Providing For Consideration Of H.R. 2996, Department Of The Interior, Environment, And Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2010
Floor Speech
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Ms. FOXX. I yield myself 3 1/2 minutes. I appreciate my colleague yielding time and, like my colleague from Colorado, I feel extremely fortunate to live where I live in my district--I think the most beautiful area of this country.
But, Madam Speaker, the underlying bill we have here today, the Interior Appropriations Act, that most of my colleagues on both sides of the aisle are being denied the ability to offer amendments to, is filled with wasteful spending. The bill itself is a 17 percent overall increase in funding from last year's bill, and most programs are increased not only above the 2009 levels, but also above the levels the President requested.
This does not reflect the hard economic times our country and our constituents are experiencing right now and is instead spending borrowed money that we do not have.
This bill contains an astounding 38 percent increase in funding for the Environmental Protection Agency. When combined with stimulus funding approved earlier this Congress, which I did not support, the EPA will receive more than $25 billion in a single calendar year, which is the equivalent of three-quarters of the entire Interior Appropriations Act we have before us.
This kind of excessive spending does not reflect but it mocks the economic challenges our constituents are experiencing.
The money that Speaker Pelosi and the Obama administration want to spend today is all borrowed money. We do not have this money. Our constituents do not have this money. And the Federal Government does not have this money.
The Democrat leaders have made the irresponsible decision to borrow in order to spend it at their whim. This bill will increase the deficit even more by borrowing and spending money we don't have.
We can no longer blame the deficit and economic difficulties today on the previous administration because the Democrat leaders are continuing to dig America into a bigger and bigger hole with more reckless spending.
This borrowed money is all being spent by Speaker Pelosi and the Obama administration and, as a result, the unemployment rate continues to rise and the deficit continues to rise also.
This bill contains also several hundred earmarks. The earmark system is flawed. And we know that even some of the earmarks in this bill have had questions raised about them.
This legislation contains several giveaways for and preferential treatment to green companies in order to promote the green climate. This bill applies Davis-Bacon, which will create wasteful spending that we do not need to have.
Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote against this rule in order to allow this body to appropriately and adequately offer their ideas and engage in the debate that our constituents deserve.
I reserve the balance of my time.
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Ms. FOXX. Madam Speaker, I love our national parks. My husband and I visit them whenever possible because we believe that they are crown jewels in our environment in this country. But by putting this and future generations further into debt, we are making it less likely that the population of this country is going to be able to visit these wonderful national parks.
I offered an amendment yesterday in the Rules Committee that was intended to save taxpayer money that was also not made in order; so we will not be debating it on the floor of the House today, much to my disappointment and all of our constituents' detriment. My amendment was a commonsense amendment to H.R. 2996, the fiscal year 2010 Interior Appropriations Act. It would save taxpayers $10 million by eliminating proposed funding for local climate change grants.
During a time when families across America are making sacrifices in order to keep food on their tables, Congress should be finding ways to reduce unnecessary spending. My amendment would have taken a small step in the right direction by removing $10 million in taxpayer funds for local groups to come up with ambiguous projects to counter climate change.
The Federal Government has increasingly entrenched the American people in trillions of dollars of debt. It is irresponsible and negligent to continue spending Federal taxpayer funds on frivolous projects that should be funded locally such as the one that I tried to take the money from. Unfortunately, in blocking debate on my amendment, the majority did not side with the taxpayers to eliminate this wasteful grant project. Instead, the majority has worked to frivolously and unnecessarily spend the public's money without listening to any of their input or ideas.
Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
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Ms. FOXX. Madam Speaker, as my colleagues have spoken so eloquently before me about the process by which this rule has been brought to the floor by the majority, I want to talk again about what's wrong with this closed process.
Never before in the history of this Congress have we seen this kind of action by the majority party. As my colleagues have expressed during today's debate on this rule, as well as the past two appropriations debates, bringing appropriations bills to the floor under a closed rule is unprecedented. It's very important that the American people understand that. It does an injustice to both Democrats and Republicans who want to have the opportunity to offer amendments and participate in debate with their colleagues over pressing issues of our time.
By choosing to operate in this way, the majority has cut off the minority and their own Democrat colleagues from having any input in the legislative process. By choosing to stifle debate, the Democrats in charge have denied their colleagues on both sides of the aisle the ability to do the job that they have been elected to do. That job is to offer ideas that represent and serve their constituents. The Democrats are denying Members the ability to offer improvements to legislation, and this is an injustice to our colleagues on both sides of the aisle.
