Tom Rice

Mr. RICE of South Carolina

Mr. RICE of South Carolina. Yes, sir.

Mr. RICE of South Carolina. I thank the gentleman for his remarks. Mr. Rokita, were you aware that by the year 2030, according to CBO's projections, that our spending just on Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and our interest, just those four things will take up the entire revenue of the United States Government, leaving nothing for other mandatory programs, like welfare, like unemployment, like food stamps, like all those things? It will also leave nothing for other discretionary spending like the FBI, like the Park Service, like border security, and like the CIA; but even more importantly, it will leave nothing for defense, nothing for the Army, the Navy, the Coast Guard, nothing to buy the first bullet. By 2030, just those four programs--Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and the interest on our debt--will take up every dime that the United States Government brings in if we don't change something. Now, the President's budget adds $2 trillion in taxes, but it adds even more than that in spending. What does he spend the money on? It is a lot of additional programs. He adds a little bit to defense, he adds a little bit across the board to other discretionary, but he throws in a lot of other programs--for example, his proposal to pay for community college, which is a nice idea, a wonderful idea--but the problem is that we can't pay for the promises we have made already. Mr. Speaker, shouldn't we, before we make new promises, find a way to pay for the promises that we have already made? The President's budget, in addition to more taxes, more spending, and more government programs, it is just another big growth of government, which we have seen over and over again during this administration. From Dodd-Frank to ObamaCare and other things, you have seen a huge explosion in government. Now, what has the effect of that been? The President loves to say, Mr. Speaker, that he is for the middle class, but I want to show you an interesting graph. This blue line here going down is the median household income in the United States. This is the middle class that the President is always saying he is for. You can see from 2008--when he took office--until today, that blue line has gone down 8.7 percent. Median household income in the country has dropped 8.7 percent--more government programs, bigger government, more intrusion on government in your life, more intrusion of government in our national economy--and you can see the stifling effect that it has on our economy. I think we had 2 percent growth last quarter. Here we are, 7 years after the Great Recession. We should have had a huge snapback. All we are doing is muddling along, trying to swallow this giant addition of Big Government that is being created. Middle class income is down 8.7 percent. Look at this, Mr. Speaker. This purple line here represents the consumer price index for medical care. Over that same time, it is up over 10 percent. This red line represents the consumer price index for gasoline, which is now turning down, but it is still above where the President took office. This green line is the consumer price index for food and beverages because, you see, gasoline and heating oil and electricity all go into the cost of food. You have to fertilize it, you have to prepare the seed, you have to transport it. All those things go into the cost of food. So, you see, food has gone up 20 percent, gasoline has gone up 10 percent, health care has gone up 15 percent--all these additional costs on the middle class. At the same time, the median household income has dropped by 8.7 percent. When the President gets up and talks about how the stock market is doing and how the economy has recovered, I can tell you, Mr. Speaker, you can look at this chart and very easily see why the average middle class family doesn't feel it. They don't agree with it. The President's proposed budget, by adding more taxes and more government programs, will do nothing but exacerbate this problem, the middle class squeeze. We are going to squeeze the middle class until there is nothing left. I cringe when the President says he is for the middle class. Don't listen to what he says; look at what he is doing. Mr. Speaker, I believe in the House Budget Committee's budget that balances in 10 years, that makes responsible adjustments to our social safety net, that makes responsible adjustments to our discretionary programs, and that brings our budget into balance in 10 years. When I came to Congress, I thought our debt was the biggest problem we faced. I no longer believe that. I know we can handle it. I have been through the budget committee. All we have to do is start now to make responsible adjustments. The longer we wait, the more difficult it becomes. My tenure in Congress is and will continue to be focused on American competitiveness. I think we have given away a lot of our competitive edge to the rest of the world. I think, if we decide we want to compete, that nobody can stop us. The only people stopping us is us. We have tied a noose of tax and regulation around our own neck, and we are running our businesses and our jobs overseas. That is my focus. We cannot fix this problem with our budget unless we have growth, and the way to increase growth is to increase our competitive status in the world. This is a list of things created by a Harvard economist and a good friend named Michael Porter. He has been to Congress more than once. He has talked to over 100 Congressmen about how to make this country more competitive. These are eight items. One of them is--in fact, the most important one is to create a sustainable Federal budget because you see, my friends, without a sustainable budget--now, you remember, the Office of Management and Budget that works for the White House says we are on an unsustainable course. Congressional Budget Office, we are on an unsustainable course. Step number one to make this country competitive and to bring jobs back to this country: create a responsible Federal budget. I submit to you, Mr. Speaker, that the President's budget fails miserably in that regard. Just as his policies are failing the middle class miserably, this budget will make us less competitive in the world. Second, it says simplify the corporate Tax Code. Simplify and streamline regulation. The House budget assumes many of these things that make this country more competitive in adopting its budget.

