Floor Statements

Mr. Chair, next week is Passover, when the youngest child at the Seder table asks four questions, the answers to which explain the meaning of the holiday.

In keeping with the tradition of asking questions to understand the importance of key events, I'd like to suggest four questions to ask Republicans so that they can explain the reasoning behind their budget resolution.

Why does your budget resolution protect and indeed increase the wealth of the already-wealthy at the expense of everyone else? The Bible says, ``He who oppresses the poor to increase his wealth and he who gives gifts to the rich--both come to poverty.'' (Proverbs 22:16). Income disparity is at near-historic levels in our Nation. Why then, does the Republican budget provide an average additional tax break of $150,000 for millionaires and refuse to eliminate subsidies to highly profitable Big Oil companies, while asking seniors, children, the poor and middle-class families to sacrifice more and more?

Why does your budget resolution take away the Medicare guarantee? The Bible tells us, ``You shall give due honor and respect to the elderly.'' (Leviticus 19:32). The average senior lives on $19,000, one in three retirees depends on Social Security for 90 percent or more of their income, and 1 in 3 seniors will need help paying for long-term care. Why, then, does the Republican budget double already high out-of- pocket spending for seniors, threaten Social Security, and cut Medicaid by $810 billion over the next decade?

Why does your budget resolution increase defense spending while cutting investments in our children and families? The Bible tells us, ``A just balance and scales are the Lord's.'' (Proverbs 16:11). The U.S. defense budget is higher than the next 17 nations in the world combined and has increased in real terms for each of the past 13 years. Why, then, does the Republican budget renege on a balanced approach to deficit reduction--increasing defense spending and asking education, job training and creation, medical research and other domestic programs to bear the entire burden?

Why does your budget resolution take away food from the poor? The Bible tells us, ``If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth.'' (1 John 3:17 18). Nearly 50 million Americans lack adequate food and 22 percent of America's children live in poverty. Why, then, does the Republican budget cut and cap the food assistance needed so that children, families and seniors can't get enough to eat?

Madam Speaker, today I voted against H.R. 4281, the Surface Transportation Extension Act. I oppose this legislation not because I oppose transportation funding--on the contrary--but because we can and should pass a better-funded and longer-term bill.

The unemployment rate in the construction industry is nearly double the national average. Over the past year, I have met with many of my constituents who work in the construction industry, including construction workers, designers, managers, engineers, contractors, and developers. The one thing they have all shared is that another short- term extension will not bring enough certainty to the industry to encourage the types of project development and job creation that our country needs.

I object to H.R. 4281 because there is a better bill we can pass right now. I am a cosponsor of H.R. 14, or MAP 21, which is identical to the bill that passed the Senate with an overwhelming bipartisan majority, 74 22. MAP 21 would fund our transportation and infrastructure needs for two years. If the Republican leadership would allow that bill to come to the floor, we could pass it today. Instead, they have elected to play political games and pass a bill that promotes an unpredictable transportation future.

I can't support a 90-day extension that will bring another funding battle at the end of June, during the heart of our construction season in Illinois. This attempt to ``kick the can down the road'' will delay projects and risk 4,500 jobs in our state alone. We need to move forward with legislation that will provide our state, local communities, and small businesses the stability and predictability they need. A short-term extension will do nothing to alleviate concerns about future funding and will not reduce unemployment.

Businesses and employees need the increased certainty that MAP 21 will provide. We owe it to our constituents to oppose a short-term extension in favor of that bipartisan, commonsense legislation that will protect and promote our economic and transportation needs.

Mr. Speaker, for too long, women have faced discrimination at the hands of insurance companies who label pregnancy as a preexisting condition and then deny coverage or charge more for it.

Erin from Chicago writes:

When I found out I was pregnant, I had full insurance

coverage. I was told, however, that I did not have a

pregnancy rider and therefore my pregnancy would not be

covered.

How can I pay for health insurance that will not cover a

vital part of a woman's life? I was asked if I wanted to

purchase the rider that would not take effect for over 365

days.

Thanks to ObamaCare, insurers will no longer be able to get away with this. Beginning in 2014, insurers cannot deny or charge more for any preexisting condition, and that would include pregnancy.

Mr. Speaker, on March 8, I voted against H.R. 3606, the Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act. H.R. 3606 has the admirable goal of increasing access to capital for small businesses, a goal that I strongly support. Unfortunately, I cannot support the legislation because, at the same time that it seeks to help small businesses, it takes away critical protections for investors.

In the wake of the Enron scandal, Congress acted to improve corporate transparency and give potential investors--particularly small investors--access to the information they need to make sound financial decisions. H.R. 3606 eliminates many of those provisions and, by doing so, leaves unsophisticated investors vulnerable. We can and should promote the interests of American entrepreneurs and small business owners without taking away recently passed rights for small investors. It is the wrong medicine for American small business growth.

