Floor Statements

Madam Speaker, I rise today in support of impeachment in order to defend our democracy and protect our country from a President who poses a clear and present danger to our republic. Last week, as I was preparing to defend Wisconsin's election results on the House floor during the certification of the Electoral College votes, the Nation experienced an attack on our Capitol and democratic process. What should have been a day of celebration as we witnessed the peaceful transfer of power--something that makes America exceptional in the eyes of the world--was marred by a lawless assault on our democracy.

It's of the utmost importance in the coming weeks to bring those who perpetrated this violence to justice. They must be prosecuted to the full extent of the law. However, we also need to address those that fostered and even amplified the toxic climate that allowed this to happen in the first place. Undoubtedly, this includes the President, who openly encouraged a mob to march to the Capitol to disrupt Congress's Constitutional role in certifying the presidential election and later went so far as to say that the rioters were ``very special'' and that he ``loves'' them.

Words and actions have consequences. For months now, the President and Members of Congress have spread lies and unfounded accusations about the integrity of our election. In doing so, they unleashed dark forces in our society and even incited a violent mob that attacked the United States Capitol. Lives were lost as a result of this insurrection, including those of U.S. Capitol Police Officers Brian Sicknick and Howard Liebengood. My prayers are with these brave officers' families as they mourn these devastating losses--their heroic actions in defense of their country will never be forgotten.

It's time to stop perpetuating the dangerous lies that this election wasn't legitimate--it was. It's time to stop weaponizing calls for unity as an attempt to downplay a violent insurrection and avoid ramifications, as if healing can take place without accountability--it can't.

For too long, too many have treated our democracy as if it's a football, something to kick around without consequence. It's not a football, it's more like a fragile egg. If you break it, good luck trying to put it back together. Failing to seek accountability now sends a dangerous signal to the future because the next time an authoritarian wannabe takes a run at our Constitution, all bets are off.

At this time in our Nation's history, our party divisions have never seemed smaller. It doesn't matter whether you are a Democrat or a Republican, the choice now is between Constitutionalists and Insurrectionists. Constitutionalists believe in the Constitution, the rule of law, due process, human rights, and civil rights for all our citizens. Insurrectionists believe in conspiracy theories, an alternate reality, and putting a person or a party above the rule of law.

I can work with anyone that's a Constitutionalist, regardless of what side of the aisle they're on. But as a Member of Congress, I swore an oath not to any one individual or one party, but to the Constitution, and I cannot work with anyone who is against it.

I have repeatedly called on the President to step down for the sake of our Nation. I have

asked Vice President Pence to invoke the 25th Amendment to ensure the peaceful transfer of power. Unfortunately, these calls have gone unheeded, leaving us no other option than to vote to impeach President Trump. We must guard against any potential future danger the President poses, send a clear message that this type of unconstitutional behavior will not be tolerated, and restore the sanity and sense of calm the American people deserve before the inauguration of President-Elect Biden.

Madam Speaker, today is supposed to be a celebration of our democracy--the peaceful transfer of power in our Country. Instead we saw mob rule descend on our Nation's Capitol. That's why I rise today in defense of a pillar of our democracy--the right for a free and fair election decided by the will of the voters and, ultimately, respected and accepted by the losing candidate and their supporters.

The other side can indulge in all the conspiracy theories they want, but when you involve the integrity of our elections in my home State of Wisconsin, well then I have a problem.

In our federal system of government, the administration of elections are controlled by our States--not Congress.

What happens in Wisconsin is up to Wisconsin--not Washington.

Our job in Congress is to count the electoral college votes, not overturn them.

Wisconsin has a long history of open, fair, and accurate elections because of the laws that our State has established and executed by 2,000 state and local officials, and countless volunteers, all who take their responsibility seriously with the highest form of honesty, integrity, fairness, and accuracy.

What is being attempted here tonight is an attempt to invalidate 3.3 million valid Wisconsin votes merely because their preferred candidate didn't win.

But if they succeed, democracy dies and dictatorship reigns.

The Trump campaign has filed state and federal court cases challenging the outcome of the vote in Wisconsin--all of which have been dismissed due to lack of any evidence of fraud.

Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Brian Hagedorn, who was former Republican Governor Scott Walker's chief legal counsel, wrote in dismissing one of these challenges:

``We are invited to invalidate the entire presidential election in Wisconsin by declaring it ``null''--yes, the whole thing . . . this is a dangerous path we are being asked to tread. The loss of public trust in our constitutional order resulting from the exercise of this kind of judicial power would be incalculable.''

And he is not alone in that assessment.

