Directing the Clerk of the House of Representatives to make a correction in the engrossment of H.R. 1.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from North Carolina for yielding me the customary 30 minutes, and I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, before we even get to the rescissions, let's be really, really honest about what is going on here. This isn't just a debate about cuts, because in this rule, Republican leadership snuck in a rewrite of their big, ugly bill.

Yes, that is right. A vote on this rule is effectively a revote on their reconciliation package, a do-over. It is a

desperate attempt by Republican leadership to fix the mess they made with their awful tax scam.

Now, when they rushed it through in the middle of the night, they included provisions that aren't even allowed under the Senate's reconciliation rules. Moreover, instead of coming clean and holding a straightforward vote on the corrections, they are trying to bury it in this rule for the DOGE rescissions package, hoping that nobody will notice. Think of it like a Trojan Horse, Mr. Speaker.

Let's be clear: The rescissions could be brought to the floor anytime. You heard that right, Mr. Speaker, they could be brought to the floor anytime. They are privileged. Speaker Johnson doesn't need this rule to move them. The only reason these things are being tied together is to trick certain Republicans into voting for a bill that they have already said they regret.

Now, it should be said that Republicans have an opportunity right now to change the bill before it goes to the Senate. Last night, in the Rules Committee, we could have voted to strip out the State artificial intelligence moratorium for the reconciliation bill, or we could have dropped the controversial language on contempt that some Republican Members objected to.

Nonetheless, Republican leadership deliberately decided not to do any of that. They decided that the very stuff their members are concerned about doesn't matter and, instead, are entirely leaving changes up to the Senate, as if we had no power or influence here in this House.

As the gentlewoman from North Carolina, the chairwoman of the Rules Committee, said herself last night during the meeting: ``Any Member who has any regrets about his or her vote on the first bill has the opportunity to vote `no' on the rule tomorrow.''

She didn't recommend a ``no'' vote, but she pointed out the choice that Members have.

I agree with her. Members have a choice here. Those who didn't like this bill have a choice to stop it right here in this House.

So to all of the Republicans who said they regret voting ``yes'' for this reconciliation bill, especially those who complained about how much this will add trillions to the deficit and debt: This is your chance for a redo. This is your chance for a redo. Vote ``no.'' Vote ``no'' here to stop this big, ugly bill from moving to the Senate. If Republicans have the courage of their convictions, then they will vote ``no.''

While Republican leadership is busy playing procedural games trying to slip this through, let's talk about what they are attaching this rewrite to.

The Republican rescission package is based on a scam, a con job, and a grift. This is not about actual savings, nor is it about rooting out waste, fraud, and abuse. This is based on cementing stupid, preposterous, and self-defeating DOGE cuts into law. These are DOGE cuts that, I might add, have already illegally been in place for months when the Trump administration wreaked havoc on our government systems by freezing critical funding.

From day one, DOGE has been one big excuse to reward Trump's wealthy donors, gut public services, and funnel resources away from programs that help ordinary people and into the pockets of the wealthy and well- connected.

Let's not forget: This is the same DOGE review that cut off funding to USDA bird flu experts in the middle of a bird flu outbreak. They sent pink slips to the people who secure our nuclear warheads. They gutted the National Weather Service so badly that right now we might not have enough meteorologists to warn communities about tornadoes and hurricanes.

DOGE was a total, complete failure, and now Republicans want to lock their disastrous cuts into law?

Come on. That is insane. That is crazy.

Mr. Speaker, look at what these cuts are targeting: funding for global health, clean water, food security, and democracy programs; funding for UNICEF and the World Food Program; funding for diplomacy, humanitarian aid, and for world peace, for Christ's sake.

People think our foreign budget is some huge, massive thing. We are talking about something that is 1 percent of our budget. So, please, do not come down here and pretend as if this is a serious attempt to cut funding.

Mr. Speaker, if you want to go after waste and save taxpayer money, then count me in. Count me in. I wish my Republican friends would express some concern about the fact that their President is spending maybe up to $40 million for a parade of military tanks on his birthday.

Really?

We are cutting money to save lives in this rescission package, but $40 million-plus is no big deal, as long as Donald Trump is happy.

We should start with the Pentagon if we are serious about getting after waste, fraud, and abuse. The Pentagon, by the way, has never, ever passed an audit. They have never passed an audit.

Let's look at tax breaks for Big Oil. We can't do that because they write big checks.

Let's go after the loopholes for billionaires. Let's end the corporate giveaways.

No. No. No. Republicans don't want to touch any of those things.

Meanwhile, the cuts in this rescission package hurt America. They weaken our leverage around the world. They pull back critical funding for our allies. They strip away tools we use to prevent conflict and promote stability. These cuts will lead to the deaths of hundreds of thousands, devastating the most vulnerable in the world.

