Providing for consideration of the bill (H.R. 256) to repeal the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution of 2002; providing for consideration of the bill (H.R. 1187) to provide for disclosure of additional material information about public companies and establish a Sustainable Finance Advisory Committee, and for other purposes; and for other purposes.

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 473, I call up the bill (H.R. 1187) to provide for disclosure of additional material information about public companies and establish a Sustainable Finance Advisory Committee, and for other purposes, and ask for its immediate consideration in the House.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Member may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks on H.R. 1187 and to insert extraneous material thereon.

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

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 1187, the Corporate Governance Improvement and Investor Protection Act.

H.R. 1187 is a package of bills designed to strengthen investor protections and require companies to provide environmental, social, and governance disclosures, known as ESG. I thank my colleague, Representative Juan Vargas, for his leadership on this package.

This bill provides investors with critical information on ESG matters by requiring public companies to disclose key information to shareholders regarding corporate political spending, worker pay, CEO compensation, climate risk, and country-by-country tax reporting; and provides issuers with clear, consistent standards to disclose this information.

This is key information that investors have been demanding in order to make the best decisions on the short- and long-term viability of the companies they are investing in.

It is surprising that, to this day, there are no explicit ESG requirements and investors are left to piece together the story of a company's material risk with insufficient information. This is unacceptable.

So I am pleased that this package of bills will improve investor protections by holding public companies accountable and providing greater transparency.

This package includes a number of bills authored by several hardworking members of the Financial Services Committee, specifically: Representative Juan Vargas, Representative Bill Foster, Representative Nydia Velazquez, Representative Sean Casten, and Representative Cindy Axne.

Specifically, Mr. Vargas' bill, the ESG Disclosure Simplification Act, requires public companies to disclose certain ESG information to shareholders, as well as the impact of the ESG policies on their strategies.

Mr. Foster's bill, the Shareholder Political Transparency Act, requires public companies to submit quarterly reports to the SEC on any and all political expenditures, including dark money.

Ms. Velazquez's bill, the Greater Accountability in Pay Act, sheds light on pay disparities, helping to close the gender and racial pay gap.

Ms. Axne's bill, the Disclosure of Tax Havens and Offshoring Act, requires disclosures that discourage companies'

use of tax havens and encourages repatriation of taxes to the United States.

Mr. Casten's bill, the Climate Risk Disclosure Act, requires disclosures that encourages companies to plan for the impact of climate change on their company.

Each of these bills passed the Financial Services Committee with unanimous Democratic support. I thank all these Members for their work on these bills, their contributions to the legislative package, and their leadership on these important reforms to protect investors and hold corporations accountable.

This package is the right thing to do for investors and our markets. It is past time that Congress make ESG requirements explicit. For these reasons, I urge my colleagues to support the bill.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Vargas), our leader and the real sponsor on this legislation.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Casten).

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Iowa (Mrs. Axne).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Connecticut (Mr. Himes).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from Illinois (Ms. Underwood).

Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record letters from California Public Employees' Retirement System, Public Citizen, the North American Securities Administrators Association, and Principles for Responsible Investment.

California Public Employees' Retirement System, Executive

Office,

June 14, 2021.

Subject: H.R. 1187, The Corporate Governance Improvement and

Investor Protection Act.

Hon. Nancy Pelosi

Speaker, House of Representatives,

Washington, DC.

Hon. Kevin McCarthy,

Minority Leader, House of Representatives,

Washington, DC

Dear Speaker Pelosi and Minority Leader McCarthy: On behalf

of the California Public Employees' Retirement System, I

write to express support for the overall direction of H.R.

1187, the ``Corporate Governance Improvement and Investor

Protection Act,'' which would require public companies to

disclose material information on the link between

environmental, social, and governance (ESG) metrics and their

long-term business strategy, as well as political

expenditures, compensation practices, climate-related risk

and tax expenditures, among other issues. This bill will

improve and enhance corporate disclosures essential to

maintaining the competitiveness of U.S. financial markets.

As the largest public defined benefit pension fund in the

United States, we manage approximately $465 billion in global

assets on behalf of more than two million members. Our

fiduciary duty requires that we take a long-term view in

assessing whether the companies that we hold in our portfolio

are effectively managed and able to provide the sustainable,

risk-adjusted returns that allow us to meet our commitments

to pay benefits earned by these dedicated active and retired

public servants for decades to come.

We fundamentally depend on the integrity and efficiency of

financial markets to meet these commitments and rely upon

financial reporting to provide transparent and relevant

information about the economic performance, conditions, and

operations of the

companies in which we invest. We believe corporate disclosure

of material financial information is a precondition to

maintaining effective and consistent corporate accountability

and sustainable economic growth. As the Securities and

Exchange Commission (``SEC'') has said in the past:

``Only through the steady flow of timely, comprehensive,

and accurate information can people make sound investment

decisions. The result of this information flow is a far more

active, efficient, and transparent capital market that

facilitates the capital formation so important to our

nation's economy.''

Critically, CalPERS and other pension funds are inhibited

from adequately exercising their fiduciary duty without such

disclosures. Disclosure of material financial information is

necessary to close the information gap that occurs when

management of a company is aware or should be aware of

certain risks, yet such information is not available to

shareowners. We believe H.R. 1187 will address critical areas

in which more high-quality, consistent, and comparable

disclosures by public issuers are necessary, and build a more

robust reporting regime that enhances shareowner value over

the long-term. We are pleased that the following measures,

which CalPERS has been on the record in supporting, are

included in the Corporate Governance Improvement and Investor

Protection Act:

H.R. 1187, the ESG Disclosure Simplification Act, which

would, among other things, require issuers to disclose

certain ESG metrics to shareholders, the connection between

those metrics and the issuer's long-term business strategy,

and the method by which the issuer determines how ESG metrics

impact its long-term strategy. We believe the current quality

and quantity of relevant ESG reporting does not meet

investors' needs and support the SEC playing a prominent role

in standardizing and assuring the accuracy of ESG data

reporting, and that it is reflected in company financials.

H.R. 1087, the Shareholder Political Transparency Act,

which would require public companies to disclose detailed

information about their political spending to the SEC and

shareholders in specified quarterly and annual reports. The

CalPERS Governance & Sustainability Principles call for

responsible board oversight, including disclosures of

corporate charitable and political activity to ensure

alignment with business strategy and to protect assets on

behalf of shareowners. As fiduciaries, we need to know how

our capital is being used, including if and when political

expenditures are made. SEC rulemaking would bring clarity and

consistency in the format and scope of disclosures and

provide a cost-effective alternative to private ordering.

Furthermore, political expenditure disclosure is consistent

with the SEC's requirement for public companies to disclose

meaningful financial information and would encourage prudent

use of corporate shareowner resources for political

activities.

H.R. 2570, the Climate Risk Disclosure Act, which would

require public companies to report financial risks posed to

them by climate change, the processes they use to identify

those risks, and the actions they take to mitigate those

risks. Our investment strategy is to make sure our portfolio

is resilient to short-term and long-term risks, both of which

include some dimension of climate change. We seek to find the

investment opportunities that the energy transition brings,

and to bring down emissions that contribute to global

warming. We believe it is vital that companies identify,

manage, and disclose material environmental risks and

opportunities relevant to their short-term and long-term

success. We support the establishment of a uniform reporting

regime for climate change risk disclosures that would address

key issues that impact shareowner value, including minimizing

risk, maximizing returns, and ensuring accountability from

all those involved.

H.R. 3007, the Disclosure of Tax Havens and Offshoring Act,

which would require public companies to annually disclose

information on their subsidiaries and specified country-by-

country financial information including total pre-tax

profits, total amounts paid in State, Federal, and foreign

taxes, employees, and tangible assets. As an investor in many

of the largest public companies in the world, we are acutely

aware of the complexities of international taxes, and the

increasingly important role that taxes play in corporate

profitability. However, current tax disclosures in the United

States do not provide investors with sufficient tax-related

information to adequately assess companies' valuations and

risks. We believe increasing transparency and requiring the

disclosure of overly aggressive international tax planning

arrangements helps to reduce systemic risk that threatens

global markets and ensure stronger long-term outcomes.

In addition, we are supportive of including additional

provisions in the Corporate Governance Improvement and

Investor Protection Act, such as the following disclosures

related to human capital management, board diversity, and

cybersecurity:

H.R. 3471, the Workforce Investment Disclosure Act, which

would require public companies to disclose information about

their Human Capital Management (HCM) policies, practices, and

performance in their annual reports. CalPERS expects fair,

accurate, and timely reporting on how companies identify and

manage risks related to the three forms of capital:

financial, physical, and human. The fact that there are few

standards for measuring and reporting on human capital topics

makes it difficult for investors to truly understand related

risks and opportunities when assessing individual companies.

We believe that rules-based disclosures with numeric metrics

provide crucial information to long-term investors, like

CalPERS, who are concerned about sustainability over time. We

have made recommendations in our comment letter on the SEC's

proposed rulemaking under Regulation S-K for metrics that

should be disclosed by all registrants, including the number

of full-time, part-time, and contingent workers; employee

turnover rates; health and safety, employee engagement and

diversity statistics.

H.R. 1277, the Improving Corporate Governance Through

Diversity Act, which would require public companies to

annually disclose the voluntary, self-identified racial,

ethnic, gender, and veteran status of their board of

directors, nominees, and senior executives, and establishes

an advisory group to recommend strategies to increase

diversity in these leadership positions. We support

initiatives that promote talent diversity--including a broad

range of education, experience, thoughts, perspectives, and

competencies--to help enable effective board leadership. We

view board diversity in terms of skill sets, sex, age,

nationality, race, sexual orientation, gender identity,

disability, and historically underrepresented groups, and

believe requiring public companies to annually disclose the

self-identified racial, ethnic, gender, and veteran status of

their board of directors, nominees, and senior executives is

an important step toward challenging ``group think'' in

corporate boardrooms and C-suites, which can severely limit

companies' ability to innovate and effectively engage with

shareowners and other stakeholders.

