Chip Roy

Mr. ROY

Mr. ROY. Madam Chair, I would only respond to the gentlewoman from Florida when she said it only applies to healthcare personnel. I just rattled off an entire list of virtually every known possible human being and job that could apply at the VA, and a whole lot of them aren't, in fact, healthcare personnel. I went through an entire list, including laundry, security, maintenance, engineering and facilities management, administrative, billing, even volunteers. Instead, some of my colleagues have said, this doesn't apply to the VA. Like I said, we reached out to the VA and, sure enough, they replied today, yes, the vaccine mandate still applies. Nevertheless, we get rid of the Medicaid. We get rid of the Medicare mandates. The private sector is out there. They can do what they want to do. The vaccine mandate has come and gone in terms of something that the American people believe we should tolerate. They want to be able to move about without having the fear of losing their job, and we have people at the VA losing their job. We have nurses that have given up their ability to practice. We have got it throughout our entire--we have members of our military that have been held up from being promoted and being able to advance. We have people at the VA. I have met with people who worked at the VA, some of whom who were facing losing their job. This should end. This madness should end. That is what this amendment would do. It would ensure that no funding goes to continuing and perpetuating that mandate. Madam Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. ROY. Madam Chair, I have an amendment that prohibits any of the MILCON-VA funding appropriated from being used to modify or remove any VA display of the original mission statement. Now, just a quick second before I go there. I didn't reserve my time because I thought we were trying to move things along. I am going to say, as a cancer survivor, as someone who did have chemo, and as someone who was on Neulasta to deal with a weakened immune system, I was in a hospital, and I wasn't being forced to wear masks and wasn't being forced to take any shots. If I wanted to take the flu shot, I could. We have a CDC Director who said that this vaccine doesn't do anything to help the spread from other people to you. That is the whole point. We should get rid of the vaccine mandates, but on another note of craziness from this administration, on March 16, 2023, earlier this year, the VA announced it updated the 1959 mission statement from: ``To fulfill President Lincoln's promise: `To care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan' by serving and honoring the men and women who are America's veterans.'' Now, it is a gender-neutral version: ``To fulfill President Lincoln's promise to care for those who have served in our Nation's military and for their families, caregivers, and survivors.'' That is, it upends the quote that is directly from President Lincoln. The original mission statement is posted in roughly 50 percent of the VA's facilities. The VA has been working through replacing them over the last couple of months by a directive. It is unclear how many displays are left. The Trump administration resisted calls to change the motto and put an additional 140 plaques at national cemeteries bearing Lincoln's quote because it is a good quote. It is a historic quote. The fact is, we should not use taxpayer dollars to allow this administration to unilaterally change the VA's historic motto and erase the words of President Lincoln in order to appease the radical left in advancing yet another one of their cultural revisionist efforts. The VA's mission statement, established in 1959, appropriately used the words of President Lincoln in his Second Inaugural Address delivered on March 4, 1865: ``With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the Nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow, and his orphan.'' That quote obviously came from the timeframe in which we were concluding the Civil War, and it came a mere month, from my recollection of history, from when Abraham Lincoln was, in fact, assassinated. The speech was in part the basis of the Department of Veterans Affairs' creation and declared mission. The Department wants to continue to waste hard-earned taxpayer dollars to erase history and expunge Lincoln's words by replacing the VA's mission statement, all in an attempt to earn woke brownie points. I am thankful, of course, for the millions of men and women who have served valiantly in our Armed Forces, but changing the VA motto is just virtue signaling. We should be focused on providing the quality care and benefits veterans have earned in a timely manner. The average wait time for new primary care appointments within the 13 South Texas Veterans Health System facilities was 50 days; veterans seeking their first appointment locally at the new Pecan Valley clinic, an average of 98 days; the VA clinic in the district I represent, Kerrville, 23 days, and that is the shortest. This amendment, like my other amendments, is about restoring VA focus, not advancing a political agenda out of step with the majority of Americans. Madam Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. ROY. Madam Chair, I will reiterate the extent to which this motto came directly from a quote from President Lincoln at his Second Inaugural Address at a particularly important and historic moment in our Nation's history. That was the point. The literal culmination of the Civil War had occurred almost around that exact date or was occurring shortly thereafter and shortly before the President was to be assassinated, I believe in April, a month after this speech. To go back and edit this and then go around changing the VA to pull out a quote directly from Lincoln just, again, shows a lack of focus on what the VA should be focused on. That is the point of the amendment. Can we just get back to trying to figure out how to provide care and do what we said we are going to do for millions of veterans who are tired of waiting and having technological systems that aren't working properly so they have trouble getting in and out of care and being able to use care in the private sector? There are lots of things we need to be fixing at the VA, and this is certainly not one of them. Madam Chair, I think that I have made the point. I think the amendment should be supported. I think we should get the VA focused on what the people of this country want us to focus on, supporting the care for veterans. Madam Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. ROY

Mr. ROY. Mr. Chair, had I been present, I would have voted ``no'' on rollcall No. 361 and ``aye'' on rollcall No. 362. Amendment No. 77 Offered by Mr. Perry

Mr. ROY

Mr. ROY. Mr. Chairman, I thank my friend from Utah for leading this amendment, and I thank my friends in the San Antonio delegation for standing up for the people of San Antonio, who are on the outside looking in. San Antonio is a city of 1.5 million people. It is the seventh largest city, Joint Base San Antonio. My colleagues on both sides of the aisle just smirk it off and say: Oh, no, don't disrupt my flights. Don't disrupt my ability to get to my local airports. Do you know what? The next time you come to San Antonio, explain that to the men and women in uniform serving their country who can't take a flight to Reagan because you guys got something in 1966, and now it is a protectionist racket to hold onto something for yourselves. I won't take this flight, for the most part, unless I am going back to San Antonio. I have a direct flight because Austin was exempted, like 10 other cities were exempted. This is seven slots. It is less than 2 percent of the total. Stop the protectionist racket. Open it up to competition, seven airlines, seven slots.

