H.Res. 647

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

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in opposition to H.R. 3971.

Contrary to what is implied by its title, H.R. 3971 would not provide regulatory relief to community banks. Instead, this bill would allow a large number of mortgage services to drop important consumer protections and set the stage for a return of the harmful practices of the subprime meltdown and the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.

Dodd-Frank tasked the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau with implementing mortgage rules under the Truth in Lending Act that would restrict the types of practices that led to the financial crisis. This bill would harm consumers by raising the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's exemption threshold on escrow accounts requirements for higher priced mortgage loans. Mortgages are classified as higher priced if the annual percentage rate--or APR--exceeds the average prime offer rate by 1.5 percent, and higher priced mortgage loans often reflect riskier or subprime borrowers.

Pursuant to the Dodd-Frank Act, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau issued escrow rules that require borrowers with higher priced mortgage loans to escrow their homeowners insurance, property taxes, and private mortgage insurance for at least the first 5 years of their mortgage.

Escrow accounts are an important consumer protection mechanism, especially for higher risk borrowers, because they ensure that homeowners have funds for these expenses, thereby reducing mortgage default or loss of the property. In fact, before the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau issued its final rule on escrow requirements in 2013, a Federal Reserve study from 2011 found that consumers with higher priced mortgages that did not have an escrow account in the first year after the consummation of their mortgage had higher instances of default.

Escrow accounts also keep homeowners from being blindsided by additional costs at the end of each year and provide a more accurate monthly cost estimate for homeownership when the loan is originated. That is why the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's rules are designed to ensure that homeowners understand and can meet the full cost of homeownership.

Even though escrow accounts are particularly important for these higher priced loans, they are certainly not unique. In fact, most homeowners escrow these funds. Loans insured by the Federal Housing Administration and the U.S. Department of Agriculture must have borrower escrow accounts, and conventional mortgages with a loan-to- value ratio of 80 percent or higher require them as well.

I have not heard a single convincing argument as to what is so burdensome about banks with $25 billion in assets ensuring that their borrowers have enough money set aside every month to pay their taxes and insurance.

Furthermore, banks with less than $2 billion in assets that serve rural or underserved areas are already exempt from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's escrow requirements, which reflects the Bureau's commitment to balanced and tailored regulations. This bill would make a dramatic leap from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's targeted relief and exempt banks up to $25 billion in assets, or over 98 percent of banks, from the escrow requirement. They would get this exemption regardless of whether they are serving underserved borrowers and without any evidence that this large exemption would increase access to credit for those who need it.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau also addressed the fact that large servicers, especially servicers that serviced loans they did not own for an extended period of time, often did not adequately communicate with customers or appropriately track paperwork. During the crisis, this contributed to millions of unnecessary foreclosures and, later on, several billion-dollar settlements for abusive and fraudulent business practices.

In its rule, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau also provides other flexibilities through exemptions to the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act loan servicing and escrow account administration requirements to only small bank servicers, if they and their affiliates own the loans they service, and service no more than 5,000 loans each year. H.R. 3971 would increase this exemption by 500 percent, from 5,000 loans a year to 30,000 loans, allowing significantly larger bank servicers to avoid these important consumer safeguards, and only requiring the lenders to hold the loans in portfolio for 3 years.

So let's be clear, homeowners do not get to choose their own mortgage servicer, and the least we can do is ensure that they are adequately protected after they sign on the dotted line.

As we saw leading up to the 2008 financial crisis, servicers often choose profits over people, and that is why we need the Consumer Bureau to look out for the needs of consumers. The Consumer Bureau has continued to do its job in spite of the unrelenting Republican campaign to slow it down or eliminate it completely.

Simply put, H.R. 3971 would enable larger servicers, whose incentives are not aligned with the owners of the loans or the borrowers, to be able to revive the abusive practices involved with predatory lending that contributed to the 2008 financial crisis. This is the second time in less than 2 weeks that I have come before you to discuss a bill that would erode vital consumer protections under the Truth in Lending Act for borrowers with high-priced mortgage loans.

I cannot support legislation that would keep consumers looking at high-cost mortgages from the vital protections and scrutiny they deserve. For all these reasons, I oppose H.R. 3971.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, I think it is important for us to realize that, in present law, community banks of $2 billion or less are exempted from requiring escrow accounts on higher priced loans if they serve rural and underserved areas. So we are talking about present law that gives this exemption. And not only does it exempt these real community banks of $2 billion or less, the banks are required to serve rural communities and underserved areas.

This is so important because, oftentimes, these are loans to riskier customers. These are loans where they are charging a higher interest rate. These are loans where they are taking more risk, and so when we hear those on the opposite side of the aisle talking about different ways to service the rural communities, this is one way that the law allows that kind of attention to rural communities and underserved areas. They say: Small community banks, you don't have to have escrow accounts, and so what we are saying to you is give your attention to these rural and underserved areas where they are higher priced loans, they are riskier accounts, and we are not going to require you to have to force upon these kinds of accounts the rules that will be forced upon different kinds of financial institutions.

If we adopt this bill, it would not be about community banks at all. And I have to disagree with my chairman of the committee who talked about this, in some way, enhancing community banks' ability to service rural and underserved areas. They are talking about expanding the exemption from $2 billion or less to $25 billion. That is not a community bank. We don't have any community banks that are worth $25 billion or more. I want everybody to be clear what this bill is attempting to do.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, I think it is important to further explain what this bill would do and why it could be harmful.

Under the present law, the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act would require that the servicers handle no more than 5,000 or less loans. Why is this important? It is important because when you have servicers that are handling a relatively small number of these kinds of accounts, they can pay attention to them.

Don't forget, these are loans by community banks. They are riskier, they are higher priced loans, they are directed toward rural communities and communities that basically you have to pay a lot of attention to when you give out these loans. And now this bill would say: Yes, we know that when you are servicing a small number, 5,000 or less, that the services have to pay attention because they are under the rule of the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act, and that act says not only do you have to pay attention and you have to contact your borrower when you are going to transfer the loan--and let me tell you how important this is.

This is so important because when you transfer a loan, if you don't give the kind of notification to the borrower that they will understand that the originator of the loan no longer has the servicing or has the same servicing contract that is now going to move to another servicer, then people, oftentimes, end up not sending their payment to the right place. And guess what, I have seen this go on for months, and then people end up in a situation where they are defaulting on the loan, and the new servicers are putting them in a position where now their homes are in danger.

So this contact, this oversight, this attention that you pay to these small borrowers is so important, and that is why the 5,000.

Now, with this bill, they want to take it up to 30,000. What does that mean? It means that we are going to see the kind of problems that we have seen in the subprime meltdown that we have gone through.

We have found that servicers caused us the most problems. Of course, they didn't service the loans adequately. They lost them. They had people applying over and over again.

First of all, we discovered that many of the servicers had no training, that they were literally hired off the street, and that they were basically saying to senior citizens, 75 and 80 years old: We lost your paper. Reapply again. Reapply again. We are sorry.

