Floor SpeechBipartisan2024-12-10

RECONCILIATION CAN SAVE OUR COUNTRY

ImmigrationHealthcareTaxesEnvironment

Context

On 2024-12-10, Representative Tom McClintock (R-CA-5) delivered a floor speech titled "RECONCILIATION CAN SAVE OUR COUNTRY" in the House. The speech addressed immigration and also covered healthcare, taxes.

Full Text

RECONCILIATION CAN SAVE OUR COUNTRY

Congressional Record, Volume 170 Issue 183 (Tuesday, December 10, 2024) [Congressional Record Volume 170, Number 183 (Tuesday, December 10, 2024)] [House] [Pages H6541-H6542] From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [ www.gpo.gov ] RECONCILIATION CAN SAVE OUR COUNTRY The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from California (Mr. McClintock) for 5 minutes. Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, our country is in dire fiscal straits. Years of profligacy under both parties are now crushing our economy under the heaviest debt in our long history. Just paying the interest on that debt now exceeds what we spend on our Nation's entire defense. History warns us that nations that bankrupt themselves aren't around very long. Now many people find hope in President Trump's creation of an unofficial Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE. Others propose a bipartisan fiscal commission. However, in our haste to pass the buck, let us all remember that it is Congress alone that holds the purse strings. Try as we may, we cannot escape our responsibility. Congress is the ultimate bipartisan fiscal commission because, in a very real sense, the buck starts here. The Federal Government cannot raise or spend a single dollar unless and until the House says that it can. Ultimately, this responsibility rests with us. It cannot be DOGE'd and it cannot be dodged. Fortunately, we have the ideal tools in our possession to bring spending in line with revenues if we choose to use them properly: the budget resolution and the accompanying reconciliation act. Here is how it works. Both Houses agree on a spending ceiling by a simple majority resolution. Reconciliation instructions are then sent to every House committee with the mandate to report out statutory changes to bring spending within these limits. If they fail to act, then the House Budget Committee acts in their place, and a single comprehensive bill goes to the floor for an up-or-down vote. The bill gets expedited consideration in the Senate, and when signed by the President, all the laws necessary to balance the budget are enacted together. There is one catch. It can only be used to enact the fiscal reforms necessary to implement the budget. It cannot be used for general policymaking beyond these fiscal confines. The last time this process was used as it was designed and intended was during the Republican majority led by Newt Gingrich in 1995. The result was four balanced budgets in a row that produced one of the greatest waves of prosperity our Nation as has ever seen. Tragically, in 2017, the Republican majority under Paul Ryan utterly [[Page H6542]] squandered this authority. Instead of using the reconciliation process to bring mandatory spending to heel, it was abused to achieve pet political projects, first repealing ObamaCare and next for tax cuts. The first attempt resulted in a mangled mess of incomplete fiscal measures that collapsed in the Senate. The next budget year, the object was tax reform, but since it had to fall within the narrow fiscal parameters of reconciliation, most of the tax cuts could only be temporary and will soon expire. The result was no healthcare reform and only temporary tax relief. The opportunity cost was to squander our last chance to prevent the fiscal debacle that our country now faces. Last month, the American people gave Republicans a rare second chance to save our country from insolvency. We must not repeat the mistakes that have brought us here. Republican leaders in the House and Senate are, once again, proposing to use the budget and reconciliation process not as it was designed, to set spending limits and adhere to those limits, but rather to chase a variety of shiny objects including tax reform, energy development, and border security. These are all vital reforms, and they need to be enacted. Indeed, some aspects of them can be realized as a byproduct of the reconciliation process. However, that process cannot produce comprehensive policy reform. It can produce comprehensive fiscal reform at a moment when our Nation faces its greatest fiscal threat in its history. I appeal to the Speaker to follow the success of the Gingrich majority. If we repeat the mistakes of the past, then we will lose the future. We are on the threshold of a sovereign debt crisis the likes of which this Nation has never seen and that few nations have ever survived. Let us not throw away this, the last fleeting chance to avert fiscal disaster. The American people didn't save our country last month. They gave us the tools and the trust to save our country. Let us use the tools that they have given us, and let us be worthy of the trust that they have placed in us. ____________________

