Floor Statements

Madam Speaker, I had a family commitment and could not attend votes. Had I been present, I would have voted ``Yea'' on rollcall No. 591.

Mr. Speaker, we had a Democratic President, John F. Kennedy, who cut taxes when he was President. I think he would take issue with a lot of the things that have been said by his own party.

It has been 30 years since we addressed taxes in this country. President Ronald Reagan addressed it 30 years ago. We are way overdue for tax cuts in the United States of America.

Everybody knows that the 35 percent tax rate on corporations has driven companies overseas. West Virginia saw, just a couple of years ago, one of our largest remaining corporate headquarters, Mylan Pharmaceuticals, relocate overseas to avoid the taxes that are too high in this country. We all know that is a problem. We have a plan we are putting forward to try to solve it.

I say to my friends on the other side of the aisle: Where is your plan?

You have no plan. This is all political. All you do is make political attacks. You have had meetings recently and said: Don't offer a plan. Let's just attack the Republicans for their plan.

At least we have a plan to address this because hardworking taxpayers in West Virginia and America need and expect us to deliver on these tax cuts. So I rise in strong support of the budget today so we can move forward with our tax cut plan.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to applaud President Trump for his comments last week which criticized the few NFL players who have chosen to kneel in protest during our national anthem. The President is right to publicly object to this disrespect to our flag and Nation. While we can disagree on politics and policies, we should not denigrate our flag and our national anthem.

I must mention that most NFL players stood in respect for the flag. It is just a few who didn't, who gave them a bad name and the sport a bad name.

In response to President Trump's criticism, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell called the President's remarks divisive. I would respond to Mr. Goodell that it is you and your players who disrespect our flag and our national anthem who are being divisive. The President defending our flag is not divisive.

My father and thousands of other Americans fought under our flag in the jungles of Vietnam. Young men and women have died recently in service to our flag in Iraq and Afghanistan. In my house, we honored our flag not only because of my father's service, but because of the deep sense of patriotism my parents instilled in me.

My mother, Lala Suarez Mooney, was born and raised in Fidel Castro's Cuba, where she and other members of her family were thrown into jail for opposing Castro's Communist regime. When she was 20, my mother escaped Cuba and fled to America with barely a penny to her name. My mom and millions of other immigrants leave the flags of these other countries--brutal dictatorships, Communist regimes, and other oppressive regimes--to come to America to live under our flag.

All Americans, whether you came as an immigrant or you were born here, you stay to live under this flag. If you don't like it, you don't have to stay. You can go. No one is making you stay. We love this flag.

Listening to my parents' inspiring stories, I knew from a young age that I absolutely believed in the American ideals of liberty as set forth by our Founding Fathers. It is with this same sense of honor and patriotism that I support President Trump in calling for all NFL players to honor our flag and remember what has made our country great.

For a few hours many Sundays, I usually enjoy time with our son watching our favorite football teams battle on the gridiron. We root for different teams. As a nation, we forget about our political and other differences and come together to enjoy the sport of football. By these few players wrongly deciding to turn the game into a political statement, we lose that moment of national unity and respect for our country.

Sports have always been a unifying factor and a chance for the Nation to come together. NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, owners, coaches, and a few players are showing a lack of respect for our Nation and her military who gives them the freedom to play football. As the men and women of our armed services face challenges at home or abroad, we should put our differences aside and unite around our flag as a beacon of hope and understanding. I certainly respect anyone's right to protest peacefully and the right of an NFL team owner to discipline disorderly conduct or rude behavior.

Sadly, three NFL teams did not even leave the locker room to hear the playing of our national anthem. Just one person on those three teams, Pittsburgh Steeler Alejandro Villanueva, came out of the tunnel of the locker room. You can see other people standing back there in the tunnel. He came out of the tunnel of the locker room to honor our country.

Villanueva is a West Point graduate, former Army Ranger, and Bronze Star recipient. He knows the value of our flag. Sadly, instead of receiving the praise he deserved, many in the media attacked him. Even his coach, Mike Tomlin, said that when Alejandro Villanueva came out of that tunnel, he was ``not respectful of our football team.''

Not respectful of the team? Really, Coach? How about respect for the flag? How about our country which soldiers die for and the flag that allows you to play that football game? Unbelievable.

