John Boehner

Mr. BOEHNER

Mr. BOEHNER. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks on H.R. 438.

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

Mr. BOEHNER

Mr. BOEHNER. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Ballenger), a senior member of the Committee on Education and the Workforce.

Mr. BOEHNER. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. H.R. 2211, the Ready to Teach Act of 2003, which was reported by the Committee on Education and the Workforce on June 10 by a bipartisan voice vote, complements the No Child Left Behind Act and will help improve the quality and accountability of our Nation's teacher preparation programs. No Child Left Behind set a lofty, but achievable, goal of placing a highly qualified teacher in every public school classroom by the 2005- 2006 school year. We can all agree that a highly qualified teacher plays a pivotal role in the successful education of our Nation's children, and those children deserve nothing less. Congress has kept our word to increase funding to help ensure teachers can become highly qualified. In fact, we increased funding for teacher quality grants by 35 percent in the first year of No Child Left Behind alone, and the increases are continuing. We are providing the resources, and this bill will build on that effort by supporting our teachers with real reforms. There is a serious problem when the programs charged with training the teachers of tomorrow are not meeting that goal, and that is exactly what we are facing today. Everyone here will agree that highly qualified teachers prepared to meet the challenges of the classroom and fulfill the needs of our students are essential if we are going to succeed with education reform in America. Yet the Nation's teacher- training programs suffer from serious lack of accountability, and this time it is the teachers who are being left behind. The bill before us today takes important steps to ensure that teacher-training programs are in fact giving perspective teachers the skills and knowledge they need to meet the highly qualified standard in No Child Left Behind. Let us be clear on this point: this bill is about supporting our teachers. We are expecting a lot from them, and they deserve to have access to high quality training programs that ensure that when they step into the classroom they are truly ready to teach. This legislation makes several improvements to title II of the Higher Education Act to ensure that teacher-training programs are providing perspective teachers with the skills they need to be highly qualified and ready to teach when they enter the classroom. This bill is about helping teachers, pure and simple, giving them the tools and training they need to meet the needs of our Nation's students. H.R. 2211 authorizes competitively awarded grants under the Higher Education Act to increase the quality of our teaching force by improving the preparation of perspective teachers and enhancing teacher professional development activities. We want to hold teacher- preparation programs accountable for preparing highly qualified teachers and recruit highly qualified individuals, including minorities and individuals from other occupations, into the teaching force. The Ready to Teach Act ensures that program effectiveness can accurately be measured and places a renewed emphasis on the skills needed to meet the ``highly qualified'' standard found in No Child Left Behind, such as the use of advanced technology in the classroom, vigorous academic content knowledge, scientifically based research and challenging State student academic standards. Under this legislation, funds can also be used to recruit individuals, and specifically minorities, into the teaching profession. The committee adopted a bipartisan amendment offered by the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Burns), the gentleman from New York (Mr. Owens), and the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Hinojosa) to authorize grants for the creation of Centers of Excellence at high quality, minority-serving institutions. In general, those Centers of Excellence will help increase teacher recruitment and make institutional improvements to teacher-preparation programs at minority-serving institutions. Grants under this program will be competitively awarded to high quality teacher preparation programs at eligible institutions, which include historically black colleges and universities, Hispanic-serving institutions, tribally controlled colleges or universities, Alaska native-serving institutions, or native Hawaiian- serving institutions. Mr. Chairman, as we work to place highly qualified teachers in classrooms across the Nation, I am particularly pleased that the Ready to Teach Act allows for innovative programs that provide alternative options to traditional teacher-training programs. Proposals outlined in this bill, such as charter colleges of education, provide a much-needed alternative route to training highly qualified and effective teachers. H.R. 2211 authorizes States to use funds to set up charter colleges of education that function in a manner similar to elementary and secondary charter schools, except that they would prepare highly qualified teachers in a higher-education setting. Charter colleges of education would exchange flexibility in meeting State requirements for institutional commitments to produce results-based outcomes for teacher-education graduates, measured based on increased student academic achievement. This bill takes the important step of recognizing that individuals seeking to enter the teaching profession often have varied backgrounds; and by creating a more flexible approach that steps outside the box, these individuals can become highly qualified teachers through training programs as unique as their own individual experiences. H.R. 2211 will also hold teacher-preparation programs accountable for preparing highly qualified teachers. While current higher-education law contains annual reporting requirements, these reporting measures have often proven ineffective in measuring the true quality of teacher- preparation programs. In fact, the current requirements have often been manipulated, leaving data skewed and often irrelevant. The Ready to Teach Act includes accountability provisions that will strengthen the reporting measures and hold teacher-preparation programs accountable for providing accurate and useful information. I would like to thank a new member of our committee, the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Gingrey), the author of this bill, for his work on the Ready to Teach Act. I would also like to commend my colleague, the gentleman from California (Mr. George Miller), the ranking member; the gentleman from California (Chairman McKeon) of the subcommittee; and his ranking member, the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Kildee), for their bipartisan effort on this bill. They have put together a bipartisan bill that makes commonsense changes to title II of the Higher Education Act to help improve the quality of our Nation's teachers. Mr. Chairman, I urge my colleagues to support the underlying bill.

