Providing for consideration of the bill (H.R. 5811) to amend title 44, United States Code, to require preservation of certain electronic records by Federal agencies, to require a certification and reports relating to Presidential records, and for other purposes.

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 1318 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to my good friend, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Lincoln Diaz-Balart). All time yielded during consideration of the rule is for debate only.

General Leave

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks and insert extraneous materials into the Record.

I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, H. Res. 1318 provides a closed rule for consideration of H.R. 5811, the Electronic Message Preservation Act. The resolution, as you know, provides 1 hour of debate controlled by the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. The rule makes no amendments in order because no amendments were submitted for consideration.

H.R. 5811 is an important bill introduced by Chairman Waxman that modernizes the requirements of the Presidential Records Act and Federal Records Act to ensure that vital government records are preserved for historical posterity.

The Electronic Message Preservation Act will make certain that we retain important Presidential records by directing the Archivist to establish standards for the capture, management, and preservation of White House and Federal agency e-mails. The Archivist of the U.S. will set new standards for tracking Federal e-mail records and annually will certify whether the records management controls put in place by the President meet those standards and comply with the act.

The bill will protect American history so that we will not lose important records in an antiquated record system that exists now, but it will also guide and enforce document retention policies within the executive branch.

The bill is very necessary. Through its investigations, the Oversight and Government Reform Committee discovered that in one instance the current White House had lost hundreds of days of e-mail, and in other instances allowed numerous White House officials, including Senior Advisor Karl Rove, to use Republican National Committee e-mail accounts for government business--improper, obviously. E-mails sent by White House officials over these RNC accounts related to official government business, and potentially hundreds of thousands of these e-mails have been destroyed.

In addition, the White House did grossly mismanage its own e-mail records and ignored concerns that were raised not by Congress, but by the National Archives, about the way it was storing e-mails.

Further, the current print-and-file record retention systems are both unreliable and not in step with modern advances in technology. For example, when President Bush came into office, the White House had an automated system in place for archiving e-mails, but in 2002, the White House decided to abandon this archiving system and replace it with an ad hoc manual system, doing so in an electronic age. White House officials were warned by the technical staff of their own White House staff and by National Archives that this ad hoc manual system for managing e-mails presented an obvious threat and serious threat of losing records. And the White House's own technical expert said the system was, to use the word of that expert, ``primitive'' and carried a high risk that ``data would be lost.'' Yet, despite these warnings, the White House has still not put into place a reliable, up-to-date system for preserving e-mails.

This bill will change that. It will require the Archivist to establish specific standards for the management and preservation of electronic messages, including the capability to retrieve messages through electronic searches. These standards will help prevent a situation like what is happening under this administration. H.R. 5811 directs e-mail records to be stored electronically and removes ambiguity in the current law that was established before we even had e- mail.

The bill and the manager's amendment were approved by voice vote in the committee because it is timely and it's necessary. I urge the passage and a ``yes'' vote on the rule.

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

Mr. Speaker, I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time, and I'm going to approach the podium to use some charts.

Mr. Speaker, this bill is about the preservation of electronic records. The debate has turned into a discussion of our energy policy. And there are two reasons why we would be discussing energy instead of the substance of the actual bill. One is that our friends on the other side don't have anything to say about the importance of the preservation of electronic records. Two is they want to use the opportunity of floor time to make a case, their case, about energy. I intend to respond to both of those issues.

First of all, I want to go back to what this legislation is about. It's about the preservation of the historical record for the American people. It's also about the preservation of the records of the administration so that in the future when any Congress wants to hold any President accountable, there will be documentation of what has happened in that administration.

It is extraordinarily important that this Congress restore its constitutional function of insisting on accountability for the American people. We have three branches of government, and one of them has been asleep for the 6 years going into the year 2006, and that was Congress, the legislative representative of the people of this country, who demand and are entitled to accountability. If you do not have the preservation of the records of their government--these are not records belonging to the President. They're not records that belong to the executive branch. It's not for them to decide ``yes'' or ``no'' that we will preserve these records. This is a right of the American people. It's their property. And what this electronic records preservation does is say that you cannot use the paper system that doesn't work in an electronic age in effect to conceal from the American people what you did. It is overdue. And to take this debate and inject into it another topic, as important as energy is, is to trivialize the fundamentally important responsibility that this Congress has to the American people to restore oversight and accountability.

This government has make enormous mistakes and justified them by concealing information from the American people. What do you need to know more than what happened in the pathway to the war in Iraq? If the truth had been out there for the American people and for many in this body to know what the President knew and when the President knew it, what the administration knew and when they knew it, we would not be in this catastrophe for the American people called the war in Iraq.

So this legislation that says that e-mail records are going to be restored and retained electronically is of profound constitutional importance to the continuation of Congress in its role as the overseer and protector of the American record and the American taxpayer. So on its merits, this legislation should be considered as of absolute

vital importance to the people of this country. And we have heard no objections, and, indeed, this legislation was passed by voice vote.

