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16Deletion of Sponsors From Public Bills and Resolutions
Daily Digest
Public Bills and Resolutions Introduced
81 public bills, H.R. 6165- 6245; and 8 resolutions, H. Res. 897-904 were introduced.
Pages H4872-76
Reports Filed
There were no reports filed today. Speaker: Read a letter from the Speaker wherein he appointed Representative Palmer to act as Speaker pro tempore for today.
Page H4821
Recess
The House recessed at 11:50 a.m. and reconvened at 12 p.m.
Page H4832
Guest Chaplain
The prayer was offered by the Guest Chaplain, Reverend Eamon Kelly, The Magdala Center, Magdala, Israel.
Page H4833
Recess
The House recessed at 12:22 p.m. and reconvened at 1 p.m.
Page H4835
Recess
The House recessed at 2:57 p.m. and reconvened at 5 p.m.
Page H4849
Researching Efficient Federal Improvements for Necessary Energy Refining Act
The House passed H.R. 3109, to require the Secretary of Energy to direct the National Petroleum Council to issue a report with respect to petrochemical refineries in the United States, by a yea-and-nay vote of 230 yeas to 176 nays, Roll No. 303.
Pages H4835-41, H4849-50
H. Res. 879, the rule providing for consideration of the joint resolutions (S.J. Res. 80), (H.J. Res. 130), (H.J. Res. 131), the concurrent resolution (H. Con. Res. 58), and the bills (H.R. 1949), (H.R. 3109), (H.R. 5107), and (H.R. 5214) was agreed to Tuesday, November 18th. Unlocking our Domestic LNG Potential Act of 2025: The House passed H.R. 1949, to repeal restrictions on the export and import of natural gas, by a yea-and-nay vote of 217 yeas to 188 nays, Roll No. 304.
Pages H4841-49, H4850-51
H. Res. 879, the rule providing for consideration of the joint resolutions (S.J. Res. 80), (H.J. Res. 130), (H.J. Res. 131), the concurrent resolution (H. Con. Res. 58), and the bills (H.R. 1949), (H.R. 3109), (H.R. 5107), and (H.R. 5214) was agreed to Tuesday, November 18th. Authorizing the use of Emancipation Hall in the Capitol Visitor Center for an event to unveil the statue of Barbara Rose Johns: The House agreed by unanimous consent to discharge from committee and agree to H. Con. Res. 62, authorizing the use of Emancipation Hall in the Capitol Visitor Center for an event to unveil the statue of Barbara Rose Johns.
Page H4851
Senate Referrals
S. 2741 was held at the desk. S. 2878 was held at the desk. S. 3022 was held at the desk. S. 222 was held at the desk. S. 351 was held at the desk. S. 1318 was held at the desk. S. 2110 was held at the desk. S. 2379 was held at the desk.
Pages H4841, H4854
Senate Messages
Messages received from the Senate appears on pages H4841 and H4854. Quorum Calls--Votes: Two yea-and-nay votes developed during the proceedings of today and appear on pages H4849-50 and H4850-51. Adjournment: The House met at 10 a.m. and adjourned at 8:57 p.m.
Every speech and line is the Congressional Record's own text, read from GovInfo. Speakers are matched to members by GPO's own metadata. Referandom places each turn on the Clerk's video by matching its words: 168 of 208 spoken turns were found. Turns without a time are still listed; they just can't seek.
Morning-Hour Debate
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the order of the House of January 3, 2025, the Chair will now recognize Members from lists submitted by the majority and minority leaders for morning-hour debate.
The Chair will alternate recognition between the parties, with time equally allocated between the parties and each Member other than the majority and minority leaders and the minority whip limited to 5 minutes, but in no event shall debate continue beyond 11:50 a.m.
Mr. Speaker, to God be all the glory. I rise today with a profoundly heavy heart to honor the life of Reverend Dr. T. Anthony Bronner, known to Buffalo's faith community as Bishop Bronner, who tragically passed away on Sunday, November 16.
Western New York, our State, and our Nation have lost a spiritual giant with Bishop Bronner's passing.
Personally, I have lost a dear friend, supporter, and mentor. He was a shepherd of souls and a North Star for our community, a man whose faith was matched by his integrity and whose integrity was matched by his love for all of God's children.
Bishop Bronner built a congregation deeply rooted in faith, compassion, and the unwavering belief that every single person is worthy of dignity, hope, and redemption.
When he founded Elim Christian Fellowship in 1999, Bishop Bronner did not just establish a house of worship. He created a place of refuge, a place of renewal, and a place for those searching for a spiritual home.
From the very first service at the old Buffalo Christian Center, where more than 700 community members stepped forward to join a vision rooted in Christ, Bishop Bronner understood that God was doing extraordinary work in western New York. He poured every ounce of himself into being a faithful servant to God.
Under Bishop Bronner's leadership, Elim's congregation grew each year, spreading the Gospel across our community. He oversaw the construction of new worship centers and affordable housing across our region and helped thousands of souls find Christ, purpose, and community.
He embodied fidelity to justice and walked the path of righteousness with conviction. Every morning, long before most were awake, Bishop Bronner led the Regional Morning Prayer Movement, a tradition that began decades ago and never stopped.
Through blizzards, a pandemic, and times of both tragedy and triumph, Bishop Bronner prayed. He prayed for Buffalo, for our Nation, for our leaders, and for our most vulnerable, whether they were in the pews or miles away. He prayed for people he knew and people he would never meet. He prayed because he knew that God hears us. He prayed because he knew that prayer works, and his prayers and faith through action changed our community forever.
Bishop Bronner embodied service and selflessness. He showed up for his family, his congregation, and our community with humble strength and ceaseless joy. He challenged all of us to be better, to lead with compassion, to stand firm in our values, and to root our service in moral clarity and love.
Bishop Bronner's passing leaves a tremendous void, but his legacy will serve as a foundation for our future, a foundation built on faith and community that will continue to uplift Buffalo and beyond for generations.
As we mourn Bishop Bronner's passing, we reaffirm our need to live by his example. In moments like this, we are reminded of the comfort and strength found in the words he often turned to in Psalm 23: ``The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: He leadeth me beside still waters. He restoreth my soul: He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for Thou art with me; Thy rod and Thy staff they comfort me. Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: Thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: And I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.''
Bishop Bronner lived these words every day, leading our community toward righteousness with courage, humility, and unwavering faith. Surely, he will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.
To his beloved wife, Lady Linda King-Bronner; their daughters, Jordan and Nia Bronner and Tami Brown; their granddaughter, Taylor Lucas; his loving parents, Reverend Sylvia and Charles B. Walker, Sr.; and his siblings,
May Bishop Bronner's work live on in each of us.
On behalf of a grateful community and nation, may Dr. T. Anthony Bronner rest in eternal peace.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize Jim Decker as he retires from the Warren County Chamber of Business and Industry.
Jim's professional life is deeply intertwined with the economic vitality of Warren County, Pennsylvania. Since 1989, he has served in some capacity with the Warren County Chamber of Business and Industry.
Since 1997, he has led the WCCBI as president and CEO. He also serves as executive director of the Warren County Development Association.
Jim is a native son of Warren County and a 1975 graduate of Warren Area High School. He proudly raised his family in Warren. He and his wife, Kathryn, have three adult children and many grandchildren.
Jim's dedication to Warren County is second to none. His community involvement is extensive, and he is a board member of numerous regional and State organizations, including but not limited to the Northwest Commission, the Northwest PA Job Connect, and the Leadership Warren County Steering Committee.
Jim has been a driving force behind major economic and recreational initiatives in the county, including the facilitation of the Warren County Industrial Complex, which is a business incubator that supports a dozen small to large midsized manufacturing tenants and is the financial anchor of the Warren County Chamber of Business and Industry.
Jim also oversaw the development of the 300 2nd Avenue Bank Building project, a key venture that now houses the Northern Pennsylvania Regional College and is a multimillion-dollar economic development rehabilitation project in the heart of downtown Warren.
A strong advocate for expanded outdoor opportunities, Jim has worked to make Warren County a prime destination. He was instrumental in expanding the Trails at Jakes Rocks mountain bike system, which features 35.2 miles of premier hiking and biking trails in the Allegheny National Forest. This is a significant regional asset that has an economic impact of more than $10 million annually.
Through Jim's efforts, Warren County has hosted major events, including the United States Canoe Association's national championships, Cabela's 3D Archery and Walleye championships, and the International Bowhunters Organization tournament.
This year, the Pennsylvania Association of Chamber Professionals gave Jim the Keystone Award. Established in 1963, it is the highest honor for the PACP awards. It recognizes outstanding service in and contributions to the profession of Chamber management in Pennsylvania. It is not awarded annually but only when an individual has demonstrated outstanding achievements.
Mr. Speaker, Jim's longstanding dedication and leadership have shaped Warren County for the better. He is the kind of leader who brings his vision to life through hard work but makes it look easy.
Warren County has become a dynamic community and recreational hub thanks to Jim's leadership. Jim is a steadfast pillar of the northwestern Pennsylvania region, and his legacy will be felt for generations.
While it is bittersweet to see Jim retire, I know that we will still see him around Warren, probably on his mountain bike, enjoying the outdoors. I wish him the best as he starts this new chapter of life.
Mr. Speaker, this past weekend, I visited the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum with my daughter. I had been before, but the timing of this visit was very intentional. I went to reflect on the horrific history of dehumanization and ethnic cleansing that ultimately led the world to create a new term to describe such an unfathomable evil. That word is ``genocide.''
During the Holocaust, 6 million Jewish people, 60 percent of those present in Europe, were brutally targeted, dehumanized, and systematically murdered. It is a crime that people, communities, and nations were aware of yet did little to nothing to stop the atrocities until it was far too late.
After the Holocaust, the international community made a commitment that such evil can never happen again to any people anywhere. ``Never again,'' they said.
That is why I recently signed on to a resolution recognizing Israel's actions in Gaza led by the Netanyahu government as a genocide. I joined this resolution with a heavy heart. I understand the pain and the history of the word, and I signed on with the utmost respect for the Jewish people, especially those in my community who may feel abandoned or deeply harmed by my action.
I will also be crystal clear that my criticizing the policies and actions of the Netanyahu government does not detract from my steadfast opposition to anti-Semitism and my persistent support for our Jewish neighbors.
Many in this body have been reticent to call out the mass suffering, ethnic cleansing, and war crimes taking place in Gaza. I will not willingly continue to be part of that complicity.
As a United States Representative, my job is to stand up against the power and our resources of this country being used in such ways.
I am a physician. I am a mother. I believe in the sanctity, the universal worth, of human life. That belief does not change based on who you are or where you live.
Each of our lives has innate, incalculable value. Our shared humanity must be recognized and preserved, or we run the risk of rationalizing and accepting acts of cruelty.
This principle, that we share an accountability to stand up against dehumanization, cruelty, and marginalization across our communities, should be universal, but it is not.
It is my duty as an elected leader in the most powerful country on Earth to stand up for those most marginalized if I stand for anything at all.
It is foundational to how I chose to represent my community and how I will continue to represent my community in Congress.
History has and will continue to judge this body, not just for what it did but for what it failed to do.
Our children are watching. As parents, we know this to be true. As elected leaders, we cannot look away as they look on. We have an implicit accountability to the children of this Nation, to show them with our actions that we hold ourselves to a standard worthy of their respect.
I want my children to live in a country where our leaders can be relied upon to lead with courage, empathy, and moral clarity.
I urge every Oregonian watching to hold me accountable in a shared, unshakable belief in the sanctity of human life. We are our brother's keeper. I will do all I can to protect and defend each person's right to freedom, safety, and self-determination.
Mr. Speaker, Zohran Mamdani's winning message was affordability, that the necessities of life are increasingly out of reach for most people, and that government is the answer.
He said on election night: ``There is no problem too large for government to solve.''
Mr. Speaker, he is right about the problem, but he is completely wrong about the solution. As Ronald Reagan often warned: ``Government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.''
Housing affordability is a good place to start. When and where a free market is maintained, homebuilders have every incentive to meet the housing needs at every income level. The profit margin might be bigger at the top, but the sheer numbers of lower income families compensate with volume, assuring ample affordable housing for all income levels.
Government sets basic safety standards but otherwise leaves consumers alone to make their own decisions about everything else. As the tax base grows, new revenues are available to expand water systems, electricity generation, highway capacity, schools, police, and fire, all the necessities of a community.
Landlords have every incentive to provide as many rental units as the population needs, while competition keeps rents low and demand keeps units plentiful.
What has happened? Government decided to solve what socialists viewed as problems.
To solve suburban sprawl, the socialists began imposing severe limits and costly fees on construction permits. Builders could no longer profit from building vast numbers of affordable homes, so they focused their limited permits on the pricier models.
To solve climate change, the socialists mandated outrageously expensive add-ons like solar panels and hermetically sealed windows.
To solve their environmental angst, they required pointless studies that were endlessly time-consuming and outrageously costly along with backbreaking, outrageous environmental fees, adding many tens of thousands of dollars to the costs that were all passed on to helpless homebuyers.
As these solutions drove up the price of housing, the socialists began offering subsidies to lower income earners who had been priced out of the market by the socialists' own policies. As taxpayer dollars flooded into the already constricted market, prices and rents rose still further. As socialists solved the rental problem by freezing rents, landlords stopped building new units or maintaining existing ones.
When anything is scarce, it is expensive. When it is plentiful, it is cheap. Socialists have made housing scarce and, therefore, expensive. Nowhere can this be seen more clearly than comparing the socialist utopia of California with the free State of Texas.
Last year, more housing permits were granted in the Houston and Dallas metropolitan areas than in all of Gavin Newsom's California. The median price of a home in Texas is $345,000. In California, it is $900,000.
Take healthcare. Americans once paid for their own healthcare. They could choose among policies offered by hundreds of competing providers for the one that best met their needs and circumstances. Most opted for inexpensive catastrophic plans for accidents and illnesses that could have bankrupted them, while paying for routine care out of pocket. Competition for their business kept prices low and quality high.
Socialists objected to leaving the poor to an extensive network of charities. They solved our healthcare inequalities with highly subsidized and mandated coverage that leaves consumers powerless to choose their own best options while severing the connection between the patient and the payer.
When somebody else is paying the bill, the patient doesn't care about price, and the payer doesn't care about quality. The result is costs spiraling out of control while patient satisfaction continues to decline.
At the center of socialism is the mistaken belief that profit is waste, and if it can be removed from the equation, everything will be cheaper. That is the fundamental misconception behind Mamdani's government grocery stores. Yet, profit is not waste. Profit is the essential ingredient that spurs competition, drives innovation, demands efficiency, and craves consumer satisfaction. Take profit out of the picture, and you have just learned the difference between FedEx and the post office.
Consumer electronics have steadily declined in cost while quality has steadily improved, precisely because the socialists have not yet decided to solve this market. When they do, you can expect the same high prices and decline in quality that they have already delivered in every field that they have solved, from housing to healthcare.
It comes down to four simple words: Freedom works. Socialism sucks.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize and congratulate Tracy Eubanks on his extraordinary leadership and decades of experience to Metrocrest Services.
For more than 40 years, Metrocrest has been a lifeline for families across Addison, Coppell, Carrollton, Farmers Branch, and Dallas, providing food security, housing stability, workforce support, and compassionate care in moments of crisis.
For the past 13 years, Tracy has guided this organization with vision, integrity, and a deep commitment to uplifting every member of our community.
Under Tracy's leadership, Metrocrest Services opened its new, state- of-the-art community center, an investment that will serve north Texas families for generations. He has strengthened partnerships, expanded critical programs, and ensured that every person who walked through Metrocrest's doors was met with dignity and hope.
As Tracy prepares for his retirement in 2026, we honor not just his accomplishments, but the countless lives he has touched. North Texas is stronger, more resilient, and more compassionate because of his service.
I thank Tracy for his leadership, his heart, and his unwavering commitment to the people of our community.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor County Treasurer Pauline Medrano for her extraordinary dedication to public service in her newly elected role as president of the County Treasurers' Association of Texas.
Treasurer Medrano has spent more than a decade in elected office, always putting the people of Dallas County first. Her leadership has helped to strengthen public institutions, increase transparency, and build a culture of accountability and service that has positively impacted countless residents.
Her election as president of the County Treasurers' Association of Texas is a testament to the respect she has earned across our State. It reflects her deep experience, her unwavering commitment to excellence, and a belief that government works best when it works for everyone.
Mr. Speaker, I am proud to recognize Treasurer Medrano for her years of leadership, her community involvement, and her tireless dedication to the people who she serves. Her willingness to answer the call of public service embodies the very, very best of civic leadership.
I wish her the best of luck as she takes on this new role on behalf of our community. I commend Treasurer Medrano for her invaluable contributions to Dallas County and to the State of Texas.
Mr. Speaker, the House voted last week on a bill to reopen the government, but tucked away in the fine print of that bill was something very disturbing and troubling: a very brazen payoff of millions of taxpayer dollars that could quietly be transferred to the personal bank accounts of eight Republican Senators. These are Senators who may have had knowledge or even participated in efforts to overturn the 2020 Presidential election.
At a time when Americans are struggling to get ahead, Republicans in both the House and the Senate signed off on a deal that lines the pockets of the very people who wrote it.
In every corner of my district, families are doing everything they can to make ends meet. They are juggling rising grocery costs, higher rents, and healthcare bills that seem to grow every single month. They expect this Congress to meet the moment with integrity, responsibility, and the basic respect for the people who we serve. What Republicans did was an insult to every hardworking taxpayer who plays by the rules and expects honesty from their government.
Republicans could have voted it down. They could have passed an
Now I am grateful that the House voted just last night to pass a bill to take this away, but there is no guarantee that the Senate will actually do that.
The American people deserve better than these corrupt, backroom deals. They deserve better than legislation crafted to enrich the few at the expense of the many, and they certainly deserve better than a governing philosophy that treats cruelty as strength and corruption as strategy.
The contrast before us could not be clearer.
On one side, we see a Republican majority operating in the currency of cruelty and corruption, willing to hold working families hostage, willing to cut healthcare, and willing to undermine transparency, all to score political points and reward political friends.
On the other side, Democrats are fighting with courage and compassion. We are fighting to protect the Affordable Care Act and to keep healthcare accessible for millions of Americans. We are fighting to lower costs for families and restore trust in a government that should be working for the people.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues in the Senate to reject this corrupt bargain and pass our bill that takes away this unethical and corrupt payout and to stand with the families who sent us here. These are families who deserve a government as honest, hardworking, and committed as they are.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the remarkable legacy of the Grundy High School wrestling program, a program which has proudly served as a cornerstone of Buchanan County athletics for decades.
With most of the county's high schools set to consolidate into a single school next year, this year marks the final chapter for Grundy's historic wrestling program.
Grundy's wrestling program leaves behind an extraordinary record, which includes 27 State championships and countless individual State titleholders, including nine winners for State titles just last season.
Year after year, these impressive athletes have demonstrated remarkable discipline and determination that reflect the very essence of southwest Virginia. The wrestling program at Grundy High School has not only gotten the attention of regional athletics in southwest Virginia. Its renowned success has become a national phenomenon, receiving press and attention from all over the United States.
In fact, Mr. Speaker, when I was first elected to Congress, an Ohio Congressman, Jim Jordan, who is a two-time wrestling NCAA champion, came over to me and asked if I now represented the great wrestling school from Virginia, Grundy High.
Student athletes from all Buchanan County high schools have contributed to a legacy that will inspire future generations of student athletes, and I look forward to watching them build on to their proud tradition.
Southwest Virginia, as a whole, congratulates Grundy High School on its historic wrestling achievements and extends a heartfelt thank you to the athletes, coaches, families, and extraordinary fans who made this legacy possible. They made it possible with their time, their dedication, and their donations.
A special nod goes to the Grundy Wrestling Club, a 501(c)(3) charity, that happens to support wrestling in the area.
Mr. Speaker, I hope that we recognize that as we come to the end of this chapter, it is not the end of the story for wrestling in the Grundy region and in Buchanan County but the beginning of a new one, rooted in the same values that carried Grundy High School to wrestling greatness.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today as Americans celebrate National Rural Health Day.
According to the Virginia Department of Health, 88 percent of Virginia is rural, including much of Virginia's Ninth District. As a result, communities face numerous barriers in the rural areas to receive adequate access and opportunities for healthcare.
Our rural healthcare providers do our country and our healthcare system a tremendous service, tending to the healthcare needs of rural communities.
I am committed to working to improve rural healthcare access in my time here in Congress.
Today, let all of us honor the profound contributions of these healthcare providers. I thank the doctors, nurses, advocates, and others who strive to make rural healthcare a possibility in America and to make America a truly healthy America in all regions.
Mr. Speaker, it is with a heavy heart that I rise to recognize the life of my longtime friend, fierce leader, and cancer community advocate, Lainie Jones.
Lainie was a seven-time cancer survivor and known on social media as The Early Detective. Lainie lost her lifelong battle against multiple cancers on October 14, 2025, at the age of 41.
Diagnosed with cancer for the first time at 18 months old, after her third diagnosis in her twenties, she discovered that she had Li- Fraumeni syndrome, or LFS, a rare genetic condition that predisposed her to multiple cancers.
Lainie faced adrenal carcinoma, sarcoma, breast cancer, thyroid cancer, melanoma, lung cancer, and, finally, glioblastoma, an aggressive form of brain cancer.
Through it all, she remained positive, ensuring others heard her story as she was deeply committed to the importance of early detection, prevention, and knowing one's risk.
For the last 13 years, Lainie worked with the American Cancer Society, using her story to educate and empower others to take control of their health.
She called herself The Early Detective on social media, believing that asking questions and acting early is what will help others survive.
As a cancer survivor myself, Lainie was always an inspiration to me and so many others in the south Florida community. She tried to help people see cancer as she saw it and not to fear it. Lainie undertook every challenge with a smile and was incredibly generous in sharing her inspirational story with so many people. She lived by the words ``live every day like it is your first.''
It is my honor to soon reintroduce the Lainie Jones Comprehensive Cancer Survivorship Act, which will seek to improve the health outcomes and quality of life for survivors.
Mr. Speaker, Lainie Jones was an inspiration and an example of how one must never lose hope, even in the darkest of circumstances. I hope her story and her spirit continue to inspire others across the country. May her memory be for a blessing.
Recognizing the City of Hollywood, Florida's, Centennial Celebration
Mr. Speaker, it is with great pleasure that I rise to recognize the city of Hollywood, Florida's, centennial celebration.
The city of Hollywood was founded by visionary Joseph Young in 1925 as a small seaside dream and has since grown into a charming coastal community and dynamic city.
Over the past century, Hollywood has become known for its beautiful beaches, historic Broadwalk, scenic waterways, and unique blend of natural beauty and urban vitality. It is one of south Florida's most unique and beloved coastal cities.
My husband, Steve, grew up in Hollywood so the city holds a special place in our hearts. Hollywood's residents represent generations of families, new arrivals, and innovators who have built a strong and sustainable community that embraces inclusion, civic engagement, and diversity.
Hollywood is also home to the Seminole Tribe of Florida, its reservation, and ancestral lands. We also honor the
The city of Hollywood is deeply committed to sustainability and innovation, ensuring that future generations can continue to enjoy the city's remarkable natural resources. The city's unique charm lies in its ability to balance progress with preservation.
This 100th anniversary is a time to honor the past and the efforts of those who came before us, as well as celebrate the achievements of today and the next 100 years.
Mr. Speaker, I am grateful to Mayor Josh Levy and the city commission for working tirelessly to ensure that Hollywood remains a world-class destination where residents thrive, businesses prosper, and visitors feel welcome.
Happy 100th anniversary to Hollywood and all its residents.
Mr. Speaker, I rise in observance of today, November 20, as World Pancreatic Cancer Day.
It is a time to shine light on the devastating impact of this disease and dedicate ourselves to improving prevention, early detection, and treatment.
Pancreatic cancer is the third leading cause of cancer-related deaths in the United States and is on track to becoming the second by 2030. Over 67,000 Americans are diagnosed each year with pancreatic cancer.
Like so many Americans, I know all too well the terrible impact of this disease. In 2021, I lost my dear mother, Nancy Gardner Sewell, to pancreatic cancer.
By the time we caught it, the cancer had already spread. She passed away just 8 weeks after her diagnosis. In an effort to turn my pain into purpose, I have committed myself to doing everything I can to prevent other families from enduring such a painful loss.
Along with my friend Congressman Jodey Arrington, I am proud to be leading H.R. 842. In the 118th Congress, Congressman Arrington introduced our bill and surprised me by renaming it after my mother, the Nancy Gardner Sewell Medicare Multi-Cancer Early Detection Screening Act.
Our bill would create a pathway for Medicare to cover multiple cancer early detection tests. Medicare will cover that by making sure that once it is approved by the FDA, it immediately becomes available to Medicare patients. This is so important because the promise of screening for more than 40 cancers lies with a simple blood test.
If passed, it will give our seniors their best shot at catching cancer early and treating it before it spreads. Just 2 months ago, our bill passed unanimously out of the House Ways and Means Committee. It enjoys overwhelmingly bipartisan support with 332 House cosponsors and 67 Senate cosponsors.
Later today, I look forward to convening lawmakers, researchers, advocates, and families for a roundtable on the latest developments in prevention, early detection, and treatment. I thank the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network, the American Cancer Society, and all of the more than 500 stakeholders for all of their efforts. I am so grateful for the tireless work of our cancer advocates. Without them, this bill would not enjoy such broad bipartisan support.
As we wear purple today in honor of World Pancreatic Cancer Day, I ask my colleagues to join me in supporting H.R. 842, the Nancy Gardner Sewell Multi-Cancer Early Detection Act.
Mr. Speaker, let's get this bill across the finish line and pave the way for the world without pancreatic cancer.
Mr. Speaker, I rise to recognize today as National Rural Health Day.
As the daughter of Alabama's rural Black Belt, I know firsthand the challenges that our rural communities face when it comes to accessing quality, affordable healthcare.
For too many patients in rural America, getting seen by a doctor requires driving miles to the nearest hospital or health center. Broken payment systems and workforce challenges have put an enormous strain on our healthcare system.
In Congress, I am proud to be leading legislation that will tackle these challenges. Our Graduate Medical Education bill will add thousands of residency slots, creating a pipeline of qualified health professionals to serve patients in rural America.
Our Save America's Rural Hospitals Act takes important steps to ensure that rural hospitals are fairly reimbursed for their services. The Home Health Stabilization Act will allow more seniors to receive the care that they need in the comfort of their own homes.
I am also working hard to expand access to telehealth services, mental health, and substance use programs, and support our rural ambulance providers. It is so important that our rural ambulance providers know the importance that they have in rural America.
Mr. Speaker, when it comes to healthcare, our rural communities are on life support. Republicans' so-called big, beautiful bill makes the largest cut to healthcare in American history. Despite the dysfunction in Washington, we in Alabama are fortunate to have amazing partners standing in the gap.
Just last month, I was thrilled to attend the groundbreaking of the Alabama School of Healthcare Sciences in Demopolis, Alabama. This new state-
I believe that access to quality, affordable healthcare should be a right for all Americans and not just for the few. As we observe National Rural Health Day, let us recommit ourselves to ensuring that every American, regardless of their ZIP Code, gets the care that they need and that they deserve.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the life of Juan Fernandez, a decorated marine, retired NYPD detective, and 9/11 first responder who passed away after a courageous battle with 9/11-induced pancreatic cancer.
As a marine, he proudly served our Nation with honor and discipline. Following his military service, Juan continued his commitment to protecting his community by serving as a detective in the New York Police Department where he was known for his courage and professionalism.
On September 11, 2001, Juan was among the many brave first responders who answered the call in one of our Nation's darkest hours. His courage and selflessness during and after that tragic day exemplified true strength and the resilience of the American spirit.
Juan's passing is a tremendous loss to his family, his friends, and those who served alongside him.
My thoughts are with his wife, Lily, and his daughters, Sydney, Samantha, and Jessica, during this difficult time. May his memory be a blessing to all who knew him and to our country.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the life of Francis ``Frank'' Duffy, a devoted husband, father, and pillar of his community, who passed away on November 4 at the age of 102.
Frank was a decorated World War II veteran, earning both the Silver Star and the Purple Heart for his valor while serving on Iwo Jima. He concluded his military career at the rank of corporal.
Upon returning home from war, Frank embarked on a career with the United States Postal Service, retiring in 1978 as a foreman for transportation.
Frank was an active member of Pearl River VFW Post 7370, John H. Secor American Legion Post, Ancient Order of Hibernians, Irish Cultural Center, and St. Margaret's Church, and he was a past member of the Knights of Columbus.
A proud father of 5, loving grandfather of 10, and great-grandfather of 11, Frank exemplified the values of steadfast wisdom and enriched the lives of all he touched within the Pearl River community and beyond.
Mr. Speaker, may God bless the memory of Frank Duffy.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the life and legacy of the Honorable John Sweeny, Jr., a true steward of justice, integrity, and service in Putnam County and across New York State.
Justice Sweeny dedicated his life to the law and to the people it serves. From his early days as administrative assistant district attorney in Putnam County to his distinguished tenure on the New York State Supreme Court and Appellate Division, First Department, where he made history as the highest ranking judge ever to hail from Putnam County, John embodied fairness, humility, and an unwavering commitment to justice.
John was a man of quiet grace and deep intellect, a mentor to many, and a true gentleman in every sense of the word.
Beyond the courtroom, he gave selflessly to his community, from supporting veterans and first responders to volunteering at local fairs and serving with the Friendly Sons of St. Patrick.
On a personal level, he was extremely gracious and supportive of me, and I will never forget it.
Mr. Speaker, to his beloved wife, Alana, his children, and all who knew and loved him, our community shares in your loss and celebrates a life so well lived.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the life of Vincent Altieri, a dedicated community leader and longtime public servant.
Before joining Rockland County, Vince worked with the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, advocating for environmental policy. He also served as a judge in the village of Spring Valley, where he will be remembered for his fairness, integrity, and respect for the rule of law.
Vince went on to dedicate more than 18 years of service to Rockland County, serving in the county executive's office as the intergovernmental relations director and later going on to serve as the executive director of the Rockland County Drainage Agency, showcasing his true commitment to improving the lives of his communities.
Vince's passing is a tremendous loss to Rockland County, and my thoughts are with his family and friends. His integrity, leadership, and passion for public service will be deeply missed.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the life of Donna Breen Clarke, who passed away peacefully on October 25, surrounded by her beloved family.
A proud graduate of Marymount Academy and Marymount College in Tarrytown, New York, Donna dedicated her life to the education and enrichment of the young minds of our community.
Donna started her career at Marymount International School in Surrey, England, before returning home to teach first graders in Mount Kisco following her marriage to her beloved husband, Joseph Clarke, in the summer of 1962.
Donna went on to serve as a preschool teacher and then director of the Nauraushaun Cooperative Nursery School in Pearl River, where she educated thousands of students, including me. Whether through educating the next generation or through her active involvement in St. Aedan's Church, Donna was deeply committed to her community.
A proud mother of three and loving grandmother of seven, Donna lived a life defined by compassion.
Mr. Speaker, may God bless the memory of Donna Breen Clarke and her husband, Joe, and may God continue to comfort her family.
Mr. Speaker, James M. Bernhard, Jr., was a legend in Louisiana. The headlines called him an icon, a titan, a giant of a man. Those who knew him understood why. He was a builder, a problem solver, and, at his core, a man of faith.
Jim was a proud LSU Tiger, graduating in construction management. He loved to tell the story of realizing at the last minute that he was 3 hours short of the credits he needed to graduate. Facing that problem, he decided to test out of a bowling class by scoring a 200, despite barely ever bowling before. In true Jim fashion, with determination and a high tolerance for risk, he figured out how to make it work and to graduate.
After LSU, he went to work for the family business, where every new employee had to start by installing toilets and air-conditioners. As the family's first college graduate and someone who had already done that work since high school, the rule didn't sit right with him. He turned down the offer to join and joined Southeast Fabricators as their first salesman.
On his first day, he picked up the Yellow Pages and got to work. He quickly discovered the company's prices were far too high to compete in south Louisiana. With no formal authority, he restructured the company's operations. By age 26, he was a corporate vice president and member of the board.
In 1986, he faced another challenge. Health insurance premiums were raised on workers, including two employees
That company grew into The Shaw Group, a Fortune 500 global engineering powerhouse headquartered in Baton Rouge, at the time, the only non-utility Fortune 500 company in Louisiana. His success brought offers from other States to relocate. With millions of dollars on the table, he refused every one of them.
Jim was Louisiana through and through. His love for the State fueled his political engagement. After years of resisting pressure to get involved in politics, he finally told his board of directors that he was a proud Democrat, to their surprise, and devoted himself to pushing leaders to feed and educate children of all backgrounds, expand healthcare, and lift Louisiana forward.
