Designating room HVC 215 of the Capitol Visitor Center as the "Gabriel Zimmerman Meeting Room".

Mr. Chairman, it is clear, when I have the ranking member of the Small Business Committee who has an enormous history of commitment to small businesses, and the ranking member of the Judiciary Committee, both former chairs, opposing this bill, then we obviously know that it is problematic.

What I know of small businesses is that they, frankly, want to have an anchor to promote and propel their business needs. The regulatory scheme and the underlying premise of this bill is to eliminate any anchor for our small businesses. And when you do that, you're clearly undermining their growth and opportunity.

I would add, as well, that I challenge as to whether or not this debate today creates any opportunity for small business, provides them access to credit, guarantees any loans, creates any jobs. Absolutely not, and it is absurd that we would suggest that agencies that are trying to promote small businesses are stopping small businesses and, therefore, we want to implode the regulatory scheme.

The APA provides an opportunity for due process through the court system. If our colleagues have problems with regulations, they can run to the courts. You don't have to implode the process to be able to address the problem.

Let's help small businesses, let's discuss how to create jobs, and let's vote against this legislation.

I have an amendment at the desk.

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

I rise today to call upon the rational and reasonable thinking of my colleagues on both sides of the aisle and really discuss an amendment that speaks the obvious.

The underlying bill puts into process a regulatory scheme that delays the implementation of regulations. Whether you agree or disagree with that approach, we all recognize that securing the homeland continues to be a top priority for this Nation.

I'm standing alongside some of our first responders looking over one of the Nation's major ports. Many who live in those areas recognize the vulnerability of America through her ports or aviation or mass transit or highways or bridges or dams.

Every moment after 9/11 is a new moment in this Nation. My amendment simply says to waive the provisions of this bill, H.R. 527, when it deals with homeland security.

I hold in my hand the National Security Threat List that lists the issues that our Homeland Security Department and intelligence communities have to address. The listing is not classified, so I will mention the many tasks that they have to address: terrorism, espionage, proliferation, the moving forward on the question of economic espionage, targeting the national information structure, cybersecurity. Why would we want to interfere with the movement of regulations to protect the homeland under the premise of this bill?

I ask my colleagues to support the Jackson Lee amendment that would waive the bill's provisions in light of protecting the homeland.

I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Let me again appeal to the bipartisanship of my colleagues. This is a very troublesome bill, and this bill interferes with the normal process, if you will, of dealing with the regulatory scheme. Although it's called the Regulatory Flexibility Act, I can assure you that the purpose of this legislation is, one, not to create jobs, and certainly not to help us secure the homeland.

The bill would add new review requirements to an already long and complicated process allowing special interest lobbyists to second-guess the work of respected scientists and staff through legal challenges, sparking a wave of litigation. This is what Homeland Security regulations would have to go through.

Since the creation of the Department of Homeland Security in 2002 and since my membership on the committee that was a select committee, we've overhauled the government in ways we've never done before. Steps have been taken to ensure that the communication failures that led to 9/11 are corrected.

More than 220 million tons of cargo moved, for example, through the Port of Houston in 2010. That cargo has to be inspected. And the port ranked first in foreign waterborne tonnage for the 15th consecutive year. Just imagine a regulation dealing with the scanning or the security of that tonnage to be interfered with by H.R. 527.

If Coast Guard intelligence had evidence of a potential attack on the Port of Houston and they wanted the Department of Homeland Security to address it or they used a regulation or there was a regulation in process, then it would have to be stopped by this legislation.

It is important to recognize that homeland security is not security by appointment. It is not security by ``let me address regulations by having them vetted by H.R. 527.''

This is a commonsense amendment that simply says, as it deals with the homeland security or the securing of our Nation as we look to be better than what occurred in 9/11 where agencies were not communicating with each other, where the fault of the cybersecurity system did not work, and we had the heinous tragedy of losing 3,000-plus of our souls in New York City. As we see the franchising of terrorism where there is the shoe bomber and the Christmas Day bomber and the Times Square bomber, it's important not to have a fettered Homeland Security Department in a regulatory process that is stopped by overlying legislation.

This legislation is a job-killer, we already know. Let's not let it be a killer of Americans because it gets in the way of Homeland Security efforts doing the work that is necessary.

I ask my colleagues to support the Jackson Lee amendment that asks simply for a waiver of this legislation as it addresses the question of securing the homeland and the regulatory scheme that is needed by intelligence agencies, our Border Patrol agencies, our TSOs that deal with aviation security, our cargo inspectors. As it relates to that work, our front line, let us waive this legislation.

Mr. Chair, I rise today in support of my amendment to H.R. 527, the Regulatory Flexibility Improvements Act of 2011. This bill would amend the Regulatory Flexibility Act, RFA. The bill would expand the number of rules covered by the RFA and requires Federal agencies to perform additional analysis of regulations that affect small businesses.

As a senior member of the Homeland Security and ranking member of the Transportation Security Subcommittee, I am very concerned about any legislation that would hinder the Department of Homeland Security's ability to respond to an emergency, which is why the Department of Homeland Security, DHS, should be exempt from this legislation.

This bill delays the promulgation of federal regulations, and delays a Federal agency's ability to issue regulations when responding to an emergency and grants the Small Business Administration's, SBA, Office of Advocacy additional authority to intervene in agency rulemaking, without providing additional funding. Further, H.R. 527 repeals an agency's authority to waive regulatory analysis during an emergency.

The bill would add new review requirements to an already long and complicated process, allowing special interest lobbyists to second- guess the work of respected scientists and staff through legal challenges, sparking a wave of litigation that would add more costs and delays to the rulemaking process, potentially putting the lives, health and safety of millions of Americans at risk.

The Department of Homeland Security simply does not have the time to be hindered by frivolous and unnecessary litigation, especially when the safety and security of the American people are at risk.

According to a study conducted by the Economic Policy Institute, public protections and regulations ``do not tend to significantly impede job creation'', and furthermore, over the course of the last several decades, the benefits of Federal regulations have significantly outweighed their costs.

There is no need for this legislation, aside from the need of some of my colleagues to protect corporate interests. This bill would make it more difficult for the government to protect its citizens, and in the case of the Department of Homeland Security, it endangers the lives of our citizens.

