A concurrent resolution expressing the sense of Congress regarding actions to preserve and advance the multistakeholder governance model under which the Internet has thrived.

Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and concur in the concurrent resolution (S. Con. Res. 50) expressing the sense of Congress regarding actions to preserve and advance the multistakeholder governance model under which the Internet has thrived.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and insert extraneous material in the Record for S. Con. Res. 50.

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

This week, representatives from 193 countries are meeting in Dubai to reexamine an international treaty dealing with telecommunications. Several hostile countries are seeking to use this opportunity to impose new international regulations on the Internet.

We need to send a strong message to the world that the Internet has thrived under a decentralized, bottom-up, multistakeholder governance model. That is why I stand in strong support of Senator Rubio's Senate Concurrent Resolution 50. The U.S. is united in its opposition to international control over Internet governance, and we've seen leadership pushing back against ceding more power to the International Telecommunication Union. It is referred to as the ``ITU.'' It's a branch of the United Nations.

Some want to give it new powers. Several countries see the Internet as a tool for political and/or economic control that they want to exploit. For example, Russia's Vladimir Putin has openly stated his intention to seek ``international control over the Internet using the monitoring and supervisory capabilities of the ITU.'' Just last week, the Syrian Government shut off Internet access as the regime sought to suppress the free exchange of information among its private citizens. But it's because the Internet is the ultimate tool of political and economic liberation that we should foster and protect it, not give those who fear its impact on politics and the economy the power to repress its continued innovation and untapped potential.

I also want to make an important point about our legitimacy in the fight to keep the Internet thriving, democratic, and decentralized. Unfortunately, we did undermine our credibility when the Federal Communications Commission imposed net neutrality regulations without the proper statutory authority to do so. Even Ambassador Verveer at the State Department had made the point. He said in 2010 that the net neutrality proceeding ``is one that could be employed by regimes that don't agree with our perspectives about essentially avoiding regulation of the Internet and trying to be sure not to do anything to damage its dynamism and its organic development. It could be employed as a pretext or as an excuse for undertaking public policy activities that we would disagree with pretty profoundly.''

We need to pass S. Con. Res. 50 and rebuild our credibility in support of Internet freedom. Regulating beyond our authority at home sets a very bad example when we want to oppose truly devastating regulations at the international level. Despite our domestic disagreements on telecom policy, one thing both sides of the aisle can agree on is that we should uphold the Internet governance model that's working. Let's not try to fix what's not broken.

In Dubai, we want our country promoting private markets and U.S. interests. Let's encourage the decentralized governance model that's been successful in the past, and let's show leadership instead of giving away broad regulatory powers to those who don't deserve and who should not have it.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, at this time I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Walden), who is the chairman of the Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet.

Mr. Speaker, at this time I would like to yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Scalise), who is a member of the Telecommunications and Internet Subcommittee.

Mr. Speaker, we have no further speakers, and as I close, I want to thank Ms. Eshoo for the leadership that she has given. She's

the ranking member of the Telecommunications and Internet Subcommittee.

I also want to draw attention to the outstanding work that Representative Mary Bono Mack did as she led the debate and the discussion and pushed for the resolution, authored the resolution that the House passed earlier on this very issue. I also want to thank her for her work with Senator Rubio and having a resolution that would be agreed to by both Chambers.

As Ms. Eshoo indicated earlier, the Senate resolution makes a technical change, a small technical change, in the resolution that was passed by the House. This is where the U.S. needs to stand firm. It's a way that we, in a bipartisan manner, can stand firm for freedom. I encourage the passage of this resolution; and I encourage that we, as a body, will continue to stand for a free and open Internet.

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

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

I thank my colleague and friend for the time.

I rise today in support of Senate Concurrent Resolution 50, which, as you've heard, opposes international regulation of the Internet. It is virtually identical to the language that our friend and colleague Representative Mary Bono Mack put forward in H. Con. Res. 127, which was introduced earlier this year and passed by my subcommittee and in the full Energy and Commerce Committee and went on to pass this House without opposition. With this vote, we unify that language and we send a strong bipartisan, bicameral signal about America's commitment to an unregulated Internet.

I want to thank Representative Bono Mack for championing this important legislation to keep the Internet free from government regulation. I also wish to thank FCC Commissioner Robert McDowell, who has tirelessly sounded the call, not only about the peril we face if we stand idly by as countries like Russia and China seek to exert control over the Internet, but also about how FCC's own actions adopting network neutrality rules regulating the Internet undermine America's case abroad.

I also fear that recent talks of cybersecurity executive orders here at home may be cited back to us by some foreign nations with them accusing us of telling them to do as we say but not as we do.

The historical hands-off regulatory policy has allowed the Internet to become the greatest vehicle for global, social, and economic liberty since the printing press. And despite the current economic climate, it continues to grow at an astonishing pace.

