Congressman Cohen Votes to Advance Build Back Better Act

WASHINGTON – Congressman Steve Cohen (TN-09), a senior member of the Judiciary and Transportation and Infrastructure Committees, today voted for the rule for consideration of the Build Back Better Act, historic legislation investing in the nation's social safety net. The measure finally closes Tennessee's Medicaid coverage gap and delivers once-in-a-generation action to lower the everyday costs that burden working families – from health care to childcare to education and more – and is fully paid for by making big corporations and the wealthiest individuals pay their fair share.

The passage of the rule today, on a vote of 221 to 213, moves the measure closer to a full House vote.

After the vote on the rule, Congressman Cohen made the following statement:

"This vote moves us closer to a historic vote on an excellent bill that addresses the country's needs with commonsense solutions to the pressing concerns of everyday life. We are investing in our children's future with universal pre-K education, an extended child tax credit lowering childhood poverty, a commitment to parents raising children with paid leave for workers, and the biggest expansion of affordable health care in a decade. This bill will finally provide coverage to the 118,000 low-income Tennesseans denied coverage because of state legislators' refusal to expand Medicaid and will lower middle class Tennesseans' premiums by hundreds of dollars a year with enhanced ACA subsidies. This is the bill the country has been waiting for. I am proud to have championed its provisions over the years and am even more proud to see them advancing in the House today. This is a bright day for America."

Congressman Cohen has spoken from the House floor twice this week to encourage his colleagues to support the Build Back Better framework while it was still being negotiated. See those speeches hereand here.

Led by President Biden and Democrats in Congress, the Build Back Better Act will be transformative for nearly every Tennessee family: delivering historic investments that meet their needs in the wake of the pandemic and will ensure that all can share in the benefits of a growing economy now, and for generations to come.

The Build Back Better Framework Will Deliver for Tennessee

President Biden's Build Back Better framework will finally close the Medicaid coverage gap and bring down costs that have held back families in Tennessee for decades by cutting taxes and making childcare, home care, education, health care, and housing more affordable. These unprecedented investments will provide new learning opportunities for children, help parents and especially working parents make ends meet, and position the economy for stronger growth for years to come. The framework will create good-paying jobs for residents of Tennessee, combating climate change, giving our kids cleaner air
and water and making America the leader in global innovation and 21st century manufacturing.

The Build Back Better Act will:

• Provide access to affordable childcare. Childcare is a major strain for families in Tennessee, where the average annual cost of a childcare center for a toddler is $9,998, meaning that a Tennessee family with two young children would on average spend 24 percent of their income on childcare for one year. The lack of affordable options also makes it difficult for parents, and especially mothers, to remain in their jobs, contributing to the 21 percent gender gap in workforce participation between mothers and fathers in Tennessee. The Build Back Better framework will enable Tennessee to provide access to childcare for 421,870 young children (ages 0-5) per year from families earning under 2.5 times the Tennessee median income (about $191,121 for a family of 4), and ensure these families pay no more than 7 percent of their income on high-quality childcare.

• Provide universal, high-quality, free preschool for every 3- and 4-year old in America. Today, only 11 percent of the 165,717 3- and 4-year-olds in Tennessee have access to publicly funded preschool, and it costs about $8,600 per year for those who can't access a publicly funded program. The Build Back Better framework will enable Tennessee to expand access to free, high-quality preschool to more than 148,048 additional 3- and 4-year-olds per year and increase the quality of preschool for children who are already enrolled. Parents will be able to send their children to the preschool setting of their choice—from public schools to childcare providers to Head Start—leading to lifelong educational benefits, allowing more parents to go back to work, and building a stronger foundation for Tennessee's future economic competitiveness.

