Condemning the Trump Administration's Legal Campaign to Take Away Americans' Health Care.

Madam Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 274 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Madam Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Burgess), 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

Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members be given 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks.

Madam Speaker, on Monday, the Rules Committee met and reported a rule, House Resolution 274. It provides for the consideration under closed rules for S.J. Res. 7, with 1 hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, and for the consideration of H. Res. 271, with 1 hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of Committee on Energy and Commerce. It also provides suspension authority for Thursday, April 4.

Madam Speaker, before I begin, I want to recognize that today marks the 230th anniversary of the Rules Committee being formally constituted for the first time.

Now, the Ways and Means Committee--which my Massachusetts friend and colleague, Richie Neal, chairs--likes to point out that they are the oldest standing committee in the House. While that is true, I would like to remind my friends that the Rules Committee is the oldest committee in the House, being first created on this day in 1789 as a select committee. So it is especially appropriate that we are on the floor today to do some important work before us.

For the record, Madam Speaker, the Ways and Means Committee can celebrate their 230th anniversary on July 24.

Now that I have cleared that up, the first measure included in this rule is S.J. Res. 7, and we are taking action on this because Yemen is in crisis. In a country of roughly 28 million people, an estimated 22 million of them are in need of humanitarian assistance.

That is 75 percent of the population facing famine, disease, and displacement. Half the country is at risk of starvation.

The famine and disease facing children is particularly sobering. Save the Children estimates that as many as 85,000 children under the age of 5 have died because of hunger and disease since 2015.

All told, this is one of the world's worst humanitarian crises, the site of the fastest growing cholera epidemic ever recorded and the biggest food emergency on the planet.

Yet, it wasn't caused by some natural disaster. It is entirely man- made, the result of a Saudi-led military conflict. Seemingly every day, bombs fall on weddings, hospitals, buses, and homes, as civilian neighborhoods are regularly targeted.

This is not some abstract war happening half a world away. In fact, the United States is intimately involved in this conflict. We have supported the Saudi reign of terror by providing logistics, intelligence, ground support, and midair fueling of bombers. Virtually all the bombs that fall on Yemen say ``Made in the United States of America.''

Make no mistake, Madam Speaker, the United States is involved in a war in Yemen today. But if our constituents look through the Congressional Record, they wouldn't find a vote authorizing it. That is because this body abdicated its responsibility to declare war when it began 4 years ago.

Now, we took one of our most sacred responsibilities and handed it to the executive branch. It is not the first time we have done it, but it is becoming a habit around here. We first let the Bush administration decide the contours of our involvement abroad, and that continues through the Trump administration today.

If that wasn't outrageous enough, past Republican Congresses used every legislative trick in the book to block Members from even debating our role there. On two separate occasions, they went so far as to strip War Powers Resolutions related to Yemen of their privilege. It was unprecedented.

But when it comes to Saudi Arabia, this administration and my Republican friends were all too content to look the other way when they murdered a Washington Post journalist. They lured him into a consulate in Turkey, they murdered him, and then they used a bone saw to dismember him. We know, based on our intelligence reports, that the highest level of the Saudi Government was involved in that terrible human rights atrocity, and the Trump administration did nothing. They rationalized it. They justified it. They basically turned a blind eye.

When it comes to human rights, this administration has abdicated its moral authority. That should be of concern to everybody in this Chamber, whether you are Democrat or Republican, because if the United States stands for anything, we need to stand out loud and foursquare for human rights. If the President of the United States and his administration don't want to do it, then we should.

No Congress should be complicit in abdicating our Article I constitutional responsibility. Thankfully, this Democratic Congress is doing the opposite. We are reasserting our power, and we are taking a stand when it comes to human rights.

Thanks especially to the dedication of Speaker Pelosi, Chairman Engel, Congressman Ro Khanna, Congresswoman Jayapal, Congressman Pocan, and the entire Congressional Progressive Caucus, we are considering a bipartisan measure that makes clear it is time for the United States' involvement in Yemen to end. No more excuses.

This is virtually identical to the resolution we passed in February. The difference this time is that this is the first opportunity that this House has had to send something on the war in Yemen right to the President's desk.

So I urge all of my colleagues: seize this opportunity. We have a constitutional responsibility and we have a moral obligation to get this done.

Don't let any legislative maneuvers deter us from ending our Nation's complicity in this humanitarian catastrophe. Let's pass this resolution free of changes that would prevent it from going right to the President.

Let me make that more clear: if we change a single word, we will derail this resolution.

Now, the second measure included in this rule is H. Res. 271, in response to a war of a different kind: the Republican war on healthcare. The Trump Justice Department recently moved in Federal Court not only to strike down preexisting condition coverage under the Affordable Care Act, but to overturn this law completely.

If the President succeeds in Texas v. U.S., the protections for preexisting conditions will be gone. The Medicaid expansion will be nullified. Insurance premiums will skyrocket. I could go on and on and on and on.

Striking down the Affordable Care Act would be a tragedy felt by every single American. We would return to the days when our health insurance marketplace was like the Wild West, when insurers were free to decline or limit coverage because someone had acne, or received an organ transplant, or even because they were a victim of domestic violence. That is how messed up our system was, and that is the system that this President and many of my colleagues want to return to.

Now, for the life of me, I cannot understand what President Trump and his allies in Congress have against Americans getting healthcare. For nearly a decade now, they have worked endlessly to sabotage the Affordable Care Act through Congress, the courts, and administrative actions. Apparently, they are not happy that 20 million people have gained healthcare coverage because of this law, or that 130 million Americans with preexisting conditions can get care. We should be celebrating these advancements. But, instead, some on the other side won't be satisfied until the Affordable Care Act is repealed completely.

Now, this Democratic majority has taken a different course. On the very first day of this Congress, we brought the full weight of the House of Representatives to bear in this lawsuit. As a result, the House Counsel has already intervened in this case to protect the healthcare Americans depend on.

Now, this resolution is our chance to speak with one voice against the administration's attempts to abolish the ACA. I have seen my friends on the other side issue sternly worded press releases and strongly worded letters to the administration. But now it is time to back up words with votes, and then I hope they will work with us moving forward as this majority takes action to reverse the administration's healthcare sabotage and strengthen healthcare for every single American.

Madam Speaker, I believe that healthcare ought to be a fundamental right for every single person in this country. It is unconscionable to me that rather than working with us to strengthen the Affordable Care Act and rather than working with us to expand healthcare protections, my Republican friends have chosen instead to wipe it out. I don't know how anybody could think like that. I don't know what motivates the President of the United States and some on the other side of the aisle to move in that direction.

Now we are told by the President that even though he doesn't have a plan to replace this, if he succeeds in nulling and voiding the Affordable Care Act, he said: Well, we will provide you one in the year 2021.

So, Madam Speaker, the man who has spent all of his time trying to rip protections away from people with preexisting conditions, the person who wants to not allow you to keep your kids on their insurance until they are 26, the leader of our country who doesn't believe in capping insurance when it comes to people with lifetime illnesses, the person who doesn't want to lower the cost of prescription drugs--I could go on and on and on and on--says: I want to repeal it, I want it gone, I want the courts to null and void it; and then just trust me, and then we will come up with some magical plan, some secret plan, after the election.

I don't think the American people are going to fall for that kind of nonsense, and they shouldn't because healthcare is not a Democratic issue or a Republican issue. It is a moral issue. It is not even an issue, it is a value that all of us should share.

So I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to support us in sending a message loud and clear to the administration that we have had enough of their attempts to sabotage the healthcare bill, we have had enough of their trying to take health insurance away from the American people, and that we are going to stand here and make it very clear that we do believe that everybody is entitled to good healthcare in this country.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Madam Speaker, I have to give the Republicans credit for one thing. They are consistent on the issue of healthcare, in trying to avoid talking about the issue at hand.

We are not talking about universal healthcare, although I support universal healthcare. We are not talking about Medicare for All, although I personally support Medicare for All. We are not talking about the Canadian system or the German system or any other system.

We are talking about preventing this President and his Republican allies from null and voiding the Affordable Care Act, thereby taking away healthcare protections for every single American. We are talking about preventing the President from throwing

tens of millions of people off health insurance. We are talking about protecting the over 100 million people in this country who have preexisting conditions. That is what we are talking about.

