Recognizing the importance of America's Waterway Watch program, and for other purposes.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my good friend and namesake, Mr. Hastings, for yielding me the customary 30 minutes, and I yield myself such time as I may consume.

(Mr. HASTINGS of Washington asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Speaker, yesterday the Rules Committee held a hearing to consider a rule for H.R. 3773, the RESTORE Act. At the outset of the hearing, the chairwoman of the Rules Committee did something that Republicans would not have even contemplated when we were in the majority.

Before Members of Congress even had an opportunity to testify before the Rules Committee, the chairwoman announced that the rule would be closed. She further went on to say no notice was sent out seeking amendments from Members, yet at least 27 amendments on a bipartisan basis were submitted to the committee. I guess, Mr. Speaker, we know now that no amendment announcement is code for no opportunity for meaningful, open debate. While surprising, this action is, unfortunately, not unprecedented for this Democrat-controlled Rules Committee.

I would like to thank all Members for submitting their thoughtful amendments on behalf of those they represent. And I especially would like to thank the Members who chose to stay and testify despite learning from the very start that their amendments would not be made in order.

It is sad that yesterday the minds and ears of the Democrat members of the Rules Committee were closed to even allowing for the consideration of amendments and alternatives to legislation, important legislation aimed at closing loopholes and strengthening our national intelligence capabilities.

Mr. Speaker, in 1978 Congress enacted the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA, to establish a procedure for electronic surveillance of international communications. As enacted into law, FISA had two principle purposes: First, to protect the civil liberties of Americans by requiring the government to first obtain a court order before collecting electronic intelligence on U.S. citizens in our country. Second, the law specified how intelligence officials, working to protect our national security, could collect information on foreign persons in foreign places without having to get a warrant.

The intent of the original FISA law was to enhance American security while at the same time protecting American privacy. Recognizing that no

responsibility of the Federal Government is more important than providing for the defense and security of the American people, Congress should be doing all it can to ensure that FISA continues to reflect the intent of the original law.

In the nearly 30 years since FISA became law, we have seen tremendous advances in communication technology such as the Internet, cell phones and e-mail. However, under the original FISA law, our intelligence officials are not free to monitor foreign terrorists in foreign countries without a court order because of advances in communication technology. It is clear that our FISA laws are outdated and must be modernized to reflect changes in communication technology over the past three decades.

In August, Congress in a bipartisan manner took an important first step forward to close our Nation's intelligence gap; but, unfortunately, only for a 6-month period. The Protect America Act passed only after repeated attempts by Republicans to give our Nation's intelligence professionals the tools and the authority they need to protect our homeland. This action was long overdue and this law marked a significant step towards improving our security.

Now Congress must act again to renew this law by early next year before it expires or our national security will once again be at risk. Unfortunately, the legislation before us today, the RESTORE Act, does not provide the security we need to protect our troops and our Nation from a potential future terrorist attack. The bill also weakens Americans' privacy protections and fails to permanently close our Nation's intelligence gap.

Specifically, Mr. Speaker, the RESTORE Act does not go far enough to reform outdated FISA regulations that burden our troops in the battlefield. It contains no provision for third parties to challenge FISA court orders. The bill also creates a centralized database that could actually increase the risk of privacy violations. Another major concern is that the RESTORE Act contains yet another sunset provision that forces the bill to expire on December 31, 2009, unnecessarily leaving our intelligence officials without the tools they need to protect Americans.

It is alarming to me that this rule brings a bill to the House floor that goes so far as to weaken American privacy provisions while at the same time strengthening protections of our enemies in times of war.

Mr. Speaker, as I mentioned earlier, nearly 30 amendments were submitted by Members on both sides of the aisle to address these and other concerns with the Democrat majority's failed attempt to update our current FISA laws. However, none of these amendments, which ranged from permanently strengthening our FISA laws to acquiring communications of foreign terrorists in foreign countries without a FISA court order, were allowed to be considered on the House floor today under this rule.

Mr. Speaker, it is truly disappointing to me that every Member of this House is prohibited from offering changes to this bill that could make it more effective in our constant battle to prevent a future terrorist attack against our Nation. After all, if we cannot come together and work in a bipartisan manner on issues as important as improving our national security, then what can we work together on.

