Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the following students who received HEB ISD Education Foundation's Award of Excellence in their respective fields of study: Aiden Aguirre, Isaiah Arellano, Matthew Boyd, Andrew Brooks, Dayton Crenshaw, Alexia Del Vecchio, Julie Eisermann, Anastasia Fike, Charles Fultz, Lauren Galkantas, Rafael Garcia, Orinda Dreshaj, Chloe Harmon, Ethan Hildebrand, Giselle Hill, Emma Hiros, Jacquelyn Holisinger, Mia Jax, Jayla King, Sagar Lamichhane, Ali Landreth, Jude Langsdorf, Mary McColm, Kylia Murphy, Dorine Ngara, Maddox Olatunde, Claire Payne, Valerie Reyes, Jerry Rivera, Julissa Rodriguez, Avery Vignali, Kassidy Zastrow, and Zecharias Zewdie. I'm inspired by these students' hard work, and I wish them the best of luck in the future.

Madam Speaker, I rise to support the impeachment of Secretary Mayorkas. His actions support lawbreaking and lawlessness and have inflicted a horrific toll on our country. The kind of damage he has done to our cities and families is something you would expect from a hostile foreign adversary looking to destabilize and destroy America.

Our cities are overrun, forcing vital services to be cut off or reduced, shutting down our schools to house illegal migrants, and turning community centers into refugee camps, all while ignoring the needs of our own citizens.

There are more than 110,000 dead Americans from fentanyl that is being smuggled by Mexican cartels. We see criminal illegal immigrants committing murder, rape, and beating our police in broad daylight.

This is far more than a policy difference. This is the death and destruction of our country and our people. I will not stand by and just politely ask the Biden administration to please stop the chaos and devastation.

In a functioning government, people need to be held accountable when they have deliberately inflicted harm on our Nation, and that is exactly what we are doing today.

Mr. Speaker, host of the popular radio show, Hawkeye in the Morning, Mark ``Hawkeye'' Louis is an avid baseball card collector. Since his childhood, Hawkeye spent years collecting Major League Baseball cards, with the collection eventually totaling an impressive 17,000 cards. Instead of letting the collection continue to collect dust, he decided to give back to our community by selling the cards and donating the proceeds.

Hawkeye decided the enormous impact of donating the more than $10,000 in proceeds would make him more proud than hanging onto the cards ever could. His background in volunteer work and fundraising at DFW children's hospitals made Cook Children's Hospital in Fort Worth the perfect choice.

Hawkeye's story is inspiring and his selfless donation will help hundreds of children in our district. I want to thank Mark ``Hawkeye'' Louis for his ongoing support of North Texas children and children's hospitals throughout our community.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of the Tax Relief for American Families Act. This is actually paid for. It will extend the Trump-era tax cuts that brought us record employment, economic growth, and wages that grew at a rate nearly 5 percent higher than inflation.

If we do not make these important reforms to our tax code, my home State of Texas will lose more than 8,000 jobs and nearly $700 million in wages.

Importantly, this bill will maintain Trump-era safeguards in work requirements to the child tax credit to ensure that it only goes to American citizens, making it one of the few tax credits to actually have the strong requirement for block claims from illegal immigrants and noncitizens.

Mr. Speaker, I stand with north Texas families.

Mr. Chair, I rise today in strong support of H.R. 5585, the Agent Raul Gonzalez Officer Safety Act. This bill is named in honor of a heroic Border Patrol agent who was tragically killed in the line of duty last year while pursuing illegal migrants as they attempted to evade capture in my home State of Texas.

The crisis at our southern border threatens our community safety and our national security. Far too often, we see smugglers and illegal immigrants, desperate to evade detection

and prosecution, who are willing to endanger themselves and innocent bystanders by taking brave law enforcement officers like Agent Gonzalez on high-speed chases.

Tragically, this administration deliberately opened our borders to weaken national security, and their policies continue to encourage smugglers and cartels, who stand to make a profit by moving illegal immigrants and drugs into our country. Our Border Patrol agents want nothing more than to secure the border and apprehend those illegal migrants, but this administration won't let them do their jobs.

As we have seen, cartel members, smugglers, and human traffickers have no qualms about surpassing speeds of 100 miles per hour, or greater, even in residential areas. Our law enforcement officers have to make a difficult decision in those cases about whether or not to pursue the vehicle. This pursuit could make a difference in a child's life who is in the grips of a human trafficker or could also prevent thousands of doses of deadly fentanyl from reaching our communities and murdering our children.

