Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2012

Floor Speech

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Ms. CASTOR of Florida. I rise in strong opposition to the underlying bill and in support of the DeLauro amendment.

Mr. Chairman, hardworking families all across America have been whipsawed in recent years by Wall Street and special interests who have had free rein to place bets on mortgages and place bets on future oil prices. And you know what? We fought back. We fought back, and we passed a Wall Street reform law that outlaws risky financial practices by banks and lenders and that protects consumers.

Taxpayers should never, ever again be left on the hook for Wall Street's reckless actions, and yet my GOP colleagues propose to do just that with this bill, let Wall Street off the hook and put consumers and our economy at risk again. This bill significantly cuts the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. The CFTC is a major piece of the landmark Wall Street reform law because the law put cops back on the financial beat into areas where the financial industry was left largely unsupervised. And you know who suffered because of that? American families suffered the firsthand consequences of an unsupervised and unregulated Wall Street.

And now they're proposing a real double whammy to the American family, because my GOP colleagues are pairing their push to put consumers at risk and threaten their economic security with their GOP plan to end Medicare as we know it and undermine retirement security.

I would have hoped that we would have all learned a lesson and that you do not return to the policies of the past that led to the financial meltdown and the economic hardship for all Americans, but it appears that some have not learned that lesson.

And you have to ask why, why are we trying to go back to the same policies that led to the meltdown and led to such pain all across the country that started back in 2007?

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Mr. Chairman, we need to ask ourselves: Who is being represented here in the Nation's capital? Do we come to this House to represent the people or do we come here to represent the special interests and the high-flying financiers of Wall Street who have already caused so much damage to this economy?

The financial meltdown caused many people to lose their life savings, their pensions, their homes. I have had six foreclosure prevention workshops since 2008 in Florida. These were largely middle class Americans, our neighbors, and we are here to fight for them and not for those who caused the damage to the economy.

But do you know what?

Since January, under this new majority, day after day, we have to come to the floor of the House to fight the misguided agenda of the majority that wants to roll back policies that are beneficial to the middle class--roll back Wall Street reform and end Medicare as we know it. Big Oil gets to keep its tax break, and companies still get breaks for exporting jobs overseas.

Meanwhile, the GOP majority has not brought one bill to create jobs across our great country, and instead thinks it is wise to undermine the economic and retirement security for American families, end Medicare as we know it, and roll back consumer protections under Wall Street reform--take the cops off the beat.

Mr. Chairman, I think it is time for Representatives to represent their neighbors back home, to get their priorities in order--to represent these hardworking American families and put their interests before the special interests on Wall Street.

I yield back the balance of my time.

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