Dana Rohrabacher

Mr. ROHRABACHER

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Speaker, this coming Sunday, July 13, 2014, family, friends, and admirers--they are legion--of Ben Carlson will gather in Newport Beach, California, to honor the memory of a local hero. Those gathered, many wearing the favored ``aloha shirts'' and beach wear of his beloved surfing community, will not, however, think of him simply as a local hero. His heroism inspires us universally. Just last Sunday he perished when he jumped out of a lifeguard boat to save a body surfer caught in a rip current. The surfer lived. Ben was overwhelmed by the sort of monster wave he had spent years conquering. His own body, its full measure exhausted, was found three hours later. The beach lifestyle, Mr. Speaker, is often treated in our popular culture as frivolous, superficial, pampered. Many Americans and visitors from abroad do find the Southern California coastline to be a special place for recreation and relaxation, a place to restore their spirits. Ben Carlson confounded that image. He was the classic rugged individualist of American lore and legend. With his high level of schooling in psychology, he could have advanced through more traditional careers in business, education, or whatever field beckoned him. He chose to follow his calling on the beach, where for a decade and a half he protected and saved the lives of countless shoreline visitors, thereby contributing beyond measure to our local bounty. Though his distinct profile was known to those who loved him, he blended perfectly into the beach culture. His livelihood came courtesy of his status as an internationally recognized surfer and his convivial service behind the bar at a popular fish taco restaurant. Ben created his primary identity as one who chose to save lives. In my book, that makes him all we may expect of a true American of whom we all may be proud.

Mr. ROHRABACHER

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize and commend the Orange County Sanitation District (OCSD) on its 60th anniversary. Since June 30, 1954, the OCSD has provided residents in North and Central Orange County outstanding wastewater collection, treatment and recycling services. The OCSD services approximately 2.5 million people, 21 cities and has two operating facilities that treat wastewater from residential, commercial and industrial sources. Through innovative technologies, the OCSD has served as a leader and model for communities around the world as they battle to protect public health and the environment from the harms of untreated wastewater. However, the OCSD does not just simply treat wastewater. In fact, by utilizing all practical and effective means, the OCSD is producing an average of 10,000 kilowatts of electricity per day, monitoring the water quality of local beaches, and recycling 268,000 tons of biosolids per year. Yet, these are only the secondary benefits of its highest achievement. In a joint venture with the Orange County Water District, the OCSD facilitated the creation of the world's largest water purification system, the Orange County Groundwater Replenishment System (GWRS). Using a three-step advanced treatment process, the GWRS purifies 70 million gallons of high quality potable water per day that would otherwise be unusable. This is the equivalent to the daily water use of 600,000 people. The GWRS has since received more than 35 awards, including the Stockholm Industry Water Award, which is the highest international honor bestowed upon water projects, and the 2014 U.S. Water Prize Award from the U.S. Water Alliance. I am proud of the work, dedication, and accomplishments of the Orange County Sanitation District over the past 60 years and wish them further success as they continue to lead the world in effective wastewater collection, treatment and recycling.

Mr. ROHRABACHER

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Speaker, our current immigration policies and political rhetoric broadcast to people around the world that they can come here illegally without consequence. In fact, if they do, they will be rewarded for it. We send this message, and then we act surprised when an illegal immigration invasion into our country skyrockets. A growing crisis at our southern border sees tens of thousands of children being abandoned at our doorstep. Their parents miscalculated. They heard someone talk about the DREAM Act and thought their children would be taken care of. Ultimately, this crisis was brought on by Democrats and Republicans who have advocated granting legal status to those people who are here illegally, especially in terms of the so-called ``DREAMers.'' While most of those advocating such policies have good motives and good hearts, they have unintentionally created a humanitarian and bureaucratic crisis that our government is not equipped to handle. I say we should send them home. The children and those who have come here illegally need to be sent home, whether they are adults or children.

Mr. ROHRABACHER

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Madam Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Madam Chairman, my amendment would prevent any funds appropriated by this bill from being provided to the Government of Pakistan. It is reprehensible that our government is still willing to provide military assistance to a known terrorist-supporting state like Pakistan. Since 9/11, Pakistan has received over $28 billion from the United States. This should not continue. It is a farce to believe that our aid, sometimes deceptively labeled as ``reimbursements,'' is buying Pakistan's cooperation in hunting down terrorists. It was the Pakistani establishment that sheltered Osama bin Laden for years. They continue to jail Dr. Afridi, the man, the heroic man, who helped the CIA locate bin Laden. Why would Pakistan do that if they were on our side? The abysmal human rights record of the Pakistani Government is shameful. It is even worse because American money contributes to strengthening the security forces which kill and persecute minority groups who are denied their own right of self-determination. This is especially true of the Baloch and Sindhi, two large ethnic minority groups in Pakistan. Our tax dollars equip the Pakistani military, which brutally oppresses the aspirations of both of these people, and both of which have a long history separate from Pakistan. Pakistan is not an ally, and any assistance we send them only strengthens their ability to act against their own people, against us, and against Afghanistan as we withdraw our military. We cannot buy the friendship of a government whose strategic interests are not aligned with ours. They are allied with terrorists. The Pakistanis, thus, are allied with the terrorist elements and our own ever more dangerous adversary, Communist China. At a time of tight budgets, we should reserve our aid to true friends and allies. Furthermore, the Appropriations Committee didn't even put an exact dollar figure in this bill for the money that will be going to Pakistan. Instead, they have inserted a placeholder because we have not yet received a formal figure from the administration. What will happen when we get this formal figure? Well, will we simply serve as a rubber stamp for the administration and insert the number requested into a conference report? Well, I would hope not. It is our duty as elected Members of the House of Representatives to determine how much and to whom tax dollars will be appropriated. I implore my colleagues to send a message today that we will not send another dime to Pakistan as long as they continue to act belligerently toward the United States and to promote terrorism and repress their own people. The policy which has us funding Pakistan's military is wrong, and the fact that we can't even debate a precise dollar figure is absurd. It is insane for us to continue to borrow large sums of money from China in order to give to Pakistan, our enemy and a friend of terrorism. I ask my colleagues to support my amendment and to end this counterproductive use of our limited resources, which has continued for far too long. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Madam Chair, may I inquire as to how much time I have remaining?

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Madam Chair, when I first came to Congress, I was perhaps Pakistan's best friend in Congress. At that time, of course, we were in the middle of the cold war and the Pakistanis were on our side and India was on the side of the Russians. Today, the cold war is over and Pakistan has become the friend of our enemies, whether they are radical terrorists or whether it is Communist China. For us now to be borrowing money from China in order to give to Pakistan--because we are still going into debt $500 billion a year. We need to make sure. We have to borrow that money, much of which comes from China, then pass that on to Pakistan, who is basically supporting our enemies. They still have Dr. Afridi, the man who helped us finger Osama bin Laden, a hero who risked his life for us to bring justice to the man who slaughtered 3,000 Americans. For us to continue to give that government who holds Dr. Afridi in a dungeon, as we speak, is immoral and is stupid and is counterproductive. We should cut military assistance to Pakistan.

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Madam Chair, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. ROHRABACHER

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk preprinted in the Congressional Record.

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Chairman, I rise to speak in favor of my amendment, which would prohibit the Department of Justice from using any of the funds appropriated in this bill to prevent States from implementing their own medical marijuana laws. Twenty-nine States have enacted laws that allow patients access to medical marijuana and its derivatives, such as CBD oils. It is no surprise then that public opinion is shifting, too. A recent Pew Research Center survey found that 61 percent of Republicans and a whooping 76 percent of Independents favor making medical marijuana legal and available to their patients who need it. As I have said, 29 States have already enacted laws that will permit patients access to medical marijuana and their derivatives. By the way, 80 percent of Democrats feel the same way. Despite this overwhelming shift in public opinion, the Federal Government continues its hard-line oppression against medical marijuana. For those of us who routinely talk about the 10th Amendment, which we do in conservative ranks, and respect for State laws, this amendment should be a no-brainer. Our amendment gives all of us an opportunity to show our constituents that we are truly constitutionalists and that we mean what we say when we talk about the importance of the 10th Amendment. In addition, this also gives us the opportunity to prove that we really do believe in respecting the doctor-patient relationship. I proudly offer this amendment that has the support of my colleagues on both sides of the aisle. I am joined by Republican cosponsors Don Young, Tom McClintock, Dr. Paul Broun, Steve Stockman, and Justin Amash, as well as Democrat cosponsors Sam Farr, Earl Blumenauer, Steve Cohen, Jared Polis, Barbara Lee, and Dina Titus. I urge my colleagues to support our commonsense, states' rights, compassionate, fiscally responsible amendment. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Chair, how much time do I have remaining?

