[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 162 (2016), Part 7]
[House]
[Pages 9314-9316]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                          LEGISLATIVE PROGRAM

  (Mr. HOYER asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute.)
  Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from California (Mr. 
McCarthy) for the purpose of inquiring of the majority leader about the 
schedule for the week to come.
  Mr. McCARTHY. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Mr. Speaker, on Monday, no votes are expected in the House.
  On Tuesday, the House will meet at noon for morning hour and 2 p.m. 
for legislative business. Votes will be postponed until 6:30.
  On Wednesday and Thursday, the House will meet at 10 a.m. for morning 
hour and noon for legislative business.
  On Friday, the House will meet at 9 a.m. for legislative business.
  Mr. Speaker, the House will consider a number of suspensions next 
week, a complete list of which will be announced by close of business 
tomorrow.
  The House will also consider the fiscal year 2017 Financial Services 
and General Government Appropriations bill sponsored by Representative 
Ander Crenshaw.
  The House will also consider the veto message of H.J. Res. 88, 
disapproving the rule submitted by the Department of Labor relating to 
the definition of the term ``Fiduciary.''
  Additionally, the House will consider a package of bills, authored by 
Representatives Lynn Jenkins and Erik Paulsen, that would make it 
easier for individuals to contribute to their health savings accounts 
and allow people to use their accounts to purchase over-the-counter 
drugs.
  Mr. Speaker, the House will also consider H.R. 4768, the Separation 
of Powers Restoration Act, sponsored by Representative John Ratcliffe, 
which will ensure that the laws Congress passes are adhered to rather 
than the interpretations of unelected agency bureaucrats.
  Finally, Mr. Speaker, the House may consider the conference report 
that includes additional resources to combat the Zika virus, if that 
measure is ready.
  Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for the schedule and 
would ask him, on his last point, on the Zika conference, does the 
gentleman have any information as to what might be the conference 
agreement? I don't have any information on that. Does the gentleman 
have any idea exactly where the conference is going and what we might 
expect?
  I yield to the gentleman from California.
  Mr. McCARTHY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  I know they are working very hard. They had met yesterday as well. I 
am hopeful that, in my conversations with the conferees, they are close 
to finishing, and I have been explaining to them, as soon as they are 
finished, we would like to bring it to the floor as soon as possible 
for passage.
  I do want to thank the gentleman for his work on this effort as well.
  Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, let's hope we cannot go home, as we went home 
one recess, without doing Zika. Let's hope we certainly don't go home 
this recess without meeting this health crisis confronting our people. 
I am hopeful that the conference will come to agreement and we can pass 
it here on the floor. Hopefully, it will be at a level necessary to 
fund the work that needs to be done to respond to that.
  The administration obviously has asked for $1.9 billion. The Senate 
was less; the House was less. Hopefully, we can come to a number that 
will be sufficient.
  On the appropriations, the Financial Services bill will be on the 
floor. Obviously, there has been an announcement from the Rules 
Committee about when amendments will be received and the deadline for 
amendments, clearly indicating it would be a structured rule.

                              {time}  1345

  I would simply, again, express concerns. We had structured rules. The 
gentleman made that point, and I agree with that point. Very frankly, 
we went from open rules, which we started out with, to structured rules 
because, frankly, it was our perception that what we were having is 
filibuster by amendments--amendment after amendment after amendment--
from your side of the aisle.
  As the gentleman well knows, the amendment process largely has been 
more amendments from your side on your bills than from our side. So we 
clearly have not been doing that. The gentleman mentioned something 
about abusing the process. Frankly, the Speaker said that as well. I 
totally disagree with that, and I don't think there is any indication 
of that.
  As I pointed out in the Energy and Water bill, a majority of your 
Members voted against your own bill, largely because it precluded 
discrimination against LGBT, which some people expressed that was the 
reason they voted against the bill, which I think is deeply 
unfortunate.
  I quote from the Congressional Quarterly: ``The use of a so-called 
structured amendment rule abandons the open-ended process that GOP 
leaders had hoped to adopt as part of a return to `regular order' for 
appropriations bills.''
  Again, we did that, but we didn't make a big thing about not doing 
it. We didn't say that it is the wrong thing to do and the House was 
acting out of regular order. We did structured rules so we could get 
the bills done on time. I, frankly, see no evidence--none, zero--that 
we have delayed consideration of these bills in any way. That

