Jared Polis

Mr. POLIS

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume, and say to the gentleman that I do have one other speaker on the way. Mr. Speaker, this bill under consideration is a small but significant step to help companies increase worker ownership to help improve the overall equity of our economy. I hope that this bill, along with the other two coming to the floor later this week, are the start of something. I hope they are a sign that this body will actually consider meaningful, bipartisan, practical, and commonsense legislation to address the issues the American people sent us to Washington to fix: creating jobs, growing our economy, reforming our Tax Code, and fixing our broken immigration system. I hope my colleagues support the underlying legislation, H.R. 1343, oppose the rule, and defeat the previous question so I can bring forward not only the employee stock ownership rule, but also the Paycheck Fairness Act here on Equal Pay Day across America so that we can make sure as we are talking about making sure that women receive the same cash and ownership in recognition of their efforts as employees across the country. This bill will hopefully pass overwhelmingly. I just wish it could be an example of how we could work under an open rule and give Democrats and Republicans a chance to build upon and improve legislation. There have been zero open rules under Speaker Ryan since he has taken over the Speaker's gavel promising, ironically, a more open process. It is about time. If not this bill, what bill, Mr. Speaker? If not a bill with strong bipartisan support that Democratic and Republican leaders are committed to bringing across the finish line, when can we have an open process that allows us as legislators to bring forward our amendments in response to debate on the floor in realtime? I wish that this would have been that bill. And I hope that by defeating this rule, we can send a message back to the Rules Committee that we should consider open rules for these kinds of bipartisan legislation. Promoting employee stock ownership is incredibly important. To have a multistakeholder economy that works for everybody will help address a lot of the legitimate concerns that Americans have, that workers and employees have not shared, and the great amount of value that has been created. Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the distinguished gentlewoman from Connecticut (Ms. DeLauro) to further discuss our proposal on the previous question on Equal Pay Day and the Paycheck Fairness Act.

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time. I want to thank Ms. DeLauro for her tireless advocacy on behalf of equal pay. I would also encourage my colleagues to join me in cosponsoring the Equal Rights Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. It is about time. Today, on Equal Pay Day, let's enshrine equality between men and women into the U.S. Constitution. If we can defeat the previous question, we will bring forward H.R. 1343, the employee stock ownership bill, but we will also bring forward the Paycheck Fairness Act so that we can do a little more work of the people's work here in the House of Representatives and help make sure that we can look ourselves in the mirror knowing that men and women will both benefit equally from a hard day's work. Mr. Speaker, I encourage my colleagues to vote ``no'' on the rule to defeat the previous question and to vote ``yes'' on H.R. 1343 as a first step to encouraging an economy that works for everybody and employee stock ownership. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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

Mr. POLIS

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding the time. Various measurements of the economy have shown economic growth and an increase in the stock market. The frustration that I hear from so many of my constituents is that: With all of this economic growth, why haven't my prospects improved? Why has there been wage stagnation? Why aren't my family and I earning any more than I was? It is true, because a lot of the benefits of this economic growth have gone to shareholders and consumers rather than workers. We are all consumers, and we have all benefited from that. And do you know what? We are all shareholders through pensions and through retirement accounts, public and private. Many people also put food on their table and pay their rent, wearing their hat as an employee or a worker. One of the things that we can do not just by passing this bill, but by passing a whole host of legal changes both in the tax framework and in the regulatory framework to make it easier for employees to own companies, is allow employees and workers to share in the value that is being created on the shareholder side of the ledger. Then, and only then, can we have an economy that works for more people rather than just a few. This bill is a small step in that direction. It can reduce the cost and remove a detriment that small to midsize companies have from aggressively pursuing employee stock ownership. But it is just a first step. There is a lot of work that we need to do to reorient the economy around a shareholder economy that aligns the incentives of workers with those of shareholders. It is good for sustainable profits, it is good for long-term economic growth, it is good for stability. It is a better way to make sure that of this vast value that is being created, we all can partake in it on both sides of the ledger, as shareholders and as workers. That is why I rise today in support of the bill, and that is why I call upon my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to see this as but a modest first step towards a shareholder economy that works for every worker.

