John Ensign

Mr. ENSIGN

Mr. ENSIGN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. ENSIGN

Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. ENSIGN. Mayor Fenty is agreeing with the Education Secretary, who says these kids should not be pulled out of this program, and this program should not end. There are so many scholarship recipients across this town who want to stay in their private schools. We should stand up for the kids and not the special interest groups, such as the National Education Association, that want to end this program.

Mr. ENSIGN. Madam President, in the underlying bill there is language addressing the DC Opportunity Scholarship Program that would effectively, after next year, kill the program. It requires that not only it be reauthorized by Congress but also that the DC City Council approve the program. There are 1,700 kids from families making an average of less than $24,000 a year that now participate in this program. The parents love this program. The kids love this program. I am a big believer in the public school system, but the DC Public Schools, which spend more than any other school district in the country, over $15,000 per student per year, are failing too many kids in Washington. So this program was put in to give some low-income kids the opportunity to succeed. Guess what. They are thriving in this program. Earlier, the senior Senator from Illinois said we have to make sure all the teachers have 4-year degrees. The omnibus bill before us requires that. My amendment does not touch that requirement. He also says we have to make sure they are in structurally safe schools. The bill before us requires that. My amendment does not touch that. So those are both side issues that are not affected at all by my amendment. We need to put special interests aside and focus on the children from Washington, DC, especially those low-income children I ask unanimous consent that this letter from the Mayor of Washington, DC, Adrian Fenty, be printed in the Record.

Mr. ENSIGN. Is there any time remaining?