Sadly, because the Democrat majority has chosen to consider the RESTORE Act under this closed process, working together in a bipartisan manner will not be possible. Instead, if this rule is adopted, Members will only have a choice to vote for or against a seriously flawed bill that threatens, not improves, our national security. Sadly, this closed process shuts out all American voices from being heard and, ultimately, every American could suffer consequences if this rule and bill are adopted. Therefore, I urge my colleagues to vote against the rule.

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

Mr. Speaker, how much time is there on both sides?

Mr. Speaker, I'm pleased to yield 4 minutes to the distinguished ranking member of the Rules Committee, Mr. Dreier of California.

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

Mr. Speaker, I'm pleased to yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Frelinghuysen).

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

Mr. Speaker, I'm pleased to yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Royce), a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Kansas (Mr. Tiahrt), a member of the Intelligence Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 3 minutes to another member of the Intelligence Committee, Mr. Rogers of Michigan.

Mr. Speaker, once again, how much time is remaining on both sides?

Mr. Speaker, at this time I am pleased to yield 2 minutes to a member of the Judiciary Committee, Mr. Gohmert of Texas.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield at this time 2\1/2\ minutes to a member of the Judiciary Committee, Mr. Franks of Arizona.

Mr. Speaker, I know my friend has more time than I have, and I have more requests for time than I have time for. And so, Mr. Speaker, I would ask unanimous consent that each side get an additional 5 minutes so I can accommodate the requests on my side.

Mr. Speaker, I wonder then if I could inquire of my friend, since he has more time, if maybe he would yield me at least enough time so I can close on my

side, and I'd ask my friend from New York if he would do that for me.

Mr. Speaker, I yield for a unanimous consent request to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Mack).

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

Mr. Speaker, how much time do I have left, and how much time does the other side have?

Mr. Speaker, I ask the gentleman from New York if he has any more speakers.

Mr. Speaker, I'll reserve my time.

I would inquire of my friend from New York if they have any additional speakers.

How much time do I have on my side?

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

Today, Mr. Speaker, I will be asking my colleagues to vote ``no'' on the previous question so that I can amend the rule to allow for a substitute amendment to be offered by Mr. Hoekstra of Michigan or Mr. Smith of Texas. This will give the House an opportunity to consider additional views that were denied with this closed rule in the Rules Committee last night.

And, Mr. Speaker, September 28, 2006, we had a debate on this issue last year, and I'd like to quote a Member and what he said on the House floor. And I quote: ``You beat with rulemaking that which you know you cannot beat with reason.''

And he goes on to say, ``I know what you say: Do as you say, not as we do. For today, in the people's House democracy has been eviscerated by those who recommend it to others. I have said it before. The way the majority runs the House is shameful. It is undemocratic. It happens every single day that we have a closed rule.''

The speaker was my good friend from Florida (Mr. Hastings).

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to have the text of the amendment and extraneous material inserted into the Record prior to the vote on the previous question.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to oppose the previous question and the closed rule.

I yield back the balance of my time.

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

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 746 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to my namesake and good friend, the gentleman from Washington (Mr. Hastings). All time yielded during consideration of the rule is for debate only.

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

General Leave

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on the matter under consideration.

Mr. Speaker, House Resolution 746 provides for consideration of H.R. 3773, the RESTORE Act of 2007, under a closed rule. The rule provides 90 minutes of debate. Sixty minutes will be equally divided and controlled by the chairman and

ranking minority member of the Committee on the Judiciary. Thirty minutes will be equally divided and controlled by the chairman and ranking minority member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence.

Mr. Speaker, with the resurgence of al Qaeda and an increasing global threat from weapons of mass destruction in places such as Iran, every single person in this body wants to ensure that our intelligence professionals have the proper resources they need to protect our Nation. As vice chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, I assure you that every one of us on that panel and others, Republican or Democrat, are working tirelessly and often together to do just that. But the government is not exempt from the rule of law, as our Constitution confers certain unalienable rights and civil liberties to each of us.

