Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, we are now on our third day of the Republican shutdown of the Federal Government. My constituents and people all across this country are disgusted with what they're seeing, the absence of an agreement on a simple idea: the American people have a right to a government that is open to serve them, but our government is closed. Eight hundred thousand men and women across the country have been placed on furlough because Speaker Boehner and the House Republican leadership will not bring up a clean continuing resolution to fund the government and keep the government open.

Now, I would like to talk a little bit about what that means for my constituents, and first to say that I have extended office hours in my district office from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. to make sure that my constituents have whatever help I can provide during this government shutdown to help navigate through the Federal Government, and that is staffed by my employees who have no guaranty they will even be paid.

But I want to talk this morning about how we got here, not to assign blame to one side or the other but to suggest how we move forward, because we've heard from the Speaker these last few days and from many of the Republican leaders they just want to compromise; if the Democrats would just be willing to compromise and go to a conference committee, this would all work out, and that Republicans are interested in delaying health care reform and cutting spending and the Democrats refuse to negotiate on these issues.

Well, this is actually completely false. In fact, look at this chart. We began with spending in the President's budget of $1.2 trillion. You can see how far there has already been compromise from the Democrats down from the enacted spending to the Ryan budget to the Senate budget and finally to the continuing resolution, which is very close to the Ryan budget--not a budget amount that we agree with but some people would be willing to compromise on.

In fact, there was a budget that was passed by the House, a budget passed by the Senate, and we passed No Budget, No Pay, which I was a cosponsor of, to make sure this budget process proceeded; but the Speaker has refused, since that happened, to appoint conferees to a Budget Committee. That's the next step. That's how we get a budget, to appoint conferees who then have the responsibility of working out compromises.

We wrote to the Speaker back in April, April 17. Here's a copy of the letter. Ranking Member Chris Van Hollen and I wrote to the Speaker urging him to appoint conferees so we could continue the budget process, but he's refused to do that.

Then, just moments before the shutdown happened, Republicans said: Oh, let's go to conference on the funding bill, the continuing resolution, not on the budget. That, of course, was a vote to shut down the government, because that wasn't going to happen in 45 minutes. And so the government shut down, and this is now day three.

You have to wonder: Why is it that the Republicans have refused to pass a clean funding bill that we are calling for? Well, one member of the House Republican caucus said:

Now that we've jumped off the cliff and lit ourselves on

fire, we've entered the valley of the shadow of death. We've

got to keep running and hold together.

Mr. Speaker, our country is facing very serious challenges today. Men and women in cities and towns all across our country don't know where to find work, don't know if they're going to be able to go to work. Seniors are nervous about whether they can rely on Social Security and Medicare, and young people are worried about whether they can afford to go to college. These issues are far too important for Republicans to refuse to negotiate simply as a matter of pride. Every Member of this House needs to put aside political posturing and act in the best interests of the people who sent us here.

Rather than coming together to support commonsense solutions and policies that would strengthen our country, Speaker Boehner and the Republicans have decided to shut down the Federal Government until they're able to undermine the Affordable Care Act. For them, it has become an obsession.

Earlier this week, one House Republican called the Affordable Care Act ``the most insidious law known to man.'' House Republicans compared this debate to the terrorist attacks of September 11. And when he held the floor for 21 hours, Senator Ted Cruz invoked the horrors of World War II and

the Nazi regime when talking about health care reform.

Mr. Speaker, this kind of hyperbole and this kind of plainly inflammatory rhetoric has no place in a serious discussion about the future of our country. For weeks, we've heard that the Republicans would refuse to fund the government until it dismantled or defunded the Affordable Care Act. This became their party's mantra until 2 days ago, because 2 days ago the Republicans stopped trying to defund ObamaCare for the first time and started to try to carve out programs to fund one by one. The very reason they brought this government to a screeching halt and closed it down was all of a sudden gone.

So I ask my colleagues today: What's the problem now? What's the hold up on passing a clean funding bill to reopen government and then go to conference to work out all of the differences on many important policy issues?

So, Mr. Speaker, I ask my Republican colleagues, my friends on the other side of the aisle, to do what's right for our country and demand that the Speaker bring a funding bill to the floor to open government and pass this resolution today.

I thank the gentleman from Ohio for yielding and for your very powerful leadership of the Manufacturing Caucus here in the House.

As you know, tomorrow, October 4, we celebrate National Manufacturing Day, which is an opportunity to underscore and reaffirm our commitment to manufacturing and to remember that manufacturing helped build this country. It made this country a great and powerful Nation. It helped build a thriving middle class and has created good-paying jobs for hardworking men and women all across our country.

