Providing for consideration of the Senate amendment to the House amendments to the Senate amendment to the bill (H.R. 3221) to provide needed housing reform and for other purposes.

With a heavy heart, I rise in opposition to this rule and the Wall Street rescue bill. Why? The key provision added over the weekend amounts to a huge elephant galloping over the American people with its blank check to Wall Street. In exchange, the American people get to cling to fool's gold--a few billion dollars to cities and States which are facing hundreds of billions of dollars of loss. Ohio alone needs the total amount of meager funds allocated to workouts. Sadly, less than one percent of the assistance in this bill is targeted to those local communities! We need a bill that strengthens each community's real estate values through Federal bond guarantees to them, not to the big investment banks and uninsured housing enterprises that caused this problem in the first place. I thank the gentleman very much for yielding.

Introduction

President Franklin Roosevelt aptly gave a name to the Wall Street financial manipulators who, time and again, put our nation in enormous financial peril. He called them ``malefactors of wealth''-- ``malefactors,'' from the Latin ``mal'' meaning ``bad,'' and ``factor,'' meaning ``makers'' . . . makers of bad. That is, people who do great harm with the use of wealth.

As a scion of old wealth himself, Roosevelt knew them well. He knew the lengths to which

they would go to satisfy their cravings for more, and more, and more-- as if reason and prudence didn't apply. And they did not care who they ran over in their quest. Their deeds have placed our nation at risk, time and again. Now, with the mortgage foreclosure crisis, they have done it again--this time, the damage is so huge it dwarfs the savings and loan fiasco of the 1980's when they ponzi-schemed up housing markets, saw them crash, and then ran to Congress to bail them out. Back then, the perpetrators centered their attention on California, Texas, Arizona, and the hot housing markets. Yet all Americans, from all states--like Ohio which was not one of the epicenters of their gluttony--were forced to pay the bills for their bad deeds.

Today, Congress will vote to burden the American people with another blank check, totaling hundreds of billions of dollars lasting three generations, to Wall Street brokerages and the shareholders of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae. It is times like this that my heart feels very heavy for my fellow countrymen and women, as I cannot save us from this wrongful debt being imposed. This bailout of Wall Street giants never had a hearing in Committee.

Why should our people be made to pay for them? What will our communities get for this added, massive debt obligation?

The Legislation

The Foreclosure ``Rescue'' bill we're being asked to vote on today won't live up to its name. I challenge any Member to tell me how much help your district will receive from this trickle down to turn around local housing markets. This bill does not measure up to the challenge

The Congressional Budget Office under estimates that the bailout package will cost the American public $25 billion. This estimate isn't a good indication of the potential cost since $25 billion is just an estimate based on many faulty assumptions. The potential cost to the public actually is several hundred billion dollars. Fannie Mae and Freddie's current debts total $5.2 trillion, which equals our national debt of $5 trillion.

The fig leaf offered--and that our communities are clinging to is the promise of a mere $4 billion in community aid plus $10 billion for state housing authorities to counteract the nearly $356 billion loss in property values and property taxes in 2007 and 2008. $4 billion doesn't even meet the City of Cleveland's needs; Ohio alone is estimated to need $164.2 billion, just the gap for the state housing authority is $20 billion. With blocks of abandoned, vandalized, and stripped homes to contend with, along with an onslaught of displaced families, our communities are being asked to do more than ever, with fewer and fewer resources.

This bill asks taxpayers to issue a blank check with the words ``stand by authority''--to Wall Street--for the first time to federally uninsured investment houses and secondary market housing agencies. This critical provision never went through Committee, there were no hearings. This was a Boardroom deal.

The former head of Goldman Sachs is now the Secretary of Treasury under a Republican administration; under the former Democratic administration, the Secretary of Treasury was from Goldman Sachs. Just this week, Goldman Sachs' top banker, Ken Wilson, will take a leave from his job there to join his former boss at Treasury, Secretary Paulson. Who's running whose show here? Is Treasury serving the American people or simply Goldman Sachs, IndyMac Bank, and Bears Stearns?

Further, under this bill the Department of Treasury that failed to regulate, examine, and audit is now going to be given even more power to create another bureaucracy to regulate the Department that didn't regulate. This house of cards only gets more topsy.

Last year, Freddie Mac Chairman and Chief Executive Richard Syron received $19.8 million in compensation--even though the company's stock lost half its value. During the same period, Fannie Mae President and Chief Executive Daniel Mudd was paid $12.2 million, including a $2.2 million bonus. But curbing their excess doesn't even come close to offsetting the huge debt this bill anticipates for the American people.

Our cities are left holding the bag, yet the greedy corporations that blew through town are being made whole. Meanwhile, homeowners have lost decades of savings and equity. Once tight-knit communities are left shattered, shuttered, and dangerous. In order to make things even worse, big banks like Citigroup are now plundering our local communities even more by offering land contracts. How much lower can these banks sink? And yet Congress rewards them?

Savings and Loan Crisis Background

Even worse than the proposed no strings attached bailout is the fact that this is deja vu all over again. The Savings and Loan bailout of the 1980s cost the American taxpayers upwards of half a trillion dollars. The American people were asked to grin and bear it for the good of the Nation. States like Ohio were not among the worst abusers, yet our taxpayers were forced to bear this debt load too.

The savings and loan scandal destroyed an entire class of community banks, moved more power to Wall Street and money center banks, and exploded our public debt. Back then, they told Americans that if they were bailed out, such catastrophes would never happen again. They claimed a new money instrument was being developed by Wall Street called the mortgage backed security. Through its magic, the public would never have to worry again about greedy bankers in the housing market. Your mortgage would be safer, as it would be packaged with others and sold through securities Wall Street would invent, like an anonymous piece of paper.

Meanwhile, face to face community banking, and necessary underwriting and regulation first enacted for home lending in the Great Depression, were destroyed. Financing became more and more hot wired, more absentee, even over the phone and internet. A deluge of promotional materials from the banks arrived at our doorsteps, almost daily, urging mortgagees to borrow more and more against their shrinking home equity, to borrow for almost anything--a vacation, a car, to put on a roof. Few cautioned against it, and the debt pushers pushed on.

Home values inflated beyond their worth. But the regulators, like FNMA and Freddie, the OTS and FDIC stood frozen in place. The mortgage itself--which is a debt that must be repaid--was rolled up and packaged with thousands of other mortgages and, as America itself is in debt, sold into the international market for the first time to foreign buyers. Try to work out a loan when your financier is located in China.

Sadly, their entire modus operandi is an old trick--create a house of cards with money by pushing risk beyond what can be considered prudent, leverage the money pyramids where the underlying asset is purposely poorly appraised, and voila--the perpetrators make billions until the market they have created busts. Then blame the American people and run to Congress to close the gap by borrowing, borrowing, and borrowing from the very people they thought so little of. Oh yes, and then, blame the whole washout on ``them,'' the public.

