Continuing Appropriations and Border Security Enhancement Act, 2024

Floor Speech

Mr. Speaker, I rise to oppose this continuing resolution. If you cannot agree to the funding levels for 2024 in order to keep government open, you must pass a continuing resolution. A 30 percent slashing of the Federal Government only continues the majority's inability and unwillingness to govern responsibly.

I would argue that you cannot call it a conservative resolution, either. There is nothing conservative about the indiscriminate destruction of public investments in America's families.

Regardless of what it is called, this bill inflicts serious consequences on the American people, whether it is signed into law, which it never will be, or because of the costly shutdown it triggers.

We are less than 48 hours from a government shutdown, and what do we have to show for it?

The American people are tired of the doublespeak coming from the majority. There are House Republicans who have repeatedly assured the public that nobody wants a shutdown, and there are others who tell us they think a shutdown would be a good thing for the country. Maybe they are not worried about a shutdown because they know that Members of Congress will not miss a paycheck.

I can speak for every Democrat in the Congress when I say we oppose this Republican shutdown, a shutdown that will be devastating for our country.

What have the Republicans offered as their effort to avoid a government shutdown? What would this bill do? This bill would slash investments in cancer research, leave communities recovering from natural disasters out to dry, and undercut allies with a $1 billion cut to Israel and further cuts to our support of Ukraine. It defunds law enforcement by 30 percent and makes our communities less safe. It takes food out of the mouths of millions.

This bill raises costs for American families at a time when the cost of living is already too high.

It cuts title I education funding, the bedrock of American public education, to the effect of 150,000 teachers being pulled out of classrooms. Mr. Speaker, 275,000 children would lose access to Head Start, undermining early education and making it harder for parents to work.

In an unprecedented move, the House Republican bill cuts the Low- Income Home Energy Assistance Program, LIHEAP, funding by roughly 74 percent. More than 5 million households will lose their home heating or cooling benefits or have their benefits cut by hundreds of dollars, threatening their ability to heat their homes in winter or cool their homes in summer.

House Republicans are threatening public health by cutting the Food Safety and Inspection Service by 30 percent. Without adequate inspection staff in our meat and poultry plants, these plants will be required to close or reduce their hours. It hurts workers' paychecks, reduces the meat and poultry supply, raises the cost of food for American families, and risks the consumption of contaminated food.

With the cuts in this bill, 400,000 fewer small businesses would be assisted by the Small Business Administration's entrepreneurial development programs. This would have a significant impact on small business owners, especially among veterans, women, and Native American entrepreneurs.

This bill has no future. At best, it is dead on arrival in the Senate and would never be signed by the President of the United States.

Everyone in this room knows that keeping the government operating and passing bills to fully fund the next fiscal year will require bipartisan cooperation. You need the House and the Senate, Democrats and Republicans, to pass appropriations bills. Yet, House Republicans are refusing to work with and negotiate with Democrats.

This is a pointless charade with grave consequences for the American people. House Democrats are ready to work. We were ready in the spring. We were ready last week. We are ready this weekend. We are ready today, tomorrow, and every day to work in good faith with our colleagues on the other side of the aisle to meet the needs of the American people.

Let's get to work, serious work.

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Speaker, I will just take a second to tell the gentleman from Arkansas that, with this bill, you will cut 1,460 teachers from your district and almost 46,000 households will have their low-income energy assistance benefits terminated.

Wasserman Schultz), the distinguished ranking member of the Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies Subcommittee.

Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this so- called CR, which is a MAGA gift basket to far-right extremists.

Let's first address the reality. The gutting cuts in this bill do not continue current funding like we have historically done in continuing resolutions. Instead, this so-called CR slashes cancer and Alzheimer's research, defunds the police, and undercuts allies like Israel and Ukraine.

Republicans claim to care about our borders, but this invites more immigration problems. Instead of giving migrants a path to work and pay taxes, it leaves them to languish in substandard private prisons.

This grab bag of budgetary garbage stands no chance of becoming law and just slingshots into a shutdown in 36 hours, a shutdown that harms everyone, from seniors and servicemembers to this Nation's most vulnerable and its very security. It snarls small-business loans and trade, delays home loans, and could force Federal contractors into layoffs.

It is a MAGA recipe for more chaos and inflation, and my home State of Florida will feel it first. The longer it drags on, the deeper the airport lines will get as TSA agents and air traffic controllers go without pay and passport processing slows down.

Worse, it actually makes our military serve without pay. Don't forget, in the 2019 GOP shutdown, they forced Coast Guard members into food banks. That does not make America stronger.

Instead of making communities less safe and handcuffing FEMA's recovery responsiveness, which this CR does, why don't Republicans join Democrats to fight Big Pharma and keep lowering drug prices like insulin?