I loved it when the gentleman from Texas said that the first vote that the Republicans asked for in this Congress was a procedural motion to protect people with preexisting conditions. Does the gentleman not know that people with preexisting conditions already have protections under the Affordable Care Act?

I mean, it sounds to me--and it seemed to me at the time--that that Republican procedural vote was about covering your rear and not about serious legislating, about trying to get the American people to believe that we really do care about healthcare and we really do care about protecting people with preexisting conditions, even though we all know here that that is just not the case.

When I hear the gentleman say that the Republicans care deeply about people's healthcare and want to make sure that everybody gets coverage, it is just not true. The reason I say that so emphatically is because I have been around here for the last few years, and I have watched the dozens of votes that the Republicans have brought up, one after another after another after another after another, to repeal healthcare protections for people in this country without proposing an alternative.

Now, the President is saying: Trust us.

Madam Speaker, I include in the Record a Politico article that just appeared that is entitled ``Trump punts health care until after 2020.''

[From POLITICO, April 1, 2019]

Trump Punts Health Care Until After 2020

(By Quint Forgey and John Bresnahan)

just last week the president had seemed to go all in on a new effort to

wipe out obamacare

President Donald Trump signaled Monday that congressional

Republicans would wait until after the 2020 elections to vote

on a GOP replacement for Obamacare--putting off a presumably

savage legislative battle on a hot-button campaign issue

until after his re-election bid.

``Everybody agrees that ObamaCare doesn't work. Premiums &

deductibles are far too high--Really bad HealthCare! Even the

Dems want to replace it, but with Medicare for all, which

would cause 180 million Americans to lose their beloved

private health insurance,'' the president tweeted.

``The Republicans . . . are developing a really great

HealthCare Plan with far lower premiums (cost) & deductibles

than ObamaCare,'' Trump continued. ``In other words it will

be far less expensive & much more usable than ObamaCare. Vote

will be taken right after the Election when Republicans hold

the Senate & win . . . back the House.''

Trump claimed that the as-yet-unseen Republican proposal

``will be truly great HealthCare that will work for

America,'' writing online that ``Republicans will always

support Pre-Existing Conditions.''

The unexpected string of tweets added drama to a week that

has seen Obamacare return to the fore as a policy issue.

The president's pledge comes days after his Justice

Department endorsed a federal court ruling to eliminate the

Affordable Care Act in its entirety, moving to invalidate the

landmark health care law despite objections within Trump's

orbit from Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar and

Attorney General William Barr. The ruling by District Judge

Reed O'Connor had suggested that the Obamacare statute, which

has passed muster with the Supreme Court, was actually wholly

unconstitutional.

The president appeared on Capitol Hill the next day, saying

that the Republican Party ``will soon be known as the party

of health care.''

Trump's call to again put Obamacare repeal on the table for

Hill Republicans was seen as a potential disaster-in-the

making by GOP leaders, who knew their incumbents and

candidates were badly hurt by it last November. And it was an

invitation to Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) to pound home

the issue once more, as she plans to do with a House vote

this week condemning the administration's decision not to

defend Obamacare in court.

Trump's efforts to eradicate Obamacare have also endangered

some of the administration's health initiatives, such as

lowering prices for prescription drugs and combating opioid

abuse and HIV.

In public and private, Republican leaders made clear that

they didn't want anything to do with the president's most

recent maneuver. They begged Trump to back down and made

their displeasure known to other administration officials, as

well.

GOP lawmakers even took the position that if Trump wanted

to lay out his own health care proposal, then they would be

willing to look at it. But Senate Republicans--facing a tough

electoral fight to maintain their majority in 2020--have

refused to sign on to a new administration drive before

seeing the specifics, giving them room to disavow any Trump

proposal if it hinders their own political outlook.

``I look forward to seeing what the president is proposing

and what he can work out with the speaker,'' Senate Majority

Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said in a brief interview

Thursday, adding: ``I am focusing on stopping the Democrats'

`Medicare for None' scheme.''

McConnell is up for re-election this cycle, as are

vulnerable GOP incumbents including Cory Gardner of Colorado

and Susan Collins of Maine, who said she doesn't want the

Justice Department to push to strike down Obamacare.

The Affordable Care Act has been a thorn in the side of

Republicans since it was enacted in 2010. After the GOP took

back the House in the midterm elections that year, GOP

lawmakers repeatedly passed legislation designed to repeal

Obamacare.

Once Trump was elected president on a promise of different

and better health care options, Republicans seemed on the

path to finally scrapping the law, only to see a 2017

``skinny repeal'' effort fail unexpectedly in the Senate.

That attempt collapsed when Arizona Sen. John McCain--upset

with the irregular way the legislation was being handled--

stunned his colleagues by voting against it.

The President says: Repeal everything, and then we will share our secret plan after the election.

Give me a break. The bottom line is that the American people want us to be on their side, not on the side of big health insurance corporations, not on the side of big drug companies. They want us to be on their side.

It wasn't too long ago when people would be provided insurance that didn't cover anything. It was junk insurance. There are people on the Republican side and people in this White House who are eager to get back to those bad old days.

Stop trying to take away people's healthcare. Stop trying to get in bed with corporate interests that basically are fighting every attempt to make sure that people have access to good, quality care in this country.

By the way, if they repealed the Affordable Care Act, that repeals essential benefits protections, which guarantee that every insurance company has to provide you coverage when you get sick. That wasn't always the case.

This is a ridiculous fight that we are having here. I cannot believe, after the midterm elections, after it was made crystal clear by the American people to the Republicans that they wanted no part of their effort to take away healthcare in this country, that here we are doing it all again.

Now, maybe they didn't intend it this way. The President wasn't on message and came out for repealing the Affordable Care Act outright, and now they have to kind of scramble to try to, again, cover their rears. That is what is happening here.

It is really disillusioning, I think, for people who are observing these proceedings that we are back again fighting over whether or not people are entitled to good healthcare, whether people are entitled to protections under our healthcare laws.

I think this is a ridiculous fight for the Republicans to be waging. But if they want to fight it, they own it. I think they will see, in 2020, that the American people are having none of it.

Madam Speaker, on the war in Yemen, we cannot wait. The starving children in Yemen cannot wait on this President or on my Republican colleagues to do the right thing.

Just to highlight how bad the war is, here are a few statistics. I noticed the gentleman from Texas barely talked about how horrific the situation is in Yemen, but let me give you a few statistics.

Madam Speaker, 130 children under 5 die each day from hunger and disease as a result of this war. The number of cholera cases in Yemen is 1 million. You heard that right. This is the largest cholera outbreak in recent history. Finally, 3-year-olds in Yemen have lived through 18,000 air raids already.

As I mentioned in my opening statement, the bombs that are dropping on civilian populations say ``Made in the United States of America.'' All of us should be outraged by that, and not only by the Saudi Government's behavior in Yemen, but the Saudi Government's behavior in general.

Yet, what is the response by this administration and their Republican allies? Send Saudi Arabia more weapons.

Sell them more weapons. Turn a blind eye to what is going on in Yemen. Let's make believe that the murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi never happened.

Again, we need to stand firmly on the side of human rights.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Let me just say you have got to love the Republicans. I mean, they have been in charge of this House for 8 years previously. They were in charge of the entire government the previous 2 years. They had the House, the Senate, and the White House. They didn't even need a supermajority in the United States Senate to be able to get whatever they wanted through, and they couldn't do it.

So the bottom line is this: You had your chance. The American people rejected your attempt to take away healthcare from millions of people. The American people believe people with preexisting conditions ought not to be discriminated against by insurance companies, and so they are having none of what you are selling here.

So you can make excuses all you want, but, unfortunately for the country, you were in charge of the House, the Senate, and the White House for the previous 2 years.

Madam Speaker, I am happy to yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Khanna), who has been a leader on the issue of Yemen, and I commend him for his efforts.

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

I have great respect for the gentleman from Texas, the former chair of the Ways and Means Committee. But I just want to remind my colleagues again that my Republican friends have been in charge of this institution for 8 years. They were in charge for 2 years of the House, the Senate, and the Presidency, and they showed us what they were about.

The gentleman says that they are not going to let the courts take away protections for people with preexisting conditions. Well, my Republican friends tried to do that on dozens of occasions. They brought legislation to the floor that would have ripped protections away from people with preexisting conditions. That is their record. It is there for anybody to see.

Now they are saying: ``Oh, we are now for protecting people with preexisting conditions''? Their whole existence in the majority has been about taking protections away from people. Give me a break. I mean, people know what is going on here.

