[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 154 (2008), Part 4]
[House]
[Pages 5672-5673]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                          LEGISLATIVE PROGRAM

  (Mr. BLUNT asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute.)
  Mr. BLUNT. Madam Speaker, I yield to my friend, the majority leader 
from Maryland, for the purpose of inquiring about next week's schedule.
  Mr. HOYER. I thank my friend, the Republican whip.
  On Monday, the House will meet at 12:30 p.m. for morning hour and 2 
p.m. for legislative business. On Tuesday, the House will meet at 10:30 
a.m. for morning hour and 12 p.m. for legislative business. On 
Wednesday, the House will meet at 10 a.m. for legislative business. And 
on Thursday, the House will meet at 8:30 a.m. and recess immediately to 
allow for the Former Members Association annual meeting, and will 
reconvene at approximately 10 a.m. for legislative business after the 
meeting is concluded.
  We will consider several bills under suspension of the rules. The 
final list will be announced by close of business tomorrow.
  On Friday, no votes are expected.
  We will consider H.R. 2634, the Jubilee Act for Responsible Lending 
and Expanded Debt Cancellation of 2007; H.R. 5719, Taxpayer Assistance 
and Simplification Act of 2008; and H.R. 5715, Ensuring Continued 
Access to Student Loan Act of 2008.
  In addition, we intend to consider at some point next week the bill 
we started today, H.R. 2537, to amend the Federal Water Pollution 
Control Act relating to beach monitoring. We will consider that to its 
conclusion.
  Mr. BLUNT. I would ask my friend on the last bill you mentioned, the 
Ensuring Continued Access to Student Loan Act of 2008, H.R. 5715, is 
that the bill that was introduced this week?
  Mr. HOYER. I am not sure when it was introduced, very frankly. It was 
marked up this week and reported out of committee. Whether it was 
introduced this week or not, I do not know.
  As you know, Secretary Spelling has indicated this is a very severe 
challenge confronting student loans. Obviously we want to get ready for 
September in particular so families have some confidence they will be 
able to secure loans for their children, or for young people going to 
college, securing the loans themselves.
  Mr. BLUNT. That is a problem, and part of what I used to do before I 
came here involved that. I am anxious to see what the bill looks like. 
It is clearly a major problem out there.
  On the vote we took earlier today, the rule vote on Colombia trade, 
if you listened to the debate, you heard two very different views of 
that debate. The view of my side was that this likely ends this 
discussion for this year, and the view I heard from the other side was 
not quite there at all. I am wondering if as the majority leader you 
have a sense of this bill, this agreement, whether it can come back to 
the floor this year or not.
  Mr. HOYER. If the gentleman would yield, I would agree with the 
observation on our side. I say that, and it is obviously not humorous 
except to me.
  The fact of the matter is I believe that what was said on this side 
of the aisle and what the Speaker has indicated was that this was sent 
down we believed contrary to normal practice not with agreement of the 
leadership and the administration on how this would be considered. The 
Speaker believed, and obviously the House did as well, that additional 
time was needed. This was not, the Speaker has indicated that, an 
attempt to kill this agreement. It still could come up. There still is 
going to be discussion between the administration and ourselves. We 
want to resolve some outstanding issues and discuss what we might reach 
agreement on with the President and the administration.
  As you know, we began those conversations yesterday. You and I were 
down there at the White House together. We hope to continue and hope 
for positive movement. Regarding other agreements that are pending, we 
have not discussed nor ruled out the possibility that future trade 
agreements may be considered by this Congress.
  Mr. BLUNT. I thank the gentleman. That was going to be my second 
question. There are two other negotiated agreements, and I believe what 
you just said was that this vote today was about the Colombia agreement 
only and those other agreements should not be prejudiced by the vote we 
took today, and perhaps the Colombia vote will not be either.
  I felt strongly about this. I still do, but I hope my friend's 
comments are correct and there is some way to now actively pursue 
whatever discussions need to be had on Colombia.
  But on the final two if I heard you right, the two that have been 
negotiated and have not been sent up yet, I think I am hearing you say 
this does not establish any new way of doing this, and I yield.
  Mr. HOYER. I don't think this was intended necessarily to be 
precedent-setting. The precedent, of course, has been that 
administrations, Republican and Democratic, have discussed with 
Republican and Democratic Congresses the timing and conditions under 
which these would be sent forward. We did not believe that had been 
accomplished this time. The administration's perspective was that there 
had not been

[[Page 5673]]

