Debbie Wasserman Schultz

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. I wish I were making it up.

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman from Florida will continue to yield, I was just going to say that all of this points to this culture that the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Meek) referred to earlier, this culture of corruption and cronyism. And it has created this groundswell of need for reform. We cannot go on like this anymore. I mean I am raising young children. He is raising young children. The gentleman from Ohio's (Mr. Ryan) brother is raising a young child now. We need to make sure that the next generation that comes up does not inherit a badly damaged country that results from the policy decisions that are being made here. There is some deep harm that will reverberate for at least a generation as a result of these cuts and more and more tax cuts and an ever-burgeoning deficit and more and more reliance on foreign countries and more debt. There are consequences for these kinds of things. When I go trick or treating with my kids on Halloween, that is when I most often get to see my neighbors and spend some really good time talking to them, and those are the times that they grab me by the wrist and say, ``Debbie, what is going on here?'' Every year that goes by with another year of this Republican leadership literally not having any ability to be in touch with the reality of the lives of real people is another year that we have shaken the confidence to the core of the American people. We have got to move in the direction. We have got to get some reform. We have got to get some leadership in America that understands what the basic needs are of the people. Instead, we have an administration that appears to be of the wealthy, for the wealthy, and by the wealthy. It has, I think, actually reached historic proportions. We have never had a time where you have had the priorities of the leadership in the government so focused on the most elite set of people in the country.

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Mr. Speaker, one of the things that I wanted to highlight was one of the things we have been asking people to do. H.R. 3764 is the Democrats' bill that would establish an independent commission on the response to Hurricane Katrina. The way that the administration relented on the independent 9/11 Commission, as the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Meek) referred to earlier, they initially opposed, was the groundswell of support, particularly from the families of the 9/11 victims. And we need a groundswell of support from the 81 percent of Americans that, when polled, say they think the only way to approach the response and the investigation of the response to the aftermath of Katrina is through an independent commission. We need people to contact us and become citizen cosponsors of H.R. 3764.

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Mr. Speaker, we have been talking about what they are not doing, that they are not establishing an independent commission. Let us mention what they are getting ready to do because we all can describe what we think the response to the aftermath of Katrina should be. Obviously, a pretty significant fiscal hit on our economy. No question about it. Between Katrina and Rita, we have refineries down. We have gas prices that have skyrocketed out of control. We have people having to dig deeper into their pockets. A dollar is not going as far as we would like it to or as it was previously before the storm hit. So one would think that the Republican leadership's response would be to ease up on the tax cuts. Let us pull back on making them permanent. Let us push back the reconciliation process, which is Washington speak for budget cuts. Let us make sure that we can ease some of the pain and dull the sharp point that has been the aftermath of Katrina. So, instead, what is their response? Because it certainly is not any of that. This week on Thursday we expect what will be an extremely close vote on a rash of Republican spending cuts that will cut to the core, to the deepest heart of the people who need the help the most, the people who have truly been impacted by the aftermath of Katrina. They are actually going to ask us, force us, to vote on cuts in the Medicaid program, force us to vote on cuts in the Food Stamp program, force us to vote on cuts to higher education. This is a laundry list of items that they are going to propose now. A 2 percent across-the-board random set of cuts that are going to impact the people who were hurt the most by the aftermath of Katrina. It boggles the mind. How that could be a natural response to the needs of the people who are hurting the most is just so far beyond me. I feel like I am dealing with people who live on another planet sometimes.

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. It speaks to the structure of their ability to respond to that disaster.

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. It does.

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Absolutely.

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Let us explain what we are talking about. In the press today there was an e-mail exchange revealed between the spokesperson of FEMA and then Under Secretary Brown where he was appalled that Secretary Chertoff had made him, I think it was the point person, I forgot the title he was given, in the aftermath of Katrina. But he looked at it as a slight, an insult, and somehow a demotion from his position as Under Secretary. In the devastation and aftermath of Katrina, is that what we want the FEMA Director to be worried about, what he is called?

