Frank Pallone

Mr. PALLONE

Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, Americans today have better health coverage and health care, thanks to the Affordable Care Act. The ACA has expanded and protected coverage for millions of Americans. More than 20 million previously uninsured Americans have newfound health security, including 95 percent of America's children. I just want to mention two of my constituents who tweeted me within the last day or so about the ACA. One is from Laurence Harbor. It said: ``The ACA provided additional health care for my autistic son who had aged out on my employer's health plan. Attempts in the interim to find a healthcare plan for him were thwarted by insurance companies that did not want to cover him.'' Another one of my constituents from Marlboro, New Jersey, said: The ``ACA helped me to stay on my parent's healthcare for 3 years after college, which was a huge relief in a tough job market.'' There are so many cases, Mr. Speaker. I could go on all afternoon. The bottom line is the Affordable Care Act is also controlling costs for millions of Americans. Premium growth has slowed over the last 6 years, compared to the years before the ACA. Mr. Speaker, if Republicans proceed with repealing the ACA, they will make America sick again. They will rip health care away from 30 million people and raise premiums for millions of others. Repealing the ACA will move us from true care to total chaos. Republicans are blinded to the success of the Affordable Care Act. Repealing the Affordable Care Act is not logical, it is ideological, and I would strongly urge my Republican colleagues to start looking at this practically rather than ideologically.

Mr. PALLONE

Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I oppose the WIIN Act in its current form. The decision by Republican leadership to include damaging legislation on California water in an otherwise good, bipartisan bill is deeply disappointing. Members and staff have devoted months to the underlying package, including long overdue aid for the people of Flint. But I cannot support the California water poison pill, and I know that many of my colleagues in the Senate are in the same position. I want to thank Leader Pelosi and Whip Hoyer for working tirelessly over the last few months to develop this package and over the last few days to save it. I hope this is not the end of the story. We have tried for years on the Energy and Commerce Committee, Mr. Speaker, to get our Republican colleagues to work with us to strengthen the Safe Drinking Water Act and provide more money for infrastructure, but they have refused. So I welcomed the Senate's bipartisan passage of an expanded WRDA that included some valuable changes to the Safe Drinking Water Act and significant new authorizations for infrastructure, and I was pleasantly surprised that House Republicans agreed to some of the changes and authorizations in that bill. However, the drinking water provisions in this bill fall short of what was included in the Senate WRDA bill; most notably, Republicans refuse to support a permanent requirement that projects funded through the SRF use American iron and steel. That requirement should not be controversial. It has been enacted through the appropriations process for years and has clear benefits for American workers and the American economy. House Democrats have proposed significant changes to the Safe Drinking Water Act that go far beyond this bill, including changes needed to address dangerous drinking water contaminants and the risks to drinking water from climate change. Ignoring these challenges won't make them go away. House Republicans need to face these challenges in the coming months and not undermine our efforts with poison pills.

Mr. PALLONE

Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 6400. This bill is extremely important to my constituents, especially those living in Union Beach, New Jersey. Passing this bill will allow the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to move forward on an important flood control project for Union Beach. H.R. 6400 would realign the mapping of several New Jersey units of the John H. Chafee Coastal Barrier Resource System. Congressional approval is required for any changes to these maps by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Over the past year, the Fish and Wildlife Service worked with the Corps to make noncontroversial changes to the mapping, completed its review, and transmitted them to Congress on November 21 of this year. Until these maps are approved by Congress, Mr. Speaker, the Union Beach flood control project will be in limbo. The Corps cannot sign a project partnership agreement or make other progress until the updated maps are approved. Union Beach was devastated by Superstorm Sandy, and residents have been waiting far too long for this project to be completed. It was initially authorized by the Water Resources Development Act of 2007 on November 8, 2007, and funding and authorization for the project came from Sandy relief funding in 2013. Moving forward on this project is a priority for the State of New Jersey, local authorities in Union Beach, and the Army Corps; however, that can only be done if Congress approves the new maps, which it can do by passing H.R. 6400. Again, passing this bill is vitally important. It is noncontroversial. I want to thank Chairman Bishop, Ranking Member Grijalva, and House leadership for allowing this legislation to be considered under suspension of the rules. I urge my colleagues to support H.R. 6400. The people of Union Beach have waited long enough to rebuild and protect their community from future storms.

Mr. PALLONE

Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 6375, the Power and Security Systems, or PASS Act. This bill will provide an important technical exemption to certain security and life safety products from energy efficiency standards set forth in the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007. A provision in the law increased the energy efficiency requirements for battery chargers and external power supplies--and I strongly supported that change. However, the provision also mistakenly included security and life safety products, and required that they be manufactured with a standby mode, despite being products that are inherently always on. Without providing this correction, the security industry will need to spend millions of dollars to comply with an energy standard that will yield no energy savings and could cost jobs, which was never the initial intent of the law. Six years ago, I stood on the House floor in support of legislation I authored that provided this exemption through July 2017. I'm pleased that Representative Welch, along with Representative Pompeo, has taken up this important issue and introduced this bill to extend the exemption I originally authored through 2023. And, the language in the bill before us today will also allow the Department of Energy to extend this exemption or reclassify these products into a separate class if they deem it appropriate. Mr. Speaker, this is a commonsense and consensus fix to a simple problem: the language was developed by both industry and efficiency advocates, with technical assistance from the Department of Energy. So it should come as no surprise that this bill enjoys broad support from the security industry and energy efficiency advocates. I urge all of my colleagues to support it.

