Securing American Energy and Investing in Resiliency Act

Madam Speaker, I rise for the purpose of inquiring to the House majority whip the schedule for next week.

Madam Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Clyburn), the majority whip of the House.

Madam Speaker, I know this is a conversation I have had for months with the majority leader as we have talked about the concern over high gas prices, and I notice that, on the agenda that was listed, there are no bills that would deal with the high price of gasoline that families are struggling under due to President Biden's many different actions he has taken to shut down American energy.

Of course, as we know, the President today is in Saudi Arabia, begging the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to produce more oil, when we have been asking the President to work with us to open up American energy, which is abundant, available, but, unfortunately, closed for business.

Of course, we know during the campaign, President Biden bragged that he was going to shut down drilling, that he was going to make it hard for the energy companies to produce in America, and he has done that. The problem is it has had devastating impacts on families.

So, we brought forward a number of bills, again, months ago. I have presented some of these to the majority leader. He said he would look at them and consider bringing some of them up. I want to present a few of these to the gentleman from South Carolina to see if we can get consideration of some of these bills next week at a time when we just saw a report with 9.1 percent inflation, the worst numbers in 40 years, in large part driven by the high price of gasoline.

We have bills to alleviate that problem that families are facing.

I will start with H.R. 7285, by Mr. Carl. This is the Unleashing American Energy Act that requires the Secretary of the Interior to conduct a minimum number of oil and gas lease sales so that we can get back to producing more energy here.

H.R. 7292, by Garret Graves, the Securing American Energy and Investing in Resiliency Act: This requires the Secretary of the Interior to conduct all oil and gas lease sales that, under current law, he is supposed to be doing. The President is not in compliance with existing law on that.

H.R. 7293, the Energy Permitting Certainty Act, by Ms. Herrell: This requires the Secretary of the Interior to process applications for a permit to drill. It doesn't tell the Secretary what determination they have to give, but it gives them a shot clock, just like they give to businesses. When they tell a business that they have to give an answer on something, it is by a certain date. Yet, when the applications are submitted, the agency just ignores it, just doesn't do their job. Let's get an

answer, yes or no. Let's get an answer and back it up with facts. That is what this bill requires.

H.R. 7298, the Promoting Energy Independence and Transparency Act, by Mr. Moore from Utah: This requires the Secretary of the Interior to submit a report on expressions of interest in applications of permits to drill and requires the publication of data on expressions of interest in applications of permits to drill.

H.R. 7304, the Restore Onshore Energy Production Act, by Mr. Rosendale: This requires the Secretary of the Interior to immediately resume onshore oil and gas lease sales. Let us have an opportunity to utilize our natural resources to lower the price of gas.

H.R. 751, the Protecting American Energy Production Act, by Mr. Duncan: This prohibits any declaration of a moratorium on the use of hydraulic fracturing, which, again, has been a threat by this administration on a very efficient, clean source of energy that America could produce but, right now, is being dramatically limited.

Finally, H.R. 1616, the Promoting Interagency Coordination for Review of Natural Gas Pipelines Act, by Mr. Burgess: This provides for Federal and State agency coordination in the approval of certain authorizations under the Natural Gas Act for the critical infrastructure of pipelines to move energy throughout America so we don't have to get it from tankers, from foreign countries, many of them hostile to America.

I would be happy to yield to see if we could get some consideration next week of some of those bills, if not all.

Madam Speaker, if the gentleman is interested in inflicting pain on Putin, then pass these bills. These bills will take away all of Putin's leverage. The only reason Vladimir Putin has any leverage over America and Europe is because President Biden shut down American energy.

Again, each of these bills addresses different components of President Biden's attack on American energy. It has been a very direct assault on American energy on many different fronts. These lay out all of those things.

You can have all the leases in the world, but if the administration won't give permits to actually execute the lease to do seismic, to build pipelines so you can actually move the resource, to drill in new areas while the resource is being depleted in other areas, then you don't have an ability to secure America's future. It results in the President going hat in hand to foreign countries like Saudi Arabia.