Wall Street's money grabbers are back, this time stretching their long arms even deeper into your pockets to cover their latest craze-- draining out our home equity and home values. Americans have built their equity over decades in their mortgages. Yet Wall Street set its sights on families' home equity, and went after it with a vengeance. It was the only major savings pool America had left other than our public assets like roads, water systems, and public works. Millions of families succumbed to the snake oil.

Overall, home equity in our nation, our largest source of savings-- has now dipped below fifty percent for the first time in modern history. Millions of Americans have negative equity in their homes, they own more on their homes than their homes are worth.

So, to fill the gap, Wall Street wants the American taxpayer--the people they bilked--to bail them out, again. Bear Stearns succeeded to the tune of $30 billion. So now there is a longer line of bankers lined up to prop up their profligacy. This bill legitimizes their behavior and gets crumbs in return for the American people. The malefactors wealth manipulated and created panic in the market. They got the Bush Administration to propose an ``emergency'' bailout plan. And then they got Congress to ``limit'' executive pay as a fig leaf to cover over their real motherload in this bill. Not a bad bit of insider dealing.

But what about the American people? What about their interests?

Meeting the Needs and Strengthening of Our Communities

Let's get something real for the taxpayer. And let's get it now. As the Economist proposed this week, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac could issue their own debt and exchange it for loans from the government-- this way, our taxpayers who are on the hook at least get something if markets recover. Otherwise, all this bill does is hand over the U.S. Mint to Wall Street.

I ask any Member: how much of this bill is going to your district relative to what it is going to cost to turn your local real estate market around?

If you don't know the details, you shouldn't vote for the bill.

And how do you know when the help will arrive? This bill is a trickle down from Wall Street; communities across this nation will be left holding an empty bag.

Our communities need expanded bonding power at the grass roots, not more rewards for Wall Street brokers who got us into this sorry situation in the first place.

We need trickle up, not trickle down.

Our communities need expanded bonding power at the grassroots level to raise the funds to combat this crisis, not more rewards to the very institutions and people who created this mess.

I have a better idea. Rather than Congress vowing to borrow more money--plus interest--from the American taxpayer for three generations to come, to make Wall Street whole, why not instead design a refinancing approach that benefits the taxpayer, and the communities they live in? Rescue local real estate markets. Give the bulk of assistance there. Let any refinancing medium reach deep into every affected community across this country. Stop the hemorrhage. Accelerate workouts now to save real estate values from plummeting even further-- including on families who own properties that had nothing to do with this ponzi scheme.

Strengthen each community's real estate values through federal bond guarantees to local countries and cities, not Wall Street. Empower local people. Empower local housing authorities' ability to respond. Democratize this bond offering. The largesse of the American people should not trickle down from the big bond houses on Wall Street who caused the problem, traffic in debt, and operate far from home. The bill being proposed in Congress is weighted WAY too heavily in their favor. For affected localities, less than 1 percent of this proposed aid is targeted to them; Wall Street gets the lion's share. Imagine a bill that strengthens local real estate markets NOW, and into the future through additional federal bond guarantee authority to those same communities. The ability of hundreds of affected jurisdictions to do refinancing and workouts will be direct, local and not just through Wall Street. Direct support to localities should be at a level commensurate with the scale of the foreclosure crisis--not just one percent of the largesse while Wall Street cleans up.

Conclusion

This approach makes sense as real estate markets are local. There is a greater likelihood that units will be turned around more responsibly and expeditiously at the local level. Wall Street is too far away. And they are already hawking their disgusting ``land contracts'' to move foreclosed units which are further blighting troubled neighborhoods.

Let's democratize this bond offering in community after community. Let's not give it away to the same Wall Street crowd that bleeds us time and again, but pays us no respect. Franklin Roosevelt understood the difference between money and wealth. He was about creating wealth in community after community, household after household, not letting Wall Street raid us dry. This Congress should remember how his policies built a middle class. We should champion that democratic vision of capitalism. It's long overdue. As this bill moves to the Senate, perhaps someone there will remember what representative democracy is all about and make this a much better bill. My vote is cast for the American people and against the malefactors of wealth.

Addendum

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac

A Better Approach: Based upon Treasury Secretary Paulson's

emergency announcement and proposal on July 13, 2008, ``The

two companies could issue their own debt and exchange it for

loans from the government--at least the American people might

yield something rather than giving wall street the equivalent

of having access to the printing press.'' (Source: The

Economist, July 19th-25th, 2008)

Additional Facts: According to a Federal Reserve economist,

because the U.S. government has essentially guaranteed Fannie

Mae and Freddie Mac's debt, the ability of home buyers to

borrow has remained difficult, while the savings Fannie and

Freddie have realized--about $79 billion--instead went

straight to their shareholders. (Source: The Economist, July

19th-25th, 2008)

Current regulation, ``allowed Fannie and Freddie to operate

with tiny amounts of capital. Their capital reserves (as

defined by the regulator, Office of Federal Housing

Enterprise Oversight [OFHEO]) of $83.2 billion at the end of

2007 supported $5.2 trillion of debt and guarantees, a ratio

of 65 to one.'' Imagine if a household earned $83,000 a year

and was able to borrow $5.2 billion on that salary.

In 1998 Freddie Mac owned $25 billion of other securities,

according to OFHEO and by the end of 2007 it had $267

billion. Fannie Mae's outside portfolio grew from $18.5

billion in 1997 to $127.8 billion at the end of 2007. This

shift in investing in outside securities does not meet Fannie

and Freddie's core mission of increasing home ownership.

OFHEO as recently as July 10th said that both Fannie Mae

and Freddie Mac had enough capital.

Freddie Mac lost $3.5 billion in 2007; Fannie Mae reported

a $2.2 billion loss in the first quarter, having lost $2.05

billion in 2007. Each had credit-related write-downs of

between $5 billion and $5 billion last year.

Currently, Freddie Mac only has a market value of $5.3

billion.

On a fair-value basis, Freddie Mac had a negative net worth

of $5.2 billion at the end of the first quarter.

fannie mae and freddie mac's debt and foreign ownership

``Paulson said the Fannie and Freddie have issued $5

trillion in debt and mortgage backed securities. Of that

amount more than $3 trillion is held by U.S. financial

institutions and over $1.5 trillion is held by foreign

institutions.'' (AP; Crutsinger, July 22, 2008)

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac's foreign debt has tripled from

$504 billion in 2001 to $1.5 trillion in 2007. Fannie Mae and

Freddie Mac's $1.5 trillion foreign debt is owned by China

$376 billion, Japan $228 billion, Russia $75 billion, South

Korea $63 billion, and Middle Eastern Oil-Exporters $29

billion. Now, both interest and principal is owed to foreign

bondholders.

