CDFI Bond Guarantee Program Improvement Act of 2022

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

Madam Speaker, when it comes to bailouts, Congress just can't seem to help itself. Under President Biden, taxpayers have been forced to bankroll the so-called American Rescue Plan which included an uncapped bailout for failing and insolvent multi-employer pensions.

From footing the bill for this excessive government spending to record-high gas prices, taxpayers can't catch a break in Biden's America, and today we are considering another bailout that will force taxpayers to cover the tab for failed, privately run pensions.

What message does this send to the men and women who have their own retirement accounts to worry about or have no retirement accounts at all?

More pension bailouts set a damning precedent. In case anyone has forgotten, we work for hardworking taxpayers in this country. As Members of Congress we have an obligation to ensure that taxpayer dollars are being spent as efficiently and effectively as possible. Unfortunately, too many ignore this important duty and are happy to mortgage the future of the next generation with reckless spending.

On top of the price tag, there have been no hearings and no markups on H.R. 6929.

Is this the standard the House wants to operate under--one where any piece of legislation can be fast-tracked to the floor without due consideration and scrutiny?

Under Democrat control, good governance has long been abandoned in the people's House.

In 2009, when Delphi Corporation completed its 4-year bankruptcy, its defined benefit pension plans were terminated and taken over by the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, PBGC, a process that has been well-established. At that time, the Delphi pension plans were collectively underfunded by $7.2 billion. Delphi did not make required contributions to its pension plans in the 4 years it was moving through bankruptcy. The salaried employee plan, in particular, was only 48 percent funded with $2.4 billion in assets and liabilities of $5 billion.

Fast forward to today, and we are considering a bill that would dole out money like candy. Under this bill, participants would receive a retroactive lump-sum payment, or ``top-up,'' of the difference between what was paid by PBGC and what the plans would have paid had they not been terminated.

But here is the kicker, Madam Speaker: this top-up would come with an additional 6 percent interest, and all participants would receive their original monthly benefits moving forward.

Let's turn our attention to the precedent that this bill sets for the entire single-employer pension system. Currently, PBGC's single- employer insurance program is funded exclusively by premiums paid by employer plan sponsors and does not--does not--receive taxpayer dollars. PBGC is the trustee of over 5,000 terminated single-employer plans.

Madam Speaker, please pay attention to this next part. By topping up one plan, Congress will be pressured and expected to top up the remaining 5,000 terminated plans and every future terminated plan.

How many plans does PBGC currently insure?

More than 23,000 active, single-employer plans are currently insured.

So, Madam Speaker, what is next on the docket?

Should Congress roll up its sleeves and make whole every American's 401(k) plan that took a few hits?

Again, how about Americans who do not have a pension plan?

There are many of those. Imagine the harebrained schemes that Congress could start pulling out of its hat if given this encouragement. We should be protecting taxpayers, not feeding them to the wolves.

This bill is a slap in the face to fiscal responsibility. H.R. 6929's cash giveaway will force taxpayers to shoulder a

cost of $800 million over the next decade and $1.3 billion in all to bail out underfunded, privately run pension plans.

Another bailout of failing pension plans does nothing but stick it to hardworking taxpayers. This bill simply underscores the fact that Congress is too misguided to focus on real issues.

Madam Speaker, hardworking taxpayers cannot afford more senseless bailouts. Enough is enough.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Keller).

Madam Speaker, I yield an additional 30 seconds to the gentleman from Pennsylvania.

Madam Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Good).

Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Turner).

Madam Speaker, my colleagues say we are here to help people. Our first job is like the doctor's oath: First, do no harm. This bill does harm.

Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Davidson).

Madam Speaker, may I inquire as to how much time is remaining.

Madam Speaker, proponents of H.R. 6929 continue to cite the statistics that the salaried employee pension plan was 86 percent funded in 2009 and, therefore, should not have been terminated. This is misleading and simply not the case.

When the salaried employee plan was terminated in 2009, it was roughly 50 percent funded with $2.4 billion in assets and $5 billion in liabilities. Delphi had not made required contributions to the plan in the previous 4 years.

Further, Delphi was moving through bankruptcy proceedings, and the company stated publicly it was unable to fund its pension plans before reaching an agreement with PBGC to terminate the plans.

