Protecting American Manufacturing Jobs Act of 2003

Mr. Chairman, how much time remains on both sides?

Mr. Chairman, this language is not well-drafted, I must say to the gentleman. He has a very good purpose but very unclear and unsure language; and as I read the language approved under unanimous consent, it makes the authority even broader.

It says trucks that are specifically allowed by Federal law to travel on the national network now can be disapproved by New Jersey. We cannot have one rule for local trucks and a different rule for through trucks.

Mr. Chairman, I thank the Chair for yielding me the time, and I reluctantly oppose the amendment of the gentlewoman from California with whom I am in accord on most issues, and I think she makes a very good point about this remote security facility.

I raised such concerns many years ago in Paris when Charles de Gaulle Airport said, for American check-in passengers, we are going to have a separate little place called the hutch. I went over to inspect it, and I said, my goodness, this is terrific, you collect all the Americans in one place so a terrorist can throw a bomb and kill them all at once. Of course, I said it in French; and they said, oh, we had not thought about that. They backed away and said, well, we will not make Americans do that.

So the gentlewoman makes a good point, but it is the point that is part of a larger process and that is to stop the expansion of the Los Angeles Airport. The Metropolitan Planning Organization is the agency in an urbanized area with the responsibility to determine the needs for projects to be advanced to meet transportation needs for the area. We really should not be inserting ourselves into that debate, certainly not at this time; and, reluctantly, I oppose the gentlewoman's well- intentioned

amendment and well-expressed amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I claim the time in opposition, and I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, I believe, with further discussion, we can find a way to come to a resolution.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Blumenauer).

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume, and I thank the gentleman for his very cogent statement.

Section 410 of existing law gives States eligibility to receive funds for alcohol-impaired driving countermeasures. It is a good program, a good provision. New Jersey is the first and only State to enact a law to impound a vehicle operated by a person who was arrested for drunk driving.

Now, section 410 requires that States meet six of nine criteria to qualify for a grant. If the gentleman's amendment is accepted, it would expand that number to seven. If the gentleman from New Jersey, as I understand from previous discussion on this amendment, would agree that as we move further into conference, that the number of criteria necessary to qualify for a grant should be reduced to six, so we not expand the number and make it easier to evade, then I would concur in this amendment.

I yield to the gentleman from New Jersey.

Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time, I thank the gentleman.

I yield to the gentleman from Alaska.

Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time, yes, we are; and I thank the chairman and the gentleman from New Jersey for a very thoughtful constructive matter that now has been resolved in, I think, a very positive way.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding. The language of the amendment of the gentleman from Oregon as originally drawn was way beyond the scope of what he intended, and we greatly appreciate the cooperation of the majority giving the gentleman the opportunity to have unanimous consent to correct the language to reflect exactly what he wants to do, to limit this amendment to small starts, which it does; and I think that relieves the concerns on both sides of the aisle.

Mr. Chairman, I believe under the unanimous consent agreement, the gentleman has already made that correction in the language pending.

If the gentleman will continue to yield, I would just add that the principle remains.

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding time and thank the gentleman and the gentlewoman for bringing this amendment forward.

In the 1980s, as the Chair of the Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight, I held extensive hearings on the status of manufacturing in light rail, passenger vehicles and buses during which we demonstrated the loss of tens of thousands of jobs in America to underbid products coming in from overseas. We shipped overseas tens of thousands of jobs in the light rail, passenger rail and bus sector of our economy.

Now it is coming back. Now we are recapturing those jobs. We now are putting in the next 6 years $51.5 billion into transit systems in America. We ought to have those jobs in America as well and reclaim the technology and the jobs that go with them for America. That is what this amendment will do.

Mr. Chairman, I thank the chairman for yielding.

I too support the spirit of the gentleman's amendment, but not the language and not the approach and certainly not the additional cost without offsets. I do want to point out that under FAA's Airport Improvement Program and with the use of passenger facility charges, airports can accomplish this purpose. In fact, provided that the vehicle is owned by the Airport Authority, operated solely on airport property, the funds from passenger facility charges can be used to purchase such vehicles.

Where a vehicle is not AIP eligible, FAA would pay for the difference in cost between low emissions and a regular vehicle. We have addressed this matter already in the appropriate context in the FAA reauthorization bill. So there is a way of accomplishing it.

