Anthony Weiner

Mr. WEINER

Mr. WEINER. Mr. Chairman, I withdraw my reservation of objection.

Mr. WEINER. Mr. Chairman, reserving the right to object, the gentleman will be offering a secondary amendment to the amendment? I did not understand.

Mr. WEINER. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. WEINER. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. I will not take the full 5 minutes. I just want to join the leaders of the communities in expressing strong opposition to this amendment. This is not an academic issue in New York City. We had a circumstance after September 11 where FBI agents fanned out into the neighborhoods doing interviews at corner stores in Arab American communities. And the FBI was required to notify the INS anytime they found anything untoward. The word spread within hours, and I think the gentleman from the Bronx would acknowledge this, spread within hours, do not cooperate, do not give the information. The FBI in the City of New York turned to the NYPD and said since they have a trustful relationship with many of these recent immigrants, can they go conduct these interviews. And a lot of the information that was gathered, including some about threats to blow up the Brooklyn Bridge, was gathered that way. So from a law enforcement perspective, this amendment has no merit. Proof of that is I can read a list as long as my arm of police departments and police organizations who are opposed to this type of initiative. As the gentleman from New York said, they do not want their officers in the position of breaking down what is often years and years of trust because of this type of thing. It is demagogically very appealing to say the minute they find out someone has violated the immigration laws, let us turn them in. But from a realistic, real life, particularly antiterror amendment, one could not imagine a worse amendment.

Mr. WEINER

Mr. WEINER. Mr. Chairman, first of all, I want to thank the chairman of the committee and the ranking member. They have both allocated a remarkable amount of resources to solve this problem and deserve great praise. I would argue on the point of order, Mr. Chairman, that this is not a change in existing law; that we, in existing law, have already articulated the will of this House that this monument be reopened; that this be a national park that we have allocated resources to. I would say that this is only a reiteration of existing law. Now it might not be in this bill, but it is existing law; and I would even argue that given the allocation for security enhancements that it is the intention of this House that steps be taken; and therefore, it is not legislating in an appropriation bill, and if it is, we should do it anyway.

Mr. WEINER. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment.

Mr. WEINER. Mr. Chairman, I thank the chairman and his terrific staff, Deb Weatherly, and the gentleman from Washington (Mr. Dicks) and Mike Stephens and the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Peterson) for their help with this amendment. This is quite simple, and I think it is something we could find broad consensus on in this House. On September 11, 2 years, 8 months and 6 days ago, all national parks in these affected areas of Washington and New York were closed. Today, all that time later, the Statue of Liberty, the national park that is closest to Ground Zero, the national park that arguably represents all of the things that were attacked on September 11 and represents the values of this country, remains closed today. What this amendment says is enough is enough, reopen the Statue of Liberty by July 31, 2004. It is not closed for lack of money. This House has allocated $19.6 million for security enhancements, and that is between fiscal year 2002 and fiscal year 2004. There is an additional $10 million or so in this budget for that. The time has come for the Statue of Liberty to be reopened. It is almost mind-boggling to me that only a matter of weeks after September 11 the Washington Monument was reopened. The Republican National Convention, which by the way we would be welcoming with open arms to New York City, will soon be coming to New York City at least in part to the proximity to that attack on our country; and yet the National Park Service refuses to open the Statue of Liberty. Recently, they made the announcement that we are going to allow people to go into Lady Liberty and stand next to her toes, that this was some kind of a great victory for the people of the United States, despite all of the money that had been allocated for reopening. If that does not gall my colleagues, take a look at this. This is a picture of a Web site from something called the Statue of Liberty Foundation. They have raised more than $7 million, which by the way is the amount that was originally said to be the cost for opening Lady Liberty. Folgers sponsors it. If a person sends in a Folgers can, they help contribute to reopening Lady Liberty. American Express has been giving a few dollars. Recently, the Daily News in New York City ran a campaign on their editorial page. People are giving donations of $1, $2, $3 at a time. Millions of dollars have been raised for what purpose? To open Lady Liberty, not open her feet. Open the crown. Open the part that is most glorious. Open the part that should be symbolic of us getting back on our feet, and yet it has not happened. It is inexplicable. The Park Service, what have they been doing? Well, we are thinking about it. We are planning to make a plan. We are anticipating maybe coming up with an idea. The National Park Service should be ashamed of their inactions. We in Congress have done our job. We have given them money after money after money for this purpose, to come up with security provisions. We here in the House of Representatives, we had to figure out security as well. We have come up with some accommodations. People are back here and visiting. This monument is more than simply a national park. It is symbolic of this country. If the National Park Service is expecting us to believe that we are going to leave this closed ad infinitum, they have got another think coming. There is no way they can secure us in this building, they can secure us on airlines, they can secure us in the Washington Monument, they can secure us anywhere in the United States of America. Osama bin Laden is not going to keep the Statue of Liberty closed, and what this amendment says is we are not going to allow it to happen. Republicans, Democrats, Independents alike have all contributed to help get this open. The taxpayers have contributed enormous amounts to help get this open. We have children doing cake sales all around the country to get the Statue of Liberty open; and what we are being told is, well, maybe someday we will allow people to go in and pat Lady Liberty's toes. That is about as far as we are going to get. I believe it is outrageous. I believe it is outrageous, and we have to recognize something, that is, if we are going to raise money to reopen it, and allow people to be deceived in that way, the very least we in Congress should do is say, spend the money for what you said it was going to be for; and if by some unimaginable set of circumstances, the National Park Service, United States Armed Services, the NYPD, the United States Congress cannot figure out a way to reopen this monument, I hate to use an overworked cliche, but really, the terrorists have won. If they manage to keep this closed, it would be a shame. I want to make one other point. I hope that when my colleagues on the Republican side of the aisle come visit New York, they have an opportunity to see the glory of traveling up to the crown of the Statue of Liberty, of seeing that glory, of participating in that. And what my colleagues will see is not only the glory of New York Harbor welcoming waves of new immigrants. They will see Ground Zero. It is a shame that when we stand at Ground Zero, the national park we see is one that is shamefully closed. Point of Order

