Expressing the sense of Congress that Congress should issue a subpoena to Dr. Anthony Fauci and reduce the salary of the Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and Chief Medical Advisor to the President.

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 601, I call up the bill (H.R. 3684) to authorize funds for Federal-aid highways, highway safety programs, and transit programs, and for other purposes, with the Senate amendment thereto, and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, I have a motion at the desk.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and to insert extraneous material on the measure under consideration,

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 5 minutes.

Americans are tired of potholes damaging their cars, failing bridges, decrepit transit, trains that derail, water mains that explode, sewer systems that back up into their basements and pollute our rivers.

More than 70 percent of Americans strongly support a major Federal investment in rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure. The last major increase in Federal support for infrastructure was during the Clinton administration's first term--the first term of the Clinton administration.

Then, President Bush did nothing on the issue.

President Obama came in talking about infrastructure investment. He passed the American Recovery Act that invested 4 percent of all that money in infrastructure. I worked with Chairman Jim Oberstar; I chaired the subcommittee. We wrote a very ambitious surface transportation reauthorization, which he had been promised by the Obama administration would be next. But it wasn't. They pulled the plug.

Then came President Trump, the builder. He invited a large group of us down to the White House. We had a long discussion, and we agreed, and finally, at the end, he turned to the Speaker and says: Nancy, Nancy, how much do you need?

And she says: $1.5 trillion, Mr. President.

He says: No, no, no, no; $1.8 trillion. No, no, no; two sounds better, $2 trillion.

Okay. We agreed to come back in 3 weeks and hammer out the details.

We came back in 3 weeks. He walked into the room, and he had a hissy fit, slammed the door, walked out, and that was the end of it, except for the seven fake infrastructure weeks during the Trump administration.

Now, the House, on the 1st of July, passed the INVEST Act, a bill that went through a real legislative process, hours in committee, amendments, hours on the floor, amendments. That was the bill the country most needed for the 21st century infrastructure. I had hoped to go to conference with the Senate, actually go through the legislative process--pretty darn rare around here these days, the way things should work, the way they are supposed to work under the Constitution. Unfortunately, because of the Senate filibuster, that wasn't to happen.

So, this President rolled up his sleeves and waded in because he promised to get infrastructure done. He negotiated first with one group of Republicans. That didn't work. He then found another group, mostly Republicans, two Democrats, and spent endless hours between the White House and that group, negotiating a bipartisan infrastructure bill.

In the end, when this bill came to the floor of the Senate, 19 Republican Senators voted for it--19 Republican Senators voted for it.

Here are a few things from the White House fact sheet on that bill. It makes the largest Federal investment in public transit ever; makes the largest Federal investment in passenger rail since the creation of Amtrak; makes the single largest dedicated bridge investment since the construction of the Interstate Highway System; makes the largest investment in clean drinking water and wastewater infrastructure in American history, delivering clean water to millions of Americans; ensures every American has access to reliable high-speed internet; tackles climate change with the largest investment in clean energy and EV infrastructure, electrifying thousands of school and transit buses; reconnecting communities; safe streets; $17 billion for ports; $25 billion for airports.

This is what the President managed to negotiate with the recalcitrant Senate and get around the filibuster and get 19 Republican votes.

This bill is not perfect. It is not the bill that I would have written. I oppose their decision not to correct the decade-long cuts to the bus program; the provision creating a dedicated set-aside for polluting buses within the Low or No Emission Vehicle Program. That is kind of laughable. I oppose the failure to tighten the Buy American Act requirements for transit rolling stock or to further crack down on predatory Chinese state-owned enterprises, which was in our bill, as well as the omission of the investments in fix it first and mandatory greenhouse gas reductions.

I will continue to work on addressing these issues. But the reality today before us is that this is the only option with an evenly divided Senate and the stupid rules of the Senate, including

the filibuster. So it is this or nothing on the long overdue investment in America's infrastructure.

I hope the Republicans on the other side will support it. If they don't, I would like them to tell us exactly what they would do.

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

Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record a summary of the bill written by the White House.

Historic Bipartisan Infrastructure Deal

Today, the President and the bipartisan group announced

agreement on the details of a once-in-a-generation investment

in our infrastructure, which will be taken up in the Senate

for consideration. In total, the deal includes $550 billion

in new federal investment in America's infrastructure. The

bipartisan infrastructure deal will grow the economy, enhance

our competitiveness, create good- jobs, and make our economy

more sustainable, resilient, and just.

The deal will create good-paying, union jobs. With the

President's Build Back Better Agenda, these investments will

add, on average, around 2 million jobs per year over the

course of the decade, while accelerating America's path to

full employment and increasing labor force participation.

President Biden believes that we must invest in our country

and in our people, by creating good-paying union jobs,

tackling the climate crisis, and growing the economy

sustainably and equitably for decades to come. The Bipartisan

Infrastructure deal will deliver progress towards those

objectives for working families across the country. The

Bipartisan Infrastructure deal:

Makes the largest federal investment in public transit ever

Makes the largest federal investment in passenger rail

since the creation of Amtrak

Makes the single largest dedicated bridge investment since

the construction of the interstate highway system

Makes the largest investment in clean drinking water and

waste water infrastructure in American history, delivering

clean water to millions of families

Ensures every American has access to reliable high-speed

internet

Helps us tackle the climate crisis by making the largest

investment in clean energy transmission and EV infrastructure

in history; electrifying thousands of school and transit

buses across the country; and creating a new Grid Development

Authority to build a clean, 21st century electric grid.

The President promised to work across the aisle to deliver

results for working families. He believes demonstrating that

democracies can deliver is a critical challenge for his

presidency. Today's agreement shows that we can come together

to position American workers, farmers, and businesses to

compete and win in the 21st century.

Roads, Bridges, and Major Projects

One in five miles, or 173,000 total miles, of our highways

and major roads and 45,000 bridges are in poor condition.

Bridges in poor condition pose heightened challenges in rural

communities, which often may rely on a single bridge for the

passage of emergency service vehicles. The Bipartisan

Infrastructure deal will invest $110 billion of new funds for

roads, bridges, and major projects, and reauthorize the

surface transportation program for the next five years

building on bipartisan surface transportation reauthorization

bills passed out of committee earlier this year. This

investment will repair and rebuild our roads and bridges with

a focus on climate change mitigation, resilience, equity, and

safety for all users, including cyclists and pedestrians. The

bill includes a total of $40 billion of new funding for

bridge repair, replacement, and rehabilitation, which is the

single largest dedicated bridge investment since the

construction of the interstate highway system. The bill also

includes a total of $17.5 billion for major projects that are

too large or complex for traditional funding programs but

will deliver significant economic benefits to communities.

Safety

America has one of the highest road fatality rates in the

industrialized world. The

deal invests $11 billion in transportation safety programs,

including a new Safe Streets for All program to help states

and localities reduce crashes and fatalities in their

communities, especially for cyclists and pedestrians. It will

more than double funding directed to programs that improve

the safety of people and vehicles in our transportation

system, including highway safety, truck safety, and pipeline

and hazardous materials safety.

Public Transit

America's transit infrastructure is inadequate--with a

multibillion-dollar repair backlog, representing more than

24,000 buses, 5,000 rail cars, 200 stations, and thousands of

miles of track, signals, and power systems in need of

replacement. The deal invests $39 billion of new investment

to modernize transit, and improve accessibility for the

elderly and people with disabilities, in addition to

continuing the existing transit programs for five years as

part of surface transportation reauthorization. This is the

largest Federal investment in public transit in history, and

devotes a larger share of funds from surface transportation

reauthorization to transit in the history of the programs. It

will repair and upgrade aging infrastructure, modernize bus

and rail fleets, make stations accessible to all users, and

bring transit service to new communities. It will replace

thousands of transit vehicles, including buses, with clean,

zero emission vehicles. And, it will benefit communities of

color since these households are twice as likely to take

public transportation and many of these communities lack

sufficient public transit options.

Passenger and Freight Rail

Unlike highways and transit, rail lacks a multi-year

funding stream to address deferred maintenance, enhance

existing corridors, and build new lines in high-potential

locations. The deal positions Amtrak and rail to play a

central role in our transportation and economic future. This

the largest investment in passenger rail since the creation

of Amtrak 50 years ago. The deal invests $66 billion in rail

to eliminate the Amtrak maintenance backlog, modernize the

Northeast Corridor, and bring world-class rail service to

areas outside the northeast and midAtlantic. Within these

totals, $22 million would be provided as grants to Amtrak,

$24 billion as federal-state partnership grants for Northeast

Corridor modernization, $12 billion for partnership grants

for intercity rail service, including high-speed rail, $5

billion for rail improvement and safety grants, and $3

billion for grade crossing safety improvements.

