Steny Hoyer

Mr. HOYER

Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, the Democratic Whip Task Force on Poverty, Income Inequality, and Opportunity was launched to bring to the forefront of Congress' attention the everyday challenges of Americans living in poverty. On Tuesday, the President sent us a budget that invests in meeting our greatest challenges: creating opportunity for all, an objective that all of us I think are committed to. The budget expands Pell grants to make college more affordable and supports more apprenticeships and skills training so that young people and others can make it in America. It doubles investment in clean energy and R&D to attract more jobs while tackling climate change. The President's budget expands access to quality child care and paid leave for working parents and provides children from low-income families healthy meals over the summer months when they are out of school, but are still eating, of course. It makes it easier to save for a retirement and provides a better backstop for when economic circumstances push careers off track. Now, Mr. Speaker, it is up to Congress to craft a budget. I hope Republicans will work with us to provide the opportunities necessary to escape poverty, as Speaker Ryan says we ought to do. Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairwoman, Barbara Lee, and her members of the task force for undertaking and focusing on this important effort.

Mr. HOYER

Mr. HOYER. Mr. Chair, the gentleman from Texas says he gets asked all the time about the national debt. He can give a very simple answer--because the Congress keeps spending money and not paying for it. That is how you incur debt; you buy things and you don't pay for them. They can be all sorts of things. They can be Social Security, they can be Medicare, they can be battleships, they can be health care, they can be roads, they can be bridges. If you don't pay for them--it shouldn't be any surprise--you incur debt. Who spends money in the United States of America? The Congress. Under the Constitution, we are the ones who spend money. I say to my friend from Texas, he might also say, Well, when you create $800 billion-plus of new debt by cutting taxes and not paying for them, you have less revenue, but you don't cut buying stuff, you have more debt. $800-plus billion in December. I didn't vote for that bill because we didn't pay for it. Now, I have been in office a long time. It is easy and takes no courage to cut taxes, no courage whatsoever. What takes courage is buying things--and if people want them--saying, we need to pay for them. We need to pay for them so our children don't pay for them, so our grandchildren don't pay for them because, guess what, they are going to have their challenges in their time, national security challenges, natural disasters like Katrina or Sandy challenges, Ebola, AIDS, health crises. They are going to have to have resources, and we are spending them. I have been here sometime, longer I think than the gentleman from Texas, longer than my friend from New Jersey. There is one person in America who can stop spending in its tracks. I have been here 36 years. No President in the 36 years that I have served has had a veto overridden of a bill that spent too much money. Not one. Not one Republican President, not one Democratic President. So a President can stop spending in its tracks. Under Ronald Reagan, we increased the national debt 189 percent. It was less than a trillion dollars when I came to the Congress of the United States. It was increased under Ronald Reagan 189 percent, the largest of any President. Under George Bush, in 4 years, it was increased 55 percent; under Bill Clinton, in 8 years, 36 percent. But guess what, during the last 4 years, we had a balanced budget, the only time in the lifetime of anybody in this body that we have had 4 years of balanced budgets. Now, my Republican friends will say, well, we were in charge of the Congress. For the last 6 years you were. But you were in charge of the House, the Senate, and the Presidency under George W. Bush, and the budget deficit was increased 87 percent.

Mr. HOYER. Mr. Chair, the President says he is going to veto this bill, but the irony is--and the chairman sits on the floor--the Director of the Office of Management and Budget has submitted a budget on behalf of the administration to respond exactly to the questions that this bill wants to ask. For the first time in 41 years, the administration has been refused the opportunity to testify, which The Washington Post called, gratuitously, contemptuous. And then my friends have the audacity to bring a bill on the floor in the same week and ask the Secretary of the Treasury to come down and testify, talk about the debt when we know darn well why the debt is what it is. It is our responsibility, because we incur it, to make sure that we pay our debt. That is our moral responsibility, as well as our constitutional responsibility. This is politics at its most contemptuous level. It is to pretend that somehow the President is responsible. My friends, we ought to reject this bill not because of the bill itself, but we get this information, as has been so often said. We already get this information. You don't need the Secretary of the Treasury to come down here and give it to us. He testifies before the Committee on Ways and Means; he testifies before other committees. Let's reject this bill because it is phony, not because substantively we don't need this information. We have it. It is redundant. It does what my friends on the Republican side so often say, we ought to not have redundant things. Mr. Chair, I appreciate the fact that my time has expired. This bill ought to expire with it.

