[House Hearing, 117 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]


                   WHAT'S THE BIG IDEA? INNOVATIVE 
                     APPROACHES TO FIXING CONGRESS

=======================================================================

                                HEARING

                              BEFORE THE

                       SELECT COMMITTEE ON THE 
                       MODERNIZATION OF CONGRESS

                                OF THE

                        HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                    ONE HUNDRED SEVENTEENTH CONGRESS

                             SECOND SESSION

                               __________

                             JULY 28, 2022

                               __________

                           Serial No. 117-22

                               __________

  Printed for the use of the Select Committee on the Modernization of 
                                Congress
                                

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                    Available via http://govinfo.gov
                    
                              __________

                    U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE                    
48-591                     WASHINGTON : 2022                     
          
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           SELECT COMMITTEE ON THE MODERNIZATION OF CONGRESS

                    DEREK KILMER, Washington, Chair

 ZOE LOFGREN, California              WILLIAM TIMMONS, South Carolina,
 EMANUEL CLEAVER, Missouri             Vice Chair
 ED PERLMUTTER, Colorado              BOB LATTA, Ohio
 DEAN PHILLIPS, Minnesota             RODNEY DAVIS, Illinois
 NIKEMA WILLIAMS, Georgia             DAVE JOYCE, Ohio
                                      GUY RESCHENTHALER, Pennsylvania
                                      BETH VAN DUYNE, Texas

                            COMMITTEE STAFF

                     Yuri Beckelman, Staff Director
                 Derek Harley, Republican Staff Director
                            
                            
                            C O N T E N T S

                              ----------                              

                           OPENING STATEMENTS

                                                                   Page
Chairman Derek Kilmer
      Oral Statement.............................................     1
Vice Chairman William Timmons
      Oral Statement.............................................     2

                               WITNESSES

Dr. Lee Drutman, Senior Fellow, New America
      Oral Statement.............................................     3
      Written Statement..........................................     6
Dr. Danielle Allen, James Bryant Conant University Professor, 
    Harvard University
      Oral Statement.............................................     8
      Written Statement..........................................    10
Mr. Joe Mariani, Research Manager, Deloitte Center for Government 
    Insights
      Oral Statement.............................................    14
      Written Statement..........................................    16
Dr. Kevin Kosar, Senior Fellow, American Enterprise Institute
      Oral Statement.............................................    24
      Written Statement..........................................    27
Hon. John Larson, Representative, First District of Connecticut
      Oral Statement.............................................    33
      Written Statement..........................................    35
Discussion.......................................................    38

 
     WHAT'S THE BIG IDEA? INNOVATIVE APPROACHES TO FIXING CONGRESS

                        Thursday, July 28, 2022

                 House of Representatives,,
                            Select Committee on the
                                 Modernization of Congress,
                                                    Washington, DC.
    The committee met, pursuant to call, at 9:01 a.m., in Room 
2118, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Derek Kilmer 
[chairman of the committee] presiding.
    Present: Representatives Kilmer, Williams, Timmons, and 
Latta.
    The Chairman. Okay. The committee will come to order.
    Without objection, the chair is authorized to declare a 
recess of the committee at any time. And I now recognize myself 
for 5 minutes for an opening statement.
    No pressure on any of our witnesses today, but I have been 
looking forward to this hearing for about 3 years. When this 
committee was first formed in 2019, we were given one year to 
do our work, and I wanted to make sure that we found a way to 
showcase some out-of-the-box approaches to fixing Congress, and 
the plan was to do a big ideas hearing at the end of the year. 
But as the end of the year approached, the committee received 
an extension through 2020, so we decided to push the big ideas 
hearing back. Then a few months into 2020, COVID came along and 
upended everything. Big ideas was put on hold while the 
committee focused its attention on pressing issues like 
continuity of congressional operations and remote work 
procedures. Fortunately, the committee was once again extended, 
this time through the end of the 117th Congress. So here we are 
at long last.
    I share that background because I want to make clear that 
this hearing has been part of the committee's plan since day 
one. So let me explain.
    A big part of making Congress work better for the American 
people involves focusing on tangible solutions. We have so far 
held 37 public hearings and passed 171 recommendations aimed at 
doing just that. The committee's structure requires bipartisan 
agreement, and we have worked hard to find common ground on 
some tough issues.
    But in addition to focusing on what seems doable, we need 
to think big. We should be open to creative problem-solving and 
considering ideas that fall outside of our comfort zones.
    I say this because Congress is not a static institution. 
The legislative branch is supposed to reflect the diverse use 
of this country, and as our society and politics evolve, so 
should our willingness to address the problems that made 
Congress less effective than it should be. New problems demand 
new solutions.
    Our Founding Fathers designed an amazing system of 
government that has lasted well over 200 years, but if it were 
perfect, there would be no need for the 27 constitutional 
amendments that have been ratified since 1791. None of those 
amendments would have passed if citizens and policymakers 
weren't willing to think big and take risks.
    So the good news is not all big ideas require 
constitutional amendments. There are plenty of innovative 
solutions to the big and small challenges Congress faces. And 
today we are joined by a panel of big thinkers who are going to 
share with us their ideas for making Congress work better for 
the American people.
    The committee will use its rules that allow for a more 
flexible hearing format that encourages discussion and the 
civil exchange of ideas and opinions. So in accordance with 
clause 2(j) of House rule XI, we will allow up to 30 minutes of 
extended questioning per witness and, without objection, time 
will not be strictly segregated between the witnesses, which 
will allow for extended back-and-forth exchanges between 
members and the witnesses.
    Vice Chair Timmons and I will manage the time to ensure 
that every member has equal opportunity to participate and, 
additionally, members who wish to claim their individual 5 
minutes to question each witness pursuant to clause 2(j)(2) of 
rule XI will be permitted to do so following the period of 
extended questioning.
    All right. With that, I would like to invite Vice Chair 
Timmons to share some opening marks as well.
    Mr. Timmons. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    I am really looking forward to today's discussion on out-
of-the-box approaches to improving how Congress works for the 
American people. As you mentioned, this has been on the agenda 
for quite awhile, so I am really glad we are finally getting to 
it. We have got 6 months left, and we are hoping to get some 
more done.
    And allow me to, again, quote the chairman who often likes 
to say, There are no bad ideas in the ideas room. It is 
entirely in the spirit that we invite our witnesses here today. 
A lot of the work on this committee has rightly been focused on 
improving the nuts-and-bolts operations of Congress. As we have 
seen, there is a lot of work to be done there. However, I 
appreciate that we can also spend time today exploring bigger, 
bolder ideas for reforming Congress for the benefit of the 
American people.
    Before I move on, I want to thank the witnesses for joining 
us. I know this committee has heard from several of you before 
on other issues, and we appreciate the work and thought all of 
you continue to put into improving the institution.
    Today we are going to hear about five very different ideas 
for fixing Congress. Some of them, such as extending the size 
of the House or extending House terms, asked us to grapple with 
some of the same arguments the Founders did. And I will say 
here, as a conservative, I believe the Founders knew exactly 
what they were doing. Our system of self-government, of 
constitutional checks and balances, and federalism is the best 
the world has ever seen. And I think we must tread very 
carefully when examining any ideas that might require amending 
the Constitution.
    At the same time, our committee has always been well served 
by our willingness to explore every idea presented to us for 
strengthening Congress, which the Founders saw as the first 
among coequal branches, so that we can improve the way we serve 
the American people. If we are going to assess what is best for 
the future of our public, we should first do a better job 
understanding where the system we have today came from. I am 
hopeful our witnesses will be able to provide helpful 
historical context on the Founders' vision to inform our 
discussions.
    I also note that another topic we will be discussing today, 
AI and machine learning, in the legislative process is a big 
idea that is something we should prepare for. As they say, the 
future is now, and we should do everything we can to prepare 
and ensure Congress is at the forefront of technology and civic 
spaces. I would particularly like to talk about the calendar 
and the schedule and how machine learning and AI can solve the 
problems we have been grappling with for the last couple of 
years.
    Really appreciate you all being here. Look forward to the 
conversation.
    With that, Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
    The Chairman. Thank you.
    Well, I now would like to welcome our five expert 
witnesses, including one of our colleagues. Because we have a 
bigger panel than usual, I will ask witnesses to keep their 
oral remarks to about 3 minutes, and then we will have plenty 
of time to discuss all of the testimony once we move to a 
period of extended questions.
    Witnesses are reminded your written statements will be made 
part of the record.
    Let's kick things off with Lee Drutman. Dr. Drutman is a 
senior fellow at New America studying political reform. He is 
also a lecturer at the Johns Hopkins University and regular 
contributor to 538. Prior to New America, he was a senior 
fellow at the Sunlight Foundation. He's the author of 
``Breaking the Two-Party Doom Loop: The Case for Multiparty 
Democracy in America.'' He earned his bachelor's in political 
science from Brown and his Ph.D. in political science from the 
University of Cal, Berkeley.
    Dr. Drutman, you are now recognized for 3 minutes.

  STATEMENTS OF DR. LEE DRUTMAN, SENIOR FELLOW, NEW AMERICA, 
    WASHINGTON, DC; DR. DANIELLE ALLEN, JAMES BRYANT CONANT 
 UNIVERSITY PROFESSOR, HARVARD UNIVERSITY, CAMBRIDGE, MA; MR. 
 JOE MARIANI, RESEARCH MANAGER, DELOITTE CENTER FOR GOVERNMENT 
INSIGHTS, CHICAGO, IL; DR. KEVIN KOSAR, SENIOR FELLOW, AMERICAN 
ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE, WASHINGTON, DC; AND THE HONORABLE JOHN B. 
          LARSON, MEMBER OF CONGRESS, WASHINGTON, D.C.

