Floor Statements

Madam Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 2226) to amend the Truth in Lending Act to provide a safe harbor from certain requirements related to qualified mortgages for residential mortgage loans held on an originating depository institution's portfolio, and for other purposes, as amended.

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

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

Madam Speaker, H.R. 2226, the Portfolio Lending and Mortgage Access Act, represents a very simple solution to a significant policy challenge facing our economy: how to expand access to mortgage credit without replicating the accumulation of excess risk in the mortgage- backed securities market like we witnessed in the run-up to the 2008 financial crisis.

My legislation achieves both goals by extending the qualified mortgage legal safe harbor to small creditors, banks, and credit unions with total consolidated assets of $10 billion or less, that originate and hold residential mortgage loans in portfolio, rather than selling or securitizing them, allowing those lenders to satisfy Dodd-Frank's ability-to-repay rule.

Such a policy would actually incentivize private sector risk retention--a goal of the Dodd-Frank Act itself--and mark a return to relationship lending in which a bank or credit union can tailor products to a consumer's needs and credit risk, without running afoul of one-size-fits-all government requirements. Under CFPB regulations, only government-defined qualified mortgages enjoy a presumption that a lender has satisfied the Dodd-Frank law's ability-to-repay requirements.

Small banks and credit unions have been disproportionately impacted by these rules, given their reliance upon residential mortgage lending and greater involvement in small dollar or balloon loans that run afoul of current QM regulations. It is no surprise that Harvard researchers have found that, since Dodd-Frank's passage, community banks have lost market share at a rate double that experienced between 2006 and 2010, a period including the entirety of the financial crisis. It is also not a surprise that many small community financial institutions have testified in front of the House Financial Services Committee and to many of my colleagues that they have simply left the mortgage business altogether because of the difficulties associated with the QM rule as currently constructed.

Indeed, a third of the National Association of Realtors survey respondents reported being unable to close mortgages due to a requirement of the qualified mortgage rule. Residential mortgages were the product or service most often identified by surveyed banks as a candidate for discontinuation as a result of Dodd-Frank. A recent study by the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University documents the falling share of bank participation in mortgage originations.

Everyone agrees, especially after the 2008 financial crisis, that a borrower should be required to show a demonstrable ability to repay. The only question is: Who is in the best position to make that determination--a community banker with a professional and, perhaps, even a personal relationship with the borrower who has full view of that borrower's character, creditworthiness, financial situation, and who is willing to assume 100 percent of the downside risk of default; or is it an unaccountable, unelected bureaucrat in Washington, D.C., who literally knows absolutely nothing about that borrower?

By bearing 100 percent of the risk, financial institutions have every incentive to make sure that a borrower can afford to repay a loan. Banks and credit unions would have more than just skin in the game. Under this legislation, their interests would align perfectly with that of a borrower.

As one witness in front of our committee testified: ``A financial institution that retains a loan's credit and interest-rate risk has a keen interest in engaging in thorough, sound underwriting to determine the borrower's ability to repay. Allowing a financial institution to make a customer-specific lending decision on a loan it intends to hold in its portfolio can be a more effective way of protecting consumers than regulatory attempts to micromanage mortgage terms with inflexible standards.''

No less than Barney Frank, former chairman of the committee, endorsed this concept in a hearing before this committee, saying he ``would like the main safeguard against bad loans to be risk retention, because that leaves the decision in the hands of whoever is making the loan,'' the CFPB also, itself, acknowledged this key point in its own rulemaking, where it recognized that portfolio lenders ``have strong incentives to carefully consider whether a consumer will be able to repay a portfolio loan at least in part because the small creditor retains the risk of default.''

This legislation also presents a viable alternative to the ``originate to distribute'' mortgage lending model that contributed to the subprime mortgage meltdown and bubble in residential real estate and taxpayer bailouts. The

result is expanded access to mortgage credit without additional risk to the financial system or to the taxpayer.

In fact, this is particularly important for young families and first- time home buyers, who tend to have difficulty meeting the ability-to- repay requirements due to circumstances, such as significant student loan debt, but who are otherwise creditworthy.

I have been working on this legislation for 5 years now, and I am happy to announce that, this year, we had a bipartisan breakthrough. That is because, at the committee markup, I offered an amendment that limited the scope of this bill to financial institutions with less than $10 billion in assets. And my distinguished colleague, Representative Capuano, offered a technical amendment that enhanced the legislation by clarifying a few key provisions. I am pleased to report that, because of those two amendments, the Portfolio Lending and Mortgage Access Act passed with unanimous support in the committee and is now on the floor today for consideration.

I want to thank Chairman Hensarling, Ranking Member Waters, Representative Capuano, the Kentucky Bankers Association, the Kentucky Credit Union League, the American Bankers Association, the Independent Community Bankers of America, the Credit Union National Association, the National Association of Federal Credit Unions, the National Association of Home Builders, and the United States Chamber of Commerce for their hard work on this important legislation.

If passed by the House, it is my hope that the Portfolio Lending and Mortgage Access Act moves quickly through the Senate. Eleven of our Democratic colleagues in the upper Chamber support this exact language, which is in Chairman Crapo's community financial institution relief bill. Together, Republicans and Democrats can deliver on the regulatory relief that many of us in this body have promised to our constituents that will enable more of them to buy the home of their dreams.

Madam Speaker, I invite all of my colleagues to vote for this important pro-homeownership legislation that perfectly aligns lender and borrower interests to the benefit of America.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Madam Speaker, I want to thank my friend, the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Kildee), for his constructive comments, his support. And the gentleman is absolutely correct. He engaged with me and my colleagues who were cosponsoring this legislation in a very constructive manner. He made valuable contributions, along with Mr. Capuano and the ranking member. Several other members on the other side of the aisle, Mr. Perlmutter, for example, offered his thoughtful comments as well. I appreciate the support, the bipartisan support, working through a compromise to get this legislation to where

it is today, so I thank the gentleman for that.

Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Emmer), who is also a sponsor of this legislation and a distinguished member of the Committee on Financial Services.

Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Hultgren), who is also, I believe, a sponsor of the legislation.

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

In closing, let me just reiterate that this legislation solves two problems. It solves the problem of responsible expansion of access to mortgage credit, access to that American Dream of home ownership; and, at the same time, preventing the mistakes that led to the 2008 financial crisis, the originate to distribute model where originators of mortgages had no skin in the game and they allowed those mortgages to be poorly underwritten or not underwritten at all, with no documentation, and then securitized and sold into the secondary market, really without any eye towards the consumer and the borrower's ability to repay.

Everybody in this institution, as evidenced by the bipartisan work here, we all recognize that a borrower should demonstrate an ability to repay that loan, but the crux of this legislation, at the core of this legislation is a recognition that a local community banker, a local credit union, a lender with a personal relationship with a borrower is in the best position to determine whether or not that borrower, that prospective homeowner, can repay that loan.

When there is risk retention, when that lender is charged with the responsibility of maintaining that loan in portfolio, the lender is much more incentivized to properly underwrite that loan and make sure that that customer, that borrower, that future homeowner, has a demonstrable ability to repay. I think it is a much better substitute to a one-size-fits-all credit box from, frankly, bureaucrats in Washington, D.C., who have no eye towards the creditworthiness of that particular borrower.

We have worked with our friends on the other side of the aisle to make this a bipartisan piece of legislation limiting the size of the institutions that can access this regulatory relief. But, clearly, when community financial institutions, bankers from around the country, every part of the country, are saying that they see the QM rule as not ``qualified mortgages,'' but as ``quitting mortgages;'' and when we see an

unnecessary constraint of mortgage credit; and when the National Association of Realtors are reporting that they are unable to close mortgages due to this onerous qualified mortgage rule, clearly the pendulum has swung too far.

