George Miller

Mr. MILLER of California

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the legislation before us this afternoon which is ill-timed, overly broad, and unnecessary. But I wish to make it absolutely clear to my colleagues, to the President, and to my constituents the exact meaning of my vote today. My vote against this bill today is a vote to endorse the peace process now underway to resolve the war in Bosnia. My vote today is a vote in favor of peace. But my vote against this bill is in no way a blanket endorsement for the President of the United States to send American troops to Bosnia at his discretion. It is my hope that American troops will never be called to serve in Bosnia. But should that ever become necessary, it will be the U.S. Congress, acting with the President, that will decide whether to approve their participation. Mr. Speaker, the war in Bosnia is a tragedy. It is time for the parties to breach their differences and rebuild their society. The peace negotiations taking place in Dayton, OH, are critical to that effort and I support this effort. But the President should not misconstrue my vote as an endorsement for his discretionary use of American forces in Bosnia.

Mr. MILLER of California

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong opposition to the conference report. On the basis of the flawed natural resources provisions in title XIII alone, Members should reject this misguided legislation. This is not a serious effort to balance the Federal budget. The conferees have both ignored opportunities to raise real revenues by reducing wasteful subsidies, and missed a chance to improve the management of our public resources. Instead, this conference report resorts to sacrificing a national wildlife refuge to oil exploitation, sanctioning the continued giveaway of mineral-rich public lands at a fraction of their fair-market value, and providing even more corporate welfare for subsidized irrigators. This bill undermines serious efforts at reform, such as those that have passed the House on a bipartisan basis in recent years, by providing inconsequential revenues to qualify their proindustry, antienvironmental policies for the sound efforts at modernizing resource management and saving the taxpayers billions of dollars. The President has remained firm in his commitment to veto any budget reconciliation bill which would open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil and gas development. To include ANWR in this bill not only denies Members an opportunity to full debate and amendments under an open rule, but is an exercise in futility. The majority of the revenues in this title are assumed to come from oil and gas leasing of ANWR. But don't bank on it. There's a phoney bait and switch going on here. To start with, don't believe the accuracy of CBO's assumption of $1.3 billion in Federal revenues from ANWR. Those estimates were based on old projections of $40 a barrel oil, currently less than half that price. By contrast, the administration projects just $850 million in Federal revenues, assuming a 50-percent share goes to the State of Alaska. What the conference report doesn't tell you is that the State of Alaska currently is entitled to a 90-percent share under the Statehood Act of 1958, and Congress may not be able to change that entitlement unilaterally to 50 percent as the conference report proposes. If an all-but-guaranteed lawsuit reduces the Federal share to only 10 percent--a lawsuit predicted by the senior Senator from Alaska as well as the chairman of the House Resources Committee, among others--the Treasury would receive only $260 million instead of the estimated $1.3 billion, using CBO's estimates. And if the administration's lower estimates are correct, then the Treasury will only receive $170 million. That's one-tenth the amount purported to be in the reconciliation bill. The conference report further resorts to trickery in the sections of the bill addressing mining law. The conferees pretend this is real mining reform and that the taxpayers will finally get a fair return from those who have profited royalty-free from public minerals for the past 123 years. But on Wednesday of this week, 230 Members voted to recommit the interior Appropriations Conference Report in part because the mining provisions in the budget bill were deficient. Now, these very same provisions that Members have rejected are back before us today-- insulated from amendment. The mining language purports to abolish the patenting of public lands for pennies. What the conference report really does is to grandfather both the existing patent applications and many existing claim holders, exempting them from any royalties. Patent holders would only have to pay for the public's resources based on the surface value of the land, which is like selling Fort Knox for the value of the roof. The few mining companies that don't make it through the patenting loophole don't need to worry much either. They would pay only the surface value for the mineral-rich land. The 5-percent net royalty is so riddled with deductions that payments would be just $12 million over 7 years according to CBO. Twelve million dollars for billions of dollars in gold, silver, and other valuable minerals. By contrast, in 1993 the House passed a comprehensive mining reform bill that would have collected $90 million annually according to CBO. The conference report also includes more corporate welfare for western irrigators. It approves a prepayment proposal that will allow water districts to prepay at a discounted rate the highly subsidized debt that they owe the treasury for reclamation projects, thereby exempting themselves from the requirements of Federal reclamation law. That means that these farmers, who have grown rich on the subsidies provided by the taxpayers of this Nation that were intended for small farmers, would be relieved from paying the unsubsidized cost for Federal water that is delivered to more than 960 acres of irrigable land. By allowing prepayment at a discounted rate, the notorious irrigation subsidies will be locked in place forever. Only the largest wealthiest irrigation districts will be able to participate in this program. This bill also contains a very harmful and unwise decision to transfer land from the Bureau of land Management to the State of California for use as the Ward Valley low-level radioactive waste disposal facility. This issue has been under intense debate and scientific scrutiny for some time. The National Academy of Sciences review panel raised some concerns about the safety of the site and recommended additional tests before moving forward with the construction of the facility. Secretary Babbitt was involved in final negotiations with the State of California, but those talks broke apart when the State inexplicably refused to provide assurances that the safety tests would, in fact, be conducted by the State prior to construction. And since those talks broke off last month, additional scientists have admitted concealing information about radioactive seepage at another facility run by the Ward Valley contractors in Nevada. This provision is wholly inappropriate to the reconciliation bill because the tiny amount of funding involved--$500,000--is insignificant in budgetary terms. This is a fig leaf being used to drag through a major policy decision that could have serious safety implications for million of Americans. The Senate version of this amendment was removed for procedural reasons, but it has sneaked back into this reconciliation bill. It is yet another example of the Republican majority trampling over sound science and environmental concerns to do the bidding of private industry. It is instructive to note is what is not in this legislation. We could have ended double subsidies to farmers who receive federally subsidized water to grow surplus crops that we are paying other farmers not to grow. We could have eliminated below-cost national forest timber sales that cost more to administer than they raise in revenue. I offered these amendments and others in the Rules Committee which would have raised over $1.5 billion in 7 years--more than even the illusory revenues that the conference report assumes from ANWR. Simply put, the natural resource provisions of this legislation are an outrageous abuse of the public trust. The President will be fully justified in vetoing the conference report.

