Floor Statements

Madam Speaker, I rise to honor the very well-lived life of Malcolm Hardy Dudley who died on February 10, 2021 at home in Atherton, California, with his wife of 67 years, Cosette. He was born in Santa Cruz, California, to Allen Mason Dudley and Gladys Alda Hardy Dudley.

Malcolm Dudley was a graduate of the University of California, Davis, and studied at the London School of Economics. He served his country in the U.S. Navy for three years on active duty and for another three years as a communications officer for the U.S. Naval Command Europe. He retired from the Naval Reserves as a captain in 1982.

Malcolm Dudley's life was full and varied and he has been described as affable, cheerful, and relaxed, traits he combined with tremendous energy and efficiency. He began his career as a financial advisor in 1962 and retired in 2017, two weeks before his 85th birthday. He had a great interest in the environment and traffic congestion which led to his interest in local government. He served on the Atherton City Council for 24 years, six of them as Mayor. He was a champion of public transportation and he was known as the resident guru on regional transportation issues.

Malcolm had a passion for boating and water-skiied on Lake Tahoe, often sailing his 70-foot motor cruiser up the Pacific coast to Washington and Canada. He loved music and played jazz saxophone, and had a popular dance band in the 50's, and played with the Unicorns swing band until this year.

Malcolm leaves his wife Cosette and his daughters, Lynette Stebin and Virginia Rock, two grandchildren and countless friends, all of whom benefitted from his generosity and kindness. I consider myself privileged to have been among his wide group of friends.

Madam Speaker, I ask the entire House of Representatives to join me in honoring the life of Malcolm Dudley, a great and good man who was a true patriot, and in extending our condolences to his wife and his entire family. His was a life well-lived, one filled with generosity, public service and care for others. He bettered our community and strengthened our country.

Mr. Speaker, I was unable to be present during rollcall vote No. 76. On rollcall vote No. 76, I would have voted no.

Madam Speaker, I rise in strong support of the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, a comprehensive bill to address systemic racism in law enforcement.

Today's legislation is named for George Floyd, whose senseless death at the hands of a police officer shocked the conscience of millions of Americans and sparked a long-overdue reckoning on race in America and a movement demanding racial justice. Congress has heard this call for justice, and in response, Congresswoman Karen Bass and the Congressional Black Caucus have written this critical legislation to hold police accountable, change the culture of law enforcement, and build trust between law enforcement and the communities they serve.

The George Floyd Justice in Policing Act takes these challenges head on by banning chokeholds, mandating racial bias training, ending qualified immunity, restricting the sale of military-grade weapons to local police departments, and establishing a National Police Misconduct Registry. While the inequities in our criminal justice system are immense, this legislation is a bold step to address systemic racism in law enforcement, and the time has come to make these reforms the law of the land.

H.R. 1, For the People Act, is one of the most important bills Congress can consider because it strengthens and reforms our democracy at a time in history when it is especially fragile. This sweeping legislation is divided into three sections: voting, campaign finance, and ethics. Its numerous provisions expand voting rights, diminish the corrosive influence of money in politics, and bolster ethics and transparency to ensure government works for the people.

Voting is a fundamental right in a democracy, and H.R. 1 will expand voter rolls by requiring every state to adopt automatic and same-day voter registration, just as California has. The bill ends partisan gerrymandering by requiring states to adopt independent redistricting commissions and makes it easier to vote by expanding early voting and allowing every American to vote by mail, just as millions did last November during the pandemic.

H.R. 1 reforms our campaign finance system to address the disastrous Citizens United decision that opened the floodgates to unlimited contributions from anonymous donors. The legislation establishes a public Fair Elections Fund to match small dollar donations,

strengthens Federal Election Commission (FEC) oversight of Super PACs, and requires ``dark money'' independent expenditure groups to disclose their donors just as candidates and Super PACs must do.

Lastly, the bill holds public officials accountable by closing lobbyist registration loopholes, strengthens conflict of interest rules, and empowers the Office of Government Ethics to better enforce ethics laws.