Mr. RICE of South Carolina. I yield to the gentleman from Indiana.

Mr. RICE of South Carolina. Not what he says.

Mr. RICE of South Carolina. In closing, my friend, I just wanted to point out what the House Budget Committee does to bring the budget within balance within 10 years, and it is not all this but three major things. One, it repeals ObamaCare, which costs $2.1 trillion over the next 10 years. Two, it initiates what is called premium support for Medicare, what you are just talking about, and it doesn't do away with Medicare, and it doesn't affect anybody who is either retired or retiring within 8 years. What it does for people that are outside that window, Medicare is still offered, and they will allow four other insurance companies to bid for Medicare coverage. The government won't pay for the cheapest; it will pay for the second cheapest. If you want to buy a cheaper policy, you can, but it brings private industry in it. If you want to buy a cheaper policy, you can, and you will get money. If you want to buy a more expensive policy, you can, and you will have to pay a little bit more for it. That is a huge savings in Medicare and something that we have to do. So premium support for Medicare, repeal ObamaCare, and, third, it doesn't cut discretionary spending, defense and nondefense, but it slows the growth a little. Those three things go 80 percent of the way to bringing our budget within balance within 10 years. Let me tell you, my friends, we don't have a choice. We are piling debt on our children and grandchildren. CBO, OMB, they will all tell you, Social Security trust fund, it will be broke in 2030 or thereabouts. Medicare trust fund will be broke in 2030 or thereabouts. You know the problem with Federal trust funds? They are not funded, and you can't trust them. Other than that, they are great. Mr. Rokita, I appreciate you allowing me to participate in this.

