Chris Smith

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding. Madam Speaker, in 2018, doctors routinely diagnose and treat illnesses and disabilities suffered by the littlest patients: unborn babies as well as newborns. They enhance both the child's health and longevity. Abortionists, on the other hand, take a far different approach. They dismember and chemically poison children to death for profit. For decades, babies have survived later term abortions. A Philadelphia Inquirer story some thirty-seven years ago called baby survival ``the dreaded complication.'' In other words, it is a complication that a child survives. I got involved in the pro-life movement when I read an AP story of a child who survived a later term abortion. The abortion rights movement then, in 1972, before Roe v. Wade--it was in New York--were apoplectic about it because the baby survived. That should have been a reason for rejoicing. Dr. Willard Cates of the CDC was breathtakingly candid when he said: ``Live births are little known because organized medicine, from fear of public clamor and legal action, treats them more as an embarrassment to be hushed up rather than a problem to be solved. It's like turning yourself in to the IRS, he said. What is there to gain? The tendency is not to report because there are only negative incentives.'' An undercover investigator asked an abortionist: What do you do? What is your protocol when the child is born alive? He said: ``I mean the key is, you need to pay attention to who's in the room, right?'' That was what he was quoted as saying. We are talking about coverup, ensuring that the people who are in the abortion clinic all gag themselves and not speak to the truth of what has happened when a baby has been killed after birth. The legislation today requires a significant penalty for healthcare practitioners present at the time the child survives the abortion, exercise the same degree of skill, care, and diligence to preserve the life and health of the child, and then get them to a hospital. This is humane legislation. I urge my colleagues to support it.

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I thank my good friend for yielding. Mr. Speaker, doctors, today, routinely diagnose and treat a myriad of illnesses and diseases suffered by societies' littlest patients--unborn babies and newborns--significantly enhancing both the children's health and longevity. Abortionists, on the other hand, take a different approach. They dismember and chemically kill unborn children for profit. For decades, babies have survived later term abortions. As far back as 37 years ago, a Philadelphia Inquirer story called baby survival ``the dreaded complication.'' Dr. Willard Cates of the Center for Disease Control said live births ``are little known because organized medicine, from fear of public clamor and legal action, treats them more as an embarrassment to be hushed up than a problem to be solved. It is like turning yourself in to the IRS for an audit. What is there to gain? The tendency is not to report because there are only negative incentives.'' Of course, the tendency is not to report. When an undercover investigator asked another abortion provider from Planned Parenthood about the procedure for checking for signs of life in a baby born after an attempted abortion, the abortionist responded by saying: ``I mean, the key is, you need to pay attention to who is in the room. . . . `' Philadelphia abortionist Kermit Gosnell had a lot of people in the room, but nobody was reporting, as he killed and snipped the spinal cords of hundreds of born babies to ensure that they didn't survive. All is not well in the abortion clinics either, in terms of their own personnel. The National Public Radio, NPR, did an incisive story featuring former Planned Parenthood Director Abby Huffman, who is now Johnson, who is now pro-life, and her outreach to clinical workers encouraging them to quit their jobs inside the abortion clinics. Heard on ``All Things Considered,'' Annette Lancaster, a former manager of Planned Parenthood in North Carolina, said her abortion work made her feel ``dark and morbid.'' Annette said she was troubled by the way she and other workers referred to fetal remains. She said: ``I just now started being able to use my deep freezer in my home by going through therapy, because we used to call the freezer the `nursery.''' That is to say for the dead babies. The National Abortion Federation, in their textbook for abortionists, says: ``Providers should consider the possibility of a live-born fetus, particularly if fetal death is not induced prior to the procedure and the gestational age is 18 to 20 weeks or more.'' ``Besides the emotional and ethical difficulties for patients, their partners, and staff, a delivery with signs of life may have legal implications.'' The problem with existing law, Mr. Speaker, is enforcement--the lack of legal implications.

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Marsha Blackburn's bill, the Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act, requires, under penalty of law, that appropriate healthcare to be given to any child who survives an attempted abortion, not looking the other way, as has been done for decades--Gosnell probably being the most egregious example. The law prescribes that: ``Any healthcare practitioner present at the time the child is born shall exercise the same degree of professional skill, care, and diligence to preserve the life and health of the child as a reasonably diligent and conscientious healthcare practitioner would render to any other child born alive at the same gestational age; following the exercise of skill, care, and diligence . . . ensure that the child born alive is immediately transported to a hospital.'' The bill also establishes strong criminal penalties for practitioners who violate this requirement; establishes a civil right of action for the mother of the child, to enforce the law; and the mother of the child born alive may not be prosecuted under this law.

