Tim Ryan

Mr. RYAN of Ohio

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. I continue to reserve my right to close.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. I will continue to reserve my right to close, unless my chairman wants more time.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Chairman, I claim the time in opposition.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Two seconds, I would just say if your philosophy has worked, you would be in the majority right now.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Madam Chairman, I would like to just say, I have voted for the ban on partial birth abortion. I consider myself a pro- life Democrat. But I will say that this amendment will increase the number of abortions that are performed. Fifty percent of abortions are performed on women who live within 200 percent of poverty. If they don't have access to prevention, they will end up getting an abortion. And I believe that if we truly want to prevent abortions from happening in the United States of America, we have an obligation, a moral obligation, to fund programs like this and prevent unintended pregnancies. Those are the poor women who end up going to abortion clinics and having abortions. Let's prevent the number of abortions from increasing by rejecting this amendment. And the more money we spend on prevention, that will mean we will continue to reduce the number of abortions. And I want to thank the gentleman for working on this with us.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. We raised the debt limit six times. How can you say it worked?

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. That's been the philosophy, and it hasn't worked.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. I don't think I am.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. I know. I have been here.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. I thank the gentleman. I wanted to make sure, because as we had the conversation, I have heard many gentleman who were up here earlier say they didn't believe in any Federal spending for education, local education, at all. I just want to clarify that you, at least, do believe that we do have an obligation to spend money. I appreciate you saying that.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Madam Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentlelady from Connecticut (Ms. DeLauro).

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. I yield to the gentleman from Wisconsin such time as he may consume.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Madam Chairman, I seek the time in opposition.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Madam Chairman, I hate to interrupt this beautiful debate going on, but I think it is important for us to make a point. We offered our friends in the fringe an opportunity within the first 100 hours we were here to strip $14 billion from the oil companies, corporate welfare that they were getting from the United States taxpayers, and you all voted against it, or at least most of you did. You had a chance for $14 billion from the oil companies. But you choose to come here now and take it out of the hide of the students and the middle-class families who are trying to make ends meet. That is the difference. This is a change in priorities. You had a chance for $14 billion from the oil companies. You were silent. Now you choose to do it for programs that are going to make us stronger in the long run. So I thank the gentleman, I thank the Chair, I thank the ranking member for putting together such a great bill here, and I think we should leave it as it is and not ask the people who have had increased energy costs, a 40 percent tuition increase, now to say wait a minute, we don't want to help you with that. We want to cut that by .5 percent, too.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. I thank the gentleman. And since my friends on the other side of the aisle have embraced their fringeness, I would like to just point out to you from the Roll Call today, around the Hill there is a festival, 11-day play, this weekend. I know many of you go home, so many of your staff may want to attend this, it's the Capitol Fringe Festival. So you may be able to attend and completely embrace the fringeness. But again, as the gentleman has said, Madam Chair, when we first got in the majority in January, we tried to pass out of this House, in our Six in '06, provisions that we passed, campaigned on and then passed. One of the provisions was to strip $14 billion from the oil companies. And our friends, who are now wanting to take this money from Pell Grants and investments in education, investments in health care, voted against stripping the oil companies of $14 billion. And this is what we're talking about. This bipartisan committee passed out of the committee unanimously, on support of the Republicans on that committee, with the support of the Democrats on this committee, well thought-out pieces of legislation, well thought-out amendments in the committee, supported unanimously by both sides. And what we're saying is, we have to make these investments. And there is no tax increase in this year's budget, none, zero, that's it. You can't point it out. In 2007, keep your forms, 2006, or last year's forms, and compare them to next year's, and there will be not one dime of an increase. All we did was we took that money that our friends were giving to the banks and we invested that money in the kids. The $14 billion that was going to the oil companies at their times of highest profits is going into health care and education now and alternative energy. As I said earlier, this is very simple. We're in a globally competitive market, and we need to make investments into our kids and into our future. That's what this bill does. Now what you're saying is, with tuition costs going up 40 percent, health insurance going up $100 a year, and energy costs going up $3,200 a year, that the solution to that problem and every other problem we have in the country right now is a .5 percent cut that would put additional burdens on families who are trying to send their kids to school, would reduce the money that we're making into making our citizens healthier and community health clinics so that at the end of the day would allow us to prevent people from ending up in the emergency room and costing us billions and billions of dollars more. These are good investments, voted on in a bipartisan way, and will secure the strength of our country in the future.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Madam Chairman, we believe we do have a fringe four or five here in the Congress. And it's not, when the gentleman refers to me or the gentleman from New York or the chairman, you're talking about a bill that passed out of the committee with unanimous support from Democrats and Republicans. You will see on the floor it will pass with Democrat and Republican votes. This is a bipartisan bill. But we have a fringe group in the House that consistently wants to try to find out and try to figure out how to make things work. And what this bill does is it invests in our future. And the bottom line is this. We're now competing with 1.3 billion people in China, 1.2 billion people in India, competitive global economy. And over the last few years, we've seen for the average American people, and the gentleman from Georgia said, well, we want people to keep more of their own money. So do we. But they haven't been over the past few years. There's been a $3,200 increase in their energy costs, a $1,200 increase in their health insurance, a 40 percent increase in college tuition. Wages for college grads in the last 4 or 5 years is down 5.2 percent. Gas prices, the fastest growing part of the budget has been the interest payments on the debt. But our bill addresses middle class family wages, down $1,669 over the past 2 years. So the American people have not been able to keep more of their own money. And so our agenda, through this bill and other bills that we have passed addressed that issue. How do you reduce the cost of energy? You make investments in research and development, and that will yield us benefits down the line. How do you help families send their kids to schools? You invest money into the Pell Grant. You cut student loan interest rates in half. And the difference really has been with the student loan interest rates, we're not spending any more money. What we're saying is that money is not going to go to the banks. That money is going to go to the kids and the students, and we're going to cut the student loan interest rates in half and increase the Pell Grant. We have money in here for our community health centers, so kids can get preventative care, so they end up they can get treated for a cold, instead of ending up in the emergency room for a much higher price to the taxpayer. So we're making significant investments. And this bill will help secure a strong future for the United States of America. We need to get more kids in college. We need to invest in foreign languages. That's what this bill does. And I'm proud of this bill, on a bipartisan basis. And I think it's important for the people, Madam Chairman, who are listening as this goes into the Congressional Record. What do they want? They want an investment in their future, and that's what this bill does. It makes that investment to secure our future and make us strong and move us in a new direction.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. You will probably remember, because we were in the State Senate together in Ohio, there was a study done by the University of Akron. It said every dollar that the State of Ohio invested in higher education, they got $2 back in tax money. This is an investment we are going to make, and we are going to yield returns.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. You do believe in Federal spending on education at the local level?

