Providing for Consideration of H.R. 4089, Sportsmen's Heritage Act of 2012, and for Other Purposes

Floor Speech

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Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. I thank the gentlewoman for yielding, and I rise in support of her point of order.

All this talk of ``deeming and passing,'' those words mean nothing to the American people, but the vote we are about to take means a lot.

What Republicans are trying to do is to jam through the Republican budget and pretend that it's the law of the land. They have to play these games because last year the American people rejected this budget the first time around. But instead of doing some soul-searching and offering a bill that reflects the true priorities of this Nation, the Republicans have doubled down, and the results are truly astonishing.

As has been mentioned, this budget ends the Medicare guarantee while raising health costs for seniors who have an average income of just $19,000 a year. It increases defense spending while placing a cap on food assistance and cutting Medicaid. It gives the average multi-millionaire--listen to this--a tax break of $394,000 while raising taxes on the middle class. It protects subsidies for oil companies and corporations that ship jobs overseas while slashing investments that create jobs and rebuild the middle class. The cuts are so severe that if their policies are carried out, by 2050 there is almost nothing left of discretionary spending but defense. As the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities has said, most of the rest of the government will simply ``cease to exist.''

But it doesn't have to be this way. Yesterday, Republicans in the Senate rejected a perfectly reasonable proposal--that millionaires and billionaires shouldn't pay a lower tax rate than a middle class family does. They should have passed the Buffett rule in the Senate, which would have been an important first step toward addressing our fiscal challenges in a fair way--a way that cuts waste, not opportunity; protects Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid; creates jobs and builds the economy; and asks more from those who can afford it.

This Republican budget is not a serious effort. It's a radical proposal. But I'll give them credit for one thing: at least they're honest in proposing this irresponsible budget.

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