[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 163 (2017), Part 11]
[House]
[Pages 15890-15892]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                   HUMAN RIGHTS IN PAKISTAN AND SINDH

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Arrington). Under the Speaker's 
announced policy of January 3, 2017, the Chair recognizes the gentleman 
from California (Mr. Sherman) for 30 minutes.
  Mr. SHERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I thank you for yielding me 30 minutes, 
more than enough time to deliver three separate speeches that I have 
prepared for presentation. The first two are informed, or two of these 
speeches are informed. The first and the third are informed by my 20 
years of experience on the Foreign Affairs Committee, and the second 
speech I will deliver is informed by 40 years as a CPA in the world of 
taxation.
  Mr. Speaker, I am the ranking member on the Asia and the Pacific 
Subcommittee and the founder of the Sindh Caucus. In those two roles, I 
have focused on human rights and the rule of law in Pakistan, and 
particularly in its perhaps largest province, Sindh, comprising most of 
southern Pakistan.
  We have dedicated ourselves in the Sindh Caucus to efforts to 
preserve the culture and the language of the Sindhi people, and 
particularly their dedication to religious tolerance. Unfortunately, 
the human rights picture in Pakistan and in Sindh are not good.
  I would like to say a few words about the disappearance of Punhal 
Sario, the leader of the Voice for Missing Persons of Sindh movement, 
and about the very serious problem of disappearances in Sindh in 
southern Pakistan.
  Just this past summer, Punhal Sario led a march between Sindh's two 
major cities, Hyderabad to Karachi, demanding accountability for Sindhi 
activists who have been abducted by Pakistani security forces or simply 
disappeared.
  Where is Punhal now? It appears that he, too, has fallen victim to 
the very serious forces that he marched against.

                              {time}  1730

  Punhal's case is hardly an isolated one. The Human Rights Commission 
of Pakistan reported that over 700 people disappeared, were kidnapped, 
and never heard of again in Pakistan in the year 2016 alone.
  In the past year, the United Nations Human Rights Committee, Amnesty 
International, Human Rights Watch, and the State Department's own 
Report on Human Rights have all noted serious concerns about 
extrajudicial and targeted killings and disappearances in Pakistan and, 
particularly, in Sindh.
  Elements of the government or military see an opportunity to simply 
make their opponents disappear. Here are a few particulars. In 2016, 
Amnesty International reported that the Pakistani security forces had, 
and these are their words, ``committed human rights violations with 
almost total impunity.''
  While Human Rights Watch observed that, ``law enforcement and 
security agencies remained unaccountable for human rights violations.''
  The State Department itself noted in Pakistan, ``the most serious 
human rights problems were extrajudicial and targeted killings 
disappearances, torture, the lack of the rule of law.''
  Two years ago, in 2015, Sindhi leader Dr. Anwar Laghari was brutally 
murdered in Pakistan. Days before his death, he had sent a memorandum 
to President Barack Obama about human rights violations by the 
Pakistani military and its ISI, the Inter-Services Intelligence, 
agency, an important part of the Pakistani military.
  I attended a memorial service for Dr. Laghari here in Washington and 
have come to know of his work for human rights for the Sindhi people of 
southern Pakistan. The Pakistani Government has not been responsive to 
numerous inquiries into the reason for Dr. Laghari's death and for why 
his perpetrators have not been brought to justice.
  Two months ago, on August 18, I sent a letter to the Acting Assistant 
Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs and the U.S. 
Ambassador to Pakistan expressing strong concerns about human rights 
violations of the Pakistani Government in Sindh. Six of my House 
colleagues--three Democrats and three Republicans--joined me in that 
effort.
  There are other human rights concerns in Pakistan that I should also 
bring to the attention of this House. The people of Sindh face 
religious extremist attacks. ISIS, for example, claimed responsibility 
for an attack on a Sufi shrine in Sindh that killed 80 people. Yet the 
government has not acted to protect religious minorities and, in 
general, has not acted to protect the people of Sindh from Islamic 
extremism.
  In addition, in Sindh, there are forced conversions of Sindhi girls 
belonging to minority communities. While the numbers are unclear, 
reports suggest that every year perhaps 1,000 girls and young women in 
Pakistan, including many in Sindh, are forcibly converted upon a 
marriage, not of their choice, to Muslim men. The Pakistani Government 
has not done enough to stop this practice, and reform measures have 
been circumvented and not enforced.
  Human rights abuses of this type cannot go unanswered. Activists 
disappear under suspicious circumstances. It is our obligation to speak 
out and demand accountability. These disappearances and other 
violations of human rights should be a major topic of conversation in 
all bilateral discussions between our government and the government in 
Islamabad.


