[Congressional Record Volume 170, Number 22 (Wednesday, February 7, 2024)]
[House]
[Pages H523-H527]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                    IMPORTANT ISSUES FACING AMERICA

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mrs. Houchin). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of January 9, 2023, the gentleman from Utah (Mr. Moore) is 
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.


                             General Leave

  Mr. MOORE of Utah. Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all 
Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their 
remarks and include extraneous material on the topic of this Special 
Order.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Utah?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. MOORE of Utah. Madam Speaker, with no shortage of topics to 
discuss and cover today, the House of Representatives just recently 
passed the Protecting Health Care for all Patients Act, a crucially 
important bill. I commend the leadership of Chairwoman Cathy McMorris 
Rodgers from the Committee on Energy and Commerce to get it done today.
  I appreciate my colleagues joining me today to share their messages 
regarding the ongoing turmoil and unnecessary strain on our border due 
to President Biden's inability to get that under control, as well as 
other topics, from women's sports and beyond.
  They have come to share their messages and speak to not only America 
but their own district.
  Madam Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Bean), a 
good colleague and friend representing the Fourth District.
  Mr. BEAN of Florida. Madam Speaker, I thank Vice Chairman Moore for 
yielding.
  Madam Speaker, as I stand before you, America is being invaded.
  Right this minute, criminals, human traffickers, drug lords, and 
kingpins are taking advantage of our porous border. If that thought 
wasn't terrifying enough, hundreds of individuals on the U.S. terror 
watch list are entering our country as if we don't even have a border.
  Secretary Mayorkas is welcoming our enemies into our great Nation and 
doing it deliberately.
  Madam Speaker, I have visited our southern border twice now, and I 
can say without a shadow of a doubt it is a turnstile for crime, 
cartels, and drugs.
  Secretary Mayorkas has allowed this to happen at the direction of the 
Biden administration. He has unilaterally disarmed the border by 
refusing to enforce the existing laws and blatantly disregarding his 
oath of office, but that is not all. We know that Secretary Mayorkas 
has issued guidance stating that an illegal immigrant's presence alone 
is not grounds for deportation. Not even criminal charges or 
convictions or gang membership are enough for deportation.
  Only in crazy town can you break the law and be rewarded.
  Madam Speaker, Secretary Mayorkas doesn't want to end the mayhem at 
the border. Rather, he blatantly supports and is forcibly pushing for 
this madness. That is why there has been over--here are the numbers:
  8.3 million illegal crossings nationwide;
  Over 7 million illegal crossings at the southern border;
  1.7 million known got-aways; and
  169 terrorists caught trying to cross the border, which is an all-
time record.
  Do we know who is coming in, and do they wish to do us harm?
  That is the point, Madam Speaker. We don't know.
  What we do know is that Secretary Mayorkas has failed us all, and it 
is not just bad in Texas. From California to the free State of Florida, 
States across the country are now feeling the consequences of the 
border crisis.
  In recent days, Border Patrol's Miami sector arrested an illegal 
resident with an Interpol red notice for homicide in Nassau, Bahamas;
  An illegal immigrant convicted of attempted indecent liberties with a 
minor; and
  An illegal immigrant with over five DUI convictions.
  It is out of control, Madam Speaker.
  Florida is located more than 1,000 miles from the southern border, 
but my constituents bear the brunt of this disaster, from strains on 
our schools and healthcare systems to fentanyl on our streets and 
strains on our law enforcement.
  Planeloads of illegal immigrants are being off-loaded in our 
communities during the middle of the night at taxpayers' expense.
  Madam Speaker, the border is a fight, but it is a fight worth having. 
When it comes to the border crisis, Americans are looking for 
leadership, not denials, distractions, or deflections. It is time to 
impeach.
  Mr. MOORE of Utah. Madam Speaker, I can't overemphasize the point 
about fentanyl enough, and I am glad the gentleman made it again.
  That was something that was top of mind, as I just had constituent 
meetings in Utah, particularly with law enforcement, in trying to 
squelch this overabundant invasion of fentanyl. It is catching people 
in situations that they would have otherwise not gotten into. It is 
overtaking our communities, and we need to communicate about it and 
have it addressed.
  Fentanyl becomes more and more the clear topic that we need to get 
out ahead of, and I think that is something that is motivating the 
Republican Conference more than anything to address this border issue.
  Madam Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Rose).
  Mr. ROSE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Utah, Vice Chairman 
Moore, for yielding and for claiming the time this morning to discuss 
these important issues facing our Nation.
  Madam Speaker, let me be clear. The President has the existing 
authority to close the southern border today. No act of Congress is 
necessary, no new law is needed.
  Section 212 of the Immigration and Nationality Act authorizes the 
President to, ``suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of 
aliens,'' whose entry he finds ``would be detrimental to the interests 
of the United States.''

