Chris Van Hollen

Mr. VAN HOLLEN

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I would just point out that I think it is useful to look at this through the perspective of history, because the last time we had balanced budgets in this country was at the end of the Clinton administration, and shortly after that, when President Bush came into office, we saw back-to-back tax cuts. The theory at that time was if you dropped the top tax rate on high- income individuals, it will trickle down to everybody else and power- charge the economy. The only problem is that didn't work. It did not work at all. The trickle-down theory of economics did not work. We didn't get that boost of economic growth. What we did get was huge, huge deficits as far as the eye could see. And so the problem with this budget is that it is a U-turn back to that philosophy--the idea that we are going to provide these tax cuts and it will create a big boost of economic activity. But reality has shown that it doesn't work that way. We should be building our economy from the middle out and from the bottom up. The top-down approach doesn't work. I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Johnson), a distinguished member of the Armed Services Committee.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Rhode Island (Mr. Cicilline), a distinguished member of the Judiciary Committee.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. We are looking forward to the debate on the budget over the next couple of days. Chairman Ryan mentioned that the critics of this budget call it draconian. I would just point out to the gentleman that the Republican chairman of the House Appropriations Committee just referred to the budget that is before this House as draconian. Now, the chairman and I do agree on one thing, which is that these budgets that we bring before this Congress reflect our different visions of America. They reflect the choices that we make. They show what we care about, and they show what we care less about. They are fundamentally different blueprints for the future of this country. The President has presented a budget that will boost job growth, sharpen Americans' competitive edge, and expand opportunity in the United States of America. Now, we have before us the congressional Republican budget, and of all of the Republican budgets that we have seen on the floor of this House since 2010, this one is the worst for America. Many will argue, Mr. Chairman, that we should not be taking this budget seriously because, after all, we have a short-term bipartisan agreement and that the Senate would never pass this budget, but I urge the country to take it seriously because what it tells America is what our Republican colleagues would do to the country if they had the power to do it. If they could impose their will, this is the budget that they would impose, so we need to look hard at the consequences. What does it mean for America? What choices does the budget before us make for our country? At its core, it rigs the rules of the game for very wealthy and very powerful special interests at the expense of everybody else in the country and at the expense of other priorities in the country. For example, if you are a multimillionaire, under this budget, you will have your top tax rate cut by one-third, all the way from 39 percent, where it is today, down to 25 percent. That is an average tax break for millionaires of $200,000. That is great for people who are well off. What does this budget do to the rest of this country? It guts vital investments in our children's future, it squeezes the middle class, and it violates important commitments to our seniors. Now, let's step back because the chairman mentioned the economic benefits of this budget. The reality is that our economic competitors around the world will eat our lunch if we pass this Republican budget. It provides for perverse tax incentives that ship American jobs overseas while shortchanging investments in jobs right here at home. As we will see over the next couple of days, it guts important investments that historically have helped power our economy, and the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office tells us that, in the next couple of years, this is going to slow down economic growth, that it is going to slow down job growth. One estimate puts the job loss at 3 million jobs. At a time when we need to be modernizing our national infrastructure--the backbone of our economy--this budget slashes the transportation budget by $52 billion in this year alone, stopping new projects, throwing construction workers off the job. It will condemn the United States to a potholed road of economic decline, and it refuses to include one thing that the Congressional Budget Office says will help boost our economy right now, which is to pass bipartisan comprehensive immigration reform. Mr. Chairman, as this budget provides these windfall tax breaks for the folks at the very top, let's see what it does to others in our country. We all depend on our kids getting a good education. It is good for families. It is good for the country. The saddest part about this budget is that it casts a dark shadow over the American Dream, and it violates the fundamental promise that every hardworking American should have a fair shot at success. At a time when we should be investing more in education in the United States, all told, if you look at early education--K-12--and college education, this budget cuts it by $370 billion below current services. That has devastating impacts on everything from Head Start to Early Head Start to K-12 to college. Let me just mention one of the things it does to college student loans. It starts charging college students' interest while they are still in college, before they have gotten out and gotten a job. That saves $40 billion in this budget--actually, a little more than that--in the same budget that provides huge tax breaks to the wealthiest in this country. So much for wanting to address the lack of upward mobility in America; rung by rung, this budget