The bill would give new companies up to five years to raise money from the public, eliminating the current requirements that an assessment of the soundness of the company's internal controls be included as part of the financial statement audit and made available to investors. That allows companies to raise money from unsophisticated investors without reasonable oversight of a company's operations.

It would enable crowd-funding, mass solicitations to investors who will now lack basic information about a company's financial soundness, a practice that is not currently allowed.

H.R. 3606 would increase the amount of capital that companies can raise from the public without triggering the full reporting and other obligations that are required under current law. That reporting includes compensation--including golden parachute compensation--of executives, making it incredibly difficult for even sophisticated shareholders to understand the status of their investment. In addition, it eliminates the Dodd-Frank requirement that shareholders approve compensation packages for emerging growth companies.

The JOBS Act would promote uncertainty, undermine capital markets, and therefore increase the cost of capital for the same small businesses it is meant to help. It would put us on a return course toward laissez-faire economics that previously led to the collapse of enormous companies to the economic ruin of their employees and investors. It is for these reasons that H.R. 3606 is opposed by the Council of Institutional Investors, the Consumer Federation of America, AARP, Americans for Financial Reform, the North American Security Administrators Association, and other consumer and investor organizations.

I urge my colleagues in the Senate to consider the ramifications of this legislation if it comes up for consideration.

I thank the gentleman very much for yielding to me.

I hope the American people understand what's going on here today. H.R. 5 represents another in a long line of partisan political attacks on the Affordable Care Act.

Since its passage 2 years ago, this historic law has been under attack. Today's bill would repeal the Independent Payment Advisory Board. The Affordable Care Act is replete with provisions to lower Medicare costs, from unprecedented tools to fight fraud to efficiency reforms. The IPAB is a backstop to those provisions.

What the Affordable Care Act does not do--and what the IPAB is prohibited from doing--is increase costs to seniors and people with disabilities or cut benefits. That may be why my Republican colleagues don't like it. If you look at their proposal to take away the Medicare guarantee and turn it into a voucher program, you can see why. Instead of lowering costs for everyone as the Affordable Care Act does, the Republican plan just shifts costs onto the backs of those who can least afford it--seniors, disabled people, and their families. These are the same people who are harmed by the tort-reform provisions of H.R. 5-- Federal intrusion coupled with disregard for injured consumers.

Instead of working to improve health care quality, as the Affordable Care Act does, H.R. 5 simply restricts the rights of patients harmed by dangerous drug companies, nursing homes, medical device manufacturers, doctors, and hospitals.

I am especially opposed to arbitrary caps on noneconomic damages. Economic damages provide compensation for lost wages. Noneconomic damages provide compensation for injuries that are just as real and damaging, injuries liking excruciating pain, disfigurement, loss of a spouse or a grandparent, inability to bear children. These arbitrary caps are particularly discriminatory for seniors and children who don't have lost wages and are not worth much.

H.R. 5--higher costs to seniors and disabled people and fewer legal rights for injured consumers. It's a bad deal on both counts.

I hope the American people understand what is going on here today. H.R. 5 represents another in a long line of partisan political attacks on the Affordable Care Act.

Yesterday, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle released their FY 2013 budget proposal. Once again they propose to repeal the Affordable Care Act and once again they propose to end the Medicare guarantee.

I find it ironic that my colleagues on the other side of the aisle criticize the Medicare program because they claim cost growth is out of control and the program is going bankrupt.

The Medicare provisions of the Affordable Care Act are replete with provisions from cutting fraud to improving the efficiency of health care delivery that will lower costs--without shifting costs to seniors and people with disabilities or cutting the Medicare guarantee. The Independent Payment Advisory Board is designed as a backstop to those provisions--which CB0 tells us will be effective enough that we will not even need IPAB for the next decade.

And, here we are today set to consider legislation to repeal the Independent Payment Advisory Board not because my colleagues on the other side of the aisle have a better idea but because they want to get rid of the entire Affordable Care Act and eliminate Medicare.

If IPAB has to act, the Affordable Care Act explicitly states that it can only make recommendations regarding Medicare and cannot make recommendations that would ration care, raise premiums, increase cost- sharing, restrict benefits or modify eligibility. IPAB is also supposed to consider the effect of its recommendations on Medicare solvency, quality and access to care, the effect on changes in payments to providers, and the impact on those dually eligible for Medicare and Medicaid.

There are certainly ways to improve IPAB and the Affordable Care Act--but the bill before us doesn't make improvements--it just repeals. I wish my colleagues on the other side of the aisle would be honest with seniors, people with disabilities and the American public about their replacement plan.

What exactly is the Republican alternative? My colleagues on the other side of the aisle have talked a lot about Medicare costs and sustainability, but what is their plan? If the alternative is anything like the proposals included in the Republican budget--which shifts costs to seniors and empowers insurance companies--then I choose IPAB.

My colleagues on the other side of the aisle have strategically paired IPAB repeal with medical malpractice reform.

We do have a medical malpractice crisis in this country--but it is not that injured consumers are suing too much--in fact, the number of suits has declined. It is not that injured consumers are receiving exorbitant compensation--in fact, the size of settlements and awards have been stable--tracking the rate of medical inflation.

