Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, many of my Democratic colleagues today have criticized Republicans in Congress as do- nothings, but my own view is a little different.

It is certainly true that the Nation has real needs. Economists tell us that legislation held hostage here would create millions of jobs and put many Americans back to work. Instead of addressing those needs, Congress is just dysfunctional.

But considering what Republicans in Congress want to do, it is a great blessing that Congress has done next to nothing. They have repeatedly voted to repeal health care reform--33 times according to one count--as if denying health insurance for preexisting conditions would put Americans back to work.

They have voted to gut or eliminate the funding for Wall Street reform--putting us right back where we were 5 years ago with the Bush administration policies that created the painful downturn that we are now in--and at least 55 times voted to restrict women's reproductive rights and access to affordable health care, which included repeated attempts to eliminate funding for Planned Parenthood. It is hard to see that as a job creation agenda.

Mr. Speaker, better to do nothing than what they want to do.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of the Honoring America's Veterans and Caring for Camp Lejeune Families Act, which the House will consider later today, especially title I, the Janey Ensminger Act.

Title I and a similar House bill honor a 9-year-old girl who died from childhood leukemia, most likely because she was exposed to contaminated drinking water at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, when her mother was pregnant with her.

And by honoring Janey Ensminger, we honor those Americans who have shown remarkable determination to make their government do the right thing. They have struggled for more than a decade to learn exactly what chemicals were in the drinking water at Camp Lejeune, water that perhaps a million marines and their families were exposed to over a 30- year period, to learn the health effects of exposure to the contaminated drinking water, and to seek justice for those harmed.

They took on their own government, including the Marine Corps they had served and to which they are still loyal, but which has been shamefully reluctant to accept responsibility for the water contamination.

Janey's father, Jerry Ensminger, is a retired marine who lived with his family on base at Camp Lejeune for a time. Jerry watched his daughter become ill from leukemia, struggle with the disease, and eventually lose the struggle. Years after he watched his daughter die, Jerry learned of the water contamination at Camp Lejeune and has not rested since.

I first met Jerry 4 years ago when he testified powerfully on the Science and Technology Committee's Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight, which I then chaired. Jerry worked shoulder to shoulder with others, including Tom Townsend, Mike Partain, Jim Fontella, the Byron family and William Hill against long odds.

The Janey Ensminger Act is the result of their remarkable efforts. They were always faithful to the cause of justice for those harmed by the contaminated drinking water.

The Janey Ensminger Act will require the VA to provide medical coverage for certain illnesses to veterans who served at Camp Lejeune between 1957 and 1987, and to their families. The VA will be the ``payer of last resort.'' Justice requires no less for the people harmed by the water contamination at Camp Lejeune.

The harm will never be fully made right. The bill will not help Janey or her father. But the Janey Ensminger Act acknowledges responsibility and provides needed treatment for many others.

The marines who have championed this legislation served our democracy when they wore our Nation's uniform, and they served our democracy by their determination to obtain justice for the people harmed by the toxic drinking water at Camp Lejeune.

Mr. Speaker, the Department of the Navy has known for 30 years that the drinking water at Camp Lejeune was contaminated. They've known for 20 years exactly what chemicals were in the water. The science may have been slow to develop on the effects of exposure to those chemicals, but they knew better than to say there was nothing to worry about, which is what they did.

The Navy concealed information from Marines and their families who drank the water, cooked with it, and bathed in it. They withheld information from the Centers for Disease Control and from Congress. And they have shamefully failed to take responsibility for the contaminated water.

Senator Burr and I introduced companion bills 2 years ago to provide treatment for certain diseases associated with exposure to the water. That legislation, the Janey Ensminger Act, is title I of this bill. Justice requires at least the benefits the Janey Ensminger Act provides.

I thank Chairman Miller and the Veterans' Affairs Committee for bringing this bill to the floor.

