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PRESIDENT CLINTON: URGING CONGRESS TO PUT PROGRESS OVER PARTISANSHIP
IN ADDRESSING AMERICA'S PRIORITIES
October 6, 2000
Today, President Clinton will sign a second Continuing Resolution to
keep the government open and urge Congress to get down to work by
passing a budget that addresses America's priorities. Last February,
the President proposed a fiscally responsible budget that maintains
America's prosperity by paying down the debt, providing targeted
middle-class tax cuts and making key investments in improving education,
promoting national security, protecting the environment, and fighting
crime. Nearly one week into the new fiscal year, the Republican
Congress has completed only three of 13 spending bills, but has managed
to strip away critical legislation to outlaw hate crimes and gut the
prescription drug import legislation. Meanwhile, Congress's deadline
has been extended twice and Congress is loading spending bills with
election-year projects for special interests. President Clinton will
call on Congress to maintain our prosperity by passing a fiscally
responsible budget that invests in key initiatives. He will also urge
Congress to enact other important legislation to prevent hate crimes and
address other priorities.
CONGRESS SHOULD PUT PROGRESS OVER PARTISANSHIP IN ADDRESSING AMERICA'S
PRIORITIES. President Clinton will do his part to avoid a government
shutdown by signing a second Continuing Resolution to fund government
operations while Congress finishes the budget. He will call on Congress
to complete its work and pass a budget that funds important national
initiatives, including:
INVESTING IN EDUCATION. The President's budget includes important
investments in education, such as modernizing 6,000 schools and
repairing 5,000 more each year for five years, keeping our commitment to
hire 100,000 quality teachers to reduce class size, funding teacher
training to help put qualified teachers in every classroom,
strengthening accountability by identifying and turning around failing
schools, increasing after-school opportunities, and preparing at-risk
youth for college success. Congress does not guarantee funding to
continue hiring 100,000 qualified teachers to reduce class size and
provides only $600 million of the President's $1 billion request to
create more after-school learning opportunities. It shortchanges
teacher quality and recruitment programs and does not help ensure a
qualified teacher in every classroom. Congress denies 600,000
disadvantaged students the opportunity to prepare for college through
GEAR UP by freezing funding at $200 million, $125 million below the
President's request. Finally, Congress fails to institute real
accountability to turn around failing schools.
PUTTING MORE POLICE ON OUR STREETS AND FIGHTING GUN VIOLENCE. The
President's budget includes $1.3 billion for a 21st Century Policing
Initiative that will put up to 50,000 more officers on our nation's
streets by 2005 and provide for law enforcement technology; new
community prosecutors; and community-wide crime prevention. To date,
the Congress has underfunded the President's request by more than
one-third. The President's budget also provides $280 million for a
National Gun Enforcement Initiative -- the largest of its kind in U.S.
history -- to fund 500 new ATF firearms agents and inspectors; over
1,000 federal, state, and local gun prosecutors; expanded crime gun
tracing; the first ever national ballistics testing network; local
anti-gun violence media campaigns; and smart-gun research. So far,
Congress has failed to fund over half of this initiative, including the
1,000 more state and local gun prosecutors and smart-gun research.
PROTECTING THE ENVIRONMENT. The President's budget supports
important initiatives to protect the public health and the environment
by promoting healthy air, safe food and clean water and addressing
climate change. Included among these initiatives are major regional
efforts to restore rivers, lakes and other water resources such as the
salmon runs of the Pacific Northwest and the Florida Everglades. The
President has also called upon Congress to send him legislation and
spending bills free of anti-environmental riders that weaken public
health and environmental protections, undercut efforts to combat global
climate change, and surrender public lands to private interests.
PROVIDING ENERGY SECURITY. Congress has not completed enacting any
of the four key components of President Clinton's comprehensive energy
strategy to ensure secure and reliable energy supplies while reducing
pollution and emissions that contribute to climate change. The
President's plan includes $1.7 billion for the Department of Energy to
support cleaner and more efficient sources of domestic energy and for
EPA research and promote voluntary energy efficiency efforts. It also
includes legislation to create tax credits for energy security,
improving the reliability and affordability of the power grid through
restructuring, and reauthorizing the Energy Policy Conservation Act,
including the Regional Home Heating Reserve.
