Tom Cole

Mr. COLE

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I yield an additional 30 seconds to the gentleman from Florida.

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume simply to make a couple of quick points to some of my friends' concerns. First of all, nobody has had 2 weeks to act. This incident occurred less than 2 weeks ago, and we were in recess last week. So let's focus on the here and now. I may be mistaken about this, but I don't think we have kept the Ethics Committee from meeting about this. Quite the opposite, we wish they had. The chairman did say he would put in a request for an emergency meeting. The reality is, the majority moved ahead, I think, before that could happen. That process, I think, would have been the appropriate one to follow or an appropriate one to follow in this case. So, I just simply posit those things for the record. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Gaetz).

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

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I continue to reserve the balance of my time.

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

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Speaker, if we defeat the previous question, I will offer an amendment to the rule to consider a resolution that would add a new House rule stating that any resolution proposing to remove a Member from a committee assignment shall not be in order unless offered by, or with the concurrence of, the leader of the party of the Member that is the subject of the resolution. Madam Speaker, my amendment would reinforce the longstanding norm of basic fairness that today's resolution does not comply with. Throughout the entire history of the House of Representatives, it has been an unwritten rule, or norm of conduct, that one party does not attempt to exercise a veto over the other party's committee assignments. The reasons for this are obvious. It protects the operations of the institution and ensures that politically motivated attempts to remove Members from committees do not happen. But the majority's actions, both today and earlier this Congress, threaten that norm and threaten to set off a new round of escalating partisan punishment anytime the majority changes hands. Establishing this as a written rule of the House would ensure that no Member ever faces this kind of partisan retribution again. Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to include in the Record the text of my amendment, along with the extraneous material, immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.

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

Mr. COLE

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I want to thank my friend for yielding, but most of all, I want to thank him for waiting here hour after hour after hour, as our friends who couldn't get their show in order, broke arms, broke knees, did whatever they had to do to bring this to the floor. Thank you for being here and making sure that things were done appropriately in a procedural way. Madam Speaker, we have purportedly a $3 billion package in two different parts in front of us today. We are not going to talk a lot about the first part of the package, the so-called infrastructure package, but I want to talk about it because it didn't come through the Rules Committee, it didn't need to, and it is not going to be subject to much debate here, but we ought to talk about it. Now, of the two bills that we are purportedly going to deal with, it is the better of the two. It is abominable. It is unpaid for. The CBO has told us it is $400 billion--$398 billion to be precise. The Senate process that produced it did not go through the committee of jurisdiction. Worst of all, it is the most egregious surrender of House prerogatives I have seen in my time here. It has not come through any committee. We have not had anything to do with it. We are going to simply accept what a few Senators negotiated and went through and call it a victory and call it bipartisan. It is nothing of the sort. Worse than that is the bill that this rule is to advance, and that is the so-called BBB bill. Now, my friends call it the Build Back Better bill. I call it the bad bad bad bill. It has been cobbled together in a convoluted process of missed deadlines, broken promises, and legislative sleight of hand. The defects are almost, Madam Speaker, too many to mention. My friends will say it is paid for. It is not. Quite frankly, they have about $1.5 trillion of revenue as far as we can tell, and they have ``$1.75 trillion'' with expenditures. But they intend to make every program here for 1 year or 3 years or 5 years permanent. So if you add them all together, it is a minimum of $4 trillion with $1.5 trillion of revenues. So it is an outrageously unbalanced bill. Some of my friends are going to vote for this because it has immigration in it. Really? Immigration, frankly, will not survive the Senate Parliamentarian, and everybody on your side knows it. Some of them are going to vote for it because it has State and local tax reform, which is a nice way of saying, my gosh, tax breaks for millionaires and billionaires in blue States. That too, by the way, will probably be changed in the United States Senate if you believe Senator Sanders and Senator Warren and look at what they have to say about this thing. Finally, we have some people who say: Well, I am going to vote for it because it is just the right thing to do. It is the wrong thing to do for the American people.