Mr. WEINER. Mr. Chairman, I would like to be heard on the point of order.

Mr. WEINER

Mr. WEINER. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the Sweeney amendment. We have essentially, as we try to figure out the way to do this, made or compounded three fundamental areas in allocating resources. First, I think there is consensus among a lot of law enforcement organizations across the country that have not allocated enough money, we need to do more. Secondly, when we first began this process, we did it entirely based on population and we had the unusual circumstance that States like Wyoming got much more per capita than States like New York, and we in Congress and this subcommittee acted to respond to that challenge by creating a new high-threat, high-density program. It was not Congress that then screwed that up, it was the Department of Homeland Security who took that program and expanded it and expanded it and expanded it to more and more cities. We had the unusual and almost surreal experience of having cities lobbying to be considered high density, high threat to the point now that we have some cities on that list of 50 that do not even have minor league baseball teams. Perhaps this is not the vehicle, but I know the bill of the gentleman from California (Mr. Cox) that is moving its way through the House seeks to take that list and limit it more closely to true high-threat, high-density areas. A third mistake that Homeland Security has made, and the gentleman from California (Mr. Cox) just referred to it, is we have this bizarre formula that takes high-threat money and allocates it first by population by a factor of nine, and then infrastructure by a factor of six, and finally threat by a factor of three. Even when we in Congress say let us allocate money based on threat, we are getting it wrong. I understand the gentleman from New York (Mr. Sweeney) wanted to address that in this bill. It was struck down on a point of order, but we need to figure out a way to fix that problem because even when we are getting money out the door theoretically addressed toward threat, Department of Homeland Security says it is not getting there because of the formulas that they are setting. I would say, not to reiterate what others have said, is that frankly Members can make the argument that every place in the country is a potential threat. Hypothetical threat is something we can all describe. For some cities, though, it is not hypothetical. It is real. For some cities, there are actual threats. What I would ask is there any homeland security expert, anyone who has said on the record the way we are allocating funds in this bill makes sense? I can tell Members the people who do not, people like the police commissioner of New York, people like the 9/11 Commission, people like Secretary Ridge, who himself has now said there is no doubt in his mind that the way we are allocating money is simply wrong and needs to be redirected. This is the man who came to that position after months and months on the job, and I am glad he did. When we talk to intelligence officials and Department of Defense officials about how they do their job, they allocate resources based on real threats, they do not do it based on hypothetical threats. I would say it is true that the Sweeney amendment does not do everything, and I would also reiterate what so many of the opponents of this amendment have said that I agree with, and that is that this should not be regional fight. This should not be factions inside of factions fighting over this fund. I have no intention on the agriculture bill to come to this floor and demand that New York City get a piece of that pie. It simply would not be appropriate, and I do not believe it is good policy. In this case, though, when we have real threats to places like New York, I believe the funding should be allocated. Just to give an idea what a real threat is, I just cite for the Record the story of Iyman Faris, a guy who comes to New York, sits by the Brooklyn Bridge, eats lunch at a Pakistani restaurant by City Hall, and then reports back to his handlers it is too hot. What did he mean by it is too hot? He observed at all four stanchions of the Brooklyn Bridge an NYPD cruiser that is there all day, all night at extraordinary expense to the people of the City of New York. And they decided not to do the operation, which was a plan to blow up the Brooklyn Bridge. That is not hypothetical. It is an actual threat. I do not think it is unreasonable that a greater portion of the money coming out of this bill goes towards places that have to deal with those threats.

