Directing the Clerk of the House of Representatives to make a correction in the engrossment of H.R. 1319.

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 179 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. Cole), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.

General Leave

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

Mr. Speaker, today, the Rules Committee met and reported a rule, House Resolution 179, providing for consideration of H.R. 1, the For the People Act of 2021, under a structured rule. It self- executes a manager's amendment by Chairperson Lofgren and makes in order 56 amendments.

The rule provides 1 hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking member of the Committee on House Administration and provides one motion to recommit.

The rule also provides for consideration of H.R. 1280, the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act of 2021, under a closed rule. The rule provides for 1 hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking member of the Committee on the Judiciary and provides for one motion to recommit.

The rule also deems as passed H. Res. 176, which directs the Clerk of the House of Representatives to make a correction in the engrossment of H.R. 1319, and H. Res. 177, which authorizes candidates for election to the House and Members of the House to file statements with the Clerk regarding the intention to participate or not participate in the small donor financing system for such elections created by H.R. 1.

Mr. Speaker, the House will be considering two pieces of critically important legislation this week that are a long time coming.

H.R. 1, the For the People Act, will expand voting rights, limit partisan gerrymandering, improve election integrity, and revise rules for political spending and government ethics. The 2020 election brought out unprecedented turnout, even in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic. Thanks in large part to voting by mail, more than 159 million Americans voted, the largest total vote turnout in United States history.

What followed was the most heavily scrutinized election in modern history, with our airwaves filled with horrific and dangerous lies that fundamentally damaged many people's faith in our democracy. Yet, through that entire ordeal, not a single shred of evidence of any systemic fraud was ever discovered--none at all.

Voting in this country, however, is far from perfect. Many people, particularly Americans of color and those from low-income families, face tremendous barriers to making their voices heard, from long lines at the polls to discriminatory ID laws.

I believe, and the Democratic majority believes, our national effort should be aimed at eliminating barriers to the ballot. We believe true participatory democracy can only be achieved when everyone--everyone-- is afforded the opportunity to vote. We believe it is better for America that every voice be heard here in Washington, in State capitols, and in city, town, and village halls across our Nation.

It is better for all of our citizens when each and every citizen has a stake in what their government says and what their government does. And we believe it is better for us on the world stage when our democracy shines as a beacon of hope and success for others to emulate.

It is becoming increasingly clear that not everyone believes our national interest is served by greater voter participation. It is held in some quarters that, rather than seeing greater participation as a sign of our democracy's enduring strength, it is instead seen as evidence of a dark, sinister plot. Or perhaps, more cynically, they express that view because suppressing votes, particularly of those with whom they disagree, will improve their chances for electoral success, even though it weakens our democracy.

Rather than trying to build on the successes of record voter turnout, many of my friends on the other side of the aisle would rather turn their backs on those successes and begin an organized effort to change the rules because they didn't like the outcome.

The minority has put forward a narrative that suggests we must choose between two separate paths, accessibility and security. But that is a deliberately false narrative. We can, and we must, achieve both. H.R. 1 is the vehicle to advance both.

The For the People Act places a significant emphasis on election security, in everything from voter registration to ensuring all voting systems are secure with paper ballots and robust election result audits.

The outrage we have heard from Republican leaders in Congress demonstrates how out of touch they are with their own voters. More than two-thirds of likely voters, including 57 percent of Republicans, said they would back the proposals in H.R. 1. Americans want more accountability from their leaders, not less.

They want the influence of money out of politics. They want an end to gerrymandered districts. They want voting to be a celebration of our civil duty, not a constant battle to overcome administrative hurdles.

We owe it to those Americans to create the ethical and accessible democracy that they so richly deserve.

The House will also take up H.R. 1280, the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act. This legislation represents the work of hundreds of legislators and millions of American advocates who have fought for decades for a more equitable future.

This fight is especially personal for me, as my own community of Rochester, New York, has grappled with two recent tragedies that underscore just how necessary police reform truly is.

