Jared Polis

Mr. POLIS

Mr. POLIS. Will the Speaker understand that? Will the Speaker understand that?

Mr. POLIS. Will the Speaker understand that the Speaker is preventing H.R. 15 from coming to the floor, and that is why there are men and women in the gallery that potentially face deportation and their families are being torn apart. It is very simple, Madam Speaker. Very simple. We need an immigration system that reflects our values as Americans--a Nation of immigrants and a Nation of laws. One that creates jobs for Americans; one that reduces our deficit by over $200 billion; secures our border; prevents terrorists from entering our country so we know who is here; and ensures that crimes are reported. We can do that, Madam Speaker. And I have heard it said that perhaps some prefer to do it piecemeal. Let's see what the pieces are and let's have a meal. That is what the Thanksgiving spirit is all about. We will be happy to look at the pieces. Let's see them. In fact, the Judiciary Committee has reported out four bills. Those bills aren't perfect, by any means; but through the Rules Committee and the amendment process on the floor, I hope that we could potentially make them part of a bill. But those four bills have languished. In the meantime, other bills that have come through the Judiciary Committee, for instance, an asbestos bill, found a fast track to the floor. Patent reform, fast track to the floor. Four immigration bills passed out of committee. Weeks go by, months ago by, and nobody hears a thing. Why aren't we considering those bills, Madam Speaker? Even I support this patent bill that we will be voting on tomorrow. But even from our friends in the tech community, job creators, major companies, they like this bill, in many cases. But you know what they really want? Immigration reform. They will say, Fine, you helped us out finding a few patent trolls. Now get immigration reform done, because we will be able to create jobs for Americans. That is what we are here for, Madam Speaker: uniting American families, creating jobs for Americans. We do that, Madam Speaker, by passing H.R. 15, by passing pieces and having a meal, however you want to do it. In fact, how about we invite our friends from across the aisle, Republicans, to join us here next week to talk about immigration reform and a path forward? We have been down here every week since the Senate passed comprehensive immigration reform demanding the House bring up pieces or bring up comprehensive immigration reform, and we invite our Republicans friends to discuss this with us. There is no Democratic or Republican solution. This takes us working together for an American solution. We know that, Madam Speaker. H.R. 15 is not a Democratic bill or Republican bill. It is a bipartisan bill, with principals from both parties. More than two-thirds of the Senate support its commonsense approach. We can improve upon the pieces and have a meal, or we can pass comprehensive immigration reform to reflect our values as Americans and create jobs for Americans and protect our borders. The longer that we fail to act, the more men and women will have to be in these galleries here, Madam Speaker--perhaps against your wishes--will have to be fasting; will have to quit their jobs working in Congress, like Erika, because her mother is facing deportation. Is that the America we want when we look at ourselves in the mirror? Madam Speaker, is that what we are proud of as Americans? Is that our values? Are we proud that a young, talented staff person like Erika, working on behalf of her country for her Congresswoman here in the United States Capitol has to quit her own job because our own government is deporting her own mother, who hasn't committed any criminal or violent crime? It might have cost the taxpayers tens of thousands of dollars for deportation and at the cost of tearing a family apart and preventing Erika from offering all that she had to give to our great country. We can do better, Madam Speaker. We can do better by the handful of people in this gallery and the millions of families across this country that are demanding action now, and the hundreds of million--yes, every American man, woman, and child who stands to benefit by immediate action here in the House of Representatives. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. POLIS

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. POLIS

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

Mr. POLIS. It seems more like we have been in a timeout for 3 months since these bills have passed committee.

Mr. POLIS. Will the gentleman yield?

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I am prepared to close, so I yield myself such time as I may consume. The gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Collins), rightly asserted that the Democrats did not, in fact, when they were in charge of the legislature in both Chambers, fix our broken immigration system. However, we did pass the DREAM Act. And given that this is football season and I think that my friend, the gentleman from Georgia, perhaps shares affinity for football, that while we did not in fact score a touchdown and fix our broken immigration system, at least the Democrats got a field goal when we were in charge. We are still waiting for the Republicans to match our field goal here if we can't score a touchdown with comprehensive immigration reform, and we look forward to improving these bills that have passed out of the committee before the asbestos bill, before the patent reform bill, and need the work of the full membership of this body to improve them. Legislation is not like a fine wine, that when it sits in a barrel it improves itself. It needs to be actively worked upon to improve it, and I hope that it is a matter of days or hours or minutes until we can dust off these immigration bills that Chairman Goodlatte and the Judiciary Committee have worked on and improve upon them so that this body can actually move forward and score a field goal, a touchdown or more, and finally replace our broken immigration system with one that reflects our values as Americans, restores the rule of law, reduces our deficit by $200 billion, creates 6 million jobs for American citizens, secures our borders, and implements workplace enforcement of our immigration system. I am confident that we can do that working together, just as we are working together on these bills that are before us today. As I indicated earlier, that while the patent bill does harvest some low-hanging fruit, there remains a lot of work to be done to create a 21st century intellectual property protection system for our country. One such effort was an amendment that I offered, Polis amendment 5, that was not allowed under this rule. This amendment reflects a bill that I sponsor with Mr. Marino that regards the Demand Letter Transparency Act. Depending on a start-up's resources, even the recipient of one demand letter can even be a death sentence for a small one-, two-, three-person company. The threat of a demand letter alone can jeopardize a company's ability to raise funds, can scare away potential customers, and, God forbid, actually defending a patent lawsuit can cost hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars in legal bills, which to a one-, two-, or three-person company is simply a matter of shutting the doors because they cannot afford to do