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. POLIS. I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, my amendment would require GAO to do a study on the impact of this legislation on employee ownership. When employees are offered the opportunity to have an ownership stake in the place they work, there are benefits for both workers and businesses in our entire economy. Many studies have shown that employee ownership increases productivity, promotes employee retention and stability, and has long- term growth benefits for the business. I believe that the underlying legislation is an important first step to increase employee ownership opportunities, but we should want to make sure that opportunities for participation are widely available to employees at different income levels. The amendment also requests the GAO to see the effect of this legislation on the diversification of securities held in ERISA-governed retirement plans. As we all know, diversification in any type of financial portfolio can help weather dramatic fluctuations in the economy and limit financial risk for retirees. By requesting the GAO study, we will be able to understand this legislation's full impact on employee ownership and make necessary changes and improvements in the future. I yield to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Hultgren) for the purpose of a colloquy.

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Hultgren), and I take the gentleman at his word. I look forward to working with him on this important issue in coordination with GAO. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to withdraw my amendment.

Mr. POLIS

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the rule and the resolution. This resolution undermines fundamental privacy for every internet user. You hear my colleague on the other side trying to conflate different things. When your broadband provider can sell your information, and there is no rule prohibiting them from doing so-- effectively that includes all of your browsing history, data entered in forms, everything that you have done on the internet that has absolutely nothing to do with a relationship with a particular content provider or e-commerce company; you can enter information, obviously, for the express purpose of them optimizing your experience or selling you a product--they are then the owners of that information, and you have choice in the marketplace. Whereas, with our broadband providers, most of us don't have a choice. You either sign up for the local cable company or you don't. Before I discuss the many disastrous facets of this resolution, I also want to point out that this is yet another closed rule. There have been absolutely no open rules that allow Democrats and Republicans to bring forward amendments. No amendments are allowed under this rule here on the floor of the House of Representatives. Sadly, that has become the norm. The FCC recently took steps to reevaluate their rule. Commissioner Pai even paused their implementation to examine the FCC doing their job. Now, why would Congress step in and use the CRA authority, a very cumbersome authority, that also prohibits future implementation of similar rules? In many ways, it hamstrings the agency. What we are worried about is that, if this bill were to become law, it would essentially be impossible for the FCC to act to protect the privacy of Americans who use broadband ever again. So it is not a matter of a nuance under this rule. If we go through the process of passing a CRA, the FCC wouldn't be able to pass any rule--or if they did, it would be under a legal cloud--to protect the privacy of the American people. That is the danger: that CRAs are effectively permanent. The second aspect is that the FCC has already established a notice and comment period that allows for comment on the new rules. By going around that, we would avoid government transparency. So here is what is at stake. On October 27, 2016, after a 6-month rulemaking process that was open to public comment and received comments, the FCC developed a commonsense rule to protect our privacy. The rule that we are talking about undoing basically does three things, which are great. It requires broadband internet access service providers to obtain opt-in consent before using or sharing sensitive information. Sounds obvious that we would want that. We wouldn't want information that doesn't have an opt-in consent to be sold or used. That includes things like web browsing history or data that is entered on forms. It would also require broadband providers to use reasonable measures to protect the cybersecurity of our data. Again, of course. Third, it requires that broadband providers notify consumers in the event of a breach of information. Again, just like we have with credit card companies, we want some kind of affirmative information that is given to consumers that your information may be breached if there is a cybersecurity threat that might do that. This bill undoes all those things. It says that you don't have to notify people if there is a breach, you don't need to have reasonable measures to protect cybersecurity, and, most importantly, with regard to privacy, it will no longer require opt-in consent before using, sharing, or selling your most intimate personal data that you use on the internet. Now, look at the implications of this rollback. It is not just a collection of internet data usage, but bulk collection of all of your network traffic. A broadband provider could collect every search, every website visited, every email written and received, every piece of data entered, every article read, see how often you log in and how you use various accounts for all members of your family, including minors, and even your location, sell that information, and use that information without restriction and without opt-in. Think about what someone can conclude about this information--your political affiliation, preferences, your health. What could they do with it? They could charge