Mr. HOYER

Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, I rise to thank Ms. Juanita Campbell, who is retiring after more than forty-two years of outstanding service to the United States Congress. Ms. Campbell retired in January as a Manager of Legislative Data, with more than four decades of service to the Library of Congress. She first started working for the Library in 1973 as a high school student, at which time she served as a Library Aide working on the National Union Catalog. Ms. Campbell went on to become a Clerk Typist in 1974 and, soon after, joined the Congressional Research Service's Economic Division as an Editorial Assistant. Three years later, she moved to the American Law Division, originally called the Bill Digest Section, where she helped track and summarize all pending public legislation. Since 1996, Ms. Campbell has served as a Manager of Legislative Data. Through the years, she has been a highly reliable and knowledgeable liaison to House and Senate staff, relaying bill status information and sharing her expertise on the interaction of the different legislative information management systems. Ms. Campbell has been focused intently on improving access to legislative proceedings. She aided in the transition of where transcripts and details of legislative proceedings could be found: from only being available through a Library of Congress database, with a limited range of users, to their availability on the internet through the THOMAS website, which everyone can access. Ms. Campbell's knowledge was invaluable during the recent transition to the more modern Congress.gov. Ms. Campbell has been instrumental at increasing legislative transparency and moving Congress into the digital age. The services she helped develop are invaluable to Congress, the public, and our democracy. The work of her unit, particularly on bill status information, has vastly increased accessibility to the legislative database as well as documentation. Her keen attention to detail has been largely responsible for the high quality of work the Library and CRS's legislative service provides. Throughout her career, Ms. Campbell's thoughtfulness and positive attitude have earned her the respect and confidence of countless Congressional and CRS staff. As a manager responsible for much of what makes complex information not merely reliable but understandable, she has always demonstrated a passion for teamwork, learning, and problem- solving. Although Ms. Campbell will be retiring, her many accomplishments will stand as a fitting tribute to her as a professional and as a patriot. Ms. Campbell's presence will be greatly missed. On behalf of this House, I congratulate Juanita Campbell on her retirement and thank her for her dedication and outstanding contributions to the institution. I wish her the best in all her future endeavors.

Mr. HOYER

Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for that. Again, I would reiterate that, on the voting rights issue, the Speaker is supportive of some legislative treatment addressing that issue. Does the gentleman have any idea when that might occur? I yield to my friend.

Mr. HOYER. I was not.

Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from California (Mr. McCarthy), the majority leader, for the purpose of inquiring about the schedule for the week to come and perhaps thereafter. (Mr. McCARTHY asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for that information with respect to the legislation that is going to be on the floor next week. I would simply say with respect to one of these bills, the Debt Management and Fiscal Responsibility Act, I don't know whether that bill requires the House to do the same, but certainly both the executive and the legislative branches of government need to have a responsible fiscal program and analysis so that, in fact, we can move toward fiscal balance. I look forward to having that discussion next week on the floor. Mr. Leader, we had a prayer breakfast this morning. It was a moving and very, I think, unifying time here in Washington where we had Republicans and Democrats and a lot of people from around the world attending. We talked about coming together. We talked about respecting one another, talking to one another, and serving our country and our people in a way consistent with our various faiths. In that context, I am going to ask the gentleman some questions on the scheduling, but I am hopeful that the Speaker has indicated that he wants to consider some broad issues. He refers to five in particular: national security, jobs and economic growth, health care, poverty and opportunity, and restoring the Constitution. I am not sure exactly what that last phrase means, but in any event, I think all of us want to make sure the Constitution is honored and certainly adhered to. However, it also appears--and we had this discussion last week--that substantive legislation--that is, translating thoughts and objectives and visions into legislation--may not occur in 2016. I don't know that to be the case, but I fear that to be the case, that we will not offer to the American people in this critically important election year specifics as to what we might do. I mention specifically the Affordable Care Act, which I know the gentleman's party believes is not good policy, whether or not we were going to consider an alternative to do what your party has said it is going to do for the last 5 years, and that is repeal, but replace with policies. I think that would be a useful discussion for us to have and do so in a way that respects the integrity of each person's view as to what the best interests of our country are. In addition, one of the pieces of legislation would be the Voting Rights Act amendment. I bring that up now because Speaker Ryan said yesterday, as I understand it, that he was in favor of doing a voting rights bill. I don't know that he went into specifics. We believe that we need to address this bill because we believe it was substantially undermined by the recent decision of the Supreme Court some few years ago. He indicated that that was not going to be brought to the floor because of Mr. Goodlatte's opposition to that or, perhaps, the failure of Mr. Goodlatte to address that in committee. I bring that up specifically because I know, Mr. Leader, you made the observation, and I think you are quoted as saying you believe the two parties can achieve consensus on that legislation, but we may not be able to move it forward this year. Excuse me. That speaks to criminal justice system reform, not to voting rights. I think we can reach consensus on the criminal justice reform. I think both parties believe that there are substantial areas that need to be addressed in criminal justice reform. Senator Cornyn has certainly indicated that. Republicans and Democrats in this House have indicated that. My question to you is with respect to the issues that I think we have all discussed and that the Speaker has discussed, such as: jobs and economic growth; health care; poverty and opportunity, which we believe is a very important issue; criminal justice reform; job creation; long- term fiscal agreements so that we can replace the sequester with a permanent rather than an every-2-year resolution; comprehensive tax reform, which almost all of us have said we are for--Mr. Camp brought a bill forward on that--comprehensive immigration reform; restoring voting rights, which I mentioned; taking action to address gun violence, which we are in favor of, and I think clearly your side has indicated that mental health is very much a component of that and you want to address that; and addressing our national security challenges, which I agree with the Speaker that is a primary responsibility and concern of, I think, everybody on the floor of this House. My question, therefore, Mr. Leader, is: Do you expect any substantive legislation, rather than simply ideas that both parties might express and put out to the public, that would be transparent, specific, and on which we could have debates on alternative policies? Do you expect, in the relatively short time we have this year, to have legislation on the floor dealing with one or more of those subjects? I yield to my friend.

Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman. I think, certainly, we agree that we ought to work together. He and I have worked together, as a matter fact, on some very significant legislation more than a month ago that passed the House. I think the American public wants that. My urging to the majority leader would be that each of these ideas, if we are going to ultimately make them policy, has to be translated into legislation. The gentleman says all of us will be able to participate. Frankly, the gentleman knows, as well as I do, that legislation has to come to the floor for all of us to engage in, hopefully, with the ability to offer amendments and our ideas on how to perfect legislation that may come out of the committees. I would hope that we would see that. The gentleman mentioned the budget. I think the gentleman and others have said they want to accelerate the budget process. I think that is a good idea. I have always felt that we ought to move the budget and the appropriations bills earlier than we have historically done so that we can get those to the Senate, so they have time to work on them and bring them back, in order to have all 12 appropriations bills done seriatim, one after another. In my view, we are going to need a bipartisan effort and not have poison pills or the so-called riders in them in order for the Senate to consider them and be able to work their will and then go to conference and get that done all prior to October 1. I don't know whether that is possible, but I think the gentleman would say that would be certainly good to do, if in fact we could get that done. When does the gentleman expect the budget, which is the start of that process, to be on the floor? I yield to my friend.

