Floor Statements

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

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself as much time as I may consume.

I rise today to speak in support of my amendment to officially end the agreement between the USDA and the Mexican Government known as the Partnership for Nutrition Assistance Initiative.

Now, this partnership began back in 2004, but it has greatly expanded under the Obama administration. It's an aggressive outreach program funded by

U.S. taxpayer dollars which promotes SNAP enrollment in targeted communities by partnering with Mexican Government officials to hold meetings, health fairs, and coordinate other outreach initiatives designed to bring working-class families into public assistance and dependence programs.

Not only is this an ill-conceived partnership with Mexico promoting a life of dependency rather than upward mobility, there is no reason to believe that the Obama administration isn't just using this partnership as a way to get illegal immigrants enrolled in the SNAP program.

This current partnership is among the most egregious examples of policies contributing to the 46 percent expansion in SNAP recipients under the Obama administration, and it must stop now.

My amendment today is an opportunity for Congress to be good stewards of our taxpayer dollars, our hardworking taxpayer dollars, and to get the U.S. Government out of the business of promoting dependence.

I urge my colleagues today to vote in support of my amendment to terminate this partnership with the Mexican Government. Let's stop this blatant misuse of the taxpayer dollars so that SNAP is there for those who have fallen on hard times and truly need temporary assistance, not for exploitation by foreign governments.

Mr. Chairman, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Crawford).

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

Mr. Chairman, this is so important that we are assured that our hardworking taxpayer dollars are used for those that are the most in need, as a safety net, and not to be given to foreign governments. And so I ask support for this amendment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

I thank the gentlelady for yielding.

Madam Speaker, when I first became a nurse over 40 years ago, I took a vow to ``devote myself to the welfare of those committed to my care.'' And it is in this spirit of both protecting life and women's health that I'm proud to rise today in support of H.R. 1797, the Pain- Capable Unborn Child Protection Act.

Now, this bipartisan legislation would ban late-term abortion after 20 weeks. I want to say that again. It would ban late-term abortion after 20

weeks, with the exception provided for when the life of the mother is endangered.

H.R. 1797 is based on undisputed scientific evidence which tells us that unborn children at 20 weeks and older can feel pain--these are babies, they can feel pain--and that late-term abortions pose severe health risks also for the mother. For example, a woman seeking an abortion at 20 weeks is 35 times more likely to die from an abortion than she was in the first trimester. There are medical reasons for this. At 21 weeks or more, a woman is 91 times more likely to die from an abortion than she was in the first trimester.

Despite these undisputed facts about a baby's level of development and a woman's health, there is currently no Federal law to protect pain-capable unborn children or their mothers by restricting late-term abortions--even at a day and age when we're seeing premature babies that are born at 22 weeks that survive.

As a society, we celebrate the birth of babies whether it's prematurely born at 22 weeks or delivered at full term, and we hope and pray for good health of that baby and the mother.

Today, with that same spirit in mind, I urge my colleagues to join me in celebrating and protecting life of both the baby and the mother by passing H.R. 1797.

Mr. Speaker, for more than one hundred years Rotary International has made it their mission to provide service to others, promote integrity, and advance world understanding, goodwill, and peace. Today, it is my honor to recognize one of Rotary's distinguished club presidents, Mr. Clark Boyd from Lebanon, Tennessee.

A graduate of East Tennessee State University, Clark served his country for more than a decade in the Army National Guard and U.S. Army Reserve. Today, Clark makes good on the promise to be a ``good neighbor'' to the customers entrusted to his care as a State Farm Insurance agent in Lebanon, where he also serves as chairman of the Wilson County Republican Party and president of his local Habitat for Humanity.

Under Clark's leadership, the Rotary Club of Lebanon generously donated $6,000 to local and international non-profits, gave $8,000 to the noble work of Rotary International and joined members of the local Kiwanis club to create a Lebanon youth baseball league. Additionally, the club was awarded the prestigious ``STAR Club Award'' and ``Globe Club Award.''

Apart from his service to Rotary, Clark evinces his devout Christian faith as chairman of the men's ministry at Immanuel Baptist Church, where he also serves as a deacon and Sunday school teacher. Most importantly, Clark is the loving husband to his wife of eleven years, Jana, and a proud father to his two children: Wilson and Blair.

While Clark's tenure as president of Rotary Club of Lebanon will end this year, his passion for investing in the lives of others and serving his community will not. I congratulate Clark on an exceptional year as president of Rotary Club of Lebanon and honor him for his selfless example of service to others.

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Mr. Chairman, as a cochairman of the Congressional Range and Testing Center Caucus, I rise in support of Congressman Pearce's amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act.