The crisis we are facing in America is that too many patients are the victims of medical errors and too many good doctors are being overcharged by private insurers. We cannot make this a fight between doctors and trial lawyers and lose sight of the fact that too many Americans will be affected by malpractice. Their lives and the lives of their families will never be the same. It is their interests that we must protect.

One in three patients admitted to a hospital experiences an ``adverse event''--they get the wrong prescription, receive the wrong surgical procedure, acquire an infection. But this goes far beyond preventable medical injuries in hospitals. This legislation is so broadly drafted that it will apply to medical devices, pharmaceutical products, nursing homes and for-profit health insurers.

We haven't any assurance that this bill will reduce the incidence of medical malpractice--nor has anyone given us any assurance that it will lower medical liability premiums. But one thing is certain--it will trample on states' rights and take away long-standing civil justice

rights. Taking away patient rights does not improve the quality of our health care system--it just leaves injured consumers without recourse.

I especially oppose arbitrary caps on non-economic damages and other restrictions on the rights of medical malpractice victims to seek accountability and compensation for their injuries. We are going to hear from proponents of H.R. 5 that these caps are not harmful because economic costs--medical bills and lost wages--are left uncapped.

But what about injuries that are just as painful but less quantifiable--the inability to bear children, the loss of a spouse or child or grandparent, excruciating pain, permanent and severe disfigurement.

Non-economic damages compensate injured victims for very real injuries--and those who suffer those injuries deserve their full and fair day in court.

H.R. 5 is an attack on victims who, for the rest of their lives, will suffer as a result of negligence and malpractice. We should not add to their pain by denying them their legal rights.

I urge my colleagues to reject H.R. 50.

Mr. Speaker, at a speak-out on women's right to birth control, I solicited comments from the huge audience that attended, and here are a few.

Reverend Luke Pepper writes:

As a Christian and as a minister, I believe that it is

important and necessary that we promote the quality of health

care and livelihood of the families in this country.

Providing access and availability of quality contraception to

women is the right and moral thing to do.

A young anonymous woman wrote:

I'm a virgin. I take birth control because I have

polycystic ovary syndrome, and it will reduce my risk of

uterine cancer.

Diane writes:

My oldest son is on the autism spectrum. Nearly 6 years

after he was born, my husband and I judged our family ready

to support and nurture a second child. If, through the lack

of access to birth control, we had been forced to risk an

unplanned pregnancy before we were ready, we would not have

had the resources--financial or emotional--to give our older

son the care and support he needed that enabled him to become

the fine young man he is. Nor would we have been able to

devote full care and attention to his beloved young brother.

Thank you for this opportunity to speak about a really good friend of mine, Don Payne. When I heard that his situation was grave, I gave a call to his brother, Bill, whom I had gotten to know on trips that he and Don took, and had the privilege then of speaking with Don. He was in hospice. This was just a couple of days ago. And I was able to tell him how much I loved him and able to tell him that I hoped that he found peace and comfort in the knowledge that he helped so many people in this world.

Don Payne was a real citizen of the world, a quiet and dignified gentleman, but he had a fierce commitment to justice and human rights everywhere. He was really the de facto ambassador to Africa. No one in this Congress knew or cared more for the people of Africa. He also personally knew the leaders, and they knew and respected him. His knowledge and his relationships will leave a big hole here. He was the go-to person. If you wanted to know anything about what was going on, the political situation, or who was who on the continent, Don Payne was the one to go to.

As I said, I was able to travel with Don and Bill to many places around the world and always listened carefully, as everyone did, when Don spoke with the kind of knowledge that he had about all things dealing with foreign relations, about all things dealing with human rights. So my heart goes out to my good friend, Bill Payne, to the children and grandchildren and one great grandchild of Donald Payne, my beloved friend, whom I'll miss so much.

Mr. Chair, on rollcall Nos. 83--Thompson/Eshoo Amendment, 84--McNerney Amendment No. 3, and 85--McNerney Amendment No. 4, had I been present, I would have voted ``aye.''

Amendment No. 5 Offered by Mr. Garamendi

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize the enormous impact and the many accomplishments of my dear friend, Alice Tregay. Alice has spent almost five decades pouring her heart and soul into promoting social change. Over these years, her activism has taken on many different forms: she has advocated on behalf of the disadvantaged, registered thousands of new voters, managed high profile political campaigns, and more. As a result of her actions, citizens of Illinois and those across the country are better off.

Ms. Tregay's first leap into activism came in 1964, when she joined the protest against Chicago Public Schools Superintendent Willis and his infamous ``Willis Wagons.'' These wagons perpetuated segregation, and the community was energized in opposition. Marching alongside well- known figures such as Al Raby and Dick Gregory, Alice learned just how much of an impact ordinary people could have. In the end, not only were the Willis Wagons shut down, but Superintendent Willis himself was removed as a result of the community's activities.

