Jared Polis

Mr. POLIS

Mr. POLIS. Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to cast a thoughtful vote and to vote ``no'' on the rule and the bills and to defeat the previous question. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. POLIS. Then I am prepared to close, and I yield myself the balance of my time. Madam Speaker, at a time when millions of Americans continue to struggle to find work, our Federal deficit continues to mount. Here we are in Congress after a 5-week recess--doing what?--considering, one, a faulty land swap deal that is a bad deal for the general public, that contains a hidden earmark and is controversial among local communities in Minnesota, and, two, a major reauthorization bill under a closed process that significantly curtails our liberties as Americans without there being any opportunities for Members of either party to offer suggestions about how to reconcile liberty with security. Look, Congress' ``to do'' list remains long, and it's steadily growing. The American public is upset that Congress isn't tackling the deficit or the debt. Congress isn't tackling jobs, infrastructure, moving forward and investing in our future economic growth. Among Congress' unfinished business is a tax increase that will hit the middle class unless Congress acts. If we defeat the previous question, we will make sure that Congress does not go home before making sure that middle class taxes do not go up. In fact, according to the House Clerk's Office, only 61 bills have become law in 2012. That's the fewest number of bills in 60 years. We only have 7 days that this House of Representatives is working here in Washington in September, yet this Congress continues to refuse to make the hard choices needed to get our economy moving. It's time to roll up our sleeves and get to work in making sure that we have the ability to protect Americans from threats. Let's do so in an open way that encourages ideas from both sides and that has a classified briefing at which Members of Congress can receive the information we need to suggest how or if FISA needs to be changed before it's authorized for a carte blanche 5 additional years. It is important to reject both of these underlying rules and these underlying bills. It is time to focus on job creation, deficit reduction, and tax reform, not on trying to rush to the floor an earmark land swap with no map for Minnesota, for what can only be taken to be purely political reasons, as well as there being under a closed process a bill about which many of us have grave concerns and that undermines our right to privacy as Americans. I urge a ``no'' vote on the rule and the two flawed underlying bills, and I ask unanimous consent to insert into the Record the text of my amendment to the rule, along with extraneous material, immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.

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

Mr. POLIS. Remarkably, the underlying bill produced by Mr. Cravaack actually uncovered a permanent earmark that the CBO found provides $6 million a year to three Minnesota counties. I think that in a Congress that is supposed to move past earmarks it's not a good precedent to include that earmark in the transition. I'd also like to clarify that Governor Dayton, while, of course, asking for the land to be exchanged--and there doesn't seem to be disagreement about that--did not ask for NEPA to be short-circuited, nor do they ask to bypass the normal appraisal process. With that, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Scott), the ranking member of the Judiciary Committee Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security.

Mr. POLIS. I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Speaker, Congress will soon leave town again for a long district work period. We believe it is essential that before we go home we must extend tax cuts for the middle class. If we defeat the previous question here today, we will amend the rule to say that Congress needs to stay here to vote on the Middle Class Tax Cut Act and not go home until we've made sure the middle class tax cut extension becomes law and that tax rates do not increase for millions of American families. To speak about the previous question, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Vermont (Mr. Welch).

