May 23, 1995 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD — HOUSE H 5455

The President just had a news conference at the Rose Garden. Again, I

want to point this out, he said that the

Congress basically is going to be clipping his wings. He needs more power in

foreign affairs. The truth of the matter

is that he has had all the power in foreign affairs.

The CHAIRMAN. The Committee will

rise informally in order that the House

may receive a message.

MESSAGE FROM THE PRESIDENT

The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr.

fBURTON of Indiana) assumed the chair.

The SPEAKER pro tempore. The

Chair will receive a message.

MESSAGE FROM THE PRESIDENT

A message in writing from the Presifdent of the United States was communicated to the House by Mr. Edwin

Thomas, one of his secretaries.

The SPEAKER pro tempore. The

Committee will resume its sitting.

fb 1637

AMERICAN OVERSEAS INTERESTS

ACT OF 1995

The committee resumed its sitting.

Mr. GILMAN. Mr. Chairman, I move

to strike the requisite number of

words.

Mr. Chairman, I yield to the gentleman from Kansas [Mr. BROWNBACK].

Mr. BROWNBACK. I thank the distinguished chairman of the Committee

on International Relations.

I just wanted to clarify one other

point, if I could, of what is taking place

here.

There has been some discussion

about Radio Free Asia, and I do not

touch any of the funding for Radio

Free Asia in the amendment that I am

putting in front of this body.

Furthermore, I just would point out

that I think the gentleman from Ohio

[Mr. KASICH] makes some good points

about what has the foreign aid been

used for, at different points in time. Is

it really being used for foreign aid, or

is it being used for some forms of corporate welfare, like Robert Riech, the

Secretary of Labor, has talked about? I

think there is a fair amount, and with

the streamlining with this reasonable

3-percent cut, we can hope to get back

some of that.

Mr. GILMAN. I thank the gentleman

for his remarks, and I urge my colleagues to support the gentleman from

Kansas in order to bring this bill within the budgetary resolution so that we

can move forward.

Mr. FUNDERBURK. Mr. Chairman, I

move to strike the requisite number of

words.

Mr. Chairman, let me first begin my

remarks by complimenting the distinguished chairman of the Committee on

International Relations for bringing to

the floor of the House the first attempt

to change the basic course of American

foreign policy in several decades.

H.R. 1561 does send a message that

America will no longer tolerate nations

who receive the helping hand of the

United States at the same time they

thumb their noses at our generosity by

voting against us at the United Nations.

That said, Mr. Chairman, the Committee on International Relations

needs to do more. America’s foreign

policy structure needs to be overhauled

immediately. The current system is a

relic of the 1950’s and 1960’s.

The State Department is a labyrinth

of competing and overlapping agencies,

offices and bureaus whose redundancy

and waste has hampered our national

interest over the last 30 years. It is up

to this Congress to abolish the residue

of the cold war and bring the State Department in line with the diplomatic

and security needs of the American

people as we head into a new century.

Mr. Chairman, the new Republican

Congress was sent to Washington to

get America’s priorities straight. Last

week we began the glide path toward a

balanced budget. It is not an easy process.

We will eliminate entire Cabinet departments, cut out the welfare programs of the 1960’s, and end most Federal subsidies across the board.

Each of us has heard from students,

seniors, veterans, and farmers in our

districts. Many of them are upset, and

they are looking at this bill. They have

every right to be. How can we go home

and say we are cutting out Commerce,

Energy, and Education and perhaps

HUD, and reducing the size of every

Federal department at the same time

we leave the State Department virtually untouched? Despite what some

in Foggy Bottom and the bureaucracy

there will tell you, will, cuts that are

proposed by the Brownback amendment are not Draconian cuts, and the

cuts which I would suggest that we also

put into the process are not Draconian

cuts.

According to the report the chairman, the gentleman from Ohio [Mr.

KASICH], delivered to the House last

week, the State Department budget

has grown from $1.7 billion in the mid1980’s to $2.6 billion this fiscal year

1995. The Budget Committee’s review

notes that the continued increase in

State Department funding has come

from the growth in salaries and expenses, areas that should be addressed.

We need to wake up the State Department. We need to send the word

that business as usual has ended.

I am sure that some will say that any

cuts in the State Department will hurt

our fight against terrorism and out-ofcontrol immigration. Such cuts will do

no such thing. The way to combat terrorism and immigration abuses is not

to spend more on bureaucrats and diplomatic staff, but it is to boost the morale of our foreign and domestic intelligence agencies, to increase the rapid

response capability of our Armed

Forces, and to lower the numbers of

people who can come to this country at

any one time.

Mr. Chairman, the State Department

employees over 33,000 people. We have

over 300 embassies, consulates, consular agencies, and missions overseas.

The committee bill folds the USIA,

the ACDA, and AID into the State Department, and in that sense the bureaucracy will continue to grow. The

cuts proposed by both the Committee

on International Relations and the

Clinton administration merely accept

the status quo, albeit on a slightly

smaller scale.

As the American people said last

year, the status quo is not good

enough. America’s foreign policy priorities need radical surgery. We can start

the process by cutting the fat at Foggy

Bottom.

We need to tell the American people

we are serious about cutting the budget and we are serious about streamlining and downsizing the bloated bureaucracy at the State Department.

b 1645

AMENDMENT OFFERED BY MR. FUNDERBURK TO

THE AMENDMENT OFFERED BY MR. BROWNBACK

Mr. FUNDERBURK. Mr. Chairman, I

offer an amendment to the amendment.

The Clerk read as follows:

Amendment offered by Mr. FUNDERBURK to

the amendment offered by Mr. BROWNBACK:

In the matter amending section 2101(a)(2) of

the bill (relating to authorizations of appropriations for salaries and expenses of the Department of State) strike ‘‘$355,287,000 for

the fiscal year 1996’’ and insert ‘‘$337,522,265

for the fiscal year 1996 and

The CHAIRMAN. The gentleman

from North Carolina [Mr. FUNDERBURK]

is recognized for 5 minutes in support

of his amendment.

Mr. FUNDERBURK. Mr. Chairman,

this amendment reduces the bill’s authorization level for State Department

salaries and expenses for 5 percent for

the fiscal year 1996.

Mr. Chairman, I feel that since we

are asking the American people to cut

the rate of growth and to cut in actual

expenditures across the board, that the

Gilman and the Brownback bills and

amendments have cut USIA, ACDA,

and AID drastically but have only

asked for a very minimal cut of 1 or 2

percent in the State Department. The

State Department should not be sacrosanct, and I feel, having worked in

the State Department as a U.S. Ambassador overseas for 4 years, that there is

a lot of waste and that we have too

much money being spent in that area,

in the modern age of high technology

and instant communications, and what

we have had and what we have seen

there in the last few years is that,

while other Government agencies and

programs are being cut back or using a

reasonable measure of trying to cut

wasteful expenditures, we have actually had an increase in the building of

consulates in countries where we really

have no major problems and an increase in the building of embassies, and

the salaries have been increasing at too

high a level.

Now most of the people in this country are being asked to tighten their