I'm very proud that H.R. 1 includes two major provisions I authored. The bill includes my Presidential Tax Transparency Act which requires the president and vice president to publicly release their tax returns annually. It also requires major party candidates for both offices to release ten prior years of tax returns within 15 days of accepting their party's nomination. Tax returns contain vital information such as whether a candidate has paid any taxes; what assets they own; if they've borrowed money and from whom; whether they've taken advantage of tax loopholes and offshore tax shelters; and whether they have foreign bank accounts. The disclosure of a presidential candidate 's tax returns is particularly important because the American people should be able to vet their finances before the election.

For decades, presidents and presidential candidates voluntarily released their tax returns. I introduced the Presidential Tax Transparency Act in 2016 when this bipartisan tradition was abandoned and it became clear that we could no longer rely on voluntary disclosure. Presidential candidates must be held to the highest standards of transparency to ensure confidence that they will work solely for the interests of the American people, not their own financial gain.

I'm also pleased that H.R. 1 establishes Election Day as a federal holiday. I've introduced similar legislation with Rep. Donald McEachin in the past three Congresses to give Americans the time off they need to vote and participate in our democracy. U.S. voter turnout in 2020 was the highest in over a century, but it consistently lags behind turnout in other established democracies, many of which vote on a weekend or holiday. While there are many factors that influence voter turnout, making Election Day a federal holiday will make voting easier and give Americans an opportunity to celebrate the importance of civic engagement and participation in the proud American tradition of self- governance.

H.R. 1 includes all of these important reforms and many others, and I'm proud to vote in favor of this critical legislation.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to the Santa Cruz County Medical Reserve Corps (MRC) which recently celebrated sixteen years of service to our community since its founding in 2005.

After the terrible events of 9/11 and the anthrax attacks that followed soon after, MRC units were formed to organize, train, and equip local volunteers to assist public health agencies and the medical community in emergency preparedness and response to all-hazards incidents.

Santa Cruz County MRC volunteers have responded with vigor and effectiveness to numerous incidents, including disease outbreaks, catastrophic wildfires, floods, power outages, and today's COVID-19 pandemic. MRC volunteers have assisted with case investigations, contact tracing, infection prevention, sheltering of the homeless, the CZU fire evacuation and sheltering of those needing a place to live. As vaccine has become available, MRC volunteers have been on the frontlines of vaccinating disabled homebound elders and supporting mass vaccination clinics. The contributions of medical volunteers have helped public health build the community's resilience and its ability to respond to future disasters.

Madam Speaker, I ask the entire House of Representatives to join me in honoring the Santa Cruz County Medical Reserve Corps. They have strengthened our community and set an example for other volunteer organizations to emulate. I thank them and I ask my colleagues to do so also. Their work is exemplary and they are bright stars in the firmament of the 18th Congressional District.

Madam Speaker, I rise today on my own behalf and on behalf of Representative Tim Walberg to honor the nine retired Adrian Dominican Sisters who lived together at the Motherhouse in Adrian, Michigan, and lost their lives to the COVID-19 pandemic in January 2021.

Those who dedicated their lives to serving others were Sister Dorothea Gamlich, O.P.; Sister Helen Laier, O.P.; Sister Jeannine Therese McGorray, O.P.; Sister Esther Ortega, O.P.; Sister Mary Lisa Rieman, O.P.; Sister Ann Rena Shinkey, O.P.; Sister Margaret Ann Swallow, O.P.; and Sister Mary Irene Wischmeyer, O.P. They strongly adhered to masking and social distancing, yet the devastating disease found them at their serene compound 75 miles from Detroit.

Three Adrian Dominicans work at Dominican Hospital in Santa Cruz, California, which provides vital health services to many residents of my Congressional District. They are Sister Rita Eileen Dean, O.P.; Sister Adrienne Piennette, O.P.; and Sister Judy Silva, O.P., all extraordinary contributors to the hospital and considered great blessings by hospital administrators.

Madam Speaker, I ask my colleagues to honor the memory of these holy women, Dominican Sisters, who lost their lives to the pandemic, and honor and thank those who continue to serve at Dominican Hospital. These good and great women of faith make our country stronger and better.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to honor a giant among journalists, Dr. Michael Krasny. For nearly three decades he has hosted the highly acclaimed Forum (KQED) and is retiring on February 12, 2021, to pursue other interests, including writing and grandparenting.

