Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I rise to pay tribute to my dear friend and previous staff member, Dominic Fucile, as he receives the Volunteer of the Year award at the Hellenic-American Neighborhood Action Committee's (HANAC) Forty-Fifth Annual Gala. Dominic has truly made his community a better place to live.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 3972, and I am very thankful to gentleman from Texas (Mr. Hensarling), the chairman, and the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Maxine Waters), the ranking member, for their support and assistance on this legislation.

This bill is very simple. It makes what I consider to be a technical fix to the rules for family offices.

Family offices are entities that are established by wealthy families to manage their own money and to provide financial services to their family members.

The original family office was created by John D. Rockefeller 135 years ago and still exists in the district that I represent. So family offices have a long and storied history in this country and have become important sources of liquidity for our markets.

It is also important to note that family offices do not pose a systemic risk and did not cause any problems in the financial crisis, so they don't pose any safety and soundness risk to the financial system.

Family offices aren't regulated by the SEC as investment advisers because they don't have traditiona clients or outside investors. They invest money in their funds like most investment advisers.

A family office is just that: a family office managing its own family money. Their clients are primarily family members, and disputes between family members are better handled either internally by the family or through State courts, which have laws to govern disputes between family members.

Prior to Dodd-Frank, the SEC had been exempting family officers and offices from the Advisers Act for decades on a case-by-case basis. In Dodd-Frank, we codified the exemption for family offices and required the SEC to write a rule formally defining ``family offices.'' The SEC finalized that rule in 2011, so family offices, to meet the SEC's definition, do not have to register with the SEC or as investment advisers.

However, a problem has now come up that we did not anticipate. We assumed that every family client or a member of the family would qualify as a sophisticated accredited investor under the SEC rules. But it turns out that there are very limited circumstances in which a family client of a family office may not actually qualify as an individual accredited investor.

For example, a 19- or 20-year-old member of a wealthy family may be in his or her first job after school and may not be making enough money to qualify as an accredited investor, which is over $200,000, annually.

The real problem is, under the rules we have now, if just one of these family clients--a young person, in most cases--in a family office is not an accredited investor, then the entire family office is not considered an accredited investor and, thus, cannot buy any securities that are limited to accredited investors, like privately issued stocks or bonds. My bill would fix this by just clarifying that all family offices and family clients are, in fact, accredited investors.

The bill does not allow that any 19- or 20-year-old can go out on their own and buy securities. It is limited to accredited investors that can only be done through the family office.

The bill also includes some important limitations: The family office has to have at least $5 million in assets, which is the same limitation that applies to trusts in the current accredited investor rule. The family office also has to have its investments directed by a sophisticated investment professional, which provides yet another layer of protection.

So, really, this bill is very narrowly tailored and provides what I consider to be a technical fix that will allow family offices to better serve their own family members.

I urge my colleagues to support this bill.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the ranking member for yielding and for her leadership on this committee.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 3898.

In August, I was part of a congressional delegation led by Senator Markey that visited South Korea, Japan, and the border between China and North Korea. It is just a short drive from Seoul, a city of about 10 million people, to the DMZ, which is the border line with North Korea. Standing there, you understand and see firsthand that even though the United States would prevail unquestionably in any armed conflict, the casualties suffered by South Korea would be horrendous.

Later, I hosted a meeting with Congresswoman Wagner with South Korean Foreign Minister Kang here in the Congress. From these two meetings, I came back more convinced than ever that we have to leave no stone unturned to solve the most dangerous problem of our times peacefully through negotiations.

I firmly believe that the only way to drive North Korea to the negotiation table is to increase the financial pressure on this reckless rogue regime, which is what this bill does. It is one of the toughest sanction bills financially we have ever considered, and may be the toughest.

The fact that the dollar is the world's Reserve currency gives our country a very important bit of leverage. Companies doing business all over the world want to be paid, need to be paid, in dollars, not in any other currency. So if we restrict international and U.S. financial institutions from doing business with North Korea, then no matter how determined they might be to continue their destabilizing reckless course, they simply will not be able to get the dollars to buy the tools of terror that they need on the international market.

This is not the kind of action we should ever take lightly. This is not a tool to use, an action to take indiscriminately. But in this rare case, in the case of North Korea, such action is not only justified, it is necessary for the defense of our Nation and the defense of other nations.

If North Korea cannot buy the materials necessary to build long- range, nuclear-tipped missiles because they just don't have the dollars, then every country, every person on this globe can breathe a little easier and be a little safer.

Mr. Speaker, this is really an urgently needed bill that not only directly addresses our own security needs, but also does a great service to the community of nations.

I would like to thank my friend, Mr. Barr, for all of his creative and hard work on this bill. I thank Chairman Hensarling and Ranking Member Waters for their leadership and support.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support this important bill.

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

Mr. Chair, I urge a ``no'' vote on this budget.

Ultimately, a national budget is like a deal between the American taxpayers and Congress about how this country will spend their money. Anyone who looks at the fine print in this budget plan can tell, with a glance, that the American people want, need, and deserve a better deal.

In the Republican tax plan that goes with this budget, 80 percent of the Republican tax cuts go to the top 1 percent. The top 1 percent gets an average of $200,000 in tax cuts.

A better deal would drop plans to slash Medicare and Medicaid to pay for massive tax cuts for the wealthiest few--a deal that instead would be a bipartisan effort to bring middle class tax relief, badly needed investments, and greater opportunity.

But what we have instead is a budget that cuts $5.4 trillion in spending over 10 years, including $4.4 trillion in cuts to the mandatory programs that help average Americans get and stay ahead.

These aren't just paper cuts. These are huge cuts--cuts that would cause enormous damage in the lives of children, students, veterans, and other Americans. About half of these cuts in nondefense spending are in programs that help people who need the help the most--cuts in programs that provide food to those in need, programs that help students from low-income families afford a college education. They even have cuts in the badly needed disaster relief that is helping so many in our country.

In fact, by 2027, more than one-third of the resources for low- and middle-income people would be gone. Struggling Americans deserve a better deal than that. And who pays under the Republican tax plan? Seniors, single parents, and middle class families, it goes up.

Nondefense discretionary is already at its lowest level since the category has been tracked. Republicans want to cut even more, and so they target senior citizens and healthcare.

This budget cuts half a trillion dollars from Medicare, replacing Medicare's guaranteed benefits with a voucher-like system and increasing its eligibility age to 67.

The CBO estimates that these cuts would cause part B premiums to increase 25 percent by 2020. And this budget claims that it ``saves'' $1.5 trillion by repealing the Affordable Care Act, even though they have already tried to repeal it about 60 times on this floor, without success, thank God, and the American people have made it clear that they don't want it repealed.

They still have no replacement plan for the Affordable Care Act. So that means that they would just be leaving millions without health insurance and threatening the coverage of all those with preexisting conditions and chronic illnesses, and would leave millions facing huge premium increases.

Their plan also cuts $114 billion from Medicaid, ripping away coverage from low-income families and the disabled. This is just plain wrong. Our seniors deserve a much better deal than that.

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

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

According to the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center, 80 percent of the Republican tax cuts go to the top 1 percent, and the top 1 percent gets an average of $200,000 in tax cuts. And what we see in this budget is a slashing of investments in the future strength of our country.

Instead of slashing infrastructure spending, as this budget does, we should be increasing our spending to fill the giant infrastructure pothole that Republican policies have left us with.

We have airports that feel Third World. We have bridges that are crumbling, tunnels that need replacing, roads that need fixing. Failing to do so costs all of us in time, money, and economic development.

This budget totally fails to recognize the value of infrastructure investment. It cuts $254 billion from transportation over 10 years. Funding would drop from $92 billion next year to just $65 billion in 2022.

It eliminates the Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery grant program used for infrastructure development and repair projects for interstate highways, bridge improvements, and ports. This is incredibly shortsighted.

According to a study by the American Society of Civil Engineers, failing to close the infrastructure investment gap brings serious economic consequences: $3.9 trillion in losses to the U.S. GDP by 2025; $7 trillion in lost business sales in 2025; and 2.5 million lost American jobs in 2025.

I have seen with my own eyes what infrastructure development can mean to business development and the quality of life in the city that I serve. The Second Avenue Subway, built with the help of Federal funds, opened in January and has already had a huge economic impact. Stores say their business is up 20 to 30 percent along that line and it has cut overcrowding and reduced traveling times.

New York's old Kosciuszko Bridge, which was first opened in 1939, was originally designed for 10,000 vehicles a day. It was carrying 18 times that and had become an accident choke point.

Thanks to Federal funding, it has been replaced, and the biggest city in the country will have a brand-new, 21st century bridge soon because these kinds of investments boost productivity and bolster our economy, with each $1 in infrastructure investment

generating up to $1.80 in additional economic activity.

The American Society of Civil Engineers gives our national infrastructure an overall grade of D-plus and our transit system a D- minus. It is just plain irresponsible to slash spending on our crumbling highways and bridges now, because if we don't make needed investments today, we will jeopardize our competitiveness tomorrow.

Let's be clear: we are already significantly underinvesting in infrastructure. As you can see from this chart, public investments in infrastructure and other public fixed assets have fallen over the last few years, dropping to a low of $274 billion in 2014, from more than $357 billion in 2009.

We have created a giant infrastructure spending pothole that you see right here. All told, it costs our Nation more than half a trillion dollars in lost investment over 5 years.

The people of this country deserve modern infrastructure. They deserve a better deal.

This budget also cuts $154 billion from nutrition, from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, ignoring the more than 40 million low-income families, including children, the working poor, the elderly, and the disabled, to say nothing of the 8 million people, including 4 million children it lifts out of poverty. The hungry children of America deserve a better deal than that.

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

Mr. Chairman, in 2001, some of our colleagues across the aisle said many of the same things we are hearing today about the miracle of tax cuts: that huge tax cuts for the most fortunate would pay for themselves, and that they would help grow our economy by trickling down through the miracle of so-called dynamic scoring.

But as we know from history, that was not the case. One year after the Bush tax cuts in 2002, here is what Brookings Institute said was happening in real life:

Our findings suggest that Bush tax cuts will reduce the

size of the future economy, raise interest rates, make taxes

more aggressive, increase tax complexity, and prove fiscally

unsustainable.

A year after that, in 2003, the Brookings Institute said: ``Over the past 2 years our country has experienced a dramatic deterioration in the Federal budget outlook.''

In January 2001, when President George Bush took office, the Congressional Budget Office projected surpluses of $5.6 trillion--as in ``T,'' trillion--from 2000 to 2011.

But in 2011, nearly a decade after the GOP promised their budget would unleash the economy through tax cuts for the wealthy and budgets that cut services to the vulnerable, this is what we found, from National Public Radio: ``Conservatives often promote tax cuts as a way to stimulate economic growth, but the years after 2001 were marked by the slowest growth since World War II.''

All of us remember when President Obama came to office that this country was shedding 800,000 jobs a month and it was a long time to dig ourselves out of that big Republican hole and get us moving in the right direction with job growth.

So let's not go down that road again. I call upon my colleagues to remember history.

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

Mr. Chair, I yield 5 minutes to

the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Beyer), my distinguished colleague.

Mr. Chair, I yield an additional 2 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia.

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

Mr. Chair, just to remind my colleagues, the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center points out that 80 percent of the Republican tax cuts go to the top 1 percent.

But in this budget resolution that we are discussing, it slashes education funding, putting the drain of a college education for average Americans even further out of reach. It asks the American people who already experience crippling student loan debt to reach even deeper into their pockets for their education by cutting $211 billion from student financial aid programs.

It freezes the maximum level awarded by a Pell grant at $5,900, covering just 23 percent of an education by 2026, compared to the 30 percent it covers today or the 77 percent it covered in 1980. In addition, it also cuts $3.3 billion from the Pell grant surplus, which provides a much-needed reserve to cover the cost of future education.

If that is not enough, after students graduate, this budget makes it increasingly difficult to pay off student loans and steers graduates away from public service and teaching jobs by eliminating the Public Service Loan Forgiveness and Teacher Loan Forgiveness programs. Our students and our teachers deserve a better deal than that.

I must say that we are suffering from three hurricanes, devastating hurricanes, yet this budget eliminates three programs that play very key roles in disaster relief. The Community Development Block Grant program, AmeriCorps, and the Legal Services Corporation are all eliminated. This budget abolishes these programs that are literally supporting our relief efforts from Harvey, Irma, and Maria.

Our Nation's veterans--our Nation's veterans--our bravest, are not spared the carnage of this heartless proposal. The GOP budget proposes $50 billion in cuts to mandatory spending on veterans programs over 10 years, including education benefits and loan guarantees. So after we have already asked so much of our men and women in uniform, this budget refuses to give them the tools they need to transition to civilian life. Our veterans deserve a better deal than that from the country that they have served so honorably.

Cuts to research, where research is the future of our country, and this budget would also cut investments that are directly tied to our country's future prosperity by slashing basic research funding.

I want to point out how important research funding is to our country. In 1996, two Stanford graduate students took a $4.5 million research grant from the National Science Foundation and developed a new algorithm called PageRank. Two years later, these same students took PageRank and launched a new internet search engine we now call Google. Today Google is worth over $600 billion and employs over 72,000 Americans, and it all began with a Federal basic research grant of $4.5 million.

Google is just one example on a long list of technological advancement companies and, most importantly, jobs that trace their roots to basic research investment. It is what has kept this country on top.

According to the Brookings Institution, two-thirds of the most influential technologies over the past 50 years were supported by Federal research grants. It has brought us lifesaving vaccines, the laser, touchscreen, GPS, and even the internet, technology that has served as a launching pad for cutting-edge medical treatment.

Sadly, the chart behind me reflects a sharp decline in the Federal share of funding of basic research dropping from 72 percent in 1967 to 44 percent in 2015. This GOP budget proposal follows that same trend with instructions to cut $41 billion from science, space, and technology precisely at a time when we should be increasing investments in these sectors.

It is important to the future prosperity of America. Cuts now mean fewer jobs and economic growth in the future; they mean less innovation and less prosperity. So if my colleagues across the aisle want to grow the economy, turning this trend around is an important way to do it.

Now, I have heard all day from my colleagues on the other side of the aisle how very, very concerned they are about the deficit, but the GOP tax plan makes it worse. The tax framework released last week by the White House and Republican leaders would add $2.4 trillion to the deficit in the first 10 years and another $3.2 trillion in the next 10 years.

So the Republican budget is just totally unacceptable. This budget flat-out ignores the reality. So if Republicans are concerned about the deficit, then they should really rewrite their budget proposal.

In conclusion, look at the fine print of this proposed deal and imagine the harm it would cause to millions of American families, to our children, to our seniors, to our sick and suffering, to our disabled and our destitute, to our economy, to our research, and to our infrastructure. It is clear--clear--beyond any and all doubt that Americans deserve a better deal.

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

Mr. Chair, I request the amount of time that is remaining.

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

Mr. Chair, in closing, I believe that this proposal that is before us is an absolute disaster. We should be charting a fundamentally different course.

When you listen to people around their dinner table in America tonight, they would be talking about their concerns in education, infrastructure, jobs, healthcare, security, environment, and disaster relief. But this plan delivers, instead, deep and sometimes disabling cuts to badly needed programs for millions in order to give away benefits to a fortunate few. This is just plain wrong. Budgets are about values and priorities, and the people of this country deserve better.

We should not be cutting our education spending. Failing to train the world's most highly educated workforce is irresponsible and puts our entire economy at a disadvantage. We should be investing more in education at every level--early education and high schools--motivating students to become engaged in science, technology, math, and engineering. We should be leading the way in developing new and improved technical and trade training programs for those who would prefer it. We should be doing more, not less, to make college and postgrad study affordable once again. To do anything less is to fail in our obligation to the rising generation.

We already trail much of the economically advanced world when it comes to healthcare. We get sicker, die sooner, and pay more for our care than most developed nations. Millions are just one serious illness away from financial ruin. But this budget plan would cut spending for healthcare, and this budget would weaken the pillars of financial security for our seniors. The proposed cuts to Medicare and Medicaid will come at the expense of seniors, the disabled, and the middle class.

Mr. Chairman, we cannot afford this budget. I urge my colleagues to reject it, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, today I rise to speak for April and against this unconstitutional underlying bill.

Mr. Speaker, her story is about one of the most complex and painful decisions a woman can face, but it would have been even more painful if this bill that we are debating, which is opposed by the American Medical Association, was the law at the time.

Eighteen weeks into her pregnancy, she and her husband discovered that their baby had a birth defect, a lethal skeletal dysplasia, and was incompatible with life. The baby would never be able to breathe on its own. The baby would either die in utero or die immediately at birth. She was heartbroken. She went to other doctors for more tests. These tests took additional weeks. Tragically, the tests confirmed the diagnosis.

At 21 weeks, April had an abortion. With this bill, the Federal Government would compel every woman like April against their will to carry to term a fetus that they knew would either be stillborn or would suffer and die at birth.

Mr. Speaker, I urge a ``no'' vote on this underlying bill.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the ranking member for yielding and for her leadership on this issue and so many others.

I strongly support the bill, and I would like to thank my good friend from Indiana (Mr. Messer) for his leadership.

We introduced this bill in order to level the playing field for our cities and States by requiring the banking regulators to treat certain municipal bonds as liquid assets, just like corporate bonds, stocks, and other assets.

As a former member of the city council in New York, I know firsthand the importance of municipal bonds. They allow States and cities to finance infrastructure, build schools, pave roads, and build subways. They are all financed with municipal bonds.

Unfortunately, in the banking regulators' liquidity rule--which requires banks to hold a minimum amount of liquid assets--they chose to allow corporate bonds to qualify as liquid assets, but completely excluded municipal bonds--even municipal bonds that are just as liquid and high-grade as corporate bonds.

This makes no sense, and it effectively discriminates against municipal bonds and cities. A municipal bond that is just as liquid as the most liquid corporate bond would not be counted as a liquid asset under the rule just because it was issued by a municipality rather than a corporation.

The Fed has already recognized this error and has amended its rule to fix the problem. But the OCC, which regulates national banks, is still refusing to amend its rule and insists on favoring corporations over municipalities. So Mr. Messer and I introduced this bill because this kind of arbitrary discrimination against municipalities cannot be allowed to continue.

So in sum, this bill levels the playing field for cities and States in a way that maintains the safety and soundness of our banking system. The bill passed the Financial Services Committee 60-0 in July, and last Congress the bill passed the full House by a voice vote.

So I urge my colleagues to, once again, support this bipartisan legislation which is critically important for our States and our cities.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to pay tribute to Kang Kyung-wha, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Korea. Foreign Minister Kang has dedicated her career to the protection and promotion of humanitarian principles domestically and around the world. On September 22, 2017, she will be honored at the United Nations by Equality Now, a non-governmental organization advocating for the human rights of women and girls worldwide, for her work on behalf of women and girls and in recognition of her appointment as the first female Foreign Minister of the Republic of Korea.

Kang Kyung-wha is a veteran diplomat, serving both the Republic of Korea and the United Nations. After beginning her career as a news producer and associate professor, Minister Kang began working in the National Assembly, serving as the Secretary for International Relations in the Office of the Speaker in 1990. Her work was focused on the promotion of human rights, women's advancement, and parliamentary diplomacy. After 8 years with the National Assembly, she began working at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, the agency she now leads.

In 2005, Minister Kang was appointed Director General of International Organizations at the foreign ministry, becoming the second female diplomat to serve at that level. She was the Minister in her country's Permanent Mission to the United Nations from September 2001 to July 2005, during which time she chaired the Commission on the Status of Women for its 48th and 49th sessions. In 2006, she was appointed by Secretary-General Kofi Annan to serve as United Nations Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights, the highest appointment in an international organization for a Korean woman. In April 2013 Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon appointed her Assistant Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Deputy Emergency Relief Coordinator for the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. In this position, Minister Kang oversaw the UN agency responsible for their response to complex emergencies and natural disasters, the coordination of humanitarian response, policy development and advocacy. During her tenure, she navigated many of the most substantial crises in our time, coordinating humanitarian action and support in places like Syria and South Sudan.

In December 2016, Minister Kang was appointed as a Senior Advisor on Policy by then United Nations Secretary-General-designate Antonio Guterres. Shortly after, in June 2017, the Republic of Korea's President Moon Jae-in appointed Kang Kyung-wha as the Minister of Foreign Affairs. She has been tasked with resolving sensitive diplomatic issues while furthering Korea's commitment to refugee and human rights. Minister Kang must help her country navigate one of the most dangerous geopolitical situations our world has seen: the nuclearization of the Korean peninsula.

Mr. Speaker, I ask my colleagues to join me in recognizing Kang Kyung-wha for the work she has done to safeguard humanitarian principles and further the international community's commitment to the rights of women and girls, and to congratulate her on her appointment as the Republic of Korea's first female Minister of Foreign Affairs. Minister Kang's continued focus on the advancement of women both in the Republic of Korea and internationally has paved the way for future generations of women around the world.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of my Amendment No.19 to H.R. 3354, the Department of the Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2018, included in Division A En Bloc 1. My amendment would increase the funding for the Smithsonian Institute Salaries and Expenses by $2 million with the intended purpose of providing increased resources for the recently launched Smithsonian's American Women's History Initiative.

I strongly support the Initiative and its goal to more completely include the contributions of women throughout Smithsonian institutions by directing resources toward cataloging collections inventory, expanding exhibits, and developing educational programs on American women's history.

I strongly believe that ultimately we need a new Smithsonian museum dedicated to American women's history. Last year a bipartisan Congressional Commission made a strong, unanimous recommendation that our country needs such a museum and that it belongs in the Smithsonian system and should be prominently located on the National Mall. I have introduced legislation that incorporates those recommendations, and I'm grateful for the support of 247 bipartisan members of the House who have cosponsored my bill. I hope there will be broad support for this amendment as well. This Initiative represents the first important step toward establishing a physical Smithsonian Museum on American Women's History and aims to make important improvements in existing museum exhibitions to more accurately and completely tell the story of our nation's history.

I strongly urge the passage of this amendment and the en bloc.

Mr. Speaker, when DACA was launched in 2012, it allowed nearly 800,000 young people to come out of the shadows and live without the constant fear of being deported. Some came here as infants in their parents' arms. Some know no other language but English, and they know no other country but America. And all of them simply seek a better future.

DACA helped breathe life into their American Dream. DREAMers are our neighbors, our friends, and our colleagues. They grew up here. They have done absolutely nothing wrong. They are in school, they are working, and they are contributing to the American economy.

And now, they must fear deportation once again. That is not the American Dream; that is not who we are.

I hope that all of my colleagues will take that to heart so that we can finally pass the Dream Act and keep these Americans out of the shadows, contributing to our economy, growing their lives, and helping live and be the American Dream.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding, and I ask unanimous consent to bring up H.R. 3440, the DREAM Act, to protect young people like Isabelle, a DREAMer who graduated from Baruch College in New York and now works to help low-income veterans recuperate and get better. Thanks to DACA, she was able to do this.

Mr. Speaker, today the Trump administration announced that it intends to crush the hopes of 800,000 DREAMers and cause them to live in fear each and every day, because that is what ending the DACA program will do.

Despite his many promises and saying that he has a heart, the President is persecuting young people who have done nothing more than come to this country in their parents' arms. They know no other language. They know no other country.

Ending the DACA program is opposed by the leadership of both parties and by the majorities in both Chambers. It is opposed by the clear majority of the American people.

But this Congress can do something to fix this. I am confident that if we put the BRIDGE Act, the American Hope Act, and the American Dream Act on the floor, if the Republican leaders would allow a vote, then it would pass.

DACA is in our court now. Let's have a vote and keep this lifeline to the American Dream alive.

Mr. Speaker, even as our colleagues in the Senate try, once again, today to strip lifesaving healthcare away from millions of Americans, I find that there is reason to hope and to have faith not in this Congress, where the work of cruel indifference to suffering precedes once again, but, rather, in the American people, because it has been the efforts of ordinary citizens whose calls and letters and protests have been making all the difference in this issue. It has been the collective voices of people telling their stories of struggle and survival who have slowed the system roller of repeal.

I salute each and every one of them. Your voices count. Your stories are important. Keep them coming because you, your health, and your healthcare matter.

Madam Speaker, I have been listening daily to heartbreaking stories from real people about their health challenges and what the repeal of the Affordable Care Act would mean to them.

People like Peter Morley, who survived cancer and now lives with lupus--he won't be able to afford his lifesaving infusions if repeal happens.

For Baby Theo, born with two holes and an enlarged kidney, the return of lifetime caps would mean the loss of insurance for him.

And Red Raccoon, an Iraq war veteran suffering from PTSD, he relies on Medicaid to supplement the inadequate VA system.

Each of them and millions more will suffer if repeal or replace goes forward. I believe we are a greater, more caring nation than this. I believe we can, we shall, we must do better.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the ranking member for yielding to me and for her leadership on this committee and in so many other ways.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong opposition to this resolution. My friends on the other side of the aisle keep talking about what this bill does, but let me tell you what it does not do.

I want to be absolutely clear that this rule does not say that arbitration is bad for consumers, and it does not say that consumers can't use arbitration. The only thing that the CFPB's rule says is that financial institutions cannot force consumers to waive their right to participate in class action lawsuits and only use arbitration. This protects an individual customer's rights. This is critically important because the evidence shows that consumers receive a great deal more relief from class action litigation against institutions than they do in arbitration.

So my friends on the other side of the aisle always say that they believe in consumer choice and customer choice and that customers should be able to choose what is best for them and not be dictated to by this Congress, but mandatory arbitration clauses restrict choice for consumers. They prohibit

consumers from choosing class action lawsuits over arbitration.

The CFPB's rule would restore this consumer choice, further empowering people, customers, empowering them to make their own decisions for themselves. This should be welcomed by any American. This should be welcomed.

Mr. Speaker, I urge a ``no'' vote on this resolution.

Mr. Speaker, over this weekend, I heard nonstop from people--people from all walks of life--who are living each day in fear that this Congress is going to strip them of the healthcare insurance they so desperately need, causing them to lose access to affordable care.

These good, decent, and hardworking people have told me again and again, in no uncertain terms, that they or someone whom they love dearly will suffer or die if our Republican colleagues carry out their catastrophically ill-conceived plan to repeal and replace or repeal and delay. They scoff at the oft-repeated Republican plan that they would merely be choosing not to have coverage, for they know the bitter truth.

To strip these people of the very coverage that keeps them, their children, and their parents alive would be as immoral an act as was ever perpetrated under the guise of governance.

When it comes to setting healthcare policy, this Congress, like every decent

doctor since the days of Hippocrates, should be guided by that eternal principle: First, do no harm.