[Congressional Record Volume 167, Number 162 (Monday, September 20, 2021)]
[House]
[Pages H4550-H4551]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         THREE IMPORTANT ISSUES

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 4, 2021, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Grothman) is 
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
  Mr. GROTHMAN. Madam Speaker, we are back from our August break, and 
there are three issues of tremendous importance that Congress ought to 
deal with and the press corps ought to be dealing with.
  I can understand, by the way, why President Biden wants to change his 
view over a few months ago and go for mandates on the vaccine, because 
these other issues are issues that I am sure would be uncomfortable for 
him to address, but they are important for the press corps and 
important for the American people to address.
  The first issue is: the Del Rio sector of the Mexican border is out 
of control. We all see the 15,000 people under the bridge, but what is 
the consequence of that?
  What is the consequence of having 2 months in a row of over 200,000 
people show up at the border? The Border Patrol has to get off the 
border, they have to shuffle people around from the Del Rio section to 
the El Paso section or to the Laredo section. They have to take care of 
all of the unaccompanied minors coming in here, and when they do that, 
they cannot guard the border. Things are out of control.
  Not only are the agents in that area not able to focus on the area, 
but things are such a disaster, we are having to bring agents off the 
northern border to make up for the huge problems on the southern 
border.
  What happens? We wind up in a situation which not only are there more 
got-aways, people aren't even being processed crossing the border, but 
we also have a situation in which more drugs are coming off the border. 
The American public still hasn't been told enough that in the last year 
we have had over 90,000 people die of drug overdoses, largely from 
fentanyl coming across the Mexican border, and that is what happens 
when you have 224 miles barely monitored.
  The Haitians are being brought here or encouraged to come here by the 
drug gangs. Why are they able to do this? It didn't happen by 
coincidence that you saw all these people under the bridge last week 
and they weren't over there a month ago.
  The Biden administration has extended the Temporary Protected Status 
for people coming here from Haiti. When they changed this process, it 
was a recruiting tool for the gangs who want more people to come here.
  I am going to emphasize, Haiti is not a very nice country, but these 
people are not coming from Haiti. They are coming here from Chile, they 
are coming here from Brazil, they are coming from Venezuela. Why are 
they coming from these other countries? It is not because they are in 
danger in Chile and Brazil. They are coming here because they can make 
more money here, and the drug cartel gangs are explaining that to them.
  These gangs are charging these Haitians at least $50,000 a person to 
come here, which is the reason why they are so involved in this.
  Meanwhile, where is the President? Where is our moderate Joe Biden? 
Where is Kamala Harris, the expert on the border, as we have this 
disaster going on at the southern border, out of control, people going 
from the United States to Mexico, back Mexico to the United States?
  Wake up, press corps, and find out how much money the gangs are 
making on this. Why are we processing over 200,000 people at the 
southern border for 2 months in a row? Things we haven't seen for over 
20 years.
  No wonder some of the press corps, the irresponsible press corps--and 
no wonder Joe Biden wants to focus on vaccine mandates. Because 
focusing on vaccine mandates takes our eyes off the border that is out 
of control.
  It is up to Congress to step forward, have some more committee 
hearings on this, do something, bring some bills to the floor. I know 
there is going to be a CR coming through, there is going to be a bill 
to break the debt ceiling coming through.
  I would ask the President, the Speaker, give us some more Border 
Patrol agents to deal with our empty border. That is the first thing 
all Americans should be concerned about. They should be asking their 
Congressmen, they should be asking their Senators, what is being done 
to prevent 200,000 people from showing up at the border? What is being 
done when over 200 miles of the Mexican border is left, to a degree, 
unguarded? Are they at all concerned about the 90,000 people who died 
in the last year of illegal drug use, primarily fentanyl flowing across 
the southern border? What is being done about all the people coming 
from the other countries?
  Remember, you did not see all these people under the bridge 2 or 3 
months ago. Why? Again, it is not just a random thing. It is because of 
a change in the Temporary Protected Status extended by President Biden, 
which results in the huge mess that we have.
  But that is not the only thing that hasn't been covered anywhere near 
enough. There is an issue that the press should be focusing on more 
with regard to the COVID situation. I know a lot of the focus is on the 
vaccine, but we have to realize that many people have gotten the 
vaccine over the last 6 months.
  We also have a situation in which people have been working on cures 
for the disease. Right now, most days over 1,000--kind of averaging 
about 1,500--people die every day from COVID. So is there any cure for 
COVID that the CDC is letting sit on the table?
  Over a year ago scientists in Israel announced hope for a generic 
drug called fenofibrate, or Tricor, which has been used safely to treat 
people for high cholesterol for years. Recently, these Israeli 
scientists have revealed that they took 15 people, all of which had 
severe COVID, all of which needed oxygen, and in 4 days, 4 to 6 days, 
14 of the 15 were out of the hospital after they were given 
fenofibrate, which cost a grand total of $1.50 a day. The other patient 
got out of the hospital within 2 weeks.
  You would think this is good news for the CDC, particularly given the 
billions of dollars that we have given them. Unfortunately, they are 
not getting enough assistance to do further trials in this country. 
Think if this 15-patient outfit were typical of the population as a 
whole. 15 for 15 cured. And not only cured. A lot of people today with 
COVID, even when they are cured, have permanent or almost permanent 
side effects. But here the side effects are a fraction of what they 
were on people who didn't take fenofibrate.