Just one block from here, on the west pediment of the United States Supreme Court, is a promise to every American: ``Equal justice under law.''

Sadly, we know that for too many Americans, that promise is an empty one. It was an empty promise for Daniel Prude, who, while naked and unarmed, faced a mental health crisis in the streets of Rochester when police arrived on the scene last March. He needed a warm blanket and treatment by a mental health professional. He got neither and died in police custody just days later.

It wasn't true just a month ago for a young girl in my community, who was forcibly restrained and pepper sprayed as she called out for her father. She is 9 years old. A police officer on the scene, impatient with her pleas to see her dad, urged her to stop acting like a child. Her response: ``I am a child.''

It would be laughable if it were not heartbreaking.

Equal justice under law was an empty promise for George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Jacob Blake, and for countless others in every corner of America and for countless more still to come unless we take bold, decisive action.

Indeed, it is up to each of us to make the changes necessary to finally fulfill the promise of equal justice.

The time for incremental change has passed. It is clear that we need a cultural paradigm shift and massive reimagining of our public safety protocols, and that starts with the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act.

The bill prohibits religious, racial, and discriminatory profiling by every police department in America, supported by improved training for officers and comprehensive data collection and tracking to ensure departments are following the law.

It will save lives by banning dangerous police practices, like choke holds and no-knock drug warrants. It will ensure that law enforcement uses deadly force only when absolutely necessary and only after exhausting deescalation tactics.

This legislation would limit the transfer of military-grade equipment to State and local law enforcement because peace, safety, and community trust cannot--cannot--be realized with weapons of war.

The George Floyd Justice in Policing Act will create desperately needed accountability by expanding the use of body-worn cameras and dashboard cameras and eliminating the qualified immunity protections that allow bad actors in law enforcement to stay on the force.

As a whole, this legislation addresses police misconduct, creates greater transparency, and affords victims meaningful avenues for redress. With these policies, we can build trust and we can begin to build cooperation between law enforcement and the communities they are supposed to serve and protect.

We passed both the For the People Act and the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act in the previous Congress, and it is my hope that this year represents a real opportunity to move both bills forward to the President's desk so that we can build stronger democracy and justice for the American people.

Mr. Speaker, I urge Members to support this rule and to support both underlying bills, and I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Mr. Speaker, just a brief comment. As much as it pains me, because I have nothing but incredible admiration and respect for my distinguished colleague, the gentleman from Oklahoma, but when it comes to the question of voting in the United States, the fact is that States right now are working--many of them overtime--to restrict ballot access. That is why it is necessary for the Congress to step forward, as is given us, the power in the Constitution, to make sure that we pass laws that fulfill the dream of voter access for all Americans.

I do also note that I think it would be much easier for us to believe that there is good faith on the other side of the aisle to negotiate some of these items and to perhaps reach compromise, but I find it hard to believe--and I stated this in the Rules Committee--given what happened over the last several months, that we would be in this position, that there is any ability to have a belief in good faith.

It is hard to imagine 60 lawsuits were brought against decisions made by States--not the Federal Government, but States--on the electoral college. Two-thirds of the members of the House Republican Conference-- two-thirds--objected to the results of the electoral college, and, in many cases, States that had Republican leadership and Republicans serving as secretaries of state or as elections commissioners.

So I would suggest that since--for the first time since 1800, when John Adams turned over the keys to the White House to President Jefferson and we observed the first peaceful transfer of power from one party to another, that since that foundational moment in American history over two centuries ago, this is the first time that people in this House have objected so strenuously and systematically to the results of the free and fair election of the American people.

So we are for the people. We want to continue to expand ballot access, and we want nothing more than those wishes of the American public to be respected by their elected officials.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Lofgren), the chair of the Committee on House Administration.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Blumenauer).