After the terrorist attacks of September 11, the Bush administration upset that balance by ignoring the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, commonly referred to as the FISA law, establishing a secret wiretapping program and refusing to work with Congress to make the program lawful. Democratic members of the Intelligence Committee, led by the distinguished chairperson, Sylvestre Reyes, have been trying to learn about the Bush administration's FISA program for years. But the administration, which has been anything but forthcoming, has done everything it can to stop us from doing our job and helping them to do theirs better.

A footnote right there, Mr. Speaker. In today's Washington Post, it is reflected as late as now, when the RESTORE Act is on the floor, the administration has agreed to give certain information to the Senate and still not to the House.

When the administration finally came to Congress to modify the law, it came with the flawed proposal to allow sweeping authority to eavesdrop on Americans' communications, while doing almost nothing to protect their rights. The RESTORE Act, true to its name, restores the checks and balances on the executive branch, enhancing our security and preserving our liberty. It rejects the false statement that we must sacrifice liberty to be secure. It does not go as far as I would want it to go. It does not go as far as some people would like for it to go, but it does protect our liberty and secures this Nation.

The legislation provides our intelligence community with the tools it needs to identify and disrupt terrorist attacks with speed and agility.

Yet another footnote, Mr. Speaker. While we concentrate on surveillance as it pertains to wire, I would have people know that the terrorists by now have been pretty well educated about these matters and may very well be using other methodologies totally unrelated to the telephone.

I remind people when it was leaked to the media that Osama bin Laden was using a certain kind of wire, he hasn't been heard from in that forum since. So let's be very cautious to not put all our eggs in the surveillance basket. There are other methodologies that might be employed that I assure you the intelligence community is mindful of and right on as it pertains to discovering them.

It provides additional resources to the Department of Justice, the National Security Agency and the FISA Court to assist in auditing and streamlining the FISA application process while preventing the backlog of critical intelligence gathering.

The RESTORE Act prohibits the warrantless electronic surveillance of Americans in the United States, including their medical records, homes and offices. And it requires the government to establish a recordkeeping system to track instances where information identifying U.S. citizens is disseminated.

This bill preserves the role of the FISA Court as an independent check on the government to prevent it from infringing on the rights of Americans. It rejects the administration's belief that the court should be a rubber stamp.

Finally, the bill sunsets in 2009. This is a critical provision because it requires the constant oversight and regular evaluation of our FISA laws, actions which were largely neglected during the last 6 years of Republican rule.

Mr. Speaker, all the American people have to do is pick up a newspaper to read about what happens when this government has unfettered access to warrantless electronic surveillance. According to a letter to Congress from a company executive, Verizon alone has fielded almost 240,000 phone record requests from the FBI since 2005. Nearly 64,000 of these requests, or over one-quarter of them, were made without a warrant.

This is almost 100 phone record requests per day by our government to Verizon seeking private information about our citizens, without a warrant. Realize, we are just talking about requests made to Verizon by the FBI. And these are just the requests that Verizon told Congress about this week because the Bush administration has consistently refused to answer our questions about the President's program.

Even more, it doesn't factor in the hundreds of thousands of requests that were made to other phone companies during the same time that we don't know about.

Mr. Speaker, if we have learned anything since the terrorist attacks of September 11, it is that the balance between security and civil liberties is not only difficult, but absolutely critical.

The RESTORE Act does absolutely nothing to block or hinder the efforts of our intelligence community. And Member after Member on the other side of the aisle are going to come down here and comment that it is hampering our intelligence efforts. Quite the contrary. It enhances their ability to do their jobs effectively and ensures the integrity of their efforts. I urge my colleagues to support this rule and the underlying legislation.

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

Mr. Speaker, before I yield, I would like to assist my colleague from Washington, who is my good friend and was in the majority last year when the Wilson bill, H.R. 5825, the Electronic Surveillance Modernization Act, was considered by the House. It was considered under a closed rule, H. Res. 1052, which self-executed an amendment in the nature of a substitute in lieu of amendments recommended by the Judiciary and Intelligence Committees. I think that is the precedent.

