Alternative Minimum Tax Relief Act of 2008

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my friend, the gentleman from Vermont, for not only yielding me this time to discuss the proposed rule for consideration of the alternative minimum tax, but I want to thank him for his friendship in the committee and the professional nature of the way he conducts himself.

Mr. Speaker, today we are going to debate a tax increase on America. No surprise. The American public has gotten used to this. The tax-and- spend Democrat Congress, the new Congress, the new way to run Washington, D.C. has resulted in not only economic failures here in this country the last 18 months but also higher gas prices, the inability that we have to control the flow in energy that comes into this country and has made us now more than ever to where we have to go get our energy overseas, send our money overseas, and not be able to be energy sufficient here in this country.

But now I find out that the excuse for raising taxes on Americans today is that there's a loophole in the tax law--a loophole--and unintended consequences. The bottom line is that it's the tax law, it was therefore reasoned, and the opportunity for us to grow our economy and build jobs and have job creation and to protect the American consumer is why these were parts of the tax law. It is not unintended consequences, it is not a loophole, it is the law, the tax law of the United States that I am very proud of, and I am disappointed to see that the Congress today will be debating new tax increases on the American people.

So I rise in strong opposition to this closed rule, yet another closed rule by this new majority that we have here, and to the underlying legislation, which takes the baffling approach, once again, of raising taxes on Americans and on the American economy during a downturn of our economy, rather than taking a way to prevent a tax increase on hardworking and unsuspecting middle class taxpayers, which sets the stage for even more job-killing tax increases in the very near future just to prevent the current low-tax policies that Republicans in Congress worked so hard to pass and to support on behalf of American taxpayers.

I think it's interesting, Mr. Speaker, that when Republicans bring tax bills to the floor of the House of Representatives, we are able to tout how many jobs our tax bill will create, how many jobs the economy will create. I have never, ever heard of a Democrat tax-and-spend bill that then touts how many jobs will be created, because they don't. They kill jobs. They kill jobs in America every time we do what we are doing today with the new Democrat majority to raise taxes on America.

Under the Democrats' flawed policy of pay-as-you-go logic used to defend this legislation, in just 2 short years--when a number of critically important tax policies like the $1,000 Republican tax credit and the Republican lower tax rate on income and capital gains and dividends are set to expire, that created job growth--the new Democrat majority pay-as-you-go rules will require more than $3.5 trillion in tax increases, and that is what they stand for today, increasing taxes on the American people, killing jobs all across the country, and yet they want to blame President Bush. Just incredible.

It makes no sense to me why we are hamstringing our economy and saddling working families with higher taxes when revenues aren't the problem. Washington is already collecting more taxes as a percentage of GDP than the historical average over the last 40 years.

We don't have a revenue problem. We have a spending problem. What Washington really has is a spending problem that this new Democrat majority can't fix and can't solve because they are all about taxing and spending. Federal spending is higher by nearly $530 billion more than the Congressional Budget Office's 2000 projection for the year 2007. So going back to 2000, and they projected how much money we would need to spend, we are $530 billion more this year, thanks to a new Democrat majority, making increased spending the main reason why 99 percent of our Nation's worsened budget picture over the last 7 years is occurring. We have got a downturn in the economy because we are raising taxes and spending to support a bloated government.

Mr. Speaker, the American people have known for a long time that Republican Members of Congress support an economically responsible solution to solving the alternative minimum tax problem. Just contrast this year's Republican budget proposal, which prevented expansion of the AMT for the next 3 years and achieved full repeal in 2013, with the Democrat budget. If you compare them, the Democrat budget, which jammed a $70 billion tax increase into our economy to pay for simply a temporary 1-year fix, and did nothing about AMT for the next 5 years after that. A 1-year fix, raising taxes $70 billion, rather than fixing the problem.

Mr. Speaker, taxpayers are already aware that last month, House Republicans unanimously supported a clean AMT patch without tax increases to prevent more than 25 million families--including 21 million families who didn't owe AMT in 2007--from paying an additional $61.5 billion that's going to come due this next April, just like we did in December of last year and just like we will continue to do if Republicans once again become the majority party in Congress.

What taxpayers may not realize is that House Democrats used to be for the same thing--at least that was until they won the majority. And with it came the opportunity to salivate, to get all this money, and to couple what used to be a bipartisan, commonsense tax prevention policy with massive, unnecessary tax hikes that burden this country, and for 18 months we have seen the promise of higher taxes, and it's killing our economy. As recently as last December, the House passed a ``clean'' AMT patch, without crippling the economy with tax increases, by an overwhelming majority of 352-64.