Mr. WEINER

Mr. WEINER. Mr. Speaker, this Memorial Day we pay tribute to those who have given their lives in defense of our great Nation. The freedoms we enjoy here at home do not come cheap. They are paid for with the blood and treasure of true American heroes. Today we reaffirm our commitment to the liberties they fought to defend. And we pledge never to forget their sacrifice. This year, Memorial Day has a special poignancy. Here in Washington, veterans of the Second World War finally received the monument they so richly deserved. The World War Two Memorial dedicated on the National Mall provides a fitting tribute to a generation of young men and women who defended the United States against the specter of a tyranny as horrible as any the world has known. The 400,000 Americans who gave their lives in the European and Pacific theaters will never be forgotten. In addition, this Memorial Day is special because it affords us an opportunity to honor the young men and women who are currently engaged in the War on Terror. Halfway around the world, a new generation has been called to battle. And like those that defeated our enemies in the 1940s, this new generation of Americans has faced the enemy with strength and determination. Almost 1,000 men and women have lost their lives in Iraq and Afghanistan. Those of us who enjoy the freedom they have sacrificed to defend should be immensely proud and eternally grateful. This weekend, as we take a moment away from our normal routines, let us say a prayer and remember both those who have gone before us and those who continue to defend freedom from oppression. Our thoughts should be with those families that have lost loved ones in battle. And our thanks should go to all those who honor us by taking up arms to defend the United States. God bless our men and women in uniform. And God Bless America.

Mr. WEINER

Mr. WEINER. Mr. Speaker, Edward R. Murrow High School is known for a great many things, not the least of which is producing the only two truly talented members of the Weiner family, my brothers Jason and Seth; but this year they are also known as the 2004 national chess champs, defeating over 150 schools, 300,000 student. This goes with their dynasty-building wins in 1992, 1993 and 1994, under the excellent coaching of Eliot Weiss. We have to recognize they do belong in the pantheon of dynasties, as they defeated every school in the country and are soon going to be taking on those in this world. And as soon as NASA makes it possible, I am sure they will defeat teams from other planets. Let me read the roll call of this great team: Salvijus Bercys, Dimitry Minevich, Olga Novikova, Alex Lidnerman, Ilya Kotlyanskiy, Oscar Santana, Willy Edgard, and Niles Smith. There is a reason they call this team the Brooklyn Kings. We offer them our congratulations.

Mr. WEINER

Mr. WEINER. Mr. Speaker, this month many of us pause to remember the Holocaust in Yom Hashoah commemorations. But on April 24, 1915, the first genocide of the 20th century began. The Ottoman Empire began rounding up a group of more than 250 Armenian intellectuals and civic leaders. Then soldiers of Armenian descent who were serving in the Turkish military were moved to labor camps and eventually murdered. Across Anatolia, Armenian leaders were arrested and killed. So, too, were the most powerless, children, women, and the elderly, all driven from their homes into the Syrian desert. These mass deportations were in fact slaughters. They were death marches. Soldiers themselves not only permitted the attacks on the deportees but participated in the killing and rapes. The inevitable end was thousands upon thousands dying of starvation or simply being worked to death, but sometimes these victims were the lucky ones. When the Turks deemed deportations impractical, the genocide took other vicious forms. In communities near the Black Sea, Armenians were forced onto boats, driven out into the middle of the ocean, and drowned. In the end, 1.5 million Armenians were killed in the genocide as the world stood by. Henry Morganthau, the U.S. Ambassador to Turkey, who pleaded with world leaders to intervene, described the Ottoman effort to eliminate the Armenian population this way: ``The whole history of the human race contains no such horrible an episode as this.'' An American diplomat stationed in eastern Anatolia cabled back to Washington that ``it has been no secret that the plan was to destroy the Armenian race as a race, but the methods used could not have been more cold-blooded and barbarous, if not more effective, than I had first supposed.'' Like communities that survived the Nazis efforts at extermination, the Armenian community today is often faced by those who deny the Turkish effort to commit genocide ever occurred. Despite records and accounts preserved in our own National Archives, there have been those bent on erasing this horrible memory from the annals of history. We will not let that happen. That is why today's commemoration here in the United States Congress and those going on this week is so crucial. If the world fails to remember the Armenian genocide of the early 20th century, we do more than a grave injustice to those who perished. We do a disservice to the generations who have come after us who would be left without the collective memory that binds those who understand the depth of evil that one community is capable of unleashing upon another. Yet even as we remember and grieve, we thank those in the Armenian community for the contributions they have made around the globe since emerging from terror 89 years ago. One need not look too far to find Armenian-Americans who have become pillars of American society. Armenian-Americans are influential businessmen, like Kirk Kerkorian; famous writers, like William Saroyan; and international sports stars, like Andre Agassi. In New York, internationally renowned scholar and Carnegie Corporation president Vartan Gregorian spent 8 years as president of the New York Public Library. Arshile Gorky was a leader of the abstract expressionist school that flourished in New York during the 1940s. And I am particularly proud that Raymond Damadian, who invented the MRI, was not only a resident of New York but was a neighbor of mine in Forest Hills. His parents were survivors of the genocide. As we gather, we also pay tribute to those who have become famous public servants, football coaches, astronauts and others. As we gather to commemorate the Armenian genocide, we do so as a lesson to one another that we must not forget the lessons that were learned. We also gather to pay a message to those who would deny that the Holocaust ever happened. But perhaps most importantly, we gather to send a signal across the world that those who seek to deny the Armenian genocide do a disservice to all of us. We here in the United States House of Representatives should delay no further in making our voices heard in this debate. It is worth noting that the very same people who would deny this Holocaust actively push that we do not consider the resolution that the gentleman from California (Mr. Schiff) has proposed. We gather here today to pay tribute, but we also gather to put pressure on this United States Congress to finally designate what we all know to be the case as genocide. The first genocide of the 20th century was not the last, tragically; but it is time that we correct the history in the minds of many and finally declare the Armenian genocide the holocaust that it was.

