Floor Statements

Madam Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 1060) to designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 1663 East Date Place in San Bernardino, California, as the ``Dr. Margaret B. Hill Post Office Building''.

Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on this measure.

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

I rise today in support of H.R. 1060, which names a post office in San Bernardino, California, for Dr. Margaret B. Hill.

Dr. Hill attended California State University, San Bernardino, and spent much of her life as an educational leader in the San Bernardino community.

She served as the principal of San Andreas High School for 16 years, and later as the assistant superintendent of administrative services for the San Bernardino school system.

In 2001, she was elected to the San Bernardino City Unified Board of Education, a position she remained in for 10 years.

Madam Speaker, I encourage my colleagues to support this legislation honoring a dedicated, local civil servant, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I have no further speakers, I am prepared to close, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support this bipartisan bill, and I yield back the balance of my time.

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.

Mr. Speaker, the Democratic Party is telling us that they care about taxpayers, but the son of the President of the United States is a tax cheat. He ignored Federal tax law on purpose. He laundered money through 20 LLCs. He concealed millions of dollars of overseas money, and the only reason he was able to accomplish these feats of getting so much money into his companies is because the President is his father. That is it.

If you are asking why we are looking for an impeachment inquiry, it is because there were 170 suspicious activity reports at the Department of the Treasury, which we went and looked through, and every one of those reports said very clearly that there was evidence of money laundering and potentially tax evasion. There were hours of depositions. There is a web of LLCs with company names that have no business interests whatsoever.

We have finally uncovered one example, Mr. Speaker, $5 million from a foreign company going to a joint venture partly controlled by Hunter Biden.

Mr. Speaker, the next day, $400,000 goes from Hunter Biden to an account controlled by Jim and Sarah Biden. Sarah Biden writes a check to herself, and then $40,000 is in a check to Joseph Robinette Biden, the President of the United States. That is your evidence. If you want to talk crime: bribery, co-conspirator to firearm violations, and we can go on and on.

Vote for the resolution. Congress must investigate these crimes.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Utah, our new vice chairman, and congratulate him, as well.

Mr. Speaker, President Biden consistently has stated that he never discussed business with Hunter Biden's associates. This is a lie. Let me repeat that for my colleagues across the aisle. It is a lie.

Throughout our extensive investigation and from the lips of credible witnesses, it is abundantly clear that the Biden family business is Joe Biden. Let me emphasize, there is no Biden family business except for Joe Biden's 40-plus-year career in Washington, D.C. That has been the family business.

As a member of the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, we have followed the paper trail and we have conducted our investigation by the book. We have discovered damming evidence and we continue to do so every day.

Our investigation has led to some alarming and eye-opening findings, which point to the President's knowledge and involvement in illegal business transactions.

For example, in 2018, James Biden, the President's brother, received $600,000 in a loan from Americore, a financially distressed and failing rural hospital operator. Bankruptcy court documents suggest that James Biden received these loans based upon representations that his last name, Biden, could open doors in the Middle East based on his political connections. We all know James Biden doesn't have political connections, Joe Biden, his brother, has political connections.

Specifically, Americore wired a $200,000 loan into the account of James and Sara Biden. Here is what makes the evidence damming. On the same day, James Biden wrote a $200,000 check from the same account addressed to his brother, Joe Biden. For the American people, the brother of James Biden is the President of the United States.

The next example is an email obtained by the Committee from a Hunter Biden associate mentioning that 10 percent of the relevant joint venture be held by Hunter for the big guy. Ten percent of a relevant joint venture was held for the big guy.

At this point in the Committee's investigation, we have established that Joe Biden is the big guy. Through the web of transactions that purposefully tried to hide the big guy's involvement, let me stress again that Joe Biden is the Biden family business.

Let me illustrate an example of the confusing web of transactions. A Chinese company sent $5 million to a joint venture between Hunter and an associate. That same day, the joint venture sent $400,000 to an entity that Hunter Biden controls alone. Less than a week later, Hunter Biden wired $150,000 from this entity to a company owned by James Biden and Sara Biden. James Biden, the President's brother.

Sara Biden later withdrew $50,000 from the same company. Less than a week later, Sara wrote a personal check to Joe Biden, aka the big guy, aka the President of the United States, for $40,000--the 10 percent of the $400,000 that was mentioned in the email by the associate to Hunter Biden.