Under Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality Improvement, funds are apportioned to the States to improve their air quality in nonattainment areas. The pilot program, unfortunately, does not address nonattainment areas within States. So just as we opposed taking FAA money off airports, we are in the position of taking CMAQ money and putting it into airports. So the purpose of the gentleman is at cross purposes with public policy already in place, and reluctantly we must oppose the amendment. But we will work with the gentleman and find a way that we can accomplish this purpose.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 2 minutes.

Mr. Chairman, I rise not only in opposition to this amendment, but to the many assaults upon the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration's hours of service rule announced just recently. But this one in particular, the FMCSA revised the hours of service pursuant to legislation that we enacted that moved out of our committee, through this body, through conference, signed into law. It has taken years for them to get this rulemaking after many hours of public discussion, debate, publishing in the Federal Register; and now people who are unhappy with the outcome are coming to the Congress to overturn a rulemaking. They have another procedure to do that. We should not by law go in and just be a congressional wrecking crew for safety.

Major change in the rules was to lengthen the required rest time after a long day on duty from 8 hours to 10 hours. An 8-hour rest is not enough. They barely get time to get home from their job, maybe get a shower, have something to eat, go to bed, and then they are going to be on duty again. A 10-hour off-duty period allows a driver reasonable time to get home, be with

family, have dinner or lunch or whatever his shift allows, and then get that 7 to 8 hours of sleep.

I have heard this said many times, including the President of the Motion Picture Association say they start at seven o'clock and they may finish at eight or nine o'clock at night, and they are not doing anything all this time. I say those who only stand and wait also serve.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Lipinski).

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 1 minute.

I thank the gentleman for his statement.

If I may have the attention of the gentleman from Alabama, he has twice

referenced that drivers have 9 hours off during the day. If he would be willing to limit his amendment to those cases where they have 9 hours off during the day, I think we could accept that.

I yield to the gentleman from Alabama.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, under the language provided for us here in this amendment, a driver could start work at 8 o'clock in the morning, work until midnight with 2 hours off during the day, and be expected back at work at 8 o'clock the following morning. I do not think it is right to put drivers on the road with so little rest, so much fatigue and so great potential for fatalities.

Now, the industry argues, well, we have not had any fatalities. But I have been involved in this fatigue issue in aviation, railroading, maritime and over-the-road truck driving for 25 years, and I know that the next fatality is just around the corner from the next weakening of safety regulations.

It is inappropriate to make the change in the way in which it is proposed here. This is not the right venue, it is not the right approach, it will endanger worker safety, and we ought to oppose this amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote, and pending that, I make the point of order that a quorum is not present.

Mr. Chairman, I will not have to claim time in opposition. The unanimous consent request includes restoring the language ``during planting and harvest periods as determined by each State'' is restoration

of current law and is not an expansion thereof.

With that understanding, we can accept the amendment on this side.

Mr. Chairman, I claim the time in opposition.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the LaTourette amendment.

First, let me say to my friend from Ohio, the domestic steel industry has no stronger advocate in the Congress than the gentleman from Ohio. He has been a leader in this area, but on this particular amendment I take issue with it and disagree.

This amendment would require that more than 60 percent of the components and subcomponents of manufactured products used for construction projects be of United States origin. Of course, this means that, instead of going to the lowest bidder, the taxpayers getting their best bang for the buck, it could raise costs conceivably as much as 15 percent on a project with its components. That means that there is less money to build more roads with, to buy additional rail cars, to build intersections that are needed, and it means fewer people can become employed because we may be paying more money just to buy domestically. This would constitute a radical and in my judgment harmful expansion of the current law.

There is already in my judgment a very wrongheaded 50 percent ceiling on non-U.S. components. I have serious concerns about raising it another 10 percent. I think we ought to be going in the other direction, and I think that this amendment makes bad policy even worse.

We need to beware the law of unintended consequences. Domestic source restrictions such as this one may indeed be well intentioned, but they only serve to increase the cost of our critical transportation projects by reducing competition available for Federal contracts and raising the cost to the taxpayers. These restrictions are often self-defeating as they can well lead to reprisals from overseas trading partners. We often lose much more business than we gain.