• Address the existential threat of climate change. From 2010 to 2020, Tennessee experienced 40 extreme weather events, costing up to $20 billion in damages. The Build Back Better framework will set the United States on course to meet its climate targets—a 50-52% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions below 2005 levels by 2030—in a way that creates good-paying union jobs, grows domestic industries, and advances environmental justice. The framework represents the largest ever single investment in our clean energy economy—across buildings, transportation, industry, electricity, agriculture, and climate smart practices in our lands and waters. And the framework will create a new Civilian Climate Corps that will enlist a diverse generation of Tennesseans in conserving our public lands, bolstering community resilience, and addressing the changing climate, all while putting good-paying union jobs within reach. In clean energy and in other sectors, the Build Back Better framework will also strengthen domestic manufacturing and supply chains for critical goods, benefiting American businesses, workers, consumers, and communities.

• Expand health care coverage and lower costs. Health care should be a right, not a privilege, and residents of Tennessee facing illness should never have to worry about how they are going to pay for treatment. The Build Back Better framework will close the Medicaid coverage gap to help millions of Americans gain health insurance, extend through 2025 the American Rescue Plan's health insurance premium reductions for those who buy coverage on their own, and help older Americans access affordable hearing care by expanding Medicare. In Tennessee, that means 289,000 uninsured people will gain coverage, including the 118,000 who fell into the Medicaid coverage gap, and 134,900 will on average save hundreds of dollars per year. In addition, the Build Back Better framework will support maternal health and invest in national preparedness for future pandemics.

• Make education beyond high school more affordable and accessible. The average cost of a 2-year degree in Tennessee is $4,639 per year, and $10,575 per year for a 4-year degree, straining many student budgets. To help unlock the opportunities of an education beyond high school, the Build Back Better framework will increase maximum Pell Grant awards by $550 for students at public and private non-profit institutions, supporting the 101,066 students in Tennessee who rely on Pell. The framework will also invest in Tennessee's 12 minority-serving institutions and the students they serve, including Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), Tribal Colleges and Universities (TCUs), and Hispanic-serving institutions (HSIs).

• Train America's workers for the jobs of the future. Of the world's biggest economies, the United States is second to last in investing in workforce development, and funding for federal job training programs has dropped by almost half since 2001. The Build Back Better framework invests in training programs that will prepare Tennessee's
workers for high-quality jobs in fast-growing sectors like public health, childcare, manufacturing, IT, and clean energy. 13 public community colleges in Tennessee will have the opportunity to benefit from grants to develop and deliver innovative training programs and expand proven ones.

• Provide nutritious food options for children. 16 percent of children in Tennessee live in food insecure households, harming their long-term health and ability to succeed in school. The Build Back Better framework will ensure that the nutritional needs of Tennessee's children are met by expanding access to free school meals to an additional 110,000 students during the school year and providing 615,610 students with resources to purchase food over the summer.

• Reduce housing costs and expand housing options. 396,000 renters in Tennessee are rent burdened, meaning they spend more than 30 percent of their income on rent, while homeownership remains out of reach for many families. The Build Back Better framework will expand rental assistance for Tennessee renters, while also increasing the supply of high-quality housing through the construction and rehabilitation of
over 1 million affordable housing units nationwide. It will address the capital needs of the entire public housing stock in America and it includes one of the largest investments in down payment assistance in history, enabling more first-generation homebuyers to purchase their first home.

• Support families with long-term care needs. The need for high-quality, accessible, and affordable care for older Americans and disabled Americans is only growing, but high costs and care shortages leave many to rely on family for unpaid caregiving. The Build Back Better framework will expand access to home- and community-based care to
more of Tennessee's senior citizens and disabled citizens, and improve the quality and wages of caregiving jobs.

• Cut taxes for families and workers. Prior to the pandemic, 11 percent of children under the age of 18 in Tennessee lived in poverty. The Build Back Better framework will bolster financial security and spur economic growth in Tennessee by reducing taxes on the middle class and those striving to break into it. The framework will extend Child Tax
Credit (CTC) increases of $300/month per child under 6 or $250/month per child ages 6 to 17. This will continue the largest one-year reduction in child poverty in history. And critically, the agreement includes permanent refundability for the Child Tax Credit, meaning that the neediest families will continue to receive the full Child Tax Credit over the long-run. The framework will also provide a tax cut of up to $1,500 in tax cuts for 381,400 low-wage workers in Tennessee by extending the American Rescue Plan's Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) expansion.

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