Mr. MILLER of California

Mr. MILLER of California. I have 1 minute to speak.

Mr. MILLER of California. Why is the Speaker going forward? Because he is angry about his treatment.

Mr. MILLER of California. On the point of order, Mr. Speaker, this chart is in order under the House rules because this chart provides and has provided to 800,000 New Yorkers the explanation of why the Speaker shut down the Government.

Mr. MILLER of California. The point of order, I believe, is to suggest what, that I am holding the cover of the front page of the New York Daily News?

Mr. MILLER of California. The point of order----

Mr. MILLER of California. If I may be heard on the point of order.

Mr. MILLER of California. May I be heard on the point of order?

Mr. MILLER of California. He is upset.

Mr. MILLER of California

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, the country is asking today: Why is the Government shut down? The President has made it clear the Government is shut down because he will not yield to the blackmail on Medicare, on Medicaid, on school lunch, on student loans. What we did not understand is why is the Speaker, why is the Speaker going forward to shut down the Government?

Mr. MILLER of California

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, Members of the House, I rise in strong support of this bipartisan effort to reform the rules of the House with respect to gifts. I, too, will be supporting Speaker Gingrich's substitute for no gifts. I wish he had treated lobbyists differently than the Girl Scouts, but so be it. I think we are better off with no gifts at all than all of the other problems raised by the exemptions. I would seriously hope my colleagues would turn down the Burton amendment. This effort at disclosure is not real disclosure. But what it does is take off all the limits between lobbyists and people with unlimited expense accounts and the special access they have to Members of Congress at events, whether they are billed for charity or for any other. You may disclose under the Burton amendment that you went to charity. What you will not disclose is you played with three oil executives or three people from the homebuilders or three people from the banking industry or from the savings-and-loans. That was not chance. That was set up. It was determined ahead of time because that is how they attracted those people to give money to the charity was to promise them that they could play with the Member of Congress and they could spend time with them over a 3-hour, 4-hour, 5-hour period of time. That will never be disclosed under the Burton resolution. We ought to turn that down. Because disclosure, disclosure will not solve the problem that we have. The problem that we have is that a group of paid people in this town who do very good work on behalf of their clients, whether it is on behalf of teachers or utility companies or home builders or what have you, they do marvelous work, but because of their access to money, because of their access to privilege, they have access to Members far beyond what our constituents have to us. That is not fair, in an area where we are competing for ideas and competing for votes and competing to persuade our colleagues to vote one way or another, and that access that is bought by money must be ended. The bipartisan bill does that. The Speaker's amendment takes it a step further, which I think is worthy of all of our support. Our constituents do not want us to disclose it, they want us [[Page H 13070]] to stop it, and they want us to stop it now.

