Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in reluctant opposition to this measure. I do so with a keen awareness that it reflects a bipartisan agreement reached to avert a government shutdown, and I commend the President and congressional leadership for negotiating a deal that avoided the most extreme aspects of H.R. 1, the Republican continuing resolution passed by the House in February. I also commend Chairman Rogers and the Appropriations Committee majority staff for soliciting input from the minority as they finalized the details of this proposal.

But ultimately, I must judge this bill on its merits and not by the process that produced it. And I cannot in good conscience support a measure that will threaten our fragile economic recovery and undermine key investments in our future, while doing little to address our long- term fiscal challenges and requiring little in the way of shared sacrifice. It is simply not enough to observe that this bill could have been much worse.

As the Ranking Member of the Homeland Security Appropriations Subcommittee, I have concerns about the cuts the bill would impose on the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), but this is not the primary reason for my opposition. This area of the budget was spared the sort of drastic reductions the bill makes to investments in infrastructure, innovation and the health and well-being of the American people. I commend our Subcommittee Chairman, Robert Aderholt, for protecting the core operational functions of the Department--from Customs and Border Protection personnel to transportation security investments to the Coast Guard.

Chairman Aderholt was not operating without constraints, of course. Overall funding for DHS will drop by two percent from last year's funding level, and the majority's decision to increase the Disaster Relief Fund by $1 billion to cover a shortfall that has traditionally been met through emergency supplemental appropriations only exacerbates this reduced allocation. Unfortunately, state and local first responder grants received the brunt of this blow, taking a 25 percent reduction overall. Not only does this adversely impact the efforts of communities across the country to keep their people safe by preparing for natural disasters and terrorist attacks, but it does so at a time when state and local budgets are already contracting, making federal assistance all the more vital.

The bill also reverses course on a decision to fund the processing of asylum seekers and refugees out of general funds, rather than asking other immigrant petitioners to pay fees to fund a service they don't receive. A reduced allocation for the National Protection and Programs Directorate is likely to delay the critical effort to secure government cyberspace, and a cut to the flood hazard mapping program will make it difficult for FEMA to meet its legal obligation to update our nation's flood maps every five years.

The bill does avoid significant cuts to most of the core DHS components, including the Coast Guard, TSA, ICE, Secret Service, and Customs and Border Protection. Importantly, the bill maintains level funding for firefighter equipment and staffing grants, which are critical to mitigate the impacts of widespread local budget cuts to public safety personnel. And because of the dire fiscal straits that local fire chiefs are facing, the bill maintains flexibility Congress has given FEMA in recent years to waive certain restrictions on SAFER grants that are difficult for most fire departments to achieve right now.

Specifically, the bill waives the requirement that SAFER grants be used to increase the number of firefighters on staff, thus allowing these grants to be used to rehire laid off firefighters and to retain firefighters who face the prospect of being laid off. In discussions over these provisions, negotiators realized that allowing these grants to be used for retention was clearly one of the most important measures that should be maintained for fiscal year 2011 SAFER grants. Second, the bill waives local cost-share requirements, which vary from 10 percent of a firefighter's salary in the first year to 70 percent in the fourth year of the personnel grant. Third, the bill waives a provision in the SAFER authorizing statute prohibiting the grants from being used to supplant state or local funds. While I believe a more comprehensive set of waivers would have served the program well, in the judgment of the bill's negotiators, provisions allowing for the rehiring and retention of firefighters, the waiver of cost-share requirements, and the supplanting of local funds simply had to be maintained for the current fiscal year.

Unfortunately, these homeland security provisions offer little consolation when we turn to other areas of the bill. The strength and security of our country are about much more than how much we spend on weapons systems or how thoroughly we police the border. They are about the investments we make in our people--in our nation's ability to recover from the current economic downturn, compete in the global economy, and build a future of greater prosperity for our children and grandchildren. The bill before us risks pulling the rug out from under the current recovery and compromising our future competitiveness.

To be sure, it could have been worse. Some of the most reckless cuts included in H.R. 1--such as a 17 percent cut to Pell Grants, a $1.6 billion cut to NIH, and an $800 million cut to the National Science Foundation--have been avoided, while the measure contains modest increases for programs such as Head Start and homeless assistance grants. Most of the extreme, ideologically driven policy riders being pushed by my Republican colleagues have been dropped.

