[Congressional Record Volume 162, Number 26 (Friday, February 12, 2016)]
[House]
[Pages H806-H811]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  1215
          AMERICA'S RULE BOOK: THE UNITED STATES CONSTITUTION

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 6, 2015, the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Woodall) is recognized 
for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.
  Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, we have got our Presidential primary coming 
up in Georgia in the first week of March, and everybody is talking 
about what it means to be an American and where it is we want America 
to go. I love that conversation. I love that it is happening on the 
Democratic side of the aisle. I love that it is happening on the 
Republican side of the aisle. I love that it is happening in every 
household in America.
  What I don't hear as much conversation about--and I wish that I did--
is about that rule book for how America is supposed to be run, called 
the United States Constitution. Folks seem to have a firm grasp on it 
when they want to be the President of the United States. They lose that 
grasp when they get to be President of the United States, because they 
want to serve. They so badly want to serve.
  What I have here, Mr. Speaker, are a couple of quotes from President 
Obama.
  He says:

       I taught constitutional law for 10 years, and I take the 
     Constitution very seriously. The biggest problems that we are 
     facing right now have to do with George Bush's trying to 
     bring more and more power into the executive branch and not 
     go through Congress at all; and that is what I intend to 
     reverse when I am President of the United States of America.

  Now, that was at a Pennsylvania townhall meeting, Mr. Speaker, when 
the President was running for office.
  As a Senator, he could see clearly that, in article I, the House and 
the Senate were in charge of passing the laws, and that, in article II, 
the White House was in charge of enforcing the laws. During the 8 years 
that George Bush was President, time and time again, charges were made 
that the White House was taking the people's power from article I and 
carrying it down Pennsylvania Avenue to the White House.
  Again, I quote from President Obama:

       I taught the Constitution for 10 years. I believe in the 
     Constitution, and I will obey the Constitution of the United 
     States. We are not going to use signing statements as a way 
     of doing an end run around Congress.

  That was at a Montana campaign event back in 2008.
  The President was absolutely right, and Republicans in this 
institution were absolutely wrong, during his 8 years in the White 
House, for not holding George Bush more accountable to his article II 
responsibilities and staying out of Congress' article I 
responsibilities; but it was hard, Mr. Speaker. It was after 9/11.
  I will forever wonder what America would have looked like but for 
that fateful day. The President was off, focusing on his agenda. We 
were not campaigning on 9/11 issues in that election. We were 
campaigning on domestic issues, on economic issues. The economy was on 
fire, and then everything changed.
  I would argue that many of my Republican colleagues--you and I were 
not here at that time, Mr. Speaker--cut President Bush a lot of slack. 
America was in crisis, and the Nation was under attack; and we said: Do 
you know what? The Constitution does give the President special 
responsibilities during these times of national crisis, and I am 
willing to allow him to adopt a little more authority--I am willing to 
be a little more deferential--to the President during these difficult 
times.
  President Obama saw that as then-Senator Obama, and he said: That is 
wrong. Republicans are not supposed to be Republicans first. 
Republicans in Congress are supposed to be Congressmen first. 
Republicans in the Senate are supposed to be Senators first. Our 
obligation first is to our constituents back home, to the United States 
Constitution, not to someone who may or may not hold the same party 
title at the White House.
  As a candidate, the President saw that clearly, but we all know how 
that transpired, Mr. Speaker.
  As President, the President has said this:

       We can't wait for an increasingly dysfunctional Congress to 
     do its job. Where they won't act, I will.

  We can't wait for that Constitution, which was specifically designed 
to be slow and painful, because every act that we pass here, Mr. 
Speaker, takes freedom or power or money from someone in America and 
gives it to someone else. It was designed to be hard; but as President 
Obama says: I can't wait. Where Congress won't act, I will.
  I continue to quote, Mr. Speaker, from a different speech during a 
Cabinet meeting in 2014:

       But one of the things that I will be emphasizing in this 
     meeting is the fact that we are not just going to be sitting, 
     waiting for legislation, in order to make sure that we are 
     providing Americans with the kind of help that they need. I 
     have got a pen and I have got a phone. I can use that pen to 
     sign executive orders and take executive actions and 
     administrative actions that move the ball forward.

  Mr. Speaker, one of my great disappointments in this administration 
is that President Obama had an opportunity to lead America in ways that 
no other President could have led. He had an opportunity when he was 
elected, with all of his personal charisma and popularity, to lead 
public opinion in ways that no other President could. He was not my 
choice for President, but when America chose him, America chose 
opportunity to do things that we could not have done otherwise.
  All we are in this Chamber is a reflection of that public opinion 
back home. All we are the voices of our individual districts back 
home--435 voices representing millions of constituents back home. The 
President could have come and changed the minds of those in this 
Congress. He could have come and changed the minds of the people. 
Instead--do you know what?--he said: I have studied the Constitution 
for 10 years. It is really hard to move Congress. It is really hard to 
move public opinion. So I am going to use my phone and my pen, and I am 
going to do it alone.
  This isn't just in the White House, Mr. Speaker. This idea that the 
people's voice in Congress is a nuisance and gets in the way of getting 
the real business done permeates the entire administration.
  I quote from EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy:

       But I will tell you that I didn't go to Washington to sit 
     around and wait for congressional action. I have never done 
     that before, and I don't plan to do it in the future.

