Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 1071 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.

General Leave

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks.

Mr. Speaker, the committee granted by a recorded vote of 9-3 a rule providing for consideration of H.R. 6276, the Utilizing Space Efficiently and Improving Technologies Act of 2023, and H. Res. 1065, Denouncing the Biden Administration's Immigration Policies.

The rule provides for consideration of H.R. 6276, the Utilizing Space Efficiently and Improving Technologies Act of 2023, under a structured rule.

The rule further provides for consideration of H. Res. 1065, Denouncing the Biden Administration's Immigration Policies, under a closed rule.

The rule provides that upon adoption of the resolution, it shall be in order, without intervention of any point of order, to consider H. Res. 1065.

Finally, the rule provides 1 hour of general debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on the Judiciary or their respective designees.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. The first step in solving a problem is to acknowledge that it exists. The other side of the aisle is having a problem with that because that is what this resolution does. It describes the problem.

The second part of solving a problem is to look at what the source of the problem is. That is what this resolution does. The other side of the aisle is having a problem with that.

In fact, today, they opened the debate by simply complaining that this is a House Resolution and not a House bill, but this is a House Resolution full of facts, inconvenient facts to this administration.

This administration, since the beginning, has passed 94 executive orders repealing border security measures that were in place and that has attracted 9.3 million illegal immigrants to our borders.

This is a problem that exists. The other side of the aisle needs to quit denying that it exists, and they need to quit trying to change the topic to Ukraine.

The topic today is these two bills. First among them is the resolution that draws attention to the problem at the border and lists specifically the things that this President could do to fix it.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Self), my good friend.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Norman), my friend and colleague on the Rules Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield an additional 30 seconds to the gentleman from South Carolina.

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

Mr. Speaker, I note my colleagues on the other side of the aisle said, when the majority recites the names of the victims of illegal immigration and illegal immigrants and the criminals who are coming across our border, that those victims are props.

I resent that. I really do because the other side of the aisle then proceeded in the next measure of the debate to enter names of victims who had been killed by criminals using guns.

Let's just agree today that when we honor the names of people who have suffered at the hands of criminals, whether they be domestic or illegal immigrants--sadly, as so many are now--we don't call them props.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Roy), a fellow member of the Rules Committee.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Alford).

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Langworthy), my friend and fellow colleague on the Rules Committee.

Mr. Speaker, may I inquire as to how much time remains on both sides?

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

Mr. Speaker, during his first 100 days in office, President Biden took 94 executive actions on immigration, including halting construction of the border wall.

In August of 2022, the Biden administration formally halted President Trump's successful remain in Mexico program.

In May of 2023, the administration announced that it would allow for the release of some migrants into the U.S. with no way to track them.

The Biden administration also ended title 42, the CDC order that allowed the Department of Homeland Security to remove noncitizens who did not have proper travel documentation, whose entry was otherwise contrary to law, or who were apprehended at or near the border seeking unlawful entry into the United States without regard to asylum claims or proceedings.

Shortly after taking office, President Biden terminated the asylum cooperative agreements with Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras to facilitate cooperation in resolving the migration crisis.

The Biden administration has also abused its authority under the Immigration and Nationality Act to grant parole on a case-by-case basis and has instead used this authority to grant mass parole to over 1 million migrants.

The Biden administration has also failed to detain migrants encountered at the southern border and has failed to use its authority to perform expedited removal of individuals illegally present in the United States.

As a result, since President Biden took office, 9.3 million illegal aliens from all over the world have arrived at the southern border. The Biden administration has allowed at least 6.3 million illegal aliens to travel from the southern border to enter American communities.

This is a tragedy. We need to call attention to it.

President Biden says there is nothing he can do. Well, I have just listed a number of things that he has done to create this crisis, and further in this debate I will talk about some of the things that he can do, that we know he can do, things that are stated in the resolution contained in this rule to end this national security, legal, and humanitarian crisis at our border.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Fallon), my good friend.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, the Rules Committee resolution that we are debating today provides for the consideration of two pieces of very important legislation.

The first is a commonsense bill that says if the government is heating, lighting, renting, and maintaining empty buildings where employees don't show up for work, let's do something about that. Let's find out how bad this problem is.

We believe that there are over 17 agencies with occupancy of less than 25 percent. This isn't green. I thought the other side of the aisle was green. It is not green to heat empty buildings and to light empty buildings when nobody shows up for work.

COVID is over. Either come to work or don't come to work, but let's not keep these buildings open if nobody is in them.

That is the first bill, which was introduced by my friend from Pennsylvania (Mr. Perry).

The second piece of legislation that is in this rule is very critical. It stands in sharp contrast to the State of the Union Address that we heard just last week in this Chamber where the President got up and said there was nothing he could do.

Well, this resolution has a lot of inconvenient facts that refute the proposition of the President that he can't do anything. Not only can he do something, the things that he has done by executive order, over 94 of them, have been hurtful to the security of this country.

We are seeing illegal immigrants drawn like a magnet to this country because of the things that President Biden has done.

The resolution begins with a bunch of statements of facts, such as the President and the Secretary of Homeland Security created this problem at the border, the worst in the Nation's history, and, beginning on day one, systematically dismantled effective border security measures and interior immigration enforcement.

This resolution closes by resolving that there are seven things the President can do to end this crisis: one, end the catch and release policy; two, reinstate the Migrant Protection Protocols; three, enter into asylum cooperative agreements; four, end abuses of parole authority; five, detain inadmissible aliens; six, use expedited removal authority; and seven, rein in taxpayer-funded benefits for illegal aliens.

He could do all of these things tomorrow, and that is why it is important to pass this resolution, to draw attention to the problem so that it can be fixed, and to state what the solutions are.

Mr. Speaker, I urge adoption of this rule, and I urge my colleagues to vote for it.

The text of the material previously referred to by Mr. McGovern is as follows:

An Amendment to H. Res. 1071 Offered by Mr. McGovern of Massachusetts

At the end of the resolution, add the following:

Sec. 3. Immediately upon adoption of this resolution, the

House shall proceed to the consideration in the House of the

bill (H.R. 16) to authorize the cancellation of removal and

adjustment of status of certain aliens, and for other

purposes. All points of order against consideration of the

bill are waived. The bill shall be considered as read. All

points of order against provisions in the bill are waived.

The previous question shall be considered as ordered on the

bill and on any amendment thereto, to final passage without

intervening motion except: (1) one hour of debate equally

divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority

member of the Committee on the Judiciary or their respective

designees; and (2) one motion to recommit.

Sec. 4. Clause 1(c) of rule XIX shall not apply to the

consideration of H.R. 16.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time and move the previous question on the resolution.

Mr. Speaker, I will give the American people an overview of the debate that is happening here today. Why are there three Members of Congress controlling time on the floor? I thought there were only two parties. No. When it comes to spending, there is the ``uniparty.'' There is only one party today, and that is because Republicans and Democrats have united to kick the can down the road. They wanted to control all time for debate today, but my colleague, Mr. Roy from Texas, came down here and used a parliamentary procedure to claim time in opposition for 20 minutes so that people who take their oath to the Constitution most seriously, the people who are most concerned about debt, the people who want to represent the good folks back home, have a voice here today.

And what are we doing here today? We are going to pass a CR. We are going to kick the can down the road. Is that going to solve any problems? No. It creates another crisis next week. That is what they want. They want another crisis. They want to threaten you with the shutdown so they can get

more spending. Is this a clean CR? We are told you can't add anything to it. No. It deals with student aid in this CR.

Are the American people concerned about student aid right now? Is that the most pressing issue to address in this spending bill? We have a crisis at the southern border. We could add one sentence to this bill that would help tremendously. Just say: None of the funds hereby appropriated may be used to disassemble border security erected by the States on our border. Put that one sentence in this continuing resolution. That would help tremendously.

I am worried that we are not going to prevail today, the third group who is debating here against the uniparty. If the other side prevails, what will happen? What will happen today, this evening after this passes? Will we stay here and work hard for another week to get the 12 bills done, the 12 separate appropriation bills? No. Guess what we are going do this evening? Everybody has already got their plane tickets. They are sending us home early. Congratulations. You moved the crisis down another week. Go home. Have a 4-day weekend.

We are going to let staff and a few Members in the Senate and a few Members in the House write this big bill, and then you can take it or leave it next week. Gone is any semblance of regular order from this process.

What we have is what the swamp always does, and I urge my colleagues to oppose this continuing resolution that does nothing but kick the can down the road.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Texas for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, there is something in this bill called tax credits, but they are also called refundable.

So what is a refundable tax credit?

It is welfare by a different name.

We are going to give cash payments--checks--to people who don't even pay taxes. The hardworking constituents whom I represent in Kentucky are tired of getting up at 6:00 a.m., driving an hour or two to work and working their hind ends off to watch their neighbors collect these checks of which there will be more of after this bill. It is just wrong.

Now, does anybody find it interesting that the Democratic leadership has not even claimed time in opposition to this bill?

Why is that?

Why aren't they opposed?

Now, there are a few Democrats opposed. Maybe some don't think it goes far enough, or some are opposed to what they call corporate welfare in here, but, by and large, the Democrats are not opposed to this because this is an expansion of the welfare state. That is what it is.

So here is my concern about that: Is it mean to give away money?

No. It is not mean. We could consider it compassionate until you think about the implications.

Now, they say this tax bill is paid for.

What does that mean?

What does it mean when it is paid for?

There are some gimmicks in here that are not going to reduce the debt. This is actually going to cost. Now, by Washington, D.C., math, it is paid for. Nonetheless, Mr. Speaker, when you look at the national debt, it will go up as a result of this bill. Everybody in here knows it. We know these are gimmicks when you call it a pay-for. This bill will increase our debt.

