Member of Congress

Roy Blunt

Role: Former Senator
State: MO
Party: Republican

Speeches

RECOGNIZING THE HONORABLE BUD CRAMER AND THE HONORABLE TERRY EVERETT ON THEIR RETIREMENT FROM CONGRESS2008-10-03

Mr. BLUNT

Mr. BLUNT. Mr. Speaker, Terry came to the U.S. House of Representatives a successful businessman and is now heading back to Alabama as a successful congressman. No one doubts that Terry knows the values of a hard day's work. He's been a farmer, an Air Force specialist, a small business owner and newsman. He served the people of Alabama's second district, stretching from Autauga down to Dothan, for the last 16 years with that same work ethic, and they have benefited from his service. Terry came to Congress as an intelligence expert from his days in the Air Force and an agriculture expert from his days on the farm--skills he put to good use sitting on the Agriculture, Armed Services and Select Intelligence committees. I'm going to miss Terry when Congress reconvenes next year. The whole House will miss his work ethic, keen insight and ability to get things done. His retirement is a blow to those in Washington that know and rely on him, but if anyone deserves our thanks for a job well done it is certainly my friend and longtime colleague Terry Everett.

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EMERGENCY ECONOMIC STABILIZATION ACT OF 20082008-10-03

Mr. BLUNT

Mr. BLUNT. I thank the gentleman for yielding, Madam Speaker. I'm glad we're here at this work today. I do think that the bill has improved and the situation has clarified from Monday. We need to come together. We need to get this work done. It's incredibly important. It seems to me that two significant things have happened: one, the changes in the bill that others will talk about and I will talk about a little bit; and two, the changes at the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Accounting Standards Board that have set forth a new way to evaluate these assets that are causing so much trouble in the marketplace. Now, where I live, nobody talks about illiquid assets. They talk about mortgages. They talk about how to pay the bills. They talk about whether they can borrow money or not, and at the end of the day, Madam Speaker, that's what this bill is about. It's not about Wall Street. It's about Main Street. It's not a bailout. It's a situation where American taxpayers are going to invest money in a way that ensures they have a return. I think with the work we've done here, we've not only ensured that they're likely is never likely to be a question of return, but beyond that, if at the end of 5 years taxpayers would appear have lost any money, the President will propose and Congress will act on a set of recommendations that go back to the agencies that participated and say we're going to recover whatever was lost. This is a chance where American taxpayers are investing in their own future. This is an opportunity where people are helping stabilize a market. We saw a bank purchase this week where it looked like the government would have to be part of the purchase, but after the government came in and said here's how we're going to work to stabilize the situation, suddenly there's a market and suddenly that purchase is much different than it would have been without government participation. This bill allows that kind of stabilization. This bill protects taxpayers. This bill has every known oversight mechanism ever conceived of by government in it now. None of those were asked for initially by the administration but they're all there now, a special Inspector General, a board that sets policy, a congressional oversight group, GAO with special authority, ultimate transparency. This is a bill the taxpayers can look at and say this is well beyond the proposal that came to the Congress. It has a transparency. It has the oversight. It has the guarantees that taxpayers should ask for, but it also has lots of options, options that weren't in the original proposal, not just to loan money, not just to purchase mortgages and other securities, but to set up an insurance plan so if that's one of the things that would make more sense in certain areas it can be used. It's a critical moment.

Mr. BLUNT. I'd like to put in the Record, Madam Speaker, a letter I received from the Secretary of the Treasury talking about the rules and regulations that they will pursue that will assure that eligible financial institutions must be established and regulated to have significant operations in the United States. It's not talking about foreign banks. Also requiring that--in the letter that they will set up rules and regulations so that people participating in this program won't benefit from this program. Department of the Treasury, Washington, DC, October 2, 2008. Hon. Roy Blunt, House of Representatives, Washington, DC. Dear Mr. Blunt: I am writing regarding the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008. The Act requires that eligible financial institutions must be established and regulated and have significant operations in the United States. Furthermore, it is the intention of the Department of the Treasury that all mortgages or mortgage- related assets purchased in the Troubled Asset Relief Program will be based on or related to properties in the United States. The Act requires the Department of the Treasury to prevent unjust enrichment of financial institutions selling troubled assets into the Troubled Asset Relief Program, including preventing the sale of a troubled asset to the Treasury at a higher price than what the seller paid to purchase the asset. The Act specifies a single exemption for troubled assets acquired in a merger or acquisition or a purchase of assets from a financial institution that is established and regulated in the United States and that is in conservatorship, receivership or bankruptcy. The Department of the Treasury believes this exemption is important to encouraging healthy institutions to pursue acquisitions of struggling institutions. Such acquisitions help to protect depositors, taxpayers and the financial system. The Department of the Treasury will issue regulations or guidelines necessary to address and manage or to prohibit conflicts of interest that may arise in connection with the administration and execution of the authorities provided under the Act as soon as practicable after the date of enactment. Sincerely, Henry M. Paulson, Jr.