Mr. ENSIGN. I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, I wish to speak once again about my amendment dealing with the DC Opportunity Scholarship Program we have here in the District of Columbia. Currently, 1,700 children from lower income families are able to attend a private school with a $7,500 voucher thanks to this program, a program we implemented about 5 years ago. It seems the No. 1 priority for the National Education Association, one of the largest unions in the country, is to eliminate this program. We are talking about real children here. These are two of the kids who attend school with President Obama's children. It is a great school. The President and Mrs. Obama could afford to send their kids to any school. They chose this particular school because it is an excellent school. They chose not to send them to a public school in Washington, DC. After seeing some of the statistics on the DC public schools, it doesn't surprise me. Why should these two happy, healthy kids who are enrolled at the same school as the President's children be forced to leave? The bill before us allows the program to continue for one more year, then, if not reauthorized and approved by the DC City Council, the bill de-funds the program and forces 1,700 children out of private schools where they are happy, healthy and learning. I quoted these statistics earlier: forty-five percent of Senators and 37 percent of members of the House send their children to private schools. That is almost four times the rate of the general population. Quality education shouldn't be only for a privileged few. We should be able to send kids such as Sarah and James here to the schools where they can get a better education, where they are safer. The safety of DC public schools is a major concern. One-half of all teenagers attending DC public schools are in a school that has enough criminal activity to be classified as persistently dangerous. In school year 2006-2007, DC Metropolitan Police reported that over 6,500 crimes were committed in D.C. public schools. Too many of these schools are not safe. It is a civil right to get a good education. So we came up with a plan a few years ago that took up to 2,000 poor children in the metro DC area and sent them to a school of their parents' choice. Washington, DC, spends more than any school District in America per student. The District of Columbia spends over $15,000 per student per year--three times as much as we spend in my home State of Nevada. Yet the public schools are failing here in Washington. So we decided to design a program to see if we can help some of those kids escape the failing public schools in Washington. We thought: if it works as a pilot project, maybe we can expand it to other places. Well, the National Education Association has come out with their No. 1 priority, which is to destroy this program. My question is, Why? I believe they are afraid this program is working, so it is a threat to their power. It is a threat to union member dues. That is unfortunate because when it comes to education, our only concern should be in the quality of education for our children. They need that kind of quality education to compete in the 21st century. I have a couple other kids to tell my colleagues about. This is Sanya. She is a beautiful, happy young lady, and is receiving a great education in a private school here in DC. Today, she has a 3.95 GPA. She is the vice president of her class. She is the captain of her soccer team, a player on the lacrosse team, president of the International Club, and she is a peer minister. She is a future leader whom we are going to be taking out of the school she loves if this bill is enacted without my amendment. Rashawn is 16 years old and a handsome devil. He started school in 1996. His father had him tested and found out he was 3 years behind his grade level. The scholarship program provided him the opportunity to go to the Academia De La Recta Christian Day School. Rashawn said he can now do his classwork with very little help because of the scholarship. His sister, Dominique, who is 14 years of age, is now attending the same school, and these are her words. She says: ``I love my school now. I am working on my level on my grade.'' Do we really want to take these kids out of their schools? Do we really want to do that? We have to ask ourselves, Do we want to protect this bill and the special interests this bill is addressing so much that we are actually going to pull 1,700 children from lower income families out of the schools they are attending today? I think it is unconscionable that we are going to be doing that. Breanna Williams is 9 years of age and in the fourth grade. She loves her new school, St. Peters. She is getting all A's and B's. She loves to read and is reading at a level above her grade. In addition, Breanna plays clarinet in the school band. When she grows up, she wants to be a translator and travel the world. Lastly, I wish to tell my colleagues about Ronald Holassie. He is currently Washington, DC's deputy youth mayor. I had the honor of meeting this young man, and I had the honor of meeting his little brother, Richard. His little brother, Richard, 8 years of age, came to our press conference and stole the show. These are two incredibly bright young men. Ronald, a tenth grader, runs track, he is studying physics, mentoring middle-school students, and absolutely loves every minute of it. As the Youth Deputy Mayor, he considers saving this program his chief legislative priority, because he has seen what it has done for him and what it has done for his little brother. So individually and collectively these programs are working. We just have to put ourselves in a commonsense position. There have been some studies quoted here claiming that this program wasn't working. First of all, the studies were incredibly flawed. We pointed out all of the flaws of the study. But we just have to ask ourselves, if 45% of the Senators send their kids to private schools, and they pay a lot of money to do that, would they do that if they thought the educational opportunity was inferior? Of course not. It just makes common sense. Do you think the parents of these 1,700 children would voluntarily send their kids to the DC schools of their choice if these schools were inferior or if their kids weren't getting a better education? Well, of course not. This is what President Obama's Education Secretary said about the DC scholarship program. He said: It is a mistake to take kids out of a school where they're happy and safe and satisfied. I think those kids need to stay in their school. So we need to adopt my amendment to keep the DC scholarship program funded. It is the right thing to do for these kids. Showing them we care more about their education than we do some special interest group is the right thing to do. So I urge all of my colleagues, when they are voting, to think of Ronald. Think of the kids we have talked about and many others. Instead of doing away with this program, let's study it. Let's study what is working about it. If it is working, let's expand it to other places in the country. America leads the world when it comes to higher education. Our colleges and universities are the best. One of the reasons they are the best is because you can take a GI bill, student loan or Pell grant, and you have the opportunity to attend any college you desire. You have a choice. About 5 years ago, this program gave these kids a choice. Our public, K-12 school system is in bad shape when compared to the rest of the industrialized world. We are falling behind, especially in science, math and in the technical fields. If we want our kids to have the chance to compete in the 21st century, we have to improve our school system. One of the ways to do that is through competition. This is just a little experiment and a little competition that some people now want to come to this floor and destroy. So let's think of these kids, and let's think of kids all over America when we are thinking about the educational choices we are going to be making in the Senate. Let's give children in DC a choice. We, as senators, are fortunate enough to have a choice for our children. Forty-five percent of the Senators chose private schools, including the chief opponent of this amendment, Senator Durbin. I thank the Chair. I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. ENSIGN

Mr. ENSIGN. Madam President, I actually send my kids to schools where not all of the teachers in core subjects have 4-year degrees. But if a teacher is teaching art, if a teacher is teaching woodshop, or some other kind of program, I would ask: Does the Senator from Illinois really believe imposing that on private schools is necessary? You send your kids to private schools just as I am sending my kids to private schools. We sent them where we thought they would get a good education. Does the Senator think these parents who are taking advantage of these programs don't care enough about their kids to send them to the best schools? That is why they are choosing to get them out of public schools. Wouldn't the Senator from Illinois agree those are wise parents signing up voluntarily for this program because they care about their kids?

