Denny Heck

Mr. HECK of Washington

Mr. HECK of Washington. Mr. Speaker, I thank Ranking Member Waters. Mr. Speaker, this is a strange day. I almost feel like we are existing in parallel universes. On the one hand, today--today--is the deadline for the Rules Committee to meet to structure debate on a budget resolution. But it is clear by now that there will be no floor consideration of a resolution today or tomorrow or the day after or very possibly ever. Instead, the headlines in Capitol Hill news publication after publication are all about how the appropriations process has descended into ``chaos.'' ``Chaos.'' So we have that on the one hand. Then on the other hand we have a bill on the floor that subjects the Financial Stability Oversight Council to that very same chaotic appropriations process. On the one hand, the appropriations process is in chaos. On the other hand, this bill moves valuable, critical, and important economic regulators into that same chaotic appropriations process. Have you ever heard the expression: Does the left hand know what the right hand is doing? When the majority talks about putting agencies in the appropriations process, I hear a lot of high-minded talk and rhetoric--and appropriately so--about the Constitution and our Founding Fathers. How would Alexander Hamilton have funded the FSOC? Frankly, I think it is great to ask those questions. I ask myself those questions every day. Everyone who takes the oath of office and has the privilege to stand here ought to keep grasping for the answers to those questions. And how appropriate this week. Yesterday was Thomas Jefferson's birthday. So I was going back and rereading something about him, his philosophies and contributions. Absolutely. We should all do that. But we also have a responsibility to stay anchored in reality, to lay down laws for the country and the Congress we have--the Congress we have--not the country and Congress we all wish we had. We live in an era of huge, complex financial markets, and we have learned again and again and again that those markets fail, sometimes wiping out $13 trillion in net worth in this country in a month. That is devastating. Somebody has to be looking at the whole system and working to shore up its weaknesses. We live in an era of a broken appropriations process. It is chaotic. Today's Congress is not Madison's perfect vision. Regardless of the ideals of article I of the Constitution, the reality today is that moving an agency into a chaotic appropriations process is to subject that agency to that very same chaos, to uncertain funding, to the risk of shutdown and backroom deals. So let's find a budget resolution, fix the appropriations process, and then maybe, just maybe, we can talk about moving agencies into the appropriations process.

