Ed Case

Mr. CASE

Mr. CASE. So we always have the ability to override the basic provisions with that balanced budget amendment in Congress, or where we believe that we do have to borrow that money. This is just a mechanism to introduce the same fiscal discipline that a well-run business or household has to follow? I yield to the gentleman.

Mr. CASE. As, by the way, is the case with 49 out of 50 of our States, who either have a similar balanced budget amendment in their constitution or by statute.

Mr. CASE. Madam Speaker, the gentleman made reference to the fact that he was a mayor, and I made the comment to the gentleman once, and I believe it, that of all of the public officials I have ever worked with throughout the country, I think mayors understand fiscal responsibility the best. The gentleman made reference to the fact that he functioned under a balanced budget as a mayor. Was there any magic to that? How did the gentleman do that? He had a requirement to do that, so what did he do? I yield to the gentleman from Utah.

Mr. CASE. Madam Speaker, so to that point, my experience in Hawaii, where we have had a balanced budget for a long time--and I was a State legislator--so I had knock-down, drag-out fights over all this kind of stuff, whether it be to increase spending, or tax reductions, or tax increases. But it was always against the backdrop that it had to balance. My sense was always that the folks that we represented understood that that presented us with a series of tough choices, and they understood that in the big picture, the tough choices that we had to make as a result of a balanced budget, were for the better, the overall, long-term, big picture fiscal health, economic health and social health of Hawaii. Did the gentleman have that experience in Utah? I yield to the gentleman from Utah.

Mr. CASE. I think what the gentleman is saying in a very gracious Utah way is that the lack of a balanced budget where we always have the recourse to just borrow money and kick some cans down the road disincentivizes the efficient and effective expenditure of government funds, of taxpayer funds. After all, if there is waste in that expenditure, there is a safety valve there, whereas a balanced budget drives a certain discipline.

Mr. CASE. One other point that the gentleman made that I think bears further discussion is the gentleman's reference to paygo. Of course, we throw ``paygo'' around here all the time. Sometimes, people's eyes kind of blank out when we talk about paygo. Can the gentleman talk a little bit more about the simplistic and basic approach of paygo? What does it mean? What is its effect on the work that we do? Madam Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Utah.

Mr. CASE. In other words, not financed by additional debt, which would have the result of driving up the deficit, the debt, and interest payments? Madam Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Utah.

Mr. CASE. Let's take a pretty straightforward example. Let's say that we wanted to reduce taxes. By the way, we can acknowledge there is a debate about whether reducing taxes does, in fact, generate revenue or not. But for these purposes and especially the recent large tax cut, we simply did not see a return on revenues from those tax cuts. But let's just stick with the fact that if we reduce taxes, then we have to either increase another tax and/or reduce government spending somewhere to be able to have a budget-neutral, a deficit-neutral outcome. Is that correct? Madam Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Utah.

Mr. CASE. Conversely, if we want to increase Federal spending, we have to either reduce some other Federal spending or increase taxes, correct? Madam Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Utah.

Mr. CASE. The gentleman said that the House rules already provided for paygo. So why are we here so concerned about it?

Mr. CASE. Essentially, we have a rule that is honored in the breach? Madam Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Utah.

Mr. CASE. Of course. One of the elements of our Blue Dog fiscal responsibility blueprint is to tighten up the rules on paygo so that we stop the bleeding on debt and deficit spending.

