Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize an outstanding individual who has made significant contributions to improve the quality of life of the constituents of California's 32nd Congressional District, Antonio Villaraigosa.

Antonio Villaraigosa is a visionary, caring and progressive public servant. Throughout his professional career, Antonio Villaraigosa has held various leadership positions in the public sector and the labor movement. He served on the boards of the Southern California Rapid Transit District and the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. In 1994, he was elected to the California State Assembly representing the 45th District of Los Angeles, and four years after was elected Speaker of the Assembly. As Speaker of the Assembly he was credited with fostering an unprecedented era of bipartisanship.

As a true coalition-builder, Antonio Villaraigosa spearheaded a $9.1 billion initiative to rebuild and modernize California schools, a $2.1 billion initiative to provide parks and open space throughout the state, and a state health insurance program, ``Healthy Families.''

On June 28, 2003, Antonio Villaraigosa will be sworn in as Los Angeles City Councilmember representing the 14th District. Some of his priorities include community safety, economic development, environmental issues and constituent services. His outstanding accomplishments and efforts to improve his community are inspiring and worth honoring.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to applaud the Supreme Court's decision to uphold affirmative action. The Court's ruling this week was a tremendous victory for all those who believe that diversity is one of our nation's greatest strengths.

The historical significance of this important ruling cannot be underestimated. For millions of minority students--Latino, African- American, Native American--it means the opportunity at a better education, higher wages, and a promising future.

The Court's ruling is especially important to Latinos, our nation's fastest growing and now largest minority group. Fewer than 10 percent of college-age Latinos pursues higher education. Only 16 percent of Latinos between the ages of 25-29 have bachelor's degrees. Clearly, many challenges remain to increase Latino enrollment at colleges and universities across the country. Affirmative action is key to breaking down the barriers to higher education for Latinos.

Affirmative action is not only beneficial to minority students, but also to non-minority students. Greater diversity on our college campuses ultimately produces students who are better equipped to thrive in an economy and society that is increasingly multicultural. As Justice O'Connor noted in the Court's decision, the future of our nation relies on leaders who are comfortable with ``diverse people, cultures, ideas and viewpoints.'' O'Connor was most likely influenced in her opinion by an unlikely coalition of business, military, civil rights, and education groups that urged the Court to uphold affirmative action because its produces leaders who are prepared for today's increasingly global economy.

The country's highest court has ruled that race may be a factor in college admissions because the nation has a compelling need for racial and ethnic diversity on our college campuses. The ruling calls into question race-neutral affirmative action plans used in several states, including my own state of California where there has been a 39 percent increase in the rejection of Latino freshman applicants to California public universities since the state's race-neutral plan was implemented. Given the Supreme Court's decision, I hope California will review and revise its affirmative action policies so that public universities in my state truly reflect the state's very diverse population. The Court has spoken about the importance of diversity. Now should California.

Throughout the United States, there are millions of Latinos and Latinas who want to succeed. They want equal educational and economic opportunities. The Court's ruling provides great hope for these young people. Again, I applaud the Court for this landmark decision.

Mr. Speaker, this bill is a sham. It does not provide adequate prescription drug benefit.

Este projecto de ley no ayudara a los ancionos. No ayudara ni a nuestras madres ni a nuestras abuelitas.

(English translation of the above statement is as follows:)

It will not help our mothers, nor our grandmothers.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to call attention to the American women who will be disproportionately impacted by Medicare reform. The reality we must confront is that women simply live longer than men--about 19 years into retirement, while men can expect to live 15 years. So although this means we have longer to cherish our mothers and grandmothers, it also means that women are more susceptible to multiple and chronic illness, and require more long-term care needs.

It is no surprise then that women comprise the majority of Medicare. In fact, we constitute 58 percent of the Medicare population at 65, and 71 percent at the age of 85. Yet even more crucial is the fact that four out of five of America's elderly women are widowed and almost half live out their days alone. Compound

this misfortune with the reality that these widowed women are four times more likely, and a single or divorced woman are five times more likely, to live in poverty after retirement than a married man.