  This is authority that has been used in the past successfully by 
previous Presidents to gain control of the border when it has lost 
control.
  His refusal to do so signals his unwillingness to secure our border, 
despite Customs and Border Protection

[[Page H524]]

reporting more than 8 million illegal encounters nationwide, including 
361 on the terror watch list since President Biden took office, in just 
3 short years.
  Let's be honest with the American people, Madam Speaker. If the 
President seriously thought an act by Congress was necessary to secure 
the border, and if he was actually willing to do so, why didn't he do 
it when Democrats controlled both the House and the Senate?
  The answer is simple. It would go against the White House's policy 
and the President's policy and desire to keep our borders open and let 
into this country millions of people illegally.
  As a candidate, President Biden made this clear. He said it multiple 
times on the campaign trail. So this isn't a policy failure. It is the 
policy of President Biden.
  Now that it is an election year and the majority of Americans believe 
the situation at the southern border is a crisis, according to at least 
recent CBS News Polls and others, President Biden is attempting to put 
a Band-Aid on what is, in my opinion, a bullet wound, and worse yet, a 
self-inflicted bullet wound.
  Except, attached to that Band-Aid, are multiple, unnecessary, and 
costly items that will only make matters at our borders worse.
  The Senate border bill isn't a border bill, it is an immigration bill 
that legitimizes President Biden's open-border policies and steals 
money from our grandchildren and great-grandchildren and relatives far 
into the future.
  On behalf of all sensible Tennesseans whom I represent, I could not 
in good faith vote for this bill in its current form. Rather, we must 
enact serious and stringent border security reforms, like the ones 
passed by the House almost 1 year ago in H.R. 2, the Secure the Border 
Act.
  New law is not needed in order to empower the President to deal with 
the problem at our southern border, but rather, to force the President 
to deal with the problem at our southern border.
  Throwing money at the problem won't solve it. Passing new laws won't 
solve it, unless the President is either forced or develops a 
willingness to enforce the laws of this country and stop the flow of 
illegal immigrants and illicit drugs into this country, his proposals 
will only make matters worse.
  Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to join me in opposing any 
legislation that will only memorialize or place into law the policies 
of this administration to allow illegals to flow into the country.
  Mr. MOORE of Utah. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman from 
Tennessee (Mr. Rose) for his willingness to always show up and share 
his message. His constituents and Americans alike appreciate it.
  Madam Speaker, I am from Utah's First, and I call it the best 
district. I believe California is also the First District, so we will 
also call it the best district.
  Madam Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from California (Mr. 
LaMalfa), the first best district.
  Mr. LaMALFA. Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague from Utah for 
yielding.
  Madam Speaker, we come to this microphone day after day, especially 
the last 2\1/2\ to 3 years, recounting the difficulty that we--``we,'' 
this collective body, the House and Senate, and the government in 
general--we are putting the people of this country through, this 
unnecessary pain, unnecessary crisis, just one after another.

