Mary Scanlon

Ms. SCANLON

Ms. SCANLON. Madam Speaker, the last time the Republicans shut down the government in 2018-2019, we had to run food drives to feed TSA workers who were required to show up but were not paid. Some of them lost their jobs when they lost their cars, doubling down on the harm. Look, a Republican government shutdown is going to hurt working families, interrupt vital services, damage our economy, endanger our national security, force millions of our troops and government employees to work without pay, all because Speaker McCarthy has turned over the House of Representatives to the most extreme Members of his caucus. Meanwhile, House Democrats, bipartisan Senate leadership, and President Biden are working together to keep the lights on.

Ms. SCANLON

Ms. SCANLON. Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Ms. SCANLON

Ms. SCANLON. Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Ms. SCANLON

Ms. SCANLON. Mr. Speaker, I was unable to attend votes today due to an immovable scheduling conflict. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yea'' on rollcall No. 361, ``nay'' on rollcall No. 362, ``nay'' on rollcall No. 363, and ``yea'' on rollcall No. 364.

Ms. SCANLON

Ms. SCANLON. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time to close. Mr. Speaker, what we are seeing this week is a tale of two Congresses, one that is capable of working across the aisle to solve real problems but one that is increasingly held hostage by forces more interested in culture wars and punching down on vulnerable people to score political points. I ask my House colleagues, again, to follow the example set by the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee as well as the House Armed Services Committee. I think this building and our country work a lot better when Members put their heads down and work on solutions to the problems facing the country. I would like to think there are many Members in both parties who would agree with that view. However, we learned a lot last week from Kevin McCarthy and the most extreme members of the Republican Party. Since the first day of the 118th Congress, particularly on the Rules Committee, we have heard countless lofty speeches from our Republican colleagues about the need for more transparency in our processes, for more amendments to be considered on the floor, for more debate, and for more rank-and-file Members to have their priorities considered by the whole House. Last week, House Republicans had the chance to stand behind those words and instead blocked over 1,000 amendments submitted to the NDAA. Today's rule and the amendments allowed on it were negotiated behind closed doors--not between Democrats and Republicans but between Republicans and the most extreme members of that party. Next week, Kevin McCarthy has already signaled that he is abandoning his commitment to consider appropriations legislation under an open rule. It has become increasingly clear what the real deal is. It is an open rule for the rightwing Freedom Caucus and a closed rule for everyone else, including many Republicans who do not endorse the chaos and antidemocratic impulses pushed by the far-right members of their party. Despite the griping about regular order and empowering individual Members, this Congress remains enthralled by a power grab--plain and simple--by the most extreme members of the Republican majority. We can now expect Speaker McCarthy to fold at the first sight of trouble, meaning that the House is now run by its loudest and most extreme Members. Beyond being an embarrassing way to run a democratic institution, this arrangement only serves to weaken the House and all but guarantees that the Senate will jam us on big legislation like appropriations, the NDAA, and the FAA reauthorization. Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to oppose the previous question and the rule, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Ms. SCANLON. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from Indiana for yielding me the customary 30 minutes, and I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, with the two bills under consideration in today's rule, we have a striking example of the best and worst that this Chamber can produce. The first bill reauthorizes the Federal Aviation Administration for another 5 years. That bill is the product of bipartisan negotiations between the members of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee. It was debated and amended in committee with the full participation of all members, Republicans and Democrats, and it passed out of that committee with unanimous support--unanimous support. So this FAA bill is an example of how the legislative process can and should work when Members of Congress seek results and are willing to work together to address the interests of the American people. The other bill in today's rule could not be more different. It is an unserious, hyper-partisan proposal from rightwing extremists designed to sow division and fear by pushing false narratives about immigrants and what is happening in our public schools. In a truly bizarre twist for the party of small government, this bill would have the Federal Government dictating to our local governments and schools what they should do with their buildings. All of this is done under the guise of solving a fake crisis manufactured by Republicans, both by sending migrants to cities run by Democrats in a failed attempt to score political points and, more importantly, by refusing to come to the table and genuinely address the critical need for substantive reforms to our immigration system. If everyone would follow the lead of our colleagues on the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, and if our rightwing colleagues could drop the heated rhetoric and partisan nonsense, there are many solutions that Republicans and Democrats could work on together to serve the American people, and we would welcome that opportunity. I will return to this point, Mr. Speaker, but first let's talk about the two bills. H.R. 3935, the Securing Growth and Robust Leadership in American Aviation Act, will reauthorize the FAA for 5 years and make a variety of much-needed improvements to the laws governing aviation in the United States. I am encouraged by many of the policy wins that Democrats achieved in the bill, including policies to increase funding for airport infrastructure, increase the scope of projects eligible for funding, hire more air traffic controllers, and grow the talent pipeline for hiring and training the next generation of pilots, mechanics, and aviation manufacturing workers. This bill also takes some much-needed steps to improve the passenger experience. The bill requires airlines to reimburse passengers for hotel and meal costs when their flight is canceled or significantly delayed. It requires airlines to allow families to sit together, and it requires airlines to make accommodations for passengers traveling with wheelchairs or other assistive devices, and to compensate those travelers if their property is damaged. While this bill is good, it is far from perfect. I recognize that when you negotiate, Mr. Speaker, you don't always get what you want. However, Mr. Speaker, when you negotiate with this House Republican majority, it is not only that you don't get what you want, it is also that you get less than