Another example is when a confidential human source overheard a Burisma executive claiming to have bribed then-Vice President Joe Biden for $5 million. As I stated earlier, Joe Biden

consistently says that he never discussed business with Hunter Biden's associates. This was a blatant lie by the Commander in Chief and the American people deserve to know the truth.

Joe Biden never thought that the Oversight Committee would get this far in its investigation, and additional damming evidence will soon be revealed to the American people.

This leads me to my next point. The Foreign Agents Registration Act, more commonly known as FARA--to be clear, Hunter Biden has never registered as a foreign agent, despite his lucrative work being done on behalf of foreign interests and his many travels on Air Force Two. That wasn't just because he missed his dad.

Specifically, Hunter has been documenting business transactions with a Chinese Government-based energy company called CEFC. Interestingly enough, the same company, CEFC, is the same one that is affiliated with the company that sent $5 million to Hunter Biden.

How is this not the definition of being and acting as a foreign agent?

Paul Manafort was convicted for far less.

The time is now to open up an impeachment investigation pertaining to the President's direct link to blatant corruption, pay-for-play tactics, and acting as a co-conspirator to crimes committed by his family on behalf of Joe Biden himself.

The Committee will continue to do our due diligence. We will not be worried about the distractions from the Democrats and from the press. We will dig through the confusing web of Biden LLCs.

Mr. Speaker, the confusion of these companies and the confusion of these transactions were done on purpose to conceal this money from the American people and to conceal the money from the Internal Revenue Service.

Joe Biden likes to talk about everybody paying their fair share, except him and except his son. They are not concerned about a fair share. We are going to continue to uncover all of this.

We are going to answer and uncover all of the information that is going to outline exactly why, in my opinion, as I represent the 19th District of Florida, why Joe Biden deserves to be impeached.

Mr. Speaker, the President of the United States has taken money from foreign sources. Meanwhile, the world is on fire. Is the President compromised?

Do agents in the Chinese Government have the upper hand on the President of the United States while our enemies are on the move?

These are serious questions that the House of Representatives has a responsibility to have answered. The way to get all that information is through the impeachment inquiry, which will continue here in the people's House.

Mr. Chair, we should be in support of this amendment for one very important reason: The CFPB is unconstitutional.

It is an agency that was given legislative powers through Dodd-Frank, one of the worst pieces of financial regulatory legislation ever to come through this Chamber, and it has no accountability and no oversight from Members of Congress.

They go to the Federal Reserve to get their money. They go out to the public, and they actually are writing regulations that Congress has not even contemplated and putting out oversight that Congress has never actually voted for. They are doing it with no oversight from the people's body.

Just yesterday, the CFPB went to Apple, Google, and the payment firms and came up with new proposed rules on digital wallets when this Chamber has not even come out with legislation around digital wallets or digital assets. We have not done that work in the people's House, so to allow an agency like this to continue to operate with no oversight, to go in and out of any company they choose to based upon the whims of Mr. Chopra, is not constitutional. Furthermore, it is not befitting for an agency under the government of, by, and for the people.

Let me also add that the bill presented by Mr. Barr from Kentucky is a good step in the right direction because it would at least give Congress Article I oversight powers over the CFPB and allow us to do the thing that Mr. Perry is arguing for, which is zeroing out this agency and eliminating it altogether.

Let's speak to the consumer protections that the gentleman from Maryland has talked about.

Before CFPB, consumer protections actually were within the purview of all the other Federal agencies that are under the oversight guise of Congress. CFPB was created so that they wouldn't have to come here for oversight.

I have no problem with making sure that consumers are protected, but not by a rogue, unconstitutional agency that should not exist.

Mr. Speaker, had I been present, I would have voted ``nay'' on rollcall No. 513.

personal explanation

Mr. Speaker, $2 trillion deficit, $33 trillion in debt, and Washington just wants to continue to grow.

Mr. Speaker, 20 percent inflation year over year is crippling every family in our country, and 8 percent mortgage rates are squeezing our real estate market, and Washington just wants to grow and grow.

Our cities are overrun with migrants because of the reckless policies of the President of the United States. Fentanyl is killing 85,000 Americans year over year, and congressional Democrats refuse to secure the border.

Mr. Speaker, enough is enough. This bill does one very important thing--really two very important things.

Number one, it returns our government back to pre-COVID spending levels of 2019. COVID-19 is over. Why can't our government live within its means? Our people have to live within their means; our government should, as well.

I remember when there was a baby formula shortage and mothers couldn't get food for their infants. Joe Biden was nowhere. Congressional Democrats were nowhere. All they said was spend more money while the problems persisted.