The only thing worse than House Democrats' tax-and-spend flip-flops on this issue is the fact that their comrades in the other body-- including Finance Chairman Max Baucus--have already recognized the reality that at the end of this day, the AMT patch will not be paid for, and that this cynical exercise meant to provide political cover is in fact dead-on-arrival the moment it passes this House. But let it be said: It's another opportunity for the new Democrat majority to show how much they want tax increases to ruin our economy.

The cost of this political gamesmanship is really quite simple: the exposure of millions of middle class taxpayers to an average tax increase of $2,400, and the increased likelihood of a repeat of last year's mismanaged process in which the late enactment of the patch prevented the IRS from processing AMT-affected returns until about 4 weeks into the filing season. It was a disaster this year as a result of the new majority.

What is worse, Mr. Speaker, is how the Democrat Congress proposed to raise the additional $61 billion of additional taxes just to prevent this tax increase. That's right. We are going to have a tax increase on the tax increase on middle class families who were never intended to pay this.

First, and rather unsurprisingly, this Democrat ``Drill-Nothing'' Congress helps repeal a tax deduction that helps American companies to produce energy for American consumers, but they are going to take that advantage away from consumers. It will only hurt energy exploration in this country, and now what we are going to see is that the American consumer will pay more at the pump.

While this proposal is laughable at best for everyone tuning in on C- SPAN across America today, it is about par for the course for the Democrat Party that also thinks that suing OPEC, not increasing the supply of American energy, will help bring down prices for consumers.

Second, this bill increases taxes on entrepreneurs that create jobs and improve failing companies, and raises the long-term capital gains rate on them from 15 to 35 percent, or even higher. So the people that are the ``goose that are laying the golden egg'' are once again slaughtered by this new Democrat proposal.

Once again, I know that most people around this country watching this debate understand that raising taxes on job creators reduces jobs and hurts our economy. But don't worry. You can blame President Bush for that, for the actions of this Congress.

Unfortunately, this proposal is not a surprise, coming from a Democrat Congress that believes when real estate and credit markets are at their weakest, that is the optimal time to raise taxes and send our economy over the edge.

Finally, the bill goes back on America's word by increasing taxes on transactions with treaty countries by mandating a new reporting requirement on private companies so that the IRS can know directly how much is being paid to merchants every year, including the Social Security or tax identification numbers associated with those transactions.

Mr. Speaker, I have got to hand it to the new Democrat majority. Every single week, they find out a new way to assault the taxpayer, every single week they find a way to raise taxes, to increase spending, and more rules and regulations. They did it again this week. Congratulations to the new Democrat majority.

Mr. Speaker, I strongly oppose this tax increase, and I will tell you that I will continue to stand up on the side of taxpayers and middle class Americans who say enough is enough.

I reserve the balance of my time.

I thank the gentleman.

Mr. Speaker, I will tell you--you've already heard me say it--this massive tax increase, once again, not only on the economy, but on Americans, could be done a different way. It could be solved. It could be solved by following through on promises that were made by both parties to do something about the AMT.

We've got to do something. We continue to see middle class Americans caught in the crossfire. Today, we see it's not just a crossfire with inability to solve the problem, it's partially solved for 1 year by raising $61 billion worth of new tax increases on Americans that they will have to pay this next April.

Mr. Speaker, since taking control of Congress in 2007, this Democrat Congress has totally neglected its responsibility to do anything constructive to address the domestic supply issues that have created skyrocketing gas, diesel and energy costs that American families are facing today. As a matter of fact, gas rose 10 cents a gallon across America just in the last few days.

So, today, I urge my colleagues once again to vote with me to defeat the previous question so this House can finally consider real solutions to the energy problems and the high costs that

we are facing. If the previous question is defeated, I will move to amend the rule to allow for consideration of H.R. 5656, which would repeal the ban on acquiring advanced alternative fuels, introduced by my good friend Jeb Hensarling of Texas back in March, almost 3 full months ago.

This legislation would reduce the price of gasoline by allowing the Federal Government to procure advanced alternative fuels derived from diverse sources like oil shale, tar sands and coal-to-liquid technology--in other words, marketplace answers--just by allowing the government to do that.

Section 526 of the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007, which this Democrat Congress passed, places artificial and unnecessary restraints on the Department of Defense in getting its fuel from friendly sources, like coal-to-liquid, oil shale and tar sands resources that are all abundant in the United States and Canada. Needless to say, it raises grave national and economic security concerns.

