H.Res. 788

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 788 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to claim the time in opposition to the point of order and in favor of the consideration of the resolution.

Mr. Speaker, the question before the House is: Should the House consider H. Res. 788? While the resolution waives all points of order against the consideration of H.J. Res. 118 and H.R. 3409, the committee is not aware of any points of order, and the waiver is basically prophylactic in nature.

We heard a lot of emotional and interesting points as to the basis of the bill that could be debated if, indeed, this rule were to be passed. I don't think it is actually the time right now in a point of order to go over the benefits of the bill or the detriments of whatever may happen if the bill, itself, is actually debated. There is time for that.

We do know that the number of individuals receiving welfare has dropped by 57 percent, that poverty amongst all single mothers has fallen by 30 percent, that the poverty amongst black children has dropped to its lowest level since 2001, and that employment and earnings amongst single mothers have increased significantly.

But that's all debate to the bill, which still has to go through the rule debate, and we're not talking about that. This is a procedural issue.

We could talk about the fact that in '93 the Ways and Means Committee did say that waivers granted after the date of enactment may not override provisions in the TANF law that concern further mandatory work retirements. But, once again, that would be the kinds of things that we should be talking about in the debate of the bill, which will come after the debate on the rule, which will come after our discussion of this procedural point of order.

So, actually, the merits of what the bill is is not the same thing as the purpose of the procedural point of order. The procedural point of order still has to be based on the idea of unfunded mandates within the rule.

The Congressional Budget Office believes that H.R. 3409 would impose an intergovernmental mandate as defined in the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act. However, based on the information for EPA and a small number of public entities would be required to comply with the bill's requirement, the CBO estimates that the cost of those entities to comply would fall below the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act's annual threshold for intergovernmental mandates. It's a threshold that is set and adjusted for inflation.

So the Congressional Budget Office states that H.J. Res. 118 also contains no intergovernmental or private sector mandates as defined by the Mandates Reform Act. That is the basis of the point of order. The bottom line is there is no violation of both an unfunded mandate within the rule or in the bills themselves.

The rest of the discussion is actually to the merits of the legislation and is appropriate at the time as we are debating that legislation.

So, Mr. Speaker, although I really have this great desire to use the full 10 minutes of discussion here, the bottom line still----

No, thank you.

I appreciate the honor. Will the gentlewoman from Wisconsin let me finish the statement?

I appreciate the interruption, but let me finish here. And probably not. Let's get on with the issue at hand here.

The point of order basically, Mr. Speaker, is still specious. It is in order to allow the House to continue its scheduled business for the day because the issue of the point of order is the unfunded mandate, not the other merits towards the legislation.

So I do urge Members to vote ``yes'' on the question of consideration. We will have an additional hour to discuss anything you wish to on the rule debate, as well as a whole lot of time on the merits of the bill when we debate the bill itself.

With that, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, for the purposes of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentlelady from New York (Ms. Slaughter), pending which 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 ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days during which they may revise and extend their remarks.

This resolution provides for a closed rule for the consideration of H.J. Res. 118, the congressional disapproval waiver of work requirements, and provides 1 hour of general debate, with 30 minutes equally divided and controlled by the chair and the ranking minority member of the Committee on Ways and Means and 30 minutes equally divided and controlled by the chair and the ranking minority member of the Committee on Education and the Workforce.

This rule also provides for a structured debate for consideration of H.R. 3409, the Coal Miner Employment and Domestic Energy Infrastructure Protection Act, and provides for 1 hour of general debate, with 20 minutes equally divided and controlled by the chair and the ranking minority member of the Committee on Natural Resources, 20 minutes equally divided and controlled by the chair and the ranking minority member of the Committee on Energy and Commerce, and 20 minutes equally divided and controlled by the chair and the ranking minority member of the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure.

Finally, this rule makes in order a number of important amendments on both sides of the aisle. If staff doesn't change my mind, I believe there are 13--7 Republican and 6 Democrat--amendments which is as close as you can get with an uneven number to a fair rule. So it is a fair rule.

Mr. Speaker, now speaking towards the merits of this particular resolution, I would like to make special mention of Congressman Johnson, who is the base sponsor of H.R. 3409, the Coal Miner Employment and Domestic Energy Infrastructure Protection Act. He definitely has been one of the leaders in this entire area of the issue of coal as it is used in energy. Not only is it important to his constituents, but this is an important issue for the entire country. And I want to recognize Mr. Johnson as having been tireless in committee, asking questions that go to the core of this particular issue, providing amendments, and then finally culminating with his bill which deals with how we actually can use coal to further our energy needs in this particular country. Representative Johnson is a freshman who has learned fast and is a true champion for inexpensive energy that will expand our economy and create jobs for American citizens.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, I hope you will forgive me if I try to limit myself to what is actually in the resolutions and the bills that we are presenting today as far as the Rules Committee is concerned.

There is, though, a common thread that runs through the two resolutions that happen to be here and deals with the definition of what is administrative and what is legislative. Even if the current administration seems to have a problem in making that definition of what is administrative, we in Congress need to clearly understand what is our legislative responsibility.

Our good friend, Louie Gohmert of Texas, always says that he who learns the lessons of history will find some other way to screw it up. That's probably true. I don't want to sound like an old history teacher, but I am. I do want to say that there are some things that we in Congress should be doing to learn from our past history.

John Page, in 1771, a Congressman from Virginia, was on the House floor when it was determined while the House was debating whether they stuck around to actually determine where postal routes should be. People wanted to go, and, more importantly, the people trusted the President. The question was, Why don't we just let the President do it all?

It was John Page who stood up and said, and I move to adjourn and leave all objects of legislation to his, the President's, sole consideration and direction. He shamed Congress into doing their job of writing the legislation and not allowing the executive branch, the administration, simply to do everything by fiat. We sometimes have forgotten that.

