Floor Statements

House of Representatives,

Committee on the Budget,

Washington, DC, April 1, 2014.

Mr. RYAN of Wisconsin. Mr. Speaker, at the beginning of

this Congress, two additional requirements for the

consideration of a concurrent resolution on the budget

resolution were set forth in Section 3(e) of House Resolution

5 (113th Congress).

The first requires the concurrent resolution on the budget

include a section related to means-tested and nonmeans-tested

direct spending programs. The second requires a statement

from the Chair of the Committee on the Budget defining those

terms to be included in the Congressional Record prior to the

consideration of such concurrent resolution on the budget.

Amendments to, and conference reports on, the concurrent

resolution must also fulfill these provisions.

Enclosed please find two tables prepared in order to

fulfill the terms of section 3(e) referred to above. I have

also included a communication and associated tables from the

Director of the Congressional Budget Office, with whom I have

consulted in the preparation of this material. While the

nonmeans-tested list is not exhaustive, all programs not

considered means-tested can be considered nonmeans-tested

direct spending. The description of programs considered to be

means-tested direct spending and nonmeans-tested direct

spending is the same as the one filed on March 7, 2013 in

compliance with the section 3(e) requirement.

Sincerely,

Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin,

Chairman, House Budget Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank Chairman Lucas and Ranking Member Peterson for their work on this issue.

Although I have deep concerns about this bill, I understand that in divided government, no party will get everything it wants.

That said, this bill lays the foundation for a fundamental reform of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, SNAP--namely, it will allow states to require work in exchange for benefits. Before the 1996 welfare-reform bill, several states experimented with work requirements, and the evidence gathered from those experiments led to the most expansive reform of the welfare state ever.

This bill also partially closes a loophole in the SNAP program known as ``heat and eat''--a reform included in previous House Budgets.

Finally, this bill eliminates Direct Payments, excludes supply- management provisions in the dairy program, and reduces the deficit by $16.6 billion over the next ten years. This bill would save more money than doing nothing.

I wish this bill included more reforms to our agricultural programs. It did not include crop-insurance reforms supported by both the House and the Senate. We should have a safety net for our farmers. We should help the little guy--the family farm that's in need. We shouldn't bankroll the big guys. So we should tighten the eligibility standards for crop subsidies. I'm disappointed we didn't use this opportunity to make fundamental changes to business as usual.

But on the whole, I think this bill will do some good. It will save more money than if we did nothing. It will provide some much-needed certainty to family farmers. It is an improvement over the status quo, and so I support it.

Mr. Speaker, Section 401 creates a new category of employee called a ``Further Revised Annuity Employee'' and would require Further Revised Annuity Employees to contribute additional amounts into the CRSDF. It is the intent of Congress for OPM to create a new normal cost for the Further Revised Annuity Employees, and to ensure that the retirement plan not be underfunded.

Additionally, it is the intent that for the new Further Revised Annuity Employee Plan that the only determinant of whether an individual is a FERS employee or Member, as opposed to a FERS Revised Annuity Employee or FERS Further Revised Annuity Employee, is through application of the FERS Revised Annuity Employee test. And that the new Further Revised Annuity Employee test only differentiates between FERS Revised Annuity Employee coverage and new FERS Further Revised Annuity Employee coverage.

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 438, I call up the joint resolution (H.J. Res. 59) making continuing appropriations for fiscal year 2014, and for other purposes, with the House amendment to the Senate amendment thereto, and I have a motion at the desk.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on the further consideration of House Joint Resolution 59.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 3 minutes.

I rise on behalf of the bipartisan budget agreement. This is the first time since 1986 that a divided Congress has done what we are about to do.

Here is what the bill does:

It reduces the deficit by $23 billion; it does not raise taxes; and it cuts spending in a smarter way. We take temporary across-the-board cuts, and we replace them with targeted permanent reforms, and these reforms take place immediately.

First, we cut waste: for instance, we stop paying Medicaid bills that deadbeat dads ought to cover; we stop sending unemployment checks to criminals;

Second, we go after corporate welfare: we eliminate a government program for energy companies; we eliminate a special carveout in the student loan program;

Third, we start to address the real problem, and that is autopilot spending: we ask new Federal employees to contribute a little more to their retirements; we ask private companies to cover a little bit more of their own pension guarantees.