Mr. HECK of Washington

Mr. HECK of Washington. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to support H.R. 812, the Indian Trust Asset Reform Act, and I commend it to you for your positive consideration. When you stop and think about it, this word ``trust'' actually has two pretty distinct meanings. It can be the belief that someone or something is honest, trustworthy, the belief that you can take them at their word. On the other hand, ``trust'' can also be a financial or a property arrangement. A trust is legally held or managed by someone else. It could be for your kids or your grandkids or any beneficiary. But the irony is a trust in the property management sense is that that often arises out of a lack of trust, as in honesty, when it comes to the person or source receiving the money. It is not a check handed over. It is a financial arrangement with conditions or requirements. When it comes to Indian Country, they have plenty of historical reasons to lack trust when it comes to the Federal Government; but, the Federal Government does not have reasons to not trust Indian Country's ability to manage their own resources, and natural resources are what have always been the most important asset in Indian Country. The Indian Trust Asset Reform Act is based on the simple notion that Indian Country prospers when tribes have the opportunity to make their own decisions and chart their own paths. This is what self- determination looks like. This is what sovereignty looks like. Many tribes, particularly those in my home State of Washington, are among the largest employers and natural resource managers in the entire region. Tribes in the Pacific Northwest have an abundance of trust resources on their land, from timber to rangeland, to fishery resources. These tribes count on the ability to make decisions quickly to adjust to changing circumstances and to maintain vibrant communities for their members and the region as a whole. H.R. 812 advances this idea by giving tribes new authority to propose and enter into management plans with the Department of Interior, plans that put the tribes in the driver's seat. H.R. 812 also returns more control to tribal members, who are often frustrated by, as has been noted earlier, years-long delays that they must go through in obtaining Federal approval to sell or lease or otherwise manage their trust lands. H.R. 812 would give individuals and tribes a new option to complete these transactions without having to wait for the Department of Interior to go through all that lengthy review and approval process. Accordingly, it will save time, it will save money, but, most importantly, it will allow the tribes to make their own decisions about how to use their historic lands. When we find commonsense fixes like this, we restore some of the trust, in the first meaning of the word, and build upon the trust that is already there. Twenty-seven years ago, if I may make a personal note, I had the privilege to join the office of Governor Booth Gardner in a role that would quickly become chief of staff. Fairly shortly, we signed off on a document known as the Centennial Accord. My good friend and colleague from Washington State will recall it well. Basically, it was the first memorialization in the history of the United States that recognized the government-to-government relationship between the tribes and the State of Washington. I have said regularly since, in an intermittent public service career extending back 40-some years, I have no higher point of pride than the small role I played in that, lo, those many years ago. Accordingly, I would like to thank Congressman Simpson very much for his leadership on this bill and for allowing me the privilege to be the Democratic lead cosponsor. I would like to add my expression of gratitude to Chairman McClintock and the gentlewoman from Massachusetts (Ms. Tsongas) as well as our ranking member, all those involved. I would like to thank the Affiliated Tribes of Northwest Indians and its Trust Reform Committee. Let it not go unsaid that there was a decade of work leading up to today, a decade of work. ``Sovereignty'' means sovereignty. ``Government-to-government'' means just exactly that. The fact of the matter is we have a moral and a legal and sometimes a treaty obligation to fulfill that government-to- government relationship. It is the right thing to do. It is in that spirit that I submit H.R. 812 for your favorable consideration.

Mr. HECK of Washington

Mr. HECK of Washington. Mr. Chair, as a fellow Washingtonian, might I just observe that you make that dais look good. I actually counterintuitively want to start out by thanking my friend, the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Luetkemeyer), for taking this issue on. We had a problem in a lot of communities around the country with businesses getting access to the banking system, and I know he worked this very hard last year. He investigated; he talked to banks, businesses, and regulators; and he actually negotiated a solution with the FDIC that he had pushed and pushed until they actually adopted it. It was a good solution. In fact, part of this bill would essentially codify that. What it would say is, you can't use FIRREA to go after whole sectors of the economy. It has to be specifically and individually based. You have to have a reason to believe that an individual business was engaged in fraud if you were going to use the banking system to get at them. Good solution, constructive solution. My hat is off to you, sir. Unfortunately, this bill, as has been suggested earlier, goes farther. Section 3 makes it a lot harder for the Department of Justice to investigate financial solutions because, as has been suggested, it takes direct and specific aim at the powers under FIRREA, as the gentleman from Minnesota had indicated. It puts limits on them as to when subpoenas can be issued. To me, frankly, that is a solution in search of a problem. FIRREA has been the key statute in going after fraud that, in fact, helped lead to the Great Recession and the crisis, and the wiping out of $13 trillion in net worth. Frankly, I am one of those people who believes we need more prosecutions, not fewer, for all the damage and harm done to Americans throughout this land. I am very reluctant to embrace any language that substantially weakens or obstructs FIRREA's ability to investigate fraud. I do agree with my friend that investigations and our oversight of them could be improved by requiring a paper trail. I worked with him to see if we could find a compromise that did that, but we couldn't. So ultimately, we had to disagree, and this is a disagreement that I will characterize as being a very strong one. The truth of the matter is, in the last two calendar years alone, FIRREA was the operative statute which led to $40 billion in fines and recoveries being levied. Truth be told, it is very, very unlikely, if not highly unlikely, that any of those $40 billion in fines or restitution could have been recovered if the language of this legislation had been in effect; $20 billion of which was restitution to harmed parties, people who lost their homes inappropriately because they had had fraud perpetuated upon them. I don't think that is what the American public wants right now. I think the American public is still eager for some accountability for the actions and behavior that led to the Great Recession.