I hope all the young people out there look at Alejandro Villanueva as a beacon of honor and duty to his country above himself.

Professional athletes in this Nation, whether they like it or not, are an example for our young people. They should stop injecting anti- American politics into sports.

I applaud, again, President Trump for standing up for our flag and our national anthem. All NFL athletes should stand together and do the same.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to commend the football players of Clay and Braxton County High Schools, both in my congressional district, the Second District of beautiful West Virginia. I commend them for exercising their right to pray before a football game on September 1.

After one person complained about prayer at football games, Clay County High School decided to institute a moment of silence instead. Much to everyone's surprise, during that moment of silence, both teams ran onto the field, knelt, and prayed together. In a spontaneous action throughout the stands, individuals stood and joined the prayer.

In this time of great divisiveness in our Nation, gestures like these remind us about what is great in America. Our First Amendment protects all Americans from laws that hinder our religious freedom, our right to free speech, and our right to worship God as we see fit.

Even though Braxton and Clay County are bitter rivals in football, they came together to share this moment to worship the Almighty God. I commend them for this gesture.

For the record, Braxton County won the game 23-13.

To the gentleman from Texas, thank you. I appreciate your good work here and your words for the American people.

Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record the following remarks by Peter Onoszko, President of the Jefferson County Commission:

``With malice toward none and charity for all'' thus said

President Abraham Lincoln in his Second Inaugural Address in

1865. Even though the Civil War would continue for several

more months before the final victory over the Confederate

States, President Lincoln was already setting the country on

the path of reconciliation. Regardless of the military

victory, the President knew that unless there was a

reconciliation the military victory would be meaningless.

The path of reconciliation has been slow and tortuous.

However, in the decades following the Civil War all but the

most senior of the former Confederate military and civilian

leadership had their United States citizenship restored by

Congress. The post-War careers of Confederate general

officers is illustrative of the reconciliation. Depending on

how one counts, there were between 425 and 562 Confederate

general officers. Of these numbers, 3 were recalled to active

duty during the Spanish-American War and served in the United

States Army. 51 were appointed to various federal civilian

positions ranging from US ambassadors to foreign governments

to US marshals to membership on various federal commissions

to postmasters and so forth. 45 were elected to the US

Congress as senators and representatives and at least one was

appointed to a federal judgeship.

What of the ordinary soldiers and how they felt? In 1905 on

the 40th anniversary of the Civil War, Congress authorized

the first campaign medal ever awarded to members of the Armed

Forces and this was the Civil War Campaign Medal awarded to

all who had served honorably in BOTH the Union and

Confederate armies. Perhaps the most poignant demonstration

of reconciliation was the Battle of Gettysburg Reunion of

1913 marking the fiftieth anniversary of that great battle.

Thousands of surviving veterans from both the North and the

South gathered at the site of the battle. During several days

of the reunion, Confederate and Union veterans toured the

battlefield walking arm in arm as they revisited the site and

reminisced with each other, recognizing that there was an

unbreakable bond that had risen among all who had

participated.

By 1978 the United States Congress had restored US

citizenship to all of the senior leadership of the

Confederacy, in some cases posthumously. The last was

Jefferson Davis, President of the Confederacy, who

posthumously had his US citizenship restored by an act of

Congress in 1978. In signing this act President Jimmy Carter

observed that this was the final act of reconciliation.

Paralleling the reconciliation of ``the Boys in Blue and

the Boys in Gray'' was the reconciliation between white and

black Americans. This also followed a tortuous path. Starting

with the Emancipation Proclamation promulgated in 1863 and

continuing with the ratification of the 13th, 14th, and 15th

Amendments to the Constitution between 1864 and 1870, slavery

was abolished and black Americans were recognized as full

citizens of the United States with all the rights and

privileges pertaining thereto.

Unfortunately the full acceptance of black Americans was

legally obstructed in many

sections of the country for the next century with the

enactment of ``Jim Crow'' laws which made racial segregation

and discrimination legal (``Separate but equal'' as the US

Supreme Court ruled in Plessy v. Ferguson [1896]). However,

the path toward racial reconciliation continued. The Armed

Forces were racially integrated by President Harry Truman

during the Korean War and Plessy v. Ferguson was overturned

by the US Supreme Court in 1954 with the Brown v. Board of

Education decision which ruled that ``Separate but equal is

not equal at all'' to cite several examples of the country

moving toward complete reconciliation. The struggle to

legally abolish racial discrimination and insure civil rights

for all Americans of whatever racial background, in which

struggle both black and white Americans participated, came to

a head in the civil rights protests and demonstrations of the

1960s. This resulted in the landmark Civil Rights Legislation

of the era which ended racial segregation and outlawed

discrimination on the basis of race.