This is especially true in my home State of Rhode Island, which is, as you all know, the birthplace of the American Industrial Revolution, and has a very long and important history in American manufacturing-- more than anyplace in the country--and I know the gentleman from Ohio will contest this a little. But Rhode Island understands the importance of a strong manufacturing sector; and if we want to get our economy back on the right track, it's critical that we start making

things again here in this country and support those companies that are already manufacturing things in America.

So I am really proud to stand with my colleagues today as we salute American manufacturing and to really underscore our commitment to helping rebuild and strengthen manufacturing in this country, and particularly to pay attention to the House Democratic Make It in America agenda, which is a very comprehensive set of bills that will help reinvigorate American manufacturing and put folks back to work in my home State of Rhode Island, and I think all across this country.

As part of that package is the Make It in America Manufacturing Act, which is legislation I introduced to help manufacturers buy new equipment, retrofit their factories, retrain their workers, and increase their exports, but really, help to jump-start what we're already seeing in this manufacturing renaissance.

As you know very well, market conditions are such that wages are starting to rise in Asia. Energy costs remain high, so the cost of transporting goods is expensive. So this is a real opportunity, a real moment to seize. And if we change some policies here in Washington and, instead of undermining American manufacturing, replace it with policies that support American manufacturing, we have a tremendous opportunity for additional job growth.

Earlier this week, we saw even more evidence that our manufacturing sector is growing stronger, again. In the September report, the Institute for Supply Management found that manufacturing was growing at its fastest pace in almost 2\1/2\ years. And as has been said--and we all know--manufacturing is a jobs multiplier. For every new manufacturing job we create, it results in an additional 4.6 jobs being created. Support it. Of course, with high-tech manufacturing, it adds an additional 16 jobs.

So this is very, very important in our ongoing effort to grow the economy and create jobs. I think it particularly is important to make note that in the area of manufacturing, we need to be very focused on job training and be sure our young people are prepared to compete for the kinds of jobs that are becoming available in advanced manufacturing.

I visit manufacturers in my district all the time and hear from them the importance of skills development and job training for the new workers in the manufacturing sector. It's not the case anymore that you can walk down to your neighborhood manufacturer and get the job your father or grandfather or mother or grandmother got. It requires a different set of skills, and it requires additional training.

So as part of our strategy, we have to focus on how do we ensure that young people and people entering the manufacturing sector have the skills necessary to compete successfully.

Of course.

I think you raise a very important point. Of the things I think we have seen, unfortunately, is the way that we have approached manufacturing in this country the last couple of decades where we have actually sent messages to young people that they should think of something other than manufacturing, that it's sort of a dead- end career and manufacturing doesn't exist here anymore. We're going to be a service economy.

And you hear it in the language of guidance counselors and sometimes in parents. I would say if kids came home and said, Mom, Dad, I want be to a manufacturer, their parents would say, Really? That doesn't have a bright future.

I think what we have to really do is support both in career and technical academies manufacturing tracks to be sure people see this as a career path and to remind people that manufacturing jobs pay, on average, above nonmanufacturing jobs. So these are good-paying jobs. And that it requires a different skill set today--a more advanced skill set.

But when you look particularly at what's happening with innovation and design and 3-D printing and all the intersections of making things with this new technology, it's a career path that has tremendous opportunities. But I agree with you very much that we have to stop saying to young people, Your life is only a success if you go to college.

When I was the mayor of Providence, I used to visit schools all the time and very often hear principals or teachers say, Everyone is going to go to college, right? And they would encourage everyone to raise their hands.

The truth is, we have to send a message to young people that if you want to go to college, and you're interested in that, great. We want to be sure you have all the tools to be successful. But you can have a fulfilling, successful, wonderful life or you can support yourself with your family in other careers like advanced manufacturing and realize that's a valuable, important, valued part of our economy. And I think there needs to be a lot of language around that and a lot of support so that people see that as a career path.

And you are making things that are sought by the rest of the world. I think one of the things we should never lose sight that those words ``Made in America'' still mean a lot. And people understand when a product is made in America, it's made by the best trained workers in the world; it has the best quality standards in the world. And so people all over the world want to buy stuff made in America.

So I think given the opportunity to do that--and, certainly, I think all Americans want to do that--given that opportunity, we will see tremendous growth in our manufacturing sector. But I think it's very important that in this moment we understand the significance of changing some of the policies in Washington that undermine American manufacturing.

I want to take a minute to applaud the President, who has really made the rebirth of American manufacturing an important priority. He talks about a lot of this in the State of the Union, I know, and addresses to the country.

