Steve Scalise

Mr. SCALISE

Mr. SCALISE. Mr. Speaker, again, I want to look at what is not in this bill and what is in this bill. We worked together, Republicans and Democrats alike, to come up with a package of bills that will help families, small businesses, hospitals, and frontline workers. We did that together, working with President Trump. And then all of a sudden, not when we were here, but when everybody was forced to work remotely, we see this package of 1,800 pages dumped on us by dark of night that does all of these things that have nothing to do with this outbreak. We should be working together to help safely reopen, like 36 States have already done successfully. Congress should be here working, leading, not working remotely. We have proven today, and we proved a few weeks ago, we can be here safely doing our job like all of the frontline workers are safely doing their job. Let's get this country back open safely. Let's work together to get it done. Drop this wish list. Thank goodness this will not become law, but it shows you the misguided priorities when you see a bill with so much garbage like this. Mr. Speaker, I urge a ``no'' vote.

Mr. SCALISE

Mr. SCALISE. I would just share the gentleman's hope that that happens. I know there was a lot of concern expressed with the resolution that authorized pro forma sessions until July 21, and I sure hope that is not the approach that the House would be taking, that instead of pro forma, we would actually be here in person doing the work of the people.

Mr. SCALISE. And then for committees like Armed Services that are going to be, hopefully, starting their negotiations on the National Defense Authorization Act, obviously, those are things that have an opportunity to be bipartisan. Hopefully, they will be bipartisan. Historically, they have been. And that would be, hopefully, some more work that the House would do here in Washington, here at the Capitol. And we would just push to make sure that that is the case, that we do as much of our work here, not remotely, not through Zoom and Skype and Webex and other things, but actually here in the Capitol where we can, again, show the country, as we are asking them to safely reopen and start getting our economy back on track, that we would do the same thing.

Mr. SCALISE. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman.

Mr. SCALISE. And is there any formal legislation or even committee hearings?

Mr. SCALISE. Madam Speaker, I think today our total number of Members that showed up, out of 435, were 406. Of course, we didn't have the full 435. We will have a few more sworn in next week. But with over 400 Members of Congress able to get here safely to do our business--and again, we know the Senate is going to be in next week; we know the President is at the White House working, as well, with his team--I would just hope that we would continue to lead by example as we are encouraging others to safely reopen. My home State of Louisiana today started entering into phase 1 of the reopening of our economy, and we saw so many new establishments. Of course, we have got our frontline workers, hospitals, and grocery stores that have already been opened and other establishments, but today we were able to have a full entering of phase 1, and from all accounts, it went very smoothly. I know the gentleman's State of Maryland is doing the same thing, and 36 different States are already entering phase 1 of reopening. I would just hope that we would lead by example by showing here in the House that we, too, can do the people's business safely in person. And do we know when that next time that the House would be convening? If it is not going to be next week, do we have a date when?

Mr. SCALISE. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman for that clarification. Obviously, we had a full debate on the floor today about this change in the proxy voting. There still were many constitutional questions raised, especially as it relates to Article I, Section 5, which states that a majority of each House shall constitute a quorum. I would hope, although the rule is clearly passed and your side was able to pass that, doesn't mean it needs to be exercised because the Senate is going to be in next week. Because we proved today that we can come back safely and conduct our business, I would just hope and urge that while it is now an opportunity, an option for the majority to use that, we still would continue to do business with a majority of Members being present. Because if a major piece of legislation were to come to this floor and to pass with a proxy--meaning 20 people holding proxies, clearly, under your bill, would be what your side would claim to be a majority--it would be challenged. It definitely would be eligible for being challenged in court under Article I, Section 5, the constitutional requirement of a quorum. I would just hope that would be considered that, while it is there in the rule now, doesn't mean it has to be the way the House conducts business.

Mr. SCALISE. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding. A couple of questions, but first, I want to ask: It is my understanding that on May 19, next week, we are supposed to be swearing in the new Members of Congress who were elected this week. You didn't mention that. Is that still going to move forward here on the House floor?

