Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of Mr. Hudson's Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act.

As things stand, each State currently determines its own concealed carry reciprocity laws. Some States don't recognize concealed carry permits from other States. This forces lawful gun owners to sometimes surrender their Second Amendment rights when they are traveling.

The current system has created accidental criminals, ruined lives, and punished gun owners simply because they fell victim to complexity and uncertainty in the law.

My colleague's bill addresses this problem by bringing much-needed clarity to the system. H.R. 38 is a simple proposal, but a necessary one. If enacted, it will allow lawful gun owners to carry their firearm into other States that allow concealed carry. This interstate recognition of concealed carry would be very similar to a driver's license.

H.R. 38 would not create national standards for concealed carry or take away a State's right to govern their own concealed carry laws, like some might claim. No. This bill simply uses Congress' 14th Amendment power to protect people's constitutional rights from State abuse.

Samuel Adams said: ``The Constitution shall never be construed . . . to prevent the people of the United States who are peaceable citizens from keeping their own arms.''

This powerful line from Mr. Adams sums up my feelings on this bill much better than I can.

I thank Mr. Hudson for his steadfast leadership on this issue.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman for yielding. I thank my friend, the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Barr), for his leadership on this vital issue.

Mr. Speaker, in regulation and in life, one size simply does not fit all. A requirement that works for one type of business may not work for another type of business.

Right now, the law treats those who make loans on manufactured houses similarly to those who are refinancing mortgages on their homes. The reality is that these are completely different transactions.

Buying a $20,000 manufactured home is simply not the same as financing a $200,000 home with a 30-year mortgage. The borrower is in a different position with very different needs. The lender is making a loan that is often secured differently for a much smaller amount, but with similar paperwork and similar costs.

The Federal Government, since Dodd-Frank, has been treating both of these transactions similarly from a regulation perspective. It has hurt borrowers trying to buy a piece of their American Dream.

In The Wall Street Journal, lenders suggested that they would not make these loans if they continued to suffer under this faulty regulation scenario. One lender says that about one-third of its sales--6,100 homes--would be affected. That is 6,100 American families who would lose out on homeownership, on building equity, and on making an investment instead of paying rent.

The bill simply says: Look, the person making a $20,000 loan on a manufactured home is not the same as a bank or a mortgage broker originating a 30-year fixed rate mortgage and should not be treated in the same way. It is a commonsense solution, and that is why it has gotten bipartisan backing.

Mr. Speaker, I urge support of the bill.

Mr. Speaker, just last week, Egypt experienced the worst terror attack in its country's history. Islamic terrorists set off explosives that took over 300 innocent lives and injured over 100 more.

What made this tragedy even worse is that it happened at a place of worship in the northern Sinai region. In their effort to wreak havoc on the Middle East and other parts of the world, the Islamic State and other terror groups have targeted Christians, Jews, and Muslims.

President Trump was right to say, after the attack in Egypt, that we should strengthen our efforts to defeat terrorism and extremism in all of its forms. In the past year, we have made progress in deterring the Islamic State's so-called caliphate in Syria and in Iraq, and while their shadow in those two countries isn't nearly what it was a couple of years ago, this doesn't mean a radical Islamic insurgency won't remain in that area.

Mr. Speaker, if military progress isn't coupled with a thought-out strategy of reconstruction, a vacuum will be left for these groups to return. As the beacon of freedom around the world, the United States must stay vigilant in our ongoing war on terror.

Mr. Speaker, the House just only moments ago passed historic

tax reform. I am proud to have supported it.

In conference, we will have the opportunity to improve the bill. There is one issue I would like to raise for them: closing the Bermuda loophole.

Basically, how it works is that a company located in Bermuda strips revenue out of its U.S. branch and then invests that revenue under Bermuda tax law, meaning the company pays virtually nothing in taxes on that income. It as crippling advantage.