Mr. RICE of South Carolina

Mr. RICE of South Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I am here to talk about a roadmap for prosperity of this country. I think the elections last week, in large part, didn't deal as much with Republicans and Democrats as it dealt with a frustration over the lagging lack of prosperity this country has experienced for the last 7 years. I think that there are ways to solve that, that are complicated, but there is a pathway that we can pursue that involves a lot of common sense. If you will look at these charts that I have here, Mr. Speaker, what I have here with this blue line that goes up until 2007 and trends down thereafter is median household income. You can see, Mr. Speaker, it drops from a peak of $56,000 annually in 2007 down to just over $51,000 today, a drop of over 10 percent for the median American family. Mr. Speaker, at the same time, this red line represents the cost that these families incur. The red line actually is food cost. You can see that they have risen from an inflation-adjusted basis of 190 to 240, almost 20 percent, Mr. Speaker. At the same time their incomes have declined over 10 percent, their costs for food have gone up over 20 percent. Then the bottom graph here represents their cost for fuel and utilities, and you can see here that they have risen almost 20 percent as well. My belief, Mr. Speaker, is that the cause of the decline in the income, as well as the cause of the rise in the cost in fuels and food, is largely from policies that come out of Washington. These are not things that are beyond repair. These are things that we can fix, so what we have to do is lay out a roadmap, a plan, to restore the prosperity that we have enjoyed for over 200 years. Mr. Speaker, before I forget, I want to credit my good friend, Professor Michael Porter from Harvard, with a lot of these slides that I am using because I am stealing a lot of those from him, but this chart here, Mr. Speaker, is a breakdown of jobs in the American economy. The red at the bottom is jobs that we have to compete with, with the rest of the world, manufacturing jobs, for example, that can be done anywhere in the world. The top part is jobs that serve local markets, things like health care that have to be delivered here, things like services, like, for example, real estate or tourism services, things that have to be delivered here. This chart begins at 1998, but you can actually go back even further, and what you would see is in the area of service jobs, things that have to be handled locally, the number of jobs has risen. It certainly dipped around 2007, but it is coming back up. But in the areas of what we call tradeable jobs, jobs that can be done anywhere in the world, the number of Americans working in those jobs has declined in this chart over the last 16 years, but you could go back even further, a very disturbing trend. Now, why is that occurring? Why is it that tradeable jobs have left our shores and continue to leave our shores? Mr. Speaker, why is it that we continue to read in the newspapers every month about another American iconic company like Pfizer or like Burger King moving their headquarters out of our country? Well, there are a number of reasons for that, and the most obvious reason is because we have the highest corporate tax rate in the world. If they want to be an American company, they have to pay extra for that. This chart at the top represents the corporate tax rates of the OECD countries, and you can see the red line at the end represents America. The average rate is 25\1/2\ percent, and we are at 39 percent. When the President says things, Mr. Speaker, like, ``Our American companies should be willing to pay the highest tax rate in the world to be patriotic,'' he is missing some real important points. One is that any company, American or otherwise, doing business in America will pay American tax rates on the profits they earn in our country, but these iconic American companies that are leaving our shores have to compete worldwide, and competition is tooth and nail, and only the strongest competitor will survive. Mr. Speaker, if you have an iconic American company that has to pay taxes at 39 percent here in this country competing on the same product line with a company that has to pay 15 percent in Ireland or in Canada, in the end, which company will survive? You see, Mr. Speaker, it is not about patriotism. That is nonsense. It is about survival. Mr. Speaker, how do we end this cycle? How do we convince our iconic American companies, our large employers, to stay in this country and to convince those that have left our country to come back? Before I came here, I had one other elected office. I was a tax attorney and a CPA for 25 years, and I helped companies structure their business in the smartest way for taxes, for regulatory purposes, and to make a profit. Once I retired from that, I ran for one other office, and that was as the chairman of Horry County Council in Horry County, South Carolina, where Myrtle Beach is. Horry County had a problem because most all of its job creation was in the tourism industry, and the tourism industry is great, but it produces an inordinate amount of seasonal jobs and jobs with relatively low pay. They needed to diversify their industry, and many other counties in the State were doing a better job of it. Once I became chairman of the county council, I started to look at why that was and what we needed to do, and it was obvious that we had many, many assets. The problem was we weren't even in the game. We weren't even trying to compete. Once we laid out a roadmap to enter the competition to attract industry and jobs, it didn't take very long. Companies responded quickly. Thousands of jobs had been created. All we had to do was enter the competition. Counties across this country compete with other counties for jobs. States across this country compete with other States for jobs, States like Texas, which has done a fantastic job. South Carolina has done a fantastic job of creating a favorable business tax environment, favorable regulatory environment, and has done tort reform, and lo and behold, companies come. Company after company after company leave States like California or Washington State and come to States like Texas or South Carolina, and you can see the result in South Carolina with BMW, Amazon, Boeing, Michelin, Continental, and on and on and on. All they had to do was decide to compete, and industry responded. You see, before I became chairman of the county council in Horry County, the attitude there was that we were the leader in tourism, and they are great at tourism. We are big, and we have a lot of advantages, and we really don't need to compete for business. But guess what, it wasn't working. Once we changed our attitude, people responded quickly, and I believe the attitude here in Washington is the same. Look, we are big. We don't have the biggest economy in the world anymore. China overtook us. We have one of the biggest economies in the world. We have great capital markets. We have great consumer markets. We don't have to try to compete. Business is going to come anyway. But guess what, just like in Horry County, it is not working in the country either, and if we simply decide to compete for industry, with all of the advantages that we have, I believe no one can stop us. My friend Michael Porter is, as I said, an economics professor at Harvard Business School. He has been there for decades. He