Mr. ROY

Mr. ROY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for the time. Mr. Speaker, of course, it is not fake. We are having to impact the entire country, and that is why I support the gentleman's bill, Schools Not Shelters. Yes, we passed other legislation, like H.R. 2, which would address the problem but which my colleagues on the other side of the aisle and this President refused to do. We are doing this, of course, jointly, while we are trying to move the FAA reauthorization. I support that bill too, but we must include slots--I just want to be very clear--for the people in San Antonio and for cities outside of the perimeter that was created in 1966. It is critically important for the American people to have access to their Nation's Capitol--including San Antonio, with 1.6 million people, the seventh largest city in the country--to have access to the Ronald Reagan National Airport. So I hope we will adopt that amendment so the FAA bill can move strongly to the Senate and get passed.

Mr. ROY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding. Mr. Speaker, I would note that my colleague on the other side of the aisle from Pennsylvania referred to the crisis that we are experiencing on the southern border as a ``fake'' crisis. I just want everyone in America to understand: Our colleagues on the other side of the aisle believe that what we are experiencing on the southern border is a fake crisis. She said: demonizing migrants. She is criticizing Governor Abbott for having to deal with the crisis that they call fake. Governor Abbott, yes, moved migrants from Texas to other parts of the country, just like the mayor of El Paso and just like the mayor of New York. The mayor of New York, by the way, exists in a sanctuary city and then wants to come begging the Federal Government for money. That is the truth. We know precisely what is going on along the southern border, and my colleagues on the other side of the aisle are not just in denial, they are literally making up facts. They are saying things that are completely untrue. Did the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania have to appropriate $10 billion--$10 billion? That is what the State of Texas had to do to make up for the fact that the Federal Government is not only refusing to enforce the law, but it is actively participating--as this President is doing and as the Secretary of Homeland Security is doing while he lies to me under oath in the Judiciary Committee--actively participating in the trafficking of human beings into the United States and the trafficking of little girls into the sex trafficking trade. Was it a fake crisis for the 53 migrants who were cooked in a tractor-trailer last August in San Antonio, Texas? Is that fake? Is it a fake crisis for the 856 migrants who died along the Rio Grande in south Texas and in Arizona last year? Is that fake? Is it fake for the little girl who is sitting in a stash house in Houston, San Antonio, New York, or Philadelphia right now being raped by her captors? Or in Fort Worth, Texas, as a Federal judge articulated in a Federal opinion just 2 months ago?

Mr. ROY

Mr. ROY. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from Pennsylvania for his comments. I think I have less than a minute left, and I will close with, as I said before, as General George Washington said on July 2, 1776, 247 years ago, on the day we actually declared independence: ``The fate of unborn millions will now depend, under God,'' on our courage and our conduct. ``We have, therefore, to resolve to conquer or die.'' That is why we are here. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. ROY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Pennsylvania, and I want to pick up on what he has observed when he goes home to Pennsylvania, when he is traveling around this country. He has observed what I observe, having individuals pull me aside in an airport, on an airplane, driving around, at a gas station in Texas, at a gas station in Colorado, at a gas station in Virginia, all over this country, they pull me aside and say: Thank you. Keep fighting. Just like you said, they don't give details. They get it. They see it. They want someone to stand up and fight for this country because they see this country slipping through our fingers. As has long been said, where else are we going to go? What else are we going to do? As President Reagan said, there is nowhere else to go. This is it. We are the beacon of hope for the world, and we are still the greatest country in the history of the world, but we are giving it away. We are losing it through a cultural rot and decay where elites are telling us that we have to apologize for being Americans. In that museum that I walked through in Dubois, Wyoming, there is a great graphic--I don't have it in front of me, although I might be able to pull up a picture--that talks about the tens of millions of lives in this world that have been liberated by Americans. Yes, we are an imperfect country. Yes, we have committed sins because all of us fall short of the glory of God. Yes, but we are a strong, righteous country that has bled for good around this world. Even in the center of sin, even in 1861 to 1865, we bled so that people around this world could be free, so they can know what it means to prosper. Here we sit in this Chamber, in the luxury of the protections bought by the people before us, giving it away, shamefully dismissing it, undermining the American Dream for our kids and grandkids. It defies all logic to do that, but the Founders knew that it was likely. Our job is to break that. When people ask me today: Why did you vote yes on five bills on the floor of the House today to say that we need to essentially end previously declared emergencies when you know, Chip, that there are bad guys connected to those emergencies and that we are using our resources to freeze their assets, take their money away, clamp down on them? Do you just want to walk away from that? No, I want to restore order in this town. I want to restore order in this country, in this government, by saying you don't get to declare an emergency in 2003 and keep operating 21 years later under an emergency. Come back to Congress. Let's figure out what we need to do. Let's figure out our authorizations of force. Let's figure out our use of our ability to freeze financial assets. Come back to Congress. We have to fight to restore order, or we are going to lose the Republic. The Republic depends on it. One last point on that, and I will yield back. The rule of law matters. The Republic depends on it. It depends on us getting it right. I heard my colleagues earlier today referring to the border crisis as a fake crisis. I mean, I don't know what planet some of my colleagues live on to refer to what I see happening to human beings in south Texas--dying in the Texas heat; dying in tractor-trailers; getting forced into the sex trafficking trade, as we are seeing unfold, as we see depicted in the ``Sound of Freedom,'' the movie. We are allowing that to happen on our watch in the supposedly most powerful nation in the history of the world. My colleagues dismiss it as a fake crisis. The Republic cannot sustain if that is how we are going to treat the rule of law and what we do at our southern border. I have to say this to all my Republican colleagues right now: If you think I am going to vote for any of our appropriations bills without forcing this President to his knees to secure the border of the United States, you are out of your dang mind. Enough. Use the power of the purse. Quit wilting in the corner. ``Oh, we have to fund government shutdowns.'' Whatever. Do your job. That is my call to my Republican colleagues. Don't walk away from the fight. We blinked on Memorial Day. That is the truth. We blinked. $4 trillion, no policy changes, we blinked. We are not going to allow Republicans to blink again in this appropriations season. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Perry).

