Tom Cole

Mr. COLE

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

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

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

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gohmert), my very good friend.

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Washington (Mrs. Rodgers), my good friend and a distinguished member of the Energy and Commerce Committee.

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Ferguson), my good friend and the distinguished chief deputy whip of the Republican Conference.

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I want to thank the Speaker for her kind and thoughtful remarks. I also want to acknowledge--I am going to follow her example. I think we should keep our mask on when we are doing our normal business but take them off when we are speaking. And thank you for setting that example, Madam Speaker. With that, I would like to yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from Arizona (Mrs. Lesko).

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I want to thank my good friend, Mr. McGovern, the distinguished chairman of the House Rules Committee, for yielding me the customary 30 minutes. Madam Speaker, let me quickly respond to my friend's mention about the group that will work on reopening Congress. I look forward to working with my friend and our colleagues on that particular issue. I do want to point out, it is important to note, last night we actually did function as a committee under the chairman's leadership, and we got our work done. We are on the floor right now getting our work done. The executive branch is in Washington, D.C., right now getting its work done. The President and the Vice President aren't hunkered down in Cheyenne Mountain. They are in the West Wing working every day. The Joint Chiefs of Staff are in the Pentagon, working every day. Every Cabinet member is working every day. I just say that to note that other people are able to get their jobs done with appropriate changes and appropriate precautions, so I rule nothing in or out. I look forward to listening to my colleague, but I do think we are capable of working in the House of Representatives, and I will be extraordinarily cautious about giving up procedures and precedents that are 230-plus years old. Madam Speaker, we are here today to consider a rule that creates Speaker Pelosi's proposed select committee on the coronavirus pandemic. Earlier this month, Speaker Pelosi announced that she would create this select committee, conveniently ignoring that any such select committee must be established through the Rules Committee and, ultimately, through a vote on the House floor. Yesterday, the Rules Committee met on extremely short notice to, essentially, rubberstamp the Speaker's action. This was particularly egregious considering that, up until right before we met, we had absolutely no details on the proposal. In the last month, the Speaker gave the minority no notice of her plans, no indication of her rationale or vision, and was radio silent since her announcement, except for the occasional media mention. In fact, we did not even know we were meeting on this item until the afternoon of the hearing. That is hardly the way to operate on something the Speaker purportedly wants to do in a bipartisan fashion. Perhaps even more problematic, Madam Speaker, is that I am not sure what the end goal of such committee will be. Speaker Pelosi claims that the proposed select committee will examine all aspects of the Federal response to the coronavirus pandemic and will provide oversight for Federal dollars being spent in response. But Congress already has significant oversight tools at our disposal. The CARES Act itself established a five-member Congressional Oversight Commission specifically for that problem. That Commission is in addition to Congress' other oversight tools, which include the House Committee on Oversight and Reform and the oversight subcommittees that exist on most other permanent House committees. If we already have a separate Oversight Commission specifically for the CARES Act and we already have a separate Oversight and Reform Committee and each committee already has separate oversight committees, what, then, is the actual purpose of the proposed select committee? It is entirely plausible for one to conclude that this new select committee will simply turn into yet another partisan witch hunt aimed at damaging the President. There may be a time in the future when it makes sense to establish a commission, like the 9/11 Commission, to review the COVID-19 pandemic and the government response. I actually support doing that at an appropriate time. But such a commission needs to be truly bipartisan and devoted to what happened and what we can learn from it to improve government responses for the future. This select committee doesn't meet that test. Before I reserve my time, later today, the House will be voting on the Paycheck Protection Program and Health Care Enhancement Act. This bipartisan bill is the next step and follow-up to the CARES Act, which Congress passed a few weeks ago. Today's bill includes $310 billion for the Paycheck Protection Program, a critical program for protecting small businesses and their employees. It also includes $75 billion for hospitals on the front line of the coronavirus pandemic and a further $25 billion for coronavirus testing. Refilling the Paycheck Protection Program account will help countless small businesses and their employees across the country, including hundreds in my district. Frankly, refilling this important account could not come soon enough. It should have happened a week ago. But I am fully supportive of this important bill, and I look forward to voting in favor of it later today. I urge opposition to the rule, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Burgess), my good friend and distinguished member of both the Rules Committee and the Energy and Commerce Committee.

