Lloyd Doggett

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 4 minutes. Mr. Speaker, this bill authorizes Donald Trump to recklessly impose a death penalty on any nonprofit in America that happens to be on his enemies list. With this bill, he can destroy the very life of civil society in this country, one group after another. Even though the group involved that he targets as a ``terrorist-supporting'' group has not violated a single law, even though the group or the public have not been presented with a shred of evidence for doing this, without offering any specific explanation or reason as to why the life is being taken out of this civil society group, and without providing a day in court, a hearing, and without any meaningful right of appeal, no matter how capricious, no matter how unjustified Trump's action may be. H.R. 9495 is a repackaged version of legislation that was originally filed months ago, with good intentions, including that of some of my Democratic colleagues. With Trump's election, the conditions have changed. The dangers of granting additional power to him are far outweighed by any benefits from this bill. This is the same Trump who vowed to be ``dictator on day one'' and has declared the greatest danger our country faces today is ``the enemy within.'' This bill is now opposed by a growing number of civil society groups, over 120 groups--the ACLU, the Brennan Center for Justice, the NAACP, Planned Parenthood, the Center for American Progress, the American Federation of Teachers--a list that goes on and on--including the Freedom of the Press Foundation. This legislation is done in the name of stopping financial support for terrorism. All of us support stopping terrorism. Like everyone here, I have done that, and I have previously voted for this very language not once but twice, though the last time it came before our committee, I voiced the very same concerns about the lack of due process that I voice today. Since none of the deficiencies of this bill have been corrected and no amendment is offered today, we must reject it. If he is on a march to make America Fascist, we do not need to supply Donald Trump with any additional weapons to accomplish his ill purpose. Our freedoms will not be destroyed in one great blow. No, it will be a thousand cuts over the term of this administration, undermining our liberties one after another. To those who say that this bill only applies to groups that are supporting terrorism, consider how very expansive that term can be, both at home and abroad. The foreign tyrants who Donald Trump so much admires have imprisoned journalists, academics, and rights activists by claiming that they are supporters of terrorism. State and Federal elected officials in this country have called for terrorism investigations or prosecution of major news outlets. Trump himself has criticized and labeled any racist activist as terrorist. Some have mischaracterized environmental groups as ecoterrorists. Under this bill, Trump's list of targets would only be limited by his imagination. There are not any guardrails in the bill. For example, if Trump claimed that Democrats, myself included, who didn't clap enough for him in this Chamber when he gave his first State of the Union were traitors, that we were treasonous, we could be targeted. He could target organizations that assist refugees for harboring terrorists. Planned Parenthood or a hospital could be targeted for the alleged terror of abortion. An environmental group could be mislabeled as an ecoterrorist. A private university that permits too many anti-Trump demonstrations could be targeted. A disability rights group that is objecting to Trump's interference with the Affordable Care Act could be targeted.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, this bill wrongfully seeks to codify Trump's one-state solution. Strangely, Benjamin Netanyahu and Hamas completely agree on one subject, they want from the river to the sea. The only question is: Who gets to control and subjugates the other one? I believe that subjugation is not security. Rather, it is a time bomb that is just getting ready to explode causing more grief and misery to all, as we are seeing now with the repeated rocket firing into Israel, the ongoing destruction of Gaza, and the escalating settler violence in the West Bank. I strongly believe in Israel as a democratic Jewish state. The Hamas attackers were not martyrs, they were murderers and rapists. They can never be a partner for peace, but neither can Netanyahu's cohorts, Ben- Gvir and Smotrich. They cannot be partners for peace. They have refused to be partners for peace, nor do they prioritize the release of the hostages. They continue to endanger Israeli security. Smotrich, a self-described Fascist, wrongly insists that a hostage deal would be surrender. He is responsible for the largest seizure of land in the West Bank since the 1993 Oslo Accords. His myopic vision for Israel is to annex everything and create a greater Israel that incorporates all the so-called Palestinians. In a June speech, he said: ``[We] created a separate civilian system'' . . . ``It will be easier to swallow in the international and legal context.'' Ben-Gvir told Israeli settlers: ``We are behind you. Run for the hilltops, settle them.'' He promotes an exclusive Israeli control of the land from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea. The same message that those people protesting Israel are advocating, he is also advocating. He has distributed thousands of assault weapons to Israeli settlements to drive Palestinians from the West Bank. When dozens of armed Israeli settlers stormed one West Bank village, firing bullets and setting homes on fire, they said that they were ``Ben-Gvir's gang here to kill the Arabs.'' Smotrich and Ben-Gvir should be sanctioned for their incitement of violence. It has led to 1,000 incidents of settlers driving over 1,300 Palestinians from their homes since October 7, with 600 Palestinians