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pascrell), my very good friend who serves on the Ways and Means Committee and the Homeland Security Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I make one reference to the Computer and Communications Industry Association which writes in support of the House Judiciary Committee's approach to retroactive immunity, contrary to what the previous speaker, my good friend, the ranking member, just said regarding that matter.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey, a distinguished member of the Intelligence Committee, my good friend Rush Holt, who is also Chair of the Special Intelligence Oversight Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the distinguished chairperson of the Intelligence Committee, Silvestre Reyes.

Mr. Speaker, I yield to my distinguished friend and colleague from Texas, Sheila Jackson-Lee, 1 minute. But before I do, I would like to have Mr. Royce understand that he is entitled to his opinion but he is not entitled to his facts. And the facts as he recited them with reference to what Director O'Connell said occurred under the old FISA law, not this one. And I might add, that old FISA law was good enough to participate in bringing down the German possible terrorists.

With that in mind, I would like to yield 1 minute to the distinguished gentlelady from Houston, Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee).

(Ms. JACKSON-LEE asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

Mr. Speaker, how much time remains on each side?

Mr. Speaker, I am prepared to reserve my time. And as a matter of courtesy to my good friend from Washington and to you, Mr. Speaker, I would like to indicate that I will be replaced in managing the time, although not required under the rules, by my distinguished colleague from New York, Michael Arcuri.

I reserve my time.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding and commend him for his excellent management of this rule affording us the opportunity to bring this important legislation to the floor.

I commend Chairman Reyes and Chairman Conyers for their leadership

in protecting and defending the American people by putting forth the best way to collect intelligence under the law.

Mr. Speaker, as we say over and over again here, and each one of us who comes to serve in this body, indeed, everyone who serves our country takes an oath of office to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. It's a thrill to take that oath of office.

As we protect and defend the American people in the preamble, it says to form a more perfect Union, Mr. Jackson has been a champion on that, to provide for the common defense. In that preamble, that's a high priority for us. We have a responsibility to protect the American people; that makes everything else possible in our community and in our society.

But as we protect and defend the American people, our oath of office calls upon us to protect and defend the Constitution and our civil liberties. The legislation before us today does just that. It's about protecting the American people from terrorism and other national security threats.

I, for a long time, have served on the Intelligence Committee, both as a member, as the ranking member, and also ex officio as leader and now as Speaker. I believe very firmly in the role that intelligence gathering plays in protecting the American people. We want to prevent war. We want to prevent harm to our forces. Force protection is a very, very high priority for us. Protection of our forces. And we must now meet this horrible challenge of fighting terrorism in the world. It has been a challenge for some time. In order to do that, we have to have the laws in place in order to collect that intelligence under the law, and that is what this legislation does. First, it helps us defend our country against terrorism and other threats. Secondly, it protects the privacy of the American people, which is important to them and a responsibility for us. And third, this legislation restores a system of checks and balances and how we protect and defend our country and provides for rigorous oversight by Congress of this collection.

In the 1970s, when the FISA law was passed, it was conceded that Congress had a role in determining how intelligence was conducted, how the executive branch conducted the collection of intelligence, the executive branch, Congress, making laws to govern that, two Houses, two branches of government. And in the FISA bill that was passed at that time, the role of the third branch of government was defined, the FISA Courts. That system of checks and balances has served our country well. With the advance of technology, additional challenges arose, and this legislation meets those challenges. Any suggestions to the contrary are simply not factual. What the Director of National Intelligence has asked for in terms of collection he has received in this legislation, and he has received it under the law.

The legislation restores checks and balances in other ways. It rejects groundless claims of inherent executive authority. Under that, we might as well just crown the President king and just say he has access to any information in our country, and he may collect that outside the law.

And this legislation reiterates that the law enacted by Congress, FISA, Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, is the exclusive means for conducting electronic surveillance to gather foreign intelligence. The principle of exclusivity is a very, very important principle, and it is enshrined in this legislation.

The bill also sunsets by December 31, 2009, at the same time the PATRIOT Act sunsets, so the next administration and another Congress can review whether the new program appropriately meets national security and civil liberty objectives.

This bill does not provide immunity to telecommunications companies that participated in the President's warrantless surveillance program. As I have said many times, you can't even consider such relief unless we know what people are asking for immunity from. Congress is not a rubber stamp; we are a coequal branch of government. We have a right to know what conduct the administration wants us to immunize against.

Working side by side, the Intelligence Committee and the Judiciary Committee have produced an excellent bill. It has been heralded so by those organizations whose organized purpose is to protect our civil liberties in light of our responsibility to our national security. It has been heralded by those who follow and hold as a value the privacy of the American people. It has been heralded by those who understand that one of our first responsibilities is to provide for the common defense. Our Founders understood it well, the balance that needed to be struck between security and liberty. They spoke eloquently to it in their speeches. They enshrined it in the Constitution. Let us protect the American people under the law.

Please, my colleagues, support this very important legislation.

Let me thank the distinguished gentleman from Florida, a former jurist, and let me acknowledge that the RESTORE Act is the right balance between national security and the protection of our civil liberties.

I beg to differ with my good friend from California because in fact there are elements of this bill that clearly provide the parameters for foreign-to-foreign surveillance. The only difference is the fact that we protect an American citizen who may be targeted inappropriately as the court intervenes in providing a warrant.

My friends, we are moving forward to secure America. I support this rule and I support the rule in its present form, because we need to now substitute a real bill that secures America supported by the language of Director McConnell and as well provides the civil liberties that all Americans deserve. I look forward to the debate on the floor. The RESTORE Act is what it is says, protecting us and providing the right surveillance and ensuring that terrorists do not attack America.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support H. Res. 746, the rule governing debate on H.R. 3773, the RESTORE Act. I thank the gentlemen for yielding and wish to use my time to discuss an important improvement in the bill that was adopted in the full Judiciary Committee markup.

The Jackson-Lee Amendment added during the markup makes a constructive contribution to this important legislation that already is superior to the misnamed ``Protect America Act'' by orders of magnitude. It does this simply by laying down a clear, objective criterion for the Administration to follow and the FISA court to enforce in preventing reverse targeting.

``Reverse targeting,'' a concept well known to members of this Committee but not so well understood by those less steeped in the arcana of electronic surveillance, is the practice where the government targets foreigners without a warrant while its actual purpose is to collect information on certain U.S. persons.

One of the major concerns that libertarians and classical conservatives, as well as progressives and civil liberties organizations, have with the PAA is that the understandable temptation of national security agencies to engage in reverse targeting may be difficult to

resist in the absence of strong safeguards in the PAA to prevent it.

My amendment reduces even further any such temptation to resort to reverse targeting by requiring the Administration to obtain a regular, individualized FISA warrant whenever the ``real'' target of the surveillance is a person in the United States.

The amendment achieves this objective by requiring the Administration to obtain a regular FISA warrant whenever a ``significant purpose of an acquisition is to acquire the communications of a specific person reasonably believed to be located in the United States.'' The current language in the bill provides that a warrant be obtained only when the Government ``seeks to conduct electronic surveillance'' of a person reasonably believed to be located in the United States.

It was far from clear how the operative language ``seeks to'' is to be interpreted. In contrast, the language used in my amendment, ``significant purpose,'' is a term of art that has long been a staple of FISA jurisprudence and thus is well known and readily applied by the agencies, legal practitioners, and the FISA Court. Thus, the Jackson Lee Amendment provides a clearer, more objective, criterion for the Administration to follow and the FISA court to enforce to prevent the practice of reverse targeting without a warrant, which all of us can agree should not be permitted.

I hasten to add, Mr. Speaker, that nothing in the bill or in my amendment will requires the Government to obtain a FISA order for every overseas target on the off chance that they might pick up a call into or from the United States. Rather, the bill requires, as our amendment makes clear, a FISA order only where there is a particular, known person in the United States at the other end of the foreign target's calls in whom the Government has a significant interest such that a significant purpose of the surveillance has become to acquire that person's communications.

This will usually happen over time and the Government will have the time to get an order while continuing its surveillance. And it is the national security interest to require it to obtain an order at that point, so that it can lawfully acquire all of the target person's communications rather than continuing to listen to only some of them.

