On the recordMarch 24, 2015
I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, actually, this Republican budget strips away provisions that are in existence today to make work pay. Child tax credits for working families, they get rid of the bump up. They get rid of the enhanced earned income tax credit for working families. As I said, they get rid of the higher education deduction for families so that they can send their kids to school. I also want to say a word about the transportation trust fund, because as the ranking member, as the senior Democrat on the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee just pointed out, this Republican budget has no provision inside the budget numbers for dealing with the crisis we are going to face in a few months. Now, the chairman of the committee mentioned the deficit-neutral reserve fund, section 510. I am looking at it now. Deficit-neutral reserve funds can play an important role in signaling a policy direction. After all, these are 10-year budgets. I would understand if we didn't know exactly what we were going to do with our transportation trust fund 10 years from now or 9 years from now, but we are talking about 1\1/2\ months from now. We are talking about in the first year of this budget. In the middle of May, we are going to see a construction slowdown. Now, the Democratic budget alternative, we have a plan. The President put forward a 6-year plan, $478 billion. It is included in his budget numbers.…
