Social Security Child Protection Act of 2025

Mr. Speaker, I also rise in support of H.R. 4429, the Developing and Empowering our Aspiring Leaders Act, or DEAL Act, which is a critical bill to support innovation, entrepreneurship, and capital formation.

The venture capital industry provides vital funding for early-stage startups at points in their life cycle when they are generally deemed to be too risky for traditional bank financing or for raising money on the public market. This basically means that if we are going to have a growing and innovative economy, then we have to have a healthy venture capital sector.

Historically, venture capital earns investor returns and frees up more capital to recycle in other companies by selling their mature portfolio companies to strategic investors or taking them public on public markets.

For a variety of reasons, including public company reporting obligations, economic uncertainty, and the rise of private equity, U.S. companies today are staying private much longer, which has reduced the opportunities for venture capital firms to recycle their investment dollars.

Some venture capital firms have sought to create new liquidity options through secondary acquisitions and investments in other VC funds. This is what Congresswoman Wagner was referring to, but that option right now is constrained by provisions in the Dodd-Frank Act of 2010 that limit venture capital funds' ability to invest in these so- called fund of funds to only 20 percent of their commitments.

That rule was very well-intentioned when passed, and the intent was to ensure that VC firms remained focused on direct investments in early-stage startups. However, it was crafted for a very different financial market than we have today.

I would also note that that constraint is irrelevant to the larger, more well-known VC funds who have the resources to shoulder the compliance burdens associated with registering with the SEC as registered investment advisers. They can already do this, but they are the big ones. They are the ones based in San Francisco and New York. That option isn't available for these emerging regional fund managers located in the middle of the country. Many of those funds increasingly depend on that fund-of-funds model.

What the DEAL Act does is just provides greater flexibility to those smaller VC funds while still ensuring that investors are protected and that fund managers continue to prioritize direct funding in small businesses. It does this by revising the existing rules to raise the cap from 20 percent in fund of funds up to 49 percent but still requiring that the majority of their investments are directly in portfolio companies.

In other words, the DEAL Act supports growth in the startup economy and ensures that capital reaches the communities and innovators who need it most.

I thank my fellow Midwesterner and friend, Congresswoman Wagner, for her leadership on this. I am proud to lead this important legislation, and I urge all my colleagues to support it.

Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 5348) to amend title II of the Social Security Act to provide for the reissuance of social security account numbers to young children in cases where confidentiality has been compromised, as amended.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and submit extraneous material on the bill under consideration.

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

Mr. Speaker, a lost or stolen Social Security number can cause a lifetime of harm to American children. Every year, more than a million children become victims of identity fraud.

Current Social Security Administration policy makes it extremely difficult for families to get a new Social Security number for a child, even when families know the original number was compromised through no fault of their own.

Previously, the Ways and Means Committee heard direct testimony from a mother who had to battle with the Social Security Administration when her 1-month-old child's Social Security number was compromised, and she was denied a new number.

This bill, the Social Security Child Protection Act of 2025, sponsored by Representative Smucker, will help families when their child's Social Security number is lost or stolen. It requires the SSA to issue a new number to children under the age of 14 when the child's card has been compromised versus sitting around and waiting for a malicious act to take place.

This is a straightforward solution that will help protect children and families from fraud.

I urge my colleagues to support this so we can continue to stand together to better safeguard the identities of American kids.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Smucker).

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

A mother testifying before the Ways and Means Committee told us how it took ``hours of effort over months'' to protect her daughter from identity theft and that ``the threat will never completely go away unless she is assigned a new Social Security number.''

This mother had to battle with the SSA after her infant daughter's Social Security number was compromised. Unfortunately, the story is all too common for millions of Americans who have had their Social Security numbers stolen or misused each year.

By taking swift action today, we can prevent a lifetime of financial harm to American children across the country.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support this legislation, and I yield back the balance of my time.

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

Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from Ohio for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, I am proud to sponsor H.R. 4429, the Developing and Empowering our Aspiring Leaders, or DEAL, Act.

This bill, which passed with almost unanimous support out of the Financial Services Committee, seeks to ensure the United States remains the most entrepreneurial country in the world, where the next great companies are founded and funded.