But the bill still cuts nutrition assistance to Women, Infants and Children (WIC) by over $500 million, Community Health Centers by $600 million, and public housing programs by $700 million--leading to more hungry children, reduced access to health care, and fewer families with a roof over their heads at a time when many are still struggling to make ends meet. It cuts Career Education programs, Dislocated Worker Assistance programs, and a range of highway and infrastructure projects -- making it harder for out-of-work Americans to find jobs at a time when our economic recovery is still fragile. And it includes drastic cuts to high-speed rail ($2.9 billion), the EPA ($1.6 billion), energy efficiency and renewable energy research ($438 million), and other key investments in our long-term economic competitiveness. The federal budget is a statement of our priorities and values. These cuts will slow economic growth, as economists across the spectrum have warned, and cost hundreds of thousands of jobs. They will inflict pain on the most vulnerable and restrict opportunities for the middle class.

Make no mistake: in order to preserve our economy competitiveness in the future, we must also put our country back on a path toward fiscal balance. As a veteran of the balanced budget agreements of the 1990s, I take a backseat to no one in my conviction that we must rein in our current deficits and put our long-term obligations on a more sustainable trajectory. And while some may claim that this bill is a necessary first step on this path, this view ignores the fact that by threatening the recovery, this bill could perversely exacerbate our fiscal troubles, all the while failing to address the real budget crisis--the massive imbalance in projected revenues and government obligations in the long-term.

Addressing this much more vexing challenge will require making targeted reductions in spending, but it should phase these adjustments in at a pace that does not jeopardize the fragile economic recovery. I have supported a series of measures in recent months that included real cuts to programs I care about. I helped draft an omnibus bill last fall that would have cut over $20 billion below the President's request, and when that wasn't enough to satisfy my Republican colleagues, I helped draft a yearlong Continuing Resolution (CR) that would have cut nearly $40 billion below the request (and $10 billion below last year's enacted level). Senate Republicans blocked both measures, choosing instead to threaten a March government shutdown. In recent weeks I supported three short-term continuing resolutions to give leaders time to negotiate our way out of this mess. These bills cut another $12 billion off of last year's level.

But we will never balance the budget through cuts to domestic discretionary spending alone. What is needed is a comprehensive approach that includes reforms to entitlements and revenue, as well as targeted spending cuts--the kind of serious approach outlined by President Obama yesterday--instead of focusing myopically on just 12 percent of the budget, as the bill before us does. Twelve percent of the budget--programs that invest in our people and our future--is not 100 percent of the problem. A real budget solution requires shared sacrifice from all Americans, instead of seeking to balance the budget on the backs of lower- and middle-income Americans while cutting taxes for the wealthy.

And so I cannot in good conscience support a measure that would threaten our economic recovery and undermine our long-term competitiveness while doing next to nothing to address our long-term fiscal challenges. This bill may have been a necessary step to avert the irresponsible shutdown of the government, but that does not make it a step in the right direction. I urge my colleagues to oppose this measure.

Madam Speaker, I rise in opposition to this continuing resolution.

All of us know we are having this debate at a challenging and tense time. We are facing an entirely unnecessary government shutdown, a shutdown that has already been disruptive to critical governmental functions and to our communities, and which may become radically more so. But we all know--everyone in this Chamber knows--this could have been avoided. This is a politically generated crisis.

In December, this House had the opportunity to pass an omnibus appropriations bill--12 subcommittee bills, each written with bipartisan cooperation, with substantial savings relative to the President's budget request--and Republicans in the Senate refused to even consider that omnibus bill.

So, failing that, we asked, What about a yearlong continuing resolution with even more savings? Again, Republicans in the Senate said they would filibuster such a bill, so here we are. What our friends on the other side of the aisle opted for instead was a potential March shutdown that they thought they could use to leverage the tea party agenda.

Now, I and many others on this side of the aisle have been willing in recent weeks to vote for two short-term continuing resolutions to give the process of negotiation more time. We accepted additional cuts, cuts that avoided real damage to the recovering economy or to critical investments. Unfortunately, the resolution before us today breaks with that pattern. It attempts to hold the House and the country hostage to an extreme ideological position to which the Republican Conference has, unfortunately, caved in.

This resolution proposes $12 billion in unacceptable and damaging cuts, cuts that would threaten this fragile recovery, destroy jobs, and pull back critical national investments. It takes, for example, $200 million from the Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children. It takes $150 million from Federal law enforcement. It would take over $200 million from the Department of Energy's environmental cleanup programs.

In the homeland security area, with which I am most familiar because of the subcommittee I chaired and on which I now serve as ranking member, it would reduce FEMA's State and local grants by 20 percent, below 2010 levels. Both the State homeland security grants and the urban area security grants would go to historically low levels.

The continuing resolution would decimate the Land and Water Conservation Fund. It would radically cut the Clean Water and Drinking Water Revolving Funds. It cuts the Centers of Excellence for veteran students. It cuts school improvement investments by $148 million, including efforts to improve education for returning veterans. It cuts hundreds of millions from the Centers for Disease Control. It would cut $1.5 billion from a critical national investment--high-speed rail. It would cut public housing operating funds drastically.