Companies that stay in America are getting killed. We have had two massive inversions in 2 years to Bermuda and Switzerland. The number of foreign property casualty insurers in the top 25 has increased sevenfold since 1990.

Closing this loophole is in the Senate bill, and it was in the last tax reform proposal. It also raises $8.7 billion in revenue. That is in addition to the countless jobs and proud American businesses that it would save.

We can't have a Tax Code that destroys American business. We have got to close this loophole.

Madam Speaker, I thank my friend, the gentleman from Louisiana, for yielding.

Madam Speaker, as my colleagues in this body know very well, it has been many years since we have reformed our Tax Code. Over the last few decades, Congress has cut some taxes here and there, but we are overdue for meaningful tax reform.

Hardworking taxpayers in North Carolina are right to ask why it has been so long since we have even reformed our Tax Code. The unfortunate truth is that, for many years, Congress has thrown up the white flag in defeat against K Street lobbyists, and they settled for preserving the status quo. However, tomorrow, we have a rare opportunity to finally deliver a tax bill that puts working families first. The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act would be the biggest overhaul to our Tax Code in 30 years.

To quickly summarize, this bill would collapse our tax brackets from seven to four; it would double the standard deduction and get rid of many lobbyist loopholes; and it would slash the corporate tax rate to 20 percent, which would allow America to compete and to win.

The nonpartisan Tax Foundation found that, if we passed this bill into law, American workers would see a 3 percent increase in their wages, and our country would see nearly 1 million full-time jobs created

Madam Speaker, yesterday, my office received a letter from a constituent of mine that said: ``As a manufacturer and constituent, I urge you to support tax reform and legislation that will fix our Tax Code that has held manufacturers back for far too long.'' This is just an example of the many letters I have received in favor of this reform effort.

In addition to letters of support that I have received, studies show that, if we pass this bill, a typical household would see their taxes cut nearly $2,000.

Let's think for a second what this means. Instead of the IRS taking it, families could spend it on their children. They could put it in their savings, or they could pay off debts.

I am supporting this bill so we no longer hold manufacturers back from success. I am supporting this bill because it would make life simpler and easier for job creators, savers, and hardworking families.

Last week, in this body, I addressed the fact that there are certain provisions within this bill that my colleagues and I may differ on, and I noted that that is just always going to be the case, but I also suggested that we ask ourselves three questions.

The first question was: Does this bill cut taxes for the vast majority of hardworking American families?

The second was: Will it bring back jobs?

And the third question was: Will this bill simplify the tax filing process for working families next year and in the years to come?

Madam Speaker, the answer to all three of those questions was ``yes.'' I urge my colleagues to vote tomorrow in favor of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.

Last year, President Trump promised to cut taxes for working families, and that is exactly what this bill will do.

Mr. Speaker, reforming our Tax Code isn't an easy thing to do. If it was, we would have done it at some point in the last 30 years. But here is the reality: because of high-powered lobbyists and special interests within a 5-mile radius of this body, we have failed, time and time again, to do what is right for the hardworking American taxpayer.

But in the coming weeks, however, we have a rare opportunity to finally deliver a tax bill that puts working families first by passing the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act into law.

First, let me address the fact that there are certain provisions within this bill that some of my colleagues and I might differ on. That will always be the case. But instead of bickering, I urge my colleagues not to look at things in a vacuum and, instead, evaluate it by asking ourselves three important questions.

The first question we should ask is: Does this bill cut taxes for the vast majority of hardworking American families? The answer to this question is yes. Studies already show that if this bill passes, a typical family of four making around $60,000 will see nearly a $2,000 tax cut.

Let's think for a second what this money could be used for. Instead of giving it to the Federal Government, families could spend it on their children, they could put it in savings, or they could even pay off their debts. President Trump promised working families around the country a tax cut. And if this was put on his desk tomorrow, that promise would be delivered.