Now, since the issue was raised, since the debate on this profoundly important question of constitutional oversight has been hijacked to turn it into an energy debate where it really doesn't belong, I am nevertheless going to respond to the arguments.

You start by this proposition. Implicit in many of the arguments that my friends on the other side made was that those of us on the Democratic side somehow don't understand the pain that the American consumer is experiencing with these record high gas prices.

I have got to just speak about Vermont. What I hear about from Vermonters is fear. I've never heard this. And gas prices are tough. They are trying to figure out how to get from here to there and pay for it. They've got cars that they don't get great mileage. They are doubling up. They are doing what they can. But, bottom line, the thing they are terrified about and they have real anxiety is how are they going to heat their homes next year.

We have to heat our homes there. And, folks, when they see that gas delivery truck show up, and last year it was like $2.50 a gallon, it's going to be $5 a gallon next year, and these families don't have the money to pay $1,000, $1,500, $2,000 to fill up a tank. They don't know what they're going to do. And we are going to see Vermonters who are doubling up. Generations are going to be living together because they don't know how they are going to pay that bill.

So, believe me, there's not a single Member in this House, Republican or Democrat, who doesn't profoundly understand the impact that this is having on everyday people, on our small businesses, on our economy.

So we can go back and forth with the accusations and we can go back and forth with the slogans, or we can acknowledge the obvious. The obvious is we have to do everything that we can in the short term to try to bring relief at the pump, to try to bring pressure off the small business and the consumer. Anything in the short-term that we can do, we should do, and we should do it together. But we also have to move to a long-term energy policy that no longer allows oil to have an iron grip on our future. That is what Americans know.

Short-term, what are some of the things we can do? We have done them. We stopped filling up the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. It will reduce demand by 70,000 to 90,000 barrels a day. Second, we are considering legislation for the oil companies to use the leases they have, or lose them.

There's this debate about bringing production online. Obviously, supply is an issue here. In the world, we pump about 86 billion barrels a day. We consume about 87 billion barrels a day. But the fact is that the slogans that I am hearing about just opening up other offshore areas in ANWR totally ignores the current reality, and that is that the oil companies, that are very good at what they do, have leases, existing leases that they pay good money on, on 68 million acres of land. That land, their leases, their leases exceed by 2\1/2\ times the area of the State of Ohio, the Minority Leader Boehner's district; 2 times the State of Illinois; 2\1/2\ times the size of Pennsylvania. These are leases on Federal lands, onshore and offshore.

What are the oil companies doing? Not much. They are producing oil on a fraction of the leaseholds that they have.

No, I won't.

In reality, if there was full production on all the areas under lease, it could produce 4.8 million barrels of oil a day.

I am going to take my time. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

That could produce 4.8 million barrels of oil a day. Yet the oil companies are not drilling where they have leases to do so. Instead, we are turning this argument into the prospect that we may be able to drill in the future on other places where there aren't leases, waiving away what will be the long-term problems of trying to make that come online, and the fact that it would probably save about a penny and a half a gallon in 10 to 20 years. That is not fair, direct honesty in the debate for the American people.

I thank the gentleman, but I intend to finish. I control the time.

So what do we have? We have a situation where the oil companies are not drilling where they can, and we are saying to them, Drill where you can. We also have a situation where the oil companies, the longer they wait, the more they make. If you're sitting on leases and oil in the ground, under the sea was $35 a barrel when you bid that lease, then it went to $75, then it went to $100, and now it's $140 a barrel, you're making money just having that in the bank. So the oil companies, the longer they wait, the more they make.

We know that oil company profits are exploding.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

The oil companies have made $125 billion. Record profits again this year. How are they spending that money? Are they investing in refineries, are they investing it in renewable energy, are they investing in drilling rigs or offshore facilities to drill in those areas? No. They are buying back their stock.

The oil companies, energy producers, should be part of the solution, and they should be using the technical ability that they have, the extraordinary skills that they have and the extraordinary profits that they have to help us find a way to an energy independent future, and it's not happening.

We know that, bottom line, everything we can do short-term, we can do, but the idea that we can do instantly something is a stretch. But what we can do, we should do.

On speculation, we are considering legislation now, and as we speak, the Chair of the Agriculture Committee, Mr. Peterson, is conducting 3 days of hearings to try to squeeze the speculator instead of having the speculators squeeze us; on not filling up the Strategic Petroleum Reserve and topping it off.

I am demanding of the oil companies that they start producing oil in those 68 million acres where they actually have leases and the right to be producing that oil. They could produce 4.8 million barrels of oil a day. Do you know what we produce domestically right now? Five million barrels of oil a day. It could lead to a doubling of the production.

So the fact is there are things that can be done that we are promoting that they be done aggressively. We are insisting that the oil companies be accountable to use and produce on the leases that they have, yet they refuse to do it. And we have been consistently and aggressively moving for a new energy policy that is going to create green jobs, that is going to give us much greater independence in foreign affairs, and is going to help us clean up our environment.