They are building shelters in parks in New York City to house migrants, and congressional Democrats say there is

no issue at the border even though everybody sees the problems that exist.

This is the time to secure the border of our Nation and to cut wasteless spending in our government. If we are going to have a society and a government worthy of the people that we serve, Washington has to do something that Washington never seems to want to do: restrain itself.

We have a fundamental obligation to secure this Nation and to secure the people that we all serve.

Coming out here talking about what is going to happen with WIC is not going to solve the problem. Talking about the fiscal health of this Nation is going to solve the problem.

Our national debt has been downgraded twice now. The Democrats want to spend more money. Support this measure.

Mr. Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. Chairman, I will be brief. My amendment does one simple thing, it actually restores the funding for the Foreign Agriculture Service to fiscal year 2019 levels.

In short, Mr. Chairman, our government spends a lot of money, and we are not even sure if it is effective. One of the things that is critical to get our overall fiscal house in order is to start looking at line items in the Federal budget pre-COVID.

We have plussed up a lot of these agencies and a lot of these departments, and the COVID pandemic was used as a reason to do so.

My amendment is simple. The COVID pandemic is over and it is now time to start focusing on getting our fiscal house in order while still being focused on the programs that are important to the agriculture community and other communities. My amendment does that.

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

Mr. Chairman, let's be very clear. What we are talking about is moving the requested number for this appropriation down $23.4 million.

In 2019, we spent $213,000,890 on the Foreign Agriculture Service. All we are saying is move it back to that line. The Federal Government will still be able to accomplish its mission, but we don't have the additional resources. We have to be prudent with the people's money so we can actually cut that back to 2019 levels and still accomplish the mission.

Mr. Chair, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Harris).

Mr. Chairman, I did not hear an argument as to why $250 million needs to be spent for the Foreign Agriculture Service. What I heard, Mr. Chairman, was talk about the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act which, by the way, has yielded more tax revenue to the Federal Government than at any other time in American history.

The minority party refuses to acknowledge the fact that actual tax policy changes in a positive way which reduces rates on producers in our country actually yields more tax revenue to the Federal Government. They refuse to acknowledge that to this day.

If you are going to ask for a recipe for fiscal sanity in this Nation, it is to actually lower marginal tax rates over a consistent period of time--consistent, controlled spending restraint at the Federal level over a period of time. Those two things will actually lead us to spending less in this government and provide more prosperity to all of the people that we serve, regardless of where they fall on the economic ladder.

Mr. Chairman, I ask my colleagues to support this amendment. This is what we should be doing. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. Chairman, my amendment in short does something very simple. It actually reduces the funding requirement for the Commodity Futures Trading Commission back to FY 2018 levels.

In short, Mr. Chairman, the job of the CFTC has been operating for a very long time. The additional $96 million in money, it is not clear why they need that to be able to regulate the Commodity Futures Trading platform.

Nothing miraculously has changed in commodity trading from 2018 to 2024, so in my view, Mr. Chairman, we need to restore those levels back to the FY18 levels in part because the CFTC will still be able to accomplish their mission, number one.

Number two, we are running a $2 trillion deficit this fiscal year. We have to actually begin to pull some of these agencies back two levels so the American taxpayer can actually begin to afford, and not the wishful thinking of Federal agencies.

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

Mr. Chairman, a couple of things. Number one, the regulatory mission and the enforcement mission for the CFTC has not been encumbered in any way over the last several years, so cutting their spending back at a time when the American taxpayer does not have more money, first, to give to the Federal Government and its leviathan of overspending but, number two, borrowing more money from its future is just not the prudent measure to do. That is one and two.

Number three, Congress has not outlined any regulatory framework around the digital assets framework. It does not exist because Congress has not spoken about digital assets. For the CFTC to take appropriations to regulate a space it has no legal authority to regulate, in my view, is outside the purview of the CFTC.

There might be a time in the future where Congress would regulate legislative responsibilities around the digital assets marketplace, but that has not occurred at this time.

Number four, I would agree with the gentleman from Pennsylvania, the CFTC, with respect to all the other regulators, is one of the most cost-effective.

Obviously, I believe the SEC is bloated and, frankly, out of control in a myriad of areas, but that does not mean that we just turn a blind eye to the budgets of every aspect of the Federal Government. We have to bring some semblance of fiscal sanity to this government and starting even with the good ``cops on the beat'' is a responsible thing to do.