                              {time}  1200

  This isn't made by weather or nature or even foreign enemies, per se. 
We are causing it by the actions either from this administration 
directly or their bureaucracy. It is one thing after another. In my 
home State of California, we echo that in spades there as well.
  One of them right now is the condition that we are treating women and 
girls in this country. Now, the usual saw might be about abortion or 
something. No, look what is happening. For girls and women in their 
sports, in their opportunities, you have men masquerading as women 
because they can't cut it on a men's team in sports, for example, so 
they switch over and just start competing on a women's team or girls' 
team in school.
  How are we even at this point of entertaining this as a legitimate 
and wise way of doing things?
  I keep asking, where are the feminist groups on this? Are they so 
locked into politics and being unified with the left that they are 
willing to sacrifice the futures of girls and young women in college 
with scholarships? Plus, the camaraderie of sports anyway, the goodness 
that comes from working as a team or those individual efforts you have 
in individual sports of excelling and finding that just dashed because 
there are a couple of biological males competing in that same sport 
with some of the built-in physical advantage they have in many sports, 
maybe not all but a lot of them.
  We see them losing opportunities for scholarships at the college 
level or winning the gold medal in whatever sport it is.
  I am glad to stand with the female athletes as they continue what has 
been a long fight to have that opportunity in sports. We have title IX 
coming along. We had some fits and starts getting there, but they 
deserve to have the same opportunities as men do.
  It is a different fight these days. What we see is the left actually 
intentionally erasing women. Their opportunities are being taken. As I 
have said, the spaces on sports teams, filling out the rosters, with 
biological males on there, they lose scholarships, or on the podium, as 
they win their medals, being replaced with biological men.
  Americans in these sports across the country are rightly outraged at 
what has happened and what is happening to women's and girls' sports. I 
have signed on to several initiatives at the congressional level to 
protect women and girls, such as the Protection of Women and Girls in 
Sports Act that keeps men from taking scholarships, roster spots, and 
championship titles from women athletes.
  Indeed, it is a point of insanity where we are with this. It is 
really unfair that they would have to even fight for this opportunity 
to compete on a stage, on a field, or what have you, with biological 
men; be pitted against them in contact sports, possibly physically 
harmed due to the physical advantages that are frequent, or the 
indignity of having to share a locker room space the way you are 
raised, with modesty, with the obvious separation of the sexes--up 
until this recent phenomena that seems to be having so much momentum 
amongst the left, amongst people who it seems like have really lost 
their sensibilities.
  This is an effective silencing of the voices of female athletes, with 
the expectation to conform, all because of a gender identity ideology 
that is running amuck right now. Indeed, we are kind of a laughingstock 
as a country from some of the countries that are still developing their 
own sports and contemplating what the heck is it they are doing over 
there.
  Women are being directly hurt by this, as I mentioned, with the 
physical harm, concussions, skull fractures, other injuries, and being 
pushed out of their opportunities by this intrusion of males.
  It is imperative for the next generation of girls that they be able 
to grow up and know that they are cared about, that they are loved, 
that they matter, instead of just being erased from these 
opportunities. It is just unbelievable we have to talk about this.
  Indeed, under this Biden era and others, my home State of California 
and several other States that are doing this, it is one crisis after 
another.
  I want to talk about energy for a minute, too, because that is 
another unneeded crisis that is being inflicted upon the people of this 
country due to the cost.
  Now, energy is the basis for so much of our economy and the cost of 
our economy. In my real life, I am a farmer. Before the 2022 crop, we 
saw the price of fuel double and the price of fertilizer triple. In 
2023 it came back down a little bit. In my home State of California, it 
is still often normal to see $5 fuel out on the roadway there. It is 
all because the day President Biden came in, he started having an anti-
American energy policy, which is harming our ability to develop and 
transport natural gas, which is very important, for example, in 
fertilizer production, but also in warming grain storage around the 
country, putting warm air on the grain so it will dry out and stay 
preserved, and so many other forms of use of natural gas, heating homes 
and operating power plants.