This leads us to the second question we should ask ourselves: Would this bill bring back jobs from overseas? The answer to this question, like the first one, is also yes. By cutting the corporate tax rate to below the global average and making other necessary reforms on the business side, this bill would make us competitive with our foreign competitors and encourage business to be done here instead of abroad.

Job creators, both large and small, have been coming out in support of this bill. Companies as big as UPS and AT&T, to small businesses right in North Carolina, have said that reforming our Tax Code will make it easier for them to create more good-paying jobs, and we should listen to them.

This takes us to my last question that we should all ask: Would this bill simplify the tax filing process for working families next year and in years to come? The answer to this, as well, is yes.

Mr. Speaker, one of the most striking statistics that I have seen with my constituents and people all around the country is that they spend more than 10 hours a year doing their taxes. Because of the many different forms they

have to fill out, recordkeeping, and tax planning that they have to do, Americans are rightfully demanding a much simpler process. By doubling the standard deduction, collapsing the rates, and closing special interest loopholes, Americans will experience a much simpler process when filling out their taxes.

I know how stressful this process can be for many back home, and I am a firm believer that the last thing you should do is worry about navigating our broken Tax Code.

Mr. Speaker, I posed three questions, and the answer to all three was yes. So instead of bickering about preserving a deduction here, or a tax credit there, I urge my colleagues to unite behind a tax reform bill that would cut taxes for working families, bring jobs back home, and make the filing process simpler for millions of people.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of the Encouraging Public Offerings Act, a bill that the gentleman from New York (Mr. Meeks) and I have worked on together, and I thank him for that.

I also thank the Financial Services Committee, in particular, the staff and the subcommittee chairman, Mr. Huizenga.

I also thank the chairman, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Hensarling). His leadership of this committee and his devotion and fidelity to the conservative principles are legendary. His retirement will be a great loss to this institution. The Hensarling legacy of conservative leadership will not be forgotten, and I am certain that his next chapter will be as great as this one. He will be missed by all, especially by those of us--myself among them--who share his vision and his limited government principles.

Mr. Speaker, no other country has a better history of connecting money with vision than the United States of America. We rightfully celebrate our legendary entrepreneurs: Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, Andrew Carnegie, Tom Davis, John Rockefeller, and a whole host of others who built the companies that drive our economy. None of those men could have done what they did without capital. None of them could have done what they did without intermediaries to connect that capital to their vision.

So, Mr. Speaker, the depressing truth is that our capital markets are the biggest, strongest, and most transparent connectors between money and vision, and they are not where they once were. We have the same number of public offerings on our stock exchanges that we did in the 1980s, when the economy was much smaller. We have lost 50 percent of our public companies since the 1990s, and more and more companies choose to go private, or they never even sell their shares to the public.

The hope is that, with this bill, we will increase the desire of companies to go public, getting our financial markets back to being the number one method for capital formation. To that end, our bill does three things:

First, it allows the companies to file their paperwork for going public with the SEC confidentially. That way, if there is an error or a discrepancy in the documents, the company can work it out with the agency without getting embarrassed in public or exposing information to competitors.

Second, it allows all companies to confidentially file their paperwork for a second stock sale after an initial public offering. Again, the point being to allow for a dialogue between the company and the regulator.

Third, it also allows all companies considering an IPO to talk to sophisticated investors and qualified institutions and see if these investors might want to buy their stock before offering it to the public, which is called ``testing the waters.'' It is hard to know if

you should sell a product if you can't check and see if there is anyone out there who even wants to buy it.

Mr. Speaker, these changes to the securities laws have received broad support. I want to quote the SEC chairman on this when he spoke at a hearing in our committee. He said: ``The initial data is positive. Not just people using it, but people saying, Thank you, we intend to use it. Both from an IPO perspective, but also from the perspective on follow-on offerings that occur in the first year . . . if there is any adverse views, I'd like to hear them. We haven't heard any.''