Mr. Speaker, this new Democrat Congress wants us to spend hundreds of billions of dollars to go build another Dubai. They want consumers in this country to pay higher costs. By doing so, it is a national security issue. We must do something. Adding alternatives to the supply chain is what is important.

Mr. Speaker, Canada currently is the largest U.S. oil supplier. It sent 1.8 million barrels per day of crude oil and 500,000 barrels per day of refined products to the United States in 2006. According to the Canadian Government, about half of the Canadian crude is derived from oil sands, with the oil sands production forecast to reach about 3 million barrels a day in 2015. Section 526, passed by this Democrat House, choked this flow of fuel from one of our Nation's most reliable allies and economic partners, and it increased our military's reliance on fuels from unfriendly and unstable governments around the world.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to have the text of that amendment and the extraneous material inserted into the Record prior to the vote on the previous question.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote for our military, for energy independence for Americans, and to help American consumers in this time of need and to support our economy by increasing the amount of oil we import and produce from friendly and reliable sources like Canada and from our own American, buy-American proven resources, these advanced alternative fuels, by voting to defeat the previous question.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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

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

Today's bill, Mr. Speaker, represents a clear difference between the two parties in the House when it comes to tax policy. Republicans believe that Congress should not raise taxes on one group of taxpayers in order to prevent a tax increase on another set of taxpayers. To say that another way, we don't believe we ought to have to raise taxes to preserve something that's already in the Tax Code.

Now, we are certainly for continuing to patch the alternative minimum tax. That's been the practice for the last several years. The President, in his budget for the last several years, has had an AMT patch in his budget without increasing taxes on somebody else. So we are certainly for that. But we are not for imposing a tax increase in a like amount on another set of taxpayers. That just doesn't make sense to us.

Without this patch, another 21 million families would come under the AMT, and their average tax increase would be about $2,400 per taxpayer. So we certainly want to prevent that. But in 2007, we had the patch in place; so we did not collect the AMT revenue from those 21 million taxpayers. And yet we collected, last year, in revenues to the Federal Government, about 18.7, 18.8 percent of gross domestic product. The historic average of revenues coming into the Federal Government for the last 40 years has been about 18.3 percent of GDP. So last year with the AMT patch in place, those 21 million taxpayers protected from the AMT, we brought in substantially more in revenues to the Federal Government than we have historically.

So why, then, should we be so intent on increasing taxes to prevent those 21 million taxpayers from paying $2,400 apiece more in taxes in 2008? The only explanation is somebody just wants to get more revenue into the Federal Government. Now, they may say, well, we want to do that because the deficit is really high and we want to get the deficit down. Well, I wonder, if we took a poll across America, how many Americans would say, ``Yes, I want to get the deficit down and I want to do it by raising taxes'' and how many Americans would say, ``Yes, I want to get the deficit down, but I want to do it by controlling spending''? My guess is more Americans would say, ``I want to get the deficit down by controlling spending.'' But the PAYGO rules that are in effect, while they give us the opportunity to reduce spending to ``pay for'' all of these things, not once have we seen a cut in spending being offered by the majority to pay for any of these items. It's always a tax increase.

So, yes, if you want to get the deficit down to zero, you can do it by increasing taxes, and under the PAYGO baseline, if we were to follow it, we would continue to increase the take of the Federal Government from American taxpayers until at the end of a 10-year window we'd be taking in 20.5 percent of GDP, an historic high, or pretty close to an historic high, and certainly only a couple times in our Nation's history have we even approached that level of revenues coming into the Federal Government.

Now, I think it's a legitimate question as to what is the appropriate level of GDP that we should bring in to the Federal Government, and Chairman Rangel alluded to that in his statement by saying that, I believe he said, the President hasn't offered a tax reform plan. That's true, I guess, he hasn't. But you know what? Under the Constitution, the President can't even introduce a bill, much less pass one. That's the job of the Congress.

So if we want to do tax reform, which I think is appropriate, we ought to have this discussion about what is the appropriate level of revenue that we should bring in? What is the appropriate take of the Federal Government of everything that Americans make? Is it 18.3 percent, the historic average? Is it 18.7 percent, what we took in last year? Or is it 20.5 percent? I don't know what the magic number is, but that's a legitimate debate, and we ought to have that debate in the context of writing a new tax system for the United States that is more modern, more efficient, and more competitive. So I hope that the chairman will, in his constitutional prerogative as the chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, undertake that task, have that debate, so that we can solve this problem once and for all of the AMT, the complexity of the code, and the continuing diminution of competitiveness that we enjoy with our tax system, vis-a-vis our competitors around the world.

