Bernie Sanders

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Chairman, the gentleman makes, I think, the key point in this whole debate. If we want a volunteer program, let us develop a volunteer program. But a volunteer program says, we would like you to volunteer. And we create the circumstances. That is a good idea. If we want people to work, we have got to pay them. I would hope that my Republican friends, who have talked about the virtue of work and how people's self-enhancement and self-esteem goes up with work, would understand that when most people work they expect a paycheck. I look forward to an amendment from my Republican friends that says, when we get people to work, we are going to pay them so their kids can see them earning a paycheck.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Chairman, I want to congratulate the gentleman from Massachusetts [Mr. Kennedy] for his leadership in this area. Let me just make a few brief points. No. 1, at a time when this U.S. Congress provides $125 billion a year in corporate welfare tax breaks and subsidies to large multinational corporations who do not need them, at a time when we are spending billions on B-2 bombers that we do not need, at a time in which we are giving huge tax breaks to the richest people in America who do not need them, I am not impressed by a policy which over the last 4 years has cut back on public housing by 25 percent. We seem to always have funds available to help the wealthy and corporate America, but when it comes to the need of working people and low-income people, suddenly it is on their backs that we are asked to balance the budget. The economic facts are very clear. Just the other day we read in the papers that the CEO's of major corporations now make 207 times what their workers make, while the new jobs that are being created are low- wage jobs keeping people in poverty after 40 hours of work. In my State of Vermont and throughout the country there are millions of people who are working 40 hours a week, and then they are being asked to pay 40, 50, 60 percent of their limited incomes for housing. There is a housing crisis in this country, and the way to solve the housing crisis is not to cut back on funding and not build more affordable housing. Now my friends here say on the Republican side we do not want to warehouse people. OK, do not warehouse them. Then why do they cut back on section 8 funding so that we can spread people out throughout the community? There are many types of models for affordable housing other than public housing projects, but they do not support those. So those are just words; that is not reality. Now in terms of public housing we hear these horror stories, and I really think that that is not a nice thing to say. Sure there are problems, some serious problems within the projects, but to give grotesque examples of what one family does is to cast aspersions on all of the people who live in public housing. So let me tell my colleagues I was mayor of the city of Burlington. We have public housing, and it serves its purpose well. It provides safe, affordable, clean housing for hundreds and hundreds of people, and it helps people. It allows them to get a footing in their lives. I resent the fact that we talk about horror stories from public housing. Do my colleagues know what? Rich people kill their kids, too. It is not just poor people. Furthermore, in terms of this work requirement, one of the points that was made during the discussion in committee was that we have a home interest mortgage deduction which allows multi-multimillionaires to deduct the interest up to a million dollars on the mansions, on the fancy houses that they are living in. So we have a public policy which provides a tax break for multimillionaires who own mansions. Now that is an interesting housing policy when at exactly the same time we are cutting back on housing for working people and poor people, and I think the suggestion was made that if we got to have a work requirement for poor people who get a subsidy, what about the millionaires who get a subsidy?

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. If I can interrupt for a moment, it is not a question of is it happening. It is happening. Let us not be naive about this. What is going on now is the standard of living of the average American worker is in serious decline. The gap between the rich and the poor is growing wider. The control of the political parties is growing sharper by the very wealthy. Ultimately, I think as a nation, we have to ask ourselves how much is enough? When does it end? How much do they want: 209 times more than the workers, 500 times more than their workers? Will we hear a movement here to bring back slavery? When does it end? We have people in this country, in my State, that are not working one job, they are working two jobs and three jobs, as the gentleman from Michigan said. I have met a husband and wife who hardly ever see each other. They are both working three part-time jobs. When does it end? This is a wealthy country. This is a great country. But we need policy so that we redevelop our manufacturing sector; we create decent paying jobs in this country. With all of the new technology, the working hours should go down, should they not? With all these new machines, people should be producing more.

