[Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 95 (Wednesday, June 23, 2010)]
[House]
[Pages H4721-H4727]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




 GRANTING SUBPOENA POWER TO COMMISSION INVESTIGATING BP DEEPWATER OIL 
                                 SPILL

  Mr. RAHALL. Madam Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the 
bill (H.R. 5481) to give subpoena power to the National Commission on 
the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling, as amended.
  The Clerk read the title of the bill.
  The text of the bill is as follows:

                               H.R. 5481

       Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of 
     the United States of America in Congress assembled,

     SECTION 1. SUBPOENA POWER OF THE NATIONAL COMMISSION ON THE 
                   BP ``DEEPWATER HORIZON'' OIL SPILL AND OFFSHORE 
                   DRILLING.

       (a) Subpoena Power.--The National Commission on the BP 
     Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling established 
     by Executive Order No. 13543 of May 21, 2010 (in this section 
     referred to as the ``Commission''), may issue subpoenas to 
     compel the attendance and testimony of witnesses and the 
     production of books, records, correspondence, memoranda, and 
     other documents.
       (b) Issuance.--
       (1) Authorization.--A subpoena may be issued under this 
     section only by--
       (A) agreement of the Co-Chairs of the Commission; or
       (B) the affirmative vote of a majority of the members of 
     the Commission.
       (2) Justice department coordination.--
       (A) Notification.--The Commission shall notify the Attorney 
     General or his or her designee of the Commission's intent to 
     issue a subpoena under this section, the identity of the 
     witness, and the nature of the testimony sought before 
     issuing such a subpoena. The form and content of such notice 
     shall be set forth in the guidelines to be issued under 
     subparagraph (D).
       (B) Conditions for objection to issuance.--The Commission 
     may not issue a subpoena under authority of this Act if the 
     Attorney General objects to the issuance of the subpoena on 
     the basis that the taking of the testimony is likely to 
     interfere with any--
       (i) Federal or State criminal investigation or prosecution; 
     or
       (ii) pending investigation under sections 3729 through 3732 
     of title 31, United States Code (commonly known as the 
     ``Civil False Claims Act'') or other Federal statute 
     providing for civil remedies, or any civil litigation to 
     which the United States or any of its agencies is or is 
     likely to be a party.
       (C) Notification of objection.--The Attorney General or 
     relevant United States Attorney shall notify the Commission 
     of an objection raised under this paragraph without 
     unnecessary delay and as set forth in the guidelines to be 
     issued under subparagraph (D).
       (D) Guidelines.--As soon as practicable, but no later than 
     30 days after the date of the enactment of this Act, the 
     Attorney General, after consultation with the Commission, 
     shall issue guidelines to carry out this subsection.
       (3) Signature and service.--A subpoena issued under this 
     section may be--
       (A) issued under the signature of either Co-Chair or any 
     member designated by a majority of the Commission; and
       (B) served by any person designated by the Co-Chairs or a 
     member designated by a majority of the Commission.
       (c) Enforcement.--
       (1) Required procedures.--In the case of contumacy of any 
     person issued a subpoena under this section or refusal by 
     such person to comply with the subpoena, the Commission shall 
     request the Attorney General to seek enforcement of the 
     subpoena. Upon such request the Attorney General shall seek 
     enforcement of the subpoena in a court described in paragraph 
     (2). The court in which the Attorney General seeks 
     enforcement of the subpoena shall issue an order requiring 
     the subpoenaed person to appear at any designated place to 
     testify or to produce documentary or other evidence, and may 
     punish any failure to obey the order as a contempt of that 
     court.
       (2) Jurisdiction for enforcement.--Any United States 
     district court for a judicial district in which a person 
     issued a subpoena under this section resides, is served, or 
     may be found, or where the subpoena is returnable, shall have 
     jurisdiction to enforce the subpoena as provided in paragraph 
     (1).

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from 
West Virginia (Mr. Rahall) and the gentleman from Washington (Mr. 
Hastings) each will control 20 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from West Virginia.


                             General Leave

  Mr. RAHALL. Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members 
may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks 
and include extraneous material on the bill under consideration.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from West Virginia?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. RAHALL. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Madam Speaker, last month President Obama issued Executive Order 
13543 establishing the National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon 
Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling. The measure we are considering today, 
introduced by our colleague, Representative Lois Capps, would authorize 
the commission to issue subpoenas, if necessary, to gather information 
and compel testimony.
  With it, we are giving the commission some teeth. The commission 
should be demanding and receiving a full and fair accounting to carry 
out its important mission. Without subpoena power, the commission runs 
the risk of allowing BP to write its own history of what happened in 
the gulf.
  As amended, H.R. 5481 includes language worked out with the Justice 
Department to ensure that any commission subpoena does not interfere 
with any present or future criminal investigation or prosecution or 
civil litigation involving the United States.
  I want to commend the bill's sponsor and a valued member of our 
Committee on Natural Resources, Representative Lois Capps, a valued 
member not only on our Resources Committee but in this body who has 
experienced oil spills in her history as many of our colleagues are 
today. Having lived through the Santa Barbara oil spill which was in 
her congressional district in 1969, Representative Capps has a deep 
understanding and a commitment to oil spill prevention and mitigation.
  Madam Speaker, H.R. 5481 is just one of a number of actions that this 
Congress will need to take to help gather information on the causes of 
the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster and develop safety and environmental 
measures to prevent such a disaster from occurring again.
  I urge my colleagues to support the passage of H.R. 5481, a 
commonsense bill that will help shed some light on what happened the 
night of this tragic explosion.
  I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time 
as I may consume.
  Madam Speaker, at this very moment, oil continues to flow into the 
Gulf of Mexico, and the urgency to address this crisis should not be 
forgotten or dismissed. It is important that we get to the bottom of 
the causes of this terrible tragedy. We need to know what went wrong 
and who did precisely what wrong. At the same time, we should not lose 
sight of the most immediate priorities.
  Those priorities are, first, the leak must be stopped. Second, the 
oil must

[[Page H4722]]

be cleaned up because the livelihood of families and communities all 
along the gulf coast need help and support, and the well-being of 
wildlife and the environment must be cared for. And third, BP must be 
held 100 percent accountable and pay all the costs associated with this 
disaster.
  This bill, as the distinguished chairman said, simply grants subpoena 
authority to the seven-member commission established and appointed by 
the President to look into the causes of the Deepwater Horizon 
accident, the resulting spill, and the response.
  I support this bill and the commission having subpoena power to 
compel the disclosure of documents and the testimony of witnesses. 
Congress has passed laws to give subpoena power to similar commissions 
in the past, and it is fully appropriate to do so here.
  To be clear, the authority granted in this bill allowing the 
commission to issue subpoenas covers BP and the companies involved in 
the drilling of this well, but it also fully covers the agencies and 
departments of the Federal Government. Not only must we get to the 
bottom of what these companies did and the failures that occurred, but 
we also must know what failures occurred by the government in their 
regulatory oversight and in responding to this spill.

                              {time}  1450

  But there is one concern with the wording of this bill, Madam 
Speaker, and the impact that it could have in prolonging the work of 
the commission beyond its 6-month timeframe set out by the President.
  The bill allows the Attorney General to object to the commission 
issuing subpoenas for certain specified situations. Those situations 
are when criminal investigations and certain civil litigation may be 
harmed by the taking of testimony. That's understandable, Madam 
Speaker. Under the wording of the bill, however, the Attorney General 
must act to make known such an objection to a commission's subpoena 
``without unnecessary delay.'' This vague term places no real time 
frame on the Attorney General to act.
  When the commission itself is supposed to complete its work within 
180 days of its first meeting, an open-ended delay that could occur due 
to the inaction of the Attorney General must be highlighted. This is 
particularly important, Madam Speaker, because the administration has 
partly justified its deepwater drilling moratorium upon allowing the 
commission to complete its investigation.
  Under the way this bill is drafted, the moratorium--which I might add 
suffered a serious legal blow yesterday by a Federal judge in 
Louisiana--could drag on much longer than publicly promised by the 
President. The economic toll that a prolonged commission and a 
prolonged deepwater moratorium could have on the economy of the gulf 
and the jobs of tens of thousands is very, very real. A stricter 
timeline for the Attorney General to review subpoenas could have 
prevented such a scenario. This was not done, and there is no 
opportunity, obviously, to offer amendments to this suspension bill. So 
Madam Speaker, I raise this as an issue because the Commission and the 
Attorney General need to be diligent to avoid such a scenario.
  This oil spill has unleashed a tragedy on the people and the 
environment in the gulf, but the Federal Government must not take 
actions that exacerbate this tragedy by not completing their work in a 
timely manner. The power to issue subpoenas is necessary to the 
commission's technical abilities to do their investigative work, but I 
must point out that questions are being raised about the seven persons 
selected and appointed by the President to his commission. So Madam 
Speaker, I would like to enter into the Record a selection of three 
pieces covering the commission.
  The first is an Associated Press article entitled, ``Obama Spill 
Panel Big on Policy, Not Engineering.'' Another news article from The 
Times-Picayune entitled, ``Oil Spill Commission Coordinator Has 
Represented Environmental Groups.'' And third, a Wall Street Journal 
editorial entitled, ``The Antidrilling Commission: The White House 
choices seem to have made up their minds.''
  The questions posed in these pieces and in other venues include: Do 
the past statements made and positions taken by several commission 
members in opposition to expanded offshore drilling affect their 
ability to act fairly and impartially? Will the general lack of 
engineering expertise among the commission members hinder their ability 
to fully grasp and get to the bottom of what happened in this accident? 
Will the absence of any drilling expertise among all seven commission 
members affect their pace of work or understanding of the matters they 
are charged with investigating? Will the pro cap-and-trade positions of 
several commission members transform this from an investigation into 
what went wrong with this incident into a pitch for a national energy 
tax? Will the commission's report ultimately be credible to all or be 
compromised due to the personal perspective of the members that the 
President appointed? Madam Speaker, only time will answer these 
questions.
  I hope the commission is able to fully and fairly conduct its 
investigation into this incident and the government's response to it. 
We do need to know what went wrong so that reforms can be made to 
ensure American drilling is the safest in the world. We've got to have 
the facts in order to develop informed, effective solutions to make 
certain an accident like this never happens again.
  So, Madam Speaker, the President's commission isn't the only entity 
looking into these questions. Congress too has a responsibility, and 
Congress should act when the facts are known. As subpoena power is 
necessary for this commission to undertake its work, I encourage my 
colleagues to support this bill.

                      [From the Associated Press]

            Obama Spill Panel Big on Policy, Not Engineering

                          (By Seth Borenstein)

       Washington.--The panel appointed by President Barack Obama 
     to investigate the Gulf of Mexico oil spill is short on 
     technical expertise but long on talking publicly about 
     ``America's addiction to oil.'' One member has blogged about 
     it regularly.
       Only one of the seven commissioners, the dean of Harvard's 
     engineering and applied sciences school, has a prominent 
     engineering background--but it's in optics and physics. 
     Another is an environmental scientist with expertise in 
     coastal areas and the after-effects of oil spills. Both are 
     praised by other scientists.
       The five other commissioners are experts in policy and 
     management.
       The White House said the commission will focus on the 
     government's ``too cozy'' relationship with the oil industry. 
     A presidential spokesman said panel members will ``consult 
     the best minds and subject matter experts'' as they do their 
     work.
       The commission has yet to meet, yet some panel members had 
     made their views known.
       Environmental activist Frances Beinecke on May 27 blogged: 
     ``We can blame BP for the disaster and we should. We can 
     blame lack of adequate government oversight for the disaster 
     and we should. But in the end, we also must place the blame 
     where it originated: America's addiction to oil.'' And on 
     June 3, May 27, May 22, May 18, May 4, she called for bans on 
     drilling offshore and the Arctic.
       ``Even as questions persist, there is one thing I know for 
     certain: the Gulf oil spill isn't just an accident. It's the 
     result of a failed energy policy,'' Beinecke wrote on May 20.
       Two other commissioners also have gone public to urge bans 
     on drilling.
       Co-chairman Bob Graham, a Democrat who was Florida governor 
     and later a senator, led efforts to prevent drilling off his 
     state's coast. Commissioner Donald Boesch of the University 
     of Maryland wrote in a Washington Post blog that the federal 
     government had planned to allow oil drilling off the Virginia 
     coast and ``that probably will and should be delayed.''
       Boesch, who has made scientific assessments of oil spills' 
     effects on the ecosystem, said usually oil spills are small. 
     But he added, ``The impacts of the oil and gas extraction 
     industry (both coastal and offshore) on Gulf Coast wetlands 
     represent an environmental catastrophe of massive and 
     underappreciated proportions.''
       An expert not on the commission, Granger Morgan, head of 
     the engineering and public policy department at Carnegie 
     Mellon University and an Obama campaign contributor, said the 
     panel should have included more technical expertise and 
     ``folks who aren't sort of already staked out'' on oil 
     issues.
       Jerry Taylor of the libertarian Cato Institute described 
     the investigation as ``an exercise in political theater where 
     the findings are preordained by the people put on the 
     commission.''
       When the White House announced the commission, Interior 
     Secretary Ken Salazar and others made compared it with the 
     one that investigated the 1986 Challenger accident. This one, 
     however, doesn't have as many technical experts.
       The 13-member board that looked into the first shuttle 
     accident had seven engineering

[[Page H4723]]

     and aviation experts and three other scientists. The 2003 
     board that looked into the Columbia shuttle disaster also had 
     more than half of the panel with expertise in engineering and 
     aviation.
       Iraj Ersahaghi, who heads the petroleum engineering program 
     the University of Southern California, reviewed the names of 
     oil spill commissioners and asked, ``What do they know about 
     petroleum?''
       Ersahaghi said the panel needed to include someone like Bob 
     Bea, a prominent petroleum engineering professor at the 
     University of California, Berkeley, who's an expert in 
     offshore drilling and the management causes of manmade 
     disasters.
       Bea, who's conducting his own investigation into the spill, 
     told The Associated Press that his 66-member expert group 
     will serve as a consultant to the commission, at the request 
     of the panel's co-chairman, William K. Reilly, Environmental 
     Protection Agency chief under President George H.W. Bush.
       Adm. Hal Gehman, who oversaw the Columbia accident panel, 
     said his advice to future commissions is to include subject 
     matter experts. His own expertise was management and policy 
     but said his engineering-oriented colleagues were critical to 
     sorting through official testimony.
       ``Don't believe the first story; it's always more 
     complicated than they (the people testifying) would like you 
     to believe,'' Gehman said. ``Complex accidents have complex 
     causes.''
       The oil spill commission will not be at a loss for 
     technical help, White House spokesman Ben LaBolt said.
       For one, he said the panel will draw on a technical 
     analysis that the National Association of Engineering is 
     performing. Also, members will ``consult the best minds and 
     subject matter experts in the Gulf, in the private sector, in 
     think tanks and in the federal government as they conduct 
     their research.''
       That makes sense, said John Marburger, who was science 
     adviser to President George W. Bush.
       ``It's not really a technical commission,'' Marburger said. 
     ``It's a commission that's more oriented to understanding the 
     regulatory and organizational framework, which clearly has a 
     major bearing on the incident.''
                                  ____


             [From Times-Picayune, Tuesday, June 22, 2010]

 Oil Spill Commission Coordinator Has Represented Environmental Groups

                           (By Bruce Alpert)

       The commission created by President Barack Obama to 
     investigate the Gulf of Mexico oil spill appointed a 
     Georgetown University environmental law professor Tuesday as 
     its executive staff director.
       Bob Graham, a Democrat, and William Reilly, a Republican, 
     lead the seven-member commission to investigate the Gulf of 
     Mexico oil spill.
       Richard Lazarus, a graduate of Harvard University Law 
     School where he was the roommate of Supreme Court Chief 
     Justice John Roberts, has been given the task of coordinating 
     the National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill 
     and Offshore Drilling, which will determine what new 
     regulations will govern future deepwater drilling operations.
       The appointment was announced by the commission's co-chairs 
     Bob Graham, a former Democratic governor and U.S. senator 
     from Florida, and Republican William Reilly, a former 
     Environmental Protection Agency Administrator.
       The Obama administration established a six-month moratorium 
     on deepwater drilling to give the seven-member commission 
     time to make recommendations, although a federal judge in New 
     Orleans issued a temporary injunction Tuesday to block the 
     order, saying it lacked justification and was doing economic 
     harm to businesses and workers.
       Reilly told the New York Times Monday that the panel won't 
     meet until mid-July and probably won't complete its 
     recommendations until early next year, signaling that, if an 
     appeals court reverses the temporary injunction, the 
     moratorium well be extended past the six-month deadline.
       Lazarus, a former associate solicitor general, has 
     represented the United States, state and local governments 
     and environmental groups in 37 cases before the U.S. Supreme 
     Court.
       His primary areas of legal scholarship are environmental 
     and natural resources law. For the past three summers, he has 
     taught a course on Supreme Court history with his old 
     roommate, Chief Justice Roberts.
       ``As staff director I would expect him to be exceedingly 
     thorough, ask a lot of questions, seek probative answers, and 
     reduce the chaos of the unknown to manageable proportions,'' 
     said Oliver Houck, who teaches environmental law at Tulane 
     University and co-authored a book with Lazarus. ``I also 
     expect him, as a lawyer and former associate solicitor, to be 
     quite aware that he is a staff member and aide and not a 
     decision-maker.''
       His appointment, though, led some to question whether the 
     commission is too heavily weighted with those who favor 
     strong environmental regulation and have been critical of the 
     oil industry.
       ``The vast majority of those on the oil spill commission, 
     as well as the staff, appear to have a predisposed bias 
     against drilling, and it appears their conclusions will be 
     based more on politics than on safety, which is 
     disappointing,'' Rep. Steve Scalise, R-Jefferson, said.
       But White House spokeswoman Moira Mack said the commission 
     has ``broad and diverse representation,'' including 
     environmentalists, academics, scientists, a former EPA 
     administrator and former governor and senator.
       ``The National Association of Engineering is conducting a 
     technical analysis that the commission will draw upon,'' she 
     said. ``The commission will consult with the best minds and 
     subject matter experts in the Gulf, in the private sector, in 
     think tanks and in the federal government as they conduct 
     their research.''
       The oil and gas industry needs a thorough examination, Mack 
     said.
       ``There's no doubt that Minerals Management Service has 
     been too cozy with the oil and gas industry and there are 
     many instances in which it has allowed the industry to 
     dictate regulations,'' Mack said. ``No more. The commission 
     will bring a set of fresh eyes to conduct a top to bottom 
     review of offshore drilling regulation and the assumptions 
     that have guided it, to ensure that the BP Deepwater Horizon 
     Spill will never be repeated.''
       Obama has asked Congress to provide $15 million to finance 
     the commission's work.
       Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., said she wasn't surprised when 
     Reilly said the commission won't be able to meet the six-
     month deadline established by Obama. She said that federal 
     commissions ``often extend their timeline, and their 
     jurisdiction,'' though she said it's important the panel 
     complete its work fairly and expeditiously.
                                  ____


             [From the Wall Street Journal, June 22, 2010]

                      The Antidrilling Commission

       The President has appointed a seven-person commission to 
     take what he says will be an objective look at what caused 
     the Gulf spill and the steps to make offshore drilling safe. 
     But judging from the pedigree of his commissioners, we're 
     beginning to wonder if his real goal is to turn drilling into 
     a partisan election issue.
       Mr. Obama filled out his commission last week, and the news 
     is that there's neither an oil nor drilling expert in the 
     bunch. Instead, he's loaded up on politicians and 
     environmental activists.
       One co-chair is former Democratic Senator Bob Graham, who 
     fought drilling off Florida throughout his career. The other 
     is William Reilly, who ran the Environmental Protection 
     Agency under President George H.W. Bush but is best known as 
     a former president and former chairman of the World Wildlife 
     Fund, one of the big environmental lobbies. The others:
       Donald Boesch, a University of Maryland ``biological 
     oceanographer,'' who has opposed drilling off the Virginia 
     coast and who argued that ``the impacts of the oil and gas 
     extraction industry . . . on Gulf Coast wetlands represent an 
     environmental catastrophe of massive and underappreciated 
     proportions.''
       Terry Garcia, an executive vice president at the National 
     Geographic Society, who directed coastal programs in the 
     Clinton Administration, in particular ``recovery of 
     endangered species, habitat conservation planning,'' and 
     ``Clean Water Act implementation,'' according to the White 
     House press release.
       Fran Ulmer, Chancellor of the University of Alaska 
     Anchorage, who is a member of the Aspen Institute's 
     Commission on Arctic Climate Change. She's also on the board 
     of the Union of Concerned Scientists, which opposes nuclear 
     power and more offshore drilling and wants government 
     policies ``that reduce vehicle miles traveled'' (i.e., 
     driving in cars).
       Frances Beinecke, president of the Natural Resources 
     Defense Council, who prior to her appointment blogged about 
     the spill this way: ``We can blame BP for the disaster and we 
     should. We can blame lack of adequate government oversight 
     for the disaster and we should. But in the end, we also must 
     place blame where it originated: America's addiction to 
     oil.''
       On at least five occasions since the accident, Ms. Beinecke 
     has called for bans on offshore and Arctic drilling.
       Rounding out the panel is its lone member with an 
     engineering background, Harvard's Cherry A. Murray, though 
     her specialties are physics and optics.
       Whatever their other expertise, none of these worthies 
     knows much if anything about petroleum engineering. Where is 
     the expert on modern drilling techniques, or rig safety, or 
     even blowout preventers?
       The choice of men and women who are long opposed to more 
     drilling suggests not a fair technical inquiry but an 
     antidrilling political agenda. With the elections approaching 
     and Democrats down in the polls, the White House is looking 
     to change the subject from health care, the lack of jobs and 
     runaway deficits. Could the plan be to try to wrap drilling 
     around the necks of Republicans, arguing that it was years of 
     GOP coziness with Big Oil that led to the spill?
       White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel took this theme for 
     a test drive on Sunday when he said that Republicans think 
     ``the aggrieved party here is BP, not the fisherman.'' He 
     added that this ought to remind Americans ``what Republican 
     governance is like.'' The antidrilling commission could feed 
     into this campaign narrative with a mid-September, pre-
     election report that blames the disaster on the industry and 
     Bush-era regulators and recommends a ban on most offshore 
     exploration. The media

[[Page H4724]]

     would duly salute, while Democrats could then take the 
     handoff and force antidrilling votes on Capitol Hill.
       Even as this commission moves forward, engineering experts 
     across the country have agreed that there is no scientific 
     reason for a blanket drilling ban. The Interior Department 
     invited experts to consult on drilling practices, but as we 
     wrote last week eight of them have since said their advice 
     was distorted to justify the Administration's six-month 
     drilling moratorium.
       Judging from that decision and now from Mr. Obama's 
     drilling commission, the days of ``science taking a back seat 
     to ideology'' are very much with us.

  Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. RAHALL. Madam Speaker, I yield myself 30 seconds.
  I appreciate the gentleman's listing and submitting for the Record 
the backgrounds of this commission appointed by the President. I will 
not at this time, although I almost feel compelled to, ask for 
submission into the Record the financial and political background of 
the Federal judge that just issued a decision against the 
administration's moratoria this week, but I won't do that; nor the fact 
that the commission had some 150 scientists at their disposal as well, 
but I won't submit their backgrounds and history at this time.
  Instead, I will yield 5 minutes to the gentlewoman from California 
(Mrs. Capps).
  Mrs. CAPPS. Madam Speaker, I rise in strong support of this 
legislation to give the National Commission on the BP Oil Spill the 
power to issue subpoenas.
  I want to thank three chairmen--Chairman Rahall, Chairman Oberstar 
and Chairman Conyers--for expediting the consideration of my bill, and 
I really appreciate the tireless effort of Chairman Markey, who has 
worked with me on this bill and our earlier bill which was the basis 
for the President's order to set up the commission in the first place. 
I also appreciate the Speaker and the majority leader for bringing H.R. 
5481 before us today.
  As we witness the continued destruction affecting the livelihood of 
gulf residents and the environment, a full and thorough investigation 
must be conducted. The American people want answers from those 
responsible for the devastating gulf oil spill. Providing subpoena 
power to the commission will ensure that no stone goes unturned, and it 
will enable the American people to get the truth about how and why this 
disaster occurred.
  While the President has committed the full cooperation of the Federal 
Government to the commission, he does not have the authority to give it 
subpoena power; congressional action is required. With the 
investigation expected to start soon, it's vital the commission has the 
tools and the resources it needs to get the job done.
  As I've said repeatedly on the House floor, oil drilling is never 
without risk, but if we're going to make it as safe as possible, we 
need to provide the commission with every means available to find out 
exactly what caused the BP disaster so we can do everything possible to 
prevent such a disaster from ever happening again. Arming the 
commission with subpoena power will help us accomplish these goals and 
will help the affected communities to recover.
  Madam Speaker, the need for subpoena power is certainly indicated by 
BP's wholly unsatisfactory response to this crisis. Unlike the gush of 
oil, BP has tightly controlled the flow of information following its 
spill. It has regularly stonewalled requests by Members of Congress, 
independent researchers, and the public to provide accurate and timely 
information.
  BP has failed to tell us the amount of oil it's spilling into the 
gulf waters every day. BP has failed to provide health and safety data 
to the public, to the scientists, and the Federal Government. And BP 
has failed to prepare for the capture of all the oil being siphoned up 
from the well. Simply put, BP's behavior raises major doubts about its 
willingness to provide a full accounting of what went wrong when they 
appear before the commission.
  The only way to get the information we all need from BP, Transocean, 
Halliburton and other private entities is for the commission to have 
the power to compel its disclosure. The commission just won't be able 
to do its work without complete access to the information it needs. So 
passing this bill is the appropriate and responsible thing to do. It's 
also consistent with Federal commission investigations that followed 
previous disasters, such as that on Three Mile Island.
  Madam Speaker, the people of the Gulf of Mexico and the Nation 
deserve an explanation for all the circumstances and the decisions that 
led up to this disaster. Only a comprehensive, independent review with 
subpoena power will ensure the necessary lessons to be learned, 
practices changed, and future disasters averted.
  So I urge my colleagues to join me in supporting this important 
legislation. Subpoena power is critical to hold all the parties 
accountable, protect taxpayers, and successfully clean up the disaster 
in the gulf.

                              {time}  1500

  Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Madam Speaker, how much time remains on 
both sides?
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Washington has 13 minutes 
remaining, and the gentleman from West Virginia has 14 minutes 
remaining.
  Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. At this time, Madam Speaker, I am very 
pleased to yield 5 minutes to a member of the Natural Resources 
Committee, the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Fleming).
  Mr. FLEMING. I thank the gentleman from Washington for the time.
  Madam Speaker, I stand in favor of H.R. 5481, which gives subpoena 
power to the National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill 
and Offshore Drilling.
  As we stand here today, oil is still pouring into the Gulf of Mexico 
off the coast of Louisiana, and 242 miles of Louisiana shoreline are 
impacted by this oil. The highest priority for us must be to stop this 
leak and to get this mess cleaned up. BP must be held 100 percent 
accountable for their actions, and the administration must be 
accountable for their role in the response and oversight. Many 
questions are still without answers, the most pressing being what went 
wrong.
  The bill we have before us today would provide subpoena power to the 
National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore 
Drilling. This commission has been tasked by the President with 
providing recommendations on how we can prevent and mitigate the impact 
of any future spills that result from offshore drilling. Future 
tragedies that we are currently experiencing can only be prevented if 
we know what went wrong. We must find out who made the mistakes, who 
made the erroneous judgment, what failed, and just exactly what went 
wrong.
  I will also interject, Madam Speaker, that, in operations like this, 
there are many backup systems; there are many redundancies. So, for a 
tragedy and a disaster like this to happen, there had to be gross error 
and gross negligence. This sort of thing just doesn't happen out of 
whole cloth.
  I will support the bill today, but I share the concerns raised by my 
colleagues on the scope of the subpoena authority. I will voice my own 
concern and will urge Congress, this commission, and the administration 
to keep their eye on the ball to resolve the crisis affecting my State 
and our country and not to use this as an opportunity to advance an 
agenda, to shut down offshore drilling, or to impose a national energy 
tax.
  The people of Louisiana have been hurt enough by BP's failures and by 
the inability of the administration to timely and effectively deal with 
this disaster. The last thing we need is the Federal Government's 
adding to this disaster by crippling one of the largest economic 
drivers in my State of Louisiana. The moratorium imposed by the 
administration would do just that. A Federal judge recently temporarily 
stayed the moratorium, affirming that it would cause irreparable harm. 
Any action by the administration, by this commission, and by this 
Congress must be based on science and not politics. Let's get the 
answers to what happened in order to stop the oil, to clean up the 
gulf, and to help Louisiana.
  Also, I want to point out a couple of things on this bill about the 
actors in this situation. First of all, I want to say that I condemn BP 
and its actions. It is very clear that BP was negligent, if not 
criminal, in its actions by putting profits ahead of safety.

[[Page H4725]]

  Let's talk about the administration for a moment. The administration 
failed to address well-known problems with the Minerals Management 
Service even well into the first 18 months of the administration. It 
held off high-volume skimmers from other countries that were offered 
within 3 days of the disaster. They barely acknowledged the spill for 9 
days. They did not give permission for berm construction for almost 60 
days in my home State of Louisiana. They repeatedly stopped emergency 
cleanup operations for trivial or unknown reasons, and that is 
happening even today. They repeatedly slapped moratoria, as I mentioned 
before, on offshore drilling that is over 500 feet, which is not, 
truly, deep water, and when all of the experts on this panel said that 
it was perfectly safe to do so.
  I would like to say there is one silver lining in this entire 
situation, and that is my own Governor, Governor Jindal. Governor 
Jindal has been standing point each day in this process, doing 
everything that a Governor should do and must do while our President is 
on the golf course and while, of course, the CEO of BP is out on a 
yacht.
  So I just want to say, in summary, Madam Speaker, that I do support 
H.R. 5481. This is one step in many toward finding out what happened 
here. We do need subpoena power to find out every bit of this, which 
will be going on for years, but so will the cleanup and so will the 
impact on my State of Louisiana, which at this point means that our 
tourism industry and our fisheries will be devastated, and now that the 
moratorium is shutting down 33 rigs, it is devastating our economy and 
our jobs.
  Mr. RAHALL. Madam Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from 
Massachusetts (Mr. Markey).
  Mr. MARKEY of Massachusetts. I thank the chairman very much. I thank 
him for his excellent work and for his timely hearings on this 
catastrophic event.
  I thank the gentlewoman from California (Mrs. Capps) for her 
excellent work on this indispensable piece of legislation and for 
working together in a bipartisan fashion with the minority to ensure 
that we have an historically accurate assessment of what has happened 
in the Gulf of Mexico.
  Madam Speaker, President Obama established a bipartisan National 
Commission to investigate the causes of the BP disaster through 
Executive order. However, the President does not have the authority to 
give the commission subpoena power. That requires the Congress to act.
  BP's response continues to be marked by catastrophic failures. Just 
today, an accident with an underwater recovery at the bottom of the sea 
has forced BP to remove the containment cap, and oil is now gushing 
into the ocean at a rate of 25,000 to 50,000 barrels per day. BP's 
mistakes seem to be without end.
  BP said the rig couldn't sink. It did. BP said they could respond to 
an Exxon Valdez-sized spill every day. They couldn't. BP initially 
claimed that the oil spill was 1,000 barrels a day. It wasn't. BP knew 
it. Internal BP documents show that, in the first week of the disaster, 
BP estimated the size of the spill could be as high as 14,000 barrels 
per day. It took BP 23 days to finally agree to release video footage 
of the oil spill. Even then, BP initially only released video of one of 
the 12 remote operating vehicles on the ocean floor.
  All along, it seems that BP has been much more concerned about its 
own liability--they pay a fine per barrel of oil per day--than they 
have been with the livability of the Gulf of Mexico and with the 
livelihoods of the people who are dependent upon the Gulf of Mexico for 
their livings.
  BP's actions raise significant concerns about whether it will fully 
cooperate with the commission. We need to ensure that neither BP, 
Halliburton, Transocean nor any other party could prevent the 
commission from getting to the bottom of what went wrong at the bottom 
of the ocean on April 20, 2010, when the Deepwater Horizon exploded.
  Congress has granted subpoena power to Presidential commissions 
investigating national crises in the past, including the Kemeny 
Commission, which investigated the disaster at Three Mile Island, and 
the 9/11 Commission.
  As the worst environmental disaster in our Nation's history continues 
to unfold in the gulf, the American people and the people of the gulf 
coast deserve answers so that we can prevent similar disasters in the 
future. This legislation will ensure that the National Commission has 
the power it needs to get those answers for the American people.
  We have to make sure that this never happens again. We have to make 
sure that the lessons learned are implemented. If the oil industry is 
going to drill in ultradeep waters, we have to ensure that it is 
ultrasafe and that there is an ultrafast response that can, in fact, 
ensure that there is a minimization of the harm done to the residents 
of the gulf. Every oil company now says they have no capacity to 
respond ultrafast to a catastrophic event the size of what is happening 
in the gulf right now. We have to make sure that none of this occurs 
again. Only with the subpoena power can we understand everything that 
happened--only with the passage of that today.
  Again, I urge all Members to cast an ``aye'' vote.
  Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Madam Speaker, may I inquire again as to 
how much time remains on both sides?
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Washington has 8 minutes 
remaining, and the gentleman from West Virginia has 9\1/2\ minutes 
remaining.

                              {time}  1510

  Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Madam Speaker, I am pleased to yield 4 
minutes to the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Cassidy), a member of the 
Natural Resources Committee.
  Mr. CASSIDY. Madam Speaker, it's been 64 days since the Deepwater 
Horizon exploded, sank, killed 11 rig workers, and began spilling oil 
into the Gulf of Mexico. So I think we all agree that, first and 
foremost, we must stop the leak, clean up the spill, protect our coast, 
and hold BP accountable for damages.
  Next, though, we've got to get to the bottom of what happened. And 
like my colleague just said, if we're going to go ultra-deep, make sure 
that it's ultra-safe. Now, for that to happen, we have to know the 
facts--a detailed account informed by understanding of what did take 
place, and then put in these ultra-safe safety and enforcement measures 
to make the United States the safest place to drill to get the 
resources to power our economy.
  Now this was supposed to be the purpose of the National Oil Spill 
Commission. Instead, the members of this do not appear to be up to the 
challenge. Instead of appointing independent experts with knowledge and 
expertise of deepwater drilling, the President has packed the 
commission with people who lack expertise in the issues we're 
confronting.
  First, let me say, Madam Speaker, I am for this commission having 
subpoena power. I am for them learning as much as they can learn. My 
concern is they do not have the members capable of understanding what 
they need to understand. There are no petroleum engineers in this 
commission, nor anyone else with experience in deepwater drilling.
  Now, if you're going to have a commission to figure out what went 
wrong in a petroleum engineering circumstance in deepwater drilling, 
you need members who have expertise in those issues. And if we don't 
learn from this, if we don't figure out how not to repeat these 
mistakes, then we're dooming ourselves to either repeat these accidents 
or to have an energy future which is far less secure.
  Now, Candidate Obama pledged to put science before politics, but it 
appears the President is rejecting science and professional expertise 
in responding to this. He recently imposed a moratorium that his 
handpicked experts said should not be put in place. These experts 
stated this moratorium ``will have a lasting impact on the Nation's 
economy which may be greater than that of the oil spill.'' They 
specifically said that the moratorium should not be blanket, but rather 
targeted to those rigs at risk.
  Madam Speaker, I speak as someone from Louisiana. We have over 
150,000 jobs at stake here. These are jobs in the energy production 
field, fisheries, wetlands, and our ecosytem. At stake is not only 
these jobs, though, but the

[[Page H4726]]

ability of our country to provide the energy we need to power our 
vehicles and our businesses, to provide jobs, in a sense, to make our 
economy go.
  Now, this spill is a disaster for the gulf coast and especially for 
my State. The citizens have had their lives and livelihoods upended by 
this spill, but the commission we're debating here today is a 
disappointment. To get to the bottom of what happened, we need people 
who are up to the task. We need to put science before politics for the 
sake of the gulf, our Nation, and for those whose jobs are at risk.
  Mr. RAHALL. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
New Jersey (Mr. Holt), a member of our Committee on Natural Resources.
  Mr. HOLT. I thank the chair of our committee for yielding.
  Madam Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 5481, which Mrs. Capps has 
brought before us, that would grant subpoena powers to the Presidential 
Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill. Our Nation is in the 
midst of a great environmental disaster of historic scale--tens of 
thousands of barrels gushing into the gulf, hundreds of miles of coast 
line contaminated, thousands of people suffering from the economic 
impact. With today's news that the cap has been removed, this 
environmental catastrophe continues only to get worse.
  BP has not been forthcoming over the past months--not forthcoming in 
what they were doing or how it was done or how much oil was gushing out 
and on and on and on. We owe it to the American people that they have 
an answer for what has happened; why it has happened; how it will be 
brought under control; what actions are being taken to prevent future 
spills. We can't let corporate prevarication and delay and feigned 
ignorance stand in the way.
  I support the President's action in creating a commission to 
determine the answers to these questions. And as the commission begins 
to investigate the spill in the coming weeks, we must ensure that it 
has the tools necessary to succeed. Granting the commission subpoena 
powers will ensure that they undertake a complete inquiry on the causes 
of the spill and make meaningful recommendations on how to prevent 
similar disasters. I urge support.
  I also want to point out that we need to ensure that the responsible 
parties are held accountable for the economic damages they've caused. 
The Big Oil Bailout Prevention Act, which has the support of nearly a 
fifth of this body, would raise the liability limit for economic 
damages from the laughably small $75 million. It's my hope that 
Congress will also act on this important legislation in the near 
future.
  Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Madam Speaker, I am pleased to yield 3 
minutes to the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Scalise), a member of the 
Energy and Commerce Committee.
  Mr. SCALISE. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Madam Speaker, I rise in support of the legislation to give subpoena 
powers to the commission. I would hope the commission would be an 
objective commission that actually looks into and helps us find out 
just what went wrong because I think we all need to know what went 
wrong on that rig to lead to the explosion that, unfortunately, took 
the lives of 11 people and has led to not only this human loss but this 
environmental loss.
  I would hope that they would be objective in their deliberations. I 
think I do have concerns that some of the members appear to maybe come 
to this with a predisposed outcome. And they would be well served and 
the country would be well served if they put their political agendas on 
the side and actually focused on finding out what went wrong and coming 
up with real recommendations.
  Now, if we look at the legislation not only here before us but also 
some of the problems we're dealing with on the ground, we continue to 
have problems and we seem to be spending more of our time fighting 
against this administration rather than fighting the oil because we're 
not getting the leadership we need from the President. Just yesterday, 
the sand barrier plan brought forward by our Governor that the 
President himself bragged about helping approve last week was stopped, 
halted by the Federal Government. Yet again, this kind of 
administrative red tape is something that's holding us back from 
properly responding to this disaster.
  But if you look at what's happening with this ban on drilling in 
general, Secretary Salazar had initially put a commission together to 
come up with recommendations. They had a 30-day report that they 
issued. And these were scientists that were put together on 
recommendation by the National Academy of Engineers, and they came up 
with some solid recommendations to improve safety; but they opposed a 
ban on drilling. Unfortunately, Secretary Salazar set that ruling on 
the side, set that report on the side, and ignored the reports of 
scientists and put politics over safety and science and went forward 
with the ban that yesterday a judge ruled was not legal, not proper.
  And so as this commission moves forward, I would hope that they would 
actually follow the rule of law and come up with objective decisions. 
But I think the Secretary would be well served and the President would 
be well served to go back to the report that was issued by his own 
scientific panel that came up with suggestions to improve safety on 
rigs without shutting down an entire industry.
  Unfortunately, the President and the Secretary continue to set those 
kinds of scientific recommendations on the side and allow politics to 
trump the science by continuing to pursue this ban, even though the 
judge said that their decision was arbitrary and capricious; that they 
did not have the legal authority to have a complete ban on drilling. In 
fact, the scientists recommended and suggested that a complete ban, as 
this moratorium that's in effect would currently have, would actually 
decrease safety on rigs.
  So, again, I would urge the President and the Secretary to go back 
and read that report and follow the recommendations of his own 
scientists.
  Mr. RAHALL. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from 
California (Mrs. Capps), the sponsor of the pending resolution.

                              {time}  1520

  Mrs. CAPPS. I thank the chairman for recognizing me.
  I just want to give some information about the nature of the 
commission for the Record and to clear up some misinformation that 
apparently is being circulated. The truth is that the commission is not 
designed to be technical in nature. It is more oriented to 
understanding the regulatory and organizational framework, which 
clearly has a major bearing on the incident.
  The commission is going to consult the very best minds and subject 
matter experts as they do their work. The commission members bring 
expertise in a range of relevant fields, from oil drilling to 
engineering to environmental science. The appointment of the commission 
is another step from the Obama administration to hold the oil industry 
accountable by ensuring that independent experts review the facts of 
the spill and recommend necessary environmental and safety precautions 
to address this disaster and to prevent future disasters. At the 
request of co-chair William Riley, there is a 66-member expert panel 
led by Robert Bea that will serve as a consultant to the commission. 
These technical experts are critical to sorting through all of the 
information that's presented, and the commission is required to draw on 
the technical analysis that the National Association of Engineering is 
currently performing.
  I just want to add that Congress is also providing oversight on 
efforts to contain the spill and to mitigate the devastation. There are 
thorough investigations into what led to this tragedy, with dozens of 
House hearings in the past 2 weeks alone in order to hold responsible 
parties accountable, as well as to inform what changes must be made so 
that it never happens again. Although Republican leaders have scoffed 
at these efforts, Democrats will continue to provide the necessary 
oversight to hold responsible parties accountable and to ensure that 
every measure is taken to ensure that a disaster like this never occurs 
again.
  Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Madam Speaker, I am pleased to yield 1 
minute to the gentleman from California (Mr. Rohrabacher).
  Mr. ROHRABACHER. Madam Speaker, let us note that this catastrophe 
could well have been avoided in a number of ways. What we are talking 
about

[[Page H4727]]

now is the fact that standards that already are in place were not 
followed, and we had best practices that, of course, are required of 
the industry that were not being followed. And I think we're going to 
find that out. So the last thing we want to do is cripple the United 
States' production of domestic energy in order to find out and hold a 
certain group of people accountable for the fact that they did not 
follow the practices or the standards.
  But let's put it this way: Congress has not done its job as well. We 
have spent billions of dollars on research and development for the 
Department of Energy. That money has been channeled into nonsense, like 
proving global warming rather than spending some money--which we have--
spending money on research and development to make the technology that 
we need to have safe oil and gas production, which our country 
currently depends upon for our standard of living.
  So we haven't done our job here. We haven't set our priorities here. 
And on top of that, we did not develop the technology necessary to deal 
with a spill of this magnitude. Kevin Costner came to our office and 
testified at a hearing. He's put his own money into this. So we need to 
set our own priorities. We need to deal with this crisis.
  Mr. RAHALL. Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. I yield myself the balance of my time.
  Madam Speaker, this commission is necessary so the commission has 
subpoena power. I think everybody understands that and supports that. 
But we need to do the three things that I had mentioned earlier. And 
that is to cap the well, to clean up all of the oil that has spilled 
out, and to hold BP accountable. Those things I think have very, very 
strong bipartisan support.
  The only issue is what has been addressed a few times at least from 
my perspective and in print about the objectivity of this commission. 
And of course, Madam Speaker, we all know that only time will tell when 
that judgment will be made. But if they work in an objective way, look 
at the facts, and come to a decision based on the facts rather than a 
political point of view, I think we'll all be better served by that.
  And with that, I urge support of this legislation.
  Mr. OBERSTAR. Madam Speaker, I rise today in strong support of H.R. 
5481, as amended, to give subpoena power to the National Commission on 
the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling.
  On April 20, 2010, the Deepwater Horizon, a mobile offshore drilling 
unit (MODU) operating in the Gulf of Mexico off Louisiana, suffered a 
blowout and an uncontrollable release of gas and oil. This touched off 
an explosion and fire that claimed the lives of 11 men, injured many 
others, and resulted in the loss of the rig.
  This casualty has also resulted in the release of millions of gallons 
of gas and oil into the Gulf of Mexico, the destruction of critical 
shoreline and ocean habitats, impacts to the health of potentially 
hundreds of workers engaged in the clean up, and catastrophic economic 
losses that will not be known for some time for the people of the Gulf 
Coast region. Gas and oil continue to gush out of control from the well 
nearly 65 days since the explosion.
  On May 22, President Obama issued Executive Order 13543 to establish 
the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling Commission. 
The Commission's mission is to:
  1. examine the facts and circumstances concerning the Deepwater 
Horizon oil spill disaster;
  2. develop options for preventing and mitigating the impact of oil 
spills associated with offshore drilling including: improvements to 
Federal laws, regulations, and industry practices and reforms to 
federal agencies; and
  3. submit a public report to the President with findings and options 
for consideration within six months of the Commission's first meeting.
  There are many serious questions that need to be answered surrounding 
this catastrophe. The President's Executive Order establishes a 
framework for pursuing these questions and providing needed policy 
improvements regarding offshore oil drilling. However, the Commission 
lacks a critical tool: subpoena power.
  Unfortunately, it is in the interests of certain parties to withhold 
important information, rather than to provide it voluntarily. I know 
from our own oversight work on the Committee that subpoena power is 
absolutely necessary to identify and to get the information required to 
make better policies and to protect public health, the environment, and 
to prevent the mistakes of the past. For the Commission to fulfill its 
critical mission, it must have the power to compel parties to provide 
it with information. Congress has provided similar powers to prior 
commissions and provided this same investigatory power to the Offices 
of Inspector General pursuant to the Inspector General Act of 1978.
  The gentlewoman from California (Mrs. Capps) has introduced 
legislation (H.R. 5481) to ensure that the BP Deepwater Horizon 
Commission has the ability to pursue critical questions and lines of 
inquiry wherever they may lead. The bill allows the Commission to issue 
subpoenas to compel the attendance and testimony of witnesses, and 
produce records and correspondence, among other items.
  Passage of this legislation will give the BP Deep Horizon Oil Spill 
and Offshore Drilling Commission a central tool that it needs to get to 
the truth.
  I thank the gentlewoman from California (Mrs. Capps) for introducing 
this important bill and for her unwavering commitment to this issue.
  I urge my colleagues to join me in supporting H.R. 5481.
  Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. I yield back the balance of my time.
  Mr. RAHALL. I yield back the balance of my time, Madam Speaker.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion offered by the 
gentleman from West Virginia (Mr. Rahall) that the House suspend the 
rules and pass the bill, H.R. 5481, as amended.
  The question was taken.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. In the opinion of the Chair, two-thirds 
being in the affirmative, the ayes have it.
  Mr. RAHALL. Madam Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX and the 
Chair's prior announcement, further proceedings on this motion will be 
postponed.

                          ____________________