Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, tonight I rise to honor a colleague, ally and a dear friend, Rick Diegel.

On October 1 of this year, the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, the union to which I proudly belong, said goodbye to long-time political legislative department director Rick Diegel.

Rick Diegel, who has been one of the most influential labor voices on Capitol Hill, is a true champion for American workers, not just organized workers, but all workers and their families. I have known and relied on his good counsel for more than 10 years.

Under Brother Diegel, the IBEW has become a respected leader on policies that affect American working men and women as they try to provide for their families.

Brother Diegel represents the true spirit of public service. A Vietnam veteran, he served in the U.S. Air Force from 1964 to 1968.

Before he came to Washington, Brother Diegel was active in politics in his native Texas. And for the record, I don't hold against him the fact that he is from Texas. In the 1970s, he served three terms as mayor pro-tem of the City of Ingleside.

As a member of Corpus Christie IBEW Local 278 in 1969, he worked for several contractors in Texas as a journeyman wireman and foreman. So, yes, he has worked with the tools.

He was elected business manager in 1977, a post he held until his appointment in 1983 to COPE director at the international office here in D.C. He became director of IBEW's political legislative department in 1998.

One of Brother Diegel's greatest achievements has been his success in helping IBEW brothers and sisters get elected to public office, where they work to advance policies that work for working families. And his success has been amazing.

More IBEW members have been elected to office than any other organization, labor or otherwise. And he has worked to create an office within the AFL-CIO to promote the election of working-class brothers and sisters to local, State, and Federal office throughout the Nation.

I hope that effort continues to bear fruit. The more that we can bring the issues of average working Americans to the forefront, the more we can take back the machinery of government from those who would use it to benefit the narrow interests of the wealthy few.

It is through the leadership of Rick Diegel and the efforts of likeminded brothers and sisters across the Nation that we can ensure that the American Government is working for the people, all people.

It is with great sadness that I say goodbye to Rick and his wife, Theresa. But I will remember Rick's kindness, his compassion, and his dedication and strive to live up to those ideals in my work on the Hill.

Congratulations on your retirement, Rick, and good luck. And as the Mexican saying goes, may you have love, success and now the time to enjoy them.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to join my colleagues in speaking out against the U.S.-Peru Free Trade Agreement. This is not a choice between trade and protectionism. It is a choice between fair trade, which can benefit working families across the Nation, and unfair trade, which benefits the wealthiest few at expense of the rest of us.

I cannot support, and I urge my colleagues not to support, this Bush- negotiated Peru Free Trade Agreement. It uses the same North American Free Trade Agreement model that has already failed working families here and abroad.

I feel like I am at a used car lot and the dealer is trying to sell the American people a beat-up old lemon with a new paint job. Well, we learned with NAFTA that there are no refunds for the American people when they are sold a bad bill of goods.

Let's learn from our mistakes and reject this Peru FTA junker. The American people deserve trade that works for working families, and the Peru FTA won't give us that. Vote ``no'' on the Peru FTA.

Madam speaker, unfortunately, I was unable to be present in the Capitol on Monday, September 17,2007 and was unable to cast votes on the House Floor that evening.

However, had I been present I would have voted ``aye'' on H.R. 3246, the Regional Economic and Infrastructure Development Act of 2007; ``aye'' on H.R. 1657, a bill to establish a Science and Technology Scholarship Program to award scholarships to recruit and prepare students for careers in the National Weather Service and in National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration marine research, atmospheric research, and satellite programs; and ``aye'' on H.R. 3527, a bill to extend for 2 months the authorities of the Overseas Private Investment Corporation.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to express my disappointment over the continued lack of progress in Iraq. The sobering content in both the GAO report and the Jones report should finally be a wake-up call that some Members in this House need in order to act to bring our troops home.

The findings should make it clear to this tone-deaf Administration that our current path in Iraq is failing. The problem of sectarian violence in Iraq will not be solved by sacrificing more blood of young Americans.

After losing more than 3,500 of our brave men and women and spending close to half a trillion dollars, it is time to bring our troops home. To continue to ask our service men and women to make the ultimate sacrifice for a misguided policy is simply immoral.

Mr. Chairman, I want to thank our chairwoman of the subcommittee, Ms. Zoe Lofgren of California, for her efforts on behalf of this issue and many others as well.

