In Opposition to the Ryan Budget

Floor Speech

Mr. MAFFEI. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong opposition of the legislation H. Con. Res. 96, the budget proposed by the chairman of the Budget Committee, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Ryan).

Unfortunately, this year's Ryan budget is more of the same recklessness and extreme partisanship that we have seen year after year from the House Republican leadership.

According to the Democrats on the House Budget Committee, under RYAN'S plan, middle class families in my district in central New York will pay an average of $2,000 more each year.

Once again, the Ryan budget ends the Medicare guarantee as we know it, and it would turn Medicare, instead, into a privatized voucher program and would shift health care costs to seniors.

It threatens to cut off critical investments in job creation and infrastructure, and it slashes education at a time when local school districts in central New York are already struggling to find the resources necessary to provide our children with the high-quality education that they deserve.

This is not a balanced approach, and it is not a responsible solution. People in central New York and across the country need better. Congress must get serious about balancing the budget and about reducing the national debt and deficit, but not on the backs of our seniors and not on the backs of the middle class and certainly not on the backs of future generations of Americans.

At a time when many central New Yorkers are still struggling as the economy recovers, we simply cannot accept the irresponsible policies of the Ryan budget.

I call on my colleagues to reject the Ryan budget and to work together to create a bipartisan budget that gets our fiscal house in order and promotes economic growth, creates jobs, protects our seniors, and strengthens the middle class.

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