Providing for congressional disapproval under chapter 8 of title 5, United States Code, of the rule submitted by the Environmental Protection Agency relating to "National Emission Standards for Hazardous Air Pollutants: Rubber Tire Manufacturing".

Mr. President, I certainly hope my Democratic colleagues can let us move forward on this, or we are going to stay all night until we get the President's Chairman of the Joint Chiefs confirmed.

Now, look, I know there was some concern about removing General Brown, CQ Brown. I actually really like General CQ Brown. I thought he did a good job. I publicly stated a number of times that he served his country very well.

But here is the deal: The President of the United States is entitled to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs that he wants. You look at history, senior military commanders on the Democrat's side, on the Republican's side--if the President doesn't feel comfortable with them, he has the right to remove them and move on. That is just our history. That has happened with Democrats.

George W. Bush wasn't comfortable with Gen. Peter Pace. He is a marine.

I happen to respect him a lot. He said: Hey, I am not comfortable. I am moving to another Chairman.

President Obama fired two very senior, four-star generals inside of 2 years. One was General McChrystal, one of the most seasoned warriors, you know, in a generation of warfighters, and he removed him.

So President Trump clearly had the authority to remove General Brown. He has now put forward General Caine, who, by the way--everybody on the Armed Services Committee thought he did a great job. He is going to get a really big vote here. So why are we delaying it? I don't know. It doesn't make any sense to me.

The President deserves his senior military adviser. That is what the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs is--his senior military adviser. The President needs to feel comfortable with that person. That person is actually out of the chain of command. We have seen throughout history that when the President doesn't feel comfortable, he can remove one general and bring in another one. That is what has happened here.

We should confirm General Caine immediately. I think he is going to do a really, really good job. As a matter of fact, I have interviewed, sat down with, served under hundreds of flag officers. General Caine is one of the most impressive I have ever met. So we need to get on with it.

You know, there are these press stories about why President Trump removed General Brown. I think it is just because he wanted to have a general whom he trusts and feels comfortable with, and that is exactly his right as the Commander in Chief.

So we should move on. General Caine is going to get a very, I think, significant bipartisan vote. He should. And if the minority leader wants to object, we will just grind it out all night and get it done.

Mr. President, I yield to my good friend from Mississippi.

My good friend from Mississippi, the chairman of the Armed Services Committee, by the way--a Senator who knows probably more about the military than anyone else here--has it exactly right.

General Caine has this breadth of experience, not just as a fighter pilot with thousands of hours, combat hours, in flight but has worked very closely with our intel services and has very significant combat experience in Iraq and Syria.

Very interestingly--and the chairman of the Armed Services Committee knows this--he has private sector experience. You would say: Why does that matter? It actually matters a lot because of our military and the need to integrate our very powerful private sector.

So he brings a wealth of experience that, to be honest--in my 10 years in this position as a U.S. Senator on the Armed Services Committee and my 30 years in the Marine Corps, I have never seen a general that brings it all together. So I think he is going to be outstanding and exceptional.

Mr. President, I would yield to the distinguished minority leader. Maybe having him watch this distinguished debate between me and the chairman of the Armed Services Committee has convinced him to bow to the inevitable, and that is the confirmation of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs.

Mr. President, maybe the minority leader will explain why he is objecting given that we just laid out very cogent, strong reasons that we need to move forward on confirming the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff right now. It is a very dangerous world. Why would we wait? I am curious on what the minority leader says.

I yield the floor if he has an answer.

This Senator yields the floor to answer that inquiry that I asked about.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, I just want the American people who are watching this that care about our national security--the chairman of the Armed Services Committee just had a colloquy here on the floor talking about why we needed to move the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to get confirmed in the Senate here. And I and the chairman of the Armed Services Committee, respectfully, asked the question of the minority leader, Democratic minority leader, why are you blocking this? And you may have seen he just walked off the floor.

He didn't answer. I don't know if he has an answer. If he has an answer, it sure would be good to hear what the answer is because we need President Trump's Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff confirmed. And I bet he gets strong bipartisan support, in terms of his confirmation, because he is very qualified. And yet, without any explanation, the minority leader of the U.S. Senate just said, ``I object,'' and he walked off the floor.

I hope the press reports on that. Holy cow. That is kind of big news. And if we have to be here all night, jamming down on them to get the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff confirmed because our country needs it during a very dangerous time, a general who is immensely qualified, then that is what we are going to do.

But it sure would be easier to just agree with us, start moving on the vote, and get this highly qualified general confirmed as President Trump's Chairman of the Joint Chiefs.

But what you just witnessed, for anyone watching, the American people watching, was a nondebate. My good friend from Mississippi and I were describing why we need to move this forward. The minority leader of the U.S. Senate, who has the power to do it, just said: ``I object.''

Normally, on the Senate floor when someone objects, they explain why. But he didn't want to do it. He just walked off the floor. So that is what we just witnessed. It is a little bit unusual, particularly when it comes to a confirmation that is so important. There are very few confirmations that the U.S. Senate does that are more important than confirming the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. And I guess the Democrats are going to block it for now, and we will go all night to make sure President Trump has his principal senior military adviser, which he needs during these dangerous times.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, it is Thursday here in the U.S. Senate, and it is time for a great tradition--I think one of the greatest traditions in the history of the U.S. Senate. It is called ``The Alaskan of the Week'' speech, which I try to give most Thursdays. It has been a while. For the pages, this is the highlight of the week. Even our friends in the media like this speech because it usually signals the end of the work week, but not right now. You saw the minority leader's objection without any explanation on why on confirming the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, so we might be here for a lot longer.

So I wanted to highlight what is going on in Alaska, as I usually do during my ``Alaskan of the Week'' speech and just give a snapshot of what is happening back home.

It is still pretty cold, still have a fair amount of snow. Anchorage just got a bunch of snow that lasted a couple of days. The 53rd Iditarod just concluded in Nome with a stunning first-time win by Alaskan Jessie Holmes and his 10-dog sled team.

The Iron Dog Race, that is a snow machine race, longest, toughest snow machine race in the world, was won by--that is done in kind of tandem--Robby Schachle and Bradley George, their second victory of the Iron Dog snow machine race.

Things are starting to thaw, as I mentioned. It is beginning of the summer tourism season, right around the corner. The first cruise ship will dock in Southeast Alaska in less than 2 weeks, and thousands of tourists from all over the world will come to our great State.

Anyone watching in the Gallery, we would love to have you. Come to Alaska.

For many of these tourists, this is going to be the trip of a lifetime. For Alaskans, this is where we live every day. And our Alaskan of the Week does something that is very unusual: He is beloved by Alaskans and tourists--not an easy task--and this person is my friend Jay Ramras.

Like many Alaskans, Jay is a jack-of-all-trades. He owns restaurants and beautiful hotels. He has had a successful political career. He is a prolific philanthropist. He loves history. And more importantly, he loves Alaska and especially his great hometown of Fairbanks--by the way, my wife's hometown.

Now, I love to talk about our Alaskan of the Week. There are so many. We have talked about hundreds over the course of many years here on the Senate floor.

Jay was born in Fairbanks in 1964. His father Dan moved to Fairbanks from Brooklyn, NY, in 1948. And as Jay says: There has been a Ramras in Interior Alaska going on 80 years.

And Jay's entrepreneurial resume, which is legendary in Alaska, began in 1986 at the tender age of 22 years old when he started a chicken wing restaurant, expanding his business footprint to other eateries across Fairbanks and, eventually, purchasing the iconic Fairbanks landmark called Pike's Landing.

For anyone going to Fairbanks, you have got to stay at Pike's Landing.

It was this purchase that led Jay to uncovering some really incredible chapters of Alaskan history--as I said, Jay is a real history buff--and he credits this to his bachelor of arts degree in American history, but it all started with Pike's.

So let's talk about Pike's. Pike's Landing was established after World War II when Lloyd Pike claimed land along the Chena River--the Chena River runs right through Fairbanks--under the Homestead Act.

In 1959--by the way, the same year Alaska became the 49th State--Pike opened the original Pike's Landing. Throughout the years, Pike's Landing cemented itself as a landmark in the Fairbanks community.

When Jay purchased Pike's Landing in 2000, he found himself wondering about the history of the property and the man who established the landmark location of Pike's. The original owner had sort of disappeared from history. So Jay asked around, collecting oral histories from Fairbanks old-timers who had seen the growth of Pike's Landing over the decades.

Jay found that Pike's Landing had long faced congestion at the boat launch due to its prime location right there, as I said, on the Chena River. That was a problem Lloyd Pike solved by building a public launch to clear up some of the demand in terms of getting boats on the river.

The original boat launch was washed away when the Chena River flooded--huge flood by the way--in 1968. But decades later, Jay found himself building another boat launch, unknowingly, right at the same spot. As he said: If I hadn't already been born, I would have believed in reincarnation. I would have thought I had been reincarnated as Lloyd Pike because he put his boat launch right where Lloyd Pike lived. Since then, Jay has been working with Fairbanks North Star Borough Historic Preservation Commission to put Pike's Landing on the National Register of Historic Places. I have no doubt that is going to happen. ``It was so important to me that we rescue Lloyd Pike from obscurity,'' Jay said.