Madam Speaker, these cuts are economic folly. They have the potential to damage this fragile recovery and to compromise critical national investments. Republicans may be willing to risk a governmental shutdown to appease extremist elements, but we cannot allow our country to be held hostage to their radical agenda.

Pass a clean Continuing Resolution and continue the discussions. But do not deliver this body blow to our economy.

Mr. Chair. I rise in opposition to H.R. 910. While cynically called the Energy Tax Prevention Act by its sponsors, the bill could more aptly be named the ``Dirty Air Act''.

This legislation would overturn EPA's scientific finding that greenhouse gases endanger human health and welfare, which stemmed from a landmark 2007 Supreme Court decision, and prevent the EPA from using the Clean Air Act--now or in the future--to limit greenhouse gas pollution from power plants and other industrial sources. This reckless and misguided attack on our environment and public health will allow more pollution into the air we breathe and threaten the health of Americans across the country.

Supporters of the bill claim that setting standards for greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act will cost jobs and undermine the competitiveness of America's manufacturers. But the argument that clean air somehow poses a hazard to the economy is as ridiculous now as it was in the 1970s, when the major polluters used it to try and stop enactment of landmark environmental laws. Rolling back the EPA's authority to limit pollution--whether it be carbon or lead--won't create a single job. It will simply undo 40 years of progress toward a cleaner environment and better public health.

In fact, the very provisions of the Clean Air Act that this bill attacks have a forty-year track record of delivering cleaner air and improved health, along with the benefits of enormous growth in the economy. In its first 20 years, the Clean Air Act prevented an estimated 200,000 premature deaths. Some 1.7 million tons of toxic emissions have been removed from our air each year since 1990. Innovations spurred by the Act have made our cars up to 95 percent cleaner today than they were in the past. EPA economists estimate that the total benefits of the Clean Air Act amount to 30 times its costs.

Passage of this bill would also mark the first time in history that Congress has approved legislation to overrule an objective scientific finding. Congress enacted the Clean Air Act precisely to require the EPA to make science-based decisions about the threats to health and welfare presented by air pollution instead of allowing such decisions to be driven by political ideology or special interests. And that is exactly what EPA's scientists have done: under both the Bush and Obama administrations, objective scientific studies have found that greenhouse gases pose a real and indisputable threat.

Recently, more than 2,500 scientists--from all 50 states--sent a letter to Congress calling on Members to support EPA's updated carbon pollution standards under the Clean Air Act, noting that the ``science- based law has prevented 400,000 premature deaths and hundreds of millions of cases of respiratory and cardiovascular disease during the 40 years since it was first passed--all without diminishing economic growth.''

Rather than heeding the science and letting the EPA and the states do their job to protect public health and our environment, this bill would give the nation's biggest polluters a free pass to keep polluting and place the health of our nation--particularly our children, elderly citizens and other vulnerable populations--at risk. A vote for this bill is a vote against the commonsense Clean Air Act provisions that keep our air clean and protect our public health. I urge my colleagues to support science and the Clean Air Act and oppose H.R. 910.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the distinguished career of a man who has been an institution within an institution: Daniel P. Mulhollan, the director of our Congressional Research Service, who will retire next month after more than 17 years at the helm of CRS and nearly 42 years of service to the Congress overall.

To say that Dan is an institution around here is really an understatement. In many ways, he has personified the growth of CRS from a relatively small division of the Library of Congress into the world- class source of objective and authoritative research and analysis that it is today.

Dan first joined what was then the Legislative Reference Service as an analyst in American national government in September of 1969, fresh out of his doctoral training at Georgetown. At the time, just two of the 435 Members currently serving in this House had been elected to Congress--and a fair number serving here hadn't even been born yet!

For the next 25 years, Dan steadily acquired seniority and respect within the Government Division of CRS, excelling as both an analyst and a division chief. When the Librarian of Congress, Dr. James Billington, conducted a strategic review of the Library's priorities in the early 1990s, Dan was tapped to help ensure that the Library's services were as relevant as possible to the Members, committees, and staff that it exists to serve. This assignment led him to assume the role of Acting Deputy Librarian of Congress, and when CRS found itself in search of a new director a few years later, Dan was a natural fit.

As director, Dan has continued to exemplify both the analytical depth that is at the core of his organization's mission and the strategic vision needed to bring CRS into the 21st century. He expanded the service's ability to bring interdisciplinary scholarship to bear on complex issues of policy, recruiting scientists and engineers to work alongside policy analysts and attorneys. He developed a personnel succession plan to ensure that CRS will continue to be able to recruit topnotch talent as older analysts retire.