These savings build up over time, and this bill saves more than if we did nothing.

This bill isn't as far as I would like. It is not near the breadth and the scope of the budget that we passed earlier, but that is how it works in divided government. That is the nature of compromise. In a divided government, you don't get everything you want, but I think this bill is a firm step in the right direction. It is not perfect. It is a start. That is how it works in divided government. I also think, Mr. Speaker, it gives us the added benefit of preventing Washington's lurch from crisis to crisis. We are bringing stability to the budget process, and that stability will help build confidence, and that confidence will help our economy.

I will be the first to admit that we have a lot more work to do. I have been bringing budgets to this floor for 5 years that balance the budget, that pay off the debt, that reform our entitlement programs. That is what we want to do. That is what we are going to keep working on doing, but in this divided government, we are going to take the steps we can take, and this step, we think, is one in the right direction. We need to help strengthen the economy. We need to help create jobs and take-home pay.

The bottom line is: this first step is designed to help improve people's lives. It is designed to make this government work at a basic functioning level, and by passing this, we will reduce the deficit.

We came here to get something done. We always lock horns. We always argue. We never agree. I think it is about time, for once in a long time, we find common ground and agree. That is what this bill does, and that is what I ask my colleagues to consider, and I ask them to support this agreement.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

Section 203 restricts access to the Death Master File, DMF, which is a list of deceased individuals maintained by the Social Security Administration.

This provision charges the Secretary of Commerce with establishing a program to restrict access to the information contained on the DMF for a three-year period beginning on the date of an individual's death, except to persons who are certified under the program. Under the program, persons certified by the

Secretary of Commerce to have a fraud prevention interest or other legitimate need for the information and agree to maintain the information under significant safeguards may continue to access DMF information on a current basis. The provision also provides for penalties in cases of unauthorized disclosures or uses of DMF information by certified persons. Finally, the provision also brings the DMF within the scope of the exemptions available under the Freedom of Information Act to ensure that Federal agencies do not disclose the information about deceased individuals maintained by SSA or contained in the DMF, except to recipients who are certified persons.

In implementing this section, the Department of Commerce should promulgate regulations establishing and providing guidelines for the certification program and provide sufficient time for legitimate current users of DMF information to comment on the regulations, especially as it relates to the timing of the effectiveness of this Section and as it relates to the authority to release the Death Master File to the public.

Section-by-Section Analysis

Section 1. Short title and table of contents.

Subsection 1(a) provides that the short title of this Act

is ``Bipartisan Budget Act of 2013''.

Subsection 1(b) sets forth the table of contents for the

Act.

Mr. Speaker, at this time, I yield 4 minutes to the

gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Rogers), the distinguished chairman of the Appropriations Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 3 minutes.

Mr. Speaker, just so that my colleagues understand what exactly this bill does or does not do, I want to walk you through a chart.

In 2011, Congress passed the Budget Control Act. That set discretionary spending at this level up here, the blue line. It said that this thing we commonly call the supercommittee was supposed to go and cut $1.2 trillion out of mandatory spending, autopilot spending, the nondiscretionary part of the budget, the big, fast growing part that Congress rarely addresses.

If it didn't happen, then the sequester would kick in. That is this red line. That is where we are now because the sequester has kicked in.

What we face in January is another round of sequester cuts, $20 billion, that hit solely on defense spending in the military. A lot of us are concerned about that. When 85 percent of our troops, our brigades, are not ready, that is a problem. When we have people in Afghanistan and we need to reset our equipment and we are not where we need to be, that is a problem; that is a concern of ours.

What we do not want to do is lose any of the fiscal progress that was made by this act. In fact, we want to go farther. So what this bill does is it says for the rest of this half fiscal year, fiscal year 2014, and the upcoming fiscal year, fiscal year 2015, it changes discretionary spending to go to $1.12 trillion and then $1.14 trillion back on to where we are with the sequester.

What does all that mean? It means that 92 percent of the sequester is still intact. For the next year and a half, this bill preserves 70 percent of the sequester; but we pay for that 30 percent that is given back.

