Providing amounts for the expenses of the Select Committee on the Climate Crisis and the Select Committee on the Modernization of Congress.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume, and I want to thank my friend from New York for yielding me the customary 30 minutes.

Mr. Speaker, I am not going to have the opportunity very often, so I want to make sure I do it while the gentleman and I are together today to tell him I agree with absolutely everything Mr. Morelle had to say. It doesn't happen very often on the Rules Committee.

If you are ever having a good day and you need to bring some discord into your life, I want you to head upstairs to the third floor, where there is a 9-to-4 majority-minority distribution, and you can find discord up there every day of the week. It doesn't matter whether it is Republicans leading the institution or Democrats leading the institution.

Last night, we had a chance to come together and talk about something that unites us all; but I oppose the rule today, Mr. Speaker, because this is a bill that passed the Congress last year, and when we passed it last year, we passed it unanimously through the Veterans' Affairs Committee. All the Republicans and all the Democrats voted ``yes.'' Then we brought it to the House floor, and we passed it unanimously here on a voice vote.

But the difference between the bill we have before us today and the bill we had before us last year is that, when we made new promises to our veterans for much-needed benefits last year, we went and we found ways to pay for those promises--not controversial ways, not divisive ways, but ways that we agreed to unanimously at the committee and the full House level. When the bill reappeared this year, those pay-fors were miraculously absent.

I am concerned about that for two reasons, Mr. Speaker, and I think this body should reject this rule and give us a chance to improve this bill. We tried to improve it with an amendment last night, and the amendment was nongermane.

For folks who are new to the institution, understand that, if the committee that sends the bill to the House floor decides they are not going to pay for it, then any effort to try to pay for it is nongermane. So, once a committee sends a bill that is flawed to the Rules Committee, unless there is a waiver of the House rules to allow a pay-for amendment, pay-for amendments are not in order.

So what happens is we are making a new commitment of about $120 million to our veterans, a wonderful commitment.

Again, I agree with absolutely everything the gentleman from New York had to say. His heart for veterans is pure, and his words were true.

But that $120 million commitment we are making, Mr. Speaker, gets folded into the Veterans' Affairs budget that we don't increase by one penny, which means we now have to go cut $120 million worth of other veterans' benefits in order to pay for this veterans' benefit.

That is not what anybody on this floor wants to do. In the Budget Committee today, we were talking about the caps, talking about how to deal with caps. Nobody wants to dip into the already promised benefits that we have made to American veterans.

But the mystery to me is that, in this Chamber that America perceives as being so divided, in this town that America perceives as being so broken, we came together last year, unanimously, to do it the right way; and with new House leadership this year, Mr. Speaker, we have instead chosen to do it the easy way.

I think our veterans deserve better, but, more importantly, I know the Members of this institution can do better. We have, and we can again.

I hope my friends will reject this rule and give us a chance to go back, pay for this, make sure there are not unintended consequences of cutting other veterans' benefits that every man and woman in this Chamber supports.

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

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

It is not like me to correct the Chair because he serves the entire House, but, I will tell you, it is entirely possible that Mr. Morelle and I could yield each other time back and forth today. That is the nature of this institution's support for veterans.

And, I have to tell you, that is what hurts me the most about the way this bill has come to the floor. My friend is exactly right, Mr. Speaker, when he says that the CBO says this: There is no direct spending in this bill at all.

I just want you to think through that with me. We are promising veterans new benefits that cost money, and the scorekeeping institution of the United States House of Representatives says this bill will cost nothing.

Now, why is that true? It is true because there are other laws on the books, the budget caps that are on the books that say: If you add one penny of veterans funding in this category, you have got to cut a penny from this category.

When we did this bill last year, we all recognized that. I am not telling anybody anything they don't already know, and it pains me to see the defense of this bill as ``we didn't have to,'' ``they didn't make us,'' ``it is not required.'' All of those arguments were true last year, too. They didn't make us. We don't have to. It is not required.

It is just the right thing to do. And we came together, and we did it.

