Retired Pay Restoration Act of 2003

Mr. Speaker, I was hoping that my colleague would remain in the Chamber for the next hour while we talk a little bit about exactly what the Committee on Veterans Affairs has done and the discussion of the cuts that are being made to the veterans budget. We will get into that a little bit later. But tonight I want to talk about something called SBP, and we will discuss it in great length. But I want to introduce you to somebody first. Her name is Dottie Welch.

Dottie's story goes something like this: When Lt. Colonel Roger Welch of the United States Army retired and signed up for the military survivor benefit plan, better known now as SBP, years ago, he was told that in the event of his death, SBP would pay his wife, Dottie, 55 percent of his retirement pay for the rest of her life.

When he signed an irrevocable agreement to pay annually-increasing SBP premiums for the rest of his life, he did not know that his wife's future SBP benefit actually would be one-third less than what they were led to believe.

When Roger died in June of 2002, Dottie was dismayed to learn that there would be an offset, an offset based on her husband's Social Security-covered military earnings, that would reduce her benefits. With Social Security survivor benefits and the reduced SBP annuity, her total income is $384 a month less than she and Roger thought she would have to live on.

Dottie thinks the Social Security offset is just plain wrong. No one will tell her why it is there and why it is so large. Her husband, Roger, only had 5 years of military service covered by Social Security.

Dottie Welch's case highlights one significant inequity of the military SBP and the reason why so many retirees and survivors are upset about its current situation.

Unfortunately, this is only the first of several ways that Uniform Service Survivor Benefits relative to premiums being paid fall far short of what retirees and survivors were promised and what is afforded survivors of other Federal retirees.

There are three major SBP inequities. But before I go into those inequities tonight, I would like to pause for a moment and recognize my good friend from South Carolina (Mr. Wilson), who has been a stalwart supporter of the veterans of this country.

I yield to the gentleman.

Mr. Speaker, I thank my good friend, the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Wilson), for his comments and his support of veterans' issues. I also wish to add my congratulations and best wishes to him as he very soon becomes one of those retirees after serving many years in the Army Guard in his home State.

Mr. Speaker, there are three major SBP inequities. One is that thousands of people who bought SBP coverage were not briefed that most survivors' SBP annuities would be reduced substantially after age 62; two, the 40 percent government subsidy envisioned by Congress and touted by the services to encourage retirees' participation has plunged to 17 percent; three, the government provides Federal civilian survivors a substantially higher share of retired pay for life with no benefit reduction at any age.

The impact of these inequities is, as Members can imagine, devastating to many survivors, because SBP is not exactly a king's ransom at 55 percent of retired pay. At 35 percent, SBP provides only a poverty level or lower annuity for most survivors, even those of relatively senior officers.

So I am here tonight to provide more specifics on how the military SBP program is not providing, is not providing the level of protection military survivors need and deserve and were expecting; and why my bill, H.R. 548, the Military Survivors Benefit Improvement Act of 2003, is what is needed now to fix the current problem.

The first issue that we need to discuss tonight is something that I call the benefit reduction shock. It is incredulous to many that such an important feature of SBP, the reduced age 62 annuity that applies to the vast majority of military survivors, was never explained to retirees being asked to sign up for the program in the seventies and in the early eighties, but it is true.

I have in my hand a copy of the actual SBP Election Form 5002 signed by a retired member in 1982 in two different places. It specifies that SBP will

pay the survivor 55 percent of the member's retired pay. Nowhere, even in the fine print, does it mention any lower figure. We can only speculate about how or why this key fact was omitted, but it hardly matters now to those who were misled by the forms and by the briefings.

Certainly, the offset was extremely complicated for retirement counselors to explain, and it was almost impossible to tell any particular retiree at that point what SBP amount his or her survivor would actually receive after attaining the age of 62.

For members who attained retirement eligibility before 1985, the offset represented the amount of the survivors' Social Security benefit that was attributable to the Member's Social Security-covered military earnings, because the military only came under the Social Security system in 1957, and that amount varied widely for different retirees, and the rules for the calculation of Social Security benefits due to military versus civilian employment are arcane at best.

When they first learned of the age 62 benefit reduction, years, sometimes decades, after they purchased SBP, many older retirees and survivors expressed outrage in the mistaken belief that Congress had changed the law on them after the fact.

Not so. The age 62 reduction was part of the initial SBP law enacted in 1972, but this critical piece of information did not find its way into most military retirement briefings and SBP election forms until many years later after complaints, years after complaints started to roll in.

Large numbers of retirees and survivors feel betrayed by what they perceive as a bait-and-switch under which they were asked to sign irrevocable contracts to pay lifetime SBP premiums without being told what the annuity level they were actually buying was.

Dottie Welch is far from the only spouse who is very much aware of the impact of the Social Security offset. One survivor's husband was a Navy hard-hat diver during World War II, then an electronics technician on a nuclear submarine until his retirement in 1966. When he died in May of 2002, his widow had no idea she would be hit by the offset. ``I was shocked. I almost fell out of the chair, and wondered why God hadn't taken me too,'' she says today.

In the grief that followed her husband's death, this 78-year-old widow also faced numerous family bills and health problems. When her SBP annuity started, she was stunned to find out that it was one-third, one-third less than what she had expected. Now faced with $21,000 in bills, she was advised to declare bankruptcy, and feared she would lose her home trying to pay her debts. Her financial struggles eventually led her to the Navy-Marine Corps Relief Society for a grant to help her get back on her feet financially.

Not one member of our greatest American generation should find themselves under this kind of stress while getting over the death of their spouse and trying to do something with the large bills that were facing them.

In an attempt to reduce this kind of confusion, in 1985 Congress established a two-tier system, not linked to Social Security, that actually provides an SBP survivor 55 percent of retired pay until age 62, and 35 percent after that age. But making the age 62 reduction clear for the post-1985 retirees did not make it any fairer, and it did not change the fact that thousands upon thousands of earlier participants had not been told of the age 62 annuity reduction.

Also in 1985, Congress shocked the survivor community by repealing the 1984 legislation that would have barred any SBP Social Security offset for survivors who earned their Social Security benefits from their own work history rather than the military retiree's, as assumed under the original offset law. This only further highlighted the unfairness of the offset to thousands of widows who had pursued their own military or civilian careers.

Now, the second issue, another broken promise. When SBP was enacted in 1972, Congress set the premium formula in law with the intent that retirees' monthly premium payments would cover 60 percent, 60 percent of the long-term costs of the survivor benefits, with the government paying the remaining 40 percent. The formula was based on the program cost assumptions prepared by the Department of Defense actuaries concerning future inflation rates, pay raises, longevity of retirees, and survivors' longevity, et cetera.

But actual experience in later years proved the actuaries' original estimates had been far too conservative, as inflation was lower than predicted and retirees lived and paid premiums longer than anticipated. Because retiree premiums were locked into law and covered a greater portion of the program costs than had been projected, the government reaped an economic windfall, and found its share of the cost for the SBP program was much lower than anticipated. By 1988, retiree premiums covered 77 percent of the SBP costs, and DOD's share had dropped to 23 percent.