Mr. SANDERS. I thank the gentleman very much for yielding, and it is a pleasure to work with my colleague who has helped lead the anti-NAFTA effort for many years and has demanded a sensible trade policy which represents the needs of workers, as well as corporate America. It is nice to be here with the gentleman from Ohio, [Mr. Kucinich], who is also joining that fight in a very strong way. I remember some 4 years ago the gentleman from Michigan, [Mr. Bonior] came to the State of Vermont and addressed a rally in Montpelier in Vermont, where we had 300 or 400 Vermonters who were out protesting NAFTA; and the sad truth is that much of what he and I said on that day, much of what he and I predicted would happen has in fact occurred. NAFTA is part of a disastrous trade policy, which is resulting in record-breaking trade deficits, which is costing us millions of decent- paying jobs. I wish very, very much, as important as the national deficit is, that the Congress would pay half as much attention to the trade deficit, which is costing us millions of jobs and which is lowering the wages of workers from one end of this country to the other. The essence of our current disastrous trade policy is not very hard to comprehend. You do not have to have a Ph.D. in economics to understand that it is impossible and wrong for American workers to be competing against very desperate people in Mexico and other parts of the world, who, because of the economic conditions in their own country, are forced to work for 50 cents an hour or 70 cents an hour. One of the interesting developments in recent weeks, I do not know if my colleague has seen it, is the front page of Business Week. Their cover story reported that CEOs last year earned 54 percent more than the preceding year. In other words, the compensation for CEOs in this country of the major corporations went up by 54 percent, while workers are struggling with 2 or 3 percent increases in their incomes. Now, these very same people who are now averaging over $5 million a year are precisely the same people who told us how great the NAFTA would be. Well, I suppose that they are right. NAFTA has been very good for them, but it has been a disaster for the average American worker. What we know is not only that hundreds of thousands of decent-paying jobs have disappeared from this country, as corporation after corporation has said, why should I pay an American worker $10, $15, $20 an hour when I can get a desperate person in Mexico to work for 50 cents an hour or a dollar an hour. Not only have they done that, but in addition to that, they are moving jobs all over the world. I was interested in this last week to read, if it were not so sad, it really would be funny, where Nike, which seems to have the inclination to move to that country in the world which is now paying the lowest wages, they have now gravitated to Vietnam. And my colleagues may have seen in the paper that in Vietnam there is now a demonstration that they are paying below what they even promised the Vietnamese workers, which I would imagine is 20 cents or so an hour. So what we are seeing is these corporations who used to hire American workers at decent wages are now running to Mexico, to other Latin American countries, they are going to China, they are going to Vietnam, where they are hiring people for abysmally low wages. And that is part of our current trade policy. I think I speak for the vast majority of the people in this country who say that what we have got to have is a fair trade policy which represents the interest of the vast majority of our people and not just corporate America, rather than a so-called free trade policy, which forces American workers to compete against desperate people throughout the entire world. Mr. Speaker, one of the issues that concerns me terribly much is that every day that I turn on the television and I listen to the radio and I read the newspapers, I keep hearing about how great the economy is. I am sure the economy must be great for somebody, but it is not great for the vast majority of the people in my own State of Vermont. The fact of the matter is that while the wealthiest people in this country are doing phenomenally well, while CEOs now earn over 200 times what their workers earn, the middle class continues to shrink and most of the new jobs that are being created are low-wage jobs, many of them part time, many of them temporary, many of them without benefits.

Mr. SANDERS. I sure would.

Mr. SANDERS. Let me just say a few words and then I am going to yield to the gentleman from Ohio, [Mr. Kucinich]. As the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Bonior] knows, 23 years ago the United States led the world in terms of the wages and benefits our workers received. Today, as a result of a number of factors, not least of which is our absurd trade policy, we are now in 13th place as a result in terms of wages and benefits. The fact of the matter is that the average American today is working longer hours for lower wages and they need that extra time in order to compensate for the decline in their income. Clearly, there is something very wrong when from one end of this country to the other, we are seeing the loss of good paying manufacturing jobs and the substitution of those jobs in the service industry which pays people $6 an hour, $7 an hour, and often does not have benefits. So I think that probably the most important issue that this Congress should be debating is to demand in one way or another, and I have some thoughts on it, you and Mr. Kucinich have thoughts on it, in one way or another we have got to tell corporate America who have made their money in this country that they have got to begin reinvesting in Vermont, in Michigan, in Ohio, back into the United States of America, put people to work at decent wages, rather than running all over the world to hire desperately poor people at starvation wages. I am happy to yield to the gentleman from Ohio [Mr. Kucinich].

Mr. SANDERS. And working less. Yet what is happening? Just the opposite is happening. And what is the end result? The end result is corporate profits soar, CEO salaries soar, and distribution of wealth becomes more and more unfair.

Mr. SANDERS. Let me just pick up on the gentleman's point, and that is essentially, if you have desperate people in Mexico who are making 50 cents an hour, who are living in shacks, whose kids may be begging out on the street, who are forced to work under the most horrendous conditions imaginable, what corporate America is saying is hey, if we can get people to work in those conditions over there, we can drive wages and working conditions down here, because what we say to the American worker is, hey, if you do not like what you are getting today, we are going to go over there. I just got a letter today from a corporate entity in the State of Vermont who told us about how high the wages are in Vermont, he could go elsewhere and so forth and so on. So I think it is not only a labor issue, it is an environmental issue, it is a union issue, and that is what our entire trade policy is about. It is the race to the bottom, it is saying to American workers, there are people in China, Mexico, throughout the world who are prepared to work for almost nothing, and we are going to lower your wages and lower your working conditions, lower the environmental standards that you work under, lower and lower and lower. Not raise the other people's, but lower ours until we have an equalized work force around the world. A very, very dangerous trend, which as the gentleman indicated, is wiping out the middle class and creating pathetically low-wage jobs.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Speaker, let me pick up on that point, if I could. Let us examine that point for a second. In terms of distribution of wealth in America, you have the richest 1 percent now owning 42 percent of the wealth, which is more than the bottom 90 percent. One of the problems that all of us have is in dealing with the media. In terms of getting information out to people, one of the reasons that half the people in America no longer bother to vote is they are not getting information that is relevant to their lives. Who owns the media? When we talk about NAFTA, I remember this very clearly, it was quite unbelievable, poll after poll showed that the country was pretty evenly divided. Some were for NAFTA; some were anti-NAFTA. We went through every single major newspaper in the United States of America, every single one of them. Were they evenly divided? Were they two-to-one pro-NAFTA? Every single one of them was pro-NAFTA, as was virtually every corporation in America. So you see who owns the media, we are seeing in terms of contributions to both political parties. Not an accident that you have this trade policy. This is a trade policy that works well for corporate America. It hurts the working people. Where does the money come from to fund the parties? It comes from the wealthy people. And we see the results of that in terms of our trade policy. In almost every aspect of our lives we are seeing a greater and greater concentration of wealth and power. And in many ways I must say this country is beginning to look more like an oligarchy than it is like a democracy.

