Alcee Hastings

Mr. HASTINGS

Mr. HASTINGS. Mr. Speaker, there is too little time left on the legislative calendar for this body to be considering partisan legislation that we have been assured will not become law. Furthermore, the future of our Nation's highways and transportation systems are far too important to continue to fund using short-term Band-Aid patches. Our constituents, this great country, deserves better. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. HASTINGS

Mr. HASTINGS. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to highlight the ongoing negotiations between the P5+1 and Iran concerning Iran's nuclear weapons program. In today's polarized environment there are few areas where we can all reach agreement, but certainly Democrats and Republicans alike can agree that Iran must not be allowed to develop a nuclear weapon. I believe that every single pathway available to Iran to obtain a nuclear weapon must be completely blocked. I commend the efforts of President Obama and Secretary of State Kerry, as well as our partners in the P5+1, as they have worked diligently to reach a framework agreement that will halt Iran's ability to develop a nuclear weapon. We must ensure that any agreement reached has as its aim a framework that allows for unobstructed verification and enforceability. Such an agreement is not only in our best interest, but also in the best interest of the region at-large. We need such a framework because it is no secret that the Iranians have engaged, over the years, in deceitful actions that are cause for much concern. This reality of course does not mean that we should not engage fully in negotiations, but simply, that we must weave this reality into our final agreement. Buyers beware, Mr. Speaker. It is my belief that as we move closer to a final agreement, we must ensure that Iran allows United Nations' inspectors the necessary and sufficient access to nuclear sites. This must include military sites. Along similar lines, we must be allowed a full accounting of Iran's previous efforts at weaponization. In knowing their past progress, we will be better able to discern their compliance with the agreement. These factors are essential if we are to determine whether Iran is meeting its obligations. Although these elements are needed, we must also have a strong mechanism that allows sanctions to be re-imposed should Iran violate the agreement. The political calculus of reimposing sanctions could be quite difficult and, therefore, it is not enough that sanctions be able to be ``snapped back,'' but we must also ensure that any sanctions in place now are lifted gently and deliberately. We cannot lose sight of the fact that Iran continues to fund terrorist organizations the world over. Any sanctions relief will undoubtedly increase their ability to fund such organizations. The final deal must spell out the immediate consequences for Iran should it violate the agreement, and sanctions must only be reduced when Iran provides unequivocal proof of compliance with the negotiated agreement. Furthermore, this ought to be clear as day to all involved--any agreement must block Iran's path to a nuclear weapon not for a year, not for five years, but for decades to come. It concerns me that Iran's breakout time will be just a matter of days after twelve or thirteen years. It is important to remember that should we need to re-impose sanctions that we will certainly need more than a few days to do so. Any deal worth signing, therefore, must mandate that Iran demonstrate that it has entirely abandoned its desire for nuclear weapons capabilities. Similarly, a final deal must insist that Iran dismantle its nuclear infrastructure. Allowing such infrastructure to remain simply courts trouble further down the road. Should Iran's nuclear infrastructure remain in place, it will be far too easy for Iran to not only skirt its responsibilities under the agreement, but to reinvest in its nuclear weapons ambitions quickly and meaningfully. Mr. Speaker, I applaud President Obama and Secretary Kerry for working diligently to find a diplomatic solution that stops Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. The United States must certainly continue to negotiate from a position of strength. Such a position is clearly strengthened when Congress continues to weigh in on what a final agreement must entail. At the end of the day, however, I do believe that no deal is better than a bad deal. Let us work together to ensure that we choose neither ``no deal'' nor ``a bad deal,'' but a strong deal that denies the Iranians all paths to a nuclear weapon.