what is needed to actually fix the problem at hand. Mr. Speaker, anyone who has taken a flight knows the sorry state of our Nation's airports. While our country was once First in Flight, our airports are now collectively second and third rate, and that is a policy choice by Congress. Over the past 30 years, we have underfunded our airports, forcing them to get by on inadequate budgets and limited revenue streams. The result is crystal clear to anyone who flies: old, crowded airports, large backlogs in runway maintenance, and a passenger experience that is often unpleasant from the moment you try to check in, Mr. Speaker, until you arrive at your destination. We did hear a fair amount of commentary on that from our colleagues in the Rules Committee last night. The passenger experience at many U.S. airports is eclipsed by virtually every other airport in Europe and Asia, and there is no good excuse for that. Beyond the benefits of improving the flying experience for American travelers, having first-class airports should be a point of national pride. We are not putting our best foot forward when foreign tourists visit the United States, the richest country on Earth, and the first thing they experience is a crumbling, unattractive, and inefficient airport. The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act made a massive investment in our Nation's airports, and dozens of projects have broken ground as a result. However, the IIJA was a onetime investment and gives us about 5 years of boosted airport funding. We need to build on the success of that bill, not rest on our laurels and pretend that this short-term fix was a long-term solution to decades of underinvestment. In addition, I would have liked to have seen stronger protections for workers and consumers. I strongly oppose the provision in the bill to raise the pilot retirement age to 67, and I would have liked to have seen reforms to organize and form a union and to hold the airlines accountable for junk fees, delays, and cancellations. However, Mr. Speaker, again, I recognize that any bill of this sort is a compromise, and in a compromise you have to work with others who don't share your beliefs, and you can't always get your own way. It is important to pass this bill in a timely way so that we are able to maintain and improve our aviation functions without a lapse. Mr. Speaker, the other bill in today's rule is the so-called Schools Not Shelters Act or, as one of my colleagues called it, the defund our schools act. This bill is a monumental waste of the House's time and taxpayer dollars. It is nothing more than an attempt by House Republicans to double down on their demonization of immigrants. The House had this same debate last month when Republicans brought to the floor a poorly drafted and fact-free resolution to the same effect. Now they have turned that resolution into a bill so they can continue their failed efforts to sow fear of immigrants in order to score political points. This bill does nothing to address the needs of communities facing an influx of migrant families or to solve the problems facing our schools. It is nothing more than another vehicle to create division and stoke culture wars because that is the point. Starting with the last administration, rightwing Republicans at the State and Federal level have abused migrant families and children fleeing poverty and violence to manufacture a crisis using them as pawns to score points. For example, if Greg Abbott, the Governor of Texas, was genuinely unable to safely shelter migrants, he could have reached out in good faith to State and local leaders around the country to collaborate on solutions instead of shipping migrant families to those places without any notice or coordination. He could have reached out to the Biden administration for additional resources, and he could have come to Congress and asked for emergency funding. Instead, when faced with all those options, Governor Abbott decided to mislead or trick migrants and ship them to other parts of the country with no coordination or communication to the receiving communities. One of the destinations chosen by Governor Abbott, and Governor DeSantis as well, was Philadelphia. I met some of those migrant families last winter. During the week between Christmas and New Year's when temperatures were at or below freezing, they sent buses of families and children to Philadelphia. These families arrived in T- shirts and sandals. They had no jacket and no gloves, and they were dropped off on the street at 6 a.m. and in the middle of the night. If not for the mercy and decency of our city officials, charities, churches, and advocates, those poor souls would have been left on the street in the middle of winter. These are human beings. These are families with children. They are people escaping horrors that apparently our colleagues can't even imagine. I still struggle to process the willingness of those Republican Governors to harm people and the willingness of our colleagues to enable them. While those Republican Governors thought that everyone shared their contempt and disregard for the humanity of these families, they were dead wrong. All over the country, the cities that have received these migrants did so with open arms and worked in unison with their faith communities, with volunteers, and with advocates to find solutions rather than to inflict further harm. They refused to play this sick game. They welcomed the migrants with compassion. I continue to be inspired by the fundamental decency and kindness of the Americans who mobilized to help migrants come to our shores yearning to breathe free, as we have throughout our American history. We are the country we are today because of the innumerable contributions of immigrants from all over the world. So instead of debating rightwing messaging bills to posture for the Republicans' extremist base, we should be using our time to pass a clear, legal, and efficient path to work, residency, and citizenship. We need to pass the American Dream and Promise Act again to provide Dreamers with a pathway to citizenship. However, our colleagues are not offering solutions to our immigration challenges, they are just offering complaints. They don't have a single, serious proposal for how we can address the needs of our immigration system. It is particularly galling that they have tried to reframe their active mistreatment of migrant families as a threat to public schoolchildren calling to defund public schools in retaliation against local governments for addressing the mess that Governor Abbott created. As my colleague, Mr. Neguse, pointed out in the Rules Committee hearing last night, the House majority has made clear its priorities: pushing unserious bills like this anti-immigrant bill while failing to address the actual issues facing our public schools, including teacher pay, student achievement gaps, gun violence, and hunger--daily hunger-- for schoolchildren. Later this week when Republicans host their press conference to celebrate passage of this bill, all these problems will still exist. Mr. Speaker, I look forward to passage of the FAA reauthorization later this week, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Ms. SCANLON. Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Ms. SCANLON. Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Escobar) to discuss this proposal.