I rise today to urge my colleagues to support this bipartisan amendment to increase funding for the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program, the SCAAP program.

When the Federal Government passed SCAAP in 1994, it recognized its responsibility to reimburse States and localities for the arrest, incarceration and transportation costs associated with criminal aliens.

Unfortunately, this program has been consistently underfunded. In fact, the President's budget proposal for next year provided no funds for SCAAP whatsoever. Fortunately, the Appropriations Committee and Chairman Mollohan wisely allocated $405 million, $164 million more than the current level. However, this is not even enough.

States and localities are still only getting a small fraction of what they are spending. This inadequate funding has had a devastating effect on public safety, especially in California and other border States. At a time when many States and counties face budget shortfalls, every dollar reduced in SCAAP reimbursement means one dollar less to spend on essential public safety services.

Following SCAAP funding cuts in 2003, the L.A. County Sheriff's Department was forced to implement a new early release policy for inmates convicted of misdemeanors. From a public safety standpoint, it is far better for criminals to serve their full sentences.

Without adequate resources, other programs will have to be scaled back or cut all together. Programs that are in jeopardy could include basic police protection, anti-gang activities, homicide investigations, anti-terrorism activities and rehabilitation programs to reduce recidivism. We introduced this amendment to ensure that police chiefs and sheriffs do not have to choose between keeping children out of gangs and incarcerating criminal aliens.

I urge my colleagues to support this amendment.

Madam Speaker, on Thursday, July 12, 2007, the House of Representatives voted on H.R. 1851, the Section 8 Voucher Reform Act of 2007. I was present for the series of Roll Call Votes 625 through 629. However my ``AYE'' vote on final passage of H.R. 1851 (Roll Call Vote No. 629) was not recorded.

Had the electronic voting tabulator recorded my vote, the record would have demonstrated an aye vote on final passage of H.R. 1851 (Roll Call Vote No. 629).

Madam Chairman, I strongly support this bill to fund the departments of Labor, Health & Human Services, and Education.

I commend Chairman Obey and his staff on their hard work and dedication in putting together a bill that addresses the most pressing needs of American families, including their health and safety and the education of their children. I especially thank the Chairman for his efforts to increase funding for school counselors. This bill provides over $61 million for school counseling programs, a 77% increase over last year's funding. This historic investment will expand counseling in middle and high schools across the nation.

School counseling is a profession often treated as an afterthought in school improvement efforts. But counselors play a critical role, especially in high schools. High school is a transition period into adulthood and the world of work. As students make this transition, many lose their way and drop out. But a good counselor can help a student find the right path. No matter how many credits a student is behind or how many personal challenges she might face, counselors can help students at risk develop a plan, access the right help, and graduate on time.

Individual attention and follow-up from a counselor can help turn around students' lives. Additional counselors, particularly at the middle and high school levels, will be instrumental in helping schools improve their graduation rates and achieve other goals of No Child Left Behind.

Again, I thank the gentleman for his commitment to the education of our young people, and I encourage all my colleagues to support this bill.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H. Res. 505, recognizing the

contributions of the recreational boating community and the boating industry to the prosperity of the United States. This resolution, introduced by my colleague Ron Klein, is an important way to highlight the vital role that the boating industry plays in the U.S. economy: it generates more than $39,000,000,000 annually as it provides 380,000 American jobs.

However, I also rise to draw the House's attention to the serious problem of propeller injuries associated with recreational boating. A typical three blade propeller running at 3,200 rpm can inflict 9,600 impacts on the human body in just one minute, and a 13-inch blade can travel from head to toe on a person of average height in less than one tenth of a second. Given the speed at which these propellers turn, it is no surprise that propeller injuries frequently result in dismemberment and death.

According to the United States Coast Guard Annual Boating Statistics Reports, there were 239 accidents involving propellers in 2005 alone. Thirty-one of these injuries were fatal, and the rest were typically very severe. Sadly, the number of propeller accidents may even be larger than the report describes. The Coast Guard acknowledges that many boating accidents go unreported, either because victims are unaware of regulations requiring them to report or because the trauma of an accident leaves them little time to think about reporting.

I commend the efforts of the brave men and women of the U.S. Coast Guard, but I recognize that they lack the resources or manpower to maintain accurate records of recreational boating accidents. A 1992 study carried out by Johns Hopkins University found that, compared to the average one hundred propeller-related accidents reported by the Coast Guard; each year between 1976 and 1990, the actual number may have been closer to 2,000 to 3,000 per year.