that. At the Rules Committee yesterday, I offered my bipartisan amendment based on legislation that I introduced with Representative Marino and Representative Deutch that would provide a comprehensive approach to increasing transparency and accountability in the demand letter process. While our amendment was not made in order, I am grateful we did include at least some slight provisions regarding who owns shell corporations, amendment 4 was allowed. We plan to continue to press forward on the need to address this issue through meaningful legislation. Our bill would require certain entities to provide additional disclosure information to the PTO and to the demand letter recipient so that these start-ups and mom-and-pop restaurant owners and stores will know who is sending these demand letters and whether the claims they are making are truthful or grounded at all or just a scam. Our bill would establish a searchable and accessible public registry of demand letters and clarify that the Federal Trade Commission could use its authority to impose civil penalties to go after patent trolls. While the FTC has announced its intent to investigate PAEs, our bill would clarify the FTC's role to use its enforcement powers against PAEs who engage in unfair and deceptive trade practices to find as a violation the provisions of our bill. Our amendment would prevent patent trolls from hiding behind anonymous shell companies and empower defendants to take collective action and share information and increase reporting so that the regulatory authorities and the PTL are on alert as to which patents are being frivolously asserted by whom. In conjunction with litigation reforms that are proposed in this underlying bill, our proposal would produce a more robust patent market and a more productive and predictable and competitive economy. Our proposal is supported by a diverse group of individuals and organizations, including DISH Network, Public Knowledge, the National Restaurant Association, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the National Retail Federation, the Direct Marketing Association, the Mobile Marketing Association, the Association of American Advertising Agencies, and the Hotel & Lodging Association, among many others. Mr. Speaker, for once, this body is moving forward on bipartisan legislation that will help spur innovation and economic growth. The first bill that we are considering with regard to private equity will help increase job growth and job creation in our country by removing a regulatory burden that was put in without the proper justification. Private equity funds had nothing to do with the meltdown in 2008 and 2009, nor do they represent any systemic risk to our economy. They simply allow people to aggregate their resources to buy stock equity in companies. We have a cap on the debt equity ratio of two to one, and they do what they do. People earn money and people lose money, and that is how the economy works, but there is absolutely no systemic risk. Some of these dollar amounts sound high, but what we talked about in the Rules Committee yesterday is that you might have a private equity fund that is $300 million. That sounds like a lot of money. That is the amount of money they have to invest over a period of years. With $300 million, they invest that over 5, 6, or 7 years. That is not their operational budget. Their operational budget is 2 percent or less of that every year. So a $300 million private equity fund might have an annual budget of $6 million. Again, $6 million sounds like a lot of money. It certainly is. But when compliance with the SEC reform is $500,000, as has been estimated, you are talking about a sizeable percentage of your annual operating budget. So that means you have to hire a couple of people less. You might not be able to do that extra investment that you didn't have the ability to do the diligence in. You might not be able to invest in that additional company and help it grow and create jobs because of regulatory compliance that has nothing to do with systemic risk. Mr. Speaker, as this session of Congress comes to a close, the first session of the 113th Congress, there is much that this body has left undone. While the other Chamber across the way has acted on overwhelmingly bipartisan measures that help fix our immigration system, saving $200 billion, creating over 6 million jobs, securing our borders, restoring the rule of law, and uniting families, this body has not passed a single bill in that area. While the other body has passed a bill that would prevent companies from discriminating against gay and lesbian employees with strong bipartisan support, this body has not even brought such a bill to committee or the floor. While I am pleased to see the bipartisan Innovation Act and Small Business Capital Access and Job Preservation Act come to the floor today, although I would like to see them with a more open process that allowed more ideas from both sides of the aisle to be introduced as amendments, I only hope that a majority of this body sees fit to hold votes on other issues such as immigration reform and employment nondiscrimination, which I am confident would pass the floor of the House today. As I talk to many tech companies and small businesses in my district, many of the purported beneficiaries of this modest patent reform bill, they support it, but they support immigration reform more. They say, Good job. Now get immigration reform done. That is what I am hearing from employers and businesses in my district. I hope that my colleagues on the other side of the aisle are hearing the same. Our Nation cannot afford to maintain a 20th century intellectual property protection system in a digital and biological era. This bill does not correct that. It does not change that. It is a modest step forward and an important part of reforming parts of the process that Democrats, Republicans, and many stakeholders can agree are broken. The measure contains bipartisan balanced proposals, just as H.R. 15 does, the comprehensive immigration reform bill in the House, with over 190 bipartisan sponsors. And just as this bill will continue to incentivize entrepreneurship, so too--times 10, times 100--would comprehensive immigration reform, which includes a start-up visa that allows entrepreneurs who have already received commitments of investment to come to this country and create their jobs here. We are turning jobs for Americans away every day we fail to act on immigration reform. We can bring H.R. 15 to the Rules Committee and to the floor of the House next week or we can stay the following week and give this body the opportunity to send a bill to President Obama's desk to finally replace our broken immigration system with one that works. Mr. Speaker, if we defeat the previous question, I will offer an amendment to the rule to bring up House Resolution 424, Ranking Member Slaughter's resolution, that prohibits an adjournment of the House until we adopt a budget conference report. This body should not adjourn until we have completed a budget conference report that could help prevent a second government shutdown and prevent a fiscal crisis. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of the amendment in the Record, along with extraneous material, immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I would like to inquire if the gentleman has any other speakers.

