Spencer Abraham

Mr. ABRAHAM

Mr. ABRAHAM. Mr. President, at this time, we are prepared to yield back the remainder of our time. I inquire before I do as to whether the Senator from Nebraska is prepared to proceed with their next amendment? If not, until they are ready I will probably be putting in a quorum call request without the time running against either side. Mr. President, I yield back the remainder of my time. I suggest the absence of a quorum, and I ask unanimous consent that the time not run against either side.

Mr. ABRAHAM. Mr. President, I yield myself such time as I need. I will be very brief, and then I will yield further time on our side. Mr. President, the fact is it is not surprising that the minority is arguing against tax cuts. They are the party that raised taxes in this country in the last Congress by a record-setting $270 billion. In my State and across America, everywhere I go, the people I talk to say we need a tax cut to make ends meet. The middle-class squeeze we talk about on the floor all the time is in no small measure the result of the fact that today in America average families send $1 to Washington for every $4 they earn versus $1 for every $50 they earned back in the 1950's and the 1960's. Those are the families who are paying the bills and paying the taxes. As we go through the belt-tightening process here in Washington to bring down the deficit, we believe it is only fair to let those hard- working families keep more of what they earn. What we have been presented with today is an amendment that says to all of those families: Wait. Wait, American families, hard-working families, for your $500 tax credit. Wait, spouses who work in the home, before you get your IRA. Wait, to people who want to adopt and need a little help making an adoption feasible. Wait, to jobseekers who need the opportunities created by progrowth tax cuts. We believe the waiting should be over. We say this: If America's taxpayers want to wait for the Democrats and President Clinton to produce a tax cut, fine. But we have already gone through a lot of waiting for the tax cut that was promised in the 1992 campaign by the President. It has never been delivered. The waiting that this amendment suggests will have to continue will also be undelivered. We are prepared to allow hard-working families to realize tax savings now. At this time I yield 6 minutes to the Senator from Alabama.

Mr. ABRAHAM. I will have somebody here shortly. If the Senator has a short speech, we would be ready to go after that.

Mr. ABRAHAM. He mentioned the minority leader.

Mr. ABRAHAM. Is the Senator referring to me?

Mr. ABRAHAM. Yes. We are prepared to do that.

Mr. ABRAHAM

Mr. ABRAHAM. I yield the remainder of our time to the Senator from Idaho.

Mr. ABRAHAM. The remainder of our time.

Mr. ABRAHAM. Fine.

Mr. ABRAHAM. I am prepared to yield our time.

Mr. ABRAHAM. Mr. President, may I inquire as to how much time is left?

Mr. ABRAHAM. At this time I yield 10 minutes to the Senator from Oklahoma.

