On the recordDecember 2, 2010
I appreciate the opportunity to discuss this important bill, which includes a wide mix of policies recently sent to us by the Senate. Portions of this bill make sense, including extending welfare programs and reducing erroneous unemployment insurance (UI) overpayments. Enacting policies to better prevent and recover unemployment benefit overpayments is good government, and save about $3 billion over 10 years. However, instead of using this money to strengthen UI programs or even paying for an extension of unemployment benefits, the majority instead uses this funding to offset unrelated spending. Similarly, I am disappointed that the bill uses $2 billion of the funds in the Customs user fee account (about half of available funds) to offset some of the spending provisions in the bill. As a result, such funding would no longer be available for key job-creating trade initiatives, such as the pending free trade agreements or extending existing preference programs. I strongly believe that this offset should be reserved for trade priorities and should not be raided for non-trade provisions. And that's really at the heart of the debate: instead of using the savings in this bill to reduce our Nation's staggering deficit or pay for extending UI benefits or promoting job-creating trade, the authors of this bill would use those savings for new, unrelated spending.