Mr. HASTINGS

Mr. HASTINGS. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize Master Chief Bob Sebaste on the occasion of his retirement after 29 years of service in the United States Navy and Coast Guard. Master Chief Sebaste's illustrious military career began as a Staff Instructor in Balston Spa, New York. During his distinguished career, Master Chief Sebaste served assignments throughout the United States as Public Affairs Officer in the US Navy, Leadership Instructor at Coast Guard Air Station in Miami, as well as Maintenance Control Officer for USCG Base, Boston. Notably, for three years, from 1990-1993, he served as an instructor at the Naval Nuclear Power School in Orlando, Florida. Throughout his career, Master Chief Sebaste continued to strive for self-improvement and successfully rose through the ranks. He distinguished himself as a well-respected leader in the US Navy and US Coast Guard. After attending Electronics Technician School, Master Chief Sebaste was commissioned as a Reactor Operator for submarine USS Tecumseh in Charleston, SC. He went on to serve in a variety of positions including Staff Instructor at Reactor Plant Training, Public Affairs Officer in the Operational Test Support Unit and Chief Electronics Technician for the US Coast Guard Cutter MOHAWK Division. Behind every great serviceman and woman is a support network encouraging them to strive for greatness. I offer my gratitude to Master Chief Sebaste's wife, Betty, a school teacher at Sandpiper Elementary School in Sunrise, Florida, and their three children Rachel, Walter and Christopher. Following in his father's footsteps, Christopher Sebaste is currently a Staff Sergeant in the United States Air Force, stationed in Okinawa, Japan. Mr. Speaker, we owe Master Chief Sebaste our infinite gratitude for his boundless devotion and years of service to our nation. It is because of individuals like Master Chief Sebaste that our nation remains safe and secure. I am honored and truly privileged to recognize Master Chief Bob Sebaste for his dedication to the US Navy and Coast Guard over the past 29 years, and offer him my best wishes for continued good health and success in the years to come.

Mr. HASTINGS

Mr. HASTINGS. That is certainly allowed. Anytime before July 30, the measure could be brought to the floor, and it could be brought to the floor without any notice to the membership because it is a motion to reconsider. It is a part of this particular rule sought by the Speaker of the House, I might add, and therefore it could be brought at any time under the aegis of the Speaker's authority.