In the TARP language, we put in language like, the Secretary of the Treasury will be able to purchase troubled assets on such terms and conditions as are determined by the Secretary; or authorize any purchase on which the Secretary determines, promotes financial market stability; or the Secretary is authorized to take such action as the Secretary deems necessary to carry out all authorities in this particular act.

That is legislative authority that we passed on to the executive branch. That was a tragic mistake. We should not incorporate that tragic mistake, wider now, by simply allowing the executive branch to take on responsibilities and authorities of their own free will and volition.

We have this same situation once again in the history of this country. We had a President of the United States who wrote a book about Congress without ever visiting Congress itself, who said what the Founding Fathers realized, in which their effort to have vertical separation of power between State and national government--what we call federalism--and horizontal separation of powers between the three branches, which we call the separation of powers--and every public school student is taught that--they were put in there so that individual liberty, which I always consider to be individual choices and options in running their lives, would be protected against the concentration of power in one branch or another.

Now, this former President of the United States called this separation of powers political witchcraft. He said it was wrong to try and separate powers perplexingly subdivided and distributed to be hunted down in out-of-the-way corners. An earlier President than him thought, you know, the President of the United States is elected by everybody, Congress by a few people, the courts by none. Therefore, ignore the courts, which has some appeal, but at the same time the President should speak for the government.

This other President, coming back later, built upon that so he increased the role and power of the executive branch under the concept the President is the President of the whole people and, therefore, he has the ability to transcend separation of powers.

His effort to improve democracy was to eliminate democracy and instead ensure that the decisions were not made by the people or the voice or representatives of the people, but by experts, experts who were serving in the administrative branches. We, if you like that concept, call it the administrative state. If you don't, we call it ``nanny government.'' Nonetheless, that was the concept.

One of the other Presidents that came shortly before him said there will be little permanent good that can be done by any party if we fail to regard the States as anything other than a convenient unit for local government. He said there is no harm by concentrating power in the hands of one individual. He also said that he would not be content with keeping his talents undamaged in a napkin. That's perhaps why the Speaker of the House at the time said he had no more use for the Constitution than a tomcat has for a marriage license.

The bottom line of what happened in the history is that all of a sudden we found that the Founding Fathers who believed in people and believed in the legislative branch, listening to John Locke, who said you cannot transfer the power of the legislature to another branch, those type of people decided at that time that the people should not be running their own affairs, that government experts should be making that policy.

To be honest, when we're talking about the first resolution that deals with TANF, the welfare issue, I don't care if the waiver is the greatest thing since sliced bread, it is still extra-constitutional and it should not be used and Congress should not allow it to take away what is the role of Congress, and only Congress, to establish these issues and set these boundaries.

In the other bill that we're talking about, we're talking about prohibiting future actions by entities, in this case, specifically the EPA, which would destroy jobs, increase the cost of our utilities that would cause greater costs of lighting homes and heating homes, especially for those who have the least ability to do so.

Congressmen and Congresswomen must stand up and insist that Congress create these standards and create these options, not being made by executive

fiat. That is the very purpose of why we are here.

The first President, to whom I referred, ended up with a legacy of many programs implemented which we still today find controversial. He was labeled by historians as an arrogant President at that time who refused to talk to Congress. Because of that, he lost some of his last, most precious programs in an effort to try and go around Congress rather than working with Congress.

Now, Mr. Speaker, that's why this resolution is before us and why these two separate bills are here. Both of them attempt to set the record straight and show that it is Congress' responsibility to set the rules and the guidelines. It is not an administrative prerogative. And we as Congress need to step forward and say we are the ones who do this. We should not allow it to be done by anyone else, regardless of why it's being done or the merits of why it's being done. It's our job.

We should learn from history. We should be more like John Page and try and make sure the Congress does these types of issues and makes these types of decisions and less like Presidents later on who thought the President speaks for everybody and the President has every right to transcend separation of powers and do it for himself. That's the basis of these two bills. That's the important issue. We should learn the lesson of history.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

With gratitude for the last speech, which was such a stirring support of fracking, which has made gas so plentiful and useful in this country, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. Lamborn).

I am pleased to yield 3 minutes to the chairman of the Science Committee, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Hall).

Mr. Speaker, I have some empathy for the gentleman from Iowa, but I will have to say that one of the reasons that those amendments were not made in order was, quite frankly, because both of them were nongermane to the base bill, and that becomes a concept.

One of the reasons that Ms. Slaughter speaks on wishing to stay here until we pass middle class tax cuts--and I think I can approve of that because, actually, when we considered H.R. 8, the Rules Committee took an extraordinary step of waiving the rules of the House--including CutGo and other budget-related points of order--so an amendment could be given by Mr. Levin, and he could have an opportunity to present that amendment. That amendment was debated, and it was rejected on a bipartisan vote of the House in August.

Unlike the amendment, then H.R. 8 passed the House with a bipartisan vote, which means the House has voted for a middle class tax cut. We have done our duty. It is one of the myriad of bills that is sitting over on the Senate side waiting for them to do something so that we can proceed to a conference committee.

So I actually approve of what the gentlelady from New York is saying because basically we've done it, and we did it on August 1.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

I actually don't think I have any other speakers. I may be surprised in the next few minutes, as will be the case.

It happens, yes.

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

In our discussion of this particular rule today, we have, as oftentimes is the case, wandered far and wide.

I would point out to one of the speakers who was just up there saying that we should stay here doing the sequestration act, dealing with the sequestration issue, the House did. On May 10, we passed the Sequestration Replacement Act. Once again, it's sitting over in the Senate. To wait here until we do the middle class tax cuts, we did that in August. It's waiting over on the Senate to do something.

We have issues that are significant in the two that are before us. If we're talking about welfare in some particular way, whether the rule that was made coming out of the executive branch was appropriate or not, we could go back and say why it was done. It is true the President, in 1997 and once again in 1998, said he would not have supported the legislation that created the system that we have. It's also true that in The Washington Post editorial, they made comments that said the Obama administration is waiving the Federal requirement that ensures a portion of able-bodied TANF recipients must engage in work activities. If this is not getting welfare reform, it's difficult to imagine what would be.