Mr. POLIS. I thank the gentleman for yielding me the customary 30 minutes, and I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Speaker, I rise in opposition to the rule and the underlying bills--H.R. 5544, the Minnesota Education Investment and Employment Act, and H.R. 5949, the FISA Amendments Act Reauthorization Act. There are significant problems in both pieces of legislation. However, both bills are, nevertheless, being brought forward under a restrictive process, despite the efforts of my colleague, Mr. McGovern, to amend the rule to allow for an open rule on amendments on both debates. Unfortunately, that motion failed in the Rules Committee. Instead, this rule is a restrictive process that limits debate and discussion that can improve this legislation. Let me briefly address the lands law before getting to the FISA bill, which is of great concern to our civil liberties. We have before us a bill that allows for the exchange of 86,000 acres of Minnesota's school trust lands within the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness for unidentified Forest Service lands. The wilderness is a critical asset for northeastern Minnesota's tourism and recreation industry, as well as the most popular wilderness area in our Nation's wilderness system. But since the bill doesn't even give details about what public land would be lost, we can't even say how bad a deal this is for the American people. It is simply bad policy to push through a controversial land swap bill without adequate public involvement and participation. I strike that in contrast to a bill that I recently introduced, H.R. 6370, the Conveyance of the Forest Service Lake Hill Administrative Site. This bill does have accompanying maps that will be made available to the committee so that people can see where the land in question is. It is land that no longer fits the characteristics of forest land, having been deforested near the highway, about 40 acres, and it should not be a controversial bill. In direct contrast to this bill, the bill I introduced today has support from the counties, towns, and local environmental community, and no local opposition to that bill. On the other hand, Mr. Cravaack's bill doesn't even identify what Forest Service parcels would be sold by the Federal Government and acquired by Minnesota. This kind of ambiguity in a land exchange bill is unprecedented for a land exchange bill and is not providing the adequate information to the Members of this body to make an informed decision on the underlying bill. Now, let me address FISA--I take issue with a number of elements of FISA--which extends the sweeping electronic surveillance network established under the FISA Amendments Act of 2008 for 5 years. I did not support the bill when it came before the House Judiciary Committee on which I serve, and I do not support this bill now. Now, of course everybody in our country understands the serious threat our Nation faces from terrorist organizations and foreign nations, but we can't give up what makes it special for us to be Americans in the name of defending our country. Our privacy rights should not be eviscerated in the name of national security. Many of these concerns are addressable, but unfortunately the bill fails to strike an appropriate balance between protecting our liberties and security. Some of its many shortcomings include giving the U.S. Government the ability to intercept U.S. residents' international phone calls and email communications without having to even name the people or groups it's monitoring or show its targets who are suspected of wrongdoing or terrorism. The target could even be a human rights activist, a media organization, a country, a region, an ethnicity. Nothing requires the government to identify its surveillance targets at all, nor are there sufficient parameters around making sure that they are narrowly tailored to our national security needs. In addition, this bill unfortunately allows the U.S. to intercept communications without having to identify the location, the phone lines, the email addresses to be monitored. In essence, the government can use this new law to collect all phone calls between the U.S. and abroad simply by saying to the FISA court that it was targeting someone abroad and that a purpose of the new surveillance program is to collect foreign intelligence information. The lack of judicial oversight is also startling. While the FISA courts have a limited role, it's limited to overseeing the government surveillance activities rather than reviewing individualized surveillance applications, including whether they are sufficiently broad or not. Yesterday, the chair of our committee, Mr. Dreier, also mentioned that Congress itself has an oversight role in making sure that the broad powers given to the Federal Government under FISA are not abused. However, this Congress--and myself, personally--have not had any briefing with regard to the use of FISA. Now, yesterday, representatives of the Intelligence Committee offered to make those briefings available, but I think the proper order to go about things, if Members of Congress are to make an informed decision about whether these vast powers given to the Federal Government are being used appropriately, would be to have the classified briefing first before bringing a 5-year extension bill to the floor so that Members of Congress, in a classified setting, have access to the information that we need--the information that I need, the information my colleagues need--to make an informed decision about whether the proper controls are in place and the extent of the use and/or abuse of the vast powers given under FISA. In addition, there are no real limits on how the government uses, keeps, or disseminates the information it collects. The law doesn't say what government can keep and has to get rid of. Potentially, this could lead to the archiving of material over decades. It fails to place real limits on how and to whom information can be disseminated. Whether it's our U.S. intelligence partners in other countries, whether it's contractors to our own government, we need to have the right controls around where private information is shared. Finally, I want to address another element of the bill in my initial remarks, and that is the indemnity that is given to companies that violate their own terms of service and allow the government to trample the privacy rights of thousands of Americans. Effectively, telecom companies and others that provide the government with enormous amounts of information are effectively completely indemnified, so there is no way to hold any of these companies accountable for their activities in violation of their own user agreement signed by two parties, themselves and their customer. There remains no way to enforce the violation of that user agreement because there is complete indemnity for those organizations. I think there needs to be a way, through the regular court system, to hold companies accountable for their activities. Letting them off the hook entirely only invites widespread abuse and disregard of their own customer agreements. Why bother even having to post or have a privacy policy if, at the whim of the company--not the government, the whim of the company--it can be completely shared with the government in disregard to their own privacy policy because that is the most effective way for the company to receive a blanket indemnification to any civil liability that might arise from violating privacy laws and/or its own terms of use. Again, national security is a critical imperative. We need to make sure that our agencies charged with keeping us safe have the right tools at their disposal to do so. But in the process of making sure that Americans are safe, we need to make sure we don't give up what makes it special to be an American. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. POLIS. I would like to inquire of the gentleman from Florida how many speakers he has remaining.