The current proposal will allow Bank of America to purchase

Countrywide's portfolio. Then if Bank of America works out a

refinancing, FHA stands ready to insure it. If the owner

fails to make payments, FHA assumes the unit. This is a great

bonanza for Bank of America.

what the legislation needs

A better solution would be to let Fannie Mae and Freddie

Mac issue debt and then exchange that for a government loan.

At least our people would get something back on the upside--

just as America did when Chrysler Corporation was refinanced

through redeemable warrants.

Democratize the bond offerings by diverting some of the

securitized debt that is intended to prop up Wall Street,

Fannie Mae, and Freddie Mac. Direct it to Main Street--our

counties, our cities, our housing agencies and authorities.

Make the approach more equitable to the taxpayer. This

approach allows communities, not only corporations, mega-

banks, and investment houses, to actually own something.

Isn't that a value worth fighting for?

Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this legislation and recognize myself for such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I do rise in opposition and I do so reluctantly because I acknowledge that we are faced with a crisis, and because there are provisions in this bill that I strongly support.

The bill strengthens GSE capital requirements, it enhances the government's receivership authority if they get in trouble. These are significant improvements over the current regime. Even more importantly, the legislation contains a measure I introduced over a year ago to create a comprehensive system for licensing and registration of mortgage originators. This provision will do more to protect consumers and prevent many of the abuses that caused the subprime crisis in the first place than just about any other reform we can make.

The problem, Mr. Speaker, is that, rather than bringing up a clean bill to the floor to improve GSE regulation, to modernize the FHA and to crack down on rogue elements in the mortgage industry, the majority has brought us something else entirely, and they prohibited any amendments, it's a ``take it or leave it.''

The bill before us today includes provisions that actually would undermine GSE safety and soundness and fiscal discipline by diverting billions of dollars from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and from homeowners and taxpayers to pay for three big new government programs. It does so at a time when we should instead be doing everything within our power to stabilize the GSEs and our housing markets and avoid the need for an even bigger taxpayer bailout down the road.

Mr. Speaker, the most troubling aspect of this legislation remains the affordable housing fund, which would siphon $9 million from the GSEs over a 10-year period to fund State and local initiatives. One of the primary beneficiaries of these funds will be political advocacy groups across the country that claim as some part of their mission the promotion of affordable housing.

When the affordable housing fund was first introduced in GSE reform legislation that the House considered in May of last year, I cautioned that this would be an additional cost on the GSEs; I said that on the floor of this House. At that time, their combined capitalization was roughly $106 billion. Today, their market capitalization is roughly $20 billion. One year and $86 billion in lost market capitalization later, a plan now to divert billions of dollars from the GSEs to fund another expensive government housing program is not only just bad policy, it's irresponsible.

Also, I believe unwise are provisions of this bill authorizing--and let me say this: The chairman of the full committee said that I have referred to this as a ``$300 billion program.'' I do that again today without apology. Mr. Speaker, this bill authorizes $300 billion in new FHA loan guarantees. Now, the chairman said that I said it would cost that in my letter to the Members. But, in fact, I said the $300 billion program would do little to help struggling homeowners. I said a $300 billion program. I didn't say that would be the ultimate cost. In fact, it authorizes $300 billion in guarantee. If anybody doubts that, 412 of the bill, line 19, it says, ``The aggregate original principal obligation of all mortgages insured under this section may not exceed $300 billion.'' At no time have I said that the ultimate cost would be $300 billion.

In fact, in another letter to the Members I quoted the Washington Post and what they said about the cost. And that cost will be in excess of $1 billion in all likelihood. So they are three new

programs, all of them costing more than $1 billion.

And as I said, this new FHA loan guarantee program would have the effect of bailing out lenders and investors seeking to offload their riskiest loans on an FHA already close to being overwhelmed by the larger role that it's being asked to play in the mortgage market.

Many of us on this side of the aisle have questioned the fairness of asking 110 million Americans who are paying their mortgages on time, renting or owning their homes outright to subsidize those who make different choices.

The version of this legislation that the House approved last May at least had the virtue of being upfront. It required taxpayers to foot the bill directly for this ill-conceived Federal program. The version we are considering today purports to protect taxpayers by changing and shifting those costs over on the GSEs--the same GSEs are asked to pick up this cost, but at the same time we authorize the taxpayer to lend them money--by imposing these costs of the bailout on the GSEs through the affordable housing fund. But as we found in the last couple of days, as I said, that's the same thing as asking the taxpayers to foot the bill no matter how circuitous you do it.

On this point you don't take my word for it. Look at the editorial of the Washington Post, not a conservative newspaper. Here's what they said: ``The bill would fund the bailout through a fee on Fannie and Freddie, possibly $531 million in 2009. This is rather circuitous, given that government backing subsidizes Fannie and Freddie indirectly (and that they may soon be borrowing directly from the Treasury)''--and they will when this bill passes, or could. ``And it contradicts the purposes of the mortgage bailout, which is to shore up housing prices: Fannie and Freddie will pass the fees along to their customers, thus decreasing housing liquidity and depressing the residential real estate market.'' Despite that, despite liberal newspapers agreeing with conservatives, it's in the bill, and we won't have an opportunity to get it out.

The editorial concludes by asking the question, and I asked the same question: ``Wouldn't it be simpler and safer to let a new regulator address the GSEs' capital needs before plunging them even deeper into the housing quagmire?'' Mr. Speaker, I couldn't agree more.

In addition to asking taxpayers to bail out the GSEs and lenders and investors seeking to rid their portfolios of their most toxic mortgages, this bill goes a step further. It establishes yet a third government program, this one a $4 billion grant program--paid for by the taxpayers--to fund the purchase of foreclosed properties by States and local governments. This is nothing more than a bailout of investors and real estate speculators who made risky investments but who will now be able to dump their foreclosed properties on State and local governments.

This approach invites more, not fewer, foreclosures by providing incentives to lenders to foreclose on properties rather than attempt to work with struggling homeowners to keep their houses or property. Besides, setting the government up as a landlord is not my idea of a wise use of taxpayer dollars or an answer to the housing crisis. What in the world it is doing in a bill purportedly designed to avert foreclosures and assist troubled homeowners is anyone's guess.

This legislation unfortunately contains yet another--despite all that--irresponsible, in my opinion, provision from the Senate-passed bill, one that establishes a moratorium on the FHA's authority to engage in risk-based pricing. At a time when we're asking the FHA to play a greater role in assisting troubled homeowners seeking to refinance, barring the agency from pricing its product according to risk is a serious mistake. Not only will this moratorium prevent the FHA from serving more homeowners, it will lead to higher mortgage costs for everyone as the FHA is forced to raise its upfront and annual premiums to compensate for its inability to charge premiums based on risk.

If we've learned anything in the last 2 or 3 years it's that there's risk out there, and we ought to price for that risk. We don't do that in this bill; in fact, we establish a moratorium to stop that.