It is often said that small businesses are the engine of the American economy, and that is an absolute truth. Small businesses make up 99 percent of U.S. employers, and they are the driving force behind the creation of a majority of new jobs.

The entrepreneurs leading these companies are building something new, taking real risks, and driving growth in communities across the Nation, but too often, they can't get a fair shot at investment.

Right now, our capital markets suffer from an extreme geographic imbalance. The data is stark. Nearly 70 percent of venture capital flows to three States, Mr. Speaker: California, New York, and Massachusetts.

This leaves entire regions of the country struggling to access funding. It leaves communities in the Midwest and the South without the capital they need to build and scale businesses. Access to capital is not just a coastal issue. It is a national economic necessity.

This capital divide is why the DEAL Act is so critically important. This bill is a targeted, forward-looking effort to modernize outdated rules and channel investment to where it is needed most.

The DEAL Act fundamentally strengthens the ability of capital to reach more founders and more communities. It achieves this by allowing larger venture funds to invest directly in smaller, regional funds, a fund-of-funds investment.

This mechanism is a game changer, Mr. Speaker. It means more funding for startups, more opportunities for businesses that might otherwise be overlooked, and more innovation happening everywhere, not just in a handful of elite ZIP Codes.

Newer, regional venture funds are often best positioned to back the entrepreneurs who are building businesses on Main Street. The DEAL Act ensures that these funds can expand that important work, giving them the flexibility to partner with larger institutions to reach a wider base of early-stage companies.

H.R. 4429 ensures our policies are helping capital move efficiently and effectively, empowering those taking risks to build something new, and helping good ideas grow into great companies.

I thank Chairman Hill for his support, and also I thank Congressman Casten for joining me and co-leading this commonsense and bipartisan piece of legislation.

Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 4429) to require the Securities and Exchange Commission to revise the definition of a qualifying investment, for purposes of the exemption from registration for venture capital fund advisers under the Investment Advisers Act of 1940, to include an equity security issued by a qualifying portfolio company and to include an investment in another venture capital fund, and for other purposes, as amended.

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 this bill.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to gentlewoman from Missouri (Mrs. Wagner).

Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record the CBO estimate for this bill.

Legislation Considered Under Suspension of the Rules

The Majority Leader of the House of Representatives

announces bills that will be considered under suspension of

the rules in that chamber. Under suspension, floor debate is

limited, all floor amendments are prohibited, points of order

against the bill are waived, and final passage requires a

two-thirds majority vote.

At the request of the Majority Leader and the House

Committee on the Budget, CBO estimates the effects of those

bills on direct spending and revenues. CBO has limited time

to review the legislation before consideration. Although it

is possible in most cases to determine whether the

legislation would affect direct spending or revenues, time

may be insufficient to estimate the magnitude of those

effects. If CBO has prepared estimates for similar or

identical legislation, a more detailed assessment of

budgetary effects, including effects on spending subject to

appropriation, may be included.

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

For reasons I explained earlier, I urge all of my colleagues to support this bill, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I thank Chairman Smith for the opportunity to bring this up in committee and then for moving it out of committee. I thank the leader for bringing it to the floor for a vote.

This is about helping kids. I know when we talk about Social Security, we don't often think about kids. But remember, every child receives a Social Security number that follows them around for the rest of their life. Every year, there are kids whose Social Security numbers are lost or stolen in the mail and exposed to fraudsters.

Because children don't open bank accounts, they don't apply for lines of credit, and they don't seek employment, it can take them years to discover that their identity was stolen or to realize the effects of a stolen identity.

Under current policy, even if the child is aware that the Social Security number was stolen, a child must become victimized by actual fraud before the Social Security Administration will give them a new number.

That is ridiculous. If my bank issued a credit card and I didn't receive it in the mail, they wouldn't send me another copy of the same card. They would cancel the old one and send me a new card. Why would we treat our children any differently? We shouldn't.

That is why, Mr. Speaker, I ask my colleagues to vote for the Social Security Child Protection Act. This bill would simply require that the Social Security Administration issue a new, different Social Security number to a child under the age of 14 if the card has been lost or stolen while being issued to the child in the mail.

Mr. Speaker, it is a simple fix to protect our children and make the process of interacting with the Social Security Administration easier. I urge my colleagues to vote ``yes.''