This first protest opened a door for Alice, and she leapt through it with her characteristic enthusiasm. She fought housing discrimination in the Chicagoland area, and marched in support of open housing alongside Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. When Dr. King's Operation Breadbasket began operations in the Chicagoland area, Alice was intimately involved. She worked hand in hand with Rev. Jesse Jackson and Rev. James Bevel to eliminate discrimination and provide jobs for the disadvantaged.

Within Operation Breadbasket, Alice started the Political Education Division. This branch of the organization trained thousands of students over a five-year period, teaching them how to organize citizens and lead political campaigns. After training a future generation of activists, Alice went even farther. She traveled to the southern United States, registering thousands of voters between Chicago and Mississippi.

Later, she served as an essential staff member on many campaigns, including but not limited to such great leaders as Congressmen Abner Mikva and Jesse Jackson, Mayor Harold Washington, and President Jimmy Carter.

In addition to her campaigning, Alice went on to serve as Director and Chief Lobbyist for the Black Illinois Legislative Lobby. In this role, she continued to work tirelessly to protect the civil rights of our citizens, and to promote the economic parity of minorities and the poor.

Alice Tregay has impacted untold numbers of lives as an organizer, educator, and change maker. She gave a voice to those who are too frequently ignored. She provided the tools to engage and equip a new generation of activists. Many of her students continue to fight for her ideals, each and every day. On behalf of myself and the many individuals who have benefited from her activities, I extend my heartfelt thanks and love to Alice Tregay for all that she has done.

I thank you for that question and for leading this hour in this important discussion.

No. In fact, our colleagues in the majority want to pay for the legislation in the transportation bill, but what they want to continue to do is to refuse to touch a single hair on the heads of millionaires and billionaires, and they stand firm in their defense of the big oil companies and the corporations that ship their jobs overseas. Instead of asking the wealthiest Americans to contribute a little bit more, they want to ask Federal workers. Instead of going to the 1 percent, they want to ask people who are solidly in the 99 percent to pay the price.

Federal employees are hardworking, middle class Americans, who work for the Federal Government all across this country, not just in Washington. In fact, only about 30 percent of Federal employees are in Washington. Of course, some of them work in our offices, and they work in this House of Representatives. We all represent Federal workers.

So who are they? You mentioned a few. Yet there are also those benefit specialists who help our seniors get their Social Security and Medicare benefits, and they're the law enforcement professionals who defend our borders and our ports and our skies and us when we're here in the Capitol.

Those are called Federal employees, as are the Capitol Police; and they're computer and network specialists who spend their days making sure that we're safe from cyberattacks. They're medical and scientific researchers who are looking for cures for devastating diseases. They're the nurses and doctors who take care of our wounded warriors. They're the men and women who make sure the food supply is safe and that our water is clean enough for our children to drink. They're the hardworking support staff. I just left my office, and I was having my trash and recycling taken away.

Those are all Federal employees. There are 423,000 Federal employees who earn less than $50,000 a year; and 48 percent of them are women, but 60 percent of the employees earning less than $50,000 a year are women. They are the people who have seen their pay frozen for 2 years while health care and other costs are going up.

For 2 years. That's about $30 billion a year in cuts. So they've already given up, really, about $60 billion from a normal increase in wages just to pay for the cost of things going up. Everybody knows that the cost of food and gasoline and those kinds of things are going up, and still we aren't asking millionaires--or they aren't. The Republicans who propose these cuts, these additional contributions from Federal employees, are not asking millionaires and billionaires to contribute their fair share.

Let me also say this.

Some argue that, oh, well, it's such a cushy job to work for the Federal Government and that Federal employees actually make more money than in the private sector. Let me explain that.

As for the people who work in the lower-wage jobs for the Federal Government, women actually make more working for government than they do in the private sector because, in the private sector, they make about 70 cents on the dollar, and thank goodness the Federal Government has more equity in what it pays. The same is true for minorities, who earn much less than white men do in the private sector; but when you work for the Federal Government, you have certain protections and certain equity that we've all supported, so they make more money.

When you get to the higher-wage jobs, working for the National Institutes of Health or more, for the higher-skilled jobs, in fact, those workers who work for the Federal Government could make more in the private sector, but they have made a decision to help our government, to help our country by working in the public sector.

So when they say some Federal workers earn more, I say God bless them because we don't discriminate like many in the private sector do, and we wish that the private sector would not discriminate in pay against women and minorities. It's not as if they should go out there and earn less money.

It's estimated, actually, that those individuals could probably make as much as 26 percent more working in the private sector, but they want to contribute to the common good and work for all of us. Then, in order to pay for our transportation bill or any other bill, we ask the Federal workers to contribute more.

Take a look around. I say to my colleagues, look around us. Everywhere we go in this Capitol, in our office building, we are looking at Federal employees that, without, this place simply would not run. We are dependent on them and we rely on them for a good reason-- because we can count on them. They contribute often as much as anyone here to making our country the great country that it is, and working in the Capitol of the United States of America with enormous pride, I might add.

