Joseph Kennedy

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Rhode Island (Mr. Langevin).

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 5811, the Long-Term Opioid Efficacy Act of 2018, authored by Representatives McNerney and Griffith. Despite the prevalent use of opioids today in combating pain, the long-term impacts of opioids and whether or not they are truly the most effective treatment is still fairly unknown. FDA Commissioner Gottlieb testified before the Energy and Commerce Committee that many opioids have not been studied for chronic administration and further studying could help address certain questions. This includes the long-term efficacy of opioids and whether opioids may contribute to increased addictive tendencies over time. This legislation would help us better understand the long-term impacts of opioids and whether opioids truly are the most effective treatment for chronic pain management by allowing the FDA to require manufacturers of controlled substances, such as opioids, to conduct post-market studies to assess the effectiveness of these products and whether or not they pose an increase in serious risk. Under current law, the FDA has the authority to request postmarket studies relating to the safety considerations of a drug, but it does not have explicit authority to do so related to the efficacy of a drug. It is our hope that, by granting this authority to the FDA, we will better understand the long-term impacts of opioids that are chronically administered and encourage more responsible prescribing of opioids moving forward. Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support this legislation, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. Speaker, I think Dr. Ruiz has done an extraordinary job on this legislation. I would urge the House to support it, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from California (Mr. Ruiz), my colleague.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 5796, the REACH OUT Act. This bill creates grants for technical assistance education for outlier prescribers of opioids. The recipients of these grants, Mr. Speaker, will educate outlier prescribers on best practices for prescribing opioids and provide instruction on how to reduce the number of opioids prescribed in the future. Coupled with legislation we will also consider today that would require notification of outlier prescribers of opioids, this bill will further provide outlier prescribers with the tools to return to the appropriate prescribing range for their specialty to help reduce overprescribing. Mr. Speaker, I have to say that we have just been informed that there will be a last-minute change to two of the suspension prints under consideration today in order to accommodate a request from the Appropriations Committee. The minority only received notice of these changes within the last hour. While they appear to be changes that are technical in nature to address the jurisdictional issues, we want to highlight our concerns with the last-minute changes being made to legislative text that are being considered on the floor with such short notice. It is not the best way to legislate, especially on bipartisan bills on such an important topic. My colleagues and I have expressed some concern about this process, and this latest issue reinforces those concerns. We urge the Speaker to commit to continuing to work with us on a bipartisan basis to avoid some of these changes in the future. Mr. Speaker, I support this bill. I hope the House will support it as well, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I rise to voice my support for H.R. 5687, legislation authored by my colleagues, Mr. Hudson and Mr. Butterfield, to provide the FDA with authority to employ the use of packaging and disposal technologies to help mitigate the risk of abuse and misuse of opioids. As a part of FDA's efforts to help prevent misuse of opioids, Commissioner Gottlieb has been actively exploring how packaging and disposal innovations can deter abuse and reduce the supply of opioids in the market. This included hosting a public workshop in December to explore how we can harness these technologies in the fight against opioid addiction and how to improve the safety of these products for those patients who rely on them to manage chronic pain every day. Commissioner Gottlieb also noted, Mr. Speaker, that the use of these technologies, such as packaging, merits consideration through a careful, science-based process, one that I hope will continue. The legislation we are considering today builds on this work and grants FDA authority to require packaging and disposal technologies for schedule II and schedule III controlled substances that reflect a level of risk associated with that substance. FDA is provided with the flexibility to permit a range of options for packaging or disposal technologies, as long as such technologies demonstrate comparable effectiveness. This flexibility will be crucial to reduce barriers to generic entry, one of the concerns that was raised during our committee consideration, and to maintain appropriate patient access to these substances. H.R. 5687 also clarifies that labeling related to the inclusion of packaging or disposal technologies cannot be used as a blocking strategy by brand manufacturers. If enacted, it is my hope that the FDA will continue to work with stakeholders, including manufacturers, to ensure that generic entry is not impeded by the requirement of packaging or disposal technologies. Both brand and generic manufacturers should be held to the same performance outcome of mitigating risk and abuse; however, at a time of rising drug costs, I believe manufacturers should be afforded enough flexibility to pursue cost-effective technologies that will also meet the shared goals of the FDA and patient community. I also hope that any costs associated with the adoption of packaging or disposal technologies will not be borne by the patients who rely on these medications to manage their diseases or conditions. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank Mr. Hudson and Mr. Butterfield for their work on this issue as well as the FDA for their guidance through the process. Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support H.R. 5687, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time. Mr. Speaker, I also endorse H.R. 4005, the Medicaid Reentry Act. One particularly vulnerable population for overdose is individuals reentering society post-incarceration. Incarcerated individuals, as my colleague, Mr. Tonko, indicated, are far more likely to suffer from substance use disorder. And without proper transition planning and treatment, former inmates are at extremely high risk of dying from an overdose after release. This legislation seeks to get at that problem. Mr. Speaker, over the course of the hearings we have had on all of these bills, there has not been a more dedicated, poignant, or powerful speaker than Mr. Tonko. This is an issue that he cares passionately about and that he has dedicated much of his time in Congress addressing. He has put that effort into text in this bill. Mr. Speaker, I urge the House to adopt it, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Tonko).