Mr. ROHRABACHER. We have 2\1/2\ minutes each. I yield 1 minute to my colleague from Kentucky (Mr. Massie).

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Chair, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Broun), our doctor in the House. We do believe in the doctor-patient relationship and that the government shouldn't interfere.

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Is this the close of the debate?

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Chairman, this is the most incredible debate we have had. Over half the States have already gone through every argument that was presented and decided against what you just heard. There are doctors at every one of those States that participated in a long debate over this and found exactly the opposite of what we have heard today. Some people are suffering and if a doctor feels that he needs to prescribe something to alleviate that suffering, it is immoral for this government to get in the way, and that is what is happening. The State governments have recognized that a doctor has a right to treat his patient any way he sees fit, and so did our Founding Fathers. I ask for support of my amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

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

Mr. ROHRABACHER

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Madam Chair, I appreciate all the great things that the chairman has done. I echo the remarks, the praise that was sung by our friends from Texas to the great job that Chairman Wolf has done in his career. I appreciate, for example, tonight that he is yielding me this time, knowing that he has strong disagreement about which I will be speaking. Tomorrow, I will be offering an amendment to the CJS appropriations bill, along with my colleagues Sam Farr, Don Young, Earl Blumenauer, Tom McClintock, Steve Cohen, Paul Broun, Jared Polis, Steve Stockman, Barbara Lee, Justin Amash, and Dina Titus. Very simply, our amendment would prohibit the Department of Justice from using funds in the bill from preventing States from implementing their State medical marijuana laws. Importantly, this amendment gives us an opportunity to show our support and what we really believe about the 10th Amendment to the Constitution, and it gives us an opportunity to support the intentions of our Founding Fathers and Mothers. They never meant for the Federal Government to play the preeminent role in criminal justice. It should be disturbing to any constitutionalist that the Federal Government insists on the supremacy of laws that allow for the medical use of marijuana. So far, 28 States and the District of Columbia--that is a majority of the States of the Union--have enacted laws to allow access to medical marijuana or its chemical derivatives. They obviously believe enforcing such restrictions on the medical use of marijuana is a waste of extremely limited resources. This amendment has solid bipartisan support, and we have the opportunity now, with this amendment, to tell the Department of Justice that they are not permitted to waste limited Federal dollars interfering with the duly-enacted laws of our States concerning medical marijuana. I urge my colleagues, Democrats and Republicans alike, liberals and conservatives, to support my amendment. Respect State medical marijuana laws.

Mr. ROHRABACHER

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Will the gentleman yield?

Mr. ROHRABACHER. I would like to note for the gentleman--and I am sure we will have your support--that the gentlewoman from California, Loretta Sanchez, and myself today are starting a Support Egypt Caucus, which will be aimed at supporting General el-Sisi in his fight to make sure radical Islam does not take over Egypt and thus threaten the entire stability of the world.

