[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 162 (2016), Part 4]
[Senate]
[Pages 5354-5355]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                       ACCOUNTABILITY OF CONGRESS

  Mr. LEE. Mr. President, of the words the American people frequently 
use to describe Congress today--at least one of the words that is 
appropriate to repeat on the Senate floor--one of the most common and 
accurate is ``unaccountable.''
  Year after year, hard-working men and women across this great country 
bristle under dysfunctional, costly, and burdensome laws made right 
here in Washington, DC, and day after day, many of them do what 
Americans have always done when faced with an out-of-touch government. 
They contact their elected lawmakers to voice their concerns about 
those laws and to push for change of those laws and the process by 
which they are made.
  Ask anyone who has ever called, written, or emailed their Member of 
Congress what happens next. It is consistent. It is predictable. Blame 
is shifted; fingers are pointed; scapegoats of every variety imaginable 
are brought forth to defend those who are charged with making the laws 
from the consequences of their own handiwork. This is the very 
definition of unaccountability, and it pervades the culture of 
Washington, DC, because Congress has allowed it to infect our laws and 
our institutions--the very institutions by which those laws are made.
  Many Americans assume that they are being lied to when their elected 
lawmakers blame someone else for the laws that are raising the cost of 
living, eating away at their paychecks, and generally making it harder 
for individual Americans and families to realize the American dream. 
But the truth is actually even more troubling than that. Most of the 
items on the Federal Government's interminable list of do's and don'ts 
governing nearly every activity of human life are not in fact written, 
debated, discussed, and passed by Congress; rather, they are imposed 
unilaterally by unelected bureaucrats in one of the executive branch's 
administrative agencies. This is true even for what are called major 
rules, which are regulations that cost the American people more than 
$100 million each year in compliance costs.
  For instance, look at the Department of Energy, whose appropriations 
we are currently considering. In a single year, 2015, the costs of the 
regulations issued by the Department of Energy exceeded $15 billion--
$15 billion. In 1 year, it cost the American people $15 billion to 
comply with the regulations issued by this single bureaucratic agency--
by this single Federal Department, the U.S. Department of Energy.
  Even if we were to agree with every cent of that very onerous 
regulatory burden, we should all be able to recognize the danger of 
allowing one group of people, consisting of individuals who never have 
had to stand for election, to squeeze $15 billion out of the 
pocketbooks of the American people. That is why I have submitted this 
amendment, No. 3856, which would restrict the Department of Energy from 
spending any funds to implement or enforce regulations whose compliance 
costs exceed $100 million, unless specifically approved by Congress.
  Unfortunately, regrettably, tragically, this amendment was blocked 
from consideration by one of my colleagues on the other side of the 
aisle for reasons that appear to be completely unrelated to the merits 
of this amendment.
  Nevertheless, I would like to take a moment to explain how my 
amendment works. This amendment would have provided immediate, much 
needed financial relief to the budgets of hard-working families and 
businesses all across the country. It would protect them from the costs 
of two major rules recently proposed by the Department of Energy--rules 
that impose new energy-efficiency standards on ceiling fans and 
commercial packaged boilers.
  Just like the Department of Energy's ban on incandescent light bulbs, 
under these rules, Americans would no longer be able to buy ceiling 
fans or commercial boilers that do not adhere to the government's 
strict new standards. Proponents of the rules think this is a good 
thing. As former Energy Secretary Steven Chu said about the light bulb 
ban back in 2011, ``We are taking away a choice that continues to let 
people waste their own money.''
  This government-knows-best approach to regulation is not only 
arrogant--it is not only off-puttingly paternalistic--it is detached 
from the economic realities of American life today. Most Americans may 
buy less energy-efficient ceiling fans than most Washington 
bureaucrats, not because they are less intelligent or less concerned 
about saving energy or less concerned about protecting the environment 
but because it is what they can afford. The additional costs of these 
energy-efficiency standards are not insignificant. In fact, it is 
estimated that these two rules would cost American families and 
businesses more than $3 billion.
  Today, the Department of Energy has the power to impose these rules 
on the public, and there is very little Congress can do about it. But 
under my amendment, the two rules would not go into effect unless and 
until Congress voted to approve them--unless and until Congress 
affirmatively enacted them into law and allowed them to be signed into 
law by the President. This simple, commonsense reform is modeled on the 
REINS Act, a bill that requires congressional approval for all major 
rules issued by all executive agencies across the entire Federal 
Government.
  Last July, the House of Representatives passed the REINS Act by a 
strong vote of 243 to 165, and it currently has 37 cosponsors in the 
Senate. Support for the legislation is growing because it is becoming 
increasingly difficult to ignore the moral and material problems of 
hiding the regulatory process in the nameless, faceless bureaucracy. 
Everyone here knows the regulatory burden in America has become 
untenable. Every single day, each of us hears from our constituents 
about how stifling government regulations have become.
  The data tell the same story. Just today we saw that the first 
quarter of 2016 was the third in a row in which private domestic 
investment has shrunk. This is disappointing, but it is not surprising.
  According to a recent study by the Mercatus Center, in 2012, ``the 
economy was $4 trillion smaller than it would have been in the absence 
of regulatory growth since 1980.'' That works out to

[[Page 5355]]

about $13,000 of lost earnings for every man, woman, and child in 
America.
  Some of my colleagues may think the costs of our regulatory system 
are defensible. I certainly don't. But I know there are different 
opinions out there, and that is exactly the point of the REINS Act. 
That is exactly the point of this amendment--this amendment which has 
been improperly blocked.
  Under the broken status quo, Members of Congress can claim 
innocence--and they regularly do--when an executive agency imposes a 
costly and controversial regulations on the country. In fact, many 
Members of Congress not only claim innocence, but they claim almost 
victim status. They behave almost as if we were a victim, as if we were 
someone being acted upon. We don't even have to debate it. It just 
kicks into law by itself. It is self-executing. This may be convenient 
for those of us in Washington, but it is fundamentally and unacceptably 
unfair to the American people. We don't make the law this way in this 
country, but that is now how our system is set up. It is time that we 
change it.
  If Congress is ever going to win back the trust of the American 
people, we must prove that we are in fact trustworthy--trustworthy to 
do what we are supposed to do and trustworthy to make law--because that 
is why we exist as a part of our government. The best way to do that is 
to make ourselves once again accountable for making the laws, passing 
the laws, and standing accountable for the laws of this country. This 
amendment would be a significant step toward making Congress 
accountable again.
  I regret--I deeply regret--that it was blocked, but I look forward to 
advancing similar reforms in the future because the idea of making 
Congress accountable isn't just a good idea; it is burned deeply, 
indelibly within our constitutional system.
  It is no accident that the very first clause of the first section of 
the first article of the Constitution says, ``All legislative Powers 
herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, 
which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives.'' All 
legislative powers--that means all Federal law in this system is vested 
in a Congress of the United States. We are not supposed to delegate 
that to someone else.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator's time has expired.
  Mr. LEE. Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Maryland.

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