Let me explain what that means just in a quick dollars and cents sense. This bill achieves $85 billion in mandatory savings, the things we talked about a minute ago, all those various permanent spending cuts. It gives back or relieves from the sequester $63 billion in spending: half to defense, half to domestic spending, like Mr. Van Hollen was talking about. The result is a net deficit reduction of $23 billion. So from the Budget Control Act of 2011, this advances fiscal responsibility to the tune of $23 billion.

To put it another way, 2 years ago, when we passed the first House Republican budget when we came into the majority, the appropriation number we were looking for then was $1.19 trillion. Then in 2012 in the next House Republican budget, the appropriation bill we were fighting for then was $1.28 trillion.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself an additional minute.

The Budget Control Act would have had us at $1.58 trillion. This agreement puts us at $1.12 trillion. Under this agreement, we would not hit that discretionary spending number of $1.19

trillion, the one we asked for 2 years ago, we wouldn't hit that number until the year 2017.

With respect to a fiscal track record, we are ahead of schedule, and we are replacing some of these across-the-board spending cuts that are indiscriminate that don't set priorities, that treat the efficient and inefficient programs the same, with smarter, permanent spending cuts in the autopilot part of spending, that part that Congress all too often ignores.

Mr. Speaker, this is good government; it is also divided government. Under divided government, we need to take steps in the right direction. To make divided government work, you can't ask each other to compromise a core principle because we don't do that here. We ask each other to find some common ground to advance the common good. That is what this agreement does. That is why I ask my colleagues to support it.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, at this time, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. Latham) for the purposes of a colloquy.

Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman from Iowa yield?

Mr. Speaker, yes, it is the legislative intent that existing contracts to use the services for not-for-profit servicers are not terminated by this bill and that they will be permitted to compete with the Department of Education's title IV servicers for additional accounts.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 30 seconds to respond to my friend, the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Clyburn). I want him to know that his time spent on these prior endeavors, the Biden Group, all those, that was not wasted. That was productive time because the findings of those groups were used in this agreement. The work that they did on all of those policies were work that we borrowed from to put this together. So I want him to know that was a productive use of his time which helped, in turn, produce this result.

With that, Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. McCarthy), our distinguished majority whip.

Will the gentleman yield?

We are having a good moment here. Don't spoil it, all right?

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 2 minutes.

Mr. Speaker, there are a couple of other factors that I think Members should weigh as we look at this legislation.

Number one is if we do not pass this legislation, we face a fiscal impasse on January 15 and, therefore, a potential government shutdown at that time. And then we face a fiscal impasse at the end of September and a possible government shutdown at that time. I don't know of anyone in this body that thinks these government shutdowns are productive or useful for our economy. So by having this agreement in place, we prevent those two episodes from occurring and we prevent those two government shutdowns.

Point number two, for too long, for 3 years, this body, Congress, the legislative branch, the one that the Founders envisioned in the Constitution would be exercising the power of the purse, the branch of government that is the representative of the people that is supposed to decide how money is spent, well, we have been ceding that authority to the executive branch by passing what we call continuing resolutions. So the spending priorities that were set 3 years ago are still in place, and then we just keep writing these blank checks to the administration, and they set the priorities. That is not a partisan thing; this is an institutional thing. This is a separation of powers thing.

Democrats and Republicans alike believe that we should do our jobs, that we should exercise the power of the purse, that the legislative branch should bring back its authority to do this. This does that. By restarting the appropriations process, by agreeing to these numbers, which are bipartisan numbers, mutually agreed to number, by not doing continuing resolutions,

we are reclaiming the power of the purse.

I yield myself 1 minute.

There are those of us who are worried about regulations, who are worried about the exercise of power at the executive branch, who are worried about a sense of less accountability among the executive branch. We do lots of oversight hearings. We do dozens a week. But oversight pales in comparison when it doesn't have any fiscal force behind it. By reclaiming the power of the purse, by having Congress write the budgets and approve and decide the budgets of the executive agencies, that gives us a far stronger hand in effecting effective oversight and conducting oversight. By using the power of the purse, along with effective oversight, we can do our jobs as the legislative branch in conducting oversight of the executive branch and setting priorities.