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EMERGENCY ECONOMIC STABILIZATION ACT OF 20082008-09-29

Mr. BLUNT

Mr. BLUNT. I thank the gentleman for yielding. I thank him for his leadership today and his leadership during this discussion. None of us want to be here today. All of us would rather not be dealing with this situation. None of us wanted to see the worldwide economic news over the weekend, but it all happened. And we see things happening in our country today that have to be dealt with, and this body has an opportunity today to deal with those things. We've reached out to try to compromise on both sides of the aisle on a solution. Now, frankly, I think every speech here today on either side that gets into wanting to allocate blame as part of this vote is not helpful. I do think what could be helpful is this solution. I don't think it is helpful the way we started talking about a ``solution, but it's not this one.'' We started talking about a bailout, and we truly have gotten, with lots of effort, to a program that could be a workout. These are not valueless assets; these are just assets that don't reflect in today's economy the value that they truly have. And this is a program that, through a number of ways, would begin to stabilize and establish that value again. Whether it was going in and purchasing some of these mortgages, whether it was insuring these mortgages and other assets that are out there, you begin to make money available again for families in America; you begin to make money available again for businesses that want to expand; you begin to make money available again for student loans; you begin to make money available again for the person who wants to pave the parking area at the service station. This is not about Wall Street; it's about Main Street. And this is not about the government going in and buying things that don't have value, it's about the government helping establish what that value is. If that's done right, and we believe that all of the transparency that you could possibly hope to have in a government program is here, all of the oversight is here--in fact, if anything, we may have overdone the oversight, but none of us want to have underdone the oversight--and that's all here. And this program would ensure, if administered as I think it now has to be under the protections in it, that taxpayers don't lose money. And if, at the end of the process 5 years from now, the Director of the Office of Management and Budget would say to the President there is still some taxpayer loss here, the President then has to come back to the Congress and say to the Congress, here's how we, over the next number of years, recover the remaining money from the people who participated in the program, not the entire financial sector, not every person in America, but the people who benefited from, who participated in the program. Taxpayers, unless a future Congress loses its ability to do what the law says they need to do, taxpayers won't lose anything. And, frankly, I think if this is administered the way it almost has to be now, that 5 years from now it will be apparent that taxpayers won't have lost, they will have gained. And while they were gaining, America gets started on the right direction. If you're watching the stock market over the next few days and we don't act, whether you have portfolios that you know about or not, if you have a pension plan, if you have a son or daughter who wants to go to college, if you have a home improvement you would like to make, you're going to be affected if the economy doesn't begin to reflect the true strength that this economy has. This bill helps us re-establish the floor for that strength. This bill helps us ensure that taxpayers don't pay any cost. This bill ensures that everybody can watch all the time to see what's going on. I urge my colleagues to vote for it. I thank my colleagues who have worked hard to get it to this point. I encourage my colleagues, too, that this is no time to try to seek partisan advantage; this is the time to try to seek a bipartisan solution.

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EARMARK DECLARATION2008-09-25

