Floor Statements

Madam Speaker, I would like to read a part of a letter from the National Governors Association to both the Speaker and the Democratic leader and Senator Frist and Senator Reid.

It says, ``Reform, however, should not be part of a 2006 fiscal year budget reduction and reconciliation process, especially if it does nothing more than shift additional costs to the States.''

We have a problem with health care costs in our country. Medicaid is one part of it. Medicare costs and private insurance and private health care is actually rising higher faster than Medicaid. Yet what we are doing with this budget resolution is actually penalizing senior citizens, and particularly children, because so much of our children's hospitals, so much of their funding comes from Medicaid because they deal with children totally.

I know in Houston, the Texas Medical Center, we have the Texas Children's Hospital, over 50 percent of their funding comes from Medicaid because they take care of children. We have to deal with health care costs, but let us not balance it on the backs of our children and our senior citizens.

National Governors Association,

December 22, 2004.

Hon. Bill Frist,

Majority Leader, U.S. Senate,

Washington, DC.

Hon. Harry Reid,

Minority Leader-elect, U.S. Senate,

Washington, DC.

Hon. J. Dennis Hastert,

Speaker, House of Representatives,

Washington, DC.

Hon. Nancy Pelosi,

Minority Leader, House of Representatives,

Washington, DC.

Dear Senator Frist, Senator Reid, Speaker Hastert, and

Representative Pelosi: The Nation's Governors look forward to

working closely with the Administration and Congress to

reform Medicaid. Reforming the Medicaid system is the highest

priority for the Governors, and will result in cost savings

and efficiencies for both the federal and state governments.

Reform, however, should not be part of a 2006 fiscal year

budget reduction and reconciliation process, especially if it

does nothing more than shift additional costs to states.

Governors are committed to administering the Medicaid

program in a very cost-effective way, and as equal partners

in the program have a tremendous incentive to continue doing

so. This is reflected in the fact that the annual growth in

Medicaid per capita spending has not exceeded approximately

4.5 percent per year, substantially below the growth rate of

private health insurance premiums, which have averaged 12.5

percent per year for the last three years. Total Medicaid

costs, however, are growing at a rate of 12 percent per year

and now total Medicaid expenditures exceed that of Medicare

primarily due to two major factors that are largely beyond

the control of states. First, states, over the last four

years, have experienced large case load increases of

approximately 33 percent. Second, and far more costly to

states, are the impacts of long-term care and of the dual

eligible population. Medicaid currently accounts for 50

percent of all long-term care dollars and finances the care

for 70 percent of all people in nursing homes. Furthermore,

42 percent of all Medicaid expenditures are spent on Medicare

beneficiaries, despite the fact that they comprise a small

percentage of the Medicaid caseload and are already fully

insured by the Medicare program. Benefits for the dual

eligible population should be 100 percent financed by

Medicare.

We agree that maintaining the status quo in Medicaid is not

acceptable. However, it is equally unacceptable in any

deficit reduction strategy to simply shift federal costs to

states, as Medicaid continues to impose sever strains on

state budgets. Our most recent survey of states shows

Medicaid now averages 22 percent of state budgets. This

commitment has caused a strain on funding for other crucial

state responsibilities. These funding challenges will become

more acute as states absorb new costs to help implement the

Medicare Modernization Act for the millions of dual eligible

beneficiaries.

We look forward to working with you on Medicaid reform.

Sincerely,

Governor Mark R. Warner,

Chairman.

Governor Mike Huckabee,

Vice Chairman.

Mr. Speaker, today marks the Battle of San Jacinto, the victory of independence for Texas from Mexico--the greatest State in the Union in my opinion. This day reminds the world that Texans refuse oppression from any source.

On April 21, 1836, 169 years ago, approximately 900 Texans and Tejanos volunteers overpowered a larger, professional Mexican army. Today, Texans are celebrating all day at the San Jacinto Battleground State Historic Site in our congressional district, including impressive historic re-enactments.

Less than 100 years after American patriots threw off the tyrannical British Empire's military domination, Texans and Tejanos succeeded in a similar struggle against a military dictator, General Santa Anna.

In the words of the Texas Declaration of Independence, the people's government had been ``forcibly changed, without their consent, from a restricted federative republic, composed of sovereign states, to a consolidated central military despotism.''

