[Congressional Record Volume 163, Number 154 (Tuesday, September 26, 2017)]
[House]
[Pages H7499-H7503]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
PROVIDING FOR CONSIDERATION OF H.R. 2824, INCREASING OPPORTUNITY AND
SUCCESS FOR CHILDREN AND PARENTS THROUGH EVIDENCE-BASED HOME VISITING
ACT; PROVIDING FOR CONSIDERATION OF H.R. 2792, CONTROL UNLAWFUL
FUGITIVE FELONS ACT OF 2017; AND FOR OTHER PURPOSES
Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I
call up House Resolution 533 and ask for its immediate consideration.
The Clerk read the resolution, as follows:
H. Res. 533
Resolved, That at any time after adoption of this
resolution the Speaker may, pursuant to clause 2(b) of rule
XVIII, declare the House resolved into the Committee of the
Whole House on the state of the Union for consideration of
the bill (H.R. 2824) to amend title V of the Social Security
Act to extend the Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home
Visiting Program. The first reading of the bill shall be
dispensed with. All points of order against consideration of
the bill are waived. General debate shall be confined to the
bill and shall not exceed one hour equally divided and
controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the
Committee on Ways and Means. After general debate the bill
shall be considered for amendment under the five-minute rule.
In lieu of the amendment in the nature of a substitute
recommended by the Committee on Ways and Means now printed in
the bill, it shall be in order to consider as an original
bill for the purpose of amendment under the five-minute rule
an amendment in the nature of a substitute consisting of the
text of Rules Committee Print 115-33. That amendment in the
nature of a substitute shall be considered as read. All
points of order against that amendment in the nature of a
substitute are waived. No amendment to that amendment in the
nature of a substitute shall be in order
[[Page H7500]]
except those printed in the report of the Committee on Rules
accompanying this resolution. Each such amendment may be
offered only in the order printed in the report, may be
offered only by a Member designated in the report, shall be
considered as read, shall be debatable for the time specified
in the report equally divided and controlled by the proponent
and an opponent, shall not be subject to amendment, and shall
not be subject to a demand for division of the question in
the House or in the Committee of the Whole. All points of
order against such amendments are waived. At the conclusion
of consideration of the bill for amendment the Committee
shall rise and report the bill to the House with such
amendments as may have been adopted. Any Member may demand a
separate vote in the House on any amendment adopted in the
Committee of the Whole to the bill or to the amendment in the
nature of a substitute made in order as original text. The
previous question shall be considered as ordered on the bill
and amendments thereto to final passage without intervening
motion except one motion to recommit with or without
instructions.
Sec. 2. Upon adoption of this resolution it shall be in
order to consider in the House the bill (H.R. 2792) to amend
the Social Security Act to make certain revisions to
provisions limiting payment of benefits to fugitive felons
under titles II, VIII, and XVI of the Social Security Act.
All points of order against consideration of the bill are
waived. The amendment in the nature of a substitute
recommended by the Committee on Ways and Means now printed in
the bill shall be considered as adopted. The bill, as
amended, shall be considered as read. All points of order
against provisions in the bill, as amended, are waived. The
previous question shall be considered as ordered on the bill,
as amended, and on any further amendment thereto, to final
passage without intervening motion except: (1) one hour of
debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and
ranking minority member of the Committee on Ways and Means;
and (2) one motion to recommit with or without instructions.
Sec. 3. In the engrossment of H.R. 2824 the Clerk shall--
(a) add the text of H.R. 2792, as passed by the House, as
new matter at the end of H.R. 2824;
(b) conform the title of H.R. 2824 to reflect the addition
of H.R. 2792, as passed by the House, to the engrossment;
(c) assign appropriate designations to provisions within
the engrossment; and
(d) conform cross-references and provisions for short
titles within the engrossment.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Texas is recognized for 1
hour.
Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the
customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Hastings),
pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During
consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose
of debate only.
General Leave
Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members
have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentleman from Texas?
There was no objection.
Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, House Resolution 533 provides for the
consideration of two bills which were reported by the House Ways and
Means Committee.
For the first bill, H.R. 2792, the Control Unlawful Fugitive Felons
Act of 2017, the rule provides for 1 hour of debate equally divided and
controlled by the chair and ranking member of the Committee on Ways and
Means. The rule waives all points of order and makes in order no
further amendments to the legislation. However, the minority is
afforded the customary motion to recommit.
For H.R. 2824, the Increasing Opportunity and Success for Children
and Parents through Evidence-Based Home Visiting Act, the rule provides
for 1 hour of debate equally divided between the chair and ranking
member of the Committee on Ways and Means. The Rules Committee made in
order four amendments to H.R. 2824, one Republican amendment, two
Democratic amendments, and one bipartisan amendment. Finally, the rule
provides for the customary motion to recommit with or without
instructions.
H.R. 2792, the Control Unlawful Fugitive Felons Act of 2017, amends
the Social Security Act to give the Social Security Administration the
necessary tools to prevent Federal benefits and payments from being
made to persons who are actually on the run from the law.
Many people might hear this and think: Why would the government ever
continue to pay someone who is actively fleeing from law enforcement?
It is a legitimate question, and it has an unfortunate answer.
In 1996, President Clinton signed the Personal Responsibility and
Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act into law. One major provision of
this reform bill was a restriction on the ability of fugitive felons
and probation and parole violators from receiving Social Security
benefits.
{time} 1230
Similar provisions have been included in other Federal entitlement
programs, including the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program and
the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program. This policy was
expanded in 2004, with the passage of the Social Security Protection
Act.
However, subsequent to the passage of these commonsense reforms,
several judges in cases from the mid-2000s ruled that the Social
Security Administration's interpretation of these provisions was too
broad and limited the Social Security Administration's ability to
curtail payments to three narrow categories of fugitives, namely:
escape, flight to avoid prosecution or confinement, and flight escape.
The bill before the House today, H.R. 2792, would restore Congress'
original intent to the reforms passed under both Presidents Clinton and
George W. Bush. Specifically, H.R. 2792 would prohibit an individual
who is the subject of an outstanding arrest warrant for a felony or
parole violation from receiving monthly Social Security income
payments. This applies only to felony charges or a crime carrying a
minimum term of 1 year or more in prison.
This legislation would not punish individuals convicted of a
misdemeanor, such as outstanding parking tickets. In fact, some people
have falsely claimed that.
Individuals who have potentially committed a felony or a parole
violation should not be able to use taxpayer dollars to evade capture.
Providing the Social Security Administration with the tools in H.R.
2792 is a commonsense way to show that the Federal Government is
sincere in its commitment to being a good steward of Federal taxpayer
dollars. The Social Security benefits can be restored once the
individual resolves the outstanding issues related to his or her
warrant or parole violation.
I want to thank the gentlewoman from South Dakota, Kristi Noem, for
her work on this legislation, and I urge Members of the House to
support this worthy bill.
The second bill in today's rule, H.R. 2824, the Increasing
Opportunity Through Evidence-Based Home Visiting Act, extends funding
for the Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting Program,
which is more commonly referred to as MIECHV.
The Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting Program is an
important program that provides low-income families with opportunities
to receive home-visiting services to help support a child's first
years. These services range from prenatal care to early childhood
services and allow for children to grow up in healthy homes.
As not only a physician but a physician who specialized in obstetrics
and gynecology, I did spend 25 years working with pregnant women and
families to help ensure that all mothers could deliver and raise
healthy children. As an OB/GYN, I know the best way to ensure that a
child succeeds is to invest in long-term services and to ensure that
the child receives access to appropriate care.
Because of the Nurse-Family Partnership's work, 90 percent of all
babies who are supported by the organization are born full term, 95
percent of those babies receive all their immunizations by 24 months,
and nearly 89 percent of those mothers breastfeed their newborns.