Mr. COLE

Mr. COLE. Mr. Speaker, it is not lost on me how consequential the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security (CARES) Act is for our nation. Along with many of my colleagues, I wish I could be there in person to voice my support for this historically massive and wide-reaching legislation. The absence of Members from our chamber doesn't make the House of Representatives any less united in our support of this significant relief package for the American people, who are greatly suffering by no fault of their own due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The natural disaster caused by COVID-19 is unlike any other our nation has encountered in modern history. Its impact is severely felt across the whole of society--causing an unprecedented strain on our public health defenders and medical providers as well as sharp economic losses and unexpected disruptions for Americans of all stripes. Hardworking Americans, families, communities, small businesses and numerous industries have been hit hard and fast in a matter of days and weeks. Given the enormous scope of this disaster, its consequences and the damage already done, it is critically important to get help to those Americans facing difficult times. I am encouraged that the CARES Act extends a much needed helping hand. To help individuals and families weather this storm, the CARES Act provides financial assistance in the form of direct cash payments and unemployment support. The legislation provides unprecedented help to sustain small businesses and their workers, after many businesses on Main Street have been forced to close their doors to comply with the guidance and orders from federal, state, local and tribal officials. For our health workers fighting on the front lines across the nation, this relief package replenishes vital medical supplies like masks, respirators and other equipment. Moreover, it provides reinforcement supplies and resources for state and local response efforts. Finally, I worked very hard to ensure tribal nations are equipped to face and fight the unknown challenges ahead with this coronavirus like other state and local authorities. Oklahoma is home to 39 sovereign tribes, and each one plays an invaluable role in the lives and health of their members and surrounding communities. I am proud that this relief package dedicates generous resources specifically for tribal nations to respond. Therefore, had I been present, I would vote ``yea'' if there was a recorded vote.

Mr. COLE

Mr. COLE. Mr. Speaker, a key part of the relief package was the tribal government stabilization fund. This fund would be used by tribal governments to offset the dramatic losses they are facing at this time. This funding would be used to help them continue to do the right thing and keep their employees on the job--paid, and supported--as our nation responds to, and recovers from the pandemic. Title VI, Sec. 601(c)(7) provides $8,000,000,000 in relief to tribal governments for losses of revenues and increased expenditures associated with COVID-19. The bill provides: [T]he amount paid under this section for fiscal year 2020 to a Tribal government shall be the amount the Secretary shall determine, in consultation with the Secretary of the Interior and Indian Tribes, that is based on increased expenditures of each such Tribal government (or a tribally- owned entity of such Tribal government) relative to aggregate expenditures in fiscal year 2019 by the Tribal government (or tribally-owned entity) and determined in such manner as the Secretary determines appropriate to ensure that all amounts available under subsection (a)(2)(B) for fiscal year 2020 are distributed to Tribal governments. Tribal governments or tribally-owned entities can demonstrate ``increased expenditures'' relative to 2019 by listing expenditures associated with the closure or diminished operation of business and government facilities, including payments made to employees or other entities while businesses or government operations are closed or operating in a limited capacity, as well as the difference in revenues transferred to tribal government accounts in 2020 versus the same period in 2019.