Mr. COLE. This bill, by the way, will not get better in the Senate. Now, when it was sold to your side, you were told that we are not going to move ahead until we have an agreement the Senate will accept. The Senate won't accept this bill. We are going to send it over there, and a few Senators are going to write it and send it right back. If you don't like it now, you are going to like it less when it gets here. Madam Speaker, we should defeat the rule; we should defeat the infrastructure package; and when it comes, we should defeat the bad bad bad bill.

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, we have heard repeatedly from the President of the United States that this bill costs nothing. That is obviously not true, it costs lots of money. Last night, my very good friend, the Rules Committee chairman, the distinguished Member from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern), said it is fully paid for. I know he believes that. Unfortunately, he doesn't know that. We don't have a Congressional Budget Committee score. We have had five Members of the other party say they would not vote for this bill unless they had a CBO score. I hope they hold true to that. Madam Speaker, we should simply not proceed until we have a CBO score. We will have our differences of opinion, fair enough. But the American people and all of us in this Chamber ought to know what this bill costs before any of us are asked to cast a vote. Madam Speaker, I would urge the support of my friend's point of order.

Mr. COLE

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I rise today to highlight important research being conducted by the University of Oklahoma, which is advancing cutting-edge developments in the areas of Air Defense Artillery, air dominance, ocean surveillance, ISR, EW, counter-UAS, GMTI, and a host of others. The developments I refer to center most directly in the budding area of all-digital radar. New capabilities associated with all-digital radar present an extraordinary opportunity for the United States to better utilize important data for national security purposes, be it weather data, flight control data, projectile data, targeting data or any other type, to our tactical and operational advantage--land or sea. Madam Speaker, in the area of distributed radar and 360-degree, all- digital, phased array radars, there are extraordinary leap-ahead capabilities which cannot be ignored. By bringing to bear advances in digital signal processing, artificial intelligence, and machine learning to the data streams that this new technology provides, the defense of the United States can be significantly advanced, providing leapfrog capabilities which vastly exceed those of our legacy radars. Over time, all of the services have been engaged in developing capabilities in this area, albeit at a rate that does not always achieve the leap-ahead and transformational requirements that we now require strategically as we focus on defense from potential near-peer adversaries. While we currently maintain many advantages, technology advances quickly around the globe. It is critical we maintain our edge, and, in doing so, obtain the generational leap-ahead needed to secure it. Madam Speaker, the Advanced Radar Research Center (ARRC) in Norman, Oklahoma, has conducted very significant research in this area. A component of the University of Oklahoma's research enterprise, the ARRC has generated important technological advancements to each major service component in the area of 360-degree phased array radars. In fact, to help further this contribution, I am supporting a National Defense Authorization Act proposal this year, initiated in the Senate, which encourages the Army Research Lab to collaborate with academia in the development of distributed radars and multi-function sensors. This is an area where I believe there will be plenty of bipartisan and bicameral support. Madam Speaker, Army Research Lab in many ways has stepped forward for the Army in this area. I am confident that, as the Army's Combat Capabilities Development Command, Army Futures Command, and the ASA/ALT examine what can be accomplished in this area, they will quickly realize the high relevance of this technology to counter-UAS, Air Defense Artillery, and their EW enterprise. It has the potential to be one of the key transformational technologies that would allow the Army to leverage ground forces more effectively and to provide better defensive capabilities against airborne threats. As the Department of Defense proceeds to develop technology in this area, we already see interest from the private sector. However, if we do not develop a joint approach to the development of this technology, it may result in it being stove-piped into systems without ever realizing the full extent of its capabilities. Furthermore, inability or unwillingness to coordinate research in this area could tax current supply chains and threaten the rate of development we are capable of in this area. Additionally, application of this technology is not limited solely to the defense enterprise. Air traffic control, weather prediction and analysis, 5G frequency scanning dependent communications, and remote sensing could all benefit; NOAA is already engaged in related research. Therefore, over time, it may become beneficial to create a Joint Interagency Working Group on the development of distributed and all digital radar. Madam Speaker, the future is bright for the development of these technologies in the United States. It is an area in which we can thrive. I look forward to working with my colleagues in the House and Senate to advance our common interests and our national defense by supporting the development of these technologies.

