Department of the Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2018

Floor Speech

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Mr. Chairman, I thank the ranking member for yielding. I want to thank Mrs. Lowey and the chairman for their leadership throughout the appropriations process.

Mr. Chairman, as ranking member of the Financial Services and General Government Subcommittee, I also thank Chairman Graves, whom I have gotten to know and work more closely with over the last few months. Our discussions have been both passionate and productive, and I thank Chairman Graves for his willingness to compromise on shared priorities.

Of course, I would like to thank Dena, Kelly, Ariana, Marybeth, and Brad on the majority staff and our talented staff director, Lisa, on the minority staff for all of the time and effort they spent working together to putting the FSGG portion of the bill together. And to my own staff, Doug, who writes these things and doesn't put his own name on there, I want to thank him anyway.

Unfortunately, the FSGG portion of the bill before us will make it more difficult for us to grow small businesses, enforce consumer protections, and promote good governance. With $1.6 billion in cuts from fiscal year 2017, many successful and established programs will suffer.

The Small Business Administration is cut by $39 million, with most coming from reductions to entrepreneurial programs that assist millions of small-business owners.

The Community Development Financial Institutions Fund is cut by $58 million, or 28 percent, which means fewer resources to spur economic growth and revitalize our most underserved and neglected communities.

GSA has zero funds to start new construction and completely rescinds the money provided in the FY17 omnibus for the new FBI headquarters, compromising our national security.

And the IRS, which has already lost over a billion dollars in funding and 18,000 staff over the past 7 years, is further weakened by additional cuts that weaken the agency's ability to close the tax gap, catch tax cheats, and provide sufficient services for honest taxpayers.

In addition, the FSGG bill contains a long list of policy riders that will undermine enforcement of the Affordable Care Act, restrict the ability for a woman to make personal healthcare decisions, and block the District of Columbia from using local funds to make local decisions.

Furthermore, this bill contains 88 pages of authorizing text to repeal key provisions of Dodd-Frank and weaken the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

Less than a decade ago, a financial crisis sparked the biggest global recession since the Great Depression and pushed our economy to the brink of collapse. No serious person would argue that the status quo, which almost crippled our economy, was working before the crisis. We need to make our financial markets safer, more transparent, and more accountable, and that is exactly what Dodd-Frank did.

Lastly, as I mentioned in my testimony before the Rules Committee, it is worth mentioning again how disappointed I am that the Rules Committee decided to unilaterally strip a provision agreed to by the committee. Congressman Aguilar's language, which passed by voice vote in the course of committee markup, was adopted according to regular order.

The provision is straightforward. It simply clarifies that DACA recipients be eligible for Federal employment. Yet, without any explanation, this section has disappeared as if it never existed. Given the administration's shameful decision to rescind the DACA program, I anticipate that we will rigorously debate this issue over the next couple days.

Again, while I cannot support this bill, I remain committed to working with my colleagues on the majority side to strengthen funding and remove harmful and unnecessary riders.

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