But even if the substance of that was inaccurate, the fact that it was done by regulation, by rulemaking coming from the administrative branch, puts us in suspect category. Rules should not be establishing what is our priority; it should be laws made on this body. If you want to change it, if you want to do waivers, it should be coming from this particular body.

The other half of it deals with coal. This is a Nation with the largest coal reserves in the world. We have 500 years of potential electricity at cheap rates coming from coal. A coal plant today is as much as 99 percent cleaner than one built 40 years ago, and yet rules and regulations that have been promulgated or are being threatened to promulgate are one of those that impede the ability of building new plants.

There is no valid reason why the American coal industry should be suffering at the hands of overzealous Washington regulators or why workers are being laid off in the Midwest, in Virginia, Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia, and other places; although, today, it was again announced that there will be 1,200 coal mining jobs that will be eliminated across central Appalachia by a company, one company.

And once again, there is the kind of unfair regulations that are taking place. It is true that H.R. 3409 is cobbled together with other bills that have passed this body, but I would remind you that each of those four that have already passed this body were passed on a bipartisan vote, with anywhere between 16 and 37 Democrats, depending on the bill, joining with Republicans to pass those. And, when put together in a package with H.R. 3409, presents a good package to make sure that we are in favor of cheap energy, energy that will drive and build our economy and provide jobs for those who need those particular jobs.

I went historically in a while earlier because I wanted to say that we have faced these types of situations in the past, where the question was: Should the President make the rules or regulations or should Congress actually pass legislation?

The President to whom I referred ended his tenure in a somewhat bitter way, refusing to work with Congress, instead, trying to go around Congress, which produced, at that time, a historic deadlock between the Presidency and the Congress.

This is a Nation of laws. Laws are made here. It's not a Nation of rules. And if the rules and regulations are going to have the effect on the future and are going to have an effect on the American people, they should not be done by executive fiat. Whether you like them or not, they should not be done in that manner. It should be done here legislatively.

That's the purpose of both of these issues that are tied together in this rule; that's the thread that comes together--whether or not we actually believe Congress should be doing the job of creating the standards and the rules, or we're willing to simply abrogate our responsibility, our power, our options to some other body.

And I would hope that as Congress we would be very careful and considerate about what our responsibility is, and we would take very seriously any encroachment on the role of law that is given to us by the Constitution. It was the vision of the Founding Fathers that this should be the body that makes those decisions, not the executive branch.

This is a good bill, these are good bills, and this is a fair rule.

We haven't even talked about the amendments that were made in order, but they do cover, in fact, we did have one statement about the amendment that was not made in order, and I half wish--the Member is no longer here, but his issue of concern is covered in another amendment that is made in order and will be discussed on this floor.

So it is a fair rule. It will have a vigorous debate. And there are two good bills that would be brought before this body that I hope sincerely pass. I do urge their adoption, and I sincerely urge the adoption of this rule that will move us forward.

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

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

I rise in opposition to this bill. The Republicans are saying that there is a war on coal, but the only battle coal is losing is in the free market--to natural gas, to wind and to solar. Just 4 years ago, coal generated 51 percent of the electricity in the United States. Now it is down to 35 percent. When you add up hydropower, the renewables, natural gas, and the other gases, you get 44 percent of our electricity sector.

Just like Governor Romney says he has given up on 47 percent of Americans, the House Republicans have given up on 44 percent of our electricity sector. Just like their politics grips tightly to the past, their energy policies hold fast to the energy technologies and the fuels of yesterday, like coal and oil.

The free market has been replacing coal with natural gas, which has grown from 21 percent of our electricity generation back in 2005 and 2006, and has now risen to 30 percent of all electrical generation in the United States. Natural gas. It's not a war, it's a revolution. What has happened is, simultaneously, coal has come down to 35 percent. Surprising, isn't it? The numbers look like they match up pretty perfectly, especially if you add up the rise from 1 percent to 4 percent of the electricity in the United States which has been generated by wind over the last 5 years. That's what's happening, ladies and gentlemen.

All the rest of this I don't understand, to be honest with you. It's almost like the Republicans are rejecting the free market as it is now operating as the country is moving to natural gas. I understand the coal State Members have to stand up and defend this change in the marketplace, but I don't understand why my other Republican friends would reject those free market principles.

Why is this switch from coal to natural gas happening? It's because natural gas is cheaper. Natural gas prices have decreased by 66 percent since 2008. It is cheaper to produce new electricity from natural gas than from coal. This isn't a conspiracy--it is a competition--but Republicans say that there is a war on coal. Well, in a market sense, that war is now being won. When I was a boy, I had to go down into the basement with my father to shovel the coal. That's how we kept our house warm. Then my mother said let's move to home heating oil, and so my father had the home heating oil come. That was a revolution. And now there is another revolution going on.

Up in the Northeast, for example, because of the low price of natural gas, 1.4 million Northeast households have switched from oil to natural gas over the last decade. And why is that? Again, it costs $2,238 to heat your home through the winter with home heating oil, and it costs $629 to heat your home with natural gas. That's why they're switching. The same thing is happening in the petrochemical industry. They're switching from oil over to natural gas. In the fertilizer industry, they're switching from oil over to natural gas. The price is low. They are moving in that direction. That's the larger story that is occurring--the natural gas revolution in the United States of America.

So, ladies and gentlemen, I just urge all of you to understand that this is not the Obama administration in a war against coal. That is not what is going on. There is a paranoia-inducing, Darwinian marketplace revolution that is taking place--led by natural gas, followed by wind-- that is changing the makeup of the electricity marketplace in our country. Only when you understand and admit this will we be able to have a real debate out here, because all the rest of this is really just meant to be political, in order to harm the President in the election of 2012, when the real harm to coal is being done in the marketplace.