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. I thank the gentleman. Would the gentleman from Georgia yield for a question?

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Chairman, that's twice in the past 2 days that our friend from Georgia has admitted being on the fringe. In response to the claim that I am on the fringe voting for this bill, I would just like to say I joined his colleagues, every Republican on the Labor-H subcommittee from all over, conservative Republicans, in support of this bill. The gentleman from New York; Mr. Regula, the gentleman from Ohio, these are balanced, fair investments. As the gentleman from New York stated, we are not raising taxes. Check, keep your forms from last year, your tax forms, and compare them to next year. There will not be an increase in your taxes. What we are doing is we are not spending the money on the banks, we are spending it on the kids. We are not giving it to the oil companies, we are giving it to the kids for education and health care. It's a difference in priorities. There is not a tax increase in here, and the bottom line is we make investments into the future of our country. I find it offensive and staggering that the minority leader can come here, along with our friends, and talk about leaving the country in better shape than they found it, or that we have that obligation. Three trillion dollars in debt under your watch, Republican House, Republican Senate, Republican White House, $3 trillion. The gentleman from Ohio wasn't here, but this Congress asked the Secretary of the Treasury to raise the debt limit five or six times so they could go out and borrow more money from China, more money from Japan, more money from OPEC countries. So we don't need lectures on how to leave the country better off than we found it.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Would the gentleman yield so I could ask you a question?

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. I was wondering, I will ask it as you are walking, do you believe that the Federal Government has responsibility for any K-12 education programs?

Mr. RYAN of Ohio

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Chairman, I just wanted to make a point here because I think what just happened on this House floor 5 minutes ago was extraordinary. For a member of the Republican Party to get up and defend what has happened here and the investments that we're making I think exposes what's been going on here for the last several months, is that we have a fringe group, Mr. Chairman, of Members of this Congress who consistently get up and try to pin Members against each other, try to find specific programs and somehow expose somebody as somehow being irresponsible. And I think it's extraordinary what happened here, that we have an extreme group in this Congress that consistently tries to divide us when we're trying to get the people's work done. This is the United States of America, and the gentleman from New Jersey benefits from the Federal court system that helps Wall Street thrive. It's the rule of law in this country that is funded by the taxpayer, courts, judges, buildings, the rule of law, and that allows Wall Street to benefit. That allows citizens in New Jersey to earn a good living and to pay taxes. And we have Members from Texas, Mr. Chairman, the great investment that this country has made into that great State, NASA, the universities, Texas has benefited from those investments. Members from the West, where the West wouldn't even exist, we have congressional districts that wouldn't exist if it wasn't for the investment of the Federal Government to build dams. The Colorado River Basin Project--there wouldn't be congressional districts in the West if it wasn't for the Federal investment. We're the United States of America, for God's sake, and let's stop trying to divide each other. Let's recognize that this bill has been supported unanimously from the Appropriations Committee, Democrats and Republicans, and I want to thank the distinguished Member from New York who put so much thought and concern into this bill, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Regula) and gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Hobson), who have consistently tried to make investments and recognize that people in Alaska, kids in Alaska need help, and I'm okay with that. I've never been to Alaska but we have needs. Let's stop trying to divide each other and stop the lectures of fiscal responsibility. The mess we're in is here because of $3 trillion in debt that our friends have borrowed from China and Japan and OPEC countries over the past 6 years; borrowed more money, Mr. Chairman, from foreign interests than every President and Congress before them combined. So enough of the lectures on fiscal responsibility. We're here now. Let's make these investments. Let's compete in a global economy by making these investments. We're competing against 1.3 billion people in China, 1.2 billion people in India. We need to make these investments. We only have 300 million people in this country. They need to be educated. They need to be healthy, and they need to live in a clean environment. That's what this bill does. Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.

Mr. RYAN of Ohio

Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Madam Chairman, I move to strike the last word.