Rob Woodall

Mr. WOODALL

Mr. WOODALL. Madam Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from Pennsylvania (Ms. Dean).

Mr. WOODALL. Madam Speaker, I didn't have the 52-year relationship with Mr. Lewis that Sanford Bishop talked about earlier. I wasn't even born when that relationship started. This very powerful and imposing face beside me, I have very little association with. If Mike Collins goes back and looks in the files, I believe he will find that they turned down a young man named Rob Woodall for a job back in 1994. It wasn't that I didn't try to get a good mentorship from John Lewis, I just didn't meet the John Lewis bar at that time. But my experience with him has been Biblically based, as so many have. But mine has been: Let the children come to me. Do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of God. If I could arrange it, I would walk down the steps behind John as he was going down the Capitol steps after a vote, because children from all over the country would come running up, ``Mr. Lewis, Mr. Lewis,'' just wanting to say hello. Whether it was the steps of the Capitol, the busiest airport in the world at Hartsfield International, or anywhere in between, I never once saw John in too much of a hurry with too much on his mind to take the time to make sure the next generation understood what happened in the last generation and the difference they could make for yet another generation. The story has already been told that staff members would say the only thing they want to do on Capitol Hill is meet Mr. Lewis before they leave. Time and time again, that is the story of any Georgia Member because, growing up, Mr. Lewis was Mr. Lewis. He always says, ``Call me John,'' but he is always Mr. Lewis and always will be. So much of the story that we have heard told about John tonight, Madam Speaker, has been about John the fighter. It is so meaningful to me that the other half of the stories we have heard tonight are about John the embracer. We have plenty of fighters in this institution, and we have our fair share of embracers in this institution. We don't have as many folks who are every bit as good at embracing as they are at fighting. We will miss John's leadership in that respect in the great State of Georgia, Madam Speaker, and we will miss him here in this institution. Madam Speaker, I thank my colleagues for coming out tonight, I know, to honor their friend and their colleague, but certainly to honor our great son from Georgia. Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. WOODALL

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I thank my friend from Colorado for yielding me the time. One of these days, Mr. Speaker, he is going to come down here and he is going to leave out that he yields the time for the purposes of debate only, and he and I are going to solve most of the ills that confront this institution. I think we could do that together. I appreciate him, because he is my friend. I appreciate his friendship and his yielding me the time today. Mr. Speaker, as the first Georgian to take the floor today, I want to tell my colleagues, on behalf of the entire Georgia delegation, that we appreciate the prayers and the thoughts that you all have been sending, not just to Mr. Lewis' family and his staff, but to all of us as well. One of my favorite parts of this job, Mr. Speaker, is talking to young people. I will speak to any student group that wants to come through that will invite me out because I love having an opportunity to influence young minds and answer those completely without shame, questions that folks ask. But the one thing I have always asked my staff to do is not schedule me after John Lewis has talked to those young people, because once John Lewis has entered a room and had a chance with those young minds, anybody else is going to be a distant second at best. Mr. Lewis has been a leader in Georgia on causes good and right for my entire lifetime. In fact, Mr. Lewis was elected to Congress before I even graduated from college. Most of the time I spent with him was as a staffer on Capitol Hill. And I remember after getting elected, he was sitting over to my left, as he often was, and I went up and I said: Mr. Lewis, I just want to introduce myself. I am Rob Woodall. I just came in in John Linder's seat, and I just am excited to be with you. He said: Rob, I know exactly who you are, and please don't call me Mr. Lewis. Call me John. John would invite the delegation over to his home to visit and talk about things--not the things that divide us, but the things that unite us. We can't afford to lose the uniters in this institution or in this country, and we have lost one in John Lewis. I will have a chance, as part of the Georgia delegation, to recognize him more later today. I am grateful to the Speaker for making that time available, but please know how much we all appreciate your outreach to John's staff and all of us. Mr. Speaker, it is fitting, thinking about being a uniter, that we are down here talking about the NDAA today. If you will recall, last year, when we were doing the NDAA, I had very few nice things to say. It had generally been a partnership exercise here, and for myriad reasons that both the chairman and the ranking member on Armed Services regretted, it became a partisan exercise last year. It came out of committee on almost a strictly partisan vote. It came across the floor on almost a strictly partisan vote. This is a bill that it has not mattered who led the United States House or who led the United States Senate or even who was in the White House. For 60 years now, each and every year, the Congress comes together and we produce a blueprint for our Nation's national security. I love that about this bill, and I love that about this institution. I love that about what it means for the leadership of the civilian government that we get past partisanship