response to their attempts to do so. Whatever the reasons, the answer 
to your question is we do not believe at this point in time that this 
is precedent for the two pending agreements.
  But I don't want to by that response represent, if we were confronted 
with the same set of conditions, that is, that we did not reach 
agreement on how those agreements were moving forward, that this might 
not be again something that might be considered. But it is not 
precedent.
  Mr. BLUNT. I hear your answer and the explanation of your answer, and 
I understand that.
  On the supplemental defense budget that we talked about last week, it 
would seem that during this period of time between now and the work 
period at home during Memorial Day, that the supplemental budget will 
move. I think last week it was your anticipation that it might move in 
committee as early as this week. That didn't happen. I also read this 
week that following the Petraeus-Crocker testimony, that a number of 
Members, including the chairman of the House Defense Appropriations 
Subcommittee, indicated that they thought that this supplemental would 
have not only extraneous spending, but also some restrictive language. 
Have you had any further discussions about either timing or whether 
this supplemental will get, in my opinion, bogged down and held back by 
any restrictive language?
  I yield to the gentleman.
  Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  First, let me say that last week, and I would reiterate the comment, 
I don't think I spoke to when the committee would move on it. What I 
did say was that hopefully the supplemental would be on the floor 
either the last week in April or the first week in May. I don't think 
that I referenced the committee consideration of that. I still believe 
that is the case.
  With respect to your second question as to what might be on the 
supplemental, obviously it has not been marked up in committee. There 
are discussions, as have been reported in the public press, with 
respect to either language that might be appended to that by the 
committee or by the House itself. I would not want to preclude that 
effort.
  I want to say that it is my understanding that the President has made 
a comment today again that what I sent you and the dollar I sent you, 
not a penny more will I sign.
  I will tell my friend, I don't think that is particularly useful. It 
continues to say from the President of the United States to the 
Congress of the United States, which is, after all, the policymaking 
body of this country under the Constitution, ``What I propose you take, 
or we'll leave it. We'll not do anything other.''
  I would hope to have discussions on this. As you know, the economy is 
in crisis. It is very nice to give money to Iraq. As you know, I 
support funding our troops. Having said that, we have people in crisis 
in housing, we have people in crisis in jobs, we have people in crisis 
without health care, and we have people in crisis with their 
educational expenses. We have a lot of people in this country who are 
in trouble.
  We think that they need to know that the Congress of the United 
States is responding to their issues as well as to the issues that the 
President brings up with respect to Iraq.
  So I don't want to commit us to simply doing exactly what the 
President asks, or apparently thinks he can tell us to do. We don't 
think that is the process.

                              {time}  1645

  Mr. BLUNT. Well, I thank the gentleman for that. I would say that my 
sense of that is that the troop supplemental should be that, and that 
we should be willing to work together on these other issues, as we did 
the stimulus package earlier this year. That's a package that the tax 
provisions are already beginning to have some impact. The rebate 
provisions will begin to have impact when people get their money in 
May, June and July.
  But I think we proved, with that effort to work together, that when 
both sides decide we want to make something happen, we don't have to 
use the troop funding or any other issue. We just have to get together 
and make something happen. I think that would be, generally, the view 
on this side of the House about how to move forward on those two 
issues, and we can and will probably debate this for some time.
  One of the issues that puts people in crisis, we saw a discussion on 
the floor today, a bill out of transportation that dealt with beach 
nutrition. Many of our Members thought that the Transportation 
Committee and the Energy Committee would be better spending their time 
focused on gasoline prices, which are $1 higher today, per gallon, on 
the average, than they were a year ago today. And I wonder if the 
gentleman has any sense of when we might see some legislation on the 
floor that would deal with gasoline prices.
  Mr. HOYER. Well, of course, as you know, we have passed legislation 
that's still pending in the Senate. In addition to that, as you know, 
gas prices in January 2001 were $1.46, on average, in this country. 
They're now, on average, $3.30, so they've more than doubled during the 
last 87 months of this administration. We're concerned about that, as I 
know you are as well. The public would like to have $1.46 gas, I'm 
sure, back. And we are concerned about that.
  We're concerned about energy independence. We all know that it's 
going to be very tough in the short term on both sides, it's recognized 
in the short term, to do something on gas prices, given where we are 
today from that $1.46 where we were in January of 2001.
  Having said that, this bill that was on the floor today was an 
important bill. It was an important bill to a Member on your side of 
the aisle, and you and I had the opportunity to talk to him about it. 
It was a bipartisan bill. It's a bill that we thought had merit. And, 
as a matter of fact, my expectation is that overwhelming numbers of the 
House are going to vote for it when it comes up for final passage.
  But, clearly, gasoline prices, gasoline, energy independence, which 
is a critical component of why we are in the position of having to pay 
such high prices, because we don't have great alternatives, getting 
more efficient automobiles, using alternative energy sources, providing 
for renewable fuels, as you know, I think you and I, I know you and I 
were both down when we presented the President with a bill that was 
signed by him at the Energy Department. We in a bipartisan way moved 
towards that last year on bills that we passed in a bipartisan way.
  Mr. BLUNT. The debate today, I thought, was important and, you know, 
certainly, the numbers you cited about what's happened in the last 7 
years, I don't fault those numbers at all. But we took a lot of 
responsibility for all of that when we were in the majority. And I 
haven't seen anything coming from this majority that would have stopped 
that $1 increase we've seen since the majority changed. I just hope we 
can work together to do that. And some of it's shorter term rather than 
longer.
  Our long-term energy needs are clearly going to be met with some 
long-term solutions. But things that encourage more production here, 
more and better use of the fuel sources we have as we develop 
alternatives, I think, are part of that solution. I hope that the 
Energy and Commerce Committee and the Transportation Committee both are 
encouraged by both sides of the aisle to get some legislation to the 
floor that would let us deal with that. And I hope that happens sooner 
rather than later.
  Actually, the debate today may have related more to the committee 
than it did the bill, but I thought it was a debate that the American 
people want to see us have on the floor of the House.

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