Mr. BOEHNER. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, let me again congratulate my friend from Michigan. This is a bipartisan bill that has been worked on with Members on both sides of the aisle to try to address the serious needs that we have in our teacher preparation programs as outlined in title II of the Higher Education Act. But as a side note, I need to respond to my colleague from Michigan when it comes to the issue of funding the Federal Government's role in education. We can look at this as a glass half empty, or we can look at it as a glass half full. Federal education spending over the last 3 fiscal years has gone from $28 billion for elementary and secondary programs to $35.7 billion for these same programs, including almost $400 million to pay for the development and implementation of the testing requirements under No Child Left Behind. We can look at title I. It has been increased almost 200 percent over the last 6 years. We can look at the last 6 years of special education funding having risen 300 percent. So when Members come to the floor of the House and suggest that we are not meeting our commitments, I have no choice but to stand up and say, let us be honest. We are doing our share. Could we do more? Of course, we could do more. But as I told my colleagues one day, I was elected to come to Congress and make decisions; I was not elected to be Santa Claus, and today is not Christmas. As we get through the appropriations process, we are going to continue to work at the appropriate funding levels for these education programs. But, today, we have a bipartisan bill that will help improve the quality of our Nation's teachers and those who seek to be teachers, and we have to continue to work together to meet this important goal. Mr. Chairman, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Gingrey), the author of this bill, who spent an awful lot of time as a school board member, a State legislator, and now as a Member of Congress, developing teacher-training programs to help meet the needs of our Nation's teachers.

Mr. BOEHNER. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of my time. Mr. Chairman, let me thank the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Kildee), the gentleman from California (Mr. George Miller), and Members on both sides of the aisle for their work. I especially want to thank the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Gingrey), a new member of our committee and new Member of Congress, for his authorship of the underlying bill. We all know that one of the real keys to ensuring every child in America gets a chance at a good education is to ensure that every child has a highly qualified teacher in their classroom. There has been much effort around the country at improving the quality of teacher preparation programs. What we try to do in the bill we have before us today is to strengthen those programs and to bring greater accountability for those programs that need a little more oversight than they are getting today. The goal here is to take young people and others outside of the profession and put them through rigorous programs that will benefit them and their students when they are in the classroom. There are just too many programs today around the country that are doing not as well as they could in terms of preparing teachers for tomorrow. There has been a lot of discussion here about funding, because later on today the House is expected to take up the Labor-HHS appropriation bill, which includes the funding for education. As I said earlier, 2 to 3 years ago we were spending $28 billion a year on elementary and secondary education programs. Today we are spending $35.7 billion per year. Most of the money to fund primary and secondary education comes from State governments, local governments, and property taxes. The Federal Government's role is focused on helping needier students have a better chance at the same kind of education than our children received. We are doing our share. Could we be doing more? Absolutely, we could be doing more. But we are here, as I said before, to make decisions, and I do think that we are meeting our commitments under No Child Left Behind. I do again suggest to all of our Members that this is a good underlying bipartisan bill, so let us support it.

Mr. BOEHNER. Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Hoekstra), the chairman of the Subcommittee on Select Education.