Mr. ROY. Mr. Speaker, I have been listening to my colleagues on the other side of the aisle decrying the alleged lack of action by those on my side of the aisle with respect to gun violence and with respect to guns generally. I think it is important to note the primary driver of the current malaise and the current dangers upon citizens by those with guns comes from criminals and those who have mental health problems. A full one-third of Americans are currently putting themselves out as depressed according to polls. We have mental health issues and drug issues with our children. We have problems with people who feel socially detached. I can assure you, Mr. Speaker, that when I was a child, about the time I was born, fully one-half of American households had weapons and they had guns. Fewer than one-third do today. The fact is we have a problem and an epidemic of people with mental health issues and we have a lack of resolve of leadership in this country to deal with those or to deal with the criminals perpetrating crimes. That is the truth. My colleagues on the other side of the aisle rush to say that they want to get the guns. The fact is we need to stop the criminals. I was a Federal prosecutor. I spent my time in the United States Attorneys' Office targeting criminals with guns and putting bad guys behind bars. There has been a movement of late to allow these criminals back out on our streets. That is a mistake. There has been a longstanding movement to not treat those with mental health problems, and it is getting infinitely worse with these devices, iPhones, and all of the focus that our young are directing towards electronic devices rather than engaging with their fellow mankind. We know it, we see it, and we do nothing about it. We rage against TikTok because of its relationship to China. Why don't we rage against the extent to which these are addictive devices putting garbage in the minds of our children and creating environments where children get detached from reality and detached from society? We see it unfold before our very eyes, and the response among leaders of this country is to form a task force. You don't need a task force to understand that our society is breaking down, and you don't need a task force to understand that our communities are breaking down. This is what the American people are feeling on a daily basis. When I talk to my constituents, the people I run into, the people I run into on airplanes, Americans I don't represent and Americans I do represent, they know that something is very, very wrong with our country. That is the truth. That is what the American people know. Not just with politicians and not just with elective leaders, not just with Congress, and not just with the economy, but that something is just fundamentally wrong and fundamentally broken with our way of life. They are not wrong. Just a couple of weeks ago, we celebrated Independence Day. One line from that document which was written specifically about and to King George citing the death warrants for all those who signed it, he said, Jefferson wrote, they wrote, they said that he--the king--has abdicated government here by declaring us out of his protection and waging war against us. How different is that from our current situation? The elites in this country are waging war against us. They are waging war against our values, waging wars war against or prosperity, and waging war against our natural rights as parents, as citizens, and as individuals. The average Americans right out there today listening just want to play by the rules. They want to go to school, they want to get a job, they want to buy a house, they want to support their family, and they want to raise their kids. They want to raise their kids to be happy, they want their kids to be free, and they want a society--more importantly--they want a family that is flourishing and happy and that can achieve. All of that is what we historically call the American Dream. What is the state of the American Dream today? If I ask that question, half the people in the room would be staring at their dadgum iPhones because we don't engage with people anymore. If I said this in the middle of a meeting of my colleagues, or if I said it in a restaurant, how many times do you see everybody just staring at these things? The question here is: What happened to the American Dream? If my colleagues were in this room--of course, they are not--I would ask: Do you believe the American Dream can be achieved by your children and by your grandchildren today? Do you believe it? Do you believe it is attainable? Do you believe that if they play by the rules that they will achieve the dream? Or do you think that the rich and the powerful--the large corporations, the government, your own leaders--are rigging the system to protect their own status and to protect their own wealth against your freedom and your prosperity? We have a system where too often today, crony policies help big, woke corporations make windfall profits while families struggle with inflation and small businesses struggle to stay afloat amid a mountain of regulatory burdens and costs. That is the truth. Everybody I talk to can't afford labor, they can't afford their supplies, they can't afford a car, they can't buy a new vehicle because it has been regulated to death, and they can barely afford their electricity bills. That is the truth of everyday Americans right now, and they are wondering why? What happened to that American Dream? The elites, on the other hand, bailed out Wall Street, and they forced Main Street to pay for it. Now they are doing it again. Wall Street got a $1 trillion bailout after a heavy hand at tanking the economy, and they are making more money than ever now. This year the Federal Government gave a $22 billion bailout to Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank of New York. The administration only cares about their own. Treasury Secretary Yellen said that small and regional banks wouldn't get the same treatment. What exactly does ``too big to fail'' mean? ``Too big to fail'' means I am going to protect the fat cats down the street, but you at home are left holding the bag. Since 2008, corporate profits have increased by 250 percent in the last 15 years. Hourly wages have increased less than 50 percent. Mr. Speaker, you say: Oh, Chip, you sound like a Democrat. What I am trying to say is we have a situation where, as the Founders predicted, the power structure in this town is too tilted to the power structure of Wall Street, and too tilted to the power structure in corporate boardrooms across this country. Hardworking Americans are the ones who can't make it, and we should be here fighting for them, but are we? In 1989, the typical American could provide middle-class essentials for a family of four by working 40 weeks a year leaving time for vacation or holidays. It will take that same individual 62 weeks to provide the same life for his or her family in 2022. Think about that, Mr. Speaker. That is just 30 years. What are we doing? The political elites shipped jobs overseas while enriching themselves off the Chinese Communist officials who are taking those jobs and threatening our supply chain. What do we do? We respond with the CHIPS Act. Don't blame me. The CHIPS Act basically just increases that flow to China. It is nuts. You can't even make it up, Mr. Speaker, but that is what we do in the people's House. U.S. manufacturing activity contracted in June for the eighth straight month declining 0.9 percentage points for May. It was the longest period of contraction in U.S. manufacturing since the Great Recession. During COVID, we shut down the greatest economy in the history of the world. People got laid off, they lost jobs, and small businesses shut down. I have read stats of 100,000 small businesses getting absolutely whacked during the COVID hysteria driven by Dr. Fauci and the cronies in this town, but the wealthiest Americans got 40 percent richer during that same time. Now, again, I am a believer in lifting all boats, but that is only true if the free enterprise and the free market system in this country is released unfettered to allow Americans to achieve the American Dream, but right now it is stacked, and it is stacked in favor of a small handful of elites against the hardworking average American. In 2023, as I said before, we have seen three of the largest bank failures in American history. First Republic, $212 billion; Silicon Valley, $209 billion; and Signature Bank, $110 billion. There we were racing to bail out. That is not capitalism, Mr. Speaker. That is not free enterprise. Rushing in to bail people out is the elites protecting their own against the hardworking American. For decades we have wasted money that isn't ours on policies and projects no one wants, and then we pass the credit card bill down to the next generation. In the months since this body extended the debt ceiling for another 18 months until January of 2025, in the infinite wisdom of my colleagues on both sides of the aisle, we have already amassed another $1 trillion in debt since Memorial Day, and yet everyone in this body except for a handful gleefully skipped away after saying: Sure, let's raise the debt another $4 trillion. It isn't going to be $4 trillion. When are we going to get serious about what we are doing here? What about wars? We are now 21 years--22 years--into the authorization of the use of military force post-9/11, and we have not updated it. The 2002 authorization of force in Iraq--Saddam Hussein has been dead 15 years-- still exists. We have an authorization of force from 1991 that still exists and 1957 that still exists. Why? Because there is a cadre of people in this town who make a large sum of money and get a whole lot of power when there are endless wars continuing for this town to fund with borrowed money driving up inflation, killing jobs, and killing the American Dream. All of us people in this Chamber are running around talking about we have to do it for the defense. For fiscal year 2022, the United States Federal Government spent $8 trillion on the post-9/11 wars in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, and elsewhere--$8 trillion, and that is not talking about the thousands of lives lost, the tens of thousands of lives permanently impacted through injury and post-traumatic stress disorder. When the bill comes due, what do we do? We raise the ceiling on what we can borrow as I said a minute ago. The $32 trillion we just increased to $36 trillion. CBO reported a $1.4 trillion deficit in the first 9 months of fiscal year 2023. That is $875 billion higher than the year before. We spent more on so-called COVID relief from 2000 to 2021, around $6 trillion, than we did in the 3\1/2\ years of World War II. Think about that, Mr. Speaker, World War II in current dollars amounted to $4.1 trillion. We are running around like a bunch of scared ninnies with masks and spent $6 trillion. Why? We could because we just wrote a blank check. Since the Biden administration took office, prices have increased over 16 percent. The annual cost of inflation has been estimated to harm American households upwards of $8,900. Household debt has increased by $2.9 trillion since the end of 2019. In the first quarter of 2023, aggregate household debt increased by $148 billion. Think about this. How about education? We just want the taxes that we pay to teach our kids what they need to know to succeed in the real world, but teachers' unions and bureaucrats want to teach them that merit and achievement are bad, that skin color defines all of us, that there isn't man and woman, and that America is evil. Meanwhile, their same beliefs want to undermine the basic parental right to raise their children in their own values and push harmful gender ideology on them. In Cupertino, California, third graders were required to deconstruct their racial identities and then rank themselves according to their power and privilege. In Evanston, Illinois, students listened to ``Not My Idea,'' a book about whiteness which states that whiteness is bad. An advisory board in Virginia's Loudoun County Public Schools demanded that teachers be dismissed if they criticized the district's equity training inspired by critical race theory. The President of the American Federation of Teachers vowed the union will fight ``cultural warriors'' that want to deprive students of a robust understanding of our common history. In Lexington, Massachusetts, fourth graders were taught to articulate what gender identity is and why it is important to use nonbinary language. They give our kids pornographic and sexualized books such as ``Gender Queer: A Memoir,'' an explicit pornographic book; ``Flamer''--good grief--a graphic book about young boys performing sexual acts at a summer camp; ``This Book is Gay,'' a book containing instructions on the ``ins and outs of gay sex.'' I am on the floor of the House of Representatives, and I am reading this garbage. Our kids are being given this garbage, and you want to know why parents are dismayed, why parents are frustrated, why the American people are left scratching their head, saying something is terribly wrong. At Round Rock ISD in Texas, at Walsh Middle School a training presentation instructed teachers not to tell parents if a student tells them they identify as transgender or nonbinary. When the children of the elites go to the right schools, they get the right jobs. Everyone else gets to rack up debt to get a job in a hamstrung economy with a useless degree that is based more on indoctrination than on education. Tuition is skyrocketing. We are not even able to afford the garbage education that the elites are foisting on the American people. Now, if you get through that maze, and you want to buy a house, you can't. You can't afford it. In 1985, the average single family home was $82,800. In 2019, they would have spent $313,000; in 2020, $391,900; and in 2022, it reached $540,000. How can you afford that? Mr. Speaker, 30-year mortgage rates have gone from 2 to 3 to percent to 7 percent in under a year. In 2021 with sub-3 percent interest rates, a $400,000 home cost $604,000 over 30 years. Today, with 7 percent interest rates, that same $400,000 home, which you can't even get in most places in this country, costs more than a million dollars over the 30-year span, interest accounting for 157 percent of the home price. Think about that. Earlier this year, mortgage demand plunged to the lowest level since 1995. What about healthcare; a system where crony policies help big corporations make windfall profits while families struggle with inflation and small businesses struggle to stay afloat? According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, medical and health service managers, which are described as managers that, ``plan, direct, and coordinate the business activities of healthcare providers,'' i.e., bureaucrats--they might be private bureaucrats, but they are very publicly funded bureaucrats through private corporations, so-called-- they are slated to see 32 percent growth in jobs from 2019 to 2029. Not doctors; bureaucrats. This is compared to a 4 percent growth rate for physicians and surgeons if we can even get them educated. Health insurance companies rake in roughly $1 trillion per year. Health and medical insurance companies placed second in biggest industries by revenue in the United States only behind retirement and pension plans. I want to pause for a second. I was blessed to go to the National Museum of Military Vehicles in Dubois, Wyoming, 2 weeks ago when I was there around Independence Day. That museum is incredible, by the way. I recommend it to all listening. A large part of the museum is dedicated to what we achieved in World War II. If you ask the average American what we achieved in World War II, at least those who were educated and informed enough to even tell you what World War II was, they will tell you that we beat Nazism, we beat Hitler, we beat Imperial Japan. Again, that is if we are lucky. The fact is, it was an unbelievable demonstration of American industrial might. Absent our industrial strength, we lose. That is the truth. If we had not been able to develop what we developed, to take our manufacturing capacity and build thousands of planes, thousands of Jeeps, thousands of boats, thousands of guns, there is no way we would have been able to carry out what we were able to carry out in World War II. Now, come back. What I just said; what is our number one industry? Retirement and pension plans. What is our second? Medical insurance companies. We have major financial institutions. Where is our industrial base? You want to beat China? Good luck. Mind you, they drove us all the way back in Korea in 1951, the Chinese did, or 1952, somewhere around there. Here we are talking about beating China, and we don't have the industrial capacity to sneeze at China right now. That should worry everybody in this Chamber, but instead, we get nothing but fits of angst over social engineering, over equity, over LGBTQ, over all manners of apologizing for past sins. We have a world to go engage in. The deals they strike with the government, these healthcare bureaucrats, most recently through ObamaCare, guarantees their growth. Anthem had a 344 percent increase in government revenue from 2010 to 2020. United Healthcare, 198 percent increase in government revenue during the same period. Cigna, Anthem, United Healthcare and Humana have seen an average increase of 562 percent in their stock prices from January 11 to January 2021. In 2016, 60 percent of the Nation's top five health insurers' revenue came from Medicare and Medicaid, up from $92 billion in 2010. In 2022, big insurance revenues reached $1.25 trillion and profits of almost $70 billion, a 300 percent increase in revenue and a 287 percent increase in profits. The CBO estimates that Federal subsidies for health insurance for Americans under 65 will reach $1 trillion in 2023. Where is the talk about doctors? Where is the talk about getting care? That is a corporate crony enrichment plan that is undermining your ability to get healthcare. Be worried about your ability to afford care and even have the care if you can afford it; to have a doctor if you want to get one; to choose the doctor if you want to choose because these bureaucrats are going to tell you who you can see. They are going to tell you when you can get care. They say it is private healthcare. It is not. We have single-payer healthcare. It is just inefficient corporate cronyism running amuck and a bunch of people in this town getting rich and lobbyists getting rich and people in this body not doing a dang thing about it while you can't get care. You can't figure out how to afford your bills. Energy; a whole other thing. Wealthy people drive around in expensive electric vehicles while climate czar John Kerry this week flies to China, spewing a trail of CO2 so he can go preach about the climate in China. You can't even make this up. Orwell would just be down here somewhere between laughing and crying. The average American is struggling just to put gas in their car and keep the lights on. They can't afford a new car because of these anti- energy policies from the radical left, but unfortunately, too often embraced by my own colleagues on this side of the aisle. In 2021, American energy prices spiked 29 percent, according to BLS, and a further 7 percent in 2022. Gas prices jumped nearly 50 percent in 2021, but here is the thing: I read somewhere online the other day the average price of a new car is almost $70,000. I don't know if that is accurate. I have to go do some research, but I can tell you from personal experience, it is a lot. Why? Why do you think Ford is shutting down certain lines? Why do you think General Motors is shutting down certain lines? Because my colleagues on the other side of the aisle and this White House want to live in their climate utopia, and they are shutting down American production and capacity to build the internal combustion engine, all so they can push electronic vehicles that nobody can afford and nobody can drive from Austin to Midland or Austin to Houston. We are literally funding the destruction of reliable energy in this country and thereby diminishing it around the world. The Democrats' Inflation Reduction Act gave $1.2 trillion in crony subsidies to unreliable forms of energy. This summer, for the first time in history, the Texas grid will see more energy demand than it can meet with reliable electricity generation. That is in Texas. The EIA estimates these subsidies could make wind and solar account for 60 percent of U.S. generation by 2050, at which point the entire mind-numbed, indoctrinated youth of this country stand up and applaud and say, isn't that awesome. What they don't know is that it isn't awesome because it is unreliable energy that increases the cost, has enormous environmental impacts, and is doing nothing to significantly drop CO2 production because China and India are driving CO2 production. These same climate doomsayers try to sell us unreliable, more expensive energy policies, which empower our enemies, the Chinese Communist Party. Chinese companies are eligible for these climate credits that we just passed. Again, you can't make this up. Can you imagine in 1939 saying, hey, guys, I have a good idea. Let's create a way for the American taxpayer to subsidize Adolf Hitler. We are doing that. We are going, oh, let's go subsidize the Chinese Communist Party. Mr. Speaker, 80 percent of the solar panels installed in the United States come from Chinese firms. China controls 77 percent of EV battery manufacturing. Meanwhile, China's building two new coal-powered plants per week in 2022, as they did, on top of the 1,100 coal-fired plants they already have. We have about 250. We are running around whining like a bunch of losers, apologizing for our ability to produce reliable energy and clean-burning natural gas. We are not building any new nuclear power. We are just running around saying subsidize, subsidize, subsidize wind and solar so we can weaken our grid, empower the Chinese, all so people can feel good about themselves while they drive their Tesla around. What the average American notices all around them in every part of their daily lives is that systematic, political, cultural rot. I use that term ``rot'' intentionally. When something rots, it decays from the inside. Even though it looks fine, it is falling apart. As some have noticed, they have said America will not lose to a foreign enemy; we will lose to ourselves. Even though they might not see it, every American can tell that something is not right. They can tell that something is amiss. There is something rotten in this country right now because that is what we are seeing happen to our way of life. My friends on the other side of the aisle love to lecture us all about the importance of our democracy. The reality is that we are currently living in a cultural oligarchy, a bureaucratic oligarchy, where the rich and the powerful protect their status and prestige at the cost of the American Dream while they preach to us. These elite forces in the government, corporate America, and our education system feel different, but they are all on the same team. They are people who profit even as the rest of us suffer. They are the ones who set the rules. They are the ones who destroy anyone who steps out of line. They are the ones who rig the system from far away so that we don't notice the rigging. The rigging starts here in Washington, but it oozes into the school board meetings. It oozes into the local council meetings. It oozes throughout the corporate boardrooms, HR offices, television shows. There is an expression in Texas: ``All hat, no cattle.'' The lesson it imparts is that if you want to talk a big game, you need to back it up with action. The American people are fed up with words. They deserve action. We can't promise a wall and not build a wall. We can't say we are going to protect freedom and then cave to Dr. Fauci and let him retire scot- free. You can't tell Americans you are going to protect their money and then get distracted in hiding behind Hunter Biden's drama and his family's money. We can't say we are against a two-tiered system of justice and not hold this President and this Cabinet--Mayorkas, Garland, all of them--accountable for targeting Americans and abandoning and endangering their country and making a mockery of the Constitution. America's systemic rot is too deep for empty promises and bumper sticker slogans. America deserves leaders who are not ashamed of the country they lead and do not make us ashamed of them. America deserves leaders who not only see the dangers of preventable decline but ones who will actually fight to defend it. We cannot back down. We cannot shy away from the fight. Right now, today, on the floor of the House of Representatives, this week, next week, next month, through the appropriations process, through the end of the year, all next year, heading into a Presidential election, we are fighting for the soul of this country. That is what is at stake. To borrow from General Washington on July 2, 1776, ``The fate of unborn millions will now depend, under God, on'' our courage and our conduct. ``We have, therefore, to resolve to conquer or die.'' That is the kind of resolve America needs from us, from this country, from Americans. That is what we owe the American people. As deep as the rot currently is, we cannot let it continue to destroy and undermine the American Dream. We are duty bound to save that American Dream for our kids and our grandkids. That is the truth. It is time for Americans to win again. That is our calling in this Chamber. I am proud to have my friend from Pennsylvania here with me. I said it would be 30 minutes; I went 35. I know of no greater patriot, a man who wore the uniform of his country and served honorably and serves honorably in the United States Congress. I am proud to call him my friend. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Perry), my friend.

Mr. ROY. Mr. Speaker, in this 2 weeks following Independence Day, you do a lot of thinking if you are, as I assume my friend was, part of an Independence Day parade. There are a lot of patriotic Americans out there, particularly in flyover country, who love their country and want to defend their country, and they just want their life back. That is it. They want that American Dream back. By God, I am going to do everything I can do in this godforsaken town to give them their freedom back, to give them the American Dream back. I don't care who gets mad at me. I don't care who is worried about what bill he or she didn't get across some finish line that nobody in America generally cares about. We are going to fight to change this town. ``Conquer or die,'' as General Washington said. The fact is you have to ask yourself the question: Are you free? Are we free? Are we free if you pay taxes to a school that teaches your children that your country is evil, or that there isn't a difference between a man and a woman, if you can't even talk about God, much less pray to God? Are you a free American if that is what you are dealing with in the schools? Are you free if you want to simply have a vehicle to move around, to carry out your livelihood to provide for your family, and you can't afford one because a bunch of elitists in Martha's Vineyard decide you have to drive an $80,000 battery-powered car? Are you free if you are worried that your streets are unsafe, your border is wide open, and you are endangered, and fentanyl is pouring into your communities because your government refuses to do its one basic task? Are you actually free? Are you free if you just want to go to the doctor of your choice and are prohibited from doing so because the government regulatory state and corporate cronies have combined to make a whole lot of money while you can't go to the doctor of your choice? Are you free? Are you free if one President is treated differently than another President by the system of justice reporting to the President? Are you free? Are we living in a free country? Are you free if you simply wanted to go about your way of life, but your government said you couldn't unless you stuck a needle in your arm with a vaccine created with full liability protection and then mandated by the very government saying you have to take it, and if you don't take it, you are going to lose your job? Are you free? No, you are not free. It is about damn time that we live free again. That is why we are here. Again, to my colleagues on this side of the aisle, I don't care about your checklist of stuff you want to campaign on. I don't care about what you don't want to vote on. I care about one thing and one thing only, and that is living free. It is our God-given right. It is what people bled and died for--living free, imperfect, in a simple world, but free. That is our calling. That is our duty. Our duty isn't to get reelected. Our duty is to fight for the people who sent us here, to fight for them against a cultural elite who wants to rip away their lives. That is what my mission is every day when I wake up in this godforsaken town. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Perry).