In our post 9/11 climate, homeland security continues to be a top priority for our Nation. As we continue to face threats from enemies foreign and domestic, we must ensure that we are doing all we can to protect our country. The Department of Homeland Security cannot react to the constantly changing threat landscape effectively if they are subject to this bill.

Since the creation of the Department of Homeland Security in 2002, we have overhauled the government in ways never done before. Steps have been taken to ensure that the communication failures that led to 9/11 do not happen again. The Department of Homeland Security has helped push the United States forward in how we protect our Nation. Continuing to make advances in homeland security and intelligence is the best way to combat the threats we still face.

Hindering the ability of DHS to make changes to rules and regulations puts the entire country at risk. As the Representative for the 18th District of Texas, I know about vulnerabilities in security firsthand. The Coast Guard, under the directive of the Department of Homeland Security, is tasked with protecting our ports of entry. Of the 350 major ports in America, the Port of Houston is one of the busiest.

More than 220 million tons of cargo moved through the Port of Houston in 2010, and the port ranked first in foreign waterborne tonnage for the 15th consecutive year. The port links Houston with over 1,000 ports in 203 countries, and provides 785,000 jobs throughout the state of Texas. Maritime ports are centers of trade, commerce, and travel along our Nation's coastline, protected by the Coast Guard, under the direction of DHS.

If Coast Guard intelligence has evidence of a potential attack on the port of Houston, I want the Department of Homeland Security to be able to protect my constituents, by issuing the regulations needed without being subject to the constraints of this bill.

The Department of Homeland Security deserves an exemption not only because they may need to quickly change regulations in response to new information or threats, but also because they are tasked with emergency preparedness and response.

There are many challenges our communities face when we are confronted with a catastrophic event or a domestic terrorist attack. It is important for people to understand that our capacity to deal with hurricanes directly reflects our ability to respond to a terrorist attack in Texas or New York, an earthquake in California, or a nationwide pandemic flu outbreak.

On any given day the City of Houston and cities across the United States face a widespread and ever-changing array of threats, such as: terrorism, organized crime, natural disasters and industrial accidents.

Cities and towns across the nation face these and other threats. Indeed, every day, ensuring the security of the homeland requires the interaction of multiple Federal departments and agencies, as well as operational collaboration across Federal, State, local, tribal, and territorial governments, nongovernmental organizations, and the private sector. We can hinder the Department of Homeland Security's ability to protect the safety and security of the American people.

This bill expands the review that agencies must conduct before issuing new regulations and the review they must conduct of existing rules to include an evaluation of the ``indirect'' costs of regulations, and grants the SBA authority to intervene in agency rulemaking. The measure also expands the ability of small businesses and other small entities impacted by an agency's regulations to challenge those rules in court.

Under current law, the process already takes as long as eight years to complete. Given the nature of its mission, the Department of Homeland Security is the last agency that needs to be subject to more levels of regulation and scrutiny. Some advocates groups also have expressed concern that by extending the rulemaking process, regulatory uncertainty could increase, which may make it more cost effective for agencies to seek enforcement through the courts, and thereby reduce the public's ability to participate in the process.

These costs add to the cost of doing business with the Department of Homeland Security, and eat away at the profits of our businesses, particularly our small businesses which often are not as equipped to absorb additional costs. Moreover, many businesses dealing with national security have higher costs because of expensive equipment, and as such are already working with lower profit margins.

The prolonged or indefinite delay of these life saving regulations threaten the security, stability, and the delivery of vital services to the American people. I cannot speak for my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, but I certainly do not want to slow the promulgation of regulations to a drip.

I have offered this amendment to mitigate the uncertainty regarding federal laws and rulemaking in the area of national security because of the increased urgency when dealing with these often sensitive matters. The Department of Homeland Security is the newest federal agency, and as such already is subject to pioneering levels of oversight and scrutiny.

I urge the Committee to make my amendment in order to ensure that life saving regulations promulgated by the Department of Homeland Security are not unnecessarily delayed by this legislation.

Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

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

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

I would like to think that our colleagues are in their offices communicating with their constituents and doing much of the work that we do and writing probably other great legislative initiatives, and they are paying attention to this debate and they keep hearing the words ``small businesses'' and they want to know why would any of us have a disagreement about small businesses when we have, I think, a consensus that small business are in fact the backbone of America; they are the job creators of America.

I recall many of us have initiatives. I have an initiative of visiting small businesses. Just a couple of weeks ago, I donned the clothing of a medical practice. I went to a beauty school and tried to do a little bit of hair design. I went to an energy company. I went on to a small export-import company, and I stood out as a safety officer for a construction company owned by a single mother.

So we all speak the language of small businesses. And you would think that my good friends on the other side of the aisle would have looked more closely at how damaging H.R. 527 is because, for those who may be listening in their offices and others, right now you have a three- agency framework of reviewing regulations dealing with small businesses.

Now you're going to include that all the agencies have to get into the act in stifling small businesses' activities and their growth and opportunity. Remember now, right now we have three, and then we're going to open up the lot so that every agency now has to go through a regulatory process to determine its impact on small businesses. It expands the use of small business review panels to review rules promulgated by all agencies to include all major rules, and some of these, of course, having the positive impact on our small businesses.

What is the significant economic impact? Nobody knows. It forces agencies to engage in wasteful, speculative analysis. It imposes an absurd and wasteful requirement on those agencies.

So I have a simple amendment. Ask the question beforehand: What is the economic impact of all of this vast new inclusion of other agencies to come down on our small businesses? It requires my amendment, a GAO study, to determine the cost of carrying out this bill and the effect it will have on Federal agency rulemaking. Simple, bipartisan amendment, I ask my colleagues to join me in supporting it.

I reserve the balance of my time.

I thank the gentleman.

Let me just continue looking for bipartisanship. I am hoping that I can convince my friend from Texas to not desire to have a can of worms, a potpourri of agencies coming out with the hand of oppression on small businesses.

