Paul Coverdell: “Let me say that every year since the Republicans gained the majority we have worked to increase the maximum Pell grant.…”

“Let me say that every year since the Republicans gained the majority we have worked to increase the maximum Pell grant. For more than 7 years, the Pell grant maximum fluctuated between $2,300 and $2,400. Last year, the President's budget cut the Pell grant. But we have been dedicated on this side. This is about the seventh time I have lost track of an amendment that has come from the other side. They may have a laudable goal, but the underlying goal is to make moot the central premise of the legislation we are discussing, which is to allow families to set up education savings accounts. If you take the amendment the way it is constructed, it obliterates the possibility to set up these education savings accounts, which means 14 million people will not set up an account who otherwise would. Of the 20 million children in school, almost half the population will not be beneficiaries of the account that otherwise would. But, more importantly, $12 billion that would be accumulated voluntarily in these accounts to help education at every level--kindergarten through college--would go away similar to snuffing out a candle. It makes no sense to do that.”