Kevin Cramer

Mr. CRAMER

Mr. CRAMER. Mr. Speaker, I thank Chairman Barton for his kind words and his tireless effort on behalf of the employees, the workers, the economy of our country, and for articulating so beautifully and so perfectly, without rehearsal, the next chapter of what I began to talk about when I talk about the historical context. We are reliving much of that history right now. As we think about ISIS, as we think about Iran and a path to a nuclear weapon, when we think about what is going on with Russia's movement further and further into Europe and its growing influence, the bear is back. Here we have the opportunity to use the peaceful tools of energy development rather than the weapons of war. Never has the world needed it more. You talked about the bipartisan effort and how proud we are to work hand in hand with our Democratic Member friends, what a blessing that has been. One of the best, a gentleman that I have grown to not just know and appreciate, but to love, is Representative David Scott of Georgia, whose heart for the things that matter has in many ways changed mine, I have to admit. He has changed mine. He has offered amendments to multiple bills, an amendment to multiple bills that I have now joined him in offering. It is not one on this bill, but I want to read the amendment because it is relevant to what we are doing. It is a simple amendment. Representative Scott from Georgia offered this, and I join him in it, if not as an amendment, at least as an instruction. I quote now from his amendment: Knowing that young Black men in the United States ages 18 to 37 are the hardest hit, at a 38 percent unemployment rate, and as high as 50 percent in some of our States and cities, the U.S. Congress, through this act, strongly requests the labor unions and contractors who will participate in the development of our oil infrastructure to actively recruit qualified said young Black men ages 18 to 37 for employment with their existing apprenticeship programs. His amendment goes on to say: These labor union apprenticeship programs will be conducted in conjunction with the National Electrical Contractors Association and the United Association of Journeymen and Apprentices of the Plumbing and Pipe Fitting Industry of the United States and Canada, under the auspices of the National Joint Apprenticeship and Training Committee, which allows apprentices to ``Earn While You Learn.'' As I said earlier, if we, as capitalists, people who support the free enterprise system--and this is clearly support of free markets--if we believe that a rising tide can lift all boats, let's lend a hand. Let's prove it. Let's prove it by giving more opportunities to populations that have disadvantages in our marketplace and prove to them that we can, in fact, lift all boats. I might add--and, Chairman Barton, if you want to explain some of this and comment on this--there is another important provision that was in H.R. 702 that is also part of this bill, and that gets to the use of support for the maritime security program. Would you be willing to share a couple minutes about that, because that is an important part of what we are doing.

Mr. CRAMER. I yield to the gentleman from Texas.

Mr. CRAMER. That is the perfect wrap-up, Mr. Shimkus. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. CRAMER. Making this vehicle another all-important appropriate vehicle for this amendment because the main piece of the omnibus package is, of course, increased spending for our defense. But you said cost effective. You are right, having these flagships available really saves the country the cost of about $52 billion worth of building the ships, so it is a tremendous tool.

Mr. CRAMER. It definitely is. Thank you for that, and thank you again for your leadership.

Mr. CRAMER. Mr. Speaker, I am going to wrap up, as well, with another history lesson. It is so interesting. I love history. I am not one who looks back a lot. I do like to look in the rearview mirror once in a while to make sure I am still going straight as I move forward. I think we as a Congress and as a country need to do the same. It was on this very day, December 16, 1773, that patriots at Boston Harbor expressed their displeasure with a foreign power's influence over what they felt was an essential commodity. Participants of the Boston Tea Party, many of whom were small-business owners, well versed in and practitioners of the teachings of Adam Smith and, yes, free market economics, never would have envisioned that one commodity should be arbitrarily discriminated against over another, especially by their own government. We have an opportunity with this commodity to make a difference. Mr. Speaker, may I inquire how much time is left? I see that Chairman Shimkus is here and might have a word or two for us.

Mr. CRAMER. I yield to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Shimkus), my good friend.