But this wasn't the only historical figure that Jay has connected himself

and the community of Fairbanks to. As Jay was in the process of building an aviation-themed extension of his hotel, he felt it needed a real airplane mounted in front to honor the lodge's proximity to the Fairbanks International Airport. While searching, he stumbled on a refurbished Cessna 140 on Craigslist. After purchasing this plane, Jay discovered it had been owned by none other than Noel Wien.

The Presiding Officer is a pilot. Maybe he knows who Noel Wien is. For those who don't, Noel Wien is considered the father of Alaska aviation--the first pilot to successfully fly from Anchorage to Fairbanks in 1924. Wien went on to found Wien Airlines, a commercial airline that operated in Alaska for nearly 60 years.

As the Presiding Officer knows, these were some intrepid pilots. That was 100 years ago he did that first flight--open-air cockpit, really cold.

Jay's interest in history, once again, piqued, and he dug into that period and discovered some great photographs of Noel Wien, Wien Airlines, and had a great celebration last year in July of 2024, celebrating the 100th anniversary of that historic flight in Alaska. Really, that was a historic flight for America. My wife Julie and I were there. Senator Murkowski was there. Our Governor was there. By the way, the Wien family was there, including Leslie Wien Hajdukovich, my former regional director. It was a great classic Jay Ramras event. Hundreds of people came out to celebrate a huge moment in Alaska history, Alaska aviation history--I would say, American aviation history.

In addition to preserving this incredible chapter in Fairbanks' history, Jay has invested in Fairbanks' future. Let me tell you about a few of his other endeavors. Each summer, Jay hosts the Yukon 800 boat race, the longest, toughest, roughest speedboat race in the world. It starts at Pike's, up to the Chena, gets out on the mighty Yukon--huge race.

Just as I mentioned, he just recently hosted the fourth Iditarod start at Pike's. Normally, the Iditarod starts down in Anchorage. That is the toughest, longest, greatest race in the world, the Iditarod. It occasionally starts in Fairbanks, but it did this year at Pike's. And as I mentioned, he regularly sponsors the Iron Dog snow machine race that, yes, is the toughest, longest, roughest snow machine race in the world.

Jay also had a successful political career, serving three terms in the Alaska House of Representatives. And he is a great philanthropist in Fairbanks--a key player in Fairbanks Food Bank and doing so many other things in terms of philanthropy.

On top of all this, Jay says his greatest legacy, he believes, will be something he recently did--which I think is just fantastic--the creation of a new synagogue in Fairbanks, the northernmost Chabad in the United States.

It began with a call from Rabbi Greenberg in Anchorage. He is a great friend of mine, one of the leaders of our Jewish community throughout the State. He asked Jay if he could host a young orthodox rabbi and his wife for a short visit. Of course, Jay, a very generous man, agreed. ``I think it would be around a two-week summer stay.'' Then they came again for a second visit, this time in January when it is 45 below zero in Fairbanks. It gets really cold in Fairbanks. And they still returned.

The young couple, Rabbi Heshy Wolf and his wife Chani have now chosen to make Fairbanks their permanent home.

Jay, generous as ever, purchased a small church with his own money. The previous congregation at the church had outgrown the place. They refurbished it, transforming it into the Fairbanks Jewish Center. The original congregation stayed on rent-free until they found a new home, a new church. Just a few weeks ago, five rabbis gathered in Fairbanks for the first time in over 120 years and hosted this new synagogue, the northernmost synagogue, I believe, in America, in Fairbanks.

Jay, thank you. What a life of accomplishment. What a legacy, not just for Fairbanks, but for all of Alaska. For every different community--sports community, Jewish community, historical community-- you have done it all. And now, Jay, you have been awarded one of the most prestigious awards anyone can achieve in their life, Alaskan of the Week.

China

Mr. President, I wanted to come to the floor to discuss a recent op- ed in the New York Times just a few days ago. It kind of made a stir. A lot of people thought it was a really good op-ed. I didn't.

I wanted to come to the floor and talk about this op-ed because it is making the rounds. It is by the columnist Thomas Freidman, and it is on national security, economic security, and trade issues relating to China.

Now, I normally enjoy, respect--don't always agree with--the seriousness of Mr. Freidman's writings. He has written a lot of books, a lot of columns, especially on the Middle East, where he has a lot of insights, no doubt about it.

But when I read this latest column called ``I Just Saw the Future. It Was Not in America,'' I couldn't believe how shockingly naive Mr. Freidman was in writing this. So I just wrote a response. I just started writing after reading this thing. My goodness, this is very naive. Then I submitted that to the New York Times. They said: Hey, sorry, it is too long.

Maybe they didn't like it. Maybe they didn't think it was that good. I said: I can just read it on the Senate floor because I think this is a big debate, our relationship with China, how we view it, how he views it, how others view it, how President Trump views it, and it needs to be debated.

That is what I want to do the next couple of minutes, talk about the Freidman piece and, in my view, why it is so naive and misses so many things and, particularly, gives Xi Jinping and the Chinese Communist Party a giant pass in terms of their history and what they have done to the international trading system.

First, the Freidman article kind of condescendingly mocks, to be honest, a lot of us. He quotes some Senators, U.S. Senators, and says, you know, these Senators ``need to get out more'' when it comes to China. That is a quote in the article.

Well, in my career, I have actually gotten out to China a lot, I mean in terms of working on the Chinese issues. I served on the National Supreme Court Council Staff under Condoleezza Rice and served as her Assistant Secretary of State in charge of economics, trade, energy, and finance. Again, under Secretary Rice, I was the Commissioner in charge of natural resources and energy in Alaska. I went to China then.

In all these positions, I met with Chinese leaders, traveled to China a fair amount. And, of course, China national security issues really bookended my entire 30-year Marine Corps career. My first deployment in the Marines was to the Taiwan Strait during what is now referred to as the ``Third Taiwan Strait Crisis,'' in 1995 and 1996. My last billet in the Marine Corps was chief of staff to the Marine Forces Pacific Commander at Indo-Pacific PACOM. It was all about China and Taiwan. As a Senator, I continued to focus on these issues, traveling to Asia frequently.

The lessons I learned when it comes to China are very different from those in the Thomas Freidman piece. As someone who has actually gotten out a fair amount to China, as Mr. Friedman tells us Senators we need to do, let's go into some of these lessons. For a smart guy, they sure were kind of naive to me.

First, Thomas Freidman talks about the need for an agreement between the United States and China. But the big worry is that President Trump would not ``stick by'' any agreement with China. That is what he says.

Now, he says this without even hinting at one of the Chinese Communist leadership's most consistent, salient, and frustrating traits, and this is it. They, the Chinese Communist leadership, almost never abides by their agreements with the United States--and I mean never. Big agreements, small agreements, it doesn't matter. They never abide by their agreements. I have seen this throughout my career.

In 2003, I was actually in this meeting right there. That is President George W. Bush and the Vice Premier of China, Madame Wu Yi in the Oval Office. I was a young staffer right there next to the President. And President Bush pressed her, Madame Wu Yi, on this theft of intellectual property that China does. He pressed her hard.

``Madam Wu Yi, you have to stop stealing our IPR.'' That senior Chinese official, 2003, looked at the President of the United States and solemnly and sincerely said: Mr. President, we will stop this. You have my word.

Well, we all know what happened. For decades, they lied about that. The last report USTR did on China's theft of intellectual property rights from the United States was $600 billion a year. Madam Wu Yi lied to President Bush in the Oval Office, no doubt about that.

I was also part of Secretary Rice's senior leadership at the State Department, taking part in the twice-yearly Cabinet-level meetings launched by President Bush and China's President Hu Jintao, called the Strategic Economic Dialogue. SED, it was called. That is more Bush- China. They never kept any of their SED commitments ever. I saw this.

This is what I refer to as ``promise fatigue''--promise fatigue. The United States makes an agreement with China, and they never keep it-- never keep it. You know who has made an art form out of promise fatigue and not keeping their promise? This guy, Xi Jinping. You remember this in the Rose Garden with President Obama--in the Rose Garden 2015. President Xi Jinping looked at Barack Obama, looked at the American people and said: We are not going to do any more cyber theft, and we are not going to militarize the islands of the South China Sea. That is what Xi Jinping told President Obama.

Guess what. That was a huge lie. They were already doing it.

Remember these? President Trump and then President Biden--Xi Jinping made commitments to both President Trump and President Biden: We are going to stop the importation of fentanyl into Mexico and the United States. Xi Jinping said that to President Trump and to President Biden. Guess what. He never kept that agreement--ever.

Of course, during the Trump administration--in the first term--the phase one China deal was signed with all this fanfare in the East Room of the White House--I was actually there when that happened--and they never kept any of those commitments.

So no matter what, when it comes to China, they just don't keep their word. They don't keep their word. And yet Tom Friedman's article focuses on President Trump's reliability?

As Joe Biden would say, ``Come on, man.''

These are the guys who cheat and aren't reliable at all, and we all know it.