Mr. POLIS

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, it is with great sadness and privilege that I honor one of my constituents, Mr. Daniel Friedlander, who died on Monday, July 9, 2012. Dan was born on February 3, 1945, in Chicago. He received a Masters Degree in Economics from the University of Chicago and spent the last years of his life as Principal at CleanTech Solutions in Boulder, Colorado. Known for his environmental activism and art, Dan was an incredible resource for the Boulder community. He spent his life focused on building start-up businesses that moved information technology into the 21st century. Using his expertise, he later shifted his focus on our growing enivornmental crises and sought to marry his long history of activism with his professional life with his position as Principal at CleanTech Solutions. He engaged his community by creating the Shanahan Neighbors for Climate Action, a neighborhood group intent on becoming more aware of how lifestyle changes can make a significant and positive impact on the environment and each other. Beyond his successful career and activism, Dan was also a gifted artist. He worked with clay tiles to create extremely unique pieces that he described as the unity of his conscious and unconscious. Dan was a dedicated father, husband and friend. I am privileged to have known his family including his wife, Diane Rosenthal, and his two sons, Michael Friedlander and David Friedlander. It has been an honor to consider Dan my friend and I know that he will be missed by the countless people who considered him a friend.

Mr. POLIS

Mr. POLIS. Reclaiming my time, there's just a particular sector. Maybe they have a lot of lobbyists. Maybe they're a big special interest, they own cows. We're going to bail them out because the price of hay has gone up. That's what we're talking about here today. We're talking about a closed rule. We're talking about a closed process. This is nothing new, this lack of transparency, this limited debate, pushing through a Big Government Republican bailout on short notice without even giving Members enough time to offer improvements to the bill, to change the bill. The first time that Republicans and Democrats even saw this bill was late Tuesday night, and here we are on the floor of the House without a single hearing, without a single markup, pushing through this bill, shutting out opportunities for Democrats or Republicans to offer improvements to this bill. This is one of the worst and widest droughts we've seen in decades. I see that firsthand in Colorado. We have had devastating fires this summer coupled with extreme heat in the West. This is indicative of a need to address the true culprit: climate change. The evidence that recent droughts and heat waves are linked to climate change is growing suddenly and represents the strong scientific consensus. We need the very conservation programs in the farm bill that are being gutted for this Big Government bailout of cows. The very programs cut by this bill are needed to help farmers and ranchers conserve soil, conserve water to make their farms and ranches more resilient to the devastating impacts we see from climate change and to mitigate that impact. Look, American farmers, ranchers, and environmentalists have all been waiting for months to see a farm bill come to the floor. To the disappointment of many, instead of a farm bill, which I understand for at least 5 weeks we're not going to see in the House of Representatives, we're presented with a cow bailout, which is yet another Republican Big Government bailout of an American industry. When the Senate passed their farm bill over a month ago, the House majority couldn't even manage to bring a package to the floor for Members to debate. Earlier this week, the Republicans were looking at a 1-year extension of the farm bill and have now decided to pull that 1- year extension in favor of a cow bailout. Let me once again stress that our severe concerns around droughts in the West and across the country are critical, but we mustn't gut programs that are some of the very programs that can help prevent the impact of droughts in seeking to bail out a particular industry. When we look at drought assistance funding, we need to have a bipartisan discussion about how we're going to structure it and where it's going to come from and why certain industries are going to be favored over others. Why is there going to be a cow bailout instead of a rooftop terrace bailout? When it's too hot, businesses suffer. If you're going to have a big Republican bailout, why don't you discuss who