Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of reinstating the assault weapons ban.

This bill would put military-grade assault weapons out of circulation for civilians. For me, the choice between banning assault weapons and protecting young, innocent children is a no-brainer. I put children above guns.

It pains me deeply that the children in our communities live in fear of suddenly losing their lives or the lives of loved ones on a daily basis.

I am a gun owner myself, Mr. Speaker. I was raised on a farm in south Texas, and I know how to use a gun, especially for hunting. But assault weapons are not for hunting. They are used to kill people quickly, efficiently, and as fast as they can. That type of weapon is used solely for that, for killing people, and it has no place in our communities.

One child's life is worth more than all the assault weapons in the world.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to celebrate House Democrats' efforts to lower costs for working families across America.

For months now, Democrats and the President have been working closely together to lower the prices of gas for Americans. We have focused on people's pocketbooks, not politics.

As a result, gas prices have been decreasing for 5 straight weeks, down around 70 cents since last month. In fact, $3.99 a gallon is the most common price in America today. Mr. Speaker, I saw the $3.99, and lower, in the Houston area over the weekend.

On average, drivers are saving $35 per month. For residents in my district, this can mean the difference between a warm family meal or going hungry.

While Republicans in Congress have no solutions to lower prices and remain focused on other matters, like stripping women of their reproductive rights, House Democrats will continue delivering results for the American people. We are the party that puts people over politics.

Madam Speaker, I rise to recognize President Biden and House Democrats' efforts to lower costs for American families.

Because of Putin's invasion, Americans have seen higher costs everywhere--from the gas pump to grocery stores, to goods across the shelves at local stores. Farmers, ranchers, and consumers have been victims of these price hikes because of Putin's invasion.

President Biden and House Democrats aren't standing for this. That is why last month my Democratic House colleagues and I passed the Lower Food and Fuel Costs Act.

This bill will lower costs of goods for hardworking American families by addressing supply chain risks, lowering the cost of food and gas prices, strengthening the food supply chain, and ensuring robust competition in the meat and poultry sector. This will bring a much- needed drop in the prices of goods for the American people.

I am also glad to report that with President Biden's leadership, gas prices have declined by an average of 65 cents over the last 40 days. Yes, you heard me right, Madam Speaker, 65 cents in the last 40 days.

To bring additional savings for the American people, House Democrats passed the Consumer Fuel Price Gouging Prevention Act to further fight Putin's price hike.

While Democrats are determined to deliver results for Americans, Republicans showed little support on this cost-saving bill. While sad on their part, I was not surprised.

On the public health front, just this year, pharma companies have raised drug prices over 1,100 times. 1,100 times. Drastic, greedy increases like these have led to insulin in the U.S. doubling in price since 2012. This really hurts States and congressional districts like mine that have historically struggled with health issues like diabetes.

In Texas, more than 12.4 percent of the people--or nearly 3 million people--have diabetes. In the Houston area where I live, almost 14 percent of the residents have diabetes.

Madam Speaker, even in my own family--and you will recall, I am one of 10--6 of us have been struck with diabetes. I have one brother who is already under dialysis treatment.

Shockingly, reports show that one in four diabetics have rationed insulin in Texas due to high costs. Many residents have even died because of needing to ration this lifesaving medicine. This is simply appalling and unconscionable. No one in our great Nation should gamble with their life by rationing insulin because of high costs.

That is why House Democrats passed the Affordable Insulin Now Act to cap the price of insulin at $35 per month because no one--and I mean no one--should have to ration insulin in America.

So, while Republicans remain focused on pleasing their political base and stripping women of their rights, Democrats remain laser focused on lowering costs for hardworking Americans across our Nation and standing with families.

Democrats are the party who put people above politics. We stand with the American people. Together we are building a better America for generations to come and for the future of our children.

Madam Speaker, I rise to celebrate the Right to Contraception Act, which will soon pass the House with the support of House Democrats.

Women's rights have been under attack for decades. The recent overturning of Roe v. Wade has sadly provided a roadmap for future courts to reconsider and overrule the right to contraception and other fundamental rights.

In fact, Republicans have used this decision as an opening to try to block or ban contraceptive methods already. But House Democrats won't stand for this, not under our watch.