I appreciate the resolution that the gentleman wants to offer to say we all should work together. Look, I am happy to work with my Republican friends to find ways to improve protections for people.

But I want to remind them, when they were in the majority, they didn't want anything to do with us because we wanted to protect people's healthcare. We wanted to protect people with preexisting conditions. We wanted to make sure that parents could keep their kids on their insurance until they were 26. We wanted to lower the cost of prescription drugs. We wanted to put a cap on people with chronic illnesses so that they wouldn't go bankrupt. We wanted to make sure that insurance companies had to offer you real protections. We had essential benefit protections there.

So we are happy to build on that. What we are not happy to do is to work with them to take these things away, and that is what their leadership has been all about for 8 years in the House. And then when they controlled the House, the Senate, and the White House, that is what they tried to do.

Thankfully, some thoughtful Republicans in the Senate didn't go along with it, so they didn't get their way. And now they are trying to use the courts to try to undermine what this body has done.

Madam Speaker, let me inquire of the gentleman from Texas how many more speakers he has.

Okay. Then I will reserve the balance of my time.

We were expecting one more speaker, but she didn't show up. If the gentleman is ready to close, I am ready to close.

I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Madam Speaker, I just find it a little bit interesting that for the last couple of days, my Republican friends have been assailing us for introducing a sense of Congress resolution, and here we have a sense of Congress resolution from them.

I guess you can't make this stuff up.

But in any event, look, I will say to my colleagues, you don't need to defeat the previous question to make clear that you believe that people with preexisting conditions should be protected, because this sense of Congress wouldn't do that.

We have a law that does that now, a law that, unfortunately, my Republican friends have been trying to repeal for years.

So if Members want to protect people with preexisting conditions, then they ought to support us on our sense of Congress resolution.

So, Madam Speaker, when it comes down to it, both of these resolutions that we are offering today are about what this Congress is willing to tolerate, whether we are willing to tolerate our Nation's involvement in the Saudi-led war in Yemen, despite never having authorized it in the first place. Do we really want our Nation to be partners with a regime that murders journalists like Jamal Khashoggi?

President Trump has said of Saudi Arabia: ``They have been a great ally.'' Well, I disagree.

And I hope that this Congress will now speak with one voice that we will not look the other way when it comes to the murder of a U.S. reporter, that we will not look the other way when it comes to the murder of innocent people in Yemen, bombing school buses, bombing weddings, bombing funerals.

Enough. We have to say enough. We are no longer okay with the U.S. and Yemen going on unchecked for another year.

This is about whether this Congress is going to tolerate the administration trying to rip away millions of people's healthcare as well. I know I am not--and many of my colleagues aren't either--willing to tolerate that.

This morning, I joined with many Members of Congress in the House and Senate, including Leader Pelosi and Senator Schumer. We marched from the House and the Senate to the Supreme Court to call on this administration to stop its assault on Americans' healthcare.

Abolishing the Affordable Care Act may be just a talking point to the President, but this law is literally a matter of life and death for people. Millions and millions of Americans could lose their insurance coverage. Premiums and out-of-pocket costs could skyrocket, and lifesaving healthcare could once again be out of reach.

The President and his allies claim to support protections for preexisting conditions, they claim that the Republican Party is the party of healthcare, but their actions say otherwise.

When this House voted on the first day of this Congress to allow us to intervene in Texas v. U.S., more than 190 Republicans sided with the President on his brutal assault on Americans' healthcare.

The majority is not going to stand for it.

Enough is enough. Enough with the unauthorized wars abroad, enough with the assault on people's healthcare.

Madam Speaker, I urge a ``yes'' vote on the previous question, this rule, and the underlying resolutions.

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

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

Madam Speaker, the American people expect us to come to this floor with solutions, not political ``gotcha'' statements. The resolution before us in this week's Democratic dosage of attack on the President is just that. It doesn't do a darn thing to protect people with preexisting conditions; not one thing.

In the opening day of the 116th Congress, House Republicans brought a powerful, but simple, measure to the floor that called on this body to legislate on what we all agree needs to be done: locking in protections for patients with preexisting conditions.

Let me repeat. Republicans acted on day one of this Congress to protect Americans with preexisting conditions. Democrats blocked that.

In fact, I introduced legislation which has 45 cosponsors that protects people with preexisting conditions. Period. This is something I have fought for my entire time in public service. It would lock in existing protections for patients. It is before the Energy and Commerce Committee, and I have worked since the first day of this Congress to get this measure passed so that if the court decision that found ObamaCare to be unconstitutional, if that judge's decision is upheld, we want to make sure that our citizens who have preexisting conditions still have coverage.

The legislation I have sponsored would do that. Republicans and Democrats could get this done, and the question is: Why are we not voting on that today?

Instead, Democrats have rushed a resolution to the floor that has never had a hearing before the Energy and Commerce Committee. So much for the talk about due process and regular order, Madam Speaker. No hearing, and it was rushed to the floor.

We only got to see it for the first time last Friday. So it is little more, in my opinion, than a political screed, not a public policy proposal. It will never go to the Senate. It is only here. Americans ought to know this, too: that the legal case working its way through the courts did not immediately end ObamaCare and will not affect insurance coverage on premiums for 2019.

Moreover, Democrat attorneys general and a couple of Republicans from intervening States are already defending the law in this case, and the judge's ruling has been appealed. This body has voted not once, but twice, to allow Speaker Pelosi to intervene in the case, and she has moved to do.

Just as my Democratic colleagues have repeatedly refused to let this House approve protections for people with preexisting conditions, they also know they could moot the lawsuit that they so decry today. All they would have to do is bring a bill to the floor and vote to repeal the individual mandate. That would turn off this lawsuit.

I am sure many on our side might be happy to join them in that effort. And if the Democrats didn't want to do that, they could vote to reinstate the individual mandate penalty. That, too, would moot the lawsuit. But we are not doing that either.

So they had policy options that could have been brought to the floor, three of them. Two would have ended the lawsuit that they decry today, and one would have given rock-solid security to those with preexisting conditions if the law is thrown out. There is no difference between us or among us about protecting people with preexisting conditions.

But, unfortunately, they chose not to actually legislate. Democrats control everything in this House. They decide what gets heard in committee or, in this case, not, and what is brought to the floor, or not. So it is clear they would rather play politics with healthcare and attack the President for political purposes rather than work with us on what could and should be bipartisan solutions.

A fact that my friends on the other side of the aisle must acknowledge is, for many Americans seeking coverage, healthcare costs keep getting more and more expensive. Last week, the Bend Bulletin, a newspaper in my district, reported on a recent analysis by the Kaiser Family Foundation about how insurance premiums are out of reach for many older, middle-class residents of our area, particularly in rural areas, including my home State.

They report: ``In central Oregon, for example, a 60-year-old individual with an annual income of $50,000 must pay at least $703 a month, representing 17 percent of his or her income, and that would only buy a bronze plan with a deductible of $6,500.''

We should be focused on helping people like that be able to afford insurance.

When the Affordable Care Act passed, Democrats promised people their insurance premiums would actually go down by $2,500. For many in America, that promise was false. For many Americans, healthcare costs, health insurance premiums, and, certainly, deductibles and copays have done nothing but gone up and up.

I was in Oregon over the weekend and held seven townhalls. Do you know what I hear about when it comes to healthcare? That insurance premiums are out of reach for too many of my constituents. And for those who cannot afford the premiums, many make difficult choices, from choosing which family members to cover, to changing jobs, or limiting income in order to continue to qualify for subsidies. This is a real problem. I think we can find a bipartisan solution if Democrats are willing to work with us on it.

But, plainly, the current healthcare system for too many Americans is not working. So we know we have more work to do, and I hope that our colleagues on the other side of the aisle would agree with us that we need to improve State markets that, in some part, were damaged by ObamaCare; that we should work together to lower healthcare costs and increase access to private health insurance.

In the Energy and Commerce Committee, actually, there are some things we are working on, on drug costs. No President, in my memory, has ever leaned farther forward to get drug costs down for American consumers than President Trump. He has been an incredible leader in this effort, and we are going to see bipartisan work get marked up tomorrow in the Energy and Commerce Committee.

So on that topic of healthcare that is so crucial to survivability of American consumers, we can move forward. We have proven that.

