John Garamendi

Mr. GARAMENDI

Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the honorable gentlewoman from the State of Oregon (Ms. Bonamici).

Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Speaker, I am prepared to close. I will take my few seconds that remain then and simply say this is a good piece of legislation. I want to thank the chair of the Coast Guard and Maritime Transportation Subcommittee for his work on this, and for working across the aisle to solve problems, some very real, serious problems in this legislation. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, first, let me thank Chairman Hunter for his work on this bill and on the other work we have been able to do with the Coast Guard and the legislation. It has been a great pleasure to work with him. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of S. 756, the Save Our Seas Act of 2018, as amended, to include other important bills addressing maritime safety and ocean technologies. As explained by the majority's manager of the bill, marine debris, especially plastics, is a persistent and growing threat to the global marine environment. Many countries, including the United States, contribute to the plastic pollution, and it does add up. For example, in 2010 alone, according to a University of Georgia study, a total of 8 million metric tons of plastic entered the world's oceans. Worse yet, the study predicts that number will grow 10 times-- tenfold--as large by 2025. Not only are floating plastic bags, straws, Styrofoam cups, and plastic bottles harmful to the health and welfare of marine life, but marine debris also threatens the food supply of millions of people around the world who rely on seafood as their primary source of protein. The impacts affect people everywhere, and the problem is not going to go away and won't be solved by itself. The legislation we put forth today is an important step in the right direction. Title I would authorize existing funding levels in the Marine Debris Act to enable the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the United States Coast Guard to identify and remove sources of marine debris and to coordinate response activities on the national and regional levels to assess and reduce the volume of the debris entering our oceans. The title also contains important amendments, including new authority to allow the Federal Government to provide assistance to mitigate severe marine debris events, such as the recurrence of the flood of debris that drifted from Japan across the Pacific Ocean in the aftermath of the 2011 Fukushima earthquake and tsunami. I also want to express my strong support for two other bills recently passed and reported by the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee that were added as separate titles to S. 756: First, H.R. 6175, the Maritime Safety Act of 2018, as title II; and my legislation, H.R. 6206, the Coast Guard Blue Technology Center of Expertise Act, as title III. The 2015 sinking of the U.S.-flagged commercial vessel, El Faro, and the tragic loss of all 33 crew members was the worst U.S. maritime disaster in 35 years. The subsequent Marine Board of Investigation, convened by the Coast Guard and joined by the National Transportation Safety Board, found numerous faults in the ship's safety management system, bridge management, and safety apparatus, as well as other critical oversights or failures. Title II enacts several important recommendations contained in the action memo released by then-Commandant of the Coast Guard, Admiral Paul Zukunft. I want to particularly note the chairman's work in bringing together a couple of hearings on this, both formal and informal, that led to these investigations and recommendations. Together, these provisions that are in this bill will improve ship communication and safety management. They will also improve our ability to identify and recover voyage data recorders and locate and retrieve seafarers who may be adrift at sea. Additionally, the investigation revealed gaps or insufficient oversight in the inspection regime, and the bill deals with those. Title II also includes several new requirements to shore up the oversight and investigation of third-party inspectors, who should be reviewing the safety of these ships. I also strongly support title III, which contains my legislation--I know you are surprised with that support, but nonetheless--H.R. 6026, to authorize the Coast Guard to establish a Blue Technology center of expertise. Unlike the Navy, ocean industry sectors, and ocean science community, the Coast Guard has not embraced the adoption and use of a wide assortment of advanced ocean technologies, systems, sensors, and platforms. This is unfortunate because I suspect that several such technologies have the potential to dramatically improve the Coast Guard's operational capability. Therefore, title III simply draws upon the existing authority to direct the Coast Guard to establish a Blue Technology center of expertise. The overarching goal is to improve from within the Coast Guard's awareness of blue technologies that apply or align with Coast Guard mission needs. In addition, this new Blue Technology center will facilitate a dialogue and sharing of information between the Coast Guard and the growing number of Blue Tech stakeholders in the private sector, academia, and ocean research community. A 2015 study by NOAA identified over 400 Blue Technology firms across the United States who generate some $7 billion in annual revenue. These firms, along with our academic and research institutions, stand ready to put their innovations to work in the service of the American people, using the Coast Guard as a mechanism to accomplish that. I am confident that this Blue Technology center will open doors of opportunity for the Coast Guard to better protect and patrol the vast oceans and complex waterways. Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues on both sides to join with me in support of this noncontroversial maritime legislation, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Speaker, may I inquire as to how much time I have remaining?

Mr. GARAMENDI. That should be enough for Mr. DeFazio, the ranking member of the committee, to share his views on this legislation. I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. DeFazio).