He established recently this Investing in Manufacturing Communities Partnership, a program to help

strengthen manufacturing and to help States develop regional manufacturing strategies. I am particularly proud that Rhode Island received one of the first grants in the first phase of this program. That will really allow us to develop a strategy that will help to support and strengthen Rhode Island manufacturing and, obviously, recognize what that will mean for job growth.

But it's been, I think, very valuable to have the President take a leadership role and continue to make the case that manufacturing and making things and rebuilding American manufacturing is a key part of our economic recovery.

It's one of those issues where one would hope that there's bipartisan support. You have been a great leader of the Manufacturing Caucus with a bipartisan leadership there. You look at the Make It in America agenda and you think, Why hasn't every single bill on that agenda already become law? These are good, commonsense bills that support American manufacturing, which is so critical to our country.

We're in a difficult period where there's not a lot of bipartisan support, but I'd love to hear the gentleman's thoughts on that because it seems so critical.

Absolutely. First and foremost, I want to congratulate you again because you have led the country with the manufacturing center, being the very first one. And I'm hoping we're going take a group from Rhode Island soon to visit so we can see the success of what you've done and the kind of model it can provide for the whole country.

But I think you're absolutely right. I think 3-D printing is one example that is really going to transform the way we make things in this country. We have some great partners in Rhode Island--the Rhode Island School of Design--where I think we're going to really begin to understand that design is going to be such an important part of this new manufacturing, and it's going to make everyone a manufacturer, in some ways--to have the ability to print products.

So you're right: our competitors around the world also know this. And they're making very substantial investments. So I think this is one of those moments in the history of our country where we have to realize that if we're going to continue to lead the world economically and continue to be a place where products are produced that are the envy of the world, we have to create conditions that help companies and individuals innovate and be successful in making things so that we can start shipping American-made goods all over the world.

One of the things I think we have to look at is how do we support American manufacturers in tax policies so that we're not incentivizing companies to ship jobs overseas and instead incentivizing companies to keep jobs here; how do we provide research and development tax credits that are more generous and more permanent so they can plan the kinds of investments that will help grow jobs.

I know you have the same experience. You go to a manufacturer in your district, and you're awed by the entrepreneurship and the commitment and dedication of the workers there and the quality of the products they're producing. And all they're asking from us is give them a set of tools to level the playing field to help them succeed so they can sell their products to the rest of the world.

That should be a bipartisan effort. Making things and taking pride in making things in America should be something we all agree on. I hope that we will enjoy a lot of bipartisan support in making that a reality.

You're absolutely right. In my State, in the cities of Woonsocket and Pawtucket and Central Falls and Providence, which all have mill buildings that were filled during a different time, filled with good-paying jobs, and so we have to make adjustments to sort of what the demands are of the marketplace: What are the new technologies that are

available, like 3-D printing? What are the skills that workers need? And what are the incentives we need to create to help those buildings be filled with manufacturing jobs of the 21st century?

And you're right, it's going to require some public-private partnership--thoughtful, careful, efficient kinds of relationships, but a real public investment that will bring tremendous benefit not only to my State, but to our country.

I, too, worry that there is a group of folks here in the Congress who believe we can't invest in anything that's important for our future. And as you mentioned, our competitors are doing it, and they're doing it at a much faster pace. So if we're going to be successful, we need to seize this moment and build on the rich and wonderful manufacturing history of our country. I think we will see tremendous opportunities in my State, and I know in Ohio and across this country.

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to clause 1, rule I, I demand a vote on agreeing to the Speaker's approval of the Journal.

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

Mr. Speaker, we're now in our 37th hour of the House Republican shutdown; 800,000 Federal employees have been furloughed from their jobs; 800,000 Americans don't know how they'll be able to pay their bills and provide for their families because Speaker Boehner refuses to stand up to the extremists in his own party.

I keep hearing people say the Speaker is just doing what he has to do because of the Tea Party, but the fact is that a real leader wouldn't jeopardize the jobs and livelihoods of 800,000 Americans to save his own.

That's what this is all about. This is about one man standing in the way of ending the shutdown.

It's time for Speaker Boehner to find the courage to end the Republican crusade against health care reform and Federal workers by bringing a clean funding bill to the floor, which will pass with bipartisan support, and demonstrate to the American people we can work together to get things done.

It's time for the Speaker to do what's right for our country: reopen the government and be the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, not simply the Speaker of the Republican Party.

Mr. Speaker, today's the first day of the Republican shutdown of our government. It's a disgrace. And why?

Because of this obsession with repealing, weakening or defunding ObamaCare, a bill that was passed by both Chambers after full debate, signed by the President, affirmed by the Supreme Court, was a central issue in the last Presidential campaign.

But this obsession with denying millions of Americans access to quality, affordable health care has caused our friends on the other side of the aisle to shut down the government unless they get their way on this policy issue.