it goes to and not just give it to who has the most lobbyists here or who gives the most campaign contributions. Furthermore, the conservation provisions that are cut by this bill do have strong bipartisan support in both Chambers. Both the Senate and the House Agriculture Committees understand the importance of the farm bill's conservation title. Both farm bills retain funding for the conservation title because many folks on both sides of the aisle agree that conservation practices are critical to protect our soil, the future production of our agriculture, water, and wildlife resources. That's yet another reason to consider a comprehensive bill, to help ensure the strength of agriculture and protect American jobs, rather than another Republican bailout. Instead of voting on the underlying bill, instead of even talking about a 5-year extension of the agriculture bill, here we are today gutting critical programs with bipartisan support to bail out yet another industry with a centrally planned Big Government solution. With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. POLIS. I yield myself such time as I may consume. I listened very carefully to the gentlelady from North Carolina. I didn't hear her defend this bovine bailout that the Republicans are proposing here today. Now, I'm going to take a few minutes and address some of the mischaracterizations of the President of the United States that were in some of those comments, but then I do want to bring it back to this Big Government bovine bailout that the Republicans are proposing here before us today. Look, the President understands and I understand, as somebody who started several businesses before I got here--I created several hundred jobs--that of course I didn't do it alone. If we didn't have roads so that employees could get to work, I wouldn't have been able to start a company. I wouldn't have been able to have any employees to get to work. If we didn't have schools that help prepare programmers and technicians to work technology companies--tech companies that I started that hired programmers, that were good-paying jobs--I wouldn't have been able to start a company. If we didn't have investors and shareholders and the right level of securities regulation to prevent fraud and to give them the confidence to invest in the companies that I started, we wouldn't have capital formation and venture capital flowing to the companies that needed it. If we didn't have the rule of law, if we didn't fund our courts, if we didn't invest in basic research, if the government hadn't provided the funding to start the Internet, I wouldn't have been able to start a single company. And most of my friends who are entrepreneurs, who have started companies, who are corporate executives agree. Yes, the entrepreneur is critical. And the President's Jobs Council recognizes that, and this President has been more friendly to entrepreneurship and to business than any President in my lifetime, working to ensure that small businesses have the opportunity to succeed and grow and create jobs in the private sector. But without that basic infrastructure, we have to ask ourselves what separates the United States of America from a country like Somalia or even a centrally planned country like North Korea. A lot separates us. But a big part of that is this collaboration of a public sector role that enables entrepreneurship, enables success in the private sector, enables people to create fortunes, enables people to create jobs. That's the proper role of government. Government doesn't stand in the way of job creation. The government's policy framework, courts people can trust, roads for people to get to work, good public schools, good health care--that's what enables success. As somebody who reached some degree of success in the private sector before I got here, I agree completely with President Obama that I couldn't have achieved that degree of success without the public infrastructure that played a role in allowing me and so many other entrepreneurs to succeed. Now, moving back to the topic, the topic of the bovine bailout that the Republicans have proposed here today. The gentlelady from North Carolina said, We have no control over climate, basically. That was the quote that she just said. Well, the vast majority of scientific consensus and agreement would indicate otherwise. We don't control weather. But climate is different than weather. And, yes, humans are contributing to climate change through carbon emissions and emissions of other greenhouse gases. The global climate has warmed. The average climate in Colorado now is