Mr. CRAMER

Mr. CRAMER. I thank the gentleman, my friend from Georgia, and others who have carried the ball on this issue for some time. A special thanks to our friend from Tennessee, Marsha Blackburn. I serve on the same committee with her, and I have learned a great deal about this and other things from Representative Blackburn. Mr. Speaker, I was reminded of a quote by the songwriting and song performing phenom Taylor Swift, who said: I think songwriting is the ultimate form of being able to make anything that happens in your life productive. Certainly, with whatever happens in your life, whether it is sad or glorious or joyful or heavy, you can write a song. It could be productive, but that doesn't mean it is profitable. If something is not profitable, the productivity of it will certainly wane over time, and we will be robbed of that very important piece of the music value chain: Where the product begins, which is in the heart and mind of the songwriter. One of the things I love so much about this job--and I am happy to admit it to my friends in the Chamber tonight--is all of the things that you are forced to learn that you never thought were important before you learned about them. It is kind of amazing. Here we are, 435 colleagues, representing, roughly, 700,000 people. In my case, I represent the entire State of North Dakota. We think about things like agriculture and coal and oil. We think about things like highway bills, but we don't necessarily think a lot about songwriting. We think a lot about markets. We think a lot about fairness. We think a lot about regulation. I was a regulator for nearly 10 years before becoming a Member of Congress. I regulated monopoly industries, and I was a rate regulator. When I was a rate regulator, setting the rates for electricity rates or natural gas, I had a lot of tools at my disposal, not the least of which was all of the evidence that the record could be filled with. In some cases, it was piles of evidence and lots of testimony. Everything was on the record. It is how you make good decisions. In the case where regulation was required and free markets weren't as free as they would be in other products, you tried to apply as a regulator the evidence to a circumstance that best reflected the market. Tonight, we are talking about something--and I appreciate Representative Collins' illustration of the government's thumb on the scale--where there has been a gross inequity, a gross injustice. It is where technology has certainly flourished, where innovation has flourished to the point at which opportunity to distribute and to enjoy music is unlike at any other time; but the songwriters have been left out of the innovation piece of it. They have been really biased against them. As I have studied this issue as it has been brought to my attention, I have looked at it, and I have thought, This just isn't fair. This just isn't fair. Frankly, the ultimate conclusion of this kind of antiquated regulatory policy would lead to a very important loss because people wouldn't be able to do this, not unless you think that Georgia and Tennessee are the only places there are songwriters. I was surprised to find out there were several hundred of them in my little State of North Dakota. It is amazing. One thing that all of us can agree on is that small business is the heart of our economy and that there is no smaller business than the single genius that writes music, right? That is the smallest of small businesses. We ought to get the government, to the degree we can, out of the way; but to the degree it requires regulation--and we understand it does require regulation as we are talking about copyright and as we are talking about broadcasting and as we are talking about things that are under the legitimate jurisdiction of the Federal Government's--we ought to at least be fair in how we do it, and we ought to be modern in how we carry it out. In addition to my friends, Representative Collins, Representative Blackburn, and others who have taught me so much about this important issue, I also want to thank a new friend who approached me at a concert that I attended just because I love him so much and love his music. I have loved it for decades. This is, I think, an important lesson of advocacy and an importance lesson of stick-to-itiveness. I had the opportunity to meet B.J. Thomas, who was a hero of mine while I was growing up. Do you know what he did with the time that we had together? He advocated not on his own behalf but on behalf of his friends, who provided the fuel for his success. He did so with a heavy heart based on the fact that his friends weren't treated as fairly and as equitably as he has been as a performer. It touched me deeply that this man, who had nothing, really, to gain by this advocacy, except, I suppose, the affection of his friends, cared enough to tell this lone Congressman from the little State of North Dakota about this really important issue. I am grateful he brought to it my attention. I am grateful for your leadership on it, and I am grateful to be here tonight to help shed some light on it and, hopefully, move the ball forward a little bit further.

Mr. CRAMER. I just have to say, since you brought it up, there is nothing that makes me much more emotional than a really good song; but the men and women who protect us in this Chamber make me as emotional as anything. I am grateful. It is a great story.

Mr. CRAMER

Mr. CRAMER. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that, when the House adjourns today, it adjourn to meet at 9 a.m. tomorrow.

