National Security and Federal Lands Protection Act

I thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I am here tonight to talk about one of the issues that is of extreme significance. In fact, in every town hall meeting I've ever held, one of the first questions that's asked, if not the first question, is about illegal entry into this country and is about, specifically, border security.

So in talking about what the issue is before us, this is a map of the United States that is divided into the Border Patrol sectors, the areas that the Border Patrol has. As you will see, if you can, from the numbers, there is a vast difference in the numbers of people coming illegally into this country based on the sectors.

If you go to the sector of the State of Maine, the last time we had verifiable figures, the last time we had complete figures from the Border Patrol and from the Department of Homeland Security, only 56 illegals were apprehended trying to get into Maine, which has to tell you that there are not a whole lot of people from Nova Scotia who are trying to come over here and take hockey jobs. In fact, I have to think they probably looked at them as tourists.

But if you look down here in the area in blue, the Tucson, Arizona, sector, which is only part of Arizona--it's not the entire State of Arizona--in the last 2 years for which we have complete data, 51 percent, or a quarter of a million people, came through Arizona. In fact, 51 percent of all of the people who illegally came into the United States and who were apprehended came through the Tucson, Arizona, sector and were apprehended in the Tucson, Arizona, sector. This has to bring about the simple question of why.

Why is this part of Arizona the obvious entrance of choice of those trying to get into this country illegally? I really think the answer lies in the next chart.

This is the borderland along our southern border. The black line is 100 miles from the border, which is, by definition, both by statute and judicial decision, the legal jurisdiction of our Border Patrol. The area in red is the area that is owned by the Federal Government in those areas. You'll see that that specific area of Arizona--almost 80 percent of that--is owned by the Federal Government. That's almost 21 million acres of land owned by the Federal Government, which is in sharp contrast to, say, the Texas border and especially the northern border. Of that roughly 21 million acres, an area the size of the States of Connecticut and Delaware combined is wilderness area, and that doesn't include also areas that are endangered species habitats.

Those areas that are red are where we find the Federal Government prohibiting the Border Patrol from doing its job. The Border Patrol actually has access in the white areas--private property--to do their job. It is only when the Federal Government stops the Federal Border Patrol from doing their job on Federal property that we seem to have a problem.

Unfortunately, those coming into the country seem to realize that this area where the Federal Government stops the Federal Border Patrol on Federal land, as unusual and bizarre as that seems, becomes the entrance of choice for their coming into this country. I'm not just talking about immigrants, people who are coming over here to try to find jobs in some particular way. This is the entrance of choice of the drug cartels. The Border Patrol will tell you privately that their best estimate--only an estimate--is that 40 percent of those coming into this area of Arizona, in fact, into the country, are part of the drug cartel.

They don't care if the economy is going up and down. They don't care if there is E-Verify or not. They are still trying to come into this country. They will tell you, roughly 80 percent of the illegal drugs coming into this country are still coming by the drug cartel area.

What is worse, it is not just the drug cartel. This is also the kind of human degradation that is taking place.

There is a Seattle Times story that ran in 2009, and the title was, ``Pacific pair accused of smuggling, enslaving illegal Mexican immigrants.'' The story was about the human trafficking we have that is a very serious problem and the kinds of violent acts that are used against women and children on this Federal property. The Seattle Times went on to illustrate the kinds of violent acts against humanity that are happening right here on American soil, the kinds of numerous accounts of rape and other violent acts that are taking place against women and children here.

The counties--and I have been down there on the border and I have seen evidence of this--have ample evidence, if you go along these trafficking routes, of rape trees in which the drug cartel members, sometimes other illegal immigrants, will rape females and then force the victim to leave an article of clothing, usually an undergarment, on the trees and make this as if it is a type of monument to the horrible activity that is taking place on government land. Yet still we do not give the Border Patrol access on government land that they have on private property.

We are a sovereign country and, by definition, a sovereign country controls its borders, and that should be what we are doing. Unfortunately, we are not doing that at all.

This is what the border down there in Arizona will look like from the air. You see, going along here is a fence--the fence doesn't go all the way up the mountainside; there are some areas in which fencing does not make sense and cannot be done--and there is one road that goes along the fence. That is the access that our Border Patrol has in this particular area, and in some cases that becomes the sole access.

If you talk to the Border Patrol agents by themselves, when they will be honest with you, they will clearly tell you they don't need more money to fight this problem on the border. They don't necessarily need more personnel. What they need is access, east-west access so they can go somewhere other than along the one road that follows the border line and the border fence. That is what becomes extremely significant.

What is so bizarre, what is so bizarre in that is that the Border Patrol must obtain permission or a permit from Federal land management agencies before its agents can maintain roads or install surveillance equipment on the lands or do what we ask them to do; and that, frankly, is simply wrong and, once again, ludicrous.

Now, you see, it's one of those odd things that we stop the Border Patrol from doing their job and, instead, we find that environmental degradation is taking place, but not by the Border Patrol, not by any other American citizens, but by those who are illegally coming across.

This simply is one of the pictures of the kinds of trash that is left behind on private property and on public property, tons of which must be picked up, resulting from the fact that we do not have a Border Patrol that does have ability to patrol these particular areas. That's what's left behind.

I hate to say this, but the drug cartel who was coming over doesn't care about wilderness designation. They don't care about endangered species habitat. They don't care about the endangered species--unless it can be eaten. What they do is simply leave behind all of the trash as they are coming through. There is something wrong with that.

This is another picture of what takes place there on the border. The cactus, this time being cacti along the border, is an endangered species that has been cut down by the drug cartels. If any other American did that, that becomes a felony. For them, all this is is a nice roadblock along one of the few roads that is there. So when somebody else comes down there in a vehicle and stops, they are a perfect target for mugging and robbing and anything they want. You will find some of the cacti that's down there has graffiti on it, which shows certain areas where the cartel is in operation.

The last couple of years, there have been some major fires down there along the southern border. The last large fire that went through Arizona and spilled over into New Mexico was a fire that started in two parts. The part up in northern Arizona probably was started by a camper, but in southern Arizona, that wasn't it. The Forest Service has yet to determine who started that fire that spilled over into New Mexico and cost hundreds of millions of dollars in damage. They have ruled out everyone except, well, illegal aliens that happened to be close to the known smuggling trails where the fire actually started.

You see, what happens down there is there are three types of fires that are started, two of them on purpose:

One is a distress fire, in which case if somebody coming across the border is in a dire situation, lost their ability to go any further and they need rescuing, you start a fire, because then obviously the firefighters will come in and you will get rescued.

There are also diversion fires started specifically. A diversion fire is to make sure that when the fire starts over here and everyone runs over there to stop the fire, it means over here is now open for your entry into this country. The drug cartels have this down to a habit and a style all of their own.

The third part is simply an accidental fire. I think the assumption is that the last fires that were done down there were probably accidental fires, started indeed by those coming across the border illegally, but definitely not for a diversion and not for a distraction, just it was a problem that caused us an enormous amount of loss of public wealth and public time in trying to fix that particular problem.

The Department of the Interior claims that the 1964 Wilderness Act takes precedence over everything else that is taking place on this property. They say that their duties are to fulfill this particular act, not necessarily to control the border. In fact, one of the letters that they sent reads very carefully. It says:

Issues remain, and we seek your (the Border Patrol's)

assistance in resolving them as quickly as possible in order

to prevent the significant, and perhaps irreversible,

environmental damage we believe is imminent. Specifically, we

are concerned with operating vehicles anywhere other than

roads, road dragging, and other activities that could cause

erosion and mobilize fragile hydric soil characteristic of

the San Bernadino Wildlife Refuge.

What that says, in simple terms, is it doesn't really matter what the Border Patrol does; you don't want them to disturb the soil even if it means being able to apprehend somebody illegal, especially the drug cartels coming over there. They would rather have the soil not bothered than actually find somebody who is entering this country illegally, especially part of the drug cartels.

This is where I started. This is a response, once again, from the Department of the Interior to the Border Patrol on this area:

The issue of emergency vehicle access by the U.S. Customs

and Border Protection on San Bernadino Wildlife Refuge has

been in dispute over the past few months. The recent

exchange of letters from our respective offices failed to

clearly identify the needs of our two agencies and reach

agreement on how to best proceed.

Now, once again, from my point of view, the way to best proceed is to stop the drug cartels from smuggling illegal drugs over here, not necessarily what took place. In fact, what they decided then, it says the Federal land managers believe it is their duty to enforce restrictive laws associated with the Wilderness Act, even if it helps the drug cartel in their drug trafficking and the human smuggling and other criminal activities that are occurring as they cross into the United States.

The chief also went on to say:

``Emergency circumstances exist''--that's nice of them--``when human life, health, and safety of persons within this area must be immediately addressed. Access to the refuge by the Border Patrol will be limited to the use of established administrative roads. However, you may access on foot to patrol or apprehend suspects.''

Managers of the land are dictating to the Border Patrol how they will do their job. I might add that this definition of what considers the chance of a Border Patrol actually going in and doing something rapidly is not what the memo of understanding between the Department of the Interior and the Department of Homeland Security actually said. They came up with their own definition to stop the Border Patrol from doing it.

Now, under this recommendation, the Border Patrol has to drive around this refuge, which adds hours to get to the other side, which obviously, if you're trying to capture somebody, something just doesn't work.

So since that's what's taking place, how does the Department of the Interior decide to solve the problem? It's easy; they put up gates. That was the result of that exchange on how to solve the problem of controlling our southern border. What the Department of the Interior simply did is they put up a gate with a lock on it on the San Bernardino National Wildlife Refuge.

It's amazing that they thought this solves the problem, because what this gate does is block out the Border Patrol from going into this area. It doesn't lock out anyone else. It doesn't lock out the drug cartel, the human traffickers, or anyone else from trying to come into this particular area.