Military dictatorships are the world's most notoriously evil governments and the moral justification for the Texas Revolution is equally applicable to certain countries today. Unfortunately, as Texans know, freedom requires great sacrifice.

After the tragedy at the Alamo, Texan and Tejano forces retreated, but in late April 1836, they took a stand on the banks of the bayous outside Houston, Texas.

As a result of their bravery, the nation, and then the State of Texas were born. Like the American Revolution, the Texan Revolution brought many different people together fighting military oppression.

The Texas Revolution proves the bands of freedom are stranger than ethnicity, as many Tejanos proved at Gonzalez, Bexar, Goliad, the Alamo, along the banks of the San Jacinto River, and in the government of the Republic of Texas.

Like on July 4th, on San Jacinto Day Texans celebrate the achievements of our patriots, and give thanks for our opportunity to have representative government.

Thank you Mr. Speaker, God bless Texas.

Mr. Speaker, today to extend my thanks and gratttude to Hipolito Acosta for his service to Houston, Texas and the United States as District Director of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services office during the last three years and his 24 years serving our country.

A native Texan, Mr. Acosta was born in Presidio, Texas and started his career with USCIS as a U.S. Border Patrol Officer in Marfa in 1975. Throughout his career he has received numerous awards as well as international recognition for his leadership in customer service and enforcement duties. He is a four-year Navy Veteran and a former member of the Illinois National Guard. He is also one of the most highly honored legacy INS officers, including six Commissioner Awards and the prestigious Newton-Azrak Award for courage and heroism displayed in the line of duty.

His domestic career included front line and leadership roles in the fight against alien smuggling in key positions such as Criminal Investigator in Chicago, Special Agent with the EI Paso District and Border Patrol Sector, and as Supervisory Special Agent in Brownsville, Texas. High profile investigations and successful undercover operations involving thousands of smuggled aliens from Central America, Europe and the Middle East were trademarks of his investigative career.

In 1989, Mr. Acosta was selected as Assistant Officer in Charge of INS operations in Manila, Philippines, assuming command of the office in February 1991. During his tenure in the Philippines, Mr. Acosta developed relations with host country government officials, to include the Office of the President and was one of six U.S. diplomats to receive high recognition by President Corazon Aquino. While in Manila, he developed the first ever citizenship program for thousands of Philippine World War II veterans. He was highly recognized as the driving force in the citizenship program abroad with the naturalization of over 7,000 applicants.

Following his tenure in the Philippines, Mr. Acosta was appointed to Officer in Charge in Monterrey and Ciudad Juarez. Later, as District Director for the INS Mexico City Office, he was responsible for overseeing sixteen different offices in Latin America and the Caribbean with operational jurisdiction over 42 countries, including a pre- inspection station in Aruba and refugee office in Havana, Cuba. In 2002, Mr. Acosta returned to Texas and assumed leadership of the INS Houston District and then became the first District Director of the U.S. Customs and Immigration Service in Houston.

I commend Mr. Acosta for his service to the United States and congratulate him on his retirement.

Mr. Chairman, I guess this is a postponed vote on MTBE. It is an issue we have been dealing with, at least in the Committee on Energy and Commerce, for a number of years. MTBE was mandated, maybe not specifically in the Clean Air Act of 1990, but reformulated gas was. And for an area like I have in Houston, we have been using MTBE as a reformulated gas in our gas to clean up our air because it replaced the lead that we used to have because lead was polluting. And now we find out that MTBE does not smell or taste good and that is right. But whatever we have in our gas tanks is not something else we want to smell or taste, either. We may not be able to taste the benzene and everything else.

But EPA informed Congress in 1990 that a reformulated oxygenate requirement would be met almost exclusively by MTBE, and congressional statements at the time reflect that knowledge. Nowadays you can use ethanol, which comes a long way, or MTBE.

It is true MTBE existed before the Clean Air Act of 1990. In fact, it was first approved by the EPA in 1979 to comply with another Federal gasoline mandate, in reducing lead. EPA followed the legislative history of the Clean Air Act and its scientific analysis and repeatedly reaffirmed approval for MTBE. The reason this bill has this provision in here is because we mandated reformulated gas in certain areas, including the district I represent. We have not had trouble with MTBE in groundwater or surface water pollution, at least in the Houston area. I know some parts of the country have.