I would just point out that I know the President likes talking about carbon emissions a lot. It is a 5,700-mile trek to Saudi Arabia, and I would imagine he is going to come back home. That is more than 11,000 miles on Air Force One. If you notice the picture, there are no solar panels on the wings of Air Force One. It is jet fuel that actually gets it from here to there and back with the President and his staff. You could save all 11,000 miles and the entire carbon footprint of that trip by staying here in America. I recommend going to a place like Port Fourchon in south Louisiana where they produce energy cleaner, cheaper, and with American jobs.

By the way, as States drill, they get revenue sharing. They would actually be able to use that investment to lower prices at the pump and to help American families.

If you think about where the price is today, whether it is $5.20 or $4.80--of course, it continues to go back and forth in a very high range--it is all double, more than double, what it was 2 years ago.

What that means is that people who are filling up are looking at the bottom line. They are looking at the fact that it is costing them over $150 to fill their car today when it cost them maybe $70 2 years ago if they can afford to fill it up all the way.

We are seeing a trend right now where many families can't even get it to full. They might have to go only halfway because they can't afford the full price. Their credit cards get maxed out before then because if they are filling up to go to the grocery store, they are also paying double-digit increases for everything they are buying there because of the spending-induced inflation.

I suggest if we want to send a message to Putin, no better way to do it than to cut him off at the knees in his ability to hold leverage over America and Europe by producing more here in America.

If we produce it in America, cartels can't control the price. Putin can't control the price. We can meet all of our needs and help our allies around the world so that Putin has no leverage over anybody.

The only person giving Putin leverage today is President Biden by allowing all these limitations on American energy production that these bills will remove. These bills will help America get back to energy independence by unleashing all of those different leverages, those different inhibitions, the prohibitions that President Biden has put on our energy.

Again, if he was against all fossil fuels, maybe there would be a consistency in policy, but he is only against American fossil fuels. He will travel 5,700 miles to beg Saudi to produce oil that he won't allow our own producers here in America to produce. I think that is what has Americans irate the most.

I yield to the gentleman.

I appreciate that. Hopefully, as I continue to have these conversations with the leader, maybe you and I could be whipping these bills together. You would see an overwhelming result and a quick reduction

in the price at the pump that is hurting families.

One final question I want to raise to the gentleman, and this came up yesterday or 2 days ago as we were having a series of votes on the National Defense Authorization Act, as the gentleman pointed out. Next week, we will be bringing up some of the appropriations bills, with still more to come over the next few weeks. As we have large numbers of amendments on NDAA and appropriations, which is typical for the process, to be able to go back to 2-minute voting where we can do our business not in 4 hours until 11 at night, but where we can actually be more efficient at processing all the requests that Members have to get a vote on different issues.

We have continued to push to end proxy voting. Again, you have seen most of the country already get there. Most of the country is getting back to work.

Airplanes, finally, you don't have to wear masks anymore. People are traveling internationally again. People are opening up their offices again to get workers in the office.

Congress, frankly, should be leading, not lagging, on this. But if we got rid of proxy voting, we could get back next week to 2-minute votes and be much more effective and efficient in doing our jobs here in Congress.

Is that something that the majority would consider, especially looking at six different appropriations bills, which I am sure will yield hundreds of amendments that would be debated and voted on, on this floor?

I yield to the gentleman.

I appreciate that. I will share--and if the gentleman wanted to share as well with the majority leader--our side stands ready and strongly encourages the complete elimination of proxy voting. We could absolutely get back to 2-minute voting with that. It is not a partisan issue.

You can look across the Capitol, in the United States Senate they have never utilized proxy voting. They continue to do their work. It is, of course, controlled by Democrats over there. They represent the same States that we represent. They managed to do their business without proxy voting so that everybody has to show up to do their job.

This time is no different than any other time in our Nation's history. There are some people who get ill; there are some people who have surgeries; there are some people who just have other things maybe with their family that takes them away. That is something that we all accommodate, we all recognize as a condition of doing a job that actually requires interaction with other people. The Senate has managed to do it without proxy voting; we would just urge that the House embrace that same approach. We will continue to push for that, which would allow us to do things like 2-minute voting.

Unless the gentleman has anything else, I am prepared to yield back.

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

Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.

On Monday, the House will meet at 12 p.m. for morning hour and 2 p.m. for legislative business, with votes postponed until 6:30 p.m.

On Tuesday and Wednesday, the House will meet at 10 a.m. for morning hour and 12 p.m. for legislative business.