                    Tax Proposal Deletes Deductions

  Mr. SHERMAN. Now, Mr. Speaker I would like to move on to a second 
speech, one dealing with the tax proposal of the Trump administration.
  The provisions I would like to focus on chiefly are those involving 
taking away the deductions, the itemized deductions that so many 
Americans take to reduce their tax liability.
  Now, these deductions are eliminated on the theory that, oh, they 
just go to the wealthy, and, for those purposes, they define the 
wealthy as the wealthiest 30 percent or so of the American people--say 
a family with an income of $100,000 or $150,000. We are told that is 
the same thing as increasing taxes on the top one-tenth of 1 percent, 
say a family with an income of $1 million or $2 million a year.
  There is a difference in the ability to pay of those two typical 
families, typifying their income brackets. The fact is, that taxing 
hardworking families with incomes of $100,000 or $150,000, in

[[Page 15891]]

order to provide reduced tax rates for those with incomes of $1 million 
or $2 million, makes our tax system more regressive. You cannot put the 
entire top 30 percent in one category for these income calculations.
  That is why, and that is only one reason why, I oppose the 
elimination of the home mortgage deduction. Another reason that I 
oppose it is elimination of the home mortgage deduction and reduction 
for local property taxes will probably decrease the value of homes by 
20 percent, is the best estimate I have seen.
  Well, if you lose 20 percent of the value of your home, you may very 
well lose all of the equity in your home. How is that going to affect 
the economy? How is that going to affect the ability of homeowners to 
go and spend money in their communities and support the economy of 
their communities?
  What does it do to the Federal budget when we are responsible through 
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac for underwriting home mortgages? We know 
that if you wipe out the equity of many homeowners in their homes, this 
can lead to defaults and cost the Federal Government perhaps more than 
we give up by having a home mortgage deduction.
  Another element to keep in mind is that the entire idea of an income 
tax is that we tax people based on their ability to pay. If you are in 
a State with high income taxes, high property taxes, that diminishes 
your ability to pay. If you make a certain salary and money is taken 
out by your State government before you ever see it, your ability to 
pay is only on that net paycheck.
  It is simply wrong to take away the deduction for State and local 
taxes. But make no mistake about it, the purpose of removing that 
deduction is not just to hurt the top 30, or 40 percent, or 50 percent 
of the American people who itemize their deductions, it is designed to 
punish those who are dependent on State and local government.
  All the conservative theorists say: If we can just eliminate the 
deduction for State and local taxes, we will cut the size of State and 
local governments. We will create a political atmosphere in which they 
slash money for local schools, slash money for local health programs 
for the poor, slash money for police.
  Who will be hurt from those cuts? Not just the top 30 percent or 50 
percent, but everyone in America, most particularly, the poor.
  Finally, I want to focus on the medical deduction. They take away the 
medical deduction in this program, this proposal of the Trump 
administration. Now, keep in mind that we already have severe limits on 
deducting medical expenses. You can deduct medical expenses only if 
they exceed 10 percent of your family's income. So medical expenses are 
itemized and deducted only by those families including someone with 
very significant health costs.
  Now, we have worked hard in this House to make sure that people have 
health insurance. But even with health insurance, there are copays; 
there are deductibles. These can be absorbed in a family budget where 
no one has a particular strong medical need. But what if there is some 
member of the family who needs experimental treatments that are not 
covered, therapies that are not covered?
  Under the present system, at least they get to deduct these 
extraordinary--not the first 10 percent of AGI, of adjusted gross 
income--but when they start spending out-of-pocket costs in excess of 
10 percent income, they can take a tax deduction--a tax deduction taken 
away in the Trump tax proposal.
  I speak not just as someone who spent a lot of time as a tax expert 
who headed the second largest tax agency in the country, but as the 
father of a child with special needs. What does this tax proposal mean 
for such a family? Well, first, there is a cut in Federal revenue under 
this proposal of between $150 billion and $200 billion a year. Deficit 
hawks will demand that these revenue cuts be matched by cuts to Federal 
spending.
  What does that do to the $13 billion the Federal Government dedicates 
to the implementation of the Individuals with Disabilities Education 
Act, IDEA, also known as special education? And what do these cuts in 
our Federal expenditures mean to the $293 million that are spent by the 
National Institutes of Health on research designed to prevent and treat 
autism and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, ADHD?
  So the first impact on a family with special needs is a slashing of 
the money the Federal Government spends for special education and 
medical research. But second, I talked about those out-of-pocket 
medical expenses. Parents with special-needs children know that health 
insurance pays only a portion of what is needed, or perhaps none of 
what is needed, for behavioral therapy, speech therapy, occupational 
therapy, physical therapy, developmental pediatricians, 
neuropsychological services, et cetera.
  Medical insurance will pay nothing toward anything branded an 
experimental treatment, and, of course, medical insurance does not 
cover special schools required to meet the needs of some special-needs 
children.
  Under current law, a special school designed to meet those with a 
physical or mental handicap are considered medical expenses. All of 
these tax deductions are taken away from a family whose ability to pay 
is diminished by the costs of providing these therapies to a special-
needs child.
  In addition, right now, the tax law provides a personal exemption of 
$4,050 for each dependent child. The Trump administration proposal 
takes that away. It does say, in some vague language, that there will 
be a child tax credit to compensate parents who are losing the personal 
exemption. But this credit will be limited to children 16 years of age 
and younger.
  So what about parents supporting children in their teenage years, and 
older? Remember, some special-needs children will need parental support 
for a lifetime. Those parents lose the exemption and are ineligible for 
this credit available only to parents of younger children.
  But perhaps parents of children with special needs should support the 
Trump tax program. While it will tremendously increase their taxes, 
while it will cut Federal expenditures on special education and on 
health research and medical research, parents of children with special 
needs can take solace in knowing that this plan will reduce taxes for 
the Trump family by over $1 billion in estate taxes and by tens of 
millions of dollars in income tax.
  Perhaps we should tell parents of special-needs children that they 
should stop worrying so much about their children and start worrying 
about Donald Trump's children. If they did, they would support the 
Trump tax proposal.