two to three degrees warmer than it was a century ago, and it continues to accelerate. Now, that doesn't cause a drought or a flood in any one particular year, but it causes an increased incidence of severe weather patterns that cost us all money, which is why we're even talking about a bovine bailout here today. Now, look, I wish this had come to the floor under an open process. I would have offered an amendment just to talk about it to say, why don't you bail out rooftop restaurants, rooftop terraces? Look, we're talking about the role of the government, the role of the private sector. I find it ironic and to the point of being bizarre-- almost like I'm in an alternative universe--that in the very same remarks that the gentlelady from North Carolina railed against a President who dares to say that the public sector has a role in creating the landscape for private businesses to succeed, at the same time, she is advocating for a bovine bailout of a particular industry. Now why this particular industry? Why not rooftop terraces? Why not solar, if it's too cloudy? Why not wind, if it's not windy enough? Many, many, many businesses are affected by weather. Retail stores are affected when it snows too much. Should they be coming to Washington, clamoring for a bailout? Look, both sides respect the role of the private sector. And when you have government preempting the private sector by picking out a particular industry and elevating it above all others, by giving it government subsidies and a big bailout, you are upsetting the very market forces that the gentlelady from North Carolina espoused support of in another context. This bill today gives us a terrible choice between drought assistance and conservation. Now, both might be worthy; but disproportionate cuts to conservation programs that are used to fund this bill undermine the continued success of conservation programs that have bipartisan support and are helping farmers mitigate the impact of climate change in their businesses. There are so many other issues of relevance for farmers that this House could be taking up. Why aren't we talking about the estate tax, which affects small farmers across this country? If we don't act by December 31, the estate tax will go to a 55 percent tax above $1 million in assets, forcing many small farmers out of business and preventing them from being passed down from one generation to the next. Are we going to leave it until the last minute? Is that a plan for the lame duck session? Are the Republicans scared to take on the estate tax before the election? I would advocate that we get down to work and start addressing issues that actually affect farmers. We should be voting to provide for the success of American agriculture, opening new markets, investing in basic research, helping to ensure that families have access to healthy food and nutrition. We need to make sure that farmers' and ranchers' needs are addressed. And if we don't address the fundamental drivers of climate change, we're only going to be faced with more and more difficulties, more and more requests for bailouts. It may be cows this time. It may be chickens next time. It may be corn the next time. There are always going to be folks here in Washington, hat in hand, coming to Republicans, saying, Give us a Big Government solution. And the question will come to this Congress, Are we going to do something about the underlying problem? And whether that approach is through a cap-and-trade system or a carbon tax or incentives for renewables, what are we going to do to prevent farmers in this country from being driven out of business? This bill does nothing. Sure, you can hand them government money. You can hand them taxpayer money, if that's the lack of regard that you have for taxpayer money, you want to hand it out to whoever comes to town and begs for it. Go right ahead. And I have some rooftop terrace restaurant owners in my district. Give them some while you are at it. That's not a solution. That's what got us into this budget deficit. That's what got us into this hole. Let's address the underlying issue of climate change in a scientific manner, have the real political discussions that are necessary to negotiate a bipartisan solution that reduces our carbon emissions, reduces the impact of climate change on American farmers, reduces the incidence and severity of droughts across the United States of America, and also be the global leaders that we need to be on this critical issue. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. POLIS. I am the only remaining speaker, and I am prepared to close.