Jim helped elect two Governors, the first Black mayor of Baton Rouge, and dozens of others across the State. He proudly served as the chairman of the Louisiana Democratic Party.
For years, many waited for Jim to run for Governor or the Senate. His son, one of my most trusted advisers, Tres--you know Tres--told me a secret. He said he was never going to run. He preferred challenging the rest of us to do better. His door was open to Democrats and Republicans alike who wanted to improve the lives of people.
When he retired from Shaw, he faced another problem: what to do next. He founded Bernhard Capital Partners, now one of the largest employers in my district. Remembering that family's business whose terms he once rejected, he joined his brother and transformed it into the largest energy-as-a-service provider in the United States.
Jim's impact stretches far beyond business. Louisianans will tell you Jim pumped the water out of New Orleans after Katrina. He helped build Category 5-strength levees that now protect the city. He built power plants that power America, paid living wages to tens of thousands of workers, expanded broadband for children in Baton Rouge during the pandemic and, with his beloved wife, Dana, founded the Every Kid a King Foundation to serve the children of Louisiana.
None of that compares to what he cherished most: his family. Dana was the great love of his life, his partner, protector, and companion until his last breath. His pride in his children, Tres, Kathryn, Patrick, Michael, and Benjamin, was immeasurable, even if he did joke about two of them going to Ole Miss. He taught them that determination, work ethic, and comfort were risks and that they should continue to live and do the right thing.
He adored his grandchildren, Ainsley, Jack, Remi, Sloane, Blake, Violet, IV, and Ella, and carried bottomless hopes for each of them.
Louisiana has lost one of its greatest champions. Jim Bernhard dedicated his life to improving this State and the lives of people.
Now, when we face a problem, big or small, we honor him by doing what he always did. He solved it.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor a Kentucky hero, Chief Herbert D. Proffitt, and his son, Jeff Proffitt, who has worked tirelessly to ensure his father's sacrifice is never forgotten.
Chief Proffitt served our Nation in Korea and then protected the people of Tompkinsville, Kentucky, for 55 years in law enforcement. Years after he left the force, Chief Proffitt was murdered by a criminal he had arrested and put behind bars over a decade earlier. When his family sought Federal death benefits provided to families of fallen officers, they were denied because Proffitt was retired at the time of his death.
This exposed a painful loophole in the system and one that I am fighting to correct. I am leading the Chief Herbert D. Proffitt Act, legislation to amend the Public Safety Officers' Benefits Program to ensure that the families of retired law enforcement officers who are killed as a result of their service are not unjustly denied benefits.
I thank Jeff Proffitt and the entire Proffitt family for their many years of service to Tompkinsville and Monroe County. I urge my colleagues to support this bill because it is our solemn duty to support the families of fallen law enforcement officers and make sure that the service and sacrifice of heroes like Chief Herbert D. Proffitt are never forgotten.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize a true pillar of Kentucky's signature thoroughbred horse racing industry.
Recently, Mr. Robert N. Clay was selected by The Thoroughbred Club of America as its 2025 Honor Guest, a well-deserved accolade that reflects a lifetime of excellence and leadership in our great Commonwealth's signature horse racing industry.
The founder of world-renowned Three Chimneys Farm in 1972, Clay built a legacy of breeding champions, supporting local jobs, and setting the standard for others to follow. Stallions to stand stud at Three Chimneys' during Clay's tenure included Slew of Gold, who was the operation's first stallion; Triple Crown winner Seattle Slew; and classic winners Silver Jones, Smarty Jones, Point Given, and Big Brown, as well as breed shapers Dynaformer and Rahy.
His contributions reach beyond the track. They reflect what Kentucky stands for: tradition, hard work, and community.
Today, we honor Mr. Clay not only for his success in breeding and racing, but also for being a model Kentuckian.
A descendant of former Speaker of the House Henry Clay, the great compromiser, Robert Clay recently helped to establish the Henry Clay Center for Statesmanship, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization dedicated to transforming the tone of our country's national discourse and inspiring current and future leaders to emulate the political legacy of Henry Clay to find common ground through beneficial compromise.
On behalf of the people of Kentucky and this House, I thank Mr. Robert Clay for his life's work. I congratulate him on this honor, and I look forward to witnessing the enormous positive impact his efforts will continue to make on our Commonwealth.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of the resolution condemning socialism and reaffirm my commitment to the principles of free market capitalism. These are principles that have guided the United States into becoming the most prosperous nation in the history of the world.
For more than two centuries, America's free enterprise system has lifted more people out of poverty, created more opportunity, and generated more innovation than any other economic model the world has ever known. American GDP has grown more than a hundredfold since 1920. Average life expectancy has risen dramatically. American workers today enjoy standards of living that socialist economies could never deliver.
Contrast that with socialism. Wherever socialism has been tried--the former Soviet Union, Eastern Europe, Maoist China, Cuba, and Venezuela--it has produced the same tragic pattern: economic collapse, shortages, lost freedoms, and human suffering. Venezuela, one of the most wealthy countries in Latin America, saw its economy contract by over 75 percent after adopting socialist policies, destroying its currency and plunging millions into poverty.
Mr. Speaker, free markets empower individuals. Socialism empowers the state. Socialism requires coercive power. To plan effectively, socialist central planners must override individual choices. This expands state power and threatens political freedom.
Capitalism, in contrast, is the only system capable of using dispersed knowledge, preserving individual freedom, and enabling spontaneous social cooperation without central direction. Under free enterprise, businesses compete, innovate, and create, driving American leadership in everything from technology to agriculture to energy.
Free markets and capitalism gave birth to the American Dream that is
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support this resolution. Let's send a clear message that the United States will always stand for freedom over government coercion, markets over mandates, and prosperity over poverty.
Mr. Speaker, although my heart hangs low, I rise today to honor the life and legacy of Ms. Helen Rucker. This week, she passed at the young age of 93.
Now, despite the challenges that Helen faced throughout her life, Helen Rucker worked very hard to become the somebody who was a sustainer of Seaside, California, the educator of our community, and the epitome of our democracy.
Helen faced blatant racial discrimination in her formative years. As a child in Louisiana, she was turned away from the local public library to being a college graduate and experiencing some of the same type of bigotry when she applied for her first job as a librarian.
Rather than being despondent, she was driven to make a difference with education not just in her life, but in our lives.
She worked for decades as a teacher and a librarian. She served as a Seaside city councilmember, a school board member, and a trustee with our local school district.
Outside of her job, she delved deeper into our community by volunteering on such important and challenging issues as civil rights, prison education, HIV prevention, police reform, affordable housing, and so much more.
Helen Rucker was an influencer well before the internet was around. She wasn't about clicks or likes. Instead, she was about organizing and galvanizing people. She wasn't about dividing people, but Helen Rucker was all about bridging our divides.
Even with all of that service and all of that activism, what she came to realize early on was that the key to change was our democratic process. She realized that it wasn't about yelling and screaming. She understood that it is all about working, sweating, and ensuring everybody has the opportunity to do what every American should do, and that is vote and get out the vote.
Rather than agonize, she organized--voting, voter education, voter registration--and she founded Seaside's Voter Education Center. Just like we saw in our recent elections, Helen understood that voting is how we make change. That is how we protect our community, and that is how we move our country forward.
No doubt that Helen Rucker faced so many challenges throughout her life, but rather than capitulate, she campaigned. Rather than demonize or disparage her opponents, she always chose civility and upheld the values of our democracy.
As we enter into this next election year, let us be reminded, let us reflect, and let us be reinvigorated by the impactful life of Helen Rucker. More importantly, though, let her rest peacefully as all of us strive to live up to her legacy by always voting in our democracy.
Madam Speaker, I rise today in honor of Tiffani Jaseph, who was honorably named the 2026 Arizona Teacher of the Year. Tiffani serves as a special education teacher at Copper View Elementary School in the Sahuarita Unified School District.
Tiffani received her bachelor of arts and masters from the University of Arizona and began her career in general education, later finding that her true passion resides in special education. Fifteen years later, Tiffani has now taught in three Arizona school districts, providing specially designed instruction in her classroom while also supporting students' needs in general education.
She emphasizes inclusive, strengths-based instruction tailored to a variety of learning styles. Before this honor, Tiffani was named the school's Teacher of the Year and has also been a finalist for District Teacher of the Year.
The Arizona Teacher of the Year award is the highest State-level recognition for public school educators. Now, Tiffani will join other State Teachers of the Year from across the entire country in a year of professional learning and a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
Congratulations to Tiffani. I thank her for all she has done to earn this prestigious award. Arizona's Sixth Congressional District is very lucky to have her.
Madam Speaker, I rise today in honor of Cochise College being ranked the number one community college in Arizona, an honor that faculty, students, alumni, and all Arizonans should be very proud of.
Cochise Community College has two campuses and four centers in Cochise County and is known for its affordable tuition, small class size, and programs that lead to real-world success. Cochise College embraces what all colleges should strive to be in this amazing country.
A product of community college myself, I know firsthand that Cochise College remains committed to helping students create bright futures. Cochise College provides both university transfer programs for those wanting to continue education and also offers workforce-ready certificates designed to prepare graduates for immediate employment in southern Arizona's growing job market.
I am honored to represent Cochise College in Arizona's Sixth Congressional District, and I am incredibly proud of their hard work and commitment to excellence.
Congratulations to President James Perey, the board, the faculty, the staff, and all the students that make Cochise College what it is today.
Madam Speaker, I rise today in honor of Pinal County's 150th birthday. Older than the State of Arizona, Pinal County was formed from portions of Maricopa and Pima Counties on February 1, 1875.
While mining in the county was the most dominant force back then, Pinal County's economy has exponentially grown and expanded over time, but agriculture remains a significant part of the county's economy, while large-scale farming operations and ag research also prevail.
Pinal County has experienced significant population growth in recent decades, becoming one of the fastest-growing counties in the entire country. The county's location, infrastructure, and pro-business environment are key factors in its expedited growth and in its development.
The beauty of Pinal County is diverse. With a landscape including both mountains and desert valleys, Pinal County is home to the Casa Grande Ruins National Monument, Picacho Peak, and way, way more.
It is an honor to represent Pinal County in Congress. Happy 150th birthday to Pinal County.
Madam Speaker, I rise today to congratulate Bishop William E. Dickerson II and Lady Luella Dickerson, who are role models in love and service, on their 36 years of selfless service and spiritual stewardship as founding pastor and lady of the Greater Love Tabernacle in Dorchester.
Across the city of Boston and the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, the names Bishop Dickerson and Lady Luella have been synonymous with truth, justice, and love. Their love of community and love for all God's children is evident in their spiritual guidance every Sunday and made manifest in their good deeds in the community Monday through Saturday.
From the pulpit to the classroom, from city hall to behind the incarcerated walls, Bishop Dickerson and Lady Luella have saved generations of souls;
It is only fitting that Greater Love Tabernacle's 36 years of service are now an indelible part of the Congressional Record to serve as a permanent inspiration to us all.
Madam Speaker, I rise to honor the life and legacy of the Honorable Judge Leslie Harris, a father, husband, grandfather, mentor, and champion for justice in Massachusetts.
Raised in Chicago, he journeyed to Boston, where he earned advanced degrees, planted roots, and dedicated his life to public service. In the courtroom, first as a probation officer, then as a public defender, then as the chief of the juvenile division of the Suffolk County DA's Office, Judge Harris inspired generations.
He possessed a fine legal mind and an altruistic heart. He saw every person as worthy of dignity, opportunity, and compassion. He will forever be remembered as a kind titan of a man who showed up for everyone, for his beloved members of the Eliot Church of Roxbury, and for students at Roxbury Community College.
He was there for young children experiencing abuse and neglect. He was there defending Black men viciously targeted and criminalized in the Charles Stuart case. He was there supporting marriage equality to facilitate the first-ever adoption by a gay couple in Massachusetts. He was there for people from all walks of life.
I can feel that he is here with us today. His spirit straightens our back and lifts our chin to motivate us in the pursuit of justice. May he rest in peace and power.
Madam Speaker, I rise today to honor the life and legacy of my dear friend and brother, former Newton Mayor Setti Warren, a trailblazer, the first popularly elected Black mayor in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
Setti was a loving son, brother, husband, and father whom I had the privilege of working alongside closely when we were both aides to United States Senator John Kerry. He was always ready with thoughtful counsel, an easy and deep laugh, and kind eyes that twinkled. He radiated life and optimism.
Setti accomplished so much in his short 55 years here with us. He was a dedicated mayor, veteran, and public servant from the White House to Capitol Hill to city hall. As the director of the Harvard Institute of Politics, he led pivotal conversations that stoked our consciousness and reminded us of our shared humanity, all the while inspiring a new generation of public service leaders.
Setti had so much life left to live, milestones to experience, hearts to touch and lives to change. My heart goes out to his wife, Tassy; and their children, Abigail and John. Know that your Kerry family, your Boston College family, the city of Newton, and your Harvard family mourn alongside you. What a tremendous loss for our country, our Commonwealth, and for humanity. Rest in power, my friend.
Madam Speaker, I rise today to recognize Ken Stewart.
Ken is a proud resident of Ohio's Second Congressional District and a former firefighter with the Batavia Fire Department. Ken spent over four decades with the department, working his way up from lieutenant to chief.
This past summer, at the age of 85, Ken participated in the 2025 World Police and Fire Games, an Olympic competition specifically for first responders that draws competitors from around the world. Ken excelled in javelin throwing, high jump, and many other track events, ultimately contributing 9 medals to the total of 1,362 brought home by Team USA. Of his nine medals, three were gold and six were silver.
Not only is Ken an accomplished athlete and public servant, but he was my science teacher at Amelia Middle School. I loved having him as a teacher. It is wonderful to see him continue to achieve greatly and inspire others around him.
Ken worked tirelessly to prepare for the games by exercising at his local YMCA every day and allowing the thrill of competition to drive his desire to win. Ken reminds us all how important it is to keep moving and take care of ourselves so we can make the most of life at any age.
Ken has centered his life around athletics, having been a high school track and field official for 47 years and track coach for 60 years in Clermont County. Ken even had the amazing opportunity to officiate the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia. His dedication to improving the lives of young people is admirable.
Mr. Speaker, coaches and officials play a key role in shaping the attitudes and beliefs of our Nation's youth, and my district is lucky to have many people like Ken to look out for our athletes.
Madam Speaker, after a long and successful career, Ken plans to retire from athletic events. To celebrate his achievements and his dedication to his community, the Village of Batavia is naming July 14 ``Ken Stewart Day.'' I look forward to being in Batavia next year to celebrate. We congratulate Ken. All of southern Ohio is very proud of him.
Madam Speaker, I rise today to recognize Billy Ray ``Daddy-O'' Midkiff and his extraordinary service to southern Ohio. Ray began serving as a volunteer firefighter in 1977 with the Wilkesville Volunteer Fire Department, and he became a charter member of the Salem Township Volunteer Fire Department. He has over 50 years of service including several years as fire chief for Salem Township.
Ray's roots in the community run deep, as he has also worked as a dairy farmer and coal miner for the Southern Ohio Coal Company. Ray has received numerous awards such as the National Grange Volunteer Firefighter of the Year and was deemed a Hometown Hero by Modern Woodmen. To this day he is an active fire chief and continues to give back to southern Ohio.
Madam Speaker, America is forever grateful for people like him and the millions of other first responders who put their lives on the line for us every day. All of southern Ohio thanks Ray for his service.
Madam Speaker, Chaco Canyon is sacred ground. It is the ancestral homeland and living landscape to both Pueblo and Dine people. It is a World Heritage Site, a place of ancient ruins, kivas, and sacred lands as far as the eye can see. It is a place that is a mere 50 miles south of the San Juan River where I was born.
I rise today in solidarity with Tribal leaders from across New Mexico to say that it is time to protect Chaco Canyon and these sacred lands. Before our very eyes, the Trump administration is trying to open these sacred lands to oil and gas drilling that would irrevocably destroy them.
Can my colleagues imagine? This is one of the most sacred sites, not just in New Mexico but in North America. It is a place that Secretary Deb Haaland worked to set aside in 2023 and a place which the New Mexico delegation is seeking to permanently protect.
As Pueblo leaders tell us, Chaco holds the footprints of our ancestors. Countless generations have carried forward their teachings and traditions. As Navajo leaders have said, it is a landscape deeply embedded in our way of life and which protects the living community, youth, elders, and our culture.
Even as Tribal leaders are saying no, this administration is forging ahead to open these lands to desecration of sites that could never be recovered.
Madam Speaker, we call on this administration to stop. These sites are sacred. We call on the American people to join us in this fight. We must protect Chaco Canyon, and Chaco Canyon is not for sale.
Madam Speaker, I have taken to the floor today to respond to Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries calling me a ``stone-cold liar'' during a press conference defending the recent discovery of Democrats' communication with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
I bring with me something that he and many of his fellow Democrats-- Democrats like Jamie Raskin, Jasmine Crockett, and Stacey Plaskett-- apparently detest, which is a thing called evidence.
Tuesday, I gave a speech on the House floor detailing my House Oversight Committee's good work to date on our Epstein investigation. After all, Hakeem Jeffries, the Democrats in Congress, and their allies in the corporate media have been demanding a full release of the Epstein documents for months, including all the documents from the Epstein estate.
Without hesitation, I subpoenaed all of the Jeffrey Epstein estate documents because I, as well as my Republican colleagues on the House Oversight Committee, want to know what really happened. We want to know what went on and who was involved in these unspeakable crimes. We want justice for the survivors. That is why we are doing this investigation.
The House Oversight Committee obtained over 30,000 pages of documents from the estate. Unlike the Democrats, who only released 10 of those over 30,000 pages of documents, Republicans on the House Oversight Committee released every single document on the website for the American people to see.
Democrats and many in the media were anxiously clutching their pearls in anticipation of potential dirt on President Trump. In the end, after full transparency by the Republicans on the Oversight Committee, there was nothing new about the President's former relationship with Epstein and certainly nothing scandalous. We did find two sitting Democrat Members of Congress had communication with Epstein.
First, it has been highly reported and debated about Congresswoman Stacey Plaskett texting during an Oversight Committee hearing with Jeffrey Epstein, while trying to conspire with him to hurt or embarrass Donald Trump. According to Jamie Raskin, that was okay because Mr. Epstein was her constituent. How embarrassing a rationale is that?
The second communication was this email right here where Hakeem Jeffries' campaign reached out directly to Jeffrey Epstein, soliciting campaign dollars for the ``Brooklyn Barack.'' Now, whereas Jamie Raskin explained Plaskett's communication with Epstein as simply responding to a constituent, Hakeem Jeffries had a very different response when asked about it by the media. He denied its existence. Hakeem Jeffries said Comer is a stone-cold liar. Then he reverted to calling me names for the second week in a row.
Let's read it to make sure. It is to Jeffrey Epstein. That is the real Jeffrey Epstein, not Jasmine Crockett's Jeffrey Epstein. This is the real Jeffrey Epstein. It is from Hakeem Jeffries' campaign.
It ends with a number for Jeffrey Epstein to call to go to the dinner and ``get an opportunity to get to know Hakeem better.''
Here is the evidence. The email speaks for itself. The only stone- cold liar in this debate is Hakeem Jeffries.
Madam Speaker, I ask Mr. Minority Leader to take a deep breath, chill out, stop lying, stop with the juvenile name calling, and own up to the fact that his campaign solicited campaign cash from Jeffrey Epstein.
Madam Speaker, I rise today to honor the profound courage and sacrifice of a woman whose story embodies the enduring struggle for freedom and human dignity in Iran, a woman known simply and lovingly as Aziz, meaning ``dear'' or ``beloved.'' Her full name is Aziz Rezaee, and she is a mother of resistance.
Aziz was born Zahra Norowzi in 1929 in Tehran. Like many mothers around the world, she married young, raised a large family, and worked to give her children a better future.
The tides of Iranian history pulled her family into the heart of political repression and terror. Aziz endured a heartbreak that no parent should ever face, which is the loss of nine members of her family: three sons, two daughters, and two sons-in-law. They were all killed across two successive dictatorships that feared the voices of those seeking democracy and basic rights. This happened first under the Shah and later under the clerical regime that replaced him.
Her children's only so-called crime was their involvement in Iran's democratic opposition movement, a movement that dared to say that the people of Iran deserved liberty, justice, and respect for human rights.
During the rule of the Shah, three of Aziz' children were imprisoned and tortured. One was killed in the street by secret police.
Aziz herself was arrested in 1975 and spent more than 3 years in prison. She was tortured. She was flogged. She was hung upside down. She was forced into solitary confinement. Yet, she never broke. The scars on the soles of her feet remain today, living proof of the cruelty she endured for simply wanting freedom for her people.
Her son, Mehdi, only 19 years old when arrested, refused to bow to the torture inflicted on him. In a rare public trial before foreign journalists, he exposed the brutal acts of the regime and pledged his life to the poor and oppressed in Iran. That defiance cost him his life, but his voice continues to echo.
After the 1979 revolution, the Iranian people hoped for democracy. Instead, a new tyranny rose, one just as ruthless as the one before. The new regime once again targeted Aziz' family.
In 1982, her daughter, Azar, 6 months pregnant, and her husband were killed in a raid by the Revolutionary Guard. Aziz fled the country, forced into exile, where she continued her fight from abroad. Years later, more of her family members were executed.
Madam Speaker, how much can one mother bear? How many sacrifices must one family make for freedom? Despite the unimaginable loss, despite being denied the right to return home, Aziz has never surrendered her hope for a democratic and free Iran.
Today, in her nineties, living in a modest apartment on the outskirts of Paris, she remains steadfast. She continues to speak out. She continues to believe. She says: ``The movement to liberate Iran hasn't died. It is strong. It is alive. We are marching forward.''
Aziz Rezaee's story is not only about suffering. It is about endurance. It is about resilience and resistance. It is a testament to the unbreakable spirit of the Iranian people who continue to demand basic human rights and who risked everything, including their lives, to achieve them.
Madam Speaker, we stand here in the United States Congress, a place that symbolizes freedom and democratic voices. We must never take those values for granted. We must never turn our eyes away from those who fight for them around the world.
Today, I honor Aziz, a mother of resistance, and all Iranians who stand bravely against oppression. I stand with the Iranian people in their pursuit of democracy, equality, and human dignity. I reaffirm that the United States will always support the fundamental rights of people seeking freedom.
Madam Speaker, may Aziz' courage continue to inspire us like it has inspired me. May her sacrifices never be forgotten. May the day come soon when the people of Iran can live free in peace, justice, and democracy.
Madam Speaker, if you drive through Clay County in northeast Florida this time of year,
Today, Madam Speaker, I rise to recognize Gayward Hendry for receiving the 2025 Distinguished Service Award from the Florida Farm Bureau, the highest honor for a lifetime of leadership in Florida agriculture.
Gayward's service has been extraordinary as a proud marine, a county commissioner, and the longtime president of the Clay County Farm Bureau. In every role, he has led with integrity, grit, and a deep love for the land.
He has mentored young farmers through 4-H, supported students through the Katy Hendry Memorial Scholarship, and welcomed generations of future leaders to his family farm to experience firsthand the traditions of Florida agriculture.
Madam Speaker, whether he is grinding cane or guiding the next generation through the challenges ahead, Gayward shows what it means to serve with purpose and to keep a community growing together.
Madam Speaker, with Gayward Hendry around, life is truly sweeter.
Madam Speaker, we know that our families can't afford the basics right now. Their electricity and gas bills are out of control. Their water bills are out of control. Don't get me started about their auto and home insurance. It is all out of control. Grocery costs are up 28 percent, healthcare costs are up and out of control, and it is even worse for those family members who are sick.
Our families can't afford the basics. Everyone in this Chamber can agree to that. There is an affordability crisis in our country, and the corporations and billionaires driving up these costs don't care. They not only don't care, they were also rewarded with a big tax break in the betrayal bill.
This is why it is important to understand that this is a policy choice, that many of our families feel like they are intentionally being put in survivor mode instead of being able to thrive.
I know that right now nearly one in five children in Michigan live below the poverty line, Madam Speaker, and 60 percent of Americans live paycheck to paycheck.
I am not going to wait for President Trump to keep his promise to address the cost of living in this country. I am going to help and push back and introduce the economic dignity for all agenda, a plan to tackle the high cost of living in our country.
We need to ensure that in every family in every single corner in our country, a child has resources that they need to live and thrive in our country, not just hope to survive.
This plan includes the End Child Poverty Act, the Baby Bonus Act, and the BOOST Act. The End Child Poverty Act would provide a universal child benefit of $458 per child per month. It would bring us closer to a nation where all children have the opportunity to flourish, not just grow. This plan will make it easy for our families to afford the basics. I hear it from them: Formula, diapers, and childcare are all out of control. It will provide, again, a long-overdue safety net for our families.
We know right now this bill, the End Child Poverty Act, is estimated to cut child poverty by 50 percent according to the People's Policy Project, and it will cut deep child poverty by 70 percent.
The second bill, a part of the plan, is the Baby Bonus Act, which would provide every family with $2,000 upon the birth of their child, bringing economic stability to households through timely and flexible assistance at a pivotal moment for a child's development.
The birth of a new child is often a time of increased economic insecurity. Families face new expenses of childcare, diapers, baby clothes, and more, while many parents must take time off leading up to and following the birth of a newborn. Without universal childcare, parents are often forced to choose between healing, caring for their newborn, and keeping their job.
As a founder of the Congressional Mamas' Caucus, it is time we listened to mothers who are urging our government to focus on families.
Roughly 134,000 families are driven into poverty annually because of the cost of childcare alone. This is not surprising when countless families are one job loss, disability, and emergency away from crushing financial hardship.
Finally, part of the plan includes the BOOST Act. It is one of my district's favorites. It is the Building Our Opportunities to Survive and Thrive Act. It would provide $250 per month to adults between the ages of 19 to 67 years old, promoting economic security for all.
Studies show that this is effective. What is not effective is continuing to give billionaires big tax breaks. Again, that doesn't impact our families in a positive way.
While costs for necessities like housing, groceries, healthcare, and education increase annually, wages fail to keep up. We all know this in this Chamber. It puts many of our families in economic insecurity. An unexpected expense like medical bills should not be a threat to a family's financial livelihood. It is important that we start looking at new ways. Regular cash assistance would make a tremendous difference to families literally on the edge of poverty and struggling to pay their bills.
Everyone in our country deserves human dignity.
We know that corporate greed is driving costs up and creating this affordability crisis, so we need to push back. If my colleagues in Congress are serious and wanting to improve the lives of the American people, they should stop corporate giveaways and support and pass the economic dignity for all plan.
Madam Speaker, I rise today to honor a profoundly extraordinary American, Colonel Marlena Parker, a daughter of Bucks County, a trailblazing Air Force officer, and one of the finest examples of courage and character our Nation could ever hope to produce.
Just days ago, over Veterans Day weekend, I stood beside Colonel Parker in Plumstead Township, Pennsylvania, as our community gathered to honor her service. She was surrounded by the people she loved most and by the veterans she served alongside.
She was, as always, glowing, gracious, resolute, still lifting others up, and still inspiring everyone around her. Madam Speaker, sadly, it was our final tribute together. On November 17, Colonel Parker passed away after a brave and courageous fight against ALS.
She did not face a single day of that battle without the same strength, discipline, and warrior spirit she brought to every mission she ever flew. She never stopped living the values she instilled in others: faith, service, perseverance, and a quiet, unwavering resolve.
Colonel Marlena Parker was born in Doylestown on December 31, 1968. She was a proud first-generation Italian American and the daughter of Tony and Lena Ventresca. Faith and family were her foundation. Discipline and drive were her compass. At Gwynedd Mercy Academy, she was valedictorian. At the United States Air Force Academy, she was an NCAA All-American gymnast. From the very beginning, she was destined to soar.
After commissioning, she completed pilot training at Reese Air Force Base and went on to fly the KC-10 Extender, one of the Nation's most critical refueling and transport aircrafts that we have.
She deployed in support of Operations Southern Watch, Allied Force, Iraqi Freedom, and Enduring Freedom, carrying American power, American hope, and American strength across continents.
Madam Speaker, her resume reads like a history of American resolve, but her service was not only defined by what she achieved. It was also defined by the way she carried herself: with humility, with precision, and with an unshakeable sense of duty.
When the world changed on September 11, 2001, Marlena was airborne, and in the chaos of that morning when
In 2013, she made Air Force history as the first female commander of the 73rd Airlift Squadron, directing VIP airlift operations and leading her airmen with precision, professionalism, and resolve that marked every single stage of her service.
By the time she retired in 2020, Colonel Parker had logged over 4,800 flight hours, including nearly 700 hours in combat and combat support missions and earned the Legion of Merit, among numerous other commendations.
She continued flying as a Boeing 777 first officer for United Airlines until 2024, an aviator until the end.
Marlena's service extended far beyond the cockpit. For more than 15 years, she shaped the next generation of Air Force leaders as an academy liaison officer. She strengthened our community through the Plumstead Township Veterans' Affairs Committee and VFW Post 175, and she guided veterans in Bucks County's veterans' court program with the same steadiness and compassion she brought to every single mission she flew.
She served because service was woven into who she was as a human being: a leader who lifted others up every step of the way.
Colonel Marlena Parker was not only a trailblazer. She was a wife, a mother, a daughter, and a friend. She and her husband, Boyd, shared 34 years together and raised two remarkable daughters, Isabel and Olivia, who now carry forward their mother's legacy of courage, service, and enduring strength.
Madam Speaker, in Colonel Marlena Parker, America saw the very best of who we are: devotion to family, duty to country, and a faith in something greater than ourselves. She was a true hometown hero and a true patriot. May her courage inspire us, may her service guide us, and may we honor her life by the way we choose to live our own.
May God bless Marlena. We will dearly miss her. All Bucks County will miss her. Well done, good and faithful servant.
Madam Speaker, this Saturday, November 22, will mark 62 years since we lost a President of the United States, a person who gave so much to his Nation, an individual who was taken from us in the summer of his years.
His daughter, Caroline, back in 2017 gave us these buttons, pins, that I proudly wear. It is an image of President John Fitzgerald Kennedy.
President Kennedy epitomized placing service above self. He was a national hero and a leader who had the grace, the dignity, the wit, the intelligence, and the love of his Nation and mankind.
That past year we also lost someone by the name of Connie Francis who sang a song at the time called ``In the Summer of His Years.''
In that song, she wrote:
It is we who carry on from this very person who served in this Chamber and the United States Senate and went on to become the President of the United States and, as important, a leader not only for this Nation but the world.
I note, especially in these times, Madam Speaker, that it is service above self that matters. It is service to your Nation, service to your family, service to your community, and service to your State that matters most.
I rise to salute the life of John Fitzgerald Kennedy.
Madam Speaker, this week, on November 29, our Nation marks a milestone, the 50th anniversary of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act.
In 1975, President Gerald Ford, Michigan's only and greatest President, signed the Education for All Handicapped Children Act into law, making a simple but powerful promise that every child, no matter their disability, deserves a free and appropriate public education in the least restrictive setting possible.
That promise changed America.
Before 1975, more than a million children with disabilities were shut out of public schools. Too many were pushed into charity-run facilities or psychiatric institutions. Far too many were left without any education at all.
We turned that injustice around. IDEA opened doors that had been closed for generations. Since its inception, it has empowered families, equipped teachers, and given children the opportunity to learn, grow, and succeed.
Today, IDEA protects nearly 8 million students, roughly 15 percent of all public school children in this country. It requires our schools to identify and support students who need services, including children experiencing homelessness and those attending private schools.
For 50 years, IDEA has been the backbone of special education, ensuring access, accountability, and equality for millions.
As we honor IDEA's 50th anniversary, I am proud to introduce the IDEAL Act, a bill that fully funds and strengthens the original IDEA program. This legislation keeps faith with families, teachers, and students by giving them the resources and support they were promised over half a century ago.
It modernizes services, reinforces accountability, and ensures that every child, regardless of circumstance, can reach their God-given potential.
Madam Speaker, 50 years ago, only one in five children with disabilities had access to public education. Today, millions succeed because of IDEA.
With the IDEAL Act, we reaffirm our commitment. We finish the job. We keep moving forward, not backward.
Madam Speaker, I rise today to honor the life of Marisol Velez, known as Pinqy Ring. She is a rooted, revolutionary Puerto Rican emcee from Chicago, decolonizing minds as a rapper, educator, mentor, and speaker.
As a cultural worker and disruptor, Pinqy's music ignites our imaginations and sustains our struggle against displacement and erasure.
As an educator and mentor, she shapes the next generation of creative changemakers through culturally rooted programming and radical care.