[[Page H525]]

  With the miracle of hydraulic fracturing developed not that long ago, 
America came from being an energy user to the ability to be a major 
energy exporter. The prices came down so much that other countries were 
actually looking at locating more and more factories here because the 
cost of energy was going to be so low.
  We have the Biden administration doing everything it can to cut off 
more development and usage of natural gas at the pass. Why is that? 
Natural gas burns cleanly. It is one of the good transition fuels as we 
move from other forms to that, but we still need all of them. We need 
all of them.
  Hydroelectric power is clean, CO2-free electricity, yet it 
is being pushed out as more and more dams--in my own district in 
northern California, four dams on the Klamath River are being attacked 
right now. One of them has already been taken down. Ostensibly, the 
idea is to save fish there, even though the fish historically really 
haven't traveled up the river the way it is claimed. They aren't true 
spawning grounds in a lake that is warm, Klamath Lake, and not ideal 
for this type of fish. Science doesn't seem to matter on that, because 
it is a political situation that is being hustled on us.

  We are going to lose this hydroelectric at the same time that many 
are mandating by the year 2035 or 2045, or whatever they want to make 
up at the time, that we have to have X amount of electric cars or 
electric stoves or electric leaf blowers and lawnmowers. Heaven knows, 
we will be moving into trucks and trains and even airplanes.
  They are taking away the ability to generate electricity, clean, 
CO2-free, baseload power such as hydroelectric and really 
clean fossil fuel but still a very clean and efficient natural gas.
  I have been attending a lot of seminars on nuclear energy as well. 
There is another CO2-free power source that is baseload, 
that is dependable, that is 24/7. And we are having such difficulty 
procuring and permitting new nuclear plants. The technology has 
continued to improve and get better. For these smaller plants, it would 
be more ideal locating near cities where the technology, the safety is 
there, but we can't hardly talk about that. We have to have a 
breakthrough on that so we can be energy independent with low cost and 
what would appear to be renewable energy.
  Renewable isn't just windmills and solar panels, which are really 
unreliable. We have the opportunity to have baseload power that would 
be low priced and available 24/7 with these technologies. We have 
roadblocks time and time again. They want to tear down dams. They want 
to get rid of natural gas. They are hesitant on nuclear energy. There 
just doesn't seem to be a solution for the left, because everything is 
``no.'' It isn't all going to be served by solar panels and windmills, 
because those are a tiny percent of our overall grid.
  The rest of the world is going ahead with oil and gas development and 
usage. The curve is going way up around the rest of the world. It is 
only us and a couple other western countries that are hamstringing our 
ability to be energy independent, develop the energy we need, and have 
an economy here. Instead, we are going to export our economy to China 
and Asia.
  We are harming ourselves by having this administration in charge with 
their wrong-headed, backward policies on this. We need energy 
independence. We can do it. We can do it cleanly and responsibly.
  I mentioned CO2 a couple times, CO2 meaning 
climate change and the fear factor that is causing around the country. 
I remind you; CO2 is only 0.04 percent of our atmosphere. 
When asked, the average person on the street who is busy with their 
lives doing what they do, they will typically guess, from all the hype, 
somewhere between 20 and 50 percent. No, it is 0.04 percent.
  With the U.S. and a couple other western countries actually 
flattening their CO2 production, even dipping down a little 
bit, it is certainly not us that would be the so-called problem. It is 
the continued export of jobs, export of economy, and export of 
manufacturing to places like China and the Pacific rim where they don't 
have nearly the protections.
  As we keep talking about a carbon-free life and going zero carbon, it 
is actually not necessary. Because so little of the atmosphere is 
carbon dioxide anyway, it is not a threat. It is one that is used by 
government, by organizations, by international organizations, to try 
and control more and more of our economy and of our lives; taking away 
our vehicles, taking away our mobility, telling us we need to live in 
stacked communities instead of the way we live; running people off the 
rural areas like in my district and the western States, running people 
out of the cattle business and such by introducing wolves, decimating 
the deer and elk populations, as well as livestock; basically pushing 
people out that are productive people that serve all of those folks 
that make these policies that live in the cities.
  I guess maybe they need to go to the end of the food line when they 
are talking about what they are doing to devastate agriculture, as well 
as these other industries that provide the minerals, electricity, 
energy, and everything they need.
  There are so many crises that are unneeded in this country, I could 
go all day long, but I shouldn't. I hope people will take heart on this 
and look at what the policies are that are being made by the Biden 
administration, by Democrats in the Senate, and the majority in my home 
State of California, 3-1 Democrat majority with Governor Newsom, and 
the havoc that is being wreaked on the people of California with these 
wrongheaded policies. Certainly, I would invite the rest of the country 
not to emulate what California does.
  Mr. MOORE of Utah. Mr. Speaker, I served on the Natural Resources 
Committee with the gentleman from California. The point that we 
continually tried to make is that American innovation and American 
leadership need to be invested in.
  The policies that are playing out and the rhetoric and all of 
hyperbole, it moves us away from improving the situation on anything 
related to energy. It is fascinating. He and I had a chance to spend a 
lot of time on that.
  To further emphasize and discuss the bill we just recently passed, 
the Protecting Health Care for All Patients Act, is an incredibly 
important voice within our conference, from Pennsylvania's 13th 
District, and a physician himself. I look forward to hearing his 
thoughts.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Joyce).
  Mr. JOYCE of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his 
leadership and for holding this Special Order today.
  Mr. Speaker, it was here in the U.S. Capitol, just a few hundred feet 
from where we are standing, that President Abraham Lincoln called on 
all of us ``to care for him who shall have borne the battle.''
  Today, the House voted on legislation which will help us to carry on 
President Lincoln's promise. By passing the Protecting Health Care for 
All Patients Act, the House voted to ensure that any patient using a 
Federal health program can never be turned away on the basis of using 
the quality-adjusted life years formulas.
  Known as QALYs, these formulas have been used to determine if 
patients should receive certain medical treatments. In essence, this is 
rationing of medical care.
  As a doctor, I treated patients at the James E. Van Zandt VA Medical 
Center in Blair County, Pennsylvania. Eliminating the use of these 
formulas for all Federal programs will ensure that our veterans will be 
able to receive the care and the treatment that they need and that they 
deserve, continuing the promise of Abraham Lincoln.