Mr. SCALISE

Mr. SCALISE. ``We are about 7 days away from shutting our doors down for good and possibly declaring bankruptcy. We don't know what else to do. I'm tired of crying myself to sleep every night wondering what tomorrow holds. Will we lose everything we worked for? Our house? Our retirement?'' ``Enough is enough.'' They had to wait an extra 2 weeks. Hopefully, that company can hold on. MJ's Grill in Columbia, South Carolina: ``We are a small, family-run restaurant that has a staff of 16. We have had to cut our staffing down to eight and those employees work limited hours. I open and close the kitchen every day without taking a paycheck to try and keep the doors open. We are quickly approaching the hard-line decision of closing our doors permanently.'' These are stories that go on and on, heartbreaking stories from businesses that just want to hold on to keep their family business going, to keep those employees, that represent millions of people. Stop thinking of them as leverage and start thinking of them as our neighbors. Just like we applaud our frontline workers, the men and women in the hospitals, the nurses, the doctors who are keeping us safe, let's work to keep everybody safe and get through this and open our economy back again. Let's pass this bill.

Mr. SCALISE. Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague from Texas for yielding. Most importantly, I want to thank all of those hardworking families across this country, people who are struggling through this crisis, who are adhering to the guidance from the President and their Governors. But they want us to get back to work. They want us to work together to help them through this critical time, to focus on finding a cure as we are seeing so many advances in medicine, on testing, and on therapies that may work. In the meantime, we are all learning how to deal with this disease better, how to socially distance. Even if you go to the grocery store now, people are being more cautious. We also need to make sure that we help those families hold on through this time, that we help those small businesses that are struggling through this time. The Paycheck Protection Program has been incredibly successful as a lifeline to those small businesses. President Trump called on us weeks ago to come and replenish this fund that has been used by so many businesses to hang on, and yet there were cries from the other side. In fact, one of the leaders of the main caucus on the opposition side called the Paycheck Protection Program leverage, that they should hold out from re-funding to get other things. This isn't about leveraging families who are struggling and hanging on and businesses that barely can make it while you try to go for other items. Help those people who are in need. Negotiate on other things that we can get agreement on, but don't hold hostages during this time. I reached out to so many small businesses and heard from people in my district and all around this country. We saw another 4.4 million people lose their jobs just this week, and yet there were businesses holding on, waiting for this money that didn't get it for the last 2 weeks while this leverage game was played. I just talked to one company, Delta Electronics in Harvey, Louisiana: ``We laid off two of our three employees. . . . We are about 7 days away from shutting our doors down for good and possibly declaring bankruptcy.''

Mr. SCALISE

Mr. SCALISE. Mr. Speaker, I look forward to seeing the gentleman next week, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. SCALISE. Mr. Speaker, clearly, the gentleman from Maryland and I both agree that this FISA law has a strong role to play in our national security, but there is also acknowledgment that there were abuses that happened. Not only was there the Horowitz investigation, but now you do have the Durham investigation that will, hopefully, conclude and identify where those abuses took place and that those people would be held accountable. We have had talks with the Attorney General, who recognizes, yes, he also agrees that this FISA law is critically important, wants to have this section renewed, but he does recognize that reforms can be made. How exactly we can come to an agreement--just like with your side, we are having those negotiations. And so, if people do acknowledge that abuses occurred, I think it would be in all of our best interest, as we are addressing this law that has had detractors on both sides, that we strengthen the integrity of the law, because it has been exposed now. It has been exposed that there were problems that occurred. The other sections where those problems occurred are permanent law. This is not. This is coming up for renewal, but it is part of the FISA law. And, clearly, as we debate the FISA law, all of this becomes part of that debate, and, hopefully, all of it can get resolved within the debate on the components that expire March 15. I am confident we can get this done because I have seen the bipartisan interest. We just need to make sure that what we bring to the floor addresses the problems that occurred so that it, hopefully, never happens again. I will be happy to yield if the gentleman had anything else on that.