But, meanwhile, the American people need to fully understand that the Democrats' one-size-fits-all, government-run plan itself would end the Affordable Care Act. You have to admit that. That is what your Medicare-for-all plan does.

They need to understand the $32 trillion price tag for the Democrats' alternative and the tax increases that would be necessary to go with it; the doubling of the individual income tax; doubling of corporate tax; and providers would have to take a 40 percent reduction in their payments.

Think of what the wait lines will be if that were to become law. Americans need to know that when the Democrats Medicare-for-all plan ends, employer-sponsored healthcare and your union plans you negotiated for, 158 million Americans who have health insurance today, will lose it tomorrow. They need to understand how they would have to wait longer for access to care than they do today.

And for my older friends, they need to understand the worst-case scenario. Seniors in America need to fully understand how this plan does away with

popular Medicare Advantage plans and Medigap plans and impacts this proposal would have on access to their doctors and an earlier bankruptcy of Medicare altogether.

So we would be better served today, and so would the American people, if we stood down, parked our partisan swords and shields, and worked together to solve the real problems Americans face when they go to pay their family bills.

I had lunch today with a couple from the southern part of my district, professionals. They said the cost of health insurance for them is so high they have had to make the choice not to have it.

This is going on every day in the marketplace, and I wish we could come together and spend our time on this House floor with a solution we could agree upon, because I think we could. But that is not what we are doing today.

It is like every week there has to be a resolution on the floor to condemn the President, something he said or did; not a policy proposal that will actually solve the Nation's problems. That is all you are dealing with today, another screed.

So let's work together. Let's come together as this Congress can, and as the Energy and Commerce Committee has had a wonderful record of doing over the years, and can going forward, to address healthcare and other issues. We can do that.

Madam Speaker, I encourage my colleagues to vote ``no'' on this partisan, political resolution, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, may I inquire as to how much time each side has remaining.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume to make a couple of comments.

First of all, the President is very good to work with, and we worked in a bipartisan manner last Congress to address the Nation's opioid epidemic. That is a healthcare issue and a life-and-death issue. We passed 60 bipartisan bills that became law, and President Trump signed them.

We extended health insurance for children in America--the CHIP program, the Children's Health Insurance Program--for 10 years. That is twice as long as ever had been done before. We did that on the Energy and Commerce Committee, and the President signed that. In my State, that is 122,700 Oregon kids and pregnant moms who are covered for certainty for 10 years under that insurance program. We reauthorized and fully funded community health centers. Now 240,000 Oregonians in 63 sites in my district get their healthcare from community health centers, Madam Speaker, and we did that at a fully funded record level.

Now, I just want to address something my friend, the majority leader who schedules bills on the floor, said about how we voted to repeal ObamaCare 65 times. What he kind of failed to mention is Democrats voted for not quite half of those, I would wager, because 25 of those votes became law, signed in large part, if not totally, by one Barack Obama, because there were problems in the Affordable Care Act or ObamaCare, however you want to describe it, that this Congress interceded on and in a bipartisan way voted to repeal ``ObamaCare.'' That is what the leader said, the 65 were all to repeal.

I would argue he probably voted for a bunch of those, because some of them passed unanimously in the House and Senate. Even President Obama agreed there were mistakes in ObamaCare. Our argument is we can fix America's healthcare laws going forward, and we should.

Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Montana (Mr. Gianforte), who is a terrific new Member of Congress and of the Energy and Commerce Committee.

Madam Speaker, I continue to yield myself such time as I may consume to say that I appreciate the gentleman's comments and share them.

This is H.R. 692, legislation that would guarantee Americans with preexisting conditions are not discriminated against. We have a lot of cosponsors on this, but we don't have a single Democrat willing to cosponsor a bill that would provide protection to Americans should this judge's decision be upheld. That is my argument today.

Why wouldn't we go ahead and schedule this, pass this, and move this to the floor so that if by some means this judge's decision is upheld, Americans with a preexisting condition would have coverage?

Meanwhile, why don't we start hearings on the Medicare for All proposal that Democrats have championed?

I have asked for those hearings from my friend. We have not seen that happen, and I know there is a certain dust-up in the press even today about alleging the Speaker's own staff person here may have been saying things or not about whether this is a good idea or not.

We ought to have a hearing on that because close to 200 million Americans might lose their insurance under this plan. So there is lots we should be doing here.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Madam Speaker, I hope, before the Speaker of the House leaves, she will listen to this.

I was moved by her story about a young child with a congenital heart defect, but nobody is going to lecture me about the need to protect people with preexisting conditions or the need to repeal the lifetime caps.

Let me tell you a story about a young man with a heart defect. February 7, 1994, he was born in Portland, Oregon, at Oregon Health Sciences University, with hypoplastic left heart syndrome. It would require immediate surgery and multiple surgeries to try to save his life, or a complete heart transplant.

Tragically, that little boy did not live long enough to be flown to Loma Linda Hospital in California for that heart transplant.

His name: Garrison Daniel Walden. He died the next day.

Madam Speaker, nobody is going to tell me about the need to protect people with preexisting conditions. Nobody is going to lecture me about the need to get rid of caps on lifetime. My wife and I dealt with those issues directly, and I will always stand up for people who face similar challenges.

That is not what this is about today, and you can laugh if you want.

Madam Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from California (Mr. McCarthy).

Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Rice) from the Ways and Means Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from South Carolina for his comments.

Mr. Speaker, I would just point out Gallup just announced in a survey, 65 million Americans, 20 percent, put off treatment this last year and borrowed $88 billion to cover their healthcare costs. So we know there are problems out there we need to address.

Mr. Speaker, could I inquire as to how much time each side has remaining?

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Austin Scott).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Carter), our resident pharmacist on the Energy and Commerce Committee.

Mr. Speaker, it is my great honor and privilege to yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Scalise), the Republican whip of the House, and an incredibly important member of our committee.

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

Mr. Speaker, in closing, I think we have had a very important debate today. I just wish that that debate had occurred on H.R. 692. This is the legislation that we should put in place in case the decision that the judge made in the Texas case that said ObamaCare was unconstitutional is upheld. If that is upheld, then there is going to be this problem, this gap that everybody is talking about.

This is an honest attempt to make sure there is a safety net for people with preexisting conditions, H.R. 692. You are welcome to cosponsor it. I wish we would move it. I always think maybe it is the old Eagle Scout in me that you are always supposed to be prepared and ready and that you help people.

I will tell you, Republicans also believed we should take care of people with preexisting conditions. Republicans also supported getting rid of lifetime caps on insurance policies and many of the other things you have heard about today, and we will continue to.

But we also led the effort to deal with the Nation's opioid crisis, made it

bipartisan, brought it to the floor, and it became law.

When seniors couldn't afford their medicines, it was Republicans, under George W. Bush, who put Medicare part D into law, and we had to fight Democrats to do that. Then seniors didn't have to go to Mexico or Canada or somewhere to get their drugs anymore. It has been highly successful. The costs are 40 percent or more less than what the Congressional Budget Office said it would be, and premiums have remained low. Now we need to do some modernization there.

Republicans also passed the longest extension of children's health insurance in the history of the country: 10 years, fully funded. Democrats voted against it over and over again on this House floor less than a year ago.

Community health centers, an incredibly important part of our network, I led the effort to get them funded at the highest levels ever. That funding is going to run out, but we don't have a plan from the Democrats yet. We are told we are not even going to have a budget on how to go forward. I think we can find bipartisan consensus there.

We are working together right now and will have a markup tomorrow in the Energy and Commerce Committee to address the drug issue and the cost of drugs. As I said earlier, I can't remember a President of the United States more engaged in getting better prices for consumers than this one. Donald Trump has led the country in an initiative to drive down the cost of drugs, and Congress is responding in a bipartisan way, and that is a good thing. We should do that here, Mr. Speaker.

The resolution before us today, if you are just watching or listening to my colleagues, is just that. it is a resolution. It will never leave the House because it is only for the House. It is the taxpayer-funded equivalent of a press release; that is all it is.

And we know that there are Members who never have accepted the outcome of the 2016 election, and no matter what the President says or does, they want to do a resolution or attack him. Yet the American people want us to come here and get our work done and stand up for them.

So rather than that resolution, I genuinely wish that H.R. 692, a bill that would protect people with preexisting conditions, was what we were voting on today. We stand ready to work with Democrats to get that done and provide that safety net that these Americans need.

