Floor Statements

I rise in opposition to the House substitute amendment to S. 47, and I urge the support of the bipartisan Violence Against Women Act sent over by the Senate.

I do so on behalf of women like Olga, who, on her wedding day, thought she had entered a dream marriage for herself and her two small children from a previous relationship. The marriage turned into a nightmare when her husband became insulting, aggressive, controlling-- like a stranger--imprisoning Olga and her children in their own home and not even allowing the children to go to school. Olga fled to south Florida, and was nurtured back to emotional and financial health by an organization in my home area called Women in Distress.

The Senate's reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act will save even more lives across America, lives like Olga's and like those of all women who have been abused by their spouses or partners.

So, today, colleagues, let's stand up for our mothers, our sisters, and our daughters. Let's pass the bipartisan Senate bill.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to talk about Ruth. She's 91 years old, from my hometown. And Ruth, like many of my constituents, through the years, she's lost her network of family and friends.

After coming home from the hospital, she was unable to shop or cook and could barely get out of bed. According to Ruth, her life was literally saved by a Federal program called Meals on Wheels that delivers more than a million meals to seniors in need each day.

On Friday, as a result of mindless, indiscriminate budget cuts known as sequestration, folks like Ruth, across this country, will be in jeopardy of going hungry, and that is wrong. So I urge my colleagues to do what is right, come together, stop the sequestration, and implement a long-term, balanced approach to reducing our national debt.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to bring up H.R. 699, a balanced bill to replace the sequester with spending cuts and revenues.

Thank you, Congressman, and thank you for inviting me to join you today. I don't want to go through all the statistics. I guess I could because sometimes we forget that we're talking about real people. Let me just keep it very, very simple.

First of all, in the State of Florida, the beautiful State of Florida--I tell people I live in paradise--we're finally turning the corner with the economy. Over the last several years, we literally lost millions of jobs. Our construction industry went bust. Of course, the whole country was hurting, so tourism got hurt. And now we're starting to turn things around. The value of our homes is going up, the tourists are coming back, and people are finding work.

The worst thing that could happen right now--the worst thing that we could do here in Congress to our economy back home--is to remove so much money in such a quick time from our economy that it would put our job market in a tailspin. Outside analysts say that just in the State of Florida, over the next year, we could lose 80,000 jobs. Now, we're not talking about 80,000 government jobs. We're talking about the removal of government spending--that horrible government spending--from our economy. It will mean 80,000 Floridians, mom and pops are not going to be able to pay their mortgage or send their kids to college. And they could be a teacher, or they could be a bus driver, or they could be a manager in a hotel. It's going to affect all walks of life.

Just like your State--and I heard Mr. Pocan talk about the effects where he lives--we will lose money from education, our science programs, and our transportation infrastructure. But what I want to talk about is a couple people today. I want to talk about real people.

I talked earlier today about Ruth. I don't know if you heard me talk about Ruth, but if you didn't hear me talk about Ruth, I want you to know about Ruth, because Ruth is 91 years old. Congratulations, Ruth, for getting that far along in life.

But let me tell you what happens when you get to be 91. I know. I'm not 91 yet, but I have a lot of constituents in Florida who have retired to the area where I live. Do you know what happens when you get to be 91? So many of the people who you love, so many of the people who you grew up with, your children, your friends, your neighbors, they pass on. And by the time you get to be 91 and you've moved away from your family--in Florida it happens often--you are left alone. So when Ruth came home from a stay in the hospital, she was alone. She had no ability, by herself, to shop and to cook, and she could barely get out of bed. She had nobody to help her, except she had us. She had us, the safety net of the United States of America.

With the safety net of the United States of America, she had delivered to her, on a regular basis, meals from a program called Meals on Wheels, so she could eat every day. It astonishes me that on Friday--it's Friday, right? On Friday, we hit a phase of our history, what we call sequestration, which means that literally hundreds of thousands of our seniors like Ruth across this country face the prospect of not having a meal each day.

I'm going to tell you one more story, and then I'm going to yield back. This is a story of a young woman named Tanjee. And this is a good story, because Tanjee, when she was a young mother, a young single mother, when she was working really hard but not making a lot of money--a lot of people in this country work really hard but they don't make a lot of money--and she has four children. And in order for her to go to work every day to provide for those children, she needed to leave them in a safe, nurturing environment, and she did so in a location in my town called the YWCA. They had a Head Start program. And today, her children, one has become a teacher, one is in the military, and two are in high school. What would have happened to her children had the United States of America not been there for her?

I want everybody to know that it's not just about numbers. There's lots of numbers. This is about flesh-and-blood people who are going to be hurt by our inaction.

So, with that, Congressman, I want to yield my time back to you and thank you for inviting me to participate today. Let's keep fighting to stop the sequestration, and let's get our fiscal house in order in this country in a balanced way and not in a way to kick people out of jobs and take food from seniors and quality child care from children.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor Mona Reis, a courageous advocate for women's reproductive freedom. Ms. Reis runs the Presidential Women's Center in West Palm Beach, Florida which has provided quality individualized health care for thousands of women since its founding in 1980. Without this exceptional resource, many women in South Florida would go without needed wellness and reproductive health care services.

Today, as we commemorate the 40th Anniversary of the Supreme Court's landmark Roe v. Wade decision, which affirmed a woman's right to reproductive choice, I thank Mona Reis for her compassionate, dedicated, and unrelenting pursuit of women's reproductive freedom.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in honor of the 40th anniversary of Roe v. Wade and the freedom of reproductive choice that this historic decision provides for all women in America. This is a very personal and private choice.

When I gave birth to my son, Ben, it was the most precious moment in my life. His life has brought me great joys and great responsibilities. The decision to bring Ben into this world was made by his father and me. It was our choice. We didn't call the Governor. We didn't call the Congress. It was our choice.

And so today, I proudly honor the 40th anniversary of Roe v. Wade and thank those who have fought so bravely to ensure that women have the right to make those life-changing personal decisions that affect them and their families. As we celebrate, we must be mindful that there is more work to be done to protect reproductive choice for our daughters and our granddaughters.