[House Hearing, 119 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
MEMBER DAY
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND
GOVERNMENT REFORM
U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED NINETEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
DECEMBER 17, 2025
__________
Serial No. 119-53
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available on: govinfo.gov, oversight.house.gov or docs.house.gov
______
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
62-382 PDF WASHINGTON : 2026
COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND GOVERNMENT REFORM
JAMES COMER, Kentucky, Chairman
Jim Jordan, Ohio Robert Garcia, California, Ranking
Mike Turner, Ohio Minority Member
Paul Gosar, Arizona Eleanor Holmes Norton, District of
Virginia Foxx, North Carolina Columbia
Glenn Grothman, Wisconsin Stephen F. Lynch, Massachusetts
Michael Cloud, Texas Raja Krishnamoorthi, Illinois
Gary Palmer, Alabama Ro Khanna, California
Clay Higgins, Louisiana Kweisi Mfume, Maryland
Pete Sessions, Texas Shontel Brown, Ohio
Andy Biggs, Arizona Melanie Stansbury, New Mexico
Nancy Mace, South Carolina Maxwell Frost, Florida
Pat Fallon, Texas Summer Lee, Pennsylvania
Byron Donalds, Florida Greg Casar, Texas
Scott Perry, Pennsylvania Jasmine Crockett, Texas
William Timmons, South Carolina Emily Randall, Washington
Tim Burchett, Tennessee Suhas Subramanyam, Virginia
Marjorie Taylor Greene, Georgia Yassamin Ansari, Arizona
Lauren Boebert, Colorado Wesley Bell, Missouri
Anna Paulina Luna, Florida Lateefah Simon, California
Nick Langworthy, New York Dave Min, California
Eric Burlison, Missouri Ayanna Pressley, Massachusetts
Eli Crane, Arizona Rashida Tlaib, Michigan
Brian Jack, Georgia James R. Walkinshaw, Virginia
John McGuire, Virginia
Brandon Gill, Texas
------
Mark Marin, Staff Director
James Rust, Deputy Staff Director
Ryan Giachetti, Chief Counsel
Christian Hoehner, Policy Director
Duncan Wright, Deputy Director of Policy
Mallory Cogar, Director of Operations and Chief Clerk
Contact Number: 202-225-5074
Robert Edmonson, Minority Staff Director
Contact Number: 202-225-5051
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C O N T E N T S
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OPENING STATEMENTS
Page
Hon. James Comer, U.S. Representative, Chairman.................. 1
WITNESSES
Rep. Rashida Tlaib, Member of Congress, (MI-12)
Oral Statement................................................... 1
Rep. David J. Taylor, Member of Congress, (OH-02)
Oral Statement................................................... 3
Rep. Rich McCormick, Member of Congress, (GA-07)
Oral Statement................................................... 5
Rep. Bill Foster, Member of Congress, (IL-11)
Oral Statement................................................... 7
Written opening statements and bios are available on the U.S.
House of Representatives Document Repository at:
docs.house.gov.
INDEX OF DOCUMENTS
* Letter, from Covenant Community Care; submitted by Rep.
Tlaib.
The document listed above is available at: docs.house.gov.
MEMBER DAY
----------
WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 17, 2025
U.S. House of Representatives
Committee on Oversight and Government Reform
Washington, D.C.
The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 9:03 a.m., in
HVC-210, U.S. Capitol Visitor Center, Hon. James Comer
[Chairman of the Committee] presiding.
Present: Representatives Comer, Gill, Garcia, and Tlaib.
Also present: Representatives Taylor, McCormick, and
Foster.
Chairman Comer. All right. The Committee on Oversight and
Government Reform will come to order. I want to welcome
everyone here this morning.
Without objection, the Chair may declare a recess at any
time.