Mr. Speaker, I urge opposition to this resolution, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I'd like to make a few comments on my bill, H.R. 692, known as the Pre-Existing Conditions Protection Act of 2019.

As we've made clear today, Republicans have long believed that pre- existing condition protections are an essential part of our nation's health care markets.

These assurances give patients and families who have suffered from or are battling pre-existing conditions peace of mind. As a nation, we will not go back to the days when patients could be denied care or charged more than their peers because of their pre-existing condition.

The Pre-Existing Conditions Protection Act has 45 cosponsors and would lock in existing protections for patients.

It aims to achieve three important goals for patients: guaranteed access to coverage; a prohibition on pre-existing condition benefit exclusions; and, a ban on premium rating based on health status.

This bill reaffirms the commitment by House Republicans to uphold these three safeguards, commonly defined as the principle pre-existing condition protections in Obamacare.

And we can build on this foundation if necessary to adapt to potential changes in law or decisions from the courts in order to ensure our citizens who have pre-existing conditions are protected.

In the first few months of the new Congress, Democrats have already voted down multiple attempts to lock in a commitment to legislate on pre-existing condition protections. Instead, they'd rather score political points on an issue that we actually have agreement on.

This bill represents the desire of House Republicans to maintain these crucial protections for patients.

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

Madam Speaker, we are here again considering one nonbinding resolution and a second resolution that will never become law. Both of these prevent us from focusing on the real business of Congress, which is to legislate.

The first, H. Res. 271, is a resolution condemning the Trump administration's recent position in the case of Texas v. United States.

So let's revisit that for a minute. Republicans are supportive of protecting access to health insurance for individuals with preexisting conditions. This resolution today will not advance the development of any policies to improve healthcare for the American people. There are options that the Democrats could have brought to the floor to lower healthcare costs and increase access to care; such legislation would indeed be worthy of our time. But, instead, we are debating expressions that basically amount to political posturing.

The first vote the Republicans called this year was a motion to require legislation protecting individuals with preexisting conditions. Surprisingly, the Democrats voted against that previous question. In 2017, as part of the proposed replacement for the Affordable Care Act, Republicans included legislation that would have preserved access for those with preexisting conditions.

Speaker Pelosi has already intervened on behalf of the House in Texas v. United States. While the Department of Justice has weighed in, the department is not litigating the case. As with every other legal case, this will play out in the courts. If Congress must act following the final legal decision, certainly we stand ready to do so. In fact, if the Democrats wanted to void this case, they know their options. They could repeal the individual mandate or they could reinstitute the tax on the individual mandate or they could provide a severability clause that was somehow left out when the Affordable Care Act was passed the first time. But we have seen them do none of those options.

The legal process will take time, and no Americans will lose access to their healthcare while the legal process is being heard. Unlike the case of Texas v. United States--which we know will not affect coverage because the judge in that case has issued a stay--individuals covered by what are known as association health plans may actually lose their coverage due to uncertainty in the legal outcome of that case. For last week, a Federal judge in the case of the State of New York, et al. v. Department of Labor, last week a Federal judge ruled that the Department of Labor's final rule on association health plans was not legal.

Association health plans provide employers who otherwise might struggle to provide health insurance for their employees to access the group market through an association, based either on geography or a line of business. The Washington Post recently reported that there are initial signs that association health plans are ``offering generous benefits and premiums lower than found in the ObamaCare marketplaces.''

Association health plans have provided additional choices for Americans seeking innovative healthcare options, but these choices may soon disappear as a result of the lawsuit State of New York, et al. v. the Department of Labor.

The Democrats are using the case of Texas v. United States to delay explaining their real ideas. Their real idea is a one-size-fits-all healthcare. The so-called Medicare for All would be a terrifying reality for our Nation. The Democrats' Soviet style, government-

run, single-payer healthcare bill would not provide access to quality healthcare for Americans. Instead, it would lead to a massive tax increase, eliminate private insurance, and bankrupt the already dwindling Medicare trust fund.

Constituents in my district back in Texas are struggling to afford their health insurance under the Affordable Care Act, and I am certain that we are not the only ones suffering from high premiums and very high deductibles.

Madam Speaker, what good is health insurance if you are afraid to use it because you can't afford your deductible?

This is an issue that I would actually like to see us tackle. But I am confident that a government-run, single-payer system would only further deteriorate our Nation's healthcare.

As the son of a physician who chose to leave Canada because of their system of socialized medicine, I worry that the central state control of healthcare would further damage the doctor-patient relationship. As a physician, I do not believe that the government should hinder a doctor's ability to act in the best interest of his or her patient. I wish the concept of government dictating a physician's practice and decisions was unthinkable, but I find myself here today having to deconstruct the idea of further government control of healthcare.

The House Democratic proposal would implement a global budget, and once that has been set, hospitals and institutions would be required to stick to that for all outpatient and inpatient treatment.

What happens if the budget runs out?

Are the patients simply told: Sorry, we ran out of money, you may try again next year?

Today we should be focusing on the parts of the health insurance market that are working for Americans. For example, 71 percent of Americans are satisfied with their employer-sponsored health insurance. This provides robust protections for individuals with preexisting conditions under ERISA law--a 1970 law, not the 2010 Affordable Care Act. Quite simply, the success of employer-sponsored insurance is not worth wiping out for single-payer healthcare.

Since President Trump took office--and this is important--since the President took office, the number of Americans in employer-sponsored health coverage has increased.

How much has that increased?

I can't precisely tell you because our Congressional Budget folks have not seen fit to give us new coverage numbers.

But since the President took office, how many people are employed that were previously unemployed?

The number is somewhere between 3 and 6 million, and a significant number of those individuals have employer-sponsored health insurance who had no insurance before.

The coverage numbers under President Trump, if the story is ever told, have gone up. Today, there is a greater percentage of Americans in employer-sponsored health coverage than at any time since the year 2000. That is why it is astonishing that House Democrats would want to abolish that insurance option entirely.

Instead of building on the success of our existing health insurance framework, Democrats' radical single-payer, government-run policy would simply tear it down. It would eliminate employer-sponsored health insurance, eliminate all private insurance, eliminate Medicaid, and eliminate CHIP.

Existing Medicare beneficiaries would not be exempt from harm, as the policy would raid the Medicare trust fund, which is already slated to go bankrupt in 2026.

Our Nation's seniors count on the existence of Medicare for their retirement healthcare needs. They have paid into it their entire working lives. How are we supposed to inform them that not only do the Democrats want to endanger their access to Medicare services, but, unbelievably, they will want to increase their taxes also?

There is no question that this policy could be catastrophic for America's patients today and for generations to come.

At least now there is some degree of honesty. Remember, a previous administration said, if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor. Now at least there is some degree of honesty.

You can't keep your doctor. You can't keep your insurance. You can't keep your personal liberty. You get nothing. Effectively, it would end all the parts of our healthcare system that are, in fact, working for the American people.

Quite simply, single-payer healthcare would be another attempt at a one-size-fits-all approach to healthcare. We know this: Americans are all different. A universal healthcare plan will not meet the varying needs of each and every one of us as individuals. Single-payer is not one-size-fits-all. It is really one-size-fits-no-one.

Again, to restate the obvious: Since the beginning of this Congress, we have heard it. Through the last Congress, we heard it. Republicans support protections for individuals with preexisting conditions.

Instead of spending our time here today worrying about the judicial branch, we could focus on our job as members of the legislative branch. We should be actively working to better our healthcare system, not spending time taking votes that will fail to accomplish any real objective.

Madam Speaker, the second resolution included in this rule directs the removal of the United States Armed Forces from hostilities in the Republic of Yemen that have not been authorized by Congress.

We considered this resolution once before. At that time, Republicans successfully passed a motion to recommit that declared the House's opposition to anti-Semitism. However, this version of the bill does not include that important provision, and we are again debating legislation that is, in fact, based on a false premise.

The resolution is fundamentally flawed. United States forces are not engaged in hostilities between the Saudi-led coalition and the Iranian- backed Houthi forces in Yemen. Previously, the United States was providing midair refueling to Saudi Arabia but ceased this assistance in November 2018. The United States continues to provide limited intelligence-sharing and limited logistics support, which does not amount to engagement in hostilities.

The Trump administration is focused on countering al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula and the Islamic State, mitigating the humanitarian crisis in Yemen and assisting our allies.