Early on when Janet Napolitano became head of Homeland Security, we received a couple of letters from her. They actually said what the issue was down there on the border with the Border Patrol. She wrote:

``One issue affecting the efficacy of the Border Patrol operations within wilderness is prohibitions against mechanical conveyances''-- that's like four-wheelers--or in the air. ``The U.S. Border Patrol regularly depends on these conveyances, the removal of such advantage being generally detrimental to its ability to accomplish the national security missions.''

In simple language, if you stop us from going on motorized vehicles into these areas, we can't catch the bad guys.

This includes that these types of restrictions can impact

the efficacy of operations and be a hindrance to the

maintenance of officer safety.

It makes their job more difficult and it puts them at risk. She continued:

For example, it may be inadvisable for officer safety to

wait for the arrival of horses for pursuit purposes, or to

attempt to apprehend smuggling vehicles within the wilderness

with a less capable form of transportation.

In simple words, again, if the idea is of the Department of the Interior that the Border Patrol, when they come to one of these special areas, have to go on foot, they have to chase them down on foot or wait till a horse arrives so they can chase them down on horse, while the drug cartels are using motorized vehicles, that flat out does not make sense. But that is, indeed, what is happening down there.

She continued on with a different correspondence to say that it illustrates that in areas where the Border Patrol has been given access, the regrowth and rehabilitation of the land has improved.

But ``overall, the removal of cross-border violators''--stopping the drug cartel from coming across the border--``from public lands is a value to the environment as well as to the mission of the land managers. The validity of this statement was evidenced recently when the vehicle fence project south of the Buenos Aires National Wildlife Refuge received praise from a Fish and Wildlife biologist. The biologist was encouraged by the regrowth and rehabilitation taking place naturally to the north of the vehicle fence subsequent to its installation.''

Now, what she was saying very simply is, when you stop the Border Patrol from being able to do their job, they don't do their job and the bad guys come across. And the bad guys don't care at all about the environment or what the laws are or what the rules are. And if you are able to stop them, then all of the degradation that takes place by the drug cartel coming across the border can be fixed, and can be fixed well.

Now, I have to admit that was early on in her administration with the Department of Homeland Security. I have to admit also, of late, that the Department of Homeland Security has been told to simply tell us everything is going fine down there on the border. Things are getting better. We are working together nicely.

It's not quite the same story I got on the trips down there to the border when I talked to the people. In fact, one of the things that is actually disturbing is our committee staff has been refused access to even talk to the Department of Homeland Security personnel ever since we started making this particular kind of push.

My assumption is there is a reason the drug cartels are trying to go through this Arizona sector. The reason relates to the kinds of lands that are down there and how we treat those lands. And the reason simply says, if we allow the Border Patrol to do their job, we will all be much more secure. And the concept of stopping the Border Patrol from doing their job on Federal property is simply unacceptable, and yet that is, indeed, what we are doing right now.

To the Department of the Interior's response to that, they said the following in a memo in 2008:

``Congress has directed construction of these facilities''--meaning the public lands--``and there is a compelling national security issue, but these towers and buildings and associated equipment and motorized activities within congressionally designated wilderness would be contrary to protecting the primeval character of wilderness; and, hence, contrary to the intent of Congress.''

Contrary to the intent of Congress? Do they really want us to believe that Congress wants to have a porous border? that Congress actually welcomes with open arms the drug cartels coming into this country? that the illegal drugs coming in here that are destroying the lives of our children we welcome with open arms? that the kind of human degradation, the kind of victim crimes, crimes against humanity, are something Congress really wants to perpetuate? That's really what they want us to believe?

Further on in this memo:

``The Department of Homeland Security's proposals would not preserve natural conditions''--this is once again Interior's memo--``would make the imprint of man's work substantially noticeable, and would substantially reduce opportunities for solitude, or a primitive and unconfined type of recreation and would impair these areas for their future use and enjoyment of the American people as wilderness. The DHS proposals do not fall under the exemptions of the prohibitions for use in section 4(c) of the Wilderness Act and, therefore, are prohibited.''

Reduce opportunities for solitude? Unconfined type of recreation? Maybe they do have a point. I'd say that the drug cartel operatives, armed with AK 47s, would pretty much reduce the solitude in a pretty serious way along the border. But, unfortunately, that is the approach; that is the attitude.

So what does the Department of the Interior propose for this? Rather than allowing the Border Patrol to do their job and trying to control our border, which a sovereign country would naturally do, you put up a sign to tell Americans that travel is not recommended. The goal is to stay away from these particular areas. The approach was simply this: Since the areas of American land on the American border are unsafe, let's do whatever we

can to stop Americans from going down there and, in so doing, cede over these areas to the drug cartels. That will be one of the ways of solving the problem.

Since that's not a terribly, terribly politically correct approach, to warn the public of the danger of traveling through American territory, perhaps you can put up a softer and gentler sign, which is a travel caution: Smuggling and illegal immigration may be encountered in this area. Proceed at your own risk.

I'm sorry. This may be the approach, but it's the wrong approach. And I wish this were just limited to the Arizona border. The same line was used in the Big Bend National Park, and it has been used on other lands around the border. We simply know it is not safe to go into these areas where criminal activity is taking place, and the problem is no one is doing anything about it.

Almost all of the Organ Pipe National Monument was closed to visitors. That's along the Arizona border. Recently I saw an article in which a portion--a portion--of Organ Pipe was opened up to visitors. That's wonderful. However, if you went there, you still had to go with an armed guard. There's an article that was written only 8 hours ago talking about the opportunity of people going down there where the park ranger, wearing a bulky, dark green bulletproof vest, told the tourists last week that they would be going on their travel in a van and a hike. He told them that there would be some law enforcement officers hiding in the hills and closely watching their 2-hour nature hike, while another pair of armed rangers would follow the tourists closely from the ground. They'll all have M14s at hand, he said. Please don't be worried.

As the group loaded into the vans, one woman from Idaho whispered to her husband:

Does it make you worried? They get chest protections, and

we don't get none of them.

Homeland Security is saying that in this park, things are getting better. I think they are because finally they allowed Homeland Security to put up nine surveillance towers in the park, making it easier for the agents to detect new foot traffic so that drug-runners are no longer simply hiding in the hills waiting to succeed where the towers cannot contact them.

You see, that's what we're doing, and that's simply not a viable approach to it.

Let me try to tell you this way. Obviously, a fence by itself is not enough to secure the border. We do need electronic tracking devices. This is a picture of one of our mobile tracking devices. It's very high tech, it's very wonderful, and if you will notice, it's a truck with a traffic device on it.

In the Organ Pipe National Monument, they tried to move this from point A to point B, and the end result was that after 6 months, the land managers finally said, okay, you can move this truck from point A to point B. By that time, it wasn't worth it. It's a truck. Now, if the land manager had studied this issue for 6 months and then said, all right, look, the land is too precious in that part where you want to go, you can't go at all, maybe I could understand that. I wouldn't like it, but I could understand it. But that's not what he said. He said, you're going to wait 6 months, I'll review it for 6 months, and 6 months later he said, okay, go ahead and back up the truck and move it.

These devices are essential for our controlling the border, but it is essential that if it is a mobile device, it has to be mobile. It has to have the ability to back up the truck and move it to somewhere else.

There is another example of the pronghorn antelope that is there, the Sonoran pronghorn antelope, in the area. A BLM official wrote in an email to the Department of Homeland Security regarding testing for replacement of equipment that they could do the following: A biological monitor shall be present--a person--shall be present at the proposed location of these traffic monitors for the Sonoran pronghorn prior to any disturbance. The monitor must have experience with observing pronghorns. The monitor will scan the area for pronghorn, and, if observed, any kind of activity will be delayed until the pronghorn moves of its own volition. The pronghorn cannot be encouraged to vacate an area. And if by any chance the Border Patrol were to run across a group of these, its job was then to back up--not turn around--but to back up no faster than 15 miles an hour until you were out of that particular area.

One of the things that we have found out that is taking place down there is basically the Department of the Interior is insisting on mitigation--I think there are some other words I would rather use-- mitigation funds coming from the Department of Homeland Security.

The calculations we conducted a couple of years ago say that, as of that date, $10 million of Federal money has gone to the Border Patrol, supposedly to protect our border, and then instead been reverted over to the Department of the Interior to hire things like the pronghorn monitor or buy other property for other purposes in the name of mitigation of the environmental damage caused by the Border Patrol. Unfortunately, there is no way to mitigate against the environmental damage caused by the drug cartels and the human smugglers coming in here, nor does the Department of the Interior seem to care about that.

I'm joined here by a good friend from Arizona who knows this full well. This is where he lives, and he understands it. He also sits on the committee that talks about these particular areas and has introduced an amendment to the reauthorization bill that comes from his committee. So the Representative, Mr. Quayle, I will yield to him what time he needs. If he would like to enter right now, and then I'll pick it up whenever you're done.

I thank you for that, and I appreciate your joining me here because, once again, you live in that State, your constituents know the fear that is taking place, Americans who live on that particular border, the danger that is down there. And, once again, this is not just an issue that will go away if the economy goes sour. These are the drug cartels. These are the human traffickers. These are the worst kinds of people, and we don't want them here. And as a country, if we're going to be a sovereign country, we have to control the border, if for no other reason than we have to be able to control the border. Whether the total number coming across is getting less or is increasing--we don't have definite figures yet--it doesn't matter. As long as one drug cartel is still coming across the border with illegal drugs, that's one too many, and we have to do something about it.

So I appreciate it very much, and I realize you have another obligation to go to. Thank you for coming down. You're welcome to stay if you would like to.