Mr. ROHRABACHER

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to discuss an issue that currently affects more than half the States in our Nation, and that is the inconsistency between Federal and State laws pertaining medical marijuana. Yes, Mr. Speaker, a majority of our Nation's States-- Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Mississippi, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Utah, Vermont, Wisconsin, and Washington, as well as the District of Columbia--all have some form of medical marijuana law on the books. Of course this means that these States allow their residents to engage in activities that are expressly prohibited by the Federal Government. To be exact, there are already 26 States that allow doctors to recommend the medical use of marijuana or its derivatives, and many more States are expected to take the step and do the same thing in the near future. Importantly, the States listed are not dominated by conservatives or liberals. This isn't a Republican or a Democrat issue. Massachusetts, Alaska, Mississippi, and Oregon are hardly the same, politically speaking, in their legislature. Politically speaking, they are not the same. But their legislators and their residents all have recognized the same reality, and that is the potential medical benefits of marijuana and marijuana's derivatives, and they believe that these derivatives and the benefits of marijuana should not be denied to their people. Unfortunately, however, the Federal Government continues to list marijuana and its derivatives as a schedule I substance, putting it in the same category as heroin, LSD, and other hard drugs. I have long supported rescheduling marijuana so that it can be researched, prescribed, and used by legitimate health care professionals. But multi-administrations, both Republican and Democrat alike, have refused to seriously talk about this topic. Instead, a heavy-handed, emotion-based policy continues. Evidence suggesting that the Federal Government ought to allow the use of marijuana for medical purposes has never had the serious discussion that it deserves. Many desperate patients have defied the Federal Government's blanket ban on the use of marijuana as a remedy for numerous ailments. The absurdity of this ban was brought home to me over a decade ago when my mother, depressed after undergoing surgery, lost her appetite and was requiring me to spoon-feed her. When I learned that medical marijuana might give her the appetite she needed and, yes, raise her spirits, the illegality of this herb was abundantly clear to me as I was there seeing my mother in the hospital bed, seeing how my mother had lost her appetite and seeing how her spirits were so low, knowing that perhaps marijuana, if the doctor had so ordered, would have been something that could have helped her and helped other people's mothers and children who were suffering the same situation. The significance of changing--or at least altering--this prohibition could no longer be ignored by me when I was confronted by this over a decade ago. Since that time, the public's interest and support for medical marijuana has increased dramatically. As I mentioned, over half the States allow people with serious illnesses to use marijuana and/or its derivatives for medical purposes. Recent polls show that the vast majority of the American people support the medical efficacy and use of marijuana for medical purposes: 77 percent according to Pew, 81 percent according to the ABC News poll, and a whopping 85 percent according to a FOX News poll last year. Just as interesting, 60 percent of the American people believe that the Federal Government should not prosecute people who are acting in accordance with State medical marijuana laws, and 72 percent think government efforts to enforce marijuana laws cost more than they are worth. Surprise, surprise, almost three-quarters of Americans believe that the cost of enforcing marijuana laws is far heavier than the benefits of having those laws enforced or having those laws on the books. All those numbers include majorities of both Republicans, Democrats, and, yes, it includes a majority of Independents, as well. What is the driving force behind this surge of support for a change in Federal policy? It is the realization by patients, researchers, and physicians that marijuana and its derivatives may offer enormous relief to numerous patients. For example, last year, the famous physician, Sanjay Gupta, released--who is a very prominent physician--released a documentary film in which he explored many of the benefits of medical marijuana. Like so many Americans, he is a relatively new convert to this position. I quote: We have been terribly and systematically misled for nearly 70 years in the United States, and I apologize for my own role in that. This is what the doctor said in his documentary. His documentary explores a number of cases in which patients who have various environmental neurological disabilities were helped by marijuana. Anyone who watches this documentary will see the positive effect that marijuana and its derivatives can have on ailing patients. Dr. Gupta is not alone in his belief that it may prove beneficial to some patients. The New England Journal of Medicine recently found that a majority of clinicians--a majority of the clinicians surveyed responded that they ``would recommend the use of medicinal marijuana in certain situations.'' We have all heard anecdotes of the ability of marijuana to improve patients' appetites, calm those with anxiety, and reduce the nausea for those who are extremely sick. Most recently, there has been an increased attention on the potential impacts of marijuana on patients who suffer from seizures, as well as those with PTSD. Some particularly conservative States in our country--Utah, Alabama, Kentucky, and Mississippi, for instance--have recently passed laws allowing patients to access medical marijuana products such as oils that are rich in what they call the Cannibis oil, which is CBD, which has been very helpful with so many patients who are looking for relief for children with seizure disorders. They have found that the CBD helps these children meet this challenge in the families that are suffering across the country watching their children go through this suffering with this type of seizures and disorders. These laws vary somewhat as to how patients are able to gain access to these products in various States, they differ, the laws differ, but they generally show that patients to be treated with this CBD-rich marijuana product, when administered by a physician and in the course of a State-approved medical study, have proved to be helpful to many people's health. Under current law, however, CBD, because it is derived from marijuana, is considered a Schedule I drug, and therefore it is prohibited to do the kind of research that is necessary to put that into the service for our people and to make sure that they have this available for their children and for other people who are suffering. We can't even do the fundamental research as long as the Federal Government continues to label it the same as heroin or the same as other types of drugs, cocaine and the rest. Well, we know from what I have said so far that there are numerous people in our country who understand that there are people who can benefit medically, and the people who understand this are not just civilians but medical professionals, as well as scientists. Also, of particular and growing interest are the benefits that marijuana has for those who suffer from posttraumatic stress disorder, that is PTSD. This is one of the most commonly diagnosed disorders for our military veterans who are returning from overseas duty. Those suffering from PTSD often experience debilitating nightmares, depression, and anxiety; and, according to many of these patients, marijuana is the only thing that helps them alleviate these awful, awful symptoms. Yet, because of our decades-old policy of not allowing the legitimate use--or even research into the legitimate use--of the medical benefits of marijuana, many individuals that we are talking about, many of these veterans, feel they have no choice but to break the law. Our Nation's heroes who are trying to escape the hellish nightmares of the war that we sent them off to fight are forced into the compromising position of illegal activity just to receive some relief from the pain they are suffering. Parents who want to treat their children with nonpsychoactive extracts of the marijuana plant are forced to engage in activities that, if caught and convicted under Federal law, would make these parents who are just trying to help their children, it makes them felons--felons. I would submit that this scenario undermines every legal and moral institution that we want every citizen--we want every citizen--of the United States to respect. It puts our people in an impossible position. It requires them to choose between providing relief for a loved one or breaking the law. In many cases, that behavior is in compliance--we are talking about offering medical marijuana--it is in compliance with State law; but these people who need it, whose family may need it, whose veteran coming home from the war may need it, whose mother is in the hospital who has lost her appetite and is depressed may need it, well, even if it is in compliance with State law, what we have got now is they are still a violation of Federal law, so we end up condemning these people to a crisis in which their loved ones must either suffer or they must break the law. It is cruel nonsense to put our people through this. Patients and providers currently run the risk of having a Federal SWAT team-like police force raid their homes or their place of business because of the consumption of a plant which could be growing right in their backyard. The militarization of the police force in order to prevent Grandma from using a medical herb that will ease her pain during her last days on Earth is the type of thing that ought to make every person who believes in liberty and freedom--it should make them shudder, as well as, of course, responsible conservatives who understand we should be making every dollar our government spends count and be doing something that absolutely needs to be done. The harassment from the Drug Enforcement Agency is something that should not be tolerated in the land of the free. Businesspeople who are licensed and certified to provide doctor-recommended medicine within their own States have seen their businesses locked down, their assets seized, their customers driven away, and their financial lives ruined by very, very aggressive and energetic Federal law enforcers enforcing a law in which we are preventing something that doctors would recommend for the health of their patients that now some way distributing that material would result in the total destruction of that medical professional and his life. Instead of continuing to finance this repressive and expensive approach, we should be willing to allow patients and small businesses to follow their doctor's advice under the watchful eye of State law enforcement and regulators rather than treating it like something that ought to be eradicated from our society. And, yes, I am sure there are plenty of people around who would love to just continue building our police forces, spending the money; but having them target people who are engaged not in rape or murder or some type of aggressive action on the population but instead have them focus on a doctor who is trying to alleviate the pain of someone who has just gone through an operation or one of our veterans who is suffering some sort of posttrauma from his being overseas, no. To say it is a total waste of money is just an understatement. The 26 States that I have named have gotten this message. They have been making great strides toward compassion and, yes, towards freedom and, yes, towards a responsible use of limited government money in our country. Now, after the States have done their job, we need the Federal Government to do its part. In the near future, I, along with several of my colleagues in both parties, will introduce an amendment to the Commerce-Justice-Science appropriations bill to bring an end to this disruptive, ill-advised, and wasteful policy that we have pushed on our people and oppressed our people with for far too long. Specifically, our amendment would prohibit the Department of Justice from using any of the funds in this bill to prevent States from implementing their own State medical marijuana laws. I think my conservative friends could benefit from hearing what some of their idols have to say about this. Milton Friedman stated that it is ``disgraceful to deny marijuana for medical purposes.'' Dr. Friedman, whom I knew personally, a personal friend of mine, spent a great deal of time talking about this very issue. He and George Schultz, former Secretary--Dr. Friedman, of course, advised Ronald Reagan when I worked with Ronald Reagan in the White House. As you know, I was a special assistant to President Reagan as well as a Presidential speechwriter for President Reagan for 7 years. There with us was, of course, Dr. Milton Friedman; and he advised us of the nonsense of making marijuana illegal, especially for medical purposes. Then we have William F. Buckley--another man who advised conservatives like Ronald Reagan--who I read as a young person. In the pages of National Review, which he edited, he wrote: The stodgy inertia most politicians feel is up against a creeping reality, and that is that marijuana for medical relief is a movement which is attracting voters who are pretty assertive on the subject. Yes, William F. Buckley was a visionary. He saw what direction the will of the American people would be having, and he foresaw today that the vast majority of the American people do not want the Federal Government wasting limited dollars destroying doctors' lives, preventing research into medical marijuana, and getting in the way of the people of the States who have voted to make this substance legal in their State for medical purposes. Conservatives in this body--in this body, in this House--who regularly call for a decrease in the size and scope of the Federal Government ought to seriously consider voting for my amendment. Likewise, conservatives in this body who routinely talk about the need for the Federal Government to respect the 10th Amendment of the Constitution and those who believe that Washington should not interfere with the doctor-patient relationship, which we have heard so much about, these people, my conservative colleagues, ought to seriously consider supporting my amendment, as well. In fact, if you are on the wrong side of Milton Friedman and William F. Buckley and people like Grover Norquist and George Schultz on the medical marijuana issue, I would suggest to my colleagues that they ought to reconsider the position that they are taking, that it may not be the one that is consistent with the conservative belief in freedom, individual responsibility, and, of course, limited government. This amendment has been introduced in the past, most recently in 2012, but the difference this time around is that the American people are now demanding the Federal Government respect the majority of the States in our country which have implemented various medical marijuana laws. The question at this point is whether the American people's Representatives in this House will grant them the wish and accede to what their opinion is and understand that laws are made for these people and their opinions have a right to be heard. I would hope that my fellow Representatives hear the American people's cry, hear those people who are trying to take care of their elderly mother or a veteran coming home or their children who are suffering seizures and say it is a total waste, it is a travesty to use limited dollars, to have a Federal Government stopping a doctor in States that have declared it as legal, prevent that doctor from offering a treatment for these people, our loved ones, Americans throughout our country. My hope and expectation is that truth and common sense will prevail. I have faith in the American people. And yes, I have faith in my colleagues. I believe that both the American people, given a choice in their lives, they will do the right thing for themselves and their family. I also believe they will do it without bureaucracy, without massive Federal intrusion into their lives. And I also have faith in my colleagues that they will begin to take a second look at this issue and see if what they are doing is consistent with our overall belief in American freedom and personal responsibility. One final point I would like to make is that, as legislators who have the power of the purse, we have a responsibility to prioritize Federal tax dollars and how they are spent. Our debt has increased by trillions of dollars in just the last few years. This year's deficit is expected to add an additional $500 billion to the debt, and the CBO estimates that the deficit will only slightly be lower next year before ballooning up again to unacceptable levels. What we are going through is already unacceptable to most of us. As we look for places to cut spending, why don't we begin by eliminating those expenditures which the vast majority of Americans believe to be an unjustified exercise of Federal powers. I ask my colleagues to join me in supporting a commonsense amendment that will be a step in the right direction in respecting State medical marijuana laws and will respect the individual liberties that our country believes in. I would hope that the Federal Government also, finally, we in the Federal Government will understand prioritizing spending, so even if you have questions of how someone making a personal choice somewhere across the country as to whether to use medical marijuana to help a family member who is sick or to stop their own seizures or whatever, yes, even if you don't believe that individuals across our country or the State governments have a right to be able to make those decisions and local voters should be making those determinations, which is what our Founding Fathers wanted, even if you don't believe in that, we should, at the very least, understand that we do not have resources at the Federal level to do everything for everybody. While showing compassion for thousands of ailing patients across our country, we can also do the right thing, that is the right thing for us to do in terms of balancing our budget and having responsible spending patterns and taxing patterns here in Washington. Here is where it crosses. Here is where the waste of taxpayer dollars and enforcing laws that they have already said they don't want at the State level, forcing this upon them, declaring that someone is not going to have the personal responsibility in his own life to make these decisions, even in States where our people have voted to make this legal in terms of decisionmaking for using medical marijuana, well, even in those States, and all of this in one formula, you still have to understand that we have to deal with a budget; and it is totally inconsistent with a responsible spending pattern to use such limited resources as we have, going into debt in order to fence in doctors and other people who are trying to use medical marijuana around the country and even prevent the research into medical marijuana to show that it might have some benefit. No, that is a travesty and a total waste of our limited resources. I would call on my conservative colleagues and my liberal colleagues, my Democrat and Republican friends and the people across the country of the United States to look at this issue with an open mind, intelligently look at the issue, look at it with your heart and your brain, and we will come to the conclusion that medical marijuana, especially in those States in which the people have decided to make medical use of marijuana legal, that it is a total waste of limited Federal funds for us to be focusing the use of those Federal funds on that activity at the State and local levels by people who are being given the choice by doctors as to what medicine they will use. Let's get the Federal Government out of the areas that it shouldn't be in. That should be something conservatives really support. And so today, I would call on my colleagues to support the amendment that I will be offering, along with Congressman Blumenauer and others here in the body, to make sure that we get back to the 10th Amendment of the Constitution and put into law that, when it comes to the medical use of marijuana, the Federal Government will not waste its money trying to thwart the will of people throughout our country and the various State legislatures throughout our country. With that said, Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. ROHRABACHER