Mr. Speaker, I have no further speakers, and I am prepared to close. I reserve the balance of my time until the gentleman from Michigan yields back.

Madam Speaker, may I inquire as to how much time is remaining.

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

Madam Speaker, this bill provides urgently needed investor protections by requiring the Securities and Exchange Commission to adopt clear, consistent standards for ESG metrics. Without the information requirements in this bill, investors are left with inconsistent information across companies and are ultimately unable to fully assess their investment decisions.

Investors deserve to know the risks they are exposed to with relation to climate change, political expenditures, and other important factors. We must make this right and take action to bring accountability to public companies.

Some or all of the provisions of this package have been supported by Public Citizen, AFL-CIO, SEIU, California Public Employees' Retirement System, Americans for Financial Reform, Council of Institutional Investors, United Nations Principles for Responsible Investment, Americans for Tax Fairness, North American Securities Administrators Association, FACT Coalition, Oxfam America, Ceres, and Sierra Club, among others.

For years, investors and market participants have been demanding more and better disclosures regarding ESG matters, which research shows can have significant impacts on the short- and long-term values of companies.

For example, a report issued by the BlackRock Investment Institute found that companies that score high on ESG measures are better able to adapt to environmental and societal changes, use resources more efficiently, have more productive employees, and tend to face lower risk of reputational damage and regulatory action.

Matters related to climate risk, the ways companies invest in their workers and further diversity, spend their cash on political expenditures, their global human rights records, their tax avoidance strategies, and how they invest in crucial corporate infrastructure such as cybersecurity are all significant and material factors in companies' short- and long-term viability.

Investors, who are the true owners of our Nation's public companies, recognize the importance of this information to their decisionmaking and have been demanding this information for years.

For example, in 2018, a coalition of public pension funds asset managers and others representing over $5 trillion in assets petitioned the SEC for rulemaking on mandatory ESG disclosures. Over 2,300 investment managers, asset managers, and service providers representing over $80 trillion in assets under management have become signatories to the United Nations Principles for Responsible Investment, which commits to incorporating ESG factors into their investment decisions.

A group of 35 institutional investors representing over $6.6 trillion in assets form the Human Capital Management Coalition has petitioned the SEC to adopt rules to require issuers to disclose information related to their human capital management policies, practices, and performance.

When the SEC solicited comments on political spending disclosures in 2011, it received over one million comments; by far more comments than any other SEC rulemaking petition, and the vast majority of which were overwhelmingly favorable. Yet the SEC's efforts were stymied because the Senate minority leader has personally insisted on statutorily prohibiting the SEC from even studying the issue.

However, we are currently without clear, consistent standards for this information to be disclosed. Investors will continue to be left in the dark. It is time we give investors and markets the information they have been demanding for so long.

And let me be absolutely clear about who we are fighting for. The other side has taken up the issue, as it tends to want to protect these big public corporations from disclosures.

It is for the American workers, the retirees, who worked their whole lives to save for retirement, for the public pension funds investing on behalf of our Nation's teachers and our firefighters, and other frontliners. We are fighting to ensure they have been given the tools they need to protect what they have worked so hard for, to achieve the American Dream.

So I would urge all of my colleagues who are concerned about not only the retail investors, but concerned about the institutional investors who are responsible for these teachers and these firefighters and these others that I have alluded to, and their ability to feel safe and comfortable that decisions are being made that are in the best interest of the people who are invested in them.

So I would ask for an ``aye'' vote on this very, very comprehensive and serious legislation.

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

Madam Speaker, I claim time in opposition to the amendment.

Madam Speaker, I strongly oppose Mr. Burgess' amendment. This amendment is interesting to me because Republicans have, without fail, consistently cited the materiality standard both here on the House floor and in the Financial Services Committee as a basis to oppose very important disclosures.

Republicans have argued over and over again that we do not need to enact any new disclosures because companies are already required to disclose any and all material information. But, with this amendment, it seems their purported commitment to materiality has gone out the window so that they can bring attention to their massive tax cuts for the rich.

In 2018, when the United States Government should have been focused on growing the real economy for American workers, the former President pushed forward the largest tax giveaway to our country's largest corporations and executives in history. This government handout provided corporations and executives with $2 trillion in tax cuts and giveaways, saddling the United States Government with debt.

Make no mistake, these tax cuts did not go primarily to workers, but, instead, they went overwhelmingly to the top 1 percent. The year after the Trump tax cuts were implemented, public companies spent nearly $1 trillion in stock buybacks, rather than investing in research and development, increasing worker wages, or shoring up their bottom lines to make sure they could weather times of crisis.

According to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, Trump's tax plan gave the top 400 highest income taxpayers an additional $15 million per year. Compare this to the $2.8 million the average college graduate will earn in their lifetime.

This amendment absolutely and completely ignores the harm done to hardworking Americans and focuses on alleged harm to the large corporations. This amendment suggests our Nation's largest companies should not be paying their fair share, while American workers are forced to pay for Republicans' corporate handouts.

Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to reject this amendment, and I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Mr. Burgess' amendment is a gimmick intended to distract from the important goals of this package. It insinuates that corporations should not be paying their fair share, while hardworking taxpayers foot the bill. So I urge my colleagues to join me in rejecting Mr. Burgess' amendment.

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

Madam Speaker, pursuant to section 4 of House Resolution 473, I offer amendments en bloc.

Madam Speaker, I rise in support of the amendments en bloc, and I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Speaker, I rise in strong support of this en bloc package of Democratic amendments to H.R. 1187, the Corporate Governance Improvement and Investor Protection Act.

These amendments include critical provisions offered by my colleagues, Representative Himes, Representative Axne, Representative Phillips, Representative Wexton, Representative Frankel, and Representative Meeks.

These provisions strengthen H.R. 1187 by requiring public companies to disclose key information related to cybersecurity, corporate board diversity, human rights abuses, human capital management, and the ways companies are investing in and protecting their workforce.

Investors, the true owners of public companies, need this information because of the significant effects they can have on the bottom lines and operations of the companies they are investing their hard-earned money in. Investors need this information to hold companies accountable.

Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support these important measures, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from Iowa (Mrs. Axne).

Madam Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Meeks).

Madam Speaker, I yield an additional 30 seconds to the gentleman from New York.

Madam Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from Florida (Ms. Lois Frankel).

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

I urge my colleagues to join me in standing up for our Nation's investors and workers to vote ``yes'' for these Democratic amendments.

I do believe that Mr. Huizenga correctly described who they are working for. He just talked about how big these corporations are and how much they have to manage.

Of course, prior to him, Mr. Burgess talked about, yes, the tax breaks that they receive, and they should receive more tax breaks. However, they are worried about these corporations and their ability to comply, despite the fact they have all of the accountants they need, they have all of the personnel they need, they have all of the management they need. They have everything that they need to be in compliance.

We are simply saying it is time for them to disclose information that the investors have been asking and begging for.

And, of course, they often refer to the retail investors. But the institutional investors must be included in this decision because they are the ones that are in control of the teachers and the firefighters and the workers on the front lines and all of that money that they are investing for them, and they have got to protect them. The way that you protect them is making sure that the investors understand how to make good decisions based on information.

If the big corporations, with all that they have to be able to operate, do not give them this information, do not have this information, do not share this information, they are at a great disadvantage.

And so I would simply ask my colleagues to understand whose side we are on. We are on the side of the retail investors and the institutional investors who are handling all of the money of our frontline workers who are investing for their retirement.

I would ask for a ``yea'' vote on these en bloc amendments.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, I claim time in opposition.

Mr. Speaker, I strongly oppose the amendment offered by Mr. Hill. This amendment would gut the entirety of H.R. 1187. Bizarrely, this amendment offered by my colleague has an odd focus on climate change, suggesting that we need more study about the financial risk of climate change. Let me be very clear: climate change is real. We cannot alter the Earth's orbit or the Moon's orbit or click our heels three times and wish for climate change to magically disappear.

In fact, the impacts of climate change are already apparent and are affecting global financial markets. Unfortunately, studies show that market prices currently fail to factor in the risks of climate change to the tune of trillions of dollars.

Mr. Hill's amendment would also allow companies to continue to engage in legally risky tax-avoidance schemes to funnel limitless amounts of corporate dark money into politics and to enrich CEOs while worker wages remain stagnant. This is precisely the information that investors want to know about the companies that they own.

I urge my colleagues to reject this amendment. I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Mr. Hill's amendment would completely gut H.R. 1187 and would prevent investors from accessing critical environmental, social, and governance information that they need to make the best investment decisions possible and hold the companies they own accountable.

I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on Mr. Hill's amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, this amendment offered by Representative Schrier requires the SEC to work with the Office of the Advocate for Small Business Capital Formation and the Office of the Investor Advocate to study the issues smaller public companies may face in reporting ESG disclosures, and to make recommendations for the SEC to consider.

Disclosures of ESG-related matters are critical to investors in markets, and it is imperative that public companies provide investors, the true owners of these companies, with this important information. However, it is just as important for us to ensure that public companies of all sizes are able to comply with these disclosure requirements.

To address this, my colleague, Representative Schrier, has introduced an amendment that requires the SEC to work with the Office of the Advocate for Small Business Capital Formation and the Office of the Investor Advocate to study the issues that smaller public companies face in disclosing ESG matters, and to make recommendations for the SEC to tailor these disclosure requirements to assist smaller public companies.