But he also added a premise into where we're going, because what is taking place, quite frankly, is the violence that is taking place on the Arizona border. We all know about Fast and Furious and what a silly idea this was, how ludicrous a program to arm the drug cartel and to find out that those arms they were given by the Federal Government are coming back to harm us. But along the border, we have had a specific row of people who have been not just harassed by the drug cartel but have been killed by the drug cartel.

Starting in 2002, Park Ranger Kris Eggle was shot and killed in the line of duty while pursuing a member of the Mexican drug cartel who had crossed the United States border into Organ Pipe National Monument, which is off limits to Americans. In 2008, Border Patrol Agent Luis Aguilar was killed in the line of duty after being hit by a vehicle that had crossed illegally into the United States through the Imperial Sand Dunes, which is BLM ground, where the Border Patrol has restrictions. What hurts me, as well, is Rob Krentz, a rancher, a multigenerational rancher, on his own property in Arizona.

See, Rob Krentz over there was actually out patrolling, going through his property. He had just had a hip replacement, was ready to have a knee replacement--or vice versa. He was on an ATV vehicle with his dog. He came across a group of illegals who were there--part of the cartel, again, is the assumption. Usually what happens is there is flight, but in this case there was no flight. He was not physically able to fly, and so what happened was both he and his dog were shot.

The one we assume did the shooting came across that wildlife refuge where the gate was locked to prohibit the Border Patrol from going in there and doing their job. Then we assume his exit back into Mexico was a circuitous route that went back out of his way so he could go back through that same area that was off limits to the Border Patrol from totally doing their job. He lost his life because of our policies that don't make sense.

December 10, 2010, Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry was shot and killed--once again on Forest Service land--with guns that were obtained through the Fast and Furious program.

One of the other committees of our Congress has on their Web site the statement that a now-sealed Federal grand jury indictment in the death of Border Patrol Agent Terry says the cartel operatives were patrolling this rugged desert area with the intent of intentionally and forcibly assaulting Border Patrol agents. And it happened because we are not taking control of our border.

As sad as that is, this is still another look at the border. You know you're looking at the border because you can see the fence is still running along and the one road along the fence is still running along. Unfortunately, there's a gap in the fence. That gap is an endangered species habitat right-of-way so the species can go from one side of the border to the other. Unfortunately, I will tell you that it's not just an endangered species that goes from one side of the border to the other. That is endemic of the situation we have down there where our border policies, our land policies take precedence over border security. That is simply what we ought not or should not be doing.

Our solution is, I think, very simple. It's House bill 1505, the National Security and Federal Lands Protection Act. The simple answer of what this bill does is simply it allows the Federal Border Patrol to do on Federal property what it already can do on private property. It says our number one priority should be controlling our borders for stopping the drugs and the violence that is taking place in Arizona. This bill protects legal use of the land--such as mining and hunting and camping and fishing--in an effort to try and make sure that we can protect American property for American use, not for drug cartel use.

There were simpler versions of this that simply said you can't stop the Border Patrol from doing what they need to do to meet their needs. Unfortunately, some of the administration in these Departments laughed at us and said, That's not going to work. You can't tell us what won't happen. So we wrote the bill to be proactive and tell what the Border Patrol can do.

It also had to put in there specific--and this is, once again, from the Department of the Interior insisting it--we put down the specific environmental laws that can be abridged only for the purpose of protecting the border. It is the same list that was done about 5 years ago when the Department of the Interior insisted that as Congress we had to list specific environmental laws that could be broached in order to complete some of the fencing along our southern border. Same rules, same laws, same element so the Border Patrol can do their job. That's what it simply does.

There is one group that was opposed to it because they said the Border Patrol is found 15 to 20 miles north of the border. Yeah, their jurisdiction is up to 100 miles north of the border. They also said that surveillance status shows that there are nearly 8,000 miles--some estimate 20,000 miles--of illegal wildcat roads cutting through some of this border area. I want you to know it is not the Border Patrol--even though this group tried to blame the Border Patrol for these 20,000--if indeed it's that high--miles of illegal roads. They're not the ones creating that. It is the drug cartels that are cutting roads through our habitat, through wilderness areas so that they can use them for their drug-smuggling activities.

If you go down there, you can simply see on the ground where these trails are. If you fly above it, you can see where they are. If you go up to the high points, you can see where their nests are. So you can see very clearly and very easily where they have their lookout spots.

Actually, I went to one of those. It was just over the border into Mexico. I was actually unimpressed because I found out that amongst the things they were leaving behind in the trash is they drank only Diet Coke. If they had done Dr. Pepper, I would have been impressed by their taste, but it was only Diet Coke.

I have also heard all sorts of rumors about what we are trying to do with this bill, trying to make sure that this border is secure so Americans can go back into American property and be secure. I have heard rumors that we are trying to limit public access. That's not true. What we are trying do is make public access safe. That's the job of the government is to make our borders secure.

I have been told that this is a simple land grab. Some groups out there who simply don't understand what's going on tried to label this as a giant land grab. I don't know how you can call it a land grab when the Federal Government is simply trying to allow the Border Patrol to do its job on Federal land. We're not expending any more power or opportunity to the Border Patrol. We're simply saying Federal land should not stop them from doing their job. There are some that will simply say, well, if we ignore this, it will simply go away. This problem is not going to go away. It is too deep; it is too severe to simply go way.

There is one last reason why this approach is extremely important, and I'm saying this in conclusion. As I said in the beginning, almost every town hall meeting that I have they talk about immigration. Immigration issues are complex. Sometimes they are going to be complicated and will require compromise and consideration. Right now out there there's a great deal of anger and anxiety in a lot of people simply because we are not controlling our borders and American lands are not safe, and there is too much violence taking place. And it's simply wrong to prohibit our Border Patrol in favor of allowing the drug cartels and those doing human trafficking to have free access into this country.

If indeed we are serious about long-term immigration, the first thing you have to do is reduce the anger and reduce the anxiety level. The first way to do that is to be able to look at the American people with a clear conscience and in truth, look them in the eye and say our borders are secure. We control who comes into this country and who does not come into this country because that is what a sovereign Nation does.

Our hope is that we can pass this bill and take the first step to controlling the border, which is simply to allow the Border Patrol access to where the Border Patrol needs to be, to give them the same opportunity on public lands that they have on private lands. Because it is very clear, Border Patrol knows what they are doing. They are doing a good job.

Where they are allowed the freedom and flexibility to do their jobs, the issue of illegal immigration and illegal entry into this country of all kinds, but especially illegal entry into this country by the bad guys who are trying to put illegal drugs and other kinds of crimes and bring them into this country, where they are allowed to do their job, they are successful.

What we have to do is now look on Federal property where the Federal rules prohibit the Border Patrol from doing their job and change that, simply allow them to do their job. House bill 1505 does that. Until we do that, we will never move forward into a larger solution to our immigration problem. And we will continue to have illegal drugs and other kinds of crimes against humanity taking place on American soil, and it will not stop. That's why this bill is so important.

With that, Mr. Speaker, with gratitude for allowing me this moment to go through this particular issue, I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 688 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Madam Speaker, for the purposes of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentlelady from New York (Ms. Slaughter), with also a congratulations and a welcome back to the gentlelady from New York, who has been incapacitated for a while. It is nice to see her back on the floor with her health starting to recover.

Pending that, I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.

General Leave

I also ask, Madam Speaker, that all Members may have 5 legislative days during which they may revise and extend their remarks.

This particular resolution provides for a structured rule for the consideration of H.R. 2578, the Conservation and Economic Growth Act, which contains 14 titles containing important legislation impacting our Nation's public lands and our national parks.

The rule provides for 90 minutes of general debate, equally divided and controlled by the chairman and ranking minority member of the Committee on Natural Resources and makes in order the vast majority of amendments which were filed at the Rules Committee. So this structured rule is extremely fair and will provide for a balanced and open debate on the merits of this particular bill.

It was only a couple of Congresses ago, Madam Speaker, in which the Senate sent over an omnibus bill. It had over 100 particular bills added to it. I should have been happy. Three of them were mine. And even though mine were really great bills, some of the rest of them were really bad. That was 1,200 pages. But what was most egregious about that bill that was sent from the Senate is that 75 of those 100 bills had not had any hearing whatsoever in the House. One in particular that dealt with my State, although not my district, not only had not had a hearing in the House, it hadn't even had a hearing in the Senate when it was put into this pile, and it was brought to the floor under a closed rule.

This bill, every single title has gone through regular order. The committee of jurisdiction has had a hearing on each of these elements. They have had a debate in full committee on each of these sections, and they have had a markup on every one of these bills. The committee has heard and has done the work. The amendments that were germane to the issue and were not assigned to other committees were made in order to be heard on the floor.

So once again, this is a bill that is unique in the spectrum of traditional omnibus bills, tying things together, because it did go through regular order, the committee did hear each of these provisions, and it is appropriate to now send it over to the Senate so they can try to consider something at some time in some form of regular order.

With that, Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Within this bill, there are, as I said, several proposals that are there, all of them dealing with Federal lands and all of them dealing with overreach that has taken place, unfortunately, by this administration. Let me just highlight a couple of them and why these bills are useful and very much important.

Title X of this particular section deals with Cape Hatteras in North Carolina. Cape Hatteras in North Carolina was established as a recreation area. In fact, the economy of that particular county, Dare County, was established as a recreation zone and a recreation area. Authorized in 1937, that's still 30,000 acres for recreation purposes.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service started in negotiations with the community of how they would actually try to manage that land, especially governing off-road vehicles. They established certain restrictions that would limit visitation.

And for local residents who were there, the residents agreed to those, even though they weren't really quite happy about it. And everything was going well until special interest groups started the litigation process.

You see, the Fish and Wildlife Service had issued a biological opinion finding that this interim management strategy that was established in the cooperative, collaborative process had indeed solved the problem and that there would never be any kind of jeopardy to any endangered species listed in that particular area. Everything was going well until, once again, there was a lawsuit.

