Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman from Alabama for yielding.

First, I want to make a comment about how this process has gone in coming up with this compromise with the amendment on the flood insurance package. We have worked in the Financial Services Committee with outside groups, whether it was the home builders or the realtors or the insurance industry. We have worked with Members of Congress from the Gulf States and

from the East Coast and from the West Coast. We worked with Democrats. We had a number meetings with the ranking member of the committee, all taking in their consideration, which has brought us to a compromise that I don't know that anybody loves, but everyone says is a pretty darn good bill that strives to make needed reforms in a program that hasn't been working well. When we have programs that don't work well, let's try to fix them.

We have a program that, as was just mentioned, is $25 billion in debt, but that doesn't include the $16 billion we just gave the program and forgave. So really, it is $41 billion in debt.

So when do we think through the policies of a program that continues to run deficits, number one, but, number two, continues to incentivize people to live in harm's way?

I was down in Houston and I got to see a family who was talking about their next-door neighbor whose house was burning down. He was telling the story about his neighbor, and as the house started on fire, he sent the kids outside--like you would because your house is burning--as the flood waters are rising. The dad went to go put out the fire, and as he was putting out the fire, he looked out the window and saw his kids were being swept away by a flood. The current was too strong, so he ran outside to save his kids and let his house burn.

What are we going to do in that neighborhood that had been flooded three times in the last 10 years?

We are going to rebuild houses in the same flood plain. This doesn't make sense. Let's think about a reform that is going to improve the program, that helps people get out of dangerous areas and get into better areas that don't flood. Having a flooding house isn't a pleasant place to live.

Not only that, first responders risk their lives to go save people, and they die. We are incentivizing through this policy to allow people to live in these dangerous areas. I don't have a lot of time left, but the reforms are going to, yes, gently increase some of the premiums for the most highly subsidized properties called the pre-FIRM properties. We offer over $1 billion in mitigation to help families flood-proof their home or get out of their home and go to a better place to live because this improves the solvency of flood insurance. We are helping them with mitigation.

We are helping them with mapping, allowing communities that haven't been mapped to actually map themselves, to pay for it, to take care of their own future and destiny instead of waiting for the Federal Government. We allow for a private market to come in and offer you a premium that might be lower than the Federal Government.

God forbid we offer a family a choice to let the private sector compete with a public offering. My God, if you get a lower price, that is great. If you don't get a lower price, you can stay in the Federal plan.

My goodness, I am going to have some people come up in a second and say: But you could cherry-pick, and that could jeopardize the solvency of the program.

The program is insolvent. It is $25 billion in debt--actually, $41 billion, if you include that $16 billion. It is not a solvent program.

Just think if in Houston and in Florida we had people who had bought insurance in the private market, we would be saving taxpayers money. This is a commonsense bill that makes the program better, that helps families, that empowers communities. Let's stand together. A little bit of reform might go a long way in making government actually work, so I would encourage all of my colleagues on both side of the aisle to vote ``yes'' for common sense.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank Chairman Hensarling for all his good and relentless hard work on this bill. I appreciate his tenacity.

I want to thank Mr. Blumenauer for the comments that he just made. The two of us had not worked together on a lot of issues, but this is one we saw eye-to-eye, and, through flood, I think we have seen a lot of common ground and built a friendship together.

I actually promised I was going to wear a bike today, and I haven't kept my promise. Later today, I will wear that for Mr. Blumenauer.

But I want to talk about the debate we have had here today. This has been an effort at bipartisanship. On the Republican side, I have worked with Representatives Graves and Scalise and Zeldin and King and LoBiondo and MacArthur trying to bring in their concerns to this legislation.

On the Democrat side, I have worked with Mr. Scott; I have worked with Mrs. Maloney, Ms. Velazquez, all concerned about the Northeast and the Sandy reforms that were necessary to learn the lessons. We have included those reforms in this bill.

I sat down countless hours with the ranking member. She shared her phone number with me. She left me at the dance though, because before this thing was done, she walked away. We tried to get a bipartisan bill. We worked on this thing together; so to say something other than that is just not fair, it is not right. We have tried.

You might not like the end product, but we have gone a great distance to get a bill that everybody can agree on, and I think we are going to get that today.

I want to talk about a few things. We are $25 billion in debt, a deficit of $1.5 billion a year. This program is not sustainable. We have people who are building homes in harm's way. They get flooded multiple times.

The chairman and I saw a homeowner who was flooded three times in 10 years. One homeowner let his house burn because he had to go save his kids who were getting swept away in floodwaters, and we rebuild those homes in the same location and risk the lives of firefighters and first responders to go save them. This policy is unacceptable and it is not compassionate.

I hear my friends across the aisle say: You are going to hurt homeowners. Their rates are going to skyrocket.

What? On average, for a year, the price of flood insurance, on average, will go up $20, less than $2 a month, and they are screaming bloody murder about that? And what do they get for it? I have a list of 30 things of great reform we get in this bill to help homeowners.

Yes, highly subsidized properties in a pre-FIRM space are going to pay a little more, a little higher escalator, but we spend a billion dollars on mitigation helping people flood-proof their homes, helping people get bought out of their home and get to higher ground so they don't have to live in a home that is continually flooded.

I don't know if you have lived in a flood home, but it ain't fun. It is horrible. Get them out. A billion dollars for that program.

We help communities with their mapping. We give them options to map, and we give them an appeals process in their mapping. Great reform, we set up a private market.

Now, you don't have to take the private market, but you have an option to get a private plan that might have a better rate than the government offers you. You have a choice--a choice, God forbid--a choice that gives you a better price.

By the way, when we get the private market in, we all float our risk to the private sector. When a disaster hits Texas or Florida, it is not just the taxpayers who bear all the burden. We have private companies in play. That is a great thing. This is a good bill. This is a bipartisan bill. Let's stand together and reform a program to help the homeowner and our national debt.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, I thank Mr. Emmer, my colleague and friend from the neighboring State of Minnesota, for offering such a commonsense piece of legislation.

I frequently hear horror stories of fraud and abuse. All of us stand against fraud and abuse. I have a news flash for everybody: This law doesn't change that fraud is illegal. It was illegal before this bill and it will be illegal after this bill. Fraud is illegal.

All we are doing is saying we are going to keep the promise that all of us say that we have to small entrepreneurs and startups to make sure that they get seed capital and make sure they can thrive and grow and create jobs in our community.

All we are trying to do is give clarity to what constitutes a nonpublic offering. What is wrong with clarity? What is wrong with bright lines that they know that they can operate in between without violating the rule?

This is simple. It is straightforward, it is common sense, and it supports everything we say we support, which is small businesses, and I think this is a great piece of legislation.

I would ask all of my colleagues to stand together. Let's not play partisanship with the smallest businesses in our communities, the ones that we both agree create jobs. This is a time for unity. Let's work together, especially when it is common sense.

I love the passion from the ranking member, but on this one, it is passion without a cause. It makes sense. It gives bright lines.

Let's stand up for small businesses that create jobs in our community. Mr. Emmer's bill does that. I ask us all to stand up and support small businesses and this bill.

Mr. Speaker, I am not recorded because I was absent. Had I been present, I would have voted YEA on Roll Call No. 591.

Mr. Speaker, I am not recorded because I was absent due to travel delays. Had I been present, I would have voted YEA on Roll Call No. 569, YEA on Roll Call No. 570, and NAY on Roll Call No. 571.

Mr. Speaker, today, Congress will have an opportunity to vote on legislation that will bolster protections for whistleblowing patriots, while vastly improving care for veterans at the VA.

The Dr. Chris Kirkpatrick Whistleblower Protection Act is the product of hundreds of hours of Congressional hearings, meetings with stakeholders, and hard work by dozens of lawmakers here in Washington, to make sure that the tragic abuse that Dr. Kirkpatrick faced will never happen again.

