Power Plant Reliability Act of 2025

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 951 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentlewoman from Pennsylvania (Ms. Scanlon), 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, the Committee on Rules met last night and reported a rule, House Resolution 951, providing for consideration of six measures.

The rule provides for H.R. 4776, the SPEED Act, to be considered under a structured rule, making in order six amendments. Additionally, it provides 1 hour of debate, equally divided and controlled by the chair and the ranking minority member of the Committee on Natural Resources, or their respective designees, and it provides for one motion to recommit.

Further, H.R. 1366, the Mining Regulatory Clarity Act, and H.R. 845, the Pet and Livestock Protection Act, will be considered under closed rules, with 1 hour of debate, each equally divided and controlled by the chair and the ranking minority member of the Committee on Natural Resources, or their respective designees, and provides each with one motion to recommit.

Additionally, H.R. 3616, the Reliable Power Act, and H.R. 3632, the Power Plant Reliability Act of 2025, will each be considered under closed rules, with 1 hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Energy and Commerce Committee, or their respective designees, with one motion to recommit.

Finally, H.R. 4371, the Kayla Hamilton Act, will be considered under a closed rule, with 1 hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on the Judiciary, or their respective designees, and provides one motion to recommit.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of this rule and in support of the underlying legislation.

The rule before us gives this House an opportunity to finally begin undoing the damage caused by years of reckless regulatory overreach and economic mismanagement driven by Democrats' failed policies.

Joe Biden may no longer be in the White House, but American families are still paying the price for his administration's failures. Under President Biden, this country experienced the worst inflation spike in 40 years, and we are still paying the price. Groceries costs were more, housing costs were more, transportation costs more, and working families were left wondering how much further their paychecks could stretch.

Mr. Speaker, that pressure didn't stop there. Under Democratic leadership, electricity prices surged by more than 20 percent in many parts of the country, including my own in New York.

Families opened their utility bills and asked a simple question: Why is this getting so expensive so quickly?

The answer is clear: Democrats chose ideology over affordability. They chose mandates over reliability, and they chose Washington control over simple, plain common sense.

Mr. Speaker, the rule provides for consideration of H.R. 4776, the SPEED Act. For years, Democrats have taken the well-intentioned National Environmental Policy Act, or NEPA, and twisted it far beyond its original purpose.

NEPA was meant to be a commonsense safeguard for our environment, not a tool to block projects indefinitely, but that is exactly how it is being abused today. NEPA is now one of the most litigated statutes in Federal law, not because projects fail environmental standards but because a small group of activist organizations exploit the process itself. They file endless lawsuits to stall infrastructure, energy, and conservation projects for years and years, sometimes decades, with little regard to the real-world consequences for workers, families, communities, and progress.

Those consequences are real. Projects get shelved. Costs skyrocket. Jobs disappear, and families pay more for energy, housing, and basic infrastructure.

We see this broken system clearly in upstate New York. Take Micron, a company and a project too big to fail. This historic investment to bring advanced semiconductor manufacturing back to the United States is critical for our country, for our national security, and for the upstate economy. This project means thousands of good-paying jobs and a stronger domestic supply chain. Yet despite meeting some of the most stringent environmental review requirements in the country under New York law, Micron is still being forced through duplicative Federal reviews that reach the very same conclusions as the State reviews.

As a result, Micron is the only semiconductor project in the country held up, pending a full environmental impact statement, not because of environmental risk, but because of bureaucratic delay and regulatory duplication.

This is not environmental protection. This is regulatory paralysis, and it is costing us jobs and a brighter economic future.

Time and again, Democrats defend this broken system because it gives Washington more control and activist groups more leverage. Because of this process, the result is gridlock. Nothing gets built. Nothing gets fixed. Nothing gets cheaper.

The SPEED Act restores balance. It reins in duplicative reviews. It requires the Federal Government to make timely decisions and stop endless delay from becoming the official policy of the government.

If Democrats are serious about infrastructure, clean energy, and environmental progress, they should support fixing the permitting system that they helped break. They should have no problem supporting things like the SPEED Act.

Mr. Speaker, the rule also provides for consideration of H.R. 3632, the Power Plant Reliability Act.

Years of Democratic energy policy have put our electric grid under real, significant strain, and Americans are feeling the consequences in real time.

Demand is rising rapidly. Manufacturing growth and electrification are pushing this system harder and harder every single year. At the same time, Democrats are forcing reliable baseload generation offline, without a serious plan to replace it. Instead of coordinating policy, they regulate in silos. Instead of planning for reliability, they react after the fact.

The Power Plant Reliability Act forces accountability. It ensures regulators cannot quietly retire critical power plants without fully understanding the reliability consequences on our Nation.

Americans don't need a white paper to understand what happens when reliability is ignored. They see it when the power goes out. They feel it when their energy bills spike. They pay the price when Washington refuses to plan for real-world demand.

Keeping the lights on should not be controversial. It should be something we should be able to get 435 votes on, but Democrats chose politics over reliability. The families in this country are the ones paying the price right now. Premature plant retirements are only part of the problem.

The rule further provides for consideration of H.R. 3616, the Reliable Power Act.

This bill addresses another uncomfortable truth that Democrats don't want to admit. Federal agencies are finalizing regulations that directly threaten grid stability without fully accounting for the consequences, and it is just purely reckless.

The Reliable Power Act requires a long-term reliability assessment that ensures that when serious risks are identified, regulators cannot simply ignore them and press ahead anyway.

Quite simply, this legislation is about ending, once and for all, the implementation of asinine regulations that only harm our grid's reliability. Reliable electricity underpins everything: public safety, economic growth, hospitals, schools, and national security. Republicans are treating that responsibility seriously, and that is why we are bringing this legislation forward today. Unfortunately, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle are not.

Mr. Speaker, the rule also provides for consideration of H.R. 1366, the Mining Regulatory Clarity Act.

Democrats talk endlessly about supply chains and national security, but their policies undermine both. Domestic mining projects are stalled, not because they fail environmental standards, but because Democrats have once again allowed endless regulation and regulatory ambiguity to choke them off.

That means fewer American jobs. It means greater dependence on foreign adversaries that are getting rich in the process. It means higher costs across our economy.

If Democrats want secure supply chains and fewer imports from hostile foreign powers, this is exactly the kind of bill that they should support.

