[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 163 (2017), Part 3]
[House]
[Pages 3526-3529]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




             FAIRNESS FOR BREASTFEEDING MOTHERS ACT OF 2017

  Mr. BARLETTA. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the 
bill (H.R. 1174) to provide a lactation room in public buildings, as 
amended.
  The Clerk read the title of the bill.
  The text of the bill is as follows:

                               H.R. 1174

       Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of 
     the United States of America in Congress assembled,

     SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

       This Act may be cited as the ``Fairness For Breastfeeding 
     Mothers Act of 2017''.

     SEC. 2. LACTATION ROOM IN PUBLIC BUILDINGS.

       (a) Lactation Room in Public Buildings.--Chapter 33 of 
     title 40, United States Code, is amended by adding at the end 
     the following new section:

     ``Sec. 3318. Lactation room in public buildings

       ``(a) Definitions.--In this section:
       ``(1) Appropriate authority.--The term `appropriate 
     authority' means the head of a Federal agency, the Architect 
     of the Capitol, or other official authority responsible for 
     the operation of a public building.
       ``(2) Covered public building.--The term `covered public 
     building' means a public building (as defined in section 
     3301) that is open to the public and contains a public 
     restroom, and includes a building listed in section 6301 or 
     5101.
       ``(3) Lactation room.--The term `lactation room' means a 
     hygienic place, other than a bathroom, that--
       ``(A) is shielded from view;
       ``(B) is free from intrusion; and
       ``(C) contains a chair, a working surface, and, if the 
     public building is otherwise supplied with electricity, an 
     electrical outlet.
       ``(b) Lactation Room Required.--Except as provided in 
     subsection (c), the appropriate authority of a covered public 
     building shall ensure that the building contains a lactation 
     room that is made available for use by members of the public 
     to express breast milk.
       ``(c) Exceptions.--A covered public building may be 
     excluded from the requirement in subsection (b) at the 
     discretion of the appropriate authority if--
       ``(1) the public building--
       ``(A) does not contain a lactation room for employees who 
     work in the building; and
       ``(B) does not have a room that could be repurposed as a 
     lactation room or a space that could be made private using 
     portable materials, at a reasonable cost; or
       ``(2) new construction would be required to create a 
     lactation room in the public building and the cost of such 
     construction is unfeasible.
       ``(d) No Unauthorized Entry.--Nothing in this section shall 
     be construed to authorize an individual to enter a public 
     building or portion thereof that the individual is not 
     otherwise authorized to enter.''.
       (b) Clerical Amendment.--The table of sections at the 
     beginning of chapter 33 of title 40, United States Code, is 
     amended by inserting after the item related to section 3316 
     the following new item:

``3318. Lactation room in public buildings.''.

       (c) Effective Date.--The amendments made by this section 
     shall take effect one year after the date of the enactment of 
     this Act.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from 
Pennsylvania (Mr. Barletta) and the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. 
Johnson) each will control 20 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Pennsylvania.


                             General Leave

  Mr. BARLETTA. Mr. 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 H.R. 1174, as amended.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Pennsylvania?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. BARLETTA. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  Mr. Speaker, I appreciate my colleagues for their work on bringing 
this bill to the floor today.
  H.R. 1174 is a straightforward bill that would make nursing rooms 
available to new mothers in public buildings. The bill would apply to 
buildings already open to the public and which already have nursing 
rooms for employees. The requirements would not apply if existing space 
cannot feasibly be repurposed.
  This is a good bill that will make the lives of nursing mothers 
easier and will improve the accessibility of public buildings.
  Mr. Speaker, I urge support for this legislation, and I reserve the 
balance of my time.
  Mr. JOHNSON of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 1174, 
the Fairness for Breastfeeding Mothers Act of 2017, introduced by my 
good friend, Eleanor Holmes Norton. I am pleased to be an original 
cosponsor of this legislation.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as she may consume to the gentlewoman 
from the District of Columbia (Ms. Norton).
  Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, I thank my good friend from Georgia for 
yielding. I certainly thank him for being a cosponsor of my bill.
  I should start, however, by thanking Chairman Shuster, and Ranking 
Member DeFazio, who have moved this bill so quickly.
  The bill is called the Fairness for Breastfeeding Mothers Act of 
2017. This is a real motherhood bill. Mr. DeFazio, Mr. Johnson, and 
Barbara Comstock have all joined me as cosponsors.
  H.R. 1174 requires locations that are either federally owned or 
leased to provide designated private and hygenic