                              {time}  1215

  Further, this legislation will help to protect Americans with 
disabilities and those with chronic diseases as well as children who 
receive their healthcare through Federal programs like CHIP.
  Today, I was proud to vote in favor of this legislation that protects 
patients' access to the latest medical technologies and to the latest 
innovations.
  Proudly, I can say that this legislation passed the House, and 
proudly I can say that we have voted to protect American patients.
  Mr. MOORE of Utah. Madam Speaker, I thank the doctor from 
Pennsylvania for his remarks. I appreciate his support on the bill and 
communicating the importance of the bill.

[[Page H526]]

  Madam Speaker, I welcome the gentleman from the Sixth District of 
Virginia to share his remarks.
  Madam Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from the nearby State of 
Virginia (Mr. Cline).
  Mr. CLINE. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman for hosting this 
Special Order and for his leadership.
  Madam Speaker, I want to talk about a subject that is in the news 
right now: the crisis that has been created by this administration on 
the border and the intentional encouragement of millions of migrants to 
make a dangerous journey from across the globe to the United States. 
Crossing the border illegally, often seeking a better life, but 
declaring asylum when they have crossed the border illegally is not the 
solution.
  Yesterday, we had a vote to impeach Secretary Mayorkas. That vote 
failed by a single vote. I thank the gentleman for his leadership in 
switching his vote to be with the prevailing side, so that he can 
perform the parliamentary maneuver and bring it back for a vote when we 
do have all of the supporters of impeachment in the House Chamber ready 
to vote. Hopefully, we will see that next week.
  Madam Speaker, for over 2 years, the Biden administration has stood 
by their policies and watched as the worst border crisis in history 
continues to worsen. The results of these open-border policies speak 
for themselves. There have been over 1 million illegal migrant 
encounters since October, including 302,000 in December alone and 19 
individuals on the terrorist watch list.
  These policies have fueled a national fentanyl epidemic, put more 
money in the hands of cartels and human traffickers, opened the border 
to national security threats, and prevented ICE from deporting most of 
those here illegally, even convicted violent criminals and gang 
members.
  What is extremely tragic about this crisis that we find ourselves in 
today is that most of this could have been prevented. The Biden 
administration assumed office with strong border security policies in 
place, and, yet, instead of taking responsibility and maintaining sound 
policies that would fix these issues and enforce our immigration laws, 
President Biden and the Secretary of Homeland Security, Alejandro 
Mayorkas, dismantled our border security.
  We have given this administration all the tools that they need to do 
their job and secure the border. There are laws on the books that 
basically spell out exactly how to secure the border, how to detain 
those coming across the border illegally, and how to prevent those from 
coming across the border illegally, but this administration has 
actively worked to find every loophole and do just the opposite.
  We, all 435 Members of this body, swore to defend the Constitution, 
yet the Department of Homeland Security Secretary, who took a similar 
oath, has the audacity to come before Congress, the Judiciary Committee 
on which I am proud to serve, and lie under oath saying that we have 
operational control of the border. Secretary Mayorkas has the audacity 
to neglect his oath to safeguard the American people and our community, 
and this body must hold him accountable.
  It is our duty to hold those accountable who neglect their duty, 
regardless of their position. Secretary Mayorkas has purposely and 
knowingly disregarded the rights and security of this country's 
citizens and failed in his responsibility to protect our homeland.
  The American people rightfully deserve action. It is imperative that 
we, as Representatives of the people, ensure that those in positions of 
power are held to the highest standards of accountability. That is why 
I will continue to fight on behalf of my constituents, whom I am proud 
to serve every day, to continue to ensure their safety and hold 
Alejandro Mayorkas accountable for his dereliction of duty.
  It is long past time we restore our Nation's rule of law and 