I think there has been a real demonization of all public sector workers lately, and that is why I'm so glad tonight we're able to put a face on these individuals and say who are they, what kind of work are they really doing.

But beyond that, to say, really, this is where we want to get the sacrifice? We're not going to ask one thing more of the oil companies or the gas companies or the businesses that are making record profits and taking those jobs overseas and outsourcing them and getting a tax break for them? We're not asking the millionaires and the billionaires in this country who have actually benefited from the work of public employees, of Federal employees to get what they need in order to get ahead, we're not asking them to pay any more? No, we're going to take it out of the hides of middle class workers, if they are lucky. Some of them are down at the lower end. We're going to take it from the middle class workers, the middle class families, and ask them to make the sacrifice and pay more for their pensions.

Actually, we did, didn't we, in the people's budget that the Progressive Caucus introduced? That budget balances the budget, cuts the deficit, cuts the debt, but doesn't try to take it out of the hide of middle class people in the same way that we see from our colleagues across the aisle.

I know included in that budget is my Fairness in Taxation Act that says that people starting at a million dollars ought to pay a higher tax bracket, ratcheting up to people who make a billion dollars a year. There may be somebody at home saying, oh, nobody makes a billion dollars a year. Yes, they do. Mr. Paulson made $5 billion in 2010. He probably paid at a rate that may have been lower than his secretary or secretaries.

One of the themes that the President has underscored over and over again is that everybody should get a fair shot and everybody pay their fair share and everybody play by the same rules.

When we talk about where should the money come from for important things like transportation--of course there are many flaws in that bill. They take mass transportation, mass transit, out of the funding stream. Transportation, I think, has always before been a bipartisan issue, and, of course, we want to be able to pay for that. It creates a lot of jobs. Everybody uses the roads. They use the transit system. They benefit. Everybody needs to pay their fair share, what they are able to pay to contribute to the common good.

The President has talked about having each other's back as kind of a basic philosophy, that we're all in this together, not we're all in this alone. That's one of the early ideas in America.

Picture, now, the covered wagons and the rugged individualism of those people crossing. They were together in a row, each one a rugged individual, but all of them were making sure that they helped to take care of each other so that they could get across safely.

I think that's the vision, that we're a combination of individual freedoms, strong individualism, but we also understand that we all do better when we all do better.

Everyone needs to hear that again. Would cut?

That he is.

That is saying a lot. As I said before, and as Ray LaHood was alluding to, as many differences that may have existed across the aisle, recognizing the importance of transportation for commerce, for business, for everyday Americans getting to work, for linking our country together, for transporting our goods, Democrats and Republicans have always been able to sit down and together craft a piece of legislation on transportation. And to come up with an equitable way to fund it. Everyone has been able to agree.

This time, not only the way the bill is funded--talking about putting the burden on public employees to help fund it, but the elements of the bill itself. The fact, as you read, it is going to actually cost jobs. The transportation bill has always been the place where we have created jobs in our country. I think it's really shameful. I don't see that this piece of legislation is going to pass, but those who proposed it, I think, have made a serious miscalculation in every way.

Well, let me give you an example.

We have seen the unemployment rate now drop to 8.3 percent, and that's not good, but it's better. We've seen it drop, and we have seen 23 months now of private sector job growth every month, which is a great thing, a great record.

Yes, let everybody look at that chart. The orange-brown part is during the Bush administration when the economic crisis first hit. And then the blue is during the Obama administration, where you see a pretty steady decrease in unemployment, and then you see now we are above the line for many months and creating jobs, and that increase in jobs.

But if the Republicans had not gone after public sector jobs, if there had not been the cut in public sector jobs at the Federal level as well as at the State level, because a lot of Federal dollars were lost to the States, causing the layoffs of many teachers and firefighters and policemen, public sector workers have been laid off, we would have an unemployment rate of about 7.5 percent if those cuts hadn't happened in the public sector. So, you know, who's really for getting our economy going, putting people back to work, letting them be taxpayers rather than having to receive unemployment benefits, you know, which we better extend because people need them, but they'd rather have a job.

No. It's a job and a paycheck, and you take it to the grocery store. And it resonates throughout the economy. But I'll tell you, it's a pinch. When that wage and that check is frozen for 2 years, people feel that. Prices at the grocery store still go up, and so that very same paycheck doesn't quite buy as much. You know, there may be some lifestyle changes, maybe not such big things but some little things that add to the quality of life that actually our Federal employees have had to do without because of the freeze. And then, they're asked now, in order to even pay for a transportation bill, to lose money out of their pension fund, to have to pay more of their pension, which is their retirement fund.

Let me also just say that you mentioned that the Republicans like to point to the President's proposals or Democratic proposals and say, oh, this is another job-killing measure. Well, the facts are the facts. And the facts are that we have seen 23 months of private sector job creation. Literally millions of jobs have been created. And so I haven't heard too much about the job killing lately because it's pretty hard to talk about every time the job numbers come out and those jobs are increasing.