I reserve the balance of my time.

I yield the remainder of our time to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Holt).

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

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

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

With just 1 more day left until Congress recesses until the election, the Republican majority has decided that, instead of dealing with real problems facing Americans by passing a jobs package dealing with the looming fiscal cliff or providing tax certainty to middle class families, we will instead debate a bill that deals with an imaginary war on coal, fabricated by Republicans in order to justify their real war on the environment, the most anti-environment Congress in history.

In reality, this bill just represents a war on us. It's the Republicans in Congress making clear that their priority is not protecting the well-being of the American people. The Republican majority has already acted on four out of the five titles in this bill, and the Senate has rejected every single one of them. The President has vowed to veto every single one of them.

The only new title that is presented is one aimed at preventing the administration from moving forward with a rule that does not yet even exist, that would limit coal mining companies from dumping tons of their toxic mining waste directly into streams and rivers.

The ironic part is that, according to CBO, this bill won't even prevent the administration from doing that. But it does prevent the administration from undertaking any action that would ensure that mountaintop mining operations are safe for workers and safe for the health of those who live and work nearby.

Mr. Chairman, I would like to, at this point, reserve the balance of my time.

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

So the Republicans say that this legislation is all about creating jobs. They say that we will save money by passing this disastrous bill. But the numbers just don't add up.

According to the Environmental Protection Agency, mountaintop mining has already buried nearly 2,000 miles of streams with mining waste that leaches dangerous heavy metals into that water. One study puts the cost of reclaiming a stream impacted by this type of mining at as much as $800 per linear foot.

If we do a little arithmetic, $800 multiplied by 5,280 feet in 1 mile, multiplied by the 2,000 miles of streams already buried, that's $8.5 billion. That's what it would cost to clean that up. And that's just to clean up the streams that have already been decimated.

But that's not the only cost included in this provision. We also have the cost to health, the cost to children.

Studies have shown that communities located near mountaintop mining sites have as much as a 42 percent increase in infants born with birth defects. These communities also have a 16 percent higher risk of giving birth to a child with low birth weight, a factor that is closely associated with fetal death, inhibited cognitive development, and chronic diseases later in life.

And that's not all. Communities located near mountaintop mining sites also have significantly higher rates of lung disease, cardiovascular disease, pulmonary disease, and a higher likelihood that these diseases will kill them.

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

Could I inquire from the Chair how much time is remaining on either side?

I yield myself the remainder of my time.

While it is impossible to put a dollar figure completely on the suffering that those families will feel, one study has put the public health burden from premature deaths in the Appalachian communities at $74 billion per year. Now, that's arithmetic that even Governor Romney would understand. In fact, when he was Governor of the great State of Massachusetts, he stood in front of a coal plant, and here's what he said. He said, ``I will not create jobs or hold jobs that kill people, and that plant kills people.''

My amendment is simple. It says, if the Secretary of the Interior is allowed to issue a rule that would protect pregnant women and children from adverse reproductive outcomes or birth defects or would reduce the prevalence of cardiovascular disease, pulmonary disease or lung cancer, that that rule can go into effect.

I urge all Members of this body to support this amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

I rise to claim the time in opposition.

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

I actually have no problem with the gentleman's amendment. If he wants to require the publication of scientific studies used to develop regulations, I am just fine with that. I'm sure he knows, of course, that this is already a Federal requirement, but I don't object to the redundancy of an amendment's passing that says they should do something that they do already.

But I do want to take a moment to talk about the Republican war on science, because this bill that we are debating today is their battle plan. The essence of today's bill is that science and facts do not matter and that, when science and facts become inconvenient, we can just repeal them.

Take the provision of this bill that legislatively overturns a scientific finding that greenhouse gas pollution is dangerous, which is a decision that was made based on 2 full years of work and on a 200- page synthesis of major scientific assessments, including assessments performed by the U.S. Global Change Research Program and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's Fourth Assessment Report. In fact, the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington recently rejected challenges to EPA's scientific endangerment finding, saying that EPA used an ``ocean of evidence'' to support its decision that it was ``unambiguously correct'' in its determination and that ``EPA is not required to re-prove the existence of the atom every time it approaches a scientific question.''

Republicans decided that peer-reviewed science was inconvenient because that analysis was what started the pretend ``war on coal.'' So we have to vote again and again and again to eliminate all of that science.

This bill tells EPA to ignore the science that air pollution causes lung disease and that mercury damages children's developing brains. In fact, it tells EPA, Don't even look at the science; look at the costs. If controlling air pollution is expensive, then we shouldn't do it even if it would save lives. It says, no matter what EPA learns about the sludge that comes out of coal-fired power plants, no matter how high the concentrations of poisonous arsenic, mercury or chromium and that no matter what EPA learns about how these materials find their way into our drinking water, EPA is not allowed to scientifically determine that material to be hazardous.

This bill turns a blind eye to science. The only time Republicans value science is when science can be used as a weapon. When science can be used to delay regulations, when endless analysis can be used to create paralysis, the Republicans suddenly value science. The Republican majority doesn't like that every respected scientific entity over the last decade has concluded that greenhouse gases cause climate change.

Their solution: repeal the science.

Republicans aren't happy that the Secretary of Health and Human Services has issued a report that finds that formaldehyde causes cancer. Sure, the World Health Organization already determined that 17 years ago.

Their solution: We should study it again. We should allow a National Academy of Sciences review so that we can prevent the administration from taking any action to protect the public against dangerous formaldehyde. In fact, there has already been a rider to the health appropriations bill that does just that, while also stripping funding for any subsequent reports on cancer. It is a strategy taken right out of the American Chemical Council's playbook. It is act one of Big Coal's comedy of errors.