Delphi had not made required contributions to the pension plans in the 4 years it was in bankruptcy proceedings. Delphi was liquidating assets in bankruptcy, and the plan had only enough assets to pay for half of its benefit obligations.

Finally, if the Delphi salaried employee plan was truly as well funded as proponents suggest, then why did it not have enough assets to cover the benefits owed to workers and retirees?

Madam Speaker, this is a big problem for the taxpayers of this country when we start bailing out pension plans in this way. We have a process through the PBGC, and that process should be followed.

Madam Speaker, it is important, really important, to make sure the Record is accurate. Most Delphi salaried pension plan participants who are being discussed today either received no cuts in their pensions or saw cuts of less than 10 percent.

PBGC typically becomes a trustee of a single-employer plan when the employer that sponsors the plan declares bankruptcy and the plan has insufficient assets from which to pay all promised benefits. When PBGC becomes a trustee of a single-employer pension plan, plan participants receive their full benefits up to a statutory maximum benefit, a benefit set by Congress.

The maximum guarantee in 2009, the year of Delphi's bankruptcy, was $4,500 per month or $54,000 per year for retirees who began receiving benefits at age 65. That is a very high amount of money that many Americans will never earn per year, let alone have for retirement.

PBGC reported in 2019 that 84 percent of retirees who receive benefits from PBGC are paid the full benefit amounts they earned under their retirement plans, meaning they do not have their benefits reduced.

In the case of the Delphi salaried employee plan, 72 percent of participants were not affected by PBGC's statutory benefit limit. Of the remaining 28 percent, 36 percent saw less than a 10 percent reduction.

Madam Speaker, again, I am speaking for the Americans who will never get a pension benefit because they have worked so hard but never made enough money to have a pension or don't have employers that pay pension benefits. We are bailing out people who are making a lot of money.

Madam Speaker, wages aren't keeping up with inflation. A Washington Post economic columnist recently pointed out that workers are experiencing the biggest decline in years in inflation-adjusted pay. According to a new report, 75 percent of middle-income families say their ``income is falling behind the cost of living.''

Given persistent and rising inflation, H.R. 6929 is the last thing we should be considering. It will cost taxpayers nearly $800 million over 10 years and $1.3 billion in all to bail out Delphi's underfunded, privately run pension plan.

Americans across the country do not want to fork over their hard- earned dollars to fund a costly project that was cooked up in Congress, especially when many have their own retirement accounts to consider or have none at all.

By doubling down on an already failed strategy, taxpayers will be forced to cover the cost of this cash giveaway. This sets a terrible and troubling precedent that will embolden the Federal Government to bail out thousands of other privately run pensions.

Madam Speaker, I encourage my colleagues to oppose this fiscally irresponsible catastrophe of a bill, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

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

The first thing I will say, I never said that the bill was a partisan bill, and I would like to clarify the record on that point.

This amendment directs the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation to issue a public request for information regarding the long-term solvency of the agency's single- and multiemployer insurance programs, and to submit legislative recommendations to Congress within 2 years.

I don't question the sincerity with which my colleague from Virginia offers this amendment. However, if H.R. 6929 is signed into law, this report will be a day late and a dollar short.

Last year, under the guise of COVID relief, congressional Democrats and President Biden enacted an uncapped taxpayer-funded bailout of failing and insolvent multiemployer pension plans. While the most recent estimate of the bailout indicates taxpayers are on the hook for $90 billion, without a cap on the total amount of spending, the bailout could cost much more.

Worse yet, Democrats refused to address the structural failures of the system, refused to hold plan trustees accountable, and encouraged further plan underfunding.

The Education and Labor Committee has been wrestling with the problems facing the multiemployer pension system and the looming insolvency of PBGC's insurance program for decades. The committee has held countless hearings on the topic. Congress even established a Joint Select Committee on Solvency of Multiemployer Pension Plans, of which Chairman Scott and I were members.

We already know the problems with the system, and we don't need to wait another 2 years for PBGC to issue a report with recommendations. Plans do not adequately fund their promises. A comment was made about keeping promises. Well, we need to fund the plans. They overpromise, undercontribute, and refuse to make responsible adjustments, ultimately, digging themselves into deeper holes.