The United States does not command, coordinate, accompany, nor participate in counter-Houthi operations or any hostilities other than those directed at al-Qaida and the Islamic State.

I might, here, just add: Those activities against the Islamic State have been significantly successful over the last 2 years.

This resolution sets a dangerous precedent. America has a security agreement with Saudi Arabia, just as we do with 117 other countries, including our NATO allies Canada, Australia, South Korea, and Israel. If this resolution were to become law, it could set a precedent that could prevent us from assisting allies and prevent us from meeting our treaty obligations. Rather than condemning a type of assistance that is no longer being provided by the United States, we should be finding ways to aid the millions of Yemenis at risk of starving to death.

Limiting how our forces can engage in the region will only further exacerbate this conflict and not help bring it to a conclusion.

Madam Speaker, I urge opposition to the rule, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself 3 minutes.

Madam Speaker, here is one of the uncomfortable truths of the Affordable Care Act: Under the law, every Member of Congress was supposed to be covered under the Affordable Care Act. Obviously, the pay and benefits of a Member in Congress exceed the subsidy limits, so these would be unsubsidized healthcare.gov policies. But then-Speaker of the House John Boehner, then-Leader of the United States Senate Harry Reid, and President Obama himself all intervened. They were fearful that Members of Congress might leave.

There might be a brain drain in Congress--if such a thing was, in fact, possible--if Members of Congress were required to put their health insurance under the Affordable Care Act, so they created an exception for Members of Congress, and Members of Congress only. They are the only people in the United States who can do this. There is a tax-free subsidy that a Member of Congress can walk into the D.C. exchange and get their coverage in the D.C. exchange.

I rejected that option because: Number one, I didn't think it was right. Number two, I didn't think it was legal. I thought it was going to be taken away from us. Apparently, no one else shared my concern because it still exists.

It does make me wonder why we would not offer a health reimbursement account, and I have brought this up several times in committee, where that same tax-free subsidy could be available to any American to walk into a health insurance plan of their choosing. Why not give the people of the country what Members of the Congress so generously bestowed upon themselves?

I didn't take the option to go into the D.C. exchange. I didn't take the option of the tax-free subsidy that went along with it. I bought an unsubsidized health insurance plan in healthcare.gov, signed up for it October 1, 2012. Many of you may remember that. We were in the process of shutting the government down at the time. It was in all the papers.

I started that process October 1, 2012. The check cleared the middle of January 2013. I went that entire time not knowing if I would have health insurance in healthcare.gov the next year because I couldn't get an answer to any questions.

You couldn't call the people at healthcare.gov. You would try, and you would be put on hold. You would stay on hold for a long period of time. You would eventually get to talk to a person. You would get cut off. You would have to start all over at the beginning. It was a miserable process.

The point is, Members of Congress should have gone through that. We should have had to deal with what we pushed off on the American people, at least those people in the individual market.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Brady), the Republican leader of the second oldest committee in the United States Congress, the Committee on Ways and Means.

I have as many as I need.

It will be me.

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

Madam Speaker, if we defeat the previous question, I will offer an amendment to the rule to move a resolution that reinforces our long- held views that every American should have preexisting condition protections.

On the opening day of the 116th Congress, House Republicans brought a measure to the floor that called on lawmakers to legislate on locking in protections for patients with preexisting conditions. Unfortunately, in a fit of partisanship, the Democrats blocked this effort.

If the Democrats were serious, they would take up legislation immediately to protect patients with preexisting conditions. Instead, Democrats are trying to score political points.

Our position is simple and clear: Republicans stand ready to protect those with preexisting conditions in a manner that will withstand judicial scrutiny. This is why, if the previous question is defeated, House Republicans will move a resolution that:

Maintains that no American should have their health insurance taken away or lose protections for preexisting conditions due to the Democrats in Congress enacting an unconstitutional law;

Instructs Congress and the Trump administration to immediately ask the Court for a stay in this decision;

Guarantees that no American citizen can be denied health insurance or coverage or charged more due to previous illness or health status;

Includes commonsense consumer protections;

Provides more choice and affordable coverage than the Affordable Care Act;

Lowers prescription drug prices for patients;

Strengthens Medicare for current and future beneficiaries; and

Rejects the Democrats' radical, one-size-fits-all, government-run healthcare that would outlaw the employer-based coverage of more than 150 million Americans.

Finally, it is important to note that Texas v. the United States, the case that is working its way through the courts, did not immediately end ObamaCare and will not affect insurance coverage or premiums for calendar year 2019. Several legal steps remain before the courts reach a final conclusion.

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

Madam Speaker, if the gentleman is agreeable, I am prepared to close.

So, in closing, while Republicans stand ready to legislate, we are again considering unnecessary resolutions. The first seeks to condemn the position of the Department of Justice in Texas v. the United States, the case in which the Department of Justice is not a party.

As I have stated several times, Republicans support protecting coverage

for preexisting conditions. I would hope we could work together to find a way to make health insurance affordable for all Americans rather than considering a divisive messaging resolution.

The resolution to remove the United States Armed Forces from hostilities in Yemen is not only unnecessary, but may prevent future assistance for our allies.

The brave men and women who are assisting Saudi Arabia in the fight against al-Qaida and the Islamic State are working to find solutions to the humanitarian crisis that is unfolding in Yemen, a mission for which we should be unified in our support.

Madam Speaker, with that, I urge a ``no'' vote on the previous question, and a ``no'' on the underlying measures.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 281 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentlewoman from Arizona (Mrs. Lesko), 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 be given 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks.

Mr. Speaker, on Monday, the Rules Committee met and reported a rule, House Resolution 281, providing for consideration of H.R. 1585, the Violence Against Women Reauthorization Act of 2019, under a structured rule.

The rule self-executes a manager's amendment that makes technical changes to reflect appropriate statute sections, corrects terminologies, and makes in order 40 amendments.

Mr. Speaker, this year, we are celebrating the 25th anniversary of the Violence Against Women Act, VAWA, a landmark piece of bipartisan legislation that has helped to reduce instances of domestic violence and ensure that millions of survivors have access to the services they need.

VAWA was the first piece of Federal legislation to acknowledge domestic violence and sexual assault as crimes and has dramatically improved our Nation's response to helping survivors in both the short and long term.

Since its enactment in 1994, VAWA has brought together law enforcement, social service organizations, and victims' advocates to bring domestic violence to light, provide survivors with support, and hold abusers accountable for their actions.

VAWA was and still is a piece of legislation developed by the people who work closest to these issues in their communities. The bipartisan bill we will vote on this week reflects the ongoing commitment of Members on both sides of the aisle to ending domestic violence and abuse in all forms.

Before I get further into the components and details of the bill, I would like to share two stories about my constituents to illustrate why VAWA reauthorization is so necessary and why we must continue to commit ourselves to preventing domestic violence at every opportunity.

Mr. Speaker, please keep in mind that each of these stories happened in the past week in my district.

First, last week, a young woman was murdered by her ex-husband at a convenience store, where the two were meeting to exchange custody of their 6-year-old son. The ex-husband left their son at home and, instead, brought an AR-15 style rifle, which he used to murder the woman in the middle of the store.

He was caught by law enforcement after he fled the store, but as a result of these horrific actions, a young woman was murdered in cold blood and a child has, effectively, lost both parents.

This was not the first time the ex-husband had threatened to kill his ex-wife during a child custody exchange just like the one this past week. Following an incident 3 years ago, he was charged with harassment and making terroristic threats, and the woman was granted a protection- from-abuse order.

But this didn't prevent her or her family from living in fear of what her ex-husband might do next. Tragically, the very worst happened.

Then, just this past Sunday evening, another woman was asleep in her home in Upland with her three children when, just after midnight, her ex-boyfriend broke into her house, entered

her bedroom, and shot her. Her 5-year-old child witnessed the shooting. Had the gun not jammed when the ex-boyfriend fired a second time, the victim would be dead.

This victim, too, had a protection-from-abuse order against her attacker, hers being issued just 5 days before that attack.

These two attacks happened just miles apart from each other, just a few days apart. These stories are all too common, because violence against women is all too common.

I am willing to bet that every Member of this body could point to similar examples of violence against women from their own congressional districts. Such acts of violence are not isolated incidents but are, instead, representative of the larger systemic problem.

According to the National Center on Domestic Violence, one in four women experiences severe intimate partner physical violence, intimate partner sexual violence, or intimate partner stalking, with impacts such as injury, fearfulness, post-traumatic stress disorder, and more.

