Floor Statements

Mr. Chair, I support reauthorizing the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, CFTC, and believe a properly resourced CFTC has a critical role to play in promoting fair and transparent markets that effectively serve end users and consumers without putting taxpayers or our financial system at risk. Unfortunately, H.R. 4413 departs from this vital objective in several important ways.

First, Title II of H.R. 4413 imposes onerous new administrative burdens on the CFTC whose practical effect will be to delay the Commission's ongoing Dodd-Frank rulemaking and encourage costly litigation. We need more certainty--not less certainty--when it comes to regulating our derivatives markets, and H.R. 4413 would take us in precisely the opposite direction.

Second, Title III of H.R. 4413 would make it much more difficult for the CFTC to regulate cross-border derivatives transactions that pose a risk to the U.S. economy. The legislation creates this vulnerability by substituting foreign derivatives rules for U.S. law unless the CFTC and the Securities and Exchange Commission, SEC, jointly determine that a foreign country's regulatory regime is not broadly equivalent to our own. While I support international efforts to harmonize effective rules of the road for derivatives transactions, I do not support presuming an equivalency in this area that does not currently exist. Six years after unregulated derivatives transactions contributed to the sharpest downturn in our economy since the Great Depression, we simply cannot afford to outsource the protection of our financial system to foreign regulators.

Third, neither this legislation--nor the FY 2015 House Agriculture- FDA Appropriations bill, which proposes to slash the CFTC's budget by 22 percent below the President's request--does anything to provide the CFTC with the resources it needs to police fraud and excessive speculation in our derivatives markets on behalf of end users and consumers.

For these reasons, I urge a ``no'' vote on H.R. 4413.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to pay tribute to Dr. Ada Sue Hinshaw, who is retiring as Dean of the Daniel K. Inouye Graduate School of Nursing of the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences (USUHS), which I am proud to have located in my Congressional district.

Dr. Hinshaw was named Dean by USUHS President Charles Rice in June 2008 and has led the School through a period of enormous change and growth. Her deanship is the capstone of a lifelong commitment to her profession, her colleagues, her patients, and the science and scholarship of nursing and health care. USUHS and her field have been transformed by her energy, wise stewardship, and insightful mentorship.

Dr. Hinshaw has numerous significant accomplishments. She developed a close working relationship with the chiefs of the Nurse Corps of the military services, which was reflected by their decision to include the dean of the GSN as a regular member of the Federal Nursing Service Chiefs. She strengthened the academic rigor of the Advanced Practice Nursing programs and skillfully managed the transition of those programs from the Master's degree to the Doctor of Nursing Practice degree.

Dr. Hinshaw recruited key faculty members to strengthen research programs, developed a partnership with the Department of Veterans Affairs in patient safety, and oversaw the successful reaccreditation of a number of GSN academic programs. She developed a highly successful model of shared governance, initiated the Behavioral Health advanced practice nursing program, and met the Air Force's need for an accession program for CRNAs. Moreover, Dr. Hinshaw closely collaborated with School of Medicine Dean Arthur Kellermann to develop an innovative inter-professional education program that will ensure that USUHS leads the health professions' integration in academic health care education and research.

Throughout her career, Dr. Hinshaw has conducted nursing research focusing on quality care, patient outcomes, measurement of such outcomes, and building positive work environments for nurses while ensuring patient safety. She has given hundreds of presentations and her findings have been widely published. In addition, she has served on numerous scientific advisory committees and task forces and has been a visiting professor at many schools of nursing.

Dr. Hinshaw has held many leadership positions during her career. She was dean/professor at the University of Michigan School of Nursing (1994-2006). She was the first permanent director of the National Center for Nursing Research and the first director of the National Institute of Nursing Research at the National Institutes of Health (1987-94). President of the American Academy of Nursing from 1991-2001, she is a member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies and on the Institute's Governing Council. She co-chaired a study entitled Keeping Patients Safe: Transforming the Work Environment for Nurses (2004), and served as Scholar-in-Residence at the Institute (2006-07). She also chaired the Institute of Medicine committee that examined the safety of the federal childhood immunization schedule.

The recipient of 13 honorary doctoral degrees, Dr. Hinshaw received a Ph.D. and M.A. in sociology from the University of Arizona, an M.S.N. from Yale University, and a B.S. from the University of Kansas.

Dr. Hinshaw was named a ``Living Legend'' in a career-capping honor at the American Academy of Nursing's 38th Annual Meeting. She has been a leader in the Academy since her induction as a Fellow in 1978 and served as President in 2001.

As Dr. Hinshaw prepares to embark on the next stage of her life, I ask my colleagues to join me in thanking her for her service to the Daniel K. Inouye Graduate School of Nursing. We are grateful to her for her wise counsel, scholarly contribution, and her dedication to the service of our nation.