Mr. COLE

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from Arizona, my good friend, for yielding time. And frankly, I want to associate myself with her remarks about the underlying legislation. My remarks, Madam Speaker, will focus on the manner in which the bills that are before us are being brought to the floor. It is, frankly, very disappointing to me, Madam Speaker, that this even needs to be said. But given the grave consequences of what the majority is proposing to do procedurally, I cannot condemn today's rule strongly enough. In today's measure, what the majority is proposing amounts to a de facto change to the House rules, one that will trample on the rights of the minority and deny any opportunity to amend the bill on the floor. Rather than bringing up the two immigration items as the standalone bills that they actually are, the majority has instead chosen the procedural gimmick of using a Senate-amended House bill to package these items together. This has the same effect of denying the minority the more than 100-year-old right to make a motion to recommit, or MTR, as they are commonly known, before moving to final passage. This is because, under House rules, the minority is not allowed to offer an MTR on any House measures that have been amended by the Senate. Of course, for the majority, the denial of the minority's traditional rights to an MTR is the whole point of this procedural exercise. These underhanded procedural shenanigans are specifically intended to deny the minority the right to an MTR on these bills. Before my friend, the chairman, responds with the number of times a Republican majority used this procedure, let me be perfectly clear. As he knows, we never, never did that as a means to deny the minority an MTR. In fact, we did it in consultation with the minority and with the sole goal of accelerating passage of key bipartisan legislation in the Senate. So, why does the Democratic majority insist on these procedural gymnastics? I can think of only one reason: The majority is embarrassed that the minority has now passed an MTR six times in this Congress, including one just last week. Madam Speaker, this is now the second time in the past 6 weeks that the majority is explicitly adopting a procedure to deny the minority our rights. I think that if the majority is really so frightened of the motion to recommit and they really want to do away with MTRs, then they should change the standing rules of the House, and that needs to happen on a vote on the House floor so that everyone can see what the majority is actually doing and how it operates. When Republicans were in the majority, the thought of limiting the use of the MTR to silence minority voices never once crossed our minds, and that is because we recognized the importance of the MTR to this institution. It has been around since the very beginning of the institution, and it has been in its present form since 1909. In fact, in 1919, Representative Abraham Garrett of Tennessee was quoted as saying: ``The motion to recommit is regarded as so sacred it is one of the few things protected against the Committee on Rules by the general rules of the House.'' Evidently, not anymore. The present majority is not content with that state of affairs, which is why they are trying, once again, to do an end run around the House rules and adopt a procedural gimmick specifically to stop the minority from exercising its right to an MTR. It is beyond disappointing, Madam Speaker. It is shocking that the majority would feel the need to rig the entire system to shut us up. My goodness, they have a 35-seat majority. But we all know why that is. It is because the majority cannot effectively defend its own policies.

Mr. COLE. So, today, Madam Speaker, I call on all Members to vote ``no'' on this rule. I ask that my colleagues, regardless of party, reject this rigged process, reject this rule, and act to protect the rights of every Member of this Chamber. The future of the institution depends on it.

Mr. COLE

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I rise today in support of this Supplemental bill, which will provide $7.8 billion for our country to prepare for, prevent, and respond to the coronavirus. Congress thankfully began preparing for public health emergencies like the coronavirus five years ago, by including generous increases for the National Institutes of Health, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Strategic National Stockpile. Beyond that, in 2018 this Congress established the Infectious Disease Rapid Response Reserve Fund, which enabled our Administration and public health officials to direct a swift and decisive response to protect our citizens from day one. The funding provided in this Supplemental bill will further target resources to state and local health officials. It will enable the government to procure medical supplies to supplement the Strategic National Stockpile. It will provide over $800 million for research into a vaccine, and provide additional funds to develop medicines, diagnostic tests, and aid in hospital preparedness. The bill also includes language waiving certain telehealth requirements during this time to ensure Medicare beneficiaries can receive the care they need at home to avoid placing themselves at greater risk of the virus. I'm glad we were able to come together in a bipartisan fashion to speed these funds to where they are needed.

Mr. COLE

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I am in its current form.

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I rise in reluctant opposition to this bill. Long before I was privileged to come to this House, I was Secretary of State in Oklahoma at the time of the Oklahoma City bombing, and I was tasked by the Governor to work with my friend, our colleague Mr. Lucas, to work with the Congress to see that we received timely assistance for a disaster that was clearly not of our own making. We got that assistance, and I am forever grateful to this body and the people in it that worked with us at that particular time. Madam Speaker, since I arrived in Congress, I never forgot the help that we received from the Congress of the United States. So I routinely voted for almost every supplemental that related to disaster relief. I was one of 49 Republicans who voted for Sandy relief, and I have no doubt that our fellow Americans in Puerto Rico are in dire need and certainly need help at this particular time. I was very proud, as I know many Members were in the last Congress, to vote for over $40 billion of relief to Puerto Rico. It needed that money. There was no question about it. Madam Speaker, we are moving prematurely here. That money, that $40 billion, roughly half has yet to be expended. It is available for immediate use right now. We still have $42 billion in the Disaster Relief Fund. That money is available for immediate use right now. There is an ongoing FEMA investigation to determine the precise needs of Puerto Rico. That has yet to be completed and reported to Congress. We should wait for that disaster relief, not because it may tell us that we need less, but it might actually tell us that we need more. We should not act without appropriate information. So, Madam Speaker, I think the appropriate thing to do is to send this back to the committee and wait for the information to move. If we move now, precipitously, it is almost certain that the United States Senate will not pick up this relief, and the President will probably not sign this bill if it got to his desk. If we wait for the appropriate information, use the available funds that we have right now to help people in Puerto Rico, we have a much better chance of getting our fellow Americans the help they need, when they need it, in the right amounts, and in the right way. There is no doubt in my mind that this Congress will respond appropriately to an emergency. I have seen us do it time and time again on a bipartisan basis. I know we will do it again at the appropriate time. So Congress will respond, if necessary. Frankly, Madam Speaker, I simply move that we recommit the current legislation to the Appropriations Committee, wait on the information, and then act in the interests of our fellow Americans. Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I have a motion to recommit at the desk.

