Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to clause 2(a)(1) of rule IX, I seek recognition to give notice of my intent to raise a question of privileges of the House.

The form of the resolution is as follows:

H. Res. 521, censuring Adam Schiff, Representative of the 30th Congressional District of California.

Whereas, the allegation that President Donald Trump colluded with Russia to interfere in the 2016 Presidential election has been revealed as false by numerous in-depth investigations, including the recent report by Special Counsel John Durham, which documents how the conspiracy theory was invented, funded, and spread by President's Trump's political rivals;

Whereas, Representative Adam Schiff, who served as ranking minority member and then Chairman of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence of the House of Representatives (the ``Intelligence Committee''), occupied positions of extreme trust, affording him access to sensitive intelligence unavailable to most Members of Congress;

Whereas, for years, Representative Schiff abused this trust by alleging that he had evidence of collusion that, as is clear from reports by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, Department of Justice Inspector General Michael Horowitz, and Special Counsel Durham, never existed;

Whereas, for years, Representative Schiff has spread false accusations that the Trump campaign colluded with Russia;

Whereas, on March 20, 2017, Representative Schiff perpetuated false allegations from the Steele Dossier accusing numerous Trump associates of colluding with Russia into the Congressional Record;

Whereas, once again abusing his privileged access to classified information, Representative Schiff released a memo justifying the accuracy of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant application on Trump associate Carter Page, of which was later found by Inspector General Horowitz to have 17 major mistakes and omissions, providing FISA Court Presiding Judge Rosemary Collyer to state unequivocally that the Federal Bureau of Investigation ``misled the

Madam Speaker, I call up the resolution previously noticed.

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to clause 2(a)(1) of rule IX, I seek recognition to give notice of my intent to raise a question of the privileges of the House.

The form of the resolution is as follows:

H. Res. 489, censuring and condemning Adam Schiff, Representative of California's 30th Congressional District.

Whereas the allegation that President Donald Trump colluded with Russia to steal the 2016 Presidential election has been revealed as false by numerous in-depth investigations, including the recent report by Special Counsel John Durham, which documents how the conspiracy theory was invented, funded, and spread by President Trump's political rivals;

Whereas Representative Adam Schiff, who served as ranking minority member and then chairman of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence of the House of Representatives, HPSCI, occupied positions of extreme trust, affording him access to sensitive intelligence unavailable to most Members of Congress;

Whereas for years Representative Schiff abused this trust by citing evidence of collusion that, as is clear from reports by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, Department of Justice Inspector General Michael Horowitz, and Special Counsel Durham, does not exist;

Whereas by repeatedly telling these falsehoods, Representative Schiff purposely deceived his committee, Congress, and the American people;

Whereas Representative Schiff lent credibility to the Steele dossier, a collection of debunked collusion accusations funded by President Trump's political rivals, by reading false Steele allegations into the Congressional Record at an HPSCI hearing on March 20, 2017;

Whereas once again abusing his privileged access to classified information, Representative Schiff composed a false memo justifying the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, FISA, warrant application on Trump associate Carter Page, which Inspector General Horowitz later found was riddled with 17 major mistakes and omissions, provoking FISA court presiding Judge Rosemary Collyer to state unequivocally that the Federal Bureau of Investigation misled the FISC;

Whereas by publicly smearing Carter Page as a Russian collaborator and justifying spurious investigations of him, Representative Schiff contributed to the gross violation of a United States citizen's civil liberties, thereby committing the very abuses HPSCI is tasked with identifying and thwarting;

Whereas as HPSCI ranking minority member and chairman, Representative Schiff behaved dishonestly and dishonorably on many other occasions, including by falsely denying that his staff coordinated with a whistleblower to launch the first impeachment of President Trump;

Whereas as part of his impeachment efforts, during an HPSCI hearing on September 26, 2019, Representative Schiff recited a false, concocted rendition of a phone call between President Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy;

Whereas Representative Schiff exploited his positions on HPSCI to encourage and excuse abusive intelligence investigations of Americans for political purposes;

Whereas Representative Schiff used his position and access to sensitive information to instigate a fraudulently based investigation, which he then used to amass political gain and fundraising dollars;

Whereas the American taxpayers paid $32 million to fund the investigation into collusion that was launched as a result of Representative Schiff's lies, misrepresentations, and abuses of sensitive information; and

Whereas if it is determined by an investigation conducted by the Committee on Ethics that Representative Schiff lied, made misrepresentations, and abused sensitive information, he should be fined in the amount of $16 million:

Now, therefore, be it

Resolved, that:

(1) the House of Representatives censures and condemns Adam Schiff, Representative of California's 30th Congressional District, for conduct that misleads the American people in a way that is not befitting an elected Member of the House of Representatives;

(2) Representative Adam Schiff will forthwith present himself in the well of the House of Representatives for the pronouncement of censure;

(3) Representative Adam Schiff will be censured with the public reading of this resolution by the Speaker; and

(4) the Committee on Ethics shall conduct an investigation into Representative Adam Schiff's lies, misrepresentations, and abuses of sensitive information.