Mr. SANDERS. By far.

Mr. SANDERS. I thank the gentleman for organizing this special order. We are fighting for our lives, we are fighting for our parents, we are fighting for our kids, and I would hope the American people would get actively involved in this struggle.

Mr. SANDERS. That is why we have to repeal those pieces of legislation.

Mr. SANDERS. People are scared to death precisely because of what the gentleman is saying. Because if they stand up for their rights, their company is going to say, we do not need you anymore. We are going to Mexico; we are going to China. Ultimately I think, after all of this discussion, after all of what is said and done, it seems to me our challenge is a very simple one. It is to tell corporate America that they no longer have the right to run all over the world and throw American workers out on the street and then be able to bring their products back into this country duty free. You do not have to be a genius to know that you would make a lot more money paying a Mexican kid or a Chinese young lady 20 or 30 cents an hour than paying an American worker a living wage. And the problem is, we have allowed them to do that. We have allowed them to run all over the world. And the end result is what the chart of the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Bonior] tells us, corporate profits are soaring. The end result is what Business Week told us two weeks ago, that the top CEO's in this country saw an increase in their compensation last year of 54 percent, and they now earn 209 times what the average American worker earns. I had not realized that one person is worth 209 times more than another person, that their children are worth 209 times more than the children of a worker. It is obscene. It is wrong.

Mr. SANDERS. I think, picking up on the point of the gentleman from Ohio [Mr. Kucinich], that the truth of the matter is the average American worker is scared to death.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Speaker, enclosed is a copy of a speech by Micah Genzlinger, a senior at South Burlington High School in Vermont. Micah is the Vermont winner of the VFW's Voice of Democracy broadcast scriptwriting contest. His speech reflects a passion for democracy of which I am proud. I am inserting his speech in the Congressional Record as I believe it will benefit my colleagues. Democracy--Above and Beyond (By Micah Genzlinger) If I may, I would like to briefly tell you a little about my life. When I was born, my parents had the freedom to give me any name they wanted. They had the freedom to teach me what they thought was important. They had the freedom to show me what they thought I should see. They had the freedom to choose what kind of school I should attend. The freedom to bring me up in a family where they see the values, shared their belief in God, and taught what they considered right and wrong. As the decisions became mine, I could choose who I was friends with, what types of music to listen to, what kinds of clothes to wear, what sports to participate in, and many other things. Soon I will be making bigger decisions: who to vote for in the elections, what college to attend, what I should do with the rest of my life, what religion I should study, and more. I am even free to disagree with what my parents taught me. You may wonder why I told you about my life. Well, I did it for one reason only, to show you how good we have it in a democracy. Some don't believe we are any better off, but only in a democracy do you have the freedom to say what is on your mind and to express your inner-self without fear of punishment from the government. We have the freedom to choose our jobs and to choose what cities to live in. We also have the freedom to decide how we are going to live; whether that be in an apartment or in a house. Some say the government is holding us down. I ask those people to look around the world. To look at the countries that decide what its youth will do with their lives without having any say, or look at the countries that kill people for speaking out against the government. Look at countries that limit the number of children a single family can have. Then try to tell me that we are worse off living in a democracy. I think my generation has become used to the fact that we have so much freedom and does not understand the true value of our democracy. When I watch the news on television I see the scenes from Bosnia or the Middle East, I am reminded that we have a very special freedom. When I look back in history at the walls constructed in Germany, I can't even imagine what it was like living in fear of being jailed for doing nothing wrong, or not even being able to see any of my family members because they were on the other side of the wall. Most of all I can't even imagine what it would be like not being free. Our country is not perfect. We have poverty, unemployment, crime and many other problems. But we have the most important things: a democratic country that allows us to make our own decisions, to live the way we want to live, to work at the job we want to do, to raise as many children as we feel we should have, and so much more. But most of all we can be free.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to discuss a terribly important topic: Domestic violence, and insurance companies' discrimination against women who are victims of domestic violence. We do not know exactly how many women are domestic violence victims each year because the numbers are significantly underreported. An estimated 4 million American women are physically abused by their husbands or boyfriends each year, and 42 percent of women murdered in this country are murdered by their boyfriends or husbands. I think we can all agree that the level of domestic violence in this country is a silent outrage, and it is absolutely unacceptable. That is why we must do everything we can to combat domestic violence. Further, it is why we can and we must prevent profiteering insurance companies from adding insult to injury by economically victimizing women who have already been physically abused. They are reacting to battered women by battering them again. We know that insurers have used domestic violence as a basis for determining who to cover and how much to charge with respect to health, life, disability, homeowners, and auto insurance. A 1993 informal survey by the House Judiciary Committee found that 8 of the 16 largest insurers in the country use domestic violence as a criterion in determining whether to issue insurance and how much to charge for it. State surveys in Pennsylvania and Kansas both found that 24 percent of responding insurance companies admit to such discrimination, and I know of two cases in Vermont. Insurance companies give a variety of reasons for denying victims coverage or for charging higher premiums. Some insurers say domestic violence is a lifestyle choice, like skydiving or smoking. That is absurd. We know that domestic violence is not a choice, but a crime. Victims do not choose to live with their batterers, but are often forced to do so for economic and safety reasons. When a victim tries to leave her abuser, her life is often at great risk. When insurance