Today, we will further protect women and their fundamental rights by passing the Right to Contraception Act because we trust women. The bill will protect women's access to birth control because no one should control women and make their healthcare decisions for them. No one.

We trust women.

Madam Speaker, I rise today in support of House Democrats and their efforts to protect women and their reproductive rights.

In 2020, more than 930,000 women had an abortion nationwide, exercising their fundamental human right. These are women who made one of the most intimate and personal decisions for their family and their futures.

However, with the decision to overturn Roe, the Republican-controlled Supreme Court has achieved the dark and extreme goal of stripping away a woman's right to choose. In doing so, they erased nearly five decades of progress. For the first time in America's history, our daughters have less freedom than their mothers. This is plain and simply shameful.

To make matters worse, now MAGA Republicans are determined to take it a step further and strip women of their right to contraception. I repeat: Extreme rightwing Republicans want to strip women of their right to birth control.

House Democrats won't stand for this. We are fighting for you. We trust you. We always have, and we always will.

Today, we will act. We will continue to fight. Tomorrow, we will pass the Right to Contraception Act to protect women's access to birth control.

We are doing this to protect the more than 60 percent of U.S. women of reproductive age who use contraception. This bill will guarantee the right to obtain and use oral contraception, emergency contraception, and IUDs because no one--and I mean no one--should have the right to take away a woman's right to choose their own healthcare.

While Republicans seek to control a woman's body for their political base, Democrats remain the party that puts people over politics and protects women and their reproductive rights.

It is simple. Democrats trust women. We trust women to make their own healthcare decisions without any questions.

To everyone listening, you have my promise that I will never stop fighting for women and their reproductive rights. I trust you, and I will never stop fighting.

Madam Speaker, I rise today in support of House Democrats and their efforts today to protect women and their fundamental reproductive rights.

In my home State of Texas, more than 50,000 women had an abortion last year. These are women who made an extremely personal and intimate healthcare decision based on what is best for them, their families, and their future.

Yet, MAGA Republicans have never wanted these women to have these fundamental rights, and they aim to strip away their freedoms.

But to all the women and the families who may be scared and are listening across America right now, please hear me now:

House Democrats have your back. We trust women. We are fighting for you. We always have, and we always will.

Madam Speaker, it has been interesting to listen to

the debate. I feel like it is a rerun of the Judiciary Committee, which we all serve on.

I think we should tell the folks across the aisle to just spare us the indignation over this political violence because, as the manager so aptly characterized, they wrote the book on it. I can think of at least one doctor who was murdered and, I think, many others injured by bombings and harassment. It is just beyond the pale what has happened to abortion providers in the last decade.

I want to get back to appropriations because, Madam Speaker, that is really what I came to talk about.

The FY23 appropriations minibus bill is something that I support. I am really pleased that many of the projects that were included in my request will come to fruition.

One of the six projects included in the bill is $4 million for the Target Hunger Campus and Education Center, which will focus on hunger prevention and nutrition education for my constituents.

Also included is $3 million for affordable housing construction projects in my district for Avenue Community Development, which, of course, will help us resolve some of the homelessness issues.

This bill also includes a request for almost $3 million for enhancements to the University of Houston's Technology Bridge.

Madam Speaker, those are just three of the 15 projects that were funded. I think that when they talk about cutting and inflation, is this what they want to do, to stop a hunger project in my district? Do they want to stop making sure our kids get a good education? Just what is it they are doing?

Finally, Madam Speaker, just quickly, I also support, of course, the bill to protect a woman's right to birth control and the right of same- sex couples to marriage. So, Madam Speaker, there are so many reasons to support this rule and the underlying bills.

Mr. Speaker, I just want to say that I think we do understand what we are doing here today; and what we are doing is supporting people's right to love and their equal protection under the law, plain and simple.

Extreme, MAGA Republicans continue to weaponize our government institutions, turning them against the people they are called to protect.

The Respect for Marriage Act will make marriage equality the law of the land.

During Pride Month, the extreme Texas GOP openly declared, openly declared, at their convention their homophobia and bigotry as part of their agenda. They are going as far as labelling same-sex couples as having an abnormal lifestyle.