The Center for American Progress, which has not traditionally been friendly to relaxing financial regulations, has said that these reforms, which were made available to smaller companies in the JOBS Act, were some of the most successful provisions in that law. This bill applies them to all companies, not just those with a certain amount of revenue.

Finally, the Treasury Department gave favorable mention to these reforms in its report on the capital markets earlier this year. This bill passed out of the House Financial Services Committee with unanimous support.

Mr. Speaker, the numbers on public companies are clear. We have a problem. The experts are clear that the changes in the Budd-Meeks bill would be a positive step towards fixing the problem. Similar bipartisan reforms have seen great success in the past.

Mr. Speaker, I urge support.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of Representative Barr's bill, the Otto Warmbier North Korea Nuclear Sanctions Act.

Mr. Speaker, how is it that a tiny, isolated country like North Korea has the ability to fund and develop a nuclear weapons program with the capability to strike American soil?

The answer to that question is found in part through correspondent and payable-through accounts, which are tools used by North Korea to bypass the existing U.S. and U.N. sanctions against them.

Non-North Korean actors use these accounts to fund the government through shell and front companies. While these sanctions are implemented in good faith, it is time to acknowledge that sometimes they just don't work.

There is some good news, Mr. Speaker. If enacted, this bill requires the Treasury Secretary to impose strict conditions on those who knowingly do business with North Korea through those accounts.

We have also seen the United Nations take action recently by banning North Korea's export of iron ore, which is another legitimate step in stopping the continued development of their nuclear weapons program.

Finally, the Trump administration's executive orders will help us more easily target companies that do business with North Korea.

These actions, plus the enactment of this legislation, will create the most debilitating sanctions package Pyongyang and their financial surrogates have ever seen.

Of all the positive things in this bill, though, I am most excited by the language amending the Bretton Woods Agreement Act to instruct U.S. executive directors at international financial institutions, like the IMF and the World Bank, to use our ``voice and vote'' to oppose financial assistance to governments that knowingly support the Kim regime.

The United States has long used its economic influence, a more aggressive element of soft power, to advance an agenda that liberates the oppressed in the darkest corners of the world like North Korea.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Kentucky for introducing this bill, and I urge its adoption.

Mr. Speaker, the Founding Fathers enshrined the guarantee of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. They regarded life as a core promise and one that was to be protected. The Federal Government is responsible for protecting those rights, and currently we are failing at that responsibility.

As I speak in this body, America is one of only seven countries in the world that have legalized late-term elective abortion after 20 weeks. More specifically, it is estimated that approximately 13,000 late-term abortions are carried out in our country each year on healthy babies.

This is simply immoral and, as lawmakers, we have the ability to take commonsense measures to protect the unborn. The bill that we are voting on today, the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, is one of those measures.

Mr. Speaker, every human being was given inalienable rights, chief among them being life itself. Governments are supposed to protect those rights. As a lawmaker, I plan to do so by supporting the bill before us today. I urge my colleagues to do the same.

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

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, I rise today to oppose a $900 million earmark to the Gateway Project, an upgrade of an Amtrak rail bridge and tunnel between Newark and New York City. This earmark is a downpayment. The project is supposed to be $29.5 billion.

My amendment would do two things: It would cut spending by $474 million, and it would take $400 million and add it to national transit funding.

Mr. Chairman, New Jersey canceled a project doing the same thing in 2010. That was when it cost $8.7 billion. Now the Federal version costs $13 billion. This is what the Governor's office said, defending the decision, in reference to comments made by Senator Frank Lautenberg:

`` . . . perhaps he can explain why he is insisting New Jersey tax and toll payers fund 70 percent of a project, while billions in Federal funding pour out of Washington for high-speed rail lines in other States like Florida, which will pay only 20 percent of project costs.''

Here we are, Mr. Chairman. Billions are about to pour out of Washington. If this earmark stands, then we send a clear message to the States: Shortchange your infrastructure, and Washington will bail you out.