This legislation--the entire legislation--presents us with extremely tough choices. It includes long-needed reforms, as I said, but it also adds costly and unnecessary programs that make it impossible for many of us to support. It takes money from the GSEs when they're already in trouble. It creates two big new government housing programs even though there's an abundance of housing programs already existing. If they are not doing the job, let's reform the ones we have. And it places a moratorium on risk-based pricing.

If that weren't enough, the bill now includes a proposal to support the GSEs by direct government investment of taxpayer dollars in the common stock of these privately held companies.

When the Treasury proposals were announced last week, we were told it was essential to avoid a catastrophic failure of Fannie and Freddie and the turmoil in global capital markets. We were told we needed to pass it within 48 hours. Confusingly, at the same time we were told that the Treasury needed blank check authority, we were assured that it would never be used. We were told it must be voted on immediately, even though we were told at the same time the Federal Reserve had agreed to provide liquidity in the event of an emergency if there was one.

Those assurances notwithstanding, giving unlimited authority to a government agency for unprecedented action is a serious matter in a system that's based on checks and balances. Deciding this issue without hearings and within a 1-week span with virtually no deliberation and no opportunity to amend is a surrender of congressional responsibility. Congress did not do that with Chrysler, Lockheed or Conrail, which all were extensively studied and debated before action taken.

It is likely that the concept of ``If you build it, they will come'' applies here; if we give them this authority, it will be used, and I believe not only to provide liquidity, but to purchase an equity stake in these private, stockholder-owned companies.

Even a small government investment in Fannie and Freddie is incremental nationalization, let's be honest, a path our government should not go down without serious consideration of the consequences. One is crowding out the private mortgage market as we give them ever larger sources of cheap money. How do private lenders compete? They don't. Not fairly.

We should hesitate to saddle taxpayers with losses in tough times that should be absorbed by those who took the risks and reaped the billions in profits when times were good.

By raising concerns, those of us who questioned a rush to judgment on a blank check request were able to delay the consideration last week and to make some beneficial changes in the bill. As a result, even Senators Dodd and Shelby have now acknowledged--and I think Senator Shelby has thought all along--that the blank check needs to be examined very carefully.

Mr. Speaker, we can do better than this bill. Given the high stakes, we must do better. We should reject this legislation and immediately substitute it with a clean bill that reforms the GSEs, modernizes FHA, and increases the Treasury lending authority by a set amount.

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

Mr. Speaker, at this time, I would like to introduce my letter of July 14 and let the Members themselves determine whether the correct characterization would be made on my statement.

House of Representatives,

Committee on Financial Services,

Washington, DC, July 14, 2008.

Hon. Barney Frank,

Committee on Financial Services, House of Representatives,

Washington, DC.

Dear Mr. Chairman: It is unquestionably true that the

financial stability of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac is

critically important to the housing market and in turn to the

overall economy. It is also quite apparent that as a result

of a weak economy, short seller activities and a declining

housing market, Fannie and Freddie are facing substantial

financial challenges. Having said that, the sweeping changes

contemplated in the proposal made by the Treasury Department

over the weekend represent a far-reaching overhaul of the

financial regulatory structure of our housing market. Making

such broad changes in a precipitous manner without adequate

study and analysis is unprecedented and, perhaps,

unnecessary.

The problem immediately at hand seems to have been

addressed yesterday by the decision of the Federal Reserve to

open the discount window to Fannie and Freddie. It also

appears this intervention by the Federal Reserve will be

sufficient to provide adequate liquidity for these

enterprises to meet any obligations for the near future.

With this Federal Reserve liquidity facility in place, a

more long-term structure can be given the careful analysis

that is necessary to avoid the all too common problem of

unintended consequences when the regular legislative order is

bypassed. Please consider a process which will allow all

sides of this issue to be given the careful consideration

they so clearly deserve.

I do believe there is need for expedited legislation and

that action is a basic GSE reform bill. This legislation

could be drafted and taken to the floor with minimal

preparation since its provisions were carefully vetted in

hearings and markup.

Sincerely,

Spencer Bachus,

Ranking Member.

At this time, I will recognize the gentlelady from Illinois, the subcommittee Chair, Mrs. Biggert, for 5 minutes.

Mr. Speaker, I recognize the minority leader, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Boehner), for 1 minute.

Mr. Speaker, at this time I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Paul).

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Manzullo).

Mr. Speaker, at this time I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Barrett).

Mr. Speaker, I have a parliamentary inquiry as to how much time is remaining.

I would ask unanimous consent to give the gentleman from Rhode Island another 1 minute.

I would ask unanimous consent, Mr. Speaker, that the total time be extended 1 minute.

I would ask unanimous consent that the total time be extended 1 minute and the gentleman from Rhode Island be given that time.

Mr. Speaker, at this time I yield 2 minutes to the capable gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Pence).

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

Mr. Speaker, at this time I recognize the deputy ranking member of the full committee, Mr. Neugebauer from Texas, for 3 minutes.

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

Mr. Speaker, at this time I yield to the gentleman from North Carolina, a member of the committee, Mr. McHenry, 2 minutes.

Mr. Speaker, I continue to reserve my time.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to inquire as to the time remaining on both sides.

I continue to reserve my time, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Speaker, at this time I would like to recognize the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Roskam), a very capable, bright member of our committee for 2 minutes.

Mr. Speaker, at this time I would like to yield 2 minutes to the secretary of the Republican Conference, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Carter).

Mr. Speaker, I'd like to inquire into the time remaining on each side.

Mr. Speaker, due to the imbalance, I'd reserve the balance.

Mr. Speaker, at this time, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Hensarling).

Yes, that is correct.

Mr. Speaker, I yield the balance of my time to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Garrett).

Madam Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 1363 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Madam Speaker, I rise today in strong support. For the purpose of debate only, I will yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Sessions). All time yielded during consideration of the rule is for debate only.

General Leave

I ask unanimous consent that all Members be given 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks on House Resolution 1363.

I yield myself such time as I might consume.

Madam Speaker, House Resolution 1363 provides for consideration of the Senate amendment to H.R. 3221, the American Housing Rescue and Foreclosure Prevention Act of 2008. The rule makes in order a motion by the chairman of the Committee on Financial Services to concur in the Senate amendment, with the text of the House amendment printed in the Rules Committee report.

The rule provides 2 hours of debate on the motion, with 80 minutes controlled by the Committee on Financial Services, and 40 minutes controlled by the Committee on Ways and Means.

Madam Speaker, I rise today in strong support of the American Housing Rescue and Foreclosure Prevention Act and this rule. Our landmark legislation today throws a lifeline to families who are struggling to maintain the American dream of home ownership during this housing crisis and the economic downturn.

Families across America are being forced to make heart-wrenching decisions in order to stay in their homes. What will they pay for in this day and age, with rising gas prices, property insurance rates escalating, the cost of health care rising? But nothing is more fundamental than having a safe and clean home for your family.