Instead of a shutdown that closes Social Security field offices, which this CR does, and takes food from the mouths of children, why won't Republicans join Democrats to bolster education, healthcare, and climate investments like Americans want? Why? Because MAGA extremists don't want to make life better for all Americans. They want to inflict pain on their own leadership, on our government, and on the American people. Why? Because it covers up their lack of an agenda, excites their base, and throws gas on their bonfires of distraction and chaos.

America deserves better than that and so does this institution.

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Speaker, I want to take a few seconds here to let the gentleman from Texas know that the State of Texas will lose almost 14,000 teachers. That is going to be really tough to explain that to families when their children do not have a teacher in the classroom.

In addition to that, almost 77,000 Texans will lose their low-income energy assistance benefits or have those benefits cut. It is going to be a tough time for folks, come the cooler months or the warmer months, to take advantage of this.

I think people need to be mindful of the consequences of a 30 percent cut, or in the case of LIHEAP, a 74 percent cut, that they are proposing today.

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Speaker, I would take a second to tell the gentleman from Ohio that 232,000 people in Ohio will be without low-income energy assistance benefits.

Further, there will be 5,500 teachers who will be pulled out of classrooms, and the families in both instances will suffer while the gentleman talks about issues that are not truly affecting what is happening in the everyday lives of the people that he represents.

Jackson Lee).

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Mr. Speaker, let me take a moment to offer my deepest sympathy to the people of California, her family, and the people of this Nation on the passing of Senator Feinstein.

Mr. Speaker, this is a serious moment in history. This is a serious moment for patriots and persons courageous enough to do the right thing.

I started out this morning by saying it will be the American people that will suffer, but it will be my neighbors in Houston and my fellow Texans.

We have a solution, and I think it should be very clearly stated. What my friends on the other side of the aisle are arguing is chaos and confusion. They are arguing no solution. They are shouting from the top of their lungs to be heard and to generate excitement for social media, but we have a very calm situation.

The Senate has voted 77-19 to put forward a reasoned extension, keeping the funding as it is, making sure our military is being paid, not cutting off women and children from supplemental nutrition--these are infants we are talking about--and taking care of communities, like the firefighters in the West who are suffering after fighting fires and other natural disasters.

They have a CR. It will come here. It has a privileged status. That status will allow us to vote. The government will be open, and then the engagement on issues that are in disagreement or agreement could be worked out.

If we continue this shrill talk and don't reasonably act courageously as patriots to be able to stop the suffering of the American people, we will have 50,000 pounds of cocaine here because we won't have Customs and Border officers.

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding additional time.

Mr. Speaker, we will have 110,000 children--where their parents are going to work--that will have no Head Start slots; 65,000 will not have access to childcare; 60,000 seniors will be robbed of nutrition programs. Then we will have 2.3 million women, infants, and children, as I said, without WIC. No educational dollars, fewer teachers, 4,000 fewer safety inspections, and we will be undermining law enforcement.

So if everyone wants to be shrill, here is a solution. Bring the temperature down, pass the Senate CR, open the doors, and stop these draconian cuts because you are hurting the American people and my fellow Houstonians.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak in opposition to H.R. 5525 Continuing Appropriations and Border Security Enhancement Act, 2024.

The reckless funding proposal included in this bill would painfully impact the lives of millions of Americans by making disastrous cuts to programs that workers and families count on every day.

Mr. Speaker, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle are more focused on introducing unpopular and dangerous funding bills that cut virtually all non-defense discretionary funding by 8 percent than working on a bipartisan solution that could be enacted.

The Republican funding bill is a short-term radical solution and would only keep the government open until October 31, 2023.

This deadline guarantees Congress will need to pass another Continuing Resolution (CR) and means either House Republicans will slash critical resources again at the end of October or the dangerous cuts in this extreme bill will be in place until Congress is able to pass all 12 full-year bills.

In exchange for keeping the government open, House Republicans are:

Slashing investments in the National Institutes of Health (NIH). Medical research into treatments and cures for diseases like cancer, Alzheimer's, and heart disease would be cut with the reduction of 2,000 research grants.

Furthering their goal of eliminating public education by cutting funding for Title I, IDEA, and Head Start. Cuts to Title I and IDEA would be the equivalent of removing more than 40,000 teachers and service providers from classrooms serving low-income students and students with disabilities. And approximately 100,000 children would lose access to Head Start, undermining early education for children in low-income communities and parents' ability to go to work.

Failing to support communities recovering from natural disasters. In the midst of hurricane season and with several response and recovery efforts to major disasters underway, this bill harms FEMA's readiness by failing to address the urgent need for additional Disaster Relief Funds to address existing shortfalls and respond to future unknown disasters.

