Maintaining American Superiority by Improving Export Control Transparency Act

Mr. Speaker, today, we are bringing a very important piece of legislation to the floor, the Maintaining American Superiority by Improving Export Control Transparency Act, a key piece of legislation to ensure our country stays ahead of our adversaries.

Businesses and universities in the United States work constantly to innovate, improve, and invent the best technologies and systems in this world. This is what keeps America on the leading edge. Our Nation's determination and commitment to achieving the best has allowed us to develop the best technologies in all fields. Through strategic investments under the leadership of President Trump, this will continue for many years to come.

In today's era of strategic competition, Congress needs to provide the administration with the tools it needs to ensure American technologies are not falling into the hands of our adversaries. Malign actors like China, Russia, North Korea, and Iran would gladly seek to use our very own goods and technologies against us, whether in military engagements or on the economic battlefield.

America's open, competitive economy has allowed us to become the global leader in cutting-edge technologies,

but in order to maintain this advantage, we must be able to track how American technology is used around the world.

My bill, the Maintaining American Superiority by Improving Export Control Transparency Act helps to ensure increased transparency and accountability in the export control process by creating better reporting in the licensing application process, giving critical information to both Congress and the administration.

My bill creates a mechanism for tracking and reporting of export licenses and can be utilized to form a paper trail to understand where American-made technologies are going, who is using them, and how they may be getting diverted to adversarial nations. If our adversaries are benefiting from American technology, we must know exactly how that happened and who is responsible.

Further, my bill will provide necessary clarity on how licensing determinations are made by producing information for each application, including the applicant, the recipient, and the compliance measures implemented to uphold export regulations. With this necessary information in one place, we will have a better understanding of where American-made technologies are going abroad, who is supposed to have them, and how we can support the administration to close gaps being exploited by our adversaries.

The American free market has led to some of the most incredible technological advances of all time, so it is important that we modernize our export control process to help protect it. Export controls are a key national security tool for the administration in these increasingly dangerous times. Therefore, Congress should swiftly pass this legislation and send it to President Trump's desk.

As my chairman mentioned, this bill passed the House unanimously in the 118th Congress. The only difference between this year's bill and last year's bill is that we have incorporated some helpful technical assistance provided by the new administration to ensure the legislation better executes the letter of the law and congressional intent.

I thank Chairman Mast and Ranking Member Meeks for supporting this legislation and working together to see that this bill made it to the floor today. I also thank the co-leads of this bipartisan and bicameral legislation, Congresswoman Sara Jacobs, Senator Jim Banks, and Senator Mark Warner.

Greater transparency and accountability in export controls is a critical national security issue that everyone should have an interest in supporting. I urge all of my colleagues to support this critical piece of legislation that will enhance our national security and economic competitiveness while protecting American innovation.

Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 1316) to amend the Export Control Reform Act of 2018 relating to licensing transparency, as amended.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of the Maintaining American Superiority by Improving Export Control Transparency Act. I wish my colleague could have picked a shorter name for it, but that is my friend, Mr. Jackson. He does good legislation, sometimes a little long- winded on the names.

Export controls are a critical tool for protecting American national security. Foreign adversaries like the Chinese Communist Party are working tirelessly to steal and exploit U.S. technology. We have known this.

The CCP is using its military-civil fusion strategy to fuel China's military buildup and commit human rights atrocities, just like we spoke about on Uyghur genocide. No American servicemember should have to face a foreign adversary armed with U.S. technology, and no act of genocide should be enabled by American innovation.

As important as export controls are to protecting American lives and values, they are only as strong as their administration and enforcement. Every U.S. export control ultimately requires the government to decide on whether to approve or deny a license for the item in question.

The Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security, or the BIS, is the lead agency for administering and enforcing U.S. export controls. As export controls have become more vital to our national security, the importance of congressional oversight has only increased. The licensing data for how BIS is administering export controls can be difficult for Congress to gain access to for oversight purposes.

Last Congress, the Foreign Affairs Committee worked persistently to uncover that BIS was routinely approving export control licenses for even the worst actors, such as Huawei and SMIC. Last Congress, the Foreign Affairs Committee worked to expose this in hearing after hearing without much help from the Biden administration. Huawei and SMIC are two of the CCP's national champions and play a critical role in supporting China's military buildup and human rights abuses.

It is essential that Congress has visibility into how many licenses are being approved for the worst actors on export control blacklists, known as the Entity List. This bill will improve transparency and ensure Congress is able to conduct regular oversight of how BIS is handling licenses and how effectively our export controls are being enforced.

I thank the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Jackson), and the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Jacobs) for introducing this important legislation. The Foreign Affairs Committee marked up this legislation last Congress, and it passed the committee and the House floor with strong bipartisan support. I expect it will receive the same support today.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support the Maintaining American Superiority by Improving Export Control Transparency Act, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Jackson), the sponsor of this long-titled legislation.

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

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleagues on both sides of the aisle for working to improve transparency and congressional oversight of U.S. export controls. It is vital. That can't be overstated enough. It is vital.

I urge all Members to vote in favor of H.R. 1316, and I yield back the balance of my time.

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

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 1316. Over the past 6 years, export controls have become a crucial tool for our national security and foreign policy to respond to the challenges posed by Russia, China, Iran, and others.

Our use of export controls have become more and more frequent and more complicated, as we have started to apply novel controls in critical technology areas such as semiconductors and AI. While this change in U.S. export control policy has taken place, congressional consultation and oversight has not kept up.

The bill in front of us today by Representative Jackson is an important step toward remedying this problem by calling for the Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security, BIS, to conduct greater transparency around license application, information, and conduct checks for problematic companies in arms-embargoed nations.

This bill will also enable Congress to conduct better oversight to ensure that BIS licensing and enforcement processes are working properly and efficiently. This bill will ensure that the Foreign Affairs Committee is getting the information it needs on export control policy and implementation, while protecting business proprietary information and allowing BIS to effectively execute its core national security mandate.

However, as we add to the list of things we are asking BIS to do, it is also important that we equip BIS with the resources and staffing to meet those requirements. This administration claims that it will prioritize export controls, yet it has frozen 10 percent of BIS' budget. That is not keeping America safe.

BIS desperately needs to revamp its outdated and inefficient IT system, which has not been updated in over 15 years. The number of license applications BIS receives per year has more than doubled in that span to over 40,000 per year. I worry that without a better IT system, reasonable requests for information like this bill will further tax BIS' limited resources.

Representative Crow and Ranking Member Meeks are working on a bill to fund IT modernization for BIS. I hope that as we pass good bills like this one by Mr. Jackson and Ms. Jacobs, we will also properly equip BIS so that it can effectively carry out its work.

I encourage my colleagues to join in supporting this measure, and I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Mr. Speaker, transparency is critical for effective congressional oversight, and Mr. Jackson's bill will allow Congress greater insight into the license application decisions and enforcement actions taken by the Bureau of Industry and Security.

Notwithstanding the length of the title, as pointed out by the chairman, I hope my colleagues will join me and support this bill. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs be discharged from further consideration of H.R. 1316 and the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration.

I ask unanimous consent that the bill be considered read a third time and passed and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.