Floor Statements

Madam Chair, the United States' relationship with Taiwan is an indispensable component in our efforts to maintain peace and stability in Asia and across the globe.

And in today's digital age, this relationship should include a strong and robust partnership on cybersecurity.

Over the past few years, China has clearly demonstrated its capability and willingness to conduct cyber-attacks against our country, such as the state-sponsored economic espionage that led to the indictment of Beijing-linked hackers last year.

On top of implementing strict retaliatory measures to deter this malicious behavior, we should work proactively with our allies to establish preventative defense plans that leverage cybersecurity sharing strategies.

Taiwan is uniquely positioned to partner with us on our efforts to combat Chinese cyber-attacks, and this amendment will help us move closer to enhancing our collaboration in this space so that we stay ahead of our adversaries.

Madam Speaker, due to an illness that required medical attention, I was unable to vote during many of last night's roll call votes.

Had I been present, I would have voted: NAY on Roll Call No. 264; NAY on Roll Call No. 265; YEA on Roll Call No. 266; YEA on Roll Call No. 267; NAY on Roll Call No. 268; YEA on Roll Call No. 269; NAY on Roll Call No. 270; NAY on Roll Call No. 271; NAY on Roll Call No. 272; NAY on Roll Call No. 273; NAY on Roll Call No. 274; YEA on Roll Call No. 275; NAY on Roll Call No. 276; YEA on Roll Call No. 277; YEA on Roll Call No. 278; YEA on Roll Call No. 279.

NAY on Roll Call No. 280; YEA on Roll Call No. 281; NAY on Roll Call No. 282; NAY on Roll Call No. 283; YEA on Roll Call No. 284; YEA on Roll Call No. 285; YEA on Roll Call No. 286; NAY on Roll Call No. 287; NAY on Roll Call No. 288; YEA on Roll Call No. 289; NAY on Roll Call No. 290; YEA on Roll Call No. 291; NAY on Roll Call No. 292; YEA on Roll Call No. 293; and NAY on Roll Call No. 294.

Mr. Speaker, at age 19, Ralph Hall jumped at the chance to join the Navy, to fly Hellcat fighters during World War II in defense of this Nation. Seventy years later, at the age of 89, he jumped again out of an airplane to honor America's veterans on Memorial Day.

At age 11, Ralph Hall was working at the Rockwall, Texas, drugstore when he served two Coca-Colas, two packs of Old Gold cigarettes, and a stack of newspapers to two customers known simply to the rest of the world as Bonnie and Clyde. Eighty years later, at the age of 91, Ralph was still working and serving the folks in Rockwall, in north Texas, as the oldest Member ever to cast a vote in the history of the House of Representatives.

From beginning to end, Ralph Hall lived one of the most extraordinary and remarkable lives of anyone ever to serve in Congress.

In his 34 years in this Chamber, Ralph spent some of his time sitting over here as a Blue Dog Democrat. For some of his time he spent it sitting over there as a conservative Republican. Ralph liked to joke that was because ``the Republicans never much wanted me, and the Democrats never much liked me.'' Neither of those was true, but it was that self-deprecating humor that made Ralph Hall beloved to everyone who knew him.

In the Science, Space, and Technology Committee room, Ralph Hall's picture hangs alongside other past chairmen. But Ralph was the only chairman to have Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, Gene Cernan, and every then-living Apollo-era astronaut come to his home to celebrate one of his birthdays. When asked why, Neil Armstrong, the first man on the Moon, who famously took a giant leap for mankind, said it was because Ralph Hall was a giant to our space program. Ralph Hall, he said, was a giant among men.

Mr. Speaker, to those on the floor who knew Ralph Hall, thank you for allowing me to remember him for the Representative that he truly was. And for those of you who did not have the privilege of serving with Ralph Hall, thank you for letting me remember the man who was the kind of Representative that we should all hope to be.

When Ralph Hall passed away last Thursday at the age of 95, he left this Earth, went right past the Moon--and our loss became Heaven's gain.

Godspeed, Ralph Hall.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask all Members to rise and observe a moment of silence to honor the extraordinary life of Congressman Ralph Hall.

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

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of the Senate amendments to H.R. 251, the Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards Program Extension Act. This bill reauthorizes the Chemical Facilities Anti- Terrorism Standards program, more commonly known as CFATS, for a period of 15 months.

