Rob Andrews

Mr. ANDREWS

Mr. ANDREWS. Reclaiming my time, would the gentleman agree, though, we should use some Federal funds for that purpose?

Mr. ANDREWS. I disagree.

Mr. ANDREWS. I did want to ask my friend from Georgia a question, Mr. Speaker, if I might. He says he's on the right track. Will the gentleman agree that we should have an up/down vote on the President's jobs plan on this floor?

Mr. ANDREWS. Reclaiming my time, is that a yes or a no?

Mr. ANDREWS. Will the gentleman yield?

Mr. ANDREWS. Reclaiming my time, will the gentleman vote for the President's tax cuts for small businesses that create jobs if they hire someone?

Mr. ANDREWS. Reclaiming my time, does the gentleman favor the provision that says we should put teachers who have been laid off back in the classroom?

Mr. ANDREWS. I thank my friend for yielding. Tomorrow will be yet another Friday without a paycheck for too many Americans. For many Americans, this may be the week that their unemployment benefits finally run out and they have no income left whatsoever. For many Americans, this might be the last weekend they spend in their home because the eviction notice or the foreclosure process comes due next week. There has been a natural disaster this summer in America, but there has been an economic disaster in America for a very long time. Fifteen days ago, the President of the United States came to this Chamber and in good faith laid out a plan to put Americans back to work. In those 15 days, this majority has had no hearings, no discussions, and no votes on the President's plan to put the country back to work. Until today, it was accurate to say they had done nothing about the job situation in America. Today, they've done something. They put forward a bill that destroys a program that has created 39,000 jobs in the private sector. My friend from California talked about the new deal that GM may strike to build the new generation of cars in China. With all due respect, that's the point. The purpose of this program is to make sure that the next generation of cars is built by Americans and sold to Chinese, not built by Chinese and sold to Americans. So if we let this bill pass, we are waving the white flag of surrender on the next generation of vehicles. Now, they say, well, we have to do this because we have to provide disaster relief. I think there is unanimity in this Chamber that the victims of floods and hurricanes and other crises deserve help, but the artificial excuse that's being used here is, well, we have to pay for the help. I have a suggestion. We're going to spend in the next 10 days in Iraq and Afghanistan what it would cost to deal with this disaster relief. How about that? Instead of crushing American jobs here at home, why don't we do the intelligent thing and say to the Iraqis and the Afghans, it's time they ran their own country with their own money. How about that for an offset? We should never have to choose between employing our neighbors and ignoring our needs. The right vote here is ``no.'' Let's bring back to the floor tomorrow a plan that both sides can support that keeps Americans working, puts Americans back to work, and solves this disaster problem. Vote ``no,'' and then let's fix the problem.

Mr. ANDREWS

Mr. ANDREWS. Mr. Speaker, America has had an economic disaster and a natural disaster. The economic disaster is 15 million people unemployed, and then we had the natural disasters of August. This bill tries to help the natural disaster get solved by making the economic disaster worse. It takes a program that has produced 39,000 private sector jobs and cripples it. Now, the ostensible purpose for this is that we want to offset the spending to help deal with the natural disasters we had around this country in August; but on multiple occasions in the last 7 years, different administrations came to the Congress and asked for infrastructure spending to help rebuild Iraq--$3.7 billion worth of it to help rebuild Iraq and not a penny of offset. Ladies and gentlemen, if we can vote to spend the public's money to rebuild roads and bridges in Iraq, let's not require an offset to rebuild roads and bridges in New York and Vermont and New Jersey. The right vote is ``no.'' Rewrite this bill, and do so in a way without worsening our economic disaster.

Mr. ANDREWS

Mr. ANDREWS. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in New Jersey on the occasion of the groundbreaking ceremony for their house of worship. This new building, located in the heart of Camden, will be a welcoming sanctuary, serving the needs of the people of Pennsauken and the City of Camden. Services will be open to the community and bilingual. The history of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in New Jersey dates back to the Church's founder, Joseph Smith Jr., who preached here. In 1944, the Church first established a congregation in Camden, where Church members from all over South Jersey gathered to worship. Over the years the Church has grown to fifteen congregations in South Jersey, including two in Camden alone. Members have met in various buildings throughout Camden and in neighboring towns. This building represents economic opportunity and investment in the City of Camden, as well as spiritual and personal growth for the community members. The chapel will be a gathering place for prayer, study, and service. I hope that this chapel will inspire further development in Camden and that its congregants will continue their good deeds in the region. Mr. Speaker, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints' commitment to the betterment of the City of Camden should not go unrecognized. I commend them for their hard work within the South Jersey community and congratulate them on the occasion of the groundbreaking of their new chapel.