Mr. Speaker, I think we all know that the entire Nation is cheering on Team USA in the World Cup right now, and we are happy that they are going to continue to do well; but, Mr. Speaker, I would like to bring the body's attention to another hard-fought game, which was the second annual Capital Soccer Classic. In a very close game, the Democrats edged out the Republicans by a score of 7-6, and we will have the plaque.

Mr. Speaker, I have to confess that both teams benefited from having some professional players on both sides, but the Democrats had a ringer in the name of Eric Swalwell, who was a great player and who was the high scorer in the game; and also, as goalie, he stopped a lot of goals.

Mr. Speaker, I would just like to thank the people who participated in the Soccer Caucus, cochair David Reichert--Congressman Reichert and Todd Young. We also want to thank the captain of the Democratic team, Mike McIntyre; and Erik Paulsen played very well.

Finally, I want to acknowledge George Miller, who is a cochair of the caucus.

Mr. Speaker, I just want to thank the U.S. Soccer Foundation for all their support for soccer, for all the good work they do to promote soccer among the youth in our country.

Now, it gives me great pleasure to yield to the cochair of the Soccer Caucus, former Division I player at the Naval Academy, Todd Young.

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague, the ranking member of the Ways and Means Committee, for all his work on this.

The bills that we are seeing today on the floor of the House are part of a series of bills that have come out of the Ways and Means Committee from our Republican colleagues that run up our national debt by putting hundreds of billions of dollars on a credit card by permanently extending a number of business tax credits. In the process, they are actually violating their own budget that they had on the floor just a few months ago.

That is why, Mr. Speaker, this is not a serious attempt to help small businesses. By bringing these measures up one at a time in a rifle-shot fashion, our Republican colleagues are abandoning what they said we should do, which we agree we should do on a bipartisan basis, which is to tackle tax reform in a fiscally responsible way.

After all, Mr. Speaker, we are not helping small businesses by running up our national debt. It was just about a month ago when our Republican colleagues told us that the biggest threat to future economic growth in this country was projected deficits in the out years. We have said to our Republican colleagues we need to work together to reduce that long-term deficit. It is not a question about whether we should do it, it is a question of how we should do it.

But this bill, and these bills on the floor today, take us in the opposite direction. Together, they are going to add over $614 billion to our credit card if you add up all these rifle-shot bills that have come out of the Ways and Means Committee.

Mr. Speaker, what happened to all the rhetoric about fiscal discipline, about getting our deficits in order? Out the window.

Just to put these numbers in perspective, that $640 billion on the credit card is 30 times what it would cost to extend emergency unemployment compensation to 3 million Americans who are out of work today through no fault of their own.

So contrasting these bills with the budget rhetoric we heard a few months ago about reducing our deficits is total doublespeak. Our Republican colleagues know it doesn't meet the laugh test.

When we had the debate on this very floor about the Republican budget, we pointed out that the claim that it balanced in 10 years was based on all sorts of Enron-like accounting gimmicks. For example, they assumed all the revenues that would come in over the next 10 years from the Affordable Care Act at the same time they said they were repealing the Affordable Care Act. Both things can't happen at the same time.

Yet today, even if you take the Republican budget gimmicks, as they would have us do, even if you do that, their budget no longer balances in 10 years, it no longer balances in 10 years. In fact, if you look carefully at the rules governing this debate, our Republican colleagues had to change their own rules to allow this bill to be on the floor today because otherwise it would have violated their claim of a balanced budget. So, that is the kind of gimmickry we have going on here.

If our Republican colleagues were really serious about reducing the long-term deficit, as they claimed to be a month ago, they would be willing to close some of those special interest tax breaks in order to help reduce the deficit, and yet their budget doesn't close a single special interest tax break. It keeps the big subsidies for Big Oil companies, it keeps tax breaks for hedge fund owners. The bills before us today are under a rule that doesn't allow us to pay for them by closing some of those tax breaks. Mr. Levin and I would have loved to have the opportunity to say: let's pay for this business expensing provision by shutting down some of the unproductive tax breaks, tax breaks that are there not because they have economic value but because a powerful political interest got that tax break in the Code. Yet our Republican colleagues have a rule that says we can't touch those.

I thank my friend.

I really think this goes to the heart of the matter, because whether it was the R&D tax credit, the research and development tax credit, or the business expensing provision, I support those provisions, but I support doing them in a fiscally responsible way that doesn't add over $600 billion to our deficit and debt.

How can we do that in a fiscally responsible way? But shutting down some of the unproductive special interest tax breaks in the Tax Code. Yet, the rule before us says we are not allowed to do that. We can't even have a vote, Mr. Speaker, on shutting down some of those special interest tax breaks. That is how far our Republican colleagues are willing to go to keep those special interest tax breaks, not even allowing a vote to close one of them to pay for an R&D tax credit.