Further, PBGC has submitted legislative recommendations regarding multiemployer pensions that Democrats have routinely ignored. For years, under both the Obama and Trump administrations, PBGC recommended

Congress establish a variable rate premium for multiemployer plans to align premiums better with the risk these plans pose to PBGC.

Single-employer plans pay a much higher flat rate premium as well as a variable-rate premium. Multiemployer plans should do the same. Single-employer plans are also subject to much stricter funding requirements that better protect the benefits of workers and retirees.

Meanwhile, poorly managed multiemployer plans fail to collect adequate contributions for the benefits they promise and bet on risky investments in hopes of making up the difference.

While I appreciate the amendment's implicit admission that throwing billions of dollars at multiemployer plans has not solved the problem, this fig leaf amendment does nothing to address the fundamental flaws of the underlying bill.

Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to oppose the amendment, and I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Madam Speaker, again, I don't think we need another study. We don't need to delay action on this 2 years. What we need to do is increase premiums and impose stronger funding requirements.

The plans are underfunded. It doesn't take an accountant or a rocket scientist to figure that out. Pogo said, ``We have met the enemy, and he is us.'' We, in Congress, are the problem. We need to do this.

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

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

Madam Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 1254, I call up the bill (H.R. 6929) to increase the benefits guaranteed in connection with certain pension plans, and for other purposes, and ask for its immediate consideration in the House.

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

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

Madam Speaker, H.R. 6929, the Susan Muffley Act of 2022, will restore the hard-earned pensions of more than 20,000 Delphi salaried retirees, including 5,000 in my home State of Michigan.

The Susan Muffley Act is a bipartisan bill supported by Republicans and Democrats in both the House and the Senate. I worked most particularly with Mr. Ryan of Ohio and Mr. Turner of Ohio on this legislation along with the other cosponsors. It is endorsed by the AARP, the AFL-CIO, and the UAW. I am glad we can come together finally to do what is right for these workers. These are workers who lost their pensions through no fault of their own.

In this country, Madam Speaker, if you work hard and play by the rules, you should be able to retire with dignity and with peace of mind. Instead, these workers had the rug ripped out from underneath them and lost their hard-earned benefits. When General Motors filed for bankruptcy during the Great Recession the Federal Government--I repeat, the Federal Government--made the unprecedented step to move in and save the auto industry. At the direction of the Federal Government, however, the U.S. Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, the PBGC, assumed responsibility for the Delphi salaried retiree pensions. After negotiations with the Federal Government, the PBGC cut those hard- earned benefits by as much as 70 percent for 20,000 Delphi salaried retirees.

These retirees were treated differently than other retirees impacted by the GM bankruptcy. They suffered significant cuts to their benefits, upending the lives of thousands and thousands of families.

In September of 2019, the Delphi Salaried Retirees Association filed suit against the PBGC to have their pension benefits restored. It went all the way to the Supreme Court until the Court declined to hear the case, making it clear that only congressional action could restore these earned pension benefits.

Our legislation would make this unique group of retirees who had their pensions unfairly and disproportionately cut will make them whole again. This means that beneficiaries will receive a payment of the difference of what was actually paid to them by the PBGC and what they would have earned had they been able to keep their pensions like everyone else did. Moving forward, beneficiaries will receive their full earned pension.

This bill is fully paid for and will not add to the deficit.

Delphi salaried retirees deserve to have their pensions made whole because it was the Federal Government that singled these workers out. It was the Federal Government who stepped in to rescue General Motors but decided to treat these workers differently and cut their earned pensions. It was the Federal Government, not General Motors, who directly negotiated with the PBGC.

What happened to these hardworking retirees was wrong, and now it is the Federal Government who has the responsibility to fix the mess that itself created.

We need to get this legislation done for people like Susan Muffley for whom this bill is named. David Muffley, Susan's husband, worked at Delphi as an electronics technician for 31 years but lost the full value of his pension in 2009. His wife, Susan Muffley, was a core part of the Delphi Salaried Retirees Association's leadership team fighting to restore these pensions.

Because of the financial difficulties of losing their pension, Susan avoided seeing her doctor because they couldn't afford it. Sadly, she was ultimately diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and passed away.