                       Iran Nuclear Control Deal

  Mr. SHERMAN. Finally, Mr. Speaker, I would like to address the issue 
of Iran and the nuclear deal, nuclear control deal that we signed with 
Iran.
  First, a little background. In 1997, I said at the Foreign Affairs 
Committee that Iran and its nuclear program were the number one threat 
to American national security.

                              {time}  1745

  For the last 20 years, I have supported every effort to impose 
sanctions on the Iranian regime. When the Iran nuclear deal was 
finalized and published, I was the first of either party to come to 
this floor and say that Congress should not vote to endorse that deal.
  But the question before us now is: Should we renounce the deal?
  Now, it would be one thing if Iran decides that we are so tough on 
them on other issues that they choose to renounce the deal, but that is 
not the issue before us today. The issue before us today is whether 
America should renounce the deal, and the resounding and clear answer 
is that is not something we should do at this time.
  Now, I will give you an example. Let's say you bought a flawed 
automobile. In some jurisdictions, you take back the automobile and you 
get back your money. But what opponents--what some are proposing now is 
that we renounce the deal. Imagine you are in a jurisdiction where you 
have to

[[Page 15892]]

take back the car and the dealer keeps your money, too. Taking back the 
car doesn't look like such a good idea anymore.
  Now, like a flawed automobile, the Iran nuclear deal is liable to not 
be working next decade. But that doesn't mean you take back the car and 
the dealer keeps the money.
  What happens if we renounce the deal?
  Iran keeps the money. We unfroze very roughly $100 billion of their 
money. If we renounce the deal, they keep the money. We delivered over 
$1 billion in currency on big pallets. If we renounce the deal, Iran 
keeps the money. If we renounce the deal, Iran is liberated from all of 
the restrictions that it agreed to on its nuclear program.
  I opposed the deal because the restrictions on Iran's nuclear program 
in the deal were temporary. I believe we need to extend and enforce 
those limitations on their nuclear program. If you listen to the Prime 
Minister of Israel, Bibi Netanyahu, he has identified the fact that we 
have not been able to extend and make permanent the limitations on 
Iran's nuclear program as the chief flaw in the deal and the chief 
thing to correct to turn it into a better deal.
  But if we renounce the deal, we don't extend and enforce the 
limitations on Iran's nuclear program, we end and eliminate immediately 
the restrictions on Iran's nuclear program. I cannot think of a worse 
result.
  Now, there are two mechanisms that we could use as a nation to 
renounce the deal, give Iran all the benefits, and liberate them from 
all their obligations. The first of these is on our mind now because it 
could be triggered on October 15. That is the day on which the 
President could, in effect, decertify this deal under the Iran Nuclear 
Review Act. I hope that, if he does that, the press will not overplay 
it, because a decertification does nothing more than focus Congress' 
attention on whether we want to reinstitute the exact sanctions that 
were waived as part of the nuclear deal. A decertification does nothing 
more than focus our attention and, over in the Senate, provide for a 
reinstitution of the old sanctions.
  Now, I don't think that Congress would be stupid enough to do that 
because, as I have explained, if we renounce the deal, Iran keeps the 
benefits and is liberated from its obligations.
  But the President should not decertify the deal and focus the world's 
attention on whether America will stand with the deal at this time.
  The second way that America could renounce the deal will occur next 
January because the basic element of the deal--the basic thing Iran got 
from the United States--was an agreement that the President would, 
every 4 months to 6 months, it depends on the exact statute, waive 
particular identified sanctions. As it happens, the existing waivers 
all expire in the middle of next January. If the President were to fail 
to issue those waivers, that would be an American renunciation of the 
deal. So it does not meet our national security objectives to renounce 
the deal.
  What meets our national security objectives is to impose tough 