Mr. MILLER of California

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, that should not be done.

Mr. MILLER of California. The gentleman will not impugn my remarks in that way at all. The gentleman from Alaska [Mr. Young] does not have the time, and he has no right to do that to this Member.

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, I only have 2 minutes. I am sorry; I only have 2 minutes.

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding. Mr. Speaker, I would just like to make a couple of points. One is that the suggestion that when they went from 3.5 royalty to 5.5-royalty that somehow that is an increase in the royalty, but my colleagues really ought to know that there is almost 3.5 payment of royalty exceptions. That means that you will never really get that 5.5-percent royalty, because the companies will be allowed to deduct almost their entire operations, far beyond what is touted as the Nevada law, so that is a huge loophole. The gentleman from Washington suggested that this takes us back to plan P on the Tongass National Forest and that was the preferred plan of the Forest Service. The fact is, that plan was never adopted by the Forest Service, and the fact is that since that time, this Congress of the United States passed a bill to better manage that forest, and that was done with Presidential signature. So there is a lot of suggestions that somehow this is major reform, both in mining and in forestry, but the fact of the matter is it is not. In mining, almost 300,000 claims that have not even made application for a patent are going to be exempted from a royalty should they ever decide to make an application for a patent. That is a loophole that you can drive the entire U.S. Treasury through.

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Colorado [Mr. Skaggs] for yielding this time to me, and I want to thank the gentleman from New York [Mr. Boehlert] for his remarks he just made because I think he outlined very clearly the issue that confronts us both in mining and Tongass. In Tongass we are presented with a radical change from established plan that was passed by both Houses of the Congress and signed by the President of the United States for the management of our largest national forests and our only temperate rain forest in the United States.

