[Congressional Record Volume 168, Number 148 (Wednesday, September 14, 2022)]
[House]
[Pages H7804-H7814]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
PROVIDING FOR CONSIDERATION OF H.R. 302, PREVENTING A PATRONAGE SYSTEM
ACT OF 2021; PROVIDING FOR CONSIDERATION OF H.R. 2988, WHISTLEBLOWER
PROTECTION IMPROVEMENT ACT OF 2021; PROVIDING FOR CONSIDERATION OF H.R.
8326, ENSURING A FAIR AND ACCURATE CENSUS ACT; AND FOR OTHER PURPOSES
Mr. RASKIN. Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I
call up House Resolution 1339 and ask for its immediate consideration.
The Clerk read the resolution, as follows:
H. Res. 1339
Resolved, That upon adoption of this resolution it shall be
in order to consider in the House the bill (H.R. 302) to
impose limits on excepting competitive service positions from
the competitive service, and for other purposes. All points
of order against consideration of the bill are waived. The
amendment in the nature of a substitute recommended by the
Committee on Oversight and Reform 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 Oversight and Reform or their
respective designees; (2) the further amendment printed in
part A of the report of the Committee on Rules accompanying
this resolution, if offered by the Member designated in the
report, which shall be in order without intervention of any
point of order, shall be considered as read, shall be
separately debatable for the time specified in the report
equally divided and controlled by the proponent and an
opponent, and shall not be subject to a demand for division
of the question; and (3) one motion to recommit.
Sec. 2. 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.
2988) to amend title 5, United States Code, to modify and
enhance protections for Federal Government whistleblowers,
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 Oversight and Reform or their respective
designees. After general debate the bill shall be considered
for amendment under the five-minute rule. The amendment in
the nature of a substitute recommended by the Committee on
Oversight and Reform now printed in the bill, modified by the
amendment printed in part B of the report of the Committee on
Rules accompanying this resolution, shall be considered as
adopted in the House and in the Committee of the Whole. The
bill, as amended, shall be considered as the original bill
for the purpose of further amendment under the five-minute
rule and shall be considered as read. All points of order
against provisions in the bill, as amended, are waived.
Sec. 3. (a) No further amendment to the bill, as amended,
shall be in order except those printed in part C of the
report of the Committee on Rules accompanying this resolution
considered pursuant to subsection (b) and amendments en bloc
described in section 4 of this resolution.
(b) Each further amendment printed in part C of the report
of the Committee on Rules not earlier considered as
amendments en bloc pursuant to section 4 of this resolution
shall be considered only in the order printed in the report,
may be offered only by a Member designated in the report,
shall be considered 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.
(c) All points of order against the further amendments
printed in part C of the report of the Committee on Rules or
amendments en bloc described in section 4 of this resolution
are waived.
Sec. 4. It shall be in order at any time for the chair of
the Committee on Oversight and Reform or her designee to
offer amendments en bloc consisting of amendments printed in
part C of the report of the Committee on Rules accompanying
this resolution not earlier disposed of. Amendments en bloc
offered pursuant to this section shall be considered as read,
shall be debatable for 20 minutes equally divided and
controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the
Committee on Oversight and Reform or their respective
designees, 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.
Sec. 5. At the conclusion of consideration of the bill for
amendment the Committee shall rise and report the bill, as
amended, to the House with such further amendments as may
have been adopted. In the case of sundry further amendments
reported from the Committee, the question of their adoption
shall be put to the House en gros and without division of the
question. 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.
Sec. 6. 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.
8326) to amend title 13, United States Code, to improve the
operations of the Bureau of the Census, 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
Oversight and Reform or their respective designees. 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
Oversight and Reform now printed in the bill, an amendment in
the nature of a substitute consisting of the text of Rules
Committee Print 117-64, modified by the amendment printed in
part D of the report of the Committee on Rules accompanying
this resolution, shall be considered
[[Page H7805]]
as adopted in the House and in the Committee of the Whole.
The bill, as amended, shall be considered as the original
bill for the purpose of further amendment under the five-
minute rule and shall be considered as read. All points of
order against provisions in the bill, as amended, are waived.
Sec. 7. (a) No further amendment to the bill, as amended,
shall be in order except those printed in part E of the
report of the Committee on Rules accompanying this resolution
considered pursuant to subsection (b) and amendments en bloc
described in section 8 of this resolution.
(b) Each further amendment printed in part E of the report
of the Committee on Rules not earlier considered as
amendments en bloc pursuant to section 8 of this resolution
shall be considered only in the order printed in the report,
may be offered only by a Member designated in the report,
shall be considered 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.
(c) All points of order against the further amendments
printed in part E of the report of the Committee on Rules or
amendments en bloc described in section 8 of this resolution
are waived.
Sec. 8. It shall be in order at any time for the chair of
the Committee on Oversight and Reform or her designee to
offer amendments en bloc consisting of amendments printed in
part E of the report of the Committee on Rules accompanying
this resolution not earlier disposed of. Amendments en bloc
offered pursuant to this section shall be considered as read,
shall be debatable for 20 minutes equally divided and
controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the
Committee on Oversight and Reform or their respective
designees, 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.
Sec. 9. At the conclusion of consideration of the bill for
amendment the Committee shall rise and report the bill, as
amended, to the House with such further amendments as may
have been adopted. In the case of sundry further amendments
reported from the Committee, the question of their adoption
shall be put to the House en gros and without division of the
question. 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.
Sec. 10. During consideration of H.R. 2988 and H.R. 8326,
the Chair may entertain a motion that the Committee rise only
if offered by the chair of the Committee on Oversight and
Reform or her designee. The Chair may not entertain a motion
to strike out the enacting words of the bill (as described in
clause 9 of rule XVIII).
Sec. 11. (a) At any time through the legislative day of
Friday, September 16, 2022, the Speaker may entertain motions
offered by the Majority Leader or a designee that the House
suspend the rules as though under clause 1 of rule XV with
respect to multiple measures described in subsection (b), and
the Chair shall put the question on any such motion without
debate or intervening motion.
(b) A measure referred to in subsection (a) includes any
measure that was the object of a motion to suspend the rules
on the legislative day of September 13, 2022, September 14,
2022, September 15, 2022, or September 16, 2022, in the form
as so offered, on which the yeas and nays were ordered and
further proceedings postponed pursuant to clause 8 of rule
XX.
(c) Upon the offering of a motion pursuant to subsection
(a) concerning multiple measures, the ordering of the yeas
and nays on postponed motions to suspend the rules with
respect to such measures is vacated to the end that all such
motions are considered as withdrawn.
Sec. 12. The requirement of clause 6(a) of rule XIII for a
two-thirds vote to consider a report from the Committee on
Rules on the same day it is presented to the House is waived
with respect to any resolution reported through the
legislative day of September 30, 2022, relating to a measure
making or continuing appropriations for the fiscal year
ending September 30, 2023.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Maryland is recognized
for 1 hour.
Mr. RASKIN. Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the
customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr.
Reschenthaler), 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. RASKIN. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may
have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks.
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Cuellar). Is there objection to the
request of the gentleman from Maryland?
There was no objection.
Mr. RASKIN. Mr. Speaker, on Tuesday, the Rules Committee met and
reported a rule, House Resolution 1339, providing for consideration of
three measures: H.R. 302, H.R. 2988, and H.R. 8326, all under
structured rules.
For H.R. 302, the rule provides 1 hour of general debate equally
divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the
Committee on Oversight and Reform, makes in order one amendment, and
provides a motion to recommit.
For H.R. 2988 and H.R. 8326, the rule provides 1 hour of general
debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority
member of the Committee on Oversight and Reform for each bill, makes in
order four amendments for H.R. 2988 and three amendments for H.R. 8326,
and provides en bloc authority for both bills and motions to recommit
for both bills.
The rule further provides the majority leader or his designee the
ability this week to en bloc requested roll call votes on suspension
bills considered from September 13 to September 16.
Lastly, the rule provides same-day authority through September 30 for
a measure dealing with continuing appropriations for the fiscal year
ending September 30, 2023.
{time} 1300
Mr. Speaker, I rise proudly today in support of House Resolution
1339, the rule for three crucial bills, each of which will protect an
essential institution in American Government and public life that came
under serious attack in the previous administration: our Federal civil
service, whistleblowers acting against public corruption, and the
Census Bureau. All three bills were marked up and passed by the House
Committee on Oversight and Reform.
H.R. 302, the Preventing a Patronage System Act, is a bipartisan bill
led by Congressman Connolly of Virginia and Congressman Fitzpatrick of
Pennsylvania. This legislation will insulate our civil service against
partisan political interference and ensure that no future President can
fire government experts and civil servants simply to replace them with
their own political loyalists and sycophants.