To its credit, Congress acted in 1990 to restore the intended 60/40 balance by reducing retiree premiums to 6.5 percent of retired pay, but the overconservative actuarial assumptions have continued to work against, work against retirees for the last decade, with the result that the Federal subsidy for SBP has continued to decline. As of 2003, the government's share has dropped from 40 percent to 17 percent, leaving retirees once more paying a higher-than-intended share of the benefit.

The only fair way to restore the proper cost balance between the retirees and the government is to reduce the premium, or increase the SBP benefit. The former benefits primarily retirees, while the latter benefits the survivors. Since retiree premiums were reduced to restore the 60/40 balance in 1990, Congress should restore the government's intended 40 percent cost share by raising the benefit for survivors. My bill does exactly that.

Now, the third issue. It is the military-civilian inequity. No less compelling than the misleading of enrollees and the decline of the intended subsidy is the stunning disparity that exists between benefits and subsidy levels the government offers military versus Federal civilian survivors.

In contrast to the military SBP subsidy of, remember, 17 percent, currently, the SBP for Federal civilian employees under the post-1984 Federal Employee Retirement System provides a 33 percent subsidy. For those under the pre-1984 Civil Service Retirement System the subsidy is 48 percent, and at 48 percent, it is nearly three times as high as the military's.

Even more important, the Federal Employment Retirement System survivors receive 50 percent of retired pay, and the other survivors under the old Civil Service Retirement System receive 55 percent for life, with no benefit reduction, no benefit reduction, at age 62.

Although Federal civilian premiums are higher, military retirees pay SBP premiums for a far longer period of time than do most civilians because they are required to retire at a younger age. Because their mortality rates are not much different, this means that Federal civilian retirees have a far more advantageous benefit-to-premium ratio, as indicated on these charts.

Now, military retirees particularly pay SBP premiums about twice as long, twice as long as Federal civilians because they retire at younger ages, but their spouses' longevity is about the same. So military SBP enrollees see a lower return and a much lower government subsidy.

Remember Dottie? My bill is the needed fix for the three major inequities of the Survivor Benefit Plan. We must keep faith with the older retirees and with the survivors. We must restore the intended 40 percent Federal subsidy, and we must put SBP on an equal footing with its Federal civilian equivalent.

The Military Survivors Benefit Improvement Act of 2003, my bill, accomplishes these three things. For these reasons, the 33 military and veterans associations of the military coalition have endorsed my bill and have made its passage one of their top priorities in the 108th Congress.

H.R. 548 will balance equity and will balance cost considerations by phasing out the SBP age 62 benefit reduction over the next 5 years. And upon enactment, the age 62 benefit increase phase-in will begin at 40 percent on October 1 of 2004 and continually annually each year after through the year of 2007

until the benefits are restored to a full 55 percent as was the desire of Congress.

In order to offset part of the costs of the benefit increase, H.R. 548 authorizes an open season provision in the legislation that would allow more retirees to participate, generating SBP program savings, and significantly reducing the outlays.

Now, Congress has already acknowledged the need for this particular piece of legislation. The fiscal year 2001 Defense Authorization Act included a provision asserting the sense of Congress that there should be enacted legislation to reduce and eventually eliminate the different levels of SBP annuity for surviving spouses who are under age 62 and those who are 62 and older. But we have failed to follow through on that commitment for the last 2 years. It is time for us to fix this problem. Military widows and widowers have waited long enough in their fight for fairness. Now is the time for Congress to step up and enact relief for the aging survivors of our greatest generation. World War II and Korean War retirees, and the following generations of retirees and survivors, deserve no less than the SBP deal they were promised and the one the government already provides for other Federal survivors.

Now, a quick time line of H.R. 548. It was introduced on February 5 of 2003. And upon introduction, we had 118 bipartisan co-sponsors. That is 27 percent of the entire House of Representatives. On that day it was referred to the Committee on Armed Services. On February 28 of 2003, it was referred to the Total Force subcommittee, and on the same date executive comment was requested from DOD. Now, over 3 months later I urged DOD to act on this request.

On March 7 of 2003, a letter was sent to the gentleman from Iowa (Chairman Nussle) and the ranking member, the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Spratt), of the House Committee on the Budget urging support to include budget authority in fiscal year 2004 in our budget resolution. On the letter there were 36 bipartisan co-signers, including numerous members of the Committee on the Budget, the Committee on Armed Services, and the Committee on Veterans Affairs. Today this bill has 268 bipartisan co-sponsors. That equates to 62 percent of this House.

All Americans should urge their Representatives to co-sponsor H.R. 548 and their Senators to co-sponsor Senate bill 451, introduced by Senator Olympia Snowe of Maine.

Again, who supports H.R. 548? The number one legislative priority of the Military Officers Association of America and the 108th Congress. Additionally, the bill is strongly endorsed by the Military Coalition, a consortium of 33 nationally prominent military and veterans organizations representing more than 5.5 million members of uniformed services, active, reserved, retired, survivors, veterans and their families; and there are many, many others that have sent letters of support for this bill.

There are others that are tracking similar legislation in this body. I would note tonight that H.R. 1726, the Military Surviving Spouses Equity Act, sponsored by the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Brown), repeals the offset from surviving spouse annuities under the military Survivor Benefit Plan for amounts paid by the Secretary of Veterans Affair as dependency and indemnity compensation, or DIC. It provides for the recoupment of certain amounts previously paid SBP recipients in the form of retired pay refund. It was filed on April 10 of 2003. It has been referred to the Committee on Armed Services. It has 24 co- sponsors. And I want to commend my colleague, the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Brown), for his efforts to restore equity to this aspect of SBP; and I am proud to be an original co-sponsor of this legislation.

H.R. 1653, sponsored by the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Saxton), would change the effective date for the paid-up coverage under the military Survivor Benefit Plan from October 1 of 2008 to October 1 of 2003. It has 25 co-sponsors, and I am an original co-sponsor of this particular bill. It was filed on April 7, and it too has been referred to the House Committee on Armed Services.

A third piece of legislation, H.R. 1592, the Military Survivors Equity Act. It has been sponsored by my colleague, the gentleman from California (Mr. Filner), and it would repeal the two-tier annuity computation system applicable to annuities under the SBP plan for retired members of the Armed Forces so that there would be no reduction in such an annuity when the beneficiary becomes 62 years of age. It was filed on April 3 of this year, referred to the Committee on Armed Services; and it has 5 co-sponsors as this time. Both the Filner bill and my bill fulfill the 2001 sense of Congress resolution to reduce and eventually eliminate this SBP reduction. Again, both these bills go a long way to fulfilling the sense of Congress and that resolution to reduce and eventually eliminate this SBP reduction.