The good news is that many of us in the Congress understand, and we are going to stand up for families and ensure that if you work hard and you play by the rules, the tools and resources will be made available to you to help you stay in your home.

The American people have a number of champions here in Congress that understand the importance of a safe, clean and affordable home. Chairman Barney Frank has spent countless hours in providing the tools necessary for families across this country to have a safe, affordable place to live.

Chairwoman Maxine Waters of California has spent a great part of her career dedicated to affordable housing for American families.

Speaker Pelosi and the Chairwoman of the Rules Committee, Louise Slaughter, are champions of American families and affordable housing as well.

Madam Speaker, today three million to four million families are expected to lose their homes to foreclosure. And when a home in your neighborhood ends up in foreclosure it affects everyone. It is usually sold at a reduced rate, and the values of homes throughout the neighborhood are affected. We have all seen these eyesores with overgrown grass, broken windows and in disrepair.

Well, that is why we are all in this together. It is vital that we fight to maintain the property values of our communities.

Madam Speaker, just a few weeks ago I had my first foreclosure workshop to get families together with lenders to try to get to a point where they could work out their loans. We were very surprised. We had over 600 individuals show up who were either in foreclosure, had fallen a month or two behind, or could see on the horizon, because of an adjustable rate loan or some family circumstance like the loss of a job or the kids going off to college, that they needed a little bit of help.

Well, we have been very active in this Congress because while this is a problem that, yes, critically affects a State like Florida, in the Tampa Bay area that I have the privilege to represent, and it affects California desperately, Ohio, Nevada, no part of the country has been immune from the sub prime lending crisis.

Fortunately, this American Housing Rescue and Foreclosure Prevention Act comes at an important time. But, you know, this Congress has been working on this for over a year and a half. So many of the initiatives contained in this package have been passed by the House of Representatives. This ``New Direction Congress'' has worked, in a bipartisan way, to pass most of the initiatives that are contained in the act today.

Families should know that H.R. 3648, the Mortgage Forgiveness Debt Relief Act, was passed and did become law at the end of last year; passed by a margin of 386-27 here in the House. It provides that over the next 3 years, families who have had to sell their homes in foreclosure will be spared from getting hit by a larger tax bill, in addition to the pain of losing their homes.

There are a number of other critical components in the Housing Rescue Package that were previously passed by the House. And I would like everyone to note, because we will probably hear a great deal of debate here today on the housing package. Everyone should note that almost all the initiatives contained in the bill today were passed over the last year and a half by wide, bipartisan margins.

First, the Neighborhood Stabilization Act. That was approved in May by a vote of 239-188. It provides grants to the States and local governments to purchase and rehabilitate foreclosed properties and turn them into safe, affordable places for folks to live.

And I would like to recognize and thank the White House for removing its veto threat. It had threatened to veto this entire package that had been negotiated with the White House over this small section that provides important tools to our State and local governments to tackle those properties that are up for foreclosure, the ones that are overgrown, that have the broken windows, allows them to go in and purchase those properties and turn them into affordable housing for families who are in need.

The package also includes the important provisions of the Federal Housing Finance Reform Act that we passed in May of 2007 by a vote of 313-104. This is vital legislation today because it establishes new and extensive oversight and regulatory authority over the Federal National Mortgage Association, Fannie Mae, and the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation, Freddie Mac.

To protect the taxpayers, we are instituting new requirements for the safety and soundness of the portfolio operations of these regulated entities. We need to make sure that we have oversight on the effects of the financial and housing finance markets of all these alternatives and provide an alternative to the current secondary market system for housing finance.

Madam Speaker, last September we also passed an important part of this package, the Expanding Home Ownership Act of 2007, by a margin of 348-72 here in the House. This is a critical piece because it expands access to the middle class to the low interest, low fee loans provided by the Federal Housing Administration. These FHA loans are a much better option to the sub prime loans. We are going to take a proactive step here to allow families facing foreclosure to qualify for the

low interest, no fee loans offered by the FHA.

The housing package today also includes the National Affordable Housing Trust Fund Act of 2007. That was passed here in the House last October by a vote of 264-148. This creates a new, innovative fund that will be used to build more affordable housing for hard working families and families who have lost their homes due to foreclosure. The new trust fund will focus on construction, rehabilitation and preservation of affordable housing in our hometowns. It will pool monies to target housing for families with the greatest economic need.

And our efforts come at a critical time if we can get this trust fund up and running. See, the Federal money for affordable housing has largely disappeared under the current administration over the past 7 years.

In many communities like mine, housing agencies have thousands on the waiting list. In my hometown of Tampa, Florida, during a 1-week open enrollment session, more than 10,000 seniors, veterans and families indicated a need for housing. But instead of receiving housing, they are placed on a waiting list, and the waiting list takes up to 4 years, and it is so long that the Tampa Housing Authority is unable to help others that need it.

Madam Speaker, another important part of this housing package is the Mortgage Reform and Anti-Predatory Lending Act of 2007. Yes, we passed this here in the House last November by a vote of 291-127. It requires States to license all mortgage professionals and mandate criminal background checks, requires exams and a ban on felons participating in the mortgage loan industry.

We all know that the predatory lending was rampant during the sub prime loan run up. And I would like to draw your attention to anyone that would like to examine in depth the details of predatory lenders and how they worked. Go to the MiamiHerald.com Web site and review their series on predatory lending that they have run over the past couple of days. It is outstanding.

They reviewed thousands of pages of court documents, State industry reports, internal e-mails, and police reports from 2000 to 2007 and they discovered that over 5,000 people with criminal histories during that time became loan originators, a rate of nearly two a day. Worse, those include over 2,000 who had committed financial crimes such as fraud, money laundering, and grand theft. Too many of our neighbors were outright lied to and steered into unaffordable, exploding adjustable-rate mortgages without being given an option for a fixed rate and are now facing foreclosure which harms their families and all of us in their community.

To accompany this extensive package, what has been added that really has not been voted on by the House today is a request by the Treasury Secretary for new standby authority to buy stock or debt in the GSEs if it is determined that an emergency exists. This is something of an insurance policy against broader losses in the housing market that could bubble up.

Mr. Speaker, our efforts here today are absolutely necessary. Families across this country are depending on us. It's unfortunate that while the House and the new-direction Congress has been focused on affordable housing over the past year and a half and has passed terrific, substantive legislation, that it's taken a few months to get it enacted and passed in the end.

Thanks again to Chairman Barney Frank for headlining our negotiations with the other body and with the White House. And I feel secure that a large bipartisan vote here today will prove that we can stand up and address this housing crisis across this country.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I am privileged to yield 5 minutes to the distinguished chairwoman of the Rules Committee, Ms. Slaughter of New York.

I yield the gentlewoman an additional 1 minute.

Mr. Speaker, I'm very pleased to yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Waters), a champion for affordable housing and America's families.