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 3192. I want to begin by thanking the chairman of our committee, Mr. Walden, for giving us a hearing on this bill and for moving the process forward. I thank the gentleman along with Dr. Burgess; Ranking Member Pallone; Ranking Member Green; and our cosponsor, Democratic colead Mrs. Napolitano as well. Mr. Speaker, a couple of decades ago, my uncle, Senator Edward Kennedy, and Senator Orrin Hatch created the CHIP program because of a consensus that children should never be caught in the midst of our debates over healthcare. It has been a successful, bipartisan program that has saved lived lives and has helped families facing their deepest despair. But just like any program, Mr. Speaker, it has been a work in progress. This bill offers a simple fix to a troubling problem. According to some estimates, nearly 500,000 children and pregnant mothers covered by CHIP are not guaranteed mental health care or substance use disorder treatment. We have guaranteed that treatment for Americans covered by Medicaid, private insurance, and employer-sponsored insurance. It is time we do so for low-income families and babies as well. In our efforts to confront an opioid epidemic that cares for no age, no income, no race--nothing at all--this bill is a crucial piece of our response. With that, Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank everyone at the Legislative Counsel's Office, at CMS, and the staff on both sides of the aisle from the Energy and Commerce Committee, and, in particular, Rachel Pryor, for putting up with my relentless and sometimes misguided questions. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. Speaker, tonight children--2, 3, 4 years old--will sleep alone in cages on American soil. Yes, the brutality being perpetrated by the United States Government is about who we are as a country. It is about morality. It is about humanity. But first, it is about those kids: The 5-year-old boy from Honduras who collapsed on a kitchen floor in Michigan, sobbing for his parents; The mother who had to listen to her 7-year-old daughter frantically screaming in a detention room next door as she was hauled away; The 3-year-old boy who was put, inconsolable, on a flight to the Midwest after his mother was left behind; A 4-month-old baby ripped from his father's arms. I don't care what you believe. I don't care who you vote for or what you think about the nuances of immigration reform. These children-- babies--need to be with their parents, just like every other child in this country. Anything less is cruelty in its purest form.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. Speaker, on Thursday, June 7, 2018, during consideration of H.R. 5895, the Energy and Water Development and Related Agencies Appropriations Act for Fiscal Year 2019, I recorded an erroneous vote on amendment number 26, offered by Ms. Lee of California. I intended to vote yes on roll call vote number 247.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor Joseph DiAntonio, a lifelong resident of the Fourth District of Massachusetts, who passed away in April after a life marked by courage, kindness, and an unwavering commitment to public service. Born in Milford, Massachusetts in 1927, Mr. DiAntonio, or ``Joe D'' to those who knew him, graduated from Milford High School in 1945 before enlisting in the Navy as our nation was gripped in the Second World War. After returning from service, Mr. DiAntonio began his career with the Rosenfeld Concrete Company where he would eventually retire as plant and credit manager. In Milford, Mr. DiAntonio will be missed at Town Council meetings where he served fifty-two years as a member, taking on leadership roles as Chairman of the Town Finance and Library Building Committees as well as Trustee of the Milford Geriatric Authority. A proud son of Italian immigrants, Mr. DiAntonio was a member of the Italian-American War Veterans Post of Milford, where he worked to honor the service and sacrifices of past and present veterans of Italian heritage, and the impact that first generation Americans continue to have on our country. On May 4th, Joseph DiAntonio was laid to rest with military honors surrounded by his six children, twelve grandchildren, and fourteen great-grandchildren. The Fourth District was proud to have a neighbor like ``Joe D'', and from the Halls of Congress, I offer our condolences to those who knew him.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. Speaker, a few years ago, Massachusetts was bracing for a brutal blizzard bringing extreme life-threatening cold. Families were bundling up; schools canceled class; first responders prepared for a long, long night of calls. And one woman, Sue Smith, was opening the doors to Faith Alliance Church in Attleboro to welcome the city's homeless population into her warm embrace. It was an extraordinary act of compassion and community service. But for Sue, it wasn't. It was just one more day of fiercely protecting her neighbors, one more night of caring for the most vulnerable among us, one more family given a roof over their heads, one more life saved from hypothermia. A few months after that snowy, freezing night, I was humbled to invite Sue to be my guest to the State of the Union Address. Sue has never asked for recognition or praise, but few are more deserving than she is. She has never asked for a helping hand when facing her own personal battles. But this week, I learned that Sue has been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. And although I know she would never ask her neighbors to return her immense gratitude, we do have a message for her. Sue, we are by your side in your fight. We know this cancer won't stop you or even slow you, but we are here with you for whatever you need. Thank you for being our better angel.