It has been just an awful situation that was created because the servicers could not handle the volume that they were contracted with, oftentimes, for the financial institution that they were supposed to be doing this work for.

So, here you have a bill that literally is not about community banks. This is about increasing the number of banks that can now have the kind of protection that we were giving to the very small community banks. So don't believe this is about community banks.

In addition to that, what you are doing is you are changing the rules and the laws under the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act that protects these rural borrowers and these small, high-risk loans that are in these communities that need a special kind of help.

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

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

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

It is important to understand why we have a Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and why it is the centerpiece of the Dodd-Frank reforms.

Prior to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, we did not have anybody looking out for consumers, and so that led us into the crisis that this country experienced in 2008 that took us into a recession and almost a depression.

When I come before you with opposition to this kind of legislation, it is because I know and understand--and we should all understand--what we can do to protect our consumers and how we can work with community banks and what that means when we are talking about a bill like this, where real community banks of $2 billion or less are dealing with populations that I have alluded to over and over again in the presentation of my opposition to this bill: the rural communities and those communities that are underserved and where these are riskier loans and where they need not only the attention of the small community banks, but the servicers who service these loans, and knowing that the servicers who service a small number of loans can, in fact, pay the attention to them that is required by RESPA and make sure that the people are understanding, when there are transfers and they are in contact with them constantly--and this goes for everything from transfers to modifications--and how to deal with high-risk loans, who may need to modify those loans, who they would talk to, how they would talk to them.

I want to tell you, if you expand this, and you have servicers that are handling 30,000 or more, these borrowers are not going to get this kind of attention. So these escrows that we are talking about are extremely important, and we should know exactly who we are protecting and who we are not protecting.

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

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

I am paying special attention to this legislation, and I take pause when I see bills like H.R. 3971 that are just a small part of Republicans' relentless attack on the work of the Consumer Bureau.

The Consumer Bureau's work on high-cost loans and consumer protections for them was well thought through and the result of careful research.

Leading up to the 2008 financial crisis, many looking to fulfill the American Dream and purchase a house were convinced to take out higher cost loans without any regard for their ability to repay. They were sold false promises about the costs of their mortgage without adequate information and protections.

The Consumer Bureau took years to talk to experts, hear from advocates, and do the research to come up with a strong rule to prevent those types of abuses from occurring again, while also providing regulatory relief to banks that serve rural and underserved communities. So let me take pause and, again, focus everyone on rural and underserved communities.

I am oftentimes appalled by the fact that we have too many legislators who represent rural communities and underserved communities, but when it comes to looking out for their financial interests, they are not doing it. Yet they go back to these communities and they talk about all the other kinds of issues. They talk about people who are not saluting the flag properly. They will talk about freedom of choice issues, and they will rally folks around everything except their financial interests.

If rural communities are being hurt, oftentimes it is because the very people who say they represent them are

not, indeed, representing them, and we can see this in this kind of discussion.

So, again, we are focused on making sure that rural and underserved communities are served properly, that they are not thrown to the wolves and thrown into situations where they can't be paid attention to after they take out these loans.

When they take out these loans, they need servicers who are trained, servicers who are committed, servicers who understand why rural and underserved communities need special protection, and who will work with them, who will contact them, who will work with them to work out situations where loan modifications may be required or requested.

Mr. Speaker, I am going to continue to oppose. I understand that there are others who would like to open this up, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, may I inquire as to how much time I have left.

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

Mr. Speaker, this bill is strongly opposed by all of the consumer groups: Americans for Financial Reform, Center for American Progress, Center for Responsible Lending, the National Consumer Law Center, and Public Citizen.

Why are they so opposed to this bill? This bill would, again, amend the Truth in Lending Act--that is TILA--and the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act--that is RESPA--to widen the size of two exemptions that the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has already provided for smaller sized institutions on escrow accounts for higher priced mortgage loans and servicing requirements for small mortgage servicers.

Under the bill, escrow accounts would no longer be required for riskier, high-priced loans at institutions with less than $25 billion in assets. Currently, the exemption applies to firms with less than $2 billion in assets. The smaller service exception for increased notification requirements to consumers would be increased, again, from servicers with 5,000 loans to those with 30,000 loans.

Why do all of these consumer groups oppose this legislation? Because it is obvious what is happening here. We are taking away the protection from those who need it the most. We are not doing anything for community banks. There are no $25 billion community banks.

Mr. Speaker, I would ask that my colleagues in this House oppose this bill. It goes in the opposite direction of what we have done to try and give protection to those consumers who need protection the most, and the Dodd-Frank reform has done this, and I would just ask opposition to this bill.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's regulations address many questionable practices that contributed to the collapse of the housing market. Such practices were widespread in the mortgage servicing industry. The Bureau's servicing rules apply across the board, while providing a narrow exemption for small servicers.

This exemption minimizes the regulatory compliance burden on small and community banks. Expanding current exemptions to larger institutions, however, just opens the door wide to abuses by larger banks primarily doing business not in the communities, the rural

communities and the underserved communities, but outside of the communities where they are based, and by nonbanks, which still make most of the riskier subprime mortgage loans.

Mr. Speaker, I continue to ask opposition to this legislation, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, may I inquire again as to how much time I have left.

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

Mr. Speaker, I want to move now to say a word about what my colleague is attempting to do. I appreciate my colleague from California (Mr. Sherman), who is going to offer an amendment that would lower the extremely high exemption thresholds in the underlying bill.

I think that, having talked to him, I do understand that he believes that this is important to expand opportunity rather than to limit the ability for protection for certain of our consumers who come from these areas that I have described as rural and areas that are underserved.

This amendment that he is going to present would allow creditors, again, with less than $10 billion in assets, to be exempted from escrow requirements on higher priced mortgage loans if they hold loans in portfolios for 3 years and allow servicers that service 20,000 loans or less to be exempted from enhanced consumer protection requirements under the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act.

His amendment changes it a little bit from $25 billion to $10 billion, that is still too much, and from 30,000 loans or less to 20,000 loans or less to be exempted from, again, enhanced consumer protection requirements under the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act.

Although I am pleased that this amendment would tighten up the language in the underlying bill somewhat, I remain concerned about the impacts it could have on many consumers. The bill is called the Community Institution Mortgage Relief Act of 2017, and the title implies that it will relieve our Nation's smaller financial institutions from regulatory burdens.

Now, we all know that community banking is not purely a function of size, but when the Consumer Bureau conducted research for its escrow requirements rulemaking, it found that none of the entities it identified as operating predominantly in rural or underserved areas had total assets as of the end of 2009 greater than $2 billion.

And when the Consumer Bureau researched mortgage service and practices, it concluded: ``The problematic practices that have plagued the servicing industry, particularly in recent years, are, to a large extent, a function of a business model in which servicing is viewed as a discrete line of business and profit center.''

