[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 103 (Tuesday, June 13, 2023)]
[House]
[Pages H2842-H2844]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
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DISAPPROVING THE ACTION OF THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA COUNCIL IN
APPROVING THE COMPREHENSIVE POLICING AND JUSTICE REFORM AMENDMENT ACT
OF 2022
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the order of the House of May
26, 2023, the unfinished business is the further consideration of the
veto message of the President on the joint resolution (H.J. Res. 42)
disapproving the action of the District of Columbia Council in
approving the Comprehensive Policing and Justice Reform Amendment Act
of 2022.
The Clerk read the title of the joint resolution.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is, Will the House, on
reconsideration pass the joint resolution, the objections of the
President to the contrary notwithstanding?
(For veto message, see proceedings of the House of May 26, 2023, at
page H2645.)
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Comer) is
recognized for 1 hour.
Mr. COMER. Mr. Speaker, for purposes of debate only, I yield the
customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Raskin), the
ranking member of the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability,
pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume.
General Leave
Mr. COMER. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have
5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include
extraneous material on the measure under consideration.
[[Page H2843]]
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentleman from Kentucky?
There was no objection.
Mr. COMER. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. RASKIN. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as she may consume to the
distinguished gentlewoman from the District of Columbia (Ms. Norton).
Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, I thank my good friend for yielding.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on overriding the
veto.
H.J. Res. 42 is a profoundly undemocratic, paternalistic resolution.
Congress, in which the nearly 700,000 District of Columbia residents
have no voting representation, is attempting to nullify legislation
passed by D.C.'s locally elected legislature.
While it is true that Congress has the constitutional authority to
legislate on local D.C. matters, it is false that Congress has a
constitutional obligation to do so. It is a choice.
D.C. residents, a majority of whom are Black and Brown, are capable
and worthy of governing themselves.
Democracy, according to the dictionary, is ``a government in which
the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised by them
directly or indirectly through a system of representation usually
involving periodically held free elections.''
D.C.'s lack of voting representation in Congress and Congress'
plenary authority over D.C. are the antithesis of democracy.
The legislative history and merits of D.C.'s Comprehensive Policing
and Justice Reform Amendment Act of 2022, which is the subject of H.J.
Res. 42, should be irrelevant, since there is never justification for
Congress nullifying legislation enacted by D.C., but I would like to
briefly discuss them.
D.C.'s Comprehensive Policing and Justice Reform Amendment Act of
2022 is consistent with House Democrats' George Floyd Justice in
Policing Act, President Biden's executive order on policing and police
accountability, and transparency legislation enacted by dozens of
States, both red and blue, to improve public safety and public trust
after the murder of George Floyd.
As President Biden said in his veto message, H.J. Res. 42, ``would
overturn commonsense police reforms.''
D.C.'s Comprehensive Justice and Reform Amendment Act of 2022 would,
among other things, make it easier to fire officers for misconduct,
prohibit the hiring of officers with prior misconduct, strengthen
civilian oversight of police, and prohibit chokeholds.
Congress requires D.C.'s local legislature, the D.C. Council, to pass
legislation twice, separated by at least 13 days.
The Council passed the Comprehensive Policing and Justice Reform
Amendment Act of 2022 by votes 11-0 and 13-0. While the legislation was
enacted without the D.C.'s Mayor's signature, the Mayor has urged
Congress to oppose H.J. Res. 42.
The D.C. Council has 13 members. The members are elected by D.C.
residents. If D.C. residents do not like how the members vote, they can
vote them out of office.
Congress has 535 voting Members. The Members are elected by residents
of States. None are elected by D.C. residents. If D.C. residents do not
like how the Members vote, they cannot vote them out of office.
The Revolutionary War was fought to give consent to the governed and
to end taxation without representation. Yet, D.C. residents cannot
consent to any action taken by Congress, whether on national or local
D.C. matters, though they pay full Federal taxes. Indeed, D.C. pays
more Federal taxes per capita than any State and more total Federal
taxes than 19 States while being denied voting representation in
Congress.
In closing, I would set the record straight on the legal effect of
H.J. Res. 42. While Congress can legislate on any D.C. matter at any
time, the process for a disapproval resolution is set forth in the D.C.
Home Rule Act.
Under the Home Rule Act, a disapproval resolution only has legal
effect if Congress passes it before the expiration of the review period
for the legislation that is the subject of the disapproval resolution.