Mr. CRAMER

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

Mr. CRAMER. Madam Chair, this amendment simply authorizes the voluntary--and I stress voluntary--vegetation management within 150 feet of the exterior boundary of the right-of-way near structures on U.S. Forest Service land. As a former energy regulator and a utility commissioner, I know there are many threats to power lines running across this country. Most of the time, this comes down to vegetation, as odd as it might seem, but especially in areas where there are a lot of trees and that are remote areas hard to get to. Off-right-of-way vegetation management on these lands are the responsibility of the United States Forest Service. But for any number of reasons, they aren't conducting this critical work to ensure the reliability of our electricity. Utility companies don't want to do the work off their right-of-way due to the lack of clarity in their legal liability or a strict liability standard. This amendment provides that legal certainty and holds utilities accountable for gross negligence or criminal misconduct. Lastly, Madam Chair, it is important to note that this amendment demonstrates that this is not--and I stress is not--a backdoor to logging and prevents the sale of the vegetation by the utility and clarifies it shall be the property of the United States. Madam Chair, I would also emphasize that the Edison Electric Institute and the American Public Power Association support this amendment.

Mr. CRAMER. I yield to the gentleman from Michigan.

Mr. CRAMER. Madam Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. CRAMER. Madam Chair, I just want to correct a couple of the statements made sincerely by the opposition to this. I want to be clear that the cost of this is borne not by the taxpayers, but by the utilities themselves. The reason that they are not able to do it now, of course, is because of a lack of clarity and the liability. So this simply clears that part of it up. Again, I want to get back to I was a regulator for nearly 10 years. Some people may remember not so many years ago a major rolling brownout that led to blackouts in the northeastern part of this country. All of that was caused by trees growing into transmission lines. It has a cascading effect. And, yes, if it is a large forest, those trees growing into transmission lines can also create forest fires. This is a very basic approach. Most of the arguments that the gentleman raised are to the underlying bill, not to this amendment. This amendment is very straightforward. I urge a ``yes'' vote. Madam Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. CRAMER

Mr. CRAMER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman for yielding the time and for his leadership. I might add that, prior to being in Congress, I was focused on the issue for nearly 10 years as a regulator of the energy industry in North Dakota. I served nearly 10 years on the North Dakota Public Service Commission, where I regulated not only the siting of coal plants, the reclamation of coal mines, but the cost of electricity to consumers. I have to address some of the comments made by the gentleman from Georgia. I am sure they were sincere. I am sure they were well- intentioned. But to stand here, Mr. Speaker, and lecture us that we are somehow motivated by hatred for the President of the United States is so beneath the dignity of this Chamber, and I am embarrassed for him. Let me tell you that Barack Obama has the right to his opinion, and he is entitled to have it be different than mine. He perfectly has the right to be wrong even, if he wants to be. But he doesn't have the right to break the law because he couldn't get a law changed when he had a Democratic House and a Democratic Senate. And that is what we are here to talk about, the violation of the law, as the chairman has pointed to earlier. I don't even want to deal with the merits of climate change or global warming. I want to deal with the solution. We have heard today that Republicans don't have a solution. Well, let me tell you about my little rectangular spot in the middle of the North American continent, North Dakota, best known now, of course, for producing a whole bunch of oil. But long before we produced oil, we produced coal, 30 million tons a year, as a matter of fact. Seventy-nine percent of our electricity is generated by coal. We generate coal-generated electricity for many States in our region. But we also are one of the seven States that meet all ambient air quality standards as prescribed by the EPA. We have a grade A, perfect, year after year after year for our air by the American Lung Association. The counties that have the greatest concentration of coal- fired power plants get an A grade. Our utilities have been investing hundreds of millions of dollars over the years in clean coal technologies and scrubbers and everything that we can do to make our environment cleaner. We live there. We love it. No bureaucrat in Washington, D.C., is going to love the air that we breathe in North Dakota more than those of us who live in North Dakota. We also enjoy, like other coal-producing States, some of the lowest- priced electricity in the country. I also would like to point out that, long before it was cool, we were siting wind farms. I sited over 1,000 megawatts of wind farms when I was on the Commission. Now there are nearly 2,000 megawatts of installed wind in North Dakota. We don't even have a mandate. We don't need to be lectured to by people who don't know a thing about where we live, a thing about our economy. We will do the right thing because it is the right thing. We will do the right thing because it is good for our families. And, by the way, the rule that we are disapproving, the two rules we are disapproving, disproportionately hurt the poor and the middle income. Do you think it is the poor people that can afford to buy an Energy Star refrigerator at the end of the month? Is it the poor people that can afford to wrap their house in new insulation? Of course not. We need to pass these resolutions and reject these rules.