What is that going to do?

It is going to cause inflation to go up. That is going to affect everybody, including the people you are trying to give the money to for having kids.

This is bad policy. I am opposed to it, and I urge a ``no'' vote.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to honor the memory of Mr. Lloyd Kenneth Rogers of Alexandria, Kentucky, who passed away on December 8, 2022, at 90 years of age.

Lloyd Rogers rose from adversity to live a life of notable achievement and civil service. Lloyd was raised in an orphanage in Kentucky, the same orphanage where he met his wife Blanche whom he was married to for 65 years.

Lloyd served 9 years in the U.S. Navy during the Korean war. Then he came back to Kentucky, and he ran and won a seat as judge-executive of Campbell County where he served in a civilian capacity. Then later, he worked as my director of Veterans Affairs in my congressional office where he was committed to helping other former servicemembers.

Lloyd also aided in crafting legislation that most of my House colleagues are familiar with. That is right. Lloyd Rogers wrote the first draft of the Regulations from the Executive in Need of Scrutiny Act, otherwise known as the REINS Act.

I saw the first draft of this bill in his basement on his personal computer. He wrote it himself because he was concerned about overreach of the executive--having served his country in the military and having served as an executive himself. He gave it to the Congressman before me who introduced the bill.

I pay tribute today to a mentor and a friend, and I send his family, especially his son, Dennis, my deepest condolences. I commend Lloyd for his unwavering commitment to his country and to his community.

Madam Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 869 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Madam Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the ranking member of the Rules Committee, the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.

General Leave

Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks.

House Resolution 869 provides for a structured rule for consideration of H.R. 5893, the Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act and a closed rule, H.R. 5961, the No Funds for Iranian Terrorism Act.

We have a structured rule for H.R. 5893, which makes in order 119 amendments for consideration on the floor. This rule provides the chair and the ranking minority member of the Committee on Appropriations limited en bloc authority and provides one motion to recommit.

We have a closed rule for H.R. 5961. Debate for this bill will be evenly divided over 1 hour between the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on Foreign Affairs and the rule provides one motion to recommit.

Madam Speaker, I urge Members to support House Resolution 869 in the spirit in which it was created, one that allows for robust debate and gives Members the opportunity to submit amendments for consideration on this floor, as many amendments were included in this rule as possible.

We are encouraging debate on the floor and for Members to fight for their priorities. There is absolutely no reason not to support this rule. Let's not forget what we have been committed to fighting for these last several months, bringing all 12 appropriations bills to the floor.

The days of Christmas omnibus bills are over. We still have more work to do to fight against inflated budgets and the growing national debt, but the step we are taking this week that prevents a Christmas giveaway on the House floor in an omnibus is a major step in the right direction.

This is what the American people expected of us. This is what we were elected to do, discuss and debate appropriation of taxpayer dollars.

Speaking of appropriations, this is our 12th appropriations bill, 12 of 12. Finally, here we are.

Do I wish this were done in a timelier manner? Of course.

Do I wish the government functioned more efficiently for the sake of the constituents we each represent? Absolutely.

We find ourselves now completing this process in the manner in which it was intended--draft, amend, debate, and vote. No Member can say today that they did not have the opportunity to participate in this process, and no Member can argue that these appropriations were not brought forward in an open and transparent manner.

I applaud the relative committees and everyone in the GOP Conference who has worked so hard to bring this bill and all of the appropriations bills forward to get this work done.

Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support the rule, and I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Mr. Speaker, to say that the Democrats spend like drunken sailors is an insult to sailors.

This bill cuts wasteful spending. If there is any scorecard to be kept between Democrat Speakers and Republican Speakers, it should be on spending. I would like to note that 40 percent of all of the national debt--which, by the way, is approaching $34 trillion--40 percent of all of the national debt that exists today, from the beginning of our country until this moment, was incurred under one Speaker. That was Speaker Pelosi.

If we are keeping score here, it should be about wasteful spending, deficit spending, and debts. We can blame Presidents for it, but the reality is, Congress--in fact, the House of Representatives--has the power of the purse. We need to look at ourselves when we look at that debt, and this bill is a good step toward reducing deficits.

The Commerce, Justice, Science and related agencies appropriations bill provides net new spending of $58.383 billion for programs under the jurisdiction of the subcommittee, which is $23.765 billion below FY23 enacted levels. That is a large cut. Maybe it is not large enough, but it is what has upset the other side of the aisle, that is for sure.

You can disguise it as anything you want, but they are really upset about this bill because it cuts spending. Not the kind of cuts to spending where we pretend to cut spending, where we have some baseline that is actually increasing spending, and then we reduce the baseline. No, I am talking about actual cuts in real dollars. That is what this bill does, and that is why they are so excited, that is why they are so angry about this rule and this bill.

By the way, this rule allows for 119 amendments. When they say those are extreme amendments, what do those amendments do? They cut more. That is what the amendments do. None of those amendments increase spending. I think that is what they are upset about on the other side of the aisle is that not only have we brought forth a bill that cuts $23 billion of Federal spending, we are allowing 119 amendments to cut even more spending.

Let me talk about the priorities in this bill. By the way, Congress has the power of the purse, and we complain about a lot of things the executive branch does, but then we, too, will frequently turn around and fund the things that we complain about. This bill actually defunds some of the things that we have been complaining about.

I and several Members of Congress had the great fortune to share breakfast with Justice Antonin Scalia before he passed away. One of my colleagues asked Justice Scalia: When are you going to help us restore constitutional balance of government? Scalia scoffed at him. He said: What are you talking about? You are the most powerful branch. In fact, every tool you need is right there in the Constitution to restore constitutional balance of government.

Another of my colleagues said, but impeachment is so unwieldy, and we can never get that through the Senate. Scalia said: I am not talking about impeachment. I am talking about the power of the purse. It is right there in the Constitution. You have it. You are the most powerful branch, and quit complaining about the things you are funding or quit funding the things you are complaining about. That is what this bill does.

It eliminates more than 70 unnecessary and wasteful programs and initiatives, including 14 polarizing diversity, equity, and inclusion offices and programs. I don't find diversity, equity, and inclusion in the Constitution. It is just not in Article I, Section 8. It is not there for us to do, and so we are eliminating those programs.

It defunds at least 15 executive orders. What are executive orders? Are they laws? No, they are not laws. The lawmaking authority is here. We should probably defund every executive order, but this defunds 15 of them--rules, memoranda, and other Biden administration policies that usurp our congressional authority to make law.

This bill reduces wasteful spending on climate change initiatives.

It prevents the FBI from using its construction balances to build a new headquarters. Why is that important? It is important because they have become weaponized against the American

public, showing up at school board meetings and targeting parents and saying they are terrorists. They don't need a new headquarters.

It rejects the administration's plans to replace the Department of Commerce and Department of Justice vehicle fleets with electric vehicles, saving taxpayers nearly $54 million.

This is what we are doing in this bill. We are using the power of the purse. There are 119 amendments. None of those amendments increase spending. I can tell you, we went through all of them. Maybe that is why they are upset that some of their amendments didn't make it in there because maybe they were trying to spend more money. I am sorry, we are not going to do that.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, let me point out that my colleague from Kentucky is right that Social Security is a legal and moral obligation to seniors. Let me also point out that every time we engage in deficit spending and spend too much money, we cause inflation.

When we have the Fed create dollars out of thin air so we can launder them through banks and then borrow them back from ourselves, we are really causing inflation.

What does inflation do to those Social Security checks? It reduces the value of those Social Security checks.

This bill is actually a step in reducing inflation by reducing Federal spending, and that will be to the benefit of those seniors who are going to be living on a fixed income.

We all know there is a cost-of-living adjustment applied to Social Security, but the reality is it is not keeping up with inflation.

Inflation is so rampant now due to the spending that we have engaged in in Congress. There is a moral imperative for us to reduce spending because it trickles down. Inflation is very detrimental to our seniors. That is why we have to pass this bill.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Langworthy), my good friend and colleague on the Rules Committee.

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

If I had a nickel for every time the other side of the aisle uses the word ``extreme,'' I would buy you lunch today. It must be poll tested. ``Extreme'' must be good for them in the polls.

Let me tell you what is extreme and what every American thinks is extreme: $33.7 trillion is extreme. The fact that we are now paying, this year, a trillion dollars in interest on that debt, on that national debt, that is extreme.

Spending money we don't have is extreme. Funding an FBI that targets its own citizens who have done nothing wrong, funding the censorship of speech of Americans, that is extreme. The American people know that is extreme.

The inflation that is caused by this is extreme, and it is affecting everybody. The cost of transportation, the cost of food, and the cost of housing are skyrocketing. That is extreme.

Now, my colleague mentioned that we didn't allow every amendment in this rule. Well, as the ranking member of the committee, surely he knows not every amendment is in order. We have certain rules in the Rules Committee, and a lot of these amendments, unfortunately--and I have to tell some of my friends this--failed our own test.

For instance, they weren't germane to the underlying bill. Americans don't want amendments tacked onto bills that have nothing to do with the underlying bill, so the amendments have

to be germane. We are protecting the American people when we keep this process for allowing amendments that are only germane.

The amendments to spending bills, as a rule--it has been a rule since I came here 11 years ago--they can't increase spending, yet unfortunately some of my colleagues introduced amendments that do sometimes intentionally, sometimes unintentionally, but especially the Democrats like to increase spending. We can't allow those amendments.

Finally, we don't allow the amendments that try to legislate on an appropriations bill. We don't allow you to change laws on a bill that has to do with spending. That is the primary reason most of those amendments that the other side is always complaining about are not in this bill. There are 119 good amendments that were allowed that we will debate later today and that we will vote on in transparency and full light of day, not snuck in at the last moment. The American people will get to see how they are being represented through these 119 amendments.