Article I, section 9 of the Constitution places the responsibility to spend the people's money in our hands as Members of Congress. This is a great responsibility given only to this congressional body with the expectation that we will engage in rigorous debate over how to best appropriate taxpayer funds. However, the majority has chosen to refuse Members any participation in this decisionmaking and instead has anointed itself as the sole appropriators in this legislative body. The Democrats in charge are limiting what ideas can be debated on the floor and what constituents can be adequately represented in this House.
Our constituents in both Republican districts and Democrat districts are
struggling to make ends meet, are facing unemployment, and yet are simultaneously being shut out of participating in a debate of how their hard-earned taxpayer dollars are being spent by the Federal Government.
Why is the majority blocking debate on such an important legislation? Are they afraid of debate? Are they protecting their Members from tough votes? Are they afraid of the democratic process?
After promising to make this Congress the most open and honest in history, Speaker Pelosi has time and time again worked to shut out both Republicans and Democrats from participating in debate and taking part in the legislative process. And I would like to give one quote from the Speaker when she was trying desperately to take control of this House. This is her quote:
``Bills should generally come to the floor under a procedure that allows open, full, and fair debate, consisting of a full amendment process that grants the minority the right to offer its alternatives, including a substitute.''
This is exactly the opposite of what the Speaker is doing. Why is she going back on her word? Is she afraid that the American people will disagree with her? Is she keeping other Democrats from having to make tough decisions on difficult votes? Is she afraid of democracy, the very principle upon which our country was founded?
Madam Speaker, it's very concerning to me that the Democrats in charge have chosen to silence the minority yet again. In doing so, they have chosen to keep the millions of constituents the minority represents from having a voice on the floor of the people's House.
Several of my colleagues, both Republicans and Democrats, offered amendments to the Rules Committee, amendments which were arbitrarily not made in order by the majority.
These amendments included asserting Second Amendment rights on Federal lands, protecting private property rights, preventing excessive regulation of greenhouse gases, eliminating excessive earmark spending across the Nation, increasing our ability to produce energy domestically, and cutting unnecessary funds in order to save our constituents money.
The list goes on and on, but these amendments will not be heard on this floor because, for some reason, the majority is afraid of allowing debate on these topics.
And we fear it's going to get even worse because they are working very hard to bring to the floor a bill on climate change. They stopped calling it global warming and now are calling it climate change.
This bill, H.R. 2454, is a $646 billion tax that will hit every American family, small business and family farm. Speaker Pelosi's answer to the country's worst recession in decades is a national energy tax that will lead to higher taxes and more job losses for rural America and small businesses.
It will shift jobs to China and India. The bill will result in an enormous loss of jobs that would ensue when U.S. industries are unable to absorb the cost of the national energy tax and other provisions, like sending jobs overseas. There is little debate that the tax would outsource millions of manufacturing jobs to countries such as China and India. According to the independent Charles River Associates International, H.R. 2454 would result in a net reduction in U.S. employment of 2.3 million to 2.7 million jobs each year of the policy through 2030.
Higher gas prices. The American Petroleum Institute reports that the cost impacts of H.R. 2454 could be as much as 77 cents per gallon for gasoline, 83 cents per gallon of jet fuel, and 88 cents for diesel fuel.
The Heritage Foundation has estimated that as a result of these increased prices, the average household will cut consumption of gasoline by 15 percent, but forcing a family of four to pay at least $600 more in 2012. It's going to be a huge impact.
It's also going to unfairly target rural America. Rural residents spend 58 percent more on fuel and travel 25 percent farther to get to work than Americans living in urban areas.
Farm income would drop as a result of H.R. 2454, according to a Heritage Foundation study, $8 billion in 2012, $25 billion in 2024, and over $50 billion in 2035; decreases of 28 percent, 60 percent, and 94 percent, respectively.
More importantly, 25 percent of U.S. farm cash receipts come from agricultural imports. U.S. farmers would be at a severe disadvantage compared to farmers and nations which do not have a cap-and-tax system and correspondingly high input costs. Over 100 State and agricultural groups oppose the cap-and-tax bill.
Madam Speaker, what it appears is happening here in this House is nothing less than a tremendous power grab and an attempt to control every aspect of our lives.
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Ms. FOXX. Madam Speaker, my colleague from Colorado a moment ago said this bill is going to create jobs. I love that old saying, ``Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.''
I wonder if this bill is going to create jobs like the stimulus package has created jobs since our unemployment has gone up significantly since the stimulus package was passed. I would also like to point out that Spain, which counted on having so many jobs from green issues, has the highest unemployment rate in Europe right now.
Madam Speaker, I am going to urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on the previous question so that I can amend the rule to allow all Members of Congress the opportunity to offer his or her amendment to the Interior Appropriations bill under an open rule.
Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the amendment and extraneous material be placed in the Record prior to the vote on the previous question.
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