At a time when China, Russia, and Iran are working overtime to challenge American influence, this bill says: Go right ahead. This is China's dream come true, the U.S. pulling back our soft power from around the world.

This is self-sabotage masquerading as savings, and it is not even a lot of money. These slivers of our Federal budget, these dollars that generate enormous return by keeping people alive and preventing crises before they happen that is what this money does. That is what Republicans are cutting.

This isn't just penny wise and pound foolish, Mr. Speaker. It is like saving money by burning down your house so you don't have to pay for the heat.

I would like to think that America's greatness comes from our humanity. It is clear Republicans believe that America's greatness is found in our inhumanity and in cruelty and callousness. I believe everyone can agree that is a truly dark, dangerous, and morally bankrupt place to govern from.

The American people deserve better than this. They deserve smarter than this. They deserve a government that prioritizes what works, not what flatters the egos of billionaires hopped up on ketamine.

Mr. Speaker, this rule is a disgrace, and the underlying bill is a disgrace. I urge my colleagues to vote ``no,'' and I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Mr. Speaker, let me try to explain this again because I don't know why this is such a tough concept for my Republican colleagues to understand.

Two things can be true. These Republican DOGE cuts can be incredibly cruel, which they are, and at the same time mathematically insignificant compared to the massive trillions of dollars that Republicans are adding to the deficit and the debt because of their reconciliation bill. So two things can be true. I don't think that is that hard for the American people to understand.

Mr. Speaker, as we have made clear time and time again, the big, ugly GOP tax scam is set to add $3 trillion to the deficit, $3 trillion. To be clear, that isn't me saying that. That is the independent, nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, CBO.

It isn't just CBO. Every other reputable independent analysis of the bill, including the Joint Committee on Taxation, Yale Budget Lab, and Penn Wharton Budget Model came to the same conclusion. Even the right- leaning Tax Foundation agrees that this bill explodes the deficit, explodes it.

Yet, here we are with Republicans patting themselves on the back over the Trump-DOGE rescission package, a package that in all reality barely makes a dent in the very debt that they ballooned.

Since they want to talk about the debt, let's talk about the debt. I want the American people to take a look at this chart, Mr. Speaker. I want the American people to look at this chart. The red indicates the $3 trillion that Trump's big, ugly bill will add to the deficit. Then we see this tiny, little blue sliver. Thank God, I am wearing my bifocals here. I can barely see it. That little, tiny blue sliver-- again, you might need a magnifying glass to see it--that is the $9.4 billion that the Republicans are trying to save through these rescissions.

To break that down a little bit more, the $3 trillion deficit increase in the GOP tax scam is 320 times bigger than the $9.4 billion that Republicans are trying to rescind through these DOGE cuts.

The real kicker here is that under their GOP tax scam, CBO says that the top 5 percent of earners will get $1.6 trillion in total tax cuts. That is 170 times bigger than the $9.4 billion Republicans want to rescind.

Republicans are cutting $9.4 billion in Federal spending so they can try and justify the trillions and trillions of dollars they plan to add to the debt so they can deliver massive tax cuts to their billionaire friends.

So these rescissions, they are not even a drop in the bucket. They are a drop in the ocean compared to the multitrillion-dollar deficit- busting bill that Republicans are trying to jam through.

Just because the sliver on this chart seems small doesn't mean these Republican rescissions are not harmful. Republicans want to cut $900 million from global health programs, including $400 million for PEPFAR, an overwhelmingly bipartisan program created by President George W. Bush to combat HIV. This program has saved more than 26 million lives over the past 28 years.

That is not fraud, waste, or abuse. That is a big deal. That is something we should be proud of. Not properly funding PEPFAR means people will literally die. That is not hyperbole. It is just the truth. In fact, because DOGE and the Trump administration illegally suspended PEPFAR already earlier this year, tens of thousands of people have already died, including thousands of children. It is despicable. They want to cut $2.5 billion in development assistance that our allies and partners use to build schools, help farmers grow food, fund clean water projects, and combat poverty. They want to cut hundreds of millions of dollars in funding for Ukraine and our allies at the border of Russia. They want to completely eliminate Federal funding for public TV and radio, which are trusted sources of news and educational programming for millions of American households, particularly in rural areas. I don't know what my colleagues have against rural areas, but those areas will be particularly hard hit by those cuts.

It is important to note, once again, that many of these rescissions, especially to foreign aid, have already started to hurt and even kill people. That is because the administration illegally froze USAID programs, which has threatened the lives of millions of people who rely on this funding to prevent or treat disease, afford food, and access to clean water.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to enter into the Record an article by the Associated Press titled: ``Children die as USAID aid cuts snap a lifeline for the world's most malnourished.''