The civil service system was created in the 19th century with the
explicit purpose of ending the so-called spoils system and ensuring
that Federal employees are hired, promoted, and fired based on their
qualifications and performance, not their political party connections
or the political favors and services they are willing to render to
elected officials.
The merit-based Federal workforce exists to effectively implement
Federal laws and programs passed by Congress and signed into law by the
President and translate those laws and programs into concrete results
and benefits for the American people. Professional civil servants, like
scientists, engineers, meteorologists, statisticians, economic
researchers, and policy analysts must be able to do their jobs and
advise government officials and the public based on empirical methods,
facts and data, not ideological filters and bars of political
correctness, and without fear of retaliation and discharge for
political reasons.
But the previous administration attempted to turn our civil service,
Mr. Speaker, into a top-down political and ideological party machine,
the kind that the original architects of civil service tried to
dismantle in the 19th century. In October of 2020, the former President
issued Executive Order 13957 to create Schedule F, a sweeping new
employment category for career civil servants who work on public policy
issues. Schedule F specifically targeted about 50,000 presently
nonpartisan policy experts, many of them holding advanced degrees and
having served for decades as policy experts across different
administrations with Presidents from different political parties.
For these civil servants, Schedule F would have stripped away their
rights, their merit-based legal protections, and their professional
independence. Civil servants transferred into the new Schedule F could
have been fired and replaced at any time for any political or
ideological reason or for no reason at all given by a hostile
administration. The 50,000 civil servants deemed to be involved in
formulating policy could have been swept up in a Schedule F political
purge and replaced with unqualified loyalists and flunkies, with
potentially catastrophic consequences for national security, the
continuity of
[[Page H7806]]
governance, and the evenhanded and effective enforcement of Federal
laws and programs.
The President already has the opportunity to appoint more than 4,000
political appointees. But Schedule F sought to go much further in
radically transforming the civil service into an instrument of the
chosen political ends and designs of the President.
Thankfully, President Joe Biden rescinded the order in January 2021.
However, several top Republicans have already expressed support for
picking up right where the previous administration left off with a new
Schedule F.
Our civil servants must be hired based on their merits and then
evaluated based on their actual job performance in office, not their
political party membership, not their ideological viewpoints, and not
their political campaign activism. Indeed, there are already processes
in place for evaluating Federal employees' actual job performance,
which is why in 2021, more than 10,000 Federal employees were removed
from their jobs for not living up to job expectations. That is how you
deal with people who are not actually doing their jobs. This bill is
precisely about ensuring that civil servants will be evaluated based on
their job performance and not the partisan political goals or
extracurricular demands of a particular administration.
As a member of the Committee on Oversight and Reform, which
considered this legislation carefully and reported it favorably and the
proud Representative of tens of thousands of Federal workers in
Maryland's beautiful Eighth District, I am proud to advance this bill
and urge all of my colleagues to support its passage on a bipartisan
basis. We have an urgent mandate to protect the historic merit-based
civil service and the integrity of the Federal Government against
anyone who would turn the clock back more than a century to allow
Presidents to convert our Federal workforce in service of agreed-upon
Federal laws and programs into an instrument of personal ambition,
campaign reelection, or party patronage.
Now, turning to H.R. 2988, the bipartisan Whistleblower Protection
Improvement Act of 2021, led by Chairwoman Maloney. This is another
piece of critical legislation in defense of another critical democratic
safeguard.
Whistleblowers are a great American institution and an important
mechanism for guaranteeing the integrity of government. Our protection
of whistleblowers reflects the fact that in our system of government,
we have checks and balances all the way down. An individual Federal
employee can hold even the most powerful government officials
accountable to the rule of law, which binds all of us. Whistleblowers
in American history have exposed self-dealing, bribery, kickbacks,
sweetheart contracts, lost and stolen Federal property, national
security failures, criminal coverups, other political corruption, war
crimes, rape and sexual harassment in the military, major public health
violations, episodes of environmental and toxic contamination, and the
systematic waste or pilfering of taxpayer dollars.
This bill will improve current protections for whistleblowers by
clearly prohibiting retaliatory investigations and other actions
against Federal employees who share information with Congress, the
House of Representatives, or the Senate, or with their supervisor. The
bill limits the public disclosure of the identity of whistleblowers and
extends whistleblower protections to new categories of Federal officers
and employees, including Public Health Service workers and the National
Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's commissioned officers.
The bill also contains provisions to ensure a timely and fair
procedure for whistleblowers facing discrimination and retaliation.
Currently, the backlog at the Merit Systems Protection Board means that
some whistleblowers may wait years for a hearing to be scheduled on
their claims. This bill grants whistleblowers access to a jury trial in
Federal district court if the Merit Systems Protection Board does not
render a timely decision in their case.
Whistleblowers are integral to government transparency and
accountability in our country. I strongly support this bill to ensure
whistleblowers can come forward without fear of reprisal or punishment.
The last bill before us, Mr. Speaker, H.R. 8326, the Ensuring a Fair
and Accurate Census Act, also led by Chairwoman Maloney, will protect
the Census Bureau against future efforts at political interference, and
it will ensure the Bureau's independence in the performance of its
essential duties.
The Census is a constitutional mandate and imperative. The U.S.
Constitution requires an actual enumeration of the whole number of
persons in the country for apportioning Representatives among the
States and Congress. The Census is an expression of the original
principle that democracy must rest on the Jeffersonian idea of the
consent of the governed. And, therefore, we need to know everyone who
is here and part of the sovereign people of the Nation. The Census
determines congressional apportionment of House seats and the
allocation of trillions of dollars of Federal spending. Even many
businesses in the private sector rely on Census Bureau statistics to
guide their decisions.
The previous administration's spectacular contempt for our
constitutional system was on full display during its many efforts to
interfere with the 2020 Census for purposes of political gain. The
effort to complete a comprehensive and effective Census was undermined
at every turn by efforts such as the unlawful plot to add the
citizenship question to the short form, which was struck down by the
Supreme Court, or the installation of a record-breaking number of
highly partisan political appointees to the ranks of the Bureau's
leadership. The reforms contained in the Ensuring a Fair and Accurate
Census Act will safeguard the integrity of the Census count against
this type of sinister political interference in the many years to come.
Mr. Speaker, I will reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. RESCHENTHALER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the distinguished gentleman
and my good friend from Maryland for yielding me the customary 30
minutes, and I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, the rule before us today provides for consideration for
three pieces of legislation that are laser-focused on a President who
has not been in office for almost 2 years now.
Meanwhile, yesterday's CPI reading came in higher than expected,
registering an 8.3 percent year-over-year increase. That is another 40-
year high, literally the highest in my lifetime.
It is abundantly clear that Democrats are focused on their efforts of
political gamesmanship, hoping to distract the American people from the
absolute failures of the Biden administration.
Let's just go through these bills. The first bill, H.R. 302, makes it
even harder for the President to remove insubordinate Federal employees
in policy-making roles. All this legislation accomplishes is further
shielding unelected career bureaucrats from accountability to the
American voter, who are footing the bill for their salary. The Federal
Government should be responsive to the voters and their elected
Representatives, not the whims and the ideological leanings of
unelected bureaucrats.
Additionally, this rule provides for consideration of H.R. 2988, the
Whistleblower Protection Improvement Act. Let me start by just saying
that the need to protect whistleblowers is one of the most bipartisan
points of agreement in Congress. However, this legislation does nothing
to protect actual whistleblowers. There is a significant difference
lost in this bill between retaliation against legitimate whistleblowers
and the consequences in response to unacceptable actions taken by a
government employee.
Finally, the rule provides for consideration of H.R. 8326, Ensuring a
Fair and Accurate Census Act. Yet, this bill does everything but ensure
a fair and accurate Census. Specifically, H.R. 8326 provides the
director of the Census Bureau with unprecedented power and authority to
make all operational, statistical, and technical decisions for the
Census.
Further, this bill constrains the ability of future Censuses to
include critical questions, including a citizenship question, ensuring
that future Censuses will be unfair and inaccurate.
Instead of focusing on real-life issues facing everyday Americans,
House
[[Page H7807]]
Democrats this week are focusing on three bills that are completely
irrelevant to the multiple crises created by Joe Biden's policies.
In fact, two of these bills have already passed in the House this
Congress in larger packages. The failed policies of the far left and
the Biden administration have plunged our economy into a recession.
And, yes, it is a recession. They have stolen wages from the American
workforce, they have destroyed seniors' retirement savings, and they
have left families with the highest food prices since 1979. Let me
repeat that. Grocery prices surged 13 percent in August, the largest
increase in over 40 years.
Mr. Speaker, 80 percent of Americans say that inflation is the most
important issue facing the country, but you wouldn't know it by the
bills the Democrats are prioritizing and running on the floor this
week.
I think it is time my Democratic colleagues listened to the people
and work with Republicans on real economic solutions, rather than
doubling down on these dangerous, reckless, out-of-control spending and
far-left policy bills, the same policies that have created the crises
that we are now facing.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to oppose this rule, and I reserve
the balance of my time.
{time} 1315
Mr. RASKIN. Mr. Speaker, I am delighted to hear my good friend from
Pennsylvania make his presentation. I was surprised that he described
these three bills as completely irrelevant, given that one is about
protecting the integrity of the Federal civil service, a force of more
than 2 million people who are doing the work of the American people in
the National Park Service, the Department of Energy, the Department of
Defense, the Department of State, the Department of Homeland Security,
and so on.
I don't know what is completely irrelevant about that. Nor do I
understand what is completely irrelevant about protecting the rights
and our encouragement of Federal workers to be whistleblowers when
there is massive waste, fraud, abuse, or exploitation taking place with
the taxpayers' money. That is an essential purpose of government.
We have a government that is an instrument of the will of the people,
and we have a lot of public policies that are being enforced, but we
want to make sure that they are being enforced correctly and that the
people's taxpayer moneys are being respected.
The whistleblowers are helping us do that in blowing the whistle on
hundreds of millions of dollars of waste, corruption, and abuse that
have taken place. Why we would turn a blind eye to that and describe it
as completely irrelevant is beyond me.
Of course, the Census is foundational to the workings of American
democracy, and we want to prevent precisely the kind of political
finger-pointing all over the Census Bureau and our laws that we saw in
the last administration.
I am just curious whether the gentleman really believes that if the
current President suggested that we take 40,000 or 50,000 Federal
workers who presently have civil service protection and put them
directly under his control for political appointment, he would think
that is a good idea because our legislation will prevent any President
in the future from doing that, including this Democratic President, any
future Democratic Presidents, any future Republican Presidents or
Independents or anyone else.
We don't think that is a good idea, and I can't believe that my good
friend from Pennsylvania would just be agnostic as to that proposition.
Let me just say, finally, about the whole question of what is
relevant and what is irrelevant, it seems like all we are hearing from
the other side is embodied in the big statement coming out of the
Senate from Senator Lindsey Graham, saying it is time for a national
Federal ban on abortion that could even be exceeded by the States.
Now, originally, they said: Well, Roe v. Wade is settled precedent,
and we accept that.
Then, they packed the Court with their Justices, who were determined,
hellbent, on overturning Roe v. Wade, and they did it.
Then, we heard from our friends across the aisle: Well, this is a
matter for the States. Let the States decide.
Now, we hear from our colleagues in Congress that, no, they want a
national criminal ban on the right of women to make their own decisions
about their health, their families, their careers, and their futures.
Then, they will even allow States to go beyond that to completely ban
abortion, which is, of course, the essential pro-life position which we
have heard from our colleagues across the aisle. That is what they are
focused on.
Meantime, the President signed, this week, the Inflation Reduction
Act, which will dramatically lower healthcare costs for tens of
millions of Americans and, finally, overturn the Republican ban on the
government negotiating in the Medicare program with Big Pharma for
lower prescription drug prices.
We are actually making progress. They want to drag everyone into
their insatiable efforts to ban the right to abortion in America.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. RESCHENTHALER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may
consume.
Mr. Speaker, I will double down on the comment that these bills are
irrelevant. They are absolutely irrelevant in that two of them are
superfluous. One has already passed. One passed in an amendment to the
NDAA, and the other one is an unprecedented grant of authority to the
Census, which is completely inappropriate. So, yes, these bills, I
would argue, are irrelevant.
Do you know who would think they are irrelevant? Any person you talk
to on the street. If you go up to somebody filling up their gas tank,
and you ask them about these three bills, these are irrelevant to their
lives. They are worried about the price of gas.
If you ask somebody at a grocery store who is trying to feed a family
about these bills, these bills are irrelevant to their grocery bill.
If you are talking about real wages and fighting the loss of wages
and inflation, these bills are irrelevant to that. A lot of blue-collar
workers want wages to increase like they did under the last
administration, not decrease like they are today.
So, yes, these bills are absolutely irrelevant to everyday Americans.
But let's just talk about the high cost of inflation. Inflation is
the top concern reported by businesses and voters alike. However,
instead of working to lower costs for businesses and workers, the SEC
proposed burdensome new rules requiring businesses to disclose
extensive climate-related data and additional climate risks.
That is why if we defeat the previous question, I will personally
offer an amendment to the rule to immediately consider H.R. 8589, which
would prohibit the SEC's woke climate rule from ever moving forward.
Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of my
amendment into the Record, along with any extraneous material,
immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Cuellar). Is there objection to the
request of the gentleman from Pennsylvania?
There was no objection.
Mr. RESCHENTHALER. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume
to the gentleman from the Commonwealth of Kentucky (Mr. Barr), my good
friend, to explain the amendment.
Mr. BARR. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr.
Reschenthaler) for yielding.
I rise to oppose the previous question so that we can immediately
consider Representative French Hill's H.R. 8589 to prohibit the
Securities and Exchange Commission from trading its independence and
statutory authority away in the name of alarmist climate advocacy.
The proposed climate change rule from the Securities and Exchange
Commission will further crush our fragile economy, and struggling
families will ultimately pay the price.
Mr. Speaker, yesterday, the Bureau of Labor Statistics released the
Consumer Price Index numbers for the month of August. As has been
mentioned already today, CPI surged to 8.3 percent, above projections,
still a 40-year high, showing that this inflation crisis is not going
away anytime soon.
[[Page H7808]]
Americans are paying more for everything, and rising prices continue to
wreak havoc on farmers, middle-class families, and small businesses
struggling to stay afloat all across America.
Of course, Democrats' overspending for the last year and a half has
produced excess demand, pushing up prices, but no amount of Fed
tightening can fix the inflationary supply-demand mismatch without also
addressing the supply side.
At the heart of this inflation crisis is the Biden administration's
war on American energy production. This policy of deliberately
constraining the supply of energy is taking its toll on the American
people. According to a Penn Wharton study, inflation reduced the
purchasing power of American households by approximately $6,000 last
year. That is like taking an entire paycheck away for an entire month
for every American household.
Real earnings, hourly earnings, dropped 2.8 percent over the year in
August. Wages are down because of this inflation crisis. Credit card
debt is up. It hit an all-time high last month.
One in six American households are now behind paying their
electricity bills and in danger of losing their utility services
altogether, with natural gas prices up 30 percent since last July.
Effectively, electricity prices are now up 15 percent, a 14-year high.
When Joe Biden took office, the average price of gasoline was $2.36
per gallon. Today, the average gas price in America is $3.72 per
gallon, and stubbornly, diesel prices are much, much higher. That goes
into everything: transportation, manufacturing, farmers having to fill
up the tank on their tractors. All of that is passed on at the retail
point of sale. In less than 2 years, America has gone from energy
dominant to energy desperate.
Mr. Speaker, ground zero for the Biden administration's war on
American energy is the weaponization of financial regulation and the
politicization of access to capital.
What do I mean by this? We all know that the Biden administration
killed the Keystone XL pipeline and other critical energy
infrastructure projects. We know that they are frustrating the
construction of new refineries. We know that they have held up 4,400
drilling permits. But ground zero is the weaponization of financial
regulation to deny American energy the access to the capital that they
need to invest in a very capital-intensive business.
Throughout the executive branch, at the Treasury Department, the
Securities and Exchange Commission, the Federal Reserve, the OCC, and
other financial regulators, Biden has installed or nominated unelected
climate alarmists and given them free rein to attack American energy
businesses, all in the name of climate change.
The sad irony, Mr. Speaker, is that if we want to innovate and
actually solve climate change, we wouldn't be denying American energy
companies and the scientists there access to financing. We would be
giving them more financing to innovate and to solve the problem the
American way, through free enterprise and innovation. One of these
radical nominees even called for bankrupting American fossil fuel
companies.
Perhaps the most dangerous regulation issued by the Biden
administration to destroy American energy is the SEC's climate risk
disclosure rule proposed in March. This 534-page monstrosity marks the
transformation of the SEC from an independent agency dedicated to
investor protection to an unaccountable and politicized bureaucracy
intent on advancing radical environmental and social policy over which
it has neither expertise nor jurisdiction.
This proposed rule is totally disconnected from the longstanding
investor-driven materiality standard and will politicize the agency and
reduce its credibility by hurting investors, elevating nonpecuniary
factors above financial returns, and steering retail investors into
lower performing, higher fee, and less-diversified ESG investments.
As a reminder, Mr. Speaker, the statutory mission of the SEC is to
protect investors; maintain fair, orderly, and efficient markets; and
facilitate capital formation. This is not about protecting investors.
It is about hurting investors. It is not about capital formation. It is
about capital destruction. It is definitively not to reduce carbon
emissions or solve climate change, but the SEC is wading into
environmental policy debates like climate change with its top-down,
government-directed, one-size-fits-all mandatory environmental, social,
and governance disclosure regulation, or ESG.
SEC Chair Gary Gensler claims that the requirements in the proposal
are material because institutional investors are demanding this
information. But according to a study conducted by the University of
Chicago and FINRA, only 21 percent of surveyed retail investors in this
country even knew what ESG stands for.
The fact of the matter is, retail investors are not demanding this
information. They want returns, not politics, guiding their retirement
and college savings.
What do retail investors really care about? Yesterday's bloodbath in
the stock market when the Dow plummeted by over 1,000 points in a
single day, the worst drop since June 2020.
That tells me what investors actually want, Mr. Speaker, and it is
returns. They need returns. They don't need an inflationary environment
that is eating away their purchasing power and rising interest rates
because of it that result in turmoil in the financial markets,
destroying retirement savings.
ESG funds are hurting American investors. They are tech-heavy, and in
a market where tech stocks are in a massive sell-off and are vastly
underperforming non-ESG funds that contain investments in energy, who
are the losers? Retail investors who are unwittingly invested in and
overexposed to ESG. On top of that, ESG funds charge 43 percent higher
fees than non-ESG funds.
In short, the government is redirecting capital away from energy, and
it is costing retail investors, which include teachers, police
officers, and other ordinary Americans saving for retirement,
extraordinary amounts of money.
But, today, Congress can actually do something to protect investors.
I am leading this previous question that would amend the rule to
immediately consider H.R. 8589, legislation offered by the gentleman
from Arkansas (Mr. Hill), my friend, to stop this SEC rule in its
tracks before it causes more damage to retail investors and to
Americans struggling to keep up with unsustainable energy prices.
Mr. Speaker, House Republicans will keep pushing for America to get
back to basics. We need to deliver economic relief to the American
people to alleviate the pain of inflation. To do that, we need to
unleash the supply side. That means more, not less, financing of
American energy to lower the price at the pump, to reduce the cost of
heating your home.
Yes, Mr. Speaker, we need financial advisers to get back to the
basics of investing. That means diversified portfolios that include
American energy, not just tech, because the point of investing your
hard-earned money isn't to further a political agenda or some far-left
view of America that some woke asset manager on Wall Street thinks.
Instead, it is to generate a financial return that will enable you to
send your kid to college, ensure you can live a comfortable life in
retirement, or pursue some other aspect of your American Dream.
Yes, Mr. Speaker, it is about capital formation. It is about giving
heroic American energy companies access to the capital and the
financing that they need, not only to make energy affordable and
reliable for the American people but to make America competitive in the
global economy.
It is for all of these reasons, Mr. Speaker, that I urge my
colleagues on the other side of the aisle to join me in supporting this
previous question.
{time} 1330
Mr. RASKIN. Mr. Speaker, my colleagues tempt me to wander afield from
what we have come here to talk about since they want to talk about
seemingly everything else. So let me try to respond to a few of the
points that have just been lobbed in our direction.
First, they seem to want to assign responsibility to the President of
the United States for the inflation rate. But then, surely, they will
assign responsibility to the President of the
[[Page H7809]]
United States for the unemployment rate, which now stands at around 3.5
percent, the lowest unemployment rate in 50 years. You have got to go
back a half century to find the kind of job situation that President
Biden has brought to the United States of America.
Last week, we learned that payroll employment is up by 315,000 in the
month of August alone. Since President Biden came into office, we have
added 668,000 manufacturing jobs.
Now, it is true the President has been fighting inflation ever since
he got into office. Why?
Well, the economy started to come roaring back--not just in America,
but all over the world in the wake of the pandemic. So we saw a
tremendous demand with broken supply chains. So what happens under the
law of supply and demand? The prices go up. But, unlike our colleagues
who seem to want to chortle about it and use it as a campaign talking
point, President Biden and the Democrats have been acting to bring
inflation down. Every single day.
Yesterday's Consumer Price Index data showed continued progress in
bringing global inflation down here in the U.S. economy. Gas prices are
down an average of $1.30 a gallon since the beginning of the summer.
Price increases slowed at the grocery store this month. Still too high.
But real wages went up again for a second month in a row, giving
hardworking families more breathing room.
It is amazing to me that some of the time has been delegated to one
of our distinguished colleagues who seem to want to blame these global
economic conditions arising from COVID-19 and the pandemic and broken
supply chains, as well as Vladimir Putin's filthy imperialist war in
Ukraine, which fortunately, the people of Ukraine, with the support of
a lot of people in this body--but not everybody--is starting to win.
And we have seen dramatic reversal of fortune in that war as the
democratic forces are beating Vladimir Putin and the autocrats in
Russia.
But in any event, we just heard someone who wanted to blame all of
these global economic conditions on an SEC regulation, which we are not
here to discuss and, therefore, unfortunately, I can't address. I might
agree with the gentleman, for all I know. It has nothing to do with the
legislation before us, and it is hard for me to believe that that is
the source of inflation around the world or the unemployment, which now
is practically at the bottom level that we have ever seen in over a
century.
But in any event, Mr. Speaker, back to the point at hand, I thought
we were going to be distracted with Republican calls to ban abortion
across the country. Well, the polls must be teaching them something
because I am not hearing about abortion today.
For many years, all I heard from them was abortion is murder, and the
millions of persons who are being murdered by abortion. They demanded
the overthrow of Roe v. Wade, and they got their way.
Yesterday, Senator Lindsey Graham introduced legislation for a
national criminal ban on abortion. But, of course, the so-called pro-
life forces want to go further in the States and ban it completely. A
lot of them don't even want to allow exceptions for rape or incest.
I thought our colleagues were going to explain what their position
really is. I would invite them to do so as long as they don't want to
talk about the legislation before us today.
Why don't they tell us what their position on abortion is, because
America wants to know.
I think their position has changed somewhat. They are singing a
somewhat different tune since the people of Kansas, by 20 points,
destroyed their anti-choice agenda, and explained to them in numerical
terms that the people of America are on the side of freedom and the
rights of women and men and families to make their own decisions and
not to have those decisions be made by Lindsey Graham, one Senator, who
yesterday pronounced that he chose 15 weeks as the right point to
criminalize abortion. He chose that himself.
What is their position now? America wants to know. What is their
position?
Do they support a national criminal ban on abortion? Are they going
to allow any exceptions for rape or incest? What is their position on
it, if they don't want to talk about the legislation at hand?
Meantime, the Democrats continue to fight for lower drug prices, for
a record, unprecedented, historic investment in renewable energy.
We are addressing the problems of the future. At the same time, we
are defending the integrity of the Federal civil service and our
workforce, which was compromised and abused in so many ways by the last
administration.
We are defending the rights of whistleblowers to tell the truth about
what is taking place in terms of political and public corruption and
not to have to face retaliation from their supervisors. We are
defending the institutions of democracy, including the Census, against
all of the kinds of machinations and corruption and political abuse
that we saw in the last administration.
We are glad that the Supreme Court struck down their last
interference with the Census by trying to paste questions outside of
the rule of law on the short form. This legislation is designed to
protect the integrity of the Census along with the civil service, along
with the whistleblowers.
But as long as my dear colleagues and friends don't want to talk
about the legislation at hand, please clarify for America what their
plan is to take away the health rights of American women and their
families. Are they supporting the plan we heard yesterday announced by
Lindsey Graham for a nationwide Federal criminal ban?
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. RESCHENTHALER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may
consume for just a few points in rebuttal.
Mr. Speaker, we keep hearing that inflation is a global issue, like
somehow it is not Biden's fault and the fault of far-left Democrats--
which it is.
The reason why this is a global issue--and remind my friends on the
other side of the aisle--is because we are the world's largest GDP. We
also just happen to be the world's reserve currency.
So, of course, when we have inflation, the world will have it. That
is just economics. So it is amazing how the principles of economics are
just cherry-picked to make points. But I would remind my colleagues of
those two facts. In short, we are exporting the inflation.
Now, as far as what we are doing to cause the inflation, well, it is
pretty simple. We have injected trillions of dollars into the economy.
That causes inflation. And then to double down on the failed policy,
Joe Biden unilaterally, and I would argue unconstitutionally, canceled
the debt of a swath of college students so you now have even more
liquidity in the market because of them.
And the sick irony here is that the guy that is driving the pickup
truck, the guy that went to school to be a plumber, an HVAC repairman,
that guy is now subsidizing the lawyer who is driving to his downtown
job in a BMW. That is what is so perverse about what is happening.
Now let's just talk about gas prices.
My colleague and my friend from Maryland said gas prices are down.
Yeah, they are down from like a week ago; they are not down from
January 2021 when they were less than $2.50 a gallon. So let's continue
to move that goalpost.
You can't argue that gas prices are up. Americans know gas prices are
up. They are feeling the pain at the pump. They are also feeling it in
the higher cost of all energy and food.
Finally, blaming Putin on gas prices and issues. Yeah, Putin is
partially to blame, but who encouraged Putin to invade Ukraine? That
would be Joe Biden by his surrender of Afghanistan.
Let me be clear that any weakness on the foreign stage is an
indication of aggression. When Joe Biden showed weakness by abandoning
the Bagram Air Base, by leaving our allies on the ground to predations
of the Taliban, that was weakness, and Putin seized on that to invade
Ukraine.
Instead of giving the Ukrainians the MiGs they needed, the proper
military supplies they needed, we decided to go halfway. Joe Biden
didn't fully commit. Now we have a protracted war in Ukraine, which is
going to lead to a humanitarian crisis not only in Central
[[Page H7810]]
Europe but all across Africa, for example, and higher energy prices
here.
Mr. Speaker, but that is all traced back to Biden being weak on
foreign policy.
Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman
from Kentucky (Mr. Barr).
Mr. BARR. Mr. Speaker, let me respond to my friend from Maryland on
some of the specific points that he made in rebuttal to my opposition
to the previous question.
The gentleman says that we don't want to talk about the underlying
bills.
What Republicans want to talk about is what the American people are
worried about, which is rising prices. What we are focused on is
opposing a previous question so that we could actually go and consider
legislation that would actually help improve the record inflation, 40-
year-high inflation that Americans are suffering with.
What we are talking about is how we are going to lower the pain at
the pump and lower the cost of heating your home, which is at a 15-year
high in America right now. That is what Republicans want to talk about;
what the American people actually care about right now.
The gentleman says that, Oh, unemployment is down.
Let me tell you the statistic that matters.
It is the fact that we have 12 million unfilled jobs in America
because the Democrats' spending spree has paid Americans to not go to
work, because employers in my district and every district around the
country can't find labor.
The supply-demand mismatch that has produced this inflation crisis is
the result of fiscal policy errors. It is the result of a war on
American energy constraining the supply of energy. It is because of
excessive spending that has discouraged people to return to the labor
force.
So we have excess demand from overspending, and we have constrained
labor supply and constrained energy supply, which is impounded into
everything and results in higher retail prices.
The gentleman says that, Oh, don't look here; don't look at us; don't
look at the Biden administration's war on energy and labor supply. No,
it is not that. It is not the Fed that continued to keep interest rates
too low for too long and flooded our money supply at a time when all of
these fiscal policy errors were going on. No, it is not that. It is
global inflation.
Well, why is it, then, in March of 2021, at the precise time that
this Congress passed the American recovery plan, $2 trillion of unpaid-
for spending, why is it then that U.S. inflation rates became
untethered from global price increases? That is what happened, in
synchronicity with their legislation.
Mr. Speaker, finally, he blames Vladimir Putin.
Gas prices on the day Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine were the highest
in 40 years. Inflation was over 8 percent on the CPI, the highest in 40
years, the highest since 1981 on the day Vladimir Putin invaded
Ukraine.
This is not about Vladimir Putin. It is about Americans not producing
energy anymore.
And why do we want this particular legislation, the legislation to
block the SEC's climate disclosure rule? Because we need more financing
of American energy.
Mr. Speaker, I would argue to my friend from Maryland, also, if the
obsession on the other side with the climate, if that is the concern,
if that is why we have this SEC rule, if that is why we have weaponized
financial regulators to go after the American energy sector and
redirect capital and financing away from the American energy sector, if
that is the solution to climate change, I want the gentleman to explain
that to me. Because the best scientists in the world working on the
issue of carbon capturing, carbon sequestration, and harnessing the
carbon cycle, they work at American energy companies.
The answer to climate change is not to centralize power in Washington
and add a thousand pages to the Federal Register. That will not change
the weather. What will solve climate change is to solve that problem
the American way. The American way is through innovation, technology,
and science, and that means robust, free enterprise. That means more,
not less capital formation. That means more financing of American
energy, more financing of innovation. That is the Republican solution
to climate.
It is also the Republican solution to our energy crisis and our
inflation crisis. That is what we are focused on, not these bills that
the American people don't care about.
We are focused on lowering prices at the grocery store and at the
pump and financing American competitiveness, American innovation, and
American know-how.
That is what we want to do.
{time} 1345
Mr. RASKIN. Mr. Speaker, the very distinguished gentleman from
Kentucky purported to speak for what Americans are worried about.
Undoubtedly, many Americans are worried about inflation, which is why
this administration has been taking strong action not just to get jobs
for everybody who wants a job and good jobs and union jobs for people,
but also to bring inflation down.
Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record a New York Times article titled
``U.S. Gas Prices Have Fallen for 91 Straight Days, a Relief for
Consumers.''
[From the New York Times, Sept. 13, 2022]
U.S. Gas Prices Have Fallen for 91 Straight Days, a Relief for
Consumers
(By Isabella Simonetti)
The price of gasoline continues to fall steadily, easing
pressure on American consumers as the cost of filling a tank
continued to tumble from record levels reached earlier in the
summer.
Gas prices fell 10.6 percent in August, which helped
moderate still-sky-high inflation, Tuesday's Consumer Price
Index report showed.
The energy index, which tracks gasoline and electricity
among other energy sources, dropped 5 percent last month, as
electricity and natural gas prices rose.
After peaking at $5.02 in June, gasoline prices have
dropped for 91 straight days, and the national average stood
at just over $3.70 a gallon on Tuesday, data from AAA show.
But analysts point to a few reasons this streak of declines
is unlikely to continue.
Because they're determined by oil prices, gasoline prices
are also susceptible to a wide range of challenges, like
hurricanes that knock out drilling in the Gulf of Mexico and
efforts to punish Russia for its invasion of Ukraine by
curbing its ability to sell crude on the global market.
While gas prices are down, the overall energy index still
remains up 23.8 percent over the 12 months that ended in
August. Electricity prices alone jumped 15.8 percent,
representing the largest 12-month increase since August 1981,
the inflation report said. The jump in electricity prices is
largely attributable to the high cost of natural gas, said
Laura Rosner-Warburton, an economist at MacroPolicy
Perspectives.
As winter approaches, other fuel prices could influence
inflation data. The cost of heating a home with natural gas,
the most common source of home-heating fuel in the United
States, is expected to jump more than 25 percent from last
year, to $952 for the six months from October through March,
according to the National Energy Assistance Directors
Association.
``You would expect that a hard winter could create a
significant increase in demand in price of natural gas,''
said Bryan Benoit, U.S. national managing partner of energy
at Grant Thornton. ``And then of course all of this is
further exacerbated by what's going on with the war in the
Ukraine.''
Mr. RASKIN. I want to talk about some of the other things that
Americans are worried about since my colleague purported to speak for
Americans because I saw a poll recently saying that Americans are
worried about the attack on democracy and voting rights.
Part of that may be the fact that some of our colleagues seem to be
ambivalent about whether or not to denounce the rampant violence that
was unleashed against this institution, this body, on January 6, 2021,
when thousands of rioters came and attacked our officers, wounding and
injuring more than 150 of them, breaking their jaws, their necks, lost
fingers, strokes, heart attacks, concussions, and contusions. And, of
course, the former President says that his mob actually greeted the
police with hugs and kisses.
Some of our colleagues shamefully have followed the former President
in trying to whitewash the worst episode of domestic mass
insurrectionary violence ever unleashed on the Capitol of the United
States with an attack on the Vice President, Mike Pence. We heard those
words, ``Hang Mike Pence. Hang Mike Pence,'' bouncing off of the walls
of the Capitol and against the Congress of the United States.
[[Page H7811]]
So, yes, people are worried about the state of our democracy with so
many members of the GOP following Donald Trump in not only his terrible
big lie, the first time we have ever seen that in American history, but
also the big lie encompassing this mob violence and this insurrection
against the Government of the United States.
Do you know what else Americans are worried about, Mr. Speaker?
Americans are now worried about State politicians and Federal
politicians trampling the rights of women. For more than a half
century, women have had a right to make their most intimate procreative
and reproductive decisions with their families, with their husbands,
with their partners, with their ministers, and with their church
leaders.
Then, they gerrymandered the Supreme Court. They kept Merrick Garland
off the Supreme Court by not even giving him a hearing over on the
Senate side.
