[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 121 (Tuesday, September 11, 2012)]
[House]
[Pages H5780-H5785]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
{time} 1300
PROVIDING FOR CONSIDERATION OF H.R. 5544, MINNESOTA EDUCATION
INVESTMENT AND EMPLOYMENT ACT, AND PROVIDING FOR CONSIDERATION OF H.R.
5949, FISA AMENDMENTS ACT REAUTHORIZATION ACT OF 2012
Mr. NUGENT. Madam Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I
call up House Resolution 773 and ask for its immediate consideration.
The Clerk read the resolution, as follows:
H. Res. 773
Resolved, That at any time after the adoption of this
resolution the Speaker may, pursuant to clause 2(b) of rule
XVIII, declare the House resolved into the Committee of the
Whole House on the state of the Union for consideration of
the bill (H.R. 5544) to authorize and expedite a land
exchange involving National Forest System land in the
Laurentian District of the Superior National Forest and
certain other National Forest System land in the State of
Minnesota that has limited recreational and conservation
resources and lands owned by the State of Minnesota in trust
for the public school system that are largely scattered in
checkerboard fashion within the Boundary Waters Canoe Area
Wilderness and have important recreational, scenic, and
conservation resources, and for other purposes. The first
reading of the bill shall be dispensed with. All points of
order against consideration of the bill are waived. General
debate shall be confined to the bill and shall not exceed one
hour equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking
minority member of the Committee on Natural Resources. After
general debate the bill shall be considered for amendment
under the five-minute rule. In lieu of the amendment in the
nature of a substitute recommended by the Committee on
Natural Resources now printed in the bill, an amendment in
the nature of a substitute consisting of the text of Rules
Committee Print 112-30, modified by the amendment printed in
part A of the report of the Committee on Rules accompanying
this resolution, shall be considered as adopted in the House
and in the Committee of the Whole. The bill, as amended,
shall be considered as the original bill for the purpose of
further amendment under the five-minute rule and shall be
considered as read. All points of order against provisions in
the bill, as amended, are waived. No further amendment to the
bill, as amended, shall be in order except those printed in
part B of the report of the Committee on Rules. Each such
further amendment may be offered only in the order printed in
the report, may be offered only by a Member designated in the
report, shall be considered as read, shall be debatable for
the time specified in the report equally divided and
controlled by the proponent and an opponent, shall not be
subject to amendment, and shall not be subject to a demand
for division of the question in the House or in the Committee
of the Whole. All points of order against such further
amendments are waived. At the conclusion of consideration of
the bill for amendment the Committee shall rise and report
the bill, as amended, to the House with such further
amendments as may have been adopted. The previous question
shall be considered as ordered on the bill, as amended, and
on any further amendment thereto to final passage without
intervening motion except one motion to recommit with or
without instructions.
Sec. 2. Upon the adoption of this resolution it shall be
in order to consider in the House the bill (H.R. 5949) to
extend the FISA Amendments Act of 2008 for five years. All
points of order against consideration of the bill are waived.
The amendment in the nature of a substitute recommended by
the Committee on the Judiciary now printed in the bill shall
be considered as adopted. The bill, as amended, shall be
considered as read. All points of order against provisions in
the bill, as amended, are waived. The previous question shall
be considered as ordered on the bill, as amended, and on any
amendment thereto to final passage without intervening motion
except: (1) one hour of debate, with 40 minutes equally
divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority
member of the Committee on the Judiciary and 20 minutes
equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking
minority member of the Permanent Select Committee on
Intelligence; and (2) one motion to recommit with or without
instructions.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Florida is recognized for
1 hour.
Mr. NUGENT. Madam Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield
the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. Polis)
pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During
consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose
of debate only.
General Leave
Mr. NUGENT. Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members
have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentleman from Florida?
There was no objection.
Mr. NUGENT. Madam Speaker, I rise today in support of this rule,
which provides for consideration of two different pieces of
legislation.
The first of these bills transfers lands within the State of
Minnesota to the benefit of the State's public school system. The rule
provides for consideration of each and every amendment offered by
Members to the Rules Committee by the amendment deadline.
The next measure this rule allows for consideration of is H.R. 5949,
the FISA Amendments Act Reauthorization Act of 2012. Also called the
FAA Reauthorization, this legislation would reauthorize programs that
are critically important to our national security.
First passed in 2008, FAA has enjoyed a history of strong bipartisan
support. Now, President Obama and his administration have made it clear
that a clean, long-term extension of FAA is their number one
intelligence priority. That's exactly what H.R. 5949 does.
Recognizing that our Nation's security cannot and should not wait
until an emergency, the 11th hour, or rushed reauthorization, the
Select Intelligence and Judiciary Committees have had hearings on the
FAA's reauthorization, they've marked up the bill, and they've sent it
to us months ahead of the expiration deadline. I congratulate both of
these committees on their timely and dedicated work for the sake of our
own safety.
It is with the tools that the FAA provides to our intelligence
community that we're able to monitor our Nation's enemies overseas.
Without this authority, the ability to track those individuals who
aren't American citizens and want to do harm to this country would
return to the state it was in before September 11 of 2001.
I really want to stress that the FISA Amendments Act applies to
targeting non-U.S. citizens living outside of the United States.
The FAA also enhances civil liberty protections for Americans. The
government cannot target an American overseas without first obtaining
an individualized court order from the FISA Court. Prior to FAA, the
government was not required to obtain an individualized court order to
target U.S. persons outside of the United States. This is an expansion
of the civil liberties made possible by the FISA Amendments Act.
As a former law enforcement officer, I know how important it is to
get the information that we need to work on a case. Without good,
reliable information, you can't do your job and protect the citizens,
but the information must be obtained in the right way.
{time} 1310
FAA is a critical tool at our international community's disposal in
our war against terrorism.
[[Page H5781]]
I encourage my colleagues to join me in supporting our national
security by voting for the FISA Amendments Act Reauthorization Act.
With that, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. POLIS. I thank the gentleman for yielding me the customary 30
minutes, and I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Madam Speaker, I rise in opposition to the rule and the underlying
bills--H.R. 5544, the Minnesota Education Investment and Employment
Act, and H.R. 5949, the FISA Amendments Act Reauthorization Act. There
are significant problems in both pieces of legislation. However, both
bills are, nevertheless, being brought forward under a restrictive
process, despite the efforts of my colleague, Mr. McGovern, to amend
the rule to allow for an open rule on amendments on both debates.
Unfortunately, that motion failed in the Rules Committee. Instead, this
rule is a restrictive process that limits debate and discussion that
can improve this legislation.
Let me briefly address the lands law before getting to the FISA bill,
which is of great concern to our civil liberties.
We have before us a bill that allows for the exchange of 86,000 acres
of Minnesota's school trust lands within the Boundary Waters Canoe Area
Wilderness for unidentified Forest Service lands. The wilderness is a
critical asset for northeastern Minnesota's tourism and recreation
industry, as well as the most popular wilderness area in our Nation's
wilderness system. But since the bill doesn't even give details about
what public land would be lost, we can't even say how bad a deal this
is for the American people. It is simply bad policy to push through a
controversial land swap bill without adequate public involvement and
participation.
I strike that in contrast to a bill that I recently introduced, H.R.
6370, the Conveyance of the Forest Service Lake Hill Administrative
Site. This bill does have accompanying maps that will be made available
to the committee so that people can see where the land in question is.
It is land that no longer fits the characteristics of forest land,
having been deforested near the highway, about 40 acres, and it should
not be a controversial bill.
In direct contrast to this bill, the bill I introduced today has
support from the counties, towns, and local environmental community,
and no local opposition to that bill. On the other hand, Mr. Cravaack's
bill doesn't even identify what Forest Service parcels would be sold by
the Federal Government and acquired by Minnesota. This kind of
ambiguity in a land exchange bill is unprecedented for a land exchange
bill and is not providing the adequate information to the Members of
this body to make an informed decision on the underlying bill.
Now, let me address FISA--I take issue with a number of elements of
FISA--which extends the sweeping electronic surveillance network
established under the FISA Amendments Act of 2008 for 5 years. I did
not support the bill when it came before the House Judiciary Committee
on which I serve, and I do not support this bill now.
Now, of course everybody in our country understands the serious
threat our Nation faces from terrorist organizations and foreign
nations, but we can't give up what makes it special for us to be
Americans in the name of defending our country. Our privacy rights
should not be eviscerated in the name of national security.
Many of these concerns are addressable, but unfortunately the bill
fails to strike an appropriate balance between protecting our liberties
and security. Some of its many shortcomings include giving the U.S.
Government the ability to intercept U.S. residents' international phone
calls and email communications without having to even name the people
or groups it's monitoring or show its targets who are suspected of
wrongdoing or terrorism. The target could even be a human rights
activist, a media organization, a country, a region, an ethnicity.
Nothing requires the government to identify its surveillance targets at
all, nor are there sufficient parameters around making sure that they
are narrowly tailored to our national security needs.
In addition, this bill unfortunately allows the U.S. to intercept
communications without having to identify the location, the phone
lines, the email addresses to be monitored. In essence, the government
can use this new law to collect all phone calls between the U.S. and
abroad simply by saying to the FISA court that it was targeting someone
abroad and that a purpose of the new surveillance program is to collect
foreign intelligence information.
The lack of judicial oversight is also startling. While the FISA
courts have a limited role, it's limited to overseeing the government
surveillance activities rather than reviewing individualized
surveillance applications, including whether they are sufficiently
broad or not.
Yesterday, the chair of our committee, Mr. Dreier, also mentioned
that Congress itself has an oversight role in making sure that the
broad powers given to the Federal Government under FISA are not abused.
However, this Congress--and myself, personally--have not had any
briefing with regard to the use of FISA.
Now, yesterday, representatives of the Intelligence Committee offered
to make those briefings available, but I think the proper order to go
about things, if Members of Congress are to make an informed decision
about whether these vast powers given to the Federal Government are
being used appropriately, would be to have the classified briefing
first before bringing a 5-year extension bill to the floor so that
Members of Congress, in a classified setting, have access to the
information that we need--the information that I need, the information
my colleagues need--to make an informed decision about whether the
proper controls are in place and the extent of the use and/or abuse of
the vast powers given under FISA.
In addition, there are no real limits on how the government uses,
keeps, or disseminates the information it collects. The law doesn't say
what government can keep and has to get rid of. Potentially, this could
lead to the archiving of material over decades. It fails to place real
limits on how and to whom information can be disseminated. Whether it's
our U.S. intelligence partners in other countries, whether it's
contractors to our own government, we need to have the right controls
around where private information is shared.
Finally, I want to address another element of the bill in my initial
remarks, and that is the indemnity that is given to companies that
violate their own terms of service and allow the government to trample
the privacy rights of thousands of Americans.
Effectively, telecom companies and others that provide the government
with enormous amounts of information are effectively completely
indemnified, so there is no way to hold any of these companies
accountable for their activities in violation of their own user
agreement signed by two parties, themselves and their customer. There
remains no way to enforce the violation of that user agreement because
there is complete indemnity for those organizations.
I think there needs to be a way, through the regular court system, to
hold companies accountable for their activities. Letting them off the
hook entirely only invites widespread abuse and disregard of their own
customer agreements. Why bother even having to post or have a privacy
policy if, at the whim of the company--not the government, the whim of
the company--it can be completely shared with the government in
disregard to their own privacy policy because that is the most
effective way for the company to receive a blanket indemnification to
any civil liability that might arise from violating privacy laws and/or
its own terms of use.
Again, national security is a critical imperative. We need to make
sure that our agencies charged with keeping us safe have the right
tools at their disposal to do so. But in the process of making sure
that Americans are safe, we need to make sure we don't give up what
makes it special to be an American.
I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. NUGENT. Madam Speaker, a number of issues that my good friend
from Colorado brought up cover both bills, actually. One, obviously, is
the Minnesota bill as relates to public education. That was passed by
the Minnesota State Legislature in a bipartisan way, and it was also
signed by the
[[Page H5782]]
Democratic Governor of Minnesota in regards to this particular issue on
this particular bill as it relates to Minnesota.
With that, I'm going to yield 7 minutes to the gentleman from
Minnesota (Mr. Cravaack).
Mr. CRAVAACK. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
Madam Speaker, I rise today in support of the rule and the underlying
bill, H.R. 5544, the Minnesota Education Investment and Employment Act.
This bill will support the teachers and schoolchildren in the State of
Minnesota, create well-paying jobs in northern Minnesota, and make the
Boundary Waters Canoe Area, for the first time in its existence, whole.
We have to have a bit of context here.
When Minnesota became a State in 1858, sections 16 and 36 of every
township in Minnesota were set aside in trust for the benefit of
schools. The State could use, lease, or sell the land to raise money
for education.
In the beginning, the State leaders decided to sell the more valuable
parcels of the school trust lands, but around the turn of the century
they realized they needed a more sustainable plan and began putting the
school trust lands to productive use for timber and mining. This has
been the goal of the State for over 100 years, and it has produced
dividends for generations for our school kids.
As DFL State Representative Denise Dittrich has so ably educated me
on, these lands are not so much owned by the State as held in trust by
the State and owned by the schoolchildren of Minnesota. It is the
responsibility of the school trust fund trustees to maximize the return
on these lands for the benefit of this fund. This is a critical point.
This is part of the Minnesota Constitution.
But in the 1970s, the Federal Government created the Boundary Waters
Canoe Area Wilderness. These lands within the Boundary Waters cannot be
logged, leased, or mined in order to preserve the unique wilderness
character of this pristine land. Thousands of visitors from around the
country come to enjoy this beautiful area. But as a result of its
creation, Minnesota and its students have been faced with an 86,000-
acre problem for over 30 years.
{time} 1320
Eighty-six thousand acres of State-owned school trust lands have been
locked within the borders of the Boundary Waters Canoe Area, unable to
produce critical funding for Minnesota public education. It is
imperative we resolve this longstanding problem. Our goal is to
preserve and protect the Boundary Waters and allow State-owned school
trust lands to raise revenue for Minnesota education.
Unfortunately, Minnesota school kids have been cheated out of public
education funding for over 34 years now. In the past, there have been a
number of working groups, studies, and resolutions. Finally, after
years of inaction, stalling and dilatory tactics by special interest
groups, Republicans and Democrats together in Minnesota said enough is
enough.
It's been referred to as Mr. Cravaack's bill. That is not, in fact,
the case. This is Minnesota's bill.
On March 22 of this year, an overwhelming majority of Democrats and
Republicans from the State senate passed senate file 1750 on a vote of
53-11. On April 3, the house followed suit, passing a bipartisan bill
90-41. On April 27, our Democratic Governor, Governor Mark Dayton,
signed the bill into law.
H.R. 5544 executes a bipartisan State plan that Governor Dayton
signed into law earlier this year. H.R. 5544 would exchange State-owned
school trust lands trapped in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness
to the Federal Government in exchange for Federal Government-owned land
outside the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness.
This bill includes important provisions that would ensure Minnesotans
can maintain their existing hunting and fishing rights within the
Boundary Waters. In addition, the bill exempts the land exchange
process from NEPA.
The land exchange itself would have no environmental impact on any
future development and would still be subject to strict State and
Federal regulations.
Intuitively, a land swap is merely a redrawing of maps and has no
environmental impact in and of itself. The mentioned activities, mining
and logging, do, in fact, have environmental impact and would be
subject to the full Federal and State review. Not one environmental
protection is lost in the execution of this bill.
I want to be very transparent here. One of the hopes of my
constituents is to have a bill to create good-paying jobs in the timber
and mining industries. The lands listed in S.F. 1750 are rich in
natural resources. Many of them lie in portions of the Superior
National Forest that are already being successfully mined for iron ore
and harvested for timber. It's a working and managed forest.
These activities employ thousands of workers and support tens of
thousands of other ancillary jobs in the region. Northern Minnesotans
want these and need these opportunities, and every American benefits
from the steel and lumber that goes into our cars and into our homes.
While I generally support the aims of NEPA, the State of Minnesota
has some of the strictest environmental standards in the country and a
track record of successful regulation of mining and logging.
On the other hand, obstructionist special interest groups have a
track record of abusing the NEPA process to sue and delay. I do not
want these groups to continue to delay this land exchange, preventing
Minnesota schools from receiving the funding that they need and, quite
frankly, they deserve.
The State of Minnesota cannot afford to be sued by environmental
groups for years. Some of those arguing for NEPA are, in fact, arguing
that defending lawsuits is an appropriate use of the taxpayer dollars
and that it's okay to transfer wealth from State coffers to special
interest groups. Interesting to note, many of these special groups
aren't even from Minnesota.
Make no mistake. This will be passed and a bipartisan land exchange
is going to get done. I will not allow special interest groups, acting
in bad faith, to abuse the NEPA process and use frivolous lawsuits to
block and derail a land exchange. If I could trust special interest
groups to act in good faith and if I could trust the Federal
bureaucracy to act promptly, I would include NEPA in this legislation.
The teachers and schoolkids in Minnesota can't wait years, if not
decades. Currently, some of the schools in Minnesota have classrooms
with over 40 kids, and some school districts, like mine in North
Branch, have been reduced to a 4-day school week. I ask, is that
progress?
This legislation will generate a lot of funding for our schools and
create good-paying jobs. Importantly, the Minnesota Education
Investment Employment Act will not eliminate a single acre of Boundary
Waters land. In fact, it would include wilderness acres to the existing
Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness boundaries while giving
Minnesota's children land that rightfully and constitutionally belongs
to them.
I urge my colleagues to support this rule and the underlying bill.
Mr. POLIS. Remarkably, the underlying bill produced by Mr. Cravaack
actually uncovered a permanent earmark that the CBO found provides $6
million a year to three Minnesota counties. I think that in a Congress
that is supposed to move past earmarks it's not a good precedent to
include that earmark in the transition.
I'd also like to clarify that Governor Dayton, while, of course,
asking for the land to be exchanged--and there doesn't seem to be
disagreement about that--did not ask for NEPA to be short-circuited,
nor do they ask to bypass the normal appraisal process.
With that, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr.
Scott), the ranking member of the Judiciary Committee Subcommittee on
Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security.
Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Madam Speaker, I oppose this rule because it
does not allow consideration of amendments to the FISA bill that would
strengthen the underlying bill by providing for greater accountability
to the public of an otherwise wholly secretive process.
Operations of the government must be held accountable to the people.
The problem with holding operations under
[[Page H5783]]
the existing FISA law is that most of the activities under it are
conducted in secrecy. The fact that I or other Members of Congress have
access to classified information regarding those secret activities is
not sufficient for public accountability.
Even if I were satisfied by my access to classified information, that
only reasonable and constitutionally justified actions are being taken
by officials in secret, I would still feel the need to give greater
assurances to the public other than simply, trust me, I'm satisfied, so
should you. Curiously, if I'm not satisfied, there's nothing I could
say because it's classified information.
The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act was passed in 1978 to curb
abuses in collection and use of intelligence information, foreign and
domestic. Under the original provisions of FISA, procedures for
collection of foreign intelligence required the government to show not
only that there was probable cause to believe that the target of the
intelligence surveillance is an agent of a foreign power, but also that
foreign intelligence-gathering is the primary purpose of the
collection.
Under the USA PATRIOT Act of 2002 and beyond, the government now only
needs to show the probable cause of the target is an agent of the
Federal government, and that the foreign intelligence-gathering is
merely a significant purpose of that collection. When foreign
intelligence collection is not the primary purpose for the collection
of information, we are left to wonder what the primary purpose of that
action might be.
The FISA Act of 2008 went a step further, authorizing the collection
of massive amounts of information about foreign persons reasonably
believed to be outside of the United States without a warrant. With
such massive amounts of information being collected, invariably
information involving U.S. persons in the United States whose
information may not be the target is also being collected.
The FAA of 2008 requires the executive branch to design targeting
procedures which limit the scope of the collection before the
government acts and minimization procedures which limit the use of
information before the government collects it, and the FISA court
reviews these procedures for legal sufficiency. However, with nearly
all of this oversight being conducted in secret, the public has no
choice but to take the government at its word.
We can do better. My amendment would simply require the executive
branch to provide at least some documentation that it uses this
authority narrowly, responsibly, and exclusively for foreign
intelligence-gathering purposes, while protecting the material that
would be classified. So we should reject this rule in favor of one that
allows amendments to strengthen public accountability over the
surveillance of Americans.
Mr. NUGENT. Madam Speaker, I certainly do appreciate the gentleman's
comments because, as a former law enforcement officer, I want to make
sure that we protect Americans. But I'm not so sure I want to protect
those in foreign countries that are not Americans, those in foreign
countries that would do harm to America, like they did on this day 11
years ago.
You know, FISA--our good friend mentioned about 2008, but prior to
2008, Americans could be entrapped within the FISA context.
{time} 1330
In 2008, that changed. What it said is that, if Americans become
involved in a FISA investigation in which their names come up, the
information comes up, it has to be minimized. Then they have to go to a
Federal judge and to the FISA court to get an authorization to do what
they need to do as it relates to a warrant in order to receive and
recover that information. That's what 2008 did. What the President has
asked is that we just continue to do what we did since 2008. The
protections that were put in place for American citizens that were not
there prior to 2008 are to be extended. That's the intent of the
reauthorization act of the FAA.
I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. POLIS. I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Madam Speaker, Congress will soon leave town again for a long
district work period. We believe it is essential that before we go home
we must extend tax cuts for the middle class. If we defeat the previous
question here today, we will amend the rule to say that Congress needs
to stay here to vote on the Middle Class Tax Cut Act and not go home
until we've made sure the middle class tax cut extension becomes law
and that tax rates do not increase for millions of American families.
To speak about the previous question, I yield 2 minutes to the
gentleman from Vermont (Mr. Welch).
Mr. WELCH. I thank the gentleman.
There is agreement in this Congress that we've got to create jobs in
this economy. There is 100 percent agreement that we should extend tax
cuts for 98 percent of the American people. If there is 100 percent
agreement among the 435 Members of Congress to provide a continuing
benefit to 98 percent of the people, why don't we do it? That's pretty
good. The election will allow each side to make its argument about the
tax cuts for the 2 percent. Incidentally, that 2 percent would be
included. They'd get their tax cuts on the first $250,000 of income. So
what we really have is 100 percent agreement that 100 percent of the
people will get a tax cut, and we have a disagreement about whether 2
percent of the people will have their tax cuts stopped at $250,000.
We know that extending those Clinton-era tax rates is very important
in order to maintain what is a fragile recovery. If we can step back
from our political posturing and acknowledge that, in fact, we do agree
that it is essential to the economy to extend those Clinton-era tax
rates, why not do it sooner rather than later? Number one, there is no
guarantee after the election that it will be easier to do then than it
will be now. It's a roll of the dice on both sides.
It would be one thing if the only thing at stake were our political
futures, our political careers. That's not a big deal. Yet what's at
stake is the American economy. It's about whether people have jobs,
whether they have security, whether they can depend on what they need
to raise their families. Some of those provisions are really important
to students--a tax credit if you have a kid in college. Some of those
are important as to whether you're going to be able to continue to
itemize your deductions if you're a middle class family. Some of those
are about the rates of tax that you pay.
We agree on all of this, but it is solely within the power of the
majority to decide whether to bring this bill to the floor for a vote.
We are asking that it be done on behalf of the American people.
Mr. NUGENT. I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Madam Speaker, we have heard a lot, particularly as it relates to
FISA. I want to clarify and make sure everyone understands that the FAA
authorizes the targeting of non-U.S. citizens who are overseas. They
are not citizens of the United States. Thus, they don't have the
protections under the United States Constitution--nor should they.
If an American becomes a target during the investigation, just as in
a criminal investigation when I was sheriff and someone became a target
during a wiretap, we then have to identify that person. If we want to
go after him, if we want to eavesdrop on his conversations, we have to
get a separate order to allow us to do that. Back in 1978, when this
was first put in place--guess what?--if an American were picked up in
one of these wiretap operations, there was no requirement to go back
and get a separate authorization to go after that American citizen. But
2008 changed that. 2008 put in a particular protection for American
citizens who may get caught up in a FISA investigation in regards to
the collection of data or voice transmissions. That's the difference.
So, when people start talking about it as it relates to civil
liberties, if you live in a foreign country, you don't have civil
liberties with us if you're plotting against the United States. That's
the whole identification reference to this: that it's a foreign country
and a non-U.S. citizen.
With that, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. POLIS. I would like to inquire of the gentleman from Florida how
many speakers he has remaining.
Mr. NUGENT. I have none.
Mr. POLIS. Then I am prepared to close, and I yield myself the
balance of my time.
[[Page H5784]]
Madam Speaker, at a time when millions of Americans continue to
struggle to find work, our Federal deficit continues to mount. Here we
are in Congress after a 5-week recess--doing what?--considering, one, a
faulty land swap deal that is a bad deal for the general public, that
contains a hidden earmark and is controversial among local communities
in Minnesota, and, two, a major reauthorization bill under a closed
process that significantly curtails our liberties as Americans without
there being any opportunities for Members of either party to offer
suggestions about how to reconcile liberty with security.
Look, Congress' ``to do'' list remains long, and it's steadily
growing. The American public is upset that Congress isn't tackling the
deficit or the debt. Congress isn't tackling jobs, infrastructure,
moving forward and investing in our future economic growth. Among
Congress' unfinished business is a tax increase that will hit the
middle class unless Congress acts.
If we defeat the previous question, we will make sure that Congress
does not go home before making sure that middle class taxes do not go
up. In fact, according to the House Clerk's Office, only 61 bills have
become law in 2012. That's the fewest number of bills in 60 years. We
only have 7 days that this House of Representatives is working here in
Washington in September, yet this Congress continues to refuse to make
the hard choices needed to get our economy moving.
It's time to roll up our sleeves and get to work in making sure that
we have the ability to protect Americans from threats. Let's do so in
an open way that encourages ideas from both sides and that has a
classified briefing at which Members of Congress can receive the
information we need to suggest how or if FISA needs to be changed
before it's authorized for a carte blanche 5 additional years.
It is important to reject both of these underlying rules and these
underlying bills. It is time to focus on job creation, deficit
reduction, and tax reform, not on trying to rush to the floor an
earmark land swap with no map for Minnesota, for what can only be taken
to be purely political reasons, as well as there being under a closed
process a bill about which many of us have grave concerns and that
undermines our right to privacy as Americans.
I urge a ``no'' vote on the rule and the two flawed underlying bills,
and I ask unanimous consent to insert into the Record the text of my
amendment to the rule, along with extraneous material, immediately
prior to the vote on the previous question.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentleman from Colorado?
There was no objection.
Mr. POLIS. Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to cast a thoughtful
vote and to vote ``no'' on the rule and the bills and to defeat the
previous question.
I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. NUGENT. I yield myself the balance of my time.
Madam Speaker, I've heard my good friend from Colorado. Maybe he
wasn't serving on the Judiciary Committee this summer, but prior to
this being vetted within the Judiciary Committee, all the members there
were offered a classified briefing as it relates to FISA. Every member
had the opportunity to attend that. As I said, I'm not sure if Mr.
Polis was a member of that Judiciary Committee at the time it was
offered to all. As a matter of fact, yesterday, at the Rules Committee,
the ranking Democratic member of the Intelligence Committee, Mr.
Ruppersberger, pointed out to the Rules Committee that, at any time,
any Member of this House can request a classified briefing--any Member.
{time} 1340
He wanted to make sure that this didn't become a political football.
He admonished all of us not to make this a political statement, but to
do what's right for this country.
I hear time and time again from my good friend as this relates to
civil liberties of Americans. If you look back to 2008, that was
rectified. Prior to that I would tell you that the civil liberties of
Americans were in jeopardy, but in 2008, that was corrected, and it's
continued on in this reauthorization of 2012.
Once again, the FISA court is comprised of U.S. District Federal
judges, and they also have a right to appeal to a court of review made
up of Federal judges. The information, as Mr. Ruppersberger said, is if
you want a briefing requested, if you want additional information in a
classified setting requested, every Member has that opportunity. As a
matter of fact, in the Intelligence Committee, there wasn't one
opposing vote. Democrats and Republicans alike came together and said
this is what's important to keep America safe. They don't want to have
another 9/11 on their watch. At the same time, we want to protect all
Americans.
When people start throwing this around and saying this is an assault
on American civil liberties, that's just not right, it's not correct,
and it's wrong because this bill does everything to protect Americans
from intrusion into their private lives. It forces the Federal
Government to go back to court if it uncovers through these
surveillance techniques activities by an American citizen who's doing
something wrong as it relates to terrorism against this country. It
gives them a process to do it because, prior to 2008, they could do it
without abandon. They could wind up collecting any information on U.S.
citizens. In 2008, that changed and rightfully so. There should be
constraints on the Federal Government.
I heard also there's no checks and balances. That's just not true.
Every 60 days there's a report done in reference to FISA in regards to
the intercepts. Twice a year, there's an automatic report that has to
be generated that goes to Congress. And at any time, the Judiciary
Committee and the Intelligence Committee can hold hearings--and they
do--as it relates to classified information, as it relates to FISA.
That's oversight. That's what we're supposed to do.
And the reason they say this is secret--well, guess what, it's not
secret, but it's kept under wraps because of this: if we tell our
techniques to our enemies, then guess what? They'll figure out a way to
circumvent so they can get the information, pass the information, and
conspire against this country. That's the reason in law enforcement we
don't give up our techniques because the bad guys will figure it out.
They're pretty smart folks. They have time on their hands. What we
don't want to do is give them time on their hands to assault the United
States of America, kill our citizens, kill and injure those first
responders, and then put our military at risk.
This is directed to those that live outside of this country, those
that are not American citizens. Let me make this perfectly clear.
Besides all the rhetoric of those who would love to inflame different
people as it relates to this, this has nothing do with American
citizens, except if they do get caught up in a conversation with
someone who is a foreign national that it does have to go back to court
to get that specific authorization to record or transmit that
information as it relates to them.
Madam Speaker, I encourage my colleagues on both sides of the aisle
to support this rule and bring these two very important pieces of
legislation to the House floor for a vote. If there's one duty that is
inherently part of our Federal Government's core mission, it's to
provide for our national security. None is more important than making
sure that this Republic survives.
The FISA Amendments Act Reauthorization is a key tool in keeping our
Nation safe. We heard it from both sides of the aisle who testified in
front of the Rules Committee yesterday. As we continue to fight
terrorists around the world who want nothing more than to harm our
Nation, the FAA gives our intelligence community the tools they need to
track these enemies overseas. That's the important word, ``overseas.''
We can't give up that fight, which is why we need to keep using the
information we have access to. The FISA Amendments Act Reauthorization
balances this need for security with civil liberty protections for
Americans living abroad. It keeps us safe at home while protecting
Americans living around the world.
I encourage my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to continue the
bipartisan tradition of supporting the FAA and to vote for this bill.
The material previously referred to by Mr. Polis is as follows:
[[Page H5785]]
An Amendment to H. Res. 773 Offered by Mr. Polis of Colorado
At the end of the resolution, add the following new
sections:
Sec. 3. Upon completion of consideration of House
Resolution 746 the Speaker shall, pursuant to clause 2(b) of
rule XVIII, declare the House resolved into the Committee of
the Whole House on the state of the Union for consideration
of the bill (H.R. 15) to amend the Internal Revenue Code of
1986 to provide tax relief to middle-class families. All
points of order against consideration of the bill are waived.
General debate shall be confined to the bill and shall not
exceed one hour equally divided and controlled by the chair
and ranking minority member of the Committee on Ways and
Means. After general debate the bill shall be considered for
amendment under the five-minute rule. All points of order
against provisions in the bill are waived. At the conclusion
of consideration of the bill for amendment the Committee
shall rise and report the bill to the House with such
amendments as may have been adopted. The previous question
shall be considered as ordered on the bill and amendments
thereto to final passage without intervening motion except
one motion to recommit with or without instructions. If the
Committee of the Whole rises and reports that it has come to
no resolution on the bill, then on the next legislative day
the House shall, immediately after the third daily order of
business under clause 1 of rule XIV, resolve into the
Committee of the Whole for further consideration of the bill.
Sec. 4. Clause 1(c) of rule XIX shall not apply to the
consideration of the bill specified in section 3 of this
resolution.
Sec. 5. Immediately upon adoption of this resolution, the
House shall proceed to the consideration in the House of the
resolution (H. Res. 746) prohibiting the consideration of a
concurrent resolution providing for adjournment or
adjournment sine die unless a law is enacted to provide for
the extension of certain expired or expiring tax provisions
that apply to middle-income taxpayers if called up by
Representative Slaughter of New York or her designee. All
points of order against the resolution and against its
consideration are waived.
(The information contained herein was provided by the
Republican Minority on multiple occasions throughout the
110th and 111th Congresses.)
The Vote on the Previous Question: What It Really Means
This vote, the vote on whether to order the previous
question on a special rule, is not merely a procedural vote.
A vote against ordering the previous question is a vote
against the Republican majority agenda and a vote to allow
the opposition, at least for the moment, to offer an
alternative plan. It is a vote about what the House should be
debating.
Mr. Clarence Cannon's Precedents of the House of
Representatives (VI, 308-311), describes the vote on the
previous question on the rule as ``a motion to direct or
control the consideration of the subject before the House
being made by the Member in charge.'' To defeat the previous
question is to give the opposition a chance to decide the
subject before the House. Cannon cites the Speaker's ruling
of January 13, 1920, to the effect that ``the refusal of the
House to sustain the demand for the previous question passes
the control of the resolution to the opposition'' in order to
offer an amendment. On March 15, 1909, a member of the
majority party offered a rule resolution. The House defeated
the previous question and a member of the opposition rose to
a parliamentary inquiry, asking who was entitled to
recognition. Speaker Joseph G. Cannon (R-Illinois) said:
``The previous question having been refused, the gentleman
from New York, Mr. Fitzgerald, who had asked the gentleman to
yield to him for an amendment, is entitled to the first
recognition.''
Because the vote today may look bad for the Republican
majority they will say ``the vote on the previous question is
simply a vote on whether to proceed to an immediate vote on
adopting the resolution . . . [and] has no substantive
legislative or policy implications whatsoever.'' But that is
not what they have always said. Listen to the Republican
Leadership Manual on the Legislative Process in the United
States House of Representatives, (6th edition, page 135).
Here's how the Republicans describe the previous question
vote in their own manual: ``Although it is generally not
possible to amend the rule because the majority Member
controlling the time will not yield for the purpose of
offering an amendment, the same result may be achieved by
voting down the previous question on the rule . . . When the
motion for the previous question is defeated, control of the
time passes to the Member who led the opposition to ordering
the previous question. That Member, because he then controls
the time, may offer an amendment to the rule, or yield for
the purpose of amendment.''
In Deschler's Procedure in the U.S. House of
Representatives, the subchapter titled ``Amending Special
Rules'' states: ``a refusal to order the previous question on
such a rule [a special rule reported from the Committee on
Rules] opens the resolution to amendment and further
debate.'' (Chapter 21, section 21.2) Section 21.3 continues:
``Upon rejection of the motion for the previous question on a
resolution reported from the Committee on Rules, control
shifts to the Member leading the opposition to the previous
question, who may offer a proper amendment or motion and who
controls the time for debate thereon.''
Clearly, the vote on the previous question on a rule does
have substantive policy implications. It is one of the only
available tools for those who oppose the Republican
majority's agenda and allows those with alternative views the
opportunity to offer an alternative plan.
Mr. NUGENT. With that, I yield back the balance of my time, and I
move the previous question on the resolution.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on ordering the previous
question.
The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that
the ayes appeared to have it.
Mr. POLIS. 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, further
proceedings on this question will be postponed.
____________________