Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the place that I am proud to call home, Bay County, Florida.

One hundred years ago today, Bay County was established by act of the Florida Legislature, igniting a century of growth and opportunity for a close-knit community that still cherishes its rich history and traditions.

Bay County is located in the heart of northwest Florida, overlooking 41 miles of sugar-white sand beaches along the gulf coast's emerald green waters. With an additional 270 square miles occupied by pristine lakes, springs, streams, and the magnificent St. Andrews Bay, Bay County has become a national destination for tourists, families, fishermen, boaters, and water sports enthusiasts.

While Bay County's beaches and diverse inland areas attract over 8 million visitors each year, it is its people who live and work there that give this place a unique spirit. A small community of little more than 11,000 people in 1920, Bay County now embodies the drive of a diverse and growing population, totaling more than 170,000 people.

Bay County's workforce is among the best educated and most highly prepared in northwest Florida, with institutions of higher learning that rival any in the region. Its economic engine is fueled not by tourism alone, but also by thriving small businesses, nationally recognized companies, major manufacturers, and one of the newer airports in the United States. And, as the home of Tyndall Air Force Base, Naval Support Activity Panama City, and more than 22,000 veterans, Bay County enjoys a rich military history.

On this day, April 24, 2013, the day of Bay County's centennial, I am proud to join my friends, neighbors, my family, and local and county officials from Panama City, Panama City Beach, Lynn Haven, Springfield, Parker, Callaway, Mexico Beach, and the unincorporated areas of our county to celebrate our past and our bright future as we work hard to make Bay County a better place to live, work, and play.

Mr. Speaker, it's tax week. As you know, that means that Americans' heads are chock-full of all kinds of numbers. We've done all kinds of itemizations, deductions, and calculations in our personal finances just to make sure that we know how much we are going to hand over to Uncle Sam. Let me share with you some more numbers.

How about $168 billion? That's how much our fellow Americans spend each year just to make sure they comply with our overcomplicated Tax Code. Just how complicated are the tax rules in this country? Well, here is another number--4 million. That's how many words there are in the U.S. Tax Code. There are 4,500 words in the U.S. Constitution. There are 775,000 words in the Bible. Yet there are 4 million in our Tax Code.

What does this all add up to?

It means that our current tax system is broken. We need fundamental, comprehensive tax reform to make our Tax Code fairer and simpler for all Americans. That is the House Republican plan.

Mr. Speaker, I thank Mr. Chairman for yielding me time this afternoon.

I am proudly standing here as an original cosponsor of this bill, H.R. 890. I think today gives us an opportunity, Mr. Speaker, to speak with clarity and say once and for all, regardless of the interpretations and regardless of the arguments on this floor, that we require an individual, before they benefit and they take, that they must work. I think it is a very safe thing for us to do. It mirrors the culture of this country down through the years.

You know, I support these requirements because working is the best way to lift people out of poverty and give them the opportunity for earned success. I remember in my youth, my father, he clearly made us work. He made us understand the value of hard work. It wasn't a punishment; it wasn't cruel. He knew that through hard work that our character would be molded, and we would understand that through work and through the sweat of our brow that we would find the destiny for our own lives.

I think today what this body should do, and will do, is clarify that the work requirements of TANF is a good thing. These work requirements are bipartisan. We've all heard on the floor today the bipartisan effort between Republicans and Democrats alike during 1996. What we're saying is they were good then, and they are good today. Most importantly, I am pleased with what occurred back in the mid-nineties. When you're talking about almost 73 percent of those who were on welfare moved to work, that's a positive thing for the lives of the American people.

The administration's unprecedented actions are clearly circumventing this law and the will of the people, with over 83 percent of Americans today believing that these work requirements are a positive thing.

It's common sense, it's a self-evident truth: if you want a positive future, you must help create that, and part of that requirement is that you must work.

I urge my colleagues today to join me in supporting H.R. 890 because it returns us to the real work of helping people who need it most.

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

I would like to thank the gentleman from Michigan for yielding the time.

Today, I rise in support of H.R. 6079, to repeal the President's health care law.

H.R. 6079 will end the individual mandate, the tax hikes on the small businesses--of which my family has been proud owners for many, many generations--the devastating cuts to Medicare, and the government intrusion into Americans' private health care decisions.

While I am disappointed with the Supreme Court and with the decision that it made by not striking down the President's health care bill, I remain committed to its full repeal. Under the health care law, over 1 million Americans will be at risk of losing their own current health care plans. The average American family will see a $1,200 increase in its health care premiums. Many of those families I know in our family community are going to be devastatingly impacted.