Mr. ROY

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

Mr. ROY

Mr. ROY. Mr. Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. ROY. Mr. Chair, we have spent the better part of the last several days making clear to the American people that this side of the aisle wants to see a Department of Defense that is focused on its core mission, defending the United States of America, rather than divvying us up by race and dividing us and separating us. I rise today to ensure that the Department of Defense is focused on its core mission rather than pursuing the political agenda of climate change to the detriment of the national security of the United States. In 2021, Department of Defense spokesman John Kirby refused to say that China is a bigger national security threat to the United States than climate change. He called them equally important and said it doesn't do any good to make a relative assessment of national security issues. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin has said climate change is an existential threat to our Nation's security. Next week, Secretary of State John Kerry literally travels to China to discuss climate change, not China's increased aggression against Taiwan, not its expansion in the Pacific, not its oppression of its people, not the fact that they produce two new coal-fired plants per week on top of the 1,100 they have while we undermine our national security to pursue the climate-fetish agenda of the other side of the aisle. President Biden's executive orders have served as the catalyst for massive reforms at the Department of Defense that compromise national security to advance this climate fetish. The amendment that I offer would prohibit any of the funding in the National Defense Authorization Act, or that flows from that authorization, from being used to carry out President Biden's executive orders on climate change. The Department of Defense's climate adaptation plan includes radical proposals to reduce greenhouse gas emissions at the expense of our warfighting capabilities. According to the plan, the DOD has identified climate change as a critical national security issue. It mandates environmental justice because why miss an opportunity to push divisive ideology? The DOD says it will transition to 100 percent carbon-free electricity, meaning America's war machine will literally depend on the wind and the sun. No one, including anyone on this side of the aisle, believes that we shouldn't pursue every advantage and technology to harness energy, no one. In Texas, we have embraced wind and we have embraced solar, but to our detriment when we have interfered with the market and interfered with our ability to have energy at our disposal and at our demand. We undermine our grid. We undermine our national security. We undermine reliability. We cause energy prices to go up. In this case, in the context of the National Defense Authorization Act, we should not be pursuing this politically motivated climate fetishization that undermines our national security. Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. ROY. Mr. Chair, I appreciate my colleague for basically making the case for the very climate fetish that I describe. When he talks about the need for energy and its existence for national security, my point is having reliable energy. We have to have energy that is available and reliable and dependable. That is the whole point. My colleague talks about nuclear power. Great. I am waiting with bated breath for my colleagues on the other side of the aisle to embrace and promote and push noncarbon-producing nuclear power. We haven't generated a new nuclear power plant since when, the 1970s? Georgia isn't even off the ground because of Federal regulation and interference. The fact is, we are subsidizing and promoting unreliable wind and solar while subsidizing the hell out of electric vehicles, and my colleagues on the other side of the aisle want to use the Defense Department to continue to promote it, when it engaged in crony capitalism to enrich a small handful of elitists on the back of the hardworking American people while we subsidize China and make ourselves reliable on China for their minerals and what they produce. It is absolutely astonishing that we would turn over our national defense capability to China at this point in time to pursue this radical agenda. Mr. Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. ROY

Mr. ROY. Mr. Chair, the Department of Defense Education Activity, an agency under the Department of Defense, runs 160 schools on military bases across the globe, serving more than 69,000 children of military personnel. The amendment that I am offering would prohibit the Department of Defense schools, DODEA, from using funds to promote or compel teachers to adhere to critical race theory. Specifically, this is what I on the floor was accused of offering as being racist by the ranking member of the Rules Committee a little bit earlier, but I was not on the floor to have the words stricken. Here is what the language is in the amendment--compel teachers to adhere to critical race theory, specifically the idea that: ``(1) Any race is inherently superior or inferior to any other race, color, or national origin. ``(2) The United States is a fundamentally racist country. ``(3) The Declaration of Independence or Constitution of the United States are fundamentally racist documents. ``(4) An individual's moral character or worth is determined by the individual's race, color, or national origin. ``(5) An individual, by virtue of the individual's race, is inherently racist or oppressive, whether consciously or unconsciously. ``(6) An individual, because of the individual's race, bears responsibility for the actions committed by other members of the individual's race, color, or national origin.'' Instead of working to empower parents, our education system is using critical race theory outside of the Department of Defense, but in this case inside the Department of Defense, to turn schools into a propaganda machine dedicated to raising students up that judge one another by race and hate our country's founding principles. Teaching kids to hate the country they live in, to view their fellow citizens as enemies because of the color of their skin is wrong. It is anti-American, and it is societal suicide. Critical race theory is an anti-American ideology that seeks to pick winners and losers based on skin color. We are seeing a large-scale effort to impose this tyranny over the minds of men and our children through taxpayer-funded indoctrination of this ideology. I believe we must preserve the foundational American truth that people are valuable regardless of their skin color and prevent critical race theory from being used to divvy us up by race further. Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. ROY. Mr. Chair, an article written by the spouse of a member of our military in The Federalist and the mother of a former Department of Defense education student talked about the training that she discovered when she dove into what their students were being taught. She saw that there would be an equity and access summit for teachers and administrators. She said: Knowing that equity means different things to different people, I wanted to get a sense of what it meant, and I was floored. They released a video of summit clips in which a principal talks about a student who felt like he had done something wrong because he is a young, White male. The teacher said she didn't know what to tell him, but she seemed pleased with the breakthrough. Perhaps she was just following the lead of DODEA's diversity, equity, and inclusion chief, Kelisa Wing, who is currently under investigation or at that time was under investigation by DOD for a history of disparaging comments toward White people. The fact here is, the sordid business of divvying us up by race is what we are trying to move past, and having our Department of Defense schools teaching the children of our men and women in uniform to focus on race and the divvying us up by race is inherently wrong and undermines the future cohesion of not just the military but the country. The purpose here is to say that we don't need our Department of Defense schools to be engaged in this indoctrination. I heard earlier the questions here about all these stats about how this improves all of our recruiting. If that is so, why is our recruiting in the toilet? It is in the toilet because if you talk to recruits, they are sick of it. They don't like the indoctrination. Their friends listen to it, and they say: ``I don't want any part of it.'' Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. ROY. Mr. Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. ROY. Mr. Chair, in closing, we are endowed by our Creator with certain inalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Life. I can't help but notice the focus of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle of terminating life. Mr. Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. ROY. Mr. Chair, in closing, a recent story indicated: Servicemembers forced to pay back signing bonuses after being removed after COVID vaccine. They see it as a kick in the face. The Air Force delays bonuses. Higher-than-projected personnel costs are driving a shortfall in FY 2023 military personnel appropriation. Meanwhile, we have jobs and notices under the chief diversity officer and myriad other positions at $183,500. Why? Why can't we get it right? Why can't we do the right thing and use the dollars that we have appropriated to fund the men and women in uniform to do their job? That is the question. The fact is what we are doing is we are funding things like a professor at the Air Force Academy posting about her desire to make students learn how to ``identify the structural racism and inequality that has been endemic in American history.'' A West Point slide obtained by FOIA stated that: ``White people and people of color live radically different structured lives, and that in order to understand racial inequality, it is first necessary to address Whiteness.'' That is what we are paying for rather than paying for men and women to defend this country. Mr. Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. ROY. Mr. Chair, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. ROY. Mr. Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. ROY. Mr. Chair, the House Armed Services Committee adopted an amendment to repeal the statutory requirement that the Department of Defense have a chief diversity officer, a senior adviser for diversity and inclusion. I applaud that. It is a good thing. That is getting rid of the requirement. I also believe that we should prohibit the ability of the Department of Defense to have said position. My amendment No. 30 seeks to amend section 904 to prohibit Federal funds from being used to establish anything similar or any position that is comparable to the chief diversity officer or senior adviser of diversity and inclusion. People say, well, why is that? The fact of the matter is we have a situation right now where we are not even able to pay the kinds of bonuses that are necessary. We are not able to pay to retain our men and women in uniform. The Air Force has been having budgetary problems, and we have got positions that are being put out there, for example, that will pay $183,500, multiple positions scattered all over the country in the name of diversity. The fact is the United States military is one of the few institutions where the skills of the men or women on either side of you could mean the difference between life and death. The Department of Defense should be focused on one thing only: securing the defense of the Nation. It is not in our national security interests to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars for diversity training that continues to try and divvy us up by race. That is the opposite of the direction we should be going, and in fact, it sows constant division into the Department of Defense. Does a person's race or skin color help them overcome hostile forces? Does it allow us to win the next battle? Do rainbow bullets and flags scare away folks? Yet, that is what we are spending our time on, and we can't even pay our men and women in uniform. Literally, the Air Force is saying sorry, we can't give you bonuses right now because they have mismanaged their budget, and they are having to spend money on positions like this. China and our other enemies do not care about feelings. Why are we funding divisive programs and divisive positions rather than positions focused on advancing and training the strongest and best military in the world? That is the purpose of the amendment. It is great that this bill eliminates the statutory requirement that we have such a position, but we ought to end this divvying us up by race. It is, in the words of the Chief Justice, a sordid business to divvy us up by race rather than to ensure that we have the best trained and finest fighting force in the world. Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. ROY

Mr. ROY. Mr. Chairman, earlier today the ranking member of the House Rules Committee accused me of offering a racist amendment. It was racist and that was because it said that we shouldn't have policies under DEI encouraging that any race is inherently superior or inferior to any other race, color, or national origin; the United States being a fundamentally racist country, the Declaration of Independence or Constitution of the United States are fundamentally racist documents; an individual's moral character or worth is determined by the individual's race, color, or national origin; an individual, by virtue of the individual's race is inherently racist or oppressive, whether consciously or unconsciously; or that an individual, because of the individual's race, bears responsibility for the actions committed by other members of the individual's race, color, or national origin. The fact is we have DEI positions like that held by Kelisa Wing where she talked about ``CAUdacity'' to say that Black people can be racist too. That is what is happening. We are inculcating racist positions at the Department of Defense. I support my friend's amendment to strike these racist positions. The Department of Defense should be colorblind so we can defend the United States of America instead of having social engineering experiments that are wrapped in a uniform.

Mr. ROY

Mr. ROY. Mr. Speaker, I take issue with the characterization of what has transpired with respect to the legislation before us. We have passed, by voice vote even, four bipartisan en bloc amendments with items like China, Taiwan, readiness, munitions, and Israel--a host of issues that do not fall into the category that the ranking member raises, which I am happy to address in a moment. There are countless other amendments that we have raised and addressed. For example, my friend Mr. Rosendale's amendment, which I know is near and dear to the heart of Mr. Griffith from Virginia, limits indefinite detention. There are other amendments. For example, Mr. Norman's requires that any Department of Defense component that fails to pass an independent audit have 1\1/2\ percent of its budget returned to the Treasury for deficit reduction. These are a lot of very good, commonsense amendments. We went through the process, combed through 1,500 amendments, and made decisions in the Rules Committee on how to equitably bring them to the floor. They cover the gamut of issues that the American people are concerned about when they see their Department of Defense no longer able to defend the United States. That is the question. I hear the ranking member talking about how we are injecting culture wars into the National Defense Authorization Act or injecting culture wars into the military when, in fact, it is this administration that has turned the Department of Defense into a social engineering experiment wrapped in a uniform. That is what is happening. That is what the American people see. When the American people see advertisements in June with rainbow bullets strapped to helmets, when they see surgeries for transgender people being funded by taxpayers at the Department of Defense, and when they see the Department of Defense ignoring existing law, existing precedent, and existing traditionally historic bipartisan agreements on Hyde amendment protections, then they see the Department of Defense being turned into a social engineering experiment. Of course, the people's House is responding to an executive branch that is making policy by executive fiat not just, of course, in this area but across the entirety of the Federal Government. So, yes, we are offering amendments to address these things. An Air Force Academy deck slide instructs cadets to use language like ``parents and caregivers'' instead of ``moms and dads.'' Well, that is a really great use of time for the Air Force Academy. Don't refer to the phrase ``mom and dad.'' Boy, that will do it. The United States Special Operations Command's diversity and inclusion strategic plan claims that diversity and inclusion are operational imperatives. The Marines tweeted a Pride Month image, as I pointed out, with rainbow-tipped bullets. This stuff is happening every day. When I go talk to military recruits and talk to the recruiters, they are struggling. They are not even able to make their recruiting goals. They are well under their numbers. Why? Because the target audience of people who want to serve in the military don't want to be preached to. They don't want to have their entire worldview being questioned by the leaders and the brass in the military. We are trying to stop that. We would like to make the military focused on killing people and blowing stuff up again because that is what a military is supposed to be for--sparingly used and not in endless wars, but ready and able to defend the United States of America. The American people I talk to back home don't want a weak military. They don't want a woke military. They don't want rainbow propaganda on bases. They don't want to pay for troops' sex changes. The American people want a military that can provide for security and win wars. Mr. Speaker, that is what we are doing with this legislation, and I am proud to support the rule.