Ms. SCANLON. Mr. Speaker, I am so sorry my colleague across the aisle misunderstood me. The fake crisis I was referring to was the crisis that this defund our schools bill is seeking to address, which is the use of active public school buildings to house migrants. That is a fake crisis. It is actually not happening across the country, and it was brought up only after the Texas Governor sent migrant families unannounced to New York State. Obviously, we have an issue with the amount of migration occurring throughout our hemisphere and the impact on our communities. I would gladly work with anyone to make sure that all of our communities, whether in Texas or New York or Philadelphia or Martha's Vineyard or anywhere across our country have the resources they need to feed and clothe the hungry and unsheltered people in those communities. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Barragan).

Ms. SCANLON. Mr. Speaker, as I suggested, this is just about rightwing messaging, pushing a false narrative that anybody is advocating for an open border--they aren't--while still refusing to come to grips with what do we do with the people who come here? What do we do with the people who are here? If there are solutions, we would love to work together on them. One of them appears to be providing enough resources for our communities to feed and house folks. Mr. Speaker, if we defeat the previous question, I will offer an amendment to the rule to provide for consideration of a resolution which unequivocally states that it is the House's duty to keep our sacred promise to American workers and seniors to protect and preserve Social Security and Medicare and reject any cuts to those essential programs. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of my amendment into the Record along with any extraneous material immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.

Ms. SCANLON. Mr. Speaker, I find myself in complete agreement that we should be addressing the actual issues, like student achievement, that are impacting our students, but, obviously, this bill does none of that. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from New Mexico (Ms. Leger Fernandez), a distinguished member of the Rules Committee.

