Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I rise to recognize the extraordinary achievements of Sister Tesa Fitzgerald, the powerhouse behind Hour Children, an exceptional organization that helps incarcerated women and their children in New York State. I am delighted to recognize her remarkable contributions at a slightly belated event along with Assemblywoman Aravella Simotas. Sister Tesa is one of New York's most inspiring, dedicated and compassionate leaders.

After joining the Sisters of St. Joseph, Sister Tesa taught in a number of local Catholic elementary schools before becoming the principal of Saint Vincent DePaul School in Brooklyn. She was then appointed Curriculum Coordinator for the Diocese of Brooklyn.

In 1986, at the request of Sister Elaine Roulet, Sister Tesa opened the doors of St. Rita's Convent in Long Island City to children whose mothers were incarcerated at Bedford Hills Correctional Facility. The convent was renamed ``My Mother's House'' and Sister Tesa and four other Sisters of St. Joseph in residence welcomed 8 children whose mothers were in jail. The children attended school, took dancing lessons, played on sports teams and, in the evening, had the sisters to help them with their homework. Each week, Sister Tesa would bring the children to the prison to visit with their mothers. There, she learned of the struggles of incarcerated women. She started volunteering to help the women--tutoring them, helping them prepare for release, helping them find their children and assisting in family reunification. These efforts grew into Hour Children, a Long Island City-based 501(c)(3) not-for-profit corporation.

Today, Hour Children provides. transitional and permanent supportive housing to approximately 70 families at seven sites located throughout Queens. In addition, Hour Children offers a job training/reentry program; case management; therapeutic counseling; mentoring programs for children and adults; a fully-licensed day care center; an after- school program; and a community food pantry.

Hour Children also works inside Riker's Island, Bedford Hills and Taconic Correctional Facilities to provide parenting classes, pre- release preparation, advocacy services, transportation and family visitation programs. At Bedford Hills Correctional Facility, Hour Children administers New York State's only nursery for infants born to incarcerated women,

where mothers and infants can be together for the first year of life.

Sister Tesa believes that her programs work because of two core philosophies: ``Change takes time'' and ``Love makes the difference.'' Her work on behalf of vulnerable women and children has been widely recognized. In 2015, Pope Francis bestowed on her the Pro Ecclesiae et Pontifice medal in recognition of her years of service to the church in the Brooklyn Diocese. In 2014 the Opus Foundation awarded her $1 million in recognition of her faith-based humanitarian efforts. She was named a White House Champion of Change in 2013 and a CNN Hero in 2012. In 2004, she was named one of the 100 Outstanding Women of New York by the Daily News and in 1997, Irish America Magazine named her one of the Top 100 Irish Americans. Her work on behalf of the most vulnerable should put her on the top of anyone's list.

Mr. Speaker, I ask my colleagues to join me in recognizing the outstanding accomplishments of Sister Tesa Fitzgerald whose vision, empathy and caring have improved the lives of some of our nation's most vulnerable women and children.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong opposition to S. 2155.

It is important to remember why we passed Dodd-Frank in the first place. We were suffering from the worst financial downturn in our country. This country suffered $15 trillion in household wealth that was lost. Eight million people lost their jobs and 6 million people lost their homes due to unfair and deceptive banking practices.

Dodd-Frank put in place protections for consumers.

Prior to the crisis, predatory lenders saddled unsuspecting borrowers with toxic mortgages that they didn't understand and could not afford. Too often, these predatory lenders targeted communities of color, and when these toxic mortgages blew up, it devastated these communities.

In response, we passed Dodd-Frank, which imposed tough new rules on mortgage lenders and beefed up our efforts to crack down on lending discrimination.

This bill would actually roll back some of these important protections. The bill would undermine fair lending laws by exempting the majority of lenders from the new reporting requirements on lending discrimination.

The bill would also weaken the protections for mobile-home buyers by allowing retailers of mobile homes to accept kickbacks in exchange for steering borrowers into predatory loans that they can't afford. It is a terrible practice that Dodd-Frank outlawed.

The list goes on and on and on.

While the bill does contain some provisions that every House Democrat has supported, taken together, the bill goes too far in weakening the key mortgage rules that Dodd-Frank put in place. So I urge my colleagues to come together in a strong ``no'' vote.

Mr. Speaker, I support H.R. 4451, the Veterans Reintegration Programs Reauthorization Act of 2018.

Due to hectic circumstances on the floor, my vote was recorded as a ``no'' when I had intended it to be recorded as ``yes.''