Mr. ANDREWS

Mr. ANDREWS. I yield the gentleman an additional 30 seconds.

Mr. ANDREWS. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 1\1/2\ minutes to a daughter and sister in a union family who doesn't forget where she came from, the gentlelady from New York (Mrs. McCarthy).

Mr. ANDREWS. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 1 minute to a person who understands the international implications of economic growth and collective bargaining, my good friend from California (Mr. Berman).

Mr. ANDREWS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 15 seconds. The gentleman from Virginia just said that this bill restrains companies from growing jobs. Here's what it restrains. It restrains from saying to a worker who dares to stand up and bargain for themselves and fight for themselves, ``You're fired.'' That's what it restrains; and it should restrain that, because that's our law. Mr. Speaker, at this time I am pleased to yield 1\1/2\ minutes to one of the most passionate voices for working Americans in the modern history of this country, my friend from Ohio (Mr. Kucinich).

Mr. ANDREWS. I yield myself the balance of my time. Mr. Speaker, when one listens to the back-and-forth in this debate, there's a lot of different points and I'm sure some confusion that flows from that. But the debate's really pretty simple, and it's about one question: If a group of people working at a business in this country chooses to try to organize a union and bargain collectively for their wages and their working conditions, and the employer is discomforted by that and the employer comes in and says, ``I don't like the fact you're trying to form a union and bargain collectively and assert your rights, so I'm moving to Malaysia. I'm out of here,'' should that be legal or not? We believe emphatically it should be illegal. To say to American workers that they dare to speak up for themselves, they dare to assert their rights, they dare to bargain collectively, therefore their jobs could be moved overseas is wrong. It is illegal today to do that. Now, in the Boeing case, a judge will decide whether or not Boeing did that. If the judge decides that Boeing didn't, the case is over. If the judge decides that Boeing did, then there will be remedies that would lie against Boeing. But this is what this case is really about, this issue is really about, this bill is really about in the lives of daily Americans. How many of our constituents are sick and tired of making a call about their credit card or some other account and realize that the person in the call center at the other end is in Asia and has no idea what they're talking about? If you want more outsourcing, if you think the problem in America is that too many jobs are being created here and we do more for other countries around the world, then this is your bill. But if you've had it with outsourcing, if you want jobs to be created in America, what we ought to do is defeat this bill and rapidly bring to the floor the jobs plan the President of the United States stood in this Chamber last week and proposed. Let's stop creating jobs around the world and start creating jobs around America. Let's stand up for collective bargaining, and let's defeat this bill. Statement of Professors From Colleges and Universities Across the United States on HR 2587 HR 2587, currently being considered by the House of Representatives and endorsed by a majority of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, would amend the National Labor Relations Act to take away from the NLRB the ability to remedy unfair labor practices involving the removal of work or the elimination of jobs by requiring employers to undo their unlawful actions. As scholars of law and labor policy, we are deeply concerned about the far- reaching impact this bill would have on employees' basic rights to organize, to bargain collectively, and to engage in other concerted activities protected by the NLRA. The language of the proposed amendment to the Act is sweeping. It provides that the Board shall have no power to order an employer (or seek an order against an employer) to restore or reinstate any work, product, production line, or equipment, to rescind any relocation, transfer, subcontracting, outsourcing, or other change regarding the location, entity, or persons who shall be engaged in production or other business operations. This language has been justified by the bill's sponsors and critics of the Board as a response to the NLRB Acting General Counsel's actions in issuing a complaint against Boeing Corporation. As such, it would prevent the Board and the courts from directing Boeing to restore work to its employees in Washington State in the event that the company is found to have illegally moved the work in retaliation for those workers' exercise of legally protected rights. But that unprecedented interference with a pending legal proceeding for the benefit of a particular employer is not all that the bill would do. If enacted, HR 2587 will eliminate the ability of the NLRB and the courts to effectively remedy any discriminatorily motivated decision to transfer work from employees or eliminate their jobs not for legitimate business reasons, but because the employees have engaged in union or other NLRA-protected activity. It will also eliminate any meaningful remedy for an employer's refusal to bargain with a union in circumstances where it is required to do so before transferring or contracting out work performed by workers the union represents. The Board has long held that moving jobs from one facility to another or shutting down a particular operation to avoid unionization or to punish workers for engaging in protected activity violates a basic policy of the Act, that of insulating union activity from economic reprisal.\1\ The same is true of discriminatorily motivated decisions to subcontract or outsource work.\2\ The standard remedy for such a violation, regularly affirmed by the Federal Courts of Appeals, is an order to the employer to return the work that has been unlawfully eliminated or removed.\3\ In the interests of economic efficiency, however, the Board will not require restoration of work if the employer can show that it would be ``unduly burdensome'' to do so.