The former Republican Speaker of the House from Wisconsin, Paul Ryan, said in a statement:

``Efforts to reject the votes of the electoral college and sow doubt about Joe Biden's victory strike at the foundation of our republic.

It is difficult to conceive of a more anti-democratic and anti- conservative act than a federal intervention to overturn the results of state-certified elections and disenfranchise millions of Americans.

The fact that this effort will fail does not mean it will not do significant damage to American democracy.''

He concluded by stating:

``The Trump campaign had ample opportunity to challenge election results, and those efforts failed from lack of evidence . . . Joe Biden's victory is entirely legitimate.''

Or consider the third ranking Republican leader in this House, Rep. Liz Cheney who described this attempt as ``deeply troubling''.

She went on to state:

``This is directly at odds with the Constitution's clear text and our core beliefs as Republicans.''

``Doing so'' she said ``Would be establishing a tyranny of Congress and stealing power from the States and the people in those States.''

Finally consider what my friend and Republican colleague from Wisconsin, Mike Gallagher, had to say about this:

``I just don't think we want to endorse the principle that January 6 is a legitimate forum for Congress to overturn the will of the States and the people . . . if you've endorsed that principle, then you've already destroyed the idea of American government. At least you've destroyed the conservative idea of American government.''

What these Republican leaders understand is this--

If Congressional Members vote to reject valid Presidential electors for invalid reasons, There is nothing anyone can do about it.

The ugly truth is that, despite a nationwide vote, fenced in with legal and technical safeguards, after 244 years of history, the U.S. President is elected on the honor system of 535 Members of Congress, each sworn to preserve, protect, and defend our Constitution and our representative democracy enshrined in it.

It's not an oath to any individual or to any party.

Now it's easy to play war when you think that you're firing blanks, but these are not blanks being fired at our Constitution.

This is dangerous today because of the collateral damage that is being done to the sanctity of the ballot box.

It is also dangerous because it now provides a blueprint for next time.

President Trump will not be successful this time, but next time when some authoritarian wannabe takes a run at our Constitution, all bets are off.

We have a tendency in this Country to kick our Democracy around like it's a football--it's more like an egg, very fragile. You break it, good luck putting it back together again.

Please, do not put Donald Trump ahead of our Constitution, ahead of the rule of law, ahead of the sanctity of the ballot box.

Vote no on this attempt to overturn a valid election.

Vote no on this objection.

Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.

I rise in strong support of the SECURE Act. This legislation is meant to address one of the great gaps we have in retirement savings: employees in small businesses, primarily affecting women, minorities, and young adults.

I want to thank the chairman and the ranking member for their leadership on the issue. I want to thank my good friend Mike Kelly for partnering with me throughout this process, along with former colleagues Dave Reichert and Pat Tiberi, with whom I had a chance to work on this issue in particular.

I also want to thank the Representative in the chair today, Representative Elaine Luria, our commander. She is the one who introduced the Gold Star fix. It was a mistake that was made in the Tax Code that adversely affects survivor benefits for children of our fallen soldiers.

It also fixes distributions to Native American children and to students who receive scholarships and grants. I thank her for her leadership on it.

This is a good, bipartisan, bicameral piece of legislation. I encourage my colleagues to support it.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from California, first of all, for recognizing me tonight but also for securing this Special Order to honor one of our great friends and great colleagues in this institution, Ellen Tauscher. I also thank John Garamendi for helping to organize tonight's Special Order as well.

Ellen was a true patriot. She was a great American, someone who loved the congressional district that allowed her to represent them, loved her home State, and loved our country even more.

I got to know Ellen as a member of the incoming class of 1997. We were both present at the creation of the New Democrat Coalition. It didn't exist back then, until we first joined. Then, with the help of Cal Dooley, another California Representative; Tim Roemer; Jim Moran; and Adam Smith, who is now chairing the Armed Services Committee and was also one of the founding Members, we helped form the New Democrat Coalition, where Ellen really excelled in her leadership. It was fun getting to work with her on such a personal level.

The committees to which she was assigned were a perfect fit for her and for the district and State she represented: the Armed Services Committee, where she developed such great expertise and knowledge on national security issues, but especially with the arms control issue that she became world renowned over; the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, with all of the work that she did to help rebuild America the way it should be, but especially the infrastructure projects that were so crucial to her area of California that she would fight doggedly over on that committee; and then her work on the Science Committee, which really fit in well with her leadership role with the New Democrat Coalition.

The New Dems were a group of Members here in the Democratic Caucus who were more moderate, more pragmatic. To Ellen, being moderate and pragmatic wasn't an ideology; it was a way of life, a way of being able to get things done in an institution where it is sometimes very difficult to get things accomplished.