After working hard for 30 years to earn a pension to support your family through retirement, no worker and no family member should be forced to forgo medical treatment to make ends meet. These workers need the Susan Muffley Act. The last 13 years have been an absolute nightmare for these families. These are people I know.

During the Obama Administration, the problem was created but never addressed. During the Trump administration, the former President talked about fixing the issue but never acted. He ran out of time before that moment could occur. But now, today, after lots of talk and not so much action, Congress can finally act to provide relief and justice for these workers, these Delphi salaried retirees.

Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support this important legislation, and I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Madam Speaker, I appreciate the comments of my colleague. I disagree with the conclusions that she makes, and I would only challenge a couple of things.

One is on the issue of precedent. There is no precedent, unless the precedent is when the Federal Government intervenes and takes control of a company, takes ownership of a company, it buys the problem. It then owns the solution. It owns responsibility for the solution.

So the only precedent that I think this sets is one that I learned a long time ago: if you broke it, you bought it. The Federal Government intervened and made these decisions disproportionately affecting these particular employees.

The rest of the employees got their pensions topped up, why wouldn't this particular set?

Secondly, I disagree with the reference that this is candy. For these taxpayers, these families, this is rent, this is food on the table, it is their mortgage payment, it is a car payment, and it is medicine-- medicines that, sadly, Susan Muffley didn't have the ability to get to because her pension was cut. This is about justice.

Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Michigan (Mrs. Lawrence), who unfortunately is spending her last months in Congress. I wish that weren't the case.

Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Higgins), my colleague on the Ways and Means Committee.

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

I appreciated the gentleman's comments. I will point out, since the gentleman did refer to the former President, Mr. Trump, that Mr. Trump saw this as an injustice and directed his administration to address it as well.

And I also think there is enough partisanship in Washington, more than enough, so let's not make something that is bipartisan just for the point of rhetorical value into something that is claimed to be partisan.

This is not a partisan piece of legislation. I see Mr. Turner on the other side of the aisle. We have worked together on this for years; 17 of the 37 cosponsors of this legislation are Republicans, including Members with whom I don't think I have ever shared sponsorship. I don't recall, for example, being a cosponsor of any piece of legislation with Mr. Mo Brooks. We are on this one.

This is not a partisan bill, so let's not call it that. You can disagree with it. You can vote against people getting their hard-earned pensions, but let's not make it into something that it isn't.

Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Michigan (Mrs. Dingell), a friend that I have known for a very long time, a member of the Energy and Commerce Committee.

Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan), a gentleman that I have been working with on this issue for as long as I have been in Congress.

Madam Speaker, I yield an additional 2 minutes to the gentleman from Ohio.

Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Kaptur), the longest-serving woman in the history of the United States Congress.

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

I do believe, and I agree with my colleague, that the facts ought to be correct and that the Record ought to be clear. That is why I want to clarify a couple of things.

Number one, I continue to hear opponents of this legislation depict it as a Democratic bill, a partisan bill. That is just not true. It is amazing to me in this body that we can still have people say things that just are patently untrue. That is not true.

Just look at the list of Republican cosponsors of this legislation. If you don't want to look at that list, don't look at that list. Just look back a couple of years when then-Republican President Donald Trump saw this as an injustice and directed his administration to solve this problem.

This is not a partisan piece of legislation. I understand the game; I get it. Everything around here somehow has to be turned into Democrats versus Republicans.

I am going to tell you something about the Delphi salaried retirees. Some are Democrats. Some are Republicans. Some are Independents. They live in every part of this country. They are people who worked really hard and did nothing wrong and lost everything that they had worked for in some cases.

Two, the other fact that I want to correct, it is true that only the losses that these pension recipients received, the losses that they experienced would be made up for. So when my colleague points out the fact that some did not receive a 70 percent cut, that is true. People will only receive what was promised to them. That is kind of an American ideal, isn't it? We keep our promises.

As to the point that this is a private pension that was mismanaged and failed and the government shouldn't become involved, that ship sailed a long time ago when the government got involved. The government took control of the company, took control of its assets, made these decisions.

So if there is a precedent to be set, the precedent is this: The Federal Government makes a mistake, the Federal Government has the obligation to fix it. I don't know what is wrong with that. I don't know what is wrong with that. I mean, that is the way I was raised.