Mr. Speaker, the rule also includes consideration of H.R. 845, the Pet and Livestock Protection Act.

It is impossible to deny that the recovery of the gray wolf is a success story. Population goals were met years and years ago, yet Democrats refuse to trust the science and acknowledge the clear success of saving the gray wolf population in this country. Why? Because it would mean betraying the radical environmental groups that want to see laws like the Endangered Species Act weaponized rather than work as intended, to save these animals.

Instead, bowing to their base and ignoring the science, Democrats have kept the future of gray wolf management trapped in endless litigation, leaving farmers and ranchers to deal with the real consequences that they face on their ranches and farms every single day.

What are those consequences? Livestock are attacked, and livelihoods across rural America are threatened, all to satisfy the whims of a radical left activist base that thinks their food comes from the grocery store and their energy comes from a socket in the wall when you plug something in.

The Pet and Livestock Protection Act puts an end to this endless litigation and weaponization of the ESA. It recognizes science, acknowledges success, and restores balance, something our colleagues on the other side of the aisle seem unwilling to do.

Mr. Speaker, finally, the rule provides for consideration of H.R. 4371, the Kayla Hamilton Act.

The bill exists because of a tragic failure, one that my Democratic colleagues, who supported the last administration for 4 long years of open borders, would rather continue to ignore. As the first Trump administration recognized, the Unaccompanied Alien Children Program has been exploited by criminals, including gang members, who come to this country as wolves in sheep's clothing. These individuals use the UAC system not for protection but to recruit and traffic new members and to wreak havoc on American communities.

Under the Biden administration open-border, no-consequences policies, policies my Democratic colleagues wholeheartedly supported, that exploitation exploded. During the Biden years, approximately 465,000 unaccompanied alien children were released to unvetted sponsors. The program lacked basic safeguards to prevent illegal aliens from serving as sponsors.

According to Health and Human Services, roughly 85 percent of UAC sponsors lack lawful immigration status. Thanks to the Biden administration's own policies supported by Democrats for 4 years, countless smugglers, cartels, and bad actors profited from nothing less than the exploitation of children and human trafficking.

Instead of tightening safeguards as encounters surged, Democrats chose to roll back background checks and sponsor reviews, moving children out of law enforcement custody faster, regardless of risk. The consequences to innocent children harmed from years of this horrific policy choice have yet to be fully reckoned with and will certainly haunt generations of innocent victims for years to come.

What we do know is that in May 2024, the Biden administration had lost track of more than 320,000 unaccompanied alien children, placing them at heightened risk of sex trafficking, forced labor, and abuse.

Mr. Speaker, this is not compassion. This is pure negligence.

Picking up the pieces from the wreckage of the Biden-Harris immigration policies, the Trump administration has committed to locating these children and to saving lives, something that eluded Democrats for 4 long years. So far, more than 22,600 unaccompanied children have been located, and over 400 sponsors have been arrested. Tragically, 27 minors have been found dead, victims of murder, victims of suicide, victims of drug overdose. Those are not statistics. Those are lives that are forever lost to tragedy.

The Kayla Hamilton Act restores basic safeguards. It requires background checks. It seeks criminal records from home countries. It puts public safety first.

I urge my colleagues to support this rule. I urge my colleagues to support the underlying legislation.

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

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

I think we are now approaching about year 9 of Democrats suffering from Trump derangement syndrome. No matter what is before this House, no matter what the rule before us today actually contains, my colleagues across the aisle find a way to make this about President Trump, not the substance of the legislation, not the issues before the American people, not the suffering the last 4 years have brought on them, not the costs facing families, not the failures of their own record. It is just about Trump to them.

While they are fixated on that, the American people have paid the price. In 2022, while Democrats were consumed by their latest Trump obsession, families were being crushed by the worst inflation spikes in 40 years after trillions upon trillions in Democratic spending overheated the economy.

Groceries, gas, and rent all skyrocketed. You didn't hear a peep on the other side of the aisle. Democrats didn't fix it. They didn't even acknowledge it. Then they doubled down on it and made it worse.

In 2024, with the border wide open and millions of illegal aliens pouring into our communities across the country, Democrats once again ignored the top concerns of American families.

Instead of securing the border or addressing affordability, they doubled down on the same, tired narrative claiming that President Trump was a threat to democracy. You will hear more of it today, Mr. Speaker.

The voters rejected it. They lost the electoral college, they lost the popular vote, and they lost every swing State on the table. Since then, Democrats haven't learned a thing. They have spent their time defending wasteful programs, failed policies, and bureaucratic overreach all while opposing every serious effort by President Trump and House Republicans to clean up the mess that they left behind.

Yet here we are today hearing the same hysterics. The American people have tuned it out. They know what actually matters: trying to lower costs, keeping communities safe, securing reliable energy, and restoring accountability in Washington. That is exactly what the bills under this rule are about.

While Democrats rehash old grievances and relive the same political fixation for the ninth year in a row, Republicans are focused on delivering results for working families. After 4 years of the economic mismanagement under Democratic leadership, Democrats are suddenly pretending to care about trade, tariffs, and the American economy. It is quite a performance. The American people see right through it.

For 4 years, Democrats told families not to believe their own eyes as inflation hit 40-year highs, as their grocery bills exploded, and as their energy costs soared. They brushed off concerns from workers and manufacturers who were watching their jobs disappear overseas and while Washington signed one bad trade deal after another.

They told Americans that surrendering leverage was smart trade policy even as foreign countries flooded our markets and shut their own doors for American producers.

Now President Trump is back in office and trying to right the ship. He is delivering results, and Democrats are scrambling to rewrite history.

Under President Trump's America First trade agenda, the trade deficit has narrowed to its smallest level since the mid-2020 year, down more than 35 percent over last year alone. Exports are up 6 percent year- over-year, reaching their second highest level on record. Inflation- adjusted exports of consumer goods are the largest ever. The trade deficit with China has narrowed to its second smallest since 2009. In the third quarter of 2025, real exports grew 4.1 percent annual rate while imports fell 5 percent, adding roughly 1 full percentage point to real GDP growth.

In November alone, the trade deficit was cut by more than one-half compared to last year, driven by rising tariff revenues as President Trump secured better terms for American workers, farmers, and manufacturers.