Mr. HECK of Washington. So I join in the chorus of my colleagues who suggest that this bill is actually not just a step backward but two giant steps backward. There is an issue here that could be worked on. This is not the right solution; and, I might add, it is not going to become law because it has already been indicated by the executive branch this probably isn't going anywhere. I would entreat you--in the spirit of trying to find a solution to a real problem--please, let us set aside, vote ``no,'' and not enact that which is a solution in search of a problem that doesn't exist and, in fact, does considerable harm to the American public and to our ability to hold people accountable.

Mr. HECK of Washington

Mr. HECK of Washington. Mr. Speaker, just last week we were home celebrating Thanksgiving, and we were giving thanks for everything we are blessed with, everything we cherish--frankly, probably a lot of the things we take for granted. For those of us in the Pacific Northwest, we give thanks for the Puget Sound, we give thanks for our salmon, we give thanks for all the natural beauty that surrounds us, and we give thanks that Billy Frank Jr. was in our lives. As was indicated earlier, in addition to the many other awards he received in his lifetime, just last week the President conferred upon Billy Frank Jr., posthumously, the Presidential Medal of Freedom. It is literally no exaggeration to suggest that what Martin Luther King meant to civil rights and Nelson Mandela meant to South Africa, Billy Frank Jr. meant to the entire Pacific Northwest, indeed, to indigenous people throughout the globe. He is a fitting person for the prestigious honor that we hope to bestow on him today. We have an opportunity to do something today--and I recommend we seize it--to preserve his legacy in the place he called home. Billy Frank Jr. was, indeed, the foremost advocate for restoration of Native American fishing treaty rights in the Pacific Northwest. He cherished clean water and healthy salmon runs. He was a key voice in the recovery of the Puget Sound. He also, as has not been mentioned, proudly served our Nation in the United States Marine Corps. He was an MP, I believe, during the Korean war. He got along with everyone. He was open and inclusive. His energy was, literally, infectious. We were deeply stunned in May of 2014 that he passed away even though, at the age of 83, we thought Billy would live forever. He is gone, but his spirit is not and his story is not. His courage and belief in us is here because, you see, Billy wandered the Halls of Congress frequently and testified numerous times. He respected this institution, and he was a powerful voice within our Chambers. His story is in the Nisqually National Wildlife Refuge in the 10th Congressional District, which I have the privilege to represent, which we now protect to give our wildlife a clean and sustainable home. Billy grew up at a place called Frank's Landing, which is literally just a hop, skip, and a jump from the refuge. He fished in the Nisqually River, in and next to the area where the refuge is now. That is the location where he was arrested more than 50 times for advocating for his treaty fishing rights. This bill will rename that refuge after Billy Frank Jr. Also, as has been indicated, it calls for the establishment of a national memorial at the exact place of the signing of the Medicine Creek Treaty in 1854. That was the first treaty in the State of Washington between Indian people and the newly established territorial government. In this case, it was between the people of the Nisqually, the Puyallup, Squaxin Island, and the Muckleshoots. Throughout his storied career, people often asked Billy: How is it you do this, get up every day and so effectively advocate on behalf of clean water and good fish runs? How do you do that decade after decade? He would always tell them the same thing: Tell your story. So when people go to the Billy Frank Jr. Nisqually National Wildlife Refuge, they will be able to see why he held fish-ins. They will see why he risked arrest. They will see why he ultimately worked with others to help protect his home. Like many young people today, he fought for what he believed in, but later worked with lawmakers to build consensus. He started out as a civil rights protestor, civilly disobedient and an advocate. He ended up being one of the great uniters in the history of the Nation and certainly the Pacific Northwest. I hope that when people drive by the sign that directs them to the refuge, maybe they will feel a little of that Billy magic, too. Maybe they will wonder: Well, who was this Billy Frank Jr.? What did he do? For those of us who knew him, it will be a frequent reminder of this hero. They say you die twice: the first time, and the second time when they stop speaking about you. It is our goal that they never stop speaking about Billy Frank Jr. and the lessons he taught us all. The refuge will be a constant reminder. I knew Billy for almost 40 years. I loved him like a beloved uncle. In fact, I called him Uncle Billy. But I was absolutely not special in that regard. Hundreds, if not thousands, of people did the same thing. Indeed, at his memorial service, the official estimate of the number in attendance was 10,000. That is how beloved this man was. I would like to thank the members of the House Committee on Natural Resources who unanimously approved this bill and all the members of the House delegation from Washington State. I would also like to especially recognize Chairman Bishop, Ranking Member Grijalva, and the hardworking committee staff, both for the majority and the minority, for their help on this legislation. In conclusion, Billy once famously said: ``I don't believe in magic. I believe in the sun and the stars, the water, the tides, the floods, the owls, the hawks flying, the river running, the wind talking. They're measurements. They tell us how healthy things are. How healthy we are. Because we and they are the same.'' Let's remind visitors that we and they are the same at the Billy Frank Jr. Nisqually Wildlife Refuge.