Second, Friedman highlights what he sees as a great opportunity with China as it relates to our economic relations. Yet he never mentions the overriding goal of this guy, Xi Jinping. What is that overriding goal? He never mentions it once. That is to make sure the Chinese Communist Party stays in power and expands its power base at home and abroad through any means necessary, including coercion and violence. This is the goal that we all know drives his decision making.

Like many in the Senate, I frequently attend classified briefings on China. We just had the INDOPACOM Commander testify today, Admiral Paparo, who, by the way, is doing a great job. Make no mistake--it is in all the Intel briefings--this guy, Xi Jinping, is preparing for war in the Taiwan Strait. Look at him there; he is in his fatigues. His aggressive efforts might extend beyond that.

What am I talking about?

The Chinese military just completed another massive military exercise to not only blockade Taiwan but to stop any reinforcements from coming into Taiwan. Then they conducted offensive military exercises off the shores of our allies the Philippines and Australia. Their navy went all the way around Australia just a couple of weeks ago.

Friedman naively references Chinese Communist Party talking points: ``healthy interdependencies'' and ``win-win.'' These guys always use that ``win-win'' and ``We will rise together.'' Yet he ignores the military menace of the CCP abroad and its genocidal tendencies at home.

But, hey, that is OK.

Mr. Friedman says: Hey, there are a lot of smart people in China who can help us with AI.

Sorry. I am a little more worried about that.

Then he notes:

[Beijing] does not want a trade war.

No, in fact, they are actually preparing for a real war, and that is a fact for anyone who knows about China.

Finally, the entire thrust of Friedman's piece builds on and reinforces one of the biggest strategic blunders that the United States has made with regard to China and our China strategy, over the past four decades, and that is outsourcing much of our national security to corporate America.

Friedman argues that we should concentrate on letting both of our private sectors, in China and the United States, work together, and if we do that, ``Americans, working in partnership with benevolent Chinese capital and technology, will prosper just like the Chinese benefited from American capital and technology in the last four decades.''

And Tom Friedman has the nerve to call President Trump's thinking ``magical.''

Well, this is really magical from Tom Friedman. First off, the Chinese communist system doesn't really have a private sector. Again, anyone who gets out to China knows this. Everybody in China, ultimately, works for the CCP, for Xi Jinping, for the Chinese Communist Party.

Just as importantly, as we have so painfully learned over the past four decades, the U.S. private sector, especially Wall Street and some of the big corporate CEOs, are very poor guardians of America's national security and economic interests when it comes to China. The U.S. Government finally, during President Trump's first term, started to say: Whoa. Wait. Stop. We can't outsource our national security to corporate America. We, the U.S. Government, need to safeguard our own interests, and that is what we are trying to do.

I will say--and we just saw it a couple of years ago--the annual American CEO confab in Beijing with Xi Jinping, in the People's Hall, which, in my view, has become a national embarrassment, with Xi triumphantly leading the sycophantic-looking American CEOs behind him, does nothing to dispel the concern that this remains a strategic weakness in our national security relative to China.

As we speak, CCP--the Chinese Communist Party--propaganda is flooding the world to fan the flames of a narrative that Friedman seems to embrace, and it is this: Their narrative is that President Trump has broken the World War II liberal international trading system.

This charge is ridiculous, and it gives a pass to the real culprit. The Chinese Communist Party broke the system a long time ago, and that has been their intention all along.

In 2005, then-Deputy Secretary of State and future World Bank president Bob Zoellick delivered his well-received speech, called the ``Responsible Stakeholder'' speech. It noted that, more than any other country, China has benefited from the international economic order set up by the United States after World War II, and it was now time for China to safeguard and embrace and become a responsible stakeholder in this system to help it endure.

I was in meetings with senior Chinese officials, not long after this speech, and they deceivingly used the term ``responsible stakeholder'' much to the American policymakers' delight. But the CCP leaders clearly had other plans: to unleash policies that continued their rampant intellectual property theft of American businesses; to never keep their promises and commitments that they make to Americans; forcing U.S. companies to hand over proprietary technology in order to gain access to China's market; aggressively subsidizing important industries, like steel, where they flooded global markets and destroyed the American heartland; blocking U.S. exports from having fair and reciprocal access to China's market; and unleashing economic coercion on our allies, like Australia, Korea, and Japan, when they dared to question CCP orthodoxy.

The Trump administration's policies are a course correction to all of this. But make no mistake, it was the Chinese Communist Party and its policies that took a wrecking ball to the international trading system. Yet, like so many other aspects of Friedman's piece, he gives the CCP and Xi a pass on this most consequential point.

U.S. Senators on both sides of the aisle, including those who don't even get out much, according to Mr. Friedman, have recognized this truth. It would be good progress if an insightful observer of the international system, like Thomas Friedman is, would do so as well.

I yield the floor.

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 177 and ask for its immediate consideration.

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

General Leave

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

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

Mr. Speaker, I remind my Democratic colleague that the rule we are debating today provides for consideration of H.J. Res. 42 regarding a Department of Energy appliance rule, H.J. Res. 61 regarding an EPA National Emission Standards rule on rubber tire manufacturing, and S.J. Res. 11 regarding the EPA's Bureau of Ocean Energy Management rules requiring burdensome archaeological reports on energy producers.

There will be ample opportunities to debate, amend, and provide suggestions when the appropriate authorizing committees move forward when we begin our work on spending reforms in a budget reconciliation package. We should focus on the legislation before us this week.

I encourage my colleagues to engage in regular order as our authorizing

committees begin to work on our reconciliation and not prejudge their outcomes and make baseless assumptions.

My colleagues across the aisle have mentioned how they find these measures not worthy of our time. This certainly isn't the first time they have mocked House Republican efforts to curb regulations on appliances, from heating systems to dishwashers, refrigerators, and freezers.

If this were such an unserious endeavor as my colleagues across the aisle claim, then why did the administration they supported for 4 years issue at least 31 regulations covering a vast array of different appliances and other products out of the DOE and the EPA? Is $60 billion foisted on to our Nation's manufacturers and consumers in new regulatory and compliance costs not serious enough for Congress to thoroughly scrutinize?

Democrats seem to be confused about what it is that the American people voted for in November, and one of those items was lowering day- to-day costs that are hurting workers and families. Reversing these regulations is something that House Republicans are deeply committed to doing, and we are working with the administration to actually get this done.

I would also recommend that my colleagues across the aisle speak with the fellow Democrats in their Caucus about how harmful these regulations are and why CRAs to reverse Biden's anti-energy and economically harmful regulations are so important.

Last Congress, Democrats voted with Republicans to pass at least five measures to halt Biden administration green energy regulations, including the following:

A CRA to halt the Biden definition of the Waters of the United States. Nine Democrats voted ``yes.''

A CRA to halt draconian emissions standards on heavy-duty vehicles. Four Democrats voted ``yes.''

A CRA to halt draconian emission standards on light-and medium-duty vehicles. Eight Democrats voted ``yes.''

In this Congress, a whopping 11 Democrats voted just last week in support of a CRA on the Biden administration's rule on conservation standards for consumer gas-fired instantaneous water heaters, one of those appliance-related regulations that my colleagues here today claim is not worth our time in the House, but their colleagues voted ``yes.''

Finally, six Democrats voted ``yes'' on last week's CRA to halt the Biden-era implementation of a natural gas tax that would harm our Nation's energy producers and consumers.

The Democratic Party is busy pulling their hair out over President Trump, Elon Musk, DOGE, whatever else is their outrage of the day. However, they have lost sight of the kitchen-table issues affecting everyday Americans. They ignore the rising costs hurting workers and families in order to cater to their own extreme leftwing base. It is so bad that even Members in their own Caucus are breaking ranks to vote for commonsense reforms such as the rolling back of these radical anti- energy agenda items that the Biden administration foisted upon us in the eleventh hour of their administration.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, we listen to calls from our Democratic colleagues for compassion and concern. I must ask the question, where was the compassion and concern while they watched prices skyrocket over our constituents over the 4 years of the Biden administration?

Where was the compassion and concern where the Biden regulatory environment smothered the U.S. economy with regulation after regulation, trillions of dollars in off-budget spending,

which soared inflation for the American people? Where was the compassion then?

Where was the outrage when House Republicans were calling for relief for the American people in the last Congress?

They said that we were following the wishes of only President Trump. They followed the Green New Deal playbook to a t, and that is what we are here to debate today are these important rollbacks of the Green New Deal agenda.

We sat idly by and watched our country get invaded by at least 10 million people that came across our country's borders with the direct will of the President to do it. President Trump has proven in just less than 2 short months the ability for a President to roll this all back with executive orders. Yet, the cost to New York alone was $7 billion in costs on New York taxpayers. Where was the outrage then?

For 8 years, this hysteria has cost them. While they persisted in their witch hunt of President Trump in 2022, Americans contended with 40-year high inflation, after Democrats and President Biden dumped trillions of dollars into a recovering post-COVID economy, which even one of their chief economists told us would create massive inflation. They ignored that guidance.