Mr. BOEHNER

Mr. BOEHNER. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks on H.R. 2211.

Mr. BOEHNER

Mr. BOEHNER. Mr. Speaker, the 15 percent reduction is only the reduction in the administrative costs of running the plan. When you begin to look at what pooling and larger pools will do, it brings the costs down significantly.

Mr. BOEHNER. Mr. Speaker, the underlying bill seeks to address the needs of 41 million Americans who have no health insurance. What the motion to recommit does is essentially mandate coverage on association health care plans. If you have no health insurance, a mandate will do you no good. What we seek to do with the underlying bill is to cover more people. Sixty percent of the people who are uninsured either work in a small business or have a relative that works in a small business. What we are trying to do here is level the playing field so that small businesses can buy health insurance for their employees just like large companies and unions can do today. Under ERISA, there are but several small mandates. We do not mandate every coverage. But if you ask employees of large companies and you ask employees and members of large unions, they will tell you that they have the best health care plans in America. These large plans in our country have great benefits. They cover virtually all the illnesses and all the diseases that are there. But they are allowed to design one benefit issue for each of these mandates that covers all 50 States. It may not read the same in every particular State. What we are trying to do with the underlying bill is to give small businesses the same advantage in the marketplace that big businesses have today. I would urge my colleagues at this hour, reject the motion to recommit and vote for the final passage of this bill.

Mr. BOEHNER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time. Mr. Speaker, we have 41 million Americans who do not have health insurance. As I said before, Congress has been talking about this for a decade. And while the underlying bill will not solve the entire problem, it will help in addressing the needs of the uninsured. As we heard before, some 60 percent either work for or have a dependent who works for a business, and so they have jobs. We are not talking about the poor here, because the poor get covered by Medicaid. We are talking about people who go to work every day, but they happen to work in an industry that maybe does not traditionally cover health insurance, or they work for a small employer who just cannot afford it because they are locked in a small State insurance pool. We know what the cost of health insurance and these increases do. It creates more uninsured. In the Wall Street Journal today, CALPERS, the country's largest health plan, is set to increase premiums on an average of 17 percent for the next year, a 17 percent increase from the largest health care plan in the country. It is time that we step up and take action. The underlying bill will in fact help small businesses create more coverage for more people. Small businesses. And who are small businesses? How about the dry cleaner down the street or the convenience store? How about the farmers in America today who have to go fend for themselves as an individual in the marketplace? They may be by themselves, maybe just family coverage. How about the real estate agents we talked about before, independent contractors, and others who may be self-employed that have to go fight to get insurance in very small risk pools in many States? If we allow them to come together with large State associations, national associations, and to group themselves, they can have real coverage for a much more reasonable cost. This is the right thing to do today, to help those who pay high premiums; and it is also the right thing to do to help those who have no insurance at all. Those plans that are out there covered under ERISA are the Cadillac of plans in the country. Why not let small employers have the same advantage.

Mr. BOEHNER. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Sam Johnson), the chairman of the Subcommittee on Employer-Employee Relations, the gentleman who shepherded this bill through our committee. (Mr. SAM JOHNSON of Texas asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. BOEHNER. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Gingrey), a member of our committee.

Mr. BOEHNER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Burgess)

Mr. BOEHNER. I yield to the gentleman from New Jersey.

Mr. BOEHNER. Mr. Speaker, I thank my good colleague for yielding me this time. We have heard about these studies today; and the gentleman knows that is the study, or at least has heard me say that the study done by Mercer is very similar to the study done by the Congressional Budget Office, and they are both flawed. They are very flawed. They do not take into account the fact that we have anti-cherrypicking language in the bill, and they assume in their studies that cherrypicking would be allowed. Secondly, they assume that there would not be any difference in the administrative fees for running the plan. The fact is that we have studies that show that up to 8 million of the uninsured would have access to affordable, quality health insurance. Let me also point out exactly what our bill does. The gentleman from New Jersey just said in the State of New Jersey, for a single person to buy a health insurance plan is about $6,000 and family coverage is about $12,000. The average cost for a large employer for the cost of their health insurance is about $3,300 for a single person and about $5,500 for a family.