America's elderly women, many of whom live alone and in poverty, have higher out-of-pocket health care costs and are now being denied access to a secure and responsible Medicare prescription drug plan under the Republican Plan. Almost 8 out of 10 women on Medicare use prescription drugs regularly, though most pay for these medications out-of-pocket. Now we are telling these women, who already spend 20 percent more on prescription drugs than their male counterparts, that they must navigate the privatized ropes, and we can only hope, not guarantee, that they will have affordable coverage and monthly premiums. Even middle-class women who have made wise financial planning decisions will quickly find that high drug costs may undermine any retirement security they have worked hard to establish.

My district, which is predominately Latino, will be one of the hardest hit by this new legislation. Latina women make up the largest minority percentage (58 percent) on Medicare with incomes less than $10,000. These minority women historically rely on public, rather than private, health insurance. Now, we are stripping their only health coverage security and implementing a new, privatized and completely unmapable plan!

Have we not learned our lessons from Medicare+Choice that private plans do not participate in many regions, that their premiums and benefits vary greatly by geographic are, that participation by Medicare HMO's has been unstable, and that private plans are not less costly than traditional Medicare?

By 2025, Latinos are expected to comprise 18 percent of the elderly population and they are continually encountering strategically placed barriers that hinder their equal right to quality health care.

Let's not forget all the mothers, grandmothers, and sisters now and in the future for whom Medicare represents a lifeline to a healthy retirement. Who wants to tell the millions of hard working women who take care of their families that once again, because of irresponsible and unbalanced tax cuts, their health care and prescription drug needs will be sacrificed?

Mr. Speaker, I thank our ranking member for yielding me the time.

I rise tonight in opposition to this bill. We have heard a lot tonight about how this bill is going to help our seniors from the other side of the aisle. Well, I want to talk about the seniors that I represent in my hometown in the San Gabriel Valley in East Los Angeles, California.

In my congressional district, I represent nearly 6,000, 6,000 seniors in poverty, making less than $11,000 a year. For them the cost of prescription drugs is so overwhelming that they often have to forgo between paying their medicine or having a meal or paying a phone bill. That is what it means to seniors in my district.

This is a choice that no senior citizen should have to make. Yet the Republican bill does nothing to reduce the cost of prescription drugs. It does not allow us to use the purchasing power of Medicare beneficiaries to negotiate lower drug prices. How ironic, just like we do for the Veterans Administration.

So what do we tell Grandma, living alone on a fixed income who cannot afford her medicine? Sorry, but Medicare has a new drug benefit, but it is not for you? Sorry, but Medicare is raising part B deductibles by eight times as much as our Social Security cost-of-living increase?

Only the Democratic alternative that we will debate later on tonight will do what I think my senior citizens want to hear, and it will provide them with the guaranteed, affordable, easy-to-use drug benefit that is part of Medicare.

Let us be clear tonight. For our seniors, for our grandmothers, our uncles, our fathers and our mothers, there is only one thing to talk about tonight and it is about medicine. This should not be about privatization or insurance companies or anything else. Let us give our senior citizens the help they need to pay for that medicine.

Let us oppose this proposal being put forward tonight by the Republicans and support the Democratic prescription drug bill.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to urge my colleagues on the other side of the aisle to bring to this House an affordable and guaranteed Medicare prescription drug benefit to seniors. So far, my Republican colleagues have proposed a bill that does nothing to lower the cost of prescription drugs and actually raises seniors' Medicare part B deductible at a rate of eight times higher than their Social Security cost of living increase, which was just 1.5 percent.

Perhaps they are not hearing the same message that I hear when I go home and talk to my constituents. In the cities that I represent in East Los Angeles and in the San Gabriel Valley, seniors are telling me that they want an affordable and guaranteed drug benefit, just like the Democratic plan. They do not want a voucher program that dismantles Medicare as they know it. They simply want their medicine, and they want a choice to be able to keep their doctor.

Thirty-eight years ago this program was created. So many people in our district, the district that I represent, feel that this is their safety net and here we are attempting to try to privatize it. That is the wrong thing to do while people right now are struggling to make ends meet. Vote down this proposition that is being put forward by the Republican Party.

Mr. Speaker, I am delighted to be here tonight to talk about a very important issue that is resonating across the country, and just recently on my return back from my district, more importantly, the issue of Medicare and prescription drug reform which is impacting largely low-income working families and especially many of the families that I represent in my district in California, Latino working families.