                    STATEMENT OF LEE DRUTMAN

    Mr. Drutman. Well, thank you.
    What a great honor to be here. Chairman Kilmer, Vice Chair 
Timmons, and members of the Select Committee on the 
Modernization of Congress, I really appreciate this opportunity 
to participate in the big ideas hearing.
    So one big idea is increasing the size of the House of 
Representatives and making it bigger. Well, maybe it is not 
that big of an idea actually, since it is something that we did 
in this country for the first 120 years. So let's get into that 
history.
    In 1790, when the U.S. House of Representatives first met, 
there were only 65 members, each with approximately 30,000 
constituents. Of course, the U.S. had only 13 States, and the 
country was much smaller populationwise. But because this was 
to be the people's House, framers envisioned Representatives 
with close connections to their constituents and districts 
small enough to make that representation meaningful.
    Now, obviously, the country has grown considerably since 
then, and as the country grew for the first 120 years, after 
each Census, Congress added more seats to reflect the growing 
population. But after the last expansion in 1911, the House 
settled on 435, no good reason there, other than they couldn't 
agree how to add more seats during what was a somewhat divisive 
and polarized time.
    Now, as you obviously know, since 1911, the population of 
the country has more than tripled, and with women's suffrage 
and the enfranchisement of African Americans, the eligible 
voting population has increased more than sixfold. But that 
number 435 hasn't budged. The average number of constituents 
per district today is 760,000, so it is hard to feel heard when 
you are one in three-fourths of a million.
    Now, we know that the larger the district, the more distant 
constituents feel from their Representatives, and vice versus. 
Distance breeds distrust and frustration and inadequate 
representation. It is not the way the framers intended the 
House to operate, and it is just bad for our form of 
representative, republican democracy.
    The American Academy of Arts and Science report that I 
coauthored--nicely printed here, of course--is part of the Our 
Common Purpose Project, which I am submitting for the record, 
recommends increasing the House by 150 members to a total of 
585. This would correspond to the number of seats that have 
shifted between the States even as their population has grown 
since that 435 cap was stuck upon. And this doesn't have to 
happen right now. Probably the ideal timing would be after the 
2030 Census, and then once instituted, the number would 
continue to expand as the population grows.
    So in addition to bringing constituents and Representatives 
closer to each other, an expansion, I think, would have some 
other benefits. One is it would bring new faces and new ideas 
to Washington. Incumbency reelection rates are extremely high. 
I guess your constituents love you all, and I can't blame them. 
But, you know, over time, that can make Washington start to 
feel a little too Washington and keeping some fresh 
perspectives out. So the people's House should be close to the 
people.
    All this could shake things up a bit for sure, but given 
how stuck and dysfunctional things seem to be right now, a 
little shakeup might be good. It could bring some new energy, 
some new creativity to Congress, and even help short-circuit 
some of the destructive hyperpartisan polarizations really 
undermining our system of government.
    And on that front, I do think pairing an increased House 
with another of the Academy's recommendations, proportional 
multimember districts would go a long way, because with 
proportional multimember districts, you would have much more 
diversity of perspectives in Congress and it would really 
expand beyond the highly polarized binaries of solid Republican 
and solid Democratic districts, and that would create, I think, 
even more possibilities for new creative problem-solving and I 
think also a more committee-oriented Congress.
    You know, more broadly, as a scholar of political science 
and history, I see that this decade ahead is actually likely to 
be a real moment of transformative change in our democracy, 
because, I mean, I think it is clear that the status quo is 
broken. And, you know, there are those who want to burn it all 
to the ground, but, you know, I at least, and I think you all, 
want to restore and renew the promise of liberal, republican 
democracy in America. And, you know, I am 100 percent convinced 
that we are going to need some big, bold ideas to make that 
work and to innovate and modernize towards a brighter future 
for this country.
    So I look forward to working with you all to achieve some 
of these innovations.
    [The statement of Mr. Drutman follows:]
    
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    The Chairman. Thank you, Dr. Drutman.
    Our next witness is Danielle Allen. Dr. Allen is a 
professor and director of the Center for Ethics at Harvard 
University. She is a political theorist who studies democratic 
theory, political sociology, and the history of political 
thought. She is widely known for her work on justice and 
citizenship in ancient Athens and modern America and is a 
member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She is the 
author of, among other things, ``From Voice to Influence: 
Understanding Citizenship in the Digital Age.'' Dr. Allen 
earned her first Ph.D. in classics from the University of 
Cambridge and her second Ph.D. in government from Harvard 
University.
    Doctor, doctor, you are now recognized for 3 minutes.

                  STATEMENT OF DANIELLE ALLEN

    Ms. Allen. Also known as square. That is what you get for 
that, doctor, doctor.
    Good morning, Chair Kilmer. Thank you for the invitation. 
Vice Chair Timmons, Representative Latta, it is an honor to be 
with all of you, and thank you so much for your commitment to 
self-government.
    You have heard my background. I have also had the honor of 
being a co-chair for the American Academy of Arts and Sciences 
Commission on the practice of democratic citizenship, but I 
want to share a little bit more about myself for context, where 
my views come from.
    I grew up in southern California in a family that prized 
civic engagement. On my mom's side, my great-grandparents 
helped fight for women's right to vote, and my great-
grandmother was president of the League of Women Voters in 
Michigan in the thirties. And on my dad's side, my granddad 
helped found one of the first NAACP chapters in northern 
Florida.
    So as a matter of both family inheritance and personal 
conviction, I bring a deep belief to this hearing in the value 
to all people of the chance to participate in self-government 
as free and equal citizens.
    I speak, therefore, from personal conviction but also speak 
today on behalf of the Academy's commission. The American 
Academy of Arts and Sciences was founded in 1780, before the 
Constitution and by the same people who led the Revolution. It 
was founded to secure for the new Nation the knowledge, 
resources needed for the daring experiment in self-government.
    In 2018, the Academy convened a bipartisan commission to 
address the widespread sense that our constitutional democracy 
is in crisis. In 2020, we issued our report, Our Common 
Purpose. You have heard about it, a fair bit of it. And the 
report makes the case that improvement of civic culture and of 
political institutions must go hand-in-hand if we are going to 
secure the health of our constitutional democracy.
    So my core message is that tweaking how Congress operates 
is not enough to restore the strength of the first branch of 
government. A healthy Congress can grow only out of the soil of 
a healthy civic culture. So investment in our civic well-being 
through civic infrastructure is investment in the health of 
Congress.
    Civic infrastructure consists of the local places, 
programs, and people that encourage all residents of 
municipalities and regions to interact, find common ground, and 
solve problems together. We currently underinvest in this 
infrastructure, and underinvestment shows up in isolation, 
disengagement, mistrust, and contention, instead of 
participation and collaboration.
    Against this backdrop, residents in local communities, just 
like my great-grandparents and grandparents, are seeking to 
turn the tide. In Inman, South Carolina, local government, 
business people, and community residents have collaborated on a 
revitalized downtown with a new public library and physical 
infrastructure to better support connections among residents 
and visitors.
    In Lexington, Kentucky, the nonprofit CivicLex builds civic 
health through accessible coverage of local government meetings 
and programs for residents and relationship-building activities 
and resident engagement in local government.
    The Citizens Campaign from New Jersey educates local 
residents in techniques of no-blame problem-solving, and 
participants form civic trusts, as they call them, nonpartisan, 
community-based civic associations that search for successful 
policies that work in other communities that might be adopted 
in their own. Local communities need a vote of confidence from 
national investment.
    In our report, we recommended the creation of a trust for 
civic infrastructure, a new national organization for grant 
making, knowledge sharing, public education, and research and 
evaluation to strengthen civic capacity and connectivity in 
local communities. A pilot trust is currently forming with 
private support, but the scope and scale of needed investments 
means civic infrastructure should also be a priority for the 
national budget.
    Future members of your body need a chance to learn the 
practices of democratic citizenship in rich schools of 
democracy at the local level. When local communities know how 
to bridge divides and engage residents in productive 
collaborations, we will be on our way to securing a healthy 
political culture nationally. This will improve your working 
conditions.
    Only with innovation can we pass on to future generations 
our valuable inheritance of constitutional democracy in better 
shape than we currently find it.
    So, again, we thank you for your willingness to renovate 
our constitutional democracy.
    [The statement of Ms. Allen follows:]
    
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    The Chairman. Thank you, Dr. Allen.
    Our next witness is Joe Mariani. Did I get that right?
    All right. Mr. Mariani is the technology and innovation 
leader at the Center for Government Insights at Deloitte 
Services LP. His research focuses on the intersection of 
culture and innovation in both commercial businesses and 
government organizations. Previously, he worked as a science 
teacher at St. Anselm's Abbey School, and served as an 
intelligence officer with the U.S. Marine Corps. Mr. Mariani 
earned his bachelor of arts in philosophy from the University 
of Chicago and his master's of arts from Dartmouth College.
    Mr. Mariani, you are now recognized for 3 minutes.