Mr. COLE

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, I want to thank my good friend, Dr. Burgess, for yielding. I rise, Madam Speaker, in reluctant opposition, quite frankly, to both the rule and the underlying legislation. As my good friend, Chairman McGovern knows, we have actually worked together to try and expand and reclaim war-making authority for the Congress of the United States, and I would offer and continue to work with him in that partnership. I think that is something that needs to be continued. I also think we have no difference that if we were to engage in a war with Iraq, it would require congressional authorization. And frankly, last night, in the Rules Committee, I offered a process whereby we could work together in a bipartisan fashion; that is, let's just follow the War Powers Resolution. Let's submit something to the committee of jurisdiction, which is actually the Foreign Affairs Committee. We have a deadline or a timeline laid out in the War Powers Act; they could operate within that. Within a matter of a few weeks we would then, in a very bipartisan manner, bring something to the floor. Let's contrast that with how this particular resolution came to the floor. We got it about 45 minutes before the Rules Committee meeting. It is written in the Speaker's Office; rewritten in the Speaker's Office, and it is sent down here to make a political point, not to actually do something that would substantively restore congressional war-making power. This is all politics; that is all it is. The political aim here is for our friends to suggest that the President either wants war with Iran or has acted hastily, precipitously, and recklessly. Neither of those things is true. Frankly, our latest dispute with Iran begins with the decision by this administration appropriately to withdraw from the very ill-advised Iranian nuclear deal, a deal, by the way, that the majority of this House and the majority of the United States Senate opposed, but President Obama went ahead with it anyway. What has been the Iranian response to our withdrawal? A series of provocations to which, as my good friend Mr. Burgess pointed out, the President, by and large, has acted with remarkable restraint. Let's just go through some of those provocations. First, it was attacks on ships in the Strait of Hormuz in the gulf. What was the President's response? Well, let's organize an international flotilla to defend these ships. He did not attack Iran. Next, as my good friend from Texas pointed out, we see strikes into Iraq itself. Particularly, we see an attack on Saudi Arabian oil refineries. What is the President's response? Well, let's not attack Iran. Let's send defensive capabilities from our country there and protect those sites. Then, we see attacks on American forces in Iraq. What is the President's response? As my friend pointed out, let's go after the Shia militias. Let's not attack Iran. Finally, after that, when the President responds, we see another attack. In that attack, as my friend pointed out, an American contractor died, and four American servicemembers were wounded. Again, the President responds by attacking Shia militia. Then, the next response, our embassy is assaulted. Thank goodness, no loss of life, but I think the President had had enough. By the way, just after that assault happens, who magically shows up in violation of a U.N. resolution in Iraq? Our good friend General Soleimani, a designated terrorist for 13 years, a person who has killed hundreds of Americans, wounded thousands more, not to mention the tens of thousands across the region. What does the President do? The President takes out a legitimate terrorist target. In Iran? No, the President doesn't want to do that. He does it in Iraq. Now, how anybody could have any doubt about the President's desire to, number one, strike at a terrorist, and, number two, avoid war, I will never know.

Mr. COLE. Madam Speaker, passing this resolution, as my good friend Dr. Burgess suggested, sends the wrong message to the wrong people at precisely the wrong time. The President did the right thing here. He has acted in a restrained manner. He has endured, and our country has endured, endless provocations. We should reject this rule. Frankly, we should have a regular process where we actually go back to the committee of jurisdiction. We should absolutely reject the underlying resolution. Before I conclude, I want to mention I know my friend is very sincere in his opinions on expanding congressional war power. There is no doubt in my mind about it. We have worked on that before. I look forward to working with my friend on that issue again. This is the wrong vehicle, the wrong place, the wrong time, the wrong consequences for our own country to pass this kind of legislation.