killed. Unfortunately, at the same time that Gaza is being rendered uninhabitable, Netanyahu's refusal to stop settler violence in the West Bank and the expansion of these West Bank settlements are all designed to prevent a Palestinian state from ever coming into being in a viable way. Like this very bill, their goal is to block creation of any Palestinian state and to refer to it as Judea and Samaria, rather than many of us, who consider ourselves to be strongly for Israel, calling it the occupied territories because it has been occupied since the 1967 war. The only hope for lasting peace and security is for a Jewish state and a Palestinian state to be side by side and find security guarantees for each. That will be a long, difficult, and challenging process. We have been unable to accomplish it for decades, but it is the only process that we can undertake that will truly lead to the survival and the viability of Israel, so it is not a matter of a temporary peace and another threat to innocent people on either side of the line. Efforts to conflate the occupied territories with Israel defeat any real hope of a lasting solution. We should reject the approach that Trump, Ben-Gvir, Smotrich, Netanyahu, and Hamas all share, of a river to the sea, a one-state approach, because that is only a recipe for an endless war and untold suffering.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Madam Speaker, Republicans are true masters, masters at naming bills that do exactly the opposite of what they say they do. They sure have the wrong name on this bill. They call it: End Chinese Domination Act. It ought to be called the ``guarantee act.'' It guarantees Chinese domination, because they are undermining America's ability to compete with the Chinese who have dominated this market. After listening to their fossilized friends, about the only progress that House Republicans have made is that they move from becoming total climate deniers to just becoming climate obstructionists. They are just here in case someone else decides to do something about the climate, and the climate crisis is truly engulfing our world. This is the latest Republican bill where America going a little greener just seems to make them a little redder because a transition is needed here in the United States from an industry we did not have fully developed. These inflexible, micromanaging requirements will have the opposite effect they say they will intend. It will take more than tough talk to stand up to Chinese domination. It takes careful American manufacturing and developing it. We don't want to cede the world to China and its domination, but all they offer is a white flag of surrender to the Chinese, jeopardizing domestic jobs and weakening American industry, ensuring that it is China that will profit at our expense. While Democrats have championed cleaner vehicles, Republicans have attempted to throw us into their favorite gear, reverse. They have tried to reverse just about everything that we have done to respond to the climate crisis. We know the transportation sector is so very important because it represents about 28 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions. We have taken the steps to promote clean vehicles that don't generate these emissions with last Congress' historic climate legislation. From this summer's suffocating heat, the wildfires, the extreme storms, the intense weather, the growing tropical diseases in our area, we know the climate crisis is already here. We don't have to sizzle further to do something about it, and our clean vehicle credits have helped consumers absorb the cost, beginning the transition to a greener and renewable future. It has helped jump-start our EV industry, leading to more than $175 billion in new investments in building electric vehicles and creating over 100,000 jobs while decreasing emissions. Our investments are designed to make our domestic industry and our domestic workers competitive in the world. Our tax incentives for going green are used to boost American workers and build more factories, as is happening right here in the USA. This bill that is being offered today would impose impossible tracking requirements on battery components and critical minerals. This simply is not possible, and it is not necessary. Tracking every screw is truly nuts. We have reasonable transition rules already in place to enable us to make it in America. That is what we need to do. If Republicans undo these rules, they will not only jeopardize American manufacturing jobs, they will only strengthen China.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, I offer a privileged resolution and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, I invite my Texas colleagues, particularly, and others who may want to come up to honor our colleague, Sheila Jackson Lee. Mr. Speaker, I rise to honor our colleague, Sheila Jackson Lee. It is strange to be here and not see her at a microphone because we know her as the outspoken and the oft-spoken colleague in this House. When I was elected back in 1994, Sheila and I were part of a very small Democrat class of 13. Even then, certainly, and even last year or even a couple of months ago, I never thought that I would be memorializing her after an illness that took her far too swiftly. She is an icon in Houston and in Texas politics. She always showed up for her constituents, just as she always showed up here. She chose to spend some of her final days helping those who were trying to recover from Hurricane Beryl, personally passing out food and water and connecting families to necessary assistance. Sheila is known all over Houston for being a fighter for her community. Here in Washington, she was certainly a fierce advocate for many causes, but particularly racial justice and equality. She was responsible for our Nation now recognizing in the bipartisan effort she made with Senator Cornyn Juneteenth as a Federal holiday to recognize the horrors of slavery and our recovering from