So what is this really all about? By running up our national credit card with these business tax provisions you add to the deficit. Then our Republican colleagues will be back here with their budget saying: do you know what, now that we have this big deficit you've got to cut funding for our kids' education, which is what they did in their budget; you have got to voucherize Medicare, which is what they did in their budget; we are not going to have enough funds for our national infrastructure and our highway program, which under their budget goes dry in September, people out of work.

So by providing permanent, unpaid for tax extenders in the business area and running up that deficit, they will come right back to us and say: Do you know what? Now we care again about the deficit, and here is what we want to do about it: cut early education, cut our investment infrastructure, cut the National Institutes of Health research into finding cures and treatments for diseases.

That is why, Mr. Speaker, this is not a serious effort. The chairman of the Ways and Means Committee made an honest effort at tax reform. I don't agree with a lot of what is in his tax reform bill, but it was an honest, professional effort. That is not coming to the floor today. In fact, this bill before us runs directly counter to the chairman's own tax reform effort, just as it violates the Republicans' own budget.

So, let's get serious, Mr. Speaker. Let's deal with these in a manner that provides the incentives we want to businesses. We can do that by extending these on a short-term basis while we work together to come up with a reasonable tax reform plan in a way that is responsible from a budget perspective. That is the way we should be doing the people's business here in the House. Because we are not doing it that way, I urge our colleagues to vote ``no'' on the provisions that are before us.

I thank my colleague, the ranking member of the Ways and Means Committee.

Will the gentleman yield?

Because I am in favor of a short-term extension, Mr. Speaker.

Point of order, Mr. Speaker.

My point of order is this:

The gentleman said that I had voted on this measure before. That is not true, and so I am asking what my recourse would be.

Parliamentary inquiry, Mr. Speaker.

A parliamentary inquiry, Mr. Speaker.

My inquiry is this:

The gentleman from Washington, who is a friend, made a statement that is inaccurate. He stated that I had voted for the provision in this bill before. This bill provides a permanent unpaid for extension of business expensing. I have not done that.

So my question to you is: What recourse do I have to set the record straight?

Mr. Speaker, parliamentary inquiry.

Mr. Speaker, parliamentary inquiry.

Mr. Speaker, parliamentary inquiry. I have a parliamentary inquiry on this.

Mr. Speaker, point of order.

My point of order now is, I have asked for a parliamentary inquiry to make it absolutely clear that I have not voted for a permanent unpaid extension of the business expensing provisions in the past, which is what this bill does and which is the root of my objection to this bill, that it runs up the deficit in the way it does.

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague, Mr. Levin.

As the gentleman from Washington knows, these issues come up every year as to whether or not we should extend certain tax provisions, in this case the business tax provision, earlier the R&D tax provision. Those are provisions that we support, but we support doing them in a fiscally responsible way.

In fact, the motion to recommit we will have will also say we should extend them for one more year while we get our act together here, Mr. Speaker, and do it in a way that doesn't run up the credit card by $600 billion, which is what the Ways and Means Committee has done in a period of 2 weeks--2 weeks--after spending days on the floor of this house a few months ago saying that the biggest threat to economic growth in the future was our budget deficit.

They say that 2 months ago, and then they waive their own rules to bring up these bills that increase our credit card debt to the tune of $600 billion total from what came out of the Ways and Means Committee, in violation of your own budget.

That is what I object to.

Mr. Chair, I rise today in reluctant opposition to H.R. 4435, the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2014.

For the last 53 years, Congress has passed--and the President has signed into law--the annual Defense Authorization bill, allowing us to provide the critical resources the Armed Forces need to maintain the best military in the world. The NDAA has also allowed Congress to have an open dialogue about many of the difficult choices with which we are confronted, including the significant financial constraints that our military is operating under. While I appreciate the House Armed Services Committee's continued support of our servicemembers and our national defense, I have serious concerns with a number of misguided provisions in this year's NDAA.

This year's authorization bill authorizes $513.4 billion in budget authority, including $495.8 billion for the Department of Defense and $79.4 billion in overseas contingency operations (OCO). Unfortunately, it rejects many cost saving measures recommended by the Pentagon and would eliminate more than $50 billion in potential savings for our military over the next five years.

Of particular concern, H.R. 4435 prioritizes unrequested weapons systems and parochial interests over our military readiness. It slashes military readiness by $1.2 billion from the President's FY15 request despite the fact that Secretary Hagel has consistently warned that if cuts to our military readiness persist, and we were confronted with an emerging threat, ``the United States may not have enough ready forces to respond.''

This year's NDAA also includes a provision to continue funding restrictions on the construction or modification of detention facilities in the United States to house Guantanamo detainees. I was particularly disappointed that an amendment offered by Ranking Member Smith to provide a framework for closure of Guantanamo by the end of 2016 was rejected. As the President made clear in his State of the Union Address earlier this year, we cannot wait any longer to close down this facility.

