Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Act, 2015
Floor Speech
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Mr. GOSAR. I thank the chairman for yielding.
Mr. Chairman, I rise today to thank Chairman Crenshaw and, indeed, Ranking Member Serrano for their leadership and the hard work that they have dedicated to the subcommittee.
I would further like to thank the committee for including in the markup a language request I made during the programmatic request period. The policy I mentioned would preclude the agencies funded by this bill from hiring or contracting with outside organizations for the purpose of teaching the employees of those agencies how to support or defeat legislation being considered here in Congress.
I first learned of this practice when reviewing Senator Tom Coburn's annual Wastebook and found that NASA and other agencies had multimillion-dollar contracts out so that their employees could learn more about Congress and the legislative process.
Though I appreciate anyone's interest in Congress and the processes involved with conducting legislative business, I do not find this a prudent use of taxpayer money. So today I humbly request that, in any conference committee proceedings between the House and Senate, the chairman push to include such language in the government-wide provisions title of any final bill that would be voted upon by both Chambers rather than limiting this policy to those agencies funded directly by this bill.
It is important to me and to my constituents that Congress does not appropriate any money to Federal agencies so that those Federal agencies can use the money to pay outside organizations to teach agency personnel to support or defeat legislation before Congress or so that they may learn about the legislative process.
There are endless no-cost resources available on legislative process, committee memberships, budget outlays, and the like. My office has taken meetings with representatives from many agencies, and during those meetings, those agency representatives are free to ask about the legislative process. It should not take multimillion-dollar contracts and symposiums to achieve these ends.
Again, I thank the chairman and the ranking member for their work and their consideration of this request.
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Mr. GOSAR. Mr. Chairman, I rise today to offer a simple but important amendment which will save taxpayer money and demand accountability for one of the Federal Government's most invasive and rogue agencies--the IRS.
This amendment reduces overall appropriations in the bill for the Internal Revenue Service by approximately 3 percent and brings funding for the IRS down to the FY 2007 appropriations. Current funding is between 2007 and 2008 levels. Additionally, my amendment still allows for more than $10.5 billion to go to the IRS. In this time during which we have over $7 trillion in debt and a deficit this year exceeding $500 billion, this is a modest reduction at best. Again, this amendment only makes a 3 percent reduction to bring the appropriations in line with the 2007 appropriations.
More directly than the financial condition of the country is the fact that this agency has shown contempt for the American taxpayer. It has ignored Congress and ignored subpoenas. It has stonewalled. It has destroyed evidence. It has lied. It has abused its powers and targeted honest Americans for exercising their political beliefs. The list of scandals and examples of mismanagement within the IRS seems to grow every day. This agency, which aggressively pursues American citizens it believes deserve extra scrutiny, must understand that the IRS is, first and foremost, accountable to the American people, not the other way around.
John Adams said that facts are stubborn things. In April, this body held former IRS Commissioner Lois Lerner in contempt of Congress for her role and testimony in relation to the IRS' targeting of conservative groups. Ms. Lerner acted with reckless disregard for the constitutional rights of United States citizens while working at the IRS, and she must be held accountable. The blatant disregard of basic liberties and the use of a government agency to harass, target, intimidate, and threaten lawful, honest citizens was the worst form of authoritarianism.
President Obama erroneously claimed that there isn't even a ``smidgen of corruption'' in the IRS targeting scandal, and yet a trail of emails proves otherwise. Further, Ms. Lerner is still refusing to testify on the grounds that she fears criminal prosecution. She should. She lied to Congress. She abused her position. She violated the rights of Americans. She tried to harm the electoral process and intimidate voters.
Getting the truth and demanding accountability from President Obama's IRS should not be too much to ask for. Yet officials in this administration continue to offer excuses and half-truths for what has developed into a disturbing trend of waste, fraud, and abuse. Tax information about the President's political opponents has been leaked, Americans were targeted for their political beliefs, and senior executives were given bonuses for their work. Waste and inefficiency have plagued the agency for years. The Treasury inspector general has reported the IRS has been wasting upwards of $15 billion a year--yes, that is 15 billion with a ``b''--more than $140 billion since 2003, due to its failure to comply with Federal law to curb improper payments.
Democrats and Republicans across the country have been demanding that Congress do something other than hold hearing after hearing about the problems at the IRS. This amendment does something that Congress has the complete power to do--it uses the power of the purse. As you know, we don't have a lot of other options, but we do know that the IRS scandal is one of the most serious scandals ever engaged in by any administration.
How can the American people trust the Federal Government to use their tax dollars efficiently when the agency tasked with collecting them squanders billions before they can even be appropriated?
This amendment simply brings IRS funding to the 2007 levels. The IRS must prove that it can be trusted with the hard-earned tax dollars of the American people before it asks Congress to increase its budget.
If you disapprove of the IRS' targeting of conservative groups for their political beliefs, then support my amendment. If you disapprove of the IRS' ignoring of congressional subpoenas, then support my amendment. If you disapprove of this agency's stonewalling of Congress, destroying evidence, and lying to the American people, then support my amendment.
I thank the chairman and the ranking member for their continued work on the committee.
With that, I reserve the balance of my time.
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Mr. GOSAR. Mr. Chairman, I rise today to offer an amendment to the Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Act for the fiscal year 2015.