OPENING STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN JAMES COMER
REPRESENTATIVE FROM KENTUCKY
Pursuant to Section 3(r) of House Resolution 5, the
Committee convenes this Member Day hearing of the 119th
Congress. A Member Day hearing provides Members an opportunity
to discuss legislation and Member priorities within the
jurisdiction of the Oversight Committee. Today, I look forward
to hearing from Members of the House, my colleagues, on the
proposals they wish to bring before the consideration of this
Committee. We have circulated a list of Members who will be
speaking today, and any testimony provided by those Members
will be added to the official record. Each Member will be given
5 minutes to discuss their proposals and field questions as
needed.
I now recognize Representative Rashida Tlaib from Michigan.
STATEMENT OF HON. RASHIDA TLAIB
REPRESENTATIVE FROM MICHIGAN
Ms. Tlaib. Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman, for this
opportunity.
As you know, the Committee on House Oversight and
Government Reform must do everything in its power to protect
the lives and safety of Federal workers, and conduct
investigations and adopt changes when current agency practices
are failing to keep our workers safe.
I want to talk about Nicholas John Acker. He was a USPS
Detroit Network Distribution Center worker, Allen Park,
Michigan, and it was a tragic workplace accident. And, again,
we do not know, but we know it is heartbreaking and it is
something that we believe is preventable. His body, Mr. Chair,
trapped in a mail handling machine, and he had been dead for
six to eight hours before he was found. He checked in at 11
a.m., and his body was not discovered until the following day
at 12:30. His death is an unspeakable tragedy for his family,
who his mother tearing up and just demanding, looking me in my
eyes and said, ``Please, please, find out what happened to my
son.'' His fiancee, they had just gotten engaged, Mr. Speaker
[sic], ten days before he was killed.
What is so heartbreaking and tragic about his death, too,
is the fact that he served in our military, U.S. Air Force, for
nine years. He was not killed serving there. He was killed
being a U.S. postal worker. His death, again, is heartbreaking,
and what we do know from his union is that there were
previously raised concerns about safety measures and procedures
at this facility and had recently filed a grievance about 90
days prior to his death. The grievance stated that the
management was pressuring staff to look for letters while the
handling machine was operating. Over a month after his death,
more questions, again, remain unanswered.
[Photo]
Nicholas was someone's son, Mr. Speaker [sic]. Look how
young he was. He was a brother, and he was a fiance. Again, he
was engaged only ten days before he was killed. They were
planning to get married in the spring. Again, Nicholas served
nine years in our U.S. Air Force. He was generous. He was a
thoughtful person. He did not, again, die serving in our
military, but here at home at a sorting facility at a U.S.
Postal Service location in Allen Park. Shortly after his death,
Representative Debbie Dingell and I wrote a letter to the
Postmaster General demanding answers, and thus far, we have not
received any responses. Please Mr. Chair, work with my team and
I. If it is legislation that we need to do to make sure this is
preventable in future, let us do that, but we cannot allow,
again, this to happen.
Also, in the Committee, we know that we oversee a lot of
important initiatives that impact prescription drugs, and so
another matter, of course, and I know, Mr. Chair, you have been
leading on this effort. I do want to enter into the record, if
I may, a letter from Covenant Community Care. It is a federally
qualified health center.
Chairman Comer. Without objection, so ordered.
Ms. Tlaib. So, describing, again, their concerns with 340B.
Mr. Chair, right now, Affiliated Pharmacies and Apothecaries,
which presents more than 500 independent pharmacies across the
country, including 150 pharmacies in my district, are literally
demanding that we do something about the Pharmacy Benefit
Managers (PBMs), the actual cost of medication they dispense,
again, driving the costs, many of them having to shut their
doors. And these independent pharmacies, as you know, Mr.
Chair, are anchors in our community. They are trusted by many
of our residents that, again, are experiencing some of the
worst health challenges from cancer and so many other diseases.
Pharmacy deserts are growing, as we know, because of this, and
patients are left without any options. So, again, community
pharmacies are facing unsustainable losses, and we need to do
more about it. We know that PBMs, and I like to name them
because it is important, but CVS Caremark, Express Scripts, and
Optum Rx are reporting record profits because, again, they lack
the transparency and accountability that is necessary.