The CFTC can still accomplish its mission if their budget is restrained to a degree. There has not been any really significant issues in the derivative markets since, frankly, 2008, where the CFTC has not been able to accomplish its mission. This lower funding level will allow them to do the same.

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

Mr. Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

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

Mr. Chair, I rise today in support of my amendment, which establishes a voluntary pilot apprenticeship program for students at Part 141 flight schools.

Up front, I will stress that this amendment has wide bipartisan support, and providing yet another option to bolster the pilot pipeline shouldn't be a partisan issue. Specifically, for the proposed apprenticeship program, up to eight students enrolled at Part 141 flight schools would be eligible for a new apprenticeship program each academic year.

To emphasize, this is a voluntary program, meaning flight schools can choose to participate. Members might ask: Why establish an apprenticeship program at flight schools?

There are several reasons:

First, apprentices will receive an airline standard of training and will also be provided flexibility in pursuing career aviation opportunities.

Second, the bill will incentivize individuals that have an interest in aviation to attend their local flight schools, which in turn will provide a greater opportunity to bolster the pilot pipeline and a certified flight instructor pipeline simultaneously.

Third, this isn't a one-size-fits-all approach. The amendment provides flexibility to establish an apprenticeship program that fits the needs/curricula of the individual flight schools themselves. After all, a flight school in southwest Florida may have completely different operations compared to a flight school in Alaska.

Moreover, there are approximately 600 Part 141 flight schools in the United States today; however, only approximately 250 of these flight schools are active in a large way.

This amendment includes provisions to incentivize retired airline pilots and retired military pilots to give back, specifically by directing the Secretary of Transportation to develop methods to establish an expedited path that will allow retired pilots to become certified flight instructors. After all, the value of their decades' worth of experience speaks for itself.

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

Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Nehls).

Mr. Chair, I am prepared to close.

Mr. Chair, this is a great amendment with strong bipartisan support. I ask Members to support this amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for yielding.

It is not often that the NDAA includes various provisions on advanced nuclear, however, these times are changing.

The U.S. military is interested in advanced nuclear reactors to provide clean, baseload power for energy operations, hence why I offered an amendment that expresses support for Project Pele, a DOD program to develop and deploy a portable nuclear microreactor, which will ultimately bolster American national security.

Additionally, one of my amendments calls for the development of a strategy to deploy microreactors for natural disaster response. Representing Florida's 19th District, which was hit by Hurricane Ian, we do know the devastation that can occur when you need to access power quickly. These microreactors can help areas do that.

Moreover, one of my amendments addresses the potential for the U.S. Space Force to utilize nuclear-powered space vehicles, and another evaluates American national security risks associated with Chinese and Russian interest in space.

Congress must recognize the importance of the U.S. military's interest in this innovative technology, and I urge my colleagues to support these six amendments.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of House Resolution 529.

Let's be very clear. The issue that is happening at our southern border--not the name-calling or talking about former President Trump-- what is happening at our southern border today and for the last 2 years under President Biden has been a dereliction of duty with respect to immigration law in the United States.

If the other side wants to speak to the actual issues at hand, it is the fact that the asylum provisions under Joe Biden are a bastardization of asylum procedure as set forth in Federal law by Congress.

Mr. Speaker, Congress never anticipated that you would have 6 million-plus people come through the asylum process in 2 years. Congress never contemplated that you would have an asylum procedure where you would have people on a 7- to 10-year waitlist to actually go through an asylum procedure.

The President knows this is the case, and it is being done on purpose.

That is a congressional purview, and it actually is a dereliction of his duty to faithfully execute the laws of the United States.

So if the minority party wants to ask about why we are here, it is that. It is my belief and the belief of many Members on our side of the aisle that this resolution should go to the Homeland Security Committee so they can fully debate and go through the depths of which Joe Biden has been derelict in his duty to execute the laws with respect to immigration in the United States which has major impacts on the American people.

There are 100,000 Americans who have died from fentanyl overdoses because of his dereliction of duty. We have the drug cartels on our southern border who have operational control of the southern border because of his dereliction of duty.

If the President and congressional Democrats actually took the time to investigate this--like going to the southern border--then they would know this, too.

Mr. Speaker, I support this resolution, and Members should be in support of it, as well.

Mr. Speaker, I actually want to welcome the people who are here in the gallery. I am glad they are here to see this. What they are witnessing is actually something functional that Congress should be doing.