The Major Range and Test Facility Base is made up of 23 installations across the country, including the Arnold Air Force Base based in Tullahoma, Tennessee. The critical testing and evaluation capabilities of the installations are truly a national asset vital to our security. The testing and evaluation performed at these facilities, though often done behind the scenes, helps to ensure that our men and women in uniform have the equipment and the technologies they need to defend our country.

It is vital that we protect these facilities against the various forms of encroachment that can undermine the effectiveness of their operation. My colleague's amendment would ensure that any new use of lands already owned by the Federal Government around these installations be approved by the Department of Defense.

I urge my colleagues to join me in support of this commonsense amendment that strengthens our national security.

I thank you the gentleman from Nebraska for yielding. I'm getting a signal from Mr. Speaker that I have 1 minute left, so I'm going to reserve what I've written up, and just talk very briefly about what my colleagues have addressed up to this point in time.

The bill that we are talking about, the Health Care Conscience Rights bill, would simply take us back to where we were before a decision was made by Ms. Sebelius to change the way in which we have operated in this country now for over 235 years. All we're asking is to take us back to where our Founding Fathers had us from the beginning, as has just been talked about by Mr. Jordan, about the founding principles of this country where people came here to be able to practice their deeply held beliefs without having government intrusion.

This is so important for the American people to understand, that this is not about the issues that sometimes are talked about from the other side about birth control. This is about religious freedom, and I thank the gentleman for leading this hour this evening. We will have many more conversations.

Once again, thank you for being a leader in this arena.

Mr. Speaker, in the wake of this recent IRS scandal, President Obama made this promise to the American people: I'll do everything in my power to make sure nothing like this happens again.

Everything? But what about ObamaCare? In spite of the culture of corruption and coverup at the IRS, the Obama administration is moving full steam ahead with ObamaCare, a law that gives unprecedented new access and powers to unelected government bureaucrats at the IRS and several other major government agencies.

Consider the potential for abuse with ObamaCare's mystery Federal data services hub, the largest personal information database the government has ever attempted, according to The Wall Street Journal. This data hub will function like a Web portal where your personal health insurance, tax and financial information, criminal background, and immigration status will be shared and transmitted between agencies, including the IRS, HHS, DOJ, DHS, and SSA.

While far too many questions still remain about who will have access to what information in the hub, we do know that a woman in charge of the IRS' eight newly created Obama enforcement offices is none other than Sarah Hall Ingram, the former commissioner of the office responsible for tax-exempt organizations during the targeted IRS scandal.

Will the Americans who do not purchase government-approved insurance soon find themselves targeted and harassed through IRS audits? Right now, only time will tell.

With so much personal information going in and out of the hub likely privy to both government employees and contractors, many of whom will have discretion over health care coverage and tax penalties, the potential for abuses is staggering. That's why I have introduced H.R. 2022, the Stopping Government Abuse of Taxpayer Information Act. My bill would require not only the IRS but all government agencies with access to ObamaCare's Federal data services hub to present to Congress--under the penalty of perjury--certification that the American people's personal information has not and will not be used for targeting any individual or group based on their beliefs.

With full implementation of ObamaCare only months away, the IRS scandal underscores why we must not only continue fighting to repeal the health care law, but we also have the responsibility to demand safeguards, accountability, and oversight measures to be put in place to shield Americans from further targeting and misuse of their personal information.

The question is: Will the President honor his promise to the American people to do everything in his power to ensure that nothing like the IRS scandal happens again?

Mr. President, join me in supporting my bill, H.R. 2022, to safeguard the American people's most personal information.

Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding. I stand here today outraged by the fact that the Internal Revenue Service has been targeting conservative groups since as early as 2010. This is not a Republican or Democrat issue. This is a First Amendment issue, one that should be a wake-up call about the dangers of the new, expansive powers afforded to the IRS under ObamaCare. No government agency, particularly one with such corruption and apparent disregard for the Constitution as the IRS, has any business accessing or monitoring Americans' personal health information.

As I speak here today, government bureaucrats are building the Federal data services hub, the largest personal information database ever created by the U.S. Government. And because of ObamaCare, five major government agencies are compiling information for the data hub, including the IRS, HHS, Department of Justice, Department of Homeland Security, and Social Security Administration.

What this hub means is that government bureaucrats are gaining unprecedented access and power over the American people's financial, health, and personal information through the implementation of ObamaCare.

The IRS scandal begs the question: How can President Obama and the congressional Democrats continue to support ObamaCare, a law that gives more power to the IRS? Ultimately, the IRS scandal is yet another example of why ObamaCare must be repealed--for the sake of our health care, our economy, and our constitutional freedoms.

