Bill Lee: “I want to thank the gentlewoman from Los Angeles, California, for her very powerful statement, but also once again for…”

“I want to thank the gentlewoman from Los Angeles, California, for her very powerful statement, but also once again for her tremendous leadership on the Committee on Appropriations and in her district on so many issues, especially relating to children. It would never happen if it were not for Congresswoman Lucille Roybal-Allard on the subcommittee. Thank you so much. Hopefully, our amendment will hold in the conference report. But, if it doesn't, it is certainly not because you haven't worked hard and have not been committed to reducing and eliminating childhood poverty. I am pretty confident that we are going to win this one. Thank you again for being here with us tonight and for your leadership. Mr. Speaker, I would like to come down and put some charts up in the well and speak so that the statistics will be very visible before the public as it relates to the poverty rates in the United States. First, let me just say, Mr. Hoyer, our whip, talked about the 50th anniversary this year of President Johnson's War on Poverty. Now, this War on Poverty included such initiatives as Medicare, Medicaid, Head Start, the Higher Education Act, and the Department of Housing and Urban Development. There was a very important immigration bill--you name it--50 years ago. This legislation, the War on Poverty, really has helped to reduce our poverty rates in the United States. Poverty has fallen from 26 percent in 1967 to 15 percent in 2015. Yet, we have a long way to go.…”