Mr. WEINER

Mr. WEINER. Mr. Chairman, I rise today to thank the leadership of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee for their hard work shepherding through TEA-LU, a bill that I will support despite its flaws. The Department of Transportation studied the Nation's infrastructure and prescribed a $375 billion solution. I joined the leadership in endorsing the original version of this bill, which filled that prescription. Unfortunately, the administration is unwilling to come up with the support necessary to ensure that we are able to maintain and improve the Nation's infrastructure. As a result, we are today considering a bill that does not do nearly enough to improve the quality of life for individuals living in New York City and around the country. I look forward to working with the Committee leadership to see that this bill is improved in conference. Mr. Chairman, as this bill moves to conference, I want to highlight four issues that are of particular import to me and my constituents. It is my hope that the conferees will include these improvements in the conference report. First, this bill should ensure that resources are devoted by formula to states that require improvements. The minimum guarantee program shifts funding from states that have the greatest need--like New York-- to other states. Each year, New York provides $20 billion more to Washington than it gets back. New Yorkers ought not be punished for our efforts to conserve fuel, as any expansion of the minimum guarantee program would do. Second, this bill shortchanges New York on transit funding. Despite having a third of the nation's transit ridership, New York only gets 14% of Federal funds. Transit funding should better reflect need. Third, I hope that conferees will ensure that states starved for a consistent funding stream for ferries and waterborne transportation can count on funding from the Ferry Boat Discretionary Fund. As a co- chairman, with Mr. Nethercutt, of the Ferry and Waterborne Transportation Caucus, I am acutely aware of how much a guaranteed stream of funding would mean to improve both congestion and homeland security all across the country, and particularly in New York City, where roads are clogged on a normal day, and ferry transportation would provide not only congestion relief but another way to ensure escape from Manhattan in the case of a terrorist attack. At a minimum, New York should receive $5 million per year. I hope conferees will work with me and other Members who represent districts that would benefit from a guaranteed ferry funding stream. Fourth, I hope that conferees will work with me to ensure that the generous funding we have provided for Senior transportation in this bill is put to its best use. I believe that establishing a center for best practices and a technical assistance center, as delineated in the other body's Surface Transportation Authorization Bill, would provide an enormous service to this nation's elderly population. Nevertheless, Chairman Young, Mr. Oberstar, Chairman Petri, and Mr. Lipinski deserve the thanks and appreciation of every Member of this House for their tireless effort to ensure that the nation's surface transportation systems receive the resources required to keep America moving. Mr. Chairman, I have worked hard to ensure that this bill will make significant improvements to the lives of ordinary New Yorkers. Included in this bill are a number of projects that will enhance transportation throughout New York City and in my district in particular. At my urging, the bill includes: $15,000,000 for the New York City Department of Transportation to build the facilities and purchase the ferry boats necessary to establish high speed ferry service between the Rockaway Peninsula and Manhattan. $500,000 to help the New York State Department of Transportation install two permanent variable message signs that will display amber alert messages on the belt parkway. $500,000 for the New York City Department of Transportation to study and implement improvements to the area surrounding the intersections of Avenue U and Flatbush Avenue. $1,000,000 for each of the boroughs of New York City to make improvements to pedestrian safety, in consultation with each borough president. $250,000 for the areas surrounding each of 10 schools in New York City. Those funds are to be spent on efforts to improve pedestrian safety surrounding those 10 schools. Students walking to IS 114, PS 200, PS 124, PS 277, Prospect Park Yeshiva, PS 81, IS 194, IS 72/PS 69, PS 153, and St. Roberts Bellarmine will all be better protected by improvements installed with funding provided in TEA-LU. $700,000 to abate noise emanating from state roadways located within New York City that are paved with concrete. ``Diamond grinding'' measures should significantly improve the quality of life of those residing within earshot of those roadways. $50,000 to improve the roadways surrounding the Brooklyn Children's Museum. $1,000,000 to be used to build a new facility for the Broad Channel Volunteer Fire Department. $4,000,000 to be used by the DOE Fund to establish a graffiti elimination program throughout the Boroughs of Queens and Brooklyn. Among the areas addressed by this program will be Kings Highway from Ocean Boulevard to McDonald Avenue. $3,000,000 to improve transportation facilities in the vicinity of West 65th Street and Broadway in conjunction with the major capital improvements being done at Lincoln Center. $1,000,000 for the New York City Department of Transportation to improve the streets and sidewalks of Middle Village, Queens. $500,000 to be equally distributed at five locations in New York City for the New York City Department of Transportation to enhance the enforcement of truck routes. $300,000 for Gateway National Park to improve the RIIS Park Boardwalk. $1,000,000 for Gateway National Park to establish a ferry terminal at Floyd Bennett Field. $3,000,000 to be used to improve traffic flow in the vicinity of Atlantic and Flatbush Avenues. $1,000,000 to be used by City and State Agencies to improve homeland security at bridges and tunnels throughout New York City. $500,000 to improve the roads and facilities at the Kew Gardens Long Island Rail Road Terminal. $950,000 to design and construct a bicycle and pedestrian walkway along the decommissioned Putnam Rail Line in the Bronx. $2,000,000 to improve 125th Street in Harlem in conjunction with improvements being made by Columbia University. $1,000,000 to help Easter Seals purchase and equip cars that provide livery service to disabled New Yorkers. And $1,000,000 to establish a bus rapid transit system at a location to be detemined in consultation with the Transportation Workers Union. Bus rapid transit uses a variety of traffic improvements, like exclusive bus lanes and coordinated signal changing, to speed bus travel on congested city routes. At the urging of Congresswoman Velazquez, Congressman Crowley and myself, the bill includes more than $1,500,000 for pedestrian safety improvements on Queens Boulevard. These high priority projects will make a considerable contribution to the lives of New York City residents. I could not have secured these and other programs within TEA-LU without the help and counsel of individuals here in Washington, as well as in Albany and New York City. In particular, I would like to thank both the Democratic and Republican staff of the Transportation Committee, both of whom worked tirelessly on this piece of legislation, and who deserve the entire House's thanks. In particular, I would like to thank Ken House, Clyde Woodle, Eric Vanschyndle, Ward McCarragher, Kathleen Zern, David Heymsfeld, Dara Schleiker, and Sheila Lockwood of Mr. Oberstar's staff. Additionally, I would like to thank Jim Tymon of Mr. Young's staff who for his willingness to work with me on the issue of Ferry Transportation. I would also like to thank Tom Kearney, Tom Herritt and their colleagues at the Albany Office of the Federal Highway Administration, Nancy Ross, Fred Neveu, Ron Epstein and their colleagues at the New York State Department of Transportation, and Andra Horsch and David Woloch and their colleagues at the New York City Department of Transportation.