[[Page 3527]]

lactation space for nursing mothers. As I will indicate, no new space 
in buildings or expenditures is contemplated.
  Last Congress, I offered this bill as an amendment to the Public 
Buildings Reform and Savings Act of 2016, and I was pleased to have it 
pass the House.
  Space for lactating women is already required for Federal employees. 
We are really not talking about a new kind of benefit. Certainly, there 
is no new money. The reason that this is not new is because Federal 
employees already have lactating space under the Affordable Care Act.
  So I have to ask my good friends on the other side: As you try to 
repeal the Affordable Care Act, do you propose to erase this motherhood 
provision as well? Will you preserve it?

                              {time}  1745

  My bill extends the lactating space requirement to include not just 
employees, but visitors and guests of Federal facilities across the 
Nation. H.R. 1174 also does not require additional Federal funds or 
space to be mandated at all. Since Federal employees already have this 
space, I look forward to visitors to Federal buildings also making use 
of this space. In our country, new mothers often come to visit Federal 
buildings, not only those who work in Federal buildings.
  The reason this is such an important bill is that the benefits of 
breast milk are so well documented: antibodies and hormones that boost 
babies' immune systems, lower risks of asthma, diabetes, respiratory 
infections, and other diseases among breastfed babies.
  There are benefits also for nursing mothers. Research has shown that 
there are lower risks of diabetes and even cancer as a result of 
breastfeeding. Speaking of motherhood, the Republican healthcare plan 
would even make maternity care significantly more expensive.
  Now, this, of course, is a bill that is very easy to support, but 
when we think of its links to other important legislation, I ask that 
there be sincere consideration given to whether or not at this moment 
in time my good friends across the aisle want their legacy to be: We 
actually repealed your health care.
  I don't think they are going to be able to do it.
  My Republican friends have no experience with structural reform. If 
you look at all the structural reform in our country, beginning with 
the New Deal, none of it was done by Republicans. Whether you are 
talking about the administrative agencies that are so important to all 
that we do in this country, Medicare, Medicaid, the Elementary and 
Secondary Education Act, whatever you have in mind, these are 
structural reforms that Republicans have, if anything, opposed, as they 
opposed Social Security, for example.
  So here what they are trying to do is to unravel, take away health 
care, and then put something in its place. They have no experience 
doing anything like it. Anybody who has looked closely at it has to 
doubt, as I do, that they can do it.
  Look what they will be doing. In my own district, the District of 
Columbia, we have cut in half the rate of uninsured.
  Are Republicans going to give me a guarantee that that cut will 
remain if they replace the bill with the markup that is going on as we 
speak?
  Ninety-six percent of District of Columbia residents have health 
coverage today. That is comparable to other advanced countries in the 
world. As we know, most countries in the world already afford this kind 
of coverage. That makes the District, according to whoever is doing the 
counting, number one, number two, or number three in the Nation in 
health care provided to our residents. I am very proud of that. I am 
going to fight like mad to keep it.
  Mr. Speaker, many of us had healthcare townhalls over the recess. We 
saw what happened at the townhalls on affordable care that my good 
friends on the other side also had. They met a revolution from their 
own constituents. We didn't have that problem in our townhalls. Some of 
the stories that residents brought forward are truly heartbreaking, so 
I want to leave you with one.