She was always looking to find those bipartisan coalitions in order to get things across the finish line, being respectful and listening, especially to our colleagues across the aisle, knowing that there was common ground to be had that we could work on together in order to represent the interests that she represented in California but all our interests here in this country.

On the Science Committee, she was devoted, as she was with the New Democrat Coalition, to making sure that our country remained the most innovative, competitive, and creative nation in the world, especially at a time of great technological change.

She came in with me in the late 1990s during the information revolution that was taking place, the dot-com era, with, of course, a tremendous impact in California, as it had throughout the rest of the country, being able to wrap our arms around that, understanding the vast implications that this was going to have on American competitiveness abroad. How to stay on that cutting edge of new discovery in the global information technology economy while also making sure that none of our citizens were left behind with that rapid change and our role in that global economy, that was something Ellen was deeply devoted to, something that she took up as chair of the New Democrat Coalition over two terms, making sure that we were spending time to understand the policy implications of the high-tech revolution, artificial intelligence, robotics, and the role our country can play in advancing that.

Again, how can we best empower all Americans so that they can be full participants of that global economy and rapid change? We haven't always done a good job at that, quite frankly.

I think that is one of the reasons there is so much consternation and even anger back home, because many people feel that they haven't been empowered with the skills they need to be full participants and to be successful in this highly charged economy.

That was something that Ellen recognized and was devoted to trying to find answers to when she showed up at work every day.

It was a great honor to be able to serve with her in that coalition and to later assume the chair position from her in order to continue to build it.

I know Ellen was particularly proud of last fall's election, the fact that 41 of the new Democratic Members who joined Congress decided to join the New Democrat Coalition, putting our number up to 101, which was unfathomable at the time we were starting the coalition in the late 1990s, let alone just in recent years.

It shows that the New Dems have a very important role to play, as Ellen recognized, in helping to shape the agenda and the policies that will make sense and work for the people back home.

I appreciated being able to work closely with her in that capacity. I learned a lot from the skills that she brought, with her varied interests and backgrounds that she had before Congress. As was mentioned earlier, she was one of the first women to hold a seat on the New York Stock Exchange, a very accomplished business person herself.

I think that is, in a lot of ways, where she derived her political pragmatism from, being able to get things done, and the role that she played in the respective committees, in the coalition, and in the friendships and partnerships that she was able to form so successfully here in Congress.

She wasn't one who took no for an answer. She always felt that there was a path to success in whatever endeavor she performed. That is why it made perfect sense that, in the first Obama term, he, along with Secretary Clinton, appointed her for Under Secretary for Arms Control and International Security. It was perfect for her personal background and portfolio, and she became the negotiating face of America when she was out negotiating the arms control treaties.

Everyone knew, with great confidence, that when Ellen entered that negotiating room, there would be no one more prepared, no one who had done their homework more than she.

It even went beyond the intricacies and the complexities of arms control and nuclear reduction. It was also getting to understand and appreciate where the negotiators across the table were coming from, the political constituencies that they had to answer to back home.

With her own political background, I think she brought that bigger perspective to these negotiations. Because of that, the success that she was able to

achieve on behalf of our country was something that she was able to achieve with her negotiating counterparts from across the table. That is a skill that we need to cherish and recognize more, quite frankly, in our various agencies throughout government.

When she stepped down from that position, she immediately was sworn in as Special Envoy for Strategic Stability and Missile Defense at the State Department. It was just the next iteration of that skill set that she brought in the course of these negotiations.

She represented us so very, very well. We were all so proud of her, those of us who had gotten to know her throughout the years, seeing what she was able to accomplish in her post-Congress career, still finding a way to serve her Nation in a different capacity.

She will be deeply missed. She was loved by those who knew her in this institution.

Of course, she had a daughter, Katherine, whom she adored above anyone else. As much fun as it was serving with Ellen when we came in, in 1997, and throughout the years, it was perhaps as much fun watching Katherine grow up in our midst, seeing her become such the accomplished and beautiful young woman that she is today. Ellen was so proud of that.

On behalf of the Class of 1997, on behalf of the New Democrat Coalition, we thank Katherine and the entire Tauscher family for sharing Ellen with us through these years of her public service, first in Congress and then during the Obama administration.

She was a great friend, great colleague, great Representative for her district in California. More importantly, she was a great American and a great patriot who believed in the future of our country.

She will be sorely missed but never forgotten, the accomplishments that she was able to achieve throughout her distinguished career here and throughout her entire life.