Mr. HECK of Washington

Mr. HECK of Washington. Their rule is to break the back of inflation. Their rule is to achieve increased employment. That is the rule they use. Exercising, yes, judgment based upon ever-changing economic circumstances. But to suggest that you can arbitrarily apply a formula without being willing to advance the formula, you want disclosure, you want transparency? Start with you. Put your rule on the table. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. HECK of Washington. Mr. Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. HECK of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself 1\1/2\ minutes. Where is it? Bring it. If it is not the Taylor rule, it is some other rule that is going to work magically to achieve price stability and full employment, you think it exists somewhere? The Taylor rule is what is essentially referenced in the bill. You say: But it isn't required. Okay. There is a better rule? Show your hand. It is time to lay your cards down. If there is actually some kind of mathematical magic formula that can always trump human judgment and changing economic circumstances, lay it on the table. But you haven't done it.

Mr. HECK of Washington. Mr. Chair, I yield myself 2\1/2\ minutes. Thus far, this has been an interesting debate that seems to have mostly revolved around a philosophical point. On the one hand, you have arguments for increased transparency and accountability. On the other hand, you have arguments against increased political interference by this institution. I have always proceeded with the assumption that philosophical debates are irreconcilable in a lot of regards because you have to presume that the other side has a point of view. This is not why I oppose the underlying bill. Although I hasten to add, why anybody would ever want to give more authority and control over the levers of the economy to this institution, with its track record in the last several years, including government shutdowns and the like, is beyond me. Again, it is a philosophical debate. Here is what is not debatable: what is proposed in this bill doesn't work. It does not work. Let's back up. Essentially, color it any way you want, this bill argues for the adoption of the so-called Taylor rule. What is that? The Taylor rule was devised by Professor Taylor of Stanford in the 1990s, looking back at the experience of the economy and what the Fed had done using a mixture of GDP, GDP potential and inflation, and he derived a formula. The problem is, again, it does not work. That is why I have offered this amendment, which would provide the Fed the ability to opt out, if we get to a stressful situation where clearly the application of the Taylor rule wasn't working. Here is the deal. I can prove to you that the Taylor rule wouldn't work. Let me show you. We have had a couple of instances in recent history in which we can test the application of the Taylor rule, both against the Fed's mission to achieve price stability as well as achieve full employment. This chart tracks the years 1979 to 1983. The red line is what the chair of the Fed, Mr. Volcker, utilized in the way of the actual Fed fund rates. The blue line is the Taylor rule. You can see that for many years, Mr. Volcker opted for a 5-percent increase over what the Taylor rule would have been. You can also see that Mr. Volcker was right, that he broke inflation. Now, unless we want to return to 12 to 14 percent home mortgages and a 17 to 18 percent inflation rate, we should----

