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Source: Congress.gov
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We've worked diligently to meet this target by ending wasteful Green New Deal style spending, supporting the rapid innovation of American industry and federal agencies, and eliminating the waste, fraud, and abuse in the Medicaid that jeopardizes care for millions of women, children, people with disabilities, and elderly Americans. To ensure American energy dominance, we will secure our energy infrastructure by taking the steps to refill our strategic petroleum reserve, which strengthens our energy security and supports our national security. In order to support the abundant energy production that will be necessary to secure our grid, and in order to increase revenue, we will expand the use of user fees to help streamline the siting and permitting of new oil, gas, carbon dioxide, and hydrogen pipelines. We can save $172 billion over the next 10 years by repealing the burdensome Biden-Harris administration regulations and over $100 billion by eliminating the EV mandates imposed by the vehicle emission and cafe standards that have failed to serve the American taxpayers. And through investments to modernize the Department of Commerce, we can integrate AI systems to make the department more secure and effective to protect the integrity of this project. And we're implementing guardrails that protect against state level AI laws that could jeopardize our technological leadership. Our legislation will raise $88 billion of new revenue through a historic agreement reauthorizing the FCC Spectrum Auction Authority or protecting U.S. national security. The Biden era inflation has left Americans struggling to access affordable health care. The issue has been exacerbated by the decisions of left-leaning state governments to spend dollars on illegal immigrants. We make no apologies for prioritizing Americans in need over illegal immigrants and those who are capable but choose not to work. Our priority remains the same, strengthen and sustain Medicaid for those whom the program was intended to serve, expectant mothers, children, people with disabilities, and the elderly.
We are prepared to stop the billions of dollars of waste, fraud, and abuse in the Medicaid program by beginning to rein in the loopholes by ensuring states have the flexibility to remove ineligible recipients from their roles and removing beneficiaries who are enrolled in multiple states. These are all common sense policies that will return taxpayer dollars to middle class families. Medicaid was created to protect healthcare for Americans who otherwise could not support themselves, but Democrats expanded the program far beyond this core mission. That's why we are establishing common sense work requirements for capable but not working adults in the expansion population. Let me be clear, these work requirements would only apply to able-bodied adults without dependents who don't have a disqualifying condition, encourage them to reenter the workforce and regain their independence. All of this is part of our effort to strengthen Medicaid for the people that need it most. When President Trump delivered his second inaugural address, he promised a revolution of common sense that will launch a generation of growth, prosperity, and health. This reconciliation bill is critical to that promise the president and congressional Republicans made to the American people. Today, we bring before the committee a package that unleashes American energy dominance, advances innovation, and protects access to care for our most vulnerable. Each of these is a core part of our effort to re-spark the American dream and ensure our country will always be the land of opportunity. I have no doubt that we'll have some robust discussions today about these proposals. These discussions are important, and I look forward to using this time to address the issues that matter most to the American families we serve. So I thank you all for your hard work as we continue our work to serve the American people. I now yield five minutes to the ranking member, my friend from New Jersey, Mr. Pallone.
The chair, the committee will come to order. The chair. The chair will advise the audience that disruption of a congressional business is a violation of law and is a criminal offense. Please come to order. The chair advises the audience that violations will not be tolerated and the violators will be removed from the room and may be subject to arrest.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I do want to say that I think hopefully everyone understands that these demonstrations are the people feel very strongly because they know they're losing their health care and the cruelty that comes from the Republican proposal that makes them lose their health care and their health insurance. But I would just ask that the police, I don't know if they're in the room, that we not arrest people if possible because many of them are disabled and I don't want to see them further hurt with their disability in the process of being arrested. But for months now, President Trump and congressional Republicans promised the American people they would not cut Medicaid benefits or strip away people's health care. In February, President Trump said, and I'm quoting, Medicare, Medicaid, none of that stuff is going to be touched. House Speaker Johnson doubled down on that promise, stating, and again I'm quoting, the White House has made a commitment. The president has said over and over, we're not going to touch Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid. We've made that same commitment. Now, I have to say, Mr. Chairman, those are promises that Republicans made to the American people, and it's clear that they have broken that promise. And I just want to reference on Sunday night, Mr. Chairman, in a Wall Street Journal interview, you actually said that the Republican plan to trim Medicaid spending, you were commenting on the Republican plan to trim Medicaid spending, and you said, and I quote, we're going to go as far as we can go to get 218 votes. Well, I think the bottom line is you're going pretty far here in either trimming or cutting, however you want to call it. You refer to it as trimming Medicaid.
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