Mr. BOEHNER. Mr. Speaker, I made some phone calls to find several plans that were both in the same area. The fact is, that is exactly what this bill does. It allows small employers to band together to get themselves into a larger pool to design their own plan so that they can, in fact, offer better coverage at lower cost to their employees. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. BOEHNER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from South Bend, Indiana (Mr. Chocola).

Mr. BOEHNER. Mr. Speaker, I am opposed to the gentleman's amendment and claim the time in opposition.

Mr. BOEHNER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, instead of embracing this bipartisan bill like many of their colleagues, some House Democrats have, instead, offered a substitute that is really no alternative at all. Their plan does nothing to address one of the real issues that is really at the heart of this debate, and that is cost. In fact, it takes us exactly in the wrong direction of where we are trying to going, raising costs for small businesses and imposing with new mandates on employers. Instead of relying on competition that AHPs would provide, thereby lowering costs, their alternative could drive small employers out of business altogether. Moreover, the substitute comes with a $50 billion price tag establishing a complex new Federal program that includes health care subsidies for certain small businesses and some workers who work in small businesses. It would establish a national Government-subsidized health care plan that attempts to model itself after the Federal Employee Health Benefits Plan, but instead imposes a new mandate such as requiring small employers to pay 50 percent of their premiums for employees. However, unlike the Federal Employee Health Benefits Plan that is exempt from costly State mandates and regulations, coverage offered under this substitute would subject this plan to the more than 1,500 State mandates that make up about 15 percent of the rising cost of health insurance. In addition, in order to qualify, the substitute imposes new mandates on employer plans. For example, the substitute mandates that employers provide health care coverage to every employee who has been employed for at least 3 months. In addition, it mandates that employers pay 50 percent of the cost of health care premiums for employees and that they cover all dependents of their workers. Well meaning, but in the end, these mandates will prohibit employers from proceeding. Self-employed individuals, however, are not covered by the substitute and would receive no benefits. So let us make clear this fact. Small businesses today have the highest health care premiums of any other group. Premiums increased this year by at least 15 percent, the highest increase in a decade. And premiums are even higher for small businesses that see increases of 40 to 50 percent a year as employers continue to get out of small group activities and States. In fact, the increase in the uninsured this year, now 41 million Americans, was made up entirely of small business workers who lost their health care coverage because their employers could not afford to continue to provide this benefit. So in answer to this, the substitute proposes to raise the cost to those small employers by adding new coverage requirements and subjecting it to more than 1,500 State mandates. And then we are going to spend $50 billion worth of Federal taxpayers' money to subsidize this coverage. In contrast, AHPs use the strengths of the employer-based system that cover about 150 million American lives today, and we rely on the private market. The benefits of competition, the economies of scales that are enjoyed by large unions and large companies all across the country to help lower costs and to provide better coverage for their workers. AHPs allow small businesses to access the benefits of ERISA that are currently offered to large employers and unions. ERISA exempts large employers and unions from State mandates so that they are able to offer a quality benefit package from one coast to another or in just several adjoining States. This uniformity reduces the cost so that more of the health care dollar that they are spending can actually go to benefits for their employees, and the lowering of the administrative costs also allows these companies and unions to offer more benefits to their members. Through ERISA, employers and unions are able to offer benefits that best fit the needs of their employees. Their small business counterparts deserve the same opportunity to craft benefit packages that are both high quality and affordable. The substitute would offer employers a difficult Hobson's choice: Meet these conditions, which may strap a business to the point of going under; or face limited and costly alternatives to health care coverage; or they can just do what they do today, offer no health care coverage to their employees. Instead of making it possible for small businesses to access more affordable coverage, their coverage options will actually be more expensive, and then