However, they also found that approximately 96 percent of community bank and small credit union services that only purchase a hold, mortgage service, and rights for mortgage loans, they actually own or originate service 5,000 or fewer loans. Yet this amendment would exceed the Consumer Bureau's research base that sets that threshold by billions of dollars and its carefully researched loan service and threshold by 400 percent.

So if the amendment is adopted, I must continue to oppose the bill because it would undermine the work of the Consumer Bureau and weaken consumer protections in homeownership. Congress should not be complicit in these acts by passing legislation that further erodes the rights and protections of America's consumers. We must continue to do all that we can to ensure mortgage loan borrowers are fully aware of the terms and conditions of their mortgage loans and how much they will owe in obtaining these loans.

If we are successful in convincing our colleagues today that they should not support this bill, I will be happy to work with my colleague, who I know has good intentions, to see what we can do to address what I think are some of his concerns. But for now, I must oppose the bill, and even with the amendment, it does not satisfy the concerns that I have addressed here. It does nothing to protect those in the rural communities and the underserved communities, and it does nothing to help community banks.

So I am opposed both to the bill and to the amendment, and I ask for a ``no'' vote.

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

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 647 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentlewoman 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

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks on House Resolution 647.

Mr. Speaker, I hope you were listening as the Reading Clerk was going through this rule, because there was a lot of meat in this rule today.

Ordinarily, and, in fact, historically, we will do a bill and we will do a rule; we will do a rule and we will do a bill. This rule today makes three bills in order, three important bills in order.

I am proud to be able to carry this rule today. I hope my colleagues will see the merits of it as I do.

The rule provides a structured rule for the debate of two bills out of the Financial Services Committee. One is H.R. 477, Mr. Speaker, the Small Business Mergers, Acquisitions, Sales, and Brokerage Simplification Act of 2017. The second is H.R. 3971, the Community Institution Mortgage Relief Act. The rule also provides for consideration of a continuing resolution, H.J. Res. 123, which provides appropriations through December 22, as final year decisionmaking and negotiating goes on. It also allows the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, CMS, to reallocate existing funds for the CHIP program through December 31, 2017.

Mr. Speaker, I want to start off talking about the Financial Services bills. We will have some members from the Financial Services Committee come down. They can talk about it in details that I cannot.

It was a fascinating hearing that we had in the Rules Committee last night, Mr. Speaker. We had the chairman, Mr.

Hensarling from Texas, and we had the ranking member, Ms. Waters. It was a conversation about how we protect people, how do we serve people better.

Now, the Community Institution Mortgage Relief Act, Mr. Speaker, is the result of small community banks and local credit unions saying: We are having a tough time providing mortgages to our members because the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has created rules designed to protect consumers that are protecting them right out of access to a mortgage at all.

Mr. Speaker, it is a legitimate disagreement that we have here from time to time about how to protect people best, about how to love people best, but it is the right kind of conversation to be having. If we pass this rule today, we will be able to get into debate on that underlying bill.

The debate will not be about should we protect people, because we all agree that we should.

The debate will be about how should we protect those people, an issue on which legitimate, well-intentioned, thoughtful men and women can disagree. I look forward to this body working its will.

The second bill, Mr. Speaker, from the Financial Services Committee, H.R. 477, was introduced by a classmate of mine in that big class of 2011, Mr. Huizenga from Michigan. He has worked this bill through the process one step at a time, trying to build consensus so that, Mr. Speaker, as we were in the Rules Committee last night, the conversation between the chairman and the ranking member was: Hey, if we can make one more amendment in order, one more amendment that Mr. Huizenga and Mr. Sherman had worked out together, if we can make one more round of changes, we believe we can get this through on a big bipartisan majority coming out of the Financial Services Committee.

Mr. Speaker, we don't celebrate those things, we don't talk about those things. The newspaper will be filled with discord coming out of this city tomorrow morning, but I can tell you that it gives me great pride to come on behalf of the Rules Committee today bringing forward these bills, not that are going to change the world overnight, but are going to make a big difference for real people facing real challenges across this country.

It turns out, Mr. Speaker, my experience is if we do a little bit together every day, a little bit today, a little bit tomorrow, a little bit the next day, we wake up a year from now finding out we have done a whole lot together on behalf of the American people.

Mr. Speaker, finally, the continuing resolution. I am not a fan of continuing resolutions, I just want to tell you. I got to talk to you about my enthusiastic, optimistic part of this rule earlier. I am going to lay some tough love on you now, Mr. Speaker. We are not supposed to be in the continuing resolution business. You know with your leadership, the leadership of the gentlewoman from New York, the leadership of the two gentlemen from Michigan here on the floor, this House passed on time, ahead of schedule, the funding bills to fund the priorities of the American people for fiscal year 2018.

Folks said we couldn't get it done, folks said we couldn't do it all. We did, and we did. We sent that to the Senate, Mr. Speaker, before the end of the fiscal year, which was back on September 30. The Senate hasn't been able to take it up yet, Mr. Speaker. The Senate hasn't been able to debate it yet, Mr. Speaker.

I don't know if the Senate is going to get it done in the next 2 weeks, but there are folks in this institution, Mr. Speaker, who say: You know what? We couldn't get it done in the Senate over these last 2 months, so let's just go ahead and pass a continuing resolution for all of fiscal year 2018.

A continuing resolution, for folks who don't follow the appropriations process, means, hey, if it worked well last year, let's just do the same thing next year. Mr. Speaker, that is awful public policy.

We came together debating almost 500 amendments. Having moved every single appropriations bill through the Appropriations Committee, we came together not just in a bipartisan way in the committee, we came together here on the House floor, debated these issues, grappled with these issues, and produced a work product with which the American people can take great pride.

I don't want to give up on that work product, Mr. Speaker. I don't want to settle for the way things have been. I believe that we can do better.

By passing a 2-week continuing resolution today, we ensure that all the features of government continue to operate as the American people expect them to, and we provide another window for the Senate to come together and pass those appropriations bills as we have done here in the House.

I am optimistic about that coming to fruition, Mr. Speaker. I believe that we can get that done together.

Mr. Speaker, we can take up these bipartisan efforts from the Financial Services Committee, we can take up this important effort to continue the funding of the government if we pass this rule today.

With that, Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support the rule, and I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Mr. Speaker, I don't disagree with a lot of what my friend from New York had to say when it comes to the facts. I do disagree with the conclusions that are reached there, Mr. Speaker.

We do need to do a better job of working together. Now, sometimes that means Republicans and Democrats, sometimes that means the House and the Senate, sometimes that means the White House and the Congress. We need to hold each other accountable, but we also need to give each other credit for our successes.