sovereignty. We must impeach Secretary Mayorkas, and it is my hope that 
we do so next week. The American people deserve better.
  Mr. MOORE of Utah. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Virginia 
for sharing his perspective from his district just west of here. I 
think that is the point. A lot of folks come up and use this time to 
share a message in speaking to their constituents, but across the 
country this impacts everywhere. We use the terminology that every 
State is a border State, but it does impact everywhere.
  Madam Speaker, again, we passed a very important healthcare bill 
today. Healthcare policy is oftentimes misunderstood and difficult to 
really communicate. That has continued on for decades.
  I want to highlight some of the aspects of this bill that we just 
recently passed out of the House of Representatives. Before doing so, I 
wanted to use this moment to also highlight something that I have done 
from this podium before on why this moment, when we talk about all the 
crises that are going on--we have major turmoil going on in the Middle 
East, we have a border crisis, and we have inflation running rampant--
in all of these different areas, I want the American people to know my 
perspective.
  I want my constituents to know that right now the political reality 
is that we have what is called split government. We have a White House 
with a Democratic President and a Democratic Party. We have a 
Senate controlled by the Democratic Party, and we have a House of 
Representatives controlled by the Republican Party.

  What the Republicans in the House of Representatives have been trying 
to do for just over the year that we have had as the majority--for a 
time we were in the minority--is to just highlight several different 
things.
  Let me speak very plainly. The American Rescue Plan was passed 
several weeks after President Biden was inaugurated. What took place 
then was everything switched in Washington. When we have a split 
government like we do now, we usually, hopefully, get outcomes like we 
did with the tax package last week where Republicans and Democrats on 
committee sat down, looked through the entire Tax Code and realized 
that certain provisions had expired. They tried to uncover what the 
important aspects were of what we needed to accomplish.
  We came to an amazing tax package that I have celebrated. I have 
celebrated along with my committee members; I have celebrated along 
with the entire House of Representatives and back home. I am so proud 
of the work that we did there. Oftentimes that is what creates a lot of 
really good results.
  Returning to the American Rescue Plan, it was a $1.9 trillion bill 
that within months created some of the worst inflation our Nation has 
seen in four decades. It is simple. When we add that much monetary 
supply and we have too much money chasing too few goods, then there is 
only one equation, and it is inflation.
  When the Republicans took over the House of Representatives this last 
cycle, it is being reported all the time now that inflation is sort of 
squashed. These are simple equations. Republicans are putting the 
clamps on what President Biden tried to massively spend during his time 
when he had the White House, the House, and the Senate, because in that 
scenario, Madam Speaker, you don't have to even dialogue with the other 
party. I am proud of the work that Republicans have done in that 
scenario.
  So I use that as an example. That is a simple equation. It is basic 
economic fundamentals. If we don't load up the monetary supply so much 
then you won't create this type of inflation, and we have been doing 
that. Prices are still high because a lot of these prices are here to 
stay, unfortunately. After a massive inflationary period, those prices 
stay high, but inflation is down. I am thrilled to have been a part of 
it and to be able to put the clamps on the Biden administration's 
spending appetite and get this back to a reasonable level.
  The point that I am trying to draw a correlation on is we have been 
hitting this border issue for 3 years now, and we are going to continue 
to do this. It is now clear from all of the data and all of the 
polling--colleagues of mine from the Democratic side recognize that 
this isn't just a post-pandemic issue where we are overloaded on the 
border--we have a fundamental issue.
  The thing that I am appreciative of on my side is just highlighting 
very specific and simple things that could be done to fix this. I wish 
we could do it legislatively, but they don't even need to be done 
legislatively. They are