This appropriations bill, I would like to point out, satisfies some of our constitutional obligations. Adam Smith said there are three primary roles of government: to provide for the national defense, to fund public infrastructure, and to institute a system of justice. It is that third obligation that we are fulfilling here today with this bill.

Then we have some constitutional obligations beyond that that are fulfilled in this bill. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, intellectual property, which is in Article I, Section 8, Clause 8 of the Constitution. That is an obligation of Congress, to provide for the protection of intellectual property. That is in this bill.

The Bureau of the Census is funded in this bill. We are directed by the Constitution to have a census every 10 years, so that is another function in this bill.

This bill funds the National Institute of Standards and Technology, sometimes called NIST. This used to be called the Bureau of Weights and Measures. The Constitution, Article I, Section 8, directs Congress to establish the weights and measures so that we are not all using in this country a different set of weights and measures.

There are many constitutional obligations provided in this bill, many necessary roles of government, some things that aren't technically in the Constitution, but we agree publicly that these are in the benefit of our country. For instance, NASA is funded in this bill.

Mr. Speaker, that is why I urge my colleagues to support this rule, and I reserve the balance of my time.

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

I look forward to the passage of this rule because there are 119 amendments that are going to expose 430-plus Members of this body to their voters.

How is that? Well, each of these amendments gets 10 minutes of debate. If so ordered, there will be recorded votes on these amendments. They address issues fundamental to our rights.

There will be amendments in this debate after this rule passes on protecting the First Amendment to the Constitution, the freedom of religion, freedom of speech, will we allow our government to censure us on social media. They have been doing it through NGOs and private organizations and research grants. I don't think we should allow it. I don't think it is constitutional. You can't launder a violation of the First Amendment. There will be a debate on that after this rule passes because of this rule.

There will be a debate on whether you support the Second Amendment, the right to keep and bear arms. There is an amendment that we will debate when this rule passes that prohibits the ATF from using funds to maintain a database. They are prohibited already, but they keep trying to do it, so we have to defund them from that.

There is even an amendment--I am particularly fond of this debate that is

coming up--to prevent Federal funds from being used to prosecute a Presidential candidate. We look like a banana republic when our justice system indicts candidates for President to try to bring down their poll numbers. This is something that you do in Third World countries.

In any event, there are 119 amendments. I think the other side is against this rule because they don't want to have these debates. They surely don't want to have to vote because that record will be for all time. Every 2 years, each of us faces our voters with those records that will be created today as a result of this rule.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, the word of the day is ``extreme'' because the other side uses it in every sentence.

Let me tell you what is extreme: Violating the First Amendment, the principles of freedom of speech and freedom of religion. That is extreme, and that is going to be addressed in this bill and this rule, utilizing the power of the purse. Violating the Second Amendment rights of Americans, their God-given rights to defend themselves; that is extreme. This bill addresses that. This rule provides for robust debate on that issue.

Extreme is violating the Fourth Amendment of the Constitution and the rights there enshrined. Violating the 10th Amendment and Federalizing our police forces. That is extreme. These are the things that Americans find extreme. These are the things that are addressed in this rule and in the underlying bill using the power of the purse.

The most extreme thing--and I do have to say that the Democrats are really good at this form of extremism--the most extreme thing is to continually spend money we don't have, to borrow until they won't lend us any money, and then to print money so we can spend more of it. Extreme is putting ourselves $33.7 trillion in debt. When I say ourselves, I mean, the American taxpayers. They are on the hook for this.

Even if you don't pay taxes, if you have worked a hard life, you have saved and you have got money in the bank and you are relying on your Social Security, what is extreme is the inflation that we have created through out-of-control spending in this Chamber over many, many years. Both parties are guilty of it. It is extreme because it hurts every American when we devalue the dollar through extreme spending.

What does this bill do?

It cuts spending.

This fight is really simple. The disagreements between both sides of the aisle--we can argue about the minor issues--but the major issue is: Do you want to expand government? Do you want it to be more prevalent in your life? Do you want to pay more taxes? Do you want to put your grandkids in hock?

If you do, vote for that side of the aisle.

If you want to put us on a path to fiscal responsibility, if you want to have open debates, if you want to have 72 hours to see what is in the bill, if you don't want to have to vote for a bill to find out what is in it, then you are with this side of the aisle. You should support this rule. I urge adoption of this rule.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the resolution.

Madam Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Madam Chair, I rise in support of my amendment, which states: ``None of the funds made available by this Act may be used to fund any grant related to any transgenic edible vaccine.''

Madam Chair, does the term transgenic edible vaccine sound like something out of a science fiction dystopian novel? Does the term transgenic edible vaccine sound like something out of a horror film? Well, it is not.

It is the scientific term that is used for research that we are funding with U.S. taxpayer dollars. This concept that we would inject RNA or DNA into our food supply, that we would encourage plants to grow vaccines within them, and that we would then encourage animals or people to consume these vaccines by consuming the food. Yes, we are funding this, but we should not, and there are several reasons that we should not be funding this.

One is, you can't control where the pollen goes from a plant. Many of these experiments happen outside of a greenhouse, outside of controlled facilities. In fact, we saw an incident where a transgenic edible vaccine was being grown in corn many years ago. What happened the next year when they grew soybeans on the same plot where this transgenic edible vaccine was grown?

By the way, this vaccine was for pigs. It was to keep them from getting diarrhea. It was never meant for humans. The next year they grew soybeans on that same plot of land, and some of the corn sprouted on its own and was mixed with these soybeans. Five hundred bushels of soybeans were harvested that had to be destroyed because they were commingled. This transgenic edible vaccine that was meant for pigs was commingled with soybeans that could have gone into human food consumption.

The offending researchers had to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines. However, do we know if we caught all of the instances of these escapes of this pollen? In fact, this happened not just once, but it happened again and in a different way. The pollen wafted over to a different field, and it pollinated corn in a different field. Over 150 acres of corn had to be destroyed in that instance because they were experimenting with transgenic edible vaccines. In that case, those vaccines were meant for animals.

Here recently, however, we have been funding transgenic plant vaccines, edible plant vaccines for human research at University of California, Riverside. They are right now trying to grow spinach and lettuce with the idea that humans would then consume this at a salad bar or something.

How do you know the dosage? What does it mean to have informed consent when you don't know what is in your food? What does it mean to have informed consent when you don't know when you are being served medication for dinner?

This is such a ridiculous concept that we shouldn't even have to debate it, but here we are. We funded it through the National Institutes of Health, the USDA, and NSF.

I will close by saying this: I offered this amendment on the Agriculture appropriations bill to prevent the USDA from funding this type of research. I am offering it on this appropriations bill to prevent it being funded in this appropriations bill, as well.

This amendment passed by a voice vote on the Agriculture appropriations bill. I hope that we will see the wisdom in this amendment today and pass this also with unanimous support.

Madam Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Madam Chair, I rise in support of my amendment which essentially prohibits funds from being made available to conduct or support gain-of-function research.

Section 533 of the underlying bill says that none of the funds in the bill can be used for gain-of-function research in China or Cuba or North Korea or Russia. The problem is that it doesn't prohibit this dangerous type of research anywhere else in the world.

Why should we be funding it in France or Great Britain? In fact, why should we be funding it here? I will argue later that we shouldn't, that the risks far outweigh the benefits and that we should have learned our lesson.

Madam Chair, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentlewoman from Iowa (Mrs. Miller-Meeks).

Madam Chair, I think it would be useful at this point to define gain-of-function research. I will use the written testimony of Richard Ebright, Board of Governors Professor of Chemistry and Chemical Biology at Rutgers University and laboratory director of Waksman Institute of Microbiology.

In his testimony in a Senate hearing, he said that gain-of-function research is defined as ``research activities reasonably anticipated to increase a potential pandemic pathogen's transmissibility, pathogenesis, ability to overcome immune response, or ability to overcome a vaccine or drug.''

Why would you want to do this? Why would you want to do gain-of- function research? It is a seductive idea that you can take one of hundreds of thousands of viruses that exist in the animal kingdom outside of humans and try to predict, poke and prod on the virus, encourage it to be transmissible among humans so that you could then predict the next virus that might come into existence among humans, and then come up with a vaccine for it.

Statistically, there is no way you are going to predict what the next natural virus is going to be. What you will do, though, in the process of this research is create a cookbook, a blueprint for the next pandemic.

Part of the danger in this research lies in the fact that you are uncovering secrets that will then be published and that can be used to create a pandemic of existential proportions.

It creates new health threats, health threats through 10,000 years of evolution that may never come into existence but in 10 days of research could come into existence in a lab, threats that don't exist in nature.

Why are we still doing this research right now? In 2014, this research was put on pause, from 2014 to 2017--wisely, I would say. The pause was suspended in 2018.

By the way, the projects that were paused did not include the projects at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, unfortunately.

When the pause was removed, this research began again in earnest, creating tremendous risk for the human race.

Why would we do this to ourselves? We shouldn't be doing this to ourselves, and we shouldn't be doing it with taxpayer dollars.

There is no practical application of this outside of the curiosity of a government lab. This research will not continue in private labs because it is just not profitable. We should stop it here.

Madam Chair, I urge adoption of the amendment. I think it is common sense. Let's protect America by not funding this research.

Madam Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

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

Mr. Chair, I rise in support of my amendment, which states: None of the funds made available by this act may be used to conduct a competitive analysis when evaluating mergers.

Beginning January 1, 1989, Congress vested primary authority to review airline mergers with the U.S. Department of Justice. Since that time, the Department of Transportation has deferred to DOJ to determine whether a merger between U.S. airlines should be challenged on competition grounds.