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Cardenas).

Mr. POLIS. I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Chu), a member of the Judiciary Committee, one of the key architects and somebody who worked very hard on this bill.

Mr. POLIS. I yield an additional 30 seconds to the gentleman.

Mr. POLIS. And I certainly wish that we had acted on immigration reform. We did pass under Democratic control a DREAM Act, if the gentleman will recall, in the waning days of the 111th Congress, and did take at least one constructive step with an immigration bill that we brought to the full floor of this House and passed. I would like to yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. Perlmutter), a member of the Financial Services Committee and a former member of the Rules Committee.

Mr. POLIS. Reclaiming my time, 68 Members of the Senate, including many Republicans, including former Presidential Republican nominee John McCain, supported the Senate immigration reform bill. I certainly understand the desire to get it right, but bills don't get right by themselves. These are four bills that have passed in the Judiciary Committee. We in Rules like to make them right by allowing good, thoughtful amendments from colleagues on both sides of the aisle. I hope that next week or when we are back, we will be able to move forward the immigration bills with the same alacrity that we have moved forward asbestos and patent reform. I hope the same thing happens that as these bills move through Judiciary that we do see them in the Rules Committee and that they ultimately come to this floor for debate. Mr. Speaker, I do support the underlying bills that are contained under this rule. I support H.R. 1105, the bipartisan Small Business Capital Access and Job Preservation Act. It exempts private equity funds which are very lightly leveraged in helping to grow companies and jobs from costly and unnecessary SEC registration and reporting requirements like venture capital firms that are already exempted and substantially have very similar business models to private equity firms. These registration requirements are an impediment to business and an impediment to job growth and have nothing to do with creating systemic risk in our economy. Importantly, this bill would only exempt private equity firms with low debt-to-equity ratios leveraged at a ratio of less than 2 to 1. Once you get to talking about much higher debt-to-equity ratios, there is potentially systemic risk if you are talking about funds in the multi-billions of dollars that are highly leveraged. It is still hard to see how that could happen. It had nothing to do with the financial meltdown of '08-'09. But in this case, we are being extremely safe in saying if they are leveraged 2 to 1, they are no systemic risk to the economy. My State and my district know firsthand the benefits that private equity provides to employees, to companies, to investors, including pensions, and our economy. There are nearly 500 private equity-backed companies headquartered in Colorado, many more that operate with employees, more than 124,000 workers in Colorado facilities. In 2012, there were 67 private equity investments in Colorado totaling over $26 billion that were brought to our State because of this investment mechanism, placing Colorado third in the States receiving the most private equity investment. The underlying rule also makes in order H.R. 3309, the Innovation Act, which I also support. In 2011, ``patent assertion entities,'' some of whom are bad actors which are sometimes referred to as ``patent trolls,'' who often produce little or nothing and derive their revenue from litigation and licensing, cost significant overhang to other businesses and to consumers for whom many of these costs are passed along in the products or services that we all enjoy. The majority of the targets of patent trolls were start-ups--hospitals, restaurants, retailers, hotels, and other important job-creation engines in our economy. The reforms made in the America Invents Act, enacted 2 years ago, went a little ways in this regard, but did not do much to halt or put a stop to or reduce patent troll litigation or improve the quality of patents. In the case of software patents, growing patent backlogs, lack of training and resources available to PTO examiners, and ambiguity regarding patentability standards have led to approval of low-quality software patents that have not even stood up when brought to litigation. Thankfully, the momentum is growing to address patent reform. I want to be clear--and I discussed this with Chairman Goodlatte in the Rules Committee yesterday--this bill is not patent reform. I believe the gentleman, Mr. Goodlatte, agrees this is not patent reform. It may be a few steps in the right direction. It may be a good start. It doesn't fundamentally create an intellectual property protection system for the digital era in the 21st century. It continues to put, constructively, Band-Aids on a 1913 system, which I do believe it is high time to rethink. I look forward to an upcoming symposium in my district at the University of Colorado this Friday that we will be having on sort of ``blue sky'' intellectual property protection mechanisms for the 21st century in the digital economy to encourage growth and to protect inventors. This bill does not do that. However, it is a step forward in many regards. While I strongly support many of these patent system improvements, it won't fix our patent system. Patent trolls have targeted every form of business. It should come as no surprise that the Innovation Act enjoys support from Members from both sides of the aisle, from companies, from academics. I submitted a letter from 67 professors at law universities who practice in IP from a broad ideological perspective into the record in our Rules Committee yesterday expressing their support for this bill. This bill maintains protections for inventors' rights to enforce their patent claims. Specifically, this bill allocates the burden of patent litigation more fairly. It includes a provision that restores financial accountability to the patent system by making it easier for courts to impose sanctions on anyone who brings a frivolous patent suit. The bill also requires the disclosure of critical details when a patent-holder files a suit, such as what patent and claims are being infringed, so the person or entity receiving the letter can know what is being discussed so that defendants don't need to guess the nature of the allegations against them. The underlying legislation further requires patent-holders to disclose additional information to the PTO, the court, and the accused infringer, including the patent ownership, who owns the patent, and parties with financial interest in the patent. These provisions will help stop patent trolls who engage in illegitimate litigation campaigns and extortion against start-ups and small businesses. While I strongly support these patent reforms that are a modest step towards improving our patent system, the litigation reforms alone don't have enough to benefit start-ups and small companies that are targeted by patent trolls who send pre-litigation demand letters. I am very appreciative of the chairman's effort to allow, and the Rules Committee's effort to allow, for the discussion of my amendment, along with Mr. Chaffetz, Mr. Connolly, and Mr. Marino, who have been working in this regard to see stronger language on the issue of pre-litigation demand letters. And I am grateful that we have made in order an amendment to increase accountability in the demand letter process. We will be discussing that amendment in a more thorough basis shortly; but, in brief, the problem is that before a patent troll even files a suit, it typically sends a demand letter, or many demand letters, demanding some form of payment. Under current law, the sender does not even have to disclose even the most basic information. As such, entities often hide behind numerous shell corporations or send vague or overbroad letters that don't even identify the owner of the patent or the basis of their legal claim, essentially leading particularly small companies to have to hire lawyers or attorneys at great expense. When you have a company that is a $300,000-a-year company, a $500,000-a-year company, and you receive one or more of these notices, you can imagine how that takes away from your growth, your margins, your ability to hire more people, if you have to retain professional counsel to even understand what is being alleged that your company did. Importantly, the underlying bill requires patent-holders seeking to bring willful infringement claims to provide their targets with a minimum level of disclosure information. The amendment enhances that and builds upon the language and would mandate that demand letters include information identifying the parent entity of the claimant. This language will help ensure that patent trolls can no longer hide under shell companies to conceal their true entity and their legitimacy from the demand letter recipient. I look forward to discussing these bills further, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. There are many things that my good friend from Florida said that I agree with. I will be discussing some of the merits of these bills, but it is worthwhile to bring forward before discussing what these bills are, what these bills are not. It has been 159 days and 14 hours since the Senate passed a comprehensive immigration reform bill. This body's failure to act on immigration reform has already cost our economy nearly $6 billion. Each additional day, each day that we delay action costs $37 million in revenue; hundreds of thousands of jobs lost; failure to secure the border; failure to restore the rule of law to our country; countless families torn apart. While the Judiciary Committee has found the time to move asbestos bills and patent reform bills to the floor with ease, immigration reform remains stagnant. The Judiciary Committee has reported out four immigration reform bills: the Legal Workforce Act, the Agricultural Guestworker Act, the SAFE Act, and the SKILLS Visa Act. They reported these four bills out prior to the asbestos bill which was rushed immediately to the floor and prior to the patent bill which was rushed to the floor after a hearing in the Rules Committee yesterday. My question to the gentleman from Florida--and I will be happy to yield for a moment--is why we are giving such treatment to asbestos and patent reform when immigration reform would create so many more jobs and reduce our deficit by so much more? I would like to know if the gentleman from Florida has an answer to that question. I yield to the gentleman from Florida.

Mr. POLIS

Mr. POLIS. Will the gentleman yield?

Mr. POLIS

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Chairman, the Holt-Peters-Polis amendment would allow the Secretary of Interior to minimize fugitive methane emissions on public lands. Methane is a potent greenhouse gas that commonly leaks during the drilling and transportation of oil and gas. If you look at the entire production process, excess methane emissions can make natural gas energy just as dirty as coal energy. Moreover, methane and Volatile Organic Compounds emitted from oil and gas wells interact with sunlight to create ozone, another greenhouse gas. Although national methane emissions fell between 2011 to 2012, emissions in Colorado, Wyoming, Utah, and other energy producing states have risen due to oil and gas operations. Colorado has approximately 50,000 wells which contribute to the state's current non-attainment status for the EPA's 2008 national ambient air quality standard for ozone. In addition, rural areas in the Upper Green River Basin in Wyoming have recorded dangerously high levels of smog that rival the worst pollution days in Los Angeles due to drilling. This is concerning since ground level ozone or ``smog'' can trigger asthma attacks and aggravate conditions of people with bronchitis and emphysema. Earlier this year I introduced the BREATHE Act, H.R. 1154 because oil and gas wells and their associated infrastructure contribute to air pollution. Despite the overwhelming evidence that oil and gas production causes air pollution, oil and gas operators are still exempt from the basic federal protections afforded by the Clean Air Act. The BREATHE Act would close the loopholes in the Clean Air Act carved out for the oil and gas industry. Energy companies can easily and cheaply curb methane emissions by simply fixing the leaks in oil and gas equipment. Also, methane control technology is inexpensive and readily available. Industry also stands to benefit from capturing emissions because they can sell the captured methane and other valuable hydrocarbons for a profit instead of leaking them into the air. Reducing methane leaks will in turn reduce ground level ozone pollution and protect the quality of life for our communities and our families. Please support the Holt-Peter-Polis amendment.