I hear about these harmful practices almost monthly from
different independent pharmacies that continue, again, to have
these challenges. Mr. Chair, from one pharmacy in Jordan, the
pharmacist explained to me how he can see a $60,000 to $80,000
loss in a month, and again, it is not sustainable. It is also a
pharmacy that has been part of the community for so long, so,
again, community health centers also being impacted. But one of
the things they continue to tell me is that, as a result, PBMs
are trying to make medical and financial decisions on behalf of
providers and the patients, and that is unchecked power. It
should stay, again, with the person providing the care. So,
Congress and this Committee, we need to act now. It is
something that, again, both, I think, sides of the aisle have
come and understand that, again, action needs to take place.
So, the Pharmacists Fight Back Act, let us get that through
this Committee, and let us work, again, incredibly hard to make
prescription drugs much more affordable and protect our
independent pharmacies.
With that Mr. Chair, I yield.
Chairman Comer. The gentlelady yields back, and thank you
for bringing this to the Committee, the postal issue. My
sincerest condolences to this family after such a horrific
incident. We have been working with the Postal Service. Your
staff and our staff have been communicating. We are trying to
learn more about this and how to ensure that it will never
happen again. I pledge to work with you and our staffs will
continue to work to try to figure out what we can do to prevent
this and see if we get any answers as to how it happened. So,
thank you for bringing this to the attention, and, again, this
is a terrible thing, and we will work together to find some
resolution on it. You have my promise to that.
And secondly, as you know, I am a co-sponsor of the
Pharmacists Fight Back Act with you. This is something that is
a huge priority for me. We have had three good bipartisan
investigative hearings and published a very substantive report
on the abuses of the PBM from this Committee. So, I want to see
legislation and more than self-governing oversight from the
PBMs, who I do not trust, so I pledge to work with you to try
to get the support to get this to not only pass the House, but
pass the Senate and become law. So, I am with you on both
issues and appreciate you coming here.
Do any other Members wish to speak or ask questions to Ms.
Tlaib?
[No response.]
Chairman Comer. All right. Thank you. I now recognize
Representative David Taylor from Ohio.
STATEMENT OF HON. DAVID J. TAYLOR
REPRESENTATIVE FROM OHIO
Mr. Taylor. Thank you, Chairman Comer and Ranking Member
Garcia, for giving me this opportunity to speak here today, and
thank you for the very hard work this Committee does. I
represent a very rural Appalachian district in Southern Ohio,
and I am here today to talk about two issues that directly
impact many throughout rural America: combating the fentanyl
epidemic and out-of-control Federal regulations.
As you know, fentanyl is an extremely deadly substance that
affects all our districts. While I applaud the Trump
Administration's diligent work to secure our Southern border,
Congress needs to pass legislation to protect our communities
from illicit fentanyl that has already entered our country.
Thankfully, there are programs, such as the National High
Intensity Drug Trafficking Area Program, or HIDTA, that assist
Federal, state, local, and tribal law enforcement agencies
operating critical drug trafficking regions across the United
States. With 33 HIDTA programs spanning across all 50 states,
this program works with communities to dismantle and disrupt
drug trafficking organizations, saving countless lives across
the United States.
Last year alone, thanks to the hard work of our law
enforcement officers and the training provided, the HIDTA
program seized over 7,000 kilograms of fentanyl. That amount of
fentanyl could potentially kill 3.5 billion people, according
to the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). The district I
represent has been ground zero for the fentanyl epidemic, and
this needs to change. With two HIDTA-designated counties in my
district, I was proud to introduce the Fight Fentanyl Act to
reauthorize to provide additional resources to the HIDTA
program. This bill would not only better equip our law
enforcement officers with the tools they need to seize more
illicit drugs, but it will also help keep our country and
communities safe. Additionally, my bill also allows the
Attorney General to allocate additional resources to
investigate and take drug traffickers and dealers to trial to
remove these destructive criminals from our communities.
