Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, on June 13, 2017, I inadvertently voted Nay on Roll Call No. 307 (On Passage of S. 1094, the Department of Veterans Affairs Accountability and Whistleblower Protection Act of 2017). My intention was to vote Yea.

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

I rise in support of H.R. 1309, the TSA Administrator Modernization Act of 2017.

When the Transportation Security Administration was created after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, Congress intended for the administrator to serve a 5-year term, like the administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration.

However, since TSA moved from the Department of Transportation to the Department of Homeland Security in 2003, there has been a lack of clarity about the length of the administrator's term. The measure before us today clarifies Congress' expectation that TSA administrators serve for 5 years.

In TSA's short history, it has had six Senate-confirmed administrators. None has served more than 4 years. The last TSA administrator, Peter Neffenger, served just 2 years.

Stability at the top is critically important as we push TSA to improve its performance and address ongoing challenges.

For example, after recent covert testing carried out by the Department's inspector general revealed alarming weaknesses in checkpoint screening operations, Administrator Neffenger focused TSA's attention on addressing its detection rate failures, improving training, and reducing vulnerabilities associated with commercial aviation screening. At the same time, Administrator Neffenger worked with Congress to increase TSA staffing levels in response to long wait times at security checkpoints during the peak travel season last summer. Under his leadership, TSA successfully reduced wait times that had reached as long as 3 hours at some airplanes, without compromising the effectiveness of security measures. And while confronting those urgent short-term challenges, Administrator Neffenger was also focused on addressing TSA's longer-term challenges related to employee recruitment, retention, and morale.

I regret, as I know my colleague, Mr. Katko, does, that Administrator Neffenger did not have the opportunity to stay on and continue making progress within the administration. But I think we can all agree that TSA needs steady leadership in order to continue to evolve and fulfill its mission to protect the traveling public.

We can help ensure that TSA will have that stability and sustained focus at the top by passing this bill today.

I thank my colleague from New York, Representative Katko, for introducing this bipartisan legislation, and I urge all of our colleagues to give it their full support.

Madam Speaker, I urge support for H.R. 1309. This bill was unanimously approved by the Committee on Homeland Security earlier this month.

Enacting H.R. 1309 will provide TSA with stable, sustained leadership the administration needs to chart a more consistent course and overcome its longstanding challenges.

I would also like to commend my colleague, Mr. Katko, who has been absolutely dogged in his support of TSA and ensuring that it has the support and the resources that it needs. I thank him for his work on this bill.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I rise in support of H.R. 1353, the Transparency in Technological Acquisitions Act of 2017.

Mr. Speaker, last Congress, I served as the ranking member of the Transportation and Protective Security Subcommittee, and we held multiple hearings on TSA's acquisition processes.

In the course of conducting oversight and engaging with stakeholders, we learned that deficiencies in TSA's planning for technology investments were causing serious issues for technology companies who produce products to meet the Agency's needs.

Under the Transportation Security Acquisition Reform Act, TSA was required to develop a 5-year technology investment plan. Stakeholders widely supported this strategy and welcomed the release of TSA's first 5-year plan in August of 2015, but that support eroded when the budget request for the same year did not align with the acquisition schedule in the 5-year plan.

The purpose of the plan was to give businesses the time and certainty they need to align their resources and planning to meet TSA's technology needs. Security technology manufacturers looked at the plan and invested significant resources in the technology that TSA planned to acquire, but then they saw the budget request and found that TSA had shifted direction and no longer planned to procure that technology.

That lost investment of time and resources hurts all technology manufacturers, but it can completely destroy small businesses and discourage small-business owners from working with the Federal Government.

My bill, H.R. 1353, will help solve this problem by requiring TSA to report to Congress on their 5-year plan annually instead of biennially, and it will require TSA to notify Congress and all relevant stakeholders of any changes or updates to the plan.

These commonsense steps will help ensure that there is ongoing engagement between TSA and industry stakeholders so that manufacturers of all sizes can continue to meet TSA's technological needs and continue to innovate and address security vulnerabilities.

Mr. Speaker, I urge Members to support this legislation.

I want to thank Subcommittee Ranking Member Bonnie Watson Coleman, Congressman Keating, and Subcommittee Chairman John Katko for

being original cosponsors of this bipartisan legislation.

H.R. 1353 was unanimously approved by the full Committee on Homeland Security earlier this month. Enacting my bill will ensure that TSA's technology objectives are more closely aligned with the industry's stakeholders that produce technologies to help TSA meet those objectives.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the Chair for his support, and I yield back the balance of my time.

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

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 1294, the Reducing DHS Acquisition Cost Growth Act. Since the Department began its operations in 2002, it has spent tens of billions of dollars to procure goods, services, and supplies in support of DHS' national security efforts. The agency's major acquisitions investments, those that cost at least $300 million, represent a significant portion of such purchasing.