Ms. SCANLON. Mr. Speaker, I yield an additional 30 seconds to the gentlewoman from New Mexico.

Ms. SCANLON. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, we heard the gentleman describing parents of schoolchildren being frightened, upset, and agitated because their school needs, their education needs, their needs for food or remedial education, are not being met. I remind my colleagues that they hold the majority. They are able to bring forward those bills and have the committee work to address those needs, but, again, the bill before us today does none of that. We would love to work together in a bipartisan manner, as the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee has done, to present a really good, forward-looking bill to address our Nation's aviation needs. We would just like to extend that ability to work on solutions, as opposed to culture wars, throughout the work before us for the good of the people. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Ms. SCANLON. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. As I was listening to some of the prior speakers, I started to understand why we have this defund the schools bill before us today. It is based upon a whole bunch of misunderstandings. The idea that migrants who are in the position where they are potentially being housed in our communities, these folks have, in fact, been vetted by our immigration agencies. Second of all, no Federal school funding can be used for that purpose. That funding is already restricted, and if it were to be used for the purpose of housing migrants, it could be immediately clawed back. Again, this is a bill that accomplishes nothing and is based on a series of alternative facts, and I strongly urge that we reject it and the rule. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Ms. SCANLON. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Ms. SCANLON

Ms. SCANLON. Mr. Speaker, there have been more mass shootings this year than there have been days. We do not have to live like this. Children are scared to go to school, parents are scared to put their kids on the bus, and teachers are scared that they will have to protect their students from a mass shooter in the classroom. The daily gun violence that often goes unreported by the media, including suicide and domestic violence, impacts neighborhoods in every corner of the country. We do not have to live like this. Last Congress, House Democrats passed into law the most significant gun violence prevention legislation in 30 years, but we know that was only a baby step in the right direction. We have seen that evidence- based violence prevention programs, like group violence intervention, can dramatically reduce gun violence. When it was implemented in the city of Chester, Pennsylvania, 3 years ago, homicides by gun dropped by over 60 percent. The expansion of that program to other cities around the country is already yielding results, but we have also seen the fatal impact of guns flooding our streets nationwide and making their way into the hands of criminal or mentally unstable users. We can't give up. Democrats are working to prevent the bloodshed. We are offering commonsense legislation that will address the epidemic of gun violence and protect the Second Amendment rights of responsible gun owners. Democrats introduced three discharge petitions last month to ban assault weapons, require universal background checks, and close the Charleston loophole. The MAGA Republicans running Congress don't want these bills to come to the floor because they would have to make a choice, and voters would see it, whether to side with the gun lobby that funds their program, their campaigns, or to protect our kids and our communities. Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues, especially those who claim to be moderates, to have the courage to sign the discharge petitions and force Speaker McCarthy to bring the legislation to the floor and to have the courage to choose kids over guns. We do not have to live this way.

Ms. SCANLON

Ms. SCANLON. Mr. Speaker, last week, we celebrated our Nation's birthday, a day that conjures up images of flags and fireworks, family barbecues and patriotic parades. But in my district, the dominant image on July 4 was a mint green child's bicycle. That little green bike lay untouched in the street in the Kingsessing neighborhood for days after it was abandoned by its innocent owner when a man wearing combat gear and a mask stalked his neighbors, shooting randomly, killing five and injuring four others. One of the victims was 13. Another was on his dinner break from work. Two-year old twins and their mother were injured when their family car came under fire. My district was not the only one that was the scene of such horrors during the holiday week. There were mass shootings in Baltimore, Fort Worth, and Wichita. From sea to shining sea, on a day when we should have been celebrating the greatness of our Nation and the blessings of liberty, we saw senseless, needless death and destruction. With the memory of the Highland Park shooting last July Fourth reinforced by more recent shootings, people across the country decided to skip parades and public celebrations because they were afraid of being shot. Today is the 175th day of 2023, and so far this year, there have been over 370 mass shootings. The bloodshed is daily. American families are scared and traumatized. Americans are tired of living in fear at the grocery store, church, school, community celebrations, and parades. It does not have to be like this. There are commonsense laws that can stem the bloodshed of gun violence, and House Democrats are committed to passing them. On June 13, House Democrats introduced three discharge petitions that would ban assault weapons like the one used by the Kingsessing shooter last week; require universal background checks, which have been proven to prevent shooters from obtaining weapons; and close the Charleston loophole. Those bills should get a vote, and Members of this House should be willing to put on the record where they stand. We have other bills that would ban ghost guns, which the shooter also carried, and implement red flag laws, which have been proven to save lives by preventing suicides and allowing law enforcement to remove weapons from troubled individuals--again, like the Kingsessing shooter--before they kill someone. These are bills that we know have the power to save lives, and they are popular, too. Republicans in Congress just need the courage, the guts, to act. Anyone without the guts to act allows this unending epidemic of mass shootings to continue. Americans do not and should not have to live like this. We don't need more neighborhoods with devastated families, abandoned children's bicycles, and people afraid to leave their homes. Mr. Speaker, I will continue fighting to protect your families and mine, and I urge every Member of this body to join me.