This is a simple question that I'm asking. The GAO, the Government Accountability Office, simply would be asking the question: What is the significant economic impact on a substantial number of small entities which will greatly slow down the rulemaking process and substantially empower other competitors to small business to throw sand in the gears of rulemaking that will help small businesses, women-owned businesses, minority-owned businesses, disabled veterans?

What is the reason for not agreeing to an important study? It forces agencies to again engage in wasteful, speculative analysis, including an assessment of all reasonably foreseeable indirect economic effects.

We can do it ahead of time. Will this kill jobs is the question. It expands judicial review to include all agency actions and not just final agency action.

Mr. Chairman, can we not find an opportunity to come together on this? I would much rather have a report to tell me how many small businesses will shut down waiting for agency review of the rules that would be helpful to them.

Have we engaged with the Small Business Committee? Has anyone

asked the ranking member of that committee, even the chairman of that committee, who are champions of small business? I don't think I have seen the chairperson, but I have seen the ranking member, who listens to small businesses across the country. If there is a regulation that is going to help a small business, this bill kills it.

The small businesses are hanging on for dear life. Pass the rule. Pass the rule. Now you have put in all these agencies, dilly-dallying around trying to be able to find a way to stifle the growth of the small business.

Mr. Chairman, common sense tells Members that it doesn't hurt to have just this one bipartisan effort to get the answer of the economic impact beforehand. Down in Texas we say, close the barn door before the cow gets out, or the cart before the horse, the horse before the cart. We've got all of that. We've got confusion.

I am simply having a simple amendment that would allow the GAO to report on how we can better serve our small businesses and create the jobs that are necessary. I ask my colleagues, including Mr. Smith, to support this amendment.

Mr. Chair, I rise today in support of my amendment to H.R. 527, the ``Regulatory Flexibility Improvements Act of 2011.'' My amendment would require a GAO study to determine the cost of carrying out this bill and the effect it will have on federal agency rulemaking. In addition, the report must contain information on the impact of repealing the ability of an agency to waive provisions in the Regulatory Flexibility Act when responding to an emergency.

This bill would amend the Regulatory Flexibility Act of 1980 in such a manner that it would result in significant delays in the agency rule- making processes by mandating multi-agency analyses of both direct and indirect costs for rules proposed or finalized by a single agency.

My amendment simply requires that the Comptroller General, within 2 years after the enactment of the legislation, issue a report to Congress on the cost effectiveness of the changes implemented by this Act.

The report would list all additional costs and resources that each agency will have to expend to carry out this Act and the amendments made by the Act.

It would also show the effect of this Act and its amendments on the efficiency of the rule making process, including the amount of time required to make and implements a new rule.

This study would report on any impact that this Act or its amendments would have on the ability to implement new agencies in the event of an emergency. Lastly, this study would examine the overall compliance of agencies with the Regulatory Flexibility Improvement Act (RFIA).

By requiring that multiple agencies conduct detailed economic analyses of a rule proposed by a single agency, each agency will have to expend time and resources to uncover the indirect economic effects of the proposed rule. This is unduly burdensome on a process that is already sufficient in length, as rules currently require a 30 day period after publication prior to effectiveness.

There is one overarching problem with H.R. 527. Although it claims to make improvements, one thing it does not do is provide the needed clarification that the GAO has repeatedly pointed out, and that the agencies have asked for.

In the past, there have been GAO reports showing incidents of agency noncompliance with the current regulatory flexibility rules for rule making. The reports cited that this noncompliance is due largely to confusion surrounding the meaning of ``significant economic impact on a substantial number of small entities.'' Agencies have expressed the need to better clarification of this clause to aide them in determining when rule making analysis and review is necessary.

Another part of this expanded review and analysis called for in H.R. 527 that concerns me is the potential it has to impede upon emergency rulemaking. Every so often, there are instances when an agency has to implement a new rule or regulation in response to an emergency. Under the current law, there is an exception allowing agencies to bypass the review process in the event of an emergency. The provisions of this bill cloud that exception.

Furthermore, the rule-making process is made more cumbersome and expensive by requiring multi-agency review. If the purported reason for amending the Regulatory Flexibility Act with this bill is to save the American taxpayers money by including provisions requiring analyses of direct and indirect effects of proposed rules, then it should follow that the costs of implementing such provisions should not outweigh the benefits they provide.

My amendment will ensure just that by requiring the Comptroller General to issue a report to Congress that includes (1) the additional costs and resources that each agency must expend to maintain compliance with this Act, (2) an analysis of the effect that this Act has on the efficiency of the rule-making process, and (3) an analysis of the potential difficulties that may arise in an emergency situation in which an agency must implement new rules.

If the process by which government agencies create rules is changed to require the disclosure of all costs associated with a proposed rule, then shouldn't the Act that makes such changes have its own costs to the American taxpayers disclosed? My amendment will ensure that this disclosure is made to the public upon this legislation's enactment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on H.R. 527.

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

America's economic recovery remains sluggish, with the unemployment rate still at 9 percent. Jobs are the key to economic recovery, and small businesses are the primary job creators in America.

A study for the Small Business Administration found that regulations cost the American economy $1.75 trillion annually, or over $15,000 per household.

Mr. Chairman, while job creators suffer under the weight of these regulations, Federal employees are visibly writing even more to implement the mandates of new laws like ObamaCare and Dodd-Frank. The same study also found that the cost of regulatory compliance is disproportionately higher for small businesses. This hurts their ability to create jobs for Americans.

Last month a Gallup poll found that small business owners consider ``complying with government regulations'' as the ``most important problem'' they face.

On February 8, 2011, I introduced H.R. 527, the Regulatory Flexibility Improvements Act of 2011, to provide urgently needed help to small businesses. Mr. Graves and Mr. Coble are original cosponsors along with the bill's 24 additional cosponsors.

This bill primarily reinforces the Regulatory Flexibility Act of 1980 and the Small Business Regulatory Enforcement Fairness Act of 1996.

It only requires agencies to do what current law and common sense dictate that they should be doing. Current law requires agencies to prepare a regulatory flexibility analysis so agencies will know how a proposed regulation will affect small businesses before it is adopted. But the Government Accountability Office has found in numerous studies that agencies are not always adhering to these laws.