These are important milestones for newborn children that can have
lasting impacts on their health for the rest of their lives, and it is
important that we support initiatives that support vital, lifesaving
programs like these.
Furthermore, the program succeeds by not only supporting the health
and well-being of children, but by supporting pregnant women and
mothers as well. In my home State of Texas, the reported incidence of
maternal mortality has increased in recent years, in part, as the State
has collected more comprehensive data on causes of death up to a year
after childbirth.
[[Page H7501]]
While no amount of maternal mortality is ever acceptable, the new
data has shown us that the causes for maternal mortality in the State
have shifted away from those traditional acute cases that I was
familiar with during my residency back in the 1970s. There were
illnesses such as pregnancy-induced hypertension, hemorrhage, and
infection during pregnancy. Now it is different. We have cardiac
disease, suicide, and opioid overdose, which oftentimes occurs in the
months after childbirth.
By supporting children in their first years, MIECHV can not only help
children live healthy lives, but help mothers live healthy lives as
well, so that they can continue to be there for their children.
The MIECHV Program and organizations like the Nurse-Family
Partnership succeed because they identify families in need that do not
have readily available care and work to provide services in home
settings.
Families cannot raise healthy children without access to care. When
families cannot find providers in their area, MIECHV grant recipients
are there to provide that support.
H.R. 2824 builds upon the successes of the MIECHV Program by
tailoring the program to ensure that it can continue to help families
that truly need the help.
For example, H.R. 2824 requires for States receiving MIECHV grants to
conduct statewide needs assessments by 2020, in order to reaffirm which
populations and communities should receive these services. The last
time such an assessment was required was in 2010.
As the needs of populations of States have evolved over these past 10
years, so should the program as well. It is important to ensure that
tax dollars continue to be invested efficiently, and this bill ensures
that MIECHV can continue to do so.
Additionally, H.R. 2824 provides additional opportunities for States
to promote quality and enhanced outcomes. The bill updates the program
by allowing for States to promote models that will have greater impact
on multiple sites and locations, thus expanding the reach of grants and
providing States with the opportunity to reimburse grant recipients
based on the quality and outcomes associated with their programs.
I certainly want to thank members of the Ways and Means Committee for
the work they have put into this bill. It is a smart bill that
continues a Federal program for low-income families that actually has
evidence of its effectiveness and, furthermore, links future funding to
the assurance of greater cost-effectiveness.
This program serves as a model for Federal programs to help low-
income families and children. I want to thank Chairman Smith and
Chairman Brady for their efforts on this bill.
For these reasons, I encourage everyone in this body to support this
rule and the underlying bill today.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. HASTINGS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume,
and I thank the gentleman from Texas for yielding me the customary 30
minutes for debate.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to debate the rule for consideration of
H.R. 2824, the Increasing Opportunity Through Evidence-Based Home
Visiting Act; and H.R. 2792, the Control Unlawful Fugitive Felons Act
of 2017.
The first measure, H.R. 2824, reauthorizes the Maternal, Infant, and
Early Childhood Home Visiting Program, or MIECHV, and provides pregnant
women and families access to resources to improve maternal and child
health and promotes child development.
I am glad to see this bill getting the attention that I think we all
agree it deserves, considering the important role the program plays in
all of our communities. However, my concern is that, once again, we are
witnessing my Republican friends take a policy that should garner
broad, bipartisan support and instead scuttle the effort by playing
politics.
H.R. 2824's State matching provision is a threat to the core
existence of this program. Because of this change from the past
authorization, I fear that many States will lose Federal funding and
will be forced to cut off home visiting services altogether.
Where do you propose poorer States with lower investments in home
visiting get the money to meet the matching requirements?
Then, Mr. Speaker, what about Tribal programs? They are especially
vulnerable to the devastation that will be wrought by making them come
up with a 30 percent match. Native American communities struggle
enough, as it is, without having to put up with these absurd
requirements.