them. She fought relentlessly to end the scourge of community violence in her work on the Violence Against Women Act, the Sentencing Reform Act, the Kimberly Vaughan Firearms Safe Storage Act. Of course, she treasured her children, Erica and Jason, and her grandchildren, Ellison and Roy, as well as her dedicated staff members here in Washington and in Houston. She graduated with honors in the first Yale University class to include women. She was a trailblazer there, as she was here, and a mentor to many. While a demanding boss, she had a great sense of humor, a side many do not remember. She seemed to be everywhere and involved in just about everything here, providing inspiration to many with her determined advocacy. The stories from her former staff members who knew her best attest that she played a major role in their professional development and provided a launching pad for their careers. With the bipartisan support of so many here, I ask that all join our delegation in a moment of silence for our respected colleague, Sheila Jackson Lee. Let's be inspired by her legacy to meet the challenges that we face.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Chair, I thank the gentleman, and I know he shares my concern about this. I am eager to work with him on it. I appreciate his comments and will be delighted to work with him. Sometimes this offer to work ends and begins at once. So long as this is not going to turn into mush in the conference committee or be totally dropped, I am ready to work with the gentleman and cooperate. I appreciate it. We so often hear about waste, fraud, and abuse as being able to finance essentially the whole government. I know there are many contractors that are doing their job. They are vital to our security. I hope we can work together and find a way to get at the core of this problem and save taxpayers money at the same time we keep our military second to none.

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 3 minutes. This is a bipartisan amendment that I offer together with the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Norman). We may appear as the odd couple politically, but we share a common interest in trying to ensure that taxpayers get their money's worth, and that is true on military contracts as with every other aspect of government. When it comes to those contracts, we are concerned that that is not happening on too many of them. We don't ask you to just take our word for it, but we have turned to a fellow named Shay Assad, sometimes referred to as the most disliked person in the Pentagon. He had four decades of experience in negotiating government contracts, served as the top director for procurement for both George W. Bush and Barack Obama. He was central to an illuminating ``60 Minutes'' report last year about price gouging, which he described as unconscionable and widespread. He has returned to the Pentagon now as the director of procurement at the Air Force. I know that Chairman Rogers and Mr. Smith have been concerned about this problem. Their committee has given it some attention, but I think we can supplement their efforts. Military contractors deserve to get a fair profit, but American taxpayers deserve to be treated fairly also. We have seen a consolidation in the defense industry where 50 firms have been reduced to about 5 primary contractors. This is a very modest amendment. It requires essentially a one-time type of audit by a review panel that will conduct oversight on the reasonableness of prices on sole-sourced munitions and weapons systems, a 1-year investigation to determine whether the Department has achieved fair prices in surveyed contracts and make recommendations made to the Armed Services Committee and the Pentagon to be sure that taxpayers are getting the best bang for their buck. Just as one example that was cited, we have had inflation. All of us are concerned about it, but the cost of a Stinger missile of the type we have been shipping to Ukraine rose from $25,000 in 1991 to $400,000 to replace it. That is a little more than the increase in inflation and the improvements that may have occurred to the missile. The Patriot, the PAC-3 missile, is very important in defense. Hundreds of millions of dollars were saved after a review, and it was found that the contractor was earning a 40 percent profit. Our amendment would not change the procurement process or add new requirements of contractors. It would simply look at what has occurred in the past and determine if there is a way to improve it. It has the support of bipartisan groups across the ideological spectrum, including the R Street Institute, the Project on Government Oversight, the Council for Citizens Against Government Waste, Public Citizen, and American Economic Liberties Project. There have been hundreds of amendments offered to the bill that we are considering. This is the only bipartisan amendment made in order for addressing reasonable prices. Mr. Chair, I urge my colleagues to support this modest step forward. It is a very modest step, but I think it can be helpful to the committee and to all of us in ensuring that we get our money's worth. Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, horrified by seeing a baby's arm blown off, the President successfully demanded the Israeli Prime Minister to halt the bombing. President Ronald Reagan also halted deliveries of weapons, but today's Republicans don't want America to lead; they would defer the decisions about the best course for America to Netanyahu and Ben-Gvir. They would place us on a disastrous path of isolation and greater Mideast instability. They attack President Biden now for halting delivery of 2,000-pound dumb bombs that are used in ways he rightly described as ``indiscriminate bombing'' that pulverizes large areas and kills and mutilates thousands of innocent women and children. Leveling Gaza, starving, and killing a multitude offers Israel no genuine victory over Hamas, no end to the cycle of violence.