pricing of goods and services discriminating against you based on your income or your past purchasing behavior. Your sensitive financial information could be used to steer you to higher costs and worse financial products. This rule would literally change how broadband providers have access to your entire personal life. It would make the broadband providers the most valuable part of the internet value chain. Now, we all want broadband providers to have compensation for the infrastructure costs and a reasonable profit. There is no doubt about that. Those of us who advocate for net neutrality, as I do, or those who advocate for privacy, we want them to have a reasonable return on investment so that we can all have access to broadband. And we have that largely through user fees and subscription fees. Have you seen your cable bill, Mr. Speaker? I have seen my cable bill. It ain't cheap anymore. But many families pay for it because it is the best way to have fast access to the internet. And guess what? The cable companies are able to justify broadband in many areas. Again, maybe there are some tweaks, and it would be great if there is a way we could have greater value for rural broadband and have them have an ROI. We would love that. But the answer is not to turn over the keys to the internet and all your personal data to cable companies and say: You own it all. You are more powerful than Amazon, more powerful than Google, more powerful than every consumer site because you own everything that is entered into every one of those and more, and you can sell it and use it as you see fit without restriction, without even requiring that users opt in. The value conveyance from the content side to the infrastructure side of this bill would be game-changing and game-destroying for the free and open internet. It simply makes no sense. Look, consumers should have the right to choose with who and how they share their personal information. When it comes to a broadband provider, we simply don't have that choice that you do with consumer websites like Facebook or Google, which are governed under a separate set of laws. Proponents of this bill are arguing that, because there is not adequate protection somehow in social media and the edge providers here, somehow the standard should be lower for broadband internet services. It makes no sense. In today's day and age, not having internet access is simply not an option for many Americans. To say you can choose not to have broadband, maybe in some places you can pay more for satellite and you might have some reasonably fast download but not upload that may be spotty, maybe you want to use dial-in over your phone. But for most of us--I use broadband. Most of us use broadband through our cable because it is the most cost-effective way to have high-speed internet access, and that is the case for most American families. So this is not the time to get rid of privacy rules and convey the vast ecosystem that is the internet away from the content and dynamism that exists there to the broadband side. That is absurd. People can choose not to use social media accounts, can choose what they share, and can choose who to enter contracts with with regard to searches or purchases. Social media is an optional platform that you can choose between many providers, but the broadband access side frequently looks and acts more like a monopoly. Supporters of this bill also mention how this somehow levels the playing field for broadband providers. What it does is it tilts the playing field entirely in their favor. Internet service providers are a gateway to the internet. They do not own the internet. The second protection the rule offers is to require reasonable measures be taken to protect the data that they want to collect. Again, we all value cybersecurity and protection of this data. Given the countless incidents of cyber hacking incidents, how can we entertain the idea of rolling back a rule that requires reasonable measures to protect consumer data? What are proponents advocating for? No measures to protect consumer data? The third important protection under this rule is the consumers whose data has been breached should be notified. Again, that is important. I had my credit card stolen a few years ago and got notified that it was. I used it at another location where it might have been compromised and I received notification. This eliminates that notification from users of broadband. It would do away with that. I would like to know, as would consumers, if my credit card information was hacked. I want to know if my personal profile or medical records or emails were hacked. If someone is able to attain my children's names, our home address, information about the schools they attend, or the homework they do, I would want to know. Now, look, this bill moves entirely the wrong direction. It basically seizes the value of the internet from content, from e-commerce, from all of the important dynamism that occurs there and tries to apply that to the broadband side rather than simply find a reasonable way for broadband providers to see a return on investment. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, up until now, every President since Gerald Ford has disclosed their tax return information. These returns provide a basic level of transparency that helps ensure the public's interest is placed first. The American people deserve the same level of disclosure from this administration. Mr. Speaker, if we defeat the previous question, I will offer an amendment to the rule to bring up Representative Eshoo's bill that would require Presidents and major party nominees for the Presidency to release their tax returns. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of my amendment in the Record, along with extraneous material, immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 7 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Eshoo) to discuss this proposal and also the important aspects of the underlying bill that need to be responded to.