Mr. CRAMER

Mr. CRAMER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding. Mr. Speaker, self-reliance and self-governance need to be more than liberal buzzwords if we are going to make a difference, if they are going to have any meaning at all. And I find some of the comments of the opposition to be quite rich in contradiction. Unfortunately, they are similar to the comments that President Obama had this morning when he announced his opposition to this legislation, stating that he could not support the bill unless tribal governments adopted his view. In other words, they have to be identical to his views in order to have sovereignty. Well, this isn't sovereignty at all. The President often likes to say that he honors and respects tribal sovereignty. In fact, I heard him say that he respects it as much as any President, right while standing in the powwow grounds in Cannon Ball, North Dakota, last summer. Yet when presented with this opportunity--and it is not the only opportunity we presented, by the way--the Native American Energy Act and gas-gathering pipeline bills have done the same thing, trying to give sovereignty where sovereignty is to be given. And, actually, it is not given to them; it is held by them. So I call on Congress and President Obama to respect the rights of tribes and pass this legislation into law.

Mr. CRAMER

Mr. CRAMER. Mr. Chairman, I thank the chairman. I have often said I don't know why it takes 36 Texans to do one person's job. I have to tell you, I was prepared to give a great speech and then I listened to my friend from Georgia and, quite honestly, I feel inadequate to the task. Because you stated it so eloquently and so beautifully, and I am committed to exactly what you talked about. So maybe what I will try to do instead in my remaining seconds is remind us of the context that it was 72 years ago this week that the Yom Kippur War broke out that led to U.S. aid to Israel, which led to a 5 percent reduction out of OPEC of oil, which led to the very issue we are talking about today, that this historical context in a national security context is not irrelevant. Let's not, I would say, let history repeat itself, but let's use the peaceful tools of energy development while creating jobs in America replace the weapons of war in Europe and in the Middle East. Let's use our influence for good by selling this American-made product that is produced by American workers, and let's do it in a bipartisan fashion today.

Mr. CRAMER

Mr. CRAMER. Mr. Speaker, I don't want to disrespect in any way the minority's opportunity that they have, but I did come here to talk about the energy bills. I chose to go last on this side because I would like to address some of the thoughtful concerns that were raised by Mr. Hastings from Florida. I call them concerns because I didn't hear real objections. I think they are legitimate concerns that some people have had, and they deserve discussion. We are talking about the rule here. He made a suggestion that somehow this lifting of the oil export ban bill, H.R. 702, takes the President's prerogative away to deal with a situation at all costs or in every situation. The reality is it does reserve a right for the President to reinstate the ban in some sort of an emergency. I want to make sure that that is clarified. I also want to clarify that he mentioned we are not in regular order, and perhaps he is referring to the Native American Energy Act. I know we have had a couple of hearings since I have been in Congress on that, perhaps not this Congress. I don't know. I am not on that committee. I can tell you that the Energy and Commerce Committee has had a hearing on H.R. 702, and two other committees have had hearings on similar bills: the Agriculture Committee and the Foreign Affairs Committee. So this has been a thoroughly vetted issue. In fact, with the admonition of Speaker Boehner, we really did take a long time with this issue to help educate one another, those of us from energy States. So I do think we have had a thorough debate on the topic, and I think it is time to have this discussion. Coming from North Dakota, I just want to tell you that I come from a State that, prior to the energy revolution, or the Bakken revolution, the shale revolution, we were experiencing outmigration and low personal per capita income. Today, we have the second highest personal per capita income in the country. We can't accept people fast enough to deal with the jobs that are available. We are at a bit of a standstill right now because we are overproducing light sweet crude in this country, which is the type of crude that the global markets are demanding, but our domestic markets, because of our refining capacity, are not. This is the time to lift this ban, and this is the body to do it. I hope we can get to it this afternoon.