every single year. And to my Democratic friends' credit, as they lead this institution, by the time the NDAA bill got back to the floor after conference, it passed on a voice vote here in the House. We had brought ourselves back together again. This year, Mr. Speaker, it has returned to that partnership bill that it has always tried to be. We had the chairman, Mr. Smith, and our ranking member, Mr. Thornberry, up in the Rules Committee last Friday, and they both attested to that fact: this is not the bill that either of them would have drafted, but it is the bill that they have come together and passed unanimously out of their committee. And, again, to my Democratic colleagues' credit, they have named the bill after our ranking member, Mac Thornberry, to recognize his lifetime of service to our men and women in uniform. That is the kind of thing that doesn't get a lot of publicity back home. Folks aren't going to sit around and celebrate that, but it is a big deal that Republicans are in the minority on Capitol Hill, but that leadership in service to others, as Mac Thornberry has done for our men and women in uniform, doesn't have a partisan label on it; and our Democratic colleagues have seen fit to honor him in this way, and I am grateful to them for that. We have a lot of amendments here, as you have heard already, Mr. Speaker, and I wish that we had been able to do this in two separate rules so that we could have come together and supported NDAA and then had our differences on the other measures that are also included in this rule. Coming out of Coca-Cola country, it would be okay with me if the grocery stores decided that, in this time of pandemic, they only had time to just stock the Coca-Cola on the shelves and they weren't going to make time to stock the Pepsi because it was just too dangerous and not enough time to make that happen. But they haven't. They have decided they are going to put it all on the shelves, and they are going to try to get back to normal. We have got to try to get back to normal, too. I know my friend, the chairman of the Rules Committee, is on the floor today, and he has got a lot of responsibility on his shoulders. We have gotten into the habit, during this pandemic, of putting a lot more things in a single rule than we used to do. I am hoping that we will start to swing that pendulum back as we all grapple collectively to get to a new normal because, besides the National Defense Authorization Act, we have got a lands bill here today. It came to us from the Senate. I understand my friends don't want to amend it because it has come to us from the Senate. I would like to put the House stamp of approval on it. I would like to put some House improvements on it. We had an opportunity in the Rules Committee, Mr. Speaker. This lands bill is exactly as my friend from Colorado described. It provides a new funding stream, a mandatory funding stream for land acquisition through the Land and Water Conservation Fund, a fund that I support, funding that I have supported. But we have a maintenance backlog on our Federal lands, and this year we are not going to have the resources to fund those maintenance backlogs at our normal paltry level, much less at the elevated level that they need to occur, and this bill is going to exacerbate that problem. Rather than funding a maintenance backlog, it is going to purchase more land that we don't have enough money to maintain already. We had an opportunity to massage that around to make sure that we were funding the Land and Water Conservation Fund and we were also providing the stewardship to those lands that the Land and Water Conservation Fund has already acquired. We didn't have a chance to do that in the Rules Committee. We are going to have a previous question opportunity, when we defeat the previous question, to come back and further improve this lands bill. I hope that my colleagues will give us that opportunity. I appreciate that the Senate has sent us this language, but I do believe we can improve it before we send it to the President's desk. And then, finally, we have bills that again, with the best of intentions, affect our Nation's childcare system. It is absolutely, positively true that we cannot get our parents back to work if we can't get our children back into the classroom or back into the childcare center. We must make all of these things work in concert together. These bills are coming to us under an emergency designation. I sit on the Budget Committee, Mr. Speaker, and what that means is the normal rules don't apply. Childcare has been a challenge in this country, not just during the pandemic, but for decades. It is an issue that is worthy of this Congress' attention. It is also worthy of getting it done right, because we can only spend each dollar once. Once that dollar is gone, if we don't spend it efficiently, we are not going to be able to serve children as well as we would like to. We are not going to be able to serve parents as well as we would like to. These childcare provisions did not go through a process that gave us an opportunity to participate. Both bills that were testified on before the Rules Committee had Budget Committee referrals. The Budget Committee has been meeting, but we have not had one word of conversation about these priorities. That does not produce the best product. Again, it may be done with the best of intentions, but it cannot possibly produce the best product to ignore committees of jurisdiction and to ignore disparate voices as we are all grappling with childcare challenges back in our district, COVID-related challenges back in our district. So, Mr. Speaker, as you take time today and, hopefully, for many days into the future to celebrate the difference-making that John Lewis did--not just for my community, not just for my State, not just for our country, I would argue he made a difference on the global stage--take a moment to celebrate that, for all the partisan headlines that are in the news, there is a lot of good partnership, collaborative give-and- take going on behind the scenes to try to make the world a better place, to try to make American policy better policy. I hope my colleagues will support the NDAA bill when it gets to the floor of this House after this very aggressive amendment process, and I do hope my colleagues will defeat this rule so that we can separate the NDAA from these items that require much more of the House's attention, and then we can rush those to the floor as soon as we have had an opportunity to perfect those, as well. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I know the heart of which my chairman speaks. I believe it is wrongheaded to craft a military budget and then figure out what kind of mission that budget can support. I think the question is what are we asking of our men and women in uniform, what is the mission, and then let's commit to funding that mission in a full-throated way. We had an opportunity in this bill to vote on what the definition of the mission is, whether or not we were going to allow the Authorization for Use of Military Force from 2001 to continue to perpetuate the forever wars that my friend who chairs the Rules Committee mentioned. We are not going to have an opportunity to vote on that today, and I regret that, as I know the chairman does. Mr. Speaker, I know that we are hoping to have an opportunity to discuss that in the future in a more full-throated way, but I would urge my colleagues--and I sit on the Budget Committee--please don't craft a budget and figure out then what you can ask our men and women in uniform to do. Figure out what it is you are asking our men and women in uniform to do, and then fund that to the best of our abilities. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. Cole), the ranking member of the Rules Committee.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Shimkus).

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Stauber).

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

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I mentioned earlier that if we defeated the previous question today that we would have an opportunity to add some additional language to the lands bill. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of the amendment I am about to discuss in the Congressional Record immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, when we have a natural disaster on our public lands, we have an opportunity, right after that disaster, to go in and salvage some of the timber that has fallen, some of the timber that has been affected. But there is a clock on how long we have to get that done, and so many of the processes that are in place normally, to seek approval for harvesting timber on public lands, remain in place in these natural disasters, in these times of crisis. Mr. Speaker, if we defeat the previous question, I will add an amendment to the rule to make in order a discussion on creating a categorical exclusion for salvage operations. Now, I know there are differences between Department of the Interior lands and Department of Agriculture lands. Former Governor of the great State of Georgia Sonny Perdue, now the Secretary of Agriculture, the lands that he is in charge of are not lands designed to be preserved; they are lands designed to be managed. It is an agricultural product that is supposed to produce timber for the American people. Even though it is a catastrophe that damages that timber, that encroaches upon the productivity of those lands, an opportunity to salvage what little may be available to be salvaged should be one that we avail ourselves of or, at the very least, should be a topic of discussion today. So, Mr. Speaker, I ask my colleagues to help me to defeat the previous question. Let's add this amendment to the rule. As I mentioned earlier, we already have everything and the kitchen sink in this rule already. One more section 7 isn't going to disadvantage us or slow us down more than a single hour, and we will be able to have this very important conversation about maximizing the asset that the American people have entrusted us to manage and to protect. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time. I want to again thank my friend from Colorado, both for his partnership on the Rules Committee and his courtesy here on the floor today. I understand the urgency about which he just spoke. I offered an amendment in the Rules Committee, Mr. Speaker, that we withdraw what they call martial law. That is the ability for the House to move with great haste. The House rules require that we pace ourselves so that the body has an opportunity to review the rules that the Rules Committee produces, the legislation that comes out of committees. We have these timelines in place. Since the COVID crisis began, over 100 days ago, we have been operating under what they call martial law, where the Speaker, in his or her wisdom, can do almost anything with great haste on the floor of the House. Both parties do that in times of crisis so that the House can be responsive in the way that my friend from Colorado has discussed. There comes a time, however, Mr. Speaker, when we need to recognize that if we have been sacrificing efficacy in the name of efficiency, that might have been the right answer on day one of the crisis and that might have been the right answer on day 30, maybe even day 60, maybe even day 90, but there is going to come a time in the same way that we have asked our food service personnel, our sanitation personnel, our law enforcement personnel, and our first responder personnel--you go right down the list of folks doing critical jobs in America. We are not asking them to shortcut those jobs. We are asking them to perform those jobs to the very best of their abilities. We