A year after this agreement had been made, there was a lawsuit which this administration, unfortunately, decided to negotiate out of court. The lawsuit was never actually adjudicated. No judge made a decision. Basically, the administration caved to the special interest groups; and they rewrote the opinion that had been ruled by the Fish and Wildlife Service, their biological opinion that it did not jeopardize any endangered species.

So that went into effect. And, unfortunately, in March of this year, they even shrank the rule again to make it even more restrictive than the consent decree that had been settled out of court.

What this bill, this section of this particular bill, does in Cape Hatteras is do what's logical. It goes back to the original concern, the original land management plan that was done with the cooperation of the Fish and Wildlife Service and the local constituents that had been agreed upon, that had nothing to do with endangered species and did not jeopardize anything, simply going back to what had been done before the administration decided simply to cave in to special interest groups and settled out of court.

There's another section, I believe it's section 11, that deals with grazing rights. One of the things that businesses deal with, especially those that deal with grazing rights, is they need a constant to make sure that business is not uncertain. That is a most significant part.

One of the things we're finding out right now, though, is with grazing, especially in the West, excessive paperwork within the Department means we create missed deadlines that cause environmental litigation. And once again, stability is a constant that is necessary in business, and grazing is a business. It's one of those problems that to redo a permit to allow grazing will take 4 to 7 years for a permit that's only 10 years in the first place.

What this bill does is say those permits now go from 10 to 20 years, once again, to give some consistency to those who are engaged in grazing activities. It also codifies appropriation language that has had bipartisan support for over a decade and makes sure that NEPA review in crossing and trailing of livestock on public lands is not going to be subjected to another layer of red tape.

This industry puts $1.4 billion into our economy every year. And if, indeed, we do not treat our ranchers well, the 22,000 ranchers who have these Federal permits, the ability of maintaining this as a viable occupation is put in jeopardy. This amendment, this section fixes that. It solves that problem.

There are some other good ones. In fact, the one that I am proposing I will talk about in a minute. But for now, let me simply reserve the balance of my time.

Once again, I appreciate the opportunity of talking about a couple of other elements in this bill. I appreciate the gentleman from Texas and his comments.

Unfortunately, yes, the study was taken out because it would be a replication of what has already been done; and the land that could be used to expand this is already in the public domain. And what we are simply saying with this particular bill is, no, we don't need to try and force private property owners to sell their lands. If they want to donate it, that's fine. It's not essential to the expansion of this particular park. I think it's the appropriate thing to do.

Let me, though, Madam Speaker, if I could, talk about the other provision,

title XIV in there, which deals with our border security. It's one of those things that I happen to think fairly significant.

If I could start with just a few charts so that people understand what is going on. This chart is simply the division of this country by Border Patrol sections. You'll find out that certain sections have a lot more people coming into this country illegally than other sections.

For 2009 and 2010--those are the last 2 years for which we have full data--there were about a half million people that were illegally apprehended, just apprehended coming into this country. But of those half million, a quarter million, 51 percent or more, were coming through one sector which happens to be the Tucson, Arizona sector. That's not even the entire State of Arizona.

So the question has to be asked, why are 200,000-plus people being apprehended in Arizona when in Maine it looks like about 39 people were apprehended? Why is this area the entrance of choice?

I think it's undeniably that one of the reasons is simply because of the territory on that southern border. Everything in red on this border is land that is owned by the Federal Government. You'll see that 80 percent of Arizona is Federal land, much of that being wilderness and endangered species habitat or conservation rights-of-way.

One of the ironies is our Border Patrol, which is tasked with securing our border, has almost unlimited rights to do what they need to do to protect our border on private property and no one objects to it, which is why the statement of the gentlelady from New York is somewhat disingenuous, because most of her district is, indeed, private property. Border Patrol already has these kinds of options.

It is only on Federal property that the Federal Border Patrol is prohibited from doing its Federal job, and that seems bizarre and, indeed, unusual.

See, this is what the border actually looks like. That's the fence, and that's the one road that the Border Patrol is allowed to use if this happens to be a Federal wilderness designation. The break in the fence, by the way, happens to be there so that animals can go freely from Mexico into the United States and back and forth. I think I could contend that not only animals are using that kind of break in the fence.

Needless to say, the issue at hand simply is: Why is the Border Patrol prohibited from going into certain Federal areas when they need to do it even though the bad guys--the drug cartels, the human traffickers, the kidnapping rings, the prostitution rings--are allowed to go in there?

We have in these Federal wilderness areas 8,000 miles of illegal roads, created by illegal drug traffickers, going into this area, and the Border Patrol by our rules and regulations and laws is prohibited from going into that same area. Is it right that they, in hot pursuit, should have to go to the edge of one of those wilderness areas and then have to wait? Indeed, that is what has happened.

Secretary Napolitano, when she was first put in there, simply said:

One of the issues is, at the Southwest border, it can be

detrimental to the effective accomplishment of our mission.

In fact, it may be inadvisable for officers' safety to wait

for the arrival of horses for pursuit purposes or to attempt

to apprehend smuggling vehicles within wilderness with less

than capable forms of transportation.

The Border Patrol clearly recognizes this. They actually tell us they don't need more money, that they don't need more manpower. What they need is access into that area, which currently they are denied. Let me show you how that works.

This is simply one of the sensors that's used. Instead of having an actual fence, you use the sensor. It's a truck with a sensor on the back of it. In this Federal national monument, which is almost all wilderness designation, the Border Patrol wanted to move this truck from point A to point B. It took the land manager 3 months to grant approval to back up the truck and move it to some other place. During that 3 months, there was a 7-mile blackout area in which there was no surveillance possible. At the end of that 7 months, if the land manager had said, ``No, that area is too sensitive. I don't think you should go there,'' I would have objected, but I would have understood. Unfortunately, after 3 months of review, he let them move the truck, and it was too late to do it then.

That kind of example of what is happening on our border is replicated time and time again. Let me give you some examples.

In 2007, the Border Patrol asked permission to improve two forest roads in the Coronado National Forest, a total of 4 or 5 miles on the border at the edge of this area. They wanted to be able to move their mobile surveillance systems to higher ground to actually get control of the particular area. They would use the road at most once a day, but the Fish and Wildlife Service delayed the decision because they were afraid some of the dirt may eventually get into one of the streams in the particular area. The net result is, in 2011, permission still not being granted in this particular area, a catastrophic wildfire burned 68,000 acres. Three illegal aliens were arrested, and one admitted actually starting the blaze.

In 2010, the Border Patrol requested three helicopter landing sites in the Miller Peak Wilderness. The Forest Service liked the idea because they could use those sites also for fire suppression. Once again, the Fish and Wildlife Service, a competing agency, had concerns because it would have an impact on the Mexican Spotted Owl. Unfortunately, when they did a survey, they found that there were no spotted owls in the area. Nonetheless, the Fish and Wildlife Service stopped the construction of those helicopter pads. Then in 2011--you guessed it--1 year later, a 32,000-acre fire, which destroyed dozens of homes, took place. Once again, it was found that illegals coming into this country started those fires.

The citizens of Tombstone, Arizona, are allowed to go five at a time with hand tools into these wilderness areas in order to repair the pipeline, which supplies water to the city, that was damaged in these fires. Once again, the Fish and Wildlife Service said the Mexican Spotted Owl was the reason for those limitations.

GAO did a survey, a report: 17 of the 26 Border Patrol stations experienced delays, and 14 of those 17 reported being unable to obtain permits or permission from land managers to use it. Stations that were found in California, Texas, Arizona, and New Mexico confirmed that they were unable to control the border due to land management positions. Even on the northern border, in the Spokane sector, they found, once again, they were being blocked from existing roads on national forest land due to environmental concerns.

The GAO report found that it could take 6 months or more for permission to improve roads needed for patrolling in New Mexico. Another Border Patrol station reported 8 months in delay for the permission to move a sensor as the land manager required an historic property assessment. A station in California reported that it took 9 months for permission to do road maintenance on Federal land.

These are the factors that are inhibiting our Border Patrol from doing their job.

Now, in the GAO report--and some people look at the executive summary, and they are looking at it improperly--it said that 22 of the 26 agents in charge reported that the overall security status had not been affected. What that meant was their status of being a controlled sector, a managed sector, or a monitored sector had not been changed; but what they did say is they were being inhibited and impeded in doing their job to try and control our particular borders.

Look, those who are coming in--the drug cartels, the human traffickers--they don't care about our laws. This is an endangered species. This cactus was cut down, but it was cut down by the drug cartel to do a roadblock across a public road in the United States so they could use it to stop cars and then mug the participants of those cars, and this is whether in those cars were Americans or other foreign nationals coming in there.

What is probably worst of all are the rape trees that are taking place--violence against women who are coming

down on American land in these areas. That simply means, as the coyotes lead these women across the border, at the end of that road, as the final payment, they will rape the women and then leave an article of clothing on one of the trees as a trophy for their actions.

This heinous activity taking place on American land is not being prohibited now and will not be prohibited unless the Border Patrol is allowed to maintain access on this property. That's why this bill, this section, is so essential. It is the war on women.

We had 19 people in the month of May of this year who died in the Tucson sector alone. Unfortunately, that is an increase from what happened a year ago in May. We need to end this problem. There are three reasons why this section is important:

One, sovereign countries control their borders. We need to be able to say we control our borders.

Two, I want to see a comprehensive immigration package go forward, but every time I hold a public town hall meeting, I know the first question that will be asked of me, which is: When will we control the border? There is a great deal of anger and anxiety out there, and it is very clear that we will never get consensus for other immigration reforms to take place until we have first reduced the anger and anxiety.

C.S. Lewis said, You do first things first, and second things will be added to it. If you do second things first, you will accomplish neither first nor second things.