Mr. CRAMER

Mr. CRAMER. Mr. Chairman, your leadership on this has been great. As I think about what Mr. Hill from Arkansas was saying in expressing his appreciation for regular order and the committee process, this really is probably one of the greatest examples since I have been in Congress of a piece of legislation and a concept that has gone through the process the way it is supposed to go through the process. Because not only did the Energy and Commerce Committee have hearings on H.R. 702, which we are going to vote on tomorrow which lifts the ban, I know you had a bill that similarly lifts the ban. You had hearings in the Agriculture Committee, which I think, by the way, the hearing you had was probably the best hearing on the entire topic. You honed in on that impact on the consumer and the input costs for producing another important product: food. And we are pretty good in the United States in places like Texas and North Dakota and lots of places in between at growing food--enough food to feed not just Americans, but a hungry world, and enhance our trade balance and enhance our economy in using the peaceful tool of food rather than weapons of war. I think, similarly, the shale revolution presents the same opportunity that food does, and that is to use the peaceful tools of energy development in place of or to enhance weapons of war. One doesn't need to be too creative to see that in the world today there is some chaos. When you have Vladimir Putin pushing further into Eastern Europe, when you have him now bombing in Syria, when you have him selling arms to Iran, you have Iran being able to get arms and now being able to sell their oil in the global marketplace, to have this stabilizing impact of U.S. production into the global marketplace, I think it can only benefit everybody. And that is true of not just stabilizing price, as we see the Brent global price much higher than the domestic WTI price. On average, over the last 5 years, that spread has been $11--a spread that is not enjoyed by consumers, but certainly harms economic opportunity and job opportunity in the United States. Your hearing really honed in on that cost to consumers and the benefit to consumers. Also, the hearing in the Foreign Affairs Committee as well. So we have had three committees of jurisdiction talking about this issue and this bill coming to the floor tomorrow, going through the Rules Committee, and the Rules Committee allowing a number of amendments to be debated and voted on tomorrow. Many amendments were introduced by Democratic Members as well as Republican Members. It has just been a rich experience. There are a number of issues related to it. Coming from North Dakota, I can tell you firsthand that not that many years ago I was the economic development and finance director in the State of North Dakota at a time when we were just stabilizing out- migration. But part of the reason we were stabilizing it was because we lost so many of our young people. Our small towns were shrinking. While we were diversifying our economy a little bit here and there, the shale revolution that came along with the technology that combined fracking with horizontal drilling dramatically changed our State. Probably my favorite anecdote of the whole situation--while there are many--is the fact that the little town of Killdeer hadn't had a football team for 20 years because they couldn't field enough young men, and now they have a football team. And that is just illustrative of what has happened in many of our small towns; because in the supply chain in the oil and gas industry, the jobs are not only numerous, they are really good. They pay, on average, 25 percent higher than the national average. So it really is a grand opportunity that is somewhat being lost-- certainly, its potential is being lost--because we are now sort of hemmed in with light sweet crude being produced more than we can use in our refineries in the United States, especially the light sweet crude which our refineries are not set up to take, for the most part, but refineries outside the United States are set up to take, for the most part. In fact, 92 percent of the oil refined outside of the United States is light sweet crude. Only about 25, 30 percent of the refining capacity in the United States is set up to take light sweet crude. So that distinction is important to understand when you see that we are now overproducing for the refinery capacity we have in our country. I want to address, Mr. Speaker, some comments made earlier this week by Secretary of Energy Ernie Moniz, a man I have great respect for-- clearly, an intellect. He made some comments in the Senate Commerce Committee that, while technically accurate, I suppose were certainly incomplete. He had said that now is not the time to lift the oil export ban; and he said that according