Mr. HECK of Washington. I yield myself an additional 30 seconds. Quickly, here is the chart for the most recent economic crisis. The red line is what the Fed did. The Taylor rule is the blue line. This is unemployment. The Taylor rule would have provided, beginning back in 2010, substantially higher interest rates when unemployment rates were still unacceptably high. The Taylor rule doesn't work. Adopt my amendment. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. HECK of Washington. I would be glad to yield to the gentleman from Texas out of my extreme respect for both you and the prime sponsor of the bill.

Mr. HECK of Washington. Mr. Chairman, with all due respect to my friend from Michigan, you didn't put the formula in the bill because it doesn't exist. If it did, you would have put it in. If there would have been an absolute magic formula that would keep this economy at full employment and price stability, we would have it on the table, but no such formula exists. That is why you didn't put it in the bill. It doesn't exist. Adopt the amendment. Allow the Fed to do the job to achieve price stability and full employment. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. HECK of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. HECK of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, the purpose of this amendment is to ask the Fed to build a time machine because, frankly, that is the only way that this bill works. You see, the fact of the matter is that, when Mr. Taylor, Professor Taylor, devised his study, which was groundbreaking, was important, he did so in the 1990s, looking back over the previous 10 years which, as I indicated earlier, was an unusually fairly stable period of time, unusually fairly stable, not an exceptional performance, good or bad, in the economy. He did so with the benefit of data that had been updated over time, because, you see, the Bureau of Economic Analysis doesn't just do one fixed number that people get to rely on. In fact, in the first year they put out not one, not two, but three updates, called the advanced estimate, the preliminary estimate, and the final estimate. But wait, there is more, to quote the Ronco ad. The next year they update again. That is called the annual reestimate. But wait, there is more. Every 5 years they do a benchmark reestimate. That is the data that Professor Taylor had the advantage of. In essence, to ask the Fed to utilize or apply the Taylor rule or any such thing like it, which does not exist, is to ask them to have the benefit of data which is not final. I don't know about you, but every month when the unemployment numbers come out, I have begun to view them pretty skeptically over the years. We all know the reason for that: because they get revised so much--so much. At the beginning of President Obama's first term, when he indicated, as is often cited, that he would act to get unemployment no higher than 8 percent, he was doing so on the basis of the first estimate, which said it was 6.7 percent or something like that. The revision was 7.8 percent 3 months later. So the fact of the matter is the Taylor rule or anything like it has the advantage of hindsight, which no rule can fully incorporate. The purpose of this amendment--vote for it, vote against it--is if you want to do this, build yourself a time machine, because that is the only way you can reasonably, with any sense of scholarship and solid research, be able to devise a formula that would work because we don't know the conditions until quite sometime later. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. HECK of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I am not often speechless in the face of my friend from Texas' remarks. Look, we cannot perform a calculation without accurate data. If you are going to join me and throw in with H. G. Wells and a great heritage of both literature and cinema history regarding time travel, then I can do nothing but shockingly accept your gracious support of this amendment. Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. HECK of Washington

