Legislative Program
Floor Speech
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Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the minority whip for yielding.
Mr. Speaker, I will say that the House will meet at 12 p.m. for morning-hour debate and 2 p.m. for legislative business, with votes postponed until 6:30 p.m. on Monday next.
On Tuesday and Wednesday, the House will meet at 10 a.m. for morning- hour debate and 12 p.m. for legislative business.
Mr. Speaker, on Thursday, the House will meet at 9 a.m. for legislative business, with last votes of the week expected no later than 3 p.m. We will consider several bills under suspension of the rules. The complete list of suspensions will be announced by the close of business today.
Mr. Speaker, the House will consider H.R. 2546, Protecting America's Wilderness Act. This bill is a package of lands bill out of the Committee on Natural Resources and would designate 1.3 million acres as wilderness or potential wilderness areas, preserving these public lands for the benefit of current and future generations.
In addition, Mr. Speaker, the House will consider H.J. Res. 79, Removing the Deadline for the Ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment. This bill would remove the deadline to ratify the ERA, paving the way for it to be added to the Constitution and taking a historic step forward for women's equality.
Mr. Speaker, I would add this is not an adoption of an assumption, that, in fact, the 38 States who have ratified to date have not ratified within the framework of the Constitution, and, therefore, that amendment should in fact be judged to have been adopted.
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Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, the answer to the gentleman's question is yes. And indeed--as I think the gentleman probably knows--the leaders of the relevant committees, Mr. Neal and Mr. DeFazio--Mr. Neal on the funding side, Mr. DeFazio on the substantive side of the policy with respect to infrastructure and transportation and other items that we think need to be included in infrastructure.
We met with the President of the United States in April. Mr. Speaker, I will tell the gentleman, it is probably the most positive meeting that I have had with the President and that other members in the group had. This was Democrats and then the Secretary of Transportation was also there, Ms. Chao.
And we talked about our joint commitment to infrastructure investment. We had suggested, as the President suggested during his campaign, that our target be $1 trillion over 10 years. In other words, a $100 billion a year, or on average, investment in infrastructure so that we will not only create a lot of American jobs, but also assure ourselves of being competitive with our competitors around the world in the 21st century.
The President responded that he thought $1 trillion was too little and suggested a $2 trillion investment, i.e., doubling the $100 billion to $200 billion on average per year over 10 years. And we had discussion about that. We indicated that we agreed with the President that such an investment would be warranted, and productive and, frankly, grow the economy and therefore be an investment and not simply an expenditure.
Mr. Neal made the point, Mr. Speaker, that the President--if we would give him some direction on what he could support in terms of funding that investment. And I made the observation, I said to him, ``Mr. President, neither in the Senate nor the House will Republicans or Democrats support that big of an investment if you are not leading. To which he responded to me, Mr. Whip, ``Steny, I agree with you.''
We then scheduled a meeting to be held--we thought--3 weeks, but it was some 5 or 6 weeks later. And unfortunately, for whatever reason-- both sides have their thoughts as to why--the President came to the meeting and said he was not prepared to meet. And we have not had that meeting since.
But I will emphatically say to the gentleman, we want to work on infrastructure. We think it is critically important. The President said during the campaign he thought it was critically important. I think your side, both here and on the Senate side, believes infrastructure is important.
So certainly, as I said, yes, we want to see if we could work together to adopt a significant infrastructure package, which we think would be good for the country.
Secondly, let me say that the President also mentioned two other things--one of which was prescription drugs. We had passed a prescription drug bill, H.R. 3. The President sent down a message that he would veto it if it were passed as it was.
What I would suggest, following the regular order, the Senate ought to take it up, change it, amend it--do whatever they feel is appropriate to do--pass it, if they can, and then let us have a conference. Because we have all said that we want to bring down the prescription drug prices.
In fact, the President says he wants to negotiate. We included in H.R. 3 negotiation. The President said he wanted to key prices to our global competitors. In particular, we put six large nations, which are similar to ours, including Australia, Great Britain, Germany, Canada, France--and one other nation--in that calculation. And that we would, in our bill, cap the prices at 120 percent of the average price across those six nations. That was something the President wanted to do.
And he responded to a question about negotiation, saying ``I want to negotiate like crazy.'' He is a businessman. He is a realtor. He knows a lot about negotiation and price. And so I think we have component parts in common.
And my suggestion would be, again, that they take up H.R. 3, which is the prescription drug bill, do what the Senate's will is to do, that we go to conference, and that we discuss differences, harmonize the bills, and pass a bill and send it to the President.
So there is certainly, in my experience of a long time here, that is the way we should get that done. I think that would be positive for the country and I think we could reach consensus, hopefully from the administration, from your party, my party, and pass those two bills to the benefit of the American people.
The last thing I would discuss is the President said he was against preexisting conditions being precluded from getting insurance. We share that view. We have passed a bill over to the Senate that affects that end. The Senate could take that bill up. Again, work on it, do whatever the will of the Senate is to do, go to conference. And assuming that we follow the President's stricture of wanting to ensure that preexisting conditions do not prohibit anybody from getting insurance, we could pass that bill.
So my response is that we pass three bills--or two bills and then infrastructure, which were four--and those are positive items we can work on, and we are prepared to do so.
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Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his comment.
First, let me talk about the prescription drug bill. We did pass a bill that was a compilation of six bills that had five Republican supporters when we voted on it. So there was a bipartisan bill.
Let me suggest we ought not to dismiss however the Senate operates, the way the regular order operates is we pass a bill. Yes, we are in charge, and, like you, we pass bills that we think are important. When you were in the majority, you did the same thing. Some had Democratic votes, some did not. But the Senate had an opportunity to send us back bills.