Mr. COLE

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

Mr. COLE. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, nobody admires my friend from New York more than I do. We worked on a number of issues. But let's be real. Democrats are going to make the rich, I guess, in every State pay for the rich in your own State. That is just the fact. Most of the benefit of this thing--56 percent of the benefits--goes to the top 1 percent of income earners. That is the fact. Eighty percent of it goes to the top 5 percent, and 94 percent goes to households that make over $200,000 a year. Those are just the numbers. Now, some of this is used for worthy causes. I would agree with that. But a permanent tax increase for a temporary tax cut, frankly, just doesn't make a lot of sense, and that is what we are dealing with here. So I would also suggest that my friends remember that the tax cut that they revile so much doubles the personal exemption for most people so that more than offsets for most people the SALT tax reduction that was reduced. It is not eliminated; it is still there. Mr. Speaker, $10,000 a year is still a pretty good deduction to be able to take. If you make that much income that you can take a deduction that large, then you are probably doing pretty well. So, again, I don't have any problem with people defending the interest of their States, that is a perfectly appropriate thing to do. I don't have any problem with people wanting to use money for good purposes. That is a perfectly appropriate thing to do. But let's be real about who is getting the benefit of this tax package, and it is very-high-income people. In fact, I am going to oppose it. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Mr. COLE. Mr. Speaker, I advise my friend I am prepared to close whenever she is. In the interim, I will reserve if she has more speakers.

Mr. COLE. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time to close. Mr. Speaker, in closing, I oppose both the rule and the underlying measure. H.R. 5377 is a deeply misguided and partisan tax bill that sets up a temporary tax break for a privileged few and seeks to trade it for a permanent tax hike for the entire country. The bill temporarily removes the cap on the State and local tax deduction, a benefit that will primarily go to wealthy taxpayers living in expensive homes in a few key States and localities. But to pay for this temporary boondoggle, the majority is adding a permanent hike at the top marginal tax rate. The benefits will go only to a few key privileged areas, but the costs are spread across the entire country. It makes very little sense to me to trade a temporary tax break for a permanent tax increase, and it makes even less sense to me to ask the entire country to pay for it in perpetuity for a short-term tax break for a few areas with high State and local taxes. Now, my friends have talked about the relative tax burden and who gives what and what States give what. As a former member of the Budget Committee, those numbers are, by the way, usually based on the discretionary portion of the budget. The reality is--I hate to say this, because we have a big problem in front of us that I don't think either party has confronted very well, certainly not mine, but I don't think my friends have either, and I don't think this administration has, and I don't think the last one did--every State in America is a debtor State if you start adding in Medicare, Medicaid, and those type of nondiscretionary expenditures. So we have a big problem. It is really related to an aging population more than it is anything else, but the idea that some States are so- called donor States, I have to tell you, Mr. Speaker, nobody is a donor State in America. We are running nearly a $1 trillion deficit. That deficit comes almost primarily because we have simply not readjusted Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security to pay for the benefits that are drawn out. I hope someday we will work on that. I actually have a bipartisan bill, I used to carry it with Mr. Delaney--a very good friend and Presidential candidate from my good friends on the other side--that would go back and set up what we did in 1983. When Ronald Reagan and Tip O'Neill worked together, we had a Social Security Commission. We actually increased the revenue going into Social Security. I think that would have to be one of the long- term fixes, not simply cuts, reductions, and reforms. That is a debate for another day. In closing, Mr. Speaker, American taxpayers, in my view, deserve better than what is in front of us here today. Rather than making the tax code more regressive and complicated, which this bill would do, we should further reform and simplify the tax code to make it easier for all taxpayers to understand. We should be making American businesses more competitive, and we should be taking steps so that American workers can keep more of their hard-earned earned income, something I know we all want to do. In closing, again, just remember this: 56 percent of the benefits of this bill go to the top 1 percent of income earners. The top 5 percent get 80 percent, and the bottom 80 percent in terms of income get 4 percent. That should explain it all and why we should reject this bill. So, Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' on the previous question, ``no'' on the rule, and I yield back the balance of my time.