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 3445, the African Growth and Opportunity Act and Millennium Challenge Act Modernization Act. I am an original cosponsor of H.R. 3445, and as Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Africa subcommittee, I want to applaud Chairman Royce, Ranking Member Elliot Engel, and the Ranking Member of my subcommittee, Karen Bass, for their commitment to Africa and to enhancing trade, and all the benefits in terms of closer relationships that flow from trade, between the people of the United States and the people of Africa. The original AGOA Act of 2000 has been called a ``cornerstone'' of our trade policy toward the continent, and it has served us well. Over the years, however, our subcommittee has had numerous hearings--not to mention meetings with African heads of state and ambassadors--on AGOA, increasing exports to Africa, and on cultivating the-rule-of-law reforms necessary to attract business and investment to Africa. In past Congresses I introduced the Increasing American Jobs Through Greater Exports to Africa Act. It has become apparent that, as well as AGOA has served us, there is room for improvement and innovation. H.R. 3445 marks a step toward that, by emphasizing capacity building and training and encouraging entrepreneurship in Africa. Importantly, it acknowledges that the world has changed since 2000, and that Africa has been targeted by radical extremists such as Boko Haram and al- Shabaab. Recognizing that we now live in a post-2001 world, H.R. 3445 fosters compliance with our counterterrorism initiatives by African businesses and institutions. Africa, and much of the developing world, has also benefitted from the Millennium Challenge Corporation since passage of the Millennium Challenge Act of 2003. MCC is a critical partner, for example, in our Global Food Security strategy, which fosters agriculture-led economic development. Though MCC has played a key role, there are also room for improvements. Sometimes during the country selection process, narratives about a country become set, and there is not a fresh appraisal of evidence regarding improvements, or backsliding, in the conditions of that country. I'd like to thank Chairman Royce for working to ensure that MCC remains a vehicle focused on assisting countries with development, and does not become diverted from its original mission. I urge my colleagues to join me in support of H.R. 3445, the African Growth and Opportunity Act and Millennium Challenge Act Modernization Act.

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I thank Mr. Olson for those very strong comments. I feel the same way about his great leadership for all these years. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Biggs), a member of the Judiciary Committee and the Science, Space, and Technology Committee.

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, it is my privilege and honor, as we approach the March for Life on Friday, to remember the infamous Supreme Court decision that has resulted in the loss of some 60 million unborn babies and tens of millions of women who have been harmed. Sixty million have been killed, a number that equates with the entire population of England, as a result of that very misguided and sad and tragic decision. It is my honor, as we open up this Special Order, to yield to Congresswoman Jackie Walorski from Indiana, a distinguished Member of this body who serves on the Ways and Means Committee.

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for her very strong and powerful statement. Mr. Speaker, I now yield to Robert Pittenger from North Carolina, who is the author of the No Abortion Bonds Act, a bill that would close loopholes in the Tax Code that allow abortion providers to finance new clinics and facilities with local bonds that are exempt from Federal taxes. Congressman Pittenger serves on the Financial Services Committee.

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, we do have several physicians who serve in this Congress who are very, very pro-life and very eloquent in their defense of life. I yield to Congressman Andy Harris, who is associated, obviously, with Johns Hopkins, the gentleman from Maryland.

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I thank Dr. Harris for his very eloquent remarks and for reminding us that this is the greatest human rights struggle on Earth. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from North Carolina (Ms. Foxx), the chairwoman of the Education and the Workforce Committee. Ms. Foxx has been a lifelong leader on the issue of life and, of course, in leadership, and now as a full committee chairman. I thank the gentlewoman for all she does on behalf of the unborn and their mothers each and every day.

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I thank Chairwoman Foxx again for her very moving words, which are backed up by her actions each and every day. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Walberg), who serves on the Energy and Commerce Committee and the Education and the Workforce Committee.

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. I yield to the distinguished gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Banks), who is a member of the Navy Reserve and who serves on the House Armed Services Committee; the Veterans' Affairs Committee; and the Space, Science, and Technology Committee. He is championing the Patients First Act to prioritize ethical stem cell research that will help patients and do no harm to the youngest members of the human family.

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his remarks. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Kelly), from the Third District, a member of the Committee on Ways and Means.

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I just remind everyone this is a total team effort. One of the beauties of the pro-life movement--and I have been in it for 45 years--is that it is filled with incredibly compassionate, selfless people who would do anything to help the weakest and the most vulnerable. So I thank the gentleman for his leadership for all these years. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from West Virginia (Mr. Jenkins), who is the famous gentleman who serves on the Appropriations Committee where so many of these battles are engaged.

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I thank my good friend for his comments. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Rothfus), a pro-life leader who has been a leader in educating members of our Conference about the dangers of assisted suicide. He serves on the Financial Services Committee. He has been, of course, a great leader in defending the unborn and their moms.

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. I thank the gentleman for his eloquent statements and remarks. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Bergman). General Jack Bergman is a retired three-star general of the Marine Corps, and he serves on the Veterans' Affairs, Budget, and Natural Resources Committees.

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Georgia (Jody B. Hice), who is co-chair of the Values Action Team. It is worth noting that he is part of the team back home that has now been ranked number 8 by Americans United for Life in what they call the ``Life List'' because of the legislation and the policies that have come forward in Georgia to protect life. He was a pastor before coming to Congress and has been a leader for religious liberty as well in the House.

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Grothman), who is from Wisconsin's Sixth District. He is a member of the House Budget Committee, the Education and the Workforce Committee, and the Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Graves), who is the chairman of the Water Resources and Environment Subcommittee.

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his very eloquent remarks. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Olson), who serves on the Energy and Commerce Committee. He has long pushed for transparency and led a landmark effort on Federal payments to Federal abortions providers. He recently led an amicus brief supporting his State's right not to be forced to fund Planned Parenthood.

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Johnson).

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Kansas (Mr. Estes), who serves on the Education and the Workforce Committee and the Homeland Security Committee. His home State of Kansas was just ranked number five as the most pro-life State in the country by AUL's 2018 Life List. I thank him for his leadership all these years as well.

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Abraham), a member of Armed Services Committee; the Agriculture Committee; and the Science, Space, and Technology Committee.

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Rodney Davis).

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Smucker).

Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.