The gentlewoman talked about important issues relating to education and improving workforce. We passed together in this institution a continuation of career and technical education funding. We reauthorized that program together, led by G.T. Thompson on my side of the aisle, by Mr. Krishnamoorthi on your side of the aisle, by Chairwoman Foxx on our side of the aisle, by Ranking Member Scott on your side of the aisle. We grappled with that issue together. We did it together, because it was the right thing for the American people, and now it sits in the United States Senate without action.

We came together, and we funded the government. We grappled, line by line, section by section, we did it together, and now it sits in the United States Senate.

Mr. Speaker, what needs to be said, one can describe it as Republican incompetence. One can describe it as Democrat intransigence. But we, as a House, have come together and gotten our work done. The Senate cannot, and why the Senate cannot is because it requires 60 votes to get something done over there under Senate rules. In order to have 60 votes, you have to have Democrat votes.

If the Senate changed its rules tomorrow and made it just a Republican majority institution, they could move all of these bills without delay. Far from being a reflection of incompetence, it is a reflection of a commitment to a bipartisan effort on the Senate side.

We can poke them and poke them and poke them and, just one day, folks might get their wish, and we may make that a completely Republican streamlined process over there. But be careful what you wish for.

We don't have to kick each other in the shins all day long, every day, over here. We have success after success that we have earned together. We should spend more time celebrating those successes, Mr. Speaker. Among those successes is the bill I mentioned earlier, offered by the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Huizenga).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Huizenga) to talk about the hard work, the effort, and the success that he has been able to accomplish in a bipartisan way.

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

I would be interested sometime, Mr. Speaker, having a team building expert take a look at some of our proceedings here on the House floor and see if they think that the conversations that happen here bring us closer to working together on serious solutions, or push us further away.

I agree with my friend from Michigan; we need to get about the business of the American people. The business of

the American people is not figuring out who to blame, it is figuring out how to fix things. And to continue to perpetuate the inaccurate message that we don't collaborate on those issues is to do our bosses, the American people, a terrible disservice.

On bill after bill to combat the opioid epidemic, we have come together in this institution. We have passed these bills in a collaborative way and sent them to the United States Senate. Bill after bill on human trafficking, we have come together in this institution. We have passed these bills. We have sent those bills to the United States Senate.

Mr. Speaker, we are talking about funding the American Government. I have been in this Congress since 2011. I got to vote, for the very first time, on funding the Centers for Disease Control, which sits right in my back yard in the great State of Georgia.

I got to vote, for the very first time, on funding the National Institutes of Health, which do such amazing research, both for our seniors and for our children. The kind of talent that we have there, Mr. Speaker, boggles the mind. We came together, and we funded those institutions in the annual appropriations bill for the first time ever.

Now, we can spend our time together talking about who hates children and who hates old people, and why it is everybody is an untalented buffoon; or we can recognize that, on issue after issue, we come together and get about the business that our bosses sent us to get about.

I don't think any of us are going to be rewarded by figuring out who to blame. I think we are going to be rewarded by getting it fixed.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Tenney), who has worked, through the Financial Services Committee, again, in a bipartisan way, to deal with local community financial institutions and local home buyers who are getting shut out of the process by an overly burdensome Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

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

Mr. Speaker, I opened with a discussion about how we all care about these American homeowners who are trying to get, oftentimes, into their first home, and how it is that we protect them better.

We disagreed about how to protect them.

Do you do it through the CFPB and Federal regulation? Or do you do it through more local hometown institutions being governed by their neighbors?

We agreed on what the need was, but we disagreed on how to get there.

What is so frustrating to me--I still feel like a relatively new Member of this institution, Mr. Speaker. I guess I am not any longer-- is that we seem to have one standard when we are in the majority and a completely different standard when the other guy takes over the institution. It seems to me that principles should be principles irrespective of who sits in your chair.

The very first big vote I took when I got here in 2011, Mr. Speaker, was to fund the United States Government in February.

Why?

Because when Democrats ran every single facet of government--they controlled the House, they controlled the Senate, and they controlled the White House--they didn't get it done. They couldn't get it done. It is hard to do sometimes, Mr. Speaker.

I will take you back. You weren't in this institution at that time. The year is 2010. The first CR that they passed went from October 1 to December 3, about the same length of time as the one that we passed.

They weren't up to anything nefarious when that happened, Mr. Speaker, and I resent the implication that we have been during that same path. They needed a little extra time and they took it.

When that CR expired, Mr. Speaker, they then went and passed, lo and behold, a 2-week CR--a 2-week CR from December 4 to December 18. They needed a little more time. They passed one for 2 more weeks to get themselves a little more time.

That didn't work out, Mr. Speaker. They still weren't able to get it done in those 2 weeks, so their next CR, Mr. Speaker, went from December 19 to December 21. Three days is what they found to be the right number to extend funding of the Federal Government so they could continue to get their work done, Mr. Speaker.

When that 3-day CR didn't work, they then punted altogether; and when my freshman class came in in 2011, we took over and we funded the government instead.

Mr. Speaker, we can describe what happened when my friends last controlled this institution as an abominable failure, or we can describe it as a frustrating failure but something that happens in this institution. It happened when my friends ran it. It happens when we run it. We need, on behalf of the American people, to get on a better track. Let me stipulate that is true.

But let me ask my friends to stipulate, Mr. Speaker, that for the first time in a long time we are on a better track because we came together in this institution and we got our work done. The Senate hasn't, and I am frustrated by that, but I want to give them a little more time.

For my friend from Michigan who asked the question, ``What difference does 2 weeks make,'' I would ask anyone who has that question to Google ``continuing resolution'' and ``Department of Defense.''

If you think that continuing to fund the government one day at a time with a continuing resolution, or even 12 months of the time during a continuing resolution, if you think that is the definition of success, Google ``continuing resolution'' and ``Department of Defense.''

Every single day that we fail to take up in the United States Senate the large full-year funding appropriations bill, we do a disservice to every single man and woman in uniform.

If we have a choice here today, Mr. Speaker, between doing that disservice to those men and women for 2 weeks or 6 weeks or 8 weeks or 12 months, I choose to.

If you wonder what difference it makes, ask any man or woman in uniform. There is a reason, Mr. Speaker, as hard as the appropriations process is, that you and I took up the defense portion, the Homeland Security portion, the national security portion all the way back in the summer and passed it out of this House before the end of July, because we knew how important it was. We knew how mission critical it was, and we wanted to give the Senate the most time we possibly could.

I am frustrated, too, but let us not describe these failures as partisan failures, as an effort by one side or the other to subvert the process. These are failures. But 2 weeks, Mr. Speaker, is going to be less of a failure for our men and women in uniform than would be 3 weeks, 4 weeks, or 12 months.

I am sorry that we are here, but this is the best circumstance that we can create to allow our Senate time to succeed.

They cannot succeed alone. Republicans cannot succeed there alone. It requires a bipartisan majority to succeed. Let us not pretend this is a partisan problem. This is an American challenge, and I believe we are up for it.

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

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

I thank my friend from New York for helping me to bring the rule today.