The same organization found that one in three women has experienced some form of physical violence by an intimate partner, and one in seven women has been stalked by an intimate partner during their lifetime, to the point they felt very fearful or believed that they or someone close to them would be harmed or killed.

Intimate partner violence accounts for 15 percent of violent crimes nationwide. Women between the ages of 18 and 24 are the most commonly abused by an intimate partner.

It is absolutely no wonder why domestic victimization is correlated with a higher rate of depression and suicidal behavior later in life.

Further, 19 percent of domestic violence involves a weapon of some kind. The presence of a gun in a domestic violence situation increases the risk of homicide by 500--that is 500--percent. You don't need to be a mathematician in order to see that guns in the hands of domestic abusers routinely leads to violence and death.

The Violence Against Women Reauthorization Act recognizes this indisputable fact and takes active measures to correct and improve our laws.

In the United States, women are 21 times more likely to be killed with a gun than women in any other high-income country.

Mr. Speaker, 4\1/2\ million American women alive today have been threatened by intimate partners with firearms. One million of those have actually been shot or shot at by their abusers.

I have represented some of these women and have seen the fear that they live with and the impact it has on their children and families.

This bill finally closes the boyfriend loophole. While Federal law prevents gun possession by people convicted of, or under a restraining order for, abusing their spouses, dating partners are generally exempt from these restrictions.

This gaping hole in our gun safety laws has become even more deadly over the years. The share of homicides committed by dating partners has been increasing for three decades. Today, women are as likely to be killed by dating partners as they are by spouses.

Closing the boyfriend loophole is a fact-based, commonsense response to a very real threat.

The provisions in this reauthorization would protect women from abusive dating partners by ensuring that their abusers are prohibited from possessing guns under Federal law.

The definition of ``dating partner'' is already contained in the Violence Against Women Act. This simple update to policy will provide increased protections for partners in unmarried relationships.

Closing the boyfriend loophole has been a bipartisan issue since long before this bill. Last year, six Republicans cosponsored legislation that would have closed this loophole, and 23 States, in their own laws, have already acted to prevent abusers from obtaining guns, including Pennsylvania and Arizona.

It is time we update Federal law to reflect the reality, which our States have already recognized, and prevent violent dating partners from being able to access weapons.

This bill also closes the stalker loophole. Stalking has been shown to be a predictor of intimate partner violence and homicide, although current law does not prohibit misdemeanor stalking offenses.

A study of intimate partner homicides and attempted homicides involving female victims found that 76 percent of those murders and 85 percent of attempted murders were preceded by at least one incident of stalking before the attack.

Passing this bill will protect women from stalkers by ensuring those convicted of stalking offenses are prohibited from possessing guns under Federal law.

On top of limiting stalkers and abusive dating partners from legally owning weapons, this bill strengthens enforcement by alerting State and local law enforcement when an abuser fails a firearms background check. This notice gives State law enforcement an opportunity to intervene before an abuser can obtain a firearm or do any further harm.

This provision mirrors a bipartisan bill that was introduced earlier this year to notify State law enforcement each time a person who is not allowed to have guns tries to buy a firearm and fails the background check. Clearly, keeping guns out of the hands of those who should not have them is a bipartisan priority.

Mr. Speaker, one of my first experiences as a young attorney was representing women and families who had sought shelter at the People's Emergency Center in West Philadelphia. That agency was started by former Congressman Bob Edgar.

Most of the women in that shelter had been subjected to domestic abuse. This was before VAWA was the law of the land, but even then it was clear there were significant problems with how the system cared for abused women and punished their abusers.

When VAWA was enacted in 1994, it spoke to so many of the problems my then-clients were facing, issues with housing and employment, caring for young children, and fighting for custody in court.

What makes VAWA such a critical bill is not just the legal protections it puts in place to protect women but the structures it sets up to help women who have been abused.

This reauthorization bill builds upon those critical reforms from 25 years ago and updates them to address current needs.

The bill funds and improves screening for victimization and the perpetration of intimate partner and sexual violence across federally funded healthcare programs. The healthcare system is often one of the first places women go where unseen abuse can be detected. Empowering healthcare professionals to address such sensitive situations can help to avert abuse before it escalates or prevent it from happening in the first place.

The bill ensures that survivors of domestic abuse can maintain housing in the event of a breakup with their partner and further protects their privacy through strengthened confidentiality agreements with housing authorities. Similarly, the bill extends traditional housing grant opportunities to organizations that help underserved populations.

Victims of domestic abuse are often at risk of significant financial loss if they are unable to work and provide for their family as a result of abuse. This bill protects survivors from termination from employment due to disruption caused by domestic abuse and also addresses the impact of domestic abuse on a woman's credit rating.

We should also note that transgender people are disproportionately survivors of sexual assault and violence, and they deserve to access services consistent with their gender identity.

Domestic violence providers and law enforcement agree: Transgender women being in the same space as other women does not make either less safe. Laws that prohibit discrimination based on gender identity have been in place for years, including specifically for VAWA programs.

Minneapolis, for example, has had gender identity protections since 1975, and there is no credible evidence that the existence of these laws has contributed to violence against women. Instead, they simply keep transgender people safe.

Since 1994, VAWA has provided critical tools to survivors of domestic

abuse, law enforcement, and community organizations to prevent and address the impact of domestic violence. Using those tools to represent survivors of such abuse, I have seen both clients and constituents find safe havens, rebuild their lives, protect their families, and develop emotionally and financially productive lives.

Mr. Speaker, I look forward to reauthorization of this bill, and I reserve the balance of my time.

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

This is not the first time that I have heard my colleagues misgender trans women as biological males, and I need to point something out. Beyond this term being outright offensive, it shows how disingenuous their concern for the safety of women is, and they are showing their hand.

The use of the term ``biological male'' is a dog whistle to transphobia that runs rampant in society and seems to on the other side of the aisle. It is not rooted in concern for women but, rather, a manifestation of their disdain for the trans community.

Also, my constituents are not the Senate. My constituents are not Mr. McConnell. My constituents want VAWA reauthorized, and we are going to do what we can to pass it.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Maine (Ms. Pingree).

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

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

Mr. Speaker, we have heard this allegation over and over again based on one case in Fresno where the facts have not been established. It is still in litigation.

As a former trial lawyer, I know that a lot of allegations can be made, but the fact that what has been stated as facts in this case, that men were in a shelter, is not true. Transgender women were in the shelter.

It has been stated that a transgender man couldn't be excluded from the shelter and that the staff at the shelter failed to take action. That actually is under dispute.

So we have one isolated instance that is being misrepresented to continue this line of argument. What we are really seeing is this tactic of trying to pit one minority group, one group in need of services, against another to convince us that the rights and protections of one group come at the cost of another. They have done it with people of color, with immigrants, and now with women and members of the trans community.

Mr. Speaker, I have a clear message: this country is better than that. They both need help. It can be done under this law.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from the District of Columbia (Ms. Norton).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Florida (Ms. Frankel).

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

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

Mr. Speaker, the NRA has spent a lot of money to create this distraction, making this about them as opposed to protecting the lives of women. Over 50 percent of women murdered in 2017 were slain by an intimate partner or family member; 82 percent of homicide victims targeted by intimate partners are women; the weapon of choice in over half of female homicides, a firearm.

This is an opportunity to support both saving the lives of women and responsible gun ownership.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from New York (Mrs. Carolyn B. Maloney).

(Mrs. CAROLYN B. MALONEY of New York asked and was given permission to revise and extend her remarks.)

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

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

I have to rebut my colleague's repeated assertion that this iteration of VAWA would violate the Second Amendment because it fails to offer an opportunity for abusers to protest having their guns taken away--and the gentlewoman said this several times in the course of debate--on the basis that ex parte orders are often entered against abusers.

But, in fact, in every instance, even if an initial order is an ex parte, the abuser has the right to request a hearing, including in Arizona, where title 12, section 1809 provides that anyone who has a protection order entered against them can file a written request for a hearing, and that is when they get their due process. So I just want to point that out.

The purpose of the Violence Against Women Act is today as it was when it was passed in 1994: to keep women safe from domestic abuse. It remains a piece of bipartisan landmark legislation.

Ms. Jackson Lee detailed the number of Republican amendments and bills that have been incorporated into this version, so it is a shining example of what Congress can accomplish when we set aside our partisan differences and work together to find actual solutions.