I also share many of the other concerns that were outlined in the President's Statement of Administration Policy. This includes language that restricts the Pentagon from retiring the A-10 aircraft and a provision that authorizes $20 million in unrequested funding in FY15 for the planning and design of a missile field on the East Coast. I also oppose sections 314, 315, 316, and 317, which would prohibit the Department of Defense from using alternative fuels and would limit the ability of our military from developing alternative energy sources that have the potential to save money and enhance our energy security.

Despite my opposition to the overall legislation, I was pleased that a bipartisan amendment offered by Representative Patrick Murphy and Representative Mick Mulvaney to address the migration of base budget funding into the OCO budget was adopted. We have worked together to ensure that the OCO budget is no longer used as a mechanism to circumvent budget caps. I am also encouraged that this bill builds on a number of provisions passed in last year's NDAA and continues to address the problem of sexual assault in the military. In particular, it would eliminate the so-called ``good soldier defense'' in court- martial proceedings, prohibiting a soldier from using good military character as a defense in a sexual assault case. These proceedings should be based on the specific evidence presented in the case.

This bill does authorize much needed funding for our men and women in uniform but ultimately it ignores the current budget landscape that our military is facing. We have to budget based on reality, instead of writing a blank check and holding onto as ``much of the stuff and the training as possible'' and hoping that

``some miracle happens and we get money next year that we don't have now,'' as Chairman McKeon put it earlier this month. As a result of this line of thinking, this legislation avoids making many tough choices at the expense of our military readiness. It is my hope that many of my objections to this legislation will be resolved in Conference with the Senate and that I will be able to support its final passage.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of this bipartisan agreement to make critical investments in our nation's water infrastructure. Today's bill is an example of Congress working together to address the priorities of the American people, and I applaud the Conference Committee for the hard work that brought it to the Floor.

The Water Resources Reform and Development Act authorizes critical projects to maintain our nation's waterways and ports. For Maryland, this work ensures continued operations at the Port of Baltimore, supporting thousands of jobs and encouraging trade. It also provides essential support for the ongoing restoration of the Chesapeake Bay, from creating habitat out of clean dredged material at Poplar Island to rebuilding our oyster population. Additionally, this bill provides for the development of a new, comprehensive plan for the Army Corps of Engineers to restore and protect the Bay.

After we pass this bill, we must provide the necessary funding to ensure the completion of its important work. I look forward to working with my colleagues to make sure we finish the job.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 3361, the USA Freedom Act.

I want to commend Chairman Goodlatte, Chairman Rogers, Ranking Member Conyers, and Ranking Member Ruppersberger for crafting a compromise bill--and taking into account many of the recommendations offered by the Presidents' Review Group on Intelligence and Communications Technologies--that will strengthen the privacy and civil liberties of all Americans. At the same time, the USA Freedom Act will ensure that that our nation continues to have the necessary and appropriate tools to protect our country from those who would seek to do us harm.

This legislation represents an important first step in reforming many of the powers that the National Security Agency (NSA) currently has at its disposal. Specifically, it would end the government's bulk collection of phone metadata and other tangible records through the use of Section 215, Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) pen registers, and National Security letters. It would also increase transparency and oversight within our surveillance operations by requiring the government to disclose the number of requests made for call records under the new collection process and provide Congress a summary of compliance records related to the use of Section 215.

Another significant change is that for the first time, every request made by the NSA for specific call records must be reviewed on a case- by-case basis by the FISA court. This improved oversight is something I have advocated for and I am pleased it was included in this bill.

While this bill is an improvement over current practices, it still falls short of what is needed to ensure adequate privacy protections. I am disappointed that the bill does not establish a Citizens Advocate to represent citizens' privacy interests at the secret FISA Court proceedings. Last December, Representative Jim Jordan and I introduced bipartisan legislation to create such a position. I was pleased when the earlier versions of this bill adopted a similar provision. Unfortunately, Section 401 of H.R. 3361 has since been weakened and only provides for a panel of advisors to be employed at the discretion of the FISC.

I also have concerns that last minute changes have the potential to create a backdoor loophole where the government can continue to collect vast amounts of phone metadata under certain circumstances. It is my hope that the Senate will strengthen the bill we voted on today by reinstituting the Special Advocate under Section 401, and more narrowly defining what constitutes a ``discrete term''.

Despite these reservations, the USA Freedom Act represents real progress and a departure from the untenable status quo. It ensures that the intelligence and law enforcement community have the necessary tools they need to protect our nation, but it does so in a manner that is consistent with the fundamental principles in our Constitution to protect the civil liberties of all Americans.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in opposition to H.R. 4031, the Department of Veterans Affairs Management Accountability Act.

First and foremost, let me address the serious allegations that employees at a number of VA hospitals around the country placed veterans on secret waiting lists and manipulated backlog data. This is absolutely shameful and if the VA Inspector General determines those claims to be true, we must hold those individuals accountable and swiftly remove and punish all employees who were part of this alleged wrongdoing.