Mr. GARAMENDI

Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself as much time as I might consume, but I will try to be brief. Mr. Speaker, we are in total support of this piece of legislation. We think this is a very, very good thing to do, to adequately fund all of our military, whether it is SOCOM or any other part of it. It is essential for our national security. However, I would like to note that, having served on the Armed Services Committee for the last several years and endured unending discussions about the horrible sequestration issues, which were totally under the control of the majority party to change should they decide to do so, that it is a little incongruous to put forth a resolution that would call for adequate funding for SOCOM, and we should do so. At the same time, when we have created a trillion-dollar deficit with a piece of legislation that passed last December with no Democratic votes--because we like to think of ourselves as deficit hawks, and we think it is difficult to put this Congress into a situation where we have to choose between the health of seniors who are on Medicare or young children who depend upon the Medicaid program or maybe the education systems. So this resolution, it is a good thing. It is something we ought to do. Certainly, we ought to support SOCOM. Certainly, we ought to pass appropriations bills on time. Let me commend the House for having done so, and we can always blame the enemy on the other side of the building, the Senate, but the reality is that the Treasury was gutted by a tax bill of which more than 80 percent of the benefit went to the top income earners of America and corporations. And a deficit has been created that will be a trillion dollars next year. That is the period of time in which this resolution calls for full funding for our Special Operations Forces. So my discussion today is really about the very difficult choices that are going to have to be made because this Congress, without Democratic support, decided that the first choice was the superwealthy and the corporations of America, not the children, not the sick, not those in need of education, not the infrastructure, but rather those who have much already. Now, I notice that I don't have many colleagues here on our side, although I would assure all the Congress that we are 100 percent in support of our Special Operations Forces, and we look forward to a continuing debate on the choices that must be made. Mr. Speaker, I urge an ``aye'' vote, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. GARAMENDI

Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Speaker, if you are a person who wants to cut taxes and borrow money from China, then you can keep the economy going. In fact, the job growth has been basically steady for the last 8 years. It has been in the last year, also, and most of this year, and we are thankful for that. Nonetheless, we have a very serious deficit. The CBO estimate that was quoted a moment ago actually took place prior to the tax cut. More recent estimates indicate that the deficit is larger than anticipated and that the growth rate has not expanded to the point that was anticipated and that the deficits that are going to be there are very real. All of that is true. While there have been increases in wages, some 2 percent over the last year, almost 18 months now--and we are grateful for that--those wages are less than the inflation rate; and, therefore, for those working men and women across the Nation who have received an average of 2 percent or so of wage growth, it has been eaten up by inflation. The point here is one of this resolution reminding us that we have a very important obligation to adequately fund, in this case, the Air Force; in the previous piece of legislation, special operations. Indeed, we do have that obligation. But at the same time, we need to have a fiscally sound government. Unfortunately, what happened last December was to pull the foundation of fiscal soundness out from beneath the government's revenue stream. Now, there is a necessity for some adjustment in the taxes, and you will get no debate on our side of the aisle about the necessity to do that. It would have been our choice, had we the majority, to reduce taxes far more than the tax bill did for the working men and women and for the smaller businesses in America, and not for the wealthy corporations that were doing quite well, and certainly not to create an international Tax Code that continues to encourage the offshoring of American jobs. That simply happened because the reduction in the corporate tax rate for America went to 20 percent, while those American corporations operating offshore could get a 10 percent tax, providing a very significant benefit to corporations to offshore jobs. I don't think we would have done that. Maybe that is why many of us voted against the legislation. There is much more to be said about it, but the fundamental point at this moment is this resolution that says fully fund the Air Force. We are 100 percent for that. The question we ask is: How are we to do that in the face of the massive deficit and, to hear from our Republican leadership, tax cut 2.0? What does that mean, on tax cut 1.0? We don't know. But I would draw the attention of all of us to what happens when you do not have the revenues necessary to fund the government--Oklahoma. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. GARAMENDI

Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I want to thank the gentleman from Oklahoma for making me aware of the current financial situation, and I will remind him that California is running a very significant budget surplus at the present time. Both of our economies are presently growing, and we are thankful for that. I also want to thank the gentleman for being a voice of knowledge on the Armed Services Committee, for his many years of service in the United States Army, and for bringing us this resolution today calling for the full and timely funding of the United States Army. My father, who served in the Army and ended that service as a major, would have been very pleased to hear that there was adequate and timely funding. I know I have said quite enough on the issue of how we are going to fund the government, and I am sure my colleagues across the aisle probably think I have said too much. If they feel that way, so be it. But I do think that we need to understand the need to be balanced as we move forward. I announce my support for this resolution, along with the two previous resolutions, and look forward to its immediate passage. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. GARAMENDI

Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Speaker, I thank you very much for the opportunity to address the House. As I often do in these evenings in the Special Order hour, I try to first lay out what it is: what is the purpose, what is the goal, and what is the value in what we are trying to accomplish. I find myself always harkening back to a quote that I saw many years ago, and then more recently found etched into the marble at the FDR Memorial here in Washington, D.C. It comes from Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and he talked about what he was trying to accomplish and what he thought America ought to accomplish during the Great Depression. His words are equally important during the Great Recession and the years thereafter. He said: ``The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little.'' It is kind of what we are all about as Democrats, and that is why we found the tax cut, the Republican tax cut which no Democrat voted for last December, so profoundly troubling. That tax cut, on top of the 2001 and the 2003 Republican tax cuts, added $2 trillion to the wealth of the top 1 percent of Americans. Let me say that once again. FDR was quite clear in his test of policy. He said: ``The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little.'' The 2001 and the 2003 Republican tax cuts, together with the December 2017 Republican tax cuts, which no Democrat in the House of Representatives voted for, added $2 trillion to the wealth of the top 1 percent of Americans. I suppose that would be okay if the 99 percent had somehow seen their wealth grow. It didn't happen. In fact, what we have seen in the last decade since the Great Recession is that the great middle class of America and the poor have seen no real income growth. In the last couple of years, yes, there has been a wage increase, about 2 percent, totally consumed by inflation, which was slightly more than 2 percent--no real income growth. So what is happening here is that we Democrats are proposing a better deal for Americans. Yes, those words are similar to what FDR used. But we are proposing a better deal for Americans, not one that makes the rich richer, although that would be fine if the rest of America could also become richer. But that is going to take a change in public policy, and that is what we are proposing to do, because our public policy going forward is going to be about a better deal for the American people. We are proposing, as we go into this election year, that we push aside the Republican proposal, which is essentially a better deal for the superrich, and we want to bring about a better deal for the people. Here are the three major elements of that deal: We want to lower our healthcare costs and prescription drugs for the American people. We can do this. Unfortunately, our colleagues on the Republican side of the aisle are going in exactly the other direction. As they have ripped the guts out of the Affordable Care Act, we have seen the cost of healthcare in America skyrocket. We have seen the cost of drugs skyrocket. We want to end that. One of the things we most definitely want to end is what the Republicans are now proposing and that is that we go back in America to the bad old days when, if you had a preexisting condition, you could not get healthcare; or, you would have to pay a small fortune just to get an insurance policy. No, we don't want that, but that is what our Republican colleagues are trying to give us all across this Nation--a return to the insurance discrimination where, if you have a preexisting condition, you cannot get healthcare at an affordable price and quite probably couldn't get it at all. Issue one, the cost of drugs. The 2003 improvement to Medicare part D provided prescription drugs at a reduced cost for seniors. All good. A clause was written into that which prohibited the Federal Government from negotiating drug prices for the tens of millions of Americans on Medicare. So we have seen the cost of prescription drugs soar. We have seen the stories about a drug that was acquired by some rip-off person who then took the cost of that drug from a few dollars per pill to several hundred or several thousand dollars per pill. So that is point one. I am going to go down to point three, because I am going to spend time on point two. What we want to do is clean up the corruption of politics in Washington and across this Nation. Just recently, the Treasury Department said that the NRA didn't have to reveal who its contributors were to its dark money program. Similarly, no other dark money PAC across the State had to reveal who their contributors were. Citizens United opened the floodgates to hidden money, secret money. Millions upon millions of dollars pour into campaigns to influence the effect of those campaigns. So we want to deal with Citizens United. We want to deal with this problem of corruption in our political system. There are many ways we can do it, but until we can deal with it, we are going to continue to see more and more legislation that benefits the rich at the expense of the working men and women of America. Now, let me go to this second one here. We want to increase and grow our economy and jobs through an infrastructure program rebuilding America. That will be the central focus of what I want to spend this evening on. So, as we talk a better deal for the American people, we will be talking about healthcare issues, we will be talking about corruption and ending the dark money. We will also talk about rebuilding the infrastructure for America and creating jobs. As we go into this, why is it important? Why is infrastructure important? I suspect many of you remember just more than a year ago that the greatest waterfall in all the world was created at the Oroville Dam in California, just a few miles upstream from my district on the Feather River. Yes, an infrastructure failure. The Oroville Dam spillway was about to give way, just to the side of this, creating a 30-foot wall of water, because the main spillway had collapsed. I suppose if you are interested in waterfalls, this was quite an event. But it was dangerous. Two hundred thousand of my constituents had to immediately evacuate in the cities of Marysville, Yuba City, and Live Oak, and other small communities in that area, for fear that that infrastructure project would fail. Well, it did, but not totally. For the folks in Seattle, Washington, or anybody who was traveling on Interstate 5 from Washington State to British Columbia, it turned out it was a tough day to get there. This is the Interstate 5 bridge. Well, I suppose if you had pontoons or maybe water wings, you could stay on Interstate 5. This is just one example of the tens of thousands of bridges across America that are considered to be unsafe and structurally unsound. This one proved it. A similar bridge in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in the Twin Cities area, resulted in deaths as that bridge collapsed. Infrastructure. American infrastructure, according to Duke University and the study they published a couple of years ago, ranks in the Ds. I do think we have one C. This is going to require glasses to try to find the one C in our infrastructure system. Our ports are a C-plus. The rail systems, the private rail systems are a B. The rest of them are Ds and Fs. Roads, bridges, dams, on and on, sanitation systems, water systems. All of us have heard about the problem in Michigan with the water system there. Well, it is repeated in California up and down the Central Valley of California with water systems that are contaminated in multiple ways, as they are in Michigan. So, what are we going to do about it? Well, we have the good fortune of an opportunity presented to us by Democratic leaders. Let me start with a couple of examples of what can be done if we were to Make It In America. Take, for example, an American success story of Make It In America. The Tappan Zee Bridge in New York, they did it right. They did it with U.S.