This didn't happen by accident. For decades, weak trade policies allowed foreign governments to exploit American openness while protecting their own industries.

President Trump ended that arrangement by using tariffs as leverage. He forced countries to come to the table. They have, and they are continuing to.

Since announcing his trade agenda in April, President Trump has secured new and improved trade deals with major partners covering more than one-half of the global GDP, spanning Europe, Asia, and the Americas. At the same time, companies are responding by committing trillions of dollars in new investment, bringing jobs back here at home, rebuilding supply chains, and putting American workers first again.

Mr. Speaker, shouldn't that be what we are working on here?

I could go on and on, Mr. Speaker, but today's debate is not about relitigating trade policy or listening to Democrats pretend to suddenly discover economic responsibility. Today we are focused on the six bills under this rule, bills that reflect the same commonsense approach that President Trump has applied to trade, strengthening domestic production, lowering costs, restoring reliability, and undoing the damage of the Biden years. That is the work before us today.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to open up the text of the rule before us today, and for good measure the underlying legislation as well, and hit ``control F'' on the words Affordable Care Act. They will quickly see that despite their fixation on making everything about the topic, nowhere in this rule or the underlying legislation is the Affordable Care Act, ACA subsidies, or marketplace coverage mentioned.

However, the policies that they are working, and hopefully there will be further bipartisan discussions about, were set to expire by their own hand at the end of a 5-year window because it was COVID emergency spending. I don't think I am breaking any news here, but COVID is over. Something that Democrats don't seem to want to ever end is an unlimited spigot of public money devoted to an issue.

We have to get to the core reasons why health insurance for all, not just those that are on Affordable Care Act plans, but for people in private insurance, all the public expenditures through our Medicare and Medicaid programs, why is healthcare an explosive cost year over year?

That is going to take bipartisanship and working together and putting some of these petty fights aside, because even if we extended these credits for 3 years, as they would like, it doesn't solve the problem for the millions upon millions and tens of millions of Americans who are on private pay insurance.

We have to really get serious about affordability, health insurance affordability, and the cost of delivering our healthcare in this country. Their remedy to this problem is putting a Band-Aid on a bullet hole. It is an expiration that is by their own hand and own design because it was designed for COVID-era emergency spending.

As a reminder, the measures in this rule are straightforward and common sense: strengthening energy reliability and tackling affordability in this area, streamlining permitting so that infrastructure can actually get built, restoring certainty to domestic supply chains, trusting science over ideology in wildlife management, and advancing public safety measures that protect our communities.

These bills are about lowering costs, keeping the lights on, and restoring accountability. That is the agenda before us in this rule today. That is an important agenda to the American people and the affordability issues that stand before us and our future prosperity.

Democrats want to lecture us about being serious on energy, but the American people remember exactly what 4 years of Democratic energy policy delivered. Under President Biden, Democrats drove up costs, weakened our electrical grid, and forced the premature retirement of reliable baseload power. They flooded the market with mandates and subsidies picked by Washington, not by engineers, and then acted surprised when electricity prices spiked and grid operators started warning about blackouts.

When those prices spiked, the price of everything spiked because increased electricity and energy costs drive up the price of all goods and services. Families paid more, reliability got worse, and Democrats told Americans that somehow it was all worth it.

Now that President Trump is back in office and reversing that damage, Democrats suddenly claim that these

bills are partisan not because they are extreme, but because they expose how reckless the last administration was.

President Trump and House Republicans are doing what Democrats refused to do: streamlining permitting so that projects can actually get built, restoring common sense to environmental review, and prioritizing dispatchable power sources that actually keep the lights and the heat on in this country.

The truth is, Democrats don't have a serious answer to rising energy demand, grid reliability, or affordability. Their answer is just throw up a few more windmills and all will be well with the world. We can shutter every other power plant that has proven baseline power, and the windmills and solar panels will solve all the problems.

Their solution is always the same: more mandates, more subsidies, more regulation, and hope that the grid holds together by wishes and dreams, not by science and practicality.

Republicans are offering something different: policies grounded in reliability, affordability, and domestic American production so American families aren't left paying more while China builds coal plant after coal plant month after month and laughs all the way to the bank.

Mr. Speaker, that is exactly what this rule advances. The energy bills before us are commonsense measures to strengthen reliability, streamline approvals, and support American jobs as well as ensure that American families have access to affordable American power, not slogans, not lectures, not dreams and wishful thinking.

If my colleagues across the aisle are truly serious about lowering costs and securing Americans' energy future, they should stop posturing and support this rule because Americans don't need more talking points. They need the lights to stay on.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, my colleague across the aisle wants to paint these bills as giveaways, which is wild considering what Democrats themselves have already done.

Democrats passed a so-called Inflation Reduction Act, the most poorly named bill in the history of the Congress because it did nothing but skyrocket inflation. Everyone has the proof of that in their weekly grocery bills and their utility costs.

It happened on their watch. They dumped massive new spending on an overheated economy and helped drive the worst inflation in 40 years. That is just fact. That is indisputable. Despite the title, it didn't reduce any inflation, not even close.

What it did was create a massive subsidy pipeline for green energy companies, all tied to the People's Republic of China. Chinese firms, ultimately answerable to the Chinese Communist Party, rushed in to take advantage of all these credits and the programs that Democrats set up. Apparently, that part has slipped their memory.

When House Republicans tried to add basic guardrails to stop those subsidies from flowing overseas to China, Democrats objected. They objected loudly, not quietly.

When Democrats are throwing around the word ``giveaway,'' it is fair to wonder whether they have forgotten their own record or are just hoping that everyone else is focused on something else.

Democrats are perfectly willing to outsource Americans' energy future and our national security to foreign adversaries to pursue their agenda.

Republicans are doing the opposite. We are strengthening domestic production. We are securing supply chains here at home in the United States and reducing our dependence on China.

That brings us back to the rule before us today. The six bills in this rule are focusing on restoring reliability, supporting domestic production, and streamlining permitting so that projects can actually move forward and lower costs for American taxpayers.

Mr. Speaker, that is the work before the House today, and I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Mr. Speaker, the rule before us reflects a clear choice. After years of regulatory overreach, misplaced priorities, and Washington-knows- best policymaking, this House is taking steps to restore balance, accountability, and common sense.