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker the point is that this legislation, as is presented to us, not only substantially increases the mandated cut for the Tongass Forest, it also increases a mandated hemorrhage of taxpayer dollars from the Treasury. Over the last 3 years we had a cashflow deficit of the Treasury because of the Tongass of $102 million. We cannot afford to cut these trees in the manner in which they want us to do it under this legislation. As pointed out by the gentleman from New York and others, the Governor of Alaska has asked us not to do it this way. He has asked us to do it within the confines of the management plan that relies on science, relies on the marketplace, and relies on making sure that the Tongass is preserved. Now a number of the Republicans who support this recognize that this is unacceptable to the American public, so they started a plan where the Republicans would plant a tree. Mr. Speaker, if all 234 Republicans plant a tree, and we wait 400 years, we will have about 234,000 board feet from the little trees that they planted, but, if we pass this bill, we will cut 100 million board feet of lumber, more board feet of lumber every year, and 100,000 trees will get cut from the Tongass National Forest, and, as they cut those 100,000 trees, they are going to reach into the taxpayers' pockets in this country and ask us to continue to subsidize forest practices that are mandated, mandated by a couple of Members of Congress that have nothing to do with forest practices, with the ecological health of this rainforest. We should not do that. Others have spoken about the sham of the mining law reform. It is not a royalty, it is a complete, complete loophole, and not only do they not change the royalty to these companies, but they let those individuals that are in the process now of getting patented claims to escape completely from the royalties, so once again we are going to see the Secretary of the Interior award tens of billions of dollars in minerals, and gold, and platinum, and silver to mining companies, and no return to the taxpayer. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the conference report. While there are many good reasons to oppose this legislation and to expect the President to veto it, there are two issues which are included in the motion to recommit to be offered by Mr. Yates which deserve special recognition. One offensive provision is the rider added by the Senate to greatly accelerate logging of the Tongass National Forest in Alaska while, at the same time, removing protections for fish and wildlife and insulating the timber barons from the public planning process and legal challenges. The Tongass rider would suspend environmental and management laws, and would dictate that a discredited 1991 timber plan rule forest management. This unprecedented congressional action would boost logging of the old-growth forest by 100 million board feet annually, or 44 percent over the historic average. By independent calculation, the Tongass timber program already costs the taxpayers more than any other national forest. GAO concluded that the cash-flow deficit to the Treasury was $102 million over the last 3 years. To support the increased logging, this Tongass rider could cost another $18 million in annual subsidies. The Tongass rider ignores new scientific information and even prevents the Forest Service from setting aside habitat to protect fish and wildlife. It is a solution in search of a problem that doesn't exist, because the economy of southeast Alaska is becoming more diverse. It is opposed by the administration, the Governor of Alaska, and significant user groups who depend on the forest resources, including the Alaska Outdoor Council. Recently, the Republican leadership circulated a memo advising that Members could enjoy excellent media opportunities and show their environmental credentials by planting trees in their districts. The same Republican leadership has allowed the Tongass rider to be included in this conference report, demonstrating that this advice is nothing more than a gimmick to cover up their antienvironmental agenda here in Congress. Well, the American people should not be fooled by this kind of trickery. If every Republican Member were to follow the leadership's plot and plant a spruce tree in the Tongass, in about 400 years we could have trees the size of those in the rain forest today. If we wait 400 years and we're lucky, each of the 234 Republican trees could produce about 1,000 board feet, for a total of 234,000 board feet of potential timber. By contrast, this provision in the conference report would accelerate Tongass logging by 100 million board feet every single year, requiring an annual cut of at least 100,000 majestic old-growth trees. Another very good reason to reject the conference report is that it contains a sham mining patent moratorium. The House has voted overwhelmingly and repeatedly to end this multibillion-dollar ripoff of mineral-rich public lands. But this bill does not extend the patent moratorium through the entire fiscal year as we have decided in the past. Instead, the patent moratorium disappears if the mining provisions in budget reconciliation become law. It also can vanish simply if the House and Senate pass identical bills but the President does not sign the bill, though the Justice Department has already concluded that this language is unconstitutional. I doubt more than a handful of Members in this body have even read the mining provisions in reconciliation which are incorporated by reference in this bill. When you do find a copy, what you will learn is that these valuable public lands will continue to be given away for a fraction of their true worth. All a mining conglomerate has to do is pay for the surface value of the land that contains the gold. That is like buying For Knox by paying only for the roof. The proponents will argue that the taxpayers will get a return from a 5-percent net royalty. But read the fine print. There are so many deductions allowed that this royalty is likely to cost more to administer than it will generate in revenue for the Treasury. Make no mistake about it. The vote on the motion to recommit is the real vote this year on mining reform. We won't have a chance for a separate vote on the mining provisions in budget reconciliation. We should reject this conference report and send the President the message that only real reform--a true patent moratorium, a real royalty, and an effective abandoned mine cleanup program--are acceptable. To do otherwise is simply to sanction the continuation of a multibillion- dollar ripoff of the public lands. Mr. Speaker, I could go on and on about the flaws in this conference report. It prevents the National Park Service from implementing the California Desert Protection Act, which we just enacted last Congress. it is cruelly unfair to American Indians who bear a disproportionate amount of the budget cuts in their programs. It fails even to meet the administration's modest request for land and water conservation fund appropriations, despite an $11.2 billion surplus in that dedicated trust fund. Mr. Speaker, this conference report is fiscally and environmentally irresponsible. I urge Members to vote for the motion to recommit.

Mr. MILLER of California. Let the gentleman from Alaska have his own time. The gentleman from Alaska wants to take cheap shots, and he can take them on his own time. The gentleman knows exactly what he did.