My friends have their priorities, and we have our priorities, and sometimes we meet and sometimes we don't. At least Congress gets to set the priorities on how the money sent to us from hardworking taxpayers is spent. That is one of the things that is accomplished in this agreement. That, along with all these other reasons, is why I really encourage all of our Members to support this agreement.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

I reserve the balance of my time. I am waiting for the leader, who is on his way.

At this time, I would like to yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Rokita), a member of the Budget Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Cantor), our distinguished majority leader.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Boehner), the distinguished Speaker of the House.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Womack).

Mr. Speaker, I have no more speakers, and I reserve the balance of my time to close.

I will defer to the Speaker's comments.

Yes.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, there are many reasons why I encourage my colleagues to support this bipartisan budget agreement. Number one, by doing this, we reduce the deficit by $23 billion. If we don't do this, we don't reduce the deficit by $23 billion. That means we are reducing it versus doing nothing, a step in the right direction, a move toward fiscal responsibility, not near as far as we want to go, but at least going in the direction we want to go.

The budget we passed here in the House, just like the prior two budgets that we passed here in the House, represents the full extent of our ambition, our vision and our goals. It balances the budgets within 10 years.

It reforms the Tax Code without raising taxes. It reforms our entitlement programs that were vital and were made in the 20th century so that they work for the 21st century.

It pays off our debt so that we do not leave our children a Nation of debt. That is our goal. That is our vision. That is our destiny.

With the bipartisan budget agreement we couldn't accomplish that because we have different opinions, we have different objectives. That is why we worked for common ground.

That is why we took our budget, all the different budgets that were offered, we laid them on top of each other, and we looked for common ground. We went through the Federal budget program by program, line by line. We discussed and debated these things, and we asked where is it that we can agree needs reforming.

Where is it that we agree taxpayer money is being wasted?

Where is it we agree that cronyism and corporate welfare should go away?

Where is it we agree that some reform for auto pilot mandatory spending ought to occur?

And where we found that agreement, we put it in this agreement. That is the way it is supposed to work. So we see this as a step in the right direction on the way toward fulfilling our ultimate goal.

The second thing we accomplished that is very important to us, and Mr. Van Hollen kind of mentioned it, this does not raise taxes. Hardworking taxpayers have worked hard and long enough that we need to work on spending instead of taking more from them.

The third thing, we are taking permanent spending cuts to pay for temporary sequester relief. We think that is a good idea.

The savings clearly take time to accrue in this agreement, and that is because we are changing permanent law, and those permanent law changes that are made by this act start accruing and compounding that savings so that the savings keep growing and compounding on and on and on.

The funny thing about auto pilot spending, about what we call mandatory spending, is it compounds away from you and spends so much more. But if you get reforms, if you get savings, those savings compound as well. This does that: permanent spending cuts to pay for some temporary sequester relief.

Now, what is the sequester?

It is across the board, it is crude, it doesn't prioritize, it doesn't give Congress any say-so on how money is being spent. That is a third thing that this does that I think is pretty good.

In addition to keeping 92 percent of the sequester intact, what this bill does is it says Congress ought to decide how money is being spent, not the administration.

So, instead of deferring and delegating our power to the executive branch with continuing resolution after continuing resolution, we, Republicans and Democrats, the legislative branch, are bringing that power back to Congress so that the people's House, so that the legislature, as the Founders and the Constitution intended, we decide how that money is being spent. We decide how to prioritize spending. That is our job.

I also like the precedent that this sets. We know we are always going to have fiscal pressure because the sequester, as they mentioned, has not been lifted. It is still here, so it is always going to produce pressure. And I like the precedent that we are starting here.

The precedent that we are starting here is we are not going back to the taxpayer. We are not going to ask more from hardworking taxpayers. We are going to ask the government to do with less.

And as we transfer permanent spending cuts for temporary relief, we are going to have more spending cuts than we give back in relief, so we reduce the deficit further; $85 billion in mandatory savings to pay for $63 billion in sequester relief. That is a pretty good precedent.

I would like to add one or two more zeroes at the end of these numbers, but I will take the direction we have right now.

The other point is this: we have been at each other's throats for a long time. Look, I was part of the last Presidential election. We tried defeating this President. I wish we would have.

