Legislative Program

Floor Speech

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Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for that information. He mentions that we will be considering some bills under suspension, as is normal, and two bills, H.R. 836 and H.R. 830, presumably under a rule.

I ask the gentleman, will those be open rules? And before I yield to him for his response, I want to say that I want to congratulate the gentleman on the process that we considered H.R. 1. While those of us on this side did not ultimately support H.R. 1, I know that the Speaker and the leader are both pleased with the openness and transparency of the process. There was a preprinting requirement, of course, so it wasn't a totally open rule in that sense. But does the gentleman expect there to be open rules on H.R. 836 and H.R. 830?

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Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman. Let me say to the gentleman in terms of a constructive discussion that we might have, and I happen to believe that the preprinting requirement is a positive requirement in that it gives notice to people. One of the things, as we know, that it requires, however, is the printing of amendments prior to the time you know the status of the bill at the time you might offer the amendment. I suggest that perhaps we have discussions about how to take into consideration the process where you preprint an amendment, prior to getting to your amendment something is changed by a previous amendment that might require a modification of your amendment in terms of an understanding on both sides that perhaps we would accommodate, either by unanimous consent or some other process, that change.

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Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman.

The current CR, as the gentleman knows, expires March 18 that we passed earlier this week, the Senate passed, the President has now signed. Can I ask the gentleman his thoughts on going forward what we might be expecting with respect to funding government from March 19 through September 30 for the balance of the fiscal year?

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Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for explaining my proposition, but if I might clarify a little more, what the gentleman has said, the way you get to $100 billion is counting that $41 billion that you say is the status quo and adding $60 billion, or $61 billion to it, to get to $102 billion, or a little short of that. My point clearly is that the gentleman and his side of the aisle have clearly counted the $41 billion that he says is the status quo.

The reason he has done so is because, he said, during the course of the campaign, and others said during the course of the campaign, they were to cut $100 billion. In fact, as I recall, the Speaker and yourself and other leaders made the point during the course of your initial consideration and the offer that was initially made to your conference, that, in fact, the $41 billion was, in fact, a cut from the President's request of $41 billion.

We agree with that, but we now believe that your side is saying, oh, no, that doesn't count, notwithstanding the fact it is $41 billion less than the President requested and you counted that $41 billion less as part of the $100 billion you represented was part of the cuts that you had said you were going to make and that you, in fact, made.

So my point is, as the gentleman has pointed out, that your $60 billion, by your side's argument of cutting $100 billion, only gets to $100 billion because you are counting the $41 billion, which we have cut. Now I say that for this reason: You made the $100 billion pledge prior to December. You made it prior to the election. Then we, in fact, cut from the figure you were using as the base, the 2011 base of the President's request, we cut $41 billion by freezing at 2010 levels.

Now, very frankly, my point to you is, as I am sure you know, that we have already come $41 billion, which means 41 percent of the way to where you wanted to get. We continue to want to discuss this matter. Hopefully we can move together and come to a compromise figure.

I know the gentleman has not served on the Appropriations Committee. He serves on the tax writing committee. But in the Appropriations Committee, we found an ability to come together and make agreement. I am hopeful that we can do the same. But I think it unfair and incorrect, frankly, not to count $41 billion because we are now starting at 2010 levels as opposed to the level that you started at and we started at, which was the President's 2011 request, and both of us have come that $41 billion, and the issue is how much further we are going to go.

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Mr. HOYER. If that's the status quo, then I suggest to the gentleman he is not going to get to $100 billion, which he represented and his side represents they want to get to. We will see whether or not they are prepared to

do that. But I will tell my friend, if that's the position, then I think we will not be able to reach agreement because there appears to be no ability to compromise in that context.

The gentleman counted the $41 billion during the course of the campaign. The gentleman counted that $41 billion when he made a representation to his caucus as to why you were offering a $32 billion cut because, together, given the fact that it was halfway through the year, that that would, in fact, be tantamount to. But again, in each one of those instances, the gentleman counted the $41 billion. He is now saying, oh, no, that is the status quo.

Does the gentleman know of any budget that President Bush signed in '01, '02, '03, '04, '05, and '06 that maintained either the status quo or cut below the so-called status quo, when your side was in charge of both the House and the Senate and the Presidency?

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Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman.

I would simply suggest to the gentleman and hope that we can work together, as the gentleman suggests, come to resolution for the balance of the fiscal year.

The gentleman has made a number of comments in the past, with which I agree, that uncertainty undermines the economy. A quote that the gentleman said on the floor last year: Working families and businesses remain gripped by economic uncertainty, and to this day Washington has only made the problem worse. If we want to cut into the 9.8 percent unemployment, Mr. Chairman, we have to instill confidence in the economy and begin to foster an environment for job creation.