In our lifetime we have had an African American president,

African American cabinet officers, including two secretaries

of state, two African American Justices on the Supreme Court,

several African American four-star generals including one

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, many Members of

Congress in both the Senate and House, along with African

American leaders in business, industry, science, medicine,

academia, and the arts.

Tragically today there exist small radical minorities among

both white and black Americans who seek to undermine over a

century and a half of progress toward the reconciliation

between regions of America and the races of Americans,

creating harmful division and discord between our people and

threatening to destroy our country. This has got to stop. We

are ALL Americans and as Abraham Lincoln said in 1858 ``A

house divided against itself cannot stand.''

Mr. Speaker, on Monday I accompanied President Donald J. Trump to his speech at the 2017 National Boy Scout Jamboree and thus missed votes Monday night.

Had I been present, I would have voted YEA on Roll Call No. 408, and YEA on Roll Call No. 409.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize a truly outstanding constituent in the field of health care, Greg Elliot of Charleston, West Virginia. Mr. Elliot has been selected this year as one of the recipients of the prestigious Joe Warner Patient Advocacy Award.

The National Center for Assisted Living, a branch of the American Healthcare Association (AHCA/NCAL), is the nation's largest association of professional long term health providers. They bestow this annual award on Association members who have worked diligently to educate Members of Congress about the needs of long term care patients, and to advance quality in the long term and post-acute care community.

These members share the same passion and commitment to progressing long term and post-acute care as the late Joe Warner of Illinois-based Heritage Enterprises, for whom the award is named. All the recipients share a compassionate and caring view of our nation's frail, elderly, and disabled.

Greg Elliot's commitment to improving long-term care continues today as the Vice President of American Medical Facilities Management in West Virginia. Mr. Elliot is a second-generation owner of AMFM, which operates 17 long-term care, skilled nursing and rehabilitation centers throughout West Virginia.

Three of these centers are located in my congressional district including the Braxton Health Care and Rehabilitation Center in Sutton, Clay Health Care Center in Ivydale and the E.A. Hawse Nursing and Rehabilitation Center in Baker.

AMFM Nursing and Rehabilitation Centers employ more than 1,700 West Virginians, provides care for more than 1,100 patients, and is the largest privately held-multi-facility nursing home company in West Virginia.

Greg is frequently in Washington visiting my Congressional office advocating on behalf of West Virginia seniors. I always appreciate his ideas and insight into health care issues and I look forward to many more meetings in the future. With Greg Elliot's leadership, AMFM has received countless awards such as the Silver Achievement in Quality Award from the American Healthcare Association. He also received Administrator of the Year Award from West Virginia Health Care Association. The third-party research institute, My Inner View, has ranked AMFM facilities in the top 10 percent in the nation 46 times for customer or employee satisfaction.

Mr. Elliot is currently on the board for the Charleston Area Alliance & Chamber of Commerce, and is an At-Large Representative on the American Healthcare Association Board of Governors.

Greg Elliot has been very involved in charities throughout West Virginia. In fact, to date the AMFM Charitable Foundation has donated more than $500,000 for charitable organizations throughout West Virginia including food pantries, local volunteer fire departments, libraries and women's shelters.

Mr. Elliot founded The AMFM Grill Team, a group of employee volunteers that band together to provide great BBQ to the AMFM centers and surrounding communities. In 2016 following the devastating flooding in our state, the team went to two flooded communities and prepared hundreds of meals for the affected residents.

Greg Elliot resides in Charleston, WV with his wife Jennifer of 16 years, his 10-year-old daughter Elizabeth and their two dogs. Greg enjoys the outdoors, cooking out, and all things electronic, especially building robots with his daughter.