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. Speaker, earlier this year, I stood in Fall River, Massachusetts, and told our country the story of that proud and resilient city. Today, for nearly 200 working families, that resilience is being tested because, this week, after celebrating $342 million in profits, Philips Lighting announced that they would be closing their factory in Fall River and moving those jobs to Mexico. Almost 200 loyal, lifelong employees are left behind, careers upended, savings lost. Mortgages, healthcare bills, tuition payments will be missed. For the 61-year-old worker who is near retirement and paying off his daughter's student loans, a meager investment in workforce retraining is not worth all that much. For the countless workers who sit around dining room tables in southeastern Massachusetts tonight trying to figure out how their family budget can absorb impossible cuts, bland lip service given by this White House yesterday means nothing. But that is not even the whole story. Philips Lighting shareholders are being showered with $187.4 million in stock buybacks because of Donald Trump's tax plan. Make no mistake, that is the legacy of this tax bill: working families that are left sorting through the wreckage while CEOs bask in windfalls; lights turned off on empty American factory floors while shareholders grin around boardroom tables; success somehow defined in dividends and return on investment rather than in jobs, in paychecks, in families supported, retirements earned, and dreams realized. Yes, Fall River is a unique city, but across this country, other families and communities find themselves in the same impossible place as economic afterthoughts in a Republican economy increasingly tilted towards the privileged and the powerful with a government that refuses to hear their voices.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to congratulate James T. Brett, President and CEO of the New England Council, on receiving the Eire Society of Boston's 2018 Gold Medal Award. Since 1937, the Eire Society of Boston has celebrated the rich history of the Irish experience and the many important contributions that Irish-Americans have made to our country and around the world. In keeping with tradition and the long list of distinguished recipients, the Eire Society has chosen to honor a truly inspiring individual this year. A lifelong resident of Dorchester, Massachusetts, James ``Jim'' Brett has dedicated his life to serving others and raising awareness for critical issues such as accessible healthcare, education, economic empowerment, and disability rights. After fifteen years in the Massachusetts State Legislature taking on a number of leadership roles such as Chairman of the Joint Committee on Taxation and Joint Committee on Banking, Mr. Brett joined The New England Council where he has continued to promote a strong economic environment and quality of living in the region. Since leaving office in 1996, Mr. Brett remains a leading voice in advocacy for individuals with disabilities both in New England and nationally, serving as a Chairman of the President's Committee for People with Intellectual Disabilities, a member of the National Council on Disability, and Chair of the Governor's Commission on Intellectual Disability and Massachusetts Disabled Persons Protection Commission. Across Massachusetts, we are proud to call James Brett our neighbor and grateful for his continued service to the disadvantaged among us. As the Eire Society of Boston gathers on April 7th to celebrate this important achievement, I call on Congress to recognize the many accomplishments of Mr. Brett's distinguished career and the impact that his tireless efforts have had on so many in New England and nationwide.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize and commend Barry Shrage, the President of Combined Jewish Philanthropies of Greater Boston, who is stepping down after more than three decades of distinguished leadership. Barry has dedicated his life to the service of others. From his time as a social worker in Mid-Westchester, New York, to his current role in Boston, he has worked to improve lives every day. He has taken action and made an impact on thousands of people, both Jewish and non-Jewish, in the Greater Boston area, in this nation, in Israel, and around the globe. With everything he does, Barry demonstrates an unwavering commitment to the highest principles of Judaism, particularly tzedek (justice), torah (learning), and tikkun olam (the repair of the world). He has also upheld the deepest American values of liberty and justice for all. In the 1980s, he was instrumental in bringing Jewish people from the Soviet Union, where they were not allowed to practice their religion, to the United States. Just last year, he founded the Combined Jewish Philanthropies Legal Aid Fund for Immigrants, an interfaith effort to assist those who are trying to start new lives of hope in this nation. He has stood throughout his tenure as a steadfast partner to all those who strive in common purpose to create a more just and peaceful world. But, Mr. Speaker, it is not only his service that I celebrate today. Barry is a man of integrity and kindness whose abiding love for humanity is an example to us all. I offer him my sincere gratitude and best wishes for good health and continued success as he goes from strength to strength.