The facts are clear, 87 percent of uninsured Latinos come from working taxpaying families. However, nearly 60 percent of Latinos live in families with incomes below 200 percent of the poverty level. Many of these families, 37 percent, in fact, lack basic access to quality care. Low-income elderly Latinos face incomparable barriers to health care at just about every corner of their lives. Linguistic, cultural, financial burdens continually impede their health access that would otherwise be available to every American.

When President Johnson signed the Medicare bill back in 1965 he said, and I quote: ``No longer will older Americans be denied the healing miracle of modern medicine.''

Medicare was not created to exclude the elderly in exchange to enrich private insurance companies. The Republican proposal as I see it undermines the universal character of Medicare that ensures quality for all seniors. Instead, it provides different benefits to different seniors depending on your income. Figures estimate that the Medicare beneficiaries who spend $4,000 or more out of pocket on drugs are not individuals making less than 100 percent of poverty, not those between 100 and 200 percent of poverty, but those individuals who live with incomes greater than 200 percent of poverty. These are the people we are asking to pay the most for their prescription drugs.

The House Republican bill increases costs for seniors by $8 billion and does not offer meaningful benefits, nor does it make drugs affordable for our seniors. How can we even realistically say we are attempting to improve the lives of all Americans when the Latinos and low-income elderly population are the most susceptible for falling between the privatized cracks?

There are more than 214,000 Latino Medicare beneficiaries currently residing in the State where I come from, in California, and over 55 percent of those seniors report having little or no information. They do not even know about the bilingual toll-free Medicare phone number. Some do not even have telephones in their homes. Who will care for those beneficiaries when the Republicans impose unaffordable premiums, requiring spending up to $250 before they can receive any help at all? This even prohibits the HHS Secretary from negotiating better prices. I thought he was supposed to be working on our side on behalf of our consumers and our seniors.

With private and for-profit managed care plans competing to entice healthy seniors to enroll, traditional Medicare will be forced to raise out-of-pocket costs astronomically for the sickest and most disabled beneficiaries. The holes in the cracks are visible. We are just seeing what has occurred in the State of California where many beneficiaries were dumped and they were left without care.

I urge my colleagues on the other side of the aisle to think of the future of these populations, the low-income, taxpaying. Whether they are Latino or not, let us help all the elderly who deserve accessible and meaningful Medicare plans. Let us protect our Nation by caring for all American seniors, and let us begin by working with the program that we know works, that will make a difference for all of us.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to Ms. Minnie Lopez-Baffo, the first Latina appointed to serve on the California Contractors State Licensing Board, as she completes her last term on the Board.

As a member of the California Contractors State Licensing Board since 1995, Ms. Lopez-Baffo has worked on legislation and consumer education committees utilizing her knowledge and expertise to educate and protect California consumers. While she served as Board Chair from July 2001 through June 2002, Ms. Lopez-Baffo was known as a fair and impartial leader and a dedicated guardian of the rights of consumers.

Ms. Lopez-Baffo is an exemplarily leader whose diligent work and dedication to her community inspired others to work hard. I am honored to call her my friend and I commend her for her vision and dedication to advocate on behalf of California's consumers.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me time.

Mr. Speaker, I rise also to express my strong support for the Rangel substitute and to thank the ranking member for his continual struggle for equitable and just tax laws.

Just tax laws are fiscally responsible and fairly allocated. Nowhere is this injustice of the Republican leadership better illustrated than in the shrewd treatment of the child tax credit. To

ensure at all costs that the rich campaign donors will get the maximum tax credits, Republicans cut out 200,000 military families that they just sent to war, these men and women that are serving abroad. They cut out working families. They cut out single working mothers. They cut out hard working people from all over the world who come to America to seek a better life and play by the rules and pay taxes.

I looked at my district in Los Angeles, San Gabriel Valley and East Los Angeles, and saw that one out of four families would get no tax relief. In fact, in my own district, I do not even have one single millionaire. So there you go. People pay in but they do not get anything out. And I saw that instead they would be saddled with the huge debts of tax. For years to come their children have to bear this. They would lose essential health care services.

And today in our Committee on Energy and Commerce, we are debating the demise, the demise of Medicare, services that are so vital and important to the health of our senior citizens. With less money for infrastructure and environmental protections and Social Security, that is what the Republicans want to talk about.

