Legislative Program
Floor Speech
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Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for his information, and I appreciate the fact that he has put on there the sustainable growth rate in Medicare budget agreement, which hopefully we can get to, which will be bipartisan in nature and will be balanced and fair as well.
In addition, legislation pertaining to the farm program's farm bill is necessary. It has been in conference for some period of time. Hopefully, we can pass that as well.
I do note, however, with some degree of--actually, I said ``some degree''--with very great disappointment that unemployment insurance extension is not listed by the leader. As the leader knows, 1.3 million people are going to have their unemployment benefits expire, I believe, on December 28. Those people will have no support structure. Very frankly, my own view is they will then go on some other support structure, some sort of welfare payment--SNAP payment, Medicaid--which they may be on already. But, in any event, it will not be at no cost. CBO estimates that it will cost as much as 300,000 jobs if we do not extend unemployment insurance.
We just had a hearing, Mr. Leader, where we had very, very compelling testimony from three people, with respect to--one of whom just found a job on Monday; she was very pleased at that--not only the economic damage that going off unemployment will cost them--and they have been looking for jobs--but also the psychological devastation to them and their families that that would cause.
Does the gentleman have any belief--I understand, and I read somewhere, the gentleman may want to comment on it. Some commented that there was no appetite for extending unemployment insurance on your side of the aisle--but can the gentleman give me any idea of the possibilities for having unemployment insurance extension on the floor so that we cannot see those 1.3 million people dropped off the rolls as of December 28?
I yield to my friend.
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Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for his comment.
We neither have the time nor do I have the inclination to go through each one of those bills to which the gentleman refers as ``jobs bills.'' Of course, we have an alternative; and Mr. Van Hollen will be talking about that in terms of jobs, investment, infrastructure, investment, education, and growing jobs for our people.
But the fact of the matter is, Mr. Speaker, there are 1.3 million people who can't find a job. To say that they will be disincentivized because we continue to give them some support so that they can survive and their families can survive during the period of time that they are looking for a job, there are three people looking for every one job that is available, and most of those jobs that are available have skill sets that, unfortunately, the unemployed have not had.
We are for, on this side, skills training; we are for investing in education. We share the majority leader's view on that; but it is not going to be much solace for them, Mr. Speaker, and their families to say, well, we dropped you off the rolls, you won't be able to pay your mortgage, you won't be able to put food on your table because the Senate hasn't acted.
Whether the Senate should act on the bills in question I think is debatable. I opposed many of those pieces of legislation myself, as did others; but we have a crisis, and that crisis is we have 1.3 million. And that same CBO to which the majority leader referred said that not to pass this extended benefit will, in fact, undermine the economy and could cost as many as 300,000 jobs of people who are working now, but who will not be working because of the lack of resources of those 1.3 million consumers. Whether they are consuming food, housing, clothing, necessities of life, we are going to be undermining jobs in America and our economy. Almost every economist that I have talked to shares that view.
In any event, I want to make it clear to the majority leader that our side will be vigorously opposed and will oppose adjourning of the House as is scheduled on Friday the 13th of this month if, in fact, we have not passed unemployment insurance. We believe that is a critical thing to pass.
We also agree with the majority leader, however, that passing the sustainable growth rate is something that we ought to do before the end of the year. That will expire on December 31. The reimbursement of doctors to serve Medicare patients will be substantially reduced as a result of that. That is bad policy, not only for those on Medicare who are seeking medical services, but it is bad policy for the doctors and medical providers that will serve those people.
So I am pleased that he mentions SGR, the sustainable growth rate, the doc reimbursement, but not pleased that we do not have listed the unemployment insurance. We will be very adamant next week that that needs to be done. I understand that we may have a difference on that, but I want to let the majority leader know that that will be our position.
In addition, I do not see on there the defense authorization bill. I know that that is not the majority leader. We passed the defense authorization bill through here. I am hopeful that the Senate will move on that intelligence authorization.
The Senate has passed, Mr. Speaker, a comprehensive immigration reform bill. They passed it with 68 votes. We are very disappointed on this side of the aisle that the Senate bill has not been put on the floor. Our bill, H.R. 15, which is a bipartisan bill on which there are Republican sponsors of that bill, or one of the four bills that has been reported out of the committee which was supported by the Republican Party in the Judiciary Committee and reported out four bills, they have not been brought to the floor.
We believe that comprehensive immigration reform is a critically important action for this Congress to take this year now. We have options available. We would hope that any one of those three options would be brought to the table, or, if you count four bills, seven options be brought to the floor.
In addition, the Senate has passed in a bipartisan way the ending of discrimination in employment. We talked about jobs; we talked about giving economic opportunity. We ought to do that in a nondiscriminatory way. The Senate has passed such a bill. That is not on the agenda for next week either.
I have an agenda which has a lot of bills on it: Make It In America. I notice we do have a suspension bill that has been specifically referenced. We will get into a debate on that next week, so I won't debate that bill today; but we have a suspension bill that we have been urging that is reported out of committee on voice vote, passed this Congress with, I think, over 350 votes--I know over 300 votes last Congress--that has not been brought to the floor, which simply says that we ought to have a plan and that plan ought to be a plan to expand manufacturing, grow jobs, grow profits, and grow salaries for individuals. And it is Mr. Lipinski's bill. I have been urging that that be put on the suspension calendar. I notice that that has not been put on either.
Trade adjustment assistance and tax extenders have been referenced. Hopefully, we can do all of those. Of course, we have a very short period of time left to do that.
Let me ask the majority leader, given that short time, does the majority leader have a high degree of confidence that, in fact, he will be seeking to follow the calendar that has been set out by the majority leader to end this first session of this Congress, indeed, on the scheduled date of December 13?