  Forbid the thought. Forbid the thought you would be on the Federal 
Government's payroll, charged with enforcing the laws of the land, and 
you might sit around and wait for Congress to pass the laws of the 
land. Forbid the thought. If you have got a phone and if you have got a 
pen, just go ahead and rewrite those laws of the land, Mr. Speaker. It 
is dangerous when Republicans do that. It is dangerous when Democrats 
do that. It is dangerous when Independents do that.
  We have a Constitution as our rule book for a reason, and that is 
that changing the law should be hard. Taking power from one group and 
giving it to another should be hard. Taking money from one group and 
giving it to another should be hard. The power is not ours, Mr. 
Speaker. The power is the people's. They allow us to administer it for 
a short period of time, and there is a long and difficult process to do 
that.
  Mr. Speaker, I am going to focus on some EPA regulations today. In 
the past, Presidents have acknowledged how hard it is to get it done, 
but they have committed to going out there and getting it done. I will 
remind you, Mr. Speaker, that the EPA was created by a Republican 
President. There is no one who cares more about clean water and clean 
air in the great State of Georgia than I do. I am a hardcore, Deep 
South Republican, Mr. Speaker, and we play outside a lot. Our kids are 
outside a lot. We are drinking a lot of water, and we are playing in a 
lot of grass. We care about a clean environment. So did President 
Richard Nixon when he created the EPA.
  He said this:

       The reorganizations which I am proposing afford both the 
     Congress and the executive branch an opportunity to 
     reevaluate the adequacy of existing programs involved in 
     these consolidations.

[[Page H807]]

       I look forward to working with the Congress in this task. 
     Congress, the administration, and the public all share a 
     profound commitment to the rescue of our natural 
     environment and in the preservation of the Earth as a 
     place both habitable by and hospitable to man. With its 
     acceptance of these reorganization plans, the Congress 
     will help us fulfill that commitment.

  Mr. Speaker, President Nixon had a vision of what he wanted to do for 
environmental protection in America.
  He said this is a three-part vision: it is going to involve the 
executive branch; it is going to involve the legislative branch; it is 
going to involve the American people. I am going to take this idea out, 
and I am going to sell it. We are going to get it passed into law 
because I am going to make the American people believe it. We all want 
the same things: we want an environment that is hospitable to and 
habitable by man; we want an environment that serves us today and our 
kids and grandkids tomorrow. He went out there, and he sold America on 
this, and we did it together. By article I, Congress passed it, and the 
President signed it into law.
  With the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990, Mr. Speaker, you will 
remember it was a Democrat-controlled Congress and Republican George H. 
W. Bush in the White House.
  George H.W. Bush said this:

       Upon signing the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990, today, I 
     am signing S. 1630, a bill to amend the Clean Air Act, and I 
     take great pleasure in signing S. 1630 as a demonstration to 
     the American people of my determination that each and every 
     American shall breathe clean air. The passage of this bill is 
     an indication that the Congress shares my commitment to a 
     strong Clean Air Act, to a clean environment, and to the 
     achievement of the goals I originally set forth.