                    STATEMENT OF JOE MARIANI

    Mr. Mariani. Thank you, Chair Kilmer, Vice Chair Timmons, 
members of the committee. Thank you for the opportunity to 
testify today.
    As you heard, I am Joe Mariani, and I lead research into 
emerging technologies for Deloitte Center for Government 
Insights. And I have come to that role with a broad range of 
experience, from Marine Corps intelligence officer to high 
school science teacher, from consultant to the government to 
commercial technology researcher. So today's task of kind of 
mining the breadth of industry and academia for the big ideas 
that can help transform government is exactly what gets me out 
of bed in the morning.
    So for the past 5 years, we have been looking at the 
potential impact artificial intelligence, or AI, could have on 
government, and from that research we have identified two ways 
that we think could help transform the legislative process.
    The first is AI as microscope; that is, using AI to assess 
the impact of existing legislation. So machine learning or ML 
models can accurately find patterns in data without having to 
specify ahead of time what those patterns should be. So just as 
a microscope can look at a leaf, for example, and find 
structures and patterns invisible to the human eye, these 
machine learning models can look at programs and find patterns 
in their outcomes that may be invisible to humans just because 
of the size, scope, or even age of the data. So, for example, 
machine learning models have found that patterns in government 
R&D investment during World War II have impacted the location 
of innovation hubs even to today. And you can use these machine 
learning models on more recent policy problems as well.
    In Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, researchers have used 
machine learning models to help understand which interventions 
are most effective at reducing infant mortality. And it is that 
ability of machine learning models to predict policy outcomes 
that kind of begs the next question, which is, you know, what 
if we did something differently? What would change?
    And answering that question is exactly our second use of 
AI, AI as simulator. So creating an AI simulator for problems 
can help policymakers test different approaches in much the 
same way that a flight simulator allows pilots to test 
different ways of flying an entirely new airplane.
    So researchers in Ireland have recently taken advantage of 
this to simulate parts of their economy, so they use data from 
patents, knowledge flows, other economic trends to simulate how 
individual companies and investors might react to different 
policies. So, for example, the researchers could examine if 
different tax incentives or funding methods would support the 
creation of new high-tech small businesses in certain specific 
parts of the country.
    And using AI in this way to simulate the complex systems 
that Congress deals with every day can actually improve the 
quality of debate and do so in three key ways. First, it can 
articulate the often unspoken assumptions and values that we 
all bring to these issues; second, it can uncover the drivers 
of particular problems; and, third, it can help us understand 
which interventions will be the most effective and at what 
cost.
    Ultimately, these simulations can help members agree on 
what they disagree on. In fact, there is even evidence that 
just experimenting with these models alone can help drive 
consensus on emotionally charged issues.
    Now, using AI in the legislative processes is certainly 
going to uncover some unique challenges. New skills, new 
security requirements, new business processes will likely be 
required. But examples already at work in other industries show 
that with the right human machine teaming, AI can help provide 
common foundation for debate, encourage consensus, and produce 
meaningful results for the American people.
    Thank you. I look forward to your questions.
    [The statement of Mr. Mariani follows:]
    
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    The Chairman. Thanks, Mr. Mariani.
    Next up we have got Kevin Kosar. Dr. Kosar is a senior 
fellow at American Enterprise Institute, where he studies the 
U.S. Congress, the administrative state, and election reform. 
Prior to AEI, he was the vice president of research 
partnerships at the R Street Institute and was the cofounder of 
the Legislative Branch Capacity Working Group. He also served 
for more than a decade as an analyst with the Congressional 
Research Service. He is the coauthor of the book ``Congress 
Overwhelmed: The Decline of Congressional Capacity and 
Prospects for Reform.'' Dr. Kosar earned his bachelor of arts 
in political science from Ohio State University and his master 
of arts and Ph.D. in politics from New York University.
    Dr. Kosar, welcome back. You are now recognized for 3 
minutes.

                    STATEMENT OF KEVIN KOSAR

    Mr. Kosar. All right. Thank you much, Chairman Kilmer, Vice 
Chairman Timmons, and members of the select committee, for 
having me here.
    And I also appreciated the setup you gave my topic in your 
introduction. You referenced rule XI clause 2(j)(2). Kind of 
gets to my point. And I think it is also interesting that this 
room is located right next to the Energy Committee's room, and 
above that is a portrait of the late John Dingell, who had many 
famous quips. One of them was that, you know, you can write the 
bill, but if I write the rules, I will win. But being John 
Dingell, of course, the language was much more salty.
    The importance of rules for the legislative process and the 
fact that rules on the waiving of the rules ultimately can be 
very determinative outputs is, you know, little appreciated I 
think outside of Capitol Hill. It is only when you get here and 
you start seeing how the wheels turn that you realize how 
impactful they are.
    So, yes, I am here to--I was called here to talk about 
excessive complexity of House rules for moving legislation. You 
know, your staff had flagged a committee I had written for The 
Hill wherein I decried excessive complexity, particularly 
citing the process by which the debt limit was raised by 
something like $400 billion or more, which was baffling to even 
long-term Congress watchers who follow this stuff. So if it is 
baffling to us, I mean, my goodness, how can anybody else in 
this country understand what occurred.
    Now, I want to say, of course, you know, there is nothing 
inherently wrong with complex rules. I mean, you are dealing 
with humans who are interacting in, you know, a legislative 
chamber. There are a lot of things that can go wrong, and so, 
of course, you want to create rules and try to have them work 
towards a productive end. But I think what we have seen is, 
over time, that the number of rules have built up, and this is 
not a phenomenon unique to Congress. All organizations often 
face this blight.
    I mean, we often decry red tape in government agencies. 
What is red tape? Well, it is a surfeit of rules. It is rules 
being layered on and aggregating year after year after year and 
ultimately creating an incoherent jumble which is exceedingly 
difficult to navigate and often can make it difficult for the 
organization to do what is expected of it.
    You know, ultimately, the rules governing any human actions 
within an institution need to serve the ultimate objectives of 
the institution. They should embody the shared values of the 
institution, and they should be readily understandable by 
participants in the enterprise. And I think--you know, I am not 
a rules' nerd. There are those over at the Congressional 
Research Service where I used to work who are totally nerd out 
on the specifics of nerds. But just as somebody who has been 
watching Congress for 20 years in this town, it feels to me 
that there are clear signs that the rules have grown overly 
complex.
    You know, the committee here has previously conducted a 
deep dive on the budget process, which is just--you know, that 
is one slice of legislative process which is rife with arcana--
paygo, 302(b) allocations--and it goes on and on and on. You 
know, there are whole fields of expertise nerds who devote 
their lives to studying budget process and just budget process 
because it is that complex. And then you consider that is just 
part of the whole. I mean, my goodness, how is a legislator 
supposed to operate in this environment?
    The rules--setting aside the budget rules, the rules 
governing legislative process are prolix, to put it mildly. You 
know, they begin on page 345 of the House Rules and Manual, and 
they conclude some 700 pages later. The manual holds rules, you 
know, 130 devoted to committee procedures, like you cited; 56 
pages address motions and amendments; 86 pages relate to the 
aforementioned budget process, and so forth.
    You know, as a point of contrast, the great State of Ohio, 
its legislative rule book has only 200 pages, and not all 200 
are devoted to rules of moving legislation. They are devoted to 
other stuff, you know, member conduct and such things.
    Do we really need that many rules here compared to the 
State of Ohio or perhaps other States? I think it is a fair 
question to ask.
    And I think, you know, when you talk about rules piling up, 
they ultimately are going to come with a cost. Not least, as 
alluded to, the more rules an organization has, the fewer 
people who can stand up. And, of course, that is going to 
create power imbalances. You know, I have referenced the iron 
law of oligarchy. There is always somebody at the top of the 
organization who knows more things than other people and, 
therefore, is able to get their way. Well, that is kind of 
inherently problematic if taken to extremes for a 
representative legislature where you are all supposed to be 
equal and you all have constituencies and States to take care 
of.
    You know, when--I conducted a study with Timothy LaPira, a 
professor, and Lee Drutman, and we surveyed congressional staff 
some years ago. We saw some clear evidence that even staff, 
whose job it is to help you guys do your work, were struggling 
to understand the rules. And we weren't asking arcana. We were 
asking some pretty straightforward stuff, and the percentage of 
folks who understood it wasn't especially high.
    Another cost of the complexity of rules is that, you know, 
regular order starts to erode. No longer can you, you know, do 
the schoolhouse rock thing where you say, okay, I will 
introduce a bill. It is going to get referred to committee or 
multiple committees. There will be a committee process. A bill 
will emerge from it. It is going to calendar, go to the floor, 
et cetera. No, not so much. It doesn't work like that. It is 
exceedingly complex.
    And as you all know and have experienced frequently, you 
know, if something does get out of committee, all the rules get 
waived. Suddenly it goes into Rules Committee land where 
special rules are written, and the thing is handled in ways 
that are often surprising and confusing, and it is bundled up 
with other stuff.
    So, you know, I suggest that, you know, it sounds pretty 
rich, but select--one thing I suggested is the select committee 
considers establishing a select committee to study the rules in 
a bipartisan way and think about ways of simplifying them and 
making them better in value, embody the values that you all 
want for the institution, one of which I think is legislator 
participation in a meaningful way.
    It won't be easy. Rules tend to change slowly here, and the 
process for changing them inevitably is a majority vote by the 
majority party at the start of each Congress, and so that 
naturally drifts the rules towards being increasingly partisan 
and arcane. But if nothing is done, then the institution is 
going to continue to get bogged down in the equivalent of red 
tape.
    With that, thank you.
    [The statement of Mr. Kosar follows:]
    
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    The Chairman. Thanks, Dr. Kosar.
    And our final witness, last but not least, is our 
colleague, Representative John Larson. Mr. Larson has 
represented Connecticut's First District since 1999. He serves 
on the House Committee on Ways and Means, was the chair of the 
Subcommittee on Social Security. Mr. Larson is also the former 
vice chair and chair of the House Democratic Caucus.
    Mr. Larson, welcome. You are now recognized.