Unfortunately, the bill before us today is a fake solution and provides no real fix to the fundamental problems at the VA. Its stated purpose is to hold senior level employees accountable by giving the VA Secretary the authority to terminate them at-will. However, current law already allows for Senior Executives to be terminated for poor performance. Moreover, the VA has broad tools to remove individuals from the SES who are rated unsatisfactory, while providing them no right of appeal. In the last two years, fourteen Senior Executives have been removed.

This legislation is an impulsive political reaction to an awful situation, and has many unintended consequences that could ultimately jeopardize the quality and care that our veterans receive. It would dismantle civil service protections that have been in place for decades and would open the door for political abuse and witch-hunts, effectively creating a mechanism where career federal employees could be removed because of their views or political affiliation. If passed, it would turn 400 Senior Executives at the VA--including many who served in the armed services and are veterans themselves--into at-will employees.

Mr. Speaker, there is nothing more important than providing for the men and women who have made so many sacrifices for our country. However, this bill merely provides a knee-jerk public relations response to a serious problem, and glosses over the real systemic issues we need to address at the Veterans' Administration.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to salute my constituent, Bettina L. Wesloh, a distinguished community leader. In June, Mrs. Wesloh, a resident of Eldersburg, Maryland, will receive the Leader of Excellence Award from Girl Scouts USA.

Mrs. Wesloh has been a mentor for pre-teen and teen girls in Girl Scout Troop 1379. She has motivated these girls to continue in scouting and inspired them to participate in outstanding community service activities, including making 75 blankets for Project Linus, for which the troop earned the Silver Award. As the members of the troop work toward earning their Gold Awards, Mrs. Wesloh continues to advise and assist the girls. She also takes the time to advise independent girl scouts who are not members of Troop 1379.

Mrs. Wesloh also serves as a mentor for the Robo-Lions FRC Team 2199 robotics team, assisting the students with public relations and business projects. She has been instrumental in organizing field trips for the students and fundraising drives to support science, technology, engineering and mathematics initiatives. Under her mentorship, the team won two Entrepreneurship Awards and the Regional Chairman's Award, which is considered the highest award a team can win at a regional FIRST robotics competition. In fact, Mrs. Wesloh is so passionate about the importance of STEM education that she is a founding director of PIE3, a non-profit organization that supports STEM education and activities in and around Carroll County, Maryland. Mrs. Wesloh is also a substitute teacher for the Carroll County Public Schools.

A member of the Wesley Freedom United Methodist Church, Mrs. Wesloh has served as President of United Methodist Women, which, among other things, advocates for women's rights and the prevention of human trafficking. Mrs. Wesloh is part of United Methodist's Leadership team and Servant Circle. In recent years, Mrs. Wesloh organized the collection of over fifty flood buckets for donation to the victims of Hurricane Sandy.

Bettina Wesloh is a truly compassionate and dedicated community leader who has made a difference in the lives of countless people I ask my colleagues to join me in expressing our deepest gratitude and appreciation to her for her outstanding community service and her invaluable work with young people.

Mr. Chair, I rise in support of the Success and Opportunity Through Quality Charter Schools Act, a bill that strengthens the existing charter schools program while including important reforms for accountability and access.

Public charter schools are an important testing ground for new ideas and innovative practices that can benefit our entire school system. Today's bill supports the expansion of high quality charter schools while making vital improvements to the program to increase oversight and access. While current law requires charter schools to be open to all students, this bill would encourage enrollment and retention of underserved populations like students with disabilities and English language learners. It also enhances charter authorizing practices to include quality controls for student achievement and management.

I applaud the Education and Workforce Committee for working in a bipartisan fashion to bring this legislation to the Floor. I hope that we can apply that same spirit of cooperation to fully reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary Education Act and improve education for all students in every public school.

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague.

I want to start by congratulating the bipartisan effort on the charter school bills. I thank Mr. Polis for his leadership on that. And I wish that was all there was to say about this rule. Unfortunately, it is not.

You might think this rule was only about charter schools. The title is, Success and Opportunity Through Quality Charter Schools Act. But then if you turn a couple pages in, you will find in paragraph 13 a reference to H.R. 4438. That is not the charter school bill. That is what we call the research and development tax credit bill.

So why is it here in this rule on charter schools, and why does it reference part B of the rule in front of us now, which says that the budgetary effects of this act shall not be entered on either the PAYGO scorecard--and it goes on to say some other things?

Well, the PAYGO scorecard has nothing to do with charter schools. It does have something to do with the R&D tax credit. And I want to explain to people what has happened here because it is important that the public know.

Last night, we were scheduled to have the debate on a bill to extend the R&D tax credit law. We were all ready to go, and all of a sudden the debate stopped and the plug was pulled.

And so I have got to say something for a second about this research and tax development credit.

I think the idea of extending the R&D tax credit bill is broadly supported. That is not the issue on the tax credit bill. The issue is a permanent extension that is not paid for.

