Thomas Massie

Mr. MASSIE

Mr. MASSIE. Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentlewoman from Florida (Mrs. Cammack).

Mr. MASSIE. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Make no mistake: This administration wants to ban gas stoves. They have said it out loud. Mr. Speaker, 38 to 40 percent of Americans use gas stoves. I asked the ranking member of the committee of jurisdiction for these bills to save our gas stoves if he owns a gas stove. In fact, he does. I asked him: Does it meet the new standards? Would he be able to buy one in the market? He has no idea. He was offended that I would ask such a question. We have two bills here to protect your gas stoves: The Gas Stove Protection and Freedom Act and the Save Our Gas Stoves Act. The Federal Interagency Committee on Indoor Air Quality has never identified gas cooking stoves as contributing to asthma or respiratory illness, nor has the Consumer Product Safety Commission nor the EPA ever identified gas stoves as a significant contributor to adverse air quality or as a health hazard. The other side of the aisle just doesn't like gas stoves. They are reaching for any reason to ban these things. They shouldn't. It is shortsighted. Number one, what if everybody had an electric stove, how would they get the energy? Well, you would burn natural gas, as many States do-- most States do--in a turbine; you would generate electricity in a process that is hardly 50 percent efficient; then you would transmit it over power lines to the household, which could be hundreds of miles, at an efficiency of maybe 70 percent by the time it goes through all of the transformers, gets to the house, and then heats up the pot. Why not take the natural gas to the house and burn it there directly? Many consumers have identified that this is a lot more efficient, and that is what they do and that is why they have gas stoves. They are 3.4 times more affordable than electric stoves. Those who use gas for heating, cooking, and clothes drying on average save over $1,000 a year in their household. When the electricity goes out, when you have natural disasters, natural gas is there and usually available to offer lifesaving heat and to boil water. I spent about 3 hours yesterday delving into the Department of Energy's regulations and their scientific basis for what they are doing because I wanted to know: How can one appliance that burns gas be more efficient than another appliance that burns gas? If you expose CH4 in the presence of oxygen, you get a certain amount of Btus. Unless you have got some science project with a catalyst, you are going to get the same number of Btus from both stoves. When I dug into it, here is what they want to do. They measured efficiency by heating up a pot of water, and they found that stoves with heavy grates or continuous grates that allow for more safety, they said those are less efficient because the grate heats up and less of your energy goes into your water. Mr. Speaker, people aren't cooking water. They are cooking food. Those grates provide more heat as the food sits there on the stove. The continuous grates provide safety for somebody who is not strong enough to pick up a pan, yet they are saying those are less efficient. Then in their studies, if you dig deep enough, they admit that a dogged pursuit of efficiency will result in stoves that are less healthy, because to make it more efficient, you shorten the grates and get the pan closer to the flame. When the flame impinges on the pan, the gas doesn't combust efficiently, and you get carbon monoxide. If all you care about is efficiency, you get more carbon monoxide. What are they doing? They are going after the high-end stoves. That is where they are going first, the ones with the heavy grates, the ones with the thick walls in the ovens that make it easier to cook good food. They are saying they are less efficient, but they are heating up water. They are not cooking food. They are making assumptions about customer preferences. In the realm of electric stoves, they say: Induction stoves are more efficient. So we will just make everybody buy new pans because all of your pans don't work on induction stoves. So what, says the Department of Energy. This is a war on stoves, and the war will be undone or stopped, halted, by the Gas Stove Protection and Freedom Act and the Save Our Gas Stoves Act. I want to finish by talking about another bill in this rule, which is to restore the separation of powers. It is pretty simple. This bill is two pages long, and it is basically a legislative repeal of Chevron deference. Chevron deference may go away soon anyway because it is based on a Supreme Court decision that said: Do you know what? If a regulatory agency does their best and makes a good guess about what they think the law is, then the court shouldn't second-guess the regulatory agency. That is not the court's job. The court's job is to look at the law as written by Congress, not to say: Stretch it as far as you want, administrative branch. The Separation of Powers Restoration Act would require the courts to look at all questions of law de novo, including interpretation of constitutional and statutory provisions. Mr. Speaker, this is a wise bill. It should pass, and the rule for this should pass. I also want to note, just in closing, that the American people don't understand why my colleagues want to give up power to the executive branch. They elected us to come up here and represent them, to live by the laws that we write, but also to be responsible for those laws when our constituents have to live under them. It sounds absurd to the American people that we would want to give up that power that those people have entrusted to us. Whether laws or the structure of government, if my colleagues just follow common sense, they know banning gas stoves isn't going to save the planet. It is going to increase prices. It is going to make it harder for low-income and middle-income families to get by if they have to buy more expensive appliances or if they have to cook their food longer. That is the result of these regulations. All of that could be reined in with the REINS Act. That is what we need to do. We need to pass this resolution today and get these four bills on the floor. We have allowed amendments, and everybody under this rule has had 72 hours to read the bill. What a concept. Give the American people the time to read the bill, as well. We have read it. We know what these bills do. Put them on the floor. Mr. Speaker, I urge a ``yes'' vote on all four bills and, most explicitly, a ``yes'' vote on this resolution.

