Chaka Fattah

Mr. FATTAH

Mr. FATTAH. Mr. Chairman, I reluctantly rise in direct opposition to the amendment, and I rise with mixed emotions. I am very pleased this is the last amendment. But, nonetheless, I am opposed to it--not in the main. That is to say, of course, none of the funds in this bill should be used to operate contrary to our laws, but some of the vagueness of the language as it intersects with State and local communities and decisions they may make. So, for instance, a local community may say that in an emergency situation public safety officers should not engage in questions about whether you have papers or not. Or, when you are seeking information about a child that has been kidnapped, and you go to a certain home or family, you shouldn't be questioning them about their immigration status when you are trying to save a child who could be in imminent danger. There could be circumstances in which this apparent language would create a real problem. I reluctantly oppose the amendment. I thank the gentleman for joining the party and closing us out tonight, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. FATTAH. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.

Mr. FATTAH. Mr. Chairman, I yield to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer), the minority leader.

Mr. FATTAH. Mr. Chairman, I thought the gentleman would yield for a second. My question was that a large swath of our bill has not been authorized, including NASA, so we have to deal with transport back and forth to the International Space Station. Even though it has not been reauthorized, your amendment, as written, would seem to prohibit NASA from being able to conduct life-sustaining activities relative to the space station. That was my question. The gentleman neglected to yield, but I will have it stand as a rhetorical question for the moment, and I oppose the amendment. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. FATTAH. I yield to the gentleman.

Mr. FATTAH. Mr. Chairman, I claim the time in opposition.

Mr. FATTAH. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition.

Mr. FATTAH. Mr. Chairman, obviously, between the Garrett amendment on disparate impact and this, this is, I guess, not actually part of their effort to reach out for a greater fan base--the idea that local communities can't make decisions in their own interests and that we need the heavy hand of the Federal Government to herd them into some particular set of responsibilities that are actually our responsibilities. Immigration law is our responsibility. It is not a local community's responsibility. When the fire department shows up, it is supposed to put the fire out, not worry about where someone's papers are. I just think that it is somewhat contradictory of what we hear from the other team about where they are headed, but this might be representative thereof, rather than doing comprehensive immigration reform. We must do our job as the United States Congress. Now, the Senate has done its job. The President has said that he wants to sign a comprehensive bill. The Chamber of Commerce and all of the various religious and faith-based groups in our country have come forward, but rather than the Congress taking up a bill--any bill--on immigration reform, what we have is this constant effort to get at local communities that are just trying to make the best of a very tough situation that the Federal Government is creating. Now, we will burden them because we don't want to take our responsibility and enact a comprehensive immigration program. I am opposed to this amendment, but I am pleased that the gentleman has reminded us that this is, in essence, the immigration program that has some currency from the majority party. We should do something different than this, and we can. There are 218 votes on this floor that would do comprehensive immigration reform if we would bring it, then we wouldn't have to deal with these kinds of amendments year in and year out, bill in and bill out, because we would have dealt with the problem. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. FATTAH. I concur with the chairman. Maybe it will get approved, but not in our bill and not at this time because we don't completely understand it. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. FATTAH. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. FATTAH. Mr. Chairman, I want to make just one other point here. Every single Federal appellate court has upheld a way to proceed in terms of looking at the impact of policies. What the gentleman offers is that if American baseball looks like it looked prior to Jackie Robinson, that that is just perfectly fine. I happen to think that American baseball is a little bit as a pastime more enjoyable for all of us after the Jackie Robinson decision, which was to take into account those who have been left out and to take an affirmative action to include them in. That is the America I want my children to grow up in. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. FATTAH

Mr. FATTAH. Madam Chair, I would join and sign such a request to the IG. Secondly, I do think that, given what you said and given the overreach, we do need to see if we can work with the authorizing committee and if, perhaps, a package that could be acceptable to the authorizers, it could even be included in such a conference committee when we finalize this bill, because we should protect Americans from the loss of property absent due process. So what you have explained is a process that is backwards under our system of laws. Before someone is penalized, there should be an allegation, there should be a fact hearing, people should have a chance to answer and hear from their accusers, versus a circumstance where their property is taken and then they have to fight a rear guard action to try to get it back. I am very concerned about this. I would be glad to work with the chairman.

Mr. FATTAH. Will the gentleman yield?

Mr. FATTAH. Madam Chair, I move to strike the last word.