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I yield an additional 1 minute to the gentlewoman from California.

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, the evaluation is as it should be. Again, when infrastructure is laid, we want a reasonable ROI. It is like utility infrastructure or water infrastructure. I would never expect that the world's most valuable companies would be the pipes in the people's homes. The magic of the internet is the content. That is what drives the desire for broadband access. And, of course, there are other ways that people can access the internet, but broadband and cable have a technical advantage on price and speed. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Capuano).

Mr. POLIS

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, the time for immigration reform is now. If we want to increase the growth rate of our economy, fixing our broken immigration system will do that. If we want to restore the rule of law and improve our national security so we know who is here, immigration reform will do that. If we want to prevent undocumented workers from undermining wages for American workers, immigration reform will do that by making sure that people who work here are registered and get right with the law and can move forward in a legal manner. There are so many reasons to pass a bipartisan immigration reform bill similar to the one that passed the United States Senate with more than two-thirds support just a few years ago. I hope that my Democratic and Republican colleagues hear the outcry from across this country that says enough is enough. Let's fix our broken immigration system. We are, after all, a nation of immigrants and a nation of laws. It is the work of this body to reconcile those two to make sure that, moving forward, we can do immigration in a legal way rather than an illegal way, a way that benefits our economy, American workers, and American businesses. Let's move forward on comprehensive immigration reform now.