Ms. Schrier's amendment, along with Mr. Vargas' provision in H.R. 1187, will help smaller public companies by ensuring that the SEC is factoring in the unique issues that smaller public companies face while also creating clear, consistent regulatory standards that reduce regulatory uncertainty, all while providing investors and markets with this critical information.

Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays. The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to section 3(s) of House Resolution 8, the yeas and nays are ordered.

Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX, further proceedings on this question are postponed.

Amendment No. 10 Offered by Ms. Plaskett.

Mr. Speaker, I understand that my friend and colleague, Ms. Plaskett, has raised some concerns about the treatment of territories in this bill, and I want to assure her that the staff has done everything possible in the bill text to ensure that territories are included in this bill and not treated disparately.

The language in this bill is consistent with regulations promulgated under the Obama administration regarding country-by-country tax reporting, which were carefully written to ensure territories were not excluded.

I want to make clear that nothing in this bill should be intended to suggest that territories are tax havens. In fact, I have worked with my colleague, Mr. San Nicolas, on this bill text. We believe that the enhanced disclosures in this bill, which will include territories, should help encourage investment in the territories and hold corporations accountable for lack of investment in territories.

I want to ensure Ms. Plaskett that I take her concerns seriously, and I intend to work with her to make sure that what she is identifying as perhaps incorrectly being defined as tax havens is an issue that I will deal with.

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

I am opposed to this bill, and I rise in opposition to H.R. 1187.

Mr. Speaker, today, my Democrat colleagues, once again, are seeking to hijack our securities laws to push leftwing political and social agendas, despite dressing it up as investor protection.

Make no mistake, this bill will increase costs on publicly owned companies, discourage private companies from going public; and, frankly, could encourage not only private companies to stay private, but even have and entice public companies to go back to being private companies.

This is going to result in fewer investment opportunities for everyday American investors, also known as our constituents, who are saving for retirement, a college education or simply looking to just build a better life.

In short, this bill will increase the number of government-directed, mandatory disclosure requirements on publicly traded companies, which will increase compliance costs on companies and divert company resources that could have been used to create more jobs.

Now, to be fair, this is a job-creation bill. However, the only jobs created by this bill will be for a special tranche of attorneys, corporate compliance coordinators, and the occasional scientist; not exactly what an economist would call productive-types of jobs.

Under this bill, public companies would be required to disclose:

Environmental, social, and governance issues, as well as climate risk. These metrics would be set by the Securities and Exchange Commission, not Congress;

Descriptions of any expenditure for political activities and donations to political candidates or trade organizations by executives, these are duplicative of existing requirements, for example;

The ratio between the pay raise percentage of the company's executives and the pay raise percentage of the company's median employee. This is, in some ways, duplicative of the mandatory CEO pay ratio disclosure that Democrats put into the Dodd-Frank Act, which itself is an especially useless metric; country-by-country tax and financial reports from multinational enterprises. This will upend the current country-by-country tax reporting rules overseen by the IRS.

Mr. Speaker, let's be clear. My friends across the aisle are using the Federal securities laws to implement their partisan wish list of social policy priorities. They are doing it through mandatory disclosure regimes that are, at best, tangentially related to actual investment decisions.

To be clear, if information presents a material investment risk to a publicly traded company, the company is--wait for this--already required to disclose it. That information is out there for those companies that have material risk.

Materiality has been, and continues to be, the touchstone of our public company disclosure regime for more than eight decades and has actually even been affirmed by the U.S. Supreme Court. It has held the test of time, and we simply cannot just discard it to appeal to the Democrats' progressive agenda.

Our capital markets are the best in the world in no small part because materiality is the basis of our disclosure regime here in the United States, yet my Democrat friends, apparently, want to throw it all away for the sake of appealing to leftwing stakeholders.

Additionally, H.R. 1187 will greatly expand the SEC's jurisdiction by requiring the SEC to promulgate disclosures on environmental, climate change, political spending, tax reporting, and foreign policy issues, among others.

This is not the sweet spot for the SEC. It does not have the experience in any of these issues, and is not the appropriate entity for determining these metrics or industry standards, nor is the Securities and Exchange Commission the appropriate entity to review and enforce such disclosures.

The SEC knows how to regulate materiality. That is their expertise. They are not climatologists or climate scientists. They are not election law experts. And they most certainly do not know international tax law. That is the purview of the EPA, NOAA, the FEC, and the IRS.

Furthermore, smaller public companies will bear the burden of additional compliance costs. This bill fails to account for the impact it will have on smaller businesses and companies, especially those who are looking to go public. Or maybe I should say, were looking to go public. They certainly do not have the infrastructure or resources to spend on fixed costs of compliance like this.

H.R. 1187 will result in fewer investment opportunities for American investors. It will discourage private companies from going public and encourage public companies to go private to avoid these burdensome new nonmaterial and useless disclosure requirements.

Sadly, this will hurt the everyday investors, our constituents, that the Democrats claim they want to help. In other words, this bill stands to harm everyone saving for retirement, a college education, or just looking to build a better life.

This is just a bad bill, and I urge a ``no'' vote on H.R. 1187.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Hill), a leader on this issue.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Barr), who has been an outstanding voice on these particular issues.

Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record the following letters, a June 14 letter from the National Association of Manufacturers, a June 15 letter from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and a June 16 letter from the American Securities Association, all in opposition to this bill.

National Association of

Manufacturers,

June 14, 2021

House of Representatives,

Washington, DC.

Dear Representative: On behalf of the National Association

of Manufacturers, I write to express opposition to H.R. 1187,

the Corporate Governance Improvement and Investor Protection

Act.

Manufacturers are taking the lead in innovating solutions

to climate change, ensuring clean air and water, and

enhancing diversity and inclusion--and, importantly, in

providing information about this critical work to their

investors. Public company reporting related to climate change

and other environmental, social, and governance topics should

allow for principles-based disclosure of financially material

information relevant to these efforts. The NAM is concerned

that the ESG Disclosure Simplification Act, the Shareholder

Political Transparency Act, the Greater Accountability in Pay

Act, and the Climate Risk Disclosure Act would impose

disclosure mandates that focus on costly one-size-fits-all

metrics rather than material, decision-useful information for

investors.

Similarly, the Disclosure of Tax Havens and Offshoring Act

would impose a significant compliance burden--while also

risking exposure of valuable and proprietary data--by

requiring public reporting of country-by-country tax

information by U.S. companies. The United States' support for

Action 13 of the OECD/G20's BEPS country-by-country reporting

initiative was based on the requirement that these reports,

which are exchanged between the IRS and other tax

authorities, would remain confidential.

The NAM is engaging with the Securities and Exchange

Commission as it considers ways to enhance the comparability

of climate and ESG information disclosed by publicly traded

companies. Manufacturers are hopeful that any new climate or

ESG reporting framework will be flexible, principles-based,

and materiality-driven while providing clarity to publicly

traded companies and supporting their efforts to furnish

material information to investors in a comparable manner. We

encourage Congress to provide appropriate oversight of the

SEC's ongoing work without mandating a one-size-fits-all

approach.

Sincerely,

Chris Netram,

Vice President, Tax and

Domestic Economic Policy.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Donalds), who is a new Member to this House Chamber and an outstanding Member.

Mr. Speaker, I yield an additional 30 seconds to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Donalds).

Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record an article from The Wall Street Journal dated from 2018, ``California Public Employees Vote Against Pension-Fund Activism.''

[From the Wall Street Journal, Oct. 18, 2018]

California Public Employees Vote Against Pension-Fund Activism

(By Paul S. Atkins)

Playing politics with other people's savings is never

popular.

The California Public Employees' Retirement System this

month said no thank you to pension-fund activism. Government

workers unseated Priya Mathur, the sitting Calpers president.

She was defeated by Jason Perez, a police-union official who

criticized Ms. Mathur's focus on environmental, social and

governance investing, or ESG. Mr. Perez emphasizes the

agency's fiduciary duty to maximize investor returns.

Calpers represents almost two million California public

employees, retirees and families. Yet it mostly makes

headlines for its activism, such as divestiture from the

tobacco industry. ``It's been used more as a political-action

committee than a retirement fund,'' said Mr. Perez. ``I think

the public agency [employees] are just sick of the

shenanigans.''

Americans have always invested to achieve personal goals,

such as saving for a house or their kids' college tuition.

Some find that an ESG or issue-specific approach to investing

accords with their personal philosophies. There is nothing

wrong with people investing their own money however they

like. But Calpers has a fiduciary duty to California public

employees, who rely on it for retirement security.

Hester Peirce, a commissioner of the Securities and

Exchange Commission, recently observed, ``When a pension-fund

manager is making the decision to pursue her moral goals at

the risk of financial return, the manager is putting other

people's retirements at risk.'' The danger for Calpers is

real: In 2016 a consultant found that the fund's

beneficiaries missed up to $3 billion in investment gains

from 2001-14. The reason? A divestiture from tobacco holdings

for political purposes.

All this happens as Calpers remain underfunded. Worse, its

beneficiaries are stuck. They are locked into the system and

cannot vote with their feet.

While Calpers beneficiaries are demanding a renewed focus

on returns, activists continue to work other channels to

impose

agenda-driven requirements on public companies. Sen.

Elizabeth Warren last month unveiled a bill that would direct

the SEC to mandate that all public companies disclose fossil-

fuel use and greenhouse-gas emissions. This month a petition

signed by 17 law professors and institutional investors,

including Calpers, asked the SEC to develop mandatory rules

for public companies to disclose ESG information.

The petition argues that since there are already so many

requests to the SEC for issue-specific disclosures human-

capital management, climate, tax, human rights, pay ratios by

sex, and political spending--the agency should impose a

broader ESG disclosure framework. The laundry list of

possible disclosures underscores the problem. Requiring

companies to account for an ever-changing list of hard-to-

quantify social issues distracts from disclosure's real,

statutory purpose: giving the reasonable investor material

information he needs to make investing decisions.

These proposals always tout purported benefits to

investors, but mandatory disclosure of additional immaterial

information would be harmful. In a 2013 speech, former SEC

Chairman Mary Jo White decried the ``information overload''

in already bloated annual reports that obscures pertinent

disclosures for investors amid a sea of extraneous

information. She summarized: ``What some investors might want

may not be what reasonable investors need.'' Translation:

More information is not necessarily better information.

Mandating politicized corporate disclosures doesn't align

with the SEC's mission to protect investors and facilitate

capital formation. Instead, it would divert resources away

from business operations and growth. It is simply an attempt

to shame public companies into compliance with activists'

demands.

As Mr. Perez put it, criticizing a proposal to divest from

some gun retailers earlier this year: ``This is nothing more

than a political ploy.'' His push to prioritize performance

over politics clearly resonated with California public

employees; lawmakers and pension-fund managers should take

note.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Rose), and I thank him for his work on the Financial Services Committee.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Fitzgerald).

Mr. Speaker, just a point of information for the chair from California: We have one more speaker, and I will be prepared to close.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Barr).

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time. I want to make sure we are clear not only with my colleagues but to those who may be listening and watching today.

Our side of the aisle has a couple of problems with this legislation today. First and foremost is the structure; next is the content; and then third, we have to question motivation.

What is the problem with the structure?

My friend from Connecticut talked about an issue that we have a lot of agreement on, and I say to him: Amen, hallelujah, let's talk about cybersecurity. Let's talk about how corporations are going to be held responsible for that.

However, my colleague from Iowa is talking about corporate tax law and country-by-country tax reporting. Now, that might be a good issue, but it is the wrong committee. I wondered to myself if Chairman Dingell, who chaired the Ways and Means Committee for a few decades, and my colleague from Michigan, would have allowed this committee mission creep. Actually, I don't wonder. I know exactly what he would have said: Hell, no. This is in my committee.

This issue is in the wrong committee, and Financial Services is not the right and proper place to be doing that.

Let's look at the content of these bills. We are not debating climate, and we are not debating these social issues that need to be addressed. We are debating who is responsible for enforcing these. We are not debating the failures and flaws of humans. We are questioning who should be the enforcer of these regulations and if they are equipped to do so.

Now, not that long ago, before defunding the police was a popular item to discuss, the SEC was commonly called on all sides the cop on the beat. They were the cops on the beat who were the enforcers. They were the ones who were coming along and saying: We are going to make sure that there is no fraud as we protect investors; we are going to make sure that we have efficient markets; and we are going to make sure that we are building capital.

Here is the problem: They are not prepared and equipped to do so.

Don't take my word for it. Let's look at President Obama's head of the Securities and Exchange Commission, Mary Jo White, who said: ``When disclosure gets to be too much or strays from its core purposes, it can lead to `information overload,' a phenomenon in which ever-increasing amounts of disclosure make it difficult for investors to focus on the information that is material and most relevant to their decisionmaking as investors in our financial markets. To safeguard the benefits of this `signature mandate,' the SEC needs to maintain the ability to exercise its own independent judgment and expertise when deciding whether and how best to impose new disclosure requirements.''

She also said at one point that the Securities and Exchange Commission was not prepared to do enforcement on areas that they had no expertise. She was referring to conflict minerals. That was also part of the Dodd-Frank Act.

So, we have a number of issues that are in this content. Earlier, my colleague, the chair from California, submitted a letter from CalPERS in support of this. Earlier, just prior to that, I had submitted an article from The Wall Street Journal where CalPERS had actually had a massive regime change--this was in 2018--regarding this pension fund activism.

At the time, Mr. Perez, who was elected as the president of CalPERS, said:

CalPERS has been used more as a political action committee

than a retirement fund. I think the public agency employees

are just sick of the shenanigans.

Hester Peirce, a Commissioner with the Securities and Exchange Commission, recently observed: ``When a pension fund manager is making the decision to pursue her moral goals at the risk of financial return, the manager is putting other people's retirements at risk.''

She was referring to the person whom Mr. Perez had beaten in that election.

The danger is real. In 2016, a consultant found that the CalPERS fund beneficiaries missed up to $3 billion in investment gains from 2001 to 2014. The reason? A divestiture of tobacco holdings for political purposes.

I wonder if this might be why some of the motivation for those on the other side, that they want to cover themselves. They want to make sure they are not open to the liability of retirees or others with a fiduciary being held responsible for bad decisionmaking when they use these amorphous, nondefined issues to make political statements rather than investment choices.

Madam Speaker, at the end of the day, what we have here is a problem not just of the issues but of the enforcement. I believe that if we are asking the ``cop on the beat,'' the Securities and Exchange Commission, to do a job that is up to the streets and maintenance department, then no one could expect that they are prepared for that. How can we expect that they are going to be able to do this?

With that, and including my opening statement where we looked at the disincentive to make sure there are more investment opportunities for everyday investors--our constituents--I must remain opposed to H.R. 1187.

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

Madam Speaker, I rise in opposition to the amendments en bloc, and I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Speaker, let's be honest. If the original bill wasn't bad enough, Democrats' en bloc amendments complete the picture. With this amendment, Democrats are packaging even more non-investment-relevant social priorities that only serve to feed protesters and dissidents with information to be used in naming and shaming companies.

I had mentioned earlier that in some of the bills in this package, we have some potential impossibility of working with each other. There are others that don't belong in our committee.

Then there are other bills that don't make sense if we really, truly are trying to protect investors from fraud and trying to build capital in our country, which is the directive of the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Let's look at some of the specific information companies would be required to disclose under these amendments and how it benefits everyday investors.

Take the workforce and human capital management disclosure amendment, for example. How exactly is a company supposed to measure and disclose, in a comprehensible and comparable manner, ``employee engagement'' and ``alignment with business strategy''?

Additionally, how does disclosing the company's policies relating to ``freedom of association and work-life balance initiatives'' help everyday investors evaluate the risks of investing in that company?

My friends on the other side have been pretty adamantly opposed to Robinhood, but those who are looking to use Robinhood might actually like that work-life balance. That is kind of millennial type of language that is being used in here.

This amendment might as well require companies to disclose their policy on dogs in the office and whether their canine coworkers are purebreds or mixed breed types of rescue dogs. This doesn't have relevance and materiality to investors.

It is also worth highlighting an amendment that requires American companies to disclose whether the company or an affiliate of the company directly or indirectly engaged with an entity or the affiliate of an entity regarding the importation of not only goods from the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region but also goods that have materials originally sourced from the XUAR.

Well, this is a redo from last Congress, and now that Democrats have one-party control, their motives are clear. The bill requires companies to show if their affiliates are indirectly engaged with affiliates of certain companies.

To put it simply, American companies would be required to disclose unknowable information and face securities fraud charges for any misstatements or omissions.

Now, let's not have any doubt: This side of the aisle has been highlighting the Uighur situation for a very long time through bills, through amendments, through sanctions, advocating those and holding China and the CCP responsible.

But, again, under this legislation, they will violate the law for trying to disclose unknowable information.

Why would a company want to go public under that regime? And how does disclosing such indecipherable information help everyday investors make more informed investment decisions?

Now, just to make sure my Democrat friends don't twist my words, like I said, I very much care about the Chinese Communist Party's human rights abuses. We need to be focused on that. I think many of the underlying concerns that motivate this legislation and amendment are important. But the public company disclosure regime is simply the wrong vehicle for addressing those concerns.

The SEC's mission is to: one, protect investors from fraud; two, maintain fair, orderly, and efficient markets; and, three, facilitate capital formation. These packages of bills do not do that, and nothing in the SEC's mission looks remotely like enforcing foreign policy goals or labor law.

Mary Jo White had pointed that out regarding the conflict minerals portion of the Dodd-Frank law. Once again, Democrats are more than comfortable with shoving the SEC into subject matter areas where they have zero expertise rather than getting the policy right.

There are real downsides to this approach my colleagues are taking. Mandatory disclosure increases compliance costs. The more complicated and technical the information required to be reported in disclosures, the more specialized the attorneys and compliance experts a company needs to adhere to a law.

If I need to spell that out for you, that is money that companies cannot spend on its workforce and investing in their business, in equipment, and in their wages, or returning money to everyday investors who have invested in those companies.

Moreover, just to be clear, because my Democrat friends keep talking about how badly investors want this information, under the disclosure requirements in these amendments, everyday investors aren't the ones who benefit. Social activists, as well as compliance professionals-- that is, lawyers and accountants--are the ones who will reap the biggest reward under these amendments.

We are helping the elite workforce with the bill and these amendments. Instead of helping investors participate in our capital markets and helping American workers, these amendments will leave everyday investors buried in disclosures that are, at most, tangentially related to investment.

Meanwhile, smaller public companies with shoestring compliance budgets will have to delay raising wages for workers in order to reallocate that capital to hiring more lawyers.

At its core, this amendment just heightens the key problem with the original bill. The additional disclosures will disincentivize private companies from going public, which will inhibit everyday investors, our constituents, from participating in our capital markets and will limit their choices of public companies to invest in.

Let's not eliminate access and opportunities to everyday investors, especially when rich investors will still have access to investing in companies that have gone private or stayed private in response to these amendments.