Mr. Speaker, please join me in thanking Greg Elliot for his years of dedication and care to our nation's frail, elderly and disabled. His career and life accomplishments truly reflect the ideals embodied in the Joe Warner Patient Advocacy Award.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize a truly outstanding constituent in the field of healthcare, Greg Elliot of Charleston, West Virginia. He has been selected this year as one of the recipients of the prestigious Joe Warner Patient Advocacy Award.

The National Center for Assisted Living, the Nation's largest association of professional long-term healthcare providers, bestows this annual award on association members who have worked diligently to educate Members of Congress about the needs of long-term care patients, and to advance the quality in the long-term and post-acute care community.

Mr. Elliot is a second-generation owner of AMFM, which operates 17 long-term, skilled nursing and rehabilitation centers throughout West Virginia.

Greg is frequently in Washington visiting my congressional office, advocating on behalf of West Virginia seniors.

The third-party research institute, My InnerView, has ranked AMFM facilities in the top 10 percent in the Nation 46 times for customer or employee satisfaction.

Greg Elliot resides in Charleston with his wife of 16 years, Jennifer; his 10-year-old daughter, Elizabeth; and their two dogs.

Mr. Speaker, please join me in thanking Greg for his years of dedication and care to our Nation's frail, elderly, and disabled. His career reflects the ideals embodied in the Joe Warner Patient Advocacy Award.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the life and memory of West Virginia's Circuit Court Judge John Yoder, who passed away on June 7, 2017.

Judge Yoder served on the 23rd Judicial Circuit, which included Berkeley, Jefferson, and Morgan Counties in the eastern panhandle of the Second Congressional District, which I represent. He practiced law in Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, for 23 years.

Judge Yoder earned a bachelor of arts degree at Chapman University, and then studied law at the University of Kansas. He also obtained an MBA at the University of Chicago.

John Yoder was appointed by President Ronald Reagan in 1983 to serve as the director of the asset forfeiture office for the U.S. Department of Justice. He continued his distinguished career as a public servant, including two stints as a West Virginia State senator before being elected as circuit court judge.

Judge Yoder is one of the early pioneers of State drug courts and was well known for his big heart and compassion. I join all West Virginians in keeping Judge Yoder's family and friends in our prayers. He will truly be missed.

Mr. Chairman, I rise today in strong support of H.R. 10, the Financial CHOICE Act. This critical piece of legislation rolls back onerous Obama-era regulations on the financial services industry

that are strangling small businesses and hurting hardworking American taxpayers.

As I held roundtables across West Virginia, I heard from small- business owners and job creators that Obama-era regulations make it harder for community banks to make loans to small businesses and first- time home buyers.

The Financial CHOICE Act will remove stifling Federal regulations from out-of-touch Washington bureaucrats and return financial decisionmaking to you, the individual consumers and to the small community banks.

I know that President Trump is committed to supporting the reforms in the Financial CHOICE Act, and I look forward to continuing to work with our President to grow our economy and bring much-needed relief to West Virginia consumers and small-business owners.

I want to thank Chairman Hensarling and my colleagues on the Financial Services Committee for their leadership on this important legislation.

Mr. Speaker, recent State Department revelations show that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad continues inflicting atrocities on his own people. The discovery of a crematorium at Saydnaya military prison will only make it more difficult to account for the thousands detained and executed by Assad.

According to numerous nongovernmental organizations, the Assad regime has abducted and detained between 65,000 and 117,000 people between 2011 and 2015. Credible reports have the regime executing up to 50 people daily. Assad uses the excuse of fighting terrorism to justify this gross campaign of inhumanity against innocent civilians. We know he has used mass graves and crematoriums to dispose of the corpses of the murdered. The savagery must stop.

I am proud to represent many Syrian Americans in Charleston, West Virginia. I urge my colleagues to join me in publicly condemning the atrocities committed by the Syrian regime of President Assad. Syrians deserve to be safe and free.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to express my outrage at the chemical attack in Syria on April 4, 2017, that killed upwards of 70 civilians, including children.

I am proud to represent many Syrian Americans in my congressional district in Charleston, West Virginia. They share their concerns with me on a regular basis.

This type of violence is a regular occurrence in Syria. Hospitals, markets, schools, bus stations, warehouses--none of these places are off limits for bombing and destruction by Bashar al-Assad and his allies. The slaughter of innocent life will not end unless the United States of America takes the lead.

