[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 120 (Tuesday, July 29, 2014)]
[House]
[Pages H7007-H7024]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
21ST CENTURY ENDANGERED SPECIES TRANSPARENCY ACT
General Leave
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. 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, H.R. 4315.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentleman from Washington?
There was no objection.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to House Resolution 693 and rule
XVIII, the Chair declares the House in the Committee of the Whole House
on the state of the Union for the consideration of the bill, H.R. 4315.
The Chair appoints the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Rodney Davis) to
preside over the Committee of the Whole.
{time} 1457
In the Committee of the Whole
Accordingly, the House resolved itself into the Committee of the
Whole House on the state of the Union for the consideration of the bill
(H.R. 4315) to amend the Endangered Species Act of 1973 to require
publication on the Internet of the basis for determinations that
species are endangered species or threatened species, and for other
purposes, with Mr. Rodney Davis of Illinois in the chair.
The Clerk read the title of the bill.
The CHAIR. Pursuant to the rule, the bill is considered read the
first time.
The gentleman from Washington (Mr. Hastings) and the gentleman from
Oregon (Mr. DeFazio) each will control 30 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Washington.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as
I may consume.
Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to bring before the House legislation that
would help update and improve the Endangered Species Act, a law that
was passed initially 40 years ago, but has not been reauthorized since
1988.
H.R. 4315 melds together four commonsense and focused bills
introduced earlier this year by myself and my colleagues, Mrs. Lummis
of Wyoming, Mr. Neugebauer of Texas, and Mr. Huizenga of Michigan.
While respecting the original intent of the ESA to conserve species,
this bill would help make the law more effective for both species and
people.
{time} 1500
Because of the more than 500 ESA-related lawsuits that have been
filed against the government during this administration alone, it has
become clear that costly litigation is not only driving ESA priorities
but that litigation has become an impediment to species recovery.
I should also note that, regardless of what some groups are saying,
this is not a comprehensive bill. It is four sections that aim to
increase transparency; to enlist greater consultation by States,
localities, and tribes; and to reduce taxpayer-financed attorneys' fees
to help invest more funding in actual species recovery.
For example, section 2 of the bill requires data used by Federal
agencies that decide which species should be added to the threatened or
endangered list to be publicly available and accessible through the
Internet. What a remarkable idea--transparency. The last significant
update to the ESA was when the Internet was in its infancy stages.
Posting data supporting key ESA decisions online will greatly enhance
transparency and data quality. The American people should be able to
access such data before Federal listing or delisting decisions are
final.
It is troubling that hundreds of sweeping listing decisions by the
Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service
cite unpublished studies, professional opinions, and other sources that
are inaccessible to the public, yet this data would be used to regulate
the very people who don't have access to this information. This secrecy
goes against the grain of good science and transparency. Data
transparency is not only good for the American public, in that it makes
our government more accountable, but it is also good for species
because it allows for an open conversation about improving species
science.
As biologist Rob Roy Ramey testified at a Natural Resources Committee
hearing:
When the data are not publicly accessible, legitimate
scientific inquiry and debate is effectively eliminated, and
no independent third party can produce the results. This
action puts the basis of some ESA decisions outside the realm
of science, and species recovery is no better off.
Withholding data does not further the goal of species
recovery.
I couldn't agree more with that statement, especially when over 700
species could potentially be listed over
[[Page H7008]]
the next few years throughout the country. These potential listings are
due to this administration's megalawsuit settlement with the Center for
Biological Diversity and WildEarth Guardians, groups, I might add, Mr.
Chairman, that have filed hundreds of lawsuits against the government
at taxpayer expense.
One of these species could include the northern long-eared bat, and I
have a map here to show. This listing could impact 39 States. As you
can see, Mr. Chairman, it is nearly all of the Eastern States.
Information on data when it comes to this species listing can only help
and not hurt. The bill before us today fosters the release of this
information.
Section 3 of the bill would enhance State, local, and tribal
involvement in ESA decisions by requiring that, before any listing
decision is made, the Federal Government must disclose its data to
States affected by such actions. In addition, section 3 ensures that
data from local, State, and tribal entities--those are the entities
that are closest to the ground, Mr. Chairman--be factored into ESA
listing decisions.
Section 4 would require the administration to track and make
available online the costs, in time and in resources, to the taxpayers
as a result of ESA-related litigation.
Finally, section 5 would seek to reduce taxpayer-financed attorneys'
fees to help ensure Federal resources are focused more on species
protection and recovery than on lucrative legal fees for serial
litigants. Such fees now, Mr. Chairman, are awarded as high as $600 an
hour. This provision in section 5 puts in place the same reasonable
hourly caps on attorneys' fees used in another Federal law--the Equal
Access to Justice Act--which deals with veterans, Social Security
disability, and other such claims.
Mr. Chairman, H.R. 4315 starts with modest, sensible updates to the
ESA by promoting transparency, greater State, local, and tribal
involvement, and by bringing ESA litigation fees in line with another
Federal law.
With that, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
I rise today just before Congress goes on a 5-week recess for the
entire month of August and the first week of September. During that
time, we will celebrate Labor Day. There are a lot of reasons to
celebrate Labor Day, but it has particular context to this debate
today.
One hundred years ago this Labor Day, Martha died.
Now, perhaps not everybody here knows about or has heard about
Martha. Martha was the last passenger pigeon. She died in the
Cincinnati Zoo. None of us remember passenger pigeons, but they were in
numbers so great--billions--that they would darken the sky for hours or
days as they passed. Yet, within a very short period of time, they
became extinct. I believe she is stuffed and on display at the
Smithsonian. I think they have a special exhibit on this that I would
recommend to people to remember the way things used to be.
We did then, 50 years later, pass the Endangered Species Act. So this
is kind of symmetrical in that, 100 years ago, there was the last
passenger pigeon, and 50 years later, we adopted a law to try and
preserve species. I think the most eloquent words I have ever heard on
endangered species were from Justice Douglas on the Mineral King
decision. This doesn't do all of his decision justice, but here is just
one sentence:
When a species is gone, it is gone forever. Nature's
genetic chain--billions of years in the making--is broken for
all time. Conserve water. Conserve land. Conserve life.
Then he went on to speculate about what might be lost with any
individual species, what potential it might have had. Could it cure
cancer? If we lose these species, who knows?
So Congress 50 years ago--in a very different time and in a very
bipartisan way--passed the Endangered Species Act.
Today, we have before us yet another missed opportunity. I am not
going to look at the Endangered Species Act and say it is perfect. It
isn't. I believe a 50-year-old law could use some revision. A lot has
been learned. A lot of real science has changed in the interim, in
particular, the individual listing of species, and particularly when
they occupy the same space. It becomes very problematic, as opposed to
taking more of an ecosystem-based approach. There are some who are
modifying the whole idea of how we deal with critical habitat, but that
is not before us today. It wasn't considered by the so-called ``working
group'' of the committee or ``special group'' or whatever it was.
They concluded that the Endangered Species Act is a failure because
it hasn't recovered enough species. They did leave out a little fact
that 90 percent of the species that are listed are recovering at the
rate specified in their Federal recovery plans. This doesn't happen
instantaneously. There are years of degradation of environment, years
of overharvesting or of overhunting. Those things don't get changed in
a short period of time, but 90 percent are on target. They left that
out probably because it didn't support their conclusion that the act
just isn't working at all.
We have an estimate, actually, that without the Endangered Species
Act passed by a more enlightened Congress--bipartisan--50 years ago,
there would be 227 species that would have gone extinct since the law's
passage. They include gray wolves--although, there are some trying to
turn around that recovery effort, including some in this
administration--green sea turtles, humpback whales, and, of course, the
iconic bald eagle. Without the Endangered Species Act, they, in all
probability, would all be extinct, a memory for our generation--gone.
As I said, it is not perfect, and I think there are changes we could
make. It is truly a deliberative process in the committee, but that
wouldn't be just a small group from one side of the aisle going around
the country, holding so-called ``hearings'' or ``listening sessions.''
We could assure greater transparency in ways that weren't considered
and won't be proposed here today. We could promote better the use of
best science. We could improve cooperation and coordination with the
States that are committed to species protection and recovery.
However, none of the legislation before us will do that. It will do
nothing to improve species recovery. It will do nothing to improve the
science underlying listing decisions. Instead, actually, contravening
what the Republicans espouse to wish, these bills will, instead,
increase the amount of red tape that is involved, create more reporting
requirements, divert agency resources from recovery efforts, and most
oddly--and, I think, perhaps, it is the oddest and most objectionable
and nonsensical part of this legislation--it will deem that any data
submitted by any Native American tribe, any city, county, or State,
will be deemed to be the best available science.
Now, there are 16,000 counties in America. Let's say a couple of them
come to a different conclusion. Suddenly, the agency is confronted
with: we have the best available science from this county, and we have
the best available science from this county, and we have the best
available science from this county. Hmm. Wow. Haven't we created an
unbelievable potential for litigation over any decisions that are made
given that mandate? I think we have. Of course, that may be why they go
on later in the bill to limit attorneys' fees--because they are
anticipating that there will be a huge proliferation of litigation, and
they want to mitigate the costs of the problem that they are going to
create with this nonsensical ``this is the best available science.'' I
think it is going to create a lot of tension, potentially, between
States and counties--rural counties and urban counties--because they
are all vying to submit the best available science.
Here we are, yet again, taking up time on the floor, and I guess we
need to do that before we get to real things, like the suing of the
President of the United States despite the fact that courts have
definitively decided we can't do that. We have political tools, and it
is a controversy, but that is not before us today--that is tomorrow--so
we are trying to kill time to build up to that end just before we go
off on recess. But I am going to raise another topic, and it is a bit
sensitive.
About 12 years ago, I had massive fires burning in my district--the
Biscuit Fire--and the committee just happened to be holding a hearing
on
[[Page H7009]]
wildfires. It devolved into the usual partisan ``you go to your corner,
and I will go to mine. We need to do a forest supplemental. We need to
do this.'' As sometimes I do, I expostulated a bit in the committee,
and I went and used my entire 5 minutes to say how wrong I thought this
was and that I thought fires were very bipartisan in their destruction
and that we should cut it out.
A few Members--oddly enough, from very different perspectives--came
to me afterwards. That would have been George Miller. It is predictable
that George would side with me, but also we had Scott McInnis, we had
John Shadegg, and, ultimately, we had Greg Walden involved. We sat
down, and we hammered out something that, ultimately, didn't pass
through the House, but our framework was adopted by the Senate--HFRA.
Then it came back to the House and was adopted. It was an attempt to
expedite fuel reduction and prevent the intensity of future fires.
I look at that as a model of how we should deal with fires. We do
need to do more fuel reduction work, and we do need to do more
preparation and pre-positioning, but we also have to fight the fires
that are burning today.
{time} 1515
Now there is the rarest of rare things in Washington, D.C., even
rarer than the rarest endangered species, which would be a bill which
is bipartisan. I guess a lot of people don't know what that means
anymore.
It means it is supported by both Democrats and Republicans,
bicameral, by both Democrats and Republicans in the House and in the
Senate in substantial numbers, and is supported by the President of the
United States.
Now, that is a pretty endangered thing. It has been around for quite
a number of months. We have yet in the House. And it is a bill that is
designed both to mitigate for future fires and to more efficiently
fight fires.
The agencies that are tasked with fighting fires are about to run out
of money. It happens every year. Who cares if they run out of money?
Well, they have got to keep fighting the fires.
All right. Well, what do they do? They gut all their other programs--
including the fuel reduction program, the forest health program, the
timber program, the recreation program--things that are going to bring
about more intense and more fires in the future and impact anybody who
has a national forest or interior lands in their State or their area.
Now, this bill has yet to have a single hearing or any consideration,
except for a mention in the Ryan budget which said he didn't support
it. That is it. That is the total action by the House of
Representatives on this issue. That is very sad. That is what we should
be here on the floor today considering.
There are, as of this moment--I just checked it out because it is
worse every day. We have, currently, nationally, 25 major fires: seven
in Oregon--these are all uncontained or partially uncontained--six in
California; four in Washington, including the largest in the State's
history; three in Utah; two in Idaho; one in Colorado; and phenomenal
lightning storms are predicted over the next 2 days, which means many,
many, many more fires. Yet Congress is going to pass, I expect the
House will pass, this ESA, so-called ESA bill today and leave town
without dealing with the firefighting issue. I think it is very sad.
Now, some say, well, we have already done our job. We passed a bill,
a couple of bills, a number of bills that could deal with forest
health, future mitigation, fuel reduction. That is true. But even if
they became law today, they wouldn't deal with today's problem that the
agencies are going to run out of fire. And even if they became law
today, it would take many years to get there.
I have got some pretty good estimates. We have somewhere around 75
million acres of land at high risk of wildfire in the West. And if we
use the most conservative possible estimate, one that estimates there
is a lot of commercial value there that reduces thinning cost, one that
assumes that there is a lot of biomass available that is economic, you
could get it down to, say, $300, $500 an acre. Well, that would be $20
billion to go out and do that work. We are about to spend the paltry
budget for this year, $300 million for fuel reduction on fighting
current fires. So we aren't exactly getting there.
It is a real issue, and that is what we should be dealing with here
today.
Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I am very pleased to yield
3 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Neugebauer), who is the
author of one of the provisions within this bill.
Mr. NEUGEBAUER. Mr. Chairman, I rise today in strong support of H.R.
4315, the 21st Century Endangered Species Transparency Act.
I also want to thank Chairman Hastings for all of the work that he
has done on this issue, and I also want to thank him for inviting me to
be a part of the ESA Working Group and for including my bill, H.R.
4317, the State, Tribal, and Local Species Transparency and Recovery
Act, in the final version of this bill.
In the 19th District, we have been facing a lot of these issues with
the Endangered Species Act. We had the lesser prairie chicken. We had
the Dunes Sage Lizard and some of the areas dealing with minnows. But
one of the things that this bill does in the part of the bill that I
introduced is something that is very simple and straightforward and
very commonsense, and that is to say we need to make sure, before we
make some of these decisions, that we have the facts.
Now, that is kind of a novel idea. When we have a lawsuit, everybody
gets to present the facts. And so what we are saying, and when we begin
to go down the road of listing, causing millions of dollars' worth of
expense and, in some cases, encumbering millions of acres of private
property, we need to deal with the facts.
Now, why are we bringing this bill up? Well, it has been pointed out
that this bill is like over 40 years old and over 1,500 species have
been listed, and only 2 percent of those have been recovered.
Now, imagine going to a doctor and you say: Doctor, what is your
outcome ratio? He says: 2 percent of the time I have good outcomes. Or
imagine buying a product where you say this product works 2 percent of
the time. So, basically, the ESA, Endangered Species Act, does need
reform, and my bill, this bill, begins to do that.
What does it do? It just says that when the Federal Government has
collected data and they are making the decision, they have to make all
of the findings, all of the data that they used to reach that decision
available to the States and local governments and to the stakeholders.
That seems fair to me.
The other thing it says is that the local stakeholders and the local
State governments and the local county governments have the right to
present their facts.
Now, one of the things that is important about that is that, I know a
lot more about Lubbock, Texas, than maybe somebody that lives in the
State of Oregon or the State of New Jersey. So that local knowledge of
the habitat, the conditions is an important part of the data.
So when you are dealing with the facts, then I think we are going to
have better outcomes. And if that is the goal of the Endangered Species
Act, then why are we trying to suppress the facts? I don't get it. So
that is the reason that this is an important part of that.
I notice that the gentleman mentioned that he thinks that this bill
somehow dictates what is the best science. Not true. What it says,
though, is that all of the data that they collect they have to present
to the other stakeholders. What it also says is that the data that the
stakeholders and the county and local and State governments present,
they have to consider that data.
The CHAIR. The time of the gentleman has expired.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. I yield the gentleman an additional 15
seconds.
Mr. NEUGEBAUER. Now, if somebody has got a study about what they
think the conditions in Lubbock, Texas, are, we think the people on the
ground in Lubbock, Texas, or in west Texas probably have better
information and ought to be a part of that consideration.
I encourage my colleagues to support H.R. 4315.
[[Page H7010]]
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 1 minute.
The gentleman made a point with which I would agree, which is they
should consider and give due weight to local submissions and people in
the area. But unfortunately, and perhaps the gentleman is unaware, this
bill elevates that, and it does say all science submitted by States,
tribes, and local governments is, by definition, the best scientific
and commercial data. Then, if you refer back to the law, under basis
for determinations on endangered species and a number of other things,
the Secretary shall rely on the best scientific and commercial data.
Well, now, suddenly everybody who is submitting something has the
best commercial and scientific data, and the Secretary is somehow
supposed to sort out between 10 different counties, five States, 14
cities, and 18 Indian tribes who all have different disagreeing best
available commercial data and science. You are creating a standard
which, given the existing law which you didn't change, is going to be
impossible to meet.
Mr. Chairman, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr.
Moran).
Mr. MORAN. Mr. Chairman, first of all, I want to associate myself
with my good friend from Oregon. I agree completely with everything he
said, and I am going to agree with our subsequent speaker, Mr. Miller,
who played an essential role in getting the original Endangered Species
Act passed. It has been wildly successful, Mr. Chairman, preventing
species extinction.
More than 99 percent of listed species still exist today. Species
recovered under the Endangered Species Act are also off the charts. The
latest analysis found that 90 percent of listed species are recovering
at the rate specified by their Federal recovery plan.
Successful species delistings are also increasing--delistings. Five
years ago this month, the Fish and Wildlife Service finalized its rule
to remove the bald eagle from the endangered species list. What a
success story.
But for those who want to open up even more of our public lands to
resource extraction, the law is a major inconvenience. So a working
group, comprised entirely of Republican Members of the House of
Representatives, was established by the House leadership to come up
with legislative proposals to weaken the act. Today's bill is drawn
directly from those recommendations.
It would deem whatever data that States, local governments, and
Indian tribes submit to the Federal Government as the best available
science.
It would undermine the ability of public citizens to contribute to
the efficacy of the act, and it would compel the Fish and Wildlife
Service to put online all data, regardless of merit, regardless of
whether it contains proprietary or private information, and
notwithstanding the fact that to do so will provide poachers and
criminals with a road map to further endanger endangered species.
Mr. Chairman, the net effect of this bill before us today would be to
force the Service, the Fish and Wildlife Service, to squander its
limited conservation resources on meritless requirements to become tied
up in legal challenges and to diminish its ability to protect
endangered species.
I guess if this body can outlaw Federal agencies from using
scientific findings related to climate change in their decisionmaking
process, then it is no stretch of the imagination for this body to
define what constitutes best available scientific and commercial data.
This bill states that data submitted by a State, tribal, or county
government is automatically deemed as the best available scientific and
commercial data. The quality of the data is immaterial. What matters is
who is sending it.
Let me say that again a different way. The quality of the information
that State, tribal, and local governments submit is irrelevant under
this bill. The bill says it shall be deemed the best available
scientific and commercial data. The Fish and Wildlife Service would be
required to include this data, even if it is not the best, even if it
were not developed by scientists, even if it were developed for purely
commercial purposes, and even if it is contrary to fact. The Service
would be forced to include it and it will, thus, alter its decisions on
listings, recovery plans, and other policies related to the
conservation of endangered species.
It is also unclear how the Service would resolve a situation where
States, tribal, or county governments submit conflicting data.
This is no hypothetical situation. During hearings on the Endangered
Species Act, one of the witnesses, a Mr. Tom Jankovsky, Commissioner of
Garfield County, Colorado, was very critical of State officials for the
information they were providing the Bureau of Land Management on sage
grouse habitat.
The CHAIR. The time of the gentleman has expired.
Mr. DeFAZIO. I yield the gentleman an additional minute.
Mr. MORAN. Commissioner Jankovsky found the State maps inaccurate,
overstating the area of sage grouse habitat. The map he commissioned
for Garfield County showed 70 percent less habitat for sage grouse.
Whose map should the Federal Government accept as the best available
science, the Colorado State map or Garfield County's? This bill gives
equal weight to both.
Mr. Chairman, this is a bad bill, and no amendment can make it a good
bill. It should be rejected.
Rather than addressing some of the compelling challenges that this
Nation is confronting, we are wasting time on a bill that may pass the
House but will go nowhere in the Senate and certainly will not become
law. I urge its defeat.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I am very pleased to yield
2 minutes to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Huizenga), an author of
another provision of this bill.
Mr. HUIZENGA of Michigan. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of H.R.
4315, and I appreciate my colleague from urban northern Virginia for
his insight on the Endangered Species Act. But those of us from more
rural areas actually understand that the challenges that are presented
in this law as it currently stands beg for reform.
This bill contains important reforms to the act, and it has been
authored by Chairman Hastings, Congresswoman Lummis, Congressman
Neugebauer, and myself. Within that is a provision that I had authored,
which is commonsense legislation that makes the Endangered Species Act
consistent with current law.
{time} 1545
It reforms the ESA litigation process while enhancing wildlife
preservation, improving government efficiency, and protecting taxpayer
dollars. And I know that is something that my colleagues on the other
side have expressed, they are concerned with wasting precious dollars
that have been appropriated to the EPA.
Well, for too long, litigating attorneys have taken advantage of the
Endangered Species Act, raking in millions of taxpayer-funded money. In
many ESA cases, lawyers' fees climb as high as $300, $400, or even $500
an hour, with hardworking American taxpayers left to foot the bill.
In fact, I have a 2013 quote here from David Hayes, the Deputy
Secretary of the Interior, who was so concerned about this waste of
resources, that he said this: ``My major concern is timing, resources
needs, the fact this has been fish-in-the-barrel litigation for folks
who, because there is a deadline and we miss these deadlines and so,
we've been spending a huge amount of, in my mind, relatively
unproductive time fending off lawsuits in this arena.''
And I couldn't have said it better.
But even worse, these rates can be awarded in cases where the Federal
Government has settled with these groups that may not have even
prevailed in the court system. This does absolutely nothing to benefit
the species or the people and is not productive. My section of the bill
seeks to remedy this unconscionable problem.
Currently, the Equal Access to Justice Act limits the hourly rate for
prevailing attorney fees to $125 per hour for veterans, small
businesses, and the Federal benefit recipients. So it is time that we
apply the same cap to the ESA citizen suits as well.
So in times of tight fiscal budgets and escalating national debt,
taxpayer dollars should be prioritized for the protection and recovery
of species, not
[[Page H7011]]
lining the pockets of highly priced lawyers.
With that, Mr. Chair, I urge my colleagues to vote in favor of H.R.
4315 and for the commonsense updates that are so desperately needed.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chair, I yield myself 1 minute.
Well, tomorrow I fully expect the Republicans to prevail on the floor
of the House to authorize litigation against the President of the
United States for nonjusticiable controversy, all per all the previous
precedents of the court.
I would note they spent $525 an hour on attorneys to defend the
indefensible Defense of Marriage Act, which was ultimately found
unconstitutional. And I expect they will spend well over $500 an hour
for a nonjusticiable political stunt suing the President.
But beyond that, during this Congress, the requests, subpoenas, et
cetera, by the committee to the Department of the Interior for
purported conspiracies, which have yielded nothing, cost $2.5 million.
The total award to attorneys was $1.7 million. So if we reined in the
subpoenas a little bit, you could save more money than by limiting the
attorneys and people's access to justice.
With that, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from
California (Mr. Miller).
Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Chair, I thank the gentleman for
yielding the time, and I thank him for his defense of the Endangered
Species Act. And I thank him for how he administers his position as the
ranking member of the Resources Committee.
This is an old argument. We have been around here time and again.
Time and again, people who don't like the Endangered Species Act have
tried to put their thumb on one side of the scale of justice whenever
these arguments come forward. They have tried to empower junk science
and give it the status of thoughtful, proven science to get in.
But now they are suggesting that the science would be based upon the
party that submits it. If the right parties--if a local entity submits
it, then it will be judged as the best science. Whether or not it is
science at all won't matter. It will simply be deemed that by the
Congress of the United States, and the Department will have to follow
that.
That just, obviously, takes you right back to the courtroom, where
they now inspire litigation. When the citizens want to sue, then the
citizens will have to go back to the courtroom because they have deemed
junk science as real science. And then they will try to limit the
amount that the citizens can be compensated in terms of their lawyers.
And yet, as the gentleman from Oregon just pointed out, they are
going to spend millions of dollars suing the President of the United
States, and they are not going to pay for any of it. They are going to
charge it to the deficit. They will charge it to the deficit. So how is
this justice coming out of the House of Representatives?
The fact of the matter is, the Endangered Species Act has been
effective. It has worked. It saves species. It has returned species off
of the list. And the American people truly support it in great numbers.
They truly support it in great numbers because they recognize that this
is about one generation taking care of what we inherited and passing it
on to another generation. People are most often pleased with the public
spaces that have been preserved to protect it, to protect the various
species.
Has every decision been exactly right? Of course not. And that is why
people go to court on both sides of the law.
Nobody is suggesting that you limit it equally. This is a question of
the science being used and who gets a leg up in that argument in the
courts, which leads to more litigation. So the idea is that you are
trying to get away from litigation.
But the fact of the matter is, the fact of the matter is that this is
an act that has caused us to pause and wait and think about what we are
doing, and what the impact of that is, whether that is development,
whether that is forced practices, whether that is public
infrastructure. Whatever it is, what is the impact beyond that project?
And is that adverse and is it detrimental to these species? Is it
detrimental to the health of the neighborhoods, to the health of the
communities? And very often, the Endangered Species Act has resulted in
better projects being designed, very often better projects being
designed because of those considerations, more sustainable projects
being designed because of those considerations.
But the fact of the matter is, many people just hate the Endangered
Species Act. So we come here Congress after Congress with these meat-ax
approaches.
I spent one of the longest negotiations on a bipartisan basis trying
to arrive at a conclusion on a section of the Endangered Species Act.
In the eleventh hour, my Republican partner, the chairman of the
committee, walked out the door. I don't know why that happened. It
wasn't communicated, but that was that. That morning, we were supposed
to have a press conference to announce the agreement, but it never
happened. With the hours and hours that were spent, I thought we had
reached a good agreement between those areas.
But the idea of frustration builds up, and you can just swing away at
the Endangered Species Act. Yes, it is very popular, and it can be very
controversial.
I am more concerned about what local agencies do in the name of
endangered species sometimes when they ask for mitigation that I find
is very unfair, that I have complained about, that I have written the
agencies about.
I think very often, it is not so much the Federal protection of
endangered species. Very often, it is people who then want to use it at
another level of government to extract from developers, from land use,
for the purposes of mitigation that I think is hard to justify.
And I would just hope that, once again, this Congress would use its
good judgment, it would support the American people, it would support
the Endangered Species Act, and it would, in fact, reject this
legislation.
This is really bad legislation, and you can't pretend that you care
about science and at the same time say you get to deem the best science
based upon the party of submission.
I have fought with agencies to get the science that people have
worked on, that universities have worked on, introduced into the
discussion. I have never suggested that they would have to accept it as
the best science. I thought it would broaden the discussion. I thought
it would bring another consideration to those debates.
So this is a bill that should be rejected, and the gentleman from
Oregon is quite right. I would have been so much happier spending our
time here on the floor today dealing with the issue of wildfires, and
not just those wildfires that are burning in California today, but by
all projections, we are already ahead of the worst wildfire seasons
this year already, and we expect it to get much worse with the
persistence of this drought. And as the chairman and ranking member
know, in those three States, we are way out ahead here on wildfires,
and I wish at some point, we would make a decision that we could deal
with these in an institutional fashion so that the firefighting assets
would know what is available to them. We wouldn't scramble around. We
wouldn't put other agencies in jeopardy by stealing money from their
accounts. But we would deal with this in an adult fashion. We would set
aside money for the purposes and replenishment of that money to fight
wildfires because the alternative cannot be not to try to control this
wildfire and stop the damage that they do both to the natural
environment and to the private environment and the local economies that
are so severely impacted by the aftermath of those fires.
But we are not going to do that. We are just going to stand up here
and take another meat-ax approach to the Endangered Species Act, which
is going to be unsuccessful, in the time we could have been talking
about wildfires, in the time we could have prepared for the remainder
of this wildfire season, giving notice to State agencies, to local
agencies, to our Federal agencies on what they can do to prepare and
the assets that they can have in place for those wildfires. We have
missed that opportunity today in the name of this continued attack on
the Endangered Species Act, which the American people have rejected
over and over. And fortunately, this Congress has rejected over and
over.
[[Page H7012]]
Mr. DeFAZIO. I would inquire of the time remaining on both sides.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from Oregon has 3\1/2\ minutes
remaining. The gentleman from Washington has 18\3/4\ minutes remaining.
Mr. DeFAZIO. I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I am very pleased to yield
3 minutes to the gentlewoman from Wyoming (Mrs. Lummis), another person
who is the author of another section of this bill.
Mrs. LUMMIS. Mr. Chairman, I thank the chairman of the House Natural
Resources Committee for working with us on this working draft.
I also support the Endangered Species Act, and I rise in enthusiastic
support of the Endangered Species Act and enthusiastic support of this
bill because this bill embodies much of the ethos that the American
people have embodied during the years the Endangered Species Act has
been in effect.
This act was passed in 1974 with goals that were admirable and goals
that the people of this country have embedded in their DNA to achieve.
To conserve species, to have habitat for species so we can have rich,
diverse populations of flora and fauna.
This bill will help those goals because we will know what science is
being used to base these decisions upon. Right now, science that is
undisclosed is being used. Right now, we have tribal governments,
county governments, and State governments, through these incredibly
impressive wildlife agencies, who have had this ethos embedded in them
since they were little kids, trying to administer these laws, trying to
save these species.
We want their knowledge shared with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service. We want to know what science is being used to make these
decisions so it can be vetted by third parties, so people who have
specialized scientific knowledge about a habitat area or a subspecies
can share that knowledge with agencies so that we are not making
decisions with litigants behind closed doors with no public input by
the people whose dream is to have an Endangered Species Act that works,
that works for the people on the land, the people who love these
species, who love the habitat, who care for it every day, the people
who want the Endangered Species Act administered in a way that is
transparent and fair and will recover species.
I am of the opinion that an act that has less than a 2 percent
recovery rate or a delisting rate is not a success. I think we can have
better models to succeed to delist species or, better yet, not list
species in the first place.
These small steps that are embedded in this bill--transparency of
science, involving tribal, State, and local governments and their base
of knowledge about what they see on the ground, is critical to having
an Endangered Species Act that works, that takes advantage of the
American people who care about conserving habitat and saving species.
Mr. Chairman, this is a commonsense, rational approach to recovery
that has the kind of transparency that we were promised by this
administration. Let's help them achieve it.
Mr. DeFAZIO. I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I am very pleased to yield
1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. Lankford), a member
of the working group.
Mr. LANKFORD. Mr. Chairman, if I were to ask most Americans, why do
we have the Endangered Species Act?, just about all of them would say,
so we can protect endangered species and increase those population
numbers. But then you ask the question of each specific species, what
is the goal? And very rarely now will you hear the goal being to
increase population. You will hear things like protection of habitat,
expansion of the species and such, but you are not going to hear
population numbers.
{time} 1545
What effect does that have? Well, come to Oklahoma some time. In
western Oklahoma, we deal with a beautiful little ground chicken called
the lesser prairie chicken. The lesser prairie chicken in the past
month and a half has been listed as a threatened species now.
So what is the result of that? Well, the first question we ask is:
What is the number that we need to have to recover? I don't know. We
are just going to try to recover habitat.
What that means is they are now trying to block in 8,000 to 9,000
acres at a time of grassland and say no one can do development on these
8,000 to 9,000-acre blocks of land--that is no building, that is no
construction, that is no energy, and that is no wind power, blocking it
off and leaving it natural, up to 70 percent of that area. Suddenly,
private lands have suddenly become the ownership of public lands.
The simple question is: How many lesser prairie chickens do we need
to have before these restrictions go away? We don't know.
The latest survey that just came out showed a 20 percent increase
from last year to this year. Is that enough? No. Fish and Wildlife
Service is not required to take in that specific study. If it came from
a State and from the people that lived there and know it best,
shouldn't we take that advice?
For some strange reason--I am not opposed to scientists from New
York--but if scientists from New York can pop in on Oklahoma and can
say, I am going to give you the best science, and when we ask for the
data behind it, they can say, no, it is secret and proprietary, and we
can't do a thing about it, that doesn't make common sense.
Mr. Chairman, this bill fixes that. I encourage the House to pass it
and support commonsense legislation.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from
California (Mr. Costa).
Mr. COSTA. Mr. Chairman, I would like to thank my colleague for
giving me time to speak on this important legislation. The Endangered
Species Act is a fundamental environmental law, one that was enacted
because we, as a society, decided that we have a responsibility to our
generation and to future generations to protect species that are
threatened with extinction, as we did with the American bald eagle, our
Nation's symbol.
Unfortunately, its implementation has had a profound impact on many
human activities in many areas of the country, including my own
district in the San Joaquin Valley of California. This year, people
that I represent will be standing in food lines due in part to the way
the ESA is being implemented in the San Joaquin Valley as it relates to
water.
Let me be clear, I support targeted reform of the Endangered Species
Act and the use of best science. However, the reform must strengthen
the policy goals of the ESA. We need to be improving its performance,
not reducing its protections.
Unfortunately, as I have said too many times on the floor of this
House, this bill, unfortunately, is going nowhere. It is going nowhere
because the process to develop it was not transparent and was not
bipartisan. It is going nowhere because this is another example of a
single-Chamber bill to score political points that has no Democratic
support.
If we are going to create law that benefits the American people,
bipartisanship is no longer an option. It is a requirement. I will vote
for this bill in spite of the flawed process on how it was developed
and my serious reservations regarding the definition of best science.
I will vote for it because it is past time to roll up our sleeves and
get to work on crafting serious proposals to reform the Endangered
Species Act that ensures greater transparency, provides for more
stakeholder input into the process, ensures that best science is used
regarding species management, and creates a better balance between
species protection and human impacts.
Mr. Chairman, I will vote for this bill because, for me, hope springs
eternal that we can come together and become legislators that work
together between the House and the Senate in a bipartisan fashion.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I am very pleased to yield
2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. McClintock), a member
of the Natural Resources Committee.
Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding.
Mr. Chairman, the Endangered Species Act serves a great cause, to
prevent the extinction of any species because of human activity, but as
Eric Hoffer warned:
[[Page H7013]]
Every great cause begins as a movement, becomes a business,
and eventually degenerates into a racket.
Unfortunately, in the last 4 years, the ESA has become the basis for
an explosion of lawsuits seeking to force hundreds of new species
listings. Many of these suits are funded at taxpayers' expense, which
in turn require Federal, State, and local agencies to spend even more
taxpayer money to respond.
In northern California last month, this kind of litigation resulted
in designating 2 million acres of the Sierra as critical habitat for
three amphibians, despite overwhelming evidence that human activity is
not to blame. The cause of the decline is nonnative predators and a
virus affecting all amphibian species in the region.
The Natural Resources Committee has heard hours of testimony of how
these decisions are based on highly questionable data from advocacy
groups that include major mathematical errors, rank speculation, and
selective suppression of data in order to arrive at predetermined
conclusions.
This measure before us begins to address these abuses. It requires
that supporting data be readily available to the general public, thus
assuring greater scrutiny, and it requires that the government use the
best available science and data from all sources.
It addresses the litigation crisis by requiring that legal costs be
tracked and publicly reported, and it conforms those costs to the Equal
Access to Justice Act that prevents extravagant claims for legal fees.
Louis Brandeis said that sunlight is the best of disinfectants. This
bill places the data for implementing the ESA back into the sunlight
where it can be fully scrutinized, and it places a modicum of restraint
on the legal fees sought by out-of-control litigants.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I am very pleased to yield
2 minutes to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Benishek), another member
of the Natural Resources Committee.
Mr. BENISHEK. Mr. Chairman, I rise today in support of H.R. 4315, the
Endangered Species Transparency Act.
Mr. Chairman, as a doctor and lifelong resident of northern Michigan,
I have been supportive of conservation my entire life. Like many on the
floor today, I understand there is more work to be done in the arena of
conservation and recovery of species. However, the Endangered Species
Act, as written, isn't working.
When the Endangered Species Act, or the ESA, was signed into law 40
years ago, it was meant to save species, not lawyers. Today, more money
is being spent on frivolous lawsuits than recovering or conserving
species that actually need saving. These lawsuits result in listings or
proposed listings for very questionable species. As a result, the
taxpayers, the environment, and the economy all lose.
In my district, the northern long-eared bat is currently a candidate
for listing. As this decision is being considered, local and State
officials, as well as businesses in northern Michigan, must be able to
know how the decision will be made and what information is being used
to make it.
I believe that local residents and officials know what is better for
northern Michigan than bureaucrats or high-paid attorneys in
Washington. That is why I am here today to support commonsense reforms
to the Endangered Species Act. The bill goes a long way towards
improving the Endangered Species Act by requiring good government
through transparency and capping attorneys' fees.
If you truly support the environment, then you realize funds should
be spent on conservation and recovery, not $500-an-hour attorneys.
Mr. Chairman, I believe this legislation is a win-win for the
taxpayer and for conservation of truly endangered species, and I urge
my colleagues to support this bill.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I would reserve the balance of my time,
since I only have 1 minute remaining, until that side has no further
speakers.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I am very pleased to yield
1 minute to the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Gosar), another member of
the Natural Resources Committee.
Mr. GOSAR. Mr. Chairman, I rise today to speak in strong support of
H.R. 4315, a commonsense package comprised of four bills that seek to
update and improve the Endangered Species Act.
These bills make commonsense changes that increase transparency, save
taxpayer money, ensure local involvement in species conservation and
the designation process, limit the hourly rate attorneys can charge the
taxpayers for Endangered Species Act lawsuits, and require the Federal
Government to make available to Congress and the public any data it
uses to determine which species to list as endangered. All of these are
common sense.
Mr. Chairman, for far too long, the Federal Government has been
making listing decisions based on secret and pseudoscience, including
studies that do not allow for peer review of the underlying data.
Even more troubling is the fact that attorneys have been making
millions of dollars based on frivolous lawsuits associated with the
Endangered Species Act, and the Federal Government doesn't even know
how much money has been paid out.
It is time to update the Endangered Species Act that involves
America, is accountable to America, and is a win-win for everybody
concerned.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to yield 1
minute to the gentleman from California (Mr. LaMalfa), another member
of the House Natural Resources Committee.
Mr. LaMALFA. Mr. Chairman, this bill brings a portion of the
Endangered Species Act back in to the 21st century and much-needed
transparency.
Under this bill, the public will have access to data used to
determine which species are listed as endangered. Backroom decisions
made by regulators at the behest of nongovernment organizations with
secret data is the sort of policymaking you might find in the Soviet
Union or communist China, not in the United States.
Astoundingly, you will hear arguments that this data should remain
secret. This is the data used to decide whether Americans can build a
home on their own property, farm their own land, or simply going hiking
in their national forest.
The bill includes also much county data used in ESA decisions, which
is key. It is important that all economic information is available so
locals get a fair shake. Had this bill been in place, my district would
have had more input in an ESA listing that will hurt the economy across
the Sierra Nevadas.
This measure also tracks and caps attorney fees paid in ESA lawsuits.
Of the 75 Federal agencies surveyed, just 10 even tracked their payouts
to lawsuit factories like the NRDC and the Center for Biological
Diversity.
Mr. Chairman, I happen to think Americans deserve to know how their
government makes their decisions. Let's pass H.R. 4315 to bring
transparency and fairness back to the ESA process.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I am very pleased to yield
2 minutes to the gentleman from New Mexico (Mr. Pearce), a former
member of the House Natural Resources Committee.
Mr. PEARCE. I thank the gentleman for yielding and appreciate his
leadership on this issue.
Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of H.R. 4315. New Mexico used to have
123 mills that processed timber. Today, that number is zero because of
an endangered species called the spotted owl.
Now, 20 years after declaring the spotted owl to be endangered
because of logging, last year, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service came
out and said: oops, we made a mistake, it is not the logging at all.
We killed 123 mills in New Mexico. Eighty-five percent of the
Nation's timber industry is gone because of a mistake. That sounds like
the junk science that our opponents are arguing that we should be
avoiding.
Mr. Chairman, last year, a lizard was going to be named as threatened
or endangered in my district, and an ad hoc committee of scientists
came together. They looked at the science that the Fish and Wildlife
Service was going to use to list, they proved all of it to be false,
and the listing did not occur--but only because of peer review.
That is what this bill is trying to do, to establish a process where
others can
[[Page H7014]]
get to see what is going on inside those hidden dark doors of the Fish
and Wildlife Service.
This year in New Mexico, the lesser prairie chicken was listed as
threatened which, again, put people out of jobs. Ben Tuggle, the Fish
and Wildlife Service director in New Mexico said they felt pressured by
the lawsuits--not by the science, but by the lawsuits. This is what it
looks like dealing with the Endangered Species Act in the West today.
It kills jobs, takes away the future, and takes away tax base--all
for junk science that is currently being used by the department. This
bill simply says let's get some transparency and let's get peer review.
I urge the Members to vote for this bill.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I am very pleased to yield
1 minute to the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Crawford), in whose
district we had a field hearing on the impact of the Endangered Species
Act.
Mr. CRAWFORD. I thank the chairman. I am glad to be here today in
support of H.R. 4315 and to emphasize the point that this is not just a
Western thing. We certainly hear a lot about Oregon's northern spotted
owl, about California's delta smelt, and we have heard about--the
lesser prairie chicken has been cited, but I doubt many of you have
heard about the rabbitsfoot mussel.
I have a map here that indicates the range of the rabbitsfoot mussel,
and I can assure you the folks in Arkansas, Mississippi, Oklahoma,
Louisiana, and Missouri have become very well familiar with the
rabbitsfoot mussel.
{time} 1600
What the critical habitat designation proposal could do, and
certainly in States like Arkansas where 70 percent of Arkansas' rivers
and streams would be impacted, it would have a direct and costly impact
on farmers and ranchers and municipalities who rely on those waterways
for drinking water, private landowners and local governments who are
trying to build and improve roads and bridges, and small and large
businesses across the State of Arkansas that use water in manufacturing
the products that help keep Americans employed.
The 21st Century Endangered Species Transparency Act will go a long
way to bringing some common sense and sanity back to the protection of
vulnerable species, and that is what we should be about.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to yield 2
minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Collins) who is also
experiencing the effects of this act.
Mr. COLLINS of Georgia. Mr. Chairman, I do appreciate the chairman of
the Natural Resources Committee yielding me this time.
You know, it is amazing when you even mention dealing with reforming
the Endangered Species Act how people all of a sudden think--and it is
just a matter of putting some controls or limiting it--that you are
antispecies, you are terrible on the environment. Really what we are
talking about here is just basically like all of the things in life
that are updated from time to time, this is something that needs to be
updated. I have been pleased to work in this working group, together
with the chairman and others, to bring about some sensible reforms.
The reason we do this, farmers, ranchers, folks back home, my Farm
Bureau, have been hit by lawsuits. And I appreciate what the gentleman
just said. It is lawsuits, not science, that seems to be pressuring
some of this along. In fact, in 2011, the WildEarth Guardians and
Center for Biological Diversity entered into an agreement with Fish and
Wildlife that added 1,000 species. Now, the only problem with that is
that no one in the ag community and others who were affected were
allowed to participate. Now, I have another bill called Sue and Settle
that would have taken care of that when we passed it out of this House.
It was said earlier that, when you take the ESA, you don't take a
meat cleaver approach. Well, I think the problem is not a meat cleaver
approach here. It is the fact that many don't want to take an approach
at all. They want to just leave it alone. They don't even want to take
up having reasonable caps on attorneys' fees. Instead of putting money
into lawyers' pockets at a cap of just $125 an hour, they would rather
go on--which, by the way, in that same 2011 case, the attorneys' fees
went over $300,000 in this situation.
You see, the problem here is not wanting to deal with ESA. The
problem is wanting to continue an ideological bent that says leave it
alone even at the expense of jobs, even at the expense of saying that
maybe we messed up, even at the expense of saying maybe we can find a
different point of view, maybe we can have valid science, or maybe just
addressing it.
For those of us in northeast Georgia, we want good, clean water,
clean air, and protection of our wildlife. But also, we understand that
taxpayer dollars spent on this needs to happen. We need to do this
reform.
By the way, Mr. Chairman, I still have no takers on my bat.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to yield 1
minute to the gentleman from Utah (Mr. Stewart), a former member of the
Natural Resources Committee.
Mr. STEWART. Mr. Chairman, H.R. 4315 is simply a no-brainer. Its
primary purpose is to require that ESA be available to the public. This
is nothing but a commonsense reform in the application of a law that is
subject to extensive bureaucratic manipulation. Some opponents wrongly
assume that the American people don't need to see this data, but how
can anyone argue against transparency in our Federal Government?
Let me quickly list an example in my district. We have the Utah
prairie dog, a species that was listed under the ESA in 1973. U.S. Fish
and Wildlife says there needs to be at least 1,500 prairie dogs before
they can be considered for delisting as recovered, but the Federal
Government only counts those dogs living on Federal lands, about 442 of
them. In 2013, there were almost 5,000 of these prairie dogs living on
private land that went uncovered.
Earlier this year, I introduced H.R. 4256, the Endangered Species
Improvement Recovery Act, something which would help in this effort as
well. H.R. 4315 is a commonsense approach, and I urge my colleagues to
support it.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I am very pleased to yield
1 minute to the gentleman from California (Mr. Valadao), a very active
Member on this issue.
Mr. VALADAO. Mr. Chairman, this bill brings a lot of common sense to
Washington. In my district currently today, they have basically shut
down agriculture because of this tiny fish there. We have seen food
products coming in from other countries, and we see people standing in
a food line.
What has caused all of this? Under the Endangered Species Act, a
species was added to the Endangered Species Act list.
And do we know if that listing actually helped that fish, if turning
off the pump has actually helped save that fish? We know it has put
people out of work. We know it has changed where we are getting our
food from. And for all we know, it hasn't even saved that little fish.
That is something that needs to be looked at. What this bill does, it
brings some transparency to this.
When we pass these rules and regulations on these industries that
affect these people at home and put them in the food line, are we
actually basing it on real science? Are we basing it on the fact that
we are actually going to save this species?
This is a tragedy. What we see going on in my hometown right now, in
my district is a tragedy. We have an opportunity to actually make a
difference today with some common sense. Make sure that we know that
the science is honest and transparent before we pass these laws.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I advise the gentleman from
Oregon that I am prepared to close, so if he wants to use his time,
then I will close.
I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of my time.
I will close where I ended my opening remarks, 25 major fires burning
in the West: seven in Oregon, six in California, four in Washington,
two in Utah, two in Idaho, and one in Colorado. And by this time next
week, probably twice as many, but next week Congress will be out of
session.
The agencies will run out of money. They can't stop fighting the
fires. So
[[Page H7015]]
what they will do is they will pull back money that would prevent
future intense wildfires from prevention programs. They will pull back
money from recreation programs. They will pull back money from a host
of things that Americans care about and want to have funded just to
fight these fires. It is an endless cycle. We need to deal with it.
We could have dealt with it here today instead of spending multiple
hours on a bill which is going nowhere, which is poorly drafted to the
point where anybody, any city, county, tribe, State who writes on the
back of a napkin can submit that to the agency and it must be
considered the best available science and commercial data. And under
the law, the Secretary has to use that to make a decision.
How the heck is that going to work? You are saying you are worried
about attorney's fees; you are creating a universe for new litigation
with this misguided approach.
So I wish we would return to a bipartisan addressing of the forest
fire issue because I know there is bipartisan concern on it. There is a
bill pending in the House--54 Republicans, 54 Democrats. We should take
that bill up today, tomorrow, or Thursday before we leave town and fund
our firefighting efforts.
I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance
of my time.
Mr. Chairman, let me make a couple of points on issues that have been
raised. First of all, H.R. 4315 is not a comprehensive reform to the
Endangered Species Act. It is very targeted.
I might mention that several Members on the other side talked about
species going extinct. I just want to say, Mr. Chairman, that during
testimony in the House Natural Resources Committee, nobody testified
that they are in favor of species going extinct.
Several Members said this bill weakens the Endangered Species Act.
Mr. Chairman, how does transparency weaken a bill? I do not see how
that works.
Finally, there seems to be a lot of discussion about allowing local
entities and tribes to use their data in the listing of species.
Several Members on the other side said the act deems that should
happen. It does not at all. In fact, let me read it. It says:
The best scientific and commercial data available includes
all such data submitted by State, tribal, or county
government.
Now, we will have more debate on this because there are two
amendments that address this section, but I just wanted to mention that
this is a targeted look at the Endangered Species Act. It is not a
comprehensive reform, but it certainly will, I think, get more people
involved, especially because of this megasettlement, the impact that
this will have on the rest of the country.
Mr. Chairman, I urge adoption of H.R. 4315.
I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. HOLT. Mr. Chair on December 28, 1973 the Endangered Species Act
was signed into law, meaning we are currently commemorating the 40th
anniversary of one of our nation's strongest and most successful
environmental laws: the Endangered Species Act.
Passed with overwhelming bipartisan support and signed by President
Richard Nixon, the Act was the first comprehensive law to address the
global extinction crisis.
The Endangered Species Act took a zero-tolerance approach to
achieving its goals: no new extinctions, no exceptions.
As a result, 99 percent of listed species have been saved from
extinction and are on the path to recovery.
Some iconic American species, such as the bald eagle, the American
alligator, and the Pacific gray whale, have recovered from the brink of
extinction and are now thriving in their natural habitats.
Beyond the preservation of individual species, the Endangered Species
Act helps to keep the strong interdependent web of life.
Today, conservation efforts under the Endangered Species Act are a
model for preserving biodiversity around the world.
Unfortunately, here in the House today we are proceeding with reforms
that would undoubtedly weaken provisions of the Act with the belief
that doing so will somehow yield greater benefits for the species it
was designed to protect.
As a member of the House Natural Resources Committee, I've been
committed to protecting our nation's strongest and most successful
environmental laws.
Let us reject the bill before us and in doing so commerate the 40th
Anniversary of the Endangered Species Act.
Ms. LEE of California. Mr. Chair, I rise to today in strong
opposition to H.R. 4315--the ``21st Century Endangered Species
Transparency Act.''
Mr. Chair, there is nothing reasonable about this bill.
This bill is an assault on citizen enforcement and the rule of law.
If enacted, the bill would place an unreasonable cap on the recovery
of attorneys' fees in suits brought under the Endangered Species Act
(ESA).
By limiting fee recoveries, this bill would make it difficult for
many citizens to obtain effective legal representation--and undermine
the enforcement of the law.
The Endangered Species Act is one of our country's most important
tools for protecting endangered fish and wildlife populations.
The fact of the matter is, the bill before us, would increase the
likelihood of future extinctions.
Mr. Chair, we are here to protect not only our wildlife, but also the
very foundation of our justice system--equal access to adequate
representation.
I urge a no vote.
Mr. THOMPSON of Pennsylvania. Mr. Chair, I rise today in support of
this legislation.
H.R. 4315 is an important first step in reforming the Endangered
Species Act, and undertaking long overdue.
This legislation is about three things: increasing government
ransparency, requiring better state and local data and input, and
limiting excessive payments for lawyers who sue the Federal government
under ESA.
First, the bill requires the Federal Government to publish on the
internet and make publicly available the data that was used to make the
determination that a species should be considered for listing under the
ESA.
Secondly, the legislaion would require the Federal Government to
include and consider data provided by state, local and tribal
governments. The purpose of this is to ensure that the best ``on the
ground'' input is taken into account when making such listing.
Finally, H.R. 4315 would limit attorneys' fees when individuals or
organizations sue the government under the ESA and prevail.
In my home state of Pennsylvania, we are currently seeing firsthand
why these changes need to be legislated. The U.S. Fish & Wildlife
Service recently proposed the Northern Long-Eared bat for listing under
ESA--despite significant scientific debate over its population levels.
While the species is unquestionably being impacted by White Nose
Syndrome, considerably more research still is needed before sweeping
federal regulations go into effect.
This species has an enormous geographical footprint and is found in
38 states. Listing this bat species would have an enormous impact,
including harming a large number of economic sectors that pose no
threat to this population.
During the open public comment period, the Fish &
Wildlife Service received a significant number of public comments
discussing this lack of adequate data, and since then, the Service has
acknowledged that the economic activities most affected by the proposed
listing have had little impact on population numbers or the decline of
the species.
As a result, the agency has now decided to extend the comment period
to further review these disparities.
H.R. 4315 is a package of commonsense reforms that will improve local
control and increase government transparency and accountability.
I strongly urge my colleagues to support this legislation.
The Acting CHAIR (Mr. Poe of Texas). All time for general debate has
expired.
Pursuant to the rule, the bill shall be considered for amendment
under the 5-minute rule.
In lieu of the amendment in the nature of a substitute recommended by
the Committee on Natural Resources, printed in the bill, it shall be in
order to consider as an original bill for the purpose of amendment
under the 5-minute rule an amendment in the nature of a substitute
consisting of the text of Rules Committee Print 113-55. That amendment
in the nature of a substitute shall be considered as read.
The text of the amendment in the nature of a substitute is as
follows:
H.R. 4315
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of
the United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ``Endangered Species
Transparency and Reasonableness Act''.
SEC. 2. REQUIREMENT TO PUBLISH ON THE INTERNET THE BASIS FOR
LISTINGS.
Section 4(b) of the Endangered Species Act (16 U.S.C.
1533(b)) is amended by adding at the end the following:
[[Page H7016]]
``(9) The Secretary shall make publicly available on the
Internet the best scientific and commercial data available
that are the basis for each regulation, including each
proposed regulation, promulgated under subsection (a)(1),
except that, at the request of a Governor or legislature of a
State, the Secretary shall not make available under this
paragraph information regarding which the State has
determined public disclosure is prohibited by a law of that
State relating to the protection of personal information.''.
SEC. 3. DECISIONAL TRANSPARENCY AND USE OF STATE, TRIBAL, AND
LOCAL INFORMATION.
(a) Requiring Decisional Transparency With Affected
States.--Section 6(a) of the Endangered Species Act of 1973
(16 U.S.C. 1535(a)) is amended--
(1) by inserting ``(1)'' before the first sentence; and
(2) by striking ``Such cooperation shall include'' and
inserting the following:
``(2) Such cooperation shall include--
``(A) before making a determination under section 4(a),
providing to States affected by such determination all data
that is the basis of the determination; and
``(B)''.
(b) Ensuring Use of State, Tribal, and Local Information.--
(1) In general.--Section 3 of the Endangered Species Act of
1973 (16 U.S.C. 1532) is amended--
(A) by redesignating paragraphs (2) through (21) as
paragraphs (3) through (22), respectively; and
(B) by inserting after paragraph (1) the following:
``(2) The term `best scientific and commercial data
available' includes all such data submitted by a State,
tribal, or county government.''.
(2) Conforming amendment.--Section 7(n) of such Act (16
U.S.C. 1536(n)) is amended by striking ``section 3(13)'' and
inserting ``section 3(14)''.
SEC. 4. DISCLOSURE OF EXPENDITURES UNDER ENDANGERED SPECIES
ACT OF 1973.
(a) Requirement To Disclose.--Section 13 of the Endangered
Species Act of 1973 (87 Stat. 902; relating to conforming
amendments which have executed) is amended to read as
follows:
``SEC. 13. DISCLOSURE OF EXPENDITURES.
``(a) Requirement.--The Secretary of the Interior, in
consultation with the Secretary of Commerce, shall--
``(1) not later than 90 days after the end of each fiscal
year, submit to the Committee on Natural Resources of the
House of Representatives and the Committee on Energy and
Natural Resources of the Senate an annual report detailing
Federal Government expenditures for covered suits during the
preceding fiscal year (including the information described in
subsection (b)); and
``(2) make publicly available through the Internet a
searchable database of the information described in
subsection (b).
``(b) Included Information.--The report shall include--
``(1) the case name and number of each covered suit, and a
hyperlink to the record or decision for each covered suit (if
available);
``(2) a description of the claims in each covered suit;
``(3) the name of each covered agency whose actions gave
rise to a claim in a covered suit;
``(4) funds expended by each covered agency (disaggregated
by agency account) to receive and respond to notices referred
to in section 11(g)(2) or to prepare for litigation of,
litigate, negotiate a settlement agreement or consent decree
in, or provide material, technical, or other assistance in
relation to, a covered suit;
``(5) the number of full-time equivalent employees that
participated in the activities described in paragraph (4);
and
``(6) attorneys fees and other expenses (disaggregated by
agency account) awarded in covered suits, including any
consent decrees or settlement agreements (regardless of
whether a decree or settlement agreement is sealed or
otherwise subject to nondisclosure provisions), including the
bases for such awards.
``(c) Requirement To Provide Information.--The head of each
covered agency shall provide to the Secretary in a timely
manner all information requested by the Secretary to comply
with the requirements of this section.
``(d) Limitation on Disclosure.--Notwithstanding any other
provision of this section, this section shall not affect any
restriction in a consent decree or settlement agreement on
the disclosure of information that is not described in
subsection (b).
``(e) Definitions.--
``(1) Covered agency.--The term `covered agency' means any
agency of the Department of the Interior, the Forest Service,
the National Marine Fisheries Service, the Bonneville Power
Administration, the Western Area Power Administration, the
Southwestern Power Administration, or the Southeastern Power
Administration.
``(2) Covered suit.--The term `covered suit' means any
civil action containing a claim against the Federal
Government, in which the claim arises under this Act and is
based on the action of a covered agency.''.
(b) Clerical Amendment.--The table of contents in the first
section of such Act is amended by striking the item relating
to such section and inserting the following:
``Sec. 13. Disclosure of expenditures.''.
(c) Prior Amendments Not Affected.--This section shall not
be construed to affect the amendments made by section 13 of
such Act, as in effect before the enactment of this Act.
SEC. 5. AWARD OF LITIGATION COSTS TO PREVAILING PARTIES IN
ACCORDANCE WITH EXISTING LAW.
Section 11(g)(4) of the Endangered Species Act of 1973 (16
U.S.C. 1540(g)(4)) is amended by striking ``to any'' and all
that follows through the end of the sentence and inserting
``to any prevailing party in accordance with section 2412 of
title 28, United States Code.''.
The Acting CHAIR. No amendment to the amendment in the nature of a
substitute shall be in order except those printed in House Report 113-
563. Each such amendment shall be considered only in the order printed
in the report, may be offered only by a Member designated in the
report, shall be considered 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.
Amendment No. 1 Offered by Mr. Hastings of Washington
The Acting CHAIR. It is now in order to consider amendment No. 1
printed in House Report 113-563.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment made in
order under the rule.
The Acting CHAIR. The Clerk will designate the amendment.
The text of the amendment is as follows:
Page 1, line 13, insert ``, State agency,'' after
``Governor''.
Page 1, strike line 16 and all that follows through the
first period on line 17 and insert ``determined public
disclosure is prohibited by a law or regulation of that
State, including any law or regulation requiring the
protection of personal information; and except that within 30
days after the date of the enactment of this paragraph, the
Secretary shall execute an agreement with the Secretary of
Defense that prevents the disclosure of classified
information pertaining to Department of Defense personnel,
facilities, lands, or waters.''.
The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to House Resolution 693, the gentleman
from Washington (Mr. Hastings) and a Member opposed each will control 5
minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Washington.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as
I may consume.
Mr. Chairman, I offer this manager's amendment which would clarify
two important items relating to section 2 and public disclosure of the
Federal Government's ESA data.
First, the amendment would provide an important but technical
clarification that the intent of the bill is for any Federal public
disclosure of ESA data on the Internet under the bill to be completely
consistent with data privacy laws of States, including those that
protect personal identifiable information from disclosure.
A significant amount of the ``best available scientific and
commercial data'' currently used by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
and the National Marine Fisheries Service for ESA listing decisions is
derived from States which have diverse laws protecting the privacy of
their citizens and sensitive species data.
While some make completely baseless suggestions that more data
disclosure on the Internet could lead to poaching of species, this
amendment would allow States an added layer of confidence that the
information they choose to share with the Federal Government does not
compromise their own data privacy laws.
Second, the amendment clarifies that the bill would not require
disclosure of classified Department of Defense information related to
lands, personnel, installations, or waters within their jurisdiction.
The Endangered Species Act has a significant impact on U.S. military
activities. According to the Fish and Wildlife Service Web site, more
than 300 ESA-listed species are located on the more than 25 million
acres spread across hundreds of Department of Defense installations
across the Nation. While greater data transparency related to U.S. Fish
and Wildlife Service or National Marine Fisheries Service listing
decisions is important, branches of the American military should not
have to disclose information that would in any way compromise national
security.
So my amendment would make clear that the Fish and Wildlife Service's
or the National Marine Fisheries Service's disclosure of best available
scientific and commercial data on the Internet can be accomplished
while safeguarding classified or sensitive Defense Department
information.
[[Page H7017]]
I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I claim the time in opposition, although I
do not oppose the amendment.
The Acting CHAIR. Without objection, the gentleman from Oregon is
recognized for 5 minutes.
There was no objection.
Mr. DeFAZIO. This is similar to an amendment offered by the chairman
in committee which carved out an exemption for private individuals.
This would carve out another amendment for the Department of Defense.
Unfortunately, crafting legislation so it doesn't have unintended
impacts is often a difficult, deliberative process. In this case, the
overly broad language in this section would still require commercial
data from timber and oil and gas companies. That is not covered by the
exemptions in the bill. And also, it could require data containing
business activity locations, operation plans, information regarding
species found on their lands, and they would be published on the
Internet, which would be an invitation to trespass in the case of
private timber companies having to publish that sort of invitation.
So I don't think the exemption goes far enough. I think the entire
provision should be stricken. But again, I will not bother to oppose
this amendment, but I will oppose the underlying bill.
With that, I yield back the balance of my time.
{time} 1615
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance
of my time.
I thank the gentleman from Oregon for his support of the amendment,
and I yield back the balance of my time.
The Acting CHAIR. The question is on the amendment offered by the
gentleman from Washington (Mr. Hastings).
The amendment was agreed to.
Amendment No. 2 Offered by Mr. DeFazio
The Acting CHAIR. It is now in order to consider amendment No. 2
printed in House Report 113-563.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk.
The Acting CHAIR. The Clerk will designate the amendment.
The text of the amendment is as follows:
Page 3, line 1, strike ``The term'' and insert ``(A) Except
as provided in subparagraph (B), the term''.
Page 3, at line 3 strike the closing quotation marks and
the second period, and after line 3 insert the following:
``(B) Such term does not include any data, study, or survey
that has been published solely in an internal Department of
the Interior publication.''.
The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to House Resolution 693, the gentleman
from Oregon (Mr. DeFazio) and a Member opposed each will control 5
minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Oregon.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, as I said earlier, and it was mentioned by
a number of Democrats on this side, we don't think the Endangered
Species Act is perfect and we could work on a bipartisan basis on
modernization-type reforms to bring it into the 21st century, compliant
with current science. However, that is not before us today. But I am
hopeful that this amendment, because of a very unsettling precedent by
the Obama administration, will get bipartisan support.
Now, the Republicans may, in this case, agree with the objectives of
an agency of government which has gone rogue in this case, which is
Fish and Wildlife. They have been trying for years to remove the gray
wolf from the Endangered Species Act. Unfortunately, science isn't on
their side. Wolves have not recovered throughout much of their range.
Oregon and Washington have a few packs; California, Colorado, Utah, and
New York have none. However, they have cooked up a little bit of
science to justify their determination to delist.
Now, in the case of Oregon, OR-7, his mate, and pups, might be pretty
safe. They are down in the corner of the State. California won't be
hunting wolves because of their own Endangered Species Act. But his
relatives up in the northeast corner of Oregon, should they cross the
border into Idaho, they will be immediately assassinated. That is the
result of what Fish and Wildlife and Congress combined have done.
They cooked up the science. Unfortunately, science has to be peer-
reviewed and published in journals. No journal would publish it. Not
even some of the captive industry journals or the livestock association
journal. Nobody would publish it. They said this is junk.
So what did they do? Well, they came up with a zombie journal. They
revived an internal journal called North American Fauna, which was an
internal Fish and Wildlife little newsletter, and it hasn't been
printed previously since 1991.
Now, again, I imagine most Republicans are saying: So what, if this
helps us get rid of the wolf--which many on that side of the aisle
would like to do--so be it, that is good.
Well, just think what is going to happen when Fish and Wildlife and
this administration, or another administration, wants to make a
decision contrary to what you care about? What if they want to cook up
a phony science on the sage-grouse, the lesser prairie chicken, or on
some of these other species that have been talked about today? They
drag out the North American fauna label and they say: Hey, it has been
published, and that is what we based our decision on.
This is a very disturbing trend by an administration--inexplicable
that this administration would go down this particular path. And again,
even if you may agree with delisting the wolf and greatly reducing the
populations, which are nowhere near what they should be for a full
recovery, threatening again a future, more comprehensive, listing--
again, a bit shortsighted if you support that, but you may.
But just think if you let this stand. If you let these people these
Federal bureaucrats, these hacks, get away with this. They cooked
something up. I mean, really? You can't even get the sheep journal to
publish this because they really hate the wolves, or the cattleman's
journal, they really hate the wolves. No, they wouldn't publish it.
They had to come up with a phony internal journal, because it was so
bad that they knew they would be subject to ridicule and violating
essentially their own morals and ethics by doing that.
I would hope that the Republicans can support this amendment, because
even though they may agree with the ends here, they surely should
disagree with the process.
With that, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the
amendment.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman is recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I yield as much time as he
may consume to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Neugebauer).
Mr. NEUGEBAUER. Mr. Chairman, as I was listening to the gentleman, I
was wondering if he was talking about the amendment that he had
actually offered, because actually he is making the case that I stood
up to make today.
Let me tell you what this amendment would do. It would exclude
scientific information published solely in the internal Interior
Department publications from the definition of ``best available
science,'' which would allow the Department of Interior to avoid
transparency requirements in section 2 of the bill, which requires that
the data used by the Federal agencies for the Endangered Species Act
listing decisions to be made publicly available and accessible through
the Internet.
So what the gentleman was saying is they cooked the books, they
cooked the information, and he doesn't want that to be made available.
So here we are making important decisions about the potential taking of
people's land, spending millions of dollars in mitigation for what may
be false science.
This gentleman's amendment defeats the whole purpose of transparency,
the intention of this bill.
What we are trying to do is we are going to say: Let's take the
facts, let's take the best available science that the Fish and Wildlife
and some of these agencies say that they have, let's compare it with
what is the best available science from the stakeholders and come up
with the truth.
But the gentleman's amendment, which I urge Members to defeat,
defeats the whole purpose of that transparency. The American people
deserve that. Their tax money is being used
[[Page H7018]]
against them in the fact that the tax money is going out and being used
to determine what is the best available science. Now if we have got the
best available science--in fact, as the gentleman referred to it as
``cooking the science,'' then the American people ought to have an
opportunity to dispute that and it not be hidden from them in some
agency memo.
With that, I encourage Members to defeat the amendment.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, well, I didn't understand that.
Look, a Federal agency revived a journal that had been extinct for 23
years. It is an internal document. They took phony science and
published it in that, and then they based a delisting decision on it.
If they based a listing decision on it, you guys would be going berserk
over there.
What I am precluding is future Federal agencies, no matter where they
come down on a listing decision, from using phony science which is only
self-published. This is like whack nuts who write books about crazy
things and they publish it themselves and say: Look, it was a book.
Yeah, it is a book. You paid to publish it.
In this case, they used taxpayer money to publish a phony study to
justify a decision they had already made, which you might happen to
agree with.
But what happens when they use that same tactic to do that with a
decision you disagree with, to actually list something?
This has nothing to do with transparency. It doesn't need to be
transparent because they couldn't use it. It is phony science. They
would not be allowed to use phony science by self-publishing it. That
is simply what the amendment does, and I can't believe you guys are
going to oppose it.
I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance
of my time.
Mr. Chairman, when I listen to my good friend from Oregon's
arguments, in many respects, maybe indirectly, he is making precisely
the argument that we are making with this bill. That is, whatever data
is being used to list or delist should be made available to the public
so they can ascertain if that data is correct.
Now, the gentleman talked about data that was made up. Okay, that is
his interpretation. If it is made up, shouldn't we know that? Shouldn't
we know that that is what the data is being used to make these
decisions rather than just accepting it?
Mr. Chairman, that is precisely what this bill is all about, to have
transparency on this scientific data. That is really all we are asking
about.
The argument got shifted to other things, like we are destroying the
Endangered Species Act and so forth. Nothing could be further from the
truth.
His amendment, however, does something that I think violates the
principle we are trying to do. He wants to exclude certain stuff from
us being transparent with it, or for the people having transparency to
that data.
So, Mr. Chairman, I urge also rejection of the amendment, and I yield
back the balance of my time.
The Acting CHAIR. The question is on the amendment offered by the
gentleman from Oregon (Mr. DeFazio).
The question was taken; and the Acting Chair announced that the noes
appeared to have it.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.
The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to clause 6 of rule XVIII, further
proceedings on the amendment offered by the gentleman from Oregon will
be postponed.
Amendment No. 3 Offered by Mr. Holt
The Acting CHAIR. It is now in order to consider amendment No. 3
printed in House Report 113-563.
Mr. HOLT. Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk.
The Acting CHAIR. The Clerk will designate the amendment.
The text of the amendment is as follows:
Page 2, line 3, strike ``(a) Requiring Decisional
Transparency With Affected States.--''.
Beginning at page 2, strike line 16 and all that follows
through page 3, line 7.
The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to House Resolution 693, the gentleman
from New Jersey (Mr. Holt) and a Member opposed each will control 5
minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from New Jersey.
Mr. HOLT. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
The bill before us today has many problems, but one of the most
egregious and obvious is in section 3, where the bill declares that any
and all data submitted by States, tribes, or local governments shall be
considered the ``best scientific data available.''
I am offering here an amendment with my friend from California (Mr.
Huffman), which would strike that provision and would force Federal
agencies to accept as the best available science actual science.
The language in question says:
The term ``best scientific and commercial data available''
includes all such data submitted by a State, tribal, or
county government.
The Endangered Species Act is one of our Nation's strongest and most
successful environmental laws. One reason for that success is that the
law has been based on scientific evaluation using peer-reviewed science
by trained scientists, not the whims and ideological wishes of
legislators.
The Endangered Species Act is not a shouting match or a fight for
power and influence among interested parties; it is a look at the need
to protect endangered species as determined by the best science. This
language that the best scientific and commercial data available
includes all such data submitted is as preposterous as it is
impractical. Where is the quality control?
Now, what happens if a locality submits something that is not, in
fact, true, or not, in fact, established within the scientific
community? Or how about if a State or a tribe submits one thing and
another State or tribe submits conflicting views? Are they both the
best available evidence? What about where a county thinks its data is
better than the State's data? These are all situations that not only
might occur, but are likely to occur.
A witness at the committee hearing on this bill--in fact, a witness
that was invited by the Republicans--testified to this very point,
saying that all does not equal best, highlighting the fact that this
bill creates more problems than it solves.
Agency decisionmakers must evaluate data from all sources to ensure
that they are making determinations based on the best information
available, and we should encourage them to do so.
Let's not have another case of congressional malpractice where
Members of Congress play scientists and try to present political
restrictions on the science.
The peer review process is the best tool available, and that is how
we draw out the best science. Maybe scientists occasionally make
mistakes, no doubt about it, and new findings can call for a revision
of the science. But surely we don't think that Members of Congress are
better at determining what is scientifically factual than the
biological and environmental scientists.
I reserve the balance of my time.
{time} 1630
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the
amendment.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman is recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I yield such time as he may
consume to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Neugebauer).
Mr. NEUGEBAUER. Mr. Chairman, basically, what the gentleman's
amendment would do is strike the language in the section of this bill
that requires the Fish and Wildlife Service to consider all data
submitted by State, tribal, or county governments as best scientific
and commercial data available.
Let me dispel one of the myths. It says that all of this data has to
be considered best scientific and commercial data. That is not
necessarily true. The Fish and Wildlife Service still has
discrimination over what data that it considers. What it does say is
that it must consider the data that is submitted.
The other thing that you hear my friends on the other side of the
aisle say is that I guess all of the best data and all of the smartest
people in the country must be in Washington, D.C., but we have Mr.
DeFazio, the gentleman from Oregon, stand up and say:
[[Page H7019]]
no, sometimes they cook the books. So I wondered if that memo that the
gentleman was talking about was the best commercial and available
science for the wolf. Obviously, he was saying it was not.
What we are really saying about all of this is it is just about
transparency. It is about recognizing that the people in the States and
the local governments may actually have better information on the
ground about a lot of these issues than somebody sitting in Washington,
looking at some model or some report that someone has drawn up.
I will talk about my State of Texas, for example. The Texas Parks and
Wildlife service has developed over 8,000 wildlife management plans
covering over 30 million acres. I would probably tell you that those
people have some of the best available and commercial science on a lot
of the issues facing Texas probably a little bit more than maybe
somebody sitting in Washington, D.C., or some other State.
So one of the things that I am a little perplexed about is my
colleagues keep fighting the transparency. This President said he was
going to have one of the most transparent administrations in history,
but that has been far from the truth.
I would encourage my colleagues to defeat this amendment. It defeats
the whole purpose of the bill and the intention of letting the American
people know the facts.
If you go to a trial, you don't get to use only your facts. You have
to hear everybody's facts. Since this is a trial that determines
whether these species are in fact endangered or not endangered anymore,
we should be able to deal with the facts, but we can't deal with one
set of facts. We have to deal with all of the facts.
So if you want to hear all of the facts, defeat this amendment.
Mr. HOLT. Mr. Chairman, I ask the Chair the time remaining on each
side.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from New Jersey has 1\1/2\ minutes
remaining, and the gentleman from Washington has 2\1/2\ minutes
remaining.
Mr. HOLT. Mr. Chairman, I yield 45 seconds to the gentleman from
Oregon (Mr. DeFazio).
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I am bemused by this.
It is simple. It says:
The term ``best scientific and commercial data available''
includes all such data submitted by a State, tribal, or
county government.
That means all the data. That means if all the counties, States, and
tribes don't agree, you have conflicting best available data. That is
what we are saying. We want them to take all data into account, but you
can't deem that theirs is the best.
In the case of nitrification in the Columbia River, Oregon and
Washington disagree. They have competing science, but now, they would
have to weigh it equally. I have heard tribes say to save salmon and
delist them, you have to take all the dams out of the river. That
becomes the best available science, if submitted by a tribe?
What are you guys thinking? We want them to listen to everybody.
Everybody can submit something, but we don't then deem it to be the
best available data. That is nuts.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I am prepared to close, so
I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. HOLT. Mr. Chairman, my colleague from Oregon said it well: All
does not equal best.
The other side evidently is embarrassed by the language in the bill.
There are many problems with this bill, but this particular section has
some language that they should be embarrassed about, and so they are
saying what they wish the language said or what they want it to say.
The best scientific data includes all such data. It does not say we
will consider all data. It says all equals best. That cannot be true.
That should be removed from the bill. That is what this amendment does.
Decisions on whether or not a particular study or data set have
scientific merit with respect to an individual species listing should
be made in the context of peer-reviewed science, not because one State
wants one thing and one county wants another thing.
It should be based on the best scientific data. That is what this
amendment would ensure.
I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance
of my time.
First of all, Mr. Chairman, I am not embarrassed by this piece of
legislation. Let me walk through this and explain why this language
says what it says because I think our friends on the other side of the
aisle are leaving out a very important word when they are debating this
issue.
The language in question is the term ``best scientific and commerce
data available includes all such data submitted,'' and so forth.
They are arguing as if the word ``such'' was taken out, where it
would read ``scientific and commercial data available includes all
data.'' We didn't say ``all data.'' We said ``all such data.''
What does that mean? How does that relate? All such data that relates
to scientific and commercial data coming from the local communities--
what is wrong with that argument?
By the way, the agency still has discretion to use that data, but it
should be part of it because lacking having this language in the bill
means that the only data is what my friend from Oregon criticized when
we were discussing the wolves.
Mr. Chairman, I think this language is pretty straightforward. It
says ``all such data that relates to it, as developed by local
communities and tribes.'' That should be part of the transparency.
So I urge my colleagues to reject this amendment, and I yield back
the balance of my time.
The Acting CHAIR. The question is on the amendment offered by the
gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Holt).
The question was taken; and the Acting Chair announced that the noes
appeared to have it.
Mr. HOLT. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.
The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to clause 6 of rule XVIII, further
proceedings on the amendment offered by the gentleman from New Jersey
will be postponed.
Amendment No. 4 Offered by Mr. Duffy
The Acting CHAIR. It is now in order to consider amendment No. 4
printed in House Report 113-563.
Mr. DUFFY. Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk
The Acting CHAIR. The Clerk will designate the amendment.
The text of the amendment is as follows:
Page 4, line 22, strike ``and''.
Page 5, at line 4 strike the period and insert ``; and'',
and after line 4 insert the following:
``(7) any Federal funding used by a person or a
governmental or non-governmental entity in bringing a claim
in a covered suit.
The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to House Resolution 693, the gentleman
from Wisconsin (Mr. Duffy) and a Member opposed each will control 5
minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Wisconsin.
Mr. DUFFY. Mr. Chairman, I want to thank Chairman Hastings for all of
his work on this legislation.
I am from Wisconsin. I have the central to northern part of the
State. In my part of the State--and for the State as a whole--we value
our natural resources. We value our wildlife. We have people who love
to hunt, fish, bike, ski, and hike. It is part of our culture and our
community.
We have many organizations that work hard to promote conservation. We
have hunting groups, sportsmen groups, conservation organizations,
State and local DNR organizations. Many of them have come together to
protect the gray wolf population in Wisconsin, so much so that it has
become healthy, and the gray wolf has been taken off and delisted from
the Endangered Species Act.
However, not all organizations come at this with a pure heart. We
have some whose main purpose and priority is filing lawsuits and suing
the government under the Endangered Species Act. It is these sue-and-
settle tactics that don't advance the cause of preserving our
environment, and they aren't good for the American taxpayer.
What is more, many of these lawsuits are funded by way of Federal tax
dollars to support the litigation, so in essence, we are spending tens
of millions of dollars of hardworking Americans' tax dollars to sue
ourselves.
So I think it is important that we have transparency in government.
If an
[[Page H7020]]
organization is suing the Federal Government under the Endangered
Species Act and they are using Federal money, let's disclose it. Let's
all see it.
We might come together and say that is a good use of our Federal tax
dollars, or we might say that is outrageous that we should be funding
suits against ourselves.
This is a commonsense amendment. I would ask my colleagues to support
it.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Will the gentleman yield?
Mr. DUFFY. I yield to the gentleman.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. I thank the gentleman for yielding and
for bringing this issue to the floor. I think it adds very much to what
we are trying to do with this underlying legislation, which is adding
transparency to our efforts.
I support the gentleman's amendment.
Mr. DUFFY. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.
The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman from Oregon is recognized for 5
minutes.
Mr. DeFAZIO. I just wonder if the gentleman can name one piece of
litigation which was sponsored by Federal tax dollars, and I yield to
the gentleman.
Mr. DUFFY. Mr. Chairman, that is the purpose of my legislation. We
don't know.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Reclaiming my time, the gentleman can't name one
lawsuit, one organization using Federal tax dollars. I guess that is
probably because he is familiar with OMB Circular A-87 that says
neither a State, local government, or an Indian tribal government can
use money provided by the Federal Government for legal expenses for
prosecution of claims against the Federal Government.
Well, okay, that leaves a big hole. What about nonprofits? They get
Federal money. That would be OMB Circular A-122, ``Cost Principles for
Nonprofit Organizations,'' which says, ``Costs of legal, accounting,
and consultant services, and related costs, incurred in connection with
defense against Federal Government claims or appeals, antitrust suits,
or the prosecution of claims or appeals against the Federal Government,
are unallowable.''
So we are now going to have the agency chase a Chimera--that is,
something that has never happened and can't happen under law. They have
got to go out and spend a bunch of money trying to unearth it.
If the gentleman could just name one instance, then that might change
the argument, but he can't.
With that, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. DUFFY. Mr. Chairman, I would just note that money is fungible. To
the point that this is going to cost a lot of money, I would disagree.
All we are asking for is that if you receive Federal money and you
are suing the Federal Government, that you disclose it. You don't have
to go on a witch-hunt. You don't have to go find it.
If you receive these dollars and you are suing the Federal
Government, tell us. If the gentleman is correct, there won't be any
disclosure, but if what I suspect is true, there will be a lot of
disclosure, and the American people will see how their tax money is
being used to sue themselves.
Mr. Chairman, I would note in closing that good government is a
government that has transparency, and we should know how our tax
dollars are being used. This is not overburdensome. This is a simple
request that if you use hard-earned taxpayer money to sue the Federal
Government under the Endangered Species Act, the Federal taxpayers know
how their money is being spent.
This makes sense. It doesn't cost any money. It is not a hardship, so
let's stand together. Let's work together, and let's make sure we have
full knowledge in how this money is being used.
I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Chairman, unfortunately, the gentleman misstated
what his amendment does. It doesn't say that individuals filing
litigation under the Endangered Species Act must disclose whether or
not they receive any Federal funds and are using any Federal funds in
this case. It doesn't say that.
It says that Fish and Wildlife Service must determine. How is the
Fish and Wildlife Service going to determine whether or not someone
used Federal funds?
As he said, money is fungible. He is saying they may be violating the
circular that prohibits nonprofit organizations from doing this. They
may be violating the circular.
These are, of course, criminal offenses, that prohibit State, local,
and Indian tribal governments from using Federal money for such
litigation. He is saying that may be go going on, so then Fish and
Wildlife should just discover it themselves.
How is that going to work? It sends Fish and Wildlife on a mission
that it is not equipped to handle. They can't say: pretty please, tell
us.
If someone is violating the law, they are probably not going to
volunteer it to Fish and Wildlife.
{time} 1645
If you wanted to do this, you would have to write an amendment that
amends the Rules of Civil Procedure or whatever--I am not a lawyer--
that would require that these litigants disclose at the time of filing
their litigation. Saying Fish and Wildlife should find out after it has
been filed is absolutely absurd.
With that, I yield back the balance of my time.
The Acting CHAIR. The question is on the amendment offered by the
gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Duffy).
The amendment was agreed to.
Announcement by the Acting Chair
The Acting CHAIR. Pursuant to clause 6 of rule XVIII, proceedings
will now resume on those amendments printed in House Report 113-563 on
which further proceedings were postponed, in the following order:
Amendment No. 2 by Mr. DeFazio of Oregon.
Amendment No. 3 by Mr. Holt of New Jersey.
The Chair will reduce to 2 minutes the minimum time for any
electronic vote after the first vote in this series.
Amendment No. 2 Offered by Mr. DeFazio
The Acting CHAIR. The unfinished business is the demand for a
recorded vote on the amendment offered by the gentleman from Oregon
(Mr. DeFazio) on which further proceedings were postponed and on which
the noes prevailed by voice vote.
The Clerk will redesignate the amendment.
The Clerk redesignated the amendment.
Recorded Vote
The Acting CHAIR. A recorded vote has been demanded.
A recorded vote was ordered.
The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--ayes 188,
noes 227, not voting 17, as follows:
[Roll No. 460]
AYES--188
Barber
Barrow (GA)
Bass
Beatty
Becerra
Bera (CA)
Bishop (GA)
Bishop (NY)
Blumenauer
Bonamici
Brady (PA)
Braley (IA)
Brown (FL)
Brownley (CA)
Bustos
Butterfield
Capps
Capuano
Cardenas
Carney
Carson (IN)
Cartwright
Castor (FL)
Castro (TX)
Chu
Cicilline
Clark (MA)
Clarke (NY)
Clyburn
Cohen
Connolly
Cooper
Costa
Courtney
Crowley
Cuellar
Cummings
Davis (CA)
Davis, Danny
DeFazio
DeGette
Delaney
DeLauro
DelBene
Deutch
Dingell
Doggett
Doyle
Duckworth
Edwards
Ellison
Engel
Enyart
Eshoo
Esty
Farr
Fattah
Foster
Frankel (FL)
Fudge
Gabbard
Gallego
Garamendi
Grayson
Green, Al
Green, Gene
Grijalva
Gutierrez
Hahn
Hastings (FL)
Heck (WA)
Higgins
Himes
Hinojosa
Holt
Honda
Horsford
Hoyer
Huffman
Jackson Lee
Jeffries
Johnson (GA)
Johnson, E. B.
Kaptur
Keating
Kelly (IL)
Kennedy
Kildee
Kilmer
Kind
Kirkpatrick
Kuster
Langevin
Larsen (WA)
Larson (CT)
Lee (CA)
Levin
Lewis
Lipinski
Loebsack
Lofgren
Lowenthal
Lowey
Lujan Grisham (NM)
Lujan, Ben Ray (NM)
Lynch
Maffei
Maloney, Carolyn
Maloney, Sean
Matsui
McCarthy (NY)
McCollum
McDermott
McGovern
McIntyre
McNerney
Meeks
Meng
Michaud
Miller, George
Moore
Moran
Murphy (FL)
Nadler
Napolitano
Neal
Negrete McLeod
Nolan
O'Rourke
Owens
Pallone
Pascrell
Pastor (AZ)
Payne
Perlmutter
Peters (CA)
Peters (MI)
Pingree (ME)
Pocan
Polis
Price (NC)
Quigley
Rahall
Rangel
Richmond
Roybal-Allard
Ruiz
Ruppersberger
Rush
Ryan (OH)
[[Page H7021]]
Sanchez, Linda T.
Sanchez, Loretta
Sarbanes
Schakowsky
Schiff
Schneider
Schrader
Schwartz
Scott (VA)
Scott, David
Serrano
Sewell (AL)
Shea-Porter
Sherman
Sinema
Sires
Slaughter
Smith (WA)
Speier
Swalwell (CA)
Takano
Thompson (CA)
Thompson (MS)
Tierney
Titus
Tonko
Tsongas
Van Hollen
Vargas
Veasey
Vela
Velazquez
Visclosky
Wasserman Schultz
Waters
Welch
Wilson (FL)
Yarmuth
NOES--227
Aderholt
Amash
Amodei
Bachmann
Bachus
Barletta
Barr
Barton
Benishek
Bentivolio
Bilirakis
Bishop (UT)
Black
Blackburn
Boustany
Bridenstine
Brooks (AL)
Brooks (IN)
Broun (GA)
Buchanan
Bucshon
Burgess
Byrne
Calvert
Camp
Campbell
Cantor
Capito
Carter
Chabot
Chaffetz
Clawson (FL)
Coble
Coffman
Cole
Collins (GA)
Collins (NY)
Conaway
Cook
Cotton
Cramer
Crawford
Crenshaw
Culberson
Daines
Davis, Rodney
Denham
Dent
DeSantis
Duffy
Duncan (SC)
Duncan (TN)
Ellmers
Farenthold
Fincher
Fitzpatrick
Fleischmann
Fleming
Flores
Forbes
Fortenberry
Foxx
Franks (AZ)
Frelinghuysen
Gardner
Garrett
Gerlach
Gibbs
Gibson
Gingrey (GA)
Gohmert
Goodlatte
Gosar
Gowdy
Granger
Griffin (AR)
Griffith (VA)
Grimm
Guthrie
Hall
Hanna
Harper
Harris
Hartzler
Hastings (WA)
Heck (NV)
Hensarling
Herrera Beutler
Holding
Hudson
Huelskamp
Huizenga (MI)
Hultgren
Hunter
Hurt
Issa
Jenkins
Johnson (OH)
Johnson, Sam
Jolly
Jones
Jordan
Joyce
Kelly (PA)
King (IA)
King (NY)
Kingston
Kinzinger (IL)
Kline
Labrador
LaMalfa
Lamborn
Lance
Lankford
Latham
Latta
LoBiondo
Long
Lucas
Luetkemeyer
Lummis
Marchant
Marino
Massie
Matheson
McAllister
McCarthy (CA)
McCaul
McClintock
McHenry
McKeon
McKinley
McMorris Rodgers
Meadows
Meehan
Messer
Mica
Miller (FL)
Miller (MI)
Miller, Gary
Mullin
Mulvaney
Murphy (PA)
Neugebauer
Noem
Nugent
Nunes
Olson
Palazzo
Paulsen
Pearce
Perry
Peterson
Petri
Pittenger
Pitts
Poe (TX)
Posey
Price (GA)
Reed
Reichert
Renacci
Ribble
Rice (SC)
Rigell
Roby
Roe (TN)
Rogers (AL)
Rogers (KY)
Rogers (MI)
Rohrabacher
Rokita
Rooney
Roskam
Ross
Rothfus
Royce
Runyan
Ryan (WI)
Salmon
Sanford
Scalise
Schock
Schweikert
Scott, Austin
Sensenbrenner
Sessions
Shimkus
Shuster
Simpson
Smith (MO)
Smith (NE)
Smith (NJ)
Smith (TX)
Southerland
Stewart
Stivers
Stockman
Stutzman
Terry
Thompson (PA)
Thornberry
Tiberi
Tipton
Turner
Upton
Valadao
Wagner
Walberg
Walden
Walorski
Walz
Weber (TX)
Webster (FL)
Wenstrup
Westmoreland
Whitfield
Williams
Wilson (SC)
Wittman
Wolf
Womack
Woodall
Yoder
Yoho
Young (AK)
Young (IN)
NOT VOTING--17
Brady (TX)
Cassidy
Clay
Cleaver
Conyers
DesJarlais
Diaz-Balart
Garcia
Graves (GA)
Graves (MO)
Hanabusa
Israel
Nunnelee
Pelosi
Pompeo
Ros-Lehtinen
Waxman
{time} 1712
Messrs. WALDEN, MULLIN, COTTON, DUNCAN of South Carolina, DUNCAN of
Tennessee, WESTMORELAND, and MATHESON changed their vote from ``aye''
to ``no.''
Ms. CLARKE of New York changed her vote from ``no'' to ``aye.''
So the amendment was rejected.
The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
Stated for:
Mr. WAXMAN. Mr. Speaker, on rollcall No. 460, had I been present, I
would have voted ``yes.''
Amendment No. 3 Offered by Mr. Holt
The Acting CHAIR. The unfinished business is the request for a
recorded vote on amendment No. 3 printed in House Report 113-563
offered by the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Holt) on which further
proceedings were postponed and on which the noes prevailed by voice
vote.
The Clerk will redesignate the amendment.
The Clerk redesignated the amendment.
Recorded Vote
The Acting CHAIR. A recorded vote has been demanded.
A recorded vote was ordered.
The Acting CHAIR. This is a 2-minute vote.
The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--ayes 204,
noes 215, not voting 13, as follows:
[Roll No. 461]
AYES--204
Barber
Barrow (GA)
Bass
Beatty
Becerra
Bera (CA)
Bishop (GA)
Bishop (NY)
Blumenauer
Bonamici
Brady (PA)
Braley (IA)
Brown (FL)
Brownley (CA)
Buchanan
Bustos
Butterfield
Capps
Capuano
Cardenas
Carney
Carson (IN)
Cartwright
Castor (FL)
Castro (TX)
Chu
Cicilline
Clark (MA)
Clarke (NY)
Clyburn
Cohen
Connolly
Conyers
Cooper
Costa
Courtney
Crowley
Cuellar
Cummings
Davis (CA)
Davis, Danny
DeFazio
DeGette
Delaney
DeLauro
DelBene
Deutch
Dingell
Doggett
Doyle
Duckworth
Edwards
Ellison
Engel
Enyart
Eshoo
Esty
Farr
Fattah
Fitzpatrick
Foster
Frankel (FL)
Fudge
Gabbard
Gallego
Garamendi
Garcia
Gibson
Grayson
Green, Al
Green, Gene
Grijalva
Grimm
Gutierrez
Hahn
Hall
Hanna
Hastings (FL)
Heck (WA)
Higgins
Himes
Hinojosa
Holt
Honda
Horsford
Hoyer
Huffman
Israel
Jackson Lee
Jeffries
Johnson (GA)
Johnson, E. B.
Kaptur
Keating
Kelly (IL)
Kennedy
Kildee
Kilmer
Kind
Kirkpatrick
Kuster
Langevin
Larsen (WA)
Larson (CT)
Lee (CA)
Levin
Lewis
Lipinski
LoBiondo
Loebsack
Lofgren
Lowenthal
Lowey
Lujan Grisham (NM)
Lujan, Ben Ray (NM)
Lynch
Maffei
Maloney, Carolyn
Maloney, Sean
Matsui
McCarthy (NY)
McCollum
McDermott
McGovern
McIntyre
McNerney
Meeks
Meng
Michaud
Miller, George
Moore
Moran
Murphy (FL)
Nadler
Napolitano
Neal
Negrete McLeod
Nolan
O'Rourke
Owens
Pallone
Pascrell
Pastor (AZ)
Paulsen
Payne
Pelosi
Perlmutter
Peters (CA)
Peters (MI)
Pingree (ME)
Pocan
Polis
Price (NC)
Quigley
Rahall
Rangel
Richmond
Roybal-Allard
Ruiz
Ruppersberger
Rush
Ryan (OH)
Sanchez, Linda T.
Sanchez, Loretta
Sarbanes
Schakowsky
Schiff
Schneider
Schrader
Schwartz
Scott (VA)
Scott, David
Serrano
Sewell (AL)
Shea-Porter
Sherman
Sinema
Sires
Slaughter
Smith (NJ)
Smith (WA)
Speier
Swalwell (CA)
Takano
Thompson (CA)
Thompson (MS)
Tierney
Titus
Tonko
Tsongas
Van Hollen
Vargas
Veasey
Vela
Velazquez
Visclosky
Walz
Wasserman Schultz
Waters
Waxman
Welch
Whitfield
Wilson (FL)
Yarmuth
NOES--215
Aderholt
Amash
Amodei
Bachmann
Bachus
Barletta
Barr
Barton
Benishek
Bentivolio
Bilirakis
Bishop (UT)
Black
Blackburn
Boustany
Bridenstine
Brooks (AL)
Brooks (IN)
Broun (GA)
Bucshon
Burgess
Byrne
Calvert
Camp
Campbell
Cantor
Capito
Carter
Chabot
Chaffetz
Clawson (FL)
Coble
Coffman
Cole
Collins (GA)
Collins (NY)
Conaway
Cook
Cotton
Cramer
Crawford
Crenshaw
Culberson
Daines
Davis, Rodney
Denham
Dent
DeSantis
Duffy
Duncan (SC)
Duncan (TN)
Ellmers
Farenthold
Fincher
Fleischmann
Fleming
Flores
Forbes
Fortenberry
Foxx
Franks (AZ)
Frelinghuysen
Gardner
Garrett
Gerlach
Gibbs
Gingrey (GA)
Gohmert
Goodlatte
Gosar
Gowdy
Graves (GA)
Griffin (AR)
Griffith (VA)
Guthrie
Harper
Harris
Hartzler
Hastings (WA)
Heck (NV)
Hensarling
Herrera Beutler
Holding
Hudson
Huelskamp
Huizenga (MI)
Hultgren
Hunter
Hurt
Issa
Jenkins
Johnson (OH)
Johnson, Sam
Jolly
Jones
Jordan
Joyce
Kelly (PA)
King (IA)
King (NY)
Kingston
Kinzinger (IL)
Kline
Labrador
LaMalfa
Lamborn
Lance
Lankford
Latham
Latta
Long
Lucas
Luetkemeyer
Lummis
Marchant
Marino
Massie
Matheson
McAllister
McCarthy (CA)
McCaul
McClintock
McHenry
McKeon
McKinley
McMorris Rodgers
Meadows
Meehan
Messer
Mica
Miller (FL)
Miller (MI)
Miller, Gary
Mullin
Mulvaney
Murphy (PA)
Neugebauer
Noem
Nugent
Nunes
Olson
Palazzo
Pearce
Perry
Peterson
Petri
Pittenger
Pitts
Poe (TX)
Posey
Price (GA)
Reed
Reichert
Renacci
Ribble
Rice (SC)
Rigell
Roby
Roe (TN)
Rogers (AL)
Rogers (KY)
Rogers (MI)
Rohrabacher
Rokita
Rooney
Roskam
Ross
Rothfus
Royce
Runyan
Ryan (WI)
Salmon
Sanford
Scalise
Schock
Schweikert
Scott, Austin
Sensenbrenner
Sessions
Shimkus
Shuster
Simpson
Smith (MO)
Smith (NE)
Smith (TX)
Southerland
Stewart
Stockman
Stutzman
Terry
Thompson (PA)
Thornberry
Tiberi
Tipton
Turner
Upton
Valadao
Wagner
Walberg
Walden
Walorski
Weber (TX)
Webster (FL)
Wenstrup
Westmoreland
Williams
Wilson (SC)
Wittman
Wolf
Womack
Woodall
Yoder
Yoho
Young (AK)
Young (IN)
[[Page H7022]]
NOT VOTING--13
Brady (TX)
Cassidy
Clay
Cleaver
DesJarlais
Diaz-Balart
Granger
Graves (MO)
Hanabusa
Nunnelee
Pompeo
Ros-Lehtinen
Stivers
Announcement by the Acting Chair
The Acting CHAIR (during the vote). There are 2 minutes remaining.
{time} 1717
So the amendment was rejected.
The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
The Acting CHAIR (Mr. Womack). The question is on the amendment in
the nature of a substitute, as amended.
The amendment was agreed to.
The Acting CHAIR. Under the rule, the Committee rises.
Accordingly, the Committee rose; and the Speaker pro tempore (Mr. Poe
of Texas) having assumed the chair, Mr. Womack, Acting Chair of the
Committee of the Whole House on the state of the Union, reported that
that Committee, having had under consideration the bill (H.R. 4315) to
amend the Endangered Species Act of 1973 to require publication on the
Internet of the basis for determinations that species are endangered
species or threatened species, and for other purposes, and, pursuant to
House Resolution 693, he reported the bill back to the House with an
amendment adopted in the Committee of the Whole.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the rule, the previous question is
ordered.
Is a separate vote demanded on any amendment to the amendment
reported from the Committee of the Whole?
If not, the question is on the amendment in the nature of a
substitute, as amended.
The amendment was agreed to.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the engrossment and third
reading of the bill.
The bill was ordered to be engrossed and read a third time, and was
read the third time.
Motion to Recommit
Mrs. KIRKPATRICK. Mr. Speaker, I have a motion at the desk.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is the gentlewoman opposed to the bill?
Mrs. KIRKPATRICK. I am opposed to it in its current form.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Clerk will report the motion to
recommit.
The Clerk read as follows:
Mrs. Kirkpatrick moves to recommit the bill H.R. 4315 to
the Committee on Natural Resources with instructions to
report the same back to the House forthwith with the
following amendment:
SEC. __. CONSULTATION WITH INDIAN TRIBES.
(a) Requirement.--The Endangered Species Act of 1973 (16
U.S.C. 1531 et seq.) is amended by adding at the end the
following:
``SEC. 17. FULFILLMENT OF FEDERAL TRUST RESPONSIBILITY WITH
RESPECT TO INDIAN TRIBES.
``In carrying out this Act, the Secretary shall consult
with affected Indian tribes to ensure that the Federal trust
responsibility with respect to Indian tribes is fulfilled.''.
(b) Clerical Amendment.--The table of contents in the first
section of such Act is amended by adding at the end the
following:
``Sec. 17. Fulfillment of Federal trust responsibility with respect to
Indian tribes.''.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that
the reading be dispensed with.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentleman from Washington?
Mrs. KIRKPATRICK. Yes, I object.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Objection is heard.
The Clerk will read.
The Clerk continued to read.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentlewoman from Arizona is recognized
for 5 minutes.
Mrs. KIRKPATRICK. Mr. Speaker, this is the final amendment to the
bill. It will not kill the bill, nor send it back to committee. If it
is adopted, the bill will immediately proceed to final passage.
Mr. Speaker, I am honored to represent a district that has more
Native American tribes that own tribal land than any other district in
the country. I have 12 tribes in my district, including the Navajo
nation, where the people speak a beautiful language called Dine. So I
am going to start my speech tonight in Dine.
(English translation of the statement made in Dine is as follows:)
Hello, my esteemed elders, my relatives, and my Navajo friends. It's
your Congresswoman speaking, Ann Kirkpatrick, and I work for you.
YA'ATEEH SHI' NANTAI SHI'KE SHI'DINE' ADO. AHE'HEE. NI'HI'
CONGRESSWOMAN ANIH, ANN KIRKPATRICK. ADO NI'HA NASHNISH.
Mr. Speaker, I grew up on tribal land, on the White Mountain Apache
where my father ran the general store, and my mother was a
schoolteacher. My father spoke Apache. My first words were in Apache.
And it is important that we know that the language of our Native
American tribes addresses their spirituality, their culture, and their
land.
What I want to talk about tonight is tribal sovereignty, because all
of our tribes have their own culture, their own history, and their own
language, but what they share is a deep respect for tribal sovereignty.
What that means is that they are entitled, they have a right to
government-to-government negotiations.
So what I want my colleagues to do tonight is do not turn your backs
on our Native American people. Do not turn your backs and shut the door
to our tribes. I urge you to push for the inclusion and the respect of
tribal sovereignty in this legislation and that there be abundant
government-to-government negotiations. Our tribes deserve that. They
have that right. Let's stand with our Native Americans and make sure
that we do everything possible to strengthen those government-to-
government relationships, conversations, negotiations, tribal
sovereignty.
I will close my remarks tonight as I began, in Dine.
(English translation of the statement made in Dine is as follows:)
Okay. Let's move forward. Thank you.
HAGONEE, AHE'HEE!
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentlewoman from Arizona will provide
the Clerk a translation of her remarks.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the
motion to recommit.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Washington is recognized
for 5 minutes.
Mr. HASTINGS of Washington. Mr. Speaker, of course this body should
recognize the treaties that we have made with our Native American
neighbors. And I say that with the privilege of representing a central
Washington district that has two Indian tribes and reservations within
my district. So that goes without saying.
However, we have had on this floor I don't know how many motions to
recommit. And sometimes I wonder exactly what these motions to recommit
are trying to do, other than maybe just make a political point. And I
have to say, Mr. Speaker, that is probably so true with this motion to
recommit.
Now why do I say that? I say that because this motion to recommit
implies that tribal members should be part of the discussion. Well, of
course they should. But apparently my friend from Arizona did not read
the bill because section 3 in the bill says very specifically that
consultation should be made with locals, including tribes.
And to add insult to injury, Mr. Speaker, the last amendment that was
offered, offered by my friend from New Jersey (Mr. Holt), would take
out the section that says tribal respect ought to be in the underlying
bill, and the gentlewoman from Arizona voted for it. Now she comes down
to the floor and says we ought to insert into the bill something for
tribal authorities that we already had in the bill.
I have no idea, Mr. Speaker, where these motions to recommit are
going, but I will say this. This bill deals with transparency in the
Federal Government to the citizens of the United States. That ought to
be number one on our minds, and that is what this bill does.
I urge my colleagues to vote against the motion to recommit and for
the underlying bill.
I yield back the balance of my time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Without objection, the previous question is
ordered on the motion to recommit.
There was no objection.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion to recommit.
The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that
the noes appeared to have it.
Recorded Vote
Mrs. KIRKPATRICK. Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.
[[Page H7023]]
A recorded vote was ordered.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 8 and clause 9 of rule
XX, this 5-minute vote on the motion to recommit will be followed by 5-
minute votes on the passage of the bill, if ordered; the motion to
suspend the rules and pass H.R. 4809; and agreeing to the Speaker's
approval of the Journal, if ordered.
The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--ayes 197,
noes 225, not voting 10, as follows:
[Roll No. 462]
AYES--197
Barber
Barrow (GA)
Bass
Beatty
Becerra
Bera (CA)
Bishop (GA)
Bishop (NY)
Blumenauer
Bonamici
Brady (PA)
Braley (IA)
Brown (FL)
Brownley (CA)
Bustos
Butterfield
Capps
Capuano
Cardenas
Carney
Carson (IN)
Cartwright
Castor (FL)
Castro (TX)
Chu
Cicilline
Clark (MA)
Clarke (NY)
Clyburn
Cohen
Connolly
Conyers
Cooper
Costa
Courtney
Crowley
Cuellar
Cummings
Davis (CA)
Davis, Danny
DeFazio
DeGette
Delaney
DeLauro
DelBene
Deutch
Dingell
Doggett
Doyle
Duckworth
Edwards
Ellison
Engel
Enyart
Eshoo
Esty
Farr
Fattah
Foster
Frankel (FL)
Fudge
Gabbard
Gallego
Garamendi
Garcia
Grayson
Green, Al
Green, Gene
Grijalva
Gutierrez
Hahn
Hastings (FL)
Heck (WA)
Higgins
Himes
Hinojosa
Holt
Honda
Horsford
Hoyer
Huffman
Israel
Jackson Lee
Jeffries
Johnson (GA)
Johnson, E. B.
Jones
Kaptur
Keating
Kelly (IL)
Kennedy
Kildee
Kilmer
Kind
Kirkpatrick
Kuster
Langevin
Larsen (WA)
Larson (CT)
Lee (CA)
Levin
Lewis
Lipinski
Loebsack
Lofgren
Lowenthal
Lowey
Lujan Grisham (NM)
Lujan, Ben Ray (NM)
Lynch
Maffei
Maloney, Carolyn
Maloney, Sean
Matheson
Matsui
McCarthy (NY)
McCollum
McDermott
McGovern
McIntyre
McNerney
Meeks
Meng
Michaud
Miller, George
Moore
Moran
Murphy (FL)
Nadler
Napolitano
Neal
Negrete McLeod
Nolan
O'Rourke
Owens
Pallone
Pascrell
Pastor (AZ)
Payne
Pelosi
Perlmutter
Peters (CA)
Peters (MI)
Peterson
Pingree (ME)
Pocan
Polis
Price (NC)
Quigley
Rahall
Rangel
Richmond
Roybal-Allard
Ruiz
Ruppersberger
Rush
Ryan (OH)
Sanchez, Linda T.
Sanchez, Loretta
Sarbanes
Schakowsky
Schiff
Schneider
Schrader
Schwartz
Scott (VA)
Scott, David
Serrano
Sewell (AL)
Shea-Porter
Sherman
Sinema
Sires
Slaughter
Smith (WA)
Speier
Swalwell (CA)
Takano
Thompson (CA)
Thompson (MS)
Tierney
Titus
Tonko
Tsongas
Van Hollen
Vargas
Veasey
Vela
Velazquez
Visclosky
Walz
Wasserman Schultz
Waters
Waxman
Welch
Wilson (FL)
Yarmuth
NOES--225
Aderholt
Amash
Amodei
Bachmann
Bachus
Barletta
Barr
Barton
Benishek
Bentivolio
Bilirakis
Bishop (UT)
Black
Blackburn
Boustany
Bridenstine
Brooks (AL)
Brooks (IN)
Broun (GA)
Buchanan
Bucshon
Burgess
Byrne
Calvert
Camp
Campbell
Cantor
Capito
Carter
Chabot
Chaffetz
Clawson (FL)
Coble
Coffman
Cole
Collins (GA)
Collins (NY)
Conaway
Cook
Cotton
Cramer
Crawford
Crenshaw
Culberson
Daines
Davis, Rodney
Denham
Dent
DeSantis
Diaz-Balart
Duffy
Duncan (SC)
Duncan (TN)
Ellmers
Farenthold
Fincher
Fitzpatrick
Fleischmann
Fleming
Flores
Forbes
Fortenberry
Foxx
Franks (AZ)
Frelinghuysen
Gardner
Garrett
Gerlach
Gibbs
Gibson
Gingrey (GA)
Gohmert
Goodlatte
Gosar
Gowdy
Granger
Graves (GA)
Griffin (AR)
Griffith (VA)
Grimm
Guthrie
Hall
Hanna
Harper
Harris
Hartzler
Hastings (WA)
Heck (NV)
Hensarling
Herrera Beutler
Holding
Hudson
Huelskamp
Huizenga (MI)
Hultgren
Hunter
Hurt
Issa
Jenkins
Johnson (OH)
Johnson, Sam
Jolly
Jordan
Joyce
Kelly (PA)
King (IA)
King (NY)
Kingston
Kinzinger (IL)
Kline
Labrador
LaMalfa
Lamborn
Lance
Lankford
Latham
Latta
LoBiondo
Long
Lucas
Luetkemeyer
Lummis
Marchant
Marino
Massie
McAllister
McCarthy (CA)
McCaul
McClintock
McHenry
McKeon
McKinley
McMorris Rodgers
Meadows
Meehan
Messer
Mica
Miller (FL)
Miller (MI)
Miller, Gary
Mullin
Mulvaney
Murphy (PA)
Neugebauer
Noem
Nugent
Nunes
Olson
Palazzo
Paulsen
Pearce
Perry
Petri
Pittenger
Pitts
Poe (TX)
Posey
Price (GA)
Reed
Reichert
Renacci
Ribble
Rice (SC)
Rigell
Roby
Roe (TN)
Rogers (AL)
Rogers (MI)
Rohrabacher
Rokita
Rooney
Ros-Lehtinen
Roskam
Ross
Rothfus
Royce
Runyan
Ryan (WI)
Salmon
Sanford
Scalise
Schock
Schweikert
Scott, Austin
Sensenbrenner
Sessions
Shimkus
Shuster
Simpson
Smith (MO)
Smith (NE)
Smith (NJ)
Smith (TX)
Southerland
Stewart
Stivers
Stockman
Stutzman
Terry
Thompson (PA)
Thornberry
Tiberi
Tipton
Turner
Upton
Valadao
Wagner
Walberg
Walden
Walorski
Weber (TX)
Webster (FL)
Wenstrup
Westmoreland
Whitfield
Williams
Wilson (SC)
Wittman
Wolf
Womack
Woodall
Yoder
Yoho
Young (AK)
Young (IN)
NOT VOTING--10
Brady (TX)
Cassidy
Clay
Cleaver
DesJarlais
Graves (MO)
Hanabusa
Nunnelee
Pompeo
Rogers (KY)
Announcement by the Speaker Pro Tempore
The SPEAKER pro tempore (during the vote). There are 2 minutes
remaining.
{time} 1734
So the motion to recommit was rejected.
The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the passage of the bill.
The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that
the ayes appeared to have it.
Recorded Vote
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.
A recorded vote was ordered.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. This is a 5-minute vote.
The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--ayes 233,
noes 190, not voting 9, as follows:
[Roll No. 463]
AYES--233
Aderholt
Amash
Amodei
Bachmann
Bachus
Barletta
Barr
Barrow (GA)
Barton
Benishek
Bentivolio
Bilirakis
Bishop (GA)
Bishop (UT)
Black
Blackburn
Boustany
Bridenstine
Brooks (AL)
Brooks (IN)
Broun (GA)
Bucshon
Burgess
Byrne
Calvert
Camp
Campbell
Cantor
Capito
Carter
Chabot
Chaffetz
Clawson (FL)
Coble
Coffman
Cole
Collins (GA)
Collins (NY)
Conaway
Cook
Costa
Cotton
Cramer
Crawford
Crenshaw
Cuellar
Culberson
Daines
Davis, Rodney
Denham
Dent
DeSantis
Diaz-Balart
Duffy
Duncan (SC)
Duncan (TN)
Ellmers
Enyart
Farenthold
Fincher
Fleischmann
Fleming
Flores
Forbes
Fortenberry
Foxx
Franks (AZ)
Frelinghuysen
Garamendi
Gardner
Garrett
Gerlach
Gibbs
Gingrey (GA)
Gohmert
Goodlatte
Gosar
Gowdy
Granger
Graves (GA)
Green, Gene
Griffin (AR)
Griffith (VA)
Guthrie
Hall
Harper
Harris
Hartzler
Hastings (WA)
Heck (NV)
Hensarling
Herrera Beutler
Holding
Horsford
Hudson
Huelskamp
Huizenga (MI)
Hultgren
Hunter
Hurt
Issa
Jenkins
Johnson (OH)
Johnson, Sam
Jolly
Jones
Jordan
Joyce
Kelly (PA)
King (IA)
King (NY)
Kingston
Kinzinger (IL)
Kline
Labrador
LaMalfa
Lamborn
Lankford
Latham
Latta
Long
Lucas
Luetkemeyer
Lummis
Marchant
Marino
Massie
Matheson
McAllister
McCarthy (CA)
McCaul
McClintock
McHenry
McIntyre
McKeon
McKinley
McMorris Rodgers
Meadows
Meehan
Messer
Mica
Miller (FL)
Miller (MI)
Miller, Gary
Mullin
Mulvaney
Murphy (PA)
Neugebauer
Noem
Nugent
Nunes
Olson
Palazzo
Paulsen
Pearce
Perry
Peters (MI)
Peterson
Petri
Pittenger
Pitts
Poe (TX)
Posey
Price (GA)
Reed
Reichert
Renacci
Ribble
Rice (SC)
Rigell
Roby
Roe (TN)
Rogers (AL)
Rogers (KY)
Rogers (MI)
Rohrabacher
Rokita
Rooney
Ros-Lehtinen
Roskam
Ross
Rothfus
Royce
Runyan
Ryan (WI)
Salmon
Sanford
Scalise
Schock
Schrader
Schweikert
Scott, Austin
Sensenbrenner
Sessions
Shimkus
Shuster
Simpson
Smith (MO)
Smith (NE)
Smith (TX)
Southerland
Stewart
Stivers
Stockman
Stutzman
Terry
Thompson (PA)
Thornberry
Tiberi
Tipton
Turner
Upton
Valadao
Vela
Wagner
Walberg
Walden
Walorski
Weber (TX)
Webster (FL)
Wenstrup
Westmoreland
Whitfield
Williams
Wilson (SC)
Wittman
Wolf
Womack
Woodall
Yoder
Yoho
Young (AK)
Young (IN)
NOES--190
Barber
Bass
Beatty
Becerra
Bera (CA)
Bishop (NY)
Blumenauer
Bonamici
Brady (PA)
Braley (IA)
Brown (FL)
Brownley (CA)
Buchanan
Bustos
Butterfield
Capps
Capuano
Cardenas
Carney
Carson (IN)
Cartwright
Castor (FL)
Castro (TX)
Chu
Cicilline
Clark (MA)
Clarke (NY)
Clyburn
Cohen
Connolly
Conyers
Cooper
Courtney
Crowley
Cummings
Davis (CA)
[[Page H7024]]
Davis, Danny
DeFazio
DeGette
Delaney
DeLauro
DelBene
Deutch
Dingell
Doggett
Doyle
Duckworth
Edwards
Ellison
Engel
Eshoo
Esty
Farr
Fattah
Fitzpatrick
Foster
Frankel (FL)
Fudge
Gabbard
Gallego
Garcia
Gibson
Grayson
Green, Al
Grijalva
Grimm
Gutierrez
Hahn
Hanna
Hastings (FL)
Heck (WA)
Higgins
Himes
Hinojosa
Holt
Honda
Hoyer
Huffman
Israel
Jackson Lee
Jeffries
Johnson (GA)
Johnson, E. B.
Kaptur
Keating
Kelly (IL)
Kennedy
Kildee
Kilmer
Kind
Kirkpatrick
Kuster
Lance
Langevin
Larsen (WA)
Larson (CT)
Lee (CA)
Levin
Lewis
Lipinski
LoBiondo
Loebsack
Lofgren
Lowenthal
Lowey
Lujan Grisham (NM)
Lujan, Ben Ray (NM)
Lynch
Maffei
Maloney, Carolyn
Maloney, Sean
Matsui
McCarthy (NY)
McCollum
McDermott
McGovern
McNerney
Meeks
Meng
Michaud
Miller, George
Moore
Moran
Murphy (FL)
Nadler
Napolitano
Neal
Negrete McLeod
Nolan
O'Rourke
Owens
Pallone
Pascrell
Pastor (AZ)
Payne
Pelosi
Perlmutter
Peters (CA)
Pingree (ME)
Pocan
Polis
Price (NC)
Quigley
Rahall
Rangel
Richmond
Roybal-Allard
Ruiz
Ruppersberger
Rush
Ryan (OH)
Sanchez, Linda T.
Sanchez, Loretta
Sarbanes
Schakowsky
Schiff
Schneider
Schwartz
Scott (VA)
Scott, David
Serrano
Sewell (AL)
Shea-Porter
Sherman
Sinema
Sires
Slaughter
Smith (NJ)
Smith (WA)
Speier
Swalwell (CA)
Takano
Thompson (CA)
Thompson (MS)
Tierney
Titus
Tonko
Tsongas
Van Hollen
Vargas
Veasey
Velazquez
Visclosky
Walz
Wasserman Schultz
Waters
Waxman
Welch
Wilson (FL)
Yarmuth
NOT VOTING--9
Brady (TX)
Cassidy
Clay
Cleaver
DesJarlais
Graves (MO)
Hanabusa
Nunnelee
Pompeo
Announcement by the Speaker Pro Tempore
The SPEAKER pro tempore (during the vote). There are 2 minutes
remaining.
{time} 1741
So the bill was passed.
The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.
Stated against:
Mr. HORSFORD. Mr. Speaker, during rollcall vote No. 463 on H.R. 4315,
I mistakenly recorded my vote as ``yes'' when I should have voted
``no.''
____________________