Elections have consequences, Mr. Speaker. And I fundamentally believe--this is just my personal opinion; I know it's a slightly partisan thing to say--to really do what we think needs to be done, we are going to have to win some elections. And in the meantime, let's try and make this divided government work.

I think our constituents are expecting a little more from us. They are expecting us to not keep shutting the

government down. They are expecting us to pay the bills. They are expecting us to be accountable. They are expecting us to watch how their dollars are being spent, and they are expecting us to find common ground; and that is what this does.

That is why I urge all of my colleagues to support this.

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

Mr. Speaker, I send to the desk a concurrent resolution and ask unanimous consent for its immediate consideration in the House.

Mr. Speaker, today, the House will consider H.R. 3521, the Department of Veterans Affairs Major Medical Facility Lease Authorization Act of 2013, as Amended. H.R. 3521 authorizes the Secretary of Veterans Affairs to carry out major medical facility leases at twenty-seven facilities requested by the Department of Veterans Affairs in their fiscal year 2013 and 2014 budget requests.

Since 1990, CBO has scored VA's major medical facility leases as operating leases and estimated the costs as being subject to appropriation (discretionary). In 2012, after receiving additional information from the Department of Veterans Affairs, CBO concluded that VA has been entering into capital leases, or binding obligations for the full period of the lease. In accordance with OMB Circular A-11 and the Anti-Deficiency Act, VA is required to obligate the budget authority upfront for the full amount of these obligations. This includes budgeting for both the estimated total payments expected to arise under the full term of the contract or, if the contract includes a cancellation clause, an amount sufficient to cover the lease payments for the first year plus an amount sufficient to cover the costs associated with termination of the contract. Up until this point, VA has not been properly budgeting for its leases according to the law.

CBO estimates that enacting this bill would provide contract authority of about $1.4 billion over the ten-year period.

HBC has worked closely with both HVAC and CBO on this issue and has produced lease authorization language, in addition to report language, that we believe adequately addresses the legitimate issues CBO raised with respect to how VA was budgeting for leases.

HBC believes this language forces VA to comply with budgeting laws, specifically that VA may only enter into binding commitments on behalf of the U.S. Government once funds have been appropriated for the purpose of that proposed commitment and that VA must then obligate the full cost of that commitment at the time it executes the lease. In addition, the language requires VA to submit to Congress a detailed analysis on how its leasing practices comply with these laws.

If the VA fails to faithfully execute the requirements in the bill and to comply with the longstanding laws governing obligations, we will revisit this issue in the context of future requests for leasing authority.

With these fiscal protections in place, I fully support H.R. 3521 moving forward to ensure continued access for our veterans to the highest quality medical care.

2023

House of Representatives,

Committee on the Budget,

Washington, DC, October 29, 2013.

Hon. John A. Boehner,

Speaker, Office of the Speaker, U.S. Capitol, House of

Representatives, Washington, DC.

Mr. RYAN of Wisconsin. Mr. Speaker, to facilitate

application of sections 302 and 311 of the Congressional

Budget Act, I am transmitting an updated status report on the

current levels of on-budget spending and revenues for fiscal

years 2013, 2014 and for the 10-year period of fiscal year

2014 through fiscal year 2023. This status report is the last

update for fiscal year 2013, which ended on September 30,

2013. For fiscal year 2014, the report is current through

October 22, 2013.

The term ``current level'' refers to the amounts of

spending and revenues estimated for each fiscal year based on

laws enacted or awaiting the President's signature.

Table 1 in the report compares the current levels of total

budget authority, outlays, and revenues with the overall

limits set in H. Con. Res. 112 (112th Congress) for fiscal

year 2013 and H. Con. Res 25 (113th Congress) for fiscal year

2014 and the 10-year period of fiscal year 2014 through 2023.

This comparison is needed to implement section 311(a) of the

Budget Act, which creates a point of order against measures

that would breach the budget resolution's aggregate levels.

The table does not show budget authority and outlays for

years after fiscal year 2014 because appropriations for those

years have not yet been considered.

Table 2 compares the current levels of budget authority and

outlays for action completed by each authorizing committee

with the ``section 302(a)'' allocations made under H. Con.

