AFSCME Legislative Report
 AFSCME LEGISLATIVE REPORT
Congress — Week ending November 18
By the slimmest of margins, House passes $50 billion spending cut bill. In earlier action, House rejects labor, health and human services spending bill.
In this issue:
House Clears Spending Cut Bill
The House of Representatives passed their $49.5 billion spending cut bill (H.R. 4241) early Friday morning by the narrowest of margins. Nervous Republican leaders were able to get the needed votes only after serious arm-twisting and last minute deals. Nevertheless, 14 Republicans still broke ranks with their leadership on the 217-215 vote while no Democrat voted for the package of cuts to Medicaid, food stamps and student loans to pay for a series of new tax cuts also moving through Congress. House GOP leaders agreed to make slight modifications to the food stamps cuts and other provisions late Thursday. A number of other moderates also came on board after extracting promises that their concerns would be addressed at a later date.
One change made to the bill would allow people with incomes up to 150 percent of the poverty level who are receiving non-cash aid under the Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) program to continue to be eligible for food stamps. Another would modestly increase Medicaid transformation grants to fast-growing states. Leaders also had agreed to slightly softened cuts in the budget savings bill to Medicaid and food stamps. The biggest changes would make it easier for seniors to shelter assets and still be entitled to Medicaid coverage for nursing home care. The bill as revised would maintain the $3 co-payment required of Medicaid recipients for most medical services, rather than increasing it to $5.
The bill now moves to a conference committee with the Senate, which passed a far different $35 billion spending cut plan that contains fewer cuts and also making changes to the Medicare program, not in the House bill. Senate leaders and the White House have said they will insist on including in the final bill the contentious issue of opening the Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) to oil drilling, which is in the Senate bill but not the House bill. A number of moderate House Republicans say it will doom the bill if ANWR drilling is restored. Votes on a conference agreement could occur as early as the week of December 5.
The 14 Republicans voting right were: Jim Gerlach (PA), Nancy Johnson (CT), Tim Johnson (IL), Walter Jones (NC), Jim Leach (IA), John McHugh (NY), Bob Ney (OH), Ron Paul (TX), Jim Ramstad (MN), Chris Shays (CT), Robert Simmons (CT), Chris Smith (NJ), John Sweeney (NY) and Heather Wilson (NM). Please call and thank them and encourage them to oppose any bill that comes out of the conference committee.
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House and Senate Rush Through Tax Cut Bills
On the heals of the passage of the budget cutting bill, House and Senate GOP leaders are rushing to complete the one-two punch we knew was coming of passing first, a massive budget cutting bill and then a series of deep, new tax cuts for wealthy Americans. The House is expected to approve a $56.6 billion tax cut bill (H.R. 4297), already approved November 15 by the Ways and Means Committee. The Senate passed its $59.6 billion tax cut bill by a vote of 64-33 after Republican leaders beat back proposals to increase taxes on oil and gas companies currently reaping huge profits amid high energy prices. In Senate action, Finance Committee Chairman Charles E. Grassley (R-IA) was forced to remove from the bill (S. 2020) a proposed extension of the capital gains tax break, which overwhelming rewards the extremely wealthy in order to win the vote of Republican moderate Olympia J. Snowe of Maine. In a clear bait and switch tactic, Senate conservatives led by Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN) wasted no time in pledging to restore the provision in conference with the House. The House version of the tax bill already contains a two-year extension of the reduced rate, a maximum of 15 percent on both capital gains and dividend income setting up a potentially contentious battle in the joint House-Senate conference committee that will soon meet to resolve differences.
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House Republican Leadership Suffers Stunning Defeat
The House of Representatives unexpectedly voted down the Labor-Health and Human Services (HHS) and Education spending bill (H.R. 3010) by a vote of 209-224, handing the leadership of the House a rare and dramatic defeat. A total of 22 Republicans voted against the legislation which provides funding for most major domestic programs. A mixture of moderate Republicans concerned about underfunding of social programs and rural Republicans dissatisfied with the lack of funds for rural health programs joined a number of other Republicans in voting against the bill. All Democrats voted against it as well.
Overall, these programs were cut $1.5 billion below the current funding. An unprecedented reduction of $230 million was proposed for the employment security program, which would have led to the layoff of up to 4,000 state workers. Restoration of funds promised to injured Ground Zero workers and volunteers was dropped. Funding for No Child Left Behind was cut by $784 million while other elementary and secondary education programs received the smallest increase in eight years. In addition, funding for essential health care programs was cut, while some programs were eliminated. Low Income Energy Assistance was not increased despite expectations of skyrocketing heating bills this winter. The legislation also prohibits OSHA from enforcing part of its respirator standard to protect health care workers from exposure to tuberculosis.
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Congress Passes Another Stop-Gap Spending Measure
The House and Senate cleared a second fiscal 2006 continuing appropriations resolution to keep numerous government programs operating through December 17, while Congress continues working on the several remaining year-long spending bills, including the massive bill for the Departments of Labor, Health and Human Services (HHS) and Education, which funds many state and local government programs. Before clearing the latest stopgap spending bill, which the House passed on Thursday, the Senate rejected, 46-50, an amendment by Sen. Tom Harkin (D-IA) that sought to maintain funding for the Community Services Block Grant (CSBG) program at FY 2005 levels. Under terms of the continuing resolution, or CR, all programs covered by the measure were funded at the lowest of three levels: FY 2005 funding, the House-passed level or the Senate-passed funds.