Mr. Speaker, according to the Boston University School of Public Health--and listen to this--more than 50,000 adults and 6,000 infants have died of HIV due to the disruption of PEPFAR. People are already dying. More than 29,000 children have died of malaria, and 25,000 people have died of tuberculosis because the Trump administration froze funding.

Republicans want to rubberstamp the Trump administration's illegal funding freeze into law, and they claim that they are reining in the debt. Well, as we can see, Mr. Speaker, that is a huge load of garbage.

This rescissions package is a moral failure masquerading as fiscal responsibility, and I urge my colleagues to oppose it.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, I don't even know where to begin after that. The gentleman talked about $100,000 here and $1 million there but not a word about the $3 trillion added to the deficit because of the big, ugly bill that he and Republicans voted for and supported. There was not a word about all that is going to be added to the debt.

Maybe the gentleman forgot this, but I am looking at a FOX News story here when the gentleman referred to the $9.4 billion as a teardrop in the ocean when he was interviewed. I don't know what happened, but somehow the gentleman couldn't bring himself to talk about the $3 trillion that Republicans are adding to the debt.

Mr. Speaker, I am going to urge that we defeat the previous question. If we do, I am going to offer an amendment to the rule to bring up amendment No. 1 to H.R. 4 offered by the gentleman from New York (Mr. Goldman), which would block Republicans from zeroing out Federal funding that Congress has already appropriated for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Public TV and radio are trusted sources of news and educational programming for millions of households across America and are particularly important in rural areas, where public stations are often the only source of local news.

This is a $1.1 billion cut, Mr. Speaker. Let's compare that to the big, ugly Republican reconciliation bill, which adds $3 trillion to the deficit and--get this--includes a provision that Republicans have been bragging about that removes a tax on gun silencers, which has been on the books for a century.

According to the Joint Committee on Taxation, the JCT, this new tax break on silencers alone will increase our Nation's deficit by $1.5 billion. That is more than the $1.1 billion Republicans are ``saving'' by eliminating all funding for public TV and radio.

Mr. Speaker, let me ask the American people and my Republican colleagues: Is this whole tradeoff worth it? Public broadcasting in exchange for cheaper gun silencers? I mean, really? Unless you are an assassin or a hit man, I hope the answer is a resounding ``no.''

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Goldman) to discuss our proposal.

Mr. Speaker, I yield an additional 30 seconds to the gentleman from New York.

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

Mr. Speaker, wow, that is something.

We were trying to keep up with the gentleman as he was ticking off all the initiatives that he doesn't like, and we were looking at these accounts. I think they all added up to $23.5 million. I don't know about some of the programs that the gentleman talked about. I am happy to look into them.

He came up with $23.5 million in programs that he doesn't like. I just want my friends to understand that that is half of what Donald Trump is going to spend on his 1-day parade on Saturday. That is half. I mean, give me a break.

Then, the gentleman said that the CBO doesn't assume a growth rate. Not only did the CBO take into account the growth rate, but so did every other think tank that did a budget analysis on the great big, ugly bill that Republicans passed.

I should also say to the gentleman and to the gentlewoman that many of these programs have already been halted illegally by the Trump administration.

Just for the record, it is estimated that over 107,000 adults have died as a result of the denial of funds, along with over 224,000 children.

I am ashamed that our government has pulled funding for programs that save people's lives. Maybe my friends think that is fraud, waste, and abuse. I don't.

People are already dying. People are already dying because the Trump administration has illegally halted funding from many of these programs, just withholding the money from USAID. I am happy to share with them the statistics.

Mr. Speaker, I also point out for my colleagues that the big, ugly way in which Republicans have advanced this big, ugly bill is just the tip of the iceberg.

Last Congress, the Republican majority presided over the most unproductive, dysfunctional Congress in modern American history. What an achievement. I know they are all proud.

Republicans shattered their own record by issuing 115 closed rules, meaning 115 times when the House could not debate a single amendment on the House floor.

Did they learn anything from being the most unproductive Congress in the history? Of course they didn't.

In just 5 months, the Republicans have racked up over 50 closed rules. More than 90 percent of the bills they bring up have no amendments, no discussion, no input. It is just take or leave it.

What are we even doing here? Republican leadership has blocked over 800 amendments, and we have yet to see a single bipartisan amendment make it to the House floor this year, not even one.

Only 14 amendments have been selected by Republican leadership to be debated across just four bills. That is a 98 percent rejection rate. They block 98 out of 100 ideas they receive.