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, Hamas can never be a genuine partner for peace, but Netanyahu, so willing to sacrifice the hostages and protect himself, is also obstructing peace. Limiting the flow of bombs is a constructive step forward toward assuring long-term security for the families of America, Israel, and Palestine.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, those who committed atrocities against Israelis on October 7 were not martyrs. They were murderers and rapists. But neither were those murderers children, and the children of Gaza have paid an incredible cost for Netanyahu's massive assault. His policies have shown conscious indifference to children, journalists, humanitarian aid workers, and civilians in general. I believe strongly in Israel's right to self-defense, but that does not require dropping hundreds of 2000-pound nonprecision ``dumb'' bombs in densely populated areas, nor does it require a medieval-type siege denying water, food, and medicine, using famine as a weapon of war, nor does it require killing, not only World Central Kitchen aid workers, but so many others. This rule gives us a proper opportunity to finally, belatedly, vote to help desperate Ukraine from Putin's war crimes and offensive without voting to support Netanyahu, but the rule, I believe, improperly rejected amendments that would have permitted a vote in support of Israel's right to self-defense without embracing Netanyahu's wrongful policies, which are killing the innocent, sacrificing the hostages, and endangering Israel's long-term security. Sending more offensive weapons to Netanyahu while begging him not to use them simply does not protect Rafah and others from an assault. I would vote to defend Israel but do not want to be complicit in providing weapons for an assault on Rafah that will cause thousands of deaths and likely lead to a wider and tragic war.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, this corporate tax windfall bill, thinly disguised as help for children, offers even more tax advantages to corporations that are paying today a mere 7.8 percent tax rate. A working mother of two earning the average wage pays a Federal effective rate of 20 percent. Even The Wall Street Journal called one provision in this bill a retroactive sop. It is minimal help for children and maximum benefits for those who are failing to pay their fair share. For every $1 that goes to children under this bill, $5 goes to corporations. Republicans are enabled to lock in $600 billion in extended Trump tax breaks while millions of children are left in preventable poverty and are denied a full tax credit. While bipartisan, this bill is no more equitable than our broken bipartisan tax code overflowing with loopholes and special advantages for the well-connected. This deal only continues slanting our tax system against working families. Reject the unjustified corporate ransom and lock in genuine relief for children.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, I missed a vote on Thursday, November 2, 2023. Had I been present, I would have voted NAY on Roll Call No. 572.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, this bill is yet another step in the Republican crusade to impose a national abortion ban to treat women across America the way Texans have been abused already. And this drastic, harmful strategy is about so much more than abortion healthcare. It is about the right to life for expectant mothers. It is about the right of a mother to be physically able to deliver a future baby. What happened to Texan Kate Cox is so very instructive. A mother herself, she was advised that having another child could not be possible if she was forced to deliver a fetus that could not live, yet Republicans insisted that she do just that. Under the Texas vigilante law, medical professionals--indeed, anyone who provides advice about an abortion, even for a child who is the victim of rape or incest--there are immediate penalties for them. As they seek to cut support for Women, Infants, and Children funding, House Republicans want to divert tax money to these propaganda centers, usually posing as a health center but lacking any medical professional staff--public funds to centers designed to fearmonger and intimidate vulnerable women. While Republicans demand protection of life from the moment of conception, they show so little interest in life after delivery. Women deserve healthcare protection free from coercion. For every American whose freedom is threatened by Republican interference, both patients and their doctors, I strongly oppose this bill.