Res. 112 (112th Congress) for fiscal year 2013 and H. Con.

Res. 25 (113th Congress) for fiscal years 2014 and the 10-

year period 2014 through 2023. ``Action'' refers to

legislation enacted after the adoption of the budget

resolution. This comparison is needed to enforce section

302(f) of the Budget Act, which creates a point of order

against measures that would breach the section 302(a)

allocation of new budget authority for the committee that

reported the measure. It is also needed to implement section

311(b), which exempts committees that comply with their

allocations from the point of order under section 311(a).

Table 3 compares the current status of discretionary

appropriations for fiscal years 2013 and 2014 with the

``section 302(b)'' sub-allocations of discretionary budget

authority and outlays among Appropriations subcommittees. The

comparison is also needed to enforce section 302(f) of the

Budget Act because the point of order under that section

equally applies to measures that would breach the applicable

section 302(b) sub-allocation. The table also provides

supplementary information on spending in excess of the base

discretionary spending caps allowed under section 251(b) of

the Budget Control Act.

Table 4 gives the current level for fiscal year 2015 of

accounts identified for advance appropriations under section

601 of H. Con. Res. 25. This list is needed to enforce

section 601 of the budget resolution, which creates a point

of order against appropriation bills that contain advance

appropriations that are: (i) not identified in the statement

of managers or (ii) would cause the aggregate amount of such

appropriations to exceed the level specified in the

resolution.

In addition, letters from the Congressional Budget Office

are attached that summarize and compare the budget impact of

enacted legislation during the FY 2013 and FY 2014 fiscal

years against the budget resolution aggregates in force

during those years.

If you have any questions, please contact Paul Restuccia.

Sincerely,

Paul Ryan,

Chairman.

House of Representatives,

Committee on the Budget,

Washington, DC, October 29, 2013.

Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that the House be considered to have taken from the Speaker's table the Senate Concurrent Resolution (S. Con. Res. 8) setting forth the congressional budget for the United States Government for fiscal year 2014, revising the appropriate budgetary levels for fiscal year 2013, and setting forth the appropriate budgetary levels for fiscal years 2015 through 2023, adopted an amendment in the nature of a substitute consisting of the text of House Concurrent Resolution 25, as adopted by the House; adopted such concurrent resolution, as amended; insisted on its amendment; and requested a conference with the Senate thereon; and during the remainder of the 113th Congress, it shall not be in order to offer a motion under clause 7(c) of rule XXII with respect to Senate Concurrent Resolution 8.

Madam Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 380, I call up the resolution (H. Res 379) expressing the sense of the House of Representatives regarding certain provisions of the Senate amendment to H.R. 2642 relating to crop insurance, and ask for its immediate consideration.

Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks on House Resolution 379.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

First of all, I would like to thank Chairman Lucas for his work on passing a farm bill through the House. It was not an easy task.

And the farm bill got a lot right, in my judgment. It eliminated direct payments. It made reforms to the food stamp program, which are in desperate need of reform. It consolidated duplicative programs, and the Agriculture Committee has started to implement very needed reforms of these programs. Unfortunately, I don't think it went far enough, which is why I am offering this sense of the House.

I think that we should accept what the Senate did--and they did it in a bipartisan fashion--to impose limits on premium subsidies going toward the wealthiest of farmers.

What this sense of the House does is it simply says, let's agree to the Coburn-Durbin amendment which said, for those making above $750,000, the sense of the Congress is that their premiums for crop insurance should not be as generous as everybody else's. In fact, their premiums should be subsidized by 15 percentage points. This is hardly draconian. In fact, I would support going much farther than this, as I have voted consistently in the past.

But what this says is, if you are a farmer and you make more than $750,000, all you will get is a crop insurance subsidy that is not as generous as everybody else's. It will be 15 percentage points less.

Let me give you an example. If you have protection for 50 percent of your yield, right now the Federal Government will subsidize 67 percent of that. Under this, if you make over $750,000, you would be subsidized by 52 percent of your crop insurance. Hardly draconian.

So what we are simply saying is, we had a vote that was 59-33 in the Senate to limit the subsidy for crop insurance for very wealthy farmers. That is 1 percent of all of our agricultural producers in the country, and what we should do is concede to that. We should agree with that in conference, and that is what the sense of this House resolution encourages.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Price), the vice chairman of the Budget Committee.

Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Blumenauer).

I yield the gentleman an additional minute.

I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Utah (Mr. Chaffetz).

At this time, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Hanna).

I yield 2 minutes to the gentlelady from Maine (Ms. Pingree).

I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the chairman of the Agriculture Committee for a very civil debate. He and I have talked about so many of these issues. We have worked so well together, and he has done the yeoman's work on moving these bills to the floor. On this particular issue, we don't agree. He may not think that I am helping, but I think I am helping by passing this. The reason is that this passed 59-33 in the Senate. If we pass it here, that just takes off the table one contentious issue that they don't have to negotiate in conference, making it easier to focus on the other things that you have yet to reconcile in conference. So we are actually trying to help the Ag Committee out here. That is one way you can put it.

On a more serious note, I want to talk about a few of the criticisms.

Pooling. My friend from North Dakota mentioned that it is important to have crop insurance with these people with very, very high adjusted gross incomes in the pool to make the cash flow. That is an actuarial argument that works with health insurance--healthy people subsidize sick people--but that is really not an argument that, I think, flows with this kind of insurance.

Point number two: no one is saying that a person who has a high net worth, who has a high adjusted gross income can't get crop insurance. All we are saying is just don't subsidize him as much as everybody else. That is really not asking a lot. What we are saying is, if you are a farmer and if you make $750,000 of adjusted gross income or higher, you don't get subsidized by the taxpayer for your crop insurance as much as everybody else. Your subsidy is 15 percentage points lower than that of the people who make less than $750,000. You still get crop insurance. You can still buy it. You will still get a subsidy, just not as much as everybody else.

Look, if you buy insurance on 50 percent of your acres, instead of the government paying for 67 percent of that insurance, it will pay for 52 percent of your insurance. If you buy insurance to cover 65 percent of your acres, instead of the government paying 59 percent of the cost, it would pay 44 percent of the cost. If you buy insurance on 85 percent of your acres, instead of the government subsidizing 38 percent of the cost of that coverage, it will subsidize 23 percent of the cost of that coverage. So there is still a subsidy.

You are not penalizing or punishing success by not subsidizing people as much. If we were having a tax debate--if we were talking about raising taxes--then you are penalizing success. If we are talking about taxing and taking money from producers--from successful people, from businesses making any amount of money--then you are penalizing success. What we are saying is just don't subsidize people as much because this subsidy is taking money from hardworking taxpayers--from their taxes-- to give to somebody else. What we are saying is let's not take

money from hardworking taxpayers to give as much to farmers who are making more than $750,000. We just don't want to subsidize them as much. That is not punishing success.

The other point is that this is one of those rare moments in which I think there is bipartisan agreement that a farm bill really ought to be for family farmers. The purpose of the farm program is to make sure that individual families can stay farming, and that means the safety net needs to be there for that family farm. I know in Wisconsin most of our farmers don't make $750,000, so it probably doesn't affect many of the corn and bean or dairy farmers whom I represent. Maybe in North Dakota and in other States there are people with thousands of acres who make that kind of money. I think that is great--I think that is wonderful--but I still think that our taxpayers shouldn't have to subsidize them as much as the family farmer.

This is one of those opportunities in which I think Congress can speak with a bipartisan voice. I really believe, if the Hanna-Pingree amendment or the Blumenauer-Mulvaney amendment had been made in order, it probably would have passed. So this is our chance here in the House to speak with one voice on a bipartisan basis. Let's not subsidize folks at the high end as much, and let's protect that family farmer. Let's agree with the Senate and take this issue off the table as one of those contentious issues because we are agreeing bipartisanly and bicamerally that we ought to have a farm program for the family farmer and somewhere limit these subsidies. That is all we are asking for.

With that, I ask for its passage, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, H.R. 3174 makes funds already appropriated to the Emergency Highway Relief program available for response to the devastating floods in Colorado this summer. Critically, the bill accomplishes this without providing additional budget authority on net, or increasing the deficit over 10 years.