So, yes, we needed some reforms in the aftermath of the financial crisis. This QM rule went too far. This is a recalibration of that. And this is important regulatory relief for our community financial institutions that will inure to the benefit of the American home-buying public, and it will do so in a responsible way, providing a viable alternative to the originate to distribute practices that really led to the financial crisis.

Madam Speaker, let me just make one final observation, and that is to give credit to the administration. The Department of the Treasury, in their findings and recommendations in their report on banks and credit unions, they recognized that this was a problem in the mortgage lending space and they made a recommendation also to increase the portfolio lending safe harbor to institutions with $10 billion in assets or lower; and that, as they argued, will accommodate loans made and retained by small depository institutions, provide that needed regulatory relief to our community financial institutions, and also expand access to mortgage credit in a responsible way.

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleagues for their support. At this time I have no further requests for time, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 4725) to amend the Federal Deposit Insurance Act to require short form call reports for certain depository institutions.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume, and I rise today in support of H.R. 4725, the Community Bank Reporting Relief Act.

Community banks were hit hard by the Great Recession and the ensuing regulations. Numerous bankers have told me they are spending more and more money and resources and time on compliance costs and less money and resources on actually providing services to customers. This is particularly alarming because these small banks are so critical to their communities. From sponsoring the local T-ball team, to lending money to a farmer for the next year's crop, to helping the single mom purchase a used car so she can get to work, these banks are involved at every level of our communities all across America, but because of overregulation, these banks are rapidly closing and consolidating.

Unfortunately, the headline for banks in the Commonwealth of Kentucky is no different. Since the enactment of the Dodd-Frank financial control law, we have seen a 20 percent drop in the number of banks in our State and there has been a dearth of charters for new banks. In fact, since 2010, there have been only a few de novo charters for banks nationwide.

Now, some people say that consolidation and mergers have been a long- term trend for the last 30 years and, therefore, not related to the recent uptick in regulations unrelated to Dodd-Frank, but they are clearly not seeing the bigger picture, because even after mergers, many branches in rural and other underserved communities are closing, leaving many Kentuckians to drive a town or two over just to get to the nearest bank.

It is not just about a long-term trend of consolidation. There have been literally no new charters, whereas before the Dodd-Frank law was enacted, there were many, many new charters every year; and since the Dodd-Frank law was enacted, no new charters. So the consolidation trend has gotten a lot worse since this avalanche of red tape coming out of Washington, D.C., and that is having a very negative impact on rural and underserved American communities.

While new technologies are helping bring banking services to anyone with an internet connection, many people still prefer the personal one- on-one banking style that they grew up with and the personal interaction often that helps the banks themselves understand the exact needs of their customers.

The Dodd-Frank law was almost 2,300 pages and required dozens of agencies to create new regulations or revise existing ones. As a result, these agencies issued hundreds of regulations and, according to the Mercatus Center, the law placed about 28,000 new restrictions on the banking industry, effectively doubling the number of regulatory restrictions in title 12 of the Code of Federal Regulation to more than 52,000.

Although not part of the Dodd-Frank rush of regulations, a growing number of banks have cited the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council's, or FFIEC, Consolidated Reports of Condition and Income--or call reports, as they are commonly called--as too burdensome.

Each quarter, all national banks, State member banks, insured State nonmember banks, and savings associations are required to file these call reports. The reports contain approximately 50 pages of financial data on each bank, including their assets, liabilities, capital accounts, expenses, and income. However, these reports are very burdensome for community banks with limited resources and offer little value to the regulators relative to the last quarter's report.

Thankfully, H.R. 4725, the Community Bank Reporting Relief Act, is fighting back against the bureaucratic nightmare of complying with these 52,000 restrictions by allowing banks with less than $5 billion in consolidated assets to file their call reports every 6 months as opposed to every 3 months.

The impact of this regulatory change will be a huge development for banks across the country. Now they will spend less time on call reports and more time on actually helping customers. This means more capital will be flowing into our local economies, spurring job growth and economic development, while making a real difference in the lives of Americans trying to access affordable capital to buy a new home or car or start a business.

I want to thank my good friend from Illinois, Congressman Randy Hultgren, for his leadership and for introducing this important legislation. Due to his leadership, this great community bank bill is being considered as a suspension on the floor today. That means that there is a great chance that this bill will build on its unanimous support earned during the House Financial Services Committee markup and will be a bipartisan provision in the Senate Banking chairman's Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief, and Consumer Protection Act, which is expected to pass out of the Senate very soon.

In addition to Congressman Hultgren, I want to thank Chairman Hensarling and Ranking Member Waters for their hard work on this critical legislation, and I urge my colleagues to vote for H.R. 4725, the Community Bank Reporting Relief Act.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 6 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Hultgren), the sponsor of the legislation and the vice chairman of the Subcommittee on Capital Markets, Securities, and Investments.

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

Let me once again thank the gentleman from Illinois for his tireless advocacy on behalf of our community financial institutions and providing some commonsense, basic relief to those institutions so that, instead of dealing with paperwork, they could actually better serve their customers and grow our local economies.

General Leave

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may

have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on this bill.

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

Mr. Speaker, I have no further requests for time, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 4768) to require the President to develop a national strategy to combat the financial networks of transnational organized criminals, and for other purposes, as amended.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 4768, the National Strategy for Combating the Financing of Transnational Criminal Organizations Act.

I want to, at the outset, applaud and thank my colleague Mr. Kustoff from Tennessee for his leadership on this important legislation and for bringing this solution to the Congress and this solution to the American people.

As Members of Congress, our number one responsibility is the national security and the well-being of the American people. Unfortunately, transnational criminal organizations threaten the safety of Americans, and we must do

everything in our power to stop them. Transnational criminal organizations, or TCOs as they are called for short, are engaged in illegal business ventures around the world such as money laundering, cybercrime, and the trafficking of drugs, weapons, endangered species, and even human beings.

While TCOs may not be motivated by a particular radical, political, or religions ideology, they are motivated by money, and they will stop at nothing to get it. According to a 2011 report published by the Obama administration, entitled, ``Strategy to Combat Transnational Organized Crime,'' TCOs have dramatically ramped up their size, scope, and influence, and are even teaming up with terrorist organizations and corrupt foreign officials to expand their networks and conceal their illicit financial assets.

These TCOs cost the Western Hemisphere about 3.5 percent of gross domestic product annually, and they generate for themselves around $870 billion, which is roughly the value of the world's largest company, Apple.

President Trump, on February 9, 2017, issued Executive Order 13773 on ``Enforcing Federal Law with Respect to Transnational Criminal Organizations and Preventing International Trafficking.''

It states that TCOs in the form of transnational drug cartels have a stronghold in America and threaten the safety of the American people. From former President Obama to current President Trump, TCOs are recognized as a major risk to national security. That is why I am very pleased to see that my good friend from Tennessee, Congressman David Kustoff, has introduced H.R. 4768, the National Strategy for Combating the Financing of Transnational Criminal Organizations Act.

This legislation requires the President, the Treasury Secretary, financial regulators, and other appropriate officials to create a national strategy to combat TCOs and their illicit use of financial networks. Specifically, the legislation requires them to identify and assess the largest TCO threats to the United States. It also mandates that the strategy include the identification of the people or groups that facilitate access to financial networks for the TCOs through laundering assets, such as, real estate, art and antiquities, smuggling bulk cash, exploitation of shell companies, and the use of covert cryptocurrencies and other cyber technologies.

The legislation also requires the strategy to include long-term and short-term goals, an explanation of how goals will be integrated into existing national security apparatuses, and, if needed, suggest legislative and regulatory changes to better fight against TCOs.