This bill employs some pay-fors, some tax increases, that I believe would be onerous and would add to the lack of competitiveness in our Tax Code. For example, there is a provision that would, for the first time, ignore tax treaties that we have entered into in good faith with other countries around the world and would impose upon companies doing business, foreign companies doing business, through a United States subsidiary in this country, creating jobs in this country, a 30 percent tax, despite the fact that we have a tax treaty that says that company would get a deduction for that income and would not have to pay that 30 percent tax because they'd be paying taxes in the country where we have a tax treaty.

Now, yes, they say, well, but the ultimate parent is somewhere where there's not a tax treaty, but that still violates the spirit of the tax treaty that we have with the country where the immediate parent of the United States subsidiary resides. That change in our Tax Code would discourage at the margin that capital from coming to this country, being invested in this country, and creating jobs in this country.

Those companies that I'm talking about employ a substantial number of Americans; 5.3 million Americans are employed by those kinds of companies. Do we want to jeopardize those jobs? And 19 percent of all United States exports, helping us a little bit to get the balance of trade going our way, 19 percent of all exports come from companies like that. And just last year they reinvested nearly $71 billion back into their United States operations. That's capital, that's investment that we should want here and not discourage through tax changes like the one in this bill.

So, Mr. Speaker, I would say to the Members of this body that we ought to reject the majority's offering that they put forward today to save 21 million taxpayers from coming under the AMT because they would impose a like amount of tax increase on another set of taxpayers. Let's not increase taxes on any set of taxpayers, certainly not in this fragile economy.

We will later offer a motion to recommit that corrects the error, that strips the bill of the pay-fors, and it would allow this body to vote on a clean AMT patch to save those 21 million taxpayers from the increased tax burden but not increase taxes on somebody else.

With that, Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I have a motion to recommit at the desk.

I am opposed to the bill in its current form.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The majority's use of PAYGO has really twisted the logic of this bumper-sticker-turned-budget-tool into a pretzel. In the last 2 weeks, when PAYGO stood in the way of more government spending, it was ignored or openly waived. But, today, the majority insists on new permanent tax increases in exchange for a 1-year extension of needed tax relief. That is not a good deal for anybody--a permanent tax increase to pay for a temporary tax relief.

The motion that we have before us would save us from that fate. It would remove the tax increases in the bill, including the particularly misguided higher taxes on energy production that would discourage production here at home, that would further increase our energy insecurity, that would reduce our energy supplies, and that would increase prices.

Is that what we want to do? Do we want to increase the price of gasoline? That is what the effect of this would be. This is a tax increase on oil and gas companies--the companies that produce the oil, the gasoline that we buy. Do we think that, if we increase taxes on them, they are just going to absorb that? Of course not. They will pass it through to the consumer, which will mean higher gasoline prices.

This is a terribly misguided part of this bill. The motion to recommit would get rid of that ill-advised tax increase. So we get rid of all the pay-fors in the bill. That's the first thing that the motion to recommit does.

The second thing we do is we do provide some relief in this bill from high gasoline prices to volunteers who use their vehicles to help charities carry out their work. A lot of charities are telling us that they are losing volunteers because of the high price of gasoline.

Now, the IRS has some authority to modify the tax deduction that people can get from using gasoline in certain situations. So the IRS did, this week in fact, implement a midyear increase in the standard mileage deduction rates, increasing to 58\1/2\ cents the allowable deduction for expenses incurred in operating a vehicle while carrying on a trade or business, and raising to 27 cents per mile the deduction for gasoline costs associated with transportation primarily for and essential to receiving medical care and for travel while moving.

But the IRS could not raise the deduction that can be claimed by individuals who use their car for charitable purposes, such as for delivering Meals on Wheels. That has to be done legislatively. So our motion to recommit would do just that. We would set the allowable deduction for gasoline expenses for charitable purposes at the same rate for medical care and for travel while moving, 27 cents per mile.

Meals on Wheels is one of those charities that has told us that they are losing volunteers because of gas prices. Nearly half indicated that increases in gas prices had forced them to eliminate meal delivery routes or to consolidate their meal services.

Mr. Speaker, these high gasoline prices are, in fact, having a very deleterious effect on charities and on Meals on Wheels in particular. I won't go into some of the details that we have been given by Meals on Wheels about the state of some of our seniors, but needless to say, it's not a pretty picture.

So this would give those charities some relief, Mr. Speaker, and it would allow them, we think, to get some of those volunteers back in active service to relieve some of these problems that we have.