[[Page 9315]]

was not true, I guarantee you, when I was majority leader of the House. 
The strategy on your side of the aisle--not you, but on your side of 
the aisle--was to delay these bills and undermine them.
  Now, we had a lot of amendments offered by your side that we didn't 
like. It was very uncomfortable politically for a number of our people. 
But those amendments were provided for. And you are absolutely correct, 
when it got to a point where we obviously couldn't get the bills done 
in a timely fashion, we did go to a structured rule. So I don't 
criticize so much the fact that you are having structured amendments as 
I am the fact that you so complained about that not being regular 
order, and as soon as you had a difficult amendment, the LGBT 
discrimination amendment, thereafter, within days, you announced that, 
oh, no, you were going to go to a structured rule because the amendment 
process was being abused.
  Now, I don't want to belabor the point any more than I have, but, 
again, on the Defense bill, we have seen an egregious, tragic, and 
horrific event. And, Mr. Speaker, this is on policy and what I firmly 
believe is a mistake that we are making. Mr. Sean Patrick Maloney of 
New York wanted to offer an amendment to say you shouldn't discriminate 
against citizens who are members of the LGBT community.
  We saw a horrific event Sunday morning where a hate crime was 
committed, a hate crime directed at LGBT members and, perhaps as well, 
members of the Latino community by an American citizen--not by 
foreigners, not an international, however he may have been motivated. 
But it was clear the animus was a hate crime.
  To the extent that we allow discrimination or do not prevent 
discrimination, I suggest respectfully that we, in a way, convey that 
it is okay to discriminate, it is okay to not like these people, 
whoever these people are, whether they be African Americans, whether 
they be LGBT, whether they be people born in another land. It is not 
okay, and I deeply regret that we don't allow the House to work its 
will.
  It did work its will. It adopted the Maloney amendment. Then that 
bill was rejected. You are right. We voted against it. We didn't like 
the bill from the very beginning. But presumably, it was going to pass 
but for the adoption of the Maloney amendment--with your votes because 
it was your bill, a majority bill. We always passed our bill, if you 
look at the Record, with our votes when we offered appropriations bills 
to the floor.
  So I am hopeful that, notwithstanding the fact the rule is going to 
be structured, the Maloney amendment, which will speak to the very 
tragedy that occurred this past week--in part, not totally--will be 
allowed to be made in order so the House can loudly, clearly, and 
unequivocally say we do not believe in discrimination against fellow 
citizens because they are LGBT citizens.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to my friend if he wants to make a comment.
  Mr. McCARTHY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman, and I understand 
the gentleman's concern. I want to make it a point to make sure that we 
do have voices heard and Members have amendments.
  I went back and looked at the numbers. Now, I know there are hundreds 
of amendments because these bills go through subcommittee, then they go 
through full committee, and at all times, Members from both sides of 
the aisle can offer amendments.
  When I looked at last year's bill, under an open process, open rule, 
we considered 65 amendments on DOD. Well, we just considered 75. So it 
is a very open, structured rule. I went back and thought, let me look 
at overall. Is there history within Congress that we could measure 
ourselves to?
  Well, if I take as of May, the 114th Congress has considered 1,269 
amendments overall on bills on the floor that have already gone through 
committee with the amendment process. In the 113th Congress, we were at 
1,545.
  Now, how do we measure up with other Congresses?
  As you spoke, during the majority of the 111th Congress, they were at 
778. I understand the concerns that you have, but I feel very 
comfortable in the fact that voices are being heard, and it is a very 
open, structured rule for amendments that could be offered.
  Another point to make is we just passed an appropriations bill 
dealing with defense in a large, bipartisan manner. So I believe it is 
working. It is a process that we continue to work through, and I 
applaud the gentlemen on both sides of the aisle who worked to help us 
get a bill that just got finished in a bipartisan manner.
  I do want to thank the gentleman for his work on our last bill. There 
have been nine bills on this floor that have dealt with terrorism, the 
radical Islam that is attacking this country and other countries, from 
the task force that we put together after the attacks in Paris, three 
of them dealing directly with the radicalization of Americans--persons 
born in America and radicalized--and the damage they cause. I mourn the 
loss of those Americans and pray for those families, for what they are 
going through today.
  Now, those bills have sat in the Senate, but the House had taken the 
action. Today, we put those bills back together to make it easier on 
the Senate to be able to move those to the President's desk and signed 
into law.
  Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his help and work with that.
  Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his comments, and 
although, as you saw, we had an overwhelming vote for those three 
bills. We had already passed those. They are in the Senate. Now we have 
packaged them and repassed them. Mr. Speaker, I would say, with all due 
respect to the majority leader that, frankly, the events of Sunday 
would not be affected by those bills.
  We would hope very sincerely--again, let me reiterate, in the ``Young 
Guns'' under your authorship and Mr. Cantor's authorship and Mr. Ryan's 
authorship, that you believed in the book, the three leaders of this 
House--Mr. Cantor is no longer with us--in openness, consideration of 
issues, notwithstanding the fact that they may be uncomfortable issues.
  And, in fact, Speaker Ryan said--and I am sure you are tired of 
hearing me use this quote: ``But Ryan said he wasn't interested in 
playing things safe if it came at the expense of an open legislative 
process . . . we are not going to auto-up the process.'' Structured 
rules auto-up the process. ``We are not going to auto-up the process 
and predetermine the outcome of everything around here. I want the 
House to work its will.''
  With all due respect to my friend, I asked a specific question--and I 
will reiterate that question. It is not about whether we have had 1,000 
amendments or 5 amendments or 700 amendments. It is whether or not the 
Maloney amendment will be made in order on the Financial Services bill. 
The reason I say that is because we have had, I think, before the 
horrific incident that occurred on Sunday, a dramatic demonstration 
that this was, among other things, a hate crime. It was a hate crime 
based upon prejudice. What the Maloney amendment seeks to do is to put 
the Congress of the United States on record as being against that 
discrimination.
  That is a very important issue. It is a critical issue about what 
this country is and the values that we have. It is the very kind of 
issue that it would seem to me to be self-evident to fall into the 
category of ``I want to House to work its will.''
  This is not some number of amendments or this, that, and the other. 
This is a serious and immediate, clear and present danger to a lot of 
our citizens. We think it is important for Congress to go on record as 
saying that we are against discrimination in that regard.
  We would hope that this amendment would be made in order. We can't 
offer it because it is not an open rule. We weren't allowed to offer it 
on the Defense bill. I would hope that Mr. Sean Patrick Maloney of New 
York is allowed to offer that on the Financial Services bill, and the 
House can consider it. If the House disagrees with Maloney, then the 
amendment will lose. But it will be consistent with the rhetoric that 
has been included for