I would be happy to yield to my friend from California, who I know has made a special effort, given his leadership duties, to join us on the floor.

I thank my friend and colleague Mr. Dreier, the chairman of the House Democracy Partnership, which I had the privilege to chair for the past four years.

Dan Mulhollan and the Congressional Research Service have indeed been critical partners in our efforts around the world in developing democracies to increase the capacity of their parliaments.

We have delegations from four parliaments in town this week for workshops on committee operations. They're from Pakistan, Indonesia, some members from Iraq----

And from Lebanon. That's right.

There are four groups of parliamentarians here this week, and the CRS, as usual, is a full partner in putting on workshops for these members, workshops that will help them strengthen their operations back home. These exchanges are very useful to us as well.

As my colleague has stressed, the main reason for the two of us being here to offer this tribute today is because of the support Dan Mulhollan has offered over the years: first to the Frost-Solomon Task Force, the precursor of our present commission,

which in the early 1990s worked in Central and Eastern Europe, offering technical assistance to the parliaments emerging from communist rule; and then for the last 6 years to the House Democracy Partnership.

So we are happy to join today in thanking Dan Mulhollan for all these years of work on behalf of the Congress and particularly for the kind of support that he has offered our international partnerships.

Dan knows a lot about Congress and has a profound respect for the institution. He has brought a particular sense of mission to the work of our commissions. As a political scientist, he recognizes how critical legislative research is to the growth of democracy, first in post-Communist Europe and now to all kinds of emerging democracies around the world.

I had the privilege of traveling last year with Dan to Warsaw to observe the 20th anniversary of that earlier task force's work. I can assure my colleagues he received a hero's welcome. His work has not gone unnoticed, and it is not going to go unnoticed by us either.

We want to salute Dan Mulhollan for his many, many years of distinguished service. We want to thank him for all that he has done, and we want to wish him well in his retirement and offer him our sincere gratitude and praise for a job well done.

Madam Chairman, I commend the gentleman from New York for raising this issue, and I thank him for the time.

As he knows, I've had a longstanding concern about the decision to relocate the National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility to the mainland without a comprehensive and validated strategy to prevent the release of harmful pathogens into the community.

When I was chairman of the subcommittee overseeing appropriations for the Department of Homeland Security, I championed a requirement that prohibited the use of funds in fiscal 2010 for NBAF construction until a site-specific risk assessment was completed and the results were validated by the National Academy of Sciences. This work was completed last November and the results were somewhat disconcerting with respect to the possible release of foot and mouth disease.

Now the Department of Homeland Security believes that this risk is exaggerated and does not take into account planned mitigation strategies. So I appreciate the language in the continuing resolution that requires a revised risk assessment once the facility is 50 percent designed and that this assessment be again reviewed by the National Academy of Sciences. This is good oversight, but this must be done before DHS can responsibly provide construction funding for NBAF.

I would prefer to condition funds on completion of this additional oversight; however, I also recognize that there are no funds in the underlying CR for NBAF in fiscal 2011, making such a conditioning of funds unnecessary. Therefore, I have no objection to my friend from New York's approach.

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Madam Chair, I rise in strong opposition to this amendment, which reduces funding for the Department of Homeland Security by 3\1/2\ percent. Under the CR, funding for Homeland Security is already 3 percent below the 2010 enacted level.

The $1.56 billion in supplemental disaster needs funded in this bill already cuts deep into Homeland Security programs. An additional 3.5 percent reduction would dangerously weaken our security. If this reduction were adopted, critical programs such as border security, disaster relief, immigration enforcement, and transportation security would no longer be shielded from ill-advised cuts.

The Department would be required to lay off critical staff we have hired over the past 2 years, including Border Patrol agents, CBP officers at the ports of entry, ICE investigators along the southwest border, and the Secret Service agents that respond to heightened threats against the President.

This reduction would mean the Department would need to abandon critical technology procurements that would better protect our aviation and transit system against possible attacks.

In short, Madam Chair, this amendment is ill advised in the extreme. I urge Members to vote ``no.''

Mr. Chair, as Ranking Member of the Homeland Security

Appropriations Subcommittee, rise to discuss the impact this bill will have on our Nation's security.

I am talking, in part, about its impact on the efforts directly managed by the Department of Homeland Security. But I am also talking about our security in a broader sense: about what makes us strong, secure, and prosperous as a Nation.

As for the bill's Homeland Security title, I want to commend Chairman Aderholt for doing what he could to shield several critical programs from the ill-advised cuts throughout this bill. Our border security, disaster relief, immigration enforcement, and transportation security efforts--for the most part--are protected.