The legislation considered under this rule addresses real problems Americans are facing: higher energy costs, delayed infrastructure, weakened supply chains, threats to grid reliability, and failures that put public safety at risk.

These bills do not eliminate environmental protections or public input. They simply require the Federal Government to act responsibly, plan for real-world consequences, and stop using endless process as an excuse for inaction.

Republicans are focused on getting things built, keeping the lights on for Americans, keeping the heat on, protecting communities, and strengthening America's economic and national security. That is what the American people expect, and that is what this rule and the underlying legislation advances. 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. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong opposition to today's rule.

While Americans are going into the holiday season struggling with rising prices and the high cost of living, with just days left before health insurance premiums are set to skyrocket for 22 million Americans, while the President is leading the country to war with Venezuela, and yet another mass shooting has claimed the lives of young Americans, Republicans are using the final legislative days of 2025 to prioritize six unserious, make-work bills.

They are using precious floor time and resources to put forward messaging bills with no chance of passing, bills that have nothing to do with the reality that most Americans are living

and the problems that they want Congress to solve.

But that is what this country has come to expect from House Republicans who have used their control of the House as a vehicle for PR stunts and to pick the pockets of working people in order to line the pockets of the wealthy and the well connected.

Under Republican control of the House, the Senate, and the White House, 2025 has been a year of chaos, controversy, and corruption in which every day brings a new self-inflicted crisis.

While most of this chaos has originated from the White House, congressional Republicans are no less responsible, for they have aided and abetted this administration's agenda at every turn. How humiliating that in recent weeks, staff at the White House have openly mocked the subservience of House Republicans.

From day one of this term, Republicans in Washington have made clear they are here to serve their donors, to serve billionaires and big business, and not the American public. They spent the first half of the year ramming through their partisan big, ugly bill which gave permanent, budget-busting tax cuts to the rich while canceling Medicaid and SNAP for millions of Americans.

They continually prioritize big business and culture wars in legislation like the bills before us in today's rule, a series of bills that put their thumb on the scale for the oil and gas industry at the expense of Americans' health and the stewardship of the environment. Republicans are deliberately choosing to raise Americans' healthcare costs because they refuse to extend the ACA tax credits.

Americans everywhere are pleading with Congress to lower the cost of living as families struggle to afford housing, healthcare, childcare, and even groceries. Trump campaigned on a promise that he would lower prices on day one, but once in office, he has put tariffs on almost every good coming into the U.S., directly raising the prices for nearly everything we buy.

Whether it is food at the grocery store, home appliances, a new car, Trump's trade wars and tariffs have made everything more expensive. These trade wars have undermined key portions of our economy. The tariffs have already cost us nearly 50,000 manufacturing jobs, and our tourism industry is suffering greatly.

Making matters worse, Congress could end the tariffs today. The House could vote today on any number of Senate-passed resolutions that would end the Trump tariffs, but Speaker Johnson has blocked every one of those bills. House Republicans have now voted on four separate occasions to block legislation that would end the Trump tariffs. They have repeatedly doubled down on that decision to keep your prices high.

But it is not just the tariffs. Just last week, House Republicans blocked bipartisan legislation that could have become law, that would have built new homes all over America, lowered rents, and made mortgages more affordable.

With healthcare, Americans are seeing the biggest increase in health insurance costs in 15 years, yet the Republican majority is actively opposing extension of the ACA tax credits that lower premiums for 22 million Americans.

While Republicans fail to act on affordability, they are also conspicuously silent on the near daily corruption emanating from this White House. Trump has pardoned hundreds of criminals convicted of serious offenses, including drug traffickers, money launderers, and fraudsters, depriving Americans of justice and restitution and enabling at least some of those pardoned to commit further crimes.

In many of these pardons, they have come at a price. Trump pardoned Juan Orlando Hernandez, who is convicted of trafficking 400 tons of cocaine into the United States. Ostensibly, this pardon will influence a Presidential election in Honduras.

Trump pardoned the CEO of Binance after he made a $2 billion investment in the President's company, World Liberty Financial. Nearly a dozen well-connected individuals, many of them donors to the President's campaign or investors in his companies, have also received pardons.

Trump has also shown a curious leniency to major criminals. He pardoned Ross Ulbricht, who ran one of the biggest drug-trafficking and money-laundering operations on the deep web.

The President also dropped criminal charges against multiple MS-13 gang leaders in order to help cover up a corruption scandal for his ally, Salvadoran President Bukele.

He has directed Federal prosecutors and law enforcement officers to drop investigations of serious crimes, including drug and human trafficking, in order to focus on immigration enforcement, letting countless criminals off the hook.

Of course, we can't forget the yearslong coverup of the Epstein files. On the campaign trail, Trump and his allies swore they would release the Epstein files, but once in office, they have blocked the release for 11 months. Ultimately, it has taken an act of Congress to force the President to release those files. The deadline to release the Epstein files is this Friday, but we still haven't seen a single document from the White House or the Department of Justice. Again, all of this begs the question: What exactly is this White House trying to hide?

All this time, while Trump is pardoning drug traffickers and dropping charges against gang members and violent insurrectionists who assaulted cops, congressional Republicans have been silent. If you ask Speaker Johnson about it, as the press has, he will tell you he has no idea what you are talking about.

Republicans are silent as Trump and his White House cause crisis after crisis. Trump and Hegseth are leading us into another forever war in Venezuela. The President has called for the execution of Democratic Members of Congress. The administration has withheld FEMA funding for disaster victims but gave a $40 billion bailout to Argentinean hedge funds.

Administration officials are wasting taxpayer dollars to fly around the country for personal business and photo ops. ICE and Border Patrol have detained more than 170 American citizens, including nearly 20 children, and that total is growing by the day.

The national debt is over $2 trillion higher in just this year alone. It is all so insulting to you, to me, to every American, to see this flagrant corruption and shameful mismanagement on a daily basis. House Republicans seem to have priorities so completely at odds with the needs of the American people that they have ignored all year the kitchen-table issues that American families struggle with every single day.

Instead, they have spent their time in Washington, when they have actually come to Washington, working on industry handouts, gold-plated ballrooms, and stirring up insane culture wars.