The Department of Transportation's general counsel under President Obama described the DOT's role in airline mergers as follows: ``With respect to DOT's competition and public interest review authorities, DOT's practice has been to use its expertise with respect to the airline industry to provide the Department's views and otherwise assist the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) in DOJ's analysis of airline mergers or acquisitions.''

The Department of Justice recently challenged an airline merger. This amendment doesn't have anything to do with that court case. In fact, it is well within DOJ's rights and authority to challenge mergers, but what concerns me is that the DOT's Secretary, Pete Buttigieg, expressed publicly that his Department has ``generally not gotten involved in these merger cases, but that is changing today.''

Between 2009 and 2016, under the Obama administration, there were nine successful airline mergers. In fact, in over 30 years, the DOT has not prevented the transfer of operating certificates for any airline merger. This begs the question: Why now?

Mr. Chair, I urge adoption of this amendment, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Correa), my friend across the aisle, the ranking member of the Judiciary Subcommittee on Administrative State, Regulatory Reform, and Antitrust.

Mr. Chairman, may I inquire as to how much time I have remaining.

Mr. Chair, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Rutherford), my colleague.

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

Mr. Chair, as a member of the Transportation Committee, I had the honor to question Secretary Buttigieg on whether he had this authority and what metrics he would use to exercise this authority.

It was obvious that they don't have any experience in the DOT to review these mergers because they haven't done it. It is for that reason that I urge adoption of this amendment. We don't need redundancy among the Departments. We need an all-of-government approach, and that is what this amendment seeks to do.

Mr. Chair, I urge adoption of this bipartisan amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

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

Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of my amendment, which states: ``None of the funds made available by this act may be used to implement section 24220 of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.''

My amendment is simple. It will defund the Federal mandate that requires all new vehicles after 2026 be equipped with a kill switch that can disable a vehicle if the vehicle has monitored the driver's performance and the vehicle determines that the driver is not performing well.

It is so incredible that I have to offer this amendment. It almost sounds like the domain of science fiction, dystopian science fiction, that the Federal Government would put a kill switch in vehicles that would be the judge, the jury, and the executioner on such a fundamental right as the right to travel freely, but here we are.

It is Federal law that this is mandated, and so I am offering this amendment to defund this mandate.

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

Mr. Chair, drunk driving is a serious problem. That is why 31 States already have a law to implement interlock ignition technology where if you have been convicted of a DUI that you have to pass this test in order to operate your vehicle. This Federal law that I seek to defund goes far beyond that, and I regret that I have to spend some of my time reading the law to the other side of the aisle, but I will do that.

This law that was passed in a 1,000-page bill 2 years ago requires that automobiles can passively monitor the performance of a driver--not the blood alcohol content, but the performance of a driver of a motor vehicle--to accurately identify whether that driver may be impaired-- not drunk; it says impaired--and prevent or limit motor vehicle operation. That is a kill switch.

Now, the question is how much time do you have once your dashboard tells you that it doesn't approve of your driving? What if you are a single mother and you're out in bad weather and you're trying to avoid some obstacles, ice perhaps, and you have swerved three times and your dashboard says swerve one more time and you are going to be put over to the side of the road, that you will have 100 yards to park this vehicle in the middle of nowhere with your children in the back seat?

This isn't some fantastical scenario. This is what will happen if this is implemented. This is the law. I have read it to you here.

Now, you maybe should have read it 2 years ago when you all voted for it on that side of the aisle, but it was in a bill that was 1,039 pages long. I can understand how you don't know what the law has in it, but I have read it to you.

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

Mr. Chair, may I inquire as to how much time I have remaining?

Mr. Chair, we actually don't know how this technology is going to work. They don't know over at the DOT either, because we have sent a letter to them, that they haven't responded to yet, asking them: Will this have cameras inside the car? Will it monitor your eyes to see if you are focused on the road? Will it have cameras on the outside of the car?

How will it know what your performance is relative to the road that you are driving on, if it doesn't, in fact, know which road you are driving on? Will it need to know where you are when you are driving? If so, who has access to this data? Who has access to those cameras?

Will the Fourth Amendment be followed? Will you require a warrant for your insurance company to access this data? Will you require a warrant for the government to access this data? Once your car has been disabled and now you are on the side of the road with your children in it, for reasons you don't understand, how long until the police show up? What if you truly are disabled and you are over to the side of the road, does anybody show up?

How long do you have to get out of the vehicle? Who decides when your vehicle kill switch is disabled and you get to drive again? Who is going to adjudicate that on the side of the road? What if it is rush- hour traffic? What if you know you have already got points against you, according to your dashboard, and it has monitored your performance and now somebody's pet is in the road? Do you swerve to miss it and get your car disabled?

What if there is an emergency vehicle approaching from behind you and you know the right thing is to swerve off the road and let that vehicle pass? What if after you have done that three times and now your car says do it one more time and we are going to leave you on the side of the road?

This is in the law. This will become law in 2026, every vehicle manufactured after that. It is not about drunk driving. If it were, it would just be about blood alcohol content.

This law has far more than that in it. It violates the Fourth Amendment. It violates so many amendments. It violates things that are so fundamental to our rights that they are not even in the Constitution, like the right to travel.

Mr. Chair, I urge support of this amendment. It will defund the law that was passed 2 years ago that the other side of the aisle doesn't even know exists.

Mr. Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, as the only still-serving coauthor and cosponsor of the motion to vacate Speaker Boehner, I can tell you this motion to vacate is a terrible idea. As the only Member who is serving here who took every chance to vote against Speaker Boehner and to vote against Speaker Ryan, I can tell you that this Chamber has been run better, more conservatively, and more transparently under Mr. McCarthy than any other Speaker that I have served under.

As a member of the Rules Committee, one of three conservatives who was placed there out of trust--the Speaker gave us a blocking position by putting three of us on there to keep an eye on the Rules Committee, to make sure the process was fair and even--I can tell you it has been fair and even. None of us are voting against the Speaker today.

Regular order is at odds with predetermined outcomes. Yet, the Speaker is being accused of not holding to regular order and predetermined outcomes at the same time. It is not possible. You cannot be for both at the same time.

I was a party to the January agreement, and I can tell you that there were promises in there, but there was never a promise for an outcome. There was never a promise that you could force Joe Biden to sign something. There was only the promise that we would try, and try we have. We have tried in the Rules Committee. We have tried on the floor. We have been trying since this summer.

There is enough blame to go around for why we don't have 12 bills, but part of it was a relitigation of the debt limit deal.

By the way, there was no promise on the debt limit deal. There were no conditions on that in January--zero--whatsoever. I was in the room for that.

The 12 bills were delayed over what? $100 billion. That is a lot of money, but it is nothing compared to the $2 trillion that I came here to object to when Speaker Pelosi and President Trump pushed that bill through.

We have had over 500 amendments. Listen, this is a referendum on this institution. We have tried regular order. Speaker McCarthy has tried regular order. If regular order fails today, if you vote to vacate the Speaker, no one is going to try again. This institution will fail. Please do not vacate the Speaker.

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

Mr. Chair, I rise in support of this bipartisan amendment.

This amendment is very simple. It states that: ``None of the funds made available by this act may be used to transfer cluster munitions to any foreign country.''

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

Mr. Chair, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Lee), my friend on the other side of the aisle.

Mr. Chair, I yield an additional 30 seconds to the gentlewoman from California.

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

Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Nevada (Ms. Titus), my friend on the other side of the aisle.

Mr. Chair, over the past year, our country has been engaged in a proxy war with Russia. We are on a path to a hot war where we will be directly involved if we don't change that path now. It is shortsighted to use cluster bombs there, to transfer those munitions. It will represent an escalation in the war that could draw us further into that conflict.

I agree with my colleagues on the other side of the aisle. It is a good idea not to transfer these to any other country.

Now, some have said to me, on previous amendments here on the floor, that they think we shouldn't be limiting our military.

I want to be clear. This amendment does not limit our own military. What it says is we will not transfer these munitions to other countries. I think that is wise, and it is the prudent thing to do. We shouldn't be providing them to any other country, certainly not under the guise of world peace, because they last, as my colleagues have said, for years and years in many cases.

Mr. Chair, I urge adoption of this amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Chair, I rise in support of this amendment, sponsored by my colleague and fellow farmer, Mrs. Spartz. The amendment states that none of the funds made available by this bill may be used to carry out commodity checkoff programs.

These may have started out as well-intentioned, but it is pretty well known in Washington, D.C. that this program has gone rotten, and it no longer serves farmers. In fact, we have just sent a bipartisan letter from Senators and Members of this House to Secretary Vilsack reminding him that the USDA is required to report annually to Congress, describing activities conducted accounting for the receipt and disbursement of all funds and including an independent analysis of the effectiveness of the program. Yet the USDA hasn't submitted this report since 2019.

Yet, the USDA hasn't submitted this report since 2019. Since that time, American dairy farmers have paid nearly a billion dollars into this promotional program. At the same time, we have witnessed the loss of more than 6,000 dairy operations across our communities.

Let me talk about the Beef Checkoff program. In 2010, an independent audit examining the equivalent of just 9 days of Beef Checkoff program spending found that the primary Beef Checkoff contractor, the National Cattlemen's Beef Association--that is right; I am calling out names-- had improperly spent more than $200,000 in checkoff dollars on lobbying and overseas vacations.

Despite a Freedom of Information Act request and complaint, a full audit has not been released to the public. Additionally, this organization, NCBA, gets 70 percent of its revenue from the checkoff program. They are prohibited from lobbying, but they are one of the biggest lobbyers up here in Washington, D.C. They lobby against things that are antithetical to cattlemen. For instance, they were up here lobbying with the money paid to them by the cattlemen against country of origin labeling.

They represent less than 5 percent of the industry. It is time to put them back to work for farmers. It is time to adopt Mrs. Spartz' amendment.

Madam Chair, as a cattleman myself who interacts with and supports thousands of cattlemen in Kentucky, I rise in support of Ms. Hageman's very important amendment, which prevents funds from being used to mandate electronic identification ear tags for cattle and bison.

The cattlemen in Kentucky know this isn't just another extra expense for them. It is the beginning of the end of the American rancher, of the American cattleman. It is the beginning of the end of multigenerational farms in Kentucky because this is an on-and-off switch that will prevent farmers from marketing their cattle if they are not in compliance with thousands of rules, a never-ending list of rules. This is why we should oppose it.

We should quit listening. I implore my colleagues who have been lobbied on this issue--we have all been lobbied on this one. I implore my colleagues to quit listening to the lobbyists who pretend to represent farmers and start listening to their farmers back home and support Ms. Hageman's amendment.

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

Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of my amendment, which states, ``None of the funds made available by this Act may be used to fund any grant related to any transgenic edible vaccine.''

Does the term transgenic edible vaccine sound farfetched? Well, it is not. We are funding it.

In fact, scientists from the University of California, Riverside, funded with your taxpayer dollars, have been studying whether they can turn edible plants such as lettuce and spinach into mRNA vaccine factories, thereby creating a transgenic edible vaccine.

One associate professor at UCR explained that ``Ideally, a single plant would produce enough mRNA to vaccinate a single person. We are testing this approach with spinach and lettuce and have long-term goals of people growing it in their own gardens. Farmers could also eventually grow entire fields of it.''

I don't think this is a good idea.

I don't think the American people should be funding this, and I would hope that we have learned something from the COVID experience with SARS-CoV-2 that some of our science projects aren't the best ideas.

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

Mr. Chair, my colleague on the other side of the aisle talks about keeping prices low. I think there is more to it than that for the American people. He also speaks as if these vaccines, these transgenic edible plant vaccines, are only used for livestock.

Well, in fact, they have been used for livestock--I will get to that in a second--but they are also being used for people. That is the intended outcome of many of these programs that we are funding with money from the USDA.

What could possibly go wrong with this research?

Well, we found out a few years ago when a biotech company was experimenting, growing, in corn, a vaccine to keep pigs from getting diarrhea.

What happened? Well, the next year where the corn was grown the prior year, the corn came up and it got commingled with soybeans that were being grown there.

It contaminated 500 bushels of soybeans, which were then commingled with 500,000 bushels of soybeans. Those all had to be recalled and destroyed.

Luckily, they caught it.

Do we want humans eating vaccines that were grown in corn meant to stop pigs from getting diarrhea? I don't think we want that to happen. Yet, that almost happened, and it could happen.

There is another case where the pollen cross-contaminated another crop of corn, and 155 acres of corn had to be burned. What are the cases where we are not discovering this?

I think it is dangerous to play God with our food. I think we need a safe food supply.

Mr. Chair, this is about food safety. Ultimately, the people in this country need to know what is in their food, and if we start contaminating the DNA of our food with DNA from other animals or viruses, the pollen could spread, and we don't know what could happen.

I would hope we have learned a lesson from the Wuhan lab that sometimes things escape, sometimes things don't go as you plan. That is why I think it is a bad idea to fund transgenic edible plant vaccine research from the USDA.

Mr. Chair, I urge adoption of my amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

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

Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of my amendment, which states in part that, ``None of the funds made available by this Act may be used to issue any new rule related to (1) regarding the number of owners of an animal for purposes of the custom slaughter exemption of the Food Safety and Inspection Service; (2) limiting the persons that may own an animal; or (3) requiring custom operators to keep records.''

My amendment simply states that no funds in this bill can be used to create new rules and regulations related to the custom slaughter exemption, limiting the number of people who may own an animal, or placing additional recordkeeping burdens on custom slaughter exemption.

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

Mr. Chairman, I respectfully disagree with my colleague's characterization of this amendment that it changes permanent law. In fact, all it does is limits the spending that can be used to promulgate any new rules. Its only period is for the extent of a year. The next year, the next fiscal year.

In fact, were it changing permanent law, we would not have allowed it as an amendment to this bill.

Mr. Chair, I serve on the Rules Committee, and we vet hundreds of amendments for this very constraint. This is not one of the amendments that changes permanent law.

If I could change permanent law, would I change permanent law? You are sure right that I would, and we will try that in the farm bill, but we can't change permanent law on an appropriations bill.

The reason I have introduced this amendment is I have found on the USDA website, they haven't done the rule yet, but they are thinking about doing a rule to limit how many families could share an animal.

Listen, there are four meat-packers that control over 80 percent of the meat that is processed in the United States. Our President himself said it from that very podium during a state of the Union speech. It is a problem. We all know it.

There is one exemption that allows people to get out from under the thumb of the multinational corporations that process most of the meat in this country, and that is the custom slaughter exemption that allows somebody who owns an animal to have it processed for themselves.

It seems somewhat ridiculous that the USDA thinks they have the power to say two families can't share that animal. Yet, that is what they are proposing in a PowerPoint slide on their website.

My amendment is simple. It says we are not going to allow the USDA to promulgate a rule that keeps families from getting healthy meat from their local farmer.

Mr. Chairman, I urge adoption of my amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that when the House adjourns today, it adjourn to meet on Tuesday, September 26, 2023, when it shall convene at noon for morning-hour debate, and 2 p.m. for legislative business.

Madam Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

The motion was agreed to; accordingly (at 1 o'clock and 47 minutes p.m.), under its previous order, the House adjourned until Tuesday, September 26, 2023, at noon for morning-hour debate.

Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 495 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.

General Leave

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks.

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

House Resolution 495 provides for a structured rule for consideration of H.R. 277, the Regulations from the Executive in Need of Scrutiny Act of 2023 and provides 1 hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking member of the Committee on the Judiciary.

House Resolution 495 further provides for a structured rule for consideration of H.R. 288, the Separation of Powers Restoration Act of 2023. It also provides 1 hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking member of the Committee on the Judiciary.

House Resolution 495 further provides for a structured rule for the consideration of H.R. 1615, the Gas Stove Protection and Freedom Act, and provides 1 hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking member of the Committee on Energy and Commerce.

This resolution further provides for a structured rule for the consideration of H.R. 1640 and provides 1 hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking member of the Committee on Energy and Commerce.

Furthermore, House Resolution 495 provides for a closed rule for consideration of H.J. Res. 44 and provides 1 hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking member of the Committee on the Judiciary.

These are five bills that may seem unrelated, but they are very related, and they have to do with the power of Congress and the fact that our power has atrophied considerably since the beginning of this country. In fact, we are almost a vestigial organ of this Republic at this point, we have ceded so much power to the executive branch, and that is how all of these bills are related.

Three of the bills seek to repeal laws or regulations that the administrative branch is unconstitutionally, I would argue, promulgating.

Two of these bills get at the heart of the matter, the problem that we have. One of them specifically is the REINS Act, which is very important. This would rein in our power to legislate.

I don't think our Founders would recognize our form of government at this point. They never intended for the administrators to be the lawmakers; yet here we are.

The Regulations from the Executive in Need of Scrutiny Act would send every major regulation that is suggested--and I say suggested--by the administration back to Congress where there would have to be a positive vote of the House and the Senate in order for that to go to the President and then, with his signature, become law, as all laws should do.

The other bill in this package that seeks to address the sort of chronic problem that we have here in Congress is the Separation of Powers Restoration Act.

It is basically a repeal of a horrible Supreme Court precedent called the Chevron deference that says, basically, any way the administration wants to construe one of our laws, they can get away with it.

The Supreme Court will give deference to the interpretation, no matter how far afield from the original interpretation the law was given from Congress.

Finally, the three bills today that deal with individual regulations, two of them deal with gas stoves. This administration has a war on gas stoves, depending on which person from the administration you listen to, a rule that is being promulgated by the Consumer Product Safety Commission and also by the Department of Energy.

There are two rules here. They would ban between 50 to 95 percent of the gas stoves on the market for arbitrary reasons. It is not clear that there would be any consumer benefit from banning these. In fact, consumers would suffer from this ban.

These are the types of rules that we need the REINS Act for. They would have a significant impact on our economy, and that is why they should be here in front of Congress, and that is why we are seeking to countermand them here today.

Finally, I think this is the most important rule that we are countermanding in legislation this week, and that is the pistol brace rule from the ATF.

We are not talking about an interpretation of a law where the EPA says, we think we should allow this much sulfur dioxide instead of that amount of sulfur dioxide and create a civil infraction where corporations could be sued or punished. We are talking about criminal penalties.

The ATF has twisted the existing statute, a law that was passed by Congress in 1934, and has magically reinterpreted it to create tens of millions of felons beginning on June 1.

We have a bad situation in this country right now where millions of people have been turned into felons, law-abiding individuals who are following the rules that were set forth by the ATF. That is why urgent action is required on the pistol brace rule repeal here today, and that is H.J. Res. 44.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, I find it ironic that the gentleman on the other side of the aisle is demanding to know what the power-sharing structure is here in the House, when, in fact, he will spend the rest of his time arguing that we should give our power to the White House, that the administrative branch should be making law, in fact, major regulations that have more than $100 million of impact.

I would say to the gentleman on the other side of the aisle that if he is wondering about the power-sharing arrangement, then he should seek to put some power here in the House, restore the power that the Founders gave us in Article I of the Constitution.

With respect to the solution to the tragic school shootings, some States have taken it upon themselves to allow qualified teachers and staff to carry

firearms. Imagine that, the children are protected by firearms the same way we are protected here. Why do we sit here and say, oh, we have got to do something, when we sit behind protection and the children aren't?