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

Mr. ROHRABACHER

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Speaker, one of the things that makes America great is that our country is a country that--regardless of one's race, one's religion, or one's ethnicity--we, as citizens of the United States, make up a collective family, the American family; yes, a diverse family, but a family, in and of itself, composed of all the people, the great variety of people we have here from every part of the world who have come here to live in freedom and enjoy the opportunity and the liberty and the justice that America represents. Here, despite where one was born or whose one's parents are or when even one became a citizen, we are all equally part of that family. Just as many families across our Nation have come to discover, at one point or another, in a time when there are scarce resources, when you are going through perhaps an economic crisis or trying to avert an economic crisis, it is not unreasonable to provide for one's family before helping others. It is not selfish to watch out, thus, for our fellow Americans. It is not selfish to watch out for our fellow Americans above the well-being of foreigners, even foreigners who wish us well and, yes, foreigners who would like to become part of the American family; but, first and foremost, those Americans from every part of the world who are citizens of this country or, yes, who have come here legally in the attempt to become a U.S. citizen, their interest must be our first priority. Tonight, I draw my attention and the attention of my colleagues to the dire consequences that we face if many--and many people have been insisting that we do this--if we implement the so-called immigration reform which, of course, would legalize the status of those who are currently unlawfully living and working in our country. Just as we are a nation of immigrants, we are also a nation of laws. What the American people and my colleagues must keep in mind, while debating this issue of immigration, is the distinction between legal immigration and illegal immigration. Perhaps the thing that has disturbed me most in this debate is the attempt to blur the difference between the two, the difference, even to the point where statistics are being used to say: well, this is what immigrants have done for our society. No, the statistics are what immigrants have done, but that does not include the illegal immigrants that are part of the equation. No, illegal immigration is on a totally different plane. Legal immigration and illegal immigration are on totally different planes. Too often, we see these lines blurred, as I say, in this debate. I happen to be very pro-legal immigration, and there is no reason for most Americans not to lift their head up when we actually understand that our country admits more legal immigrants annually than all the other countries of the world combined, totaling roughly a million legal immigrants every year. While our immigration system certainly needs reforming or making it more effective and more efficient in what it is doing, this controlled and open process of legal immigration has worked well for America and demonstrates the capacity for our people to have compassion and generosity towards other human beings, other people who would like to come here to be part of the American family--coming here while obeying the rules, coming here not thumbing their nose at our legal system, coming here with respect towards the rest of us by obeying the laws and the regulations that are necessary for someone to come here legally. Those folks have been wondrous, and, in fact, we all trace our roots back to people like this who came here and have contributed so much to the well-being of our country, and those million people who come here legally every year are a major positive asset to our country. Despite our generous legal immigration policy, it is estimated that anywhere from 11 to 20 million foreigners are unlawfully present in the United States today. While I certainly understand the positive motives and the essential goodness of the vast majority of these trespassers, of these people who are here illegally, it does not negate that they are lawbreakers, nor does it negate the economic and social consequences of inundating our country-- far above that million-person mark of legal immigration, but inundating our country with a large number of people, thus causing a growing damage to the American family, to people who are here who have come here legally, and to our U.S. citizens. The dire consequences are evident to average Americans who see the decline in the quality of their schools, their neighborhoods--the safety of their neighborhoods, yes--and their health care. Yes, even their jobs. They can see the decline in the quality of the jobs that are available to working people in this country. Not only are citizens hurt by permitting illegals to cut in front of the line, but it is also a slap in the face to those who continue to wait their turn to come to America. When we give in to trying to placate and trying to meet the interests of people who come here illegally, it is done at the expense of those people who are waiting in line and want to be American citizens and want to obey our laws and want to come here legally. Yes, illegal immigrants hurt the American people and hurt legal immigrants even worse. Earlier this year, President Obama's 2012 unilateral deferral of deportation for certain illegal immigrants, essentially an amnesty decree, caused huge delays for thousands--that is thousands who are here legally seeking green cards, seeking to have government employees do their job and to actually make the immigration system work. Our government employees were servicing illegal immigrants at the expense of legal immigrants. They got it totally backwards. And that is the argument that we face today. It has a lot of things totally backwards. While it is concerning that the President's actions appear to be political--which is this effort that we saw to try to appeal to the various segments of our population in order to conduct policy in the interest of illegal immigrants--I am most troubled by the fact that, basically, our President would defy the rule of law and congressional intent by unilaterally granting preferential treatment to those immigrants who are here illegally. And our President then, without congressional intent or any rule of law behind it, actually shifted the services of our government to service the needs of people who are here illegally at the expense of those people who are here legally. Nearly 4.5 million mostly legal immigrants are currently caught up in the backlog of our bureaucratic immigration process. That is 4.5 million people who we need to be concerned about. They are part of the American family. They have come here as part of those 1 million legal immigrants that we have coming in, but yet they end up waiting decades--years, and sometimes decades--to make sure that their papers are processed so that they can become citizens. The last thing we need to do--and unfortunately this administration has been doing it--is shift over the work effort and the time and the resources that are necessary to help these people who come here legally become citizens, shift that over to trying to service those people who are here illegally and have thumbed their nose at our law. A policy which hurts those who follow the law and hurts those who are U.S. citizens and then rewards illegal and dishonest behavior is going to have some pretty bad consequences. We are not fooled by the rhetoric--and no one should be fooled by the rhetoric--that we need to have ``comprehensive immigration reform'' and that it will in some way impact in a positive way what I have been talking about this afternoon. What they really mean when they talk about ``comprehensive immigration reform''--what they really mean--is ``amnesty.'' They don't want to use that word because the American people learned what that was all about. What they are really doing is rewarding those who have broken the law; and they do so at the expense of American citizens and, yes, at the expense of those immigrants who are here legally. As the saying goes: Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me. Mr. Speaker, we have already been fooled once. Amnesty has been tested, and it has proven to be a failed policy. In fact, it has served only as a catalyst for chain migration, which has compounded many of the horrific economic and social challenges that we face today. So we have already had an amnesty in the past, and we know what it has done to the challenges that we had then. It has made them worse. And now we have ended up with, as I say, horrific economic and social challenges. I am, of course, speaking--when I talk about the amnesty of the past--of the 1986 immigration reform bill, where Congress infamously promised President Reagan that they would enhance border security in exchange for an amnesty on the behalf of nearly 3 million illegal immigrants then residing in the United States. Needless to say, border security was never enhanced and, needless to say, many more than the 3 million that we were supposedly talking about were legalized through chain migration. And millions upon millions more would continue to illegally flock to our country. Why? Because they saw that those people who had come here illegally ended up becoming naturalized, ended up being put in front of the line of those people who were waiting diligently in other countries to come here legally. Thus, it created a major increase in the flood of illegals into our country. As common sense would dictate, the U.S. Government cannot continue to send this type of mixed message, the message which basically says we are going to reward that person who is here illegally by making him a citizen, putting him through the process actually even before those people who have come here legally, and anybody who gets here illegally, we will reward them with citizenship. They will then have the rights of Americans for education, for health care and the opportunities that are abundant here for American citizens and legal immigrants. Well, if we continue to say anybody who can get to this country illegally or not is going to have those benefits, that is a mixed message if we expect that illegal immigration is going to be halted or in some way that the people overseas who are considering will hesitate to come here. In fact, we are rewarding those who made it here. Without expecting the legal immigration invasion of our country to increase, we actually gave people the incentive to come here illegally. Illegal immigration only dramatically jumped after the 1986 amnesty deal, setting the path for our current predicament. And what is our current predicament? We have social and economic dislocation that is harming the American people, especially middle class working people. Like after the 1986 amnesty deal, those admitted into the United States under a new amnesty will surely have spouses, children, parents, even siblings back in their home country with whom they will want to reunite. They will insist on reuniting with--legally or illegally--those people who are in the United States. So that is why we have ended up in a situation where we hear people say: Well, we have these people that we will never see in our family in this other country. Well, the people who are saying that have every right to go to that other country. It is as if someone who is in the United States who is saying that we have to reunite the families--and they are here illegally in the first place--that that is a reason that we should legalize their status so that they can reunite the family that has been left behind. No. The other option is people who are here illegally should go home and be with their families that they left behind. It is better for them to do that. So this has really been a potential threat when we talk about family reunification and the rest because there is a potential to triple the number of people who are currently here in this country illegally. Let's get that right--triple. If we give amnesty and we legalize the status of those who are here illegally, we could be tripling the number of people. We could be inserting this number of people into our system. If true, this abrupt population swell will fundamentally change America socially, economically, and, yes, politically, causing major consequences that we can even see across the board. And you can see what those consequences will be because those people that now are swirling in the ranks of our population will mainly be poorer people, people at the poorest end of the economic level. We will be importing millions--tens of millions--of poor people, increasing poverty in America. The stress that would place on our social services is one thing, but to our economy and what that does to the American people in the job market would be horrendous. According to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, every 1 percent increase in the labor force attributable to immigration tends to lower the relative wages of all American workers. Let's get that straight. That is what happens when you have an increase in the labor force by immigrants who come to this country. That is why we want to limit it to 1 million people. If we have 11, 20, 30, 40 million people coming in, we can expect major decreases in the actual wages that all Americans receive. It is going to impact the American wages. Surprise, surprise. When you have a flood of illegal immigrants into a country, they are bending down the wages, bending down the wages of the American people. However, those who stand to lose the most are whom, when we say that these people are mainly people from lower income levels? So what we are talking about, the people who are really losing by legalizing the status of illegals, by having a plan that would eventually bring tens of millions of more people into our country and insert them into our process, the people who are hurt the most are low-income, low-skilled American workers. One major study found that increases in immigration during the 1980- 2000 era resulted in an 8 percent decrease in wages for high school dropouts and a 3 percent decrease in wages for the average American worker. Well, this is hardly surprising. Well, for me, it wouldn't be surprising. During