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize Homes for Our Troops, a nonprofit headquartered in Taunton, Massachusetts where I am proud to represent. Since 2004, Homes for Our Troops has built accessible homes for veterans who require adapted housing to accommodate for the difficulties of the severe injuries they have sustained in service. Overseen by a board of civilian specialists and retired military personnel, nearly 90 cents of every dollar spent has gone directly to housing projects and services, helping Homes for Our Troops become one of the top-rated military and veterans' charities in the country by watch dog groups Charity Navigator and Charity Watch. This past Saturday, Homes for Our Troops celebrated the completion of their 250th home in Temecula, California, built specifically for Sergeant Cristian Valle, a husband and father of four who was part of the first wave of U.S. troops to enter Iraq in 2003. In October 2005, Sergeant Valle suffered a life-altering injury when an enemy grenade left him without the use of his legs. After returning to the United States, Sergeant Valle faced challenges adjusting to his new life, but through the services of Homes for Our Troops, he and his family will receive a new home specially adapted to his needs to help him focus on recovery and restore independence and stability to his life. While our veterans face many challenges, none should have to endure returning from service to a home that is inaccessible to them. I join Governor Baker of Massachusetts in bringing attention to this important organization, and call on the House to honor Homes for Our Troops and the valuable work they do serving those who have sacrificed so bravely so that we may enjoy a life of peace in the United States.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to remember the life of Dr. Surin Pitsuwan of the Kingdom of Thailand. Dr. Surin, a great friend to countless Americans in the diplomatic and Peace Corps communities, passed away on November 30, 2017. Dr. Surin became a household name in U.S. diplomatic circles, first as Thailand's foreign minister and later as Secretary General of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations. Throughout his life in government and academia, Dr. Surin wielded his skills to influence and forge peaceful partnerships with America and the world. Dr. Surin first entered the American experience as an impoverished teenager in southern Thailand as a student of David and Phyllis Johnston--his ``Angels of Hope'' as he called them--two Peace Corps volunteers who helped him receive an American Field Service scholarship to attend his senior year of high school in Minnesota. With the help of grants from the Rockefeller Foundation and the Winston S. Churchill Association, Dr. Surin received his bachelor's degree from Claremont Men's College (now Claremont McKenna College) in California and a master's and doctorate from Harvard University, and through a Congressional Fellowship from the Asia Foundation worked in the office of Representative Geraldine Ferraro. For a Muslim of Malay-descent who didn't own a pair of shoes until the age of 11 to later become a globetrotting envoy, Dr. Surin never lost his deep sense of humility and grace and ease with communicating. Dedicated to improving the lives of others, he always made time during his frequent trips to his family's hometown to meet with the poor and see how he could help them. He is survived by his wife, Alisa, and their three sons, to whom I extend my deepest thoughts and condolences. I had the pleasure of meeting with Dr. Surin in 2014 while he was in America to receive the National Peace Corps Association's Harris Wofford Global Citizen Award. Dr. Surin accepted the award on behalf of what he called ``the millions of other so called `Peace Corps Products' all around the world whose lives have been enriched and influenced by [Peace Corps volunteers].'' From his ``Big Break,'' as he called it, with volunteers David and Phyllis until the day he died, Dr. Surin channeled the spirit of the Peace Corps to partner in peace, progress, and understanding. I hope that Dr. Surin's life and work can serve as a model for all of us.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. Speaker, this morning, a high school senior sat attentively in a Chicago classroom while this country held her college dreams hostage. This morning, a fourth-year medical student started her rotation as an aspiring thoracic surgeon in Cambridge while this country took her talent for granted. This morning, an enlisted soldier living in Queens eagerly awaited his basic training assignment while his country shrugged their shoulders at his service. This morning, 800,000 young men and women woke up, offered a brave smile to their loved ones, and sought to better the only home they have ever known. You can call them DREAMers. You can call them immigrants. You can call them Americans. You can call them husbands, wives, sons, daughters, neighbors, doctors, students, servicemen and -women. You can call them human beings who deserve to live in a place that they call home; whose lives shouldn't be horse-traded for big walls, petty tweets, and bad campaign ads; who have offered us their talent, their tirelessness, their ingenuity, their empathy, their loyalty, and their patriotism; who have earned their government's protection in return. We gave those 800,000 human beings our word, and if those of us here in this room who have the incredible privilege of serving in these halls bestowed with the title ``Representative,'' if we aren't willing to defend the American word and make sure that it still means something, then who will?