I think that is one of the things, Madam Speaker, that is getting lost in this. Those that have will continue to have those options. Those that are trying to build a future are going to get frozen out once again.

For that reason, I oppose this amendment, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I am prepared to close, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Madam Speaker, this was claimed earlier by one of the authors that investors wanted this information, I believe was the quote.

Well, I ask the question: If investors want this information, as claimed, then they can bring a vote to the shareholders to require these disclosures. Evidence, Madam Speaker, would dictate and show that precious few of these types of issues have actually been brought to shareholder meetings, where they are voted on. In the rare times that they have, even fewer have actually been approved.

So, no, investors don't look at this information. They don't want this information, and they don't view it as material to the investment decisions that they are making.

So you have to ask the question, then: Who is requiring or requesting this information? I suspect it is more about appeasing social activists. It is not about the workers and it is certainly not about the investors. This is about making sure that the virtue signaling that is required in today's corporate world--may I add, for large corporations, because there are plenty of small and medium-sized, even publicly traded companies that are bucking this.

But for these large corporations who have massive, massive compliance departments that are chock-full of attorneys, chock-full of CPAs and others that are going to work through this, and they are going to hire their friends in the consulting world to make sure that they are dotting the I's and crossing the T's, that is who it is really about.

Sadly, unfortunately, who ultimately ends up losing in that equation is the worker and the investor, our constituents.

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

Mr. Speaker, I claim the time in opposition to this amendment, although I am not opposed to it.

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the goals of this amendment, and I applaud my colleague from Washington. We should be concerned about the effects of this bill and ESG reporting on small businesses, and I would say that this is a step in the right direction.

However, I don't believe this amendment actually goes far enough. The ranking member of the full committee submitted an amendment to the Rules Committee that would have exempted small businesses from the onerous and unnecessary requirements of this bill, and, sadly, that amendment was not made in order. I think that may have achieved the same goal in a certainly much more clear manner for the author.

This bill will be particularly burdensome on small businesses that don't have the resources to pay all the expenses associated with complying with these disclosures, such as lawyers, accountants, and other ESG consultants.

I know the chairwoman had mentioned that somehow my statements earlier and the statements of my colleagues were supportive of large business and their support of this. It is actually the exact opposite. I could really care less what the Fortune 50 think about this.

I am concerned about that bottom 50. I am worried about those up-and- coming companies that are going to have those precious resources sucked into more compliance that, again, does not have relevance or materiality to investors, nor is it actually requested by investors.

But this bill is a prime example of Wall Street versus Main Street, and I commend my colleague for fighting for Main Street with this amendment.

I am prepared to accept this amendment because I hope it will help small businesses.

Mr. Speaker, I continue to support this amendment, and I am happy to accept it.

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

Madam Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 473 and ask for its immediate consideration.

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

General Leave

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

Madam Speaker, today, the Rules Committee met and reported a rule, House Resolution 473, providing for consideration of H.R. 256, to repeal the Authorization for Use of Military Force against Iraq resolution of 2002, under a closed rule. The rule provides 1 hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on Foreign Affairs and one motion to recommit.

The rule also provides for consideration of H.R. 1187, the Corporate Governance Improvement and Investor Protection Act, under a structured rule. The rule provides 1 hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on Financial Services, makes in order 10 amendments, provides en bloc authority to the chair of the Committee on Financial Services, and provides for one motion to recommit.

The rule provides that the provisions of section 202 of the National Emergencies Act shall not apply to H.J. Res. 46. The rule also deems passage of H. Res. 467.

Finally, the rule provides the majority leader or his designee the ability to en bloc requested roll call votes on suspension bills considered on June 14 or June 15. This authority lasts through June 17.

Madam Speaker, there are two critically important measures contained in this rule.

H.R. 1187 will build on landmark reforms like the Dodd-Frank Act and Sarbanes-Oxley Act. It will help hold corporations accountable, help investors make informed decisions, and build a more sustainable and equitable economic recovery. These improvements are badly needed, especially at a time when we are seeing a new era of sustainable investors.

I want to discuss one bill in particular here today, Madam Speaker, a bill that was authored by the distinguished Chair, Congresswoman Barbara Lee from California, because this Congress is doing something extraordinary.

Nearly 20 years after we passed a measure to address the overthrow of Saddam Hussein and 10 years after the conflict in Iraq officially ended, we are reasserting our constitutional responsibility over matters of war and peace by finally repealing the 2002 Authorization for Use of Military Force.

This isn't an arcane legislative maneuver or simply some rhetorical exercise. This AUMF has been used over and over again to expand the mission and range of targets of U.S. military operations in Iraq never imagined when it was passed.

In fact, President Trump misused it as recently as last January to justify the strike that killed Iranian General Qasem Soleimani. The impacts of that decision dramatically escalated tensions between the United States and Iran and throughout the region, tensions that persist to this very day.

Madam Speaker, the process that we are starting here today with H.R. 256 provides a roadmap for Congress to get off the sidelines and to stop abdicating its constitutional responsibility to debate matters of war and peace.

That is what our Founders intended. They knew that decisions of such magnitude should not be made in a vacuum solely by a President. That is why the Constitution makes the President Commander in Chief but gives only Congress the power to declare war.

It is no secret that for a long time there were Members on both sides of the aisle who preferred to skirt that responsibility. They left such consequential decisions to whoever sat at 1600

Pennsylvania Avenue, Republican or Democrat.

But each of us was elected and sent here to do more than just make the easy calls. We were sent here to make tough decisions, especially when it involves sending our uniformed men and women, the people we represent, into harm's way and shoveling billions upon billions of taxpayer dollars overseas.

A growing number of Members, both Democrats and Republicans, have been working together to reclaim our Article I powers. There is now a bipartisan, bicameral consensus that we not only have to end endless wars, but we have to reexamine the shrinking congressional authority and the expanding executive powers that get us into global conflicts in the first place and, like inertia, keep us there for decades.

The Rules Committee has been working with the House Foreign Affairs Committee to do just that because everything has changed since Congress enacted the original War Powers Resolution over President Nixon's veto more than 50 years ago.

When we fight, how we fight, and why we fight, these are big issues that merit our most engaged attention and resolve. We have a responsibility to make sure that these laws and authorities work in the modern age.

I want to thank, in particular, Ranking Member Cole on the Rules Committee for working with me in this effort. He has been pushing to reclaim Congress' Article I responsibilities, no matter which party controls Congress or who sits in the White House. I know that sometimes it has been a lonely journey, but he has never stopped fighting because it is the right thing to do for this country and for this institution.

I also want to thank Chairman Meeks and Ranking Member McCaul for working with us on this bipartisan effort.

Again, I want to thank Congresswoman Barbara Lee for being consistent and never giving up in her effort not only to end endless wars but to make sure that Congress lives up to its constitutional responsibilities.

I am grateful that we also have a President in office today who supports reevaluating executive war powers. I have to be honest, Madam Speaker, I never thought I would see that day. But President Biden spent decades in the Senate grappling with the limitations of the War Powers Resolution, and he has a record of looking for ways to change it.

This opportunity is like lightning in a bottle. We have a coalition in Congress trying to get this done, and now the missing piece, a President in the Oval Office with the political will to take this on, is hopefully now falling into place.

I encourage all of my colleagues to join us in seizing this moment. Let's make the repeal of the 2002 AUMF the first step in not only repealing and reforming outdated AUMFs but reimagining the War Powers Resolution for the modern age.

President Johnson once said that it is damn easy to get into a war, but it is awfully hard to get out of one. We are here today because of the truth of that statement.

It should never be that Congress, and the people we represent, are sidelined on the life-or-death questions of when to go to war and when to come home.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

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

I include in the Record a June 1 Newsweek article titled ``Congress Has a Chance To Reclaim Its War Powers.''

[June 1, 2021]

Congress Has a Chance To Reclaim Its War Powers

(By Dan Caldwell)

In response to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, then-President

George W. Bush signed into law the 2001 Authorization for Use

of Military Force to provide the legal authority to pursue

and punish those responsible. The following year, the 2002

AUMF was passed to authorize the ill-conceived invasion of

Iraq and the overthrow of dictator Saddam Hussein.

Over the last 20 years, both laws have been used to justify

military actions disconnected from their original intent.

These laws--unmodified since their original passage--have

sanctioned combat operations in at least 19 countries.

Successive congresses have abdicated their constitutionally

prescribed role in foreign

policy, allowing four presidential administrations to exploit

the 2001 and 2002 AUMFs and stretch their Article II

authorities. Multiple military conflicts have been expanded

or initiated with minimal congressional oversight and debate.

It is past time for Congress to firmly reassert its role in

shaping U.S. foreign policy. After 20 years of endless war,

it owes its constituents--including our men and women in

uniform--a better foreign policy that prioritizes keeping

Americans safe. Rather than abdicating its solemn duties,

Congress must inquire, ``Why, at what cost, and toward what

end?'' are young American servicemembers sent to fight and

die for ill-premised objectives that are fundamentally

disconnected from vital national interests. Further evasion

of these hard questions cheapens the ``true faith and

allegiance'' they swore to uphold when elected to office.

Over 7,000 Americans have lost their lives and tens of

thousands more wounded in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Yemen and

Africa. These conflicts have cost the American taxpayer over

$6.4 trillion dollars--a number that will surely continue to

grow as wars drag on and the cost of caring for veterans of

these wars is tallied.

Congress has several ways it can help bring an end to our

endless wars while helping shape a better foreign policy.