Then, what do you know, Mr. Speaker? They followed what the RNC was
asking for in all of their platforms for all of these years: Overturn
Roe v. Wade. They overturned Roe v. Wade.
Then, we heard from our colleagues: Well, we just want the States to
decide.
But, yesterday, Senator Lindsey Graham unveiled what the real plan
is: a nationwide criminal ban on abortion, and if they can go further
in the States, they will go further in the States.
We have Republican proposals all over America to completely ban
abortion from the moment of conception, which is the pro-life
orthodoxy, which is life begins at conception.
We heard it in the Judiciary Committee. We have heard it in the
Oversight and Reform Committee. We have been hearing it for years. But
now they have fallen strangely and demurely silent. Why is that? Part
of it is because of the good people of Kansas, who showed them just
where America is on this.
America is a country committed to individual freedom and the rights
of the people to make their own decisions and not having busybody,
theocrat politicians in State capitals telling them how to make their
own decisions about their careers, about their lives, about their
families, and about their healthcare--and certainly not allowing
Lindsey Graham to dictate to the women of America what their destiny
will be.
They won't say a word about it. They will talk about an SEC
regulation nobody heard of that we are not here to talk about today.
They will blame Joe Biden for global inflation. They will blame Joe
Biden for Vladimir Putin's filthy, imperialist invasion of Ukraine.
I hear them denouncing Joe Biden. They won't denounce Vladimir Putin
for 1 second.
I would happily yield 1 minute if they would denounce Vladimir Putin,
but they won't do it. We have heard people over on their side
cheerleading for Vladimir Putin. I heard the gentlewoman from Georgia
say: Russia wins.
Guess what? Russia doesn't win. The people of Ukraine are winning
today, and the people of America are with the people of Ukraine. We are
on the side of democrats, small d democrats, all over the world against
the autocrats like Putin, against the theocrats like people who would
dictate to the women of America their own health decisions.
We are against the tyrants, the bullies, and the despots. We are
against Presidents who get into office and try to dictate the political
decisionmaking of individual members of the workforce and try to push
their ideological program into the government. We are for defending
whistleblowers; we are for defending the Census; and we are for
defending democratic institutions in America.
I am just shocked that I hear from my good friend from Pennsylvania,
someone I like and someone I trust, that he actually is defending Putin
against Biden and blaming Joe Biden for Putin's long-running plan to
invade Ukraine. That is a remarkable thing to me, and I hope we can
have that clarified.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. RESCHENTHALER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may
consume.
Mr. Speaker, I let my good friend from Maryland know that I like him,
too, and I would certainly clarify the remarks on Putin.
I will denounce Putin right now. Remember, I was the one calling in
the beginning of this conflict for a no-fly zone to be established led
by the United States. I don't think there is anybody more hawkish on
Russia and the Ukraine issue than myself on this side of the aisle. So,
to say that I was up here defending Putin is ludicrous.
We, of course, needed to beat Putin. We should have been much more
engaged from the beginning of this conflict, not just to send a message
to the Russians but to send a message to the Iranians and a message to
the Chinese vis-a-vis Taiwan. But I could go on.
I would say it is a total mischaracterization of my position to say
that I am up here saying good things about dictator Putin.
I remind my friend from Maryland about the history of this building.
In 1814, it was literally burned to the ground. In the seventies,
Puerto Rican separatists stormed in and detonated a bomb. So, let's
just get the historical context in place.
As far as denouncing violence, everyone on this side of the aisle has
denounced political violence consistently. The inconsistency is from my
friends from across the other side of the aisle who cherry-pick when
they denounce political violence.
I remember that during the entire summer of 2020, my friends across
the aisle treated the destructive BLM and antifa protests that caused
$2 billion worth of damage, they treated those protesters with kid
gloves. You had the current Vice President paying the bail for the
protesters. You had the gentlewoman from New York, Ms. Ocasio-Cortez,
saying: ``The whole point of protesting is to make people
uncomfortable. . . . To folks who complain protest demands make others
uncomfortable, that is the point.'' Those are the words of the
Democrats, not of us. We could go on.
Chris Cuomo, CNN host: ``Please, show me where it says protesters are
supposed to be polite and peaceful.'' The last time I checked, that was
a Democrat.
New York BLM cofounder Hawk Newsome said in response to Eric Adams
trying to put plainclothes police officers on the street: ``There will
be riots; there will be fire; and there will be bloodshed.''
It sounds to me that the political violence and the support for the
rhetoric that is coming to support political violence and upheaval are
coming from one side of the aisle, the Democrat side of the aisle.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr.
Barr) for more rebuttal.
Mr. BARR. We may have found a point of bipartisan agreement that we
all dislike Vladimir Putin. But one of the main reasons why Vladimir
Putin was able to invade Ukraine was the removal of deterrence:
unilaterally waiving sanctions on Nord Stream 2, refusing to respond
for a full year of a buildup, inviting aggression by retreating from
Afghanistan, and signaling to our allies that we are not coming to help
you. That might be one of the reasons why we have a problem with
Vladimir Putin right now.
To the gentleman from Maryland's argument that we are just purporting
to speak for all Americans, we are the Representatives of the American
people, and we are their only voice in this Chamber. I am not
purporting to speak for Americans. I am telling you what my
constituents in Kentucky are telling me.
Charlie from Fleming County says that he can't afford to fill up his
tractor as a farmer because diesel prices are where they are. He says:
I don't know where they get their numbers in Washington, Congressman,
but it feels three times 8 percent on the CPI.
Lorna from Mount Sterling, Kentucky, owns a floral business, a Main
Street small business, and everything costs more. She said: This is not
the America I know.
Then, Jamie, who is a mom of two kids, she goes to get baby formula.
She goes to the grocery, and she can't afford groceries. She tries to
fill up her car to take her kids on errands, and she can't afford it.
This is not purporting to speak for the American people. These are
the American people, and they are suffering because this administration
will not fix the supply side.
[[Page H7812]]
They raise taxes on businesses, which discourages business investment
and capital expenditures that we need to fix the supply bottlenecks.
They raise prices at the pump by declaring war on American energy
production by weaponizing financial regulation. They refuse to take
actions that actually will solve the supply problem by encouraging
people to go back to work.
We don't need to be discouraging people from going back to work. We
need to fill those 12 million unfilled jobs right now by encouraging
productivity and American people going back to work.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to defeat the previous question so
that we can go to some legislation that would actually help lower
prices, what the American people do care about, not what they purport
to care about, what they tell us they care about, and that is lowering
prices.
This bill would help us do that because it would unlock the financing
we need to make America energy dominant once again and lower prices
across the board.
Mr. RASKIN. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. RESCHENTHALER. Mr. Speaker, I have no further speakers. I am
prepared to close, and I yield myself the balance of my time.
Mr. Speaker, as I mentioned earlier, the CPI just released yesterday
shows that prices have increased 8.3 percent from August of last year.
Real wages are down 2.8 percent. The cost of electricity has
skyrocketed 15.8 percent. That is the most since 1981, the most since I
was alive.
As of August, nearly one quarter of all Americans reported forgoing
basic needs like food and medicine just to be able to afford their
energy bill. This number will only get worse because we are going to
face even higher costs to heat our homes this winter, with natural gas
prices nearing a 14-year high.
Yet, Democrats want to focus their efforts on, again, I would call
it, irrelevant legislation that has already passed the House. It will
not provide any relief to American workers and American families.
For these reasons, I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on the
previous question and to vote ``no'' on the rule.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. RASKIN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.
Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from Kentucky spoke about what his
constituents are interested in. Apparently, they are interested only in
the question of inflation.
My constituents are interested in that and are satisfied about the
fact that we have had more than 90 days of decline in gas prices and
that this administration is fighting to reduce inflation, including
with the Inflation Reduction Act, which dramatically reduces healthcare
costs, saying that nobody will have to spend more than $35 a month on
insulin--no diabetic in America--and no one in the Medicare program
will have to spend more than $2,000 a year on prescription drugs,
generally.
How is that for getting inflation down?
But that is not all they care about. They care about women's right to
choose and the GOP assault on the freedoms of the people, something
which our colleagues maintain their demure and uncharacteristic
circumspect silence about today. They didn't want to talk about this
new GOP plan to ban abortion all across America. That is what we heard
yesterday from Senator Graham about his plan for America.
My constituents want freedom in America. They want democracy in
voting rights. They don't want to see violence unleashed against the
Capitol of the United States, against school boards, against State
capitols, or any of the political violence we have seen from whatever
source. I am happy to denounce all of it.