knocks out the steps of that ladder of opportunity. If you are to the manor born, you are going to be just fine under this budget, but for everybody else, tough luck and worse. Let's look at seniors as our next example. Those on Medicare will immediately pay more if they have high prescription drug costs, right? The chairman mentioned that the Democratic budget cut Medicare and turned it into something else. The reality is that the savings that were achieved in Medicare by ending some of the overpayments in the Democratic budget were recycled to strengthen key parts of Medicare, including to close what has been called the prescription drug doughnut hole. The Republican budget here reopens the prescription drug doughnut hole. If you are a senior with high prescription drug costs, it is $1,200 more per year, on average, as a result of this budget. Seniors who have been able to get preventative health services without having to put down copayments will no longer get those screenings, and now, they will be at risk of not getting the treatment and care when they need it. On top of all of that, it ends the Medicare guarantee by creating a voucher program. For seniors who decide to stay in the traditional Medicare program, they will see their premiums hiked by 50 percent when that goes into effect. They can stay, but they will have to pay big time to stay. That is not the Medicare guarantee. Middle class families--I mentioned that this budget cuts the top tax rate for millionaires from 39 percent to 25 percent. That is a 30 percent tax cut, but it says it is going to do that in a deficit- neutral manner, so it is simple math, Mr. Chairman. If you are going to do that, you are going to squeeze middle class taxpayers. In fact, this budget pretends that Chairman Camp and the exercise he went through in the Ways and Means Committee--the fact- based exercise--never happened because what Chairman Camp found was that you couldn't bring that top rate down to 25 percent without squeezing middle-income taxpayers. That is why he had a top rate of 35 percent in his plan, and yet this says let's go to a 25 percent top rate. That means $2,000 more in taxes for a family with kids to finance the tax breaks for the folks at the very top. This budget reserves, perhaps, its cruelest blow for those who are seeking to climb out of poverty into the middle class, to have an opportunity to participate in the American Dream. In the last election, the Republican candidate, Mitt Romney, said he really didn't care about the 47 percent. This Republican budget sets out to prove that statement. If you look at this budget, it is an assault on Americans who are struggling to climb out of the middle class. We had a big debate in this Congress about food nutrition programs. The Republican plan called for $40 billion in cuts. It ended up being $8 billion. In this budget, it is $137 billion. Millions of more kids will go hungry as a result of cutting that safety net, and that is why faith-based groups that have looked at these Republican budgets over the last 3 years have said that they don't meet the tests of a society that cares for the least of these. I want to close by asking a question because our Republican colleagues say the goal has to be 10 years to hit this political target. It is interesting because the Republican budget 3 years ago didn't balance until around 2040, but now, we have this sort of political target that they have to hit. If it is so important to hit that, why do they ask everything of our kids and of our seniors and of struggling families and of nothing from very powerful special interests? This budget does not close one special interest tax break for the purpose of reducing the deficit, not one--not a special interest tax break for hedge fund owners, not a special tax break for big oil companies. We have a race to hit their political timetable here, but we are not going to ask those special interest groups to pay one dime to help reduce the deficit. Here is the really strange thing: after all is said and done, this Republican budget does not balance in 10 years if, at the same time, the Republicans claim to be repealing the Affordable Care Act. It just doesn't add up. The math isn't there. What this Republican budget does is this: it gets rid of all of the benefits in the Affordable Care Act. It gets rid of the tax credits that help Americans purchase affordable care. It gets rid of the provision that says you can stay on your parents' insurance policy until you are 26. It gets rid of the provisions that say you cannot be denied coverage because you have a preexisting condition. It gets rid of all of the benefits. Guess what it keeps? It keeps all of the tax revenue from the Affordable Care Act. You don't have to take my word for it. This is The Heritage Foundation. This isn't some liberal group. Here is what they say: Perhaps the biggest shortcoming of this budget is that it keeps the tax increases associated with ObamaCare. It is what they said about last year's budget. This year is exactly the same. This budget also keeps all of the savings from Medicare. It doesn't recycle any of those savings to strengthen it as the Democratic budget does, but it keeps them. If you actually look at this chart, you will see that, in 2024, when the Republican budget claims to balance, without the revenues and the savings from Medicare, it doesn't come close to balancing. So our Republican colleagues have got to choose. Either you claim to have a balanced budget and you recognize that you support all of the revenues and savings in the Affordable Care Act or not, but you can't have it both ways. The sad thing is, after hitting everybody but the very wealthy in this budget, they still can't achieve what they claim is their goal. With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. As you know, the value meal on that McDonald's menu 10 years ago cost more than the value meal today. This is just to get about math and budgeting in a transparent way.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Will the gentleman yield?