Let me talk a little bit about the VA budget for 2004. Our service men and women who continue to fight for our freedom and security around the world must know that Americans are united in their support for them and for their safe return. We in Congress, along with President Bush, support not only the troops in the field but also the scores of veterans who have already given so much to this country.

Unfortunately, there have been false reports, false reports circulating that Congress is actually cutting veterans benefits. Here are the facts of the congressional budget for fiscal year 2004 relating to veterans spending. This budget will allow us to fully meet our commitments to more than 2.6 million disabled veterans and widows who rely on VA benefit checks every month. It calls for $33.8 billion in mandatory spending. This is the highest spending ever in this area. It also calls for $30 billion, a 12.9 percent increase in discretionary spending. Nearly 90 percent of this funding is for veterans' medical care. These are the indisputable facts of this year's Federal budget for veterans.

House Members, particularly the Republicans, along with President Bush, are committed to ensuring that those who have served their country with pride, with valor and dignity receive the best of America's appreciation. Any suggestion otherwise is simply untrue, is not supported by the facts.

During January, I had the opportunity to visit with some of our men and women in uniform stationed in Germany, Italy, and France. And I was struck by their professionalism and commitment to their assigned duties. They were proud to serve. It is just as simple as that.

Two weeks ago, I visited North Korea where freedom is nowhere to be found and democratic thought is oppressed. We are truly blessed to live in a world of freedom and democracy and where life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are abundant and, I would submit, many times taken for granted.

Defense of the principles and values that we hold so dearly as a Nation leads our men and women into conflicts around the globe. Many return home after giving the ultimate sacrifice in defense of such values. But to those who do return, we can never say thanks enough.

Today, as we continue to rely on our Armed Forces in the war against terrorism, we look to our veterans for their example of courage and sacrifice. It is their selfless service that has made our Nation strong and our world a better place. America's veterans deserve our respect, our deepest respect, and enduring appreciation, as do their spouses who choose to marry members of our armed services and to share with them all the joys and sacrifices of their active duty careers.

The Survivor Benefit Plan is not to military spouses what Congress had intended or what enrollees were promised. The program is not providing the level of protection military survivors need and deserve.

Retirees and survivors deserve no less in the SBP deal than they were promised. This Congress needs to step up and deliver what the aging survivors of our greatest generation retirees were promised. And we need to provide at the proper level the protection necessary for future generations of retirees. Congress must act to fix this problem now.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding me time.

Let me congratulate my colleague, the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Skelton), my good partner on the Committee on Armed Services, and all the Members, Republican and Democrat, who helped to put this bill together. I want to thank the gentlewoman from North Carolina (Mrs. Myrick), the chairman on the committee, the gentleman from California (Mr. Dreier), who gave us a lot of time and attention, and all the members of the Committee on Rules.

Let me just say a word or two about what this bill does because this bill makes what I consider to be some sweeping reforms and it is a great bill. It covers a number of major areas, and along with what I call the ``people issues''; that is, the pay raise that has been mentioned, the additional monies for housing that brings down the amount that a service member has to pay out of their pocket, all of the things that go to quality of life for personnel. It also covers some major areas that have needed reform.

One aspect of that is what I call freedom to train, and today if you go to a place like Camp Pendleton, I have used that as an example, it has some 17 miles of shoreline. Only a very small area can actually be utilized for Marines who basically practice Iwo Jima. They practice assaulting a defended beach area. They can only do that practice in a very, very limited area of about one kilometer because of environmental considerations. And if you go to bases around the country, rifle ranges, air space for our Air Force and our other services to undertake integrated training with multiple aircraft, all of that is being hindered and obstructed because of a collision with our environmental laws.

Now, we have an answer to that, and the answer is a management plan called an inramp, and that is where the military gets together with State Fish and Wildlife and Federal Fish and Wildlife and they make an agreement. They make an agreement and they say, okay, the habitat for the gnatcatcher will be over here, we will set aside this 400 acres, and the Marines will have this area for rifle training or the Army will have this area for tank training or the Air Force will have this area for aircraft training.

Once you make that agreement and you put it in place, it is not open for groups to come in and sue under the Endangered Species Act to close down that rifle range, to close down that tank range, to close down that air space that is so vital so that our people can survive in theaters like Iraq and Afghanistan.

So this is offered under the proposition that the real endangered species here is a 19-year-old Marine rifleman who needs the very best training that he can get here at home before he projects American power overseas, and in this bill we put together this balance between conservation and military requirements.

Also, with respect to allowing our submariners to utilize the best of their sonar devices that will keep them alive when they are in the littorals, in shallow water areas around the world, where they will be faced with very quiet diesel submarines which are now being proliferated in certain adversaries' navies. We say that, whereas before the standard was that if a mammal, maybe a sea lion, was potentially disturbed that military training could not take place in his neighborhood. Now we say he has to actually be significantly disturbed. He has to actually be disturbed or that disturbance has to be significant enough to alter the way he migrates or feeds or the way he goes about his daily life.

So we are trying to give as much value to the sailors' survival as we have given to the sea lions' survival. I think that is a good balance. In this case we put the sailor ahead of the sea lion. I think the American people want that.

With respect to personnel, right now we are facing a war that is a new war. It is a war in which we see terrorists with high technology. We have to be flexible. We have to move quickly, and that involves people who not just wear the uniform of the United States, it also involves people who wear the civil service uniform.

So we are empowering Mr. Rumsfeld with the ability to reshape his civil service so that instead of taking 4 or 5 or 6 months to go through the bureaucracy to qualify a civil servant to work at a job so you get to the point where you just direct a sergeant to go do it and he salutes and goes and does it, we will now be able to quickly move civil servants into that job. We will be able to hire them quickly, and when people show an extraordinary ability to work and an enthusiasm and dedication that rises above the community, that they will be rewarded for that. And we have tested these ideas in pilot projects around the country, and the members who have participated in the pilot projects have voted that they like it.

So we are undertaking important reforms in this bill. We are giving the military the tools they need to fight this new type of war. I would urge everyone to support the rule and support the bill.

Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague, and we are going to describe during the general debate the great industrial base provisions, like the machine tool provision that we came out of this conference with, some excellent stuff.

But with respect to titanium, we know that we have three major makers of titanium left in this country. Otherwise, you have to rely on foreign sources. I want to thank the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Hayes) personally for putting together the working group between industry and the Air Force and Members who are interested, and putting together what we call the basket approach to titanium.

The basket approach says basically this: If you are going to take a domestic system, like the planes that are candidates for this tanker operation, and you convert them into a military system, right now the Berry Amendment says you have to use American-made titanium on American military systems.

We have agreed that since some of these civilian aircraft will have some foreign-made titanium, we got with the industry leaders and they agreed that they would take and require the same amount of American titanium, with in fact a 10 percent increase, and spread that across the rest of their lines to make up for the foreign titanium that was in those civilian aircraft. I have talked with industry leaders. They feel a strong commitment to that policy.

I want to thank the gentleman for putting that in place. I think it is going to accrue to the benefit of not only our tanker program, but also the health of the titanium industry.