You deserve better. America deserves better. We deserve a functioning Congress that actually works for the American people, not just the wealthy and well connected.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, I think the point we are trying to make is that this shouldn't be about economic policy. The Republican leadership's refusal to address the Trump tariffs and the damage they have inflicted upon our economy and upon American families' pocketbooks should be the topic before the House instead of these makeweight bills that are never going to become law.

Mr. Speaker, at the start of 2025, the Republicans knew there were two big tax provisions due to expire at the end of this year, now, within the next 10 days. One of them was the 2017 Trump tax cuts which overwhelmingly went to the wealthiest Americans, and the second was the ACA tax credits that helped millions of Americans afford health insurance. This has been known to everybody all year.

Now, our Republican colleagues made the choice in their big, ugly bill, which they spent so much time and energy on this summer, to extend the Trump tax cuts for the wealthy, and they have also made the intentional choice to let the ACA tax credits expire. In doing so, they are causing the premiums for 22 million Americans to skyrocket. It is likely that millions of Americans will lose their health coverage this year due to our Republican colleagues' failure, refusal, in fact, to address that issue.

Mr. Speaker, when we hear our Republican colleagues talk about their healthcare bill that they are trying to bring to the floor this week, know that their legislation will not renew the ACA tax credits. It will not lower premiums, and it will not lower costs.

Mr. Speaker, 80 percent of the bill is simply new paperwork requirements for pharmacy benefit managers, and the parts of the bill that do involve healthcare costs are horrible. They basically want to sell Americans junk insurance policies, and people know about these. These are the policies that have low sticker costs but terrible coverage when you need it, Mr. Speaker.

We really just have been imploring our colleagues to come to the table to try to do what the American people need them to do so that Americans have health coverage when they need it, and we have not seen them be willing to do that.

That is why we have a discharge petition sitting there at the desk. We just need four Republicans to join all of the Democrats in the House to force a vote to extend the ACA tax credits, and we would invite them to do so.

Mr. Speaker, if we defeat the previous question, I will offer an amendment to the rule to provide for consideration of H.R. 6074, which would extend the Affordable Care Act enhanced premium tax credits for 3 years, through 2028.

Mr. Speaker, for months, Democrats have sounded the alarm about the expiring enhanced premiums, urging the Republican majority to join us in extending these premiums before the end of the year so that all of our constituents can get the healthcare coverage they deserve.

Millions of Americans have already received notices from their health plan that their premiums are going to skyrocket starting January 1, 2026, just a few days from now, in some cases by over $1,000 a month. The median income in my district is about $80,000 for a family of four. They can't afford an additional $12,000 a year for health insurance.

However, there are only 3 legislative days remaining to fix this problem before the health insurance costs of over 20 million Americans rise, but this Republican majority has ignored and blocked any effort to extend those credits. The majority even told their own moderates they won't get a vote on the floor to extend them.

I am happy to give them that vote right now. We can defeat the previous question, and we can consider a bill that would extend the ACA enhanced premium tax credits for 3 years.

There is no more time to waste. The deadlines are all passed. We have to act now for the American people.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Min) to discuss our proposal.

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

Mr. Speaker, I completely agree with my colleague from New York that Congress needs to get serious about affordability both of everyday products and services but also health insurance, and that is why we have offered the amendments that we have and why we have been urging our colleagues across the aisle for months to address this issue.

However, as we focus on the rule today, which does not address affordability, there are a number of issues dealing with electricity prices. American households right now are paying record-high electricity prices, prices that have been rising, and most analysts are predicting will continue to rise more in 2026.

There is only one real way to lower electricity prices. That is to build more energy in the United States. Democrats did this, made serious efforts toward this when we passed the Inflation Reduction Act. We provided a forward-looking mix of financial incentives to build more power from all sources but especially from wind and solar. Those measures have been embraced by the American people, and they have been embraced by our energy industries.

However, while our Republican colleagues say they want to lower electricity bills, they have actively torpedoed these efforts to build more domestic energy.

President Trump and congressional Republicans have rescinded nearly all the investment incentives from the IRA. As a result, we are seeing domestic power generation decreasing, household electricity costs rising, and thousands of good-paying jobs being effectively canceled.

At the same time, the big, beautiful bill gave huge handouts to the oil and gas industry. These are handouts that won't increase energy production but will simply pad the profits of Chevron and Exxon. This is the Republican energy agenda: higher prices for you, the consumer, and higher profits for the oil and gas industry.

It is an incentive that we see continued in some of the bills under consideration in this rule today, which will require that coal- generating electricity plants stay online even when they have outlived their usefulness and profitability. Meaning, once again, consumer costs go up, but the coal industry gets the benefit.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, we have heard some well-intentioned debate from our Republican colleague today, but the fact remains that this week is being wasted on messaging bills that will not become law.

All year, Republicans have failed to act on affordability. They failed to bring down housing costs, to control inflation at the grocery store, or to lower electricity bills. They were elected to office to tackle these problems, but for an entire year, they have sat on their hands, opting for press conferences and tweets instead of legislation and dealmaking.

Earlier this year, Republicans ended healthcare coverage for 15 million Americans with their big, ugly bill. All this year, Republicans have blocked each and every effort to renew the ACA tax credits. Now, health insurance costs are at a 15-year high, and premiums are set to skyrocket for 22 million people.

In my district and in most of America, electricity prices are through the roof. Meanwhile, the Trump administration has bent over backward for AI companies, cut billions of dollars in energy investments, and canceled major clean energy projects.

In Congress, Republicans' energy agenda continues to boost oil and gas profits but does nothing to actually lower bills.

This past weekend, America witnessed yet another mass shooting that took the lives of two and critically injured nine more. This year has seen 391 mass shootings. We have lost nearly 14,000 people to senseless gun violence. No matter how many times we see the same tragic story play out on the news, our Republican colleagues keep their heads in the sand and refuse to bring forward or endorse commonsense gun safety legislation, which the majority of Americans and law enforcement leaders support.

This term, Republicans have turned Congress into a rubberstamp for executive action. It is a major abdication of our constitutional responsibilities, and it has done irreparable damage to this institution. It is my sincere hope that 2026 brings new opportunities for bipartisan action on these pressing issues.

The American people deserve better than a President who governs by tweet and a Speaker who has neutered Congress' role in our constitutional order.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on the previous question and rule, and I yield back the balance of my time.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to H.R. 3632. It is a bill that will raise energy prices for American families by forcing them to pay for outdated polluting plants that are poisoning their air and water.

