Melvin Watt: “I think we need to put this in perspective. Yesterday, my colleagues were proposing to terminate the FHA Refinance…”

“I think we need to put this in perspective. Yesterday, my colleagues were proposing to terminate the FHA Refinance Program that helps people refinance mortgages under FHA. Next week, we'll be back on the floor out of our committee with a proposal that they have made to do away with the Community Stabilization Program, which is designed really to stabilize communities and keep people who own properties and are trying to pay their mortgages from seeing the values of their properties go down even further. And next week they'll be offering a proposal to do away with the mortgage refinance assistance program called HAMP. Of all of the four proposals, including the one we're here debating today, this, I think, is the most mean spirited and most duplicitous one and I think the one that most vigorously deserves to be opposed by my colleagues here in the House; because this proposes to do away with a program that assists people who were employed, got a mortgage, were paying their mortgage, then lost their jobs to the downturn in the economy and found themselves in a position where they could no longer afford to pay their mortgage.”