A confident nation is one that faces directly the problems that it has. And when it comes to the question of energy, what symbolized for me the energy policy that this country has had was a front page picture of the President of the United States, hand-in-hand with King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia as they were about to go into a meeting. In the custom of the Arab States, they walked into that holding

hands. The purpose of that meeting was for the President of the United States, the greatest country on Earth, to implore the King to increase production of oil.

You know what? A confident nation, a nation that takes on the challenge of solving its own problems, does not go hat in hand to others and ask them, who are not our friends, incidentally, to solve our problems. We take that challenge on ourselves. We take it on because it's our responsibility. We also take it on because we know that in the doing of it, we are going to create jobs, clean our environment, and give us much more latitude in foreign policy.

So this debate on energy, misplaced as it is in this matter of electronic records and restoring the responsibility of Congress to the American people to conduct oversight and to preserve a historical record, important as that is, the argument on energy, the question of energy is the profound question that this country faces economically for the next generation, and the challenge will be whether we are willing to face that squarely and take it upon ourselves to solve our problems, or we are going to continue to be dependent on oil companies that have not played on behalf of the American people and on foreign countries that are not our friends; Venezuela, Middle East States, Russia. We have to take on this challenge ourselves.

Mr. Speaker, I will just close by saying, going back to this bill, that it's an extraordinarily important bill, not just so that we can preserve records, but that we in Congress can restore confidence to the American people that we are a cop on the beat.

This bill makes significant and long overdue changes to document retention systems that were outdated and inefficient. The vast amount of government business that is currently conducted over e-mail requires that we update the law regulating record retention. Government e-mails should not be deleted or destroyed, as they are as important in revealing to the public and historians as paper documents, and we all know that.

Mr. Speaker, I urge a ``yes'' vote on the previous question and on the rule.

The material previously referred to by Mr. Lincoln Diaz-Balart of Florida is as follows:

Amendment to H. Res. 1318 Offered by Mr. Lincoln Diaz-Balart Of Florida

At the end of the resolution, add the following:

Sec. 3. Immediately upon the adoption of this resolution

the House shall, without intervention of any point of order,

consider in the House the bill (H.R. 2208) to provide for a

standby loan program for certain coal-to-liquid projects. All

points of order against the bill are waived. The bill shall

be considered as read. The previous question shall be

considered as ordered on the bill and any amendment thereto

to final passage without intervening motion except: (1) one

hour of debate on the bill equally divided and controlled by

the chairman and ranking member of the Committee on Energy

and Commerce, and the chairman and ranking member of the

Committee on Science and Technology; and (2) an amendment in

the nature of a substitute if offered by Representative

Dingell of Michigan or his designee, which shall be

considered as read and shall be separately debatable for 40

minutes equally divided and controlled by the proponent and

an opponent; and (3) one motion to recommit with or without

instructions.

(The information contained herein was provided by

Democratic Minority on multiple occasions throughout the

109th Congress.)

The Vote on the Previous Question: What It Really Means

This vote, the vote on whether to order the previous

question on a special rule, is not merely a procedural vote.

A vote against ordering the previous question is a vote

against the Democratic majority agenda and a vote to allow

the opposition, at least for the moment, to offer an

alternative plan. It is a vote about what the House should be

debating.

Mr. Clarence Cannon's Precedents of the House of

Representatives, (VI, 308-311) describes the vote on the

previous question on the rule as ``a motion to direct or

control the consideration of the subject before the House

being made by the Member in charge.'' To defeat the previous

question is to give the opposition a chance to decide the

subject before the House. Cannon cites the Speaker's ruling

of January 13, 1920, to the effect that ``the refusal of the

House to sustain the demand for the previous question passes

the control of the resolution to the opposition'' in order to

offer an amendment. On March 15, 1909, a member of the

majority party offered a rule resolution. The House defeated

the previous question and a member of the opposition rose to

a parliamentary inquiry, asking who was entitled to

recognition. Speaker Joseph G. Cannon (R-Illinois) said:

``The previous question having been refused, the gentleman

from New York, Mr. Fitzgerald, who had asked the gentleman to

yield to him for an amendment, is entitled to the first

recognition.''

Because the vote today may look bad for the Democratic

majority they will say ``the vote on the previous question is

simply a vote on whether to proceed to an immediate vote on

adopting the resolution . . . [and] has no substantive

legislative or policy implications whatsoever.'' But that is

not what they have always said. Listen to the definition of

the previous question used in the Floor Procedures Manual

published by the Rules Committee in the 109th Congress, (page

56). Here's how the Rules Committee described the rule using

information from Congressional Quarterly's ``American

Congressional Dictionary'': ``If the previous question is

defeated, control of debate shifts to the leading opposition

member (usually the minority Floor Manager) who then manages

an hour of debate and may offer a germane amendment to the

pending business.''