For example, current law allows an agency to avoid preparing a regulatory flexibility analysis if the agency head certifies that the new rule will not have a significant economic impact on a substantial number of small businesses. But these terms are not defined in the law, and agencies routinely take advantage of this and fail to prepare any analysis.

The bill fixes this problem by requiring the Small Business Administration to define these terms uniformly for all agencies. Also, it requires agencies to justify a certification in detail and to give the legal and factual grounds for the certification. And this bill restricts agencies' ability to waive the Regulatory Flexibility Act's requirements.

The legislation also requires agencies to document all economic impacts, direct and indirect, that a new regulation could have on small businesses. Agencies already must account for indirect economic impacts under the National Environmental Policy Act. Small businesses deserve the same level of scrutiny.

This bill assures that small businesses will have a voice in the regulatory process. Currently, only three agencies, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, the Environmental Protection Agency, and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau must consult with small business advocacy review panels before issuing new major regulations. Building on this, the bill requires all agencies to use advocacy review panels.

Equally important, this bill strengthens requirements that agencies review and improve existing regulations whenever possible to lower the burden on small business. It enhances the Small Business Administration's ability to comment on and help shape major rules. It assures that the law is uniformly implemented so agencies can not interpret their way out of its requirements. And the bill improves judicial review.

Some critics of regulatory reform may claim that this bill undermines agencies' ability to issue new regulations. On the contrary, the bill only strengthens the existing law with carefully tailored commonsense reforms.

Especially in light of current economic conditions, this bill is a timely and logical step to protect small businesses from overregulation. Like the Regulatory Flexibility Act of 1980 and the Small Business Regulatory Enforcement Fairness Act of 1996, the Regulatory Flexibility Improvements Act of 2011 recognizes that economic growth ultimately depends on job creators, not regulators.

The economy is already on shaky footing. It is more important than ever for regulators to look before they leap to impose more regulations. I urge my colleagues to support the bill, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Coble), the chairman of the Courts, Commercial and Administrative Law Subcommittee of the Judiciary Committee.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Chabot), a senior member of the Judiciary Committee.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Poe), a former district judge and a senior member of the Judiciary Committee.

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

Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Manzullo), a member of the Financial Services Committee.

Mr. Chairman, we are prepared to close; so I will reserve the balance of my time.

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

Job creation is the key to economic recovery, and small businesses are America's main job creators. But overregulation kills jobs and is especially burdensome for small businesses. Anyone who doesn't believe that probably hasn't spent much time in the private sector. Even President Obama, who has not spent much time in the private sector, wrote in a Wall Street Journal op-ed and recognized that overregulation ``stifles innovation'' and has ``a chilling effect on growth and jobs.''

It has been 15 years since Congress last updated the Regulatory Flexibility Act of 1980. Experience during that time reveals that further reforms are necessary. The Regulatory Flexibility Improvements Act of 2011 makes carefully targeted reforms to the current law to ensure that agencies properly analyze how a new regulation will affect small businesses before adopting that regulation. In the current economic climate, with millions of Americans looking for work, we simply cannot afford to overburden small businesses with more wasteful or inefficient regulations.

I urge my colleagues to support the bill. I look forward to its passage.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I claim time in opposition to the amendment even though I do not oppose the amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I support this amendment.

The amendment aims to require an agency to account for rules implementing the free trade agreements when the agency considers the cumulative impact of a proposed rule. I support free trade because I believe it is in the best interest of American business, workers, and consumers alike.

The gentleman from Pennsylvania and I may differ on this issue, but in the context of this amendment, that is beside the point. It can't hurt to make sure that agencies consider the impact of rules implementing the free trade agreements in their regulatory cumulative impact calculations. I don't think the analysis will show that free trade destroys American small businesses. Quite the opposite is true, in fact. But that isn't a reason not to do the analysis. We should know how these kinds of regulations contribute to the cumulative regulatory burden on small businesses.

In conclusion, Mr. Chairman, I do support this amendment and hope to have the gentleman from Pennsylvania's support for the bill on final passage.

I yield back the balance of my time.

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

I am prepared to close; so I will reserve the balance of my time.

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

The bill only requires agencies to do what common sense and current laws dictate they should be doing right now. The Department of Homeland Security is not exempt from the Regulatory Flexibility Act. Like other agencies, the Department should analyze how a new regulation will affect small businesses before issuing the regulation. If the Department needs to issue a regulation in a true emergency situation, such as one involving national security, it can already do so under the ``good cause'' exception to notice-and-comment rulemaking in the Administrative Procedure Act. This good cause exception would allow the agency to bypass the analysis required by the Regulatory Flexibility Act as well.

As written, the amendment would exempt the Department from H.R. 527 but not from the Regulatory Flexibility Act, itself. The result of this would be two versions of the Regulatory Flexibility Act at play in the Federal Government--one for the Department and one for everyone else.

Small businesses do not need any more confusion and uncertainty when they are trying to participate in the Federal regulatory process.

For these reasons, I oppose the amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, even the President and his regulatory czar, Professor Cass Sunstein, admit that over-regulation hampers job creation. The Regulatory Flexibility Act of 1980 is based on the fact that regulatory compliance is especially costly for small businesses, which are America's main job creators. In this economy, we have no room for error when it comes to over-regulation.

The bill ensures that all agencies follow the Regulatory Flexibility Act. H.R. 527 does not ask agencies to do anything that they should not be doing already right now.

There is no reason to create the blanket exemptions proposed by this amendment. There are no such exemptions currently in the Regulatory Flexibility Act for the categories of rules described in the amendment. Further, the amendment would create tremendous confusion among agencies and small businesses regarding which version of the law would apply to a future rulemaking. We need less confusion and uncertainty, not more, in the regulatory process.

If the amendment stems from a concern about the ability of agencies to make rules in emergency situations, I would note once again that agencies may avail themselves of the ``good cause'' exception to the notice-and-comment rulemaking process already in the Administrative Procedure Act. If an agency justifiably invokes this exemption, it will not have to conduct the analysis required under the Regulatory Flexibility Act.

