Progressive Caucus
Floor Speech
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Mr. POCAN. Mr. Speaker, I am glad to be here on behalf of the Progressive Caucus Special Order hour. We are going to be talking about the budget. Everyone is talking about the budget, the Paul Ryan Republican budget, the Democratic budget, the Progressive Caucus budget, and other budgets that we have had before us.
We have our own version of a budget. The Progressive Caucus has the Better Off Budget. It is a budget that invests in the economy, creates 8.8 million jobs, and does a tremendous job of dealing with issues that are at the forefront of what America needs to deal with.
But we have a huge contrast in the budget that we have in this body before us that the Republicans have introduced that we will be voting on this week, tomorrow, in this very body. Tonight we would like to have a little talk about that.
As you look at the Better Off Budget in blue versus the GOP budget, the Better Off Budget creates 8.8 million jobs by investing in infrastructure, investing in our schools, and investing in energy, and a number of programs across the country.
On the contrast, the Republican budget actually costs the economy 3.1 million jobs. That is as many people as the entire workforce of the State of Wisconsin getting fired in a simple budget.
One of the biggest issues about the budget is what we are doing about jobs and the economy. We have been told by the Congressional Budget Office that the number one issue this year, the number one thing that causes our deficit, three-quarters of the deficit in 2014, is caused by economic weakness, in other words, unemployment and underemployment. Our budget directly addresses that, and the GOP budget does just the opposite. It is an austerity budget.
I would like to yield some time to one of my colleagues, a strong member of the Progressive Caucus, an outstanding Member of our California delegation. I would like to yield some time to Mr. Alan Lowenthal.
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Mr. POCAN. Again, thank you, Mr. Lowenthal, for your service, for your hard work on this budget, and for all you do for the people of California.
When we talk about those discretionary funds, it is interesting because, when we had the sequester that made a huge cut to these programs and that affected people in all of our States, the Paul Ryan Republican budget doubles down on these sequester cuts, and it makes even deeper cuts in a number of areas.
I just want to go through a little bit of a chart. Unfortunately, I found out that I can't use a marker on the House floor because that is against the rules, so we are going to use this in a little bit of a different way, to try to have you take a look at this and decide where the difference is and who winds up winning on the side of the GOP Paul Ryan budget and the Congressional Progressive Caucus Better Off Budget. I just want to go through a few examples of programs that would matter.
Let's start with unemployed workers. Let's take a look at the two budgets. When you look at the Better Off Budget, as I showed before, 8.8 million jobs are created by the Better Off Budget. In the Republican budget, according to the Economic Policy Institute, it would cut 3 million jobs by the year 2016.
If you are someone who is unemployed, the Better Off Budget would make sure we extend emergency unemployment benefits. The GOP budget is silent--crickets. There is absolutely nothing to help people who--in a tough economy and who have worked hard all of their lives and who have played by the rules--have lost their benefits.
SNAP, for people who are getting help on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or food stamps, by and large, two-thirds of those people are children, seniors, and people with severe disabilities.
If you add the working poor, you are at 92 percent of the people who receive these benefits. The Democrats restore the cuts that happened this year in the farm bill and previous cuts to the program. $31.50 a week is what someone was making on the SNAP program to help him in getting by with food. We know this program is one of the best programs to help lift people out of poverty, and we restore that funding.
What does the Paul Ryan budget do? You may remember the debate that we had on the farm bill. Originally, the Republicans wanted to cut the SNAP program by about $20 billion, and they couldn't get enough votes because Republicans wanted to cut it even more, so they finally cut it by $39 billion.
Now, when we got to the conference committee with the Senate, we were able to get that down to $8 billion of cuts, but these are cuts to, as I mentioned, children, seniors, people with severe disabilities, and the working poor--two-thirds of whom are seniors, children, and people with severe disabilities.
What does the Paul Ryan budget do? Does it cut the $20 billion that they couldn't pass originally? No. Does it cut the $39 billion like the Republicans ultimately passed? Oh, no, as it was not nearly enough.
There is a $125 billion cut to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program in the Paul Ryan Republican budget.
Let's take a look at that for jobs. It costs 3 million jobs. It does nothing for the long-term unemployment extension, and it cuts assistance to the needy by $125 billion. I would say that the Progressive Caucus Democratic budget, by far, would win out in that category.
Let's next look at education. We have got pre-K, K-12, and college students. Let's look at each of these areas. The Better Off Budget invests $100 million into a stimulus for teachers and schools, so that we can help do what we need to in order to be competitive globally.
We need to be investing in our students through our teachers and our schools. We provide funding to rehire teachers who have lost their jobs through the bad economy in the last several years. We invest in early childhood development, which is crucial for someone to get a fair start in life, and we invest in job training. That is what the Congressional Progressive Caucus Better Off Budget includes.
What does the Republican budget include? Let's start with pre-K. In pre-K, there is an $18 billion cut to early education programs. Right off the bat, are they investing more? There is an $18 billion cut. Once again, the Progressive Caucus budget leads us.