We've seen it over and over again on the House floor: first deny the science; second, delay the regulations by legislating a new scientific study to review the first science the industry doesn't like; and third, deter efforts to protect the health and security of millions of Americans by requiring yet another third party to review the scientific study that was just legislated and postponing regulatory action until after that is complete.

This bill isn't about the war on coal. It's about the Republicans' war on science. That's why we're out here. It continues unabated today.

With that, I yield back the balance of my time.

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

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

There is a tremendous revolution going on in the United States right now that the Kelly amendment would cut right to the heart of.

Between 2017 and 2025, as fuel economy standards in America would rise to 54.5 miles per gallon just because of those additional 8 years of higher fuel economy standards, we would back 2 million additional barrels of oil per day out of the United States. How much is that?

Well, let me just give you an idea. There is conversation about whether or not there might be a war with Iran. Well, the United States imports 1.8 million barrels of oil per day out of the Persian Gulf, 1.8 million barrels a day.

This amendment would kill the efforts, which the auto industry has accepted, to back out 2 million barrels of oil per day by increasing the fuel economy standards between 2017 and 2025. This is one of the most anti-national security amendments that we could ever have out here on the House floor. Combined with the dramatic increase in CO2 that would go into the atmosphere--an additional 6 billion metric tons of CO2 would go up into the atmosphere if this amendment passed. Now, how much CO2 is that? That's as much CO2 as the entire United States emitted in the year 2010 in our country.

If you look at these two issues in combination, you look at the fact that the auto workers endorsed the increase in fuel economy standards, the auto industry endorses the increase in fuel economy standards, it's not unlike this myth that's been created that it's anything other than the marketplace that is the problem that the coal industry is principally having with natural gas coming as a substitute across the country, and the petrochemical industry, and the utility industry, and consumers choosing it for home heating rather than oil.

Well, the same thing is happening here. Where's the problem? Who wants this change? The auto industry doesn't want it. The auto workers don't want it. Clearly it's a huge national security issue. And the auto industry enjoyed last year and is repeating this year record sales as their fuel economy standards go up.

So I would just say that if you care about national security, you really don't want to change the law tonight that backs out 2 million barrels of oil per day, that the industry that is living under the regulation supports. That makes no sense at all as we're getting briefed in secret this afternoon about al Qaeda all across the Middle East, all across North Africa. Why would we do this?

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 788, I call up the joint resolution (H.J. Res. 118) providing for congressional disapproval under chapter 8 of title 5, United States Code, of the rule submitted by

the Office of Family Assistance of the Administration for Children and Families of the Department of Health and Human Services relating to waiver and expenditure authority under section 1115 of the Social Security Act (42 U.S.C. 1315) with respect to the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program, and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and to include extraneous material on H.J. Res. 118.

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

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.J.Res 188, a resolution to disapprove of the Department of Health and Human Services rule waiving the work requirements in the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, or TANF, cash welfare program. The requirement that 50 percent of a State's welfare caseload work, or prepare for work, was a central part of the bipartisan 1996 welfare reforms signed into law by President Clinton. Those reforms were overwhelmingly successful in reducing welfare dependency and poverty while increasing work and earnings. Unfortunately, President Obama said that he would have opposed such reforms had he been in Congress at that time. And so on July 12 of this year the Obama administration issued an ``information memorandum'' to waive the welfare work requirements in a blatant end-run around the current Congress.

The administration's action is unlawful on two fronts. First, the welfare work requirements are contained in a section of the Social Security Act, section 407, that may not be waived according to that law. Second, the nonpartisan Government Accountability Office determined that the administration's ``information memorandum'' qualifies as a rule and therefore should have been officially submitted to the Congress for review before being issued. It was not.

Just yesterday, GAO released another report that found that HHS has never before issued any TANF waivers in the history of the program, including involving the TANF work requirements. More importantly, they found that when previous HHS Secretaries were asked about the possibility of waiving work requirements, HHS responded that ``the Department does not have authority to waive any of these provisions.'' That was the conclusion of the Clinton administration, the Bush administration, and at least, to date, the Obama administration.

When it comes to welfare work requirements, I guess we can say President Obama was for them before he was against them. Unfortunately, for the President, the American people do not agree with his original and most recent position on this issue. A recent survey shows that 83 percent support a work requirement as a condition for receiving welfare. And for good reason. The work requirement and other 1996 reforms are responsible for increasing employment of single mothers by 15 percent from 1996 to 2000, and decreasing welfare caseloads by 57 percent over the last decade-and-a-half.

But inexplicably, these results don't sit well with the Obama administration. They refuse to acknowledge their mistake and rescind their memorandum. That's why we've brought this resolution to the floor today.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to preserve the successful welfare work requirements and join me in passing this resolution.

I reserve the balance of my time.

I yield myself 30 seconds only because the gentleman referred to me.

I will just say that the issue that he refers to was actually to extend the work requirements to other programs, which actually would have increased the work requirements.

Let me just say, I'm glad my friend brought up the fact checkers, because The Washington Post fact checker calls the Democrats' claims of increasing work ``a stretch,'' stating that it is not clear that ``the net result is that more people on welfare will end up working,'' and actually gave the ``eloquent speech'' by President Clinton my friend referenced two Pinocchios for saying that it would increase work by 20 percent.

At this time I would yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Paulsen), a Member of the Ways and Means Committee.

I yield the gentleman an additional 30 seconds.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Graves).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to a distinguished member of the Ways and Means Committee, the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Roskam).

At this time, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Gingrey).

I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

I have no further speakers. I believe I have the right to close. I'm prepared to close when the gentleman is through with his speakers.

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

When the bipartisan welfare reform bill was passed in 1996 and ultimately signed by President Clinton, the work requirement was a key part of that welfare bill. And the work requirement is this: that at least 50 percent of the caseload has to be engaged in work. And the principle was that, if you're able-bodied, you ought to be working if you're going to be receiving Federal benefits.

