Floor Statements

Madam Speaker, the right of people to openly and freely question their leaders and discuss solutions to common problems is the reason our democracy works.

I hold town hall meetings every August all across my district. This August, I had nine town hall meetings. I had over 700 people come out to these meetings. It is a wonderful time. The overwhelming majority of my constituents had a clear message: It is high time to change the way Washington does business.

The people of western North Carolina are sick of wasteful spending and the broken Tax Code that funds it. They have had it with incompetence and waste in Federal bureaucracies. They are sick and tired of Washington not securing the border and stopping illegal immigration.

Again, I want to thank my constituents for coming out to these town hall meetings. It is a sincere pleasure to represent them and to try to fight for that change here in Washington, DC.

Madam Speaker, I want to thank them for coming out and making their voices heard. I have listened, and I am working to make that change.

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for yielding.

A major component of the Democrats' energy legislation and the Democrats' answer to our energy crisis is, hold on, wait one minute, wait one minute, it is promoting the use of the bicycle. Oh, I cannot make this stuff up. Yes, the American people have heard this. Their answer to our fuel crisis, the crisis at the pumps, is: Ride a bike.

Democrats believe that using taxpayer funds in this bill to the tune of $1 million a year should be devoted to the principle of: ``Save energy, ride a bike.'' Some might argue that depending on bicycles to solve our energy crisis is naive, perhaps ridiculous. Some might even say Congress should use this energy legislation to create new energy, bring new nuclear power plants on line, use clean coal technology, energy exploration, but no, no. They want to tell the American people, stop driving, ride a bike. This is absolutely amazing.

Apparently, the Democrats believe that the miracle on two wheels that we know as a bicycle will end our dependence on foreign oil. I cannot make this stuff up. It is absolutely amazing.

Ladies and gentlemen, I bring you the Democrats, promoting 19th century solutions to 21st century problems. If you don't like it, ride a bike. If you don't like the price at the pumps, ride a bike.

Stay tuned for the next big idea for the Democrats: Improving energy efficiency by the horse and buggy.

Mr. Speaker, the issue before us is whether or not illegal immigrants can get government benefits, and the Democrat majority in this House has shown that they are willing to cheat in order to win a vote. Cheat in order to win a vote. And----

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to withdraw my words.

Mr. Speaker, my point is that the actions of the Democrat majority on the House floor last night besmirches the character of this House, and it's because they support giving benefits to illegal aliens in this country, and it's about the issue of illegal immigration and whether or not illegals in this country can receive government benefits. They're willing to protect some of their freshmen vulnerable Democrats and make them toe the line.

But Mr. Speaker, when they lost the vote on the House floor, the Speaker came down and voted in this well in order to tie that vote, and when that wasn't good enough and when a vote switched and they lost, they lost that vote, they're willing to gavel it down in order to protect themselves from a tough vote demanding that illegals do not receive government benefits.

So, Mr. Speaker, was it a cover-up? Was it a sham? Absolutely. And some, some believe the actions were cheating the facts.

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

The trial lawyers have an uncanny way of making their living. Although the title of this legislation is a technical corrections bill, one glaring technical correction that needs to be made is left out.

As the ranking member said earlier tonight, the original SAFETEA-LU bill amended the definition of a commercial motor vehicle to exclude vehicles 10,000 pounds and less. The Department of Transportation had never issued regulations of this type of vehicle, which is essentially a small van or something smaller. It seemed to clear up the books and just make sense when it was done at the time. All too often what seems to be a simple idea ends up having much more significant consequences.

What was considered a cleaning up of the books turned out to be a dramatic shift in labor law. The Fair Labor Standards Act exempts drivers of vehicles that can be regulated by the Secretary of Transportation. The definitional change of a commercial vehicle unwittingly brought a whole new class of employee under that act.

In writing the provision, neither Congress nor the administration intended to fundamentally alter our national labor policies, but that is exactly what happened.

What are the consequences? As I said, the trial lawyers have an uncanny ability to find sources to make money off of. Companies across the country that believed that their business model was and is perfectly legal because it had been may get a knock on the door from their friendly neighborhood trial lawyer informing them that they are now liable for overtime wages dating back to August 15, 2005, when SAFETEA-LU was signed into law.

Congress didn't know what they had done. The administration didn't know

they had done this. How can we expect a small delivery service or some satellite dish installer or plumber to know that their business model is no longer viable?