We will not allow this rightwing obsession to impose their personal religious views on people's private lives to go any further.

To my colleagues across the aisle, and to the Texas GOP, marrying the person you love is not abnormal. It is, frankly, none of your business.

Abnormal is your obsession with what other people do in their private lives and in their homes.

``Love is love.'' ``Amor es amor.''

Madam Speaker, I rise in outrage at the cruel attacks extreme Republicans have launched on women and their rights.

Because of these MAGA Republicans, our daughters will have less freedom than their mothers for the first time in American history.

This has been their plan all along. As this graphic behind me shows, women have been fighting Republican attacks for decades, and it has been a tough fight. But House Democrats won't give up. We cannot go back. We won't give up because we trust women.

Today, we will pass two bills to protect women, their rights, and their freedoms--the Ensuring Women's Right to Reproductive Freedom Act and the Women's Health Protection Act--for the second time.

Democrats are the party that stand with women. Without them, we cannot be a better America. We always have and always will be with women. We trust women.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to speak in support of H.R. 8297 by my colleague and friend from Houston, Congresswoman Fletcher.

First, let me be clear. There seems to be some fixation from the other side that this decision should be left up to the States because the Supreme Court said that. They need to re-read the opinion. It simply says that it is returned to the people and their elected Representatives. Last time I looked, I was an elected Representative, and we all are elected Representatives.

So, we can pass these two bills today and put them in statute and make it the law of the land because, I can tell you, if we leave it to the States, things will be more extreme.

In my home State of Texas, extremist Republicans have created a patchwork that is scary, discriminatory, and oppressive, and they are doing that to limit our right to make our own deeply personal, private healthcare decisions about our own bodies together with our families and our providers.

This bill would restore women's rights in Texas and across the country. It would stop Republicans from criminalizing, fining, or suing women who exercise their constitutional right to travel across State lines to obtain an abortion.

This is important since many companies have announced policies that cover travel expenses for employees seeking abortion care who are not able to get them in their own home State. They are threatening businesses in Texas that they will throw them out of Texas.

This bill is necessary. We are the elected Representatives. We get to decide.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of women and their fundamental rights to reproductive healthcare.

While MAGA Republicans want to rip away women's rights, House Democrats remain committed to standing with women. We trust women.

For a second time, we will vote to pass the Women's Health Protection Act to make the protections of Roe v. Wade the law of the land once again. House Democrats will also pass the Ensuring Women's Right to Reproductive Freedom Act, which will prevent Republicans from suing or fining women who travel across State lines to obtain an abortion.

Trusting women to make their own personal healthcare decisions is what we believe as Democrats. Controlling women and stripping away their rights is what they are as Republicans.

Democrats won't give up the fight. We stand with women. We trust women.

Madam Speaker, I rise in outrage that extreme Republicans seek to control women and their most intimate healthcare decisions by banning abortions. These cruel efforts will hurt the already vulnerable women in our communities the most, especially poor women.

Madam Speaker, there are more than 800,000 women of reproductive age with incomes under 100 percent of poverty who live in States that haven't expanded Medicaid.

These women are being left without access to comprehensive healthcare coverage, and now many are being stripped of their abortion rights. These women are less likely to access birth control, will struggle to receive wellness exams, and now will not have access to abortion.

This is the vision Republicans have for America. This is what the rightwing wants. Well, I won't stand by quietly, and Democrats will not stand by quietly. I plan to fight for women because I trust women to make their most personal, intimate healthcare decisions.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman for including my two amendments in this en bloc.

Madam Speaker, I rise in support of two of my amendments that are included in this en bloc. The first authorizes Federal funds for two grant programs under the Maritime Administration.

My amendment focuses on the often overlooked but critical maritime industry. It is especially important to my district, which includes the Maritime Center of Excellence campus and the Port of Houston.

My amendment authorizes $30 million for a grant program to colleges which offer high-quality maritime workforce education and training programs. It also authorizes $30 million for the small shipyard grant program which supports training programs for shipbuilding and ship repair workers.

Congress must support the next generation of maritime workers, and Congress must support our supply chain workers. This amendment does that. It is just that simple.