   STATEMENT OF THE HON. JOHN B. LARSON, A REPRESENTATIVE IN 
             CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF CONNECTICUT

    Mr. Larson. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman and Mr. Timmons, 
Mr. Latta. Great to be here.
    And I applaud you for the big ideas that are coming 
forward, and I think they are essential to a democracy. There 
are many that I would like to explore, and I apologize I got 
here a little late, because I am very interested in the 
testimony.
    And what Kevin was just alluding to, I think part of the 
problem, whether it is a Member or staff, is getting acclimated 
to Congress, especially for the first time, even if you have 
had State legislative background or interests and you may 
understand or have a grasp of the legislative process. But it 
is different here, and it is compounded by the distance that a 
number of people have to travel.
    Not everybody has a short trip like you do, Representative 
Kilmer, but it is--and the stress that that creates both on the 
individual and, I dare say, families as well. We could spend 
the day talking about the impact on spouses and families and 
how little Congress does with regard to that, to the ongoing, I 
think, atrocity that people have to sleep in their own 
buildings because of the cost of living here, and they sleep in 
the House and shower down in the locker room, you know, 
contrary to what public opinion is about what happens to 
congressional Members.
    So some time ago--and I think I was on House Administration 
at the time--I had introduced a bill that said one of the ways 
that we could correct this was to have 4-year terms for Members 
of Congress, not dissimilar to what the Senate does; have 4-
year terms and then stagger those terms so that there still 
would be an election cycle every 2 years, but only half of the 
435 Members would be up for election. Why? So that you would 
have an opportunity, first and foremost, to learn and acclimate 
with regard to the practice.
    Two former Presidents, President Eisenhower and President 
Johnson, both felt and were astounded at the enormous amount of 
pressure that is placed on a Member in the House of 
Representatives. And as all of you know too well, you no sooner 
get here, and the first thing you are doing, even before you 
are sworn in, is down at your respective DCCC or the Republican 
Committee to Reelect raising money. And everyone that you meet 
in the first days that you are here will all tell you the same 
thing: What you have got to do is make sure that you go down 
and raise money.
    So the brief acclimation that people have, and most of it 
off campus at--I remember the trip up to Harvard where we had--
you know, we spent maybe a day-and-a-half, I just think it 
requires far more time than that and that people ought to be 
allotted the time to make sure that they and their families get 
to adjust to the very rigorous schedule that Congress has.
    Most people do not understand that the day isn't done for a 
Member of Congress after voting is through. For a number of 
people when they are here, the fundraising continues, and there 
is always your constituent work back in your district as well. 
It is a 24/7 job. And to have that election cycle every 2 years 
only compounds the problem.
    Our colleagues in the Senate, as you all know, you know, 
have 6-year terms, and they are staggered so that only a third 
of the body is up. Why shouldn't the House have a similar 
system, keeping with the tradition of having election every 2 
years, but only half the body? And after the first election, it 
would work, you know, odd or even numbers, however it would be 
determined by the House. People would then have that 
opportunity and I believe, therefore, able to focus more 
clearly on the task in front of them and to familiarize 
themselves with the process, including, as Kevin said, their 
staffs as well having that opportunity to fully appreciate, 
understand both their colleagues, the process, and 
fundamentally how a bill really becomes law up here.
    And, with that, Mr. Chairman, I yield back, and I am happy 
to answer any questions, especially from the person voted the 
handsomest man in Congress. I don't know how many people know 
that, but I just wanted that for the record.
    [The statement of Mr. Larson follows:]
    
