Tuesday, October 20, 2015

Politics in Action: H.R. 1937, H.R.692 and H.R. 10

STATEMENT OF ADMINISTRATION POLICY
H.R. 1937 – National Strategic and Critical Minerals Production Act of 2015
(Rep. Amodei, R-NV, and 48 cosponsors)

The Administration strongly opposes H.R. 1937, which would undermine existing environmental safeguards for, at a minimum, almost all types of hardrock mines on Federal lands.  Specifically, H.R. 1937 would undermine sound Federal decision-making by eliminating appropriate reviews under the National Environmental Policy Act if certain conditions are met, circumventing public involvement in mining proposals, and bypassing the formulation of alternatives to proposals, among other things.  The Administration also opposes the legislation's severe restrictions on judicial review.  Although the legislation purports to limit litigation, its extremely short statute of limitations and vague constraints on the scope of prospective relief that a court may issue are likely to have the opposite effect.

The Administration strongly supports the development of rare earth elements and other critical minerals, but rejects the notion that their development is incompatible with existing safeguards regarding uses of public lands, environmental protection, and public involvement in agency decision-making. 

H.R. 692 – Default Prevention Act
(Rep. McClintock, R-CA, and 112 cosponsors)

The Administration strongly opposes H.R. 692, which would result in the Congress not paying obligations it has already agreed to, thereby putting the Nation into default on its obligations.  Any legislative proposal to prioritize certain payments over others is default by another name and would not protect the full faith and credit of the United States government or avoid the negative impact of default on American jobs and businesses.  Such an approach would be the equivalent of a family saying that it will choose to pay its mortgage, but not its car payment, credit card, or student loans, and expecting that its creditworthiness will not suffer.  It would cause the Nation to default on payments for Medicare, veterans, national security, and many other key priorities.  Making some payments while not making others would be unacceptably risky and unfair to the American people.

Under the President’s leadership, annual deficits have come down by roughly three-quarters as a share of the economy since 2009, the fastest period of sustained deficit reduction since just after World War II.  In Fiscal Year 2015, the deficit fell by $44 billion to just 2.5 percent of GDP—a level significantly below the roughly 3-percent level needed to stabilize our debt-to-GDP ratio.  The President has put forward a balanced approach to deficit reduction in his FY 2016 Budget that would continue to stabilize the Nation's debt as a share of the economy, without shortchanging the kinds of investments that are critical to long-term economic growth. 

The President continues to work to find areas of compromise and common ground with both parties in the Congress.  But the President has been clear that he will not negotiate about whether to uphold the full faith and credit of the United States.  The Congress must pay the bills it has already incurred; failure to do so would cause the Nation to default on our obligations for the first time in history.

The President will not tolerate political gamesmanship, which caused the Nation’s credit rating to be downgraded in 2011 and proved harmful to both the United States and global economy.  For this reason, if the President is presented with legislation that would result in the Congress choosing to default on our obligations and imperil the full faith and credit of the United States, he would veto it.


H.R. 10 – Scholarships for Opportunity and Results Reauthorization Act
(Rep. Boehner, R-Ohio, and 14 cosponsors)

H.R. 10 would reauthorize the Scholarships for Opportunity and Results Act, which provides Federal support for improving traditional public schools in the District of Columbia (D.C.), expanding and improving high-quality D.C. public charter schools, and offering private school vouchers to a limited number of students.  The Administration continues to strongly oppose the private school vouchers program within this legislation, known as the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program.

Rigorous evaluation over several years demonstrates that D.C. vouchers have not yielded statistically significant improvements in student achievement by scholarship recipients compared to other students not receiving vouchers.  In addition, H.R. 10 would extend this voucher program to a new population of students previously attending private schools.  Instead of using Federal resources to support a handful of students in private schools, the Federal Government should focus its attention and available resources on improving the quality of public schools for all students.
 
Source: The Executive Office of the President, Office of Management and Budget 

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