EV Infrastructure

U.S. market share of plug-in electric vehicle (EV) sales is

only one-third the size of the Chinese EV market. The

President believes that must change. The bill invests $7.5

billion to build out a national network of EV chargers. This

is the first-ever national investment in EV charging

infrastructure in the United States and is a critical element

in the Biden-Harris Administration's plan to accelerate the

adoption of EVs to address the climate crisis and support

domestic manufacturing jobs. The bill will provide funding

for deployment of EV chargers along highway corridors to

facilitate long-distance travel and within communities to

provide convenient charging where people live, work, and

shop. Federal funding will have a particular focus on rural,

disadvantaged, and hard-to-reach communities.

Electric Buses

American school buses play a critical role in expanding

access to education, but they are also a significant source

of pollution. The deal will deliver thousands of electric

school buses nationwide, including in rural communities,

helping school districts across the country buy clean,

American-made, zero emission buses, and replace the yellow

school bus fleet for America's children. The deal invests

$2.5 billion in zero emission buses, $2.5 billion in low

emission buses, and $2.5 billion for ferries. These

investments will drive demand for American-made batteries and

vehicles, creating jobs and supporting domestic

manufacturing, while also removing diesel buses from some of

our most vulnerable communities. In addition, they will help

the more than 25 million children and thousands of bus

drivers who breathe polluted air on their rides to and from

school. Diesel air pollution is linked to asthma and other

health problems that hurt our communities and cause students

to miss school, particularly in communities of color and

Tribal communities.

Reconnecting Communities

Too often, past transportation investments divided

communities--like the Claiborne Expressway in New Orleans or

1-81 in Syracuse--or it left out the people most in need of

affordable transportation options. In particular, significant

portions of the interstate highway system were built through

Black neighborhoods. The deal creates a first-ever program to

reconnect communities divided by transportation

infrastructure. The program will fund planning, design,

demolition, and reconstruction of street grids, parks, or

other infrastructure through $1 billion of dedicated funding.

Airports, Ports, and Waterways

The United States built modem aviation, but our airports

lag far behind our competitors. According to some rankings,

no U.S. airports rank in the top 25 of airports worldwide.

Our ports and waterways need repair and reimagination too.

The bill invests $17 billion in port infrastructure and $25

billion in airports to address repair and maintenance

backlogs, reduce congestion and emissions near ports and

airports, and drive electrification and other low-carbon

technologies. Modem, resilient, and sustainable p011,

airport, and freight infrastructure will support U.S.

competitiveness by removing bottlenecks and expediting

commerce and reduce the environmental impact on neighboring

communities.

Resilience and Western Water Infrastructure

Millions of Americans feel the effects of climate change

each year when their roads wash out, airport power goes down,

or schools get flooded. Last year alone, the United States

faced 22 extreme weather and climate-related disaster events

with losses exceeding $1 billion each--a cumulative price tag

of nearly $100 billion. People of color are more likely to

live in areas most vulnerable to flooding and other climate

change-related weather events. The deal makes our communities

safer and our infrastructure more resilient to the impacts of

climate change and cyber attacks, with an investment of over

$50 billion. This includes funds to protect against droughts

and floods. in addition to a major investment in

weatherization. The bill is the largest investment in the

resilience of physical and natural systems in American

history.

Clean Drinking Water

Currently, up to 10 million American households and 400,000

schools and child care centers lack safe drinking water. The

deal's $55 billion investment represents the largest

investment in clean drinking water in American history,

including dedicated funding to replace lead service lines and

the dangerous chemical PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl). It

will replace all of the nation's lead pipes and service

lines. From rural towns to struggling cities, the deal

invests in water infrastructure across America, including in

Tribal Nations and disadvantaged communities that need it

most.

High Speed Internet

Broadband internet is necessary for Americans to do their

jobs, to participate equally in school learning, health care,

and to stay connected. Yet, by one definition, more than 30

million Americans live in areas where there is no broadband

infrastructure that provides minimally acceptable speeds--a

particular problem in rural communities throughout the

country. The deal's $65 billion investment ensures every

American has access to reliable high-speed internet with an

historic investment in broadband infrastructure deployment,

just as the federal government made a historic effort to

provide electricity to every American nearly one hundred

years ago.

The bill will also help lower prices for internet service

by requiring funding recipients to offer a low-cost

affordable plan, by creating price transparency and helping

families comparison shop, and by boosting competition in

areas where existing providers aren't providing adequate

service. It will also help close the digital divide by

passing the Digital Equity Act, ending digital redlining,

creating a permanent program to help more low-income

households access the internet, and establishing a new

program to help low-income households obtain the devices

required to access the internet.

Environmental Remediation

In thousands of rural and urban communities around the

country, hundreds of thousands of former industrial and

energy sites are now idle--sources of blight and pollution.

26 percent of Black Americans and 29 percent of Hispanic

Americans live within 3 miles of a Superfund site, a higher

percentage than for Americans overall. Proximity to a

Superfund site can lead to elevated levels of lead in

children's blood. The deal invests $21 billion in

environmental remediation, making the largest investment in

addressing the legacy pollution that harms the public health

of communities and neighborhoods in American history,

creating good-paying union jobs in hard-hit energy

communities and advancing economic and environmental justice.

The bill includes funds to clean up superfund and brownfield

sites, reclaim abandoned mine land and cap orphaned gas

wells.

Power Infrastructure

As the recent Texas power outages demonstrated, our aging

electric grid needs urgent modernization. A Department of

Energy study found that power outages cost the U.S. economy

up to $70 billion annually. The deal's $73 billion investment

is the single largest investment in clean energy transmission

in American history. It upgrades our power infrastructure,

including by building thousands of miles of new, resilient

transmission lines to facilitate the expansion of renewable

energy. It creates a new Grid Deployment Authority, invests

in research and development for advanced transmission and

electricity distribution technologies, and promotes smart

grid technologies that deliver flexibility and resilience. It

invests in demonstration projects and research hubs for next

generation technologies like advanced nuclear reactors,

carbon capture, and clean hydrogen.

Offsets

In the years ahead, the deal, which will generate

significant economic benefits, and it is financed through a

combination of redirecting unspent emergency relief funds,

targeted corporate user fees, strengthening tax enforcement

when it comes to crypto

currencies, and other bipartisan measures, in addition to the

revenue generated from higher economic growth as a result of

the investments.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone), the chair of the Energy and Commerce Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Johnson), a member of the committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Cohen), a member of the committee.

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

I was confused by the gentleman's speech. This bill was written by 10 Republican Senators and two conservative Democrats, and to say half the bill isn't infrastructure, there is a $1 billion program to rejoin communities split asunder.

The President went down and visited one in Louisiana. It is a skyway that has to come down. It is falling apart. So are we just going to build another skyway or are we going to rejoin that community?

In Portland, Oregon, they are talking about a freeway-widening project there, but they are also going to cap that so they can rejoin a neighborhood. That is infrastructure, and it is also creating community jobs and economic development.

I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from Georgia (Ms. Bourdeaux), a member of the committee.

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

The gentleman who preceded me, of course, did not talk about what he would do to fix the Nation's crumbling infrastructure:

42,000 bridges that need replacement or repair.

40 percent of the National Highway System degraded to the point where it has to be rebedded, not just put a coat of asphalt on top.

A $100 billion backlog to bring transit up to a state of good repair. On and on and on.

Wastewater, drinking water. The needs are incredible. This bill will address those things.

And the rate of return is phenomenal, if you look at analyses by Wall Street and others. There is no better investment that the Federal Government can make than investment in infrastructure. It not only creates jobs,

it creates lasting economic benefits for this country, makes us more competitive with the world.

The gentleman is conflating two different bills. We have one bill before us, not being held hostage. We are here debating it. But I didn't hear your alternative.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 2 minutes.

The events that led up to this bill were pretty messy and painful; I agree with that.