Mr. MASSIE. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the resolution.

Mr. MASSIE

Mr. MASSIE. Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. MASSIE. Mr. Chair, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chair, my amendment is quite simple. It expresses the sense of Congress that the Department of Education and the Secretary of Education should no longer have any authority to administer any program related to elementary or secondary education in the United States. Some people may confuse the purpose of my amendment, and let me be clear: It is to strengthen public education in the United States. I am a product of public education, K-12. I attended public schools, as did my wife and all of our children. We are proud of our schools in this country, but it is time to turn in the grade card for the Department of Education. They have been at it for 40 years, and they get an F. Education has not improved, but spending has doubled per pupil. It is time to return the power back to the States, back to the people, and back to the school boards to allow them to make these decisions locally. Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. Brecheen).

Mr. MASSIE. Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. MASSIE. Mr. Chair, as my colleague from Oklahoma pointed out, Congress lacks the constitutional authority to create what amounts to a national school board of unelected, unaccountable bureaucrats. How many are there; 4,000 bureaucrats in Washington, D.C.? My colleague on the other side of the aisle said that basically every school would like to have more money. How could we do that without raising taxes? Quit wasting it in Washington, D.C., on 4,000 bureaucrats who cost us about $100,000 apiece. These bureaucrats make more than the teachers. Yet, they don't teach a single class. They don't write books. They don't help with that. In fact, the Federal Government is responsible for about 90 percent of the red tape that local schools have to deal with and only about 10 percent of the funding. It is time to change that equation. Imagine if we could hire 4,000 more teachers in this country using that money and pay them each $100,000, pay them what the bureaucrats get in Washington, D.C. How many more kids would get a better education? I suspect a lot more kids would get a better education. This was a reelection ploy that was foisted on America by Jimmy Carter and Congress at the time in 1979. It did not work. He did not get reelected. It was not a good idea, but here we are. We are stuck with it. It is time, as I said before, to reevaluate this. Mr. Chair, I urge my colleagues to vote for this amendment to show that we support public education. We support the rights of parents to determine through their school boards the rights of teachers. The teachers know what to teach and how to teach. They don't need the Federal Government telling them. What your child learns or how your child learns shouldn't be dependent on who won the Presidential election and who became Secretary of Education. It is too important to leave it up to that. You need to leave it up to your community, to the teachers and the parents. Mr. Chair, I urge adoption of this amendment and the underlying bill, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. MASSIE

Mr. MASSIE. Madam Speaker, I said that the other side could have released them.

Mr. MASSIE. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Speaker, I surely didn't expect this to turn into a debate on the January 6 videotapes or to hear the Democrats propose that it sounds like they are in favor of all of the tapes being released instead of just some of them. I think if the gentleman would review the transcript, and I could be wrong, but I think he will find out that I said Tucker Carlson only released a few minutes of that, and those few minutes were able to destroy the narrative that had been constructed over 2 years. But if the gentleman cares to answer a question, then maybe we have come to some bipartisan agreement that all of the tapes should be released. Madam Speaker, I would ask if the gentleman when he speaks next if he would speak to that topic and if he would be in favor of releasing all of the tapes instead of releasing them partially. Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. MASSIE. Madam Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 199 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. MASSIE. Madam Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only. General Leave

Mr. MASSIE. Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks.