Pinqy is a GRAMMY U mentor. She sits on the National Advisory Board for Music Will and serves as a U.S. Hip Hop Cultural Ambassador to facilitate cultural diplomacy programming and conflict transformation through music. In her roles, she is shaping the first-ever K-12 hip-hop guidelines with the Hip-Hop Education Center.
On behalf of Illinois' Third Congressional District, I commend her.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor an exceptional leader and someone who I can now call a good friend, Father Eamon Kelly.
This past August, my colleague from California, Pete Aguilar, and I had the privilege of leading a bipartisan delegation of freshmen Members to Israel, where Father Kelly baptized several of our Members in the Sea of Galilee.
It was a transformational experience that we will keep with us for the rest of our lives, and it was, in large part, thanks to Father Kelly's leadership, faith, and commitment to helping others experience the power and the history of the Holy Land.
When I first met Father Kelly, I asked him where he is from because he has an interesting accent, or brogue. He told me: ``I am from the Holy Land, and I live in the Promised Land.''
Having served at the Notre Dame of Jerusalem Center for more than a decade and now serving as the vice director of the Magdala Center, Father Kelly's work in the Holy Land has impacted people from all walks of life from all over the globe. The fruits of his labor will undoubtedly have a lasting impact for generations to come.
As we honor him on the House floor today, we also pray that many more people will encounter God and grow in their relationship with Christ as a result of his ministry.
Mr. VAN ORDEN. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to unfortunately, once again, highlight the scourge of veteran suicide.
Matthew Burns was in my platoon when I was his Navy SEAL chief. Unfortunately and for a reason only known between him and God, he decided to end his life a few months ago.
With Matthew's passing, that makes 22 of my Navy SEAL friends who have committed suicide.
I will be exiting the House floor. I will miss votes today, and I will miss them tomorrow because I will be interring Matthew's earthly remains in San Diego, California, with his family.
Mr. Speaker, I will just ask one thing: If you are a veteran and you think that there is no hope, there is. You have to know that you are loved and cherished and that you have value.
So if you are thinking of doing what Matthew did, don't. Please call 988, option 1. That is the Veterans Suicide Prevention Line.
May God grant Matthew's family peace and have his soul rest in gentle repose.
Mr. Speaker, last weekend, I visited Saint Sabina Church in Chicago for emergency food distribution.
There, I talked to a single mother with a young child with disabilities. She showed up in the cold 4 hours early for a food distribution of a single box of food. Without her November SNAP payment, she said that she would have to skip meals to make ends meet.
I also talked to seniors who were deciding whether to purchase their groceries or their medicine for the month.
For these Chicagoans, the administration's delay in SNAP benefits made for a brutal month. For the 360,000 Illinoisans who will be cut off of SNAP because of the big, ugly bill, they will be weighing these tradeoffs for years to come. Veterans, older Americans, and kids aging out of foster care will lose benefits.
They deserve better. We must keep fighting for them.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize Mr. Bernie Adams, a World War II veteran from Coudersport, Pennsylvania, who will turn 102 years old on Saturday.
Bernie served in the U.S. Navy and was a seaman third class gunner on a supply tanker ship at Normandy. He also saw service in the Philippines.
Bernie was born in Hollidaysburg, Pennsylvania. He married the former Barbara Fetzer in 1946, and they had a beautiful union of 75 years before her passing in 2020.
Bernie and Barbara settled in Shinglehouse, Pennsylvania, where they raised five children: Pamela, Larry, Bernie Jr., Amy, and Jeffrey.
Family was important to them, and the family has grown over the years. Bernie has 9 grandchildren, 23 great-grandchildren, and 3 great- great-grandchildren.
Bernie worked for the Pennsylvania Railroad and was later employed as a pipe fitter in Olean, New York. He enjoyed hunting and fishing, and he loves watching baseball, especially the Chicago Cubs.
Bernie now resides at Sweden Valley Manor in Coudersport, Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania's 15th Congressional District, where he will have a birthday celebration on Saturday.
Mr. Speaker, I wish Bernie Adams the very best as he turns 102, and I thank him for his service to this great Nation.
Mr. Speaker, I rise to honor my constituent Cecilia Mendoza, a defender and advocate for our constitutional rights.
Cecilia's passion for justice is reflected across her entire career, from her beginnings as a community organizing intern with the Illinois Hunger Coalition, to her work as an immigration service coordinator with Family Focus, and eventually to her role as the associate director of Government Relations with the National Immigrant Justice Center.
As our city has come together to defend each other, Cecilia has been an indispensable asset to my office and to the immigrant rights movement, advancing equity and inclusion through research, policy, and community resources. Through her leadership, we are better equipped to continue welcoming and protecting those seeking refuge in the United States.
On behalf of Illinois' Third Congressional District, it is my honor to commend Cecilia Mendoza for using her power and voice to protect our immigrant neighbors and build a welcoming Nation that we hope for and deserve.
Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of the Safer Supervision Act, a bipartisan bill backed by Federal law enforcement, probation officers, and public defenders. This broad coalition shares a common goal: a supervision system that improves public safety and supports successful reentry.
Today, more than 110,000 Americans are on supervision. Probation officers are carrying caseloads so large that it is difficult to focus on the individuals who truly need the greatest oversight.
The Safer Supervision Act restores individualized judicial decisionmaking, creates a responsible path to early termination, allows treatment-based responses, and focuses resources where they make the greatest impact.
This is smart-on-crime reform that strengthens safety and supports second chances.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support the Safer Supervision Act.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to condemn the Trump administration's deployment of CBP to North Carolina.
Since last weekend, North Carolinians watched in horror as masked agents descended on our State, terrorizing communities, and abducting people off the streets based on the color of their skin.
These immigration raids only serve one purpose: sowing fear and intimidation.
If the Republicans cared about fixing our broken immigration system, this wouldn't be the way to do it. If they did, they would work with Democrats to ensure our border is secure, families stay together, and our farms and businesses can get the workers they need. Instead, they refuse to do anything to fix our immigration system for legal immigration.
Mr. Speaker, Wake County and our State are welcoming, vibrant places, made stronger by the hardworking immigrants who choose to call our communities home. It is time for Federal immigration officers to go home and stop attacking our people. They need to arrest real criminals.
Mr. Speaker, on behalf of American families, Republicans have delivered on the promises made by President Donald Trump to create jobs for affordability.
Signed into law by President Trump, appropriately on July Fourth, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act puts American families first. The law will raise wages up to $3,300 for every American worker. It eliminates taxes on Social Security for 88 percent of recipients. It permanently extends tax cuts that will create jobs. It eliminates taxes on tips, adding an average of $1,300 annually for workers. It also will eliminate taxes on overtime, adding an average of $1,400 for millions of hourly workers.
In conclusion, God bless our troops as the global war on terrorism continues. Trump is reinstituting peace through strength, revealing war criminal Putin lies, insulting Trump and mocking Trump as The Washington Times exposes today that 25 civilians were murdered yesterday by Putin near NATO ally Poland with children burned alive.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to welcome to our Nation's Capitol my constituent from Lynbrook and the founder of the Love for Giovanni Foundation, Georgina Cornago.
Mr. Speaker, Georgina is the beloved mother of Long Island native Giovanni ``Gio'' Cipriano, pictured here, who we tragically lost in 2013 due to a severe allergic reaction.
In the face of unimaginable loss, Georgina has transformed her grief into purpose. She has been a tireless force behind Gio's law, a bipartisan legislation that I introduced to equip local law enforcement with EpiPens to quickly and effectively respond to allergic reactions and save lives. Thanks to her advocacy, first responders on Long Island are already saving lives.
Mr. Speaker, I ask all my colleagues to join me in honoring the memory of Gio and working together to prevent future tragedies and pass Gio's law.
Mr. Speaker, today, I rise to celebrate Ken Siemek on his retirement as 10/11's severe weather center chief meteorologist. For over 40 years, Ken has informed Nebraskans with vital, sometimes even lifesaving weather updates.
Since joining 10/11 in 1981, he quickly became synonymous with the trust and reliability across the Lincoln market. He was an ever-steady presence on the newscasts and on the air.
From warning families of severe storms to sharing forecasts with the news of a sunnier tomorrow, Ken's calm, steady voice resonated deeply across the Lincoln media market. His legacy of excellence and dedication will continue to inspire future generations of broadcasters across Nebraska. Through the years, Ken Siemek was the calm before the storm.
Mr. Speaker, I join everyone from Lincoln to Imperial in thanking him for his decades of dedication and wishing him the very best in retirement.
Mr. Speaker, in just a few weeks, tax credits for the Affordable Care Act are set to expire.
The President has had weeks and months to negotiate a deal that addresses the healthcare crisis in this Nation. Instead, here in the House of Representatives, the Speaker chose for us to be out of session for 8 weeks, while people across this country and in my State of Florida are getting letters in the mail saying that their healthcare premiums will go up anywhere from 50 to 300 percent. Mr. Speaker, 189,000 of my own constituents have been getting these notices.
One of my constituents, battling stage IV breast cancer, said that without these credits, she can't afford insurance or the lifesaving medicine that she needs.
For her and millions more, this isn't about partisan politics. It is literally about life or death.
Donald Trump's latest idea is to give money directly to the people to pick their health insurance, but that is exactly how these ACA subsidies worked.
Since he can only make concepts of a plan for our healthcare system, I have a plan. Let's fix it, let's invest in it, and let's make our government actually work for the people, not just the ultrawealthy. I believe healthcare in this country should be a human right.
Mr. Speaker, as we celebrate National Adoption Month this November, I find myself reflecting on the profound impact adoption has had on my life.
When I was born, my birth mother made the courageous decision to place me up for adoption, and I spent my first few months in the loving care of the Children's Home Society of Virginia in downtown Richmond.
At just 8 months old, I was blessed to be adopted by extraordinary parents who taught me the values of resilience and community service, shaping who I am today.
This year, the Children's Home Society of Virginia proudly celebrates its 125th anniversary of dedicated service and commitment to finding families for children in need.
Adoption is a powerful act of love that provides children with the opportunity to grow up in a supportive environment where they can thrive much like I did.
National Adoption Month serves as a reminder of the importance of raising awareness about the needs of children in the foster care system and the families who open their hearts and homes to them.
Mr. Speaker, please join me in celebrating the gift of adoption.
Mr. Speaker, Thanksgiving is next week, and this year, families are paying more because of the President.
The staple items for this classic American holiday cost, on average, 7 percent more than last year.
Take my favorite side, stuffing. A box of stuffing mix has soared by double digits. The centerpiece of many tables, turkey, is up 7 percent.
It is not just Thanksgiving food. Grocery prices are up. Families of four are spending more than $1,000 on groceries each month.
Americans simply cannot afford to live in Trump's economy--not my constituents expecting their healthcare costs to more than double next year, and not small business owners and consumers alike hit hard by tariffs.
Americans are hurting because my colleagues across the aisle would rather give tax breaks to billionaires than lower costs for working families. Americans and their families deserve better.
Whether someone calls it stuffing or dressing, cranberry relish or sauce, I will keep working for them to lower their costs and make life affordable.
Mr. Speaker, I honor the life and legacy of Louis Pate, Jr., a former North Carolina senator from Mount Olive who passed on August 29 at 88 years old.
Louis' journey began in Duplin County. He would later serve 20 years in the United States Air Force, including time as a navigator on a B-57 during Vietnam.
After his military career, Louis returned home to continue serving. He served as the mayor of Mount Olive, in the North Carolina House of Representatives, and later in the State senate, serving as deputy president pro tem.
Louis' greatest accomplishment above all was being a devoted husband for 59 years to Joyce and being a loving father to their children, Lisa, Chip, and Frances.
Mr. Speaker, I am so grateful to have had the opportunity to serve alongside Louis, and I extend my heartfelt condolences to Joyce and the Pate family.
Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 879, I call up the bill (H.R. 3109) to require the Secretary of Energy to direct the National Petroleum Council to issue a report with respect to petrochemical refineries in the United States, and for other purposes, and ask for its immediate consideration in the House.
The Clerk read the title of the bill.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to House Resolution 879, the bill is considered read.
The text of the bill is as follows:
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The bill shall be debatable for 1 hour, equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on Energy and Commerce or their respective designees.
The gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Guthrie) and the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone) each will control 30 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Guthrie).
Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks on this legislation and to include extraneous material on H.R. 3109.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the gentleman from Kentucky?
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, the American economy is fueled by petrochemical refineries
The national security component of a viable refining industry cannot be overstated, and we must not forfeit these essential supply chains.
Under the previous administration, we saw the impact of an energy retreat: higher prices for families and businesses, emboldened adversaries, sluggish economies, and increasing reliance on other nations.
Unfortunately, this is still the case in States like California, where a hostile regulatory environment has forced refineries to reduce operations. In fact, the Golden State is expected to lose 17 percent of its capacity in the next year. This has led to an average gasoline price of nearly $5 per gallon, an increased fuel dependence on Asian producers, and jeopardizing the fuel supply chain of military installations in their State.
We must not let this become status quo across the country. H.R. 3109 requires the National Petroleum Council to collect and examine information regarding the role of petrochemical refineries in the United States and their contributions to affordability, security, and reliability. The report will assess opportunities to expand capacity as well as current risks to refineries.
H.R. 3109 will provide the Committee on Energy and Commerce the information we need to enact policies to deliver affordable, reliable, and clean energy to all Americans.
I thank Representative Latta, the chairman of the Energy Subcommittee, for his leadership on this issue.
I urge all of my colleagues to support H.R. 3109, and I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to this bill, which is a complete and utter waste of the House of Representatives' time.
It asks the National Petroleum Council to do a study, and that is it. That is the entire bill. In my opinion, to ask the National Petroleum Council to do something it can already do on its own makes absolutely no sense.
The House was out of session for over 50 days because Speaker Johnson refused to bring Congress back to resolve the healthcare crisis created by Republicans and to reopen the government. Now, Speaker Johnson claims we will be working day and night on important problems. I certainly agree that we should be doing that. We should be working on problems that Americans care about, but millions of Americans are seeing their healthcare costs skyrocket because the President and Republicans refuse to extend critical tax credits that make healthcare more affordable for millions of Americans.
Millions more are paying thousands of dollars more a year for everyday goods because of the President's tariffs. These tariffs are attacks on the American people, and they are expected to cost families more than $2,000 each year when they take full effect.
Meanwhile, prices on everything from utilities to food to energy, even prices for Thanksgiving dinner next week, are going up.
You would think that House Republicans would be doing something, anything, anything at all to fight these high prices. Instead, we are here talking about a bill that requires a Big Oil and Gas lobby group to put together a report. That is it.
I cannot stress enough that this report is simply not needed, regardless of who does it. In fact, it is almost an insult, particularly to refinery workers on the East Coast, including my State of New Jersey, who don't need a study to tell them why refining capacity here has dropped by over one third in the last decade. It all goes back to the repeal of the crude oil export ban in 2015.
You don't have to take my word for it. The nonpartisan Government Accountability Office found in a 2020 report--that was a report--that domestic refinery margins suffered in the wake of the repeal. This bill only asks for the report to assess executive actions, regulations, or policies that have impacted refineries, not a change in the law. If it were dealing with a change in the law, I think that would make sense.
It is a massive, massive oversight to not talk about the law and what happened when the crude oil export ban was lifted 10 years ago. That is what caused the problem with refineries.
The most ridiculous part of this bill is that it demands the study not be done by the Department of Energy but by the National Petroleum Council, an industry advisory body for Big Oil and Gas. I have no doubt that the National Petroleum Council will produce a biased report that will likely complain about every environmental regulation that they don't like, but that protects the American people. That is what Republicans have been doing: repealing all the environmental regulations.
If Republicans wanted an unbiased view of domestic refining challenges, they would have asked the Department of Energy to craft a report. That is not what they are looking for because Republicans just want to sanction fossil fuel propaganda. That is what they are doing with this bill.
It is a waste of everyone's time, Mr. Speaker. It is just another example of how Republicans have absolutely no ideas to help American families lower everyday costs.
We need to be working on real solutions, Democrats and Republicans, to address the affordability crisis. That is what the American people want, not this report.
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
When I was a young man in the 1970s--when I was a kid, I guess, in the 1970s--I remember gas lines and having to push my father's car to get gasoline. At the time, everybody said we were going to run out of crude oil. That was the thing, running out of crude oil.
I appreciate the gentleman bringing up the crude oil issue. It is actually because of the ingenuity of the American people that we have an abundance of crude oil. The issue isn't crude oil. It is the refining capacity.
Since I was a kid, we found this abundance of crude oil in the Permian Basin, North Dakota, and all the places I can name. We have more oil than they have in the Middle East, which, when I was a kid, a lot of it was coming from the Middle East.
Then, you have this chokepoint of refining capacity. We haven't built a new refinery in the United States since I was a kid, so that is the thing that we want to address. That is the issue we want to address. We do want prices to go down. We don't want it to be $5 a gallon.
I was putting gas in a rental car in California, and I looked over at the guy next to me. I paid probably $2.60 a gallon in Kentucky, and I think it was $4.80 there. I said: Do you guys have any idea what the rest of America is paying for gasoline?
We are here to address it, and we are addressing it by a bill authored by my good friend, the chairman of the Energy Subcommittee, a member of the Energy and Commerce Committee, and a leader in this arena.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Latta).
Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend, the chairman of the full committee of the Committee on Energy and Commerce, for yielding.
Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of my bill, H.R. 3109, the REFINER Act. This legislation will direct the National Petroleum Council to report to Congress and the Department of Energy on petrochemical refiners in the United States.
This legislation is essential to ensuring that the U.S. can reliably produce enough refined products domestically. The Energy Information Administration projects global demand for liquid fuels to increase by about 20 million barrels per day by 2050. Alarmingly, over the last several years, North America has lost an estimated 1 million barrels of fuel per day due to low refining capacity.
The last report from the National Petroleum Council on refining was completed over 20 years ago.
The report must include information concerning the contribution of refineries to U.S. energy security; capacity projections of U.S. petrochemical refineries; opportunities for expanding capacities and risks to those refineries; an assessment of any State or Federal executive actions, regulations, or policies that have caused or contributed to
American refineries have played a crucial role in providing secure, affordable, and high-value petroleum products to global customers. Importantly, this legislation would help identify States that have caused or contributed to a decline in U.S. petrochemical refinery capacity.
Hostile regulatory environments, like in California, have led to the shuttering of several refineries. California used to be home to over 40 refineries in the 1980s. This number has now decreased to 14 as of last year, with two additional refineries slated to close in early 2026.
These anticipated closures will disrupt fuel supplies and increase energy prices for consumers, businesses, and farmers.
An analysis by the University of Southern California anticipates retail gas prices in the State could increase by as much as 75 percent under certain conditions. The bottom line: Fewer refineries result in supply disruptions and higher fuel prices for Americans.
The REFINER Act seeks to produce a detailed roadmap to strengthen and expand refinery capacity to increase American energy security and economic growth.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support the legislation, and I thank the chairman for yielding.
Mr. Speaker, my point is that this report does not ask the people that are doing it to look into the change of law that would be necessary in order to bring refineries back.
The reason why we lost so many refineries, particularly on the East Coast and New Jersey, was because the ban on the export of crude oil was lifted 10 years ago. You don't need a refinery if you can export the crude, but this report doesn't address that at all.
Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as she may consume to the gentlewoman from Florida (Ms. Castor), the ranking member of our Energy Subcommittee.
Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding the time.
Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to H.R. 3109.
I know my Republican colleagues want to pretend that this is a simple, unbiased study bill, but it is not. The bill asks the National Petroleum Council, a council that is made up of members from the oil and gas industry, to create a report that says that the United States needs more oil and gas. I fear that what this is a recipe for is higher electric bills and higher costs for hardworking Americans who already are being crushed by higher bills.
There are unbiased public servants who could write this report--for example, at the Department of Energy--but, of course, Elon Musk and the Trump administration have pushed out more than 3,500 public servants there. As a result, the Department of Energy is in trouble. The Department has even had to ask external lawyers for things like defending against challenges relating to their illegal cancelations of projects across the country.
To bring this bill at a time when people really want to see the Congress work to solve problems, I think, demonstrates that Members are out of touch. It is part of a very disturbing Republican trend, led by the President, to purge the government of real experts and to slash and burn, like medical research, finding the cures and treatments that we need to survive and thrive; trying to illegally dismantle the Department of Education; and going after public health and really ruining a lot of the expert public health advice that helps keep our neighbors healthy and safe.
Then, here, when we are talking about oil and gas and their lobbyists, they are so firmly in control of the agenda here in the United States Congress. I just think my colleagues are not solving problems. Watching the President just remain out of touch is so painful to people back home that they feel betrayed.
Even during the Republican shutdown, was the President focused on trying to negotiate a solution there or trying to take us out of the healthcare crisis? No. He was giving the White House a makeover. He tore down the entire East Wing to make way for a 90,000-square-foot, $300 million ballroom, funded by corporations that have a lot to gain monetarily; and he had ``Great Gatsby'' parties at Mar-a-Lago with dancing girls. It is just mind-boggling.
Back to electric bills. Let's not forget that President Trump convened oil industry executives and lobbyists at his home last year to ask for $1 billion for his Presidential campaign. Well, now they are coming to collect.
Even after almost 2 months, when Speaker Johnson had the House of Representatives shut down because he didn't want to find a solution to rising healthcare costs and he wanted to avoid a vote to release the Epstein files, we could have been focusing on, behind the scenes, some ways to lower costs and solve real problems, but they continue to bring bills like this: a study on how we produce more oil and gas.
Here is the connection to higher bills. While they want to pad the profits of oil and gas companies, what they are doing to sabotage jobs and cleaner, cheaper energy now is showing up in people's electric bills, and they are angry.
I was with neighbors a couple of weeks ago who were burning their electric bills because costs are increasing so dramatically.
Why? On January 20, the President froze Federal leasing for wind projects and blocked permits for projects that had already been approved.
On February 5, the Army Corps of Engineers halted permits for 168 renewable energy projects on private lands.
In March, as part of his tariff war, he imposed a 10 percent tax on energy imported from Canada, hitting Midwestern States with higher gas prices.
In April, the Trump administration abruptly fired the entire staff overseeing the low-income Home Energy Assistance Program, which helps working families afford their utility bills. Weeks later, the White House proposed cutting it entirely.
In May, the Secretary of Energy ordered an old Michigan coal plant to stay online, forcing the company to spend nearly $1 million a day. These are costs that are passed on to families across the Midwest.
In June, the Trump administration's EPA proposed a rule to allow coal and gas power plants to emit unlimited amounts of climate pollution, locking us into a dirtier and more expensive future.
In July, Republicans passed their big, ugly bill, which will saddle American families with price hikes of at least $110 next year and up to $4,000 annually within a decade.
In August, EPA announced an illegal cancellation of the $7 billion Solar for All Grant Initiative, which was intended to bring affordable energy to more than 900,000 hardworking American households.
In September, the Trump administration unveiled a more than $600 million bailout for coal plants to keep them online.
In October, while shutting down the government to deny Americans access to affordable healthcare, the White House tried to claw back billions in clean energy funds.
These actions are costly, and American families deserve better. We should be working together to solve problems and not wasting time on trying to figure out how we pad the profits of industries. Instead, we should be looking out for the pocketbooks of the people who sent us here. People deserve better. Hardworking Americans expect better of this Congress.
I hope that we can send a message on this bill and the next one that we are not going to put up with it anymore. We want real solutions to lower the cost of living.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair will remind all persons in the gallery that they are here as guests of the House and that any manifestation of approval or disapproval of proceedings is in violation of the rules of the House.
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
It is frustrating that we lost 42 days because our side of the aisle wanted to open the government and wanted to have the government operating. We
I was always embarrassed to even look in the eye--I voted for all of it--to go see a TSA agent at the airport in Nashville in my home State of Tennessee where I fly out of, the FAA people going to work at the airport. I was embarrassed coming here and seeing the people sitting in front of us here, the people guarding the doors of the Capitol building, with no respect, having them come to work without respect and paying them. That was extremely frustrating to me. It is just beyond pale that that happened.
On the Epstein files, the Speaker tried to come and unanimous consent the Epstein files. Remember, last week he came down and said let's pass the Epstein files, and the other side of the aisle objected to it. I don't know why they would object to passing the files.
They held it up for several days. I know there were a few rallies that happened, and then we all voted. It was 427-1. Were they trying to get the Epstein files out, or were they trying to make sure people got in town for their rallies? That is what I would like to know.
The National Petroleum Council that we are referring to in this bill is a part of the Department of Energy. All through government, we have councils of people that are experts in their fields who come to D.C. The Department of Labor has them. People from the labor community come and have councils to give advice on bills.
We know we have ample crude. We know the ingenuity of the American people to have ample crude. What we are talking about today is where 40 refineries in California have gone to 14. If you want affordability, not only do you have to be able to get the crude out of the ground, you have to refine it to where we can use it.
As we are shrinking refining capacity in this country and increasing demand, if we don't increase supply, we are not going to have affordability. You can talk about affordability all you want, but you have got to have the supply to address it. That is what we are focused on doing today.
We want the experts to give us their information. We don't have to do what they say. We want to take their information, take the good ideas and try to implement them into where we can provide lower prices.
If you think this doesn't work, come buy gas in Kentucky. Then go to my good friends who are sitting here from California and buy gas in their State, then tell us what does efficient energy policy do for affordability. I will challenge them to do that. I will say you can buy the most expensive gas in Kentucky, and we will compare that to what is going on in California.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Carter), my good friend and very important member of the Energy and Commerce Committee.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 3109, the REFINER Act.
For too long, America has fallen behind in refining capacity. In fact, we have lost an estimated 1 million barrels of fuel per day due to low refining capacity.
The Biden administration declared war on American energy by suspending oil and gas leasing on Federal lands, delaying permits for energy infrastructure, and canceling the Keystone XL pipeline.
With President Trump and House Republicans in charge, those days are over with now.
The REFINER Act offers a commonsense solution to this critical issue. This bill requires the National Petroleum Council to submit a report to Congress analyzing the capacity of American refining and recommending how we can increase our refining capacity.
The American people elected us to lower prices, especially prices at the pump. This bill will provide crucial data and guidance on how we can best reinforce our domestic energy infrastructure and help ensure fuel costs are low for Americans.
This bill is an important step toward delivering American energy dominance. It is something the President has worked on and is diligent about.
If we are going to power domestic manufacturing, if we are going to beat China in the AI race, and then deliver on affordable energy for all, we must ensure that domestic refining can keep up.
Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend Representative Latta for introducing this important piece of legislation, and I urge its immediate adoption.
Mr. Speaker, listening to my colleagues on the Republican side of the aisle, this report obviously does absolutely nothing to address the prices of power and electricity that continues to go up.
Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record a document from the Joint Economic Committee, as well as a link to the document located at: https://www.jec.senate.gov/public/_cache/files/22e24fd6-4db7-44c6-93a9- 9710c6f48b85/electricity-bills-report.pdf
State-by-State Data: Annual Electricity Bills Up $100 Per Family in
Mr. Speaker, last year, as I think everyone knows, President Donald Trump repeatedly promised that energy bills across the country would be cut in half within 12 months of his taking office. This shows a State-by-State analysis of how much electricity bills have gone up instead of being cut.
Just to mention to my two colleagues, here in Kentucky, it says that they have gone up 11.8 percent; in Ohio, 9.9 percent; in New Jersey, 13.6 percent. Certainly nothing like the cut in half that President Donald Trump promised. This report projects that American households will pay approximately $100 more per household in electricity costs this year.
We are going to deal with this pricing issue when we get to the next bill about LNG, which, again, is only going to increase prices. It is clear that the Republicans have no intention of dealing with this crisis of affordability with electric or power bills, as well.
Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from California (Mr. DeSaulnier).
Mr. Speaker, I will say to my friend from Kentucky that it has been a long time since you have been to the Bay Area, so I will take you up on your offer.
One of the reasons I wanted to come down and speak to this is because I represent an area in the Bay Area that has five refineries in it. They have been valuable tax providers and employers for many years. One of them is about to close and another one is in the process of closing. Two others have spent billions of dollars to work on transitional fuels, to put investment into those refineries to produce biofuels that are part of the transition to cleaner, safer, more economical energy sources. The last one, Chevron, is doing both.
I must say I am reminded, as I sit here, to the same arguments 30 years ago having been involved at the local level in California about secondhand smoke and tobacco when the tobacco industry was insisting that the Tobacco Institute do studies about the cost to smokers by passing secondhand smoke ordinances that figured out the full cost to consumers for people who didn't smoke.
As a former restaurant owner, who didn't allow people to smoke, it just reminds me of the same thing. I believe in research because I have worked with a refinery and oil companies for many years. I was one of those regulators. I represented the Bay Area on the California Air Resources Board for 10 years. I was appointed by two Republicans, by the way, and one Democrat.
What we have done is, we are transitioning. Twenty-five percent of the cars in northern California last
Let's do research on how we transition and give States the ability to transition, if they choose, and local governments to transition. While I value the research, let's be honest about having more research that is more objective and consider the full cost to changing our energy.
Almost 50 million Americans live within a mile of a refinery or a heavy processing plant. Their public health costs are disproportionately affected by what we know from traditional pollutants, particulate matter, and smog. Then when you add carbon into it, the economic model changes completely.
Mr. Speaker, I suggest to Mr. Guthrie, before he comes out to the Bay Area, we have a collegial conversation and we can go to those refineries. I would particularly like to take him to the ones that have invested on the transition because we know we need a transition for those of us who want to go to as near-zero emissions as possible, and we are succeeding.
I will remind my colleagues, too, across the aisle that the Chinese are our global competition. The Chinese auto manufacturing industry is about to become the largest auto manufacturer in the world. They are all EVs.
They are moving to this. While we try to protect traditional energy sources, let's be smart about the transition economically for American consumers and taxpayers.
I don't disagree with looking at capacity, but let's do it in a broader and more objective way that tells the full story as truthfully as possible, so we as policymakers can be more thoughtful about the short-term impacts of our policy decisions, as well as in the midterm and long term.
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, I appreciate my friend from California, and I actually do love going to California. I haven't been in the bay area in a couple of years, and we will figure out an opportunity to come there. My family tries to go to California as much as we can. I know he is from the beautiful bay area. Actually, when I was talking about the high price of gas, it was down in southern California, which has its own beauty, as well.
I am a fan of California. Other than Kentucky, I think California is one of the prettiest States we have in the Union. From the redwoods to the Yosemite Valley, it is absolutely stunning. I absolutely would love to come back out to the bay area because it is beautiful, as well.
In this bill, we are talking about electricity prices. China is building the electric car industry, but they are also building the power generation, like a coal plant a week, I think, to provide the energy for that.
This bill we are talking about is on gasoline and diesel. Remember, everything that arrives to a store comes on a truck. Sometimes they come on a train, but the last mile is almost always or is always a truck. Diesel prices, fuel prices, matter in terms of food prices and about everything else that we consume.
This is important to do. Electric affordability is also important to do, and we are committed. We will work together to get our prices down, but we have to produce more.
That is what we are wondering. How do we efficiently, effectively, safely, and cleanly produce more gasoline and diesel? You can't do it without more refining capacity unless you decrease demand for it. That is not the avenue we have to go, either.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Weber), my good friend and the vice chair of the Subcommittee on Energy of the Committee on Energy and Commerce.
Mr. Speaker, it is interesting to me that our friends across the aisle say that we already have enough oil. It is also interesting that President Obama, when he--the gentleman from Georgia, Buddy Carter, mentioned the Keystone pipeline. It would have come into my district in Texas, 830,000 barrels of oil a day. That is what we are talking about refining on the Gulf Coast of Texas. If you transfer that to 18- wheelers, it is about 5,253 18-wheeler tankers on the road every day. The pipeline is the best way to do this.
Mr. Speaker, in Texas, we understand better than anyone else that America's energy strength depends on what happens to the oil after it comes out of the ground. The Keystone pipeline is a good example.
Mr. Speaker, it is our refineries, the men and women who run them, and the communities built around those businesses that turn our resources into fuels and products that power everyday life.
The REFINER Act takes on a question that Washington has ignored for far too long: Are we doing enough to protect and expand America's ability to refine the energy we produce? Right now, unfortunately, the answer is no, we are not.
Over the last several years, America's refining capacity has gone backward. We have lost more than a million barrels of capacity per day, and several facilities have shut down altogether. The gentleman from California mentioned one of them.
In several States, hostile policies are pushing refineries out so fast that families are now facing higher prices and increased dependence on foreign fuel.
That is not how you build energy security, Mr. Speaker. That is how you weaken it.
Meanwhile, global demand for fuels is still rising and is expected to grow as much as 20 million barrels a day by 2050.
The world isn't slowing down, Mr. Speaker, and neither should American energy.