Mr. ENSIGN. I thank Senator Durbin for yielding. Madam President, is the Senator aware that in all of the private schools these kids are attending the core subject teachers have 4-year degrees and that it was only in subjects such as art and wood shop that they did not necessarily have 4-year degrees? Madam President, I ask the Senator from Illinois, through the Chair, whether he is aware of that.

Mr. ENSIGN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. ENSIGN. Madam President, will the Senator yield?

Mr. ENSIGN. Madam President, I wish to talk about my amendment dealing with the DC Opportunity Scholarship Program. Unfortunately, if the current bill should pass, this program will end. There is specific language in the bill that says unless this program is reauthorized and the DC City Council approves it, 1,700 children will lose their opportunity scholarships that allow them to attend a private school in the District of Columbia. That is unfortunate, and that is why my amendment must be adopted. When we take a close look at the data on DC schools, it is no wonder the DC opportunity scholarship parents are so vocal about keeping this program alive. Here in the District of Columbia, public schools spend, on average, over $14,000 per year per student. The DC class size has one of the lowest student-teacher ratios in the country, 14 to 1. Yet reading scores continue to languish at or near the bottom in every national assessment. Recent data shows that 69 percent of fourth graders in the DC Public Schools are reading below basic levels as defined by the Department of Education. DC students in DC Public Schools ranked last in the Nation in both SAT and ACT scores. About 42 percent of DC students drop out of school. Beyond the low performance in the classroom, DC schools are often violent and dangerous. A Federal government study found that roughly 12 percent of DC students were threatened or injured by someone possessing a weapon on school property during a recent school year. This percentage is well above the national average. Perhaps, it is because of these statistics, that President Obama chose to enroll both his daughters in a private school. Let's see what his Secretary of Education said about the DC scholarship program: I don't think it makes sense to take kids out of a school where they're happy and safe and satisfied and learning. I think those kids need to stay in their school. Secretary Duncan was referring to the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program, the same program we are trying to save today. Michelle Rhee, the Chancellor of DC city schools said: I would never, as long as I am in this role, do anything to limit another parent's ability to make a choice for their child. Ever. That is what she said. DC Mayor Fenty said: We should not disrupt the education of children who are presently enrolled in private schools through the DC Opportunity Scholarship Program. Last Friday, Senator Durbin, the senior Senator from Illinois, made some charges against this DC Opportunity Scholarship Program that I wish to address. Senator Durbin claims the program doesn't work. He claimed the Department of Education study proves the DC Opportunity Scholarship Program doesn't work. What Senator Durbin failed to mention were some of the fundamental flaws of the Department of Education study. First, the study fails to examine the performance of students who actually took advantage of the scholarship and actually attended private school versus the performance of those who attended public schools. Instead, it compares the students who were just offered the scholarships to those in public schools. In fact, over a quarter of the students who were considered private school participants for purposes of this study did not even attend the private schools. This study has many flaws and we could go through all of them. How can the program be considered not working yet there are 1,700 kids whose parents showed they are satisfied and that think their kids are getting a better education? The parents are happier, and they can sleep well knowing their kids are going to safer schools. I believe that if there were more than 1,700 scholarships available, there would be a lot more people who would be enrolled in the program because of the satisfaction of both the parents and the teachers. According to the Heritage Foundation, 37 percent of the members in the House of Representatives and 45 percent of Senators send their children to private schools. That is almost four times the rate of the general population. The senior Senator from Illinois, Mr. Durbin, stated on Friday that he and his wife sent their children to private Catholic schools. He said this was their choice, and it was a personal family decision. I respect Senator Durbin's choice to send his own children to private schools, but why should the choice to send children to private schools be the right of only a privileged Senator's family or those who make a lot of money? Keep in mind, the 1,700 children we are talking about come from families whose average income is less than $23,000 a year. A good education is a civil right, and this should not be the exclusive purview