Mr. MASSIE. Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to amend the pending resolution with an amendment that I have placed at the desk.

Mr. MASSIE. Madam Speaker, last night, the Rules Committee met and reported House Resolution 199, providing for consideration of three measures: H.R. 140, H.J. Res. 27, and S. 619. The rule provides for H.R. 140 to be considered under a structured rule with 1 hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and the ranking minority member of the Committee on Oversight and Accountability or their designees. The rule further provides for consideration of H.J. Res. 27 under a closed rule with 1 hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure. Additionally, the rule provides for consideration of S. 619, under closed rule, with 1 hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Select Committee on Intelligence. Finally, the rule postpones the vote on a potential veto message from the President on H.J. Res. 30 until the legislative day of March 23. Madam Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Texas (Mr. Roy).

Mr. MASSIE. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Speaker, I rise in support of this rule and in support of the underlying legislation, H.R. 140, which went through regular order, which was marked up in the Oversight and Reform Committee, where Democrats had copious opportunities to offer amendments and to change the bill, as did Republicans. H.R. 140 is called the Protecting Speech from Government Interference Act, and would prohibit Federal employees from using their official authority to censor a private entity, including outside of normal duty hours or away from an employee's normal duty post. Under President Biden, administration officials and Federal bureaucrats have abused their positions, authority, and influence to encourage censorship and erode Americans' First Amendment rights. Recently released reports have uncovered efforts by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Centers for Disease Control, the Department of Homeland Security, and other government agencies to pressure social media companies and internet providers to censor and remove speech posted on social media platforms. Advocates for this censorship flag certain posts and users as spreading misinformation on various topics, including COVID-19, racial justice, and the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan. Executives at Facebook and Twitter have admitted that prior to the 2020 Presidential election, after a warning from the FBI, they censored the sharing of news regarding Hunter Biden's laptop leak, which has since been proven true. It was not a Russian disinformation campaign. Even former White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki, during a July 2021 press briefing, called on Facebook to ban specific accounts from its platform. Congress should recognize that the biggest spreader of misinformation over the last several years, whether it has been about elections or about COVID, has been the Federal Government. The censorship must stop. Congress must restore constitutional protections enshrined in the First Amendment. H.R. 140, and the amendments that are pending votes here as well, are critical to ensure that government officials can never again promote censorship and pressure private entities to suppress Americans' First Amendment rights. Additionally, the rule before us provides for consideration of H.J. Res. 27, a resolution ``providing for congressional disapproval under chapter 8 of Title 5, United States Code, of the rules submitted by the Department of the Army Corps of Engineers, Department of Defense, and the Environmental Protection Agency relating to ``Revised definition of `Waters of the United States.' '' It is Groundhog Day again in America. Every time the administration changes, this rule changes. The Biden administration's new rule would radically redefine the term ``Waters of the United States'' to expand the Federal Government's authority in regulating bodies of water. Specifically, Biden's EPA would expand the term to include impoundments of jurisdictional waters, tributaries, adjacent wetlands, and