has written multiple books on competitive theory. He has come here to Congress with me, and we scheduled seminars with Congressmen from both sides of the aisle to talk about what this country needs to do to be competitive. We have been in front of over 100 Congressmen, and this is the roadmap that he lays out. I am not going to claim authorship. This is the roadmap that he lays out. His book is, ``On Competition,'' by Michael Porter. It is one of many. Michael Porter sits on the board of public companies. He represents countries around the world. He has written this roadmap for the United States. If we will adopt the attitude that we are going to be competitive in the world, we can expect to see American companies coming back, more foreign investment in the United States, and millions and millions of American jobs created and our economy lifted from its meager growth to above trend and restore our American prosperity. Mr. Speaker, let's look at these things one by one. One of them is lowering the corporate tax rate, and as I pointed out earlier, this one is common sense. We have the highest corporate tax rate in the world. Does that mean that we have to collect less revenue? No. Our corporate Tax Code is incredibly complex. It is filled with deductions and credits, many of which make sense but others that don't. It needs to be cleaned up. Dave Camp and the House Ways and Means Committee put out a proposal to do it last year. I agree with, by far, the bulk of it. The House needs to take it up-- or something like it--and we need to get it over to the Senate, and we need to get corporate tax reform. The President agrees we need corporate tax reform, but the President thinks we need to raise revenue. The goal here, Mr. Speaker, is not to increase taxes. The goal here is to make our country more competitive. Why? Because then we will have more business and we will have more jobs and we will raise revenue that way, rather than by raising taxes. If we boost our economy, the revenue will come. The second item on this menu, Mr. Speaker, is taxing overseas profits earned by American companies only where they are earned. We are the only remaining OECD country with a global tax system. Everywhere else, they pay taxes where they earned the money, and they can bring the money home without paying taxes. But here in America, our multinational companies--companies like GE, GM, and every alphabet soup company that you can name--if they earn profits overseas and they pay taxes at the lower rate over there, they know if they ever bring that money back to the United States, they have to pay it at 39 percent. So what do they do? They park that money overseas. It is only common sense. They are competing tooth and nail worldwide. To make any other choice puts them at a huge disadvantage. So let's say we have an American company that has a billion dollars in profits in India and they need to build a factory and are looking for where to build that billion dollar factory. Do you think they are going to bring that money back and pay 40 percent taxes in the United States to build that factory? No. What they are going to do is build that factory in India and employ a thousand people there instead of employing a thousand Americans, so we need to change our global tax system. We need to ease the immigration of highly-skilled immigrants. Mr. Speaker, I am for comprehensive immigration reform, but I am not for the kind of immigration reform the President is talking about. Mr. Speaker, we have the most liberal legal immigration system in the world. We allow 1.2 million legal immigrants every year. The problem with our system is that most every OECD country that has looked at this has decided they are going to use immigration as a mechanism to be more competitive. Other countries are already working on this. So what they do is they say, ``Okay. You can immigrate into our country if you have a skill that we need. They allow people with high skill sets and high education to come to the front of the line to immigrate.'' Our immigration system is exactly the reverse. It is completely counterintuitive. Sixty-five percent of the immigration that we allow is not based on skill set but based on family relationship. Only 12 percent of our immigration is based on skill set, and what is the result? The result of that, as I have read, is that as many as 42 percent of the new applications for Medicaid come from immigrants. At a disproportionately large amount, legal immigrants rely on our social safety net, and that makes us less rather than more competitive. We need comprehensive immigration reform, but what that means to me is that we need to base our immigration largely on skill set. I am not saying eliminate immigration based on family relationship, but I am saying make that a much smaller piece of the pie. Another problem with our immigration system is with our student visa program. We have the best universities in the world. People come from all over. In fact, I think I read yesterday that there were a record number of foreign students in American universities. So the problem is when they get their degree and after their student visa expires, under our immigration system, we require that they go back to their home country. We prevent them from staying here. They have to go back to their home country for a period of years before they can even apply to come back to the United States. We have given them the best education in the world, and we force them out of this country. So what does that mean, practically? Let's say we have a gentleman from China who gets an engineering degree from MIT and has the best idea in the world to manufacture whatever it might be, but he can't stay here and do that. He can't even apply. He has to go back home and do his initial public offering and build his plant there and employ thousands of people there, rather than using the education that our American universities gave him to create thousands of jobs here in this country. There are so many things about our immigration system and there are so many things about so many areas of Federal law that are clearly counterintuitive. They are exactly the opposite of what they need to be to make this country competitive. Next, we have addressing distortions and abuses in our trading system. I am not going to spend a whole lot of time on this, but let me just say that, at one time, we were so advanced, we were so competitive, we were so much far ahead of the rest of the world, that we could adopt trading plans that weren't necessarily to our benefit. We can't afford to do that anymore. We need to have free trade. We need to have fair trade. Improving American logistics, communications and energy infrastructure. Everybody knows we need infrastructure to be competitive. We do so many things to hold ourselves up: roads, bridges, pipelines, and everything else. Federal regulation drags out projects for not just years--decades--and drives up cost. When the Port of Miami has been working on trying to get their environmental permit to deepen their port to 50 feet for post-Panamax ships for over a decade; when the Port of Charleston, in my home State of South Carolina, has been under study for 4 years to determine whether they can go from 46 feet to 52 feet so that they can take these post-Panama Canal ships, and they are hoping that they get that port deepened by the year 2020, in the end everybody knows that port is going to get done. In the end, there will be little or no environmental damage, and what there is will be mitigated, but it is going to take a decade of wrangling to get to where we can deepen our port. Let me tell you how important that is. Right now, I think one in five families' incomes in South Carolina are related to the use of that port. Companies in South Carolina, shipping or importing or exporting, it takes $3,000 to ship a container from the Port of Charleston to Shanghai on ships as they exist today. When the Panama Canal opens and the new ships come through, that will drop the cost of transportation by 20 to 30 percent. So instead of it costing $3,000 to ship a container from Charleston to Shanghai, it will cost $2,200. If an importer or exporter in South Carolina or in the Southeast doesn't have access to one of those ports, they start out $800 per container behind the rest of the world. So there are only two of those ports that can take these ships right now on the east coast: Norfolk and Baltimore. If a manufacturer or an importer or an exporter is looking to where they are going to locate their business, do you think they are going to locate in a place that they are going to start out $800 per container behind the rest of the world? And it is going to take us till 2020 to get approvals to get this port deepened? So many of these environmental rules are just mechanisms to delay progress. In the end, we know this port is going to get done. Let's get busy and dig this port, and then we can talk about what we need to do to mitigate. But why are we going to hold it up for a decade and put my home State and this country at another competitive disadvantage? We need to work on infrastructure. We need to find a way to get the highway trust fund funded. We need to eliminate a lot of the uncertainty. So many of these problems that are listed here, because they haven't been solved, they create so much uncertainty in the economy. It makes it very difficult for businesses to invest. The Federal Government is an incredibly complex organization, yet it hasn't had a budget in 5 years until last year--not even a budget, not even for a year. Any complex organization, to make rational decisions, has to have long-term planning, and we can't even do a budget for a year. We continually kick the can down the road, things likes the highway trust fund, things like the SGR, the doc fix. The Federal Government has got to resolve these things, remove these uncertainties so that people know how to plan and invest. I skipped over one here: responsible development of our oil and gas reserves. The administration has thrown up every roadblock that you could throw up to development of our reserves. We have had the largest oil and gas boom in history in the last 6 years. Eight years ago, when President Bush was in, they were talking about something called peak oil theory, where they said we had already discovered all of the recoverable oil and it was going to get lower and lower, and it was going to be harder and harder to recover and that we were at our finite limits. That shows you how wrong science can be, because in the last 5 years we have had the largest oil boom in history right here in the United States. Yet, at the same time, the day that President Obama was sworn in, gas was $1.80 a gallon. Google it. It went up as high as $3.75 a gallon just a few months ago, and it has been gradually backing down because, despite all of the roadblocks and all of the burdens that we have placed on developing this oil, private industry is figuring out how to get it done. We won't let them build pipelines, so they put it on rail. We try to regulate them out of the rail business, and they figure out a way around that. The administration is using executive orders to broaden the clean air rules and the Clean Water Act to do everything they can to prevent the development of these oil and gas reserves, and the result of that is that the price of fuel is artificially high because they want us off of these fossil fuels and they want us on alternative energy. You know what? So do I. But I want it when the technology can deliver it at a competitive price. I don't want to artificially inflate the cost of fossil fuels simply to force us on to alternative energy, because, you see, cheap, reliable energy is another factor that makes us competitive. How does it make us competitive? Well, number one, it lowers the cost of a company doing business in the United States if they have cheap, reliable energy. That is obvious. But another problem is we do have the largest consumer market in the world. Two-thirds of our economy is based on consumer spending. And when you have declining income, what does that do to consumer spending? Obviously, it goes down. When you have increasing expenses for fuel and home utilities, with the war on coal, that affects the cost of food, so all these things rise. That takes money out of the consumers' pockets when they already have declining income. What do you think that does to our economy? What do you think that does to our competitiveness? So we need low-cost energy because, A, it makes it cheaper for companies to do business here and will bring jobs here, but it also puts more money in consumers' pockets. When the President was first elected, he said we need a stimulus program, and he put in something called a payroll tax holiday that gave everybody, the average working man, $90 a month more in his pocket. But at the same time, with his policies for energy, with the war on coal taking our coal plants offline, that increases the cost to the average consumer by about $40 per household a month. If putting $90 a month in his pocket is stimulus, what does taking $40 a month out of his pocket do? That is ``de-stimulus.'' Then when his policies forced up the price of gasoline from a $1.80 a gallon--it was $3.80 a gallon; now it is $2.80 or $3--every dollar a gallon costs the average consumer another $90 a month. Now the payroll tax holiday is gone. Instead of putting $90 a month in the consumers' pocket to stimulate the economy, we are taking $200 a month out of their pocket. What does that do to the economy? This one is a no-brainer. We need to do everything we can to responsibly develop our fuel reserves; and we need low-cost, reliable energy in this country to, A, encourage companies to come here for the low energy cost and, B, to put more money in consumers' pockets to stimulate our economy. The last thing on this list is create a sustainable Federal budget, including entitlement reform. I will run through this, but I am about out of time. Entitlements are on a collision course with bankruptcy. Nobody who understands it will argue that point. These things have got to be done. They create so much uncertainty. They create instability in our economy, and they are nothing but future taxes. The House Budget Committee, of which I am a member, has put out a budget that would balance in 10 years. For the last 2 years in a row that I have been in the Congress, and I believe 2 years before that, they have not even been taken up by the Senate. We need to put our budget on a path to balancing. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office agrees and says that where we are is unsustainable. Mr. Speaker, thank you for your patience with me. Thank you for allowing me to lay out my road map. I hope that the Republicans and the Democrats and everybody will consider this as a pathway to a prosperous future. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. RICE of South Carolina