Mr. COLE

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, today, I voted in favor of H.R. 2119, the Family Violence Prevention and Services Improvement Act. It is important for our Nation to address the scourge of domestic violence, which affects far too many residents of our country, and I am disappointed that the legislation before the House today could not be written, and ultimately passed, on a bipartisan basis. Domestic violence transcend politics and does not discriminate based on political preference. There are provisions in this legislation that are important to constituencies I represent. My home state of Oklahoma is home to some of the largest Tribal populations. I am pleased that H.R. 2119 provides increased resources to Tribal nations to fully respond to domestic violence in their communities. Specifically, H.R. 2119 increases the tribal set-aside for grant funding from 10 percent to 12.5 percent. This increased set-aside will improve technical assistance to Tribes, development of domestic violence prevention strategies, and implementation of community responses to reduce risk factors for family violence. Moreover, the implementation of a new emergency hotline dedicated to serving Indians affected by domestic violence will significantly benefit the Native American population. Yet I also recognize that the bill voted on today has some very real problems. I have concerns with several key provisions, which is why it is my hope that if the Senate passes its own version of this legislation, these troubled provisions could be eliminated in a conference between both chambers. If not, then I reserve the right to vote no on any vote on final passage.

Mr. COLE

Mr. COLE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding. Mr. Speaker, as my good friend from Georgia explained, if we defeat the previous question, we will immediately move to bring up H.R. 5586. This bill is critically important to ensure there will be no expansion of Internal Revenue Service requirements for financial institutions to report the ins and outs of bank accounts. Members may remember this issue during the debate on ObamaCare when the Democrats tried to require anyone who received a payment of more than $600 to be given a 1099. People were rightly outraged by this provision, and it was repealed before it ever went into effect. Now, with their new reconciliation bill, the Democratic majority is again looking for payfors and are willing to sacrifice the privacy of all Americans in that quest. Every threshold being discussed for inclusion will give the IRS full access to what is in the bank account of every American. And what is the justification for that, Mr. Speaker? It is to help the IRS to identify tax cheats. Well, I can tell you, Mr. Speaker, the Democratic proposal will make everyone who pays rent or a mortgage a target and won't do anything to help the IRS close the tax gap. Mr. Speaker, the Democratic plan is an astonishing breach of privacy. Giving the IRS the power to snoop around financial accounts, even with no accusation of wrongdoing, violates every protection against government overreach. Americans have a reasonable expectation of privacy in their homes and in their personal lives, including their financial lives. Yet, if the majority has their way, the IRS will be empowered to go digging around in the bank accounts of everyday Americans in search of wrongdoing. That is simply beyond the pale. We have seen what can happen when the IRS abuses its power. It was only a few short years ago that the IRS was targeting political and religious organizations for their beliefs, an astonishing violation of their First Amendment rights. What the IRS needs, Mr. Speaker, is oversight and accountability, and that is why we need to bring up and pass H.R. 5586 today. Only this will ensure that the IRS is not granted unprecedented power to intervene in the lives of and invade the privacy of ordinary Americans.

Mr. COLE

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, on Motion to Suspend the Rules and Pass, as Amended, H.R. 4369, had I been present, I would have voted YEA on Roll Call No. 318.

Mr. COLE

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I just want to quickly inquire of my friend. I am prepared to close, if my friend is.

