Providing for Consideration of Senate Amendment to House Amendment to Senate Amendment to H.R. 1586, Education Jobs and Medicaid Assistance Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. McGOVERN. I thank the gentleman for yielding, and I rise in support of the rule and the underlying bill.

Madam Speaker, our communities are struggling. Forty-seven States are facing budget shortfalls, and at least 34 States will cut both jobs and services in this fiscal year unless there's an additional 6-month extension of the FMAP program.

All of us are hearing from our Governors. In June, a bipartisan group of Governors wrote to Congress pleading for an extension of FMAP money because they believe it is the most efficient way to avoid further layoffs and health care cuts that will slow the recovery. At a time when States like Massachusetts are starting to see unemployment rates decrease, now is not the time to pull the rug from under them.

If we were to fail our States and not enact this extension, 2,900 teaching, police, and firefighter jobs in Massachusetts would be at risk. What would that mean for classroom size, cops on the streets, and firefighter response? To put it mildly, it wouldn't be good.

This is exactly the type of Nation-building we should be focusing on here at home, and I wish that my friends on the other side of the aisle and the other

Chamber could realize that.

It is important to note that this bill is not only essential; it is paid for. In fact, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office finds that this bill will cut the deficit by $1.4 billion over the next decade. If only the Bush tax cuts for the rich, the Medicare prescription drug benefit, or the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were paid for we would not be facing the deficit issues we are today. So we don't need any lectures by Republicans about deficits. They created this mess that we're in, and Democrats once again have the responsibility of cleaning it up. They should be ashamed of what they did to this economy.

Madam Speaker, I would be remiss if I didn't express my deep concern with one of the offsets in this bill. Specifically, I think it is just plain awful that the Senate has sent us a bill that cuts future funding for the SNAP program, formerly known as food stamps.

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act rightfully included significant funding for SNAP. Economists from the right and the left argue that SNAP is the most effective stimulus available today, and we rightfully included funding for increased SNAP benefits in the Recovery Act; yet, the Senate has included a cut in these SNAP benefits that will result in $59 less per month for a family of four starting in 2014.

The choice then is to provide critical aid to the States and protect jobs for teachers, firefighters, and police officers today or protect future benefits for those hungry Americans who struggle to put food on their tables. It is not a choice that we should be forced to make.

It frustrates me to no end, and quite frankly, I'm outraged, that this is one of the offsets. I would ask my friends in the Senate: Why do the most vulnerable in our country always have to pay more than their fair share? This practice of robbing Peter to pay Paul must come to an end. Yet here we are.

Madam Speaker, I will support this bill because it will help the people of Massachusetts and the people of this country. This bill will do good things, and it will do them immediately, but I'm casting this vote because we have time to fix the SNAP issue in the future. I continue to believe that we can properly fund the SNAP program, as well as other domestic anti-hunger programs and ensure that no person in America goes hungry. And by not dealing with the issue of hunger more aggressively, we are not saving money, Madam Speaker. We are costing the country much more in terms of everything from increased health care costs to lost productivity. I believe that in the richest, most powerful Nation in the world people shouldn't go hungry. Millions of our fellow citizens sadly don't have enough to eat, and that, quite frankly, is a national disgrace.

Let's approve this bill. Let's help keep teachers in the classrooms, cops on the streets, and more firefighters in our cities and towns, and then when we come back after recess, let's do what's right and restore the SNAP cuts. Let's find another offset that doesn't make a bad situation worse. For America's hungry and food insecure, let's for once make them a priority.

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