The oxygenate requirement has done a great deal to clean up our smoggy urban air; and to this day the EPA will talk about the success of it, particularly in the Houston area. MTBE is on the way out and being cleaned up around the country, regardless of the amount of litigation. Tank owners, insurance and State funds are doing the real work, 96 percent of all cleanups according to the EPA. A case in point, the city of Santa Monica is suing its former law firm over the $66 million legal bill for its trouble in suing over MTBE.

I guess the concern I have is that MBTE, if it is a defective product, we mandated it. And let me quote from some of the remarks earlier in the Clean Air Act. We had Members who are still sitting Members of Congress who were bragging about, we mandated the oil companies to be able to do stuff, for cleaning up our air; and yet nowadays, 10 years later, 15 years later, we are going to say, no, they are responsible, even though we told them to do it, and it has been successful.

My concern about the loss of MBTE, we cannot trade clean air for clean water; we have to have both. And there is a way we can have both, but not by taking away the ability to have MBTE, which is probably the most in use because it is the most efficient in reformulated gasoline.

But, again, Congress made a decision to deal with ethanol more than MBTE, and that will happen. This bill allows for fixing the best by using the Leaking Underground Storage Tank fund, and that will go a long way to help us.

Mr. Chairman, my colleagues supporting this amendment say we do not have a crisis. We do have a crisis. Natural gas prices are triple what they should be. We are paying more to heat and cool our homes and also for our raw materials for our chemical industry and all of our industries, so we need to do something.

The solution is to either drill more or import it, and LNG is one of ways we can do it. We have a great safety record not only in our own country but worldwide in liquefied natural gas. And it is frustrating when you say you do not want to drill, you do not want to refine, and you do not even want to import. The only way you will get around then is by walking.

In Houston, we are too big to walk so we will have to have gasoline and we have to have something to cool our homes in the summer.

The low natural gas supply is impacting our jobs and driving up electricity prices causing higher consumer prices. Higher prices are leading to inflation and slow-down worries, which is why Alan Greenspan testified before our committee that the United States needs more LNG.

LNG import terminals can be our interstate commerce. That is why we need to have a Federal role, but the States will still have a very important role in this process.

States will have influence over the kind and use of facility; the existing and projected population of the local area; the existing and proposed land use near the local area; and the natural and physical aspects of the location.

The bill creates new authority for states to inspect LNG terminals for safety and security, beyond what they have in interstate natural gas projects.

Low natural gas supply is impacting jobs, driving up electricity prices, and causing higher consumer prices for a variety of goods and services.

Higher prices are leading to inflation and slowdown worries, which is why Alan Greenspan testified to our Committee that the U.S. needs more

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time.

There was pressure to rush this bill out of the committee without a markup, but I am glad the committee made the right decision. We had a 3-day full committee markup where almost every imaginable energy issue was raised, from cow manure energy to ocean power. We even extended daylight savings time to save energy.

Overall, there are many beneficial provisions in this bill, such as resolving permit confusion, improving electric reliability, and mandating Federal energy conservation.

Importantly, this bill provides incentives to clean coal technology, renewable energies like wind and solar; and it also increases LIHEAP funding authorization to $5 billion for this year.

Very quickly, I want to thank the chairman for inclusion of a number of provisions in the bill, such as the provision encouraging the siting on liquefied natural gas (LNG), which is important to energy security to cut into the rising natural gas prices that threaten our economy.

The top concern of homeowners and manufacturers in our district are the high natural gas prices. If we keep offshore production limits, we have to have LNG to import from other countries. We included some modern incentives for petroleum coke gasification so we can see what we can do with basically a byproduct, and important coal gasification incentives. Energy diversity brings economy-wide benefits.

I commend the authorization of a complex well-testing project at the Rocky Mountain Oilfield Testing Center. The ability to tap more resources with fewer wells provides a public benefit for environmental protection.

The bill contains a study on LIHEAP reform. Providing energy assistance to families in cold and hot weather is a public necessity, and I thank the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Dingell) and the gentleman from Texas (Chairman Barton) for accepting two new amendments, one which would require the Department of Energy and the National Cancer Institute to conduct a health assessment of those living in proximity to petrochemical and refinery facilities.

Many of my constituents live and work near these facilities. The communities are concerned, and they deserve the most accurate health information about their community.

There is a lot to be said about this bill. We have an energy bill for the first time in my 12 years in Congress.