Michael Krasny earned his B.A. and M.A. degrees from Ohio University, and his Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin. Since 1983 he has worked in broadcast journalism, first with ABC, and in 1993 began his career in public broadcasting.

Michael Krasny has shared his vast knowledge as a teacher at San Francisco State, Stanford University, the University of California and the Fulbright International Institutes. He conducts interviews for City Arts and Lectures, and has written many books, including Off Mike: A Memoir of Talk Radio and Literary Life; Spiritual Envy; Sound Ideas, and Let There Be Laughter.

Dr. Krasny has been honored for his outstanding work and is the recipient of the Y.Y. Agnon Medal for Intellectual Achievement; the Eugene Block Award for Human Rights Journalism; the James Madison Freedom of Information Award; the Excellence in Journalism Award from the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Society; the Career Achievement Award from the Society of Professional Journalists and an award from the Radio and Television News Directors Association.

Michael Krasny is described by Holly Kernan, KQED's Chief Content Officer, as a Bay Area jewel. She said: ``His is a model public service career and he has brought depth, compassion and the expertise of a literature professor to the airwaves on a daily basis.''

Madam Speaker, I ask the entire House of Representatives to join me in honoring this stellar broadcaster, author and academic, Michael Krasny, Ph.D. who has enhanced the lives of countless people by informing, examining and educating us. We are a stronger community and a better country because of his extraordinary work.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to my dear friend and colleague in public service, Katherine Strehl.

Katherine was born in Oakland, California on October 4, 1944, to Elizabeth Williams Strehl Kerley while her father was serving overseas during World War II. Her stepfather, Bob Kerley, UC Berkeley Vice Chancellor for Administration and Student Affairs, was an important part of her life and a mentor to her. Katherine died at her home in Menlo Park, California on January 24, 2021. She was 76 years old.

Katherine was a graduate of Skyline High School and a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of UC Berkeley. She earned a master's degree from Stanford University and completed the coursework for a Ph.D. in communications research. She was a 1979 graduate of the Coro Women's Program in leadership development.

Katherine had a successful 40-year career in public affairs, and received Santa Clara County's 1994 Women of Achievement Award. She was known for her commitment to collaboration between business, government and community. She served as the Manager of Community Affairs and Public Policy at Lockheed Martin Missiles and Space, and was Executive Manager of External Affairs at BART, then managed public outreach for the California Transportation Commission. She served on the Commonwealth Club's Silicon Valley Advisory Board, and on many Menlo Park commissions, most recently the Planning Commission.

Madam Speaker, I ask the entire House of Representatives to join me in expressing our deepest condolences to Katherine's beloved husband of 22 years, Bill Dempsey, and to her family and wide circle of friends. She was a warm, loving, smart and accomplished woman, and we will miss her dearly.

Mr. Speaker, the Budget Resolution before the House is the first step toward providing urgently needed relief for the American people, as our Nation struggles to address the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on our economy.

The need for Congress to act is both great and urgent. We're in a race against death, with over 450,000 fellow Americans lost to COVID- 19. Our failure to defeat the virus has dragged our economy down, with more than 18 million Americans currently unemployed and scheduled to lose their unemployment insurance in six weeks if Congress does not act.

House Concurrent Resolution 11 allows Congress to quickly pass a bold $1.9 trillion relief bill to defeat the virus, support workers and small businesses, and help families until the economy can reopen. President Biden's American Rescue Plan includes $20 billion for a national vaccination strategy to increase supply and vaccination sites; $50 billion to scale up testing through the purchasing of rapid tests and expanded lab capacity; and $3 billion in innovative COVID-19 treatments. While we have effective vaccines to prevent people from getting COVID-19, we do not yet have accessible medicines to treat people who are sick with the disease. This plan funds research and large-scale clinical trials needed to develop therapeutics such as antivirals and antibodies to help people recover from COVID-19. The American Rescue Plan will also extend increased unemployment insurance for laid-off workers and provide resources for state and local governments to preserve the jobs of essential public workers fighting on the frontlines against this pandemic. These are the right policies at the right time.

House Concurrent Resolution 11, the Budget Resolution for Fiscal Year 2021, allows Congress to provide pandemic relief through reconciliation, a procedure that allows the Senate to bypass the filibuster and pass this legislation with a simple majority vote. The American people simply want Congress to help them survive this pandemic and defeat the virus. This resolution is a major step in making good on our promise to provide bold, urgent, and necessary support to those who have been hit the hardest by the pandemic and to address our cascading economy, and I urge my colleagues to support it.