Mr. POLIS

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

Mr. POLIS

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I just returned from visiting with hardworking Americans down on The National Mall, including Tom Weiss from Colorado, who are camped out and fasting in front of the Capitol on The National Mall. It is called the ``Fast for Families,'' a call for immigration reform and a pathway to citizenship. Fasting this month are many fine Americans using their own suffering to send a clear message to us here in Washington--to their elected leaders--that the moral and economic toll of Congress' failure to pass immigration reform is simply too great. This is an economic cause, yes, a security cause, yes, but it is a moral cause to unite families, to allow people to give back to our country to make it greater. Men and women from all corners of the country are pleading with us to pass comprehensive immigration reform. H.R. 15 here in the House reduces the deficit by close to $200 billion, creates over 100,000 jobs for Americans, secures our borders, unites families, makes sure that we have people with the skills we need to build a 21st century economy, and all that it requires is action here on the floor of the House. There are many others in States, including Arizona, Nebraska, California, New York, and Pennsylvania, who are also fasting and depriving themselves of food to demonstrate their passion for fixing our broken immigration system. I want to share with you the words of Jesus Ramirez, a 16-year-old high school student from Indianapolis, whose parents brought him to the United States when he was just 7 years old to escape the violence that was gripping his home country of Mexico. He says: My family and 11 million families out there who are undocumented are living in the shadows and living with a fear that one day they will come home and not see a loved one. Sadly, Mr. Speaker, every day until Congress acts, Jesus' worst fears come true for the 1,100 men, women, and children who are forcibly deported from the United States because our broken immigration system provides no recourse, provides no way under current law to get right with the law, no remedy, no line to get in for people for whom we say ``get in line.'' Immigration reform is about creating that line. The people who are here illegally will go to the end of the line behind people who are in process under our current immigration system. Clara Cuesta of Philadelphia, who is also fasting, said that she has friends who deal with hostile and exploitive conditions in the workplace, but are afraid to report it or to change jobs because they are worried about being asked to produce documents that they don't have and, again, have no way to get under current law. According to Clara, she has friends that are yelled at and treated less than equal simply because there is no way for them to get right with the law. There are women across our country, Mr. Speaker, who are victims of domestic abuse but don't seek the help they desperately need from authorities because they fear the risk of deportation from those very same authorities that should be there to protect them from harm. Since 1994, there have been more than 6,000 reported deaths on the U.S.-Mexico border. Comprehensive immigration reform will finally secure our southern border. Let's heed the call of the fasters, of those who pray passionately for comprehensive immigration reform. As Reverend Jim Wallis, the president of Sojourner, said: For people of faith, this is not a political issue, but a moral one; and for Christians, how we treat 11 million undocumented people, the strangers among us, is how we treat Christ himself. I am sad to report, Mr. Speaker, it has been 145 days since the bipartisan Senate immigration bill passed with two-thirds of the Senate. It is rare, Mr. Speaker, here in my time serving in this body, that two-thirds of the Senate can agree on anything. But to agree on something of the importance of immigration reform, more than two-thirds of the Senate, sends a message that our friends on the other side of this building have heard the call of the people of this country to restore the rule of law, have heard the call of law enforcement to get real and enforce our laws, have heard the call of employers who want a highly skilled workforce, have heard the call of families who simply want to be safe in their homes as they work hard to make our country stronger. That is why I am proud to be part of a coalition of House Members that introduced a bill similar to the Senate bill, the bipartisan bill, H.R. 15, the Border Security Economic Opportunity and Immigration Modernization Act, which creates jobs, reduces our deficit, provides a pathway to citizenship, and unites families. Immigration reform will provide significant economic growth as immigrants will be able to contribute substantially to economic growth, increased wages, and productivity. According to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, the Senate immigration reform bill will lead to significant economic growth. Over the next decade, comprehensive immigration reform will increase our GDP by 3.3 percent. That means raising wages for Americans by $470 billion. That means creating an average of 121,000 jobs a year for Americans. Immigration reform also means that immigrants will pay more than $100 billion in additional taxes, including to State and local government, to support the services that they have been using all along. It is not fair to our fellow Americans for people who are here without paperwork illegally to be using our public services without contributing with their taxes, and yet they support paying taxes. It is rare to meet people in this country who want to pay taxes, but, to a person that I have met with, they are ready. They are ready. They are patriotic. They are ready to contribute to our country, if only we will let them. The bill also expands the number of H-1B citizens from 65,000 to 110,000 and allows the cap to rise as high as 180,000, depending on the U.S. economy, to ensure that businesses don't have to compete for oversubscribed visa slots and can access the workers they need so we can grow the next great generation of companies here. When a company is hiring in the technology field or a computer programmer, they are going after the person. If they can't bring the person that they want here to fill that job, they will fill that job in India, they will fill that job in England, they will fill that job in South America. It is a global economy. As Americans, we want those jobs and that economic productivity here. The House refusal to take up immigration reform has cost this country over $5.3 billion in potential revenue so far. The cost continues to go up every day that we fail to act. One of the issues in the contentious budget discussions about restoring fiscal solvency to our country is how we can repair our entitlement programs, make them secure for the next generation of retirees. Take the solvency of the Social Security trust fund, for example. The Social Security trust fund is already paying out more in retirement benefits than it receives in taxes. From an actuarial perspective, that is scheduled to get worse as baby boomers age. But as the Social Security Administration estimates, close to two- thirds of the 8 million people who are here illegally currently work in an underground labor economy where neither their employers nor they are declaring their earnings or paying payroll taxes. Imagine that, 8 million more people paying into Social Security to make sure that it is there for Americans who have worked hard all their lives. We owe that to so many Americans who have paid in that it is there for them, and comprehensive immigration reform will ensure that that happens. Today, only about 37 percent, it has been estimated, of people who are here legally pay into Social Security with payroll taxes. Experts are estimating that our Nation loses about $20 billion a year in payroll taxes. I want that number to be 100 percent. I want people who are working here in this country to pay their fair share to ensure that Americans who have worked hard and paid into Social Security their whole lives are able to retire with the benefits that were promised to them and that they planned their lives around. While people who are here illegally are already helping to support Social Security to the tune of $12 billion a year, we are foregoing $20 billion a year, which is what it has been estimated they would pay in if only we let them. If we can provide a pathway to citizenship for the 11 million people who are here illegally, they will contribute hundreds of billions of dollars more to our Social Security system--$606 billion over the next 36 years. That funds a lifetime of retirement benefits for almost two and a half million Americans just from those. We are not talking about letting new people into the country. We are not talking about changing the way that people get here. We are talking about people who are already here and working. We are just saying, Pay your taxes. Pay your taxes like other Americans do. Let's talk about health care costs. While people here illegally pay into some of the health care programs to the tune of $115 billion for Medicare--again, we are foregoing the revenue--health care costs will continue to rise for American families because of the cost of the uninsured. As the Center for Immigration Studies estimates, the current cost of treating uninsured immigrants who enter this country without documentation is $4.3 billion a year, mostly at emergency rooms and free clinics. So again, costs are being shifted to American citizens to pay for the health care of those who are here illegally. The answer is simple. Make them pay for it themselves. H.R. 15 does that. Let's bring it to the floor. How much longer must we continue to subsidize the health care for people who haven't even followed our laws in working in our country? If we can pass a comprehensive immigration reform bill that brings our underground economy out of the shadows, many of these immigrants, some of whom have been here for decades, who are currently receiving benefits without paying for them, will be required to pay for their benefits. They will be required to purchase health care or get insured through their employer. In doing so, our labor market will be healthier, more productive, and generate economic growth. The people who are here illegally will no longer be able to undermine wages for American workers because they are willing to work under the table and take public benefits from others rather than paying for it themselves, and that is why it is time to pass H.R. 15. There are only 10 legislative days left in 2013 for the House of Representatives to pass immigration reform. Thousands of men and women across the country who are fasting should send a strong message to this body. We need to ask immediately to pass comprehensive immigration reform that provides a pathway to citizenship and helps rebuild our economy. The average work week is an example of many of the hardworking immigrants in our country. On the farm worker side, it is 53 hours a week. The average wage of a noncitizen worker is $318 a week. Until we can find a way to bring the underground economy out from the shadows, illegal immigration will continue to exert a downward pressure on wages for American workers, reward businesses that skirt the law, that hire people illegally, and provide a drag on our overall economy and job creation. There is no other bill that I know of that will create over 100,000 jobs for Americans, reduce our deficit by close to $200 billion, improve our national security, decrease the terrorist risk to our homeland, and unite hardworking families. Immigration reform will do that. The economic case is compelling. We have gone through some of the numbers here tonight. The security case is compelling in terms of making sure that people in our country cooperate with law