-manufactured steel. It was a $3.9 billion project and 7,728 American jobs created. Out in California, we do things a little differently and not always better. You have heard of the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge. Well, they decided that the Chinese steel would be cheaper. It turned out it wasn't, and there were thousands of American jobs that didn't happen. It was $3.9 billion over budget, as that Chinese steel was used. There were 3,000 jobs created in China, and the most modern steel mill in the world to produce steel that was badly welded and flawed in many ways. So, we have a choice: We can make it in America, as New York did with the Tappan Zee Bridge, or you can have it made in China, as California did with the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge, not our proudest moment. For you who are not aware, I am a Californian. I was the Lieutenant Governor when this disaster was going on. I screamed and yelled and jumped up and down and said, What in the world are you doing? Oh, but it is cheaper. It is supposed to be by 10 percent. Cheap is not always better--an example of what could be done if we were to make it in America. Now, this idea of Make It In America actually started with Steny Hoyer, our minority whip. I am going to put up a couple of things. He has renewed his program that he and I worked on beginning in 2010. Over the years we have talked about Make It In America. We have talked about various ways it can be done, policies and the like. This Monday, Minority Whip Steny Hoyer re-energized Make It In America. I think it is Make It In America 4.0. So we have encouraged entrepreneurship by assuring access to workplace benefits like healthcare and retirement security, and providing more and stronger boosts to businesses with ideas and successful businesses. I just came across one of these earlier today. I was talking to a friend out in California, Phil Wyatt, a Ph.D. guy who worked out of the University of California, Santa Barbara for some time. He came across a way of using a machine to analyze what is in something--a chemical analysis, an analysis of biological components, and the like. He started a company called Wyatt Technology. It is an analytical machine that is used all around the world. It is used in healthcare. It is used in biology. It is used in chemical analysis and the like. The company is an American company, an entrepreneurship that was developed in this country. There are 88 straight quarters of profitability, and no way in hell is he going to allow the Chinese to steal it from him, even though his equipment is broadly used throughout the world. A great success story, Wyatt Technology. So, where did it come from? Well, it was an entrepreneurial program. We need more entrepreneurs. We need more entrepreneurs who are out there developing new businesses like Phil did several years back. They can do it. They are going to need support from their government. They need sound tax policy. They need the education and research that is going on in our universities. They need to be able to accept the risk of starting a new business, whether it is a high-tech business or maybe it is somebody that wants to go out and work at a taco stand. But they ought to be able to have their healthcare and they ought to have their retirement security available to them as they go through that time. So, that is one of the things that Mr. Hoyer has talked about as he renews the Make It In America plan. We are going to hold infrastructure for a few moments and pick up the third element in his plan, which is education, which ties directly to what I talked about with Mr. Wyatt. Wyatt's business, almost more than a decade old, actually came out of the University of California, Santa Barbara, where he was a professor and he was doing research. And so it is the educational system, not only at the high level, but also all the way down the line, promoting pathways for career opportunities. A lot of this is something you might find in the career technical education field, where a man or woman learns to be a welder and then says, Well, I can start my own welding shop. I can become my own boss. So they do. Or, maybe it is somebody that has learned hairstyling or cosmetics and decides they want to open their own shop. If they are able to have portable healthcare, if they have their retirement benefits, they can run the risk of starting their own business. The training programs and education and the research all fit into this focus on education. So Mr. Hoyer has outlined that as the second element. The third element in the renewal of the Make It In America plan that he and I worked on in the beginning of 2010, and continued working on these many years, is a focus on infrastructure. As I said earlier, as I talked about the failure of our basic infrastructure systems--water, sanitation, bridges, highways, reservoirs and dams--is this problem, also this opportunity. As I said, with this report coming out of Duke University, where they rated the infrastructure systems--as did the Society of Civil Engineers--it is a fact that if we are building our infrastructure system, for every dollar we invest in the infrastructure, we will be able to create 21,671 jobs. And for every billion dollars we invest, we will create those jobs. For every dollar we invest, we will improve the economy by $3.54. So the return on that $1 investment is 3.5 to 1, so it makes a lot of sense to do that. Besides that, the bridges won't fall down and the dams won't crumble. This one is extremely important: repairing and rebuilding our aging infrastructure. It also gives us the opportunity to innovate in the infrastructure of the future. Well, as Mr. Hoyer wants to talk about the infrastructure of the future, I want to talk about, for my remaining time here, the infrastructure of the past. You may be aware that America is now a nation that exports a strategic national asset. It is our petroleum products. For fracking and other reasons, we are now an export nation when it comes to crude oil, gasoline, diesel, and, above all, natural gas. We have succeeded in turning this around from an importing nation to an exporting nation. Some of these statistics lead me to an opportunity that we could rebuild, reenergize, a critical national infrastructure. We don't often think about our maritime industry as being infrastructure, but it really is. It supports, to be sure. And we often talk about ports. We talk about intermodal, from the ship to the port, to the trail, to the train and rail, and then on to the highways. All true, but we often ignore the ship itself. So here we are. The future of American shipbuilding actually resides in the export of oil and natural gas. By 2020, the U.S. is expected to be the world's third largest exporter of LNG, liquified natural gas. Mr. Speaker, 225 LNG vessels are expected to be added to the world fleet by 2020. Those are big ships. There is a little picture there of one. Due to the eroded capacity of American shipyards, not one--none, nada, none--of those 225 LNG ships, vessels, will be built in American shipyards unless there is a law that requires that just a small part of that export of LNG be on American-built ships. Similarly, oil, I don't have that up here, but none of the oil that will be exported from the United States will be on American-built ships unless there is a law. So, are you surprised that we are proposing a law called the Energizing American Shipbuilding? It is a piece of legislation that I have introduced to deal with a critical infrastructure, the ships that America once had. So, of 225 new LNG vessels, currently 70 percent of those orders are going to Korea and the rest to China, maybe a few to Japan, and none to the United States. So, the legislation called Energizing American Shipbuilding Act, introduced by myself, H.R. 5893, was introduced a few weeks ago. It requires that a certain percentage of the liquified natural gas and crude oil exports be transported on United States-built ships and American-flag vessels, crewed by American mariners, from the captains to the engineers to the seamen, American men and women on these American-built vessels. A similar bill was introduced in the Senate by Senator Wicker, and that bill also does exactly the same thing. Senator Casey, Mr. Hunter, Mr. Courtney, and Mr. Wittman--two Democrats, two Republicans-- introduced the legislation. In the Senate, one Republican and one Democrat have introduced the very same legislation, bipartisan, bicameral, and, by God, we ought to do it. What happens if we were to do it? Well, let's look at some of the very simple opportunities that exist. Instead of China and Korea and