There are a number of other bills coming out of the Ways and Means Committee. When you add them all up, they add $310 billion to our deficit. Unpaid for. Put it on our credit card.

It is kind of interesting, Mr. Speaker, because it was only about 3 or 4 weeks ago that here on the floor of this House we had a debate on the Republican budget and they told us the number one priority was to reduce that deficit. Yet now we have a bunch of bills that say let's put it on the credit card.

And, Mr. Speaker, you know that at the end of the day, we all have to pay when we put it on our credit card.

We pointed out that if you don't pay for it by closing some other special interest tax breaks, like tax breaks for big oil companies, someone else is going to have to pay.

Now what we didn't realize is that the Republican plan as of last night was to pay for the R&D tax credit extension by cutting Medicare, Mr. Speaker. Because their failure to come up with offsets in the bill meant that current law would continue in effect.

In the past, we have turned off the trigger that says it is paid for by a sequester to a number of programs, the biggest being Medicare. But our Republican colleagues didn't turn it off.

So when they decided not to pay for the R&D tax credit in the bill and decided not to turn off the sequester, what they were aiming for was to have Medicare pay for that tax extender and to ask the people who depend on that program to foot the bill for the R&D tax credit.

Well, Mr. Speaker, we blew the whistle on that issue last night. We saw our colleagues go scampering back to the Rules Committee to change it.

We will talk a little later today, but the bottom line is the same. When you put stuff on the credit card, someone pays the piper at the end of the day.

We have proposed paying for it, in part, by closing some of the wasteful special interest tax loopholes in the Code. We think the R&D tax credit is a pro-growth policy, but subsidies to big oil companies; no.

And so, because our Republican colleagues don't want to pay for it in the bill, they are going to increase the deficit. In fact, the rule yesterday waived the rules of the House. Because the R&D tax credit bill was inconsistent with the Republicans' own budget.

The budget that was passed 3 or 4 weeks ago, it is inconsistent with it. Even under the Enron accounting in that budget, it throws it out of balance. Our Republican colleagues need to know that. You are putting it on the credit card. At the end of the day, that means if you are not going to ask Medicare to pay for it, which apparently had been the original plan, you are going to be cutting our kids' education, you are going to be cutting research at places like the National Institutes of Health that try to find cures and treatments for diseases. You are going to be letting the infrastructure of this country come to a halt. In fact, the budget calls for allowing the transportation trust fund to go insolvent.

That is what happens when you refuse to take fiscal responsibility and pay for things.

It was interesting to discover that the plan last night was to allow the Medicare cut to go into effect to pay for it. We are glad we are not doing that anymore.

We are glad that after we called attention to that issue, our Republican colleagues realized that it was not a good idea to have an across-the-board cut in Medicare to pay for business tax incentives. We are glad they woke up to that fact.

But the underlying report here is going to remain the same. Putting $310 billion on the credit card, someone has got to pay. We should take the responsibility in this House to figure out how we are going to do it.

We put forward proposals as to how to do it. Unfortunately, despite having passed a budget a couple of weeks ago, they are now waiving their rules on their own budget for these purposes.

I look forward to the conversation later today.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my friend and colleague, the ranking member of the Ways and Means Committee, for all the work he has done on tax policy to make sure we have a tax policy that is both pro-growth and works for the country. And I want to commend the chairman of the Ways and Means Committee for his efforts on tax reform.

I wish what we were doing today was talking about real tax reform. Many of us agree that we need to reform our corporate Tax Code, that we do need to deal with the rates and we need to deal with the base.

But that is not what this is about. The Speaker decided not to bring before this full House the tax reform bill

that the chairman of the Ways and Means Committee has worked on, and that is not what we are dealing with today. Nor is what we are dealing with today whether we are for or against the research and development tax credit.

The chairman of the committee said there is bipartisan support for the R&D tax credit. I agree, it is a pro-growth tax policy.

The issue is whether we extend it on a permanent basis and unpaid for, not one penny of it paid for. The chairman mentioned that we had raised this on an annual basis in the past. That is true. One of the reasons we didn't take it up on a permanent basis was because everybody realized what impact it would have on our long-term deficit and said, you know, that is not good fiscal policy, that is not good fiscal discipline, let's try and work together to get it done in a fiscally responsible way.

But instead of doing that, we now have our colleagues coming forth and doing it in a way that puts it on a credit card, puts it on a credit card. Not one penny is paid for. We have this R&D tax credit bill before us today. There are four other business tax incentive bills that are coming out of the Ways and Means Committee. Together they add $310 billion to the deficit. That means $310 billion on our national credit card.

Now, what is interesting is it was probably less than a month ago that on the floor of this very House we had a debate on the Republican budget. We were told then that the most important thing we could do for long-term economic growth was to reduce long-term deficits. That was the be-all and end-all. It is important. And do you know what? We agree it is important to reduce the long-term deficits. The question is not whether, it is how.