That's not how our democracy works. Our friends have allowed the Tea Party coalition within their caucus to hijack our government and shut it down, causing harm to veterans and seniors and Federal employees, and stopping the basic functions of government.

It's time to end this practice. It's time to put the American people first.

You got exactly what you wanted. One of the key spokesmen of the Tea Party, one of our colleagues said, and I quote:

We're very excited. It's exactly what we wanted, and we got

it.

The American people deserve better.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor Staff Sergeant Timothy Raymond McGill, a member of the Rhode Island National Guard who was killed in combat last Saturday while serving as a member of the United States Army's elite Special Forces unit in Afghanistan.

A life-long resident of New Jersey, Sergeant McGill enlisted in the Marine Corps immediately after high school and was still training in boot camp when terrorists struck the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on September 11, 2001. After serving in Iraq, he joined the Rhode Island National Guard as an anti-armor specialist and just 2 years ago became a weapons sergeant with the Army Special Forces, the Green Berets.

Americans are blessed to live in a free and democratic society because of the heroic efforts and brave sacrifices of our men and women in uniform and owe an especially profound debt of gratitude to those like Timothy who have made the ultimate sacrifice.

We express our sincere condolences to Timothy's father, Raymond; his mother, Carol; and his two sisters, Megan and Lindsay. I pray that they find some small measure of comfort in knowing that an entire Nation is deeply grateful and shall keep them in our thoughts and prayers.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to express my strong opposition to the deep cuts to nutrition programs that are being proposed this week by my friends on the other side of the aisle.

The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program provides critical food and nutrition support for hardworking families in cities and towns all across my home State in Rhode Island. The United States Department of Agriculture estimates that more than 180,000 Rhode Islanders rely on this important program every day.

Once again, House Republicans have decided, rather than working to come to a bipartisan agreement on the farm bill, that they will instead pander to the far right of their party and, in doing so, impose real hardships on America's working families and put many children at risk of going hungry all across our country.

While protecting generous subsidies for agricultural corporations, my Republican colleagues are threatening the food security of our most vulnerable neighbors. So let's review this package of cuts to the nutrition program and consider its impact on children, seniors, veterans and families.

First, the Congressional Budget Office estimates this proposal would cut SNAP funding by at least $40 billion. Some of these cuts would be particularly devastating for seniors and low-income families.

For example, this bill would eliminate categorical eligibility, putting working families at greater risk of going hungry and eliminating the incentive to find work.

Currently, a working mother who makes a little more than $24,000 a year qualifies for SNAP if her disposable income falls under 130 percent of the poverty line due to the rising cost of child care or rent. This bill would eliminate this provision and deny some working mothers and children in 40 States from receiving necessary nutrition assistance.

Make no mistake: this places a cruel burden on working families who can least afford it.

But it gets worse. Another provision would require the mother of any child a year of age to work or participate in a training program or risk losing their nutrition assistance. At a time of high unemployment and dwindling resources for job training, this bill means that a 2- year-old could go hungry if the child's mother can't participate in job training or find work.

Of course these provisions don't only impact working families. Even a veteran receiving disability compensation could lose their exemption and have their nutrition assistance terminated if they can't find a job under this bill.

These cuts imposed on the backs of disabled veterans, children younger than 6, and working moms are bad enough. But to compound these cuts, the Republican farm bill makes it more likely additional beneficiaries will be hurt as well.

This legislation would actually encourage individual States to kick people off nutrition assistance by promising them 50 percent of the savings.

Of course, some of this is old news. We're here debating this issue again. Shockingly, the immoral, outrageous cuts I've already outlined weren't enough for the conservative fringe. They weren't satisfied with cutting funding for SNAP. They demanded even deeper cuts that would force more children and more unemployed workers to go hungry. They've insisted that more seniors and veterans, the people who helped build this country, should be turned away at their local market.

The House Republican leadership was happy to comply, and they decided to make a bad bill worse. They doubled the cuts imposed on the SNAP program and chose to slash nutrition assistance by a total of $40 billion. These newer cuts target jobless adults without children who live in areas with high rates of unemployment.

The National Association of Evangelicals said they were ``especially concerned'' about this proposal.

Let's not mischaracterize this as a new work requirement. The changes proposed in this bill tell people who are struggling to find work in a difficult economy that if their job search goes on longer than 3 months, they should go hungry too. But the bill does not provide additional workforce training resources, and it doesn't invest in job creation to help individuals find work.

This sends a clear message. If you're struggling to find a job in an area hard-hit by the recession, get ready, because in a few months you're also going to struggle to eat.

