Committee on Education and Workforce

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, 6 months ago, Congress passed a tax cut that cost almost $2 trillion that overwhelmingly benefited corporations and the wealthy. Today, the Republicans are asking struggling children and families to foot the bill. Nearly half of the $15 billion in cuts in the Trump-GOP recessions package targets the Children's Health Insurance Program, or CHIP. While $7 billion may be a rounding error in the corporate tax cut, eliminating this funding from CHIP will jeopardize its ability to ensure access to healthcare for the children and families who depend on the program every year.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding. As the Representative of Hampton Roads, Virginia, I support the significant increase in Navy shipbuilding in the NDAA. But while we consider national defense, we must also consider school construction. Yesterday, U.S. banks reported $56 billion in first quarter profits. At the same time, our teachers are being forced to go on strike for a living wage and adequate funding for our public schools. But when the majority pushed its tax bill through Congress, it was the banks, not teachers and not the schools, that received the biggest benefit. H.R. 2475, the Rebuild America's Schools Act, would be a step forward in correcting our priorities by investing desperately needed funding into our public school infrastructure. This $100 billion proposal, which is barely 5 percent of what was spent on the tax cut for corporations and the wealthiest Americans, would go towards repairing crumbling public school buildings to ensure that every student has access to safe, healthy, and high-quality learning facilities.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for allowing me to speak on this very important issue, and I thank her for leading this Special Order on this important topic, which is gun safety, especially as it relates to school safety. Keeping all students and educators safe is a top priority. On Friday, we had another tragedy. A small town that few could point out on a map is now infamous. Santa Fe High School, near Galveston, Texas, experienced a mass shooting, leaving 10 dead: Eight students, two teachers. Several students said to the media, they knew this would eventually happen to them. Our thoughts and prayers are with those students and with the families suffering from acts of gun violence, but enough is enough.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, there is a lot wrong with this bill, but as ranking member of the Committee on Education and the Workforce, I am particularly concerned about its impact on students. SNAP eligibility is tied to eligibility for other vital Federal programs, so the proposed cuts in SNAP eligibility will also cut access to free school meals for 265,000 children.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 5242. This legislation under consideration today will improve our understanding about the role of school resource officers. But we must acknowledge that this bill barely scratches the surface of what is actually required to keep our schools safe, and I urge this body to do more. In the wake of February's tragic shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida, many have called for a so-called Federal focus on hardening of our schools, which includes increasing Federal dollars to hire more police officers and embracing the most harsh punishments for school discipline, and even allowing school teachers to carry firearms, despite the overwhelming evidence that many of these initiatives do more harm than good.