Mr. BLUNT

Mr. BLUNT. Madam Speaker, pursuant to the Republican Leadership standards on earmarks, I am submitting the following information for publication in the Congressional Record regarding earmarks I received as part of H.R. 2638. Requesting Member: Congressman Roy Blunt. Bill Number: H.R. 2638. Account: Army--RDT&E, Sensors And Electronic Survivability. Legal Name of Requesting Entity: Missouri State University and Foster Miller Inc. Address of Requesting Entity: 524 N. Booneville Ave, Springfield, MO 65806. Description of Request: $4 million is included in this bill for advanced warning systems enabled by integration of sensors and onboard intelligence such that robotic platforms can be tasked to self-deploy and self-maneuver to provide situational awareness and recommend a plan of action without being detected. The use of taxpayer funds is justified because a major impediment to mobility and security of Department of Defense personnel and facilities in theater is lack of perimeter monitoring capabilities for detection of approaching enemy elements, vehicles, and release of toxic chemical and biological threats. In theater, forward security teams have relied on use of dogs to warn warfighters of the presence of intruding personnel. More than ever before such teams, operating covertly or otherwise, find themselves in hostile territories and are required to rotate sentry duty among the team. What is needed is advanced warning systems enabled by integration of sensors and onboard intelligence such that robotic platforms can be tasked to self- deploy and self-maneuver to provide situational awareness and recommend a plan of action without being detected. Requesting Member: Congressman Roy Blunt. Bill Number: H.R. 2638. Account: Army--RDT&E, Medical Advanced Technology. Legal Name of Requesting Entity: Missouri State University and St. Johns Health System. Address of Requesting Entity: 524 N. Booneville Ave, Springfield, MO 65806. Description of Request: $5.4 million is included in this bill to fund technology to allow for the improved ability to quickly treat soldiers who sustain severe eye injuries in the field. Currently, the time from injury to treatment for eye injuries in the Iraqi conflict averages more than 18 hours due to the lack of field-ready, easy-to-use eye injury stabilization materials. Walter Reed Army Medical Center feels strongly that the project has considerable military relevance and plans to collaborate in the program. The use of taxpayer funds is justified because many of the injuries suffered by our military personnel serving in the Middle East are a result of IED (improvised explosive device) mortar and direct action injuries. Between October 2001 and June 2006, over 1,100 troops with combat eye trauma were evacuated from overseas military operations, making serious eye wounds one of the most common types of injury experienced in current U.S. conflicts. Requesting Member: Congressman Roy Blunt. Bill Number: H.R. 2638. Account: Air Force--RDT&E. Legal Name of Requesting Entity: Missouri State University and Nantero Inc. Address of Requesting Entity: 524 N. Booneville Ave, Springfield, MO 65806. Description of Request: $7.2 million included in this bill for Carbon Nanotube-based Radiation Hard Nano-Electronic devices. Requesting Member: Congressman Roy Blunt. Bill Number: H.R. 2638. Account: Global Command And Control System Research, Development, Test And Evaluation, Air Force. Legal Name of Requesting Entity: Gestalt/Accenture. Address of Requesting Entity: 320 4th Street, Joplin, MO 64801. Description of Request: $4 million is included in this bill for the purpose of allowing the delivery of critical information across a low- bandwidth enterprise and to manage services. C2SLM will enable our military to respond to the agility of our opponent by building agility and flexibility into our technology. C2SLM has been selected by the Pentagon to be the early pathfinder for the A-Staff, which will lead to a contract in excess of several hundred million to address non-AOC command and control for COCOMs and NAFs.

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EARMARK DECLARATION2008-09-25

Mr. BLUNT

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TRAVEL PROMOTION ACT OF 20082008-09-25