VAWA has dramatically improved our Nation's response to domestic violence and has provided invaluable support to victims, communities, social service providers, and law enforcement. It is working.

We won't solve domestic violence overnight, nor will we end it with the passage of a bill, but we can continue to change the culture of violence against women and provide the support that survivors need.

The two constituents I spoke of in my opening never should have experienced the violence that was inflicted upon them; but it is not enough to condemn what was done or to charge those responsible, no. We must change the conditions to allow such acts of violence to occur.

We can look at the facts and we can look at the research so we create policies and pass laws to better protect women from abusers, and this reauthorization is a bold step in the right direction.

Mr. Speaker, I urge a ``yes'' vote on the rule and the previous question.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, I am a survivor of domestic violence. I also serve on the advisory council of a domestic violence shelter in my district, and I am the cochairwoman of the congressional Bipartisan Working Group to End Domestic Violence.

That is why having a strong Violence Against Women Act, commonly known as VAWA, that works for the American people is so very important to me.

Ending violence against women and protecting women and children should not be a partisan issue. However, we find ourselves debating a VAWA reauthorization act that is literally a Christmas tree of progressive, liberal policy objectives rather than an honest approach to reforming and updating such an important law for millions of women and children.

VAWA has lapsed, putting millions of women and children at risk, when it didn't need to. I, along with 194 other Republicans, voted to reauthorize VAWA through the end of the fiscal year on February 14, 2019.

I sponsored the Protecting Women Act, which would reauthorize VAWA until September 30, 2019. This would have allowed the program to stay in place while we worked in a truly bipartisan fashion to update and reauthorize this critical program.

VAWA has historically been a bipartisan bill with little controversy. However, this particular VAWA proposal moved through the Judiciary Committee without a single vote of support from any Republican.

Throughout this process, my friends across the aisle have talked a lot about bipartisanship, but I have seen little effort from my Democratic colleagues to engage in a process to pass a VAWA reauthorization bill that could garner wide-ranging bipartisan support. And believe me, I have tried.

I have reached out to my Democratic colleagues to set up meetings several times, to no avail.

H.R. 1585 is a treasure trove of liberal policy objectives that will put women, girls, and children at risk. This bill, as written, forces shelters and service providers, under the power of Federal law-- shelters that may not even be equipped--to place males in the same sleeping and showering quarters as women and children purely based on how that individual ``identifies.''

These gaping holes in the law will put women and children at risk to predators, who may have experienced trauma from male predators themselves. Based on this bill, the shelter would be required to accept a biological male even if the shelter is not equipped to separate males and females, forcing vulnerable women who have been abused and maybe sexually assaulted to shower with and sleep next to males.

We hear constantly from the other side of the aisle that this is all conjecture, what I am saying is all conjecture and completely hypothetical, and that this just does not happen. However, we know this is not true, and I have stated this before in the Judiciary Committee and the Rules Committee.

Nine women in Fresno, California, are suing a shelter for being sexually harassed in a shelter by a biological male.

The Hope Center in Alaska is another example, where a woman was quoted as saying she would rather sleep in the woods than have to be in close quarters with a male and relive her trauma.

Further, this legislation requires--requires--prisons to place biological males who identify as women in women's prisons. We have seen how this played out in Britain, where a biological man who identified as a woman raped two females.

Those on the other side of the aisle have accused those of us who want to preserve sex-segregated spaces based on biology as discriminatory and demonizing transgender individuals. This is completely false.

Nothing in the amendments that I have offered would discriminate against anyone. Any shelter could still take anyone in, but I don't want government forcing the shelters to take someone in if they are not equipped to do so.

What we are pointing out are gaping holes in this legislative proposal and potential for predators to take advantage of the law. We must give those who are sheltering and serving women the tools to keep them safe.

H.R. 1585 also seeks to eliminate due process and infringe on Second Amendment rights. I agree that we need to keep guns out of the hands of dangerous criminals, but expanding laws to prohibit individuals from exercising their Second Amendment rights without them even being present to defend themselves, as is the case in ex parte orders of protection, is a dangerous precedent.

Further, H.R. 1585 includes provisions that would result in a permanent prohibition on owning or possessing firearms by anyone convicted on a misdemeanor. Permanently losing a fundamental civil right for a misdemeanor conviction is virtually unheard of. The bill uses the legitimate and serious issue of domestic violence as a way to limit legitimate gun rights.

When coupled with the bill's expansion of the definition of ``domestic relationship'' to include ``former dating partners,'' a subjective term that could be easily abused, the bill expands power to permanently remove someone's right to own firearms to an untenable degree.

This legislation also advances policies that could reduce criminal prosecutions by tying States' grant eligibility to policies that ensure that compelling victim testimony is discouraged.

Further, it permits the use of VAWA funds for new ``alternative justice'' models, under which funds could be granted to programs that force mediation between an abuser and the victim of the abuser.

Finally, H.R. 1585 rolls back protections for sex trafficking. The bill deprioritizes the use of grant funding to protect victims of sex trafficking and would only allow this funding to go to grantees if their program is primarily focused on domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, or stalking.

These are just a few of the hyperpartisan provisions that my colleagues on the other side of the aisle have injected into this VAWA reauthorization. We all want to protect women and children, and VAWA has typically received wide-ranging bipartisan support; however, this legislation fails to do that.

We should be focusing on commonsense, bipartisan reforms to VAWA instead of on a bill that is a nonstarter in the U.S. Senate and a bill that will not be signed by the President.

Mr. Speaker, I urge opposition to the rule, and I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Before I have my friend speak, I am going to address what Representative Scanlon said, that calling a transgender woman a biological male, she said, is offensive and it shows my disdain for transgender individuals. That is absolutely false. I have no disdain. I am just merely stating fact.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentlewoman from Missouri (Mrs. Hartzler), my good friend.

Mr. Speaker, I have one comment before I introduce my friend from Oklahoma.

It is said that there has only been one incident where a biological male threatened the women, and that is just simply not true. There have been several incidences. Quite frankly, the question is, how many women have to be put in a potentially unsafe situation or have their privacy violated by males before you realize that this concern is really legitimate.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. Cole), my good friend, the ranking member of the Rules Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from North Carolina (Ms. Foxx).

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Roy), my good friend.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from West Virginia (Mrs. Miller), my good friend.

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

Mr. Speaker, may I inquire on the time remaining?

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

If we defeat the previous question, I will offer an amendment to the rule to provide additional consideration of H.R. 1741, authored by Representative Elise Stefanik.

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, H.R. 1741 is a bill that would provide a 1- year extension of VAWA while we work on negotiating a long-term reauthorization of VAWA. I think there are a lot of things that the Republicans and Democrats can agree on, and I would like to come up with a bipartisan bill.

During the Rules Committee, my colleague, Representative Woodall, asked the Democrat witness if the majority would consider moving a short-term extension if the U.S. Senate does not take this bill up. The witness could not answer the question.

This is a dangerous gamble the Democrat majority is willing to play. We have received no indication that the U.S. Senate will use this bill as a starting point or move quickly on this liberal proposal, leaving VAWA unnecessarily expired during the meantime.

The Democrats are in control and have the votes to pass their bill; however, they are putting the lives of millions of women in jeopardy by gambling on what the Senate will do. We should not be gambling.

The Democrat majority has already passed up a short-term extension once via a vote, and the program has lapsed. There is no reason why we should not send an additional option that the Senate can take up quickly to keep the program functioning.

Mr. Speaker, in closing, we all--Republicans and Democrats--want to protect women and children and stop violence against women, but, unfortunately, this particular bill advances a separate policy agenda other than that.

The long history of bipartisanship of VAWA will become a thing of the past with this bill. This bill leaves gaping holes for potential predators to victimize women and children in areas that are supposed to be safe.

It advances new gun control policies to permanently restrict people from exercising their Second Amendment rights or does so without that person even being able to defend themselves in court.

It deprioritizes funding to combat sex trafficking and includes various new forms of criminal justice policy that could let perpetrators walk or have opportunities to revictimize women and children.

As a survivor of domestic violence, I want to see a VAWA reauthorization that focuses on women and children and keeps our country safe. We should be voting on legislation which all women of this Chamber could support; however, this bill is not that.

Mr. Speaker, I urge ``no'' on the previous question, ``no'' on the underlying measure, and I yield back the balance of my time.

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