Mr. Speaker, as a mother who has worked for many years outside of the house raising our three children, I know firsthand about the challenges of trying to balance work with family life. That is why I'm a proud cosponsor of the Working Families Flexibility Act, which would give more time to workers, the freedom to decide how to use their time. For some people, this may mean taking a sick child to the doctor or attending their daughter's ballet recital or caring for an aging parent.

Currently, an outdated law prohibits private sector employers from even offering their employees the option to choose paid time off as compensation for overtime hours worked. The Working Families Flexibility Act would put an end to this arbitrary restriction.

By leveling the playing field and giving more employees the freedom to control their overtime compensation, this commonsense proposal will help strengthen families and our workforce.

Mr. Speaker, I stand here today outraged and deeply saddened by the heartbreaking story of the abortion doctor, Kermit Gosnell. This is the man currently on trial for the murder of eight people, seven of whom were newborns who were killed after surviving late-term botched abortions in his ``house of horror'' clinic.

But Gosnell didn't act alone. He had a host of silent co-conspirators who referred women to his practice knowing full well of the horrors that went on behind those closed doors. Meanwhile, the State boards gave Gosnell a free pass for 17 years by failing to inspect his clinic.

When asked about Gosnell's crime, our President tells us he has no comment. Where is your outrage, Mr. President? Are you too busy preparing your remarks for tomorrow night's Planned Parenthood fundraising gala?

My heart breaks that our country has reached a point where we are all not outraged by a practice that ends a beating heart and takes the lives of our most vulnerable in our society. May God forgive us.

Mr. Chairman, nearly 23 million Americans are still struggling to find work, and millions more low- and middle-income Americans are struggling with the reality of depressed wages, higher food and gas prices, and rising health care costs.

It is clear that the President's tax-and-spend policies are putting the American Dream further and further out of reach of more and more Americans. It's hard to get ahead in America when you can barely get by--paying your rent, putting food on the table and getting to and from work.

I believe the status quo is not working, and I believe that the American people deserve better than the chronically high unemployment, record levels of debt, unrealized dreams and a diminished future.

That is why I stand here today to urge my colleagues to support the House Republicans' Path to Prosperity budget. The Path to Prosperity budget funds America's priorities. It protects important entitlement programs, it saves our social net, it repeals the President's budget- busting health care law, reforms our broken code and balances within a decade.

President Obama and the congressional Democrats say that they want to get America back to work and support a ``balanced approach'' to our fiscal problems. But they also support record deficits and budgets that never ever balance. Instead of government living within its means, the Democrats' budgets raise taxes to fuel more spending, and in turn, millions of Americans remain out of work. The only place that these failed policies will lead is to higher unemployment, depressed wages and a crushing debt crisis.

The majority of Americans are not satisfied with the current state of our economy, and they're not hopeful about the future. And who can blame them? I believe the American people deserve better than the status quo, and I believe the American people deserve leaders here in Washington who are honest with themselves and their constituents about the challenges facing our Nation and what it's going to take to get this Nation back on track.

I urge the House to pass the Path to Prosperity budget and for the President to work with the congressional Republicans to balance the budget so that we can start to create the conditions for economic growth, job creation and more opportunities for current and future generations of Americans.

I have an amendment at the desk.

Madam Chairman, I rise today in support of reaffirming our commitment to upward mobility and greater opportunity for all Americans.

My amendment would express the sentiment of the House that the funding for the United States Department of Agriculture, USDA, marketing and outreach program currently used to increase participation in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, SNAP, better known as ``food stamps,'' would instead be used to fund job training programs contained in the SKILLS Act. These precious taxpayer dollars should be used to facilitate upward mobility and employment, not dependence.

The USDA created an aggressive outreach program that has grown under the Obama administration, particularly through the President's stimulus package. These expanded initiatives include the collaboration between the USDA and Mexican Government officials to promote participation in targeted communities, which teaches recruiters how to convince working class families into public assistance and dependence.

The Obama administration has conducted over 30 meetings with the Mexican Government personnel since he took office. Since this program began in 2004, the United States taxpayer has funded this participation with the Mexican Government to promote the SNAP program by holding 29 health fairs and traveling to 19 cities.

The USDA, in coordination with the Mexican Government, has conducted an aggressive campaign issuing guidance to State and local agencies with a record 91 meetings focusing on growing the outreach program to expand enrollment in SNAP. None of these new meetings were used to point them in the direction of jobs training programs or employment searches that would offer much greater opportunity than whatever the Federal Government would have to offer.

I recently read through this 55-page document put out by the USDA, entitled, ``SNAP, Guidance on Non-Citizen

Eligibility,'' that essentially explains every possible scenario for avenues of going about receiving SNAP assistance. These policies are in plain conflict with the financial health of the United States, and it fails to recognize that welfare reform is guided by the moral principle that good policy helps more people live better lives.