First, in the coming months the House of Representatives

will likely have an opportunity to repeal the 2002 AUMF by

passing legislation introduced by Representative Barbara Lee

(D-Calif.)--a stalwart champion of Congress reclaiming its

powers in matters of war and peace. A similar bill has been

introduced in the Senate by Senators Todd Young (R-Ind.) and

Tim Kaine (D-Va.), which has been endorsed by the Biden

administration. Additional legislation repealing the outdated

1957 and 1991 AUMFs has been introduced by Representatives

Peter Meijer (R-Mich.) and Abigail Spanberger (D-Va.).

Passage of these bipartisan bills should be a no-brainer for

a Congress bitterly divided on other issues and an important

first step toward Congress reclaiming its most important

prerogative.

Congress should also consider revision--or outright

repeal--of the 2001 AUMF. More than the 2002 AUMF, this law

has been stretched to justify conflicts far afield from its

original intent of authorizing operations against Al-Qaeda

and the Taliban in Afghanistan after 9/11. It is worth

acknowledging that the underlying purpose of the 2001 AUMF

has been satisfied: Osama bin Laden is dead, Al-Qaeda has

been decimated and the Taliban severely punished. And despite

never being amended, this authorization has been cited to

account for operations against groups that didn't even exist

on 9/11 in places such as Somalia and Libya.

If Congress repeals the 2001 AUMF, the executive branch

still has the authority to authorize military operations to

repel imminent attacks and to engage in self-defense

(although Congress should take steps to ensure that this

authority isn't stretched too far, as it was by President Joe

Biden's recent airstrikes in Syria). If Congress identifies a

need to replace the 2001 AUMF, it should authorize force

against clear targets given specified objectives, geographic

boundaries and clear sunsets.

Congress should also use its power of the purse to assert

its authority in foreign policy. This is in many ways the

most effective tool Congress has and it has been used

successfully in the past to end American involvement in

conflicts, including Vietnam.

Repealing outdated AUMFs and helping end our forever wars

around the globe would enjoy broad support from the American

people. Poll after poll has shown a majority of Americans

want an end to our wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, while also

supporting Congress playing a greater role in authorizing

military conflicts abroad.

I am proud to have deployed to Iraq as a U.S. Marine. Many

of those I served with are still in uniform and are still

deploying to war zones on a regular basis, even if they

harbor doubts about the necessity of those conflicts.

Congress owes it to them to step up and do its job by

reasserting itself in matters of war and peace. Failing to do

so dishonors those who have and who continue to serve

overseas in the wars that have dragged on in part due to

congressional inaction.

Madam Speaker, over the last 20 years, both the 2001 and 2002 AUMFs have been used to justify military actions disconnected from their original intent.

I want to say to my colleague from Pennsylvania that we are grateful for his service to our country. But the fact is that we are still operating under an AUMF that we passed almost 20 years ago, almost two decades ago.

When we were debating that AUMF--an AUMF that I voted against--there is no way that we would have anticipated what the realities are now. The notion that somehow we can't, as a body, come together and revisit these AUMFs on a regular basis, to me, is beyond comprehension.

We owe it to the men and women who serve our country in our Armed Forces to make sure that we are doing our due diligence.

The President has multiple authorities, by the way, to be able to respond to any threats against individual U.S. citizens almost anywhere in the world. But if people are trying to use this AUMF as a way to potentially have a war with Iran, let me just say this: If that is what anybody's goal is, you better damn well come back to Congress and have a debate, and people ought to be able to vote yes or no on it.

Many of us are concerned that these lingering AUMFs are going to be misconstrued and misinterpreted and misused.

I include in the Record a Statement of Administration Policy. President Biden supports the Lee bill. He doesn't see any need to have a continuation of the 2002 AUMF. If the President of the United States doesn't see a need to continue it, I don't know why we feel we have to continue something that is clearly outdated.

Statement of Administration Policy

h.r. 256--repeal of authorization for use of military force--against

iraq resolution of 2002--rep. lee, d-ca with 134 co-sponsors

The Administration supports House passage of H.R. 256, to

repeal the Authorization for Use of of Military Force Against

Iraq Resolution of 2002 (``2002 AUMF''). This bipartisan

legislation would terminate the October 16, 2002, statutory

authorization for the use of military force against Iraq.

The Administration supports the repeal of the 2002 AUMF, as

the United States has no ongoing military activities that

rely solely on the 2002 AUMF as a domestic legal basis, and

repeal of the 2002 AUMF would likely have minimal impact on

current military operations. Furthermore, the President is

committed to working with the Congress to ensure that

outdated authorizations for the use of military force are

replaced with a narrow and specific framework appropriate to

ensure that we can continue to protect Americans from

terrorist threats.

In working with the Congress on repealing and replacing

other existing authorizations of military force, the

Administration seeks to ensure that the Congress has a clear

and thorough understanding of the effect of any such action

and of the threats facing U.S. forces, personnel, and

interests around the world. As the Administration works with

the Congress to reform AUMFs, it will be critical to maintain

the clear authority to address threats to the United States'

national interests with appropriately decisive and effective

military action.

Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Rhode Island (Mr. Cicilline).

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

Madam Speaker, what a crock. I mean, it is hard to hear anybody on the other side of the aisle talk about government shutdowns. I remember when they lost this place 3 years ago. What did they do? They left us with a government shutdown. First time ever in history, the Republican majority did that.

The gentleman is saying we are not going to vote on this stuff. Maybe he doesn't understand the legislative process. Let me remind everybody that we have to vote on every single cent that we put forward here.

We have an appropriations process. Maybe the gentleman doesn't understand that. But every cent that we spend has to be voted on by people in this Chamber. So nobody is not going to vote on anything.

Let me just put this in perspective. Yes, the President's budget was late, and given the timing of the President's budget, the Appropriations Committee needs to get started to start doing their work, unless my friends don't want the Appropriations Committee to do their work. Deeming a top-line number for appropriators is a housekeeping item that we can take care of so they can move forward, and we can then turn our attention to a budget resolution and enacting the transformational policies included in the President's American Jobs Plan and American Families Plan.

Here's the thing that really gets me when I hear people have meltdowns on the floor. This process has been used by Republicans and Democrats alike in order to allow appropriators to get started on their work. Ever since the first deeming resolution in fiscal year 1999, when Republicans were in charge, overall House Republican majorities used deemers nine times, including for fiscal years 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, and 2019. Boy, how convenient it is to forget about all of that. But, then, again, facts don't seem to matter.

Just one other thing. When the gentleman used the term ``big lie,'' I don't want to be lectured by anybody about a big lie, especially by individuals who voted deliberately to overturn the will of the American people, to undermine our democracy. I will not be lectured to by anybody on that matter.

I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Pennsylvania (Ms. Scanlon), a distinguished member of the Rules Committee.

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

I don't even know what to say. The response to the situation at our border and to the people who are fleeing their countries in Central America to try to seek refugee in the United States, the response that the Republicans just came up with basically is saying we are going to withhold any money for Vice President Harris' travel budget unless she goes to the border and does a photo op.

We are supposed to be a serious legislative body. We are supposed to be the most serious, most deliberative legislative body in the world, and my friends say we are going to withhold her travel budget unless she goes to the border and does a photo op. That is what this is.

Never mind that Vice President Harris represented California as a United States Senator, which is a border State. Never mind that she just went to Central America because people are coming to our border from places like El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala. Never mind she went to some of these countries where people are fleeing so we can try to figure out how to deal with this issue.

My Republican friends have brought to the House floor a bill that basically says: You know what? Our solution is you either go and do a photo op at the border or we are going to withhold your travel budget.

I mean, really? That is a serious legislative proposal?

I don't even know how to respond to that, other than to say that, you could have come up with something better. This isn't even worth any more of my time talking about it.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

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

The gentleman can come and huff and puff all he wants on the House floor, but, again, I remind people that the solution that is being put forward by my Republican friends is to withhold the Vice President's travel budget until she does a photo op. I think this is beneath, quite frankly, the dignity of this legislative body.

I would also say to the gentleman that what the Vice President was trying to do was get at the source of migration, of people coming to our border, trying to solve the problem. She was spending her time trying to figure out how to solve the problem, not try to figure out how to overturn the last election; not trying to figure out how to reinstate the last President who lost the election not only fair and square, but by a pretty big margin, but actually trying to solve problems.

It is hard to sit here and listen to some of the things we have listened to here today and then be told: Oh, here is our proposal.

I mean, come on. Give me a break.

Let's get back to trying to figure out to solve problems rather than try to score political points. And if you are going to try to score political points, certainly you can come up with a better idea than this.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

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

I don't know what the gentleman was talking about, about woke yuppies and all this other kind of stuff he was talking about here today, but Democrats actually believe in science. We believe that climate change is real. We believe that we ought to have some accountability, especially in the corporate world, as to what they are doing and how they are reporting their actions.

I find this so concerning that we can't even have a debate on what, in fact, the underlying legislation is. I think the bill that Congresswoman Waters has brought to the floor is a commonsense bill that I hope even some Republicans might support.

I would also say that the other piece of legislation that we were talking about here today is Barbara Lee's bill to repeal the 2002 Authorization for Use of Military Force. Many of us have been urging that we repeal that 2002 Authorization for Use of Military Force for quite a while now. It has passed the House and it has passed committee. Yet here we are again, and now we have a President of the United States that says that he no longer wants that, that he actually supports what we are trying to do here. Yet we still have people on the House floor who say, no, we need to hold onto it, an Authorization for Use of Military Force that we passed almost 20 years ago that somehow is applicable today. That just doesn't make any sense to me.

People like Congresswoman Lee; Congressman Adam Smith; the late Republican Congressman, Walter Jones; and Congressman Tom Cole have talked about the need for us to reclaim our constitutional powers when it comes to committing American forces into harm's way.