So we proposed, in addition to some of the cuts we have already made in this House, that we also close some of the unproductive wasteful special interest tax breaks that happen to go to different interests around the country, not because it is important to our economy, not because it helps the economy grow, but because they happen to have a lot of influence here in Washington. So we should get rid of some of those to help pay for pro-growth tax policy like the R&D tax credit. But our Republican colleagues said no. They wouldn't close one, not one special interest tax break to help reduce the deficit, not one.

So here we are today after all that talk just a few weeks ago about reducing the deficit doing a permanent and unpaid-for extension of the R&D tax credit--the first installment of, as I said, five bills that will add $310 billion to the deficit, all on a credit card.

In fact, Mr. Chairman, I don't know if all the Members know, they had to waive their own rules because this bill is inconsistent with the budget that was passed in this House a few weeks ago--inconsistent. In fact, if you look at the five bills coming forward, they put the Republican budget at a balance even on its own terms. They used funny math to claim that their budget was balanced. They actually used the revenue from the Affordable Care Act--ObamaCare--even when they said they are getting rid of it. But let's give them that for a moment.

By their own terms, these five bills now mean that their own budget, Republican budget, is not in balance anymore. We are in favor of the R&D tax credit. We would like to find a way to permanently extend it, but let's do it in a fiscally responsible manner.

Here is the thing, Mr. Chairman--all of us know this. When you don't pay for it, when you put it on a credit card, at the end of the day somebody is paying for it. Now, last night we pointed out that the Republican proposal was actually going to pay for it by hitting Medicare. They left in place a Medicare sequester under statutory PAYGO. They were going to ask Medicare to pay for these tax credits. I am glad they reconsidered that. But at the end of the day someone has got to pay. Who pays?

Let's go back and look at the Republican budget from a few weeks ago. I will tell you who pays. Because that budget refuses to close any of those wasteful tax breaks, whether it is for corporate jets--whether it is for big oil companies, whether it is for hedge fund owners--because they refuse to do any of those to reduce the deficit they come after our kids' education: deep cuts in Head Start, deep cuts in K through 12, deep cuts in helping more students afford college, deep cuts in medical research, scientific research. We are talking about the importance of giving the private sector incentives to invest in R&D-- that is right.

But when you cut the nondefense discretionary budget by 25 percent compared to now over the next 10 years, you are also cutting our capacity as a country to invest in cutting-edge R&D. After all, there were Federal Government investments that helped launch the Internet, which has had huge economic benefits. Investments in scientific research at NIH, huge benefits.

That's why it is so important to do this in a fiscally responsible manner. Because when you add $310 billion to the deficit somebody pays at the end of the day.

What we have said is, let's pay for it in a way that makes sense, a combination of cuts, many of which have been made, but also getting rid of the unproductive wasteful tax breaks that are in the Tax Code, which are there not because of the economic benefit, but because of the power of a lobby here in Washington.

I would hope we would go back to what the chairman of the committee actually wanted to do when he started the effort of tax reform a couple of years ago and beyond, which was, yes, let's do real tax reform, let's do it in a way that makes sense, let's do it in a way that doesn't bust the deficit wide open and leave our kids having to pick up the tab either through higher interest rates or cuts to their education. That is not right.

I urge my colleagues to vote against this legislation.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in opposition to the latest version of H.R. 4414, the Expatriate Health Coverage Clarification Act of 2014. I want to commend my colleague John Carney on his efforts to address the needs of expatriate health care plans and to ensure that the jobs created by managing these plans remain in the United States. However, the bill, in its current form, would create more problems than it resolves. As you know, the Affordable Care Act established new coverage standards and protections for millions of Americans, including that they cannot be denied coverage for preexisting conditions nor have their benefits capped at arbitrary annual and lifetime limits. Unfortunately, the bill contains potential loopholes that could weaken coverage for many families and immigrant workers who live in the United States. While I do believe the text of the bill has been improved since its initial consideration, there is still more work to be done. According to the Statement of Administration Policy, the Administration echoes our concerns and it remains willing to work with Congress to find a reasonable solution. I hope my colleagues in the Senate will make the necessary changes in order to resolve this matter as quickly as possible.

Mr. Chair, I rise today to express my support for H.R. 4486, the FY15 Military Construction and Veterans Affairs and Related Agencies Appropriations Act. I commend Chairmen Rogers and Culberson and Ranking Members Lowey and Bishop for crafting a bipartisan bill that not only provides for current and former service members and their families but also substantially addresses the veterans' claims backlog.

The MilCon-VA bill makes critical investments in our military infrastructure, housing, and services to our nation's veterans, active military members and their families. It provides $71.5 billion in discretionary funding for these programs and activities, including $64.7 billion for the Department of Veteran Affairs. It also provides $58.7 billion in advance funding for the VA in FY16.