No one will argue that people aren't entitled to a fair and equitable, appropriate wage, but if we are going to significantly alter national labor law, we should have a full and open debate and we should do it intentionally, not by accident and not by trial lawyers. I think that is the one glaring omission from this act. If we would fix that, we would have a number of employers from around this country who would be safe from more trial lawyer, frivolous lawsuits.

Shouldn't we ensure that companies are held liable? Sure, but we should do it as a Congress in a knowing way, a way that is befitting of this body, not by accident. We should not make them pay for our Congress' mistakes.

Mr. Speaker, Iran's self-proclaimed ambition to develop nuclear weapons is a grave threat to the United States and the world. Imagine the consequences of Iran developing nuclear weapons. It would destabilize the Middle East in an unprecedented fashion, ramp up the threat to our greatest ally, Israel, and give Islamic extremists the means to satisfy their gruesome goal, which is to bring chaos and death to our Nation and world.

In confronting this perilous threat, the United States must employ every element of our national power to stop the Iranian nuclear weapons program. The House will take a strong step today in that direction by passing the Iran Sanctions Enabling Act, which discourages investment in Iran's energy sector.

Countering the Iranian threat requires a steady, rational assessment of the world around us. And when a country led by Islamic extremists vows to attack our greatest ally and our country, you better believe we will stand firm and stare down the enemy.

Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.

Mr. Chairman, I am happy that the Chair is accepting this amendment, but I would like to speak on it as an opportunity to speak about cutting government spending.

Though it's just $50,500, that's far more than the median income in my district. I want the American taxpayers to know that this is an important step, and it's good that they're accepting a limitation on the rapid increase in spending within this legislation.

There are a lot of good points that we have to consider here. We have to consider the totality of government spending when we're debating here on the House floor. The government spending for this fiscal year is over $2.7 trillion. To put that into perspective, Mr. Chairman, that is larger than all the economies of the world, except for two. It is far larger than even the Chinese economy, which is about $1.9 trillion.

The reason why I bring this up is that when we're discussing each of these appropriations bills, we tend to focus on small parts of the appropriations process. We tend to focus on an amendment here, an amendment there, maybe increasing funding here and there and increasing funding in a particular appropriations bill. But we have to talk about what's that doing to the whole of the budget. And if we spend money here in the Department of Agriculture, we may not have that money to fund this SCHIP proposal that the Democrats are bringing to the floor at the end of this week.

Now, to talk about that bill, what they're going to do is not simply cut government spending elsewhere in the budget, elsewhere in the government, reforming programs, eliminating programs that are ineffective and no longer cost-effective for the American taxpayers, but what they do is they go out and find new revenue and raise taxes under this SCHIP proposal.

The Agriculture bill we have here today increases government spending, thereby forcing this new Democrat majority to go out and raise taxes for their new programs. And, Mr. Chairman, they've proposed a lot of new programs, this new Democrat majority, and what we have to do is focus on making sure we balance the budget. Now, balancing the budget, to me, as a fiscal conservative, does not mean going out and getting new revenue.

It means doing things, sensible things, such as the Congressman from Georgia, Mr. Gingrey, my good friend and colleague, is doing here. It cuts 1 percent out of the administrative budget of the Department of Agriculture, just 1 percent.

I have an amendment that I would like to perfect. If 1 percent was acceptable to the Chair, I would like to see if maybe 2 percent would be acceptable and see where we can actually draw the line in cutting government spending, where the breaking point is in this House of Representatives. To that end, I think it is important that we have a discussion on what that proper number is.

I know my colleague from Georgia may have another amendment similar to this next up, I hope, at which point I would like to see if we can actually go a little bit further in cutting government spending. Let's talk about not just the Agriculture appropriations bill, which is the key focus of today, but also the long-term consequences of our just having a narrow, myopic focus on the current bill on the floor. Let's talk about the totality of government spending, ways that we can reform the government, limit the government, and actually get back to what is sensible.

We have a big debate going on right now about the war in Iraq. We have a big debate going on about children's health care. We have a big debate about whether or not the farm bill that we passed last week was the right thing to do and whether or not you should actually have a massive tax increase in order to implement the new programs within that formula. Many of us agree that that wasn't the right thing to do, but, unfortunately, the majority in the House did vote for that massive tax increase.

It is important that we have a discussion on health care and agriculture and the long-term consequences of these issues going forward. Certainly, the bill today and the chairman's willingness to accept a 1 percent cut in the administrative budget is a step in the right direction. We can be thankful for that.