Restrictions such as those proposed here could possibly provide some immediate short-term benefits to some American companies, but in the long run, in my judgment, they hurt the overall economy. We cannot maintain our global leadership in manufacturing by artificially propping up industries that are not able to compete in the global marketplace.

Mr. Chairman, we are here today touting the job creation potential of this reauthorization bill, so I have to ask this question: Have we considered the counterproductive, anticompetitive consequences of restrictionist amendments like this one? How many jobs could be created with the dollars firms will have to spend to comply with these government-unique restrictions? Our goal should be to ensure that we have access to open world markets so that we can get the best deal on the best goods available, regardless of their location. The American taxpayer deserves nothing less. This again allows us to spend more money from this transportation bill on transportation products, which means we can employ more people than these restrictions would otherwise give us.

I cannot overstate the potential harm posed by such economic isolationist restrictions, harm to our critical transportation infrastructure, because by paying more we end up being able to do less; harm to our Nation's

place in the global economy; and harm to our job creation agenda.

We have to remember a couple of things.

First of all, the details of the certification contained in this bill in my judgment means that if there is not availability of U.S. parts then we are going to need waivers. Waivers are going to have to be obtained. In these waivers, of course, it takes more time, which delays transportation projects.

Secondly, it could have the unintended consequences of allowing by these waivers more foreign products in the U.S. than you may get otherwise in some instances.

Thirdly, and most important, this can invite retaliation from foreign countries who, as we restrict the ability of their goods to get into markets, they retaliate against us.

What does this mean? It could be retaliation against agricultural products, information technology, even other manufactured products. It is anticompetitive, and it is antijobs, in my opinion, as it is currently constructed. I rise in opposition.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Modification to Amendment No. 15 Offered by Mr. LaTourette

Mr. Chairman, reserving the right to object, could I just ask what the purpose of the modification is?

This makes a bad amendment better.

Mr. Chairman, I withdraw my reservation of objection.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of my time.

Let me just say on this amendment, this may expand the Buy America for steel, but it shrinks Buy America in other areas, other manufactured areas, perhaps agriculture, perhaps information technology, because of this kind of action that basically invites retaliation from foreign countries.

America is only 5 percent of the world's consumers. If we want to succeed from a manufacturing standpoint and economically around the world, we need to expand those markets. This goes in the opposite way. We ought to be reducing the Buy America requirements, reducing the certification process that does nothing but invite waivers which delays transportation projects; and we ought to put our transportation dollars into getting as much road money, as much money to buy rail cars, to lay track and move America as we can. This raises the cost of doing that with this legislation. It is for that reason that I oppose this and urge opposition to this amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I will say, though, I am usually in favor of what occurs by State action, but what this amendment does, it allows the State of New Jersey to limit large trucks and twin-trailer combination trucks to the interstate system, not intrastate, the New Jersey Turnpike and the Atlantic City Expressway, except when making local deliveries. It is amazing when you need your donors you allow a twin-trailer truck to arrive at the door but nobody else.

In 1999, the New Jersey DOT actually allowed New Jersey to ban, that is DOT of New Jersey, large trucks from certain roads. However, that was challenged in court by the trucking industry; and if I am correct, just recently, last week of this year, the U.S. District Court from New Jersey ruled that the New Jersey truck highway access regulatory system discriminated against interstate commerce and violated the commerce clause of the U.S. Constitution.

This amendment would reverse that decision; and, again, I would suggest that New Jersey use all the recourse through the law. Because to take now a case that has been won by one side of the argument in the court and now us, as a Congress, to reverse that----

I yield to the gentleman from New Jersey.

Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time, but the industry or the plaintiff that filed the suit is now being precluded from going forth. If my colleague wants to do that, have the court or New Jersey file an injunction against the court's decision. Do not ask us to undo what a court has ruled.

Reclaiming my time, they can continue their suit, but they are not the ones now that have to pursue the suit. They are the ones that won the case, and they can drive their trucks on interstate commerce because of the clause in the interstate commerce clause under the Constitution. What the gentleman is asking us to do in the Congress is to undo what the court has ruled.