The REFINER Act takes a serious look at that situation, directs the National Petroleum Council to review our refining capacity, identify where we are vulnerable, and highlight opportunities for us to expand. In other words, it gives us the facts we need to strengthen a critical part of our energy supply chain.
When refineries close, families suffer; small businesses suffer; transportation costs rise; and prices jump at the pump. The whole region becomes dependent on foreign suppliers.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The time of the gentleman has expired.
Mr. Speaker, that is exactly the opposite of the energy dominance vision that we are working toward under President Trump.
Let me tell you this, Mr. Speaker--you know this--in Texas, we know what happens when refineries thrive. We fuel the Nation. We even supply our allies. We make money doing this, and we support thousands of good- paying jobs.
The REFINER Act recognizes that refining isn't an afterthought. It is a foundational piece of our national security, as well as our economic strength.
Mr. Speaker, as I mentioned, other than the Commonwealth of Kentucky, California is one of those beautiful States in our--they are all beautiful, actually. We live in a wonderful country. There is nothing prettier than the tunnel view from Yosemite Valley.
I don't know, with your lines changing so much, but I know my good friend from California used to represent our beautiful natural resources in the National Park of Yosemite Valley. He still does.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. McClintock), my good friend and a classmate elected the same year.
Mr. Speaker, no one has suffered more than Californians because of the left's war on fossil fuels. Forty years of folly are now driving energy prices out of reach for working families and driving those working families out of California.
In 1980, 40 refineries served the California market, producing abundant gasoline at easily affordable prices. Mr. Latta said 14 refineries were left. His numbers are old. We are now down to
Californians already pay the highest gasoline prices in the United States, averaging $4.64 a gallon as of yesterday. The same gallon costs only $2.56 in Oklahoma.
When we lose these next two refineries, economists at UC Berkeley predict Californians will be paying more than $8 a gallon by the summer. Leftwing zealots like Gavin Newsom obsess over a 1-degree rise in global temperatures over the next century, but they couldn't care less that they are making it impossible for growing numbers of Californians to heat their homes or get to work.
This is not only a quality-of-life issue for Californians and a cautionary tale for the rest of the country. It is a national security risk, as well. Forty military bases depend on these dwindling West Coast refineries. As California strangles production, we must increasingly rely on foreign imports from our enemies.
H.R. 3109 requires the National Petroleum Council to report on ways to reverse such foolish and self-destructive policies. What has happened to California is the predictable result of bad policy made by fools.
I hope the REFINER Act will shine a light on their folly and recommend ways to reverse the damage that they have caused before they can do any more harm to our Nation's prosperity and security.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Fong), who is from Bakersfield, California, and was elected just recently to Congress.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of H.R. 3109, the REFINER Act.
This legislation is critical to unleashing our energy potential, lowering costs for hardworking families, and protecting our national security.
U.S. refineries are vital to our energy ecosystem. They convert crude oil into fuels and countless products, ranging from shoes and plastics to cell phones, computers, solar panels, medical devices, and even space suits. They make gasoline and diesel for our cars and trucks, and they make jet fuel for our planes.
Yet, over the past few years, our refining capacity has declined due to burdensome Federal and State policies.
I know this bitter reality all too well in my home State of California.
From 2020 to 2022, we lost more than 1 million barrels of production capacity per day, and refinery closures are projected to slash that capacity by 20 percent over the next year. Twenty percent of our refining capacity is going to disappear overnight.
Since 2018, over 360 energy companies have left California. Oil production has dropped by 47 million barrels over the past 5 years, and foreign imports now account for over 60 percent of our crude supply in California.
Californians pay nearly $5 a gallon. In fact, Californians are paying the highest gas and electricity prices in the Nation, thanks to Governor Gavin Newsom's radical-left failed energy policies. California has an affordability crisis that Governor Gavin Newsom created, but this crisis also goes well beyond the pump.
As California fuel production declines, it jeopardizes our national security and undermines our military readiness, as multiple strategic military bases rely on California fuel. With threats from our foreign adversaries, like China, only continuing to grow, we cannot risk leaving our defenses weakened.
The REFINER Act is common sense. It will help identify ways to expand refining capacity, protect our energy infrastructure, and strengthen our national security.
Mr. Speaker, we must act now to restore American energy dominance, secure affordable fuel for families, and protect our Nation's military defense. I urge my colleagues to support H.R. 3109.
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time to close.
Mr. Speaker, I urge President Trump and my Republican colleagues to start taking the American affordability crisis seriously. President Trump is simply out of touch with the reality that American families are facing.
Earlier this week, he seemed to mockingly suggest that ``affordability'' is a word the Democrats made up to attack him. Well, that is rich coming from a man who has declared bankruptcy six times. The American people are hurting because of President Trump and the Republican policies, and they should not be mocked for that. Even FOX News reported last night that 76 percent of Americans view the economy negatively.
Americans are struggling to afford basic necessities. A new report from The Century Foundation found that utility prices are up 32 percent since 2022. That is nearly three times the rate of inflation. Nearly a quarter of that jump occurred just this year alone. These rising costs are debilitating to the middle class. Nearly 1 in 20 households are in severe utility debt.
Roughly 4 million Americans are at risk of having their utility bills sent to collections. It is an incredible number. They have done nothing wrong. They just can't afford to keep up with the exponential rise in electricity prices. They can't afford to pay the bill.
Now, the two bills that are on the floor today, in my opinion, will only increase the average utility bill even further. Just last week, the U.S. Energy Information Association found that natural gas prices will rise by 16 percent in 2026, primarily due to increased LNG exports amid flat production growth.
Secretary Chris Wright promised to double LNG exports to countries like China within 5 years. The next bill that we are going to consider is all about giving more LNG to China, to Beijing, to Communist China. Why are we helping them?
The American people desperately need a solution to lower energy costs at home. Why does the President or the Secretary refuse to take care of the American people that the Trump administration is supposed to represent?
Now, I have said it before, but it bears repeating: The Trump administration only cares about bailing out themselves and their fossil fuel friends.
It is time for Republicans to come to the table to work with Democrats on a solution to this affordability crisis, and it can begin here with the Energy and Commerce Committee.
I urge my colleagues to oppose this bill, and I yield back the balance of my time, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time to close.
Mr. Speaker, we are all concerned about rising prices. My friend from New Jersey talked about since 2022, and he said the emphasis is on what has happened in the first few months of this year.
The decisions were made prior to the present Trump administration to take power offline. I know in my community down in Bowling Green, Kentucky, a few years ago with the polar vortex, we actually had blackouts, we had to have rolling blackouts because of taking power offline.
We all want to address it. The way we address this is not taking power offline, not building new, safer--my good friend from California talked about what they are doing in California to make refineries cleaner and safer, and that is what we want. We want refineries to refine in a safe, responsible, and sustainable way. We can work together to do that.
On the LNG we are going to talk about in just a few minutes, we do have the gas in our country. We have people who can develop, particularly in your home State, Mr. Speaker. The problem is, can we move it to where it needs to go. We know the challenge isn't the access to gas, it is actually moving it to where it needs to be.
We need to work together. I think Natural Resources today had a markup, T&I is working on a markup, and we hopefully can work together as Members across the aisle in the Energy and Commerce Committee to do our share to make sure this explosive growth of energy is not just in gas and diesel but also in electricity. We need every electron we can produce to beat China.
Talking about China, China is struggling and working as hard as they can to beat us to control the data that flows around the world through AI. It
Again, this is a Department of Energy council, made up of people in the industry, to give us a report to see where we should go in making sure that America has proper refining. It is not a report that is going to produce what we do. It is the kind of report that informs us in what we do. I know on our side of the aisle--I think on both sides of the aisle--we try to take as much information as we can to make a reasonable decision to make sure we have clean, sustainable, but ample and safe fuel for this country in order to get groceries to the grocery store, either through diesel or gasoline.
Prices matter. It hurts families when their electric bills are high and when their grocery bills are high because people have to eat and they have to have a safe and clean place to live. This is what this is about. This is what our struggle is over, and this is what we are going to accomplish as a committee.
Mr. Speaker, I encourage a ``yes'' vote on H.R. 3109, and I yield back the balance of my time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. All time for debate has expired.
Pursuant to House Resolution 879, the previous question is ordered on the bill.
The question is on the engrossment and third reading of the bill.
The bill was ordered to be engrossed and read a third time, and was read the third time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the passage of the bill.
The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that the ayes appeared to have it.
Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 879, I call up the bill (H.R. 1949) to repeal restrictions on the export and import of natural gas, and ask for its immediate consideration in the House.
The Clerk read the title of the bill.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to House Resolution 879, the bill is considered read.
The text of the bill is as follows:
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The bill shall be debatable for 1 hour equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on Energy and Commerce or their respective designees.
The gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Guthrie) and the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone) each will control 30 minutes.
Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on H.R. 1949.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the gentleman from Kentucky?
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, in February 2016, the first cargo of U.S. LNG set sail from the lower 48, making the United States a natural gas exporter for the first time since the 1960s.
Since then, exports have increased from 5 billion cubic feet per day in 2016 to nearly 12 billion cubic feet per day in 2024, making the U.S. the global leader in LNG in less than a decade.
U.S. LNG has played an undeniably important role in providing affordable, abundant, and clean energy to the world. This could not have been more evident than in 2022, when Russia invaded Ukraine, disrupting global commodity markets and leaving Europe without secure access to energy.
Immediately, for our friends in Europe, U.S. producers began sending cargos of American gas to the Continent to fuel their economies and heat their homes, helping some of our most important global allies and friends.
However, in January 2024, the Biden-Harris administration announced an illegal and indefinite ban on new export authorizations, all in the name of vaguely stated climate change goals. Current law is clear. Requiring a statutory presumption in favor of exports are in the public interest.
Plus, the vast majority of studies show that not only do LNG exports boost our energy security but they also help maintain low domestic natural gas prices for Americans.
The Biden-Harris administration's action not only jeopardized our European allies but it threatened the faith and credibility of American companies' contracts. It emboldened Russia and other nefarious actors and created uncertainty for domestic producers of natural gas.
H.R. 1949, the Unlocking Our Domestic LNG Potential Act of 2025, would ensure this catastrophic policy decision is never made again by removing DOE from the statutory authorization process.
This legislation maintains the President's authority to impose sanctions on foreign governments, prohibiting imports or exports, if justified. Free trade, open markets, and competitions have resulted in the U.S. emerging as a global energy superpower. Lifting these restrictions will help maintain this dominance at a time it is needed most.
Mr. Speaker, I urge all my colleagues to support H.R. 1949. At a meeting a couple of years ago with people at the highest levels of the German Government, they said they needed American LNG gas to rain down on them because of what was going on in Eastern Europe and Ukraine.
High natural gas prices around the world fund the Russian Army. That is how they fund their army. It is not that friends are buying from them but, as the world price goes higher, the Russian price goes higher from the people who do choose to buy from them. We are not talking about affecting those people. The President still needs to have the authority. We are talking about our friends and our allies who are dependent on us.
I worry about what we do here in our country, but also America cannot cut itself off from the rest of the world and have our friends and allies look elsewhere to other people for the natural gas they need to run their economy. They will do that if we don't step in and do this at this time.
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong opposition to this bill. This bill would allow unlimited amounts of our liquefied natural gas, or LNG, to be sent abroad to any designation in the world including to our adversaries like China.
This is all about China. The President gets up on a regular basis and says we need to export more LNG to China. My Republican colleagues say they worry about Beijing and what Beijing is doing to challenge us. Yet, they are going to allow with this bill unlimited exports to Communist China.
By sending more American LNG abroad, this bill would reduce our energy resources at home, raising our constituents' utility bills at a time when they can least afford it. It just makes common sense that if we send liquefied natural gas abroad, it is going to raise the price here because there will be less here. It is just Economics 101, in my opinion.
Americans are already being crushed by the rising cost of living. Now Republicans are making matters worse by pushing legislation that will only drive up monthly power bills even further. It is quite the departure from President Trump's campaign promise to cut American power bills in half. He said that during the course of the campaign that in the first year he would cut power bills in half. Instead, they keep climbing.
Right now, thanks to the congressional Republicans' backward energy policies, electricity prices are climbing more than twice as fast as inflation. More than 80 million Americans are struggling to pay their utility bills, with many having to make the impossible choice of either paying for medicine and food or keeping their lights on. I think it is a disgrace that, instead of offering up solutions to this affordability crisis, Republicans are here today to just make it worse.
Let's be clear, Mr. Speaker. It is a well-established fact that unlimited LNG exports would increase prices here at home. If my colleagues don't believe me, last year the Secretary of Energy noted: ``Unfettered exports of LNG would increase wholesale domestic natural gas prices by over 30 percent.''
Mr. Speaker, if you are a Republican who perhaps didn't trust the Democratic Department of Energy, I would certainly assume you could trust your own current Department of Energy.
Just last week, the Energy Information Administration noted that it expects natural gas prices to increase by 16 percent next year due largely to increased exports of LNG. Mr. Speaker, 16 percent is on top of the 15 percent increase in natural gas costs that Americans already suffered this year. It is all due to the LNG export approvals that President Trump made in his first term.
All this bill does is make that problem worse by ensuring there are zero restrictions on how much of our own LNG we are shipping out to other countries. The only ones who stand to benefit are fossil fuel companies, proving that Republicans care more about padding the profits of their rich fossil fuel friends than they do about lowering costs for the average American.
Mr. Speaker, I want to stress the China part again. China is one of the top recipients of American LNG, and not only the President but LNG companies are openly bragging about how they can sell to Chinese buyers. This bill completely removes any review of whether exporting more of our LNG to China is in the public interest.
The chairman said that that is a presumption that the public interest has met. I argue it is more than a presumption. There is no longer any review of the public interest. When I talk about the public interest, I am talking about price. I am talking about national security. I am talking about impact on the environment, the air, and whatever people breathe.
This bill completely removes any review of what is in the public interest before we export to China or anyone else. To me, it is the very reversal. The President talks about America First. This is putting America last in my opinion.
Mr. Speaker, I don't know what to say. We have seen this story before. Mr. Speaker, 10 years ago, Congress removed the ban on exporting American crude oil. I already mentioned that. Before that, we were only sending China 420,000 barrels of oil each year. We now send China more than 160 million barrels of oil a year.
Clearly, Republicans have learned nothing from that, despite constantly proclaiming the importance of beating China in the AI race and so many other things. Republicans consistently say that losing the AI race to China would be like losing the Cold War to Russia. The bill they are proposing today is like selling rocket fuel to the Soviets during the space race. It defies all logic.
Finally, I want to point out a basic fact. We have already approved enough permits to triple our LNG exports by the end of the decade, and that is on top of the more than quadrupling of LNG exports we have already seen over the last 6 years. When my colleagues on the other side talk about Europe and our allies, there is no way that at this point with the permits that have already been approved that the Europeans or any of our allies have to worry about not getting enough LNG from us.
Mr. Speaker, I think it makes sense to ask the Department of Energy to keep an eye on this to ensure that all these exports are actually a good thing and are in our public interest: For our economy, for our national security, and for the communities that we here represent.
All this bill does is get rid of all of that and say we don't care and we should export whatever we want to China or whoever else. The American people are tired of these antics. They don't have time for them. They need us to get serious about addressing the skyrocketing cost of living. Today they will see that Republicans are making it worse, while Democrats are fighting to make it better to try to reduce prices.
Mr. Speaker, I encourage my colleagues to vote ``no,'' and I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. Speaker, this bill does nothing to prohibit the President, or whoever is President, from limiting LNG exports, sanctioning China, or tariffing China. There is no limit to that.
The people who are begging, I can tell you, Mr. Speaker, for our energy is Europe, who are our friends. I do know from just recently meeting with friends from Japan and Korea they want the natural gas that we have in our great State of Alaska. This is important.
The chairman of the Energy Subcommittee is a leader on this issue and has fought for reliable and sustainable energy.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Latta).
Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Kentucky, the chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee, for yielding.
Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 1949, the Unlocking our Domestic LNG Potential Act, introduced by my friend and colleague from the 11th District of Texas.
This legislation will streamline regulatory approvals of LNG export facilities to meet the movement of global energy demands.
This legislation removes unnecessary and burdensome reviews at the Department of Energy for exporting U.S. LNG while maintaining the required site and environmental reviews at FERC. Increasing opportunities for exports increases overall U.S. production, putting downward pressures on prices for everyone.
The U.S. LNG industry contributed $44 billion to the economy and supported 220,000 good-paying jobs while providing $11 billion in taxes and royalty payments.
In response to Russia's unprovoked invasion of Ukraine in 2022, American energy producers immediately supplied Europe and our allies with LNG. The U.S. was the number one supplier of LNG to Europe in 2023. Unfortunately, in 2024, the Biden administration took politically motivated actions to place an indefinite ban on LNG export permits to appease the climate lobby. This legislation ensures that future administrations cannot unilaterally prohibit exports of LNG for political purposes.
Nothing in this legislation limits the authority of the President to impose sanctions on foreign governments and does not affect the existing FERC authorities for reviewing facilities for environmental or safety purposes.
H.R. 1949 brings commonsense reforms to treat LNG just like other commodities such as crude oil. In the 114th Congress, I was proud to support legislation from the Energy and Commerce Committee that lifted the crude oil export ban which elevated the United States as the premier global oil producing nation.
This bill will similarly allow our vast natural resources to advance our national security interests.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support this legislation, and I thank my friend, the chairman of the committee, for bringing forth this bill.
Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to H.R. 1949. It is a harmful bill that demonstrates how Republicans in Congress continue to ignore the rising cost of living and inflation that is crushing American families and that they are willing to sell out American energy to our adversaries like the Chinese Community Party.
I know it wasn't even 2 weeks ago that President Trump said: I don't want to talk about affordability.
Well, we are going to talk about it, and we are going to stand up for people's pocketbooks at home.
This bill is just another example of how Republicans have not brought one single bill to the House floor that would lower energy costs for hardworking families.
Electricity bills are skyrocketing. It is getting harder and harder for people to pay their utility bills. Now Republicans and the Trump administration are making it worse. They have passed the big, ugly bill to rip away savings and rebates for cleaner, cheaper energy a few months ago and energy efficiency that keeps bills lower, all to pay for tax breaks for the wealthy and the well-connected.
Now they want to ramp up gas exports that will make life even more expensive. It wasn't even 1 year ago that the Department of Energy released its study that made it clear, continuing to approve gas exports would raise costs on U.S. households and businesses.
Don't just take it from me, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record a letter from the Industrial Energy Consumers of America dated November 17, 2025.
They say this bill is inconsistent with the President's pledge to put America first, and it prioritizes gas exports over U.S. consumers by removing longstanding consumer protections. They urge everyone to oppose this bill and preserve those consumer protections.
Mr. Speaker, when you export more gas, that raises domestic gas prices, electricity prices, and the cost of manufactured goods. A vote for this bill is a vote to raise utility bills. That is particularly problematic to the neighbors back home I represent in the State of Florida. The State of Florida, the Sunshine State, you would think would be powered by the sun, Mr. Speaker, but we are 75 percent reliant on gas to generate electricity.
Now, Mr. Speaker, you are saying: Okay, Floridians, you are already being crushed by utility bills, and now Republicans are going to make it worse.
It is raising costs on all of us in more insidious ways too because we do have a climate crisis across the world. Mr. Speaker, when you are paying more to
Given that large methane and carbon dioxide emissions are emitted during fracking, pipeline transport, liquefaction, overseas shipping, and combustion, costs go up, and so do pollution and health risks, especially along the Gulf Coast.
Now, let's talk about point number two. Mr. Speaker, if higher costs in electric bills are not going to convince you to vote against this bill, then I hope that America's national security will. Republicans and the gas industry and their lobbyists want carte blanche to export gas to anyone, even our foreign adversaries.
Now, under current law, the U.S. Department of Energy is responsible for authorizing exports of domestically produced gas to foreign countries. In doing so, DOE makes a determination whether or not that export is consistent with the public interest. Republicans and the industry want to eliminate that important review, that even if the gas goes to the Chinese Communist Party and other foreign adversaries that is okay, there is no need to look and no need to review that. That is wrong and dangerous.
Aren't Republicans in Congress concerned that shipping American energy overseas to China to power their AI data centers and their manufacturing is a risk, an economic risk, and a military risk?
I also serve on the House Select Committee on the Strategic Competition Between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party. On that committee, we have heard over and over about the dangers of Chinese industrial dominance. They want to just kind of sweep up all natural resources across the globe for their economic and military advantage.
Why would Republicans in Congress be party to that?
Through this bill, House Republicans want to make it easier for China to import U.S. energy to power their industrial and military sectors.
Republicans have also enacted policies that wave a white flag to China on cleaner and cheaper energy, on electric vehicles, and on the next generation of energy manufacturing and technology, all evidenced by what they have done in gutting clean energy tax credits in manufacturing, in jobs, and in cost savings in their big, ugly bill.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The time of the gentlewoman has expired.
Plus, it is hypocritical for Republicans to condemn Chinese forced labor, subsidies, and intellectual property theft on the one hand and then allow massive amounts of U.S. resources to flow to Chinese factories on the other hand.
These are not hypothetical concerns. In June, the President posted that hopefully China will be purchasing plenty of oil from the U.S.
Then, after meeting with President Xi in October, the President said that a very large-scale transaction may take place concerning the purchase of oil and gas from the great State of Alaska.
This is all too much. If these projects come online, then U.S. LNG would represent up to one-quarter of all of China's contracted LNG under the contracts that have already been entered into.
I urge my colleagues now to do the patriotic thing. Really, go ahead, and put America first for a change.
It is vitally important that energy export decisions benefit the American people, not our foreign adversaries. Exporting more LNG without guardrails does nothing to lower energy bills for hardworking families. In fact, it will make it worse, and people deserve better.
Mr. Speaker, there are still protections in place so the President can sanction and not send to any adversaries. What this does is prevent a President from suspending LNG gas exports for some reason at a time when our friends in Europe are literally begging for it, and I know our friends from Japan and Korea are asking for it.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Weber), the vice chair of the Energy and Commerce Committee and my good friend.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of H.R. 1949, the Unlocking our Domestic LNG Potential Act, led by my friend and fellow Texan, Representative Pfluger.
For years, America has been blessed with abundant natural gas. In Texas, we have been at the heart of it all. We are the world's number one producer of oil and natural gas and the top exporter of LNG. That didn't happen by accident. It happened because American workers, American innovators, and American energy producers were finally unleashed.
Under the previous administration, we launched an indefensible freeze on LNG export permits, a politically motivated blockade that put our economy at risk, undermined jobs, and was just simply wrong for global security.
That was wrong for Texans, wrong for America, and wrong for our allies working to wean themselves off of Russian gas.
H.R. 1949 fixes that. This bill removes outdated restrictions on natural gas imports and exports and puts decisionmaking authority back where it belongs--with FERC, not some bureaucrats using climate reviews or climate change as a backdoor veto.
Some of you have seen that even the Microsoft founder, Bill Gates, is now backing up on his climate claims. This is ridiculous.
This bill restores certainty for developers who have already committed more than $70 billion--with a b--in new investments since President Trump took office.
It strengthens our hand abroad by ensuring our allies that they can rely on American energy instead of their adversaries'. Most importantly, it reinforces a simple truth: Energy security is national security.
In southeast Texas, we understand that better than anybody. We produce it. We refine it. We ship it. We keep America moving every single day.
H.R. 1949 is pro-jobs, pro-growth, pro-ally, and proudly pro-American energy. I urge my colleagues to support H.R. 1949 and keep America the world's energy leader.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today on behalf of the residents of California's 25th Congressional District against H.R. 1949, which would increase their energy bills.
The desert communities I serve are already bearing the brunt of high energy bills and underinvestment in infrastructure. They simply cannot afford this bill.
Under Trump, in the last 9 months, electricity prices have gone up by 11 percent across the Nation. Trump's one big, beautiful bill, better known as the big, ugly law, will simply make matters much, much worse by delivering higher energy costs. It will raise energy costs by over $600 a year in California.
In my district, families are already struggling with some of the highest energy costs in the Nation. Families in the desert are paying hundreds more per year, not because they are using luxury power, but because extreme heat makes air-conditioning a necessity.
For many families, the rising costs of energy are not abstract numbers. High costs force impossible choices between cooling their homes or risking heat-related illnesses.
These bills being debated here today directly affect their health, safety, and financial stability because they raise costs.
More specifically, H.R. 1949, the Unlocking our Domestic LNG Potential Act, is a direct threat to working people and middle-class families in my district and across the country.
This bill removes the requirement that the Department of Energy determine whether LNG exports are in the public interest, like lowering costs, before approving shipments to countries without free trade agreements.
In other words, this bill assumes automatically and without review that every LNG export is good for America. That assumption is not only irresponsible, but it is also dangerous and absolutely false.
Analyses have shown that increasing LNG exports drives up natural gas
DOE found that the kind of unlimited exports authorized under this bill would increase household energy costs by more than $100 per year on top of the cost increases already burdening families under the Republicans' One Big Beautiful Bill Act, i.e., the big, ugly law.
Let's be clear. H.R. 1949 is a substantial giveaway to major oil and gas corporations, billionaires, and executives at the expense of working people once again.
It strengthens foreign adversaries, including China, while forcing American families, especially those in extreme heat regions like mine, to pay the price through higher monthly bills.
For the hardworking people of San Jacinto, Coachella, and Imperial Valley, the pass area, where triple-digit heat is a life-threatening reality, these rising energy costs are devastating. They represent choices no family should ever be forced to make between cooling their homes during extreme heat or keeping their loved ones safe.
This is not hypothetical. This is unacceptable.
The people I represent are resilient and hardworking. Right now, they are facing higher energy bills while already dealing with extreme heat and limited resources.
This bill will make matters worse. This bill will raise their costs even more. We need to lower costs, not raise them. That is why I urge a ``no'' vote on H.R. 1949. Let's lower costs.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Allen), a very valuable member of the Energy and Commerce Committee and my good friend.
Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman for yielding. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 1949, the Unlocking our Domestic LNG Potential Act, and I thank Representative Pfluger for his leadership on this bill.
In January of last year, former President Joe Biden unveiled the latest of many attacks on our domestic energy capabilities when he announced an indefinite pause on all pending approvals of liquefied natural gas exports, or LNG.
This certainly made the Russians happy, and Europe could have used some help with their energy demand.
Not only was this decision completely unnecessary, but it was also economically and strategically dangerous. Under both Democratic and Republican administrations, DOE has consistently found that U.S. LNG exports serve the public interest, contributing positive economic benefits and strengthening energy security for the American people.
Even more, recent studies confirmed that increased American LNG exports do not significantly raise global emissions. In fact, it is quite the opposite. Clean natural gas is a major reason why the United States has significantly reduced emissions.
Thankfully, we now have a Commander in Chief who understands the importance of embracing an all-of-the-above energy strategy and unleashing the production and export of clean, affordable, and reliable American LNG.
In the first days of this administration, the President signed an executive order reversing President Biden's LNG pause, an important step in reclaiming global energy dominance and lowering costs across the board.
It is shocking to me that House Democrats will run to the news cameras and clamor about the cost of living while they also offered their full support for reckless anti-domestic energy policies from the Biden administration that caused prices to skyrocket in the first place.
I mean, look at the price of gasoline at the pump 2 years ago. Look at the price of gasoline at the pump today. That is all you have to do.
The reason that energy prices are spiking is because input costs are spiking.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The time of the gentleman has expired.
Mr. Speaker, I am hopeful that my colleagues on the other side of the aisle will join us in passing H.R. 1949, which amends the Natural Gas Act to repeal all restrictions on the import and export of natural gas, effectively overturning the Biden-Harris administration's attempt to undermine U.S. domestic energy production.
Removing unnecessary export controls on LNG will strengthen the domestic economy and increase the energy security of the U.S. and our allies.
Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak in opposition to H.R. 1949.
Mr. Speaker, this bill would force the Department of Energy to rubberstamp every LNG export and strip the Department of its ability to review whether those exports are actually in the public interest.
At a time when families across the country are already seeing rising costs, Republicans are doing the opposite of what is needed. Instead of working to lower energy bills, they are prioritizing legislation that props up the fossil fuel industry and blocks affordable, clean energy that is ready to be connected to the grid.
We already know that increased LNG exports means higher energy prices for our communities at a time when families are already facing an affordability crisis. Due to skyrocketing demand, including from data centers, families in New Jersey saw a 20 percent spike in electricity bills this summer.
Further, Republicans claim that we need more fossil fuels to compete with China. If that is their concern, why advance a bill that makes it easier for China to purchase even more of our domestic energy? Why are we driving up our own energy bills to help an adversary? It makes absolutely no sense.
If we are serious about competing with China, we should take an all- of-the-above strategy to energy production and fast-track clean energy onto the grid.
Further, my colleagues across the aisle should tell the Trump administration to get Revolution Wind, which is off the coast of Rhode Island, back on track. That is how we produce more energy in this country. Doing so would bring down prices for American families in the process.
Mr. Speaker, I am strongly opposed to this bill, and I urge my colleagues to join me. Let's put the interests of our communities and of our country first.
Mr. Chair, I yield to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Balderson), another good friend. I am yielding to all of my good friends, but I yield to a very valued member of the Committee on Energy and Commerce.
Mr. Speaker, House Republicans and President Trump remain firm in our commitment to lowering costs for families and restoring American energy dominance.
I am proud to represent parts of the Utica and Marcellus shale formations, where natural gas development has transformed local economies and strengthened our Nation's energy security. Boosting natural gas production in Ohio and expanding LNG exports are essential to our vision of energy dominance.
Under the last administration, President Biden repeatedly undermined the domestic energy producers, including imposing a ban on new LNG export permits. This misguided action discouraged investments in American natural gas and harmed our allies abroad, who are working to reduce their dependence on Russian energy.
The Unlocking our Domestic LNG Potential Act ends political interference in the permit process and unleashes America's full energy potential.
Here are the facts on LNG:
Increasing LNG exports would add over $70 billion to the U.S. economy and create over 400,000 American jobs by 2040.
American LNG is more than 40 percent cleaner than Russian LNG.
Since we have increased our LNG exports, domestic natural gas prices have remained affordable and stable.
Under President Trump, we are restoring American energy leadership.
Mr. Speaker, I thank Congressman August Pfluger for leading this important legislation, and I encourage my colleagues to vote ``yes.''
Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to H.R. 1949, the Unlocking our Domestic LNG Potential Act.
Mr. Speaker, I asked for 2 minutes. I only need seven words: We should not be fueling our adversaries.
This bill strips the Department of Energy's authority to provide oversight on exports of liquefied natural gas to foreign adversaries like China and Russia, which poses what should be an obvious and grave threat to our national security.
Unfettered sale of LNG to countries like China and Russia would power their data centers, AI systems, and cyber missions, all by using American energy.
This legislation, importantly, is a departure from how we regulate all other energy sources. Sources like oil and coal, we have laws that impose certain restrictions on exports to foreign entities of concern, like China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea.
Mr. Speaker, under this new bill, LNG would not be subject to this policy, and I have to ask: Why?
If this bill is really about better supporting our allies in Europe and the Indo-Pacific, I support that, but there are currently no restrictions from literally fueling our adversaries. In fact, by exporting LNG, we could be risking higher domestic natural gas prices, meaning our constituents and our neighbors would face higher electricity bills and pay more at the gas pump.
That is why I planned on introducing legislation requiring DOE to certify that LNG exports to our foreign adversaries are actually in the public interest and aligned with our Nation's national security needs.
We must close this current loophole exempting LNG from oversight and affirm DOE's role in the process. The premise is simple. It is not and should not be controversial or partisan. We should not be fueling our adversaries.
Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of my legislation. I am proud to offer H.R. 1949 today, Unlocking our Domestic LNG Potential Act.
It has been a long time coming. For 4 years, we suffered as a nation under the Biden administration's disastrous energy policies that put our energy security and the security of our allies at serious risk.
The White House launched a whole-of-government assault on American energy production: slow-rolling permits; killing infrastructure projects, like pipelines; and, most importantly, pandering to radical climate activists. Then they delivered perhaps the most damaging and egregious move of all: They banned new exports on LNG. This wasn't to help the environmental laws or to lower prices for American families. It was to satisfy the radical green activists.
Let me be clear that this ban put politics over people by jeopardizing the American economy and handing Vladimir Putin a lifeline as our European allies were forced to scramble for energy. That was not leadership. That was failure.
It gets worse. After independent experts uncovered major flaws in the study used to justify the freeze, the Biden administration doubled down, and senior officials deliberately hid reports that completely contradicted their argument.
The administration knew the truth, and they hid it. They buried it.