This legislation passed the House Committee on Financial Services with unanimous support in January, and it is my hope that it passes with unanimous support today on the House floor.

Mr. Speaker, in addition to Congressman Kustoff, I thank Chairman Hensarling and Ranking Member Waters for their hard work on this issue. Together we can, in a bipartisan way, empower our government to better fight transnational criminal organizations, making the American people safer and our economy stronger.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote for H.R. 4768, the National Strategy for Combating the Financing of Transnational Criminal Organizations Act.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Kustoff), a member of the House Financial Services Committee and a former United States Attorney from the Western District of Tennessee, who has brought considerable prosecutorial experience in drafting and authoring this legislation.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Rothfus), the vice chairman of the Financial Services Subcommittee on Financial Institutions and Consumer Credit.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from North

Carolina (Mr. Budd), a member of the Financial Services Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Gaetz).

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

I, once again, thank my colleagues for supporting this legislation. In particular, I thank the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Kustoff) for his leadership on this issue.

I would note, also, in addition to all of the many sound and persuasive arguments that have been offered for why we need this legislation, this National Strategy for Combating the Financing of Transnational Criminal Organizations Act, the National Fraternal Order of Police has endorsed this legislation, and I include in the Record their letter.

National Fraternal

Order of Police,

Washington, DC, February 15, 2018.

Hon. Paul D. Ryan,

Speaker of the House, House of Representatives, Washington,

Mr. Speaker, as a Member of Congress representing a State that has been ravaged by heroin and opioid addiction, I can't think of a more important thing for this Congress to do than to develop a national strategy for combating these transnational gangs that are preying on our communities.

Once again, I commend Mr. Kustoff for his leadership in this area and in this effort and in this fight. I applaud my colleagues for supporting the legislation on both sides of the aisle.

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

Mr. Speaker, I thank Chairman Roe for his tireless leadership as a veteran himself, as a physician, and for his exceptional leadership on veterans issues as chairman of the committee.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 4533, to designate the healthcare system of the Department of Veterans Affairs in Lexington, Kentucky, my hometown, as the Lexington VA Health Care System and to individually designate medical facilitates located at 1101 Veterans Drive in Lexington, Kentucky, as the Troy Bowling Campus, a campus where my own grandfather, a World War II veteran, spent his final days; and to designate the Department of Veterans Affairs Healthcare Center located at 2250 Leestown Road in Lexington, Kentucky, as the Franklin R. Sousley Campus.

Born in Hilltop, Kentucky, Marine Private First Class Franklin R. Sousley landed on Iwo Jima on Friday, February 19, 1945, and he actively fought in the battle for the islands. During these intense fighting moments, members of the United States Armed Forces secured Mount Suribachi and hoisted a United States flag on top of the summit.

On February 23, 1945, Private First Class Sousley, alongside five other brave U.S. servicemembers, raised a larger U.S. flag so it could be seen over the island. The iconic photograph taken of these six marines while they raised the U.S. flag attached to a heavy Japanese pipe soon became the immortalized symbol of American bravery, perseverance, and sacrifice endured by members of the United States Armed Forces during the intense battles of World War II.

Tragically, Private First Class Sousley was killed in combat by a Japanese sniper around Cayetano Point on March 21, 1945, and was finally laid to rest at the Elizaville Cemetery in Fleming County, Kentucky. I have been to that grave site many times. The VFW in Fleming County always, on an annual basis, goes out there to pay their respects to the Sousley family right at that grave site.

Private Troy Bowling bravely fought at Iwo Jima. While attempting to secure Mount Suribachi, his unit came under intense and concentrated fire, as was previously said, completely overwhelming his unit. Two projectiles struck Private Bowling in the chest and leg, leaving him critically wounded on the battlefield. At that moment, Bowling said: ``As I lay bleeding on the black sands of Iwo Jima, I looked to the heavens, promising that, if I survived, I would serve mankind for the rest of my life.''

Troy's unit received the Presidential Unit Citation, and he received the Purple Heart. In keeping faith with his commitment to God made during that battle, Private Bowling, whom I had the honor of meeting on several occasions, devoted the next 66 years of his life by giving over 78,000 hours of volunteer service to others at the Lexington VA Medical Center, and he rose through the ranks within the Disabled American Veterans organization, holding nearly every position, including state commander.

He also received a Lifetime Service Achievement Award from the Department of Veterans Affairs and was nominated and selected to be inducted into the Kentucky Veterans Hall of Fame for his lifetime of service to veterans.

These two deserving veterans, Franklin Sousley and Troy Bowling, embody the best of American ideals, values, and commitment to serving others, never abandoning the marine motto of ``semper fidelis,'' always faithful. Therefore, it is fitting that we rename the Lexington VA Medical Center campuses during the 73rd anniversary of the landing of the U.S. forces on the beaches of Iwo Jima and honor these two servicemembers for their service and sacrifice to our country and to our veterans.

I would like to thank the members of the Sixth Congressional District Veterans Coalition for bringing the idea for this legislation to my attention. I would also like to thank my colleagues in the Kentucky congressional delegation--Leader Mitch McConnell, Senator Rand Paul, Congressman Hal Rogers, Congressman John Yarmuth, Congressman Brett Guthrie, Congressman Thomas Massie, and Congressman James Comer--for their support as well.

Mr. Speaker, in closing, I urge my colleagues in the House to support the passage of this meaningful legislation honoring veterans in Kentucky.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of this combined rule that will enable the people's House to consider both the World Bank Accountability Act and the Home Mortgage Disclosure Adjustment Act.

Before I speak about why I support this rule, I do want to respond to the other gentleman from Colorado saying that this House is not doing the people's business. In fact, this House is dealing with year-end spending, and we are doing it right now. We are working on immigration reforms. To suggest otherwise is simply not true.

In fact, on year-end spending, this House passed all appropriations bills ahead of time, ahead of schedule, before the end of the fiscal year. Those bills were sent over to the Senate.

This House also dealt with the issues related to the Children's Health Insurance Program, dealt with community health centers and a whole range of other issues. Those pieces of legislation went over to the Senate.

So the issue is really with the Senate, it is not with this House.

Furthermore, this House has passed historic tax reform that has become law. It has passed over 16 Congressional Review Acts rolling back Obama-era regulations and rules that were holding back our economy. The result is millions of jobs were created and the best economy we have seen in a decade.

So it is just simply not true to suggest that this House is not doing the people's business. We are dealing with some important additional issues this week. We can do both: plan for the year-end spending debates with the Senate and also reauthorize the World Bank.

The World Bank's mission is to reduce poverty around the globe. However, during congressional oversight hearings, it has become clear that the World Bank is falling short of its antipoverty mission.

As early as 1992, outside reviews of the World Bank--and, later, its own reviews--concluded that a ``pressure to lend'' on staff, through the staff evaluation process, has created perverse incentives for some World Bank employees to focus on loan volume in order to receive a raise or a promotion rather than what really matters, which is poverty reduction outcomes.

In addition, there are numerous examples of where the very group of people that was supposed to be helped through World Bank assistance was actually harmed by a corrupt government or its cronies. From violent evictions to rape, to murder, the list of human rights violations goes on and on.

One of the most egregious examples of human rights violations was the Uganda crisis, where contractors were sexually abusing a dozen or more girls, and it took the World Bank years to stop it. Even more perplexing, the World Bank's country manager for the Uganda project was, disturbingly, promoted to become World Bank country director for the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where allegations, not surprisingly, of sexual and gender-based violence have resurfaced in 2017.

For these reasons and more, I support the World Bank Accountability Act, which requires the World Bank to fix its problems or face a 15 to 30 percent reduction of the U.S. contribution to the World Bank's International Development Association fund, or, as it is commonly called, IDA.

More specifically, the bill authorizes $3.3 billion for IDA over the next 3 years and mandates that the World Bank must align its incentives for employees with the World Bank's goals of poverty reduction, ending the ``pressure to lend'' problem that is pervasive today. Throwing money at this problem is not the answer, but getting results and doing so without these kind of terrible, horrific scandals is critically important.

The legislation also requires the World Bank to fix failures identified in the Uganda sexual abuse crisis so that nothing like that ever happens again.

Additionally, the legislation requires the World Bank, through its various tools, to support property rights, due process of law, and economic freedom. The World Bank must also demonstrate that none of its resources have been used to fund terrorism, and must also improve its ability to detect and minimize corruption. If the World Bank does all of these commonsense reforms, then it will receive its full U.S. contribution for IDA. But if it fails to do this, then the World Bank doesn't deserve the full funding backed by U.S. taxpayers.

Mr. Speaker, I also am a strong supporter of the Home Mortgage Disclosure Adjustment Act. This much-needed legislation exempts community financial institutions, such as small banks and credit unions, from the onerous doubling of Home Mortgage Disclosure Adjustment Act reporting requirements if they make 500 or fewer mortgages and 500 or fewer home equity lines of credit each of the preceding 2 years.

The lenders I have spoken to say that, without relief, they will have to devote more resources to compliance costs, rather than deploying more capital into our economies to benefit working families and businesses.

Instead of having to collect superfluous redundant data, let's allow and liberate our community financial institutions to do what they want to do, and what they should be doing, in their core mission, and that is serving their customers and providing loans.

Mr. Speaker, I thank Congressman Emmer for his hard work on the Home Mortgage Disclosure Adjustment Act. I thank Chairman Hensarling also for his leadership on both of these bills.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support both of these important pieces of legislation.

Mr. Chairman, I thank the chairman for yielding, and I thank him for his support and leadership in bringing my legislation to the floor.

As Chairman Hensarling has already noted, H.R. 3326 passed the House Financial Services Committee by a unanimous vote of 60-0. No amendments were offered by any of our Democratic colleagues during that markup. So it is disappointing to me that the ranking member is standing in opposition today, despite voting for this bill in committee and then waiting half a year before proposing any changes.

Nonetheless, I want to address the gentlewoman's criticism of the withholding mechanism in this legislation, because she seems to share a philosophy endemic at the World Bank, which basically says this: money equals impact. But this runs counter to the evidence we have heard again and again during multiple oversight hearings.

It also runs counter to how the World Bank itself operates with its borrowers. The World Bank lends to poor countries by attaching conditions. People can disagree if that conditionality is too much or too little, but the World Bank affects behavior by telling governments that there are no blank checks. The ranking member knows this, and it goes without saying that there are many elements to World Bank conditionality that the ranking member and her Democratic colleagues passionately support, but if the gentlewoman from California would never tolerate the World Bank writing blank checks to governments, it is odd that she wants Congress to write a blank check to the World Bank.

Here is how a former, longtime senior staff member of the World Bank put it in testimony before our subcommittee last Congress: `` . . . the reality is that bank staff are assessed by the volume of their lending, dollars of money lent. And that is just a poor indicator of impact on poverty. You have impact on poverty sometimes when you don't lend at all.''

This perverse lending culture at the World Bank has been documented for at least a quarter century and documented by the World Bank itself.

Mr. Chairman, I want to draw your attention to a 1992 bank management review entitled, ``Effective Implementation: Key to Development Impact'', commonly known as the Wapenhans Report, which details a pressure to lend that distorts staff incentives at the expense of management and project implementation. Again, this is from 1992.

Well, fast forward to 2014, and a report by the bank's own evaluation office entitled, ``Learning and Results in World Bank Operations: How the Bank Learns,'' concludes that the pressure to lend is alive and well.

In addition to focusing on better incentives and management at the World Bank, H.R. 3326 requires the World Bank to more effectively support secure property rights, due process, and economic freedom. As distinguished academics such as Nobel economics laureate Angus Deaton, New York University's William Easterly, and the University of Chicago's James Robinson have found, foreign aid makes little positive difference if we are indifferent to the poor's right to exert control over their livelihoods, own land and other assets, and be free from arbitrary government interference.

Now, Mr. Chairman, if the World Bank supports a corrupt government, that doesn't mean that it is going to help the condition of the impoverished in that country that is denied economic freedom.

Why doesn't the ranking member support these commonsense principles? If the bank doesn't lend with the rights of the poor in mind, then the ranking member's concerns about withholding money aren't serious. If money is being squandered and it isn't helping the poor to begin with, why would you not want to withhold it?

Again, our Democratic friends love conditionality at the World Bank; they just had a change of heart when a Republican-sponsored bill is holding the World Bank to high standards. So let no one watching this debate be fooled by crocodile tears.

Let me close by touching on the national security elements of this bill, which the ranking member also plans to vote against.

H.R. 3326 incentivizes the World Bank to strengthen its work to fight violent extremism and keep state sponsors of terrorism away from World Bank resources. This latter provision was a direct result of bipartisan discussions that we had in our subcommittee, so it is shocking to see anyone on the other side of the aisle oppose the legislation.

Finally, this bill would also ensure that the U.S. oppose World Bank financial assistance to countries that knowingly fail to enforce U.N. Security Council sanctions against North Korea. Our committee passed nearly identical language as part of the Otto Warmbier North Korea Nuclear Sanctions Act, which I am proud to have sponsored, and the provision benefitted directly from input from my subcommittee ranking member, Ms. Moore. The committee vote, yet again, was unanimous on that bill, and the House went on to pass it by a vote of 415-2.

It boggles the mind that any Member of this body would vote against that language as part of H.R. 3326.

In closing, if the ranking member is upset that we take the interests of the poor more seriously than the interests of the World Bank, then so be it, but I believe the World Bank's interests and the poor's interests should be aligned, not just in theory, but in practice, and if they are not, it is the World Bank that should look at itself in the mirror.

Mr. Chairman, I urge my colleagues to support H.R. 3326.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment, although I am not opposed to the amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding.

Mr. Chairman, I want to thank the gentleman from South Carolina for his very thoughtful amendment. His amendment addresses an issue dear to our heart, and that is economic freedom. By making the bill even more explicit in its support for entrepreneurship, his contribution makes a good piece of legislation better. Still, it is important to remember that the poor, wherever they may be in the world, can succeed if their government lets them, and that is a principle we should all wholeheartedly support. I hope the World Bank will subscribe to it as well.

I would just say one other thing about the debate that has transpired here today. This is hardworking American taxpayers' generosity. It is their charity. It is the American taxpayers trying to help people who live in impoverished countries.

It is unfair to hardworking taxpayers and it dishonors the generosity of the American people to not hold the World Bank accountable.

I applaud the gentleman, Mr. Norman, for his amendment, which will unleash entrepreneurship in these lesser developed countries.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to the amendment, although I am not opposed.

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman from Virginia for his efforts, and I am willing to accept his amendment.

The language he proposes would ensure that the Treasury keeps Congress updated on the World Bank's efforts to ensure that certain visa holders at the World Bank are aware of the provisions of current law.

This addition to the bill is unobjectionable. I am pleased to support it.

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

Mr. Chairman I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. Chairman, I rise to offer a straightforward amendment that would simply make this bill's language more consistent with legislation the House has already passed with an overwhelming bipartisan majority.

As reported, H.R. 3326 calls on the Treasury Department to oppose World Bank assistance to IDA countries that knowingly fail to enforce U.N. Security Council sanctions against North Korea.