I do compliment Mrs. Noem for fighting along with our colleague on
the Rules Committee, Tom Cole, for a 5-year hiatus before they would
have to make the match. But as one who represents two Tribes, the
Seminoles and the Miccosukees, I don't even think, after 5 years, their
vulnerability to devastation is going to be avoided.
Mr. Speaker, I ask: Why are my Republican colleagues again choosing
to abandon bipartisanship in favor of partisan politics?
Our goals should be to reauthorize the vital program, not change
long-established and successful policies that will hurt the most
vulnerable in our country.
This program, as traditionally reauthorized, puts families first in
order to strengthen communities and improve outcomes for kids and their
families. Without the MIECHV Program, at-risk families will suffer.
I strongly support moving quickly to reauthorize this program before
it expires on September 30, 2017. But adding a provision that will make
it impossible for many States to fully participate in this program is
not only not the way forward, it is downright dangerous.
The second measure is H.R. 2792. It is a sidecar bill, as its only
purpose in being considered is to offset the cost of the MIECHV
Program.
H.R. 2792 would reinstate an old, failed policy that had damaging
effects for many seniors and people with disabilities by taking away
Supplemental Security Income benefits from every individual who has an
outstanding felony warrant, regardless of the seriousness of the
alleged violation, the age of the warrant, or the condition of the
recipient.
Mr. Speaker, over 110 national, State, and local organizations have
warned that H.R. 2792 is a cruel bill that could have catastrophic
consequences for some of our most vulnerable citizens.
Everyone can agree that dangerous criminals should not receive public
benefits while fleeing justice. In fact, the Social Security
Administration already provides regular notification to law enforcement
of any beneficiary who has an outstanding warrant. This bill, on the
other hand, despite its title, would harm seniors and people with
severe disabilities, not felons.
Mr. Speaker, a larger issue at hand is not simply the dangerous
policy changes in the first bill, nor the failed unnecessary policy
found in the second, but rather the partisan manner in which these
bills are being considered, especially in the face of the laundry list
of items that this body needs to urgently address in a bipartisan
manner.
We do not have the luxury of time to debate the majority's attempts
to legislate failed and dangerous policies that will threaten families.
We should be acting in the most exigent fashion to address issues
such as ascertaining the full scope of Hurricane Maria's devastation on
Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands and what we need to do to make
our brothers and sisters in those areas whole again.
We should not be spending our time taking a partisan approach to a
program that provides pregnant women and families access to resources
to improve maternal and child health. Rather, we should be working
across the aisle to address the real pressing issues facing our
country.
{time} 1245
Congress should be addressing the plight of the millions of American
citizens living in total devastation in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin
Islands.
Five days after Hurricane Maria decimated what Hurricane Irma had
spared, 15,000 people remain in government shelters, thousands of homes
are destroyed, roads are blocked, bridges buckled, and a dam in Puerto
Rico is on the edge of collapse, threatening the lives of nearly 70,000
people with flash flooding. Two hospitals in the Virgin Islands have
been destroyed, and lest I
[[Page H7502]]
not mention that we have not dealt adequately with what is required in
Texas and in southwest Louisiana and in Florida.
Today, in my office, numerous representatives of government officials
and organizations came to present issues concerning ongoing matters
having to do with their concerns in our area. The Speaker of the House
and the chairman of appropriations were with several of us in the
Florida delegation last week to review and view the damage that has
occurred in the Keys. And here we are, rather than dealing with a
humanitarian crisis as towns are left without fresh water, power, and
fuel, we are dealing with a dangerous bill that will address vulnerable
people in a negative way.
Officials reported that 1,360 of Puerto Rico's 1,600 telephone cell
towers are down. The same holds in the Virgin Islands. With 85 percent
of aboveground and underground phone and internet cables knocked out--
the same in the Virgin Islands--officials still had not had
communication with 9 of the 78 municipalities. It has been difficult or
nearly impossible for individuals to reach or connect with their loved
ones.
Let me make something very clear that many Members of the House do
not understand. Everybody cries that FEMA should do all of the things
that we would want it to do as the Federal Emergency Management Agency,
but FEMA today is dealing with 30 disasters in this country.