I want to thank our law enforcement officers who risk their
lives every day for their work to combat fentanyl, and our
HIDTA officers for the training and the work they do to keep
our communities safe. I also want to thank Congressman Levin
for co-leading the Fight Fentanyl Act with me, and I would love
to work with you, Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member, to provide
our HIDTA program and law enforcement officers with the tools
they need to keep our community safe. I appreciate your
consideration of that issue.
The other issue I came here to speak about and I hear about
from people across Southern Ohio is the overwhelming amount of
Federal regulations that hurt businesses, farmers, and increase
the cost of living for all of us. In my district, ridiculous
regulations led to the closing of several critical businesses,
including the coal plants, which provided affordable
electricity to an entire region. As a small business owner
myself, I know firsthand the impact that burdensome regulations
can have on an economy. That is exactly why the first bill I
introduced in Congress was the Regulation Decimation Act. This
bill, which codifies an executive order from President Trump,
would simply require agencies to find ten regulations to repeal
for every new one promulgated.
The harsh reality is that no one even knows how many
Federal regulations there are. The best guess we have to go off
of is the number of pages in the Code of Federal Regulations,
which had roughly 23,000 pages in 1960 but is now up to nearly
200,000, which is approximately a 769-percent increase. This is
largely reflective of Congress slowly giving away all of its
authority to unelected bureaucrats within Federal agencies, and
we saw the impact of this during the Biden Administration with
their de facto electric vehicle mandate and the Waters of the
United States (WOTUS) Rule, which sought to punish nearly every
business and farmer in the country. This needs to change. We
cannot continue allowing such important decisions to be made by
those who can never be held accountable. I applaud President
Trump and his ten-to-one deregulatory agenda, and I am happy
the Supreme Court struck down the Chevron deference, but
Congress needs to act.
Mr. Chairman, I am happy to collaborate with you on the
best ways to cut regulations and restore responsibility to
Congress to fulfill its constitutionally mandated duties. I
appreciate you letting me share my perspective today, and I am
looking forward to working with you on my bill and this issue.
Thank you guys, and I yield back.
Chairman Comer. The gentleman yields back. Thank you for
your testimony today, and I was proud to sponsor the
reauthorization of the Office of National Drug Control Policy
last Congress, which passed the House in a bipartisan manner.
It went to the Senate, and my junior senator from Kentucky held
it up in the end and it did not become law, even though I think
there was overwhelming support in the Senate. So, that may be
someone you need to talk to about that, and that is where the
HIDTA funding comes through, the Office of National Drug
Control Policy. So, it is a big issue in my district. My law
enforcement officers support that as well, so we will work with
you to try to get that funded, but I think the problem is in
the Senate with that, so.
So, do any other Members seek recognition?
[No response.]
Chairman Comer. Seeing none, thank you Representative
Taylor. I now recognize Representative McCormick from Georgia.
STATEMENT OF HON. RICHARD MCCORMICK
REPRESENTATIVE FROM GEORGIA
Mr. McCormick. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you,
Ranking Member, for having me here today. This is an issue near
and dear to my heart, something I have come to your office for.
Chairman Comer. Yes.
Mr. McCormick. And I am happy to come to the Democrats for
the same reason. I think this could be a bipartisan solution.
We know what the problem is. Everybody is now recognizing that
paying $1 trillion of interest payment on basically $38
trillion of debt is unsustainable. As we continue to be
downgraded as a currency, we are going to end up being at about
$2 trillion, especially when we see Medicare and Social
Security, objectively, predictably becoming bankrupt probably
in the next presidency. This is an unfortunate byproduct of not
having the foresight to do something different than we normally
do. My bill is very simple. We know that we have had almost a
52-percent increase in Federal spending just since 2019. We
know that during that period, we have also had about an 86-
percent increase in deficit spending. We cannot continue doing
this. My bill is very succinct, very simple. As a matter of
fact, it has been reviewed by leadership as saying this sounds
too good to be true, that why haven't we done this sooner?