I wish my colleagues would denounce political violence when it comes
to our very doors, when it enters this Chamber, rather than playing
follow the leader with the former President who has disgraced himself
as the first President in U.S. history to be impeached twice and
continues to be embroiled in all the political corruption
investigations all over the country, as it has been shown that he egged
on armed protesters to come to try to attack this body, to drive Vice
President Pence out of the body, and to drive us out of the body, as
well, interfering with a Federal proceeding.
Mr. Speaker, I urge a ``yes'' vote on this rule and the previous
question.
The material previously referred to by Mr. Reschenthaler is as
follows:
Amendment to House Resolution 1339
At the end of the resolution, add the following:
Sec. 13. Immediately upon adoption of this resolution, the
House shall proceed to the consideration in the House of the
bill (H.R. 8589) to prohibit the Securities and Exchange
Commission from finalizing the proposed rule titled ``The
Enhancement and Standardization of Climate-Related
Disclosures for Investors''. All points of order against
consideration of the bill are waived. The bill shall be
considered as read. All points of order against provisions in
the bill are waived. The previous question shall be
considered as ordered on the bill and on any 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
Financial Services; and (2) one motion to recommit.
Sec. 14. Clause 1(c) of rule XIX shall not apply to the
consideration of H.R. 8589.
Mr. RASKIN. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I
move the previous question on the resolution.
{time} 1400
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Tonko). 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. RESCHENTHALER. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.
The yeas and nays were ordered.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 9 of rule XX, this 15-
minute vote on ordering the previous question will be followed by 5-
minute votes on:
Adoption of the resolution, if ordered;
En bloc motion to suspend the rules, if offered; and
Motions to suspend the rules and pass:
H.R. 884;
H.R. 5774;
S. 2293; and
S. 442.
The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--yeas 213,
nays 206, not voting 13, as follows:
[Roll No. 424]
YEAS--213
Adams
Aguilar
Auchincloss
Axne
Barragan
Bass
Beatty
Bera
Beyer
Bishop (GA)
Blumenauer
Blunt Rochester
Bonamici
Bourdeaux
Bowman
Boyle, Brendan F.
Brown (MD)
Brown (OH)
Brownley
Bush
Bustos
Butterfield
Carbajal
Cardenas
Carson
Carter (LA)
Cartwright
Case
Casten
Castor (FL)
Castro (TX)
Cherfilus-McCormick
Chu
Cicilline
Clark (MA)
Clarke (NY)
Cleaver
Clyburn
Cohen
Connolly
Cooper
Correa
Costa
Courtney
Craig
Crow
Cuellar
Davids (KS)
Davis, Danny K.
Dean
DeFazio
DeGette
DeLauro
DelBene
Demings
DeSaulnier
Deutch
Dingell
Doggett
Doyle, Michael F.
Escobar
Eshoo
Espaillat
Evans
Fletcher
Foster
Frankel, Lois
Gallego
Garamendi
Garcia (IL)
Garcia (TX)
Golden
Gomez
Gonzalez, Vicente
Gottheimer
Green, Al (TX)
Grijalva
Harder (CA)
Hayes
Higgins (NY)
Himes
Horsford
Houlahan
Hoyer
Huffman
Jackson Lee
Jacobs (CA)
Jayapal
Jeffries
Johnson (GA)
Johnson (TX)
Jones
Kahele
Kaptur
Keating
Kelly (IL)
Khanna
Kildee
Kilmer
Kim (NJ)
Kind
Kirkpatrick
Krishnamoorthi
Kuster
Lamb
Langevin
Larsen (WA)
Larson (CT)
Lawrence
Lawson (FL)
Lee (CA)
Lee (NV)
Leger Fernandez
Levin (CA)
Levin (MI)
Lieu
Lofgren
Lowenthal
Luria
Lynch
Malinowski
Maloney, Carolyn B.
Maloney, Sean
Manning
Matsui
McBath
McCollum
McEachin
McGovern
McNerney
Meeks
Meng
Moore (WI)
Morelle
Moulton
Mrvan
Murphy (FL)
Napolitano
Neal
Neguse
Newman
Norcross
O'Halleran
Ocasio-Cortez
Omar
Pallone
Panetta
Pappas
Payne
Peltola
Perlmutter
Peters
Phillips
Pingree
Pocan
Porter
Pressley
Price (NC)
Quigley
Raskin
Rice (NY)
Ross
Roybal-Allard
Ruiz
Ruppersberger
Rush
Ryan (NY)
Ryan (OH)
Sanchez
Sarbanes
Scanlon
Schakowsky
Schiff
Schneider
Schrader
Schrier
Scott (VA)
Scott, David
Sherman
Sherrill
Slotkin
Smith (WA)
Soto
Spanberger
Speier
Stansbury
Stanton
Stevens
Strickland
Suozzi
[[Page H7813]]
Swalwell
Takano
Thompson (CA)
Thompson (MS)
Titus
Tlaib
Tonko
Torres (CA)
Torres (NY)
Trahan
Trone
Underwood
Vargas
Veasey
Velazquez
Wasserman Schultz
Waters
Watson Coleman
Welch
Wexton
Williams (GA)
Wilson (FL)
Yarmuth
NAYS--206
Aderholt
Allen
Amodei
Armstrong
Arrington
Babin
Bacon
Baird
Balderson
Banks
Barr
Bentz
Bergman
Bice (OK)
Biggs
Bilirakis
Bishop (NC)
Boebert
Bost
Brady
Brooks
Buchanan
Buck
Bucshon
Burchett
Burgess
Calvert
Cammack
Carey
Carl
Carter (GA)
Carter (TX)
Cawthorn
Chabot
Cline
Cloud
Clyde
Cole
Comer
Conway
Crawford
Crenshaw
Curtis
Davidson
Davis, Rodney
DesJarlais
Diaz-Balart
Donalds
Duncan
Dunn
Ellzey
Emmer
Estes
Fallon
Feenstra
Ferguson
Finstad
Fischbach
Fitzgerald
Fitzpatrick
Fleischmann
Flood
Flores
Foxx
Franklin, C. Scott
Fulcher
Gaetz
Gallagher
Garbarino
Garcia (CA)
Gibbs
Gimenez
Gohmert
Gonzales, Tony
Gonzalez (OH)
Good (VA)
Gooden (TX)
Gosar
Granger
Graves (LA)
Graves (MO)
Green (TN)
Greene (GA)
Griffith
Grothman
Guest
Guthrie
Harris
Harshbarger
Hartzler
Hern
Herrell
Hice (GA)
Higgins (LA)
Hill
Hinson
Hollingsworth
Hudson
Huizenga
Issa
Jackson
Jacobs (NY)
Johnson (LA)
Johnson (OH)
Johnson (SD)
Jordan
Joyce (OH)
Joyce (PA)
Katko
Keller
Kelly (MS)
Kelly (PA)
Kim (CA)
Kinzinger
Kustoff
LaHood
LaMalfa
Lamborn
Latta
LaTurner
Lesko
Letlow
Long
Loudermilk
Lucas
Luetkemeyer
Mace
Malliotakis
Mann
Massie
Mast
McCarthy
McCaul
McClain
McClintock
McHenry
McKinley
Meijer
Meuser
Miller (IL)
Miller (WV)
Miller-Meeks
Moolenaar
Mooney
Moore (AL)
Moore (UT)
Mullin
Murphy (NC)
Nehls
Newhouse
Norman
Obernolte
Owens
Palazzo
Palmer
Pence
Perry
Pfluger
Posey
Reschenthaler
Rice (SC)
Rodgers (WA)
Rogers (AL)
Rogers (KY)
Rosendale
Rouzer
Roy
Rutherford
Scalise
Schweikert
Scott, Austin
Sempolinski
Sessions
Simpson
Smith (MO)
Smith (NE)
Smith (NJ)
Smucker
Spartz
Stauber
Steel
Stefanik
Steil
Steube
Stewart
Taylor
Tenney
Thompson (PA)
Tiffany
Timmons
Turner
Valadao
Van Drew
Van Duyne
Wagner
Walberg
Waltz
Weber (TX)
Webster (FL)
Wenstrup
Westerman
Williams (TX)
Wilson (SC)
Wittman
Womack
Zeldin
NOT VOTING--13
Allred
Budd
Cheney
Herrera Beutler
Mfume
Nadler
Pascrell
Rose
Salazar
Sewell
Sires
Upton
Wild
{time} 1441
Ms. STEFANIK and Mr. CAWTHORN changed their vote from ``yea'' to
``nay.''
Ms. BOURDEAUX changed her vote from ``nay'' to ``yea.''
So the previous question was ordered.