And I am happy that along with my Democratic colleagues, we cried out the last few weeks against this injustice and the country listened to us. In fact, the other body and the President responded by agreeing to restore the child tax credit. But these folks on the other side, they do not want to listen. They think that somehow nobody is paying attention. They use the child tax credit to try to make a $400 billion deficit even bigger. There you go. They take, they take, they take, but they do not give back.

I implore my colleagues to please, across the aisle, please support the Rangel substitute.

Mr. Speaker, tonight I rise as Chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Health Task Force and want to call the attention to the imposed impact that the so-called Medicare reform will have not only on the Latino community but across the Nation as well. Minority Medicare beneficiaries including Latinos are among the fastest-growing portions of this population, and they currently represent about 16 percent of the total Medicare population; but by the year 2025, Latinos are expected to account for 18 percent of the elderly population.

Yet time after time we ignore the needs of the community by creating packages that help HMOs and the private insurance industry and not necessarily our seniors. Just look at the proposed Republican Medicare prescription drug plan. They want to strip Medicare's foundation by forcing seniors to change plans, change doctors, change pharmacies, and even change the drugs that they take every 12 months. Not only are the enrollment procedures extremely complex, now we are asking our Nation's elderly to make incredible changes that many will feel uncomfortable about making into a program that does not even make drugs affordable for our seniors; and nearly 60 percent of Latinos live with families with incomes below 200 percent of the poverty level and 87 percent of the uninsured, that means working poor families, Latinos coming and trying to receive some type of health care benefit. Yet how can we even realistically say that we are attempting to improve the lives of all American seniors when the Latino elderly population, which is the fastest growing, will be the most susceptible in this privatized plan?

There are more than 214,000 Latino Medicare beneficiaries right now residing in the State of California that I represent. Fifty-five percent of Latino seniors covered under California's Medicare program report having little or no information about Medicare, including access to a toll-free Medicare number; and I say that specifically because we need to improve access to different communities in their respective languages so that we can really access and have the benefit of having all seniors participate in these programs.

Who is going to care for these beneficiaries when the Republicans impose unaffordable premiums, require spending of $250 before they receive any help at all? In some cases in my district that would be disastrous. It would mean not being able to pay their rent or be able to buy additional medicine that they need because $250 is a large amount for people in my district. It even prohibits, get this, the HHS Secretary, Secretary Tommy Thompson, from negotiating better prices. Hello? I thought that is what his job was there for. He was supposed to watch out for our interests.

We cannot ignore the 25 percent of Latinos compared to 10 percent of non-Latino whites who do not have supplemental insurance along with traditional Medicare, and in my district Latino seniors continuously share with me their concerns about the monthly Medicare premiums and the costs of prescription drugs. We have to make the prescription drug benefit an advantage for all Americans regardless of where they come from and regardless of what language they speak, and we need to help our country's seniors and people with disabilities navigate through an affordable system made easily available and meaningful to them and protecting their benefits. We need to protect the choices that they currently have because that is what really matters at the end of the day. We need to provide physician choice, pharmacy availability, and prescription drug selection. Let us not strip the security from our seniors. Let us work toward a program that helps improve all the lives of our seniors.

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

Mr. Chairman, I would like to also voice my strong opposition to this bill, H.R. 1115. This bill is worse than what we saw last year, and it would be applied retroactively to pending cases, including those brought by employees at Enron for financial fraud, Dow Chemical for environmental charges, and Wal-Mart for employment discrimination against women.

In midstream the bill would strip the rights of plaintiffs in these cases, causing expensive and wasteful interruption of their pursuit for justice and equal treatment under the law.

In the wake of corporate scandals, workers in our country have lost well over $175 billion in retirement savings. Let us look at the real facts here. In California alone, workers have lost over $18 billion in retirement savings. At a time when we should be holding corporations more accountable, not less, their bill sends the wrong message.

Congress should stand up and protect consumers, employees, pensioners, and not corporate wrongdoers. They call this the Class Action Fairness bill? I am sorry. In my language it is a mentiras. That means it is a lie.

I urge my colleagues to please vote for the Sandlin-Conners substitute.

Mr. Chairman, during rollcall vote No. 268 on the Jackson- Lee amendment to H.R. 1115, I was unavoidably detained. Had I been present, I would have voted ``aye.''