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I can assure Members I won't use it all. Madam Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time. Madam Speaker, I just want to quickly point out to my friend who has cited a number of statistics on State vaccinations, and I agree with him. Everyone should be vaccinated. I spend a lot of time in my district urging people to do that. I know my good friend from Massachusetts does the same thing. But with respect to the previous question, nobody is vaccinated that is coming across illegally. They are not tested, and they are not vaccinated. This is really a commonsense item. I am surprised, quite frankly, my friends have not accepted this in some earlier iteration. My friend, Dr. Burgess, mentioned he brought it up multiple times. This is actually something we should agree on. Let's not just let anybody into our country that has not been tested. And if they are found unvaccinated, give them the vaccine. I think we can argue about immigration all day long. I don't know why in the world we argue about that particular issue at all. What my friend from Iowa is proposing is very much common sense. Madam Speaker, the bill before us today is a deeply misguided bill. It makes in order one item, a standalone bill lifting the debt ceiling through the end of 2022. Republicans have been very clear on their stance. So long as Democrats continue to spend, spend, spend on partisan reconciliation bills, Republicans will not act to help them lift the debt ceiling. The majority has been governing in a partisan manner since they took control earlier this year. That is their prerogative. If they continue to insist on ramming their big government socialist agenda through Congress on narrow partisan votes, then it becomes their responsibility to lift the debt limit on their own. Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on the previous question and ``no'' on the rule, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentlewoman from Iowa (Mrs. Miller-Meeks), my good friend and author of this bill, to further explain the amendment.

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I am sure my friend from Massachusetts is not aware of this, but Mrs. Miller-Meeks has actually run multiple events for vaccines. She has vaccinated people herself. She has spent 24 years in public health in service to the country. So I agree with you about the vaccine. Nobody in this body has done more to promote it and administer it than Mrs. Miller-Meeks. Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the distinguished gentlewoman from Tennessee (Mrs. Harshbarger), my very good friend, to speak more about the need to ensure illegal immigrants are tested for COVID-19 before being released.