I don't know who is watching today. I don't know how many Americans are watching, but I hope they are paying attention. I know a lot of those Delphi salaried retirees are watching. Despite some of what you heard today--because this place becomes very political, unfortunately-- despite some of what you heard, what you saw and what you are about to see in a little while, we are Democrats and Republicans who disagree on a lot of things and we are coming together to fix a problem that has lasted for 13 years, a problem that occurred on the watch of a Democratic President, a problem that a Republican President was attempting to address, but who didn't get it done, and now in this moment Members of Congress--with whom I have very little in common-- share one thing for sure, we represent many of the same people, people who have suffered an injustice and are looking to the Congress of the United States as the last chance they have to have that mistake made right.

That is a precedent I don't mind seeing us set. If the Federal Government makes a mistake, we fix it. That is what we are about to do here today.

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

Madam Speaker, I have an amendment at the desk made in order under the rule.

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

Madam Speaker, this amendment is simple and straightforward. It requires the Director of the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation within 1 year after the date of enactment to issue a public request for information regarding ways to ensure the long-term solvency of the PBGC's insurance programs, and then within 2 years after the date of enactment, the Director shall issue a report to congressional committees with recommendations on how to ensure the long-term solvency of the insurance programs.

As my colleagues know, the PBGC administers two insurance programs, one for multiemployer pensions and the other for single-employer pensions. PBGC's multiemployer program has been on the brink of insolvency. It was projected to run out of money in just a few years, but thanks to the Biden administration and congressional Democrats stepping up and passing the American Rescue Plan last year, millions of Americans' pensions have been saved.

Because the law requires participating businesses to pay into those failing plans until the businesses go broke, tens of thousands of businesses have been saved, and the solvency of the PBGC's multiemployer program has been extended for at least 30 more years.

For the single-employer program, the PBGC's most recent annual report indicates that it is financially healthy, with a positive net position of over $30 billion at the end of fiscal year 2021 compared to just over $15 billion at the end of fiscal year 2020. So, fortunately, it is not at the near-term risk of becoming insolvent.

A few years ago, I had the honor of being one of the four House Democrats selected for a special committee charged with addressing the multiemployer pension crisis. We tried to address the immediate crisis facing multiemployer pension plans with their participants and employers while also considering other long-term reforms to pension programs, but unfortunately we could not reach any agreement before the clock ran out.

Now that congressional Democrats and the Biden administration have solved the immediate crisis, and it looks like we can solve this crisis, we should take action to ensure that this doesn't happen again. We will do this by getting policy recommendations from the PBGC on how we can ensure long-term solvency of both insurance programs and avoid the possibility that 20 years from now pension plans would again be on the brink of insolvency.

I urge my colleagues to support the amendment, and I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Madam Speaker, the distinguished ranking member pointed out that the saving of the multiemployer pension fund would cost about $90 billion. That is right.

What she omitted was that estimates of doing nothing with the people losing their pension, they would pay less in income taxes, they would use more social services, and the Federal Government was on the hook for $170 billion if we had done nothing. In other words, we would have to spend $80 billion more to help the people who lost their pensions and the businesses that went broke trying to save those pension plans.

But in any case, Madam Speaker, the time to fix the roof is when the Sun is shining. We have gotten past the crisis. Let's find out what we need to do to avoid the possibility that these pension funds might be back here 20 years from now in a state of failure.

We need to make sure we fix it. Let's get these recommendations. That is why this amendment is so important that it will guarantee getting the information so we can fix these plans once and for all.

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

Madam Speaker, 13 years; 13 years. I have been in Congress now for a little while, and I cannot begin to tell you what an example that the Delphi salaried retirees have set. It is the absolute gold standard for activism and lobbying their government.

And I, you know, normally get up here and get pretty upset; but I have got to kind of laugh because when I hear our friends on the other side talk about irresponsibility and gimmicks and nanny states and socialists, I think of all my friends in the Delphi salaried retirement.

These are the most hardworking citizens that I have in my district. And they show up for work. They coach the baseball teams. They work at the church. They are veterans. They give back. They are great parents. They are

great-grandparents. They are involved in the community.

Our job here is pretty simple. We look at the field, see what is happening in the country, and if some person or group of people are being wronged unfairly, it is our job to fix it. It is not a Democrat thing. It is not a Republican thing. It is not a left-right thing, not a free market thing, or a socialist thing.