This legislation also builds on efforts made in last year's MilCon-VA bill to end the claims backlog that continues to plague our VA regional offices, including the VA's Baltimore Regional Office. It fully funds the budget request of $173.3 million for the Veterans Benefits Management System (VBMS) and provides an additional $20 million to the Veterans Benefits Administration (VBA) for digitizing records and staffing needs. The legislation also requires each VA regional office to submit a monthly report on its claims processing performance and imposes even stricter requirements on the poorest performing offices around the country. I am hopeful that these measures will be an important step in ensuring that backlogged claims are expedited as quickly as possible.

I do have reservations about a number of provisions contained in the bill, however. I strongly oppose section 411, which prohibits the construction, renovation, or expansion of any facility in the U.S. to house individuals that are currently being detained at Guantanamo Bay. And as the White House outlined in its Statement of Administration Policy, it is disappointing that this bill does not provide full funding for VA Medical Care, potentially delaying the delivery of important health care services to our veterans.

Despite my concerns, the MilCon-VA bill reflects our commitment and the promises we have made to our veterans, our service members, and their families. I hope my colleagues will join me in supporting this important piece of legislation.

Madam Chairman, I claim the time in opposition to the gentleman's amendment.

Madam Chairman, what we have got here with this particular amendment is more than a doubling down on what was already a bad idea.

We heard, actually, from Mr. Rogers, who is the chairman of the Appropriations Committee and a Republican Member of Congress, that the Republican version of the budget offered by Mr. Ryan was ``draconian''--draconian because of the impact it has on important investments that have historically helped make our economy grow, make us a world leader, make sure that we can keep our competitive edge in a global economy. The Republican budget coming out of the Budget Committee devastated those important investments.

Of course, they didn't close one single special interest tax loophole for the purpose of reducing the deficit, but they decided to cut deeply into investments in our kids' education, everything from early education, to K-12, to college ed. They make no secret about it.

They want to charge college students higher interest rates and, at the same time, protect special interest tax breaks. What we have here in the Republican Study Committee's amendment is simply a doubling down on what the chairman of the Republican Appropriations Committee already called draconian.

The interesting thing to me, Madam Chairman, is that I would have thought that the Republican Study Committee would have taken a different approach. I would have thought they would have taken an approach that didn't require, as part of their budget, the revenues from the Affordable Care Act, but if you look at their revenue line, it is identical to the revenue line in the House Republican budget, which is identical to the Congressional Budget Office's revenue line, which The Heritage Foundation--no left-leaning group--has said means that these budgets incorporate the tax revenues from the Affordable Care Act.

Again, here is what The Heritage Foundation said:

Perhaps the biggest shortcoming of this budget is that it

keeps the tax increases associated with ObamaCare.

It is what they have said about the House Republican budget's revenue line. This one has the same thing.

If they are going to repeal the Affordable Care Act, as they say they will, that revenue line should go down; yet no matter how you cut it, Madam Chairman, the choices remain choices that we do not believe reflect the values and priorities of this country,

which are of protecting those special interest tax breaks for very powerful interests while gutting important investments in our future, investments that have been proven historically to make the United States the leading economic power in the world.

I reserve the balance of my time.

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

The gentleman speaks about the importance of fiscal discipline and fiscal responsibility, and we agree.

The question we have is: Why do they exempt from the whole practice of fiscal discipline all of these what are called tax expenditures and tax preferences that have been put into the Tax Code many times by very powerful special interests?

What does a tax preference mean? It means in many cases that, because somebody has well-heeled lobbyists, he is able to escape having to pay taxes on something that everybody else has to pay for.

What our Republican colleagues are saying is they don't want to take away any of those special interest preferences for the purpose of reducing the deficit. They would rather cut deeply into our kids' education. They would rather charge college students more interest on their loans. They would rather increase class sizes in K-12, which is what happens when you cut Title I and special education.

They talk about opportunity, but the opportunities that they are protecting are those for the special interests who had their lobbyists do very well for them in Washington. Hey, hands off all of that. We don't want to touch that. But we are coming after everybody else, including, by the way, seniors on Medicare who will immediately see the reopening of the doughnut hole.

So if you are a senior with high prescription drug costs, that is going to cost you $1,200 more per year, on average, immediately. And then they begin to phase in in their budget their Medicare voucher program, which will end the Medicare guarantee.

This is all about priorities. The interesting thing here is that, despite all the talk about fiscal discipline from our Republican colleagues, it is hands off imposing any fiscal discipline on powerful special interests who have succeeded in getting themselves special deals in the Tax Code.

I am very pleased to yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Becerra), chairman of the Democratic Caucus and a member of the Ways and Means Committee, who has spent a lot of time focusing on these issues.

Mr. Chairman, it is now my pleasure to yield 2 minutes to the gentlelady from Florida (Ms. Brown), a distinguished member of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee and someone who is focused on investing in America.

I yield the gentlelady an additional 1 minute.

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