I would encourage the other side of the aisle to cosponsor my bill to change the default setting here in this country. The default setting was set by the Gun-Free School Zone Act, which makes it illegal to even be near a school and have a firearm, which makes it harder for States to set policies that would save our children. All it does is make felons of law-abiding gun owners.

I would encourage them to look at a real solution. You can ban a pistol brace, but you are not going to stop a single mass public shooting. Most of these mass public shootings occur with a pistol, not a pistol with a brace on it or with a short-barreled rifle, as they would say, or with a rifle, an assault rifle they might call it.

They can start banning these pieces of plastic, like the Biden administration is doing, and then they can move on to banning magazines. As the ranking member of the Judiciary Committee admitted to me last night, he would like to ban all of the AR-15s. They could ban handguns. Then they will get down to shotguns. The reality is you can't stop these tragedies with a ban. You have to change the way we protect our children.

This pistol brace rule that has been promulgated by the administrative branch will cause--they just haven't been arrested--will cause and has already caused tens of millions of Americans to be felons. That happened on June 1. Time is up. You are done. You are now a felon if you own one of these braces on your firearm.

Whether you own one or not, most Americans understand what is happening here. Our system of lawmaking has been turned on its head. Even more fundamental than that, people were told it was legal by the ATF. The technical division of the ATF reviewed the prototypes of these pistol braces in 2012 when Obama was the President.

What did Obama's ATF say to Mr. Bosco, the inventor of the pistol brace? ``You are asking if the addition of this sample, a buffer tube forearm brace, would convert a firearm in a manner that would cause it to be classified as a `rifle' and thus a `firearm' regulated by the National Firearms Act. . . . `'

``Based on our evaluation,'' our technical department ``finds that the submitted forearm brace, when attached to a firearm, does not convert that weapon to be fired from the shoulder and would not alter the classification of a pistol or other firearm.'' ``. . . Such a firearm would not be subject to NFA controls.''

This is a letter on ATF letterhead, in fact, the Department of Justice letterhead, dated November 26, 2012, that millions of Americans relied on, that many entrepreneurs relied on.

Now what happens? The rug is getting pulled out from under them, but not by the legislative branch. By the way, we could have repealed this. The Democrats controlled both chambers. They could have passed a legislative ban on these braces. They didn't do it. Why didn't they do it? Maybe it is because they are accountable. They are accountable to the people, unlike these bureaucrats. Nobody is going to lose an election at the ATF for promulgating this rule.

The people here are scared. The people here in this Chamber are scared to do their jobs, and the people in the Senate are scared to do their jobs, so they would much prefer the administration do our jobs.

What have they done? What is the penalty for owning this piece of plastic on a firearm that is connected to a pistol? I asked the ranking member of Judiciary Committee last night in the Rules Committee meeting. He did not know. It turns out it is a quarter of a million dollars and 10 years in prison. Is that the appropriate sentence for somebody who followed the law for 10 years, followed ATF guidance that was given during the Obama administration and now doesn't even know they are violating the law? Is 10 years and a quarter million dollars appropriate? I don't think so. They relied on this letter.

Now, to another part of the pistol brace rule. The ranking member of the Judiciary Committee and the ATF Director Dettelbach have both testified incorrectly that you can comply with this pistol brace rule from the ATF by merely separating the firearm from the brace. That is wrong. That is not what the ATF rule says.

Why did they say this in testimony? Why did the ranking member of the Judiciary Committee say this? Why did the ATF Director say this? Because they wanted to sound reasonable. That may seem like a reasonable solution, but it is not the solution that the ATF has put into law.

Again, this isn't a fine. This isn't like saying the EPA decided that we have too much sulfur dioxide in the atmosphere so we are going to reduce emissions and set the sulfur dioxide emissions at a different level and you can be fined if you don't comply and you are a corporation.

This is not a civil infraction. This is a criminal infraction that will put millions of Americans in jeopardy of going to jail. For what, a piece of plastic? Does it make the firearm more dangerous? No. Does it make the firearm more concealable? No. Does it make the firearm more deadly? No.

Then I hear from the other side of the aisle: Oh, well, we are not banning them. Oh, we wouldn't ban them. Really? You are telling people in the United States you have to register them as short-barreled rifles. Guess what? That is illegal in 13 States. Thirty-six percent of Americans live in those 13 States where you can't even comply. You cannot legally comply with the ATF directive to register that pistol with that brace on it as a short-barreled rifle. Compliance is impossible if you want to keep that accessory. It is a ban. It is a de facto ban, especially on people in those 13 States.

Here is what it is really about. They can't ban guns. They would love to, but they can't ban them. They can't do it legislatively. The President came into office and looked at all of the regulations and how could he ban some guns. Well, he found this one here. How can he get more guns registered.

By the way, it is illegal for the administrative branch to create a registry of firearms that are in common circulation here in the United States. That is illegal. They are not allowed to do it in the administrative branch. What have they done with this pistol brace rule over there that we seek to countermand? They are going to create a registry of millions of Americans who own pistols who happen to have this brace.

I would argue this wasn't just a way to ban guns with certain accessories. It was a way to do something else that is not legal, not authorized by Congress, and that is to require millions of Americans to register.

To close out this pistol brace rule, I thank Mr. Clyde for introducing this resolution. It is absolutely necessary. It is very timely. I wish we had gotten it done before June 1 because now we have got millions of felons in the United States just waiting to be arrested; don't even know they are not in compliance. This ATF rule will do nothing to increase safety.

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

Mr. Speaker, as a father and a grandfather, my heart breaks when I see the victims of these deranged killers at schools and elsewhere. We need serious solutions.

I think it is an insult to the victims and families that banning a piece of plastic is going to save a life--it won't--or telling them that putting up a sign that says gun-free zone will save a life. It won't. It will cost lives.

When one of my former staffers was married for less than a year, she and her husband had a karaoke business, and she had a stalker who followed them to each of their events. She got a concealed carry license in Tennessee and carried her gun to protect herself from the stalker. This was Nikki who worked for me.

One night, they set up their business in a bar, and the sign said ``No Guns Inside'' because they served alcohol. Nikki left her firearm to protect herself in the car, but her stalker did not leave his.

He came into the bar and shot her husband viciously in front of her. She has to live with that. That is why she wants serious solutions. She knows that gun-free zones are unserious. She knows that banning pieces of plastic is not serious. She knows that children deserve the protection that we have here.

We all know, if you are willing to look at the data, that in every school that has allowed qualified teachers and staff to carry a firearm, there has never been a school shooting. It is a fact.

We need to work on serious solutions, not unserious solutions like banning a piece of plastic.

Mr. Speaker, going to the stove ban, which is also unserious, it is going to cost consumers. It is going to make the products less safe, not more safe. It is going to make them less available. It is not about safety or efficiency or consumer benefit. It is about banning fossil fuels. That is why this administration has declared a war on gas stoves.

Two of the bills in this package would repeal those rules from this administration.

Natural gas, when it is used in appliances, is 3.4 times more affordable than electricity. Why is that? Let's think about where that electricity comes from. A natural gas plant can burn electricity, spin a turbine, create electricity at maybe 50 percent efficiency and then put it on wires that are hundreds of miles long to go to a household. Those wires may be 70 percent, 80 percent efficient.

When it gets to the household, what do you do with that energy that came from the natural gas that is now electricity? You turn it back into heat if you have an electric stove, which is how this administration would want you to live.

Guess what? That is less than half as efficient. It costs 3.4 times more to do it that way than to create electricity with natural gas and then use the electricity at your house than if you just brought the natural gas to the household. In fact, consumers who use natural gas in their house save over $1,000 a year.

This is a war on the middle class and the poor. The war on gas stoves is a war on affordable heating and cooking.

When the electricity goes out in natural disasters, whose stoves work? The ones who have gas stoves.

Who can boil water to drink when the water is unsafe because of a natural disaster? Those who have gas stoves.

This administration should quit gaslighting consumers by telling them they are acting in their best interest. The Federal Interagency Committee on Indoor Air Quality has never identified gas stoves as contributing to asthma or respiratory illness. The Consumer Product Safety Commission and the Environmental Protection Agency have never identified gas stoves as a significant contributor to adverse air quality or as a health hazard.

Why are they doing this? It is a war on gas stoves. These two bills would seek to reverse that. It is just common sense.

In fact, the other side of the aisle said these are messaging bills. Guess what? Some Democrats liked the message because they voted for these bills in the Energy and Commerce Committee. It must be a great message. It must be a message the American people want to hear. It must be a message that they like to hear because they know if we had the Senate and the White House, this kind of ridiculousness would not go on. That is why it is important to pass these two bills to protect our gas stoves.

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

Mr. Speaker, I wonder, since we are proposing that children would be saved by banning a piece of plastic, has anyone on the other side of the aisle proposed that Congressmen are safer now that this piece of plastic is banned?

I don't think so.

Has anyone proposed that gun-free zone signs would keep us safe?

I don't think so.

What I see surrounding me here and right outside the door are people with firearms protecting us. Our children deserve the same respect and the same serious solutions.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Roy), who is my good friend and colleague on the Rules Committee, to speak in favor of the rule as he did in the committee.

Mr. Speaker, may I inquire as to how much time each side has remaining.

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

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

Mr. Speaker, I thank the other side of the aisle for pointing out that all the ATF rule does is change the legal status, that you can still get the brace and you can still get the pistol.

The last thing that is on a criminally deranged person's mind is: What is the legal status of my firearm? Is this a pistol? Is this a rifle? Is it a short-barreled rifle? How much time will I get when I go on this suicide mission for doing this because of the legal status?

However, what changing legal status does is it creates millions of felons out of legal firearm owners who presumed they were operating legally.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Roy).

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

Mr. Speaker, 6,000 veterans signed a petition opposing the ATF rule, so I hope that is enough to convince the other side.