Mr. HOYER. Am I correct, then, in saying that our target is the first week in March or the second week in March, at the latest, for the budget?

Mr. HOYER. I appreciate that information. Let me discuss a number of other specific issues, if I can. First of all, the Speaker indicated that he wanted to see legislation on the floor of the House by March 31 on Puerto Rico. As you and I both know, Puerto Rico is facing a fiscal crisis of its own. It is going to need some authority to deal with that crisis so that neither the Americans living in Puerto Rico are disadvantaged nor the children and others--whether it is through the educational system, the healthcare system, providing power, or whatever services are necessary--will not be adversely impacted. Can the gentleman give me an idea as to what progress we are making towards seeing legislation on the floor by March 31? I yield to my friend.

Mr. HOYER. I appreciate you keeping me posted, but my frustration is that this issue has been hanging around for a very long period of time. When Mr. Cantor had your position as majority leader, he indicated he was receptive to addressing it. The gentleman is correct; I was not there either, but I believe the Speaker is reported as having said it needs to be addressed. I understand bottom-up, but if bottom doesn't work, you never get up. I refer to the Export-Import Bank that lay sanguinely for 2 years in the committee because the chairman was opposed to it when the majority of your party was for it when it came to the floor. So it is one thing to say that we ought to work bottom-up, but if the bottom is a stopper and creates gridlock, frankly, this body does not get to do what its responsibility is, and that is to reflect the will of the people, as we did on the Export-Import Bank. So I sympathize with the bottom-up, and that is the way it ought to work; but if, in fact, what we have is a blockage to the people's Representatives having the ability to work their will and reflect the United States citizens' views, then democracy is not working. We saw that in the Export-Import Bank, in my opinion, which I worked on very, very assiduously for over 2 years to get to this floor. Very frankly, when it did get to this floor, as I said repeatedly, it would enjoy the majority's support. In my view, if a voting rights bill gets to this floor, it will enjoy the majority's support. As you know, Mr. Sensenbrenner was the sponsor. President Bush was President when we passed the Voting Rights Act in 2006. It passed overwhelmingly in the House, overwhelmingly in the Senate, and was signed by President Bush. I am certainly sympathetic to wanting to make sure that we follow regular order, but if regular order precludes democracy from working, then it is irregular order and not in the best interests of our country. Lastly, Mr. Leader, recently, all of us are concerned about Zika. We are all focused on Zika. Can the gentleman tell me whether or not there are any planned efforts to address what is clearly a very serious health crisis that confronts not only us, but certainly South America, Latin America, and other parts of the world? I yield to my friend.

Mr. HOYER. You gave me such a great opening.

Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman. We certainly agree on that. I look forward to working together to address it. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. HOYER

Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker. I rise today to recognize the Charles County Chamber of Commerce on the occasion of its sixtieth anniversary. Since its establishment in 1956, with Reed McDonagh as its first President, the Chamber has provided a boost to the local business community through educational seminars, public forums business development strategies, and a strong voice for the needs of its members. Working in partnership with the county government, the public school system, and local community leaders, the Chamber continues to contribute to the goal of ensuring that Charles County grows and remains a great place to do business. With each passing decade, the Charles County Chamber of Commerce has taken creative steps to fulfill its mission to support its members and advance the county as a leader for economic growth and private sector job creation in Southern Maryland through its effective advocacy, high level networking and timely communications. The Chamber has always dedicated itself to the mission of making Charles County a great place to invest, work, and grow a business. In its first years the Chamber gave rise to the Committee of 100, which later became the county's Economic Development Commission. In the 1970's, it established the Annual Trade Show to introduce local businesses, large and small, to county residents and to promote available services. In the decade that followed, it launched a scholarship program in memory of U.S. Navy Seabee diver, Robert D. Stethem, a Charles County resident and an early victim of the War on Terrorism, an example of the many ways it has worked to strengthen the local community over the years. The Chamber created a memorial ``Business of the Year'' Award honoring Reed McDonagh in the 1990's to recognize a business that provides exceptional leadership in advancing the mission of the Chamber and its core principles. Around that time as well. the Chamber played a vital role in advocating for the importance of the Naval Surface Warfare Center. Indian Head Division, during the BRAC Commission process, in which I was proud to help lead the fight to keep these installations open and an integral part of Southern Maryland's culture and economy. In recent years, the Chamber has played a critical role in working with federal, state, and local officials to help businesses and families get back on their feet after a devastating tornado, bringing a minor league team to the county, and forging a new international partnership through the Sister City program. The Chamber has also been an active member of the Tri- County Council of Southern Maryland. Now located in La Plata, its services are easily accessible to residents and businesses across Charles County, and it has broadened its efforts to take advantage of new developments in the region through its Young Professionals Group and Military Alliance Council. Throughout its history, the Chamber has sought to provide resources, gain insight, and develop and advocate for solutions which continue making our local economy stronger and more vibrant. The Chamber prides itself on its commitment to helping members grow and prosper, and I hope my colleagues will join me in saluting the great work it has done over the past six decades. I look forward to continuing to work in partnership with the Chamber as it continues to help make Charles County a great place live and do business.

Mr. HOYER

Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, reserving the right to object--and I do not intend to object--I want to thank the majority leader. I personally, as a former majority leader, appreciate the policy enunciated by the Speaker in turn to accommodate Members' schedules so that we vote on time. But this was an extraordinarily important vote. Large numbers of Members of both sides missed it, and I very much appreciate the majority leader's action and the Speaker's agreement to it to accommodate our Members so that, on this important bill, they will be able to vote on the 26th. Mr. Speaker, I withdraw my reservation of objection.

Mr. HOYER

Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, at this time, I yield to the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Scalise), the majority whip, for the purpose of giving us the schedule for the week to come.

Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for the information. I know the majority leader is not here, but I observed, with some irony, how much argument for legislation was included in the scheduling announcement. I think that is not necessarily inappropriate--I will make that point-- but I am sure the majority leader will remember that in the future. I thank the gentleman for the information. I want to say to him at the outset, we note and we took action on his motion to which we neither asked for a vote nor objected, but that we have delayed the consideration of the veto of the President of the United States, ensuring that the 22 million people that would be removed from health insurance, if the President had not vetoed that bill, will not go into effect. I want to assure the majority whip, as the minority whip, that that bill will not go into effect whether we vote on it today or we vote for it on the 25th. There are more than sufficient votes on this side of the aisle to support and confirm the President's veto and to ensure that those 22 million people, as well as those who are benefiting from other portions of the bill, will continue to do so. I thank the gentleman for that information. I regret that we have delayed that vote, but I am absolutely assured that on the 25th or the 26th, that veto will be sustained by this House. Of course, it will initiate in this House. I also wanted to say to the gentleman, the Speaker has pointed out that this year, he wants to see real substance considered during the debate on the bill that I just discussed, the Affordable Care Act. There was some discussion by Mr. Upton that there was an alternative that the Republican side of the aisle had or his committee had. We, of course, never considered--notwithstanding the 62 votes to repeal--an alternative. I would ask the gentleman if he believes that there will be, during the coming weeks or months, an alternative to the Affordable Care Act considered on this floor. I yield to my friend from Louisiana.

Mr. HOYER. I understand that, and I appreciate the gentleman's observations. I am wondering whether or not our Members would expect, at some time in the future, to have such a bill presented for a vote on the floor so that the American people could see, as I understand the Speaker's premise being that he wants to lay out an agenda so that in this Presidential election, there will be alternatives. My question to the whip is: Will this House be expecting to vote on an alternative, to consider an alternative with amendments perhaps made in order as well? I yield to my friend from Louisiana.