In the case of the Comprehensive Policing and Justice Reform
Amendment Act of 2022, the review period expired before the Senate
passed H.J. Res. 42. Therefore, H.J. Res. 42 would have no legal effect
even if the veto were overridden.
Nevertheless, I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on overriding the
veto, and I say to every Member of Congress: Keep your hands off D.C.
Mr. COMER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from New
York (Mr. Garbarino).
Mr. GARBARINO. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of overriding the
Presidential veto of H.J. Res. 42, disapproving the action of the
District of Columbia Council and approving the Comprehensive Policing
and Justice Reform Amendment Act of 2022.
Democrat politicians in cities like New York and D.C. have
continuously fed antipolice sentiment that endangers our officers and
makes it harder for them to do their jobs.
Policies like those in D.C.'s deeply misguided police reform law only
empower criminals at the expense of our men and women in blue. In fact,
since these policies were enacted, more than 1,000 officers have left
the D.C.'s police force.
Dedicated public servants are resigning in record numbers due to the
current policing environment with very few willing to take their place.
That means fewer officers to combat rising crime. This has become a
public safety crisis.
I was proud to join with Congressman Clyde to offer our joint
resolution to disapprove the D.C. law, which went on to gain a majority
of support in both the House and Senate--bipartisan majorities in both
the House and Senate.
Congress sent a clear message that enough is enough. We will not
stand by while our law enforcement officers are vilified and handcuffed
by pro-criminal/anti-cop legislation.
With this veto, President Biden showed his disregard not only for law
enforcement but also for the American people whose duly elected
Representatives voted to block this harmful D.C. legislation.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to vote
in favor of the override to show our brave men and women in law
enforcement that we have their backs and to reject the President's
attempt to undermine the will of Congress and the people we represent.
Mr. RASKIN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, I speak in opposition to this effort to overturn
President Biden's veto of H.J. Res. 42, legislation that was introduced
by Georgia Representative Clyde to strike down the people of
Washington, D.C.'s local police reform law.
If it rings a bell, it is no wonder. The House and Senate have
already voted on H.J. Res. 42. The overwhelming majority of Democrats
voted to oppose it when Republicans brought it to the floor in April.
When it reached President Biden's desk in May, he vetoed Mr. Clyde's
resolution, as he promised that he would.
Although the resolution narrowly passed the House and Senate, in
neither Chamber did it assemble anywhere close to the two-thirds
majority required in both Chambers in order to override a veto.
Mr. Speaker, today's vote is an exercise in time-wasting and
vainglorious futility. The Republican majority doesn't have the votes
to override the veto, and it doesn't deserve to.
H.J. Res. 42 would nullify a law passed unanimously by the Council of
the District of Columbia representing more than 700,000 residents to
promote accountability for police officers who use excessive force or
abuse their power, a goal that the vast majority of Americans share.
The D.C. law bans the use of chokeholds and other dangerous neck
restraints and sets reasonable standards for the use of deadly force.
It requires public release of body-worn camera footage and creates a
police officer misconduct database, but only for officers who have been
either convicted of a crime or for whom allegations of abuse have been
civilly or administratively sustained.
The law prohibits D.C. from hiring police officers who have engaged
in prior criminal or official misconduct.
Most importantly, the new law empowers the chief of police to fire or
discipline officers who break the law by removing police disciplinary
matters from the collective bargaining table.
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Now, Mr. Speaker, you may recall that this is the position that
galvanized the opposition to D.C.'s law. This provision is why
Republicans want the Congress of the United States to behave like a
535-Member nationally elected super-city council with the power to
overturn the work of the 13-member Council of the District of Columbia
elected locally by the actual residents of Washington, D.C.
So what is so important about this provision? Well, the local police
union doesn't like it, and they have been the chief lobbyists against
it. They sued when this reform legislation was first passed in D.C.,
asserting that the provision removing police discipline from the
collective bargaining table violated the U.S. Constitution, but they
lost their case in the U.S. District Court for D.C. and the U.S. Court
of Appeals for D.C., and the Supreme Court failed to grant cert.
Now, in their haste to kick around the people of Washington and not
to support D.C. police officers who, after all, came to our defense on
January 6, many of whom were wounded by the insurrectionists and ended
up with broken fingers and arms and legs, and so on, our GOP colleagues
are suddenly embracing the extreme position on police disciplinary
matters which has already been rejected by the courts in which
jurisdictions across America are debating and doing away with.
Now, why is the ending of discipline of police officers a subject for
collective bargaining such a big deal? Well, Washington itself is a
good example.