  A woman who came to testify at my healthcare townhall, her name is 
Markita. Markita's grandmother was a D.C. Public Schools cafeteria 
worker for most of her career. She retired early. She retired before 
she had Social Security or Medicare. She was suffering from diabetes 
and a stroke, but she was so prideful that she never let anyone know 
that she had to slice her pills in half just to get by. Now she is 
under the protection of the Affordable Care Act. Markita's grandmother 
is healthier and can afford her medication. She is no longer splitting 
her pills in half.
  Mr. BARLETTA. Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentlewoman from 
Virginia (Mrs. Comstock).
  Mrs. COMSTOCK. Mr. Speaker, I rise to support H.R. 1174, the Fairness 
for Breastfeeding Mothers Act. I thank my colleague for introducing it. 
It was unanimously supported--thank you, Mr. Chairman--in committee and 
in full committee. As expected, it is going through because people 
understand this is a commonsense bill, so I am happy to support this 
once again.
  I know you were discussing H.R. 375 earlier. I did want to return to 
the bill to designate the Federal building and courthouse in Nashville, 
Tennessee, to my good friend, Fred D. Thompson. That building will now 
be named after him appropriately.
  Fred Thompson was a larger-than-life character, a true patriot, and a 
great wit who believed in and lived the American Dream in starring 
roles on stage, screen, and national politics. He served as a Senator 
for 8 years, and then later he ran for President. Originally he was 
here in Congress serving as a counsel where, of course, we had that 
famous line: ``What did the President know, and when did he know it?'' 
That was a line that he was well known for.
  What he was also often not given credit for was what a profoundly 
good lawyer he was. He had come to the attention of people in Tennessee 
by Lamar Alexander when Howard Baker came and asked now-Senator Lamar 
Alexander to take a role in the Watergate hearings, he said: No; you 
want to have Fred Thompson there. He asked his friend Fred Thompson to 
come and serve in that role.
  Fred then became an actor because when they went to write a movie 
about a woman who had been dealing with corruption in Tennessee 
politics, and Fred had been her lawyer, they couldn't find someone to 
play Fred, and they came and asked him: Could you play yourself? He 
said: Well, I guess I could. That is how he became a character actor 
and a larger-than-life character there. Some of his famous lines there: 
``Stack `em, pack `em, and rack `em.'' In ``Die Hard'' I believe that 
one was.
  In movies, he starred with Paul Newman, Tom Cruise, Clint Eastwood, 
Gene Hackman, Robert Duvall, Bruce Willis, Sissy Spacek, and so many 
others. After he came here to the Senate, he humorously said: ``I often 
long for the realism and sincerity of Hollywood.'' So this is somebody 
who took his job very seriously but never took himself seriously and 
continued to have that great wit.
  My husband and I were very privileged to know him and learn from him 
and spend many a good day and delightful time and evening with him and 
his wife, Jeri, his family, his children, and his many friends and 
admirers. We are so grateful for and appreciate his celebrated service 
and justly celebrated service to our country. This building will be a 
great memorial in a State that still very much reveres him.
  I was privileged to be able to attend his service where hundreds and 
hundreds of people from Tennessee came to honor him, from country 
singers to people who stood by the side of the road as we drove to his 
funeral service, saluting him and thanking him for his service. This is 
somebody who in today's politics is sorely missed by all of us, and 
certainly most by his many friends, his family, and his scores of fans. 
God bless the Honorable Fred Thompson.
  I thank you, Mr. Chairman, for this opportunity to be able to have 
this building now be a legacy to his great service and being a great 
attorney and lawyer for this country.