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Social Security Privatization Beaten Back — For Now
It appears that President Bush and his GOP allies who announced that privatizing Social Security was their top priority have finally conceded that their plan to destroy Social Security by permitting workers to set up private accounts is going nowhere - at least in 2005. While Bush promoted, cajoled, and begged the Congress to pass legislation privatizing Social Security, he had never submitted a plan of his own. Bush left it to his GOP allies in the House and Senate to introduce a variety of privatization plans. And, when the polls showed that the overwhelming majority of Americans opposed the original GOP privatization plan, which would have accelerated the depletion of the Social Security Trust Fund by allowing workers to divert a portion of their payroll contributions into private accounts, congressional privatization supporters announced a privatization plan that they called the "Grow Accounts". However, the public was not fooled. "Grow Accounts" were still funded out of the Social Security Trust Fund and would still have led to massive benefit cuts, probably a hike in the retirement age and a huge increase in the deficit.
Over the past several weeks, Bush has stopped talking publicly about wanting to privatize Social Security and Senate Finance Committee Chairman Grassley conceded that privatizing Social Security was "dead" for this year. The final nail in the Social Security privatization coffin occurred when House Ways and Means Chairman Bill Thomas (R-CA) dropped his plan to include Social Security privatization in a broad "retirement security" bill that also addressed changes in pension law.
Since the privatization of Social Security has been a goal of the GOP leaders and the business community for over 20 years, it would be naïve to conclude that the privatizers have conceded permanent defeat. The privatizers will be back. But whenever a proposal to privatize Social Security reemerges, we will fight them back over and over as often as it is necessary.
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Job Application Opens Window to Judge Alito's Views
The Bush Administration this week released several documents on Judge Samuel Alito who was nominated to replace retiring Justice Sandra Day O'Connor on the Supreme Court. One document is a job application from 1985 when Judge Alito sought a promotion in the Reagan Administration. In the document, Alito pledges his allegiance to an extremely conservative agenda aimed at reversing landmark Supreme Court decisions in the areas of civil rights, civil liberties and fundamental freedoms. In the document, Alito expresses his personal views on key issues that restrict affirmative action and limits remedies in racial discrimination cases, areas where he says he is particularly proud of the work he has done. The document shows that Alito was an aggressive participant in a movement in the 1980s that aimed to withdraw discrimination protections from workers and even criticized the concept of one person, one vote.
As a judge on the Third Circuit Court of Appeals in Philadelphia, Alito's earlier views can be seen in his rulings where he consistently has voted to limit Congress' authority to pass laws that protect the rights of workers and individuals, including the Americans With Disabilities Act and the Family and Medical Leave Act. He ruled to weaken the ability of citizens to bring suit against polluters under the Clean Air Act. And, although the majority of his fellow judges disagreed with him, Alito set a standard so high that victims of sex discrimination would find it virtually impossible to prove their case.
Alito's confirmation hearings will begin in January 2006.
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Senate GOP Leaders Favor Drug Industry over Consumers and First Responders
There is an effort underway by Senate GOP leaders to push through legislation that would provide legal immunity to makers of drugs and vaccines for pandemic flu and for pharmaceuticals developed to counter acts of biological and other forms of terrorism. While there is precedent for shielding vaccine makers from lawsuits, Congress has previously coupled such protections with programs to compensate individuals who are seriously injured as a result of receiving a vaccine. However, in this case, while Senate GOP leaders are maneuvering to protect drug makers, they are adamantly opposed to providing a program that would pay for health care needs and replace lost wages of those injured by a vaccine or countermeasure.
Because they would be unable to pass the legislation on its own, Senate leaders are attempting to attach the provision to some other must-pass bill going to the House and Senate floor that cannot be amended.
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Head Start Reauthorization Bill Delayed Threat of Possible Amendment
The consideration of legislation to reauthorize the Head Start program (S. 1107) is being delayed in the Senate. The delay is due to controversy over a damaging amendment that AFSCME has been working to defeat. The controversial amendment, sponsored by Rep. John Boehner (R-OH), would repeal longstanding civil rights protections. If the amendment is adopted, AFSCME will oppose the bill on final passage.
We are still concerned that this bill does not address the low pay offered to Head Start teachers and staff and the lack of financial assistance to be provided to meet new and more rigorous educational requirements. We support S. 1107's focus on raising standards for Head Start teachers but we have very serious concerns regarding the provision calling for at least 50 percent of all teachers in a Head Start center-based program to have a bachelor's degree within five years and all new Head Start teachers to have an associate's degree. While we support increased qualifications for Head Start teachers, the language in S. 1107 could be used to punish programs unfairly by failing to provide the funding for scholarships, release time substitutes and most importantly, compensation to attract and retain teachers who meet the higher degree requirements. Return to Index
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