Floor Statements

I thank the chairman for yielding and for his leadership on this issue.

To the gentleman from Washington, I would tell him yesterday this House voted to cut government spending and keep the government open. Today this House will vote to cut government regulations and keep the Internet open. That's what this is all about.

Let me add that, to the gentleman from Pennsylvania who said all the FCC is doing is making two simple promises, here they are: 200 pages, single spaced, small print, to make two simple promises to keep the Internet open.

Well, guess what. The Internet is open now and we have laws to protect keeping the Internet open now, and they are called antitrust laws. If they need to be modified, they should come forward with those proposals. But the Internet is open today.

And to my friends in the technology community, and they are my friends, some of whom think this is a great thing the FCC is doing, I would say to them, be careful what you ask for because these 200 pages are just the beginning. There will be thousands of pages more as they illegally try to blast their way into regulating the most valuable invention in the history of the world. That is what is going on here.

And to the gentlewoman from California who says there is a market power analysis, I refer to page 12 of the very FCC regulations, which says: ``We are not performing a market power analysis in this proceeding.''

This issue is very, very important. The Internet is based upon free enterprise. It is based upon individual initiative and creativity. It is not based upon government regulation, and government regulation will stifle it and ultimately snuff it out. If you want proof of that, go look at government-

regulated Internets in other countries around the world like China and Iran. That is not what this country is about. We are about protecting the greatest job creator we have ever made in this country.

Support this resolution. Oppose the naysayers.

I rise in support of House Joint Resolution 37. Many Internet content providers are concerned, as am I, about proposals to create different classes of content on the Internet or to discriminate against legitimate content or services online.

Unfortunately, I believe that the FCC has gone too far in its recent action and urge a yes vote on H.J. Res. 37, which would eliminate uncertainty created in the marketplace by the FCC's power-grab.

I believe in free market principles and the fact that Government involvement often stifles innovation. I also believe that our Nation's antitrust laws have served as important guidelines to ensure that markets remain competitive and that these antitrust laws must remain applicable to ensure that Internet access providers do not discriminate against or block access to certain Web sites, services, or content. In fact, the Judiciary Subcommittee on Intellectual Property, Competition, and the Internet, which I chair, recently held a hearing to discuss the impact of antitrust laws on net neutrality. I urge passage of this resolution.

I thank the chairman for yielding me the time and for his leadership on this issue.

I rise in strong support of this legislation.

Despite President Obama stating that he would prefer Congress to take the lead in determining how to handle greenhouse gases, what do you know? The Environmental Protection Agency has begun their own plan to regulate greenhouse gases.

American voters spoke in November, and they clearly rejected the cap- and-trade agenda that was offered in this Congress last year and that was not taken up in the United States Senate. Now we, ourselves, are faced with the need to act. So unless Congress acts to stop the EPA, this administration and the Environmental Protection Agency will enact their own cap-and-trade-like agenda.

Without action, the EPA will add more regulatory red tape onto American businesses and manufacturers, hampering the ability of companies to operate competitively in the United States. These businesses could be forced to move those jobs overseas, to locations with fewer regulatory burdens, or they could simply pass these increased costs on to American consumers. Either choice is not good for jobs in America. Without action, these regulations will be paid by anyone who turns on a light switch or who plugs in an appliance.

We must stop the EPA from continuing their spree of overregulating our economy. During this economic slow-down, we should be adopting policies that seek to rebuild our economy and create more jobs. We should be producing more energy, an all-of-the-above energy plan that I know the Energy and Commerce Committee is working on, to increase the domestic production of oil and natural gas and coal and safe nuclear power and to encourage new productions from new sources of energy.

Let's make America energy independent. Let's not raise the cost of energy and ship jobs overseas, which will cost millions of American jobs. We should be doing just the opposite. This legislation starts us on that path, and I urge my colleagues to support it.

Mr. Speaker, each week, folks across Virginia and the nation are confronted with the rising cost of energy. However, Virginians understand that a major component in lessening energy costs is to produce more energy.