Mr. Speaker, the American people deserve the truth that exporting American LNG strengthens our country. U.S. LNG exports replace dirtier fuels from adversaries like Russia and Iran. In fact, during Biden's LNG export ban, Russia overtook the U.S. as the lead supplier of gas to Europe. In no world was this good for the American consumers or our allies.
Mr. Speaker, I would like to say that Republicans and Democrats have similar goals, but that is just not true. We had 4 years to study this. We had 4 years of evidence on this. Democrats want to kill hydrocarbons, plain and simple.
Republicans are moving to lower prices, and anybody who knows this industry, anybody who has studied this industry, and anybody who has been to where this industry happens, knows for certain that this is a good bill because they understand not just the economics of it, but they understand the long-term implications of this industry. If Members vote against it, they are telling me and the American people one thing: They haven't studied this industry.
Gas exports strengthen our economy. They stabilize prices, and they drive much-needed investment in energy infrastructure that bolsters our energy security.
The facts are clear: We must reform the broken approval process and unlock LNG's potential. My bill does exactly that. It eliminates the politicized DOE, which was weaponized by the previous administration, and gives FERC sole authority over that authorization process.
This is common sense. FERC already leads the review of LNG facilities under section 3 of the Natural Gas Act. It completes the environmental work. It completes the technical review. It completes the full analysis. We are cutting the red tape.
This is promises made, promises kept. The Unlocking Our Domestic LNG Potential Act removes that red tape and replaces it with a streamlined, transparent process that gives producers certainty, strengthening global energy security, and lowering the cost for all of our domestic consumers.
We have to depoliticize the export process. Once again, when the Biden administration banned LNG exports, they weaponized and they politicized that aspect, but today we have the opportunity to stand with American families and businesses and lower the cost and restore energy dominance.
This legislation should be an easy, bipartisan bill. If you support affordable, reliable energy, then this bill strengthens our economy. It lowers prices, and it signals that you have studied the industry and that you know your facts.
Mr. Speaker, I urge all my colleagues to support this and am proud to offer H.R. 1949.
Mr. Speaker, I will mention to my colleagues on the other side that the Biden administration did not ban LNG exports.
There was a pause because they were concerned about the public interest, in particular, because the price was increasing for power, for natural gas, and so many other things.
It made sense to take a review and see what that meant for price, what that meant for national security, what that meant for the environment and climate.
The reality is that the amount of natural gas permits and LNG permits continue to rise and rise every day. This idea that somehow they banned it is simply not the case.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Casten).
Mr. Speaker, my colleague just said that to vote against this bill means you haven't studied the energy industry.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today as someone who spent 20 years working in the energy industry. I rise today as the son of someone who spent his entire career in the energy industry. I will take my fancy book learning or school of hard knocks learning against any of you all any day.
What strikes me in listening to this debate is, it reminds me of a paperweight my dad had on his desk when I was a kid. It was a little paperweight of an oil barrel. On one side of the barrel, it said: ``Relax. The price will go down,'' if you flipped it over, it said, ``Relax. The price will go up,'' because energy consumers want the price to be cheap. Energy producers want the price to be high.
If you work in the energy industry as long as I have or even if you worked there for 35 seconds, you spend time talking to consumers and producers. The debate that is going on here in this body is not what is in consumers' interest, what is in producers' interest, but what is in the national interest.
The Republicans across the aisle are making a very articulate case for energy producers. It is not lost on us that most of them represent districts that are heavily dominated by producers.
Over here, there is a very articulate case on behalf of consumers because most of Americans--I would hazard a guess that all Americans are consumers.
Because when we export natural gas from the United States, we reduce domestic supply, which pushes up the price. That is why the Natural Gas Act since 1935, among other things, has required that gas export facilities can't be built unless they are in the national interest, not producers' interest, not the drillers' interest, not some random Chinese fertilizer manufacturers' interest, but the national interest. They go on to talk about facts. If you want to talk about people who studied this, let's talk about the Department of Energy.
There is an LNG export terminal, I am sure you are aware of it, in Freeport, Texas. In June 2022, it was shut down because of a fire for about a month. That gave us real-time experiments on exactly what happens when you make a marginal shift in the export of LNG from the United States.
According to the Department of Energy website, this is what happened: ``The U.S. natural gas spot price fell by 13 percent on June 9. The price continued to decline by an additional 17 percent through the end of June. Prices fell largely because the outage at Freeport decreased U.S. natural gas exports, putting downward pressure on natural gas prices.''
That is 30 percent inflation in just one month from just one facility. Supply and demand is real. This is not complicated.
Mr. Speaker, understand what this bill is trying to do. By stipulating that all exports are in the national interest, you are stipulating that raising every American's monthly heating bill is in the national interest.
This week, Donald Trump gave a speech where he said: ``We are looking at affordability--we are going to bring it down for everybody. . . .'' I think he meant we are going to make things more affordable, but you understand the point.
If the Republicans all care about affordability, if they care about the national interest, if they just care about proving Donald Trump right for once, if they just care about doing what he tells them to do, vote ``no'' on this bill.
Mr. Speaker, I thank Chairman Guthrie for yielding.
Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of the Unlocking Our Domestic LNG Potential Act.
In 2024, America exported nearly 12 billion cubic feet of LNG every single day. That is enough LNG to power almost 48 million homes in a single day.
What we are now faced with is making President Trump's vision of American energy dominance real.
LNG has a huge part to play in this vision, but we are fighting with one hand tied behind our back.
American oil and gas producers are restrained by bureaucratic red tape and the lingering rules and regulations of the Biden administration.
The Unlocking Our Domestic LNG Potential Act stands as a pivotal piece of legislation poised to bolster United States energy security, foster economic growth, and promote environmental sustainability. At its very core, the bill aims to streamline the regulatory process surrounding the exportation of LNG, thereby unleashing the full potential of America's abundant natural resources.
Now in north central Florida, not many people know this, but we are home to one of the largest bunkering LNG hubs in North America. This is critical to our domestic economy, as well as our national security.
The reason why this bill is so important is, first and foremost, it addresses the Biden administration's extreme LNG permit ban. By facilitating the exportation of LNG, we reduce our reliance on foreign energy sources, mitigating the geopolitical risks, and enhance our national security in the process.
By expanding LNG export capabilities, it means that this is job creation. It stimulates investment in our energy infrastructure and fosters innovation across the related industries.
Increased LNG exports translate into expanded markets, bolstering domestic production, and will do more in the next 50 years than we can imagine.
As I mentioned, the State of Florida is a dominant player in this role. We need to make sure that we are doing everything we can to make sure that the unelected bureaucrats are not hindering growth.
Mr. Speaker, I encourage all my colleagues to support this legislation.
Mr. Speaker, I will say that we want the world price produced by what we have here in our country. The price does fluctuate on a stop price day-to-day. However, just because we are sitting on massive reserves of natural gas where our friends in Europe are suffering, where our friends in Korea and Japan are asking for it, the argument is, if you don't export any natural gas, the argument some people seem to be making is the price would go down, but that is just not true because the producers are going to produce to world price. A real problem in price of natural gas is getting it distributed to where it needs to go and that is pipelines. I hope we can work together on permit reform.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Oklahoma (Mrs. Bice).
Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of the Unlocking Our Domestic LNG Potential Act, which will support a robust natural gas industry in the U.S. and meet President Trump's goal of achieving American energy dominance.
Natural gas is a major engine of economic growth, particularly in Oklahoma. LNG exports alone in the U.S. support more than 273,000 U.S. jobs and contribute $40 billion to our GDP.
This sector is a lifeline for communities across the country, including Oklahoma's Fifth Congressional District, and we must ensure it has a stable framework to reach its full potential.
LNG exports are also a win for the environment. A recent S&P Global study found that U.S. LNG exports reduce global greenhouse gas emissions by 65 million tons. Anyone serious about lowering global emissions should strongly support the expansion of American LNG.
Yet, despite this abundance of benefits, President Biden chose to unilaterally ban the issue of LNG export permits. While this was overturned by a court, if approval for export is determined by political appointees at the Department of Energy, the threat of a future ban from a progressive Presidential administration remains in place. Turning these decisions over to a neutral party, like the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, will ensure the industry is kept safe from such reckless attacks in the future.
Some argue that LNG exports raise energy prices for Americans by reducing domestic supply. This claim is simply false. Increased export opportunities incentivize production and drive efficiency gains, which will help domestic prices continue to be affordable.
Given the abundance of economic and environmental benefits from LNG exports, I believe it is critical that we help protect the industry from misguided political attacks such as those made by the Biden administration last year.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to join me in voting in favor of this legislation.
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, I hear my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, the Republicans, talk about the demand for LNG in Europe and how we are not giving Europe or other allies enough LNG. The fact of the matter is that we are sending more LNG to our European allies and our other allies than ever before.
DOE, the Department of Energy, has issued enough permits to triple our export capacity from what it is today, even if they never issued another permit. That will take us into the early 2030s, when European policy is set to reduce natural gas consumption. We have approved so many terminals that
If this bill never becomes law, our European allies, our allies--I think South Korea or Japan was mentioned--will be well supplied.
What is really happening here with this bill is helping China. That is what this is about, Beijing, Communist China.
In 2024 alone, the United States exported over 200 billion cubic feet of gas to China. At a time when Americans are struggling to pay their heating bills and our power grids are facing unprecedented demand, President Trump and his Republican Party care more about subsidizing China's economic development and basically lining the pockets of their fossil fuel friends.
Republicans claim to be obsessed with beating China in the AI race. Why are they trying to advance a bill that makes it easier to send American LNG to China to fuel their data centers and AI tools? Why are they putting the profits of Chinese technology companies over the well- being of American families and the success of our American companies?
I have said this before, but it bears repeating. Republicans on the Committee on Energy and Commerce have compared winning the AI race with China to the importance of winning the Cold War. If that is true, then why are we sending more energy and trying to send even more and more energy to China? It makes absolutely no sense.
H.R. 1949 will enrich Big Oil and the Chinese technology companies that rely on LNG to fuel their data centers, all while worsening the energy affordability crisis that Americans are experiencing. The only Americans who benefit from this deal are the rich fossil fuel executives.
H.R. 1949 squarely puts China first and America last. The President and the Republicans keep talking about putting America first. How does this bill do that? This bill does the opposite.
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, I was actually in a meeting with Europeans at the highest level of government, and when they talked about needing more LNG exports from the United States and criticized the ban, somebody made the point that my friend just made to them and said: Well, I understand all of your terminals are full. You couldn't receive any more anyway. They said: We need the world price to come down. We have to have the world price come down.
Energy prices in Germany are three times what they are here. Could you imagine trying to compete in the global economy when energy prices are three times as high and when you have a neighbor just a few countries over that has an unprovoked and illegal invasion of another country?
We can't just dismiss that this is important to Europe as well just because they have full terminals.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from West Virginia (Mrs. Miller), my good friend from a neighboring State and a good neighbor.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of H.R. 1949, the Unlocking our Domestic LNG Potential Act of 2025.
As co-chair of the Energy Export Caucus, I understand that eliminating harmful barriers around American energy exports is essential to strengthening our economy and national security.
This legislation takes a crucial step, cutting through bureaucratic red tape, which has slowed or even stalled natural gas imports and exports for far too long.
Giving the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission sole authority to approve or deny natural gas applications eliminates permitting bottlenecks and gives American energy producers a clear and reliable path to move forward with critical projects.
H.R. 1949 ends the harmful Biden-era delays on liquefied natural gas export approvals. Delays discourage investment, undermine our energy leadership, and threaten the security of our global partners who depend on the United States to break free from harmful foreign influence.
The United States is blessed with abundant natural gas resources, and our producers stand ready to meet rising global demand.
Our Nation must capitalize on what we have here at home and continue to make meaningful progress to stay competitive in the global energy arena. H.R. 1949 ensures that American energy remains affordable and accessible, keeping it unmatched on the world stage.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support this important piece of legislation.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of H.R. 1949, the Unlocking our Domestic LNG Potential Act of 2025. I am proud to be an original cosponsor of this very important legislation.
The United States is already the world's leading producer of oil and natural gas and also the top exporter of LNG. A whole lot of that energy comes straight out of my district in the great State of Texas.
That is why it is long past time that we repeal the harmful, politically motivated Biden-era restrictions that have shackled and locked down our LNG industry. These restrictions did nothing but threaten American jobs, drive away investment, and undermine the energy security of our own allies and friends.
H.R. 1949, led by my friend Representative August Pfluger from Texas, fixes this. It lifts restrictions on the import and export of natural gas and allows American LNG to flourish once again.
Mr. Speaker, America should never ever voluntarily surrender its energy advantages, not when our production strengthens families, their paychecks, and communities, and certainly not when Texas and our Gulf Coast stand ready to supply LNG to the world safely, cleanly, and reliably. Energy security is national security. We must never forget this.
I am proud to support this bill. It is a wise, good bill that will strengthen America. I urge my colleagues to join me in unlocking America's full LNG potential to achieve world energy dominance.
Mr. Speaker, I should have introduced my good friend from Texas (Mr. Babin) as a colleague and fellow chairman, the chairman of the Committee on Science.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Arrington), chairman of the House Committee on the Budget, my good friend.
Mr. Speaker, as I listened to the ranking member talk about China's need for U.S. energy, thank God it is that way and not the other way around.
If we followed the green new manifesto, with the regulatory assault on U.S. energy, and kept throwing hundreds of billions of dollars in distorting Green New Deal energy subsidies, that is exactly what would happen, we would wake up and be dependent on China for yet one more critical product.
Mr. Speaker, I am proud to stand alongside Chairman Guthrie and my fellow west Texan, August Pfluger, in support of the Unlocking our Domestic LNG Potential Act. America is the world's top exporter of LNG, a vital pillar of both our economic strength and national security.
In an effort to placate the radical left, which I think was primarily the motivation, the Biden administration, with its whole-of-government assault on American energy, froze new LNG export permits with no economic, environmental, or national security justification. That reckless decision threatened billions of U.S. investments, undermined our allies, and harmed energy-producing regions like west Texas.
Thankfully, we now have a President in the White House who is committed to doing the right thing for the country, for our producers and consumers, and committed to making American energy great again, not weaponizing
This bill removes politics from the export permit process and secures America's position as the world's energy superpower. I urge my colleagues to support this bill and prevent future administrations from threatening America's energy dominance. I thank the chairman again for his leadership.
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.
Mr. Speaker, I respect the chairman of our committee so much. The last time he spoke, he said that we need the world energy price to come down. What about the price here in the United States? The price is higher in the rest of the world than it is here, and that is why the rest of the world wants more of our LNG, because it is cheaper for them.
What about us, though? Shouldn't we be primarily concerned about Americans and the price here?
This bill, in my opinion, is just a giant handout to Big Oil and Gas that enriches our adversaries, primarily China, and forces middle-class families to pay the price with higher home energy bills. The bill removes the requirement that the Department of Energy determine LNG exports to be in the public interest before approving any export applications.
The bill assumes that all exports of LNG are automatically in the public interest. I think this is absurd, considering multiple analyses have found that increased LNG exports directly lead to higher natural gas prices here in America.
Last year, the Department of Energy's own review was clear: Unfettered gas exports will hurt the American economy. It found that energy costs would go up by more than $100 per year for every individual. At the same time, that is on top of the costs imposed by Republicans' big beautiful or ugly bill.
The Department of Energy also found that natural gas prices would increase by over 30 percent, so we are essentially, in this bill, removing crucial safeguards. What you are going to have instead is a Wild West, allowing all adversaries like China to purchase even more of our energy, essentially, to use against us.
This is the same playbook that Republicans ran when they repealed the crude oil export ban in 2015. After that repeal went through, oil exports to China increased from 420,000 barrels per year to over 160 million barrels per year in 2023. Last year, the United States sent 213 billion cubic feet of LNG to China, but Trump says he wants to send even more. He says that all the time.
All I am saying is if beating China is really as important as Republicans and President Trump claim, we shouldn't be raising our own energy prices just to fuel Chinese data centers. That is what this bill does.
I ask my colleagues to vote ``no,'' and I yield back the balance of my time, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.
Mr. Speaker, the price is different around the world because of the way it is distributed. The price of natural gas is the price of natural gas. To use it, you have to get it to market. You have to have it there.
To use an example my friend from Illinois said, Mr. Speaker, that you have a real-world example, he said there was a terminal that went offline that was supposed to export natural gas. It burned, so it went offline. There was natural gas moving to that terminal. All of a sudden, for a few days, you had an excess of capacity of natural gas. The argument would be, we would have the same production of natural gas if we just shut down all of the ports. If you can use one as an example, if you shut them all down and continue to produce the same level of natural gas, the price would drop.
The issue is, there is a certain point where it costs you to produce natural gas. You have to reach that point. What we are saying is, there is a world price for natural gas. If you continue to expand markets for people to ship natural gas, you will continue to have natural gas, and they will continue to drill to meet those market demands around the world.
If you shrink the demand around the world artificially by banning the exports, then they are not going to produce as much natural gas, and it doesn't affect the price. You can point to times when there are disruptions in the supply, but overall, it is basic economics. That is how it works.
Mr. Speaker, also, you can call what President Biden did a pause as opposed to a ban, but I know from the time he implemented the pause or ban until President Trump came into office, you couldn't ship natural gas. Either pause it or ban it, I think that is saying the same thing.
Mr. Speaker, this is important. We do want to beat China. I have a tremendous amount of respect for my ranking member. We want to work together to beat China, and we are going to work together to beat China because that unites all of us. Everybody in this room and everybody in this Chamber wants America to be first. We are going to work together to do that.
I think this is important. We may disagree on this policy. I think it is important. I encourage my colleagues to vote for this bill, and I yield back the balance of my time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. All time for debate has expired.
Pursuant to House Resolution 879, the previous question is ordered on the bill.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the engrossment and third reading of the bill.
The bill was ordered to be engrossed and read a third time, and was read the third time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on passage of the bill.
The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that the ayes appeared to have it.
Researching Efficient Federal Improvements for Necessary Energy Refining Act
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX, the unfinished business is the vote on passage of the bill (H.R. 3109) to require the Secretary of Energy to direct the National Petroleum Council to issue a report with respect to petrochemical refineries in the United States, and for other purposes, on which the yeas and nays were ordered.
The Clerk read the title of the bill.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the passage of the bill.
The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--yeas 230, nays 176, not voting 27, as follows:
Mr. KENNEDY of New York, Mrs. FOUSHEE, and Ms. DAVIDS of Kansas changed their vote from ``yea'' to ``nay.''
Mr. STANTON changed his vote from ``nay'' to ``yea.''
So the bill was passed.
The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
Mr. Speaker, I rise to honor a visionary, steadfast, and deeply respected leader and an indispensable participant in advancing our mission for the people, my longtime chief of staff, Terri McCullough.
Terri is stepping down this month to spend more time with her family, her teenagers.
Terri's service has been defined by her wisdom, by her warmth, and by her unwavering belief in the power of public service to improve private lives.
From her beginnings as an intern in my San Francisco district office nearly 30 years ago to her outstanding leadership as chief of staff in the Speaker's Office, Terri has embodied the very best of her core values: integrity, excellence, and compassion.
Terri made history as the first woman to serve as a chief of staff in the Speaker's Office, a testament not only to her extraordinary capabilities, but to her trailblazing example for women across this institution and the Nation.
Her leadership helped guide our work through times of enormous challenge and change, from strengthening our institution to delivering historic progress for working families.
Her judgment, strategic insight, and care for every member of our office, our Caucus, and our Congress have been essential to our success.
While we will miss her daily leadership, we wish her every happiness in the next chapter of her life. We look forward to continuing our collaboration, friendship, and shared mission in new ways.
Mr. Speaker, I thank Terri McCullough for everything.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX, the unfinished business is the vote on passage of the bill (H.R. 1949) to repeal restrictions on the export and import of natural gas, on which the yeas and nays were ordered.
The Clerk read the title of the bill.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the passage of the bill.
This is a 5-minute vote.
The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--yeas 217, nays 188, not voting 28, as follows:
The SPEAKER pro tempore. There are 2 minutes remaining.
So the bill was passed.
The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
Mr. Speaker, today, I was not recorded on Roll Call Nos. 303 and 304. Had I been present, I would have voted ``NAY'' on Roll Call No. 303 and ``NAY'' on Roll Call No. 304.
Mr. Speaker, I was unavoidably absent and unable to vote. Had I been present, I would have voted YEA on Roll Call No. 303 and YEA on Roll Call No. 304.
Mr. Speaker, I necessarily had to miss the vote. Had I been present, I would have voted NAY on Roll Call No. 303, REFINER Act and NAY on Roll Call No. 304, Unlocking our Domestic LNG Potential Act of 2025.
Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on House Administration be discharged from further consideration of H. Con. Res. 62, and ask for its immediate consideration in the House.
The Clerk read the title of the concurrent resolution.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the gentleman from Wisconsin?
There was no objection.
The text of the concurrent resolution is as follows:
Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that I may hereafter be considered to be the first sponsor of H.R. 2180, the Keep the Watchdogs Running Act; H.R. 759, the Federal Firefighters Families First Act; H.R. 1560, Postal Supervisors and Managers Fairness Act of 2025; and H.R. 1559, Postal Employee Appeal Rights Amendment Act of 2025, all bills originally introduced by Representative Connelly of Virginia, for the purposes of adding cosponsors and requesting reprintings pursuant to clause 7 of rule XII.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the gentleman from Virginia?
Mr. Speaker, with deep admiration for the memory of our departed colleague, Sylvester Turner, I ask unanimous consent that I may hereafter be considered to be the first sponsor of H.R. 1034, the DHS Cybersecuirty On-the-Job Training Program Act, a bill originally introduced by Representative Turner of Texas, for the purpose of adding cosponsors and requesting reprintings pursuant to clause 7 of rule XII.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the gentleman from Rhode Island?
Mr. Speaker, I rise to address the skyrocketing costs of healthcare.
When President Obama signed the Affordable Care Act, he promised affordable coverage for all. Mr. Speaker, 15 years and billions of dollars later, all we have gotten are higher costs and less coverage.
Basic economics tells us that when government subsidizes the price consumers pay, demand surges, and prices soar.
We have seen this movie before. Since Federal student loans began, college tuition has risen four and a half times faster than inflation. When Democrats passed the Inflation Reduction Act and spent $1.8 trillion on subsidies for all kinds of things, inflation hit a 40-year high.
It is clear that pouring taxpayer money into a broken system will only
It is time for real market-driven reforms with choice and competition.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to call for a vote on the extension of the Affordable Care Act subsidies that help 22 million Americans afford their healthcare.
As you all know, they expire at the end of the year. If Congress does nothing, costs will skyrocket, and people will lose their healthcare.
In my district alone, 32,000 people will see their costs skyrocket, and 14,000 people will lose their healthcare entirely. This means that people will be unable to afford their medicine, kids will miss critical treatment, and people with serious conditions will lose access to care overnight.
There is still no commitment from the Speaker to extend these credits and no plan to prevent the healthcare crisis we know is coming.
There is a bipartisan effort and bipartisan support to extend these credits, and I urge my colleagues to join these efforts in getting this done and getting it done now.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize the extraordinary achievement in high school athletics by Benedictine College Preparatory School located within Goochland County.
They have made program history by capturing its third consecutive VISAA Division I State Championship defeating Trinity Episcopal 20-0.
From the first snap, the Cadets showed they came ready to compete. Benedictine set the tone, demonstrating exceptional determination, discipline, and heart.
JoJo Johnson led the charge with an impressive 85-yard touchdown run followed by key contributions from quarterback Kaiden Kohler and VMI commit Landon Snyder, giving the Cadets a commanding 20-0 halftime lead.
Defensively, the Cadets were nothing short of dominant, ultimately leading to their championship win.
Benedictine forced five turnovers, including a critical interception by Malachi Mingo that helped seal the shutout.
I am honored today to recognize the student-athletes, coaches, families, and entire Benedictine community for their remarkable accomplishment, as well as for the pride they have brought not only to Virginia's Fifth Congressional District but also to the entire Commonwealth of Virginia.
Mr. Speaker, for more than 40 days, families across our country suffered through the longest government shutdown in history.
How did our President and Congressional Republicans respond?
They responded by amputating the East Wing of the White House to make way for a $300 million gilded ballroom.
They responded by throwing a lavish Gatsby-themed party at Mar-a-Lago where the President's wealthy friends toasted with champagne mere moments before 42 million Americans lost their monthly food assistance.
They responded by inserting a disgusting, corrupt provision into a so-called clean spending bill that allows for a slush fund for eight Republican Senators at the last hour to each collect as much as a million dollars or more--one million taxpayer dollars each--because their phone records were lawfully seized in connection with the January 6 insurrection.
The President and Congressional Republicans aren't looking for ways to feed people or lower costs. They are thieves lining their pockets.
I believe F. Scott Fitzgerald would have called them ``careless people.''
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Members are reminded to refrain from engaging in personalities towards the President.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to commend the air traffic controllers and the men and women of the FAA.
For 43 days, while the Democrats kept our government closed, the aviation system that they rely upon and the traveling public depend upon was pushed to the brink.
As a member of the Aviation Subcommittee, I have seen up close how critical a fully functioning system is to safety and commerce.
The Indianapolis International Airport is in my district. I spent time in the tower. I spent time in INDY Center, the regional air traffic control center. I met with the team running traffic in and out of the second largest FedEx air cargo hub in our district.
When the good people who keep our skies moving tell you what is at stake, you pay attention. Their work is why I pushed to secure funding to modernize our outdated air traffic control technology. We have to invest in the next generation of controllers, cut the bureaucratic lag, and build a system worthy of the people who run it. I intend to keep at it.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to bring attention to the Trump administration's plan to raise healthcare prices for seniors.
That is right. You did not mishear me. The Trump administration announced that they will be raising Medicare part B premiums, and deductibles will surge around 10 percent in 2026, almost double the increase from 2025.
Next year, the annual standard Medicare part B premium will be over $2,400. Seniors and disabled enrollees rely on Medicare part B to cover costs for outpatient hospital care, ambulance services, preventative screenings, medical equipment, certain prescription drugs, and more.
If that is not enough, since Medicare premiums are typically deducted from Social Security payments, the average anticipated cost-of-living increase for Social Security will be reduced by almost a third.
Many seniors who could have seen an increase of about $56 in their monthly Social Security payments will be lucky to see $38 after premium increases.
This administration continues to attack Americans' access to healthcare and undermine affordability.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize the University of North Dakota for earning the Gold Award as a 2025-2026 Military Friendly School.
UND was named among the nation's top 10 military-spouse friendly schools nationwide. This honor places UND in the top 10 percent of universities across the U.S. for its commitment to serving our servicemembers, veterans, and their families.
UND's leadership reflects a long tradition of service that dates back to its founding. This gold recognition marks a proud milestone, especially with more than 2,000 military-affiliated students enrolled this year.
From peer-to-peer mentoring to faculty training and veteran advocacy,
I congratulate President Armacost, Director Angie Carpenter, and the entire UND community for their dedication to those who defend our freedoms.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to commemorate National Rural Health Day and National Rural Health Month.
Due to a lack of infrastructure and support, rural communities suffer from the worst health outcomes nationwide. Pharmacy deserts, maternal health deserts, mental health deserts, worker shortages, and more limit people's access to care, sometimes forcing residents to travel 1 hour or longer for primary and emergency care.
These communities that already need help accessing affordable, quality care now face a growing crisis due to draconian cuts to Medicaid and the big, ugly law signed in July, which will make it harder for rural communities to access the care that they need.
Mr. Speaker, 338 rural hospitals from across the country have been identified as at risk, 6 in Virginia, 1 in my district.
I traveled around rural areas during our recesses talking to these providers about their concerns. I was accused by my Republican colleagues of fear-mongering. Yet, I was amplifying the fears that they had. Lo and behold, weeks after visiting some of these providers, three rural providers closed their doors citing the big, ugly law's Medicaid cuts.
A Farmville hospital announced the closure of its labor and delivery unit, citing a reduction in Federal care. We need to do more for our rural communities in providing care, not less.
Mr. Speaker, it's not too late to address this health care crisis of Republicans' making. We can start by permanently extending the enhanced premium tax credits under the Affordable Care Act to prevent millions more from seeing their premiums skyrocket.
This Rural Health Day, I urge my colleagues on the other side of the aisle to recognize this issue for what it is, and to act now.
Mr. Speaker, I introduced today the House companion to Senator Ted Cruz' ROTOR Act, legislation that I believe, as a pilot, is essential to strengthening safety and communication in America's airspace.
Earlier this year, the devastating collision between an American Airlines flight and an Army Black Hawk helicopter claimed 67 innocent lives. Among those on board was Asra Hussain, a neighbor of mine from the St. Louis region.
Asra was a newlywed and a brilliant young professional whose life was ended far too soon.
That disaster exposed troubling gaps in how Federal aircraft operate in complex airspace.
The families who lost loved ones deserve answers, and the American people deserve swift action to rebuild trust in the safety of our skies.
The ROTOR Act closes loopholes that allow military aircraft to disable location sharing during routine flights and requires aircraft in high-traffic airspace to use modern tracking and location-sharing technologies. This reform is backed by ATCs, pilots and, most importantly, the families forever changed.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support the ROTOR Act's timely safety reforms.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize the Minneapolis American Indian Center and to celebrate their 50th anniversary. The Minneapolis American Indian Center has carried out its mission of celebrating and uplifting Native culture through a wide range of programs and services that preserve important traditions.
The center creates pathways for opportunity for over 35,000 tribally diverse American Indians living in the metro area.
I am proud that my office was able to secure $3 million in Federal funding to support their renovation and expansion. The center stands as a powerful example of resilience and the enduring strength of the Native community.
I ask my colleagues to join me in celebrating the Minneapolis American Indian Center's 50 years of service.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize Sheriff Jud Smith of Barrow County, who has been named Georgia's 2025 Sheriff of the Year.
Throughout his career, Sheriff Smith has led with integrity, professionalism, and an unwavering commitment to the people who he serves. His steady leadership during times of crisis, including the tragic events at Apalachee High School, brought comfort and stability to a grieving community and reminded us of the vital role that law enforcement plays in keeping our neighborhoods safe.
A lifelong resident of Barrow County, Sheriff Smith has dedicated his life to public service. He has earned the trust of his community through compassion, humility, and an unrelenting dedication to justice. The people of Georgia are grateful for his courage, his faith, and his service.
Today, we honor Sheriff Smith for exemplifying what it means to lead with heart and to serve with honor.
Mr. Speaker, I rise to introduce bipartisan legislation, alongside my northwest Ohio colleague, Representative Bob Latta.
Our purpose is to honor a legendary Ohioan and pioneer of American military history, Rear Admiral Alene B. Duerk.
Admiral Duerk was the first woman in the United States Navy to achieve the rank of Rear Admiral. Our legislation would require the Navy to rename a naval vessel in her honor.
Admiral Duerk was born in Defiance, Ohio, raised in Holgate, and graduated from the Toledo Hospital School of Nursing in 1941. Over her long career, she treated wounded servicemembers during World War II and the Korean war. In 1972, she became the first woman in naval history to attain flag rank.
In August, I also joined Representative Tim Kennedy in sending a letter to the Secretary of Defense asking to rename a vessel in her honor and in September sponsored a separate amendment to this year's National Defense Authorization Act.
Our added legislation continues our effort to properly honor Rear Admiral Duerk. I look forward to working with colleagues, on both sides of the aisle, to ensure Rear Admiral Duerk's legacy of service, sacrifice, and excellence is properly honored and commemorated by the people of the United States of America.
Mr. Speaker, today, I rise to recognize Reese Gallagher as the champion of the week for Ohio's 13th Congressional District.
Reese is a senior at Archbishop Hoban High School, and she was named
Reese has been described as an aggressive and ferocious player and is heralded as the most prolific goal scorer in the Akron area.
This season, Reese scored an impressive 44 goals and 15 assists, leading the Hoban Knights to the State semifinals.
This is Reese's fourth year on the varsity team, and over her impressive soccer career, she has been recognized as a Division II all- Ohioan and an all-American. Not only is she a first-class athlete, she is also a stellar and star student, carrying a 4.1 GPA.
Next year, she will represent us proudly on the women's soccer team at the University of Dayton.
Go Flyers.
Mr. Speaker, Reese is a shining example of why Ohio's 13th Congressional District is known as the birthplace of champions. I look forward to seeing all that Reese accomplishes in her future.
Mr. Speaker, Mohammed bin Salman's visit to Washington this week has been a disgrace to American democracy.
The President of the United States scolded a reporter as insubordinate and then tried to explain away bin Salman's central role in the grisly murder of Jamal Khashoggi, The Washington Post journalist, who was ambushed in Istanbul, strangled, drawn and quartered, and dismembered by bin Salman's 15-member security detail, according to U.S. intelligence.