additional waters. To be clear, what the Biden administration is pushing through here will heap serious burdens on farmers, small businesses, homebuilders, and rural communities across our country. In 1972, Congress didn't tell the EPA and the Army Corps of Engineers: Do whatever you think is necessary to protect water. That is not what the bill said. Yet, that is what they have taken as their directive. The Clean Water Act was never intended to be applied as broadly as the Biden administration is proposing. Every Member of Congress should be concerned about the EPA's attempt to expand its authority over individuals' private property and regulate farms and communities, even those which lie far away from any lakes, rivers, or streams and very far away from Washington, D.C. Congress has the constitutional authority and responsibility to provide oversight and to review regulations issued by the executive branch. If the executive branch promulgates rules that could overstep their authority, as President Biden is doing here, it is vital that we exercise our oversight authority in Congress. Finally, the rule before us provides for consideration of S. 619, the COVID-19 Origin Act of 2023, which would finally declassify any information relating to potential links between the Wuhan Institute of Virology and the origin of COVID-19. In 2020, at the height of the pandemic, anyone who spoke out questioning whether COVID-19 might have come from the Wuhan lab in China was denounced as a conspiracy theorist, and their words were labeled as ``dangerous misinformation.'' People were censored online, their accounts were suspended, and their reputations were damaged for questioning the origins of COVID-19. What is the difference between COVID-19 conspiracy theory and the truth? About 2 years. We have seen them called natural immunity conspiracy theories. We have seen people who said masks don't work called conspiracy theorists. Now, we are finding out that all of those conspiracy theories, so-called, were accurate. Fast-forward to today. Even the government admits it. The Department of Energy and the FBI have both publicly reported their conclusions that COVID-19 likely emerged as a result of a lab leak from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, a research institute in Wuhan, China, controlled by the People's Republic of China and, ultimately, the Chinese Communist Party. Was it funded in part by our government? Yes, it was. This legislation is long overdue and is necessary to expose the truth about the origins of COVID-19. Americans deserve to see the information. President Biden could have released this information at any point. It could have been released a year ago. It could be released today without this resolution. But this resolution is important because the President has not released this information. The last Congress, led by Speaker Pelosi, could have voted to do what we are doing here today. But no, they wanted it to remain hidden from the American public. I fear the Federal Government has been involved in a coverup about the origins of COVID-19 because they are afraid of being exposed as culpable in the creation of the disease at the center of the pandemic. To my colleague's point about the videos that were released on Monday, I think the other side of the aisle is out of touch and out of step with the American public on this. A recent poll by Rasmussen showed that 81 percent of likely voters believe that all of the tapes should be released. The Democrats had 2 years to release these tapes. But 81 percent of voters believe that. Is that just Republicans? No. Madam Speaker, 86 percent of Republicans and 78 percent of Democrats--they are out of step with their own party--believe that these videotapes should be released because Americans deserve to know the truth and the defendants in these trials deserve to have the evidence they need to present their defense. Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support this rule, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. MASSIE. Madam Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. MASSIE. Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Langworthy).