May God bless her and take her into His care.

Mr. Speaker, as a lifelong hunter and clay shooter at the Ettrick and Holmen shooting ranges in Wisconsin, I have enjoyed passing on the Wisconsin hunting tradition to my two boys, and I know firsthand how important these traditions are for many Wisconsin families. That is why I'm concerned about the decline in access to target ranges and gun clubs throughout the nation over the last few decades. Target ranges promote safe hunting and responsible gun ownership, and they are often used to sight in hunting rifles before a hunting season begins.

I also believe it is important to ensure our federal programs are working with hunters and state fish and wildlife agencies to ensure that we can preserve local wildlife and their habitats for generations to come. However, this goal is threatened by a decline in hunters throughout the country--a recent study found that the number of hunters had declined approximately 16 percent since 2011. Hunters have generated billions of dollars for wildlife restoration and hunter safety programs through Pittman-Robertson (PR) funds, which come directly from excise taxes on hunting and shooting equipment. With fewer hunters, there is less money available for protecting our habitats.

As a long time member of the Congressional Sportsmen's Caucus, I am a proud champion of legislation that supports sportsmen's issues, and as a former member of the House Natural Resources Committee, I have built a strong record of voting to protect our natural heritage. This bill supports both causes by giving states more flexibility to use their allocated PR funds to recruit and retain more hunters and recreational shooters through the development and maintenance of public shooting ranges. Under current law, there is a 75% percent federal and 25 percent non-federal cost share for all projects covered under Pittman- Robertson. This bill would adjust that cost share to allow states to use PR dollars to fund as much as 90 percent of the costs of acquiring land for, expanding, or constructing a public target range. It also allows PR funds to remain available to states for up to five fiscal years (compared to two fiscal years under current law) for the use of acquiring land for expanding or constructing a public target range.

I will be pleased to see it pass the House of Representatives unanimously. The bill will go to the President's desk, where I am confident he will sign it into law.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to express my support for the bipartisan National Resources Management Act. Congress has not enacted a public lands package of this scale since 2009, and passage of this bill will mark a major milestone for the conservation and future of America's public lands. This bill will permanently authorize the Land and Water Conservation Fund, designate over 1 million acres of wilderness, and protect over 1 million acres of land from destructive practices.

I have supported the Land and Water Conservation Fund for many years and since its creation, the Land and Water Conservation Fund has helped preserve America's outdoors heritage by supporting anglers and outdoor recreation for families in every state. Wisconsin alone has received $211 million in LWCF funding over the past five decades, helping to protect the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest, Ice Age National Scenic Trail, and North Country National Scenic Trail.

I am proud that the package includes the Migratory Birds of the Americas Conservation Act, which reauthorizes the Neotropical Migratory Bird Conservation Act to help conserve migratory birds in rapid decline in Wisconsin and throughout the country. The Neotropical Migratory Bird Conservation Act provides more than $66 million in grants to support long term conservation, research, and habitat protection of migratory birds.

As the founder and co-chair of the National Parks Caucus and longtime member of the Congressional Wildlife Refuge Caucus and Congressional Sportsmen's Caucus, I am proud to support this legislation.

Madam Speaker, I was unable to have my votes recorded on the House floor Monday, February 11, 2019 due to unexpected family obligations in Wisconsin. Had I been present, I would have supported the passage of both bills considered on the floor.

Madam Speaker, I was unable to have my votes recorded on the House floor on Monday, January 28, 2019 due to flight cancellations from heavy snow in Wisconsin. Had I been present, I would have supported the passage of all bills considered on the floor. In particular, I strongly supported the passage of H.R. 502, the FIND Trafficking Act, as this bill is an important step forward in preventing online marketplaces used for sex trafficking or illegal drug trafficking.

Madam Speaker, I was unable to have my votes recorded on the House floor from Tuesday, January 22 through the first vote series on Wednesday, January 23, 2019 due to flight cancellations from heavy snow in Wisconsin. Had I been present, I would have supported the passage of all bills and resolutions considered on the floor. In particular, I strongly supported the passage of H.R. 676, the NATO Support Act. NATO has been a critical organization in protecting the rules-based international world order that was created by the U.S. and its allies after WWII, and it deserves the full support of the U.S.

Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from Massachusetts for yielding me this time.

Mr. Speaker, I rise, first, in opposition to the rule. I think the gentleman from Massachusetts is correct. Here we are in the waning days of this session of Congress, and we can't produce a rule that specifically focused on the farm bill. They had to include, in the late hours of last night, language that affects our policy as it relates to Yemen.