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

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate my colleague from Illinois, and I may not agree with him very much on this subject. But I really disagree if he thinks the Committee on Rules today was fun. He must be a heck of a cheap date.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Pennsylvania (Ms. Scanlon), my good friend, and distinguished colleague from the Committee on Rules.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, I do want to again just note, although it has been said ad nauseam for the last several months, that while we clearly respect States' roles in these elections and that it is the States who run elections and organize them, we do have the power in the Congress given to us in the Constitution. But more importantly, this year, while the voters in Georgia, Pennsylvania, and Arizona cast ballots in free and fair and open elections, and those were certified repeatedly despite an onslaught of lawsuits brought by the former President and his advocates, all of which were denied going all the way up to the Supreme Court, our colleagues didn't respect those States' elections even though they were certified and even though, as we all met on what will be one of the darkest days in American history on January 6 to accept and certify those results given to us by the States, my colleagues and friends objected to them.

I am not sure what that says about their respect for State elections since they didn't respect the results of those elections, in many cases run by Republicans in their respective States.

Mr. Speaker, I must say I find this a most curious discussion. If we are not going to abide by the results of elections, and if we are not going to trust those various States to submit elections unless they agree with the outcome that we want, why we would be arguing so strenuously for the continuation of State control and no involvement by the Federal Government, despite the fact that the Constitution clearly vests that power here in the Congress?

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

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

Mr. Speaker, as I indicated when I began my comments this evening, I have nothing but the greatest admiration and respect for the distinguished ranking member of the Rules Committee.

I don't want to be argumentative, but I would note that I think there is a significant and substantial difference between a symbolic objection made by one or two Members to the electoral college results of a single State versus the objection of 140 Members of this House, particularly as it follows a violent, unprecedented attack on what I consider the sacred cathedral of democracy, the United States Capitol.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate very much, as always, the thoughtful comments by my colleague and friend, the distinguished gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. Cole).

Mr. Speaker, as it relates to the question of matters before us here, we do have significant differences in how we view access to the ballot.

I would note that, historically, parties change. They evolve. Typically, because this is in keeping with American democracy, we evolve to reflect the needs and concerns and wishes and results of American elections and their expression of the will of the people of this country.

Mr. Speaker, what I find troubling right now is that friends across the aisle seem to be focused not so much on learning the lessons given to us by those voters, by the American public, as expressed in the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November.

But instead, conscientious, by-design work to limit those who would want access to the ballot so that they can choose the voters, as opposed to the other way around--disenfranchising those, and setting up barriers, as we see happening in State capitals across the country, is troubling indeed. And, I think, it demonstrates the clear division between the two parties on this particular issue.

We seek, and we will always seek, to expand access to make sure that every single American, every single citizen who wants to participate in our democracy has the right, because that is how we end up with a better America, and we fulfill the promise of moving toward a more perfect Union.

Mr. Speaker, I thank all of my colleagues for their words in support of the rule before us today. I urge a ``yes'' vote on the rule and a ``yes'' vote on the previous question.

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

Mr. Speaker, I thank the distinguished gentleman from New York (Mr. Morelle), my very good friend, for yielding me the customary 30 minutes, and I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, today's rule covers two items, both of which will be familiar to Members who were here during the 116th Congress. We are once again considering H.R. 1, a bill that nationalizes our election system and substitutes Washington's judgment for a key responsibility of our States in the administration of free and fair elections. We are also considering H.R. 1280, the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act.

Unfortunately, despite its title, H.R. 1 has nothing at all to do with the people. It is, instead, a bill about preserving the present Democrat majority. It is a bill by Democrats for Democrats. Though the majority claims this bill is about reforming our political system, the reality is that most of the changes in this bill, if enacted into law, would be to benefit the majority to the detriment of the minority.

The most egregious of these provisions are those dedicated to changing our national system of campaign finance. Now, in general, I think this is a worthy goal, but the majority's proposed solution does not make much sense. The majority is proposing to create a new federally funded campaign ATM using corporate fines, ensuring that certain candidates will receive millions of dollars just for running a campaign.