As we rise to honor the contributions of the recreational boating community, we must also commit to doing more to protect the members of that community. We must pay special attention to children and young adults, the boating community's most vulnerable members, who sustain 40 percent of all propeller injuries.

When considering how we might reduce propeller injuries, one potential area of improvement lies in the make-up of the National Boating Safety Advisory Council (NBSAC), which consults with the U.S. Coast Guard in setting federal regulations. Ensuring that a sufficient portion of the NBSAC membership has no direct or indirect financial ties to the boating industry would be a step toward ensuring the airing of a diversity of views and improving the efficacy of the consultations and resulting federal regulations.

I invite my colleagues to take this opportunity to learn more about propeller injuries and to consider how we might work together to minimize them while continuing to support this vital industry.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of the College Cost Reduction Act.

Students from working families, especially those who are the first in their families to attend college, face many obstacles.

For example, there is no one at home to say the SATs aren't that difficult or that tricky; or that financial aid forms aren't going to be a nightmare to fill out; or that taking out a student loan isn't as scary as it might seem.

The high cost of college is, of course, the biggest obstacle. In recent years, rising college tuitions have far outstripped inflation, and the previous congressional majority failed to ensure that Pell Grants kept up.

That's why I am proud to support this bill. It provides the single largest investment in higher education since the GI Bill at no new cost to taxpayers.

My mother and father, both immigrants who arrived in the U.S. with little money, and not knowing English, raised seven children. With a lot of hard work and sacrifice, all of us attended college and two even made it into Congress.

What I really like about this bill is that it ensures that the doors that were open to my brothers and sisters and me will stay open for the young people of today and generations to come.

I urge support for this inportant bill.

Mr. Speaker, recent elections have been marred by allegations of deceptive practices that are frequently centered in neighborhoods that have a large minority or low- income population. These communities are littered with inaccurate election information in a deliberate effort to prevent voters from casting their ballots on Election Day.

When most people think of violations of the Voting Rights Act they envision Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Freedom Riders. However, many don't realize that voter suppression still occurs today.

One example of recent voter suppression hits close to home. During the 2006 election, constituents of my sister, Loretta, were targeted. Letters were sent to individuals with Spanish surnames, written in Spanish, informing them that immigrants voting in a federal election were committing a crime ``that could result in incarceration and possible deportation...'' These letters were false. Immigrants who have become naturalized citizens have as much a right to vote as citizens who are born here. In fact, many immigrants have told me that one of the great privileges that accompanies their naturalization is the right to vote in free elections. This letter disseminated false information and ignited fear in the Hispanic community. The clear intention was to suppress the Hispanic vote.

This is just one example--and sadly it is not an isolated incident. These types of practices still occur today, all over the country. That is why I rise in full support of H.R. 1281, the Deceptive Practices and Voter Intimidation Prevention Act of 2007 and applaud my colleagues for tackling this critical issue.

H.R. 1281 strengthens the prohibitions on and punishments for deceptive practices that aim to keep voters away from the polls. It also requires that the Justice Department prevent and end misinformation campaigns that mislead voters and prevent them from voting.

The right to vote is one of the most cherished rights granted to U.S. citizens. I am proud to support this bill that ensures that those who attempt to infringe on that right are stopped and punished.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to honor one of my personal heroes, my mother, Maria Sanchez, on her retirement yesterday after 30 years teaching in the classroom. I can honestly and proudly say that my mother is a true American success story.

An immigrant, she came to this country without knowing English, without much money in her pocket, and without a job waiting for her.

Her life's been hard, and we kids didn't make it any easier. But she and my father taught us to work hard, persevere, and play by the rules.

My mother raised seven children and sent them all to college. She is the only mother in U.S. history to send two daughters to Congress.

And she did this while going to night school to get her A.A., then her B.A., then a teaching credential and, ultimately, a master's degree. She cleaned houses in her ``spare time,'' and found creative ways to make ends meet for a family of nine.

As an English/Spanish dual-immersion teacher, she helped children better express themselves and communicate with each other--shaping our community one student at a time.

Her teaching career may be ending, but she'll keep leading and touching lives. Mom, here's to you!