However, I now switch to two other bills that are in this rules package because this is Groundhog Day. We will be here again. The administration does something which has the effect of law, and then we are feckless to change it.

There have been over 90,000 rules promulgated since the Congressional Review Act was put into place. Only 20 rules have ever been countermanded because it is such a high bar to get a majority of the House and a majority of the Senate and the President to sign something to undo a law.

How did it become law? Just because the administrative branch willed it into existence.

Our Constitution says: ``All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and a House of Representatives.''

Does it say, and also an ATF or also an EPA? No, it does not. It says House and Senate.

Does it say, some legislative powers? No. It says, all legislative powers are vested in Congress.

The REINS Act would do quite a bit to restore our power. Not enough, though, because the Chevron deference still exists.

The other bill in this package is the Separation of Powers Restoration Act, which is a legislative repeal of the tragic Chevron deference that has plagued this country for so many years, where the Supreme Court gives full latitude, broad authority to the administrative branch to twist and contort the laws that we make in creating new laws.

I urge people to vote for this rule because it includes these two packages, which put our Republic back into a structure that our Founding Fathers envisioned, where the legislators make the laws, and the administration enforces the laws.

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

Mr. Speaker, I have no further speakers, and I am prepared to close.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to submit for the Record a letter to Speaker McCarthy, Ranking Member Hakeem Jeffries, and others signed by 11 veterans and military organizations in support of H.J. Res. 44.

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time to close.

The REINS Act, which I would argue is the most important part of these five bills, is here, and we are debating it today because my constituent, Lloyd Rogers--who grew up in an orphanage in Kentucky, where he met his future wife in that same orphanage--sent this idea for this bill to his Congressman who preceded me.

Lloyd Rogers served in the Army during the Korean war. Then he came home, and he served as a county judge executive. He was shocked when he was trying to serve the people in his community at how many of the rules and regulations that tied his hands were never passed by Congress. He wrote this bill, and he sent it to his Congressman.

By the way, he and his wife were married for 65 years, and Lloyd turned 90 on Saturday. He is watching this debate.

This is how our Republic is supposed to work. Laws aren't supposed to come from unelected bureaucrats with no accountability. They are supposed to be ideas that people in our communities have that would make their lives better, and then we are accountable to them, so when they talk to us, we have to listen. They can throw us out every 2 years. Maybe they should throw more of us out every 2 years.

Lloyd came to his Congressman and said, please, put this bill on the floor. It went to legislative counsel. The Congressman introduced this bill, and it has been very popular. It is one of the most popular bills among the American people because they know the structure of our government intended by our Founding Fathers was for us to write the laws and for the administrative branch to execute the laws, not to write them themselves.

Mr. Speaker, I urge adoption of this rule, which contains five bills that I urge the passage of.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the resolution.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on H.R. 277.

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

Even before America declared its independence, John Adams emphasized that a republic is a government of laws and not of men. That is what we are here to debate tonight.

Are we a government of laws or a government of the executive branch? Are we going to allow the executive branch to write the laws? Are we going to turn our Constitution on its head? Have we gone too far already? I would argue we have, and that is why we need the REINS Act, Regulations from the Executive in Need of Scrutiny. It provides that every major regulation that the administration seeks to promulgate has to come to Congress first, has to be passed by concurrent majorities in the House and the Senate and signed by the President. This is exactly what our Founders prescribed. This is a bill about who makes the laws in our country, and it is about reclaiming our legislative power from the administrative state.

I think it is appropriate to read from our Constitution at this point. Article I, Section 1 of the Constitution says: ``All legislative powers . . . `' not some legislative powers.

``All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives.''

Does it say it shall consist of a bureaucracy? It does not. All legislative powers are vested here and in the Senate. That is why we need to stop letting the executive branch make law.

Are they merely tweaking regulations? Are they determining the amount of sulfur dioxide that is acceptable to release from a power plant with civil infractions imposed if a company doesn't comply? No, they are making laws that put people in prison over in the administrative branch, and we are doing nothing about it.

We have atrophied. The power of Congress has atrophied. We are almost like ombudsmen to the executive branch now. This needs to change.

In the words of James Madison: ``The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands . . . may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny.''

I am afraid that is what we have come to. Too many of our laws, civil and criminal, are now being written by the executive branch.

Here is what the REINS Act does, and here is why it is important. If a regulation that is passed by the executive branch or suggested by the executive branch has more than $100 million of impact--that is a pretty high threshold. I would argue if it has any impact, we should be legislating it, but this is a compromise. If it has more than $100 million of impact, it has to come here if it is going to become a law.

They do not get to write the laws, and so that is why we need the REINS Act.

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

House of Representatives,

Committee on the Judiciary,

Washington, DC, May 31, 2023.

Hon. Jodey Arrington,

Chairman, Committee on the Budget,

House of Representatives, Washington, DC.

Dear Chairman Arrington: Thank you for consulting with the

Committee on the Judiciary and agreeing to be discharged from

further consideration of H.R. 277, the Regulations from the

Executive In Need of Scrutiny Act of 2023, so that the

measure may proceed expeditiously to the House floor.

I agree that your forgoing further action on this measure

does not in any way diminish or alter the jurisdiction of

your committee, or prejudice its jurisdictional prerogatives

on this measure or similar legislation in the future. I would

support your effort to seek appointment of an appropriate

number of conferees from your committee to any House-Senate

conference on this legislation.

I will include the exchange of these letters in the

Judiciary Committee's report to accompany this legislation

and in the Congressional Record during consideration of this

legislation on the House floor. I appreciate your cooperation

regarding this legislation and look forward to continuing to

work together on matters of shared jurisdiction during this

Congress. Thank you for your attention to this matter.

Sincerely,

Jim Jordan,

Chairman.

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

We now have had a sneak preview of what the next hour of debate is going

to look like. The other side is going to argue that we need to give up more power to the executive branch.

I think our constituents would be appalled. They sent us here and they say we are not effective enough, yet the other side of the aisle is going to say, oh, we need to give the power to the executive branch.

We have also heard here already tonight that this bill, which would restore our Constitution, they say may be unconstitutional. They are referring to a Supreme Court case that has nothing to do with this bill, INS v. Chadha, which said you can't have a legislative veto. That bill that they were ruling on ran afoul of the Constitution because it didn't require passage in both Chambers and a signature by the President.

The REINS Act requires passage in both Chambers and a signature by the President, so their claim that it is unconstitutional is absurd because this is what is required to restore the Constitution.

Their claim that the REINS Act is redundant because we already have the Congressional Review Act is equally as absurd. There have been over 90,000 rules passed by the executive branch since the Congressional Review Act was passed. Only 20 of those have been able to be repealed by this Chamber and the Senate.

This is not a substitute for the Congressional Review Act. It is not redundant. This is what is required. It is what is missing right now in our constitutional structure from what our Founders intended.

Mr. Chair, I yield 3\1/2\ minutes to the gentlewoman from Wyoming (Ms. Hageman), who is also a member of the Subcommittee on Regulatory Reform.

Mr. Chair, I include in the Record a cost estimate for H.R. 277 prepared by the Congressional Budget Office.

Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Rutherford).

Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. McClintock), my good friend who serves on the Judiciary Committee.

Mr. Chair, I yield such time as she may consume to the gentlewoman from Florida (Mrs. Cammack), the sponsor of the REINS Act.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Posey), my good friend.

Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Tiffany).

Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman from Wisconsin for his comments, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, reasonable minds may differ about certain policies, but under the Constitution, we should all be on the same page about who should make law. Congress should make law.

Think about some of the laws that have been promulgated by the administrative branch, things that should have come to Congress. I got on an airplane a few years ago, and they said that Federal law requires that you wear a mask.

Do you know what I thought to myself? We never voted on that law. We should have voted on whether that should be a law or not. I would have voted ``no.''

It probably would not have passed, and if it had and our constituents decided it was too onerous, they could appeal to us, not some bureaucrat.

What are some other examples? The vaccine mandates that cost people their jobs. These were not laws passed by Congress. These were from the executive branch.

Then, tonight, we have just had two bipartisan votes to repeal executive branch rules, one on the pistol brace and one on stoves-- bipartisan.

What does that mean? That means if they had tried to bring those as laws through Congress as the Founders had intended, they would have failed because there would have been bipartisan opposition to that.

We should be making the laws here. It is very simple. When unelected, unaccountable, unrecallable bureaucrats write the laws, then the laws become more numerous and more onerous. We should pass the REINS Act and bring the constitutional authority back to Congress to pass legislation.

Mr. Chairman, I urge adoption of the bill, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Chair, I move that the committee do now rise.

Madam Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 463 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Madam Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentlewoman from Pennsylvania (Ms. Scanlon), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.

General Leave

Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Last night, the Rules Committee met and reported House Resolution 463, providing for the consideration of four measures: H.R. 277, H.R. 288, H.R. 1615, and H.R. 1640.

The rule provides for H.R. 277, the Regulations from the Executive in Need of Scrutiny Act, also known as the REINS Act, to be considered under a structured rule, and provides for 1 hour of general debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on the Judiciary or their respective designees. The rule makes 15 amendments in order.

The rule provides further for H.R. 288, the Separation of Powers Restoration Act, to be considered under a structured rule, and provides for 1 hour of general debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on the Judiciary or their respective designees. The rule makes one amendment in order.

Additionally, the rule provides for H.R. 1615, the Gas Stove Protection and Freedom Act, to be considered under a structured rule and provides for 1 hour of general debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on Energy and Commerce or their respective designees. The rule makes two amendments in order.