Mr. SCALISE. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate that the gentleman talked about a response. I haven't seen that response yet, but I look forward to working with our folks who are heavily involved in these negotiations to see if we can reach agreement because, in the past, the program has had many supporters, Republican and Democrat, but clearly some detractors on both sides as well. It is a very critical tool in our national security. The FISA courts have been used to stop terrorist activity, to prevent other terrorist attacks, but there is clearly other weighing that goes back and forth on civil liberties and ensuring that the rights of Americans are protected. It is a balance that was tested, frankly, in 2016, when we saw clear abuses of the FISA court. The first time we had seen those kinds of identified abuses, they were limited, but they were blatant. It is a dangerous affront to our Nation's national security if you have people at intelligence agencies who abuse their power. In fact, the Horowitz report was very specific in outlining 17 different exact abuses of the FISA court. Some of this is still being investigated through the Durham investigation, which will, hopefully, yield a list of specific people. I will just read from parts of the Horowitz report. ``As more fully described in Chapter 5, based upon the information known to the FBI in October 2016, the first application contained the following seven significant inaccuracies and omissions.'' He goes on in this report: ``In addition to repeating the seven significant errors contained in the first FISA application and outlined above, we identified 10 additional significant errors and three renewal applications, based upon information known to the FBI after the first application and before the renewals,'' where abuses of this FISA law occurred. Now, I think, on both sides, we would agree that if somebody in a position of national security abuses their power deliberately, they need to be held accountable. One of the concerns we have is that the law does not allow strong enough penalties. I am hopeful that, when the Durham report comes out, the people who were identified as abusing their power in 2016 ought to be held accountable and, in fact, ought to go to jail for what they did because what they did not only undermined our electoral process, but it jeopardizes a law that has bipartisan support but has bipartisan opposition as well. If somebody abused their power to taint that process, the FISA court, it undermines the integrity of the FISA court. We all need to work together to ensure that anyone who abuses their power is held fully accountable, not only to hold them accountable, but to ensure it doesn't happen again. No Republican, no Democrat candidate for President ought to be concerned that people in intelligence agencies are abusing their power to try to undermine an election. If it happened, as we know it did--and the Horowitz report is very specific. Hopefully, the Durham investigation names names. Hopefully, those people are held accountable and go to jail so that nobody else does it again. But as we know, there is the possibility for that to happen under current law. That is why it is so important that we get this agreement to make necessary critical reforms, to put guardrails in place; to keep the process available to our national security experts so that they can continue to stop future terrorist attacks; but to also ensure that if somebody abuses the process, it makes it harder for them to do it; but if they still cross the line, that there are strong criminal penalties in place for those who would violate that law. I know we have laid those out. I am glad to know you have come back with a response. Hopefully, we can get that agreement in the next few days before this law expires. Clearly, there is strong support, hopefully, on both sides, for putting real reforms in place that fix and address the abuses that occurred in 2016, as identified by the Horowitz report. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman for anything else on that.

Mr. SCALISE. Mr. Speaker, clearly, we will debate that because the Supreme Court has already addressed the constitutionality upholding it, but it has no genesis in religious tests. It has a genesis in the security of this country. Again, if you go look at the nations that are listed in the ban, Chad went and did the things that the Department of Homeland Security said you needed to do to be in compliance, and they got removed from the list. Every other country on that list has also been invited to go and just do basic sharing of information to ensure that the people coming from those countries are not terrorists, are not criminals, are not going to provide a security threat to our Nation. It is a clear test. Every other country in the world already does it. Why does Libya choose not to comply? I don't know, but they haven't. Why does North Korea choose not to comply? I don't know, but they haven't. Like Chad, go and address these deficiencies, and then you can be removed from the list. Chad has already done that. Every other country can. We will debate it, but it does put additional red tape in front of the President that would preclude him in the health arena from responding to the nations that have a threat of the coronavirus, like the President was quickly able to do with China, quickly able to do with Iran. He would not be able to quickly respond in the future under the bill that is proposed. Clearly, we will heavily debate that next week.

Mr. SCALISE. Mr. Speaker, clearly, we do have disagreements on that. Hopefully, we can work through those in the debate next week. There is another bill that is going to be, hopefully, coming up that we can get agreement on, and that deals with the renewal of components of the FISA law. I know the Committee on the Judiciary earlier this week had a markup that they ultimately pulled back on. There are negotiations ongoing between Republicans and Democrats to try to come to an agreement on not only how to renew the FISA law, but also how to make the reforms that are critical and necessary to the FISA law, to address the abuses that we know happen. I would ask the gentleman first if his side is in a position of identifying some of the areas we can find agreement on, on reforms, because I believe Ranking Member Nunes had submitted a number of specific reforms, and the gentleman's side is reviewing those. Has the gentleman had a chance to review them? Does he have an alternative proposal? Because the reforms are critical to the renewal. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman to answer that.