\4\ An order to restore work that has been eliminated or removed is also the standard remedy in cases where the employer's actions were taken in violation of its duty to bargain. In unionized workplaces, employers have a legal obligation to bargain over certain decisions affecting where and by whom bargaining unit work is performed. If the employer acts unilaterally, without first bargaining with the union until the parties reach agreement or are at impasse, the Board routinely orders the employer to rescind the unilateral action and restore the work until the duty to bargain has been satisfied, subject again to the ``unduly burdensome'' standard.\5\ If HR 2587 becomes law, the Board will be precluded from ordering this common-sense relief. Employers will be able to eliminate jobs or transfer employees or work for no purpose other than to punish employees for exercising their rights and the Board will be powerless to direct the employer to return the work regardless of the circumstances. Without the ability to order a unionized employer to bring back work that has been unilaterally transferred or outsourced in violation of the duty to bargain, the Board will also be unable to insure that employees, through their union, are able to engage in meaningful bargaining over such decisions. We are dismayed that a single complaint, not yet tried by an administrative law judge argued to the Board, or ruled on by the courts, should be the basis for so fundamental a reversal of long-standing law. The legal theory on which the Acting General Counsel's complaint against Boeing is based is thoroughly consistent with existing law. Contrary to the claims of critics, the Acting General Counsel is not seeking to dictate where Boeing assigns work, but only to insure that such actions are not taken in retaliation for workers' exercise of rights protected by the NLRA. In fact the complaint itself specifically states that ``the Acting General Counsel does not seek to prohibit Respondent from making nondiscriminatory decisions with respect to where work will be performed, including nondiscriminatory decisions with respect to work at its North Charleston, South Carolina, facility.'' But as we have shown, the impact of HR 2587 would go well beyond overruling the Acting General Counsel's actions in the Boeing case. If enacted, it will give tacit permission to employers to punish any segment of their workforce that chooses to unionize or to exercise the right to strike by eliminating their jobs. It will allow unionized employers who find it convenient to ignore their duty to bargain with the union before transferring or eliminating bargaining unit work to act unilaterally without concern for legal consequences. Employers will be able to eliminate lines of work, hire subcontractors, switch jobs to non-union facilities or transfer them out of the country in violation of the NLRA-- secure in the knowledge that the Board will be unable to order it to undo those actions. In the Committee report regarding the bill, the majority states, ``To ensure employees can continue to exercise their rights under federal labor law, the NLRB will continue to have more than a dozen strong remedies against unfair labor practices to protect workers and hold unlawful employers accountable.'' However, the report does not list those remedies and we are at a loss to identify them. The Board's remedial power under existing law is already severely restrained. The Board cannot impose sanctions. It may not seek to punish wrongdoers. It cannot impose fines; it cannot require anything that would amount to a new contract between the parties. If the bill passes, the Board will have no effective response to basic unfair labor practices. The Committee majority seeks to justify the reducing of employee rights and Board authority by claiming that it is merely strengthening the employer's right to make basic business decisions, including where and how to invest its resources. We reject the premise that restoring work to those who would perform it were it not for the employer's unlawful action violates an employer's basic entrepreneurial rights. The policy of restoring victims to the position they would have been in had it not been for unlawful conduct is common throughout our legal system, and it represents no more than a recognition of simple justice. endnotes \1\ See, for example, Frito-Lay, Inc. 232 NLRB 753 (1977) (employer violated the Act by shutting down plant and transferring the work to another facility in response to a union organizing campaign); Lear Siegler, Inc., 295 NLRB 857 (1989) (same). \2\ See, for example, Century Air Freight, 284 NLRB 730 (1987) (employer's subcontracting of trucking work violated Act because purpose was to avoid bargaining with union). See also Aguayao v. Quadrtech Corp., 129 F. Supp. 2d 1273 (C.D. Cal. 2000) (granting the Board's request for an injunction stopping an employer from moving its California operations to Mexico in retaliation for union organizing). \3\ See, for example, Mid-South Bottling Co. v. NLRB, 876 F.2d 458 (5th Cir. 1989) (affirming appropriateness of Board order directing bottling company to reopen a distribution facility closed because employees voted for union representation); Woodline Motor Freight, Inc. v. NLRB, 843 F.2d 285 (8th Cir. 1988) (upholding Board order requiring employer to restore trucking operations transferred to another facility after employees engaged in union organizing campaign); Statler Industries, Inc., 644 F.2d 902 (1st Cir. 1981) (approving Board order directing employer to restore office jobs relocated to another facility in order to frustrate union organizing activity). \4\ Lear Siegler, Inc., supra, 295 NLRB at 861. \5\ The Board's authority to order such a remedy in refusal to bargain cases was expressly affirmed by the supreme Court in Fibreboard Paper Products Corp. v. NLRB, 379 U.S. 203 (1964), which upheld a Board order directing an employer that contracted out the work of its maintenance employees without first bargaining with the employees' union to resume maintenance operations and reinstate the employees. The Court said the order restoring the status quo ante ``to insure meaningful bargaining'' was well-designed to promote the policies of the Act and had not been shown to impose an undue burden on the employer. Id. at 216. Institutions and affiliations listed for identification purposes only