Ms. SCANLON

Ms. SCANLON. Mr. Speaker, I cannot overstate the solemnness and sadness that I feel right now. To see the House so debased by the invocation of our most grave constitutional duty--impeachment of a President--should disturb every patriotic American. Just 49 years ago, Barbara Jordan, the great gentlewoman from Texas, invoked the solemnity with which any serious Member of Congress must approach our duties, and particularly the circumstances under which we should consider impeachment. That solemnity has guided the majority in this House in recent years as we have tried to navigate an extraordinarily tumultuous time in service to our Nation and our constituents--a time in which we have seen a rogue former President run roughshod over the guardrails of democracy and decency, compromising our national security and disparaging the courts, the free press, law enforcement, Congress, and anyone who would try to hold him accountable. During that time, we impeached former President Trump twice, but we did so based upon a careful and close study of law, history, our Constitution, and rigorous factfinding, as well as consideration of the impact upon our country. We prayed. We prayed for guidance to discharge our duties to our country, our constituents, and our Constitution with fidelity. Today, as we confront this deeply unserious effort to impeach a President to serve partisan political posturing and political profiteering, I have to return to the words of Barbara Jordan. She cautioned: ``Common sense would be revolted if we engaged upon this process for petty reasons. Congress has a lot to do: appropriations, tax reform, health insurance, campaign finance reform, housing, environmental protection, energy sufficiency, and mass transportation. Pettiness cannot be allowed to stand in the face of such overwhelming problems.'' Jordan's words could not ring more true today. Common sense is revolted by the political grandstanding and petty stunts allowed by the House majority. Days on end are wasted catering to the whims of an extremist minority. We are marking 6 months of one of the least productive Congresses in history. Under the control of this MAGA majority, we have made no progress in addressing the most pressing issues facing America, whether gun violence, hunger, opioid abuse, housing, immigration, health costs, tax reform, or the environment. So I must oppose both this rule and the resolution, because in the words of Congresswoman Jordan: ``My faith in the Constitution is whole; it is complete; it is total. And I am not going to sit here and be an idle spectator to the diminution, the subversion, the destruction, of the Constitution.''

Ms. SCANLON

Ms. SCANLON. Mr. Speaker, I rise to honor the steadfast patriotism and integrity of Adam Schiff. This scurrilous resolution is so dishonest and defamatory that it would justify a lawsuit if it were made anywhere other than the Halls of Congress. This is pure political revenge and exposes both the depths to which the House Republican majority has sunk and their threat to our constitutional order. I encourage our colleagues to seriously consider how stunts like this bring dishonor upon this House and to condemn it unequivocally.