Japan building the ships for the export of this strategic national asset, let's do it in America. Let's make them in America. The Energizing American Shipbuilding Act, introduced in the House and the Senate this year, if we were to pass this legislation, we are talking at least 50 new ships built in America. Let's see. That is 3, 6, 9, 12--about 15 of them, LNG ships, would be built here in the United States. And when they are commissioned and they are on the oceans, they would have American mariners on board providing a strategic advantage to our American defense policy. I will talk about that a little later. There would be many, many more on the crude oil side, perhaps more than 30. Probably closer to 35 ships would be built in the next decade and a half to two decades, providing, oh, I don't know, maybe more than 1,500 jobs for American mariners. And we haven't yet been able to calculate all the jobs in the shipyards of America, but we know that, for San Diego, at the shipyards in San Diego, they would be building these ships. We know that they would be building these ships in the shipyards of the Gulf Coast and in the shipyards on the East Coast, particularly in Philadelphia. These jobs would be spread around at the shipyards on the West Coast, the Gulf of Mexico, and the East Coast. And, just as important, the bill would require that the engines, the hydraulic systems, the pumps, the pipes, the electronics, that those, too, also be built in America. We are talking about a major opportunity to make it in America, to make it in America once again so that America can continue to be a major place for the construction of American-built ships, whether those are naval ships, as they are today, required to be built in the United States, or whether they are commercial ships requiring that a small percentage of the export of oil and natural gas be on American-built ships with American sailors. Bottom line: manufacturing matters. So, when Mr. Hoyer, our minority whip, talks about renewing the Make It In America agenda and he talks about the necessity for that to be focusing on infrastructure, we put forward that a critical piece of that infrastructure is the American maritime industry--just as important as the trucks that travel our highways, another piece of infrastructure; just as important as the trains that travel the rails, another critical piece of infrastructure; just as important as the barges that move up and down the Mississippi River system on the Ohio, the Missouri, or the Mississippi itself. All of that is infrastructure, as are the airports and the airlines. We ought to start and always think about the fact that we are a maritime nation and that in our infrastructure we consider the American maritime, we consider the ships and the men and the women who are on those ships. Now, this is a national security issue. TRANSCOM, responsible for moving American military supplies around the world, has stated categorically that, unless we revive our American maritime industry, unless we have sailors and captains and engineers on ships who are able to transport our military wherever they need to go around the world, we are going to be in a world of hurt. Earlier today, I was talking to one of the officers of Liberty Maritime, one of the American shipping companies, owners of ships that will soon be transporting a brigade of Reserve men and women from the United States to Europe as part of our European defense issues. So it becomes important that we deal with the infrastructure of the United States and that we do so keeping in mind that these are American jobs that fulfill this important policy position. This is the value that, as we go about our legislative work here, we keep in mind that the test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide for those who have too little. Among those who have too little are the working men and women of America. And if we carry out this infrastructure challenge, if we make it in America, if the steel is American made, if the locomotives are American made--and there is a marvelous example of what can be done with public policy that says, if we are going to build locomotives for the Amtrak system on the Northeast corridor from Washington, D.C., to Boston, that those locomotives will be American made, with 100 percent American-made equipment. Interestingly, when this was part of the American Recovery Act back in 2010, a bill put forward by Democrats and President Obama, there was a requirement for $700 million or $800 million to be spent on American- built locomotives, 100 percent American made. A German company said: Whoa, $700 million? $800 million? Locomotives? American made? We could do that. So, in Sacramento, California, Siemens, one of the great manufacturing companies in the world, said: Well, let's see. We make not locomotives, but we do make cars for the transit systems. We can do locomotives. And they did. Just this last week, I got off one of the Amtrak trains from New York City, walked past a gleaming locomotive, brand-new, and on the side it said ``Siemens.'' I am going: That locomotive was made in Sacramento, California, just outside my district, by a German company with American workers, American steel, American wheels, American engines--made in America. How did it happen? Because Congress, with Democrats in control and a Democratic President, said: We are not going to talk about making America great again; we are going to actually pass a law that says this money will be spent on American-made locomotives. And so it was. And now that plant is continuing to expand as they produce cars for transit systems all across this Nation. FDR had it right, and we are going to follow. We are going to make sure that the laws of this Nation actually provide for the working men and women; for those who don't have a job, an educational program, job training programs, career development programs in community colleges and high schools, apprenticeship programs, so that the men and women of America can participate in the revitalization of the American infrastructure system. Whether that is a highway, an interstate freeway, an airport, a dock, or a port, we are going to make sure that the American workers have a chance not only in building the infrastructure, but in using the steel and the concrete and the other elements that go into these infrastructure projects. Those should also be made in America so that that infrastructure program flows way beyond just those who are pouring the concrete to those who are making the cement and making the manufacturing plant that will develop the cement. This is where we are. And by the way, we want to make sure that tax policy does not do what the Republicans have repeatedly done--2001, 2003 tax cuts and again in the 2017 tax cuts that have transferred $2 trillion of American wealth to the top 1 percent. That is shameful, but that has actually happened. And all the while the rest of Americans have seen virtually no improvement in their economic situation. Tax policy--critically important. Policy that requires that when we spend your tax dollar, that your tax dollar is spent on American jobs in American factories, putting Americans to work in what we call a ``Make It In America'' agenda. And so keep this in mind, Mr. Trump, this is how you make America great again, by making it in America. So we can work with our Republican colleagues, as we are with our shipbuilding program, the Energizing American Shipbuilding Act. Democrats and Republicans understand, together, that it is public policy. It is the laws that we write that set the pace for economic growth and spread that growth out across the great American population so that everyone--everyone can participate in the rebuilding of America's infrastructure, whether it is a ship at sea, a port that is being developed, an airport, a highway or a railway, water system, sanitation system, we must write into all of those laws that when American taxpayer money is used, it is spent on American manufacturing and American workers. So we will make it in America, and America will make it when we follow these kinds of wise public policies, keeping in mind that our task is to make sure that we always focus not on those who have much, but, rather, on those that have too little. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. GARAMENDI

Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Speaker, well, the latest tweets from the President: ``So many people at the higher ends of intelligence loved my press conference performance in Helsinki.'' Obviously, he is referring to Putin, because there are not many people in the United States who saw that press conference as a success. In fact, it was an unmitigated disaster. Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats said, ``The red lights are blinking.'' Our election process, our critical infrastructure, is being attacked by Russia, and what is the House of Representatives doing today? Eliminating funding to protect our election process. Obviously, those who vote for this reduction in funding are not at the higher levels of intelligence.

Mr. GARAMENDI

Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize Rick Gonzales, Sr. and his family for their selfless service to their community. As a young child, Rick Gonzales, Sr. made it to the fifth grade before it became evident that he needed to work on the family farm to help provide for the family, but his desire to learn and have a good education never wavered. As a young adult, Rick Sr. was drafted and proudly served our country during the WWII Pacific campaign in Okinawa. Upon his honorable discharge he enrolled in barber school, where he met his wife, Angela. Together, they raised four sons, Laverne, Rick Jr., Garry and Jerry. Barber school would soon prove to be far more than a career decision; it was a move that would begin Rick's lifelong journey as an agent for change. In 1953, Rick Sr. opened Rick's Top Hat barbershop, and the business soon became the central hub of information on political and social issues. Soon after, Rick and Angela knew that women in the community would also be an important component, and Angela opened Velvet Touch Beauty Salon. Rick Sr. had a passion to make a difference. He wanted to give a voice to the voiceless and restore hope to those who couldn't. Rick and Angela relished in these ``teaching moments,'' of listening, guiding and helping their community. In 1970, Rick became co-founder of the Mexican-American Concilio of Yolo County, which operated with five employees serving the Latino community. Rick Gonzales, Sr. has been recognized by his community for his outstanding accomplishments and activism. The Yolo County Department of Social Services has named their building the Rick Gonzales Building and in 2018, the city of Woodland honored him by naming their newest park after him. Rick Gonzales, Sr. valued education and instilled the importance in his children as they were growing up. All four pursued and received higher education degrees with three receiving their Masters degrees. Continuing his father's legacy and under his mentorship until 2004, Rick Gonzales, Jr. joined the Concilio and currently serves as their President. In 1998, under his leadership, Rick Jr. created the Annual Concilio Recognition Dinner & Scholarship Fundraiser, which awarded two scholarships the first year. Rick has devoted the past twenty years raising awareness for the scholarship dinners and this year reached a milestone of raising $400,000 for 1000 scholarships awarded. His passion and service to the community is admirable. Mr. Speaker, I ask my colleagues to join me in honoring Rick Gonzales, Sr. and his family for their incredible dedication, selfless service and contributions to the Yolo County community.

Mr. GARAMENDI

Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Kihuen, I don't want you to stop. I want you to stay strong. I want your voice to be heard. I want your experiences to be known. Eight years old, coming to America with your parents. In this room, there are very few who would share such an experience, who could understand first the excitement of being in America, and then the potential terror of being taken from your parents. I want you to make your voice heard because it is the voice of experience. It is the voice of a recent family coming to America. So as we go through these days, please come to the floor, tell the experience again, not only of your family, but also what you saw in those shelters, in those cages. Will the gentleman do that?

Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman speaks about the laws and about the potential, and every member of the Democratic Caucus has now signed on to be a coauthor of the legislation, Keep the Families Together Act. It would end immediately the separation of families that has now taken 2,300 children away from their parents. Mr. Speaker, joining us tonight is the Representative from the city of Las Vegas, Nevada. I thank him for joining us and yield to the gentleman from Nevada (Mr. Kihuen).

Mr. GARAMENDI. There is something incredibly immoral. I thank the gentleman for traveling to bring the reality back to the House of Representatives. It is really important, and I thank him very much for doing that. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New Jersey for joining us this evening. I yield to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Payne).

Mr. GARAMENDI. So any age, literally, 4-, 5-, 6-month-old babies taken from their mothers?

Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his comments and would ask him a question. The gentleman said he visited one of the shelters, and there were babies, babies a few months old.

Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Castro).

Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Speaker, America, my colleagues, Democrat and Republican, this young girl needs our help. She is crying out for her parents. She needs our help. She needs our help now. She is crying for her mother and her father, who have been taken from her. This is the picture of America today. This is a picture of our values as Americans. 350 million of us are responsible for this young girl crying for her mother and her father, who have been taken from her. They came to America, her mother came to America because she feared that in her home country, they would be harmed. They came to America seeking life. This young girl is crying out for our help, and she is not alone. She is joined by this young girl, who has been separated from her parents, and she is alone in a building foreign to her. She is crying out to America for our basic humanity, for our basic morality, and she is not alone. She is not alone, and neither are these young children in a cage in America. What have we become? What has America become that we would take children and their parents who have come here seeking refuge, we take the parents away and we put the children in a cage? What has America become that we would allow this to happen? Whatever the reason is for their arrival at our border, we know this about them: they came here seeking the very best of America, the promise of this country, and we put them in a cage. What has America become that we would allow this to happen, that the man in the highest office of this Nation would make it the policy of America to cage children; that the man who occupies the highest office in this land would make it the policy of this Nation, a Nation whose reputation was one of humanity, of concern, and fundamental morality, that the man who occupies the highest office in this land would put in place policies that would make this young girl cry for her parents? Is this the America that we want? Is this the America that we have come to be? Is this the America who has lost its moral compass, who believes that you could take this young girl or these young men and women, these children, and hold them hostage? The ransom is a border wall. Is that where we are as Americans that the price for a border wall is this? Is that where we are as Americans? Is that what we have become? We can't debate here on the justice or the value of a policy without taking a young child away from its parents and putting them in a cage so that we could somehow use them as ransom for a public policy. This is not America. This is not what we should expect from the man who occupies the highest office in this land. Have no doubt about it: this is not about a law. This is about a policy directed from the White House that says a person crossing into this country, whatever their reason; asylum seekers trying to get away from the horrors of the country from which they came, coming to America seeking the benefit of this great country, that they are a criminal and therefore must be separated from their children. Something is terribly, terribly wrong here. In America, we need to cry out, just as these children are crying out, just as this young girl is crying out. We need to cry out in moral outrage and say to the President, Stop it. Stop it now. It is wrong. It is immoral. And it is un-American. Stop it. One phone call is all it takes. Change the policy. There is much to be said. We could talk about the laws, we could talk about how we could change it, we could talk about border control, we could talk about walls, we could talk about new judges, we could talk about lawyers, but at the bottom of this issue is a common issue of morality. Back away for a moment. Think about your childhood. Think about that moment when you had your mother's hand and you were 4 years old and you were walking in the mall. Think back to your childhood and think of that moment, and there is probably not a one of us who hasn't experienced this, when that hand wasn't there, and we looked around in panic, and we had lost our mother and we were alone and we were in a strange place. Is there one of us anywhere that at some moment in our early life reached out and mother's hand was not there? Mr. President, your policies did that to this young woman and 2,300 others, crying out for their mother. This is not American. This is not right. It is immoral and it is un- American at its very heart and its very foundation. Mr. Speaker, joining me tonight are some of my colleagues who share the same concern. My colleague from the district next to me has joined me. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from California (Mr. McNerney).

Mr. GARAMENDI. I am quite certain that across this country, every one of the 430-some Members of Congress saw this photo. Probably most have heard the audio recording of young children just like this calling out for their mommy or daddy, papa. I suspect many of us have seen the pictures of young children, 3, 4, 5 with a Sharpie telephone number on their chest so that if somehow they were separated, there would be someone to contact. I am certain that every Member, 430-plus of us, plus the Senate, that was a child, that at some point in their life, when they were young, 3, 4, 5 years of age, they were separated from their parent. And I am absolutely certain that each one of us knows the terror of that moment. And most of us are now parents. Most of us are now parents, and we know the terror of a child who has disappeared, wandered off. I don't believe there is one of us that knows the terror of this mother whose child was taken away by American police; the awesome power of this government imposed upon that young woman, a mother, taken from her child. Is there one of us? Is there one of us that has endured that police power? Okay. I get emotional about this because I am a parent. No. I don't know the terror of the police state taking my child away. I don't know that. But I know the terror of that child who has wandered off. This is a policy that has been imposed upon parents and their children by the President. This is not a law that requires this kind of cruelty. There is no such law that requires this kind of cruelty. There is no law that requires the American government to cage children. There is no law that requires this. This is the policy of the President of the United States. This is his policy. Zero tolerance. His policy that cages children as though they were animals. His policy that puts the fear into a child. It is the President's policy, not the law, that caused this young child to cry out for her mother and for the police to stand over her. The Attorney General says it is the law. It is not the law. It is his policy, together with the President's policy, that has created this humanitarian crisis in the United States of America. It must end. Martin Luther King--who was killed, murdered, assassinated 50 years ago--from the Birmingham jail spoke about justice and the law in his letter from the Birmingham jail. So, Mr. Attorney General Beauregard Sessions, listen to what he had to say. He said: ``A just law is a manmade code that squares with the moral law or the law of God.'' He went on to argue: ``An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law.'' And how should justice be defined? He answered this way: ``Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust.'' Mr. Attorney General, by the words of Martin Luther King, your defense of what you say is the law is unjust, it is immoral, and it is not the law of God. My wife, Patty, has what she calls cradle songs, songs that she sung to our children as they were young and growing. One of those was written by Bobby Dylan, Blowin' in the Wind: Yes, and how many times can a man turn his head Pretending that he just doesn't see? Yes, and how many ears must one man have Before he can hear people cry? And, Mr. President and Mr. Attorney General, the opening line of that song is this: How many roads must a man walk down Before you call him a man? Mr. Speaker, I yield back.

Mr. GARAMENDI

Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Chair, may I inquire how much time is remaining?

Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Chair, I rise in support of the amendment. I also want to compliment my colleagues on the other side of this argument: the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee; I see our friend from Colorado and others here. All of us have the same goal, and that is to assure that the United States, and indeed the world, is safe from a nuclear war. We use deterrence as the way of accomplishing that. Every President since Ronald Reagan has strived to achieve a safer world by reducing the number of nuclear weapons. However, in recent years, beginning with President Obama and being carried on today, we are now involved in a new nuclear arms race. Not only are we going to build new nuclear weapons--bombs, if you will--such as this 762, presumed to be low-yield, which is still extraordinarily devastating, we are also creating new delivery systems, new land-based missiles in the Upper Midwest, new submarines and new rockets and new stealth bombers--all of that costing more than $1 trillion. At the same time, we are developing new sensing devices and new ways in which we might protect those sensing devices and communications. All of this is creating an extremely dangerous world for our future, not a safer world. We are going in the absolutely wrong direction of increasing the likelihood of a mistake. I don't think anybody on any side would ever want to initiate, but this particular bomb presents the opportunity for an escalation, a tit for tat. Russia escalates to deescalate, we escalate to deescalate, and they escalate, and we escalate, and pretty soon it is all gone. I would just ask all of us to step back and ponder for a moment why it was that Reagan and George H.W. Bush and Clinton and George W. Bush and Obama all went the other direction, to reduce the number of nuclear weapons. But here we are in the midst of a new nuclear arms race--$1.7 trillion. And all of us know that there are numerous needs that we have. So I would ask us just to pause for a second and to accept this amendment.

Mr. GARAMENDI

Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Chairman, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from New Mexico (Ms. Michelle Lujan Grisham).

Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Suozzi).

Mr. GARAMENDI

Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in memory of an extraordinary group of people. Yesterday was National Maritime Day, and I rise to bring attention to the House legislation that I recently introduced, H.R. 5879, the World War II Merchant Marine Congressional Gold Medal. I hear the cheers from all of my colleagues here on the floor as they line up to support this piece of legislation. Last year, my colleague, Susan Brooks, my good Republican friend, introduced this legislation. I am grateful to her and to Congressman Don Young of Alaska for their support of this legislation this year. This bill has obvious bipartisan support and bicameral support. Senator Murkowski of Alaska is leading this bill in what some call the upper Chamber; we simply call it the Senate. During World War II, our Armed Forces relied upon the Merchant Marine to ferry supplies, cargo, manpower and womanpower into both theaters of operation: the Pacific and the Atlantic. They paid a heavy price for their service. The Merchant Marine casualty rate was the highest among all branches of the U.S. Armed Forces. An estimated 8,300 merchant mariners lost their life during the war, and around 12,000 were wounded. But these brave men and women, who put their lives on the line to sustain our Armed Forces, were not even given veteran status until 1988, much less public recognition for their invaluable service. Today, I am going to meet with a group of World War II Merchant Marine veterans: Charles Mills from Texas, age 97; Eugene Barner from Kansas, age 92; and Robert Weagant from Illinois, age 92. I will also be meeting with families of other veterans who are no longer with us. I am meeting them to hear firsthand their stories of bravery and peril in the service of our Armed Forces. They deserve the recognition of a Congressional Gold Medal, and that is precisely what this legislation will do. I urge all of the Members of this House and the Senate to give our Merchant Marine veterans and their families the honor they deserve. I will also be discussing with these gentlemen and their families a piece of legislation that we introduced the day before yesterday, we call it the Energizing the American Shipbuilding Industry--taking a small percentage of the oil and natural gas that we are now exporting and requiring that that be on American-built ships with American mariners, so that we can maintain the extraordinary tradition of bravery and service that the World War II mariners showed this Nation. If we are successful in passing this legislation, we will be building some 50 ships, or more, in our shipyards all across America, providing jobs in the upper Midwest, where they build the great engines for these ships: the pumps, the pipes, and the electronic systems. We would also be providing some 1,800 jobs for the next generation of mariners. Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues not only to support the Congressional Gold Medal for the World War II mariners, but support our effort to create mariners for the next generation, which, hopefully, will not be a war but, if it is, we know that we can rely on them, just as we did in World War II.

Mr. GARAMENDI

Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize and honor Mr. Jay Roberts, who is retiring after thirty years of dedicated service in music education and as a community leader. Mr. Roberts began his career in 1988 as a part-time elementary music education teacher while working at home repairing musical instruments. He began teaching full-time at Brentwood Union School District in 1990. In 1995, he entered the Elk Grove School District system, teaching music education at Harriet Eddy Middle School, and will retire as the music director for the award-winning Toby Johnson Middle School Band in Elk Grove, where he's taught since 2001. Mr. Roberts has served admirably as an outstanding and accomplished music educator and leader in our community. He can be credited with the recognition of Toby Johnson's Middle School Jaguar Marching Band and Color Guard, an award-winning marching and jazz band. As a music education teacher, Mr. Roberts has impacted the lives of hundreds of students, giving them a sense of confidence and accomplishment. He's challenged them in a way to make them realize their potential, and the results are an award-winning middle school music program--an incredible accomplishment. In the community, he founded the Elk Grove Community Concert band, the Jay Roberts Swingtime Orchestra and he also conducts for River City Theater Company. Mr. Roberts holds a Bachelor of Arts in Music Education from California State University, Fullerton and completed his graduate work at California State University, Hayward. Mr. Speaker, Mr. Roberts has served our student community with admirable leadership, passion and dedication. He leaves a remarkable legacy. It is my honor to thank him for the positive impacts he's had on his students and wish him the very best for an enjoyable retirement.