of the rich or the well connected. Before closing, I wish to highlight some of the stories of success in the DC Opportunity Scholarship Program so it can be clear who is losing out because of the Democrats' efforts to kill the Program. I wish to put some names with some of the faces and show how important this program truly is. Sarah and James Parker attend the Sidwell Friends School in our Nation's Capital with President Obama's children. Here they are right here. Unlike the Obama girls, they could not afford this school without the $7,500 voucher they received from the DC Opportunity Scholarship Program. Now, keep in mind, these two students are funded at half what it costs to send a child to DC Public Schools. Every time we take these students out of the public schools in Washington, the DC Public Schools save money. So why would we want to end this program? Plus the fact that these kids love going to school where they are going. Now, Sanya Arias is a scholarship recipient who lives in Adams Morgan. She said some of her friends she went to school with in middle school and who now attend public high school speak using profanities and aren't making the kind of progress she is making academically. This is Sanya, here. Sanya said in middle school she started slacking off and she would have probably followed her friends' path if she didn't receive the scholarship to attend private school. Sanya currently has a GPA of 3.95. She is vice president of her class, captain of the soccer team, a player on the lacrosse team, president of the International Club, and a peer minister. This is the type of student the Democrats are going to take out of a school that she loves so much. Rashawn is 16 years of age and started school in 1996. His father had him tested and found he was 3 years behind his grade level. The scholarship program gave him the opportunity to attend Academia De La Recta Christian Day School where Rashawn has said: ``I can now do my classwork with very little help'' because of this scholarship. Dominique, who is Rashawn's sister, is a 14-year-old girl who lives in Washington, DC. She is now attending the same school and, in Dominique's own words, she says: ``I love my school, and I am working on my level and my grade.'' Breanna Williams is a 9-year-old girl in the fourth grade. She loves her new school, St. Peter's, because she is getting all As and Bs. She loves to read and is doing that at a level above her grade. In addition, Breanna plays the clarinet in the school band and when Breanna grows up, she wants to be a translator who travels the world. I would be remiss if I did not reintroduce you to Ronald Holassie. He is a 10th grader at Archbishop Carroll High School in the District, where he is thriving--running track, studying physics, mentoring middle-school students. Further, he has just been appointed as DC's deputy youth mayor. Ronald said that maintaining the DC opportunity scholarship is his chief legislative priority. Ending the program will send Ronald, who is just a sophomore, to Woodson High School, a failing school under the No Child Left Behind Act, for his senior year. Individually and collectively, these students demonstrate just how important it is to continue the DC Opportunity Scholarship Program and just how wrong the program's opponents are to eliminate it for political purposes. We should continue this scholarship program and help students like the ones I just pointed out--help them to continue to succeed and to develop in our Nation's Capital. I ask President Obama and the Democrats to keep Sarah, James, Sanya, Rashawn, Dominique, Breanna, and Ronald in mind before deciding to kill the DC Opportunity Scholarship Program. I ask my colleagues to please join me in supporting this critical program. Madam President, I will close with this. I met Ronald last week. I met him and his folks. I met his little brother who is also in the program. I looked in their eyes and saw their heartfelt pleas to keep this program going. I challenge any member to look into their eyes and then vote against this program. We should be putting kids before special interest groups. Shouldn't our educational system be about kids? Shouldn't it be about their education and providing them the opportunities to compete in the 21st century? I think the people who are against this program are afraid of this program for one reason--because it is actually working. This program is very popular. The senior Senator from Illinois sends his kids to private school. Parents choose to send their kids to private schools because they want better education for their kids. Let's give these children a chance at a better education. Let's prove that it is working. Let's study the students and the program. Don't stop this program when it is still in its infancy. Let's decide how we need to measure it, prove it is working or not working. But I predict that at the end of the day, if we really follow these kids in an objective manner, we will show this program has great promise, and maybe we can even take it to other places in the country and help other low-income kids get a better chance at a better education. Madam President, I yield the floor.