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 437, I call up the conference report on the bill (H.R. 1588), to authorize appropriations for fiscal year 2004 for military activities of the Department of Defense, for military construction, and for defense activities of the Department of Energy, to prescribe personnel strengths for such fiscal year for the Armed Forces, and for other purposes.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, first, I want to thank all of my colleagues who participated in putting this bill together from the earliest hearing that we had early in the year on the threat that America faces, on the status of our Armed Forces, and on what we need to do to give the President and our troops the tools to get the job done. My partner, the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Skelton), is every bit a 50-50 partner in this operation, Mr. Speaker. When we really get down to what it takes to protect our freedom, there are no Republicans or Democrats, and we have a very bipartisan committee, and I am proud of that. I want to thank the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Skelton) as not just a friend, but a real full partner in helping to shape America's defenses, along with all of the members on the Democrat side on the Committee on Armed Services and, of course, our great, great folks on the Republican side, along with the subcommittee chairmen and ranking members who have done such a great job.

Now, Mr. Speaker, we face a new era. This is an era of what I would call terrorists with high technology; and probably Jim Woolsey said it best when he said we have killed the big dragon, that is, we have disassembled the Soviet Union, but there are lots of poisonous snakes out there, and we are seeing those poisonous snakes and the effect of their bites every day around the world, not just in the theatres in Afghanistan and Iraq, but elsewhere. And I think probably the American people since 9-11 still have an acute understanding of the venom and the poison that is manifest in that capability of our adversaries in this new era of terrorists with high technology.

Our job is to meet that threat, and our job is further, in meeting that threat, to shape the U.S. military and our defense apparatus to meet the threat, to defeat it, and to equip it; to give it the tools that it needs to do its job most effectively, and this bill does that, Mr. Speaker.

I wanted to talk about a number of issues with respect to this bill. This is a sweeping bill; and it does a number of reforms, a number of changes, a number of things that I think are important to change our military as we move into this new era.

Let me talk about, first just talk about the last subject that came up during the rule, and that is the tankers. Because, yes, the tanker agreement is in this bill. Let me tell my colleagues a little bit about that.

First, anyone who does a security analysis or a briefing on potential threats around this world and present threats understands that tankers are extremely important. I just might add that I undertook a series of classified and unclassified briefings, as have most members of the Committee on Armed Services over the last many years, and paramount to our ability to project power is American air power.

Whether we are talking about B-2 bombers that can fly literally from Whiteman Air Base to strike a target in Kosovo with precision munitions, or talking about tactical aircraft flying off a carrier and hitting targets in Afghanistan or Iraq, we need tankers. Tankers, that big gas station in the sky that the gentleman from Kansas (Mr. Tiahrt) talked about, are necessary to project American air power. If we have American air power and, specifically, if we have stealth, and we couple that stealth with precision munitions, that is, instead of carpet- bombing a bridge, we send in that one precision munition, it hits one strut on that bridge and brings the whole bridge down, if we have that combination and we have the legs to get it there over the target in whatever remote part of the world we are operating in, we can project American power, we can protect our military forces, and we can drive them in a blitzkrieg attack against the enemy target, whether it is enemy forces surrounding Baghdad or some other area of the world; and Americans now understand that.

So we have to have tankers. If we do scenarios around the world, every single scenario requires lots of American tankers and, I might say, Mr. Speaker, more than we have now, newer than we have now, more capable than we have now. That is the reason we are putting the tanker deal together, and that is the reason that this is being carried in this bill.

Now, let me tell my colleagues, with respect to personnel, we have had some arm wrestling over this. But I think that the guy with whom we are trusting millions of young American lives, the Secretary of Defense, can be trusted with reshaping our personnel system in civil service in the Department of Defense to be more effective, and I think be more rewarding for those workers. I think they like the idea that we are going to be able to hire people right out of that job fair instead of telling them, in 3 months, maybe the Federal Government can hire you, while IBM and the private concerns are picking them up immediately. I like the idea that they are going to be able to be qualified for a job within a few days instead of after 3 or 4 months of bureaucracy, and that will allow them to take jobs that military people are doing now. When we have tested these things in places like China Lake, a majority of the workers, the workers have voted that they like this new system, this new flexible personnel system. This is an important new part of shaping the military.

So I think that is good.

Freedom to train, Mr. Speaker, we have talked about that. We have to give our young people the freedom to train, and once we make that agreement that the bird hatchery is going to be over here and the rifle range is going to be over here, we cannot let groups then go sue to close down the rifle range on the basis that they want to get that one too. We have to allow a balance to be maintained. One Marine said it best. He said to our members of the Committee on Armed Services, he said, for years we have done work-arounds. He said, we cannot work around it anymore, there is no land left to work around. So we need to have this. This is very, very important legislation, freedom-to-train legislation, Mr. Speaker.

Let me talk about the industrial base. We have got in this bill a great foundation for bringing back and maintaining the industrial base of this

country, and the centerpiece of this is what I think is the centerpiece of American production, the machine tool industry of this country, which used to be second to none. We have a provision in this bill, it is not a mandatory provision, so it is not going to make anybody have to go in and take out billions of dollars of machine tools, but it says that if you are an American contractor bidding on a DOD job, if you use an American machine tool instead of a foreign machine tool, you are going to get points in the competition. And I think that is going to incentivize some of our companies, big and small, to say instead of looking at another foreign-made machine tool, let us call up that American company and see what they have. Maybe we can use that machine tool. And that is going to, I believe, Mr. Speaker, start to bring back this base of machine tools upon which a lot of our defense manufacturing capability was founded. We do a lot of other great things in our industrial-based provisions, Mr. Speaker; but that is the centerpiece, and I think it is a very important foundation.

Now, we also reauthorize for 10 years the maritime security program. This is a program that brings in the strong right arm of America's maritime unions and makes sure that they are the ones that are moving men and materiel across the ocean into theaters of action instead of having to rely on rental operations where we are taking unions and working people from other countries and having to rely on foreign personnel to move the wherewithal for military victories around the world. That is what is going to bring our maritime unions, our ship- builders, and our maritime operators back into preeminence; and we have worked hard on that, Mr. Speaker, and that is a great aspect of this bill.

Concurrent receipt is very important, Mr. Speaker. We started out last year by saying people who are actually hit in combat, people who have won the Purple Heart, are going to get now two checks. They get the full check for everything that they have been disabled, for all of their disability, and they get the full check for their retirement for everything that they have done to serve the U.S. military. We now also say, and incidentally, I see the gentleman from New York (Mr. McHugh) here, our chairman of the Subcommittee on Total Force, who very much has been a leader in putting this thing together. We also now are going to give full concurrent receipt, that is that full disability check, to all of those people who are wounded in the combat area or who are disabled or hurt in the combat area, who are hurt or disabled while training for combat. Maybe that guy who is jumping out at the 82nd Airborne, with the 82nd Airborne at Fort Bragg hurt his back, he is going to get it; and also people who are hit by instrumentalities of combat, like people who are hit by agent orange, Mr. Speaker. Then we go to the entire population of veterans who were not hurt in combat, were not hit by enemy bullets, were not hurt while training for combat but, nonetheless, have disabilities. And all of those people who are over 50 percent, Mr. Speaker, are going to receive both checks.