This administration seems to be intent on trying to do, for whatever political purpose it may have, second things first. The first thing is to control the border. When we can truly look with an honest answer in the eye of our fellow citizens and say, ``America's borders are secure,'' then there will be a reduction in the anger and the anxiety that will allow us to move forward.

Three, we have to stop the violence against women. These rapes that take place on rape trees on American property--on Federal land on American property--because the Border Patrol does not have access to this area to patrol it effectively must stop. It's our duty and obligation to make that stop.

With that, Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself 2 minutes.

Once again, Madam Speaker, I appreciate the gentleman from California's comments, although I'm going to have to push back slightly on a few of those, if it's at all possible.

This particular bill deals with 100 miles from the border simply because that is the legal definition of border land by both statute and judicial decree. It does not deal with coastal areas. In the committee, those areas were taken out because it is maritime area. The Border Patrol deals only with land borders and those particular areas.

The 36 rules that are waivable is precedent established by this Congress. In California, where the gentleman resides, when they wanted to finish the fence and it was being withheld by certain kinds of litigation, Homeland Security came up with 36 specific rules and regulations they wanted to be able to waive so they could do it. That was the precedent. The rules and regulations that are in this particular bill that's now title 15 are the exact same 36. That's where the precedent comes. That's why Homeland Security wanted that time to finish their job. That's what they needed this time.

However, I'm also making an amendment to this bill that will reduce those 36 because, to be honest, some of those never really were a problem. It will reduce it now to the 12 that the Border Patrol thinks are the most egregious. But there is precedent for that particular thing. All we are doing is trying to give the Border Patrol the same rights on Federal lands that they currently have on private property. There is no expansion of power and no expansion of jurisdiction. It's the ability to say our number one goal is to have border security; and if there is a rule or regulation getting in the way--and there are according to the GAO reports--those should be waived for the purpose of border security. That's the whole purpose. We're not expanding a power. We're not taking anything more than that in particular away.

With that, Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Iowa (Mr. King), who would like to speak about this particular rule.

I appreciate the efforts of my namesake from New York. I appreciate what he is doing. Chairman Hastings of the Resources Committee was extremely specific in which he said that after the Democrat Senate had sent over that atrocious omnibus bill with over 100 bills cobbled together, 75 of which have never had a hearing over here, we would only put together this type of regulation if it had gone through regular order. Unfortunately, the gentleman's bill has not had a hearing in any committee. It has not actually been reported yet, which is one of the reasons why it has not been included in this particular list. Although I'm not denigrating his efforts whatsoever.

I would like to yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Bilbray).

Madam Speaker, I yield myself 3 minutes.

I appreciate many of the comments that have been made here. I'm glad the gentleman from Colorado is still here, because in the memo of understanding which controls what the Border Patrol does, Border Patrol is able to go anywhere they want to on foot or horseback. They may go on a motorized vehicle on existing public administrative roads. But there is nothing in the memo of understanding that extends there to prevent them unless it is an existing exigent emergency. And the problem the Border Patrol actually has is no one really knows how to define exigent emergencies. That's one of the reasons why they want to have something specific in the memo of understanding--nor the statute does not help them in those particular areas--because, indeed, land managers have handled those exigent circumstances differently.

I would like to say one other thing as well, because there are some places in this Nation in which the idea of title XIV in this bill, which is the bill that deals with border security, has been expanded with information that is simply inaccurate. Montana, for example, has a 545-mile border with Canada. It has different issues than the southern border--but it's not numbers--but it is remote, and who can cross that border illegally is significant.

The junior Senator from Montana actually asked the GAO to come up with a study on border security in the North, and the report was only 1 percent of the northern border is secure. That was his study that he wanted. Despite the fact that the Missoulian has warned about al-Qaeda plots in Montana, that the Border Patrol chief from Montana has begged some kind of action--indeed, this month the Border Patrol has sent out a warning of the use of terrorists who are talking about--chatter abusing wildfires as an area to distract so they can come in entrance, and one of the States they specifically mentioned was Montana.

Even though that is taking place, there is a campaign going on where this particular issue, border security, has been hijacked in the name of politics. And only because it is my idea that's being the center of this, I find that somewhat unusual, somewhat offensive. It is an effort to say that this effort to try to control our borders is related in some way to the PATRIOT Act or the REAL ID Act or, indeed, that it deals with some other element of expansion of power. Some people have gone as far as saying it is a land grab.

It is unusual to me that this concept of border security was presented in the Senate on an appropriations bill and was passed by a voice vote. Then the bill in which this amendment was placed was then passed by the Senate, and the junior Senator from Montana did not object to the voice vote and actually voted for it and now claims that this same idea is an expansion of government power, thus, something not work.

I yield myself 1 additional minute.

What I also found somewhat distressing is that in this campaign in Montana there is another group called Montana Hunters and Anglers, who, unfortunately, are simply a partisan hit group that are taking out ads directly against this particular provision and saying that other members in the delegation from Montana are supporting something that is wrong. Unfortunately, the members of that hit group have ties to Democrat organizations. The secretary is part of the Obama Committee in the State of Montana. The treasurer is a former Democratic staffer up there.

This group, the Montana Hunters and Anglers, are a faux group. The real supporters of this bill are people like the Montana Wool Growers Association, the Montana Association of State Grazing Districts, the Montana Public Lands Council, Montana Stock Growers Association. These are real groups, and they all support this particular provision and this particular bill because they realize the value of border security that takes place. They also realize what Secretary Napolitano recognized: that if you improve border security in the area by removing violators from public lands--those are the people that destroy things-- the land value is enhanced. It is better for Border Patrol if they have enhanced ability to control those particular borders.

I reserve the balance of my time.

I reserve the balance of my time to close.

In my last minute, Madam Speaker, there are a couple of things I would like to say. First of all, I appreciate the words that were read. Unfortunately, reality is different. One of the reasons why this particular provision is supported by the Border Patrol Union as well as the Association of Retired Border Patrol Agents, reality is sometimes different than what we think it should be. And I also have a list of three pages worth of groups who support not only this provision but the other 13 provisions.

I must in closing, though, bid the apology of the gentlelady of New York for one thing. One of the former Parliamentarians wrote a book and said when we put C SPAN cameras in here, everyone started to read their speeches, and our debates became extremely dull. That's true. But when you read something, you don't make a misstatement. I did. I did a couple. My amendment does not reduce it from 36 down to 12; it reduces it from 36 to 16. I also used the ``disingenuine'' in talking about the gentlelady's remarks. That was the wrong word. That was, indeed, the word I said, but it is not what I meant to say, and I apologize for saying that. That goes over the line of comity and I'm sorry, and I just want you to know that I apologize for ``oopsing.'' That should only be done by Governors, not by Members of Congress.

Madam Speaker, in conclusion, each of these bills in here has been heard by the committee of jurisdiction. It's had a hearing. It's had a markup. The difference between this and other bills that we have seen in the past is that everything had to go through regular order first. Nothing was included in this rule that had not gone through regular order through this particular committee.

It's a good bill. It's a good rule. It's a fair rule, and I urge its adoption.

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

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

Mr. Chairman, I inquire as to the time available.

I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

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

I wanted to talk, and maybe list, so that the American people and the Members of Congress understand the scope and the depth of H.R. 2578, in particular, title XIV: National Park Service Units within 100 Miles of the U.S.-Mexico and U.S.-Canadian Borders. There are 54 National Park Service units and 11 National Park Service wilderness areas:

Acadia National Park; Amistad National Recreation Area; Apostle Islands National Lakeshore-Gaylord Nelson Wilderness; Big Bend National Park; Cabrillo National Monument; Carlsbad Caverns National Park- Carlsbad Caverns Wilderness; Casa Grande Ruins National Monument; Chamizal National Memorial; Chiricahua National Monument-Chiricahua Wilderness; Coronado National Memorial; Isle Royale National Park-Isle Royale Wilderness; James A. Garfield National Historic Site; Joshua Tree National Park; Keweenaw National Historical Park; Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park; Lake Chelan National Recreation Area; Lake Roosevelt National Recreation Area; Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National Historic Park; Nez Perce National Historical Park; North Cascades National Park-Stephen Mather Wilderness; Olympic National Park-Olympic Wilderness; Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument; Organ Pipe Wilderness; Padre Island National Seashore; Palo Alto Battlefield National Historical Park; Perry's Victory and International Peace Memorial; Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore; River Raisin National Battlefield Park; Ross Lake National Recreation Area; Saguaro National Park-Saguaro Wilderness; St. Croix Island International Historic Site; San Juan Island National Historical Park; Theodore Roosevelt Inaugural National Historic Site; Theodore Roosevelt National Park; Tumacacori National Historical Park; Voyageurs National Park; White Sands National Monument; Women's Rights National Historical Park; Wrangell-St. Elias National Park; Wrangell-St. Elias National Preserve; Yukon-Charley Rivers National Preserve.

I list those because turning these shared treasures of the American people from the land managers that provide the access, the interpretation, and the multiuse mandate to these areas to an agency like Homeland Security with no expertise, no track record, no history, and giving them carte blanche, almost czar-like control over these valuable legacy parks of our Nation, is one of the reasons that we have 66 organizations--environmental, Latino, and consumer organizations-- opposed to the legislation and opposed in particular to title XIV.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

I think the purpose of title XIV of H.R. 2578 is not to make the border more secure. Rather, the purpose of the bill is to use border security as cover to effectively repeal more than a century of environmental protections for Americans living and working along our borders with Canada and Mexico.

In April, the Natural Resources Committee held a joint oversight hearing with the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, during which the Government Accountability Office, the Interior Department, the Agriculture Department, and the Border Patrol all testified under oath that Federal land management laws do not impair border security. According to the GAO report, 22 of 26 Border Patrol agents-in-charge that were interviewed reported that Federal land management laws had no impact on the overall security status of their jurisdiction.