I sat here a moment ago and heard our colleague from Montana describe
over a million acres of fire ongoing there. In southern California,
there is an extraordinary fire that is taking place in that particular
area.
This devastation, these disasters as in Puerto Rico, the Virgin
Islands, and elsewhere are only cracks of the service of the long to-do
list that Congress is confronted with. The list is long and time is
short.
In addition to the MIECHV program, which the majority has decided to
undermine here today, at the end of the week, the Children's Health and
Insurance Program--CHIP, the Children's Health and Insurance Program--
Medicare provisions, and the Community Health Centers Fund all expire
without any discussion at all in this House. We are leaving not only
our constituents, young and old, and the American people in a quandary
about their health insurance or treatment facilities, but adding
unnecessary anxiety to their lives.
Mr. Speaker, I would argue that the snowball is only going to grow
with the end of the calendar year looming right around the corner.
Let me just remind my colleagues in the majority what needs to be
addressed by December 8: reauthorizing the National Flood Insurance
Program--I don't know what that was yesterday that they were trying to
do with the FAA authorization--an absolute necessity in the wake of
these devastating storms; keeping the government open and EPA pesticide
registration fees. And by the end of the year, we must also act to
reauthorize the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, FISA, which we
now know plays a critical role in the fundamental aspects of our
democracy.
The Affordable Care Act's annual fee on health insurance providers
needs to be addressed, important for the health of the marketplace, and
the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund financing rate.
Now, Democrats stand ready to work in a bipartisan fashion to address
each and every one of the matters that I just talked about, and all of
them must pass pieces of legislation. What we are witnessing today is a
clear indication that my Republican friends do not share the same
spirit, but would rather play politics.
Let me just add one little bit about that. In the other body, the
United States Senate, we saw an example of partisan politics play out
to its extreme, and it is not likely that there is going to be an
important measure dealing with the healthcare of Americans coming from
the United States Senate back to this body that passed something that
was an awful bill earlier in the year.
But what did it do?
It caused Lamar Alexander and Patty Murray, who were working on
bipartisan measures, to stop their bipartisan efforts so that we could
go forward in the Senate on a partisan measure that is going nowhere.
People sent us here to work together. They did not send us here to be
partisan in every one of our moves. What we are witnessing here today
is another example of partisanship.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 2 minutes.
Mr. Speaker, I want to talk again just for a minute about the second
bill in today's rule, H.R. 2824, the Increasing Opportunity and Success
for Children and Parents through Evidence-Based Home Visiting Act, that
does extend funding for the Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home
Visiting Program.
I just wanted to talk for a minute about some of the results that we
have seen in these program grants and, at this point, reference my home
State of Texas to see how they have performed.
The Nurse-Family Partnership is a community-based home services group
that supports pregnant women and new mothers in the Dallas-Fort Worth
area. They have used grants from this program to support women through
both the promotion of preventive and prenatal services for pregnant
women, like connecting women to physicians, helping them get
medications, and through the utilization of risk reduction services
such as smoking cessation.
Again, I tell you this to reiterate that these are good programs.
This is a good program that we are reauthorizing today and it is worthy
of our attention and support.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. HASTINGS. Mr. Speaker, I hope my colleague will support the
DelBene amendment, which will eliminate the matching funds for Tribes
altogether. I mentioned that earlier.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from Colorado (Ms.
DeGette), my good friend.
Ms. DeGETTE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding. I
associate myself with his remarks about everything we need to do by the
end of the fiscal year, which is the end of this week; in particular,
reauthorization of CHIP that has helped so many millions of kids get
health insurance and get the care that they need.
I rise today, though, to talk about the MIECHV bill, which is up
today, and to express my deep disappointment that my colleagues on the
other side of the aisle have chosen to walk away from yet another
opportunity to work on a bipartisan basis. We could extend this program
on a bipartisan basis just the way we started it. It is really a
success story.