Deschler's Procedure in the U.S. House of Representatives,

the subchapter titled ``Amending Special Rules'' states: ``a

refusal to order the previous question on such a rule [a

special rule reported from the Committee on Rules] opens the

resolution to amendment and further debate.'' (Chapter 21,

section 21.2) Section 21.3 continues: Upon rejection of the

motion for the previous question on a resolution reported

from the Committee on Rules, control shifts to the Member

leading the opposition to the previous question, who may

offer a proper amendment or motion and who controls the time

for debate thereon.''

Clearly, the vote on the previous question on a rule does

have substantive policy implications. It is one of the only

available tools for those who oppose the Democratic

majority's agenda and allows those with alternative views the

opportunity to offer an alternative plan.

I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the resolution.

Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my good friend, the gentleman from Vermont (Mr. Welch), for the time; and I yield myself such time as I may consume.

During an interview last week, the distinguished majority leader, Mr. Hoyer, said that he is opposed to a lame-duck session, and that he is committed to adjournment sine die by the previously announced date of September 26. If the majority decides to follow that commitment to adjourn the 110th Congress on September 26, then Congress has only 7 weeks of session left to complete its work for the year.

And so as Congress begins its last 7 weeks of work before recessing, what important pieces of legislation are at the top of the majority's priority list? Well, maybe it's passing the 12 appropriations bills before the end of the fiscal year, or maybe energy legislation to deal with the record gasoline prices consumers are paying each day. No, Mr. Speaker, they've decided that those problems can wait for another day, for another Congress. Instead, their legislative priorities are to designate a 600-mile historic trail and to require preservation of electronic records.

I spent most of last week meeting and speaking with constituents in my district about the issues that matter to them; and, Mr. Speaker, no one mentioned anything closely related to these two bills. These bills may be important in their own right, but there certainly are other issues that are much more pressing issues that we should be debating, that we should be dealing with.

When Americans are paying over $4 per gallon for gasoline, we should be working on legislation to lower gasoline, increasing domestic energy exploration, and reducing our reliance on unstable foreign energy. France produces approximately 80 percent of its electricity from nuclear power, and yet the United States has not built a new nuclear plant in about 30 years.

Why does the majority refuse to consider legislation to deal with our energy and other serious problems? According to an article published in the newspaper The Hill on Tuesday, the majority, and I quote, ``has scrubbed the floor schedule of the energy legislation that it vowed to tackle after the Fourth of July recess.''

Why doesn't the majority schedule energy legislation for debate? Maybe it's because they don't have a real plan. If you read the rest of The Hill article, you find out what a Democratic aid called the majority's plan: ``Right now, our strategy on gas prices is to drive small cars and wait for the wind.'' That's most unfortunate. That ``non-plan'' ignores the urgent call of Americans for Congress to pass serious energy legislation.

I know the majority will claim that they expect to take up energy legislation soon and the committees of jurisdiction are considering possible legislation, but they already pulled legislation they expected to consider after the July 4 recess, and we still have to consider 12 appropriations bills, housing legislation, the Medicare payment fix for physicians, an alternative minimum tax fix, and numerous conference reports. That doesn't leave much time for energy legislation. Maybe if the majority had different priorities, we would be considering energy legislation today instead of legislation designating a 600-mile historic trail and legislation requiring promulgation of regulations to preserve electronic records.

I wish to take this occasion to congratulate the majority on breaking their own record of most closed rules. The proposed rule we are considering now marks the 59th closed rule of this Congress, the most of any Congress in the history of the Nation. It didn't have to be that way.

Before the new majority took over control of the House they laid out their promises for a more civil, more open, and more transparent House in a document entitled ``The New Direction for America.'' The document provides clear guidelines for how legislation should move through the House. One of the promises made in the document is that ``bills should generally come to the floor under a procedure that allows open, full and fair debate, consisting of a full amendment process that grants the minority the right to offer its alternative, including a substitute,'' yet here we are with a closed process that doesn't allow Members from either party the ability to offer amendments.

The majority continues to break their promise on allowing an open, full, and fair debate and their promise to consider energy legislation after the July 4 recess. So much for their promises.

Energy Bill Out of Gas

(By Jared Allen and Mike Soraghan)

House Democrats are in a bind on the focal point of their

energy plan.

Worried that a floor vote on any energy-related measure

would trigger a Republican-forced vote on domestic drilling,

the leadership has scrubbed the floor schedule of the energy

legislation that it vowed to tackle after the Fourth of July

recess.

Just before leaving for their districts, a number of House

Democrats called a press conference to declare victory on a

number of energy bills--including overwhelming passage of a

bill to rein in excessive oil market speculation.

Democrats declared victory on a bill they failed to pass on

the suspension calendar--their ``use it or lose it bill'' to

force energy companies to either start drilling on their

federally leased land or give it back--saying they had put

176 Republicans on record as siding with the oil companies

over consumers.