Finally, the rule provides for H.R. 1640, the Save Our Gas Stoves Act, to be considered under a structured rule and provides for 1 hour of general debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on Energy and Commerce or their respective designees. The rule makes three amendments in order.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Our constituents didn't elect us to come here and eat fancy dinners and go from one fundraiser to the next, take lavish trips, and rub elbows with important and famous people. They sent us here for one job: Pass laws or, in some cases, repeal laws. Set the rules under which they will live under; and then we are accountable every 2 years.

The Founders were very wise. Some people complain, but every 2 years our constituents have a chance to replace us if the rules we have set aren't in their favor. They have no such choice with bureaucrats.

Our Founders didn't set this system up for bureaucrats to make the laws. Excessive regulation stifles economic growth, hurts small businesses, and raises consumer prices.

In fact, much of the inflation that we see in the sectors of food and energy is due to overregulation. It is vital that Congress act to reduce our regulatory burden now, which raises consumer prices, reduces wages, and costs jobs.

I think the American people watching this debate are somewhat vexed that the other side of the aisle says we need to give up more power to the executive branch when they sent us here to do something, and they wonder why we are so feckless so often.

They are probably shaking their heads. What are these other people talking about that somebody else should make the rules that we live under?

The REINS Act would require congressional approval for regulations that have a major impact on our economy of more than $100 million, or lead to a raise in consumer prices, or adversely affect employment.

If the REINS Act becomes law, every major regulation promulgated by the administration will come back to Congress for our approval. These regulations, they are not just regulations, these have the force of law. You can go to prison for 10 years, as we have seen with the regulation on pistol braces, just because some bureaucrat decided they wanted to pass a regulation.

In fact, the jobs-crushing OSHA vaccine mandate was one of the things that we should have voted on. If you are going to do that to your constituents, vote on it. But we didn't. We let the executive branch do it.

The idea behind the REINS Act isn't novel. It is enshrined in the Constitution. Article I, Section 1 of the U.S. Constitution says: ``All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives.''

Does it say and a bureaucracy? No, it doesn't. Does is it say some legislative powers herein granted? No, it says all legislative powers herein granted are given to the Congress of the United States.

Congress has delegated its authority to unaccountable Federal agencies over the past decades, and our constituents are feeling that burden. Unelected bureaucrats do not have the constitutional authority to write laws, nor are they accountable to the people. They are career bureaucrats.

Our Congress has this power, and ceding it to the Federal agencies undermines our representative form of government.

Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. McCormick), my good friend.

Mr. Speaker, one of the arguments made from the other side of the aisle that I find absolutely laughable is this notion that the REINS Act might be unconstitutional, might have some constitutional infirmity because it requires Congress to pass the laws instead of the executive branch.

They reference a Supreme Court decision, INS v. Chadha, that doesn't even read on this bill. The REINS Act does not violate the Presentment Clause because it requires passage in the House, passage in the Senate, and a signature of the President. It doesn't even apply to the Supreme Court decision that was referenced.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Roy), my good friend.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to include in the Record a document titled: ``Gas stove use and respiratory health among adults with asthma in NHANES III,'' the conclusion of which is: ``Among adults with asthma, there was no apparent impact of gas stove use on pulmonary function or respiratory symptoms.''

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

Mr. Speaker, I would like to tell the story of how the REINS Act originated. It is one of the most popular bills in Congress. It is the one bill that would do the most to restore the constitutional balance of government.

It was an idea from Lloyd Rogers. Lloyd is a constituent of mine. He grew up in an orphanage where he met the girl who would later become his wife. They were married for 65 years.

Lloyd served during the Korean war. Lloyd came home and ran for county judge executive, where he served the people of Kentucky once again. Time after time, when he was trying to do the right thing for the people in Kentucky, he was frustrated by laws, but he dug into them. They weren't laws. They were rules, and he couldn't talk to his Congressman to get these things fixed so that he could govern locally.

He came up with the idea of the REINS Act, gave it to the Congressman who represented the district before me, and then that Congressman brought it here to Congress. That is the way laws are supposed to happen, not by some bureaucrat.

Mr. Speaker, I want to move on to the gas stove act here. Despite media gaslighting to the contrary, the Biden administration has effectively declared war on gas stoves using varying rationales.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Langworthy), my good friend.

Mr. Speaker, the other side of the aisle has said that nobody's gas stove is going to be banned. Let me read you a statement from Jeremy Ortiz, a spokesperson for the Department of Energy: Our ``analysis is constructed so that the proposed standard would ensure that products with at least one HIR burner and continuous grates can continue to be available on the market.'' Here is the punch line: ``We did go out of our way to make sure that these two features would remain on the market in creating our analysis. Over half the market would remain if this standard is finalized as proposed.''

Wow. They went out of their way. They bent over backward to make sure they were only going to ban half of the gas stoves on the market for now.

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

Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentlewoman from Florida (Mrs. Cammack).

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Make no mistake: This administration wants to ban gas stoves. They have said it out loud.

Mr. Speaker, 38 to 40 percent of Americans use gas stoves. I asked the ranking member of the committee of jurisdiction for these bills to save our gas stoves if he owns a gas stove. In fact, he does. I asked him: Does it meet the new standards? Would he be able to buy one in the market? He has no idea. He was offended that I would ask such a question.

We have two bills here to protect your gas stoves: The Gas Stove Protection and Freedom Act and the Save Our Gas Stoves Act.

The Federal Interagency Committee on Indoor Air Quality has never identified gas cooking stoves as contributing to asthma or respiratory illness, nor has the Consumer Product Safety Commission nor the EPA ever identified gas stoves as a significant contributor to adverse air quality or as a health hazard.

The other side of the aisle just doesn't like gas stoves. They are reaching for any reason to ban these things. They shouldn't. It is shortsighted.

Number one, what if everybody had an electric stove, how would they get the energy? Well, you would burn natural gas, as many States do-- most States do--in a turbine; you would generate electricity in a process that is hardly 50 percent efficient; then you would transmit it over power lines to the household, which could be hundreds of miles, at an efficiency of maybe 70 percent by the time it goes through all of the transformers, gets to the house, and then heats up the pot.

Why not take the natural gas to the house and burn it there directly?

Many consumers have identified that this is a lot more efficient, and that is what they do and that is why they have gas stoves. They are 3.4 times more affordable than electric stoves. Those who use gas for heating, cooking, and clothes drying on average save over $1,000 a year in their household. When the electricity goes out, when you have natural disasters, natural gas is there and usually available to offer lifesaving heat and to boil water.

I spent about 3 hours yesterday delving into the Department of Energy's regulations and their scientific basis for what they are doing because I wanted to know: How can one appliance that burns gas be more efficient than another appliance that burns gas?

If you expose CH4 in the presence of oxygen, you get a certain amount of Btus. Unless you have got some science project with a catalyst, you are going to get the same number of Btus from both stoves.

When I dug into it, here is what they want to do. They measured efficiency by heating up a pot of water, and they found that stoves with heavy grates or continuous grates that allow for more safety, they said those are less efficient because the grate heats up and less of your energy goes into your water.

Mr. Speaker, people aren't cooking water. They are cooking food. Those grates provide more heat as the food sits there on the stove. The continuous grates provide safety for somebody who is not strong enough to pick up a pan, yet they are saying those are less efficient.

Then in their studies, if you dig deep enough, they admit that a dogged pursuit of efficiency will result in stoves that are less healthy, because to make it more efficient, you shorten the grates and get the pan closer to the flame.

When the flame impinges on the pan, the gas doesn't combust efficiently, and you get carbon monoxide. If all you care about is efficiency, you get more carbon monoxide.

What are they doing? They are going after the high-end stoves. That is where they are going first, the ones with the heavy grates, the ones with the thick walls in the ovens that make it easier to cook good food. They are saying they are less efficient, but they are heating up water. They are not cooking food. They are making assumptions about customer preferences.

In the realm of electric stoves, they say: Induction stoves are more efficient. So we will just make everybody buy new pans because all of your pans don't work on induction stoves. So what, says the Department of Energy.

This is a war on stoves, and the war will be undone or stopped, halted, by the Gas Stove Protection and Freedom Act and the Save Our Gas Stoves Act.

I want to finish by talking about another bill in this rule, which is to restore the separation of powers. It is pretty simple. This bill is two pages long, and it is basically a legislative repeal of Chevron deference.

Chevron deference may go away soon anyway because it is based on a Supreme Court decision that said: Do you know what? If a regulatory agency does their best and makes a good guess about what they think the law is, then the court shouldn't second-guess the regulatory agency.

That is not the court's job. The court's job is to look at the law as written by Congress, not to say: Stretch it as far as you want, administrative branch.

The Separation of Powers Restoration Act would require the courts to look at all questions of law de novo, including interpretation of constitutional and statutory provisions.

Mr. Speaker, this is a wise bill. It should pass, and the rule for this should pass.

I also want to note, just in closing, that the American people don't understand why my colleagues want to give up power to the executive branch. They elected us to come up here and represent them, to live by the laws that we write, but also to be responsible for those laws when our constituents have to live under them.

It sounds absurd to the American people that we would want to give up that power that those people have entrusted to us.

Whether laws or the structure of government, if my colleagues just follow common sense, they know banning gas stoves isn't going to save the planet. It is going to increase prices. It is going to make it harder for low-income and middle-income families to get by if they have to buy more expensive appliances or if they have to cook their food longer. That is the result of these regulations.

All of that could be reined in with the REINS Act. That is what we need to do. We need to pass this resolution today and get these four bills on the floor. We have allowed amendments, and everybody under this rule has had 72 hours to read the bill. What a concept. Give the American people the time to read the bill, as well. We have read it. We know what these bills do. Put them on the floor.

Mr. Speaker, I urge a ``yes'' vote on all four bills and, most explicitly, a ``yes'' vote on this resolution.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the resolution.