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Madam Speaker, what this boils down to is, it is about the three Cs: We have competence, cronyism and corruption. That is what this Chamber has become about. It is a question about their incompetence. There has clearly been corruption, and we have only to list the myriad of people who are in hot water at the executive branch level and, unfortunately, in this Chamber on the other side of the aisle. As much respect as we might have for our colleagues, we have an even greater respect for this institution, and, unfortunately, there are quite a number of people who forget their need to respect this institution. And if it were not bad enough that we have a laundry list of people now who have been hired as cronies who were unqualified at the executive level for the position that they took on and then later engaged in corrupt activity, on top of that now just yesterday we hear a report that Special Operations forces were taught by individuals who have been determined to be in this country illegally, illegally, and who are now in the process of being deported. We have Special Operations forces who do not even like to acknowledge that they exist being taught foreign language by people who were found to have been in this country illegally, two from Indonesia and one from an African country. Let us go further because I wish it stopped there. Just yesterday, we found that there is a spy apparently in the White House. I mean, a spy in the White House. I do not know. I am new. I am a freshman, and 9/11 was 4 years ago. I would think that by 2005, as 4 years has passed, the crackdown and effort that the administration and the Republican leadership here has been engaging in it to shore up our homeland security and make sure people feel safer, and security has been the issue. How in God's name do we have illegal immigrants from areas that one might question the motivation of some of the people and why they are here because certainly those nations that these illegal immigrants are from have had al Qaeda representatives come? We cannot make a blanket statement about it, but no question there have been problems with those countries. Special Operations forces being taught by illegal immigrants and a spy in the White House, and we have cronyism that is running rampant at the executive branch level and ethical problem after ethical problem and indictments in this very institution. My God, if that does not cry out for a new direction and this country to be taken in a new direction, I do not know what does. I came here and held up my right hand and swore to uphold the Constitution and the integrity of this institution, and I want to underscore the summary that the gentleman from the State of Illinois (Mr. Emanuel) said the other day on a news program. The way he characterized what this institution has become is that the leadership in this institution has taken this institution from the People's House to the auction House, and there is no other way to describe it. That is the bottom line. And it is really sad.

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Pork. We will substitute any appropriate word. We have to make sure that we provide some real relief to the minivan moms and dads across this country.

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Madam Speaker, if my colleagues do not mind me jumping in here, lest people think that we are just on the Floor here pointing fingers and only being critical, we have our own alternative proposal, the democratic alternative to the energy bill tomorrow. People might think that we as Members of Congress are somehow different than our constituents. I am just a minivan mom. I do not drive a big old SUV; I drive a mini van. I wish I could drive a car that was smaller, but I have 3 little kids who have to be strapped into a car seat. I have 6-year-old twins and a 2-year-old baby girl and I, like most moms, do not have much of an alternative in terms of making sure I have a car that is safe, that is big enough to haul them and all their soccer stuff and Brownie stuff and baseball stuff, just all their stuff. That is what parents across this country deal with every single day. Last week and the week before and the week before that, I paid $45 to $50 to fill up my tank. Whenever I end up spending $45 to $50 on anything, I swallow hard. When you have to do that once a week, there is a problem. We make an okay income as Members of Congress. Think about the people who are struggling paycheck to paycheck. Tomorrow on this floor, we are going to offer a real alternative to the energy bill. We are going to offer an alternative that puts some bark into the Federal Trade Commission's bite. We are going to give explicit authority to the FTC to define, for the first time, price gouging and what it is and how to penalize for it and make sure that there are factors that can be determined. We are going to make sure that everybody in the supply chain, including home heating fuels, deals with price gouging measures. We are going to make sure that it is not just one end of the chain, the energy chain, but the whole thing. We are going to establish a strategic refinery reserve. Our substitute would increase our Nation's refinery capacity by establishing a strategic refinery reserve. Madam Speaker, we are taking real steps in our proposed alternative tomorrow which, of course, is not going to pass because the Republicans much prefer their industry-laden benefits package, which is the best way to describe this bill.

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. There is not a single item in this bill that will reduce gas prices, not tomorrow, not next Tuesday, not 3 weeks from now will one penny get cut off a gallon of gas as a result of this bill. What will happen is it will put more money in the pockets of the people who make money off the energy industry; we are going to waive the Clean Air Act provisions; it limits FTC penalties for price gouging; and it is almost completely impossible to increase refining capacity. There is a taxpayer subsidy for oil companies. These are the provisions in this bill. There is a giveaway of Federal lands in this bill. Madam Speaker, it is unbelievable. We just did this 7 weeks ago, and now we are going to give them more. I mean, where does it stop? We have an alternative, I say to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Meek), if the gentleman would like to outline some of the provisions in it.

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Madam Speaker, tomorrow they will be trying to create the mythology for the American people that this is going to do something to reduce gas prices.

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Madam Speaker, since the rule for the energy bill tomorrow was just filed, it seems a good place to jump off from, because I really hope that now that tomorrow we are going to be throwing the door, blowing the door wide open to more offshore oil drilling in the United States coastal regions, the gentleman from New Jersey represents the Jersey shore, I represent the eastern coastline, the gentleman represents the eastern coastline. Sorry, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan) does not have much of a coastline. But we have some deep, deep concerns that are going to be dealt with on the floor tomorrow where, for the first time, we are going to have the possibility of drilling much closer to the United States coastline in places that have been subject to a ban and moratoriums. Given the track record, particularly recently, of competence, cronyism and corruption, I am hopeful that we are not going to see the giveaways that are in this bill tomorrow turn into what we have seen in terms of the three C's in the last several weeks and, quite honestly, in the last several years.