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RECONCILIATION CAN SAVE OUR COUNTRY Congressional Record, Volume 170 Issue 183 (Tuesday, December 10, 2024) [Congressional Record Volume 170, Number 183 (Tuesday, December 10, 2024)] [House] [Pages H6541-H6542] From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [ www.gpo.gov ] RECONCILIATION CAN SAVE OUR COUNTRY The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from California (Mr. McClintock) for 5 minutes. Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, our country is in dire fiscal straits. Years of profligacy under both parties are now crushing our economy under the heaviest debt in our long history. Just paying the interest on that debt now exceeds what we spend on our Nation's entire defense. History warns us that nations that bankrupt themselves aren't around very long. Now many people find hope in President Trump's creation of an unofficial Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE. Others propose a bipartisan fiscal commission. However, in our haste to pass the buck, let us all remember that it is Congress alone that holds the purse strings. Try as we may, we cannot escape our responsibility. Congress is the ultimate bipartisan fiscal commission because, in a very real sense, the buck starts here. The Federal Government cannot raise or spend a single dollar unless and until the House says that it can. Ultimately, this responsibility rests with us. It cannot be DOGE'd and it cannot be dodged. Fortunately, we have the ideal tools in our possession to bring spending in line with revenues if we choose to use them properly: the budget resolution and the accompanying reconciliation act. Here is how it works. Both Houses agree on a spending ceiling by a simple majority resolution. Reconciliation instructions are then sent to every House committee with the mandate to report out statutory changes to bring spending within these limits. If they fail to act, then the House Budget Committee acts in their place, and a single comprehensive bill goes to the floor for an up-or-down vote. The bill gets expedited consideration in the Senate, and when signed by the President, all the laws necessary to balance the budget are enacted together. There is one catch. It can only be used to enact the fiscal reforms necessary to implement the budget. It cannot be used for general policymaking beyond these fiscal confines. The last time this process was used as it was designed and intended was during the Republican majority led by Newt Gingrich in 1995. The result was four balanced budgets in a row that produced one of the greatest waves of prosperity our Nation as has ever seen. Tragically, in 2017, the Republican majority under Paul Ryan utterly [[Page H6542]] squandered this authority. Instead of using the reconciliation process to bring mandatory spending to heel, it was abused to achieve pet political projects, first repealing ObamaCare and next for tax cuts. The first attempt resulted in a mangled mess of incomplete fiscal measures that collapsed in the Senate. The next budget year, the object was tax reform, but since it had to fall within the narrow fiscal parameters of reconciliation, most of the tax cuts could only be temporary and will soon expire. The result was no healthcare reform and only temporary tax relief. The opportunity cost was to squander our last chance to prevent the fiscal debacle that our country now faces. Last month, the American people gave Republicans a rare second chance to save our country from insolvency. We must not repeat the mistakes that have brought us here. Republican leaders in the House and Senate are, once again, proposing to use the budget and reconciliation process not as it was designed, to set spending limits and adhere to those limits, but rather to chase a variety of shiny objects including tax reform, energy development, and border security. These are all vital reforms, and they need to be enacted. Indeed, some aspects of them can be realized as a byproduct of the reconciliation process. However, that process cannot produce comprehensive policy reform. It can produce comprehensive fiscal reform at a moment when our Nation faces its greatest fiscal threat in its history. I appeal to the Speaker to follow the success of the Gingrich majority. If we repeat the mistakes of the past, then we will lose the future. We are on the threshold of a sovereign debt crisis the likes of which this Nation has never seen and that few nations have ever survived. Let us not throw away this, the last fleeting chance to avert fiscal disaster. The American people didn't save our country last month. They gave us the tools and the trust to save our country. Let us use the tools that they have given us, and let us be worthy of the trust that they have placed in us. ____________________