Mr. Aderholt, who was testifying before the Rules Committee said: Oh, this rescissions bill gives us an opportunity to vote up or down on whether we want to support public broadcasting. The bottom line is, no, it doesn't because we are not having separate votes. You have to take the whole package or leave it. We can't even vote on the individual cuts that are being made a part of this rescissions package.

Republicans have blocked debate on amendments that would help States protect against deadly wildfires and post-disaster recovery. They blocked amendments that would support new mothers and infants impacted by substance use. They blocked amendments to protect SNAP and Medicaid for millions of Americans.

Really?

It is no wonder why no one likes Congress. Republicans are happy to debate trivial issues passionately but important ones not at all.

Mr. Speaker, here is the kicker: At this point in our majority, Democrats gave Republicans more chances to debate their ideas than their own leaders do.

In 5 months, only 6 of the 220 Republicans in this Chamber have had amendments made in order. I mean, that means over 97 percent of Republicans have not had a single amendment debated.

Are my Republican colleagues proud of being excluded from the legislative process?

Mr. Speaker, I say, again, to the gentleman from Texas who just spoke, I am sorry. Don't lecture us about deficits when you voted for a bill that added $3 trillion to the deficit.

It is shameful. The so-called budget hawks around here talk a tough game, and then they cave. We did have a debate in the Rules Committee about this last night, but the gentleman was absent.

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

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

Every major organization that does budget analysis says that they are going to add trillions to the debt. The only people who don't are the gentlewoman from North Carolina. I am sorry. I didn't know that you do independent budget analyses, but every other one does.

There is one Republican in this House who is not afraid of Mr. Trump and that is Mr. Massie.

Let me read a couple of tweets that he posted. He writes: ``Why didn't Trump's 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act make tax cuts permanent?

``Because the impact of the tax cuts on debt after 2025 was understood by them to be too great. Now they're employing new math to claim that renewing the tax cuts, without cutting spending, won't impact debt.''

He writes: ``Hidden inside of a resolution we will vote on today to bring rescissions to the floor is an order to pass H. Res. 492 without a vote. H. Res. 492 changes the text of the BBB after it already passed the House. Sneaky.''

Can we at least be honest about what is happening here?

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from New Mexico (Ms. Stansbury).

Mr. Speaker, may I inquire as to the time remaining.

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

Mr. Speaker, we have heard a lot of talk today about tightening belts and making tough choices. This bill doesn't make tough choices. It makes stupid choices.

These rescissions would gut PEPFAR, a program that saved millions of lives by preventing the spread of HIV and AIDS. It would slash funding for malaria prevention, for maternal and child health, for clean water, and for food assistance.

These programs are not giveaways. This money isn't a handout. These are smart, strategic investments that make Americans safer and save this government money down the road. Every dollar we spend on global health, on diplomacy, on humanitarian aid can save $10, $100, even $1,000 later by preventing conflict, disease outbreaks, refugee crises, and wars.

This bill eliminates those smart investments. It strips away those tools. It tells the world at a time when it is desperate for American leadership that we are walking away. It will let China, Russia, and Iran fill the power vacuum that we leave behind, and for what?

All so Republicans can say they cut spending while they protect billions in tax breaks for Big Oil and billionaire donors.

Let's be clear: This bill isn't serious about fiscal responsibility. If it were, there would be a rescissions package for the Pentagon. We would be debating clawbacks for defense contractors who charge $10,000 for a toilet seat. We would be looking at whether Elon Musk's companies should be getting massive government subsidies, but no.

The party of billionaires would rather defund ``Sesame Street.'' They would rather go after Elmo, and they would rather go after programs that help save lives.

Yes, Mr. Speaker, this is about Trump's military parade, too. The Army estimates it can cost between $25 to $40 million.

Let's do the math. We are going to kill disaster relief, gut UNICEF, and stop investing in global AIDS prevention. Yet we are fine with Donald Trump throwing himself a birthday party with tanks and missiles in the streets like it is North Korea.

What the hell are we doing here, Mr. Speaker? This is why people don't trust

government. If we want to be serious about budgeting, fine. Let's be serious. Let's look at where the waste, fraud, and abuse runs rampant.

Let's audit the Pentagon. Let's go after corporate welfare and Big Oil handouts. Let's close the loopholes that let billionaires pay zero in taxes. But let's not pretend this bill is about any of that.

This bill is a fraud and a con job. America deserves better. The world needs better. This is a revote on the reconciliation bill.

Vote ``no'' if you are against gutting Medicaid, Medicare, and SNAP.

The Speaker pro tempore. The time of the gentleman has expired.

Vote ``no'' if you oppose $3 trillion----

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

Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 499 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern), 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 may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks.