we are going to finance it with higher taxes. While AHP legislation would be implemented quickly, the Democrat substitute might take years to get up and running because we are going to require the Department of Labor to design this, then to figure out how they are going to sell it, and then figure out how they are going to parcel out the $50 billion. If the appropriation does not go through, then you have got a plan with no financing behind it at all. So, let me make myself clear, if I have not already: I believe our Nation's employer-sponsored health care system is a huge American success story. Employers provide coverage for the vast majority of our Nation's population, and almost 150 million Americans have coverage through ERISA. The Committee on Education and the Workforce and the Department of Labor through our oversight of ERISA have jurisdiction over employer- sponsored health care, and I support the employer-based system to address the problem of the uninsured. However, the way that the substitute does that is not by building on our strengths to offer really good plans. The mandates in their bill will basically say to small employers, you either offer the best health care plan in the entire market that is possible to your employees, or you get no help at all. I think the strengths of the current system are good, and I think building on those by allowing Association Healthcare Plans will, in fact, work. This bill is being supported by our nation's small business associations. The NIFB, the National Retail Association, the National Association of Wholesale Distributors, the National Association of Homebuilders, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and others strongly support this bill, and the same groups oppose the substitute that we have before us. So I hope Members will join me in offering assistance to our Nation's small businesses by supporting the underlying bill, and I ask my colleagues to reject the substitute we have before us. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. BOEHNER. Madam Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time. We could look at the problem of the 41 million Americans through many different lenses, and we could talk about solutions. We believe that we are bringing a solution here where we are showing the glass half full. My colleagues on the other side want to look at this solution as a glass that is half empty. The fact is that 41 million Americans have no health insurance, and we in this Congress, over the last decade, have talked about it and talked about it and talked about it. As a matter of fact, we brought this bill to the floor on two occasions before today, and unfortunately the other body did not see fit to move the legislation. But we are not going to quit because if we do not help these 41 million Americans who have no health insurance, guess what, they are going to continue to get sicker. They are going to end up getting treatment later in their illness, and they are going to continue to pile up massive amounts of healthcare debt that by and large they do not pay for, those who purchase health insurance pay for in terms of higher fees. We have heard all of the discussion about the fact that we do not mandate this coverage and mandate this coverage. The reason that we have the crisis in many States is because they have mandated every coverage known to man be stipulated in each of the policies, whether they need the coverage or not. Large employer plans do not have mandates other than two small mandates that are in ERISA. Neither did the union plans. They cover virtually all of these diseases and all of these treatments because that is what their employees want. We know that bare-bones policies do not work because employers do not buy them and their employees do not want them. And if we look at the best plans in America, they happen to be large employer plans, union plans that cover broad healthcare coverage and those employees love those plans. Why would we not allow small businesses to come together, and whether it is through the Ohio Chamber of Commerce or the National Restaurant Association or the Lumbermen's Association, or how about the Farm Bureau, why would we not allow them to allow their members to come together where they could offer them a package of healthcare plans? Maybe it is one or two, maybe it is four or five potential plans that their members would get to choose from. Take the issue of farmers, I have got a lot of farmers in my district. They are independent contractors. Their ability to go out and buy health insurance on not on their own is about zero unless they wants to pay $1,000 to $2,000 a month. If they were allowed to come together with other farmers around Ohio, other farmers around the country, guess what? They would get much better coverage than they are getting today at far less cost, and why should we not give them the opportunity to do this? So I say to my colleagues as we end the general debate today, this is a good bill. It has strong bipartisan support, and I urge my colleagues to support the underlying bill.