Mr. Speaker, I'd like to correct the record here because this House of Representatives has been working in a bipartisan way for almost 2 years now on housing legislation. In fact, in my opening statement, I chronicled the number of bills starting last year that have been passed in this House by substantial bipartisan margins and sent over to the Senate where they waited. To say that there's been no opportunity for amendment or debate, that's wholly inaccurate.

Out of this package, it contains at least five or six bills that had committee hearings, extensive hearings, the opportunity for amendment in committee, the opportunity for debate, previous debate, debate on the floor, amendments here on the floor, debate in the Rules Committee.

So I think it's important that the record reflect that reality.

And at this time, I'd like to yield 5 minutes to the chairman of the Financial Services Committee, the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Frank).

I yield the gentleman 30 additional seconds.

Mr. Speaker, we reserve the balance of our time.

Mr. Speaker, at this time I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Lee).

I will have to object to that. I will note that the rule does provide for an extended amount of debate on the legislation, itself.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee).

Mr. Speaker, I have the right to close, so I will reserve the balance of my time until the gentleman from Texas has made his closing statement.

Mr. Speaker, I urge adoption of the American Housing Rescue and Foreclosure Prevention Act and this rule, as families across America are in the grips of a housing crisis and it demands expeditious action.

The President of the United States says it's necessary. The Governors in this great Nation say it's necessary, and I will submit their statements into the Record.

Foreclosures are way up, and the options for safe, clean, and affordable housing are down. In my home town of Tampa, Florida, one in 280 homes is in foreclosure. Now, as Rules Committee Chairwoman Slaughter said, we're going to clean up this mess because America's hardworking families are depending on us, but we will also need to follow up and hold those accountable who have created this mess.

Now, the House of Representatives over the past 1\1/2\ years have passed bills to help homeowners avoid foreclosure, provide resources to local communities to build new, safe and affordable housing, and crack down on predatory lenders. It has all come to fruition here today.

Our efforts will keep the American dream of homeownership available to more American families, thanks to the efforts of Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Chairman Barney Frank and Chairwoman Maxine Waters, and the other champions for America's families who are going to continue to side with them, and our commitment to affordable housing and safe and healthy communities.

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

Executive Office of the President, Office of Management

and Budget,

Washington, DC., July 23, 2008.

Statement of Administration Policy

H.R. 3221--Housing and Economic Recovery Act of 2008, (Rep. Frank (D)

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

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 1363, I call up the bill (H.R. 3221) to provide needed housing reform, and for other purposes, with the Senate amendment to the House amendments to the Senate amendment with an amendment thereto, and ask for its immediate consideration in the House.

Mr. Speaker, I offer the motion at the desk.

Mr. Speaker, I recognize myself for such time as I may consume.

Let me concur with the remarks of the gentleman from Louisiana. I don't like everything in this bill either. It is inconceivable to me that anybody would like everything in this bill, because it is the product of a very significant set of compromises. To some extent, frankly, the challenges the Congress faced and the administration faced in dealing with the housing crisis--remember, we are here in substantial part because of a terrible housing crisis that has affected the economy of the U.S. and the world. We are dealing with the consequences of bad decisions and inaction and malfeasance from years before.

Obviously it requires a joint effort. To some extent, this is a test of our ability as a self-governing people to govern. Because if everybody held off and said I am only going to support a bill with which I am in complete agreement, we would not be able effectively to respond to this crisis.

So I appreciate the President's policy statement saying I don't like everything in this bill, but I'm going to sign it and you should pass it quickly. I think that's true of all of us who have looked at this.

Now I do want to refute some of the myths. One, we heard reference to a $300 billion program. My colleague, the ranking member, sent out a Dear Colleague letter that said the part of the bill that tries to avoid mortgage foreclosure is a $300 billion program. In fact, it's a $1.7 billion program, according to CBO.

Yes, it's $300 billion, $300 billion is the total amount of mortgages that could be insured. It would cost $300 billion only if no one who had one of those mortgages ever made a payment of a penny and the houses were worth nothing. Obviously it's not a $300 billion program. That's why CBO said our version was $1.7 billion.

We also heard from some of the Republicans that it is a $5 trillion program. What they call a $5 trillion program, the stand-by authority that the President has asked us to give the Secretary of the Treasury, the Congressional Budget Office says is a $25 billion program but probably won't be spent.

So I think we need to understand conservative Republican arithmetic. It is the most inflationary arithmetic I ever heard. $1.7 billion of CBO becomes $300 billion. $25 billion from CBO becomes $5 trillion. I hope it will be very clear to people that these numbers that are being thrown around are simply inaccurate and misleading.

I also want to talk now to some of my friends on the left and others who have, I think, been misrepresenting what we are doing with regard to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac giving stand-by authority, saying this is bailing out the corporations, that this is welfare for the rich.

Let me read the list of people, organizations, who have specifically endorsed what this bill does with regard to stand-by authority to keep Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac from collapsing:

The Consumer Federation of America, the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, the Leadership Conference on Legal Rights, the League of United Latin American Citizens, the Mexican American Legal Defense Fund, the National Association of Consumer Advocates, the National Council of La Raza, the National Urban League, the National Fair Housing Alliance, the National Low Income Housing Coalition.

Mr. Speaker, apparently there has been some infiltration. Apparently the corporate welfare advocates have taken over all the liberal organizations in America. We will probably have to investigate that, because all of the organizations with which I have worked for 28 years, who are the effective advocates for low-income housing, say pass this bill, please, and please specifically help Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

So the amount of misinformation here is enormous.

Finally, I want to address the question of procedure. Everything in this bill, with the exception of the emergency request from the President for stand-by authority for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, has been fully debated in the Financial Services Committee and voted on and debated on the floor of this House.

We are repackaging a number of things. Sometimes it takes our friends in the Senate two, three and four tries to get something done, so we keep serving the ball to them. Everything in this bill, with the exception of the emergency stand-by authority, has been thoroughly debated and voted on the floor of the House, and no part of it got less than 260 votes. So we're hardly rushing through things for the first time.

July 17, 2008.

Statement on Recent Federal Action To Provide Stand-by Support to

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac

The undersigned consumer, civil rights and fair housing

organizations commend U.S. Treasury Secretary Paulson,

Federal Reserve Board Chairman Bernanke and leaders of the

Senate Banking and House Financial Services Committees, for

acting quickly to provide for stand-by support to Fannie Mae

and Freddie Mac, the two government sponsored housing

enterprises (or GSEs). This support reaffirms the importance

of the two companies in providing liquidity and stability to

the housing market during this tumultuous period.

The U.S. economy has a deep stake in the success of Fannie

Mae and Freddie Mac as companies with an essential public

mission. As history has shown, both GSEs are vital to the

long-term health and success of our nation's housing finance

system. Furthermore, their public mission activities have

been and must continue to be instrumental in expanding

opportunities for homeownership and affordable rental housing

for consumers.