The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
Members Recorded Pursuant to House Resolution 8, 117th Congress
Baird (Bucshon)
Barragan (Correa)
Bass (Correa)
Bush (Bowman)
Cardenas (Correa)
Conway (Valadao)
DeSaulnier (Beyer)
Dingell (Kuster)
Fallon (Nehls)
Gaetz (Cawthorn)
Higgins (NY) (Pallone)
Johnson (TX) (Jeffries)
Jones (Beyer)
Kirkpatrick (Pallone)
Lawrence (Beatty)
Lawson (FL) (Evans)
Levin (MI) (Correa)
McEachin (Beyer)
Miller (WV) (Kim (CA))
Moore (WI) (Beyer)
Newman (Beyer)
Payne (Pallone)
Pingree (Kuster)
Rice (NY) (Deutch)
Schiff (Deutch)
Schrader (Correa)
Scott (VA) (Beyer)
Scott, Austin (Cammack)
Stansbury (Pallone)
Stevens (Kuster)
Tlaib (Bowman)
Wexton (Beyer)
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the resolution.
The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that
the ayes appeared to have it.
Mr. RESCHENTHALER. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.
The yeas and nays were ordered.
This is a 5-minute vote.
The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--yeas 219,
nays 209, not voting 4, as follows:
[Roll No. 425]
YEAS--219
Adams
Aguilar
Auchincloss
Axne
Barragan
Bass
Beatty
Bera
Beyer
Bishop (GA)
Blumenauer
Blunt Rochester
Bonamici
Bourdeaux
Bowman
Boyle, Brendan F.
Brown (MD)
Brown (OH)
Brownley
Bush
Bustos
Butterfield
Carbajal
Cardenas
Carson
Carter (LA)
Cartwright
Case
Casten
Castor (FL)
Castro (TX)
Cherfilus-McCormick
Chu
Cicilline
Clark (MA)
Clarke (NY)
Cleaver
Clyburn
Cohen
Connolly
Cooper
Correa
Costa
Courtney
Craig
Crow
Cuellar
Davids (KS)
Davis, Danny K.
Dean
DeFazio
DeGette
DeLauro
DelBene
Demings
DeSaulnier
Deutch
Dingell
Doggett
Doyle, Michael F.
Escobar
Eshoo
Espaillat
Evans
Fletcher
Foster
Frankel, Lois
Gallego
Garamendi
Garcia (IL)
Garcia (TX)
Golden
Gomez
Gonzalez, Vicente
Gottheimer
Green, Al (TX)
Grijalva
Harder (CA)
Hayes
Higgins (NY)
Himes
Horsford
Houlahan
Hoyer
Huffman
Jackson Lee
Jacobs (CA)
Jayapal
Jeffries
Johnson (GA)
Johnson (TX)
Jones
Kahele
Kaptur
Keating
Kelly (IL)
Khanna
Kildee
Kilmer
Kim (NJ)
Kind
Kirkpatrick
Krishnamoorthi
Kuster
Lamb
Langevin
Larsen (WA)
Larson (CT)
Lawrence
Lawson (FL)
Lee (CA)
Lee (NV)
Leger Fernandez
Levin (CA)
Levin (MI)
Lieu
Lofgren
Lowenthal
Luria
Lynch
Malinowski
Maloney, Carolyn B.
Maloney, Sean
Manning
Matsui
McBath
McCollum
McEachin
McGovern
McNerney
Meeks
Meng
Mfume
Moore (WI)
Morelle
Moulton
Mrvan
Murphy (FL)
Nadler
Napolitano
Neal
Neguse
Newman
Norcross
O'Halleran
Ocasio-Cortez
Omar
Pallone
Panetta
Pappas
Pascrell
Payne
Peltola
Perlmutter
Peters
Phillips
Pingree
Pocan
Porter
Pressley
Price (NC)
Quigley
Raskin
Rice (NY)
Ross
Roybal-Allard
Ruiz
Ruppersberger
Rush
Ryan (NY)
Ryan (OH)
Sanchez
Sarbanes
Scanlon
Schakowsky
Schiff
Schneider
Schrader
Schrier
Scott (VA)
Scott, David
Sewell
Sherman
Sherrill
Sires
Slotkin
Smith (WA)
Soto
Spanberger
Speier
Stansbury
Stanton
Stevens
Strickland
Suozzi
Swalwell
Takano
Thompson (CA)
Thompson (MS)
Titus
Tlaib
Tonko
Torres (CA)
Torres (NY)
Trahan
Trone
Underwood
Vargas
Veasey
Velazquez
Wasserman Schultz
Waters
Watson Coleman
Welch
Wexton
Wild
Williams (GA)
Wilson (FL)
Yarmuth
NAYS--209
Aderholt
Allen
Amodei
Armstrong
Arrington
Babin
Bacon
Baird
Balderson
Banks
Barr
Bentz
Bergman
Bice (OK)
Biggs
Bilirakis
Bishop (NC)
Boebert
Bost
Brady
Brooks
Buchanan
Buck
Bucshon
Burchett
Burgess
Calvert
Cammack
Carey
Carl
Carter (GA)
Carter (TX)
Cawthorn
Chabot
Cline
Cloud
Clyde
Cole
Comer
Conway
Crawford
Crenshaw
Curtis
Davidson
Davis, Rodney
DesJarlais
Diaz-Balart
Donalds
Duncan
Dunn
Ellzey
Emmer
Estes
Fallon
Feenstra
Ferguson
Finstad
Fischbach
Fitzgerald
Fitzpatrick
Fleischmann
Flood
Flores
Foxx
Franklin, C. Scott
Fulcher
Gaetz
Gallagher
Garbarino
Garcia (CA)
Gibbs
Gimenez
Gohmert
Gonzales, Tony
Gonzalez (OH)
Good (VA)
Gooden (TX)
Gosar
Granger
Graves (LA)
Graves (MO)
Green (TN)
Greene (GA)
Griffith
Grothman
Guest
Guthrie
Harris
Harshbarger
Hartzler
Hern
Herrell
Herrera Beutler
Hice (GA)
Higgins (LA)
Hill
Hinson
Hollingsworth
Hudson
Huizenga
Issa
Jackson
Jacobs (NY)
Johnson (LA)
Johnson (OH)
Johnson (SD)
Jordan
Joyce (OH)
Joyce (PA)
Katko
Keller
Kelly (MS)
Kelly (PA)
Kim (CA)
Kinzinger
Kustoff
LaHood
LaMalfa
Lamborn
Latta
LaTurner
Lesko
Letlow
Long
Loudermilk
Lucas
Luetkemeyer
Mace
Malliotakis
Mann
Massie
Mast
McCarthy
McCaul
McClain
McClintock
McHenry
McKinley
Meijer
Meuser
Miller (IL)
Miller (WV)
Miller-Meeks
Moolenaar
Mooney
Moore (AL)
Moore (UT)
Mullin
Murphy (NC)
Nehls
Newhouse
Norman
Obernolte
Owens
Palazzo
Palmer
Pence
Perry
Pfluger
Posey
Reschenthaler
Rice (SC)
Rodgers (WA)
Rogers (AL)
Rogers (KY)
Rosendale
Rouzer
Roy
Rutherford
Salazar
Scalise
Schweikert
Scott, Austin
Sempolinski
Sessions
Simpson
Smith (MO)
Smith (NE)
Smith (NJ)
Smucker
Spartz
Stauber
Steel
Stefanik
Steil
Steube
Stewart
Taylor
Tenney
Thompson (PA)
Tiffany
Timmons
Turner
Upton
Valadao
Van Drew
Van Duyne
Wagner
Walberg
Waltz
Weber (TX)
Webster (FL)
Wenstrup
Westerman
Williams (TX)
Wilson (SC)
Wittman
Womack
Zeldin
NOT VOTING--4
Allred
Budd
Cheney
Rose
{time} 1458
So the resolution was agreed to.
The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.
[[Page H7814]]
Members Recorded Pursuant to House Resolution 8, 117th Congress
Baird (Bucshon)
Barragan (Correa)
Bass (Correa)
Bush (Bowman)
Cardenas (Correa)
Conway (Valadao)
DeSaulnier (Beyer)
Dingell (Kuster)
Fallon (Nehls)
Gaetz (Cawthorn)
Higgins (NY) (Pallone)
Johnson (TX) (Jeffries)
Jones (Beyer)
Kirkpatrick (Pallone)
Lawrence (Beatty)
Lawson (FL) (Evans)
Levin (MI) (Correa)
McEachin (Beyer)
Miller (WV) (Kim (CA))
Moore (WI) (Beyer)
Newman (Beyer)
Payne (Pallone)
Pingree (Kuster)
Rice (NY) (Deutch)
Schiff (Deutch)
Schrader (Correa)
Scott (VA) (Beyer)
Scott, Austin (Cammack)
Stansbury (Pallone)
Stevens (Kuster)
Tlaib (Bowman)
Upton (Katko)
Wexton (Beyer)
____________________