Mr. Chairman, I urge support, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, a couple of things. I look at this, and this still allows funding of existing projects and infrastructure, but it also reduces the deficit, too.

And I want to quote the Eno Center for Transportation here: ``It is obvious from the beginning of the timeline that the new Hudson River tunnel project was conceived as a way around Governor Christie's cancellation of the ARC tunnel project. Instead of having Jersey Transit as the sponsor like ARC, the new tunnel would be under the aegis of Amtrak.''

Mr. Chairman, this isn't about Amtrak funding. This is about funding for a single project in New Jersey that the State, itself, wouldn't fund in 2010. Amtrak funding for the Northeast Corridor account remains untouched under my amendment.

We are talking about Amtrak funding for a single project. As the chairman, himself, has said, a significant proportion of the $328 million in the Northeast Corridor account will go to Amtrak.

This is 300 times the size of an average earmark, when we had earmarks. We have an earmark ban in place right now. There is debate over this, but it is not fair with the ban in place that chairmen get huge earmarks and the rest of us, essentially, are banned. There should be one rule that applies to everyone, and right now the earmark ban is what applies.

One-sixth of the non-aviation DOT money in this bill is going to Gateway. In what universe is that reasonable?

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chairman, this is a lot of money, as I mentioned earlier. The State of Good Repair account is funding at 18 times last year's appropriated level. Let me say that again: 18 times last year's level and the budget request.

I will close with one more quote from Governor Christie regarding the decision to cancel the original version of this project. He said: ``I don't want to hear about the jobs it will create. If I don't have money for the payroll, it will not create the jobs. This is not a difficult decision for me.''

The Federal Government doesn't have the money for the payroll either, Mr. Chairman. We are $20 trillion in debt. Heritage Action for America, Club for Growth, FreedomWorks, National Taxpayers Union, and Citizens Against Government Waste are scoring ``yes'' on my amendment.

Mr. Chairman, I urge a ``yes'' vote.

Mr. Chair, I thank the chairman for yielding, and I yield back.

Mr. Chair, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor a former aviator, war hero, and Huey helicopter pilot in Vietnam, John Clement Budd. He was my Uncle Jack. I remember his stories of the war--they were captivating. Growing up, I remember me and my brother putting on his old helmet and pretending we were flying. Later we didn't have to pretend. My oldest brother and I became civilian pilots, and my middle brother flew for the Army and the Air Force. The Budd family are fliers, Mr. Speaker, and my uncle was part of starting that proud tradition.

In 1965, he flew over the infamous Ia Drang Valley in Vietnam, known as the ``Valley of Death,'' where he medevaced soldiers wounded by enemy fire. He pulled an A-6 Avenger pilot out of the line of fire at Ia Drang, after three other helicopters had been shot down in the attempt. He used to say that it was the only time he had ever been kissed by a colonel.

Jack was also an exceptional mind and tactician--the tactical doctrine he and his fellows developed in the skies over Vietnam was used in the Armed Forces until the 2003 invasion of Iraq. So Jack also left a lasting imprint on the way we fight wars.

Mr. Speaker, many Americans were not even born when the Berlin Wall came down, and Eastern Europe was freed from the cold grip of international Communism. Even more were not alive to witness the crucible that Vietnam was for our country. I am unbelievably proud that my uncle was there, on the front lines of that struggle.

His courage there is among the millions of stories of service and sacrifice in the tapestry

of our victory over an evil ideology. His sacrifice, and his legacy to our country will not be forgotten. I know his five children and nineteen grandchildren are as proud of him as I am.

Mr. Chairman, as the designee of the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Francis Rooney), I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, the Davis-Bacon Act hinders economic growth and increases the Federal deficit. It imposes enormous burdens, stifles contractor productivity, ignores skill differences for different jobs, and imposes rigid craftwork rules.