I am not a lawyer. Thank God for that. We have got enough of those around here. But I am a little concerned that what we are doing here is really not fair to the persons that filed the suit to begin with. We are saying you cannot do it. You can go back to court. As we go back to court, well, you cannot use the truck. Under the interstate clause, that is against the Constitution, as the court has ruled.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Oberstar).

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

I rise in opposition to the amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Oberstar) who wishes to speak on the amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve my time.

Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. Chairman, I simply wanted to compliment

the gentleman and the gentleman from Oregon for their presentations. As I told the gentleman from New Jersey, I did support the concept of this amendment.

I also agree with my ranking member that, as we go through it, we will do it the right way and do it correctly so we can actually solve a serious problem. His story is a very telling story.

So with that, I guess we will have a voice vote; is that correct?

Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I yield to the gentleman from Minnesota.

Mr. Chairman, reclaiming my time, we are going to support the amendment as intended. However, there is a slight, as I think the gentleman from Minnesota mentioned, drafting error, the section that applies to both the current new starts and the new small starts process. We will take the amendment at this time with the gentleman's understanding we want to correct the language in conference so that the exemption applies only to the new small starts process.

Does the gentleman understand that?

Reclaiming my time once again, Mr. Chairman, if he has done that, I apologize. I was talking to my staff and they did not advise me of that. If that has already been done, we do not have to worry about that.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Although it is well merited, the Federal Public Transportation program does not provide programs for airport-based services. In addition, we understand that this amendment, according to our figures, adds $300 million to the cost of the bill, and that concerns me a great deal.

And, lastly, may I suggest respectfully, as important as natural gas is, we have some real problems getting natural gas to the United States, and we had better start looking at that problem very quickly; and under the energy bill we can do that. We have not passed the energy bill, but it is crucially important for this Nation to have a new supply of natural gas.

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding me time and especially thank the gentleman for his perseverance and the work he has done, as well as the ranking member for accepting the amendment to the amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I think what I have said before is it is a way to have a little logic in this body. I do compliment the gentleman for bringing this amendment to the floor.

Mr. Chairman, I move that the Committee do now rise.

Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

The Chairman pro tempore. The Clerk will designate the amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 1 minute.

Mr. Chairman, the U.S. motion picture and TV industry makes movies that are seen around the world. But, unfortunately, foreign countries are offering tax incentives to attract that production overseas, and I think most of us have seen movies lately that were set here, but filmed in Canada or Mexico.

This amendment would help stop that, and it simply will allow the motion picture industry, the TV industry, to operate under the current Hours of Service regulations. Not only the motion picture industry and the TV industry which asked me to bring this amendment, but the Teamsters Union have endorsed this amendment. It will simply allow those drivers who drive out to the location for an hour or 2 hours, then have 9 hours of rest and then have 2 hours in the evening to continue those hours of service. They have an excellent and exemplary safety record.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from California (Mrs. Tauscher).

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Coble), who is one of 38 Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure members who have signed a letter in support of this amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Foley) in support of this amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 1 minute.

Mr. Chairman, I would like to include in the Record a letter from the Teamsters in support of this amendment, and these are the very drivers that are driving these trucks. And as the gentleman from Florida said, these drivers drive and our amendment limits them to 100 miles. They drive out in the morning. They drive back at night, and that is their responsibility, and they do have 9 hours of rest. This does not include overnight. They go with the film crews. They go with the actresses. They go with the actors. They go with the camera people. And they are all out there from sunup to sundown. And the Teamsters, if the Members look at the letter that I am introducing, they will tell them that they are afraid they will either lose their job because they will continue to go out of country or they will turn these jobs into 2- or 3-hour part-time jobs and hire two crews. And instead of having a good-paying job, they will have no job.

Studio Transportation Drivers,

Teamsters Local Union No. 399,

North Hollywood, CA, July 16, 2003.

Re: support for exemption from new hours of service

regulations.

Hon. Ernest Istook, Jr.,

Chairman,

Hon. John W. Olver,

Ranking Member,

House Appropriations Subcommittee on Transportation,

Treasury, and Independent Agencies, Washington, DC.

