Curt Weldon

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from California to ask if she supports that initiative?

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I ask each of my three colleagues from California, do they now publicly state on the record that they support President Clinton's plan, which, in fact, cuts Medicare by what amount or reduces the level of growth by what amount?

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. So the gentleman is saying it is the President's plan. Mr. Riggs, correct me, would you read what the President's plan calls for?

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Reclaiming my time, what I would say to the gentleman is the Republican Conference came up with a proposal for America, across the board, that we put forth to the American people in last November's elections, and the American people responded overwhelmingly. As I mentioned in the beginning of my talk, in case my colleagues have not been aware of this, since the President took office, 136 public elected officials have switched parties. None have switched to your party. One hundred thirty-six have switched to our party from California, from Washington, from Maine, from the south, including five Members of Congress. But let me say this to my colleagues, where I find fault with your holding up this issue of tax cuts is, where is your proposal to save Medicare? This is the report issued by the three cabinet members and signed not by Republicans, but by Robert Rubin, Robert Reich and Donna Shalala. They said, and I quote, the fund is projected to be exhausted in 2001. So my question for my colleagues is, where is your plan?

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. That would have been a change from past practices of these 1-hour speeches. Mr . FARR. We are all Californians. We yield a lot. First of all, this issue about getting to the merits of the debate, and I appreciate that, we want to get to that, and I think it is appropriate. Tonight we generate a debate on the floor that we have not been able to have in committee. I would be willing to come down here and do that and hope we schedule that. I think the real big issue here, and I think you can understand this, if you go out to our constituency and on the one hand are telling them look, we are going to balance the budget; everything is targeted in this, that is why these cuts are in here. Then you turned around and say, by the way, we are also going to give a big tax break. That is why the phoniness comes. People do not think you can do both. I do not think you can do both. If you really legitimately believe that this whole issue is just related to sort of waste, fraud and abuse, then let us take the tax cut off the table. Just have the Republicans abandon that.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Reclaiming my time, I will say that I am just as much for cutting out waste, fraud and abuse as anyone, and will take a back seat to no one in attempting to reduce defense spending, whether it is through cutting the Office of the Secretary of Defense, which we are doing by 25 percent this year. While defense spending has gone down, the number of people in the Secretary's Office has gone up dramatically, or, [[Page H 9889]] whether it is by putting in procurement reforms. But let me say if we are talking about reforming, I never hear the other side, and maybe even some on my side, talk about the waste, fraud and abuse in human service delivery. I looked at a study that was done by the Baltimore Sun last December, and for any of our colleagues listening to this debate tonight, I will be happy to provide a copy of that study. The Baltimore Sun did an expose on SSI [supplemental security income]. They found that it is one of the grossest programs in terms of waste, fraud and abuse this country has. Now, whether he talked about some of the sufferings of poor people, which I can very well relate to, believe me, let me say this: Why do we not hear anyone talking about the example that was given in the Baltimore Sun of a family in Louisiana, a common law couple living together, where the mother has now been certified to get SSI because she is too stressed out to work, the father was certified to get SSI because he is overweight and can't work. They have five teenage boys, and because, after a number of tries, the mother was able to get all five kids certified as operating below their functional level, now has all of them fully qualified for SSI, that that family is receiving $47,500 a year, tax free. Let me say to my colleagues back in their offices, and to the constituents all across the country, let me repeat that number again, just in case there are senior citizens back home that did not hear it correctly: $47,500 a year for one family in Louisiana documented by the Baltimore Sun as receiving SSI benefits. When the reporter asked the mother, ``What do you say about receiving all this money?'' She said, ``I am entitled to it.'' You know what? She is. Do you know in fact that under the current guidelines established by the minority party when they were in control, she is not violating the law. She is entitled to $47,500 a year. Then the reporter went on to ask her, ``Ma'am, how much of this money do you use to help your kids improve themselves?'' She said, ``I do not use any of that for that. They all have teenage girlfriends, they are teenagers, I give them $25 a month total to spend on their teenage girlfriends.'' To our senior citizens listening across America to this debate, I hope they ask the question to Members of Congress, what are you doing to cut the waste, fraud and abuse out of the SSI system, which is completely out of control? Let me also further state an example given to me by my good friend and your colleague from California [Elton Gallegly] when he brought in to me a four-page brochure, printed in Spanish, paid for by the taxpayers of this country. That brochure being distributed in Mexico today, and says anyone who is pregnant can go to a hospital in Elton's area and receive prenatal care, postnatal care, deliver the baby, the baby becomes an American citizen, and, furthermore, in Spanish it says the mother cannot be turned in to the Immigration Service. I wonder if our taxpayers around the country know that their money is going to illegal immigrants to come in and have their children delivered. Is that waste, fraud, and abuse, or only in the case of the Pentagon or others? What I am saying is this debate should be based on substance, it should be bipartisan, and it should not be this rhetorical name-calling back and forth, because there is enough waste here that all of us should be attacking it. If there is waste in defense, we should be doing it bipartisan. If there is waste in human services, you should be joining with us. If you are not joining with us, you are only ignoring one part of the problem. That is what I object to. Even though we were not here to get time, I yield to my colleague.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, as a member of the Committee on National Security, it was President Clinton's Defense Secretary, Les Aspin, who came up with the bottoms up review who told us what we needed to protect this country. To meet Secretary Aspin's bottoms up review, the General Accounting Office said President Clinton's plan was $150 billion short. The Congressional Budget Office said his plan was $60 billion short. Democrats like the gentleman from Missouri, Ike Skelton, on our committee, came out with their own budget saying he was $44 billion short. The President stood in this very well in the State of the Union speech this year, and what did he say? We need to put $25 billion more back into defense. That was not me standing in the well there, it was the President of the country, who is the leader of your party.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. So the gentlewoman does not support the President's plan.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. We have had debate on this issue for the 9 years I have been here. Talking about 1 day of debate in the Committee on Ways and Means is not about what is going on in this country on this issue, or I have been living in a vacuum. I have that debate at town meetings every day.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. I thank the gentleman for those comments. Let me say what offends me most about the debate on this issue is what has become nothing more or less than gross partisan attacks. That is what offends me. Let me tell you why. I am a Republican who works with the other side on labor issues, proudly. I work with the other side on environmental issues, wetlands protection, endangered species. I am in front on all of those issues working with Members on the other side. I am working with the other side even in areas of defense cuts. I voted to eliminate the B-2 bomber, which I heard many of my colleagues tonight say only Republicans are concerned about strong defense. I can look at the votes and the delegation of our colleagues from California and that vote in particular. But the point is, you have turned this into partisan name-calling, trying to scare seniors, giving us the impression tonight that only Democrats care about kids and seniors. Let me tell you, I am the youngest of nine kids. My mother is 85. We were born and raised in a poor town. I was the first to go to college. She has 55 grandkids and 38 great-grandkids, all living today. My mother has no pension. She relies on Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid. I resent having anyone on the other side saying I do not care about my mother. Who are you to say that we as Republicans are insensitive to the concerns of seniors? I taught school in a public school for 7 years in west Philadelphia and adjacent. I ran a chapter 1 program with economically deprived kids. I resent the fact that you stand up here in a 1-hour special order and try to portray Republicans as not being concerned about human beings, and that is exactly what was said tonight. I heard my other friend and colleague from California say, and you know, they do not want to cut defense. Ask the one million people in this country, the United Auto Workers, ask the Electrical Workers, who have lost their jobs in plants in southern California, in Boeing and GE. Ask them if we have cut defense at all. One million men and women have been downsized because of 9 years of defense cuts, not cuts in the rate of increase, but actual real cuts in terms of defense spending. So all I am saying is why can we not move beyond the partisanship and discuss this as intelligent human beings? The people back home do not want to see your side get up and call us names and us get up and call you names. They want us to solve problems.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Let me just say, before I yield to my colleagues on the other side, I will in fact yield to them despite past hours of times where Members of your side would not yield to our Members, namely, I was over here one night with the gentleman from Pennsylvania [Mr. Greenwood], who tried repeatedly to get an honest dialog going, but you would not allow that to take place, even though there was no attempt to have bipartisan spirit, I will allow the gentlewoman to respond and have some comments while the gentleman from California [Mr. Riggs] is still in the Chamber.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Which plan is that?