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    The Chairman. I am really bringing my A game.
    Thank you, Chairman Larson.
    I now want to recognize myself and Vice Chair Timmons to 
begin a period of extended questioning of the witnesses. Any 
member who wishes to speak should just signal their request to 
either me or Vice Chair Timmons.
    I want to start actually with Dr. Drutman. So I just want 
to think through kind of what the pros and cons of adding more 
members to the House are. So last hearing, we focused on 
constituent services, and I think it is probably undeniably so 
that your capacity to do casework and to address constituent 
concerns is probably easier with a smaller district. You know, 
at the same time, over the course of the hearings that we have 
had, it is striking how many witnesses that we have had who 
have spoken about the importance of relationships within the 
legislative body, and I can see probably some downside if you 
substantially increase the size. It is already hard to have 
relationships with 400 and--you know, if you include the 
delegates, 440 others other than yourself. You know, that is 
tricky.
    And so I am just curious if you can talk a little bit about 
what is achieved by increasing the number of members and, you 
know, if you have got a sense of the puts and the takes.
    Mr. Drutman. Yeah. Well, like everything, there is pros and 
cons. So, certainly, it does bring members closer to their 
constituents if the districts are smaller. I think it has the 
potential to make Congress more representative of the people as 
a whole if there are more members. But, you know, it does--it 
is more members for you all to interact with.
    I mean, I guess the question is at--you know, if you go the 
proposal that we have put forward in this report, is to add 150 
members, so to go from 435 to 585. So that is, you know, more 
people to get to know, but, you know, I think Con--I mean, I 
think the House has gotten to a point where it is just hard to 
get to know everybody, especially if you are only here for, you 
know, for 2 years potentially and then you are--because I know 
most people are here for longer, but constantly running for 
reelection.
    So in terms of members getting to know each other, I think 
to your point, Congressman Larson, if people spent less time 
having to go into their fundraising dens and more time just 
hanging out, if folks were here more and not just flying in on 
Tuesday and flying out on Thursday and, you know, folks 
actually brought their families here and spent more time here, 
that would help.
    But, you know, I mean, there is certainly a tradeoff. With 
size, it is harder to, you know, get to know everybody. But, on 
the other hand, you know, when was the last time the House 
deliberated as a whole? So I think----
    The Chairman. I was even just thinking about like in 
committees, right? Already it is a little bit tricky in 
committees. And we are lucky we have 12 people on this 
committee, so our capacity to actually have dialogue is all 
right. You know, if you look behind you, the Armed Services 
Committee, really big. Right?
    Mr. Drutman. Right. So, I mean, one thing to think about is 
also the committee structure, right? I mean, Kevin is talking 
about the complexity. And, you know, there is some things a 
committee has done with simplification, but there is a lot of 
things that Congress has called on to legislate on and think 
about and oversee. And I think if you had a larger Congress, 
you might have the potential for more committees and 
subcommittees, that there just has to be a level of 
specialization among Members of Congress, you know, that it is 
really hard to be a generalist given all of the things that you 
need to be thinking about.
    So having a larger member--having more members might allow 
for more potential for people to really focus on particular 
subcommittees, which, you know, where you could develop some 
real expertise. Like, there is a certain amount you have just 
got to trust each other and delegate to each other to really 
solve some very hard and tricky problems.
    The Chairman. Dr. Allen, did you want to weigh in on this?
    Ms. Allen. A small footnote. My understanding is that both 
the U.K. Parliament and the German Bundestag are larger than 
our Congress. Their populations are smaller, of course. So I 
think it would be very productive if your committee were to 
reach out to them and ask that question about what it means to 
operate in a body of that scale.
    The Chairman. Go on, Dr. Kosar.
    Mr. Kosar. They are both about 700 members.
    Just to riff off Lee's point, with respect to oversight, I 
mean, 435 members who have to oversee, you know, $6 trillion 
worth of spending, there is approximately 180 executive 
agencies. You know, as the executive branch has grown in size 
and complexity, the number of Members of Congress has not, and 
the size of staff has actually declined since the 1980s in the 
House. And so you just think about the information of 
symmetries there, you know, obviously, adding more members----
    The Chairman. Yeah. That is fair.
    Dr. Drutman [continuing]. And then I want to bring Vice 
Chair Timmons in the conversation--can you speak a little bit 
about how this would work? You know, how would adding seats to 
the Chamber and reapportionment work?
    And you made kind of passing reference to maybe not using 
single-member districts but having a different approach. I was 
hoping you could say a little bit more about that.
    Mr. Drutman. Yeah. So, you know, I think in addition to 
increasing the size of the House, we ought to think about 
increasing the size of districts to go from single member to 
proportional multimember districts, three to five members per 
district.
    And I think one of the challenges in this moment of our 
politics is, you know, things have become so deeply divided. 
Hyperpartisan polarization is real. It is a tremendous problem, 
and there is just a tremendous amount of gamesmanship that is 
going on in trying to crush the other side.
    I mean, I am watching in horror as I see the DCCC putting 
money to elect the most extreme Republicans. But within the 
single-member district with a zero-sum winner-take-all 
election, you win by disqualifying the other side. And one way 
to disqualify the other side is to have their side be the most 
extreme. Now, that is, I think, an incredibly dangerous and 
dumb game, but it is the logic of our single-member system and 
the binary choice that it forces.
    Now, imagine, you know, if you have three- or five-member 
districts, you know, it is not zero-sum. It is not winner take 
all anymore. You have a diversity of representatives who 
represent the larger diversity of that district. I mean, you 
all represent very diverse districts. And, you know, I mean, 
you--I know you work very hard to try to represent all of your 
constituents, but ideologically, valueswise, you know, 
demographically, there is some constituents who it is hard for 
you all to represent, even if we did increase the size of the 
house and, thus, reduce the size of the district.
    So I think if we had proportional multimember districts 
where three or five members represented a district and split up 
the district and represented different constituents and 
different perspectives, we would have less of this binary zero-
sum that is really destroying the ability of Congress and our 
government to work. You would see more conservative Democrats, 
more liberal Republicans, maybe some, you know, new parties, 
new perspectives represented, and you combine that with 
increasing the size of the House, I think you create a Congress 
that is just much more representative of the diversity and 
pluralism in this country and I think much better able to work 
out some complex compromises, because everything is not, you 
know, we have got to crush the other side because they are 
evil. And that is the mindset that I think is really 
overwhelming the ability of this Congress to function, and it 
is terrifying where this is leading, to me.
    The Chairman. Vice Chair Timmons.
    Did you want to weigh in?
    Mr. Larson. Well, I just wanted to make a comment about 
that. I think the biggest threat that we face in our democratic 
republic--and I apologize for not catching all the testimony. 
But when Mr. Kosar was talking about the rules, the House has 
already passed over 400-plus bills that sit in the Senate, and 
they haven't voted on a one of them, and that was a practice 
both under Harry Reid and is still a practice--I would say 
Mitch is far more successful about it.
    But for a member of the House, and whether you are a 
Democrat or a Republican, the committee chairs and that whole 
process has been neutered by a Senate rule. Nothing in the 
Constitution that says that you need 60 votes to pass a bill, 
nothing in the Constitution that says a filibuster is 
constitutionally authorized. It may be, some would argue, a 
tradition. But this isn't Mr. Smith goes to Washington. This is 
people simply in their room saying--calling a culture vote, and 
no House bill moves in the United States Senate.
    And you can argue that even the last two bills that the 
House has voted on from the Senate, major bills, the 
infrastructure bill and most recently the so-called gun 
violence bill, never went through a public hearing in the 
House, never was vetted, and came from the other body.
    And it is alarming how much this has happened and becoming 
part of the norm, instead of what is called regular order. 
These things used to be sorted out in what is called a 
conference committee. There are very few people in Congress 
today that can even recall what a conference committee is. But 
that is where the so-called issue of hyperbipartisanship got 
resolved within those committees of conference when there was 
disagreement.
    But the House is now at an enormous disadvantage because of 
a Senate rule. And, frankly, the media pays no attention to it. 
Seventy percent of the bills that pass the House that sit over 
in the Senate are bipartisanly passed. So this notion that we 
are bipartisanly always at one another's throats simply isn't 
true. On the major issues where there are philosophical, 
ideological, and regional differences, that has always been the 
way it has been throughout history, and rightfully so.
    But a democratic majority, whether it is Republican or 
Democrat, needs to govern. And it can't be minority rule and 
ruled by culture vote, or what they call Rule 22. We are 
sending over something I would like to submit for the record, 
an op-ed on the new catch-22 is rule 22.
    The Chairman. Ba-dump. Thank you.
    Vice Chair Timmons, go ahead.
    Mr. Timmons. Thank you. Thank you.
    Representative Larson, I actually like your idea about the 
4-year term, and I want to give you something to think about. I 
don't know the answer to it. How would you deal with 
redistricting?
    Mr. Larson. That is a great question. I mean----
    Mr. Timmons. It gets really tricky.
    Mr. Larson. Well, it does, and it depends--and, of course, 
redistricting is something that is left up to the States.
    Mr. Timmons. But if half the members have 4-year terms and 
they are alternating, then someone would be in the middle of 
their term poss--I mean, I guess you could do it State by 
State, so certain States would get reelected at----
    Mr. Larson. Right.
    Mr. Timmons. Anyway, something to think about.
    Mr. Larson. Well, in terms of, yes, what would that mean if 
you went--I get the question. What would it mean if you went, 
say, odd and even districts? You know, how would that break 
down in terms of who is up for election in that 2-year cycle? 
And----
    Mr. Timmons. When you redraw the lines, it would get really 
tricky. But something to think about.
    I am going to talk about the calendar and the schedule, and 
you are going to fix this; I feel it. Welcome to the party.
    So the variables are this: 435 Members of Congress serve on 
an average of 5.4 committees and subcommittees. We have 20 
standing committees, 5 select committees, around--I am just 
guessing--75 subcommittees. So there is a hundred people that 
have authority to schedule hearings and markups, and we just 
run around all the time.
    In 2019, we had 65 full days. Generally speaking, we don't 
have hearings or markups outside of 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., so that 
is 520 hours. But in those 520 hours, we have to have 
conference and caucus meetings, constituent meetings, floor 
votes, committee meetings, subcommittee meetings, and 
fundraisers.
    So we have to be here more. We need more time, but we are 
only getting--like, the best schedule I can come up with, which 
is not going to get adopted, has 104 days, full days, which is 
not going to happen. If we get 80, we will be lucky.
    Can AI fix this to where we just deconflict it a little 
bit?
    Mr. Mariani. I won't promise that it can fix it. The good 
news is what you are describing is basically just an 
optimization problem, right? Like, there is a ton of data, and 
we need, within these defined parameters, find the optimal 
solution. And the good news is that is exactly the type of 
thing that AI is really good at, right? We talk about human 
machine teaming because AI's strengths are exactly what humans 
are weak at, and humans' strengths are exactly what AI is weak 
at.
    So this problem that you are speaking of, we have so much 
data and so many variables and we can't just crunch all those 
numbers; that is exactly where AI can help. When we start to 
talk about contextual variability and emotion and value 
judgments, that is where humans are significantly better. We 
need to bring them together. But scheduling, AI can help.
    Mr. Timmons. The biggest challenge is committee and 
subcommittee meetings are generally left to the chair, and they 
don't want to be told what to do. And floor votes are left to 
the majority leader, and he is not going to listen to anybody. 
That is what he gets to do.
    So can you factor that in? How do you factor in--can we do 
an optimization without being directive? Can we make suggestive 
optimizations?
    Mr. Mariani. Sure, absolutely. And the other way to do it 
is kind of what--that second model that we talked about that is 
kind of like AI as simulator, you can sort of set the 
parameters of the system. You know, hey, here are all the rules 
that are in play, here is kind of what we want to accomplish, 
and then allow people to kind of play around it. So you could 
have, you know, different players in that model, the different 
committee chairs and different other folks that need your time 
to play around with that. And from that, you can create one, 
