Continuing Appropriations Resolution, 2014

Floor Speech

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Speaker, let me begin by quoting Sir Walter Scott:

What a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive.

This amendment is an exercise in deception. It is designed to shut the government down. It drastically underfunds the fundamental priorities of the American people, and it tries yet again to delay families' access to affordable health care. We do not have time for this sort of recklessness.

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke warned us that the automatic across-the-board cuts could cost us as many as 750,000 jobs in 2013. The majority wants to make these cuts permanent, regardless of the job loss, damage to our economy, or harm to working families across the country.

Because of the deep cuts enshrined here, over 57,000 children lose access to early learning through Head Start. These children never get that opportunity back. The biomedical research that saves lives is being curtailed, delayed, or lost. Educational programs are sharply reduced for over a million of our most disadvantaged kids, even though one in five children currently live in poverty.

Hundreds of thousands of unemployed adults are losing access to job training. Low-income seniors lose out on 5 million congregate and home-delivered meals. Mental health programs are being gutted. And with this funding, labor, health, and education programs are slashed 17 percent.

Beyond the deep cuts, the Republican majority is, once again, trying to use the budget process to take the government hostage unless we delay the Affordable Care

Act. Because of the Affordable Care Act, Americans with preexisting conditions finally have coverage. Women's health is finally on an equal footing. Maternity and pediatric care is covered, and preventive care can be obtained with no out-of-pocket costs. The doughnut hole is closing for seniors. Young people stay on their parents' plans. It empowers patients and doctors. And yes, insurance companies no longer can make the decision about whether or not you will get health insurance or not get it.

The Affordable Care Act is, at last, affordable health care for more American families.

We stand on the verge of a government shutdown. Instead of behaving responsibly, of working towards a reasonable compromise, the majority continues to put their personal, radical ideology above the fundamental priorities of the American people. This is wrong. I urge my colleagues to vote against it.

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