Did they seek to address everyday Americans' concerns about the direction of our economy? They did not. They doubled down on lawfare against President Trump, and it lost them the House in 2022. In 2024, when the world was on fire with our borders flung open to the invasion of millions of illegal aliens into this country that prompted a crisis in countless communities, including my own, Americans' top concerns coming back time and time again, poll after poll, were the economy and our border. Democrats did no work to address those concerns.

Did Vice President Kamala Harris address them? No, she did not. She didn't make that sale to the American people when she was campaigning across this country. Instead, all we heard was about Kamala brat summer and the last-ditch jittery attempt at once again trying to convince Americans that Trump was somehow a threat to democracy. Democrats lost, historically, on November 5, 2024. They lost the electoral vote, the popular vote, and they lost every swing State on the table.

Did Democrats learn from this smarting defeat since President Trump took office? They clearly have not. Instead, they focus their time again defending USAID slush funds, flat-out government waste, and pretty much every problem, trying to lay it at President Trump's feet, including what he is doing every single day as well as DOGE and how they are trying to fix the crisis and the mess that was left behind by the Biden years.

Mr. Speaker, the American people have time and again responded to Democratic hair-pulling with, at best, disinterest. Yet, here we are today on the House floor with more of the same.

The rule before us considers legislation focused on ridding American consumers in an industry of harming regulations that are truly impacting their wallets and their financial well-being and our Nation's economic future. I urge my colleagues to quit the hysterics and for once listen to the voices of the American people after years of refusing to do so.

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

Are you yielding me your time?

Mr. Speaker, we have seen a lot of masterful theatrics out of the Democratic Party recently, and we are seeing nothing different from that today. It is amazing that people who are so concerned about burdensome regulations and costs on people offer no solutions.

We are here doing the work of that today. We are taking price concerns off of the back of industries. We are preserving jobs. We are creating a brighter future for our communities by getting rid of this eleventh hour rulemaking that was put forward by the Biden administration.

They had all the power to make this country move in the right direction when Democrats controlled all of Congress and the White House following the 2020 elections. They had the ability to make those changes, but they took the country in the wrong direction.

That is why the country, at the ballot box, made the changes that they made. They took the House out of Democratic hands and made Republicans lead the House of Representatives. Then, they did the same with the Senate and the White House in 2024.

That is the report card that the Democratic Party earned because they prioritized the things that the American people did not want prioritized. They haven't read the room. They answer to their woke and angry mobs that they are foisting on Members of Congress and people all over the country right now. It is a very coordinated effort. They deny it, but make no mistake, every U.S. Senator today released a video that has the exact same script. It is very clearly a theatrical performance that the American people are seeing out of Democrats in the U.S. Senate.

We are here with solutions to problems created by the last administration. We are putting them forward to get the job done. We have a timeline that we have to focus on, and that is why these CRAs are so important for us to tackle right now. We have limited legislative days in order to roll back these unnecessary, burdensome regulations that no one asked for and no one wanted. We are getting the job done that we were sent here to do.

Let's look again at the numbers. The Biden administration has issued at least 31 regulations for residential and commercial appliances and equipment, totaling $60 billion. If my friends on the other side of the aisle don't think that added regulatory costs filter into the price of new appliances, then we

have several bridges available for them to purchase.

Let's look further at some of the regulations that will reap financial savings for American consumers. In one example, under the Biden DOE's dishwasher efficiency standards, Americans are expected to save a whopping $1.12 under that regulation. Was that necessary to put out there? Of course, it wasn't.

These are savings that the left expected the American people to be excited about as they racked up more regulations and more restrictions that cost us jobs from the results of the Biden years.

Under the latest DOE rule that H.J. Res. 42 would fortunately curb, home appliance manufacturers have already outlined how the rule requires their industry to provide a myriad of unnecessary information and data that is meaningless when demonstrating efficiency but simply is required to meet compliance with the rules.

It is regulations for the sake of regulations, and the American people are left to pay higher prices and have fewer choices.

At the end of the day, Mr. Speaker, my colleagues simply refuse to acknowledge the natural dynamics of the marketplace. When left to their own devices, the American people will seek out the most efficient model of an appliance that they can afford.

I agree with my colleagues when they say that the American people want cost savings, both at sale and with efficiency over the lifecycle of an appliance. What they don't want is government intervention that limits their ability to make those choices themselves. They want to have more affordable options available to fit tighter budgets, not fewer, more expensive choices because unelected bureaucrats at Biden's DOE needed to micromanage what refrigerators, dishwashers, heaters, air-conditioners, you name it, were permissible under unrealistic efficiency standards.

H.J. Res. 42 will help curb these costly, limiting, and anti-natural gas standards from the final days of the gasping Biden administration that were finalized at the behest of his radical climate lobby.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, the epiphany that those on the other side of the aisle now have--and they are so concerned about costs and economic concerns-- when they fought us tooth and nail on every single action that we tried to take to curb the Biden administration's uncontrollable regulatory environment is just laughable.

We watched, warned, and fought in the 118th Congress to stop an administration that created a regulatory environment that has added about $1.5 trillion in needless regulations that have stifled the growth of industry and jobs in this country. Now, we are seeing them all of a sudden change their tune.

As our new administration is less than a month and a half old, things are moving in the right direction. People have a new view of what the future is. We are fighting hard to preserve a predictable tax code in this country. We are extending the current tax code so that we can have regulatory certainty, tax certainty, so that businesses can thrive and grow and not fear the hammer of government that they did in the Biden years.

There was an explosion after election day of people ready, willing, and able to invest in America. We have seen unprecedented investment come in from overseas, bringing new jobs, new opportunities, and new future creation here to the United States since election day. That will continue because that is what President Trump campaigned on. That is what House Republicans fight for and what we will achieve together.

Mr. Speaker, this epiphany that we have had on the other side of the aisle, that they are now all of a sudden concerned with the costs of everyday Americans, was nowhere to be found for 2 years in the 118th Congress, as we fought every day about the costs of gas and groceries and how it was pinching away because of Biden's inflation and what it had done to the purchasing power of everyday Americans' accounts.

People in probably both of our districts said the same exact thing, that they were watching the American Dream slip away from our kids and grandkids because we couldn't necessarily be certain that the future would be brighter under the current trajectory of this country.

We have saddled the country with $36.5 trillion in debt. It is a debt service that is higher than what we spend on our national defense. It is an unacceptable legacy that we are leaving to our future generations. We are working every day toward our budget reconciliation to get that under control so that we can be the era that bent the curve on spending and got this country back on track.

Yet, we have other people on the other side of the aisle who want to keep spending levels at the COVID era. COVID fell upon us 5 years ago this week, yet they still want to spend like we are in the midst of an emergency.

It is time that we have a commonsense revolution in this country, commonsense like what we are doing here today: rolling back needless regulations that hurt jobs, hurt workers, and hurt consumers. That is what we were asked to do by our constituents.

These CRAs this week are important because they reinstitute choice in the marketplace. They take the bureaucrats that DOGE is fighting every single day out of the equation and put the

American consumer back in the driver's seat so that we can have choice in our consumer goods, not creating a standard just to justify someone's job in a cubicle somewhere. That is what this government has been about for far too long, but those days are over.

Mr. Speaker, we are now putting common sense in the driver's seat in this country. We are working toward a brighter future for our kids and grandkids.

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

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

For 4 years, Democrats gaslit the American people in a vain attempt to convince them that costs weren't going up, inflation wasn't real, our economy wasn't in trouble, and there wasn't a crisis at our borders. The American people saw past that deception, and they voted for a President and a Congress that promised to put our country back on track.

Part of fulfilling that promise includes unwinding a slew of burdensome rules, prohibitions, restrictions, and other ticky-tacky attempts to micromanage everyday life for Americans. It also includes ensuring that the woke mob and their radical environmental NGOs can no longer call the shots at these Federal agencies at the expense of our manufacturers, our domestic energy producers, and good-paying jobs.

Mr. Speaker, I strongly support the rule before us today.

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

Mr. President, I rise today to talk about the GENIUS Act and the urgent need to strengthen this bill before the Senate votes on it later this week. The GENIUS Act would create a framework for bringing stablecoins deeper into the U.S. financial system.

For those who are unfamiliar with stablecoins, they are a type of cryptocurrency whose value is pegged to the value of another asset like the U.S. dollar. A stablecoin is similar to a bank deposit only without the guarantees of a bank behind it. A stablecoin is supposed to maintain a stable value, so a holder can redeem it to get their cash back on demand, and they can make payments with it, at least in theory.

Democrats want to work with Republicans to advance a stablecoin bill that will make stablecoins safer to use and curb the worst abuses of the industry. There are five areas that need revision.

First, a bill must include basic rules so government officials can't use stablecoin ventures to line their own pockets and so that foreign governments and giant corporations cannot use stablecoins to pay bribes to the President of the United States.

Second, the bill must prevent Big Tech and other commercial firms from issuing stablecoins, thereby preserving America's historical separation between banking and commerce.

Third, the bill must include basic consumer protections--the same as for any other financial transaction.

Fourth, the bill must safeguard national security, providing the same guardrails as other payment systems, to make sure that we are not turbocharging the financing of drug traffickers, terrorists, adversaries like North Korea, and crypto scammers.