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

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of the rule and of the underlying legislation. Yesterday, the Rules Committee met and produced a rule, House Resolution 499, providing for the House's consideration of H.R. 4, the Rescissions Act of 2025.

This rule provides for consideration of H.R. 4 under a closed rule.

The rule provides 1 hour of debate, equally divided and controlled by the majority leader and minority leader or their respective designees, and provides for one motion to recommit

Additionally, the rule provides that House Resolution 492 is hereby adopted.

Mr. Speaker, before we get into the substance of the bill today, I would like to clear up any confusion about any remarks I made in the Rules Committee last night.

Let me be crystal clear. I encourage all Members to support the rule before us today. My comments last night were lacking in context. Democrats made the argument throughout the hearing that this process is somehow another vote on H.R. 1. That is false.

The resolution today makes purely technical changes to protect the privilege of the reconciliation bill as it heads to the Senate.

It is not a redo or relitigation of any underlying policy issues in the bill.

Let me repeat: There are no policy decisions included in this engrossment correction.

That is what the Senate is working through, and I look forward to considering H.R. 1 when the bill returns from the other Chamber.

Mr. Speaker, House Republicans remain on a positive, forward moving trajectory in delivering upon the American people's mandate from November. Just a few short weeks ago, we passed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.

This week, we are taking up a nearly $10-billion rescissions package, and soon we will be moving into the appropriations process.

Discretionary waste is about to be put through the congressional shredder.

Mr. Speaker, the American people demand that this happens. Now our colleagues across the aisle will leap to their feet and scream bloody murder about how the waste we are targeting simply doesn't exist and how we are laying siege to everything under the Sun.

Au contraire. We have the receipts to back everything up.

Here is just a small sampling of the mind-boggling discretionary waste that we will be slashing in foreign funding:

$158 million from the Lebanon peacekeeping mission which has been fraught with waste and abuse as evidenced by its abject failure to contain Hezbollah;

$3 million for an Iraqi Sesame Street;

$833,000 for services for transgender people, sex workers, and their clients and social networkers in Nepal; and

$500,000 for electric buses in Rwanda.

These examples barely skim the surface, Mr. Speaker, and it is really no wonder why Americans are outraged that their tax dollars are being squandered.

It is the American people's money. A single dollar of taxpayer money wasted is $1 too many in our view.

Then there is NPR. I honestly don't even know where to begin on that one. Even if someone were to accept the premise that we need to finance a public radio outlet, then certainly we can all agree that it simply cannot be NPR any longer. NPR's own CEO testified before Congress that she has never seen any political bias at NPR. I don't know what reality she is living in, but it clearly isn't this one.

Here is the kicker: NPR does harbor political bias. It took a $1.9 million grant to improve objectivity and diverse viewpoints.

There is the proof, and it is a concrete example that NPR's CEO was giving false testimony to Congress.

Mr. Speaker, you either understand that you are biased and need help, apparently in the form of taxpayer grants, or you haven't witnessed any bias. You can't have it both ways.

Then there is PBS. Again, I honestly don't know where to begin. On top of the concrete, statistically proven bias against conservatives, Republicans, and the Trump administration, this is the 21st century. We have Sesame Street now streaming on private services so the taxpayers are now subsidizing for-profit companies. We have seen private celebrities like Ms. Rachel who are engaging in crossover with Sesame Street which, again, leveraged taxpayer dollars to concentrate wealth to private individuals.

It is clear that we must slash this tranche of wasteful spending and continue down a path to fully restore fiscal sanity in our Nation.

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

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

Once again, I need to set the facts straight. Our colleagues keep flip-flopping on their characterization of cuts to wasteful spending and our campaign to get our fiscal house in order.

At one moment our spending cuts are so monumental and draconian that the Earth is going to stand still and people are going to die, as they told us in the Rules Committee. Literally seconds after they said that yesterday, not even minutes later, they tell us that the spending cut is inconsequential, that it is a rounding error, and that it is a drop in the bucket.

Mr. Speaker, which is it?

It has to be one or the other.

The fact that our colleagues keep twisting themselves in knots is simply evidence that they are doing everything in their power to hide the facts about this vote.

At one minute, this $10 billion return on taxpayer dollars is not worth Congress' time. At another minute, they will tell us that these are draconian cuts that they will oppose with every ounce of strength in their bodies.

Give me a break.

Republicans are finally offering taxpayers relief from years of profligate spending from Democrats. Again, they expanded the Federal Government with an unprecedented $11 trillion in spending, $6 trillion of which has been added to the national debt. It is time to end that spending.

We are ending it in H.R. 1. We are ending it in this package here today, and we won't stop fighting for taxpayers. We can cut spending in little chunks and in big chunks.