Mr. MILLER of California

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, earlier the minority leader suggested that we have a short-term [[Page H 12245]] resolution, and the gentleman from Wisconsin [Mr. Obey] has offered a short-term resolution to this. And the reason is this: Right now CNN is reporting the President is about to go live that the Republicans and the White House have agreed to try and agree, to set aside their differences and agree to try and agree. As the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Stenholm] points out, why would we shout down the Government in the face of that? What is wrong with a 24- hour or 48-hour continuing resolution, so the Committee on Appropriations can continue to do its work, so it can send the transportation bill from the Senate? But this is ridiculous, to start sending people home, calling them back, and sending them home, when in fact the principals now to this agreement have decided they will try and reach an agreement, which is a far different situation than we had an hour ago and we had yesterday. So the point is this: That we do not have to inflict either the cost or the pain on the recipients, the Social Security recipients, the veterans recipients, that the minority leader referenced earlier. We ought to do this and get on with the business of this House and the Congress and finish our work.

Mr. MILLER of California

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, I know that all Members of the U.S. House of Representatives will join me in honoring an outstanding public servant, Donald Freitas, who is going to be leaving his position as a director of the Contra Costa Water District next month. Don Freitas has been one of the great leaders in the effort to preserve and restore the water quality of San Francisco Bay and the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta throughout his 16 year tenure on the board, including his service as its president in 1987-89. He has always been a trusted and valued ally to me as I have waged battle after battle here in the Congress to reform California's water policy and to make it more responsive both to the taxpayers and to the environment. I want to mention some highlights of Don Freitas' service on the board, because he has made many contributions that will endure long after he has moved on to other challenges: Don has served as the manager of the Contra Costa County Clean Water program which is charged with implementing the Federal Clean Water Act storm water pollution program within our county; Don Freitas helped lead the successful fight in 1982 that stopped construction of the Peripheral Canal that was intended to divert much of the delta's water south to farms and cities in other regions of the State, with devastating consequences to the ecology of the delta and San Francisco Bay; Don was a leader in the long effort to build the Los Vaqueros Reservoir which is now under construction to serve the thousands of Contra Costans whose water quality has long been at risk because of the mismanagement of our State's water supply. On these and many other challenges over the years, Don Freitas has demonstrated exceptional vision and leadership, and I am honored to have had him as a colleague and friend. We all join the 400,000 customers of the Contra Costa Water District, and all advocates of water policy reform, in wishing Don Freitas the very best in the future, and in thanking him for his years of dedicated service.

Mr. MILLER of California

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, I think the gentleman from Utah [Mr. Hansen] and the author of this bill, the gentleman from California [Mr. McKeon] have it about right. We agree with the bill. Mr. Speaker, I am a cosponsor of H.R. 924 Representative McKeon asked myself and others to cosponsor this bill because of his deep concern that the placement of the proposed Elsemere Canyon solid waste landfill could negatively his constituents and the local communities. It is obvious from the Resources Committee hearing that this proposed landfill is very controversial. The proposed landfill would be developed on land that is now part of the Angeles National Forest, land that would be acquired through a land exchange between the landfill operator and the Forest Service. While it appears highly likely that the proposed landfill will be rejected under the existing administrative procedures of the Forest Service, House passage of this legislation which will legislatively end any chance of this project going forward. Mr. Speaker, I support H.R. 924 and recommend its adoption by the House. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. (Mr. MILLER of California asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. MILLER of California