FCC Commissioner McDowell and Chairman Genachowski are in Dubai this week as U.S. delegates to the World Conference on International Telecommunications. Our committee has also sent representatives from both parties to keep an eye on the proceedings. There, the 193 member countries of the United Nations are considering whether to apply to the Internet a regulatory regime that the International Telecommunications Union created in the 1980s for old-fashioned telephone service, as well as whether to swallow the Internet's nongovernmental organizational structure whole and make it part of the United Nations. Neither of these are acceptable outcomes and must be strongly opposed by our delegation.

Among those supportive of such regulation is Russian President Vladimir Putin, who spoke positively about the idea of ``establishing international control over the Internet,'' to use his own words. Some countries have even proposed regulations that would allow them to read citizens' email in the name of security, require citizens to register their email addresses for tracking purposes, and to charge for Internet access to their countries on a per-click basis.

This resolution rejects these proposals by taking the radical position that if the most revolutionary advance in technology, commerce, and social discourse of the last century is not broken, as you've heard others say, there's no reason to ``fix'' it.

The ability of the Internet to grow at this staggering pace is due largely to the flexibility of the multistakeholder model that governs the Internet so successfully today. Nongovernmental institutions now manage the Internet's core functions with input from private and public sector participants, and this structure prevents governmental or nongovernmental actors from controlling the design of the network or the content that it carries. Without one entity in control, the Internet has become a driver of jobs, information, business expansion, investment, and innovation. Moving away from the multistakeholder model would harm these abilities, preventing the Internet from spreading prosperity and the cause of freedom.

As the United States delegation continues its work at the WCIT, this resolution is an excellent bipartisan demonstration of our Nation's commitment to preserve the multistakeholder governance model and keep the Internet free from international regulation. I encourage my colleagues to support passage of this measure.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentlelady from Tennessee for yielding and for her leadership on this issue.

As has been noted, right now, in Dubai, an arm of the United Nations is considering trying to take international control over parts of the Internet. If you look at the struggling economy we have right now in the United States, one of the few bright spots is the telecommunications industry. One of the reasons--as a computer science major, I would argue that one of the reasons that the telecommunications and technology industry has been so successful even in a tough economy is because the government hasn't figured out how to regulate it and slow it down.

And yet here you have a proposal by the United Nations, coming out of the United Nations, to interfere with that multistakeholder organization which has been and allowed this industry to be so successful and allowed the Internet to shape and dramatically improve so many people's lives. So many of the things we can do today and all of the conveniences that have been added through great new aps and great new technology have come from this multistakeholder governance of the Internet. And yet here you have the United Nations try to step in.

And let's be real clear about who some of these countries are that want to do this and what they're intending to do if they are successful. Countries like Russia and China are leading this. Some of the Arab nations right now where you see uprisings, and many of those uprisings, by the way, have been brought through social media, through an open and free Internet where people can come together in cyberspace and hold their leadership accountable and in some cases rise up against oppressive governments, and those governments would like nothing more than to be able to shut that down by taking over control of the Internet.

I know it's been brought up before by the gentlelady from Tennessee and others, but I think it's important to know that Vladimir Putin, when he was meeting with the ITU Secretary-General said his goal, the reason that he and others like China are pursuing this, is to establish international control over the Internet through these new ITU rules.

And so while these discussions are going on in Dubai, I think it's critical that this piece of legislation is something we can arm our supporters with, those who stand up for Internet freedom, to say it is the United States Congress' bipartisan agreement that we want to maintain that freedom. We don't want United Nations control over the Internet.

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

Mr. Speaker, it's fitting that on the week in which the World Conference on International Telecommunications convenes in Dubai that the House will once again take up a resolution demonstrating the bipartisan commitment of Congress to preserve the open structure and multistakeholder approach that has guided the Internet over the past two decades.

I think we are all very, very proud that there is not only bipartisan but bicameral support underlying this resolution, and there is complete support across the executive branch of our government. In other words, the United States of America is totally unified on this issue of an open structure, a multistakeholder approach that has guided the Internet over the past two decades.

The Senate resolution before us today, Mr. Speaker, makes a minor technical change to a resolution that the House passed unanimously in August by a vote of 414-0. I have no objection to this change, and I ask my colleagues to support this bipartisan measure.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, on Wednesday, December 5, 2012 I had a previous engagement that necessitated my involvement. I was speaking to students from Lakeland College during one of their American Government Classes. The Professor's name is Shane Roger and his class was American National Government. I missed procedural votes on the following votes--S. Con. Res. 50, which is a concurrent resolution expressing the sense of Congress regarding actions to preserve and advance the multi-stakeholder governance model under which the Internet has thrived; H.R. 6602, which would make revisions in title 36, United States Code, as necessary to keep the title current and make technical corrections and improvements; and finally on S. 2367 the 21st Century Language Act of 2012, which removes references to the word ``lunatic'' from rules of construction of the U.S. Code and banking law provisions concerning: (1) trust powers of banks, and (2) bank consolidations and mergers.

Had I been present, I would have voted ``aye'' on the above stated bills.