Typically, in a budget, and I came up with this idea about
30 years ago when I was a logistics officer for my squadron and
realized at the end of my year, when I have ten percent in
reserve for my emergency spending, that all of a sudden I have
to spend a bunch of money. And we see this in the military, but
also through every bureaucracy in America where, if we do not
spend it, we lose it. Somebody else spends it anyways, and they
will actually reduce your budget because you obviously did not
need it. So, we all got in the habit of doing something we know
is wrong, we know is wasteful, and we know is built in by the
American Government to be wrong: we are spending money we do
not need to spend.
My bill says instead of use it or lose it, which is what we
have now--a stick to do the wrong thing--instead, whatever you
do not spend for that year, 49 percent of that goes back toward
debt and deficit. Not to the Speaker, not to the President, not
to hire headquarters--debt and deficit, a real problem. Forty-
nine percent rolls forward to the next fiscal year. So, instead
of being penalized with a smaller budget, you actually get a
larger budget. And then two percent goes back to reward the
people who are being effective and efficient in that department
with bonuses up to ten percent of their salary as retention. It
is three carrots to do the right thing instead of two sticks to
do the wrong thing.
I think this should be bipartisan--gentlemen, bipartisan--
that we can actually say this is entirely voluntary and non-
punitive. There is no downside for it. There is no way the
Congressional Budget Office (CBO) can score it wrong. I am a
big critic of the CBO. How could you do anything other than
save money on a voluntary basis? It gives you an option to not
be penalized, but to be rewarded for saving the American
taxpayer money, to save our children money on interest
payments. Why wouldn't we do something so common sense? Why
wouldn't this be bipartisan? Why wouldn't this be a good
solution? Can we not reinvent the way we look at government?
I hope that everybody in both sides of the House can
actually get it behind this bill. It is called the Incentivize
Savings Act. I think it is going to be great for America. It is
going to be great in the way we approach government. I think it
will be great for approaching debt and deficit and responsible
thinking without having a DOGE stepping in and making the
decision for you. You are in charge of your own self-
determination of your department and what you save money on,
and you get rewarded for doing the right thing. Please, I
encourage you to all sign on to the Incentivize Savings Act. It
is the right thing to do, it is common sense, and I know it
sounds too good to be true, but it is not.
My second piece of legislation, H.R. 6211, the Medical
Professional Access Act, which just simply allows people during
times of emergency, whether it be something catastrophic, a
hurricane or whatever, when you cross boundaries and state
lines--I am a physician--and you have credentialing issues
between states because that is what we do, but they are not
that much different from each other. And in times of emergency
where there is need, it is, basically, a Good Samaritan law
that says we do not have to go through another credentialing
process, that you are allowed to practice there during that
emergent time. If there is a declaration of emergency by that
Governor or by the President, you are allowed to practice there
without consequences, without review, because we do not have
time. This is just a commonsense approach to solving a very
real problem when you need people to help others in the
healthcare industry during an emergency.
I highly encourage you also to sign on to H.R. 6211 in
order to help people in times of emergency. And with that,
gentlemen, I yield
Chairman Comer. Thank you, again, for coming by the office
and explaining that. That sounds like common sense to me, and
we appreciate it and look forward to working with you in the
next year. Does any other Member seek recognition?
[No response.]
Chairman Comer. All right. We will suspend momentarily as
we move to the second panel.
[Pause.]
Chairman Comer. All right. We will now move to Panel Two.
Mr. Mfume may be en route. When he gets here, we will let him
participate, but I now recognize Representative Bill Foster
from Illinois.