The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that the Davis-Bacon Act will raise Federal construction costs by $13 billion between 2015 and 2023.

Now, wages are often set at or above the union scale, despite the fact that only 13 percent of the private construction workforce is even unionized nationwide, Mr. Chairman.

The Davis-Bacon wage determinations have also been known to be lower than the current market rate, which is equally problematic and especially detrimental for local contractors. It is just erratic.

The GAO, the Government Accountability Office, has repeatedly criticized DOL's Davis-Bacon wage determination process for its lack of transparency in the published wage rates and its tendency to gather erroneous data through unscientific wage surveys.

Repealing the DBA would allow the government to build more infrastructure and create 155,000 new construction-related jobs at the very same cost to the taxpayers. In fact, repealing Davis-Bacon would have saved the Federal Government $10.9 billion, and that was back in 2011.

This amendment would uphold the government's responsibility to deliver quality infrastructure improvements at the best possible price to the taxpayers, which is certainly what we owe them. It is imperative that all levels of government guarantee the general public that their tax dollars are being spent in the most effective way possible.

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Francis Rooney) for his work on this amendment, and I withdraw my amendment.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the service of Major Jennifer Curtis. Major Curtis has retired from the Air Force after 20 years of service in the military. She showed exceptional bravery when the base she was serving at was struck by a Taliban rocket attack, one of the 126 she would endure during her tour of duty in that country. For 20 minutes, she was the only medic on the scene, and fought to save the lives of six Special Forces members who had been wounded by shrapnel in the attack. Thanks to her heroism, and that of her comrades, all six men survived. For this, she was awarded the Bronze Star and the Air Force Combat Medal.

In the heat of battle, she served with distinction. But she also exhibited quiet heroism, the day to day efforts that separate the exceptional from the great. She travelled with the special forces to different parts of Afghanistan on 62 different occasions, providing women in rural areas with the tools they need to empower themselves and their communities.

I wish her well in her next chapter of life, and congratulate her on her service to our county and our Republic.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of H.R. 3364. In particular, I am proud of the bipartisan language in the bill which would create a national strategy for combating terrorism and illicit finance. The financing of terrorism and related forms of illicit finance present a direct threat to our national security and financial system.

It is critical for the government to create and maintain a unified strategy to fight financial crime, both to accommodate new and developing threats and to help Congress develop legislative and funding priorities now and in the future.

Additionally, a national strategy should seek to enhance intergovernmental cooperation, to identify illicit financing trends, and to encourage Federal agencies to work with the private financial sector to do the same.

Mr. Speaker, this bill does these things and will go a long way in making sure we are keeping pace with the ever-changing terror finance landscape.

I would like to thank Chairman Hensarling for his extraordinary conservative leadership on the Financial Services Committee and for helping to include this language in the overall bill.

Additionally, I want to thank the chairman of the Terrorism and Illicit Finance Subcommittee, Mr. Pearce, and for his support, and for my colleague, Ms. Sinema, for her work on this as well.

Mr. Speaker, Ron Howard, of Canton, North Carolina, has passed away. After 31 years of military service, this city, Washington, D.C., was his last battlefield. The jungles of Vietnam were his first. I regret deeply that his final hours were spent preparing for battle against the bureaucracy of the country to which he had given so much.

Any man who has seen combat and death knows how precious life is. A normal man who serves his country for 31 years takes the rest and ease that he has more than earned. Ron was an extraordinary man, and he used the remainder of his time to build his company, his community, and his country. He gave his time, and he knew its price, but it was a price he paid gladly. We are all the better for it.

His legacy lies in his beautiful family, his company, and in the magnificent airplane that he brought into existence. When a Hellfire missile leaves one of the rails on the Archangel and its rocket motor comes to life, hammering down pain and misery on ISIS terrorists, that too is Ron's legacy. His was a truly great American life, and an inspiration to those who knew him. He will not be forgotten, not by me, not by anyone who knew him