companies deny, drop, or charge more for coverage of victims of domestic violence, it has very serious consequences. It means that someone who already has reason to fear for her life has one more major reason to fear telling someone, and to avoid getting help. This insidious insurance practice sends exactly the wrong message. We should be doing all we can to ensure victims of abuse seek help and get away from their batters. Instead, insurance companies are telling women they must not only fear physical retribution from their abuser, but also economic retribution from their insurer. If a woman tries to get help, she must fear losing access to health care for herself and her family or insurance that provides for her family in case of death or disability. Battered women's shelters must also fear losing their insurance, as we have seen in my State of Vermont. Insurance companies are effectively tearing down all the work that has been done over the last 20 years in creating safe havens and assistance for victims of domestic violence. I am pleased to report that we had some success on this issue last year, when an amendment Congresswoman Morella, other Members, and I wrote for the Kennedy-Kassebaum health insurance reform bill became law. That amendment will ensure that victims of abuse will not be denied insurance in the group health insurance market. However, we still must prevent insurance companies from overcharging women because they are victims of abuse, and we must work to end this discrimination in all lines of insurance, not just health. Today, we introduce legislation to protect victims of abuse across this country from being singled out as uninsurable. Our bill, the Victims of Abuse Insurance Protection Act, prohibits all lines of insurance carriers--including health, life, property, auto, and disability--from using domestic violence in determining whom to cover and how much to charge for coverage. It has been endorsed by the American Bar Association, the American Civil Liberties Union Women's Rights Project, the Center for Patient Advocacy, the NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund, the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, Women's Action for New Directions [WAND], and the Women's Law Project.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to introduce the Electronic Fund Transfer Fees Act of 1997. This legislation addresses the growing practice of automated teller machine [ATM] operators assessing a surcharge on consumers who use their machines. Specifically, my bill prohibits an ATM operator from imposing an additional surcharge on customers for accessing their bank accounts through the operator's ATM. On April 1, 1996, the national communication networks for ATM's-- Cirrus and Plus--terminated their policy which prohibited ATM owners from surcharging consumers for using their machines. As a result of this policy change, customers may now be charged twice for accessing funds from the customer's own bank account if the customer uses an ATM which is not owned by the bank; the first fee is charged by the customer's bank for using a nonbank ATM and the second fee is charged by the ATM operator. At the time of this policy change, experts estimated that within the first 18 months, 80 percent of ATM owners would impose a surcharge. In actuality only 6 months after the policy change 71 percent of ATM owners were assessing surcharges in North Carolina, 69 percent in Arizona, 60 percent in Virginia, and 48 percent in Maryland. While the nationwide figure has only reached 23 percent a recent study of banking practices in Texas indicates that the percentage will continue to grow; Texas' largest 10 banks have been allowed to surcharge since 1987 and all 10 banks now assess a surcharge for noncustomer ATM withdrawals. In practice, banks enjoy tremendous savings by conducting consumer transactions through ATM's because ATM transactions are less costly to a bank then teller transactions. An ATM withdrawal on a nonowned machine may cost a large bank between $.50 and $.60. By contrast, a teller transaction with a customer costs the large bank between $.90 and $1.15. A study by the Consumer Finance Project indicates that in 1995, banks avoided 2.6 billion teller transactions because consumers used ATM's. Because the banks are actually saving money by using ATM's, consumer groups view it as extremely unfair to charge a consumer multiple fees for withdrawing his/her own funds through ATM's. Consumer groups such as U.S. Public Interest Research Group [US PIRG] and the Consumer Federation of America support this legislation. Mr. Speaker, it is now typical in many parts of the country for a consumer to be charged between $1.50 and $2.50 just to access money on the consumer's own accounts. Whatever costs may be incurred by a bank when a customer uses a nonbank ATM, banks do manage to recover; on average, customers pay $1.18 to their bank for the convenience of using ATM's which are not owned by the bank. I am especially concerned because, unlike the banks that hold our accounts, the machine owner has no incentive to keep his/her fees reasonable because no relationship exists between the ATM owner and the customer. As such, the more remote the ATM machine, the less incentive for reasonable fees, and the more captive the bank customer. Mr. Speaker, at a time when banks are making record profits and one- third of those profits--tens of billions of dollars a year--come from fees, it is outrageous that these same banks and other ATM owners are charging consumers even more to access the consumers' money. We must eliminate these additional surcharges and help protect the consumer from another needless expense.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Speaker, yesterday Congresswoman Connie Morella and I announced a major breakthrough in the campaign that we initiated to get big-name sports stars and coaches to speak out in the national media against domestic violence in America. More specifically, last January Representative Morella and I first wrote directly to the commissioners and other top officials of our Nation's major professional and amateur sports leagues. We urged them in the strongest terms possible to join with us and commit to work together to fashion a multi-faceted strategy to prevent domestic violence, including counseling, strong disciplinary action when warranted, and a high-profile public education and advertising campaign against domestic violence. (A copy of our original letter is reproduced below.) Next we held extensive discussions with leaders of the sports industry to determine how best to enlist the voices of star athletes, as role models of profound national influence, in speaking out against domestic violence. Then in July we introduced our legislation (House Concurrent Resolution 199) calling for national summit of sports, political, and community leaders to promote nonviolence through sports, starting with a sustained nationwide campaign against domestic violence and sexual assault. We are making progress because more and more Americans are willing to stand up and speak out against domestic violence as a crime. For example, starting next week an on-going series of public