In summary, the number of Border Patrol agents-in-charge who found that Federal land management laws were impeding border security but were prevented from fixing the problems by the Interior Department was exactly zero. The administration concurred with this finding at multiple hearings. The

record is clear. And the problem this bill claims to solve does not exist.

The true purpose of this legislation is also clear. The proponents oppose the more-than-30 bedrock environmental protections that will be effectively repealed by this legislation, including the Clean Water Act, the Clean Air Act, the Clean Drinking Water Act, everywhere, not just within 100 miles of the border. Title XIV employs a manufactured conflict with border security to weaken their application.

The laws to be waived by this act are the work product of dozens of administrations and Congresses, developed after thousands of hours of negotiation and compromise and, in most cases, were enacted with strong bipartisan support. Title XIV hands the Border Patrol a unilateral veto over all of these laws, all this work, and all this bipartisan effort.

Enactment of this legislation and title XIV would not only allow DHS to trample the ground near the border. It would also allow the Agency to trample the rights of States and Native people. This legislation would empower individual patrol agents to enter tribal land without notice and conduct any and all activities, including excavation and construction, without regard for the presence of tribal sites or tribal leadership.

The real problem of border enforcement is one of manpower, budgets, economic incentives, and difficult terrain. This bill addresses none of those concerns. We will not secure our borders by allowing our waters to be polluted. We will not secure our borders by allowing our air to be dirtier, by ignoring the laws that have protected the environment and the American people. That will not bring security to the border.

This legislation and title XIV reduce the number of immigrants coming to this country. If it does, it will only be because the water, air, and economics of our border communities are so degraded that no one wants to come there anymore. This legislation is sweeping. It's reactionary. This bill is not what it appears to be. And it should be rejected.

I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Without a doubt, proponents of H.R. 2578 and, in particular, title XIV, the border bill portion, claim this legislation will end the horrors of the border, that it will secure the border and, finally, Arizona and the rest of the Nation will be ready to sit down, conduct real work, and reach comprehensive immigration reform.

The horrors they will describe--the rape tree, the murders, the abuse of people--some are quite real. The violence is conducted by criminal organizations that prey on desperate and poor people, fueled by a drug trade that produces billions upon billions of dollars for these very criminals that create the violence.

In the last decade, over 4,000 souls have died trying to cross through the most desolate parts of the Arizona desert. And this human tragedy should not be the excuse to undo environmental and public protection laws, which the majority has been attacking on all fronts since the beginning of this Congress. This is a dangerous precedent, that in order to secure the border we must lose those protections. It's an absurd connection, and there is no correlation.

It is interesting that in the list of laws to be waived, if we are truly to make a dent in that violence, we find no mention of suspending the unregulated gun shows that happen in border regions. Eighty-five percent of the assault rifles used by cartels and organized crime syndicates along the border and in Mexico originate in the United States from these gun shows. It is interesting that there is no mention of suspending Federal support for U.S. financial interests that harbor and launder money from Mexican crime syndicates here in the United States.

The environmental laws and protections being eliminated under title XIV will not bring long-term solutions to our beleaguered southern border. These laws are not the reasons for the stress. The reason for the stress is the unwillingness of this Congress to deal with immigration reform and the broken immigration system. Enforcement is part of the solution; it is not the only part of the solution.

The stress is caused by politicians who either exploit the issue for their own gain or run away from the issue because of their own fear of it. To begin to deal with this issue, we need the resolve to work toward comprehensive immigration reform. But all the majority wants to do is scapegoat its lack of resolve to deal with this real issue in order to advance an agenda to hijack the laws that have served our public lands and our citizens well for decades.

This is a terrible precedent. It's backdoor amnesty for polluters, developers, and mining industries. And those extremists want all these protections and environmental laws eliminated. The border is the excuse; the target is the environment.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Yes, we are.

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

This package of 14 bills is an unwarranted combination of individual bills that would do serious and lasting damage to communities and people across this country. Many of the individual pieces are controversial, but they are overshadowed by title XIV, the drone zone title.

The drone zone created by this bill would trample the environment and the personal freedoms of millions of people living within 100 miles of the border. At a time when the clock is ticking on the reauthorization of the highway trust fund, where real jobs can be created, we are wasting time on this misguided package. At a time when the clock is ticking on making college loans remain affordable, we are wasting time on this package. We should reject H.R. 2578 and get down to the serious work, which is to create jobs and help middle class families make ends meet.

Mr. DeFazio and Ranking Member Markey and I will be offering amendments to address the absolute worst aspects of this package. I urge my colleagues to support the amendments. Unfortunately, even those amendments cannot fix all that is wrong with this package, and I ask my colleagues to reject H.R. 2578. There is a point in which common sense and sanity should prevail in this House. We have a piece of legislation that begs the question on both before us, and I would urge its defeat.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I rise to speak on the manager's amendment.

On the manager's amendment, we have no problem with the technical changes to the legislation. The content remains the same and the opposition remains the same.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk.

Out of all the titles cobbled together under this one piece of legislation, title XIV is the most alarming, so I have introduced this amendment to strike it all from the bill.

Not only is it the text of one of the most controversial bills introduced in this Congress, its intent is to expand the scope and the authority of one government agency to achieve a loosely defined objective, an agency that has not even asked for this expanded authority. Title XIV of this legislation would supersize Customs and Border Protection so they could seize control of Federal lands within 100 miles of the northern and southern borders. It would be at their discretion and without any recourse by the public to be able to counter that.

If this bill were to become law, families who use our parks, forests, and wildlife areas in all of these States could be subject to increased surveillance without any notification. We already know what happens to the economic welfare of families and what has happened to the economies of the States of Alabama and Arizona when States pass hostile anti- immigrant laws. This takes the same concept and spreads it across our northern and southern borders.

Right now, Customs and Border Protection isn't suffering from a lack of authority. If anything, it is suffering from a lack of focus. The ability to access Federal lands isn't causing Border Patrol problems. In the most recent GAO report, radios that don't work and the lack of infrastructure and personnel are what they have cited as being barriers.

Yesterday, during the debate over the rule for the bill, the sponsor of the legislation that has become title XIV claimed that we can't deal with the issue of immigration reform before securing our land borders. He went on to say that people are angry about the situation at the border and that, before this anger is addressed, we can't do anything about our broken immigration system, so we are going to pay some lip service to border security to advance what is essentially an anti- environment and anti-immigrant agenda.

That should make many of us angry because it adds to the division in our Nation and to the sense of millions of families in the border region and across this country who feel they are political pawns in a system--in a game--that is never ending. Millions of people live along these 100 miles, and they deserve the same protection from environmental pollution or government overreach that the rest of us in the country enjoy.

The original bill granted DHS a waiver of 36 laws. The recently introduced amendment would allow that list to be 16. The fact that we were able to concede half of the original list proves that the bill is, from the outset, an unnecessary overreach. The 16 laws left in the legislation are not minor statutes. They include the National Historic Preservation Act, the Endangered Species Act, the Antiquities Act, the Wilderness Act, and the Administrative Procedure Act.

The solution to a broken system along the border is comprehensive immigration reform. If you took that 100-mile zone along the southern border and made it into a State, it would lead the Nation in poverty, unemployment, educational attainment, the lowest wages, the most uninsured, and the lowest economic growth. Yet this legislation and title XIV, once again, take this region, and instead of providing support and comprehensive attention to it, we further marginalize and isolate it.

All the laws that are being waived and eliminated are all landmark pieces of legislation that guide and manage our Federal lands, resources that belong to every single American taxpayer. Throwing away decades of law that help protect and preserve our Federal lands makes no sense. The supporters of this legislation will say it is necessary to address the horrors and violence that occur on the border. That's not true. It's back-door amnesty for extremist anti-environmental groups, industries, and developers who lust after our public resources for private profit at taxpayers' expense.

That is why I've introduced my amendment to strike the title from the bill. I encourage its support and reserve my time.

Mr. Chairman, if I may inquire as to how much time is remaining?

Mr. Chairman, I yield the remaining time to the gentleman from North Carolina, the ranking member of DHS appropriations, Mr. Price.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate your courtesy.

I would at this point say that I appreciate the time, and I'll wait to call for a vote. Thank you very much.

Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on the bill H.R. 2578.

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

Mr. Chairman, the Conservation and Economic Growth Act is aimed squarely at cutting government red tape and bureaucracy to boost local economic development and job creation. This legislation contains 14 commonsense bills from the House Natural Resources Committee, nearly all of which have received bipartisan support.

By solving problems and reducing red tape, this legislation will have a real impact on the people it affects. Among its many economic and job creation benefits, the bill will encourage tourism and recreation by ensuring public access to public lands. It will promote responsible use of our resources. It will protect the environment. It will secure Federal lands along our borders. And it promotes clean and renewable hydropower.

Month after month, Mr. Chairman, Republicans in Congress have been focused on encouraging and supporting new job creation. The House has passed over 30 job creation bills that sit in the Senate, where Democrat leaders have refused to take any action.

By reducing red tape, promoting American-made energy, and streamlining bureaucracy, we can start creating jobs for tens of millions of Americans who are looking for work. The Conservation and Economic Growth Act fits into this same job creation mold.

When it comes to the Environmental Protection Agency, the American public is well aware of the ability of this Federal agency to slow our economy with debilitating regulations. And when it comes to our Federal lands, which are predominated located in the Western part of the United States, there is plenty of bureaucracy and red tape to go around.