My colleagues in the majority have bemoaned the massive amount of money that has been entering into our campaign system over the past few decades, yet their proposed solution is to dump corporate dollars into the system.

In what world does this make sense?

Even Democrats know what a flawed program this is, which is why today's rule also includes a provision to allow Members of Congress to opt out of this program. Before this bill was even passed by the House, Democrats were already running from it. They should just keep running and pull this bill from the floor.

Other proposed changes in this bill are just egregious. Wherever possible, the majority is attempting to impose one-size-fits-all systems from Washington onto the States. It does this with a one-size- fits-all voter registration system, including forcing States to provide same-day voter registration whether they want to or not.

It takes away the power of the States to choose how to redistrict, forcing them to adopt Washington-imposed ``independent redirecting commissions,'' something that less than 20 percent of the States who undertake redistricting actually do.

These provisions impede the traditional power of the States to control their own elections. As a former secretary of state and election official in my home State of Oklahoma, I find these changes to be particularly concerning.

But what is worse, H.R. 1 also includes severe restrictions on free speech and repeals the Lois Lerner rule, a rule put into place after the IRS began targeting the speech of conservative organizations in determining whether or not they would qualify for tax exempt status. If enacted into law, these provisions would reweaponize the IRS and limit the abilities of organizations, corporations, and individuals to freely exercise this most-important right guaranteed under the Constitution.

How the majority can claim that this bill is for the people when they are blatantly restricting the people's right to free speech is beyond my understanding.

Mr. Speaker, what the majority is attempting today is egregious. Changing the national campaign finance system to benefit themselves, taking traditional powers away from the States, and restricting the right of free speech are all part of an unprecedented power grab.

I strongly urge the majority to change course, and I urge my colleagues to reject this terrible bill.

Today, we are also considering H.R. 1280, the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act. As with H.R. 1, this bill will be familiar to our returning Members, as the House passed an identical bill last summer.

Unfortunately, while I think this bill is well-intentioned, it, too, is misguided. Reforms contained in H.R. 1280 will do more harm than good. I do not doubt the majority's good intentions with this legislation.

The George Floyd Justice in Policing Act came about following the tragic events of last summer. George Floyd's death demonstrated what so many Americans know only too well, that abuses of power clearly exist and must be grappled with.

And while the overwhelming majority of law enforcement officers faithfully and bravely carry out their duties and responsibilities each day, all too often many Americans receive different treatment due to the color of their skin. Americans across the country rightly condemn this horrific and unacceptable act.

Unfortunately, rather than choosing to come together to legislate in a bipartisan manner, the majority chose to take the exact opposite course last summer, and we are once again considering the same flawed and deeply partisan bill we considered then and that the Senate failed to take up. I believe this bill will face the same result, should the House pass it again this week.

During the last Congress, when the Judiciary Committee met to mark up this bill, the majority completely shut out Republicans from the process. Republicans made good-faith attempts to work with the Democrats to find common ground on needed reforms, yet every single one of these attempts were rejected.

This year, the majority has not even deigned to bring this bill to a markup in the Judiciary Committee, and, once again, the majority has shut Republicans out of the process.

This is no way to legislate on an issue that is this important, Mr. Speaker. Republicans and Democrats alike agree that reforms are necessary. We all watched the tragedy of George Floyd unfold last summer and we all watched the resulting protests. We all agree that action is necessary. But rather than working together in the best interest of the American people, the majority is once again telling Republicans that they can only have a

Hobson's choice. They can take the Democrats' bill or they can take the Democrats' bill with no other options.

But I, along with my fellow Republicans, reject that idea. We fully recognize the critical need for reform. My colleagues, both in the House and in the Senate, have put together our own package, the JUSTICE Act, filled with bipartisan reforms that could pass both the House and the Senate and be signed into law quickly. These reforms include critical measures, like providing funding for body cameras for police officers, requiring deescalation procedures, and banning choke holds.