  Mr. Speaker, if you will recall, at the time of the Clean Air Act of 
1990, I was in college. It was a battle in Washington, D.C. It was a 
battle. Again, the Democrats were controlling all of Congress, and the 
Republicans were in the White House, trying to decide what our 
obligations were as individuals, what businesses' obligations were, and 
what government's obligations would be. It was hard and it was 
important.
  Mr. Speaker, you will remember that was acid rain. That was when they 
panned the camera around to the monuments throughout the city and 
showed where the facial features were being eroded by acid rain.
  We said what can we do together to make a difference? It was not 
someone with a phone and a pen. It became a national movement. It was 
what all laws are supposed to be, Mr. Speaker, which is where we come 
together and we talk about our differences; we take steps forward where 
we can; we take time to sort out the steps we can't take today but hope 
to take tomorrow.
  In signing that legislation, the President said: This represents my 
vision. This represents my goals. This represents my commitment to 
clean air. Because the people's Representatives in Congress passed it, 
it represents all of the American people as well.
  Mr. Speaker, that is the way it is supposed to be. It is hard and it 
is slow, and it has been a long time since we have seen that function 
effectively; but let me tell you what the impact of that is.
  The Founding Fathers were really smart folks, and I am never willing 
to underestimate the wisdom that is in those few founding pages. We 
have article I in the legislative branch. We have article II in the 
executive branch. We have article III in the judicial branch. In these 
days, where article I and article II are not functioning as they 
should, article III is wielding more than its fair share of the power, 
and I will tell you that is wrong. I will tell you that is wrong.
  Decisions about what is the right law of the land are made one of 
three ways, Mr. Speaker. They get made because the President of the 
United States, who was popularly elected, signs a bill into law. They 
get made because the United States Congress, which was popularly 
elected, overrides a veto and implements a new law; or they get made 
because nine men and women who are in black robes and are across the 
street at the Supreme Court, who have never been elected, sit around 
and think deeply about it and pronounce what the law of the land will 
be.
  Now, Mr. Speaker, I have great respect for the Supreme Court, and I 
believe it is critical--again, in the wisdom of our Founding Fathers--
to have balanced power in that way; but as a citizen, as just a guy 
from the great State of Georgia--just one of 300 million--when I have 
to choose who writes the law--the President I have a chance to vote 
for, the Congress I have a chance to vote for, or the Supreme Court, 
which is appointed for life and is never accountable to anyone--I feel 
a little bit safer when it is one of the folks who has to be up for 
reelection every once in a while.
  It is bad for America when the President--with a pen and a phone--
goes and implements those things, when we as the legislative branch 
don't identify ourselves as article I but identify ourselves as 
Republicans and Democrats--who are divided along those lines--and allow 
the courts to sort it out.
  Let me just give you an example, Mr. Speaker: WOTUS, waters of the 
U.S. I had never heard the term ``WOTUS'' until I showed up in this 
Chamber, Mr. Speaker. Waters of the United States is an initiative from 
the President that is going to reregulate who controls and keeps tabs 
on clean water in America.

                              {time}  1230

  Currently, if it is navigable water, water that you can sail your 
boat on, then it is governed by the Federal Government. If it is any 
other water, it is governed by State government.
  The little creek in the backyard at the park down the road from my 
house, that is governed by the great State of Georgia, and they do a 
great job with it. It empties out into the Chatahoochee River, which is 
navigable, which is regulated by the Federal Government. It goes 
through some National Park land, national recreation area, but it 
begins--where so much of an opportunity to impact pollution and make a 
difference in water quality--at the headwaters, which is regulated by 
State governments.
  Well, Jim Oberstar, a Representative in this Chamber back in 2010, 
introduced a bill that said, since the Federal Government is so 
effective at everything that they do, let's entrust all clean water 
decisions to the Federal Government instead of to the localities that 
have been doing it so well for so long.
  Well, he introduced a bill in Congress, Mr. Speaker, and that is the 
way it is supposed to start. This was H.R. 5088. He introduced a bill 
to expand the definition of water so that the Federal Government could 
regulate everything.
  Second step, Mr. Speaker, is to have that bill considered. Well, the 
bill never was considered in this Chamber. It could not gather enough 
support in this Chamber to even be considered in the committee, much 
less the floor of this House.
  Well, you have seen it, Mr. Speaker:
  ``Yes, I'm only a bill, And I'm sitting here on Capitol Hill. Well, 
it's a long, long journey to the Capital City. It's a long, long wait 
while I'm sitting in committee . . .''
  That is ``Schoolhouse Rock,'' a tale of how a bill becomes a law. If 
you can't get consideration, it expires.
  Well, the President wanted this regulation, and he couldn't get the 
support in Congress to pass it. He didn't want to go out and sell it to 
the American people, so he went to the Federal Register, Mr. Speaker. 
Most folks don't even know the Federal Register exists. It comes out 
every day. It is a list of all the regulations that the administration 
is proposing, and it is thick. Every day, it is thick. It is new 
restrictions on private life in America.
  In April 2014, the President went out and published this rule and 
said: This is what I am going to do. Congress hasn't authorized it. It 
is a dramatic departure from the way America has been governed for the 
last 200 years, but I have a pen and phone, and I am just going to do 
it.
  Mr. Speaker, if he wanted to do it, he should have come and sold 
Congress. If he wanted to do it, he should have gone and sold the 
American people, but he didn't. He published it in an obscure 
publication, and, a year later, he announced new rules that would 
govern all activity affecting water in the United States of America. 
Not one congressional bill had passed authorizing such an action.
  In fact, Mr. Speaker, the opposite had happened. Congress saw what 
was going on. Congress saw that the President was way outside of his 
authority. Congress saw that he was way outside of the mandate given to 
him by the people, and Congress passed legislation to block those 
rules.

