Hal Rogers

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the distinguished chairman of the Military Construction and VA Subcommittee on Appropriations, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Culberson).

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Speaker, I'm pleased to bring to the floor today H.R. 1473, the full year spending agreement for fiscal year 2011. This final CR makes nearly $40 billion of real spending cuts compared to fiscal year 2010 levels while funding the government's critical services and programs and supporting our Nation's troops for the rest of this fiscal year. After weeks of hard fought negotiations, all sides were able to come together in this final agreement to find common ground and take steps to help balance our budget. This legislation is a bold move for Congress, one that points us in the right direction on Federal spending. Never before has any Congress made dramatic cuts such as these that are in this final bill. The near $40 billion reduction in non-defense spending is tens of billions of dollars larger than any other cut in history and is the result of this new Republican majority's commitment to bring about real change in the way Washington spends the people's money. My committee went line-by-line through agency budgets to execute the agreement reached by our Speaker crafting deep but responsible reductions in virtually all areas of government. Our bill targets wasteful and duplicative spending, makes strides to rein in out-of- control Federal bureaucracies, and will help bring our Nation one step closer to eliminating our job-crushing level of debt. This led to the following cuts from the President's budget request: Agriculture accounts were reduced by 14 percent; Commerce, Justice, and Science reduced by 12 percent; Energy and Water reduced by 10 percent; Financial Services, General Government, 13 percent; Interior and Environment by 9 percent; Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, 8 percent; Legislative Branch, 11 percent cut; State and Foreign Operations, 15 percent cut; and Transportation and HUD, 19 percent cut. The Department of Defense is funded at $513 billion, which is a $5 billion increase over fiscal year 2010 to provide the necessary resources for our troops and the success of our Nation's military actions. In this bill, Madam Speaker, we've defunded Obama administration czars--we said, ``Nyet''--ended unsuccessful education programs, advanced efforts to repeal ObamaCare, and reduced Congress's own budget. We've also put into place mandatory audits for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, banned taxpayer funding of abortion in Washington, D.C., and continued the global fight against terrorism. In addition, with this legislation we have ended the stimulus spending spree and have taken the next step to cutting trillions of dollars in the years to come. We stood by our commitment to eliminate earmarks, terminated unnecessary and ineffective programs, and made real spending cuts that will help right our fiscal ship. And we will continue to hold the government to a standard of responsible, sustainable spending in the future. Our goal is and has been to keep precious taxpayer dollars where they are needed most--in the hands of our small businesses and individuals so they can create jobs and grow our economy. I hope, Madam Speaker, that my colleagues will take the opportunity to support this historic bill and finally close the book on the fiscal year 2011 budget. For those who have been saying in their career here in this body, ``I came here to cut spending and to bring down the size of the government,'' I say to them here's your chance. If you believe in cutting spending, you can vote for $40 billion of it today, the largest any Member of Congress has ever been able to vote for. This is historic, a historic reduction in Federal spending after a 2- year spending spree that increased discretionary spending by 82 percent. This bill will reverse that rise and will start us back down toward responsible spending in the government. Madam Speaker, before I close, I would like to take a moment and thank these hardworking individuals who have been toiling behind the scenes now on this bill for the last several months, with little fanfare, and they get no credit in public, that made this legislation possible. Our legislative counsels deserve our appreciation. I want to say thanks to Ira Forstater, Tom Cassidy, Ryan Greenlaw, and their group of appropriations coordinators. I would like also to thank Janet Airis and the staff at the CBO. I also want to thank the floor staff, the parliamentarians, the Capitol Police, and all those support staff who have put in the extra hours to keep this institution running at its very best. Finally, I want to offer a special thanks to the Appropriations Committee's fine staff on both sides of this aisle, those in our full committee, the subcommittee clerks, the subcommittee staffs in both majority and minority. They have been given impossible task after impossible task, facing untenable deadlines, gone for days and weeks working around the clock, and yet have miraculously produced all that we have asked of them and more. I want to especially say a real thanks to the clerk of the committee, Bill Inglee; the deputy clerk, Will Smith; and all of the other staff that's worked on the majority side. And Mr. Dicks and his wonderful staff have been just magnanimous in their support and hard work. I want to say thank you to them as well.

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. Madam Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 218, I call up the bill (H.R. 1473) making appropriations for the Department of Defense and the other departments and agencies of the Government for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2011, and for other purposes, and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. I yield 1 minute to a new member of our committee, the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Dent).

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. I yield to the gentleman from Washington.