We have a Federal agency called the ATF that has unilaterally decided that they want to make illegal a piece of equipment that they legalized more than a decade ago. The ATF said that the pistol brace is a functional and legal piece that can be added to--and I stress ``added to''--a firearm, and they allowed it to be sold in the United States for more than a decade.

Now, why do I say, ``added to''? The question for the people in the gallery and the people watching on C-SPAN across the country is: Have you ever seen a pistol brace? It is mostly plastic and/or carbon fiber. It wraps around your forearm, and it has a little pole that sticks out to the midpoint of your hand. The purpose of said brace is for people who actually had an arm injury but still wanted to take advantage of their Second Amendment rights, and the ATF more than a decade ago allowed that brace to be sold in the United States.

We now have the same ATF who is deciding unilaterally to go back and say that that brace now needs to be registered, and if you don't register it, you are a felon in the United States. If that is not a gross violation of separation of powers, I don't know what is. Congress never gave the ATF that authority to criminalize American citizens after they were allowed to buy a piece of equipment.

If an agency says that they think a piece of equipment is a detriment to public safety, then it is the requirement of the agency and the executive branch to come to this body and ask for legal permission to say so. They did not.

They don't just get to act on their own accord. They don't just get to define terms for themselves unless Congress gives them that ability.

Mr. Speaker, one of the fundamental problems we are having here at the national level is that we have too many agencies who are taking too much latitude with the liberties of the American people. Instead of going to their Representatives for clarification, they decide that they want to make them felons through the back door. That is abhorrent.

That is a violation of separation of powers. It is a violation of the very Constitution, and it is a violation of the liberties of the American people that we are all here to represent.

Regardless of how you feel about guns, and regardless of how you may feel about a pistol brace, none of us should be supportive of an agency using their authorities or not using any of their authorities to criminalize the American people.

This is a good CRA. We should be voting up on this CRA.

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate my colleague from Texas yielding me additional time, but I don't think I will need another minute.

Mr. Speaker, we should be voting for this measure. This is a measure to stop a Federal agency from stepping over its bounds and turning law- abiding American citizens into felons. A ``no'' vote on this measure is a vote to allow the Federal agencies to run amok, unobstructed over the will of the people. Our Members should be supporting it. Frankly, every Member in this Chamber should be supporting this resolution today.

Mr. Chair, as is often said in this Chamber, I didn't anticipate debating, but as I sit on the floor listening to some of the things coming from the Democrats about this bill, a lot of it is just simply not true.

The Democrats are accusing us of providing funds and slush funds to Big Oil, but in the very Inflation Reduction Act that they passed last Congress--on a partisan basis, mind you--there is $20 billion in that bill that goes to the green energy--I don't know--environment slush fund. The EPA is already saying, Mr. Chair, that that $20 billion is being basically earmarked for a handful of special interests that the American people have no idea about.

The Democrats want to lecture us about making sure that we stop the polluters, but their own energy plan actually empowers the biggest polluter on the planet, and that is China. It is China that mines all the minerals for electric batteries, and China does not care about emission standards.

The Democrats have no problem empowering China when it comes to mineral production. They have no problem empowering China when it comes to oil production. They just want to limit it here in the United States.

This is the same backward thinking that the Europeans have realized in the face of Putin's aggression in Ukraine. It was all good to let Russia drill as long as Europe didn't drill.

Mr. Chair, that does not work when it comes to energy production. H.R. 1 brings common sense back to America's energy matrix. It is an all-of-the-above strategy.

Listen, I am a Member who has some issues, but I am voting for the legislation because it is far more important to put America in first position when it comes to energy exploration on the globe, as opposed to funding these Green New Deal think tanks and these Green New Deal energy consortiums that haven't proven that they can deliver baseload power to address the needs of the American people.

We have an energy problem. That is true. Our energy problem starts first with having cheap and readily available energy for poor Americans, middle-income Americans, small business owners, medium-sized business owners, and, yes, even the people who are wealthy among us.

Our economy thrives with a robust energy matrix, not one divided up based upon special interests from the left. That does not work. What works is actually using tried and true energy production standards.

By the way, when we drill for natural gas and explore for natural gas and oil here in America, we do it cleaner than anywhere else on the globe. We do it better than anywhere else on the globe, so much so that people want to import it from us.

That sounds like a quality plan for America, not the dogma from the Democrats.

I have been hearing the talking points all week. Polluters over people? That is a joke. The only people who are putting interests over people are the Democrats with their faulty energy policy. It must stop.