Let's not forget the context in which this particular bill is drafted. It comes after House Republicans stripped out the nutrition title and passed the rest of the farm bill.

In other words, they were happy to provide agricultural companies with extremely generous subsidies to purchase crop insurance. They were happy to spend $40 billion on commodity programs. But nutrition assistance for children and the underemployed was apparently a bridge too far.

Dozens of religious groups and other leaders have strongly opposed this bill. Earlier this week, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops reminded us that ``how the House chooses to address our Nation's hunger and nutrition programs will have a profound human and moral consequence.''

The Jewish Federation argued that this bill ``would constitute untenable trauma to millions of Americans and their families.''

Former Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole, a Republican, warned ``this is no time to play politics with hunger.''

They've sent a clear message. This bill is wrong, it's immoral, and does not reflect our values as a country. I strongly urge my colleagues to oppose this proposal.

Mr. Speaker, 9 months after the tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut, our country is once again facing the terrible reality of another horrific mass shooting. In this case, 12 innocent men and women were murdered at the Washington Navy Yard just 2 days ago. I know that all of us are keeping the victims and their loved ones in our thoughts and prayers today.

All of us in this Chamber should ask ourselves whether there is anything that we could have done to prevent this tragedy. According to the Associated Press, the person who carried out this cowardly attack had previously complained about serious mental health issues, including paranoia, sleep disorder, and hearing voices in his head. And despite all of this, he legally purchased a shotgun from a firearms dealer in Virginia just last week.

Mr. Speaker, there is something seriously wrong in this country when someone with such serious mental illness is able to purchase a firearm without even the slightest bit of scrutiny.

We owe it to the victims of the Navy Yard and their families to finally close loopholes that allow criminals and the seriously mentally ill to purchase firearms. How many tragedies should we witness before we finally enact commonsense gun violence prevention?

Mr. Speaker, I have a motion to recommit at the desk.

I am opposed.

Mr. Speaker, this is the final amendment to the bill which

will not kill the bill or send it back to committee. If adopted, the bill will immediately proceed to final passage, as amended.

Much of the debate today has properly focused on the importance of rare-earth elements to our national security and our economic competitiveness.

Globally, the demand for mineral materials continues to grow. These resources are critical for a wide range of products that help ensure the long-term viability of our manufacturing sector, public health, and our defense capabilities.

New technologies and emerging American industries rely on rare minerals. For example, a diverse set of less abundant heavy rare-earth elements are essential to the production of cell phone and laptop screens. Hybrid engines and advanced vehicle technologies similarly rely on these rare minerals. In addition, patients and health care professionals regularly use medical devices and equipment that require rare-earth elements during production.

Finally, our defense capabilities for manufacturers of jet fighter engines to satellite and antimissile systems rely on a consistent supply of rare-earth minerals.

This is an important subject for many business leaders and manufacturers in my home State of Rhode Island and all across our country. In order to plan for the future and to hire additional workers, businesses need to be certain that the supply chain for essential minerals remains consistent and predictable.

So it should be clear that we all understand the strategic and economic importance of these minerals. Some of us disagree on how we should manage the extraction of these elements.

I believe that thoughtful management of these natural resources, instead of undermining important environmental protections, would actually help ensure a supply chain that is sustainable in the long term.

But this amendment addresses a different concern. Today, China has a near-monopoly in the global rare-earth element production market. According to recent estimates from the U.S. Geological Survey, China possesses 97.3 percent of the world's mine production and 55 percent of the world's rare-earth elements reserves.

At the same time, in an attempt to manipulate the world market for minerals and raise prices, the Chinese Ministry of Commerce has established strict export quotas and tariffs. Obviously, this has a real impact on the mineral supply chain for American manufacturers and businesses.

China is not acting alone. Iran is also one of the largest mineral- producing countries in the world. The director of the Persian Gulf Mining and Metal Industries Special Zone in southern Iran has said that China is their largest commercial partner. Recently, according to international reports, senior Chinese officials have engaged with Iran on various geological research projects as they look to expand this relationship. In other words, China is already stockpiling various minerals upon which American manufacturers and our defense capabilities rely, and they may even be working with Iran to gain a larger market share. This is a real threat to our national security; but it's also a real concern for local businesses and manufacturers, technology companies, and defense contractors who rely on rare-earth elements every day.

Despite these concerns, the underlying bill fails to protect these strategic and critical minerals from exposure to foreign influence or control. That's why I rise today offering an amendment to ensure that minerals produced under this act do not become available to China, Iran, or any entity that has violated existing sanctions laws. Specifically, the amendment would ensure mine permits issued pursuant to this act include provisions prohibiting the export of the strategic and critical materials produced under the permit to China or Iran.