Mr. SCALISE. Mr. Speaker, I yield to my friend, the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer), who is the majority leader of the House, for the purpose of inquiring about the schedule for next week.

Mr. SCALISE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding. In relation to the NO BAN Act, I understand there was a disagreement over whether or not the gentleman supported the President's ability to restrict travel from certain countries based, not on whether they were a Muslim country, but based on whether or not they were a country that was not in compliance with our Department of Homeland Security requirements and criteria to ensure that they are properly vetting people who come to our country for national security purposes and, specifically, to ensure that people who are known terrorists and people who have other known criminal backgrounds are not able to come into our country. Most countries around the world, including a number of Muslim countries, are in compliance and, in fact, have a very good cooperative travel agreement between the United States and those countries, but there were a limited number of countries back in 2017 that the President ultimately determined, working through the Department of Homeland Security, were not in compliance. He listed those countries. He added a few more to it later. I know a number of people on the majority side were in disagreement with that. Some took that to court. It ultimately went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. The Supreme Court upheld this travel ban. But I would want to point out to the gentleman that the Department of Homeland Security has been very clear to these countries that if they comply with the basic reporting requirements--again, that every other country in the world that has that same travel agreement with the United States has--if they were to come into compliance, then they would be removed from the list. In fact, Chad is one of the countries that was originally listed. Chad worked with us--as every country should--and said: We are going to comply. We want to make sure that we are properly sharing information so that people who are coming to the United States from Chad now are properly vetted for terrorism and other criminal activities. They got removed from the list. The other countries, by the way, have been invited to do that. They have chosen not to. Why they have chosen not to is a good question they should be asked. We should not criticize the President for using his executive authority to keep this country safe and to keep terrorists from coming into this country and ensuring that those nations that send people to the United States--as we send them to their countries--are in compliance with the requirements of the Department of Homeland Security. So why would a bill like that be brought up, especially at this time when now with this coronavirus there are a number of countries that we have seen, starting with China, that have a serious outbreak that we are trying to prevent from coming into our country? Under this bill that would be coming forward, not only does it limit the President's ability to protect us from having countries be able to send terrorists into our Nation, now it would limit the President's ability to respond to a health crisis like the coronavirus where there are some countries that are listed, like China and Iran, that have to be screened or can't send people from those countries if they have been in those countries in the last 14 days, it would tie the President's hands from even responding to that crisis. We have seen just today the Governor of California--probably not somebody who is philosophically aligned with the President too often-- just sent a cruise ship back into the Pacific Ocean and said the cruise ship can't come into San Francisco. And that is the Governor's power and authority to provide for the health and safety of his State. Why would we want to tie the hands of the President of the United States when he wants to ensure the health and safety of the people of this country? Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Maryland.