As the U.N. Panel of Experts has concluded, lax enforcement, including in developing countries eligible for IDA support, has significantly undermined the effectiveness of U.N. sanctions against the Kim regime.

All my amendment does is change the word ``should'' to ``shall,'' making U.S. opposition to World Bank assistance for those countries mandatory. At the same time, the amendment adds Presidential waiver authority so that the administration can exempt countries that may be facing limits to their government capacity or which are making an effort to correct their enforcement failures. There is also a national interest waiver included in this provision.

The Financial Services Committee has already passed this stronger mandatory provision in the Otto Warmbier North Korea Nuclear Sanctions Act, which I am proud to have sponsored along with my subcommittee ranking member, Ms. Moore from Wisconsin. Ms. Moore's input was important to making this provision both tough and flexible enough to incentivize foreign countries to work harder on sanctions enforcement.

Our committee passed the Otto Warmbier sanctions bill unanimously, and it passed the full House in October by a vote of 415-2. Again, this is a minor change to align this bill's language with a policy that the House has already endorsed on a bipartisan basis.

Mr. Chairman, I urge my colleagues' support.

Before I conclude, I do want to just make a general comment about the wisdom of this legislation and the approach to enforce accountability on the World Bank. We heard some of the arguments from our friends on the other side of the aisle--our colleagues on the other side of the aisle. I would just say, on a bipartisan basis, we are the guardians and the custodians of the American taxpayers' charity. We are the guardians of their hard-earned income that they pay in the form of taxes to their government, and they ask us to be wise stewards of those tax dollars.

These taxpayers work hard to pay their taxes. So when that money comes to Washington, they expect when we are fighting poverty in Third World countries with their tax dollars that we make it work because the American people--and we all agree here--want to fight poverty in these Third World countries.

We want to make sure that these Third World countries are not either knowingly or unknowingly supporting circumventing these sanctions against North Korea.

We want to make sure that they are promoting economic freedom and actually helping people rise out of poverty and achieve their God-given potential in these countries that need our humanitarian assistance.

So for goodness' sake, let's support accountability at the World Bank so that we don't have rape, murder, and violent evictions associated with World Bank projects, which is what everybody knows the testimony has been in our oversight.

This is not about turning our backs on the poor. It is about standing up for the poor. It is about making sure that the money that our taxpayers are giving to the World Bank is actually helping alleviate poverty and not exacerbating the problems in these poor countries.

If the Bank can't undertake the reforms in this bill--again, reforms that the minority supported--then, by definition, the Bank's money is not benefiting the poor. If it is not benefiting the poor, how could withholding a portion of it be punishing the poor?

For goodness' sake, let's honor the charity of the American taxpayers. Let's not dishonor it. Let's honor it by actually making reforms to the World Bank so that it can fulfill its important mission and not undermine its important antipoverty mission.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Hensarling), the distinguished chairman of the full committee.

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

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to applaud the great work of the chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, my good friend from Texas (Mr. Brady) for his good work to overhaul America's Tax Code to deliver historic tax relief for workers, families, and job creators.

I resent the rhetoric from some of my friends on the other side of the aisle who talk about this as hurting disabled families. I am the brother of a disabled sister, and I am voting for this bill because it helps families with loved ones with disabilities, like expanding the ABLE Act.

I thank Chairman Brady for working with me and others to address a provision in the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which would negatively impact work-study colleges, such as Berea College in my district.

The gentleman has fulfilled his commitment to me to fix this problem in the conference committee for work-study colleges and other small schools so that their endowments would be exempt from the excise tax on large college endowments.

Regrettably, last night, Senate Democrats used procedural rules to insist that this exemption be stripped out of the final conference report. It is unfortunate that they put partisan politics ahead of ensuring that students--many of whom are low-income and

first-generation college students--at work-study colleges would continue to be able to receive a tuition-free education.

Mr. Speaker, these are first-generation college students who receive a tuition-free education.

I know that Chairman Brady shares my commitment and that of Chairman Rogers, Senator McConnell, and others to make sure that Berea College and other work-study colleges continue their important mission.

Accordingly, I ask the gentleman's commitment to work with me to permanently exempt work-study colleges from the excise tax on endowment income in a timely manner, in the tax extenders, or another appropriate legislative vehicle as soon as possible.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of a bipartisan bill, the Systemic Risk Designation Improvement Act of 2017, introduced by my good friend and colleague, Congressman Blaine Luetkemeyer from Missouri.

I also want to thank Chairman Hensarling for his leadership and, for my friends on the other side of the aisle, particularly Mr. David Scott from Georgia, for his leadership in support of this legislation.

Among the least transparent and most mysterious black holes of the United States Government is the process under the Dodd-Frank financial control law, by which U.S. financial firms are designated too big to fail.

Formally called systemically important financial institutions, or SIFIs, these firms are considered by all-knowing Washington bureaucrats as businesses so critical to the Nation's economy that they need to be burdened with additional regulations, supervised more strictly to further the cause of bureaucrats, and designated as a SIFI to send a clear signal to investors that it is a firm which is most likely to be bailed out by taxpayers during the next crisis.

For bank SIFIs, there is a one-size-fits-all designation model that says that any bank with more than $50 billion in assets is automatically a SIFI. Bureaucrats do little to nothing to account for the unique nature of each institution that may indicate it is more risk adverse or better positioned to handle a turbulent economy.

Bank SIFIs suffer from the same plight, in that they are not told by the U.S. Government what they need to do to rid themselves of the shackles of this SIFI designation. Instead, these firms are left in the dark to guess what they can do to de-risk by Federal regulators. And even if firms try to make reforms, they have no idea if the changes they are making will help them shed themselves of this arbitrary designation.

In the end, the entire SIFI process does little to make our economy stronger and more resilient. Instead, designated U.S. firms and their workers are harmed and disadvantaged relative to their international competition, undermining credit availability, causing weaker jobs and economic growth in America.

For these reasons, I support the Systemic Risk Designation Improvement Act, which will give much-needed transparency to the SIFI designation process and eliminate the arbitrary automatic SIFI designation of banks with $50 billion or more in assets.

Under this legislation, banks will be judged by their merits, such as interconnectedness, size, cross-jurisdictional activity, complexity, and substitutability, and the justifications for a designation will be clearly communicated to them. The end result will be greater credit availability for small businesses, more capital formation, more help for consumers, greater consumer choice, greater economic growth, and greater competition.

Mr. Speaker, again, I want to thank Mr. Luetkemeyer and Mr. Hensarling for their leadership on this critical issue, and I urge my colleagues to vote for this legislation.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of the Strengthening Oversight of Iran's Access to Finance Act introduced by my good friend, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Williams).

Since the seizure of the U.S. Embassy and the taking of 66 American hostages during the 1979 revolution, Iran has taken a long view on its global ambition, supporting terrorist proxies like Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis in Yemen.

From 1983, when Iran-supported Hezbollah bombed a U.S. Marines barracks in Lebanon, killing 243 servicemembers, to the killing of over 500 soldiers in Iraq by the elite Quds Force leader, Qasem Soleimani, Iran has earned its reputation as the world's leading state sponsor of terrorism.

Most recently, Iran Air, an Iranian state-owned airline, was sanctioned by the Treasury Department in 2011 for using its commercial passenger aircraft to transport weapons to terrorists helping the Assad regime in Syria and for transporting military cargo to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. This is in addition to what the world already well knows, that the Iranian regime has covered up and lied about its nuclear program for decades, deceiving international inspectors, agreeing to intrusive inspections, and then allowing those inspections to be implemented only provisionally and selectively.

Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, regularly chants ``Death to America'' and ultimately calls for the annihilation of the Jewish people.