As some of you may know, Dr. Chris Kirkpatrick was a clinical psychologist at the VA in Tomah, WI. He was a veteran, a graduate of Northwestern University, and a caring individual who dedicated his career to providing innovative treatments for veterans suffering from PTSD. Most notably, he created a yoga program to help vets at the VA in Chicago. He was known to be very well-liked by the patients he served.

In 2009, Dr. Kirkpatrick expressed concerns that his patients were being heavily overmedicated. It became so bad, he said, that he was unable to properly do his job. He wanted to do what was right for veterans, and as a veteran himself, he couldn't stand to see how careless some of the VA staff were being with high levels of dangerous medications.

Unfortunately, instead of looking into Dr. Kirkpatrick's claims, the facility's chief of staff told him to mind his own business, and to instead focus on his own work. Shortly thereafter, Dr. Kirkpatrick was called to a disciplinary meeting and given a written reprimand.

This type of retaliation went on for months.

Then, in July, Dr. Kirkpatrick complained again that a dangerous veteran had not been properly discharged, despite recommendations from a treatment team. A week after making the complaint, Dr. Kirkpatrick was fired from the VA.

He was devastated. He begged for an opportunity to stay, and expressed concerns that he had been given too many complex cases, and that the emotional toll was too high. Again, his concerns were ignored.

That night, Dr. Kirkpatrick wrote a note to his girlfriend in Chicago, another to the kennel he wanted to take care of his dog, and one final note for the mailman. It read: ``Please call 911--tell them to go to red barn building.''

He had taken his own life. He was 38 years old.

Dr. Kirkpatrick's death was the product of a broken system--a system that encourages retaliation against whistleblowers, while ignoring the underlying causes of their concerns.

If Dr. Kirkpatrick's death wasn't tragic enough, a subsequent investigation at the VA found that a patient had died from ``mixed drug toxicity'', and that Dr. Kirkpatrick's concerns were completely warranted.

Not only did whistleblower retaliation cost Dr. Kirkpatrick his life, it cost the life of a patient as well.

That's why I urge you all to vote yes on the Dr. Chris Kirkpatrick Whistleblower Protection Act.

A yes vote means that VA personnel will no longer be able to access a whistleblower's medical records as means of discrediting them, which a separate investigation found happens far too often.

A yes vote means that federal agencies have to notify the Office of Special Counsel when a suicide takes place.

A yes means clear disciplinary actions for supervisors who retaliate against whistleblowers, training for supervisors on how to properly respond, and a requirement that employees are made aware of the mental health services at their disposal.

A yes vote also means keeping upholding normal burdens of proof to strengthen protections for employees. This legislation calls for the Inspector General, Office of Special Counsel, or a Merit Systems Protection Board Administrative Judge to ``determine'' that a supervisor has committed a prohibited personnel action, meaning through the normal preponderance of the evidence for any other disciplinary action under Chapter 75 of title 5. This does not mean some arbitrary process for some bureaucrat to create later on.

I want to be clear: this legislation strengthens protections for patriots--for those who are trying to do the right thing. For those who care about veterans and their safety. And for folks like Dr. Kirkpatrick, so that no one ever has to go through what he went through.

Mr. Speaker, I want to take a moment and thank Ms. Castor and Mr. Ross for their hard work on this legislation.

There are some here in this body who have said: if we let free markets into the National Flood Insurance Program that is run by the Federal Government, you are going to undermine the premiums that come into the national flood insurance pool.

It is $25 billion in debt and is structured in a way where premiums can't rise. This doesn't undermine the program.

What we are doing is saying: Listen, if you are in the National Flood Insurance Program right now, the way it is structured, there is only one place you can buy insurance. But this is a provision that will open up the market and let private companies come in and offer families better policies at better prices. If they don't, you can stay in the NFIP. You don't have to go private. You can stay government. But you give people a choice.

It is like saying: Listen, you have to keep the United States Postal Service as your one carrier. You can't have FedEx or UPS. You don't get those choices.

People want a choice. In Houston, instead of having only 20 percent of the people who had coverage, you might have had 40, 50, or 60 percent of the people who would have had coverage. More people would have had protection.

I have got to tell you, I am disappointed in the partisanship.

I am going to quote a person I rarely quote, but a person I truly like. She once said in the process of this bill: ``This is an example of real compromise.''

Then, on the substance of the bill, this fine woman from California said: ``We can have the opportunity for our constituents to have some choice. I think that is real compromise, that is substantive compromise, that is meaningful compromise, and that is the kind of compromise that reasonable people can engage in.''

Mr. Speaker, that was the gentlewoman from California, who is now in opposition to this bill.

When this came up by itself--the same bill--last Congress, everyone voted for it. When it came up in committee, everyone voted for it. Democrats and Republicans voted for this bill because they knew that it was going to offer more choice and better prices to American families. That is why it was bipartisan.

I think this is a moment where our Congress can stand together on behalf of the American people who don't have flood insurance, who don't have a reasonably priced policy. Let's stand with them today and pass the Ross-Castor bill. By the way, Ross and Castor are both from Florida. Two Florida Members, Republican and Democrat, came together.

Let's get it done, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. Chairman, this debate oftentimes can become confusing because banking law is confusing.

We hear both sides take different positions on the Financial CHOICE Act and on Dodd-Frank, but I think the way you cut to the fat about whether Dodd-Frank was great law and does the Financial CHOICE Act actually make this law way better, I think we have to look at a couple simple factors.

Big banks brought us to the crisis in 2008. The question for my friends across the aisle and people watching this debate is: Because of Dodd-Frank, have big banks gotten smaller or have big banks gotten bigger?

The answer is: Big banks have gotten bigger.

If you go to rural Wisconsin, small community banks and credit unions that help grow businesses and help provide to capital to our families are going out of business. Big Wall Street banks don't set up shop in rural Wisconsin. So the little guy is getting hurt and the big guys are doing really well.

You have got to ask yourself: Who supports the Financial CHOICE Act?

You have the NFIB protecting small businesses, the Independent Community Bankers of America, the National Association of Federally- Insured Credit Unions, and the Credit Union National Association. Credit unions and small banks support this bill.

Who doesn't support this bill?

Well, if you look to The Washington Post: Hensarling, our chairman, faces opposition from big-bank CEOs that like Dodd-Frank. They hate the Financial CHOICE Act.

Another quote from The Wall Street Journal: ``Big banks have an unexpected message for President-elect Trump: Don't trash the Dodd- Frank Act.''

Big banks hate this bill, and little banks and little credit unions love it. If you want to know where people stand on this, go to your small community banker, go to your credit union, ask them about Dodd- Frank, and they will give you an earful. Then ask them: Do you like the Financial CHOICE Act? They will sit back and give you a small, slow clap.

Let's do what is right for the American people and the small banks and small credit unions. Let's join together, pass H.R. 10, and give a win to the little guy.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that when the House adjourns today, it adjourn to meet on Monday, June 12, 2017, when it shall convene at noon for morning-hour debate and 2 p.m. for legislative business.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to recognize the dedication and bravery of our nation's law enforcement, especially in relation to keeping drugs out of our communities.

I would like to commend the efforts of Wisconsin officers who are on the front lines to halt the flow of methamphetamines into our communities. After a three-year investigation conducted by local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies, 19 individuals have pleaded guilty to conspiring to distribute meth in central Wisconsin. During that period, the individuals involved distributed 127 pounds of meth, at a value of $5.7 million.

These heroes in law enforcement deserve our praise. They go to work every day not knowing if they are going to come home. And they are leading the fight against meth, which has scourged our families and communities. Meth distributors intentionally seek to create new addicts in our communities by flooding the market with cheap product and targeting individuals. Our officers see the consequences of meth in the eyes of the children they rescue from homes consumed by this addiction. That's why the fight against this epidemic is so important, and why we are eternally grateful for their service.