Mr. SCALISE

Mr. SCALISE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman. On those fronts, clearly there is an ability to find common ground as we talk about infrastructure. There has been a lot of discussion over what that number would be, what the amount would be, because ultimately, it would have to be a number that we could both get an agreement amongst Republicans and Democrats that would be paid for. And I think both sides acknowledge, it has got to be paid for. That has usually been the sticking point with infrastructure. But within that, whether it is $200 billion or $2 trillion, there is an understanding that we need to do more work to try to find out how we can get agreement on how to pay for it. And I do think the ability is there to find that agreement. The amount would be variable. But also, it is something the President has talked about, as well as a number of Members of Congress have, making reforms to the way we build major projects: roads, bridges. The infrastructure delays so often are caused by red tape that is unnecessary. I have heard from Governors, both Republican and Democrat, that would like to see Congress not only send money--obviously, the States would like to see more Federal money come--but also, to see less strings attached so that a project that right now might take maybe 10 years to do, because of so many overlapping delays in red tape, that should maybe take 2 years at most. In many cases, that delay alone is what prohibits the project from being done because it drives the cost up so much. Because a project that might take 10 years, in many cases is going to be deemed unaffordable and it just gets scrapped as opposed to if we address not just the financing, but also the bureaucracy and eliminating red tape so that we can get more projects done quickly. I think that would be another area where there is a lot of mutual interest in seeing if we can come together. And the President is very interested in doing that, when I have had talks with him. It is not just the amount that we are able to get agreement upon, but it is also the reforms to the red tape so that we can move projects quicker. And in many cases, do projects that are unaffordable because of those delays that are unnecessary. And I know that is something we can work on. Hopefully, we can get everybody together a few more times to get closer to finding that agreement on infrastructure. As it relates to healthcare, there has definitely been a divide between our sides, if you look at H.R. 3. I think the gentleman recognizes it was a very bipartisan bill. The vote reflects that. The Senate--however our agreement might be on how the Senate does business, clearly, they do business differently than the House--but traditionally, they have been reluctant to take up hyper-partisan bills when they are moving things through. They will go more to a bill that has got more broad support. USMCA is a real good example of that. It is probably the best template for how both sides can work together to do something big. Something very bipartisan, something very good for our country and something that we were able to get moved through both sides. If you look at H.R. 19, for example, I would suggest to the gentleman that whatever the bill number is, it is not really the number of the bill. It is what is ultimately in it that we can get bipartisan agreement upon. H.R. 19 was an approach that we took to say let's go find not the partisan approaches to healthcare, but areas where we had broad bipartisan support, including the package of bills that came out of the House Energy and Commerce Committee unanimously. Most people across the country are shocked when they hear that Congress actually did work together. Republicans and Democrats came together to put together a package of bills that would lower drug prices that the President would sign that could be in law today where prescription drugs, generic drugs, would be on the market quicker so people could be paying a lower cost. That package of bills came out of committee unanimously. Every Democrat, every Republican worked for months. It took a long time to put that agreement together, but, ultimately, both sides did come together. If we could look at those approaches. And, again, H.R. 19 includes only bills that were bipartisan. People had worked together on various elements of improving healthcare, from lowering prescription drugs, protecting preexisting conditions, but not in a partisan way, in a bipartisan way that could actually get signed into law. One way or another, we are going to find some issues where we can move, both Republican and Democrat coming together, bills over to the Senate. Those would clearly have a much higher likelihood of not only getting taken up by the Senate, but actually getting signed into law. So I would suggest, when you look at some of those approaches, the bipartisan approach where you don't have a Presidential veto, but you also have a strong ability to get Senators on both sides to want to take that up as well. And then, finally, on school choice, the Education Freedom Scholarship and Opportunity Act, this is something that President Trump cited in the State of the Union specifically, and you can see it in isolated cases. I come from a city, New Orleans. I was born in the city of New Orleans. I was on the board of Teach for America in New Orleans, and we had a dramatic overhaul of our public school system where we created a charter school movement. It was actually a Democrat Governor, Kathleen Blanco, who, unfortunately, passed away recently, who signed that bill, Republicans and Democrats working together, that has transformed some of the worst failed public school systems in the country. New Orleans' public school system--prior to our reforms, considered by most as the most failed public school system in the country--now has a very healthy charter school movement where children have real opportunities. Parents have real opportunities. Schools are competing for students, and it is working for the student. This is in a large urban system where it was failed, and now it is very successful. Clearly, no system is perfect, but there are many more options there. There are many more options for parents. Congressman Byrne has a bill--there are other bills that are out there--to try to give at least some additional options to families so that, if they are in a failing school, they can have a better place to go, and, ultimately, the system would be working better for the students. So, on all of those fronts, I would hope that we could find those areas of common ground and start there, build that, and work with the Senators and with the President, who wants to address these issues, like we were able to address USMCA, which was signed into law last week. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman.

Mr. SCALISE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding back and for going through those items that are going to be up on the House floor next week. I would like to ask the majority leader with respect to some of the things that were discussed at the State of the Union--and I am sure we are going to be talking about a few things that happened during the State of the Union. The President identified a number of items where he challenged us in Congress to work with him on addressing some of the challenges that are facing our country. And he identified some items by executive order that he is working on, but he also identified some items from infrastructure--where I noticed there was applause on both sides of the aisle--to some areas on educational opportunities, school choice--where unfortunately, the remarks weren't received as equally as maybe they should have been--but it also provides us some opportunities to find some areas where we can work and achieve some things that would benefit people all across this country. I would ask the gentleman, first, starting with infrastructure, there is tremendous interest that I have heard from Members on both sides to try to work on a package that we can get agreement on. I haven't seen the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure tasked directly with doing that, but I have heard there is interest from Chairman DeFazio and from Ranking Member Sam Graves in trying to reach that common ground. Is there an emphasis that is placed from the leadership of the majority on tasking the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure with actually going and working and going and finding that common ground, which we know is there, to try to put together an infrastructure package in these next few months? Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer).