Mr. HOYER. Well, I appreciate the gentleman's presentation. Of course, presumably, if it is transparent, if it is open, then presumably, the Democratic members of the committee of jurisdiction on whatever issue there may be, we think we can work together with you on supporting job creation, reaching a long-term fiscal agreement on permanently replacing the sequester, which your chairman believes is not a reasonable alternative. We believe we can reach agreement with you hopefully on comprehensive tax reform, although my personal opinion was that the passage of the tax bill a few weeks ago, which I voted against, undermines that possibility. We also believe we can work together with you on something that this week has been made dramatically clear, that is needed very, very badly, and that is comprehensive immigration reform. As I said on Ex-Im Bank, I thought there was a majority of votes in both parties for the Ex-Im Bank. Unfortunately, it took a discharge petition to get it to the floor. When it got to the floor, I was correct. It had a majority of the Republicans and all but one Democrat for it. I think comprehensive immigration reform would pass. In a system that is transparent and open to the American people, what one would do would have a vote here on this floor so the American people can see where each Member is on that issue. We also believe we can work with you, Mr. Whip, and with the majority leader, the Speaker, and your Members, on restoring voting rights. Mr. Cantor, when he was here, and Mr. McCarthy, the majority leader, he and I were honorary cochairs--John Lewis is, of course, the chair-- when we went to the Edmund Pettus Bridge in recognition of that march, which ultimately led to the adoption of the Voting Rights Act. We think we can work together with you on that. I know there are strong feelings on the efforts that the President has taken to make sure that those who purchase guns in America are not dangerous to their neighbors or to others. We think we can work together with you on that. Does the gentleman expect a vote on that issue on this floor in the near future? I yield to the gentleman from Louisiana.

Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for bringing up that issue. We are all privileged and honored to serve in this House with John Lewis. There is probably no Member of this House who has been recognized for greater contributions to what America stands for than our colleague, John Lewis. It was so appropriate for Secretary Mabus, who is the Secretary of the Navy from Mississippi and former Governor of Mississippi, to not only name this ship, as the gentleman observed, but because it is the first ship. And this ship is all about serving others, about supplying others with that which they need--not only fuel, but also food and supplies--and is so appropriate because John Lewis lived his life serving others and supplying. This is not a warship, per se. It is a Naval ship that is going to be critically important to our Navy. The gentleman is absolutely correct that honoring John Lewis was an appropriate act to take. I think he and I both extend our thanks to Secretary Ray Mabus for taking this action. Lastly, I have had a long association with Puerto Rico. Puerto Rico, of course, is an integral part of the United States of America. Its citizens are citizens of the United States of America. Like other jurisdictions--whether they be in California or in New York or in the Midwest or the South or the North--who have from time to time found themselves in deep fiscal trouble, Puerto Rico now finds itself in that position. I had the opportunity to talk a little earlier today with Chairman Rob Bishop about the hearings that are going on in the Committee on Natural Resources this month with reference to Puerto Rico. I know that Speaker Ryan has indicated that we need to address this issue in an effective way by March 31. I very much appreciate his setting a goal and a timeframe for that. Can the gentleman give me any additional information as to the status of consideration of Puerto Rico and extending it bankruptcy authority so that it might restructure its debt so that it doesn't undermine its school system, its public safety, its transportation, and other needs of its people? I yield to my friend.

Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman. I would reiterate to my friend, we really do look forward to working with your side of the aisle on addressing some of the critical problems that I mentioned, that you have mentioned, that Speaker Ryan has mentioned. We hope that those will be open, transparent, and inclusive so that all views can be heard. Ultimately, we hope that proposals and policies do come to this floor for a vote. It is my understanding that the Speaker also wants to do the 12 appropriations bills, do them discretely, that is, one at a time, and bring them to this floor. We look forward to that process occurring as well. I yield to my friend.

Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for that offer. I hope his feelings are not hurt when his crabs are left on the table. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. HOYER

Mr. HOYER. The ranking member took the words right out of my mouth. There are 22 million Americans covered now that weren't covered before. Mr. Speaker, The Wall Street Journal reported on Monday, ``House Speaker Paul Ryan, starting this month, will push to turn the Chamber into a platform for ambitious Republican policy ideas.'' My friend, Mr. Upton, talked about policy ideas, but Mr. Van Hollen correctly observed they are not on this floor. You haven't brought them to this floor. All you have brought is a negative. Bring a positive. That, presumably, is what your Speaker ought to be talking about. Many have been wondering what new, ambitious ideas Republicans would put forward to kick off this new session of the 114th Congress. Well, today we have the answer, the 62nd effort to repeal the Affordable Care Act, which everybody knows is not going anywhere. We have seen this fresh, new idea before. It is coupled with a vote to defund Planned Parenthood, which will deny millions of Americans access to affordable health care. So not only by repealing the Affordable Care Act will we deny health care to people, but by doing what they are doing to Planned Parenthood, millions of people will not have access to the health care they are relying on. What we have before us is not anything new. In fact, it is a repeal of health reform that goes even further than the Republicans brought to the House floor in October, this time also ending tax credits and subsidies that enable those with modest incomes to afford health insurance and repealing the expansion of Medicaid. The reason there is not another bill on the floor is because people would then see how draconian the policies are. These are components of the Affordable Care Act that have enabled millions of previously uninsured Americans to gain coverage since 2010. Senate Republicans took a bad bill and made it worse. I am disappointed that Speaker Ryan would bring it to the floor as his first major act of this new session of Congress. This reconciliation bill would cause an estimated 22 million Americans, as the ranking member has pointed out, to lose their health care, would increase premiums by approximately 20 percent, would provide employers with much uncertainty, and worsen the outlook for deficits over the long term. Only in the first 10-year window do you have a savings. The CBO says, if you go to the second 10 years, this bill is a loser and exacerbates the deficit. I urge my colleagues to join me in opposing this 62nd vote to repeal or undermine America's access to affordable, quality health care.

Mr. HOYER

Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for yielding. Mr. Speaker, I rise on behalf of those who have been flustered by Jo- Marie. Jo-Marie, as all of you know, has been with this institution for over two decades. She started as an intern in the Committee on Rules, unfortunately, because she got to know the rules very, very well. And as majority leader for 4 years, as Jo-Marie ran the opposition-- the constructive opposition, I will say, the friendly opposition but, nevertheless, the opposition--her intellect, her judgment, her tenacity, her focus was always a challenge. But it has always been good for this institution, because she made sure that the minority was heard. Unfortunately, for us, she has also made sure that the majority was loudly heard when the Republicans were in the majority. Jo-Marie, as some of you know, is a mathematician by training. She is also a lawyer. She is also a scholar. She is also somebody who cares deeply about this institution. Jo-Marie is my friend. Now, that does not mean that Jo-Marie and I always had an even-keeled relationship. Sometimes, as I said, she flustered me and us by her skill and by her devotion and loyalty to the Republican Party. But more than that, as the Speaker has said, she had a loyalty to this institution and to our country. Jo-Marie, you have been an extraordinary representative not only of your party, but of this House. You have been an extraordinary friend of mine and so many. I know Alexis Covey-Brandt, my chief of staff, and you have worked together a lot. Sometimes you agreed, and sometimes you didn't. Two brilliant women who cared, however, about this institution and making it work for the people. We call this the people's House. Jo-Marie, you have been one who has always kept that uppermost in your mind. We, on this side of the aisle, share a great respect and affection for you, and we wish you the very best. As a young woman, you still have a lot of contributions to make, and we know you will make them. We have mixed emotions about your leaving. To some degree, frankly, we think we are advantaged by your leaving. But as an individual and as someone who is your dear, dear friend, I will lament your not being on the floor and ever present, for your advice and counsel, always honest; sometimes in opposition, but always positive. Thank you for all you have done. God bless you.