Unfortunately, given the dysfunction on the other side of the Hill, called the Senate--absurd rules like the filibuster, where you have to have a supermajority to do anything, and I don't know how many bills the House has sent over that are sitting there that would serve the American people well; and then the Byrd rule, which we are going deal with later, a rule written by a Senator dead for 12 years, a rule written 28 years ago where the Parliamentarian holds a seance to find out what can go in and not go in the bill. That is what we are dealing with.

If we are going to make the investments that we need in our infrastructure--and I don't think there is anybody on the other side of the aisle that disagrees, when you see the ratings from the American Society of Civil Engineers, when you see the water mains blowing up and flooding streets, when you see the sewers backing up into people's houses or overflowing into the river or, without the resilience we need because of climate change, have them getting overrun during severe weather events.

These are investments that America needs, and I am still not hearing from the other side of the aisle their plan to make these needed investments, put millions of Americans to work in very good-paying family wage jobs, and to make America more competitive.

Yes, I wish the Senate bill had been different. I wish, for instance, they had taken our provisions to put some predatory Chinese companies out of business. I don't know, I guess they have a very good lobbyist over there on the Senate side.

There are many things like that that were neglected in this bill that would have provided more American jobs. But there are millions of jobs attached to this bill. We need those jobs. We need the investment. We need to rebuild America.

Mr. Speaker, may I inquire as to the time remaining on each side.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 2 minutes.

That was incredible. This is the Green New Deal bill? It includes Rodney Davis' provision from the House side, which guts the NEPA process. That is not exactly a Green New Deal priority.

It cut dramatically the investments in the House bill in transit and rail, not exactly the Green New Deal priority.

That is absurd. You want to drag out this chimera. ``Oh, look, it is the Green New Deal.'' No, it is not the Green New Deal. It is a bill written by 10 Republican Senators and two conservative Democrats coming from the Senate side, which is not, in my opinion, doing near enough to address climate change impacts from fossil fuel transportation, our largest contributor.

Now, of course, on your side of the aisle, climate change doesn't exist. You want to have a bill for resilience. Why do you need resilience? Why is the sea level rising? Why are we having incredible, unprecedented severe weather events or like the heat dome in Oregon, where people died?

Why are we having these things? ``Oh, it is a natural occurrence like the Ice Age or whatever.'' It is not. It is real, and this bill does not do enough to deal with it.

I intend to continue to fight to do more to deal with climate change, no matter how much you want to deny it on that side of the aisle.

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

Mr. Speaker, may I inquire about two things of the Chair. How much time remains on either side, and since we are ending the debate before we are finishing the debate, which side gets to close?

Mr. Speaker, could you repeat that?

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

There seems to be confusion on the other side of the aisle. I am hearing a

lot of different numbers. There is one bill before us today. The gentleman says it is not bipartisan. Eighteen Republican Senators voted for it. Granted, neither of his illustrious Senators from his State voted for it, but 18 Republican Senators did vote for it.

The numbers keep jumping around. We have one bill before us today, not the other one you want to debate. We have one bill before us that will build America's infrastructure, a long-overdue investment. We haven't increased investment substantially since the Clinton era. It has fallen apart. If you deny that, I have nothing more to say.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. We are going to close the debate for tonight and continue this debate tomorrow. Perhaps Summit will come back to planet Earth.

Mr. Speaker, look, very simply, we are looking at a record investment in our crumbling infrastructure. I will just repeat it one more time: 42,000 bridges on the national highway system in need of serious repair or replacement; 40 percent of the National Highway System needs to be rebedded--that is totally rebuilt. That is expensive, not just another coat of asphalt on top, because it has been neglected for so long.

This is costing Americans every year a thousand bucks for car repair, blown-out tires, misaligned front ends when they hit these potholes.

Americans want this done. Yeah, it is going to increase investment in transit; $100 billion-dollar backlog to bring transit to a state of good repair in this country.

We have the strongest Buy America requirements of any part of the government. There were two potential problems with Chinese-owned industries. Unfortunately, the Senate couldn't see their way to close those. But the predominant amount of this money--and those loopholes have already been partially closed from other legislation I put through--will be spent on American jobs, American manufacturing made here in the United States of America, another key part of the President's proposal. Bring it home. Make it here. Rebuild our country. To be continued.

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

Mr. Speaker, it is my privilege to rise as the anchor of the CBC Special Order addressing Caribbean American Heritage Month and to welcome my colleagues to the floor to be able to engage in a very important and provocative discussion.

Let me just say that last weekend, in fact, yesterday, was the national holiday, the Juneteenth independence day. All over America this commemoration brought about knowledge, understanding, jubilation, and honor. So we are delighted to be on the floor today to, in fact, provide an opportunity to expand and to talk about the heritage of so many in this Nation.

General Leave

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include any extraneous material on the subject of this Special Order.

It is my privilege now to, first of all, thank the Honorable Joyce Beatty, who is the chairwoman of the Congressional Black Caucus, for her continued efforts to ensure that the American people know our message and our power, know the work that we are doing, know the success that we are having, and also give us an opportunity to articulate the historical record of African Americans and those who have heritages from elsewhere.

I also take a moment to congratulate her for receiving the Juneteenth honors in Washington, D.C. last Thursday from the Juneteenth Foundation. It was a privilege not only to be with her and to acknowledge many others who received those honors but to be there on such a special night. She was well-deserving.

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from Ohio (Mrs. Beatty), who is the chair of the Congressional Black Caucus.

Mr. Speaker, I thank Chairwoman Beatty for laying the framework of how enriched the Congressional Black Caucus is with the vast diversity of Members who have these enormous connections and heritage and to honor the leader of this legislation making June Caribbean American Heritage Month and to be astute enough to continue her work as the chair of the State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs Subcommittee on Appropriations. She has been a lifeline to the Caribbean and astute on many issues from immigration to disasters to the issues of dealing with democracy and humanity.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for her leadership. Might I add that she also has a strong heritage in Texas and was a very powerful contributor to our celebration of Juneteenth in Texas. Along with her relatives she was at the Ashton Villa site where General Granger came to announce the freedom of the slaves. She did that during Juneteenth in Texas. We were glad to have her.

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

Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairwoman for capturing so well the unfinished business as it relates to the Caribbean and overall, and I thank her for being the leader of the resolution to establish Caribbean American Heritage Month that we now are able to commemorate year after year.

It is appropriate that the gentlewoman is the chair of the State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs Subcommittee because she can have a very large voice on the changing of our treatment of the Caribbean, along with the leadership of our chair of the CBC and CBC members. I thank the gentlewoman so much for that.

Mr. Speaker, it is my privilege, of course, to now yield to the gentlewoman who hails from Brooklyn that has such a sizable representation of Caribbean Americans. She is a senior member and vice chair of the Energy and Commerce Committee and the founder of and collaborator with the Caribbean-American Caucus here in the United States Congress, and she has worked on a number of immigration issues that really impact our brothers and sisters in the Caribbean.

I must say that, just a few years ago, I think we were shuttling during the Christmas holiday--it seems like it was near the Christmas holiday--from the Hill to the World Bank, trying to work on redoing the treatment that they were giving to Jamaica. I thank the gentlewoman for that leadership. I was pleased to join her in that effort, and we were successful.

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Clarke), and I better say Brooklyn, New York.

I thank the gentlewoman from Brooklyn, New York. What a powerful display of the richness of the Caribbean, the family connections, her pride for this wonderful opportunity to speak about the people in the Caribbean. I am very grateful to you for relating both your familial connections but your predecessor.

So we all have stakeholders in Shirley Chisholm. I guess my pride is as a very young person having introduced her at a church program and then as a lawyer at a lawyer's program, those moments were very special; working in her district for, you might remember her, Carol Bellamy, and getting to know and be around her during that time.

I am delighted to make mention at this point of Representative Jamaal Bowman, who will be presenting his statement into the Record, a very strong, new Member who has exhibited such leadership. He will be one of those that will submit statements into the Record along with Representative Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick. She will likewise present her statement into the Record.

I will proceed now to make my concluding remarks as I celebrate Caribbean American Heritage Month. I thank Congresswoman Barbara Lee for H. Con. Res. 71. I think it was introduced at that time in 2006, and she has done that every single year. She has made the Congressional Black Caucus better for being worldly enough to acknowledge the connection.

I will build on what you have said, Congresswoman Lee. As a member of the Homeland Security Committee, we considered the Caribbean, just a few years back, after 9/11 as the third border of the United States, and it had key importance for the role it played in the security of the United States.