Announcement by the Chairman pro tempore

Mr. Chairman, during rollcall vote No. 269 on the Lofgren/ Sanchez amendment to H.R. 1115 I was unavoidably detained. Had I been present, I would have voted ``aye.''

Amendment in the Nature of a Substitute No. 4 Offered by Mr. Sandlin

Mr. Chairman, during rollcall vote No. 270 on the Sandlin amendment to H.R. 1115 I was unavoidably detained. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yea.''

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor and remember Sergeant Atanasio Haro Marin, who lost his life in service to our Nation during Operation Iraqi Freedom. Today was his funeral. He came from a city I represent in Baldwin Park.

He was a member of Battery C, 3rd Battalion, 16th Field Artillery, 4th Infantry Division of Fort Hood, Texas. Today I pay tribute to him, to his loved ones, to his family for the safety and freedom and protections that he gave us. Let us not forget the other soldiers that are there that are also protecting our freedoms.

Mr. Speaker, I ask that Members of Congress please join me in extending my sincerest sympathy and condolences to the family and friends of Sergeant Atanasio Haro Marin, and would ask that all Americans join me in remembering our soldiers at this time.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor and remember Sergeant Atanasio Haro Marin who lost his life in service to our nation during Operation Iraqi Freedom. Sergeant Haro Marin was a member of Battery C, 3rd Battalion, 16th Field Artillery, 4th Infantry Division (Mechanized) of Fort Hood, Texas, and was from Baldwin Park, CA.

Sergeant Haro Marin exemplified the very best of our great nation. He represents the spirit of the brave soldier, exhibiting courage, selfless service, and honor beyond measure. His heroic actions have contributed to the safety, freedom, and security of our nation, Iraq, and the world.

I would like to extend my sincerest sympathy and condolences to the family and friends of Sergeant Haro Marin, and would ask that all Americans join me in remembering our soldiers and their loved ones during these challenging times.

Though Sergeant Haro Marin has passed, his spirit remains in the freedom that each and every American enjoys. Through his valiancy, bravery, and fearless commitment to the Armed Services of our nation, many lives have been touched. Our nation is privileged to have service men and women like Sergeant Haro Marin willing to risk their lives for the greater good of our country. I urge my colleagues to join me in remembering the life of Sergeant Atanasio Haro Marin.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today also to join with my colleagues in celebrating Patsy Mink. We are going to honor her by naming a post office after her, but she deserves so much more. She was a wonderful human being whom I had a chance to know in my first term here in Congress. She was a warrior, a warrior in the sense that she fought for those who were voiceless. She was a champion for women's rights, equality, civil rights and environmental justice, someone whom I believe will always be remembered in the halls here of Congress. She was a role model not only to women of color but also to the many, many young women who were striving for equality in the sports field, to even the playing field. Today with much honor, I wear a symbol of shattering the glass ceiling. This pin that I am wearing, this brooch, symbolizes women breaking through and challenging and shattering the glass ceiling. Patsy Mink was one of those warriors, someone who was always constantly testing our tenacity, encouraging us as women and new Members here in the House to step forward. She was tremendous in the arguments and debates that occurred on welfare reform. Even though we did not get what we wanted, she was there.

I commend the gentleman from Hawaii (Mr. Case) and the gentleman from Hawaii (Mr. Abercrombie), who are paying tribute to her. She is a wonderful individual. I would ask our colleagues to support this measure.

Mr. Speaker, tonight I rise to speak on behalf of future generations of Americans. The needs of these children, and their children, are clear. They need a strong economy, quality education, health care and a clean environment.

The $350 billion tax cut passed by House Republicans provides none of this. In fact, the tax cut steals from the future to feed the greedy of today.

Last-minute changes made by Republicans will prevent families, like this one, with incomes of less than $26,000, who have 11.9 million children, from receiving the child tax credit. In fact, 1 out of every 4 families in my district in California will get no child tax credit.

Working families, like the one pictured here, who told me how hard they are working just to provide basic needs for their children, will get nothing. House Republicans claim they could not fit these families into their tax cut. Somehow they found plenty of room, however, to allow corporations such as Enron to continue to hide $50 billion in offshore tax shelters.

How can I go back to my district and tell families such as this one that their children will get no tax relief because Republicans chose to protect corporate tax shelters instead?

In the Republican plan to rob the future, millionaires get $90,000 in tax cuts, while working families like this one, who build and invigorate our economy, will get next to nothing.