I suggest to the gentleman we will not do that until we come to an agreement. Both sides need to work toward that end. I agree with the gentleman on that. I am hopeful that the Senate will, in fact, make a suggestion in the near term; I mean, hopefully, in hours and a few days rather than weeks.

The 18th will be on us, as you know, very soon. If we don't reach an agreement by next Thursday, in my opinion, we will not be able to get the paperwork done to get a bill ready to pass by Friday the 18th, 2 weeks from tomorrow.

I think that will be unfortunate and will lead to uncertainty and disruption, both in the public sector and in the private sector.

Let me ask you one more question on the issue of compromises. Assuming the Senate makes an offer and assuming it passes an offer or reaches an agreement, when it comes back, will there be any hearings on the proposed cuts and the ramifications of those cuts?

I yield to the gentleman.

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Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for that answer.

The reason I ask that question, however, I don't know whether the gentleman had an opportunity to read a column in The New York Times by David Brooks, a relatively conservative columnist in The New York Times, as the gentleman knows, in which he wrote a column called, ``The New Normal,'' and in paragraph 4 in which he stated, ``In Washington, the Republicans who designed the cuts''--which are included in H.R. 1--``for this fiscal year seemed to have done no serious policy evaluation.''

He goes on about four paragraphs later to say, referring to his austerity principle--there are three austerity principles that he propounds. He said, ``Never cut without an evaluation process.''

I think that we need cuts. I've said that. The gentleman said that. We are proceeding. In fact, we have done some of those and we have agreement on some of those, as the gentleman knows. But there were no hearings. That's why Mr. Brooks says that they seem to have done no serious policy evaluation of those cuts. That's why I asked that question. But I understand the gentleman's answer.

I will bring this to a close. We have some concerns by the fact that a number of economists, a large number of economists, have expressed concern about the economic ramifications of some of the cuts and the magnitude of the cuts that are included.

As you know, Ben Bernanke indicated that this spending plan could cost a couple of hundred thousand jobs, a number he called ``not trivial.'' And according to Goldman Sachs, we might adversely affect GDP by 1.5 to 2 percentage points in the second and third quarters compared with current law or as the gentleman refers to, the status quo.

I ask the gentleman: Is that of concern to you or do you believe that those evaluations are incorrect?

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Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman for his comment.

And certainly, I agree with him that we need to deal with the deficit. As the gentleman knows, I've been pretty vocal about that and indicated that we need to look at the whole spectrum of spending. Focusing on 14 percent of the budget will not get us there. I think the gentleman probably agrees with that proposition. I know the chairman of the Budget Committee agrees with that proposition. I may not agree with the chairman of the Budget Committee on how he wants to get there, but I think we do agree that we have to look at all of the spending that we do, and that bringing down the deficit is of critical consequence.

Let me say to the gentleman, however, when he speaks about jobs, as he knows, we lost 3.8 million jobs in 2008, the last year of the Bush administration. The last

year of the Obama administration, the last 12 months, we have gained 1.1 million private sector jobs. So when the gentleman says that the Recovery Act did not have the effect that the administration hoped for, he is correct. We went up above the 8 percent unemployment. But the gentleman, I'm sure, knows that during the last 12 months we have gained jobs on an average of 569,000 over the last 5 months, so half a million jobs.

Is that enough? It's not. Frankly, we are going to have to be at 300,000 or 400,000 per month to overcome the number of jobs that were lost prior to or during the recession which started, of course, in 2007.

So I want to agree with the gentleman and hope that we can work together on looking at the entire challenge that confronts us in bringing this deficit down. But I tell my friend to continually focus, as the gentleman has been doing in this colloquy and in other colloquies, on simply the discretionary spending, non-defense and non-security spending, while we certainly need to cut fraud, waste, and abuse, cut duplication and make government simpler and more accessible and more cost effective for the American people, we also need to be, as you said, honest with the American people that if you cut out every penny of the portion of the budget at which you are looking, we will not solve the deficit problem.

So I say to my friend, I will look forward to working with him. Our side looks forward to working with him and his side. I have had discussions--I see Mr. Dreier on the floor. We need to work together on this issue because the gentleman is correct; it is a critical area.

Unless the gentleman wants more time, I will yield back.

I yield to the gentleman.

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Mr. HOYER. I thank the gentleman.

Just in concluding on that, the administration did, of course, appoint a commission, Mr. Bowles and Senator Simpson, which did, in fact, look at the spectrum of spending and made some very substantive recommendations. The administration has commended those recommendations to us for consideration.

But the administration also said that we need to make sure that we invest in growing our economy if we expect to bring the deficit down, investing in the education of our children, investing in our infrastructure, investing in innovation and invention. I agree with the administration on that. I think we need to be very careful that we pay attention to both the investments and to the reduction of the deficits.

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