Mr. ENSIGN

Mr. ENSIGN. I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. ENSIGN

Mr. ENSIGN. Madam President, in a moment I am going to ask unanimous consent that the pending amendment be set aside so I can offer an amendment dealing with the DC scholarship program for low-income children. I wish to talk about it first and give the other side fair warning, because I understand that the other side is going to object, which is very unfortunate. We have had a wonderful program that recognized DC public schools are failing children of the District of Columbia. Most of those children are low income, minority children. A few years ago, under a Republican Congress and President Bush, we put together a program that initiated a little experiment. In DC schools, the dropout rates are high, kids aren't learning to read at the appropriate levels, they aren't learning math at the appropriate levels; across the board the crime levels are too high in the schools. Since the vast majority of the schools in the District of Columbia are failing the kids, Congress decided to experiment here and see if something works. So we selected 1,700 kids and we gave their parents a $7,500 scholarship to be able to go to the school of their choosing in the area. The response by the parents was overwhelming. A lot more people wanted to sign up for this program than there were scholarships available, but we at least allowed 1,700 children to participate for the last five years, this being the sixth year now. In this underlying bill, there is language that effectively kills this program, because it says that unless the bill is reauthorized and the DC City Council approves the program, no funding shall be allowed to go toward this DC scholarship fund. Now, we know Head Start and the Higher Education Act both continued, even though they weren't reauthorized, for many years until we were able to come together to reauthorize. That is not uncommon in this building because it is difficult to get legislation reauthorized. So we continued funding Head Start. We continued funding Higher Education. But the No. 1 issue for the National Education Association is to kill the DC scholarship program for poor children. I ask: What are they afraid of? Well, as was stated today in the Chicago Tribune, they are not afraid of this program because it is failing; they are afraid of this program because it is actually working. Let's ask a commonsense question: If this program weren't working, would the children who have received this scholarship continue in this program? The obvious answer is of course they wouldn't. They would go back into their other schools. We had a press conference earlier today with some of the parents and teachers who are involved in this program. Three wonderful young men came together with us today. We had Fransoir, Richard, and Ronald. Two of them had written statements, and then there was little Richard who got up and spoke off the cuff. All three of them were incredibly articulate. They were talking about how important this scholarship program was to them and how they didn't want to go back to the other schools because in the schools they are in today, they are actually learning. So do we put the interests of the National Education Association first, or do we put the interests of our children first? It isn't just these 1,700 kids whose future is at stake. We are trying to look for programs in education, reforms that actually work, because the No. 1 priority for our children should be about their education into the future. If they are going to compete in the 21st century, they have to have a good education. It is the new civil right of our day. It is not a civil right to stick them in failing schools that are unsafe, that are gang ridden, that are drug ridden, that have teachers who are not teaching our children in a constructive manner. It is not a civil right to say to them: I know other people have more money than you. They can go to a good school and can learn, but we are going to trap you in this poor performing school simply because you don't have enough money. Civil rights is supposed to be about giving people opportunities, not based on income, not based on race, not based on religion, but simply because they are Americans who can actually have a chance. So this program is going to show, I believe, as the studies come out on it, that these kids did better because they had an opportunity. I think this is what the National Education Association is afraid of. They are afraid this program is going to work and it will then be tried in other areas. What are we afraid of? Are we afraid we are actually going to improve education in the United States through an innovative program? Even yesterday, the Secretary of Education under President Obama made this comment about the DC scholarship program. He said: I don't think it makes sense to take kids out of a school where they're happy and safe and satisfied and learning. I think those kids need to stay in their school. He was talking about those 1,700 kids who are in the DC schools under