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I appreciate my friend from Georgia (Mr. Woodall) for kicking off this debate. As he indicated earlier, as we debate the budgets, there will be differences of opinion and differences of philosophy, but when it comes to math, there is not a Republican math, and there is not a Democratic math. When you run a math equation, you get the same result whether you are a Republican or a Democrat. What this bill attempts to do is to legislate away inflation. Gee, that would be so nice if we could pass a law and inflation would go away. What is worse is this bill then says that we are going to put together budgets on the assumption that there is no inflation, on the assumption that the price of goods and services doesn't change over time, and if you do that, you will get very misleading results in your budget. Now, the gentleman talked about Washington math. Madam Speaker, I would just like to show you the change in the cost of a hamburger from the last 10-year period. We do our budgets in 10-year windows. The price of a hamburger in 2004 was $2.71. The price of that same hamburger 10 years later, in 2014, is $4.62. That is not Washington math. That is reality-based math. Here is what this Republican proposal would do. It wants to take that fantasy land math and apply it to our budgets. Here is the chart. If you applied that idea in the budgets that we had from 2004 to today, you would assume that the price of that hamburger or of any goods and services that we bought as the Federal Government would remain the same--no inflation, no change--but that is not the reality. The reality is, between 2004 and 2014, we had inflation, and the costs of goods and services went up. The good news is that we did not have this proposal in effect from 2004 to 2014, so we didn't have this detachment from reality. Yet what our Republican colleagues want to do is say, from now on--from 2014 on--when the Congressional Budget Office puts together its estimations of future budgets, it has got to assume away inflation. Presto. As you can see, over time, that would become further and further detached from reality, not Washington reality but economic reality. Here is what would happen if you budgeted that way. For $2.71 today, you don't get as big a hamburger, right? So apply that idea to an aircraft carrier. We have 10-year budgets. The gentleman's proposal is to pretend that, over the next 10 years, there will be no increase in the price of the inputs to making that aircraft carrier. Just assume it away. Inflation. Do you know what? If you plan that way, at the end of the day, you are going to have half an aircraft carrier in your budget just like you would have a half a hamburger in your budget. Imagine a business that was planning ahead for the next 10 years, trying to do a profit and loss statement, and it had to calculate what it was going to cost it to buy inputs to its manufacturing process-- energy inputs, oil and gas, other inputs of material it has to purchase. Then let's say that, today, it miraculously assumed there was no increase in the costs of those inputs. Boy, that would be nice, but do you know what? That private business would go under, and that business would be sued for malpractice by its shareholders. Why would we do something to the Federal Government that we would never allow to happen in the private sector that would result in a private sector business's going belly up? I would just say, Madam Speaker, that the reason the Congressional Budget Office projects the budgets as they do today--the reason they include the estimated costs of inflation--is not that they do Washington math. It is that they can go out and go to McDonald's and find out that--do you know what?--the price of a Big Mac is not the same today as it was 10 years ago. It would be misleading to pretend, as we put together our next 10-year budgets, that the price of aircraft carriers and the price of education and the price of providing health care to our veterans will be the same. If you assume that, at the end of the day, you shortchange those veterans, you shortchange that defense policy, you shortchange our kids because, just like you can only buy a half a hamburger today for what you could have in 2004, you are not going to be able to buy the same education for kids and the same military 10 years from now. We are not talking about Washington math. This is a case of basic math. As I said, it shouldn't be a Republican math or a Democratic math. We would all love to repeal inflation. That is not the real world. Let's stick with real-world budgeting. If we get away from that, we are going to be in a world of trouble here in the United States Congress. Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to yield the control of the balance of my time to the gentleman from California (Mr. Huffman), a terrific new member of the Budget Committee.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong opposition to H.R. 1459, which would create arbitrary new rules to make it more difficult for presidents to protect our national heritage and resources through the Antiquities Act. The Antiquities Act is a century-old tool that gives the president the ability to set aside already-public land for protection as a National Monument. Nearly every president since 1906, both Republican and Democratic, has used this authority to designate some of our nation's most iconic treasures, from the Grand Canyon to Acadia National Park. In my own Congressional district, President Eisenhower used the Antiquities Act to designate the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal, the first step in a process to preserve what is now a thriving national park with a scenic towpath that showcases the rich history and natural beauty of the site. Antiquities Act designations are good for surrounding communities, preserving natural resources, providing outdoor recreation opportunities, and boosting tourism. Moreover, the Antiquities Act complements, rather than overrides, Congressional action, as Congress retains the ability to declare monuments and manage resources for presidentially-proclaimed monuments. Today's bill places arbitrary limits on designations and needlessly complicates the process, making it far more difficult to achieve permanent designations of heritage spaces. In the last three years, Congress has failed to create even one new unit of the National Park System. We should not prohibit the president from taking action to conserve public land and protect public resources. I urge a no vote.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Garrett, what I said was I support the part of your amendment that puts them on budget.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Will the gentleman yield?

