Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize an American hero.

One year ago today, Sergeant Donald Walters bravely offered the ultimate sacrifice in hand-to-hand combat during the now famous ambush of the 507th Army Ordnance Maintenance Company, the same attack in which Pvt. Jessica Lynch was captured.

Sgt. Walters served our nation courageously and honorably long before September 11. He served during the first Gulf War, and returned to raise a family. So if, after the Gulf War, Sgt. Walters decided to never again leave his home and family to defend freedom in a faraway place, he could rest easy because he had already given more than most.

However, after September 11, Sgt. Walters volunteered to rejoin the U.S. Army in order to serve America yet again. He was selfless. He was courageous. He knew what every soldier knows: that great sacrifices would be required in order to serve our nation in its time of need, and he made those sacrifices. I am deeply saddened that, one year ago today, he made the ultimate sacrifice.

Yet his sacrifice, his courage, and his heroism has not and will not be forgotten. Sgt. Donald Walters fought bravely in the ambush on the 507th, and his courage in the face of fire both inflicted damage on the enemy and helped others in his unit to escape the ambush. His gallantry in action has earned him a Silver Star from the Army, a reward much deserved.

The exact chain of events on that fateful day may never be fully revealed. But the family of Sgt. Donald Walters should be assured that the Army, this Congress, and this Nation consider him a hero, and he will never be forgotten.

Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from Texas for yielding me this time.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in opposition to this restrictive rule and to the underlying budget.

Yesterday I offered two amendments in the Committee on Rules. By the way, both of these were job amendments. One of these amendments would have increased funding for the Army Corps of Engineers, which is woefully underfunded in this budget before us. The other amendment would have protected families and communities throughout the West by providing the necessary funding for hazardous fuel reduction programs.

What the hazardous fuel reduction program does is it helps stop all of those horrible forest fires we were having in the West, it protects communities, it protects homes and it protects healthy trees so that they can be logged. And at the same time it also provides jobs.

When we look at cutting the Corps of Engineers' budget, what does that budget do? Why would we increase it? It is the budget, it is the organization that dredges all of my coastal communities that keeps those communities alive. It provides transportation, water transportation for over $1 trillion worth of goods in this country.

Neither of those amendments, or many others, were allowed under this rule.

My home State of Oregon has the highest unemployment in the country, and our coastal communities have been very hard hit by the economic downturn. These communities depend on fishing and tourism, and without dredging and other harbor safety measures undertaken by the Army Corps of Engineers, these industries would be further devastated. This budget sets the wrong priorities for our Nation, and I encourage my colleagues to oppose this rule and the underlying bill.

I thank the ranking member for yielding time and thank him for his leadership throughout this whole process.

Mr. Chairman, a budget resolution is all about priorities. I think few people here would disagree that education has to be one of our top priorities. All we have to do is look around at what is happening today. We have jobs being shipped overseas. We are retooling some of our manufacturing plants. What are our jobs going to be in the future? What do they require? The one thing we know they require is a good education. This underlying budget and the alternative fail our children, fail to provide the investment we need in our future.

Last Congress, we passed sweeping education reforms. We said we want to have the best educated children in the world. We want to make sure that they live up to our expectations. But part of that agreement was funding. This budget leaves children behind. It does not fund Leave No Child Behind. We promised 29 years ago we were going to make sure that children with disabilities, that that was funded so our local schools would not have to pick up the whole piece of that. Last year in our Budget Committee we said, this is a good idea, Republicans and Democrats agreed that we should fully fund IDEA; and we said, we are going to have it done by 2010. This year if you look at the budget starting in 2005, it increases by a half a percent a year, which means we will never get there. We said it is important to make sure that our students have higher education, that that is important. Yet we have not increased Pell grants.

The budget is a reflection of our national priorities. Our alternative does better at meeting those priorities than the Republican budget. I urge my colleagues to oppose the Republican budget and support the Democratic alternative.

