Providing For Further Consideration Of H.R. 1, American Recovery And Reinvestment Act Of 2009
Floor Speech
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Mr. STEARNS. Madam Speaker, thank you very much.
I will be using most of my arguments from the Congressional Budget Office cost estimate dated January 26, 2009. The CBO and the Joint Committee on Taxation estimated that enacting the provisions in division B would reduce revenues by $76 billion in fiscal year 2009, by $131 billion in fiscal year 2010, and by a net of $212 billion over the 2009-2010 period.
So combining the spending and revenue effects of H.R. 1, the CBO estimates that enacting the bill would increase the Federal budget deficit by over $170 billion over the remaining months of the fiscal year 2009, by $356 billion in the year 2010 and $174 billion in 2011, and it continues on, $816 billion over the period 2009 to 2019.
There is a wide range of Federal programs here which increase the benefits payable under the Medicaid unemployment compensation nutrition assistance program, and the legislation would also reduce individual and corporate income tax collections and make a variety of other changes to tax laws. This is basically an unfunded mandate.
CBO anticipates that this bill would have a noticeable impact on economic growth and employment in the next few years. Following long-standing congressional budget procedures, this estimate does not address the potential budget effects of such changes in economic outlook. But the point that the CBO is making is that this is a huge unfunded mandate, particularly in the Medicaid and unemployment compensation and nutrition assistance program.
So with that, Madam Speaker, in light of the provisions in the bill and the amendments made in order by the rule, are, therefore, in violation of section 426 of the Congressional Budget Act, I do, Madam Speaker, raise this point of order.
I reserve the balance of my time.
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Mr. STEARNS. Madam Speaker, if I may continue, the distinguished chairwoman of the Rules Committee has indicated that this point of order would eliminate debate and not offer the opportunity to Members to really discuss the rule at all. But I would like to say to her, and she was in the Rules Committee when I came out to present my amendment, when the Energy and Commerce Committee marked up that portion of the stimulus package, we were in session for 12 hours. During that time we had six amendments accepted on the Republican minority side.
It turns out that all six of these amendments were agreed to unanimously by the majority. When the bill went to print and when I went to the Rules Committee, I found my amendment was not included, and neither was the gentleman from Pennsylvania, Mr. MURPHY's or Mr. Blunt's. Three of the amendments were not included, and we questioned how could this be that out of a full markup of Energy and Commerce Committee, we passed six amendments and only three were put in. Yet the Speaker's office had a sheet, a fact sheet, which indicated that all six amendments were put in the bill and all six of these amendments show the bipartisan-ness of this stimulus package.
Now I think what happened on the Energy and Commerce Committee happened in the Ways and Means Committee and it happened in Appropriations Committee. So this, in fact, stimulus package is not bipartisan.
Reading from the Office of Speaker Nancy Pelosi, her fact sheet of January 27, 2009, she says this is a bipartisan, open and transparent legislative process. It is not, Madam Speaker. The amendments that came out of Energy and Commerce, 50 percent were dropped arbitrarily, capriciously, without any comment from the minority.
Now one of those amendments, which was mine, indicated if you are going to give federal subsidies for COBRA, which is unemployment compensation for individuals in America, why give them to people who have a net worth of $1 million or $100 million?
There was no threshold in this bill. So, I basically said, if you're going to give COBRA subsidies, that is you're asking to have the taxpayers pay 65 percent of the COBRA for anybody unemployed, including a man who, for example, left Lehman Brothers or Bernie Madoff; all those people who, under the Democrats' position in the stimulus package, would be able to apply for COBRA subsidies and have the taxpayers in my home county have to pay for their health benefits.
They are asking the taxpayers to pay 65 percent almost indefinitely. And I basically said this should not apply to people that are making $100 million, $10 million, or have a net worth of that amount. And, Mr. Waxman, who is the chairman of the Energy and Commerce, was kind enough to say, I agree with you, and that should be part of the bill. So my amendment was agreed to.
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Mr. STEARNS. I thank the distinguished Member. That is absolutely true. And I think, as he clearly points out, I think we should really ask the distinguished chairwoman of the Rules Committee, why were, in this case, three amendments that were agreed upon in Energy and Commerce, why were they dropped from the print?
And, perhaps if she can't, then I think really the Speaker, whose office this fact sheet came from, should clearly tell us why she dropped amendments that were passed through the democratic process here in the House of Representatives of the United States of America. Yet, they have a fact sheet saying they are still in here. She uses the word ``bipartisan'' when you can't say it's bipartisan if, in my case, my amendment is not in there. It was agreed upon. And others in the Energy and Commerce, their amendments are not here as well.
So I would be glad to yield time to the distinguished chairwoman of the Rules Committee to find out why these amendments, after they were passed overwhelmingly in the Energy and Commerce Committee, are not in the print.
The distinguished chairwoman of the Rules Committee, does she wish to answer?
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