So, Mr. Speaker, our motion to recommit does two things. It takes out the tax increases in this bill, leaving in place the AMT patch to give tax relief to those taxpayers who would otherwise be subjected to a $2,400-apiece increase in taxes, and number two, it increases the deduction, the mileage deduction, for vehicle use for charitable purposes.

Mr. Speaker, I urge its adoption.

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

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 1297 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to my friend, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Sessions). All time yielded during consideration of the rule is for debate only.

General Leave

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks and to insert extraneous materials into the Record.

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

Mr. Speaker, H. Res. 1297 provides for consideration of H.R. 6275, the Alternative Minimum Tax Relief Act of 2008, under a closed rule. The rule provides for 1 hour of debate, controlled by the Committee on Ways and Means.

As Americans know, the alternative minimum tax was enacted in 1969 with a very legitimate intent: to ensure fairness in our tax system by avoiding the situation where very wealthy individuals don't pay taxes and to close loopholes. It is in the same spirit of fairness that we consider legislation today that will keep the middle class out of being hit by the alternative minimum tax when it was never intended that they would be caught up in its web and who have been because of inflation and because of no adjustments in the Tax Code.

The Alternative Minimum Tax Relief Act of 2008 will provide, one, 25 million Americans with over $61 billion in tax relief. Two, it offers property tax relief to homeowners and expands the child and adoption credits to parents. Nearly 50,000 families in my own State of Vermont, Mr. Speaker, will see tax relief from this legislation.

However, in order for the tax relief to be fair, we have to ensure that the cost of the tax relief is not simply passed on, the credit card debt, to our children, and we have already saddled the next generation with $9 trillion in debt, costing us $1 billion a day in interest payments, money that could be spent on other, much more productive things. Enacting an AMT patch today when we don't pay for it would simply shift that $62 billion burden from the middle class on to their children and their grandchildren. What we fail to pay today they will be forced to pay tomorrow with interest.

Furthermore, we do pay for this tax relief by improving the Tax Code. With the bill's offsets, we are closing two very large tax loopholes, one that has benefited very wealthy hedge fund managers at the expense of middle class taxpayers, and let me talk about that first.

The ``carried-interest'' loophole. It is a preferential rate of capital gains tax, a 15 percent rate that gets applied to income earned by many people who do financial work.

Right now, under current law, the income earned by many investment fund managers at a private equity firm, and hedge funds, are taxed at the lower capital gains tax rate. So you have this very unjustified situation where some of these folks who are making, in some cases, billions of dollars, pay a tax rate lower than the secretaries who work in their firms, and they do this when they don't actually put their capital at risk but manage the capital of others.

A second loophole that is closed in this bill stops major oil companies from receiving what is called a special domestic production subsidy through the Tax Code. As we all know, record gas prices, the record cost of a barrel of oil is resulting in oil company profits that are unparalleled in the history of this country, in some cases, as high as $11 billion in a single 3-month period. So it's clear that those companies are doing very well and that they do not need continued taxpayer assistance.

I commend Chairman Rangel and Chairman Neal and the Committee on Ways and Means for their excellent work on this legislation, and I encourage my colleagues to support the rule and the underlying legislation.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I am the last speaker on our side. I will reserve the balance of my time until the gentleman from Texas has an opportunity to close.

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

Mr. Speaker, my friend from Texas characterizes a bill that will provide tax relief to 25 million Americans as a tax increase, and it is just flat out wrong. There are 25 million Americans. These are folks who earn between $40,000, $50,000, $60,000 a year, who, if we do not pass this legislation, will find themselves essentially being the target of legislation that was intended in 1969 to have millionaires pay their fair share.

We are talking about soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan who get a job as a police officer or as a carpenter. We are talking about some our school teachers all across the country. We are talking about sanitation workers who are struggling hard on $40,000 or $50,000 a year, oftentimes with two people in that family who are working, raising three or four kids. We are saying in this legislation that we are going to protect you, because we know you need to have that money to pay your bills.

We also have to level with the American people. This is going to be $61 billion in tax relief for those incredibly hard-working Americans who are getting clobbered by these $4-plus gas prices. They can't fill up their tank. They have got cars or SUVs or trucks that they have to drive, and they don't have the money to get something that is a little bit more fuel efficient. A lot of them have long commutes. This legislation is going to give them the opportunity to keep a little bit more money in their pocket so they can make it from one end of the week to the other and can pay their bills.