Mr. Speaker, I believe in truth in advertising, and of all the things that you heard the Reading Clerk read, when he went through word for word for word from this rule, you heard not one word about taxes today. Why? Because we are not talking about taxes today at all. Because nothing that we are doing today has anything to do with taxes at all. Because of all the successes that we are down here to partner on today, tax is not one of them.

What is on the list today?

Well, in the spirit of truth in advertising, Mr. Speaker, shutdowns aren't on the list either. In fact, the opposite is true. If we pass this rule today, we will fund the government. We will prioritize keeping the doors open.

Mr. Speaker, habits are hard things to break, and we are in two very bad habits in this institution. One is failing to see the merit in what the other side is offering. We have two Financial Services bills today that break that pattern, that see the merit in working together and collaborating together, and we bring two bills to the floor that this entire institution can be proud of.

We have another bad habit of ascribing to the other side's motives that I believe are not worthy of this institution at all. A government shutdown would be one of those things. We are, in good faith, working together--Republicans and Democrats, House and Senate, Congress and White House--to get about the business of the American people, and it is hard. But it is worth doing, and it is worth doing right.

If I have to choose between fast and right, I choose right. We have got a chance today, with the passage of this rule, to bring up two bills that our colleagues, in bipartisan ways, have worked through on the Financial Services Committee that will make a big difference to families and businesses across this Nation.

We have an opportunity today, if we pass this rule, to bring up a continuing resolution that guarantees to every single American that the doors are open, the lights are on, and we continue and have an opportunity for the Senate to move final legislation.

I want my colleagues to support this rule. I want my colleagues to support the underlying bills. But, Mr. Speaker, more than anything, I want my colleagues to take pride in the successes that we have achieved here today.

CHIP funding, Children's Health Insurance funding, is at risk, but not because we haven't succeeded. We have. All we need is one more signature from the Senate.

CDC funding may be at risk, but not because we haven't succeeded. We have. We just need that bill to get across the floor in the Senate.

Our troops are on the cusp of receiving a well-deserved pay raise. Why? Because we came together and we passed it here. We just need it to get across the floor of the Senate.

And there is not one of those items or a dozen more that I could list, Mr. Speaker, that will move across the floor of the Senate in anything but a bipartisan way.

Do you want bipartisanship? If you want cooperation, if you want success, we have our chance today. Vote ``yes'' on this rule, Mr. Speaker. Vote ``yes'' on these underlying bills, and let's get together and get the Senate across the finish line as well.

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

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me the customary 30 minutes, and I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I have great fondness for Mr. Woodall. I think he is one of the best, most pleasant persons on the Rules Committee, and it grieves me that I have to, right off the bat here, take issue with him, but I have to take issue with the claim that Republicans completed their appropriation work on time.

I have got a timetable of the budget process that came from the website of the Budget Committee majority, on which my colleague, Mr. Woodall, serves. Let's review the most important deadlines.

First, the President must submit his budget to Congress by the first Monday in February. The truth: this year, the administration released what they called a skinny budget on March 16 and didn't release the full budget until May 23. From our reckoning, that is 4 months late.

Second, the Congress must complete action on the budget by April 15. The truth: this year, Republicans weren't able to get the fiscal year 2018 budget through Congress until October 26, over 6 months late and nearly a month into the new fiscal year.

Now, here is another deadline, again available on the Republican Budget Committee's website. The Appropriations Committee is supposed to complete their work by June 10. The truth: this year, they didn't report out any appropriations bills until after that deadline had passed.

Another deadline: the House is supposed to complete action on annual appropriations bills by June 30. The truth: not only did the Republican majority fail to meet that deadline, they weren't able to pass any of them separately at all. Instead, they lumped four bills together and passed them on July 27 and then passed an Omnibus with all 12 bills together on September 14, leaving 2 weeks only for the House and Senate to work out their differences, but the law said that they should have 3 months to do it.

I wouldn't bring this up except I know Mr. Woodall believes, with all his heart, that what he is saying is right, because we have heard it before.

That leads me to the final deadline that they missed. Fiscal year 2018 began October 1, but here we are more than two months later on December 7. The Republican majority has still failed to fund the government, because they have been too busy working to kill the Affordable Care Act and to give big tax breaks to corporations and billionaires.

On time, Mr. Speaker? Any school child could tell you that you don't get credit for an assignment that is 2 months late.

Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record the timetable of the budget process from the website of the House Budget Committee majority.

Time Table of the Budget Process

Title III of the Congressional Budget Act establishes a

specific timetable for the congressional budget process.

On or Before, Action to be completed:

First Monday in February, President submits his budget;

February 15, Congressional Budget Office submits report to

Budget Committees; Not later than 6 weeks after the President

submits the budget, Committees

submit views and estimates to Budget Committees. (Frequently,

the House Budget Committee sets own date based on Legislative

Calendar); April 1, Senate Budget Committee reports

concurrent resolution on the budget; April 15, Congress

completes action on the concurrent resolution on the budget.

(This is not signed by the President)*; May 15, Annual

appropriation bills may be considered in House; June 10,

House Appropriations Committee reports last annual

appropriation bill; June 15, Congress completes action on

reconciliation legislation. (If required by the budget

resolution); June 30, House completes action on annual

appropriation bills; October 1, Fiscal year begins.

Mr. Speaker, the majority has put before us today a 2- week continuing resolution to fund the government through December 22.

I have heard some in the majority question why anyone would take issue with this approach, but, Mr. Speaker, the question that should be asked is this one: What is the majority actually willing to get done over the next 2 weeks? Because it has now been more than 2 months since some vital national priorities have lapsed under their leadership.

The Children's Health Insurance Program, which provides healthcare to more than 9 million children across this Nation, expired on September 30. So did the community health centers, which serve more than 25 million people. Now, this expiration has put 2,800 centers in danger of closure and 9 million people at risk for losing their access to their healthcare.

The Perkins Loan Program, which many low-income students rely on for their education, was allowed to expire by the majority with no reauthorization in sight, despite broad bipartisan support for a bill to do just that. Unfortunately, the majority has been unwilling even to bring it up for a vote.

Are they now ready to take meaningful action to protect our children, our students, our public health, and our Nation?

Democrats haven't just been fighting to reauthorize programs that expired 2 months ago, we are also trying to address the priorities that we know our Nation will face in the weeks ahead. That includes passing hurricane relief funding to help the families that are still recovering from this horrendous hurricane season; and as all of us are fearful of and sad about, California is burning once again; reauthorizing section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which we depend on, which is due to expire at the end of this month. The FISA court helps to keep our country safe.

Mr. Speaker, if past is prologue, this majority will be missing in action 2 weeks from now, just as they have been for months.

Just consider, for a moment, how they have squandered this year, wasting months on fruitless attempts to repeal the Affordable Care Act until persuaded by their constituents that they did not want that done. It remains the law of the land today after the public overwhelmingly demanded the majority stop that crusade.

