Mark Souder

Mr. SOUDER

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Chairman, I thank my friend from Georgia for yielding me this time, and I want to commend the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Boehner) in his efforts with this. And I rise completely opposed to this amendment, which is basically a masquerade to go back to the days of old when you could stay in school forever. You could not take a job unless it paid just the amount you wanted, even though many people take jobs right at the poverty line or just above. They work hard and they pay their taxes. But, no, this bill would enable them to stay and say, oh, I do not want that job, it does not pay quite enough. The way an individual moves up in the workplace is to get an entry level job and ask, how do I move to the next level, get training to move to the next level? It is not going to college forever; it is focused. But I rise as chairman of the Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, Drug Policy and Human Resources of the Committee on Government Reform to object to another provision of this. This goes back to the old days again, where we say people who take tax dollars from hard-working Americans, many who are struggling along the poverty line, who chose to work rather than take welfare and follow the laws, that this bill would say, if you are convicted of a drug crime, you are still entitled to the money from those who have been working, from those who have been following the laws. We made a change, partly because countries around the world say, America, you are not focused. They say, America, you are not really trying to get rid of drug use in your country. You are letting it spread around the world and cause problems elsewhere. Here is a bill where we were making progress, just like in other areas, and this amendment would repeal it. It would say, hard-working taxpayers, follow the law, but you do not have to if you are on welfare.

Mr. SOUDER

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of this important legislation, which I believe takes historic and long overdue steps to improve the coordination of Federal agencies in protecting the United States against catastrophic terrorism and our borders against many other diverse threats. I rise as the Chairman of the Drug Policy Subcommittee and one of the co-chairs of the Speaker's Task Force on a Drug Free America to specifically address Section 878 of this legislation, which is a provision to create a Counternarcotics Officer. I originally included this provision as an amendment in the Government Reform Committee with bipartisan support from the Gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Cummings) and the Gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Davis). I also would like to thank Speaker Hastert, Chairman Armey, and Senator Grassley, who sponsored a nearly identical provision in the other body, for their strong support of this concept as the legislation has moved ahead. Many of the agencies that will be transferred to the new Department of Homeland Security are also our Nation's preeminent agencies for the interdiction of illegal drugs. The creation of the new Department, therefore, provides a unique opportunity to greatly enhance the operational coordination between these agencies and our efforts to keep drugs out of the United States. It also presents the risk, however, that these critical missions will be made of lesser importance and that resources will be allocated away from drug interdiction to deal with catastrophic terrorism. While some flexibility in this regard is appropriate, we cannot allow our efforts at drug interdiction to falter when almost 20,000 Americans die each year of drug-related causes and as we have increasingly seen the ties between the drug trade and financing for catastrophic terrorism. To address these concerns, Section 878 of the bill will establish a counternarcotics officer at a senior level to coordinate policy and operations within the Department and between the Department and other agencies on drug interdiction. The officer will also be charged with ensuring the adequacy of resources within the Department for drug interdiction, and tracking and severing connections between terrorism and the drug trade for the purposes of the Department of Homeland Security. As the author of this provision, I want to address two important points of legislative intent. First I want to reiterate, as I said in the earlier floor debate on this legislation, that it is my intention that the person appointed to this position must be a senior official within the Department with the authority to ensure the efficient conduct of the interdiction mission. We had originally designated this position as an Assistant Secretary position. After discussion with the Administration that designation was removed, but I want to make clear my intention that the appointee to this position should have a similar level of seniority and authority in order to make and enforce effective policy between the diverse agencies that will be headquartered in the new Department. I would also like to make clear my intention that the official designated under this provision should not be a ``dual- hatted'' appointee who has other responsibilities or obligations within the Department, nor should they be affiliated with any of the component organizations of the new Department. The clear intention of this provision is to provide a single, neutral, official who will concentrate solely on ensuring effective drug interdiction and acting as a broker and arbiter between different agencies within the Department. Second, I would like to briefly address a couple of concerns that were raised today by the Office of National Drug Control Policy with respect to the provision that the Counternarcotics Officer will serve as the United States Interdiction Coordinator for the Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy. That position is an advisory position to the Director with respect to national coordination of drug interdiction activities. The USIC is appointed by the Director, but in the past the job customarily has been filled by the Commandant of the Coast Guard. This provision of the bill was necessary in order to provide the ``clear lines of authority'' which the President just yesterday said were so important to have in Homeland Security matters. Within the Department of Homeland Security, the official provided for in Section 878 of the bill will be responsible for coordinating the activities of all department agencies on drug interdiction, including the Coast Guard. The USIC position needed to be addressed to ensure consistency and harmony on drug interdiction issues. It would have been completely illogical to have the Commandant report to the narcotics coordinator within the Department, but then have the coordinator report to the Commandant for the purposes of the National Drug Control Strategy. Because the counternarcotics officer is intended to have broad and more sweeping responsibilities in this area, the intention is simply to have the counternarcotics official assume the role as USIC, and I believe this is the only sensible outcome. I want to stress that this is in no way intended as any reflection on the Coast Guard, for which I have extremely high regard both in this particular area and in general, or the current or past Commandants, who have provided outstanding service as USICs. It is necessary incident to the reorganization of the interdiction agencies within the new Department, which I believe provides us with a significant opportunity to enhance our overall national effort. President Bush has clearly stated that Homeland Security should not be about ``turf'' or the prerogatives of individual agencies or government officials but instead about improving how we keep Americans safe. This provision was included in that spirit, and I believe that it ought to be embraced in that spirit by the Coast Guard and will be embraced in the finest traditions of ``Semper Paratus''. Director Walters made me aware, however, of some concerns which I agree merit careful consideration in the future. The USIC has been a senior advisor to the Director and ONDCP, and the statutory designation of the Homeland Security counternarcotics officer in that role within ONDCP removes the prerogative of the Drug Czar to appoint his own senior advisor. I am sensitive to this concern. I did not consider it in drafting the amendment simply because the Director has customarily and routinely named the Commandant of the Coast Guard to the position in the past, and my intention was to make a direct substitution. I want to make clear as the author of this amendment and as Chairman of the authorizing Subcommittee for ONDCP that it is not intended in any way to diminish the Director's authority over his office. I also continue to believe, however, that the USIC post must adapt to reflect the structure that has now been created within the Department of Homeland Security, and thus will not attempt at this late hour to revise the language in the bill. I will, however, revisit this issue as we consider reauthorization of ONDCP in the next Congress to try to develop a better formulation that will address each of these concerns.

Mr. SOUDER

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Speaker, I rise deeply disappointed. I am a strong supporter of bankruptcy reform. I was a former retailer and business person, and many of my supporters are in support of this. I cannot believe that we are here on the floor debating this today and that this bill has been brought up. We are likely to hear in the closing remarks from some of our leadership that this does not apply to pro-lifers and it does not sit on free speech. I think they are terribly wrong, and they put many of us in deep conflict in trying to defend civil liberties and, at the same time, reform bankruptcy; and many of us are deeply disappointed in our leadership that this bill has come forth. I think many Americans around the country, as nearly every pro-family and pro-life group in America, has stood arm in arm against this bill. National Right to Life, which does not take positions on issues such as this, is about the only one, and it does not mean that they favor the bill; it just means they are silent. This is going to be double-scored if the rule passes, and many Members are going to have their ratings go down among conservative groups, as well as liberal groups, permanently, because they have not listened to their constituents at the grassroots level and the organizations that represent them. We are going to hear probably quoted from a memo by Kenneth Starr, who has been hired by the business interests to advocate a position that is manifestly inaccurate in his memo. He, for example, tries to address the question and correctly points out that ``willful'' and ``intentional'' are the same. But that memo is silent on ``malicious,'' and that is a critical, critical point on this. He does not have anything in there on ``malicious.'' The FACE Act makes it a tie; it ties the two together and makes pro- lifers liable in a way that others are not. PETA is not liable. They do not have a FACE Act. This law focuses on pro-life demonstrators. Yes, it can reach many other demonstrators, possibly even anti-war demonstrators if they protest in front of a factory that produces weapons. Peaceful protestors. The Mahoney case, one protester, kneeling in prayer, was in front of a locked door, was found guilty by the D.C. Circuit Court. One kneeling Christian, silently protesting abortion, has had the force of law thrown at them. Where are we going in America? Also in the Starr memo there is another false assumption, and that is that somehow the courts are going to interpret this separate from the same-as-additional law. The courts never interpret a new law as redundant. They assume that we have a purpose. Senator Schumer is correct in saying there is a congressional intent with this law. The courts will rule that. This is, in fact, a broad expansion of the government potentially restricting civil liberties in all parts of protest, but particularly those of us who were very pro-business, are first and foremost deeply motivated by defending the most innocent of life, the little children. We are not talking about violent protests. We tried to compromise. We definitely favor it for violent, but peaceful, kneeling prayer should never be deprived from civil liberties. I urge my colleagues to carefully consider those commands from Mary Ann Gloran of the Harvard Law School. Because the proposed language is substantively identical to FACE, it will be read in light of existing decisions under FACE. Existing interpretations of FACE will almost certainly be read into Sec. 523(a)(20). Worse, abortion clinics and their supporters will likely argue that by re-enacting the same statutory language, Congress has approved existing decisions and those confirmed their status as valid and appropriate interpretations of FACE itself. This is a critical point, because existing interpretations of FACE in the lower courts, extraordinarily favorable to the abortion clinics and their supporters, have not yet been accepted or rejected by the Supreme Court of the United States. Congressional passage of proposed Sec. 523(a)(20) could figure prominently in eventual Supreme Court arguments on the interpretation of FACE, lending plausible support to the worst interpretations of that statute. I will not consider in this opinion letter the interpretations of ``force or threat of force,'' ``intentionally injure,'' or ``intimidate.'' Some interpretations of those provisions have been surprisingly expansive, but those forms of protest are not the issue for most protestors. The real work of FACE, and of proposed Sec. 523(a)(20), is in the provisions that target anyone who ``by physical obstruction . . . interferes with . . . or attempts to . . . interfere with' interfere with'' access to a clinic. Each of these terms has been construed or defined to mean more than first appears. No actual interference, and no actual physical obstruction, is required for a violation. Courts have found violations in peaceful protest that did not actually prevent access to clinics. ``Physical obstruction'' is defined in 18 U.S.C. Sec. 248(e)(4) to mean making ingress or egress ``impassable . . . or unreasonably difficult or hazardous.'' What is ``unreasonably difficult'' has, in the lower federal courts, sometimes turned out to be remote from physical obstruction. Thus, in United States v. Mahoney, 247 F.3d 279 (D.C. Cir. 2001), the court found physical obstruction and interference with access from a single protestor kneeling in prayer outside a locked door to an abortion clinic. Id. at 283-84. The door was a ``rarely used'' emergency exit. The court said that someone might have used the door, and that the law does not distinguish frequently and infrequently used doors. More remarkable still, the court held that a single person kneeling in prayer rendered use of that door ``unreasonably difficult'' and forced patients to use a different entrance. Id. at 284. Mahoney also held that six other defendants physically obstructed and interfered with access to another door. The court of appeals' entire discussion of this holding is that five protestors ``knelt or sat within five feet of the front door,'' that the sixth defendant ``was pacing just behind them,'' and that they ``offered passive resistance and had to be carried away.'' Id. at 283. The court does not even say whether they were arrayed across the sidewalk or along the sidewalk, whether they left a passage open, or any other fact that might to a plain meaning understanding of ``physical obstruction'' or to preserving a reasonable right to protest. It was enough for a violation that they were near the door. Both FACE and proposed Sec. 523(a)(20) are limited to ``intentional'' violations, but Mahoney shows that protection to be illusory. The court found specific intent to interfere with access to the clinic, even in the case of the lone protestor praying before the locked door. It relied on the fact that the protestor prayed that women approaching the clinic would change their mind about getting an abortion; the court quoted his prayer as evidence of criminal intent. 247 F.3d at 283-84. To similar effect is United States v. Gregg, 32 F. Supp. 2d 151, 157 (D.N.J. 1998), aff'd, 226 F.3d 253 (3d Cir. 2000), cert. denied, 523 U.S. 971 (2001). Gregg had much more evidence of actual obstruction than Mahoney. Even so, the Gregg court relied on defendants' ``anti- abortion statements, including imploring women not to go into the clinic or not to kill their babies,'' and on the fact that defendants ``carried anti-abortion signs,'' as evidence of forbidden intent. The government in these cases has offered evidence of opposition to abortion as evidence of specific intent to obstruct access, and the courts have relied on this evidence for that purpose. Clinics and their supporters would of course argue that Congress has codified these holdings if it enacts proposed Sec. 523(a)(20). Courts have emphasized that FACE plaintiffs need not prove actual obstruction. ``It is not necessary to show that a clinic was shut down, that people could not get into a clinic at all for a period of time, or that anyone was actually denied medical services.'' People v. Kraeger, 160 F. Supp. 2d 360, 373 (N.D.N.Y. 2001). Plaintiffs need not ``show that any particular person was interfered with by the defendants' obstruction.'' United States v. Wilson, 2 F. Supp. 2d 1170, 1171 n.1 (E.D. Wis.), aff'd as United States v. Balint, 201 F.3d 928 (7th Cir. 2000). To sum up, proposed Sec. 523(a)(20) would re-enact statutory language that has been interpreted not to require actual obstruction, has been interpreted to prohibit a single protestor kneeling in prayer near an unused exit, and has been interpreted to treat anti-abortion statements as evidence of criminal intent. These interpretations would almost certainly be read into Sec. 523(a)(20), and there would be a serious argument that Congress had confirmed these interpretations in FACE itself.

Mr. SOUDER

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Speaker, yesterday, the House passed H.R. 3580, the Medical Device User Fee and Modernization 2002. Kosciusko County in Northern Indiana is one of the nation's largest centers of the medical device industry. I have visited many of the medical device manufacturers in my home state, and continue to be amazed with the marvels that these companies produce every day. Injuries and illnesses that only a decade ago would have been debilitating are now curable, thanks in no small part to the ingenuity and innovation of companies that produce medical devices. H.R. 3580 is a win for both medical device producers and for consumers. It streamlines the process by which medical devices will be approved by the Food and Drug Administration by establishing a new user fee program similar to the one that exists for pharmaceuticals and biologics. By doing so, it helps medical device producers get their products to the marketplace more quickly, making them available to those who need them. The legislation also establishes a new Office of Combination Products at the FDA so that producers of combination drugs and medical devices do not have to be approved by two separate agencies. Even more impressive is that medical device consumers are not being forced to pay for the creation of a new, faster approval system for medical devices. Under this legislation, the companies themselves will fund the expedited process. It is important to note that this expedited procedure will not sacrifice thoroughness for speed. This legislation carefully spells out strict standards to ensure the absolute highest level of safety. On behalf of medical device manufacturers in Warsaw, Indiana as well as those across the nation who benefit from their products, I am pleased to support this bill, and urge its passage.

Mr. SOUDER

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Speaker, first I want to say thanks to the chairman of the Committee on Appropriations, who is in the unenviable position of getting battered by everybody all of the time. I appreciate that of the cardinals and our appropriators. On the one hand, some of us most right wing elements of the Republican Party, as I and others are sometimes called, criticize the Committee on Appropriations for spending too much. Then others say they are not spending enough. The fact is that every year when we get to the final appropriations bills, I have supported the Committee on Appropriations because they have tried to work within a budget, and we understand that it is a system in which the Senate is probably going to come up with a higher number. We come in. We like to have a budget. We would like to work it out and probably the numbers are going to be higher than our initial numbers and lower than their numbers. I know it is very frustrating for the appropriators because often inside the majority will of our conference may be different than their particular goals. They see all the requests that all of us put into the Committee on Appropriations, and at the same time try to balance what are the long-term goals. We have had extraordinary increases in the amount in education. We have just heard basically 65 percent over the last 5 years. All of the sudden we are facing a deficit in this country. We do not want interest rates to go up. We do not want inflation to go up. Yes, we do not want to leave any child left behind. We are trying to work this out. This CR gives us more time to work out a compromise with the Senate where those final numbers can be agreed upon. Labor-HHS appropriations bill is always the toughest. It is always at the end. It certainly will not be resolved, most likely, in the last few weeks before an election. It is easy to be outside of power and to criticize those who are inside power, but I want to thank our appropriators and our leadership for trying to work this through. Hopefully, we can finally get some of the appropriations bills through. They are likely to be higher than some of the conservatives would like. And they are likely to be lower than some of the liberals would like. But that is how you get a balanced budget that does not drive up interest rates, that does not kill inflation and also gives children in America the best education possible.

Mr. SOUDER

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Speaker, today the Committee on Government Reform and Oversight unanimously approved the report of the Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, Drug Policy, and Human Resources titled ``Federal Law Enforcement at the Borders and Ports of Entry,'' the most comprehensive report ever on our Nation's border security. As chairman of this subcommittee, I would like to discuss some of the findings and how I feel they impact the debate on the resolution regarding Iraq that is before us. There are 130 official ports of entry on the northern border at which it is legal to cross, whether by vehicle or foot. There are an additional over 300 unofficial crossing areas along the northern border, roads which are unmonitored and allow for individuals or groups to cross undetected. Near Blaine, Washington, the only barrier is a narrow ditch easily stepped over and containing no water between two roads. In northwest North Dakota, it is even easier: It is flat for miles, and there is no ditch. As for the southern border, it is not exactly known as impenetrable. If we cannot stop tens of thousands of illegal immigrants, it does not breed a lot of confidence that we can stop all terrorists. Our subcommittee has also begun to study port security. The challenges in our largest harbors, Long Beach and Los Angeles, are overwhelming. But by the time a nuclear device has slipped into L.A., we are already in deep trouble. Preclearance at point of origin, or at a point prior to coming into the U.S., is a probable method to reduce risk; but shipments could have chemical, biological, or nuclear weapons added en route at the receiving harbor or in transit to the next shipping point. I have not even discussed airport security. The point of my comments is this: If those opposed to this resolution somehow think we are going to stop terrorists from crossing our borders, that by itself is an incredibly high-risk strategy doomed to probable failure. As chemicals come across in different forms or nuclear weapons in parts, even with dramatically improved security we will not catch it all. We need a multifaceted approach. We need a vastly improved intelligence collection and information-sharing. That is obvious to everyone. We are working to improve border security, port security, and airport security. But when we can see the chemical and biological facilities that have manufactured, can manufacture, and probably are manufacturing weapons of mass destruction intended for us, we need to act to destroy those facilities. When we get solid intelligence that someone intends to kill Americans and that they have the weapons to do so, we need to eliminate their capacity to do so. If this leader and nation have already demonstrated, as Saddam Hussein has, a willingness to use such weapons of mass destruction to terrorize, like Iraq, alone in the world in demonstrating such willingness, then the need to act becomes urgent. The American people do not want to burn while the politicians fiddle. We need to strengthen our borders. We need to monitor suspected terrorists and arrest those who become active. We need to take out the capacity of those bent on terrorizing our Nation. If we implement all of these strategies, we have a chance of success. Partial, timid strategies against people bent upon killing Americans will not save lives. They will cost lives.

Mr. SOUDER

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, in closing, this is a very important resolution that we acknowledge that, even under this time when we are under a terrorist attack, that we are under chemical attack as well. In my hometown of Fort Wayne, Indiana, we have seen in the past month a very gruesome murder that occurred to cover up another murder, where kids were high on drugs and alcohol. In fact, they not only beat up and then shot but then burned two of their acquaintances in a field. This past week we saw another group murder. It appears to be gang- related. It appears to be related to narcotic sales in the City of Fort Wayne. The principal of South Side High School had to have teachers and police at the football game. He has been actively reaching out and looking for prevention programs and trying to reach the kids, whether it is through community churches, community organizations and the classroom, to try to show the evils of narcotics and the impact they have on the community and the evil of gang warfare that often is closely related. We may or may not ever see terrorist attacks in Fort Wayne and we may or may not see terrorist attacks around the United States, but we are certainly going to see drug abuse. For the people in the field, those working in the programs and prevention in the schools and prevention in the communities, those who work with treatment, it is often very discouraging. A lot of people ask me, as chairman of the Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, Drug Policy, and Human Resources, why can you not just eliminate this problem? But let me remind the Members that, at core, there are a couple of different things. One is that we will never eliminate evil from the world. We try to control it as much as possible. This is true of rape, it is true of child abuse, it is true of spouse abuse, it is true of child abandonment. They have been with us for a long time. As leaders in this country, we cannot say, oh, it is not working; therefore, we are going to abandon it. We have to redouble our efforts. Furthermore, in the area of narcotics, we see every day new people who heretofore we thought were invulnerable to a narcotics attack, whether it is young kids who now are being exposed for the first time in elementary school, the first time at a party in junior high, or at a club scene as a high schooler who had never been exposed to narcotics before. We have to be there in prevention, be there when they are first exposed, be there for treatment, and also be there to intercept the drugs as they are coming into this country, so we keep the prices from going so cheap and the purity so high that, when they have that exposure, they die on simple impact. This is a combined strategy that never gives up, that understands that we are battling all the time to try to change these families, people who have lost work, people who have gone through a divorce, people who are vulnerable at that moment, much like they are for other types of things. We need to be working aggressively, and this resolution praises all those in the field who have worked with this and reminds Congress and the American people that we have tens of thousands of people who lose their lives, who get shot, who go to emergency rooms because of this evil of narcotics. Mr. Speaker, I commend this resolution to the House and hope that it passes unanimously.

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. This resolution expresses the support of the House for the President's National Drug Control Strategy as well as for the work of the many individuals across America, in the government and in the private sector, who dedicate themselves to controlling and preventing drug abuse and helping drug abusers. I introduced this resolution in my capacity as chairman of the Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, Drug Policy, and Human Resources, joined by, as original cosponsor, the ranking member, the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Cummings). I very much appreciate his bipartisan support for this resolution and on so many other issues during this Congress. I would also like to recognize the continued work of my co-chairs on the Speakers' Task Force for a Drug-Free America, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Portman), the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Mica), as well as the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Davis), who has been a great member and asset to our subcommittee. I believe it is also appropriate to take a moment to recognize the lifelong work on drug control of the vice-chairman of the subcommittee, the gentleman from New York (Mr. Gilman), the former chairman of the Committee on International Relations. He has tirelessly advocated vigorous efforts to stop drug abuse and trafficking and protect American youth throughout his distinguished career, and his unwavering leadership in this House will be sorely missed, especially on this issue. As the resolution details, drug abuse continues to be a serious problem in America today. The death of nearly 20,000 Americans this year will be caused directly by illegal drugs. Fifty-two thousand Americans will die of drug-related causes, and more than 600,000 Americans visit hospital emergency rooms for drug-related episodes every year. In the past year, we have redirected the focus of the vast apparatus of the Federal Government to the threat of catastrophic terrorism. I want to remind my colleagues, however, that day-to-day and town-by- town, the slow, deadly, painful, and disruptive toll of illegal drug use continues unabated. Today, in addition to the continued tremendous challenge of holding the line on traditional drugs like cocaine and heroin, we also face emerging threats such as high potency marijuana, which many know as ``BC Bud,'' the growth of methamphetamine use, the so-called ``club drugs'' like Ecstasy, and increased abuse of the prescription drug Oxycontin. Earlier this year, President Bush and Director Walters of the Office of National Drug Control Policy released the National Drug Control Strategy to detail the administration's approach to reducing drug use in America. It is a balanced strategy that calls for stopping drug use before it starts through education and community action, healing America's drug users by getting treatment resources where they are needed, and disrupting the market by attacking the economic basis of the drug trade through interdiction and vigorous law enforcement. As part of the strategy, the President has set the aggressive goal of reducing drug use in America by 10 percent during the next 2 years and 25 percent during the next 5 years. This resolution expresses the support of the House for the balanced strategy set forth, as well as the goal of a measurable reduction of illegal drug use in America. I believe that meeting these specific goals will be a challenge but that the House should strongly support the effort to restore accountability and performance measurement to the Nation's drug control programs. I also believe that the House should express its support for the tireless and often thankless work which so many Americans do every day to combat illegal drug traffic and abuse within our country and around the world. Whether it be a drug counsellor who helps the addicted, the DEA agent who risks his or her own life to fight the often violent drug cartels, the community coalition leader who tries to keep kids from starting drug use, the Customs, Immigration, or Border Patrol officer on the front line at the border, the doctor or nurse who offers the medical help, the Coastie on the water in the transit zone, the local cop, the Foreign Service officer in a source country, or even the mother who reports suspicious activity on her block, these and countless other Americans work every hour of every day to fight illegal drugs. We ought to recognize and thank them. This resolution does that. The resolution also expresses the sense of the House that narcotics control should continue to be a priority mission for the new Department of Homeland Security, as well as our continued opposition to any use of narcotics not permitted by the Controlled Substances Act, the basic Federal law prohibiting use of illegal drugs. Finally, I want to note that this resolution calls on all Americans to join in a united effort to fight drug use in our communities. This is especially true of our parents, who we want to urge to talk to their children about the dangers and consequences of illegal drug use and encourage others to do so in their families and communities. We have seen how increased vigilance to threats to our society and way of life can help make us safer as a Nation, and I hope that families and communities can do the same with respect to parenting and drug use. I urge my colleagues to support the resolution. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks on this legislation.

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and agree to the resolution (H. Res. 569) expressing support for the President's 2002 National Drug Control Strategy to reduce illegal drug use in the United States.

Mr. SOUDER

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Speaker, we have many, many difficult and complex issues that we each face every day. We just heard from the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Kaptur), my friend and colleague, about war. Most of us spend probably the majority of our time, or at least the largest percentage of our time, dealing with economic growth and recovery, jobs, and what we need to do to help attract or keep companies in our district, and the regulatory issues, and many other things. We also work regularly on other issues that come up. For example, I am chairing a hearing Thursday on the West Nile virus which has particularly hit my hometown hard. We just had an hour debate on moral issues. But in addition to these kinds of issues, we deal inside the Federal budget with an incredible array of issues. I would like to address one tonight that is in danger of being overlooked as we address the big issues that are in front of Congress. Former President Theodore Roosevelt once said: ``Nothing short of defending this country during wartime,'' which is now, ``compares in importance with the great task of leaving this land a better land for our descendants than it is for us.'' His legacy was the National Park system. I want to talk a little bit about the financial pressures on our National Park system. This legacy is important. It is not just what we are doing today with the different pieces of legislation, but what are we going to leave for future generations; what are they going to remember America by; are they going to have the natural and cultural beauty. The Park Service manages 385 sites; has more than 83 million acres of land to manage; habitat for 168 threatened and endangered species; more than 80 million museum artifacts, some of the greatest collections of museum artifacts than other museums combined, for the most part; 1.5 million archeological sites; and 26,000 historic structures. Now, the problem that we have is that we have a shortfall of $600 million just to keep the maintenance backlog covered, which amounts to 32 percent of what the Park Service needs to fulfill its mission, and we are falling more and more deeply behind. What I wanted to address in addition to the very specific thing that a number of us have requested is that the conference committee, and the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Lewis), who just a little bit ago and I were debating on another matter have cosponsored legislation or efforts to raise the National Parks funding to $280 million. We were successful in getting an additional $118.5 million, working with the gentleman from New Mexico (Mr. Skeen) and the gentleman from Washington (Mr. Dicks), the chairman and ranking member. And the wonderful people on the Interior Committee on Appropriations actually boosted the park funding over the President's request. However, the Senate bill is much less, and we need to make sure we hold that House position. Let me give an illustration of why this is so important. Earlier this month, this House passed these boundary adjustments for the Pemberton's headquarters in Vicksburg National Military Park, the George Washington Birthplace National Monument, the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation area, the Golden Gate Recreation Area boundary adjustment, and the Allegheny Portage, Pennsylvania Railroad National Historical Park. We also did land acquisition at the Salt Lake City Museum of Natural History, Salt River Bay St. Croix, Virgin Islands and Timpanogos Cave National Monument, Grand Teton land exchange, James V. Hansen Shoshone National Trail, the Mcloughlin House Preservation and the William Jefferson Clinton Birthplace. We also passed in this House a study for feasibility and inclusion of the Miami Circle site, a very expensive site, by the way, in the city of Miami, but worthwhile; Gateway Communities Cooperation, Mount Nebo Wilderness Boundary, and Bainbridge Island Japanese American Memorial. We also voted to establish Victims of Terrorist Attacks Memorial in Washington, D.C. We also asked for more funding for Historically Black Colleges and Universities; historic preservation, which could be as high as $120 million from 2003 to 2007; and we passed the Vancouver, Washington National Historic Reserve Development costs from 5 million to $25 million. Tonight, alone, on Monday night we passed the Cedar Creek Battlefield and Belle Grove Plantation National Historical Park Act. We passed the Spirit Lake and Twin Lakes Land Adjustment Act. We passed the Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area Protection Enhancement Act of 2002. We passed tonight the Southern Campaign of the Revolution Heritage Area Study Act. We passed tonight the Andersonville National Historic Site Boundary Adjustment Act. We also have passed the Civil War Battlefield Preservation Act to preserve Civil War battlefields. These are all worthy projects, but how can we stand here and pass bill after bill after bill after bill after bill to go into the National Park Service, and then say we have no more money, when we have a backlog of $600 million? There has to be some sort of accountability within this Congress. I supported these bills. I was here tonight and let them go through on unanimous consent. But then I have an obligation to say we are going to fund these efforts, because otherwise we are pulling the wool over the Americans' eyes. We cannot keep saying that we are going to do this new park, this new park, this new heritage area, we are going to maintain Glacier and Yellowstone National Parks, we are going to make sure the campgrounds are up to snuff, we are going to make sure there are decent roads, we are going to make sure the resources are protected, and then not do the funding. We need to make sure we hold the House funding level. It is a critical part of our national heritage.

Mr. SOUDER

Mr. SOUDER. Madam Speaker, I thank the chairman and I also want to thank my friend and colleague, the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Jones), for his efforts. We are here on the floor again with some deep differences of people who share very strong commitments on this issue and of the role of how we work through as Christians and people of multiple and diverse faiths in America, how we work through the role of those who have deeply felt views and how they can express those and participate. I do want to correct a couple of things on the record from the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Edwards) because I think there is a little bit of overparanoia. One is that in the idea that charitable choice is somehow going to be tied in with this, as the gentleman knows, while the bill passed the House, it is pending in nowhere. We have agreed with a compromise, and many of us here tonight have agreed with compromise, and then the Senate developed a compromise and there will be no charitable choice grants coming through, authorized by Congress. They are working through some of those things in the executive branch, but we have worked out that we have shared concerns about the Federal Government getting it directly into funding and what that could mean to the separation of church and State if churches become dependent on Federal funding. Furthermore, the statement that we are doing this late at night is because of the death of our friend and colleague, Patsy Mink, we had a waiver. This was originally scheduled to occur much earlier in the evening. We had a 2-hour debate tonight and that pushed it later in the evening. This in fact would have been debated in prime time. It is near prime time in much of the country anyway. But this is, first, a fundamental disagreement about what the bill is. I do not believe nor do any of the people who wrote the bill nor do most people who do not have a position that is overtly against the conservative churches basically being able to speak out believe this affects money. This affects endorsement. I do not believe it changes campaign finance one wit. And I was talking with my dear friend, the gentleman from Connecticut (Mr. Shays) because I share his concern about churches having, as the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Lewis), my friend, said, taking up collections for political campaigns. That would be horrendous. That is not what this bill does. We have fundamental disagreements even about what the bill does. This is supposed to be able to clarify Internal Revenue Code that pastors who speak on behalf of the church can say what they believe. We know in America that many churches in fact do that. In fact, in the civil rights movement had brave people not been willing to stand up and register in churches, and Reverend Jesse White is getting a statue in Fort Wayne for his work. He was active through his church in registering voters, bringing in candidates, endorsing candidates because he felt that was the only way in my home area to change some of the civil rights areas. In the Vietnam War era, pastors were endorsing candidates in liberal churches. There are many conservative Christians in this country who deeply feel in the fundamental part of their heart, and we can see it in which groups are backing this, that conservative churches, once they got active, and most denominations like mine are very separatist and would never endorse from the pulpit and believe in that separation. But many churches believe, including those churches that do not endorse, that there has been a difference in America; and when the conservative churches started to get politically involved, the Clinton administration came down on them. And that belief is deeply felt. That is what we are trying to address. We believe that all people ought to be created equally. There should not be direct funding. That is covered in campaign finance law. There should not be church funds intermingled. That is the point of (c)(3)s and (c)(4)s. But when there are deeply felt issues like abortion that conservatives feel deeply about; the pastor should be allowed to say this is what we believe. These are candidates who share those views. They should not be able to use church funds to promote that view. That is the point of (c)(3)s. They can have their voter guides outside the sanctuary, and they can do other things with nonchurch money; but they ought to be allowed, when a Christian world view is fully comprehensive, the beliefs of Jesus Christ are not just faith, they are also works. If one believes they are works, a pastor whether he sees civil rights or war or abortion or pornography, he ought to be allowed to speak out and the congregation ought to be allowed to speak out.

Mr. SOUDER

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin), the distinguished chairman, and the other gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. John). Our mosquitos may not be as big as Louisiana. I know that one time I tried to camp in a bayou outside New Orleans, and we quickly moved into the car. It did not fully digest the car, but we decided not to camp. But we have our own mosquito problems in the Midwest as evident from the Illinois and Michigan cases, and in northeast Indiana we have one of the highest rates of West Nile virus in the country, 157 probable cases as of 2 days ago, but another batch was due in yesterday. Forty-nine of those in my home area in Allen County in Fort Wayne, Indiana including three deaths. That is 10 times our population base in the country. I strongly support this. Our Committee on Government Reform subcommittee that I chair has jurisdictions over matters of public health, and I join with the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin) and the gentleman from Louisiana (Mr. John) in supporting this bill, H.R. 4793, to help equip our communities to have the tools necessary to control the mosquito-borne diseases. We need to help rather than hinder the ability of States and municipalities to do the proper spraying. We have had a major debate in the city of Fort Wayne that has been a controversial point about whether to spray, and we waited, bluntly put, too long to spray, and part of that was financial, part of it were other debates; but we need this type of legislation that requires that the political subdivisions do the assessments and then they are eligible for the grants. On Thursday afternoon of this week, I will be chairing a hearing on the West Nile virus where we are going to have the Illinois Health Commissioner, Florida Health Commissioner, and the Allen County Health Commissioner, as well as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and NIH to look at some of these questions about research-funding levels, efficacy of mosquito spraying, the viruses communicability through blood transfusions and organ transplants and how difficult it is and what we have not learned and some of the difficulties that they have faced in being able to come up with quicker ways to get feedback to individuals for vaccines. One of the most troubling aspects in my hometown is that one cannot find out for sure whether one has West Nile. A number of people have taken 3 weeks, are down to 10 days, and if they have a severe case, the cases where they have identified it, they have died shortly thereafter because they cannot find out soon enough. I wanted to just read a couple of comments from one couple that went public about his struggles after he received the West Nile virus and how his body started to deteriorate, how initially one of the things that is panicking everybody on the news is they say if one starts to have a headache, if one gets a neck ache and so on, they may have West Nile. So they go in for a test and this particular gentleman went in for the test, but then it was just the start. His fever climbed to 103. His body shook with chills. He became dizzy, began losing his balance, reached the point where he could not walk. After a blood test revealed that his white blood cell count was extremely high, indicating an infection of some kind, his doctor drew blood for the West Nile test. Now he has to wait multiple weeks until they can figure out what is happening. And the symptoms vary, ranging from the mild flu to this more severe case. In his case the tests came back positive. He became dehydrated. Furthermore, he got sicker. He lost 15 pounds, dry heaves, and then eventually started to get mentally confused and is still battling this even though he did not die, which is the good news. I thank the gentlemen again for their leadership.