And they vowed that the bill, the centerpiece of their

energy message, would be back.

``We've taken some bold steps this week, and we're going to

build on that [after recess] with the bills we take up,''

Democratic Caucus Vice Chairman John Larson (Conn.) said at

the press conference.

But, as of Monday afternoon, neither ``use it or lose it''

nor any other energy measure had been scheduled for floor

action this week.

Democrats said they were simply taking a different approach

to passing their top energy-related priorities.

Nadeam Elshami, spokesman for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi

(D-Calif.), said energy activity this week is taking place at

the committee level, noting that there are four hearings

planned on the issue of speculation in oil trading.

``Different members have different ideas,'' Elshami said.

``We'll bring forward the best piece of legislation based on

the recommendations and hearings we are having this week.''

Republicans pounced, saying Democrats were backtracking

after realizing they would be unable to defeat a Republican

vote on increased domestic oil drilling in new areas.

``It's panic time for Democrats,'' said a senior Republican

aide. ``They are on the wrong side of three-quarters of the

American people who support increased production of American-

made energy.''

While Democrats were in their districts advocating their

plans to end gas price-gouging, rein in speculation, pass

``use it or lose it'' and even call for President Bush to

release millions of barrels of crude oil from the Strategic

Petroleum Reserve (SPR), Republicans were touting polls

showing that a healthy majority of Americans now support

increased domestic energy production.

That is proving to be a particular concern for Democrats in

that any non-suspension-calendar energy vote would be subject

to a Republican alternative, almost certainly calling for

offshore and Arctic drilling, that would very likely pass.

``If we could send deepwater drilling over, it would pass

the Senate,'' said a Republican leadership aide, highlighting

just how much an energy vote could backfire on Democrats.

A senior Democratic leadership aide acknowledged this week

that there are plenty of members of the majority caucus ``who

want to drill and want to drill where Republicans want to

drill.''

Even if Democratic leaders could beat back a GOP motion on

drilling, the vote could be used as political ammunition

against their vulnerable members this fall.

The Democratic setbacks come after they scored a political

victory this spring when they overwhelmingly passed an SPR

bill over initial White House objections. But Republicans now

claim they have the upper hand, noting that Sen. John McCain

(R-Ariz.) is citing drilling repeatedly on the campaign

trail.

Further complicating matters for Democrats is the growing

number of pro-drilling Democrats who are becoming

increasingly worried that voters might throw them in with

their anti-drilling leadership.

One pro-drilling Democrat predicted that the backlash

against Congress for gas prices could rival the outrage

voters felt about the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal.

Another, Rep. Charlie Melancon (D-La.), is frustrated at

not being listened to.

``My concern with my leadership is that they're not letting

all the people in the room to present the facts,'' said

Melancon, a proponent of more offshore drilling. ``Where are

all the pro-oil legislators? I'm not in the room. I don't

know who is. My feeling is we are not being all-inclusive to

pass legislation that can get through the Senate and avoid a

veto.''

For now, though, there will be no legislation to pass, as

the only energy-related action this week will occur at the

committee level.

Republicans may try to continue a strategy they

demonstrated before recess by forcing drilling votes as

energy amendments to bills being considered at the committee

level, including appropriations bills.

And Republicans may go one step further by trying to get

amendments added to the energy and water appropriations bill,

a likely contender to see the floor this week.

``We're going to demand a pro-production energy vote before

Congress goes home for the month of August,'' said House

Republican Conference Chairman Adam Putnam (Fla.). ``We've

tried to highlight efforts to solve America's energy problem

a thousand ways to Sunday, and [Democrats] keep pulling them

from committee, pulling them from the floor and kicking the

can down the road.''

Exactly when Democrats will change their present course and

bring an energy bill to the floor remains uncertain.

``Right now, our strategy on gas prices is `Drive small

cars and wait for the wind,' '' said a Democratic aide.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gohmert).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Shimkus).

(Mr. SHIMKUS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Speaker, I yield the gentleman an additional 1 minute.

Mr. Speaker, I yield the gentleman 1 additional minute.

Again, I thank my friend from Vermont for his courtesy in yielding the time.

Mr. Speaker, Americans are now paying over $4 a gallon for gasoline; yet the majority fails to bring legislation to the floor to lower gas prices or decrease our dependence on foreign sources of energy. It is time for the House to debate ideas for lowering prices at the pump and addressing the skyrocketing cost of gasoline. So today I urge my colleagues to vote with me to defeat the previous question so this House can finally consider real solutions to rising energy costs. If the previous question is defeated, I will move to amend the rule to allow for consideration of H.R. 2208, the Coal-to-Liquid Fuel Act. This legislation would encourage the use of clean coal-to-liquid technology, authorizing the Secretary of Energy to enter into loan agreements with coal-to-liquid projects that produce innovative transportation fuel.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of the amendment and extraneous materials immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.