As I have said time and time again, bad procedure leads to bad policy, and 2 years ago--my goodness--on full display, we saw bad procedure. That's why I stand here ready to cast my 10th vote in favor of repealing the President's health care law.

I'd like to thank the gentleman from Tennessee for yielding time.

As a new Member of this body, it was quite an honor to be appointed a conferee to go to conference. Those who are a part of this body recognize that, that it's usually something that obviously senior Members are appointed to. It was a great honor and it still is, even though we have yet to have a product that we can vote upon.

You can imagine my disappointment when, after attending five working group meetings, I did not have a single individual to look at on the other side of the table representing the other body. You see, when the American people sent us here, I believe they sent us here to change the way we do business. And I'm pleased that we were sent to be involved in those five meetings.

I keep hearing oftentimes in the media, Mr. Speaker, that it is the Republican side that isn't perhaps interested in a bill. But I would say, if that were true, then why did I attend five working group meetings only to have no counterpart on the other side of the table?

We recognize not just words; we recognize actions.

I think the American people are so tired of words. I think that they would be terribly disappointed if they knew that their elected Members did not even attend meetings. And if they did not attend these working group meetings, then how could they be serious and expecting us to believe that they're interested in a bill? I think that we trample on their trust when we don't do the people's work. It's terribly, terribly disappointing.

I want the reforms. I believe they're important. I believe that if we can build a bridge like I 35 through Minnesota, if we can rebuild it in 437 days, I think it makes sense to include streamlining provisions in this bill that say that every project around the country is just as important as I 35, and so, therefore, we need to build all bridges back to their original state without having to go through long, laborious, expensive environmental impact studies if we're rebuilding that bridge back or repaving that road back on the original footprint. I think that makes sense.

I think the American people want us to do their work. They want us to create a bill of value and a bill that is paid for. I think that what we have voted upon and the reforms that we have asked to be considered, not only have they not been answered or even addressed, but we haven't even had the opportunity to even look at one of our counterparts on the other side of the aisle and speak to them at conference. It's terribly disappointing.

With that, I rise in support of this motion to instruct because I believe that we need to have Members come and we need to debate and we need to do the people's business.

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

Mr. Chairman, the Southerland-Grimm amendment prohibits funds in the CJS Appropriations Act from being spent on limited access programs otherwise known as catch shares. Ladies and gentlemen, what I'm referring to here is nothing less than a battle to prevent freedom in our oceans. I want to make sure that I am very clear that our amendment only addresses the New England coast, the South Atlantic, the Mid-Atlantic and the Gulf of Mexico. I also want to make sure that it is clear that this amendment only deals with new annual catch limits, not any old programs that are currently in place.

Catch shares are no different than any other inside-the-Beltway style tactic determined to destroy American freedom. By capping the amount of fish that may be caught annually----

I yield to the gentleman from Washington.

Reclaiming my time, in an attempt to answer your question, while you were here since Magnuson-Stevens, my family was continuing 200 years of living on the coast in the Gulf of Mexico. So though I respect your time here, we were there experiencing the crushing impacts of what catch shares do.

Reclaiming my time, I want to make it very clear that this amendment does not affect the West Coast.

They are welcome to get their own time, Mr. Chair, so I would like to finish my statement.

It is very clear that these catch shares in the bodies of water that I made reference to are an effort by a select group to take away the individual fishing rights of individual citizens and to implement a cap-and-trade system where fish are traded like a commodity. The only problem, the American people own this natural resource. This is not like a crop where a farmer has planted this in a field. And so I want to be very clear that this does not affect any existing programs. It just says that no dollars may be used for new-- new--programs.

I would like to submit for the Record this extensive list of organizations and associations that represent tens of thousands of fishermen, commercial, boats for hire as well as individuals.

I yield back the balance of my time.

You know, what's amazing is I always hear stuff that's not true. I was very clear. The letter that my colleague, Mr. Chairman, read, clearly stated that it would eliminate programs, catch share programs currently in bodies of water all around America; and that's just not true. That's not what it says.

My amendment is crystal clear. New catch shares in New England, Mid- Atlantic, South Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico--that's four bodies of water.

Now, I also want to make it very clear that every time that opponents or proponents of catch share stand up they want to talk about commercial fishermen. And I have commercial fishermen in my district, and I'm concerned about our commercial fishing industry.

But I'm also concerned about the individual freedoms and liberties of the American people, and the proponents of the catch share program never want to talk about the individual rights and freedoms of the American people.

This is a public resource, a natural resource. This is not just for a small select group of commercial fishermen that are backed by very, very wealthy environmentalists to decide alone.

This is an issue that is worthy for the American people to speak on. And this is the people's House. And so I stand here, yes, as a Member of the people's House, but I also stand here as someone who's lived on the Gulf of Mexico,

as a family, for over 200 years. I know what I'm talking about.

And you just quoted something that was untrue, Mr. Chairman, and I have a problem with that. Geez.

I yield to the gentleman.

I reclaim my time, sir. When the gentleman stood up he mentioned----

I'd like to thank the gentleman from Massachusetts. I agree with his comments.

Again, I want to be just very clear. I think that the amendment is crystal clear. I think that all Americans who believe----

Offered By: Mr. Southerland

Amendment No. 39: At the end of the bill (before the short

title), insert the following:

I thank the chairman for yielding.

We have a lot of folks in the gallery today that have worked hard and saved money that they've earned to make their trip and to come here and listen to this debate. They understand that Santa Claus and a fairy tale is not going to pay for their transportation back. They get that. And they know that when they get back home, they're going to have to earn and work and find earned success if they want to bring their family back again. They get it. They get it. The American people get it.

At no point in time have the American people had to do more with less and the Federal Government has done less with more.

We hear a lot about fairness. True fairness does not come from wealth distribution. True fairness means rewarding merit, creating opportunity, and letting people rise. That has been a bedrock of the American system, the free enterprise system; and it is that free enterprise system that has given opportunity and rewarded people. And America has been benevolent with the gifts of being rewarded by hard work and honest dealings.

The Democratic budget does not support that; yet the Ryan budget or the Path to Prosperity, the Republican budget, does.

Announcement By the Acting Chair

I'd like to thank the gentleman from Louisiana for yielding. I also would like to commend him on his leadership regarding the work that we have performed on this bipartisan effort to really restore the Gulf of Mexico.

The five States that were affected most, their Representatives here-- many who have already spoken today--have worked extremely hard to make sure that the Federal Government never profits from the pain and suffering of those who call the Gulf of Mexico and the gulf coast their home.

This has been a wonderful experience to work across the aisle with many who understand how critical it is that we take care of the hardworking men and women along the gulf coast. I just urge approval and passage of this amendment.

I thank the gentleman from Michigan for yielding time.

Mr. Speaker, if we ask the American people what they want, I think it would be glaring. Do they want the House bill that protects seniors' access to doctors for 24 months, or do they want the Senate version for 2 months? Do they want a Federal unemployment benefits extension for 13 months, or do they want that for 2 months? Do they want payroll tax cut extensions for 12 months or for 2 months? Do they want a payroll tax break for $1,000, or do they want it for $167?

Do they want pay freezes for Members of Congress and for Federal workers, or do they want those freezes to go away like the Senate version states? Do they want unending unemployment and food stamp benefits for millionaires, or do they want that to continue? Then they would want the Senate version. Do they want requiring Social Security numbers for refundable child tax credits, or do they want that to go away?

This is a good one: Do they want to prevent access to welfare benefits at strip clubs and liquor stores like the House version we passed last week? Or do they want that to go away in the Senate version?

If we asked the American people, I think their answer would be glaring and clear. They want certainty. Right now, the Senate version throws the American family a life preserver drifting in a sea of uncertainty. The House version reaches out to them and pulls them out of that sea of uncertainty, putting them in a lifeboat.

I ask the American people, do you want a life preserver or do you want a lifeboat? Any commonsense American would say, put me in the boat that extends this for 1 year rather than 2 months. This isn't difficult. This is common sense.

Madam Speaker, yesterday, in the Natural Resources Committee, we held an oversight hearing regarding the President's new National Ocean Policy, an Executive order to tell us how we can best use our oceans.

Yesterday, it was amazing to hear those who believe in this policy applaud the use of the Federal Government in bringing stakeholders together. I will say this: This particular policy has been driven from the White House through Executive order under the auspices of ocean conservation, when its actual effects will be far reaching, economically harmful and hurtful to American jobs and businesses both at sea as well as ashore.

Inside of this policy, there is something called marine spatial planning, how to best use our oceans, totally ignoring the common sense that the God who created us gave us at the moment He did create us. The background of this goes back quite some time.

In 2009, a task force--I love those here. We have so many. We have councils and task forces. Do you know what? We need to form another committee. Well, I'm of the opinion that had Moses formed another committee, they would still be wandering around in the desert today. However, that's the mode of operation here. And in these frameworks and in these task forces, they come out with effective coastal and marine spatial planning.

I believe this is one of the largest efforts of government regulatory overreach in my lifetime. And with the world being 73 percent water, what better way--for if we can capture and make sure that we determine what people do with these waterways, what better way to push our policies forward, to rob the American people of job opportunities and the freedoms that I believe were given at birth?

The National Ocean Policy is less about coordinating fishing activities with other ocean user activities and more about creating new regulatory processes to further restrict fishing opportunities in both the recreational and commercial fishing sectors, according to the director of public affairs for the At-sea Processors Association.

In my State of Florida, we have a crisis when it comes to homes and when it comes to real estate. Yet I know that homebuilders are going to be damaged greatly because this regulatory push does not just deal with offshore, but it also deals, as I stated, with onshore.

The National Ocean Policy has a potential to create yet another set of standards and/or approvals that could unnecessarily impose significant impacts on homebuilders, private landowners, and other businesses while providing minimal--minimal--effects. Yesterday, we heard that what this plan does is bring together, through an adaptive process, stakeholders. Well, do you know what? We have the ability as stakeholders to communicate now.

Since when do we need the Federal Government to tell us that we can talk

to each other? Have we been so dumbed down? No, we have not. We have the ability to talk now and communicate without forming another government bureaucracy that robs us of those freedoms.

And I appreciate that call to being a stakeholder at the table, but really--really--that would be like the Greeks asking the people of Troy to help plan the design and construction of the Trojan Horse. This is nuts--nuts.

I live in Florida. I lived on the coast. I have spent my whole life on the coast.

This is another plan to push onerous regulations upon the American people and to rob the States and to abolish and do away with the 10th Amendment. I'm telling you, the States should be doing more while the Federal Government should be doing less.

Do not be fooled by this. We must not be fooled by this. They say we need an economic analysis going forward. Well, how about a constitutional analysis to examine the balance between the Federal Government and the State governments?

The National Ocean Policy is something that concerns me greatly, and I really believe with all my heart it would have concerned, in a terrible way, our Founding Fathers. This is an effort to turn our oceans into an aquarium. It is high time that the American people stood up and said enough is enough.

I rise today with great disappointment in the administration's misguided agenda on job creation and deficit reduction.

You see, I have been in a family that has created jobs for generations. Shortly after World War II, my grandfather wanted to create an opportunity for his family. He wanted to create an opportunity to make a difference in his community. So, with a sixth- grade education, with $3,000 of borrowed money, and with a dream to make a difference, he did what small businesses do naturally when they do not have the impediments of the Federal Government: He created jobs. His dream, his vision, included that--to make a difference, to give other people an opportunity to forge a brighter and better future for them and their families.

It wasn't a self-serving dream.

It was a dream to serve others.

During those decades following World War II, we saw that same example all across this great Nation of people doing what people were created to do--make a difference.

It is not government's responsibility to create a job through a bill. It is government's responsibility to create an environment, an environment that produces certainty, an environment that a small business owner has the guarantee that he knows what his taxes are going to be, that he knows what his fees are going to be, that he knows what his regulations are going to be, not just in 6 months or 12 months, but for years, and that creates certainty.

I had never served in elected office before being sworn in as a Member of this House in January. I went from small business to Congress, and so I bring with me that understanding that, if government gets out of the way and if we can do what Americans do better than any country in the world, we will make our communities a better place, and, yes, because of our benevolence, we will make the world a better place.

It was a great disappointment when the President came to this Chamber and the President introduced his plan. I was saddened. Yes, there were some things that I agreed with that we need to do--the free trade agreements. We are still waiting for those free trade agreements with Colombia, Panama, and South Korea. We're waiting. There was agreement on tax reform. There was agreement on payroll tax reduction to give small businesses more money, to give individuals more money on their paychecks. We agreed there. But if you look deeper into this bill, you will see, unfortunately, more of the same.

This jobs bill creates a brand new, permanent, government-owned bureaucracy. As a matter of fact, it's a corporation--the President's American Infrastructure Financing Authority, a solely owned subsidiary of the Federal Government. It is not time for the Federal Government to create corporations, corporations that have chief executive officers and chief financial officers, risk officers, chief compliance officers, chief operating officers, chief lending officers, general counsel, and boards of directors who are lending money--lending money--with terms out to 35 years.