Madam Chair, I rise in support of H.R. 2771, the legislative branch appropriations bill. I want to thank Chairwoman Wasserman Schultz, Ranking Member Wamp, and the appropriations staff for their hard work in crafting this fiscally responsible bill.

The bill on the floor today is ``lean and mean,'' providing just the resources that we need to serve the people in an honest, transparent manner.

I strongly believe that as our Nation's elected leaders, we have a responsibility here in the people's House to lead the Nation in creating an environmentally friendly workplace. This is why I crafted two amendments for today's bill that would have directed the Architect of the Capitol to take small but significant steps toward ``greening'' the Capitol complex.

I am pleased that Subcommittee Chairwoman Wasserman Schultz shares my support for the Speaker's Greening of the Capitol Initiative. Since she has enthusiastically agreed to consider them during conference, I won't be offering them today.

But I would like to draw the House's attention to these two initiatives because they demonstrate how small investments can reap large rewards.

Both initiatives were drawn from the Greening of the Capital report recently

completed by the Architect of the Capitol, and both are endorsed by the American Society of Landscape Architects.

The first initiative would study the feasibility of constructing a ``green roof'' on the Ford House Office Building. A green roof is a rooftop that is carefully planted with vegetation. It can be anything from a simple plot of grass to a park-like setting.

Green roofs have proved to be tremendous economic and environmental benefits. They are great insulators, reducing heating and cooling costs often by as much as 25 percent. And they save on maintenance costs as well since they are more protective than traditional roofs. Green roofs cool the surrounding neighborhood by reducing the amount of heat that is reflected back into the surrounding atmosphere, the so-called urban heat island effect. Vegetation on green roofs celebrates our natural heritage and also absorbs rainwater, reducing contaminated runoff.

Even with all these benefits, green roofs have not caught on. They are not very popular yet in the United States. And as Members of Congress, we now have the opportunity to lead by example. A successful demonstration of the economic benefits of green roofs right here in the Capitol Complex can help promote green roofs across the Nation.

My second proposal concerns the planting of more trees around parking lots in the Capitol Complex. My colleagues who closely follow environmental issues already know that trees have a remarkable ability to reduce the air temperature in our urban areas. Trees remove carbon from our atmosphere, shade our buildings and cars, and even reduce asthma by filtering out air pollutants. According to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, this proposal would even save the taxpayers money.

Without action this year, many of the Speaker's Greening of the Capitol Initiatives, including the two I have just discussed, won't get funding until 2009 or 2010. These proposals would get us started modestly but promptly and don't require additional funds.

I look forward to working with Chairwoman Wasserman Schultz to incorporate these projects into the legislative branch's plans for 2008.

Mr. Speaker, this week, we celebrate the 35th anniversary of the signing of title IX into law. Title IX was enacted on June 23, 1972, and it marked a major milestone for American women.

Title IX is a deceptively simple piece of legislation, requiring that ``no person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.'' Who knew that one unpretentious sentence could accomplish so much? But title IX has provided the framework for an America that finally guaranteed a truly equal education for men and women.

The positive effects of this legislation are evident. Women now have the opportunity to participate in any sport they desire. Before title IX, two-time Olympic gold medalist Donna de Varona was effectively forced to retire from amateur swimming at the age of 17 because no American colleges were offering women scholarships in swimming or most other competitive sports. But today, just a generation later, NCAA women's sports and professional female sports leagues such as the WNBA are thriving and giving women everywhere chances to be superstars that they've never had before.

But I think the most telling effect of title IX is the fact that today, more women than men are attending college. Equal education for women was rare before 1972, when many law and medical schools allowed a maximum of 15 women in per year, and when women were often shut out of classes such as criminal justice and auto mechanics. Today, well over half of all undergraduate college students are women--and women outnumber men in graduate school enrollment, including high-paying, high-powered professional programs like law.

Title IX was all about opportunities. Title IX gave women new chances that they had never had before, and today, it is easy to see that women around the country are taking full advantage of them. While you might be able to name only a few famous women making news at the turn of the 20th century, it wouldn't take you more than a minute to name dozens-- maybe even hundreds--of female news makers at the turn of the 21st century. It's amazing how many outstanding women have carved out careers in journalism, science, law, politics, sports, and the arts-- and disheartening to imagine the amazing women of the past who were never given the chance. I am excited to see what today's little girls will do with the opportunities title IX will provide to them.