Mr. Chairman, our veterans have made great personal sacrifices, and we have a responsibility to serve them just as they served our country. At a time when men and women are once again at war, what better way to honor their service than by treating their predecessors with respect and dignity. But the needs of our veterans are not being met. Funding for medical care per veteran has actually declined in constant dollars over the past decade while the number of veterans seeking health care has increased.

We must ensure that our promises to provide health care for our veterans is kept. I want to read an excerpt from a letter from Alan Bowers, national commander for the Disabled American Veterans. He says, ``Shortchanging veterans is all the more objectionable because it in no way is necessitated by our fiscal situation, but rather is part of a larger objective to make deep cuts in spending on veterans and other domestic programs at the same time far more costly cuts are made in taxes. The House budget resolution is all the more objectionable because it is part of a greater plan to impose cuts in discretionary spending and impose a freeze on any improvements or adjustments in benefit programs such as veterans disability compensation in fiscal year 2006 through 2009. To the veterans of this Nation, it is incomprehensible that our government cannot afford to fund their medical care and benefit program at a time it can afford generous tax cuts costing hundreds of billions more.''

I know in Oregon our VA has over a thousand veterans waiting. Seven hundred to 800 new veterans enroll each month requesting medical care. I have heard people are waiting over a year to see a primary care physician. No person, especially a veteran who has served this country, deserves to be treated this way.

If Members can look at this chart, this is both by the chairman and the ranking member from the Committee on Veterans Affairs, of which I am a member. They said, we have concluded that an additional $2.5 billion in budget authority would be needed to ensure a current services budget. So this is a bipartisan issue.

The Democratic budget provides $1.3 billion more than the Republican budget for veterans and $6.6 billion more over 5 years. The House Republicans may tout the fact that their budget contains more veterans appropriations than the President's budget, but the Republican budget still provides $1.3 billion less than the Committee on Veterans' Affairs has recommended.

The Democratic budget will improve access and reduce waiting time for all veterans. This is real simple. We have more veterans coming into the system every day. Health care costs are going up. They are skyrocketing past inflation. This budget does not meet veterans' needs. Not one soldier who puts his life on the line should have to worry about getting health care when he returns from battle. I urge my colleagues to vote against the Republican budget and join me in supporting our veterans.

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman from Wisconsin for yielding me this time, and I applaud his leadership on this issue.

I do not know about anybody else, but I grew up in a family where if we gave our word, we kept our word. We did not break our promise. And this budget is full of broken promises.

I want to talk about just one of those today. There are many, including for veterans, No Child Left Behind, IDEA; but one of the things we do is we fill niches in education, and education is the one piece that gives everybody equal opportunity in this country. Education is incredibly important. Twenty-nine years ago, this Congress pledged it would fully fund IDEA, which is Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. We would fully fund it at 40 percent of the excess cost. And for 29 years Congress has failed to keep that promise, leaving States to shoulder the brunt of this unfunded mandate. Many of us have voted here. We said we will not have any unfunded mandates; yet this has been going on for 29 years.

This budget continues to fail our students, our schools. It costs on average twice as much to educate children with disabilities than a nondisabled child. With the Federal Government failing to live up to its end of the bargain, the State and local school districts are forced to divert already-meager resources from other students in order to ensure that special needs students also receive instruction.

This year, the appropriations for IDEA was $10.1 billion, or at 18.65 percent of excess cost, leaving States and local districts with an unfunded Federal mandate of $12 billion. That is 12 billion that our States and our school districts could be spending to alleviate the school crisis, reduce class size, modernize our schools. The failure to adequately fund IDEA is affecting every student in every classroom across America.

Last year I was very pleased. The Republicans and Democrats got together and said we are going to get to fully funding by the year 2010. I said hooray, at least we know where we are going. But this budget in front of us in the year 2005 increases special education by

half a percent. At this rate we will never reach our obligation of 40 percent funding. In fact, we will continue to fall further behind. In committee, I offered an amendment to increase funding for IDEA, and this amendment was voted down on a straight party-line vote. I thought we were willing to work together to all get there.