The establishment of a strong independent regulator, as

provided for by the housing measure pending before Congress,

will serve to maintain public confidence that Fannie Mae and

Freddie Mac remain safe and sound and thus able to continue

to carry-out their vital public mission. Immediate action on

GSE regulatory reform signals that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac

functions are essential to the housing market and to

consumers.

Center for Responsible Lending

Consumer Action

Consumer Federation of America

Consumers Union

Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law

Leadership Conference on Civil Rights

League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC)

Mexican American Legal Defense Fund (MALDEF)

National Association of Consumer Advocates

National Association of Neighborhoods

National Community Reinvestment Coalition

National Consumer Law Center (on behalf of its low-income

clients)

National Council of La Raza

National Fair Housing Alliance

National Low Income Housing Coalition

National Urban League

Opportunity Finance Network

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 1 minute.

I welcome the evolution in the gentleman's thinking. A week ago he sent me a letter saying we should not do the FHA modernization, so he has apparently expanded that, and I appreciate that.

There is one other myth, though, that I forgot to refute that he trotted out, namely, that this is going to force the FHA to take bad loans. That could not be further from the truth. This bill explicitly leaves the FHA in complete control of the decision to guarantee a loan or not. Nothing in this bill coerces the FHA. The lenders, to be eligible, would have to write down the loan by a significant percentage. An independent decision is then made by the FHA as to whether or not they want to guarantee it.

I now yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from California, a major author of important parts of this bill.

I now recognize the Chair of the Financial Institutions Subcommittee, the gentleman from Pennsylvania, for 1\1/2\ minutes.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 45 seconds to say that the gentleman from Alabama suggested that I was misrepresenting his letter. Here is the last paragraph: There is need for expedited legislation, and that action is a basic GSE reform bill that can be drafted, and taken to the floor with minimal preparation, since we have had hearings, not FHA modernization and not a tap standby authority. That's what he asked for a week ago, only GSE reform and not anything else.

Secondly, the minority leader has understated the administration's position. I'm sure that he wants to be accurate. They are not simply saying the President would sign the bill, the statement of administration policy urges the House to pass it expeditiously. So they are not simply going to sign it, they want us to pass it expeditiously. I know the minority leader wouldn't want to understate the position of the administration.

I now yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Marshall).

Would the gentleman yield?

The gentleman from Georgia has been a diligent advocate for a sensible public policy, and I admire both his diligence and his grasp of the issue. He is correct. Nothing in this title changes existing Federal law with respect to the authority of the Office of Thrift Supervision and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency's preemptive authority, and their right to regulate and oversee a depository institution's products and services marketing and distribution system, and they do obviously have definitional authority under this legislation.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to a very diligent member of the committee, the gentleman from New Hampshire (Mr. Hodes).

Mr. Speaker, another one of the most active members of our committee, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Al Green) is recognized for 1 minute.

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from California (Mr. Baca), and there is language in the bill dealing with in-person counseling of which he is the main author, and I yield to him now for a unanimous consent request.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the majority leader.

Mr. Speaker, I yield for the purpose of making a unanimous consent request to the gentleman from Connecticut (Mr. Shays).

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Hinojosa), a very active member of the committee.

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

Mr. Speaker, I am glad now to yield to my neighbor, the gentleman from Rhode Island (Mr. Langevin), 1 minute.

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

That's very generous of my friend. If he wishes to give another minute, I certainly would want to facilitate that.

I believe you can get unanimous consent, but if the gentleman's time has expired it would then be within the prerogative of the gentleman from Alabama to yield him another minute.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to my colleague from Massachusetts (Mr. Lynch), a valued member of our committee.

I now yield to an alumnus of our committee, the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Sires), 1 minute.

I yield 1 minute to a member of the Ways and Means Committee, the gentlewoman from Nevada (Ms. Berkley).

I yield 1 minute to another member of the committee, the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Carson).

I yield 1 minute to a very active member of the committee, the gentleman from Florida, Mr. Klein.

Mr. Speaker, yet another very active and important member of our committee, the gentleman from New York (Mr. Meeks). I yield him 1 minute.

I now yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the Chair of the Small Business Committee and a member of our committee, the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Velazquez).

Mr. Speaker, I am about to yield to the Speaker, but I yield myself 30 seconds to say to my friend from Illinois who wonders about this newfound confidence in the President. My confidence in giving him power is growing as his time in office diminishes.

I now recognize the Speaker of the House for 1 minute. Her leadership has been very important on this.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from Ohio (Mrs. Jones) who has been very concerned with this crisis given the impact that it has in her home district.

I yield the gentlewoman an additional 30 seconds.

I accept that we should. The imbalance is not intentionally done, just we're better at time management.

I now yield 3 minutes to one of the leading members of our committee in the preparation of this bill, the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Watt).

Would the gentleman yield to me at this time?

All the debates I've heard about civil litigation have been concerned that plaintiffs' lawyers would initiate lawsuits. We're talking here, as the gentleman well knows, about citizens who are finding themselves as defendants in foreclosures, and I can't imagine that people meant to exclude the ability of lawyers to defend people when we've got a record of some of these foreclosure packages being abusive.

So I would agree with the gentleman, and if necessary, I would hope we could make that very clear that defending someone who's being foreclosed upon, when there have been inappropriate practices isn't what has generally been meant here by a stopping the initiation of civil litigation.

I want to now yield to the chairman of the Budget Committee who has been a very important factor in our being able to pull this together, the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Spratt), 2\1/2\ minutes.

Let me inquire of my colleague, I understand he only had one more speaker?

Well, we have two. So I will now yield to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Waters) for 2 minutes and then I'll be closing on our side.

Would the gentlewoman yield?

We were able to postpone the deadline there of October 1. There is also an issue on risk-based pricing. I believe we will have both of those resolved in a more flexible way before October 1 so that seller financing and risk-based financing, appropriately done, will not go out of existence.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong opposition to this rule and to the underlying legislation, which is proof of not only the Democrat majority's careless disregard for the American taxpayer but also their complete disregard for the energy crisis facing Americans today. Mr. Speaker, today you will hear the other side of the story.

This legislation--submitted late last night after the House had already finished its business for the day--is proof that when the Democrats want to bring legislation to the floor in a hurry, they're very capable of that. It's just too bad that we aren't seeing some energy legislation which would make a difference to consumers all across America.

Mr. Speaker, despite the pleas of working families and small businesses across the country, Democrats have failed on every occasion to treat the serious issue of high energy costs with the same level of urgency that they're bringing to this debate over this massive bailout of two private companies.

This is not to say that there are not good parts to this hastily negotiated legislation. While I believe that Congressman Lee Terry, myself, and other Republicans had a better, more effective proposal, the inclusion of the first-time home buyer credit is wise and has the potential to help reinvigorate our slumping housing and homebuilding markets.