[[Page H808]]

  Now, hear that, Mr. Speaker. The President had legislation introduced 
to implement the rules. It never even got out of committee because 
folks opposed it. Then he went around Congress, tried to do it on his 
own. Congress passed a new measure that said: Mr. President, that is 
wrong. Don't do it.
  So Congress--it is not that we failed to act--we acted affirmatively 
and said: Mr. President, that is not okay.
  It passed the House, Mr. Speaker. It passed the Senate. It went to 
the President's desk, where he vetoed it. Understand that.
  The President is outside of his constitutional role. Congress calls 
him on it, passes it by both Houses--which is rare, these days, as you 
know. The President, armed with the knowledge that the American people 
are against him on this issue, vetoes that measure. It took him exactly 
24 hours to think through that, Mr. Speaker. Hear that.
  He knew Congress rejected the measure because he couldn't get it out 
of committee. He implemented it by going around Congress, doing it 
entirely through the administrative branch, which we all know from 
Constitution 101 is not the way laws get made.
  Congress affirmatively passes a law that says: You cannot do that, 
Mr. President; that is outside of your bounds. It takes him 24 hours to 
think about that before he stamps it with a veto stamp and sends it 
away.
  So what do you do, Mr. Speaker? What do you do? What do you do when 
you represent 300 million Americans, you have a democratic process here 
on the floor of the House, everybody's voice is heard, you duly pass 
measures, and the President says: No, I am not concerned about that?
  You go to court. You go to court. Mr. Speaker, I hate going to court. 
I hate it.
  We are the Congress of the United States. We are article I for a 
reason. This is where the power was supposed to reside, distributed 
among all of us across this country.
  I hate going to the court to solve problems between the White House 
and the President. We ought to be able to solve those on our own, but 
we haven't been able to. We haven't been able to start that dialogue. 
So what do we do? We go to the court.
  Here is what the court says about this waters of the U.S. rule. I am 
quoting from their opinion:
  ``Even so, a review of what has been made available reveals a process 
that is inexplicable, arbitrary, and devoid of a reasoned process.''
  They are not talking about what happened in Congress, Mr. Speaker. We 
did everything by the book. The court is talking about what happened at 
the White House and at the EPA, this administrative process that tried 
to craft a brand-new regulatory regime to reregulate all water in the 
United States of America: our review ``reveals a process that is 
inexplicable, arbitrary, and devoid of a reasoned process.''
  Quoting from another section of the decision, Mr. Speaker:

       It appears likely that the EPA has violated its 
     congressional grant of authority in its promulgation of the 
     rule at issue, and it appears likely the EPA failed to comply 
     with the EPA requirements when promulgating the rule.

  That is the requirement that we have some public input on the rule. 
So not only did we violate our authority to begin with, but even if the 
EPA had had authority, the court says it should have invited more 
public input, which it did not.
  Reading, finally, from that decision, Mr. Speaker:

       A far broader segment of the public would benefit from the 
     preliminary injunction because it would ensure that Federal 
     agencies do not extend their power beyond the express 
     delegation from Congress.

  The court said: No, Mr. President, no. You do not have this 
authority. Congress makes the law. The answer is ``no.''

  So just a recap, Mr. Speaker: a bill was brought in this Congress to 
implement these rules. It never made it out of committee because folks 
didn't like it. The President did it unilaterally, and Congress 
responded by passing a bill out of both Chambers and sending it to the 
President's desk, saying: Don't do that; that is wrong.
  The President vetoes it.
  America sues, and the court says: You can't do that; that is wrong. 
You are exceeding your grant of authority under the law.
  You would think that after all of that, Mr. Speaker, the White House 
might say: Well, I don't know how we got it wrong, but we got it wrong. 
Let's go back to the drawing board.
  Not so. The White House continues to march on in this direction.
  Mr. Speaker, it sounds like inside baseball. It sounds like this is 
just that standard quibbling--Republicans-Democrats-Washington, D.C., 
dysfunction. That is not so. We are talking about water. We are talking 
about every spigot in America, Mr. Speaker.
  Let me tell you what folks have said in Georgia. This is our attorney 
general, Sam Olens. He is commenting after the court has prevented the 
implementation of these waters of the U.S. rules. He says:

       I am pleased the Sixth Circuit has granted a nationwide 
     stay on the burdensome waters of the United States rule. 
     Under this illegal rule, Georgia families, farmers, and 
     businesses would be subject to excessive and intrusive 
     Federal regulation. As the Federal Government continues to 
     issue massive and unconstitutional executive directives at an 
     alarming rate, I remain steadfast in my commitment to protect 
     and defend the interest of Georgians.

  Mr. Speaker, I don't know how it is in your home State. In my home 
State, the attorney general is elected by the people. He is not named 
by the Governor. This is the popularly elected representative for 
constitutional issues in the State of Georgia talking about Washington, 
D.C., and the White House, talking about illegal rules, 
unconstitutional executive directions coming out at an alarming rate.
  Again, these are regulations that have traditionally been controlled 
at the local level. I promise you--I promise you, Mr. Speaker--there is 
not a man or woman in this city who cares more about the streams 
outside of my home than I do; there is not a man or woman in this city 
who cares more about the water in my district than I do; and there is 
not a man or woman in this city that knows better about how to protect 
that order than the men and women in local government back home.
  This is from the Association County Commissioners in Georgia, Mr. 
Speaker:

       We feel that this rule has great potential to increase 
     counties' risk of litigation and unnecessary delays and 
     confusion and cause disincentive for adequately constructed 
     and maintained drainage ditches.

  This is where it has come, Mr. Speaker. In the massive power grab 
that is the waters of the U.S. rule, trying to grab everything and 
carry it to Washington, D.C., I have county commissioners writing to 
say this goes even to the drainage ditches in our area, which we are in 
charge of keeping clean, which we are in charge of water quality. We 
are involved in sediment control.
  It will also divert critical county resources--those being taxpayer 
resources--from other critical local government services and federally 
mandated Clean Water Act responsibilities at a time when our budgets 
are already under great duress. Hear that. There are already Federal 
mandates on counties for a variety of other issues. They are handling 
it all, even in these tough budget times, and they are saying not only 
are these new regulations going to drain taxpayer resources that would 
have been going to clean water, but the litigation is going to drain 
them because we are going to sue and we are not going to allow you to 
do these unconstitutional things.
  This is the Georgia Chamber of Commerce, Mr. Speaker:

       As such, the chamber opposes recent attempts by the Obama 
     administration to circumvent the role of Congress in the 
     regulation and management of the Nation's water resources, as 
     well as that of the States. In addition, the chamber believes 
     the proposed rules would violate private property rights and 
     subject business to yet another layer of uncertainty.

  More lawsuits, Mr. Speaker. This is not an issue for courts to solve.
  The President proposed it. Congress rejected it. Then the President 
tried to implement it, and Congress rejected that, too. Then the 
President vetoed that. Now the courts have rejected it, too.
  Mr. Speaker, if you have got a good idea, get out there and sell it. 
If you want to change the law of the land, get out there and persuade 
folks it is a good idea.

[[Page H809]]

  Look at what the President did on the Affordable Care Act, Mr. 
Speaker. There is not a man or a woman in America today who believes 
there should be lifetime caps on insurance policies. They believe, if 
you are facing the greatest crisis in your life, your insurance company 
ought to be there for you. President Obama won on that issue. I agree 
with him on that issue. That law is never going to change, that segment 
of it.
  President Obama said, you know, just because you have had cancer 
doesn't mean you shouldn't ever be able to buy an insurance policy 
again; just because you were born with a preexisting condition doesn't 
mean you should never be able to buy an insurance policy again.
  The President was right. Republicans in Congress passed that for 
federally regulated plans back in 1996. Some States didn't follow suit. 
That is now the law of the land. The President went out and led on some 
issues and changed America's minds on some issues.
  He did not do that here. He did it with his pen and his phone. It is 
unconstitutional, and the courts are telling him as much.
  This is right from my home district, Mr. Speaker. Gwinnett County is 
the biggest county in the district. I only represent two counties. So 
many folks live in these two counties, Mr. Speaker.

       On behalf of the Gwinnett County Board of Commissioners and 
     the residents of Gwinnett County, I am writing to encourage 
     continued action by the United States Congress to delay and 
     defeat the proposed EPA rule regarding the definition of 
     waters of the United States.

  The county commissioners, who have enough work to do, Mr. Speaker, 
are taking up for Congress, saying this is way outside of the bounds of 
what lawmakers ought to be doing from the White House. It ought to be 
happening in article I. Do what you can.
  Quoting from that same county commissioner, Mr. Speaker, the 
chairwoman of our county in Gwinnett:

       This would have the potential to increase costs and cause 
     delays in permitting an operation of needed public works 
     projects. In Gwinnett County, 2,700 miles of roads and 684 
     miles of ditches within the highway right-of-way would be 
     impacted by this proposed definition if it is adopted, as 
     would 1,400 miles of streams and 1,400 miles of drainage 
     ditches.

  Now hear that, Mr. Speaker. I guess I kind of glossed over that. I 
called this the largest power grab that we have seen in water rights in 
American history, but I haven't really tried to enumerate it.
  One county in the State of Georgia--we have got a lot of counties, 
Mr. Speaker. I believe we have the second most counties in the United 
States of America. So our counties are not that big.
  In one county, there are 2,700 miles of roads going under Federal 
regulation, 684 miles of ditches in those right-of-ways going under 
Federal regulation, 1,400 miles of streams going under new Federal 
regulation, and 1,400 miles of additional drainage ditches going under 
Federal regulation in one county--one county.
  To add insult to injury, Mr. Speaker, the Government Accountability 
Office, the auditor of the United States Government, had this to say in 
December of last year:
  ``The Environmental Protection Agency, EPA, violated publicity or 
propaganda and anti-lobbying provisions contained in appropriations 
acts with its use of certain social media platforms in association with 
its `Waters of the United States,' WOTUS, rulemaking . . .''