Mr. MASSIE. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to include in the Record an article in the New York Post titled: ``10 myths told by COVID experts-- and now debunked,'' by Marty Makary, a professor at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine.

Mr. MASSIE. Madam Speaker, in this article that I have just referenced, misinformation No. 7 was that ``COVID originating from the Wuhan lab is a conspiracy theory.'' It is not. I think we are going to find that out when this resolution passes, and I expect a lot of Democrat support for the resolution. It passed by unanimous consent in the Senate. ``Google admitted to suppressing searches of `lab leak' during the pandemic. Dr. Francis Collins, head of the National Institutes of Health, claimed, and still does, he didn't believe the virus came from a lab. ``Ultimately, overwhelming circumstantial evidence points to a lab leak origin, the same origin suggested to Dr. Anthony Fauci by two very prominent virologists in a January 2020 meeting he assembled at the beginning of the pandemic. According to documents obtained by Bret Baier of FOX News, they told Fauci and Collins that the virus may have been manipulated and originated in the lab, but then suddenly changed their tune in public comments days after meeting with the NIH officials. The virologists were later awarded nearly $9 million from Fauci's agency.'' Maybe this is why we are not getting the truth yet. We will get the truth if this rule passes and the subsequent S. 619 passes here in the House. I think it is very important. Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. MASSIE. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Speaker, although it is not the subject of today's resolution or any of the bills covered by this resolution, the Democrats just can't avoid talking about the release of the January 6 videos. They keep going back to it during this debate. Madam Speaker, I would remind them that 78 percent of Democrats out in America support the release of all of these videos. The fact that they are apoplectic about the few minutes of video that Tucker Carlson released on Monday shows that Tucker Carlson is over the target. For 2 years, they have been selectively releasing information and videos to set a narrative. In just a few minutes, the entire narrative was challenged--might I say it collapsed under the scrutiny, under the review of just a few minutes of undoctored video that came from this body. I applaud Tucker Carlson for releasing that. The American people are right. If the Democrats are so upset that only a few of these videos were released, I would remind them that they were able to release these at any point in the past. Moving on to something that is the subject of this resolution, I want to talk about the repeal of Joe Biden's 2023 WOTUS ruling, the waters of the U.S. ruling. Like I said before, it is ``Groundhog Day'' again. Under President Bush, we had one set of rules that farmers, homebuilders, and landowners came to understand. They were a little hard to comply with because every division of the Army Corps of Engineers might interpret them differently, or different States would interpret them differently, or different bureaucrats at the EPA would interpret them differently. Then, Obama came along with a rule to expand the definition of waters of the U.S., and then Trump came into office and the rules changed again. Now, Biden is here trying, once again, to change the rules on what are the waters of the U.S. The farmers and homebuilders I talk to don't say they don't want any regulations. Nobody in this body has said no regulation is what we want. The question is, give us clear, precise, understandable regulations we can follow that do not change. Frankly, those should be written by Congress. They shouldn't be made up by every administration that comes into power. Yet, that is what we are doing, or that is what has happened. Today, we are talking about repealing those onerous changes and unclear changes. For instance, Susan Bodine testified in front of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee this year on this topic, and she talked about the significant nexus test that they apply in WOTUS 2023, waters of the U.S. To support expanded jurisdiction under this rule, the agencies now claim that isolated water can affect the biological integrity of navigable water. What does that mean? If you have a puddle of water that a bird lands in and drinks from and takes some seeds or some larvae, and when it drinks and flies to a river and deposits it in its bird droppings, or maybe as it flies over the river and it doesn't even visit the river, if there is any kind of biological connection--and as we have found, everything is biologically connected on this planet. If there is any biological connection that they can establish between a puddle of water on your property and a navigable water, then they say, this is now covered under waters of the U.S. This is ridiculous. The only certainty that our farmers and our landowners are going to get from Biden's 2023 WOTUS rule is the certainty that if a raindrop has fallen on your property, a government agent will show up someday and tell you what you can and can't do with that property under this rule. That is why it is important for us to repeal that, and that is why this resolution is so important. Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. MASSIE. Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. MASSIE. Madam Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time. Madam Speaker, it is somewhat serendipitous, but in the context of this debate on a rule about other bills, it seems we have come to some agreement, it appears to me, with the American people, 81 percent of whom believe that all of the tapes should be released. It seems as if we have come to some agreement that we all would be better off if we get to the bottom of the truth and all of the truth comes out and all of the tapes come out so that no one side can distort what actually happened that day, and then let the American people decide. So in the interest of transparency and in the interest of getting back to the subject matter at hand, which are three bills covered by this rule, I want to talk about S. 619, which is so important. It is transparency, and it is the transparency that the American people deserve. It passed by unanimous consent in the Senate. Even though it seems like there is some opposition on the other side, I suspect we are going to get a lot of votes from Democrats on S. 619. I think it is important to go on the record for elected Representatives to say whether or not they believe their constituents are entitled to the truth which our government possesses or at least information that they possess that would help somebody come to a conclusion of what the origins of this virus were and did they come from Wuhan. The President could do this at any time. He could have done it at any time in the past 2 years. He hasn't done it. It is time to put him on the spot and say: You either veto this or you release that information that you have withheld from the American public for 2 years, which is too long. I suspect we could overcome his veto. Next, Madam Speaker, I want to talk about the Waters of the U.S. rule. Why is this timely? Because on March 20 this goes into effect. That is why it is so urgent to repeal the 2023 Waters of the U.S. rule. These are laws. Were they written by lawmakers? No. Our Founding Fathers created three branches of government. We have the executive branch which enforces laws, we have the judicial branch which resolves disputes, and we have the legislative branch which is supposed to make the laws. Yet, here we sit abdicating that authority and that responsibility. You can delegate authority, but you can't delegate responsibility, Madam Speaker. We have a responsibility to the American people to make sure that these laws are concise, that they don't change on the whim of an executive who gets in the White House, that they are not onerous, that they have their intended effect, and that they are applied uniformly across the country. Yet we have abdicated that responsibility. But we will take that responsibility back by the passage of this rule and the subsequent legislation to repeal the WOTUS, Waters of the United States 2023, by Joe Biden. We, the American people, deserve that. Finally, I will close by talking about H.R. 140. This is a bill that went through regular order. What a wonderful thing. We have talked about it so much. It is a bill that covers one topic only. We have talked about that so much. Here we are, and we even have a chance--even though it was amended in the committee--to amend it here on the floor to perfect it even more for Members and by Members who aren't members of that committee. Are these amendments that are not germane? Are these the kind of amendments that the American people hate where Members offer an amendment and then they stick something into a bill that is completely unrelated to it? No. Every one of these amendments is germane to this bill. We have made sure of that in the Rules Committee. The gentleman serves on the Rules Committee, and he had plenty of time to voice his concerns there. So we have a lot of amendments that are great. I think they will improve the bill. But what is most important is that people have a chance to have their point made and to get a vote on this. Finally, I will talk about what H.R. 140 would fix. It would fix this loophole that they think they have constructed that allows the Federal Government to violate the Constitution. Obviously, Federal agents can't take away our First Amendment rights, and, obviously, the Constitution wasn't meant to bind social media companies. It was meant to bind the administration. What we have is a loophole where the administration leans on a social media company that they are paying money to. Millions of dollars have gone to these social media companies from the CDC and from the FBI. So when they say: Would you pretty please ban this user? Or: Would you pretty please take down these posts? There is a whole series of these posts. The government doesn't get in line. They have a back door that they can trot to every day and submit lists of people whom they think should be banned because they don't like what they have said. This is dangerous to our Republic. If the other side wants to call it a democracy, then it is dangerous to the democracy. But this is a republic. Our government has built an elaborate but constitutionally unsound framework for violating these natural rights. As we have seen with the Twitter files, they boldly work in close cooperation with private-sector actors who aren't subject to constitutional restrictions imposed on government by our Founders. But they also claim foreign influence and national security so they can target U.S. citizens with agencies in the government under the military chain of command whose missions are ostensibly directed at foreign actors who have no constitutional rights. Elected lawmakers be damned, legions of government lawyers create shaky legal scaffolding and ad hoc doctrine to indemnify the actors within our government who eagerly exploit these loopholes. In this way, government actors can claim everything they do is legal. They have a bunch of lawyers to back them: Oh, we didn't do anything illegal, it is all legal. Here, look at our doctrine. The lawyers have gone through it, it is all legal. Here is the problem, Madam Speaker: much of what they do is unconstitutional. So whose job is it to resolve that difference? It is actually not the Supreme Court's job. We are entrusted with oversight. We all here swore an oath to the Constitution, and if we know that authorizations that we have made or that funding that we have appropriated has been twisted in a way to get around the Constitution or to drive through a loophole that some lawyers in the administrative branch have created, then it is our obligation--we owe it to the American people, we swore an oath to the Constitution--to fix that--not to make them go to court to get some remedy--but to fix it, to stop it in its tracks. H.R. 140 with its pending amendments is a good down payment on that promise to the American people. Madam Speaker, I support this rule, I urge my colleagues to vote for it.