ENSURING THAT ALL AMERICANS SHARE IN OUR PROSPERITY. House and Senate
Republicans have made deep cuts to President Clinton's proposals to
bridge the digital divide, including (1) eliminating funding for a $50
million proposal that would provide home Internet access for low-income
families; (2) cutting in half the Administration's $100 million
initiative to create Community Technology Centers in low-income
neighborhoods; (3) slashing by two-thirds the Administration's $45
million proposal to support innovative applications of information
technology for underserved communities; and (4) refusing to help support
welfare recipients and low-income families save in an Individual
Development Account for a car that will help them get or keep a job.
President Clinton is also working to assure authorization and funding
for the programs in the New Markets/Community Renewal Agreement with
Speaker Hastert, including $200 million for Round 2 Empowerment Zones;
$37 million for America's Private Investment Companies; and $58.3
million for SBA's New Market Venture Capital and BusinessLINC programs.
PUTTING PUBLIC HEALTH BEFORE SPECIAL INTERESTS. President Clinton
supports the Department of Justice's litigation to hold the tobacco
companies accountable for deceiving the American public, particularly
youth, about the dangers of tobacco. In light of the clear ruling last
week by a U.S. District Court allowing the case to go to trial, Congress
should reject special protections shielding tobacco companies from the
financial responsibility for the harm they've caused and instead provide
the funds necessary to let the American people have their day in court.
ADDRESSING THE NATION'S HEALTH CARE PRIORITIES. The President has
proposed new options to cover millions of uninsured parents and their
children in CHIP, workers in between jobs, 55- to 65-year-olds, young
adults between 19 and 20, and legal immigrants. Studies show that the
President's proposals do more to increase coverage than tax approaches
advocated by the Republican leadership. The House and Senate have both
refused to fund the President's $76 billion effort to help insure
working families. In addition, Congress has failed to enact the
President's historic long-term care initiative, which invests $28.6
billion over 10 years in a long-term care tax credit. Congress should
also reauthorize the Older Americans Act and strengthen it by investing
$1.25 billion over 10 years in a new Family Caregivers program.
PROTECTING CIVIL RIGHTS AND WORKING FOR EQUAL PAY. This year,
President Clinton requested a 13 percent increase to improve civil
rights enforcement, bringing the federal commitment to more than $1
billion per year. This initiative provides resources for stepped-up
civil rights enforcement, education and outreach at the Departments of
Justice, Education, Health and Human Services, Labor, and Housing and
Urban Development. The House has cut $136 million from the President's
request, while the Senate cut $108 million. Congress has also failed to
fund $10 million for the President's Equal Pay Initiative at the Equal
Employment Opportunity Commission to fight wage discrimination and
provide training to employers on equal pay requirements.
EXPANDING FAMILY PLANNING. The President's budget would allow family
planning clinics to provide reproductive health services and clinical
care to over 5 million low-income women. It would also prevent over a
million unintended pregnancies per year through comprehensive
reproductive health services, including sexually-transmitted disease and
cancer screening, HIV prevention and counseling, programs to discourage
adolescent sexual activity, and contraceptive counseling and services.
The President's budget requested $274 million for this initiative, but
the preliminary conference report provides only $239 million.
PROTECTING OUR NATIONAL SECURITY AND ADVANCING U.S. LEADERSHIP IN THE
WORLD. The President requested $836 million to fully fund our
contribution to the International Development Association, (IDA) the
concessional lending arm of the World Bank, to clear our arrears and
help poor developing countries invest in HIV/AIDS prevention and other
health, education, and social infrastructure programs needed for lasting
poverty reduction. Second, the President requested $830 million to
reduce the threat of weapons of mass destruction, encourage citizen
exchange programs, and help local governments and non-governmental
organizations in the former Soviet Union promote democratic and economic
reform. Third, the President requested $275 million to continue
progress towards the congressional target of 10,000 Peace Corps
volunteers and provide needed technology upgrades. Fourth, Congress
should fully fund the $846 million request for UN peacekeeping missions
critical to successful diplomatic efforts to prevent violence and work
to end the conflicts in Europe, the Middle East, Africa and elsewhere.