The amendment also prohibits issuance of permits to any company in which China or Iran has an ownership interest.

Finally, the amendment prohibits issuance of permits to any entity that has been convicted of violating the Iran Sanctions Act and related laws.

In the end, the amendment accomplishes three important goals. First, it guarantees that our own domestic resources aren't used to promote or increase Iranian or Chinese business interests at the expense of the American taxpayer. Second, it makes sure we continue pressuring Iran with economic sanctions in a sector critical to their local economy. This is a vital bipartisan national security interest. And, third, it provides more certainty for domestic manufacturers by ensuring that American minerals stay here and help make our domestic supply chain more predictable.

I urge my colleagues to support this simple amendment and to protect our country.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Speaker, on this very somber anniversary, we remember the lives of 2,977 innocent men, women, and children who were killed 12 years ago today.

The horrific and brutal attacks that we witnessed the morning of September 11, 2001, forever changed our country and the world. But even during these difficult hours, we also saw inspiring examples of the very best that America has to offer.

We saw first responders who worked day and night searching for survivors at the World Trade Center. We saw thousands of men and women in uniform bravely answer the call to serve our Nation in a new kind of war--a war against terrorism. And we saw Americans all across this great Nation come together united in the certainty that we would recover from this tragedy, hold the perpetrators accountable, and do everything we could to protect our Nation.

As we face a new set of challenges today, let us recall the inspiring examples that we saw 12 years ago and remember that we are all Americans united by a shared set of values and ideals. But most of all, let us honor the lives that were lost and continue to pray for the comfort and peace of all those who still mourn today.

Mr. Speaker, 48 years ago this week, President Lyndon Johnson signed into law legislation that formally established Medicare and Medicaid--promises to seniors that following a lifetime of hard work, they'd be able to retire with economic security and peace of mind and always have access to the guarantee of quality, affordable health care.

For nearly half a century, Medicare has provided critical benefits and health care services for seniors in my home State of Rhode Island and all across this country. Today, nearly 200,000 Rhode Islanders receive Medicare benefits. Despite it's remarkable success, the promise made through Medicare has come under attack in recent years from my friends on the other side of the aisle.

This week, instead of working with Democrats to address the many challenges facing our country, House Republicans are holding their 40th vote to undermine the Affordable Care Act, a historic health care reform that strengthens Medicare and ensures it can continue to serve seniors today and for generations to come.

Our constituents deserve better. Let's set aside partisan politics and commit to preserving Medicare so it will continue to provide critical benefits for hardworking seniors in my home State of Rhode Island and all across this great Nation.

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

Mr. Chairman, I am proud to join my colleagues today in advocating for critical investments to rebuild our Nation's transportation infrastructure. The bill we are considering this week makes devastating cuts that will have serious consequences on our ability to compete in the global economy and ensure the stability and well-being of local communities.

The fact of the matter is that our infrastructure is crumbling, with the American Society of Civil Engineers grading the United States with a D-plus on their annual report card assessing the condition of America's infrastructure. In my home State of Rhode Island, 21 percent of our 757 bridges are structurally deficient and in need of repairs.

In the short-term, supporting our Nation's roads, rails, and airports will generate job growth in a construction sector that remains hard hit from the recession--employing the talented, capable men and women of the building trades to rebuild America.

In a rapidly changing global economy, the ability to quickly and safely transport goods, services, and information is a real advantage. To compete successfully, every American business, from energy companies and manufacturers to technology companies and farmers, must have access to a world-class connected transportation system. transportation system.

But to maintain this edge, virtually every expert has said we must continue to invest in rebuilding America. If you don't believe me, look at the strategic decisions being made by competing nations. Just last week, China's Ministry of Rails announced plans to invest another $32 billion to upgrade their rail system. In June, President Putin proposed investing $43 billion to build a new superhighway in Moscow, modernize the Trans-Siberian Railway, and construct a brand-new 500-mile high- speed rail line.

While Russia and China are betting on their economic future, my friends on the other side of the aisle have offered a bill that would unquestionably set us back. This bill guts investments in our railroads, cutting more than $468 million in funding for Amtrak compared to fiscal year 2013 enacted levels and eliminates all funding for high-speed rail.

This bill cuts intercity passenger rail despite recent reports demonstrating how rail has been an area of growth. According to a report from the Brookings Institution last year, Amtrak was our Nation's fastest growing mode of transportation in the last 15 years.

My local train station in Providence, Rhode Island, has seen ridership totals increase by more than 137 percent, and Amtrak is not just used by tourists.

So, demand for intercity passenger rail service has grown exponentially in the last decade and our competitors abroad have noticed, investing billions in their rail systems. But here, some of my colleagues have decided to slash

funding and put our rail system at risk. This is clearly the wrong approach.