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Speaker, just to quickly respond to my friend, I remind him, his leadership didn't vote to raise the debt ceiling. I remind him four out of the last five times we had complete control. I remind him that the majority leader in the United States, Mr. Schumer, didn't vote for it four out of five times. And I remind him that then-Senator Biden didn't vote for it once. So please, please, let's look at the facts here before we start saying how much Democrats have always bellied up to the bar to help us out. That is just simply not the case. Madam Speaker, if we defeat the previous question, I will offer an amendment to the rule to bring up H.R. 1897 for immediate consideration. This bill is simple: Before the Biden administration can release any illegal immigrant from custody, the person must have a negative COVID-19 test. Madam Speaker, the Biden administration's crisis at the southern border is not only a humanitarian and a security crisis, but it is also a public health crisis. Just last week, Secretary Mayorkas admitted that 12,000 migrants in Del Rio, Texas, who were released by the Biden administration, were not tested for COVID-19 and were not subject to any vaccination or testing mandates. This stands in stark contrast with the CDC's continuing embrace of mask mandates, even for the vaccinated. Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of my amendment in the Record, along with the extraneous material immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern), my very good friend, the distinguished chairman of the Rules Committee, for yielding me the customary 30 minutes, and I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Speaker, today's rule covers a standalone bill that suspends the national debt limit through the end of 2022. Today's item does not come out of a vacuum. Just last week, the Democratic majority in the House passed a continuing resolution to fund the government through early December. Unfortunately, that bill also included this same suspension of the debt ceiling through 2022. The inclusion of this item meant that not a single Republican in the House supported last week's bill, and not a single Republican in the Senate supported it either. But today, not content with having run headlong into a brick wall once, the majority is now seeking to do the same thing again. As baseball player and philosopher Yogi Berra once said, today is truly deja vu all over again. Madam Speaker, I don't know how much more clear Republicans can be on this topic. So long as the Democratic majority continues to insist on spending money hand over fist, Republicans will refuse to help them lift the debt ceiling. This year alone, the majority has rammed through one partisan spending bill through reconciliation already. That bill spent $1.9 trillion, allegedly for COVID relief, but really about a laundry list of progressive policy priorities. And I remind my friends they were offered a compromise of many hundreds of billions of dollars, but that wasn't sufficient. Today, the majority is neck-deep in negotiations on an even bigger partisan reconciliation bill, this one supposedly $3.5 trillion but, frankly, likely to run much higher than that. If passed, this one would mean Democrats have pushed through $5\1/2\ trillion of spending in 1 year, which is almost one-and-a-half times the amount of normal Federal spending. And that all comes on top of our regular discretionary and nondiscretionary spending. Madam Speaker, Republicans have been very clear on this for months. So long as Democrats keep pushing these bloated spending measures, and so long as they continue to ram through partisan policies like those found in the Green New Deal, Republicans will not work with them to raise the debt limit. Since the beginning of this year, Democrats have been pushing their policy agenda despite having the bare minimum of a majority in both the House and the Senate. The results have been shocking: more Big Government socialism, more spending, and higher taxes. They have been doing all this on their own, with only Democrats voting for these measures. To be clear, this is the choice the majority has made. They have chosen to govern in a majority-rules fashion. They are pushing through bill after bill larded up with huge spending and more and more Big Government socialism all on their own. The majority also has the power to lift the debt ceiling all on their own, using a process they are quite familiar with, reconciliation. Since they have chosen to ram the rest of their agenda through on their own, they also have the responsibility to lift the debt ceiling on their own. If they want to keep spending the people's money like this, then they alone must act and take responsibility. Madam Speaker, my good friend alluded to the fact that he has repeatedly voted for debt ceiling increases in his capacity as a Member. I know that to be true, and I respect my friend. I have done that myself. I have voted under both Republicans and Democrats. But I do want to address this point about the debt limit. The point was best summed up by Speaker Pelosi in her Dear Colleague letter Sunday night. ``The debt limit is a shared responsibility, and I urge Congress to come together . . . on a bipartisan basis, as it has in the past.'' Oh, really? I think we should look at the record and clear that up. The last five times that Congress voted on raising the debt limit when Republicans controlled the White House, the Senate, and the House, President Biden, who was then in the Senate, didn't vote to raise it a single time. Majority Leader Schumer voted to raise it once out of five times. The Democratic leadership voted to raise it once out of five times. So to somehow pretend that both sides have not on occasion used the debt ceiling to express their concerns or that everybody has rallied to the cause simply does not square with the facts. Madam Speaker, I will make a bold prediction. I suspect the debt ceiling will at some point get raised, and I suspect it will be before we reach a deadline. And I share my friend's point that, indeed, that needs to happen. However, when you launch a program as expensive and as expansive as the Democrats have, and you choose to do it on a partisan line way, then don't shirk the responsibility at the end of the day. Don't try to shift it to others. I think that is what is happening here. One last point, Madam Speaker. We talk a lot about the Trump debt. I remind my friends they were in control the last 2 years of the Trump Presidency. I remind my friends that most of the debt was actually accumulated in that time. And I do remind my friends it was a bipartisan effort. The biggest part of that debt was COVID relief, which we agreed on, on both sides of the aisle and both supported, and we raised the debt ceiling for it. So, when we work together, we can solve these problems. My friends have chosen not to work with us, and I think now they are going to have to bear the responsibility. I am sure they are up to the task. Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Speaker, to my good friend from Massachusetts, if we want to deal with urgent matters, why don't we pass a clean CR and make sure the government doesn't shut down in 48 hours. That is urgent. And hopefully we will be able to get about that business shortly. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Burgess), my very good friend and fellow Rules Committee member, classmate, member of the Energy and Commerce Committee, who has been a passionate advocate on this issue and who will speak more about the previous question.

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, could I have a quick time check?

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I yield an additional 1 minute to the gentleman from Texas.

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

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