In that regard, there are four primary Federal land management agencies: the Bureau of Land Management; the Forest Service; the Fish & Wildlife Service; and the National Park Service. Combined, they manage over 600 million acres of Federal land and have over 60,000 Federal employees. Many of these Federal employees do important, helpful work. But there are many times when their actions or outdated Federal laws have a tremendous negative impact on their surrounding communities. But these Federal policies, restrictions, lawsuits, and the bureaucratic decisions can harm local economies and the public's ability to access public lands for the multiple uses for which these public lands were intended.

It doesn't have to take Federal spending or taxpayer money to solve these problems. It simply takes Congress making commonsense changes in laws and regulations to restore reasonableness, transparency, accountability, and, yes, Mr. Chairman, sometimes sanity to the actions of the Federal Government.

That is the purpose of this underlying legislation: to fix local and national problems caused by Federal red tape and policies that are harming the public and our economy throughout America. We will hear more specific information from the sponsors of these solutions during the debate this afternoon.

Mr. Chairman, this legislation also reflects the promises of House Republicans when they were elected as a new

majority in 2010. The Conservation and Economic Growth Act is an efficient way to uphold Republicans' commitment to an open and transparent House.

The text of the act has been online since last Tuesday and available for Members and the public to read now for a week. Each and every one of the 14 bills that is in this package has had a public hearing, has been open to amendment in the committee, has been voted on in the committee, and amendments will be debated and voted on here today by the full House.

Now, Mr. Chairman, this stands in stark contrast to the previous way of doing business, when we had monster omnibus bills that were forced through the House without any chance of amendment. In fact, one can compare this small 14-bill package that has undergone full public and legislative review with the 2009 monster omnibus lands bill enacted into law when the Democrats controlled both houses of Congress. The 2009 omnibus bill was over 1,200 pages in length, it cost $10 billion, and it contained over 170 bills, including 75 that had never been considered in the House.

Yet through all of this process, not one single amendment was allowed to be offered, and even the minority--the Republicans at that time-- were denied an opportunity with the motion to recommit.

Well, those days of the monster omnibus are over. No longer will controversial bills that haven't seen the light of day be hidden deep inside a thousand-page bill. Since the start of this Congress, we reviewed bills one by one in the Natural Resources Committee. Each has had a public subcommittee hearing; and once the committee acts, the full House considers them in a transparent manner.

This bill, the underlying legislation we're dealing with, lives up to this standard. It is an antidote to the abusive processes of the past. It is a bite-sized package that can be easily read and today is getting a thorough debate on the House floor.

So now the House can act to approve this bill to roll back red tape, to restore some commonsense to solve problems, and to boost economic activity. This bill deserves bipartisan support, and I urge my colleagues to vote for its passage.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I'm very pleased to yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Denham), the primary sponsor of this legislation.

I yield the gentleman an additional 1 minute.

Mr. Chairman, just to correct the record, there is nothing in this bill that affects the Bureau of Reclamation or the hydro-dams on the Columbia River in my district.

I'm very pleased right now to yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Alaska (Mr. Young), who is the author of title III of this bill.

(Mr. YOUNG of Alaska asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Chairman, I am very pleased to yield 3 minutes to the author of title XIV, the gentleman from Utah (Mr. Bishop).

Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Wittman), the author of title XIII of this legislation.

Mr. Chairman, I am very pleased to yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Nevada (Mr. Amodei), the author of title IX of this bill.

Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to yield 3 minutes to the author of title V of this bill, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Flores).

I am pleased to yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Idaho (Mr. Labrador), who is the author of title XI of this bill.

Mr. Chairman, I am very pleased to yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Canseco), who is the author of title IV of this bill.

Yes.

The gentleman is correct, with the adoption of the manager's amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I'm pleased to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Utah (Mr. Chaffetz), who is the author of title II of this bill.

Mr. Chairman, I am very pleased to yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Jones) who is the author of title X of this bill.

I am very pleased to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Herger), who is the author of title VIII of this bill.

Mr. Chairman, may I inquire of my friend from Arizona, we have no more requests for time, and I'm prepared to close, if the gentleman is prepared to close.

Mr. Chairman, can I inquire as to how much time I have remaining.

I yield myself the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, let's go back to the basic issue, really, that's facing this country--and I alluded to it in my opening statement. What Americans really want is jobs. And while this package of bills is in line with that, what it really does is add some certainty to those that live in and around Federal lands. Therefore, allowing for at least some certainty as it relates to jobs, but probably as important, if not more important, is access to our public lands for those that want to utilize our public lands.

There's been much discussion here about how this bill does some damage to the environment. Well, let me just touch on a couple of issues that were mentioned on the other side and I think it needs to be clarified, at least here, before this debate is over.

First, the reference was made to sea lions that were guilty of one thing, and that was eating only fish. Well, I happen to be the author of the title of that bill. Let me clarify. There's a rest-of-the-story here. We had a hearing in the full committee of the Natural Resources Committee today on the Endangered Species Act. I think, frankly, it hasn't been reauthorized for 25 years, and I think we need to update that act to make sure that we recover species. And my colleagues on the other side of the aisle said it's a great act. That's good. We at least have some establishment of commonality.

The reason that provision is in the bill regarding sea lions is that salmon are listed as threatened on the Columbia River. And as they move upstream after coming back from the ocean, they get crowded going up Bonneville Dam. Now, there's a nonindigenous animal called the California sea lion that comes up there and feasts on these fish as they're going through the Bonneville Dam. So it's destroying an endangered species. The California sea lion is not listed as endangered, and they're not indigenous.

So that part of the legislation simply allows for lethal taking of those sea lions so the fish can pass upstream and spawn. Nothing more than that. It's a cute way, to borrow a phrase, to say that they're guilty of only eating fish. But there's more to that story.

This legislation also encourages the development of renewable hydropower. What could be cleaner than that? It promotes healthy forest and prevents forest fires, as my colleague from northern California just said in regard to the title of the act he has in there. It restores access to different parks for recreational purposes in the North Cascades and at Cape Hatteras on the Atlantic Coast, and it preserves old growth in Alaska.

So, Mr. Chairman, there is a lot to be liked about this bill, but it seems most of the discussion is around title XIV.

Let me read the title of title XIV one more time. It is the National Security and Federal Lands Protection Act. Now why do we need that? Because, unfortunately, there are those that want to come into our country illegally, and they don't have the same feelings as we do about our public lands. When they come through illegally, in many cases, they trash those lands. We're simply giving the Border Patrol more tools to protect those public lands and to provide for our national security. I don't know why anybody on the floor of this House should be opposed to that aspect. That's all that title XIV does, as was explained very well by the author of that provision, Mr. Bishop of Utah.

So, Mr. Chairman, this bill is worth supporting. It has been developed in a bipartisan method. It has been developed in a transparent method, having gone through the committee process.

I urge adoption, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk.

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

This amendment makes some technical, clarifying, and conforming changes to the underlying bill. It amends title IV to delete a portion of the land that the National Park Service does not want to acquire for the San Antonio missions and which would expose it to liability for cleanup costs.

It conforms the text of title VI to match what the House passed in the 111th Congress in H.R. 2806.

And it conforms title VIII with the leadership protocols regarding length and amount of authorizations.

And, finally, it clarifies what funds States may use to increase access to target ranges under title XII.

With that, I urge adoption and I reserve the balance of my time.

I urge adoption of the amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I rise to claim the time in opposition.

I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Alaska (Mr. Young).

(Mr. YOUNG of Alaska asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

I yield myself the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition, obviously, to this amendment because this amendment would single out one particular group of Native Alaskans for restrictions that currently only apply to timber harvested from certain Federal lands in the lower 48.

Now, the irony here, as was pointed out by the gentleman from Alaska, is that the Forest Service in the Tongass allows for 100 percent export of red cedar harvested in the Tongass and 50 percent of old growth harvested in the Tongass. So I think it is, in all honesty, Mr. Chairman, a bit hypocritical to impose the domestic limitations on Natives while the Forest Service is doing just exactly the opposite.

Now, I'll also add that this amendment does not affect other landowners on the Tongass; it only affects the Natives of Sealaska. Now, I don't think that's really what we should be doing here on the floor of the House is singling out one group for a penalty, and that's precisely what this amendment does.

So I urge rejection of this amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

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

I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Idaho (Mr. Labrador), the author of the title of this bill.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the motion to recommit.

Mr. Speaker, I've had an opportunity several times to come down here to debate the motions to recommit, and I've prefaced virtually every time I've come down here with, history repeats itself.

Mr. Speaker, history is repeating itself one more time. Why do I say that? Because probably the biggest issue that Americans are concerned about is jobs. This is another effort that deals with American jobs by dealing with regulation that slows down economic activity.

So what does the other side do? They try to put up another impediment to a bill that is straightforward, had transparency in committee, had a full debate in committee, and put together to debate on the floor. It's the same arguments that we have that, frankly, are meaningless.

Now, to the essence of what the gentleman's amendment does. All of this is essentially redundant. It's in law right now.

Is this just a political move on the minority's part? Is that what it is?

If the issue is really trying to deal with firefighting in the West, I would remind this body, Mr. Speaker, that 2 weeks ago, we passed legislation to allow the Forest Service to buy tankers to fight forest fires. We've already done that.

All I can say, Mr. Speaker, is that history repeats itself. Let's vote down this motion to recommit and let's vote for the jobs bill.

I yield back the balance of my time.

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

Mr. Chairman, ladies and gentlemen of the House, I rise in opposition to H.R. 2578.

Now, some of you may recall the old Rod Serling television show, ``The Twilight Zone.'' At the beginning of each episode, Serling would explain that viewers were ``about to enter another dimension--a dimension not only of sight and sound, but of mind, a journey into a wondrous land of imagination. Next stop, the Twilight Zone.''

Well, that is very much where we are this week on the House floor. We are truly entering another dimension--a wondrous land of paranoid imagination. Republicans call it the ``Operational Control Zone,'' but it is really the ``Drone Zone.''