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, this transparency bill lacks transparency on two of the major problems that are impacting soaring healthcare costs. The only reason to reject transparency for, first, private equity and, second, Medicare Advantage is that they have got more to hide and apparently more lobbying power. A growing private equity takeover of healthcare has already undermined care in nursing homes and now threatens hospitals and medical specialty practices across the United States with higher prices, higher cost to taxpayers, and less quality. A Senate committee has just launched a major investigation into the impact of private equity on hospital costs and lower quality care. Having failed to save taxpayers a dime that was promised--of the many millions that was promised--Medicare Advantage costs $1,500 per person each year over the cost of traditional Medicare. That is billions in wasted taxpayer dollars. The best way to fund much-needed services at community health centers and to expand and improve and strengthen Medicare with services such as dental, hearing, and vision is to take it right out of Medicare Advantage. This bill, I believe, should be rejected until these issues are addressed by permitting the very amendments that we offered in the House Ways and Means Committee that rejected them, as usual, to address private equity and Medicare Advantage. Mr. Speaker, with all respect to the bipartisan efforts and hard work in the Energy and Commerce Committee, I believe there is a better way to finance needs, and a very important need, to address the issues of transparency on Medicare Advantage and private equity. Therefore, I oppose the bill.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, I will vote ``present'' for H. Res. 894, not for a lack of commitment to condemn antisemitism and the Hamas atrocities as well as the outrageous examples of violent antisemitism referenced in the Resolution, but because of some of the language tucked into this measure and some that is omitted. While Anti-Zionism can be a cover for antisemitism, not all actions that are anti-Zionist are antisemitic. This resolution states ``clearly and firmly'' that ``anti-Zionism is antisemitism''--such a blanket statement is wrong. It fails to reflect the complexities of the Jewish people or the definition of Zionism and anti-Zionism itself. Undeniably, some in the Jewish community do not support the Zionist movement. Although I personally believe in Israel as an independent Jewish state, I have often criticized the Netanyahu government. Surely it would only devalue the meaning of antisemitism to misapply it to the many--Jewish and non-Jewish--who strongly disagree with that government. Much is omitted from this Resolution. Mr. Netanyahu's ultra-right wing government and the Israeli settlers, who have terrorized Palestinians in the West Bank, share a common view with some Palestinians--all want only one country; they differ only on who gets to expel the other. I believe and have long advocated for a future with two states, living in peace and security--one is Israeli and another Palestinian. Additionally, after the murder of a six-year-old child because he was a Muslim and the shooting of three Palestinians, apparently because they were Palestinian, and numerous examples of hate directed against Muslims, this Resolution fails to acknowledge that Islamophobia is just as wrong as antisemitism or Asian hate or other expressions of racism. Indeed, all these forms of bigotry have historically arisen from ultra- right wing white nationalists like those who marched in Charlottesville shouting ``Jews will not replace us.'' This resolution should have condemned all forms of hate speech. None of us are truly safe unless all of us are safe. Finally, the timing of this Resolution is troubling. It occurs on a day when the United Nations has described conditions in Gaza as ``apocalyptic.'' Along with demanding accountability from Hamas for its terrorism, we should be focused on how to stop the killing of innocents and secure the release of all remaining hostages. Because I do not want my views on Hamas, antisemitism or other hate to be misconstrued and because no amendments to correct this defective resolution are permitted, I will vote ``present.''