I want to thank you very much for bringing up an example of a piece of legislation that doesn't address our transportation needs, that does result in job loss, and that is paid for by going after middle class Federal workers as the ones who have to sacrifice in order to fund legislation like this. Thank you.

Unless Congress acts, emergency unemployment benefits will run out on February 23 for 3 million Americans. We simply can't let that happen.

Congress has never before allowed benefits to expire when unemployment was higher than 7.2 percent. And with more than three applicants for every job opening, we must not turn our backs on Americans who want to work, are trying to work, but simply can't find a job.

We shouldn't demean them either by asking them to jump through hurdles to get the unemployment insurance benefits that they've already paid for, such as getting drug tested or going back to high school after decades in the workforce.

Our economy is improving, thanks to the policies of this administration, but we have more to do. We need to extend unemployment benefits. It's good for American families, and it's good for America. Every dollar spent on UI benefits increases economic activity by $2. That increases gross domestic product and creates jobs and creates a stronger economy that works for everyone.

History has taught us and economists warn us about the dangers of prematurely pulling the plug on policies that work. Let's extend unemployment insurance benefits for a full year.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased that H.R. 658, the FAA Air Transportation Modernization and Safety Improvement Act, will fully fund the FAA through FY2015, particularly because it will include the NextGen Air Traffic Control Modernization Program. That program is important to my constituents who travel through O'Hare Airport. The program will ensure that air traffic congestion is lessened, noise and pollution mitigation efforts are continued, and air traffic control is improved according to best practices.

However, it is unconscionable that anti-labor provisions regarding the National Mediation Board were allowed to find their way into this bill. Organized labor has protected the rights and livelihood of American workers for decades. H.R. 658 changes the rules for holding elections, making it harder even to give workers the opportunity to have union representation. The bill makes it easier to strip union rights in the case of mergers between airlines or railways. It also allows election results to be challenged in person by employers, opening up union elections to voter intimidation. Those and other provisions will only undermine the ability of American laborers to be represented in their places of employment. They do not belong in the bill, and they will hurt rather than help workers and our national transportation system as a whole.

I agree that the FAA, and the NextGen program should be fully funded. I voted against H.R. 658 because it injected anti-labor provisions into a reauthorization that should have been devoid of partisan political stunts.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to remember a lifelong educator and political activist. Chris Turney passed away in December at the age of 60. Chris dedicated her life to the education of children. Chris was a music teacher for 34 years, and spent the last 20 years of her career teaching at Lincoln Junior High School in Skokie, Illinois. Ms. Turney, as she was known by her students, shared her passion and love for music with many students over the years. She played a variety of musical instruments including the piano, flute, piccolo and guitar. She frequently used these instruments in her classroom. Most importantly, Ms. Turney inspired hundreds of children to follow their dreams. Ms. Turney encouraged all her students to believe in themselves and their own unique skills and abilities as they moved through life.

Outside of the classroom, Chris was a political activist fighting for a better education system. Chris was a lifelong Democrat and very active in the National Education Association (NEA). She was president of the Skokie-Morton Grove Education Association, was the Region 36 Chair of the Illinois Education Association, and eventually became an NEA State Director. As a State Director, Chris was frequently on Capitol Hill meeting with members of Congress. Some of Chris's favorite moments in her life were shaking hands with President Clinton and then Senator Barack Obama. After retiring from her teaching career, Chris continued to be politically active. She served as the President of the DuPage Chapter of the Illinois Retired Teachers Association, a position she held until her death. She was an advocate for public education and for better schools for our children.

Chris will be missed dearly by her former students, colleagues, friends and family. She is survived by her life partner of 30 years, James C. Keating, her sisters Judy Goldsmith and Linda Turney, and three nephews. She encouraged all three of her nephews to follow their dreams which they have done. Her oldest nephew Rob Goldsmith is currently an education and labor staffer for Congressman Bruce Braley. Jeff Goldsmith is a very successful musician who has written and recorded numerous songs and albums. Mark Goldsmith, the youngest nephew, is currently an engineering student and baseball player at the Colorado School of Mines. Her memory and influence lives on through them.

Chris's memory will live on through the people whom she inspired for years to come. She was an agent of change to many. If you knew Chris well, she changed your life. Her uplifting, energetic, and positive attitude will be missed and she will not be forgotten.

I thank the gentleman.

You know, there's a lot of areas of agreement. We all agree that we're in the midst of a long-term care crisis. We agree that today there are 10 million Americans in need of long-term care services and support. By 2020, that number will grow to 15 million, and by 2050, the number of seniors who need long-term care will reach 26 million.

The costs associated with long-term care are high. We agree on that. Nursing homes can cost over $70,000 a year, and 20 hours a week of home care can cost nearly $20,000. But repealing the CLASS Act does nothing to address the glaring need for adequate coverage of long-term care services and support. The CLASS Act addressed a number of critical needs, including providing a way for persons with disabilities to remain independent in their community and bringing private dollars into the long-term services system to reduce reliance on Medicaid without impoverishing individuals and families. We agree that the CLASS Act is far from perfect, but it does provide a framework to begin to deal with the problem.