Mr. Chairman, the astronomical estimates we hear on the cost of regulation assume that no business would ever do anything that any regulation requires unless there was a regulation requiring them to do it.

The truth is that most businesses really want to do the right thing. Most businesses try to have a safe workplace. Most businesses try not to pollute the air and pollute the water and release toxic chemicals that are going to affect public health. Most businesses want to have safe products. They don't want to produce baby formulas that are going to hurt infants. Those folks do the right things.

The other folks who don't want to do that and would save a little bit of money by not doing anything that common decency requires, in addition to regulations, they hire lobbyists and they make campaign contributions. Those are the folks that we need regulations for.

Mr. Chairman, most Americans don't know what this bill really does. They don't know what a ``freeze on significant regulations'' really means without a long explanation, and a reporter who's trying to get air time to talk about this bill or print space is not going to have much luck. This bill is just too in the weeds, and Republicans obviously think that there is public safety in the weeds.

If Republicans were to try to bring a bill to the floor that openly repealed

the Wall Street Reform Act, the Clean Water Act, the Food and Safety Act, and on and on, that bill would get some attention. This bill does much the same thing as repealing those acts but without being honest about it. They would have to explain themselves to their constituents if they just up and repealed those laws. Instead, Republicans are speaking in political gobbledygook. They don't tell folks what this bill is really doing. It's like adults who spell out words so their children won't know what they're talking about. Their constituents, Republicans hope, will not know what ``red tape reduction'' means, really. It sounds good, but the effect is to undo all of the protections that we depend upon from our government.

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to clause 1, rule I, I demand a vote on agreeing to the Speaker's approval of the Journal.

Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to honor the lives of four North Carolinians: Lieutenant Colonel Paul K. Mikeal of Mooresville, Major Joseph M. McCormack of Belmont, Major Ryan S. David of Boone, and Senior Master Sergeant Robert S. Cannon of Charlotte.

The four airmen of the North Carolina National Guard's 145th Airlift Wing were supporting firefighting efforts throughout the Rocky Mountains when their aircraft crashed on July 1. Their sacrifice reminds us of the selflessness of those who put their lives at risk to protect our lives and property.

Our thoughts and prayers go out to the entire North Carolina National Guard community. We are grateful for their service and for their courage.

Tomorrow will be a peculiar day in Washington and in American politics.

Republicans will denounce ideas that they enthusiastically supported until those ideas became associated somehow with the Obama administration.

We expect to hear the ruling on the individual mandate across the street at the Supreme Court. The individual mandate was the centerpiece of Republican health care proposals until the Obama administration embraced it. Then the Republicans decided it was an outrageous infringement on personal liberty.

Here in this Chamber, we will debate Operation Fast and Furious. Most Democrats, including me, don't really even quite get what the supposed scandal is about, but have always thought that gun sales in large quantities to drug cartels was just generally a bad idea. For Republicans, on the other hand, the gun sales that were part of Operation Fast and Furious appear to be the only gun sales they've ever had a problem with. We will also have a 180-degree reversal on the issue of information that Congress can require as part of our oversight powers.

I was an Oversight Subcommittee chairman for 4 years. I believe congressional oversight is an important check on the executive branch of government, an established, important part of our Republic system of checks and balances. I support investigations that might make an administration of my own party look foolish or worse. I want people who have the power of government, of either party, to be accountable for their decisions. I want them to pause over how they will explain their decisions in public; and if they can't explain them, maybe they shouldn't do it. Congressional oversight exposes and deters abuses of power and garden-variety stupidity of which there is plenty in the public sector, in the private sector, and in all activities in which human beings are involved.

But the courts have also recognized that uninhibited, candid discussions improve decisions. Decisions are less likely to be stupid when they are carefully discussed, and the courts protect the privacy of some discussions within the executive branch to further the goal of fewer stupid decisions. The courts recognize a strong privilege for discussion between the President and his top advisers and a lesser privilege, a qualified privilege, for other debates within the executive branch.