Cutting border security funding. Despite claims that this bill prioritizes border security, it does the opposite by cutting funding critical to those operations. The bill would ensure disruption and chaos at the border, harm our economy, empower transnational criminal organizations, endanger communities, and put our agents' and officers' lives at risk.

Neglecting our water infrastructure by cutting funds to the Army Corps of Engineers. House Republicans are cutting funds to the Army Corps of Engineers Construction activities by 21 percent. With $444 million slashed from the Corps of Engineers' Construction activities, projects critical to waterway navigation of supply chains, reducing flood and storm damage, or providing ecosystem restoration would freeze.

Taking food out of the mouths of children, families, and seniors. House Republicans are threatening food safety, raising the costs of food, and killing jobs in rural communities by slashing the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) by 11 percent (or $124 million).

Turning their backs on America's small businesses. The Small Business Administration (SBA), Entrepreneurial Development Programs would be cut by 8.1 percent. This means approximately 107,000 fewer small businesses would be assisted. This would have a significant impact on underserved communities such as Veterans, Women, and Native American entrepreneurs.

Slashing resources for the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline and Opioid Use Disorder treatment. The Republican CR cuts funding for the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline by 18 percent. Nearly 1 million people facing a suicidal or mental health crisis would be unable to access support services through the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, and thousands of individuals would be denied admission to opioid use disorder treatment, denying them a potentially life-saving path to recovery.

Mr. Speaker, their unrealistic proposals almost guarantee that our government will shut down tomorrow at midnight.

A Republican government shutdown would hurt hard working families in Texas:

172,877 active duty and reserve personnel serving our nation's armed forces in Texas would be forced to go without the pay they earn during a shutdown.

The Small Business Administration would stop processing small business loans, halting a program that provides $2,742,702,800 in funding to small businesses in Texas every year.

176,276 people flying through Texas airports every day would face potential delays and safety concerns due to staffing impacts on TSA agents and air traffic controllers.

786,686 people in Texas would soon lose access to Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) benefits.

168,4l3 federal workers in Texas would be furloughed or forced to work without pay, in addition to the many employees of businesses with government contracts who could be laid off, furloughed, or see their hours cut.

Workers at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) would be sidelined, risking interruptions and delays to the 892 food safety, pharmaceutical manufacturing, and other inspections conducted in Texas last year.

The Department of Agriculture would be forced to stop processing housing loans, which provide $456,125,359 in funding to help 2,742 families in rural Texas communities buy homes every year.

The Department of Agriculture would be forced to stop processing farm loans which provide $209,391,000 in funding for farmers in Texas every year.

3,291,584 Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) beneficiaries in Texas would lose access to benefits in a prolonged shutdown.

5,4l3,161 people who visit national parks in Texas every year would be turned away or unable to fully access parks, monuments, and museums.

State governments would be forced to pay for federal services like the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program, potentially risking benefits for the 20,846 TANF beneficiaries in Texas.

Mr. Speaker, I urge all my colleagues to oppose H.R. 5525 as its passage would be detrimental to lives of millions of Americans.

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Speaker, I find it hard to believe that the gentleman from Texas believes that wasteful spending is on teachers who really teach our youngsters, and 14,000 of them will be gone in the State of Texas.

I find it hard to believe that it is wasteful spending to deal with 77,000 people who will lose their LIHEAP benefits. Is that wasteful spending, for people to have heat or be cooled or kids being taught in school?

Let's talk about wasteful spending and the tax cuts my colleagues on the other side of the aisle are willing to give the richest one-tenth of 1 percent of the people in this country and the richest corporations, and tax cheats, I might add, as well.

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Speaker, to both of the gentlemen from Florida, 8,500 teachers, gone. Think about the kids who are going to school and there is no teacher for them. Think about folks who need to heat or cool their homes. We are looking at 36,000 households that will be without those benefits.

Do they really care about those folks? Probably not.

As a Democrat, I took the lead on the infant formula crisis--I don't know where my colleague was during that crisis--and called to attention a company that knowingly sold tainted product and wound up killing three or four people. I don't know where he was during that. I know where I was, and I know where the administration was.

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Speaker, I remind the gentleman from Arizona that there will be 63,000 households in Arizona that will be without the low-income energy assistance benefits. These are not just numbers. These are people, and we are making their lives more difficult at a time when there is serious inflation and when there is, in fact, a high cost of living.

My colleagues on the other side of the aisle are only adding and increasing to that high cost of living.

I might also remind the gentleman from Arizona that we are looking at about 2,800 teachers.

Now, again, these are not just numbers. Children go to school. If there is no teacher to teach them, what is the result? What happens to parents when they find out that their child's teacher is gone? If there was a teaching shortage before, this will make it even worse. That is the result of the cuts that my colleagues on the other side of the aisle want to make. It is there. It is in black and white. You can't make up the numbers.