I hope, as we go on in the debate, the Chair will be willing to accept other amendments that limit the rapid increase of funds going to the Department of Agriculture and we can actually rightsize the government. There are many on this side of the aisle who want to cut the size and scope of government. I know that the chairwoman has been willing to examine programs and reform those programs. I hope that she will be willing to accept many of the amendments we have here today.

I also know my colleague from Georgia has a number of amendments like this. It is important that we discuss the long-term consequences of our failure to limit the growth of government.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I offer a second-degree amendment.

Mr. Chairman, my amendment is pretty simple. As the previous speaker said, the debate that we have had ongoing here on the House

floor may cost taxpayer dollars. If we are going to have a debate about cutting spending, I am going to offer a second-degree to make sure the spending is a greater number to save the taxpayers more money so we can continue to have this debate.

I appreciate the applause from one Member on the other side of the aisle. Two Members. So we have two members of the Democrat Caucus who wish to cut spending. Thank you both. Mr. Chairman, I want to thank them both.

At this point, I yield to my colleague, the ranking member of the Budget Committee, Mr. Ryan from Wisconsin.

Reclaiming my time. I think it is also important to note that the SCHIP bill the gentleman speaks of raises taxes on tobacco, raises taxes on all health care plans in American, and I think important for us to talk about that later on this week.

Offered By: Mr. McHenry

Amendment No. 23: Page 33, line 16, after the dollar

amount, insert ``(increased by $32,000,000)''.

Page 56, line 19, after the dollar amount, insert

``(reduced by $32,000,000)''.

Offered By: Mr. McHenry

Amendment No. 24: Page 48, line 12, after the dollar

amount, insert ``(increased by $17,820,000)''.

Page 56, line 19, after the dollar amount, insert

``(reduced by $17,820,000)''.

Offered By: Mr. McHenry

Amendment No. 25: At the end of the bill (before the short

title), insert the following:

Offered By: Mr. McHenry

Amendment No. 23: Page 33, line 16, after the dollar

amount, insert ``(increased by $32,000,000)''.

Page 56, line 19, after the dollar amount, insert

``(reduced by $32,000,000)''.

Offered By: Mr. McHenry

Amendment No. 24: Page 48, line 12, after the dollar

amount, insert ``(increased by $17,820,000)''.

Page 56, line 19, after the dollar amount, insert

``(reduced by $17,820,000)''.

Offered By: Mr. McHenry

Amendment No. 25: At the end of the bill (before the short

title), insert the following:

Mr. Chairman, I thank my colleague Dr. Price for offering this amendment. Certainly the American people can relate to this amendment. It simply says that we will not spend 1 percent of the bill as currently written, 1 percent. Well, that equates to $500 million, a substantial sum of money even in the context of the Federal budget.

What we have in Washington, D.C., is a spending problem. We don't have a problem with income to government. The government will receive about $2.7 trillion this year on a Federal budget that actually spends $2.9 trillion.

What is absolutely fascinating about this is that there are only two countries on Earth with whole economies that are larger than the Federal Government here in Washington, D.C., and that is the governments of Germany and Japan. When we talk about China and the growing threat of China's economy, well, look at the size of the Chinese economy. The whole economy of China is $1.9 trillion. What we have here in Washington D.C. is certainly a spending problem.

What this amendment proposed by Dr. Price says is that we should be able to slip off just a little bit of that spending, just a little bit, show the American taxpayers that we can tighten the

belt just ever so slightly, which means, instead of eating that whole cake, which is what the Democrat leadership proposes for dessert, eating that whole cake, we are just going to take off just a little bit of the icing, just a taste of the icing, rather than eating that whole cake.

Now, certainly we can do that. Certainly the American people understand the Federal Government could save 1 percent. Every family budget across America can save 1 percent.

I urge my colleagues, even the liberal Democrats on the other side of the aisle, my friends from the other side of the aisle who said that we want to spend more and more and more. They certainly can say we will, when we are increasing spending so rapidly, what the Democrats are doing here, we could say that just 1 percent, we will take off 1 percent right off the top.

So I urge my colleagues to support this reasonable and commonsense measure that shows some level of restraint, even with bloated Democrat spending in Washington, D.C.

Offered By: Mr. McHenry

Amendment No. 33: At the end of the bill (before the short

title), insert the following: