[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 34 (Friday, February 27, 2015)]
[House]
[Pages H1485-H1492]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




   MOTION TO INSTRUCT CONFEREES ON H.R. 240, DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND 
                   SECURITY APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 2015

  Ms. ROYBAL-ALLARD. Madam Speaker, I offer a motion to instruct.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Clerk will report the motion.
  The Clerk read as follows:

       Ms. Roybal-Allard moves that the managers on the part of 
     the House at the conference on the disagreeing votes of the 
     two Houses on the bill H.R. 240 be instructed to recede from 
     disagreement with the Senate amendment.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 7 of rule XXII, the 
gentlewoman from California (Ms. Roybal-Allard) and the gentleman from 
Texas (Mr. Carter) each will control 30 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentlewoman from California.

                              {time}  1500

  Ms. ROYBAL-ALLARD. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume.
  Madam Speaker, my motion would instruct the conferees to recede to 
the Senate position, which is the responsible position of providing a 
full-year funding for the Homeland Security Department.
  Secretary Johnson has warned over and over again that the Republican 
leadership's refusal to allow a vote on a clean bipartisan funding 
bill, such as the one sent to this House by the Republican-led Senate, 
is threatening the national security of our country. Without a full-
year bill, the Secretary tells us that he is unable to move forward on 
key Homeland Security priorities, including new investments in border 
security technology, more aggressive ICE investigations related to 
transnational criminal organizations that engage in drug and human 
smuggling and human trafficking, enhanced preparedness for responding 
to surges in illegal migration such as the one experienced last summer, 
acquisition of the Coast Guard's eighth National Security Cutter, and 
the construction of the National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility in 
Manhattan, Kansas, both of which could potentially be delayed and lead 
to associated higher costs.
  Also at risk are the badly needed security upgrades at the White 
House complex and the issuing of State and local terrorism prevention 
and response grants so critical to supporting our local first 
responders. These are just a few of the negative consequences of not 
fully funding our Department of Homeland Security.
  Madam Speaker, nothing can be gained by another stopgap funding 
measure, but much can be lost. We should not allow ourselves or the 
American people to be fooled into thinking that the House can continue 
to delay resolving this issue without undermining the national security 
of our Nation, or that the Department of Homeland Security has been 
doing just fine under the continuing resolution and can operate 
effectively under the uncertainty of a continuing resolution for even 
another day, much less 3 more weeks.
  The dire consequences of not funding the Department of Homeland 
Security are not the made-up warnings of Democrats. They are the 
warnings of the Secretary of Homeland Security and the heads of his 
agencies.
  Let me again read a portion of a letter sent by Secretary Johnson to 
the bipartisan leadership of the House and Senate regarding the dangers 
of either a funding lapse or another short-term continuing resolution:

       A mere extension of a continuing resolution has many of the 
     same negative impacts

[[Page H1486]]

     of a shutdown. It exacerbates the uncertainty for my 
     workforce and puts us back in the same position on the brink 
     of a shutdown just days from now.

  The Secretary ends his letter by saying: ``The American people are 
counting on us.'' Again, Madam Speaker, the American people are indeed 
counting on us, and so far, the House Republican leadership has let 
them down.
  This stopgap funding measure does not fully address our national 
security needs. It simply represents the complete and utter abdication 
of our responsibility as Members of Congress to protect the American 
people and our country. The Senate has acted in the best interests of 
our Nation and sent this House a bipartisan, bicameral agreement on 
funding for the Department of Homeland Security.
  Madam Speaker, our enemies aren't waiting around while the Republican 
leadership continues to delay a full-year funding for the Department of 
Homeland Security or for Congress to go to conference in the hope that 
some time in the future we may have an agreement.
  Let the House, like the Senate, do the right thing and send this bill 
to the President. I urge my colleagues to vote for this motion to 
instruct conferees to bring back a clean, full-year, bipartisan funding 
bill for this Nation's homeland security.
  Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. CARTER of Texas. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume.
  Madam Speaker, I rise in opposition to the motion to instruct 
conferees. As the House and Senate come together to find a path forward 
on funding the Department of Homeland Security, we must reconcile our 
profound differences over how to handle the President's executive 
actions. But the minority should keep this in mind as we go to 
conference: the majority of American citizens oppose the President's 
actions on immigration, and they have asked us to fight those actions.
  The House has acted decisively to fulfill that mandate. Six weeks 
ago, when the House approved a bill funding the Department of Homeland 
Security until the end of the fiscal year, the House also by large 
margins approved six amendments to stop the President's far-reaching 
actions.
  The President himself has said--no fewer than 22 times--that he does 
not have the authority to change our immigration laws unilaterally. Now 
the courts have weighed in, saying that no law has given the President 
the power to make these sweeping changes to our immigration policies. 
The evidence is overwhelming on this side of the debate. Now, we can 
vote again, but the outcome will be the same. The American people have 
spoken. We must stand up against the administration's overreach on 
immigration.
  While it is clear the President will not fulfill or act within the 
bounds of the law, we in Congress are here to defend our Constitution, 
to provide those checks and balances that our Founding Fathers put into 
place to ensure the President does not act like a king.
  Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to join me in opposing this 
motion to instruct, and I reserve the balance of my time.
  Ms. ROYBAL-ALLARD. Madam Speaker, how much time is remaining?
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentlewoman from California has 25 
minutes remaining.
  Ms. ROYBAL-ALLARD. Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the 
gentlewoman from New York (Mrs. Lowey), the ranking member on the full 
Appropriations Committee.
  Mrs. LOWEY. Madam Speaker, I rise in support of the motion to 
instruct conferees to agree to a clean funding bill for the Department 
of Homeland Security.
  Democratic and Republican negotiators reached a deal on 2015 Homeland 
Security funding levels and related policy issues in December. The 
Republican leadership made the political calculation to hold this 
funding hostage to ideological policy riders reversing the President's 
executive actions on immigration.
  Having failed to extort these policy concessions, the Senate has done 
the right thing and moved forward to pass a clean Homeland Security 
funding bill that does not include poison pill immigration riders. Yet 
House leadership continues to dither, keeping alive the threat of a 
shutdown affecting the agencies that protect our ports, borders, 
aviation systems, communities, and more.
  This motion to instruct would make clear the will of the House is for 
a clean full-year Homeland Security funding bill. This motion rejects 
spending another 3 weeks failing to give our critical agency the budget 
certainty it needs to hire employees, invest in new equipment and 
technologies, and provide preparedness grants on which our communities 
rely.
  A $40 billion Cabinet-level department must be able to plan more than 
3 weeks in advance and must not be forced to rely on outdated funding 
levels or policies for 1 day longer than they already have.
  Madam Speaker, enough is enough. We know that the Senate cannot and 
will not pass a bill that irresponsibly ties Homeland Security funding 
to immigration policy. We know that the President would never sign such 
a bill into law.
  This charade is wreaking havoc on some of the most important agencies 
in our Federal Government. It is time, my colleagues, it is time, my 
friends, to move on, and the way to do that is through a clean, full-
year 2015 bipartisan Homeland Security funding bill that we negotiated, 
Democrats and Republicans, House and Senate. Let's do it.
  Mr. CARTER of Texas. Madam Speaker, at this time, I would like to 
yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Jolly), my friend.
  Mr. JOLLY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
  Madam Speaker, I am a new member of the Appropriations Committee. I 
fully understand and respect the significant place that this committee 
sits in, Republicans and Democrats, to keep the government funded. I 
know that. I think the first responsibility of Congress is to keep the 
government open. But I take great reservation to my colleague's 
suggestion that somehow this is an abdication of our constitutional 
responsibility. Nothing could be further from the truth.
  Madam Speaker, I want to make something clear to the American people 
today. All week I have seen signs on the House floor saying that 
Republicans are shutting down the Department of Homeland Security, and 
I have seen press conferences saying Republicans are shutting down the 
Department of Homeland Security, scaring the American people about 
something that has not happened.
  Here is what we have not heard: Where are the solutions and where is 
the compromise? Because I will tell the American people this today: 
what my colleagues on the other side of the aisle have said is: It is 
all or nothing.
  I understand the interest in a clean DHS bill. I am very sympathetic 
to that. But to take that position when we know that there are Members 
of this body who take grave, grave reservation to the constitutional 
overreach of the President, that is an abdication of the constitutional 
responsibility of this body.
  All or nothing is not legislating. Signs are not legislating. Press 
conferences are not legislating. Legislating is reaching a compromise 
between two sides of the aisle with very different views of this. I 
will tell you, this process has not gone how I would have wished it to 
go. But I know this: the Nation is better and the Congress is better 
when we have regular order and when we legislate the way the 
Constitution has ordained.
  Madam Speaker, we cannot abdicate our constitutional authority to 
recognize that we have a bicameral, bipartisan Congress with a 
disagreement, and what we owe to the United States Constitution is the 
opportunity for us to find a compromise.
  So I will ask you this: What if DACA provisions were removed from the 
DHS bill? Does that get us votes? What if we delayed the President's 
executive order until final disposition by the courts? Does that get us 
votes? What gets us the votes we need as a body of 300 Members? Not 218 
Members, but 300 Members. Where is the compromise? All or nothing is 
not legislating.
  I will tell you it was a remarkable comment by the majority leader on 
the other side of this building this morning to suggest that going to 
conference is a waste of time. That is an abdication of the 
constitutional responsibility of this body.

[[Page H1487]]

  All I am asking for, Madam Speaker, is that we recognize the 
difference and we ask my colleagues on the other side of the aisle: 
Where is the compromise? Because all or nothing is not legislating. 
Signs are not legislating, scare tactics are not legislating, and press 
conferences are not legislating.
  Ms. ROYBAL-ALLARD. Madam Speaker, I would just like to point out that 
we have a solution, and it is the bipartisan, bicameral compromise bill 
that was sent by the Senate for us to vote on, and that is what we are 
asking for.

                              {time}  1515

  Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from California 
(Ms. Lofgren), the ranking minority member of the Homeland Security 
Subcommittee on Immigration and Border Security.
  Ms. LOFGREN. Madam Speaker, a lot of discussion has been that, 
somehow, the President has acted unconstitutionally or unlawfully. 
Nothing could be further from the truth.
  There is ample legal authority for what the President has done. 
Prosecutorial discretion is a long-established practice in every area 
of the law, both civil and criminal. When a law enforcement agency has 
only enough resources to go after a fraction of the individuals who it 
suspects of violating the relevant law, it has to make choices. There 
is no alternative.
  In the case of immigration, not only do we recognize this, Congress 
has specifically directed the head of the Department to set priorities, 
enforcement priorities, for removal.
  Now, in addition to that, the Supreme Court has recognized in many 
cases the need--and really the authority of the executive--to make 
these decisions. In the Arizona case, it said Federal officials, as an 
initial matter, must decide whether it makes sense to pursue removal at 
all.
  Our own Congressional Research Service has found that no court 
appears to have invalidated a policy of nonenforcement founded upon 
prosecutorial discretion on the grounds that the policy violated the 
take care clause.
  Deferred action is nothing more than a tentative revocable signal to 
a noncitizen that the government does not intend to initiate removal 
proceedings at this time. Not only is that tentative, but the statute 
at U.S.C. 1182(a)(9)(B)(ii) authorizes the period of stay by the 
Department in such cases.
  Congress has expressly recognized deferred action by name repeatedly. 
In addition to the statute, the formal regulations of the Justice 
Department and Homeland Security have also expressly recognized 
deferred action.
  In the Reno v. American-Arab Anti-Discrimination case, Justice Scalia 
said, ``At each stage, the Executive has discretion to abandon the 
endeavor''--referring to the removal process--``and at the time IIRIA 
was enacted, the INS had been engaging in a regular practice (which has 
come to be known as 'deferred action') of exercising that discretion 
for humanitarian reasons or simply for its own convenience.''
  The arguments that somehow this is unlawful are so far wrong because 
nothing in the recent executive actions conflicts with either the 
letter or the spirit of the Immigration and Nationality Act or any 
other Federal statute.
  I would note that the court in Texas did not find the President's 
action unconstitutional. It suggested--and I think wrongly--that the 
Administrative Procedure Act applies to these actions. There is nothing 
in the history of the Administrative Procedure Act that suggests that 
is the case.
  I would just suggest that the Republicans fund Homeland Security and 
let the process work through the courts.
  Mr. CARTER of Texas. Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Ms. ROYBAL-ALLARD. Madam Speaker, I yield 30 seconds to the 
gentlewoman from Florida (Ms. Brown), the ranking member on the 
Veterans' Affairs Committee.
  Ms. BROWN of Florida. Madam Speaker, let me just be clear--I am from 
Florida--the number one responsibility of any Member of Congress is to 
defend the American people, and we don't do that by punting our 
responsibility to fund Homeland Security, period.
  You all need to stop playing games with the safety of the American 
people.
  Mr. JOLLY. Will the gentlewoman yield?
  Ms. BROWN of Florida. You are the one that got on this floor and said 
it is a political football. If it is a political football, you are done 
playing.
  Mr. JOLLY. Will the gentlewoman yield?
  Ms. BROWN of Florida. My time has expired.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Members must direct their remarks to the 
Chair.
  Mr. CARTER of Texas. Madam Speaker, I yield such time as he may 
consume to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Woodall).
  Mr. WOODALL. Madam Speaker, I thank my friend from Texas not just for 
the time, but for the work he is doing to try to fund the 
responsibilities of the government.
  I have been in this institution for 4 years, Madam Speaker, and I 
have grown to love this institution. I have grown to love the people 
who serve in this institution, and it is disappointing to me to see 
some of the tempers that boil over here and have that on display for 
the American people.
  The truth is those tempers boil over, Madam Speaker, because folks 
here care. They don't care a little; they care a lot.
  What I have been grappling with as we have been going through this 
process--and the Appropriations Committee has been working so hard--is 
how do we bring our passion to the President's desk in a way that can 
make a difference for our people back home.
  I look at the chairman of the Appropriations Committee here and the 
ranking member. For Pete's sake, they passed a bill out of committee on 
this issue last summer.
  To watch this debate, you would think that the Congress is so 
derelict that we put everything off until the eleventh hour. Not true, 
Madam Speaker. Last summer, the House passed this out of committee.
  Now, of course, the process broke down last summer. We passed seven 
bills across this floor. The Senate had yet to pass one. I am tired of 
figuring out who to blame here. I am in the business of trying to 
figure out how to solve problems.
  The Senate is making some progress. Golly, they have considered more 
amendments in the Senate so far in 2015 than they considered all of 
last year combined. They are making progress. We are starting to get 
this train back on track.
  What is happening here today, though it seems so controversial, is we 
have got a motion to instruct, Madam Speaker, conferees. Now, I 
disagree with the motion to instruct. The motion says: Let's just do 
what the Senate said we should do.
  I don't actually think that fulfills my constitutional obligation, 
but the fact that we are even in a place today to instruct conferees, 
it takes us back. I would argue if we took a poll outside, Madam 
Speaker, we could find folks all up and down Constitution Avenue, all 
up and down Independence Avenue, who saw that skit on ``Saturday Night 
Live'' with the bill tumbling down the stairs as folks tried to 
remember how a bill becomes a law.
  If we can pass this 3-week continuing resolution today, we are going 
to be able to demonstrate how a bill becomes a law when the House has a 
position and the Senate has a position and they come together to work 
out those differences before it goes to the President's desk.
  Madam Speaker, I have been here 4 years. I can count on one hand how 
many times I have seen that process work. These issues are too 
important to say: The other body took care of it, I will just defer to 
them.
  The Members of this body are too talented, they are too committed, 
they love this country too much. For the 435 of us to come together and 
say, We have nothing to add, let's just do what the Senate said--I 
can't count the number of colleagues I have, Madam Speaker, on the 
Democratic side of the aisle who love this country, care about this 
country on one hand. I can't count them on two hands. I can't count 
them on all of my fingers and toes because it is every single Member.
  The same thing is true on my side of the aisle. I would just ask my 
friends, my committed patriot friends, it is 3

[[Page H1488]]

weeks to have an opportunity to have our collective voice heard. The 
American people deserve it; the Nation needs it. Our leaders on the 
Appropriations Committee, Republican and Democrat alike, have given us 
an opportunity to do it.
  Let's take ``yes'' for an answer. Let's reject this motion to 
instruct, but let's do go to conference. Let's pass this continuing 
resolution, and let's restore some pride in a process that has served 
this country so well for so long.
  Ms. ROYBAL-ALLARD. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume.
  I just want to point out to the gentlemen that the ranking members 
and chairs of the Appropriations Subcommittees of the House and the 
Senate worked together on the bill that we are trying to bring for a 
vote, that this was a negotiated bill by both Houses.
  This is not something that we are just trying to bring from the 
Senate without the House having any input. This was the negotiated, 
compromised bill of both Houses.
  I now yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Ellison), 
a member of the Financial Services Committee.
  Mr. ELLISON. Madam Speaker, I would like to thank the gentlewoman for 
yielding.
  Madam Speaker, just for people who are watching this debate, I would 
like to take us back to December of 2014 when we passed this thing 
called the CR/Omnibus, all these spending bills together that we spent 
money for the American people over the course of a year to fund our 
government, except for the Department of Homeland Security bill, which 
would be funded right through midnight tonight.
  Why did we single this one bill out for this short term? For one 
reason and one reason only: The Republican majority wanted to pick a 
fight with the President over the President's execution of his lawful 
authority to try to solve problems in the area of immigration.
  Now, a Federal district court judge, who has a long history of 
Republican partisanship, decided that he would issue an order stopping 
the execution of this executive order action; so, now, why don't we let 
the district court handle it, pass a year-long bill, and look after the 
public safety of the American people?
  This thing is where it should be. It is with the courts. People on 
the Republican side of the aisle, Madam Speaker, who say that this is 
unconstitutional--which it is not--now have the ball in the court they 
say they want it in, which is in the court's hands, so let us get about 
the business of protecting the homeland.
  Madam Speaker, I am from Minneapolis, Minnesota, and I am proud of 
that, but I have got a terrorist group in Somalia talking about what 
they want to do to my mall. That is a fact of my district right now, 
and I feel very bitter and resentful that we are holding up Homeland 
Security money.
  I ask this body to not kick the ball for 3 weeks, but to get to 
business now, so that we can plan and protect our homeland.
  This is serious business, not a political football to acquire power.
  Mr. CARTER of Texas. Madam Speaker, I yield as much time as he may 
consume to the gentleman from the great State of Alabama (Mr. 
Aderholt), my friend.
  Mr. ADERHOLT. Madam Speaker, I thank the chairman for letting me 
speak on this motion.
  As a past chairman of this Subcommittee on Homeland Security, I know 
firsthand how important it is for the funding for Homeland Security to 
go forward. The bottom line is the House has done its job.
  Back in December, the House voted to fund the Federal Government for 
the fiscal year. We kept the funding for the Department of Homeland 
Security on a continuing resolution so that it would not lapse.
  By doing so, we were making a promise to the American people, a 
promise that once the Republicans had full control of the Senate, we 
would work together as a Congress to ensure that the President's 
unconstitutional and dangerous actions would not go unchecked.
  Every President takes an oath under the Constitution that the laws of 
this land will be upheld; however, the concern that we have now is the 
President is directing Federal employees to take unlawful actions.
  The House position on this bill provides proper funding. It defends 
the President's unlawful actions. The House has voted, the Senate has 
voted, and--as my colleague from Florida had said earlier--once that 
happens when you don't agree, you go to conference, and that is how you 
legislate.
  I urge my fellow House Members to support the actions laid out by the 
Speaker so that we can move forward with this so that we can go to 
conference and act like true legislators in how the Founding Fathers in 
their wisdom meant for this to move forward.

                              {time}  1530

  Ms. ROYBAL-ALLARD. Madam Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman 
from Pennsylvania (Mr. Brendan F. Boyle), a member of the Committee on 
Foreign Affairs and the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.
  Mr. BRENDAN F. BOYLE of Pennsylvania. Madam Speaker, I realize that I 
haven't been serving in this body very long--only 8 weeks--but today is 
exactly the kind of day that drives most people nuts about Congress. 
Even though we all agree--Senate Republicans, Senate Democrats, in a 
more than 2-1 vote; House Democrats and House Republicans--that we need 
to fund the Department of Homeland Security, yet here we are a few 
hours before the deadline once again playing around with the security 
of the United States.
  Madam Speaker, we have a way to end this. We have the Senate bill in 
front of us. Let us adopt the bipartisan bill, get the Department of 
Homeland Security funded, and then we can move on and have this 
legitimate debate about immigration.
  Mr. CARTER of Texas. I reserve the balance of my time.
  Ms. ROYBAL-ALLARD. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman 
from Kentucky (Mr. Yarmuth), a member of the Committee on the Budget 
and the Committee on Energy and Commerce.
  Mr. YARMUTH. I thank the gentlewoman for yielding.
  Madam Speaker, I would like to repeat some things that I have heard 
over the last couple of weeks about this particular situation:
  ``I fully believe we should not be playing politics with a national 
security agency like the Department of Homeland Security, particularly 
given the high threat environment that we are in right now.''
  ``The political impasse on DHS funding must end. Responsible members 
of both parties must work together to find some way to fund DHS without 
further delay.''
  ``The worst thing we can do is let our enemies think we are backing 
off, that we are cutting off funding. This involves human lives, and 
this is too risky a game to be playing here. This is no way to run a 
government.''
  Madam Speaker, those aren't my words. Those are words from Republican 
Members of this body discussing the reckless game that their party is 
playing with the funding of the Department of Homeland Security.
  Every rationale I have heard for not voting for a clean funding bill 
right now involves some kind of an ideological orientation. We have got 
a lot of constitutional lawyers, apparently, in this body because 
people are arguing whether it is constitutional or not. Meanwhile, we 
face threats day in and day out, both here and abroad, that we are not 
being able to cope with.
  There is a great or legendary conservative thinker and writer, 
William F. Buckley, Jr. He once said: ``Idealism is fine, but as it 
approaches reality, the costs become prohibitive.'' Right now, the 
costs to our defense, the security of our Nation are becoming 
prohibitive. Let's stop this argument. Let's do what we both agree on 
and fund our Nation's security apparatus.
  Mr. CARTER of Texas. At this time, I yield such time as he may 
consume to the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Byrne).
  Mr. BYRNE. Madam Speaker, I rise to oppose this motion, and I would 
like to address the House with the reasons why.
  I have been here for a year and 2 months, and I believe in my time 
here, this is the first time that we have actually been in the position 
to get a bill

[[Page H1489]]

back from the Senate on which they disagreed with us and that we have 
even the opportunity to go to a conference.
  Now, when I took high school civics, it was my understanding that 
that is the way the process works. The bill starts in one House, goes 
to another House; the other House disagrees, and it comes back to the 
other House. If the other House wants to go and discuss it, we go to 
conference and discuss it.
  This House took a very important position back in January to fund the 
Department of Homeland Security, and we added some riders. Now we need 
to go to conference so that our position, the House's position, can be 
fully discussed by the conferees for both Houses. During that 
discussion, we don't know what the outcome will be, but that discussion 
could lead to something that could get us a solution. That is what the 
people of America want us to try to do is to get to a solution. So far 
what we have tried hasn't worked.
  Now, I wish the Senate had acted earlier. I wish we could have gotten 
this back in time enough for us not to have to go through some of the 
gyrations we are doing now, but we are where we are. To go to 
conference and to give whoever is appointed as the House conferees the 
opportunity to work with whoever is appointed from the Senate as their 
conferees to try to arrive at something like a consensus that we can 
all vote for--even if we don't feel 100 percent good about it--seems to 
be what I thought we learned in high school civics class is the way the 
process is supposed to work.
  So I hope that we will go forward. I hope this motion is defeated for 
that purpose, so that we can do things in regular order, which perhaps 
this Congress has forgotten to do, it has been so many years since we 
have done it. Now that the Senate has acted--and many of us, including 
me, have said we wanted the Senate to act--let's take their action, go 
to a conference committee with them, and work on trying to get this 
thing worked out.
  Now, some people say that this isn't going to work, that nothing is 
going to come of it. I tell you this: if we don't try it, absolutely it 
is not going to work; but if we give it a chance, then we could get 
something out of it that is a win not for us in this House or the 
Senate, but a win for the people of the United States of America, the 
people we are here to represent.
  So I hope that the people in both Houses and both parties can come 
together at least long enough for us to talk with one another, not at 
one another, not from an ideology, not from a partisan standpoint, but 
from the standpoint of what is best for the people of the United States 
and for what is appropriate under the Constitution of the United 
States, because we are also here, as our oath requires, to uphold the 
Constitution of our country.
  I believe our conferees should have an opportunity to go in there and 
do the right thing to protect the people of America through the funding 
of the Department of Homeland Security and to do the right thing to 
defend the Constitution of our country. By defeating this motion and 
going forward with the conference, we give the process a chance to 
work, and to work well, in both of those regards.
  So I respect the people on the other side who think we should just 
give in; but I don't think we should just give in, because I don't 
think the American people want us to just give in. I think the American 
people want us to do our work, to make sure we protect our country by 
appropriately funding the Department of Homeland Security, but that we 
also protect our country by defending the Constitution of the United 
States.
  I believe the actions taken by the President are unconstitutional. A 
judge has stayed those actions because he has got some legal issues 
with them. I don't know what is going to happen in that court 
proceeding. I am not going to try to predict that here on the floor of 
the House, because a lot of times you try to predict a court 
proceeding, you will find out you are wrong.
  In the meantime, we still have an obligation to do our job, and I 
think going forward with this conference committee is doing our job in 
the most important of senses. I appreciate the opportunity to stand 
here today and address this House and to urge my colleagues to defeat 
this motion so that we can do something we haven't done in a number of 
years, and that is to fulfill the obligations given to us by our 
forebears, do our job, get this thing done, get it done right, and make 
sure that we have done right by the people of the United States.
  Ms. ROYBAL-ALLARD. How much time is remaining on both sides?
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentlewoman from California has 14 
minutes remaining, and the gentleman from Texas has 14 minutes 
remaining.
  Ms. ROYBAL-ALLARD. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the 
gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson Lee), ranking member of the 
Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, Homeland Security, and 
Investigations.
  Ms. JACKSON LEE. Let me thank the gentlelady for her excellent work 
on the Subcommittee on Homeland Security of the Committee on 
Appropriations and the gentleman, Mr. Carter.
  To the statements that have been made on the floor, might I just 
chronicle a more correct, if I might say, articulation of really what 
happened.
  First, it is an applause and appreciation for the work done by the 
gentlelady from California and the gentleman from Texas, along with the 
ranking member and the chairman of the Committee on Appropriations, 
because they had 12 appropriations bills ready to go forward.
  What my good friends have missed on the other side of the aisle is 
they debunked the full funding of the Department of Homeland Security 
because of their ire against the President's authorized constitutional 
executive action. That is why we are here today, for no other reason 
than, rather than allowing the debate on a clean funding on the omnibus 
bills, the 12 that have come from the House, they took out the 
Department of Homeland Security and left it to the side.
  They took it out in the light of young women, as I indicated. Three 
Denver girls played hooky from school and tried to join ISIS. They took 
it out in the light of the FBI Director saying there is an ISIS cell in 
every State. They took it out in the light of the tragedies that 
happened in Paris, in Denmark, and have happened around the world in 
Australia. Boko Haram, they took it out. They took out that full 
funding of the Department of Homeland Security and skewed it by adding 
their contempt for the executive action.
  But then, lo and behold, what happened is a judge didn't rule it 
unconstitutional in Texas. That was not the order of the court. It was 
that there were questions that should be decided--it was actually a 
stay--and that it should have gone through an administrative procedure, 
the APA. It did not rule it unconstitutional, but it was an action that 
caused, at least for the moment, a stay in the actions of the 
President.
  What does that say, Madam Speaker? It says that today we can come and 
give a full funding for the Department of Homeland Security.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The time of the gentlewoman has expired.
  Ms. ROYBAL-ALLARD. I yield an additional 30 seconds to the 
gentlewoman from Texas.
  Ms. JACKSON LEE. I thank the gentlelady.
  Madam Speaker, that order answers their concern about the executive 
action. In the meantime, we have every opportunity tonight, today to 
vote on a clean full funding of the Department of Homeland Security 
until September, because that is what the Senate did. They did their 
work.
  But now we are playing games, in spite of the letter from the 
Secretary of Homeland Security, and we are telling the Customs and 
Border Protection, we are telling the TSOs, the FAA, the ICE officers, 
all of them, we put a stop sign and said we no longer want to secure 
America.
  I ask for support of this motion to instruct, and I ask for full 
funding for the Department of Homeland Security. Let's do our job.
  Mr. CARTER of Texas. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the 
gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Pittenger).
  Mr. PITTENGER. I thank the gentleman for yielding me the time.
  Madam Speaker, I am here today absolutely in amazement that we are in 
this discussion about the Constitution of the United States. This is an 
issue of

[[Page H1490]]

the balance of powers. This is an issue of our liberties. As important 
as the Homeland Security bill is, we recognize today that the Congress 
has made its statement, the President of the United States has made his 
statement 22 times that he did not have the right to declare amnesty, 
the courts have made their statement, and yet today we are in this 
dialogue.
  I hope the American people are watching today and seeing the 
miscommunication of truth. The truth is we are committed to the 
Constitution, and we are going to stand by the Constitution. We are not 
going to allow the edict of one person to commit this country to a 
direction unchallenged. We are here committed to that principle. We 
believe that the rights of the American people are founded in this 
Constitution, and we will submit ourselves to that.
  Ms. ROYBAL-ALLARD. I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. CARTER of Texas. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the 
gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Austin Scott).
  Mr. AUSTIN SCOTT of Georgia. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Madam Speaker, as I listened to this debate and watched as some of 
the people talked about what our duty was and was not as Members of 
Congress, I thought I might come down and read the oath that we as 
Members of Congress take. It is simple.
  ``I do solemnly swear or affirm that I will support and defend the 
Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and 
domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that 
I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or 
purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the 
duties of the office on which I am about to enter, so help me God.''

                              {time}  1545

  Ladies and gentlemen, this is not about immigration. This is about 
whether or not the President has the ability to unilaterally run this 
country by creating fees and spending those fees as he sees fit. I 
would submit to you that he doesn't. If the President can do this and 
is allowed to get away with this, then, when we get a pro-life 
President, that pro-life President can create a fee on abortion 
providers and use it to fund adoption.
  It seems to me that the Democratic Party, which prefers free cell 
phones to taking care of the men and women who protect our country in 
uniform, likes the rules when they are working for them but doesn't 
want to abide by the rules all the time.
  What the President has done violates, I believe, the separation of 
powers. I would suggest to you that this is a very dangerous precedent, 
and this is well worth fighting for in maintaining our oath as Members 
of the United States Congress to defend the Constitution.
  Ms. ROYBAL-ALLARD. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman 
from Massachusetts (Mr. Keating).
  Mr. KEATING. Madam Speaker, let's not lose focus here. We are talking 
about our country's security. We heard what would happen if the 
homeland function were to be eliminated immediately over a shutdown 
even with the emergency provisions that are existing.
  I want to address an important issue, and that is the issue of our 
security being jeopardized because of these stopgap budgets. Now, what 
does that mean? That means we continue to work within the constraints 
of last year's priorities, that we can't move beyond the funding that 
is there for those functions that we said were important for our 
security last year. The trouble with that is the terrorist threats are 
changing every single day. The landscape is changing under our feet, 
yet we are in a straightjacket in dealing with it. We cannot continue 
going forward. It has already jeopardized our ability to look at 
nuclear detection in this country because of these stopgap budgets.
  My State suffered a terrible tragedy with the Boston Marathon 
bombing, but I think all of us agree and all of us saw the way they 
organized, the way they coordinated all the functions--the State, the 
local, and the Federal Government, the medical functions, the emergency 
service. We all concluded--rightfully so--that countless lives were 
saved because of that. Do you know why? Because there was training and 
preparation for what could come.
  We cannot deal successfully in this country with the threats that are 
confronting us here today and tomorrow--terrorist attacks--with last 
year's priorities and without being able to shift and meet those 
priorities. Let's stop the stopgap budgeting. It is hurting our 
country. It is hurting our security. Let's do what we are supposed to 
do under the Constitution--make these decisions to fund it.
  Mr. CARTER of Texas. Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Ms. ROYBAL-ALLARD. Madam Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman 
from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer), the Democratic whip of the House.
  Mr. HOYER. Madam Speaker, I rise in support of this motion. I also 
rise to lament the fact that we had an opportunity just a few hours 
ago, or an hour ago, to do what the Senate rationally did. After four 
opportunities of trying to adopt the House position, the Senate failed 
to do so.
  Now, I heard my young friend from Texas talk about the Constitution. 
I have heard a lot of people say we ought to read the Constitution. I 
agree with that. The Constitution has provided for the resolution of 
the injury of which you speak so passionately, and that is Article III 
of the Constitution.
  Marbury v. Madison said that the Supreme Court had the authority, 
whether it was the President or the Congress, to say that that is not 
constitutional. Frankly, by our passing a law and saying this is 
constitutional, as has been attempted and done in the past by my 
Republican friends, to say, ``we say, by legislative fiat, this is 
constitutional,'' unfortunately, today, we gave up the opportunity to 
act responsibly. My friend Mr. Rogers, for whom I have great respect, 
and Mrs. Lowey know we are going to be back here some 20 days from 
today with this same debate because the Senate has already said they 
are not going to conference. When I say ``the Senate,'' the Democrats 
are not going to give 60 votes as the Republicans would not give 60 
votes to go to conference on other bills in past years.
  What we did was we reversed the order of the legislation we are 
considering. Had we done the original order, we would have done this 
motion to go to conference and the motion to instruct first. As a 
result, we would have still had the Senate bill in the House of 
Representatives so as to act responsibly, but there apparently was a 
fear that we might do that, so that bill was sent back to the Senate 
before we considered the CR for 21 days.
  I urge my colleagues to vote ``yes'' on this motion to instruct. Vote 
``yes'' to, at some point in time, do what is the responsible and 
doable alternative. It is not a question of whether you like it or I 
like it. It is the alternative that we in the Congress can do, and that 
is why 68 Members of the United States Senate--Republicans and 
Democrats--voted to say we have tried for 6 weeks to do what we all 
need to do, and that is to fund the Department of Homeland Security to 
keep America safe. We are going to delay that; but, at a minimum, we 
ought to say to the conferees--and few of us on this floor believe 
there will be any conference. Again, the Senate will not vote to go to 
conference. Let us vote at least for this responsible motion made by 
the gentlewoman from California.
  Mr. CARTER of Texas. Madam Speaker, may I inquire as to how much time 
I have left.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Texas has 10\1/2\ minutes 
remaining, and the gentlewoman from California has 5\1/2\ minutes 
remaining.
  Mr. CARTER of Texas. Madam Speaker, I would first like to say that I 
certainly hope that Mr. Hoyer, when he referred to his young friend 
from Texas, was talking about me. That makes me feel really good. I 
appreciate that.
  At this time, I yield 3 minutes to my young friend from Texas (Mr. 
Gohmert).
  Mr. GOHMERT. Madam Speaker, I appreciated so much my friend Mr. Scott 
for bringing up that oath. It does mean a lot--in my case, taking that 
oath to serve in the Army for 4 years, taking, basically, the same oath 
to be a prosecutor in Texas, to be a judge in Texas, to be a chief 
justice in Texas, and now to be in Congress. It