this scholarship program today. Two of those children actually go to school with President Obama's children. Unfortunately, the majority party in Congress has written into this bill that we are going to take those kids out of these schools. We are going to effectively eliminate the scholarship that allows them to stay in their schools. One young man, Ronald, who was here today is a junior in high school. Ronald is also the Deputy Youth Mayor for Washington DC and has made education his number one priority. Next year Ronald will be a senior. They are going to take him out of a school he has attended the last 5 or 6 years and make him go to a different high school for his senior year. At this other high school, it's likely over half the kids aren't learning at the grade level they should be learning at and where about half of them drop out of that school. Instead, Ronald should remain at the school that gave him a future, hope, and opportunity. I wish all Americans could have heard him speaking today, and then I would like to see the other side of the aisle vote against this amendment and vote against allowing this amendment to even come to a vote. It is very unfortunate that the other side is not allowing us to do but just a few amendments, amendments that they deem worthy to be voted on. That is not the way the Senate has worked the last several weeks. It has actually been working. As the minority, we realize we have fewer votes on this side. We understand that. We understand we are going to lose most of these votes. Occasionally, as last week, we did win one, but most of the time we are losing these votes. That is the way this body is at least supposed to work, you debate amendments and you have votes on the amendments. Unfortunately, with regards to the bill before us, that is not the case. Normally, we vote on appropriations bills one at a time and somewhere around 15 amendments per bill are offered and voted on. We have eight or nine bills combined together and, so far, I think we have had six or seven amendments voted on. We will have a few more voted on tonight. That seems to be the total that the majority wants us to vote on. By the way, the Democrats have come to an agreement that they are going to defeat them, whether they are meritorious or not, because they set a false deadline of tomorrow to finish the bill. They said tomorrow the funding runs out for our Government. In reality, all you have to do is pass a continuing resolution that will fund the Government for another week. We could do it on a voice vote, and then the House can do it on a voice vote. Then we can come back next week and debate amendments and have votes on them. This is one of the amendments that needs to be voted on. If you want to throw 1,700 kids out of good schools and put them into nonperforming schools, I want you recorded on this vote. Some have said this isn't just going to poor children. The limit is 185 percent of poverty and below. That is the limit of the income to qualify for this scholarship program. The average income for families qualifying for this scholarship is $23,000 a year. The National Education Association said this is a threat to public education. Oh, really? First of all, $7,500 is what we give as a scholarship. The average spent per student in Washington, DC, public schools is around $15,000. So we are spending half that. We didn't give them the full $15,000, just half that. This was in addition to the Washington, DC, School District money. But the benefit is, every child you take out of Washington, DC schools, allows money to be spent on other students. I have a couple stories to tell you about. Sherine Robinson, the parent of an opportunity scholarship recipient, believes parents should not have to worry about violence in their schools. That is one of the reasons some of the parents are taking their children out. It is not just the educational opportunities, it is the violence they may have to experience while they are in school. She believes the parents should not have to fight for their kids to learn. She believes all parents should have a choice and ``the DC Opportunity Scholarship Program gives us a chance to find the best school possible.'' Those are the words of a parent. She now feels her child is in a safe school and is doing well. Why do we want to deprive her of that opportunity? Obviously, I believe strongly in this scholarship program. I believe this program is working. I believe we can prove it is working statically and spread this program across the country. Let's put our children first; let's not put special interests before our children and their education. That is what this argument comes down to. Let's use common sense and put compassion back into this bill. Let's allow amendments so we can take care of our kids and educate them in the way they deserve to be educated. I ask unanimous consent that the pending amendment be set aside and that I be allowed to call up the Ensign amendment No. 615, which provides an opportunity scholarship for 1,700 poor children in the District of Columbia.

Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the pending amendment be set aside and that I be allowed to call up amendment No. 615.

Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. ENSIGN. Madam President, this is most unfortunate. It is what I thought would happen. There was a rumor going around today that this would happen. I plead with the other side to give these 1,700 children a chance to learn, a chance to continue in the program that is working for them. I would love to expand the program, but I know that is not doable in this Congress. But let's at least keep these 1,700 schoolchildren in school with the ability to learn, in safe schools that are actually giving them hope and opportunity for the future. I yield the floor.

Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that further reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. ENSIGN

Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, very soon I am going to talk about an amendment I want to offer on the DC Voucher Program for low-income kids. But first I want to talk about the bill in general for a few minutes. Yesterday, I talked about the spending bill we have before us as being 8 percent over spending from last year on various programs that are contained within the bill. We just had Secretary of Treasury Geithner before the Senate Finance Committee. I asked him a question. I said: I applaud the President for hosting a fiscal responsibility summit just last week at the White House. I think that was a great thing. It set some very important goals for us to be fiscally responsible to the next generation. I told him this administration had an opportunity to say these are last years bills, drafted under a different administration. But rather, they said, we are going to look the other way; we are not going to hold to our ``no earmarks'' pledge or fiscal responsibility pledge on this bill, we are going to do that on future things. But the problem is, it is not just this bill that increases spending by 8 percent. This bill gets added into the baseline. This extra $23 billion gets added into this year's baseline, which means that next year's the baseline goes up and the budget for the next year after that goes up, and up and up, so this $23 billion increase in federal spending ends up being several hundred billion over 10 years. That is not what we should be doing now. We have entitlements that are going to be exploding. Every family in America today is looking for ways to cut their budget. We are hearing that the movie industry is actually doing pretty well right now because people are saying: That is actually a little luxury I can afford, because they can't afford some of the bigger luxuries they wanted. Instead of buying cars or big-purchase items, they are buying smaller things. That is why Wal-Mart seems to be doing well at this point. People are looking for values. Businesses across the country are looking to cut expenses. They are looking to cut wasteful spending. Every bureaucracy, whether it is private or public, grows over time, so businesses are looking for ways to be able to handle these tough economic times. Local governments and State governments are forced to live within a budget. So what are they doing? They are making tough choices right now. Even with the money the Federal Government sent them, they are still having to make difficult choices, so they are looking for what wasteful spending is out there and what ways they can cut back on waste. The one place that seems immune to cutting wasteful spending is the Federal Government, and the people responsible for that are right here in this Chamber and in the Chamber across the Capitol. We control the purse strings. This is not a time for us to increase spending. This is a time for us to ask every Federal agency, department, program out there: How can you save money right now? How can you cut administrative costs? Which programs are duplicative? Which programs are working and which ones are not? Let's take the money away from the programs that are less efficient right now, let's cut back on bureaucracy instead of expanding the bureaucracy at this point. I would say this is really an irresponsible moment for this Congress. I applaud two Members from the other side of the aisle, Senator Evan Bayh and Senator Russ Feingold. They have come out in opposition to this bill because they said pretty much the same things I was saying this morning. Senator Evan Bayh from Indiana wrote a great opinion editorial today in the Wall Street Journal laying out why this is an irresponsible bill and why he is going to be opposing it. If we are going to care about our children and our grandchildren, we cannot wait a year or 2 years. We need to be fiscally responsible today. We should have been doing it in the past years as well. I agree there has been irresponsible spending in this body by both sides of the aisle and by the previous administration, but that is no excuse for us to say we can just continue it. Federal spending has been rising and rising, much of it off budget. I agree with the Democrats when they criticize Republicans in the previous administration for off-budget spending. I have been one of the people up here saying the tricks we were playing with the budget on defense were dishonest. They were trying to say they were not increasing spending because it would take money away from defense, knowing it would be added on later so they could increase other spending bills. That was dishonest. That was dishonest budgeting, and it is time to get to honest budgeting. But it is also not just honest budgeting we need to get to. We need to get to fiscal responsibility. So really take a look at what we are doing here. Think about the next generation and future generations. Do we really want to add this kind of debt burden, where they have to pay hundreds of billions of dollars and even trillions of dollars in interest just because we were unwilling to take tough votes here in the Senate? The second issue I wish to talk about is the issue of DC choice. The schools in Washington, DC, are some of the worst schools in America. We brought this issue up last week, and we were able to get an agreement that, instead of having a vote on the DC voting rights bill, the majority leader would give us time on the Senate floor to reauthorize the program. It is a program that says for very low income kids in the District of Columbia, we are going to experiment and see if maybe we can give them a decent education. The District of Columbia spends around $15,000 a year per student on public school education. We said we will give them a $7,500 voucher towards the ability to go to a private school, a school of their choice. The number of people who want to get into this program is incredible. Why? Because DC schools are failing too many children. DC schools are mostly made up of minorities, and we are trapping those very minorities into a school system that by and large does not work. So the DC voucher system was put in to at least take a few of those students out and see if they can do better in a different setting. Does it work? Some people say we are not measuring it right. All you have to do to know whether it works or not is to talk to the parents and to the students who have been involved in the program. Guess what. They want it to continue. As a matter of fact, they would like to see it expand. But what are we doing? This bill all but guarantees its elimination. How does it do that? If this language is not removed from the omnibus the program would be effectively cut. The omnibus contains language to eliminate the program after the 2009-10 school year unless congress reauthorizes it and DC City Council approves it. We know where the votes are on the DC City Council. The votes on the DC City Council would kill the program. The teachers unions in the District of Columbia, as they are in most cases, are totally opposed to any kind of voucher system. They believe it is a threat to their power base. I am concerned about the kids and their education. That is all I am concerned about. If this program is going to work--and it seems to be working based on the interest of the number of families who want in it and based on the desire of the families who are in it to continue in it--then that is what we should be concerned about. I am going to be offering an amendment that would strike the language in the omnibus bill and would allow us to authorize it this year in the Senate. That is the right thing to do, to make sure these kids still have a chance to get a good education in the United States. I yield the floor.

Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. ENSIGN

Mr. ENSIGN. There are plenty of others we could go through, but for the sake of time, let's just be fiscally responsible right now. Let's add a little fiscal responsibility into this body, and let's adopt this amendment that says we are going to freeze spending from Government that was not already plussed-up in the stimulus bill. Let's be fiscally responsible. I yield the floor.

Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, I wish to first address a few of the misrepresentations of my amendment by the Senator from Washington. My amendment does not cut any specific program, and you know it. It says to the Appropriations Committee: We will send this back to the Appropriations Committee, and you determine which programs are funded and which ones are not funded. But you will fund them at last year's level. If you want to raise the level in certain areas, then you will have to cut funding in other areas. We just have to ask ourselves the question: Does anybody believe there is wasteful Washington spending? Does our Government have any wasteful spending in it? If you say there obviously is wasteful spending, when was the last time we cut anything? When was the last time we cut any wasteful spending? Congress needs to address this wasteful spending. Part of the Appropriations Committee job is oversight. The Committee then figures out what is working, what is not working, fund what works and cut what does not work. But that doesn't happen around here. All they do is add and add. If you check the Constitution, the purse strings are controlled by Congress, not by the President. Democrats are entering their third year of that control in both houses. So what we have to do here is exercise our authority and say we are going to be fiscally responsible. You can say you are fiscally responsible all you want, but unless you act on it, the words are hollow. Businesses across America are looking for ways to cut waste from their budgets during this economic downturn. Do you know what they are finding? Talk to them. I have been in business myself. I understand that when times are good, you sometimes add staff you don't need, you waste money in places you don't need to, and that is in the private sector. The Government is less efficient than the private sector. Times are tough in this country, instead of thinking we will just add to the deficit, we will just raise taxes, let's look for efficiency and let's eliminate wasteful spending. We have a bill in front of us that is going to increase spending over last year's level by 8 percent. Is that fiscally responsible? We just passed a nearly $1 trillion spending bill called the stimulus bill, and now we are going to increase this by 8 percent? It seems to me that is not fiscal responsibility. That is the height of irresponsibility. Let's have a debate on this, but let's have a honest debate. We are not cutting any specific programs. Do not say we are cutting education. Do not say we are cutting health care. Do not say we are cutting police and firefighters because this amendment does not do that. What this amendment says is, let's send this bill back to the Appropriations Committee, to last year's level. The Appropriations Committee can determine which programs are funded at what level. If you believe there are certain priorities that need more funding, then fund them; otherwise, let's be honest about this debate. And I am more than happy to go back and forth with the other side about the merits. But if anybody thinks there is not wasteful spending going on in Washington, DC, you need to wake up and smell the coffee because it is outrageous how much waste there is in our Government today--outrageous. We do not require fiscal discipline in our agencies, and that is what we need to start doing. I yield the floor.

Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that further reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. ENSIGN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.