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Madam Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Madam Speaker, it is great to see that our ranks are expanding, in more ways than one in the 30-something Group, just a little ribbing to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone). We have been talking about this for the last couple of weeks, and it is almost hard to pick a jumping off point when it comes to the culture of corruption and cronyism that goes on here. I am the newest one of us, so I sort of have the freshest look. I was so hopeful when I came here 10 months ago that we would be able to come together in a spirit of bipartisanship and that of all types of investigations, of any investigation, that the investigation of the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina would be one that you would think would be a no-brainer as far as bipartisanship. It has to be similar to the 9/11 independent commission, and it is not just about that we need Democrats and Republicans. It is that we need no partisanship involved in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, the investigation of Hurricane Katrina. The analogy we have been using on the floor is having a committee in the Congress that is lopsided in terms of partisanship and internal and not independent investigating Hurricane Katrina's aftermath would be like saying that the Enron executives or the Tyco executives should be allowed to investigate themselves and determine what happened and report back to the public or the Federal Government as to what happened. I think that people would be pretty outraged if we allowed the Enron CEO to handle their own investigation. Back in 1994, I was serving in the Florida House of Representatives with the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Meek), and I remember when Mr. Gingrich took the floor repeatedly and pointed then to what he called an arrogance of power. I have to tell Members it did not take them very long to come full circle and be kings of the hill of that arrogance. They have literally defined the word. We have reached a point now where what they pointed to that they said developed over 40 years, it only took them 10. So they have a much shorter learning curve than some of our predecessors. The cronyism and the corruption has got to stop. We could go through a long list of people hired who were totally unqualified for the positions they were appointed to. And then to add insult to injury, also engaged in corrupt activity during their tenure, one of whom, Mr. Safavian, was just arrested, just indicted, and he was in charge of procurement at the White House.

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to engage the gentleman from Minnesota in a colloquy and seek support to include language in a future supplemental bill to provide individual assistance to residents in Broward and Miami-Dade Counties, Florida, who suffered damage because of Hurricane Katrina. Hurricane Katrina struck Broward and Miami-Dade counties as a Category One storm on August 25. The Federal Emergency Management Agency's initial assessment revealed that over 170 homes were destroyed or severely damaged in Broward and Miami-Dade counties because of Katrina's fury. Following the initial assessment, local and State authorities documented that there were at least 219 homes in Broward and 189 homes in Miami-Dade severely damaged or destroyed. FEMA denied assistance to individuals in Broward and Miami-Dade Counties on August 31, 2005. On September 6, 2005, Florida appealed FEMA's decision and provided specific information to support its original request, including the disproportionate number of low-income residents impacted and the fact that the State does not have disaster relief funds. This appeal was also denied, leaving hundreds of south Floridians with little hope of Federal individual assistance.

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. I yield to the gentleman from Minnesota.

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Florida and the gentleman from Minnesota, and I look forward to working with them to correct this inequity.

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. I yield to the gentleman from Florida.

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his leadership, commitment, and support.

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. No, I was just going to suggest that you give out the website. And we always encourage people who watch us each week to contact us, give us your thoughts and opinions and please let Members know.

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Madam Speaker, and yet they are still, in the aftermath of Katrina, in the aftermath of Rita, with ballooning deficits and horrific corruption and cronyism, still talking about tax cuts, making the tax cuts permanent. They are still talking about budget reconciliation, which is Washington speak for cuts. They are still talking about not providing what people in this country, in the middle, in the middle, the average hardworking American needs. You know, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan) is absolutely right. It is the fringe that has been governing this institution, and this country for the last 10 years. Most of us are mainstream. Most people consider themselves very middle of the road, moderate, not left, not right, just middle of the road, and they want the course to generally be steering in an almost straight path, not veering in one direction or another, and most definitely, not favoring one group over another. This leadership has clearly favored the privileged, and it is not like, there is no question about that; that is documented fact. The privileged, they are first in line to get theirs. And you know, if we can throw some crumbs to the people who are average everyday Americans, then you know that is fine, too. But we have got to make sure that we get back to the competence that we need to run this government. We have to rid this government of the cronyism and the corruption, and we have got to restore the fourth C which is the American people's confidence.

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Do not forget the deficit.

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield. It gets worse. I was watching the hearings yesterday. FEMA's responsibility is to coordinate the response of the Federal Government in a natural disaster. They literally are the point agency, and all of the agencies in the Federal Government are basically brought under their direction. So what was Mr. Brown's response to, I think it was a question from the gentleman from Connecticut (Mr. Shays), about what he did to coordinate the disaster response. His answer was that he told the mayor of New Orleans and the Governor of Louisiana that they should issue a mandatory evacuation, and they did not listen, according to him. That was the sum total. That is what he kept repeating. That was the sum total of his response to the question of how did he coordinate the vast resources that FEMA has at their disposal and every agency in the Federal Government: that he picked up the phone and called two people and told them to evacuate New Orleans. Well, I do not know about you, but if I had at my disposal the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Energy, the Department of Health and Human Services, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, and the list goes on, I think that I could probably think of a couple more things to do besides make two phone calls. This was the biggest natural disaster in American history and his response was to make two phone calls. Now, that may have something to do with the fact that his only previous experience was running the Arabian Horse Association, I do not know; but I would think even with a clean slate, and not knowing almost anything, not being an expert in disaster response at all, I would think I could do a little bit more than make two phone calls.