two, three, maybe even a few optimum models that then human 
judgment can choose between because, say, hey, we don't want to 
work on Christmas Eve or something. So, yeah, absolutely.
    Mr. Timmons. What business would we hire to help with that? 
I mean, we have been trying to create a committee calendar--a 
unified committee calendar just so people can just see. We are 
not trying to use AI to fix anything. We just want to make it 
so you can actually tell what you are doing when you are doing 
it as opposed to just picking time out of thin air and being 
like, oh, interesting. You know, 90 percent of the subcommittee 
actually has another committee meeting at the same time. That 
is not great. Let's maybe do it an hour later, an hour earlier.
    So we can't even figure out a way to get a unified 
committee calendar, no less optimize it. So do you know anybody 
that does this?
    Mr. Mariani. Yeah. I think the good thing is, you know, 
these types of optimization problems, you know, kind of as we 
talked about, they can be found kind of across government, 
across industry. So there is lots of folks that have expertise 
in applying these, creating them, and feeding them to the 
context.
    I think to your point, the challenge is, hey, everyone out 
there has experience adopting AI protocols and using them 
potentially at scale. How do you then cross that with the 
unique context of having those technological tools work in 
Congress?
    And I think what we are starting to see is, you know, as we 
heard from some of the other examples, other legislatures, 
other parliaments starting to take those first tentative steps 
and using AI, small scale processes. South Africa has an AI-
enabled personal assistant that gets kind of at what you are 
talking about. You know, members can ask it questions, and it 
will automatically respond back about, you know, here is the 
content in a bill or, hey, here is the time and conference room 
you need to get to in the next 2 minutes.
    So those types of things are already out there, and they 
are discovering some of those unique challenges of using AI in 
a legislative context.
    Really, I think to your question, the challenge is learning 
from both, so learning from those examples in industry where 
they are already doing this stuff, you know, how do you do this 
at scale, and then learning from those small scale proofs of 
concept that are out there in, you know, South Africa, the 
Netherlands, Brazil, about what are the unique requirements to 
do this in a legislative context.
    Mr. Timmons. Thank you.
    Yes, ma'am.
    Ms. Allen. Again, small footnote. Every college and 
university has this problem, and we have methods for solving 
it. So I would recommend calling a major public university and 
asking them how they----
    Mr. Timmons. Middle schools also do it.
    Ms. Allen. True. But the relevant scale, the relevant scale 
that you need, you know. And, yes, there are optimization 
tools. So I think you would easily find something usable.
    Mr. Timmons. One real quick followup.
    Dr. Drutman, ignoring the policy considerations around 
having another 150 Members of Congress and the staff and all 
that stuff, my biggest question is just space. Where do they 
go? Like, we can't put another 150 people on the floor. I mean, 
I guess we could build another House Office Building.
    Mr. Drutman. Yeah. Right. I mean, you have got that parking 
lot south of----
    Mr. Timmons. Okay.
    Mr. Drutman. And some beautiful parks.
    Mr. Timmons. It is overwhelming to think about adding 
another 150 members.
    Mr. Drutman. Right. I mean, you know--but also, people work 
from home more now. I mean, it is post-pandemic, we have sort 
of figured out remote work a little bit, I mean, not that it 
can all be remote. But I think you can build another office--
there is space south of the three existing office buildings. I 
mean, I hate to lose those beautiful parks, but, you know----
    Mr. Timmons. You know, it is interesting, our first year, 
one of our early hearings, somebody suggested moving the 
Capitol to Nebraska. So we could maybe couple moving the 
Capitol to Nebraska with that. I am just kidding.
    Mr. Drutman. I mean, sure. There is plenty of land there. I 
mean, it would be in the middle of the country.
    Mr. Timmons. I think the chairman would appreciate that.
    Mr. Drutman. Yes.
    Mr. Timmons. But thank you.
    I.yield back.
    The Chairman. Mr. Latta.
    Mr. Latta. Well, thanks, Mr. Chairman and Mr. Vice 
Chairman, for today's hearing, and to our witnesses. And this 
is kind of--it is interesting, the hearing that we are having 
today.
    First of all, people are agreeing with me. First of all, I 
can make this very simple. You know, we always talk about 
schedules. We did it in the Ohio legislature. This is not 
rocket science. On Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursdays when we had 
session, we started at a certain time in the senate. If they 
said we are starting at 11:30, start at 11:30. Next day we are 
going to be in session on the floor at 1 o'clock, we were on 
the floor. Next day 1:30. The other thing is you weren't 
allowed to run committee hearings during session. Very simple.
    So, you know, I have advocated these things, so it is good 
to hear these things come up. The other thing that is also good 
to hear come up I advocated is this. Our committee sizes are 
too large. And the other thing is that if you go back 50, 60 
years ago, members didn't serve on two, three, four committees. 
They served on one and became experts on that committee.
    So, you know, we can simplify things from people always 
being broken up where they need to be at a certain time by 
simplifying the process. And so I will just throw my two cents 
in there real quick.
    But, Mr. Kosar, you know, one of the things that I think 
you mentioned, you know, about the--you were talking about the 
executive branch and how large it has got and Congress hasn't 
kept up. I think part of the problem is Congress has just 
abdicated its power to the executive so you don't have to take 
the blame. You know, it is just like, we have done it, you guys 
take care of it, and it is out of our hands now. So how do we 
pull that back in to start saying we are going to start 
bringing that power back to the House, back to the Senate so 
that the executive doesn't have it?
    Because, again, you know, I can remember as a kid--my dad 
was here from 1959 to 1989, but I can remember driving down 
Independence Avenue, where these office buildings are today, 
they were Quonset huts left over from World War II. Look at 
photographs. That is what we had. It is amazing that this 
government operated at a much smaller scale than we have today. 
But how do we bring that back?
    Mr. Kosar. Well, as a person on the right, certainly I 
would suggest that Congress consider doing something to pare 
back the size of the executive branch. I mean, do we really 
need all 180 agencies? It has been a long time since I think I 
have seen any sort of concerted effort to do some sort of, 
like, let's put together a bipartisan list and let's start 
zeroing things out. Maybe hold a vote at the start of each 
Congress and hold hands and jump together. It can be done 
through a legislative procedure, an expedited one, or something 
like that. That would put incentives in the right direction 
and, you know, make the job a little more manageable.
    You know, I think that there also is--you know, the 
information asymmetries are so immense. I don't think the House 
did itself any favors in growing government but then reducing 
the number of staff over the past 40 years. I think technology 
can help make up for it. I think this is where AI is very 
interesting.
    You know, when committees get together and study a problem, 
you know, 3, 4 years later, very few people on the committee 
are still there, many of the staff have left, and what you have 
is a bunch of printed hearing volumes. And that knowledge is 
just fading from memory because you guys are all working on new 
stuff. And being able to manage that knowledge, especially so 
new members can come in and get up to speed fast and get a 
sense of what really, you know, are the options and what should 
be done, what are the problems, I think that is part of the 
mix.
    The basic incentive, like, you know, James Madison thought 
that the legislature would be the most powerful entity of all 
in the three branches. You know, the ability to exercise power, 
power of the purse, power over the law, he thought that would 
be absolutely irresistible to members. I think he would be 
baffled by the fact that members, as you note, frequently just 
delegate authority. They delegate authority up towards 
leadership and they delegate authority over towards the 
executive branch and, therefore, have grown this massive 
administrative state.
    So some of this is going to be an attitudinal change, but I 
think also the kind of difficulty that the individual member 
has in exerting his or her will, like, why put in the work to 
try to reign in an agency or change policy if your bill is not 
going to get out of committee, if it is not going to get called 
for a vote, and if the Senate is going to sit on it.
    Empowering members to get stuff done I think has to be part 
of the equation.
    Mr. Latta. Let me--just a real quick followup for you. You 
know, you are also talking about, you know, our rules and 
procedures has gotten pretty well out of hand. Do we just go 
back to just a manual?
    Mr. Kosar. No. I think we have to go a little bit beyond 
that. I think there are some--you know, some of these 
specializations, I think, are valuable. I think perhaps, you 
know, when you are talking about a trade treaty or certain 
other specified areas, having an expedited procedure can be 
valuable. But, certainly, the whole corpus needs to be paired 
back. I mean, you have got rules that are on the books, but not 
even used. Calendar Wednesday has been around for how long? 
When was the last time it has been a vote? Fifty years ago, but 
it is in the book, theoretically it can be invoked?
    Congress even--Don Wolfensberger told me that Congress had 
picked up a new rule at the start of last January, and 
regularly it waives the rule.
    Mr. Latta. It is a problem.
    Mr. Mariani, quick question. I am the rank on 
Communications Technology, right across here at Energy and 
Commerce, and we are talking about all the AI, and one of the 
things--of course, we have had a lot of questions about, in the 
past, about how algorithms are set, especially when we are 
talking about AI.
    How would you make sure that those algorithms are correct, 
that they are not biased to one side or the other?
    Mr. Mariani. Sure, absolutely. And the short answer is, I 
think, everyone involved at every step of the process has a 
role in ensuring that those AI models are accurate and 
equitable. And that starts even before the models are made. It 
starts with selecting and collating the data to make sure it is 
accurate and clean, and kind of most important for equity, too, 
kind of fit for purpose, because you can gather one data set in 
one context and it can be a representative and, you know, not 
biased one way or the other. But if you use it to answer a 
different question in a different context and all of a sudden, 
it can accidently introduce bias.
    Those types of controls and governance processes, then, 
need to extend into the next phase where you are making the 
model and using it. And focusing on transparency and those 
steps is probably the most important so you can identify kind 
of what are the model weights, what are the variables, what are 
the assumptions that we are using.
    And then even into Members yourself, to make sure that when 
you are using the outputs, that you have kind of the literacy 
of how those models work so you can understand kind of their 
left and right lateral limits, because, you know, AI is a 
powerful tool, but it is not an infallible oracle. Really, it 
is just more of a decision aid for yourself, and probably also 
unique to the legislative context, and also having enough 
knowledge to be able to communicate to constituents how those 
models are being used so you can build their trust in 
confidence in how AI is being used as well.
    Mr. Latta. Two more questions, if I could, Mr. Chairman?
    Thank you very much.
    Dr. Allen, you know, in your testimony, again, you are 
talking about--we always are trying to figure out at home, 
across the whole country, how to get people back engaged but, 
you know, a lot of people, they are pulling themselves in. You 
know, they stay home. They are in front--you know, it is just 
like years ago when--I am not going to date myself, but I am 
going to say this, but when you could go to the corner store 
and pick up a cassette tape and you are going to take it home 
and watch a movie. The theaters all said, nobody is ever going 
to do that. Nobody is ever going to stay home and watch it on 
their own TV, this movie. Well, they were all proven wrong.
    And we see more and more where people now--it is always--
you know, they just keep pulling things back. They are not out 
there communicating with one other. A lot of neighborhoods, you 
never see your neighbors until spring. You know, everybody just 
kind of disappears for 6 months.
    So I guess my question is, is that, you know, we want to 
get people actively involved again in the political process, 
which our Founders wanted us all to be. How do we get these 
people reengaged? You know, it is just like disengaging 
themselves from, you know, their phones. You know, like--it is 
a different piece of legislation, 94 percent of all accidents 
that occur on the road today are driver error. And most of it--
I rode with the highway patrol not too long ago in Ohio, and it 
is because of people playing with their what? Their phones.
    So how do we get people reengaged in this?
    Ms. Allen. I really appreciate the question. I think we all 
have direct experiences of the sort of disconnection that 
people are living with and then the negative psychological and 
behavioral consequences that flow from that. The good news is 
that there really are people in communities across the country 
who know how to pull people back.
    At the end of the day, social connection is rewarding, it 
is empowering, it supports mental health and well-being. And so 
when people have an opportunity to participate again, they tend 
to come back. So they don't just participate once. But in order 
for that to work, you need those, in effect, civic 
entrepreneurs who are going to put in the time and energy to 
build the context, to issue the invitation, to follow up with 
people and so forth.