We have not continued that. And I believe as we look to reenhancing our communications and collaboration with the Caribbean, it is to recognize the important role that they are in securing America and securing the Caribbean and the work that they have done with our military, but also our drug enforcement, in a way that protects them and protects the United States.

Millions have emigrated from the Caribbean to the United States since our Nation's founding. Congress should continue to recognize the important contributions of Caribbean Americans to our Nation's history and their role in our Nation's future. Those were the words from that legislation and from Barbara Lee as this bill was introduced.

Today, we celebrate the vibrancy and diversity of the Caribbean- American communities as well as the strong ties reinforced between the United States and our Caribbean neighbors.

We certainly recognize Cuba and know that there are immigration policies that apply to Cuba.

I think at this point, I want to make that sure that all of us in the Congressional Black Caucus continue to work on the issues dealing with Haiti, in particular: The natural disasters, the issues of democracy, the fact that they are a strong and resilient people, that they have many, many needs, but we also want fairness.

As the former ranking member on the Subcommittee on Immigration, Citizenship, and Border Safety, working with the Caribbean Caucus, we are looking forward to the administration working on humanitarian parole on some of the persons here of Haitian decent, so there is a balance and a fairness of their immigration status with others.

These are things that we, in the Congressional Black Caucus, are looking to work on as we cite the very strong ties that we have.

Shirley Chisholm certainly represents sort of an iconic figure. Most persons see her from Brooklyn. I remember her saying as she was appointed to the Committee on Agriculture, a tree does grow in Brooklyn.

She was not going to let herself be denied the status of importance, Mr. Speaker, when this urban member was appointed to the Committee on Agriculture as a point of, you better sit here. She made much out of that and was a great leader on food stamps and other issues dealing with the urban community.

We might not know that W.E.B. Du Bois, a prominent African American, the first to earn a Ph.D. from Harvard. And, of course, Vice President Kamala Harris, the First African American of Jamaican heritage to serve as Vice President of the United States. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, a Latina of Puerto Rican heritage and the first to serve in the United States Supreme Court.

We have noted Alexander Hamilton, the first Secretary of the Treasury. James Weldon Johnson, the writer of Lift Every Voice and Sing, and a key figure of the Harlem renaissance. I can assure you that he was very prominent. This song was very prominent during the Juneteenth celebrations.

Gloria Estefan, one of the best-selling female artists of all time from Cuba with the hit songs ``Conga'' and ``Rhythm is Gonna Get You.''

Then a name that we might not be familiar with: Bad Bunny, Spotify's most streamed artist and album globally of 2020, and the first time a non-English language music artist topped the year-end list.

The history, however, of the Caribbean is many. It is filled with natural resources, natural beauty. It is, along with CARICOM, a perfect partner to the United States.

In addition, I too want to applaud President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris at the Summit of the Americas. We understand, as we were participating as Members of Congress with Speaker Pelosi, that there was an outstanding meeting that went on with CARICOM to re- cement the relationship between the Caribbean and the United States.

That is important because, as I said, natural resources, natural beauty, a third border against terrorists and against other aspects of danger to the United States, but a partner so that the Caribbean is secure as well as the United States. A bastion of democracy.

That is why we must continue to fight for Haiti as it restores itself, rebuilds itself. We met with the Haitian president there to try to find a pathway for that country to restore itself. As indicated, we can be on the front line working with our Members of Congress, both Democratic and Republican.

I believe that there are a number of codels that have recently gone to the Caribbean, including one led by the chairwoman of the Committee on Financial Services, Maxine Waters, who, in fact, is a member and co- chair of the Caribbean caucus.

But as we study the history, let us realize there is much more synergism than one might imagine, because as we celebrated Juneteenth, it is important for America to remember that slaves were also in the Caribbean.

It was a tragic experience. Over 40 percent of all Africans who were enslaved were sent to the Caribbean islands; estimated at 5 million enslaved Africans beginning as early as the 16th century.

Within the Caribbean, the death rates of enslaved populations were extremely high. It was very hot, and there were a lot of insects, if I might say, that took a toll on many, but they kept on surviving. Untold numbers, however, suffered from inhumane working conditions.

However, the rise of abolitionist movements, coupled with anti- slavery sentiment, and several military and political crises, sowed the seeds for prohibition against slavery in the Caribbean countries.

In fact, I believe Haiti was one of the first free countries, securing independence from France at a very, very early stage.

We honor Caribbean heroes who rebelled against slavery which led to official emancipation in anglophone countries in 1823. Major revolts shocked the world: The Tacky's Rebellion in the 1760s in Jamaica; the Haitian Revolution; Fedon's Revolution in the 1790s in Grenada; the Barbados slave revolt in 1860; and the slave revolt in Jamaica led by Sam Sharpe.

What a unique difference and experience, but yet there was slavery. Emancipation was achieved because of the movements and the legal efforts within respective Caribbean countries.

Those revolts inspired the abolitionists in the United States. The parallel histories of Caribbean countries and the United States are rooted in oppression and the ongoing struggle for lasting true liberation, justice, equality, and freedom.

What is good about this discussion is to reflect on the fact that those enslaved Africans that were in the Caribbean, now, their descendants are the heads of state of all the Caribbean countries and our leaders in the CARICOM.

This is an important partnership for the United States, and it is one that we must utilize and teach our children. We embrace them as our ancestors who suffered in hopes that future generations would not; supporting their children so that a time would come when freedom would reign.

We now have the responsibility as we deal with the Caribbean to reflect on the Caribbean immigrants who have come here to the United States. It has already been noted how they have achieved and succeeded.

We mentioned members of our caucus who are Members of the United States Congress who have that heritage. Since 1820, people of the Caribbean descent have immigrated to the United States.

We want to make sure that the process is fair. We want to make sure that these individuals are not deported randomly.

As I said, we hope to have a response to the Haitians as to the Cubans, those who come from Cuba and have the wet foot, dry foot effort that are not Haitians. We see them being deported from the Mexican-U.S. border. That is not fair.

We have had a relationship with Haiti for centuries. Haiti fought alongside of Americans in the Revolutionary War. They came to be at our side.

Since 2000, the population increased 26 percent to 3.7 million Caribbean-Americans in 2010 and grew another 18 percent to 4.4 million in 2017. Today, there are 13.4 million Americans of that heritage; always hardworking, ready to serve, ready to serve in the United States military, and often found at the front line of aid here in this country.

The fight reached its apex with the Haitian Revolution in 1804. As I indicated, the fight did not end with Britain's Slave Trade Act of 1807 that sought abolish the British slave trade.

The point of my comments is to make sure everyone knew that they were always fighting for justice, they were fighting for equality, and their history is worth studying.

I do want to draw to our attention the connection of H.R. 40, the commission to study slavery and develop reparation proposals. Juneteenth: Healing, restorative, repair as well. Know the story.

I can tell you, across America, I heard one colleague, if I might, from Chicago who said there were so many moments of celebration.

Our majority leader indicated in his own home State, there was one event, Mr. Speaker, that had 6,000 people celebrating Juneteenth. It warms my heart. It was a decade-long fight, and here we are today, really in the eye-opening experience of Juneteenth.

I had the privilege of speaking at the Ashton Villa, the place where General Granger came to make that announcement of the No. 3 order. And to have, as well, the statue of Al Edwards, a State representative who was the first probably in the Nation to drive a State holiday in the State of Texas. He achieved that more than 20 years ago.

Being trained up under that kind of leadership, it was instilled in me that we should have a national holiday, a national Independence Day on the Juneteenth basis. I am so excited about the overwhelming support, unanimous in the Senate, 415 votes in the House, if anyone can imagine.

So, as we talk about these issues, I want the world to see and the Nation to see that over this weekend, the Juneteenth events all over the Nation reflected people coming together from many different backgrounds.

There was a degree of excitement. There were children there, families there, and our celebrations were focused around peace and unity, and they were focused around prayer.

That is what we did in Houston, Texas, at the historic--historic-- Antioch Baptist Church founded in 1866 by Jack Yates. Can you imagine, only 1 year after the Emancipation Proclamation that was issued in 1865, after 2\1/2\ years when the South did not pay any attention to Abe Lincoln's order, President Lincoln's order, that he had to dispatch this general, a West Point grad, a hero on the battlefield, to announce in Texas--I can remember the words. It seems like they are loud in my ears.

