Howard Berman: “And I do it simply in the context of urging my colleagues to vote for this legislation; to point out, number 1, that…”

“And I do it simply in the context of urging my colleagues to vote for this legislation; to point out, number 1, that this is not an entitlement program. This is an authorization. It is not an appropriation. To the extent, after we pass this legislation and it is signed into law, that the statement takes its appropriated resources and uses some of those resources to develop the strategic plan to work with these organizations for what the gentleman himself concedes is a very important cause, those resources will come from some other form of resources. They will not be additional spending unless there is an appropriation. And this bill is not an appropriations bill; it is an authorization bill. I urge my colleagues to support it. It's a critical issue.”