CFATS is a vital national security program that makes Americans safer by helping chemical facilities secure dangerous substances. Under CFATS, security and industry stakeholders must work together to identify high-risk facilities and ensure appropriate security measures are in place to mitigate these risks.

I look forward to working with my colleagues across the aisle and in the Senate to develop a long-term reauthorization to protect our Nation and provide certainty to industry.

I thank my colleagues in the Senate for taking up this urgent matter to prevent this program from expiring, and I urge my colleagues to support this bill.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Shimkus).

(Mr. SHIMKUS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. Speaker, I urge all Members to support this bill to allow this program, which protects and secures our chemical facilities, to continue, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 5759: the 21st Century Integrated Digital Experience Act--also known as the ``21st Century IDEA.''

Mr. Speaker, I first want to thank my colleague, Representative Ro Khanna, for his leadership on this important legislation

This bill is bipartisan. Because if there's one thing we can and should agree on--it's the federal government's duty and obligation to serving the American people as best we can.

It's been a privilege to co-lead on this effort to help make sure we do a better job.

We all know that there's a lot of room for improvement when it comes to meeting the needs of the constituents we were sent here to serve.

But the 21st Century IDEA homes in on a particular area where our federal government lags staggeringly behind: digital modernization and technology.

Why's this such a big issue? Because it's hurting our ability to ensure folks get timely and efficient help from agencies like the IRS or VA.

And even though the technology we need to mitigate this problem is already available-we aren't using it. But as times change, and as citizens' needs transform, it's our job to ensure we evolve the services we provide.

In today's world, this means ensuring that when citizens engage with the government, that interaction mirrors other modern, cost-effective experiences in their everyday lives.

With everything from hailing a cab, buying groceries, or ordering a pizza, we've shifted away from phone calls, walk-ins, or pickups, toward online orders and mobile apps that save us time and, often, money.

The same is true when it comes to federal agencies: Digitization increases the quality of service, promotes efficiency, and improves cost-effectiveness. In fact, recent data from the IRS shows that it costs an agency about $42 to help a customer on the telephone, and about $54 to respond to letters sent through the mail.

The same assistance costs only 22 cents when conducted online.

The 21st Century IDEA takes steps to catapult our federal government into the 21st Century by requiring specific efficiency-boosting and cost-saving improvements to government websites and digital services.

These improvements include, for example, ensuring that consumers can connect to government sites through a secure connection, that sites offer search functions, that sites provide consumers a personalization option, and that sites consolidate redundant material

These changes will be overseen by a responsible agency official to ensure compliance.

On top of this, agencies will be required to make paper-based forms available digitally within one year, to provide a digital option as an alternative to in-person government services within two years, to submit a plan to increase the use of electronic signatures on contracts and related documents within 180 days, and to modernize their public- facing websites within one year.

Consumers will no longer be required to print and fill out forms that must then be either faxed or mailed in.

These digital improvements will drastically improve the way our federal agencies provide critical services to folks all across the country, including people with disabilities or those who live in rural areas with limited access to traditional, in-person assistance services all while saving countless taxpayer dollars.

I cannot stress it enough that the federal government is supposed to work for the American people. And we owe it to them to do a better job.

The tools we need to restore the United States' global leadership in technology and digital government are already at our fingertips. Now it's time to act.

I urge my colleagues to vote yes on H.R. 5759: the 21st Century Integrated Digital Experience Act.

Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 6443) to amend the Homeland Security Act of 2002 to authorize the Secretary of Homeland Security to establish a continuous diagnostics and mitigation program at the Department of Homeland Security, and for other purposes, as amended.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include any extraneous material on the bill under consideration.

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

Mr. Speaker, earlier this year, the Office of Management and Budget and the Department of Homeland Security

released a report on the cybersecurity risks faced by Federal agencies. Among the findings of that report was that almost 75 percent of our Federal agencies are vulnerable to cyber threats, in large part due to their inability to understand cybersecurity risks and, therefore, to properly prioritize resources.

Mr. Speaker, it is statistics like this that should make the state of our Nation's cyber readiness and resilience deeply troubling to all of us. And it is one of the main reasons that DHS' Continuous Diagnostics and Mitigation, or CDM, program has been one of my top priorities during my time as chairman of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Protection Subcommittee. That is because CDM has the potential to provide solutions to this problem by dramatically increasing visibility across Federal networks, thereby dramatically improving the ability of DHS, OMB, and agency security officers to better understand the technology assets being utilized across their agencies.