In response to Mr. McGovern's obvious assertions, Members always have a choice to vote up or down on legislation, be it a rule, authorization, or appropriation.

The plain text of the rule provides for consideration of this rescissions package and advances H.R. 1 by adopting the engrossment resolution.

Since Democrats seem to have selective memory, let me remind them, and Americans, that during the 117th Congress, very recently, House Democrats deemed 29 items total. Also included in that number is the engrossment correction resolution they deemed in a rule for the American Rescue Plan Act, which included section and paragraph strikes.

In contrast, Republicans in the 118th Congress deemed only two measures. We understand that this is a tool of the majority that should be used only when necessary.

We all know the Democrats opposed H.R. 1. They opposed it weeks ago, and they opposed the engrossment resolution last night on the basis that it advances H.R. 1.

Mr. McGovern is tying himself in knots here. In a ``Dear Colleague'' he circulated, he characterized this rule as repassing H.R. 1, just before he went on to complain that H.R. 1's engrossment is not getting its own vote.

Nothing was added to H.R. 1. Let me repeat, nothing was added to H.R. 1. Every change was technical or simply removed provisions to make sure this big, beautiful bill has its day in the Senate.

Let's remind the American people what the Democrats voted against in H.R. 1. Democrats went on record against tax cuts for families, against tax relief for tips, against tax relief for senior citizens. They went on record against protecting Medicaid by advocating for the enrollment of 1.4 million illegal aliens. They went on record against increasing the quality of life funds for our Nation's military families.

We have a rule before us to protect H.R. 1's process in the Senate and restore fiscal sanity to our Nation, and the American people need and want us to deliver.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. This rescissions package does reduce certain global health accounts by hundreds of millions. Keep in mind that $10 billion has been appropriated for this work in these accounts, making this rescission exact and very targeted.

The Trump administration has communicated it will not reduce funds for treatment in PEPFAR, rather it eliminates programs antithetical to American interests and ones that worsen the lives of women and children. Enacting this rescission will get this funding stream back to its core mission by refocusing it on protecting health and supporting life-sustaining treatment.

What we don't need is the wasteful spending priorities of President Biden now exposed by the Trump administration: $500,000 for a Lesbian Justice Foundation in Canada; $9.3 million to the John Snow Research and Training Institute to advise Russian doctors on how to perform abortions and gender analysis; $800,000 for transgender people, sex workers and their clients and sexual networks in Nepal; $7.4 million for a One Health Workforce project whose curriculum includes teaching practitioners about environmental racism and the importance of DEI.

This spending, guised under the terms ``equity, reproductive health, and family planning,'' stray far from the mission of sustaining life and serve no benefit to the populations they are intended to help.

These are wasteful programs financed by the American taxpayer, funded by deficit spending; but no longer. This money is better off returned to the Treasury, and PEPFAR's integrity is now being restored.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Norman).

Mr. Speaker, I yield an additional 30 seconds to the gentleman from South Carolina.

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

Mr. Speaker, the Public Broadcasting Act of 1967 mandates that all public broadcasting programs must demonstrate strict adherence to objectivity and balance in all programs. There is a myriad of statistical studies that prove they are not.

NPR banned coverage of the Hunter Biden laptop story, claiming it was a mere diversion. PBS made 162 references to ``far right'' versus only 6 references to ``far left.'' Perhaps most damning for NPR is the fact that it had to utilize a $1.9 million Federal grant to improve objectivity and diverse viewpoints last year.

The problem with the Public Broadcasting Act is that it lacks an enforcement mechanism, so we will go with our constitutional prerogatives here to enforce the law. That starts with this rescission of funding.

PBS and NPR will continue to pivot their response to this cut back and forth, as they have for some time. They tell us that their taxpayer-funded gift is just a drop in the bucket, not worth our attention. Nothing to see here. Yet, when we want to hold them accountable, it is the end of the world.

They will weaponize their content against congressional Republicans. They will hire lobbyists. They will buy ads. In fact, they have. They can continue to do that, but thankfully, it won't be subsidized by the taxpayer any longer.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to my distinguished colleague from Texas (Mr. Roy).

Mr. Speaker, I yield an additional 15 seconds to the gentleman from Texas.

Mr. Speaker, I think my colleague from Texas (Mr. Roy) explained very well why we are not voting to increase the deficit by $3 trillion. We all know that that is coming from the fact that we are extending tax cuts that were passed in 2017.

By the way, if we go back and look at the Record at all the scare tactics and all the Armageddon comments that were made when we passed the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act in 2017, we heard the same things. None of those things happened. In fact, we had a booming economy. I don't think the same scare tactics are going to work again.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, Americans are the most generous and caring people in the world. We have set up lots of programs to save the lives of people across this country and across the world, and we will continue to do that, Mr. Speaker. What we are doing here is not going to cause people to be dying if the money is spent the way Congress intends for it to be spent.