Quite frankly, many of us have been raising this issue--didn't matter who was in the White House, whether it was a Democrat or a Republican-- because we think it is the right thing to do. We think somehow it is cowardice for Congress to just keep on kicking the can down the road to ignoring these important debates.

You have those debates, and if people decide to continue the same old, same old, fine. That is what the majority of people here vote for. If people decide to end it, that ought to be fine, too. That is what we are here for.

I think this institution would be better served if we took our constitutional responsibilities with regard to war and peace more seriously.

Today, I hope we will pass this rule and we will then pass the Lee bill. But it isn't the end of our work. We are going to need to continue to review and repeal and reform outdated Authorizations for Use of Military Force, and we need to reimagine the broader issues embedded in the War Powers Resolution, because never again should we acquiesce and allow Congress to sit on the sidelines as wars are crafted and carried out by the White House, wars that never end, wars that sacrifice lives and sacrifice treasure.

Let's respect our troops. Let's respect their families. Let's respect this institution. Let's finally get back to doing our jobs, taking responsibility and voting on issues of war and peace. And let's start today by supporting this rule and the underlying measures.

The material previously referred to by Mr. Reschenthaler is as follows:

Amendment to House Resolution 473

At the end of the resolution, add the following:

Sec. 9. Immediately upon adoption of this resolution, the

House shall proceed to the consideration in the House of the

bill (H.R. 3403) to limit travel by the Vice President until

after certain activities are undertaken with respect to the

southwest border, and for other purposes. All points of order

against consideration of the bill are waived. The bill shall

be considered as read. All points of order against provisions

in the bill are waived. The previous question shall be

considered as ordered on the bill and on any amendment

thereto to final passage without intervening motion except:

(1) one hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the

chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on

Oversight and Reform; and (2) one motion to recommit.

Sec. 10. Clause 1(c) of rule XIX shall not apply to the

consideration of H.R. 3403.

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

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

Madam Speaker, I want to thank my good friend, Chairman Meeks. We work well together. When we disagree, we do it civilly, and I think that is the way this body should operate. But I do disagree on this one.

I have said many times before that war should not be on autopilot. I do think this is an outdated AUMF, and I do believe that Congress needs to reclaim its war powers under Article I of the Constitution.

I also share the desire to repeal the 2002 AUMF, as well as the 2001 AUMF, but that must be part of a serious process to provide clear, updated authorities against the terrorists who still plot to kill Americans at home and abroad. I still hope to work toward that end with my respected friend, Chairman Meeks, but a repeal and replacement should be simultaneous.

It is confusing to me that we are jamming through a standalone repeal without basic due diligence; without consulting the State Department, the Defense Department, or the intelligence community; without consulting the Government of Iraq and our coalition partners and allies.

In the 3 months since I made that complaint at our markup, the majority still has not scheduled a single briefing. This, in my judgment, is not a serious legislative process for the most serious issues that we face, and that is war and peace.

This feels like yet another political effort to undo one of President Trump's boldest counterterrorism successes: using the 2002 AUMF to remove Qasem Soleimani from the battlefield.

Soleimani was Iran's mastermind of terror for decades. He was responsible for the death of more than 600 Americans and wounded thousands more. He orchestrated the attack on our Baghdad Embassy. He plotted to assassinate the Saudi Ambassador on American soil here in D.C. He oversaw Iran's support for Assad, who killed hundreds of thousands in Syria. In short, America and the world are much safer with Qasem Soleimani gone.

While the 2002 AUMF was largely about Saddam Hussein, it also clearly

addressed the terrorist threats in and emanating from Iraq. All prior administrations, Republican and Democrat, have used it for that purpose.

Today, the biggest threat in Iraq is not Saddam Hussein. We can all recognize that. But it is the Iran-sponsored terrorist groups attacking our diplomats, our soldiers, our embassy, and our citizens. They cannot be targeted using the 2001 AUMF because they are not associated with the forces of al-Qaida, the Taliban, or ISIS, but they can be targeted using the 2002 AUMF, as the prior administration did to take out Soleimani, consistent with longstanding practice.

Last year, the Trump administration ``strongly opposed'' repeal, saying it would ``terminate a critical legal authority'' and undermine our defense ``against ongoing threats from Iran and Iranian-sponsored proxies.''

The Biden administration now claims that it does not need the 2002 AUMF for current operations because it has Article II authority to use force without congressional authorization.

Is that what we are going to do now, is yield to the President's Article II authority without any congressional authorization?

Madam Speaker, that is precisely what this repeal does. It takes our authority, our Article I authorities, away. We are repealing our Article I authority and yielding it to the President of the United States.

Telling the President to rely solely on Article II, in my judgment, is a big step backward from the war powers reform and reasserting Congress' Article I powers.

It is also inconsistent with the War Powers Resolution. That law says that the President's Article II powers are limited to responding to an attack on the territory or Armed Forces of the United States. It does not cover American civilians in a foreign country, such as our contractors, our diplomats, and our embassy, who are under attack, as I speak, in Iraq.

We should not encourage any President to go it alone without Article I congressional authorization.

Finally, today's vote is not happening in a vacuum. This rushed, standalone repeal, without any consultation with the Department of Defense, the Secretary of State, or the intelligence community, as Mr. Mast has consistently talked about, sends a dangerous message of disengagement that could destabilize Iraq, embolden Iran, which it will, and strengthen al-Qaida and ISIS in the region.

We would avoid such dangers by taking up a repeal and a replacement simultaneously. I think both sides of the aisle agree, we need to update this AUMF, and we need to reform it to the modern-day threats in the region. Saddam Hussein is no longer the threat.

Real AUMF reform requires Congress and the administration to work together. The chairman has committed to doing this, and I appreciate and trust him. We work well together, but we have to do this, to work together with the administration to replace this aging AUMF with updated authorities needed to keep Americans safe from today's terrorist threats, an updated AUMF that reflects the modern-day threats in the region.

Again, I look forward to working together with Chairman Meeks and our colleagues on this if we are going to be serious about war powers reform. But this bill is not it. This bill is not responsible. We are not doing this the right way. If we are going to repeal it, let's update the AUMF to modern-day needs and reform it.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

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

I would just like to comment that to me it is very interesting, the timing of the gentlewoman from California's repeal. It happened after President Trump had an air strike to take out Soleimani in Iraq, at exactly the same time. He had authority to do so under the 2002 AUMF and Article II under the Constitution.

What is interesting about now, the other side of the aisle was upset when President Biden struck the Shia proxies in Syria, and that is when we saw this bill resurrect itself again in this Congress. Very interesting timing.

What I object to is that now we are abdicating our responsibility by giving the President Article II authorities alone without any authorization of use of military force from the Congress. They talk a lot about Article I on the other side, but aren't we abdicating our Article I responsibility?

I am all for updating this thing, but to completely do away with it and just give this President Article II authorities to do whatever he wants without any congressional review, in my judgment, is a wrong step forward.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

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

Let me just clarify again. This bill was filed last Congress after President Trump took out the mastermind of terror for two decades in the Middle East, Qasem Soleimani, to challenge his authority to take out one of the biggest

threats to the region and to our American soldiers, 600 of whom were killed and thousands wounded.

That is the genesis for this legislation, and I think that is important to note. If we do away with this without replacing it, we abdicate our Article I authorities in an absolute manner to the executive branch under Article II.

I think that it is important for anyone watching this debate to understand what we are doing here today.

Madam Speaker, with that, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Kinzinger).

Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Mast), a combat veteran, a distinguished servicemember, and a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee.

Madam Speaker, I yield an additional 2 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Mast).

Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Calvert), a member of the Appropriations Committee.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, just a brief comment, once again, that repealing this Authorization for Use of Military Force, which has been used in the past to take out Soleimani and other very bad actors, and not replacing it does not uphold our Article I responsibilities.

Mr. Speaker, in fact, what we are doing is ceding our authority under the Constitution to the executive branch and saying: Oh, Article II, the President has unlimited discretion under Article II to do whatever the hell he wants to do.

That is not what this Congress should be doing. We need to replace this with an updated AUMF that reflects the threats in the region, the current threats, which are Iran and the proxies of Iran that have hit our embassy, have killed our soldiers, and are attacking our diplomats in the region.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Just a point of clarification to the chairman. I am not talking about a declaration of war against Iran. What we are talking about is what is the current threat in Iraq. Today, it is proxies, the Shia proxies of Iran in Iraq.

The reason why President Biden hit them in Syria, it is the authorities that President Trump used to take out Soleimani in Iraq, not in Iran. Soleimani, ``The Butcher'', the mastermind of terror for two decades, killing 600 American soldiers and wounding thousands more.

I am all for updating this thing, but to replace this and throw it out with not anything to protect our men and women who are in Iraq today, including the diplomats, is highly irresponsible, it is reckless, and it is dangerous.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Rogers), the lead Republican on the House Armed Services Committee.

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

Mr. Speaker, I agree with the gentleman. We need to exercise our Article I constitutional responsibilities and update this outdated AUMF. That is precisely what we are arguing today. We are not saying that we should replace this, but we shouldn't repeal without an updated AUMF that reflects the modern-day threats.

As I close later, I will talk about the chairman and I working on that effort. That is what this body should be doing, because otherwise, if we repeal this, we are again ceding our Article I responsibilities to the executive, and just giving him unlimited Article II powers.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, I think I laid out our arguments, and I think it is irresponsible to repeal this authority, which still is used to protect our embassy diplomats and soldiers in Iraq against the Shia proxies of Iran.