Mr. Speaker, at the end of the day, looking across all networks and systems the Federal Government owns and operates, it comes down to fingers on government keyboards, whether they be laptops, desktops, tablets, servers, or in data centers.

We need to know what we have before we can try to defend it.

That is why the CDM program is so crucial to the cybersecurity posture of our Federal Government. Through its phased rollout, CDM requires DHS to provide agencies with the capabilities to collect the cybersecurity risk information necessary to make better decisions. It not only allows the ability to combat our enemies in cyberspace, but also to help Federal CIOs manage information technology.

The security data that CDM capabilities and tools collect will help Federal CIOs and DHS make smarter choices about where taxpayer dollars are going and to understand some of the most basic questions a cybersecurity expert faces, including what devices are on the network.

Mr. Speaker, H.R. 6443 is necessary to codify the CDM program at DHS and ensure that these authorities will exist to allow the continued progress of this essential cybersecurity program.

Making sure that Federal agencies have access to the tools and capabilities they need to defend their networks and getting DHS the data to understand cybersecurity risks and vulnerabilities, and to coordinate our Federal network defenses, are paramount concerns in this technological age.

My goal, and the goal of the bipartisan group of cosponsors supporting H.R. 6443, is to help boost the long-term success of the CDM program.

This bill also ensures that this program keeps pace with the cutting- edge capabilities being developed in the private sector, thereby avoiding the type of vendor lock that has previously been a problem. In that way, this bill ensures that we will be modernizing and updating our systems before they become legacy technologies unsupported by vendors and at even greater risk of being exploited by our digital adversaries.

It is DHS' CDM program that will help Federal agencies and the whole of the Federal Government to understand the threats they face and the risks that these vulnerabilities pose in real time. Authorizing the CDM program will further DHS' role in the cybersecurity mission throughout our government and will continue to strengthen and elevate this important program.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support this bill, and I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my friends across the aisle, Ranking Member Thompson and Congressman Langevin, for their support of this bill. I would like to thank the ranking member of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Protection Subcommittee, Mr. Richmond, for cosponsoring this bill.

Mr. Speaker, this is, very simply, commonsense legislation that will strengthen our Nation's cybersecurity posture and thereby strengthen our Nation's national security.

Mr. Speaker, once again, I urge my colleagues to support H.R. 6443, and I yield back the balance of my time.

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

Mr. Chair, I would like to thank Chairman Carter and Ranking Member Wasserman Schultz for their hard work on behalf of the 63,000 veterans in my district, as well as servicemembers and veterans across the country.

Mr. Chairman, I am grateful to once again have the opportunity to offer this important amendment, which would simply prohibit any funds made available in this act from being used to propose, to plan for, or to execute a new or additional round of BRAC.

Mr. Chairman, I am privileged to represent the Fourth Congressional District of Texas, which is home to the Red River Army Depot. The Depot has supported the warfighter since 1941; and although the Depot community has weathered a lot of changes over the years, its commitment to mission has remained the same. On the placards inside of every vehicle are the words ``We build it as if our lives depend on it. Theirs do.''

The Depot is a vital job creator in northeast Texas, and it is a critical component, Mr. Chairman, of our national defense. In this fiscal environment, we have to be careful stewards of taxpayer dollars and focus our limited resources on addressing critical national security objectives and our military readiness. Having another round of BRAC simply won't help us achieve this goal.

To that point, the Government Accountability Office said that the last round of BRAC back in 2005 cost the American taxpayers over $35 billion, which was 67 percent more than the original cost estimate.

Starting another round of BRAC would weaken our capabilities while

increasing our vulnerabilities in the face of critical threats facing our Nation right now.

I would like to thank my colleagues who have supported this important amendment for the past 3 years, and I look forward to having this amendment included in the MILCON-VA appropriations bill.

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

Mr. Chair, I yield to my colleague from Texas, Chairman Carter.

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

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to commemorate and celebrate the life of ATF Senior Special Agent Scott Ragsdale from Fate, Texas, who tragically passed away on May 24, 2018, at just 41 years of age during an ATF training exercise.

Agent Ragsdale is survived by his wife, Erin, and his two children, Aidan and Riley; his mother and father, Patti and Roy Ragsdale; his sister, Kelly Novikoff, her husband, Lee, and their two children; and many aunts, uncles, and cousins who loved him dearly and will miss him.

Those who knew Agent Ragsdale best say that he will most be remembered for his incredible sense of humor and, of course, for his 17 years of dedicated service to his fellow man.