Additionally, I support the establishment of a more robust and competent regulator of the GSEs which will restore competence to the marketplace and ensure that these entities operate in a safe, sound, effective manner maintaining adequate capital and internal controls and ``contribute to the liquid, efficient, competitive, and resilient national housing financial markets that minimize the cost of housing finance.''

If this were all that the bill did, I'm confident that the bill would pass this House unanimously. Unfortunately, there are a number of extraneous provisions--cynically added by the Democrat majority to an emergency bill that they are bringing to the floor today under a rushed and closed process--that either weaken the financial position of the GSEs that they claim to be helping, provide a taxpayer bailout of reckless financial behavior, or simply don't make logical sense.

Most perplexing of all is the logical inconsistency underlying the entire bill. On the one hand, this Congress is being asked to declare an emergency and authorize the use of unlimited taxpayer funds to become a part of the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac problem while also raising the debt limit by $800 billion to lend these companies as much money as they may need. On the other hand, this bill creates an affordable housing trust fund that taxes the GSEs to support questionably effective low-income housing activities and to cover the losses that the FHA will surely incur after the Federal Government accepts financial responsibility for the most toxic loans in the marketplace.

So, Mr. Speaker, I will ask my Democrat colleagues that drafted this legislation, which is it? Are Fannie and Freddie private companies teetering on the brink of financial disaster thereby justifying this unprecedented taxpayer exposure and government intervention into the marketplace? Or are they cash cows that can and should be forever milked to provide financial support to every low-income housing whim that this Congress can dream of? I ask this because the answer simply cannot be both.

Mr. Speaker, because this lockdown rule provides the minority with only 60 minutes to debate this 694-page bill, I'm going to use the little time that I have to let my Republican colleagues come to the floor and use this limited opportunity to discuss all of the shortcomings associated with this bailout of mortgage lenders, investors, and speculators. I will leave it to my Republican colleagues to talk about all of their problems associated with the creation of this permanent housing slush fund, this $800 billion debt-ceiling increase, and this new $4 billion liability that will allow local governments to expose themselves to the up-and-down risks of the real estate market. And perhaps most of all, I will leave it to my colleagues to let them explain why the multibillion-dollar tax increase included in this bill to fund all of the bad ideas I've just described and certainly many more is a bad idea.

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

Mr. Speaker, there are lots of reasons to oppose this bill. We've talked about the things that we have in common with the bill. But I think it's important that we talk about what this bill actually does.

First of all, the GSE bailout. The 18-month term of authority for the Treasury to extend Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac's line of credit and purchase their equity is too long, we believe. Six months should be the limit. Not 18 months. The conditions under which a bailout is allowed should be clearly stated and should restrict the unlimited authority of the Treasury Secretary to act. The amount of Federal investment authorized should not be unlimited.

We've just given two great ideas, ideas that, because of a closed rule, you will not see on this floor of the House of Representatives. The conditions under which a bailout is allowed should be clearly stated and should restrict the unlimited authority of the Treasury Secretary to act.

Mr. Speaker, we believe the amount of Federal investment authorized should not be unlimited, and perhaps most importantly, we see that what Congress is doing is abdicating completely our authority and our role to the executive branch.

That's bad policy, and we should not be doing that on this floor of the House of Representatives today.

Secondly, the Affordable Housing Trust Fund, this legislation would place a permanent Affordable Housing Trust Fund mandate on the GSEs. In light of their current liquidity and capital conditions, taking money from Fannie or Freddie is a bad policy. Taking money from two of these instruments should not be done.

Moreover, the Affordable Housing Trust Fund could be used as a slush fund for political activity purposes. We see one of the housing groups that actively engages in open partisanship on a regular basis, and yet, they quite likely will qualify for a lot of taxpayer money. For what purpose? More politics.

Mr. Speaker, once again, the Republican Party is on the floor offering alternatives to this bad piece of legislation. We are not just saying ``no.''

What we're saying is this is an open slush fund and should not be allowed.

Mr. Speaker, we reserve our time.

Mr. Speaker, at this time, I'd like to yield 4 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Georgia, Dr. Price.

(Mr. PRICE of Georgia asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

I would like to give the gentleman an additional 30 seconds.

Mr. Speaker, at this time I would like to yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Dallas, Texas (Mr. Hensarling).

I yield the gentleman 30 additional seconds.

Mr. Speaker, at this time I would like to yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Flake).

Mr. Speaker, if I could inquire upon the time remaining on both sides.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to inquire of the gentlewoman from Florida if we could ask unanimous consent to extend on both sides, 15 additional minutes. We have a lot of speakers that are here on the floor, and it seems like a reasonable thing to do.

Well, Mr. Speaker, we tried to get additional debate on this issue, but I know the closed rule we have got is intended entirely to squeeze down time and the amount of debate that would take place, confirming that again.

Mr. Speaker, at this time I would like to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Campbell).

Mr. Speaker, at this time, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Connecticut (Mr. Shays).

Mr. Speaker, at this time, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Minnesota (Mrs. Bachmann).

Mr. Speaker, at this time, I yield 1 minute and 45 seconds to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Garrett).

I give the gentleman an additional 15 seconds.

Mr. Speaker, I will go ahead and close with the understanding that the gentlewoman is at that point in her presentation, also. Seeing an affirmation, I will go ahead and close.

Mr. Speaker, since taking control of this House, this Democrat Congress has totally neglected its responsibilities to address the domestic supply issues that have created the skyrocketing gas, diesel and energy costs that American families today are facing.

Today, they are proving that they can move a bill--like this housing bill--quickly when they choose to do so. However, they do not believe that the energy crisis facing American families and businesses is important enough to treat it with the same level of seriousness.

So today I urge my colleagues to vote with me to defeat the previous question so this House can finally consider real solutions to the rising energy costs in addition to this housing and GSE legislation.

If the previous question is defeated, I will move to amend the rule to allow for additional consideration of H.R. 6566, the American Energy Act. This bill would increase the supply of American-made energy, improve conservation and efficiency, and promote new and expanded energy technologies to help lower the price at the pump and help reduce America's increasing costly and dangerous dependence on foreign sources of energy.

I encourage everyone that believes that a comprehensive solution to solving this energy crisis and achieving energy independence includes increasing the supply of American energy should vote to defeat this rule and the previous question.

I ask unanimous consent to have the text of this amendment and extraneous material inserted in the Record prior to the vote on the previous question.

Mr. Speaker, we have given lots of reasons about ways we can make this bill better. The ways we can make it better is to make sure that what we do today is carefully understood, that we do not pass on to future taxpayers billions of dollars, and to any administration the opportunity simply to hand out money without an understanding and an expectation of performance.

Mr. Speaker, we've outlined our reasons today. We need to make sure that the Members of Congress who will vote today understand that opposing this bill and sending it back and making it better is the right thing to do. We also need to make sure that we take care of the American consumer who is having

increasing problems paying their bills, not just their housing bills, but also at the gas pump.

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

Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.