So it seems to me if we all agree on the need, not only the need for long-term care but the need to do better, then instead of repealing the CLASS Act and passing H.R. 1173 with no effective alternative, we could, right now today, sit down and work together to repair this program. Ignoring it or even postponing this long-term care crisis simply is not going to make it go away.

I move to strike the last word.

Mr. Chairman, roughly 70 percent of us at some point are going to have difficulty taking care of ourselves independently, and we're going to need some sort of long-term care or support. So as the population ages, of course the need for these services only increases.

I've been listening to this debate. On the substance, or at least as we identify the problem, there is an enormous amount of agreement. We all know that the costs associated with long-term care are very high, that nursing homes can cost over $70,000 a year, and that just 20 hours a week of home care costs nearly $20,000 a year. For working families, there are few practical options in order to plan and pay for long-term care and support services. Only about 3 percent have a private policy covering long-term care while the majority is forced to spend its way into poverty to qualify for the Medicare safety net coverage of those costs.

We know this. We all agree on this.

What the CLASS Act did was to address a number of critical needs, including providing a way for persons with disabilities to remain independent and in their communities by bringing private dollars into the long-term care services system in order to reduce the reliance on Medicaid without impoverishing individuals and their families.

Mr. Chair, here is how: if a person must go into a nursing home--and those are the potential long-term people, Americans--if such Americans must go into a nursing home, first they spend down their resources, and then they go into a nursing home at a cost of about $80,000 a year.

We all agree that the CLASS Act is far from perfect, but it provides a beginning framework to begin to deal with the problem.

I got a letter from Jonathan Lavin, CEO of AgeOptions in Oak Brook, Illinois, a service provider. He emailed me, actually, to say:

Please do not vote to repeal the CLASS Act. Such a vote

will reverse the hope of millions of Americans that one day

they may collectively insure themselves for the eventuality

of a debilitating disability. When we see a young former

Congresswoman gunned down and a healthy vibrant Illinois

Senator struck by a stroke, we realize that any of us may

suffer from a disability.

A broad-based, effective insurance program will assist

those who face such life-altering challenges. We understand

why the CLASS Act is delayed in implementation since the

economic situation is so dire, but we cannot understand

deliberately acting to eliminate the potential for such

legislation to do so much good after the economy recovers.

Every American faces the reality that an accident or illness requiring long-term care could devastate them financially.

While this issue affects everyone, I want to focus on the importance of the CLASS Act for women in this country.

Long-term care is very much a women's health issue. Women live longer than men. Their life expectancy exceeds those of men by some 5 years. Because they live longer, women are at greater risk of needing long- term care services to help them when they become disabled or too sick or frail to care for themselves. Women tend to need more resources for long-term care. Women tend to be ill for longer periods of time, and women are less likely to have a family member to care for them.

Over 70 percent of nursing home residents and nearly two-thirds of home-care users are women. Because women, far more than men, take on the role of caregiver, women are the ones who end up staying at home, sometimes giving up careers to provide care for a sick or disabled family member, adults and children alike. Indeed, women make up three- fourths of the home-care workforce.

CLASS would help make these challenges easier. It would help provide the care women may require if and when they need long-term care or supports for themselves. It would help provide relief or a break, if you will, for those women who spend all day every day at home taking care of others in need of long-term care.

To take away this program is to take away the first real opportunity that the women of this country have to deal with the long-term care challenges they face day in and day out both as patients and as caregivers. Like so many other Republican assaults on the Affordable Care Act, H.R. 1173 is, in fact, an attack on women and women's health.

Like all those other assaults, we should push back and reject this one. CLASS is just one of the many advancements for women's health that is included in the Affordable Care Act. As you have heard many times today, let's fix it, not repeal it, so it can work for women and all Americans as intended.

Instead of passing H.R. 1173 and repealing the CLASS Act with no effective alternative in place, we can and should work together to repair this program. Ignoring the long-term care crisis won't make it go away.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Well, I thank the gentleman not only for yielding,

but for day after day, week after week coming to the floor and talking about something that resonates with every American, that in the United States of America it is time for us to bring jobs home and to have things that we make here stamped with ``Made in America.''

I also want to thank my colleague. Representative Blumenauer came to Chicago and convened, oh, it was maybe 100 people from all aspects of the transportation industry, contractors and actual workers, people who made the cement and people who were the engineers and would be involved in his project, Americans who are ready to work.

And, yes, at the very dawn of this country we had an industrial policy. President George Washington made sure that we thought about and created a policy for not only importing from England, who we had just split from, but actually making things. He insisted that the suit that he wore for his inauguration be made in the United States of America. And it wasn't that easy to find that suit, but he did so that he would be wearing something made in America.

That's correct.