My colleague, Representative Stauber, offered this as an amendment at the Rules Committee earlier today, but, once again, the majority chose to shut out Republicans and refused to make this amendment in order.

That is a sad state of affairs, Mr. Speaker, but the real losers here are the American people. This is an issue we can and should cooperate on. I urge my colleagues in the majority to rethink the path they are on. On an issue that is this important and this critical to the American people, the very best thing we can do is work together. And with a reduced majority, I think that would actually be good political advice for my friends.

We can work on bipartisan reforms together and we can produce consensus legislation that has the buy-in of Members on both sides. Unfortunately, the majority has once again chosen the opposite path: Partisan bills filled with provisions that do not reflect the best interest or consensus of the country.

We can do better than that, Mr. Speaker. The American people deserve better.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Reschenthaler), my good friend, also a member of the Committee on Rules.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Rodney Davis), my very good friend, and the distinguished ranking member of the Committee on House Administration.

Mr. Speaker, my friend and I disagree on the two pieces of legislation today, but we absolutely agree that the Committee on Rules' meeting was not fun.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from Georgia (Mrs. Greene), my friend.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Westerman), my very good friend and the ranking member of the House Committee on Natural Resources.

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

Mr. Speaker, just quickly to my friend from New York, I wasn't here, and he wasn't here, but our friends thought to challenge in this Chamber the election in 2001, after 2000. I was here in 2004 when they challenged a State and demanded a recount. Then, I was here in 2017 when my friends on the other side sought to challenge 10 different States. So, let's not act like this is somehow unusual.

Mr. Speaker, another part of today's rule includes a provision to deem passed a correction to last week's budget reconciliation measure. Given that the majority now wishes to reopen last week's reconciliation, it is certainly appropriate to further amend that resolution to correct one of the more egregious provisions in it.

If we defeat the previous question, I will offer an amendment to the rule to immediately adopt H. Res. 178, an engrossment correction to strike funding in the budget reconciliation bill for the Pelosi subway tunnel in California and instead direct the $140 million to support mental health and suicide prevention in States where children do not have the option of in-person instruction in school.

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

Mr. Speaker, I urge a ``no'' vote on the previous question.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentlewoman from Oklahoma (Mrs. Bice), my good friend, for further explanation of the amendment.

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

Mr. Speaker, obviously, I oppose the rule. The majority is proposing two significant pieces of legislation today that are, unfortunately, both deeply partisan. In neither case has the majority allowed Republicans to be involved in the process of legislating.

Mr. Speaker, on H.R. 1, the majority is proposing a deeply troubling takeover of election practices that will benefit only Democrats. The bill will take away the traditional powers of the States to run their own elections as they see fit, imposing a one-size-fits-all regime from Washington.

It dumps huge amounts of corporate money into the campaign finance system, particularly benefiting certain candidates. It imposes severe restrictions on free speech that are anathema to a free and fair election.

On H.R. 1280, the majority is once again seeking to pass the same flawed police reform bill it passed last Congress.

Mr. Speaker, we had a real opportunity here for both Democrats and Republicans to work together to pass real reforms for the American people. Instead of taking ``yes'' for an answer, the majority is instead seeking to impose a deeply partisan bill that will not fix the problems or help heal the American people.

Mr. Speaker, we deserve better than that. The American people are best served when their Representatives in Congress can come together and work in a bipartisan manner. One side attempting to impose partisan legislation on the country does us all a disservice.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to rethink this path, reject both of these bills, and return to the negotiating table and work with Republicans for a brighter future for all Americans.

Mr. Speaker, I mean this with all sincerity. There is a great gap between us on H.R. 1. We just simply look at this matter differently. I think it is egregious partisan overreach. On H.R. 1280, there really is an opportunity for bipartisan cooperation. The JUSTICE Act that Mr. Stauber filed last year and presented today as an amendment has a great deal in common with some of the objectives I know my friends want to achieve on their side of the aisle.