Unfortunately, these investments offer little consolation when we look at other areas of the DHS budget. This bill would severely cut federal support for state and local first responders, which is particularly troubling when we consider the fiscal restraints that state and local governments are facing right now.

The elimination of firefighter grants is especially galling. That cut is guaranteed to result in thousands of firefighter layoffs across the United States.

But while I am concerned about the problems with the homeland security section of this bill, I know that these cuts pale in comparison to other critical domestic services and investments.

And that is exactly my point: the strength and security of our country are about so much more than how much we spend on weapons systems or how thoroughly we police the border. They are about the investments we make in our people, in our Nation's ability to recover from the current economic downturn and compete in the global economy.

By this measure, this Republican proposal would dangerously weaken our security by undermining the things that make us strong--from education to scientific research to infrastructure--in an effort to achieve an arbitrary level of cuts dictated by the most extreme elements of the Republican Conference.

As an illustration, look no further than my own congressional district, the Research Triangle of North Carolina. In just a few decades, the Triangle has become one of the leading centers of research, education, and innovation in the world--an engine of economic growth whose impact extends well beyond state lines.

But now my Republican colleagues are threatening to undermine the very basis of our economic success

This bill would gut higher education by slashing the maximum Pell Grant award by 17 percent. In my district, over 27,000 students receive Pell Grants--over 249,000 students in North Carolina overall.

We cannot possibly ``out-educate'' our competitors by denying a college education to thousands of American students and allowing the most disadvantaged children to fall even further behind.

Nor can we ``out-build'' our competitors by slashing funding for high-speed rail, clean energy technologies, and other investments in the infrastructure that will be necessary to sustain the industries of the 21st Century--as this Republican proposal would do. Cuts to transportation and infrastructure in this bill would directly result in the loss of over 20,000 jobs in North Carolina alone.

Indeed, the enactment of this measure could sound the final death knell for any hope that the United States will become the global market leader in ``green'' technologies. Instead, we will only fall further behind as China and other countries develop the energy sources that will fuel our economy as the price of oil soars.

Finally, this Republican plan would eviscerate our investments in scientific research--in the source of so much of our economic success, especially in the Research Triangle.

It would cut cancer research and other NIH funding by nearly $1.6 billion. It would cut National Science Foundation research and education by over $800 million. And it would cut $400 million from agricultural research that keeps our farmers competitive in the global market.

These are just a few of the dozens of initiatives which have built the foundation for our Nation's economic prosperity--and, by extension, our Nation's security. To take a wrecking ball to this foundation at a time when we are struggling to recover from a financial crisis and compete again in the modern global economy would be both reckless and reprehensible.

We shouldn't even be calling this bill a Continuing Resolution. The ``CR'' could more accurately stand for ``Continuing the Recession'', or ``Choking the Recovery''--because that's exactly what this bill will do.

I urge my colleagues to oppose this dangerous measure.

Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. Chairman, as Members are aware, H.R. 1 provided no funding in 2011 for firefighter hiring grants, also known as SAFER grants, a reduction of $420 million. Fortunately, yesterday the House resoundingly overturned that ill-advised move and adopted an amendment by Mr. Pascrell to restore the funding.

But my colleagues should be aware that funding is only part of the problem with this bill when it comes to the SAFER program. The underlying bill also neglects to maintain provisions enacted in fiscal years 2009 and 2010 that allowed fire departments to use these grants to rehire laid-off firefighters and to prevent others from being laid off in the first place.

The law traditionally permits SAFER grants only to hire new staff. That provision makes sense when our economy is booming and local governments are in a position to hire new workers. But when the recovery is still fragile and local budgets are actually contracting and workers are being laid off, FEMA needs the flexibility to use these grants to keep firefighters from being cut off in the first place.

After all, the purpose of the SAFER program is to help maintain a safe level of fire staffing across the country. According to the firefighter organizations, over 5,000 firefighter jobs have been lost since 2008, and another 5,200 are currently at risk. Right now, the safety of our communities is being jeopardized by potential and actual layoffs of public safety personnel, not mainly because of a reluctance to hire new personnel.

This amendment also continues provisions from 2009 and 2010 that waived certain budgetary requirements local fire departments have to fulfill in order to receive a grant. These include not allowing our fire department's overall budget to drop below a certain level, not reducing staff over a number of years, even if budgets continue to suffer, and providing local matching funds. Again, these provisions are fine when local coffers are healthy, but we all know how strapped our cities and counties are right now, and these requirements, quite simply, are impossible for many of them to meet.

So, Mr. Chairman, if we don't pass this amendment and waive these provisions, the fire organizations tell me that very few departments will be able to apply for funds. The burden of these requirements is simply too much right now. The result will be more firefighter layoffs, fewer rehires, and a less prepared country.