[[Page 9316]]

years by, frankly, the majority party, Mr. Speaker, that we will 
consider issues on their merits.
  Mr. Speaker, I will be glad to yield to my friend, but I hope I 
convey to you that we don't believe this is a political issue in that 
sense. We believe this is a serious issue, and we believe that 
literally millions of Americans are feeling very, very lonely in some 
respects, threatened in other respects, and hopeful that the Congress 
of the United States would go on record as saying we will not tolerate 
discrimination against fellow Americans just because of a category that 
they may reside in.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield to my friend.
  Mr. McCARTHY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for the effort in 
which he puts forth his argument.
  Every amendment before the Rules Committee will be considered, and 
that will be brought forth next week. I will keep the Members posted on 
what the Rules Committee comes forth with.
  The one thing I do want to remind the gentleman of, the numbers show 
this may be a structured rule, but there were more amendments offered 
on the floor under a structured rule than an open rule. This is 
probably one of the most open, structured rules we have ever had.
  The numbers show that the amendments here are almost twice as many 
were offered in the 111th this time by May, and even more importantly, 
these bills have gone through committee--subcommittee and full 
committee--where all amendments are offered without going through the 
Rules Committee.
  So, yes, it is my desire to have the voice of individuals heard, to 
be able to have amendments on this floor. That is why we created a 
structure that has this process to be able to work.
  Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman. The gentleman has just 
said we want to have individuals have the right to offer amendments. 
Mr. Sean Patrick Maloney of New York wants to offer this amendment.