Next, on K-12, in which we invest in the hiring of teachers and invest in our schools, what does the Republican budget do? In the Republican budget, if you have a child in K-12 public education in this country, there is an $89 billion cut.
Again, $89 billion in cuts or investing in our teachers and schools? Once again, the Congressional Progressive Caucus budget outdoes the Republican budget.
How about college students? This is where you are going to see some really big differences. We invest in the very financial aid programs that people need. We invest in higher education because, in order to be competitive in a global economy, we have to have the most talented, the smartest, the most innovative people we can possibly have in the economy to create the jobs we need to for the future.
What does the Republican budget do? It cuts $205 billion in higher education services--$205 billion--and I am not even counting Pell grants. Pell grants, which help some of our neediest students get access to higher education, get a $145 billion cut. We are talking, overall, just in higher education, almost $350 billion.
We invest more in those educational opportunities, and the Republican budget cuts over $350 billion. Overall, in those three areas in education alone, the Republicans cut $871 billion to education. That is what we do for middle class families and those aspiring to be in the middle class in the budget that this House will very likely pass tomorrow.
Let's look at the next category, seniors. Seniors, you have put your entire lives into this country, and you have worked all of your lives. You expect to have a retirement that you have invested in, and you have put your hours in.
What is the difference in the budgets? The Congressional Progressive Caucus budget does a number of things. One, we protect Social Security and Medicare. We make future investments in those programs. We protect funding in the Medicaid program.
We allow Medicare to negotiate for better prescription drug prices, so that seniors can pay less on drugs that they have to pay a larger percent of their income on, so that they can get by in those years, and we help, overall, in putting America on a path towards offering a single-payer option.
What does the Republican budget do when it comes to seniors? First of all, they end Medicare as we know it. Under the Republican budget, you now have a voucher program. You don't get Medicare. You get a voucher, something you can trade in, hopefully, for something in the future, which will very likely be a cut in the very health care that you have now and that you receive.
They increase the costs for seniors on prescription drugs by reopening the doughnut hole, which is going to cost seniors $4.1 billion extra on prescription drugs. Seniors are going to pay more for the prescription drugs they need.
They raise the Medicare eligibility age to 67, and they put seniors who rely on Medicaid at risk because they are making big cuts to the Medicaid program, $732 billion in cuts to the Medicaid program.
Once again, for seniors, it is cuts, it is paying more for prescription drugs, and it is putting you at risk through the Medicaid and Medicare program. The Democrats and the Progressive Caucus protect all of those programs that the seniors rely on so very much.
Our next group, the vets; they have served our country with distinction. If it weren't for the veterans we have, we wouldn't be able to protect the very liberties and freedoms that we have as a citizenry.
What does the Progressive Caucus budget do? We adopt a cost-of-living adjustment that takes into account realistic retiree expenses, and we fully fund veterans programs in advance.
We are protecting the programs, so that they have the guarantee to the veterans, the guarantee that they have promised to them, as they have put their time in for this country. We protect those very programs to ensure that they will have those programs in the future.
With the Republicans, we hear a lot of lip service about veterans and about protecting veterans, especially around Memorial Day and Veterans' Day, but the proof is in the budget.
What do the Republicans do? By 2016, the Republicans actually cut funding for veterans by $1.7 billion. Now, we saw what they did back in the budget in December when they cut the pensions for families who are in the military, but now, in their budget in 2016, there is an additional $1.7 billion cut to veterans.
This is the sort of lip service that you get when a holiday comes up and when we show up. The reality is when we vote on it on this floor.
Once again, for veterans, they lose money under the Republican budget, and in our budget, we protect programs that veterans deserve.
The middle class, what does our budget have for the middle class, and what does the Republican budget have for the middle class?
There are a couple of things around taxes. One of the things that we have been very careful to do is to get rid of some of the tax loopholes that benefit special interests.
There are tax breaks for Big Oil and Big Gas and tax breaks that go to companies that send jobs overseas, which doesn't even make any sense, yet we incentivize those very companies that send those jobs overseas rather than create jobs in America.
We protect middle class taxpayers by going back to the Clinton-era tax rates for households who make more than $250,000, and we add new brackets at $1 million. That allows us to bring in revenues from those who can most afford to, but protecting the very middle class that are the backbone of this economy.
By doing that--and protecting health care, seniors, education, investing in infrastructure for the very roads and services that people count on--we are doing everything we can to protect the middle class. This is one area where the distinction could not be more clear.
The Republicans have given a lot of lip service about trying to protect the middle class. Once again, the proof is in their budget. The budget shows their real values.
What does it do? It lowers the top tax rate down to 25 percent. Do you know what percent of taxpayers are in that top bracket? Less than one-half of 1 percent.
So when Chairman Ryan described the budget in the Budget Committee, which I serve on--we spent 10 1/2 hours last Wednesday debating the budget--he said the budget was a win-win.