Mr. Chairman, in weighing this amendment I encourage colleagues to consider the intent of the SAFER program: ensuring we have a safe level of staffing of our Nation's preeminent first responders, firefighters, and ensuring that our communities have workable options for keeping their firefighting staffs at full strength.

We've already overwhelmingly supported funding for firefighter jobs by adding funding back to the SAFER program. If we really support these jobs, we should vote to allow these funds to be used flexibly, in the best way possible to keep the firefighters on staff.

I yield back.

Mr. Chair, if there ever were a case of overheated campaign rhetoric overtaking responsible governing, then we are seeing that case here today.

Far from continuing to fund the government through to the end of the fiscal year, this measure would dramatically slash the investments in our economic recovery and undermine our national security in the process. I don't know why we even call it a continuing resolution--I guess to avoid a markup in the Appropriations Committee. But it's a brand new appropriations bill, and a very destructive one at that. It's a job-killer of all kinds of jobs but most especially of national security jobs.

Let's talk about firefighters. We rely on our firefighters as our preeminent first responders. They arrive at the scene of all types of emergencies--attempted bombings, security incidents, medical, fire emergencies, all kinds of emergencies. But this bill eliminates the SAFER firefighter staffing program, guaranteeing that thousands of firefighters will lose their jobs this year, according to the Fire Chiefs Association. SAFER has enabled our local communities to avoid firefighter layoffs in tough economic times, to keep their fire departments at full strength. This Republican continuing resolution would just simply remove this protection.

Let's talk about law enforcement, funded in the Commerce-Justice appropriations bill. We rely on our local police officers, not only as first responders, but also as first detectors of homegrown terrorist activity. Yet this bill eliminates the Community Policing grant program, the COPS program, guaranteeing that local governments which are already laying off workers will have to fire between 1,300 and 3,000 police officers.

Now, these job losses could be prevented if we were attempting to govern seriously instead of appeasing the Republican tea party base. The best cure for our budget deficit is a recovered economy, not a bill that slashes and burns government services that are critical to our economic competitiveness and to our public safety.

So I urge a ``no'' vote on this CR. Instead of a continuing resolution, we might say that CR in this case stands for ``Continuing the Recession,'' because that's really what this bill would achieve.

Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in qualified support of this amendment.

The bill before us eliminates the firefighter hiring program, known as SAFER, and it reduces funding for grants to purchase fire equipment by 23 percent. If adopted, these cuts will result in over 2,400 firefighters being laid

off in 2011 and prevent fire departments from purchasing equipment, breathing apparatus, and protective gear that our firefighters depend on during a time of emergency. This is simply not acceptable.

During my tenure as chairman of the Homeland Security Appropriations Committee, we ensured that not only was funding providing for these critical firefighter programs, but that these dollars could be used flexibly in this time of economic stress to retain firefighters that might lose their jobs, to rehire firefighters that have been laid off due to economic conditions, as well as to hire new firefighters.

Repeatedly, I hear from communities that were able to use funds for these purposes. For example, in Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana, SAFER funding was used to hire and retain a total of 73 firefighters, ensuring that seven departments had salaried firefighters and that 12 parish fire stations could be manned 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

The North Las Vegas Fire Department was able to hire 15 new firefighters with a SAFER grant, permitting them to open an eighth fire station, thereby reducing response times and enhancing the level of protection for city residents as well as the millions of visitors to Las Vegas.

Spanish Forth, Alabama, recently received a SAFER grant that allowed them to retain their whole roster of firefighters instead of letting some go. Collinsville, Illinois, received a recent grant, allowing them to retain five firefighters who otherwise would have been laid off.

Retaining this funding, Mr. Chairman, preserves government services that are critical to our public safety and security. Local governments are already facing serious budget constraints. The CR simply exacerbates the layoffs we're already seeing with public safety personnel. This amendment will help keep thousands of firefighters on the job.

Mr. Chairman, I must express some reservations about how the increase in firefighter grants is paid for in this amendment. The gentleman's amendment drastically reduces funding for research and development activities throughout the Department of Homeland Security. It's not desirable or wise to cut the Department's research and development budget so much. But, unfortunately, the majority has prevented us from paying for these amendments from other parts of the bill, and the overall allocation for Homeland Security and the rest of the domestic agencies is completely inadequate.

So I support this amendment, but I'll work diligently to restore these funding cuts as the bill progresses and we get down to responsible budgeting in negotiations with the Senate and the White House.

Mr. Chairman, Members have a choice to make: Support this amendment and support your local firefighters, or vote ``no'' and see a decline in critical first responder personnel in this country and in the options available to hard-pressed local communities.