                              {time}  1400

  This House voted for his amendment, as the gentleman recalls. A 
majority of this House supports the Maloney amendment, unless they have 
their votes changed. They had their votes changed. We came back the 
following week, and the majority of this House voted for the Maloney 
amendment. Unfortunately, the bill went down. I say ``unfortunately'' 
because the Maloney amendment didn't go forward. There were a lot of 
good things in that bill. A majority of your Members voted against it. 
Had a majority of your Members voted for it, it would have passed, 
notwithstanding what we did, because you are in the majority and you 
have the numbers.
  So I would simply urge not to talk about we have had 15 amendments or 
500 amendments. We would feel it very important that this Congress go 
on record telling our fellow Americans that we don't believe in 
discrimination against LGBT citizens, period. If the majority of the 
House would vote that way, I think the majority of the Senate would 
vote that way. If the Maloney amendment is made in order, it will have, 
in my view, the support of the majority of this House. In that regard, 
therefore, it is certainly not specious, and I would hope that it would 
be made in order.
  Lastly, Mr. Speaker, we have seen a 16-hour filibuster on the floor 
of the United States Senate. That filibuster was about bringing to the 
floor of the House of Representatives legislation which is supported by 
over 75 percent of Americans.
  First of all, if you can't fly, you ought not to be able to buy a 
gun. If you are so dangerous that you can't get on a plane, you ought 
not to be allowed to buy a gun that could kill a lot of people very 
quickly, as we saw just the other day.
  And secondly, the overwhelming majority of Americans support enhanced 
background checks overwhelmingly. Those two issues.
  I am led to believe, though I haven't done the poll directly, that a 
majority of those who are members of the NRA--not the association 
itself, the National Rifle Association, but the majority of the 
members--when asked, support those two propositions.
  I would hope that they would be brought to the floor so that the 
House could work its will, again, on the premise, as you have stated 
and others have stated in your party, that under the leadership of the 
Republican Party the House is going to be able to work its will on 
important issues. That, we believe, is a critically important issue. I 
would hope the gentleman could assure me that that will be brought to 
the floor not necessarily next week, but in the very, very near future.
  I yield to my friend if he wants to respond.
  Mr. McCARTHY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  As the gentleman knows--and I thank you for buying the book; I 
thought only my mother did--an open process also means going through 
committee. I can't will something just to come to the floor. We like 
things to go through committees.
  I know at times like this we want to make sure that fear does not get 
the better of our judgment. It is absolutely appropriate for us to 
discuss options that could hopefully prevent the next attack.
  I am proud of the fact that the last bill we just passed dealt with 
the radicalization of Americans. But we cannot lose sight of our basic 
rights protected in the Constitution, including the right to due 
process.
  In the weeks and months to come, I would expect that the House will 
take additional action in response to the threat posed by ISIL and 
others. I look forward to working with the gentleman in a constructive 
way to ensure the safety and security of all Americans.
  Mr. HOYER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman.
  Let me remind him that--although there seems to be some tangential 
relationship because of the self-proclamation by the killer, the person 
who created the massacre in Orlando--the person who created the 
massacre in Charleston, Roof, had no relationship to ISIL or anybody in 
the international community. He didn't like African Americans. He 
killed them because of the color of their skin, and we speak out 
against that, properly so.
  Had the background check been appropriate in that case, that may have 
been stopped. We don't know. But it is certainly worth making the 
effort to ensure that guns do not get in the hands of those who ought 
not to have them. Again, as I say, a majority of the American people 
support that.
  And, yes, the Export-Import Bank was bottled up in committee--we 
understand you can bottle things up in committee--over 2\1/2\ years. 
When it finally got to the floor, a majority of Republicans and all but 
one Democrat voted for it, over 300 votes for it, but it was bottled up 
in committee. That may be regular order, but it is not openness, and it 
is not having the House work its will.
  I would urge that those two items in particular--the no fly, no buy 
legislation and the enhanced ability to know whether people ought to 
have guns or not--whether suffering from some sort of mental problem or 
having criminal records, that they not buy guns. I would hope we can 
bring that to the floor and have this House work its will, as has been 
suggested your side would do when and if it was in power, and it has 
been in power now for some period of time.
  If the gentleman wants to make additional comments, I will yield. If 
not, I will yield back the balance of my time.
  Mr. McCARTHY. Will the gentleman yield for one point?
  Mr. HOYER. I yield to the gentleman from California.
  Mr. McCARTHY. It was your birthday this week, and I just want to wish 
you a happy birthday.
  Mr. HOYER. Another vicious attack on me.
  I thank the majority leader, who is always very kind. I appreciate 
that very much.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

                          ____________________