enforcement investigations, that we know who is here, and they are accountable for following our laws. The moral case for immigration reform is what is driving this to national prominence. Moral issues always trump our day-to-day concerns. When something is right or wrong, Americans know that. They know that in their minds. They feel it in their heart, and Americans are good people, Mr. Speaker, and they want a country, they want to live in a country and be part of a country that reflects their values as Americans. Americans know that the way we handle immigration today does not do that. It is not moral to take a hardworking mother who plays a critical role supporting her family away from her American children and put her in indefinite detention. It is not right to allow thousands of people to die at our border rather than secure it, and not let people who shouldn't be here through. It is not right to force millions of people to live amongst us in a secret and underground manner, risking exploitation, risking being found out at any turn. That is why, Mr. Speaker, the faith-based community--from the evangelical coalition for immigration reform to the Catholic bishops to the Jews and Muslims to nonbelievers--has joined together not just to support immigration reform but to be the strong, moral voice for comprehensive immigration reform. It is simply the right thing to do by our people, for our values. We are a Nation of laws, and we are a Nation of immigrants. We need those two to be consistent. We need to reflect our American values as a Nation of immigrants, in our laws that welcome those who want to work hard and play by the rules to our shores. Yet today we have people who have worked hard every day for years, for decades, who have American kids who have gone through our schools and are as American as you or I, while their parents or their uncles or aunts are still forced to live underground and in secrecy. Despite being American in fact, they are not yet American in word. Again, there is no pathway, there is no line for people to get right with the law. Many people face what is called a lifetime bar, meaning that if they even try to come forward, they would have to live in some other country they might not have even been to for decades, and don't have a job and don't have any family there, and very likely never be able to return to where their kids are. When you ask that of people, they are not going to self-deport. That is not a good deal. What parent is going to want to leave their kids for the rest of their life and go to a country that they haven't been in for decades and don't have a job and might not even have family or friends there. It doesn't meet the real life needs of people in our country. What does is making sure that we hold people accountable for following our laws. Let's create provisional status so that eventually they can earn a green card. It is also important to know that H.R. 15 and the Senate bill don't grant citizenship to anybody. There is nobody who is granted citizenship under any of these immigration reform bills we are talking about. It is about creating the line, creating the pathway, creating the way that people can get behind in line those who are already in line, a minimum of 13 years before they are even eligible to take the test or become a citizen. I have had the opportunity in Estes Park and in Centennial, Colorado, to be at the new citizenship ceremonies where we administer the oath of citizenship to new Americans from across the world. It gives me great pride as an American, as a great grandchild of immigrants, as a Member of Congress, to be able to participate in welcoming people from Holland, Kenya, Israel, Brazil, from Mexico, to name just a few of the many countries represented at the two ceremonies I got to be a part of. There are many more that would like to work hard beside their American brothers and sisters to make our country stronger. Through acting on immigration reform, we can create jobs, reduce our deficit, improve our security, and most importantly, reflect what we know to be right and our values as Americans. I have been speaking every week on the floor of the House since the passage of the Senate immigration reform bill and since we introduced the House immigration reform bill about the need to pass immigration reform in the House. I believe we have the votes, Mr. Speaker. I believe H.R. 15, which has strong bipartisan sponsorship, if it was placed on the floor of the House, I am confident it would pass. I am confident that the Senate would accept the improvements that the House has made to the border security provisions. We have moved to an outcome-based model to hold border security accountable, and I am confident that President Obama would sign that bill. There are 2 more weeks here, Mr. Speaker, 8 more legislative days. I think America would like to see Congress work a little harder here. We have 40-some days left in the year. Most Americans have to work more than 8 days out of 40. I think Americans would like to see us work 10 days, 12 days. I mean, God forbid, 25 or 30 days out of 40. That is what most Americans do. If we do that, I know we can pass immigration reform, whether it takes a day, a week, a month. We owe it to our country to try. I have been disappointed to see the types of bills that we have been spending days debating here on the floor of the House these last few weeks. While these are, of course, issues that people care about--last week we talked about asbestos torts; this week we talk about BLM fracking regulations, certainly an issue that affects Colorado near and dear to my district--I can tell you that the number of people from my district who have written in or called in on immigration reform has been, I think, 100 times. We were talking about asbestos reform last week. I didn't have a single constituent who had called in saying what I really want Congress to tackle is asbestos reform. I haven't had one in the years I have been here saying this is an issue they want us to deal with. Fracking, frankly, my constituents have asked me to take action on, but it is not the action that the House considered with the BLM. It is more like the bill that I sponsored, the Breathe Act which we offered as an amendment, and was not allowed in the Rules Committee. Even that, even though my district is home to fracking issues and BLM lands, the numbers of letters and calls we have gotten to act on that issue is dwarfed by the overwhelming demand for immigration reform. There has never been an issue like it in the public's desire and passion for Congress to act. It is an issue that our municipal governments can't fix, our State governments can't fix. Only our Federal Government can secure our borders. Only our Federal Government can require workplace enforcement. Only our Federal Government can determine who is here legally and who is here illegally. These are not things that cities or States can do. With a void of Federal leadership, States are around the edges trying to do what they can. They are talking about in-State tuition. They are working with deferred action kids. The President has moved forward with deferred action programs that provide a 2-year respite for young de facto Americans who know no other country, but only Congress, only the lawmakers, can address this issue and actually replace our broken, immoral, nonsensical immigration system with one that works and is enforced to restore the rule of law to our Nation. This problem won't go away until Congress acts. It won't resolve itself. We can wait. We can wait, and in 5 years, maybe there will be 14 million people here illegally instead of 10. Maybe there will be a whole new generation of people who are here working illegally because we refuse to enforce the laws, refuse to require that employers verify that people who work at their companies are here legally. We don't do that in this country. We have a program, it is an optional program. So guess what? Most employers don't do E-Verify. You are an employer, why would you do it if it is optional? I think under 10 percent of companies use E-Verify, so it is not a burden on small business, but we need to make employment verification required, which H.R. 15 does. I mean, if we are ever going to get serious about ending the demand side of illegal immigration, which is people coming here for jobs--if they can't get the jobs, they are not going to be here. We need to be serious about that. H.R. 15 does that. We need to be serious about securing our border. Now, another important thing for Americans to know is securing our border is very important, but it is only about half of the issue. About half of the people who are here illegally came legally and stayed and worked illegally. So locking down that border, you are never going to get 100 percent, but 99 percent, whatever you get down there, that can reduce illegal immigration by about half. But the other half came here legally, meaning they were on a student visa and they stayed illegally and worked illegally, or they flew on a tourist visa and they stayed and worked illegally. There are a number of different ways where it is perfectly legal to arrive here, but then they stay illegally. So we have to deal with both sides of that, which is why border security is great, but it is not enough. In the best cases, it reduces the number of people who enter our country illegally by about half. It doesn't do a darn thing about the fact that there are 11 million people already here illegally, it doesn't do a darn thing about people who will keep entering illegally because they actually enter legally and stay illegally. There are a lot of moving parts to this immigration boondoggle that the country will continue to find itself in until Congress has the courage, the integrity, and the desire to act. If there are other ideas, we are happy to hear them. We put H.R. 15 on the table. There have been many ideas from the Senate bill. I know there are a number of bills that have passed out of the Judiciary Committee. There might be a way to bundle some of those together in what has been called ``piecemeal reform,'' if we can create a holistic system that works. If there is a piecemeal approach, Mr. Speaker, we need to start having a meal of the pieces and seeing what the pieces are. I was in the software and Internet industry before I was elected to office, and we used to have a word for products that were much hyped and never delivered upon. We called it ``vaporware.'' I fear that this piecemeal approach could become vaporware if we don't start seeing some action soon. God forbid we work more than 8 days out of 40. If we don't see action by the end of the year, I know we are here in January for 3 weeks. What an excellent time to take up immigration reform, something that I feel can unite this body, the good and proud men and women who make up this body, who care deeply about restoring the rule of law, who care deeply about ensuring that our Nation has a prosperous future, reducing our deficit and creating jobs for Americans on both sides of the aisle, which is why more than two-thirds of the Senate joined in a rare bipartisan vote of support for immigration reform and has challenged this House to take similar action. We can do it, Mr. Speaker. We need to schedule the floor time to do that. We need to get the ideas that Members from both sides of the aisle have on the table. We think H.R. 15 is an excellent bipartisan vehicle. If the leaders of this body have other solutions, we are happy to talk about them. But the most important thing that the American people already know about immigration, and I hope the leadership of this body recognizes, is that it is not an issue that solves itself, and it is not an issue that goes away. It is an issue that only becomes more salient year after year that Congress fails to act. I call upon this body to bring forward H.R. 15 and to pass commonsense immigration reform. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. POLIS