I urge my colleagues to vote ``yes'' on this amendment.

Offered By: Mr. Price of North Carolina

Amendment No. 514: At the end of the bill (before the short

title), insert the following:

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, this motion is as straightforward as they come. The Patriot Act should be enforced in a manner that doesn't violate Americans' constitutional rights, and those who believe their constitutional rights have been violated should receive fair and equitable treatment by the courts.

I can't imagine any of my colleagues from either party voting against this bedrock principle that the executive branch should respect the Constitution when it comes to investigating American citizens. After all, each of us took an oath of office last month to support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic. I know we all take that oath seriously. Indeed, we opened this session of the Congress by reading through the U.S. Constitution on this floor, an exercise in which I was pleased to participate.

It's in that same spirit that we offer this motion. For while we have differing views on how best to protect our national security, while upholding our cherished liberties, and in this case, on whether the enhanced authorities in this underlying bill are still needed nearly a decade after the September 11 attacks, we should all be able to agree that the United States Constitution is our last line of defense in cases where an American's civil liberties may be threatened. So, by assuring that the exercise of these powers doesn't violate our basic constitutional rights, this motion would provide a safety net to protect Americans' civil liberties in the absence of a more comprehensive review of the Patriot Act.

The second part of this motion states simply that Americans who believe their constitutional rights may have been violated by the government should receive the same expedited consideration by the courts that the government already receives. How can anyone argue with that? Why shouldn't our courts be equally responsive to the concerns of American citizens as they are to the concerns of the government, especially when an individual believes his constitutional rights have been violated. A government of the people, by the people, for the people has the utmost responsibility to protect the constitutional rights of every individual, especially when it comes to matters of national security.

So this motion to recommit, Mr. Speaker, is simple, straightforward and consistent with the bedrock principle of our Republic. I urge my colleagues to vote ``yes'' regardless of their views on the underlying bill, to vote ``yes'' as an affirmation of the support of this body for our Constitution.

Offered By: Mr. Price of North Carolina

Amendment No. 105: Page 244, line 21, after the dollar

amount, insert ``(reduced by $18,400,000)''.

Page 244, line 22, after the dollar amount, insert

``(reduced by $18,400,000)''.

Page 247, line 1, after the dollar amount, insert

``(reduced by $33,920,000)''.

Page 247, line 4, after the first dollar amount, insert

``(reduced by $33,920,000)''.

Page 247, line 5, after the first dollar amount, insert

``(reduced by $33,920,000)''.

Page 247, line 10, after the first dollar amount, insert

``(reduced by $33,920,000)''.

Page 248, line 25, after the dollar amount, insert

``(reduced by $6,269,000)''.

Page 253, line 12, after the first dollar amount, insert

``(increased by $90,000,000)''.

Page 253, line 14, after the dollar amount, insert

``(increased by $90,000,000)''.

Page 254, line 21, after the dollar amount, insert

``(reduced by $1,411,000)''.

Page 255, line 4, after the first dollar amount, insert

``(reduced by $10,000,000)''.

Page 256, line 10, after the dollar amount, insert

``(reduced by $20,000,000)''.

Offered By: Mr. Price of North Carolina

Amendment No. 277: At the end of the bill (before the short

title), insert the following:

Offered By: Mr. Price of North Carolina

Amendment No. 402: Page 247, beginning on line 10, strike

``Provided further,'' and all that follows through

``equivalent screeners:'' on line 15.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to H.R. 359, a bill summarily repealing our system of public funding for Presidential elections.

The process by which this bill has been brought to the floor--no hearings, no committee consideration, no markup, no deliberation--is the opposite of responsible legislating. It contradicts everything the Republican majority committed to a mere 3 weeks ago.

The process is atrocious; the substance is even worse. This repeal bill would destroy one of the proudest and most successful examples of reform that followed the Watergate scandal. Have we forgotten what the Watergate scandal was about? The Committee to Re-Elect the President, fueled by huge quantities of corporate cash, paying for criminal acts and otherwise subverting the American electoral system.

The hallmark of the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1974--enacted in response to Watergate at a time when public confidence in the government was dangerously low--the hallmark was our voluntary program of public financing for Presidential elections. To this day, this innovative reform stands as the flagship of public financing systems used in the United States and one of the greatest steps we have taken to bring transparency and accountability to our electoral system.

The Supreme Court, in affirming the constitutionality of the system, noted its basic purposes: ``To reduce the deleterious influence of large contributions on our political process, to facilitate communication by candidates with the electorate, and to free candidates from the rigors of fundraising.''