[[Page H527]]

simple things like re-implement the Migrant Protection Protocols or the 
remain in Mexico policy. This is the strongest signal to the cartels 
that says: You can't overrun our borders because through this asylum 
process, you will get put in the system, you will get a spot and you 
will get your case heard, but you are not allowed to be released.
  It is the most simple and basic policy. If President Biden wanted to 
truly effect positive change at the border, then he would just re-
implement things like the catch and release program. There are simple 
fixes to that, and I have highlighted it over and over again. I will 
continue to do that and to call this out. Hopefully, we can.
  Even going forward, it is a tumultuous time in the House of 
Representatives and in the Senate right now about figuring out where to 
land on some of these negotiations. We cannot give up just because 
things seem difficult or overwhelming. We have got to be willing to 
find a way to massively improve our situation at the southern border.
  Again, back to the legislation that we covered today and that we 
recently passed. This is another step to improve our healthcare system 
and ensure all patients get access to the best treatments and care that 
they need.
  Chairwoman Cathy McMorris Rodgers' Protecting Health Care for All 
Patients Act will help ensure the value of lifesaving cures and 
treatments for people with disabilities is not discounted.
  The bill will provide all Federal healthcare programs, including the 
VA and Federal Employees Health Benefits Program, as well as federally 
funded State healthcare programs like Medicaid, from using prices that 
are based on quality-adjusted life years or similar measures. Quality-
adjusted life years are intended to measure the value of medical 
interventions relative to someone's condition and how it will impact 
the patient's longevity.
  Nonetheless, this can devalue certain patients' lives and lead to 
picking winners and losers, ultimately taking the decision out of the 
hands of patients and their healthcare provider. A ban on quality-
adjusted life years currently only applies in Medicare, so by extending 
this prohibition to all Federal payers, we show people with 
disabilities and chronic illnesses that we value and cherish their 
lives and their ability to get the care they need.
  This is particularly important in Medicaid and the VA. Medicaid 
serves a large population of people with disabilities, and the VA, as 
we know, cares for injured veterans and those with service-related 
disabilities like the brave men and women who serve at Hill Air Force 
Base in Utah's First Congressional District.
  This policy also protects the ability of payers to use utilization 
management tools and other measures to determine cost effectiveness to 
keep our healthcare costs down, so long as those measures are not 
discriminatory.
  The Protecting Health Care for All Patients Act is widely supported 
by leading advocacy organizations that support vulnerable patients with 
chronic diseases or people with disabilities ranging from The ALS 
Association, to Autism Speaks, to the National Down Syndrome Society 
among many, many others.
  Madam Speaker, I thank Chairwoman Rodgers for her passion for these 
issues. I urge the Senate to take this up and to seriously consider it, 
not to look on party lines, and pass this legislation. There is merit 
to this, and it will go and serve vulnerable populations.
  Again, Madam Speaker, I thank my colleagues for being willing to come 
and share their message. I appreciate their willingness to always come 
and do this and be a part of our Special Order.
  I will end with just saying there are simple fixes to a lot of this, 
and we cannot continue to make it so difficult.
  Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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