Please make sure that my vote on H.R. 4451 is recorded as ``yes,'' which is what I had intended.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the ranking member for yielding and for her leadership on the Financial Services Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I strongly, strongly oppose this resolution, which will actually encourage discrimination against people of color who want to buy cars.

I know my Republican colleagues claim that this is about a rulemaking process, but let's be clear: This is not about process. This is about discrimination.

This issue is very simple. Financial institutions that make auto loans have an obligation not to discriminate against borrowers based on the color of their skin. This has been the law since Congress passed the Equal Credit Opportunity Act over 43 years ago.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau found compelling evidence that, when financial institutions allow auto dealers to increase the interest rates on auto loans for specific borrowers that come into their dealership, minority borrowers were systematically charged a higher rate. In other words, this particular practice resulted in illegal lending discrimination.

So the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau did what it was supposed to do. It told financial institutions to stop this illegal and discriminatory practice or risk being sued by the Bureau for lending discrimination.

But the Consumer Bureau did not stop there. It also told the lenders exactly how they needed to change their practices to avoid being sued for lending discrimination.

This kind of transparency is a good thing. It allows the Consumer Bureau to root out discrimination in the auto lending market while also providing guidance and certainty to all the lenders that want to do the right thing.

Yet this guidance is exactly what the resolution before us today would repeal. Why? This would have the effect of encouraging discrimination against minority borrowers in the auto lending market and discouraging the Consumer Bureau from cracking down on this horrible practice.

I believe we need to stand strong against discrimination in all forms, including lending discrimination.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote for their constituents, to vote for consumers, and to oppose this resolution.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to pay tribute to World Lymphedema Day. World Lymphedema Day is committed to increasing awareness of a disease that affects up to 10 million Americans and an estimated 150 million people worldwide.

Lymphedema is an extremely understudied yet common disease that occurs when the body's natural lymphatic drainage system is underdeveloped, blocked, or damaged. The lymphatic fluid, unable to properly drain, becomes trapped in a particular area of the body like the arms, legs, torso, head, or neck. The resulting swelling can hinder mobility and impair proper bodily functions. In many cases, the swelling can cause extreme pain dramatically reducing quality of life.

Stanford University estimates that 10 million Americans are affected by lymphedema; however, lymphedema research continues to be chronically underfunded. This has led to an' unfortunate number of misdiagnosis and under-treatment of the disease, which add significant costs to patients and the healthcare industry.

Lymphedema can be inheritable or result from a trauma or health complication later in life. Secondary Lymphedema is reported to develop after health experiences such as cancer treatment, radiation therapy, major surgery, and severe burns. Combat injuries sustained by the brave men and women who don the uniform in defense of our country significantly increase the risk of developing lymphedema.

Lymphedema affects an estimated 15 percent of all cancer survivors and 40 percent of all breast cancer survivors. This is particularly concerning as one in eight women will be diagnosed with breast cancer at some point in their lives.

I have long fought to increase funding for breast cancer research by the National Institutes of Health, and have recently passed legislation that will increase funding for research through the Breast Cancer Awareness Commemorative Coin Act.

The New York State legislature recently passed a resolution recognizing March 6 as the 2nd Annual World Lymphedema Day and the U.S. Senate commemorated the day in the last Congress.

Mr. Speaker, I ask my colleagues to join me in recognizing the amazing dedication and strength of the advocates, patients, and health care providers calling for increased awareness of and research funding for lymphedema as we mark World Lymphedema Day.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to join my colleague and good friend Representative Ellison and other members of the Progressive Caucus to say that healthcare should be a right for everyone in the United States of America.

I have proudly cosponsored the Medicare for All legislation for many years because I don't believe a person's economic status should have any bearing whatsoever on their ability to access quality and affordable healthcare.

The Affordable Care Act took us a long way toward that goal, and I am so proud of that vote. I am proud to join all of the Members here who are supporting it and to fight back against attacks from the Republican majority and the White House to dismantle it.

But we can't just play defense. We have to move toward ensuring greater access to coverage, greater affordability, stronger consumer protections, and higher quality healthcare services. That is why this bill is so important, and I think its time has come.

What Medicare for All would provide is universal coverage for everyone. This is something we should be taking up right now. I am proud to join my colleagues who are supporting it.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding and for his incredible leadership in supporting Louise, organizing all of her many elections, and organizing this tribute to her tonight.

No one was a better public servant or fighter for her constituents than Louise Slaughter. Her passing is a huge loss for New York, for the House, and for all of us. She worked for people right up until the day she died. When I first came to Congress, Louise took me under her wing. For that, and her friendship, I will be forever grateful. I truly miss her dearly, but I am comforted knowing the legacy that she leaves behind.