Submitted for your consideration are the following facts:

This week, world leaders are gathering in Rio to deal with the threat of global warming. Meanwhile, the majority has us gathered here to address the threat sea lions pose to salmon. Right now, firefighters are working day and night to try to contain wildfires in forests in Colorado and New Mexico, and the majority has us working here to give away old-growth Alaskan forest.

We have just 2 weeks before the transportation authorization bill expires and student loan rates double. And what are we doing? We are spending an entire day on a piece of legislation that has zero chance of being enacted into law. It is a package of bad ideas that are largely irrelevant to the real issues facing our Nation.

Title I of this bill would flood part of a Wild and Scenic River. Title III is an earmark to an Alaskan Native corporation that will facilitate clear-cutting in the Tongass National Forest. Titles IV and V appear to create new parks, but include harmful provisions that would cripple the management of these parks. Title VII would authorize the death penalty for sea lions whose only crime is eating fish. Title X would overturn the protections for endangered turtles from being run over by off-road vehicles. Title XI would extend the practice of below- cost grazing on public lands--a bargain-basement discount for cattlemen all across this country not paying their fair share. Actually, being a type of Federal welfare for cattlemen. And unbelievably, title XIV would create a 100-mile ``drone zone'' along our northern and southern borders within which the Border Patrol could suspend 36 environmental laws and seize control of all public land management.

Let me spend a moment here talking about what I find to be the most offensive part of this legislation: title XIV. This is the national map. What the Republicans do here today is they take a 100-mile area all along the northern border of the United States and the southern border of the United States and they create a new area. And this new area is really a drone zone. The reason that it's a drone zone is that it allows for 36 health and safety and environmental laws to be overridden, and it would expand the area where the Department of Homeland Security could use drones for surveillance. It allows the Department of Homeland Security to shut down national parks at a moment's notice. So all of a sudden the Department of Homeland Security can start using drones in this area.

Now, when you add up all of the space that is now included, it is equal to the total area of California, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Connecticut combined, which will now be in this new special area that has the Department of Homeland Security determining where drones can be used. And as we know, that won't be just for ensuring environmental laws not being violated. They'll be over this whole area.

Now, if you take a look at this map, I understand why the gentleman from Utah introduced this bill. Utah is far away from the Republican drone zone. They're not within the hundred miles of the border of the Mexican or Canadian people. But what if you live in Maine? Nearly your entire State is in this drone zone. Want to go to Acadia National Park? Better check with the Department of Homeland Security and the Republicans first. Or Minnesota: maybe you want to take a trip up to the Boundary Waters. Better check with the Department of Homeland Security and the Republicans first. Or Olympia National Park in Washington State: better check with the Department of Homeland Security or the Republicans first.

Want clean air in the drone zone? Better make sure the Department of Homeland Security and the Republicans haven't exempted the Clean Air Act. Want to drink some water after a long hike? Better make sure the Department of Homeland Security and the Republicans haven't waived the Safe Drinking Water Act.

Make no mistake, this isn't a bill that actually addresses America's immigration issues. Neither the Department of Homeland Security nor its Customs and Border Protection division support this bill. They don't want this authority, but the Republicans are insisting on giving them this authority--100 miles along the Mexican and Canadian borders.

The GOP's drone zone bill does not increase resources for border agents, but instead turns over our natural resources to the Department of Homeland Security. Passing this bill does not increase the number of Border Patrol agent boots on the ground. It just ignores the protections against trampling on sovereign and sacred ground like tribal grave sites. It does not look for a path toward citizenship. It tells families on vacation or a picnic that the Department of Homeland Security can kick you off a path at any moment.

Under this bill, ranchers and their cattle can be herded away by border agents, jeopardizing their entire ranching operation. Families and visitors to public parks can have their trips canceled. And the water, the air, and the land will be left unprotected.

Instead of working to pass a DREAM Act to help solve the immigration challenge, House Republicans instead want to create a nightmare scenario at our borders. That's why more than 50 Hispanic and Latino groups have joined with environmental organizations,

tribal groups, and organizations representing sportsmen and hunters to oppose the Republican drone zone bill. Fifty Hispanic and Latino groups opposing this bill.

We might be spending 4 hours here today on the House floor in a legislative twilight zone created by the majority considering a bill that isn't grounded in reality. But as we do, let us not forget that there are millions of Americans outside of this alternative reality who are trying to make ends meet, trying to keep their families together and safe, and hoping to maintain the environmental protections which make our country great.

I urge a ``no'' vote on this bill, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 5 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Mrs. Napolitano), the ranking member of the Subcommittee on Water and Power.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 4 minutes to the gentlelady from the State of Connecticut (Ms. DeLauro).

I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Holt).

Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. Chairman, we're about to talk about grazing fees. For people in many parts of the country, they may not know what that is. That is that, on Federal lands across the country, cattlemen can bring their cattle onto Federal lands--that is, the public lands of the United States--and graze. And what are they charged? Well, they're charged $1.35. That's exactly what they were charged in 1986.

Now, right next to this Federal land, in many States, there is State land. That State land in Colorado is very valuable; but they ensure, the Governor of Colorado, that the cattlemen there in that State pay $10 to graze, not 1.35. In Montana, cattlemen have to pay $7.90. In Utah, they have to pay $7.30. But on the public lands in each of those States--that is, the Federal lands--it's 1.35, just hasn't increased. And who pays the price? Well, the Federal taxpayer pays the price because the cattlemen get to basically have this incredible subsidy.

So, just to use the analogy, when I started working, I got paid $1.35 when I was a kid. I'm sure there are many people who would still like to just pay $1.35 for a kid to work in the supermarket, but they can't do it because time moves on--unless you're a cattleman, where they have locked that minimum price into a hermetically sealed, cryogenically frozen price, $1.35. That's great, except for the Federal taxpayer who cannot collect all of the money they need.

Or should we just say, for the sake of discussion, that you happen to have a rent-controlled apartment in New York City. The rent was set back in 1986 or 1976, and now the markets have raised that price up to perhaps $4,000. The Republicans would say, well, rent control, that's good; we like keeping the price that way because it benefits a certain class of people. And I understand the Republican philosophy of freezing in prices that way--keeping the minimum wage as low as possible, keeping the rent control price for an apartment as low as possible. I understand the government intervention role of the Federal Government not allowing the free market to determine the price of something. But here what happens is that it balloons the Federal deficit because people aren't able to collect what we absolutely know to be the price to graze for a cow per day. We know what the price is because, in the adjoining land in Colorado or Utah or in Montana or in Washington State, we know what the State is charging on State public lands.

So this is just an attempt to give the Department of the Interior the ability to raise by $1--not all the way up to $10, not all the way up to $7, but just $1 from $1.35 up to $2.35--just as a little experiment just to see what happens out there in the market when people actually have to pay something that even remotely approximates what the price to graze would be.

At this point, Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Would the Chair please inform us as to how much time is remaining?

I will, at this point, continue to reserve the balance of my time.

I yield myself the remainder of my time.

So this argument that's being made by the Republicans is nonsensical. What you're saying is, that in your home State, on State land, you charge 10 bucks or 7 bucks to the cattlemen to graze. But on Federal land it's only a buck 35 in your State. And your answer to raising the price for cattlemen is that we should be having a debate over whether or not the State of Colorado or Montana controls all of the Federal land in your State. Then you'll begin to debate whether or not cattlemen should get away with only a buck 35?

You know, you're giving new definition to the term ``free range beef.''

You're allowing for the cattlemen in these States to get away with murder, and you're not even debating the issue of how they get away with this.

That's all we want from you. Tell us why you think they deserve a buck 35. You don't even want to reach that issue. You want to go off on the secondary issue of how much land in each State is controlled by the Federal Government, which is not what we are debating. We're debating how cattlemen get away with this bargain basement price that then comes to every other State to make up the difference in the Federal deficit because you're unwilling to collect it.

Meanwhile, you say to Grandma, higher rates for Medicare. You say to kids in school, higher payback for the loans that you take out. But for the cattlemen in your home State, somehow or other you don't understand that this is a debate that goes to the heart of why it is the people are very unhappy with the way the Federal Government operates.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Announcement by the Chair

Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

I rise in opposition to the amendment.

This amendment is just further evidence that the problem this drone zone bill claims to be solving does not exist and that the underlying bill is a dangerous overreach.

When this legislation was first introduced, we were told that it was necessary to establish this 100-mile drone zone around the entire United States--east coast, west coast, Hawaii, and Alaska. That version of the drone zone looked like a giant red belt surrounding the entire country. Then supporters of the bill decided that they'd gone too far. The bill was altered to say the drone zone would only cover a 100-mile stretch along our northern and southern borders and along the eastern border of Alaska. Even with that change, we were still assured that a blanket waiver of the full list of 36 bedrock environmental laws was absolutely necessary for our border security.

Now we have a further change.

This amendment will reduce the list of laws weighed by the drone zone from 36 environmental laws down to 16 environmental laws. This is the ever-shrinking bill. It gets smaller and smaller as people realize that environmental laws are not the problem when it comes to border security and that the zone created by this bill would harm the environment and individual freedoms for millions of Americans.

The Bishop amendment proves that the underlying bill has always been an extreme and extremely harmful solution to a problem that does not exist. Perhaps if we give supporters enough time, they can shrink this idea down to waiving parking enforcement in a small area around Tucson. This amendment reduces the damage this bill would do, but it does not begin to prevent that damage. Waiving 36 laws was an unnecessary overreach, and waiving 16 laws would be as well.

Limiting the scope of this terrible bill is a small step in the right direction, so there is no reason to oppose this amendment.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Would the Chair please inform the Members as to the time remaining on both sides.

I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from California (Mr. Filner).

I yield the gentleman an additional 30 seconds.

I am the final speaker on our side if the gentleman from Utah is ready to conclude debate.

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