Mr. RICE of South Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

Mr. RICE of South Carolina

Mr. RICE of South Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I submit the following proclamation: Whereas: It is the privilege and duty of the American people to commemorate the two hundred twenty-sixth anniversary of the drafting of the Constitution of the United States of America with appropriate ceremonies and activities; and Whereas: Public Law 915 guarantees the issuing of a proclamation each year by the President of the United States of America designating September 17 through 23 as Constitution Week; now, therefore I, Tom Rice by virtue of the authority vested in me as Representative of the 7th Congressional District of the State of South Carolina do hereby recognize the week of September 17 through 23 as Constitution Week and urge all citizens to study the Constitution and reflect on the privilege of being an American with all the rights and responsibilities which that privilege involves.

Mr. RICE of South Carolina

Mr. RICE of South Carolina. Mr. Speaker, counties and States around this country compete every day for jobs. How they do it is not complicated. They adjust their tax and their regulatory burdens to attract businesses, and those that do the best job attract the most jobs. The problem is that they are competing for a declining pool of jobs in America because Washington is not competitive. We need to adopt that competitive attitude right here. In times of war, we forget partisanship and pull together. In truth, we are in an economic war. Countries around the world have teams of people that work every day to beat us economically. The House has passed 39 jobs bills in this Congress which are gathering dust in the Senate. Surely Harry Reid and the President can find one among these 39 bills they can work with to make our country more competitive and put our people back to work.

Mr. RICE of South Carolina

Mr. RICE of South Carolina. I thank the gentleman for yielding. Mr. Speaker, the only people I hear talking about impeachment in this Chamber are the Democrats. The Democrats must want the President impeached as far as I can tell. My favorite piece of art in this Capitol Building is a picture in the rotunda of a group of our forefathers, who gathered together because they could no longer bear living under a monarchy, and they decided that they would fight for freedom. They signed the Declaration of Independence, knowing full well that they were signing their own death warrants if they were caught and tried for treason. Our forefathers fought a Revolution against the greatest military power on Earth in order to escape the bonds of a monarchy. At the end of the bloody Revolution, the last thing they wanted was another king. They wanted freedom. To protect that precious freedom, they designed a government where power rested with the people based on the separation of powers. The legislative branch makes the laws. The President enforces the laws. President Obama has decided that he cannot be bothered with the separation of powers. He has bragged that, if Congress will not accept his priorities, he has a pen and a phone, and he will make the law. He may have a pen, but the people have the Constitution. Our forefathers recognized that one man who can both make the law and enforce the law is not a President--he is a king. Thomas Jefferson once said that freedom does not disappear all at once; it is eroded imperceptibly day by day. The prosperity of our great country sprang from our freedom. Our form of government, set forth in the Constitution by our forefathers, has protected that very fragile freedom for 200 years. My friends across the aisle worry about the price of a lawsuit to protect our freedom. Our forefathers paid dearly for that freedom. Many paid everything. Our freedom is in peril. We cannot stand by and watch the President shred our Constitution. I stand in support of House Resolution 676.

Mr. RICE of South Carolina

Mr. RICE of South Carolina. Mr. Speaker, my favorite piece of art in this Capitol is a picture in the rotunda of our Founding Fathers gathered together to sign the Declaration of Independence, a document that they knew, when they signed it, they were signing their own death warrant if they were caught and tried for treason. They felt that strongly that they wanted to escape the bonds of a monarch and pursue freedom. Our forefathers fought a Revolution against the greatest military power on Earth to escape the bonds of a monarchy. At the end of that bloody Revolution, the last thing they wanted was another king. They wanted freedom. To protect that precious freedom, they designed a government of, by, and for the people based on a separation of powers. The legislative branch makes the laws; the executive branch enforces laws. President Obama has decided that he is not bound by the separation of powers. He has bragged that if Congress will not accept his priorities, he has a pen and a phone, and he will make the laws himself. He may have a pen, but the people have the Constitution left us by our forefathers. Our forefathers recognized that one man who can both make the laws and enforce the laws is a king, not a President. Thomas Jefferson once said that freedom does not disappear all at once, but is eroded imperceptibly day by day. The prosperity of our great country sprang from our freedom. Our form of government set forth in the Constitution by our forefathers has protected that very fragile freedom for 200 years. Mr. Speaker, my friends across the aisle worry about the price of a lawsuit to protect our freedom. Our forefathers paid dearly for that freedom. Many gave all they had, even their lives. Our freedom is in peril, my friends. We cannot stand by and watch the President shred our Constitution. I stand in support of H. Res. 676.

Mr. RICE of South Carolina

Mr. RICE of South Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize a young lady in my district, Miss Isabella Hixenbaugh of Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. Isabella is an eighth-grader at Forestbrook Middle School and was officially recognized in Washington, DC, this week as one of South Carolina's top two youth volunteers. Isabella selflessly devotes her free time to helping others in need by volunteering at a therapeutic riding foundation, Fidelis Foundation. There she assists in the emotional healing of abused, neglected, and traumatized children by teaching them how to ride horses and care for the animals. Isabella has been volunteering at Fidelis Foundation since its founding in 2010, and enjoys helping others find comfort in one of her favorite pastimes. When not teaching children how to ride or leading an arts and Crafts project at the barn, Isabella participates in horse shows to raise money for the Fidelis Foundation. Mr. Speaker, young people, like Isabella, inspire and encourage so many. It is important that we recognize their leadership and service in our communities. On behalf of South Carolina's Seventh District, congratulations Isabella and thank you for your volunteer service.