Mr. Speaker, by voting ``no'' on the previous question, Members can take a stand against these high fuel prices and for doing something about them. I encourage a ``no'' vote on the previous question.

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

Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of H.R. 5811, the Electronic Message Preservation Act of 2008, and I want to thank Representatives Clay and Hodes for their commitment to oversight and accountability and for their hard work on this bill.

The Electronic Message Preservation Act amends both the Federal Records Act and the Presidential Records Act to ensure the preservation of e-mail records.

In recent years, e-mail has become an essential form of communication and a key source of information about Federal decision-making. Despite the importance of these records, serious deficiencies exist in the way e-mails are preserved both by the White House and Federal agencies. The preservation of these records must be improved if historians are to have access to a complete record of government decision-making and if Congress is to perform needed oversight.

Under President Bush, the White House has allowed senior officials to use nongovernmental e-mail accounts maintained by the Republican National Committee for official business. An investigation by the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform found that many of these e-mails have been destroyed. Other e-mails have been lost because the White House relied for 5 years on an e-mail archiving system described as ``primitive'' by a former White House information technology officer.

While the problems have been particularly acute under the Bush administration, other administrations, including President Clinton, have also encountered problems preserving e-mail records.

To ensure that these Presidential records are appropriately preserved, H.R. 5811 directs the Archivist to establish standards for the capture, maintenance and preservation of e-mail records and to certify that the White House is meeting these standards.

Committee investigations have also revealed that Federal agencies are inconsistent in the management of e-mail records. Most agencies still rely on an unreliable ``print and file'' process to preserve e-mail records rather than preserving them electronically.

GAO, in a report released yesterday, found that senior agency officials are not compliant with key e-mail preservation requirements. GAO reviewed the practices of senior agency officials and determined that the e-mails were not retained in adequate record keeping systems, making the e-mail records easier to lose or delete and harder to find and use.

This bill would modernize agency record keeping. The bill directs the Archivist to issue regulations mandating that within 4 years of the enactment of this legislation, all Federal agencies manage and preserve their e-mail records electronically.

Mr. Speaker, some have said that this bill is about preserving history. And it is. But it also is about our constitutional responsibility for oversight and for holding this and any administration accountable. Access to Presidential and Federal records helps us do our job. I urge all Members to support this bill.

Thank you very much for yielding.

The issue of energy is very much related to this question of e-mails and the preservation of the records. Now, why do we have our energy problems in this country? Suddenly Republicans are saying, notwithstanding the fact that they have run this government for 7\1/2\ years, the Democrats, the Democrats are at fault.

Well, let me point out that as soon as President Bush came into office, he asked Vice President Cheney to chair an energy task force, and they operated in secrecy. We don't know exactly who they heard from or what they were asked to do, but we know that the legislation that the administration requested from the Congress was for billions of dollars to be given to the oil, gas, coal, and nuclear industries, industries that are making record profits.

Now, at that same time, those of us from California were having a very difficult situation because energy wholesalers, including Enron, were holding back supplies in order to drive up the price, and we all met with Vice President Cheney. And you know what he said to us, The reason you're having high prices of electricity is because of environmental laws. And we said, No, it's because we're being taken to the cleaners by Enron and other energy wholesalers. And he said, No, it's not true. Well, when we did our investigations on Enron, we found out it was exactly what was happening.

Now, the point I want to make is we don't know what went on with this administration's deliberations for energy policy. We know that they've all failed. We wouldn't have the high price of gas today if they had done their job of getting us off our reliance on oil because we're so dependent now on bringing in oil from overseas. Even if we drill every possibility in the United States, we'd still be importing oil from places that are very vulnerable and are very hostile to us.

But this energy task force, and this administration, proposed benefits for the oil companies and no policies to help us get out of that dependence on foreign oil and domestic oil, to look for alternatives, to look for conservation, to do something other than drill, drill, drill, and make the oil companies more profitable.

And when we tried to find out what went on, we couldn't get the e- mails. We couldn't look at the e-mails. And why? Well, do you know why? Because they weren't using e-mails from the government of the United States while they were doing government business.

They were using the e-mails of the Republican National Committee. Are they doing Party business or are they doing government business?

That's one of the reasons we need this bill, and we need to get away from this partisanship on the question of high oil prices.

I object.

Mr. Speaker, I wish to speak on the motion to recommit.

Mr. Speaker, I want to point out to everyone who is listening to this debate that fundamentally this bill is about accountability and preventing cover-up. On the Oversight Committee, we have seen firsthand how destruction of e-mails frustrates accountability and allows officials to hide wrongdoing.

We investigated Jack Abramoff's contacts with the White House. We saw

that Abramoff told his colleagues that he used the Republican National Committee e-mail accounts when he was dealing with White House officials so that his communications would remain secret. This bill shuts down that loophole. It says Jack Abramoff can't send secret e- mails to White House officials.