Peace in Syria is impossible while Bashar al-Assad remains in control. He has proven this time and again by his reckless and evil use of chemical weapons and other cruel tools of war on his own people. We must establish safe zones for innocent civilians.

I call upon President Trump and other world leaders to do whatever they reasonably can to end these atrocious attacks on the innocent, and return stability and peace to Syria.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of the rule and the underlying joint resolution to begin the process of rolling back President Obama's war on coal. That is the rule we are debating today; that is the bill before us, not to be confused with the other issue that is being discussed.

I was proud that, in the last Congress, I was the lead sponsor of the STREAM Act, H.R. 1644, which would have prevented the implementation of a new coal regulation that would have cost upwards of 70,000 good- paying jobs. My legislation passed the House of Representatives in January of 2016, with bipartisan support, and sent a clear message to President Obama's administration that the so-called stream protection rule was bad policy. Unfortunately, my bill never received a vote in the U.S. Senate.

Despite the clear message from Congress, the Obama administration, in the final days, issued a disastrous stream protection rule. Again, he did this as he was leaving the Presidency in the final days before he left office. But don't let the clever name fool you. The new regulation will have far-reaching impacts for the coal industry--an industry, I might add, that provides over 90 percent of the power generation for my home State of West Virginia.

The rule prescribes a one-size-fits-all approach in defiance of common sense and the Federal law. There is no need to rewrite over 400 regulations, as this rule does, other than as a blatant attempt to regulate the coal industry out of business. We cannot allow this rule to move forward, and thus we need to support the rule and the underlying joint resolution of disapproval.

Let us not forget that former President Barack Obama promised that he would bankrupt the coal industry. People are losing their jobs and the dignity that comes with work. Our communities are also suffering. Fewer jobs means less economic investment and less hope.

I encourage my colleagues to visit West Virginia or Appalachia and see firsthand what President Obama's policies have done to our communities. It is heartbreaking to hear the stories and see the faces of struggling families as they try to pay their bills. I stand today with those communities in rolling back the policies that have caused so much harm and pain.

These new regulations would be catastrophic to the coal industry and all of the hardworking American families that depend on coal to keep their energy costs low. The shame of it all is that it is preventable. We must end this war on coal now, and that process begins today.

I made a promise to my constituents of the Second District of West Virginia that I would fight for the coal industry and bring back jobs to my State. Today is the first in many steps this Congress, along with President Donald Trump, will take to make good on the promises we made in November.

Again, I encourage support for the rule and the underlying resolution of disapproval.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak on an issue that I care deeply about: protecting the unborn and defending life. This week, I reintroduced the Life at Conception Act.

I am honored to be the lead sponsor of the Life at Conception Act, which simply defines human life as beginning at the moment of conception. As a result, unborn babies are entitled to legal protection under the Constitution. We had a record number of original cosponsors this past Congress, and I pray this bill will pass Congress swiftly.

I believe that we have a moral obligation to protect the unborn at every stage of development. It is something I have always been passionate about. I was president of my college's pro-life group, the Dartmouth Coalition for Life. I can still remember the conversations I had with my fellow students as I discussed the value of human life with them. It was a great feeling to know that I was opening eyes to the value of all human life one student at a time.

Protecting life is one of the issues that compelled me to run for office. When I first asked for the opportunity to serve you as your representative in Congress, I promised I would be a strong defender of the unborn. I am proud to say I have delivered on that promise.

The Life at Conception Act is a crucial part of the long-term battle to protect the unborn. It started 44 years ago to the week, in 1973 in the Roe v. Wade decision when the Supreme Court asserted that, because the beginning of life is not legally defined by Congress, it is up for interpretation by the court. The Life at Conception Act simply fills that gap and defines that human life begins at the moment of conception.

Even Vice President Joe Biden, a Democrat, recently restated publicly his belief that human life begins at conception. There is bipartisan agreement on this issue. It is important for Congress to define human life because the unborn are the most helpless among us. They need us to have enough courage to step up and protect them.

My bill also sets a standard for promoting and encouraging a culture of life. If enacted, it would simply affirm what we all know in our hearts and minds to be true: that unborn babies deserve our protection.

Last year, the Life at Conception Act had 146 cosponsors in the U.S. House of Representatives, including my two colleagues in West Virginia, David McKinley and Evan Jenkins. I hope that more Representatives will join me in promoting respect and protection for all human life.

