Tom Price

Mr. PRICE of Georgia

Mr. PRICE of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Barton). (Mr. BARTON of Texas asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. PRICE of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 502, I call up the resolution (H. Res. 501) expressing the sense of the House of Representatives regarding any final measure to extend the payroll tax holiday, extend Federally funded unemployment insurance benefits, or prevent decreases in reimbursement for physicians who provide care to Medicare beneficiaries, and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. PRICE of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Clearly, the economy and jobs is the number one issue for the American people all across this land; and if you were to ask the folks who create jobs what is the greatest impediment to job creation, they would say it's uncertainty. Businesses don't know what taxes are going to be. Job creators don't know what the rules and regulations are going to be. Employees and workers don't know if their jobs will be lost. Doctors don't know whether or not they're going to be able to see Medicare patients. Patients don't know whether or not they're going to be able to see their doctors. Therefore, the House believes what the American people already know: that more certainty, greater certainty, is imperative if we're going to get this economy rolling again. Consequently, we, the House, passed a bill that provides that certainty. Our bill provides for a 1-year extension of the payroll contribution to Social Security, offset so that Social Security resources are not depleted; Our bill provides for a 13-month extension of Federal unemployment benefits with real reform, including job training and helping folks get GEDs and allowing drug screening by States for those receiving benefits should they so desire; Our bill provides a 2-year extension of payments to doctors caring for seniors--for Medicare patients--so that our parents and our grandparents can continue to see their doctors. So the House passed a 1-year extension of the payroll tax reduction and paid for it with reduced spending elsewhere. Yet the Senate, Mr. Speaker, wants 60 days and more uncertainty. The House passed a 13- month extension of Federal unemployment benefits. The Senate wants 60 days and more uncertainty. The House passed a 2-year continuation of funding for doctors to see Medicare patients. The Senate--that's right, Mr. Speaker--wants 60 days and more uncertainty. Republicans and Democrats in both the House and the Senate agree that we ought to extend these items. There is no debate about that. The differences lie in whether or not we get our job done now or whether we punt the fulfilling of our responsibilities for another 2 months. The Senate's action is unworkable and unacceptable. Various organizations representing job creators have already said that a 2-month punt is unworkable and costly--therefore harming more job creation. Now we're ready to sit down with our colleagues on the other side of the aisle and on the other side of the Capitol to get a 1-year extension put in place before the end of this year. That's what you do when there are differences in the House and the Senate. Both sides have passed legislation, but we have disagreements. So now we ought to sit down, like Congresses have done for over 200 years, and work out those differences. We ought to do that today, not 2 months from now. This resolution makes it clear that the House supports taking care of middle class families, seniors, and job creators. It makes it clear that the House stands ready and willing to work with the Senate to get this done. If our colleagues on the other side of the aisle support providing relief and certainty for middle class families and for seniors and for job creators, then they ought to support this resolution. There is bipartisan support for the proposals within this resolution, and there is bipartisan support for a 1-year extension. I call on my colleagues to support this resolution and support the efforts under way to work out our differences with the Democrat-led Senate and to put in place a set of solutions that will create certainty for families, job creators, and seniors. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. PRICE of Georgia. I am pleased to yield 1\1/2\ minutes to my friend, another physician colleague and a colleague from the State of Georgia (Mr. Gingrey).

Mr. PRICE of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 1 minute to a productive and excellent member of our conference, the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Wilson).

Mr. PRICE of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, how much time remains for each side?

Mr. PRICE of Georgia. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I am pleased to yield 1 minute to the gentleman from California (Mr. McClintock).

Mr. PRICE of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, may I say to my colleague that I am prepared to close if the gentleman is prepared to close.

Mr. PRICE of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 1\1/2\ minutes to a dear friend and a wonderful member of the Energy and Commerce Committee, the gentlelady from Tennessee (Mrs. Blackburn).

Mr. PRICE of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I am honored to yield 3 minutes to our Republican chair of our conference, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Hensarling).

Mr. PRICE of Georgia. I am pleased to yield 1 minute to my physician colleague from Indiana (Mr. Bucshon).

Mr. PRICE of Georgia. I am pleased to yield 1 minute to a freshman Member from Mississippi (Mr. Nunnelee).

Mr. PRICE of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I yield the gentleman an additional 15 seconds.

Mr. PRICE of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Duffy).

Mr. PRICE of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Griffith).

Mr. PRICE of Georgia. I am pleased to yield 1 minute to a physician colleague from Louisiana (Mr. Cassidy).

Mr. PRICE of Georgia. I am pleased to yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Murphy).

Mr. PRICE of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I would remind my friend that it was President Obama who said: This Congress cannot and should not leave for vacation until that--until they have made sure that that tax increase doesn't happen. Let me repeat that: Congress should not and cannot go on vacation before they have made sure that working families aren't seeing their taxes go up by a thousand dollars. Mr. Speaker, in order for their taxes not to go up by $1,000, the length of time of the payroll tax reduction has to be 1 year, not 60 days. I am pleased to yield a minute and a half to my friend from Texas (Mr. Culberson).