The D.C. Metropolitan Police Department has been forced by labor
arbitrators to rehire a significant number of officers who had been
fired for engaging in serious criminal misconduct, including criminal
assault, including sexual assault.
Every D.C. police chief for at least the last 25 years have expressed
outrage about having to hire bad cops after they have been fired for
engaging in serious misconduct. Forcing police chiefs to reinstate bad
cops fired for breaking the law is bad for public safety, bad for
community trust, and bad for morale among the vast majority of good
police officers who are doing their jobs, like the ones who came to
defend us on January 6, 2021, against the violent mob insurrection
incited by the former President.
This should not be a partisan point. This is a matter for local
decisionmaking in Washington, D.C., as it is in every other
jurisdiction in the country.
Mr. Speaker, 700,000 tax-paying American citizens have decided
through their locally elected representatives that the chief of police
who is appointed by the Mayor should be able to discipline bad actors
within the police department. Reversing the D.C. government on this
local matter is outrageous interference by Congress to impose a bad
public policy on the Capital City.
The D.C. police accountability law makes reasonable, commonsense
reforms that will make the D.C. police more accountable to the
community of people they serve, increase public trust, and strengthen
public safety.
In fact, multiple provisions constituting the D.C. police reform law
are mainstream reforms that enjoy strong public support and are
congruent with the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, which passed
the House in the 117th Congress, and with police accountability laws
enacted by dozens of States and localities in recent years in the wake
of notorious episodes of brutality, like the unconscionable murder of
George Floyd.
For example, since May of 2020, at least 24 States have enacted
legislation to limit the use of dangerous neck restraints against
citizens; 39 States have passed reforms related to officer education
and training.
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Twenty-six States have enacted laws to improve data collection and
increase transparency. At least seven States, including Arizona,
Colorado, and Wisconsin, have passed legislation requiring the
publication of police databases or use-of-force information. Twenty
States since 2020 have enacted laws that address State-level use-of-
force standards.
This is a matter for States and localities to decide themselves.
Reversing D.C. on this local matter is an outrageous effort to impose
bad public policy on the people of D.C.
Voting to override the veto of this GOP resolution is yet another
attack on local decisionmaking, federalism, and the policies of
meaningful oversight and accountability that the majority of Americans
want. A vote to override the veto today is a vote against political
democracy and local self-government in America. A ``yes'' vote today is
a vote against commonsense oversight and accountability over policing
in Washington, D.C.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to stand
up for democracy, stand up for political self-determination, and vote
``no'' on this attempt to override the President's veto.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. COMER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, I continue to support this bipartisan resolution as a
majority of my colleagues in the House did 2 months ago. Not much has
changed since we last passed this resolution of disapproval.
Since Congress sent this resolution to President Biden, we have
continued to see rampant crime in the District of Columbia. D.C.
residents and visitors are still unsafe in their Capital City.
The Metropolitan Police Department continues to face retention and
recruitment challenges.
Crime levels are still higher in 2023 compared to the same time in
2022. Total crime is up 27 percent. Violent crime is up 16 percent.
Homicide is up 19 percent. Motor vehicle theft is up a staggering 118
percent. This is unacceptable.
Most notably, as of June 7, D.C. hit a concerning marker. There have
been 100 murders in D.C. this year. According to the D.C. Police Union,
this is the earliest point in the calendar year that the city has
reached this marker since 2003.
However, in the Committee on Oversight and Accountability's March 29
hearing, D.C. Council Chairman Phil Mendelson claimed that there is no
crime crisis in D.C.
In another Oversight and Accountability Committee hearing on May 16,
U.S. Attorney Matthew Graves refused to take accountability for his
office's failure to prosecute 67 percent of cases last year.
The D.C. Council and the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia
have failed the residents of D.C.
Congress has a duty to oversee the Nation's Capital and ensure its
safety for all residents and visitors. It is time for this body to
stand up to the criminals. I call on my colleagues to vote in favor of
this resolution.
The President's veto of H.J. Res. 42 serves no purpose other than to
continue to allow crime to spread and hinder our local police from
fulfilling their duties to protect the D.C. community and the Nation's
Capital City.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to uphold what we and the Senate
have done over the last 2 months by voting in favor of this resolution.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. RASKIN. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Without objection, the previous question is
ordered.
There was no objection.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is, Will the House, on
reconsideration, pass the joint resolution, the objections of the
President to the contrary notwithstanding?
Under the Constitution, the vote must be by the yeas and nays.
Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX, further proceedings will be
postponed.
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