And, fifth, the bill must have sufficient safeguards so that a stablecoin meltdown won't trigger an economywide financial meltdown.

With adequate changes in those five areas, Democrats can support the GENIUS Act.

When the GENIUS Act was before the Banking Committee in March, Senate Democrats worked hard to improve the bill. Together, Democrats introduced nearly 70 amendments. We called for votes on more than two dozen of them. Every single Democrat voted for every single amendment, and every single Republican voted no. When the bill advanced out of the committee, Democrats made clear they needed to see real changes in the bill before they could vote for it down here on the floor of the Senate.

The version that will be voted on by the full Senate as early as this Thursday makes only minor changes, leaving fundamental problems with the bill. I know that the Republican majority intends to force this vote with no real changes. That would be a mistake. If the majority wants to establish a durable legal framework for digital assets rather than just try to score political points, they will take these concerns seriously and agree to improve the bill.

Since the committee vote, President Trump's aggressive efforts to profit from stablecoins and the obvious opportunities from bribery and other influence peddling have demonstrated why it is vital that we make meaningful, substantive reforms to the bill. So let's talk for just a minute about how we got here.

During his first term, Donald Trump was extremely critical of crypto, describing crypto as ``highly volatile and based on thin air''--thin air--and highlighting that it can ``facilitate unlawful behavior, including drug trade and other illegal activity.''

When he ran for office in 2024, however, the crypto industry poured enormous sums of money into Donald Trump's election, and after he was elected, crypto leaders contributed another $18 million to his inauguration. It was no surprise when Trump reversed his position and began to boost the industry, but it has been shocking to see Donald Trump move at breakneck speed to use his position as President to reap billions of dollars for himself personally and for his family.

The biggest corruption scandal in modern history is unfolding right now, and no one in here is paying attention to it. Trump has created the opportunity to trade Presidential favors like tariff exemptions, pardons, and government appointments for crypto purchases that will directly benefit himself and his family, and no one needs to speculate on what might happen. All of this is happening in full view of the public. Over his first 100 days, the President has enabled corruption on such an unprecedented scale it would truly make a two-bit dictator blush.

Most people are aware that the meme coin Trump launched ahead of his inauguration was sagging in value recently, so his recent announcement that he would host a dinner for the top 220 investors in the coin and would provide an ``exclusive bonus'' VIP White House tour for the top 25 investors suddenly boosted Trump's crypto venture. Trump has already made more than $300 million from trading fees alone and billions more in unrealized gains since he owns 80 percent of those coins.

And this is not his only crypto grift. Two weeks after the Banking Committee voted on the GENIUS Act in March, President Trump's crypto company World Liberty Financial launched its own stablecoin called USD1. Donald Junior is promoting it as ``just as safe as a bank account but without all that extra nonsense.'' USD1 was quietly launched less than a week ago, and its market capitalization now exceeds $2 billion. It is already the seventh largest stablecoin in the entire world.

As the New York Times reported last week in a front-page story about Trump's crypto corruption:

World Liberty Financial has eviscerated the boundary

between private enterprise and government policy in ways

without precedent in modern American history.

And here is the most egregious example: Trump's stablecoin was issued on the network of Binance, the largest crypto exchange in the world. Binance is an interesting choice to be Trump's partner in the stablecoin business. Back in 2023, Binance pleaded guilty to criminal charges after allowing ``money to flow to terrorists, cyber criminals, and child abusers through its platform.'' Its CEO went to jail after also pleading guilty to criminal money laundering charges. He is reportedly lobbying Trump for a pardon. What better way to buy off Donald Trump than to offer him a very favorable business deal in the stablecoin business.

The opportunity for corruption is not hypothetical. Trump has already given us a staggering example. Last week, it was reported that an Abu Dhabi investment firm MGX is using Trump's USD1 stablecoin to finance a $2 billion investment in Binance, essentially giving Trump a cut of the deal. The firm is chaired by the so-called spy sheikh of the United Arab Emirates and co-

owned by G42, a firm with extensive ties to the Chinese Government. The Trump Organization recently announced plans to build a hotel and an apartment building in the UAE, and buyers--you guessed it--will be allowed to make payments in bitcoins.

The GENIUS Act makes this kind of corruption worse. There is nothing in the bill to stop it. Instead, the bill would accelerate it. President Trump and the crypto industry are not trying to jam through this bill because they know it will make corruption and bribery harder. They are trying to jam it through because they know it will turbocharge the size and scale of the stablecoin market and help boost the value of their own stablecoin ventures, all while containing no real restrictions on the President's self-dealing.

Under the current version of the bill, President Trump is able to rake in transaction fees every time his stablecoin is used or traded. When trading is active, those fees are measured in the hundreds of millions of dollars.

Trump will also make money a second way: Everyone who owns USD1 essentially provides Trump with an interest-free loan. This means that Trump will make money on assets backing the stablecoin, and he will pay no interest to the holders of the coin. Big corporations and foreign governments can run the MGX play and use USD1 to cut Trump in on business deals or openly pay him off for tariff exemptions and other special deals, pardons, or government appointments. For a giant corporation hoping to see a prosecution dropped or a license granted, Trump's new stablecoin business creates a way to offer a payoff for the President of the United States to use his influence to get the desired outcome.

These massive opportunities for grift must be stopped, and Democrats have commonsense amendments to do exactly that. For example, we propose that the President and all other elected officials and their families be barred from owning, controlling, promoting, or otherwise participating in stablecoin business ventures. While I believe that all elected officials should be barred from buying, selling, and trading stock, investments in stablecoin companies themselves create a special risk right now. Congress is currently writing laws that will sharply increase or decrease the value of these businesses. The public should know that no one is making decisions to further their own financial interests. The current version of the GENIUS Act contains no such restrictions. The Senate should not pass a bill that facilitates Trump's breathtaking corruption and lines his pockets and welcomes other elected officials to do the same.

There are other fundamental problems with the GENIUS Act that need to be fixed before we vote.

It is crucial to prohibit the intermingling of commercial businesses and stablecoins. For centuries, our country has maintained a separation between our system of money and payments on the one side and actual businesses in the real economy on the other side. That separation helps protect the stability of our financial system, helps promote fair competition in the economy, and prevents concentrating too much economic power in the hands of just a few.

Democrats and Republicans have, time and again, linked arms to defend exactly this separation. For example, when Mark Zuckerberg tried to leverage Facebook to create a stablecoin in 2019, both Democrats and Republicans said: No. Run Facebook or run a stablecoin operation, but do not mix the two together. Under the GENIUS Act, however, Zuckerberg could launch his own coin as soon as the bill is passed.

This is particularly of interest to Elon Musk. He has already explained his plan to expand his social media platform X into a payment platform, X Money. He has said that he can use the reach of X so that, in a few years, his X Money and his stablecoin will be ``half of the global financial system.'' The man has vision. He and other Big Tech billionaires would be free to issue their own currencies to compete with the U.S. dollar.

There is absolutely no reason to allow this. Other bipartisan stablecoin bills have not permitted this. Blessing ``co-President'' Elon Musk's ambitions to overtake the U.S. money supply is completely unnecessary to build a well-regulated and safe stablecoin regime. Democrats have an amendment to prohibit the intermingling between nonfinancial companies and stablecoin issuers, and we should make that change before we vote on the GENIUS Act here in the Senate.

It is also important to strengthen the GENIUS Act to safeguard our national security. Stablecoins now count for more than 60 percent of crypto transactions, according to a recent public analysis from the blockchain analytics firm Chainalysis, making them the ``new kingpin of illicit crypto activity.'' The current version of the bill does little to prevent stablecoins from being exploited by terrorists, cartels, and criminals. In fact, compared to the version voted out of the Banking Committee, the current bill creates new loopholes to allow operators of so-called decentralized crypto exchanges and other services to continue circulating for noncompliant stablecoin issuers.

It is critical for service providers like crypto exchanges and custodians to maintain programs to check for illegal financial activity and for our government to be able to sanction mixers that move millions of dollars for our adversaries. It is important also that terrorists and drug traffickers know that they cannot escape sanctions enforcement by switching from dollars to stablecoins, and it is critical that stablecoin issuers be required to monitor the blockchains on which stablecoins are traded. As drafted, the GENIUS Act does not include those safeguards. Democrats have language to fix that.

We need also to ensure that the same basic consumer protections that apply when somebody pays their rent using their checking account or buys a cup of coffee with their credit card also apply to stablecoins. For example, at a bare minimum, consumers should have easy access to their money if they want to redeem their stablecoins. However, the GENIUS Act does not do that, leaving consumers exposed to potential delays, process hurdles, and junk fees.

When it comes to consumer protection, the most recent version of the bill actually got worse compared to the version that was voted on in committee. The current GENIUS Act strips out certain protections, leaving consumers exposed to fly-by-night, scammy wallet providers to hold their stablecoins. And--get this--all but the very largest stablecoin issuers get to evade auditing requirements, leaving consumers vulnerable to the type of financial fraud that is now rampant in the crypto ecosystem.

Notably, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is not mentioned once in the bill despite the CFPB being responsible for enforcing our Nation's Federal consumer financial laws.