Now, the question is for this Congress, do we pay for it, or do we put it on the credit card? As to what my friend from Texas is characterizing as a tax increase, let me go through it, because I think Americans have a commitment to fairness, and I think Americans know a very commonsense proposition, and that is we have all got to bear the burden. We all have to pay our share of the load.

There are two very glaring situations in the Tax Code, and attention should be paid to them, and it is overdue. One is this hedge fund exemption, where folks who make an awful lot of money pay at a capital gains rate. What is unfair about it? If you are a financial advisor, if you or I ask someone to help us figure how to invest our money, we pay them a fee, and of whatever earnings they get, they pay a regular tax rate just like any other American. Whatever that rate is--15, 20, 35 percent--that is what they pay.

If you are a hedge fund executive and you make billions, because of this provision in the Tax Code, which I am calling a loophole, they get to pay at a 15 percent rate. That is costing the treasury billions of dollars, and it is also a glaring unfairness, because you literally have a situation where the hedge fund manager who is doing the same work as another financial advisor down the street pays one rate, 15 percent, while the other person doing the same work, working just as hard but who is perhaps making less money, pays 35 percent.

You also have this bizarre situation where the person making this immense amount of money pays a much lower tax rate than the secretary, than the back office help in that very same firm. I think most Americans see a basic fairness, and let's have the income tax rate apply to earned income. That is what this provision does.

The second question is on the oil company exemption, and I am using the word ``loophole.'' What is a ``loophole''? I think, commonly, you know it when you see it. What a ``loophole'' is in this case is giving taxpayer benefit to very successful companies that do very well in what they do--explore for oil, sell it. We are taking money from the taxpayers of America to give it to major American and foreign oil companies. These are mature industries that are making hundreds of billions of dollars, and they don't need taxpayer help.

So this legislation provides 25 million Americans with tax relief, and it is the folks who need it. It asks other Americans, the hedge fund executives, to pay at the income tax rate, and it has oil companies foregoing what has been an incredibly good deal--tax credits that they get at the expense of the American taxpayer.

I urge a ``yes'' vote on the previous question and on the rule.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the resolution.

Madam Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 7005) to amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to provide alternative minimum tax relief for individuals for 2008.

Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and to insert extraneous material in the Record.

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

The provisions of H.R. 7005, the Alternative Minimum Tax Relief Act of 2008, as scheduled for floor action today, provides alternative minimum tax relief.

Ways and Means Committee Chairman Rangel and the ranking member, Mr. McCrery, have asked the nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation to make available to the public a technical explanation of the bill. The technical explanation expresses the committee's understanding and legislative intent behind this important legislation. It is available on the joint committee's Web site at www.jct.gov. I want to thank Mr. Rangel for his diligent work on a flurry of last minute bills here. There is some urgency to the bill we are debating today. I also want to acknowledge, to his everlasting relief, that this is the last time Mr. Reynolds will have a chance to speak on the issue of the alternative minimum tax.

If we do not pass this legislation today, 25 million families will pay higher taxes this year. That is right, this tax relief is for this year. I might add to this conversation that one of the nice things about this bill, despite how tumultuous these days have been for Members of Congress and for the American citizens watching what has happened to their 401(k) plans, this legislation actually provides middle class tax relief. The current patch expired at the end of the last year, and it is urgent that we pass this relief now.

Of those 25 million families facing higher taxes, 84 percent of them earn less than $200,000. In my constituency alone, families paying alternative minimum tax will rise from 8,000 to 69,000 if we do not enact this patch, and only 500 of those unlucky 69,000 people earn more than half a million dollars annually. Clearly, the alternative minimum tax is not the millionaire's tax it was designed to be.

For the last decade I have sought to repeal or radically reform the AMT because of the unfairness it wreaks on our progressive tax system. The AMT patch we are considering today costs more than $60 billion, and a reminder to all, next year, $70 billion. But unlike the version we considered earlier this year, we should acknowledge, this one is not offset. Despite partisan efforts in outreach to the other side on the issue of fiscal responsibility, we have, unfortunately, been unable to find common ground. We have run up against the reality of the closing days of Congress, and this legislation simply must be accomplished.

Again, I want to congratulate Chairman Rangel on crafting a responsible bill and one which picks up on the good work of our colleagues, Mr. Van Hollen of Maryland and Mr. Johnson of Texas, on the issue of incentive stock options. For a decade, Mr. Johnson and I have tried to find relief for those taxpayers unfortunately caught with a massive AMT bill on phantom stock gains, and today's bill provides relief by abating penalties and interest on underpayments and by allowing quicker recovery of AMT credits.