The Democratic substitute, which we will consider tomorrow, is better than the Republican budget on IDEA in every single year, putting us on a path to full funding by 2012, finally keeping our promise.

States across this Nation are dealing with an economic crisis facing large State budget deficits and making deep cuts to services. In my home State of Oregon, school districts are facing tough decisions, including shutting down early. In Oregon, fully funding IDEA would mean another $60 million. That is really important, another $60 million that our Federal Government is obligated to pay for. This would make a huge difference to our schools in Oregon.

I encourage my colleagues to vote for our students, our schools, and vote against the Republican resolution.

Mr. Speaker, across the Nation, rates of hunger and food insecurity are on the rise. Since 1999, food insecurity has increased by 3.9 million individuals: 2.8 million adults and more than 1 million children.

The Federal Government, through child nutrition programs, has the opportunity to help dramatically lower the incidents of childhood hunger, giving all children a chance to grow, develop, and succeed in the classroom and beyond. Despite the educational and nutritional benefits of the Summer Food Service Program (SFSP), the large majority of students who could qualify for and benefit from these programs are not being served. Currently, only 15% of Free School Lunch Kids participate in the summer programs.

This legislation, designed to improve the Summer Food Service Program, would encourage additional sponsors to participate in the SFSP by directing the Secretary of Agriculture to make competitive start-up grants of no more than $5 million per fiscal year for the 10 States with the least amount of sponsor participation. Further, it would increase child participation by requiring that 40 percent, rather than the current levels of 50 percent, of the children served by the SFSP in a region come from families below the 185 percent poverty level.

These modest changes will make an enormous difference to the over 13 million food-insecure children across the Nation who would benefit from a reliable source of healthy food to grow, develop, and succeed in the classroom and beyond.

Mr. Speaker, due to the fact that I was unavoidably detained in my district on the dates of March 2, 3, and 4, I was unable to vote on legislation before the House. I wish to submit for the Record how I would have voted on those bills.

On rollcall Vote No. 32, I would have voted ``aye;'' on rollcall vote No. 33, I would have voted ``aye;'' on rollcall vote No. 34, I would have voted ``aye;'' on rollcall vote No. 35, I would have voted ``aye;'' on rollcall vote No. 36, I would have voted ``aye;'' on rollcall vote No. 37, I would have voted ``aye;'' on rollcall vote No. 38, I would have voted ``aye;'' on rollcall vote No. 39, I would have voted ``aye;'' on rollcall vote No. 40, I would have voted ``aye;'' and, on rollcall vote No. 41, I would have voted ``aye.''

Mr. Chairman, Oregon has had the dubious distinction of being the number one State for unemployment. We lost more than 57,000 jobs. I think people need to be reminded that unemployment benefits do not pay their full salary. This is a bridge from one job to another. And when people go out and cannot find a job, they need that bridge.

I was talking to one woman. She is in her 50s. She has worked her entire life. She was laid off. She has looked for a job every single day. She had to sell her home to be able to support herself and her family. A gentleman just a week ago I was talking to said he is 52; he has got a daughter who is an honors scholar in high school. He would like to see her go to college. Now he is afraid about losing his house and how he is going to support his family.

These benefits are not used for luxury items. They are needed to pay the rent and mortgage, buy food, pay utility bills.

The President has talked about marriage promotion programs costing billions of dollars. But it is scientific fact that poverty and homelessness directly increase the rate of divorce. Therefore, unemployment benefits, which keep families experiencing temporary hardships off the street until they find a job, should be considered the best marriage promotion program of all. Yet these benefits have been ignored by this Congress and this administration.

Some have raised concerns that extending unemployment benefits would bankrupt the system. Yet there is money in the bank to be used only for this purpose. There is not a legitimate argument toward not extending these unemployment benefits. This is a no-brainer. Vote ``yes'' for this amendment.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the martial law rule.