sanctions on Iran, draft those sanctions carefully, and explain them to 
the world not as a renunciation of the deal, but as appropriate 
sanctions given Iran's non-nuclear, outside-the-deal, wrongful 
behavior.
  Now, the question is: Can we have sanctions on Iran and continue to 
force them to abide by the deal?
  The answer is clearly yes.
  In July of 2015, Secretary Kerry came before our committee, and I 
raised this very issue: If we adopt the deal, can we impose sanctions 
on the Central Bank of Iran to deter terrorism? Or would that violate 
this agreement?
  I specifically asked: Are Congress and the United States free under 
the agreement to adopt new sanctions legislation that will remain in 
force as long as Iran holds American hostages or supports the murderous 
Assad regime?
  Secretary Kerry's answers were clear. He stated: We are free to adopt 
additional sanctions as long as they are not a phony excuse for just 
taking the whole pot of past ones and putting them back.
  So we can and should impose new sanctions on Iran to the extent 
justified by Iran's behavior outside the area of nuclear research and 
uranium enrichment. Look at that as an opportunity because you could 
make a list of every sanction any one of us here on this floor has 
thought of. And add in the creativity of the United States Senate and 
make a list of every sanction we could impose, I assure you that those 
sanctions and more are justified by the non-nuclear evil committed by 
the regime in Tehran.
  Iran is more responsible than Russia for the hundreds of thousands of 
deaths in Syria. The lifeline of Assad's murderous regime is a lifeline 
to the aid, money, weapons, thugs, and training that Iran has 
provided--hundreds of thousands of deaths, an immoral responsibility of 
the Islamic Republic of Iran.
  Turn to Yemen, where tens of thousands of people have died because of 
Iran. Look at worldwide terrorism, and Iran is the number one state 
sponsor of terrorism year after year, according to our State 
Department. Look at the treatment by Iran of its own people, the 
murders by the state of anyone they identify as being part of the LGBT 
community, the murders by the state of women--it is usually women--
accused of adultery.
  The evil that comes from the Islamic Republic far exceeds the ability 
of this House to identify sanction points. That is why the proper 
policy for the United States is to impose the maximum sanctions and to 
explain to the world that this is not a phony renunciation of the 
nuclear deal, but it is the appropriate response to Iran's actions that 
are outside of the nuclear deal.
  If we do that, we will have substantial support from Europe, Asia, 
and elsewhere first for demanding that Iran continue to be subject to 
all the nuclear limitations and inspections that they agreed to under 
the deal and which continue to be enforced well in the next decade.
  What we shall do next decade, well, I will come back here and give 
another speech next decade. But at least many years deep in the next 
decade, this deal provides us with valuable limitations and valuable 
inspections of the Iran nuclear program, and Europe will insist that 
those be adhered to.
  Second, Europe may join us in the sanctions when we sanction Iran for 
its actions in Syria, its actions to its own people, its actions in 
Yemen. One more I should add, and that is Iran's violation of U.N. 
Security Council resolutions by testing and developing missiles and 
exporting weapons.
  So if we stick with the deal and we sanction Iran, they may choose--
if those sanctions are as effective as I think they can be--to walk 
away from the deal. But if they do, we will have the whole world with 
us enforcing sanctions against Iran.
  Now, there is one part of the policy I put forward that may not meet 
the psychological needs of the President of the United States, for he 
has shown an uncontrollable personal need to pour disgusting liquids on 
anything associated with President Obama. Maybe it meets his 
psychological needs to say he is renouncing the nuclear deal. But the 
fact is we don't have to renounce the nuclear deal and liberate Iran 
from its obligations in order to impose the toughest imaginable 
sanctions on this regime that is doing so much evil.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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