The evidence-based models are proven to deliver results for kids and
families in every single State. Investments in MIECHV are investments
in the success of America's children and their futures. Peer-reviewed
evidence proves that MIECHV leads to improvements in health outcomes
for mothers and babies, school achievement, parenting practices, and
overall early childhood development.
On top of all that, MIECHV is a great return on investment for
Federal dollars. For example, for every Federal dollar in the Nurse-
Family Partnership, we get $5.70 in return. Sadly, this bill that the
House is considering today would set MIECHV back. The partisan proposal
would make it more difficult for MIECHV models in all of our States to
continue their success stories.
Under current law, MIECHV only has enough funding to reach 6 percent
of eligible families. But instead of working together to help the
program reach more children, this bill curtails the reach. It cuts the
funding and, as my ranking member said, it imposes a harmful State-
matching requirement that could force some of these home health visit
programs to shut down altogether.
It is really a shame that when you are talking about healthy starts
for kids, we can't work together on both sides of the aisle. I would
hope we would defeat this legislation and come back and do what we have
done before on this program, work together to have a robust piece of
legislation.
Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. HASTINGS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
It is shameful that President Trump would end the DACA program
without a single thought to the consequences
[[Page H7503]]
this decision would have on the 800,000 young lives this program
protects.
Do the American people even want DACA to end?
The answer is clearly no.
According to a Politico/Morning Consult poll: ``Support for allowing
these immigrants to remain in the United States spans across party
lines: 84 percent of Democrats, 74 percent of Independents, and 69
percent of Republicans think they should stay.''
Congress must act to protect our DREAMers.
Well, Mr. Speaker, here is our chance to rectify President Trump's
heartless decision and restore the American people's faith in us. If we
defeat the previous question, I am going to offer an amendment to the
rule to bring up H.R. 3440, the Dream Act. This bipartisan, bicameral
legislation would help thousands of young people who are Americans in
every way except on paper.
Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of my
amendment in the Record, along with extraneous material, immediately
prior to the vote on the previous question.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentleman from Florida?
There was no objection.
Mr. HASTINGS. Mr. Speaker, through the Chair, I would advise my
friend from Texas that I have no further speakers and that I am
prepared to close.
Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. HASTINGS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.
We stand here today with a to-do list a mile long, and we don't have
much time to cross items off that list. By kicking the can down the
road on nearly every past piece of legislation, this Republican
majority has shown itself completely unable to govern. They have
abdicated their duty to the American people to accomplish even the most
basic of legislative tasks: passing a budget. Without Democratic help,
they wouldn't be able to even keep the lights on.
My sincere hope is that the next time we meet we will take up
legislation that provides some much-needed relief to our brothers and
sisters in Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands, as well as my home State
of Florida and Texas and southwest Louisiana; and address the other
disasters that are occurring throughout our country, more specifically
having to do with wildfires in Montana, in Oregon, and in California;
and that we will begin the process of addressing every single one of
the needs of this Nation, particularly its health and its healthcare in
a bipartisan way.
My colleagues on this side of the aisle stand ready to do so. I urge
a ``no'' vote on the rule.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Members are reminded to refrain from
engaging in personalities toward the President.
{time} 1300
Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, today's rule provides for consideration of two important
pieces of legislation to restore sanity to the administration of the
Social Security program and to provide critical tools for disadvantaged
homes in helping families raise their children with the best possible
practices.
Mr. Speaker, I thank Chairman Brady, Mrs. Noem, and Mr. Smith for the
work on each of their respective pieces of legislation, and I urge
Members of this body to support both bills and the rule which will
provide for their consideration.
The material previously referred to by Mr. Hastings is as follows:
An Amendment to H. Res. 533 Offered by Mr. Hastings
At the end of the resolution, add the following new
sections:
Sec 4. Immediately upon adoption of this resolution the
Speaker shall, pursuant to clause 2(b) of rule XVIII, declare
the House resolved into the Committee of the Whole House on
the state of the Union for consideration of the bill (H.R.