When Louise became a Member of the House in 1987, she was one of just 25 female leaders. Today, we number more than 100. I have no doubt that her leadership and the example she set as the first female chair of the House Rules Committee led to more women running for office. She was a trailblazer, and she broke down doors for people, for women, and for real change in this country.

While I could go on and on about her legislative achievements, including the Violence Against Women Act--the first bill that I worked on when I came to Congress with Louise--she was the lead Democrat along with then-Senator Biden. It was a transformational bill that addressed violence against women. She fought years for it. Many people thought it was a personal affair, a family affair, and she fought to making it a legal affair that women should be protected in any and every circumstance. It had money in it to train police and prosecutors to be more sensitive to the needs of women and the violence against them.

She was a biologist by training and was very proud of this background. She was a leader on FDA health issues and was the first to introduce genetic information and the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act that became a central part of the Affordable Care Act, that you should not hold preexisting conditions and prevent healthcare for people because of preexisting conditions.

She considered that one of her greatest achievements. She led the debate on the floor for the Democrats for the Affordable Care Act and its passage. She oversaw that historic debate.

Her impact extends far beyond the bills that she passed and the committees that she chaired. She was the first woman to chair most of the committees that she became part of. During her 31 years in Congress, she was a

mentor to many female Members and, because of that, played a major role in shaping our party and coalition we are today.

She was a leader for New York, and she was a leader for Democrats in New York. She was one of the first Democrats to be elected in upstate New York, and everyone running for office in upstate New York, the first person they went to was Louise Slaughter.

I am proud to have called her a dear friend and mentor and grateful to be able to pay tribute to her and to say thank you to her and her family. She adored her late husband, Bob, and we all appreciate the great impact she had on me, on this Congress, and on our Nation.

Louise, we miss you. You are in our hearts. Thank you, dear friend.

Mr. Speaker, thank you so much. We are here today to declare our strongest resolve and determination to protect American consumers and defend the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

The Bureau is under assault by the current administration, the Republican administration, and we will do everything in our power to guard it and to protect it so that it can protect consumers.

I am pleased to stand here with Democratic House members of the Financial Services Committee and of the Joint Economic Committee. I would like to thank Ranking Member Maxine Waters for her leadership and for working collaboratively with me to organize this important Special Order.

It is fitting that the Financial Services Committee Democrats lead efforts to protect the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, because we created it in 2009 when we passed the landmark Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, known as Dodd-Frank for Senator Chris Dodd and our former colleague and chairman, Barney Frank.

It is also fitting that Democratic House Members of the Joint Economic Committee participate because the attack on the CFPB not only hurts consumers, but harms businesses and our overall broader economy.

Let's put things in historical perspective. During the last 2 years of the George W. Bush administration, we suffered what former Federal Reserve Chairman Bernanke called ``the worst financial crisis in global history, including the Great Depression.''

The former Chair of the Joint Economic Committee for President Obama, Christina Roamer, said that the economic shocks during that period were five times greater than the Great Depression.

In the last month of the Bush Presidency alone, our economy lost over 800,000 private sector jobs. We were hemorrhaging 800,000 jobs a month. Nearly $13 trillion in household wealth was completely lost. Home values plunged, on average, by almost 20 percent. Millions of people lost their homes. And at the peak of the recession, unemployment reached 10 percent. African-American unemployment reached almost 17 percent, and Latino unemployment was 13 percent.

In short, millions of Americans lost their jobs and millions lost their homes. At the root of the economic crisis were bad mortgages sold to families that could not afford them, a lack of consumer protections to shield Americans from financial predators.

No single government agency was dedicated to protecting consumers. They were dedicated to protecting banks and other financial institutions. But often consumer concerns was a secondary thought, a third thought, or not thought about at all.

So Democrats wrote and passed into law the Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, and at the heart was the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Its sole purpose was to prevent this type of economic disaster and to protect consumers.

Consumers want and need protection. The Federal Government sets and enforces safety standards on a wide variety of consumer goods. But until 2010, with the passage of the Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, there were few protections for consumers of financial products--and many, many abuses.

Senator Elizabeth Warren, in her groundbreaking article, called for the creation of an agency dedicated solely to protecting consumers of financial products, pointed out the absurdity of not protecting consumers:

``It is impossible to buy a toaster that has a one-in-five chance of bursting into flames and burning down your house. But it is possible to refinance an existing home with a mortgage that has the same one-in- five chance of putting the family out on the street. . . .''

What is good enough for toasters and washing machines and cars, she argued, is good enough for mortgages. And it certainly would help our people. She was right. And that is a primary reason that we must defend the original mission of the CFPB today.

Ranking Member Waters will describe some of the excellent work of the CFPB, which they have done to protect consumers.

Three numbers bear pointing out: In the first 6 years, the CFPB handled more than 1.2 million complaints and has delivered almost $12 billion--billion, as in B--in relief, and sent that money back to consumers for their use in their pockets and their homes, to nearly 30 million consumers who had been harmed.

My Republican colleagues call this ``regulatory overreach'' or government run amuck. They want the CFPB to be less aggressive. In other words, they don't want the CFPB there to protect

and help consumers. In fact, it is doing exactly what it is intended to do: protect ordinary Americans against financial predators.

I dare opponents of the CFPB to inform those 30 million Americans who have received almost $12 billion in relief of their plans to weaken the agency. For those who want to neuter the CFPB and consumer protections, it is outrageous, it is wrong, and Democrats are going to fight this like you would never believe.

I would like to draw your attention to one very important function of the CFPB: enforcing the Credit Cardholders' Bill of Rights, the CARD Act, which I am proud to have authored.

The CARD Act prevents what were some of the worst abuses of the credit card industry. It used to be almost out of control. You couldn't walk on the floor or down the street without people coming up to you and telling you stories about credit card abuses.

The bill was common sense. It cut out unfair, deceptive, anticompetitive actions by restricting fees. It protected consumers against retroactive rate increases on existing balances. In order to increase the rate, the consumer had to opt in and agree to an increased rate.

What happened before is they would be told you can buy a car for $8,000 at a 6 percent interest rate. They would buy the car, then all of a sudden the rate was up to 20 percent, 30 percent, and consumers were caught in a never-ending cycle of debt.

This bill requires the lenders to alert consumers of any rate increases, prevents double billing, and prevents lying. If you say your rate is one rate, then that is what the rate has to be. It prevents credit card companies from raising credit limits for people who can't repay the debt.

In 2016, the CFPB report found that the CARD Act alone saved American consumers over $12 billion. That is 12 billion, as in B. I call it the Democratic stimulus plan because it kept the money in the consumers' hands and not in fees that were unfair.

But it is not enough just for the CARD Act to exist. It also has to be enforced. Enforcement of existing laws has been a critical function of the CFPB.

Few would deny that the CFPB has been ver effective. That is why I believe the opponents, the Republican majority and others, are attacking it.

The Trump administration has launched an assault on the CFPB. President Trump illegally appointed a man to head the CFPB who once said that he wished it didn't exist. As a Member of Congress, he sponsored a bill to abolish it.

Now, why would you put someone in charge of an agency who says they want to abolish it, unless you want to abolish it?

This follows in the pattern of other appointments in this administration: putting people in charge of an agency that they fundamentally oppose.

Now that Mick Mulvaney runs the CFPB, he is taking radical steps to make it ineffective. This means weakening consumer protections and restricting enforcement.

We had a hearing today at the Financial Services Committee this morning, and I asked him how many enforcement actions he has taken since he has started as the Acting Director for 5 months? His answer was none, zero.

Now, under the former Director, Richard Cordray, the Bureau took roughly 70 enforcement actions. They were bringing one roughly every week to protect consumers. But now, under Mulvaney, they are bringing absolutely none.

Weakening the CFPB and loosening consumer protections will make tens of millions of American families vulnerable. But it will also affect the economy via an indirect route.

A lack of effective protections will make it difficult for consumers to differentiate good products from bad. Reputable financial institutions that treat their consumers fairly--and there are many of them--will suffer with this uncertainty, and they will be incentivized to copy their disreputable competitors in a race to the bottom.

In this way, weak consumer protections can slow economic growth. As it turns out, what is good for consumers is also good for the economy.

We have other people who are here to speak, but I do want to say that, in some ways, at the heart of a financial crisis was a lack of consumer protection. Predatory lenders were able to sell bad mortgages. It was immensely profitable. They were what we called NINJA loans for people with no income, no job, and no assets.

In New York, they used to say that, if you can't afford your rent, go out and buy a house; it is easy to do. They were handing out bad loans and then securitizing mortgages on the secondary market, which were destined to fail. And they bought insurance--default swaps--to supposedly eliminate risk, which, in fact, only made it riskier. A giant wave of mortgage defaults ignited the financial crisis, leading to the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.

Economists have said over and over again we could have saved our economy from this terrible $15 trillion loss of home values and home assets if we just had good management and protection of consumers. And it all began with a mountain of bad mortgages, many of them unfair and predatory. If the CFPB had existed at that time and if it had implemented current mortgage standards, we would not have had that financial crisis.

So I would say Mick Mulvaney and other opponents of the CFPB should have learned a lesson from the catastrophic financial crisis that caused many Americans to lose their homes and their jobs, and we are still recovering.

The philosopher, George Santayana, said that those who forget the past are destined to repeat it. So now the effort by the Republican majority to roll back the protections from the Wall Street Reform Act and to roll back the protections from the CFPB are increasing the probability of another catastrophe. We don't want that to happen, and that is why we defend Dodd-Frank, and that is why we will fight to oppose efforts, in any way, shape, or form, to weaken the CFPB.

Why in the world would anyone want to weaken protections for working men and women?

Now, one of the great leaders in this country for working men and women and for fair treatment under the laws of our country is the esteemed ranking member of the Financial Services Committee from the great State of California, Ms. Maxine Waters, a tireless advocate for consumers and the work of the CFPB. She has led Democrats on numerous efforts to maintain the structure, independence, and power of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau so that it can continue working for you, working for the people, the American families, the consumers that we have in our country.

Mr. Speaker, it is now my honor to yield to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Maxine Waters), the distinguished ranking member.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for her statement tonight and for her leadership.

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from the great State of Nevada (Mr. Kihuen), and we welcome him.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his really heartfelt report to us on how it affected his constituents.

Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record an article in Roll Call on the importance of the CFPB, and also the actions that the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has taken by the numbers to help people in our country.

Mulvaney's Attacks on CFPB Hurt Consumers and Economy

(By Rep. Carolyn Maloney)

As a congressman, Mick Mulvaney once co-sponsored a bill to

abolish the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. And since

being appointed by President Donald Trump to temporarily lead

the agency, he has worked to cripple it from the inside.

What he is doing will hurt consumers not once but twice--

first, by letting off the hook financial institutions that

take advantage of their customers, and second, by giving

other companies large incentives to do the same.

In its first six years, the CFPB has handled more than 1.2

million complaints and delivered almost $12 billion in relief

to nearly 30 million consumers. It has put in place new

protections against payday lending, investigated predatory

payday lenders, fought mortgage servicers for wrongful

foreclosures, established new mortgage standards to protect

homebuyers, and required lenders to verify that borrowers

have the means to repay their loans. It also banned financial

institutions from using arbitration clauses to deny consumers

the right to sue, took action against companies for illegal

collection of student loan debt, ordered Wells Fargo to pay

full restitution to customers for opening accounts without

their consent, enforced the Credit Cardholders' Bill of

Rights, published a public database of consumer complaints,

and established extensive educational materials on financial

products for consumers.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., who was the driving force

behind the CFPB's creation, has pointed out that we shouldn't

put people in charge of agencies they want to destroy. That

seems self-evident--unless the specific goal is to destroy

it.

Soon after his appointment, Mulvaney began weakening and

radically changing the CFPB, stating that part of the

agency's new core mission statement would be to deregulate

financial products by ``regularly identifying and addressing

outdated, unnecessary or unduly burdensome regulations.''

He has zealously pursued this new mission by putting a

freeze on the implementation of all new rules, delaying long-

planned rules to protect users of prepaid cards, halting the

agency's investigation of Equifax for failing to protect

customers' private information, weakening rules against

predatory payday lenders, and pulling the plug on a suit

against payday lenders that charged annualized interest rates

of up to 950 percent. Mulvaney is trying to politicize the

agency by placing political appointees in positions normally

staffed by nonpartisan civil servants. He also tried to

starve the agency by requesting zero operating funds for the

second quarter of fiscal 2018.

The rollbacks won't just hurt consumers, they will also

hurt our economy. Fair regulations that protect consumers are

essential for well-functioning markets. Without effective

rules, we've seen that some companies will cheat their

customers. As word spreads, millions of consumers are forced

to question whether products are safe or secure. This

uncertainty leads them to buy less. Many businesses--even

those that treat their customers fairly--lose sales. The

economy suffers.

One would think that deregulators like Mulvaney would have

learned a lesson from the 2007-2008 financial meltdown, which

threw our economy into a devastating recession. At the root

of the crisis were the many lenders who convinced American

consumers to purchase mortgages they could not afford,

including the infamous NINJA loans to those with ``no income,

no job and no assets.'' At first, companies that sold these

predatory loans were on the outskirts of the industry, but

when regulators failed to step in to protect consumers, many

reputable companies that feared being left off the gravy

train jumped in.

The mountain of subprime mortgages, sold and repackaged as

securities presumably to eliminate risk, turned out to be a

house of cards, resulting in what former Federal Reserve

Chairman Ben Bernanke called ``the worst financial crisis in

global history, including the Great Depression.'' Millions of

Americans lost their jobs or their homes. It took nine years

for the economy to fully recover.

Fair regulations that are enforced rigorously are critical

not only to protect consumers, but because they are essential

for markets to work efficiently. Deliberate efforts to

undermine the CFPB will not only prove to be a raw deal for

millions of Americans but can cause lasting damage to our

economy.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank all of the hardworking people at the CFPB and those who worked to create it, and I thank my colleagues and friends for joining me tonight on this Special Order.

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

Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

The motion was agreed to; accordingly (at 7 o'clock and 43 minutes p.m.), under its previous order, the House adjourned until tomorrow, Thursday, April 12, 2018, at 10 a.m. for morning-hour debate.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak against the Right to Try Act.

It sounds compassionate, but it only offers fake hope. An FDA process already exists to allow terminally ill patients to try experimental drugs at no charge. But the difference is that the proposal that we just voted on strips consumer protections and charges patients.

The FDA program receives about 1,000 requests each year and responds in a few days, often recommending changes to enhance safety for the patient. Removing the FDA from the approval process does not add value and could instead be detrimental.

The bill would open up access to drugs after phase I trials, which are very small and, more often than not, unsuccessful. This bill allows pharmaceutical companies to profit off of experimental drugs that could ruin the quality of life that is left.

This bill creates the wrong incentives and pushes care for the terminally ill in the wrong direction, which is why I join patient and consumer advocates in their strong opposition to this bill. This was under suspension and, therefore, did not pass. I remain opposed to the bill.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to pay tribute to Sanford and Joan Weill as we mark the 20th anniversary of the renaming of Weill Cornell Medical School in their honor. The Weills are renowned for their extraordinary philanthropic contributions to culture, education and medical research.

Mr. and Ms. Weill are Brooklyn natives who grew up in modest circumstances, and worked hard to make a better life for themselves and their family. Mr. Weill started out as a $30-a-week runner at Bear Stearns, while Ms. Weill worked as a teacher to help them make ends meet. Wanting more, in 1960, he and his partners founded their own investment firm. The firm was eventually sold to American Express and Mr. Weill became President of American Express. He left American Express and started acquiring financial services companies, until he created the financial giant now known as Citicorp.

Throughout their lives, Mr. and Ms. Weill have been incredibly generous supporters of many of the institutions and organizations that are central to New York. They founded the National Academy Foundation, a foundation that partners with schools in underserved communities to connect them with specialized training programs and internships in finance, STEM, and hospitality & tourism. Inaugurated with one pilot finance academy in the heart of Brooklyn, the foundation has now grown to 675 academies in over 36 states and serves approximately 100,000 children a year.

The Weills have played a key role in our cultural institutions. Mr. Weill served for many years on the board of Carnegie Hall, and helped shepherd it through a major renovation. Thanks to their generosity, one of the three performance halls is named the Joan and Sanford I. Weill Recital Hall. A devotee of modern dance, Ms. Weill served on the board of the Alvin Ailey Dance Theater for 20 years, 14 as Chair. At her retirement celebration, more than $40 million was raised in her honor, capping off an eminent career and enabling the company to expand its building.

More impressive still is the enormous impact Sanford and Joan Weill have had on medical education. Mr. Weill was a longtime Trustee of Cornell University and became Chairman of their medical school. In 1998, the Weills gave $100 million to the medical school, prompting the school leaders to rename the institution Weill Cornell Medical College. Since then, the couple has generously given over $600 million to the school, helping to ensure its legacy as one of the premier medical institutions in the world.

In 2001, I had the pleasure of helping to midwife the creation of a medical school in Qatar. I brought Qatar's interest in having a school that offers an American medical degree to the attention of Mr. Weill and he helped make it happen. Thanks to his vision, Cornell University is the only institution to offer its MD degree outside the country. The Weills also made possible the Weill Bugando University College of Health Sciences in Tanzania. I am proud that Cornell University accepted the challenge of creating an applied sciences school on Roosevelt Island and I was pleased to join the Weills to break ground on Cornell Tech which opened its doors September 12, 2017.

Mr. Speaker, I ask my colleagues to join me in honoring Sanford and Joan Weill, the very embodiment of the American dream.

Mr. Chair, I thank Congresswoman Lee for yielding and for her extraordinary leadership on this issue and in so many other areas.

Mr. Chair, I rise in strong, strong support of H.R. 1865. It is transformative legislation. It is important and it will save lives. It is a historic legislative achievement. I thank my colleague Ann Wagner for her selfless, dedicated, effective leadership in bringing this bill to the floor. I thank my colleagues, Joyce Beatty and Sheila Jackson Lee, Congresswomen Roby and Walters, really everyone, and the leadership of this body for bringing this bill to the floor. I hope we should all pass it. It is important.

This bill clarifies that internet companies that actively advertise the sale of trafficking victims, many of whom are children and minors, are not protected by the Communications Decency Act, Section 230. When Congress enacted it 22 years ago, it never, never intended to make the internet into a red-light zone and a protected area to shield sex traffickers and corporations from selling our young people, many of whom are stolen, doped, forced into sex trafficking, and then protect them from the appeals of their parents for some type of justification, some type of recognition of the harm that they have caused.

Now, this bill, like every other sex trafficking bill, has been a bipartisan effort between Democrats and Republicans. It is landmark. It is important. And we must continue to fight this modern-day form of slavery wherever it exists, and this crime has absolutely exploded online because it is so profitable.

You can sell a gun once. You can sell illegal dope once. But they sell the human body over and over again until they die.

Mr. Chair, this is an important issue. I must tell you that we have a choice.

This has gone to the courts, and the courts have said Congress must decide whether Congress wants to shield corporations, profit-makers, exploiters--I would say--murderers of young children online, selling them for sex trafficking. So if you vote against this bill, you are shielding them. If you vote for it, you are protecting our children.

This bill removes obstacles for attorneys general throughout the country to enact State antitrafficking laws. That is why 50 attorneys general have supported it.

Victims and families will be given a pathway to justice through private civil action that they have been denied too long. Over 50 organizations have come out in support of H.R. 1865, and I include in the Record a list of those organizations.

Shared Hope International, Arlington, VA; Rights4Girls,

Washington, DC; Covenant House International, New York, NY;

ECPAT USA, Washington, DC; World Without Exploitation, New

York, NY; Mary Mazzio & I AM JANE DOE Community, Boston, MA;

Courtney's House, Washington, DC; Legal Momentum, New York,

NY; Equality Now, New York, NY; National Center on Sexual

Exploitation (NCOSE), Washington, DC; My Life My Choice,

Boston, MA; Truckers Against Trafficking, Englewood, CO;

Sanctuary For Families, New York, NY; Trafficking in America

Task Force, Gainesville, FL; CSA San Diego County, El Cajon,

CA; Villanova Law School Institute on Commercial Sexual

Exploitation, Villanova, PA; National Council of Jewish Women

New York, New York, NY; Dawn's Place, Philadelphia, PA;

Child's World America, Villanova, PA; Freedom From

Exploitation, Inc., San Diego, CA.

Women's Justice NOW, New York, NY; Children's Law Center of

California, Sacramento, CA; Carole Landis Foundation For

Social Action, Haverford, PA; The Voices and Faces Project,

Chicago, IL; NH Traffick Free Coalition, Milford, NH; The

Samaritan Women, Baltimore, MD; Free to Thrive, San Diego,

CA; Enough Is Enough, Great Falls, VA; The Lynch Foundation

for Children, Ranchero Santa Fe, CA; Bags of Hope Ministries,

Boston, MA; Hope Ranch For Women, Wichita, KS; Wings of

Refuge, Iowa Falls, IA; North Star Initiative, Lititz, PA;

Zoe Ministries, Greenwood, DE; Abolition Ohio, Dayton, OH;

Arrow Child & Family Ministries, Baltimore, MD; Consumer

Watchdog, Washington, DC; Airline Ambassadors International,

Arlington, VA; Journey Out, Los Angeles, CA; The Ricky Martin

Foundation, San Juan, PR; Praesidium Partners, Richmond, VA;

Worthwhile Wear, Silverdale, PA; Amirah, Woburn, MA; Saved in

America, Oceanside, CA; Awaken, Reno, NV; Ala Kuola,

Honolulu, HI; Glory House of Miami, Miami, FL; Generate Hope,

San Diego, CA; Refuge for Women Las Vegas, Las Vegas, NV.

individual signatures

J.S., Child sex trafficking survivor, Chattanooga, TN.

Tom and Nacole S., Parents of a child sex trafficking

survivor, Chattanooga, TN.

Kubiiki Pride, Mother of a child sex trafficking survivor,

Boston, MA.

Ambassador Swanee Hunt.

Marian Hatcher, Senior Project Manager/Human Trafficking

Coordinator, Cook County Sheriff's Office, Chicago, IL.

Penny M. Venetis, Clinical Prof. of Law/Director,

International Human Rights Clinic, Rutgers Law School,

Newark, NJ.

Michelle Madden Dempsey, Professor of Law, Villanova

University Charles Widger School of Law, Villanova, PA.

Donna M. Hughes, Professor, Eleanor M and Oscar M Carlson

Endowed Chair, University of Rhode Island, Kingston, RI.

Jody Raphael, Senior Research Fellow, DePaul University

College of Law, Chicago, IL.

Audrey Rogers, Professor of Law, Elisabeth Haub School of

Law, New York, NY.

Katha Pollitt, Columnist, The Nation, New York, NY.

Sarah Robinson, Public Defender, Defender Association of

Philadelphia, Philadelphia, PA.

Dayle Ann Hunt, Playwright, The Trauma Brain Project,

Chicago, IL.

Some corporations, like Facebook, Sheryl Sandberg, and others have stood up and said: Enough is enough; protect our children.

Mr. Chair, I include in the Record the following statement from Sheryl Sandberg of Facebook.

Sex trafficking--particularly of young girls and boys--is

one of the most heinous acts that takes place anywhere in the

world. Those of us in the United States must recognize that

these deplorable acts of buying and selling children for sex

don't just happen in other countries. They happen here all as

well--right under our noses, on our streets, and on the

Internet. We all have a responsibility to do our part to

fight this. That's why we at Facebook support efforts to pass

amended legislation in the House that would allow responsible

companies to continue fighting sex trafficking while giving

victims the chance to seek justice against companies that

knowingly facilitate such abhorrent acts.

I care deeply about this issue and I'm so thankful to all

the advocates who are fighting tirelessly to make sure we put

a stop to trafficking while helping victims get the support

they need. Facebook is committed to working with them and

with legislators in the House and Senate as the process moves

forward to make sure we pass meaningful and strong

legislation to stop sex trafficking.

Mr. Chair, today, 22 years after

Congress passed the CDA, we have the opportunity to declare that the intention of the law was never to protect traffickers and companies that actively sell and enable them to continue this incredible, horrible, life-taking crime of promoting sex trafficking and selling our young people.

I urge a strong ``no'' vote. Let's make it unanimous. Let's show the world, the courts, the families, the victims where we stand.

Madam Speaker, a leader must believe in the mission of the organization he or she heads.

But Donald Trump turned this principle on its head by appointing Mick Mulvaney to head the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

Mr. Mulvaney doesn't believe in the agency's mission to protect consumers. In fact, he once said that he doesn't ``like the fact that the CFPB even exists.''

When he was a Member of Congress, he cosponsored legislation to eliminate it. Now, as Director of the CFPB, he wants to zero out its budget for this year.

He eviscerated the CFBP's rules against predatory payday lending, and then dropped all the lawsuits against them. He halted its investigation into Equifax.

As Senator Elizabeth Warren pointed out, you should not put someone in charge of an agency when they want to destroy it. He is running it into the ground, and we must stop it. Consumers will pay dearly.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the ranking member for yielding and for her extraordinary efforts to protect consumers by opposing this bill.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in very strong opposition to H.R. 3299. I don't think that we should be doing anything to take away States' authority to enforce their own usury laws, which make it illegal for lenders to charge outrageously high interest rates on their residents.

This is a core consumer protection issue, and if we allow lenders that aren't subject to the strict Federal regulations for banks to circumvent State regulations too, then we are just throwing consumers to the wolves, removing protections.

I know that some people have claimed that this bill would promote innovation by allowing financial technology companies to better serve lower income customers; but let's be clear. The only loans that would be allowed by this bill that aren't already allowed are loans that violate State usury laws that are put in place in States to protect their consumers. Why in the world would we want to do that to people?

I am sorry, but there is nothing innovative about usury, and there is nothing innovative about gouging low-income consumers with outrageous interest rates. This is a terrible, terrible bill.

So this bill is not about innovation. It is about taking away protections for consumers from predatory loans. Why in the world would we want to do that to people?

I urge my colleagues, I urge them to protect consumers and to oppose this bill.

Mr. Speaker, this is not a game. Congressional Republicans who own the House, the Senate, and the White

House refuse to work out a bipartisan compromise to keep the Federal Government open. This not only disrupts the lives of millions of Americans, but it may have real harmful economic consequences.

The Trump shutdown sends exactly the wrong message. It projects chaos. It can hurt business confidence, tapping the brakes of economic growth.

In 2013, the last time the congressional leaders shut down the government, the economy took a real hit. The nonpartisan Bureau of Economic Analysis found that the shutdown lowered GDP growth by 0.3 percentage points on an annualized basis. Economic analysts at Moody's, Standard & Poor's, and Goldman Sachs estimated it may have cost our economy $24 billion, about $1.5 billion per day.

Our economy depends on faith in our government institutions. Let's not do anything to jeopardize it. Let's stop this dangerous game. Open the government. Fund the government.