my college days, I was a janitor. I worked as a janitor. And let's note, I worked as a janitor because I needed a job. I was cleaning toilets. I was scrubbing floors. I was picking up trash. That was not my desired job, but I needed the money. Historically--right now--jobs such as these would be a steppingstone for those who perhaps lacked an education or were trying to earn their way through school. I was trying to help pay my education expenses. But after decades of illegal immigrants who have been bending back the wages and the businesses willing to exploit them, many of the jobs that we are talking about, like janitorial jobs, no longer pay even the wages that were paid in real dollars then. I have gone back and taken a look at what a janitor makes, and janitors were making basically the same pay as I made back 40 and 50 years ago. Well, why is that? Our economy has quadrupled, maybe tripled, in the last 40 years. How come janitors make exactly the same amount of money? They have been left out. They have been left out because the job of janitor has been bid down. The wages for people who would be janitors in our country have been bid down, bid down by people who flooded into our country illegally willing to work for a pittance, willing to live in homes where you have three or four families to a house that is only supposed to have one family. We have a situation where who is being hurt? It is that American who would have had that job being that janitor--maybe working his way through school, maybe not--who now can't take that job because it pays so little. People say, well, how can we afford to take care of buildings if you are going to have to pay a certain amount of money, more money to those people who are taking care of the buildings? Well, proportionately it is the same. The people who own the buildings are making a bigger profit now at the expense of the fact they are paying a pittance to illegals to take care of the building. But also we can rest assured that technology would by now have developed that would make the life of a janitor and the job of a janitor much more efficient. You probably would have toilet bowl machines that would permit one person to clean 100 toilet bowls a night rather than 12 or 15, and that, then, would mean that the person running that machine and making that machine would be an American citizen or a legal immigrant who is earning a decent wage. There is nothing wrong with having people who are working those jobs earn a decent wage so that they could then raise a family and, yes, maybe own their own little home some day. That is the way it used to be. When you are a working person, then you can expect to earn enough to maintain a decent standard of living. But we have a flood of illegals coming in. Especially after we gave that amnesty, what we have done is bid down the wages of the American people as tens of millions of illegals are now present in our society. To this point, between 1960 and 2012, a time when America was experiencing its highest levels of immigration, native-born workers and legal immigrants lost an average of $402 billion in wages while native- owned firms, meaning American-owned companies, profited by an average of $437 billion. So thus we have wages being depressed by illegal immigration that actually lowered the amount of money by $400 billion in money that was paid in wages, yet the people running the business or owned the property were $437 billion richer. So what we have seen here is a huge shift of wealth to whom? To upper-class owners of businesses at the expense of the lowest level of Americans. Now, how is our country a safe country? Our country is a safe country because all of us who are part of the American family are doing our part to protect our country. Those people at the lower end of the economic sphere, they are the ones who join the military and go out and defend us. They are the ones who obey the law. They are the ones whom we rely upon in their good judgment to support the Constitution and a rule of law. If they lose faith in the system, we will suffer greatly. That is one of the things that is happening is that the poor people are being left out. Actually, their standard of living is going down. Of course, our friends in the other party have provided very lucrative welfare abilities to people to be on the dole rather than giving them a good job. At the same time, they are pushing for more government programs to give the dole, to make people dependent and thus, I might say, lose their dignity of being able to be self-sufficient. At the same time, the folks on the other side of the aisle are pushing for amnesty, for illegal immigration, that would bring in 40 million new people, insert 40 million people, foreigners, into our system. What is that going to do for the poor people of this country? Why are the unions in our country not jumping up and supporting the rights of their working people not to be having to face illegal immigrant labor bidding down their labor? Over the last 50 years, there has been a massive transfer of wealth going on, and yet at the same time we see the business wages, business profits, going up and workers' wages going down. Yet we have policies that seem to encourage it that don't make any sense. We have people who use the rhetoric of trying to care for America's poor. The last thing they should be doing is bringing in 40 million new foreigners--mostly poor--into our country. Knowing this, it should be no surprise that Big Business has been a consistent advocate of amnesty. Big Business wants cheap labor, and this, I might add, is not being loyal to the American family. To be loyal to the American family, no matter who they are, whether they are poor Americans, working class Americans, we should be watching out for each other. Lower wages, however, are not the only negative impact of mass illegal immigration into our country. Similar structural breakdowns and strains can be seen in our education system. People in the lower income parts of town are seeing their education system fall apart. We see the health care system in our country falling apart. We see as well in a variety of other institutions that people rely on that the strain of millions of illegals--and they want to bring more in--is destroying this social, this economic, and this infrastructure that our people depend on. All things considered, if amnesty were being granted to the 11 to 20 million illegal immigrants currently in the United States, it would cost the American taxpayers an additional $6.3 trillion over the next 50 years. At least 45 million foreigners, mostly poor, would be inserted into our society. Is that going to make America a better place? Are the working people, the people who are part of the American family, going to be better off because of that? Absolutely not. And the voices of the American people need to be heard because we have people posturing as if they are doing a favor for the less fortunate by advocating this amnesty for illegal immigrants which would bring in tens of millions of more poor people from foreign countries into our country. With our national debt approaching $18 trillion, a budget deficit of over half a trillion dollars and two unsustainable entitlement programs that we need in order to maintain some sort of security for the American people, Medicare and Social Security, these are currently on the road to bankruptcy, and if we bring in these millions more people, we can expect that the expenses of our government will shoot up trying to provide benefits for people who now--by the way, now after making them legal, they are entitled to those benefits. Someone who is here legally is entitled to every benefit and protection as people who are here who were born here. And if we legalize the status of illegals, we are taking tens of millions of foreigners who are here illegally and granting them the rights to all those programs. America cannot afford amnesty for those foreigners who are here illegally. We must take care of the needs of the American family, of American citizens, and of legal immigrants into our society who have joined our family. Their interests have to come first over the interests of--yes, and let me just say, there is no doubt that those people who are here illegally in our country, the vast, vast majority, 90 percent or more, are wonderful people. We should not fool ourselves into thinking that we can somehow take care of all of the wonderful people in the world. We can't do it. As we try to do it and try to open up our borders even more than the 1 million legal immigrants that we have, we are going to attract even a bigger flood into our country which will put even more pressure on us. What we are doing in that case is hurting our fellow Americans. Even if these people are wonderful people who come here legally and they are seeking opportunity, I am sorry, we can't take care of the whole world, and we can't tell the world that whatever good person comes here illegally we are eventually going to give them amnesty and they will be eligible for all our programs. There is an argument about what are called the DREAMers, young people who were brought here by their parents. They didn't come here voluntarily. Their parents brought them here when they were 2 or 3. And now they don't have legal status. There are a lot of obstacles in their way. They want those obstacles removed. They want themselves to be legalized. But do you know what will happen if we do that, if we say that a young person going to school because they are young and they have been brought here by their parents, what is going to happen? What will be the message if we do that? If we legalize the status of just the DREAMers, we are telling the people throughout the world, man, when you come here illegally to the United States, make sure you bring your children. We are telling people throughout the world, bring your children to this country so we can take care of the needs of your children. We have needs of our own children in the United States of America. And they are wonderful kids out there that we care about, but we have to care about our own kids first. People who have come here legally have that right. They are part of our family. American citizens are part of our family. But the well-being of children from foreigners in various countries throughout the world has to be second on our list, down on our list, way down as compared to the well-being of our own people. Yes, if we take care of the DREAMers, what is going to happen is we will be encouraging a mass flow of young people into our country. Younger people who are in school, we will have to take care of their education, et cetera. That is not right. You can't give the incentive to people to come here and expect that we are not going to have many, many more people coming here. We will have many more DREAMers coming here if we legalize the status of those who have been brought here illegally by their parents. This issue continues to be presented as a humanitarian imperative, as something that without cost we could help these people among us. We can do that without cost? There is nothing without cost. We are being presented that we can have an amnesty as if it is not going to cost the American people. It is costing us right now. What we have done in the last 20 years to ignore this influx of illegals into our country has already caused great damage to the well-being and the standard of living of American workers at the lowest level. People say they think they are appealing to Mexican Americans by being for amnesty for illegals. The hardest-hit community in America, perhaps the hardest-hit, and certainly minority communities, including Mexican Americans, they know where their jobs are going. They know when they have a job and an illegal comes across the border from whatever country, Asia or Mexico or Honduras or Ireland or wherever they are coming from, if they are taking the job of an American, the Mexican American community is the hardest-hit. Their education funds are the hardest-hit. Their neighborhoods are the hardest-hit. That is why I believe that Americans of Mexican descent are patriots. They are part of the American family. And that is why I do not believe that they want to legalize the status of every illegal that has poured into our country. It hurts their families more than anyone. So what we need to do now is make sure that as we discuss legalizing the status of illegals, of amnesty--they don't want to call it that, they want to call it comprehensive immigration reform--that we keep in mind these things could have a dramatic, negative impact on the well- being of American people. Whose side are we on? That is what you have got to ask. What are the answers to this? Let me just say that solutions are not easy, but I would suggest there is a simple but not easy solution. We should make sure that anyone who comes here illegally does not get a job. We need to E-Verify all the jobs that are here in the United States to make sure they are not going to illegals, and they should be going to Americans or legal immigrants. And we should make sure that no illegal immigrant or the immigrant's family receives government benefits, whether it is health care or education. I don't believe in deportation, actually. I think deportation is the wrong tactic. But unless you are going to--the President, obviously, didn't fulfill his obligation for deportation, but he didn't take another step that would then deter illegal immigration. The step to do it is no deportation. It is dehumanizing. No sweeps through people's community. But don't give jobs and benefits that belong to the American people to foreigners who are here illegally. That is the solution. They will go home. They will go home in peace. They have our well wishes. But they are not going to have our jobs and our scarce resources that should be going to the American people. I would ask my colleagues, as this discussion on the legalizing of illegal immigrants takes place, that we be honest with each other, and yes, that we be compassionate, but that our compassion is aimed at the American people and legal immigrants and not just compassion for those who come here illegally. No matter how wonderful people these people are, we have to consider the American people first. Mr. Speaker, with that, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. ROHRABACHER