Tlaib).

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Speaker, I remind the gentleman from Texas that the eyes of the people of Texas are upon you when you are thinking about really 77,000 seniors and kids without any benefits from the low-income energy assistance program and also 14,000 teachers will be gone from Texas schools.

Clarke).

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Ms. DeLAURO. Clarke).

Ms. CLARKE of New York. Mr. Speaker, I rise on this day in opposition to the continuing resolution, which includes the Republican extreme and restrictive immigration and border security legislation, H.R. 2.

This cruel legislation would force draconian restrictions and punishments on migrants and asylum seekers and set America's immigration priorities back decades. This bill would damage the asylum system, a process millions upon millions of vulnerable and desperate people and families have long depended on for their safety and future.

Instead of putting forth legislation that can pass the Senate and avert a government shutdown, extreme Republicans would rather hold the economy and border security hostage, throwing millions of lives into a tailspin.

Let's be clear. Any bill that would allow vulnerable migrant children to be inhumanely detained by Border Patrol for up to a month, to be ripped from their families and locked up from the world, is unacceptable. It is fundamentally un-American.

To treat innocent people who are looking for a better life in our Nation with such contempt, such vitriol, such callousness, while also making American families vulnerable in putting food on their tables, that is not leadership. It is called cowardice.

Every American, no matter how long their families have called this country their own, should be outraged at the GOP embracing the Trump administration's failed and immoral border policies to keep the government open.

It is almost laughable to think about chaos. I think the majority has demonstrated overwhelmingly in the last several days, the last several months, an unwillingness to govern, an inability to govern, and chaos, general chaos, here.

It is interesting. The gentleman is from South Dakota, where, last I understood, a little bit like the Northeast, in New England, it gets cold. It gets cold in the wintertime in South Dakota. The gentleman is happy to see 24,000 individuals not get energy assistance, low-income heating assistance. We may be taking up a collection of hats and coats and gloves, et cetera, because they are not going to get their LIHEAP benefits in a cold climate.

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Speaker, I want to let the gentleman from Wisconsin know that 195,000 households are beneficiaries of the LIHEAP program. They will be jettisoned from that program. If you think it is cold in this Chamber, head to Wisconsin and you will know how cold it is in the wintertime. Think twice about whether or not you will vote to cut 195,000 people's benefits.
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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Speaker, I find it unbelievable that the gentlewoman from New York would support a bill that cuts $1 billion from our ally in the Middle East--that is, from Israel.

What we are looking at here is a piece of legislation that makes a 30 percent cut in programs that have a serious effect on the lives of the people in this country.

Let me just lay out some of them because these have not been talked about so far.

The National Institutes of Health will be cut. There would be a reduction of 7,000 research grants.

I think we have people in this Chamber on both sides of the aisle who have had a loved one with a cancer diagnosis or Alzheimer's or heart disease, but there is a willingness to cut the National Institutes of Health and thereby cut 7,000 research grants.

Let's take a look at our allies. We speak about Israel and Ukraine. Israel will receive a $1 billion cut in the funds that the U.S. provides. We talk about Israel as being our closest ally in the Middle East.

People should understand what is in this bill. We defund--not we--my Republican colleagues defund law enforcement, reduce drug enforcement administration agents, Federal law enforcement officers, eliminate hundreds of State and local law enforcement.

They talk about crime, and they talk about law and order, but there is a willingness to cut the funds in order for us to make our communities safe.

Social Security offices, the field offices, would be forced to close down, reducing access to in-person services.

People applying for disability benefits will wait additional months for the processing of claims. That is what is in store with this bill if you support it.

Wildfire suppression efforts will be hindered, 57 percent cuts, and we know what devastation wildfires have had all over our country. Look at what happened in Maui.

Unbelievable that they would talk about a bill, extol a bill that has such devastating repercussions on the people of this country.

They slashed the resources for the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline. Opioid use disorder. They are worried and talk about an opioid crisis, but let's cut off the avenue where people can get treatment and help and potentially save their lives.

Education. It is an abomination, what they will do to education because they are on a march to eliminate public education in the United States of America; that opportunity that all of our families have said: Go to school, get an education so that you can succeed.

Rural America? Let's care about rural America, not cutting the loans and grants for farmers and rural communities.

They will make it harder for farmers to access loans and grants, making home farm ownership more difficult. They cut rural housing, rural utility, broadband to keep people in touch, and they eliminate health services for rural and underserved families.

Mr. Speaker, 2 million vulnerable individuals and families will lose access to healthcare services. They take food out of the mouths of children, families, and seniors.

Mr. Speaker, there needs to be a ``no'' vote on this irresponsible continuing resolution. I yield back the balance of my time.

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

The yeas and nays were ordered.

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