  So I beg the CDC or anybody in the administration who is listening, 
we brought this to their attention before, see what you can do to have 
the vast sum of money and the U.S. Government weigh in to see if we can 
have stronger trials with more people on the fenofibrate, and we can 
get ourselves in a position in which soon if someone does wind up going 
to the hospital, if someone does wind up needing oxygen, they are given 
the fenofibrate, and they can wind up like the 15 patients they have 
already tried this on, all of which are apparently doing very well and 
are even getting rid of the symptoms that people who have had COVID 
sometimes hang onto for months and months and months.
  If we have anybody out there listening from the CDC, listening from 
the

[[Page H4551]]

NIH, I would ask them to familiarize themselves with the study. It is 
fenofibrate. It has been well covered in The Jerusalem Post.
  Why, in a time when we have 1,200 to 1,500 Americans dying every day 
of COVID, is this not something that is being pushed? I strongly 
encourage our health establishment to familiarize themselves with what 
right now looks like a miracle drug.
  My final comment is with regard to the pro-life issue. When you 
consider the hundreds of thousands of people who would have been born 
every day in this country but who have their lives cut short before 
they are born, you can see why this is another issue that our press 
corps should be talking about, our churches should be talking about.
  Already there have been big changes of policy under the new 
administration. First of all, in the past, under the Mexico City 
policy, if money was going to an international organization, if that 
international organization was performing abortions, they could not 
have the money. We changed that, President Biden changed it, saying: 
You can't use that money directly for an abortion, but since money is 
fungible, your organization can take the good name of the United States 
and use it to proselytize, use it after switching money around to have 
the U.S. assist in performing abortions around the world.
  The second thing they did is under Title X, money going out, again to 
nonprofit organizations, in the past if these organizations referred 
for abortion, they couldn't get the money. Change that policy, so the 
type of organizations who work towards legalizing or work towards 
normalizing abortion got more money.
  They wouldn't get the money in the past because it was too much a 
part of their mission to perform abortions. But one more time, they are 
going to be getting money.
  But now we have a new bill coming up, and I think all Americans have 
to stop and think what is happening when it has come to this in 
America.
  This bill will legalize abortion nationwide almost or perhaps all the 
way to birth. Now, throughout most of our country's history, abortion 
was illegal. It is kind of amazing, abortion was illegal before they 
had ultrasounds, before people could see actually what was going on.
  I had felt when I began to get involved in public life that when 
ultrasounds become available, the number of abortions would drop. But 
despite the ultrasounds, things continue on ahead, in part because 
powerful organizations continue to hold abortion as a way out of a 
pregnancy.
  But it is truly shocking that I believe a majority of people in this 
Chamber are going to vote to say that we have abortions right up to 
birth and get rid of even minor laws that are postponing the abortions 
otherwise.

                              {time}  2015

  When I was in the State of Wisconsin, I authored a bill putting in a 
24-hour waiting period for abortion. I talked to the women who were 
bullied by their boyfriends or cajoled by their parents into having 
abortions, and they felt it was very important that there be some sort 
of waiting period after you went to the office of the abortionist one 
time that you got a chance to stop, step back, and think.
  I think there are a lot of other places in our society where doctors 
or other people put a waiting period out there knowing that it is a 
very important decision, and you are never going to be able to change 
your mind once you make that decision. But under the extreme bill that 
we are going to be voting on later this week, they are going to say, 
no, we can't have that. Once they get you in that clinic on day one 
they can perform that abortion right away, and we are not going to give 
you 24 hours or 40 hours or whatever it is around the country to stop 
and maybe change your mind.
  That is the type of thing that is going to be passed in the U.S. 
House of Representatives.
  It doesn't take many people to change their mind and say, you know, I 
may consider myself so-called pro-choice, but the idea of saying that 
it is legal to perform an abortion a few hours after you walk in the 
abortion clinic, I just can't go that far. And I hope some of my 
colleagues who think they are going to vote for the bill later this 
week change their mind.
  I hope they change their mind on things like sex selective abortion. 
We know in other cultures, and I happen to think we have a better 
culture by a mile, but in other cultures it is apparently not unusual 
to do, see whether they are going to have a boy or girl and if it is 
not what you want, we are going to end the life of that child before it 
is born.
  Some States have made that illegal. Well, some people in Congress 
apparently feel they know better. We are going get rid of that law, and 
we are going to cut that life short just because maybe let's say it is 
a girl, and we were hoping for a boy.
  I can see why certain members of the press wouldn't want to talk 
about this, and I can see why certain members of the administration 
wouldn't talk about this. I don't know what I would do, how I would 
explain such a radical bill.
  So, in any event, I will leave the public with those three things to 
think about. Think about over 200,000 people a month at the border. 
Think about the Border Patrol stuck processing people, not able to 
monitor the border. Think of all the drugs coming across. Think of the 
5,000 and up that the people coming across are having to give these 
drug gangs in Mexico further strengthening their power.
  I ask you to think about like they have covered in the Jerusalem Post 
what is going on with the fenofibrate and the fact you can think how 
many lives we would save of the approximately 1,500 people a day that 
are still dying of COVID. And I want you to think about that bill being 
passed on Friday and whether it is right for the heavy hand of Congress 
to say not only can you have an abortion up to birth, but we are even 
going to get rid of laws like a waiting period law or get rid of laws 
like a sex selective law.
  Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Members are reminded to address their 
remarks to the Chair and not to a perceived viewing audience.

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