We have to put Americans first. Support H.R. 1.

Mr. Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. Chair, I appreciate the time and the effort here.

In an effort to ultimately streamline the regulatory approval timeline, my amendment requires the implementation of a study that explores the licensing and permitting process of other energy sources under the Department of Energy's jurisdiction.

By studying the licensing procedures of various energy sources, we can streamline the regulatory process overall by cutting down unnecessary red tape.

My amendment seeks to optimize American power production, create a sense of ease and standardization in the regulatory maze surrounding various energy sources and examine other regulatory procedures to safely expedite the approval timeline.

Mr. Chair, I urge my colleagues to support this amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Madam Chair, I rise in support of this amendment. What this amendment really does is it requires a study on America's current uranium supply, specifically looking into the status of and the quality of such domestic uranium deposits, and it seeks policy solutions relating to America's domestic uranium challenges.

My amendment also requires analysis of America's supply in comparison to other countries around the globe.

In short, Madam Chair, if you are going to embrace nuclear power in the United States, we also have to understand what our uranium needs are. We have to be able to assess them, and that is what the nature of my amendment does.

Madam Chair, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Self) to talk about this amendment, as well.

Madam Chair, it is important for us to understand that there are two key investments that America is going to need to make. One is increasing our domestic uranium mining capabilities, and number two is bolstering our domestic uranium conversion and enrichment capabilities.

If the concern of the United States is to find a way to increase baseload power, and also the necessary concern about emissions, then nuclear power is the path forward for that. We have to take stock of our uranium capabilities here in the United States.

Madam Chair, I yield to the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Westerman), the chair of the Natural Resources Committee.

Madam Chair, I thank the gentleman from Arizona for his concerns, and that is something I definitely want to work on as we move forward.

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

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to congratulate and commend Fort Myers' Southwest Florida International Airport, better known as RSW, for being ranked the number one airport in the United States of America, according to Travel Lens U.S.A. Airport Report.

As the Member of Congress that proudly represents RSW, I am excited to stand here today to shine light on this distinct accolade within my district. In 2022, RSW set a record for the total number of passengers, despite the severe impact stemming from Hurricane Ian.

To be frank, there are many reasons why a record number of Americans are visiting and moving to southwest Florida. The inherent beauty of RSW speaks for itself--now imagine the stunning beauty throughout my entire district.

I can confidently say that I have the most beautiful district in the country and the best district overall, especially considering how many Members come and visit my district.

Finally, I want to share a few quick statistics. The average wait time at RSW is only 16 minutes. It is second in the Nation for the lowest amount of carbon emissions per passenger. Number three, it has the fourth highest passenger satisfaction rating in the United States of America.

Once again, I congratulate RSW for receiving this great honor for being ranked America's best airport.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman for yielding time.

Mr. Speaker, in short, the pandemic is over. It is time for Federal employees to go back to the office.

I find it interesting in this debate that one of the things that is occurring right now is that the President's budget is due next week. We are in the middle of this calamity around debt ceiling which the President, by the way, has led us to. His budget is due next week, and he is telling everybody he needs another month.

I wonder if this is because some of his own budget staff aren't in the office. This is something that should have been done long ago. If the President was doing his job being the leader of the executive branch, those employees would have been back. Since Congress is the body responsible for appropriating funds to the executive branch and the President does not do his job of making sure it is working effectively, then Congress does have a responsibility to make sure that these employees come back and get back to work. Life has been happening here in the people's House.

A couple of things: It has already been said about the IRS delays. It is shocking that right now it takes 2 to 4 months to get assigned an agent. If you call the IRS, you won't get a call back for 4 weeks.

It is also important to understand that right now it takes 30 days for USCIS to respond to a Congressional inquiry. There are many backlogs at the VA; some of them almost 2 years, 197,000 backlogs. How is that affecting the men and women who have served our country with honor and with dignity?

Mr. Speaker, this is simple stuff. Most of the American people have gone back to work. All we are saying is let's go back to pre-pandemic protocols which does have telework provisions throughout all of the Federal agencies. It is clear, looking at the backlogs that have occurred through COVID-19 and continuing, the extended telework situation in the Federal agencies is not working for the American people.

Mr. Speaker, my colleagues should be supporting this legislation. This is good legislation. It will help all of the American people and, frankly, help the President probably pass his budget on time.

Mr. Speaker, I was delayed on my way to the floor. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yea'' on rollcall No. 26, H. Res. 11.