Madam Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Madam Chair, the 2020 Trump moratorium banned all energy leasing off the coast of Florida until 2032.

President Trump recognized the natural beauty, tourism attractions, and unique wildlife, as well as one-of-a-kind military training and testing offered by Florida's coast.

It goes without saying that energy development threatens all of that, especially off the coast of Florida. I thank President Trump for his declaration.

However, President Biden and Democrats in Congress undercut the Trump moratorium in the Inflation Reduction Act by allowing offshore wind development off the coast of Florida.

This threatens our economy, ecosystem, and military readiness, as well as a number of endangered species in ways that were obvious to all except Democrats who voted to force this wind development on an unwilling public.

My amendment requires the GAO to conduct a study on how wind development would impact military readiness, marine life, tourism aspects, and prohibits offering leases for wind development until the study is complete.

I have confidence that the study conducted by our government experts will show what President Trump so easily understood--that wind is bad for Florida.

My Florida Republican colleagues and I are committed to ensuring that no wind turbines will ever be placed off the coast of Florida.

We will work with our colleagues on the Appropriations Committee to block funding for this kind of development, and we will repeal the section of the Inflation Reduction Act that my Democrat colleagues voted for that want to build windmills on our beaches.

These very ugly and ineffective turbines pose untold dangers to Florida's thriving marine life and our precious natural resources.

Wind turbines also threaten our Nation's military readiness by interfering with radar detection, which can result in a complete loss of detection capabilities, according to an FAA and DOD report to Congress in 2016.

In my district, turbines are harmful to an already endangered species in the area, not to mention, there are the untold effects of turbines that will be had on the tourism economy. People travel from all around the world to our pristine beaches, not to see windmills.

I thank Chairman Westerman and Whip Emmer for working with the Florida delegation on these amendments. On behalf of one of the biggest delegations in the country, I urge my colleagues to support this amendment and protect Florida from Joe Biden's windmill fantasy.

Madam Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Chair, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Westerman).

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

Madam Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Madam Chair, major components of wind infrastructure are imported from our enemies like China. We have seen how poorly President Biden has handled the energy crisis, and to make it worse, he is outsourcing our energy to foreign adversaries.

This threatens our national security, throws away American jobs, and increases our dependence on foreign energy.

Regardless of the energy source, we need to prioritize our domestic supply chain and support American energy independence.

American energy should come from America, not China--U.S. materials, U.S. jobs, U.S. energy independence.

Madam Chair, I urge my colleagues to support this amendment, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Chair, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Westerman).

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

Mr. Speaker, I will start out by saying ISIS has been destroyed. A few hundred troops will not stop the next terrorist dot- com, and that is never going to end. I am, frankly, tired of hearing the sentiment on both sides that if we do not fight them there, they will come here. There are way too many countries to apply that logic.

If we are so concerned, then why is the majority of the U.S. Government stagnant on the southern border where it matters. Terrorists are literally walking in.

Better yet, if that is a true concern, then why did we leave billions of dollars in equipment during a botched withdrawal in Afghanistan? Do you really think terrorist dot-coms aren't going to use that equipment like ISIS did?

Peace is accomplished through superior firepower, strong leadership, and a plan, not blunders of failed foreign policy literally repeating itself.

We have zero strategic advantage and zero reason to be in Syria. In fact, they don't even want us there.

Al-Assad and Putin are tight. If you check out some of Russia's naval warships, they are actually hanging out in the western port of Syria. What we need to be focusing on is a bigger issue like China.

Syria is a very dangerous place for us to be leaving a few hundred Americans. We are better off sending those troops to places like South America, where we can build stronger and useful allies who will actually work with us.

Make no mistake, if we take China at their word, a near-peer fight is coming. It will require 100 percent of our military and more than the American people are going to pay for it. That is why I support this resolution.