I would like to recognize the Lincoln County Sheriff's Office, especially Detective Lieutenant Chad Collinsworth; the Wisconsin Department of Justice, Division of Criminal Investigation; the Wausau office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation; the Drug Enforcement Administration; the Marathon County Sheriff's Office Special Investigations Unit; the Wausau Police Department, and IRS Criminal Investigation unit for their work on behalf of our community.

Mr. Speaker, I encourage all Americans to take the opportunity to thank a police officer in their community. They have our backs, and the least that we can do is to let them know that we have theirs.

Mr. Speaker, on March 30, 2017, on rollcall No. 207 on motion to recommit with instructions, I am not recorded. Had I been present, I would have voted ``nay.''

On rollcall No. 208 on final passage of H.R. 1431, the EPA Science Advisory Board Reform Act of 2017, I am not recorded. Had I been present, I would have voted ``aye.''

personal explanation

Madam Speaker, on March 29, 2017, on rollcall No. 203 on ordering the previous question, I am not recorded. Had I been present, I would have voted ``aye.''

On rollcall No. 204 on agreeing to the resolution, H. Res. 233, providing for consideration of H.R. 1431, I am not recorded. Had I been present, I would have voted ``aye.''

On rollcall No. 205 on motion to recommit with instructions, I am not recorded. Had I been present, I would have voted ``nay.''

On rollcall No. 206 on final passage of H.R. 1431, I am not recorded. Had I been present, I would have voted ``aye'' on final passage of H.R. 1431.

Mr. Speaker, it's with a heavy heart that I rise today to recognize the loss of four members of our greater Wausau community. It was last week that four lives were taken from us all too early.

Karen Barclay was warm and caring to everyone around her. At Marathon Savings Bank, she made sure that no child left the bank without a lollipop.

Dianne Look, known as `Dee-Dee,' celebrated her 25th wedding anniversary last month. Dianne loved to make jewelry; raising money for the American Cancer Society.

Sara Quirt-Sann had an infectious laugh and ran her own law practice. She proudly served as a Guardian ad Litem for kids in our community.

We also lost Detective Jason Weiland of the Everest Metro Police Department, who was killed in the line of duty. Serving 18 years in what was described as his `dream job,' Detective Weiland wore the Everest Metro PD uniform because he wanted to protect people and keep his community safe.

On behalf of this institution, I rise to extend my deepest regrets to their families--the mothers and fathers, husbands, wives, and children who no longer have a special member in their homes.

Mr. Speaker, it is with a heavy heart that I rise today to recognize the loss of four members of our greater-Wausau community. It was last week that four lives were taken from us all too early.

Karen Barclay was warm and caring to everyone around her. At Marathon Savings Bank, she made sure that no child left the bank without a lollipop.

Dianne Look, known as Dee-Dee, celebrated her 25th wedding anniversary last month. Dianne loved to make jewelry, raising money for the American Cancer Society.

Sara Quirt-Sann had an infectious laugh. She ran her own law practice, and she proudly served as a guardian ad litem for kids in our community.

We also lost Detective Jason Weiland of the Everest Metro Police Department, who was killed in the line of duty. Serving 18 years in what was described as his dream job, Detective Weiland wore the Everest Metro PD uniform because he wanted to protect people and keep his community safe.

On behalf of this institution, I rise to extend my deepest regrets to their families, their mothers and fathers, husbands and wives, and children, who no longer have a special member in their homes.

Mr. Speaker, on rollcall No. 201 on motion to table the appeal of the ruling of the chair, I am not recorded. Had I been present, I would have voted ``aye.''

On rollcall No. 202 on final passage of S.J. Res. 34, I am not recorded. Had I been present, I would have voted ``aye'' on final passage of S.J. Res. 34.