Madam Speaker, I ask the entire House of Representatives to join me in honoring Wikipedia on the 20th anniversary of its founding on January 15, 2001. The organization has developed a flourishing, free, and accessible home for the world's knowledge and has become an indispensable part of our lives.

While encyclopedias have long relied on a small number of academics and experts to write and update information, Wikipedia leverages a voluntary, community-based approach that has allowed the product to expand to cover an extraordinary array of topics that has worldwide scale, well beyond what all previous encyclopedias could cover, combined. To date, Wikipedians have created an astonishing 175 million pages that are visited by two billion unique devices per month.

The world-class team of people . . . employees and volunteers that administer Wikipedia, are a major reason why the project has been such a success, and I'm proud that many of my constituents are part of this group. Wikipedia's success is also due to the fact that it is managed by a values-driven nonprofit organization, the Wikimedia Foundation.

Wikipedia is a large part of the reason we all have the world's information at our fingertips and it's a privilege to congratulate Wikipedia on celebrating 20 years of informing the world.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to honor the life and work of a distinguished American and a brother-friend, Adolph Floyd Gonella, Ph.D., who was born on November 1, 1933 in San Mateo County, California, and passed away on January 4, 2021, at the age of 87. Floyd Gonella was the son of Amedeo and Margherita Gonella who were immigrants from Italy. His father was a farmer who raised cabbage and artichokes. Floyd's family lived humbly and he learned from them the value of hard work and service to others. He experienced anti-Italian discrimination during World War II when they were declared enemy aliens and placed under curfew as residents of a coastal county. This contributed to his empathy and passion for helping the disadvantaged among us.

Dr. Gonella earned his degree in education and several teaching certificates from San Francisco State where he was a star football player, and he earned a doctorate in education at the University of California, Berkeley. His distinguished career included service as an adjunct professor at Santa Clara University, and as Superintendent of the Jefferson Union High School District. He went on to be elected to three 4-year terms as the San Mateo County Superintendent of Schools and was considered `Mr. Education' by everyone.

Dr. Gonella retired as County Superintendent of Schools in 2003 and stepped up to become Superintendent of East Palo Alto's bankrupt Ravenswood City School District. Working with city, school and community leaders he revitalized the district and brought it to fiscal and educational health. He then went on to the dysfunctional Vallejo City Unified School District where he and Superintendent Rick Damelio were successful in rescuing the district. In addition to assisting poorly performing school districts, Dr. Gonella and his wife, Margaret, created the Daly City Youth Health Center which has been providing services to low-income teens for thirty years.

Dr. Gonella earned many awards, including Coach of the Year in 1962 and the Fred Kiesel Distinguished Service Award. He served on the California Advisory Council on School Restructuring and was named Outstanding Alumnus by the San Francisco State Education Department. For three decades he served as Team Chair of the Western Association of Schools and Colleges, frequently traveling to various Asian countries to accredit schools. He also led the Daly City Chamber of Commerce in an extensive membership drive.

Dr. Gonella gave generously of his time and considerable talents to the San Mateo County Child Care Partnership Council, the Criminal Justice Council, the San Mateo County AIDS Program Community Advisory Committee, the Junior Statesmen Foundation, the First 5 Commission, and the American Heart Association. In 2003, the County Office of Education honored him by naming its offices the Floyd Gonella Education Center.

Floyd Gonella was a decades-long friend and trusted advisor to me and beloved by my entire family. His compassion and care for those less privileged were a source of inspiration to all who had the good fortune to know him, and his expertise as an educator was unparalleled. He will be sorely missed by all who knew him, worked with him, and called him friend. He leaves his wife, Margaret Taylor; his daughter, Michelle Gonella; his son, Michael Gonella (Chelsea) and grandsons, Nick and Alex; and his son, Stephen.

Madam Speaker, I ask the entire House of Representatives to join me in expressing our condolences to Margaret Taylor and the entire Gonella family. Floyd Gonella lived a purposeful life, transforming the lives of countless students who he had great faith in. He made our community a better place to live in and learn, and he strengthened our country with his countless contributions.