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

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

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' and defeat the previous question. This will give us the opportunity to renew middle class tax cuts. When we talk about job creation, when we talk about growing our economy, the need to make sure that we don't increase taxes on the middle class during a recess is something economists from both sides of the aisle agree on, something Democrats agree on. I hope Republicans agree, too, that we shouldn't raise taxes on at least 98 percent of Americans. Then let's have the discussion about the other 2 percent. But let's agree on what we agree on. Let's not raise taxes on 98 percent of American families before Congress goes on break. Before the Republicans send us all home to enjoy our summers, let's do something about jobs. Let's do something about the economy, and let's demand that we give middle class families across America the surety and the security to know that they're not going to need to pay an additional $1,000 a year in taxes, an additional $2,000 a year in taxes. I think it is critical, and I call upon my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to vote ``no'' and defeat the previous question so that we can bring forward this critical amendment to provide the certainty that America needs to grow our economy and create jobs. I urge a ``no'' vote on the rule, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, if we defeat the previous question, I will offer an amendment to the rule to make in order an amendment which proposes that Congress will not adjourn until the President signs middle class tax cuts into law. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of my amendment into the Record along with extraneous material immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding me the customary 30 minutes, and I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to the rule and the underlying bill, H.R. 6233, the supplemental agriculture disaster assistance. Look, weather impacts our lives. I'm going to talk a little bit about climate change and some of the driving factors that are causing more severe weather conditions, be they droughts or floods. Yes, they affect businesses, but the solution is not another Republican Big Government government bailout of yet another industry. The Republicans have bailed out Wall Street. The Republicans have bailed out the banks. Now the Republicans are seeking to bail out cows. Yes, Mr. Speaker, another Big Government solution to another problem, in part, of their own creation by refusing to take up action and reducing our carbon emissions for climate change. Where does this all end, when it's too cloudy? The solar industry might suffer. Are we going to bail them out? When it's not windy enough, the wind industry might suffer. Are we going to bail them out? We have restaurants on Pearl Street Mall in Boulder that have rooftop lounges. When it's too hot, less people go up to the rooftop lounges. We've had a drought in May and June and not enough people went to rooftop lounges. I would like to ask my colleague, Ms. Foxx, if there could be government bailout money for those rooftop lounges. I yield to the gentlelady from North Carolina.

Mr. POLIS

Mr. POLIS. Prior to yielding to the gentlelady from Connecticut, I just want to the ask the gentlelady from North Carolina, what is House Resolution 783? We're having trouble locating it. I yield to the gentlelady.

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

Mr. POLIS. I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I didn't like this underlying bill in its original form. I voted against several components of it on Judiciary Committee, and it's a lost opportunity because there was real opportunity to do bipartisan regulatory reform. Both parties agree with streamlining government processes, reducing red tape, and helping important projects move forward, but that was the path not taken. Unfortunately, this body is moving forward in a different way now. With the underlying flaw in the bill, I would imagine it would have very little support from either side of the aisle--namely, prohibiting agencies from promulgating regulation until employment reached, or unemployment, reached 94 percent, which is nonsensical. But even this new bill now, this correction to the bill, which corrects a nonexistent House Resolution 783, which, it has been indicated, needs to be changed. And there was an effort to do that, which was inexplicably withdrawn. No one from my party indicated that they planned to object; they simply reserved the right to object and find out what exactly was going on. We have found out what is going on. Apparently, the Republicans need to change the resolution that is referenced in H. Res. 741. And I hope they do so. At the very least, then, this bill, while bad policy, will not be nonsensical as it is now, referencing a nonexistent bill. But consideration of all of this is the equivalent of fiddling while Rome burns. Consideration of this rule and this bill and the change to the bill and the change to the rule that changed the bill is all a major time sink while the country has real needs, like a middle class tax cut, like investing in infrastructure and like creating jobs. The only thing preventing tax cuts for 98 percent of Americans and 97 percent of small businesses from going into effect now is this House of Representatives. We should not hold these tax cuts hostage to a change to a bill and a change to a rule that changes a bill that doesn't exist. No--a change to a rule to a bill. Well, that's where we are today in the U.S. House of Representatives, Mr. Speaker. Frankly, Mr. Speaker, this country deserves better. I cannot support this wasteful rule or bill. I urge a ``no'' vote on the rule and the underlying bill, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. POLIS. We have one remaining speaker.