I continue to be guided by my faith and values. I look forward to working with my colleagues to defend the innocent and give voice to the voiceless. I welcome the marchers this week coming for the annual March for Life. I thank them for their participation in defending the unborn.

Mr. Speaker, it is an honor and a privilege to serve the constituents of the Second Congressional District of West Virginia for a second term.

As we begin the 115th session of Congress, my top legislative priorities are rolling back anti-coal regulations that have been imposed by President Obama's administration over the last 8 years; fighting the drug epidemic; repealing ObamaCare and making health care more affordable and accessible; and investing in our roads, bridges, airports, and other key infrastructure.

West Virginia needs good-paying jobs. President Obama has spent the last 8 years waging a war on coal on our country. During this session of Congress, we must continue to work together to promote an all-of- the-above energy strategy that conserves our natural resources, cultivates our economy and jobs, and promotes American energy independence.

One of our Nation's and our States' greatest natural resources is our fossil fuel. Fossil fuel, including coal, supplies around 85 percent of our Nation's energy. West Virginia produces about 15 percent of that total.

Under the outgoing administration, we have seen our West Virginia energy industries come under attack even though we have made significant strides in recent years to improve the quality of our air, land, and water. By rolling back harmful regulations like the so-called stream protection rule, we can save 30,000 jobs in the Appalachian region right now. That is why last year I introduced my bill, the Supporting Transparent Regulatory and Environmental Actions in Mining Act, also known as the STREAM Act. My bill was passed by the House last year with bipartisan support, and I will continue to fight to stop this outrageous rule from taking effect.

Another top priority for this Congress must be stopping the drug epidemic in our country. Drug abuse ravages our communities, rips families apart, and further ruptures our State's already-ailing economy. This issue is above party politics. It is a plague that both parties must come together to solve. There is no magical solution to this epidemic. We need local, State, and Federal officials to work together to effectively and efficiently fight back.

This past Congress I worked with Members on both sides of the aisle to find commonsense solutions to fight back against this scourge. That is why I introduced H.R. 4499, the Promoting Responsible Opioid Prescribing Act. This bipartisan bill struck out a harmful provision of ObamaCare that places unnecessary pressure on doctors and hospitals to prescribe narcotic pain medicine. I am proud to say that the Department of Health and Human Services announced that they changed their policy and implemented my bill. This change in policy is an important part of the fight against opioid abuse. I will remain steadfast in my efforts to fight this epidemic.

Another important way to fight back against the drug epidemic is by making health care more accessible and affordable. The first step to do this is to repeal ObamaCare.

Healthcare costs are on the rise because ObamaCare adds burdensome taxes, regulations, and mandates onto American consumers. The limited choice in health insurance plans is harming families and their budgets. ObamaCare will kill 2.5 million jobs in 10 years. It has continued to raise health insurance costs and has placed the Federal Government in between patients and their doctors.

Research done by the National Center for Policy Analysis found that average monthly premium costs increased for almost everyone regardless of their age, race, or gender after ObamaCare was implemented.

As a Republican in Congress, I want to ensure that everyone has access to health care, but I want it to be quality health care that people choose for themselves. That is why Republicans have come up with a plan that we call A Better Way. Our plan recognizes that people deserve more patient-centered care, not more bureaucracy. That means more choices, not more mandates.

The A Better Way plan offers many improvements that will help West Virginia's Second Congressional District, including commonsense reforms such as allowing health insurance sales across State lines. Simple changes like these will lower costs and increase choice for Americans.

Finally, it is imperative to pass bills that invest in our Nation's deteriorating infrastructure. President-elect Trump has said that updating our Nation's infrastructure is a top priority for his administration.

The Federal Highway Administration has classified more than 142,000 bridges as either ``structurally deficient'' or ``functionally obsolete.'' Also from the Federal Highway Administration, traffic delays cost the U.S. economy more than $50 billion annually. Most major roads are rated as ``less than good condition.''

Improvement to other Nation's infrastructure would greatly benefit West Virginia, which needs road, bridge and rail repairs. We are also in need of water, sewer, and power line repairs.

By improving the transportation, our country will open the opportunity for job growth and expansion. I look forward to working with my colleagues in the House and the Senate, as well as the new administration, to make sure that these legislative priorities take hold.