Mr. HASTINGS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume, and I thank the gentleman, my friend from Georgia, for yielding the customary 30 minutes for debate. Mr. Speaker, this rule provides for consideration of H.R. 2596, the Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2016, as well as provides that the motion to reconsider the vote on passage of the Trade Adjustment Assistance measure may continue to be postponed until the end of the legislative day on July 30. First, I commend the efforts of Chairman Nunes and Ranking Member Schiff for their effort in crafting a bill with largely bipartisan support that provides our Nation's intelligence community with the resources they need to keep us safe. Our national security relies on the continued strength of our intelligence community. As we face ongoing security challenges both at home and abroad from threats such as ISIL, lone wolf attacks, the emergence of cybercrime, as well as the specter of unknown challenges that may be awaiting us, a strong intelligence apparatus is of the utmost importance. This legislation will do much to meet those challenges. Specifically, this bill supports investments in cutting-edge technology like spy satellites, enhances our Nation's human intelligence capabilities, provides resources to safeguard valuable signals intelligence collection, and partners with our foreign allies to maximize the reach of our intelligence efforts. This investment in our country's intelligence infrastructure comes at a critically important time. As you know, the Office of Personnel Management recently suffered a disastrous breach. Hackers were able to target OPM and gain access to personnel data, including employees' names, addresses, Social Security numbers, and numerous other personal details. Perhaps most disturbing, OPM houses the applications and files submitted by those applying for security clearances, with data going back until 1985. These files were compromised as well, leading some experts to argue that the compromise of these files could have tremendous negative effects for our human intelligence gathering capabilities. These cyber attacks represent a critical threat to our national security. We all love the convenience that technology provides us, but we must also be prepared to invest in technologies that will protect us from those who wish to sabotage our security in the virtual world. It is time for the OPM to implement and abide by best practices so that we never face a data breach like the one we saw last week. To the extent that Congress will play a role in securing our virtual infrastructure, we should work as quickly as possible to ensure that our employees and our most sensitive material are not needlessly exposed to those who wish to do us harm. Mr. Speaker, while I support the strong national security protections this authorization provides, I am extremely disappointed yet again in how my Republican colleagues have skirted the fiscal cuts imposed by sequestration in order to fund the things that they care about, while ignoring the effects such fool-headed cuts have on the vital domestic programs that they don't seem to care about. We have people hurting all over this Nation because of this irresponsible and senseless policy of sequestration. Republicans claim to be using this policy as an important tool to rein in out-of-control government spending; yet, when sequestration affects programs and areas of the budget they care about, they magically get around this dilemma by using accounting gimmicks. That is just what they have done here in this measure. The majority has yet again used the overseas contingency operations account to evade sequestration spending caps. Wouldn't it be nice if Republicans wanted to evade spending caps for the Department of Education so that we can get around sequestration and properly educate our children? Or if they could use accounting tricks to get around sequestration to fully fund and repair our crumbling infrastructure? Or if they were also inclined to use their budgetary magic to get around sequestration caps to properly fund critically important agencies like the Environmental Protection Agency so that our children and grandchildren can continue to have access to clean water and clean air? Alas, all we get from the majority is more of the same budgetary double standard, using tricks to get around spending caps on things you like to spend money on and then cry, ``sequester, sequester,'' on things you don't like to spend money on. Let's stop pretending. That isn't a plan to rein in government spending. That is just spending taxpayer money on things you deem worthy of unfettered spending and ignoring programs, for political reasons, that you don't even like, even though such programs remain vital to our country's success. Mr. Speaker, many on my side of the aisle have taken issue with the detention facility in Guantanamo Bay since day one; I certainly have. Once again, the Republicans look to continue the operation of this prison, when we should be working to bring about its orderly closure. We are better than this prison. As a country dedicated to the rule of law, as a country that inspires people the world over to work for and even die for the establishment of democratic rule, we are better than this prison. This prison is an exercise in Kafkaesque justice, which has long worked to undermine our standing with our allies and helped terrorist organizations recruit more and more fighters. Look, I don't think that anyone is arguing that, if we close the prison, then the myriad terrorist groups who use it as a recruiting tool will no longer have people joining their ranks, but it would be one less arrow in their quiver. For that reason, we need to work together to close the prison as quickly as possible. In doing so, we will not jeopardize the safety of our country, but will act more fully to reflect our commitment to democracy and the rule of law. We know and I know, having been in the judiciary, that our justice system is more than capable of handling the prosecution of terrorists, no matter where they are, including those held in Guantanamo Bay. We have successfully tried Richard Reid, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, Faisal Shahzad, and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev--the Boston bomber--and we have either sentenced them to death or life imprisonment in our most secure prisons. At last night's Rules Committee meeting, my friends on the other side of the aisle decided to make a last-minute change to today's rule--or, I might add, to further pollute today's rule. That last-minute change allows for the postponement of the motion to reconsider TAA. Over the course of my tenure in Congress, I voted to support thousands of pieces of legislation. In the 20-plus years that I have served in this body, I can think of only three votes which I deeply regret making, and one of those was in support of NAFTA. In the years since, I have seen after NAFTA a decrease in American jobs, a rollback of critical environmental protections here and in Mexico, where I was promised that the environmental circumstances in the maquiladoras would be cleaned up and they were not and a stagnation of wages that has prevented the financial upward mobility of working class and middle class Americans and has ground poor Americans into poverty beyond belief. If we are going to create trade policy that is worthy of future generations, then we must ensure that that policy strengthens, not weakens, labor rights. It must strengthen, not weaken, environmental protections. It must ensure other countries' responsibility to adhere to basic human rights. It must expand and strengthen our middle class, not squeeze hard-working Americans in favor of corporate interests. The legislation included in this rule today is part of a trade package that does nothing to bolster these important priorities. Finally, as I have stated time and again, I take issue with the manner in which these important measures are being considered. Legislation as important as the ones at hand deserve an open and transparent process where Members of both parties and both Houses of Congress may debate and offer amendments as they please. This process, envisioned and designed by our Founding Fathers to serve as a safeguard to democracy, continues to be eroded by the majority's insistence on grouping multiple, unrelated bills together under one rule and limiting the number of amendments that can be made in order, as well as the time available for debate. There were amendments offered last night. For example, Congresswoman Speier offered whistleblower protection, not made in order. My colleague Representative Schweikert from Arizona and I offered a very sensible measure under the intelligence provision to allow for us, as a sense of Congress only, to say that we will participate with Tunisia's intelligence operation in a more pronounced manner--totally innocuous, but at the very same time, helping a country that may very well make the bridge to democracy and certainly has been an ally in intelligence--and a needed one, in light of the number of people that come up from north Africa through Tunisia and wind up fighting in the Middle East. If we are truly to operate as the deliberative body the U.S. House of Representatives was created to function as, we must do more to ensure that our Nation's most critical pieces of legislation are afforded the time and consideration they rightly deserve. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. HASTINGS. Mr. Speaker, at this time, I am very pleased to yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentlewoman from Connecticut (Ms. DeLauro).

Mr. HASTINGS. Mr. Speaker, at this time, I am waiting for one additional speaker, but perhaps I can engage in a colloquy with my colleague from Texas.

Mr. HASTINGS. I yield the gentleman an additional 30 seconds.

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

Mr. HASTINGS. I think you are absolutely correct, and it is unprecedented. At the very same time, as my friend from Georgia pointed out, they have done so transparently by putting it here, but that does not mean it would not be used at some point in the future.

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

Mr. HASTINGS. Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Georgia (Mr. David Scott), my good friend.