Under our budget rules, discretionary appropriations that the Congress designates as an emergency are not subject to budget limits and do not have to be offset with other spending reductions. To ensure emergency appropriations are only devoted to emergency requirements, our budget rules do not allow emergency funds to be used as an offset for non-emergency purposes. If this were allowed, it would provide a backdoor means of allowing funds for non-emergency purposes to escape budget limits.

This legislation is attempting to make available funding for flooding in Colorado using funds already appropriated and designated as an emergency by Congress. However, this bill is not an appropriations measure. From a budget scorekeeping standpoint the effect of the bill is to decrease emergency discretionary budget authority and increase non-emergency mandatory budget authority. If this bill instead amended the Disaster Relief Appropriations Act of 2013 (P.L. 113-2) and designated the funding for Colorado floods as an emergency, then the purposes of this bill would be accomplished without any scored increase in budget authority. Because there is no effective process for designating mandatory spending as an emergency, the non-emergency mandatory budget authority increase in this bill cannot be offset by the decrease in emergency discretionary budget authority.

In the end, this bill intends to meet new emergency needs making use of existing emergency funds. For that reason, I am going to support this legislation. However, I do not view this as a precedent and will not view a reduction in emergency spending as an appropriate offset for non-emergency funding.

Mr. Speaker, yesterday, I missed rollcall votes 484 and 485. Had I been present, I would have cast the following votes: rollcall No. 484--On Motion to Suspend the Rules and Pass H.R. 1961--``yes.'' rollcall No. 485--On Motion to Suspend the Rules and Agree H.Res. 354--``yes.''

Mr. Speaker, today, my colleagues and I introduced a House Resolution condemning the attack that occurred at the Oak Creek Sikh Gurdwara on August 5, 2012, and honoring the memory of those who died in the attack. We remember all those affected by the senseless act of violence that occurred one year ago in Oak Creek, Wisconsin. We call to mind the heroic efforts of Lieutenant Brian Murphy and all the medical and law-enforcement officials who responded to the scene. We also recognize the public servants who helped our community heal during this trying time.

Since that fateful day, the people of Oak Creek have come together. They refuse to let violence shake their community. My thoughts and prayers are with the victims and their families, and I'm committed to continuing to help the community overcome this tragedy.

Madam Chair, I want to thank Representative Amash for offering this amendment to the Department of Defense Appropriations Act for 2014. We now know that the National Security Agency (NSA) is keeping a phone log of all calls made in the U.S. This issue merits heightened congressional scrutiny. We need to strike a balance between our efforts to prevent terrorist attacks and our protection of civil liberties. The committees with jurisdiction are conducting a thorough review--as they should. I look forward to hearing their recommendations.

That said, rewriting laws--especially one that NSA Director Gen. Keith Alexander says is vital to our safety--is not within the scope of the appropriations process. I welcome further discussion about the scope and intent of the PATRIOT Act, and look forward to working with my colleagues to ensure that the law is not overly broad. So though I commend Mr. Amash for raising this issue, I must respectfully vote against his amendment.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to join with my ranking member, Congressman Van Hollen in recognizing the service of Frank Sammartino, who is retiring on July 26th after 33 years of public service, with 26 of those years in Congressional service. Frank is currently the Assistant Director for Tax Analysis at the Congressional Budget Office, where he has worked for most of his career. Frank's first job in Washington was as a staff economist at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation. While there, he designed and developed a microsimulation model to analyze policies affecting Social Security, taxes, and means-tested transfers. Frank brought that modeling knowledge to CBO, where he developed the first microsimulation model used by the agency for analyzing tax policy. That model became the basis for CBO's individual income tax projections and its analysis of the

distribution of federal taxes. Frank also served for two years as Chief Economist and Deputy Director at the Joint Economic Committee.

As leader of the Tax Analysis Division at CBO, Frank has led his staff in providing high quality and timely analysis of tax policy and budget issues. He has directly contributed to and overseen numerous baseline projections, policy studies, and cost estimates. His expertise on a wide range of public policy issues has been a valuable resource for members and staff. In addition, everyone who has worked with Frank appreciates his warm manner, gentle sense of humor, and helpful spirit. We wish him well in his retirement from CBO and hope he will continue to contribute to our understanding of public policy issues for years to come.