You have a different vantage point of this Chamber, Mr. Speaker, than I do. From your chair, it may look like that bipartisanship breaks out across this Chamber in mass quantities every day of the week, but, from my position behind this podium, we don't find that many things that both spend money and save money, those things that make new promises while revising old promises that weren't working as well, those things that make promises today but pay for them today instead of passing the bill on to our children and grandchildren.

And we did that together last year. We did it together. How can folks forget? Yes, we have lots of new freshmen in this Chamber, but we came together last year, unanimously, to do this bill right, to tell veterans: We do want to serve you better; we are going to create a new benefit; and we are not going to force cuts to other benefits as a result.

I am not going to give up on bipartisanship breaking out in this Chamber again and again and again, and I am certainly not going to give up on the bipartisan commitment that we have to serving our veterans. There are only so many days in a year. There are only so many weeks in a Congress. We cannot waste them doing a halfway job when we could have done the job right.

In this case, it is not as if we don't have a roadmap of how to do the job right. We did it. It is not as if we thought about doing it; we voted unanimously together to do it.

Yet, in this new day, we have chosen a different path, an inferior path. I just challenge my colleagues, as Paul Ryan used to say: Raise your gaze. This is a good idea. This is a good programmatic policy. But we need to pay for it, not cut veterans' benefits in order to squeeze it in.

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

Mr. Speaker, I would welcome my friend to close, but, in the spirit of bipartisanship, I will be happy to begin that process.

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

It is a different job in the minority. The power that Mr. Morelle has to open this debate and close this debate, it lends credence to his words. As I stipulated at the beginning, everything he said was true. It is what he didn't say that we can do better on.

I will say this one more time because, again, for new Members of this Chamber, you may not understand how the Rules Committee works. If a committee does not pay for legislation, if a committee just makes promises and does not find a way to pay for it, it is not appropriate, under House rules, to then try to add a pay-for. It requires a waiver from the Rules Committee of House rules in order to include a pay-for in a bill that is not already paid for. We offered that amendment last night. It was rejected on a party-line vote in the Rules Committee. Mr. Speaker, if we defeat the previous question today, we will offer a solution.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of my amendment in the Record, along with extraneous material, immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.

Mr. Speaker, the amendment that we will offer if the previous question is defeated would add the language that, by collecting fees on housing loans that would pay for this new childcare benefit so that we don't have to go deep into the Veterans' Affairs budget, cutting other benefits in order to pay for this, so we don't have to violate budget caps and borrow from our children and from our grandchildren, so that we can make promises to men and women who deserve and need this benefit and know that we have come together and done the heavy lifting to pay for it today.

I hope my friends will unite, as we did last year, in approving this funding language, unite in defeating the previous question, so that I can bring this amendment up and we can do this in the same honorable, bipartisan, collaborative way that we unanimously passed this very same language just a few short months ago.

I urge my friends: Know that we can do better.

Mr. Speaker, while I contemplated yielding back, I am going to reserve my time just in case there are any more speakers who have been affected by my words and want to come and join this effort that we have today. I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Mr. Speaker, it is troubling to me that we have those things that divide us, that permeate these conversations that could be uniting. Again, I don't think we have that many opportunities where we are able to come together as an entire institution unanimously to support legislation, so I deeply regret we have missed that opportunity.

I want to encourage my friends on the other side of the aisle not to fall under the same trap that I think Republicans fell into just 8 short years ago. Every single conversation we have now in the Rules Committee, the tax cuts come into it.

The fact that so many of my Democratic friends didn't want tax cuts for the American people isn't a mystery to me. I got not one Democratic vote on the entire bill. I get it. One team thought it was a good idea, one team didn't, but we cannot use that disagreement as an excuse not to do the very best that we can on each and every bill going forward.

I will give you that example from the Republicans experience. I was categorically opposed to the Federal takeover of healthcare that was the Affordable Care Act. I was categorically opposed to the way that small businesses lost options. And my friends that were promised they could keep their doctor and they could keep their plan, those promises were broken.