In short, my amendment gives the Government precisely what Director of National Intelligence McConnell asked for when he testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee:

``It is very important to me; it is very important to members of this Committee. We should be required--we should be required in all cases to have a warrant anytime there is surveillance of a US [sic] person located in the United States.''

In short, my amendment makes a good bill even better. For these reasons, I am happy to support the rule and urge all members to do likewise.

Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and agree to the resolution (H. Res. 549) recognizing the importance of America's Waterway Watch program, and for other purposes.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks on H. Res. 549.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. House Resolution 549, introduced by Congressman Gus Bilirakis, recognizes the contributions made to our Nation's security by the Coast Guard's Waterway Watch program. As chairman of the Subcommittee on Coast Guard and Maritime Transportation, I strongly support the Waterway Watch program, and I support the resolution offered by the gentleman from Florida.

Put simply, America's Waterway Watch program enlists the 70 million Americans who work, play or live around our Nation's waterfronts, rivers, lakes, and coastal regions to become part of our Nation's first line of defense by observing and reporting suspicious activities. Founded by the Coast Guard in 2004, the Waterway Watch is similar to earlier Coast Watch programs instituted during World War II.

At the time, the Coast Watch program was comprised of a group of volunteers who scanned our coasts for U-boats threatening U.S. shipping. Today, America's Waterway Watch calls on volunteers to aid in the war on terrorism on our home front. People are advised to take note of suspicious activities and, if it can be done safely, they are encouraged to take photographs or videotape of the occurrence. Observers are then asked to immediately report incidents they have witnessed by calling 911 or the America's Waterway Watch 24-hour national toll-free telephone number, 1-877-24-WATCH. Reported information is then sent to the National Response Center located at Coast Guard headquarters to be evaluated and dispersed to local Coast Guard responders.

I emphasize that this watch program is meant to be a simple deterrent to potential terrorist activity by asking

those who frequent our waterways, ports, and waterfront areas to report events and people that seem out of place. It is not a surveillance program and is not meant to spread paranoia.

Mr. Speaker, as chairman of the Coast Guard and Maritime Transportation Subcommittee, I also commend the Coast Guard Auxiliary, which is at the forefront of the Waterway Watch program. The auxiliary is the uniformed civilian component of the Coast Guard. It is primarily responsible for implementing programs that serve the recreational boating community. In fact, the auxiliary helps to promote America's Waterway Watch through their well-established recreational boating safety programs.

I also commend the Nationwide Insurance Company, which has supported the Waterway Watch program by giving the Coast Guard Auxiliary Association a $96,000 grant to support the auxiliary's role in the Coast Guard's maritime homeland security missions. The grant funded the purchase of Waterway Watch stickers that boaters can display on their boats. It also funded the printing of brochures, wallet cards, and posters that provide pertinent information on the watch program, including detailing how citizens can become involved in the program and listing the numbers that can be called to report suspicious activities.

The Coast Guard's active duty, Reserve and auxiliary forces have united with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, and the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and local law enforcement agencies to detect and deter threatening activities at waterfront facilities.

However, there are some 95,000 miles of shoreline, 300,000 square miles of waterways, 6,000 bridges, 360 ports of call, and 12,000 marinas in the United States; and the Coast Guard and other first responders simply cannot watch all of these facilities all the time. America's Waterway Watch program ensures that ordinary citizens can help our Nation's uniformed agencies protect our homeland simply by remaining vigilant in their own communities.

Mr. Speaker, in closing, I again express my support for America's Waterway Watch program, which helps keep citizens involved in watching our Nation's shores and waterways, and recognizes the importance of the service they are providing. I urge my colleagues to adopt H. Res. 549 and again commend Congressman Bilirakis for his work on this measure. I also congratulate and thank my colleague, the ranking member of our Coast Guard and Maritime Transportation Subcommittee (Mr. LaTourette), for his cooperation in this bipartisan effort.

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

We will reserve, Mr. Speaker.

We have no other speakers.

Mr. Speaker, I continue to reserve.

We are prepared to do so.

Mr. Speaker, we urge Members to vote for this very meaningful resolution, and we wholeheartedly support it. I want to thank the sponsor for his thoughtful piece of legislation.

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