To the people of Texas, I now declare that the slaves are free, and they are free to be able to achieve property, they are no longer property, and they are citizens of the United States.

Slavery had not been abolished, but he indicated that the slaves were free and that they could maintain themselves as employer and employee. I would venture to say that even with that pronouncement, most of them, uneducated, had ever heard the words employer and employee. It was master and slave.

The one thing they knew, they were not staying. They were leaving and going up the trail, the Emancipation Trail, into the areas of La Marque in Texas and in Houston, a place called Freedmen's Town and Independence Heights.

They were going under the leadership of Jack Yates, when they got to Houston, who bought in 1872 the first park ever bought in Texas. It was bought by freed slaves, and it was a place where the emancipation Juneteenth celebrations would go for decades and decades and decades.

That history should allow us to pass with ease the commission H.R. 40 that has been percolating now since 1989 and the commission to study slavery and develop reparation proposals. It was modeled after the Civil Liberties Act that was passed in 1988 and signed by Ronald Reagan.

We championed that for the Japanese Americans. It was based on the internment that had happened wrongly of Japanese-Americans, patriots who love the country, who were rounded up, belongings left, take what you can take, properties left to their own devices, if you will, and held in an internment camp.

To this day, the Japanese-American association is a strong advocate for H.R. 40 because of the friendship and collaboration and the work we did, in particular the late John Conyers, who worked with them and then introduced H.R. 40, the Commission to Study and Develop Reparation Proposals for African Americans Act.

I would imagine most people would wonder where that name came from. It came from General Sherman, who wanted to give 40 acres and a mule to the freed slaves. Unfortunately, this is what happens. Elections count, and the next President after the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln did not hold to that commitment.

With that in mind, just know that we have built this Nation on that labor; built this Nation on making cotton king; providing resources to the enriched South, the landed South; creating the Wall Street banks, if you will; and providing an economic engine that propelled this small country into a growing international force.

Mr. Speaker, I think that H.R. 40 is a perfect complement because one of the things it does is it gets a study just to look at the landscape of how slavery impacted this Nation and how it impacted the people, how it impacted New England, the Midwest, California, the South, the Deep South, and the southeastern region where African Americans began to move all across this Nation.

Interestingly enough, California, of course, has already implemented this bill, H.R. 40, and a task force is now working to do enormous work. I refer everyone to a Harvard University medical study that indicated that if reparations had been given preceding COVID-

19, that horrible pandemic would not have so lopsidedly impacted the African-American community.

Let me be very clear that this idea of reparations is a sense of looking systemically at what would be the solutions. The commission is to be able to hear from people across America and to be able to recommend and to engage with people from all backgrounds, not just one background, not just African Americans. I am excited about that dialogue. I think it will be a powerful dialogue.

As we celebrated Juneteenth, as we had this memorial service at the Antioch Baptist Church, what an emotional time we had with song and words and dance and prayer. People left there saying that they were more inspired than they have ever been before to bring us together. It was a diverse audience of people who came even from out of town to do something that was part of my vision that on Juneteenth, and that was happy Father's Day, we would take a moment to honor slaves who were born, who lived and died as a slave and never knew freedom, to give them the honor that they never got.

As I reflect on how this Nation was built by immigrants and how it was built by the ancestors of African Americans today, I do want to continue to emphasize the Members of Congress who have this wonderful heritage and to honor the late Shirley Chisholm, who both became the first African-American woman in the United States Congress and as well became the first African-American person to run for President.

As I do so, let me cite my relatives, Sybil Gooden, Willie Gooden, they excelled as leaders coming from the Caribbean; the Lockets; the Rashfords; and, of course, my grandparents, Olive Clarke Jackson and Albert Jackson, who worked on the Panama Canal. It was so powerful to go to the Panama Canal and see his name written there. It was an emotional experience. Eric Jackson, Allen Jackson, Charles Jackson all served in World War II; Ezra Jackson, my father; and his older brothers who served in World War II. Elaine Oliver and Ollie Oliver, both of those individuals came and made great strides. Their son served in the United States Air Force. An outstanding daughter, Elaine Oliver, worked for me. Of course, Eric Holder, Colin Powell, Patrick Gaspard, Harry Belafonte, many others, our outstanding communications director.

Tonight, we have had a storytelling night of truth. We have had a great celebration of Caribbean American Month, and we have told the history and story of the powerful connection between the Caribbean and the United States of America. That should be a moment of celebration, friendship, unity, heritage, knowledge.

I am delighted to have anchored the Congressional Black Caucus Special Order hour on the Caribbean American Heritage Month, and I thank the chairwoman and the officers of the Congressional Black Caucus and all of our members for continuing to tell the truth.

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

Mr. Speaker, I thank our distinguished chairman for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, whenever you hear the words of Speaker Pelosi, you know that the gentlewoman is leading us on the fight to protect our seniors. I am glad to cosponsor this legislation to be a strong supporter of being on the front seat of protecting our seniors.

Whenever you hear us being demagogued from those on the other side using demagoguery, you can be assured that when they pass a tax bill, it was not having seniors as their priority. But when you hear the word ``Medicare,'' you know that Democrats are standing strong to make sure that not one dime is taken away from our seniors with Medicare.

My open letter to my seniors in my district--open message to my seniors is: We will die on the vine to protect your Medicare. That is what we are doing today on the floor of the House. Not one dime will come out of your Medicare.

Mr. Speaker, I am proud to support H.R. 1868, which excludes the budgetary effects of the American Rescue Plan of 2021 from scorecards established by the Pay-As-You-Go, or PAYGO Act of 2010, preventing across-the-board cuts to numerous direct-spending programs. That is what we are doing here today. We are taking our seniors seriously.

I say to seniors: Have no fear with all of this demagoguery because we are going to make sure that not one dime comes out of your pocket.

In addition, I say to seniors: You are going to be living in cities like Houston, where it says that Houston's share of the stimulus package is $615 million.

That is going to help keep the city services going, the fire, the police, and trash pickup going. We know that seniors call my office and these issues are important to them.

Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record a Houston Chronicle article dated March 10, 2021, showing that the city of Houston will receive $615 million.

[From the Houston Chronicle, Mar. 10, 2021]

Houston's Share of Stimulus Bill Expected To Top $600M, Help Avoid Cuts

to City Services, Officials Say

(By Jasper Scherer)

Houston and Harris County are expected to receive more than

$1.5 billion through the stimulus bill approved by Congress

Wednesday, providing a massive cash injection that city

officials say will help close a budget shortfall widened by

the pandemic for the second year in a row.

The measure provides local governments with their most

generous round of COVID-related funding yet, and it comes

with fewer spending restrictions than last year's aid.

Houston will receive an estimated $615 million, putting the

city at more than $1 billion in direct federal relief during

the pandemic, while Harris County is projected to receive

$914 million--more than double its allotment from the first

round of local aid last March.

``I'm hopeful and optimistic that we will be able to use

this money to, essentially, bail

the city out of a very dire financial situation,'' said City

Controller Chris Brown, who monitors the spending of

Houston's more than $5 billion city budget.

Many local governments, including Houston, have seen their

sales tax revenues plummet as the pandemic slowed consumer

spending on dining, tourism and other leisure activity. And

while rising appraisal values mean the city is projected to

take in more money from property taxes this year than last,

officials say the pandemic's true toll on property tax

revenue may not be felt until early 2022, when homeowners

make payments for this year's not-yet-certified tax rolls.

Much to the relief of local officials, the latest round of

federal aid allows cities and counties to spend the funds to

replace revenue lost due to the pandemic. Trump

administration rules barred local governments from using the

first round of local COVID relief to plug budget holes,

stipulating it could only cover expenses tied directly to the

pandemic, though Mayor Sylvester Turner's administration

still was able to use the funds to avoid furloughing city

employees.

Marvin Odum, the former Shell executive appointed by the

mayor to oversee the city's COVID recovery, said Wednesday he

is ``very optimistic the funds will be able to be used to

mitigate the city's budget shortfalls resulting from COVID-

19.'' Still, he noted that beyond the broad language in the

bill, federal officials have yet to release specific rules

for how local governments can spend the funds.

``I'll just caution that clarity on the guidelines for

these programs tends to come over time. It's not always

available immediately,'' Odum said.