Of course, this legislation does not only jeopardize our Nation's rail system; it also slashes funding for municipal and State governments hoping to invest in critical local projects.

This bill eliminates all funding for the TIGER grant program in fiscal year 2014, and it rescinds $237 million of the $500 million appropriated for the current fiscal year.

The TIGER program invests in innovative, multimodal transportation projects, providing for upgrades of bridges, roads, ports, and other transportation infrastructure that are critical to regional economies. But perhaps most importantly, this is a program that encourages local stakeholders to plan for their future and think about innovations to local transportation infrastructure that will spur growth and create jobs. This is exactly how Federal investments are supposed to work.

Unfortunately, this bill once again leaves our State and local partners without the resources needed to help strengthen local communities. Sadly, it gets worse. This bill also jeopardizes the still-fragile recovery of our housing market and communities at risk.

For example, this bill decimates funding for the Community Development Block Grant program, which was signed into law by a Republican President who recognized the importance of assisting communities by providing flexibility to invest in everything from wastewater treatment facilities to housing and economic development. This critical program is a lifeline for families facing difficult economic challenges and provides critical resources to promote economic development and improve quality of life.

Today, this bill cuts CDBG funding levels almost in half compared to current enacted levels, the lowest level of funding since it began, and a billion dollars less than President Ford requested for the program in 1975. Let that sink in. This bill cuts our investments in local projects so drastically that we have reduced programs to less than 60 percent of what they were nearly four decades ago.

Mr. Chairman, this bill clearly does not reflect our values and priorities as a Nation. I urge my colleagues to reject this reckless and shortsighted bill, and to work together on a plan to respond to our urgent transportation and infrastructure needs and a plan that dedicates resources to strengthening local communities. Our ability to promote growth, create jobs, and compete in a global economy depends on it.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, earlier this year, the United States Senate passed a bipartisan immigration bill that brings each of our 50 States under the umbrella of a single, uniform immigration policy that is easy to understand, is fair, focuses on uniting families, protects new immigrants from exploitation, secures our borders, and creates a path to citizenship for new Americans. It's critical for us to seize this moment.

A group of Republicans and Democrats are working to craft a bipartisan House proposal that establishes a roadmap that is achievable and accompanied by a demonstration of the responsibilities of citizenship for the millions of men and women already living here today to aspire to become citizens of this great Nation. The American people deserve a vote on comprehensive immigration reform.

According to the Center for American Progress, immigration reform would create 121,000 jobs each year for the next 10 years. In addition, the Congressional Budget Office estimates that fixing our broken immigration system will reduce the Federal deficit by about $200 billion over the next 10 years and about $700 billion in the decade after that.

For far too many years, Congress has failed the American people on this issue. I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to do what is right for our country and for families all across America and fix our broken immigration system.

Mr. Chairman, I thank the chairman and the ranking member for this bipartisan en bloc amendment and rise in support of my amendment that would better ensure that we meet the urgent mental health needs and addiction treatment needs of military personnel returning from Afghanistan.

After more than a decade of war, many of our heroes are returning home from several tours of duty in Afghanistan and Iraq. To honor their service, we have the responsibility of ensuring that we develop treatments to address the specific health needs of our returning veterans. This year, as our troops return home to their families and loved ones, Congress should be increasing investments in the research that will help us better understand how to provide these veterans with the care they need and deserve.

Early indications and analysis suggest the need to focus our efforts on psychological health and substance abuse. Importantly, in many cases, our returning veterans suffer from both mental health and substance abuse disorders simultaneously. Delivering health care to these patients is exceedingly difficult, but it is our responsibility to address this critical health need among our Nation's heroes.

I want to compliment the chairman and the ranking member because this legislation contains important investments in peer-reviewed traumatic brain injury and psychological health research programs, but I believe that we have the means and the ability to do more. As this health need grows more acute and as more veterans return home, we should be increasing these investments. That's why this amendment would increase funding for psychological health research by $13 million and substance abuse research by $1 million.

To pay for these increases, my amendment would slightly reduce the increase in funding for the Afghanistan Security Forces Fund by $60 million, a modest decrease of a total allocation of $7.7 billion. My amendment would shift a small fraction of this increased funding, reducing the total allocation by less than 1 percent, in order to provide a small increase in funding for critical health research for our veterans and returning military personnel here at home.

I thank the ranking member and the chairman for including this in the en bloc amendment.

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

Mr. Chairman, I first ask unanimous consent to modify the amendment to reflect the figure of $200 million as the reduction in the Afghanistan Infrastructure Fund because of the passage of the previous amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I rise today to offer an amendment that would shift funding away from the Afghanistan Infrastructure Fund in order to reduce our deficit and focus on investing here at home.