A reliable and affordable energy supply is vital to our way of life. Unfortunately, this bill and Republican policies are making electricity less reliable and less affordable. Mr. Speaker, electricity bills are up about 13 percent on average across America this year. They are higher in many places.

In Florida, they just approved the largest rate increase in the history of the country. They approved $7 billion in rate hikes for Florida Power & Light. Tampa Electric and Duke Energy in my neck of the woods also hiked rates this year. For TECO customers, we are paying 82 percent more than 5 years ago, or $939 more than we were.

Electricity prices are climbing more than twice as fast as the rate of inflation. Why is this happening? It is because of Republican policies. It is the chaos and dysfunction. Let's go ahead and get into this.

Why are electricity prices so high?

What is driving the cost increases?

First, there are the arbitrary Trump tariffs. They are now at the highest levels than they have been since the 1930s. Estimates are that the average household is going to pay at least $1,000 more because of tariffs. When we talk about energy, we are talking, as well, about how we modernize the grid, power poles, wires, and everything that goes into an electrical system. The utilities are passing that on to hardworking families.

Then we have the big, ugly bill that Republicans forced through here last summer. Predictions were when we take a hatchet to cleaner, cheaper energy poised to come onto the grid, when we rip away tax credits and rebates for consumers to keep their electricity bills low, prices are going to go up. That is what we are seeing now, too.

The big, ugly bill is estimated to raise electricity prices by a staggering 61 percent over the next decade, particularly as a result of Republicans declaring war on clean, cheap energy and crippling the American clean energy industry.

I don't know, Mr. Speaker. Did you see the jobs report that came out this morning? It doesn't look good. In today's jobs report, the number of manufacturing jobs continues to slide. November was the seventh straight

month of monthly decline. A lot of that goes back to the big, ugly bill and what the Trump administration has done over the past year in canceling clean energy projects.

My colleagues have heard all about them. An offshore wind project might be approved, permitted, and ready to come online. He says: No, we are not going to do that.

Mr. Speaker, that has an impact on the bottom line for our families. We might have another project coming online that is ready to go. It is cleaner energy. Everyone knows that solar power with storage and wind power with storage is the cheapest energy online. The Trump administration and Republican policies said no.

When our constituents open up that electric bill, I want them to understand that all of this has a cost and that they deserve so much better than the chaos and dysfunction, the distraction of tearing down the East Wing to build a ballroom, and the parties with dancing girls at Mar-a-Lago. Why don't my colleagues focus on people's cost of living for a change?

We would think that folks in Congress would come here to help solve problems.

Is there going to be an answer for higher healthcare costs? In Florida, 4.7 million of my neighbors rely on the Affordable Care Act tax credits.

Do Republicans have any answer for the 20 million families here during the holiday season who can't buy holiday gifts they want to put under the tree for their families? No, they will have to pinch every penny to pay for their healthcare. Many will go without.

Mr. Speaker, think about the cancer patients now who are looking at the new year and how they are going to afford their treatment.

It is electricity costs. It is groceries. It is healthcare costs. Then my Republican colleagues will waste our time with a bill that is another in the line of special treatment for polluters at the expense of hardworking American families today.

This bill would give the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission broad authority to force utilities to keep expensive and polluting fossil fuel power plants operating for extended periods, up to 5 years. What that does is it locks customers into paying billions of dollars more for power plants that were slated for retirement, despite the volatile fuel costs and the environmental harm.

They want to continue to block cleaner and cheaper energy, which is the cheapest energy coming onto the grid right now. I think they are living 20 to 30 years ago. Electricity generated by coal is on the decline. While it was about 50 percent of the electricity generation in America in the year 2000, here we are, 25 years later, and it is only 20 percent of electricity generation.

The main reason for that is simple. Coal is more expensive than a lot of the other options we have today. In almost every case today, it is actually cheaper to build new renewables than to keep existing coal plants running. Coal is only getting more expensive. Three-quarters of coal plants saw costs rising faster than inflation just over the past few years.

This bill is anticonsumer. Frankly, it is anti-American. People deserve better. If we want to lower electricity bills, I would ask my colleagues to march down to the White House because the President is the only one arbitrarily taking energy generation offline and hiking electricity costs.

During the last administration, the number of utility-scale electric power plants actually increased by over 2,000. We produced more energy than ever before. We have a commitment to serve the people that send us here and to help them lower their bills through rebates, through energy efficiency, through help for their pocketbooks, not the bottom line of polluters who have all too much power here on Capitol Hill.

Mr. Speaker, the Department of Energy already has the authority under the Federal Power Act to prevent power plants from retiring if doing so would cause reliability problems. Republicans want to go further. This bill requires States to file reliability complaints 5 years before a generator retires. It is almost impossible to predict the impact of a plant retirement that far ahead.

This bill gives polluting plants a pass to ignore Federal, State, and local environmental laws. As we have already seen multiple times just this year, these plants aren't even reliable.

Mr. Speaker, we will have a whole lot more to say on this, but I really wish we would not waste people's time by coming here and making their lives more expensive at a time when they are clamoring for help on their groceries, on their healthcare, and on their electricity bills. Republicans brought a bill that actually hikes electricity and utility costs. They deserve so much better.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Tonko), the ranking member of the Environment Subcommittee.

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

Mr. Speaker, I had a raised smile when I saw that poster, ``House Republicans are Strengthening the Electric Grid,'' because it is such a canard. It was just a few months ago where the Trump administration canceled hundreds of millions of dollars to modernize America's electric grid in red States and blue States. It was a complicated system of wires and transmission.

Mr. Speaker, you would think that, in a country such as ours, where we know electricity demand is going up, that one thing we could agree on investing in is modernizing our electric grid, but no. The Trump administration, just like they have taken a hatchet to cleaner, cheaper energy, has taken a hatchet to those hardworking people and the folks who keep the lights on for us.

Grid modernization is important, so the last thing Republicans and this administration are doing is strengthening the grid.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentlewoman from Michigan (Ms. Scholten).

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

Mr. Speaker, I simply must call out some of the hypocrisy coming from my colleagues on the other side of the aisle.