Now, that is going to bring in about 250,000 people, new people into the system. It is a big, big victory for veterans. It is a wonderful thing.

Mr. Speaker, let me just say, too, along with the gentleman from New York (Mr. McHugh), the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Bilirakis), obviously, the guy that I call the father of concurrent receipt, it has been a big part of his career. And the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Smith), the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Blunt), lots of great people; I might say that Senator Warner also, working on Purple Heart Plus last year, had a good hand in starting to put this thing together, lots and lots of people. Lots of our veterans and veteran supporters in this House have been involved in putting this program together. This is a great program.

Mr. Speaker, this is a great bill. It is a far-reaching bill. It gives the President and the troops the tools to get the job done. Let us pass this bill.

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Saxton), who is chairman of the Subcommittee on Unconventional Warfare, Terrorism and Capabilities and oversees these very important special operations forces who are doing such a great job for our country.

(Mr. SAXTON asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. McHugh), who has a high responsibility of overseeing the total force of the military, our Reserves, our Active, our Guard, with respect to all the personnel issues, pay, personnel issues, family benefits, the chairman of the Subcommittee on Total Force.

(Mr. McHUGH asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Washington (Mr. Dicks.)

(Mr. DICKS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Speaker, the gentleman is correct. Section 135 of the conference report does authorize a tanker acquisition program as did the Fiscal Year 2002 Defense Appropriations Act.

The gentleman is again correct. Section 131 codifies an agreement reached with the administration. The conferees relied upon a letter sent on November 5, 2003, to the chairman and ranking member of the Committee on Armed Services in the other body by the Deputy Secretary of Defense, Mr. Wolfowitz, in coming to agreement on the tanker acquisition program authorized by section 135.

The gentleman is correct. Section 135 authorizes the Air Force to enter into one contract for 100 aircraft, 20 by lease and 80 by purchase, or more than one contract for the same combination of aircraft.

The gentleman from Kansas (Mr. Tiahrt) is correct. The conferees in their joint report language agree that this section would ``authorize the Secretary to enter into a multi-year procurement program, using incremental funding.'' This language indicates that the multi-year procurement program authorized by section 135 would allow the Air Force to make payments as agreed to in the contract and that the Air Force would not be required to have the full budget authority required to purchase an aircraft in order to place an order for that aircraft under the contract.

Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks on the subject of my special order.

Madam Speaker, it is no secret to anyone in this body, nor to

the Nation's 25 million American veterans and their families, that the health care system is critically underfunded.

The result is that tens of thousands of veterans are being forced to work and one group of veterans is being denied access to VA care altogether. The current funding process for veterans' health care is broken. It simply does not work and, frankly, it never has.

The problem starts out at OMB where they consistently pare down the Department of Veterans Affair's budget requests to accommodate the other priorities of the White House. It moves on to this Capitol where Congress must squeeze the veterans' programs into funding for a myriad of other priorities of ill-advised tax cuts to the Space Station. It ends with veterans waiting in lines, sick and disabled and living with the year-to-year anxiety that comes from wondering if the VA will be there when they ask for help.

In short, Madam Speaker, veterans, the individuals who defended this country in time of war and kept us a free Nation, are forced by a cruel funding process to continue fighting for what is rightfully theirs.

I and 117 of my colleagues so far, some of whom join me today, believe enough is enough. There is no feasible alternative to permanently fix this problem. Only one. And that is mandatory funding of the VA spending, just like Medicare, just like the Department of Defense, TRICARE and just like the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program, the veterans deserve some consideration as the beneficiaries of their plans.

The Nation's veterans organizations strongly agree. The American Legion, AMVETS, Blinded Veterans Association, Disabled American Veterans, Military Order of the Purple Heart, Paralyzed Veterans of America, Veterans of Foreign Wars, Vietnam Veterans of America and others, including organizations that represent nearly 6 million members, are speaking up across the Nation. They too are saying enough is enough.

That is why I have introduced H.R. 2318, the Assured Funding for the Veterans Health Care Act of 2003. The bill would require the Secretary of Treasury annually to come before Congress to provide funding for the VA's care, based on the number of enrollees in the system and medical inflation.

What could be more appropriate than providing funding for veterans' health care, based on the number who will need it, the demand and the projected cost. Let us be absolutely clear. These projections and the subsequent funding of them should be based on care for all eligible veterans.

Madam Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Strickland).

Mr. STRICKLAND. Madam Speaker, I want to thank my friend and the ranking Democrat on the House Committee on Veterans' Affairs, the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Evans). I want to thank the gentleman for being such an advocate for veterans, but I also want to thank him for introducing this legislation, the Assured Funding for the Veterans Health Care Act of 2003.

What we are talking about here is simply having mandatory funding for veterans programs so that the vets do not have to come to the Congress year after year after year with hat in hands and ask for what they need. But if this bill that the gentleman has introduced passes, and by the way, I think it has 117 cosponsors at the present time, if it were to pass, there would be a mandatory stream of funding. Veterans would be able to have assurance that what they needed in terms of benefits and health care would be there for them.

I would like to take a minute, if I can, just to put this debate about mandatory funding in context and talk about what is at stake here. We need to put mandatory funding in this budget because right now funding for veterans' benefits is inadequate.

This is what we have seen happen in recent months: There are hundreds of thousands of veterans who are waiting 6 months or more just to get an appointment to see a doctor. Think about that. Would any Member of this House of Representatives tolerate having to be put on a waiting list and to wait 6 months or longer to see a doctor? I think we would not. And I think it is a fair question to ask. Why should those of us who serve in this body have access to health care in a more timely manner than that which is made available to our veterans?

Another problem, veterans about a year and a half ago, had to pay $2 for each prescription they received. The VA increased that copayment from $2 to $7 a prescription. And now the President has requested that that copayment be increased from $7 a prescription up to $15 a prescription.

And one of the most outrageous things that has happened, the VA actually placed a gag order on their health care providers. The VA sent out a memo to all of their network health providers saying, you can no longer market VA services to veterans. In other words, you cannot proactively tell veterans what they are entitled to receive. Think about that. I mean, it is almost unbelievable that the Department that is supposed to be looking out for veterans, protecting veterans, servicing veterans, would actually put out a memo telling their doctors and nurses and social workers that they could not participate in health fairs, that they have could not send out newsletters telling veterans what they are entitled to receive under the laws that have been passed right here in this Chamber, that they could not make public service announcements urging veterans to come in for services. And that gag order is in effect tonight, and it is shameful. And it is in effect because we do not have sufficient funding to pay all the costs of veterans' benefits and veterans' health care.