We tried to investigate the false intelligence that led to the war in Iraq, but this investigation did not have access to Karl Rove's e-mails because they were destroyed. This bill says that Karl Rove's e-mails have to be preserved and not destroyed.

We tried to investigate the Cheney Energy Task Force, which gave us the energy policy this Nation has followed under President Bush for the last 7\1/2\ years, which I believe has led to these incredible high prices for energy. But once again we needed access to the e-mails to understand what deals were cut with the special interests, including at that time Enron, which played a very active role on Vice President Cheney's Energy Task Force.

A vote for this bill will make sure that the White House cannot hide its abuses. What we need is for this bill to pass so we can have honest and open and accountable government. That's why this legislation is before us today.

Of course, we don't know what the motion to recommit is until the very last minute; so we have to prepare for whatever may come. This is not a motion to recommit that would destroy the bill, and I appreciate that fact. It's a motion to recommit that, by and large, I think makes sense, and why it wasn't offered as an amendment leaves me perplexed. I do have some minor concerns about the motion to recommit, but that can be worked out in conference. This should have been brought up as an amendment to the bill. But, in effect, a motion to recommit is a motion to amend the bill. And since I do not oppose, in effect, the amendment that's being offered, I will join in support of this motion to recommit because this bill is too important. I know it was minimized a lot in the debate where people said why are we talking about e-mail preservation when we should be talking about drilling in Alaska and off the coast of the United States? Well, they are related because had we been able to have the Energy Task Force, chaired by Cheney, Vice President Cheney, we could have found out how we had this policy decided, and now that we're saddled with it, we could have done something about it 7\1/2\ years ago.

I will join in support of this motion to recommit, and I will urge my colleagues to vote for it so we can get the bill passed with this amendment that's being offered to it. I urge a vote for the motion.

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

I thank my distinguished colleague, Mr. Clay, for his leadership along with Mr. Waxman on this bill.

I rise today in strong support of H.R. 5811, the Electronic Message Preservation Act. My colleague from Virginia has said that the Archivist suggests that the requirement for certification under this bill is unprecedented. Well, this bill is filed, in part, as a response to White House practices that have been unprecedented and show clearly the need for this legislation. The documents, which include e-mails, correspondence, memos produced by an administration belong not to the President but to the people of the United States.

This bill will help ensure that these records are preserved properly for our future generations, and more importantly, this bill will help lift the veil of secrecy that has fallen over our government under this administration.

Every day the President and his staff generate thousands of documents on the issues confronting our Nation. These documents contain important insights into the way that our government is making decisions that affect our lives. Why are those decisions being made? Who benefits? Who gets to influence our government leaders?

We have serious concerns about the way the White House is preserving these documents, or not preserving them, and whether the true purpose of not preserving them is to hide the dealings from the American people. Through the investigations by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, we have learned that the White House lost hundreds of days of e-mail records between the years 2003 and 2005. Additionally, it appears that senior officials in the White House have been found to be skirting the historical record laws by using an e-mail system provided by the Republican National Committee for most of their e-mail correspondence.

For example, Karl Rove, former Deputy Chief of Staff, is said to have used the RNC system for 95 percent of his e-mail correspondence to which the American people will never have access. Under the Presidential Records Act, the President has the sole authority to manage his records during his time in office. The General Accountability Office found that this administration did not keep records as it was required to.

So the question becomes: What were they trying to hide? It is no surprise that the administration that leaked Valerie Plame's covert identity and organized propaganda to promote a war in Iraq is evading record-keeping practices to hide information from the American people. This is arguably partisan politics at its worse, and the only remedy is more accountability and more sunshine. The Electronic Message Preservation Act will help to make sure that these important records are kept and help shine light on what our government is doing and why.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to enter for the Record a letter supporting this legislation that brings accountability back to the White House. The letter was signed by a number of groups that advocate for an open, transparent government, including the Government Accountability Project and openthegovernment.org.

Mr. Speaker, the Bush administration has been one of the most secretive and least transparent and most closed in American history. We still don't know what was said in closed-door meetings with Big Oil executives to set our energy policy, and today, we suffer from record- high gas prices. The secrecy in the White House has prevented officials in the White House from being held accountable to the American people.

The Electronic Message Preservation Act will reform White House record keeping and allow the American people to have confidence that future administrations will not be able to hide the truth from the people of this country or from history.

July 9, 2008.

Hon. Henry Waxman

Chair, House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform,

House of Representatives, Washington, DC.

Dear Chairman Waxman: We are writing to support the passage

of H.R. 5811, the Electronic Message Preservation Act.

Investigations and reports by your Committee and by several

nonprofits document the significant deficiencies in the

preservation of e-mail by the federal government. H.R. 5811

directs the Archivist of the United States to establish

standards for the capture, management, and preservation of

White House e-mails and other electronic communications and

to issue regulations requiring agencies to preserve

electronic communications in an electronic format. This

legislation demonstrates that Congress is paying attention to

this serious issue, and taking steps to begin addressing the

systemic problems with electronic records in general and

electronic communications records that the federal agencies

and the White House have failed for too long to address.

