Concurrent Resolution On The Budget, Fiscal Year 2016

Floor Speech

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. ENZI. Colleagues, good morning. Working with Senator Sanders yesterday, we made good progress on opening day for the budget resolution. It might not have been as fun as being at opening day for baseball, but getting underway on the first balanced budget resolution this Senate has seen in nearly 20 years was pretty exciting for me, and I appreciate the good work and the full debate we have had.

Today, I am looking forward to more work on a variety of amendment ideas for the resolution. Some Senators want to debate amendment ideas that have to do with the budget and some Senators want to debate amendment ideas that have nothing to do with the budget. So we will hear from some Senators today on issues such as our spending caps or the sequester, how best to preserve and protect Social Security, and what is the best way to ensure women are treated fairly in the workforce.

Other Senators may want to discuss items such as how to treat the waterways of the United States, free from overreach from the EPA, or how our communities and localities are under siege from Washington when it comes to ideas about taxing carbon or coal, and Senators may wish to discuss how our national security is best served by the spending levels contemplated in the budget.

But we will also hear about something that really interests me, as it marries the numbers our budget resolution carries with the work our committees and Congress can do once the budget is passed.

I think one of the frustrations of the other side is this is a fairly general budget because it sets the spending limits for the committees and then builds in some reserve funds for some flexibility. It doesn't go into the specifics of exactly how the committees are to operate. The reason for that is the committees are the people who have at least an intense interest in that field or maybe even a lot of expertise. When we try to preclude what they are doing by what we do in the budget, it won't work.

We will also hear about something that marries the numbers our budget resolution carries with the work our committees and Congress can do once the budget is passed. The statutory deadline for passing the budget is April 15. Just prior to that, we are going to have a 2-week recess, which shortens the amount of time we have to work.

I would remind everybody that Republicans have only been in charge for a few weeks and are going to pass the first budget in 6 years. That is a pretty fast track to be on, but I am pleased with where we are at the moment.

Later on this morning, the Senate will consider an amendment to help improve care for children with medical complexity within Medicaid. Children with medical complexity require intensive health care services. These children often have two or more serious chronic conditions, and often see six or more specialists and a dozen or more physicians. They also often require care that takes them across State lines. There are 2 million of these children on Medicaid.

Reflecting a bipartisan bill, Senator Portman intends to offer an amendment to create a reserve fund in anticipation of committee action that recognizes the critical importance of Medicaid to children with medical complexity, and the need for greater coordination and integration of care for this population within Medicaid. If Congress can write a bill that fits this reserve fund, then we can benefit children with medical complexity and their families. I look forward to a good debate and several votes in the Senate today.

I yield the floor.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. ENZI. Madam President, I get a little upset when I hear one side say that the other side doesn't care about infrastructure. That is not true. We even had a colloquy just a little while ago where the two sides said we need infrastructure. I agree that we need infrastructure, but I will oppose this amendment because it is telling the tax committee exactly what to do to provide infrastructure. One committee is getting into another committee's jurisdiction to say exactly how to do it, and that is not right. That is not the way we handle legislation around here.

Senator Wyden is on the tax committee. He is the ranking member on that committee. Senator Hatch is the chairman of that committee. They are both concerned about infrastructure. There is already a provision in the bill that allows for the money to be put into place to do it, but that provision does not tell the Finance Committee that it must plug a certain tax loophole and put it into infrastructure. The committee can do that, and the President's budget--one of the reasons there is some excitement here--on money that is held overseas by companies, puts a mandatory 14 percent tax on that and expects it to be brought back right away to fund these things. That is a proposal that has been in the tax committee before--but not at 14 percent. It has been at a lower rate. Fourteen percent is more money than both the highway committee and the defense committee are talking about. We cannot produce a budget in which we tell committees exactly how to do their work. We need to build in the flexibility so they can do their job.

The chairman of the committee is convinced that we can do the job of fixing our infrastructure. Of course, we will never fix the infrastructure as well as we would like to have it fixed. I think the ranking member on the Budget Committee mentioned that we have four times as much need as what his proposal addresses. He has a proposal for $468 billion. There is a couple trillion dollars' worth of need out there. Of course, we hope we can get a lot of people involved in fixing these problems. It is not just a Federal problem. It is a local and State problem as well. We hope everybody will participate so that we can improve the infrastructure. It does put people to work, just as Keystone would put people to work.

I ask that my colleagues vote against the bill because we are telling one committee exactly where to get the money for another committee.

I yield the floor and reserve the remainder of our time.

Madam President, I yield the balance of our time for the Senator from Oklahoma.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source