[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 150 (2004), Part 14]
[Senate]
[Page 18896]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                              THE TAX BILL

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, we are shortly going to have before us a tax 
bill that will increase the debt of this country by, in some estimates, 
more than $1 trillion. This year's deficit that the President 
acknowledges is $430 billion. Of course, as we have learned here today 
in the presentation of Senator Conrad, the ranking member of the Budget 
Committee, that doesn't take into consideration the cost of the war, 
nor does it take into consideration the fact that he is borrowing money 
from the Social Security trust fund. So the debt, of course, is closer 
to $600 billion, this year.
  Today we learn from any newspaper we pick up that one way the 
President is going to try to save a few bucks is by going after the 
poorest of the poor. He is doing this by changing housing subsidies. I 
quote: ``The Bush administration is changing the fair market rent to 
section 8 tenants. The Government pays tenants about 7 percent of this 
amount. Here's a sampling in metropolitan areas.''
  This sampling will cause the hair on the back of your head to come 
up. What has happened is, to help the President pay for all the things 
to help the rich of this country, corporate America, he is going after 
the poorest of the poor. The poor in Boston, section 8 tenants, in a 
one-bedroom apartment will lose 5 percent; in a four-bedroom apartment, 
27 percent. In Detroit, they will lose, in a one-bedroom apartment, 6 
percent; a four-bedroom apartment, 21 percent. In New Haven, they will 
lose 4 percent on a one-bedroom, 21 percent on a four-bedroom; in 
Trenton, 18 percent on a four-bedroom; in Atlanta, 16 percent; in New 
York City, 14 percent; in Philadelphia, 13 percent. On and on with 
these slashes that affect the poorest of the poor.
  I hope the people around this country are seeing what has happened to 
the fiber of our country. We used to talk about a safety net. There is 
no safety net anymore. It has been eradicated in the last 4 years. 
Section 8 tenants in the major cities of America are going to really 
suffer. It is too bad. It is too bad that the poor are getting poorer, 
the rich are getting richer, the middle class is becoming smaller and 
smaller. That is what this administration has done to America.
  I yield the floor, and any time I have left in morning business, I 
yield back.

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