Mr. RICE of South Carolina

Mr. RICE of South Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize one of our nation's finest teachers, Mrs. Jennifer Ainsworth of Horry County, South Carolina. Mrs. Ainsworth was recently named South Carolina's 2014-2015 Teacher of the Year for her exemplary work at Socastee High School, where she teaches and mentors mild to moderate special needs students. Drawing from the inspiration of her late-mother, grandmother, and late- class assistant, Mrs. Ainsworth prepares her students for their future by teaching them life and work skills so they can be productive citizens. Mrs. Ainsworth attributes her success to unconditional love, hard work, and her dedication to making a difference in her students' lives. Too often, people focus on the broken portions of our education system. We must recognize and celebrate our educators that go above- and-beyond their job duties, like Mrs. Ainsworth. Our nation's teachers, especially our special education teachers, dedicate their lives to enriching the lives of our children. Mr. Speaker, I applaud Mrs. Ainsworth, and all of our country's educators, for their selfless commitment to our country's future.

Mr. RICE of South Carolina

Mr. RICE of South Carolina. Mr. Chairman, the Congressional Progressive Caucus' Better Off Budget is really a bigger government budget. The Progressive Caucus substitute increases total spending relative to the Republican budget by $8.4 trillion over the next 10 years. American families, and particularly our children and our grandchildren, cannot afford this next year, and absolutely not for the next 10 years. This bigger government budget creates new taxes, more regulation, duplicative Federal programs, and will stifle progress across the board. People, this is not complicated. We need a budget that will grow our economy. Higher taxes, higher deficits, and bigger regulation will never grow the economy. If we put folks back to work, we solve a lot of problems. We solve unemployment problems, deficit problems, poverty problems, income inequality problems, crime problems, drug problems, and problems across the board. The number one issue in my district, and I believe the number one issue in this Nation, is jobs. Five years after the Great Recession, the economy continues to struggle, and far too many Americans remain out of work. Mr. Obama's Big Government economy has failed. We can solve this problem. It is not rocket science. We can build our economy and put hardworking Americans back to work if only we will take a few steps to make America more competitive. Just like counties across the country compete for jobs, just like States lower tax rates and streamline regulations to attract industry and jobs--and you can look at States and see what they are doing and how they are successful--we must adopt an attitude here in Washington that we will compete in the world if we expect to stop sending our jobs overseas and bring American jobs back home. If we retain the world's highest corporate tax rate, how can we expect to compete in the world? If Washington continues to spend more than we take in, threatening our entire economy, how can we expect to compete in the world? If we continue to build upon our already oppressive regulatory burden, how can we expect to compete in the world? This is where I believe my friends across the aisle miss the mark. They seem to believe and preach that somehow making this country competitive benefits only the wealthy. But the truth is that people with high assets and high skills do well in a global environment. They can compete from anywhere.

Mr. RICE of South Carolina. But the longer we wait to enter the global competition for jobs, the more we damage the hardworking folks in the middle class. We will not grow our economy or put people back to work by expanding entitlements. We will never solve the problems of poverty and inequality through bigger government. If America will enter the global competition for jobs, our economy will accelerate and the sky is the limit. This is not a Republican issue. This is not a Democrat issue. This is an American issue. We are so blessed that if we simply decide to compete, no one can stop us.

Mr. RICE of South Carolina

Mr. RICE of South Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and to include extraneous materials on the topic of my Special Order.