Now they are trying to pass a tax cut for the wealthy that, if enacted, would represent one of the largest transfers of wealth from working families to the wealthy that our Nation has ever seen.

I want everybody to please pay attention to this, because it is proof positive of what is happening with this majority. According to the Joint Committee on Taxation and the Congressional Budget Office, under the majority's plan, those making $40,000 to $50,000 would pay an additional $5.3 billion in taxes combined over the next decade. Now, remember, they are going to pay more into the number of $5.3 billion.

At the same time--attention, America--those earning $1 million or more would see a $5.8 billion cut. Have you ever seen anything as cut and dry? They absolutely want to take from the poor to give to the rich--Robin Hood in reverse.

So we are 2 months into the fiscal year, and the majority has been so preoccupied with the special interest agenda, that we haven't passed full year appropriations. This has robbed the Federal agencies and our economy of the certainty that they need.

The majority holds the House, the Senate, and the White House and still can't get anything done. So when Democrats see a continuing resolution for 2 weeks, we don't see a simple extension of the status quo; we see it for what it really is: kicking the can down the road in order to pursue reckless partisan politics, and it comes without any plan to tackle the major issues that face our Nation today.

Let me remind my colleagues how important it has been for both parties to work together, because in this process, both the CR and the tax bill, there are no Democrat fingerprints on any of it. For a lot of this stuff, there has even been no committee action.

Democrats have helped the majority pass every major funding bill since they assumed control in 2011. That is the result of bipartisanship.

This time, the majority decided not to compromise with us to reach a deal. Let's see if they can cobble together the votes to get this proposal over the finish line.

Even if it passes, we will be back here later this month to consider another short-term continuing resolution, and we still have no idea whether this bill, the one we are working on today, could even pass the Senate.

This is no way to run the United States of America. The lives of our countrymen are hanging in the balance.

All we do under this majority is to lurch from one self-inflicted crisis to the next. Our constituents deserve much better than this.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Kildee).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Lee).

Mr. Speaker, I yield an additional 2 minutes to the gentlewoman.

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

Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from Georgia said they need the Democrats. He must be aware that they only need us when the votes come.

There is not a Democrat fingerprint on that tax bill. We had nothing to say about any of it. And while we begged almost on our hands and knees to be a part of what they are doing, we are not. It always sounds good when we hear it on the floor: Bipartisan. Oh, look, we want to work together.

But then, oftentimes, as you know, Mr. Speaker, bills come to the Rules Committee with no committee action whatsoever and no possible description to be bipartisan.

Mr. Speaker, for years we have endured relentless Republican attacks on the Affordable Care Act, including just last week in the Senate's disastrous tax bill. By repealing the individual mandate, the Senate bill has knocked 13 million people from their health insurance.

I must have asked 20 times when they were doing those 60 times to try to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act: Why do you want to take healthcare away from people?

I have never, to this day, gotten an answer as to why it is they so despise a healthcare bill that is working and has literally insured more Americans than have ever been insured before.

Then suddenly, just on a whim, one party decides--the one that has been fighting to kill it over and over again--that they will come at it piecemeal and just try to render it helpless by taking away the ability to even say it is time to go sign up again.

I am sure they thought they would do grievous harm, but it didn't work that way, and millions of people came out to sign up again because healthcare is one of the most critical needs for any American family.

To make matters worse, the bill also repeals most of the State and local tax deductions, and that is a deduction that helps middle class families in my State of New York.

New York, on average, gives back to the Federal Government of the United States $40 billion; money that we send to Washington and get nothing back for it, the way we are rewarded for that. I think that probably will not be happening anymore since the taxes are going to go up so much higher on the people of my State, unless they do away with what is absolutely one of the most atrocious things I have ever seen them do.

Mr. Speaker, it is evident that the tax bill was not designed to help middle class families put food on their table, but, instead, it gives corporation tax cuts to line the pockets of their shareholders.

I have yet to read or see the Senate tax bill, but I understand there are gifts in there for people who own jet planes. I don't represent any of those.

But taking care, again, of the rich, as demonstrated in the figures that supported my speech a while ago, that just

short of $6 billion, that goes from the poor people who make under $40,000 to the rich people, the same office, the same amount of money, dollar for dollar, and absolutely proves what we are saying.

But you don't need to hear from it me. Don't take my word for it. Republican Congressman Mark Sanford recently said in a moment of great candor: ``From a truth-in-advertising standpoint, it would have been a lot simpler if we just acknowledged reality on this bill, which is it's fundamentally a corporate tax reduction and restructuring bill, period.''

There is no tiny scintilla of reform in this bill. It is simply, as he points out, a way to lower the corporate tax and take care of the extraordinarily wealthy in this country who don't need it.

Mr. Speaker, I wish we could provide health for middle class families, which is what I believe the President of the United States thinks he did. I hear him say all the time that there is nothing in there to benefit him--except, probably, the estate tax, which we understand would save him about $1 billion.

So, if we defeat the previous question, I will offer an amendment that will prohibit any legislation being considered on the floor that limits or repeals the State and local tax deduction or repeals the ACA individual mandate.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of my amendment in the Record, along with extraneous material, immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.

Mr. Speaker, let me take a moment and remind everyone watching of the impacts of the majority's last shutdown in 2013. The impacts on our economy were significant. We lost $24 billion in just those 2 weeks. The impacts on our economy, as I said, were very significant:

Federal loans to small businesses, homeowners, and families were brought to a halt.

Banks and other lenders were unable to access government verification services, which delayed private sector lending to small businesses and individuals alike.

Federal permitting was brought to a standstill, which delayed job- creating projects in the transportation and energy sectors.

Experts have estimated that all told, this 16-day shutdown cost our economy an estimated $24 billion.

So, during this shutdown, again, vital services were put on hold.

At the National Institutes of Health, hundreds of patients were unable to enroll in possibly lifesaving clinical trials.

Federal agencies like the Food and Drug Administration and the Environmental Protection Agency were unable to conduct health and safety inspections.

Federal scientific research was also halted, and we lost a lot of scientists in this country because of all that. Five Nobel Prize winning scientists who worked for the Federal Government at the time of the shutdown, four of the five of them were laid off.

This is all according to a report issued by the Office of Management and Budget.

The public knows how devastating another shutdown could be. According to a poll conducted by Morning Consult and Politico released this week, there is bipartisan opposition, with 68 percent of Democrats, 62 percent of Republicans, and 61 percent of Independents all opposing a government shutdown.

I forgot to mention up there about Social Security checks and things for the Veterans Administration. They came to a halt.

So that is what makes this so frustrating. I agree with Mr. Woodall. This is a frustrating part of what we are trying to do here. Every day it seems we get up and we face some kind of new disaster.

We could have crafted a bipartisan bill--we sure could have--that would have removed any question of whether a continuing resolution would pass the House and Senate.