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Madam Speaker, ask them how much more money that $1,000 is going to save you when your healthcare benefits are taken away. By the way, that clause just got added over in the Senate. Ask them how much more some savings might go for one family when you gut and shred a social safety net that has powered the greatest expansion of economic growth that this country has ever seen. That is what your bill does. That is what this bill means. That is what this bill is about. It is about the values envisioned of an America, about a tax structure that should reflect the values of the American family, not the values of corporate balance sheets.

Mr. KENNEDY. Madam Speaker, I thank my friend and mentor in the House, the dean of our delegation from Massachusetts (Mr. Neal), for his leadership on this issue and so many others. Madam Speaker, I am always heartened by the quotes of President Kennedy offered by any Member of this body. I would like to think that they would seek to emulate him not just on the marginal tax cuts that were put forth some 50 years ago, but also on his stance on immigration, on civil rights, and on Russia. But those are issues for another day, Madam Speaker. The issue today is a vote that we will take on this floor tomorrow to rewrite an American Tax Code that will touch every single American life. True tax reform is complicated, it is cumbersome, and, above all else, it is deeply personal. But this bill is none of those things. It is a massive, permanent handout to corporations passed off on American families. It is a terrifyingly precise attack on patients with chronic illness, a heartless roadblock for low-income students, and a choice to value inherited wealth more than hard-earned income. It is a gift to corporations paid to the richest among us, and it is paid for by long nights, by double shifts, by vacations not taken, and of hardworking American families sacrificing for their hope for a better tomorrow. You are asking them to fortify your tax cuts and stock options with their classrooms, your corporate profits with their roads and bridges, your balance sheets with their hard-earned retirement and healthcare benefits. For all the talk about the boost to corporate profits, 80 percent of the stocks in this country are owned by 10 percent of Americans. Ask yourself who is going to actually be the beneficiary of all that money. That is what this bill does. You have heard from my Republican friends over the course of the past couple days about how much this will save the average American family, but not about the 36 million people and families who will experience a tax hike. What they aren't telling you is what is going to happen the moment this bill is passed. Luckily for the American public, one of the chief economic advisers to the President has said so. He said that after this bill is done, they are turning directly toward welfare cuts, Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. So when you hear questions about how much this bill is going to save you, ask how about your retirement. These cuts go right to Social Security.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. Speaker, no one likes to pay taxes, but when our Founders dreamt of a nation, they knew that our success would rest on every shoulder. So it is not to make us just citizens of this great country, but stakeholders where everyone chips in, where everyone contributes, where everyone has skin in the game. It is the only way that a gutsy American experiment could work: if each of us is so committed to what this country stands for that we are willing to give a piece of what we earn to help it succeed. Of course, that willingness hinges on a system that would deliver for all of our people. We pay into a common good because we also reap from a common investment. We send our kids to public schools. We sleep safe at night under the protection of American defense. We wear down roads and bridges with commutes, with after-school pickups, with delivery runs, and family trips. So we do our part, however begrudgingly, however it might strap us or sting us, and all that we ask for in return is that what we give gets put to good use. The tax reform bill being offered by my Republican colleagues does not put that money to good use--not the money it takes from hardworking American families. It does not ask families that are living paycheck to paycheck to fork over money that--make no mistake--they do not have so they can invest in affordable housing, so that we can help exhausted parents pay for quality childcare, and so that we can stop middle class kids from being priced out of higher education and ensure that families that are hit by catastrophic medical events don't lose their livelihood--not this bill. Instead, this bill asks Americans to scrape their bank accounts so that the Trump administration can turn around and use that money to give to the wealthiest among us and make them even wealthier; so that they can make tax cuts for corporations permanent but abandon American workers after a few years; so that they can multiply dividends enjoyed by the 10 percent of Americans who own the vast majority of