I believe that Virginia should have every tool available to access their energy supplies. For

many years, the Commonwealth of Virginia has seriously been considering the potential positive impact that Outer Continental Shelf (OCS) development off Virginia's coast would have on the Commonwealth. In fact, there has been wide support for environmentally responsible energy production by the Governor of Virginia, the Virginia General Assembly and by many local governments in the Commonwealth.

The Commonwealth of Virginia has made it clear that they want to access their energy resources. I believe that we should access these resources and we can do it while being environmentally responsible. Therefore, I rise today, with the majority of the Virginia Congressional Delegation, to introduce the ``Virginia Access to Energy Act,'' to give the Commonwealth access to these energy supplies. This legislation would start energy production off of Virginia's coast based on the Department of Interior's own proposal. This legislation simply requires that the Department of Interior proceed with their proposed Virginia lease sale no later than one year after passage of this legislation.

Passage of this legislation and development of VA's OCS will significantly boost the economy of the Commonwealth of Virginia. It has been estimated by the U.S. Department of Interior that Virginia's OCS has 130 million barrels of recoverable oil and 1.14 trillion cubic feet of recoverable natural gas. This translates into a significant boost to the economy of the Commonwealth of Virginia. In fact, some estimates have shown that development of Virginia's OCS will create 2,578 full- time equivalent positions on an annual basis, induce capital investment of $7.84 billion, yield $644 million in direct and indirect payroll, and result in $271 million in state and local taxes. While exploration activities alone will infuse the Virginia economy with a significant amount of new capital, this legislation will also authorize any qualified revenues generated by the lease sales to be shared between the federal government and the Commonwealth of Virginia. Additionally, the legislation sets up revenue-sharing for the Commonwealth for any future lease sales off of Virginia's coast.

My legislation, the Virginia Access to Energy Act, is an important component to any long-term strategy to reduce our dangerous dependence on foreign oil. This legislation ensures that Virginia has every tool available to access its energy supplies, while at the same time creating thousands of jobs for Virginians and infusing the Commonwealth with new capital growth. I urge Congress to pass this legislation to allow Virginia to move towards a path of energy independence.

Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

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

For the past 2 years, we've seen the administration and the Environmental Protection Agency take overzealous action in the Chesapeake Bay Watershed, with the potential to dramatically affect jobs, the economy, and local government budgets throughout the six- State region.

The EPA has proposed arbitrary limits on the amounts of nutrients that can enter the Chesapeake Bay and how these nutrients enter the bay. At the same time, the EPA is seeking to expand their regulatory authority by seizing authority granted to the States and converting the bay's cleanup effort into a process that is a top-down approach with mandatory regulations.

These overzealous regulations will affect everyone who lives, works, and farms in the Chesapeake Bay Watershed, and the cost of complying with these requirements will be devastating during our current economic downturn, resulting in many billions of dollars in economic losses to States, cities, towns, farms and other businesses, large and small.

The EPA's approach is far from the best approach to restore the Chesapeake Bay. I believe that each individual State and the localities in each State know better how to manage the State's water quality goals than the bureaucrats at the EPA.

I'm sure that there are some who wonder why what is happening in the Chesapeake Bay Watershed is important to their district. While EPA's unprecedented actions are starting in the Chesapeake Bay, they are coming to a watershed in your region of the country in your State. The EPA has stated in the document ``A Coming Together for Clean Water: EPA's Strategy for Achieving Clean Water'' that ``The EPA will use the Chesapeake Bay as a demonstration for strengthening total maximum daily load pollution-reduction plans. The Chesapeake Bay Watershed will be a model for watershed protection in other parts of the country.''

It is important that we in Congress tell the EPA to slow down. The EPA does not have the authority to micromanage States' water quality goals, and we must stop their power gap.