Mr. CASE. Again, I am honored to be the gentleman's co-chair, and I thank the gentleman for adding to our debate today. Madam Speaker, I want to make one other point before I close on this subject. I want to emphasize one of the points made by my colleague from Utah. He talked about restoring the budget and appropriations process. This starts to be real inside baseball. Congress goes through a process establishing a budget, which is the overall outline of Federal spending for the next year--because we do everything on a yearly basis, for the most part--and then passing appropriations bills that are consistent with that budget. In other words, we make the big picture decision upfront in a budget, and then we have our appropriations bills that must match that budget. In what we refer to here as regular order, what we would do is first have a budget resolution that passes the House, passes the Senate, and is agreed to by both the House and the Senate so that we know what our roadmap is. Then, we would take each of the areas of government that needs appropriations every year. The way we do it is, there are 12 separate appropriations bills, and we would individually pass each of those bills consistent with the budget. We would do all of that by October 1, which is when our fiscal year starts. We would call that regular order. That would be quite regular order for any business and any personal budget. The last time we followed regular order was 1995. The last time we went through a full budget process, an individual appropriations bill process, was 1995. And that has simply thrown our Federal fiscal house into disarray. We saw that with an incredibly tragic and unnecessary Federal Government shutdown just late last year and earlier this year. That was in part to be laid at the feet of our failure to follow basic budgetary, fiscal, and appropriations procedures. We have tried, on a bipartisan basis, to fix this. In fact, just last year, we had a bicameral, bipartisan committee set up to reform the rules of the House and the Senate as to the budget and the appropriations process. I want to read a passage from that committee's report. This was the Joint Select Committee on Budget and Appropriations Process Reform, Republicans and Democrats, House and Senate. Here is a quote from the committee's report in late 2018: ``There have been numerous breakdowns in the budget process in recent decades. Fiscal year 1995 was the last time Congress passed a conference report on the budget resolution followed by passage of 13 separate appropriations bills before the beginning of the new fiscal year.'' We now do 12. ``Continuing resolutions, CRs, have become the status quo for funding the Federal Government, demonstrating Congress' failure to complete its work on time. CRs create uncertainty for agencies and the American people.'' By the way, I stop to describe a CR as a resolution that says: Sorry, we can't figure out what to do in this next fiscal year. So while we are trying to figure it out, all we are going to do is continue the spending the way it was in the last fiscal year, no adjustment of spending levels, no adjustment of priorities, and no update for current situations. Let's just kick this can down the road. That is a CR. Back to the report. ``In many years, there has been concern that parts of the government would have to shut down due to the failure to enact even stopgap appropriations, and shutdowns of various durations have actually occurred. In the 115th Congress alone,'' the most recent Congress, ``there have been two government shutdowns. Whether it is Federal employees being furloughed, national parks shutting down, adverse effects on defense and law enforcement, shutdowns inflict severe damage and uncertainty on the Nation's fiscal state. Additionally, multiple JSCBAPR members expressed frustration regarding the lack of legislative tools available for Congress to address national needs or the national debt in a bipartisan manner.'' The committee's report was submitted very, very late in the last Congress, so there was really not enough time to debate it fully and to proceed, but the report certainly remains highly relevant together with recommended legislation. Our Blue Dog Caucus believes that reform along those lines is necessary. Finally--and I don't speak now for the Blue Dogs, but I do speak for myself and, I believe, many individual Blue Dogs and perhaps others--we have another mechanism available to us, a mechanism that we shouldn't have to follow but that sometimes may be the only way to cut through the political dialogue and the fears of people to make tough decisions. That is to develop independent commissions outside Congress of experts, hopefully on a neutral basis and hopefully on a nonpartisan or bipartisan basis, who are charged with reviewing and making decisions on revenue and spending matters and reporting their results back to Congress, hopefully for an up-or-down vote. If Congress gets the opportunity to pick at a balanced report once it comes back, then it defeats the purpose of the commission to start with. Simpson-Bowles was one very well-known commission that failed, and there have been others. It is certainly conceivable that if we can't get our act in order in Congress-- as we should be able to do, and as I believe the American people want and think we should do--then we need to resort to some other mechanism to get this House in order. Finally, we need public support. We need to get people involved again in this issue. As I said earlier, the late 1990s and early 2000s were the height of public concern over deficits and debt, and it resulted in external pressure to Congress to balance our budget. A succession of two Presidents with bipartisan Congresses, by the way, got it balanced. The public demanded it; we delivered. Now, it is almost a forgotten issue. It doesn't even rank in the top 10 of major issues. We have many, many major issues. But, Madam Speaker, I will tell you one thing, the issues that are in the top 10, our solutions to those issues will be crippled if we don't get our basic fiscal house in order. In conclusion, the Blue Dogs believe that we are, in fact, in a national crisis. We stand ready to work with anyone and everyone toward commonsense, mainstream solutions. Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. CASE