                              {time}  1245

  Mr. Speaker, the EPA violated propaganda and antilobbying provisions. 
Hear that. I am begging the administration to go out there and sell the 
American people before they act, as is supposed to be done.
  The General Accountability Office is chastising the administration 
because, instead of going out and selling it, they are illegally 
lobbying for it after the fact. We couldn't persuade anybody about it 
ahead of time. We didn't bother to involve folks ahead of time. We are 
going to go out after the fact illegally and try to change everybody's 
mind.
  Quoting again from that same report:
  ``The EPA engaged in covert propaganda when the agency did not 
identify EPA's role as the creator of the Thunderclap message to the 
target audience.''
  This is one particular campaign that the General Accountability 
Office is looking at.
  Mr. Speaker, we have got to demand better. President Obama, when he 
was Senator Obama, was demanding better of the Bush administration. He 
was right to do so.
  I am demanding better of the Obama administration. This Congress is 
demanding better. We are right to do so. Whoever the next President is, 
him or her, we have to ask more of them.
  The Constitution was crafted with three branches of government for a 
reason, one branch to create the laws--that is us--one branch to 
enforce the laws--that is the President--and one branch to adjudicate 
the differences.
  I will come back to the courts, Mr. Speaker. I have been talking 
about waters of the U.S. That is just one of dozens of examples of 
administration overreach.
  This headline, Mr. Speaker: Supreme Court Deals Blow to Obama's 
Effort to Regulate Coal Emissions. Coal emissions. This is the war on 
coal that you hear so much about.
  Mr. Speaker, the President has not come to Congress to sell Congress 
on doing away with our number one natural energy resource. The 
President has not gone to the American people to sell the American 
people on doing away with the number one energy resource in America.
  In fact, if you go into coal country, Mr. Speaker, every single 
Democrat at the Federal level has been defeated not because they 
weren't doing a good job--they may well have been--but because the 
President was declaring a war on coal.
  Hardworking Americans who work in the coal industry said: Why are you 
picking on me? If you want clean air, let's pass clean air regulations. 
Why are you declaring war on coal? This ends up in the Supreme Court.
  Former EPA Assistant Administrator Jeff Holmstead says this: It is 
the first time the Supreme Court has actually stayed a regulation.
  This is happening right now. It is happening right now. Mr. Speaker, 
I have got it on the front page of yesterday's National Journal, one of 
those Washington, D.C., dailies that tracks Federal opportunities and 
regulations. The headline reads: ``Obama's Second-Term Agenda Hits a 
Roadblock: the Supreme Court.''
  Think about that, Mr. Speaker. The headline, the generally accepted 
conventional wisdom, is the President's agenda hits a roadblock because 
the Supreme Court says no.
  Mr. Speaker, the President's agenda hit a roadblock when he decided 
not to sell it to Congress, not to sell it to his constituents, but to 
go around us both and do it through administrative action. It is the 
first time in American history that the Supreme Court has stayed a 
regulation, so egregious is this action.
  I go on from The New York Times, Mr. Speaker, just this week: ``But 
the Supreme Court's willingness to issue a stay while the case proceeds 
was an early hint that the program could face a skeptical reception 
from the justices.''
  With the Court's four liberal members dissenting, a 5-4 decision was 
unprecedented. ``The Supreme Court had never before granted a request 
to halt a regulation before review by a federal appeals court.''
  `` `It's a stunning development,' Jody Freeman, a Harvard law 
professor and former environmental legal counsel to the Obama 
administration, said in an email.''
  A stunning development. What is stunning, Mr. Speaker, is around and 
around and around the President goes, around this body, Republicans and 
Democrats.
  It is not a partisan issue. This is a constitutional issue of whether 
or not we should be concerned why it is that the courts are solving the 
issues.
  Here is a quote from Laurence Tribe, Harvard law professor. In fact, 
he was President Obama's constitutional law professor when the 
President was in law school.
  Professor Tribe says this: ``To justify the Clean Power Plan''--that 
is this power plan that is implementing the coal regulations that the 
Supreme Court just put a stay on this week--``the EPA has brazenly 
rewritten the