[[Page 3528]]


  Mr. JOHNSON of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I 
may consume.
  What happened 43, 44 years ago during the Watergate hearings with 
that seminal question that everyone keeps asking, ``What did the 
President know, and when did he know it?'' and in the words of Yogi 
Berra: ``It's deja vu all over again.''
  People are asking that question today, and it rings more loudly today 
than it did back then in 1973, 1974, ``What did the President know, and 
when did he know it?'' about a lot of issues.
  But this issue of the Affordable Care Act and whether or not you are 
going to repeal it and replace it with something better or you are 
going to repeal and replace it with something worse, what did the 
President know, and when did he know it?
  Because it is clear now to everybody who has had the opportunity to 
look at this offering that the Republicans have put forward, you are 
going to be worse off today than you were when the Affordable Care Act 
was implemented because 20 million of the 30 million people who are on 
coverage now will be off coverage if this thing passes.
  This Fairness for Breastfeeding Mothers Act of 2017, which was 
introduced by my colleague and friend, Congresswoman Norton, which I am 
so pleased to be a cosponsor of, is a bill from a mother herself who 
knows the needs of other mothers. This is bipartisan. I am so happy 
that this bill is passing today, but I will tell you, I can't help but 
think of the 20 million people who are going to lose their coverage. A 
lot of those people are women and children, even some babies. They are 
going to lose coverage because the Republicans are kicking them off 
under their plan. They will be a healthy part of that 20 million people 
who lose their coverage. It is unfair. It is not right. It is un-
American.
  Mr. Speaker, how much time is remaining on my side?
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Georgia has 8\1/2\ 
minutes remaining.
  Mr. JOHNSON of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my 
time.
  Mr. BARLETTA. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
South Carolina (Mr. Sanford).
  Mr. SANFORD. I thank the chairman for yielding to me.
  Mr. Speaker, I rise with the greatest respect for my colleague from 
the District of Columbia and her passion on this subject and the bill 
that she has introduced. I rise with equal respect for my colleague, 
Chairman Barletta, and the way in which he has walked this bill through 
the process, but I am going to oppose this bill. I am going to do so on 
the basis of process. I thought it important to explain why, given, I 
think, the amount of energy that has gone into the bill and the fact 
that I wasn't able to voice a vote against it when it was voice voted 
at the committee level.
  I do so because I think that blank checks rarely work out well for 
the taxpayer. In fairness to the bill, it is not a blank check. The 
bill is actually prescribed in three different ways--the way in which 
it will impact Federal buildings. My problem, though, is on methodology 
in that the General Services Administration that ultimately gave the 
numbers to the CBO on which they base their score did not get in final 
form how many Federal buildings we are talking about. I think that 
leaves, therefore, something of an open end as to what this bill will 
ultimately cost; and that then goes to impact the very children for 
whom the breastfeeding will take place.

                              {time}  1800

  A child born in America today is going to inherit a giant liability 
from the Federal Government in terms of the cost of our Federal 
Government. By accountants from both the left and the right, they have 
said what we have in place is not sustainable. Therefore, I think it is 
very important, from a process standpoint, that we look at a final form 
number on any of these bills that we throw out and we prescribe, 
regardless of, again, how well-meaning they are and how measured they 
are, which is certainly the case with this bill.
  I wanted to stand to give a quick explanation. I thank the gentleman 
for the time.
  Mr. JOHNSON of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from South 
Carolina (Mr. Sanford), my friend, opposes the bill because the CBO 
scoring process, which came up with a no-cost estimate for this bill, 
the contention is that that CBO study was insufficient. Well, I am sure 
that my colleague and friend from South Carolina will agree with me 
that with no CBO scoring for this congressional Republican healthcare 
repeal bill that they have put forward, then we are certainly not in a 
position to proceed further with a fast-track legislating process, as 
this bill seems to be on. They are going to mark it up with no 
hearings.
  When we were dealing with the Affordable Care Act, we held 79 
hearings over 2 years, heard from 181 witnesses from both sides of the 
aisle, and posted the bill online for 30 days. The CBO scoring actually 
showed that this bill was going to save money, as opposed to cost.
  Mr. Speaker, I ask my colleague from South Carolina to be in 
opposition to his own party's healthcare repeal bill.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the kind gentleman from 
Massachusetts (Mr. Kennedy), my friend.
  Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for his work 
on this.
  Mr. Speaker, after weeks of empty promises that he had a secret plan 
to insure every American at lower costs with higher quality care, 
President Trump is now standing behind a House GOP repeal plan that was 
introduced last night that fails every single one of those promises. 
Based on estimates that we have seen so far, millions of Americans 
stand to lose coverage, out-of-pocket costs will skyrocket, and the 
quality of care will plummet.
  But today, hours after that bill was introduced, Mr. Speaker, our 
President referenced a to-be-announced second and third phase of his 
healthcare rollout that Secretary Price referred to as ``a work in 
progress,'' once again injecting our healthcare system with crippling 
uncertainty that is hurting our patients, hospitals, behavioral health 
providers, and local economies.
  If you are so proud of this bill, why has it been locked in dark 
rooms? Why not have an open debate? What are we so afraid of to have a 
debate on this floor?
  That is why I urge my colleagues, Democrats and Republicans alike, to 
support my resolution of inquiry tomorrow, to try to make sure that the 
details that have been discussed by this White House and by the 
Republicans behind closed doors are open for America to understand 
before we cram a healthcare overhaul down our throats.
  Mr. BARLETTA. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. JOHNSON of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I was looking at my 
congressional calendar, and I noticed that this year we are working in 
Washington, D.C., more than we have under the past 5 years of the rein 
of the Republicans. We have been the most do-nothingest Congresses on 
record for many years, and so this year we will be working. But I am 
baffled as to whether or not it is because the Republicans don't want 
to go home and face their constituents in a townhall meeting about the 
Affordable Care Act repeal bill that they have filed. We will be here 
in session now for another 4 weeks before the public has a chance to 
hear from their Representative when they return home for an extended 
time. But on the flip side, that gives everybody time to prepare for 
those upcoming townhall meetings which need to be held to explain what 
they are trying to do to the American people.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Illinois (Ms. 
Schakowsky), my friend.
  Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.
  Last Thursday, I was wandering the Capitol searching for the 
Republican's secret repeal bill. We went from room to room, and it 
wasn't there. But now that I have seen it, I understand why they would 
want to hide it.
  Even if we can all agree that we need to make health care more 
affordable