I commend my colleague from Massachusetts for his efforts to try to strip section 2 out of the title of this rule, so we could have a rule that specifically addresses the farm bill. It wasn't done. We should go back and make sure that it is and allow that policy to develop in the debate that we need on the House floor.

Mr. Speaker, I am a representative of one of the largest agriculture producing districts in the Nation, my rural western Wisconsin district. I own a farm myself. We rotate corn and beans. We have some beef cattle in from time to time. No one appreciates the hard work that our family farmers are going through to stay in business today more than I.

This past year, I had countless meetings with family farmers throughout my State. I have never seen the palpable fear in their eyes or heard it in their voices than we have this last year after dealing with multiple years of low commodity prices. Our family farmers are being driven out of the business in droves right now.

I appreciate, having been involved in farm policy in the past--and mind you, we only have a chance to correct farm policy every 5 or 6 years in this place--how difficult it is to put together a coalition to get a farm bill done.

There are many things in this bill that are commendable. As co-chair of the House Organic Caucus, we have perhaps the strongest organic title of any farm bill ever produced. We have good agriculture research programs in this farm bill, a plus-up in funding for rural broadband expansion, a new beginning farmer program, and the nutrition title was protected after what was initially reported out of the House earlier this year.

But I reluctantly stand today in opposition of the overall bill because it is not addressing the two evils that are driving our family farmers out of business today: overproduction and the trade war that President Trump has created.

In fact, they are doubling down on encouraging policy that will lead to more production, which will flood the market and drive commodity prices down even more, by expanding the title 1 subsidy programs.

These are taxpayer subsidies that primarily go to a few, but very large, agribusinesses. Mr. Speaker, 80 percent of the title 1 subsidies are going to the 20 percent largest farm operations in the country.

The average person back home would be astounded to see how many subsidy checks are being mailed to addresses in Washington, D.C., New York City, Chicago, and San Francisco. Under this bill, they are even expanding those subsidy opportunities by what is called a multiple entity rule that was, again, included in the final conference report.

That means no longer just husbands and wives will qualify for subsidies operating on the farm, but sons and daughters, uncles and aunts, nieces and nephews, and cousins will be able to qualify now for these subsidy programs. Not only will that encourage, again, these large operations to ramp up production, driving prices down, but it is not fiscally responsible.

Mr. Speaker, we are in an era now of huge budget deficits, yet we are finding an additional $1 billion under the title 1 subsidy programs, primarily by taking it out of the conservation fund by reducing funding under the Conservation Stewardship Program from $1.8 billion to $1 billion. That will jeopardize quality water programs throughout our Nation.

So, unfortunately, this bill is not going to solve the problem, the crisis that our farmers are facing today, which is driving them out of business in record numbers: the overproduction in agriculture in our country and this trade war.

I think we should take a little bit more time and get the policy right, because we won't have another opportunity for another 5 or 6 years, and that is going to be too late for too many of our family farmers.

Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from Massachusetts for yielding me this time.

Mr. Speaker, I am a member of that committee of jurisdiction. I also remember growing up as a kid in Wisconsin, and many of us looked forward to this radio program that Paul Harvey would deliver giving the news of the day.

There was also a special segment of that program called ``The Rest of the Story,'' where he would fill in the blanks of what actually is taking place here. That is what I am here today to explain, the rest of the story of what is happening with this legislation and why I rise in opposition to the rule and opposition to the underlying bill.

A little over a year ago, this Chamber passed comprehensive tax reform for the first time in over 30 years. I thought the process then was deplorable with no hearing, with no vetting, with no stakeholders, with no feedback from people back home, or with no opportunity for there to be any constructive review of what was attempting to be passed. In a little over 50 days, a major overhaul of the Tax Code.

And yet, today, we have a process with this tax bill before us that is even worse. Not only was there no hearing held on it or vetting or feedback from any experts or feedback from people back home about the impact this is going to have, we didn't even have a markup in committee for us Members to be involved and try to find where mistakes were being made, and now with the rush to judgment with this bill that was finally offered late Monday night.

I have been poring over this document over the last 2 years. I will guarantee the American people that the average Member of Congress had no way of reviewing this or even understanding what was in this bill, especially given all of the legalese that is involved with it.

They will be forced to come to the floor tomorrow morning expecting to vote on a major piece of legislation with no clue of what it does or what the mistakes and the unintended consequences are. That alone is reason to reject this process and say ``no'' on the bill.

But the other reason why this process is so bad is because of what we discovered the last time they jammed a major tax bill through: the mistakes that were made in it.