This bill appropriates $270 million to the Afghanistan Infrastructure Fund over the next year. This fund is notorious for its inefficiency. Several government watchdogs, including the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, have repeatedly found that projects funded through the Afghanistan Infrastructure Fund are hopelessly behind schedule, lack proper oversight, and are poorly administered.

One example, the Kandahar Bridging Solution Project, which was developed to help provide electricity to a troubled region in Afghanistan, went 20 percent over budget in its first year of development, costing $8 million more than planned. Even with these cost overruns, the anticipated gains from this project are in serious jeopardy because of the slow pace of construction of related infrastructure that are central to the region's long-term electricity needs.

The failure to complete this project has led to higher fuel costs borne by the American taxpayer and raises serious questions about Afghanistan's ability to sustain electricity production in the future because of these high costs.

The original intent of the Afghanistan Infrastructure Fund was to identify a small group of infrastructure

projects in 2011 that were shovel ready and capable of being completed by the middle of 2013. The Afghanistan Infrastructure Fund was never meant to last beyond the completion of these seven projects or into fiscal year 2014. And yet here we are, once again, appropriating hundreds of millions of dollars for projects that remain stalled and ineffective. Meanwhile, we're making major cuts in critical domestic funding here at home and doing almost nothing to rebuild the crumbling infrastructure in our own country.

Congress has appropriated more than $1.1 billion over the last 3 fiscal years to the Afghanistan Infrastructure Fund. This bill would commit another $279 million in fiscal year 2014, despite the release of a Special Inspector General report indicating five of seven projects remain six to 15 months behind schedule. The same report also concluded that ``Congress and the U.S. taxpayers do not have reasonable assurance'' that projects completed using AIF funds would be sustained or made viable by the Afghan Government after we leave.

This is increasingly disconcerting when we consider that only about 10 percent of the $400 million appropriated in fiscal year 2012 has been dispersed as of April 2013, with another $325 million of taxpayer money from the current year appropriations remaining unspent.

So we know the money is not being sent out quickly enough to accomplish the original intent of the program--to complete infrastructure projects by the middle of 2013. And we know that even if we were to complete these expensive projects, that they will likely not be maintained by the people of Afghanistan after our withdrawal. Knowing these facts, why should we provide an additional $279 million to this fund for next year? That is the definition of throwing good money after bad.

Of course, it is also useful to remember the context in which we're spending the additional money on Afghanistan's infrastructure. These are incredibly difficult fiscal times here in our own country.

Earlier today, we passed a rule for consideration of legislation that makes deep cuts to investments in domestic transportation and infrastructure. It eliminates the TIGER program to fund local transportation programs; it zeroes out our investments in high-speed rail; and it decreases funding to upgrade our airports and other FAA facilities by more than $500 million. Does this Congress really believe it's more important to invest hundreds of millions of dollars in Afghanistan's infrastructure when we're cutting those same investments in our own roads, bridges, airports and transportation systems? Let's put America's needs first.

My amendment reduces the deficit, eliminates the inefficient Afghanistan Infrastructure Fund, and allows us to refocus on building our own infrastructure here at home.

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

Mr. Chairman, I would just say that the argument that we owe it to the Afghan people to ensure that we rebuild their economy, we owe that responsibility first to the American people.

We have a crumbling infrastructure in this country--our roads, our bridges, our ports, our transit systems. Every economist I know says that investing in infrastructure so that we can get goods, services and information in this competitive 21st century economy is critical.

I hardly believe, with all due respect, that giving $1.1 billion, where only a little over $100 million has actually been spent, that that is abandoning Afghanistan. This is $1.1 billion of taxpayer money; only $111 million has been spent. And we're now appropriating another $279 million. I don't believe we're abandoning anybody.

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

Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Speaker, since taking control of the House of Representatives, House Republicans have held 39 separate votes that would undermine all or part of the Affordable Care Act. What is most unfortunate is that, in those 2\1/2\ years, the House Republican leadership has refused to work across the aisle with Democrats to put people back to work and pass a comprehensive jobs bill, a bill that would help middle class families.

It's time for the House Republican leadership to put away political slogans and partisan gamesmanship and to get serious about governing.

Let's focus on rebuilding the crumbling infrastructure of our country so we can move goods, services, and information to compete in a 21st century economy. Let's harness American innovation and support the resurgence of American manufacturing by taking up the Make It In America agenda of the Democratic Caucus. Let's also protect young people and families from rising interest rates on student loans.

Mr. Speaker, let's stop wasting time, and let's get America back to work.