We could have reauthorized the Children's Health Insurance Program, community health centers, Perkins loans, and more months ago, if only the majority were willing to work with Democrats. Instead, bipartisanship is all too often becoming a dirty word under the majority. I sadly say: It is the American people left to pay the price.

So I urge a ``no'' vote on the previous question, the rule, and the bill, and I yield back the balance of my time.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of H.R. 3971, the Community Institution Mortgage Relief Act. It is an important bill that is cosponsored by a bipartisan group of Members--again, bipartisan. It was approved in the Financial Services Committee with a strong bipartisan vote of 41-19, and it has a long track record of bipartisan support,

and all Members should take note of this.

I want to thank the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Tenney), who is a fine member of the Financial Services Committee. I want to thank her for introducing the legislation and really helping lead our congressional effort to provide needed regulatory relief for our small community banks and credit unions, to give them relief from rules that are unfairly restricting our constituents' access to mortgage credit. This is mortgage credit that would help Americans achieve a greater level of financial independence by being able to achieve perhaps their version of the American Dream, a home they can actually afford to keep.

H.R. 3971 is a narrowly focused, modest effort to resolve concerns related to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's rules implementing Dodd-Frank Act provisions on escrows and mortgage servicing. The CFPB's escrow requirements for property taxes and insurance are unnecessary, they are impractical, and they are a significant expense that just makes it harder for community banks and credit unions to offer mortgage loans to their customers and members.

These escrow accounts are the accounts that people use to pay their taxes and pay their homeowners insurance. With the amendment soon to be introduced by the gentleman from California (Mr. Sherman), a cosponsor of this legislation, this bipartisan bill would simply relieve certain small community banks and credit unions from the obligation to provide escrow accounts if they have consolidated assets of $10 billion or less and hold the mortgage on their balance sheet for 3 years.

Again, Mr. Speaker, if they are holding the mortgage on their balance sheet, they have every incentive--every incentive to protect the collateral and ensure that tax and insurance payments are current. There is no reason to force them, these community banks and credit unions, to go through this very expensive process of escrowing, particularly if the customer or the credit union member doesn't want it.

A large majority of community banks do not currently escrow because of the cost of which I have spoken. And requiring them to do so, Mr. Speaker, is only going to stop them from making loans; fewer home loans, fewer people with homeownership opportunity.

You know, a community banker in Missouri recently told us that the CFPB's rule has forced his bank to ``limit in-house residential real estate lending.'' The banker went on to say: ``This is hurting the housing market and our community.'' That just shouldn't be happening, Mr. Speaker.

A credit union official in Pennsylvania told us that this bureaucratic CFPB requirement has caused his credit union members to become ``very upset and confused as to why they were unable to pay their taxes how they always had.''

He went on to write: ``These members had managed their tax and insurance payments for years without institution interference, but suddenly they feel like the government now told them they were not responsible enough to manage their own affairs.''

This echoes precisely what we learn from a credit union leader in Pennsylvania who wrote a letter saying that ``changes to mortgage servicing rules have made it more expensive and more time consuming. Servicing rules and regulations have become a full-time regulatory and compliance nightmare.'' Again, Mr. Speaker, fewer home loans means fewer homes for our constituents. It is not right.

To fix these problems, H.R. 3971 would also increase the small servicer exemption threshold from 5,000 mortgages to 20,000 mortgages annually, which better delineates small servicers from the large servicers. A community bank or credit union that services fewer than 20,000 mortgages should not be subject to the same regulatory scrutiny as the big financial institution that has a $2 trillion servicing portfolio.

Again, these important reforms will give smaller credit unions and community banks greater flexibility to ensure more of their members and customers can get a loan to buy a home and stay in their home.

Again, Mr. Speaker, Ms. Tenney's bill has strong bipartisan support. It has in the past; I expect it will have it again today. It solves a real problem for our constituents, and I urge adoption of the measure.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Luetkemeyer), the chairman of the Financial Services Subcommittee on Financial Institutions and Consumer Credit.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 30 seconds just to say we are losing a community bank or credit union a day in America, and we are losing them because they are drowning in a sea of Dodd-Frank regulations; and as they perish, so do the dreams of many of our constituents.

Mr. Speaker, if a small community bank or credit union makes a loan and keeps it on their books, guess what. They want the loan repaid. They are going to make sure that the taxes are kept current. They are going to make sure the insurance is kept current. They don't need the burdensome regulation coming out from some Washington bureaucrat telling them how to do their business. They want to ensure the loan gets paid anyway.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Rothfus), the vice chairman of the Financial Services Subcommittee on Financial Institutions and Consumer Credit.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Williams), a fellow Texan and a member of the Financial Services Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Barr), chairman of the Financial Services Subcommittee on Monetary Policy and Trade.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Utah (Mrs. Love), an outstanding member of the Financial Services Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield an additional 30 seconds to the gentlewoman from Utah.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Duncan).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Budd), a very hardworking member of the Financial Services Committee.

Mr. Speaker, may I inquire how much time I have remaining.

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

Mr. Speaker, I listened very carefully to my colleague, the ranking member, and I know how much respect she has--bordering, perhaps, on religious fealty--to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and I must admit, now that it is being led by our former colleague Mick Mulvaney of South Carolina, I am taking a renewed interest in their actions and their pronouncements. I am just curious, as time goes by, whether the ranking member will continue to show such faith and confidence in that particular institution.

Here is what we know, Mr. Speaker. All across America, we continue to lose one community bank or credit union a day. They are not perishing of natural causes. They are perishing from the sheer weight, volume, load, cost, complexity, and expense of the Dodd-Frank regulatory burden, of which this CFPB rule is just one aspect.

Again, as my colleague, the chairman of the Financial Institutions and Consumer Credit Subcommittee--I believe it was he who pointed it out. There is not any one particular regulation that may cause the demise of these financial institutions, but it is the totality of them all. And as they perish, so perishes the American Dream of homeownership for so many of our constituents, particularly in rural areas like much of the Fifth District of Texas that I have the honor and pleasure of representing.

Mr. Speaker, it is important that we save our community financial institutions. They play a vital role in our economy. It takes small banks and credit unions to fund our small businesses, which are the job engine of America. But again, they are being crushed by a regulatory burden.

So I want to thank the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Tenney) for bringing, again, just one needed, vital regulatory relief bill.

Again, let's make sure, Mr. Speaker, everybody knows what this bill is talking about.

Number one, already in current law, there is an exemption for small financial institutions dealing with having mortgage servicing and mortgage escrows. We are trying to bring it to a more reasonable level, an exemption that already exists. And I assume that the ranking member believes in the exemption or she would offer legislation to repeal it in total. So now we are debating how large this exemption ought to be.

Given how many of our constituents still are in need of mortgage opportunities, given the demise of our community banks and credit unions, I think what we are trying to do here is most reasonable. Soon, the gentleman from California on the other side of the aisle, a respected Democratic member of the committee, will offer an amendment that I believe the sponsor of the legislation--I, myself, am willing to accept because we are trying to work on a bipartisan basis.