Mr. WEINER

Mr. WEINER. Madam Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Andrews). (Mr. ANDREWS asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. WEINER. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Madam Speaker, first I would like to extend my thanks and gratitude to the chairman, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Sensenbrenner), for making this part of the hallmark of the Committee on the Judiciary that we are going to start to continue to have reauthorization bills on the floor for DOJ. I think that is an important thing. For too long it has gone without. This is a large, important bill and an important part of our government. Now the next step is to have it under regular orders, to have the bill open for amendments, to have the people have the opportunity to offer suggestions. They are a diverse element of this bill. I think it would serve this body well to have an active debate about some of the elements therein and be able to go through the regular process of amendments to perfect the bill even further. This bill has some very excellent provisions, not the least of which, as the chairman mentioned, is the reauthorization for the first time in a while of the COPS program. The COPS program is by just about every measure a success. It is one of those programs that is extraordinarily democratic, with a small D. Small towns, big cities have all benefited from the police hirings that have gone on. This is something that transcends politics. It transcends regions. While we can have a debate, and we often do, where criminologists suggest why crime might be going down nationwide, we have academics that have taken a look at it, at the end of the day I believe it is because we in the Federal Government got off the sidelines with the COPS program and started to provide funding for States and localities to provide law enforcement officials. Now we have a situation where there are over 110,000 cops presently funded to walk the beat all over the country with funding provided by this Congress. This bill would reauthorize it and improve it. It is not an accident that this has broad bipartisan support. A coalition of Members just recently wrote to the Appropriations Committee urging that the COPS components be fully funded. It includes the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Stupak), the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Ramstad), the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Andrews), the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Platts), the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Holden), the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Keller), the gentleman from New York (Mr. Quinn), and myself. It should be pointed out, though, that the President for the second year in a row included zero dollars and zero cents in his budget for the hiring components of the COPS program. We have heard over and over again the Attorney General and the Deputy of Homeland Security Secretary say homeland security starts in our home towns. We go periodically to higher levels of alert where we tell our local law enforcement officials, our local first responders, you have got to absorb more responsibility. Yet, at the same time, we in the Federal Government have been reluctant to provide that funding. This authorization bill changes that with a program that would provide over the course of the bill $3 billion worth of funding. Another provision that is included in this bill that is long overdue is getting our Department of Justice off the sidelines in another issue, and that is, that increasingly, by dint of terrorism overseas, U.S. citizens are dying. And simply put, the enforcement, the indictment, the investigation of those crimes is not happening. We have seen 36 Americans murdered by Palestinian terrorists alone since the Oslo Accords have been signed; yet there have been zero indictments. There have been no real rewards. Suspects' names and faces have not been listed by the Justice Department. The Koby Mandell Act, which was authored by the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Andrews) and included in this bill, changes that; but there are things that are not included in this bill that if it would have been open rule, we would have had an opportunity to include In 2000, we in this Congress recognized that we had a real problem after a GAO study showed that increasingly very realistic-looking badges were falling into the hands of those that should not have them. This is before September 11. A person can today go on to the Internet and search for collectible badges, and they can find realistic ones that are so realistic that they can pass for NYPD badges, Customs Department, FBI and all kinds of others. The reason is, although it is illegal to possess a badge like that, there are some very big loopholes that you can drive a truck through. For example, if you are a collector and you certify that you are, you can purchase one of these badges. If you are someone that is using it for a movie or an entertainment purpose, you can get one of these badges. There is even an exemption in the law, a loophole in the law, if you want to use the badge for recreational purposes. Now I do not know how sophisticated a game of cops and robbers someone is interested in playing, but this is a very serious issue in the context of so many check points that we have now, so many security lines that people have to cross. These badges have caused a problem. Over 1,200 times in New York City alone, someone has used a fake badge for illicit purposes. This is a very easy loophole to close. I would have liked the provision to have been included in the bill. It would have been a nice thing to offer, and I believe it would have had the support of this House. If you are a collector, you can still get a badge. It has to be encased in Lucite, very simple. If you are someone who is in a movie or a film production, you have to go to the law enforcement authority wherever you are shooting and get them to sign off that you are using this badge for that purpose, and there absolutely should not be an exemption for ``recreational purposes.'' These badges are being used in some cases by true collectors; but in many cases, they are being used for illegal and illicit purposes. Madam Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Visclosky).