Mr. HECK of Washington. Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. HECK of Washington. Mr. Chairman, small towns and cities alike have reasons to manage their storm water runoff. Our streams, rivers, lakes, and estuaries are all at risk of dangerous pollution following a downpour. Trust me, those of us from western Washington know this full well, and places like Puyallup, Washington, are actually finding ways to adjust their neighborhoods to protect surrounding waterways from pollution. Since 2009, Puyallup has helped residents install rain gardens to absorb the rainfall. These rain gardens are linked by pipes that collect the excess water from the roofs and direct it to the gardens rather than to the streets and then into the sewer. This is just one innovation of several great ideas that are innovated throughout this country in places like Puyallup. My amendment today builds on the success on the ground by simply asking the Department of Transportation to develop best practices for storm water management, to collect the information, and a guide on how to implement, install, and maintain green storm water infrastructure, and help any State that requests help with the development of such a plan--a voluntary program, not a requirement, no new money. Many of these innovative infrastructure practices--permeable pavement, natural drainage swales, green roofs--are economical and increase property values and invest in the people that make their careers designing and building these inventions. These new tools are both flexible and yield a strong return on investment. The people of Puyallup, Washington, get that. They know and I know and you know that we can't let water carry oil from our cars, pesticide from our lawns, and other pollutants into Clarks Creek or the Puyallup River or the Puget Sound. We can't do that and keep a strong economy or a desirable location for business and living. We can't let runoff kill, as an example, our cherished Coho salmon. So I ask you to support the promise of these innovative economical ideas to manage our storm water and to get DOT involved. This is the best of federalism. No new money, no mandatory program, just a way to get the information out, which the Federal U.S. DOT is in the perfect position to collect and make available. Mr. Chair, I yield to the gentleman from the Sixth Congressional District of Washington (Mr. Kilmer).

Mr. HECK of Washington. Mr. Chairman, may I inquire as to how much time I have remaining?

Mr. HECK of Washington. With all due respect to the chair of the committee, that isn't included in the current legislation and is clearly not the intent of the amendment. The intent of the amendment is to ask them to accumulate best practices. Yes, they have programs where they promote and they advocate. This is to ask them to go out and find these programs like we talked about in Puyallup which are unusual and innovative and which aren't yet in the manual so that they can share. This is information sharing on a scale that they don't currently do. In fact, Mr. Chairman, it would help with a serious problem; but given the Chair's opposition to this, I will only ask that he consider taking a deeper dive into what we are trying to accomplish here because it solves a problem.

Mr. HECK of Washington. Mr. Chair, I withdraw my amendment.

Mr. HECK of Washington

Mr. HECK of Washington. Madam Chair, let's begin with the facts. The facts are this: every single killing amendment being offered tonight is, in fact, being sponsored by somebody who voted against passage of the Ex-Im. They don't want to improve the Ex-Im. They want to kill the Ex-Im. The fact is the 20 percent target in current law, with all due respect to one of the previous speakers, is not a requirement. It is a target. Stop saying requirement. Words matter. That is misleading, and it is wrong. The fact is nearly 90 percent--90 percent--of all transactions of the Ex-Im go to small businesses. I can't help it that Jenny's Pickles, a jar thereof, sells for infinitely less than a Boeing airplane or that Manhasset music stands sell for infinitely less. The fact of the matter is 90 percent of their transactions go to small businesses. The fact of the matter is Economics 101. Please hear me sometime: the Boeing Airplane Company has 14,800 businesses in its supply chain and 6- to 8,000 are small. Reject the amendment.

Mr. HECK of Washington. Mr. Chairman, two quick points. First, let's not quite leave this issue of the irregular order and nature of what we are doing. Let's all remember one thing. Not only are all the people who are advancing amendments here today opponents of the Ex-Im and want to kill it, but they also, many of them, sat in the committee and voted against an amendment to the budget views and estimates that suggested that reauthorization of the Ex-Im ought to be subjected to regular order. They have already made their position clear: no regular order. They not only don't want regular order, they don't want the Ex-Im. No, it is not 700 and however many countries that have export credit authority; it is only 59. It is every other developed nation on the face of the Earth. The Chinese have not one, but four, export credit authorities. In the last 2 years, they financed as much as our Export- Import Bank has in its 81-year history. Let me leave you with this one thought: I know a lot of you on that side of the aisle read The Wall Street Journal. I hope you saw the Business section 2 days ago. The headline is, ``China Rolls Out First Large Passenger Jet''--The Wall Street Journal. I warned here about a year ago they were developing the C919. There it is. There is the picture. They also indicate in here that they have the C929, which is a double aisle, wide-body jet airplane under development. Do you really want to strike this death blow to the heart of America's manufacturing business? Please vote ``no'' on this and all amendments.