It is about people. It is about American citizens who did everything right. They showed up one day in the middle of a bankruptcy that, as Mr. Kildee has articulated here, the government was organizing, and reorganizing, the American auto industry. This isn't some private- sector bankruptcy. The government was in there manipulating everything, and they screwed up.

There was no one screaming louder than I was at the Obama administration, Sherrod Brown and I, in meetings with Tim Geithner and all the rest over the last 13 years.

I thank Congressman Kildee from the Ways and Means Committee, Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee Richie Neal, Sherrod Brown, Rob Portman, Mike Turner. The Members of Congress and Senators who are on the ground with these families came together and have been fighting.

Here we are, 13 years later, where we are going to vote this out of the House, and we are going to send it to the Senate. We are going to try to help people because that is our job.

What I really appreciate about this is that during the rescue package, we were able to save hundreds and hundreds of thousands of pensions for people, about 100,000 in Ohio, because there was a problem, and we tried to fix it. That happened to be unions.

This group happens to not be union, but they deserve help all the same. That is what we are doing here. I was proud that the Auto Workers and the AFL-CIO are helping to support this.

We need more of this. I think this is an example of how to try to influence your government, try to get help, try to right a wrong, and not talk about Democrat and Republican and red and blue and all that nonsense that we are all sick of.

We are ready to move forward. If you need help, if you have been wronged, we are going to stand up and fight for you.

Again, I thank Mr. Kildee for his leadership here. We are going to send this over to the Senate.

I know there are a lot of people, again, living and working and talking to these families over the last 13 years. How many people have passed away? How many families have been harmed? How many other people have not gotten the healthcare that they needed because they couldn't afford it, or they had situations in their family, and they didn't have enough money, maybe, to help their kids or help their grandkids?

This is the right thing to do. This is the absolute right thing to do. I am glad it is bipartisan, and I am glad we finally got it done after 13 years.

Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 7733) to amend the Community Development Banking and Financial Institutions Act of 1994 to reauthorize and improve the community development financial institutions bond guarantee program, and for other purposes, as amended.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks on this legislation and to insert extraneous material thereon.

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

Mr. Speaker, I support H.R. 7733, the CDFI Bond Guarantee Program Improvement Act, led by Representative Cleaver, who also is the chair of the Subcommittee on Housing, Community Development, and Insurance.

The CDFI Fund's Bond Guarantee Program provides CDFIs with federally guaranteed, long-term, low-cost capital to support existing and new economic development projects in their communities.

Unfortunately, small-sized CDFIs currently have difficulty applying for this financing directly because the current $100 million minimum financing amount is much higher than the amount many small CDFIs are seeking. As a result, some CDFIs can only access the program by applying with larger CDFIs.

This bill would lower the minimum threshold for a bond issuance from $100 million to $25 million, giving smaller CDFIs a fairer shot at being able to access this program. This will help expand financing and investments to support small businesses, healthcare facilities, and affordable housing.

This bill builds upon the work I led last Congress to provide CDFIs with $12 billion in equity and grant funding. In particular, that legislation, which has already distributed $1.25 billion to CDFIs, represented the largest public investment in CDFIs ever.

Mr. Cleaver's bill complements those efforts by helping smaller CDFIs better access private dollars to further their efforts to serve low- income and underserved communities.

While the Bond Guarantee Program's authorization ended in 2014, Congress has extended it on a year-by-year basis in annual appropriations bills. This bill would extend the program for 4 years, creating longer-term certainty. The bill also includes studies to examine areas where the program can be strengthened.

Furthermore, this bill is a House companion to a bipartisan bill in the Senate, S. 3441, introduced by Senators Tina Smith and Mike Rounds.

I urge my colleagues to support this bill to ensure that more CDFIs have access to long-term financing through the Bond Guarantee Program so they continue to spur economic development in communities across the Nation.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Cleaver).

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

H.R. 7733 is supported by a number of groups, including the CDFI Coalition, Credit Union National Association, Independent Community Bankers of America, National Association of Federally-Insured Credit Unions, National Community Reinvestment Coalition, and Opportunity Finance Network.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support this bill, and I yield back the balance of my time.