Mr. POLIS

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume, and I thank the gentleman for yielding me the customary 30 minutes. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the rule and the underlying legislation. First, when the gentleman from Georgia said there were no amendments brought forward on this in the Rules Committee, that is partial truth but not the entire truth. The entire truth is, when we have a process whereby Members believe that there might be an amendment process, there is something called a call for amendments which is issued. Often our chair, Mr. Sessions, and my friend from Georgia has heard Mr. Sessions come down to the floor and say: We are calling for amendments on this bill. Submit them. The Rules Committee will consider them and allow some of them to advance to the floor. At least you know you have a fair shot. In this particular case, there was no call for amendments issued, which means, yes, Members could have spun their wheels, and sometimes you feel like a hamster doing that, just running around and not moving anywhere in one of those circles. And if we thought there was any realistic hope that amendments could be included, I, myself, would have been happy to submit one, as would many of my colleagues. Chairman Smith actually requested a closed rule on this. So, again, the chairman of the committee and the Rules Committee gave every indication that we are not allowing any amendments to this bill; and that is what discourages Members from going through the work of submitting an amendment if they have a good idea what the outcome is already going to be. So this is a closed rule. This is an antiscience bill. It is another example of how we go around the ability of Members to improve bills and, instead, work in a partisan, smoky, backroom manner where this bill emerges fully formed. The chair of the committee of jurisdiction himself didn't want any amendments or any changes to this rule, and the Rules Committee never called for those amendments. Now, if the goal of this bill is somehow to increase government transparency, why don't we start with the lawmaking process and have an open rule that allows Democrats and Republicans to improve a bill and offer their best ideas forward? And if they are good ideas, they will be incorporated into the bill. If they are bad ideas and can't command a majority of this body, they will be defeated. But, unfortunately, these partisan tactics that were seen trying to ram through legislation last week that failed when the Speaker and the President refused to work across the aisle with us on healthcare reform and now on improving the process at the EPA, instead of working with us to improve science, they are seeking to undermine the integrity of the important scientific work done at the Environmental Protection Agency and bury the Environmental Protection Agency in red tape. The underlying legislation that this rule talks about has a lot of problems, Mr. Speaker, and so many problems, in fact, I won't even be able to talk about them all during my limited time for debate here. Hopefully they will be able to cover some more during the debate on the bill. The first issue I want to address that is highly problematic with this bill, and it is something that is so important to the American people--liberal, conservative, and moderate--and that is the issue of privacy. This bill would undermine the privacy of American families in a number of ways. What it would do is prohibit the Environmental Protection Agency, an agency that exists to protect our health, from taking any action unless it is based on data that is fully available to the public. Now, that sounds good, ``fully available to the public.'' But what does that mean? You see, normally the EPA has relied on peer-reviewed, scientifically valid research to inform its actions. Now that is something that the process of science across the world informs. It is a very important, well-founded process that respects the efforts of scientists everywhere and the diligence of a peer-reviewed process. Much of these bodies of work utilize personal health information and confidential data which, currently, are legally protected from public disclosure. The EPA identifies the academic papers that it uses in the Federal Register so we have that transparency, but it doesn't release the legally protected private data--participants in studies, health of people--to the general public nor is there any scientific value to that personal information. The value is in the studies, which are done scientifically and are already made public. This bill would force the EPA to either ignore these valuable studies because they utilize private data or violate Federal law by sharing confidential patient information with the general public. We are talking about everything ranging from Social Security numbers, to whether you got cancer from something you were drinking as a child, to our most intimate health or lifestyle issues that are researched by the agency. The majority here, the Republicans, are trying to include a provision in the bill that allows personally identifiable information to be redacted prior to the EPA making the information available. I am sure my colleague from Georgia will cite that, but that is woefully inefficient because it has a loophole in that very provision that basically negates that provision in another section by allowing the EPA administrator to allow any person who signs a confidentiality agreement to have access to all the redacted data. So, again, basically, at the whim of the administrator, they can allow companies and people in there--the information can be put in front of people who have access to it, to use it in any way they want, and that is highly personal information. Again, whether it is under the coverage of a confidentiality agreement or not, it is shown with unknown partners. This is not the Federal agency itself. This is perhaps even the company that caused the pollution that wants to come in and look at it or just various Americans with prurient interests who want to know intimate health details, and there is effectively no protection for that. It is entirely at the whim of the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. So that is an enormous setback for the privacy of American families and a woefully insufficient privacy protection with a loophole that is big enough to drive a truck through. There is not even a numerical limit on the amount of people or corporations that would be allowed access of that data. There could be a blanket permission from the administrator allowing thousands, tens of thousands of people, again, to see the individually identifiable data, including your Social Security Number, including your health details or medical records, including things that affect property value and affect health. Another major issue with this bill, major fault, is it actually undermines the goal of the Agency itself. The Environmental Protection Agency, which