Mr. POLIS. I yield myself the balance of my time. Mr. Speaker, if we defeat the previous question, I will offer an amendment to the rule to make sure we don't go home unless we finish the budget by December 13. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of the amendment in the Record, along with extraneous material, immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.

Mr. POLIS. I will submit for the record, as well, a recent poll. The Denver Post published an article this past summer that states that 65 percent of Colorado residents favor protecting wilderness parks and open space and our Federal lands for future generations and 30 percent support more drilling. It has been 144 days and 13 hours since the Senate passed its immigration reform bill, S. 744. We have introduced H.R. 15 here in the House. Each day that the House refuses to take up reform costs the country $37 million. Already there is more than $5 billion in potential lost revenue so far. If we can take up immigration reform and pass it, I would even support allowing that revenue to be used to keep the loopholes for the oil and gas industry open--something that I have long opposed. But if we can pass immigration reform, I would accept that pay-for as a way of keeping the oil and gas loopholes open for the next several years. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office found that the comprehensive immigration reform bill would increase our GDP by 3.3 percent, raise American wages by $470 billion, and create an average of 121,000 jobs for Americans each year. So rather than take up a job- creating bill for Americans that reduces our deficit, we are taking up a bill that hurts the economy and hurts jobs in districts like mine. The longer we fail to act on immigration reform, the greater the cost to the American people. Take the example of the solvency of the Social Security system. As the Social Security Administration estimates, close to two-thirds of the 8 million undocumented people who are here currently work underground. No surprise. They are not allowed to work aboveground in official jobs with payroll deductions, and neither they nor their employers are able to legally declare their earnings or pay their payroll taxes. Today, only 37 percent of undocumented immigrants pay Social Security taxes. Experts are estimating that our Nation loses about $20 billion in payroll taxes each year. We will continue to lose that money until we pass H.R. 15, comprehensive immigration reform. The Senate has acted--with strong Republican support and strong Democratic support--and passed bipartisan immigration reform last June; and yet the House hasn't had a single moment of floor time for any immigration reform bill, despite the fact that four have been passed through the committee. The time is now. We are here today, we are here tomorrow, we are here 2 more weeks. If we need to come back, let's do it. The country is demanding that we create jobs. Comprehensive immigration reform will do that. The country is demanding we shore up our entitlement programs. Comprehensive immigration reform will do that. The country is demanding that we reduce our deficit. Comprehensive immigration reform will do it. Securing our borders, protecting our country from terrorists--law enforcement, the faith community all support immigration reform. In closing, I want to again state the article I am submitting for the record says 65 percent want to protect our environment and 30 percent are for more drilling. The people have spoken. These bills are out of touch. It is time to take up comprehensive immigration reform. I urge my colleagues to oppose the rule and the bill, and I yield back the balance of my time. [From the Denver Post] Poll of Westerners on Drilling on Public Lands: 65% Protection; 30% Drilling (By Bruce Finley) A new poll finds that 30 percent of the residents of Colorado and the western United States favor oil and gas drilling on public lands, while 65 percent support protecting wilderness, parks and open space for future generations. Results of the poll done by Hart Research Associates were presented Monday by the policy group Center for American Progress, which with the Wilderness Society was launching a campaign for balance. ``This is a case where Washington's policies and rhetoric are still locked in a drilling-first mind-set, but westerners want the protection of public lands to be put on equal ground,'' said John Podesta, chairman of the Center for American Progress, which is headquartered in Washington, D.C. ``Voters do not see conservation and development of public lands as an either-or choice. Instead, they want to see expanded protections for public lands--including new parks, wilderness and monuments--as part of a responsible and comprehensive energy strategy,'' Podesta said. U.S. domestic oil and gas production has reached record levels, with more than 37 million acres of public land leased to companies for drilling. Polling and focus group discussions were conducted in Colorado, Montana, New Mexico, Oregon, Arizona, Idaho, Utah, Wyoming and Nevada in April and May. The poll asked participants to state what they regard as a very important priority, and 65 percent said permanent protection of public lands. Results showed 63 percent prioritized ensuring access to public lands for recreation, while 30 percent favored ensuring access to oil and gas resources. The poll found that 29 percent supported use of public lands for grazing livestock. Western Energy Alliance officials in Denver cited a different poll. It found that more than 78 percent of voters nationwide favor increased development of oil and natural gas in the United States. Voters have a favorable view of ``how oil and natural gas in produced in America,'' said Tim Wigley, president of Western Energy Alliance in a statement. ``Almost one in four (24 percent) chose federal lands over state or private lands.''