But I still came together with my Democratic friends on the floor to find additional dollars for veterans healthcare and plus-up those accounts, to find additional ways to serve veterans who had not been served through healthcare and plus-up those accounts. The fact that we disagree on really big important issues does not mean we cannot come together and do the very best that we can.

And with that in mind, I want to give credit where credit is due. I have talked a lot about how we unanimously passed this bill last Congress. It is true. We unanimously passed it out of committee, and we unanimously passed it on the floor of the House. But what that means is, it came to the floor of the House on the suspension calendar, which meant no amendments were made in order.

The way that my friends on the other side of the aisle have brought the bill up, amendments are made in order, and the Rules Committee made 21 different amendments in order. We passed the bill unanimously under our leadership, but there was not an opportunity to improve it.

My friends on the other side have chosen a different path that does allow an opportunity to improve it, but doesn't allow the opportunities that I am seeking to pay for it.

I don't have to demean my friends or their intentions because their intentions are pure, and they are thoughtful, honorable Members of this institution. The fact that we disagree about policy does not mean we have to disagree about the motives of one another. And when we have these opportunities to do not just good but better; not just good, but good in a way that we don't pass the bill on to our children and our grandchildren, we take care of that bill today.

I will close with this, Mr. Speaker. Again, I can't disagree with any of the words my friend from New York tells because the half of the story that he tells is absolutely true. This is an authorizing bill where we make a new promise to veterans.

If this bill passes the floor of the House today, it then goes to the Appropriations Committee to fulfill this promise that we all celebrate today, and the Appropriations Committee will have not one new penny to pay for this new promise.

We have all been in this business long enough to know what happens to promises that folks don't put any money behind and what happens to promises that don't get paid for. The law prevents the Appropriations Committee from funding this new promise, unless they cut dollars from existing veterans promises today.

This bill is doing all the right things for all the right reasons. Let's not make another veteran have to pay in a cut for what we are promising to one of his brothers or sisters in a new benefit.

Defeat the previous question; allow us to pay for this bill; and let's put our money where our hearts and our mouths are.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 105 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Woodall), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.

General Leave

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members be given 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks.

Mr. Speaker, on Wednesday, the Rules Committee met and reported a rule, House Resolution 105, providing for consideration of H.R. 840, the Veterans' Access to Child Care Act, under a structured rule.

The rule provides for 1 hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on Veterans' Affairs.

The rule makes in order 21 amendments, each debatable for 10 minutes. The rule also provides for adoption of H. Res. 86, a resolution providing interim funding for our two new select committees.

Lastly, the rule provides suspension authority through next Friday, February 15.

Mr. Speaker, the Veterans' Access to Child Care Act would make permanent the VA's childcare pilot program, allowing more veterans to access cost-free childcare when they receive mental or other intensive healthcare treatment through the VA.

A nearly identical piece of legislation passed in the House last year under a Republican majority with bipartisan cosponsors and without objection. It is my hope that this Congress will support these efforts to make it easier for our brave servicemembers to get the care they need while supporting their families.

Millions of working families across the Nation are struggling to afford the rising cost of childcare. Families in my own State of New York often pay upwards of $15,000 each year to place one child in a childcare center. Some parents may find themselves owing their entire salary each month to provision of daycare. This cost can be so debilitating that parents are being driven out of the workforce--many of them women.

For veterans, these struggles can be even more acute. Many veterans are primary caregivers to their children or even their grandchildren. These brave men and women rely on the VA for their healthcare, but many of them are forced to miss appointments or forgo treatment altogether because they

have no childcare options. For many, that can be devastating. We have seen the harm that can be done when military veterans do not receive high-quality mental health services.

This Nation is facing a crisis. Each day, 20 American veterans take their own life. Studies have shown that mental health disparities are a leading cause of high suicide rates among veterans who struggle with depression or post-traumatic stress.