Ms. SCANLON

Ms. SCANLON. Mr. Speaker, I share with you and with the American people a conversation I recently had with a group of children's doctors because it has haunted me ever since. These busy doctors who work at some of our Nation's finest pediatric hospitals and practices took the time to travel to D.C. because they wanted to help Members of Congress understand the ever-expanding and heartbreaking toll that gun violence is taking on children and our communities every day. They came to D.C. to beg lawmakers, not for thoughts and prayers, but to pass commonsense gun safety laws that will help them stop this epidemic. We now know that firearm injuries are the leading cause of death for children and teens, but they see it firsthand. The stories these doctors shared of the injuries and death that they have to deal with on a daily basis were shocking, but what really struck me was the raw pain in their faces and in their voices as they shared those stories. Think about it. These doctors have dedicated their lives to caring for children, and now they are reeling from the trauma of having to face day in and day out the toll that our Nation's gun violence is taking on those children, knowing that the lion's share of this pain and death is preventable if lawmakers only had the courage to act. The stories these children's doctors told broke my heart. Today, I share their words with you. One said: ``As a primary care pediatrician in Philadelphia, my heart stops every time I see on the news that a young person has been shot and killed. I fear they are my patient. I am sick that these young people that I watch growing up are being murdered on the streets by gangs. Something must change.'' Another said: ``I am haunted by the image of a child's shoe. My patient, a young boy with autism, was at a community July Fourth celebration with his family when they heard shots. The family ran, and in the chaos that ensued, his shoe fell off and was lost. For weeks after the shooting, this child didn't have the words to describe what he was feeling, but he kept asking: `Where is my shoe?' He was clearly impacted by the events and was having trouble sleeping. Although this child and his family were physically unharmed, the question, `Where is my shoe?' is evidence of a child, family, and community traumatized yet again by gun violence.'' Another is a neonatologist, a baby doctor. She said: ``You might think I would never see my patients be impacted by gun violence, but sadly, I have seen too many families impacted by it. Mothers tell me about close calls they had with gun-related violence. After all, pregnant and postpartum women are more, not less, likely to experience abuse and assault. I have had patients who were born early, delivered frantically in an attempt to save their lives and those of their shot mothers. Patients have fathers, siblings, aunts, uncles, and grandparents who are disabled or dead because they were shot. I should not see this so often, babies whose lives start shrouded in trauma because we do not have background checks and red flag policies.'' Another said: ``As a pediatric emergency physician, I face the effects of gun violence daily. I tell devastated parents that their toddler has been fatally shot by a sibling playing with a handgun. I scramble to rapidly transfuse blood into children caught in the crossfire of gang violence. I exit trauma bays covered in the brain matter of teenagers who have made the tragically final decision to end their lives with a gun. And if I am lucky, I find a moment to grieve these losses before moving on to the next patient in need of my care, a child struggling with depression after losing a family member to gun violence. This is my reality. It is heartbreaking, and it must stop.'' Finally, one said: ``I am also a mother, a mother who spends sleepless nights googling bulletproof backpacks every time an AR-15 has turned other mothers' children into sitting ducks at their schools. I should not have to worry that someone with a mental health disorder can go to a store, buy a weapon of mass destruction, and, that same day, shoot my little boys as they sit sounding out letters. But because of our laws, that dull, familiar fear rears its head often when I drop them off at school. It doesn't have to be this way.'' She is right. They are right. It doesn't have to be this way. It must stop. We don't have to live this way. There are laws that could help turn the tide, and this shouldn't be a partisan issue. Children are being shot every day regardless of their family's party affiliation. Mr. Speaker, our communities are begging the Republican majority to come to the table and find common ground to pass comprehensive, commonsense, and constitutional legislation that will end this epidemic. The American people overwhelmingly support background checks, safe storage, red flag laws, and limiting access to assault-style weapons because they understand the Second Amendment is not a suicide pact.