service advertisements, featuring football stars from the professional and collegiate ranks, will begin broadcast on television stations across the country. On this coming Monday--September 30, 1996--there will be an antidomestic violence public service announcement broadcast in prime time during the ``ABC Monday Night Football'' nationally-televised game between the Dallas Cowboys and the Philadelphia Eagles. I want to applaud the officials of the National Football League and stars like Steve Atwater of the Denver Broncos who have made possible this series of public service announcements to help us in our efforts to prevent domestic violence. At the same time, I am very pleased to announce that starting next month viewers of televised college football games will see for the first time many of our Nation's college football stars speaking out against domestic violence. I especially want to salute the outstanding players coaches, and officials of the College Football Association [CFA] for filming these ads as well a the generous sponsors of the Liz Claiborne Foundation for financing this trail-blazing antidomestic violence campaign as well as the scholars at the Northeastern University's Center for the Study of Sport in Society for helping craft the message. (The text of one of these unprecedented television spots to be broadcast is reproduced below as well.) These ads will provide a powerful start in October to a wide range of activities planned for Domestic Violence Awareness Month. These televised public service advertisements by major athletic associations are a very positive first step in our efforts to recruit sports leaders to lend their voices to the growing campaign to stop domestic violence. I can't think of a better way to deter physical abuse against women and children than to have our Nation's football heroes take to the airwaves to spread a blunt message all across America. Tough guys mix it up on the field, but they won't beat up on their wives, girlfriends and kids. At the same time, we will press ahead with our plans to convene during the next year the first-ever national summit on sports and non- violence. Already scores of health, athletic and antiviolence groups have endorsed our legislation and joined the call for defining a prominent role for our Nation's sports industry and athletic heroes to help lead the campaign against domestic violence. U.S. House of Representatives, Washington, DC, January 24, 1996. Mr. Paul Tagliabue, Commissioner, National Football League, New York, NY Dear Commissioner Tagliabue. We are in receipt of the January 17th letter from Mr. Harold R. Henderson, Executive Vice President for Labor Relations and Chairman of the National Football League (NFL) Management Council. First, we want to salute the outstanding work of the NFL across many decades in supporting so many charities and community-building activities throughout our nation. In addition, the players and coaches of the NFL, as role models of profound national influence, have already helped for many years to positively shape the lives of countless young Americans. It is the NFL's record of civic responsibility to which we want to appeal. Specifically, we are writing to ask in the strongest terms that the NFL join with us and commit to work together to fashion a multi-faceted strategy to deter domestic violence, including counseling, strong disciplinary action when warranted, and a high-profile public education and advertising campaign against domestic violence. It is commendable that the NFL has taken decisive action and instituted disciplinary policies on both drug and alcohol abuse as well as unabolic steroid and related substance abuse. But we believe the time has come for the NFL to step forward, as you are accustomed to do, and assume a leading role in deterring domestic violence among current and future NFL personnel in particular and the general public as well. A startling investigation by The Washington Post revealed that between the January 1, 1989 incident that led to O.J. Simpson pleading no contest and former pro football players and collegiate football athletes were reported to police for 156 alleged offenses of violent behavior toward women. Surprisingly, at the time of that review, 43 of the men accused of domestic violence were active players on NFL team rosters. In fact, to the best of our knowledge, only one NFL player has ever been disciplined for a gender-related offense: former Philadelphia Eagle tackle Kevin Allen, who was denied re-entry after serving a 33-month prison term for rape. There is good reason to suspect that domestic violence is even more prevalent among NFL players than these statistics indicate. The Post's review did not uncover all accusations against current and former football players. Many rape and sexual assaults are never reported to police, while additional charges often are kept confidential for preferential reasons. Since 1990, multiple studies have shown that there is a significantly higher prevalence of domestic violence among football players than among the general population. For instance in one study that was published last year by researchers at Northeastern University and the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, it was determined that male student-athletes comprised 3.3% of the total population at 10 large universities in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). But this same group of student athletes represented 19% of the men reported to campus officials for sexual assault from 1991 to 1993. Our concern is corroborated by Don Sabo, a social science professor and co-author of ``Sex, Violence and Power in Sports: Rethinking Masculinity.'' He has studied behavioral patterns, while asking ``are athletes more likely than non- athletes to engage in sexual abuse? His conclusion: ``Yes, I believe we are discovering a cultural pattern in sports that has been hidden for too long by silence.'' For far too long a pointless, circular debate has raged over whether the high incidence of domestic violence among professional and collegiate football players is a sports problem or a societal problem. Clearly, it is both. Regardless of how thoroughly we can quantify that athletes commit violence against women at a rate greater than the average population, common sense and repeated tragic examples involving professional football players cry out for coordinated non-governmental and legislative action. Surely you recognize the enormous influence that big-time football players at the professional and collegiate levels, as role models, have upon our society. Many men identify with NFL players and look on them as both heroes and role models to be emulated on and off the field. Undoubtedly when instances of domestic violence receive little more than a slap on the wrist in courts and go unpunished by the NFL, as was the case after Minnesota Vikings quarterback Warren Moon reportedly assaulted his wife last summer, that sends an insidious and harmful message to many Americans. Unfortunately, the current message being sent seems to be that domestic violence is not to be taken too seriously and that it is not the indefensible and serious crime that it is. This destructive