The Department of Veterans Affairs has shown that the suicide rate has increased faster among those veterans who have not recently received treatment through the VA system. Addressing inadequate access to lifesaving mental health and intense health services is critical as we seek to reform our veterans' healthcare system, and we know that making care more accessible will save lives.

Currently, the Department of Veterans Affairs operates a pilot program to provide cost-free childcare to help primary caregivers seeking mental health treatment at selected VA facilities across the country. This program has been extended by Congress several times and has provided care for more than 10,000 children already.

Congress now has an opportunity to extend not only this pilot, but to expand this essential service to every VA facility in the Nation. This will allow thousands more veterans to receive cost-free childcare, ensuring that they never have to choose caring for their family over caring for their own mental health well-being.

This legislation is especially important for female veterans across the Nation, many of whom are single parents or primary caregivers. An increasing number of female veterans have been in combat. One in five female veterans seen by the VA report military sexual trauma.

It is clear that female veterans face unique health challenges and unique barriers to accessing the care they need. This legislation will work to dismantle those barriers so the VA can build on the progress we have made in treating female veterans.

For many veterans, it is not only essential that they receive mental and intensive healthcare, but that they receive care quickly. When facing a serious mental health crisis, veterans shouldn't have to worry about their babysitter dropping out or how they will pay for a day of daycare or how they will find someone to take care of their child while they go to the hospital and receive services. We must ensure that the men and women who have laid their lives on the line for our Nation have timely access to the lifesaving services they need and that we have promised to provide.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote for this rule and the underlying legislation, and I reserve the balance of my time.

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

First of all, I appreciate the comments by my distinguished and wholly entertaining colleague, the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Woodall). I do want to just make a couple of points related to his comments.

First of all, as the gentleman indicated, the amendment that he talked about was not germane, not before the House, and that was ruled such yesterday. But, as it relates to the paygo rule, we are entirely in compliance with that. In fact, the Congressional Budget Office advised us that there is no direct spending in the bill.

As my mother is often wont to say: You can't be holier than the church. CBO has ruled on it and indicated that the bill does not add a single penny to our deficit or to the national debt, period.

I do, Mr. Speaker, however, find it somewhat ironic. I was thinking about this just yesterday after our conversation in the Rules Committee, and I do note that the appropriation over the next 5 years, $120 million--that is million with an M, not billion with a B, and certainly not trillion with a T. And I do find it ironic to some agree that the gentleman and his colleagues last year would enact a tax cut which provided that 83 percent of its benefits went to the wealthiest Americans.

And, if we were here each day, Mr. Woodall and I, for 365 days a year, for the next 30 years--10,000 days, 10,000 times--that tax bill would have spent more money than this would during that time, if we did this for 10,000 days. Think about it.

The work that we do here: authorized spending on a program for veterans, not our wealthiest Americans; those who are struggling; those who have,

during their time, provided great service and sacrifice to our country; those who have kept us safe. And I know Mr. Woodall and I share an appreciation for all the work our veterans do.

But this is a policy bill, Mr. Speaker. It is not an appropriations bill, and it has no direct spending. What it does: It helps save the lives of veterans, and it helps put them on a safer, more sound bearing for the future.

The cost for implementing it is, as I said, $120 million over the next 5 years. And it seems to me, it seems to my colleagues, that this is appropriate given the priorities we have for our Nation and for our veterans.

So the next step, as the gentleman knows, is to provide funding through the appropriation process, and I hope that this Congress does invest in our veterans, particularly those who have challenging health issues, whether they be physical, mental, or behavioral, who also happen to be the parents or caretakers of our young children.

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

Mr. Speaker, I inquire of the gentleman whether or not there are other speakers or whether I should use this opportunity to close.

Mr. Speaker, I apologize. I am still learning this. The lingo on the floor of the House is much different than the lingo on the floor of the New York State Assembly, where I had the privilege of serving, and I do appreciate the gentleman's help through this. He has me at a bit of a disadvantage.

I do want to just reiterate before I yield that, in fact, this is a policy that we set with this bill and this rule. It will be up to the appropriators to make a decision about whether this is a priority as they go through this process and determine whether there will be funding for it in the appropriations bill.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson Lee).