We have watched over the past few months as electricity costs for hardworking Americans have gone up. People are asking why this is happening. We talked about the impact of the arbitrary tariffs that are raising the cost of living on everyone. The Republican policies in the big, ugly bill have taken a hatchet to cleaner, cheaper energy coming onto the grid.

When that is married up with the very significant project cancellations of the Department of Energy and across the administration, it comes to lost or delayed private investments of $53 billion; 324 projects canceled or delayed, or layoffs; over 24,000 megawatts lost that could have been coming onto the grid to keep prices lower. That adds up to over 13 million homes that could have had cleaner, cheaper energy powering them.

There is so much hypocrisy here in Washington right now. For decades, Republicans claimed to be the party of free markets and of business and competition. This bill is anti-competition. I remember a day when Republicans actually championed competition in the electricity sector. Those days are over, and that means that our neighbors back home are going to pay higher prices.

Today's bill has nothing to do with free markets. Instead, it is government intervention into the electricity sector that would make a Soviet planner blush. Instead of letting power plants compete to see who can deliver reliable power at lower costs, Republicans would instead establish a 5-year plan to mandate which power plants stay online and forcing Americans to pay the bill. This bill has more in common with Karl Marx and Chairman Mao than it does with the pre-Donald Trump Republican Party.

Mr. Speaker, we can't take our eye off the ball here. The reality is that the President promised to cut Americans' electricity bills. He promised that he would cut them in half by the time he was 1 year into his term.

Here we are, at the end of the year, and energy bills are up, way up, over 13 percent in many places. I think that is a failing grade. I think it speaks to the weakness of these arguments, as they try to paper over the struggles of American families and like to pretend that they are doing something, while we watch healthcare costs go way up and the costs of groceries weigh people down.

They want free markets when it means well for their fossil fuel allies, but they want government intervention and socialized costs the moment consumers might actually benefit from lower prices.

The hypocrisy here is just staggering.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, this is a really tough time for the folks we represent back home. It is made worse by Trump's unfolding energy crisis. It is an affordability crisis.

Looking ahead, looking in the years ahead, I think my colleagues had a point: We are going to need more energy. So it makes no sense at all for Republicans in Congress and the Trump administration to take a hatchet to cleaner, cheaper energy that is poised to come on the grid, cancel projects, and throw people out of jobs.

I pointed out earlier that if you looked at the jobs report that came out this morning, manufacturing jobs were on their seventh month of decline. Part of that is because the Trump administration went into this year saying that we don't believe in solar power and wind power and storage and everything that makes your power more efficient. At the same time, they passed the big, ugly bill that rips away all sorts of cost-savers, like for families back home that are going to replace their heating and cooling system, a little bit of help in their pocketbook to do it in an affordable way.

Meanwhile, the President, what did he promise? He said: I am going to make life more affordable. But everything that they have done, whether it is arbitrary tariffs, canceling projects, killing jobs, now trying to pass bills that heap costs on our families back home, everything they have done has raised the cost of living.

I was flabbergasted when the President said: This whole affordability thing, it is a hoax. You tell that to the hardworking people back home going into the grocery store or the people now looking at their health insurance bill that this Congress refuses to solve. Then you bring a bill to the floor to add insult to injury, to make life even more expensive by making their utility bills more expensive? They are already up 13 percent on average across the country.

Ever since Republicans took the majority here, we have been waiting for one bill to lower the cost of living. We have nothing. Just this year, utilities have asked for $34 billion worth of rate increases. American families have each spent $1,200 more this year to fund Trump's tariffs. Electricity prices are up by 13 percent. Natural gas prices are up by 8 percent, and the big, ugly bill will increase electricity prices by 61 percent. American families simply cannot afford the weight of all of this any longer, and they deserve so much better.

What do the Republicans want to do today? They want to pass another bill that will increase prices by up to $6 billion each year. This is not a hoax. This is not a hoax. Instead, they offer a Christmas gift to the Nation's largest polluters.

But I guess Republicans in Congress just believe what the President said: Affordability is a hoax; nothing to see here.

Mr. Speaker, I want to be clear to all Americans. I don't care if you are a Democrat, a Republican, or Independent, how you are registered, we are going to stand up for you. We are going to fight back at every turn. We are going to fight for your pocketbook. We are not going to let them get away with this. We are actually going to do something about it because we know you deserve better. This is not a hoax.

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

Mr. Speaker, Pursuant to House Resolution 951, I call up the bill (H.R. 3632) to amend the Federal Power Act to adjust the requirements for orders, rules, and regulations relating to furnishing adequate service, to require owners or operators of generating facilities to provide notice of planned retirements of certain electric generating units, and for other purposes, and ask for its immediate consideration in the House.

Mr. 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.R. 3632.

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

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 3632, the Power Plant Reliability Act, sponsored by my colleague from Virginia's Ninth Congressional District (Mr. Griffith).

This legislation improves existing tools under the Federal Power Act to keep the lights on for households and ensures more effective long- term planning for our generation resources.

In the event that a power plant closure creates a shortage of available electricity, H.R. 3632 equips States and grid operators with an opportunity to seek relief from FERC until replacement capacity comes online.

Mr. Speaker, we are in the midst of a reliability and affordability crisis because of the Biden-Harris administration and blue States who took a hatchet to our baseload capacity resources, while making it impossible to build the necessary energy infrastructure to replace it.

These policies were designed to achieve environmental goals that were unrelated to reliability, affordability, or stability of the bulk-power system. Nothing can be more destructive to our communities than a blackout.

When a State seeks to close a power plant without identifying a sufficient replacement, there is little recourse for effective households in neighboring States that need the power. The Power Plant Reliability Act solves this by providing a bridge solution to maintain generating resources until sufficient capacity can come online to fill the gap.

The numbers are staggering. Over the last decade, 115 gigawatts of power are expected to go offline, while 150 gigawatts of demand are expected to come online. The Department of Energy finds that the current pace of retirements and generation growth could increase the risk of outages over 100 times in just 4 short years.

Making matters worse, our adversaries are close on our heels to securing leadership positions in the next-generation economy. There is little time to waste.

Importantly, significant investment is flowing in growing our base of dispatchable resources. The Trump administration is working tirelessly to reverse unnecessary barriers to generation development and fuel innovation and baseload power like advanced nuclear. Yet, before these policies can take root, we must ensure that States and grid operators are equipped with the necessary tools to maintain reliability of the bulk-power system.