And I yield to my friend.
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Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, I am not surprised that the majority leader wants to talk about health care, because much of that legislation he has talked about then, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46 times that the Republican Party has tried to repeal health care.
My view, I want to make it very clear, is that this bill is substantively a very positive bill for the American people. A bill to which the gentleman referred that Republicans offered in 2009 covered less than 3 million people of the 30 to 40 million people that had no insurance in America. So less than 10 percent were covered by the Republican bill.
Tens of millions of people, I predict, by the middle of next year, are going to be having coverage and having health care assurance because we passed this health care insurance bill.
He is right, the rollout was terrible. We are all disappointed with that, the President is disappointed with that, and it is being worked on. Now he doesn't recall, of course, perhaps, or he hasn't mentioned the rollout of the prescription drug bill, which wasn't too smooth, either. And, of course, the health care bill is broader even than that. He may not recall that Medicare had a tough rollout for a couple of years. But there is nobody on this floor who is saying, I am not saying that they don't believe it because I think there are people who believe we ought not to have Medicare. As a matter of fact, a former majority leader, not this majority leader, said we shouldn't have Medicare in a free society. That was a Republican majority leader, Mr. Speaker.
The fact of the matter is the health care bill is going to work, but it is interesting that when you ask a specific question about some critical issues that have passed the Senate in a bipartisan fashion overwhelmingly, they are not mentioned. Just go to the health care bill. Why? Because that is the politics. That is the politics of the issue right now.
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Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman.
Governor Steve Beshear of Kentucky spoke to us this morning. Now, Kentucky is not the center of Democratic politics in America, as Mitch McConnell would quickly observe. Thousands of people are signing up in Kentucky--thousands of people--successfully. Thousands of people are coming forward. About 70,000 people have already signed up in Kentucky. Thousands of people are coming forward in New York and California, all over this country, who are saying I want the assurance and coverage of health care.
What have they spent their time on? Trying to repeal health care. They have talked about repeal and replace. We haven't had much replace, but we have had a lot of repeal. And what does the majority leader refer to, Mr. Speaker? A 2009 bill. It is a bill from three Congresses ago that he is talking about, and all we have had on this is repeal. If they are concerned about health care, then there ought to be an alternative that the other side offers; but, frankly, Mr. Speaker, they have not done that.
I would be glad to move to another subject. I am sure we can go back to health care because the majority leader, notwithstanding his assertion that this is not about politics, I will tell him that the majority of the American people in poll after poll after poll says they don't want health care repeal. They want it fixed, and they want it to work right and the assurance that it is available to them, but they do not want it repealed.
Right now, even though they are upset, as we all are, as I am and as the President is, about the rollout and about the Web site not working as effectively as we would like, Americans right now, I will tell the majority leader, the majority in polls say they don't want it repealed. They want it fixed and they want to have it work. Very frankly, I think that is where they are. Not everybody. Not everybody, I understand that, and certainly not some factions of the Republican majority's party. They have made that very clear in statements on this floor. But my view is that we ought not to simply distract from some of the important things that need to be done.
I was interested in Senator Cornyn's response when he talked about the Iran deal, which 65 percent of the American public says was a worthwhile effort to make. We need to carefully review it, and we need to oversee it and make sure it works, and the majority leader and I have to work on that. But when Senator Cornyn said this was just a ruse--and I don't think he used the word ``ruse,'' but just an effort to distract from health care, I think that sort of indicates the extraordinary focus that this issue has energized the Republican Party, Mr. Speaker, over the last 3 or 4 years.
Can I ask the majority leader about the budget conference, whether he has any idea--he has talked about, on the schedule, the budget conference coming forward. Does he have any idea whether a budget conference agreement has been reached, number one; and number two, if an agreement is reached, will it manifest itself in the form of a budget conference report?
I am informed, maybe correctly or incorrectly, that there will never be a budget conference report. Does the gentleman know whether that is the case or not, and whether or not some agreement might be manifested by a bill and not by a conference report?
I yield to the gentleman.
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Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for his comments. I will say that he and I, as he has articulated, do agree that the sequester is not good policy. As a matter of fact, Chairman Hal Rogers, the chairman of the Appropriations Committee, said it best when he said that the sequester cuts are ill-conceived and unrealistic and that he believes that the House action has indicated that that is the case. We have not done appropriation bills consistent with the sequester levels that as I understand were agreed at Williamsburg to be offered, but they haven't worked.
My own view, Mr. Speaker, of what is being discussed in the budget conference, some of the things that I have heard, strike me as being unbalanced, unfair, irresponsible, and unacceptable. Unless we have a balanced agreement, which in my view should replace the sequester because, as the majority leader indicates, it is not the rational way to go, as Mr. Rogers indicates, it is not the rational way to go, and as every chairman of the appropriations subcommittees on the Republican side have said, it is not the way to go and ought to be replaced.
I am hopeful that any agreement will, in fact, replace the sequester. I am hopeful, Mr. Majority Leader, as you well know, that we will get a big deal--not a little deal, not nibbling around the edges so that what occurs is we do this every 6 months and we never get to a stability that I know the majority leader and I believe would give confidence to our economy, to the business community, and to our people if we got a big deal. Unfortunately, that does not seem to be, at least at this point in time, in the discussion. I think that is unfortunate.
As I said, what I have heard so far seems to me to be unbalanced, unfair, irresponsible, and, from my perspective, unacceptable. So I am hopeful that the Budget Committee conference will revisit or at least come up with a product that is not yet being discussed, which will accomplish the objective of putting this country on a fiscally sustainable path for the long term, not just the short term.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
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