message may have been reinforced by the recent handling of the case of Lawrence Phillips, star running back of the national champion Nebraska Cornhuskers football team. After admitting to a physical attack on his girlfriend last year, Phillips sat out a few games, but was reinstated in time to play in the Fiesta Bowl. Then he was actively encouraged by his college football coach, Tom Osborne, to leave the University of Nebraska early in favor of playing in the NFL, thus minimizing any further public criticism about domestic violence. Apparently the lesson to be drawn from this case is that if you are a good enough football player, you can attack your girlfriend, still play in the big game, leave college early, and pursue an unblemished professional career, essentially free of nagging questions about how you treat your women off the playing field. Finally, we are also troubled by public comments of the NFL's Communications Director, Greg Aiello, to the effect that unless domestic violence affects the business of football, then the NFL should be reticent about taking disciplinary action against professional football players who are charged with domestic violence for fear of possible legal action. That sounds like a short-sighted rationalization to justify the NFL continuing to ignore domestic violence in its own ranks. When an NFL player is suspected of drug abuse, doesn't the NFL get involved out of consideration for the individual concerned and the public reputation of the NFL regardless of whether the player in question is criminally charged? Furthermore, even measured by that self-interested, commercial standard, the NFL and NCAA could have been expected reasonably to have taken coordinated action already to counteract the scourge of domestic violence among football players. Consider the pending case in Virginia where a woman is suing Virginia Tech University over an alleged sexual assault by two college football players and is seeking $8.3 million in damages, the same amount the team is estimated to have earned for that university by its appearance in the 1996 Sugar Bowl. Clearly taking forceful action against domestic violence makes sound business sense for the NFL and the NCAA. In the final analysis, it is not our purpose to single out professional and collegiate football players for special punishment for incidents of domestic violence against their wives or girlfriends, although they certainly should not receive preferential treatment because of their celebrity status in the entertainment world. Instead, we are appealing to you to make it a top priority to see to it that the men who are privileged to play professional football, as role models, help to publicly condemn domestic violence as a serious crime and do not sluff it off. Not a week goes by during the NFL season without tens of millions of viewers seeing televised public service announcements by star football players featured in community service and saluting the work of the United Way and other worthy causes. Imagine the public service that would be rendered if the NFL, starting this Super Bowl Sunday, was to sponsor advertisements in which NFL stars help to spread the word that real men don't beat up women and domestic violence is inexcusable. We look forward to working with you to find constructive ways that we can team up with the NFL to wage an effective national campaign against domestic violence wherever it occurs. Sincerely yours, Constance A. Morella, Member of Congress. Bernard Sanders, Member of Congress.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased today to join with Representative Rosa DeLauro in introducing ``The Breast Cancer Patient Protection Act of 1996'' to require insurers to pay for a minimum 2-day hospital stay for a mastectomy and a 1-day stay for a lymph node removal, unless the doctor and patient decide less time is appropriate. The legislation responds to a recent trend by insurers who are refusing to pay for an overnight stay for a woman with breast cancer who has had a mastectomy, the surgical removal of a breast, unless the doctor can prove it is ``medically necessary.'' While medical societies have no established guidelines on how long a woman should stay in the hospital following a mastectomy, doctors have argued that women need to stay 1 to 2 nights after such surgery. Surgeons have told me that the large majority of women would not do well going home the same day after such a surgery. It is unbelievable to me that the insurance industry is now considering mastectomy an ``outpatient procedure'' and denying women overnight stays. After a mastectomy, a women has a large wound, still-attached drainage tubes and intravenous fluids, and, often times, excessive pain. Overnight stays allow doctors to address many of the problems that can arise in the 12 to 24 hours following surgery and allow women the time to learn how to care for the wound, handle the paint that accompanies such surgery and recover from the emotional trauma that can result from the surgery. Outpatient mastectomies are disturbing new part of a growing trend in the insurance industry to deny care or truncate stays. First they denied insurance to victims of domestic violence, then they sent mothers and their newborn home within hours following a birth and now women with breast cancer are being denied the ability to have a very difficult surgery with some degree of dignity. I have played an active role in ensuring that victims of domestic violence are no longer discriminated against in the health insurance industry and in guaranteeing that mothers and newborns are not sent home before they are ready to go. To that end, I will remain steadfast in my commitment to protect breast cancer patients from premature discharges from the hospital. I am pleased that the National Breast Cancer Coalition has given its support to ``The Breast Cancer Patient Protection Act of 1996.'' I look forward to working together with the Breast Cancer Coalition, surgeons and medical societies to protect safe and appropriate care for cancer survivors. The truth of the matter is that insurance companies are trampling on the sacred doctor-patient relationship and it must stop. The decision about when a woman should leave the hospital after a mastectomy should be made between the doctor and the woman, not by insurance companies bent on profits. Congress must restore the doctor-patient relationship once and for all, and I am doing everything I can to see that that happens. In the meantime, this critical measure will protect thousands of women who confront breast cancer surgery from being forced out of the hospital against their will and against the best advice of their doctor.