Bernie Sanders

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Chairman, I thank my friend. First, I want to apologize to my friends for forcing them to vote. I have never done this before. It is not my style. I had an amendment at the desk dealing with an issue of deep concern to tens of millions of Americans and, I think, a majority of the Members of this body, and that is to make an important change to the USA PATRIOT Act so that the FBI is not given carte blanche to go into our libraries or our book stores with no probable cause. Now, I understand that there are Members who may disagree with that notion. I would tell my colleagues that we have 129 cosponsors, conservatives, liberals, progressives, and the support of the American Library Association, the American Book Sellers Association. What is disturbing me very much is the possibility that this important issue, and both sides of the issue, will not be allowed to be debated this afternoon in this legislation. Mr. Chairman, I brought forth an amendment which is at the desk. We needed to make, upon advice from the Parliamentarian, some minor modification. I asked the chairman of the committee to give us unanimous consent to make a minor modification so that we could debate both sides of this issue, one of the most important civil liberties problems facing the United States of America, and the chairman refused that courtesy. So let me be very clear. The American people have a right to read without the FBI looking over their shoulder. The American people have a right to have that issue debated on the floor, and I intend, with my colleagues, to do everything I can to make certain that that occurs.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Chairman, I move that the Committee do now rise.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Chairman, I move the Committee do now rise.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Chairman, in terms of the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey), what I would say with regard to his asking us to give notice, I did not have warning. I turned on the television and found this bill on the floor of the House. Nobody gave us warning this bill was coming to the floor of the House. Second of all, this is a legislative body. I know the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Wolf) is a fair man, and if other people have missed their amendments, presumably because this bill has moved so fast, maybe we should give them a chance to have their amendments discussed and debated. That is what we are supposed to do. This is an enormously important issue. Let us have that debate. Let us have those votes. But I have to tell my colleagues that on an issue of this importance, I am going to be fighting for it, and I am not going to give up. We are going to have a vote on this.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent to have 2 minutes to address the House.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Chairman, the Sanders-Kind amendment would increase funding for the very successful Weatherization Assistance Program by $15 million, from $225 million to $240 million. Even with this $15 million increase that we are proposing, funding for the weatherization program would still be $48 million less than the President's request. We are not sure yet what the offset is, and that is an issue we will be working with the majority on. According to the statement of administration policy that was endorsed by the Office of Management and Budget: ``The administration opposes the $63 million reduction from the President's $288 million request for the Weatherization Assistance Program that assists low-income families with their energy bills while conserving energy for the Nation. The President is committed to increasing funding for this program by $1.4 billion over 10 years.'' I do not often agree with the priorities established by the Bush administration, but on this issue they are absolutely right. One of the absurdities in terms of public policy both for the needs of low-income people and in terms of environmental protection is that we have huge numbers of low-income people throughout this country who are living in homes that are very poorly insulated, where energy is going right through the doors, through the roofs, through the windows, and it is a very sound investment indeed when we improve the weatherization of their homes. Low-income people save substantial sums of money on their limited budgets, and as a Nation concerned about the environment we do not see energy going right up.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Chairman, I want to thank the gentleman from Washington (Mr. Dicks), the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey) and the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Kind); and I thank the majority for their support for this amendment.

Mr. SANDERS. Will the gentleman do his best?

Mr. SANDERS. I yield to the gentleman from North Carolina.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. SANDERS. I yield to the gentleman from Washington.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his leadership on this issue. I think what is very interesting on this issue is that we are finding people from different philosophical perspectives, Republicans, Democrats, Independents, Conservatives, Progressives, Liberals, Moderates, coming together and making one very strong point. And while our analysis may be different, the bottom line that we all agree on is that it is simply unacceptable that the people of the United States year after year are forced to pay by far the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs, many of which are manufactured right here in this country. As the gentleman from Minnesota knows, several years ago I took some of my constituents, and I was the first Member of Congress to do that, and being in Vermont we are right near the Canadian border, so we went from Franklin County, northern Vermont, over the border, and we had with us a number of women who were struggling with breast cancer, a terrible illness. They were able to purchase, and the gentleman has it right in his hands, a widely prescribed breast cancer drug called Tamoxifen. These women could not believe their eyes when they ended up paying one-tenth the price, 10 percent of the price, in Montreal than they were paying in the State of Vermont. Now, my view is that the time is long overdue for the Members of the United States Congress, Republicans, Democrats, Independents, to stand up to what I believe is the most powerful lobby in the history of our country. The pharmaceutical industry has spent hundreds of millions of dollars fighting every effort here in Congress. No matter what the idea is, they have fought it. My understanding now, and my colleague can correct me if I am wrong, is that they are running ads all over the country against the concept of reimportation. They are lying about people's political beliefs. They are putting up and funding phony front organizations to represent their interests. And the point to be made, in my view, is that it is absurd that year after year, when the pharmaceutical industry leads all other industries in the profits that they make, when they have enough money to pay their CEOs exorbitant compensation packages, when they have enough money to have over 600 paid lobbyists, and, my friends, there are only 435 Members of the House, yet they have 600 lobbyists, former leaders of the Republican Party, former leaders of the Democratic Party, they are besieging the institution, that we cannot walk the hallways without bumping into a representative of the pharmaceutical industry telling Members of Congress, please, do everything you can to make sure that Americans continue to pay the highest prices in the world. The last point I would make, and my friend from Michigan touched on this issue, I happen not to be an advocate of free trade. I think free trade in the last number of years has been a disaster for American workers, et cetera. But for all of those people in Congress, a majority of people, who think that it is okay to bring in products from China, to bring in vegetables from Mexico and Latin America, to bring in beef and pork bellies from Canada, if all of that is okay, how come we cannot bring FDA safety-regulated prescription drugs from Canada, which has a regulatory system quite as strong as the FDA? I would love our colleagues to tell me that answer.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Speaker, common sense would dictate, is it not far more difficult to regulate the vegetables or the beef or pork that are raised on farms and ranches, what pesticides are they using, who knows, it is very difficult to regulate, but it is okay to import that product into the United States. But when you have prescription drugs manufactured in the United States and approved by the FDA, sent to Canada, approved by their regulatory system, all of a sudden we cannot regulate it. On the surface it is absurd and laughable, and anyone who makes that case should be laughed out of this institution.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Speaker, I am pro-choice. I am proud of it. I have always been, and I will always be. But for the pharmaceutical industry to lie about the pro-life people just shows the desperateness as to where they are. What they are nervous about and what this Special Order is about is people from different political parties coming together on behalf of the American people and saying, enough is enough, pharmaceutical industry, you cannot rip the American people off. I think we have them on the run, and if we keep our fiber and keep working together, we will win this effort. I want to thank the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Gutknecht) for his leadership efforts on this issue.