He will be greatly missed in our northeast Texas community for his brave and selfless service as a member of our law enforcement.

On behalf of the three-quarters of a million Texans whom I represent across the Fourth Congressional District of Texas, I offer my most sincere condolences to his family and loved ones.

I wish you Godspeed, Special Agent Scott Ragsdale.

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Republican Conference, I offer a privileged resolution and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency Act of 2017.

Mr. Speaker, we are here today to take action on what I believe is the defining public policy challenge of our generation: the cybersecurity posture of the United States.

We have seen cyber attacks hit every sector of our economy with devastating impacts to both government agencies and to the private sector alike. It is our duty to ensure that we are doing our very best to defend against the very real threats that our cyber adversaries now pose.

The Department of Homeland Security is the Federal Government's lead civilian agency for cybersecurity. Within it, the National Protection and Programs Directorate, or NPPD, leads our national effort to safeguard and to enhance the resilience of our Nation's physical and cyber infrastructure, helping Federal agencies and, when requested, also helping the private sector to harden their networks and to respond to cybersecurity incidents.

As the cyber threat landscape continues to evolve, Mr. Speaker, so should the Department of Homeland Security. H.R. 3359 elevates the cybersecurity and the infrastructure security missions of NPPD to strengthen the Federal Government's ability to act and react to the changing threat landscape.

The cybersecurity mission today is extremely challenging due to a number of factors: the ability of malicious actors to operate from anywhere in the world now, the linkages between cyberspace and our physical systems, and the difficulty of reducing vulnerabilities and consequences in complex cyber networks.

The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Act of 2017 rises to this challenge and prioritizes the Department of Homeland Security's vital role in cyberspace. By authorizing the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency within the DHS, this bill establishes the structure, the nomenclature, and the flexibility to best serve the American people.

The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency will be structured to best work with partners at all levels of government, from the private and the nonprofit sectors, to share information and to build greater trust in order to make our cyber and our physical infrastructure more secure.

This bill provides the necessary overarching structure and the interdepartmental flexibility to best allow the DHS to execute its mission in both cybersecurity and the infrastructure security space.

Mr. Speaker, we consider this legislation at a great time of transition and opportunity for the DHS. Just last week, Kirstjen Nielsen was sworn in as the Secretary of Homeland Security. In addition to an impressive record of public service, Secretary Nielsen brings unprecedented cybersecurity experience and savvy to the agency, qualifications fitting the threat landscape that she now inherits.

We owe it to her and to the dedicated women and men working alongside her to ensure that DHS has the proper organization and resources to carry out its mission as the lead civilian cybersecurity agency in our Federal Government.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank Chairman McCaul for his leadership and his dogged determination in this effort and getting this bill to the floor, as well as the other committees of jurisdiction who worked closely to craft this compromise.

Mr. Speaker, the cybersecurity challenges we face are about more than protecting bottom lines or intellectual property or even our Nation's most sensitive classified information. Ultimately, our obligation as lawmakers to be protective cybersecurity stewards stems from a fundamental obligation to safeguard the American people. This is what we aim to do with this legislation, and I urge my colleagues to join me in supporting it.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to take from the Speaker's table the bill (H.R. 1616) to amend the Homeland Security Act of 2002 to authorize the National Computer Forensics Institute, and for other purposes, with the Senate amendment thereto, and concur in the Senate amendment.

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

Mr. Chairman, I thank Chairman Dent and the ranking member for their hard work on behalf of the 63,000 veterans in my district, as well as servicemembers and veterans from all across the country.

I am also grateful for the support of Congressman Shuster in offering this amendment, an amendment which would simply prohibit any funds made available in this division from being used to propose, plan for, or execute a new or additional round of base realignment and closure, or

I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania.

Mr. Chairman, I thank the chairman for accepting the amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

I would like to thank my colleague and friend from North Carolina, the gentleman, Congressman Walker, for yielding to me and for hosting this Special Order tonight, which is fittingly titled, ``The People's Night.'' After all, there is a reason that the United States House of Representatives is often called the people's House. It is because our job is to fight for the priorities of the people that we are privileged to represent here.

Over the past 6 months, Republicans have been fighting for the people, fighting to fundamentally change Washington and to return power to the American people where it really belongs.