In Oregon, the recession much earlier than the rest of the country. My State has had the dubious distinction of having the highest rate of unemployment in the country for much of the last 3 years. During that time, Oregon has lost 57,000 jobs, a lot of jobs from a State like mine.

Unemployment benefits are intended as a safety net to carry people from one job to the next. They do not provide 100 percent of a person's previous salary, and they require sacrifice to make it work, but the benefits are absolutely vital for families to make ends meet. And not only do those benefits provide a level of security to families, unemployment benefits are also a stimulus to our local economies. When you take spending power from people, businesses hurt. Each dollar spent on unemployment benefits results in boosting the economy by $1.73. But unless Congress takes action today, almost 40,000 Oregonians will lose their unemployment benefits in the first half

of next year. Benefits that are needed to pay their rent, pay their mortgage, pay for food, pay utility bills.

Eleven thousand Oregonians exhausted their benefits last month and that number is going to continue to grow unless Congress acts today. The Federal Government Unemployment Trust Funds have a balance of roughly $20 billion, more than enough to continue and improve the extended benefits program. These funds were paid into that unemployment compensation system just for the purpose of helping dislocated workers during difficult economic times. This is money that is there. This is the only thing that money can be used for. It does not add to the debt. This is something we need to do.

I urge my colleagues in joining me to defeat the previous question on the martial law rule for the omnibus spending bill so we can bring up an unemployment extension bill.

Mr. Speaker, there are a number of things both good and bad in this Omnibus Appropriations bill that we're considering today. I want to talk specifically about an issue that is extremely important to me and the people I represent, and one that I've been working on for years.

Our farmers grow the best produce and raise the best livestock in the world. And American consumers know this. Studies have shown that Americans want to buy American commodities, and are even willing to pay a premium to do so. Yet while a consumer can go into a department store and know that their shirt is made in this country, they can't go into the grocery store and have the same certainty about the food they are going to serve their families.

U.S. producers need mandatory labeling in order to compete in the marketplace. Product differentiation is the only way consumers can exercise their choice between purchasing either domestic beef or beef produced by foreign competitors. Our nation's farmers and ranchers produce the best and safest commodities in the world, and our nation's consumers deserve the chance to determine where their food is born, raised, and processed.

For these reasons we had country of origin labeling provisions added to the Farm Bill last Congress. Unfortunately this bill throws another hurdle in front of our consumers and our farmers, delaying implementation of this important law.

Country of Origin Labeling is good for Americans farmers and good for Americans consumers. I am extremely disappointed that the conferees included these delays on country of origin labeling.

Mr. Speaker, I have a parliamentary inquiry.

If the majority leadership agrees with our leadership to bring the unemployment extension bill under unanimous consent, would such a bill be in order for consideration today?

Mr. Speaker, continuing my inquiry, it is my understanding that the leadership on our side of the aisle would agree to such a unanimous consent agreement on considering an unemployment bill. Can the Chair tell us if the majority leadership has taken a similar position?

Mr. Speaker, I ask the Chair to recognize me to make a unanimous consent request for the House to consider H.R. 3568, the Emergency Unemployment Compensation Act, recognizing that families will begin to lose unemployment benefits a few days after Christmas unless Congress acts today.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to commemorate the 20th anniversary this November 22 of the restoration to federal recognition of the Confederated Tribes of the Grand Ronde Community of Oregon.

Twenty years ago, on November 22, 1983, President Ronald Reagan signed into law the Grand Ronde Restoration Act, Public Law 98-165, bringing to fruition a long and determined effort by the elders and leaders of the Grand Ronde Tribes to reverse their thirty years of termination.

The vision and perseverance that marked the Grand Ronde's triumph over that very difficult termination period has continued to guide them since restoration.