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to a new member of our committee, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Austria).

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. I thank the distinguished chairman of the Rules Committee for the time here. And I thank him for the diligent work that he continues to do as chair of the Rules Committee, the sort of traffic cop for the bills that reach this floor. I want to expand a bit, Madam Speaker, on a point that Chairman Dreier alluded to earlier, and that is the historic nature of the bill that we will be considering on the floor. As the chairman pointed out, under Speaker Pelosi, discretionary spending in those 2 years increased by 82 percent--a record. With this bill, we not only are arresting that growth, but we are receding actual discretionary spending by a record amount, nearly $40 billion in actual cuts in spending. That has not ever been accomplished by this body in its history, in the history of the country. The cuts in this bill exceed anything ever passed by the House. It's the largest cut ever--by four times. The largest previous single cut was in 1995, when we cut around $9 billion. With this bill, you cut almost $40 billion. Now I don't understand sometimes my friends on the other side of the aisle when they criticize this bill. It's being supported by your President. He says, pass the bill. It's what we agreed upon. It's being supported by Senator Reid, the leader on the Senate side. It's being supported by the Speaker of the House. And it's being supported by an overwhelming number of Members on this side of the aisle, and I predict a great number of Democrats likewise support the bill. Now on the Defense portion of this bill, let me briefly refer to it. The provisions in this bill about the Defense budget are much like they were when all parties last December on both sides of the aisle in this body and on both sides of the aisle in the Senate body agreed to the expenditures for the Department of Defense. We simply lifted those agreed-upon provisions for the Defense Department and dropped them into this bill. There are two people in this body that know more about Defense spending than any of the rest of us, and that's the chairman of the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee on Appropriations, Bill Young of Florida, and my good friend, Norman Dicks, the ranking member of that subcommittee and the ranking member on the full Appropriations Committee. He worked long and hard with Bill Young for these provisions. And I salute him for it. It's good work. It does the right things. It cuts back on the President's request for Defense. It does increase in real dollars, about $5 billion, over the current spending rate. But we're in three wars. And there's no reason at all for us to shirk from the responsibility to provide adequate funding for our troops in combat. And that's the reason why, one of the big reasons why we support this bill, why the President supports the bill, and why Senator Reid and the Senate supports the bill. And so let's focus on actual cuts in spending. We all profess that we want to cut back on the deficit for the year and for the ensuing years. The deficit this year, $1.4 trillion in just 1 year, the largest in history, adding to a debt that exceeds all of our fears of some $14.2 or $14.3 trillion. We all say, let's cut back on spending. Here is your chance. Here is your opportunity. If you profess to be a fiscally responsible Member of this House, you have a chance, yea, an obligation, to vote for this bill and support it. It's historic. We've never been here before. We've reached a pinnacle and a great opportunity for us to show to the rest of the country that we're serious about controlling the free-spending nature of this body. This is your chance. Don't miss it.

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. Mr. Speaker, pursuant to the order of the House of today, I call up the bill (H.R. 1363) making appropriations for the Department of Defense for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2011, and for other purposes, with the Senate amendment thereto, and I have a motion at the desk.

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on H.R. 1363.

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, we come here tonight just moments before the government is forced to close its doors with very good news. We have an agreement with the Senate and the White House to fund the government for the rest of the fiscal year, while providing critical resources for our national defense. In addition, when this agreement is signed into law, we will have taken the unprecedented step of passing the largest non-defense spending cut in the history of the Nation, tens of billions of dollars larger than any other non-defense reduction. This remarkable achievement is the result of hard-fought negotiations that required all sides to come together to find common ground. The American people need and deserve to have a functioning government, but they also deserve a government that spends its taxpayer dollars responsibly, a government that won't saddle their children and grandchildren with unsustainable and reckless debt. Our constituents have sent us the message that the standard tax-and- spend culture in Washington is no longer acceptable. It has been the goal of this new Republican majority to keep precious tax dollars where they are needed most, in the hands of businesses and individuals across the Nation so that they can create jobs and grow our economy. This agreement will mark the end of a budget process that should have been completed almost a year ago by the previous Congress. Yet sometimes the end result is worth the wait, and the unparalleled spending cuts in this bill will not only save the taxpayers tens of billions of dollars this year, but will allow Congress to continue the trend of reductions to dig our Nation out of our dangerous deficits and debt for years to come. Now that a broad agreement has been reached, my committee will work over the next few days to craft legislation to bring to the floor next week. While we continue to work, we must make responsible decisions to fund our troops and their families, keep the lights on in government, and continue to provide the services that Americans depend on every day. This temporary CR allows us to meet these needs by providing funding through next Friday, April 15, while also making $2 billion in additional spending cuts to show the American people that we are serious about cutting spending wherever and whenever we can. Mr. Speaker, I guarantee the final legislation will rein in Federal spending, and this CR keeps us on track to cut excessive Federal spending as we continue to finalize a deal. We are determined to deliver to the American people a complete budget with historic levels of deep and real spending cuts, cuts that will keep our economy moving in the right direction. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. Will the gentleman yield?