For these reasons, I oppose this amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

I am prepared to close; so I reserve the balance of my time.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

First of all, I would like to point out that the National Federation of Independent Business actually does support this legislation. I also would like for the record to show that a recent Gallup poll taken on October 24 of this year said that small business owners themselves cite ``complying with government regulations'' as their most important problem. Now, that's why we are here today.

Mr. Chairman, I oppose this amendment because it puts the cart before the horse. The reason we require agencies to conduct regulatory flexibility analysis is so the agencies and the public will know how a new regulation will affect small businesses before the agency issues the regulation.

The amendment would exempt from the Regulatory Flexibility Act any rule that would result in net job creation. We certainly know that regulations can destroy jobs. Even the administration acknowledges that.

Whether regulations can ever truly create jobs is another question all together. Assuming that a regulation could create jobs, an agency will not know this without analysis first, which is what the bill requires agencies to do.

There is no good reason to transfer this responsibility to conduct this analysis from the agency, themselves, to the Office of Management and Budget, as the amendment proposes.

For these reasons, I oppose the amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I am prepared to close; so I reserve the balance of my time.

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

I oppose this amendment because it is unnecessary and would result in a biased study by the Government Accountability Office.

The study proposed by the amendment focuses excessively on costs to agencies to comply with the Regulatory Flexibility Act, and how the bill would affect agencies' abilities to pass new regulations. The study would not focus enough on how the bill would benefit small businesses and lead to better regulations, which is where our focus should be.

It is worthwhile to require agencies to finally comply with the law. That is especially true if it means that agencies will reduce unnecessary regulatory burdens and free small businesses to create jobs.

In the future, I certainly would like to know whether agencies comply with the Regulatory Flexibility Act as amended by this bill, or whether they remain disobedient. This amendment, however, favors the idea that the bill places too heavy of a burden on regulators.

Fundamentally, the purpose of the Regulatory Flexibility Act is to reduce the regulatory burden on small businesses, not on agencies. Job creators, not job regulators, are the key to our economic recovery.

Mr. Chairman, for these reasons, I oppose the amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

I oppose this amendment because it carves out an exception to the bill for regulations under the Food and Drug Administration.

If agencies were doing the depth of pre-regulatory analysis they are supposed to be doing under the Regulatory Flexibility Act, then we wouldn't be here today.

Small businesses create jobs, and jobs are the key to economic recovery. To help small businesses--like minority-owned restaurants, for example--create jobs, we need to reduce, not increase, the regulatory burden on them.

The FDA is not currently exempt from the Regulatory Flexibility Act, so it makes no sense to exempt the FDA from the bill, either.

This amendment also would create confusion within the FDA by exempting only its responsibilities under the Food Safety Modernization Act from this bill. There should not be two versions of the Regulatory Flexibility Act in play at the FDA.

For these reasons, I oppose the amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

I want to thank the ranking member for yielding time.

This bill amends the Regulatory Flexibility Act of 1980, which requires agencies to engage in so much analysis and in so many new procedures that it basically befuddles the agencies in bringing forth any rules in the future. It is elimination by burdensome regulation. While it doesn't say it is eliminating rules, that's the effect of it. It subjects all major rules and other rules, those which have a significant economic impact on a substantial number of small entities, to review by small business review panels.

The cumulative effect of these and other changes in H.R. 527 will be to undermine the ability of agencies to effectively regulate consumer health and product safety, environmental protection, workplace safety, and financial services industry misconduct, among other critical concerns.

We talk about small businesses. Small businesses are important, and they create more jobs than any other sector of our economy, but small businesses are made up of human beings. To paraphrase Mitt Romney, who said that corporations are people, small businesses are people, too. Small businesses are concerned about consumer health and product safety because they are the victims of it. Small businesses are concerned about environmental protection and workplace safety and food and drug safety and, certainly, about financial services industry misconduct, which almost brought this country to its knees in what could have been a depression but for the work of our great President and the Congress that worked with him at that time.

This bill does little to help small businesses shape or comply with Federal regulations. Right now, we can take for granted that the food we eat, the water we drink, the air we breathe, the places we work, the planes we fly on, the cars we drive, and the bank accounts in which we put our savings are going to be safe because we have strong regulation; but if H.R. 527 is enacted, it will be harder, much more difficult, maybe impossible, to provide those protections for future generations.

H.R. 527 is based on the well-intentioned, but false, premise that regulations result in economically stifling costs.

In particular, proponents of H.R. 527, and of anti-regulatory legislation generally, of which we have seen an abundance in this Congress, repeatedly cite a thoroughly debunked study by economists Mark and Nicole Crain, which made the ridiculous claim that Federal regulations impose a $1.57 trillion cost on the economy.

Ridiculous? Why, you say. Because they even admitted, and the Congressional Research Service said, it failed to account for any benefits of regulation. There are indeed benefits of regulation and great--and the Office of Management and Budget said great benefits outweigh costs.

Moreover, the study was never intended to be a decisionmaking tool for lawmakers or Federal regulatory agencies to use in choosing the right level of regulation. But they still use that as the basis for this law.

So let's focus on the real facts.

H.R. 527 will bring agency rulemaking to a halt because of multiple layers of bureaucratic review and analysis that it adds to the rulemaking process. It is the de facto end of regulations.

As Sherwood Boehlert, a colleague of mine here in Congress, of the previous Congresses from the State of New York and a Republican and a long time chair of the House Science Committee, recently warned, this measure ignores history--Newt Gingrich--``ignores history, larding the system with additional reviews based on previous efforts that have slowed progress while helping nobody.''

Second, the bill clearly presents a serious threat to public health and safety for all Americans. It does this by eliminating the emergency authority that currently allows agencies to waive or delay certain analyses so they can expeditiously respond to national crises such as a massive oil spill, or a nationwide outbreak of food poisoning, or an emerging financial marketplace meltdown. We've experienced all of these.

The priority in the face of an emergency is to have emergency agencies to say, sorry, we can't do this. We have to conduct regulatory analysis first before we aid the American people.

H.R. 527 is simply chock full of crafty provisions to slow down rulemaking, requiring small business advocacy review panels to analyze rules promulgated by all agencies, and not just those from the three agencies for which review panels are currently required. Moreover, it would require review panels for all major rules, not just those that have a significant economic impact on a substantial number of small entities. And this bill would force agencies to engage in seemingly endless, wasteful and speculative analysis, including assessment of all reasonably foreseeable, indirect--indirect--economic effects of a proposed rule.