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, this bill is soft on war crimes. The massacres in Mariupol, Bucha, and the kidnapping of Ukrainian children, similar to what happened in Israel, are all crimes against humanity. Like the Holocaust, there is no ``other side'' justifying these crimes. All of these criminals must be held accountable. Yet, because of Trump affection for Putin and his little helpers here in Congress, this bill offers absolutely nothing to help fight Russian terrorists and nothing to stop Hamas terrorists, unless well-connected Republican tax cheats get help first. Nor does defeating Hamas require encouraging collective punishment of the children of Gaza by denying them food, medicine, and water. Immediate Senate correction of the many failings in this bill can produce a balanced bill that I and many others will join in supporting. A humanitarian pause now, stopping disproportionate responses, represents no surrender to Hamas--rather, it offers the chance to secure the hostages, avoid a wider war, and achieve long-term security.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, it has been 1 year since the death of a young woman, Mahsa Amini, in Iran, and it has been 1 year during which revulsion to repression has given birth to so many courageous Iranians expressing their defiance of arbitrary restrictions on their freedom. Nevertheless, it has also been another year of torture and murder at the hands of a fanatical tyranny. With approval of this legislation named for Mahsa, we say to Iranians: ``Your voices are heard, your voices are important, and you are not forgotten.'' While the type of military action against Iran urged by fanatics outside of Iran would be disastrous and counterproductive, through this act we seek to use all other available means to hold accountable the cruel repressors in Tehran. Those of us who are progressives, opposing any war against Iran, are equally opposed to the Iran war that the government is currently carrying out against its own children. We share the battle cry of peaceful Iranian protesters: Woman, life, freedom. This bill has little to do with the Iran nuclear agreement, which was wisely negotiated by President Obama's administration and our European allies. The world is less safe today not because of that agreement but because of President Trump's unilateral cancellation of the agreement presenting us today with an Iran that is nearer the development of a nuclear weapon than it was prior to the agreement. We need to be seeking to do everything we can to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon short of war; but our desire for a safer world should not impair our willingness to do more to make Iran safer for its own citizens. As Amnesty International reported just this past month, Iranian authorities have been subjecting victims' families to arbitrary arrest and detention, imposing restrictions on peaceful gatherings at gravesites, and even destroying victims' grave markers, and now within the last few days, detaining Mahsa's uncle so that he cannot speak out this Saturday on the anniversary of her murder. Already this year, the Iranian Government has executed 320 people, doubling the rate prior to Mahsa's death, and giving Iran the wretched distinction of the highest number of executions per capita in the entire world. Building upon current, existing executive orders, this bill proposes to codify existing sanctions targeting those at the top of the Iranian regime for their human rights abuses and for this egregious action over the last year. Nevertheless, the attacks on President Biden really are misplaced if this is to be a truly bipartisan initiative. I believe that passage of the MAHSA Act sends a message to Iranians not about this administration, but of the fact that we, the elected Members of the people of the United States, oppose these abuses.

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, passage of this act is not about what this administration has or has not done, but that it reflects the broad determination of this body, the Congress, the Representatives of the people of the United States, to speak out against a brutal theocracy. We stand with Iranians who seek a brighter future where the rule of law and freedom are respected, and hopefully one day there will be an end to the terrible division between our two countries.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, today, it is with a heavy but grateful heart that I rise in honor of the late Joseph ``Joe'' Trent Siff, who was a dedicated, principled political activist with more than 50 years of support and work for local, state, and national leaders. His involvement began in 1968 and lasted through his local precinct work in Houston and his volunteer work for Rep. Lizzie Fletcher in 2022. Joe was born on November 16, 1947, in Akron, Ohio, the son of Alvin Stanley and Iris Gene Siff. The Siff family moved from Akron to Houston, Texas, when Joe and his twin brother Ted were 6 months old. From the beginning, Joe and Ted were each other's biggest supporters and good-natured competitors--even running against 1 another for president of their sixth-grade class, but losing to a third candidate. With an impressive list of accomplishments as a child and young adult, Joe was an Eagle Scout as well as a proud member of the first class to attend all 4 years at Memorial High. He was also a multi-year class officer and champion orator and debater. Joe excelled at almost everything he did. As a huge Houston Colt 45's/Astros fan, Joe worked for many years as a press box runner and assisted sports writers, announcers, and scoreboard keepers during home games. Always 1 to pay it forward, he helped several fellow members of the Memorial High speech and drama teams get summer jobs as tour guides and ushers. After completing his freshman year at Lafayette College, Joe finished college at Rice University, studying architecture. In 1968, he was part of the campaign team to elect John Hill as Governor of Texas. In 1970, Joe was elected president of the Associate Student Chapters of the American Institute of