Mr. PRICE of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, may I inquire of my colleague as to how many speakers he has remaining?

Mr. PRICE of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield a minute and a half to my physician colleague from the great State of Maryland (Mr. Harris).

Mr. PRICE of Georgia. I am pleased to yield a minute and a half to my colleague from the great State of Texas (Mr. Conaway).

Mr. PRICE of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and to include extraneous material on H. Res. 501.

Mr. PRICE of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, somebody once said that whether you say you can or you can't, you're right. The other side says they can't. The other side says we can't. We believe we can. Mr. Speaker, we have two different versions of H.R. 3630. There is a House version and a Senate version. Everybody who knows about the United States Government knows that when you have two different versions you come together in a conference committee. You come to common ground, work out the differences, and move the bill back to both Chambers. What are the differences? In the House bill, we protect seniors' access to their doctors for 24 months. How about in the Senate bill? It's 2 months; In the House bill, the Federal unemployment benefits extension goes for 13 months. In the Senate bill, it's 2 months; As for the payroll tax cut extension, in the House bill, it's 12 months. In the Senate bill, it's 2 months; As for the payroll tax cut for workers earning $50,000 a year, in the House bill, it's $1,000. In the Senate bill, it's $167. There is a pay freeze for Members of Congress and Federal workers included in the House bill, not in the Senate bill. There is the ending of unemployment and food stamp benefits for millionaires in the House bill, not in the Senate bill. So, Mr. Speaker, this is about two different bills. It's about certainty. It's about certainty for families and for job creators and for seniors. It's also about real jobs for real people. Our bill provides certainty and 20,000 jobs with the Keystone pipeline construction and another 120,000 new jobs in the supply chain for the pipeline: positive policy. Why wait? Why wait, Mr. Speaker? Why not make a decision in the next few days on these tax and health care and unemployment extensions? What's the economic or the policy argument for putting this off for another 2 months? The truth is that there is none, and there are strong arguments against delay. We ought to be working on alleviating the uncertainty that that would bring about, not adding to it. Mr. Speaker, I call on my colleagues to support this resolution and to move forward positively for families, for job creators, and for seniors. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. PRICE of Georgia

Mr. PRICE of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, this Congress has enacted a defense authorization bill every year for the last half-century, generally with broad bipartisan support. The reason for this broad support is simple: under Republican and Democratic leadership alike, we have recognized that support for our Nation's men and women in uniform should remain above the partisan fray, unencumbered by controversial policy debates that are only tangentially related to the mission of our Armed Forces. Throughout my service in Congress, I have almost always supported this annual measure, which authorizes funding for a wide range of programs upon which our military depends, from salaries and benefits to military health care to critical equipment and readiness accounts. I thus find it deeply unfortunate that the House Republican leadership chose to use this year's bill as a vehicle for advancing ill-advised policies that seek to tie the President's hands in the war on terror and expand the military's role in the detention and disposition of terror suspects, at the expense of our civilian justice system and our civil liberties. To be sure, the original House version of this bill, which I opposed, was much worse. It would not only have indefinitely extended the Authorization for the Use of Military Force that was enacted in the wake of September 11, but would also have required suspects detained pursuant to that authorization to be prosecuted in military tribunals. My Republican colleagues' inexplicable insistence on forcing terror trials into military commissions instead of civilian courts flies in the face of the facts; our court system has a strong record of trying and convicting terrorism suspects, while the record of military commissions has been spotty at best. It is no wonder that the Obama Administration threatened to veto this bill--as any administration, Democrat or Republican, would almost certainly have done. To their credit, our Democratic conferees succeeded in averting the worst aspects of the House bill in the conference report before us today. But they didn't go far enough. The measure would still require all foreign suspects detained in the war on terror to be kept in military custody, potentially disrupting critical anti-terrorism operations and muddying the waters of a process that should be crystal clear. As FBI Director Robert Mueller reiterated today, this provision would unnecessarily complicate interrogation and intelligence collection--the very capabilities that the provision's supporters claim they are trying to enhance. The conference report would also needlessly reaffirm our ability to detain terror suspects indefinitely, upholding an ambiguity in current law that should be resolved by the courts. And it would impose new consultation requirements that further restrain the discretion of the Attorney General to determine how to prosecute terror cases. For these reasons, I intend to oppose the measure before us today, despite my strong support for the majority of its provisions. In the future, rather than using the defense authorization bill to advance their partisan agenda, I urge the Republican leadership to return to the past practice of leaving controversial policy debates for another time and place. Our men and women in uniform deserve nothing less.

Mr. PRICE of Georgia

Mr. PRICE of Georgia. Madam Speaker, on rollcall No. 929, I was unavoidably detained. Had I been present, I would have voted ``aye.''