[[Page H810]]

history of an obscure section of the 1970 Clean Air Act . . . 
Frustration with congressional inaction cannot justify throwing the 
Constitution overboard to rescue this lawless EPA proposal. . . .''
  Mr. Speaker, we are supposed to disagree on things. You don't have to 
go far outside of my congressional district. Hank Johnson represents 
the south side of the county just beyond me, John Lewis just beyond 
that.
  We disagree on all sorts of things. I admire them. I respect them. We 
work together on issues. It is not surprising that we disagree.
  What is surprising and, in fact, alarming is that the American 
people's thirst for results has become such that Presidents think they 
can just skip the process, that the ends are going to justify the 
means.
  President Obama's law school professor, an undisputed congressional 
scholar, not a conservative by any stretch of the imagination: 
``Frustration with congressional inaction cannot justify throwing the 
Constitution overboard to rescue this lawless EPA proposal. . . .''
  I need folks to understand, Mr. Speaker, that this is not Republican-
Democrat. This is article I, article II. We talked about waters of the 
U.S. We talked about the war on coal. What about Guantanamo Bay, Mr. 
Speaker? What about the detention facility in Guantanamo Bay?
  U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch in November of last year--this is 
not old news; this is right now--said: ``With respect to individuals 
being transferred to the United States, the law currently does not 
allow for that. . . . ''
  The Attorney General of the United States, President Obama's Attorney 
General, the chief law enforcement officer of the land second only to 
the President, says the law will not allow you to transfer these 
individuals to the United States.
  The Secretary of Defense, Ash Carter, just last month: ``There are 
people in Gitmo who are so dangerous we cannot transfer them to the 
custody of another government no matter how much we trust that 
government. . . . We need to find another place [and] it would have to 
be in the United States. So I've made a proposal for the president, and 
he has indicated that he's going to submit that to Congress.''
  Hear that. The Secretary of Defense, Mr. Speaker, says the guys in 
Guantanamo are so dangerous, we cannot trust any other government on 
the planet with them. And so, if we are to close Guantanamo, as the 
President has desired for 8 years, we must bring those folks back to 
the U.S. It is the only way.
  He's going to have to submit that proposal to Congress, the Secretary 
of Defense says. Why is that? Because it's against the law to establish 
another detention facility, so, therefore, to get the support of 
Congress.
  It is against the law. So we have got the Secretary of Defense saying 
these guys are really dangerous, which would question why we want to 
bring them to the United States to begin with.
  But you can't transfer them here because it is against the law. We 
have Loretta Lynch, Attorney General, saying you can't bring them here 
because it is against the law.
  But I challenge anyone in this Chamber to do a news search, a Yahoo! 
search, Google search, however it is you get your news, and look in the 
last 14 days and see if you have seen another statement from the 
President saying he is going to bring those folks here.
  There is no proposal on Capitol Hill to do that. There is no effort 
from the White House on Capitol Hill to get that done. In fact, the 
opposite is true. Time after time after time this body, the Senate--the 
President has signed it into law--says that you cannot bring these 
folks back to America, that they are too dangerous. The Secretary of 
Defense agrees. U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch agrees. Yet, we go 
down this road again.
  Visa waiver reform, Mr. Speaker, I was about to dismiss. Yet another 
issue. We passed a bill that said: Listen, if you have been traveling 
to some of these countries in the Middle East where terrorism is 
running rampant today, you are not going to get a free pass into 
America. We are going to want to look at your background before we tell 
you to come on in.
  Now, that seems fair, Mr. Speaker, if you are from one of these 
countries and you have been traveling through these countries where 
terrorism is running rampant, where there is case after case after case 
of terrorists leaving those countries and performing deadly acts around 
the globe, before we just let you in, which is what the Visa Waiver 
Program is.
  It says: Come on in. We are not going to do a background check on 
you. If you are from England, you are from France, you are from 
Germany, we trust you. Come right on in.
  We say: If you have been traveling to sites where the terrorist 
training camps are, we are going to want to give you a little further 
scrutiny.
  Congress passed this. The House passed it. The Senate passed it. The 
President signed it into law. And then he turned around the very next 
day and said: Well, but I am not going to enforce that because I 
promised the Iranians in my nuclear deal that I wouldn't enforce those 
kinds of rules against Iranians.
  Well, you can't pick and choose. Veto the bill if you don't like the 
bill. Sign the bill if you do like the bill. You can't pick and choose.
  I quote from Senator Ron Johnson. He is the chairman of the Homeland 
Security and Governmental Affairs Committee on the Senate side.
  He says: ``Congress has every right to expect full compliance with 
the new provisions.''
  As the lead sponsor of the Visa Waiver Program Improvement and 
Terrorist Travel Prevention Act of 2015, I can attest that Congress 
considered and rejected expanding the waiver authority in the way the 
President proposes because these groups of travelers would be hard to 
verify and any waivers granted would be easy to exploit.
  This isn't 8 years ago. This isn't 5 years ago. This isn't 3 years 
ago. This is happening right now. The President signed language into 
law in December, signed language into law in November, in October, in 
September, signed language into law last year and said that this is the 
way it is going to be and has shown up this year and said: Oh, well, I 
didn't mean it. I am going to do it differently.
  You have the lead Senate sponsor, the chairman of the Homeland 
Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, saying: No. We considered 
that. We specifically didn't give you that waiver authority. Don't go 
down that road.
  Mr. Speaker, I have a chart up here. You can't see it. It says 9-0. 
It is another Supreme Court decision against the administration, 
saying: You have gone outside of your congressionally delegated 
authority. You can't do that.
  You see a lot of 5-4 decisions out of the Supreme Court, Mr. Speaker. 
You rarely see a 9-0 decision. These are Justices appointed by 
Presidents of all political stripes, including Justices appointed by 
President Obama.
  They looked at what the President did in the Noel Canning case where 
he declared that Congress was in recess so that he could put people in 
executive positions without having to have Congress' approval.
  And they said: Nonsense. Nonsense. You can't do that. It is 
outrageous. The Supreme Court rejected that 9-0.
  Mr. Speaker, I don't pick on this issue because it is an example of 
good news. I pick on it because it is an example of bad news. The 
courts said the President is overreaching and seizing congressional 
power illegitimately, unconstitutional actions.
  But when I go to Democrats in the Senate during the time period this 
was going on, Mr. Speaker, I get this.
  Senator Tom Harkin from Iowa: ``By appointing these nominees, 
President Obama has acted responsibly in order to ensure that workers 
and businesses across this country who rely on the stable functioning 
of this important agency would not be caught in the crossfire of the 
Republicans' misguided ideological battle.''
  He has a good reason. He has a good reason for defending the 
President. Partisan politics have created gridlock on Capitol Hill, Mr. 
Speaker.