Mr. ABRAHAM. I yield myself such time as I may need to make a brief statement or two regarding this amendment. And then I will yield time to another Member on our side. The chairman of the Senate Labor and Human Resources Committee and I were chatting here on the floor, and the Senator from Kansas indicated to me a couple of things. Members on both sides are probably aware that there are discussions going on now that may directly address much of the content of this amendment in a way that would be very similar to what is being proposed here. Those discussions are going on as we debate this issue. There is likely to be, from our side, an amendment which would be responsive to some of these concerns, many of which were raised in the Labor and Human Resources Committee--Members on both sides of the aisle--during the debate. For the students who are watching today and listening to our proceedings, or their families, I want to point out a couple of factors which, once again, the chairman of the committee reminded me of, which we discussed during our deliberations on this. First of all, nothing in the reconciliation package will, in any way, affect the volume of loans available to students. In other words, the growth rate of student loan volume will continue unabated under the Republican package. Students who are hoping to get loans will have those loans available. We are not contracting the size of the loan volume. I believe it will be in the vicinity of $26 billion annually under this package. In addition, I point out concerns that have been raised hear about the origination fee that is part of this package. There was an amendment, as the President will remember, brought before the committee that would have eliminated the origination fee. It was opposed and voted down. I believe every Member of the minority party voted against an amendment that would have eliminated those origination fees. I want to, once again, point out just for clarification, insofar as the grace period issue is concerned, we are not asking students to begin paying back their loans upon completion of school. Our changes only go to the issues of when interest begins to accrue. Students will still have 6 months after they graduate before they are required to begin paying their student loans. Indeed, as I think everybody is aware, the overriding goal we have here in this reconciliation package, and more broadly in our budget, is to bring the budget into balance. Mr. President, when we do that, we not only will bring down interest rates for the Federal Government, we also will bring down interest rates across America for everybody. When those interest rates come down, they will not just come down insofar as what we pay on the bills, it will be for what people pay on home mortgages and with respect to student loans. As those student loan interest rates come down, they will, I believe far more effectively, help students to finance their college education than anything we are doing here today, because a much lower student loan rate is going to mean far less total dollars spent by students than anything else we could do here in the U.S. Senate. I also note that in our finance package here in the reconciliation bill, there also is a student loan deduction available to people who are paying student loans, for middle-income families. That, too, will help to offset the burdens of college education that middle-class families in this country pay. So we are trying to be responsive. We are not reducing the volume rate. We are not requiring students to begin paying their loans earlier; and, most important, we are trying to balance the budget so that interest rates on student loans will be so low that they will help students in the kind of ways students want most, which is a total amount of money being paid back, lower than what they have to pay back today. I yield 10 minutes to the Senator from Montana.

Mr. ABRAHAM. Mr. President, the majority does not object. We support the 90-minute time agreement.

Mr. ABRAHAM. Mr. President, I yield the remainder of my 14 seconds.

Mr. ABRAHAM. Mr. President, I yield myself 1 minute to just recapitulate the point that has been made on our side in the last hour of debate. Our position is quite simple--that if States are given the kind of flexibility that has in part been given for waivers to run Medicaid Programs, they can bring down the rate of growth of these programs far more effectively than a Federal bureaucracy in Washington; that, indeed, the growth rates are growth rates that decrease but growth in spending that has been outlined in the reconciliation bill can still provide the sorts of benefits that all of us want to see for our citizens, if we let the States, the people closest to those in need, run these systems. In my State of Michigan, our Governor, our legislature, and our department of social services insist that they can make our program even more efficient at the rate of growth that is proposed in this legislation if they are simply given the opportunity to do so. We have come to a point when health care costs are skyrocketing in the public sector but are being brought under control in the private sector through such things as competition and other market factors. Let us give the States the chance to do some of the same things this legislation does. That is the reason we have included this approach and State flexibility in the reconciliation package. At this point, I yield the remainder of our time to the Senator from Missouri.

Mr. ABRAHAM. I would prefer not to use our 2 minutes at this point.

Mr. ABRAHAM. Mr. President, how much time is left on each side?

Mr. ABRAHAM

Mr. ABRAHAM. Thank you, Mr. President. At this time, I will yield 10 minutes to the Senator from Tennessee, Senator Frist.

Mr. ABRAHAM. Mr. President, parliamentary inquiry. How much time remains?

Mr. ABRAHAM. Mr. President, at this time I would yield 10 minutes to the Senator from Missouri.

Mr. ABRAHAM. Mr. President, I propose to have Senator Graham proceed. If he chooses to take time off the bill, we will for Senator Nickles.

Mr. ABRAHAM. The motion I believe is the motion of the Senator from New Jersey. I believe the agreement with regard to time on that motion is 10 minutes had been reserved.

Mr. ABRAHAM. I do not think it is a request, simply a confirmation of an agreement reached last night for 10 minutes reserved for Senator Nickles to comment further on the motion that the Senator from New Jersey has offered.

Mr. ABRAHAM. We would be happy to enter into a unanimous-consent agreement, and we wish to reserve the 10 minutes of time for Senator Nickles for whatever time later that he might be available. I move that we temporarily lay aside the EITC motion so that we might proceed to the next motion, I believe it is, while reserving 10 minutes of debate on our side for the EITC.