can do better here. Now, my friend from Colorado mentioned that we stuff these things all into a single provision, and it does save us 1 hour of additional debate. It does save us 1 hour. Now, in the grand scheme of things, I might say having a more deliberative process would be worth 60 minutes of this body's time. We didn't have our first day of session in June until the very last week of June, so I think we could find the time. But that is not really my biggest concern. My biggest concern, as the ranking member of the Rules Committee mentioned, is the bills that have been stuffed into this bill that haven't been the product of regular order. And I don't mean regular order where we have to talk about everything and delay it ad infinitum. I am talking about regular order where thoughtful, serious legislators actually have a chance to make a difference and things aren't written by a select few in leadership behind closed doors. In a crisis, leaders have to lead. And I don't fault the majority for circling the wagons and doing what they needed to do to respond in the way that they thought was appropriate. I might have disagreed with them, but they have a responsibility and an obligation to lead. We are entering a time, Mr. Speaker, where we need to recognize that we are the deliberative body. This is where the American people come to have their voices heard, and we must open up the process so that that can happen. Mr. Speaker, I mentioned earlier that we did a pretty good job on the National Defense Authorization Act. Again, it passed out of committee 56-0. That is not because everybody agreed. That is not what happens in legislating. It is that everybody came to a place where they were comfortable and they did the negotiating they had to do to satisfy that higher priority of defining America's national security needs and goals. I have the list of amendments that have been made in order by this bill, Mr. Speaker. You can see the list of bipartisan amendments. I feel pretty good about that. There are a lot of numbers you see on this page, bipartisan amendments that are going to be made in order in the National Defense Authorization Act. There are almost as many--in fact, as many as the Democratic amendments that were made in order under this rule. You see that is a lot of Democratic amendments that were made in order, too, and I am glad we had bipartisan, and I am glad the majority was able to continue to improve upon what they have done. This is the list of Republican amendments that have been made in order. It is not a screen tear, Mr. Speaker. It is just that this is only how many there are. We in the Republican majority, 2017 when I had an opportunity to lead a subcommittee there and 2018, we would make more Democratic amendments in order than Republican amendments because Republicans were leading, so, by definition, fewer Democratic voices could be included in the regular process. We weren't able to do that today, and I regret that. But I want to recognize, because I think it is important to recognize, Mr. Speaker, I have a lot of constructive counsel for my friends on the other side of the aisle about how they can do better, and any time they want to come to me and partner with me on that leadership, I am available to them to do that. I don't think we are going to get to where I want to go by the end of this Democratic majority, and I think when the Republican majority takes over in January, that is going to be my opportunity to get us back to where I want us to be. But this bill, this National Defense Authorization Act, this bipartisan work product, this collaborative effort to support our men and women in uniform, as my ranking member mentioned, can be improved on the floor of this House or that partnership can be destroyed on the floor of this House. The leadership on the Democratic side of the aisle on the Rules Committee has a very difficult job trying to find those amendments that can help to improve the bill without destroying the bill, and I want to recognize the real sweat equity that folks put in to trying to keep the poison pills away and trying to find those ideas that needed to be discussed and not to destroy our partnership. Let's support this National Defense Authorization Act, Mr. Speaker. Let's defeat this rule but support the underlying bill. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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

Mr. WOODALL

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

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I share with my friend from New York that I don't have any speakers remaining, and I am prepared to close. Can I ask how much time is remaining, Mr. Speaker.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I am a positive guy. I love coming down here and talking about the great things we are doing as a country, the amazing steps forward that we are making, the way we are exceeding the expectation of our constituents, and that was the speech I got to give when Republicans were in the majority and I got to bring the bipartisan package. At that time, Janet was sitting to my left and Caitlin would have been sitting right behind Mr. McGovern. A lot of things haven't changed much since that time. But some things have. One of the things that has changed is COVID-19 is ravaging the Nation, and I want to say to my Rules Committee friends, because we have got a lot of work left to do in this cycle, I recognize that there is an inclination among some in leadership in this House to shut down this process, to keep folks off the floor, to keep votes from happening with great frequency, all in the name of public health. I would tell you that may protect the health of the Members generally, but it undermines the health of the institution specifically. And I am grateful to my friends on the Rules Committee for fighting those urges and advocating