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

Mr. CASE

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

Mr. CASE. Madam Chair, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Chair, not far from here, on the slopes of Capitol Hill, is a small, serene, and unassuming memorial. On its walls are names not now known to too many Americans but indelibly etched in a dark chapter of our national story. Tule Lake, Poston, Manzanar--these are the internment camps where 120,000 ethnic Japanese, most of them American citizens, were locked up in the hysteria of the Second World War just because they were Japanese. This amendment, proudly sponsored by many of my colleagues in our Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus, including our chair, the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Judy Chu), asked us a question that must be asked: Are we repeating history or in danger of doing so? In these recent years of justifiably heightened scrutiny on the intelligence activities of the People's Republic of China, a disproportionate number of Americans of Chinese descent have been investigated and prosecuted for espionage. Those convicted have received disproportionately high sentences, and the too many exonerated have had their careers ruined nonetheless. No doubt, China seeks to recruit Chinese Americans to its goals, and no doubt, our government should and must review specific cases of potential espionage by China on specific facts. But have we fallen into the same trap all over again of justifying investigations and other actions toward the ends of national security by means of general profiling and targeting based solely on ethnic identity? The Committee of 100, a group of prominent Chinese Americans in diverse fields, reviewed the empirical evidence and concluded that ``Asian Americans, whether immigrant or native-born, may be facing unfair and increasing racial prejudice in this era of geopolitical competition.'' It stated, and I believe correctly: ``A definite line can be drawn between appropriate prosecution that is based on actual evidence and free of bias and overreaching persecution that is triggered by unfounded suspicions and tainted by racial prejudice. All Americans, regardless of ethnicity, depend on that line.'' This resolution is a flashing red light to our intelligence community: Stop, look, and listen. Take some time to think it through to be sure you are staying on the right side of that line, and then report back to us here in Congress that you have done so and have the procedures and mindset in place to ensure that we won't repeat history with Chinese Americans or any other broad ethnic or interest group. Madam Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Schiff), the committee chair.

Mr. CASE. Madam Chair, I strongly urge adoption of this amendment. It is the right amendment. We certainly want our intelligence community to do its job, but we also want them to be very conscious of the decisions that they are making and are in line with our basic civil liberties. Madam Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. CASE

Mr. CASE. Madam Chair, I rise today in support of my amendment requesting the Department of Defense to assess the status of security cooperation and assistance with Pacific Island Countries and the feasibility of expanding it. The Department of Defense currently operates a Maritime Security Initiative in the South China Sea that works to build regional capacity to address a range of maritime challenges. This effort includes a wide range of assistance including International Military Education and Training, Foreign Military Financing, operations combating the narcotics trade, and the transfer of excess defense articles. Our nation launched this program, in part, to help check Chinese influence in the region. China provides its assistance without regard for America's principles for a free and open Indo-Pacific that has governed the region since the end of World War II. Given the rise of Chinese influence in the Pacific Island Countries, the question we have before us is can this program be replicated to help the island nations in the Pacific who are seeing a push by China to expand its influence into Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu, the Solomon Islands, Fiji, the Federated States of Micronesia, Palau, Kiribati, the Marshall Islands, Nauru, and Tonga. This Chinese influence threatens the blood, sweat, and treasure spent by our country during World War II in an effort to ensure freedom and the rule of law would thrive throughout the Indo-Pacific. My amendment takes the first step to see what can be done to protect these nations who share our values and are under pressure for Chinese influence. The amendment would direct the Defense Department to assess the current status of security cooperation and assistance with Pacific Island Countries and the feasibility of expanding it to advance our national security objectives in the Indo-Pacific. I urge support of my amendment to determine how to ensure our traditional allies in region have the tools and training needed to help America ensure a free and open Indo-Pacific.

Mr. CASE. Madam Chair, I rise today in support of my amendment directing our military intelligence agencies to determine the degree of foreign influence in the Pacific Island Countries and to assess how to close any intelligence gaps our nation has in the region. Because my home state of Hawai`i is closer to Asia than Washington D.C., I have met with many leaders from the Pacific Island Countries, which includes Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu, the Solomon Islands, Fiji, the Federated States of Micronesia, Palau, Kiribati, the Marshall Islands, Nauru, and Tonga. Time and time again, I have heard stories of troubling Chinese influence in the region. Efforts to bribe senior government leaders. Questionable foreign business investments near U.S. military installations, and even an effort that might have thrown a parliamentary government into crisis. We need our intelligence community to assess what is happening so we can determine how to respond. To address these threats, my straightforward amendment only asks for three things. First, the Defense Department would assess the actions of foreign militaries in the Pacific Island Countries. Second, the department would assess any gaps in our intelligence collection capabilities that may undermine this intelligence assessment, and third, the Defense Department would determine how to eliminate any gaps in our intelligence. With this information, we can fully assess what is happening in the Pacific Island Countries to and determine how we should respond to ensure that our partners in the region are not undermined by a foreign influence that is combating our nation's goal of ensuring a free and open Indo-Pacific.

Mr. CASE. Madam Chair, I rise today in support of my amendment directing the Department of Defense to provide a report regarding the risks posed by non-military aircraft flying over our nation's military installations. Not unlike many other states, on the Island of Oahu in my home state of Hawaii we have multiple military installations situated near a major international airport and a large airport supporting general aviation. Although agreements have been made to help control this air traffic, on a regular basis these agreements are violated. For example, I have personally seen tour helicopters fly right over sensitive locations around Pearl Harbor, the home of the U.S. Pacific Fleet and Pacific Air Forces. My amendment seeks to achieve two commonsense steps to address the potential risks from these nonmilitary aircrafts operating near U.S. military installations. First, the Department of Defense will assess the encroachment challenges and security risks posed by non-military aircraft that fly over military installations, to include operational impacts, installation and personnel security and intelligence concerns. Second, the department would propose practicable strategies and recommendations for mitigating any significant risks. I urge my colleagues to support this amendment so we can start responding to encroachment and security risks from non-military aircraft today before waiting until an incident forces us to act because our nation's security and safety have been compromised.

