Departments of Commerce, Justice, and State, the Judiciary, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2005

DEPARTMENTS OF COMMERCE, JUSTICE, AND STATE, THE JUDICIARY, AND RELATED AGENCIES APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 2005 -- (House of Representatives - July 07, 2004)

The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to House Resolution 701 and rule XVIII, the Chair declares the House in the Committee of the Whole House on the State of the Union for the consideration of the bill, H.R. 4754.

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Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.

Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to rise in support of the Manzullo-Velazquez amendment to the Commerce, Justice bill. But before I speak to that amendment, I want to commend the very distinguished chair of the committee and the ranking member for their leadership in bringing this bill to the floor.

As one who served many years ago, in my earlier time with the Committee on Appropriations, on this subcommittee, I have an appreciation for the many difficult decisions that you have to make and the great opportunity there is for the American people in this particular appropriations bill.

I also want to take the opportunity to acknowledge the tremendous leadership of the gentleman from Virginia (Chairman WOLF). He knows this, but I want to take a public opportunity to say that there is no person in this House that I admire more than I do the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Wolf). He is a champion for human rights throughout the world, and as one who has spoken out, as with many of our colleagues in the Congressional Black Caucus, on the situation in the Sudan, I want to recognize his exceptional leadership in that regard and say how much we all appreciate your visit, your trip there, and your relentless, persistent advocacy for the underprivileged throughout this world, in this case in particular, in Darfur. I know many of us are eager to hear a report of the gentleman's trip there.

Once again, I thank the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Wolf) for being the great challenge to the conscience that he has been in his service in Congress.

I would like to now address the amendment that is being proposed to improve the small business access to 7(a) loans. As you may know, Mr. Chairman, the SBA 7(a) loan program is the most commonly used Small Business Administration loan, and backs approximately $11 billion in loans to small businesses each year. And yet it has faced shutdown caps and restrictions this year and received no funding under the latest Bush budget and Republican appropriations bill.

The President's budget proposes to run the program solely through fee increases, substantially raising the costs for small businesses to use the program and taking billions of dollars out of the economy.

Democrats, and in this case in a bipartisan way with the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Manzullo), are fighting to adequately fund the 7(a) loan program and make more loans available to small businesses.

We know that small businesses, Mr. Chairman, are the engine of our economy. They account for 95 percent of employers in our country, create half of our gross domestic product and create three out of four new jobs nationwide.

We have a chance today to save the 7(a) program, and I hope that our colleagues will join the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Velázquez) and the gentleman from Illinois (Chairman Manzullo) in supporting the bipartisan amendment. It will provide fuel to our small businesses which run our economic engine.

I would like to again recognize the leadership of the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Velázquez), our ranking Democrat on the Committee on Small Business, and the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Manzullo) for cosponsorship of this amendment.

We are very proud of the service and leadership of the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Velázquez). She is making history in her role as the ranking member on a full committee in the House; and in her service on that committee and in this body she has been a champion for small businesses.

I know she will be joined by the gentlewoman from Oregon (Ms. Hooley) and others from the committee who have worked very hard.

When we had our small business summit in June, small businessowners came from around the country, and access to capital was one of their top priorities. Passing this amendment will go a long way to addressing the need for capital. Capital attracts talent, talent attracts capital, the dynamic goes on and on. And while we want to promote the growth of many, many more jobs in our country, it is important that we do so by creating much more equity for potential businessowners and for current businessowners.

With that, I urge my colleagues to support the Manzullo-Velázquez amendment.

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Ms. VELÁZQUEZ. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Pelosi), the minority leader.

Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Chairman, I will not be using that full amount, but I did want to rise once again to commend the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Velázquez) and the gentleman from Illinois (Chairman Manzullo) for their excellent leadership in bringing this amendment to the floor. I again want to commend the distinguished gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Wolf), chairman of the full committee, for his great leadership in bringing a very important appropriations bill to the floor; and I thank the gentleman from New York (Mr. Serrano) also for moving this section 7(a) provision in full committee. Although he was not successful, his leadership was important to the momentum that we have today. I thank him for his leadership.

Mr. Chairman, I just want to close by saying this one thing: I always say that the only thing more optimistic than starting a new business is getting married. In order to take on the responsibilities of a marriage or a business, a person has to be very entrepreneurial, very optimistic, very confident. There are so many risks involved in starting a small business. At the very least, we should have access to capital so that we can increase the equity, the ownership that the American people have in businesses that do create jobs, that do create capital in our country, which in turn attracts the talent that we need to be internationally competitive.

This is a very important amendment today. It is not to say that the decisions that have to be made to fund it are not difficult; and as I said earlier, I commend the gentleman from Virginia (Chairman Wolf) and the gentleman from New York (Mr. Serrano), ranking member, for the difficult decisions they had to make to bring this Departments of Commerce, Justice, and State, the Judiciary, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act to the floor.

But we have to choose in favor of small businesses in our country if we are going to grow the economy. Small businesses are the engine of the economy. We cannot just talk about supporting small business. We have to put our resources there and give them access to the capital they need to succeed to accompany the great optimistic spirit and entrepreneurial spirit that they bring to the endeavor of starting a new business.

So with that, Mr. Chairman, I urge our colleagues to support this bipartisan Manzullo-Velázquez amendment.