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

Mr. POLIS. Reclaiming my time, again, in the absence of an actual House Resolution 783, I thought perhaps it was an erroneous reference to H.R. 783. Again, it is unclear what we are debating, but I know that we have somebody here who wants to debate an important topic that is critical to the country. I am happy to yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from Connecticut (Ms. DeLauro).

Mr. POLIS. But let us get on to it. Again, the corresponding change does not exist in the spirit of bipartisanship. I was informed that my party was willing to withdraw their objection to a change that would have made a proper reference in this resolution to a corresponding bill that made sense. Absent that, the change does not make sense. I think it speaks to, again, the broader issue of: Why the great rush on a bill that is not an emergency bill by any sense of the word? There are critical bills we face that we need to move quickly on. My goodness, the Senate just passed the middle class tax cut. If the House doesn't pass a corresponding middle class tax cut, taxes will increase for tens of millions of American families on January 1. There should be, likewise, some urgency around reining in our budget deficit and balancing the budget. Likewise, there should be some degree of urgency about creating jobs and ending the recession, putting people back to work. Here we have a bill, H.R. 4078, which, of course, is referenced under either version--the corrected or noncorrected version of this particular resolution--that is not a bipartisan bill. It's a bill that, in Judiciary Committee, did not have any Democratic support. It is a bill that the President has indicated he does not support. It is a bill that we have no indication from the Senate that they would proceed with or pass. And I fail to understand the urgency of moving forward so fast that we don't only make--that there is not only a mistake that was made in the original bill, but there is also a mistake apparently that was made in the correcting resolution, and there seems to be some uncertainty about whether we are even talking about a change to this bill or a Virginia tribe bill or an unemployment definition. And again, I would fully understand that if this was an emergency situation that required this body to move forward on behalf of our Nation. If this was a last-minute deal and something was expiring at midnight, we would need to immediately correct that and move forward. And I don't think there would be any games from either side because that's for the importance of the country. But that's not the situation that we are facing here today. Now the American people, unfortunately, have grown to expect inefficiency and ineffectiveness from the House of Representatives. But this set of errors, this comedy of errors here today, is really just icing on the cake. The Republicans have put together a partisan, omnibus bill that they later find out had a typo. Then there was an effort to correct the typo, an effort that our side was willing to allow to move forward after briefly discussing. And then inexplicably, the Republicans decided not to correct the mistake. And now it is unclear whether we are talking about a tribal recognition bill or a nonexistent bill, a bill that has not been introduced. If there is no H. Res. 783, we are referencing a nonexistent bill, unless it references H.R. 783 from a previous session. But in any event, these matters need to be corrected before we can proceed in any manner. This is an example of how the House of Representatives is run of late. There are many bipartisan, job-creating ideas that we can take up and we should take up on behalf of the country. Instead, we have a partisan approach that lacks bipartisan support, an innocent error made in the bill, another innocent error made in correcting the error to the bill. And that leaves us in a quandary, frankly, because we are discussing a fix to a nonexistent bill that it is hard to debate or talk about because how can one be for or against a change to a nonexistent bill. And that puts all of us in a very difficult situation. I'm sure, Mr. Speaker, the American public, even more so, the dismay that they show at this Congress, is only doubled and tripled, just throwing up their arms and saying, How are you even talking about a bill that makes reference to and changes a nonexistent bill which may or may not be a Virginia tribal bill, an underlying bill that is a partisan bill that confuses employment with unemployment? So that's where we are, Mr. Speaker. We'll get through this together. We'll move forward as a country, but we can do better. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. POLIS. Reclaiming my time, again, looking at the THOMAS registry, H.R. 783 is called the Thomasina E. Jordan Indian Tribes of Virginia Federal Recognition Act.

Mr. POLIS. Reclaiming my time, if I can ask the Clerk to read the current resolution before us.