Mr. CASE

Mr. CASE. Mr. Speaker, I rise to recognize the 75th birthday of one of the most iconic ships ever to sail the seven seas, the U.S. Navy's USS Missouri. Mighty Mo, our last battleship, was commissioned June 11, 1944, after being laid down and launched at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. She went on to one of the longest and most distinguished careers of any Navy ship ever, earning 11 battle stars in three wars: World War II, the Korean war, and Operation Desert Shield/Desert Storm. But she is best known for her role not in war but in peace. For of course it was on her decks at anchor in Tokyo Bay on September 2, 1945, V-J Day, that General Douglas MacArthur accepted the surrender of Japan, ending World War II. Mighty Mo was finally struck from the register in 1995. For the last two decades, she has been moored in a place of honor at Pearl Harbor, alongside her fallen sisters--most notably, the USS Arizona--as a living museum under the loving stewardship of the USS Missouri Memorial Association in partnership with the U.S. Navy. On her decks next year, on September 2, we will recognize the 75th anniversary of the end of the Second World War. But for today, let us simply wish Mighty Mo a heartfelt hau'oli la hanau, happy birthday, and many more to come. Mahalo.

Mr. CASE

Mr. CASE. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 1261) to establish a national program to identify and reduce losses from landslide hazards, to establish a national 3D Elevation Program, and for other purposes, as amended.

Mr. CASE. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on the measure under consideration.

Mr. CASE. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as she may consume to the gentlewoman from Washington (Ms. DelBene).

Mr. CASE. Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support this legislation, and I yield back the balance of my time. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of H.R. 1261, the ``National Landslide Preparedness Act.'' H.R. 1261 establishes a national program to identify and reduce losses from landslide hazards and a national 3D Elevation Program. The bill also authorizes a study of ground subsidence. Climate change charges us with the responsibility to study significant landslide threats to mitigate damages and protect our citizens. The 3D Elevation Program (3DEP), authorized under H.R. 1261, systematically collects 3D elevation data in the form of light detection and ranging (lidar) data for the conterminous United States, Hawaii, and the U.S. territories, with data acquired over an 8-year period. Mr. Speaker, due to global warming, high river levels provoke floods and landslides, which block roads and hinder people from escaping life- threatening situations. More than 30,000 people worldwide were killed by landslides between 2004 and 2010, according to the Geological Society of America. And in the U.S. between 25 and 50 people are killed by landslides every year, according to the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS). Slides can occur in all 50 states, but regions like the Appalachian Mountains, the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific Coastal Ranges have ``severe landslide problems,'' according to the USGS. Mother Nature is unpredictable and can endanger our constituents' lives and homes if advanced warning procedures are not established. Continued wet weather has also resulted in rivers reaching increasingly dangerous levels. As of 25 February, National Weather Service data showed over 250 rivers in the Midwest, South and East to be above flood stage. In February 2019, one person died in flash flooding in Tennessee after a storm system was caused by a landslide brought on by record- breaking rain to the Nashville area. The Cincinnati metropolitan area is another region that faces constant threats of landslides. It sits in part on what's called the Kope shale formation, which breaks down easily and is highly prone to landslides. In 2010, the Cincinnati metro area faced landslides that wrecked properties and caused damages that were difficult to assess. Losses from landslides in the United States were estimated in 1980 to exceed $1 billion per year. The U.S. Geological Survey estimated annual losses to be between $2 billion and $4 billion per year. However, landslide costs across the country are not currently tracked or measured in a uniform way by any one agency. Passage of H.R. 1261 will result in the: publication of a national strategy for landslide hazards, risk reduction, and response in the United States (including territories); Development and maintenance of a publicly accessible national landslide hazard and risk inventory database; an expanded early warning system for debris flow; and the establishment of emergency response procedures for the rapid deployment of federal scientists, equipment, and services to areas impacted by a significant landslide event. Mr. Speaker, H.R. 1261 incentivizes geologic investigations, good engineering practices, and effective enforcement of land-use management regulations to reduce landslide hazards. Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to join me in supporting H.R. 1261 to establish and strengthen the nation's emergency preparedness procedures to assess and evaluate landslide damages and threats.