The bill we are considering today is a true hold-harmless patch because it not only extends but increases the AMT exemption level. It also extends protection from AMT for taxpayers with personal, nonrefundable credits, such as education credits and the dependent care credits. Otherwise, taxpayers might lose these essential credits to

Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Kind).

Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pascrell), a fine member of the Ways and Means Committee.

I yield 1 additional minute to the gentleman.

Madam Speaker, I appreciate my friend, Mr. Dreier's, comments, about the alternative minimum tax and how we are going to proceed today, but, let me be blunt, over my objections for the last 8 years, what we talked about today is simply this for the American people that might be viewing this discussion, we are going to borrow the money. I object to it, but I have tried time and again to find concurrence on the other side with a common way forward and have been unsuccessful.

Madam Speaker, I would like to yield 2 minutes to the gentlelady from Nevada, a very valued member of the Ways and Means Committee, Ms. Berkley.

Madam Speaker, I want to agree with some of what Mr. Reynolds said, but I also want to remind the American citizenry today, we have now borrowed hundreds of billions of dollars to fix the alternative minimum tax, only to discover that a temporary patch is hardly a fix.

Think of what we might have done had we adhered to some fiscal rectitude and actually paid for this legislation as opposed to borrowing the money.

The reality is, in a legislative body, that there are some days that you can't get the votes to do what you would like, and this is one of those days.

But be mindful as we proceed to the next session of the Congress that the request for fixing the alternative minimum tax, or patching the alternative minimum tax, you will be out $70 billion, the following year $80 billion, maybe more. Then when you calculate the interest that attends to the issue, we quickly find that we will be at $500 billion to have temporarily patched alternative minimum tax, when we have offered a remedy here to do away with it?

We can argue about percentage of GDP that results in taxation to administer the Federal Government. I have heard that argument. The difficulty with that argument is that it doesn't take into consideration the reality of what we might have done in the intervening time to address the issue.

We have put very thoughtful pieces of legislation to permanently repeal it, to put it behind us once and for all, alternative minimum tax, only to discover that we have had difficulty securing the necessary cooperation to get it done. So, I will be standing here next year, talking about alternative minimum tax, asking for a permanent repeal. I hope, in the atmosphere of tax reform, that we might accomplish that task.

Madam Speaker, I would like to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New York, a classmate of mine from 1988, my friend, Mr. Engel.

I would be prepared to close upon listening to the eloquence of the gentleman from New York.

Madam Speaker, let me, as I close, acknowledge the work of Chairman Rangel. He has given me considerable latitude not only on this issue but on a range of other issues within the jurisdiction of the committee. We have come up with some pretty good pieces of legislation during the last couple of years.

What is striking about this debate is we find ourselves in the same predicament where we will once again convene next year to discuss it. Mr. Rangel's legislation that I helped to author actually repealed the alternative minimum tax and did it in a responsible manner. The fact that we are here today because we couldn't find enough numbers in the House to move forward on the proposal, I think, demonstrates the frustration that we all feel with what has now become a very onerous position for the Congress to entertain.

But I do want to thank my friend, Tom Reynolds. And he is my friend. We probably on tax policy disagree on where the sun rises and the sun sets, but it is an example of a friendship

that has been able to supersede any of those differences because after the debate of this House is over, socially he has been a good pal for a long time. And I have the impression that he is not going to miss debating alternative minimum tax when he is back in New York. His position has been steadfast in this arena on the issue of AMT, and we have really worked hand in glove with one minor difference: I think rather than borrow the money, I think we should pay for it. And at the same time, I must tell you, he has been a good and humorous friend along the way, and we will miss his presence in the House and on the Ways and Means Committee.

Madam Speaker, I urge adoption of the resolution.

I yield back the balance of my time.

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

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

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

Madam Speaker, I thank the chairman of the Select Revenue Measures Subcommittee of Ways and Means. Mr. Neal has been a true leader in the goal of trying to get permanent repeal of AMT, and while it is something that we share, we have not yet reached a solution.

So I find myself rising today on behalf of middle class families all across America in strong support of this bill. As my colleagues well know, I have fought year in and year out for the AMT patch, and I am disappointed that Congress has not addressed a permanent solution. Absent a long-term proposal, I think we have no choice but to once again pass a temporary 1-year fix.

Without patch legislation, more than 25 million families will be hit by this stealth tax. This includes more than 21 million taxpayers who didn't owe AMT in 2007. If Congress does not act, each American affected by AMT will, on average, face a tax increase of almost $2,500. We delayed action for so long last year that 13.5 million taxpayers were forced to delay filing their returns. Because we did not act earlier this year, millions more have been hanging in the balance.