We have been doing this against a strong headwind of obstructionists, sometimes from colleagues across the aisle, sometimes from certain in the media more interested in a liberal agenda than in accurate reporting, and sometimes from embedded bureaucrats and special interests within the government industrial complex who really don't want to see the Washington swamp drained. But in spite of that, we are succeeding.

And while many of these conservative winds have gone unreported and, therefore, flown under the radar, the truth is that we are indeed steering the ship in the right direction, we are steadily undoing the damage done by out-of-touch policies by the Obama administration.

Case in point is a fact that has not garnered a lot of headlines, but should have, something that Congressman Walker pointed out earlier: the fact that in the first 100 days of this 115th Congress, we have passed more bills--158 to be exact--than were passed during the first 100 days of any and all of the four prior administrations: the Obama, Bush, Clinton, and H.W. Bush administrations. And as proof of our productivity, we have signed more of those bills into law than in any of the other administrations' first 100 days as well.

But it is not just the quantity of the bills that we are turning into laws. It is about the quality and the substance. We are passing legislation that is making government smaller. We are passing legislation that is making government less costly. We are passing legislation that is making the government finally more accountable to the people. We are dismantling the enormous bureaucratic overgrowth and underbrush that spun out of control under former President Obama.

As a former prosecutor, I believe you have got to win your case with verifiable facts and evidence, so let me give you some. In the last 20 years, prior Congresses have successfully used the Congressional Review Act one time. Just once in the prior 20 years has Congress used the CRA to undo midnight regulations passed at the 12th hour in the dead of night as administrations were walking out the door. But in the first 4 months of this Congress, Republicans have united to use the CRA 14 times to overturn 14 of President Obama's most harmful midnight regulations, and in so doing, we have saved the American people, the United States taxpayers, billions of dollars in the process.

Now we are in the process of finally saving America from arguably the most disastrous piece of legislation in our Nation's history: ObamaCare.

If anyone needs any further evidence of its implosion into a death spiral,

just yesterday CMS announced that 2 million Americans dropped off of the ObamaCare exchanges in just the first 3 months of this year.

The ObamaCare house is on fire, and rather than waiting for it to burn to the ground with American families still inside, Republicans in the peoples' House have acted now. Republicans won't let Americans suffer in the face of such inevitable continuing adversity when it comes to our healthcare. So as ObamaCare continues to dissolve in front of our eyes, we have already taken action by sending an ObamaCare repeal bill over to the Senate.

All of this work makes me incredibly optimistic about the results that we are continuing to deliver on the people's behalf, just as we did again last week when we passed a House bill that tackles a key issue that I have been sounding the alarm about since my first day in Congress: ending the reckless overreach of Elizabeth Warren's Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

I was so grateful for the opportunity to support the House's passage of my fellow Texan, Jeb Hensarling's, Financial CHOICE Act last week, which puts an end to the days of the Obama-era CFPB as we know it, because the Financial CHOICE Act legislation converts the CFPB into the Consumer Law Enforcement Agency, which is tasked with promoting competition rather than stifling it, tasked with enhancing consumer choice rather than eliminating it, all the while ensuring congressional oversight that has been missing for far too long.

Mr. Speaker, every Federal agency needs to have someone grading its paper, and the Financial CHOICE Act will allow the CFPB's paper to be graded for the very first time.

I am incredibly excited about the economic opportunities that our Nation is going to continue to be afforded as we continue here to wipe away President Obama's sweeping government mandates and regulations so we can get our country back on track and back working for all Americans.

There is a lot more to be done to ensure that America's brightest days truly are ahead of us, but with so many committed conservatives as we have here tonight, I am optimistic that we are going to continue to deliver results for the people here in what finally, once again, can be appropriately referred to as the peoples' House.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 1842, the Strengthening Children's Safety Act of 2017.

Mr. Speaker, there are few things more shocking to the conscience or sickening to the soul than crimes against children--the most innocent, the most vulnerable members of our society.

In my time as a Federal prosecutor, the child exploitation images that I was forced to review as part of the evidence were, by far, the most disturbing and difficult part of that job. All of these years later, I still can't erase those depraved images from my mind, and I doubt that I will ever be able to do that.

But crimes against children should stick with us, they should haunt us, and then they should spur us to take action. If we do anything here in Congress, it should be working to protect children. We talk all day long in this Chamber about the future of this country. Well, Mr. Speaker, the children are the future of this country. We need to put our words into action.

So today I am introducing H.R. 1842, the Strengthening Children's Safety Act of 2017, a bill which closes two sets of loopholes in Federal child exploitation laws to make sure that all dangerous sex offenders are treated the same and are subject to the same enhanced penalties under the law.

