Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2023

Floor Speech

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chair, pursuant to House Resolution 1232, I offer amendments en bloc.

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

The bipartisan en bloc amendment includes 29 proposals offered by my Democratic and Republican colleagues. This bipartisan en bloc amendment will make changes to the Financial Services bill, the Interior bill, and the Military Construction bill.

For example, for the Financial Services bill, the amendment will increase funding for entrepreneurial development programs by $6.7 million, increase funding for the Truman Foundation, and provide $5 million to help prevent fentanyl overdoses.

For Interior, the amendment will enhance activities for the preservation of historically Black colleges and universities and civil rights landmarks.

For military construction, the amendment will provide $1 million for grants to assist States and Tribal organizations in establishing veterans' cemeteries and support increased access to medical care for veterans.

These are bipartisan proposals that we can all support, and I urge my colleagues to support this amendment.

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Virginia (Ms. Spanberger).

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chairman, as I stated, this en bloc will make this package stronger and meet the needs of the people who have entrusted in us their faith that we can serve them and serve them well.

Mr. Chair, I urge my colleagues to support this amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chair, I rise in support of the amendment offered by Ms. Tlaib. Our Nation's policy toward Cuba over the past six decades has proven to be ineffective and counterproductive. The Biden administration has started to peel back some of these restrictive policies in a manner that will both empower the Cuban people and safeguard U.S. national security interests, and this amendment would further these efforts.

This amendment would lift the longstanding restrictions on the private financing of agricultural exports to Cuba, which harm U.S. farmers and ranchers and their competitiveness. Cuba imports more than $2 billion in agricultural exports per year.

Eliminating this longstanding prohibition would increase business for our Nation's ranchers and farmers, and we would create jobs for hardworking American families.

Let me give you an example. In 2021, the U.S. rice imports from Vietnam were $12.6 million; Malaysia, $16 million; Thailand, $51 million; and Pakistan, $34 million. We are costing American taxpayers dollars by importing when we could be helping Alabama and Louisiana and be able to import rice from Cuba at a lot lower cost.

Mr. Chair, I support the reforms that allow for better relationships with Cuba, and I urge support for this amendment.

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chair, pursuant to House Resolution 1232, I offer amendments en bloc.

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chair, I yield to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern), who is the chair of the Rules Committee.

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chair, I yield the gentleman from Massachusetts an additional 2 minutes.

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chair, I yield 5 minutes to the gentlewoman from Florida (Ms. Wasserman Schultz), who is the chairperson of the Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies Subcommittee.

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

With great respect for my friend from Massachusetts, I rise in strong opposition to these amendments.

I spend every day in my work as chair of the Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies Subcommittee protecting and improving the lives of our Nation's veterans. I vigorously oppose privatization, so much so that I voted against the VA MISSION Act, in which the AIR Commission appeared as part of that law, because of my concern about sending veterans who might end up remaining permanently in community care.

This en bloc contains two amendments to the MILCON-VA division that would eliminate funding for the AIR Commission at the Department of Veterans Affairs. This independent commission was established by the VA MISSION Act to develop recommendations to modernize and realign VA health facilities so we can best meet the needs of our Nation's veterans.

The reality is that the VA has different infrastructure needs today than it did decades ago. Not only are most VA facilities over 60 years old, but the veteran population has also shifted geographically over time.

The draft market assessments VA has developed and will continue to fine-tune are essential to ensure that VA's facility footprint meets veterans' needs where they are physically located today, not where most veterans were over 60 years ago. We can't ignore these changes and also effectively meet the current needs of our veterans.

We cannot just cancel the Commission and pretend the problem doesn't exist or need to be addressed. We all care about veterans and, since we do, we should be focused together on making sure they have state-of- the-art facilities that are designed to modern standards and are best- positioned to serve them.

The point of VA's market assessments is to identify the current, true needs of our veterans in each market, and the AIR Commission will then review those assessments and make final recommendations to the President and to the Congress. They come back to Congress after these market assessments and recommendations are made.

The funding in this bill does not implement the recommendations. I repeat. The funding in this bill does not implement the recommendations.

We all, on both sides of the aisle, consistently talk about meeting the needs of our veterans. Making sure veterans have access to high- quality care in high-quality facilities is a priority we all share. Adjusting the landscape of our facilities to meet veterans where they live today is key to meeting the needs of our veterans.

If we want to make sure that we don't move further toward privatized healthcare for our veterans, we need to make sure that there are VA facilities that are convenient for them, or that they are eligible by law to go into community care if there are not.

I have the utmost respect for the gentleman and my colleagues who are sponsors of this amendment, but as Chair of the Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies Subcommittee responsible for the entire budget for the VA, it is our responsibility to meet the needs of veterans across the entire country.

We need to be careful about making rash decisions that have a long- term impact. Unfortunately, the amendments in this en bloc will do more harm than good. And for those reasons, I will vote ``no'' on this en bloc, and I urge my colleagues to do the same.

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chair, I yield to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan), the chairman of the Legislative Branch Subcommittee.

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chair, I yield to the gentleman from Maine (Mr. Golden).

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chair, I yield to the gentlewoman from New Jersey (Ms. Sherrill).

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

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