The second amendment I led supports a pilot program on the sharing of suspicious financial activity. This pilot program allows financial institutions to share any suspicious information with their foreign branches, subsidiaries, and affiliates. Put simply, this program is designed to promote transparency and prevent illegal financial activity. It became law as part of the Anti-Money Laundering Act of 2020 included in the NDAA. Currently this pilot program is authorized for 3 years with a start date of January of 2021. Regrettably, the program is yet to begin.

With the adoption of my amendment, which is just a technical fix, the pilot program will be authorized for 3 years following its actual inception. This allows ample time to implement and to also measure its success.

Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support the en bloc amendments and the underlying bill.

Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend and colleague, Mr. Green, for his leadership on this very important amendment.

I am not shocked by this amendment. I am pleased with this amendment. This is something that is desperately needed because this amendment would permanently authorize the Community Development Block Grant Disaster Recovery Program.

This important program does provide States and communities like mine in Houston with flexible, long-term recovery resources for building affordable housing and infrastructure after a disaster.

This amendment would ensure that these essential services go to the most deserving communities, those hit hardest by a disaster. It builds safeguards to ensure that funds are not diverted away from the lowest- income survivors.

Further, it reforms disaster recovery allocation formulas and protocols to ensure equity, prioritizes transparency and oversight and discovery, disaster recovery, protects civil rights in fair housing, and supports disaster mitigation efforts.

Mr. Green and my hometown of Houston is no stranger to disasters, and Mr. Speaker, I would submit that if the folks on the other side of the aisle think that this is not a good program, and they don't want the dollars because it takes too long to get them, we will gladly accept them in Houston because we get hit almost every year or every other year. We get hit hard, and we get hit in the most vulnerable populations.

So, again, I urge support of this amendment, and I urge all my colleagues to do the same.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to recognize the efforts by House Democrats to protect women from the extreme Republican antiwomen agenda.

I say to my colleagues that Republicans across our Nation seek to criminalize abortion nationwide with no exceptions, not for rape, not for incest, and they are very determined.

But while they seek to control women and their personal choices, President Biden and House Democrats firmly stand with women. We trust women.

Just last Friday, President Biden signed an executive order aimed at protecting access to reproductive health services. This week, House Democrats are passing legislation to protect a woman's ability to travel freely and voluntarily throughout the United States, including for reproductive health.

We trust women because that is who we are as Democrats. We are the party that stands by women and their human rights. We trust women.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairwoman and the ranking member for such kind remarks about a dear friend and colleague back home, Benny Martinez.

They have covered a lot of what was said, but I will repeat some of it because I think it is important, not just for people in my district to hear it, but for people across the district because, with the naming of this Post Office, Mr. Speaker, it will mean the first post office named for a Latino in the Houston area, which, too, is a remarkable achievement.

Mr. Martinez was a community leader, an advocate for Mexican-American civil rights, an Army veteran, a nurse, a Houston, Texas educator, and a friend.

Benny and his family came from humble beginnings in Goliad, Texas, but moved to Houston, like many others, to find more opportunities.

In 1956, at the age of 18, Benny was inducted into the U.S. Army. After completing his training, he was sent to Korea, where he was assigned to the 564th Quartermaster Company.

Benny put his education degree to use and worked as an associate teacher in the Houston School District at Crockett Elementary.

On top of this, Mr. Speaker, he served many organizations. As was mentioned, he was a lifelong member of LULAC, the League of United Latin American Citizens; the Veterans of Foreign Wars; the Knights of Columbus; and the American GI Forum. He also found time to be an usher at his local church.

The thing that has been mentioned but that I want to underscore, because it was another historical note, is that he is better known for facilitating a historic meeting between a Texas LULAC chapter--again, the League of United Latin American Citizens--and then-President John F. Kennedy in 1963. This event is the first known meeting between a U.S. sitting President and a Hispanic civil rights group--very noteworthy.

After a lifetime of a lot of achievements, Mr. Martinez passed away at 85 in 2019. This bill would name the post office after him. I urge all of my colleagues to support this bill in the memory of a history maker and a pioneer in our community.