We have an opportunity to end the uncertainty of the middle class that they have been facing all year long. Each Member of this House has the opportunity to live up to their responsibility and truly help the middle class trapped in this stealth tax that was so unintended for the middle class.

Yesterday the other body passed their bipartisan tax extenders package. The Senate majority leader was as candid as I have ever heard him when he bluntly told the House, ``Don't send us back something else. We can't get it passed.'' He went on to make it clear that if we do, the important extenders we have all been working so hard to accomplish will die and we will have ``snatched defeat from the jaws of victory.''

In these difficult and uncertain economic times, we have an obligation to pass a bill that can be signed into law as quickly as possible to protect middle class Americans. While I believe our time today would be better spent moving a comprehensive tax extenders package, I am nonetheless pleased to see the majority put up a clean AMT bill before this House.

I thank Chairman Rangel for his leadership on this legislation and Chairman Neal for his additional leadership as the Chair of the Subcommittee of Select Revenues.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Texas (Mr. Brady), a member of the Ways and Means Committee.

Madam Speaker, it is now my pleasure to yield 2 minutes to the ranking member of the Rules Committee, who has long been an expert on trade as well as tax issues that affect this body and the country, the gentleman from California, David Dreier.

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

I yield the gentleman 1 additional minute.

Madam Speaker, today is solution day. There have been times where I have come to the floor and indicated I was sad over the circumstances we were in. Today I am not sad. We are moving the result of legislation I have introduced since probably 2005, a 1-year patch that protects anyone else from getting trapped in the middle class of AMT and make sure that we do this patch.

I don't believe, and most of the Members on my side of the aisle don't believe you need to raise taxes in order to pay for a tax cut on middle class Americans here.

But I am bringing concern, not sadness, but concern, because Chairman Rangel and Chairman Neal have moved this legislation to the floor and that we, I hope, will pass this legislation, as we have in the past, with very strong bipartisan measure. But I don't take lightly a message from the leader of the other body on the closing days of this session that we make sure that we don't fall through the cracks, our

version versus the Senate--the other body--version that could cause this to fall through the cracks and 25 million middle class Americans are trapped.

So while we are looking to move this in the spirit of strong bipartisan support, it's indicative that the leadership of this body make sure that they full well know how we can get the mechanics with the other body to make this law as the President gets it to his desk.

So the caution is we are not quite there yet because we have taken action today. While I like the version of the bill, we have taken our legislative prerogative and advanced it to have just this free-standing AMT bill.

I support however we get the law signed, but I bring the caution that leadership in this House will have to work very closely with the Senate leadership of the other body to match a solution that's law so we don't put our 25 million Americans in the same harm's way of inaction that we have seen in other years past.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, if I might inquire to the chairman if he has any other speakers, I am prepared to close.

Madam Speaker, it's interesting in the debate, and many of us who spoke today and so many others that have come forward in years past have presented the history or the finger pointing or the direction of how we got to where we are.

The important thing is that we know that we must produce a result, even if it's a 1-year patch. It has been admirable, as Chairman Rangel took over Ways and Means, a goal he had was to rid the AMT tax from the books. We need to work in a bipartisan fashion, I suspect, to reach that permanent goal.

But as we banter some on PAYGO or pay not, or whether they are in or they are not, it reminds me to think as a Member who will not be going home to campaign, maybe I should spend a little time to see how many times we have waived PAYGO on this bill after we beat up the fact that we should do it, it's the right thing, it must happen. And then at the end of the day, we take the Republican version of not raising taxes. Quite frankly, I don't think we are borrowing money for the bill, we are just not raising taxes in order to prevent a tax increase, particularly one to the middle class which both parties so dearly want to preserve.

So as we look to the reality of this year, I remind my colleagues, we have caution to get this bill matched with the other body so that we make law in order to send it to the President's desk to protect our middle class taxpayers.

Last year 352 bipartisan Members of the House voted for the AMT extension that was not offset by devastating tax increases, just like this bill coming before us today.

I urge my colleagues to do the same today by supporting this bill so it may be included in a comprehensive tax extenders package equal to the Senate version, or that the other body relinquishes their very clear, strong warning from their leader. Ignoring the other body's warning will not get this across the finish line. So I urge adoption of the resolution, and I thank Chairman Rangel and Chairman Neal for their efforts and work to get this before us today as we are in the final days of this legislative session.

Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.