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

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I thank the gentleman from Utah for yielding me the customary 30 minutes. Mr. Speaker, for this body to spend the final week before a week-long break, one of the final weeks of the year, the third-to-last week of the legislative year, considering messaging bills that aren't going anywhere is a disservice to this country and one of the reasons that this institution is as unpopular as it is. Rather than taking on immigration reform, rather than protecting Americans from employment discrimination, both of which bills passed the Senate with strong majorities, including many Republicans, we are instead debating a bill to move backward rather than forward. H.R. 1965 and H.R. 2728, the Federal Lands Jobs and Energy Security Act and the so-called Protecting States' Rights to Promote Energy Security Act, circumvent future Federal regulations designed to keep people safe and healthy by handing over jurisdiction to States that have any guidance, even a few words of guidance, regarding hydraulic fracturing. We will be talking about the example and what this means in my home State of Colorado in a few moments. But neither bill will become law. Unlike immigration reform, unlike ENDA, which would end workplace discrimination against gays and lesbians across our country, these bills will not become law. Similar legislation to H.R. 1965 was considered last Congress. This legislation was opposed by the administration. It was not brought up by the Senate, and yet here we are debating it again in the House of Representatives when we have real business to take care of. These are not the issues that my constituents are calling in demanding that I take action on. They are demanding that I work to fix our broken immigration system. They are demanding that I work to balance the budget. They are calling in demanding that we work to improve upon health care delivery in this country; yet, instead, we are discussing bills that are detrimental to the economy of the district that I represent and destroy jobs. Let me discuss H.R. 1965 first. This bill's central premise is to allow oil and gas companies to drill wherever and whenever they want to drill on public lands. This bill is completely irresponsible and prioritizes the needs of the oil and gas industry over every other use of our public lands, including the drivers of jobs in my district: hunting, fishing, skiing, and off-road vehicle recreating. This bill sets arbitrary deadlines for the BLM to approve drilling applications and requires the BLM to lease at least 25 percent of lands nominated by the oil and gas industry each year. In addition, the underlying bill offers millions of acres of public lands for lease to companies that are trying to develop a fuel source that has not even proven to be viable--oil shale--without regard to the impact on water or our local economy or environment. I represent the district that includes popular destinations like Vail and Breckenridge and Winter Park, Colorado. People from across the country come to enjoy our skiing in winter, our outdoor recreation, our hunting, our fishing, and white water rafting. When you use areas of land for extraction and you create oil rigs, the heavy truck traffic and roads associated with the extraction industry, people are less likely to want to come visit for these other purposes. It will hurt our ability to attract tourists from the rest of the country if we don't have adequate safeguards around the Federal lands which are part of Eagle and Summit Counties and on which our economy relies. Now, on H.R. 1965, I did offer several amendments to try to improve these bills, but only one of my amendments was made in order under this rule. I am pleased at least my amendment with the gentleman from California (Mr. Huffman) is in order, which requires the National Academy of Sciences to study and report to Congress about the impact of flooding on oil and gas facilities and leaks and spills from tanks, wells, and pipelines. My district recently fell victim to horrendous floods. We call it our 100-year flood in Boulder, Larimer, and Weld Counties. A number of drilling operations were impacted, and we are continuing to assess the damage, not only with regard to drilling operations and potential contamination, but of course our people are digging out with regard to their homes and their offices as well. The September floods in Colorado caused an unprecedented level of destruction to thousands of oil and gas facilities in northern and eastern Colorado. As a result, over 43,000 gallons of oil and over 26,000 gallons of produced water spilled from the tanks, wells, and pipelines into the floodwater. That is why I joined Representative DeFazio, the ranking member of Natural Resources, in sending a letter on September 25 to Chairman Hastings requesting a hearing to fully understand the consequences resulting from the flooding. That hearing hasn't been scheduled yet, but I am hopeful that we can resolve this issue, hold congressional hearings, understand how this issue affects my district, but also affects other districts that might be subject to flooding that house drilling operations. With regard to the oil shale amendment, I am disappointed that the other amendment I offered with Mrs. Napolitano was not made in order. It would have simply required a study. The U.S. Geological Survey would have studied the impacts of oil shale leasing on the quantity and quality of water available in the West. My friend from Utah knows that water in the West is a very important thing. You know, gold is for looking at, and water is for fighting over. Frankly, when we look at the impact and the potential impact that a very heavy use of water would have with some of the extraction techniques that are being explored for oil shale production, we need to look at the impact that would have on water that we need for agriculture, for homeowners, and for recreation. And a simple study would be a first step in doing that. Unfortunately, under this rule and this closed process, we were not allowed to bring forth this amendment to discuss a study of how oil shale production would affect water uses. Many of the test processes use enormous amounts of water to develop oil shale. It is very concerning because the largest known deposits of oil shale are in the Green River formation, which include portions of Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming, all three of our States experiencing over the last several years drought conditions and have scarce water resources that are relied upon by our residents and by our farmers. Thirty million users of water, including farmers, ranchers, and municipalities, depend on water from the Colorado River basin. My amendment would ensure that we have a better understanding of how much water oil shale would use and could pollute or otherwise impact through the quantities used of the water available for other purposes. Now, I would like to turn to H.R. 2728. Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, is a national issue. It is something that we need to address here in Congress. It is something my constituents are demanding of me that we address here in Congress, but H.R. 2728 is not what my constituents had in mind. In this election this month, earlier here in November, four of the five largest municipalities in my district--Fort Collins, Boulder, Lafayette, and Broomfield--passed measures that put bans or moratoriums on fracking. Never before in my time in public service have I ever seen an issue that has been the number one issue on the ballot in four of the top five municipalities. And I should add, it was scheduled to be on the ballot of the fifth, but it was deferred. The petitions to put it on the ballot were deferred, and we expect it will be on the ballot at Loveland at this point if the citizens continue with their push for an initiative there. We have seen tremendous growth in natural gas development due to fracking and directional drilling in the last decade alone. That is a great thing. It is a great thing for American energy independence. It is a great thing for American manufacturing. It is a great thing for reducing our energy costs. In Colorado alone, 50,000 wells have been drilled, and many more have been drilled nationally. These drilling activities, however, in a district such as mine, a district that is an extraction district, are occurring very close to where people live, work, and where they raise families, yet our State doesn't have any meaningful regulation to protect homeowners. It meets the definition of having fracking rules; it certainly does. Unfortunately, the fracking rules are overseen by an oil and gas commission that is heavily influenced by the oil and gas industry. They don't have at their disposal the independence or the ability to enact real penalties for violations of our laws, and their charge is not first and foremost to protect homeowners and families and health. That has led to this backlash, which is why even very conservative towns in my district--one of the towns that had a 5-year moratorium on fracking elected a very conservative mayoral candidate by a 60-40 margin, which is not unusual for this town. These are folks who are fundamentally conservative voting for a conservative candidate for mayor, who won, and yet, at that same election, that same year, they passed a moratorium on fracking in Broomfield County. This is of great concern to the people in my district. The growth of fracking without commonsense Federal guidelines, without commonsense State guidelines, has caused an enormous amount of friction between the American Dream of homeowners in my district and our Nation's need for energy. State and local rules are an important part of the equation, but we also need standards at the Federal level, particularly as relates to Federal lands--namely, BLM lands--which are an important part of the equation to address impacts that go beyond any particular community, such as keeping our air free from pollution, keeping pollution out of our lungs, our waterways, and our drinking water. Some State and local laws addressing oil and gas extraction are woefully unprepared. The extraction industry hit before they had the chance to even create a local regulatory framework, or they have one that is woefully outdated and relates to the extraction technologies that were prevalent