Rick Santorum

Mr. SANTORUM

Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, what it will show is that we have seen State after State--Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan--many States who have already reduced their caseload or are in the process through welfare of reducing it more, and the amendment of the Senator from Louisiana will make them spend as much money, although they have less on the caseload. That just is not right. That penalizes States for doing exactly what they want them to do. I think it is a well-intentioned amendment. I understand the concern for the race to the bottom. But the Dole, as modified, bill provides adequate safeguards to make sure that States are not going to eliminate their welfare expenditures. I think it does so in the context of encouraging welfare reform on the State level. I reserve the remainder of my time. I suggest the absence of a quorum. I ask unanimous consent that the time be divided equally.

Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, the Senator from Louisiana keeps bringing up the point about the Federal Government contributing 100 percent, not having the benefit of any savings. I just suggest to you that if what we want to accomplish here is savings in the welfare system, the 90-percent maintenance effort will do more to reduce those savings than anything we have seen produced. The fact of the matter is, yes, his amendment may be scored as a reduction in Federal outlays. But I suggest, Mr. President, if you went back to the Congressional Budget Office and said, ``What would be the increase in State spending as a result of this amendment,'' you would see that it would be more than offset in the reductions in Federal spending. What does that mean? That means from the average taxpayer who does not care whether the money is being spent on the Federal level or State level, they are going to pay more for welfare. That is the bottom line here. It is not how much the Federal Government saves, or how much the State government saves, or how much we spend and they spend, but how much the taxpayers spend on the program. I think what your amendment will do is net result in higher welfare expenditures. Sure, they will have to pay more State taxes or more money to the State than the Federal if we equal them out dollar for dollar in taxes. The fact of the matter is your amendment will cause States to spend even more money than what we save on the Federal side. I think that is clear. I think that is your concern. Do not try to approach this amendment that we are somehow being nice to taxpayers. Taxpayers pay State taxes and Federal taxes. When you tell them they have to pay more on the States, more than we save on Federal, this is not a friendly taxpayers amendment. This will cost more money to the average taxpayers in America, not less. Just because we save a few dollars, they will be more than made up by required increased expenditures on programs that are being dramatically reduced. I have a table that shows from just 1993 to 1994, and I say to the Senator from Louisiana that we have even seen more reductions in welfare caseload from 1994 to this year because of other programs being put into effect. I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record this table showing the change in the average number of AFDC recipients from 1993 to 1994.

Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the time be equally charged to both sides.

Mr. SANTORUM

Mr. SANTORUM. I would be happy to yield 5 minutes to the Senator from Iowa.

Mr. SANTORUM

Mr. SANTORUM. The Senator is saying this is totally fair. I think she is right given this abstract when you say start all over. But as you know, in the bill, I think what we propose is a modification by the leader to the substitute. There is going to be an 80-percent maintenance of effort provision in all 5 years of this bill which means that these States, like New York and California that have high maintenance efforts, are going to require that they continue to contribute 80 percent of the 1994 funding level. If we are going to require 80-percent maintenance of effort, how could there conceivably be a situation where New York, for example, where we are going to require New York with their maintenance of effort provision to actually contribute more on the State level than the Federal Government will under the Graham formula? Could that be a result?

Mr. SANTORUM

Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.

Mr. SANTORUM. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, I move to table the Dodd amendment and ask for the yeas and nays. [[Page S 13196]]

Mr. SANTORUM. I yield myself such time as I may consume. In closing, I just want to remind Members what this amendment does. This is not an amendment targeted at preschool children, to provide single mothers support for preschool children. Children aged 12 and under are eligible for a full-time guaranteed day care slot under this proposal, under the Dodd amendment including two-parent families. Not just single mothers but two-parent families also qualify for a full- time day care slot. It also has a 100-percent maintenance-of-effort provision in this bill on the States. This is a throwback to some of the ideas that we were debating for the past 2 decades. This is not in a new direction. This is not the direction we should take if we are going to reform the welfare system and get people back to work and get back to self-sufficiency. I urge my colleagues to defeat the Dodd amendment. I yield back the remainder of my time. Mr. DODD addressed the Chair.

Mr. SANTORUM. I would like to recognize the Senator from Washington for 2 minutes.

Mr. SANTORUM. Their time has expired?

Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, what time is remaining on both sides?

Mr. SANTORUM. Mr. President, if I can reclaim my time, I just think, within the existing AFDC block grant, there are funds available, that are currently available under the AFDC program, for child care. Those funds would continue to be available if the State should so desire to create a program to provide assistance for people on welfare in addition to the block grant funding. So what we do is provide State flexibility to be able to use those funds as the State sees fit, which is in keeping with what this side of the aisle was trying to do, which is for the States to be able to design, we believe, better programs than a Washington-based program. Again, I think throughout this dialog we found that, in fact, this program is an expansive, new--I will not use the term ``entitlement'' because there is not an entitlement in the law --but it fully funds every slot that is necessary. I know that is not an entitlement because you cannot go in there and go to court and say I am entitled to this money. But the money is there. Anyone who has a child under the age of 13, one or two parents, will be able to get fully funded government day care, a full-time day-care slot. Again, it is the option of first resort, not last resort. If you look at the money the Senator from Massachusetts was just talking about, the block grant funding, and he talks about how many working families are waiting for this assistance, it is not the option of first resort. You have to look at family and neighbors and friends. That, I would think, would still be--it is harder. But I think we have done enough to say that families are not important in this country or that fathers are not important in this country, to continue to provide money to replace existing social networks and just say the Government will do it. You do not need the father's money. You do not need a father around anymore. We will pay the father's money. That is what AFDC is for and all these other programs. You do not need grandparents or cousins. We will have a fully funded Government day care slot for you. We do not need family support. What does that mean? That is not necessary. We will continue to isolate you from your surroundings. I think that is harmful. I think guaranteeing something up front is harmful in the long run. It may sound good, but it will continue to destroy the fabric and culture of our society where we used to be interdependent. And because the Government is now coming in and doing everything for you, you have become this island unto yourself. I think it is a very sad state in our communities. And we will only add to that with this program. I hope we do not accept this amendment. Mr. President, I reserve the remainder of my time.