This legislation is another step to securing the grid and improving long-term planning needed to lead the next-generation economy. I urge my colleagues to support H.R. 3632.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, in 2024, the FERC Commissioner, Mark Christie, testified before us in the Energy and Commerce Committee. He was referring to the severe impact that the Biden administration EPA's power plant rule, commonly known as the Clean Power Plan 2.0, was having.

He stated this: ``If the EPA's new power plant rule survives court challenge, it will force the retirements of nearly all remaining coal generation plants and will prevent the construction of vitally needed new combined-cycle baseload . . . generation.''

This loss of this dispatchable generation resources will be, in his words, ``catastrophic''--``catastrophic.''

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Carter), from the First District.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Balderson), from the 12th District.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Fry).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. Evans).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from North Dakota (Mrs. Fedorchak).

Mr. Speaker, I yield an additional 15 seconds to the gentlewoman from North Dakota.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Palmer), who represents Alabama's Sixth District.

Mr. Speaker, this chart tells it all. We talked about it the other day.

Mr. Speaker, look at the top 12 States that are having problems. California is at the top. Then look at the New England States: Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Vermont. Their Governors earlier this year stated that their citizens are paying 40 percent more for fuel this winter. Why is that?

Well, if they don't allow pipelines, they don't allow energy to get into their area, and they rely on somebody else to do it for them, then it is going to happen.

If the people want to know who is causing the prices to go up, then they had better go home and talk to their State's legislators and their Governors and find out why, because these numbers don't lie. They do not lie.

We are going to take off 115 gigawatts of generation alone in this country when we are supposed to be putting on 155 gigawatts of power.

Earlier this year, the RTOs and the ISOs, those are the folks who manage the wholesale electricity markets and transmission in this country, all testified for us in committee and said this: We need more power not less, more power not less.

They also said this: And we can't take off any generation. If you want to see prices go up, just keep taking that generation offline because that is what is going to happen.

I thank the gentleman from Virginia's Ninth Congressional District for sponsoring this important legislation.

This bill provides a critical tool for States and grid operators to secure the grid until new generation comes online and ensures long-term effective planning by improving our understanding of our available generation resources.

There is nothing more expensive than a blackout, and this bill will ensure processes are in place to keep the lights--the lights--on for all Americans and to make their utility bills more affordable.

H.R. 3632 has broad support from America's Power, the National Hydropower Association, Americans for Prosperity, and the National Mining Association.

Democrats like to talk about affordability, but electricity prices went up over 25 percent--25 percent--during the Biden administration. House Republicans are taking action with legislation like H.R. 3632, to help lower Americans' utility bills.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support the Power Reliability Act, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, it was with interest that I heard the remarks of my colleague from New York. I just wanted to correct a few things as someone who just won one of those swings seats that was in play last year.

I would say that that was not a mandate, but the Republicans did win Congress, they did win the Presidency, and I think that Republicans last year rightly focused on inflation, the cost-of-living, and the economy as key issues that Americans are facing.

Now, I represent a very wealthy district. The median income in my district is about $130,000. Even in my district right now, people are suffering. When I go visit my food banks, the usage right now is at record highs. This is directly related to the policies that were in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, as it is Orwellianly named by our Republican colleagues.

The tariffs and the OBBB in combination have caused costs to skyrocket, and inflation right now is as high as it has ever been, as high as it ever was under Biden.

They are seeing their electric costs go up because of the giveaways to utilities and the crackdown on renewable energies, very cheap forms of energy. In places like California, they are seeing their grocery prices go up because of the tariffs. They are set to see their health insurance costs go up massively.

When I go out there and I talk to my families, it is not as if they have one budget for utilities, one budget for food, and one budget for health insurance. They have a budget, and they are struggling right now to pay for things. They are now going to see in the State of California, in my district, their health insurance costs, if they are purchasing it on an exchange, go up between 50 percent to 200 percent or more as was announced by Covered California just last month.

That is a cost that people just can't afford, no matter how much they are making. I know the billionaires do pretty well under this Presidency, under this Republican-controlled Congress, but regular people, even people who are making a good amount of money are struggling to get by right now, to pay those bills.

I have talked to too many people in my district who are making that hard decision. Many of them, we know, will drop their health insurance because they just can't afford to pay it. They need food. They need to keep the lights on. They need to buy gas to get to work. Consequently, they are going to drop health insurance.

That means that we will have more families who are one catastrophic illness or injury away from bankruptcy, something that is far too common. You can multiply that by millions and millions of households across this country right now because millions of households are facing that same dilemma.

I urge my Republican colleagues right now to ignore what their President is doing. He is focused on the ballroom. He is focused on building out our golf courses here in D.C., according to yesterday's news. He is focused on foreign affairs, giving money to Argentina, and blowing up boats off the coast of Venezuela.

What I would urge my Republican colleagues to start focusing on is the cost of things right now. We have a way to do that, a bipartisan initiative. We would love it to be bipartisan, if you all would join us in just giving a clean 3-year extension of the ACA tax credits. This is something that would give immediate relief to millions of families out there that are seeking to lower their costs.

Now, I know we have this vote coming up on this package of healthcare bills. I would say it is very complicated stuff, lots of random proposals in there. There is clearly an attack on women's reproductive rights and access to contraception. That is a key part of what these healthcare bills will do.

What they do not do in any way, shape, or form is address the fact that people are going to pay thousands of dollars, sometimes tens of thousands of dollars more for their health insurance because of Republican policies.

You have a chance right now to do right by the American people to try to rectify the wrongs that your policies have created. This has nothing to do with Trump. It has nothing to do with Biden. It has to do with an opportunity right now to get some bipartisan legislation passed.

This is going to save lives. We are literally talking about people in your district, in my district, in Mary Gay Scanlon's district. We have a chance to really help save lives right now. Even in districts like mine--again, a wealthy district--I have talked to many people right now who are set to lose their health insurance, set to lose their healthcare.

Whether they have kids with cancer or whether they have autistic children, they are struggling right now. We have a chance to show the American people that we can rise above partisan politics and do what is right. I think there is broad consensus on both sides of the aisle that extending the ACA tax credits is good policy. I urge them to join us.