I am committed to work with the chairman to update this outdated AUMF. And I think if there is any agreement in this Chamber, and also on both sides of the aisle, it is that we need to modernize it to the modern-day threats.

And as I read from the President's Statement of Administration Policy, the President says: I am committed to working with the Congress to ensure that outdated authorizations for the use of military force are replaced with a framework appropriate to ensure that we can continue to protect Americans from terrorist threats.

I agree with the President of the United States, and I think the chairman does as well. We have to do this, and it is not going to be easy, but it is time to update this outdated AUMF.

I would prefer to have repealed and replaced it with our updated AUMF. But as Brian Mast, a heroic veteran who lost his legs in battle, said, We cannot just repeal this and talk about updating when we haven't even talked to the Department of Defense, the Secretary of State, and the intelligence community about what is the modern-day threat, and what we need to do in Congress to exercise our Article I responsibilities that we have a responsibility to do, and not just cede everything to the executive branch under Article II.

The argument is made, well, this could be done under Article II. Well, that is probably true. But are we not abdicating our responsibility and ceding it to the executive branch by doing this? I would argue that we are.

Mr. Speaker, I want to close with the motion to recommit.

If we adopt the motion to recommit, we will instruct the Committee on Foreign Affairs to consider my amendment to H.R. 256. It responds to the serious escalation by Hamas against Israel that we saw in May.

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 motion to recommit.

Mr. Speaker, Hamas launched over 4,000 rockets at our closest allies in the Middle East. This was a stark reminder of the dangerous threats that Israel faces from Hamas, Hezbollah, Iran, and other terrorist organizations.

For this reason, our MTR makes sure that the United States can quickly react to Israel's security needs in the event of future attacks.

If enacted, this language would establish contingency plans to provide Israel with defense articles such as munitions, ISR technology, aircraft, and related services. It would also create a waiver to expedite arms transfers if Israel is under threat of military attack.

This language passed the House last Congress with broad bipartisan support, and I encourage all of my colleagues to support it today.

I fear that the 2002 AUMF repeal we are considering today without a replacement may embolden our adversaries, especially Iran--the largest state sponsor of terror in the world--and its proxies by signaling that we are retreating from the Middle East.

Our MTR is intended to send a strong message that this is absolutely false. It will also send a message that passage will demonstrate our ironclad support for Israel and all our allies in the region.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support the motion to recommit today, and I yield back the balance of my time.

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

The Clerk will report the motion to recommit.

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

Madam Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 473, I call up the bill (H.R. 256) to repeal the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution of 2002, and ask for its immediate consideration in the House.

Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on H.R. 256.

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

Madam Speaker, I rise in strong support of H.R. 256. Let me start off by thanking my very good friend and partner, Barbara Lee, the author of this bill. I am proud to stand with her in her unyielding quest to repeal the 2002 AUMF, and I congratulate her early on for working so hard for over 20 years to get this done.

Nineteen years ago, as a junior Member of Congress, I faced one of the most consequential decisions of my career as an elected official with the United States Congress. The drumbeats of war were reverberating throughout Capitol Hill as the Bush administration prepared to invade Iraq. After carefully considering all the evidence before us, including unanswered questions about post-Saddam Iraq, I cast my vote against authorizing military force against the Hussein regime.

But our vote this morning to repeal the 2002 AUMF is not about relitigating our past. Rather, repealing this outdated authorization is about planning strategically for our future. It is about Congress reclaiming its constitutional obligation to weigh in on matters of war and peace.

On substance, the case for repealing the 2002 AUMF is unassailable. The 2002 AUMF would have no effect on any ongoing military operations in Iraq. The United States is not relying on the 2002 AUMF as the sole authority for any military operations. It has been used as an additional legal justification for strikes by Presidents from both parties but not as the sole authority for any strikes over the last decade. The Biden administration, in an unprecedented move, has announced support for the legislation we are moving today.

Repeal is crucial because the executive branch has a history of stretching the 2002 AUMF's legal authority. It has already been used as justification for military actions against entities that had nothing to do with Saddam Hussein's Ba'athist dictatorship, simply because such entities were operating in Iraq.

Given all of the countries active near Iraq today, including Turkey and Russia, the 2002 AUMF is vulnerable to being abused.

I have heard from my friend, the ranking member, Mr. McCaul, as well as other Members opposed to this legislation who expressed two concerns: one on the process, about the need for further briefings and conversations, and another on substance, about Iran-backed groups in Iraq.

On procedure, we should dispel ourselves of the fiction that this is a new issue. Congress has been debating what to do in a post-Saddam Iraq for 18 years, and our status of forces agreement expired in 2011. This has been a frontline issue for nearly two decades, and the House Foreign Affairs Committee moved this bill through regular order.

Regarding the concern about Iran-backed groups, let me once again reiterate that the 2002 AUMF was about removing the Hussein regime in Iraq. It had absolutely nothing to do with Iran. A decade and a half before the 2002 AUMF was passed, Iran and Iraq were fighting each other in a vicious war that lasted almost a decade.

If the President needs to strike these groups to defend our Nation, our diplomatic personnel, or our Armed Forces, he can do so under Article II of the Constitution. If any Armed Forces personnel on the ground need to defend themselves, they have the inherent right under unit self-defense principles.

Today, Congress has a historic opportunity to repeal this outdated authorization and reassert its proper authority over the solemn matters of war and peace.

I urge all of my colleagues to vote ``yes'' on this legislation, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Lee), the sponsor of this bill.

Madam Speaker, I yield the gentlewoman an additional 10 seconds.

Madam Speaker, I will just say really quickly: Before Soleimani, we had passed a bill on the AUMF in 2019, so it wasn't in response to President Trump. So this was attempted even before that.

I now yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Connolly), head of the United States delegation to the NATO Parliamentary Assembly and a member of our Foreign Affairs Committee.

Madam Speaker, I now yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from Virginia (Ms. Spanberger), a member of our HFAC committee with strong foreign affairs credentials.

Madam speaker, I now yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Jacobs), the vice chair of the subcommittee on International Development, International Organizations, and Global Corporate Social Impact.

I want to remind the gentleman that the 2014 strike against ISIS, the primary AUMF, where it was utilized in the 2001 AUMF, continues and still is in existence. Also, when you talk about Soleimani, the primary utilization, still-President Trump talked about Article II. So those still are in existence to protect the American people and at the President's options.

Madam Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from Massachusetts (Ms. Clark), the assistant Speaker.

Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his service, and I really respect him for what he

put on the line for our country. We will always do that.

But I will also say that those individuals who we did bring before the committee, though they might be professors now, they either served in the DOD or the White House, plus we had a classified briefing in the auditorium with representatives from the Joint Chiefs. So we were making sure that we had to get all of the information that we could in regards to this issue.

Madam Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from Minnesota (Ms. Omar), the vice chair of the Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health and Global Human Rights and the Subcommittee on International Development, International Organizations, and Global Corporate Social Impact.

Madam Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Velazquez), the chair of the Small Business Committee.

Madam Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Pelosi), our illustrious leader and Speaker of the United States House of Representatives.

Madam Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Waters), the chairwoman of the Committee on Financial Services.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Green), a distinguished Member.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Eshoo).

Mr. Speaker, it is now my honor to recognize a gentleman who I want to thank for his service, for he is a Marine combat veteran who served in Iraq.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Gallego).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Jones), my friend.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Kildee).

Mr. Speaker, I would just say to my friend from Texas that maybe we should do--if you think Iran is a threat--an AUMF for Iran. This AUMF was for Iraq.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from Washington (Ms. Jayapal).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from Illinois (Ms. Schakowsky).

Mr. Speaker, I just want to remind my friend that this 2002 AUMF has not been utilized as the sole reason or the sole authority in over 10 years. The 2001 AUMF is still in effect.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Brown), who is a colonel, retired, and we thank him for his service in our military.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from South Carolina (Ms. Mace), and I thank the gentlewoman for her bipartisan spirit in coming down to the floor today to speak on this

Mr. Speaker, I have no further speakers, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time. I thank the gentleman from Texas for his hard work. As he has indicated, it is a pleasure working with him on this committee and working collectively and having open and honest dialog where we agree and where we disagree. The manner in which we do that, I think, serves this body in a very good way, and I look forward to continuing to work with him in that regard.

Even though we see this a little differently, I will say right now that I am

ready to work with the gentleman in repealing and replacing the 2001 AUMF. I think that is what we utilized as primary for the 2014 ISIS issue in dealing with all of the terrorists and terrorism that is going on. But the 2002 AUMF was specific to Iraq.

Our duty and our responsibility in what took place is over. There comes a time when certain AUMFs simply become outdated and need to be repealed. We are going to do two others. We have an AUMF still on the books from 1957. We have another one that is on the books from 1991. There is no need to repeal and replace. They are outdated. Once they become outdated, let's just remove them from the books.

So let me again reiterate this: the repealing of the 2002 AUMF would have no effect on any outgoing military operations in Iraq. In fact, the only thing leaving the AUMF on the books does is risk inviting future administrations to try to stretch its legal authority and bypass Congress' constitutional obligation to make decisions on matters of war and peace, thereby getting past and abdicating our responsibilities under Article I authority and allow the executive to interpret the AUMFs far beyond their intent.

So the repeal of the 2002 AUMF is only one in a series of steps that Congress must take to reclaim its Article I authority, but it is, indeed, an important step. Today's historic vote is a turning point to quickly bring an end to this outdated AUMF. I understand from listening to the Senate that the Senate's intention also is to quickly bring the 2002 AUMF repeal for a vote.

So I look forward to Congress no longer taking a backseat on some of the most consequential decisions our Nation can make.

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

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