OFFICIALS LEGISLATION INTEREST GROUPS PUBLIC STATEMENTS COMMITTEES VETOES

American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009--Continued

Floor Speech

Date: Feb. 6, 2009
Location: Washington, DC
Issues: Government Budget and Spending


AMERICAN RECOVERY AND REINVESTMENT ACT OF 2009--Continued -- (Senate - February 06, 2009)

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

AMENDMENT NO. 501, AS MODIFIED, TO AMENDMENT NO. 98

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, there will now be 2 minutes equally divided prior to a vote in relation to amendment No. 501 offered by the Senator from South Carolina.

Mr. CONRAD. I will take the time, since I do not see the Senator from South Carolina. I will say very simply, colleagues, this amendment is designed to help address the housing crisis by reallocating money from lesser priority areas to the FDIC mortgage foreclosure mitigation plan.

Sheila Bair, the head of the FDIC, has written us and said to us, if this amendment is passed, it will prevent 1.5 million American homes from being foreclosed on. It is paid for. This is critically important to economic recovery. Virtually every economist has told us if this is not dealt with, the housing crisis, and dealt with effectively, we cannot expect economic recovery.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New York is recognized.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. SCHUMER. Madam President, I rise in opposition to this amendment for one very simple reason. The Senator from Connecticut, Mr. Dodd, the Senator from Florida, Mr. Martinez, have the identical amendment coming up next, but instead of taking the money out of this proposal, it takes the money out of the TARP where it belongs.

This is a proposal related to housing, related to the economic crisis. This week the President will announce a TARP proposal, where he will send to us a letter, where $50 to $100 billion will be used for housing. The amendment of the Senator from Connecticut will do that.

I ask my colleagues, if this is a worthy cause, which it is, would we rather take the money out of this proposal--where we are fighting for every nickel? We have different views. Some want more tax cuts, some want more spending--when we can take it out of the TARP where the money otherwise would go to the large banks and others. And we are not happy with where the money went.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT


Source
arrow_upward