Then something else that more and more veterans across this country are just becoming aware of, the VA created a new classification for veterans. They have call it Priority 8. And they say those who are in Priority 8 are of higher income. Now, quite frankly, one can make as little in my district as about $24,000 a year and be considered higher income. And so these are called Priority 8 veterans, and they are being told that they can not enroll in the VA health care system at all. Think about that.

These are men and women who have served our country admirably. They have been honorably discharged. Many of them are in great economic and financial need. And because they make about $24-, $25,000 a year, the VA is saying you are high income and so you do not qualify to participate in the VA system.

Does my colleague not think it is fair that the people in this country know that he and I earn about $150,000 a year? I think that is high income. I do not think $24,000 is high income. I think this is really shameful what the VA has done here.

Right now, the House Committee on Appropriations has been considering the fiscal year 2004 appropriations for the Department of Veterans Affairs, and it does not look good. Despite assurances from the leadership here in the House, in fact, they have held press conferences saying, oh, we are going to treat the veterans in the right way, despite those assurances, Republicans have abandoned their promises; and they are going to increase the cost of prescription drugs for a veteran.

The President asked for this in his budget. At a time when we were getting ready to send our young men and women into harm's way, the President sent a budget to this House, and he asked that veterans be required to pay more money for a prescription drug. In fact, he wanted that copayment to be doubled, more than doubled, from $7 to $15 a prescription; and he also asked that this Congress impose an annual enrollment fee on priority 7 and 8 veterans, an enrollment fee of $250 a year. Then the President asked that the cost of going to see a doctor at a clinic be increased from $15 a visit to $20 a visit, and this House is going along with that request.

Oh, but we were told, do not worry, because we have actually increased funding for veterans health care next year; and we were told it was going to be $3.4 billion, but it looks as if the Congress is reneging on that promise as well, and the increase has been cut about in half, down to $1.4 billion.

These are shameful acts in my judgment, and I want to tell my colleagues that all of the veterans organizations in this country, and I am talking about the American Legion, the VFW, the AMVETS, the Disabled American Veterans, Vietnam Vets, they are pretty

upset about this. I have a letter which they sent out last Friday, and it is from the National AMVETS, the Disabled American Veterans, the Paralyzed Veterans of America and the Veterans of Foreign Wars; and they say here: ``The VA-HUD Independent Agencies appropriations bill, which calls for a $1.4 billion increase over last year and approximately the President's request,'' basically this House is doing what the President has requested. These groups say that is wholly inadequate. It is inadequate to provide health care to sick and disabled veterans, and it represents a flagrant disregard of promises made to veterans by this Congress.

``So much for promises,'' they say in their letter. So much for promises. Providing a wholly inadequate $1.4 billion increase calls into question all the press conferences and the news releases touting this Congress' commitment to the men and women who have served this Nation.

So what we are asking for in the gentleman from Illinois' (Mr. Evans) bill is that we make this funding mandatory. Just as other parts of our Federal Government call for mandatory spending, we want veterans to have the assurance that comes with mandatory funding.

These veterans service organizations that I mentioned tell me that this is their number one legislative priority. There are lots of things that veterans need; but nothing is more important to them than having mandatory funding, so that year after year we can know how much money our hospitals are going to get, our outpatient clinics, how much money is going to be there to take care of our aging population of veterans.

I would just close my remarks by reminding my colleagues and others once again that what this Congress is doing represents a following of the directions that came to us from President Bush. He sent his budget over here in January. As my colleague will recall, January was a time when we were preparing for war. Talk is cheap. The gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Evans) knows that.

But health care costs a lot of money, and it does cost a lot of money to provide needed health care to our veterans; but these are men and women who have paid the price. They have served our country. They have taken the oath. They have served honorably and admirably; and as they chose to do that, to provide the service to their country, promises were made to them, and our country has an obligation to keep those promises; and the best way to keep those promises, I think, is to pass my colleague's legislation, the legislation that he has entitled appropriately Assured Funding for Veterans Health Care Act of 2003.

Every Member of this House should sign on as cosponsors. We have, I think, 117 cosponsors now, thanks to the gentleman's leadership. We ought to have every Member, Democrat and Republican alike, in this House sign on to this act. It is H.R. 2318, and I repeat that just in case there may be some veterans who are listening and who would like to communicate with their Senator and their House Member, H.R. 2318. It is called the Assured Funding for Veterans Health Care Act of 2003.

Madam Speaker, I would hope that veterans across this country would recognize the importance of this legislation and would let their representatives know how important it is to them, and perhaps they will just decide to urge them to sign on as cosponsors.

I thank the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Evans) for his leadership. I admire him greatly. I was elected to this body for the first time, took office in January of 1993. He and I were both younger men then; but I admired him then for the dedication he had to serve our veterans, and across the years my admiration for him has only grown, and I thank him for introducing this vital legislation. I pledge to him that I will do everything in my power to see that we get as many cosponsors as possible, that we urge the leadership of this House to allow this legislation to move forward; and I thank him for allowing me to participate with him tonight.

Mr. EVANS. Madam Speaker, I appreciate the remarks, and at this time I yield to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee).

(Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

Madam Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for her charitable remarks. I appreciate working with her and will be engaged with her in fighting these cuts that have been announced by the administration and look forward to working with her in this regard.

Madam Speaker, I thank the distinguished gentleman for his yielding, and I thank him for his leadership. It is an honor to work with the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Evans) as he has worked for the issues of veterans not only because he is a passionate legislator and a member of this body, an honored and esteemed member of this body, but because he also is a Vietnam-era veteran and clearly knows the sensitivity of these issues and the great need in these issues.

Madam Speaker, I represent a veterans hospital and many veterans in the State of Texas in the 18th Congressional District. We are honored to have as one of our very fine medical institutions the veterans hospital, and it is particularly of great importance to my constituents and my community because during Tropical Storm Allison in 2001, when the medical center found itself flooded in and many of its patients were in need of transfer and need of additional assistance or many of its equipment was not working, who rose to the occasion? It was the veterans hospital, and of course, those who were committed to serving veterans, who had the mindset, the charitable mindset, they had the great knowledge and as well the caring attitude to open their doors and as well to take many of the staff, they were also veterans themselves, to be able to assist by providing beds for the patients who needed it. They rose to the occasion.

Tonight I think it is important that we are on this floor to rise to the occasion on their behalf. I support totally H.R. 2318 concerning mandatory funding for veterans health care and am proud to be a proud sponsor of this legislation, would encourage the Members of the House and the other body, who have not yet found their way to this legislation. I expect that it will be dropped by one of or our very fine Senators in the other body, of course, and hope that we will be able to move this legislation quickly through the Committee on Veterans' Affairs and as well bring it to the floor.

We know that the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Evans) and the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Smith) work well together. I would hope that this would be the kind of legislation that has no problems, should have no obstacles. It should move. I think I would be optimistic, I would want it to be in the committee tomorrow or at the end of the week so that as soon as we get back here in September we could quickly move this legislation forward.