Republican lawmakers bitterly opposed the local aid,

including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, who accused

Democrats of sending ``wheelbarrows of cash to state and

local bureaucrats to bail out mismanagement from before the

pandemic.'' Meanwhile, local officials across the country

have warned they would have to enact deep cuts to city

services, such as fire, police and trash collection, without

federal aid to offset their revenue losses.

``Every mayor, every county judge, every local official

that I visited with since before December, they all need

help,'' said U.S. Rep. Sylvia Garcia, D-Houston, a former

Houston controller and county commissioner. ``Every city in

America will get dollars to help with their revenue

shortfalls. And that's huge, because they can keep the

firefighters working, they can keep police departments open,

they can get the garbage picked up.''

Even before the pandemic, Houston officials in recent years

have scrambled to close major city budget gaps, often dipping

into reserves to balance spending and revenue. The city's

public safety costs, which make up more than half of spending

on core services, have steadily increased as the budget

remains capped by a limit on how much property tax revenue

the city can take in each year.

``It's going to solve, in the short term, some of these

problems, but the real challenge is, you cannot solve a

structural problem with one-time financing sources,'' Brown

said. ``You actually have to do the hard work to cut

recurring expenses. And that's the only way you can narrow

that budget gap over time.''

Local governments will receive half their federal aid

within 60 days of Friday, when President Joe Eiden will sign

the bill into law, according to White House press secretary

Jen Psaki. They will receive the second half of the funds at

least a year later.

That means Houston will receive more than $300 million to

offset its revenue losses next fiscal year, along with any

potential shortfall before the current fiscal year ends June

30. Odum said the city finance department is projecting a

budget gap of between $160 and $200 million next year, while

Brown--whose office generates its own estimates separate from

Turner's administration--said he expects the shortfall to be

even higher.

Brown noted that while finance department projections

assume the city will see a less-than-1 percent reduction in

sales tax revenue this year, the actual decrease has been 7

percent.

``The (Turner) administration, I don't think, has properly

evaluated the reductions in sales and property tax,'' Brown

said. ``There's a $40 million variance between us and (the)

finance (department) in sales tax alone.''

Brown estimated city officials will have to lay off about a

dozen city employees for every $1 million trimmed from the

budget, meaning Houston could have been looking at more than

2,000 layoffs without any federal aid.

Instead, Houston's relief will far exceed its budget

deficit. The city also is expected to devote a chunk of the

aid to direct COVID relief, such as testing and vaccinations.

Turner's administration exhausted the previous round of aid,

totaling $405 million, in December. Those funds covered

contact tracing efforts, city workers whose jobs were

consumed by COVID, and relief to renters and small

businesses, among other areas.

Turner, who proposes the annual budget to city council each

year, did not respond to questions Wednesday about how he

intends to spend the new round of relief aid.

Mr. Speaker, let me also indicate that seniors' healthcare will be in a good place with this particular program. Their grandchildren will be able to go back to school with almost $1 billion to the Houston Independent School District.

Seniors' stimulus checks are not going to be ignored. They are going to be able to get stimulus checks directly into their accounts. Their grandchildren, their children will get $3,600 for a 5-year-old.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, they will get $3,000 for children above 9 years old. There will be enhanced unemployment for the young people in their lives who have been unemployed. And then, of course, that local restaurant will be able--and I fought for this--to be open again with $28 billion.

The issue of public assistance or local government assistance was something I was allowed to offer a motion to instruct on. It was something that I thought we could not abandon. We will not abandon seniors. We will not let them touch one dime of Medicare, as our friends on the other side have.

Vote for this legislation because we are seniors first.

Mr. Speaker, as a senior member of the Committees on the Judiciary, on Homeland Security, on the Budget, and as the Member of Congress for a congressional district that has experience the worst of the COVID-19 as a public health emergency and economic catastrophe, I rise in strong support of H.R. 1868, which excludes the budgetary effects of the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021, from the scorecards established by the Statutory Pay-As-You-Go (PAYGO) Act of 2010, preventing across-the- board cuts to numerous direct spending programs.

The legislation also excludes the budgetary effects of this Act from the Senate PAYGO scorecards.

This legislation is necessary to ensure that that Medicare and other programs are protected from PAYGO sequestration.

The Statutory Pay-As-You-Go Act requires across-the-board cuts, known as ``sequestration,'' to a defined set of programs if certain legislation affecting mandatory spending or revenues increases net deficits.

Although legislation that Congress designates as an emergency or otherwise excludes from the PAYGO scorecard does not trigger sequestration, this action is necessary because restrictions on the content of reconciliation bills prevented the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 from including a provision to avert sequestration.

The bill before also extends a separate Medicare sequester relief provision, first enacted in the CARES Act, that expires March 31,

Mr. Speaker, Congress has never permitted sequestration to affect the Medicare trust fund and it certainly will not allow it now, just when help is arriving under the American Rescue Plan Act to put shots in arms, money in pockets, kids in school, and workers back on the job.

It is worthwhile to explain why the American Rescue Plan Act is the most transformative legislation in more than a half century and easily justifies exclusion from sequestration.

H.R. 1319, the American Rescue Plan Act, is a landmark, life-saving legislation that will provide urgently-needed resources to defeat the virus, put vaccines in people's arms, money into families' pockets, children safely back into classrooms, and people back to work.

With tens of millions of Americans infected, more than half a million lives lost, over 18 million Americans unemployed and millions more hungry and food and housing insecure, thanks to the work of congressional Democrats in the House and Senate and the Biden Administration, at long last the people of the United States and my home state of Texas can be assured that `Help Is On The Way.'

In simple terms this life-saving and life-enhancing legislation puts vaccines in arms, puts money in people's pockets, puts children safely back in school, and it will put workers back in jobs.

1. Put Vaccines in Arms: The plan will mount a national vaccination program that includes setting up community vaccination sites nationwide and addressing disparities facing communities of color. It will also take complementary measures to combat the virus, including scaling up testing and tracing, addressing shortages of personal protective equipment and other critical supplies, investing in high-quality treatments, and addressing health care disparities.

2. Put Money in People's Pockets: The plan finishes the job on the President's promise to provide $2,000 in direct assistance to households across America with checks of $1,400

per person, following the $600 down payment enacted in December. The plan will also provide direct housing assistance, nutrition assistance for 40 million Americans, expand access to safe and reliable child care and affordable health care, extend unemployment insurance so that 18 million American workers can pay their bills and support 27 million children with an expanded Child Tax Credit and more than 17 million low-wage workers through an improved Earned Income Tax Credit.

3. Put Children Safely Back in School: The plan delivers $170 billion for education and $45 billion for childcare providers. This includes a $130 billion investment in K-12 school re-opening and making up for lost time in the classroom, with funds that can be used for such things as reducing class sizes, modifying spaces so that students and teachers can socially distance, improving ventilation, implementing more mitigation measures, providing personal protective equipment and providing summer school or other support for students that help make up lost learning time this year. The plan also provides more than $40 billion for higher education.

Here is what the American Rescue Plan Act means for the State of Texas, Houston, and Harris County.

An estimated $16.7 billion will come to the State of Texas.

The lion's share of $3.3 billion will come directly to the City of Houston, and Harris County will receive a similar share of $5.667 billion, thanks to a provision in the law I helped secure that created the Coronavirus Local Fiscal Recovery Fund and appropriated $45.57 billion.

$1.4 billion in direct payments is allocated to smaller jurisdiction like Jacinto City.

Houston Independent School District can expect to receive close to $100 million ($993,198 million to be more precise).

The law specifically allows this funding to be used:

1. To respond to the pandemic or its negative economic impacts, including assistance to households, small businesses, and nonprofits, or aid to impacted industries such as tourism, travel, and hospitality;

2. For premium pay to eligible workers performing essential work (as determined by each recipient government) during the pandemic, providing up to $13 per hour above regular wages;

3. For the provision of government services to the extent of the reduction in revenue due to the pandemic (relative to revenues collected in the most recent full fiscal year); and

4. To make necessary investments in water, sewer, or broadband infrastructure.

In addition to these funds, Texas will receive $100 million out of the newly created $10 billion Coronavirus Capital Projects Fund for ``critical capital projects directly enabling work, education, and health monitoring, including remote options, in response to the public health emergency with respect to the Coronavirus Disease.