Mr. WEINER. Madam Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee).

Mr. WEINER. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I wanted to conclude the way I began, by offering my thanks to Chairman Sensenbrenner. He has made this Committee on the Judiciary one that functions in a no-nonsense fashion. We legislate. We very often disagree on issues, but they are all heard. And I think he has also done an excellent job in protecting the prerogatives of the committee, making sure that important things like the funding of the Judiciary, of the Justice Department, is not left entirely to the appropriators and that we have an opportunity to craft a bill. I would now encourage our colleagues in the other body to get going. They have many of these provisions they are also looking at. I understand they are going to take up this bill. I would urge them to do so quickly. And I think that we should, as the chairman said, get in the habit of treating this agency like others. There are sticky issues, but I think we have shown in the Committee on the Judiciary that we can navigate them. I do want to make reference to one point, because many of my colleagues have mentioned it in passing. There is a great deal of controversy, I think much of it overblown, about the PATRIOT Act. I think supporters of the PATRIOT Act have wildly overstated its impact, and detractors have wildly overstated the impositions put on Americans. But I think the chairman deserves credit for fully funding the Inspector General's Office, with particular attention being paid to making sure that PATRIOT Act investigations are being done in an aboveboard way that does not violate the rights of Americans and that as we review the PATRIOT Act as it prepares to sunset that we have a full arsenal of information at our disposal. I wanted to also offer my thanks to some members of the staff here at the on the Democratic side of the Committee on the Judiciary, Sampak Garg, Perry Apelbaum, Ted Kalo, Bobby Vassar, Greg Barnes, and Marc Dunkelman of my staff. In particular, I would like to offer my gratitude to Lamar Robertson, who has been my counsel on the Committee on the Judiciary for years now and has done so with remarkable aplomb, remarkable intellect, with a great sense of humor. He will be missed by those of us with whom he serves in the House, and this part in particular that deals with the COPS program is a testament to his hard work. With that, I offer my thanks to the chairman, and I urge a ``yes'' vote. Madam Speaker, I have no further requests for time. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. WEINER

Mr. WEINER. Mr. Chairman, I offer an amendment. The Chairman pro tempore. The Clerk will designate the amendment.

Mr. WEINER. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. WEINER. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I do not know where to start. First, let us start about the mistake that the gentleman made about the bill, line 13, page 1: may not impose a fee on the depositor. Nothing in this bill stops the bank from charging a fee to the person who bounced the check. Let me say it again. Nothing in this bill stops the person who bounced the check from getting a fee. You can charge them $10,000. I think it is too high, but $10,000. Here is the scenario I would like to explain to the gentleman. The gentleman from Alabama (Mr. Bachus) knows me. The gentleman and I serve on a committee together. I give the gentleman a check. I have violated the rules. I give the gentleman a check that does not have enough money to back it. Can the gentleman check whether I have enough money in the account? Under the rules of privacy we passed here, he can. He does everything exactly according to Hoyle. The gentleman is now the victim of a bad check. The gentleman is the victim of a bad check, I say to the gentleman. I leave town. I do not get reelected. I get elected mayor. Stranger things have happened. And the gentleman from Alabama is now out the money for the check, and his bank is charging him a fee. I want to make sure the gentleman understands this, because he misstated it consistently over 5 minutes. There is nothing stopping the bank from penalizing the person who bounces the check. This is about the person receiving the bad check. And this notion about the landlord and the oppression that we are putting on people, do my colleagues know who benefits from this bill the most? Those that are represented by the food marketing institute, local supermarkets, local liquor stores, local bodegas, people who receive checks in large numbers, who do everything according to the rules the gentleman from Alabama just described; and they are facing a sanction for the benefit of having a bounced check. The gentleman says, well, we are sticking this to the banks. No. There is no reason that we should stick this to anyone, but especially not the victim. To oppose this amendment is to say, I believe the person who had the check bounced against them should pay this fee. I would say, Mr. Chairman, there are a lot of reasons why I can see the banks are so jealously guarding this. They all have dollar signs after them. They make a lot of money from this practice. But, frankly, it is patently unfair, unfair to individual consumers, unfair to that landlord. In the gentleman's description, the landlord is out the rent, and he is out the fee. What did that guy do wrong? What is the purpose of a penalty if it is not penalizing anything that he can avoid? He followed every single rule. And I would ask the gentleman again, you are running a supermarket, you get a check. You say, I want to see your ID; I want to see your driver's license. I want a photograph. I want to know where you live. I want to know the names of your sisters and brothers. And they take the check, following every rule the bank set up, and it bounces. What have you done wrong? How do you avoid that sanction? What kind of a law do we ever pass here where we tell how you avoid the penalty? It is patently unfair. I want to reiterate this. This is a consumer issue, because consumers get bad checks. Ninety-nine percent of these checks are to businesses, small businesses who use this check as an article of faith, and we should not penalize them for doing that.