I think we may see agencies purchasing crystal balls so they can comply with this inane requirement of looking into the future. As any first-year law student would know, it can take years of costly and time-consuming litigation to figure out exactly what is reasonably foreseeable and what is indirect. Where is Mr. Paul's graph?

While adding analytical requirements and opportunities for industry to disrupt rulemaking, H.R. 527 provides absolutely no assistance to business in complying with Federal regulations, which is what small business really needs. And for those of us who should really be worried about the national deficit, this bill has a hefty price tag. The most conservative estimates,

$80 million, and a more realistic estimate is $291 million over a 5- year period.

Thank you.

H.R. 527, like H.R. 3010, which we will also consider this week, is simply a wolf in sheep's clothing. What proponents seem to describe as commonsense revisions to current law actually would result in a dramatic overhaul of the rulemaking process, threatening agencies' ability to ensure basic health, safety, and other precautions.

I oppose this bill and urge my colleagues to do so. Also the cumulative effect of these and other bills would be to be undermine the ability of agencies to effectively regulate consumer health, work product safety, environment protection, financial services misconduct, and others. Right now we can take these for granted.

This is a dangerous bill, and I would ask our Members to vote against it and think about the safety of the public and the future. Small businesses are people, as Mr. Romney said about corporations, and those people also suffer from lack of regulation.

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

I yield myself such time as I may consume.

My amendment would exempt from this particular bill the rules it has when it relates to food safety, workplace safety, consumer product safety, air quality, and water quality--things we all hold dear, things that will be jeopardized if this bill passes.

As I noted in my opening remarks, this threatens to halt agencies' ability to promulgate rules by adding analytical requirements and numerous opportunities for industry to challenge agency rulemaking. Yet you should be able to challenge agency rulemaking, but courts shouldn't be able to summarily throw them out based on a lack of knowledge that they have of an area in which the agencies are really expert, but that's what would happen.

The societal cost of enacting H.R. 527 would be to place public health and safety at risk. As we enter this holiday season, it would be well to remember that the reason we take for granted that the food we eat and the water we drink--and the drinks we drink--at all our holiday dinners and receptions won't kill us or sicken us is because of effective rulemaking. Likewise, because of strong regulations, we can take for granted that toys given to our children or grandchildren won't poison them; but the consequences of failing to regulate can be dire.

In 2006 24-year-old Jillian Castro became gravely ill after eating spinach tainted with E. coli bacteria. Her organs were rapidly deteriorating; her kidneys were failing; her red blood cells and platelets were dropping rapidly; and she nearly died.

According to the best available estimates by public health and food safety experts, millions of illnesses and thousands of deaths each year in this country can be traced to contaminated food.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that foodborne microorganisms have caused 48 million illnesses, 128,000 hospitalizations, and 3,000 deaths. Many of these could be avoided with the proper regulations of food and drug. That's why I ask that food safety be eliminated from this

bill, because it will be expensive to treat these people, let alone the fact that they will die. The CDC estimates that salmonella alone affects a million people a year. Just today, the Food and Drug Administration issued a recall of grape tomatoes because of potential salmonella contamination.

Other recent examples of regulatory failure include the Listeria- tainted cantaloupes that killed 29 people across the country in October. Pedal entrapment issues that cause cars to accelerate unexpectedly resulted in Toyota's recall of nearly 2 million vehicles. There was Mattel's recall of nearly a million toys in 2007 because the toys were covered in lead paint. There are other examples of this.

Public health and safety precautions have been on the books for a long time and were passed with bipartisan support. The fact is there were more regulations during President Bush's term than there were overall in President Obama's when you calculate the time they've been in office. Yet there was no call to cut back when President Bush was in office. It's only since President Obama has been in office.

The Pure Food and Drug Act was enacted in 1906 by Teddy Roosevelt, then the Food, Drug and Cosmetics Act in 1938. The Clean Air Act and the Occupational Safety and Health Act were enacted in 1970 when Richard Nixon was President. The Clean Water Act was enacted in 1977. They've served our country well for many years.

If H.R. 527 is enacted without adopting this amendment, we can no longer take protections from these harms for granted because, in the future, agencies will be hamstrung from passing regulations to protect the public.

I would urge us to pass this amendment and to protect our workers, our consumers, our small businesses, and our small business people when they eat their breakfasts, their lunches and their dinners, when they buy toys for their children and their grandchildren, when they drive their cars, and when they work in their workplaces.

I yield back the balance of my time and ask for a positive vote.

Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

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

I would just like to point out that the Crain study referred to already by the distinguished chairman of the committee, apparently he hasn't found out that it's been held in error in a number of ways but mostly by the Crain study people themselves, who said that their analysis was not meant to be a decisionmaking tool for lawmakers or Federal regulatory agencies to use in choosing the right level of regulation.

In other words, the study is flawed because it fails to account for any benefits of regulation. So I want everybody to know that this correction about $1.75 trillion has been thoroughly debunked by not only CRS but other authorities as well.

Now, this debate follows a number of pieces of legislation that we're considering. It's sort of a regulation tidal wave--or anti-regulation tidal wave: H.R. 3010, Regulatory Accountability; H.R. 10, which we will see soon, the REINS Act; and H.R. 527, the bill before us now, the Regulatory Flexibility Improvements Act.

Now, it's strange to say that this trio of public safety-killing legislation would make it harder to control and make safe our products that we count on. Under the law presently, rulemaking must make an analysis for every new rule that would have a significant economic impact on small businesses. Among other things, the bill would repeal the authority that allows the agency to waive or delay this analysis in response to even an emergency. It's hard to imagine how the bill under consideration would make regulations more cumbersome, would take longer, would risk national emergencies, and would lose a lot of the safety and health protections that we now enjoy. I feel that there hasn't been a careful consideration of what the real final goal is.

The Wall Street Journal, which is no enemy of big business, said: The main reason United States companies are reluctant to step up hiring is scant demand rather than uncertainty over government policies.