My amendment is simple. It transfers resources from the General Services Administration, also known as GSA, to the U.S. Court of Appeals, the U.S. district courts, our Nation's bankruptcy courts, and other related judicial programs.
Specifically, it gives the U.S. court system an additional $42 million, and it comes directly from the wasteful spending within the GSA. The $42 million transfer to the courts will put their budget in line with the budget request for fiscal year '15.
Let me say that I have taken issue with government waste since my very first days in Congress. I knew it was bad, but I did not fully comprehend how bad things were until I actually got here and started to get my hands dirty while digging around for waste, fraud, and abuse.
I take particular issue with the GSA. The mission of the GSA is to ``deliver the best value in real estate, acquisition, and technology services to government and the American people.''
Given the major GSA scandal involving wasting hundreds of thousands of dollars on conferences with clowns and fortunetellers and on YouTube rap videos, it is clear employees within this agency have lost sight of this mission.
Furthermore, by our government's own estimates, there may be 77,000 empty or underutilized buildings across the country. The Office of Management and Budget estimates these buildings could be wasting hard-earned taxpayer dollars at a rate of up to $1.7 billion a year--yes, $1.7 billion. That is astonishing.
We are even spending money on buildings that are completely empty because the grass needs mowing, the pipes must be maintained, the fences surrounding the buildings must be checked and repaired, and the list goes on and on.
Again, I truly appreciate and applaud the excellent work the committee has done on this bill. It is a particularly tough one to craft this year in the wake of the IRS scandals and others.
I do take issue with any increase whatsoever to GSA's budget for rental of space. We are wasting billions on empty buildings, and we are worried about billions in rental agreements--$5.5 billion in rental agreements.
I would also like to note that the amount proposed in the underlying bill is over $700 million more than the entire court system of the United States. We are talking the Supreme Court, appellate courts, circuit courts, bankruptcy courts, and other Justice offices and initiatives.
They are the third branch of government, and their budget is still $700 million less than the money spent on rental agreements.
The judiciary enforces the rule of law, and it administers justice in a fair and impartial manner. In fact, it is our justice system that is possibly America's most attractive component to others around the world that yearn to be free and have a fair day in court, those who yearn for rights under the law.
So, you see, there is something wrong with this disproportionate appropriation. One is for billions in waste, while the courts struggle with a steady rise in their caseload. Again, we are spending more than $700 million more on rent space than our courts, and we are wasting nearly $2 billion a year on buildings being empty or underutilized.
At this point, this amendment should speak for itself. We are wasting billions on rent when we have empty spaces all over the place. We must either sell the empty buildings or cut GSA's rental of space budget. I urge my colleagues to vote in favor of my commonsense amendment.
I thank the chairman and ranking member for their continued leadership on the committee, and with that, I yield back the balance of my time.
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Mr. GOSAR. Mr. Chairman, I rise today to offer a simple, but important, amendment, which will redirect resources in the bill to important entrepreneurial development programs with the SBA.
Specifically, the amendment reduces a $3.8 million increase, above the fiscal year 2014 level, that was slated to go towards administration and bureaucracy. Instead, the amendment prioritizes spending and redirects those funds to important programs that actually help small businesses, like the HUBZone program, Small Business Development Centers, SCORE, women's business centers, the State and trade export promotion, Native American outreach, and veterans business outreach centers.
If programs with the SBA are going to get an increase above fiscal year 2014 levels, it should be for worthwhile SBA programs, not bureaucracy.
Small businesses are the backbone of our economy and create on average seven out of every 10 new jobs. The SBA needs to continue to support worthwhile efforts that foster economic growth. The entrepreneurial development programs within the SBA do exactly that.
In 2013, Small Business Development Centers helped nearly 15,000 entrepreneurs start businesses, providing counseling for nearly 65,000 others. SBDCs assist more than 530,000 clients annually and are a critical program for creating jobs and helping small businesses grow.
In 2013, the SCORE program assisted with the creation of nearly 70,000 new jobs. The program provided important services that helped open the doors of nearly 40,000 businesses.
I could go on about several other of the entrepreneurial development programs, but I think you get my point, so in the interest of time I will not.
I will discuss, however, the offset of this amendment. The committee was critical of the Small Business Administration in the committee report accompanying this bill.
I would like to quickly read a few excerpts from that report:
The committee believes the SBA should especially focus on these ``true'' small businesses and less on larger businesses in ``high-growth'' areas that have more capacity and access to capital.
The committee remains concerned about the quality of lender oversight at SBA. SBA's loan programs depend on an array of outside parties to be executed.
In fiscal year 2011, the SBA Office of Inspector General (OIG) found that more than half of the loan dollars guaranteed by the SBA were made using delegated authorities with limited oversight.
In an OIG report released June 6, 2014, the OIG found that the SBA's Loan Guarantee Processing Center (LGPC) ``emphasized quantity over quality for 7(a) loan reviews,''and loan specialists were not provided adequate guidance and training to conduct 7(a) loan review assignments.
The committee has consistently provided SBA with robust resources and expects the SBA to appropriately fund the LGPC in order to provide a thorough review of all loans made by the center. SBA loans made without an effective review process leaves taxpayers on the hook for any defaults. The committee expects SBA to adopt the recommendations included in the OIG report and will continue to monitor the SBA's progress in this area.
I ask my colleagues to support my commonsense amendment, and I thank the chairman and ranking member for their continued work on the committee.
With that, I yield to the gentleman from Florida, the chairman.
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