Now, the statute named 12 different things that qualify as work. Most of us think of work as going actually to employment, but there are 12 things. And a couple of them, let me just say, such as job search and job readiness actually, under current law, qualify for work. Vocational training and education qualifies for work as long as it doesn't exceed 1 year.

Also put into the statute was a clear statement that the work requirement could not be waived, because changing the paradigm on welfare was absolutely critical. And as I said in my opening statement, it has been important to reducing welfare caseloads, to bringing people to independence, to reducing child poverty. Those were all critical goals that have been met.

Let me read what Dr. Haskins, the Staff Director of the Ways and Means Committee--and I was on the Ways and Means Committee; I helped write the welfare bill; I was on the conference committee--said at that time, in terms of waivers. ``Waivers''--and this is the committee report.

Waivers granted after the date of enactment may not override provisions of the TANF law that concern mandatory work requirements.

That's because this was such an important part of the change that we were trying to bring to welfare. And it's been very successful, some might say the most successful social change that has occurred.

So every administration since then, whether it was the Clinton administration or the Bush administration or even at the beginning of the Obama administration, recognized that work requirements could not be waived. There is plain language in the statute in section 407 that says the work requirement cannot be waived.

Then here comes the Obama administration, through an information memorandum, that now both the GAO and the Congressional Research Service say is really a rule; and I would like to place in the Record both the letter of September 4 and the September 12 Congressional Research Service memorandum, both which say that the administration action was a rule.

The full CRS report I am inserting in the Record is available online at http://waysandmeans.house.gov/uploadedfiles/evaluating_whether_the _tanf_information_memorandum_is_a_rule_under_the_cra_redacted_ 5.pdf

Now comes the administration saying, Well, we don't have to go to Congress to change the law. Even though Congress voted on this in a bipartisan way and this was a critical piece of major legislation, we're just going to send in an information memorandum and have unelected bureaucrats change the law of the land.

People who sort of referee things around here, like the GAO and CRS, said, No. Hold it. Stop. This is not an information memorandum. This is a rule.

If an administration wants to promulgate a rule, there are certain criteria that they have to follow. The reason is that unelected people are making law. So, in order to do that, they have to inform the Congress, and they have to do certain things, none of which the administration did. Let me read a piece of this information memorandum:

Projects that test systematically extending the period in

which vocational education training or job search-readiness

programs count toward participation rates, either generally

or for particular subgroups, such as an extended training

period.

Under the law I just said, vocational training can only last a year. This information memorandum reads you can be in training for longer than a year. Number one, that is weakening the work requirement. Number two, they did not follow the law by notifying the Congress. They need to go back, and they need to issue a rule.

Frankly, if this is that important to them, come engage the Congress. There has been no consultation. There has not been one staff person from HHS who has come up and had an opportunity to brief any of us on this. I am willing to work with the administration. I'd like to hear their ideas. I'd like to have that opportunity to do so. I think it is regrettable that we've gotten to this point, but we've gotten to this point because there has been a mistake. They made a mistake, and they need to withdraw that.

I urge that we support the resolution. This is too important to have unelected bureaucrats make the law of the land.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Government

Accountability Office,

Washington, DC, September 4, 2012.

Hon. Orrin Hatch,

Ranking Member, Committee on Finance, U.S. Senate.

Hon. Dave Camp,

Chairman, Committee on Ways and Means, House of

Representatives.

By letter of July 31, 2012, you asked whether an

Information Memorandum issued by the Department of Health and

Human Services (HHS) on July 12, 2012 concerning the

Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program

constitutes a rule for the purposes of the Congressional

Review Act (CRA). The CRA is intended to keep Congress

informed of the rulemaking activities of federal agencies and

provides that before a rule can take effect, the agency must

submit the rule to each House of Congress and the Comptroller

Genera1. For the reasons discussed below, we conclude that

the July 12, 2012 Information Memorandum is a rule under the

CRA. Therefore, it must be submitted to Congress and the

Comptroller General before taking effect.

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

Over the past 2 years, this Republican House has amassed the most anti-environment record in the history of Congress.

During this period, the Republican House has voted more than 300 times on the floor to weaken long-standing public health and environmental protections, block important environmental standards, and even halt environmental research. It's an appalling record.

I remember a time when there was bipartisan support for protecting the environment. Some of our best allies were Republicans like former Science Committee Chairman Sherwood Boehlert. It would have been unthinkable then to bring a bill that eviscerates the Clean Air Act and the Clean Water Act to the floor. But those days are apparently over.

Our last order of business before the election in 2012 is this bill, H.R. 3409. This is the single worst anti-environment bill to be considered during the most anti-environment House of Representatives in history. Under the guise of protecting coal mining jobs, House Republicans have resurrected their most extreme anti-environmental bills.

This new Frankenstein legislation is a sweeping attack on environmental protections, many of which had nothing to do with coal. It's an all-out assault on America's bedrock environmental protections.

Since 1970, when Richard Nixon was the President of the United States, the U.S. has had a national policy that air should be safe enough for people to breathe. The Republican bill that we're considering today would overturn this policy and cut the heart out of the Clean Air Act by allowing air quality standards to be set on the basis of polluter profits rather than health. This would reverse decades of progress in cleaning up our air. The gentleman that just last spoke on the floor said it was great, he likes the fact that we have cleaner air, but enough is enough.

The standards that we see being changed would no longer be based on health.

The bill also nullifies EPA's rules to require power plants to finally reduce their emissions of toxic mercury, which can cause brain damage and learning disabilities in infants and children. Blocking reductions in toxic air pollution means more heart attacks, more asthma attacks, more emergency room visits, and more premature deaths. Well, we've had enough of those kinds of clean air. Why have we've got to go backwards and allow toxic pollution to do harm to so many people?