Madam Chairman, I thank the chairman of the Committee on Resources for yielding me this time.

This is a perennial amendment we have. This energy bill provides for production, conservation and research, but ANWR is one of the most important production parts. Granted we cannot produce ourselves out of these high energy prices, but we have to produce in our own country if we ever expect to lower the prices.

Our Nation needs more energy. Our economy, consumers and workers bid against China, Europe and India's economies for every barrel of Middle Eastern, African and Venezuelan oil. The Congress so far has refused to open promising offshore areas to exploration, even as Cuba, employing Spanish and Chinese energy companies, is drilling 60 miles from the Florida Keys, much closer than we allow American companies to do.

No nation can produce energy more responsibly than ours. Energy production is not like it used to be 50, 25 or even 10 years ago. It is much cleaner and much more scrutinized. Supporting only long-term solutions and conservation is important, but not enough. Our cars get 25 percent of their gas from U.S. lands, but our children will see even less if we do not produce at home.

Two-thirds of the world's oil reserves are in the Middle East, controlled by OPEC. If they act as a cartel, they will control the world price of oil for the foreseeable future. If we allow domestic production to die out, conservation and research will not save us and we will have to pay a terrible economic price.

If we allow production in ANWR, we will see great benefits at a very low, temporary cost and see thousands of good-paying jobs created over the next 25 years. The caribou, bears, birds and other wildlife can thrive just as they have at Prudhoe Bay. Tanker accidents will be prevented by new, double-hulled oil tankers and environmental impacts overall will be much less.

Drill sites are much smaller today and we use fewer wells with our new drilling technology. Permanent gravel roads are no longer necessary if we use the winter ice road. The doom and gloom scenarios by opponents of ANWR oil are inaccurate and not based on reality. I have been there many times, Madam Chairman, and I can tell you that we can produce it and the bears and the caribou will be in ANWR just like they are in Prudhoe Bay.

Mr. Chairman, I reluctantly rise in opposition because the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Solis) is a good member of our committee, and we work on lots of issues together.

I represent a blue collar district. We have probably more refineries in the district I represent now than anyone else in the country and those are our jobs, are our tax base and what economic development we have, and they are blue collar jobs. They are minority jobs in our district.

I am concerned, though, about what is happening in our country. We continually transfer our blue collar industrial capacity overseas. My concern is we are seeing the same thing happen whether it be with refineries or petrochemical plants just like we have seen with our textiles. It would not be very difficult to move a chemical plant to where they are still flaring natural gas or to have a refinery ship us refined product.

That is why I think the provision of the bill is really good, and I think the amendment does a disservice maybe to our whole country because we need to expand our refining capacity, again, reopening those, make them get the permits, but also make sure that we keep those jobs in our country instead of moving overseas.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 483, a bill to rename the courthouse in Brownsville, Texas as the Reynaldo Garza and the Filemon B. Vela courthouse.

Filemon Vela was born in Harlingen, Texas in 1935. He served as state district judge in Texas for Cameron and Willacy counties in 1975 until he was appointed as a federal judge by President Jimmy Carter in 1980. He served until 2000 when he retired.

Filemon Vela was a strong advocate of education because of his father's strong belief in education. As one of nine children he believed that he would not finish high school, but when his mother died his father motivated him to continue his education. He graduated from Harlingen High School and then went to University of Texas Austin. After serving in the U.S. Army Filemon Vela went to St. Mary's Law school and Doctor of Jurisprudence in 1962. Throughout his career he taped more than 200 radio programs urging children to stay in school and promoting literacy programs.

Reynaldo Garza was the first Mexican-American federal judge in the U.S. when he was appointed by President John F. Kennedy in 1961 to the South Texas bench. In 1979, President Jimmy Carter appointed him to the U.S. Court of Appeals, making him the first Mexican-American appointed to that court. He served his lifetime appointment in Brownsville, Texas.

Reynaldo Garza contributed many things to the Hispanic community, he was the first Mexican American elected to the Brownsville school board, and he worked with the League of United Latin American Citizens to improve the civil rights of Mexican Americans in Texas.

The lifetime accomplishments of both of these men are truly inspirational to us all. By naming the courthouse in Brownsville after them we recognize not only their contribution to the judicial community, but also to the city of Brownsville.

Mr Speaker, I rise today in opposition to this bill.