On Thursday, the House will meet at 9 a.m. for legislative business.

Next week, the House will begin our work to advance appropriations bills to fund the government for fiscal year 2023 and consider H.R. 8294, a minibus package of Transportation and Housing and Urban Development; Agriculture and Rural Development; Energy and Water Development; Financial Services and General Government; Interior and Environment; and Military Construction and Veterans Affairs.

The House will also consider Representative Kathy Manning's H.R. 8373, the Right to Contraception Act, which will protect in Federal statute the rights enshrined in Griswold v. Connecticut and Eisenstadt v. Baird.

American women deserve to be able to make decisions about their own bodies and their own lives, including whether to become pregnant and have children.

The House will consider bills under suspension of the rules. A complete list of suspension bills will be announced by the close of business today.

Additional legislative matters are possible.

I thank the gentleman for yielding. I assure you that we will get to discuss and debate and hopefully pass all of these bills at the appropriate time.

However, I am sure the gentleman is aware that Russia's war against Ukraine is driving up prices all over the world--Putin's price hike.

Three weeks ago, the price of crude oil was trading at $115.25 per barrel. It closed yesterday at $96.47 a barrel, a decrease of $18.78 per barrel, or a decrease of 16 percent in almost a month.

The average price for gasoline, a gallon of gas, last month was $5.01. It is now $4.57. It decreased 44 cents, or a decrease of 8 percent, in a month. Funny how that works.

Cuts at the pump are half that of the price of crude, and we are shocked to know that major oil companies are raking in record profits.

The House passed the Lower Food and Fuel Costs Act, which will help ease inflation, which the gentleman voted against and quipped against. This bill helps Americans save money at the gas pump by promoting local, renewable energy production, and it also expands access to E15.

The House also passed the Consumer Fuel Price Gouging Prevention Act to prevent all corporations from prioritizing profits instead of increasing supply. It empowers the FTC to crack down on oil companies that excessively overcharge their consumers for gas just to boost their bottom line.

The President has released historic amounts from our Strategic Petroleum Reserve, a million gallons a day, and expanded access to cheaper E15 gas across the Midwest, among other steps to bring down energy prices.

The Biden administration has approved more drilling permits on public lands in 2021 than the previous administration did each year during the first 3 years in office, 2017, 2018, and 2019.

The Biden administration is also working with our allies and partners around the world to implement a price cap on Russian oil so that we can continue to inflict pain on Putin while minimizing the pain at the pump.

I thank the gentleman for yielding.

I think the gentleman is well aware that the President has certain authorities that he can use, and he is using them. The oil companies have certain responsibilities, and the question is whether or not they are living up to their responsibilities.

I know the gentleman is as aware as I am of all the permits out there that are not being utilized. Of course, we are at the mercy of those corporate decisions. Hopefully, they will be made in due course and in such a way that would bring relief to the American people.

I suspect the consideration of all those bills that you are discussing will be taken up by the leader at the time that he considers to be appropriate. I, along with the gentleman, will continue to consult, and hopefully, we can address all these issues in the very-- let's just say shortly.

Thank you for yielding.

As the gentleman knows, proxy voting has been utilized by both sides of the aisle. I admit it can be a very cumbersome process here on the floor, but we all utilize it. It is done because it serves a very valuable purpose for this institution.

We have made great strides in mitigating the harm of the coronavirus pandemic through vaccines and treatments, but as we both know, the disease continues to spread in both of our home States.

We are hearing numbers that are very concerning. In just this week of this session alone, I know of several Members who have tested positive for COVID and are, therefore, isolating.

These Members can still participate in the process and represent their constituents by using the proxy vote. Of course, having the proxy vote and having 2-minute votes doesn't seem a pretty efficient process to me. We are having a hard time getting it done during 5 minutes.

We just had several 5-minute votes, and I saw on my friend's side of the aisle about 15 people still lined up after the time has expired.

Both of us are being disadvantaged and inconvenienced by this process, but I think it is something that we have to do. I don't know how we could be efficient in this operation with 2-minute voting.

I will pass that along to the leader and hope that he will keep in mind that coronavirus is still here with us, as the gentleman knows.

We serve together on the coronavirus select subcommittee, and we are confronted with issues that still concern the American people. I think that we have to keep all of that in mind as we try to carry out the people's business.