The Department has worked to improve its acquisition programs in recent years, but DHS still struggles when it comes to major acquisitions. Take, for example, the SBInet--a southwest border infrastructure project--that ballooned in cost to about $1 billion before it was canceled in 2011, after GAO found that it was ineffective.

More recently, there is the case of the Electronic Immigration System, an automated immigration benefits processing system. According to the Department's inspector general, this U.S. citizenship immigration services program is now on course to be completed 4 years later than originally estimated and at a cost of $1 billion more than estimated.

The importance and complexity of DHS' mission demands effective oversight of the Department's investments, particularly its major acquisitions. H.R. 1294 seeks to ensure greater congressional oversight of such acquisition programs by requiring the Department to report to Congress when cost, schedule, and performance requirements are not met. Additionally, when such requirements are not met, this bill requires DHS to provide Congress with an analysis explaining the root cause of the failures as well as a remediation plan to mitigate the problems.

The Committee on Homeland Security unanimously approved this measure earlier this month, and similar language was approved by the House in October 2015 as a part of comprehensive DHS acquisition legislation.

I commend my colleague from Florida for his work on this bill.

Mr. Speaker, effective oversight of the Department's acquisitions programs is essential to ensuring optimal program performance. Given DHS' limited budgetary resources and the gravity of its mission, it is critically important that DHS get its major acquisitions right. Enacting this legislation would require a greater level of accountability from DHS and give Congress a greater level of oversight to intercede before programs go off the rails.

Mr. Speaker, I urge support of H.R. 1294, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, Michael Flynn's resignation and reports of constant contact between Russia and the Trump campaign raise serious questions, and the American people deserve answers.

President Trump was informed weeks ago that Flynn lied about his discussions with the Russian Ambassador and might be vulnerable to blackmail.

Why did the President take no action until that lie became public?

President Trump has reportedly been briefed about contact between his campaign and Russian intelligence officers.

Why does he continue to insist that there was absolutely no communication with Russia?

These questions cannot go unanswered. We need to put politics aside, do what is right for our democracy, and create an independent commission to fully investigate Russia's influence on the Trump administration and the Presidential election.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 974, the Boosting Rates of American Veteran Employment Act, which I introduced along with Congressman and Colonel Paul Cook of California.

The BRAVE Act is commonsense, bipartisan legislation that will authorize the VA Secretary, when awarding Federal contracts, to give preference to contractors with high concentrations of full-time veteran employees. This bill will cost taxpayers absolutely nothing.

It will, first, reward companies that actively hire and invest in our veterans, companies that seek out veterans and give them opportunities to bring their unique skills, training, and experience to the civilian workforce.

Second, it will create an incentive for other companies to do the same and bring more veterans into their workforce.

Most importantly, as more and more companies hire more and more veterans, they will ultimately see that investing in veterans is good for business. That is the real incentive here. It is not just an advantage in securing Federal contracts; it is getting the benefit of employees who have worn the uniform, who have been trained by the greatest military in the world, and who have learned to get the job done, no matter what that job is.

We need more businesses in the private sector to recognize the value of investing in the men and women who have served our country. It is not an act of charity. Veterans are not looking for a handout; they just need an opportunity. The BRAVE Act will help ensure that more veterans have those opportunities.

I want to thank Chairman Roe of Tennessee, Vice Chairman Bilirakis, and Ranking Member Walz for supporting this bill and for helping to bring it to the floor today.

This legislation passed unanimously in the last Congress, and I urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to, once again, give it the bipartisan support it deserves.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak in honor of Bishop Frank Otha White, who passed away on Friday after serving for many years as the Senior Pastor of Zion Cathedral Church of God in Christ in Freeport, NY.

Born in 1940 in Oakley, South Carolina, Bishop White moved with his family to Long Island as a child, and went on to become a pillar of the Freeport community. In 1971, while serving as Assistant Pastor, Bishop White was the driving force behind the construction of the Zion Cathedral Church, a beautiful place of worship that still graces the Freeport skyline and will long stand as a visible testament to Bishop White's leadership, faith, and commitment to the Church.

I knew and worked with Bishop White both in my current position, and when I served as the Nassau County District Attorney. He was, first and foremost, a man of God, a man who dedicated his life to bringing people together and helping them to find in themselves the same enduring faith that motivated his work. And he was a leader not only in the Church, but in the community. He was deeply committed to the pursuit of justice, and to helping those who are most in need and so often overlooked by our society--the homeless, the poor, the sick, the elderly. He was a powerful advocate for children and for education. He saw tremendous value in every human life, he recognized that every human being had something unique to contribute to the community, and he worked to make others see the same.

I feel blessed to have had the opportunity to know Bishop White and tremendously grateful for all that he did to strengthen the community in Freeport and beyond. I offer my prayers and deepest condolences to Bishop White's family and loved ones and to the entire Zion Cathedral congregation as they mourn his loss and celebrate his life. I pray that he will rest in peace, and that his memory will continue to inspire us all to act with love and commit ourselves to the pursuit of justice in our communities every single day of our lives.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize retired United States Air Force Major General Joseph McNeil, a resident of New York's fourth congressional district who is being honored today by the Franklin Square Historical Society.

Fifty-five years ago this month, General McNeil was a 17 year old freshman at North Carolina A&T State University when he and three other freshmen entered a Woolworth's store in Greensboro, North Carolina and sat down at the whites-only counter. They were denied service and asked to leave, but they kept their seats until the store closed. The next morning, they came back with more students. Again they were denied service, and again they refused to leave. They were ridiculed and taunted, but they resisted provocation in their commitment to non- violence. By the fourth day, as news spread, hundreds of students had joined the sit-in, and soon, similar peaceful protests had begun in other towns across North Carolina and beyond the state's borders.

The young men who initiated this wave of civil disobedience live on in American history as the Greensboro Four. Their actions reflect the very best of the American character--the commitment to freedom and justice and equality, and the courage to confront injustice with the force of truth and disciplined nonviolence.

As Black History Month draws to a close, I wish to recognize General McNeil for his instrumental role in a movement that has made the United States of America a better nation and the American people a better people. I wish also to recognize his distinguished service as a decorated officer in the United States Air Force and Air Force Reserves for more than three decades. I am tremendously grateful for General McNeil's contributions to our communities in New York's fourth congressional district, and it is my distinct honor to serve as his representative in Congress.

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

I rise in strong support of H.R. 719, the TSA Office of Inspection Accountability Act of 2015.

Mr. Speaker, as ranking member of the Subcommittee on Transportation Security, I have a responsibility to ensure that the Transportation Security Administration operates effectively and efficiently. Part of this responsibility includes working to ensure that not a single taxpayer dollar is wasted so that resources are properly expended to protect our Nation's airports and the traveling public.

Regrettably, we have learned from the Department of Homeland Security's inspector general that the TSA's Office of Inspection is not operating effectively and efficiently. Specifically, we have learned that taxpayer dollars have been wasted in a manner that may well be undermining the effectiveness and integrity of internal investigations and inspections within the TSA.

According to a report issued by the inspector general in September of 2013, some employees in the Office of Inspection were designated ``criminal investigators'' and have received the premium pay and early retirement benefits commensurate with that position, despite the fact that they perform little to no investigative duties.

Apparently, the Office of Inspection knowingly made these improper designations and knowingly conferred better pay and benefits to employees who did not do the work required to justify such compensation.

If no changes are made to the number of criminal investigator positions, the inspector general estimates that it will result in the wasting of as much as $17.5 million over 5 years. H.R. 719 seeks to put an end to this wasteful practice and prevent it from happening in the future.

Mr. Speaker, this bill would require TSA to certify that all persons designated as criminal investigators are working on criminal investigations at least 50 percent of their time. If the TSA wants to provide an employee with the enhanced pay and benefits that criminal investigators receive, then they should have to certify that the employee is actually performing the duties of a criminal investigator. That is just common sense.

This measure would not affect individuals in that office who legitimately hold the criminal investigator title and would not impede efforts to thwart terror plots and other criminal enterprises that threaten our national security.

Again, this legislation is common sense. It reflects a commitment to good government and the careful stewardship of taxpayer dollars. The House unanimously approved identical legislation in the last Congress, and I urge my colleagues to do the same with this bill.

This is an opportunity for bipartisan action to solve a problem and demonstrate the strength of our commitment to eliminate wasteful spending.

Mr. Speaker, in closing, I would like to commend Chairman Katko, as well as the gentleman from South Carolina, Representative Sanford, for their work on this legislation. If enacted, H.R. 719 will bring greater accountability to TSA's Office of Inspection and ensure taxpayer dollars are being used efficiently and that past abuses are not being repeated.

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

Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of H.R. 720, the Gerardo Hernandez Airport Security Act of 2015, and yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, the bill before us today is named in honor of Officer Gerardo Hernandez, a Transportation Security Administration officer who was tragically shot and killed in the line of duty on November 1, 2013, at Los Angeles International Airport.

Officer Hernandez was the first TSA employee ever to be killed in the line

of duty, and this bill that bears his name seeks to better prepare our Nation's airports to respond to such security incidents in hopes that we can prevent another TSA officer, airport employee, or passenger from suffering the same fate.

That morning in November 2013, a man entered LAX with a semiautomatic rifle, a bagful of ammunition, and the intent to target TSA officers. After killing Officer Hernandez at the TSA checkpoint, the man proceeded into the secure area of the terminal where he shot and wounded two more TSA officers and a civilian.

Those two TSA officers heroically continued to help passengers escape to safety while the shooter made it as far as the food court at the end of the terminal before he was shot and wounded by LAX police officers.

The men and women of the Los Angeles World Airports Police Department and all emergency responders who arrived on the scene that morning acted bravely and swiftly prevented further loss of life despite tremendous communications challenges.

It is with those men and women and all emergency responders in mind that I rise to support this bill because this incident exposed serious deficiencies in planning, preparedness, and communication that must be corrected for the safety of emergency responders and all who use and work in our airports.

Mr. Speaker, H.R. 720 would implement commonsense security measures to ensure that our Nation's airports have in place individualized strategies for responding to a security incident such as an active shooter scenario or an act of terrorism.

This bill also specifically requires TSA to provide information to airports on best practices for responding to a security incident at checkpoints; provide Transportation Security officers with practical training for responding to active shooter scenarios; and conduct a nationwide assessment of the interoperable communications capabilities of the law enforcement, fire, and medical personnel responsible for responding to an active shooter event at an airport.

These requirements are informed by postincident reviews conducted by TSA and LAX, as well as hearings and oversight work conducted by the Committee on Homeland Security Subcommittee on Transportation Security.

Mr. Speaker, prior to my time here in Congress, I understand that the Subcommittee on Transportation Security also visited LAX to see firsthand how the tragedy unfolded and hear from TSA airport officials and the American Federation of Government Employees about how the response to a similar incident can be improved going forward.

I hope that we can continue that productive dialogue with LAX and our other airports and work together to better prepare for such violence in the airport environment.

We will never forget what happened at LAX on November 1, 2013, nor can we afford to forget the lessons to be learned from that tragic day. The threats to our Nation's airports are ceaseless and constantly evolving. There could be another attack on any given day at any given airport. We must assume that it will happen. We must be more prepared. We must do better. We owe it to Officer Hernandez and his family.

That is why I rise today in support of H.R. 720, and I urge all of my colleagues to pass this important bill.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Waters), the ranking member on the U.S. House Committee on Financial Services whose district encompasses Los Angeles International Airport.

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

Mr. Speaker, in closing, I would like to thank Subcommittee Chairman Katko for the bipartisan, inclusive, and constructive way in which he has conducted the subcommittee's response to this incident. I am proud to join Ranking Member Thompson and Chairman McCaul as an original cosponsor of H.R. 720. This is bipartisan legislation that was unanimously passed by the House last Congress, and I urge my colleagues to do the same with this bill.

I strongly believe that with our votes today, we will not only honor the life of Officer Hernandez, we have the opportunity to save lives, be they transportation security officers, airport workers, or members of the flying public. At the end of the day, saving those lives is the best way we can honor Officer Hernandez and his family. I once again urge my colleagues to pass this bill.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I have a motion to recommit at the desk.

I am opposed in its current form.

Mr. Speaker, this is the final amendment to the bill, which will not kill the bill or send it back to committee. If adopted, the bill will immediately proceed to final passage, as amended.

Like many of you, especially my fellow freshman Members, I told my constituents of New York City's Fourth Congressional District that I wanted to come to Washington to offer commonsense solutions.

As you heard, the amendment does important things that my friends on the other side of the aisle also find important, such as saving tax dollars and providing regulatory relief for small businesses. The amendment also ensures that H.R. 185 would not stymie protections of workers' wages, especially those of women, or weaken protections against workplace discrimination. But the most important provision in this amendment, in light of current events, would ensure that H.R. 185 won't apply to actions that prevent terrorism and crime.

As the former District Attorney of Nassau County, just outside of New York City, terrorism is not abstract for me and my constituents. It is very real and it is very personal. Thousands of Long Island residents commute to the city every single day. We all remember too clearly the September 11 attacks, and we all live with the reality that such a day could come again if we are not vigilant in our efforts to prevent terrorism.

The horrendous attacks in France last week serve as a tragic and chilling reminder that we must be on high alert here at home, and the best way to do that is to ensure that those who protect us have the resources they need to do their jobs. That is our job--to make sure they have the resources they need to do theirs.

Mr. Speaker, I will make one final point. A number of freshman Members, myself included, came to Congress with a mandate to find compromise and to govern. Passing H.R. 185 will not demonstrate such priorities. We should be working together to actually solve problems. We should be working to find new ideas and new solutions to our Nation's problems and creating legislation that will make our government work more effectively.

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

Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.