Mr. Speaker, our Constitution overthrew kings. It opposes cruel and unusual punishment. It bans titles of nobility, and yet the President's foolish actions will embolden vicious monarchs, autocrats, and theocrats all over the world.
This warm welcome dishonors the Constitution and the American people. We must be doing a lot better than this.
Mr. Speaker, in Binghamton, we call our baseball team the Rumble Ponies, and you probably want to know why.
Rumble Pony is another name for a carousel horse, and the Triple Cities is the carousel capital of the world. We have more carousels per capita than any place in the entire world. It is true.
When the Endicott-Johnson Shoe Factory built the Triple Cities, it employed tens of thousands of people, built homes and parks, and the parks had carousels. The carousels are free to ride. They always have been. They always will be. It is part of the Square Deal.
We are very proud of our Rumble Ponies, and these days we call them something else, too: Eastern League champions.
Trailing 2-1 on the road in the bottom of the sixth in an elimination game, the Ponies did what we do in upstate New York: They picked themselves up, they fought back, and they won.
Mr. Speaker, I congratulate Manager Reid Brignac; Jett Williams; Pitcher of the Year Jonah Tong; Ryan Clifford; KJ and David Sobatka; and, of course, Rowdy and Ruby on a 90-win season and an Eastern League championship.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the life and legacy of Bishop Kenneth Spears, pastor of First St. John Missionary in Fort Worth, who passed way suddenly on November 17.
Bishop Spears was a proud son of Fort Worth and devoted more than four decades of his life to the ministry and service and spiritual uplift of our community.
Bishop Spears answered his calling at just 17 years old, and from that moment forward, he dedicated himself to learning, teaching, and leading. He pursued theology study at Bishop College, which he was very proud of, and the United Theological Seminary College there.
In 1995, he faithfully shepherded First Saint John Cathedral, guiding its growth to a vibrant multicampus ministry with much outreach. His ``Be Restored'' broadcast reached thousands each week, offering hope, healing, and encouraging words.
Within the Full Gospel Baptist Church Fellowship, he rose to the district overseer to state bishop of north Texas and was always committed to expanding the Fellowship's reach and strengthening its mission.
Bishop Spears was not only a spiritual leader but he also was the author of several books. He served alongside his wife, Angela, and his sons, Kenneth and Kyle, who were the joy of his life.
Mr. Speaker, Bishop Spears' ministry transformed lives in Fort Worth and north Texas, and I ask my colleagues to join me in honoring his extraordinary service, his enduring faith, and the powerful legacy that he leaves behind.
Mr. Speaker, and still I rise, and still I rise, a proud, unbought, unbossed, liberated Democrat.
And still I rise, censured but not silenced. It is important to have this photo tonight because it will get us into some very important issues.
This was the occasion when I stood before the President as he stood behind me giving a statement at a joint session of Congress. I was seated right over in the third row up.
The President started to talk about his mandate. I collected my portable items, and I was about to make my way out to the aisle so that I could traverse my way out through the doors. That was my means of peacefully protesting, but as I moved and he talked about his mandate, something came over me. It was spontaneity. It was not contrived.
I stood and I said to the President: You don't have a mandate to cut Medicaid. That was what I said.
Now, the press has distorted that, a good many of them, these opinion makers, opinion shapers. They want to define people and define what you say notwithstanding your having said something contrary to what they would like to hear.
They said that I said he didn't have a mandate. I never said he didn't have a mandate. I said he didn't have a mandate to cut Medicaid, and I still stand by it.
By the way, it became something that people across the country agreed with. So, I said it, and then I left. I left after having been told that I had to leave because the Speaker concluded that I was out of order.
I have no hard feelings as it relates to the Speaker. I have no animus to his requiring me to be removed, although I am the only person who has ever been removed from a joint session of Congress.
Here is what happened after I left. The President, from this podium, looked over toward my Democratic colleagues, and the President said to them, as he was talking, words tantamount to them being lunatics. He said it. Members of the Congress of the United States of America are at a joint session of Congress, and the President calls the Democrats lunatics.
I wasn't here. I don't know what I would have done had I been here and he called me a lunatic, because I never insulted him by saying something negative about his personhood. I didn't do that, but I was censured. The President was not censured for calling Members lunatics at a joint session of Congress. He has not been reprimanded in any way. We have allowed him to normalize his behavior.
I was censured. I had to stand in the well. I accepted my punishment. I accepted it. I never criticized the notion that it was improper for me to be removed. I did say that I didn't think the punishment was appropriate in terms of being censured, but I never said anything that would cause the President to believe that I was disrespecting him as a human. He called Democrats lunatics--no penalties, nothing done.
We cannot allow the President to normalize demeaning people, calling them names, low IQ. We can't allow him to do this. If we do, at some point, what I have in my hand now will occur. I have in my hand an article from Politico dated November 20, 2025. When we allow the President to say these things with impunity, this is what we face. November 20, 2025, 10:42 a.m. Eastern Standard time--it is styled: ``Trump calls for Democratic lawmakers to face trial for `seditious behavior.' ''
I don't agree with that, but that is not the point. There is more to be said.
It goes on to say, in bold print: ``SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR, punishable by DEATH!'' he wrote on Truth Social.
The President is saying now that someone, Democrats, have engaged in seditious behavior punishable by death.
Then, he goes on. The article reads: ``President Donald Trump on Thursday called for six Democratic lawmakers to face arrest and trial after they made a video encouraging U.S. servicemembers and members of the intelligence community to refrain from following orders if they broke the law.''
What does that mean if they broke the law? Well, it means this: If the President gives you an unlawful order, you are not to follow that order. That is what it means. By the way, that is what the law says. You don't follow unlawful orders. We don't want people following unlawful orders.
I am not going to name the people, but then it goes on to say: ``It's called SEDITIOUS''--this is the President now. ``It's called SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR AT THE HIGHEST LEVEL,'' Trump charged in a post on Truth Social. ``Each of these traitors''--now they have become traitors. ``Each one of these traitors to our Country should be ARRESTED AND PUT ON TRIAL.''
I don't agree with that, but that is not the most egregious thing in this document that I hold in my hand. I will get to that as I read on. ``Their words cannot be allowed to stand,'' he says.
Then, he goes on to say: ``We won't have a country anymore!!! An example MUST BE SET.''
Now, we are getting close to the reason I am standing here tonight. If he had only said the other things, I probably would have, as many others are doing, just let it go, but sometimes, you can cross a line of no return. The President crossed that line with these words. The President then posted 16 Truth Social posts, including one that advocated for hanging Democrats. Now, that is the line.
Mr. President, what is wrong with you? Don't you know that there are people who will read this and consider doing something dastardly? Don't you know that you are putting people in harm's way?
By the way, I don't think it just includes the eight people who are named here. I don't think it just includes them. I think if you are a Democrat, any Democrat, you should be concerned about what this President has done. I don't think that this applies to just the six Democratic lawmakers that are mentioned here--six, not eight. I think it applies to all of us.
Just so that you will know, my friends, when you walk into my office now, the first thing you see is a person with a gun. When I first got elected to Congress, we didn't have police officers sitting out in the lobby. You walk in now and the first thing you see is a person with a gun. Why? Because of this kind of ignorant behavior on behalf of the President. By the way, I am being kind by saying ``ignorant.'' There are many other ways, many other ways, many other adjectives.
There is something wrong with the President. There is something wrong with the President of the United States of America. For the President of the United States to say that people should be--let me read it to you one more time. The President then responded with 16 Truth Social posts, including one that advocated for hanging Democrats.
There is something wrong with the President. There is something wrong. We can't ignore this. We cannot allow him to say this with impunity. We can't.
Now, I don't speak for anybody other than myself and everybody who agrees with me. A lot of people agree with me that the President can't be allowed to do this. That is why I say: ``Censured but not silenced.'' I have not been silenced. I will not be silenced. I am not going to be one who is going to allow this to take place and not speak up and speak out and say to the world that this has to change.
We are normalizing not just hate, but we are normalizing these signals to persons who may not be as stable as I would like for them to be, who will then proceed to do something to harm someone.
Yes, when you come to my office, the first thing you see is a person with a gun. When I go out to events now, I have to have someone to escort me out to events. When I am in the airport, we have to be escorted through the airports.
Do you think this improves the situation? This does not. This only exacerbates a situation that we already are having to deal with. We have had to allocate more funds so that Members can have armed protection. For me it is armed--maybe for some others it is not--but protection. This is not normal.
If we just allow it to continue, we may find ourselves at a point where we can't stand here in the well and say what I am saying. We may find ourselves at a point in the history of the United States of America, which was a functioning democracy when the President took office for this term, we may
You have to see what is coming. You have seen what he has done, calling all of the generals in, all of these high-ranking officers. In a sense, they spoke down to them. He changed the name of the Department of Defense into the Department of War. He has become a ``might makes right'' President--might makes right.
In a might makes right world, the weak are wrong. If you don't have the might to match what the President is doing, then you are weak. I am coming back to this, but I have to step aside for a second and say this to you:
This is a President who has decided that he will use the awesome power of the Justice Department to punish people who are perceived to be, in his mind, persons who have harmed him in some way by simply prosecuting him.
Now, look, if we can all decide that we are going to indict the prosecutors in our cases, then we are not going to have a rule of law in this country. What happens to the rule of law if everyday people, like you and me--I can't force the Justice Department to do anything, but he knows this. He knows that he and the Justice Department have unlimited time, a coffer in the millions, if not billions, and that you may beat the rap, but you won't beat the ride, you won't beat the indictment. You will have to pay. This is all so obvious in terms of what he is doing.
However, back to this. Censured but not silenced. Well, there is a remedy. If my colleagues who generally sit on this side won't rein him in, if the Supreme Court has decided that it won't, for whatever reasons, then there is but one option left. There is but one.
The Congress of the United States of America has the authority to rein in a President who commits impeachable offenses. Impeachable offenses. Saying that Members of Congress that advocated for people to follow the law, saying that these Democrats should be lynched, at some point there is a line. This is the line. This is the solution.
We are in a countdown to impeachment. I intend to bring Articles of Impeachment to remove this President, who is normalizing violations of the Constitution. He could care less about due process. Due process, the notion that you ought to be able to at least raise your hand and say, hey, you have got the wrong person when you are being taken away by people who have masks and are not properly identifying themselves as members of the constabulary. You should be able to stop that.
In my opinion, people ought to be identified so that a person will know who arrested them. However, he doesn't care. It doesn't matter to him that we have a branch of the government called the judiciary. He wants to impeach the judges when they differ with him. We have got a Member of Congress who has filed Articles of Impeachment against a judge because they don't agree with their opinion.
Most people in this country of more than 300 million people can't do that. They can't decide that they are going to impeach the judge because they don't like the opinion.
We have entered into an era now where an authoritarian President has control of the House of Representatives, the Senate, and a Supreme Court that has to date not challenged him properly, in my opinion, so now he believes that he can say we should hang Members of Congress.
Well, Mr. President, you shouldn't. You shouldn't say that, and the remedy is to remove you from office.
He shouldn't be allowed to serve out his entire term. I am not implying that anything should be done to his physical person, no. I am talking about what we can lawfully do, peacefully do. He should not be allowed to finish his term of office because he is not getting better. There is something wrong with him, and he is not getting better.
It is progressively moving toward a point in time when he will say something that is going to impact every person in this country, it seems. I hope that it never happens, but I do believe that he is setting us up such that when he is to leave office, when his term is up, he will have some rationale for staying on, and he will have the power, the awesome power of the Presidency to back him up.
What he did when he should have left office before and he encouraged--there are other words that I could use--people to come over to the Capitol, a person was killed. People died. People were walking around the Capitol with gallows, looking for the Vice-President, calling out Speaker Pelosi's name, defecating in the Capitol, and not in the necessary facility, but in inappropriate places.
He did that. When do we get enough evidence to realize that what he did once he will do again? Yet, he has now greater authority because of the Supreme Court saying to him that he is immune to certain things. He has been given a certain amount of immunity, which he has taken as absolute immunity.
We can see what is happening. He is progressively moving toward the date that he is to leave office, when, in my opinion, he will not. I think he will try to stay on. I think he will use the awesome power of the Presidency--and if he can, the United States military--to stay. That is my prognostication.
Mr. Speaker, I don't want to wait until he does it to take a stand. That is why I am counting down to impeachment now. That is why I am taking a stand now. I am not saying to any other Member that they must vote to impeach. I am saying to everybody they have notice now. They can do all of the things they want to do to prevent the Articles of Impeachment from coming to the floor for a vote. Go ahead and do that.
For posterity, I want everyone to know there was one Member of Congress at least--I believe there are others--but there was one Member of Congress at least that realized we should have taken action and one did. We must take this action.
If nothing else, maybe if he sees that impeachment is imminent, maybe he will change his behavior. I doubt it. Maybe he will change it. Maybe he will come to his senses and realize that what he is doing is harmful to democracy--to democracy. It is not just harmful to the people he demeans but to democracy.
Mr. Speaker, I will bring these Articles of Impeachment. Everybody is on notice now--everybody. Not only am I going to file them but I am going to ask for a vote. This cannot stand.
There are people who will say in quiet places something similar to what I just said. I hope that those people will have the courage. If they don't want to say it publicly, I just hope they will have the courage to do what they can do to prevent the imminent threat that this President has become to American democracy. I say ``threat.'' It is an assault on democracy now. It was a threat. It has now become an assault.
We are in a countdown to impeachment. I am giving every assurance that I can. Please take me literally. I plan to bring these Articles of Impeachment against this President. I pray that the Senate will convict. The Articles of Impeachment filed in the House are comparable to an indictment but not the same. They are comparable to it in a sense.
The Senate then has a trial. I would hope that the Senate would vote, Republican and Democrat, to convict and remove this President from office. That would be my desire. I don't always get what I want, which means I have got to be prepared to file again.
Mr. Speaker, I am not going to let this behavior die. If my colleagues don't vote this time, it is okay. I will file again because there is plenty he has already done. Not everything should be put into just one set of articles. There are plenty of other things.
Mr. Speaker, I already have articles pending against him that I call the sword of Damocles for what he has done in defying court orders, in flouting court orders, and not giving due respect to orders of the court. This is the President of the United States doing it. This is not just some other person. It is the President.
They are hanging there. I am waiting to get the order from a judge who is looking at it. I have been waiting since this occurred. There is a judge looking at a case that was before him. If this judge rules, as I think he will, the sword of Damocles will fall on him. I am referring to the articles I have already filed dealing with his failure to obey the simple constitutional premise
Everybody in the country knows--as he would say, ``everybody.'' We know everybody doesn't, but that is his terminology. Everybody knows that we get due process in the United States of America except the President. They get what a might-makes-right mentality accords them when they are dealing with the President.
We have this countdown to impeachment. I am going to file against him before the Christmas break. I will let everybody have fair shots at me and do whatever they need to do. I probably shouldn't have said ``shots.'' I will let everyone take whatever lawful measures they think they should take.
Before the Christmas break, I plan to have articles filed and voted on right here in the Congress of the United States of America because we cannot allow him to normalize the notion that someone can just hang Members of Congress because they don't agree with their position. Even if their position is wrong, he shouldn't say it. I am referring to six Truth Social posts, one including that he advocated for hanging the Democrats.
If anybody wants to read this, it is in Politico. Thank God for Politico. It says: ``Trump calls for Democratic lawmakers to face trial for seditious behavior.''
By the way, there are Members who will agree with this. There are Members who will say it is okay for the President to say we can hang people in this fashion. They will say it because it has become normal for some people.
Mr. Speaker, I don't live in that world. I live in a world where the President of the United States is supposed to be the most respected person in the country and where the President of the United States is a person who sets the example. He is an exemplar and not just an example. He is an exemplar. He is a supreme and superb exemplar of what behavior should be like in the country.
Even Presidents make mistakes, but these are not mistakes. These things are done with intentionality, and they are done almost on a daily basis. There is something new almost every day. I expected something new today, but I didn't expect this.
Before Christmas, we will vote again on impeachment. I am giving notice now so that no one will say they are surprised when I bring additional articles. I already have some on file, and there are other things that he has done that I shall pay attention to. This has some specificity associated with it, but there are other things, as well.
Mr. Speaker, as I conclude my message tonight, I think it is important to note that we live in a participatory democracy. Every person has a duty, responsibility, and an obligation to participate in our functioning democracy. We should vote. We should serve on a jury. We also have a duty in a participatory democracy to protect the democracy. We have to protect it.
We can't just allow a President to become a might-makes-right authoritarian. We have to protect the democracy that we have inherited. We do it for ourselves. We do it for posterity. We do it because, without this participatory democracy, the world itself becomes at greater risk.
Mr. Speaker, the United States of America is a pretty important piece of the puzzle of life that the entire planet Earth is a part of. We have got to protect this participatory democracy.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Members are reminded to refrain from engaging in personalities toward the President and to direct their remarks to the Chair and not to any perceived viewing audience.
Mr. Speaker, I have missed all of you. I don't know if you missed me.
We are going to actually try something tonight, and some of what we are going to do this evening is a little bit complex. It is going to be a little bit thick, but we have double-checked and triple-checked the math, which means that a number of our brothers and sisters will turn their ears off almost immediately because, remember, Mr. Speaker, we all work in a math-free zone.
A couple of items of order first. I thank--though I don't know if they were screwing with me or having some fun. I think it is ``Forbes Breaking News'' that took about 12 or 13 hours of these floor speeches and put them up on YouTube. I have actually had a couple of people who obviously don't have lives who have been watching them, and we have been playing this game of: Here is the prediction, Schweikert, you made over the last year. Here is what you have right, and here is what you have wrong.
First, I got wrong my prediction on interest rates. I really thought the 10-year bond would be closer to 5. It is at 4.1. However, things like the U.S. getting downgraded, things like the semaglutides crashing in price by the end of the year, we have actually gotten right.
The one thing I wish I had gotten wrong was the debt and deficit projections. For the trolls out there who immediately say, ``Well, there is all this spending in the tax bill,'' most of that hasn't started yet. If you actually look at the breakdown of what is going on, what the two drivers of U.S. sovereign debt are, they are the very things that we are not allowed to talk about. It is interest and demographics.
We are going to walk through some of the reality of the math because this is how perverse this place has become. The Democrats will blame, and Republicans will blame, and we are going to blame shiny objects, things that actually have almost no actual value to our future, to this Republic, and where we are going.
As we start this, I need everyone to embrace a couple factoids. We have 7 years until the Social Security trust fund is empty. No one stole the money. We just didn't have enough young people to keep the ratios. So, in 7 years, the math right now says a 24 percent cut.
In 7 years, we double senior poverty in America. In 7 years, the math says: You are going to start to see baby boomers doubling homelessness. In 7 years, the Medicare trust fund is empty. Hospitals right now and others who are part of the Medicare part A cash flow take about 11 percent cuts. In 7 years, we double the spending on Medicare. We go from $1 trillion right now to $2 trillion.
It is demographics. Mr. Speaker, I am going to show you some of those charts, but let's first walk through the craziness. I have had some administration folks and other folks talk to me about tax receipts being up, and they are. There is a whole series of things we have done to reduce spending, but none of it appears to be big enough to deal with the cost of the refinancing of debt that is coming off the very low interest rates from a few years ago to the much higher interest rates today, to the medical inflation, to the healthcare utilization, and to just the things that are basic driven by our demographics.
Let's deal with some reality. If anyone has a question about my math, you can look it up online, Mr. Speaker. Go to the Treasury's website. This is important. We are now 51 days, I believe, into the new fiscal year. We are 51 days.
Mr. Speaker, do you realize we have now borrowed $628 billion in the first 51 days of this new fiscal year? Treasury has put more--is holding almost $900 billion in cash, which they typically operate with about $800 billion because of the in and out, but you start to realize, at the current borrowing rate, we crossed $1 trillion this fiscal year before Christmas.
It is not Republican or Democratic. It is demographics and interest, but that isn't a lot of fun because our political consultants need something where we can attack each other. By doing
Understand a basic principle, Mr. Speaker: At this rate of borrowing, when you are clicking off $1 trillion in just 4 months, 5 months, then you have decided the bond market, basically, is the most powerful organization in ruling your country. It is not us as policymakers. It is not the White House. It is the bond market because if you do the last 12 months, we have been borrowing about $6.3 billion a day. So far this last 51 days, we are borrowing closer to $12 billion a day.
It is just math, except we are incapable of actually talking about it.
Think about these microphones here, Mr. Speaker. How many people since we got back from the shutdown have you heard, on the left and the right, get behind these things and say, ``Hey, guys, the greatest threat to your Republic is actually the math''?
This group hates something Donald Trump does. Our side doesn't like some of the things they do. Okay, great. The lack of civility is crushing. However, one of my personal theories is the reason you just had a 40-something-day shutdown, Mr. Speaker, is that it is not like the old days, where you could have bought the Senators' votes. Hey, if you vote for us, you get a bridge. We now have to deal with the fact that we don't have cash lying around.
We are going to borrow. You will start to see this. We went from $37 trillion to $38 trillion in 71 days. There were lots of excuses for this. There was, hey, we had the debt ceiling, had to repopulate, pay back the internal borrowing we did, those things. Except the difference is here we are into the new fiscal year after the debt ceiling has been raised, and the burn rate still looks really similar.
I am sure all the committees, all the leadership, all the folks who are helping us watch the bond market and the liquidity and our ability to borrow are all paying attention to the bleed rate, but it is math. It is real.
Mr. Speaker, our debt to GDP when we closed the '25 fiscal year actually got slightly better, but we also rolled some of the borrowing into the next day, which hit a new fiscal year. It happens all the time. You have strike dates of when you can actually pay certain bills, Mr. Speaker, but this one isn't in question. Last year, for every dollar of tax receipts we took in--this is customs duties. This is excise tax, income tax, corporate tax. Everything we took in, we spent $1.43.
This year, for every dollar we take in, our budget says that we are going to also spend $1.43. How long can we do this? How long can we do this?
Mr. Speaker, my 3-year-old--and, yes, I am this age. My wife is my age. We have a 10-year-old and a 3-year-old. There is a dataset out there that basically says that when my 3-year-old is about 22, 23 years old, so 20-some years from now, every tax in America, every tax, needs to be doubled just to maintain baseline spending.
Mr. Speaker, how many people have you had come behind this mike and who have just said: Look, is this moral? Is this really what America is all about? Yes.
I am going to show the slides that show what the Democrats say: We will just tax billionaires and rich people. It doesn't get you anything close. It doesn't close the gap, and you know it.
For our side, we are going to cut spending. Really? It doesn't get you close because we are not ready to have the revolution of how we spend money. That is because adopting the very technologies, the cures, the things we can do, this army of lobbyists outside this door loses their blanking minds because we are requiring them to either change their business models or make the bureaucracy do it differently or maybe come up with the conclusion we shouldn't do it at all.
Once again, for every dollar we take in of tax receipts, we are going to spend $1.43. Why doesn't that almost create a sense of panic, of agita, for the left or the right?
Is it just that we run into the problem of telling the truth to our voters after maybe we have lied to them? It is rich people that we don't tax enough. It is waste and fraud. It is illegals. All of those are real, except, in the scale of the spending, they are just not that much. It is just the insanity of what is going on.
Look, I am trying to help you understand wages.
Let's back up.
Tax receipts are up. Spending is up dramatically more, but most of the tax receipts that we are gaining are almost all capital gains. So, of the increased tax receipts, only about 5.5 percent of it is actually the growth in wages. Almost 65 percent is capital gains because the stock market has been doing well. So, once again, we are back to the world of financial engineering.
Those of us with assets, we are doing great. You keep hearing people talk about the K-shaped economy. What they mean by that is if you are on the lower tier, you don't hold assets, particularly after the years of inflation. Those with assets, the asset is inflated, and they are just fine. If you didn't hold assets, you are poorer today.
For my district in the Phoenix-Scottsdale area, I think our calculation is, after sort of the first year of the Biden administration, if you don't make today at least 28 percent more than you did then, you are poorer today.
Now, there is almost no cycle where magically prices start to come down. The way you deal with this is economic growth, wage growth.
Is prosperity moral? Is it Republican or Democrat? It is just the right thing to have a society where people's lives get better every day.
This is just a board I have used before, but it is just to make a point for anyone that is paying attention. This is the 10-year bond. Right now, the United States isn't at 4 percent. We are about 4.1. Okay. We can sell a 10-year bond today for about 4.1 percent. I need you to look here. Greece can sell a 10-year bond today for about 3.3 percent. When Greece has a better strike, a better--let's call it a credit rating. It is technically not a credit rating, but when Greece can sell a bond cheaper than the United States, should that actually raise the hair on the back of your neck?
Are you thinking about the fact that the United States, for the industrialized countries, is like number 12?
Let's call it the credit stack, the ability to sell a 10-year bond. Why are other countries able to sell a 10-year bond cheaper than the biggest economy in the world, the country with the reserve currency? Does anyone pay attention to this? People say, ``Oh, David, that is not fair. Greece engaged in fiscal consolidation.'' They are actually lowering their debts, where we are now over 100 percent of debt-to-GDP. There are no plans to tell the truth about it. If you tell the truth, you might get unelected. You have a dozen countries that can sell a 10- year bond cheaper than the United States today, Greece being one of them.
Let's get into some of the complications. When I say one of the primary drivers is interest and demographics, remember, if you have $38 trillion--and remember, we play this game. The United States does this. Other countries don't do this.
Here is $30 trillion that we have to go to public markets. People from all over the world, primarily from the United States, buy our bonds. It is in your pension. It is in the bank note you buy. There are another several trillion that are actually borrowed internally. It is not magic money. We still owe the Social Security trust fund money, the Medicare trust fund money. When we borrow the cash out of those trust funds, they are paid interest, so it is still an obligation.
It is one of my great frustrations when you hear some of the government economists say, Well, publicly borrowed money is this. Yes, but the internally borrowed money we still owe interest on, are we not going to pay it back? It is borrowing.
When I come back and say demographics, understand age groups as a share of the population, from 2004 to 2024, so a year-plus ago, we had 1.4 percent of the population was 18 years old. In 2024, 1.3 percent of the population was 18 years old. It is just demographics. The United States, in around 1990 to 1991, started to roll over in the number of children we have.
For the people who are into the natalist policies, we spent lots of time researching this. There is no magic solution. You have a country out there that, when you have your third or fourth child, they buy you a house. It still hasn't increased fertility rates.
This is why getting tax policy, regulatory policy things, so correct--because we are going to have to be able to find a way to have productivity grow and grow so we can raise people's wages because so many of our brothers and sisters are poorer today. The way you raise wages is two things: inflation--well, that doesn't get you anywhere--or productivity.
You can't be afraid of AI, synthetic biology, robots. People go, ``Oh, David, you are not supposed to say that,'' but it is true. Next year, the number of 18-year-olds is lower, smaller, than this. The year after that, it is smaller than that. Then, it is smaller than that. America is now running into a situation where we have too many classrooms and too many schoolbuses and not enough senior centers.
This place is doing an amazing job at having an honest conversation about the United States' demographics and where we are going. ``Oh, David, we are not supposed to talk about that.'' How do you make public policy if you can't even be honest about the most basic parts of the math?
The other part of the punch line here is, 20 years ago, 12.3 percent of the population was 65 and up. Mr. Speaker, 20 years later, it is, functionally, 18 percent. It is not double, but it is pretty darn close to double those who are 65 and up.
Look, a weird little factoid: When I was a teenager in the 1970s--and I remember this number. There was, functionally, $7 spent for every young person and $1 spent on seniors. Today, that is flipped. It is just demographics. The baby boomers have moved into their retirement years. We have a societal promise we have to keep. We made a promise, but once again, in 7 years, the Medicare trust fund is gone. In 7 years, the Social Security trust fund is gone. We are going to lie our heinies off around here. If we just tax rich people more--and I will show you the slides. The math doesn't work. Once again, we work in a math-free zone.
Let's have a little more fun with reality, change in population by age. Now, this board is controversial, but the math is accurate. I will see if I can try to describe this in a way where we can all absorb it. In 2004, we had, functionally, 77 million that were 18 or younger. We estimate, in 2035, if we do not have immigration--remember, this year, we expect almost zero population growth, so let's first do those who want no immigration. In 2035, we have only 64 million that are under 18. With immigration, you still have fewer people. That is over 20 years.
Okay, fine. Maybe that is the policy decision of our society. In that case, don't stand in our way when people like me are trying to find ways to actually have productivity, wages grow.
This is something very unique that the United States is up against: massive amounts of debt. Massive amounts of debt. Remember, so far this fiscal year--God, I have to do this math really quick.
I think we are borrowing like $130,000, maybe $131,000 every second. If I take it over the last 12 months, it is like $71,000 a second.
So you have this massive debt, and then a population that is flat, and where we are going right now, it actually could be declining over the next decade. Not by a lot.
Tell me how I make the economy grow. How do I make sure your pension is there? How do I make sure your access to healthcare is there? How do I make sure your wages go up? There are ways we can do it, and I have come up behind these mikes over and over and over and talked about the adoption of technology, about redesigning government.
We have bills that actually would save $3 trillion, and I can't get a single other Member of Congress to sponsor them because they are hard.
I will get lobbyists who will say mean things about me.
So let's keep just doing the shiny objects. Let's just keep doing the petty around here. I think yesterday was the 14th time we have tried to reprimand or censure a fellow Member. Let's just do more of that because it gets great Twitter traffic, and we don't have to talk about the fact that that day we borrowed over another $6 billion. Actually, if it is just this fiscal year, it is closer to $12 billion that day.
So let's take another look.
Change in employment status of native born and foreign born. This is something that is really, really interesting. We are actually taking a look right now for what we believe is sort of this fiscal year's snapshot. We actually have foreign born actually going down. Now, some of this is self-deportation. There are things going on, we don't have enough data to completely understand it, but my problem is: I don't actually have enough folks for the civilian labor force.
Look, something funky happened in this morning's unemployment numbers where there was a good pop in jobs, maybe almost 2, 2\1/2\ times what many of the economists expected, but did you notice unemployment popped up? Now, that is typically saying: Oh, we don't like that.
I need you to think about this. We have been desperate for more of our brothers and sisters to come back into the labor force, but here is my problem: How many of those folks are coming back to the labor force because they can't pay their bills because wages still haven't gone up enough to make up for the years of inflation?
We actually don't know completely yet, but we do know that our brothers and sisters out there are stressed out of their mind when you start to look at credit card delinquencies, car delinquencies. ``Our impairments'' is the better way to phrase it.
We need to get our heads out and start thinking about those policies that get the economy working, a tax code that actually gets investment in the next generation. But are we going to adopt policies?
All right. Let me go jump on a landmine.
Does it make sense to have a government that goes out and owns 10 percent of Intel? So your government is the largest shareholder of Intel.
Okay. I love Intel. But I can actually show you some brilliant economic papers that say that it should be four different or three different companies; here is the fab; here is the engineering; here is this and that.
The concept of creative destruction. Here is how the thought experiment works: If you are old enough to remember Blockbuster Video, should we have slowed down the internet so that Netflix could not have put Blockbuster Video out of business? That is sort of what we are doing today, we are choosing the winners and losers instead of the creative destruction that starts the next cycle of productivity.
We need the creative destruction in our economy to have the rebirths of the newer, better, and faster. Yes, it is always uncomfortable. It is also really great free market economics. And it is as if we have repealed the rules of a free market economy in this country right now.
So let's actually take another look. Now we are going to step onto the next, much bigger landmine. Let's talk about Social Security.
Social Security finances and worker-to-beneficiary ratio. This is how many workers there are compared to our brothers and sisters receiving.
Do you see the red lines here? This is actually the trust fund. You will notice, actually, around 2020, the trust fund had $5 trillion in it.
In 7 years, it is all gone, and no one stole your money. The average couple, it is a crap rate of return. You have to understand. If 20, 25 years ago, you had been allowed to take a little sliver and put it in the markets, you would be dramatically better off moving into retirement, but the left lost its mind on the discussion. The unions lost their minds. AARP lost its mind. But now we can look back. We have 25 years. We can actually do the calculation and tell the truth.
They were wrong. But it is too late to do anything like that today because the population bubble has already moved into their retirement years. So here we are. At 7 years, that trust fund is gone.
What is also interesting--it is a little hard to see in this chart-- as we get into the outer years, you are getting to the point where you have 2.2, 2.3. So you and your spouse or you and your partner functionally will have one retiree, and that is the way the system
It is demographics. We know the math. We have known for how many years that we had baby boomers and 67 million of them. Yet, this place because it is crap politics to tell the truth about math, we lie. We make up things. Well, we tax billionaires.
I am going to show you boards that every dime of every billionaire in America would only run the government 9 months, and, also, you would put the world into a depression because most of that value is actually in stock. So if you happen to have some stocks in your retirement fund, it is all gone. We are going to crash everything, but it is a thought experiment.