H.R. 5585 will help protect our brave law enforcement officers by criminalizing the act of fleeing from Border Patrol agents and local law enforcement officers. By passing this bill, we will give our law enforcement officers the tools they need to prosecute and punish criminals who engage in these dangerous high-speed chases. We will ensure that any illegal alien who evades Border Patrol agents can be deported and not allowed to return to our country.

Mr. Chair, we have a solemn duty to do everything in our power to protect those who protect us. I am grateful to my friend, the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Ciscomani), for offering this important piece of legislation and to Senator Cruz for offering a similar measure in the U.S. Senate.

Mr. Speaker, in 1985, when a group of churches and community organizations saw that children across North Texas were in need, they rose to the occasion, creating the Network of Community Ministries. Today this incredible organization has expanded to serve fourteen zip codes, providing programming such as basic needs assistance, mobile food pantries, stabilization programs, and mental health services.

During the school year, the mobile food pantry stops at seven Title 1 schools, where almost half of the school's students qualify for free and reduced lunch. Over Christmas break when students aren't in school, many of these students go hungry without provided lunch. So, the Network of Community Ministries stepped up, giving students nonperishable food items to eat over the break.

The Network of Community Ministries' impact on the greater-Dallas community is far-reaching and hundreds of families have been blessed by their consistent, dedicated work. I want to thank the Network of Community Ministries for their work to provide food for North Texas children and families over the Christmas Break.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to celebrate the dedication and renaming of the Whistlestop Plaza Clock Tower to honor Marvin Randle, who is not only the former Mayor of Irving, but also a beloved mentor and friend. His lifetime of service to our city spans a variety from his decades as a devoted small business owner, community leader, and public servant. I'm pleased that the Whistlestop Plaza Clock Tower will be renamed in his honor as a tribute to his impact on our community

Marvin has dedicated his life to making our city better, always looking for ways to improve the lives of those around him. Through his small business, Irving Counter Top, Marvin created 1,200 jobs for North Texans, inspiring many with his entrepreneurial spirit and desire to do good.

From sponsoring local sports teams and charities to serving in leadership roles in local organizations, Marvin has always found ways to embrace our community. Whether he's cooking fish fries for the Irving Heritage Society or flipping burgers at hamburger cookouts to support the Irving Police Department, Marvin's legacy will always be one of selfless service.

A pillar of our community, it is fitting that we honor Marvin by dedicating the Whistlestop Plaza Clock Tower as the Randle Clock Tower. On this momentous occasion, I want to honor and thank my dear friends and mentors, Marvin and Bobbie Randle, for their enduring commitment to serving others.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of legislation introduced by my good friend from Minnesota, a strong voice for the voiceless, Mrs. Fischbach.

The Supporting Pregnant and Parenting Families Act blocks a disastrous rule proposed by the Biden administration which would strip funding from pregnancy resource centers.

As we heard in last week's markup, those who oppose this bill have even admitted that they are pro-life starting only 2 seconds after you are born.

Ironically, so many on the other side of the aisle, most of whom can't even define what a woman is, not only share in this delusion, but also claim to be the party of women's rights.

Now, I am sorry. We just heard that these centers are masquerading as women's healthcare facilities. You want to talk about masquerading as providing women's healthcare? Let's look at their pro-abortion facilities. They are not providing healthcare. Mr. Speaker, 97 to 98 percent of the services that they provide are abortions, not healthcare services.

My colleagues on the left claim that it is somehow worse for a mother to have access to the vital services offered by pregnancy resource centers. In fact, the gentlewoman from California defined them as extremists.

Let's explore the services that these pregnancy centers offer that my colleagues find so offensive and so extreme.

Let's see. How does it hurt for a young family to have access to free prenatal vitamins, formula, and diapers? How about free maternity and baby clothing? How about educational classes on unplanned pregnancy, childbirth, parenting, and adoption information? How about free life skills training and help with housing? How extreme? How offensive?

As is clear by the nearly 1 million women assisted by pregnancy resource centers in 2022, they provide an extraordinary service to women and families across the country.