There is a lot of bipartisan legislation that goes to the House Financial Services Committee. I wish the ranking member would participate in more of it, as she did last week. I am sorry she is losing out on this opportunity today, so I am happy to work with the gentleman from California on a bipartisan basis to get this legislation done.

Another important note to be had, Mr. Speaker, is we get this implication from the ranking member that, oh, my Lord, if we pass this bill, H.R. 3971, all of a sudden, all consumer protection law disappears from the books. Well, I have got good news: it doesn't.

After the passage of H.R. 3971, all of these mortgages will still be subject to the Equal Credit Opportunity Act; they will still be subject to regulation B; they will still be subject to the Fair Housing Act; they will still be subject to the Fair Credit Reporting Act; they will still be subject to the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act; they will still be subject to the Homeowners Protection Act; they will still be subject to the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act.

I have got a whole sheet here, Mr. Speaker.

Again, that is a red herring. At the end of the day, this is about ensuring our constituents, particularly in rural areas, have access to mortgage credit and that community banks and credit unions that are absolutely suffering under the weight of the load aren't forced to escrow when they keep a mortgage on their books for 3 years. They are going to make sure the taxes are paid. They are going to make sure the insurance is paid. Instead, all that regulation does is burdens them and causes them to make fewer mortgage loans and, in some cases, no mortgage loans.

So, again, I just want salute the gentlewoman from New York. I want to thank her for her leadership and what she is doing for her constituents in rural New York, and I urge everybody to adopt H.R. 3971.

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

Mr. Speaker, I claim time in opposition.

Mr. Speaker, I am looking at this motion to recommit, and, on its best day, it may be superfluous and redundant; and on its worst day, it may be confusing. But I fear, in many respects, it is just a smokescreen to give many of my friends on the other side of the aisle an excuse not to vote for the underlying legislation, H.R. 3971.

Already the CFPB has full UDAAP authority to deal with unfair, deceptive, and abusive acts. That already exists. So this is a red herring that somehow people are using the lack of the passage of the MTR as a rationale not to support H.R. 3971, which is vitally needed for so many of our community financial institutions to be able to make home mortgage loans to hardworking Americans who deserve their chance at the American Dream.

Again, as I said earlier during this debate, Mr. Speaker, all of these mortgages continue to be subject to the Equal Credit Opportunity Act, the Fair Housing Act, the Fair Credit Reporting Act, the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act, the Homeownership Counseling Act, the Homeowners Protection Act, the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act, the Secure and Fair Enforcement for Mortgage Licensing Act, the Truth in Lending Act, Regulation Z, and the list goes on and on and on.

That is simply an excuse. The MTR is an excuse not to save our struggling community banks and our citizens in rural America who deserve the services of these community banks and credit unions.

Again, on its best day, it is superfluous and redundant. On its worst day,

it is introducing confusing language into an already settled area of the law for consumer protection.

Mr. Speaker, I urge all Members to reject the motion to recommit, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material in consideration of H.J. Res. 123.

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 647, I call up the joint resolution (H.J. Res. 123) making further continuing appropriations for fiscal year 2018, and for other purposes, and ask for its immediate consideration.

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

I rise today to present H.J. Res. 123, a continuing resolution that maintains funding for Federal Government operations and prevents a shutdown.

Current funding legislation expires tomorrow, Friday, December 8. Congress must act now to prevent a government shutdown and preserve vital Federal programs that Americans rely on. This action is critical to our Nation's stability, our national security, our economic health, and the well-being of the American people.

This simple, clean extension of funding provides fiscal year 2018 funding for government programs through December 22, an additional 2 weeks, and will allow time for leadership to reach a deal on overall topline spending levels for the 2018 fiscal year.

I would note that the executive branch supports adoption of this continuing resolution. Yesterday's Statement of Administration Policy says: ``This legislation funds the Federal Government at current spending levels without unnecessary extraneous provisions.''

It concludes that his advisers would recommend that the President sign the bill into law.

Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record the December 6 Statement of Administration Policy regarding H.J. Res. 123.

Statement of Administration Policy

h.j. res. 123--further continuing appropriations act, 2018--rep.

frelinghuysen, r-nj

The Administration supports House passage of H.J. Res. 123,

the Further Continuing Appropriations Act, 2018.

This legislation funds the Federal Government at current

spending levels without unnecessary extraneous provisions

through December 22, 2017, while the Congress continues to

work on a longer-term funding agreement. The legislation also

includes language to ensure that States and Territories have

adequate funding for the Children's Health Insurance Program

(CHIP) through December.

The Administration believes that funding for national

security, including for our military, to secure the Southern

Border, and to enhance missile defense capabilities, must be

prioritized in a long-term funding agreement, and will

continue working with the Congress to achieve that goal.

If H.J. Res. 123 was presented to the President in its

current form, his advisors would recommend that he sign the

bill into law.

Mr. Speaker, the House has completed our appropriations work over 80 days ago, passing all 12 bills before the end of the last fiscal year for the first time in nearly a decade. This included critical, important funding for national defense and other important matters.

Unfortunately, the Appropriations Committee cannot proceed without an agreement with the Senate on overall funding levels. The reality is that we are running into a deadline this week, and this resolution is our best and only option at this time.

Once a broader budget agreement has been reached, which I hope will be soon, the committee will continue its work to complete final negotiations with the Senate on all 12 of the regular appropriations bills that will fully fund the Federal Government through September of next year.

Our committee is also moving quickly to act on a third emergency supplemental funding bill to help our communities across the Nation recover from recent major disasters.

In the meantime, Congress must do its job and pass the continuing resolution and then another one into the new year to keep the government open and ensure that all important Federal services are available to all Americans.

Mr. Speaker, I urge support of this necessary and responsible legislation, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Rogers), my colleague, and the distinguished chairman of the State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs Subcommittee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Aderholt), the chairman of the Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies Subcommittee on Appropriations.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Granger), the chairwoman of the Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Idaho (Mr. Simpson), the chairman of the Energy and Water Development, and Related Agencies Subcommittee.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Culberson), the chairman of the Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies Subcommittee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Carter), the chairman of the Homeland Security Subcommittee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Calvert), the chairman of the Committee on Appropriations Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies Subcommittee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield an additional 15 seconds to the gentleman from California.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. Cole), the chairman of the Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies Subcommittee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Diaz-Balart), the chairman of the Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Dent), the chairman of the Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies Subcommittee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Walden), the distinguished chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield an additional 1 minute to the gentleman from Oregon.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Burgess), chairman of the Health Subcommittee of the Energy and Commerce Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Emmer).

Mr. Speaker, in closing, I strongly urge my colleagues to vote ``yes'' on this responsible, necessary legislation. Let's keep the Federal Government open for business to serve our constituents across the Nation.

I yield back the balance of my time.

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