has the congressional mandate to keep our air and water clean, to protect our health, this bill actually does the opposite by burying the Agency under a mountain of red tape and bureaucracy. This bill removes sound, scientific, objective decisionmaking and replaces it with ridiculous amounts of red tape, adding to the process of regulations, adding to the process of rules, requiring the Environmental Protection Agency to jump through additional bureaucratic hoops to use certain information, and making their entire goal of fulfilling their mission less efficient than if this bill were not the law. The Environmental Protection Agency already uses a peer-reviewed scientific process. They publish in the Federal Register the reference of the works that they are basing their opinions on, just as the rest of America's scientific community does. This bill undermines the scientific process, is unscientific, and is opposed by so many scientific advocacy organizations, including opposed by the Union of Concerned Scientists who are strongly opposed to this legislation. Now, on top of the red tape and antiscience aspects of the bill, this would also cost the government $1 billion of EPA funds; that is according to analysis of a very similar bill last Congress. These are funds that would be diverted away from protecting our health and safety, which is what they are doing now, toward creating more red tape and bureaucracy for the very agency that the American people entrust with the goal of keeping our air and water clean and the American people healthy. Look, we all know what this bill is. It is a thinly veiled attack on science, part of the antiscience agenda that we are seeing from the Republican Party. The budget that the President offered earlier this month cuts science funding to the bone. Enormous setbacks in the very research into lifesaving science in the future that would help improve our quality of life and duration of life and help our economy boom are being devastated under the President's budgets. Scientific research creates billions of dollars of economic impact and innovation in States like mine, Colorado, and every other State. Science helps keep us healthy. It keeps crops alive and productive. It keeps our businesses open and keeps America as a global leader in innovation. I also want to take a moment to highlight that, while this bill is being heard on the floor today, President Trump is signing an executive order that effectively repeals all of the work that the Environmental Protection Agency and other Federal agencies have done in the last 8 years to protect our planet from the impacts of climate change. Unfortunately, while we focus on a bill that forces scientists to not use the best science available, the President has signed an executive order that will essentially begin the repeal process of the Clean Power Plan. The Clean Power Plan is a basic requirement for States to bring their emissions down to a sustainable level to protect Americans' health, to reduce the amount of pollution in our air and water, and to reduce the human impact on climate change. The executive order also, unfortunately, undermines some of the commonsense protections we have with regard to fracking, something that is near and dear to my constituents and people in Colorado, as an area that is impacted by extraction activities. This repeal, for example, would allow oil and gas companies to hide the chemicals that they use when producing oil and natural gas. Picture that: fracking wells near homes and schools who would no longer have to report what chemicals could potentially be leaking into drinking water or groundwater. How can that possibly further our goal to protect the health and welfare of the American people? So, at the same time, we have this legislation undermining the scientific process of the Environmental Protection Agency and burying the Environmental Protection Agency under red tape, coordinated the same week with the President's disastrous executive order that will hurt the health of the American people and, ultimately, cost lives. These are just another step in the undermining of science and the work to improve and protect the health of the people of our country. The Environmental Protection Agency relies on the best science available when developing new standards, and they are fully transparent about posting those scientific studies. However, because many of the studies that this bill requires would impact legally protected private data, like personal medical records, to reach their findings, the Environmental Protection Agency could even be prohibited from considering that research. This ridiculous restriction would force the EPA to ignore a lot of relevant information because of the desire of the researchers and the legal imperative of the researchers to protect the private data of the participants, ultimately leading to policies that are ineffective and are not based on sound facts or science. Mr. Speaker, facts exist. Science and the pursuit of truth is an incredibly important human endeavor, and we can't afford to disregard that quest for truth in the name of a fiction-based reality that we increasingly seem to be headed toward as a nation. Without sound and strong science, America will fall behind in the world. Americans will--our lifespans will be of lower quality and lower duration, and our economy will be hurt as we cede our leadership role to more forward-looking countries willing to invest in the future. If this bill had been in place over the last few decades, I am pretty sure that the cloud of smog over Denver, Colorado, would probably still be there. Rivers and lakes across this country would suffer from pollution in a significantly worse way, and that is not the future that the American people want. If the EPA is prevented from using the best available peer-reviewed research data on air quality, asthma will be causing more attacks and, yes, even deaths of children across our country. Let's see this legislation for what it is--an attack on science, a giveaway to corporations who benefit from pollution, who don't like the fact that the EPA is using sound silence, who want to create and live in their own fictional reality, where the externalities of their actions somehow don't matter. We need the truth. The American people deserve the truth. We deserve the benefit of the outcome of the process of objective science, and this bill undermines that by burying the Environmental Protection Agency under immense red tape, while preventing them from using some of the very peer-reviewed studies that would lead to the very best decisionmaking possible to protect the health of the American people. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I have some scoring from the Congressional Budget Office, dated March 11, 2015, that I include into the Record. H.R. 1030--Secret Science Reform Act of 2015 As ordered reported by the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology on March 3, 2015