For example, 47 percent of the people in my State of California will get a total tax cut of less than $100. One hundred dollars does not go too far in California, which has some of the highest costs of living in the country; 140,000 of those families in my district will get no child tax credit, and many of these families saw their sons and daughters and fathers and mothers go off to the war. Across the country, there are 250,000 children of active duty military families, such as these, that will receive no child tax credit.

These families all sacrifice when we ask them to protect future generations of Americans. How can I go home and tell these families that their own and future generations will get nothing because Republicans would not even sacrifice a few thousand dollars of the millionaire's $93,000 tax cut?

Families in my district and across the country suffer from rapidly increasing rates of asthma and respiratory disease. How can I tell them the pollution that compromises their health will only get worse because Republicans made room for $100,000 tax breaks for the largest, most polluting SUVs?

These same families, along with families of 9.2 million children across the country, already cannot get relief for their children because they have no health insurance. How can I tell them that we could have provided this coverage, but instead Republicans chose to create a $350 billion tax cut that goes mostly to the wealthy?

Everywhere we look we see future generations in peril. We have schools that need $300 billion in maintenance and repair, a No Child Left Behind Act that is short $9.7 billion, 44 million people with no health care, basic water infrastructure in critical decline, and 9 million people unemployed.

With a $400 billion deficit and 100,000 jobs lost from the economy each month, we have few resources and little time to deal with this problem. Yet Republicans spend our time forcing through a tax plan that primarily helps millionaires, offshore tax haven, and large SUVs.

This is nothing short of a crime. The future has been stolen from future generations, like this family.

Madam Speaker, today I rise to introduce a bill designating a post office after Francisco Martinez Flores, a courageous and dedicated Marine from the city of Duarte in California in my congressional district.

Lance Corporal Francisco Martinez Flores demonstrated his courage and his love of our country when he lost his life serving in Operation Iraqi Freedom just 2 weeks before gaining his U.S. citizenship. I take this opportunity not only to pay tribute to Lance Corporal Martinez Flores as a brave and self-sacrificing Marine, but also to remember him as a loving son, brother, a friend to those living in California's 32nd Congressional District.

Known affectionately by his friends and family as ``Panchito'', Lance Corporal Martinez grew up in the city of Duarte, having emigrated with his family at the age of 3 from Mexico. He attended Duarte High School, where he displayed both his artistic and athletic talents by participating in the high school football team and jazz band.

After graduating from high school in June of 2000, Francisco enlisted in the Marines and was assigned to the First Marine Division Marine Corps Air Ground-Combat Center at Twenty-nine Palms in California. On January 23, 2003, Lance Corporal Martinez Flores was sent abroad to fight in Operation Iraqi Freedom. While only 2 weeks shy of gaining his U.S. citizenship, he was killed in the line of duty near Nasiriyah, Iraq, on March 25, 2003.

After his death, Lance Corporal Martinez Flores was granted posthumous U.S. citizenship on April 6, 2003. He was one of those thousands of lawful permanent residents who volunteered their service to protect the United States by joining the U.S. military.

Lance Corporal Martinez Flores was a strong, noble, valiant man who lost his life to ensure the loved ones he left behind could live in a safer and more secure world. His mother, Martha, stated, ``He loved the United States so much. He was from Mexico, but he was fighting for America and its ideals.''

My heart and my prayers go out to the family and friends of Lance Corporal Martinez Flores, as well as to all those who have lost their loved ones during these turbulent times. The mayor and city council of the city of Duarte have also expressed their support for naming the post office located at 1210 Highland Avenue in Duarte, California, after Francisco A. Martinez Flores.

I urge my colleagues to join me in recognizing the American ideals of hero Lance Corporal Francisco Martinez Flores, who fought for and defended the spirit that we embody here in this House.

I also want to provide attention to his family, because his family is a working-class family. They work very hard to put food on their table, and I could see where they are going to need a lot of comfort and help and support by this Federal Government. I hope, too, that by the end of the week we also can pay them with the child tax credit that they would need that they would not be eligible for at this time.

So I would ask Members to remember a soldier who gave his life, a soldier who represents a working-class family who dedicated himself to the freedoms that we have. Let us not forget our men and women who serve us and those that are giving their lives as we stand here tonight.