Mr. WEINER. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, this is a very easy-to-understand issue, but a very difficult-to-understand fee. When someone writes someone a check and they do not have the funds in that account, they pay a penalty. They pay a fine. They violated the rules of the transaction. When they receive the check, what have they done wrong? What rule have they violated? What sanctions should be against someone for receiving the bad check? And the gentleman from Massachusetts was absolutely correct. This is a proconsumer measure. But let us remember who the recipients of most bounced checks are. They are small businesses, they are supermarkets, they are liquor stores, they are appliance stores that are not only out the money, they are out the goods. It simply makes no sense. I have seen some of the arguments against this. They say, well, it is going to increase the cost of banking for consumers. If there is a cost to this transaction, I ask only one question: Why does the victim pay it? All my amendment does is it says they cannot charge the victim of a bad check for that action. Why should the victim pay? Why should the victim pay? Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. WEINER. Mr. Chairman, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Frank).

Mr. WEINER

Mr. WEINER. Mr. Speaker, I want to express my gratitude to the Committee on Rules for making my amendment in order and to the sponsors of the Financial Services Regulatory Relief Act, which seems to be an excellent piece of legislation, although somewhat complex for those of us who are not familiar with banking law. My amendment is both very simple, very easy for average consumers and businesses to understand. In fact, I believe when many of my colleagues are confronted with my amendment, they are going to be shocked that what I proposed to ban is even permitted in the first place. We all know that when someone writes a check to someone, let us say they are buying an air conditioner at a local appliance store, they write a check. If they do not have sufficient funds to cover that, very often in addition to having to make up the funds for the bounced check, they get a fee from the bank. I think many of us can quibble about whether that fee is too high or not, whether it is fair. However, that is reasonable. They have violated the essential rules of the transaction by not having enough money in the account. What many Americans do not realize is that small business who is selling them that air conditioner, also when they have the check bounce, they are out the money. They have lost their air conditioner because they have already turned it over to the customer. But little known to many Americans is they also pay a fee. Banks charge the victim of a bounced check fees in the magnitude of $10 to $25 and in some cases $30. Seventy-five percent of all banks in the country charge this fee to the victim. We may hear arguments that, well, it costs us some money for the transaction. I do not dispute that. In fact, the person who is bouncing the check is paying a fine. What is unique about this practice that my amendment seeks to ban is it takes a customer who has done nothing wrong, they have followed every single rule of their bank, every single rule of trust, every single rule of good faith, and there is no way they can avoid this fine. And who is getting it? Average consumers get it from time to time when someone purchases something from someone and they accept a check, but more often than not it is small businesses who are victimized. That is why so many small business groups are in favor of this amendment. The Consumer Federation of America representing consumers is supportive of this amendment. I, frankly, would defy anyone to tell me why the person who received the check should be penalized or sanctioned. Do not argue to me that they need to be disincentivized or discouraged from accepting a check. Believe me, no one intentionally takes a bad check. They are already harmed in many ways. Do not tell me that there is money that it costs to process the transaction. That could very well be the case. The only point I am making is why should the person who has already been harmed once be harmed again? And perhaps the worst possible reason is the one that underlies all of the opposition to this amendment to the extent that there is any. Banking institutions said, Hey, Congressman Weiner, we make a lot of money on this. That is not a good enough reason. Frankly, the rules of the banking system, like any rule, like any law, should provide people fundamental rules of the road, should provide disincentives to do something bad, should punish someone who does something bad; and at the end of day in the final analysis if they are a good citizen, a good consumer, they should be able to avoid the sanction. In the case of this fee, there is no way that any of those four things apply. They cannot avoid the fee. They cannot do anything. They can ask, I want to see ID, I want to see their driver's license. You cannot even call up the bank and say, hey, does Mr. Smith have enough money in his account, because privacy laws now prohibit releasing that type of information. Simply put, there is no rational reason why the victim, the small business that is the victim, should have to pay this fee, and there is no reason why the consumer who is the victim of a bounced check should have to pay this fee. I will be offering an amendment that, as I said, I am grateful to the Committee on Rules for making in order which will say they simply cannot charge this fee. This is one that is not fair. I do not care if they disclose it in bold print, it is simply not fair, and anyone who believes it is have them come to this floor and say during this debate that we believe it is fair. It has no more connection to the person who received that check than it is to someone walking by the bank that day, charging them the fee. There is no connection with what they did either, other than being in the wrong place at the wrong time. If the banking community believes that they need additional money to pay for these transactions, there are plenty of ways that they can deal with this. They can charge more at the front end. They can have interbank relationships that say, You have a customer that wrote a bad check and we want a few dollars from you to help cover it, or they can spread out the cost throughout if it is that substantial, which I frankly do not believe it is. Some estimates say it is as low as 62 cents, even when the banks themselves say that they have a case where someone can test and I want a copy and I want to debate it; even that only costs them $4 or $5 or $6. The simple fact is this is a way that victims are victimized again, and I urge support of the Weiner amendment.