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

Mr. POLIS. This is based on H.R. 1030 from last session, the Secret Science Reform Act of 2015, effectively the same operating provisions as this new bill. If there are any cost-saving elements in this new bill that weren't in H.R. 1030, I would encourage my colleague from Georgia to let us know because we are voting without scoring or costs on the newest version of this legislation. The previous version of this legislation, as I mentioned earlier, would cost $250 million annually over the next several years, $1 billion to implement, and that is the scoring from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office whose director was appointed by the Republicans on a substantially similar bill. Mr. Speaker, we are deeply concerned by reports from our intelligence community regarding Russian interference in last year's election. Even more troubling is FBI Director Comey's sworn testimony that the FBI is now investigating the possibility of collusion between members of President Trump's campaign team and Russia. Mr. Speaker, the legitimacy of our electoral system is at stake; and, frankly, it is time that we rise above partisanship and that we get our job done and get to the bottom of this. Unfortunately, recent actions by the House Intelligence Committee chairman have left many Members of both sides of the aisle convinced and the American public convinced that the committee is unable to conduct an impartial investigation of this critical matter of national security. Mr. Speaker, if we defeat the previous question, I will offer up an amendment to the rule to bring up Representative Swalwell's and Representative Cummings' bill which would create a bipartisan commission to investigate Russian interference in the 2016 election. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of my amendment in the Record, along with extraneous material, immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Swalwell), a member of the Intelligence Committee, to discuss our proposal.

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I yield an additional 1 minute to the gentleman from California.

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, the EPA protecting our quality of life, our air, and our water has nothing to do with Heaven or God. It is based on science. Individual Americans like Mr. Gohmert and myself have our own faith traditions. I don't think there is anybody in the country whose faith tradition is to worship the EPA. We have created the EPA for a purpose: to protect the health of the American people and protect our air and water. There are people alive today and people who are healthier today because of the work of the EPA. The converse of that, without the Environmental Protection Agency, some of us wouldn't even be here and others of us would be sickly. It really doesn't make any sense to talk about people worshipping the EPA. We respect the scientific work of the EPA, and maybe this confusion between faith and science is what is leading to the undermining of the scientific aspects that the EPA reaches their conclusions on. Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record a letter that shows the strong opposition from those who advocate for our health against this bill. Alliance of Nurses, American Lung Association, American Public Health Association, National Medical Association, Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America, and others have all signed a letter in opposition to this bill because this bill threatens the health of the American people. March 27, 2017. Dear Representative: The undersigned health and medical organizations are writing to express our opposition to the EPA Science Advisory Board Reform Act of 2017 and the Honest and Open New EPA Science Treatment Act of 2017. Our organizations are dedicated to saving lives and improving public health. Science is the bedrock of sound medical and public health decision-making. The best science undergirds everything our organizations do to improve health. Under the Clean Air Act, EPA has long implemented a transparent and open process for seeking advice from the medical and scientific community on standards and measures to meet those standards. Both of these bills would restrict the input of scientific experts in the review of complex issues and add undue industry influence into EPA's decision-making process. As written, the EPA Science Advisory Board Reform Act would make unneeded and unproductive changes that would: Restrict the ability of scientists to speak on issues that include their own expertise; Block scientists who receive any EPA grants from serving on the EPA Scientific Advisory Board, despite their having the expertise and conducted relevant research that earned them these highly competitive grants; Prevent the EPA Scientific Advisory Board from making policy recommendations, even though EPA administrators have regularly sought their advice in the past; Add a notice and comment component to all parts of the EPA Scientific Advisory Board actions, a burdensome and unnecessary requirement since their reviews of major issues already include public notice and comment; and Reallocate membership requirements to increase the influence of industry representatives on the scientific advisory panels. In short, EPA Science Advisory Board Reform Act would limit the voice of scientists, restrict the ability of the Board to respond to important questions, and increase the influence of industry in shaping EPA policy. This is not in the best interest of the American public. We also have concerns with the HONEST Act. This legislation would limit the kinds of scientific data EPA can use as it develops policy to protect the American public from environmental exposures and permit violation of patient confidentiality. If enacted, the legislation would: Allow the EPA administrator to release confidential patient information to third parties, including industry; Bolster industry's flawed arguments to discredit research that documents the adverse health effects of environmental pollution; and Impose new standards for the publication and distribution of scientific research that go beyond the robust, existing requirements of many scientific journals. Science, developed by the respected men and women scientists at colleges and universities across the United States, has always been the foundation of the nation's environmental policy. EPA's science-based decision-making process has saved lives and led to dramatic improvements in the quality of the air we breathe, the water we drink and the earth we share. All Americans have benefited from the research-based scientific advice that scientists have provided to EPA. Congress should adopt policy that fortifies our scientists, not bills that undermine the scientific integrity of EPA's decision-making or give polluters a disproportionate voice in EPA's policy-setting process. We strongly urge you to oppose these bills. Sincerely, Katie Huffling, RN, CNM, Director, Alliance of Nurses for Healthy Environments. Harold P. Wimmer, National President and CEO, American Lung Association. Georges C. Benjamin, MD, Executive Director, American Public Health Association. Stephen C. Crane, Ph.D., MPH, Executive Director, American Thoracic Society. Cary Sennett, MD, Ph.D.,