They are attempting to try to clean this up again without any hearing or without any scrutiny of what policy needs to be corrected, and that, too, is wrong.

Let me just give you one example, as my friend from Massachusetts pointed out. There is also tax relief for nationally declared Federal disaster areas in this country. Unfortunately, 44 disaster areas were declared in the last year. Only nine of them are qualifying for tax relief assistance under this bill, and they are on the coast: the East Coast, the West Coast, down South. It is the wildfires. It is the hurricanes.

There were other regions of the country, including my home State of Wisconsin that was hit with devastating flooding this summer. For whatever reason, the chairman of the committee decided to exclude those areas. The pain that those communities are facing--the homeowners and the small businesses--are just as real in the upper Midwest due to the devastating flooding as what has been taking place on the coast, yet there is no logical explanation why there has been this wholesale exclusion of other areas around the country that don't qualify for these tax provisions. That is something I would have anticipated we could have brought up in committee and tried to correct through the normal regular process but was deferred.

Finally, let me add this thought. The last tax bill that they passed is going to increase our national debt over the next 10 years by $2.3 trillion. This bill is another $53 billion downpayment on the fiscal irresponsibility that has been coming out of this Congress for too long.

This last session of Congress under Republican majority leadership is going to go down in history as one of the most fiscally irresponsible Congresses that has dug such a deep fiscal hole for the future of our children and grandchildren. It is going to be incumbent upon us as the new majority in January to start cleaning up the mess.

Let me tell you how things will be done differently:

We will immediately start having hearings on that massive tax bill in order to correct the problems and the mistakes and the unintended consequences by calling people with knowledge before us to get feedback.

We will go through the regular process of having hearings, of having markups, of doing proper vetting, and giving Members who aren't even on the committee an opportunity to weigh in on significant pieces of legislation rather than it coming out of one person's office--the chairman, in this case--in the dead of night on Monday night and rushing this to the House floor later on expecting the rest of the body to make an informed and reasoned judgment on it.

This whole process is embarrassing. We can do better in January.

I encourage my colleagues to vote ``no'' on this rule and oppose this legislation tomorrow morning.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this legislation because this bill today, again, shatters one of the greatest cons ever perpetrated on the American people, that the modern-day national Republican Party is the party of fiscal responsibility.

The three bills that we have before us this week, coupled with the tax cut version that passed last year, will add over $5 trillion to our national debt at a time when 70 million baby boomers are fully invested in Social Security and Medicare, giving them the excuse later on to come back and say that we have to cut Social Security and Medicare because we don't have revenue anymore.

If we are entrusted with the majority next year, we will do tax reform the right way. We will simplify it, we will make it more competitive, we will certainly make it fair, and we will do it fiscally responsibly by shutting down extraneous loopholes in the Code to pay for it. We will do it with hearings and with the proper feedback which was lacking here.

For all these reasons, Mr. Speaker, we should reject this bill and do tax reform the right way.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from California for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, I rise reluctantly in opposition to this legislation. I say reluctantly because there are some good, decent provisions that are contained in this legislation.

The first year expensing for new businesses, the net operating loss and tax credit carry over to new ownership and small businesses.

There is a lot of bipartisan support for doing more to support entrepreneurs and the startup of businesses in that early stage capital that this bill, in part, is meant to address. Unfortunately the process is all wrong. Instead of holding hearings, instead of getting feedback, instead of soliciting bipartisan support--and I am confident that if time were in order to build support for this bill, there would be wide bipartisan support--this legislation is being driven for one reason and one reason only: the political calendar. That is a missed opportunity.

We ought to get back to doing our business on the Ways and Means Committee and start holding hearings, start getting feedback, and doing it in a fiscally responsible manner.

This bill, because of no effort to find an offset, will increase our debt by over $5 billion. Again, it is for some press releases leading to the midterm elections. Who cares what the impact is going to be for our children and grandchildren or on future financial obligations that our Nation shares. Apparently, that fiscal responsibility is out the window right now, based on the tax cut that passed last year and the next two bills coming up out of the Ways and Means Committee this week.

But what else is also unfortunate is that during the markup of this bill, our good friend, the gentleman from California (Mr. Thompson), offered a very important and I thought thoughtful amendment that would allow tax credit deductibility for small businesses that were impacted by natural disasters.

My district in western Wisconsin just got slammed with major flooding this past month. Unfortunately, there is not a lot of help at the Federal and State level, whether it is FEMA or State agencies, when it comes to helping small businesses get back on their feet. There just isn't. There are small, low-interest SBA loans and maybe some no- interest loans that the State can offer that all have to be repaid. Other than that, there is really nothing.