       So I support the President ignoring the Constitution, 
     seizing authority that is granted only to the Senate, and 
     doing what he wants to do with it.

  This is a United States Senator choosing to be a Democrat first and 
defending article I second.
  I am not picking on Senator Harkin. That happens all the time in this 
place, Mr. Speaker.

[[Page H811]]

  When did that happen? When did it become more important to defend 
your President than to defend the Constitution? When did it become more 
important to be a good Republican than to be a good Congressman? I 
argue we can still turn the tide on that, Mr. Speaker.
  Representative George Miller from California, ranking member of the 
Education and the Workforce Committee, which had jurisdiction over 
these issues in the House, said this: ``President Obama's recess 
appointments will guarantee both employers and employees will have a 
place to go to have their rights under the law protected and 
enforced.''
  Well, that would be true except that they were unconstitutionally 
appointed, and, thus, all of the decisions they rendered are now moot. 
No one is defending article I. Folks are defending their President 
instead.
  Senator Harry Reid: ``Since President Obama took office, Senate 
Republicans have done everything possible to deny qualified nominees 
from receiving a fair up-or-down vote. President Obama did the right 
thing when he made these appointments on behalf of American workers.''
  Mr. Speaker, at 9-0, the Supreme Court said: No. You did not do the 
right thing, Mr. President. In fact, you did exactly the wrong thing. 
In fact, it is unconstitutional what you did. You do not have the power 
to act in this way. And Democrat after Democrat after Democrat is 
defending him.

                              {time}  1300

  Now, Mr. Speaker, if I put up these same charts from the Bush 
administration, I would have Democrats saying the Bush administration 
overstepped its bounds, and Republican after Republican after 
Republican would be defending them.
  It has got to stop. It may be too late for this administration, Mr. 
Speaker. The lines in the sand may have already been dug so deep that 
we won't be able to cross them, but here in this Presidential primary 
season we have got to ask of our Presidential candidates: What are you 
first? Are you your own leader first? Are you a Republican or Democrat 
first? Or, are you the leader of the free world under the restrictions 
of article II first?
  Are you going to use your pen and your phone? Are you just going to 
go out there and get it done by yourself? Or, are you going to go sell 
your boss on the idea--your boss, being 300 million Americans--and then 
are we going to bring ourselves together as a Nation to do these things 
one by one?
  Mr. Speaker, we have got to stop defending or criticizing actions 
based on which party is involved in it. There is one rule book for this 
country. It is not the policy position of the Republican National 
Committee. It is not the policy position of the Democratic National 
Committee. The one rule book in this country is the United States 
Constitution, which says Congress writes the law and the President 
enforces it.
  We have got to expect more of our Presidents--not about the results 
that they get, but about the leadership they provide. Not the 
leadership to go around the law, but the leadership to change people's 
minds and then change the law.
  We have got so much opportunity, Mr. Speaker. We have so much 
opportunity. The men and women that I have gotten to know in this 
Chamber would rather lose their seat tomorrow--who cares about the 
election--and they want to make a difference for the country. Don't 
tell me partisan gridlock has rendered self-governance impossible.
  Gridlock is the natural state of the constitutional government that 
our Founding Fathers created. We have to work with it, not around it, 
and we have to work with the American people, changing hearts and 
minds, not going around the American people and having to rely on the 
Supreme Court to fix those mistakes.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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