Full-Year Continuing Appropriations Act, 2011

Floor Speech

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Mrs. CAPPS. Madam Chairwoman, I move to strike the last word.

The Acting CHAIR. The gentlewoman from California is recognized for 5 minutes.

Mrs. CAPPS. Madam Chair, I am troubled to be on the floor this afternoon.

Americans still are facing staggering unemployment rates, and our economy has not yet fully recovered; but instead of talking about the many ways we can generate jobs, especially clean-energy jobs that can't be shipped overseas and about ways to improve the health of American families, we have an extreme piece of legislation before us.

Americans all agree that fiscal discipline is a must, but special interests giveaways and legislative earmarks to protect big polluters won't balance our checkbook. Putting health protection on the chopping block means dirtier air, dirtier water, and more children's lives at risk. One of the most egregious legislative earmarks in the bill would block the EPA from doing its job, which is to protect our health from air pollution.

Madam Chair, not allowing the EPA to address carbon pollution under the Clean Air Act is flat-out dangerous. Climate change is a serious problem. The scientific evidence is clear. The debate is over. Climate change is real. It is happening--and human beings are largely to blame.

2010 was the hottest year on record. In the last decade, the Earth experienced nine of the 10 hottest years since data has been recorded. We are also starting to see the irreversible damage to our economy and to our environment. Sea levels are rising. Acidification is happening in our oceans. The world is witnessing increased rainfall, floods, droughts, and wildfires; and our fresh water supplies and capacity to grow enough food will be severely challenged in the years ahead.

Madam Chair, the longer we delay taking action to address climate change, the more difficult and expensive the solutions will be. That is why the EPA is taking a cautious, flexible, and balanced approach to addressing carbon pollution. Each of the steps it has taken so far has followed the letter of the law. For four decades, the Clean Air Act has protected the health of millions of Americans, including our children, our seniors and the most vulnerable among us, from all kinds of dangerous air pollutants. The law also has a tremendous track record in providing certainty to businesses and delivering economic benefits.

Since the Clean Air Act was enacted, overall, air pollution has dropped while the U.S. GDP has risen 207 percent. We have also seen major health benefits, including asthma reduction, lower lung cancer rates, and much greater productivity. In fact, by 2020, the benefits of the Clean Air Act are expected to reach $2 trillion, exceeding any cost by more than 30 to 1.

All of these benefits, Madam Chair, are jeopardized by this dangerous rollback of the Clean Air Act included in the Republican omnibus spending bill.

And that's why groups, many groups ranging from the American Lung Association to the American Sustainable Business Council, have decried the harm of this proposal to people's health and our economy. And it's why I stand with them today in opposing the extreme earmarks to gut the Clean Air Act. This sweeping proposal has many impacts. It would block new construction. It tampers with the clean car agreement between the automakers, the States, and the Obama administration. And it would stop the renewable fuels standard in its track.

Madam Chair, our constituents want us to create jobs and to stand up for the health of our families. They don't want us to stand with the big polluters. This attack just doesn't make sense.

Last month, President Obama stood on the House floor and talked about "winning the future" through innovation, and he used clean energy as his central example. We know that clean energy will put Americans to work. It will help our economy grow, and it will help America compete in a global marketplace. Let's create jobs by investing in cleaner forms of energy. Let's not obstruct the EPA from doing its job of protecting the public's health and environment.

These are crucial issues, Madam Chair, for the public and the planet. It's our duty here in this place to ensure both are protected from harmful carbon pollution. Unfortunately, this extreme legislation does not meet this crucial test. Congress should be investing in America's future, not moving backwards.

So I urge my colleagues to say "no" to this irresponsible omnibus with all of its reckless spending cuts.

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Mrs. CAPPS. Madam Chair, I move to strike the last word.

The Acting CHAIR. The gentlewoman from California is recognized for 5 minutes.

Mrs. CAPPS. Madam Chair, I rise to speak in strong support of the Lowey amendment reinstating the funding for the title X program, which supports family planning services for all of our constituents. While we all agree on the need to reduce spending, it is just bad policy to eliminate a proven, successful program that saves the taxpayer money and provides critical health care services for our mothers, our sisters, our friends. This is bad policy.

The title X program, the only Federal program devoted to family planning, is the core of the public effort to ensure that all women, regardless of income, have the knowledge and health care they need to plan for their families. Its flexible grant funds not only help pay for direct client services but also help to ensure that State and local governments and nonprofit organizations across the country can place safety net clinics in the communities that need them the most. These clinics are the primary source of health care for millions of low-income American women.

By helping women and couples plan and space their pregnancies, family planning services have led to healthier mothers and children and have been instrumental in the long struggle for women's equality in education, the workforce, and society.

In light of the economic downturn, the freedom that the title X program has given to women in the workforce is particularly important. But this program hasn't just been successful for the over 4 1/2 million Americans who use it every year. It has been successful for the American taxpayer, as every dollar spent on this program saves our Nation nearly $4 in return.

In light of the important role that family planning has played in health care and society, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has called family planning one of the top 10 greatest public health achievements of the 20th century, alongside other critical breakthroughs like vaccinations and the campaigns against smoking.

Over 40 years ago, title X family planning funding was enacted on a unanimous vote in the Senate and by an overwhelming majority in the House. When signed into law, then-President Richard Nixon said it fulfilled a promise that "no American woman should be denied access to family planning assistance because of her economic condition."

How far we have come from that time to this day, when we have the research to prove that a program works, and yet the House Republican leadership has recklessly decided to cut it completely. Eliminating title X now would be a devastating blow to the health, the security, and the dreams of millions of American women and their families, denying 5 million women preventive care, including annual exams, lifesaving cancer screenings, contraceptive services, and testing and treatment for sexually transmitted infection.

If Members of Congress really want to reduce our Federal deficit, we would double funding for family planning, which studies have shown could save the taxpayers nearly $2 billion per year. And yet, for some reason, my friends on the other side of the aisle seem to believe that cutting this program, defunding a program that actually saves Americans money and improves the health, improves the health of millions of Americans, that somehow this is a good idea.

For those Members who oppose title X funding, I ask you: How do you plan to ensure that the women in your district and your State have access to lifesaving prevention services? This sham of a Republican omnibus spending bill contains no answers to these questions, just broken promises for the American people.

Let's be clear. A vote against title X is a vote for unintended pregnancies. A vote against title X is a vote for the spread of sexually transmitted diseases and HIV. A vote against title X is a vote for increased rate of cervical cancer and breast cancer if caught late or if at all. And a vote against title X is a vote for increased abortion rates.

While I would like to think of this as an oversight, it is not the first attack to women's access to health care that has been seen in the 112th Congress. Combined with the mean-spirited bills moving through House committees that reopen the culture wars, it is obvious that this extreme and reckless proposal by the Republican majority to defund title X clinics is just the next step in an all-out Republican assault on women's health.

This Congress should be focused on creating jobs for the millions of moms working to put food on the table, not attacking their rights and their health.

I urge my colleagues to support the Lowey amendment to add some common sense to this omnibus spending bill.

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