Since restoration, the Tribe has grown strong and prospered. The sense of Tribal community, severely tested but not broken during termination, has flourished among a membership that, while looking to the future, actively embraces its culture, traditions, and long history. The Tribe's home lands, once reduced to their cemetery, are now thriving with housing for elders and other Tribal members, a Tribal community center, a beautiful and modern health clinic, and new governmental offices. In the near-by hills, the Tribe sustainably manages its 9,800 acre forested reservation, secured with further legislation in 1988.

In the two decades since restoration, the Grand Ronde Tribal government has pursued its full measure of responsibility, representing and providing for the Tribal membership, and directly administering the full range of federal services. A key element is the Tribal government's efforts to provide for the economic security of its members and its own self-reliance. In twenty years, the Tribe has become a primary economic engine in the area, moving from its timber base into a gaming and hotel facility and today into more broadly diversified endeavors that keep an eye toward the future.

And throughout all of this, the Grand Ronde Tribe has sought to work cooperatively with its neighbors. This is a hallmark of the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde. Despite the understandable temptations to walk their own path, they have consistently reached out to their neighbors, seeking to foster understanding and cooperation. There is no better example of this in the Spirit Mountain Community Fund. This fund has given over 22 million dollars to community organizations since its creation in 1997.

For the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde, it has been a remarkable twenty years of progress and fulfillment. As for all the restored tribes of Oregon, restoration is a defining moment in their long history, and on the November 22, 2003 twentieth anniversary of the restoration of the Confederated Tribes of the Grand Ronde Community of Oregon, I wish to commemorate and salute their achievement.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time and for all the hard work he has put in on this particular piece of legislation. I also want to especially thank my two colleagues, the gentlemen from Oregon (Mr. Walden) and (Mr. DeFazio), for their enormous work on this piece of legislation.

Mr. Speaker, this is an issue that is very important to my home State and to my congressional district. Reduction of hazardous fuels. Oregon has been hit hard by wildfires in recent years, and I am very happy that we are finally taking steps in this House to make up for years of neglect of our Federal forests. Forests and timber are vitally important to the citizens of Oregon. The economic costs of forest fires in Oregon have been astronomical and the human costs have been even higher. It is essential we do something about it, and something sooner rather than later.

Prior to coming to Congress, I served as a county commissioner in Clackamas County, which owned thousands of acres of forest land. I was responsible for management of those forests. I know from experience that it is possible to manage and protect a forest and that in many cases, it is necessary to manage a forest in order to protect it.

This legislation before us will have a positive impact. Not only will it help save people's homes and people's lives, it will focus money on lands that need it most and provide environmental protections.

At the same time it allows local communities and citizens to remain involved in the process. What I am most pleased about, however, is that this legislation provides funding for fuel reduction. The $760 million authorized in this bill is a great start and will help protect our forest and our communities.

The House and the Senate have reached an important compromise that is balanced, and provides money to get the job done. Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to join with me in supporting this legislation that fosters a healthy management and protection of our national forests.

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for yielding me this time, and I rise in opposition to this bill.

While Congress dithers in what is probably the waning days of the first session of the 108th Congress, it is inexcusable that we are considering adjournment without first passing an extension of unemployment benefits for the millions of American workers who are currently jobless. In my home State of Oregon, the unemployment rate is still 7.6 percent, nearly 2 percentage points higher than the U.S. average. Even that number, though, is misleading, since it only counts the workers who are still looking for work. It does not include those people who have been off work, who no longer receive unemployment benefits.

Mr. Speaker, to me it is inexcusable and unconscionable that the bill offered by our colleague, the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Cardin), is not being brought to the floor right now. Instead, the Republican leadership has chosen to force a vote on a 2-day CR because they are unable to fund the government by passing appropriation bills on time and in regular order.

Let me tell you just a little bit about these people who are looking for work, Mr. Speaker. These are people who are out of work through no fault of their own. They go out every single day and look for a job. One gentleman said to me that it is like playing musical chairs. He says, I go in, I think I have this wonderful resume, I meet all of the criteria, and I go in and there are 200 people that all have the same qualifications to meet that job. So he said it is a little bit like playing musical chairs with 200 people in the room and only one chair.