Mr. SOUDER

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of this legislation, but I have a serious reservation that I would like to discuss. I speak as chairman of the Subcommittee on Drug Policy and cochair of the Speaker's Drug Task Force to express my concern with the permanent modification to the annual drug certification process contained in this bill. The annual certification process is one of the strongest tools that we have as a Nation to ensure full cooperation from other nations with our efforts to control international narcotics traffic by conditioning U.S. foreign aid on such full cooperation. I believe that this is a reasonable and basic condition on the use of taxpayer dollars. Clearly, American workers should not be asked to subsidize the programs of foreign governments that will not help us stop drug traffic. As a practical matter, we have also heard scores of anecdotal reports that the threat of decertification often has been the only real means for American officials serving abroad to get meaningful cooperation on matters such as extradition, law enforcement, and many other means of controlling the drug trade. In fact, I was part of the Presidential delegation down to the swearing in of the new President of Bolivia; and outgoing President Cariaga made a special pitch to me and the other members of the delegation, Do not compromise this regulation. He said it was the only tool that they really had in Bolivia to take them down from supplying one-third of our cocaine down to about 2 percent, and he said that this was the most effective tool. I appreciate very much the work that the gentleman from Illinois (Chairman Hyde) and his staff did to minimize what I believe will be a permanent weakening of the certification process in this legislation. I was disappointed that the administration supported weakening the certification standard from fully cooperating, which has been proven to work successfully over several years, to leaning toward a new standard that would only decertify those countries that have failed demonstrably to make substantial efforts to cooperate. Instead of the burden falling on countries who want American aid to cooperate completely with our efforts, we will now presume in many cases that the foreign nations are cooperating, and the State Department will have to prove that they are not doing so. No major drug source or transit country should ever presume that it is entitled to American money, and this body certainly should not enshrine such a presumption into law. I am particularly concerned that it appears that the administration and the other body were determined to weaken the standard to satisfy a single foreign country. I worked with the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Mica), who has long been involved with this statute, to propose an alternative. The alternative would have kept the current standard for decertification, but only would have publicly named those countries who are not fully cooperating, instead of the entire majors list, which will still be made public under the modified law. We believe that this would have addressed the concerns of the nations. They have talked to me on every visit down to Central and South America, and they are concerned about this listing and seeming to have to go through a proving process, but it would only have listed those who are not fully cooperating, and would have still maintained our option to enforce tough sanctions. I am still baffled that the administration would not work with us on this compromise which I believe is far superior to the provision in the bill today. I am pleased, however, that the conferees agreed to change the certification reporting date back to September 15 from early November, which had been proposed in the original version of the bill. An early November report would have essentially removed any congressional role from the process. I also strongly support the bill's provision allowing the President to use the old ``fully cooperating'' standard in making certification determination as he sees fit. I fully encourage the administration to use this standard as the basis for its determinations in the coming year, rather than the weaker ``demonstrably failed'' standard included in this bill. The traditional standard has been successful for many years as a tool for our foreign policy and has reflected congressional intent for many years on the proper standard to be applied in allocating taxpayer dollars. Unfortunately, the new standard seems only to reflect an agreement between the administration and a few select Members of Congress. Let me give one specific example. If a Nation does not cooperate with us on extradition, one of the toughest and most important things, does that mean that they have demonstrably failed, or does it mean they are not fully cooperating? Clearly, they would not be fully cooperating, but it is not clear that they would have demonstrably failed. So at the margins of the real world, unless the administration takes the fully cooperating standard, we are in a real box here. My question would be, is this going to be our new standard on terrorism? Is this going to be our new standard on human rights? If not, why is it different on drugs than it is on human rights and terrorism? I know that it has been offensive for us to list all of these different countries and try to make them prove the case, but we need something more than ``demonstrably failed'' and we need something that enables and gives the administration the flexibility. I hope they will exercise what they have been given in this bill, because there is nothing more tragic right now going on in America, thousands of people dying on our streets because of drug abuse and the cocaine and heroin and methamphetamines and BC Bud pouring into this country, and I hope that we do not back up on this administration on drug policy.

Mr. SOUDER

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Speaker, at least the pro-abortion forces are being very clear about what their position is. They now want to force people who disagree with their position to perform abortions, to counsel for abortions, to pay for abortion through insurance laws. We have things in the United States called voluntary associations, and if voluntary associations want to form an insurance company that may or may not cover different things, apparently they can cover about anything, unless it is a moral view. In fact, my friend, the gentleman from New York, should know that the Catholic hospitals of the City of New York have in fact formed an HMO. There are many religious institutions in this country and many religious people who have bonded together to form health insurance of all different types. We should have a right, those of us, regardless of what the Court says, those of us who have a moral view that abortion is murder, should not be forced to counsel, pay for or fund that murder. It is one thing to say we are going to deprive someone else of their human right to what I believe is to take another human life, and I believe the right to life is preeminent and I believe the Court decision was wrong, but even if you agree with that Court decision, why would you force me, who believes that the taking of these innocent little babies is an abominable sin, why would you force me to say I cannot have insurance coverage that does not pay for that? I cannot fund a hospital or participate in caring for the poor and caring for people who need health care unless I will also fund what I find to be as abominable as the killing of innocent little babies? Why deprive me of my rights? Why deprive me of my rights of association? Why deprive those people who are not necessarily a majority, we are evenly divided in this country, but why deprive the people who believe it is morally wrong of their right to not fund it, to not counsel it? There are alternatives. If there are all these people who favor abortion, if there are all these people who support abortion and all these abortions, there are plenty of options for them. Why make me and the people who find this abominable have to pay for this? The reason this law is needed is in fact the courts in several States have challenged the HMO laws, the hospital laws; and we need this legislation.

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Speaker, the question in Alaska overruled what was, in my opinion, at least, what my former employer intended to say, that the Alaska Supreme Court struck down the conscience clauses applied to the hospital, holding that there was no compelling State interest in the conscience rights of the hospital. Now, if compelling State interests overrules a Federal law that is based on religious freedoms based on our Constitution and laws that are passed, we are in deep trouble. You can see by the intent that my friend, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Weldon), just referred to of the Maryland national abortion rights group, their goal is to force those of us who deeply feel that abortion is murder to be able to not have our own plans for healthcare, to not fund our own hospital systems, to not have any alternative but to fund what we view as one of the fundamental evils in the United States. We can continue to fight abortion in this House and we will continue to fight about it, but those of us who deeply hold that this is a fundamental life should not be forced to fund in any way or participate in plans that require us to lay out dollars that require those of us who share that faith to practice what we believe is murder. Furthermore, I was deeply offended by the line that said we are trying to hide behind the Vatican. The Council of Catholic Bishops, their pro-life activities have spoken out on this, and there should not be cheap shots at the Catholic Church or those of us who share many deeply held religious views based on those views.

Mr. SOUDER. As a former staff member, I think I have some flexibility for him.

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Speaker, as we heard earlier, this is an issue that deeply divides our country and us individually. I am passionately pro- life, and I believe it is a shame on America to watch these young kids get killed. But that is not what this bill is about. This bill is about whether people who share my view about abortion have the right to practice their conscience in America and what are we doing to trample religious rights in America, of people who voluntarily join a health plan that shares their moral and religious beliefs. Religious institutions, particularly the Catholic Church in this country, founded hospitals to care for the poor and to practice the saving of life. To be able in this country to force them to fund, provide abortion counseling or other things are anathema to their religious beliefs and is wrong. The bill that my former employer, former Senator Coats, passed in the Senate, intended to address this conscience clause. Announcement by the Speaker Pro Tempore

Mr. SOUDER

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of this important legislation. I particularly would like to discuss a provision of the bill that arises from an amendment that I successfully offered in the committee with bipartisan support from the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Cummings) and the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Davis) to provide for a senior-level official within the new Department to coordinate counternarcotics matters. I raised this issue as chairman of the Criminal Justice and Drug Policy Subcommittee and as one of the cochairs of the Speaker's Task Force on a Drug Free America. I believe it is extremely important, and I would also like to thank the leadership, including Chairman Armey, Speaker Hastert and the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Portman) for working with us on this provision. The scope of the legislation we are considering today is much larger than just catastrophic terrorism. One of the issues the proposed reorganization will have an impact upon is drug interdiction. Let me remind the House of two critical facts. First, approximately 19,000 Americans will die this year of drug-induced causes. These tragedies happen every day in every congressional district across the country. Thousands more Americans have to seek emergency treatment and thousands more families are disrupted by the effects of illegal drugs. The second is that three of the most prominent agencies involved in this legislation, the Customs Service, the Coast Guard and the Border Patrol, are among the preeminent agencies in the Federal Government with respect to drug interdiction. This bill will move these agencies into a new Cabinet Department whose stated mission and focus relate primarily to catastrophic terrorism. While I strongly support the overall intention of the bill, I also believe with equal strength that our efforts to respond to potential future acts of terrorism cannot come at the price of relaxing our efforts against drugs. Section 768 of the bill, which is derived from my amendment, will require the appointment of a counternarcotics officer who will be a senior official in the Department to assure this coordination. The new counternarcotics officer must be a senior officer capable of ensuring proper attention and resources to this critical mission. He or she must also be dedicated solely and exclusively to this task. In my view, it will not be acceptable for the new Secretary of Homeland Security simply to add this job on top of others tasked to another senior official. The purpose of the provision is to ensure that there will be a responsible official whose energies and attention are devoted to managing the significant responsibilities of the new department in this area. This mission is unique among all of the nonterrorism functions and it is important that we have this senior level coordinator. Our Subcommittee's oversight findings have long suggested the need for such a single operational coordinator even prior to the current reorganization. This new Department will become the preeminent drug interdiction agency for the federal government, and we cannot allow that mission to continue to be run with such a lack of integration and coordination. We must have an official in charge of this vital task, and I again very much appreciate its inclusion in the bill. Drug control is an integral part of Homeland Security, and I look forward to working closely with the new Department in pursuit of this goal.

Mr. SOUDER

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Chairman, I rise as chairman of the authorizing subcommittee for the Office of National Drug Control Policy and the media campaign to raise a couple of points about this important matter. I believe the most important thing we need to do is protect the media campaign, and there is a big dispute about the best way to do that. I was hoping this could be worked out in conference and I am comforted by some of the words here in the debate, but I am reluctantly going to oppose the amendment. I believe the media campaign is one of our only national programs that we have to try to reduce demand for illegal drugs, and I appreciate the efforts of the gentleman from Georgia as well as other members of our subcommittee to try to hold accountability and effectiveness in the media campaign, and we agree on that fundamental point. I am very disturbed about some of the process of the bidding. I am disturbed about the violations of the law that Ogilvy has committed. I am concerned about the processes of how the creativity is done. But I also do not want the media campaign to go dark which the administration has maintained could happen depending on how this goes. I am concerned that if the Senate language and the House language are too similar, this could be conferenced and not give us the flexibility. We have a hearing scheduled for Friday to look and see whether this would cause the media campaign to go dark. We need tougher answers from the administration to make sure that they are not being biased in the bidding process as opposed to real concerns that the media campaign can go dark. I believe this needs a more careful approach. Generally speaking, I totally agree with the gentleman from Georgia's point. When somebody has violated the confidence of the taxpayers, they should not be rebid unless there is compelling evidence, but in the Committee on Government Reform, we have seen other agencies where, for example, in long-term care, we have had to continue with some organizations, at least for a period of time, to make sure that the people are serviced as opposed to using an arbitrary one-size-fits-all standard. I agree with the goals of this amendment. I believe that we need to carefully review the process. I would hope that whatever happens with this amendment, that the conference committee will continue to look through and make sure that the media campaign can stay up and on the air. We have a very effective antiterrorism message right now, but at this point, I reluctantly oppose the amendment.

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Chairman, does the drug czar of the administration agree that the campaign will not go dark?

Mr. SOUDER

Mr. SOUDER. Mr. Speaker, as a cosponsor of H.R. 4965, the Partial- Birth Abortion Ban Act, I believe the Congress must act now to pass this important bill. We should not allow the heinous killing of a partially delivered baby to be lawful any longer. In a partial-birth abortion, the abortionist pulls a living baby feet-first out of the womb and into the birth canal, except for the head, which the abortionist purposely keeps lodged just inside the cervix. The abortionist then punctures the base of the skull with a surgical instrument, such as a long surgical scissors or a pointed hollow metal tube called a trochar. He or she then inserts a catheter into the wound and removes the baby's brain with a powerful suction machine. This causes the skull to collapse, after which the abortionist completes the delivery of the now-dead baby. H.R. 4965 would ban performance of this abhorrent procedure except if it were necessary to save a mother's life. It defines partial-birth abortion as an abortion in which ``the person performing the abortion deliberately and intentionally vaginally delivers a living fetus until, in the case of a head-first presentation, the entire fetal head is outside of the body of the mother, or, in the case of breech presentation, any part of the fetal trunk past the naval is outside the body of the mother,'' and then kills the baby. The bill would permit use of the procedure if ``necessary to save the life of a mother whose life is endangered by a physical disorder, physical illness, or physical injury, including a life-endangering physical condition caused by or arising from the pregnancy itself.'' According to Ron Fitzsimmons, executive director of the National Coalition of Abortion Providers, partial-birth abortions are performed 3,000 to 5,000 times annually, usually in the fifth and sixth months of pregnancy, on healthy babies of healthy mothers. It has also been used to perform abortions as late as in the third trimester, which is the seventh month and later. Many of these babies are old enough to live, and many of them are developed enough to feel the pain of this horrendous procedure. The Congress has voted to ban partial-birth abortions twice, only for the ban to be vetoed both times. We must pass H.R. 4695 now to ensure that partially delivered babies are protected and that the awful procedure used to perform partial-birth abortions is banned under law.

Mr. SOUDER

Mr. SOUDER. I yield to the gentleman from Oklahoma.