So even the business community recognizes that the big problem with our economy is not that rules are tying up businesses but that we don't have enough people buying, because they don't have enough jobs to create the demand. If you examine it carefully, as many on our Committee on the Judiciary have done, you will find that the safety standards of which we are really very proud are going to be compromised in a very embarrassing way.

Regulations don't kill jobs; they save lives.

There are plans underway--this is one of them--here in the House to undermine the regulatory process that guarantees the health and the safety of millions of Americans. I urge all of the Members of the House to carefully consider the direction of this bill.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to yield 5 minutes to the ranking member of the Courts, Commercial and Administrative Law Subcommittee, the gentleman from Tennessee, Steve Cohen.

I yield the gentleman an additional 2 minutes.

Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to yield 1 minute to a distinguished member of our committee, the gentlelady from California, Judy Chu.

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

Members of the House, it's important for us to realize who else has difficulty in supporting a bill that ends up creating unsafe products, promotes dirty air, and other kinds of harms to our citizenry. The American Lung Association is opposed to H.R. 527. The Environmental Defense Fund is opposed to this bill. The National Women's Law Center does not support this bill. Public Citizen is opposed to it. The Union of Concerned Scientists is opposed to it. And, indeed, a total of more than 70 organizations have all written urging us to very carefully consider what we are doing here today.

It's absolutely critical, and it is very important that we understand that there is no evidence, credible evidence that regulations depress job creation. Now, this is great rhetoric, but we're passing laws here today.

The majority's own witness before the House Judiciary Committee agrees with us. Christopher DeMuth, who appeared before the House Judiciary Committee on behalf of the American Enterprise Institute, stated in his prepared testimony that the focus on jobs can lead to confusion in regulatory debates, and that the employment effects of regulation, while important, are indeterminate. He can't figure it out, and he was a pretty good witness for our position that regulations have no discernible impact on job creation.

If anything, regulations may promote job growth and put Americans back to work. The BlueGreen Alliance notes: Studies on the direct impact of regulations on job growth have found that most regulations result in modest job growth or have no effect.

Economic growth has consistently surged forward in concert with these health and safety protections. The Clean Air Act is a perfect example. The economy has grown 204 percent and private sector job creation has expanded 86 percent since it was passed in 1970. And so, my colleagues, regulation and

economic growth can go hand in hand. We recently observed that 40 years of success with the Clean Air Act has demonstrated that strong environmental protections and strong economic growth go hand in hand.

What's in this bill is a provision that every regulation change would have to come back through the Congress. It would be unthinkable that we could add this to our schedule, especially if there was a health emergency that required a rapid passage.

So I want every Member of this House to examine the grossly different analyses that are being made here and come to your own conclusion. I think if you do, you will realize that regulations have no discernible impact on job creation.

I reserve the balance of my time.

I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I'm glad my friend is still on the floor because he asked, what do the doctors have to say about this? The doctors oppose the bill. And I'd like to point out, the American Lung Association and the Center for Science in the Public Interest do not agree with you, and they agree with our position on the bill.

In just a minute I'll be very pleased to.

The Environmental Defense Fund, the Friends of the Earth, and the Union of Concerned Scientists are all in agreement with us. And so I want you to know that the medical people that have spoken about this bill are not in support of it.

I will yield briefly to the gentleman.

Just a moment. These are not lobbyists. I don't know if these organizations have any offices here. But the Union of Concerned Scientists probably doesn't have any lobbyists. I doubt if the American Lung Association does.

I would, except that your side has far more time than my side does.

I reserve the balance of my time.

I yield myself such time as I may consume. I too am prepared to close on this side.

Ladies and gentlemen of the House, we have two starkly opposing views of what this bill does. I have over 70 organizations that are from the labor movement, from the health movement, from the science world, from the Women's Law Center, from the Union of Concerned Scientists all telling us that this is a very dangerous process that we're involved in, that the results wouldn't be that the authors of this amendment intended to harm people or that they intended to produce unsafe air products or that they were supporting making the air unbreathable, but that is the result of this bill.

It's been stated twice on the other side that we are accusing you of bad intent. I don't do that. I want you to be very clear. It's not a matter that your intentions are not honorable, but the results of a bill like H.R. 527 would create unsafe products. It would ultimately produce air that is more polluted than the air that we're dealing with now. It would delay the promulgation of regulations that we need. It is exactly going in the wrong way because we, as a matter of fact, need to have more regulation surrounding products, particularly children's toys. We want the air to be much better than it is.

And so I urge my colleagues to examine the premises starkly different than have been presented here today and to join us in turning back and sending back to the committee a bill that would make our health much more endangered.

I yield back the balance of my time.

I thank the gentlelady from New York.

My friend on the other side from Missouri, who is managing the bill, I was happy to hear you say that this measure that we are examining does nothing to hinder the rulemaking process. And I'd like to help you out in that area if I may because this expands in the bill the use of small business review panels to include rules promulgated by all agencies, and to include all major rules.

I would say to the gentleman from Missouri that right now there are only three agencies that are affected. What this does, my friend, is extend the review process to every agency. Do you recognize, sir, that there are over 50 agencies in the Federal system? And so for it to be thought that this isn't going to change much is a grievous mistake. And of course I am here to help you out, to the extent that I can.

The other thing that it does--and you think that this will not change the rulemaking process--is that this measure would force agencies to engage in speculative analysis, including an assessment of all reasonably foreseeable, indirect economic effects of a proposed rule.

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

I rise today to offer House Resolution 364, designating HVC 215 of the Capitol Visitor Center as the Gabriel Zimmerman Meeting Room.

On January 8, in Tucson, Arizona, tragedy struck this country in a shooting that shocked our Nation and tore through the fabric of the congressional community. Six people died that horrific day, including Gabriel Zimmerman, a congressional staffer for our friend and colleague, Representative Gabrielle Giffords of Arizona's Eighth Congressional District.

Now, less than a year after this horrible day, it is fitting that the United States House of Representatives, through passage of this resolution, properly honor the sacrifice and service of one of our own.