This bill will weaken homestead protections currently in place under state laws, hurting my constituents, the citizens of Texas, and the citizens of any other states that have laws protecting individuals' homes valued over $125,000, which is the limit this bill sets.

Texas, which has the longest and oldest history of homestead protection laws in our country, has no cap on homestead protection, along with Kansas, Iowa, Florida, and South Dakota.

Minnesota, Rhode Island, and Nevada's laws protect home equity of $200,000.

Property values across the nation vary widely. The median resale price of a home in California is $215,000. In Nebraska it's $70,200.

While I understand there must be a sensible cap on exemptible home equity to ensure the law is not protecting million dollar mansions, $125,000 is unreasonable given the skyrocketing price of real estate in Texas and many other parts of the country.

This bill will make bankruptcy even more expensive and burdensome than it already is, on hardworking Americans who have fallen on hard times and seniors on fixed incomes, while doing nothing to address the out of control lending practices by credit card companies.

Mr. Speaker, I cannot support a bill that will hurt hard-working Texans, and I oppose this bill.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H. Res. 190, which honors the life and achievements of Pope John Paul II.

Pope John Paul II was a man of devout faith who used his leadership to help the poor, mediate conflicts around the world, and fight tyranny. As a man who fought both the Nazi and the Communist regime in Poland in pursuit of his own faith, he was a strong advocate for religious tolerance and freedom. His life's work is truly inspiring to all of us.

As the most traveled Pope in history, Pope John Paul II visited more than 120 countries and traveled approximately three quarter of a million miles. During these visits he worked to bring peace to regions of the world that were in conflict. He embraced the poor and the oppressed across the world by encouraging us to help those who are less fortunate.

His hope for a better world for those who had nothing should remind us all as Pope John Paul II said to ``practice mercy heroically with the lowliest and the most deprived.'' Pope John Paul II was able to rise above political and religious conflict to deliver a message of peace, love, and faith all while promoting equality for all.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to take my Special Order at this time.

Mr. Speaker, during the Easter recess, our office sponsored a town hall meeting for constituents to voice their opinions on the administration's plan to partially privatize Social Security. It was actually held at a community college, at Houston Community College Northeast, that is in our district; and we had both college students and senior citizens there.

One of the things that came out of that town hall meeting is the concern that Social Security is not broke; that sure, $1.7 trillion of our national debt is, as the President says, IOUs from Social Security, and my constituents' concern is that if we are going to pay back the 40 percent of our national debt, about $7 trillion, to the many citizens of foreign countries who loan money to the United States, why on this Earth would we not pay back the Social Security trust fund that $1.7 trillion.

One thing that came out of that town hall meeting is that the more details they learned about the President's plan, the less they favor it. That might be why the administration has released so few details about their plan. What we know is the plan includes a proposal to allow taxpayers 4 percent or up to $1,000 in private savings accounts that theoretically would yield a greater return than the government bonds on which Social Security is now invested. That proposal sounds all well and good until the American people, in our district particularly, realized that the private accounts would not alleviate any of Social Security's financial challenges.

The recent Social Security Trustees Report estimated the Social Security shortfall to be $3.7 trillion over the next 75 years. But the proposal to create these private accounts or personal accounts will not help the bottom line at all. Even the President, before we broke for our Easter recess, admitted that ``personal accounts do not solve the issue.''

What the President needed to add at the end of that sentence is that the private accounts actually make the problem worse.

In the first 20 years of the President's plan, the Federal Government will have to borrow $5 trillion to make up for the additional shortfall created by these private or special accounts. And, even worse, if you use the Social Security Administration's assumption, the administration's privatization plan would exhaust the trust fund actually 11 years earlier than currently projected.

Through this particular concern, several of my constituents pointed out that the creation of private accounts is voluntary, and that is true. That is, if the folks think that the market is too risky, they do not have to open that private account, and that is true. Private accounts are 100 percent voluntary.

But what folks have often heard is that the plan also includes the proposal to change the way the benefits are calculated. This element of that plan, called price indexing, would help pay for the private accounts and reduce the Social Security shortfall. But at the end of the day, the price indexing would result in a cut of guaranteed benefits for all beneficiaries, regardless of whether they choose to enroll in a private or personal account. It would cut everyone's.

So under the administration's plan, the private account is voluntary, but the cut in guaranteed benefits is mandatory.