There was someone who had an article out this last week that talked about saying: Well, when the Social Security trust fund is gone, we will just borrow it from the general fund, and the general fund will borrow it from the debt market.
Okay. Let's see. When you start to look at the scale of debt, do you see the red here? That is already where we are going. That is already in the baseline. This line here exploding up, that is as if we took the Social Security trust fund--and I don't believe this even has the Medicare trust fund, which is also empty in 7 years.
If anyone really wants to understand how difficult the policy choices are and, also, how--let's have a brutal moment--the Members here don't tell the truth, particularly my brothers and sisters on the left. We will just tax rich people.
Please go look up Jessica Riedl's calculations from the Manhattan Institute. There are a couple of great articles. They walk you through the math.
Every tax--so do the Bernie Sanders math. We are going to take people over $400,000, $500,000, and we are going to maximize tax. You maximize everything. It is almost a Laffer curve. We are going to tax you to the point that it rolls over. On every tax, you get 1\1/2\ percent of GDP in new taxes.
Okay. It would probably be really helpful.
On the Republican side, the things we talk about cutting, we only get about 1 percent of GDP.
Last year, if you do the internal borrowing, we borrowed about 7.6, 7.4 percent of the entire economy.
We are actually looking that in 2035 we are going to borrow 8.4 percent of the entire economy, and the solution I get from the left covers 1\1/2\ percent. Often, the solution I get on my side is 1 percent.
Does anyone see the math problem? We are all going to go home and talk to our partners and audience and say: If I just cut taxes, or if I just cut things. Maybe we have to do that, but it doesn't get you close.
Once again, 1\1/2\ percent from taxing all the rich people, and 1 percent of GDP in the cuts we have actually articulated. I have 2\1/2\ percent. In 9 budget years, we are borrowing 8.4 percent of the entire economy, and that is assuming interest rates don't go up.
Remember, in 9 years under today's interest rate scheme, 30 percent of tax receipts go to just the interest. If interest rates go up 1 percent, it is 45 percent of all tax receipts of the United States in 9 years would go to just interest.
I will say this, and I have said it how many times behind these microphones and people go, David, that is interesting. Please never say that again because I don't want to actually have to explain this.
If we do the math, take every billionaire in America, get full face value of everything they have. Sell every stock, every yacht, every this, every that, you covered government for 9 months. That is assuming you don't put the world into a depression. You don't crash all the stock markets. You don't crash all the asset markets. It covers 9 months.
Why do we live in this fantasy world where people throw out solutions like this that they know are absolute frauds? Because it is great politics. It is crap math.
Let's actually go on to one of our current debates.
I watched someone come to the floor yesterday on the subsidies on top of the subsidies in the ACA. Let's call it ObamaCare because that is the common vernacular, but it is the ACA. We are having the debate because the Democrats actually did these enhanced subsidies on top of the subsidies and those subsidies expire.
Let me do this one backward, so there is a little more understanding of the line.
How much of the healthcare population in America is actually in the ACA? It is really important. Forty-eight percent is employer sponsored, 7 percent we believe is uninsured, veterans are about 3 percent, Medicare is 18 percent, and Medicaid is 22 percent. Now over the next couple years that flips. Only 7 percent of the healthcare population is actually in the ACA.
That is the entire population that is receiving the enhanced subsidies, so the subsidies on top of the subsidies, is a fraction of that.
Now you have to also take a look at what is wrong in that math. We actually keep looking at these numbers over and over. We have been analyzing them with our joint economic economists, and I have a couple Ph.D.s in healthcare economics. We are trying to understand what the hell is going on with these numbers, but you start looking at it after the COVID subsidies.
Do you know you got 41 percent of the population that is actually supposed to be just receiving government subsidies to make it more affordable and they are paying zero?
Do you understand what they did with the subsidies on top of the subsidies? They took populations 400 percent of poverty and up, and in some areas, you have four or five kids, you have people making $400,000, $500,000 qualifying, except that is a small population of them but they still would qualify.
Why is this important?
Mr. Speaker, if I could have some way to burn this on to people's psyche. What the ACA, Medicare for All--the Republican alternative had better actuarial distribution, but they have tried to turn healthcare into financial engineering.
What you have done is, is financing, is subsidies healthcare. Well, we will tax these people and we will subsidize this population. Listen to the debates here. It is about subsidies on top of subsidies. It is financial engineering. Now, it is healthcare. Why it is healthcare is because it is easy. It makes the lobbyists happy. It makes the people receiving the money happy because no one gets cut. No one has to do a new design. No one has to actually stop new technology. No one has to fixate on our brothers and sisters.
If obesity is 47 percent of U.S. healthcare, none of the money goes to making our brothers and sisters healthier so they live longer and they don't have multichronic conditions because we are just going to subsidize them.
It is perverse.
Could you imagine the $35 or $40 billion that the Democrats are demanding for the subsidy on top of the subsidy for populations that are upper income? If some of that money actually went to lowering the actual cost of healthcare instead of the financial engineering of subsidizing insurance companies because that is what they are talking about.
Let's just go to this one and see if I can make this make sense. This is a bit complicated, but we have been trying to do the analytics of how much the subsidies have screwed up the price of healthcare.
If you walk through it, we can actually chart where the subsidies come in and it actually raises the price of healthcare. The way the insurance companies retain their profits--we have actually built a model that shows, of the stunning amounts of money we are spending, only 34 percent actually goes to the insured and their healthcare. Another 28 percent is disappearing into people that didn't even know they had insurance.
I am sure we all have been reading the articles that a third, 30 percent of those in the enhanced ACA subsidies--so the subsidies on top of the subsidies--didn't even know they had health insurance.
A couple days ago, you saw someone got convicted of or pled guilty to a couple hundred million-dollar fraud
The system is absolutely screwed up and we have 38 percent disappearing in the insurance malaise.
This is what we have turned healthcare into. It is a financing. I beg of my brothers and sisters here, we have pieces of legislation, dozens of them, that would change the cost of healthcare.
When we think we may have spent $25 to $35 billion last year in duplicative MRIs, X-rays, CTs, ultrasounds, why not a simple piece of legislation that when you get your MRI, it is attached to this thing so it is portable to your next doctor.
Is that that scary? Except the lobbyists show up and say, David, you don't understand. The duplicative scans are part of our profit model. Oh, I am not supposed to say that out loud. We have dozens of things like this.
We have turned healthcare into being about the money instead of our brothers and sisters living better, living healthier. Mr. Speaker, what if some of the money goes to the cures so we don't finance your misery, we finance your freedom from that misery?
I say these things and tomorrow morning there will be an army of lobbyists or an army of groups from my district saying, David, you don't understand. We need the cash. Don't make us do it in a modern fashion.
Mr. Speaker, I am going to make the argument prosperity is moral. Curing people's misery is moral. Using the technology that makes you sovereign, that makes you free so you can help take care of your own health, is moral, and what we do here is absolutely immoral.
We don't tell the truth about the debt. We don't tell the truth about the demographics. We don't tell the truth about the damage we are doing to your retirement, my little kids' future. We don't tell the truth that if we would actually legalize technology--and I am serious about this--legalize it, how much healthier every American could be and we could crash the price of healthcare.
Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent for all Members to have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include any extraneous material on the subject of my Special Order hour.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the gentlewoman from Illinois?
Mr. Speaker, I would like to start my Special Order hour by honoring someone who has been monumental in my life.
I rise today to honor the life and legacy of my pastor and friend, the one and only Reverend Fernando Siaba. It is hard to fully describe the impact that he had on my life and how much I will miss him blessing me with ``God bless''; ``Dios te bendiga.''
Pastor Siaba lived a life that exemplified love for God and for his neighbors. I met Pastor Siaba at Humboldt Park United Methodist Church when I was just 15 years old. He invested heavily in my spiritual and professional development, both as my pastor and as board chair of Humboldt Park Social Services, now Center for Changing Lives, the organization that I had the honor to be the executive director for, for 9 years.
Mentoring leaders, particularly women of faith and leadership, was one of Pastor Siaba's greatest gifts. Over his impactful career, he served eight congregations. Even after his retirement, he continued serving by mentoring pastors, being registrar for the John Wesley Theological Institute, volunteering at a food pantry, and leading at Euclid Avenue United Methodist Church.
Pastor Siaba had a gift for thoughtful planning. He was so detail- oriented, humble, and truly the best listener.
In true Pastor Siaba fashion, he planned his own funeral, and he requested his eulogist preach on John 1:16: ``From his fullness we have all received grace upon grace.'' While he may have defined his life by grace, we all benefited from the grace he extended to us. He wanted the best for all of us. He advocated for immigrants, people who were unhoused, and people who were struggling with substance abuse.
He truly lived a life of love and action. He taught us to love God, to serve our community, to seek justice, and to welcome our neighbors with open arms.
Today, on behalf of Illinois' Third Congressional District, that young person that he mentored, supported, and believed in has the greatest honor to commend him here on the House floor, in the House of Representatives, to commend the life of Reverend Fernando Siaba for his legacy of love, joy, and service.
I express my sincere condolences to his wife, Judy Siaba; his three daughters, Erika, Marta, and Ruth; and his entire beloved family.
May his memory be a blessing that sustains our fight for justice, and may he be welcomed in the company of saints and ancestors as a good and faithful servant. Mr. Speaker, may Pastor Siaba rest in peace.
Mr. Speaker, I also rise today to honor someone else. Today, I want to honor Marisol Velez, known as Pinqy Ring. She is a rooted, revolutionary Puerto Rican emcee from Chicago, decolonizing minds as a rapper, as an educator, as a mentor, and as a speaker.
As a cultural worker and disruptor, Pinqy's music ignites our imaginations and sustains our struggles against displacement and erasure.
As an educator and mentor, she shapes the next generation of creative changemakers through culturally rooted programming and radical care.
Pinqy is a GRAMMY U mentor. She sits on the National Advisory Board for Music Will and serves as a U.S. Hip-Hop Cultural Ambassador to facilitate cultural diplomacy programming and conflict transformation music. In her roles, she is shaping the first-ever K-12 hip-hop guidelines with the Hip-Hop Education Center.
On behalf of Illinois' Third Congressional District, it is my honor to commend Marisol Velez for helping young people find their truth unapologetically and share it creatively.
Now, here in the House of Representatives, her name will live on. I congratulate Pinqy.
Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from Illinois (Ms. Underwood).
Mr. Speaker, I rise today because what happened in Illinois during Operation Midway Blitz can never happen again.
The last time this Chamber convened before House Republicans took an 8-week vacation was September 19. This is the first chance that I have had to address the House about the outrageous abuses of power our community has endured for the past 2 months.
Under Kristi Noem's so-called leadership, Department of Homeland Security agents have terrorized my district. Their reckless and incompetent methods have traumatized families and endangered entire neighborhoods.
No community in America should live under siege by the Federal Government as mine has.
Federal immigration officers and National Guard personnel, weaponized and politicized by the Trump administration, swept into my district with no communication, no coordination, no transparency, no accountability, and no regard for public safety. They came barging into our towns, ignored our laws, and trampled on our civil and human rights.
In Aurora, a Federal agent pepper-sprayed a constituent of mine directly in the face from inches away while she was standing completely still with her hands at her sides, unarmed.
Elsewhere in my district, we heard reports that Federal officers used an elementary school as a staging area, positioning armed tactical teams on school grounds in full view of children.
Parents are afraid to leave their homes after hearing about neighbors abducted by masked agents while walking their kids to school, leaving the children unattended by the side of the road.
Workers fear going to their jobs. Our economy is suffering. Local businesses have seen foot traffic collapse.
Despite the Trump administration's claims of targeting ``the worst of the worst,'' their immigration enforcement operations have been a chaotic mess, sweeping up U.S. citizens, legal immigrants, and people with no criminal record.
I was horrified when Federal agents rappelled down from helicopters to a Chicago apartment complex in the middle of the night, smashed windows and doors, threw flash-bang grenades, dragged children from their beds, and zip-tied and detained U.S. citizens for hours.
Yet, after all that, Federal prosecutors have not filed criminal charges against anyone detained that night.
In a recent court filing, DHS listed 614 people arrested as part of Operation Midway Blitz, and only 16 of them have criminal histories of any kind. That is 2.6 percent. The other 598 people have no criminal record.
What is happening in Illinois is called racial profiling. Greg Bovino, the Border Patrol agent who led Operation Midway Blitz, literally told a reporter that agents arrest people based on ``how they look.'' Masked officers are violently targeting people, including U.S. citizens, because their brown skin and their black hair make them seem suspicious.
This is a complete failure. Our Founding Fathers warned us about this type of government overreach after seeing how a desperate King's troops could trample on our unalienable right to liberty. Yet, as we approach our Nation's 250th birthday, we are confronting a similar tyranny.
That is not all. Many of those arrests have essentially disappeared. Members of Congress could not get basic information from DHS about where they took our constituents. During the Republican shutdown, DHS leadership chose to furlough the liaisons that we rely on to locate detainees and resolve urgent casework.
When a constituent reached out because her husband was denied access to medical care in a detention facility, my office's emails bounced back and our calls went unanswered. Weeks later, I am still waiting for a response.
However, the shutdown didn't stop DHS agents from harassing citizens and using force on peaceful protesters, because the administration deemed those violent tactics essential. That was not an accident. That was a policy choice.
I say to my fellow Americans, this is not what legitimate law enforcement looks like. Operation Midway Blitz disregarded Illinois State laws, Federal laws, and the U.S. Constitution. Due process, a foundational constitutional right for all people in this country, went out the window. Local police and officials were kept in the dark. People were snatched off the streets seemingly at random.
Many of my constituents felt like they were being hunted because of the language that they speak or the color of their skin, simply because they needed to run an errand at the hardware store or walk their kids to school.
This is not about public safety. When the President has the power to terrorize American communities for his political purposes, it makes us all less safe. It makes us all less free.
The people of Illinois deserve answers, and Americans deserve better.
Mr. Speaker, I thank Congresswoman Underwood for her hard work, her courage, her commitment, and for speaking truth to power in the people's House.
Mr. Speaker, when I look around at every single chair here, I think about the fact that Members of Congress, every one of us represents about 700,000 people, but together we represent every single person that lives in this country. That has got to be the greatest honor and privilege for anyone to be able to serve humanity in this way.
Therefore, it is important for me to think about the people's House, about the fact that we went 43 days without being in session. The Speaker put us into recess, and some of my colleagues were not even in their district. But here we are 43 days later, on the fourth day of this week of session, and as a reminder, I feel the necessity to remind my fellow Americans around the country and everyone watching what has happened here.
As a reminder, Republicans' big, ugly bill perpetrated the greatest transfer of wealth from working people to the ultra-wealthy in American history. I can tell you that when I visited food pantries in my district, I met people who said to me: Congresswoman, every single year I donate a thousand dollars to this food pantry, but here I am making a line, and I have been here for 3 hours. This is not the country and the promise that I thought the President made.
Here we are now. This week, instead of actually fixing healthcare, instead of passing legislation where we are actually strengthening the safety net for our constituents, instead of working together to build in the people's House, we are here filled with censures. And this week, Republicans are attacking more of the programs that our fellow Americans rely on, resolving that programs like Social Security, Medicare, unemployment insurance, workers' compensation, and more are horrors.
Let's talk about the truth of the so-called Denouncing the Horrors of Socialism resolution that we are going to be voting on in a couple of hours in the morning. Republicans must despise you and hate the idea of seeing our communities thrive.
Look, Republicans are quick to steal the programs and services you rely on to bail out the ultra-wealthy and big corporations, so we know that it is not the subsidies or supports that are the problem. Republicans champion socialism when it is benefiting the rich and the powerful who they think deserve it most. But when it comes to working families, then social programs are a nightmare because, bottom line, they do not believe you deserve the support.
Let me give you a few examples of social welfare programs that Americans rely on every single day whether they are in a Republican district or a Democratic district: SNAP benefits, VA benefits, local fire departments and police departments, the United States Postal Service, FEMA, public education, and the interstates that make commerce possible.
Listen, socialized programs are the foundation and safety net that ensures all members of our community can thrive regardless of our personal economic ability to pay into a capitalistic society.
Let's be very clear. I know, Mr. Speaker, you may not want to hear this, but it feels like hypocrisy. They want to give money to the elites while leaving nothing for everyday working families. It goes without saying that I will be voting ``no'' on this resolution.
I believe that our country must reprioritize and reconsider what we invest in. For me, that is working people. The ultra-rich don't need more subsidies. We are about to have a trillionaire that comes from this country, and they should finally be paying their fair share in taxes.
I believe that everyday, hardworking people deserve more and better. They have said this to you directly. They have said this to all of us directly.
I believe in universal healthcare--I do. I believe in free higher education--I do. And I believe social housing and pensions for all so that people don't have to work until they are 90, and they can retire with dignity. I also believe in a guaranteed minimum income, free public transit, and so much more.
You see, working families should be given every single thing they need to thrive. They shouldn't have to work 40 hours a week and still feel like they can't make it. We demand more. We demand a future that works for every working person. We can, in fact, build that together, but we can't do that if we destroy healthcare.
Since day one, the Trump administration and Republicans in Congress have been clear about the pain they are willing to inflict on the American people. You see, in only 11 months, Republicans have used their power to cut our healthcare, to close our hospitals, to raise our healthcare costs in order to make sure that billionaire bosses become richer.
It is open enrollment season, and working families are already seeing
Here is the bottom line: Costs keep increasing and people won't be able to afford their healthcare. Millions will go without the goods and services that they need, and the President wants us unhoused. He wants us foreclosed, he wants us poor, and it seems like he also wants us uninsured.
Look, I have already signed the discharge petition to ensure that the ACA subsidies extension is put on the floor for a vote because we need to use every single tool at our disposal to fight for our working families. I think it is time--it is past time--for Republicans to join Democrats in prioritizing working people and address the pain that our communities are enduring.
We should be demanding more, and it means that we could be using the discharge petition process. We have seen it work before this week, to release the Epstein files. We can do the same thing and get to the magic number of 218 Members of Congress who care more about their constituents than they care about a dictator, who care more about their constituents than they care about insurance companies, who care more about their constituents than they care about billionaires.
Here is the bottom line: We must demand more. Every Member of Congress who says they care about healthcare and working people--it doesn't matter if you are a Democrat or a Republican--needs to sign the discharge petition and take action on the rising cost of living.
Mr. Speaker, people keep saying, where does my money go? My taxes keep increasing. Where are they going? Well, Mr. Speaker, you and I both know where the money is going. Yes, it is going to Homeland Security, $150 billion there so that the Secretary can cosplay and jump on those $200 million jets. But it is also going to other parts of the world to pay for bombs.
Mr. Speaker, I want to talk about a bill I introduced a few months ago. It is the Block the Bombs Act.
It must frustrate my colleagues, whether Democrat or Republican, that our government is using their money, their taxpayer dollars, so that someone else can use them in another country and bomb women and children.
I have been clear since the beginning of the ceasefire in Gaza and Israel that Netanyahu and Trump are a lethal, unaccountable duo that cannot be trusted. In the time since the most recent ceasefire agreement, the Netanyahu government has continued to bomb Gaza, including refugee camps. It has restricted the movements of humanitarian aid, moved to annex the West Bank, and continued to arrest Palestinians without charge.
Mr. Speaker, this is all while Netanyahu continues to lobby the U.S. for more and more of our money so they can get more weapons unconditionally, which Trump is inclined to deliver as long as he can turn Gaza into the next Middle Eastern Riviera.
Today, on this House floor, we must say enough is enough. Congress must assert its oversight authority and withhold the weapons that are still being used right now, even in the midst of this so-called ceasefire, to violate U.S. and international law. That is why we must continue to demand that Congress pass the Block the Bombs Act as the first step in accountability and oversight.
Do not be fooled into thinking that blocking bombs is no longer necessary. The only thing that will actually affirm a permanent ceasefire is the oversight that this body gives. It is needed more than ever because every Member of Congress should join us today.
Mr. Speaker, as I prepare to close, I think about the moment we are living. I think about the children in schools who are wondering what the future will look like for them. I think about the responsibilities that we all took when we took an oath to protect the Constitution, to protect the well-being of our communities, to uphold the Constitution, and to honor our constituents.
I have to say that these last 11 months have been painful. As someone who lives in the city of Chicago, I never thought that I would say that I knew what it felt like to feel like I was living under siege. As a Chicagoan under the leadership of Kristi Noem, we have felt like we have lived under siege.
Mr. Speaker, I know firsthand what it feels like to have a Black Hawk helicopter surrounding my home every other day because they are getting someone else. They are arresting another mother in front of a school or tear-gassing someone else who is just recording.
I know firsthand the terror that DHS immigration raids have had on our communities. We have been surveilled. People have been threatened. A 1-year-old was teargassed. A U.S. citizen child was teargassed. A pastor was pepper-balled seven times. People were subjected to warrantless arrests, precision immobilization technique maneuvers, kidnapped and disappeared.
Neither Trump's administration nor DHS cares if a person is a U.S. citizen, a baby, a senior, or a pastor. There is no respect for the rule of law. Terror has been unleashed on American cities. They think that as long as they issue a statement with whatever fabricated lie that they have created that they can continue to get away with it. I want to give my colleagues three examples of what I am talking about.
Mr. Speaker, on Saturday, October 25, border patrol agents aggressively disrupted a children's Halloween parade and terrorized and injured a 67-year-old U.S. citizen. They pulled him out of his vehicle, tackled him to the ground, and detained him, arresting him.
On Saturday, November 8, ICE agents pepper-sprayed a family and their 1-year-old child as they were leaving Sam's Club. It was a 1-year-old girl. She was a baby.
On Friday, October 10, an unmarked vehicle, driven by Federal agents, crashed into Dayanne Figueroa's vehicle. They exited the vehicle with weapons drawn on her to forcibly drag her out of her car and arrest her. She is a U.S. citizen.
Here is my question to my colleagues in the people's House. If DHS cannot be held accountable, if we can't do our oversight work, if we are obstructed from conducting oversight, if they are systematically undermining our civil rights and perpetrating violence in our communities, then what is Congress' responsibility?
Mr. Speaker, let me say this: The answer is very clear. We must strip away every tool they are using to terrorize our communities. We can start with the taxpayer dollars they are using to harm Americans. It is time for us to begin defunding ICE.
Mr. Speaker, this last month, Nevada County, indeed the entire State of California, lost one of its finest, its truly great citizens.
Eduardo Agullo Garcia was born in Barcelona, Spain, during the Spanish Civil War. He was the second child and only son of Jose and Esperanza. His favorite memory as a child was playing marbles in the streets, although he frequently returned home with an empty bag.
His life was forever changed when he applied and was accepted into the American Field Service program and became an exchange student in 1955. He sailed across the Atlantic with fellow students. They spent the time discussing American customs and culture.
It was on this ship that he was advised to avoid asking out girls who wore a pin because the pin indicated that they had been pinned by a boy and were not available to date. He traveled across the United States on his way to Millbrae, California, where he was hosted for the school year by the mayor of Millbrae, Webb Witmer.
When he arrived at the San Francisco airport, he was greeted by American AFS students including Nancy Campbell. While he was intrigued by Nancy,
When he discovered that she was not actually seeing someone, he immediately asked her out. After Eddie graduated from Capuchino High School, he returned to Spain to complete his compulsory military service. After the military, he went to work for a chemical company in Spain. He and Nancy continued their relationship via letters and visits.
As Nancy neared completion of her degree at University of California, Berkeley, he asked her to marry him. They were married in California in 1961 and moved to Barcelona for several years. Their daughter was born in 1963, and 8 months later they moved back to northern California.
Eddie was importing and selling sporting rifles and ammunition but turned to wholesale decorative accessories. He started his company, Garcia Imports, out of the garage of their house in Millbrae. It soon grew to a small warehouse in San Bruno and then a bigger warehouse in San Mateo and then in Redwood City and finally in Hayward.
He traveled extensively for business, both overseas and the United States. He achieved one of his greatest goals by becoming a citizen of the United States in 1973.
After over 40 years in the home furnishings industry, working side by side with both his wife, Nancy, and his daughter, Barbara, he and Nancy retired in 2008.
In 2009, they moved to Grass Valley. They were not entirely sure what they wanted to do in retirement, but they met some wonderful friends and soon became very involved with the Tea Party, the State of Jefferson, and the Nevada County Republican Party. It was a full-time passion for both Nancy and Eddie.
Eddie joined the Nevada County Fairgrounds Foundation in 2011 as a director. In 2015, Eddie and Nancy, as well as their daughter, Barbara, and son-in-law, Larry McDonald, were named the Family of the Year by the Nevada County Fair's board of directors. The board chose the Garcia-McDonald family for their volunteer efforts, their vision for the foundation's station, and their ongoing support of the Nevada County Fairgrounds.
After nearly 60 years of marriage, Nancy passed in 2020, which was, of course, such a great loss for Eddie. However, he stayed busy in the last several years supporting political campaigns, keeping an eye on local politics, and working to improve his adopted country.
He was very passionate about the candidates he supported and has traveled with friends to support those candidates wherever he could. He continued to pursue his passions right up until he passed peacefully and quickly on October 9, 2025.
Eddie, we miss you, my friend, but your legacy will be felt by our community forever.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to, again, call for an end to the terrible redistricting war that is cascading across the country with the domino effect going from one State to the next. States are throwing out their entire congressional map and upending representation in their State. It is something that is deeply unpopular with Members of Congress on both sides of the aisle, and it is deeply unpopular with the American people.
Gerrymandering is bad enough, but throwing out the maps specifically to gerrymander in the middle of the decade is even worse. At this point in time, we have seen Texas and California both adopt gerrymandered maps, although both States now find their new maps being challenged in Federal Court, which adds yet another element of uncertainty for Representatives and constituents alike.
However, it has gone far beyond California and Texas. We are now seeing States either already or in the process of starting to adopt new maps in States like Missouri and potentially Indiana, Kansas, and Florida, perhaps, as well as Virginia, Illinois, or Maryland, and several others. It seems that hardly any State will be spared. Many have said they wanted to but simply don't have time this year, so they are waiting to do it until the next cycle.
It has gotten completely out of hand. It has gotten to the point where we could get into this world of rolling redistricting where district lines are never settled for more than a couple of years and where the connection between voters and Representatives is continually being severed.
I have called time and again for an end to this redistricting war or an armistice. The fact of the matter is that there is still an opportunity to do that, but it is a very narrow window of opportunity that exists.
My bill, H.R. 4889, would bar mid-decade redistricting in every State in the country. This makes sense as an act of Congress under our Article I Elections Clause authority. But it makes sense, in particular, because redistricting itself is a creature, it is a creation of the Constitution, of the Federal Government, which says that it has to be done every 10 years. It is only a new phenomenon, a fairly recent phenomenon, where States are deciding to do it more frequently than that.
So we can, as a House, pass this measure. I believe if it were brought to the floor it would pass overwhelmingly to stop this madness in every State in the country.
The reason I say it is a narrow window is because the filing deadline in Texas is coming up on December 8, and, realistically, nothing that we do here would affect the map in that State after that point in time. So that is really, effectively, a deadline for a national solution to this problem. Even if, by the way, that deadline were to pass and Texas or California would not be affected, I still think we should move forward to spare these other States from having to deal with the adverse consequences.
I begin today calling on the Speaker of the House to bring this bill to the floor for a vote so we could end this madness. We could stop mid-decade gerrymandering, we could go back to the way it is supposed to be where we redraw our district lines once every 10 years, and we could focus all of the time, energy, and resources being put into this fight--which, by the way, it seems is not going to help one party or the other to any significant degree, it is probably going to be more or less a wash, but we can get back to focusing on the issues that actually matter to the American people.
Mr. Speaker, last week, Governor Gavin Newsom's chief of staff was indicted for 23 felony counts in a Federal corruption investigation. This is his former chief of staff. She left the office at the end of last year.
The charges include conspiracy to commit bank and wire fraud, bank fraud, wire fraud, conspiracy to defraud the United States and obstruct justice, subscribing to false tax returns, and making false statements to the FBI. The main conduct being alleged involves theft of campaign funds totaling $225,000, tax fraud, as well as fraud surrounding a PPE loan.
The indictment lists a number of co-conspirators, including the former chief of staff for California's attorney general, including a high-powered lobbyist, including another well-known consultant, as well as a number of other un-named co-conspirators. In other words, these are the people running our State government in California. These are the people who control our politics in California.
Now, I have spoken about a culture of corruption that exists in Sacramento, and this latest series of events has cast that culture of corruption in stark relief. Indeed, the former chief of staff or communications director for both Jerry Brown and, I think, Dianne Feinstein used those very words in the aftermath of this indictment to describe the area that he had worked for many, many years, a culture of corruption. He referred to Governor Newsom's chief of staff who has now been indicted as a ``Mafia boss.''
So I think it is important for people to take note of what has transpired because it does cast a light on the corruption that is endemic to politics in Sacramento.
Mr. Speaker, I believe that this is really the core issue when you look at
The fundamental issue is not Democrat versus Republican even. It is the people of our State versus this entrenched and corrupt political class.
So I do believe that in order to get our State back on track, we need to reform the way politics and government are done in California. I believe we are actually on our way to starting to do that, not only with examples of people being held accountable as of this indictment, but also with The Coalition for Common Sense that you see forming across California, Mr. Speaker. This is the same coalition, for example, that came together last year to defeat our political establishment and pass Proposition 36 to make crime illegal again in California by an overwhelming margin, 68 percent of the vote, in that election.
So I do believe that there is a coalition of people who care about California, who want to reform our State, and who want to restore sanity and good government and common sense. Hopefully, this latest truly troubling and horrifying example will help to speed that process along in a very healthy way.
Mr. Speaker, today, I voted for and the House passed the REFINER Act.
This is an important piece of legislation that is designed to identify obstacles to expanding refining capacity in the United States, and it is designed to promote energy independence.
Before we go through exactly what the bill does, I wanted to make clear why this is so important for those of us in California. California is seeing the closure of two of its refineries, Phillips 66 and Valero, which represent a significant chunk of our State's overall refining capacity.
Now, we already pay the highest gas prices of any State in the country. We also have electricity prices that have gone up by 34 percent over the last several years, The New York Times just reported, far more than any other State. We pay the highest gas prices out of all 50 States, substantially more than the national average, higher even than Hawaii, which is an island State.
The causes of that are well understood, and it is those very causes that are now causing these refineries to close in a way that is going to make the problem even worse by further constraining supply.
The reason, of course, the cause, is the taxes, the regulations, the particular fuel blend that is required, and the continually changing environmental mandates that cause the cost of doing business to continually grow and that require these refineries to continually update their equipment in a way that makes doing business just no longer viable.
All of these things together led researchers at USC to determine that, by the end of next year, Californians could be paying an average of $8 a gallon for gasoline.
The bill we passed today here in Congress, in the House of Representatives, will help with this because, in addition to the data collection that it requires and the aspects of it that seek to support an agenda designed to promote energy independence through getting rid of needless regulations, it also is looking at State actions that are contributing to our decline in refining capacity.
California, I am sure, will be the State where the most such actions are identified. I am looking forward to the results of this and then being able to act to use whatever leverage we have here at the Federal level to try to spare Californians from the continually rising cost of gasoline and to restore a little dose of common sense to our State's energy policy.
Mr. Speaker, yesterday, California's nonpartisan Legislative Analyst's Office revealed that the State has an $18 billion deficit--an $18 billion deficit. The nonpartisan Legislative Analyst's Office noted that this is the fourth straight year that the State has had budget problems, even though revenue has been increasing.
The LAO, the Legislative Analyst's Office, also noted in their report on the State budget that the State's economy is not in good shape. Indeed, job growth this year has amounted to zero, nothing. There has literally been no job growth in the State of California.
In addition, consumers in California are increasingly pessimistic about our State's economy, so these problems have all been building and building and have, in particular, accelerated during the governorship of Gavin Newsom.
In his first year as Governor, our State budget was $208 billion. Now, the budget is $322 billion. It has increased by more than 50 percent. Can Californians say they are getting 50 percent more for their tax dollars? Of course not.
The problems in our State have continued to grow. We continue to lead the Nation in homelessness, unemployment, taxes, regulations, and poverty.
I would hope that this latest report from the Legislative Analyst's Office will be a wake-up call for the politicians in Sacramento that we need to start doing things differently. We need to have less of a tax and regulatory burden. We need to support small businesses and workers. We need to get the budget under control, so we don't continue to spend more and more as we get less and less.
Mr. Speaker, this is the first opportunity I have had to address the House since the passage of Prop 50 in California to re-gerrymander our State and to return us to the era of political gerrymandering.
Of course, I was against the proposition because I am against gerrymandering everywhere. I am against it in California. I am against it in Texas. I am against it in every State, Republican or Democrat.