As Fed Chair Jerome Powell said in a Senate hearing shortly after DOGE attempted to shut down the CFPB, when CFPB is not on the job enforcing consumer protection laws, there is no one in the Federal Government to pick up the slack--no cop on the beat. That is exactly what the supporters of the GENIUS Act are hoping for--no one in the Federal Government who has the expertise or the budget to be a real cop on the beat. The stablecoin scammer will target every person in America, and under the GENIUS Act, they will run almost no risk of getting caught.

The current version of the GENIUS Act leaves consumers exposed to scams, fraud, and abuse. We can plug those holes and make sure that consumers are protected when making electronic payments regardless of the technology that underpins the transaction, and Democrats have amendments for that.

Finally, the GENIUS Act lacks the basic safeguards necessary to ensure that stablecoins don't blow up our entire financial system. This isn't a hypothetical risk. Circle's stablecoin dipped from $1 to 88 cents in March of 2023--2 years ago--threatening a broader run on the crypto market. But regulators bailed out Circle's and other big corporations' deposits at Silicon Valley Bank in order to prevent a banking crash. Money market funds and the repo market, which pose similar risks as stablecoins, have been bailed out twice in less than 20 years.

The threats that stablecoins pose to our economic system are real, and once

again taxpayers will be called on to bail out millionaires and billionaires--only this time, it will be the millionaires and billionaires who are fronting for cryptocurrencies.

The bill as drafted permits stablecoin issuers to invest in riskier assets, including uninsured U.S. and foreign bank deposits and repo loans and hedge funds, and allows them to engage in risky nonstablecoin activities, like private credit or derivatives trading.

At the same time, the bill constrains regulators' ability to apply capital and liquidity safeguards to limit the chances of stablecoin failures. It restricts regulators' ability to enforce the already weak requirements of the bill when a stablecoin issuer violates them, and it stacks the deck against denying stablecoin applications submitted by risky companies.

In addition, regulators would have no authority to block worrisome mergers and acquisitions even if the new stablecoin owners have a history of financial fraud or money laundering.

Let's just give an example here. Sam Bankman-Fried decides he wants to buy a stablecoin company while he is still in prison. The GENIUS Act says: Go right ahead.

Democrats have solutions to fix these financial stability weaknesses, and we should include them in the bill now. If the GENIUS Act goes forward without these changes, Donald Trump will continue to line his pockets with crypto scams while his policies continue to tank the economy for everyone else. Efforts to personally pay off government officials like the President of the United States will accelerate, and they are going to happen right out in the open. Big Tech billionaires will have even greater control over our economy. Terrorism financing and sanctions evasion risks will grow. Consumers will be at greater risk of getting cheated. Another financial crash will be more likely.

The problems with this bill are serious, but here is the thing: They can be solved. Democrats have offered solutions throughout this process, and it is not too late. We can find common ground on a reasonable framework to regulate the stablecoin market and to put those changes into the bill now. But we cannot bless Trump's corruption and put consumers, our financial system, and our national security at risk.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I was sitting with the CEO of one of America's biggest and most influential companies last month, and I asked him a simple question: What could President Trump do that would be a bridge too far for you? What attack on democracy or the rule of law could Trump make that would cause you to speak up?

His answer was pretty simple, and it was pretty confident. He said: If Trump were to ignore a Supreme Court ruling, that would cross the line.

He was reflecting a familiar theme: that until President Trump thumbs his nose definitively at a Court ruling, then his attacks on democracy are troubling but not lethal. It is normal politics up until that dramatic confrontation between the executive branch and the judicial branch, for which the Constitution, as we know, really has no prescribed remedy.

For many Americans, they may breathe a sigh of relief that America's most influential private sector leaders would rise up to defend democracy; that if this confrontation that we worry about would come to pass, combined with a massive public mobilization, we could be saved.

But I didn't breathe a sigh of relief. It was the opposite.

I am deeply worried that we have really spent little time studying the paths that democracies take when they collapse. Most of the time, there is not a singular moment when the Executive dramatically seizes power. There is not normally a brazen attempt to burn down the Parliament building. No, instead, democracies die when gradually, often quietly and methodically, over time, the structures that hold the Executive accountable for corruption, for thievery, for wrongdoing are dismantled--dismantled so that citizens can no longer hold the Executive accountable; dismantled so that the political opposition never has enough room to maneuver meaningfully.

There are still elections. The Executive doesn't try to stuff the ballot box. Occasionally, at lower levels, the opposition still wins. But what happens is that those structures of accountability are either so degraded or so completely co-opted by the regime that the truth is just buried, and the political opposition loses the basic tools that it needs to win.

In every democracy that stops being a democracy, then, there is a familiar story. There are four institutions that the regime attacks and that it attacks relentlessly until those structures of accountability are so disintegrated that, even though elections continue to happen, the same party or the same person wins power election after election. Those four institutions are the press, the legal profession, universities, and the business community. If you degrade or co-opt these four institutions, you never need to have a high-stakes fight with the top court in your country. You don't need to burn the Reichstag down. You can still have elections, but only one party will win.

So that is why this CEO's assurance, frankly, sent a chill down my spine--because our democracy isn't at risk of dying; it is dying. As we speak, we are watching it die. It is not too late to save it.

Let me say that again. It is not too late to save our democracy. But we can't continue to close our eyes and think that our democracy can survive a coordinated assault on those four key institutions of accountability. Democrats and Republicans need to see what is happening before our eyes, rise up, and defend the independence of journalists, of lawyers, of universities, and of the private sector.

So I want to spend a minute or two to walk you through what President Trump is doing and how it, frankly, chillingly, mirrors the tactics that other leaders have used to transition real democracy into pretend, fake democracy.

It always starts with journalists, from Hungary to Belarus, to Venezuela--countries that have elections but elections where one party just keeps on winning. These are places where journalists are subject to a nonstop harassment campaign from the regime, such that people just stop doing journalism or journalists stop telling the full truth.

Last month, for instance, Turkish President Erdogan locked up 11 journalists simply because they were covering protests against Erdogan's jailing of the top opposition leaders.

Now, Trump has not started jailing journalists, but the pace of harassment in the first 60 days of his second term is alarming.

He has denied access to government buildings, including the White House, to journalists who don't use preapproved language from the White House. He is preferencing credentials to partisan journalists who simply parrot his party line. His FCC has begun to deliberately harass media companies that are owned by political opponents of the President.

But Trump's campaign to destroy independent journalism has a darker and more menacing side because Trump isn't just trying to intimidate journalists so that they will be afraid to tell the truth; he is also trying to destroy the concept of truth itself. Again, this is a key facet of leaders who are elected who are trying to transition democracies away and into something very different.

How do you destroy truth? Well, that is why the Secretary of Defense looks into the camera and tells the American public that the text messages that everybody read, filled with classified information and war plans, did not include classified information and war plans.

The White House wants you to believe that one plus one does not equal two any longer; that you should doubt even the clear things that you see with your eyes; that nothing is real; that nothing is true; that if you are a supporter of the regime and I tell you once plus one equals three, then one plus one equals three. Those weren't war plans. Those weren't classified items.

That is also why the official position of the White House on key issues like tariffs changes every hour, because if the ground truth just changes constantly, then there is no truth at all.

Journalists are made to look foolish by reporting a true thing at 9 a.m. that becomes untrue at 10 a.m. Journalism loses its credibility when the facts being distributed by the White House change all the time.

Trump says the tariffs are permanent.

Journalists report that the President says the tariffs are permanent.

An hour later, Trump says: I never said they are permanent. They are not permanent. I am cutting deals.

They write that he is cutting deals.

An hour later, they are suspended--no more tariffs.

When the truth changes constantly, it is hard to believe that there is anything true any longer.

Second, universities are always--always--a target of would-be autocrats. Again, in Turkiye, the government has terminated thousands of professors just because they criticized the government. In Hungary, one of the nation's most prestigious universities was forced to move out of the country because President Orban attacked it so ceaselessly for fomenting protests against his government.

Universities, over the long history of democracy, have been the place where protests--especially youth protests--begin. They are a thorn in the side of leadership. The famous Tiananmen Square protests in China were, of course, started by university students.

So it is no surprise that if you want to crush democracy, you need to crush the independence of universities. That is why Trump's decision to target universities that permit criticism of President Trump is so bone-chilling. He pretends like he is standing up to anti-Semitism on campuses, but what he is really trying to do is make clear that protests against his policies on campuses will result in Federal funding being cut off.

Columbia University was forced to agree to a stunning list of free speech concessions in order to gain assurances from President Trump that their Federal funding would continue. They had to agree to allow campus police to arrest protesters. They had to essentially agree to receivership, Federal receivership, over an academic department

that houses professors who are critical of Trump and his policies. Effectively, the President of the United States got to pick the person who will oversee the Columbia Department of Middle East, South Asian and African Studies as well as the Center for Palestine Studies. That is extraordinary. That is not what happens in a healthy democracy--the leader of the country micromanaging academic departments at major universities to ensure that academic work aligns with the regime.