I want to be clear, we all agree more must be done to restore the bay, and this is not meant to cut off the good work that is happening in the bay watershed. We have made substantial investments to clean up the bay. This amendment will not stop work that is going on in the States or the voluntary programs managed by Federal agencies that work with those on the ground to restore water quality. What this amendment will do is stop the EPA's regulatory power grab. It will stop the EPA from taking over responsibilities that have traditionally been left to the States.

I yield to the gentleman from Kentucky.

I thank the gentleman.

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

Mr. Chairman, it is my pleasure to yield 1 minute to the chairman of the Conservation Subcommittee, the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Thompson).

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself the balance of my time to make two points.

First of all, the gentleman from Virginia is quite correct. The Chesapeake Bay is getting healthier, and that's a very, very good thing, all of which is happening as a result of the voluntary, incentivized, State-controlled regulation of this process. None of it has occurred under this TMDL provision that the gentleman from Maryland referred to, because of the fact that it is only now being imposed on farmers. They are very concerned about it, as are small cities and towns, as are homebuilders and others. This will have a devastating economic impact on the entire bay region, small cities and large included.

The second point is that we checked with the Department of Agriculture, and we checked with counsel on the Agriculture Committee. They agree that this restricts only those purposes described in the legislation related to the implementation of this language related to what the EPA is trying to do with their TMDL.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I rise to enter into a colloquy with the chairwoman.

Without consulting with my office in any way, the General Services Administration took advantage of the lack of specific congressional direction in the stimulus bill and initiated renovation work on the Richard H. Poff Federal Building, a Federal building in my district, in Roanoke, Virginia. This renovation was funded at $51 million. However, the total cost for the renovations are now in excess of $65 million when you factor in the relocation costs for the agencies that were located in the Poff building.

I have repeatedly demanded a comprehensive cost-benefit analysis from the GSA showing that this project is financially worthwhile, as is required by law. To date, I have not received such an analysis.

It is completely unacceptable for GSA to move forward any further with this project until such an analysis is produced.

I would like to request that you and the committee commit to working with me to demand that the GSA provide a comprehensive cost-benefit analysis that shows these renovations are worthwhile before any further funds are appropriated to renovate this Federal building.

I thank the gentlewoman.

Mr. Chairman, I rise to enter into a colloquy with the chairwoman.

I intended to offer an amendment that would have prevented funds from being used in this bill to subsidize wireless phone service in the underlying legislation. As you know, the Universal Service Fund provides Federal money to subsidize landline and cell phone service for low-income individuals.

I can understand the need to ensure that low-income individuals have a basic telecommunications link of some sort for emergency calls. However, the State and local governments are the appropriate levels of government to provide this service.

Especially in a time of fiscal distress like we are currently facing, I do not believe it is the role of the Federal Government to be subsidizing cell phone service.

Would the chairwoman commit to work with me on report language in the fiscal year 2012 appropriations bill addressing this issue?

I thank the chairman.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to introduce the bipartisan ``Security and Fairness Enhancement (SAFE) for America Act.'' This much-needed legislation eliminates the controversial visa lottery program, through which 50,000 aliens are chosen at random to come and live permanently in the United States based on pure luck. The visa lottery program threatens national security, results in the unfair administration of our Nation's immigration laws, and encourages a cottage industry for fraudulent opportunists.

Because winners of the visa lottery are chosen at random, the visa lottery program presents a serious national security threat. A perfect example of the system gone awry is the case of Hesham Mohamed Ali Hedayet, the Egyptian national who killed two and wounded three during a shooting spree at Los Angeles International Airport in July of 2002. He was allowed to apply for lawful permanent resident status in 1997 because of his wife's status as a visa lottery winner.

The State Department's Inspector General has even weighed in on the national security threat posed by the visa lottery program. During testimony before the House Committee on the Judiciary, the Office of Inspector General stated that the Office ``continues to believe that the diversity visa program contains significant risks to national security from hostile intelligence officers, criminals, and terrorists attempting to use the program for entry into the United States as permanent residents.''