Architecture (AIA), where he served on the national board and testified before Congress. Two years later, Joe would return to help John Hill become the Texas Attorney General while also taking part in the campaign for Sissy Farenthold for Governor. He also served on the advance team for Sargent Shriver's Vice-Presidential campaign. Campaign work inspired Joe and eventually resulted in him becoming an assistant to Boston Mayor Kevin White. Before Joe's health problems arose, he would also serve as a precinct election worker. He was a loyal member of the Texas Democratic Party. His advocacy, like his concern for others, knew no boundaries; his passion knew no limits. At the completion of his work for Mayor White, Joe returned to Houston where he started his career as a financial advisor. He quickly became a senior vice president at Prudential Bache Securities and then at Lehman Brothers. In the early 1980s, Joe married Bonnie Hickerson. This marriage was blessed with the births of Iris Trent Siff and then Jordan Benjamin Siff. Joe's personality was infectious. He maintained relationships, fostered friendships, and often tried to help friends achieve their goals. It was a natural transition in the 1990's when he created his firm, Access Strategies, to connect people and their ideas to the capital and other resources they needed. This talent, matched with his wide-ranging network, resulted in projects involving real estate, art, book and live performance productions, and so much more. His multi- decade representation of artist David Adickes is I example of his many skills. A great storyteller with an unceasing curiosity about the world around him, Joe loved his family, conversations, politics, architecture and design, and travel. He was a kind and supportive father, brother, and friend, including mine for many decades. On Tuesday, July 11, 2023, our world lost a bright soul, who was committed to making it a better place for everyone. Joe was 75 years old, and is survived by his 2 children, Iris and Jordan, and their mother, Bonnie; his twin brother Ted Siff (Janelle Buchanan) of Austin, Texas, as well as nieces and numerous cousins. Mr. Speaker, once again, I am pleased to honor the life and legacy of Joe Siff, and I am grateful to share his story with the rest of our Nation. I cherish our memories while admiring his significant, personal contributions. He worked tirelessly to make our state and the world a better place. May he Rest in Peace.

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, a strong military is certainly essential at a time when we face so many threats, from Russia's war crimes in Ukraine to threats from the People's Republic of China and North Korea to constant cyberattacks. Paying for this security is very costly. It accounts for almost one- half of every dollar discretionarywise that we approve each year in the Congress. Of those dollars, almost one-half of the defense dollars goes to defense contractors--billions and billions of dollars. While designed to ensure that we get more national security, this national defense authorization should also be doing more to provide taxpayer security--security from being ripped off by price gouging and by war profiteering. As currently written, this bill provides insufficient protection for taxpayers regarding the private defense industry, which can too often extract monopoly prices and demand basically a blank check for weapons and military supplies that are essential to our servicemembers. An industry that is basically self-policing itself without much competition and without much of a watchdog inevitably leads to overcharging. Since the 1990s, there has been massive consolidation of defense contractors, and at the same time, the Pentagon has cut tens of thousands of contract negotiators and watchdogs, leading to less oversight, less transparency, and too little accountability. Overpricing for our military can impact the readiness of our Armed Forces, the well-being of our servicemen and -women, and certainly the resources of American taxpayers. Let me give you just a couple of examples, Mr. Speaker. A woodruff key, which is a one-half inch semicircular disk that is used to connect machine parts to rotating shafts, is available at Walmart or you can go online to Amazon and buy one for about 10 cents a key. The Department of Defense recently bought some of these for $300 per key. The Pentagon paid over $10,000 for an oil switch when a commercial equivalent was available for about $300. It has spent over $32,000 for an oil pump kit when one was commercially available for about $3,600. These prices just keep soaring. Decades ago, the original price of a Stinger missile was $25,000. Now it is up to over $400,000. I have submitted two modest amendments to try to rein in some of the waste and abuse and to, quite literally, provide our military more bang for the buck. Both of these have been endorsed by the Project On Government Oversight, by the R Street Institute, and by Taxpayers for Common Sense. One would simply establish a panel to review major contracts to determine whether fair and reasonable prices were paid and make recommendations to better ensure that the Pentagon gets the best possible deal. The second would strengthen transparency and provide government contracting officers access to sales data that they need to make informed, reasonable decisions in negotiating fair prices. Both result from the excellent report that ``60 Minutes'' did in May that highlighted price gouging by some of the giant corporations that just happen to be enjoying record profits. For Republicans who are always telling us that we need to fight waste, fraud, and abuse, now is the time to do something about it in the biggest appropriations bill and authorization that we have before this Congress. Because they have thus far refused to approve these taxpayer protection amendments, I think that we are not getting at the waste in Pentagon procurement. Mr. Speaker, I oppose this rule and remain hopeful that eventually these amendments to do something to protect taxpayers along with our military readiness will be approved.