Now, having successfully forced Columbia to bend the knee and quell dissent on their campus, Trump is targeting other universities. Some of them will sign similar agreements giving President Trump power over those campuses. But, frankly, all Trump has to do is make an example of a handful of universities, and others will simply comply and obey in advance.

Why? As an academic president, when you have Federal dollars that employ people at your university, would you permit a major protest against a Trump policy if you know that is going to jeopardize Federal funds? Maybe you allow it because you don't want to brazenly stand in the way of free speech, but you just make sure that it is not too big a protest or it is not too critical. You police speech to be on the right side of the regime. That is what happens in all of these fake democracies, and that is what is happening here.

But controlling speech on campuses is not enough. Controlling and intimidating journalists is not enough. You have to go after the lawyers too.

Now, maybe there is not a lot of love for lawyers in this country, but lawyers are the ones who bring the lawsuits to stop the thievery and the illegality. Lawyers are compelled by their oath to stand up for the Constitution.

Putin arrested Navalny's lawyers right on the eve of Navalny's trial.

In Venezuela, Maduro routinely harasses and detains lawyers--human rights lawyers--because he knows those are the ones who will hold him accountable.

In Tunisia, the regime stormed the offices of the bar administration to intimidate the legal profession into silence.

Here in America, Trump is engaged in a shameless campaign of extortion against any major law firm that has taken a position against Trump or Trump's interests. What he is doing is extraordinary, and it is mind-blowing to me that it is just being ignored by my Republican colleagues. He is going firm by firm--and not to every firm, just to the firms that have represented Democrats or brought cases against him--and he is telling them that if they don't fall in line and stop doing work to oppose him, their clients will lose access to Federal work.

That is extortion. This body, Republicans and Democrats, should stand up against it. But it is working. Several law firms have signed deals with Trump that obligate them to support--guess what--causes aligned with Donald Trump.

Paul Weiss was targeted by an Executive order and struck a deal. But so did Skadden. They struck a deal with Trump before they had even been targeted. Already, collectively, these firms have pledged--think about this--about a quarter of a billion dollars of pro bono work to file cases in coordination with the President of the United States' political interests.

Just like what happened with the universities, there is a lot of extra compliance that is happening. I know for a fact that firms that have already signed these agreements with Trump have gone above and beyond the terms of the agreements to quiet their criticism of the government. No doubt, every single major law firm will think twice before bringing an action against an illegal or corrupt action of the President in fear of Trump retaliating against their business.

That is the point. The point is to try to crush dissent. The point is to try to stand in the way of anybody who is going to hold Trump accountable by using the power--the official power granted to him by the people of the United States--to try to signal retaliation against anyone who dares oppose him.

But collective action can be a powerful tool. Together, the collective might of our universities and our law firms is significant. So they could choose to band together and decide to sign no agreements with Trump, to refuse to let the President of the United States dictate the terms of their speech, their business, their defense of the rule of law.

I don't want to make the victim the perpetrator. This is all Trump's fault, what he is doing to extort political loyalty from universities and law firms. But instead of there being collective action on behalf of these industries, the opposite is happening.

In the legal profession, when Paul Weiss was being targeted, the other big firms didn't rise to their defense; they started making calls to Paul Weiss clients and lawyers, using Trump's assault as a means to poach business or partners. That is shameful, acting like ravenous vultures, putting your profits first instead of your country's interests or the interests of the legal profession, which pledges before a court to stand up for the rule of law. Instead, these big firms are aiding and abetting the destruction of the rule of law by doing Trump's work for him, making targeted firms even more vulnerable by working behind the scenes to strip them bare for parts.

There are good, patriotic lawyers at many of these high-priced firms who know that this is wrong and they should speak up. Some of them already have.

Now, finally, Trump is coming for the rest of the private sector. Listen, I have no idea what the Trump tariff policy is. The constantly shifting positions of the last week are an embarrassment. It is complete incompetent malpractice. It has jeopardized jobs and retirement savings and college funds all across this country.

But the tariffs are complicated and convoluted and hard to understand, likely because they aren't actually economic or trade policy; they are a political tool--this one designed to force every major company to come before Trump to plead for tariff relief in exchange for giving Trump the company's political loyalty--no different than what is happening in the legal profession or in America's universities.

A tariff can be written very easily to favor one industry over another or one company over another, and the confusing nature of the tariff regime is a means for Trump to require every major company in the country to come on bended knee to him to get the relief they need. And that loyalty pledge could be anything--the purchase of some Trump crypto coin, public support for Trump's economic policies, donations to his political campaign. But having watched what Trump has done one by one to universities and law firms, why would we assume the tariffs aren't just simply a tool to do the same thing to big companies?

What I am trying to say here is that you don't need a battle royal between the President and the Supreme Court for democracy to die. If journalists are constantly looking over their shoulders and unable to report on the truth; if protest is suppressed, even moderately, at universities; if lawyers start giving cover instead of uncovering corruption and illegality in the regime; if companies start being mouthpieces for the regime as a price of doing business--if all that happens, then we are not a real democracy anymore; we are a fake democracy. Elections still happen, like in Turkiye, like in Hungary, like in Venezuela, but the rules are going to be tilted, and dissent will be suppressed so much that the same side--Trump's side--wins over and over and over.

This should matter not just to Democrats, not just to members of the minority party; this should matter to Republicans as well. We swear an oath to uphold the Constitution, and it is time for us to see the game that is being played.

The good news is that the rules have not been fully rigged yet. There is still time--not loads of it, but there is still time for this body to set a tone that causes the kind of massive public outrage necessary to stop this campaign of destruction in its tracks. But that requires those of us who believe that the threat to democracy is urgent to act like it. That means saying to our Republican colleagues that we are not going to act like business as usual, that we are not going to proceed to legislation unless we have agreement, Republicans and Democrats, to stop this assault on free speech and dissent. It requires the minority party to say that right now.

Only if we come together are we going to have a chance to save ourselves from the fate that has befallen so many other countries that have slowly, too quietly, seen their countries transition from real democracy to fake democracy.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Madam Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 177, I call up the joint resolution (H.J. Res. 61) providing for congressional disapproval under chapter 8 of title 5, United States Code, of the rule submitted by the Environmental Protection Agency relating to ``National Emission Standards for Hazardous Air Pollutants: Rubber Tire Manufacturing'', and ask for its immediate consideration.

Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on H.J. Res. 61.

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

Madam Speaker, I rise today in strong support of my bill, H.J. Res. 61, a resolution providing for congressional disapproval under chapter 8 of title 5, United States Code, of the rule submitted by the Environmental Protection Agency relating to ``National Emission Standards for Hazardous Air Pollutants: Rubber Tire Manufacturing.''

My resolution will repeal this suspect rule that the Biden administration pushed out after the election but before President Trump's inauguration.

This rule was flawed to begin with. It was published on November 29, 2024, after the election of Mr. Trump but before his administration could take office.

Further, as required by the Clean Air Act, EPA performed a risk and technology review specifically on rubber tire plant emissions as recently as 2020. After the risk and technology review, the EPA concluded that the pollutant thresholds and emission regulations already in place were sufficient and protected public health with an ``ample margin of safety.''

Madam Speaker, under the Clean Air Act, this should have been the end of it, as the EPA is only required to review and revise the standards on emissions every 8 years. To make matters worse, the EPA basically said the only way to comply with the new regulation is to buy regenerative thermal oxidizers, which are essentially flares that burn off the smokestack exhaust at the specific tire plants.

These devices are expensive and likely will not be able to be installed within the 3-year Clean Air Act deadline. It is my understanding that the tire industry estimates that it will cost about $100 million to get the regenerative thermal oxidizers ordered, fabricated, and installed and then about $20 million more per year to operate the devices.

While this cost is across several affected plants, these figures are certainly much higher than the EPA's estimates.

I also note that this rule does not affect most of my constituents. I am sure some of my constituents drive from eastern Henry County to work at the Danville Goodyear plant located in the district of my neighbor, Congressman John McGuire, and that facility would be affected.

In the Rules Committee, I was erroneously under the assumption that this might affect my Yokohama Tire plant today. I still submit, Madam Speaker, that it could affect them because what happens at the EPA, if they do it now on the larger producers of tires, et cetera, at some point, they are going to look at doing it at the medium-sized producers.

The Yokohama plant that employs a lot of people in my district, in my hometown of Salem, Virginia, could be affected long term, but currently it affects Danville. Now, that is about 16 miles from the edge of my district. In my area, because it is a rural area, lots of people drive more than 16 or 17 or 18 miles, whatever the number is, to get to a good-paying job like these facilities have that make tires for the American market.

This rule wouldn't be the first time my constituents have seen an environmental rule from the government inflicting economic pain on our rural part of Virginia. Several years ago, an EPA rule ended up closing down a plant in a small town.

In the end, the Supreme Court struck down the rule just a few weeks after the coal-fired plant closed. It was in Glen Lyn, Virginia. A few weeks after the plant was closed by Appalachian Power, the Supreme Court ruled that the EPA hadn't done it right. The rule was improper and it was invalidated by the Supreme Court, but they are not going to come back in and reopen the plant.