Mr. POLIS. Last Congress, we considered a bill called the Secret Science Act, which was nearly identical to this bill. That was a bill that I submitted was at a cost of billion dollars. If the gentleman from Georgia has any evidence that this bill will cost less, I encourage him to bring it forward. This bill, frankly, would force the EPA to be dishonest, to not use the best available science, and threaten the privacy of the American people. Our goal should be to help the agencies that we charge with protecting our health to use the best possible science to do the best possible job that they can. We should not be throwing up roadblocks and red tape and bureaucratic mazes that hurt the quality of work and the science that we base our protections on. We need to protect American lives from things like dirty air, dirty water, and pollution. We should protect the privacy of all Americans, but this bill doesn't protect the privacy of Americans. It undermines the goal of the Environmental Protection Agency. My colleague, Mr. Swalwell, brought forward a very important motion. When we defeat the previous question, we have a motion to create a bipartisan commission to investigate Russian interference in the 2016 election. That is what I hear about from my constituents. I haven't heard from any constituents that say: We want our personal data to be revealed by the Environmental Protection Agency or we want to stop them from citing scientific papers. That is simply not on the minds of the American people. What is on the minds of the American people is that we need a full accounting for the Russian interference in the 2016 election, which is why we have a bill to create a bipartisan commission to investigate that Russian interference in a manner that has credibility with the American people, that can end this increasingly bizarre spy novel that seems to be unfolding in this city that we are meeting in now, and replace it with investigations and facts and a full accounting for the American people as to what happened and who was involved. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time. Mr. Speaker, I want to inquire if the gentleman from Georgia has any information as to why the new bill would cost any different amount than the prior version of the bill from the last Congress that was scored?

Mr. POLIS. I yield to the gentleman from Georgia.

Mr. POLIS. Reclaiming my time, what the bill essentially does is two things in this regard. One, it will foist an unfunded mandate onto those who are conducting the research to go through the effort themselves of releasing the data. But more perniciously, it will prevent data and scientific studies that there are legal protections from even being looked at by the Environmental Protection Agency. They won't even be able to consider that data. I think it is important that we get back to the topics that the American people care about. I hope that we can move forward with Representatives Swalwell's and Cummings' bill to create a bipartisan commission to investigate the Russian influence in the 2016 election rather than attack and undermine science, attack and undermine privacy, and attack and undermine the American people. This bill undermines our privacy protections and opens the door for more Americans to get sick and hurt by pollution in our air and water. I hope that we can stand up against that. Mr. Speaker, I ask Members to vote ``no'' on this bill and vote ``no'' on this rule. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.