Mr. PALLONE

Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Oregon (Mr. Schrader).

Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Florida (Ms. Castor).

Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gene Green), the ranking member of the Health Subcommittee, who, again, has been critical, particularly in the last 3 months, in putting this bill together.

Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, over the past 2 years, my colleagues and I on the Energy and Commerce Committee have worked to craft the 21st Century Cures Act with the goal of getting new treatments and cures to the people who need them the most. It has been a long journey, and I want to thank my colleagues, Chairman Upton, Representatives DeGette and Gene Green of Texas for their commitment to this important legislation. This is not a perfect bill, but, after much consideration, I believe the benefits outweigh my concerns, and I fully support its passage. This final bill includes many provisions that my Democratic colleagues and I, as well as the administration, fought hard to have included. The bill provides new funding for the National Institutes of Health, the President's Precision Medicine Initiative, and the Vice President's Cancer Moonshot initiative. It also provides new resources for the Food and Drug Administration and grants for States currently battling the opioid abuse crisis. This final legislation also includes important policy changes that break down the research silos that have existed for years. The bill includes data sharing among NIH-supported scientists and increases the number of racial and ethnic minorities and women that are included in NIH-funded clinical trials. These important changes will allow the entire scientific community to learn lessons from this critical NIH-funded research and will strengthen research for diverse populations. I am also pleased, Mr. Speaker, that the bill includes a new FDA grant program to study the process of continuous drug manufacturing. This innovative process will allow for more effective drug production without sacrificing quality. The bill also includes important hiring provisions to help the FDA recruit and retain the best and the brightest and policies to move us closer to ensuring we have interoperable electronic health records, which are critical to reducing costs and improving care. As I said, this is not a perfect bill, and I have some concerns with the final product. I am disappointed that the bill does not contain guaranteed funding. Instead, we must ensure each year that the Appropriations Committee and the Republican majority lives up to the promises they make today, and we will hold them to these promises. The lack of immediate funding for the FDA is a particular concern given the fact that this bill asks the FDA to take on significantly more responsibilities that we know are extremely resource intensive. I am also concerned that the bill removes certain categories of medical software from FDA oversight. This makes it difficult for FDA, in the future, to bring software that is used to support or sustain human life back under FDA's jurisdiction. I am also troubled by the new priority review voucher program which will likely require the FDA to issue significantly more PRVs. This could pose a burden on FDA drug reviewers when redeemed and could prevent the FDA from being able to prioritize its review of drugs based on public health priorities. The bill includes new language added without full consideration by the House or Senate regarding FDA oversight of regenerative medicine products. While most of the harmful language was taken out, I do remain troubled that the bill creates a new designation process under FDA's accelerated approval pathway. I am pleased, Mr. Speaker, that this package includes the Helping Families in Mental Health Crisis Act. This is a helpful step towards the more substantial reforms our broken mental health system needs. I am specifically proud that the bill expands an important set of Medicaid benefits to kids receiving inpatient psychiatric treatment. However, let's be clear, the benefits of the mental health bill will be far outweighed by the catastrophic harm caused by individuals with mental illness if the Republicans move forward with their radical plans to repeal the Affordable Care Act or block grants for Medicaid or cut benefits for low-income individuals. Again, on balance, this is a good bill. I fully support it. I want to thank all of my committee colleagues and their staff for their hard work on this legislation. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from Colorado (Ms. DeGette), who is the Democratic sponsor of the bill and who has worked so hard to make this day a reality.

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

Mr. PALLONE. I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I would like to conclude by referencing the Statement of Administration Policy because I believe it reflects my position for the most part. If I could just read some sections--I am not reading the whole thing--it says: ``The Administration strongly supports passage of the bipartisan House Amendment to the Senate Amendment to H.R. 34, the 21st Century Cures Act, which dedicates more than $6 billion to implement key priorities such as the President's proposal to combat the heroin and prescription opioid epidemic; the Vice President's Cancer Moonshot; and the President's signature biomedical research initiatives, the Precision Medicine and Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies (BRAIN) Initiatives. It also takes important steps to improve mental health . . . ``The Administration is committed to taking immediate action to lay the groundwork to ensure that the funds in the bill would be disbursed quickly and effectively so we can begin to address these important public health challenges . . . ``There are . . . provisions in the bill that raise concerns, but that have been modified from previous versions to help address those concerns, such as provisions that allow for the marketing of drugs to payers for off-label uses. In addition, a number of effective dates will be challenging to meet, especially without additional administrative funding . . . ``That said, this legislation offers advances in health that far outweigh these concerns. As such, the Administration strongly supports passage of the House Amendment to the Senate Amendment to H.R. 34, the 21st Century Cures Act.'' Let me just say also in conclusion, I believe that this is an important piece of legislation that we need to pass, and I would hope that the Senate would take it up and pass it, and, obviously, the administration or the President will sign it. From the very beginning, when we passed the 21st Century Cures Act, I thought that it would make important strides in actually dealing with those diseases for which we have not made a lot of progress in terms of advancing and finding cures, but, at the same time, I am happy that this legislation has now become a little more of a catch-all or a lot more of a catch-all, if you will, because it is addressing funding for opioids. Many of us know we passed an opioid package that the President signed in July, but it is not funded. So there will be funding for that bill now. As far as the mental health reforms, our committee spent a tremendous amount of time over the last 2 years trying to address that legislation. We passed a bill here in the House. Again, I am happy that this is included because the kinds of reforms that were in that bill are now in this bill, and I think they are important strides in terms of addressing some of the mental health concerns that we have in this country. The same is true for Cancer Moonshot. The President spent a lot of time, the Vice President as well, and this will make at least a down payment on that. So, overall, this is a good bill. I support it. I urge my colleagues to support it as well. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, may I inquire how much time remains on each side?

Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I have no additional speakers other than myself to close, so I am going to continue to reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from Colorado (Ms. DeGette).

Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from New Mexico (Mr. Ben Ray Lujan).

Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, how much time remains on both sides?

Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Connecticut (Ms. DeLauro).

Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Kaptur).

Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Kennedy), who has been such a strong advocate on mental health issues.

Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I have a few additional speakers on their way; so I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Cohen).

Mr. PALLONE

Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to congratulate the Long Branch Free Public Library as its administration, Board of Trustees, members and the Long Branch community celebrates its 100th anniversary this year. Its commitment to serving the community is truly deserving of this body's recognition on this significant milestone. Throughout its history, the Long Branch Free Public Library has supported and been supported by the community. At the proposal by a group of thirty local women, the Long Branch Free Public Library got its start in 1878 as The East Long Branch Reading Room & Library Association. For 38 years, The East Long Branch Reading Room & Library Association was operated by the group until they turned it over to the City of Long Branch in 1916 as a requisite for a Carnegie Corporation grant for a new library that city residents had approved via referendum that November. Since its founding, the Long Branch Free Public Library has been an integral part of the Long Branch community and maintains outstanding resources and accessibility for its patrons. Over the years, the library continued to grow, expanding to a second branch in the Elberon section of Long Branch and currently averages 10,000 visits per month. It has evolved with technology and the changing needs of its patrons, providing computers and free Wi-Fi access, career services, research assistance, literacy and citizenship classes, and homebound library services among many other vital services. The Long Branch Free Public Library also serves as a place for the community to come together, offering programs for children and young adults, book clubs, cultural events, historical programs and activities for all ages. The Long Branch Free Public Library is a welcome place for the community to share and has been recognized for its efforts to offer an outstanding space for learning and civic involvement. It was selected by Asbury Park Press readers as one of the Best Libraries in Monmouth County in 2015 and received the 2014 New Jersey State Library Innovation Award. Its Director, Tonya Garcia, was also named the New Jersey Library Association 2016 Librarian of the Year. Mr. Speaker, once again, please join me in celebrating the 100th anniversary of the Long Branch Free Public Library. The library continues to uphold its mission to assist the community and its efforts are to be recognized.

Mr. PALLONE

Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, according to his transition team, the President-elect's administration will withdraw the United States from the Paris Agreement and scrap the Clean Power Plan because, they claim, it will increase energy bills without any measurable effect on Earth's climate. This is dangerous, shortsighted, and completely inaccurate. The United States took an important leadership role in making the Paris Agreement happen and should continue to help lead international efforts to combat climate change. The Clean Power Plan is an essential part of the U.S. keeping its end of the bargain. If the President-elect's administration follows through on its plans to abandon our commitments, the United States and the world will continue to suffer from increasing sea level rise, more frequent and intense natural disasters like Superstorm Sandy, and longer periods of drought, as well as other effects. What it won't do is save coal country jobs, something that the top Senate Republican pretty much admitted last week. As President Obama said, the President-elect's administration should carry on the tradition of honoring our international agreements, and I urge him and his team to continue the efforts begun by President Obama to stop climate change before it is too late.

Mr. PALLONE

Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to raise serious concerns about the President-elect's plan to dismantle ObamaCare. As an architect of the law, I am proud to report that the percentage of Americans uninsured is at a record low. More than 20 million additional Americans have health care, and a million additional enrollees are expected this year. The Affordable Care Act is, in fact, working. Reports have surfaced that the President-elect's plan to dismantle ObamaCare would eliminate the subsidies that have enabled more than 70 percent of consumers to find plans at less than $75 a month. Any effort to eliminate subsidies would lead to unsustainable cost increases and a loss of healthcare coverage for people nationwide. There is also a threat to undo the Medicaid expansion under which almost 16 million Americans have been insured. With children representing about half of all Medicaid recipients, the elimination of that expansion would be disastrous for the most vulnerable Americans. Mr. Speaker, Democrats stand ready to work to improve and strengthen the Affordable Care Act, but we will continue to stand resolute against any effort to dismantle it. For the sake of the American people, we can't get this wrong.