3440) to authorize the cancellation of removal and adjustment
of status of certain individuals who are long-term United
States residents and who entered the United States as
children and for other purposes. The first reading of the
bill shall be dispensed with. All points of order against
consideration of the bill are waived. General debate shall be
confined to the bill and shall not exceed one hour equally
divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority
member of the Committee on the Judiciary. After general
debate the bill shall be considered for amendment under the
five-minute rule. All points of order against provisions in
the bill are waived. At the conclusion of consideration of
the bill for amendment the Committee shall rise and report
the bill to the House with such amendments as may have been
adopted. The previous question shall be considered as ordered
on the bill and amendments thereto to final passage without
intervening motion except one motion to recommit with or
without instructions. If the Committee of the Whole rises and
reports that it has come to no resolution on the bill, then
on the next legislative day the House shall, immediately
after the third daily order of business under clause 1 of
rule XIV, resolve into the Committee of the Whole for further
consideration of the bill.
Sec. 5. Clause 1(c) of rule XIX shall not apply to the
consideration of H.R. 3440.
____
The Vote on the Previous Question: What It Really Means
This vote, the vote on whether to order the previous
question on a special rule, is not merely a procedural vote.
A vote against ordering the previous question is a vote
against the Republican majority agenda and a vote to allow
the Democratic minority to offer an alternative plan. It is a
vote about what the House should be debating.
Mr. Clarence Cannon's Precedents of the House of
Representatives (VI, 308-311), describes the vote on the
previous question on the rule as ``a motion to direct or
control the consideration of the subject before the House
being made by the Member in charge.'' To defeat the previous
question is to give the opposition a chance to decide the
subject before the House. Cannon cites the Speaker's ruling
of January 13, 1920, to the effect that ``the refusal of the
House to sustain the demand for the previous question passes
the control of the resolution to the opposition'' in order to
offer an amendment. On March 15, 1909, a member of the
majority party offered a rule resolution. The House defeated
the previous question and a member of the opposition rose to
a parliamentary inquiry, asking who was entitled to
recognition. Speaker Joseph G. Cannon (R-Illinois) said:
``The previous question having been refused, the gentleman
from New York, Mr. Fitzgerald, who had asked the gentleman to
yield to him for an amendment, is entitled to the first
recognition.''
The Republican majority may say ``the vote on the previous
question is simply a vote on whether to proceed to an
immediate vote on adopting the resolution . . . [and] has no
substantive legislative or policy implications whatsoever.''
But that is not what they have always said. Listen to the
Republican Leadership Manual on the Legislative Process in
the United States House of Representatives, (6th edition,
page 135). Here's how the Republicans describe the previous
question vote in their own manual: ``Although it is generally
not possible to amend the rule because the majority Member
controlling the time will not yield for the purpose of
offering an amendment, the same result may be achieved by
voting down the previous question on the rule . . . When the
motion for the previous question is defeated, control of the
time passes to the Member who led the opposition to ordering
the previous question. That Member, because he then controls
the time, may offer an amendment to the rule, or yield for
the purpose of amendment.''
In Deschler's Procedure in the U.S. House of
Representatives, the subchapter titled ``Amending Special
Rules'' states: ``a refusal to order the previous question on
such a rule [a special rule reported from the Committee on
Rules] opens the resolution to amendment and further
debate.'' (Chapter 21, section 21.2) Section 21.3 continues:
``Upon rejection of the motion for the previous question on a
resolution reported from the Committee on Rules, control
shifts to the Member leading the opposition to the previous
question, who may offer a proper amendment or motion and who
controls the time for debate thereon.''
Clearly, the vote on the previous question on a rule does
have substantive policy implications. It is one of the only
available tools for those who oppose the Republican
majority's agenda and allows those with alternative views the
opportunity to offer an alternative plan.
Mr. BURGESS. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I
move the previous question on the resolution.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on ordering the previous
question.
The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that
the ayes appeared to have it.
Mr. HASTINGS. Mr. 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.
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