Let me tell my colleagues why, because there are many things that are happening to our veterans, and we are getting more veterans as we speak because, as my colleague well knows, we had a quarter of a million troops stationed in Iraq. Now we have 140,000. Clearly there is discussion as to whether or not we need more; but many of those troops are going to be veterans soon, and right now as we speak, even though they may not be retirees, we have several problems that are occurring.

We have problems with respect to veterans not being able to enroll in hospitals right now. We have problems about the concurrent receipt issue where veterans have to choose between disability pay and retirement pay, dollar for dollar. What an insult to our veterans, and there is H.R. 303 in which we are trying to correct that problem.

The work that the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Evans) is doing is crucial as relates to health care. So I rise today in support of H.R. 2318, the Assured Funding for Veterans Health Care Act of 2003. This legislation is key to addressing shortfalls in the fiscal year 2003 budget appropriations for veterans health that could prove injurious to our veterans. We have a duty to protect our veterans from misunderstanding as to the new veterans administration medical care budget proposed by the Bush administration.

About 25 million veterans, living veterans, nearly 19 million have served during times of war. There are 19 million stories to tell and 19 million histories to preserve. However, time is of the essence. There are only a few thousand World War I veterans left and World War II veterans left. These World War I veterans are all more than 100 years old. The average age of our World War II veterans is more than 77, and we are losing 1,500 of them a day. We need to preserve not only their tribute to us by fighting in World War II

and World War I, but certainly if they are in need of health care, obviously we know that they would be, that we certainly would not want to say no to those few remaining veterans of that era and then the veterans that are now coming from the Korean War and all of the conflicts that we have had through not only the Vietnam War but the Persian Gulf and now Iraq.

Republican tax cuts and the shortfalls to the veterans health plan will have a negative impact on the veteran community and the veterans health care service facility of Texas and of the Nation. In the State of Texas, there are approximately 1.721 million veterans. I believe my State has one of the highest numbers or the highest numbers. Certainly in my congressional district there are a large number of veterans with whom I work on a regular basis.

Currently, 3,400 veterans are on the waiting list; and due to the war in Iraq, we will have new veterans in need of services as relates to health care. The Veterans Administration Medical Center in the 18th Congressional District has seen an 18 percent increase in its need for its services this year already. There must be additional funding to meet that need.

I am adamantly opposed to any effort that would reduce accessibility or the extent of health care to our veterans. The Republican budget cuts also include cutting health care and education needs for our veterans.

It is really, I believe, a questionable practice to suggest that a veteran making $30,000 a year should have to be questioned regarding accessing the veterans hospital services. It just does not make sense, and the budget that we put forward would slash services to veterans who make $30,000 a year or more. Can my colleagues imagine, $30,000 a veteran, may have a family, needy in health care, people making $30,000 a year, may not have health insurance because of the cost and the amount it takes to raise their families.

If this present structure is in place now without this legislation, without the full funding that our ranking member, the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Evans), has put forward in this very, very important bill, then what we have are hundreds upon hundreds of thousands of veterans, maybe even millions, who are not able to access health care at the veterans hospitals, and this is what we promised them when they went into the United States military, in a volunteer military.

As it speaks right now, it says we will provide the kind of resources that are necessary for them. And yet here we are in 2003 denying them the right to have the resources that would allow the veterans hospitals to provide care if they make over 30,000 a year.

I am astonished and I am also appalled at the taking away of promises that we made to individuals who are willing to offer the ultimate sacrifice, and that is their life.

Someone said to me that we do not have conscription, we do not have a draft anymore. That occurred in the Vietnam War. Now we have a volunteer military. That means that most of those who are in today got up out of their hometown and went to the office where the military was, whether Army, Navy, Coast Guard, or any of the others, and signed up to be able to defend their country and to follow the orders of the Commander in Chief or if this Congress would declare war.

They are in a war now that there was no declaration of, but they are there fighting. They are there loyal to the United States. They have taken an oath and they are sacrificing both their life and limbs on behalf of the people of the United States of America. Those very young men and women will ultimately become veterans. God hope they will come home to their loved ones.

How dare we cut a budget and suggest that if they make $30,000 a year, they cannot get health care?

But, really, in my district, I see individuals that are not in that category, who cannot access health care because they are making moneys of $31,000, $32,000 and $33,000 a year. Some of these individuals are in desperate need. And I might add, even though we are talking about full funding, some of the very people that are penalized overall with the budget structure and the veteran structure in the hospital are my homeless veterans, homeless veterans who because of the trials and tribulations of war, yes, they came back to us, but even though they came back to us they came back broken in mind and spirit. So, today, we find thousands upon thousands of homeless veterans who also cannot get resources because of the cuts in the veterans budget that impacts on the veterans hospitals and thereby impacts on veterans' health care.

So this bill by the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Evans) for full funding makes a lot of common sense. In fact, it upholds the tradition of this Nation that we care and love and nurture those veterans who care about us; we care and love those individuals who are willing to sign up on the bottom line, take the oath, and say I, swear loyalty to the United States of America and so I am going into the United States military; and if I am called to a place that would jeopardize my life, I am willing to give the ultimate sacrifice.

Yet we here in the United States are failing to provide the kind of regulations that would ensure that they could enroll, here we are de- enrolling and not allowing veterans to get the kind of health care that they need to take care of themselves.

This legislation being put forward, with 117 sponsors, assures funding for veterans' health care. It ensures that there are no signs at veterans hospitals that say ``No room at the inn.'' Can we do less than to provide the opportunity for veterans to have full funding?

Let me close by simply acknowledging that my good friends will say that they have given an increase in funding for health care, and yet I think it should be acknowledged that that funding is $400 million short of meeting veterans' needs. It is $400 million short of meeting veterans' needs. That is why we have in place a policy that requires veterans to be denied coverage or denied coverage of health care at these hospitals if they make over $30,000 a year. I understand there is also a proposal to impose a new $1,500 annual copayment on higher income nonservice connected veterans who receive medical care from the

Madam Speaker, I rise this afternoon to talk about an issue of fundamental unfairness which burdens many of our veterans: concurrent receipt. I organized this Special Order to focus attention on the unfairness of the concurrent receipt law and to give Members the opportunity to demand that the Republican leadership bring to the floor H.R. 303, the bill that would end concurrent receipt.

Madam Speaker, today we will hear Democratic Members from districts throughout the Nation call for an end of concurrent receipt. Concurrent receipt is a Civil War-era law that prevents disabled veterans from receiving both military retirement and veterans disability benefits. Under the law, for every dollar that a veteran receives in disability pay, $1 is taken away from their retirement pay. The effect of the concurrent receipt law is to tax a veteran for being injured while serving in the military. This is an extremely unfair burden that we place on our wounded veterans.

Madam Speaker, America's veterans have made huge sacrifices in order to protect our freedoms. We should not repay their sacrifice by denying them the benefits they have earned and deserve. Congress must repeal the concurrent receipt law.