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Speaker, the U.S. taxpayer is the single largest supporter of biomedical research in the world, spending $33 billion--in 1994 alone--for biomedical and related health research. Yet the taxpayer is not getting a fair return on their investment--paying twice for health care inventions, first as taxpayers and second as consumers. It is incumbent upon the Secretary of Health and Human Services to require a reasonable relationship between the pricing of drugs, the public investment in those drugs, and the health and safety needs of the public. Unfortunately, taxpayer accountability was tossed aside when the Nation's reasonable pricing policy on drugs--which was put in place by the bush administration--was dropped in April 1995. The reasonable pricing clause was dropped after extensive review of the policy, even though the review resulted in no certain recommendations. The rationale for this decision was that ``the pricing clause had driven industry away from potentially beneficial scientific collaborations with the Public Health Service.'' Yet, there was no hard evidence given during the review to show that this was the case--only anecdotal stories by the drug industry. When 42 percent of all U.S. health care research and development expenditures is paid for by the taxpayer, and 92 percent of the cancer drugs developed since 1955 were developed with Federal funding, we owe it to the taxpayer to give them a fair return on their investment with a reasonable price on the drugs they paid to develop. The Health Care Research and Development and Consumer Protection Act reinstates the reasonable pricing clause and gives the Secretary of HHS the authority to waive the clause when it is determined to be in the public interest to do so. In determining a reasonable price for a drug, the Secretary shall consider-- The public interest in continued health care research and development; The contribution of the person marketing such drug to the drug research and development expenses, including the amount, timing, and risk of investment in such research development; The contribution of the Federal Government to the research and development of such drug, including the amount, timing, and risk of investment in such research and development; The therapeutic value of such drugs; The number patients who are expected to purchase drug; The cost of producing and marketing of such drug; The cost of therapies which are similar to the therapy using such drug; and Other relevant factors. In addition to restoring the reasonable pricing clause, this legislation will promote the research and development of new drugs by requiring the Secretary of Health and Human Services to adopt rules which set out minimum levels of reinvestment in research and development for persons engaged in the manufacture of drugs sold in the United States. I urge my colleagues to restore accountability to the U.S. taxpayer and support The Health Care Research and Development and Consumer Protection Act.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to have my name removed as a cosponsor of H.R. 3937.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased that this week the House is considering Monitoring of the Student Right to Know and Campus Security Act of 1990. As you know, the Student Right to Know and Campus Security Act requires colleges in receipt of Federal funding to report to students, faculty and prospective students once a year on the number of crimes reported in a number of categories, including murder; sex offenses, forcible or nonforcible; robbery; aggravated assault; and burglary. This law helps assist students in taking appropriate steps to protect themselves from becoming victims, and it assists families and students in making the most appropriate decisions about the schools they may wish to attend. On February 6, 1996, ABC news reported that at Clemson University 100 students met with the football coach to discuss their safety on the campus following the arrest of the 9th Clemson football player this year. Since January, more than 50 college athletes in 13 States have been charged with assault, theft, trespassing, burglary, sexual assault, and drunk driving. I was pleased to hear the remarks of the chairman of the Economic and Educational Opportunities Committee, Mr. Goodling, expressing his concern over violence among athletes at universities. In his remarks Chairman Goodling appealed to all the presidents of colleges and universities to: Stand tall and be firm against those who would pressure them, be they coaches on the campus or alumni. There is no excuse for some outstanding athlete to go free after battering women or committing rape or breaking laws in relation to alcohol and other drugs. To use the excuse that you are trying to save that individual cannot be used when you are thinking about the other thousands who are there: Mr. Speaker, several months ago, Representative Connie Morella and I wrote to the national sports associations with concern over a growing number of reported acts of violence against women by professional and college athletes. We have since met with representatives of the National Football League, Major League Baseball, the National Basketball Association, the National Hockey League, the National Athletic Association and other major sports associations to discuss our desire to have these organizations join with us in our national effort to eradicate violence against women. This August, Representative Morella and I introduced a sense-of- congress resolution calling for a national summit on sports and nonviolence to help develop a national campaign to eradicate domestic violence. Our legislation addresses three realities of American society: first, that we have an epidemic of domestic violence in this country; second, that America has a fascination with sports, from the Olympics to the Super Bowl to the Final Four; and third, that professional and collegiate athletes are viewed as sports heroes by Americans. Sports leaders, as role models, are often emulated both on and off the field, and we are asking that our national and collegiate sports leaders make it a top priority to help publicly condemn domestic violence and sexual assault and join us in a national awareness campaign. As role models, these sports leaders can send a strong message that the rough and tumble, hard-nosed competition stops when players leave the field and that there is no excuse for domestic violence and sexual assault. I am pleased to report that since the introduction of that resolution we have received letters of support from numerous individuals and organizations, including: American College of Nurse Midwives; American Psychological Association; AYUDA; Larry Brown, Coach, Indiana Pacers; Catholics for a Free Choice; Jacquelyn Campbell, director of doctoral studies, Johns Hopkins School of Nursing; Center for the Study of Sports and Society; Center for Women Policy Studies; Community Anti-Drug Coalitions of America; DC Rape Crisis Center; Domestic Violence Advocacy Project; Joseph Glass, Team Sports; Britt King, head women's basketball coach, University of DC; Lee McElroy, director of athletics, American University; Older Women's League; National Association of Social Workers; National Coalition Against Sexual Assault; New Waves: Empowering Women and Confronting Abuse; NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund; Pennsylvania Coalition Against Rape; Thomas Penders, Head Basketball Coach, University of Texas; Rhode Island Coalition Against Domestic Violence; National Urban League; U.S. Department of Justice; Office of Justice Programs; Vermont Network Against Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault; Women's Research and Education Institute; YWCA of the USA; and the Violence Policy Center. I also want to congratulate the College Football Association, who, in cooperation with the Liz Claiborne Foundation and the Center for the Study of Sport in Society, plans to launch an ``Athletes Against Violence'' program this October, where college football players will break the code of silence about relationship violence and, through a series of public service announcements, convey the message that relationship violence should not be tolerated. The College Football Association is also encouraging coaches to consider inviting their players to participate in the annual Take Back the Night candlelight march conducted on college campuses during the month of October (Domestic Violence Awareness Month). The concept of a National Summit on Sports and Non-Violence initiative is generating a great deal of support and I would encourage my colleagues to join me and Representative Morella in our efforts by cosponsoring House Concurrent Resolution 199.