Thank you, Congressman Michaud, and I also thank Betty Sutton for being here this evening to talk about the President's Trade Promotion Authority and its effect on working families. Mr. Michaud and I cochair the House working group, and we have been working very hard this year to emphasize the impact that our current failed policy has on average households.

We are here because we believe that our trade policies should ensure a fair shake for American working families, not just for those who sit in corporate board rooms. We have already spoken many times in this House about the flaws in the new trade deal recently announced by the administration. This new deal, which applies to the Bush negotiated Free Trade Agreements with Peru and Panama, is an improvement over past FTAs, but it still doesn't give American families much to be excited about, quite honestly.

Despite additional labor and environmental provisions, these agreements are based on the NAFTA trade model, the same failed NAFTA model that has hurt the American family for the past decade, the same NAFTA trade model that didn't bring about the jobs or the prosperity that we were promised, the same NAFTA model that didn't stop the immigration flow from Mexico, the same NAFTA model that hasn't been able to assure that our trading partners uphold the strong labor and environmental standards that we do here in the United States, thus putting our workers at a competitive disadvantage.

If the long-sought-after labor and environmental protections the administration promises to include in the Peru and Panama FTAs are no stronger than those that we were promised in NAFTA or its cousin CAFTA, they are little more than hollow promises. Yet the Free-Trade-At-All- Costs lobby asks the American people to have faith that the administration has really turned over a new leaf. They are asking us to trust that enforceable labor and environmental standards will be included in the text of the Peru and Panama agreements. But even if these agreements are the best written, fairest trade agreements possible, so long as they rely on this administration to enforce the labor and environmental standards they contain, they are not worth the paper that they are written on.

This administration has failed to protect workers here in the U.S. The BP Texas City explosion, the Sago mine disaster and the 9/11 first responders and cleanup workers who have developed serious breathing ailments, these are just the most notorious examples of this administration's lack of dedication to provide even the most basic protection to workers: the right to work in a safe environment. Even the U.S. Chamber of Commerce says these new worker and environmental protections can't be enforced.

Now, if that isn't telling, I don't know what it is. They flatly came out and said they are not enforceable. This President has lost our trust, and with it any argument that he has to renew his trade promotion authority. The administration's track record does not demonstrate a commitment to the working families of America.

Free trade was supposed to create economic opportunity for everyone, for big businesses, as well as small businesses, working families at home and abroad, but that, quite frankly, hasn't been the case. The truth of the matter is that the NAFTA free trade model favors the wealthiest at the expense of small businesses, workers, families, and ultimately communities, like the communities Mr. Michaud was talking about that are dependent upon millwork for their life blood.

More than a decade after NAFTA and NAFTA-styled replicas, it's clear that the promise of economic prosperity has yet to arrive. Our trade deficit has ballooned into the tens of millions of dollars. Real wages for American families are down, and our manufacturing base is falling apart.

We need an administration committed to protecting the rights of workers, and until we get one we cannot grant this administration an extension of Fast Track authority. The American people deserve better. They deserve a commitment to trade that expands their opportunities rather than diminishes them.

I urge all my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to help our working families get back on track to economic prosperity.

I urge them to oppose the Fast Track renewal, and I want to thank, again, my two colleagues for their leadership on this issue, because they have been trying to carry this message to those who have been unwilling to hear it.

Sure. About 2 weeks ago I returned from Colombia, and it was my second visit in just 7 months. Colombia is one of the countries that President Bush negotiated a free trade agreement with without really seeking the advice of those Members of Congress who have been vocal opponents to the NAFTA trade model which he based this agreement on.

And I have to say at the outset, Colombia is a beautiful country. It's people are a warm people. We were well received there. And so I want to be very clear that I am for expanding trade with countries around the world, but in a way that is fair and balanced to both our workers here in the United States and also the workers in the countries that we seek to engage in trade with.

Just for the record, Colombia has a horrible record on human rights and labor rights violations. In Colombia, more trade labor unionists were killed there last year than in all the countries of the world combined. So it has an abysmal record with respect to violence towards people who try to organize workers to help lift them out of poverty. And nobody really wants to talk about that dirty little secret of Colombia's, because they want to talk about how much better things are in the first 6 months of this year.

The statistics do show that there is an improvement. I will grant them that, and I applaud that. But it still means that about 99 percent of the murders that happened last year have gone unsolved, and nobody has been brought to justice for that.