Gabe Zimmerman served as the community outreach director for our friend and colleague, Congresswoman Gabby Giffords. Gabe was perfectly suited for this position, as anyone who knew him would tell you. That's because working as a community outreach director married two great passions in his life: his drive to help individuals and a firm conviction that America's Government needed to be open, accessible, and responsive to every American.

Ask any Member of Congress here what is one of the most valuable positions in their office, and they will tell you it is our constituent outreach director. They listen each and every day to the concerns of our constituents--their problems, their suggestions, their complaints-- and then they work to help them. The hours are long. Nights and weekends at home with family or out with friends are often sacrificed to attend community meetings. Each and every one of us have staff members working for us who show such dedication, and the hallways of this Capitol have echoed for two centuries with the hurried footsteps of congressional staffers serving the American people.

This resolution, designating the Gabriel Zimmerman Meeting Room, is not put forward to mark Gabe's death but, rather, to recognize his commitment in life and to making others' lives better. Ask those who knew him and they will tell you that Gabe had a way about him that invited conversation. He could walk into any room and find a way to connect to people. Gabe would often put in extra hours and was known to pay out of his own pocket for poorer constituents' bus fare, whatever he could do to help that little extra amount.

Gabe's dedication and cheerfulness had a profound effect on those with whom he came in contact. Just days after the shooting, well after dark, a gentleman came to Representative Giffords' Tucson office, tears in his eyes, visibly shaking. He explained that just days before, Gabe had taken the time to sit down with him; and even though he'd come in late in the day, he listened to him, treated him like a human being, and made it clear he was going to work to help him. The gentleman simply couldn't believe that such a good person had been taken so young.

Among his colleagues in Tucson, Gabe was profoundly well liked. They told me, when I visited after the shooting, that Gabe was always excited to come in to work and that he cherished the ability to work for a Member of Congress and for one he so admired. His coworkers kiddingly called him Prince Charming because he was always there for them, always ready to come to their rescue.

In Representative Giffords, Gabe found someone for whom he cared deeply as his mentor, as his boss, as a friend, and as a Member of his Congress who shared his passion for selflessly helping others. And while Representative Giffords counted on Gabe to be her eyes and ears in her district, her husband Mark Kelly said that Gabby also looked upon Gabe like a younger brother, as so many of us as Members of Congress look at our own staff members.

Tragically, this loyal, determined, and talented public servant, someone who was a true apostle of our representative democracy, unknowingly also made the ultimate sacrifice for his country.

Gabe Zimmerman is the first congressional staffer in the history of this institution to be killed while carrying out his official duties. It is in this historical and hallowed moment that we vote on this resolution to name the congressional meeting room currently known as HVC-215 the Gabriel Zimmerman Room.

As those of us who work on the Hill know well, HVC-215 is frequently used for staff meetings of every variety. I can think of no better way to memorialize Gabe's service and ultimate sacrifice than to have this meeting place forever carry his name and memory.

Over the past 4 months, a bipartisan group of more than 400 of our colleagues, 402 now, to be exact, have signed on to this resolution in solidarity as cosponsors of this resolution honoring Gabe's sacrifice. This makes this resolution among just a select few pieces of legislation in history to have garnered such broad support in the House of Representatives.

With this vote, we honor the life of Gabe Zimmerman, and we also recognize all congressional staff--working in every corner of our great Nation--for their dedication to Congress and the American people.

From now on, each time we enter the Gabriel Zimmerman meeting room, let us be reminded of Gabe and of the service and sacrifice of every congressional staffer. I urge my colleagues to join me in support of House Resolution 364.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, it is now my privilege to yield 2 minutes to a good friend of Congresswoman Giffords and a wonderful representative of the great State of Arizona (Mr. Grijalva).

It is my privilege to yield 3 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer).

Madam Speaker, it is now my privilege to yield 2 minutes to a close friend of Congresswoman Giffords' and someone who has stood by her, the gentleman from Washington (Mr. Smith).

Madam Speaker, it is my privilege to yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Pastor).

(Mr. PASTOR of Arizona asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Madam Speaker, it is my pleasure to yield 1 minute to the gentlelady from California (Ms. Speier).

Madam Speaker, it is my privilege to yield 1 minute to a woman with whom I experienced one of the most emotional experiences in my life, along with our colleague from New York, Kirsten Gillibrand, when we watched Gabby Giffords open her eyes after her injury, the gentlelady from California, our leader, Nancy Pelosi.

Madam Speaker, before I yield back, I want to share one more story to really demonstrate to the entire country the heart of the young man that we are honoring here today, because even those who only occasionally came into contact with Gabe Zimmerman were touched by his passing because of the way he treated them in life.

The week following Gabe's death, the night shift security guard came and knocked on the door of Congresswoman Giffords' Tucson office. They were working late, and her staff opened the door. The guard came hoping that the person he so often talked to at night hadn't really been killed. Tearing up, he said he hadn't known Gabe's name, but said that he often found Gabe working late and that Gabe would always ask him about his family or his weekend or just talk about sports. Gabe always treated him with dignity, which meant so much to him.

That's the importance of the legislation that we have in front of us today. Knowing that we are going to forever designate HVC 215 as the Gabriel Zimmerman Meeting Room sends a message to all of our staff and to the hearts of all who serve that we will honor their service, honor their commitment, honor their willingness to make a personal sacrifice to devote their lives to helping others. That was the epitome of Gabe Zimmerman.

I want to close just by thanking the entire Arizona delegation, particularly Mr. Franks and Mr. Flake, and most especially Dave Schweikert, who had such courage in sponsoring this resolution with me, was passionately committed to garnering cosponsors for it, and really worked incredibly hard to bring it to the floor.

I also want to thank the leadership of both the Democrat and Republican Members. This is a very challenging and difficult time for our Nation, Madam Speaker. It is my hope, as hard as it is and as hard as it has become for us to engage in civil discourse, that we really all redouble our efforts as we have all publicly stated that we are willing and interested in doing, myself included, to make sure that we can earn the respect and earn every day the privilege that our constituents have given us to represent them here in our Nation's capital. And in doing so, we will honor Gabe's memory, honor the service of our colleague and friend Gabby Giffords, and know that Gabriel Zimmerman did not die in vain.

I yield back the balance of my time.

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