Now all that is well and good but let me tell you what the American Rescue Plan Act means for a hard-working and hard-pressed single mother of two children making a modest income:

Mr. President, I come to the floor this evening to talk about the partisan reconciliation legislation that is before us tonight. It is named the Inflation Reduction Act, but that is misnamed because, unfortunately, it does not reduce inflation; it actually makes things worse.

When you are at the gas pump or at the grocery store or buying something anywhere today, you are feeling the sticker shock. Yet this legislation is going to make it even worse. It adds $700 billion more in spending and over $300 billion more in new taxes at the worst possible time, increasing costs to consumers and actually making inflation worse.

The nonpartisan Penn Wharton Budget Model that a lot of us have used over the years to look at various legislation predicts that it will actually increase inflation over the next 2 years.

While over time it says that may even out, it won't decrease inflation as the name suggests and the bill sponsors claim. Why? Well, primarily because when you put $300 billion-plus of new taxes in the economy, it actually hurts workers and it hurts consumers.

Yes, they are saying it is going to go to companies, but what happens then? Companies pass it along. And at a time when we have the worst inflation in over 40 years, that is bad for the economy.

The nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation that we have to rely on here in Congress--not a partisan group but nonpartisan--says this bill will hurt Americans in nearly every tax bracket. They say that more than half of the burden of the over $300 billion in new taxes is going to fall on folks making less than $400,000 a year.

Well, that directly contradicts promises made not to increase taxes on Americans at that level.

While I am glad the blow to manufacturers has been somewhat softened in the last 24 hours, with the latest version of the bill, what the Democrats did was essentially exchange one bad tax--the book tax on manufacturers--for another bad tax, a tax that will tax stock buybacks, that is going to hurt particularly Americans who are trying to save for retirement.

Let me start with the book tax. This is a proposed tax that is very different from the existing corporate income tax which is based on income that business report to the IRS when they file their taxes. That IRS income, by the way, is defined by the U.S. Congress. Here in the Senate, we debate that all the time: Is it good to have a particular tax incentive or another tax incentive, that is not in the book tax? The book tax, instead, looks at a company's financial statement. And that is what this new bill does.

In fact, it comes up with a whole other definition of tax and, therefore, another tax system called the adjusted financial statement income. This is broader than the IRS income. It is not fair. It is way too complicated, and it is going to hurt employees and consumers.

Taxable income owed the IRS is meant to raise revenue, and, again, it includes these incentives or disincentives for certain activity like being able to immediately deduct the cost of new equipment, if you are a manufacturer. We want to encourage that, particularly in periods of high inflation, so we allow them to do that.

The financial statement income is not determined by us. It is not determined by elected representatives at all. In fact, Congress does not have anything to do with it. It is actually determined by something called the Financial Accounting Standards Board, which is a private nonprofit recognized by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission as the accounting standard setting for private companies.

That may work fine for determining accounting standards, but this change effectively puts these people in control of what the corporate tax base is, even though they are not elected to anything. That doesn't make sense. Let's not set up a whole new tax system for some companies. Let's learn from the past.

Back in 1986, when we passed a big tax reform bill, they put a book tax in place, and it was repealed less than 3 years later. Why? Because it was viewed as unfair, way too complicated, and, actually, they thought that you shouldn't have these nonelected officials deciding what the taxes ought to be.

They said it was bad for the economy, too, because companies were managing to the book tax rather than the IRS tax. So let's learn from the past. Why would we want to do that again, set up a whole other tax system, tax the American economy, tax consumers, tax workers, and do so through something that in 1986, we looked at and decided this is not working?

So Democrats will say tonight, Well, this new complicated tax system is just going to affect big companies.

That is true. But you know what, big companies employ a lot of people, and a lot of people are going to be hurt. They also sell to a lot of consumers, all of us who will be hurt. Last year, there were over 200 companies listed on the Fortune 500 as meeting the criteria that is set out in this legislation. They employ over 18 million Americans. It is those employees and those who are customers who are going to bear the brunt of these tax increases as it is passed down to them in the form of lower wages, lower benefits, and higher prices for goods and services.

The Joint Committee on Taxation, a nonpartisan group, just last year said they expected 25 percent of these corporate taxes to fall on workers; again, this means lower wages. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office says that employees and workers bear more like 70 percent of the burden of income taxes, so there is a long list of analyses in- between.

Let's say between 25 percent and 70 percent of these taxes are going to fall on workers in the form of lower pay and lower benefits at a time when wages are not keeping up with inflation that is getting higher and higher.

And, by the way, it is not just wages I am talking about; families will now face even higher prices as the cost of corporate taxes get passed along to them. In a study last year performed by the business schools at the University of Chicago and Northwestern, they found that 31 percent of corporate taxes fall on consumers through higher retail prices. Aren't prices high enough?

Dems have just added another new tax in the past 24 hours. Democrats now say we are going to have this complicated tax called an excise tax on stock buybacks. Again, this is instead of some of the tax they had in the other new tax that they put forward called the book tax.

Now, Democrats tonight will talk about how taxing buybacks is good because it somehow hurts Wall Street fat cats. Here is the truth: It increases the price of stocks to allow buybacks, and by taking away that incentive by putting a tax on it, there will be less of it. So the reality is this is a tax on working families, including those trying to save for retirement when they are already dealing with the struggling portfolios due to the recent economic contraction and the record inflation we are experiencing.

Fifty-eight percent of Americans own stock, and 60 million investors invest in an IRA or a 401(k). We want people to save for retirement; it is a good thing. We want them to have healthy retirement. So when Democrats say they worry about stock prices going up, I have to ask: Are they worried about people having a healthy retirement account?

Again, when companies buy back stock, it generally causes that stock to go up, which means it makes Americans' retirement accounts that much larger. Why is that a problem? The Tax Foundation says retirement accounts own 37 percent of all corporate stock. That is about $8\1/2\ trillion in retirement funds, $8\1/2\ trillion of retirement funds own corporate stock. Americans lost about $2 trillion in their IRAs during the COVID crisis. Let's not encourage them to lose anymore.

Some will say, this is just 1 percent. Well, we know that once a tax is initiated, it tends to increase. This is the camel's nose under the tent. The first income tax in 1913, by the way, was 1 percent and just on top earners. I think a lot of middle-income earners right now would be happy to have a tax rate that low.

This type of proposal will impact families and their retirement, and for that reason, we should not even go down this path. Democrats will also tax employee stock ownership programs, or ESOPS, in this package. I think some of my colleagues might be surprised to hear that. ESOPS are plans to give employees ownership of their own companies, with tax incentives for the dividends to go to their retirement savings. They are really popular.

ESOPS work; they are great. They enjoy wide bipartisan support here in the Congress. Employees have this ownership stake, and because of that, those companies tend to do better. Employees are happier. They are more profitable. They are more productive. The companies benefit from it. I don't understand why Democrats want to punish this ownership structure. Doing so will, once again, discourage investment and hard work, and it could not come at a worse time.

That is why I want to introduce an amendment tonight that will exempt ESOPS from the minimum book tax. This is a commonsense amendment-- nothing complicated about it. It will encourage savings and investment; it is good for the country; and I encourage my colleagues on both sides of the aisle who support ESOPS to support the amendment.

I also plan to offer an amendment that will increase funding for Customs and Border Patrol by $500 million that will be used for new technology to detect fentanyl and other dangerous drugs that are, unfortunately, flooding across our southern border.

Over 100,000 Americans died of drug overdoses last year, the worst year on record. Unfortunately, more and more people are dying of overdoses, and they are dying from this synthetic opioid called fentanyl. About two-thirds of those overdose deaths were due to fentanyl.

At a time when deadly fentanyl is flooding across the border, only 2 percent of cars and only 16 percent of commercial vehicles are being screened. Now, these drugs come across the ports of entry where only 2 percent of cars and 16 percent of trucks are being screened.

They also come between the ports of entry, but at a minimum, we should be able to do screening of these vehicles and trucks. It is a gaping hole in our border security, and it has got to be fixed.

This amendment will simply assure that the new funds in this bill for the Department of Homeland Security bureaucracy, for an office called Readiness, $500 million will be assigned to a higher priority, to have Customs and Border Protection be able to detect and stop deadly fentanyl that is being smuggled into this country at record levels.