USDA has also used these outreach dollars to hand out a Hunger Champions award in 2011 to certain workers, which translated to a 10 percent increase in food stamp recipients in just one year.

Under the Obama administration, the number of food stamp recipients has jumped 46 percent, with one in six Americans living in poverty, and the administration still continues to undermine work requirements and effective job training.

We need to reaffirm our belief that we are a Nation of opportunity and not dependence. The government should not be promoting food stamps. The government should be using hard-earned taxpayer dollars to help those who are out of work to acquire skills for jobs that they want and to achieve the American Dream that they have for them and their families.

I would now like to enter into a colloquy with the gentleman that is the chairman of the Committee on Agriculture, Mr. Lucas.

I yield to the gentleman.

I thank the chairman. I so appreciate your earnestness in working together in making sure that we do have upward mobility rather than dependence.

Madam Chair, I want to again thank the chairman for being willing to work with me on what I think is a very important issue of making sure that we help people with upward mobility.

With that, Madam Chair, I ask unanimous consent to withdraw my amendment.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.

I rise today to speak in support of Congressman Messer's bill, H.R. 668. This requirement would be a powerful reminder to the President and Congress on how the decisions regarding our government's spending impact the constituents that we serve.

Despite the fact that on the President's watch we have had 4 straight years of deficits exceeding $1 trillion and we still have nearly 23 million Americans who are struggling to find work, the President continues to champion more and more deficit spending as a cure to what ails our struggling economy.

But spending money we do not have is not an investment. It's a liability that limits the potential and the freedom of the American people and future generations. Every man, woman, and child in America currently owes $52,000 as their share of the national debt. It's time that the President and Congress level with the public about the burden of debt that's being placed on the American taxpayer each and every year.

Madam Chair, yesterday, the President took to the White House briefing room to lecture, as he has done before, on the virtues of the so-called ``balanced approach'' to budgeting. However, while he failed to mention that his balanced approach would never lead to a balanced budget, his last 4 years have made that abundantly clear. It's long past time for the President to level with Congress and the American people about when his so-called ``balanced approach'' will actually balance the budget.

Today, the House will take up the Require a PLAN Act, which will force the President to do just that. By requiring the President to explain when and how he would balance the budget, we can begin to have an honest and constructive discussion about what it is actually going to take to prevent a debt crisis. History and math tell us that our fiscal challenges can only be solved through responsible budgeting that cuts spending and reforms entitlements.

The President's incessant demand for higher taxes is not a solution to our fiscal problems but, rather, a deceptive rhetoric that cannot withstand the scrutiny of basic math or honest budgeting. No amount of tax hikes will ever be able to steer us away from the looming debt crisis we face.

Averting the most predictable crisis in U.S. history is not a question of how, but a question of if the President will have the courage and the foresight to work with the House Republicans to lead our country out of economic stagnation and away from a future limited by mountains of debt.

Mr. Speaker, in the year 2000, Congress created the U Visa program as a way to allow illegal immigrant crime victims a temporary--a temporary--legal status in order to assist law enforcement in the prosecution of their assailant, which has helped bring thousands of criminals to justice.

However, over time, the U Visa has become a pathway to citizenship for essentially everyone who applies. The rampant abuse of this program is detrimental to law-abiding individuals who seek to immigrate to our country through the proper legal channels.

We are a Nation of immigrants, and we are also a Nation built upon respect for the rule of law. Our heritage and our principles demand of us the courage to reform our broken immigration system so that those who follow the law and want to contribute to the betterment of our Nation will have the opportunity to do so.

That is why I have introduced the U Visa Reform Act of 2013 to stop abuses in the U Visa program. I urge my colleagues to join me in support of this commonsense piece of legislation.

Mr. Speaker, as a charter member of the Fix Congress Now Caucus and as an early supporter of No Budget, No Pay, I am very excited that this legislation will be voted on in the House later today.

We on the House Budget Committee work hard to pass a responsible budget each year, but the Democrat-controlled Senate refuses to do the same. In fact, it has been nearly 4 years since the Senate has passed a budget. Since that time, the Federal Government has racked up annual deficits exceeding $1 trillion; and, in total, more than $5 trillion has been added to our national debt in just 4 years. If we stay on our current path of record deficits, big government and unfunded entitlement programs, Greece's present will be America's future.

A massive debt crisis is surely not the future we want for our children or our grandchildren. Fiscal responsibility and accountability in the Halls of Congress cannot wait. Today, we will take an important step in the House to force the Senate to either do its job or face the consequences. It's simple: no budget, no pay.