Mr. SANDERS. That is amazing.

Mr. SANDERS. The gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Burton) and I did a study. We requested of the CRS to take a look at the Canadian prescription drug regulatory system. We are not dealing with some Third World in Canada. What the CRS told us is that the Canadian prescription drug regulatory system almost always is equivalent to the FDA in the United States, which makes the argument that the drugs coming in would be unsafe totally ridiculous.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Gutknecht) and the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Hoekstra). There is no question that there are people in this country who are literally dying or suffering because they cannot afford the high prices that they are forced to pay in this country. It is not acceptable that an industry which is so wealthy and so profitable can continue to force Americans to suffer in that way. It excites me that we are coming together regardless of philosophy or party to say enough is enough. I look forward to that vote. I think we have them on the run, and I think the literature that the gentleman showed is just an indication of how desperate and panicky they must be. I would say to the American people it is a sad state of affairs when an industry has to stoop to that level. I think Congress has caught up to them, and I think we are finally going to represent effectively the American people on this issue.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. Mr. Chairman, let us think for a moment about what our great Nation can be and then think at the same time about the direction in which we are going. And this legislation, this appropriations bill reflects the fact that we are moving in a very bad direction. The reality is that in our great Nation, we have the capability of providing a decent life for all of our people. The middle class should be expanding, not declining. Poverty should be going down, not increasing. Unemployment should be going down, not up. We should be taking care of the most vulnerable people in our country, the elderly, the sick, the children, not seeing them exposed more and more to the dangers that impact upon their lives. We should be asking the wealthiest people in this country to help make our entire Nation great, not provide trillions of dollars in tax breaks for people who do not need it. That is what the United States of America is about. That is where we should be going, a good life for all of our people, not extraordinary wealth for a few, the decline of the middle class and an increase in poverty. In terms of our elderly, think about what millions of elderly people are trying to do today, as we speak, in an attempt to survive on Social Security. They are trying to figure out how can they afford to pay the outrageously high cost of prescription drugs which the pharmaceutical industry imposes on us. They are thinking about in the cold weather, States like Vermont, how can they heat their homes when oil prices go up and they have inadequate sums of money. They are thinking about what happens to their family if they need home health care, if they need a nursing home. They are thinking about the pleasures that they receive, few as they may be, when they are getting Meals on Wheels delivery to their homes. These are frail people who cannot leave their homes, who every day have someone knock on the door giving them sustenance. These are people who once or twice a week go to a congregate meal program which gets them outside of the home, which enables them to socialize with their friends, which enables them to see a social worker which adds years to their lives. And then think about what this bill does and what the right wing Republican agenda is all about. What the agenda is about is to defund the basic programs in this country that protect the littlest children and the oldest people, that provide people with a basic minimal standard of living. We have got to defeat this legislation, cut back on these huge tax breaks, and make sure that all Americans get the kind of help that they need.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Speaker, I am not really a Blue Dog. Mr. Speaker, the Republican proposal ignores the most important prescription drug issue facing our country: cost containment and the need to end the national disgrace by which our citizens are forced to pay, by far, the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs. If we do not pass this motion to recommit, the pharmaceutical industry will have succeeded in keeping prices high and their profits high. This motion to recommit removes the poison pill in H.R. 1, the so- called Cochran amendment, and establishes a real prescription drug reimportation program with Canada. This provision alone, without costing the taxpayers one penny, will do more to help seniors and all Americans get affordable drugs than the $400 billion being spent by the Republicans.