Mr. WEINER

Mr. WEINER. Mr. Speaker, there are clearly some messages to take from recent events and the bill that is on the floor today. The overriding message is that there is a responsibility that comes with being entrusted to broadcast over the public airwaves. People say if viewers do not like the content of a certain show and find it offensive, just do not watch. The problem with that argument is when content is being broadcast over public airwaves, it sometimes cannot be avoided. The fact is that people in this country surf and flip up and down channels on TV and radio. If we do not regulate what people can see and hear in these forums, children in particular will be exposed to material that is completely inappropriate. While we, and broadcasters in particular, should take action to crack down on indecent material, we must not allow this focus on indecency to become a mission instead to do everything possible to gain favor with the FCC and their ultimate leader, President Bush. Being contrary to the government and offensive to the President and his campaign donors should not fall into the category of indecent material. Unfortunately, the Clear Channel case with Howard Stern leaves that impression. Consider the facts: on February 25, Clear Channel announced that its radio stations would no longer carry the ``Howard Stern Show,'' citing ``indecent content'' in Stern's February 24 radio broadcast. But nothing in Mr. Stern's recent shows has been cited for indecency, and it has been years since he has been fined by the FCC. Some commentators have said his show has been milder in recent months. According to the Wall Street Journal, Mr. Stern's sponsors have not pulled their advertisements, meaning that the sponsors do not believe the show is across the line. The only thing that has changed is that just 2 days before his suspension, Mr. Stern had become more critical of the Bush administration, an administration Clear Channel and its top executives have bank-rolled to the tune of $42,000 this election campaign cycle, and hundreds of thousands of dollars in years past. Even more curious is the location where Mr. Stern's show is being dropped. Is it simple coincidence that political battlegrounds of Ohio and Florida are losing a popular critic of the Bush administration just as the election season begins? While we are right to take action today to keep indecent material off the public airwaves, this should not be seen as open season on a diversity of views. If we only have radio personalities who are sympathetic to the President and his large corporate backers, then we will only have a small number of voices being heard, and all of them will be at the far right end of the radio dial.

Mr. WEINER

Mr. WEINER. Mr. Speaker, I will be brief, perhaps even less than the 3 minutes. Of the forest of things that is wrong with the bankruptcy bill, and I voted against it, this is actually a provision that represents a tree that actually makes some sense. So my colleagues understand this provision, it says that when an entity enters into bankruptcy no investment house that has been involved in underwriting on any level at any time in the history of that company could be involved in the reorganization. So the following not-so-hypothetical could happen: Ford Motor Company goes into a bankruptcy proceeding and Goldman Sachs, who happened to be involved in their IPO 50 years ago and has had no investment and no underwriting since, is precluded from doing it. So who winds up benefiting from this provision? One company that is not an American company that happens not to do any underwriting. We have been all year on this side of the aisle, more than all year, for the last several years, fighting against efforts by the Republicans to take away discretion from judges. This is a provision that says we are going to let the bankruptcy judge decide whether a party is disinterested, conflicted or not. If we are truly concerned about having conflicts of interest, theoretically we should not let accountants do business with the debtor company or a lawyer that has done business with the debtor company or anyone that has given advice to the debtor company. Yet we are singling out investment banks. Why? It does not make any sense to do that. What we should do is take the language in this bill and make it the model for other debates on tort reform and everything else in this House. We have judges; we trust them to judge. We trust them to go through the parties, decide who is interested, who is disinterested, who has conflicts and who does not and then to draw conclusions about who is interested in doing what. By striking 414 and putting this blanket provision that says anyone who has ever done any underwriting work cannot be involved in the proceedings, I would argue does not benefit the debtor or the stockholders or anyone else. We should want judges that say we want the very best, most talented people who are going to look out for the people who are the parties in the case. That should be how we do it. If we think the judges are doing a bad job, well, that is another question. If we think they cannot be trusted, well, that is another question. But we had a problem in this House recently. We say that juries cannot be trusted when it comes to tort reform. We say that judges cannot be trusted when it comes to this type of thing. When did we become such experts? Apparently, the only thing American people can be trusted to do is vote for us, and then we take away all the discretion for everyone else. I think it is a very bad idea. There are 1,001 reasons why this bankruptcy bill should go into the dust bin. This is one provision that should not be changed. I urge a ``no'' vote.