Gentlemen: I understand that your committee is considering

amendments that would provide relief to certain industries

from aspects of the new hours of service (``HOS'')

regulations published by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety

Administration. On behalf of the Studio Transportation

Drivers of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Local

399, I wish to express our support for a proposal to permit

commercial drivers to continue to comply with current HOS

regulations concerning daily, on-duty time when operating to

and from a motion picture or television production site

located within a 100 air-mile radius of their work reporting

location.

Existing HOS duty time regulations are better suited to the

unique schedules of studio transportation drivers than th new

regulations that will take effect January 4, 2004. Drivers

assigned to productions drive only a few hours each day;

these are short haul assignments. These drivers have had an

excellent safety record, and their schedules meet the current

HOS limitation. To comply with the new regulations, the

industry will not be able to use the same drivers for an

entire production day. Thus, each driver will receive

significantly less compensation than under the current

system. Given our excellent safety record, and that new HOS

regulations largely were designed to address the fatigue of

long-haul drivers, application of new duty-time limits to our

drivers will increase operating costs without a corresponding

safety benefit.

I hope that you will support retaining current hours of

service regulations for studio transportation drivers.

Sincerely,

Leo T. Reed,

Secretary-Treasurer/Principal Officer.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. Chairman, as the gentleman knows, this amendment was first proposed last October and we have tried to work in committee. We tried to work on this issue. What we are talking about is we have restricted it to 200 miles: 100 miles in the morning, 100 miles at night. To me it is almost a joke to say that that would fatigue these drivers. The very drivers that are driving, they have been operating under these rules for years and years and years and have an exemplary safety record.

Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I am proud to offer this amendment with the gentlewoman from Michigan (Ms. Kilpatrick). I offered a similar amendment in committee, and the chairman and the ranking member have been kind enough to work with us to incorporate as much as possible into the manager's amendment today.

Mr. Chairman, as Members know, we have a manufacturing crisis in this country. We have lost an estimated 3 million manufacturing jobs. While many of us may hold different views on how that came about, I think we can all agree that the Federal Government should be part of the solution to the crisis.

The problem here is that there is too much confusion currently as to what a manufactured good is. The gentleman from Washington (Mr. Baird) had a sense of Congress on the floor a little earlier that addressed this issue. Today, Buy America requires that a manufactured good must be made with components assembled in the United States. Subcomponents, however, do not have to be American made. This has caused a good deal of confusion.

This amendment that the gentlewoman from Michigan and I are offering will correct the problem. The amendment is a modified version of H.R. 3682, the Protecting American Manufacturing Jobs Act, which was introduced by the gentlewoman from Michigan. We were able to work this out with input from the Federal Transit Administration so they can implement it.

Under this amendment, we clarify that 60 percent of the components and subcomponents in a manufactured product must be American made. For construction projects and system acquisition, the amendment requires that 60 percent of the total cost of components and subcomponents in manufactured products must be American made. We also required that final assembly of any manufactured product must happen in the United States. By making these changes we will make sure that Federal dollars support American jobs.

This is, in my opinion, a good amendment. It helps take care of our own manufacturing jobs in this country. I urge support.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent to modify the amendment with the text which I have placed at the desk.

If the gentleman will yield, the committee, both minority and majority, have asked me to use this amendment as a vehicle to make technical corrections in the bill.

Mr. Chairman, it is my pleasure to yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentlewoman from Michigan (Ms. Kilpatrick), who, as I indicated in my other remarks, is the sponsor of the original legislation and the coauthor of this amendment.

Mr. Chairman, it is my pleasure to yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Oberstar), the distinguished ranking member of the committee.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of my time.

I want to make this observation. The Federal Government in the procurement process has no greater champion in this Congress than the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Tom Davis), the chairman of the Committee on Government Reform. The hearings that he has conducted have literally saved the country and the taxpayers billions of dollars.

This issue, however, while I appreciate every argument that he has made, it is time, not by being protectionist but it is time in the manufacturing sector that we take care of our own in the United States. It is not unreasonable to require that 60 percent, we are not asking for 100 percent, but 60 percent of these goods and projects be manufactured in the United States and there not be some shell game where they simply have to be assembled in the United States. You could have a machine with 150 parts and today's requirement is they could all be made overseas as long as we had a shop that assembled them here in this country. It is wrong, and I ask for support of the amendment.