Conference Report on H.R. Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2019

Floor Speech

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Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding.

I, too, join my colleagues in commending Ranking Member Lowey and Chairman Frelinghuysen for their stewardship of the appropriations process in the House. We are moving in the right direction. We have partial regular order, and, hopefully, with every passing fiscal year, it will get better and better. But, truly, it is an accomplishment.

I also want to commend Subcommittee Chairwoman Granger and Ranking Member Visclosky for producing a Defense Appropriations bill that provides the resources necessary for our armed services to perform the critical role of securing our Nation.

Additionally, I thank Subcommittee Ranking Member DeLauro and Chairman Cole, my dear friends, for their hard work on the Labor-Health and Human Services-Education funding bill.

The bill before us funds both the assets our armed services need and invests in our servicemembers. It provides for a much-needed 2.6 percent increase in military pay.

The bill also includes over $1.4 billion for congressionally directed medical research programs, including $130 million for breast cancer research, a personal issue to me.

I am proud to say this bill retains my language protecting access to lifesaving mammograms, particularly for women between 40 and 50 years old, and provides $5 million for my ongoing initiative, the Breast Cancer Education and Awareness Requires Learning Young Act, or the EARLY Act, which will continue to help increase the quality and quantity of life for young women with breast cancer.

The bill increases funding for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention by $125 million and funds programs that fight the spread of the Zika virus, as well as combats the use of tobacco.

It also provides vital funding that will benefit seniors, and it includes $5 million to help Holocaust survivors and their families.

Mr. Speaker, I represent one of the largest Holocaust survivor populations in the United States, and with every passing day, they are getting extremely elderly, and we are losing more and more of them each and every day. Honoring them and allowing them to live with dignity in the last years of their lives is critical.

I would be remiss if I didn't mention that this bill will help us shine a light on an inhumane family separation policy perpetrated by this administration. This legislation--and I very much appreciate this--includes my amendment to allow Members of Congress immediate access to immigration detention centers. We must remain committed to seeking justice for families that have been needlessly torn apart at our borders.

The administration, actually, repeatedly stopped Members of Congress from being able to immediately access these detention centers to conduct our proper oversight role, and this amendment, when it is signed into law by the President, will allow us to conduct that oversight as a coequal branch of our government.

Mr. Speaker, more importantly, before yielding back, I just want to take a moment to thank Chairman Rodney Frelinghuysen. It has really been an honor to serve with this gentleman, in the truest sense of the word. He has done a remarkable job serving his constituents. It has been fun being a member of the Appropriations Committee both while he was a chairman, a ranking member, and now the chairman of the full committee. We will miss him, and I know his constituents will miss his service.

Mr. Speaker, I urge Members to support this appropriations bill.

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