We have 275 bills that we have done. We think they are all on substantive matters that deal with items that are good for the people, for the American people, and the Senate has not acted on them.
The way the system ought to work is we send our ideas over there; if they have different ideas, they send them back to us, and we go to conference and resolve it. I agree with the gentleman, that is what we ought to do, and I am hopeful that we could do that.
But the bill that we did pass, as I say, was a compilation of seven bills and had five Republicans. But, as you do, five Republicans makes it a bipartisan piece of legislation, and the Senate could send it back with something we don't agree on and try to resolve it because we want to reach that end.
The other bill the gentleman talks about, H.R. 3, the bill that we brought out had improvements to the ACA to make it work for the American people.
Your side, of course, wants to repeal the Affordable Care Act. Our side differs and believes that, in fact, millions of people, not only those who avail themselves of ACA--and, in the short term, it didn't bring down premiums, but it is now starting to bring down premiums, as we thought it would.
The constant assaults on the ACA by people who want to see it repealed have obviously hurt that because it has undermined certainty, which means that the insurers are not certain what the rules are going to be, and, therefore, our view is the premiums are still inflated.
But, again, I would urge the whip to talk to Mr. McConnell and say: Look, we have a lot of bills over there. Pass your version of the bill, send it back and let us work on it, and let's see if we can get to an agreement.
That is how we have done for hundreds of years, and that is the way we ought to continue to do it.
I realize that Mr. McConnell, as any majority leader the Senate has, has challenges in doing that; and what I think, frankly, he does not want to do is get to a bipartisan agreement which will allow passage through the Senate.
We don't have that here, as you know. Your side could pass bills on a partisan basis when you were in charge; we can do the same.
As I say, we had five Republicans agree with us on the bill to which you referred, but I would hope you would urge Senator McConnell to pass our bills.
Senator Braun from Indiana was on TV with Chuck Todd on ``Face the Nation'' talking about impeachment. He said: Let's get through this impeachment and get to the people's business.
I think that was a reasonable proposition. The problem is the Senate is not getting to the people's business. They are not passing their own bills, and they are not passing our bills. In fact, they are spending all their time confirming judges.
We think that has a purpose of making sure that, for the long term, whether they are in the majority or not, they will have an influence on what happens in the United States. I understand that political motivation, but it is impeding us doing the people's business.
Mr. Speaker, Mr. Scalise and I try to work together. I would hope that the Senate would work together so that they could send us back bills of their choice, we can go to conference, and we can make things happen.
This House, last year, passed over 400 pieces of legislation. I don't have the exact number that the Senate has passed of significant bills as opposed to naming post offices or something like that, but it is in the tens, not the hundreds.
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Mr. HOYER. I would simply say, if we reach a consensus in the Congress--we are a coequal, separate branch of government--and whether Obama was President or whether Mr. Trump is President, I am for the Congress acting on that which it agrees.
Is it helpful to have agreement with the President? It is. But if we can't reach agreement with the President, our responsibility as a Congress, the Senate and the House, is to move policies that we believe are advantageous for the people.
If the President disagrees, then we have the option of overriding that veto. It is doubtful that we would do that, I understand. But that is the process that I think is most productive and most expected by the American people.
I would again reiterate, on the bill that you keep saying could have unanimous support, in my opinion, what it would not have in terms of healthcare is support for doing what we so fervently believe needs to be done, and that is to make sure the ACA works as it was intended to do.
If there is an alternative, we should consider that. But, very frankly, neither the President nor your side of the aisle has had agreement on an alternative.
Senator McCain, as you know, was the deciding Republican vote on the last health bill that you sent to the Senate, and you sent that when you were in the majority. It didn't pass, notwithstanding the fact that you also had the majority in the Senate.
Two weeks after you had the celebration at the White House, I was astounded to hear that the President effectively called that a mean bill.
So we do have substantial disagreements. That does not mean that, given the fact that we have a Democratic House, that is, that we are in the majority, and a Republican Senate with the Republicans in the majority--now, I understand the gentleman's concern that it is necessary to get bipartisan agreement in the Senate in order to get that 60-vote threshold. And you and I may agree on the 60-vote threshold of getting bills on the floor. It is one thing to pass something or not.
But, in any event, I would urge the gentleman to urge Mr. McConnell to pass their prescription bill. And if it is what you say and it can be done unanimously, send it over here and we will have a conference. Because both of us have articulated that we are for making sure that prescription drug costs do not price people out of being healthy. So I would urge you to do that.
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Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, starting a State of the Union with a shout of ``four more years'' reminds me more of a rally than a State of the Union.
Clearly, neither the Speaker, nor any of us in any way diminished people that he introduced; some of whom I severely disagree with and thought that the actions taken with respect to that individual were totally inappropriate in a State of the Union because it served further to divide and to undermine any ability to work together.
Having said that, ``four more years'' was disrespectful to this institution.
The recitation in the gentleman's resolution of the honoring of individuals he just reflected had nothing to do with the State of the Union, but had everything to do with honoring people who had done great things, experienced great hardship, who ought to be empathized with; no one was saying those were a lie.
One can interpret the speech for what each believed it was and can say something about it and reflect to the American people what they think of the substance of the representation of the State of the Union.
It had nothing to do with the people who were honored, whether we agreed with them being honored or not. Certainly, I agreed with almost every one of them, save one.
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Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, none of those individuals should take anything that was done personally. In fact, almost every one of those individuals was honored by people on this side of the aisle and that side of the aisle acknowledging them and honoring them with appropriate action.
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