Mr. Speaker, if I can also add, to those of my colleagues that had mentioned the Kurds, our NATO ally Turkiye, who is not the best NATO ally, might I add, has deemed them a terrorist organization. After the take-back of Mosul, we actually turned our back on them after promising to recognize them as a nation at the United Nations.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to address the politicization of what is happening at our southern border against the American people.

Several years ago, before politics was even a factor or thought for me, I got involved as a counter-trafficking activist. During that time, I had the honor and privilege of working next to some very brave people who were working to expose what was happening with the whole immigration debate.

One of the more alarming things that I found is the more that I addressed this issue, the more that I got involved to really shed light on it to the American people, the more that I was called a ``coconut,'' the more the color of my skin became a topic of discussion, and the more that the left sought to, if anything, underestimate and undermine my capability to address this topic because of the fact that I am a conservative.

Yes, I am Hispanic. Yes, I am a veteran. Yes, I grew up and saw things that a lot of people, probably in this very body, haven't had to experience.

But what I am standing here today to say is: What I have realized over that journey--what I have realized over the past couple of years-- is that I thought that in politics some people would be here to do the right things, and I found that it is actually the exact opposite.

I found that within this body people will lie to the American people about what is happening at our southern border, not because they want to help people, not because they actually care about these issues, but because they simply seek power. I think that we are seeing that today.

Only several years ago you could see some Members of the Democrat Party, some people like former-President Barack Obama say: Don't come here, you will get hurt in the process. Yet, the media seems to forget about that.

They say now that if you are a Republican, if you embrace border security, if you want to stand up for people that are being trafficked that you are a racist, that you are xenophobic, and they seek to label us. It is simply not true.

I have been down to the border three times, and I can tell you that on my last experience down there I went with a member of the Border Patrol Union, his name is Art Del Cueto. We went down to a portion of the border that was completely open. It was on an Indian reservation. What I saw and heard down there was alarming. It was alarming for several reasons, one mainly being that the media wasn't discussing it. But also, too, one of the most horrifying stories that I heard was actually from him saying that on just regular walkie-talkies that you could purchase at Walmart, you could pick up the radio frequency of some of the ``coyotes'' working with the cartels to actually scout out women that were crossing illegally and they would be brought up to the top of these mountains and raped. That was their right of passage they would say; they would joke about it.

That is something that we should all be talking about. We pride ourselves in this country--being that we are a free country, free of slavery. Yet, that is happening every single day. We have the opportunity to fix it and we don't.

Why?

It is not because we can't fix it, we can.

It is because of partisan politics. That has to end. In 2021 alone, 147,000 unaccompanied minors were crossing along the U.S.-Mexico border. There is no question in my mind that these young people are absolutely exploited for entry and abuse of the asylum process that has been actively happening over the last couple of years, especially under this administration.

The Coalition Against Trafficking in Women estimated that 60 percent of Latin-American children caught by cartels are actually exploited for child pornography or drug trafficking purposes.

If we, as a country, cannot come together and address the simple issue of trafficking, of modern-day slavery, of the exploitation of children--minority children at that--then are we any better than a Third World country or a place like China that engages in human rights abuses every single day?

I am tired of this. I am sitting here willing to work with Members across the aisle, but I don't see that olive branch because of the fact that I am a conservative Republican. That is wrong, and that is why I am standing here today.

I hope that we, as a country, can come together. That this administration can accept responsibility for the absolutely inappropriate abuse of the media saying that they want to legalize everyone, that is encouraging people to come here and people are hurt on both sides because of it.

Madam Speaker, if there are people willing to work with me, I hope to work with them. I hope to end this awful slavery that we are seeing every single day.

Madam Clerk, I rise to nominate Byron Donalds as Speaker of the House.

Madam Clerk, I have known Byron for roughly about 4 years now and being that he is from the State of Florida, I can tell you that I have come to know him on both the campaign trail and personally.

But I want to clarify something real quick to my colleagues across the aisle. What you are seeing with this discussion does not mean that we are dysfunctional. And in no way, shape, or form will a Democrat ever hold the gavel to a Republican-controlled House.

These discussions and dialogue have actually been good for the American people. And although the media tries to pit us against each other, I can tell you that it has been something that we need as a country. There are people that are frustrated with this process.

Byron, through this entire time, has done something that leaders should do more of, and that is listen; respect people when they are talking; understand the needs of the American people; be willing to negotiate but also realize when it is proper to stand your ground on certain things.

I ask my colleagues today to support him. I think he is an incredible representation of what this country is, and that is exactly why he has my vote for Speaker of the House.