Here is how price indexing works. Currently, benefits are tied to wages, which rise higher than prices, giving us an increased standard of living each year. Under the administration's plan, the benefit calculation would be tied to prices and not wages. Under this calculation, Social Security benefits that seniors would receive would replace a smaller portion of their paycheck before retirement. Currently, Social Security benefits make up 42 percent of the average wage earner's salary. Under price indexing, however, Social Security will only replace 27 percent of wages for someone retiring in 2042.

The picture is even worse for our children and grandchildren. I am proud to have a granddaughter who was born on February 1 of this year. In 2075 when she is 70 years old, her Social Security benefits would only be 20 percent of her wages if we allow this element of the administration's plan to take effect.

So in other words, price indexing lowers what our seniors get in their cost-of-living increase, and they already get so little compared to the cost increases with Medicare that they are having to pay. It is extremely important that the younger generation gets the straight story about how this plan will affect them. According to a poll commissioned by Rock the Vote, once young people learn about the trade-offs that come from private accounts, they will overwhelmingly oppose this risky proposal.

Among 18- to 39-year-olds, 63 percent oppose private accounts if it means that the Federal debt will have to increase to pay current benefits.

Seventy percent of 18- to 39-year-olds oppose private accounts if they mean cuts in guaranteed benefits the private accounts will not cover.

Sixty-five percent of those 18- to 39-year-olds oppose private accounts if it means cuts in guaranteed benefits for all beneficiaries regardless of their participation in the private accounts.

With the effect of the administration's plan being a $5 trillion addition to our national debt, a 46 percent cut in guaranteed benefits for all, this proposal does not sound like a good one for anyone, including the constituents that I represent.

Mr. Speaker, on rollcall vote No. 90 on Monday, March 21, 2005, I would have voted ``yea.'' Like a number of our colleagues, I was unable to attend this emergency session due to the unavailability of commercial air travel within the time constraints.

Mr. Speaker, I support this legislation, S. 686, for the relief of the parents of Terri Schiavo. This deeply personal family matter has come to our attention and been acted upon by Congress when the State courts have already made their decisions and rightfully so as this matter is in their jurisdiction.

Now we find ourselves in the middle of a deeply personal battle between Terri's husband and her family. While we all understand the pain and tragedy of this family's struggle, we cannot overstep our boundaries in this heart-wrenching situation that many families have made and will have to make in the future. No one wants to witness the death of a family member; however, if that person stated their wish was not to be kept alive artificially, those wishes must be upheld.

In this case, the State courts of Florida have ruled that Terri's wishes were indeed to not be kept alive artificially if she were to ever fall into a persistent vegetative state. The idea that Congress would intervene in this case is indeed unsettling and does bring some disturbing questions of constitutionality to the table.

We are justified in sending this highly emotional case to the United States District Court for the Middle District of Florida even though Terri remains in this persistent, seemingly unrecoverable, state. The Federal courts should review Terri's case to determine if her constitutional rights have been violated because it is not the role of Congress to make such decisions regarding these issues.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of this Wartime Supplemental bill but not without some hesitation after questioning why some funding is included in what should be a bill solely to support our troops and their ongoing efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan.

I applaud my colleagues who are working to include at least some FY2006 funding for Iraq and Afghanistan in the FY2006 Budget. The Congressional Budget Office predicts that the cost of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq could reach $458 billion over the FY 2005 to 2014 period, on top of the more than $200 billion already expended. An emergency is something unforeseen, but these war costs can be estimated far in advance.

In his FY2006 budget request, President Bush did not include funds for construction of the U.S. Mission in Iraq. Instead, a week after submitting his FY2006 budget to Congress, the President sent Congress an FY2005 emergency supplemental funding request which included more than $1.3 billion for the embassy in Iraq. This hardly seems to be emergency funding since we have known we will need to operate and maintain an embassy in this country, yet there has been funding for the U.S. embassy in Iraq included in the previous two wartime supplemental bills, and again in this bill.

There is also $36 million dollars included for the construction of a new detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba in this supplemental. We have been detaining suspected terrorists at Guantanamo Bay since shortly after September 11, 2001; this is clearly a need seen far in advance and should be included in the Defense appropriations bill, not in this bill.

Additionally, this bill should not be used as a means to move controversial legislation, but the rule for this bill includes a provision to attach the text of H.R. 418. This bill was brought to the Floor of the House in February without a hearing in the Judiciary Committee, circumventing the legislative process.