When I was an Oversight Subcommittee chairman, I read many of the court decisions that discussed those privileges. Anyone who says that the law is clear, in that what is privileged and what is not is well defined, is misinformed or dishonest.

Five years ago, the Democratic majority disagreed with a Republican President over whether information we sought as part of our oversight powers was privileged. There was plenty of partisan acrimony at the time, but we found a simple solution. We filed a lawsuit to ask a judge to decide whether we were entitled to the testimony and the documents that we had subpoenaed. The Bush administration argued that the court shouldn't decide the case. The judge disagreed. The judge said that enforcing subpoenas and deciding what testimony or documents are privileged is something courts do every day. Judges expect lawyers to make careful, calm arguments based on the law and the facts; and they have little patience for tedious, dishonest talking points or personal attacks.

The debate here tomorrow will not even remotely resemble a legal argument in court. So we could go now to a court to clarify the law. I would support that. Many Democrats would support that--but no. Instead, House Republicans are going to force a vote to prosecute the Attorney General for the crime of taking a plausible position on uncertain legal issues. Instead of asking for a careful, calm decision by a judge on a legal issue, House Republicans are choosing an intemperate, acrimonious debate here in this Chamber over legal issues about which few Members have the first clue.

Why? The only possible reason is that House Republicans just like partisan acrimony.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to congratulate Steven Meyer on the occasion of his 90th birthday. Mr. Meyer is being honored by his family for the exceptional life he has led and for his many accomplishments in both the professional and personal realms.

Born in Moers, Germany in 1922, Mr. Meyer fled the Nazi Occupation with his family in 1939 and settled in New York, New York. Drafted by the Army in 1943, Mr. Meyer served with the Army Corps of Engineers in the European Theater of Operations. During his military career he worked as a planner for the D-Day invasion of Normandy, and while in the service Mr. Meyer gained his American citizenship. Following the war, Mr. Meyer had a 30-year career as a contract manager with Koppers Company in Pittsburgh, PA. While in Pittsburgh, he earned his degree in Mechanical Engineering from Carnegie Tech, now Carnegie Mellon. He raised two sons, Robert and Andrew, with his late wife Mrs. Irma Meyer, and has four grandchildren.

Mr. Meyer is an upstanding member of his community and a model citizen. During their years in Pittsburgh, Mr. Meyer and his wife participated in the Council for International Visitors, a program that helped recent arrivals to the United States acclimate to the local community, often hosting dinners at their home for visiting professors and businesspeople from around the world. Mr. Meyer was also active in SHARE, the South Hills Association for Racial Equality, and participated in many community Holocaust commemorations. Following Mrs. Meyer's passing in 2006, Mr. Meyer, together with his sons, endowed the Irma Meyer Memorial Lecture Series at the West Penn Hospital in order to better educate health care providers about end-of-life issues.

Steven Meyer currently resides at the Raleigh, N.C. Heritage Raleigh Brookdale Senior Living community in my congressional district, where he has assumed an active leadership role. He has thrice been elected president of the resident's council, and serves on various committees. In his retirement, Mr. Meyer has discovered a latent talent for painting and rediscovered his love for playing the piano. His paintings have been exhibited at Raleigh City Hall, and he often given piano recitals for fellow residents at the Heritage.

Mr. Speaker and distinguished colleagues, I ask you to join me in wishing Steven Meyer a happy birthday and best wishes for continued health and happiness.

I move to strike the last word.

Mr. Chairman, I did not want to cut the spending for NASA either, but the financial crisis of 2008, from which we are still suffering, cost Americans trillions of dollars. And even more importantly, it has undermined deeply Americans' faith that our Nation really does believe in the rule of law, that the same laws apply to all of us equally. They have not seen anything that justifies a belief that that has happened in this case.

What happened in the financial crisis was not a perfect storm of unforeseeable economic forces. What happened was a visible hand of fraud, or at least a hand that would be visible if anyone would just look.