our Nation's stocks while everyone else gets left behind; so that they can blow a hole in our Federal deficit that again--make no mistake--working and middle class families will be forced to fill with their bare hands for generations to come, for we all know that the moment that this bill passes, you are going to hear those calls for cuts to Medicaid, Medicare, and Social Security come roaring back from my Republican colleagues. So for these families, the money that they send to the American Government every year isn't just some meaningless check. It represents the late nights; the double shifts; the school plays and the teacher conferences missed; the bedtimes when you didn't make it home; the vacations you could not take; those endless, countless, thankless sacrifices that you make every single day so that you can take care of the people whom you love. You deserve a country that will make your contribution count and that will make that investment in your family, too. This bill doesn't even come close.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. Speaker, this moment is a bit hard to stomach. It is hard to stomach yet another attempt to sabotage the Affordable Care Act, in the words of our colleagues, while extolling the virtues of public health programs by cutting grace periods down to 30 days that will result in hundreds of thousands of people losing access to their insurance. It is hard to stomach a $1 trillion tax cut being proposed for wealthy adults at the same time that our Republican colleagues are telling us that we can't afford to care for sick kids. It is hard to stomach the indifference shown in this Chamber over the course of the past month as CHIP lapses and panic sets in amongst families whose lives depend on this program. It is hard to stomach an idea that the only way to give them care is to somehow take it away from somebody else, by gutting the Public Health Fund in the midst of an opioid epidemic or scapegoating patients who struggle to afford the monthly premiums and sometimes fall behind. Why is it always those patients who are asked to sacrifice? It is always those communities that are asked to do more with less. Why do we somehow create a false choice on this floor today that leads 9 million families to an impossible choice tomorrow? For those families, CHIP is not a privilege or a line item in the budget, it is a lifeline. They deserve the same decency and the same urgency that our Republican colleagues showed the wealthy in their tax plan yesterday.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. Speaker, on Sunday night, in mere minutes, one man took at least 59 lives, forever altered hundreds more, and left invisible, incurable scars on thousands. On Monday morning, our Nation welcomed all of them into America's fastest growing community: families left with a gaping hole in their hearts caused by a bullet; a community that does not have the luxury of moving on from gun violence after TV cameras leave, after the front pages fill with news stories; a community that includes families Black and White, rich and poor, big and small, Democrat and Republican. Ending gun violence isn't political. It is personal. So we are now powerless. We are not helpless. We are not hostages to some political organization. We are not bystanders, as bullets tear through our concerts, prayer circles, elementary school classrooms, nightclubs, military compounds, and quiet neighborhoods. This is up to us, every single American. This is our country, our home, and our families. We can decide that one person's right to bear arms does not come at the expense of a neighbor's right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. We must say, ``No more.''

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. Speaker, in this country, we do not retreat. We may stumble and we may struggle, but we press on. Time and again, our greatest challenges have delivered our crowning achievements: the New Deal, the 19th Amendment, the GI Bill, the Civil Rights Act, and marriage equality. The tougher the moment, the more we demand of ourselves; the bigger and bolder we demand to dream for a fairer, more just nation, for an America where every person counts, where every voice matters, where we are all treated with a decency and a dignity that we deserve, where every American family has access to quality, affordable, accessible healthcare. Right now, this week, we must fight harder than before to say: Not this bill, not this time. Not this cop-out, not this retreat, not this white flag. The latest version of TrumpCare is an admission that the wealthiest Nation on Earth will not, by choice, care for all its citizens; that a child in Texas or Massachusetts with pediatric cancer deserves treatment, but not both; that a grandmother in Maine or Oklahoma deserves long-term care, but not both; that a young man in Georgia or West Virginia suffering from substance use disorder can be treated, but not both. This version of TrumpCare, worse than those before it, pits State against State, American against American. It is up to every single one of us here today to say: Not this--not in my country, not on our watch. In our Nation, every person counts.