decades ago rather than the new extraction technologies that are being deployed today. Colorado is trying to update its oil and gas rules, but they really haven't done anything to create a meaningful framework to protect homeowners and families, which is why four of the five largest municipalities in my district have either banned or put a moratorium on fracking. We have a State issue, and the State has actually threatened to sue some of these same municipalities for that ban. That is not a Federal issue, but this has been an enormous issue in my district. The citizens in my district want more protection, not less, when it comes to fracking. The industry reaction has been extremely counterproductive. The desire for my citizens to see more protection--somehow the industry interprets this as the citizens need more information or need more marketing about how great fracking is. That is not what they need. They have got plenty of that. The opponents of these ballot initiatives, the oil and gas initiatives, spent millions of dollars educating my constituents about how wonderful and harmless fracking is. That is not what they are asking for. If we could take some of that money and instead apply it to recapturing gases from the well sites and ensuring that we have closed systems for the water recovery instead of the marketing campaigns, we would actually make progress with regard to increasing consumer confidence and the confidence of my citizens in the process. But that is not what we have seen to date, and this bill will not help bring it about. For almost 5 years, I have represented Colorado's Second Congressional District. In that time, I have witnessed exponential growth in natural gas extraction in and around our district. I have met with too many families and communities that have been forced from their homes and devastated by nearby fracking activity. Fracking has occurred hundreds of feet from homes, schools, and playgrounds. I have been powerless to stop it. We tried to ask an oil and gas company not to frack near a school in Erie, Colorado, Red Hawk Elementary, but the response that I got at my office after two letters continues to be a formulaic response from their attorneys that ``we have the right to frack here and we will.'' Many families are fleeing those communities not because of lack of information, not because the oil and gas company hasn't done everything they can to have wonderful ambassadors in our community creating a lot of great literature, advertising all over our airwaves. That is not why families are fleeing. They are fleeing because they don't want to live next to an oil rig or have their kids going to school next to a fracking pad or oil rig. That is just common sense. There is no amount of marketing or information that will change their minds, and that is the fundamental flaw in the reasoning process that many in the oil and gas industry have had to date. I have heard many stories from families about getting fracked, and as a result, I had introduced the BREATHE Act in the last Congress and the FRAC Act, requiring disclosure of fracking fluids, removing the exemption that fracking has from the Clean Air Act and the Clean Water Act, the small-site exemption. I, unfortunately, have gotten to experience fracking firsthand here in this last year. For more than a decade, I have had a peaceful family farm, about 50 acres, near Berthoud, Colorado, where my father-in-law lives. That is our house there. Fracking, without any notice to us, because, of course, it wasn't required under State law, occurred hundreds of feet from our home. In July, overnight, without any warning, a towering drill rig arose, literally across the street from where my father-in-law lives. You can see it right here. The sounds of the 24-hour-a-day-and-night operation led us to invite my father-in-law to have to stay with us in Boulder in our apartment on our couch during the active phase of the drilling process. The rig was spewing black smog and making loud noises at all hours of the day. And when the drilling rig went up without notice or warning, our little dream and our life became a nightmare and was thrown into turmoil. Last night, at the Rules Committee hearing, Chairman Sessions and Chairman Hastings spoke about a Web site, www.fracfocus.org, that supposedly reveals all the chemicals used during the fracking process. But FracFocus is actually not revealing at all. It gives operators sole discretion to decide what information they display and what they don't display. This is actually an example of a well. This is the one that is very close to our house. You will see that, of course, many of the ingredients of the fracking fluids are completely noncontroversial. We know they are largely water, sand, and quartz. We are not talking about that. That is not the issue. As you will see, they have ``proprietary'' listed next to several vague terms. They have surfactants here, proprietary. So people in the neighborhood don't even know what environmental contaminants to measure for or to look for. Again, from a marketing perspective, the oil and gas companies are saying it is not leaching into groundwater, there are not surface spills; but, at the same time, they are refusing to provide the information that would allow the independent verification of their claims and safety. When I looked up the drilling site near my house on FracFocus, there were many ingredients that were listed as proprietary, including surfactants and polymers; and because of the lenient policy of FracFocus, the company that drilled near my house withheld the only information that we were actually interested in in terms of what was being used in the ground. We need to look at a commonsense approach to fracking. The constituents in my district are demanding it. We could have voted on such a balanced approach to fracking. I introduced, as an amendment to H.R. 2728, the BREATHE Act. The BREATHE Act was identical to a bill that I introduced earlier this Congress. It would have reversed the oil and gas industry's loophole to a provision in the Clean Air Act that protects the public from small air pollution sources that might individually be de minimus but, in the aggregate, released large volumes of toxic substance into the air. We have to talk about the concentration of this operation. In Weld County, Colorado, there are close to 50,000 wells. Again, for any particular fracking pad, the emission profile is small; but, if you have a number, a dozen, two dozen, 100, in a limited area, the emission profile is going to look a lot more like a factory or even a coal- burning plant than it does something that can be rounded down to zero. We need to look at the fact that the concentration of thousands of wellheads in a very limited geographic area has a profound potential impact and cumulative impact on air quality that affects our health and our quality of life. My amendment is critical because there is significant evidence that oil and gas wells and their associated infrastructure, including heavy truck traffic and diesel engines, contribute to air pollution. Chemicals such as benzene and volatile organic compounds and methane are associated with oil and gas production sites and should not be subject to an exemption from the Clean Air Act. Despite the growing proof that the oil and gas industry causes air pollution, oil and gas operators are still exempt from the basic Federal protection afforded by the Clean Air Act. I offer this amendment and introduced the BREATHE Act because people who live near oil and gas developments deserve the protections of the Clean Air Act, just as other Americans do who live near factories, just as other Americans do who live near coal-burning plants. We have 55 sponsors for the BREATHE Act, yet it has not received a hearing or a markup; and on a party-line vote yesterday in the Rules Committee, it was not allowed to be considered as an amendment to this bill. Another amendment I helped offer to the underlying measure would also improve the legislation. The amendment I offered with Mr. Holt allows the Secretary of the Interior to issue regulations to minimize fugitive methane emissions on public lands. Methane is a potent greenhouse gas that often leaks during the drilling and transportation of oil and gas. In fact, methane leaks are so common in oil and gas drilling that we have rural areas in the Upper Green River Basin in Wyoming that have recorded higher concentration levels than the worst pollution days in downtown Los Angeles. Fortunately, there are already control technologies available to minimize air pollution in operations. If the oil and gas companies would use just some of the money that they spend on lobbying and on marketing and on all the wonderful advertising that they are doing on our airwaves in Colorado and, instead, upgrade their facilities to recapture methane, I think we could actually see some progress on this issue. I urge my colleagues to support this amendment when it comes up for consideration later in the afternoon. Mr. Speaker, the American people are calling for real solutions in Congress. The people of the Second Congressional District are for an all-of-the-above approach to energy. We are for solar. We are for wind. We are for oil. We are for gas. We are for hydro. We want to make them all work. And just as there would be a zoning process around creating a windmill in a residential neighborhood that is 100 feet tall right near your home, there should be a zoning process around the extraction of oil and gas, especially near where the constituents of my district live and work. Mr. Speaker, this bill is a messaging bill that might help the majority's relationship with oil and gas companies, but what we really need is a balanced approach that ensures that we can develop our domestic oil and gas resources in a way that doesn't destroy jobs in districts like mine and protects the health of Americans across our country. These bills fall short on that account. And despite our effort to amend them, the rule doesn't allow many of the most important amendments that would remove the exemption from the Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act and ensure that we have an extraction industry that is consistent with the public health. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Mrs. Capps).

Mr. POLIS

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

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