Mr. BOEHNER. Madam Speaker, I am pleased to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Dooley), one of my good friends and colleagues on the Committee on Agriculture.

Mr. BOEHNER. Madam Speaker, as I said earlier, this bill does have broad bipartisan support. I am happy to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Wynn).

Mr. BOEHNER. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Speaker, the most pressing crisis that we face in health care today is the number of Americans who lack basic health insurance benefits. It is a problem that can be illustrated by just a few numbers, so let us just look at the facts. Today, 41 million Americans are uninsured. This problem is not going to go away, and we have a responsibility to confront it. With health care costs continuing to rise sharply across the country, more and more employers and workers are sharing the burden of increased premiums. Employer-based health insurance premiums leaped an average of 15 percent in 2003, the largest increase in at least a decade, according to a study just released June 11 by the Center for Studying Health System Change. We know that for every 1 percent increase in coverage, additional price increase, 300,000 more people lose their health insurance, according to a 1999 study by the Lewin Group, a national health care and human services consulting firm. The second number is 60. Sixty is the percentage of the 41 million uninsured Americans who either work for a small business or who are dependent upon someone who does. So let us remember, there are 60 percent of the uninsured where they or one of their dependents works every day for a company that likely does not offer health insurance. Many of these Americans work for small employers who cannot afford to purchase quality health insurance benefits for their workers. Notably, the 2002 Census Bureau statistics show that employer-sponsored health care coverage has declined because small businesses with less than 25 workers have been forced to drop coverage because of rising health care costs. These small employers are denied the ability to purchase quality health benefits that compare with the coverage that large, multi-State corporations and unions have been offering to their workers for decades. The last number is $130 billion. Yes, $130 billion is the cost to the American economy every year of poor health and premature deaths amongst those 41 million Americans who lack basic health insurance coverage, according to a study released just this week by the Institute of Medicine. Madam Speaker, $130 billion a year of additional costs to our society and disproportionately aimed at the 41 million Americans that do not have any health insurance. The implications of these numbers are tragic, not just for employers who cannot afford the high cost of health insurance, but the millions of uninsured families who are being denied access to quality care. Clearly, we need to focus on providing affordable health care to the uninsured as well as ensure that employers who provide health benefits to their employees are not forced to drop coverage because of rising premiums and high administrative costs. The Small Business Health Fairness Act, which we have on the floor today, responds to this problem and can help reduce the high cost of health insurance for small businesses and uninsured working families. By creating association health plans, which would be strictly regulated by the Department of Labor, small businesses could pool their resources and increase their bargaining power with benefit providers, which will allow them to negotiate better rates and purchase quality health care at a lower cost. President Bush addressed this point directly last year during his speech at the Women's Entrepreneurship Summit when he said, ``Small businesses will be able to pool together and spread their risk across a large employee base. It makes no sense in America to isolate small businesses as little health care islands unto themselves. We must have association health plans. Well, the President is right, and we should help level this playing field so that small businesses can afford to offer the kind of quality coverage that large companies and unions do across America today. Importantly, the bill gives AHPs the freedom from costly State mandates because small businesses deserve to be treated in the same fashions as corporations like GM and UPS, and unions who receive the same exemption so that they can offer high quality plans and benefits to their workers. Clearly, State health care mandates are useless to families who do not have the health care coverage in the first place. And if you do not have health care coverage, State mandates requiring health plans to offer specific benefits to those they cover do you and your family no good at all. Let us be clear on the protections this bill provides workers, however, because it includes strong safeguards to protect workers. In fact, the solvency standards in the bill go far beyond what is required any single employer plan or labor union plan under law. And despite the bipartisan nature of this bill, some misinformation has been spread about the bill that I would like to take a moment to correct. The measure protects against cherrypicking because we make clear that the AHPs must comply with the 1996 Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, HIPAA, which prohibits group health plans from excluding or charging a higher rate to high-risk individuals with a high-claims experience. Under our bill, sick or high-risk groups or individuals cannot be denied coverage. In addition, AHPs cannot charge higher rates for employers with sicker individuals within the plan, except to the extent already allowed by State law based on where the employer is located. The bill also contains strict requirements under which only bona fide professional and trade associations can sponsor an association health plan, and therefore does not allow sham association plans set up by health insurance companies to go out and do what some did over the next decade or so. These organizations must be established for purposes other than providing health insurance and they have to be in existence for at least 3 years prior to the passage of this bill. This campaign of disinformation belies not just the need for the bill, but the bipartisan support behind it. Not only is it strongly supported by the President of the United States, President Bush and Secretary Chao at the Department of Labor, but it has more than 160 bipartisan co-sponsors, including my colleague, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Sam Johnson), the subcommittee chairman; the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Fletcher), the former member of our committee, now on the Committee on Energy and Commerce; or the Democrat member, the gentleman from California (Mr. Dooley); and the Democrat member, the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Velazquez). It is noteworthy and significant that Republicans and Democrats alike are joining together to deal with the crisis affecting more than 41 million uninsured Americans. Uninsured workers deserve the security of knowing that health care is not just a dream but a reality for them and for their families. This bill can help make that happen. Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. BOEHNER

Mr. BOEHNER. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to take from the Speaker's table the Senate bill (S. 1276) to improve the manner in which the Corporation for National and Community Service approves, and records obligations relating to national service positions, and ask for its immediate consideration in the House.