Mr. BLUNT

Mr. BLUNT. Madam Speaker, I rise today in strong support of H.R. 3232, the Travel Promotion Act of 2008. As I've stated this month during committee consideration of this bill, I believe this is a good bill that will allow our public and private sectors to cooperate on a strategy to encourage foreign visitors to come to the United States. I also want to extend, once again, my thanks to my friend and colleague, Bill Delahunt, whose primary sponsorship and work on behalf of this legislation has gotten us to where we are today. And to all the other cosponsors and supporters of this bill, let me also offer my appreciation. This legislation is a response to the opportunity costs borne by the travel and tourism industries following reforms that Congress implemented in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. Security was tightened at our ports of entry and we have made progress in better coordinating our national security apparatus to be aware of who is coming in and out of the country. Those reforms, though not always perfect, were important and we should be grateful that our country has been made safer as a result of them. But the cost of those reforms has impacted some segments of our economy that were already directly impacted by the 9/11 attacks. Foreign visitors who, for a period of time, were unwilling to get on airplanes due to uncertainty about their safety after 9/11 are now unwilling to get on the same airplanes due to the bureaucratic obstacles to getting into the United States. Multiple agencies have heeded our call for greater security and barriers to entry, but the resulting layers of bureaucratic tape mean that legitimate visitors are often treated in a way none of us should be proud of, simply because they don't possess a United States passport. Millions of foreign travelers who want to visit our country for all the right reasons have received this message loud and clear: KEEP OUT. It isn't worth it to come here. The United States does not welcome you. I've seen some estimates that show the results. Between 2004 and 2005, the United States experienced a decline of 10 percent in business travel. At the same time, Europe experienced an 8-percent increase. In 2005, we lost an estimated $43 billion in visitor spending alone. Increasing unwillingness by foreign visitors to come to the United States since 9/11 translates into a loss of $94 billion in visitor spending; a loss of $16 billion in tax revenue to Federal, state and local governments; and the loss of 200,000 American jobs. Travel and tourism affects every congressional district in America. In my home district in Missouri, tourism in the city of Branson alone produced approximately $1.8 billion for the local economy. Every one of my colleagues have places in their districts that foreign travelers benefit from visiting. We need to encourage that. Getting people to visit our country brings incredible benefits for things that are important to our country. Three specific things come to mind: First, tourists spend and that helps local and regional economies. We all know our nation faces economic challenges today. Support for local businesses and the goods and services they offer is good for our tax base. Those revenues are benefits that our constituents don't have to pay in taxes themselves. And that's a good thing. Second, tourism helps create jobs. Local businesses in support of tourist economies generate and sustain employment at all levels of the economy. At a time of economic challenge for many American families and their communities, these jobs are critical. Finally, people who visit the United States tend to like Americans more. At a time when polling shows that fewer people understand Americans, it shouldn't surprise us that there is waning support for our policies throughout the world. We know that when people visit us here in our country, they almost always like Americans more and are likely to consider American foreign policy more favorably than those who don't visit us. Members of Congress know better than anyone in the country that our best ambassadors are our constituents, when given the opportunity. The Travel Promotion Act of 2008 is an effort to encourage all of those things, and reverse the dangerous notion that America is an unwelcoming place, not even worth the trouble of visiting. It creates a partnership that combines the resources and willpower of the private sector and the government to generate renewed interest in visiting America. We also took a hard look at what's already on the books and streamlined parts of the government that are supposed to be doing this work but aren't doing it effectively. One area where I wish we'd spent some more time and effort was on updating the language relating to the Electronic System for Traveler Authorization (ESTA). When we originally crafted this bill, the ESTA had not yet been created, so our language included a reference to this on the condition it was authorized. The ESTA was authorized as part of the 9/11 bill that Congress passed last year. Unfortunately that legislation did not provide a mandate for the administration to collect the very fee that will provide the federal matching funds for the Corporation. I had hoped that as a result of the negotiations that got us here today, we would have found a way to create that mandate. I've been told that the Department of Homeland Security intends to create a fee in order to implement the ESTA in the near future. I would encourage the Department to do that and help get this program established. The bill we have in front of us is an amended version of the bill that Mr. Delahunt and I introduced last year. I appreciate the hard work that Chairman Dingell and Ranking Member Barton have put into these amendments, as well as the work that Mr. Rush and Mr. Stearns put into the amendments that cleared the subcommittee last week. I think most of these changes enhance the bill and make it a better product. I'd also like to thank Chairman Bennie Thompson and Ranking Member Peter King from the Homeland Security Committee, and Chairman John Conyers and Ranking Member Lamar Smith from the Judiciary Committee. Without the hard work of these members and their staffs, we wouldn't have this bill up on the floor today. I'm looking forward to passage of the Travel Promotion Act. I'm looking forward to working with the industry experts who eventually will serve on the board of the Corporation for Travel Promotion and with the Department of Commerce to develop a strategy to ensure our country is an attractive market for international travelers. And, of course, I'm looking forward to welcoming as many of those travelers as possible to Branson, Missouri.

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LEGISLATIVE PROGRAM2008-09-18

Mr. BLUNT

Mr. BLUNT. I thank the gentleman for that. On your indication the House will and of course has to consider some way to continue funding the government with the fiscal year ending at the end of this month and no appropriation bills passed up until now, we would be considering a continuing resolution next week. Does the gentleman have a sense of whether that would be a continuing resolution with other items on it and what any of those other items might be? I would yield.

Mr. BLUNT. I yield.

Mr. BLUNT. This may very well be the last time, certainly before the election, we have a chance to talk about the work we get done in the next few days, and so I do have some questions, and I won't go there, but I would like to see us get that Defense authorization bill done. I do think it's a shame that we can't do that in an appropriate conference and go through the regular process.