to the EIA, somehow we weren't really hemmed in because we were still importing some oil. It ignores so many things, not the least of which is that distinction between light sweet and heavy sour that I talked about just moments ago; the fact that our refineries, for the most part, in the United States are set up for the heavy sour that we aren't producing an excess of--and, by the way, about 30 percent of which are owned by vertically integrated companies outside of the United States who have more of an interest in buying their oil than ours. But the world is really where the opportunity exists. The other thing that he ignores in his statement saying that we are not yet hemmed in, he ignores just the natural order of things, that global markets, global demand being accessible to domestic producers, U.S. producers, will grow the production. You can't expect people to produce more of something than they can sell or than can be used in their limited market. If we have access to the global demand, of course we are going to produce more--that is the whole point--creating more jobs, more entrepreneurial opportunities. The other thing that bothers me about what Secretary Moniz said about now not being the time is that it ignores so many things. It ignores the fact that we still have a very low workforce participation rate in this country. We need more jobs. We have many people that are either underemployed, unemployed, no longer looking for work, and these are good, high-paying jobs up and down the supply chain. And lest we forget, they are not just jobs in the oil patch. It is not just in west Texas; it is not just in Houston; it is not just in North Dakota or Oklahoma or New Mexico. These jobs are in every State in the country. In fact, according to the Energy Equipment and Infrastructure Alliance, which did a vast study on this, the third leading recipient of new jobs, if this export ban is lifted, is the State of Illinois. And you might wonder, well, why is it? Well, because Illinois has a lot of manufacturing, especially a lot of large equipment manufacturing. Those manufacturing jobs are great for families. They are great for the economy. They are great for startup business opportunities. So it is every State in the country that benefits. Secretary Moniz certainly dismisses that, or at least ignores it, in his statements. I want to wrap up with this point. I always like to say that America's national security and America's economic security are tied directly to America's energy security. I touched on it earlier, but there has never been a time certainly in my public service when the world was in a more fragile state, and certainly chaos is reigning. I talked about Vladimir Putin's push into Eastern Europe, his bombing of Syria, his alliance with Iran. Iran, by the way, is another major producer of oil, who, as per the Iran nuclear deal, now gets to sell their oil onto the global marketplace. But our President thinks it is a better idea for them than he does for United States producers. He ignores the opportunity that, again, the peaceful development of oil and gas and the production of it and then the marketing of it in the global marketplace, the opportunity that has to spread influence and create peace in places that desperately need it, especially for our allies. It is interesting. I doubt that the folks that scheduled the floor time for tomorrow's bill had this in mind, because this was more of a process of regular order than it was the calendar; but we are, right now, in the middle of the 42-year recognition of the Yom Kippur War. The Yom Kippur War was what sort of began, really started, the energy crisis that led to the 1973 embargoes. We are reliving, in many respects, some of the geopolitical aspects of that time and that situation. Our friends in Israel are not sure whether we are with them or not as a country, whether we are going to be with them on big issues, dependent on Russian oil largely, a Russia that is playing bad in the neighborhood, and uncertainty as to who is going to fill the leadership vacuum in places like Syria, a very important player, 42, 43 years ago. There is a lot adding up to this being a very, very important vote tomorrow on lifting the export ban on H.R. 702. There are things adding up that we didn't even contemplate at the time that the bill was introduced. But it is a grand opportunity to secure America's economy, secure America's national security while at the same time spreading our influence of freedom and free enterprise around the world. So I am looking forward to, hopefully, a lot of bipartisan votes tomorrow, a big vote, so that we can send that over to the United States Senate, who I know has a different standard than we have. But, hopefully, we can show them the way. I thank the gentleman for yielding so much time to me.