But the bill doesn't stop there. It would overturn the Obama administration's historic vehicle fuel efficiency and carbon pollution standards. These standards are supported by the auto industry because they provide the industry with regulatory certainty and a single, national program. The standards will boost our energy independence by saving over 2 million barrels of oil a day. They will save consumers thousands of dollars at the pump over the life of a vehicle. The savings to American consumers will be equivalent to lowering gasoline prices by $1 per gallon.

These standards that the Republican bill would overturn are a victory for the auto industry, consumers, and the environment. They have nothing to do with coal. But House Republicans are targeting them anyway.

The legislation would prohibit EPA from taking any action to reduce dangerous carbon pollution. It codifies climate science denial by overturning EPA's scientific finding that carbon pollution endangers health and welfare. The premise of title II of this bill is that climate change is a hoax. The bill even eliminates the existing requirement that oil refineries, chemical plants, and other large polluters disclose how much carbon pollution they are releasing.

The signs that climate change is already occurring are all around us. The recent wildfires, drought, and heat

waves are exactly the types of extreme weather events that scientists have been predicting for years. The House Republican solution to the greatest environmental challenge of our time is to bury their heads in the sand and pretend it isn't happening. And they call this bill a moderate, not extreme, one.

This assault on the Nation's environmental laws will be the last order of business before the House adjourns for the election. It won't go anywhere in the Senate. It is a partisan, political bill that is distracting us from dealing with the real problems facing our Nation, like creating jobs and strengthening our economy.

We should stay here, Mr. Chairman, and do some real work for a change. This political bill is the wrong direction for America.

I urge my colleagues to oppose this legislation, and I reserve the balance of my time.

I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

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

We have an additional speaker who is on his way, so I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from the State of New Jersey, an important member of our committee, the ranking member of the Health Subcommittee, Frank Pallone.

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

Mr. Chairman and my colleagues, there is no war on coal. If coal is not able to compete with cheaper natural gas, that's not the government's fault. That's the market. That's the way it works. Do we blame the government for the failure of typewriter manufacturers to stay in business because they've been replaced by computers?

Coal is not going to go out of business.

The President said in his Statement of Administration Policy:

To be clear, the administration believes that coal is and

will remain an important part of our energy mix for decades

to come. For that reason, since 2009, the administration has

committed nearly $6 billion in advanced coal research,

development and deployment and continues to work with

industry on important efforts to demonstrate advanced coal

technologies.

Let me just tell you what the American Heart Association, the American Lung Association, American Public Health Association, Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America, Health Care Without Harm, National Association of County and City Health Officials, Physicians for Social Responsibility, and Trust for America's Health say. They say:

With such dramatic consequences for public health and

enormous costs from air-pollution-related illnesses, we urge

you to stand up to the pressure of big polluters and reject

H.R. 3409 for what it is, a war on lungs.

That has no place at the top of Congress's legislative agenda.

Coal has had a pretty good deal. They've never had to carry the full cost of burning coal because they have never had to pay for the external consequences to human health and the environment.

But their failure in the market is because of lower competition.

I yield back the balance of my time.

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

Mr. Chairman, this bill is 80 pages of one reckless assault after another on public health and environmental protections. It is probably the single worst anti-environment bill in the most anti- environment House of Representatives in history.

The bill continues the Republican war on science and head-in-the-sand approach to climate change, which is the biggest environmental challenge of our time. This bill attempts to legislate away the scientific findings by the Environmental Protection Agency that emissions of carbon pollution endanger public health and welfare by contributing to climate change. I have news for my Republican colleagues: You can rewrite the Clean Air Act, but you can't change the laws of nature.

In June, the D.C. court of appeals upheld EPA's endangerment finding in a unanimous decision led by the Reagan-appointed Chief Judge Sentelle. The court stated that ``EPA's interpretation of the governing Clean Air Act provisions is unambiguously correct.'' The court dismissed every challenge to the adequacy of the scientific record supporting the EPA's findings.

Now that the courts have decisively rejected the Republican arguments against the endangerment findings, House Republicans want to change the law. But denying scientific reality is not going to change climate change.

My amendment is very simple. It strikes the language in the bill that would repeal the endangerment finding. It does not fix the other egregious anti-environment provisions of the bill, but at least Congress would not be doubling down on science denial. When the Energy and Commerce Committee first produced the language in title II of the bill last year, here's what one of the world's preeminent science journals, ``Nature,'' wrote about the votes to deny the existence of climate change:

It's hard to escape the conclusion that the U.S. Congress

has entered the intellectual wilderness, a sad state of

affairs in a country that has led the world in many

scientific arenas for so long. Misinformation was presented

as fact, truth was twisted, and nobody showed any inclination

to listen to scientists, let alone learn from them. It has

been an embarrassing display, not just for the Republican

Party but also for Congress.

What this amendment would do is to accept the scientific consensus, support our amendment, and restore the findings as they should be in this bill. It does not change the bill, except for the findings that, I think, are embarrassing to this institution and don't deserve to be in this legislation.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman and my colleagues, I ask for support of this amendment. Let's not have the House of Representatives take a position on a bill upholding findings that are inaccurate, go against the scientific consensus, and put our head in the sand about the whole problem of climate change.

I know that many of the people that don't want to deal with climate change are going to be coming to us, asking us to bail out their farmers for the crop losses. We're going to have people coming in and asking those of us from other parts of the country to help pay for the other climate disasters. We're Americans, and we try to take care of each other, but we also owe it to this country to try to prevent the damage that we're seeing and will only increase in the years ahead if we do nothing about climate change, and certainly if we deny the very reality of the carbon emissions that are causing greenhouse gases, global warming, and climate change.

With that, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 4 minutes.

The House meets today to spend time debating a resolution that is on a purely fabricated problem. Rather than focusing on the real problems facing American families, we are, instead, focusing on a resolution of disapproval--a resolution that does not create a single job.