for a more open process on the floor of the House. Again, I know I can attribute that sentiment to my friend from New York, and I know I can attribute that sentiment to the chairman, the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern). But the transportation bill, Mr. Speaker, is different from most of what we do. I hope we will have an opportunity to bring a bipartisan bill to the floor, and then we can have that bipartisan conversation about limiting debate so that we can move the bipartisan idea forward so that we can get a signature on the President's desk. Mr. Speaker, every good thing you heard mentioned that this bill does on the other side of the aisle today, every good thing you have heard mentioned, I want to stipulate that the bill absolutely does that. And I ask my friends to stipulate that the bill has absolutely no chance of ever becoming the law of the land, so none of those things are ever going to happen. Hear me, Mr. Speaker, it does every single one of those things if it becomes law, but because it is moved in a partisan process when we have bipartisan government, it will never become law and it will never happen. Not one of those things that my colleagues earnestly believe their constituencies need and are demanding is going to be delivered. Mr. Speaker, I don't want to make the point. I do want to make the difference. I recognize that in divided government sometimes you have to put out the party line. Sometimes you have to stand up and say, ``This is where I am; now let's figure out where you are,'' and then the negotiation happens later. That happens on a lot of bills in this institution. It doesn't usually happen on transportation, it doesn't usually happen on infrastructure, because the way transportation and infrastructure usually happen is we partner from day one. In the last Congress, Mr. Speaker, last time we moved this bill, roughly an equal number of Republican ideas, Democratic ideas, and bipartisan ideas were considered to improve the bill. This time around, Mr. Speaker, we will consider 17 bipartisan amendments, 19 Republican amendments, and 134 Democratic amendments. Last time around, roughly one to one; this time around, seven Democratic ideas for every one Republican idea. Last time around, the bill was crafted in a partnership way so that more ideas and everyone was included in the beginning. This time around, the bill moved in a strict party-line vote. I understand we can't be the best version of ourselves as an institution every day of the week, Mr. Speaker. I recognize that. And it is not even our goal every day of the week. Sometimes we have a partisan priority, an itch that needs to be scratched. But good habits are hard to keep; bad habits are easy to make. There is a reason the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee is special. There is a reason Mr. DeFazio stood in line so long waiting on his opportunity to lead. It is a special place where you can make a huge difference on behalf of not just your community, but your country. We are squandering that opportunity today. There were lots of good ideas that we could have moved forward in a partnership way. I hope that the extraordinary partisanship that represents a dramatic change from anything that we have ever done in this transportation environment before is the aberration, and that as soon as that partisan itch gets scratched, my colleagues will then turn their attention to being able to get something done. Because when my friends talked about road safety and the needs America has, they were right. When my friends talked about crumbling infrastructure and the needs America has, they were right. When my friends talked about investing in us as a nation, my friends were right. I want to join with them to make those things happen; but today, Mr. Speaker, I encourage my colleagues to vote ``no'' on the previous question and to vote ``no'' on the rule. I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I serve on the Transportation Committee as well as the Rules Committee, Mr. Speaker, so I always get excited when there is a transportation bill that is coming to the floor. I am less excited today. My friend from New York is a wonderful leader for his constituents and a wonderful bipartisan leader in this institution. I look forward to his time when we get to question witnesses in the Rules Committee because invariably he asks a question that I might have asked or should have asked, and invariably I learn something from the gentleman and his line of questions that I believe is going to benefit this institution and benefit the Nation. And, candidly, as you know, Mr. Speaker, that is not always the way it is. Some folks are asking questions to get their next 30-second film clip so they can send it out on social media for purposes that perhaps are less valuable to the institution and to the Nation. And so I look forward to an opportunity to be down here and talk about a partnership issue, like transportation, with the gentleman from New York. He mentioned that this bill is designed to be a partnership between the Federal Government and the States and localities. Sadly, I must tell you that is where any suspicion of partnership ends. I went back and pulled the video from 2015 when we did our last transportation bill. As the gentleman from New York knows, we are assigned, so often, our Rules Committee legislation based on our other authorizing committee assignments, so I got to carry that bill back in 2015. I was reminded how long it has been since I got to tell the Speaker that I will, by order of the Committee on Rules, call up a resolution. I miss that opportunity. I hope to get that back in January. But I had this big smile on my face, Mr. Speaker, because the speech that I got to deliver that day in 2015 was that the House was bringing the most open Transportation Committee bill in decades to the House