Over the past several years, there has been a strong bipartisan effort to repeal this law. In this Congress, the bill to repeal concurrent receipt, H.R. 303, has 370 cosponsors. The gentleman from Florida (Mr. Bilirakis), a longtime Republican Member, is a sponsor of H.R. 303. Madam Speaker, 370 cosponsors is an extraordinary number of cosponsors for any bill. As all of us know, there are few bills introduced in this body that have 370 cosponsors. There are even fewer bills that do not come to the floor for action by Members of the House.

Yet despite this tremendous bipartisan support, the House Republican leadership, as well as the White House, has refused to support this bill. In fact, the Secretary of Defense has said that he would recommend that the President veto any legislation that includes language which would eliminate concurrent receipt. The House Republican leadership continues to ignore the will of the Members, and our constituents, and refuses even to allow H.R. 303 to come to the floor for action.

The opponents of this bill say that it will cost too much money. They cite a study from the Congressional Budget Office which estimates that it would cost the Federal Government $3 billion in fiscal year 2004 to cover the 400,000 eligible veterans. It is incredible that the opponents would offer such a poor excuse for why they refuse even to bring this bill to the floor.

Give me a break.

Mr. Speaker and Members, the Bush administration has spent almost $80 billion in Iraq and Afghanistan and is seeking a supplemental appropriation of $87 billion for the war in Iraq and Iraqi reconstruction. Yet, the administration will not seek the resources required to protect the retirement pay of veterans who had the misfortune of becoming disabled while serving their country. What a cruel, sick joke. These veterans earn their retirement pay, and they deserve both a full retirement benefit and their disability compensation.

We must not walk away from our obligations. How can we put a price on the service that these men and women gave to our country? How can we put a price on going through life without a limb or without the ability to see or hear? They did their job with bravery and dedication. Now, we must do ours. The Federal Government should provide full benefits to veterans who protected our people. Simple fairness and decency requires it.

Because of the opposition of the Republican leadership to this bill, Democrats have had to file a discharge petition in an attempt to bring H.R. 303 to the floor and force consideration of this bill. A successful discharge petition requires 218 signatures. To date, however, even though H.R. 303 has 370 cosponsors, there are only 203 signatures on the discharge petition.

Nearly every Democrat has signed the discharge petition, but only two Republicans have signed. Because of the opposition of the Republican leadership, not even Congressman Bilirakis, the sponsor of H.R. 303, has signed the discharge petition.

Mr. Speaker, it is shameful that the Republican leadership has strong-armed their Members into not supporting the discharge petition on H.R. 303 and prevented the Congress from providing this essential relief to our veterans.

The Republican leadership's unfair and outrageous refusal to bring H.R. 303 to the floor for action is harming our veterans and keeping many veterans from obtaining a decent quality of life. Unfortunately, there are hundreds of thousands of veterans suffering under the concurrent receipt law. Because the United States military is committed to missions throughout the world that will result in additional veterans becoming disabled, the number of veterans who will be subjected to this tax will only grow.

Unfortunately, this is only one of the many policies that this administration and the Republican party have adopted which harms our veterans. For example, although it is not uncommon for a

veteran to wait 6 months or more to see a doctor, the Republicans' budget did not provide enough funding to shorten these waiting periods.

Mr. Speaker, it is disappointing to see the President constantly using our veterans for photo-ops, but when it comes to providing the necessary funding to give our veterans a good quality of life, the Republicans are nowhere to be found.

We, Democrats, have another way. We appreciate the sacrifice that all veterans have made and believe that the government must provide the necessary funding for veterans to receive the medical, educational, and other benefits they need and deserve. We particularly appreciate the men and women who were injured while serving their country and believe we should provide them with their full retirement benefits, as well as their full disability compensation.

Mr. Speaker, I urge this body to pass H.R. 303 and help our disabled veterans.

Mr. Speaker, I yield time to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Woolsey).

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Sandlin).

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from North Dakota (Mr. Pomeroy).

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from California (Mrs. Davis).

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from California (Mr. Filner).

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from Nevada (Ms. Berkley).

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Strickland).

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Ruppersberger).

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from New York (Mrs. McCarthy).

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from New York (Mrs. Maloney).

Mr. Speaker, may I inquire as to the time left on the hour.

Mr. Speaker, it gives me great pleasure to yield to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Marshall), who has truly been a leader on this issue all over the country, and he is the Member who filed the discharge petition.

Mr. Speaker, I certainly thank the gentlewoman from Georgia.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank not only the gentleman from Georgia but all of my colleagues who spoke this evening. We are spending so much time

on this issue because our veterans should be special and should be very important to all of the Members of Congress and to public policymakers in general.

Our veterans have been so loyal, not just to our country because of their service but they are always loyal to the Commander in Chief. They have allowed themselves to be misused, to be ignored, and to be marginalized too much, and particularly by this administration. We find ourselves fighting and the veterans are scratching and clawing trying to just get the kind of benefits that they deserve.

They are in these veterans hospitals across the Nation waiting in line for service, cannot get appointments. We do not have enough beds for them in nursing care homes. And now we hear about this particular issue on the floor tonight, and it seems to me that the President of the United States would put an end to this. This is a Commander in Chief that is now saying that he needs $87 billion more to continue the war in Iraq? We are going to have more veterans who will be disabled, who will come home, who will have to suffer this great injustice.

This is the President who has already spent $79 billion and who is coming back for more. And this is the President, along with others in the administration, who is talking about we all have to make sacrifices. Our soldiers are dying, our soldiers are being crippled and disabled. They are losing their limbs. How long do we have to beg? How long do we have to plead with this President?

I am here tonight, along with my colleagues, to ask my colleagues on the other side of the aisle to please sign that discharge petition. Please send a message to the veterans that during this time when we are at war, at a time when many of those who watch us on television who are fighting in Iraq, who may be the victim of some sniper's bullet any time, any day, let them know that should something happen, should they be crippled, should they lose a limb that they can depend on their government to see to it that they get both their retirement and the disability benefits that they deserve. I do not think that is too much to ask, Mr. Speaker.

I certainly feel a little bit ashamed this evening that we have to carry this debate this far. I served on the Committee on Veterans' Affairs when I first came to the Congress of the United States. I interacted with all of the service organizations. I made a lot of friends, and I discovered at that time that there are many in the Congress who will wave the red, white, and blue flag and they will talk the talk; but they will not walk the walk. They will not stand up and ask for the dollars. They will not defend the services. They will not even take the time to help the veterans fight through the bureaucracy of veterans affairs to get the benefits that are coming to them.

My office makes this its number one priority. Not only do we work for the veterans, we have had to organize a whole chapter of the Vietnam- era veterans in my district because they were being ignored and they were not being serviced. We think that that is the least that a Member of Congress can do, to service the veterans, to fight for them, to make sure that they get justice. And on this issue, this should be the highest priority of our veterans agenda.