Mr. HASTINGS. Mr. Speaker, at this time, I am very pleased to yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson Lee), my good friend.

Mr. HASTINGS. Mr. Speaker, at this time, I am very pleased to yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Texas (Mr. Doggett).

Mr. HASTINGS. Mr. Speaker, at this time, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from California (Mr. Sherman).

Mr. HASTINGS. I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, perhaps I should say to the membership of this body that if they vote against this rule, it doesn't mean that we would not have an intelligence authorization. It simply would mean that those of us-- my friend from Georgia and myself--would have to go back to the Rules Committee and fashion a rule that does not include an unprecedented matter that should not be in this Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2016 in the first place. And toward that end, among the things that were sought to be included, if we were going to include the TAA measure, then the ranking member, Ms. Slaughter, proposed on behalf of the minority that we also include a vote on the Trans-Pacific Partnership, TPP, for the reason, one, TAA was overwhelmingly--3-1--defeated; TPP passed by a very thin margin. So if we are going to twist arms and find methodologies to employ to try to change the minds of Members over a 6-week period of time, then perhaps it would be those of us who are opposed to the measure would have an opportunity to try to persuade some of those people who caused the thin margin of it to pass on TPP. We felt that was a fairness measure. At least if you were going to include it, that should have been included as well. Before proceeding, Mr. Speaker, perhaps I should learn how much time each side has at this time.

Mr. HASTINGS. Will the gentleman yield for just a question?

Mr. HASTINGS. Mr. Speaker, all of the things that the gentleman from Georgia said are in the measure are true. But does he also agree that it is unprecedented that we have included a measure to delay an already-voted-on rule? Never before has that been done. Or to your knowledge, has it been?

Mr. HASTINGS. I yield the gentlewoman an additional 30 seconds.

Mr. HASTINGS. Many of those measures in a 5\1/2\-hour, into-the-night session that the Rules Committee operated.

Mr. HASTINGS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time. I would urge that Members understand that we have already voted on this measure, and it was defeated, as I say, 3-1. Robust funding for our intelligence infrastructure is clearly needed and, indeed, welcomed, but enough is enough. It is time for Republicans to stop squeezing important domestic programs through their arbitrary implementation of sequester. We must invest in education in this country; we must invest in our decaying infrastructure; we must invest in a clean environment; and we must invest in a strong middle class. Republicans want to make investments in our intelligence community. Great. So do I. We all do. But at some point, we have to start asking: What is it that that community is protecting? Without investments in education, infrastructure, and our middle class, we risk undermining what makes this country so exceptional and worth protecting in the first place. I urge a ``no'' vote on the rule, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. HASTINGS

Mr. HASTINGS. Mr. Speaker, it is my distinct honor to rise today to recognize and commemorate the centennial anniversary of the Port of Palm Beach located in Palm Beach County, Florida. Since its founding in 1915, the Port of Palm Beach has grown and flourished, maintaining a superior standard of work while enriching the surrounding county and community. The Port now stands as the fourth busiest container port in Florida and 18th in the nation. Some two million tons of cargo, valued at greater than $5 billion dollars passes through the Port annually, which further serves to highlight the substantial contribution the Port makes to the state at large. This heavy load and its many years of service have not dissuaded the Port from expanding its enterprise, however, and just this year the Port celebrated the maiden voyage of a new cruise liner. Now with nearly 3,000 Floridians under its employ, the Port of Palm Beach is an industrial powerhouse, helping to fuel South Florida's development and contributing millions in revenue to Florida's economy. Most remarkable is the Port's record of self-sustenance, as it has been nearly 40 years since the Port last levied any sort of tax on the citizens of Palm Beach County. Mr. Speaker, the Port of Palm Beach is a cornerstone of the greater Florida community and a model of excellence. I applaud the Port's many years of success and wish it many more years of prosperity and progress.

Mr. HASTINGS

Mr. HASTINGS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Before making my remarks, I just want to say in a challenging way to the chairman of the Rules Committee that if we were to fix a bridge, it takes people to fix that bridge. And the people who fix that bridge spend their money in the local areas and pay taxes, which brings revenue back in. And that is why we need to fix bridges, in my judgment. I am pleased at this time to yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern), my good friend with whom it is a pleasure to serve with on the Rules Committee.

Mr. HASTINGS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern).

Mr. HASTINGS. Mr. Speaker, I would ask that you ask my good friend, the chairman of the Rules Committee, if he is ready to close. I have no additional speakers at this time.