STATEMENT OF HON. BILL FOSTER
REPRESENTATIVE FROM ILLINOIS
Mr. Foster. Thank you, Chairman Comer, Ranking Member
Garcia, and Members of the Committee. I am here today to
request your support for H.R. 6571, the Responsible and Ethical
AI Labeling Act--the REAL Act--which will require government
agencies and officers to include a disclaimer on public-facing
communications that are created or generated with artificial
intelligence. I am happy to introduce the commonsense
bipartisan bill with the support of your Chairman of Government
Operations Subcommittee, Congressman Pete Sessions of Texas. I
want to start by thanking Congressman Sessions for his
partnership on this important bill to strengthen trust and
accountability in government communications.
In short, the REAL Act would require Federal agencies and
officers, from junior level staff to the very top, to clearly
label any official content distributed through official
channels that has been generated or manipulated using
generative artificial intelligence. Specifically, it would
require Federal agencies and officers to label AI-generated
images, audio, videos, and any AI generated texts that is not
reviewed by a human prior to publication. The Office of
Management and Budget would be tasked with developing uniform
rules for labeling AI content across the agencies to ensure
that labels are clear, prominently displayed, written in plain
language, easily understandable to the public. Each label would
clearly inform the reader that content was manipulated with AI
and include a brief description of how the content was changed
and which tools were used.
This bill includes certain exemptions that are meant to
protect the internal use of low-impact AI tools by Federal
agencies and to protect personal communications of Federal
officers that are unrelated to their official responsibilities.
First, agencies will not be required to label AI content that
is circulated internally and not intended for public release.
Second, content that is created for classified purposes will
not require labeling. However, agencies will be required to
label classified content for any unclassified release of that
content. Third, the bill exempts basic graphics and visual
elements, such as text overlay or formatting, and minor visual
adjustments, such as brightness or cropping, if those
adjustments do not materially alter the meaning or context of
the underlying content. Fourth, the use of certain text
drafting tools is exempt as long as the content is reviewed for
accuracy and by human agency staff prior to publication. This
exemption is meant to preserve internal use of AI by agencies
while ensuring a robust review of AI content and requiring
labeling for automated messaging systems, like chatbots.
Importantly, this bill does not apply to any of the bill's
requirements for public-facing content that is not related to
official duties of a Federal officer, as long as it is
published using a personal, non-government social media account
or other unofficial medium. This bill includes clear guidelines
to correct communications that fail to include the appropriate
disclaimer. If an agency determines or is found to have issued
a communication in violation of this act, that agency will be
required to retract the communication and publish a corrected
version of the communication on their website and, to the
extent possible, to the same audience that received the initial
communication. This bill also includes appropriate penalties
for noncompliance by agencies and contractors, including the
adoption of remediation plans or potential oversight by the
GAO.
In an age of disinformation, Americans should be able to
trust that information coming from official government sources
is legitimate and based on reality. With rapid proliferation of
AI-generated content, there must be clear guidelines to ensure
that our Federal agencies are not using AI in a way that could
purposefully or inadvertently mislead the American public. This
legislation is about ensuring transparency and trust in Federal
communications. The REAL Act does not prohibit the use of AI or
the distribution of AI content. It simply requires official
channels to clearly indicate whether the content being shared
has been created or altered using AI.
Well, thank you for holding this Member Day hearing, and I
thank, again, Congressman Sessions for co-leading this effort.
I encourage all Members of this Committee to support and
advance the REAL Act to ensure that AI tools are responsibly
used in government communications. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I
yield back.
Chairman Comer. Thank you. Huge issue, and we certainly
look forward to working with you in the future on this issue.
Any other Members seek recognition?
[No response.]
Chairman Comer. All right. Well, thank you very much.
Mr. Foster. Thank you.
Chairman Comer. That concludes our Member Day. In closing,
I want to thank the Members for their testimony. Would you like
to add anything?
Mr. Garcia. No, I am good.
Chairman Comer. With that, and without objection, all
Members have five legislative days within which to submit
additional testimony.
If there is no further business, without objection, the
Committee stands adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 9:28 a.m., the Committee was adjourned.]
[all]