into a
V-shaped recovery and a 1.4 percent inflation rate.
In less than 2 years, they managed to flatten that out and give us
the highest inflation rate in over 40 years.
How did that happen? That happened by unrestrained Democratic
spending, out-of-control budget proposals by the President, a
Democratic Senate, and a Democratic House that wouldn't say ``no.''
Well, those days are behind us. I understand the agony of my friends,
that they actually have to sit down now and talk with the Republicans
and come to agreement.
Now, we have come forward with a proposal that we think makes a lot
of sense. My friend is worried about us driving up the debt.
Why are we passing an extension of the debt ceiling? That is exactly
what this legislation does. We are saying we just want to talk. Here is
our opening proposal.
We don't expect you will take everything or agree with everything. We
know you control the United States Senate. We know the President of the
United States has a veto, but you are going to talk with us, and you
are not going to get a clean debt ceiling.
We are not going to give you what you can't get yourself in a
Democratic United States Senate. We are going to have a real discussion
about what we need to do as a country.
[[Page H1977]]
Now, my friend says we have different values. In some ways, we do. We
have a common commitment to the institution. We have a common belief in
democracy. I think we believe in civil discourse, even when we
disagree.
We have many things beyond that that we agree on, but we do differ in
some ways. We believe we ought to live within our means, and that is a
good thing to try and do.
We think the American people ought to be able to keep more of their
own money to spend on their own family and their own investments.
We are willing to put some ideas forward how to do it. We think out-
of-control spending is going to make life worse.
The cruelest tax of all is inflation. My friends are worried about
the poorest of the poor. I know that is sincere.
I also know the inflation that this Democratic House and Senate of 2
years ago and the administration inflicted on the American public is a
curse to the poorest of the poor.
Let's sit down, find some common ground. We have done it before. We
act as if it is extraordinary to actually debate around debt ceiling
spending restraints.
That is the way it is normally done, particularly in divided
government. That is what the American people have given us. I suspect
they want us to work together.
We have done our part of the bargain. We will finish that out today.
We will extend the debt ceiling, as we promised we would do.
We will put forward a series of suggestions and proposals. We think
they are good. Our friends won't agree with them all, but at the end of
the day, they are going to have to come to the table.
If they can't pass a clean debt ceiling--or if you can pass a clean
debt ceiling in the Senate, go ahead and do it and come to the table
with that, but I don't think you will be able to.
We are going to sit down and find some ways to begin to restrain this
out-of-control spending, and we are going to do it because there is a
Republican majority in the House that demands that we do it; that we
begin to live responsibly; that we not inflict inflation on the
American people; that we prioritize our spending in some reasonable and
rational way.
The material previously referred to by Mr. McGovern is as follows:
An Amendment to H. Res. 327 Offered by Mr. McGovern of Massachusetts
At the end of the resolution, add the following:
Sec. 3. Immediately upon adoption of this resolution, the
House shall proceed to the consideration in the House of the
resolution (H. Res. 178) affirming the House of
Representatives' commitment to protect and strengthen Social
Security and Medicare. The resolution shall be considered as
read. The previous question shall be considered as ordered on
the resolution and preamble to adoption without intervening
motion or demand for division of the question except one hour
of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and
ranking minority member of the Committee on Ways and Means or
their respective designees.
Sec. 4. Clause 1(c) of rule XIX shall not apply to the
consideration of H. Res. 178.
Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time. I urge
the passage of the rule and the underlying legislation, 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.
Mr. McGOVERN. Madam 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 are postponed.
____________________