Even if improvements were made to the visa lottery program, nothing would prevent terrorist organizations or foreign intelligence agencies from planting members in the U.S. by having those members apply for the program. As long as those individuals do not have previous criminal backgrounds, these types of organized efforts would never be detected, even if significant background checks and counter-fraud measures were enacted within the program.

Usually, immigrant visas are issued to foreign nationals that have existing connections with family members lawfully residing in the United States or with U.S. employers. These types of relationships help ensure that immigrants entering our country have a stake in continuing America's success and have needed skills to contribute to our Nation's economy. However, under the visa lottery program, visas are awarded to immigrants at random without meeting such criteria.

In addition, the visa lottery program is unfair to immigrants who comply with the United States' immigration laws. The visa lottery program does not expressly prohibit illegal aliens from applying to receive visas through the program. Thus, the program treats foreign nationals that comply with our laws the same as those that blatantly violate our laws. In addition, most family-sponsored immigrants currently face a wait of years to obtain visas, yet the lottery program pushes 50,000 random immigrants with no particular family ties, job skills or education ahead of these family and employer-sponsored immigrants each year with relatively no wait. This sends the wrong message to those who wish to enter our great country and to the international community as a whole.

Furthermore, the visa lottery program is wrought with fraud. A report released by the Center for Immigration Studies states that it is commonplace for foreign nationals to apply for the lottery program multiple times using many different aliases. In addition, the visa lottery program has spawned a cottage industry featuring sponsors in the U.S. who falsely promise success to applicants in exchange for large sums of money. Ill-informed foreign nationals are willing to pay top dollar for the ``guarantee'' of lawful permanent resident status in the U.S.

The State Department's Office of Inspector General confirms these allegations of widespread fraud in a September 2003 report. Specifically, the report states that the visa lottery program is ``subject to widespread abuse'' and that ``identity fraud is endemic, and fraudulent documents are commonplace.'' Furthermore, the report also reveals that the State Department found that 364,000 duplicate applications were detected in the 2003 visa lottery alone.

In addition, the visa lottery program is by its very nature discriminatory. The complex formula for assigning visas under the program arbitrarily disqualifies natives from countries that send more than 50,000 immigrants to the U.S. within a five-year period, which excludes nationals from countries such as Brazil, Canada, India, the Philippines and others.

The visa lottery program represents what is wrong with our country's immigration system. My legislation would eliminate the visa lottery program. The removal of this controversial program will help ensure our Nation's security, make the administration of our immigration

laws more consistent and fair, and help reduce immigration fraud and opportunism.

Offered By: Mr. Goodlatte

Amendment No. 467: At the end of the bill (before the short

title), insert the following:

Offered By Mr. Goodlatte

Amendment No. 468: At the end of the bill (before the short

title), insert the following:

Offered By: Mr. Goodlatte

Amendment No. 469: At the end of the bill (before the short

title), insert the following:

Offered By: Mr. Goodlatte

Amendment No. 470: At the end of the bill (before the short

title), insert the following:

Offered By: Mr. Goodlatte

Amendment No. 471: At the end of the bill, before the short

title, insert the following:

limitation on funds for non-federal museums

Sec. 4002. None of the funds appropriated, or otherwise

made available, by this Act may be used to fund non-Federal

museums.

Offered By: Mr. Goodlatte

Amendment No. 225: At the end of the bill (before the short

title), insert the following:

Offered By: Mr. Goodlatte

Amendment No. 226: At the end of the bill (before the short

title), insert the following:

Offered By: Mr. Goodlatte

Amendment No. 227: Page 251, line 20, after the dollar

amount, insert ``(reduced by $5,000,000)''.

Page 252, line 15, after the first dollar amount, insert

``(reduced by $5,000,000)''.

Page 359, line 11, after the dollar amount, insert

``(increased by $5,000,000)''.

Offered By: Mr. Goodlatte

Amendment No. 228: At the end of the bill (before the short

title), insert the following: