Bobby Scott

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, this amendment would add all international organizations as foreign sources that universities must report funding from under section 117. It would include the United Nations, UNESCO, the World Health Organization, and the World Trade Organization. These multinational organizations, many of which have significant participation by the United States, should not be deemed as necessarily national security threats. This amendment would expand the burdensome section 117 compliance without giving any clear reason of how it would protect national security. For that reason, I oppose the amendment. Mr. Chair, I urge my colleagues to vote ``no,'' and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, I am prepared to close, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent to include in the Record a letter from the American Council on Education signed by 18 national higher education organizations.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, part of the letter reads: ``While we understand the concern regarding foreign funding to U.S. institutions in higher education is bipartisan, we believe the DETERRENT Act is duplicative of existing interagency efforts, unnecessary, and puts in place a problematic expansion of the data collection by the U.S. Department of Education that will broadly curtail important needed international research collaboration and academic and cultural exchanges.'' Mr. Chairman, I think that applies to this amendment, too. Mr. Chairman, I hope Members vote ``no'' on the amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to offer this Democratic amendment in the nature of a substitute to H.R. 5933. My Democratic colleagues and I remain committed to ensuring institutions have sufficient resources to safeguard their work from undue foreign influence. Nevertheless, while I appreciate the majority's interest in addressing this important issue, I fear that their proposal is far too extreme and does not actually promote institutional compliance. Specifically, with such harsh fines and limited opportunities for institutions to seek guidance, I am concerned that these changes to section 117 of the Higher Education Act will discourage institutions from collaborating with international entities that are essential in solving important global issues. It is also very concerning to see language that targets individual faculty members for their collaboration with foreign entities. We have seen, in cases such as the wrongfully accused MIT faculty member, that this sort of targeting can easily lead to harmful consequences rooted in xenophobia for innocent scholars. We must always strive to strike a balance between enforcing the law and fostering safe campuses for students, scholars, and faculty. Through its overlapping and overly burdensome requirements, harsh penalties, and duplicities to current foreign influence requirements across Federal agencies, the DETERRENT Act takes a sledgehammer to a problem that needs to be addressed with a scalpel. The Democratic substitute makes a thoughtful approach to section 117 compliance to support institutions as they evaluate and implement their research integrity and foreign influence policies. In addition to requiring the filing of annual reports for gifts and contracts from foreign entities, our bill would create a robust database at the Department of Education to hold these reports. It establishes commonsense sanctions for noncompliance that allow for room to help institutions that need support scaling up their compliance work. Moreover, it establishes a single point of contact at the Department to coordinate section 117 compliance. It also builds on the work being done through the implementation of the Chips and Science Act and the ``Presidential Memorandum on United States Government-Supported Research and Development National Security Guidelines'' by aligning important requirements to those of other Federal agencies and requiring the Secretary of Education to go through negotiated rulemaking to address key implementation aspects of section 117. Mr. Chair, I urge my colleagues to support the Democratic substitute, rather than the underlying bill, to enhance institutions' real ability to protect against foreign influence. Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Chairman, may I inquire as to the time remaining.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Chair, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson Lee).

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Chair, I yield an additional 15 seconds to the gentlewoman from Texas.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Chair, I yield myself the balance of my time. Mr. Chair, in the committee chair's remarks, she mentioned that there is a difference between countries of concern and other countries. I remind her that we just passed an amendment that essentially eliminated that difference. A recorded vote was requested, and perhaps she could join me in trying to defeat that amendment to the bill. This amendment in the nature of a substitute significantly increases the gifts and contracts that need to be reported compared to present law. It takes a more moderate approach to national security than the underlying bill, which I think is an extreme approach. It will be very difficult for colleges to comply with. For that reason, I hope that we adopt the Democratic amendment in the nature of a substitute and, if not, defeat the underlying bill. Mr. Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Chair, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Chair, I rise in opposition to the amendment and the underlying bill. House Republicans' partisan bill is an attack on students, workers, and families. For 2024, the bill would cut close to $64 billion, roughly 28 percent from the Department of Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies. The last time it was this low was in 2008. Inequity in America's education system persists. Significant funding disparities among neighboring schools continue to rob students of equal access to quality education, and this bill cuts title I significantly. Moreover, the bill cuts other programs like completely eliminating the Federal Work-Study that allows students to work their way through college; the Teacher Quality Partnership; the Job Corps, completely eliminated. There are essential programs that workers in our districts rely on, and if this becomes law, those programs would be eliminated. This amendment would cut Federal student aid, making it more likely that they would have to take out student loans. The underlying bill is bad enough. It is the first time in over a decade that the Pell grant wouldn't increase. Also, our Nation is facing disturbing child labor law violations, and House Republicans are slashing the OSHA budget. Despite actively negotiating bipartisan reauthorization for the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act, we are proposing cuts in adult and youth job training programs. Finally, the bill is an insult to families. It cuts Head Start programs so drastically, if this bill were to become law, 50,000 children would lose access to childcare. Mr. Chair, I would ask that we oppose the amendment and the underlying bill, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Chair, we know that the most effective way for young people to get into the middle class is with an education. Those without an education are going to have challenges. Whatever station of life you come from, if you get a good education, you have got a good shot at the American Dream. When President Johnson signed the Higher Education Act back in 1965, he said that essentially any student in any State could apply to any college or university and not be turned away because their family is poor. This amendment essentially eliminates that powerful promise. What is the vision for administering the opportunity to get an education? How are you going to get a Pell grant if you don't have anywhere to apply? How are you going to administer student loans? This just eliminates the opportunity for young people to get the education they deserve. I would hope that we would not adopt this amendment and, in fact, not even adopt the underlying bill. We need to make sure those opportunities are there.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Madam Speaker, I rise today in support of the resolution offered by the gentleman from Utah, Mr. Owens. America's institutions of higher education should be welcoming learning environments for all students and faculty. I strongly denounce antisemitism: it has no place on our Nation's campuses. That said, the resolution does not completely paint an accurate picture of what took place on some of the campuses it mentions. For example, while the resolution describes the actions taken by a Stanford instructor, it does not report that the instructor was suspended by the University. Furthermore, the resolution fails to acknowledge that the Brandeis University Student Union, as the University described in a statement designed to correct the record, ``decided to strongly condemn Hamas, and it has communicated its stance to the Brandeis community, and the media more broadly.'' As a co-equal branch of the federal government, Congressional documents should be accurate and reflect the truth of the matters they assert. We must be especially careful when pointing out instances of antisemitism as my colleagues in the majority have reminded us before, accusations of racism (including antisemitism) are easily weaponized in our modern era. Congress must also be vigilant to ensure that college campuses remain places where freedom of speech and thought are maintained. I know this is an important issue to my colleagues in the majority as they have convened multiple hearings on free speech on campuses. As we denounce actions that create unsafe spaces for Jewish students on our Nation's campus, we must also recognize that while the First Amendment does not protect threats or fighting words, it does protect unpopular and abhorrent speech. It is in trying and tense political moments like this that it is easy for us to forget our truly American ideals with regard to free speech--debates on issues like this are simply outlawed in other Western democracies. I firmly believe the solution to bad speech is more speech. To that end, we should reject attempts to restrict student association or limit speech that may feel comforting but compromise the very freedoms that make America exceptional. I commend the American Civil Liberties Union for their open letter to College and University leaders asking them to reject efforts to restrict constitutionally protected speech on campuses. The inaccuracies in the resolution, and concerns about free speech notwithstanding, we realize that instances of antisemitism on college campuses have risen precipitously in the past few weeks. And while this recent rise is attributable to events in Israel and Gaza, the fact is antisemitic acts on college campuses have been on the rise for the last six years. As such, H. Res. 798 is a missed opportunity, to recognize that issues of racial hostility on college campuses are broader and older than the events it cites. Over six years ago, after an uptick in racial incidents on college campuses, I wrote a letter to Chairwoman Foxx requesting a hearing ``to examine how institutions of higher education are meeting their responsibility under title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Title VI prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, or national origin in `any program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.'1A'' In that letter, I contextualized attempts by the Trump Administration to investigate the use of race in admissions, use that had recently been affirmed in the Supreme Court case Fisher v. University of Texas-Austin (Fisher II). While some of us may have forgotten, 2017 saw a marked increase in racially hostile events on campuses. In a 2017 report describing the uptick in racially hostile events on campus, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) said ``White supremacists, emboldened by the 2016 elections and the current political climate, are currently engaged in an unprecedented outreach effort to attract and recruit students on American college campuses.'' Jonathan Greenblatt, CEO of the ADL, was quoted in that same report saying ``[w]hile there have been recruitment efforts in the past, never have we seen antisemites and white supremacists so focused on outreach to students on campus.'' Some of the most infamous events in that year included: the hanging of nooses with bananas in them on the campus of American University the day after the election of the school's first black student body president, Ms. Taylor Dumpson; the racially charged murder of Richard Collins, III, a black ROTC student at Bowie State University, during a visit to the University of Maryland, College Park; and the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia in which white supremacists marched unmasked through the grounds of the University of Virginia, carrying torches and chanting racist and Anti-Semitic phrases such as ``Jews will not replace us!'' and ``Blood and Soil!'', direct allusions to Anti-Semitic conspiracy theories and Nazi sentiments from the 1930s. Later that weekend, counter-protestor Heather Heyer was murdered, and 35 others injured by an attacker in his car as they protested the Anti-Semitic and racist presence in Charlottesville. My request for a hearing on this issue was ignored, and instead, I convened, in partnership with House Judiciary then-Ranking Member John Conyers, an issue forum on September 8, 2017 entitled, ``Affirmative Action, Inclusion, and Racial Climate on America's Campuses.'' In my prepared remarks for that forum, I said: The presence of some students of color at some predominantly white institutions is questioned, even though those same schools afford advantages to legacy students, families of wealthy donors, and students who have benefited from high-quality education because of the inequities in the educational system. When confronted with racist behavior on campus, students are often told that the First Amendment protects such behavior. Since that initial request in 2017, I welcome the recognition by the majority that colleges have a duty to provide healthy learning environments for all students. This is a point Democrats have made consistently in the wake of issues surrounding racial hostility and free speech on college campuses. We have done so while having to hear past and current colleagues mock students as ``snowflakes'' and assert the problem when it comes to free speech on campus is that students are not being allowed to ``freely express their beliefs without the fear of retribution from fellow students, faculty, and administrators.'' I am glad that the majority has finally woken up to the realization that free speech issues cannot be separated from demographic changes on campus, the legacy of structural racism and the recent explosion in hate speech on campus. I only wish that the majority would realize that the same protections that apply to Jewish students must be enforced for other students as well. Under the majority's leadership in the House, we have had multiple hearings and markups where the mere existence of trans students has been questioned. Research shows that due to stigma, trans youth experience depression and suicidal ideation at disproportionate rates compared to their peers. Recent data from the CDC show that transgender youth are 10 times more likely to experience homelessness. Transgender students are also more likely to feel unsafe at school, to experience bullying and other forms of violence including being threatened with a weapon at school, and social isolation. Experiences of a hostile school climate, potentially compounded by an unstable living situation, lead to disproportionate drop out rates for these students. Title IX of the Education Amendments Act of 1972, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity, was modeled after Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964; in the same way schools have to provide safe learning environments to all students irrespective of race, they must also do so irrespective of sexual orientation or gender identity. Democrats have consistently raised this issue only for it to fall on deaf ears with our majority colleagues. Our committee has held multiple hearings and markups where the idea of having professionals tasked with making sure our colleges and universities are diverse, equitable, and inclusive (DEI) has been ridiculed. We have attempted to explain that institutions of higher education that were not designed to serve diverse student populations are facing specific challenges related to the changing demographics of their student bodies, and having DEI personnel on hand to address these issues can help schools foster the healthy learning environment all students need. To suggest that efforts aimed at inclusion are somehow responsible for the proliferation of AntiSemitic acts on college campuses, as the sponsor of this resolution suggested in closing debate on the resolution, defies belief. Under Title VI, institutions of higher education have a duty to provide safe learning environments for all students. What's true for Jewish students now was just as true for Black and Brown students six years ago. This resolution could recognize the universality of the charge in our civil rights laws and call for an end to hostility towards all students on campus based on race, religion, sexual orientation and gender identity, but it fails to do so, and as such is a missed opportunity. And while some might claim that antisemitic behavior is what is on the rise now, the Federal Bureau of Investigations Director Christopher Wray in testimony to Congress just this week highlighted that events in the Middle East are resulting in increases in threats against both Jewish Americans and Muslim Americans--explicitly referencing the murder of a six-year old boy for no other reason than he was Muslim, an incident the FBI is currently investigating as a federal hate crime. As I did in 2017, I continue to support efforts to ensure that all schools are safe and healthy learning environments for students. For that reason, I support H. Res. 798. Hate has no place on college campuses, and speech that has crossed the line into threats and hostility directed at Jewish students, or any other group of students, must be exposed and denounced. I firmly believe that colleges and universities can live up to their Title VI obligations to all students, provide forums for students to exercise their rights of free speech and free expression, and be the cauldrons of thought that produce the critical thinkers our country needs to solve the challenges of today and the future.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Chair, I rise in opposition to H.R. 4368, the Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2024. This bill falls woefully short of adequately investing in important programs and policies that support the American people. The bill's provisions targeting low-income women, infants, and children are especially concerning. The insufficient funding included in H.R. 4368 jeopardizes access to food and critical services for low and moderate income pregnant and postpartum women, infants and children by drastically underfunding the program and undermining science-based WIC food benefits. This is especially concerning as the country continues to face an infant and maternal health crisis. For over 25 years, there has been a bipartisan commitment to provide sufficient WIC funding to serve all eligible applicants and maintain the longstanding no-waitlist commitment--until now. The House agriculture appropriations bill purports to fund WIC at $6 billion for Fiscal Year (FY) 2024, but the bill also demands a $500 million rescission in a later section. Realistically, the bill only funds WIC at $5.5 billion. This is $800 million below the President's budget request for FY 2024 ($6.3 billion) and $185 million lower than the level of funding made available in FY 2023 ($5.685 billion). Last month, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) outlined the need for an additional $1.4 billion in Fiscal Year 2024 funding for WIC due to a significant increase in participation this fiscal year with a total of 6.7 million women, children, and infants being served by the program as of June. OMB has warned that without additional funding, participants could see disruptions in benefits. To prevent any disruption to a program crucial to supporting new parents and young children, it is vital that WIC funding be increased to align with projected participation and food costs as the process moves forward. Under the funding levels included in the House agriculture appropriations bill, up to 600,000 eligible new parents and children-- including 11,600 Virginians could be turned away from the program. While WIC participation is increasing, this bill also drastically cuts WIC's increased science-backed fruit and vegetable benefits for roughly 1.5 million pregnant and postpartum participants and 3.5 million children aged one to four. The bill reduces the monthly fruit and vegetable benefit from $25 to $11 for child participants, from $44 to $13 for pregnant and postpartum participants, and from $49 to $15 for breastfeeding participants. Current benefit levels ensure that participating women and children have access to recommended levels of fruits and vegetables, thus improving health outcomes and program retention. Pre-pandemic benefits of $8 for children and $11 for pregnant, postpartum, or breastfeeding participants allowed for less than a one-cup equivalent of fruits and vegetables per day, woefully short of the recommended amounts. In addition to insufficient funding for WIC, the bill includes other harmful provisions targeting nutrition programs. For example, the bill includes a rider that rejects a pending rule to revise WIC Food Packages. Additional riders reject nutrition standards in both school meals programs as well as the Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP). These harmful riders weaken the science-based process that determines nutrition standards and criteria in child nutrition and related programs. A dozen health organization and other stakeholders, including the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Heart Association, the American Public Health Association, the National WIC Association, and UnidosUS implored Congress not to include harmful nutrition-related riders and to maintain and respect the current science-based processes. In addition to the threats to the health and well-being of women and children, this bill would harm farmers as they recover financially from the COVID-19 pandemic. Specifically, this legislation strips funding from Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) programs enacted last Congress. Rescinding the IRA funding will harm farmers as they recover losses suffered during the COVID-19 pandemic. The decision to divest from food security and those who produce the food and fiber we depend on is short sighted. I am also alarmed by amendments to curtail the United States Department of Agriculture's (USDA) work to advance equity and inclusion. For far too long, farmers of color, female farmers, and farmers who identify as LGBTQI+ have faced discrimination in farm lending. Restricting the USDA's ability to address these failures is detrimental to achieving the USDA's mission and ensuring food security. For these reasons and many others, I urge my colleagues to oppose the bill.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Chair, I claim the time in opposition.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Chair, this amendment, as the gentleman from Wisconsin has said, prohibits funds from being used to finalize, implement, administer, or enforce the milk section of USDA's proposed rule that aligns nutrition standards to the 2020 dietary guidelines for Americans. This appropriations rider is preemptive as the final rule hadn't even been released by the Department, and it is out of place because this issue should be taken up within the context of a child nutrition reauthorization, not an appropriations rider. This amendment disregards the normal scientific process currently being undertaken to establish the nutrition guidelines. School meals and beverages are required to be consistent with the dietary guidelines for Americans, which are evidence-based recommendations set to provide nutritional guidance. This amendment would effectively undermine the unbiased, evidence- based process that ensures that children receive the most nutritious meals and replace that scientifically based process with a political process. It is critical that science continue to guide the process in determining options in schools and that the regulations are updated to align with the newest dietary guidelines using a process that intentionally allows for adaptations in line with the latest scientific and expert recommendations. Importantly, the Department of Agriculture has specifically requested public feedback on the proposed milk options for consideration when crafting the final rule. The bottom line is that scientific experts, not politicians, should be the ones to determine the nutrition standards and ensure that our children get the healthiest meals possible. A dozen organizations, including the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, the American Academy of Pediatrics, and the American Heart Association, have all urged Congress to continue to respect the scientific-based process and not interfere with the normal procedure. Mr. Chair, I urge a ``no'' vote on the amendment, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to acknowledge that 20 years ago, on September 4, 2003, President George W. Bush signed the Prison Rape Elimination Act, or PREA, into law. This law recognized the difficult truth of rampant and completely unacceptable sexual abuse of people in our jails, prisons, and juvenile detention facilities, and endeavored to address it. PREA sought to end these abuses by creating research mandates, promulgating National standards, and providing grant funding to meet those standards. Ending prisoner rape remains one of the increasingly rare topics on which people on both sides of the aisle can continue to agree. I joined forces with my Virginia colleague, Congressman Frank Wolf, to sponsor the bill in this chamber, and Senators Ted Kennedy and Jeff Sessions sponsored PREA in the Senate. PREA passed with unanimous support in both the House and Senate. Fighting against institutional abuse and protecting those who cannot advocate for themselves should never be a partisan issue, and I have been gratified by the coalition of support PREA has inspired over the years. Since PREA's passage, we've seen dramatic improvements in how adults and children in detention are treated. Thousands of corrections professionals have been hired and trained to ensure the safety of people in their custody through the implementation of PREA's National standards. The U.S. Department of Justice is now required to gather data on sexual abuse in custody that provides corrections facilities, advocates and policymakers with invaluable information on the dynamics of sexual abuse in detention, and how it can be stopped. Hundreds of thousands of incarcerated people are educated every year about their right to be safe and respected, and how to speak out if they are not. Incarcerated people, their families, and advocates now have more effective methods of reporting sexual abuse, as evidenced by the dramatic increase in the number of reports we have seen since PREA's enactment. This is a clear sign that incarcerated survivors understand that people care about their experiences, that they have mechanisms to advocate for themselves, and that their voices should no longer go unheard. Through these efforts and sustained support for survivors, the stigma of reporting abuse has been steadily eroding since PREA's passage. I also want to acknowledge the broad-based coalition of advocates and civil rights groups that fought to pass PREA, encourage corrections facilities to implement PREA's National standards, and continue to ensure that the law lives up to its intended purpose and promise. Specifically, people who have endured this abuse have been on the front lines of the effort to make our prisons and jails places where people are free of sexual abuse. Just Detention International's Survivor Council deserves special mention. These courageous survivors have fought tirelessly to ensure that no one ever has to face abuse and to instill in all of us the principle that no matter what crime a person has committed, rape is not part of the penalty. The work we set out to do with PREA is by no means over. Rape in prisons is still far too common. And young people, LGBTQ+ individuals, immigrants, and people who come from communities of color are more affected by this crisis than others. The recent cases of staff sexual abuse in California at the Federal Correctional Institution Dublin (FCI-Dublin) at the highest levels expose and illustrate the impunity with which many staff perpetrators still operate. Making things worse, the dozens of women at FCI-Dublin who were abused could not initially get support services. This highlights a larger problem of a lack of resources for community service providers. Prisons, jails, and youth detention facilities nationwide must commit to implementing the National Prison Rape Elimination Act standards. This doesn't mean merely changing policies as they're written on paper. It means meaningfully adopting those policies and shifting the culture on the ground in detention facilities. This encompasses everything from safer reporting procedures for survivors to stronger investigations after an assault occurs. We must empower staff to identify signs that incarcerated people are being abused, and to identify red flags in staff behavior that could result in abuse. We must also have more confidential emotional support services in prisons, especially from community providers, so that survivors can get the help they deserve. And finally, we must end the culture of impunity and the code of silence among staff which allows abuse to flourish. As I have before, I call on the Department of Justice to work vigorously to ensure that every state implements PREA to protect all inmates from sexual violence. Mr. Speaker, on the 20th anniversary of its enactment, let us take this moment to recognize the ways that PREA marked an important shift in how we, as a country, deal with this violence. Sexual abuse in detention may not be a secret epidemic anymore, but it is incumbent upon us to actualize the goal set out in this historic law and end this crisis, once and for all. Let me say again: rape is not part of the penalty.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I speak in opposition to H.R. 3941, the scapegoating not solutions act. It is frustrating that we are taking up another proposal that, among other things, purports to improve school safety, yet does nothing to address school safety, does nothing to address learning loss, does nothing to address gun violence in the schools or improve students' mental health. Regrettably, so far this Congress, House Republicans' priorities for K-12 education focused entirely on culture wars. First, they passed legislation that would facilitate the banning of books. Then the House advanced a bill to seek to bar trans students from participating in sports activities. House Republicans are currently working on a budget that makes devastating cuts to Federal support of education. Now the House is considering yet another proposal to threaten to strip away funding from schools and institutions of higher learning if they use any of their facilities to temporarily house asylum seekers or undocumented immigrants in an emergency other than those caused by a disaster. The message is clear: If you do not support this extreme agenda, congressional Republicans will pull your support for education. Republicans have also falsely implied that temporarily using school facilities to provide shelter diverts educational resources from students already impacted by learning loss, and yet, they present no evidence to support this claim. We can't meaningfully address learning loss or meet students' mental health needs if we are talking about taking away Federal funds from schools and institutions of higher learning that are not aligned with the Republicans' extreme agenda. Republicans also claim that this bill is about school safety. Let's remember that this bill prohibits emergency sheltering of undocumented immigrants except due to disasters. If it is not a disaster, and it is an emergency, you can't house the immigrants. If it is not an emergency, there is no prohibition. You can house the undocumented immigrants all year just so long as it is not an emergency. If it is a disaster, there is no prohibition. You can also house other people. If it is school safety, how about housing defendants awaiting trial in pretrial detention or those on work release? How about housing them? No prohibition against that. This isn't about school safety. We can't talk about protecting school safety without addressing gun violence. The reality is that Republicans have done nothing about gun violence in schools, which we know causes the greatest threat to our children's safety. We have repeatedly said that any conversation about school safety that doesn't meaningfully address gun violence is not a serious conversation. H.R. 3941 does not address the real issues confronting our students today, and that is ending gun violence and helping students address learning loss and threatens to take funds away from schools and institutions of higher learning. I, therefore, urge my colleagues to oppose the bill and reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as she may consume to the gentlewoman from Oregon (Ms. Bonamici).

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, prior to yielding to the gentleman from New York, I yield myself 1 minute to remind the gentleman about what his bill actually does. It does not prohibit the sheltering of anyone other than undocumented immigrants in an emergency short term. I mean, long term and not in an emergency, that is okay. Other people, that is okay. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Goldman).

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I yield an additional 1 minute to the gentleman from New York.

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Connolly).

Mr. SCOTT of Virginia. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New Mexico (Mr. Vasquez).