[[Page 3529]]

and more accessible, this bill is not the solution. In fact, this bill 
will only make things worse.
  The Republican repeal bill gives tax breaks to the rich. We are 
talking about over $600 billion overall, while taking away health 
coverage from millions of Americans. The Republican repeal bill will 
drastically increase the cost of health insurance for millions of 
Americans, with the biggest increase for seniors and for working 
families.
  It would radically change the Medicaid program, slashing funding, and 
covering fewer people.
  The Republican repeal bill will force Governors and State legislators 
to ration care. My Republican Governor weighed in now and said that it 
would be trouble for Illinois if Medicaid is cut back.
  Who do they want to cut out? Children, the elderly, people with 
disabilities. Thousands of hardworking individuals in Illinois will 
lose access to health coverage. As I said, in fact, Republican Governor 
Bruce Rauner said that our State ``won't do very well'' if the 
Republican repeal bill becomes law.
  The Republican repeal bill breaks the promise made by President Trump 
to cover more Americans at lower cost.
  I oppose this bill. I am going to fight tooth and nail to protect our 
care. And, frankly, I think this bill, as my mother would say, is 
deader than a door nail.
  Mr. BARLETTA. Mr. Speaker, I continue to reserve the balance of my 
time.
  Mr. JOHNSON of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I yield an additional 1 minute 
to the gentlewoman from the District of Columbia (Ms. Norton).
  Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, I wanted to correct the gentleman from South 
Carolina (Mr. Sanford), who opined that this bill was not scored 
correctly.
  We are talking about space already designated for Federal employees. 
The intent of the bill, and I am the author of the bill, which could 
never have gotten through committee if it involved the expenditure of 
funds. Yes, sometimes these lactation rooms will be dedicated to 
lactation, but that doesn't mean they are exclusively designated to 
lactation.
  And the whole notion that some Federal buildings don't have such 
space means they are in violation of the Affordable Care Act, which 
requires that they have such space, even if it is not space that is 
exclusively used for the few women who are lactating or nursing.
  Mr. BARLETTA. Mr. Speaker, I continue to reserve the balance of my 
time.
  Mr. JOHNSON of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I have one more point that I 
needed to make about this abolition, this abolishment of the Affordable 
Care Act plan that has been submitted. A foundation of their plan is 
the demise of the individual mandate that requires people to purchase 
insurance, so they are claiming that that is a matter of freedom.
  Well, the fact is that when everyone is required to have insurance, 
it reduces the cost for everyone else. So it was a cost-saving measure 
that has worked with the rise in premiums being at the lowest level in 
decades. The affordable care has worked to cut the cost of health care.
  But what they are doing when they abolish that individual mandate is 
they are also going to penalize people who decide to drop their 
coverage and pick it up later. Or if you miss one payment because you 
missed work, missed a paycheck or something like that, you missed 1 
month and have to reinstate, then you are going to pay a 30 percent 
penalty on your insurance. That is highway robbery.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
  Mr. BARLETTA. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion offered by the 
gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Barletta) that the House suspend the 
rules and pass the bill, H.R. 1174, as amended.
  The question was taken; and (two-thirds being in the affirmative) the 
rules were suspended and the bill, as amended, was passed.
  A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.

                          ____________________