Mr. Speaker, Texas is home to 200 pregnancy resource centers, and I will not stand by as the Biden administration attempts to take away choice from pregnant women, nor will I stand by and allow them to block funding for the vital programs offered by these pregnancy centers.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of my Texas colleague's resolution condemning the purposeful actions of the Biden administration and Secretary Mayorkas for turning over our Nation's security and southern border to Mexican cartels and ushering in a vast tsunami of over 10 million illegal immigrants, who are overwhelming our cities and our States.

Ten million illegal immigrants have come here illegally, yet my Democratic colleagues insist the border is closed, nothing to see here.

Indeed, the Biden administration has enabled a horrific new era of human slavery, forced labor, and child sex trafficking that is destroying the lives of tens of thousands of people and causing crime to escalate across America, all because they refuse to enforce our laws that are already written.

This isn't about creating a whole new immigration process. This is about forcing the administration and agencies to do their jobs.

Democrats admit that the President's additional funding request isn't about securing the border or national security, but it is about processing illegals faster into the country.

With more than 100,000 dead Americans from Chinese-supplied and Mexican cartel-trafficked fentanyl into our country, we need to understand that we are at war.

The Biden administration has gleefully brought this misery and destruction to the American people. The first job of the Federal Government is to protect our rights and protect our homeland. Unfortunately, under the Biden administration's disgraceful and dangerous actions, the American people are less safe. We face a national security catastrophe, and the leftists running the White House could not care less.

All of Congress should stand up for the American people, stand up for truly secure borders, and empower Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the brave men and women of our Border Patrol to do their jobs, lock down the border, and fight the Mexican cartels. This is what Americans want, and this is what Americans deserve.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize our Texas-24 Hometown Hero, Saisheren Senpon of Irving.

Ever since he was three years old, Saisheren has been practicing karate. Now, 20 years later, he has become an elite athlete at Champion Karate Academy, earning a 3rd Degree Black Belt and a spot on the USA Karate Senior National Team.

As Mayor of Irving in 2014, I had the privilege of recognizing Saisheren for his accomplishments and am impressed by all that he has gone on to accomplish.

Following in his parents' footsteps, both of whom were national champions in karate, Saisheren is a nine-time National Champion, multiple-time US Open champion, three-time Pan-American Champion, and a gold medalist in the Junior Pan American Games, Cali 2021. Most recently, he brought home the bronze medal in the 84kg category for Team USA at the Pan American Games, Santiago 2023. He currently stands at No. 47 in the world rankings.

Congratulations to Saisheren, and I wish him continued success in his karate career.

Madam Speaker, I rise today in support of this joint resolution to rescind this detrimental and job-killing regulation from the Biden administration. This final rule revives the Obama-era joint employer standard and leaves companies liable for employees whom they don't oversee or directly manage.

As co-chair of the Congressional Franchise Caucus and chair of the Committee on Small Business' Oversight Subcommittee, I have heard from countless franchise businesses about this rule. Overwhelmingly, they would suffer drastically. They would lose out on income, opportunity, and autonomy over their business.

The cost is not small. A very similar 2015 standard cost the franchising sector over $33 billion per year. It resulted in nearly 400,000 lost job opportunities, and it practically doubled litigation against franchises.

My home State of Texas continues to lead the Nation in job growth and is the fastest growing State for franchise establishments. This misguided policy would hurt these job creators who want nothing more than to provide for their families and offer job opportunities to our communities.

Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support this resolution to push back on the Biden administration's vast overreach and give our small businesses the chance to survive and to thrive.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today on behalf of a grateful Nation and the citizens of the Twenty-Fourth District of Texas, the 2023 Congressional Veteran Commendation is hereby presented to Dannie Needham, Staff Sergeant, United States Air Force, of North Richland Hills, Texas for the honorable service he performed while in the Armed Forces of the United States of America and for his continued service to his community.

Mr. Needham enlisted in the U.S. Air Force in 1966, serving as a fuel specialist, with service in Vietnam. During his time in Vietnam, the airbase where he was stationed was attacked by North Vietnamese forces as a part of the Tet Offensive. While he was refueling a C-130 aircraft, an enemy mortar round hit the aircraft destroying it and causing secondary explosions across the airfield. With the fuel truck still near the aircraft, he raced to move the truck and then administered aid to another soldier who had been engulfed in fire retardant. His actions during the Tet Offensive earned him the Airman of the Year Award for the U.S. Pacific Air Forces. His decorations include the Air Medal with three Oak Leaf Clusters, the Good Conduct Medal, the National Defense Service Medal, the Vietnam Service Medal, and the Republic of Vietnam Campaign Medal.

The selflessness Mr. Needham demonstrated in the U.S. Air Force continues with his service to his community. He actively volunteers with the North Richland Hills Police Department and the Knights of Columbus. He is also a member of the Men's Club of the Good Shepard Catholic Church as well as a volunteer of the church. Mr. Needham's service is consistent with the finest traditions of the United States Air Force and reflects great credit upon himself, the State of Texas, and the United States of America.

Mr. Speaker. I rise today on behalf of a grateful Nation and the citizens of the Twenty-Fourth District of Texas, the 2023 Congressional Veteran Commendation is hereby presented to Darwin Bybee, Master Sergeant, United States Air Force, of Coppell, Texas for the honorable service he performed while in the Armed Forces of the United States of America and for his continued service to his community.

Mr. Bybee enlisted in the U.S. Air Force in 1958, serving as an intelligence specialist with service at the National Security Agency, an assignment as a consultant to Secretary of State Henry Kissinger's Strategic Evaluation Task Force, and in West Berlin during the height of the Cold War. His decorations include the Meritorious Service Medal, the Air Force Commendation Medal with one Oak Leaf Cluster, the Air Force Good Conduct Medal with one Silver Oak Leaf Cluster, the Air Force Longevity Service Award with four Oak Leaf Clusters, the National Defense Service Medal, and Small Arms Expert Marksmanship Ribbon, the Army Good Conduct Medal, and the Army of Occupation Medal.

The selflessness Mr. Bybee demonstrated in the U.S. Air Force continues with his service to his community. Over the past 15 years, he has served as a State Veterans Advocate at the VA Waco Regional Office and the American Legion Department of Texas. With the American Legion, he served in numerous positions of leadership including mentorship to the youth as Chairman of the Boys State Program. He also served as a precinct chair, a poll watcher, and in multiple leadership positions with the Heart of Texas Stamp Club. He was a volunteer of the AARP Tax- Aide Program where he assisted senior citizens with their taxes across the DFW Metroplex. He currently serves as the Chairman of the Coppell Senior Center Advisory Committee.

Mr. Bybee's service is consistent with the finest traditions of the United States Air Force and reflects great credit upon himself, the State of Texas, and the United States of America.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today on behalf of a grateful nation and the citizens of the Twenty-Fourth District of Texas, the 2023 Congressional Veteran Commendation is hereby presented to Patrick Ryan, Major, United States Army, of Southlake, Texas for the honorable service he performed while in the Armed Forces of the United States of America and for his continued service to his community.

Mr. Ryan was commissioned as an officer in the U.S. Army in 1972, serving as a Military Police officer. His decorations include the Army Commendation Medal, the National Defense Service Medal, the Korea Service Medal, and the Armed Forces Expeditionary Medal.

The selflessness Mr. Ryan demonstrated in the U.S. Army continues with his service to his community. He currently serves as the Fundraising Chair for the St. Peter Lutheran Church in Roanoke.

Mr. Ryan's service is consistent with the finest traditions of the United States Army and reflects great credit upon himself, the State of Texas, and the United States of America.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today on behalf of a grateful Nation and the citizens of the Twenty-Fourth District of Texas, the 2023 Congressional Veteran Commendation is hereby presented to Jason Rankin, Sergeant First Class, United States Army, of Dallas, Texas for the honorable service he performed while in the Armed Forces of the United States of America and for his continued service to his community.

Mr. Rankin enlisted in the U.S. Army in 1993, serving as a medical specialist, with service in Iraq and Bosnia. His decorations include the Bronze Star, Army Commendation Medal (9th Award), the Iraq Campaign Medal with three Campaign Stars, the Army Good Conduct Medal (6th Award), the National Defense Service Medal, the Armed Forces Expeditionary Medal, the Global War on Terrorism Service Medal, the Korea Defense Service Medal, the Armed Forces Service Medal, the Overseas Service Ribbon (5th Award), the NATO Medal, as well as the Combat Action Badge and the Expert Field Medical Badge.

The selflessness Mr. Rankin demonstrated in the U.S. Army continues with his service to his community. He spends time as a vocational rehabilitation counselor helping those in the community with disabilities get school, training, prosthetics, hearing aids, vehicle modifications, and job placement to get them back to work.

Mr. Rankin's service is consistent with the finest traditions of the United States Army and reflects great credit upon himself, the State of Texas, and the United States of America.