    And that is what we have historically had a habit of 
investing in, and that habit has fallen away. So if you look at 
the sort of earliest history of the country, take Massachusetts 
in the colonial period, 1600s even, you know, the State 
government, such as it was, sort of colonial assembly insisted 
that every town put resources into a school. That was sort of 
really the beginning of public school, and you can think of 
that as the first example of civic infrastructure. And the 
purposes were civic. They, you know, were economic too, but 
actually civic first.
    And then throughout the late 19th century, early 20th 
century, we had these extraordinary philanthropists. You know, 
Andrew Carnegie and so forth, who built libraries all over the 
country, and he was not alone. Our contemporary billionaires do 
not invest in civic infrastructure in the same kind of way, and 
that is something that we should all recognize. And even the 
question of what can Congress do to incentivize private 
philanthropy back into supporting these local-level civic 
entrepreneurs is really important.
    So the short message is that people are out there who know 
how to pull people back into connection, but they are not 
getting support in the way that they have historically gotten 
in this country.
    Mr. Latta. Thank you.
    Mr. Chairman, I know I have gone over my time, but I have 
so many other questions. But thank you very much for your 
indulgence.
    The Chairman. I wanted to follow up with Mr. Larson. I 
don't think there is anything magic about 2 years. I think 
there is a sense, though, that maybe the intent of the Founders 
was to make sure that we were closer to our constituents, more 
accountable to our constituents. I imagine that might be a 
pushback against extending the length of the term. I just want 
to get your sense of how would you respond to that.
    Mr. Larson. Well, actually, you are absolutely right, the 
Founding Fathers had a major debate over this because they 
thought it should be 1 year. And the idea was that in a 
democracy, they wanted to make sure you had one chamber that 
was close to the people and that the people elected every year. 
And that is the concept. And I think actually Eisenhower and 
Johnson used almost the exact same phrase that you did: There 
is nothing magic about 2 years.
    But the idea of staggering them would, I think, also help 
create competition upstream for those that are in the House but 
don't have to necessarily give up a seat in order to run for a 
governorship or run for the United States Senate. But the 
primary goal here is, I think both Johnson and Eisenhower 
recognized, people really need to understand the responsibility 
and role. And to do that in a 2-year period, obviously it has 
been done, but when you complicate that with both the need to 
raise money and the family concerns that that has on spouses 
and children, it just seems to me to be a far more humane way 
to go about this business that we are in and allow both for 
greater understanding, camaraderie, and, I think, a better 
legislation in the final run.
    The Chairman. Dr. Kosar, I want to get your sense--I have 
been struck over the course of this committee's existence that, 
I guess, by two dynamics related to the rules. One, we have a 
bunch of rules that we don't actually follow, right? There is 
just a ton of underbrush, right?
    I have been here nearly 10 years. I don't think we have 
done calendar Wednesday, right? But it is in the rules, right? 
There is all of these rules that we consistently waive, and 
Lord knows that the budget and appropriations process, we 
have--in that instance, there is laws that govern that process 
that by and large we don't follow either.
    I guess I am just curious your sense of, has there--can you 
point to an example of either another--a parliament or a State 
legislature that has done this process that you are suggesting 
that has successfully kind of cleared that underbrush and kind 
of Control-Alt-Delete on the rules and refreshed it?
    Mr. Kosar. Unfortunately, no. And I think, you know, in 
part when you look at State legislatures, I don't think they 
have had the kind of kudzu problem that the House has had where 
things have gotten so out of control so rapidly. Their 
pairings, I think, are more modest, incremental changes, but 
things didn't get out of control. Things got out of control 
here, and now we have, you know, each Congress, you know, 
little tweaks of the rules but no fundamental revisiting, 
because it is just not part of the process.
    But, you know, I certainly would love to see and, again, 
this may be where our friends at Congressional Research Service 
or NCSL, National Council of State Legislatures, could partner 
up to work together, and just lay the House rules next to the 
rules of four States where we have well-functioning 
legislatures and just compare.
    The Chairman. Yeah. Well, I also--I guess I find myself 
thinking, your recommendation of whether it be another select 
committee or continuing the work of this select committee, to 
do a deeper dive into this. I am just curious how much you 
think that actually fixes stuff. You know, we had a year of 
people testifying in front of this committee, well, we should 
get back to regular order.
    And, you know, I came out of a State legislature where 
every bill was taken up under an open rule, where if you had an 
amendment that was at all germane to the bill, you could offer 
it, it would be debated, and it would be voted on.
    In my experience in the State legislature, that was abused 
probably five, maybe six times for gotcha politics. You know, 
the notion of doing that here is laughable, right? Like, it 
would be used for gotcha politics at every angle, and that is 
not a rules problem; that is a culture problem, right?
    So I am just curious how much you think we should invest in 
a deep dive into rules change in light of that dynamic?
    Mr. Kosar. Yeah. Yeah. Well, you know, there is a sick kind 
of relationship between the rules and the behavior. And, you 
know, there has been this process where, when it comes to the 
floor, you know, some bad behavior crops up so the rules get 
tightened more.
    The Chairman. Yeah.
    Mr. Kosar. Bad behavior springs up elsewhere. I mean, it is 
almost like dealing with a rebellious child or something like 
that. Like, I am going to put more rules on you to stop you 
from doing it, and then the buggers figure out a way to get 
around it.
    The Chairman. Yeah.
    Mr. Kosar. You know, they are extremely inventive, and so 
you just keep ratcheting and ratcheting. And that is the 
dynamic. And I think, no, it is going to require a larger 
conversation amongst Members to get people to say, like, do we 
want to keep living this way? Is this how we want to be 
legislators, or do we want to change the rules in a way--and we 
had a bit of that in the class of 1974 when they came over and 
took over Congress. They said we are not playing by these 
rules. And they just had--you had enough of them making a 
cultural demand change, and the rules were changed so that they 
could do what they could do.
    The Chairman. Dr. Allen, one of the values of my long 
commute that Mr. Larson mentioned is the--a lot of time to 
read. So I read the Our Common Purpose report. I thought it was 
really thoughtful. My recollection was chapter four was the 
civic bridge-building chapter. And you spoke to this dynamic 
that part of the division that you see in Congress is driven by 
division in our communities.
    I had this crazy experience this last fall where two things 
happened. One, we had a series of attacks on religious 
institutions in Tacoma. There was an Islamic center that got 
burned to the ground, two Buddhist faith leaders got assaulted 
outside their temple, and a church got vandalized all within 
the span of 3 weeks. And in the spirit of something good coming 
out of something bad, we actually saw an interfaith alliance 
sort of spring up and say, hey, we are going to pull together. 
Everybody, get them all in the same room, and say that is not 
what we are about in this community. And it was actually a 
really great event.
    Afterwards, one of the faith leaders came up to me and 
said, you know, that was really powerful, but if we are going 
to do this right, this wouldn't just be a 90-minute exercise; 
this would be something that we do on an ongoing basis. And he 
said, just out of curiosity, any Federal support for something 
like that? And I said, no, not really.
    And then literally a month later, I visited a YMCA in my 
district, thinking they were going to talk to me about Mike 
Quigley's bill, the GYMS Act, because gymnasiums are losing 
money. That is not what they wanted to talk about.
    They said, all the polarization, all the talks they see, 
that you see in Washington, D.C., has shown up in our Y. They 
said, we have literally had arguments and fights break out over 
pick your red or blue issue.
    And they said it has become so bad we have hired a 
consultant that is training our staff, training our board in 
conflict resolution, and we are going to host this--as you 
suggested--you know, we are going to host sort of bridge-
building discussions where we get people to talk to each other 
and listen to each other, rather than have The Jerry Springer 
Show show up in our YMCA.
    And they said, any Federal support for that? And I said, 
you know, not really. At least not currently.
    And, you know, the report that--Our Common Purpose report 
acknowledges that we do support this sort of civic 
infrastructure investment through the National Endowment for 
Democracy, but that support is to other countries, to 
strengthen democracy in other countries.
    And so I see--I absolutely see value in this. In fact, Vice 
Chair Timmons and I--and we have 10 Democrats and 10 
Republicans on a bill to maybe not create a trust, but set up a 
pilot program that could accept private philanthropy, and to do 
this grant making to local organizations.
    I think the question that most commonly comes up is, one, 
how do you measure success? And two, why is this an innately 
Federal obligation. Right? You know, you mentioned that there 
is philanthropists that are supporting this endeavor already. 
You know, as I have spoken with colleagues on the floor and 
said, hey, do you want to sign on to this, probably the most 
common question I get is, why is this something the Federal 
Government ought to do?
    So can you respond to both of those?
    Ms. Allen. Absolutely.
    The Chairman. Sorry for the long windup, but I wanted to 
give you a sense--I actually do think you are really on to 
something because we are seeing it in our communities.
    Ms. Allen. No, absolutely. I mean, we are seeing it all 
over, and I want to lift up your bill. I think it is the 
Building Civic Bridges Act. I think it is very important, so 
happy to lend my voice in support of it----
    The Chairman. Thanks.
    Ms. Allen [continuing]. At whatever appropriate points.
    But in brief, I mean, I think there is sort of three really 
important points. And I will admit that as our commission 
conversations on this started, I was a skeptic about the trust 
for civic infrastructure for exactly the reason that you just 
articulated, the question of, well, you know, should the 
Federal Government be doing this? Should this be really what we 
do at a local level anyway? And, you know, I changed my view, 
basically, and I came to change my view for a number of 
reasons.
    The first is just recognizing that our practice of 
investing in the infrastructure of democracy in other countries 
came at a time historically when we were really building a 
strong wall defense against the challenge of communism. And we 
have to be honest that at this point in time, the greatest 
challenge for democracy on the globe right now is our weakening 
democracy. And we need civic strength here at home.
    The Chairman. Hear! Hear!
    Ms. Allen. We need it as a matter of defending democracy 
for the globe. So in that regard, the same motivation that led 
to those national investments in the past pertain, but they 
pertain here at home.
    Now, the challenge, of course, is the question of, you 
know, once you think the Federal Government should be involved, 
you sort of worry, well, won't that become very partisan in 
terms of what kinds of investments there are. And so in that 
regard, I think, a way to avoid that problem is really to focus 
on a project of seeking to match other investments that local 
communities are defining.
    So the investments--there should be a sort of broad set of 
principles, design principles for the kinds of investments, but 
not a kind of blueprint of like here is everything everybody 
must do, because local communities need to be able to provide 
definition for that to give us the diversity and flexibility 
across the country of defining precisely what this 
infrastructure should look like.
    So then what might be some of those broad design principles 
that Congress might be sort of interested in in sort of 
matching grant program? One I think is the idea that civic 
infrastructure should help ensure that self-government is 
operational. Okay. And so what does that mean exactly?
    I mean, we expect that with more investment of civic 
infrastructure, you should see higher trust, higher 
volunteerism, and more effective community problem-solving. 
Those are all measurable things. We have some existing data 
approaches that do measure them. We could improve on them and 
would need to. And one of the things the trust should do would 
be to improve precisely the sort of set of indicators being 
used to measure whether or not self-government is operational 
at that local level.
    A second design principle is for all. Self-government for 
all. We have another challenge, which is that, insofar as our 
civic infrastructure investments have historically been--I 
refer to the colonial period where sort of States--the colonial 
State of Massachusetts required towns to invest in schools. We 
had flag schools(ph) and so forth. We have a situation now 
where well-resourced communities are able to invest in civic 
infrastructure, and those with lower property tax bases are 
just not in the same sort of way.
    So there is a need for Congress' investment, again, to sort 
of elicit investment in those communities where the issue of 
support is more challenged. But, again, I do think it is really 
important that this be about drawing out philanthropic dollars 
as well, ensuring that community foundations are fully 
activated across the whole of their community.
    And then what Congress can also assist in is helping people 
build bridges across jurisdictional and regional lines, which 