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. I will yield to the gentlewoman at the appropriate time. Continue.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Regular order, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I wish I was going to take an hour here on a different topic, but I have to respond, along with my colleague, to some of the things that have just been said. One of the pluses of our great society is you can say anything on the floor of the House. You do not have to back it up with fact. You can say anything you want about anything. Whether or not you believe it is something people back home have to make up their own minds. I would say the American people have spoken about what this party has done. I would remind my Democrat colleagues before they leave the floor that since Bill Clinton took office, 136 publicly elected officials have switched parties in America, 136. Zero have switched from the Republican Party to the Democrat Party, and 136 have switched from the Democrat Party to the Republican Party, including 5 Members of Congress and the only American Indian in Congress. So I would say to my colleagues the American people are listening, and your elected officials around the country are coming in droves to support the ideals and the principles of this party. What we are going to attempt to do is provide some honest information to rebut what you have just said here. Let me read a quote. This quote is from Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, one of the most stalwart Democrats in the Senate. This quote was from September 17, 1995: At the present moment, Medicare costs double every 7 years. The Republicans want to slow that down to doubling every 10 years. The Administration is somewhere in between. No one is talking about abolishing Medicare and, indeed, no one is talking about cutting Medicare, especially the rate of growth. I would say to my colleagues on the Democrat side this is Senator Moynihan speaking. This is not some Republican. This is not Newt Gingrich. This is your leader on health care issues and on Medicare issues, Senator Moynihan. If you want to quote someone, respond to the quote of Senator Moynihan. Let us be factual, Mr. Speaker, in this debate. Let us stop the use of partisan politics in attempting to scare senior citizens. Your party does not have a corner on caring for people any more than ours does. I think it is wrong to use mean-spirited attacks to try to scare seniors into thinking someone is trying to take benefits away from them. That is absolutely outrageous. I yield to the gentleman from California [Mr. Riggs].

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Which plan does the gentlewoman support?

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. But the gentlewoman does not support that plan?

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Reclaiming my time, I yielded to the gentlewoman thinking she was going to respond to a point of personal privilege about something that our colleague from California said. Evidently that is not the case. I thought the gentlewoman was going to make a complaint about what he said being false or erroneous.

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. But the gentlewoman does not support the President's change?

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. So my colleagues are not going to reform it at all. They do not buy this? Does the gentlewoman buy this or not?

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. When will we get your plan?

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Reclaiming my time, when do we get your plan to save Medicare? [[Page H 9892]]

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Does the gentleman support the President's plan?

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Does the gentleman support the President's plan?

Mr. WELDON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, now reclaiming my time, does the gentleman from California [Mr. Farr] does he support the President's plan?