In 2015, the Obama administration made a historic mistake by agreeing to the ill-conceived Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, or as it is also called, the Iran nuclear agreement or JCPOA. The agreement removed financial sanctions on Iran, enabling greater financial resources for Iranian-funded terrorism.

Adding insult to injury, later, in 2016, due to the agreement, the Obama Treasury Department authorized the sale of more than 200 planes to Iran, the same Iranian airline that was sanctioned in 2011, and the Department also authorized U.S. banks to finance these transactions. But there is evidence that the carrier has continued its illicit behavior.

According to an April 2017 hearing in our subcommittee, Dr. Emanuele Ottolenghi, a senior fellow at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, testified that Iran Air operated at least 114 flights to Syria between January 16, 2016, which was Implementation Day of the JCPOA, and March 30, 2017. These flights are known as weapons resupply routes and stopovers in Iran with a suspected IRGC logistical hub that supports airlifts to the Assad regime.

In communications with the committee, Dr. Ottolenghi later confirmed that Iran Air had run at least 134 such flights between Implementation Day and May 4, 2017, which means the Iran nuclear agreement facilitated Iran helping the brutal murderous regime of Assad.

In exchange, what did the United States get out of this?

Only managed access to suspect nuclear sites in which international inspectors must appeal to Iran, Russia, and China in a bureaucratic process that takes at least 24 days, during which Iran can remove anything covert and in violation of the agreement.

International inspectors have also been denied access to military sites, the most likely places in Iran where illicit nuclear activity is occurring. But even if the JCPOA was delivering on its core promise of a denuclearized Iran, the agreement was sold with specific assurance that the JCPOA would not limit the United States' ability to stop Iran's nonnuclear activities and their support of terror activities.

Then Secretary of State John Kerry, in defense of the agreement, selling the

agreement to Democrats and Republicans in the Congress, testified that: ``If we catch them funding terrorism, they are going to have a problem with the U.S. Congress.''

Mr. Speaker, apparently not, because Members of Congress don't have a problem with this evidence that Iran is funding terrorist proxies and the Assad regime.

For these reasons, it is imperative that Congress pass the Strengthening Oversight of Iran's Access to Finance Act, which would require the Treasury to provide a report to Congress describing these connections. This is a reporting bill. Even if you support the JCPOA, you should support congressional oversight.

Mr. Speaker, I thank Chairman Hensarling for his leadership, and especially a thank-you to the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Tenney), my friend, for her outstanding leadership on this issue; and I rise in support of her legislation, the Community Institution Mortgage Relief Act.

Homeownership is part of the American Dream; however, an ill- conceived rule promulgated by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has made it harder for Americans to purchase a home.

In typical one-size-fits-all Washington bureaucrat fashion, the Bureau's rule places excessive escrow and mortgage servicing requirements on the backs of smaller community financial institutions and mortgage servicers.

What the Bureau missed is that these lenders are rarely in subprime lending and frequently hold the loan in portfolio for the term of the loan. This means these lenders have a very strong incentive to ensure that taxes and insurance premiums are being paid because they are taking on 100 percent of the downside risk if the borrower fails to hold up their side of the deal, and, therefore, an escrow account isn't necessary.

However, as a direct result of the rule, there is less consumer choice and more expense. That is because many community financial institutions are leaving the market or have been forced to charge home buyers more so they can afford to hire the extra professional staff they need to comply with this rule.

For these reasons, I support the Community Institution Mortgage Relief Act, which exempts community financial institutions with assets of $25 billion or less from much of the regulatory burden of the Bureau's rule.

Again, I want to thank my good friend from New York, Congresswoman Claudia Tenney, and our chairman, Congressman Jeb Hensarling, for their leadership on this issue, and I urge my colleagues to vote for the Community Institution Mortgage Relief Act.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of efforts to simplify our outdated and overly complex Tax Code in order to make our economy more competitive and to provide big tax cuts to hardworking American families.

Last night, the House voted to go to conference with the Senate to work out differences between our two versions of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. I am confident the conference committee will report a reconciled bill capable of passing both Chambers, because the American people need and deserve tax relief.

Make no mistake: no matter what the tired talking points are on the other side of the aisle, this legislation will be a tremendous benefit to middle- and lower-income Americans who have been hit hardest by the policies of the previous administration. This is a massive victory for low- and middle-income Americans.

But don't just take it from me. Let's review the facts.

The House bill takes the lowest 10 percent tax bracket to zero, and it doubles the standard deduction, meaning hardworking Americans can immediately take home more of their paychecks. Specifically, the first $24,000 of family income will be completely tax free under this plan.

We are nearly doubling the child tax credit. The changes to all tax brackets means we are lowering taxes for low- and middle-income taxpayers even as we simplify the Tax Code and broaden the base.

A study by the nonpartisan Tax Foundation found that, in Kentucky, this legislation will create 11,782 new full-time jobs and will increase take-home pay by $1,724 by Kentucky households making the median income.

Not only will middle-income families be able to keep more of their paychecks, their paychecks will grow.

A letter signed by 137 economists last week, sent to all Members of the House and Senate, made the case that ``a competitive corporate rate is the key to an economic engine driven by greater investment, capital stock, business formation, and productivity--all of which will yield more jobs and higher wages.''

That is why these economists are urging us to make the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act law. They note that our current corporate tax rate of 35 percent, which is the highest in the industrialized world, has made America noncompetitive, resulting in the loss of 4,700 companies to overseas competitors since 2004, lost jobs, and lost wages.

This analysis is confirmed by the Tax Foundation, which concludes that approximately 74 percent of corporate taxes are paid by workers in the form of lower wages. Let's give American workers a pay raise.

Reducing the corporate tax rate will ignite economic growth, allow jobs to return from overseas, increase new private sector jobs through greater investment, and increase paychecks. A win-win-win-win for middle class workers and those looking to get ahead.

Now, the ultimate irony is that if you actually wanted to help the wealthy and the well-connected, then you would vote against tax reform and you would keep the current Tax Code in place. It is a complicated mess of multiple brackets, high rates, and special interest loopholes. The Code is a haven for special interests, tax manipulators, and the well-connected. It is an impossible frustration for ordinary middle class Americans who need to comply with the Code to hire tax lawyers and accountants. So if you want to help the middle class, get rid of this complicated mess.

Finally, Mr. Speaker, I would like to take a moment to respond to my friends on the other side of the aisle who after more than doubling the national debt during the Obama administration and who continue to push massive unpaid increases in spending, such as single-payer healthcare-- government-run healthcare--have suddenly become gravely concerned about our national deficit and debt.

Now, let me be clear: I welcome this epiphany. I welcome their change of heart. I hope we can work together to actually address the true cost drivers of our deficit and debt. But last year, the Federal Government took in $3.3 trillion in revenue. Our deficits are not the result of too little revenue. They are the result of Members of Congress who are unwilling to force the government to live within its means. We will never balance the budget or even think about paying down our debt without robust economic growth.

Those on the other side assume that a $1.5 trillion tax cut will increase the debt by $1.5 trillion. But that is based on the absurd assumption that nobody changes behavior when you get a tax

cut. It is based on the assumption that the economy is fixed. They are wrong because they don't account for the extra revenue that tax reform will generate by creating more taxpayers and higher paychecks.

As was noted by an analysis by the American Enterprise Institute and U.S. Policy Metrics: ``If the economy grows an average of 2.6 percent, the Republican tax reform bill would not raise the deficit. If the economy grows faster than 2.6 percent, the deficit would actually fall.''

It should be noted that in the last two consecutive quarters, the U.S. economy has grown at an annual rate of 3 percent or more. That is, in part, due to the increased confidence by businesses, consumers, investors, and entrepreneurs that we will indeed make good on our promise to complete tax reform this year.

Mr. Speaker, I encourage all of my colleagues concerned about the deficit and the debt to join me in supporting the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act when this bill returns to the House floor so that we can ignite economic growth, create new jobs, and give American workers the pay increase that they deserve.

Mr. Speaker, it is their money. Let's give it back to them.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 1699, the Preserving Access to Manufactured Housing Act.

Homeownership, for many, is part of the American Dream, but overbroad and burdensome regulations arising out of the Dodd-Frank financial control law are limiting the ability of Americans to realize that dream.

A one-size-fits-all regulation issued by the CFPB makes it harder for lenders to offer mortgages to hardworking Americans who simply want to buy a manufactured home. By expanding the range of loan products considered ``high cost'' under the Home Ownership and Equity Protection Act, the CFPB has failed to recognize the unique nature of manufactured housing loans.

Due to the increased legal liabilities and stigma associated with making these so-called high-cost mortgages, many lenders have simply stopped making these loans altogether. In fact, according to the government's own Home Mortgage Disclosure Act data, origination of manufactured housing loans of $75,000 or less has plummeted by 22 percent since this regulation went into effect. This data clearly showed that there is a negative impact of these Federal rules on the availability of credit for manufactured homes.

While virtually all mortgage market segments have been growing in the last few years, HMDA data clearly shows continued declines in small dollar loans for manufactured homes.

As a result, this regulation is harming low- and moderate-income families, particularly in rural areas, and existing homeowners are harmed because they will not be able to sell their homes. These regulations are hitting Americans in rural areas of modest means the most.

Take, for example, the hospital worker in Kentucky. And, yes, Mr. Speaker, this is about the hospital worker in Kentucky, not Warren Buffett. This hospital worker applied for a loan of $38,500 to finance a manufactured home. He had an 8 percent down payment. His monthly income was $2,200 per month--plenty to cover the all-in

housing costs of $675 per month. The payment he would have been investing in his own home would have been less than what he was spending on rent. But he couldn't get financing. He contacted his local banks and credit unions, but they no longer finance manufactured homes.

This is not about Warren Buffett. This is about helping low-income Americans achieve the American Dream. The reasons for this crippling lack of credit are unaccountable, unelected bureaucrats in Washington, D.C., at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and their ``high- cost'' loan regulations and the definitions of mortgage originator and loan originator established in the Dodd-Frank Act.

These regulations fail to take into account the unique circumstances associated with manufactured housing and the fixed costs associated with the purchase of any home, large or small. They fail to recognize the simple, mathematical fact that fixed costs on smaller loans translate into higher percentages of the total loan. They fail to recognize that even if interest payments on manufactured homes are more than your average home, the payments are still more affordable than the all-in cost of a site-built home or even rent in many markets.

This is especially the case when one considers that purchasing a manufactured home as opposed to renting allows these owners to build equity leading to financial stability for their families.

This bipartisan bill, the Preserving Access to Manufactured Housing Act, recognizes the unique nature of manufactured housing, something that bureaucrats in Washington don't know anything about. They don't know anything about what goes on in rural America. This fixes these government-caused problems by modifying the definition of loan originators and mortgage originators to exclude manufactured housing retailers and sellers from the definition of a loan or mortgage originator, so long as they are only receiving compensation for the sale of the home and not engaged in loan offerings.

The legislation also increases the thresholds for high-cost loans to accommodate manufactured home purchases of up to $75,000.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman for the additional time.

Mr. Speaker, it accommodates manufactured home purchases up to $75,000 while maintaining the tough restrictions on lenders to prevent any borrowers from being taken advantage of. Yes, that is right, this preserves those consumer protections.

As Members of Congress, we have an obligation to protect the American people from regulations that harm their ability to purchase an affordable home for themselves and their families. We need to end government policies under the guise of consumer protection that are actually protecting Americans right out of homeownership. It is not consumer protection, Mr. Speaker, when you deny people affordable housing.

I thank the chairman for his leadership on this issue and I applaud both Democrats and Republicans who support this commonsense solution.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in favor of this rule that would allow the House of Representatives to debate legislation I introduced, H.R. 1699, the Preserving Access to Manufactured Housing Act.

Homeownership, for many, is part of the American Dream; however, overbroad and burdensome regulations arising out of the Dodd-Frank financial control law are limiting the ability of Americans to realize this dream.

Specifically, a one-size-fits-all regulation issued by the unaccountable Consumer Financial Protection Bureau makes it harder for lenders to offer mortgages to hardworking Americans who simply want to buy a manufactured home. By expanding the range of loan products considered ``high cost'' under the Home Ownership and Equity Protection Act, the CFPB has failed to recognize the unique nature of manufactured housing loans. Because of the increased legal liabilities and stigma associated with making a so-called high-cost mortgage, some lenders have simply stopped making these loans.

According to recent Home Mortgage Disclosure Act data, data that is submitted to the government, the number of manufactured homes of $75,000 or less has plummeted by 22 percent since this regulation went into effect. As a result, the CFPB's overzealous regulation harms lower and moderate-income families, particularly in rural areas, who just want to purchase a manufactured home but, now, cannot access the necessary financing. In addition, existing homeowners are harmed because they won't be able to sell their homes.

These rules are hitting Americans in rural and suburban areas and those with modest means the hardest. Take, for example, the hospital worker, in Kentucky, who applied for a loan of $38,500 to finance a manufactured home. He had an 8 percent downpayment. His monthly income was $2,200 per month, plenty to cover the all-in housing costs of $670 per month. The payment he would have been investing in his own home would have been less than what he was spending on rent, but he was unable to get financing. He contacted local banks and credit unions, but they no longer finance manufactured homes.

The reason for this crippling lack of lending is the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and its so-called high-cost loan regulations and the definitions of ``mortgage originator'' and ``loan originator'' established in Dodd-Frank. These regulations fail to take into account the unique circumstances associated with manufactured housing and the fixed costs associated with any home purchase, large or small. They fail to recognize the simple mathematical fact that fixed costs on smaller loans translate into higher percentages of the total loan.

Even if interest payments on manufactured homes are more than your average home, the payments are still more affordable than the all-in cost of a site-built home--or even rent, in many markets. That is not predatory lending. That is actually getting people into more affordable housing. This is especially the case when you consider that purchasing a manufactured home, as opposed to renting, allows the owners to build equity, leading to financial stability for those Americans.

The Preserving Access to Manufactured Housing Act recognizes the unique nature of the manufactured housing industry, and it fixes these government-caused problems by modifying the definition of ``loan originators'' and ``mortgage originators'' to exclude manufactured housing retailers and sellers from the definition of ``loan originator'' so long as they are only receiving compensation for the sale of the home and not engaged in the financing of the loans.

The legislation also increases the thresholds for high-cost loans to accommodate manufactured home purchases of up to $75,000 while still retaining tough restrictions on lenders to prevent any borrowers from being taken advantage of.

As Members of Congress, we have an obligation to protect the American people from regulations that harm their ability to purchase affordable homes for themselves and their families. We need to end government policies that are issued under the guise of consumer protection when those policies actually are protecting Americans right out of homeownership. Again, that is not consumer protection.

So, for these reasons and the fact that about 40 different proconsumer and probusiness trade associations support this legislation, I urge my colleagues to vote for this rule.

This is not the only reason why we should vote for the rule. The other legislation, introduced by my friend from Kentucky, the Ensuring a Qualified Civil Service Act, is another piece of legislation that will help ensure that the U.S. Federal Government has a competent workforce.

Mr. Speaker, I thank Congressman Comer for his hard work on this issue, and I urge my colleagues to vote for this rule.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to engage in a colloquy.

Mr. Speaker, I want to first commend Chairman Brady and the Ways and Means Committee for their outstanding work on the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which will provide tax relief to millions of hardworking families and businesses.

I would like to address a small provision in the bill that inadvertently impacts Berea College, a small private college in Berea, Kentucky, that is a member of the federally recognized Work Colleges Consortium.

Work colleges, by definition, do not charge their students tuition, and they also require their students to hold jobs. For over 125 years, Berea College has fulfilled its mission of providing a tuition-free education to students with limited economic resources, primarily from Appalachia, and who are often first-generation college students. Berea pairs its strong academics with a student labor program, honoring the dignity and utility of all work.

Berea could not fulfill its unique and special mission of providing free tuition to all students without a healthy endowment. The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act includes a 1.4 percent excise tax on private college endowments over $500,000 per student. There are two federally recognized work colleges with endowments above this level, including Berea College in my district.

I was pleased to learn that the Senate version of the bill exempts schools with fewer than 500 tuition-paying students from the excise tax. This provision would effectively exempt work colleges from the tax, because they do not charge tuition.

I understand it was never the committee's intent for this legislation to negatively impact work colleges that use their endowments to provide tuition-free education. In fact, I understand the intended purpose of the excise tax is to encourage colleges to use their endowments to keep college costs down. In this case, Berea College uses its endowments to defray 100 percent of the cost of tuition.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman for his willingness to work with me on a solution in conference, either acceding to the Senate position or another mutually accepted solution that exempts work colleges and allows them to continue their unique mission.

I yield to the gentleman from Texas.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to adamantly dispute this false narrative that the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act is only intended to benefit the wealthiest Americans and does not benefit the middle class.

When you hear this fiction from the other side of the aisle, remember these facts: this bill lowers tax rates on low- and middle-income Americans. It takes the lowest 10 percent bracket to zero. It doubles the standard deduction, meaning hardworking Americans can immediately take home more of their paychecks. Specifically, the first $24,000 of family income will be completely tax free under this plan.

By slashing our noncompetitive corporate tax rate, this bill will result in more jobs and, according to the nonpartisan Tax Foundation, it will deliver average American households a pay raise of at least 2\1/2\ percent.

With this legislation, a typical family of four earning $59,000, the median household income, will receive a $1,182 tax cut.

Madam Speaker, that is not a tax cut for the rich. That is a tax cut for low- and middle-income hardworking Americans, and that is a fact.

This will benefit people like Jared from Frankfort, Kentucky, who told me: ``The extra income from the tax cut will enable us to have some breathing room.''

It will also help constituents who are living paycheck to paycheck, who have told me they would use these tax cuts to save for a rainy day, make car repairs, occasionally go to a restaurant, and invest in higher education for their kids.

I heard from my constituent in Lexington named Gary, who told me: ``It doesn't matter how I plan to use my money. By definition, it is my money to begin with. Trust me to spend it in the way that applies for me.''

Gary, you are absolutely right, it is your money.

Tax relief is not about handouts. It is simply about allowing the American people to keep more of the hard-earned income that they made.

On behalf of all of the hardworking people of central Kentucky, I urge my colleagues to vote for Gary and to vote for all other taxpayers who deserve to keep more of what they earned. Vote ``yes.''

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to share the amazing story of Rick Corman, the hardworking, hard-charging founder of R.J. Corman Railroad Group in Nicholasville, Kentucky, in my district. Rick's life story is an example of the American Dream, and his tireless spirit, grit, determination, and generosity benefited not only the employees of R.J. Corman, but an entire community.

Unfortunately, because of America's broken Tax Code, the abilities of entrepreneurs like Rick are compromised, and the estate tax, in particular, threatens the future ability of the R.J. Corman Railroad Group to continue to drive economic growth, employment, and charitable giving in Kentucky.

This story is timely. As Congress takes on the task of reforming our broken Tax Code over the next few weeks, critics will undoubtedly protest that this plan is a tax cut for the rich, and they will cite our changes to the estate tax as an example. But as the story of Rick Corman reveals, the estate tax is not a tax on the wealthy as much as it is an unfair penalty on hard work, jobs, charity, upward mobility, and the American Dream.

In 1973, after growing up in a low-income, five-room house with no interior bathroom, Rick Corman started his company immediately following high school graduation with nothing more than a dump truck, a backhoe, and a tenacious spirit. Driven by his remarkable operator skills, and then by his commitment to safe and reliable service, Rick was able to become a trusted provider in the railroad industry.

But his success would not have been possible without the assistance early in his career from Luther Deaton, a community banker for what is now called Central Bank in Kentucky. As Rick grew his company, he faced debts and cash flow problems. He struggled to get a loan. As Luther said: He had a good company; he just faced a cash crunch.

But Rick invited Luther to the site of a coal train derailment inside a tunnel in the middle of the night to show his work; and Rick, recalling the episode, laughed because he had gotten his banker filthy and covered in coal dust. But after that experience and seeing how hard Rick worked, Luther knew that this man would not fail. So Rick was then able to secure character-based loans that allowed his company to thrive because his community banker was willing to take a risk on him based on what he knew about his business and Rick's drive to succeed.

Today, this type of loan would never be allowed under the overly restricted Dodd-Frank law, but those loans proved to be essential for the growth of Rick's company and ultimately highly profitable for the bank.

Without access to capital, today's entrepreneurs are prohibited from doing what Rick Corman did. Over 40 years he grew his company into what is today known as R.J. Corman Railroad Group, continuously investing profits back into his business, into its workers, and into the surrounding community.

Today, R.J. Corman has field offices in 23 States. The company serves all seven class I railroads, many regional and short line railroads, as well as various rail-served industries.

Rick grew the company into what it is today by treating all of his workers well, working alongside them, and never asking them to do a job that Rick himself was unable or incapable of doing himself. The company's diversity and investment in people gave it the ability to service all aspects of the freight railroad industry at any scale. The company has been critical to restoring service when class I railroads are devastated by flooding or storms like Hurricanes Katrina, Harvey, or Irma.

But now the future success of this company is threatened by the estate tax, also known as the death tax. In 2013, Rick Corman passed away after a heroic 12-year battle with cancer. It resulted in the transfer of his life's work to a living trust. More than anything, Rick had an intense appreciation for the hard work and loyalty of his employees who had been and continue to be an integral part of the company's success, and he wanted to ensure that he protected their jobs into the future.

Since Rick's passing, the trust has continued to reinvest cash into the company, as he intended, and the company continues to operate and help those who have benefited from it. The company has invested nearly $110 million in capital assets, and employment has grown by 53 percent, nearly 450 jobs. The company has donated more than $2.5 million to charitable causes since Rick's passing.

But due to the estate tax, the company has yet to feel the full impact of the tax. But starting in 2019, nearly 30 percent of its annual cash flow will be pulled from the company as a result. This will significantly impact R.J. Corman's ability to create jobs, purchase equipment, and donate to charity. The leadership of the company now tells me that the government will actually lose revenue because the company will not be able to grow and create jobs that would produce more revenue than the estate tax will produce.

This is an example of why it is so important we end this unfair tax. The death tax destroys intergenerational small businesses and family farms throughout the Nation owned by people who started with literally nothing and worked their entire life to build a successful company and jobs.

So as we look at the estate tax and tax reform in the coming weeks, I hope my colleagues will remember the story of Rick Corman. These families and these businesses should not have to fear triple taxation from Washington just because someone passes away.

Our bill immediately delivers relief from this tax, and I hope that we will pass a repeal of the estate tax to honor entrepreneurs, job creators, and philanthropists like Rick Corman.