is a major challenge right now for people who are trying to 
support investments in this space.
    And then the last design principle I would point to is 
connectedness, another version of bridge building. We have been 
able for decades to measure increases in residential 
ideological polarization, worsening dynamics of 
hypersegregation for low-income communities of color, and 
increasing experiences of loneliness and disconnection across 
demographic groups, and, honestly, we see those data points 
showing up in also things like mass shootings and so forth.
    So this is connected to a lot of big stuff in our society. 
So just as we can measure all the ways in which those things 
have been worsened, those--reversing those dynamics would be 
indicators of success for investments in civic infrastructure 
around that design principle of connectedness.
    The Chairman. That is great.
    Vice Chair Timmons.
    Mr. Timmons. I guess I am going to throw out another big 
idea and just get you all's feedback on it. I think one of the 
biggest challenges our society is facing is right here. 
Technology, interconnectedness, our inability to interact with 
one another. You know, we often talk about whether the 
hyperpartisanship in Congress is a Congress problem or a 
society problem, and it is probably a little bit of both.
    But I think one of the biggest challenges is our inability 
to, I guess, digest information, because you get a lot of 
information that, previously, humans just wouldn't get because 
the journalism would weed it out before it got that far, and 
now you have things being posted on social media anonymously 
and just by crazy people.
    And so how do we grow past the challenges that technology 
and interconnectedness are creating? Anybody.
    Ms. Allen. I am happy to speak to that if--so I think your 
question gets to the deepest issues we are all facing and the 
question that all of these suggestions relate to, which is, we 
are facing a crisis of representation, of the activity and 
practice of representation. And it is not a crisis of any 
particular individual's making; it is a crisis that at the end 
of the day has been finally driven all the way home by the 
invention of social media. And I just want to be very clear 
about why and how and, therefore, why your committee is so 
important.
    Basically, you know, we all know the Federalist papers, we 
all know Federalist 10. The argument of Federalist 10 was that 
the design of the Constitution, among other things, its job was 
to mitigate the problem of faction. And the answer to how it is 
supposed to mitigate is delivered in Federalist 10. It is a 
two-part answer. We only teach one part of the answer.
    We teach the part of the answer that it is about 
representative government. The notion that you don't have 
direct democracy; you have representatives who are going to 
filter and synthesize opinion from around the country.
    But there is a second part to Madison's answer, and it was 
literally that the breadth of the country being a broad 
republic would make it hard for people with extreme views to 
find each other and coordinate. Okay?
    So geographic dispersal was literally a pillar of the 
original design. Okay? So Facebook knocked that pillar out from 
under us.
    And so all the work we are trying to do in terms of 
thinking about the future of Congress is answering the question 
of how to have effective representation when we no longer have 
the pillar of geographic dispersal supporting the information 
ecosystem that supports healthy deliberation.
    So, yes, you need rules changes, okay, in order to improve 
the process of deliberation and recognizing that circumstantial 
change. Yes, we need a bigger House to be connected to the 
whole of the country, and, yes, we need investment in civic 
infrastructure that helps people navigate a completely changed 
information ecosystem. We need all of these things in order to 
have a healthy Congress.
    Mr. Kosar. Yeah. I mean, I guess a quick kick would be just 
Members should get off Twitter. But, no, it is a long-standing 
problem that, you know, elites in the country have always had a 
greater voice in the ears of Congress. I mean, this is 
political science in the forties that complained to the--the 
problem of pluralism is that it always--its chorus always sings 
with an upper-class tone. So it is imbedded in the system. Some 
people are going to be better connected, some people are going 
to have the means to get here and communicate, et cetera, et 
cetera.
    But, certainly, technology has exacerbated it. It has, as 
you have noted, just to sort of mediate things. And we have 
also seen since the seventies a massive uptick in the number of 
interest groups, not-for-profit, trade, otherwise here in 
Washington, D.C. So you guys are getting hit from a million 
directions with a lot of voices. But interestingly enough, most 
of those are very self-interested voices that their views don't 
necessarily jive with those of the public. But when you are 
constantly hearing that sort of stuff, it naturally is going to 
try and pull your brain towards those issues and those 
solutions and that sort of thing.
    So how do you counteract it? It is not easy. I mean, 
turning off Twitter is one part of it, but you are still going 
to have people beating their way to your front doors and, you 
know, trying to come to your fundraisers, and do all sorts of 
stuff like that.
    So we have got to think about new tools for helping you 
guys better get a sense of the communities and what their views 
are on other things. One of the interesting experiments that 
was, you know, being done--I heard about a few years ago was 
this Steve Kull, social scientist, was working on something 
called ``voice of the people,'' where he would put together 
these really deep focus groups, on postal reform and other 
stuff, of regular Americans, and they would come up with 
solutions about how you could get something done, but they were 
coming up with solutions that just never got a voice on the 
Hill.
    You all have been stuck in the position of, you know, you 
go back to your districts, you try to do a town hall, but guess 
what? Elites will hijack those. You know, interest groups will 
send people because they want to create a Twitter moment or a 
YouTube moment, and they wreck that too.
    And so, like, it is really a tough position, and I don't 
know if there are, you know, technological tools that can help 
you kind of separate the kind of elite noise and get a better 
sense of what, you know, the average community can make, other 
than just the shoe leather you all put in so much, but it is a 
real thing.
    The Chairman. Dr. Drutman, I think----
    Mr. Drutman. I just want to address your question as well 
because it is a crucially important question and, I mean, 
social media has done a lot of good things in connecting a lot 
of people and it has also done a lot of bad things in 
connecting other people, I think. I mean, the business 
incentives of social media, of course, are to drive what gets 
the most clicks, what is the most emotional, and that is the 
stuff that people want to read, which is how terrible the other 
side is.
    There is a lot of confirmation bias, a lot of--when you 
look at studies like why do people share stuff on social media, 
it is because it makes them feel good. It makes them feel like 
they are right. They have got it all figured out, and it 
reinforces the kind of emotional charge that they get by hating 
on the people that they like to hate on essentially.
    And, you know, that is a real problem. But, you know, a lot 
of these trends of division started before social media. They 
started with cable news, they started with talk radio, before 
social media, you know, took over. In fact, it is interesting. 
I have looked at some studies. It is really older Americans who 
are most victimized by this, by fake news, because they haven't 
grown up in this environment of social media and Facebook and 
where they can really more easily distinguish, and also, they 
are most set in their views and most likely to believe the 
worst things about the other side, you know.
    So a lot of it is really coming from political leadership 
and, you know--like, it is a reinforcing dynamic because 
political leaders say, well, I just have to--what my angry 
followers are saying, I should amplify that. As the expression 
goes, Twitter is not the real world, but it is a representative 
sample of people who are the most engaged in politics.
    Now, one thing that gives me some hope is that, well, 
social media is obviously everywhere throughout western 
democracies and the world. Not every country that has social 
media is as polarized and divided as the U.S. So makes me think 
that there is something distinct about what is happening in the 
United States, and I think that distinct thing is the endless 
demonization of the other side that is coming from leadership 
and political elites and media elites, and that filters down 
and that is where most people get their opinions from and then 
they want to hate on the other side.
    Also, the geographical sorting that a lot of the 
polarizations really that people live in communities that are 
very solidly ``R'' or very solidly ``D.'' And when you are 
surrounded by like-minded people, you tend to become more 
extreme. And when people on the other side are far away and 
distant, they become scarier and it is easier to demagogue and 
fearmonger about who they really are.
    So some of this bridge building is important. People are 
more polarized in real life, actually, than they are on social 
media, which is something that I don't think we really 
appreciate. So, you know, I think social media amplifies a lot 
of what is happening, but it is not--it is an amplifier, not a 
root cause of a lot of the division.
    And, you know, it is true, people's attention spans are 
shorter, but the belief in conspiracy--I published a rather 
interesting paper recently--that belief in conspiracy theories 
hasn't increased over time; it is just that it is consolidated 
more on a few that become more amplified.
    So, I mean, the lack of people's understanding about 
politics--I mean, this is--political scientists have always 
kind of taught, oh, American people don't know anything about 
politics. American people are so dumb, right? But like--you 
know, that is not really fair because most people know what 
they need to know from shortcuts and heuristics, and they 
depend on political leaders to represent them and help them to 
figure out what they know. And when political leaders don't do 
that responsibly, we--it is very hard for people who really 
depend on leadership. Leadership matters.
    The Chairman. Go ahead, Mr. Larson, and then Mr. Mariani.
    Mr. Larson. Well, I just wanted to--these are all good 
questions, and I am enjoying listening.
    But Representative Cole and DeLauro have a bill on history 
and civics and, frankly, it is not being taught the way it 
should be within our school systems. Some do it better than 
others, but across this Nation, the lack of civic understanding 
and responsibility, which is critical for a republic, isn't 
taught. And between that and financial literacy, Congress is 
loathed to mandate educational instruction on the States that 
is responsibility of the State, but especially in this day and 
age where you are bombarded with information, and people--it is 
hard to distinguish the difference between the two.
    And, frankly, anyone can produce a scientist or an 
economist or something that supports their point of view and 
there really isn't a Nation that has been grounded in its civic 
responsibility.
    There is another notion and idea also that we should have 
to go along with that, what Australia does with 100 percent 
voting, and having voting as a requirement. And making sure 
that civic instruction, in order to get out of high school, 
that you understand how that works and how we apply that.
    The Chairman. Go ahead.
    Mr. Mariani. I will just strike an optimistic note on the 
technological side, which is technology certainly has created 
some of these challenges, but it is ultimately a tool, right? 
So it is value agnostic. It kind of just does what we tell it. 
And to Dr. Kosar's point, there are some technology platforms 
that just by tweaking the rules, you can drive towards 
consensus. So vTaiwan is a social platform that Taiwanese 
government uses to drive towards some of these things that 
consensus on even fraught issues like internet regulation.
    But to Dr. Allen's point about, you know, trust in 
government, you can see one of the things that we have been 
looking at in our research is, one of the factors that can 
drive that is this kind of idea of, you know, psychic distance; 
like, how close you feel to that is kind of how much you trust 
it. So the public trusts local government more than State, 
State more than Federal, and so on.
    So by creating distance technology, you know, you don't 
have to go to your county clerk anymore, you don't need to meet 
in person with your Representative. By creating a distance, it 
can feed that distrust, but we have also seen the opposite 
begin to take place.
    If you can create a good customer experience for the 
public, that actually goes a long way. Even if it is a digital 
customer experience, that goes a long way to building trust. So 
we have seen this kind of high correlation between the customer 
experience of government services and public's trust in 
government.
    So if we kind of have the mindset shift that everyone is 
describing, we can actually use these technological tools to 
actually build some of the trust that we are all looking for.
    The Chairman. Okay. I feel like this was well worth waiting 
3 years for this hearing. This was really meaty.
    I want to thank our witnesses for their testimony today and 
thank our committee members who were able to attend. I also 
want to thank our staff for pulling together another great 
hearing with such outstanding witnesses. And I want to 
acknowledge the Armed Services Committee for letting us squat 
in their room.
    Without objection, all members will have 5 legislative days 
within which to submit additional written questions for the 
witnesses to the chair which will be forwarded to the witnesses 
for their response. I ask our witnesses to please respond as 
promptly as you are able.
    Without objection, all members will have 5 legislative days 
within which to submit extraneous materials to the chair for 
inclusion in the record.
    And, with that, our hearing is adjourned. Thanks, 
everybody.
    [Whereupon, at 10:32 a.m., the committee was adjourned.]
    
                            [all]