Now, unfortunately, this is insanity. This sounds so much like the first stimulus--and the first stimulus, we know, with 35 percent of those funds having yet to be spent. We were promised our unemployment numbers would not go over 8 percent. As a matter of fact, the administration claimed that unemployment numbers by this time would be at 6.5. Well, we all know that is not true. As a matter of fact, in my home State of Florida, we're living with 10.7 percent unemployment, and, last year, we spent most of the year at 12--historic unemployment numbers.

Unfortunately, insanity, when you do the same thing over and over and over again, expecting different results, seems to be the order of the day; and that is not what the American people want right now. They want certainty. They want certainty to be able to work hard, to have honest dealings and to know that after they work hard and they're honest, that they will have a brighter future when they wake up tomorrow.

They deserve that. They deserve that and unfortunately this plan goes in the opposite direction. So it bothers me that with the regulations that we face, the cloud of uncertainty just grows.

Madam Speaker, I say in closing, business has never been asked to do more with less, and they clearly know less certainty.

Madam Speaker, I rise today with great disappointment in the President's most recent proposed bill to create jobs. I was hopeful that the President would offer a commonsense, pro- growth agenda. Unfortunately, the House continues to stand ready without a proposal that is acceptable.

But this administration continues to offer the same tired, Big Government proposals. One example is the section that creates, in 17 pages, a wholly government-owned corporation--that's right, government- owned corporation--complete with a chief financial officer, chief risk officer, chief compliance officer, chief operations officer, chief lending officer, general counsel, board of directors, and billions of dollars in new taxpayer money.

It appears once again that this administration is more focused on growing government than it is on growing jobs.

Mr. Speaker, when the President steps into this Chamber tonight, he will be addressing an American public that has grown weary of unfulfilled promises and empty, prepackaged rhetoric. He will be speaking to a restless Nation that grows louder than ever in its demand for strong, visionary leadership from its government leaders. They want solutions.

Not one job was added during the entire month of August. I will remind all of us that it requires 150,000 new jobs each and every month for this country's economy just to break even. For 31 straight months, the unemployment rate has been above 8 percent, the lowest percentage of Americans holding a job in 28 years, over half of my lifetime.

Two hundred nineteen newly planned regulations are on tap for the American people if not stopped, costing over $100 million each. The average small business with fewer than 20 employees faces yearly regulatory costs of over $10,000.

Total yearly regulatory costs equal $1.75 trillion, according to the Small Business Administration. And according to the EPA Numeric Nutrient Criteria Standards, these standards would cost the State of Florida, my home state, over 14,000 agriculture jobs alone. And a GDP, I might say, that grew this year at just 0.4 percent in the first quarter.

The American small business people, Mr. President, deserve real results. They will expect that tonight. They will expect that from this entire body from this point forward.

American small business people are real people, people like Jay Trumbull.

Jay is a personal friend I've known for a long time. He lives in my own congressional district. Jay is an independent dealer for Culligan Water, a company with offices in Panama City, Tallahassee, and Fort Walton Beach. He has been in business for over 30 years delivering water purification systems and installing water softeners and drilling wells throughout north and northwest Florida.

Jay told me that he's never seen conditions as bad as during the past 3 years of this administration. Over the last 3 years, Jay estimates that his personal business has dropped over 25 percent. Jay says that continued economic uncertainty has made it very difficult, almost impossible for him to expand his work force and to purchase new work vehicles.

He has said that he receives 25 to 30 job inquiries each and every week, people seeking employment, but he says he's stuck in a ``holding pattern'' due to this administration's failed economic policies.

We've all heard similar stories. With 25 million Americans who are unemployed or underemployed, we can all count family, friends, and neighbors among those who are struggling to find work.

The American people will be listening very closely tonight to this address. They will be hoping, they will be praying that this President acknowledges we need to chart a new course. Government doesn't create jobs, but it certainly, certainly can destroy them.

We need tonight to reduce regulatory burdens on our small businesses. Small businesses make up 85 percent of this Nation's economy. We need to streamline our Tax Code to spur investment and create jobs.

We need to help the American manufacturers be more competitive. We need to expand access to safe, affordable American-made energy. And of course, we all know we should, by now, that we must pay down our crushing burden of our debt. Mortgaging our children's future is immoral. It is unacceptable.

That is the agenda that the American people want to hear about tonight, Mr. President. And until we do our jobs here in Washington, the American people will continue to find it harder and harder, if not impossible, to do theirs.