Grassley made his point during action by the Senate committee charged with tax, health care and unemployment legislation. He said today's committee action fell short because the proposal offered for consideration was pushed through in a partisan manner and failed to garner support from senators seeking enactment of policies that have proven abilities to revive economic growth and create jobs.
The Finance Committee passed the $67 billion mostly spending bill with a Democratic party-line vote. Grassley is the senior Republican on the committee.
Grassley said the next opportunity to unravel the partisan knots that have formed and reinvigorate a bipartisan effort to develop an economic stimulus package is with the full Senate. "The American people expect us to work together. The Senate leader has an obligation to break the stalemate by letting go of the highly charged partisan approach he's used so far in this debate," Grassley said.
Since September 11, Grassley has been involved in regular negotiations aimed at reaching bipartisan agreement on an economic plan. He said the efforts to find common ground between competing ideas have been stymied by the Senate Majority Leader, Tom Daschle of South Dakota. Last month, Grassley put forward a $74 billion package of tax cuts and spending increases to provide unemployment and health benefits to people who've lost jobs and to stimulate business activity and create jobs.
Earlier this week Grassley urged Senate party leaders, both Republican and Democrat, to form a task force with Centrist leaders in the Senate and work to break the impasse and find agreement on a proposal. "Our economy's in trouble and action by Congress on legislation that will stimulate the economy ? rather than just sign-off on massive new government spending ? is critically important. Congress needs to act sooner rather than later, and the only way to make progress is to work in a bipartisan manner," Grassley said.
Grassley's opening statement from today's Finance Committee markup follows here:
Mr. Chairman, you and I shared a goal at the start of this process. We both wanted a bipartisan economic stimulus package that also addressed the unemployment benefits and health care needs of dislocated workers. I still have that goal.
I also feel it's important that the Finance Committee act on this issue. On every legislative matter that comes within the jurisdiction of this committee, you can be sure that I will always uphold our jurisdiction. Taking action on this issue is not only our duty as representatives of this Committee, but our duty to the many Americans who are really hurting.
Unfortunately, however, it's obvious we are not going to operate in our committee's bipartisan tradition. Despite all the window dressing, today's committee product is designed to be partisan. The chairman's mark, which embodies the Democratic caucus position on this issue, will pass because Democrats have decided to deal only with themselves. So, everyone out there, let me say that the result has been worked out in advance. You need not stick around. The fix is in.
Mr. Chairman, I did not file any amendments, including a Republican alternative. The Republican caucus will respond on the Senate floor. I might add our door is open to Democrats, centrists and independents. There is no point in proceeding with an alternative today because, as I said above, the deck is stacked against it.
Mr. Chairman, I am frustrated and disappointed right now. There's a lot of common ground, but little will on your caucus' part to meet our side halfway, or even part of the way. That unwillingness doesn't make a lot of sense in a Senate that is divided 51-49 and a committee that is divided 11-10.
So where is the common ground? Let's start with the economic stimulus. Basically, the President and Chairman Greenspan gave a "Greenspan" green light to the stimulus exercise. Chairman Greenspan instructed us to take a hard look at proposals that were temporary, immediate, and efficient. Chairman Greenspan said we needed to pay particular attention to the decline in manufacturing investment. There is a chart that shows what Chairman Greenspan was talking about. Democrats and Republicans agreed to pursue accelerated depreciation as a stimulus measure. Both caucus plans have this proposal in them, though the Democrats are at a very ineffective 10 percent and the Republicans are at 30 percent.
Both caucuses pursued proposals that while not as stimulative as accelerated depreciation, would still provide some much-needed relief to struggling businesses. Democrats proposed liberalizing the net operating loss carryback rules. Republicans proposed repealing the corporate AMT. Here again, there was room to work on a bipartisan agreement.
Republicans put on the table an acceleration of the income tax rate cuts put in place by the bipartisan tax relief bill passed earlier this year. The Democratic caucus objected to the proposal because, even though this proposal is stimulative, it re-opened a statute that a majority of Democrats did not support.
I recognize that the acceleration is not viewed as common ground, but I'd ask a question. How could the Democrats re-open the statute by putting the rebates for payroll or non-taxpayers on the table. It appears to be a bit inconsistent, doesn't it? To those of us on this side, it appears the Democrats have taken the positive gesture by the President on the rebates, but have not been flexible in return.
Needless to say, by default, both sides have common ground on the next round of rebate checks. This proposal stimulates consumer demand. Secretary Rubin was very keen on some modest level of consumer demand stimulus. So, on the investment side and consumer demand side, both Democrats and Republicans have proposals with similar features, with the Republicans placing more emphasis on investment. But, Democrats have made marginal rate cut acceleration a deal breaker.
We Republicans want to aid dislocated workers and provide assistance with coverage of health insurance. First off, I want to clear up some misstatements. Some have incorrectly said Republican proposals do nothing to help cover the costs of health insurance for dislocated workers. That is baloney.
The President supported health care assistance by proposing funding for health care benefits to laid-off workers. Both the House bill and the Senate Republican caucus position embraced this idea.
But in negotiations, I was willing to go beyond the President's proposal. I offered to more than triple the amount of money. I also proposed expanding coverage of health benefits to dislocated workers who don't qualify for COBRA, such as small business workers. I then offered the Democrats complete flexibility to write the criteria under which the money would be granted, so they could be confident in the program. How much more flexible can you be than that? But, the Democratic leadership said no, and rejected my offer.
So, we have common ground on the goal of helping dislocated workers with health care benefits. Now, are there differences in how we want to provide this assistance? The answer is yes.We want to do more than provide unemployment checks. We also want incentives to get workers back their paychecks.