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word.

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Chairman, I am very happy to hear my good friend from Texas supporting the other legislation that we have that leaves it up to the States to make sure that they can declare marijuana legal or illegal. I am very happy to have you on board. I rise in strong support today, however, of the Blumenauer-Farr- Rohrabacher-Polis amendment to the MilCon-VA Appropriations bill, which would essentially remove an unreasonable barrier that prevents VA physicians from recommending that our veterans have the benefit of State medical marijuana programs. The idea that VA physicians, totally legitimate doctors who treat veterans and their illnesses, cannot recommend marijuana--or, by the way, any other drug to their patients--and to treat things especially when they are going to recommend a drug that might be used in treatment for posttraumatic stress disorder, this is extremely troubling. Our veterans have benefited from using medical cannabis to treat PTSD and other ailments, so why are we denying our veterans the ability to access something through their health care provider that is available to the general public through access to their providers? The fact that our veterans cannot receive recommendations from VA physicians means that they are forced to go outside the VA system just to get a simple recommendation on a drug. Restricting the freedom and ability of our Nation's heroes, individuals who have sacrificed so much for our freedom, to obtain medicine that their doctor believes would alleviate their problem and would be a treatment to an ailment that may be as a result of a war that we sent them off to fight, but now to deny them the right to actually have their doctor give the recommendation that he thinks would help them is just simply not right. There are numerous physicians who believe that medical marijuana can have a great impact on these patients, on these veterans, on these people who are perhaps suffering as a result of the battles that we put them through. To fence off our veterans from such benefits is simply not acceptable. I sincerely hope that all of my colleagues will stand up for patients and veterans by rejecting this heavy-handed government intervention into the doctor-patient relationship. Vote for this amendment and get out of the way of the medical judgment of VA physicians who are treating our veterans. Get out of the way. Let our VA physicians do what they believe is right for our veterans. That is what the issue is today. We are talking about medical marijuana or other treatments, and certainly, our VA physicians would know more about that and have more concern for their patients than we here in Congress and those people who set up national rules have. So let's get out of the way, make sure we give the power and empower the VA physicians to do their job. Our veterans deserve that from us. They don't deserve obstructionism between the United States Congress and the veterans' physicians. I call on my colleagues to join me in support of this amendment. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. ROHRABACHER

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Mr. Speaker, today, I rise to warn the American people that fundamental changes are being proposed in our legal system here in Washington that could have a dramatic impact on their freedom, a dramatic impact on the prosperity of this country, and a dramatic impact on the security of our country. These changes that I am talking about are not so apparent to the average person because they deal with a very complicated issue of technology and technology ownership. I have been in Congress for about 25 years--actually 26 years at the end of this year. During that time period, there has been an ongoing fight that has not been recognized by many American people. It is the fight to maintain a very strong patent system in our country. It has been ongoing because major players around the world, especially multinational corporations, have not been supportive of the idea that the American people have a right to own their own creations. In fact, our Founding Fathers felt that this was so important that we have the patent rights and copyrights for the average American person that they wrote it into our Constitution. I just happen to have a copy of the Constitution here. Article I, section 8 says one of the powers of Congress is ``to promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries.'' This is what our Founding Fathers wrote into the Constitution. This is the body of the Constitution. This is before the Declaration of Independence. Our Founding Fathers were so much in favor of this concept where people would own what they created, and that would spur the creativity and the genius of people and that would uplift all of humankind, they were so much engaged in that concept they wrote it into our Constitution and put it on par thus above the Bill of Rights in terms of speech, religion, and other rights. People like Benjamin Franklin, who is one of our great Founding Fathers, a technologist at heart, knew this is the way we would be the shining light of the world where ordinary people would be able to live well. Jefferson--go to Monticello and see--he himself was an inventor. Yes, he was the first administrator of the U.S. Patent Office. The intellectual property rights that our people have enjoyed over the years have been one of America's greatest assets. They have provided ordinary people throughout the world a chance to live decent lives, have jobs in which they can own homes, have jobs that will create wealth. It wasn't because our American people work harder. People work hard all over the world. All over the world you have people struggling and working so hard, but they don't have freedom and they don't have technology. It is the freedom to create technology and the utilization of that technology by ordinary people that expands the creation of wealth so that ordinary people can live well. Tonight, I would like to alert the American people: one of the fundamental elements laid down by our Founding Fathers that would help us create this wonderful country of freedom and prosperity for ordinary people, it is now being threatened, it is being threatened by a concerted attack by large, huge corporations, multinational corporations, who do not have loyalty to the American people at their heart. Let me note that today, after fighting this fight for 26 years, the first fight that we were in dealt with, they were going to put an amendment on the gap implementation legislation, which is a treaty laying down the rules for trade around the world. The provisions they were going to put in would have reversed the basic tenets of our patent system. That is, number one, they were going to say that if you apply for a patent, after 18 months, whether or not that patent is issued to you, it is going to be published for the whole world to see. That is what they were trying to foist on us. I called it the Steal American Technologies Act. Today, if you apply for a patent, that is top secret. In fact, if somebody in the Patent Office leaks that information they can be put in jail for a felony. But they wanted to change that because the rest of the world--Europe and Japan--has that system and they want to globalize our rights, especially our patent rights. They said they were going to eliminate it so that, after 18 months, they would just publish it. We fought that back--Marcy Kaptur, who is a Democrat, and I. On both sides of the aisle, we had people fighting this, and we beat the big guys. Unfortunately, over the years, we have had three or four of these fights. Sometimes, we have lost; and sometimes, we have won. Once again, we are talking about people who have come to the floor to reform the patent system. They always use the word ``reform'' when, in reality, they are trying to destroy the fundamentals of a strong American patent system. The last patent reform bill was the America Invents Act, which just went into effect last year. The patent lawyers and courts and innovators are still trying to figure out what the implications are of the changes that we made in the last Congress. However, we have to recognize that that bill itself was the most sweeping in changes to the American patent system in the history of our country. Now, even before we see how that is going to impact America and the American people, they are trying to shove another one through. It actually has gone through the House. Even before we are able to judge the effects of the last Congress' America Invents Act, another bill-- that is H.R. 3309, the Innovation Act--was rammed through the House last December. Its companion bill, S. 1720, the Patent Transparency and Improvements Act--all of these sound so good, don't they--right now is being considered in the United States Senate. Prudence and good judgment suggest that Congress should move forward slowly and see how at least the last bill that we put in place is working. If it is phase one, let's wait for phase two, to see how phase one is working. Perhaps we should take time to see if there are unintended consequences. By the way, there are unintended consequences, but I am here to say to the American people today that there are intended consequences to these changes. The intended consequences are to diminish the patent protection that has been afforded the American people since the founding of our country--to diminish your rights to own the technologies you have developed. It is a great threat to our people. This onslaught has been under the guise of being pro-patent and pro- inventor. They use those words over and over again when, in reality, this is cynical, and it is being proposed by huge corporations-- multinational corporations--that despise the little guy because he is demanding to be paid when his technology discoveries are being used. Instead, of course, what we have is a globalist effort to neuter the patent rights of the American people, the patent rights that we have had--the strongest patent system since our Constitution was written. In the whole world, we have the strongest patent system. This antipatent juggernaut has been organized and financed by megacompanies, by mega- multinational companies. The public and, yes, my colleagues haven't had time to fully understand the implications of this power play that has been ongoing, especially the power play that we see now on the part of the electronic industry giants like Google; yet a vote approaches in the Senate which could take us down a road which will be hostile to American innovation, a road from which we will never return. The vote in the Senate should be and must be postponed. The American people need to speak to their Senators and let them know that they expect the Senate patent bill to be postponed--maybe, perhaps, until next year--while we get a chance to look and see what is in this bill and what impact it will have on the American people. Right now, as I say, some huge corporate interests are on the verge of being given power--that is what this bill would do--to steal the creative genius and innovation of American technology entrepreneurs and inventors. What will this do to the United States? This may help those big companies for a little while, but in the long run, it will undercut the well-being, the standard of living, the prosperity that we have for average Americans here. How could this be? How could this be happening? Why would we give up our freedom and undercut our competitiveness? The big boys have set out to scare us into giving up our freedom. They have set out to create some horrible threat--the sound of which is very sinister--that will let us put restrictions on the ownership of intellectual property, which we know is America's greatest asset, yet we are going to go along with it because there is some threat to that. Twenty-five years ago, they called it the submarine patent. Oh, how horrible that was going to be, in that it was going to undercut our competitiveness. Of course, it proved to be nothing, zero. Today, the patent battle is supposedly aimed at patent trolls. This sinister sounding classification refers to scam artists who are using patent infringement claims to extort money from innocent small business men and small business owners. Yes, some of that happens in our country. Throughout our economy, you will find lawyers who are threatening lawsuits that are not substantive, but that are aimed at forcing victims to pay and face exorbitant legal fees in order to get them off their backs. Of course, that is a frivolous lawsuit. It is throughout our system, and it is something that, unfortunately, the average businessman in America and businesswoman in America has to put up with. Frivolous lawsuits have plagued every portion of our society. Every businessman, doctor, lawyer--you name it--throughout our society is affected by frivolous lawsuits, but this only focuses on, supposedly, frivolous lawsuits by inventors. How come they are being singled out? How come they have to make sure that we have to change the rules of the game, so there won't be frivolous lawsuits by inventors, as compared to all of the other frivolous lawsuits? That is because this legislation that is going through Congress treats all inventors as if they are scam artists. You see, there aren't any legitimate lawsuits by these guys against inventors. Every one of them is a scam artist. In order to get those scam artists, they have got to eliminate or dramatically reduce the ability of small inventors to protect their inventions. This bill, of course, is a reversal of the frivolous lawsuit scam. Interestingly enough, what we have here are large corporate interests that want to steal the inventions and inventiveness of our little guys by making it too expensive and complicated for them to protect their rights through our judicial process. Of course, they are not going to tell you that is their goal, but that is what it is. They are trying to shackle the little guy, so he can't protect his own rights. In the legislation making its way through Congress, the terms ``patent troll'' and ``patent assertion entity'' and ``non-practicing entity'' are all lumped together. This is the evil. This is, obviously, a semblance of a wrongdoing by someone and is certainly not a legitimate property right for these people to be bringing these suits. That is what we are being told. The legislation, however, doesn't limit just frivolous lawsuits. In fact, it doesn't limit frivolous lawsuits at all. It limits lawsuits by every inventor. It weakens the position of every inventor in relationship to a large corporation that is involved with arrogantly trying to steal that inventor's patent rights without paying the little guy. It is the little guy who created these things, and this law that we are putting through in the name of getting the patent troll basically cuts the ground out from the people who we have most to be grateful for, the inventors of this country, who have come up with the technology that has created the wealth and the freedom that we have here and the security that we have here. This battle is the ultimate David versus Goliath, and I am sorry to say that the Congress of the United States seems to be on the side of Goliath. After all of these years of fighting this battle, Marcy Kaptur and I--Democrats and Republicans on both sides of the aisle--now find with this legislation on behalf of one huge, mammoth company--the ``Goliath Google gang'' we can call them--that they have greased the skids. With the power play, of course, we have to recognize they have greased the skids. They have gotten a lot of them. They have gone way down the road on this, but they are not unstoppable, and it is not irreversible yet, but if the Senate passes the bill, that is probably the point of no return. However, we do have a chance. They have overplayed their hand, and that is often what happens when companies become too arrogant. In this case, the universities, which are not helpless and without supporters as compared to the small inventors--the little guys in their garages or the small inventors--have been put at risk by this legislation. Science and research departments of educational institutions create new things all the time. They have patents that they apply for and get all the time because they are involved almost on a full-time basis of pushing back the boundaries and the understanding of knowledge that would help us create new technologies. They deserve to reap the rewards from these discoveries. They deserve to have the benefit of patents. Our Founding Fathers knew this would be a great source of wealth for institutions that invested in creating new ideas. Yes, they have many patents that are not practiced, which means the universities just develop the new technology, but they don't practice it. They don't try to commercialize it. Guess what? That makes them patent trolls, by the definition of the legislation. According to the patent legislation, they are patent trolls. Our universities become patent trolls. In fact, if this legislation passes in the Senate and if it is enacted into law, much of the value of the patents held by America's universities will evaporate. It will be the most damaging hit ever taken by university-based science in the history of our country. Google, however, will be doing just fine. Our universities may take a big hit, but Google will be doing fine, along with these other multinational corporations. If this becomes law, small businesses will be forced to sue in order to defend their patents, and they will find that the process is more costly, more risky, less certain. Investors will stop investing in small companies, by the way. They will stop investing and trying if someone comes to them with a good idea, and they will require a greater return for their investments if someone is trying to help an innovator or a technologist develop his or her idea. Their risks will be increased, so that any investor will demand more of a return. This will destroy the small and independent inventors, but these big companies don't care. What they care about is taking anything they can get their hands on and using it without paying the inventor. In the past, we have had an effort by the corporations to eliminate what you call triple damages. Triple damages are if someone comes to them and says--or if one is informed or if it can be proven that one is aware that they are using patented technology and not paying a royalty to the inventor of that technology, they can be sued for triple damages. They tried to take this away. The reason the corporations wanted to take it away was that you could never get a lawyer to work for you on contingency if you were only going to get your equal damages paid for, but if you have got triple damages, a lawyer could be called in to help defend the little guy against the big guy. They tried their best to get this taken out. Now, why are they doing that? Why is a big corporation doing that? They are doing it because they don't want to pay that little guy. What has happened is that because they couldn't get the triple damages taken out--that is something that Marcy Kaptur and I defeated--they have found a way around it. Before, when a company was developing a new type of video screen or electronic device, if there were a new chip or something that needed to be included, there would be a patent search to go and see if they were stepping on somebody's toes. That was part of what they did. That was part of the process. It was a costly part, but it made sure that everybody's rights were protected. They didn't go forward in building something without notifying the patent owner and working out a deal with him or her. That is not the way it is anymore. These big corporations that we are talking about instruct their engineers and their scientists: don't do a patent search because, if you don't do a patent search, they can't prove that we knew that this was invented by somebody else; thus, we don't have triple damages. This is as cynical as it gets, but yet we have Members of the House who come to the floor and defend these corporate scavengers, who defend these big guys who are trying to step on little Americans. They defend them because--guess what--these are powerful players; and, yes, Google has given enormous amounts of money politically over the years in order to make sure people listen to them. I am not saying people are bought by them, but they have laid the foundation, and now, Congress is listening to them. That is why that bill passed. The American people have to counter that. We counter that by making sure our voice is heard, by making sure that the voice of the little guy is heard, by making sure that the people who believe in the Constitution of the United States, that their voices are heard over some mega-multinational corporation board members who are out wining and dining people. We can turn this around. America has proven that freedom works if the American people are willing to work at it. But we have had the fundamentals working for us. We have had a patent system and a Constitution working for us. So what we need to do, and if indeed there is a problem with trolls, let's admit to these corporations, yes, there are some frivolous lawsuits in your area of the economy. Just like in all the other areas of the economy, there are frivolous lawsuits by people who shouldn't be filing them, who are trying just to get paid off because the cost of the litigation will be so high. Okay. We admit that to them. Let's say, Let's fix that problem. Let's go and just fix the problem of frivolous lawsuits, and let's make sure that if there is a frivolous lawsuit, it is easier for people to counteract a frivolous lawsuit in the technology. If they want to do it just for technology people, fine. It hurts everybody, but we should do it for everybody. But fine, if they have got the ear of the Congress now, let's work and change that law, the laws that will then make it easier to counteract the frivolous lawsuits by these sinister people, the trolls that are aimed at putting pressure on when it really isn't legitimate. We can do that. The legislation that has passed here last year and the legislation in the Senate does just the opposite. It only focuses on all inventors, on regular people who are doing things and creating things themselves, not trolls. What it is is the old theory of how we are going to make America under different countries better. This is way back when our country was being founded we had to decide: Are we going have a system in which the government can control everybody in order to prevent the bad people from doing things or are we going to give everybody freedom and then really punish the bad people? This legislation that we have now before us and what has just passed the House and is now lingering in the Senate is an attempt to supposedly control the bad people in our country by controlling all of us, by making rules that will take away the rights of every inventor. No. No, that is not what you do. That is inconsistent with American tradition, inconsistent with our Constitution, inconsistent with what our Founding Fathers had in mind. Let's go down and say: What specifically, if you have frivolous lawsuits coming at large electronic corporations, how can we handle that without undermining the rights of those inventors who are coming up with the apps and the new creations, the three-dimensional printers and the wonderful things that we are on the verge of today? That is not going to happen unless the American people rise up. That is not going to happen unless the voice of these giants, these Goliaths of the industrial world, Google and the rest of them who are now rampaging and stepping on the rights of individual American inventors, unless we speak up, unless our voice is heard at least as loud as theirs, we are going lose our freedom. We are going to lose our edge. It has been the American technology and our inventiveness over the years that has made us a secure country. It is the technology that we have developed for our Nation's defense. You take away the patent rights of our American people, we will neuter that and we will be vulnerable, you take away the patent protections that we have had for our inventors that have come up with newer ways to compete. How can American workers compete with a world filled with cheap labor? I will tell you how we can do it. We can make sure they have the best technology and the newest ideas and are the greatest innovators, because they can outcompete people who are working just with their muscles and their sweat. We can do that, but that is not the direction our government is going in. That is not the direction our multinational corporations want us to go in. Let me alert you, we have a bill in the Senate. If it passes the Senate, it will totally undermine the little guys, the independent inventors. It will undermine the universities. It will undermine everybody but the big multinational electronics corporations. That needs to be thwarted. Something else is happening. Something again is being snuck through, just like they tried to sneak through 25 years ago in the gap implementation legislation. The gap is, again, a trade treaty we are getting into to try to do this where we would publish all of America's patent applications even before they were issued to our inventors. They tried that. The other thing they tried to do was what? Was if someone applies for a patent, that at that moment the clock starts ticking and 20 years later they have no more patent protection. Of course, until their patent is issued, they have no patent protection anyway. Quite often patents take 5 to 10 years. Plus, they are cutting in half the time the inventor has for patent protection. They are trying to push that through. We stopped that. Well, guess what? We now have several trade treaties that people are negotiating for this Congress. Look real close at what is happening. These big multinational corporations, from what I understand, are trying to put provisions into those trade treaties that will change the fundamental law of intellectual property rights here in this country. Beware. Be aware and beware of what will happen if that comes about. You put this into a treaty. It snuck through. They tried to do that in gap, and it took a Herculean effort on the part of a few of us to try to stop that 20 years ago. With that said, I would like to put into the Record, Mr. Speaker, at this point a list of those things that would be very detrimental to the small inventor that are provisions of the bill that is now in the Senate. Patent Transparency Provisions It would create a new requirement that a patent holder must, once filing a claim for infringement, provide information about all parties with an interest in the patent to the patent office, the court, and the accused infringer. This means the elimination of privacy in business dealings. The little guy is totally exposed as his friends and suppliers will be as well. The patent holder will be forced to provide a list of potential ``bank accounts to raid'' to the accused infringers. In addition, once this requirement has been invoked, the patent holder must maintain a current record of the information on file at the patent office or forfeit their rights. That means a patent holder gains a new bureaucratic reporting requirement, dramatically increasing the vulnerability of the small inventor and investors. This just because they reported an infringement of their intellectual property rights. In addition, the patent holder gains a new bureaucratic fee by being forced to pay recordkeeping fees to maintain their current record at the patent office. These are minor inconveniences to multinational corporations, but will be of killer significant burden on the little guy. Customer Stay Provisions The Patent Transparency Act also enables large multi- national corporations to create nested ``shell companies'' which have few assets, but can infringe on patents while the inventor is unable to sue their ``customers'' who are free to continue infringing the patent while the first court case moves through the system. This process could keep an infringing process in place for a decade or more while an inventor, if he has the resources, tries to stop it. Small Business Education, Outreach, and Information Access Provisions The Patent Transparency Act authorizes the patent office Director to create a ``patent troll'' database, and to create a strategy program to teach small businesses how to defend themselves from ``patent trolls.'' So we will be encouraging the Director of the patent office to create an ``enemies list'' and a strategy guide for infringers to undermine patent rights. The ultimate results of this legislation will be: increased patent infringement, reduced legal remedies for those being infringed, reduced investments in small business, and irreparable damage to our research universities, our inventors, our entrepreneurs, our economy, and our nation.