So this money would stay at the Department of Homeland Security. It will instead be used for a more urgent priority. Let's be serious about our national security and this drug crisis we face, and let's give the Border Patrol what they need to counter the drug cartels and the traffickers.

Tonight, I also plan to offer an amendment to ensure the new postal electric vehicles are actually made in the United States of America. In this bill, there is a $3 billion appropriation to the Postal Service. We just went through postal reform, as some of you know, we provided them additional funding that they needed. This is an additional $3 billion appropriation to buy electric vehicles and charging infrastructure. However, there is no requirement that these vehicles be made in America, with U.S. batteries and other components.

In other words, the bill uses taxpayer funds to buy electric vehicles that can be made with Chinese batteries and Chinese critical minerals. We know that this is counter to everything we are trying to do around here. We just passed legislation to make us more competitive with China. Again, we just passed legislation to provide the Postal Service with funds for new vehicles, including electric vehicles. The Postmaster General just made a decision to go from 10 percent electric to 20 percent to 50 percent. That is already happening. But in that case, there are requirements; in this case, there are not.

We know that Democrats believe that when we are expanding electric vehicles, that we ought to ensure that these vehicles are being made in America. How do we know that? Because in another part of the bill, which is the expansion of the electric vehicle tax credit, Democrats included new requirements that the tax credit award EVs made in the United States with American components.

My amendment would simply apply these identical requirements to these new electric postal delivery vehicles. Both involve taxpayer subsidies. What is good for the American driver should be good for the Postal Service.

My hope is this misnamed ``Inflation Reduction Act'' can be stopped before it makes things worse, but at least I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to look at these commonsense amendments and accept some of these amendments. Some, I have laid out, and some others, I have talked about tonight to improve a flawed bill.

I yield the floor.

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 233, I call up the bill (H.R. 1868) to prevent across-the-board direct spending cuts, and for other purposes, and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks and insert extraneous material into the Record on H.R. 1868.

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

Mr. Speaker, because of the American Rescue Plan, relief checks are already being deposited in Americans' bank accounts, furloughs have already ended for tens of thousands of workers, and we have averted the unemployment cliff. But we have a loose end to tie up before our work is finished, and that is the bill before us.

Enacting COVID relief through budget reconciliation was always plan B, but the American people could not afford any more delays, and Congress needed a path forward for the American Rescue Plan and the transformative support it provides. Because paygo requirements cannot be changed in reconciliation bills, we knew from the outset that this additional legislative fix was needed to avert painful and indiscriminate cuts to Medicare, farm supports, and other programs.

The language of H.R. 1868 should look familiar. Over the past year, Congress has enacted multiple COVID relief packages to address the crises facing the American people and our economy. Each time, we excluded these bills from statutory paygo calculations because of the dire impact sequestration would have on our Nation's seniors, students, farmers, and others.

Today's bill will ensure the American Rescue Plan is treated the same as these previous relief measures and treated the same as the last reconciliation bill passed by Congress. That was in 2017, when Republicans used reconciliation to pass the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.

Following the bill's passage without Democratic support in either the House or Senate, Republicans proposed this same legislative fix, albeit buried in a problematic continuing resolution. Enough House and Senate Democrats joined Republicans to prevent harmful across-the-board cuts to critical programs I mentioned, even though we opposed the short-term CR and the massive tax giveaways to the wealthy.

This time the situation is flipped, but the same nonetheless. House Republicans opposed the American Rescue Plan. I don't understand their position. This bill is supported by more than 70 percent of Americans and will directly benefit far more. But that is the choice they made. Either way, a statutory legislative fix for paygo is now needed and, historically, that has been enacted with little dispute.

Even in the wake of contentious legislation, Congress has come together to prevent sequestration and to protect Medicare, farm support programs, social services, resources for students and individuals with disabilities, and other programs Americans rely on. This time should be no different.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Scott), the distinguished chairman of the Committee on Education and Labor, and also a member of the Budget Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to remind the gentleman from Virginia that in 2017 when Republicans passed an almost identical amount of tax cuts, 83 percent of which went to the top 1 percent and major corporations, Mitch McConnell said on the Senate floor: Sequestration has never happened, will not happen now, and will never happen. His words were prophetic because it is not going to happen today.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Minnesota (Ms. Craig), a distinguished member of the Energy and Commerce Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. David Scott), who is the distinguished chairman of the Agriculture Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield the gentleman from Georgia an additional 30 seconds.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Panetta), who is a distinguished member of the Ways and Means Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield an additional 30 seconds to the gentleman from California.

Mr. Speaker, I want to remind the gentleman from Mississippi, along with all the other Members of this body, that his citizens will receive, in total, $900 million from just the $1,400 checks. That is the average that every congressional district is going to receive, and I hope that at some point they will realize the benefits of that injection of capital into an economy that is struggling.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Connecticut (Mr. Courtney), who is a distinguished member of the Education and Labor Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I am happy to yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Illinois (Ms. Schakowsky), a distinguished member of the Budget Committee.

Mr. Speaker, may I inquire as to how much time remains on both sides?

Mr. Speaker, I am happy to yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson Lee), a distinguished member of the Budget Committee.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Doggett), a distinguished member of the Budget Committee.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Illinois (Mrs. Bustos), a distinguished member of the Committee on Agriculture and Committee on Appropriations.

Mr. Speaker, I have no further speakers, and I am prepared to close.

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

Mr. Speaker, the last couple of months have been an incredibly busy time. The work that was done on the American Rescue Plan, from start to finish, was extraordinary, and we owe our staffs an enormous debt of gratitude, and not just the Budget Committee staff, but the staff of the 12 committees that also contributed to the drafting of the American Rescue Plan.

I would like to take this time to read the names of the Budget Committee staff who pulled all-nighters, all-weekenders, and went way beyond the call of duty in doing the work on the American Rescue Plan:

Erika Appel, Ellen Balis, Samantha Carter, Edward Etzkorn, Jose Guillen, Jocelyn Harris, Emily King, Sarah Lee, Sheila McDowell, Diana Meredith, Leyla Mocan, Kimberly Overbeek, Barbara Pike, Katie Raymond, Scott Russell, Laura Santos, Raquel Spencer, Greg Waring, Alexandra Weinroth, Christie Wentworth, Jennifer Wheelock, Sam Wice, Ted Zegers, and Grady Stevens. I want to thank all of them personally for their work on behalf of the House.

In closing, Mr. Speaker, I just want to say this: You know, we have heard a lot of newly found concern about the deficit and the debt today. We heard it during the debates. This is the same party that drove up the deficit 3 years ago, 4 years ago now, with a $2 trillion tax cut, most of which benefitted the wealthiest Americans, and, according to virtually everyone who has looked at it, didn't even come close to paying for itself.

What we have done in the American Rescue Plan is give an incredible boost to the American people, the American people who need the boost most. Not one dollar in the American Rescue Plan goes to the top 1 percent of Americans. The vast majority goes to middle- and lower- income people struggling to get by.

I am kind of amused when people talk about their States being cheated. The gentleman from Georgia talked about how Georgia was cheated. Under the American Rescue Plan, Georgia gets over $8 billion, twice as much as Georgia got under the CARES Act. That doesn't even count all of the money that is going to the Georgia citizens.

As I said, in every congressional district in this country, on average, the people, the citizens we represent, will get $900 million, every congressional district.

My friend from Missouri talked about his family of four. I know his math is better than this, but a family of four doesn't get $1,400, as he mentioned. A family of four gets $1,400 times four, which is $5,600, and then two children, depending on their ages, get at least $3,000 each. So that family of four is going to get $11,000 out of this bill.

The talk about future generations, I love that. You know, I am sure that when the national debt reached $1 billion under Abraham Lincoln, there were people saying: ``Wow, we are laying an incredible burden on our grandchildren.'' When it reached $1 trillion under Ronald Reagan, I am sure there were people saying the same thing. And when it gets to $50 trillion, as it probably will in the next couple of decades, people will be saying the same thing.

We have been accumulating debt for our entire history, and yet no one has ever been asked to pay for that debt, and no one ever will.

So all in all, we are very proud of the American Rescue Plan. The American people love the American Rescue Plan. This fix, which we ask for today, is something that, again, is just what the Republicans asked to do in 2017. It is a routine measure. Nobody wants to cut Medicare to providers and certainly benefits to our citizens. I am sure we will have a bipartisan vote on this today, and I urge all of my colleagues to support H.R. 1868.

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