Representative Thompson offered an amendment that said: Let's have the Federal Tax Code work with these small businesses rather than against them. Instead of that being thoughtfully considered, it was rejected out of hand because of the rush to get this bill on the floor. Again, another missed opportunity of how we should be conducting business around here and recognizing the needs of small businesses throughout the country.

Let's slow down. Let's reject what is before us today. We still have time. The Senate is not planning on taking up these bills. Let's go back to doing it the right way. Let's talk to one another and find some common ground. And let's do it in a fiscally responsible manner so we are not saddling future generations with huge debt, especially given the aging population in our country.

What we have before us today is the result of a bad process. We can do better. I encourage my colleagues to reject it. Let's do it the right way.

Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from Texas for yielding me this time.

I am an original sponsor of the original bill, which became the basis of this bill, the Retirement Enhancement Security Act.

Unfortunately, today this bill is not that bill. A lot has changed, a lot was taken out, and a lot was removed from it because the process is broken. We didn't have hearings. We didn't have consultation. We didn't have the back-and-forth that is needed to build bipartisan support for an important measure such as this.

We do have a retirement savings in this country. We can be doing more to make it easier for individuals and small businesses to offer retirement savings plans for their employees.

I have been proud to work with my friend from Pennsylvania, Mr. Kelly, on legislation to try to correct it. Part of the original bill, the RESA bill, it has been called, was based on legislation that I have offered for years with my friend and colleague from Washington State, Mr. Reichert, another Member of the committee.

In fact, the original RESA bill, when it was up before the Senate Finance Committee, passed 26-0. That is how controversial it was. But unfortunately, again, this bill does not reflect what was done there.

An important provision that would have provided PBGC premium pension relief from rural electric co-ops, from nonprofits, like the Boys and Girls Club of America, or the Jewish Federation of North America, the Christian Schools International, was mysteriously stripped from this legislation with very little explanation. That is a problem that we could easily fix right now, as just one example.

Another problem we have is that the pay-for that was recognized and identified in a bipartisan manner, the so-called stretch IRAs that we could be shutting down to help pay for this legislation, was also stripped.

Now, I get the fact that fiscal responsibility is out the door with the majority party. They don't believe in paying for things. But when we come up with a bipartisan pay-for, after vetting it and getting feedback from the various stakeholders, and they still can't accept it, that tells me that, not only don't they care about fiscal responsibility but they are hostile to fiscal responsibility.

This is one of three bills now that the Ways and Means Committee is bringing to the floor, with no opportunity for amendments or other Members to contribute to help form this legislation. They are here before us in what is called a closed rule; no amendment opportunity, and none of the bills will be paid for which, according to the Joint Committee on Taxation, will, when these three bills are implemented, cost our Nation over $3 trillion in new debt; $3 trillion. And this comes on the heels of the tax cut 1.0 that passed late last year which, again, wasn't paid for, which will add $2.3 trillion to other national debt.

Now, I don't know about you, but you give me the opportunity to write $5 trillion worth of hot checks, and I will give you the illusion of wealth and growth in this country.

But there is a day of reckoning that will come from all this because this is happening at the wrong time. When we have got growth, we have got virtually full employment, and you guys can't throw enough fiscal stimulus at this economy. You are taking our fiscal tools away from us.

You are taking all the fiscal tools away from us, so when there is another recession, and there will be, unless somehow we repeal the economic cycle in this country, the Federal Reserve will be the only institution standing that can actually take corrective action, probably with extraordinary measures, which we all hated in 2008 and 2009.

But this bill, and the three bills this week that are before us are here for three reasons and three reasons only: Because of the election calendar, with the midterms coming up in early November, and vulnerable Members' names being attached to these bills, so that they can do their ads and they can do their press releases back home, knowing that it is not going to go anywhere in the Senate.

Then finally, we are here this week because tax cut 1.0 went over like a wet blanket with the American people because they know what that was about; where 83 percent of that tax cut is going to large corporations and the wealthiest 1 percent of our Nation. The American people get that.

And what did these corporations do with their huge tax windfall? They are doing exactly what they said they would do, share buybacks, dividend distribution, executive compensation salaries. They are all buying private jets because of the additional money that they have for their executives right now. Very little has gone into increased wages or salary increases, and this is what corporate America said they would do, so no one should be surprised by that.