Mr. ANDREWS. I thank my friend. Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to yield 2 minutes to a passionate voice to fight the ravages of outsourcing in our country, the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Cummings).

Mr. ANDREWS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 20 seconds. The previous speaker's claim that the National Labor Relations Board is dictating where jobs go in America is utterly incorrect. If any company said, We want to move from State A to State B because we think the State tax structure in State B is more favorable to us, they have an absolute right to do so. The issue is whether they can move because they want to discourage and undercut the right of collective bargaining. If they want to destroy collective bargaining, they can. At this time, Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 1\1/2\ minutes to a very persuasive voice for the working families of America, the gentlelady from Hawaii (Ms. Hirono).

Mr. ANDREWS. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 3 minutes to the most effective leading voice for working people in America today, the senior ranking Democrat on the Education and Workforce Committee, my friend from California (Mr. Miller).

Mr. ANDREWS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 20 seconds. My friend who just spoke indicated that this decision, or attempt by the NLRB, would destroy jobs in South Carolina. That's not accurate. On page 8 of the NLRB's complaint, it says the relief requested by the NLRB does not seek to prohibit respondent, Boeing, from making nondiscriminatory decisions where work will be performed, including work at its North Charleston, South Carolina, facility. At this point I am pleased to yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Woolsey), a strong, progressive voice for working people in the United States.

Mr. ANDREWS. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. ANDREWS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 15 seconds. We don't have a czar controlling executive pay in this country. We have executives acting like czars outsourcing jobs around the world and ruining the middle class. That's the problem in the United States. It is my privilege at this time to yield 3 minutes to the Democratic whip, who strongly understands the value of collective bargaining, the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer).

Mr. ANDREWS. For years, the understanding in this country has been, if you show up for work every day and work your heart out and do your best, what you get in return is a good wage, good benefits, and a future that's secure as long as your company's secure, but it seems like that version of the American Dream moves another continent, another ocean, another day away each day that goes by. Outsourcing is destroying the middle class in the United States of America, and this bill is the outsourcers' bill of rights. It says to an employer, if you want to use as an excuse the collective bargaining and union activities of your employees and you want to pick up and move to Central or South America or Asia, here's the way to do it. This bill draws a map of jobs outside--rather, it draws a map as to how to take jobs from inside the United States and move them outside the United States. If an employer, under our law for decades, says that I'm gonna shut down and move my plant or my office because you dared to try to organize a union or you've spoken up for the rights of the workers, that's illegal. The purpose of this bill is to remove the only effective remedy to combat that illegality. If this bill became law, here's what would happen: An employer who says, I'm tired of employees speaking up for their own rights. I'm tired of union organizing. I'm tired of collective bargaining. I'm moving to Malaysia, it would still be illegal under this bill for the employer to say that, but there would be nothing the labor board could do to stop that; because if the employer formed a shell company in Malaysia and took all of the money and put it in the shell company, and the labor board said, Well, you've got to pay backwages to the people you just laid off, there would be no money to pay the backwages. This is the outsourcers' bill of rights. We don't need an outsourcers' bill of rights. We need a working person's bill of rights in this country. We need a bill of rights that says, if you hold up your end of the bargain, the American Dream will no longer move out of your reach. This is a bill that overreaches, it undercuts the middle class of this country, and it should be defeated. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. ANDREWS. I yield the gentleman an additional 30 seconds.

Mr. ANDREWS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 3 minutes. (Mr. ANDREWS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. ANDREWS. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 1 minute to the leader who's leading the fight against outsourcing and for collective bargaining, the minority leader of the House Democrats, the gentlelady from California (Ms. Pelosi).