Mr. BLUNT. Would the gentleman anticipate that we would be dealing with the continued funding of the government again in this session of Congress? In other words, would the time frame be mid-November or do you anticipate a time frame well into next year? I would yield.

Mr. BLUNT. The House has, I guess, passed one of the 12 appropriations bills. Would the gentleman anticipate that any other bills in addition to that one might be included in the continuing resolution, and if so, which ones might we be looking at?

Mr. BLUNT. I thank the gentleman. On the Department of Defense Authorization Act, would that be a conference report we'd expect?

Mr. BLUNT. On that issue, it's my understanding, at least, that Chairman Oberstar and the Great Lakes delegation is substantially in favor of that. Hopefully that has removed whatever obstacle that we've been dealing with with that issue. And I yield back.

Mr. BLUNT. I thank the gentleman for that. I am tempted to go into the whole topic of the informal conference. It's so frustrating to all of us.

Mr. BLUNT. I'm grateful to have that potential to be back in October, and we have very few scheduled work days from the 1st of August to the end of the year, but clearly this economic situation we're in could very well bring us back. The gentleman mentioned that list of--we call them here anomalies, but they're really the things that wouldn't necessarily be part of or perhaps should be part of a straight extension of funding. I know one of those on the energy front that's been discussed a lot would be the moratorium on using money to begin the process of leasing and exploration on either the Outer Continental Shelf or the so-called oil shale moratorium in the West. Does the gentleman have a sense of whether those moratoriums would be included in the CR or, as the administration has asked, that they not be included in the CR? I would yield.

Mr. BLUNT. I was hoping for a little more definition than that.

Mr. BLUNT. I yield to my friend, the majority leader, to give us an update on what we intend to do next week.

Mr. BLUNT. The only specific question I had from a Member right before we started was whether or not, in the suspensions for next week, the Great Lakes Compact could be included in that. I think we sent that message over that I might be asking about that.

Mr. BLUNT. On that list of things we discussed, I don't know that we have specifically discussed it, but some kind of redefining the previously authorized loans to auto companies could be in that effort of things we look at on the CR? I would yield.

Mr. BLUNT. So the unemployment fund would not be running out of money----

Mr. BLUNT. But the people who already used one extension, that extension we agreed to 9 or so weeks ago would reach its 13-week conclusion is what the gentleman is discussing?

Mr. BLUNT. If it's not there, it won't be a stumbling block for our side, based on the letters you've seen and other things. That's for sure. Tomorrow, at one point we were believing that some issues could be included in what was being called an economic stimulus package could be on the floor. That's not happening now. Would you see some of those issues also as likely things that might be added to the continuing resolution? I would yield.

Mr. BLUNT. I would say, just to clarify on that topic, what they would be running out of would be the end of the first 13-week extension on top of the normal unemployment.

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DEMOCRAT ENERGY BILL2008-09-16

Mr. BLUNT

Mr. BLUNT. We're here today to talk about a bill that nobody had seen, or at least no Republican had seen as late as 9:45 last night. No committee has seen the bill. In fact, I asked has this been to the Energy and Commerce Committee? I thought, as a member of that committee I must have missed the hearing. But, no, it hasn't been to the Energy and Commerce Committee. And so I asked has it been to the Resources Committee because it deals with our natural resources. No, it hasn't been to the Resources Committee. I asked has it been to the Ways and Means Committee. There's a $1.2 billion project in this bill that the chairman of the Ways and Means Committee has wanted forever to extend subways in New York, so I thought surely it had been to the Ways and Means Committee. But it hadn't been to the Ways and Means Committee. In fact, it's been to no committee anywhere, and it does nothing. Republicans have worked for years in this House to send good legislation to the Senate, joined by Democrats who agree with us on this issue. We worked all of August to call attention to the fact that we weren't dealing with the number one problem facing the American people, and now we have a bill that we find will not produce any more energy and we know will increase energy prices. The renewable portfolio standards that raise everybody's electricity bill are unreasonable. But that really doesn't matter because nobody expects this bill to become law. The drilling in the Outer Continental Shelf can't really occur. But maybe that doesn't matter either because this bill's not about something that would become law. I'm offended, Members of the House are offended, and we should be by this process. And the American people should be offended that we're not doing the job for them that really matters.

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