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. I really deeply appreciate the gentleman's reminding us again that he and I are determined to bring to the floor every single one of the 12 appropriations bills and complete our work in the House before the August recess.

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. I yield the gentlelady an additional 30 seconds.

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. I yield 1 minute to a member of our committee, and a good one, the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Dent).

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. Madam Speaker, I yield myself 30 seconds. Chairman Simpson a moment ago referred and reminded us that we're in this mess that we're in because the other side, when they controlled the House last year, failed to pass a single appropriations bill and left the mess in our hands when we took over in January. And now they are complaining about the way we're trying to clean up their mess. It reminds me a bit of Abraham Lincoln back in Illinois when he was practicing law spoke of a man who was accused of killing his parents, and in court made a plea that he was an orphan. I yield 2 minutes, Madam Speaker, to the chairman on the Financial Services Subcommittee on our full committee, the gentlelady from Missouri (Mrs. Emerson).

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. Madam Speaker, I yield 1 minute to another new member of our committee and a new Member of Congress; but he is doing a great job, the gentleman from Mississippi (Mr. Nunnelee).

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. Madam Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Brooks) a member of the Armed Services Committee.

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. Madam Speaker, may I inquire of the time remaining on both sides?

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to one of my hardworking subcommittee chairmen on Appropriations, the chairman of the Interior Subcommittee, the gentleman from Idaho (Mr. Simpson).

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Speaker, I rise today to support H.R. 1363, the Department of Defense and Further Additional Continuing Appropriations Act, 2011. I ask my colleagues, Madam Speaker, to support this bill so that we can avoid a government shutdown and provide the necessary time to finally complete negotiations on a final funding agreement for the rest of the 2011 fiscal year. This bill funds government operations for 1 week while reducing spending by $12 billion. These cuts include funding rescissions, reductions, and program terminations from nearly all areas of the government. Virtually all of these cuts were also included in H.R. 1, and many were included in the President's budget requests, the Senate's alternative to H.R. 1, or the recent OMB CR proposal. Most importantly, Madam Speaker, this bill supports our troops and our national security by providing funding for our national defense for the remainder of this fiscal year. Our troops and their families deserve to have the financial security we promised them while we continue to work towards a final budget agreement. After months of uncertainty, it's high time we provide for our national security in a responsible way. This means commonsense funding that ensures the safety of our war fighters and the success of our missions abroad. However, while this legislation points us in the right direction on security and spending cuts, what we all want right now is to wrap up these negotiations, complete the process for 2011, and move our many other important legislative items onto the table. As I have said many times before, Madam Speaker, short-term measures like this are not the preferable way to fund the government. So while no one wants to fund the government in 1- or 2-week bursts, this short- term CR is what we must do to prevent a government shutdown and allow time to pass a smart and thoughtful bill for the rest of the year. Madam Speaker, coming into this Congress, the Democrats left us with a financial mess: soaring deficits, unchecked spending, and no budget, not a single appropriations bill for 2011. And now that we're 6 months into the fiscal year, the Senate Democrats have yet to produce any plan to help clean up this mess. Despite all the roadblocks we've faced throughout this process, we must continue down the path to fiscal solvency, and this CR both affords us the time required to complete negotiations as well as makes the spending cuts needed to continue to help balance our budgets. We are committed to making real spending cuts like these to reduce our deficits both now and in the future. We are determined to complete this work where Democrats failed to do so. While answering our constituents' calls to reduce excessive government spending, this bill provides time to negotiate in an honest way to do what is only right for our constituents, our Nation, and our financial future. Let's pass this bill and finally get this leftover work from last year behind us once and for all. Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. I would point out, Madam Speaker, that this bill would prevent a shutdown. This keeps the government operating. That's one aspect of it. I yield 3 minutes to the very distinguished chairman of the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee and former chairman of the full committee, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Young).

Mr. ROGERS of Kentucky. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to a member of our committee, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Carter).