But despite the fact, the compelling evidence of real misconduct, fraud and probably criminal fraud, there has certainly not been an investigation. There certainly have not been prosecutions to reassure Americans that, yes, there is a rule of law, and those same laws apply to you no matter who you are, what your station in life is.

If we seriously pursued those claims of fraud, those allegations of fraud, criminal fraud charges, every defendant would have a defense team that would make the O.J. defense team look like a public defender 2 years out of law school handling 100 other cases. We would be swamped by the opposition.

But that is certainly no reason not to pursue those charges. In fact, that is all the more reason to go forward and to pursue criminal fraud, to assure Americans that you do not get out of the rule of law; you do not get a ``get out of jail free'' card because you are rich and powerful.

In contrast, the savings and loan crisis, which was nothing compared to the crisis that we are still in, there were 1,000 agents from the FBI who were assigned to investigate. There were ample lawyers to bring the claims; and, in fact, almost 1,000 figures from the savings and loan crisis, in fact, were criminally prosecuted and went to jail, with a 90 percent conviction rate.

The current task force, the one the President announced at the State of the Union, has now, we understand, 50 to 60 lawyers and accountants working on the largest financial crisis in history since the Great Depression. The results of this are going to depend upon the kind of resources that that task force has.

It is important that we compensate the people who were the victims of that fraud, and the task force will have the legal power to do that. Even more importantly, it will satisfy Americans' sense of justice, the sense of justice that has been offended, that the people who have suffered the most from the financial crisis really were blameless. And they do believe that there were people who were not blameless, whose misconduct, including criminal misconduct, caused it. We need to satisfy their sense of justice.

Mr. Chairman, I want to satisfy my sense of justice. I support Ms. Waters' amendment.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, on rollcall No. 132 for H.R. 3606, I inadvertently voted ``yea'' but my intention was to vote ``nay.''

Madam Speaker, pursuant to clause 1, rule I, I demand a vote on agreeing to the Speaker's approval of the Journal.

Madam Speaker, I object to the vote on the ground that a quorum is not present and make the point of order that a quorum is not present.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to support the provisions in the Affordable Care Act that close the gender gap in health care. Beginning in 2014, health insurers cannot charge women more just because of their gender. Health insurers cannot deny coverage because of preexisting conditions like having survived cancer or having been pregnant or having been a victim of domestic violence, a condition that is almost as disproportionately experienced by women as pregnancy. And health care will have to cover preventive services like mammograms, screening for cervical cancer and, yes, contraception.

Republicans in Congress are trying to block these and other reforms so that health insurers or employers or Members of Congress can make women's health and reproduction decisions rather than trust those decisions to women. Madam Speaker, women can make those decisions. They really don't need help from insurers or employers or politicians or radio talk-show hosts. Women want to make those important personal decisions for themselves, and they should.

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

The Offices of the U.S. Marshals and Deputy Marshal were created by the first Congress in the Judiciary Act of 1789, the same legislation that established the Federal judicial system. The marshals were given extensive authority to support the Federal courts within their judicial districts and to carry out all lawful orders issued by judges, by Congress, or by the President.

Their first duty was to support the Federal courts, and they served summons, subpoenas, writs, warrants, and other processes issued by the courts, made any arrests necessary, and handled the prisoners. They disbursed the money. The marshals paid the fees and expenses of the court clerks, the U.S. Attorneys, the jurors, the witnesses. They rented the courtrooms, the jail space, hired the bailiffs, the criers-- what we probably would now call a bailiff--the janitors, and on and on. They ensured the courts functioned smoothly. They took care of the details so that the judges and the lawyers could concentrate on the cases before them. They made sure that the water pitchers were filled, the prisoners were present, the jurors were available, and the witnesses were on time.

But that was really only part of what the marshals did.