Madam Speaker, future generations are not going to know the names of each Member in the Chamber today and voting, but they will know what we did and why. We must impeach the President because he incited the mob that attacked the Capitol of the United States, the tabernacle of our democracy. He is incapable of honoring his oath and our Constitution, and he has proven to be unfit and dangerous.

I will vote to impeach this traitor to our country.

Madam Speaker, I rise in support of H. Res. 8, which establishes House rules for the 117th Congress. This package contains many strong reforms I support, including ones that prioritize ethics and accountability, promote diversity and inclusion, and embrace technology, including a provision I requested that expands machine- readability of House documents.

On October 1, 2020, I testified at the Rules Committee about the need for the House to continue the progress we've made in expanding what legislative materials and House documents are available in machine- readable formats. Today, bills and resolutions are posted to congress.gov in a machine-readable format, however, materials for markups are posted online as PDFs, and sometimes they are not even searchable PDFs.

Why does this matter? If we receive amendments in the nature of a substitute 24 hours before marking up lengthy bills, we cannot compare amendments to original bills without manually reading documents line- by-line or investing in expensive software. This is also prohibitive to public interest groups, stakeholders, and members of the public that wish to follow the legislative process. With machine-readable formats, Members, staff, and any interested party can easily analyze amendments and any other House document.

I'm pleased to see that Section 3(j) directs the Committee on House Administration, the Clerk, and relevant House offices to take further steps to publish House documents in machine-readable formats and enabling staff to create comparative prints.

This is critical for Members wishing to analyze legislation before us, but the move is just as important for the sake of public transparency. Public interest groups that advocate for government transparency have long called for all government documents to be available in machine readable formats because it enables informed analysis and engagement.

I thank Chairman McGovern for including my suggestion in the proposed House rules package for the 117th Congress that we are considering today, and I urge my colleagues to support the legislation.

Mr. Chair, I rise in strong support of Amendment No. 47 to H.R. 2500, the National Defense Authorization Act of 2020, an amendment I offered with my good friend from Nebraska, Mr. Fortenberry.

The Fortenberry-Eshoo amendment declares that the safe return of religious and ethnic minorities in Iraq to their ancestral homelands, and the restoration of fundamental human rights to these communities, remains a priority for the United States.

Iraq is home to some of the oldest Christian communities in the world, yet less than 200,000 Christians remain in Iraq, down from 1.4 million in 2002.

Christians and other religious and ethnic minorities suffered horrific oppression and violence beginning with the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003 and again at the hands of ISIS beginning in 2014.

In March 2016, Congress, under the leadership of Mr. Fortenberry and myself, declared this brutal and system persecution constituted genocide, one of only three times in history that Congress has made such a declaration.

Despite efforts by Congress to help religious and ethnic minorities return to their homelands in Iraq, harassment and threats from armed militia groups continue to jeopardize their safety and long term security.

Congress cannot stand by and watch as one of the oldest Christian communities in the world is wiped out. As the daughter of parents who fled religious persecution in the Middle East, this is personal to me.

I'm pleased Amendment No. 147 was included in En Bloc 5 to H.R. 2500, which will help ensure Congress does not give up on these vulnerable populations who continue to face persecution and oppression in Iraq.

Madam Chair, I thank my colleague, Mr. Khanna, for yielding.

I rise in strong support of amendment 423, and I want to thank all of the Members who have worked so hard on this.

I am proud to have written legislation in early April of this year, the Prevention of Unconstitutional War with Iran Act, which enjoys 79 cosponsors and prohibits the President from using any funding appropriated by Congress to take military action in or against Iran without authorization from Congress. This amendment mirrors and complements that legislation by prohibiting the use of any funding in this year's NDAA to carry out unauthorized military attacks against Iran.

It is very important to have this amendment on the floor because the Trump administration seems determined to provoke military confrontation with Iran, and the President and his hawkish advisers have publicly stated that they don't need authorization from Congress to carry out preemptive attacks.

They are wrong. The U.S. Constitution is clear. Article I, Section 8 gives Congress the sole authority to declare war, allowing the American people to decide, through their Representatives in Congress, whether military action is in the best interest of the country.

We carry no grief for Iran, not one of us, but this amendment should pass.