One woman told me she had to sell her home. She has been looking for work every day. She has sold her home and is living off the profits of her home. She does not know what she is going to do when those run out.

Another gentleman said, I have been trying to reeducate myself, so every day I am out looking for work. He said, I just feel like if I can just hold on for a little longer that job is going to be there.

Let us tide over the 90,000 Americans per week who will lose their unemployment benefits by the end of this year. Congress can and should pass an extension that will allow workers who are seeking employment to provide for their most basic needs as the holidays approach. Let us get on with this. Let us extend those unemployment benefits.

Mr. Speaker, I thank my good friend, the gentleman from Massachusetts, for yielding me this time.

During floor debate of the Fair and Accurate Credit Transaction Act back in September, I told a story of a constituent who had her purse stolen and ended up spending hours trying to clean up her credit files as a result. It got so bad, in fact, that the police officer suggested it would be easier for her to change her name than to deal with the damage caused by the result of a theft. At that time, I continued on to say that something is wrong with the law when a law enforcement official suggests changing your identity in order to protect yourself from identity theft.

Well, I am ecstatic to report to everyone that after 4 years' struggle, the law is changing. Today the House and Senate conferees met and approved the Fair and Accurate Credit Transaction Act, a bill that will do many things to protect consumers and safeguard our Nation's credit system. Above all, however, this legislation will put in place landmark protections against identity theft, the fastest-growing crime in the United States.

This legislation has been a long time coming and is the result of a lot of hard work by a number of Members of Congress. I would especially like to thank the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Frank) and the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Oxley) for all of their incredible work; Senator Sarbanes and Senator Shelby for the leadership they have shown through a bipartisan conference process; and a special thanks to

the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Bachus) and the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. LaTourette) for the long hours they put in on this piece of legislation. Because of these leaders' work and the incredible staff that worked with us, we have a conference report that takes the best provisions from the Senate and the best provisions from the House to pass this piece of legislation.

I will share a few of the consumer protections it provides, and I will insert the remainder of this list in the Congressional Record.

First of all, it provides consumers with a free credit report, gives consumers the right to see their credit scores, provides consumers with broad new medical privacy rights, gives the consumers the ability to opt out of information-sharing between affiliated companies for marketing purposes, and establishes a financial literacy commission. Those are just a few.

I am proud of how the committee worked together. I think we were the poster child of how this process should be run. I am proud of the substance of this conference report that is good for consumers and good for businesses. I urge all of my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to support our Nation's consumers by voting ``yes'' for the conference report.

The agreement reached by conferees today will:

General Provisions:

Provide consumers with a free credit report every year from

each of the three national credit bureaus, from a single

centralized source;

Give consumers the right to see their credit scores;

Provide consumers with broad new medical privacy rights;

Give consumers the ability to opt-out of information

sharing between affiliated companies for marketing purposes;

Establish a financial literacy commission and a national

financial literacy campaign;

Ensure that consumers are notified if merchants are going

to report negative information to the credit bureaus about

them; and

Extend the seven expiring provisions of the Fair Credit

Reporting Act.

Identify Theft Provisions:

Allow consumers to place ``fraud alerts'' in their credit

reports to prevent identify thieves from opening accounts in

their names; including special provisions to protect active

duty military personnel;

Require creditors to take certain precautions before

extending credit to consumers who have placed ``fraud

alerts'' in their files;

Allow consumers to block information from being given to a

credit bureau and from being reported by a credit bureau if

such information results from identify theft;

Provide identify theft victims with a summary of their

rights;

Provide consumers with one-call-for-all protection by

requiring credit bureaus to share consumer calls on identify

theft, including requested fraud alert blocking.

Prohibiting merchants from printing more than the last 5

digits of a payment care on an electronic receipt;

Require banks to develop policies and procedures to

identify potential instances of identify theft;

Require financial institutions to reconcile potentially

fraudulent consumer address information; and

Require lenders to disclose their contact information on

consumer reports.