When George Washington set up his first administration and Congress first convened, they both quickly discovered a gap in the constitutional design of our government. It had no provision for any administrative structure throughout the country. Both the Congress and the Executive were housed in the Nation's capital, and no agency was established or designed to represent the Federal Government anywhere else. The need for a national organization quickly became apparent.

Congress and the President solved that in part by creating specialized agencies, like customs and revenue collectors to levy taxes and tariffs, but there were still many other jobs in the Federal Government that needed to be done and no one to do them. The only officers available to do it were the marshals and their deputies.

So the marshals were pretty much the Federal Government throughout much of the country, and they pretty much did everything. They took the national census every 10 years until 1870; they distributed Presidential proclamations, collected a variety of statistical information on commerce and manufacturing; they supplied the names of government employees for the national register; and they performed other routine tasks that were really necessary for the central government, the Federal government, to function effectively.

Over the past 200 years, Congress and the President have called on the marshals to do all manner of things: to carry out unusual and extraordinary missions like registering enemy aliens in time of war, capturing fugitive slaves from that lamentable period of our history, sealing the American border against armed expeditions aimed at foreign countries, and swapping spies with the Soviet Union. They remained a law enforcement agency.

Within the last decade, the marshals retrieved North Carolina's, my State's, copy of the Bill of Rights in a sting operation. North Carolina's copy had been stolen by Sherman's men when Sherman's army came through Raleigh after they went through Atlanta and treated Raleigh with the same loving attention and care that they had shown Atlanta. We are proud now to have our copy back and thank the marshals for having done it.

Madam Speaker, I support this deserved honor for our Marshals service.

I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, we have no further speakers.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Madam Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Madam Chair, I hate to be the only one at the campfire not singing ``Kumbaya,'' but I do part company with my President and with the ranking Democrat on the Financial Services Committee in their support for this bill.

I do fear that if we cut back on the transparency and we cut back on the investor protections, it really is only going to take one or two well-publicized cases of investors losing their shirts, losing their retirement savings because they got defaulted for small business capital to dry up, to get harder to come by instead of easier to come by.

But I do agree that governments should not go to great lengths to protect people who really can fend for themselves, who are more sophisticated, and who really knowingly decide that they do not want protections.

This amendment increases the exception from SEC registration to 2,000 investors, provided that no more than 500 are not accredited investors. I think the importance of accredited investors, or their sophistication, may well be overstated. But they are, in fact, people who have well more than the net worth of most Americans. They have a net worth of $1 million, without consideration of equity in their home, which used to be more than it is now; or have an income of $200,000, annual income of $200,000 for an individual or $300,000 for a couple.

More important, they actually have to fill out a form to ask to be an accredited investor. They have to opt in. They have to decide that they do want to be outside of some of the protections of the SEC. So this will limit some of the effect of the bill to investors who are somewhat more able to fend for themselves, are somewhat more sophisticated, and are more able to take a loss in investing in a small business that may be a greater risk of an investment, an investment which may be more of a risk but may also promise more reward.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Wall Street may be in disrepute with most Americans, but their power here, their political power in Congress, is undiminished.

Americans strongly support a consumer watchdog, the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, but the CFPB has become Republicans' new least favorite agency, which greatly pleases their friends on Wall Street.

Months ago, Republicans in the other body announced that they would block the confirmation of the first Director

of the new agency, whether the nominee was Elizabeth Warren or anyone else, unless Congress stripped the agency of its independence and of the powers to protect consumers from the abuses that were rampant in the last decade.

In the next day or two, the other body will vote on the confirmation of Richard Cordray to head the CFPB. If the vote goes as expected, Republicans will abuse their constitutional confirmation powers to hobble the new agency. They don't want Elizabeth Warren. They don't want Richard Cordray. They don't want anyone because they don't want the agency, and they don't want the agency because they don't want to protect consumers.

Republicans are willing to leave consumers vulnerable again to predatory lending practices. They're willing to leave the economy vulnerable again to another financial crisis to please their friends on Wall Street.