Here is Congresswoman Comstock's letter to me about ending the 40 year ban on exporting U.S. oil (I've highlighted text in pink for items with which I completely disagree)
Dear Ms. Guynup,
Thank you
for contacting me about your concerns with the recent government funding
bill, the Consolidated Appropriations Act for Fiscal Year 2016,
otherwise known as the Omnibus. I appreciate and respect your views and
the opportunity to hear from you. This legislation passed the House by
316 to 113, and passed the Senate by a vote of 65 to 33 with a majority of
Republicans in both chambers. It was signed into law by the
president on December 21.
Concurrently,
Congress also passed a significant tax-cut-and-reform package that
included $600 billion in tax relief for American families
and small businesses. The funding and tax relief measures that passed
contained a number of important wins for conservatives and the country,
including increases for military and national security spending and easing
the misguided defense sequester cuts, improving the protections in our visa
system so as to not be exploited by terrorists, ending the 40 year ban on
exporting U.S. oil, putting a stop to a number of Obamacare taxes; and
passing permanent tax cuts for research and development,
business investment, and families with children, among many other important
items.
I understand
the concerns that many have about both the process by which this bill came to
pass and having one large spending bill instead of individual appropriations
bills which would allow us to cut more inappropriate spending. Our new
Speaker has already implemented reforms for the next budget cycle to change
and improve this process and results going forward.
In terms of
overall spending, it is important to note that the spending levels in this
legislation are actually below those prescribed in the Budget
Control Act of 2011 (BCA), which was hailed by conservatives at the time
as a deal that would lead to the largest spending decreases since the end of
World War II. Specifically, this budget:
- Spends $56 billion less than
what was budgeted in the BCA for Fiscal Year 2016, and
- Spends $70
billion less than what the BCA outlined for Fiscal Year 2017.
Finally,
despite intense pressure from the president to raise taxes on hard working
American families and small businesses, this budget was coupled with
legislation that actually cut taxes by hundreds of billions of
dollars—another big win for conservatives.
Budget Priorities To Improve Our National Security And Improve Our
Economy Include:
- Easing defense sequester cuts that were
gutting our military and providing much-needed resources to our military
so that our troops can confront ISIS and the dangerous national security
challenges we face;
- Giving well-deserved pay raises for our
men and women in uniform;
- Implementing new Homeland Security
measures to prevent terrorists from exploiting our visa system;
- Repealing the antiquated, 1970s-era Oil
Export Ban, which will now create an estimated 1 million jobs
throughout the country by 2018 and add an estimated $170 billion to
the nation’s GDP;
- Repealing/Delaying a number of Obamacare
provisions including:
- Prohibiting any new funding for
Obamacare;
- Cutting $15 million from the
Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB), which is an unelected board
that restricts services to seniors and patients;
- A two-year delay on the Obamacare tax
on high-quality healthcare plans;
- A one-year delay of the Health
Insurance Tax, which if implemented would have raised the cost of small
business health insurance premiums—to the tune of $159 billion over ten
years—and would have been passed on almost entirely to consumers;
- A two-year delay of the Medical Device
Tax, which was a harmful tax that would kill jobs, harm innovation, and
prevent new, lifesaving healthcare tools from entering the
market;
- Prohibiting a government bailout of
health insurance companies.
- Blocking EPA overreaches by lowering the EPA budget to the
lowest levels since President Obama took office, and by prohibiting
certain illegal or unconstitutional EPA mandates;
- Shifting billions of dollars from
agencies like the EPA and the IRS to Customs and Border Protection and
ICE to monitor the border and enforce our immigration laws;
- Preventing the IRS from harassing
501(c)(4) organizations based on their ideological beliefs and freezing
IRS funding at
$1.7 billion below the president’s request;
- Providing resources to our dedicated
researchers who are working to discover new cures and medical
breakthroughs for diseases like leukemia, Alzheimer’s, cancer, Lyme
disease, diabetes, and so many others;
- Reauthorizing healthcare
benefits for 9/11 first responders who continue to suffer from
complications due to their heroic actions in the aftermath of the
attacks;
- Prohibiting the president’s efforts
to close Guantanamo Bay or transfer terrorist detainees
to the United States—without a doubt, moving detainees to the mainland
would pose imminent danger to communities in which they would be placed;
and
- Zeroing
out the dollars in the account that would be used to implement the Paris
climate change agreement.
Next Actions: Repeal Obamacare and Defund Planned Parenthood
The first
agenda item in the House this week will be to pass a budget reconciliation
bill that will, for the first time, send to the president’s desk a
bill repealing Obamacare, defunding Planned Parenthood, and redirecting
the Planned Parenthood funding to community health centers. It will
also increase funding to these more accessible and community-based
services. The bill is known as the Restoring Americans'
Healthcare Freedom Reconciliation Act, for which I have already
voted in 2015. The Senate has also now voted on this bill and returned
it to the House for final passage to put on the president’s
desk.
Providing Relief and Helping The Economy: A Year End Tax Cuts
Package
With all of
the discussion of the Omnibus, many people failed to learn of the $600
billion tax cuts package we passed at the same time. It has always been
a priority of mine to support policies that lower taxes on our businesses and
hard-working families. The Protecting Americans from Tax Hikes
Act, or the PATH Act, reauthorized a number of worthy tax provisions.
- Provisions made permanent:
- The Research and Development (R&D)
Credit that will create jobs and spur our economy, especially the
economy of the Tenth District;
- Code Section 179 Expensing, which helps
businesses invest in new business equipment and property;
- The State and Local Sales Tax Deduction;
- A number of Charitable Tax Deductions;
- Deductions for teacher classroom
expenses;
- Temporary American Opportunity Tax
Credit, which is a credit for qualified education expenses paid by
college students;
- Temporary changes to the Earned Income
Tax Credit (reducing marriage penalties and assisting families with
three or more children);
- Expansions of the Child Tax Credit,
including the refundability for low-wage workers;
- Commuter Tax Benefits Parity, which
raises revenues to the Treasury while easing traffic congestion; and
- The Employer Wage Credit for active
duty military, including expansion for all employers
- There is also a five-year extension of
Bonus Depreciation provisions for businesses to use against the
depreciation of equipment (50% for 2015-17, 40% in 2018, 30% in 2019);
and
- A
two-Year Extension for Mortgage Debt Forgiveness provisions.
With passage
of these bills, Congress is poised to take on a much larger overhaul of the
tax code that will lower rates, broaden the tax base, and make America
competitive again in an ever-increasing global economy. I look forward
to taking on these challenges in 2016 under regular order.
Thank you
again for contacting me. I am honored to serve Virginia’s Tenth
Congressional District. I may be contacted at my Sterling office at 703-404-6903,
or my Washington, D.C. office at 202-225-5136. By visiting http://comstock.house.gov,
you can sign up to receive my email newsletters and follow my efforts to
serve you. You can also follow us on Facebook
and Twitter
for real-time updates on my activities in Congress and in the District.
If I ever may be of service, please do not hesitate to call on me.
Sincerely,
Barbara Comstock
Member of Congress
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