Thank you for your leadership on this critical aspect of

government management and accountability. We look forward to

working with you on this and other issues in the future.

Sincerely,

American Association of Law Libraries, American Library

Association, Association of Research Libraries, Common

Cause, Essential Information, Freedom of Information,

Oklahoma, Government Accountability Project (GAP),

iSolon.org, Liberty Coalition, National Coalition

Against Censorship, National Coalition for History,

Mine Safety and Health News, and Minnesota Coalition on

Government Information.

Mississippi Center for Freedom of Information, National

Freedom of Information Coalition, National Security

Archives, National Press Club, 9/11 Research Project,

Open TheGovernment.org, Peacefire, People For the

American Way, Project on Government Oversight (POGO),

ReadtheBill.org Foundation, Society of Professional

Journalists, and Washington Coalition for Open

Government.

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

This is an issue. And the frustration on this side--and it should be on that side--is on the lack of an energy policy that only Congress can solve.

I know there's a lot of talk. The Speaker just sent a letter to the President to use the SPR, as if that's going to solve the problem. That's not going to solve the problem. In fact, it will make the problem worse. We have to address the supply side of this issue, and we're not doing it.

The last time we produced any new energy on this floor was 1973 when we had an embargo and we had no fuel, so we passed the Trans-Alaskan Pipeline. In 1976, we produced the first barrel of oil to America from Alaska. In 3 years, we built an 800-mile-long pipeline 48 inches around. We built the terminus point in Valdez, and I wear that today on my tie. We drilled the wells and we built the collection lines to deliver that oil. And we got as high as 2.2 million barrels a day to the United States of America because we were under the threat at that time, the same threat we are today, of control by overseas forces, not forces of military fact, but in fact those that control our supply. At that time, we were importing 39 percent of our oil from overseas. Today, it's 70 percent. And we have done nothing in this Congress to relieve that problem.

Your constituents are paying for it today. There is no shortage of fuel. There is a high cost of fuel because we don't have the domestic capability of providing it. We need to have this debate on the floor. Let us stand up and be counted on both sides of the aisle who is for domestic production.

There is no shortage of fossil fuel in the United States of America. We have an abundance of it. We've had the lack of will to produce it. It was easier to buy it abroad. We just had a sale in Alaska, other than ANWR, in Chukchi Sea about $2.6 billion from an oil company to try to develop it because there is a lot of argument on that side, well, they're not drilling the acreage they have now. You know why they're not drilling? Because your friends and your allies are filing suits not allowing them to drill, suits that say, oh, there's going to be polar bears affected or there's going to be some little other type of animal affected. In the meantime, your constituents are paying that $4.62 a gallon. Yes, the oil did drop yesterday, but it will go up tomorrow and the next day because we are not supplying the oil to our people through the domestic source.

We have the shale that was mentioned in Utah and Wyoming and all the other areas, Colorado; huge amounts of oil. We have more coal in the United States than there is all around the world and we're not developing it. We have not had the will to develop it because this Congress sits by and talks about saving records of the past administration. Your bill may not do that, but this is what this is all about. And I'm saying that doesn't produce any gas. That doesn't help the truck driver. It costs $2,000 to fill up one Peterbilt truck that delivers your food to your grocery store. Wait until that price starts hitting the prices in the grocery store, and it already has. The harvester who harvests the grain today now is paying sometimes as high as $4 and $5 for diesel fuel to run it. That's going to affect you, too.

We have not acted on this floor. And the responsible way of addressing the issue--now, some people will say we'll have the other forms of energy, wind and hippy-hoppies and that type of thing to solve the problem. But the reality is fossil fuels drive objects. It's the trucks, the planes, the trains, and the automobiles that deliver to your homes and your hospitals and your schools, and we must have that.

Yes, we can go into nuclear. Yes, we can go into wind. Yes, we can go into solar. And we can go to geothermal and hydro. We can do all those things and we should. My bill, H.R. 6107, to open ANWR--this, by the way, 12 times it passed this House floor. We won't have a vote on it this year, but we should have a vote. The one time we got it out of the Senate and Bill Clinton vetoed it.

Bill Clinton vetoed it because he said it will take 10 years to produce it; ANWR, 10 years. That was 13 years ago. If we had built it then, we would have it pumping today over 1 million barrels a day, but no, he didn't do that.

Let me stress again, ANWR is, in fact, 74 miles away from the existing pipeline, 800 miles long, a terminus point and all the infrastructure in place, and we built that in 3 years. And if you don't think we can build a pipeline 74 miles away and drill the oil and

get it to that pipeline in 3 years, you're not studying this fact. It can be done for the American people.

I'm asking you on both sides, let's drill, let's develop our domestic sources for the good of America, the good of the Nation, and make sure we can go forth.