Well, if he meant it was a win for the top 1 percent and a win for the second percentile, I will agree. The other 98 percent of us pay for those two wins that are out there.
By lowering that rate to 25 percent, that gives the average millionaire a $200,000 tax break. Millionaires get big, big tax breaks.
How do you pay for that? Well, there is only one way: you are going to have to put the taxes onto the backs of the middle class. It is estimated it would be about $2,000 per middle class family to pay for those wealthiest few in the Nation.
So when it comes to the middle class, there is no question our budget does more for the middle class, and the Republican budget is a direct attack on the middle class by what we are able to do by making them pay for the very tax breaks that the wealthiest have put out there.
When you look at all this, there is one group that wins at the very bottom. I mentioned millionaires and billionaires. I have to give that edge to the Republican budget. You are going to get a great tax break--a great big check from Uncle Sam--at the courtesy of the middle class taxpayers in this country.
That is the only winner under the Republican budget. Clearly, in every other category, the Progressive Caucus and the Democratic budgets are superior to that budget introduced by the Republicans.
You are going to hear how it balances the budget in 10 years. That is the only talking point the Republicans have. They don't want to talk about the specifics because they lose in every single category, but the one thing that they claim they have is that they balance the budget in 10 years.
They don't mention it is on the backs of the middle class, but they say they are going to balance the budget in 10 years. Well, I wish their math were only as accurate as their rhetoric because the math simply doesn't add up. Let me tell you why. Let me give you one big glaring example of why the budget doesn't add up.
The Republican budget repeals the benefits of the Affordable Care Act, so it repeals all the positive things like the fact that, when you go to get insurance, if you have a preexisting condition, you now can get access.
You have got preventive care provided, so we can save long-term health costs. You don't have a lifetime cap on your insurance. Your children can stay on your policy until they are 26.
All these benefits were incorporated in the Affordable Care Act, and we just saw the success from the enrollment numbers. Millions of more people have access to health care.
It repeals those benefits, but get this: it keeps the revenues and the savings of the Affordable Care Act in order to make the numbers balance out for that allegedly 10-year balancing of the budget.
It doesn't take much more than a fourth-grader to understand that doesn't work out. You can't repeal a program, but still keep the revenue and the savings from that program, but the Republicans are trying to pass that off. They are trying to sell you a bill of goods.
Do you know how much that bill of goods is, that fuzzy math? Two trillion dollars is the amount that they are using in fuzzy math to try to claim their budget balances in 10 years. It doesn't take a lot to poke the holes in the fact that their budget doesn't balance out.
If their budget doesn't balance out, it doesn't benefit the middle class, and it only benefits the wealthiest, we have a really bad budget that this House will be voting on tomorrow. We are going to do everything we can to make sure that that budget doesn't pass.
I think one really important note that people have to realize from all that we describe that is in that budget is, even if it doesn't become the law of the land--thankfully, we have the Senate and the President still--it is the roadmap that the Republicans have if they were to take control.
If they were to keep the House of Representatives, if they were to take the U.S. Senate, if they were to take the Presidency, this is the fourth year in a row they have laid out this essential roadmap--this roadmap that benefits the top 1 or 2 percent and that every other person--every other American has to pay to subsidize those people.
We lose those important programs in health care and education, for veterans and for the unemployed and those struggling to get by in our society.
There is a very clear distinction between what the Democrats and the Progressive Caucus have put out as our budget that we have put forth to the American people and what the Republicans are actually offering.
They have warmed over austerity. Again, cuts, cuts, cuts will somehow make the economy work, and that is simply impossible to happen.
What I would like to do, at this time, is introduce another Member of the Progressive Caucus who has been a very hard worker on behalf of the middle class, not just in his district in the State of Pennsylvania, but across the country.
I yield to Representative Matt Cartwright from the great State of Pennsylvania.
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Mr. POCAN. Thank you, again, Mr. Cartwright. The work you have done on behalf of the people not just of Scranton--I have heard you mention Scranton many times on the floor--but for all of Pennsylvania and the entire country, thank you for all your efforts. I really appreciate that.
In closing, for this part of the Progressive Caucus Special Order hour, I just want to hit the main point again when it comes to the budget.
We all know that the top three issues facing this country are jobs, jobs, jobs. There is such a difference between what the Democrats and the Progressives have proposed and what the Republicans have proposed.
Again, the Better Off Budget for the Progressive Caucus shows an 8.8 million increase in the number of jobs in this country. We invest in our infrastructure. We invest in our schools. We invest in job training. We create 8.8 million jobs.
The Republican budget, according to the Economic Policy Institute, would cost this country 3.1 million jobs. Those 3.1 million jobs are as many people as we have working in the entire State of Wisconsin. Think about firing every single person in the State of Wisconsin. That is the job loss that would come out of the Republican budget.
So it is an honor tonight to talk on behalf of the Progressive Caucus and our budget and to highlight the many problems that we are going to have tomorrow when this body votes on the Republican budget.
Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
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