Ms. SCANLON

Ms. SCANLON. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume, and I thank the gentleman from Kentucky for yielding me the customary 30 minutes. With all the very real issues facing our great Nation, it is really disappointing that once again the House majority has decided to waste valuable time and resources to promote a bunch of half-baked legislative ideas and stir the culture wars pot with MAGA conspiracy theories. The bills that we started considering yesterday in the Rules Committee and will debate and vote upon in the next couple days, consuming an entire week of scarce legislative time, will do nothing to address the most pressing issues our constituents are begging us to address: gun violence, affordable health and childcare, the growing impact of climate change, Social Security solvency, immigration, and national security. Worse, the antigovernment philosophy inspiring these bills will ultimately harm Americans by creating dangerous bottlenecks in critical government functions, misrepresenting the role and actions of the Federal Government, and disrupting the government's ability to protect Americans from harm. Let's get some facts straight. While our colleagues across the aisle have framed their argument as necessary to ensure that Congress exercises its legislative function, they completely ignore the fact that the Federal agencies and rulemaking processes they are attacking have been established by Congress to undertake specific functions. That includes rulemaking, which is delegated to the agencies by Congress and ensures that they implement policies using the best and most recent expertise available, for the benefit of the American people. By enlisting the assistance of Federal agencies to administer the laws that it passes, Congress fulfills its constitutional mandate, the mandate for our entire government to establish justice, ensure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to our colleagues. In other words, working together with the other branches, our government is charged with accomplishing certain basic goals for the American people. The regulatory process that our colleagues seek to frame as a battle against a vast bureaucratic conspiracy is actually an essential part of ensuring that we all have clean air and water to breathe and drink; healthy food to eat; safe planes, trains, and automobiles to travel in. In reality, regulations mean that when a senior goes to the pharmacy to pick up their prescriptions, the lifesaving medication that they will take is both safe and effective. When you boil it down, rules and regulations are extremely tangible ways that the Federal Government protects people's health and safety and helps create a fairer economy where everyone has a chance to succeed. Subject matter experts at agencies craft these regulations, many based on highly complex and technical data. Once a rule is proposed, it undergoes an often years-long rigorous review in which comments are solicited from the public, business interests, and other agencies. Of course, these rules and regs are issued in response to congressional directives. They are an important step towards implementing laws that Members of this body have passed while representing the people back home who elect them to come here. We can see examples of successful rulemaking all the time across the country. Before the Clean Water Act, the Delaware River, which runs alongside my district, was so polluted that it stripped the paint off passing ships. These days, you can safely kayak on the river thanks to regulations developed by agencies to carry out that law. While the regulatory process can always be improved upon, the proposals we are considering today are not good-faith improvements or efforts to provide checks on the regulatory process. The first of these bills is H.R. 277, the REINS Act, which would turn the administrative rulemaking process on its head, requiring every major rule--of which there are dozens and sometimes hundreds every year--to be passed again by both houses of Congress and signed by the President. Remember, these rules have been developed in the first instance as a result of congressional action. What the REINS Act is really doing is creating a process that will cause gridlock that then Republicans, or other political operatives, can take advantage of to stop rules they don't like. The burdensome requirements of H.R. 277 are simply not needed because Congress already has multiple opportunities to shape or rescind major rules if it disapproves of them. We can hold hearings and offer public comment. We can disapprove major regulations before they take effect, or we can rescind those regulations under the Congressional Review Act. On that last point in particular, I will note that this majority has moved these types of measures through this Chamber already many times this Congress. In addition, we can also pass legislation to change laws or regulations, if we so please. Of course, we are considering bills today to do just that. I know my colleagues on the other side of the aisle are aware of the avenues through which Congress can review and reverse rules. I know it because they use them, or try to use them, week in and week out. For them to paint a bill like the REINS Act as a noble effort to empower Congress is disingenuous, and, ultimately, it diverts attention from the disastrous consequences this legislation would actually create. Effectively, the REINS Act nullifies all new rulemaking by any administration, whether Republican or Democrat, and it would bring government operations to a standstill. Any new regulation would have to be passed by Congress in order to take effect. So let's think about what that would really mean. A Congress, with a House majority that would rather bring the country to the brink of default instead of paying bills that Congress has already approved, would have to vote on every new major regulation from every Federal agency. If that doesn't scare you, the Senate, hardly a model of expeditious legislation, would need to do the same. In addition, the bill might actually be unconstitutional because it creates a mechanism in which one House of Congress can effectively veto an agency's rule by simply not acting on it within a 70-day legislative time