House Committee on Education and Labor
U.S. House of Representatives

McKeon: Rather than trying to score political points, let’s get serious about protecting workers and enforcing the law

The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) today testified before Congress about the findings of its undercover investigation into ineffective and inconsistent enforcement of the nation’s wage and hour laws. According to GAO, its investigation “revealed sluggish response times, a poor complaint intake process, and failed conciliation attempts, among other problems.”

Republicans were harshly critical of the Department for its alleged failures to fully enforce the law, and are calling for quick action to ensure stepped up enforcement and accountability. However, Republicans also chastised congressional Democrats for attempting to score political points on the backs of vulnerable workers by focusing their efforts on assigning political blame on the previous Administration rather than calling the Department of Labor before the Committee to account for its failures.

Republicans requested that the Democratic majority – which determines which witnesses will testify before Congress – bring Department of Labor officials before the panel to account for the alleged widespread failures uncovered by GAO. However, only the GAO testified today, leaving critical questions unanswered.

“At our urging, I understand that the majority requested that a Department of Labor official testify here today.  I’m told the Department declined. I’m not sure how persistent we were in pressing the Department on this point, Mr. Chairman. But personally, I don’t think we should have taken ‘no’ for an answer,” said McKeon.

“If we’re serious about enforcing the law – and not just scoring political points – we should insist on bringing the individuals who are responsible for investigating wage-and-hour violations here to account for their actions,” McKeon continued.

Under questioning, the GAO confirmed that it has no evidence linking these enforcement failures to appointees or the leadership of the previous Administration. Rather, the failures appear to be systemic, driven by a lack of internal controls, training, resources, or simply human failure.

Republicans are committed to effective enforcement of our nation’s laws. They’re also committed to standing up for American workers who fall victim to nameless, faceless federal bureaucrats who fail to meet workers’ needs.

Watch the clips below for key excerpts from today’s hearing.

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This morning, the House Budget Committee will consider the budget resolution for fiscal year 2010, which is a blueprint for determining tax and spending policy for the upcoming fiscal year.  While all of the talk in Washington has been on the President’s budget request that was released in February (filled with massive tax increases, mammoth new government programs, and trillions – not billions – of dollars added to the national debt), the budget resolution passed by the House and Senate is of much greater consequence in the real world.  That’s because the policies it sets out are binding as Congress sets funding levels for each agency of the federal government.  You can see our views on the budget here.

As Congress begins the budget process, we hope that the Democratic Majority will join Republicans in rejecting the President’s budget because it spends too much, taxes too much, and borrows too much.  Instead, Democrats should put forth a budget that reaffirms the responsibility of policymakers to act as good stewards of taxpayers’ hard-earned dollars.

Even though many Americans are tightening their belts, the Administration’s budget grows the size of government by almost 10 percent.  Under the President’s plan, total government spending would be set at a staggering $3.9 trillion, or 28 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP).  That’s the highest level since World War II.  These facts were confirmed last Friday when the nonpartisan and independent Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released its latest estimate of the nation’s budget situation.  CBO projects that, because of the President’s policies, this year’s federal deficit will hit a post-World War II record of $1.8 trillion, 13.1 percent of GDP.  The agency also projects that the President’s new policies would double the federal debt to $14.5 trillion over the next 10 years.  With CBO’s new estimate, it has become more imperative than ever that Congress must make sure that the nation’s budget focuses on reducing wasteful government spending, unnecessary new programs, and bureaucratic federal mandates. 

One area of great concern is the President’s plan to grow the size of government by nationalizing the student loan program.  His budget requires student loans to be made solely by the federal government and eliminates the Federal Family Education Loan (FFEL) program, the public-private partnership that has been in place for more than four decades and has a strong record of making students’ dreams of a college education possible.  The federal government’s $4 billion investment in FFEL programs leverages more than $60 billion in student loans, which provides important college opportunities to 6.2 million students attending over 4,400 institutions each year. 

These students also receive extensive financial literacy counseling, financial aid counseling, and default prevention services that help students repay their student loans.  Eliminating this public-private partnership in favor of a one-size-fits-all Washington solution is likely to cost the country more than 30,000 current jobs, and it will surely have a ripple effect on thousands more.  It will eliminate any sort of choice in lender for millions of students across the country, and it will jeopardize the ability of institutions of higher education to tailor programs that best fit their students’ needs.  We hope that Congress will reject the Administration’s extreme proposal and examine the student loan programs in terms of what is best for students.

If history is any guide, we’re sure that the budget resolution that will be passed by the Democrats on the House Budget Committee will call for greater government involvement fueled by higher taxes and deeper deficits.  Republicans will fight this irresponsible budget and propose a better plan that focuses on pro-growth policies that foster innovation and job creation, promote American competitiveness, and ensure accountability, state and local flexibility, parental choice, and funding for what works in education.

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Yesterday, President Obama signed into law a massive omnibus spending bill that contains funding for the nine appropriations bills that were not completed last year, including programs at the Department of Education.  While the bill includes funding for a whole host of programs that have been singled out for elimination by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) and the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), it eliminates funding for the highly successful Reading First program. 

To put it plainly, Democrats have eliminated a program to help students, including disadvantaged students and students with disabilities, learn how to read.  Everyone knows that a young child’s ability to read is essential to their academic achievement and success in the later grades and other subjects.  That’s why elimination of this program is so stunning, and short-sighted.

Reading First provides funding to our nation’s highest need schools to implement scientifically-based reading instruction programs in grades K-3.  It serves more than 1.6 million students.  And results from the program are clear.  Nationally, the percentage of third graders in Reading First schools scoring proficient on state reading assessments has grown nearly eight percent, much faster than overall growth.  In addition, state-reported performance data released last year indicates impressive gains in reading comprehension, with improvements seen by nearly every grade and subgroup of students.  28 of 37 states that reported data experienced an increase in the percentage of students proficient in reading comprehension.  Recent reports by the U.S. Government Accountability Office, the Inspector General, and the Center on Education Policy have all found widespread support for the program among the states.  In one Center on Education Policy report, 97 percent of Reading First school districts said that the program was an important or very important cause for increases in students’ reading scores. 

In eliminating the funding for the program, Democrats point to a series of reports from the Department of Education’s Inspector General in late 2006 and early 2007 documenting management errors by the Department in the early implementation of the program.   This, however, ignores the fact that, over two years ago, the Department implemented all of the Inspector General’s recommendations for improving oversight of the program; actions that the Inspector General has stated addressed his concerns.

As this blog is being written, the U.S. Secretary of Education is testifying before the House Budget Committee on the President’s budget blueprint for the upcoming fiscal year.  While congressional Democrats have succeeded in ending this vital reading program for now, the Obama Administration could easily restore it by calling for funding in FY 2010.  Unfortunately, the budget blueprint released late last month is silent on whether Reading First should be funded.  We think this is a glaring omission, and one that deserves follow-up during the Secretary’s testimony this morning.

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It’ll take an act of Congress to keep two classmates of the President’s daughters in school…

This morning on WTOP radio, Cal Thomas commented on congressional Democrats’ plans to destroy the Washington D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program.

Click HERE to listen to the audio.

Posted in School Choice | 0 Comments | Permalink