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, unfortunately, today the President had to veto the debt limit and will veto the continuing resolution. This should not come as a surprise to those of us who follow the politics and the people involved in this issue, because back in April the Speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich, predicted that he would create a titanic legislative standoff with President Clinton by adding vetoed bills to must-pass legislation increasing the debt limit. In April, the Speaker made a decision that he would bring the government to a halt. But he was assuming that the President would have vetoed a whole series of bills that were to be passed by the Congress between April and now, and he would put those bills back on the debt limit or to a continuing resolution, and the President would have to sign those. He made it clear then that he was prepared to bring the Government down. But what has happened since that time is there has been a massive failure by the Republicans to pass those legislative measures. They have passed only 3 of the 13 appropriations bills. So when the Government shuts down tonight at midnight, it will not affect the Department of Agriculture, because the Department of Agriculture's appropriations bill has passed. But the Republicans have had a massive failure, unlike anything seen in modern Congresses, an inability to pass legislative appropriations billings for the coming fiscal year. So what have they decided to do? They decided to shift the light off of their ineptness and the fact that their party is now captured by the most extreme elements of the Republican Party, and they have decided to shift the light away from that, to suggesting that somehow the President wants to bring the Government to a standstill. The President has made it clear from the time that he passed the clean continuing resolution that we are operating under today back in September, that there was no need to bring the Government to a standstill. When the Republicans passed their bills, we could consider them then and he would either sign or veto them. When the Republicans pass their budget tonight, tomorrow or the end of this week they can be considered then. [[Page H 16949]] But what the Republicans have chosen to do is to try and put a gun to the President's head and say ``Sign this bill or the Government comes doen. Sign this bill, or the Government of the United States, for the first time in history, will default on its credit rate. Sign this bill, or millions of American homeowners will have higher interest rates because of that default.'' That is no way to negotiate. The President of the United States has never given in to terrorists. He cannot give in to these kinds of terrorist activities by the Republicans when they are playing with the credit and well-being of the U.S. Government. A clean CR can be passed through the Congress of the United States in a matter of hours this evening, in the House and Senate. A debt limit can be extended if it is clean in a matter of hours, and the American public need not suffer. The American economy need not suffer that, and America's credit rating in the rest of the world need not suffer that. The Speaker made it clear again in September, he said ``I do not care what the price is. I do not care if we have no Executive offices and no bonds for 30 days. Not this time.'' These are the reckless words of a reckless man, playing with his own ego, playing with his own political fortunes, whether he be up or down in the polls, as opposed to taking care of the business of this Nation, taking care of the economy of this Nation, and taking care of the credit rating of this Nation. This kind of riverboat politics should not be tolerated. They should not be tolerated at a time when he sends a bill to the President suggesting that we are going to have to raise the premiums for Medicare recipients, but we will not address the other problems in Medicare costing money. They did not send to the President a bill to address waste, fraud, and abuse in Medicare. They did not send a bill to the President on the debt limit to address the exorbitant doctors' fees and hospital costs that cannot be justified. They did not address those needs. No, they only addressed what the senior citizens have to increase in premiums, and, of course we know why they are doing that, because they seek to transfer those $270 billion in Medicare savings. They seek to transfer $245 billion to among the richest people in this country, a tax cut that cannot be justified when they are seeking the kinds of cuts that are in the social fabric of this country, when middle income people are not doing as well as they were in 1973. Yet the massive effort that we see here now is all about getting a tax cut, half of which goes to the top 5 percent of the people in the country. It is unacceptable. A clean continuing resolution should be passed, a clean debt limit should be passed, and we should get on with the debate over the bills when the Republicans finally finish their debate within their party and pass those bills.

Mr. MILLER of California

Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, how many more times do the Members of this House and the public have to pick up the newspaper and see a new ethical transgression by the Speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich? Once again, we are treated in the Wall Street Journal to Newt Gingrich mixing campaign contributions, private interests, and public service. We now see that Mr. Donald Jones served as an adviser to Mr. Gingrich 2 or 3 hours a day to interpret the telecommunications bill to him while he gave Mr. Gingrich, his PAC gave the Republican Party $125,000, $25,000 to the Gingrich PAC. It turns out that, not only did Mr. Jones have a financial interest in the outcome of the telecommunications bill, he was sitting in the Speaker's office, but also when many of us were startled when the Speaker took a position against the cyberporn portions of the telecommunications bill to protect children from pornography. We now find out that Mr. Jones had a financial interest in the telecommunications company that was dealing with pornography and adult films. Mr. Jones said he did not know. Forty percent of his income from that company came from pornography. Mr. Speaker, clean up your office.