Mr. SCALISE. Clearly, we have got a lot of agreement on our disagreement with the Senate's way of doing business. Of course, one of their impediments that I know I have encouraged a change in that they haven't taken up is the 60-vote rule just to bring up a bill. So many of the bills, when we were in the majority, that would go over to the Senate that we felt strongly about that would not be brought up, it was a majority Republican Senate, but because they have a 60-vote requirement, the minority could and would, on occasion, prevent many of those bills from coming up. But that is why I suggested to the gentleman, what we found is, of the issues we would like to tackle that we really do feel confident we can get an agreement with the President on, the Senate has shown a higher likelihood of taking up a bill if it has got that broad support. And so in the example of H.R. 3--and, for the record, there were only two Republicans who voted for it--while that could be called bipartisan, there was a separate package of bills that came out of committee unanimously. So, if you have one approach that still is viewed as very partisan, with just two Republicans voting for it, to address healthcare issues, if there is a different way to approach it where every Republican and every Democrat on the committee of jurisdiction passed those bills that would lower drug prices and the President said he would like to sign it, I would think the gentleman would agree, if those two bills are put side by side, which one do you think would have a higher likelihood of making it through the Senate to the President's desk? It is very clear that the one that was unanimous would have a higher likelihood. And that is why I just suggested H.R. 19, because that was a bill that, while we would have liked to have included a number of other issues that maybe just our side might support, we put those on the side for now to say let's find those areas in healthcare where we have very broad support amongst Republicans and Democrats, and that is reflected in H.R. 19. You want to put a different package together. If the approach is let's address this in a bipartisan way, we have a very high likelihood of getting not just the President's support, but also the Senate's support at moving that through. I don't know if the gentleman has any more comments on that.

Mr. SCALISE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman. And now that the Senate has a little more free time, maybe we can get them to take up some of that legislation. I surely hope that we, on both sides, will continue working toward those, because there are areas of common ground that many have found and many have worked for months to find. I do want to shift gears and talk about the decorum the night of the State of the Union. The President talked about many things, as in any State of the Union, and I have attended 10 now. We have had Republican and Democrat Presidents, and there are things that I agree with in certain States of the Union, and you can stand, you can sit, you can applaud. But I think we all saw something that goes way beyond and, in fact, violates the rules of decorum in the House, and that is when the Speaker ripped up the speech. Clearly, it was a premeditated move. I have seen actual video of her practicing or starting to rip it prior to the end of the speech. But when you go through the speech--and, again, the President's theme was ``the great American comeback,'' and he talked about things that are working well in our country, working well for everybody, where every segment of society is benefiting, and, of course, as every President since Ronald Reagan has done, highlighting some of those great things that are happening in our country by bringing people into the gallery to show the real face on some of these great things that our country does. Again, if part of a policy that created that great visual is something that one side disagrees with, some people stand up, some people don't. But to suggest that it didn't happen or that it is a lie--as some in the leadership of your majority actually said, the whole speech was a lie--I would ask: Was General Charles McGee's recognition as a Tuskegee Airman a lie? I think that was something great that people enjoyed celebrating. Kayla Mueller, the humanitarian worker who was brutally murdered by al-Baghdadi--it happened. Her family was here. And al-Baghdadi was taken out by American troops, which I think was the right thing to do. That is not a lie. That is something that we ought to recognize and respect. When Staff Sergeant Christopher Hake was killed serving a tour of duty in Iraq by a roadside bomb that was generated from an Iranian terrorist, which was led by General Soleimani. And now Soleimani is gone because the President took action to take him out. That happened. It is not a lie. In fact, the fact that Soleimani is gone is something we should all celebrate, just as we celebrated when President Obama gave the order to take out Osama Bin Laden. I think for most people there wasn't a dry eye in the House. I know I have heard from friends all across the country who were tearing up when they saw First Class Sergeant Townsend Williams, who had been on his fourth tour in the Middle East, and here was his wife and young children, and the President surprised surely her, and all of us, by bringing him back home. What a special moment that was, just to see that family reunited. And, again, tears, I think, were not a partisan issue at that moment. But it clearly did happen, and is not a lie, and it is something, again, we should all celebrate. But again, for decorum of the House, for the Speaker to do that, I think most would agree, was not appropriate. At a minimum, an apology should have happened. There wasn't. We brought legislation yesterday to rebuke the Speaker to make it clear that that is something not becoming of any Member of the House, let alone the Speaker of the House. Unfortunately, it was tabled on the roll call vote yesterday. But I would hope that we could recognize, when that happens again, that we won't tolerate that kind of activity from our Members, let alone our leader. If the gentleman has anything to say about that, I will yield.

Mr. SCALISE. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the gentleman's comments, but those names were part of that document that was ripped, and I am sure many of them were as offended as we are that it happened. I just would hope it wouldn't happen again. I wish we would all speak out equally against that. I yield to the gentleman from Maryland.

Mr. SCALISE. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer), my friend, the majority leader, for the purpose of inquiring about the schedule for the House next week.

Mr. SCALISE. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the gentleman making that statement, and I would share that. I wish the person who took the action would make that statement to those people because many were offended. But that will be left to discuss later. But for now, I look forward to working with the gentleman on all of these issues that we discussed that the President offered the olive branch for us to work with him on and, I think, are very achievable if we do roll up our sleeves and tackle it together. I think there is, again, a template for how to do it. USMCA is clearly one, and there are many others. 21st Century Cures is another example when we were in the majority with a Democrat President and worked very closely to achieve something that will be a milestone in curing major diseases for years to come; and, hopefully, we can deliver more of those kinds of wins for the American people that we all represent. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. SCALISE

Mr. SCALISE. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding and for his leadership on our ability to make sure that any administration, Republican or Democrat, has the ability for the President to carry out their duties as Commander in Chief. And that is what is at stake here, this amendment that we are debating right now that would completely repeal the 2002 AUMF and not have an honest conversation, a sincere debate about if there should be any changes to it, modernize, work with the administration. Again, any Commander in Chief should have the ability to defend America, to respond to attacks on Americans both here in America or abroad. Madam Speaker, as you look at this debate as well as the vote we are going to be taking shortly on the Iranian language, which would limit the ability of the President to respond to attacks coming from Iran, it is another major concern about whether or not we are going to have a Commander in Chief who can actually defend America. There are things that are going on right now that we all know are an underlying part of this debate. Let's start with the taking out of one of the bloodiest terrorists in the history of this country, Soleimani, who was just taken out primarily using the authority of the 2002 AUMF, which would be gutted if this were to pass. So I don't think most people in this country think it is a debatable question of a bloody terrorist who killed hundreds of American troops. This guy had the blood of over 600 U.S. servicemen and -women on his hands. He was in Iraq plotting to take out more Americans, to kill more Americans, and he was taken out. Is it really a question of whether or not that was the right thing to do? I think most Americans would agree he was a brutal terrorist. And whether it was Osama bin Laden or al-Baghdadi or other terrorists who want to kill Americans, our Commander in Chief ought to have the ability to protect Americans and stop terrorists who want to kill more Americans. To take away that ability is reckless. It is destructive to the country. Again, if you wanted to have an honest debate, Madam Speaker, you would have seen the committees of jurisdiction have true hearings on this, bring in people in the administration, talk about what the right way to approach this is. That is not what happened. They literally took a coin bill--a coin bill--and brought it forward with these two amendments so that there can't be that honest debate on both sides, shutting out the minority's ability to bring amendments, to have an honest discussion about what the process should be. In terms of Iran, just think about what they are doing there. It is not only Iran. It is Iranian proxies that carry out attacks against servicemembers of the United States and our allies, and they take that away, too. Don't tie the hands of any President of the United States, Republican or Democrat, from being able to defend this country both here and abroad. I oppose both amendments and would hope we reject it.