Mr. Speaker, in an almost evenly divided House and an evenly divided Senate that still has the filibuster, you can't do things by reconciliation every day. Most days, to get much done, it is going to require bipartisan cooperation.

We often say that never happens. The reality is it happens a lot more than people acknowledge. Five times last year we came together as Republicans and Democrats and passed COVID relief packages that made a big difference in this country. We also passed the spending bill on a bipartisan basis that funded the government for this entire fiscal year. We did that in the middle of a Presidential election year that was extraordinarily divisive.

Mr. Speaker, we can work together. I would ask my friends to rethink the course of the reconciliation bill and now these two pieces of legislation and start thinking about where we can actually get things done. I think the George Floyd bill, H.R. 1280, is one of those places. I also think the appropriations process can be one of those places. We can probably even find some common ground on some of the electoral issues, although personally, in my view, H.R. 1 is a very flawed piece of legislation.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my friend from New York for the debate and tell him that, despite our disagreements on these two pieces of legislation, I look forward to working with him. I don't think either of these are likely to get through the United States Senate. I do think we can get a product back from the United States Senate that both of us might be able to vote for, in terms of police justice and overhaul. We will wait and see what happens with H.R. 1. I am less optimistic we will ever see it again, but I am happy to say good-bye to it out of this Chamber.

Mr. Speaker, I urge rejection of the rule and I urge rejection of both underlying pieces of legislation.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, I thank Ranking Member Cole and the Committee on Rules. It was a fun day up there for a few hours.

This nearly 800-page bill that, if signed into law, would impact millions of Americans' right to vote and to participate in the political process, was introduced on January 4 of this year. And the first and only hearing on H.R. 1 was held just 4 days ago, in the smallest committee in Congress.

Democrats on the Committee on House Administration also decided a markup of this bill wasn't needed, despite the fact that both the bill itself and the membership of our committee have changed since last Congress. This is especially concerning since Democrats changed House floor rules this Congress to weaken the MTR, making committees the only real opportunity for the minority to provide an alternative. But now, they are not even doing that. They are not even holding a markup on this major elections bill.

This bill was rushed. And I guarantee most of my colleagues supporting this bill have no idea how this bill would really impact elections or political speech. But I bet they do know that if this bill were to become law, they would get a lot more funds for their own campaigns through the public financing provision.

H.R. 1, the for the politicians act, includes hundreds of pages of mandates on States and local election administrators. At the only hearing Congress has held on this massive bill, the minority's witness was the only person on the panel with experience in actually running elections. And he told this committee that it would be unworkable in States like his.

Mr. Speaker, we should be reviewing the issues that we saw during the 2020 election cycle and helping States develop a better process. Simply mandating how States run their elections is not only unconstitutional, but it will lead to chaos and confusion for voters.

The for the politicians act creates a first-ever fund to publicly finance our own congressional campaigns by providing corporate money, the first corporate dollars allowed into individual Members of Congress' campaigns since 1907, laundered through the Federal Government and into Members of Congress' own campaigns.

Provisions in this bill also attack free speech protections under the First Amendment. We did not have any hearings on the impact of changing the current bipartisan balance of the Federal Election Commission to a partisan makeup or the effect that a ``speech czar'' will have on people's ability to participate in the political process.

Mr. Speaker, this bill is terrible. This bill doesn't address the important issues that deserve hearings. Any bill to fundamentally change our elections or restrict our freedom of speech needs--at the very least--to go through regular order. The American people deserve to know what is in this bill and the real-life impact it will have on them.

Mr. Speaker, I urge a ``no'' vote on the rule and on the underlying bill, and I figure my time has expired since you have the gavel.

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the gentleman's courtesy.