[[Page H1491]]

means something. Protecting the Constitution means that, if we don't 
preserve the balance of power, then this little experiment in 
democracy--or ``a Republic, madam,'' as Benjamin Franklin referred to--
will be lost.
  I appreciated what my friend from Maryland said, and I wrote it down 
because it was profound: ``we gave up the opportunity to act 
responsibly.''
  I would humbly submit, Madam Speaker, that that has been going on for 
the last 6 years. Now, some of it went on during the Bush 
administration as the President used executive orders and took powers 
that probably shouldn't have been his. In talking to people who have 
been in Congress over the last 35 years or so, they have told me that, 
whether it was Gerald Ford or Richard Nixon when Goldwater went down 
Pennsylvania Avenue, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, 
Bill Clinton, or George W. Bush, there was a willingness on both sides 
of the aisle to get in a car together and go down Pennsylvania Avenue 
and say, ``Mr. President, you have usurped far too much power. We can't 
let you destroy the Constitution any further. We are taking a stand.'' 
We have missed that opportunity to act responsibly, but, fortunately, 
it is not yet too late.

  If you do not know what ``irresponsibility'' is, then look at Judge 
Hanen's opinion. He spells it out. This President didn't even have the 
gumption to write an executive order and sign it. He spoke his new 
amnesty law into being, and then Jeh Johnson did a memo. That took the 
power of Congress away from us. So the question on acting responsibly 
is: Do we make that message clear that we are not having laws spoken 
into being in this country and having some bureaucrat--unelected--come 
around with a memo that undoes laws by different Congresses all these 
years that have been signed by different Presidents? With a memo? Come 
on.
  It is time to act responsibly. Now is the time. Please. I know party 
divisions run deep, but stand with us for the Constitution.
  Ms. ROYBAL-ALLARD. Madam Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman 
from California (Ms. Pelosi), the Democratic leader of the House.
  Ms. PELOSI. I thank the gentlewoman for yielding, and I commend her 
and Congresswoman Lowey for their very important motion to instruct 
conferees to accept the Senate language.
  Madam Speaker, I want to address some of what a previous speaker had 
mentioned, but I am going to go to the most recent previous speaker.
  If you feel so strongly--because I don't know if this is about 
thinking or feeling--about the immigration issue and the executive 
actions taken by the President, I respect that; but why are you 
jeopardizing the homeland security of the United States of America by 
attaching your emotions to this bill?
  That is what this is about. If you have an argument about 
immigration, have an immigration bill come to the floor, and let's have 
that debate. You did say that we have given up the opportunity to act 
responsibly. That is exactly what you are doing today. Policy 
differences about immigration or the rest are a legitimate debate in 
this great marketplace of ideas that is called the House of 
Representatives; but it is not for you to hold hostage the homeland 
security of our country, to jeopardize the opportunity to prepare, to 
have what is current and necessary for the realities of the threats 
that we are facing now instead of--3 months since December until, it 
would be, March 19--3-month-old funding carried over from last year. A 
lot has happened since then in Paris, in the Middle East, with threats 
in our own country.

                              {time}  1600

  Get a grip on our responsibility. Get a grip, Madam Speaker. Give us 
a chance to vote on a bill that passed by more than two-thirds in the 
United States Senate with strong bipartisan support.
  As far as your criticisms of President Obama, nobody said ``boo'' 
over there when President Reagan used--justifiably so, rightfully so--
his executive orders on protecting immigrants in our country. George 
Herbert Walker Bush, the same. President Clinton. George W. Bush, who 
was one of the best Presidents on immigration in our country, wasn't 
able to convince his Republican colleagues to respect immigration as 
the invigoration of our country. But, nonetheless, he led on that 
subject.
  So you have made a mess. We have so many bills, counter bills, CRs, 
all the rest of it coming back, forward, and all the rest, and every 
time I ask all of you what is happening, everybody says: I don't know.
  It is only 8 hours until the government will shut down. That can't 
possibly happen. And I want to address that point. Someone has said to 
me, Well, the President said he won't let the government shut down--
that he would sign this 3-week option. That is a bad choice that we 
have given the President--to shut the government down or extend it for 
3 weeks--when that 3-week extension is as undermining to our national 
security as a shutdown in government. That is just not right. It is not 
responsible on our part.
  So I say to our colleagues, if they want to go down that path of poor 
choices, let the Republicans do that. If they have got multiagendas 
here, anti-Obama agendas here about immigration and the rest, let them 
go down that path. Let them put their 218 votes on the board without 
our associating ourselves with it.
  And just because the President's person says of the two bad choices 
he would choose the 3 weeks if it came to his desk, don't let that 
deter you from voting ``no'' on that and ``yes'' on what Congresswoman 
Roybal-Allard and Congresswoman Lowey are putting forth as well.
  Yes, we do take that oath, as the gentleman said, whether you are a 
judge, whether you are in the military, whether you are in Congress, or 
the President of the United States, to protect and support the 
Constitution of the United States. We are not protecting anything with 
what you are doing here. We are not protecting anything. We are 
dragging it out.
  We are sending a message that, for some historic reason, we are now 
taking it out on Barack Obama because we are angry about what the 
gentleman on the Republican side said that Reagan, Bush, Clinton, and 
Bush have done. Bring it up under another circumstance. Keep it off the 
protection of our country.
  Your chairman, Mr. Rogers, working with our ranking member, 
Congresswoman Lowey, was able to put together 12 bills which were a 
compromise--bills that everyone was prepared to support--until you 
decided you were going to use immigration to hold hostage the national 
homeland security of our country.
  And so kick the can to here. Now you have kicked the can to here, and 
now you are going to kick the can to March 19. What do you think is 
going to happen on March 19? We have already had two recesses today in 
this very day of congressional deliberation. What do you think you are 
going to accomplish later if you are not willing to grow up, bite the 
bullet? You made your point.
  Your colleagues, the Republican Senators, do not agree to drag this 
out. They have given you a face-saving path. The judge in Texas gave 
you a face-saving path. ``I am Charlie''--``Je suis Charlie''--gave you 
a face-saving path.
  The urgency is very, very clear--well, clear to everyone except if 
you happen to exist in this Chamber--when your negative attitudes 
toward President Obama have so overwhelmed you that you are willing to 
jeopardize the homeland security of our country. So whether it is 
firefighters, the SAFER Act, FEMA, or anything where the Federal 
Government comes in contact with people, you are standing in the way 
and using immigration as the excuse. For some of you, it may be a 
reason. Maybe it is for some of you, but for some of you it is an 
excuse. And for all of you it is a shame. It is a shame.
  One gentleman said: If we accept the Senate language, we are not 
living up to our responsibility to have a bill in the House. And then 
you expect them to accept your language. Doesn't it hold true both 
ways? If you don't want to accept their language, why do you expect 
them to accept your 3-week language?
  Do you not understand the legislative process? This Constitution, 
which we value, has the legislative branch. The first article of 
government is the legislature, preeminent. The President can't sign 
what we don't send him, in terms of making the law. He can take 
executive action, but the law is stronger.

[[Page H1492]]

  Let us honor our responsibilities and stop standing in the way of 
protecting the American people. It is about the security of the 
American people versus the philosophy that you have going over there, 
which is perfectly to be respected in another piece of legislation. 
Let's have that debate separate from protecting.
  It is about time for us to come together to get the job done. The 
Senate did it. We can. Please support Congresswoman Roybal-Allard's and 
Congresswoman Lowey's motion to instruct the conferees to accept the 
Senate bill.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair reminds Members to please direct 
their remarks to the Chair and not to other Members.
  Mr. CARTER of Texas. Madam Speaker, how much time is remaining?
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Texas has 7\1/2\ minutes 
remaining.
  Mr. CARTER of Texas. Does the gentlewoman have other speakers?
  Ms. ROYBAL-ALLARD. No. I am prepared to close.
  Mr. CARTER of Texas. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume.
  Madam Speaker, I have had a lot of schoolteachers shake their fingers 
at me and tell me things. And most of the times, I have deserved it. I 
have been looked right at and told I was wrong before. Many of those 
times, I deserved it.
  But I want to make something really clear. This is not a debate on 
immigration. This is not a debate on whether or not we are going to 
fund the Department. We are funding the Department for the next 3 
weeks, using the same manner that we funded this Department for years 
at a time when our colleagues on the other side of the aisle were in 
charge of this House.
  The CR was one of the most popular vehicles that they used in funding 
our country during the period of time they ran this place. So we are 
not using anything that we don't all use. It funds the Department. It 
keeps the Border Patrol okay and keeps them paid.
  But it also allows us to do something that--by the way, the gentleman 
is absolutely right. In what we would call recent history, going to 
conference was so rare--my mother used to say ``rare as hen's teeth''--
when they ran this place.
  So we are at least doing something that was designed to be done, and 
we are going to conference. When you go to conference and you have two 
sides of the story, you are supposed to go in there and discuss the two 
sides of the story. What they are asking to instruct here is to just 
take what the Senate sent us.

  Well, to some extent, I guess we should reward the Senate. This is 
about the first thing they have sent us in recent history where we have 
actually had a bipartisan vote. In fact, last year we just didn't have 
any votes at all. In fact, you wondered if they even knew how.
  And so here we are. We are going to conference and doing it the way 
it is supposed to be done. All parties will be able to participate, and 
maybe we will resolve our differences and maybe we won't, but the 
American people also ask us to try to work in a bipartisan manner. And 
here is our opportunity.
  The Homeland Security Department will be funded. They will have a 
paycheck. We will address this issue in conference, and hopefully we 
will come to a resolution the way we are designed to with bipartisan 
participation.
  This is not about immigration. And after having spent 4 years with 
some of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle and some of the 
colleagues over here working on immigration, I am not anti-immigration 
policy. This is anti-stepping on the feet of the Framers of the 
Constitution and walking all over that piece of paper.
  And that is why we are here to fight today. We are fighting for the 
rights of this legislative body as we address the Executive. And we are 
fighting to fund the Department.
  With that, I yield back the balance of my time.
  Ms. ROYBAL-ALLARD. Madam Speaker, let me just say that regardless of 
what the other side of the aisle will have us believe, the Secretary of 
Homeland Security and the men and women who put their lives on the 
front line every day for us and to protect this country tell us that a 
continuing resolution jeopardizes their ability to fully and 
effectively protect this country.
  And so I urge my colleagues to do the responsible thing and to vote 
for this motion to instruct conferees to bring back a clean, full-year, 
bipartisan funding bill that will enable the Department of Homeland 
Security to fully and effectively protect our Nation and the American 
people.
  I yield back the balance of my time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. All time for debate has expired.
  Without objection, the previous question is ordered on the motion to 
instruct.
  There was no objection.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion to instruct.
  The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that 
the noes appeared to have it.
  Ms. ROYBAL-ALLARD. Madam Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX, further 
proceedings on this question will be postponed.

                          ____________________