So I say, let's slow down here. Let's think about the fiscal future of our country, more importantly, the fiscal future of our children and grandchildren because right now we have 10,000 baby boomers retiring every day. When these three bills are fully implemented, all 70 million baby boomers will be completely vested in the retirement system, drawing on Social Security and Medicare. And we have set those programs up for failure with these reckless tax cuts that aren't paid for and are going to leave a legacy of debt, which will invariably lead to huge cuts to Social Security and Medicare, because, guess what? We don't have money anymore to support those programs.

That is what is going on around here right now. But we still have time to correct it because the Senate is not going to take it up.

Let's vote ``no''. Let's do this the right way.

Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend and colleague from Oregon for yielding me this time. I agree with my colleague.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this legislation, not because of the policy initiatives underlying these bills, but because of how fiscally irresponsible it is being done.

This week, out of the Ways and Means Committee, we have 10 bills to be debated and voted on on the House floor, at a total cost of roughly $90 billion. There was no effort made to try to find an offset or a pay-for in order to maintain some fiscal discipline in this place. That is problematic, because we keep digging the hole deeper.

But my name is on a few of these bills. Yesterday we had the repeal of the medical device tax, legislation that I had authored with my friend from Minnesota, Erik Paulsen. But that came at a cost of $20 billion. No offset. No pay-for. Just borrow more money from China and let future generations wrestle with it.

But it made sense policy-wise to try to repeal that in a fiscally responsible manner, because we were taxing these manufacturers whether they were making a profit or not. In fact, the pre-revenue companies were getting hit by the same tax. Policy-wise, it didn't make a lot of sense.

Today, I was happy to introduce legislation from our friend and colleague, Ms. Jenkins, on the Restoring Access to Medication Act. This will make it easier for patients to purchase over-the-counter medicine with their HSA and FSA account money without having to first run to their doctor to get a prescription. Just for the sake of efficiency and the cost savings, policy-wise, that makes sense; but the legislation comes with a cost, and there was no effort to pay for that.

Also part of this package is legislation I have introduced with our colleague, Mr. Smith, called the Personal Health Investment Today Act, or the PHIT Act. This would allow HSA and FSA dollars to be used for physical exercise, for gym memberships, so that we are investing in the front end of wellness and keeping people healthy in their lives rather than the hundreds of billions of dollars we spend at the back end dealing with chronic disease management.

Policy-wise that makes sense, but the legislation, again, comes with a cost. No attempt to pay for it. I think that is fiscally irresponsible.

At the time when we worked on and passed the Affordable Care Act, President Obama had one major request, that all of it had to be paid for, all of it had to be offset. We worked hard to accomplish it, and, in fact, we did, and then some. We did not add one nickel to our budget deficit or to future budget debt forecasts because of how we dealt with that in a fiscally responsible manner.

All we are asking is that our colleagues on the other side who are in charge now and running this place try to practice some semblance of that fiscal discipline that we showed with the passage of the Affordable Care Act.

We ought to be working together, finding out what is working with the healthcare system and fixing what isn't.

What is not working is the elimination of cost-sharing reduction payments that help health insurance providers spread the risk in the health insurance exchanges. That is one of the reasons why premiums are being driven up right now.

What is not working is refusing to provide funding to the navigators, who help people make the choices with the health plans that they have available, or undercutting funding for any education outreach with patients, or the elimination of the individual responsibility component so that young and healthy people don't get to sit around and wait until they get sick or injured and then go out and acquire health insurance. That is not how insurance markets work.

What also doesn't work is an administration that is trying to undermine the protections that are in place under the Affordable Care Act for people with preexisting conditions. There is a lawsuit pending right now. This administration should be defending that preexisting condition exclusion, and they are refusing to do so. That will implicate millions of lives throughout our country.

There is a lot that we can and should be working on together to improve the healthcare system, to reduce healthcare costs for all Americans. This approach, this piecemeal approach, while policy-wise there is a lot of justification and explanation for what is happening, is being done in a very fiscally irresponsible manner, just piling on the debt.

Mr. Speaker, this comes, by the way, on the heels, in this session of Congress, of the passage of a major tax cut last year that will add over $2 trillion to our national debt over the next 10 years because, again, there was no attempt to pay for it. It comes on the heels of the passage of a 2-year budget that will increase spending by over half a trillion dollars, none of it paid for, none of it offset.

Just yesterday, President Trump just announced a $12 billion subsidy bailout program for our family farmers because of the adverse effects that they are feeling due to his tariffs. And that is going to be borrowed money from China, again, to pay our farmers because they can't now sell their product--guess where--into the Chinese market.

How crazy is this? I hope we are not in an era now where budget deficits and debt only matters when there is a Democrat in the White House. Over the last year and a half, that certainly seems to be the case in this Congress.