And the reason why trade labor unionists are targeted is because they speak out on behalf of people who are living in poverty, who are earning wages that don't allow them to support themselves or a family. They're working in dangerous working conditions.

And I have to say, on the trip that I just most recently returned from, we really weren't given a lot of time to go and actually talk to the workers themselves about their experience. We were basically told by the government that things are getting better and things were improving.

Interestingly enough, the first trip that I took to Colombia last November, I met with labor organizations, civil rights groups and advocates, and I met with the workers themselves who told me, ``don't be fooled by the rosy picture that our government has painted. It's very dangerous here in Colombia to speak up if you are working in dangerous working conditions. It's very dangerous in Colombia to speak up if you'd like to see your wages rise so that you can support yourself.''

And, in fact, there is a very big informal labor sector in Colombia which isn't even subject to basic standards like a minimum wage. There's no minimum wage for these folks. There are no contributions made on behalf of them for the hours that they work into any kind of Social Security or pension system. And there are no workplace safety standards. A lot of these workers work in some of the biggest industries that they're pushing the free trade agreement because they say that they need to expand these industries, one of which being the textile industry, which is notorious for their workers that are part of the informal sector that don't have contracts, that don't have any basic rights.

And basically, in Colombia, when I bring up the point that there's this promise made to lift all these people out of poverty, but when they have to compete against U.S. goods, some of which will be subsidized, like many of our agricultural products, who is going to suffer the most? Who's going to bear the cost? Because they tell me, oh, yes, there are some transitional costs associated with moving towards this new free trade agreement, but they're transitional costs; they won't be forever, and not everybody's going to be affected.

But let me tell you who will be affected by those transitional costs: rural, poor, indigenous people and largely women who are heads of households. They are the ones that will suffer the most, not to mention American workers who will have to compete in industry with Colombia, where they have no minimum wage, no minimum work day, so they can work workers 16 hours a day if they want, and no safe working conditions.

And there's just, quite frankly, no way that American workers, who demand a certain level of respect and dignity at the workplace, are going to be able to compete in industries where those are the conditions that Colombian workers are working in.

Knowing all of this, did President Bush negotiate with Colombia a free trade agreement that would try to address those very basic labor standards? No. He based the Colombian free trade on the NAFTA model. They didn't even put in basic rights that are respected around the world as international standards for human and labor rights. He just said, hey, the marketplace is going to take care of it. We're going to move forward. This is the trade agreement, and Congress, because of Fast Track authority, you can't change it; you can't make it better; you can't amend it. It's either yes or no; you vote in favor of this. And if that's the choice that I'm given, my vote is no because it doesn't even try to address the problem with the labor standards and the violence in Colombia.

I say, hey, I'm willing to give Colombia the benefit of the doubt. If you can

show to me over a certain length of time, minimum of 2 years, that, yeah, you've gone after these people that have targeted labor unionists, and yeah, you've moved people out of the informal sector into the formal sector where people have basic standards, I'm willing to give Colombia an opportunity. But I'm not willing to enter into a trade agreement with them based on empty promises of how much better things are going to be.

All we heard when we were there, 90 percent of what we heard was how much better Colombia was at human rights and how much better they were at trying to find those responsible for killing trade labor unionists. But while we were there, one of the biggest scandals that has hit Colombia in recent months is the scandal of paramilitary groups that are linked to elected members of their congress, elected governors, some of whom were hand picked, and cabinet members, some of whom were handpicked by President Uribe himself. And these paramilitary groups have been responsible for killing people, for massacres of villages of people. And currently, 14 elected officials sit in jail because they've been tied to these paramilitary groups. And there are as many as two dozen more that are under investigation.

But we're supposed to trust President Uribe that they're going to bring these people to justice and that labor rights and human rights are going to be better in Colombia. I say, show me, and then we'll sit down and negotiate. But I thought it might be interesting to just inform you guys a little bit about what the flavor of that trip was.

And like I said, I think the Colombian people are wonderful people. I think we need to open up new markets. But we need to do it in a way that's fair and balanced for our workers here, so we don't continue to hemorrhage manufacturing jobs, and for the workers in these countries, which corporations will exploit.

And with that, I will yield back to Mr. Michaud.

Madam Speaker, on rollcall 482 today I voted ``aye.'' I intended to vote ``no.''