The whole point of this bill is to get people benefits right away. Yet the Democrats want to create a new bureaucracy that would take many months to get up and running. The Democrats' proposal would not be able to get benefits to workers until it's too late. That's because federal law requires that when a new federal program is established, regulations must be promulgated and the public be given notice and an opportunity to comment. Clearly these laws affecting new programs are in place for good reason. But we can avoid this hurdle by using existing programs, especially ones that are tailor-made for national emergencies. That's why the President took the approach he did through the National Emergency Grant Program.
Our goal was to use the existing National Emergency Grant program ? one that the federal government and states have used for years ? to ensure benefits can get to dislocated workers in the fastest possible way. No new infrastructure would be required by the federal government, and states could quickly access much-needed funds.
The bottom line is that hard-working Americans who have lost their jobs as a result of the tragedy cannot wait six, nine or 12 months for health care insurance. They need help right now. We proposed to do just that, but our Democratic colleagues were not interested in any bipartisan compromises -- even when they represented common sense.
The second problem with the Democratic health package is that it places undue burdens on states, which are already struggling to respond to the adverse impacts of Sept. 11. Requiring a new federal infrastructure and corresponding new state infrastructures in order to access "emergency" funds seems to be downright unreasonable. We should be working our hardest to get money to states immediately. We should not penalize them by demanding that they, too, establish extensive new bureaucracies to get the money out the door.
For example, the Democrats' proposal would require many states to enact legislation in order to set up and fund new state infrastructures to certify and deliver COBRA benefits. This is an unfunded mandate. In addition, the Democrats' proposal requires states to use their own money. This means only those states which happen to have extra money in their Medicaid budgets could help workers that are not COBRA eligible. I'm not aware of any state claiming it has extra Medicaid money burning a hole in its pocket, and I think this is just plain wrong. I proposed to provide 100 percent federal funding through the National Emergency Grant program to allow states to cover non-COBRA eligibles.
Once again, I ask my Democratic colleagues, why are you insisting on doing this the hard way -- especially when there's a much more efficient alternative?
Now let me make a few points on extending unemployment benefits to dislocated workers. Again, both sides agree that providing 13 weeks of additional benefits to workers in need is reasonable. The Democrats, however, want to take our finite resources and spread them thinly across every state, so that the needy will not get enough help.
I offered to provide unemployment benefits in two ways. The first was to allow 13 weeks of benefits to be extended to those states which experienced a significant increase in unemployment. What qualifies as a "significant increase," you may ask? I was completely flexible on that point! In fact, I was more than willing to bring the threshold well below what the President proposed.
In addition, I believe that extended unemployment benefits should be made available to particular industries or communities adversely impacted by Sept. 11. This should be the case even if a state as a whole doesn't experience a major increase in unemployment.
So I hope I've made it apparent that on our side, we care about dislocated workers and getting them unemployment and health benefits. The differences are grounded in how to do it, not whether to do it. I still believe we are not that far apart, and our differences can be bridged. If we are willing to take the partisan blinders off and focus on getting help to workers immediately, instead of winning ideological points, we can come to agreement on a proposal.
So, here we are, Mr. Chairman, and I'm left asking why we're stuck in this partisan ditch. We have common ground on the investment side, consumer spending side, unemployment benefits, and health coverage for dislocated workers. Why couldn't we work out an agreement? It seems there are three reasons.
The first reason is that Democrats don't want two negotiations with Republicans. They don't want to negotiate with Senate Republicans first and then have to negotiate with the White House and House Republicans later in conference. In terms of the rules and character of the Senate, however, this view is absolutely unrealistic. I have to chuckle when I hear this type of objection coming from the Senate Democratic leadership. When I was negotiating the bipartisan tax cut in the Finance Committee, I ran into the same objection from many in the Senate Republican caucus. They said:
"Grassley, don't negotiate with Baucus. If you do, you will have to negotiate further to the left on the Senate Floor. One negotiation is better than two."
If I had followed that "one negotiation" directive, we would have had chaos on the Senate floor. As it turned out, the bipartisan Finance Committee agreement held on the Senate floor and largely stayed intact in conference.
What's the second reason we couldn't negotiate? It seems that many in the Senate Democratic caucus want some kind of "pay back" against the bipartisan tax relief legislation. In their view, the bipartisan deal was wrong, and, with their caucus now running the Senate, they do not want to see it repeated in any way. In their view, a bipartisan Finance Committee deal would be a bad deal unless it contained all four corners of the Senate Democratic caucus position. As I said, I showed movement on several issues, but could not get movement from the other side. Everyone knows that, unless both sides move, you can't get a deal.
So, here we are with basically the Senate Democratic caucus position as the Finance Committee mark-up document. There is no gesture to the Republican side. The document says, "Our way or the highway." I only ask, is this what the American people want? I didn't think so at the time of the tax cut, and I don't think so now.
What's the third reason we can't get a deal? Senate Democrats say the House Republican partisan process necessitated a partisan response. We're kind of engaged in a game of legislative ping pong. That frustration, while understandable, doesn't justify shutting out Senate Republicans. The House passed a partisan tax bill, but that did not stop the Senate from passing a bipartisan package. The Senate is not and should not be rendered irrelevant because of partisan politics in the House.
Mr. Chairman, the American people expect us to work together. That's what I've been trying to do over the past few months. We Senate Republicans are flexible and willing to move toward Senate Democrats, but this place is a two-way street, and Democrats must also show movement.
So, to sum up, Mr. Chairman, we want to get a bipartisan stimulus package. Bipartisanship does not mean adopting the Senate Democratic caucus position.
You have the votes lined up, and we on this side have been left out. This is unfortunate for this great committee and the Senate as a whole. I can only say I hope the process changes on the Senate floor, and reasonable heads prevail. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.