My district, the currently drawn Third Congressional District, did indeed vote against Prop 50, and if it had its way, it would remain one contiguous district.
Unfortunately, this was not decided on a district-by-district basis, so it must be acknowledged that the people of California have spoken. Even though there is an ongoing Federal challenge to the new map, I am proceeding under the assumption that the new map will govern the elections in 2026.
I did want to point to one particular provision in Prop 50 that I actually support. Indeed, I think a good part of the reason why it passed is because they actually put this provision, this sentence, right there in the description that people saw on the ballot when they voted, which is the proposition that established a State policy of supporting independent redistricting nationwide. While it, on the one hand, brings back gerrymandering in California, on the other hand, it calls upon Congress to establish independent redistricting commissions in every State in the country.
I am going to answer that call to action from the voters of our State. I am currently working on legislation to do precisely what the initiative calls for, to establish independent redistricting in every State in the country. It will be modeled on the independent redistricting commission that Prop 50 just pushed aside in California.
If we can get this passed here in Congress and signed into law, then by the time of the next Census in 2030, when States are actually supposed to be redrawing district lines, the horrible scourge of gerrymandering, this scourge on our democracy, will finally be put to an end in the United States of America.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the life and legacy of a Bronx giant, Eric Andrew ``E Boogie'' Farmer. His passing on October 8 leaves a profound void in Forest Houses and in the heart of our borough.
Eric Farmer was born and raised in the Bronx, and for more than 50 years, he embodied the very best of our community. A gifted athlete whose dreams were interrupted by tragedy, Eric transformed personal loss into public purpose. In 2012, he became the tenant association president of Forest Houses, a role he carried out with honesty, compassion, and relentless effectiveness. When Eric called a meeting, the room was full of people because people trusted him. They knew he listened, and they knew he delivered.
Eric forged partnerships with NYPD PSA 7, community organizations, and city officials to bring real resources into Forest Houses. He invested deeply in young people by offering mentorship, securing grants, creating summer programs, and opening doors for anyone seeking a second chance. His community events, like book bag giveaways, turkey distributions, and Christmas gifts for every child, were not just traditions. They were often lifelines.
Eric's leadership extended far beyond the Bronx. His work on the Gramsci Monument brought international attention and investment to Forest Houses, employing more than 150 residents and showcasing the cultural brilliance of our community.
Eric never sought recognition. His mission was the people. He was the heartbeat of Forest Houses, a mentor, connector, unifier, and friend.
May his memory be a blessing, and may his legacy continue to guide the Bronx for generations to come.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the life and legacy of Roza Gjonaj, a woman whose story embodies the very best of the American immigrant experience.
Born in 1948 in Montenegro, Roza grew up grounded in compassion, community, and faith. In 1966, she married her beloved husband, Zef. Just 2 years later, they embarked on a courageous journey to the United States to build a better life, and what a life she built.
As a devoted mother to Mark, Elza, and Paul, and as ``Nana Roza'' to seven grandchildren, Roza created a family rooted in love, generosity, and unwavering support. Her nurturing spirit and deep care for her family were evident in everything she did.
Roza's commitment extended far beyond her home. She was a dedicated friend, a pillar of her community, and a passionate supporter of civic engagement. This was never more evident than in her tireless advocacy during her son Mark's political endeavors.
As a woman of deep Catholic faith, Roza carried and shared that faith everywhere she went, often literally by gifting rosaries to others. Her spirituality was not only personal; it was a beacon of hope and a reminder of the power of prayer.
Roza Gjonaj's life was defined by love, faith, and service. Her legacy lives on in the community she strengthened and the family she so fiercely cherished. May her memory be a blessing, and may we honor her by striving to live with the same grace that she exemplified every day.
Mr. Speaker, Domonic Smith is a testament to perseverance, purpose, and the power of second chances.
A graduate of the college of New Rochelle with a bachelor's degree in psychology, he continued to elevate his expertise by becoming a certified substance abuse counselor. His journey has been anything but linear, from exploring the music industry as an aspiring writer and artist to becoming a respected leader in youth development.
For more than 18 years, Mr. Smith has dedicated his life to uplifting youth and families across New York City. His work has connected him with parents, teens, educators, elected officials, and community members who share his belief that every young person deserves guidance, opportunity, and hope.
As a preventive manager at the Mosholu Montefiore Community Center, where he has proudly served for over 12 years, he oversees transformative programs, including drug prevention and restorative justice. Through his leadership, these programs reach more than 700 youth and families every year.
Mr. Smith's impact also extends to his time as the program director at MMCC's Edenwald Community Center. There, he launched essential support systems, such as Narcotics Anonymous meetings, a mentorship program for high-risk youth, and a men's support group, spaces that continue to change lives and restore hope to those who participate.
Beyond titles and positions, Mr. Smith is a youth advocate at heart. He is a motivational speaker, mentor, and guide for young people who are navigating some of life's toughest challenges. As the CEO and founder of Your2ndChance, he leads a powerful youth leadership initiative that supports high-risk students, alternative school populations, justice-involved youth, and individuals returning home from incarceration.
Mr. Smith's story is a reminder that, with resilience, vision, and commitment to serving others, one person can inspire change that ripples across families, communities, and endures for generations.
Recognizing Reverend Reginald E. Paris and United Christian Baptist
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor a remarkable leader and a cornerstone of faith in the Bronx, Reverend Reginald E. Paris of the United Christian Baptist Church.
Since its founding on May 16, 1960, by the late Reverend Elias Miner, United Christian Baptist Church has stood as a steadfast pillar of hope, service, and spiritual resilience. What began as a small gathering of believers has grown into a thriving ministry that has produced reverends, deacons, evangelists, and generations of community leaders, all committed to winning the world for Christ.
The church's journey from its humble beginnings on Amsterdam Avenue to its permanent home on East 222nd Street reflects a legacy of perseverance and divine purpose. With more than 22 ministries and partnerships with over 20 interdenominational churches, United Christian has fed the hungry, empowered families, supported youth, and uplifted the Bronx for more than six decades.
At the heart of this extraordinary institution stands Reverend Reginald E. Paris. Reverend Paris is a proud son of the Bronx, whose own path to ministry began as a Sunday school teacher, then deacon, and now just celebrated his eighth pastoral anniversary in the church. His leadership is rooted in humility, compassion, and an unwavering commitment to service.
Through initiatives like Cripple to Crowned, youth mentorship, antigun violence advocacy, and daily acts of care, Reverend Paris lives the gospel, not only in word but in deed. Under his guidance, United Christian Baptist Church is a sanctuary where people are lifted, restored, and empowered, and it remains a beacon of faith for the Bronx community.
I thank Reverend Paris and the entire United Christian family for their enduring service. May their work continue to bless the Bronx and beyond.
Mr. Speaker, I rise to acknowledge Tanya Pedler, a passionate community leader, disability advocate, and the current president of the Morrisania Air Rights Houses Tenant Association in the south Bronx.
A dedicated mother and tireless organizer, Tanya has become a leading voice for families living in NYCHA developments, especially those raising children with autism and other developmental disabilities.
Since her son Glen's autism diagnosis in 2018, Tanya has worked to address the lack of services, programs, and inclusive spaces for children and families with special needs in the Bronx. She has made it her mission to ensure that the New York City Housing Authority, NYCHA, residents are not left behind in the fight for access, equity, and opportunity.
Due to Tanya's dedication and activism, she was instrumental in securing $750,000 in Federal funding for the first sensory garden and sensory playground at the Morrisania Air Rights Houses. These groundbreaking spaces are designed to provide safe, inclusive environments for children of all abilities to play, explore, and thrive, transforming public housing into communities where families feel seen, supported, and valued.
In 2023, Tanya founded The Sensory Exploration Center, Incorporated, a not-for-profit organization dedicated to bringing sensory play, therapy, and inclusive programming to the Morrisania Air Rights community and beyond.
Tanya has also expanded her advocacy beyond local infrastructure. In 2025, she organized and led a groundbreaking trip for over 220 children and families with autism, providing them with a day of joy and connection in honor of Autism Awareness and Disability Pride Month.
Under Tanya's leadership, Morrisania Air Rights has become a hub for inclusive programming, sensory-friendly initiatives, and strong community engagement. Her vision and persistence have reshaped the way NYCHA communities embrace children and families with disabilities, setting a precedent--a powerful precedent--for public housing developments within the Bronx and across New York City.
Mr. Speaker, I rise to honor a dear friend and constituent, Rosetta Kirkland.
A dedicated Bronx community member, SEIU 1199 union member, and current president of the board of directors of Concourse Village of the Bronx, I am grateful for her immense community contributions, social justice advocacy, and her ongoing fight to improve the lives of working people in the Bronx.
Rosetta consistently strives to improve the lives of all working people, as well as the lives of those she lives with in her community in Concourse Village.
She has worked alongside local groups and elected officials, including myself, putting on powerful community events such as family days, turkey giveaways, and Halloween events. Through her tireless work, Rosetta has become a powerful force for good in her community.
In addition to her Bronx community leadership, Rosetta is a leader in her faith community. She has taken part in different functions at Greater Universal Baptist Church, New Season Church, and the Pastor's Aide League of Greater New York & Vicinity, as a choir member, the president of the Pastor Aide Committee, and much more. Her commitment to her faith is an integral part of her identity and an inspiration to those around her.
Rosetta spent 21 years within the MTAs president's office aiding the largest public transportation system in the country. While at the MTA, Rosetta joined the powerful 1199 SEIU union and has been a proud member since 2011. She was hired as part of the administrative staff at Kings Harbor Multicare Center where her peers elected her as their union delegate.
In that capacity, she persistently and effectively represented the members in grievance procedures and ensured their rights were always protected. She engages members in union campaigns to preserve sufficient funding for healthcare and organizes Member-to-Member electoral campaigns.
As a delegate, Rosetta went on to become a union activist where she demonstrated her drive to make a positive difference for social and human justice. She is now part of the 1199 candidate screening team, which is a committee of 1199 staffers who the union relies upon to be responsible for choosing the next political candidate they support with an endorsement for their run for office.
It is with immense respect and admiration that I honor Rosetta Kirkland for her dedicated service to her community, her advocacy for workers' rights, and her ongoing commitment to improving the lives of those around her. Her leadership, compassion, and tireless work on behalf of others exemplify the values of our great borough.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor a New Yorker whose leadership embodies the best of our city's spirit, a spirit of service, inclusivity, and relentless dedication to community: Melissa Sigmond.
Melissa is a transformational leader and currently the CEO of the Riverdale Y. I can state from personal experience that partnering with Melissa means partnering with someone who understands impact not in the abstract but in the everyday lives of real people.
As the CEO of the Riverdale Y, Melissa has taken an already important institution and elevated it to new heights. Under her leadership, the Riverdale Y has not simply been a community center but a community anchor. It supports New Yorkers of every age, background, and identity. It is a place where children learn, where seniors find companionship, where families gather, and where every person who walks through the doors feels seen, valued, and welcomed.
In addition to her work at the Riverdale Y, her career spans Fortune 500 firms, financial institutions, and some of the most mission-driven philanthropic organizations in our Nation.
Whether working with education nonprofits, technology innovators, or faith-based institutions, Melissa has brought the same steady hallmark of excellence: a commitment to strengthening community connections and lifting people up. She understands something essential about public life. Solutions are strongest when government, nonprofit leaders, and industry work hand in hand.
Today, we honor her achievements, her compassion, and her unwavering dedication to the people of New York.
Mr. Speaker, we thank her for her service, her vision, and her enduring belief in what a community can be when we choose to build it together.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor a true Bronxite, Mr. Gene Edwards. His story is inseparable from the story of our borough, our city, and our country.
Gene grew up in the very heart of the Bronx, attended New York City public schools, raised in public housing, and from those humble beginnings, he charted a path defined by courage and service.
After high school, he enlisted in the U.S. Navy where he served for 10 years with distinction. Over three combat tours in Iraq, Gene demonstrated extraordinary bravery and valor. His acts of service earned him decorations and the deep gratitude of our Nation. In 2024, he was rightfully inducted into the New York State Senate Veterans Hall of Fame.
When Gene returned home, he did what true public servants do: continued to serve. For the past 15 years, he has worked in the Bronx District Attorney's Office, fighting for justice on behalf of victims of crime and standing up for the safety and dignity of our communities.
Gene's service extends far beyond the walls of any institution. He is a senior leader of the youth literacy initiative, Ms. Ann's World, which has placed thousands of free books into the hands of low-income children to nurture the minds and imaginations of the next generation.
For his military service and his work as a district leader, Gene serves as a Vice State Commander of the National Association of Black Veterans, advocating at the State level to ensure that veterans receive the support and services they have earned. As district leader of the 79th Assembly District, Gene has championed voter education, civic engagement, and political empowerment, always ensuring that the people of south Bronx know their rights and know their power.
Mr. Speaker, Gene has fought for this country. He has fought for the Bronx, and he continues to fight every day for the people. His life is a testament to what it means to rise from the Bronx and serve the Bronx with unwavering devotion. It is my honor to recognize him today.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize Sherman Browne, an extraordinary community leader and the CEO of the AIMHigh Empowerment Institute.
Raised in the U.S. Virgin Islands and now a proud member of the Bronx community, Sherman brings a lifetime of resilience, public service, and dedication to empowering young people.
His background in public administration and youth development gives him a deep understanding of the challenges facing the young men he serves. Through the AIMHigh Empowerment Institute, Mr. Browne leads a transformative program that provides weekly in-school empowerment sessions, personalized coaching, leadership training, and academic and career support.
He works to ensure that students are surrounded by mentors who believe in
Mr. Speaker, I am proud to honor Mr. Browne for his unwavering commitment to our youth and for helping build stronger, brighter futures across our community. He represents the best qualities in what it truly means to be a mentor by inspiring, listening, and instilling confidence in the youth of the Bronx.
Mr. Speaker, I rise to honor a man who has dedicated his life to the Bronx and his community, Miguel Peterson, president of the Teller Avenue Resident Association.
For more than four decades, Mr. Peterson has lived in the same neighborhood, building a life rooted in family and community. He and his wife, Maria, have been married for 43 years and together have raised nine children.
Mr. Peterson's family is a testament to generosity, responsibility, and the values that have long strengthened the Bronx.
Mr. Peterson dedicated his professional career to helping others, working as an orthotics and prosthetics technician before joining NYCHA, where he rose to the position of superintendent.
Mr. Peterson's commitment to public service extends even further. He served honorably in the U.S. Army Reserves, earning the rank of staff sergeant, and volunteered as a police officer for more than 2 years, leaving the police force with the rank of sergeant.
For nearly 20 years, Mr. Peterson has served as the president of the Teller Avenue Resident Association. For the past 8 years, he has been elected vice chair of the Bronx South District Council of Presidents, where he advocates tirelessly for safer housing, stronger services, and a better quality of life for his neighbors.
A graduate of Bronx Community College, a father to a Bronx family, and a superintendent of Bronx housing, Mr. Peterson embodies the very best of civic duty and community leadership.
Mr. Speaker, I am proud to recognize his extraordinary contributions to our borough and thank him for a lifetime of service.
Mr. Speaker, I rise this evening to say to the American people: Well, Congress is back.
Congress is back because we were finally able to do our job after 43 days of our colleagues on the other side of the aisle, our Democrat colleagues, parading around the country, acting like they were fighting for you when, in fact, they were preventing us from being able to do the work we were sent here to do.
They were fighting to make worse a broken healthcare system that they have been holding you, the American people, hostage to, as they were also holding our government funding hostage. They were fighting to protect a broken healthcare system on behalf of insurance companies and regulators and to fund healthcare for illegal aliens, transgender surgeries, and abortions.
Republicans said enough. We fought back, and we held the line. We funded the government through January with three appropriations bills because that is what we told you we would do. The President and the Speaker of the House deserve credit because we were able to deliver.
Throughout all the headlines that this place gets, House Republicans, Senate Republicans, and the President have done a lot this year to deliver tangible results and wins for the American people. Let's just take a look at a few.
On day one of his return to office, President Trump addressed many of the issues upon which he campaigned. He fought the powers of globalists, defunding UNRWA, the dollars that were going to Hamas against Israel and against our national security interests. He defunded the United Nations Human Rights Council. He defunded the World Health Organization.
Each one of these were things that I had introduced legislation on and many of my Republican colleagues had introduced legislation on, but our Democrat colleagues wouldn't allow us to move. The President came in and executed on those important items to get us removed from these world bureaucrats.
The President also signed a declaration declaring cartels as foreign terrorist organizations--again, a bill I introduced 5 years ago that the Democrats were blocking. The President was able to deliver. We should codify it, but we have to beat Democrats to do that.
The FACE Act: The President stopped the abuses of the FACE Act against pro-life Americans and people who have the Department of Justice abusing them for carrying out their faith, and then he pardoned the pro-life activists who had been targeted and given jail time for praying and standing in defense of life. I introduced a bill to get rid of this pernicious abuse of law. The President came in, and he executed.
January 6: Alongside pro-life observers, Americans who were charged and jailed, often unfairly targeted, were pardoned after the Federal Government conducted a massive sweep to openly punish thousands of Americans, including some of my constituents. Some of us had to go down to the jail to force them to release people who the President pardoned.
Gender sanity: In return to normalcy, the administration removed the Gender X designation on U.S. passports, a piece of legislation I was proud to introduce that JD Vance carried in the Senate when he was there.
Laken Riley Act: In March, the Laken Riley Act would ensure Federal immigration officials detain illegal aliens that commit crimes and would allow States to sue the Feds. I was proud to introduce, along with my colleague from North Carolina, Dan Bishop, the SUE for Immigration Enforcement Act, which was included in the Laken Riley Act. It will allow us to sue the government in the future when they fail to secure the border, a monumental change in allowing States to defend themselves against the abuses that we saw under Biden and Mayorkas.
Speaking of the border, perhaps the most comprehensive and consequential policy achievement under President Trump has been securing our border. With the leadership of Tom Homan, Secretary Noem, Stephen Miller, the President himself, Border Patrol, ICE, all of these great law enforcement officials, despite the criticisms of leftists and Marxist mayors and cities that refused to work with them, they have brought down the flow across our border to basically zero, a 92 percent reduction from the massive flow across our border that was endangering Americans, endangering the people.
Energy independence: Trump signed an executive order ending American dependence on unreliable energy sources and slashed $3 billion in bogus abuse of emergency spending that wasn't even being used for emergencies.
ICE officials were given access to data for the Nation's 79 million Medicaid enrollees to be able to look at it and go find illegal aliens that were using Medicaid.
The Interior Department announced today that all agency decisions related to wind and solar energy must undergo strict reviews.
The Treasury Department announced today that they are taking action to ensure no tax benefits will go to illegal aliens.
This year, we advanced a responsible budget, along with President Trump, to reflect our well-established goal to return to pre-COVID spending.
Let's look at more. This Congress, working with the President, has held spending flat for the last 2 years, and now it is flat through January. If we honor our commitments, it will be flat through next September. By holding government spending flat and growing our economy, we are reducing the size and scope of bureaucracy. We are reducing debt as a percentage of our GDP and honoring the commitment that we gave to reduce inflation and to take our country back from the grasp of debt.
We avoided a massive omnibus spending bill twice, the scourge of this town, where you have these huge omnibus bills in December, at the end of the year. We have now stopped that twice with a mix of appropriations work and continuing resolutions.
We achieved major rescissions in wasteful spending. We cut IRS funding. We gutted the Commerce slush fund. We boosted immigration enforcement and deportation operations. We set the stage for additional rescissions and pocket rescissions that the OMB Director, Russ Vought, has been able to carry out, as well as impoundments.
We delivered on cutting the Federal spending that went to the badly broken PBS and NPR. I would point out, for those who want to apologize, NPR didn't utter a word. In my district, in Kerrville, Texas, on the morning when the floods were underway, they were running ads trying to fight for their own funding, but the private radio stations were going out and putting out emergency alerts to help people. The President rightfully reduced their funding. If they want to survive, they can go compete, but they don't need taxpayer dollars for, effectively, leftist propaganda.
We were able to pass the big, beautiful bill, which is a monumental achievement in which we reduced taxes for the American people, ensured taxes wouldn't go up. We were able to secure over $1.5 trillion in deficit reduction, five times the original projection of $300 billion.
We were able to end over half of the green new scam subsidies that were enriching the Chinese and enriching massive leftist corporations at the expense of the ability of the American people to have reliable grids and affordable energy.
We were able to advance welfare and Medicaid reforms, SNAP work requirements, commonsense work requirements for Medicaid.
We phased down the Medicaid provider tax threshold to save money and save hundreds of billions of dollars, cracking down on States' provider tax money-laundering schemes--which were going to illegal aliens--we saved money, made the system better and going to American citizens.
We were able to protect life by defunding Planned Parenthood and Medicaid.
We were able to protect the Second Amendment by ending taxation for suppressors and short-barreled rifles.
We were able to ensure full funding for border security, when we knew Democrats were going to shut down the government, with $150 billion set aside for continued operations for border security, as well as $150 billion for our defense, knowing that they would risk defense and border so they could try to shut down the government for political gain. We did that. We did that with the President.
We were able to ensure that our men and women in uniform didn't miss a paycheck in October, because we did that. We were able to ensure that we are continuing to revamp and restore our Defense Department, our War Department now, to a fighting machine rather than a woke indoctrination machine. Now we have enlistments at record numbers, we have people wanting to go to the military academies, proud to be in the military again, and people around the world are respecting our military again.
Now let's talk about this November continuing resolution: Democrats orchestrated the longest shutdown in history. They did so because they have nothing to run on, because they have nothing to sell to the American people except for hatred of President Trump and wanting to play games with your healthcare.
Because they broke the healthcare system, you now can't afford either health insurance or healthcare. You can't go to the doctor of your choice. If you do get any insurance, you are told that you only have a handful of doctors and that you have a massive copay or some other kind of limitation on your ability to choose a doctor. For example, in my case, as a cancer survivor, on ObamaCare, I can't go back to M.D. Anderson, which saved my life, because ObamaCare doesn't have M.D. Anderson as an option.
That is not coverage. That is fake. Democrats sold you fake coverage, and now your premiums have doubled, your copays and your deductibles have doubled or tripled, and you have fewer options for less quality care.
However, we were able to defeat the Democrat-led effort to spend another trillion and a half dollars to fund healthcare for illegals, abortions, and transgender surgeries.
We kept the reduction in workforce cuts that were made prior to the shutdown in order to hold and save money back for you, the American people, rather than bureaucrats who are at war with you.
We affirmed the President's goal of reducing the size of the bloated Federal Government, which 90 percent of Americans share.
We crafted a responsible, short-term continuing resolution through January, and now we are going to do the work to continue our job of holding spending flat.
We have done a lot. We have delivered on a large number of the promises upon which the President campaigned, on tax policy, on border security, on reductions in spending, on trying to drive down inflation, on getting interest rates under control, and we are just getting started. That is the truth. The American people are going to be the beneficiaries of that.
However, my message to my colleagues in this Chamber, and generally, is: We have miles to go. We have so much more to do. We have to continue to undo the damage of the last 12 of the last 16 years under Democrat control of the executive branch and policies that have been destroying the average, hardworking American family. We have had 10 months. We are going to continue to fight and to make those changes, but it takes a little time to unwind those damaging 12 years.
For example, healthcare, which is almost 30 percent of our budget. Healthcare is destroying the average American family. I know businesses in Austin, I know schools in Austin that are having to increase prices and increase tuition and increase what they have to deal with simply because of covering insurance premiums, which are going into the pockets of insurance companies to provide you substandard options in healthcare.
They don't provide you care. They don't. They are a middleman, a funding mechanism that gets in the way of you going to the doctor of your choice.
Republicans have plans to fix that. We have put forward those plans to fix that. Democrats block it at every turn. The simple truth is we believe in patients going to doctors. We believe in being able to share costs across Medi-Share, health-sharing ministries, other options, direct primary care, and getting bureaucrats out of your way.
We believe in ensuring that you will, in fact, have coverage that you can actually afford. We do that through the expansive ability for you to have the same tax treatment as corporations and the same tax treatment whether you are self-employed or employed by a business.
We can do that tomorrow, literally. We can transform the healthcare system in a day if we would put the legislation on the floor and Democrats would get out of the way. That is the simple truth.
The American people deserve, in a supposedly free country, to be able to go and get insurance products that work for them, doctors that are best for them, care that is best for them, and to be able to provide and take care of their families. Democrats would rather you be beholden to insurance companies, government bureaucrats, and their political priorities.
They want to scare you into believing they have got plans. They tried to do it with a shutdown. We called their bluff, and now we need to deliver healthcare freedom for the American people. We have the legislation to do it, and we have got to deliver.
We need to make sure that we address the price of housing. We shouldn't have corporate and foreign ownership of our housing supply. It is that simple. I don't know why foreign nationals and major corporations, BlackRock or otherwise, are buying up single-family residences. We should stop that. We should, frankly, give tax advantages to get rid of the ownership of those from corporations and foreign nationals to get them to American citizens so they can own those houses and own their ability to have a future for their kids and grandkids.
There are other things we can do, but we have got to drive down the price of housing, and we can do it if American citizens are the ones who are able to get access. You can get it also if you don't flood the country with literally tens of millions of people that are illegally here or through an abused legal immigration system.
Congressional stock trading: I have got to be honest, my colleagues on both sides of the aisle, stop it. When you are serving out in the private sector, God bless you, do what you want to do, but when you come here and you want to serve, why don't you just pause and let's take our investments and put them in broadly held mutual funds, do our work for 2, 4, 6, 8, 10 years, and then go home.
If you want to day trade, get off the House floor because too many of my colleagues are day trading while we are voting on important issues. We could pass that tomorrow; we have just got to have the willpower to do it. The American people want us to. It is like an 85/15 issue.
Education: Give it back to the States, get out of the way, empower States and parents. Expand choice, expand those options, but don't fund bureaucrats. The President is right to dismantle the Department of Education. It was started in 1979. We put a man on the Moon in 1969. Why do we need the Department of Education? We don't.
Importantly, we need to codify what the President is doing on our border and go even further. We passed H.R. 2 in the last Congress, the most comprehensive border security plan we have ever had. It wasn't about future flow. It wasn't about amnesty. It was about securing the border. It was about fixing the broken asylum, the broken parole, the broken catch and release, all of the things that Biden and Mayorkas were using to abuse our system to flood our country with foreign nationals.
President Trump is delivering that through execution as President. We need to codify that and prevent a future administration from abusing it ever again. We could do that. We could do it tomorrow. We passed H.R. 2 in the last Congress. Let's pass it again. Let's send it to the Senate, and let's fix our broken immigration system.
I introduced legislation today to say that we should pause legal immigration except for very short-term tourist visas. Yes, pause it all. We have 51 million people in this country who are foreign born. We have massive abuses with diversity visas and chain migration in which tens of thousands of people come into our country.
We have serious abuses under H-1Bs, which are not really being used for high-skilled workers. They are often for entry-level positions. We are leaving American workers behind, and we need to reform it.
We need to reduce the magnets that are here. We need to end birthright citizenship as it is currently known and make it what the American people actually expect if you talk to them: that you are a citizen if you are born of an American citizen. You are not a citizen just because somebody walked across the Rio Grande. We have got to stop the Supreme Court's forcing of States from having to fund the education of illegal aliens, which brings me to my final point about legal immigration.
Mr. Speaker, we have got to stop allowing people who are adherent to sharia law from coming into the United States and then trying to force sharia law into our system. It is in direct conflict with Western civilization. It is in direct conflict with the Constitution and the rule of law.
If we want to see what America is going to look like across this country if we don't address it, look at Dearborn. Look at Minnesota. Look at Mamdani's election in New York. Look at London. Look at Paris. Look at Germany. Ask if that is what we want in Dallas or Houston. Ask if we want this in Charlotte, North Carolina. Ask if we want this in Atlanta, Denver, Phoenix, or anywhere else.
It is happening, and it is happening in Texas. I will fight it in Texas. I will fight it here. I have introduced legislation to deal with it, but this body has got to deal with it and speak up about it. That starts with ending the importation of people who want to undo our system. They openly say it. If they are adherent to sharia law, then they have no business being here. That is just the simple truth.
We have a country to save. We have the greatest country in the history of the world. We are making massive progress with a President who is bold and willing to lead. We need Congress to continue what we did with the One Big Beautiful Bill Act and continue what we did with the Laken Riley Act. We need them to continue to do what Speaker Johnson did a great job of which is hold the line against Democrats who shut our government down for political purposes.
Now we need to drive forward and force Democrats in the Senate to deal with great legislation, to codify our border, make sure people can afford healthcare, make sure people can afford housing, and do the things we said we would do.
Mr. Speaker, I will close with this since today is Thursday and a week from today is Thanksgiving. I know that most of the people that I represent are deeply thankful to be Americans and to be Texans. Every Thanksgiving, The Wall Street Journal runs an editorial called, ``The Desolate Wilderness.'' To the best of my knowledge, I think it has run every year since 1960 or 1961. It goes like this:
``Here beginneth the chronicle of those memorable circumstances of the year 1620, as recorded by Nathaniel Morton, keeper of the records of Plymouth Colony, based on the account of William Bradford, sometime governor thereof:
``So they left that goodly and pleasant city of Leyden, which had been their resting-place for above 11 years, but they knew they were pilgrims and strangers here below, and looked not much on these things, but lifted up their eyes to Heaven, their dearest country where God hath prepared for them a city and therein quieted their spirits.
``When they came to Delfs-Haven they found the ship and all things ready, and such of their friends as could not come with them followed after them, and sundry came from Amsterdam to see them shipt, and to take their leaves of them. One night was spent with little sleep with the most, but with friendly entertainment and Christian discourse, and other real expressions of true Christian love.
``The next day they went on board, and their friends with them, where truly doleful was the sight of that sad and mournful parting, to hear what sighs and sobs and prayers did sound amongst them; what tears did gush from every eye, and pithy speeches pierced each other's heart, that sundry of the Dutch strangers that stood on the Key as spectators could not refrain from tears. But the tide, which stays for no man, calling them away, that were thus loath to depart, their Reverend Pastor falling down on his knees, and they all with him, with watery cheeks commended them with the most fervent prayers unto the Lord and His blessings; and then with mutual embraces and many tears they took their leaves one of another, which proved to be the last leave to many of them.
``Being now passed the vast ocean and a sea of troubles before them in expectations, they had now no friends to welcome them, no inns to entertain or refresh them, no houses, or much less towns, to repair unto to seek for succor; and for the seasons it was winter, and they that know the winters of the country know them to be sharp and violent, subject to cruel and fierce storms, dangerous to travel to known places, much more to search unknown coasts.
``Besides, what could they see but a hideous and desolate wilderness, full of wild beasts and wild men? And what multitudes of them there were, they then knew not: For which way soever they turned their eyes (save upward to heaven) they could have but little solace or content in respect of any outward object; for summer being ended, all things stand in appearance with a weatherbeaten face, and the whole country, full of woods and thickets, represented a wild and savage hew.
If they looked behind them, there was a mighty ocean which they had passed, and was now as a main bar or gulph to separate them from all the civil parts of the world.''
Mr. Speaker, this editorial appeared since 1961. That is what they did. They
If we dare to leave the faith that built this country, then this country will lose the blessings that have been bestowed upon it. We are ever thankful to live in a country where we are free to believe what we want, where we can think what we want, and where we can say what we want for the most part.
Mr. Speaker, when it comes to setting up a country and a system of laws, they must bind us together. They must bind us together as a community, the kind of community that could pull people from the four corners of a country to sit in foxholes together, to fight the most evil forces in World War II and beyond, without question, without fail, because we were bound together as Americans.
That is who we are. We must fight for it every day. We must fight to keep her. We do that here by stopping the ridiculousness and spending money we don't have to indebt our children and grandchildren.
We do it here if we pass policies that will allow the American people to prosper under their own devices, to be able to afford healthcare and houses and food for their families, without interference from people here who say they know best in the false name of compassion.
We do it here when we secure our communities with secure borders and security laws and to make sure criminals don't roam free on the streets but that law-abiding citizens can prosper by walking freely on the streets, knowing they will be safe.
We do it mostly if we adhere to our faith in the Lord Almighty, acknowledge that faith, and fight to defend our collective belief in him. We have people who wish to undermine that way of life. It is real. We cannot win a war that we refuse to acknowledge exists. That war is here. We either fight right now to save this country for our kids and our grandkids or we lose it forever.
This Thanksgiving, I will be ever thankful to be an American, to be a Texan, and to live free. I am evermore committed to double down to save this country for our kids and grandkids. It is the responsible action here on this House floor and as a responsible member of my community back home in Texas and in every step that I try to take.