Now, as my Democrat colleagues are well aware, reconciliation bills are different from other types of legislation and are prohibited from including provisions deemed as extraneous in the Senate.

What we are doing here in terms of the engrossment resolution for H.R. 1 is we are striking a few provisions in the bill that Senate Parliamentarians concluded would jeopardize the privileged status of the bill in the Senate.

The House is taking all necessary steps to enable the One Big Beautiful Bill Act to be considered expeditiously in the Senate and sent to President Trump's desk under the reconciliation process, which is what this engrossment resolution does.

Mr. Speaker, I will also remind the ranking member and my Democrat colleagues that when they were last in the majority, they also utilized an engrossment resolution to strike extraneous provisions from their American Rescue Plan in 2021.

Furthermore, Mr. Speaker, what we are doing with the reconciliation bill and with the rescission bill is, we are doing everything we can to get our country back in fiscal shape. That is more important to the people in this world than any individual program is. It is important that the United States remain the greatest country in the world and that we reduce our debt and deficit. That is the focus of Republicans.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, the answer is clear: The American people gave Republicans a mandate to restore fiscal sanity. This rescissions package is part of achieving that end.

Republicans are cleaning up the ruin that the Biden-Harris administration left this country in. We are taking a fiscal scalpel to waste, fraud, and abuse within the Federal Government. It is the right thing to do.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote ``yes'' on the previous question and ``yes'' on the rule.

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

Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairwoman, my friend from North Carolina, for yielding me time.

Mr. Speaker, I support this rule, and I rise in support of the rule.

For the American people watching back home, we are here because, on June 3, the House of Representatives received a rescissions request from the White House to eliminate $9 billion in unobligated spending. Let's just say there is much more to go. This is step one.

Under the Impoundment Control Act, once a request is received, Congress has

45 days to act. The House is now acting. These rescissions are, in part, due to what DOGE was able to uncover and bring forward in terms of wasteful government spending.

Just look at what we have been funding with taxpayer dollars: $6 million for net-zero cities in Mexico; $5.1 million for programs to strengthen the resilience of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, and queer--good grief--global movements; $1.5 million to advance diversity, equity, and inclusion in Serbia's workplaces; $2 million for Moroccan pottery classes; $2 million for sex changes and LGBT activism in Guatemala; $33,000 for being LGBTI--I can't even keep up with this stuff; $6 million to fund tourism in Egypt; $32,000 for transgender comic books in Peru; and $1 million to help disabled people in Tajikistan become climate leaders.

Is that what Democrats think their taxpayer dollars should go toward? I can promise the minority that the people I represent think that this is absolute garbage.

How on Earth can my Democratic friends possibly defend that? My friends on the other side of the aisle would like you to believe, seriously, that if you don't use your taxpayer dollars to fund this absurd list of projects and thousands of others that I didn't even list, somehow people will die and our global standing in the world will crumble.

Let's just reject this now. The White House is right to send up this rescissions package. This should be just step one. There should be numerous other steps.

We should rescind billions upon billions of dollars of wasteful spending that is destroying our country through inflation and increasing the size and scope of government, undermining the safety and security of the American people.

How about the $160 million we can save by not giving more money to UNRWA, the organization whose own employees participated in Hamas' slaughter of Israeli citizens on October 7, which we now know to be verifiably and completely true?

Why would we continue to shovel money to an organization that is funding terrorism against our allies and against our American citizens? Yet, that is precisely what my colleagues on the other side of the aisle would wish us to continue to do.

Mr. Speaker, let's address the One Big Beautiful Bill Act issue. My friends on the other side of the aisle are raising the prospect of $3 trillion of additional deficits. I have been very open in my belief that this bill should be better, that we should cut more spending and be more mindful of reducing the size of government to get deficits down much further than we are seeing in this bill.

To be very clear--and we had this debate in the Committee on Rules-- what my friends on the other side of the aisle are forgetting and not putting forward here in this debate, when they say $3 trillion of additional deficits, is what you believe the growth rate will be if you adopt policies that will actually increase economic growth. That is putting more money into the pockets of the American people and deregulating so that businesses can create wealth.

We assumed 2.6 percent economic growth. That is higher than the CBO's expectation of 1.8 but lower than the historic growth of 3.2 percent.

We hit the sweet spot. We believe that if you get that growth, you will have deficit neutrality on this bill so that you will end up creating wealth, creating jobs, putting more money into people's pockets, and trying to deliver on the spending cuts, reversal and termination of the green new scam, and the application of Medicaid work requirements to make sure that people aren't getting benefits when they should be working.

Mr. Speaker, I believe it is a good bill.

Mr. Speaker, I believe it is a good bill, and I will say it again: I think the bill can get better. I think the Senate should improve it. I think that we should find more savings, but to say to the American people that it is creating deficits, ignoring economic growth, is just simply not true.

Mr. Speaker, I thank Representative Foxx for yielding me the time.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of H.R. 4, the Rescissions Act of 2025, a bill that finally codifies the spending cuts identified by the Department of Government Efficiency, otherwise known as DOGE.

The American people are getting a front row seat to one party who is perfectly content to bankrupt this country, one party. We will get no votes on this rescission package, none from the Democratic Party.

They had their time. When their President, who was cognitively, let's just say, deficient, where were the cuts? None. They didn't say anything. They didn't stand up for the American people. They were silent.

Where were our good friends with the 15 to 20 million illegals coming into this country, with the drugs flowing in, with the children that were trafficked? Where were they? They were quiet. They didn't say a thing. Mr. Speaker, it is anti-American.

This package is not about tightening belts. It is about cutting loose the dead weight.

As Congresswoman Foxx just mentioned a few things, let me mention a few things that Democrats will spend Americans' money on:

$3 million for Iraqi Sesame Street; $6 million for NetZeroCities in Mexico--NetZeroCities in Mexico, what is that? Mr. Speaker, Democrats will spend $158 million for Lebanon peacekeeping operations which fail to contain Hezbollah; $135 million for the World Health Organization controlled by China. This is what Democrats are for. This is how they are wanting to spend your money.

With $38 trillion in debt, they will keep on spending and spending on their pet projects. President Trump is calling an end to it.

Mr. Speaker, of this, we are talking about $9.4 billion in rescissions, funds that should never have been appropriated in the first place. This includes $8.3 billion from foreign aid programs--some which I just read--$1.1 billion from the Corporation of Public Broadcasting. Taxpayers should not be forced to subsidize a leftwing media operation like NPR and PBS. These cuts are more than symbolic. Mr. Speaker, they are structural. They target woke U.N. handouts, failing to keep the peacekeeping efforts, and Biden's DEI and climate propaganda campaigns masquerading as humanitarian aid.

Let me be clear. This does not cut defense. This does not cut Social Security. This does not cut Medicare. This is about rooting out waste, fraud, and abuse and very firmly putting America first, which they are not doing.

If we don't codify these cuts, they will be reversed quietly over time with no vote from this Chamber.

This rescissions package is the lockbox. It makes the DOGE cuts permanent. It ensures the victories that we don't want to get washed away in the next budget cycle. This is our chance to turn--

Mr. Speaker, this is about freedom. This is about maintaining America as we have known it in the past. This is about returning the American people to some fiscal sanity, which my friends on the left will not do and never have done, particularly in the last 4 years.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the ranking member for yielding me time.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak on my amendment to President Trump's reckless and stunningly shortsighted rescissions package, which would, among other harmful cuts, entirely eliminate Federal funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Mr. Speaker, let's be very clear. This is not cutting waste, fraud, and abuse. This isn't trimming around the edges. This isn't the teardrop in an ocean. This is all Federal funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which is PBS, NPR, and local public television and radio.

This is not just an attack, though, on PBS and NPR, as so many of my Republican colleagues have said. The majority knows full well that more than 70 percent of this cut will be felt by the local radio and television stations in their own communities and across the country.

These stations use federally funded CPB radio towers and infrastructure to disseminate lifesaving emergency alerts. They don't just inform rural Americans and serve news deserts to discuss local news, which, of course, they do, and they are often the only source of educational programming for children around the country, but they are also essential for disaster response and emergency preparedness.

There are 20 States that list NPR in their emergency response plans. This infrastructure is essential for emergency alerts, geotargeted text messages, and first responder communications. My colleagues know all of this. The Republicans know how devastating this defunding will be.

Even Chairman Aderholt acknowledged yesterday in the Committee on Rules that these cuts will harm his State's public broadcasting networks and that he would like to work on it with Democrats. The gentleman's chance is right now, on the previous question, which, if my colleagues vote ``no,'' we can work together on funding the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Mr. Speaker, this is not about actual funding. This is caving to Donald Trump's thin skin and his inability to deal with facts rather than to stand up for local stations, local communities, and the First Amendment, which specifically prevents Congress from abridging the freedom of the press.

To every Republican listening, this is yet another chance to oppose Donald Trump's attack on any objective form of accountability and to do what is best for your constituents.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on the previous question and to choose their constituents over Donald Trump.