frame. This, in effect, is indistinguishable from the one-House legislative veto that the Supreme Court held to be unconstitutional in Immigration and Naturalization Service v. Chadha. The unfortunate truth is, Congress struggles every day to meet the most pressing needs of the American people. There aren't enough hours in the day, year, or congressional term for us to weigh in on all the regulations that we would need to implement the laws that we are passing. Under this policy, crucial regulations would be left to languish unacted upon, and the health, safety, and welfare of the people we are supposed to serve would be in jeopardy. In addition to the REINS Act, there are three other bills that my colleagues are pushing through today which would also undermine the regulatory process and threaten public welfare and safety. H.R. 288, the SOPRA Act, eliminates the decades-long standard for judicial review of agency decisions. That is a precedent that rests, in part, on the understanding that Congress delegates to agencies certain authorities to carry out the laws that it passes. It is clear that all the talk on the other side of the aisle about this being to restore power to Congress is empty words because this bill actually incentivizes unelected judges, not Congress, to make and enact policy from the bench. Ultimately, it would slow the rulemaking process and skew it toward more powerful, well-funded, and often corporate litigants, which may be the point. Finally, the two gas stove bills that our colleagues are pushing this week actually demonstrate some of the flaws in the REINS Act; chief among them, the ready availability of alternatives to the REINS Act proposal and the dangers of politicizing the rulemaking process. H.R. 1615 and 1640 are fearmongering attempts to prevent the enactment of standards to make gas stoves more safe and efficient and would hinder agencies' abilities to address potentially dangerous consumer products. The majority's trumped-up battle to defend gas stoves from the Federal Government is nothing more than a conspiracy theory cooked up to embroil Congress in culture wars that shed more heat than light on the issues facing our Nation and are likely done so with a healthy helping of fossil fuel lobbying dollars. Contrary to the heated rhetoric from our colleagues across the aisle, the Federal Government has not proposed to remove appliances from Americans' homes. That persuasive falsehood has been repeated for months by partisan hacks like Tucker Carlson to stoke grievances and cause chaos. H.R. 1640, the Save Our Gas Stoves Act, nullifies new, congressionally mandated energy efficiency standards for gas stoves, for new gas stoves only, that would save consumers up to $1.7 billion in energy bills and cut down on emissions that are being shown to be particularly dangerous to children's health. Most of us are familiar with these energy efficiency standards, and we rely upon them when we purchase new appliances like stoves and freezers and furnaces. I know that I do because it is the responsible thing to do as a consumer from both an environmental and an economic perspective. Contrary to my colleagues' assertions, half of the gas stoves on the market today would meet the standard, and the remainder would have 3 years to make the necessary and already available adjustments to bring their new stoves into compliance. H.R. 1615, the Gas Stove Protection and Freedom Act, is even worse because it threatens the government's ability to identify and regulate unsafe gas stoves, including those with design defects that could cause injury or death to American consumers. Just last year, the Consumer Product Safety Commission recalled a gas stove that had sent multiple people to the hospital and placed many more at serious risk of injury or death from carbon monoxide poisoning. This bill would have prevented the recall of that dangerous appliance and would prevent the Consumer Product Safety Commission from addressing other dangerous appliances in the future. It is simply irresponsible to jeopardize the health and safety of Americans in order to promote conspiracy theories for the far right. Overall today, my Republican colleagues take a misguided approach to the issues facing rulemaking and Federal regulations. It is clear they don't want to make the government work better. They want to break it. They would rather allow polluters and corporations to wreak havoc on our environment, children's health, and working people's livelihoods. They would prefer to decimate a regulatory process that improves the lives of Americans every single day. The Federal Government has long played an important role in promoting the health, safety, and welfare of the American people, and we need to ensure that it can continue playing that role. Madam Speaker, I strongly oppose these bills, and I reserve the balance of my time.

Ms. SCANLON. Madam Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Doggett).

Ms. SCANLON. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Ms. SCANLON. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. My esteemed colleague from Kentucky talked about the popularity of the REINS Act, but I suggest that that popularity is overstated. The REINS Act has been introduced by its extremist advocates for more than a decade without ever being enacted into law, even when Republicans held both Houses and the White House. I would suggest that it is because saner heads have prevailed and understood that enactment of the REINS Act is bad for America. Mr. Speaker, if we defeat the previous question, I will offer an amendment to the rule to provide for consideration of a resolution which states that it is the House's responsibility to protect and preserve Social Security and Medicaid for our future generations and reject any cuts to these essential programs. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of my amendment into the Record, along with any extraneous material, immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.

Ms. SCANLON. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to include in the Record a Politico article titled: ``What the right's gas stove freak- out was really about.'' That is dated January 14. The first line is: ``No, President Joe Biden isn't coming for your gas stove.''