In July, the administration announced a waiver process under the welfare law that would allow Governors to use innovative approaches to move more welfare recipients into employment. Immediately, Washington Republicans claimed the waiver would

gut the welfare reform; but fact checker after fact checker has publicly discredited attempts to characterize the waiver as going soft on work requirements, and we are still waiting for the majority to show us exactly where the administration's waiver proposal eliminates the work requirement.

Even the Republican staff director of the Ways and Means Committee subcommittee at the time of the 1996 welfare reform law says that these claims are false. In fact, the administration has even clarified the rules, writing that no State will get a waiver unless it shows an increase in employment of 20 percent.

Actually, the Republican position here is fairly consistent. They haven't done anything here to create new jobs. They're against welfare recipients getting jobs, and they're against Governors increasing employment opportunities by 20 percent. So I guess we now know, in these last waning days of session, that the Republican Party here is against all jobs. No matter who is standing in line for the jobs, they're against those jobs even though the Republican Governors have petitioned for the right to change the welfare law so they can put more people to work. The administration says you can do that if you put 20 percent more people to work. Imagine putting 20 percent more people to work on the welfare rolls of California or New Jersey or Texas, but the Republicans say no.

The Republican Governors and Democratic Governors asked for this authority in 2002, 2003, and 2005, and the House passed a much broader waiver authority in trying to give the Governors, if you will, State flexibility. That's what they were asking for, but now all of a sudden, in this political year, their candidate is running a little behind, so we see this as an effort to try to attack the President of the United States for doing exactly what the Republican Governors and what the Republicans in Congress have done and have voted on and passed.

As President Clinton says, it takes brass to denounce something that you, yourself, have already supported. The hypocrisy doesn't stop there, but you've got to have a lot of hypocrisy when you're defending a candidate who believes in everything and stands for nothing.

Just weeks before the administration announced its waiver process, the Republican Workforce Investment bill was reported out of my committee. The mantra of the Republicans all through that bill and all through the consideration over the last couple years has been ``State flexibility.'' Well, they accomplished it in this bill. It provides so much State flexibility that the State with an approved unified workforce training plan can, at the State's discretion, eliminate all work requirements from TANF. It passed out of the Education and the Workforce Committee on a partisan vote, with all Republicans supporting that effort to let Governors eliminate all work requirements.

So this debate is a little bit behind the times and is probably not dealing with the serious problem, which is the reauthorization of the Republican Workforce Incentive Act. What a difference a few weeks and a convention make, and here we are using the valuable time of this House before we go to adjournment to carry out a political prank--a manufactured problem, a fabricated problem--based upon fabricated facts. Yet still we don't see ourselves dealing with the questions of middle class tax cuts, and we don't see ourselves dealing with jobs bills that we've been asking for time and again while this Congress has been in session.

It's a sad way to end this session of the Congress of the United States without providing the access to those jobs that this Congress could have been providing throughout this entire year to strengthen the economy. Then again, as the Senate leader has said, they don't want to work with this President. They want him to fail. And for him to fail, that means the American people can't have jobs. That's the goal here.

With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer).

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

I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Andrews).

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

I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Woolsey).

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

Mr. Speaker, this is all interesting, except the fact is there's nothing in what the Secretary of Health and Human Services has proposed that's inconsistent with the Republican position over the years, with the Bush administration position over the years, with the Clinton administration position over the years and the Obama administration position over the years, and that is that when they passed historic welfare reform there would be an authority in there so, as the Governors lived with this over time, they could make adjustments. And that's why we keep reciting to the various instances when Governors have asked for this--29 Governors of both parties, a couple of Republican Governors recently--asking for this authority, because they thought they had a better way to put it to work.

It's rather interesting today that one of the questions is whether or not we would extend the education time so people can get the proper credentials, the proper training for a job. Many people have been unemployed now for a couple of years from a job that may not be coming back and the skills they have need to either be updated or they have to learn new skills to get the job that's available in their locality or maybe a ways down the road.

It's also interesting that the Business Roundtable is in Washington this week talking about this exact problem: How do we develop those new skills because of the skills mismatch that exists in this country today for hundreds of thousands of jobs that are available, but apparently the skills are not there?

Now, I wonder if that skills training so that that person can get a job in a good industry and a good job, what if that takes 13 months as opposed to 12 months or what if it takes 8 months instead of 6 months? Why don't we live with the Governors having the flexibility if they believe that's the economic plan for their arrangement?

We see consortiums now, because of the Higher Ed Act, coming together--community colleges, State universities, manufacturing consortiums, employer consortiums--developing the programs to develop the skills for the American workforce. And some of that is inconsistent with the requirements under this law, and that's why Governors who want to move to the future came and asked for that relief. And that waiver authority exists in the Social Security Act. That waiver authority is explicitly for this purpose.

But in the name of politics, we're going to deny those States that are struggling, those Governors that are struggling, with the ability to do this. And under the rules, as the memorandum has suggested, they would have to show a very substantial increase in moving people from welfare to work. Supposedly, that's the goal of everybody who's a Member of this body, but politics is has overwhelmed that.

If you had these concerns, we could have fixed it and moved on with getting people off of welfare to work. But we will leave here with some kind of political statement, a hollow political victory that means nothing except that those people will still be waiting to get off of welfare and go to work. The Governors will still be waiting to implement the program to get them off of welfare and go to work. And the Congress will go home.

In the face of the desperate need of these people to acquire these skills to improve their talents, to provide for these families, to feed their kids, to educate them, to provide for health care, the Congress will go home. It won't give the Governors this authority because it'll look bad for their Presidential candidate. They won't give the Governors this authority because they can score a point here. Those Governors weren't trying to score a point. They were trying to score some jobs. They were trying to score some jobs for their citizens.

But political games are going to win out here because the clock is running out on this Congress. So we could have helped those Governors. You could have tweaked this so you could have said you change from what President Obama wanted, and we could have gone on and people could have had opportunity in America. You keep saying you're for it, you just don't get around to providing it.

I yield back the balance of my time.

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