Finally, the President has requested $11 billion to combat terrorism and
other threats, including $1.1 billion to raise the level of security at
embassies. Congress has failed to fund nearly $5 billion of the request
and has eliminated resources to prepare local terrorism law enforcement
and protect the nations critical infrastructure systems.
PROVIDING DEBT RELIEF TO FUND AMERICA'S INTERNATIONAL OBLIGATION TO
HELP FIGHT GLOBAL POVERTY. To help fight global poverty that leaves over
one billion people surviving on less than $1 a day, President Clinton
requested $435 million to live up to the expanded international debt
relief efforts announced at the Cologne G-8 Summit. Already, Congress'
inaction has stalled relief for Bolivia and Honduras. This summer the
House took a good step by approving an amendment offered by Rep. Waters
to provide $225 million; the Senate has included only $75 million in
their bill. However, the President's full request is needed to keep the
program from stalling out next year.
GETTING RESULTS BY PUTTING PROGRESS OVER PARTISANSHIP. This year,
Congress and the President have succeeded whenever they have sat down to
work together and emphasize policy, not politics. By working together,
we are:
CONSERVING AMERICA'S LANDS. Congress passed a bipartisan agreement
doubling our conservation investment next year, and guaranteeing even
greater funding in the years ahead, to ensure that communities have the
resources they need to protect their most precious lands - from
neighborhood parks to threatened farmland to pristine coastlands.
Increased support for conservation, preservation, and infrastructure
improvement includes a total of $1.2 billion in the Interior
Appropriations bill, an increase of almost 90 percent over this year.
The bill also creates a new "conservation spending" category - protected
from being spent on any other programs" for state and local needs and
for maintaining existing parks and other conservation and recreation
areas.
ENHANCING MILITARY READINESS. Nine months ago, the Administration
set enhancing the current high level of readiness as its top defense
priority. The FY 2001 budget fully funds key compensation initiatives,
including the Administration's requests for a 3.7 percent pay increase
for military personnel, training, spare parts, equipment maintenance,
and base operations. The bill also fully funds key modernization
programs such as the F-22 fighter aircraft and the CVN-77 Nuclear
Aircraft Carrier.
SAVING LIVES BY PREVENTING DRUNK DRIVING. Congress has also reached
agreement on a critical measure to help set a nationwide impaired
driving standard of .08 blood alcohol content. This common-sense
nationwide limit will save an estimated 500 lives a year and prevent
thousands of injuries.
PROMOTING THE ARTS IN AMERICA. This year President Clinton proposed
to expand resources for the National Endowment for the Arts to provide
support for the important cultural, educational and artistic programs
for communities across America. Working together, the President and the
Congress were able to increase funding for the NEA to $105 million, a $7
million boost over last year's funding level and the first significant
increase in the six years since the Republicans took control of the
Congress.
MEETING THE NUTRITIONAL NEEDS OF HARD-PRESSED WORKING FAMILIES.
Congress has agreed to enact the President's proposal to change the food
stamps law to make it easier for 245,000 people to own a reliable car
and still be eligible for food stamps. A second change in the law will
help over 2 million people by ensuring that the food stamp program
recognizes the high housing costs faced by many low-income working
families.
PRESIDENT CLINTON WILL ALSO CALL ON CONGRESS TO COMPLETE OTHER
UNFINISHED BUSINESS. Congress should not adjourn without passing
legislation on key American priorities. In addition to passing the
remaining spending bills, President Clinton will call on Congress to:
-- Pass meaningful hate crimes legislation;
-- Increase the minimum wage by $1 over two years;
-- Provide an affordable, accessible, and voluntary prescription drug
benefit option for all Medicare beneficiaries;
-- Enact a real Patients' Bill of Rights;
-- Approve common-sense gun safety legislation;
-- Reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act;
-- Reauthorize the Corporation for National Service Act;
-- Pass the Breast Cancer and Cervical Treatment Act; and
-- Reform immigration law to treat immigrants more fairly.