Mr. DOGGETT

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

Mr. DOGGETT

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Chair, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Millions of Americans are finding the security and the peace of mind that comes from having access to a family physician through the Affordable Care Act. If the gentleman has been listening to the American people, he has turned a tin ear to the 16 million Americans that have now enrolled in the marketplaces under the Affordable Care Act. Republicans, unwilling to accept the success of what they demeaned as ObamaCare, Republicans who failed more than 60 times in this House to repeal ObamaCare, who failed three times in the Supreme Court to undermine ObamaCare, have now embarked on a new strategy, which is to circumvent and undermine the invaluable protections of the Affordable Care Act. With this bill, Republicans are demanding that every individual who gets stuck in one of these newfangled plans that they have is denied protection from having their insurer exclude preexisting conditions, no assurance of coverage for essential medical care, and no assurance of affordability. I offered an amendment to correct one part of this defective bill to give Americans statutory protection, so they are not back in the old pre-Affordable Care Act period of losing coverage when they needed it most because they had something the insurance company defined as a preexisting condition, but that was rejected. At the time, they claimed that was their intent, but when you look at the specific statutory language, there is no doubt that the protection for preexisting conditions and essential conditions is excluded from their legislation. These so-called Individual Coverage Health Reimbursement Arrangements, ICHRAs, are about as convoluted as the name suggests. They are as my grandson, Canyon, would say, they are icky. Handing people a voucher and telling them to go shop for coverage follows the same ill-conceived Republican approach to sabotage Medicare, which they continue to promote in their latest budget. Instead of giving Medicare beneficiaries guaranteed coverage, they would give seniors a voucher with declining value and tell them to go find coverage. Instead of the guaranteed, comprehensive coverage workers now receive, this bill would force so many people to find healthcare in a sea of junk, exposing them to misleading marketing and aggressive brokers. An estimated 2 million workers would be immediately impacted by this sorry bill, and with another provision that is in the bill that directs the Treasury Department to go out and promote access to junk plans, we could expect these numbers of impacted workers to increase. Inevitably, the result is bare-bones, junk insurance that misleads on coverage, has high out-of-pocket costs, and abandons those with preexisting conditions. The policy's fine print takes away all the bold promises of the marketing. Those who need coverage the most will be unable to afford it or receive minimal junk coverage. In a Nation that is as rich as America, going broke shouldn't be a side effect of trying to get healthcare, but exposing more people to financial ruin is exactly what this kind of legislative approach will achieve. This misguided scheme suffers, I think, from a form of preexisting condition itself. It is called amnesia, because they forget the conditions that existed for so many Americans in this country before the Affordable Care Act became law. Situations like those who contacted me from Texas: Someone who had been a victim of domestic violence declared to have a preexisting condition; an infant born with some preexisting condition denied the coverage that they need; any number of excuses when coverage was needed the most because of preexisting conditions. That is why I thought it was so important to amend this legislation, and the refusal of my Republican colleagues to clarify that now sends forward loud and clear that that is their objective. There is even more ick to the ICHRA bill that is being introduced, and that is the opportunity that is created for class discrimination. This bill legalizes that discrimination. My amendment would have prevented that also. Employees that are out there on the assembly line; those who are in the chicken processing plant, or the meat-packer, or out in the cornfields; they are in the dirtiest, most difficult, and usually the lowest-paid jobs. They can be treated one way under this bill, while the executives sitting off in the office tower are treated another and getting an entirely different kind of coverage because of the way they have written their bill. Lower-wage workers who would be eligible, in fact, for a better policy under the Affordable Care Act with a no-premium or low-premium policy, would instead be required to search for a policy with more holes than safety net. Finally, we discover something on which Republicans are pro-choice. I didn't think they were pro-choice on anything, but the genuine choice they provide is to the employer, not to the employee, a choice to divide employees into the haves and the have-nots; providing employer coverage to some and leaving others to fend for themselves. Predictably, that burden will fall on the low-wage workers and the sick employees that employers don't want to cover. One survey already of employers found that 60 percent of large firms intended to offer ICHRA to only low-wage workers. That is icky. To prohibit discrimination by employers and junk plans alike, the amendment I offered would have offered protection. This bill, as it stands, does not. It should be rejected. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Chairman, I continue to reserve the balance of my time.