Mr. FATTAH. Madam Chair, I want to acknowledge the great work of the gentleman from Texas on patent reform. We worked together and he led the effort that has reformed our patent system, I think, in a remarkable way. The majority leader and I spent some time on one of the last vote days here to go over to NIH and hear from Dr. Collins about great research, particularly interested in pediatric cancers and the like. So these are two gentlemen, the authors of this amendment, who have been very positive and focused in a number of areas that I share with them. However, this amendment is misguided, and I want to speak in opposition to it. The notion that we would want to eliminate certain investigations by the National Science Foundation into economic science or behavioral science, when we talk about disasters, the reason why we have saved so many lives, it is not just that we have improved weather forecasting, even though that would be eliminated in terms of the moneys here for investigative purposes by the National Science Foundation, but also understanding the behaviors of people facing disasters is very important. That would be cut. This area of posttraumatic stress is a critical area. We know now that many of our returning soldiers face posttraumatic stress, but we also know that children living in very difficult circumstances in our country are more traumatized than if they were living in a war zone, an active war zone in another country. So eliminating, cutting back scientific investigations in this regard would be, I think, disastrous. That is why I am hoping that whatever is causing this, there will be some reversal of it eventually. But in the meantime, I want to suggest to the House that we should oppose this amendment, we should oppose the notion that somehow we don't want to know certain things. I was at the University of Pittsburgh. I saw some results of National Science Foundation funding that started out 30 years ago that a Member on this floor would be on the floor complaining about now. It was the examination of what happens in the neurons of a monkey when they move their arm, what neurons fire off in their brain. Well, that research today, 30 years later, literally has a woman who, because of a disease, has no control of her body, but can now move an artificial arm through her thoughts. This is the result of research by the National Science Foundation. It is the world premier basic science foundation, it is the model for our economic competitors. They are imitating it. A small country like Singapore with less than 5 million people is investing $7 billion in their national science foundation. Here we are, the wealthiest country in the world, and we are putting $7.4 billion, which is the highest ever, and I thank the chairman. But now we want to put handcuffs on the agency about what it is that they can look at in terms of improving the life chances of Americans. The research has paid off. That is why we are the great country that we are today. The World Economic Forum says our Nation and our Nation's economy is driven by innovation. The last thing that we should be doing on the floor of this House is equivocating or compromising or making it more challenging for those who are engaged in the innovation ecosystem to do their work. Even though I compliment the gentleman, Mr. Smith, and the majority leader, Mr. Cantor, for all their efforts, I can't imagine for the life of me why we would be on this floor tonight debating a retreat on behavioral science, on economic science. It makes no sense. I would hope that the House, notwithstanding the fact that the majority is held by the other team, I hope in this instance, as the chairman said, we would realize that this is not a competition between Democrats and Republicans. We are competing against countries that have big and plus populations like China and India, they want to eat our lunch economically, and what we need to do is stop the bickering back and forth and figure out what is best for our country. The chairman and I voted for Simpson-Bowles. We were one of just less than 40 Members who did so. I might be in the minority on this vote, but I am going to vote on what is in the best interest of our Nation, and that is to continue to invest in innovation. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. FATTAH. Madam Chair, in reclaiming my time, there will also be another amendment on NSF that the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Price) may speak to, and with that, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. FATTAH. Madam Chair, I move to strike the last word.

Mr. FATTAH. Madam Chair, I share the sentiments of the chairman. Space technology is critically important. I want to acknowledge the work that was originally done by Bobby Braun, who is now at Georgia Tech, Mike Gazarik, who now is the chief space technologist at NASA doing an extraordinary job, but the resources are needed. I want to thank you for offering this amendment because it points us toward greater resources in that regard. I am familiar with the great work that is being done in your home State of Ohio at the Glenn Research Center.

Mr. FATTAH

Mr. FATTAH. Will the gentleman yield?

Mr. FATTAH. I also would like to join in in whatever we can do from our side to help in this matter so they can come to a positive resolution.

Mr. FATTAH. Reclaiming my time, let me say: Let's work through it. We can work together. The chairman has given you his assurances that he will work with you, but there is no possibility that we can afford to cut this agency by 20 percent. I need to oppose this amendment. We would love to work with you to get you the answers because you are not trying to punish OSTP, you are trying to get legitimate answers to legitimate questions, and we want to help you and facilitate that.

Mr. FATTAH. What the chairman offered--he said $150,000 if we can't get you Holdren or someone to give you a satisfactory answer to your question. There are some rules about executive branch agents, individuals, and advisers to the President not being compelled to testify, but when you have line staff people running an agency, Holdren is available, and we can have him come with his staff and answer these questions.

Mr. FATTAH. Madam Chair, I think we have resolved this, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. FATTAH. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.

Mr. FATTAH. I yield to the gentleman.