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

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Georgia for his indulgence and his patience as I hopefully will get the training wheels off at one of these points, but I appreciate his comments.

I do want to note that this bill, the amendment which the gentleman speaks of, will not have been germane in the previous Congress either, and it was not ruled germane during the Rules Committee deliberations.

But, Mr. Speaker, I do want to thank all my colleagues for the words of support for H.R. 840, the Veterans' Access to Child Care Act. The Veterans' Access bill, I want to especially thank the sponsor, Congresswoman Julia Brownley and Chairman Mark Takano of the Veterans' Affairs Committee, as well as the ranking member, Mr. Roe, for their work in supporting our Nation's veterans.

I am proud that this rule provides for the consideration of so many diverse ideas, including minority and bipartisan amendments, something that would not be allowed in the previous Congress. I am proud we have taken this bipartisan approach, and I appreciate all the work that Chairman McGovern has done to make sure that that is part of the work that we do.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, let me say that the gentleman from New York is doing an excellent job. He has translated the great leadership of the New York legislature and brought it here to the House. We thank the gentleman for his service.

I have been affected by the gentleman from Georgia's comments. We have been on this floor together, and I know that we have a heart of service. As well--coming from Georgia, coming from Texas--we know veterans and we certainly know Active-Duty persons as well.

So I rise to support the policy underpinnings of this legislation that has been so well articulated by the gentleman from New York.

And it is important to note, just as background: When this government was wrongly shut down, we lost $11 billion, $3 billion that we will never see again and $8 billion that we may see again. But, in the course of that, all of us interacted with our veterans, many of them devastated because some of them were in positions that caused them to be furloughed. That means they were not getting a paycheck.

Some of them, of course, are disabled veterans or veterans who are engaged in the veterans' health system.

And we know that these veterans have pride. So this bill is an authorizing bill that affirms that pride, that allows veterans--many of them young veterans, having been in the Afghanistan war, having been in the Iraq war, having been in Syria--many of them young with young children, that they can go to get their medical care--that is well needed--by now having childcare during their medical care visits.

And I am glad the gentleman from New York made it clear over and over again that this is an authorizing bill. There is no need for paygo. There is no need for the offset. That will be handled. This is a policy point.

This is Democrats, hopefully joined by Republicans, to affirm our commitment to the service of veterans. But, as I do that, maybe the gentleman from Georgia would join me in reconsidering the new tax cuts by the GOP, which would cost $3.8 trillion to the deficit this second round and create $3.2 trillion in the Federal deficit over a decade.

Maybe my good friend will join me and indicate that our veterans are more important, that services to our families are more important, and, therefore, let's reconsider this deficit-busting GOP tax bill.

But as relates to this policy, I am grateful to the leadership of the Veterans' Affairs Committee. I thank the gentleman from New York in the Rules Committee for bringing forward this thoughtful, smart veterans bill. Remember, you have been hearing us talk about smart border security, and we are working on that right now to keep the government open, but this is a smart bill.

I have a veterans hospital in my area, formerly in my district, and I know how important Medicare is.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to support the rule, and I rise to support the underlying legislation, which is authorizing legislation to help veterans have childcare when they go to get their medical care.

Madam Speaker, I was unavoidably detained on February 7, 2019, and, as a result, I missed four votes. Had I been present, I would have voted ``aye'' on roll call vote no. 68, ordering the previous question providing for consideration of H.R. 840, the ``Veterans Access to Child Care Act;'' ``aye'' on roll call vote no. 69, on agreeing to H. Res. 105, the rule providing for consideration of H.R. 840 and adopting H. Res. 86, providing for the expenses of the Select Committee on the Climate Crisis and Modernization of Congress; ``aye'' on roll call vote no. 70, final passage of H.R. 450, the ``Preventing Crimes Against Veterans Act;'' and ``aye'' on roll call vote no. 71, final passage of H.R. 507, ``Put Trafficking Victims First Act.''

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