Mr. SANTORUM. I do not know the answer to that.

Mr. SANTORUM. My understanding is, under the current proposal, that money is a block grant to the States with the States' discretion to provide those funds.

Mr. SANTORUM. I will put a unanimous consent in, and then I will be happy to respond. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the vote on or in relation to the Dodd amendment occur at 5:15 p.m. today, notwithstanding the previous order, with the time between now and 5:15 equally divided.

Mr. SANTORUM. Before I answer that question, how much time is there remaining?

Mr. SANTORUM. Under the amendment of the Senator from Connecticut?

Mr. SANTORUM. If I can reclaim my time, the 50 percent participation standard means that 50 percent of the people in the welfare program are going to be required to be in a work program. The other 50 percent are not required to be in a work program and therefore the need for day care, I would assume--there would be no need for day care because they would not be in a work program. So, what the Dodd amendment does is provide funding for those who have to work. That is my understanding.

Mr. SANTORUM. My understanding, if I can respond to the first point, is that the Senator from Connecticut has repeatedly said the formula was calculated based on fully funding every welfare parent who is required to work with children under 12. That includes single parents and married parents. So there will be parents who will not have to work because only one of them will be required to work that will, in fact, get day care. I think that is a little much.

Mr. SANTORUM. Right.

Mr. SANTORUM. If I can reclaim my time, I will be happy to answer the question. It says on page 4 of the amendment, eligible children are-- For purposes of this section, the term ``eligible child'' means an individual, who is less than 13 years of age and resides with a parent or parents who are working pursuant to a work requirement contained in section 404 of the Act. So I think it is clear that those who are eligible are under 13 years of age, can be with a single parent or parents, which I assume means married.

Mr. SANTORUM. If I can finish--that is what the Senator's amendment does. It focuses in on the problem areas. It says, if you cannot find day care, and if you can show that day care is unavailable, whether it is just too costly, given the amount of money you receive on welfare, or it is not proximate to where you live, or whatever the case may be-- and there is a laundry list of things that you can use to show the unavailability of day care--under the Snowe amendment that is included in the Dole package now, if you can show that day care is unavailable, you are exempted from the work requirements. That is a very important measure. Because what that does is it says to the State--which, I remind you, has to have, when this program is finally phased in, half of the people in the program in the work program. Those people who cannot find day care remain in the denominator but not in the numerator. So they are part of the base of 100 percent, but they do not go toward the 50 percent you need for work participation. If you have a sufficient lack of day care, that is going to have a big effect on your ability to meet your 50 percent work participation standards. We believe that will be adequate impetus, in fact more than adequate impetus, to get the States to provide day-care services that are necessary to get younger mothers, in particular, into the workplace. We think that kind of flexibility and dynamics are better than creating out of the box a fully funded entitlement--or guarantee, it is not an entitlement--guarantee that you are going to have day care if you are on welfare: You get day care if you have children under age 13 whether you are married or not, whether you are working or not. I just think that is too big of a loophole, too big of a grant. [[Page S 13193]] And I think it is an unwise move by the U.S. Senate.

Mr. SANTORUM. If I can reclaim my time, I say the answer is yes. I think we do that in this bill. In the Dole modified bill, we believe there are ample dollars available. Within the AFDC block grant, there will be money available for child care. You have the additional child care block grant, which is appropriated at $1 billion for this year and as necessary for future years. We will have this debate every year, Senator. We are going to have a debate on the floor of the Senate over how much money we will provide in the appropriations process for people on welfare who need day care assistance. I may be back here with you, joining with you in having started this program in place and having seen the needs and heard from the Governors that we may need to appropriate more money in the years ahead. There is nothing that prohibits us from doing that. But to lock in--you do not call it an entitlement, but it might as well be one--to lock in a program of $6 billion right now, not just again for young kids, for children under the age of 5, but for children up to the age of 12, for parents who are single and married, I think that just goes too far. I hope that my colleagues will look at the expansiveness of this amendment, the cost of this amendment, and I think the unfairness of this amendment when juxtaposed to the working family in America. We are telling the working family in America that, if you want to raise children, fine. But you are on your own. But if you go on welfare, even if you are married, we are going to provide a full-time government day-care slot for you. I think that goes too far. I hope we will reject this amendment, that we will continue to work-- as I know the Senator from Utah [Mr. Hatch] has talked about, and I know the Senator from Vermont and others who are looking at this issue will--we will continue to work to see what we can do to make sure that people are not disqualified from working because of the unavailability of day care. That is what the Snowe amendment----

Mr. SANTORUM. I think the number is around 9,000.