Mr. RICE of South Carolina. Mr. Speaker, back last summer when the President unilaterally announced that he was going to not enforce the employer mandate under the Affordable Care Act, I was quite surprised because the next day there was a news article in The New York Times about it. Democratic Senator Tom Harkin was quoted in the article. He was one of the architects of the Affordable Care Act. He said, speaking of the President: This was the law. How can he do that? How can the President simply unilaterally choose to ignore the law? Our Founders, Mr. Speaker, designed a system of government based upon a separation of powers. The legislative branch enacts the laws and the executive branch, the President, enforces those laws. They did that to protect our very, very fragile freedom. We cannot allow those separations to be eroded. One man who can both make the laws and enforce the laws is more a monarch than a President. Article II, section 3 of the Constitution requires, in part, that the President take care to faithfully execute the Nation's laws. In 1792, when George Washington was faced with enforcing an unpopular whiskey tax, he wrote in a letter that: It is my duty to see that these laws are executed. To permit them to be trampled upon with impunity would be repugnant to that duty. President Obama, on the other hand, has, throughout his administration, picked and chosen which laws or parts thereof he wishes to enforce. House Resolution 442 would require the House of Representatives to institute a lawsuit against the President to comply with this article II, section 3 of the Constitution. It lists four specific examples where the President has either failed to enforce the laws or has gone beyond the laws as written: One is the 1-year delay in the employer mandate under ObamaCare, which I mentioned earlier; Another is the 1-year extension of the substandard insurance policies, which by my definition is any insurance policy anybody would really want to buy; One is the waiving of the work requirements under the welfare laws; and One is the granting of deferred removal action to illegal aliens. Again, one man empowered to both enact the laws and enforce the laws is more a monarch than a President. This is not a Republican issue. This is not a Democrat issue. It is not a Tea Party action. This is not for messaging. H.R. 442 merely recognizes that no American, including the President, is above the law. What would we say if the next President came in and said, I don't like the Affordable Care Act and, therefore, I am not going to enforce the individual mandate, which would gut the law? What would we say if President Obama or any other President said, I think the top income tax rate is too high and, therefore, I am not going to enforce it, or I am not going to enforce the lowest income tax rate? What is the difference between those situations and what President Obama is doing right now not enforcing the employer mandate under ObamaCare? After all, the Supreme Court has ruled that the penalties under ObamaCare are a tax. What would we say if a President said, I am not going to enforce this tax against my friends but I will against my enemies, or I am not going to enforce it against my contributors but I will against everybody else? What is the difference between that situation and what the President has done granting 1,300 unilateral exemptions to different groups under the Affordable Care Act? If the President is allowed to make the law or to ignore those laws passed by Congress, Congress can just go home; there is no need for the legislative branch. In fact, when Congress, following the President's lead, when the House of Representatives passed a bill that would delay the employer mandate for a year, which the President had already announced he was going to do unilaterally, the President threatened to veto it. At this time, I yield to Representative Martha Roby from Alabama.

Mr. RICE of South Carolina. Thank you, Mrs. Roby. I yield to my friend and colleague from Utah (Mr. Stewart).

Mr. RICE of South Carolina. Thank you, Mr. Stewart. I yield to my friend from Georgia (Mr. Woodall).

Mr. RICE of South Carolina. As you said, Representative Woodall, I am an American first and a Republican second, and if the President usurps the Constitution, I will call him to task.

Mr. RICE of South Carolina. Representative Woodall, that is exactly what this resolution is intended to do. It is intended for Congress to take action to enforce the Constitution. Representative Woodall, do you hear from your constituents back home when you speak to them that the President is breaking the law, and why don't you do something about that? I do all the time. I think that is a result of the erosion of Congress' power--exactly what you are talking about.

Mr. RICE of South Carolina. Thank you, my friend. I yield to my friend from Florida (Mr. Yoho).

Mr. RICE of South Carolina. Thank you, Mr. Yoho. I yield to my friend from Florida (Mr. DeSantis).

Mr. RICE of South Carolina. I thank my friend from Florida. Separation of powers is fundamental to our form of government. The Congress enacts laws. The President enforces the laws. One individual who can both make the law and enforce it is more a monarch than a President. Without the separation of powers, our form of government crumbles. As earlier speakers said, the erosion of the separation of powers didn't start with President Obama, but it has certainly accelerated. At home I am asked all the time, The President is breaking the law; why don't you do something about it? This resolution is an attempt to do exactly that. Nobody would argue that the President has no discretion in enforcing the law. Clearly, he does. But in these four instances, he has clearly overstepped that discretion. I fall back to say, what would we say if the President has the power to waive these things, the employer mandate, the penalty under the employer mandate, that is a waiver of a tax? What would we say if the next President waived the capital gains tax, or waived the maximum bracket under the income tax, or waived the income tax for his friends? Clearly, that is beyond the discretion of the President. Clearly, President Obama has gone beyond his discretion, and Congress needs to enforce the Constitution. We have 44 cosponsors to our bill so far, but we need the help of the American people. We need you to talk to your Representatives. If you need more information about our resolution or what you can do, please go to my Web site at www.rice.house.gov. Thank you for your concern. Thank you for viewing. Let's protect our democracy. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. RICE of South Carolina

Mr. RICE of South Carolina. Mr. Speaker, it is with much sadness that I rise today to commemorate Florence County Deputy Joseph Antwine. Last week, the Florence County Sheriff's Department and South Carolina's Seventh District lost a young and upcoming deputy in the line of duty. Joseph Antwine of Lake City, South Carolina, was responding to a fellow deputy's call for immediate assistance when his car crashed. A recent Citadel graduate, Deputy Antwine earned his degree in criminal justice. At the Citadel, his leadership and loyal service to the Corps of Cadets was recognized when he was presented with the Col. Joseph E. Perkins Honor Committee Award. Deputy Antwine was a dependable young man, dedicated to his work and protecting our community. Even at his young age, he has been a role model to many and a model of public service. My thoughts and prayers go out to his family and friends and the Florence County Sheriff's Department.