H.R. 418 includes language that allows the Secretary of Homeland Security to waive any law necessary to construct barriers and roads along our borders. With over one thousand miles of border in Texas alone, I did not feel it was appropriate to allow the Secretary of Homeland Security to waive environmental regulations, undermine the competitive bidding process and threaten the ability of workers to be paid a prevailing wage on these projects.

The most important part of this issue is catching people who are here without proper documents. In December of 2004, I voted to authorize 10,000 new border patrol agents over the next 5 years, however the President's budget would fund only 210 of the 2,000 authorized border patrol agents, 143 of the 800 authorized interior investigators and only 1,920 of the 8,000 detention beds promised by the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004. H.R. 418 will not solve our immigration problem if we do not put agents on the border and increase the capacity of detention centers.

I do strongly support a number of provisions in this bill, however, which will better protect the men and women serving in Iraq and Afghanistan, better provide for the families of those who gave their lives serving in these countries, and better equip our troops.

It is time that we increase the military death gratuity benefit to $100,000 and the subsidized life insurance benefit to $400,000 for the families of soldiers who died or were killed on active duty while serving in Iraq and Afghanistan after October 2001.

We must take additional steps however, to improve benefits for the families of our troops not addressed in this bill. When families of our service members do not have access to healthcare because they cannot find a provider that has a contract with Tricare, there is a major problem We need to address the excess paperwork and low reimbursement rates in the Tricare system to ensure family members do not have to worry about their health care while their loved ones are serving our country.

In addition, after continually hearing stories from the men and women serving in Iraq about the lack of protective armor, this supplemental addresses these problems by providing

$75 million for body armor protection and $611 million for add-on vehicle armor kits which was $48 million more than requested. We also provide necessary oversight on the vehicle armor kits and several other procurement requests, while offsetting increases in funding for our troops with decreases in unnecessary foreign aid. In addition, we rightly increased the request for the family of medium-tactical vehicle, or FMTVs, to $735 million after recognizing wartime operations are causing much greater wear and stress on these vehicles than peacetime operations.

I support this bill because it provides necessary benefits and equipment to our troops, but I do not believe it should be used as a vehicle for projects that could and should be funded through the annual budget. During this time of soaring deficits, we must practice fiscal discipline; however this bill fails to do that by adding projects unrelated to the immediate wars in Iraq and Aghanistan. This bill should be solely about providing our troops with necessary resources for their mission in Iraq and Afghanistan. Anything not directly related to that does not belong in this bill.

Mr. Chairman, I thank my colleague from South Carolina, our ranking member on the Committee on the Budget for yielding me time.

Mr. Chairman, I wish I had enough time to respond to the Majority Leader's problems with this budget, but, in all honesty, the War on Terror, we just passed the supplemental that was not part of this budget, and most of us, in fact I voted for that supplemental because it was the War on Terror.

But I rise to oppose the drastic cuts in Medicaid in this budget resolution. Medicaid is not the problem child of our health care system and should not take the fall for this administration's inability to balance the budget.

Medicaid's cost per capita growth is lower than Medicare or even private insurance, despite the fact that Medicaid has absorbed an increased beneficiary population due to gaps in Medicare coverage, an economic downturn and the decline of employer-sponsored health insurance. Medicaid is a success story in this country, not a program that belongs on the Federal chopping block.

As a member of the Committee on Energy and Commerce, I cannot support this budget resolution instruction to my committee to cut $20 billion outs of Medicaid.

The robust Medicaid program is critical for the health care delivery in my home State of Texas. Forty-five percent of all infants born in Texas are covered by Medicaid, 45 percent. Nearly 50 percent of all children receiving care in our children's hospitals are Medicaid beneficiaries. Medicaid is the single-largest health insurer for our Nation's children. How can we cut the most vulnerable in our society, our children, and still consider ourselves looking out for the least of this society?

To paraphrase the Bible, let us not suffer the little children. That is not our job here in this Congress. If Congress goes forward with these ill-advised Medicaid cuts, the States will be left holding the bag and their only option is to further cut the benefits.

Mr. Chairman, 45 million Americans currently are uninsured. It makes no sense to slash Medicaid spending, which will virtually guarantee an increase in the number of uninsured in our country. Medicaid cuts will not better our bottom line. It will only make our problems worse.