Those jobs are lost. The jobs of the people who worked there, who then ate lunch at the local lunch facilities, or who might have bought a car, or might have bought something else there in the very small town of Glen Lyn, no longer did so. As a result, the people there lost their livelihood, their economic resilience because of an erroneous EPA regulation.

The EPA's callous disregard for my peoples' jobs is not forgotten. What happened in Glen Lyn took about a decade. The population dropped, and last year, they turned in their charter to be a town. They are now an unincorporated census area inside of Giles County, and it all started with an EPA regulation that was misguided and improperly done.

I submit, Madam Speaker, that this regulation is probably not properly done, but that is for the courts to decide. We can fix it, though, here in Congress with this Congressional Review Act.

Some on the other side may say, if we repeal this regulation, we are letting tire manufacturers get away with unchecked pollution.

Madam Speaker, I say not so. That is not so. The EPA's National Emission Standards for Hazardous Air Pollutants would still exist. All major sources would still have to abide by their Clean Air Act Title V permits and various other Federal and local controls and regulations.

Regardless, if Congress were to pass this joint resolution, rubber tire manufacturers will still be subjected to pollution regulations. The EPA can always come back with an updated hazardous air pollutant standard if they can ever get actual data indicating specific and significant pollution. They don't have that now.

Madam Speaker, I urge all Members to join me in voting in favor of H.J. Res. 61 because it is important for peoples' jobs and for the principle of not doing willy-nilly regulations at the end of an administration in order to pursue something that does not have verifiable data indicating specific and significant pollution.

Mr. Speaker, further, as alluded to in this New York Post article, titled, ``Jen Psaki mocks reporter when asked about Keystone pipeline job losses,'' so-called ``green jobs'' are not plentiful enough to make up for jobs lost because of EPA regulations.

[From the New York Post, Feb. 8, 2021]

Washington--White House press secretary Jen Psaki on Monday

mocked a reporter who asked when workers on the canceled

Keystone XL pipeline would get ``green jobs'' promised by

President Biden.

It's expected that up to 11,000 jobs will be lost following

Biden's day-one decision to immediately shut down

construction of the pipeline that was supposed to carry oil

from Canada to Texas--leaving South Dakotans reeling and

1,000 people immediately out of work.

``Where is it that they can go for their green job?'' Fox

News reporter Peter Doocy asked Psaki at her Monday afternoon

press briefing, referring to Biden's promise to create good-

paying union jobs in the green energy sector as his

administration attempts to end the nation's reliance on

fossil fuels.

``That is something the administration has promised and

there is now a gap so I'm just curious when that happens,

when those people can count on that?'' Doocy added.

``Well, I'd certainly welcome you to present your data of

all the thousands and thousands of people who won't be

getting a green job,'' Psaki snarked. ``Maybe next time

you're here you can present that.''

``But you said they will be getting green jobs. I'm just

asking when that happens?'' Doocy responded, noting a report

by the Laborers' International Union of North America that

found 1,000 union jobs on the Keystone project would

``immediately vanish.''

Another 10,000 construction jobs expected to be created by

the project have also been nixed by Biden's decision.

A prominent union leader and Biden ally, AFL-CIO president

Richard Trumka, lashed the decision in Axios on HBO interview

Sunday, saying Biden should have also announced where he

would replace those lost jobs.

``I wish he hadn't done that on the first day, because the

Laborers International was right. It did and will cost us

jobs in the process,'' Trumka told Jonathan Swan.

``I wish he had paired that more carefully with the thing

that he did second by saying, `Here's where we're creating

jobs,' '' he went on, saying he believed Biden knows his

announcement was a ``mistake.''

Trumka, a former coal miner, also signaled his skepticism

at Biden's plan to transition coal, gas and oil workers to

clean energy jobs, saying he was subject to a similar failed

policy.

``You know, when they laid off at the mines back in

Pennsylvania, they told us they were going to train us to be

computer programmers,'' Trumka said.

``And I said, `Where are the computer programmer job at?'

`Uh, they're in, Oklahoma and they're in Vegas and they're

here.' And I said, `So, in other words, what we're going to

be is unemployed miners and unemployed computer programmers

as well' '' he recounted.

But Psaki swatted away the criticism and made a vague

promise that Biden would put a jobs plan forward in the

coming weeks.

``He has every plan to share more details on that plan in

the weeks ahead,'' she said when asked how Biden would

support workers left jobless by the decision.

Biden's climate czar John Kerry was also condemned by

Republicans last month as ``out of touch'' when he suggested

that energy and coal workers impacted by climate change

efforts could ``go to work to make the solar panels.''

Last month, the Biden administration unveiled its $2

trillion Green New Deal-fueled environmental plan, which

includes eliminating coal, oil and natural gas as electricity

sources by 2035.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Madam Speaker, let me assure you that those of us on this side of the aisle have no desire to make people sick.

The number one test in a community as to whether or not there is a likelihood of being sick or healthy is whether or not the people have a good, strong economy and have a job. What this regulation would do is to take that away.

As I talked about with Glen Lyn, if you start shutting down factories, you shut down towns, and people don't have jobs. Then you will have people who are clearly going to have more issues with their health than they currently have.

Further, in regard to the various things that my colleague said, I have seen it before where the EPA goes out and they create a maximum achievable control technology and they claim, oh, it is out there or it will be soon, and industry tells me it doesn't exist.

Now, in this case, it does exist. It is just very expensive and it would take longer than the Clean Air Act gives them in order to install it. This is where I think we should take care of it instead of letting the executive branch do all of our work for us. They used proxy data and used total hydrocarbons instead of looking at what the EPA is charged with doing, which is the actual hazardous air pollutant. They don't have that data, and when they last checked for that data, they said there was an ample margin of safety.

November 29, they suddenly throw this regulation on the books as a final rule without referencing how the ample margin of safety that was found in 2020 somehow disappeared in a 4-year time period, how it went away. They don't have any data to show actual hazardous air pollutants. They used proxy data. That is not good enough for regulations that could cause the curtailment of tire manufacturing in the United States.

Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Rouzer), my colleague.

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

Obviously, when, in 2020, the EPA found there was an ample margin of safety, there was no reason for the Energy and Commerce Oversight Committee, which at the time I chaired, to do an oversight hearing on something that appeared to be a matter which on its face would not require new regulation.

The EPA, of course, does things that sometimes are perplexing to many of us. I would submit as well that one would have anticipated they would have used, as they are supposed to, an actual hazardous air pollutant study or standard. Instead, they used a proxy study of total hydrocarbons.

Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Mississippi (Mr. Kelly), my friend.

Reclaiming my time, I would like to enter into a colloquy with the gentleman from Mississippi (Mr. Kelly).

Is the gentleman trying to tell the American people that it is only a minor rule, as one of our colleagues said, it is only a minor rule if it doesn't apply to you?

I yield to the gentleman from Mississippi (Mr. Kelly) for a response.

Also, if it doesn't take your job?

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Crenshaw).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Guthrie), the chairman of the Committee on Energy and Commerce.

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

Mr. Speaker, I recognize none of us wants the world polluted. The gentlewoman indicated that somehow this was going to affect arsenic and lead. I suppose, in a theoretical world, perhaps it could, but there are other regulations on tire manufacturing that may deal with that.

That is not what this Congressional Review Act is about. It is about a regulation that was put into effect because, instead of looking for things like arsenic and lead or actual hazardous air pollutants, the EPA used a proxy measurement and measured carbon dioxide. They didn't use a test to come up with this rule based on arsenic or lead. It was a proxy using carbon.

Further, somebody said earlier, Mr. Speaker, that we were stripping away critical regulations. I would say, Mr. Speaker, if it was so critical, why did the Biden administration wait until November 29 with less than 2 months left in their term? If it was so critical, why did the EPA in 2020 find that there was an ample margin of safety in the regulations that already existed?

Mr. Speaker, this is not about stripping away all regulations on tire manufacturing. It is one specific ill-advised, ill-timed, expensive regulation.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, the EPA was under no obligation to do this regulation. They may have been under an obligation to look at unregulated hazardous air pollutants, but nowhere in the statute does it allow for proxy carbon studies.

Hydrocarbons are not listed as a hazardous air pollutant. The plain language, I repeat, does not authorize proxy or surrogate studies to say: Well, we looked at it, and there is a lot of carbon. Therefore, we are going to make specific regulations that cost hundreds of millions of dollars and may or may not cost jobs.

That is not their job. That is the purpose of the Congressional Review Act. It is to rein in unreasonable, improper, or irrational regulations done at the last minute by an outgoing administration or by an incoming team.

This is not something that needs to be on the books to protect health. They did a proxy study. They don't have actual data that shows that this would do any good at all. It will perhaps cause significant curtailment in production at certain facilities of tires made in the United States. It is our job as Members of Congress to prevent this travesty.

Mr. Speaker, I think that the arguments that we have made have now worn out. We have used up the mileage on these arguments. Now, we get to vote ``yes,'' and voting ``yes'' is where the rubber meets the road and gives us a more sound regulatory scheme related to tire manufacturing.

Mr. Speaker, I ask everyone to vote ``yes,'' and I yield back the balance of my time.