Mr. CRAMER

Mr. CRAMER. Madam Speaker, North Dakotans affirm life every day through strong, stable family structures and a culture that values life and that, frankly, values ending the circumstances that cause a woman to believe that her best option is an abortion. We have over 70,000 square miles and thousands of women who need healthcare services, but we don't have a Planned Parenthood clinic because North Dakota women somehow don't meet its business model. There are, however, compassionate providers offering more comprehensive services across my State. This map shows the localities of 71 federally qualified health centers that provide quality care to underserved and low-income women in rural and urban communities throughout my State. The patients who go through the doors of these clinics are treated as valued community members, not as a fee for service and certainly not as a $45 specimen. This Congress and its relevant committees must complete a thorough investigation of the disturbing accusations evidenced--yes, evidenced-- in the Planned Parenthood videos that we all have seen before another taxpayer dollar goes to this controversial organization. These funds can be better used to provide legitimate health services for women in places like North Dakota.

Mr. CRAMER

Mr. CRAMER. Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the chairman's clarifying the statements just made from the other side. I think we all have the same goal, but the lack of certainty, when you put in rule that for today we are not going to determine it hazardous but we leave the thing open- ended just in case we change our mind, that is uncertainty. That is what we are talking about. I come from a State, North Dakota, where, for nearly 10 years, I was a coal regulator. I regulated coal mining, among other things, including utilities, thank you very much. I appreciate the fact that we were able to mine our coal, burn it at the mine mouth, and generate some of the lowest cost electricity in the country largely because we are able to use the coal ash as a beneficial use for lots of things including, by the way, putting in the foundations of wind turbines. We didn't need the Federal Government. We have been doing this since the 1970s. We didn't need the EPA's overreach to teach us how to do it. The regulation of coal ash disposal has been debated for decades--for decades. Fortunately, for those of us in North Dakota, we have done pretty well with it. We have had modern facilities and modern standards. Our State regulators at the health department, along with the Public Service Commission, working with industry--and I stress ``working with industry''--to develop these standards and practices that have worked for all these decades really don't need further imposition of the Federal Government, and certainly not the EPA. All of our regulations are tailored specifically to our coal types, specifically to the coal ash, specifically to our geology; and, frankly, this legislative approach may not be perfect, but it is better than the EPA's proposal, Mr. Chairman, which leaves way too many opportunities for extreme environmentalists to meddle, to use the courts to come in place throughout the years and impose much more extreme regulations. I again thank the chairman for his leadership, and I thank the gentleman for introducing the bill.

Mr. CRAMER

Mr. CRAMER. Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that my name be removed as cosponsor of H.R. 2722.

Mr. CRAMER

Mr. CRAMER. I thank the chairman for yielding and for your leadership on this issue. Let me pick up where the gentleman left off relating to the comments made by the opposition to climate change's role in extreme weather conditions. Mr. Chairman, a couple of years ago, there was a weather condition that many people out here refer to as the polar vortex; in North Dakota, we call that winter, but I think what a lot of people don't know is that, during that cold snap, they don't know how very susceptible and fragile our system of transmitting and distributing electricity was, largely because we don't have the base load generation that we once had largely because of this attack on base load fuels like coal, and that is really what we are talking about. Mr. Chairman, I spent 10 years prior to coming to Congress as one of those energy regulators, one of those people in the State agency the Governor would consult as per this law, the Governor would consult before determining whether they should opt out of the clean power plan. It was my responsibility to make sure North Dakotans had reliable electricity, that a grid system and a distribution system was reliable and could deliver on a regular basis, as needed, electricity and that the rates remained as they are still today in North Dakota, among the very lowest in this country. I also had regulation over the coal industry. I am also very proud of the fact that, while North Dakota is a major coal-producing State that generates over 4,000 megawatts of electricity at the mine mouth and distributes it throughout a robust transmission and distribution system that generates lots of low-cost electricity, it also creates lots and lots of good-paying, important jobs. The chairman also in response referenced the importance that Republicans are placing on other things besides climate change, things like job creation. Well, the clean power plan is a jobs killer, and it makes us less competitive in the global marketplace. It is really, in many respects, a unilateral disarmament of the American economy at a time when the only really great thing going on in the American economy is energy development. A rule like the clean power plan goes exactly against the one robust and positive in the American economy, and that is energy development. Let's get back to the issue of the constitutionality, the judicial question. Our bill simply provides an opportunity for a judicial review, something that the President and the EPA should have done before doing this rule, finishing this rule, and putting this rule out. I find, frankly, the Ratepayer Protection Act to be a rather modest response to the overreach and the zeal of the EPA and this administration. Mr. Chairman, I thank the chairman again for his leadership on this important issue.

Mr. CRAMER

Mr. CRAMER. Madam Speaker, big things are happening in the small cow town of Medora, North Dakota. The famed Medora Musical, also known as the Greatest Show in the West, is celebrating 50 years of entertaining and inspiring visitors while paying tribute to American values like family, patriotism, and faith in God, and, of course, the legacies of Theodore Roosevelt and Harold Schafer. Medora serves as the gateway to Theodore Roosevelt National Park, named for the city slicker turned cowboy who ranched the Badlands of Dakota Territory before going back East, refreshed and restored, to accomplish big things. Madam Speaker, tonight, I am thankful that God gave us the Badlands and Theodore Roosevelt and that he gave a dream to Harold Schafer and that, today, the Theodore Roosevelt Medora Foundation keeps that dream alive in beautiful Medora, North Dakota.