Mr. HECK of Washington. Mr. Chairman, of all of the arguments against the Export-Import Bank, this is my favorite. Ayn Rand would be thrilled. I am appalled. Of all of the arguments, private lenders will be crowded out. Private lenders will be displaced. Private lenders: ``Woe is me. You are taking away our business.'' Yet no one ever--not once--has answered the question: Why is it then that the American Bankers Association and the Independent Community Bankers Association are among the strongest supporters of this? It is because--and the truth of the matter is--markets aren't perfect, and they don't work in certain circumstances. Where don't they work? They don't work with low-cost items: Miss Jenny's Pickles, Manhasset Music Stands, PEXCO's Traffic Cones. Why? It is because a small bank doesn't have the wherewithal to collect across an international border, and a big bank isn't going to bother with that low volume of a transaction. A big bank isn't going to bother with Miss Jenny's Pickles or with Manhasset Music Stands. It is not worth it to them. That is why they see that markets aren't perfect. There are certain instances in which they fail, and that is why they support the reauthorization of the Export-Import Bank. We, actually, ought to be very proud of them. Sometimes it is used as a point of criticism. ``You know they only finance 1 or 2 percent. Who needs them? It is such a small amount.'' You ought to take that as a point of pride. We are laser-focused on exactly where the need is-- where the market isn't perfect. We are not subsidizing. We are, in fact, compensating for an imperfect market. Perhaps it is China that is subsidizing with their four export credit authorities, which, again, in the aggregate, have loaned more in the last 2 years or have financed more than we have in our 81-year history. We are laser-focused where the market doesn't exactly work--small cost items. Large-lived capital items, that is the other issue. Who is going to collect across an international border? I urge you to vote ``no'' because the private sector wants you to vote ``no.''

Mr. HECK of Washington. Mr. Chair, let's remind everybody that it has been asserted here that you would pass this amendment to protect taxpayers, and the exact opposite is the truth. The truth is, for a generation, the Export-Import Bank has transferred money into the U.S. Treasury to reduce the deficit. If you want to reduce the deficit, vote ``no'' on this amendment. It has also been suggested that these amendments somehow constitute reform as opposed to the underlying bill. It is not true. This is the biggest package of reforms ever enacted for Ex-Im. It does the following: increases small-business target from 20 to 25 percent, codifies the chief risk officer and the risk management committee, provides and requires external audits of fraud controls, provides for upgrades and modernization of IT long overdue, expands loss reserves to 5 percent, reduces exposure of the portfolio from $140 billion to $135. Lastly, it has a pilot program for a reinsurance program shifted to the private sector. This is a reform bill without these amendments. These amendments are designed to kill the bill. Vote ``no'' on the bill. Vote for reform. Vote ``no'' on the amendments.

Mr. HECK of Washington. Mr. Chairman, the gentleman from South Carolina suggested that the Export-Import Bank was a political extension of this administration. If that is true, let's be real clear: it has been a political extension of every single administration since it was created in 1934. All 13 Presidents have supported the Export-Import, all 13--Democrats and Republicans, liberals and conservatives. Sixteen times it has bean reauthorized in this Chamber. Virtually every time, it was done unanimously and overwhelmingly. In earlier remarks, the other gentleman suggested that those of us who oppose these amendments are trying to have it both ways. They also say that we try to pick winners and losers with the Export-Import Bank. Well, this amendment is exhibit A in picking winners and losers. It compels diversification. It is not based on need and not based on creditworthiness. Diversification for diversification's sake, that is not what a good bank does, and that is not what the Export-Import Bank does. The Export-Import Bank meets a specific need in the marketplace; and when it does it, it creates jobs, jobs for Americans. Oppose this amendment. Oppose all amendments.