Understanding the future of this country, that if we are going to compete in a global marketplace, we cannot just be a service economy. We can't just have people working and making beds and flipping hamburgers and selling in retail stores. All these industries, all these jobs could be better jobs if they were better paid.

We need to manufacture things. We are the center of innovation. We can educate our young people to become innovators. In fact, I had a meeting this week with educators and the founder of the Austin Polytechnical Academy where they are teaching young people how to work in advanced manufacturing and the new kinds of steel mills and talking about ownership of those plants.

I wanted to say just a couple of things about what the President raised at the State of the Union address:

So we have a huge opportunity, at this moment, to bring

manufacturing back. But we have to seize it. Tonight, my

message to business leaders is simple: Ask yourselves what

you can do to bring jobs back to your country, and your

country will do everything we can to help you succeed. My

message is simple. It is time to stop rewarding businesses

that ship jobs overseas, and start rewarding companies that

create jobs right here in America.

I have a piece of legislation called Patriot Corporations of America that would reward those patriot companies that hire 90 percent of their workers as American workers. They would get tax breaks. They would be able to jump the line for government contracts, and it would be paid for by taking away those tax cuts.

I want to return to the issue of transportation that you raised, that my colleagues Mr. Altmire and Mr. Blumenauer were talking about. In fact, we have done something on transportation. My home State of Illinois, along with Iowa, Michigan, Missouri, California, and Washington State, received $782 million, my State did, for the purchase of 33 quick-acceleration locomotives and 120 bilevel passenger cars that will run on rail corridors in our States. Those trains will be designed to travel at more than 110 miles per hour between cities, will follow high-speed rail standards established by State-led Next Generation Equipment Committee. The committee will provide manufacturers with consistent specifications, reducing costs for manufacturers and customers. It is exactly the kind of coordinated government effort needed to address our transportation needs.

No. This is high-speed rail, money that has gone to States.

I want to point out that we hear a lot from the Republicans about how the President hasn't created jobs, which, of course, he has--3 million new jobs, 22 consistent months of private sector jobs. But Wisconsin, I would like to point out, refused to accept the money from the Federal Government for high-speed rail, $810 million to construct a new high- speed rail line between Milwaukee and Madison. As a consequence, a company called Talgo America, which was going to actually build trains in Milwaukee--and the City of Milwaukee invested over $10 million to prepare a facility for Talgo. The company hired about 100 union workers, and 80 percent of those had been out of work for more than 2 years. That factory is going to close down this year because Governor Walker told the Federal Government that Wisconsin did not want the $110 million in Federal investment. We are hoping that that company is going to move to Illinois to build those trains where we are more than willing to move ahead.

What I am saying here is that, in a partnership between government at all levels, Federal and State, and partnerships with private industry, like a company like Talgo, we can create millions of jobs and billions of dollars in economic activity in this country. Why we would see a reluctance, as Mr. Blumenauer pointed out, by the Republicans to fill this gap that we have between our need for infrastructure development and the millions of people who want to work, to make our country so much better and stronger and safer so we don't have the bridges collapsing--Mr. Altmire mentioned the thousands of bridges in his State that are not safe. We have thousands of them in Illinois as well. We can do this. We can do this together. Why the reluctance to partner, I can't understand. We can make it in America and America can make it in the world, continuing as a world leader.

I thank you.

I wanted to go back to this theme of a robust middle class. It's really in the manufacturing sector. It's really making it in America that built the middle class in our country. Yet there are people--and you hear it all the time--who say, you know what, these jobs are never going to come back. Just forget about it. We're not going to do this kind of manufacturing in America anymore.

Why would that be?

That is a myth that we have to bust. Of course, we can make it in America. We're not going to necessarily see factories where people are doing those kinds of repetitive jobs, and we don't want to see those dirty smokestacks come back. It's the vast manufacturing, the manufacturing for the 21st century and beyond, of clean jobs and of creating energy-storing batteries that we need and that we can export all around the world--the wind turbines that need to be built all over the world. Those innovators are here. Instead of turning it over to some other country--to China or some other country--to then make the stuff or create the supply chain, we should make it right here. With transportation costs going up as they have been, it's actually becoming economically advantageous to make it in America. That's why manufacturers are actually coming back, and we want to encourage that at every step.

So the idea that somehow making it in America--factory work--is passe is absolutely wrong. That's what the Democrats have been saying, and that's what our Make It in America agenda is all about, that we are going to be the creators, the thinkers, the engineers, the factory owners.

And do you know what? We actually have a succession problem in the factories that we have right now. Instead of thinking, in order to make it, you have to go into the financial sector, where absolutely nothing is made, we have to encourage our young people: go into business, the business of making things. Start figuring out how you can be a leader in a manufacturing plant, in the manufacturing process, which is going to lead this country in the 21st century.

It is all there, waiting for us, if government will be a partner, not just creating the jobs but partnering with the private sector to make it all happen.

President George Washington knew if we didn't do that, that we would not see the United States of America becoming a world leader or even putting its own people to work and being able to grow.