Right now, Mr. Speaker, current law establishes minimum national standards for sex offender registration and notification in all 50 States, in the District of Columbia, in U.S. territories, and Tribal jurisdictions. If a sex offender knowingly fails to register or update a registration, that individual faces a fine and imprisonment of up to 10 years.

There is also an enhanced penalty of 5 to 30 years imprisonment if the offender, while in that noncompliance status, also commits a crime of violence under Federal law, under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, the law of the District of Columbia, Indian Tribal law, or the law of any territory or possession of the United States.

But here is the problem, Mr. Speaker: Right now, only individuals committing crimes of violence under these Federal, military, and Tribal laws are subject to the enhanced penalty, while individuals committing the same crimes of violence under State law are not.

Mr. Speaker, hopefully, we can all agree that child predators committing crimes of violence should be subject to the same enhanced penalties, regardless of whether these crimes are being charged in Federal court or at the State level. So this bill adds similar State crimes of violence to that list to ensure that the enhanced penalty applies equally to all dangerous offenders.

Mr. Speaker, the second portion of H.R. 1842 addresses enhanced sentences for individuals with prior sex offenses. Fortunately, our child exploitation laws consistently do call for higher sentences any time a defendant has a prior conviction for Federal or State sex offenses. But currently, these sentencing provisions do not consistently include all similar sex offense convictions that arise under the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

H.R. 1842 amends those Federal child exploitation laws to include all child sexual exploitation offenses under the Uniform Code of Military Justice in the recidivist provisions, as appropriate. Again, I think it is critical, Mr. Speaker, that we close this loophole to ensure that all prior child exploitation convictions are penalized for repeat offenders.

Many issues in Congress these days are partisan, but it is my sincere hope, Mr. Speaker, that Members on both sides of the aisle today will be able to come together to support stronger protections for children who are sexually abused. Mr. Speaker, I urge all of my colleagues to support this important bill.

Mr. Speaker, I claim the time in opposition to the amendment.

Mr. Speaker, I strongly oppose the amendment offered by the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson Lee), my friend.

Her amendment would sunset the very modest, yet necessary and appropriate, authority that we are seeking to grant Federal probation officers today. No valid reason has been given for the need to sunset this provision. In fact, ample evidence is available showing why probation officers need this authority to perform their duties safely and effectively.

Just last year, over one-third of the safety-related incidents reported by Federal probation and pretrial staff involved third parties encountered by officers while performing their official duties.

For example, during an unannounced home visit to an apartment by officers, as they approached the apartment, two unidentified subjects entered the hall from another unit. Officers knocked on the resident's door and there was no answer. One third party stated: ``Hey, five-oh, who are you looking for?'' And they began approaching the officers in a menacing manner.

One of the third parties pulled out a cell phone and started videoing, yelling obscenities, and making other statements to the officers. Another individual, in response to the commotion, entered the hallway possessing a knife and drew it as he moved toward the officers.

These types of threats, Mr. Speaker, are very real and very dangerous to the brave men and women who serve the criminal justice system as Federal probation officers. The types of threats that exist today will continue to exist in 2\1/2\ years when the gentlewoman's amendment would sunset the proposed arrest authority.

I want to make one thing very clear, Mr. Speaker. The bill before us today does not create a new Federal crime. It is already a Federal crime to assault, resist, oppose, impede, intimidate, or interfere with a Federal probation officer for which an individual can be placed under arrest. The only thing the bill today does is say that probation officers can make that arrest.

And why shouldn't they be able to make that arrest?

Probation officers have a unique role in our criminal justice system, balancing the skills of a law enforcement officer with the skills of a social worker. In addition to the 6 weeks of initial training, Federal probation officers are required to complete at least 40 hours of continuing education and training annually.

I don't think it is a radical idea to suggest that Federal law enforcement officers should be able to arrest someone who commits a Federal crime by interfering with the duties being performed by that officer.

Let them do their part in keeping the public safe. Let them do their jobs safely. Let them do their jobs effectively.

Mr. Speaker, I oppose the amendment, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, there is no Fourth Amendment violation, the bill makes no reference whatsoever to the issue of searches, and there is no objection to the gentlewoman's request for a study. But there continues to be, and needs to be, objection and opposition to a sunset provision with respect

to the authority that probation officers need to perform their duties safely and effectively.

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