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself as much time as I may consume. Let me say at the outset that we welcome any proposals to improve the budget process, but it is a mistake to suggest that simply tinkering with the budget process will somehow solve our problems. The bigger issue in the Congress has been an unwillingness of many people to compromise, and at the end of the day, in order to make budgets work, you have to have give-and-take. So, for example, the reason we saw our government shut down last October had nothing to do with the budget process. It had to do with the fact that our Republican colleagues said they were going to shut down the government as a means to try and shut down the Affordable Care Act, to shut down ObamaCare. It was clear that that was not going to work. We are not about to strip millions of Americans from the new insurance protections they have. Despite that, our colleagues pursued that strategy, and we saw 16 days of unnecessary and unproductive government shutdown. That was not a problem of process; it was a problem of politics. Now, with respect to this bill, I would say to the gentleman from New Jersey that, if your bill were limited to bringing Fannie and Freddie on budget, we would join you. We would welcome you in that. But, as you know, this bill does much more than that. In fact, it fundamentally changes the way we account for credit programs, Federal credit programs, including things like the student loan programs. Now, the gentleman from New Jersey mentioned the impact on the FHA. A couple years ago--I think it was 3 years ago--on the Budget Committee we actually had a hearing on this subject. This bill was then on the floor in 2012. At that time, many of us said that, before we consider the other changes that this bill proposes, at least we should have a hearing in the Budget Committee to determine what the impact will be on student loan programs, Small Business Administration programs, veterans loan programs, at least we should have that information. Yet 3 years have gone by. We are now back with the same bill on the floor with no hearings to try and judge what impact it would have on student loan programs. I want to mention the student loan programs in particular. The gentleman said that the President had ``nationalized'' the student loan program. Let me just translate what that means. It had been that the big banks were essentially a conduit for all of our student loan programs. They were taking very little risk, but they were pocketing big profits just as a middle man, a middle man without risks but taking the profits. So Democrats proposed that we go to a direct loan program to try and make sure the taxpayer dollar actually did what we hoped it would do, which was provide more students with loans to help more of them afford college. So, yes, we got rid of the middle man and we used the savings to try to increase--and in fact, did increase-- the amount of funds available so more students could afford to go to college. Now, this bill comes along, and it would actually change the way we account for student loans, to artificially make those student loans look more expensive on the budget than they would otherwise be from a budget perspective. Now, maybe this isn't surprising. After all, just last week in the House Budget Committee, we debated the House Republican budget. In fact, that Republican budget is going to be here and debated on the floor of the House tomorrow. We will start debate on that budget. That budget significantly cuts the student loan program. So one of the things it does is it charges students interest on their loans while they are still in college. That is about $41 billion of additional interest costs they put onto students. At the same time, in their budget, they protect special interest tax breaks for hedge fund owners, big oil companies and the like. So that is what their budget does. Now, this piece of legislation would address that from a different direction. It actually would artificially increase the cost on the budget books of student loans going forward. Let me just read from a letter from a Dr. Reischauer, who was the former head of the Congressional Budget Office. He writes: The accounting convention used since enactment of the Credit Reform Act of 1990 already reflects the risks that borrowers will default on their loans or loan guarantees. Under Credit Reform, costs are already based on the expected actual cash flow from the direct loans and guarantees. This bill proposes to place an additional budgetary cost on top of the actual cash flows. Then he goes on to point out that that may be something that Members want to consider during debate, but to actually put that artificial inflation in the budget actually is potentially misleading to people who are looking at the budget. So, like so many bills around here that are misnamed, this one, named the Budget Transparency and Accountability Act, actually reduces budget transparency by putting in the budget a cost for student loans that is actually artificially increased. I would suggest to my colleagues that we reject this particular proposal. Again, if the gentleman had brought to the floor a bill that simply put Freddie and Fannie on budget that would be fine. But this bill actually is a vehicle to inflate the actual costs of things like student loans, at the same time where we have a Republican budget coming to the floor that actually cuts those student loans. At this point, Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that the balance of my time be controlled by the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Yarmuth).

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. So, to the extent that that is your question on the budget, I am happy to join with you on that. I wish you would join with us now in reconsidering your proposals to change the student loan calculations, but we may be asking too much at this point.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, I keep hearing our Republican colleagues say they want the ``complete picture'' and ``more information is better than less.'' We agree. This is why it is so interesting, that they specifically exclude information based on bills that come out of the Appropriations Committee that call for investments in our economy and in areas that can help promote job growth. They say they want more information, but their bill says they want it only in one area and not in another. Again, Mr. Chairman, I guess I am not surprised, given the fact that the budget that the Republicans just voted out of the Budget Committee and expect to be on the floor next week makes dramatic, historic cuts to important investments that this country has made in the past. In fact, it is 40 percent below the lowest investments as a share of the economy we have made since the 1950s. This country has been able to compete and has been an economic powerhouse, in part, because of the great investments we have made as a Nation in important areas like science, research, infrastructure, and education; and yet Republicans want to exclude that in this bill. Again, it is not surprising because the Congressional Budget Office, the very entity that they say they want to provide us this analysis, has said, over the next couple of years, their budget is going to slow down the economy and economic growth, in part, because of the deep cuts they make in this one area of budget that they don't want this information about. Surprise, surprise. Mr. Chairman, I yield 4 minutes to the distinguished gentlelady from the State of Texas (Ms. Jackson Lee).

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Chairman, I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Chairman, may I inquire as to how much time remains on both sides.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Just to respond to the last point of the chairman of the Budget Committee with respect to the appropriations process, as I indicated earlier, this bill specifically exempts those pieces of legislation even if they meet the threshold with respect to the other legislation in here. Again, it is, perhaps, not surprising. I think the American public knows that we have a short-term budget agreement, the Murray-Ryan agreement, but if you look at the budget that Republicans in Congress are proposing, it calls for a 24 percent cut to the current services in the recent bipartisan legislation over a 10-year period. Let's just take one category of investments--in our kids. That means about an $18 billion cut in early education. It means about an $80 billion cut in K-12 education. It means about a $205 billion cut in current policy higher education. It calls for charging college students higher interest rates for the period of time when they are in college. That raises about $40 billion at a time when that same budget doesn't ask for anything from the highest-income individuals and doesn't raise one penny to reduce the deficit from closing special interest tax breaks. So it is no surprise to me that they would want to exclude the economic impacts of those investments that they are dramatically cutting. As I said earlier, the CBO, in its most recent analysis of the House Republican budget, says it will slow down economic growth in the next couple of years. It is very interesting that they don't want that quantified with respect to the appropriations bills. At the same time our Republican colleagues are saying they want more information, they specifically limit the information to certain areas. The other thing I want to mention, Mr. Chairman, is immigration reform. We want the CBO to give us an analysis, when they have a specific bill, so they can determine the economic benefit and the impact of it. That is a good thing, and the CBO has done that for immigration reform. In fact, of all of the pieces of legislation that are before this House right now, one of the things that could have the most immediate economic growth benefit is the bipartisan immigration bill before this House. The Congressional Budget Office has looked at that. They say that will generate a lot more economic activity. In fact, they say, over year 10, it will actually boost economic growth by 5 percent compared to what it would otherwise be. They say it will reduce the deficit in this 10-year window by almost $200 billion and, in the 20-year window, by almost $1 trillion. That is an analysis that we all should benefit from. Interestingly, while that would provide great economic growth, based on CBO reports, and when Democrats the other night proposed an amendment in the House Budget Committee to adopt that bipartisan immigration reform bill which would generate economic growth, all of our Republican colleagues voted ``no.'' We want more information--the more the better--but it needs to be information that the economists say they can usefully provide us. I get back to the fact that, when it comes to the tax reform proposal, for example, that Chairman Camp put in, they said that they couldn't narrow it down to one answer. They gave eight different models based on different assumptions. Our Republican colleagues are trying to say to professional economists, We really don't care what you say; you come up with a particular answer. Whereas, we think we should be asking for information in every case where it can be plausibly provided. Unfortunately, our Republican colleagues don't want it everywhere it can be plausibly provided because they specifically exclude the economic benefit of important investments in our economy and jobs. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Chairman, look, the gentleman who just spoke mentioned some important examples. If you are a CEO, you want to know when you buy a piece of equipment or capital what the economic dividend is going to be on that. But I go back to the fact, on page 3, our Republican colleagues are asking for information on economic growth impacts of all sorts of things, but they specifically exclude anything that comes out of the Appropriations Committee. It is not a surprise, because the Congressional Budget Office, in its analysis of the Republican budget, says that during the next couple of years it will actually slow down economic growth. In fact, if you look at their proposal, it calls for deep cuts in important investments. CBO says that will have a negative economic impact over the next couple of years. So it is not surprising that they don't want that information provided as part of this analysis. Mr. Chairman, I yield 4 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Foster), a member of the Financial Services Committee.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Connolly), who will be offering an amendment a little bit later.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to this legislation. I was interested to hear my colleague from Georgia end his comments by saying we should have more information rather than less. As I look at this legislation, on page 3, they say they want more information on the dynamic effects of different policies but specifically exclude, for example, the Committee on Appropriations; investments that we might make in our kids' education; or investments that we might make in other areas to power our economy--research and development, for example. It is particularly interesting because the Republican budget that was just released and voted on the other night in the Budget Committee, according to CBO, in the next couple of years will create a drag on the economy, will actually hurt jobs in the next couple of years. Why is that? That is, in part, due to the fact that they make deep cuts in parts of the budget for investment in research and development and other areas that help power our economy. So it is kind of interesting, Mr. Chairman, that they specifically excluded the CBO from doing an analysis on that. Now, a couple of my colleagues will have amendments to the bill, and if our Republican colleagues don't somehow mean to ignore those important investments, hopefully they will join us in supporting those amendments. If you were the CEO of a company and you were projecting your growth and you were projecting your income, you would want to look at how much you are going to make from certain investments you make in your workforce and those kinds of investments. According to this bill, you don't want that. What this bill is after is simply to do an analysis primarily on a tax policy. It is motivated primarily by this idea that, if you provide big tax breaks to people at the very high end of the income ladder, it will trickle down and lift up all the boats, everybody else, trickle-down theory. We saw how well that worked in the 2000s. We had big tax cuts in 2001 and 2003. A few years later, for a variety of reasons, the economy tanked. You heard the former Chairman of the Federal Reserve who predicted that those tax cuts would generate growth come back and say, you know, he was wrong. So, I am all for additional information. On that point, I want to say to my colleagues that, on the most recent tax reform proposal that came out of the Ways and Means Committee, you actually do have a number of scores from the Joint Tax Committee, from our nonpartisan scores. They have eight. They have eight scenarios. One projects .1 percent growth; one projects 1.6 percent growth. That is, of course, the one that Chairman Camp ran with in all the information he put out. But what he failed to mention is they came up with eight scenarios. The reason they came up with eight scenarios is because they couldn't boil it down to say this will be the dynamic impact of that particular legislation because there are too many unknown variables. That is why they had eight. Now you want them to somehow come up with one when they have repeatedly informed this Congress that it depends so much on the different assumptions that you make, that you can't make one prediction on that kind of legislation. I have trouble with this legislation for a variety of reasons; one being, when it comes to tax policy, we have been informed by the experts that it is hard to pinpoint one number and boil it down to a growth figure. Then, as I mentioned, my colleagues have left out the benefits of investing in things like infrastructure, things like our kids' education, things like scientific research, so they are certainly not asking for more information when it comes to those important investments. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Chairman, I thank my colleague Ms. Jackson Lee. We have heard from our colleagues all morning that they want more information, a more complete picture of the impact of legislation on our economy. Well, the legislation before us, as we have pointed out repeatedly today, exempts the part of the budget that deals with investments in discretionary spending. From the start, it does that. Then they said no to amendments on the impact on jobs. They have said no to getting more information on the impact on State and local governments and local taxpayers, and now, they are saying no to getting more information on vital portions of our economy. This doesn't say the CBO can't look at other things. It just says that it is important that they look at this part of the economy. There are HUBZones in every part of the country, and they are an important part of our strategy that a lot of us are working towards to try to make sure that everyone in this country has an opportunity to move forward and succeed. So it is discouraging to hear our colleagues reject a request for more information on jobs, local taxpayers, and now in this particular area.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, I just ask one more time, if our Republican colleagues want information to make informed decisions, why did they specifically exclude one whole category of information based on legislation coming out of the Appropriations Committee to make some important investments that can help our economy grow? They say they want all this additional information, but apparently, they didn't. Again, I say it is not surprising because some of the changes that the Republican budget makes in that area do, according to the Congressional Budget Office, create a drag on the economy in the coming few years. So, again, you are going to have an amendment later on offered by Mr. Connolly--and he will talk about that point--to find out if our Republican colleagues really do want full information, but at least in the current form of this bill, they don't. With that, Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Chairman, I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. The CBO provides lots of information right now. I hope all Members of Congress will take advantage of the information they provide. We have now heard, for the second time today, that the Affordable Care Act has cost the economy jobs. Well, the CBO looked at that. They studied it. They gave the Congress information just like our colleagues are asking for. They didn't say that it had any negative job impact at all right now. Now, they said, in the outyears, that now that people are able to go into exchanges to afford health care, that people may decide to not go to a job where the job had been the only way to get taxpayer-benefited health care. Under our current system, if you want a tax benefit for your health care, if you want preferential tax treatment on your health care, where do you go? You go to a job. That is where the tax benefit comes from. As a result of the Affordable Care Act, people now can get a tax credit and go into the exchange. So they can decide to launch a business from their home and get health insurance without having been locked into another job which had been the only place where they got tax-benefited health care. So I encourage my colleagues to read the CBO reports that have already been issued on the Affordable Care Act. I also urge them to read the CBO reports that have already been issued on the recovery bill because the Congressional Budget Office has indicated that, as a result of the recovery bill, the economy actually saved millions of jobs, that that helped the economy from falling farther and farther. Remember, when President Obama was sworn in, we were losing 800,000 jobs every month, and the recovery bill helped stop that free fall and turned that around. That is what the Congressional Budget Office said, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. So it is great our colleagues are asking the Congressional Budget Office for more information, and we welcome that. It would be great if they read the information the Congressional Budget Office has already issued. I just want to make one final point, Mr. Chairman. I have made it before, but it is important because we keep saying we want more information, more complete information, and if you read this legislation, it says that. Then it says: except. We want information except. We don't want any information on the job impact of those parts of our budget that invest in jobs and our economy, like R&D at places like NIH, National Institutes of Health, like our kids' education. We want all the information, but don't tell us about the benefits of those investments. And I wonder why. It is because the Republican budget slashes our investments in those areas. So don't tell us about the impact of that, Congressional Budget Office. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. VAN HOLLEN

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to H.R. 2824, which would roll back a Reagan-era rule to protect Appalachian streams and communities from mining waste contamination. In 1983, in order to protect ground and surface water, the Reagan Administration implemented a rule that said mountaintop mining operations could not dump their waste too close to streams. Today's bill would require states to replace those existing protections with a 2008 rewrite of the rule that would weaken standards and fail to safeguard water resources from the impacts of mining waste. States would not be permitted to enact stronger standards to shield their drinking water from contamination. I offered an amendment with my colleagues Representatives Cartwright and Lowenthal to ensure States have the right to take additional action if they find it necessary, and I urge my colleagues to support it. This legislation is particularly egregious because just last month, the DC Circuit Court vacated the 2008 rule because the Bush Administration failed to consider the impact of waste dumping on threatened and endangered species. Not only would this bill write that illegally-drafted rule into statute, it would set a five-year moratorium on any new rules to protect streams from coal mining waste. The Interior Department is currently in the process of developing new rules to reflect advances in mining practices and mitigate environmental and health impacts from mining operations. Rather than forcing implementation of a rule so flawed that it's been tossed out by the courts, we should allow this process to go forward to safeguard Appalachian communities. I urge a no vote on the bill.