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Speaker, let us be frank. Exxon, Ford, Citibank, and DuPont are profitable multibillion dollar corporations who pay their CEO's millions of dollars in salary. These companies do not need OPIC corporate welfare payments from the taxpayers of this country to provide them with incentives to invest abroad. Incentives to invest abroad. At a time when some Members of this body are proposing huge cuts in Medicare, Medicaid, education, veterans programs, environmental protection, it is totally absurd to increase the amount of corporate welfare that we provide to these huge profitable corporations. Not only is this a bad deal for taxpayers, it is bad economic development and job creation. Many of these same corporations are downsizing, laying off hundreds of thousands of American workers. Our policy should not be to encourage these companies to invest abroad, our policy should be to demand that these companies reinvest in the United States of America, in the State of Vermont, all over this country, and create decent paying jobs here. Let us vote no on this OPIC corporate welfare program.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Speaker, today Congress has the opportunity to put an end to the insidious practice of insurance companies sending moms and babes home before they are ready to go. Hurried discharges after childbirth fly in the face of established medical practice, insult the precious institution of motherhood, and greatly increase the likelihood that newborn babies could suffer irreversible brain damage or require emergency medical care for illnesses within hours or days after discharge. These abbreviated stays also put mothers at risk. Mothers and doctors are not seeking cadillac health care coverage, they are merely demanding similar coverage to that received by mothers and infants in every other industrialized nation on Earth. Efforts by insurers to arbitrarily limit maternity stays for mothers and newborns should be of concern to all of us. Decisions on how long mothers and newborns should stay in the hospital should be made by doctors and patients together based upon medical and health care needs and not primarily by the short-term business predictions of shortsighted health insurance providers. Mr. Speaker, the former CEO of U.S. Healthcare, Leonard Abramson, earned $20 million in a single year. Following the recent acquisition of U.S. Healthcare by Aetna, Mr. Abramson made a personal profit of approximately $1 billion. With an additional night in the hospital for a mother and her child costing between $700 to $1100, Mr. Abramson's take home pay and bonus could provide as many as 1,020,000 babies and their mothers an extra night in the hospital. To put it another way, one man's salary and bonus is enough to provide one-quarter of all the babies born in America and their moms an extra night in the hospital. In August of 1995, the House of Representatives passed a resolution that I introduced which called upon the insurance industry as a whole to abide by the established discharge guidelines of the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists an the American Academy of Pediatrics until there is clear and convincing evidence to demonstrate a need for a change in these guidelines. Unfortunately, the insurance industry has done nothing in response to congressional resolve on this matter, except organize opposition to such coverage. Today Congress has the chance to require insurance companies to pay for appropriate maternity stays for mothers and their newborns by supporting the motion to instruct on the VA-HUD bill. I encourage my colleagues to support the motion to instruct and stand with American families.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Speaker, last year the 104th Congress marked up and passed the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995. I was pleased to support that legislation in committee and on the House floor. In fact, I was successful in including an amendment to this new law which makes it a top priority for the Office of Management and Budget [OMB], when collecting information and applying new information technology, to make certain that small businesses selling goods and services to the Federal Government get paid on time. But this new statute still does not assign nearly enough priority to cutting the redtape and paperwork on the smallest of the small businesses that are most in need of relief. This is because the executive branch generally defines a small business to mean any employer of 500 or fewer employees. Most businesses in Vermont have 10 or fewer employees. Furthermore, I venture to say that most Americans don't think of a company that employs 499 employees as having the same needs and problems as a company that employs 25 or fewer employees. We need to focus the attention and limited resources of OMB and other Federal agencies on reducing burdensome paperwork on those it is hurting the most--the smallest businesses that can least afford the time, personnel, and additional costs associated with meeting all of the Federal Government's regulatory and reporting requirements. This bill does just that. It defines microenterprises to be small businesses in America that employ 25 or fewer employees. In addition, it calls upon the Director of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs within OMB to make it a priority to first consider the adverse effects on the smallest of small businesses, when directing and overseeing efforts to cut Federal paperwork and information reporting. It also makes helping the smallest of small businesses a priority for voluntary pilot projects when OMB, other Federal agencies, and non- Federal entities test alternative policies, practices, regulations, and procedures to reduce the Federal paperwork burden. We live in a time when the Federal Government must learn to do more with less. Therefore, in setting out to cut Federal regulatory costs and paperwork for American businesses, we should first strive to help the truly vulnerable small enterprises who operate much closer to the margin and whose survival is always in greater jeopardy.