Presidential public financing has worked remarkably well--being utilized in the general election by every Republican and Democratic Presidential nominee from 1976 through 2004 and by John McCain in 2008--although in recent years the need for modernization has become evident.

Perhaps the best example of this program's success is President Ronald Reagan, who participated in the Presidential public financing system in all three of his Presidential campaigns in 1976, 1980, and 1984.

In his 1976 primary campaign, Reagan had less than $44,000 in campaign money at the end of January of 1976 while his opponent, incumbent President Gerald Ford, had fifteen times more cash on hand. The $1 million in public funds that Reagan received in January and the $1.2 million that he received in February were essential in allowing him to continue his campaign.

Reagan was once again short of cash at the end of March and was allowed to continue as a result of an infusion of public money, which matched small private contributions. This illuminates one way that public financing has worked in both parties. It has often benefited candidates who challenge the party establishment.

In later elections, due to his broad base of supporters throughout the Nation, Reagan was able to capitalize on his small-donor fund- raising capacity to accrue substantial amounts of public money. In fact, even in 1984 when he was seeking reelection without significant opposition from within his own party, President Reagan raised about 60 percent of his campaign funds from small donors and as a result received $9.7 million in matching funds. This was the maximum amount of public money a primary candidate could receive in accordance with the law at that time. And to this day, President Reagan is the only candidate ever to reach that public funding primary campaign maximum.

My colleagues, the Reagan case is merely illustrative of the positive effects that public financing has had in both parties at both the primary and general election stages. It also highlights the system's focus on small donations, rather than big bucks from large contributors. This is no free ride. This is no willy-nilly spending program. All primary candidates must seek the support of thousands of small donors, and only then do they receive matching public funds.

Today one could wish not for this Republican juggernaut--flying in the face of the positive history of this program, flying in the face of prior Republican support, flying in the face of responsible legislating--but for a bipartisan effort to repair the system, to restore its effectiveness.

I don't know of any policy challenge that exemplifies the maxim ``mend it; don't end it'' better than this one.

Yesterday, Congressman Van Hollen and I reintroduced a bill, H.R. 414, that would do just that. The White House has cooperated in formulating this bill. It would modernize the Presidential public financing system and again make it an attractive and bill would bring available funds into line with the increased costs of campaigns, adjust the program to the front-loaded primary calendar, and enhance the role of small donors further. It also would remove public funding of political conventions, as their roles indeed have changed since the system was first instated. This bill has been carefully designed. It deserves deliberation and debate through the normal committee process in this body.

At a time when confidence in government is low and assumptions of government corruption are high, why is the new majority trying to return us to the dark days that preceded Watergate? Why would we even want to contemplate such a thing?

Let's, instead, restore and improve our public financing system and move on to real solutions to put our Nation's fiscal house in order.

I thank the gentleman.

I am pleased to close for our side with a plea to our colleagues that they not dismantle, in an irresponsible and summary fashion, one of the proudest achievements of post-Watergate political reform in this country.

I also can't let pass what the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Schock) said about our President. Of course we want President Obama, we want all Presidential candidates, to opt into this system. We've made it about as clear as we possibly could that the bill that the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Van Hollen) and I have introduced is designed to make it feasible once again for candidates to participate in the public financing system.

But the gentleman from Illinois--talk about having it both ways-- comes

onto this floor to condemn President Obama for opting out of the system, and then he proposes to abolish the system so that everybody has to opt out! Neither President Obama nor anyone else could participate. The logic of that is way beyond me.

Of course we want a system that works. We know the system needs to be adjusted. And we have constructive efforts under way to do just that. What we should be doing, instead of having this up-or-down exercise on the floor today, with no committee consideration, is actually undertaking that kind of discussion, that kind of reform, that kind of improvement.

There is a bipartisan history here. There is a bipartisan history of supporting this program; a bipartisan history of participating in the program. I assume that is out of fashion now for our Republican colleagues.

But under the pretense of achieving fiscal responsibility, to come to this chamber and abolish one of the proudest and most successful of our reform efforts--that does a disservice to the new majority and to this House. It also violates all the pledges we had 3 weeks ago--of hearings, committee consideration, markups. None of that has been done. This is simply an up-or-down vote, as I say, flying under the false colors of fiscal responsibility.

We have a chance to take on this challenge--to mend it, not end it-- to make certain that we preserve this reform, but to adjust it to the realities of modern campaigning.

To simply abolish this, to once again turn over Presidential financing to big private and corporate interests, to overlook the abuses, the problems that led to this system in the first place, falls far short of what we should be about as responsible legislators looking out for our country's best interests.

I ask for Members to look at our legislation, to repair and rejuvenate the public funding system and in the meantime to reject this summary attempt to destroy one of the proudest achievements of reform.