Mr. MASSIE. Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the resolution, as amended.

Mr. MASSIE

Mr. MASSIE. Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that it be in order at any time to consider H. Con. Res. 21 in the House if called up by the chair of the Committee on Foreign Affairs or his designee; that the concurrent resolution be considered as read; that the previous question be considered as ordered on the concurrent resolution to adoption without intervening motion except for 1 hour of debate equally divided among and controlled by Representative McCaul of Texas, Representative Meeks of New York, and Representative Gaetz of Florida or their respective designees; and that the provisions of section 7 of the War Powers Resolution, 50 U.S.C. 1546, shall not apply to H. Con. Res. 20.

Mr. MASSIE

Mr. MASSIE. Mr. Chairman, it is interesting to hear the other side of the aisle talk about logic. What we are talking about today is whether to repeal the vaccine mandate on international travelers. Well, what is the logic of having a vaccine mandate on legal international travelers but not on the millions of people who are pouring across our border? Where is the logic in that? I don't see any logic. It is time for us to join the rest of the free world. You want a list of countries that don't have this mandate? Australia, Japan, Mexico, Canada, Spain, Germany, France, Ukraine. I could go on and on. Am I memorizing a list of countries? No. I am telling you basically all of the countries in the world. In fact, dictatorships have already gotten rid of this vaccine mandate: Russia, Syria, China. Cuba even doesn't have this draconian xenophobic measure at the border. Let's talk about the State of the Union Address last night. The President said: Today COVID no longer controls our lives. Gee, I wish that were true. I wish that were true. Here is a letter I received--now, it is from a foreigner who is related to Americans: Dear sir, I am an Australian. My daughter married an American in September of 2020. My wife and I were not allowed to visit for the wedding. Subsequently, due to the U.S. ban on unvaccinated arrivals, I have not seen my daughter in over 2 years. I appreciate your attempts at overturning this harsh rule. I am sure I speak for many separated families. Yes, he does. He speaks for tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions of people who have been separated at our border because of this ridiculous, illogical, unscientific policy. What else did the President say in his State of the Union Address last night? ``We opened our country back up.'' Well, we need to tell all of the tourism industry that we have opened our country back up because the U.S. Travel Association has stated this week, just this week, that it cost over $90 billion. This one policy has cost over $90 billion of revenue, of income to this country in tourism, and that is why they support getting rid of this ridiculous mandate. What is the Democrats' argument over there? I have heard it all already. I see they are very smug and smiling. They bleat about democracy. They bleat on and on about democracy. Is this democracy? Their best argument--virtually their only argument--is right here in ``The Whip's Daily Preview'' on the Democrat side: ``House Democrats have been stalwart in their defense of following the science over playing politics with COVID-19. The decision to end vaccine requirements for global travelers should be made by public health experts with real-time understanding of the situation. Hamstringing agencies from responding to ongoing or future threats that could impact the health and economic stability of America undermines our Nation.'' They are arguing that they are not qualified to vote on laws that affect the most basic human rights of people in this country and people wishing to visit this country. Imagine that. Working so hard to get elected, preaching about democracy, and then getting here and saying: Do you know what? I don't think we should be voting on this because, well, I think the bureaucrats are probably more qualified than we are. The science is hard. Science is hard. That is basically their argument. Let's take their argument. Let's listen to the scientists, the bureaucrats. What does the World Health Organization, what does this collection of global scientists, say about this policy? This is real- time because it was January 30, 2023. They had a meeting and said No. 6 in their recommendations: ``Continue to adjust any remaining international travel-related measures, based on risk assessment, and to not require proof of vaccination against COVID-19 as a prerequisite for international travel.'' They love global government. You think the science over there would appeal to the World Health Organization, but if that doesn't work, let's listen to our own CDC, which said in August of last year: If you are deciding to quarantine or mask or any of these other things, it shouldn't be done with respect to vaccination status. In other words, there is enough natural immunity, and there was in August, for the CDC to say we shouldn't discriminate based on vaccination status when determining policy. I will just close with this: Let's not be hypocrites. We were all in this room last night, hundreds of us, with hundreds of visitors, and none of us were under a vaccine mandate. Repeal this vaccine mandate. Vote for H.R. 185 and support the bill. Mr. Chair, I include in the Record a report from the WHO Director- General, and a recommendation from the CDC for managing SARS-CoV-2 exposure. Mr. Chair, I enter into the Recrod two articles: Statement on the Fourteenth Meeting of the International Health Regulations (2005) Emergency Committee Regarding the Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) Pandemic The WHO Director-General has the pleasure of transmitting the Report of the fourteenth meeting of the International Health Regulations (2005) (IHR) Emergency Committee regarding the coronavirus 2019 disease (COVID-19). Continue to adjust any remaining international travel- related measures, based on risk assessment, and to not require proof of vaccination against COVID-19 as a prerequisite for international travel. Continue to support research for improved vaccines that reduce transmission and have broad applicability, as well as research to understand the full spectrum, incidence and impact of post COVID-19 condition, and to develop relevant integrated care pathways. Managing SARS-CoV-2 Exposures CDC now recommends case investigation and contact tracing only in health care settings and certain high-risk congregate settings. In all other circumstances, public health efforts can focus on case notification and provision of information and resource to exposed persons about access to testing. Persons who have had recent confirmed or suspected exposure to an infected person should wear a mask for 10 days around others when indoors in public and should receive testing  5 days after exposure (or sooner, if they are symptomatic), irrespective of their vaccination status. In light of high population levels of anti-SARS-CoV-2 seroprevalence (7, 16), and to limit social and economic impacts, quarantine of exposed persons is no longer recommended, regardless of vaccination status.