Mr. Speaker, H.R. 1 is the most significant democracy reform package in a generation. It will make it easier to vote--regardless of income, ability, geography, or race; ends the domination of big money in politics; and enacts tougher ethics standards to ensure that public officials actually work for the American people.

Mr. Speaker, I am particularly proud of three provisions that I helped incorporate into this bill:

Bringing the Oregon vote-by-mail model nationwide;

Paving the way for all States to offer vote-by-mail and early voting;

And automatic voter registration for individuals interacting with State agencies.

Mr. Speaker, this is personal for me. I started my political career as a college student, testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee on the constitutional amendment to lower the voting age. I spent 2 years of my life working in Oregon on that and on the national campaign. Subsequently, I was on a national commission from the Ford Foundation, the National League of Women Voters, and the Civic League to deal with how we were to reform the election process to make it more uniform and easier for the American people.

Mr. Speaker, I was proud of that work, but I am a little embarrassed that that was four decades ago and we are still talking about the need for those reforms. And as my colleagues have mentioned, there are people right now in various State legislatures that are actively continuing a process of making it hard for Americans to vote. This is embarrassing. This isn't just a matter of what happened with civil rights, this has been refined as a high art to be able to gerrymander people into unrepresentative patterns that undercuts the ability of politicians selecting their voters, rather than people selecting their politicians.

Mr. Speaker, I have been pained by the lies that have been made about mail-in voting. I am the first Member of the House of Representatives to be elected as a result of a mail-in ballot. We pioneered that in 1996, and we have continued to pioneer that effort. And it is secure, it is convenient, it saves money for local government. It allows people to process this in their own home, in their own time, in their own way. In an era of the pandemic, it provides health--keeping older poll workers from being exposed.

The notion that somehow this is a problem that justified some of the outrageous statements and behavior, defies description.

Mr. Speaker, I am pained with this misrepresentation that the President of the United States would denigrate mail-in balloting while he, in fact, does it. This has been done by Republicans and Democrats alike. It is secure. It is safe. And it helps the American people.

Mr. Speaker, I strongly urge approval of H.R. 1 and rejection of the bogus claims about the problems alleged with mail-in ballots. It is the most secure. It is the most effective. And it is one that I think the public deserves.

Mr. Speaker, if we defeat the previous question today, we will call up a resolution that I introduced, H. Res. 178, which would instruct the House Clerk to modify the text of H.R. 1319, the American Rescue Plan Act, to direct $140 million from Speaker Pelosi's pork subway project and to instead put those funds toward critical mental health services for the Nation's children who have continued to suffer in isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic.

My resolution would ensure that mental health and suicide prevention services are provided in States where children do not have the option of in-person instruction in school, as isolation has been a major driver of mental health impacts on our Nation's kids.

Mr. Speaker, children across this Nation have been disproportionately affected by the mental health impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. A study by the National Institutes of Health found that social isolation has had a significant impact on America's children. Social isolation during quarantine has caused many to develop feelings of sadness, anxiety, and loneliness.

Unfortunately, a study by the American Academy of Pediatrics found that there has been an increase in suicides among children following the imposition of stay-at-home orders last year.

Another study by the Virginia Pediatrics Association found a 90 percent rise in cases among children involving depression, anxiety, and academic struggles.

Mr. Speaker, there is hope. The CDC recently released new guidelines that recommend students return to in-person instruction where it can be done safely. Dr. Anthony Fauci himself has backed these new guidelines and has spoken in support of getting our Nation's kids back in school.

The feelings of social isolation felt by so many children today can be quickly alleviated by reopening our schools. In areas of the country where reopenings are not happening, my resolution would provide $140 million to bolster mental healthcare for these affected children. I think we can all agree that the mental health impacts on our children should be swiftly addressed on a bipartisan basis.

Mr. Speaker, let me state again that America's children deserve the very best. Let's defeat the previous question today so that we can provide needed relief and critical mental health services

to children who are suffering across the Nation.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote to defeat the previous question.