John Breaux

Mr. BREAUX

Mr. BREAUX. Madam President, my colleagues, what we are trying to do with welfare reform is very simple. I think we can all agree we should be tough on work, we should be good for kids. Everybody knows we should put work first, but in doing that we should not put children last. I am afraid the Republican bill, without my amendment, does exactly that simply because of this. The Republican plan says that after you take the parent off of AFDC assistance, you forget about the children. You absolutely forbid the State in their own wisdom to determine whether they should give any assistance to the children who are innocent victims of welfare at the sins of the parents. We should not be punishing the children for what their parents have not done correctly. So let us be as tough as we can on work, make the parent go to work, but when the parent is taken off welfare, for God's sake, can't we as a nation at least allow the States to use their block grant money to provide the things that a child needs in order to survive in this country? That is the issue. Are we going to disregard the children? Or are we going to help the children while we are so tough on the parents? My amendment, I think, should pass.

Mr. BREAUX

Mr. BREAUX. Mr. President, I thank the distinguished Senator for yielding me some time and for his continued outstanding work in trying to make sure that whatever we do in this body is fair. All of us want to be tough on work. We have said that many times. We also should be fair to children and to pregnant women. We should be fair to those who are the neediest among us. This legislation makes fundamental changes in the Medicaid Program, and that is not supposed to be what we are doing. Our Republican colleagues have offered an amendment which has taken Medicaid out of the equation. We are working on a welfare bill. But without the Chafee- Breaux amendment and a number of our colleagues, this legislation will still adversely affect those people who are on Medicaid and health care assistance. The question is, why? Very simple. Because under the current law, people who are eligible for AFDC assistance are also eligible for Medicaid. Therefore, under this legislation, the States could be changing all of the eligibility requirements for AFDC and, in doing so, kick off, potentially, 4 million people who are on Medicaid because of their eligibility for AFDC. It sounds complicated, but it is not really. We made a decision in the Congress and the people who run the Medicaid Program that the standards for AFDC would be the standards for Medicaid eligibility. That was a decision that should not now be changed without a careful consideration of whether that is good policy or not. Nobody is debating Medicaid eligibility on this floor. But when you change the welfare program, you, in fact, will be changing the Medicaid eligibility for millions of Americans. As Senator Chafee shows, we are talking about pregnant women, children under 13, people who are the least able to take care of themselves in our country. I think that is just not what we are all about in this country. It is interesting to note that both the House and the Senate bills that were passed last year contained a provision just like the Chafee amendment. We have already adopted this before. By a vote of 87 to 12, the legislation that contains the Chafee-Breaux amendment was passed by this Senate body. That language in the House bill and in the Senate bill said very clearly that we would continue Medicaid coverage, health care coverage, for poor children and their parents who would have qualified for AFDC assistance under the rules in effect at that time. Now we have essentially the same bill before the Senate, but it does not have that provision in it anymore. I do not know where it was dropped or how it got dropped. This is almost a technical amendment because we have already adopted this amendment. When the welfare reform bills were previously before the House and the Senate, there was no disagreement in the House and no disagreement in the Senate that the people who are Medicaid-eligible because of AFDC eligibility would continue to have that eligibility. That is what the policy should be. If we want to come back later on and change Medicaid eligibility, let us do it that way. Let us have a fair debate about whether we are going to take the aged, the blind, the disabled, pregnant women, or children, the people least advantaged among us, and kick them off of not only welfare but off of Medicaid, too. At least allow us to have some discussion about it. With that, Mr. President, I reserve the remainder of the time that was yielded to me from Senator Chafee. Mr. ROTH addressed the Chair.

Mr. BREAUX

Mr. BREAUX. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. BREAUX. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. BREAUX. The Senator talks about food stamps. For the first time, you are taking the Food Stamp Program and, through block grants, States do not have to use their money for food stamps if they do not want to.

Mr. BREAUX. The question is: Is it not possible that the States do not have to provide food stamps for the child you are talking about if they do not want to?

Mr. BREAUX. You are mandating.

Mr. BREAUX. It is a voucher of 5 years, optional on behalf of the State. The cutoff in less than 5 years is mandatory on the part of the child.

Mr. BREAUX. Not the parent. The parent gets zero under my amendment. We are talking about a child maybe 2 years old that cannot work.

Mr. BREAUX. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. BREAUX. Is that the Senator's premise of what he is trying to accomplish? Let me read a very short description of what a voucher program does, and tell me why he disagrees with it. It says a voucher provided to a family under this law shall be based on the State's assessment of the need of the child of the family. That shall be determined from the day of the subsistence need of the child; that it is effectively designed to appropriately pay third parties for shelter, goods, and services received by the child; and, third, finally, it is payable directly to such third parties. If a State decides to have a 24-month termination of a parent because they do not follow the rules, what is wrong with this provision taking care of the needs of the child designed by the State to take care of the needs determined by the State to be payable to a third party on the subsistence needs of the child? If they talk about food stamps, it would not qualify under this. We are talking about assistance needs of the child. Food stamps would include food.

Mr. BREAUX. We got it this morning.

Mr. BREAUX. The State.

Mr. BREAUX. Let me read it again. A voucher provided to a family under this law shall be made on the State's assessment of the need of the child--not the Federal Government, not Washington, but the States.

Mr. BREAUX. As I understand the Senator's question--let me try and restate it as simply as I possibly can. Under the Breaux voucher amendment that will be offered, for a family that is cut off from welfare after being there for 5 years, it would allow the State to use their block grant funds to provide vouchers to a child if the State determines that there is a need for assistance for that child. If the State has a shorter period than 5 years--2 years, 3 years, 4 years, what have you--based on the State's assessment of the need of that child, the State decides there is a needy child here, then the State is required to use block grant funds to help that child. They determine how much; they determine where to spend it. It does not go to the parent. It does not go to the child. It goes to a third-party provider.

Mr. BREAUX. I will respond to the Senator in this way. I would like to, but politically I do not think it is possible to do it, to say that when you have a block grant fund going to the State, and the State has made a determination that there is a needy child out there, the State be required to use those funds to take care of the needs of the child at any point, 5 years, 2 years, or 3 years, either one. I just do not think that is politically possible to do.

Mr. BREAUX. I respond by saying I offered that in the Senate Finance Committee. I think it may have lost on a tie vote. I tried it once. I think I will try to get something that will pass the Senate and narrow it down to one. The bottom line is very simple.

Mr. BREAUX. Mr. President, I ask for 2 additional minutes.

Mr. BREAUX. I thank Senator Exon for yielding the time. What I am trying to accomplish--and I do not think anybody on the Senator's side is being cruel with children or anything. I think that there is a great deal of sympathy on both sides. I say to the Senator, what I am trying to do is say to the States that are getting Federal money with their State money, if the State looks at their population and the State sees children who are being put in need because we have cut off their parent, that we should use funds to take care of the needs of those children. The State determines what the need is. The State determines how to help that child. The State determines whether to help that child or not. They can make a decision this child does not need help. But if the State makes a decision that there is a child in need, and he has been put in need because the parent has been cut off of welfare assistance, that we should have a requirement that they use Federal and State funds to take care of that need. How much they do is left up to the State. How they do it is left up to the State. But, by gosh, we have an obligation here to say that we are not going to let children go hungry or uncared for. I think the Senator's side should agree with that. I think that many do.

Mr. BREAUX. Yes.

Mr. BREAUX. I respond to the Senator by saying that we have been talking about a little of everything here, but most of the comments have been about the Breaux voucher amendment.

Mr. BREAUX

Mr. BREAUX. I think 10 minutes.

Mr. BREAUX. I thank the Chair. Mr. President, I was just looking at the amendment. It is the first time I have had the opportunity to see it and read it. The Social Security Disability Program that the Senator is referring to is essentially cash benefits for disabled people, most of which are elderly. The question I am concerned about when the Senator's amendment says ``nothing shall be construed to authorize recruitment activities, including any outreach program, or demonstration projects,'' I think it is important that the agencies let people know what the program is about. I tend to agree with the Senator about going out and trying to recruit people to come in and engage in a program that is there. But is the Senator's amendment intended to prohibit trying to let people know what is in the program? Would they be prohibited under the Senator's amendment from telling people about what the program does and how it works?

Mr. BREAUX. Let me ask the Senator something further. We have a lot of Federal programs that provide benefits and loans. For instance, the Senator is aware of the farm programs. The Farmers Home Administration has loan programs and things that are beneficial to farmers. They try to communicate that information to the farm community to let them know that we have a program that does the following three things. ``If you are interested, come in and talk to us.'' Would this prohibit the Social Security people from doing the same thing that other Federal programs are able to do with regard to informing people about the benefits of the program?

Mr. BREAUX. Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk under the previous order and ask for its immediate consideration.