floor. The bill I got to bring that day, Mr. Speaker, talked about how the bill passed out of committee on a voice vote, a voice vote, because Republicans and Democrats, as is so often true on the Transportation Committee, were arm-in-arm moving forward on an issue that is important to all of our constituencies. I had not even finished my Rules debate time, these 30 minutes, before I had to offer an amendment to the rule to make even more amendments in order than the amendments we had already made in order. And then we came back the next day and made even more amendments in order. At that time, Mr. Speaker, having had a bill that was worked through the process in a bipartisan way, that passed out of committee on a voice vote, we then brought rules to the floor that made in order about equal number of Republican amendments, Democratic amendments, and bipartisan amendments. To be precise, it was 45 Democratic amendments, 47 Republican amendments, and 34 bipartisan amendments after the process had been worked in a bipartisan way already, after the bill had passed out of committee on a voice vote already. Today, that is not the kind of rule we are bringing. And I recognize that COVID has made our voting requirements different today. But this bill didn't pass out of committee, the committee on which I sit, the Transportation Committee, on a voice vote with everybody in agreement. This bill passed out of committee on a strictly party line vote, because this bill, unlike the bill that had been worked through in a bipartisan way when last we reauthorized service transportation, this bill had been worked in a purely partisan way. Mr. Speaker, I mentioned that at that time we made in order, roughly, a number of Republican amendments and Democratic amendments and bipartisan amendments. The rule before us today makes in order a roughly equal number of bipartisan amendments and Republican amendments, 17 bipartisan amendments and 19 Republican amendments. Less than half the number that we had made in order when last we worked this bill when we did in it in a partnership way. But while the bill makes in order an equal number of Republican amendments and bipartisan amendments, again, 19 Republican amendments, 17 bipartisan amendments, it makes in order 134 Democratic amendments. Now, mind you, Mr. Speaker, I tell you that this process has been a partisan process from the beginning in the Transportation Committee, meaning, it was worked entirely through on the Democratic side of the aisle. So as Republicans come to the floor, those Republicans who don't serve on the Transportation Committee for their only opportunity to influence this process, and I said it, and the gentleman from New York knows it to be true. Back in 2015, I said what is wonderful about opening up the process is that every single one of us has something to contribute. The more than 700,000 people that sent each one of us here have something to contribute. The wonder and uniqueness of this institution comes from the variety of Members who come here to serve and the varied experiences that they bring. Seventeen bipartisan amendments, 19 Republican amendments, and 134 Democratic amendments made in order by this rule. Even the Democrats were shut out of the partnership process, because any serious legislator on Capitol Hill knows the right time to get your language included isn't in an amendment on the House floor, it is by going to your chairman or your ranking member. If I want to get something done on the Transportation Committee, I go to my ranking member, Sam Graves, and I talk to him about it, and he talks to the chairman about it, and then we get it done together because that is the partnership in which the committee works, or at least the way that it used to work. It is unbelievable to me that in a time of great national distress that one of the sole remaining vestiges of bipartisanship on Capitol Hill, the Transportation Committee, and one of the primary vehicles for moving those partnership ideas, the highway transportation bill, has devolved into the partisan exercise that we find ourselves in today. It is not too late to fix that. Mr. Speaker, I will be urging defeat of this rule. If you listen to the reading clerk read it, you will know that if you have been watching this institution for any period of time, 2 years, 4 years, 8 years, 10 years, 20 years, 30 years, you have never heard a reading clerk read a rule that looks like this. We have just never seen one that looks like this. So partisan have things become, Mr. Speaker, that the Rules Committee historically has offered en bloc authority to the chairman, because the chairman has been working in partnership with the ranking member. Because the way to dispose of amendments on the floor of the House in an expeditious manner, which we absolutely positively need in a COVID- 19 environment, is through partnership. In this case the partnership never started. I would like to tell you the partnership eroded, but that is just not true, the partnership never began. There was never an opportunity for erosion, and thus, we have the kind of en bloc authority that you see today, not designated to the chairman to enact, but created by the Rules Committee, and the chairman has an opportunity to oppose it if he would like. Mr. Speaker, I am disappointed. But for my colleagues who are also disappointed, this doesn't have to be the end of the conversation. My ranking member--I haven't talked to him in the last 2 or 3 days, but when last I heard him speak--said he was still committed to working in a partnership way. That he was absolutely available. From day one, he said, make me a part of this conversation, don't rule anything out. In fact, the chairman said exactly that last night, that the ranking member approached him early on in the process, and said, don't count us out for anything, we want to work in a partnership fashion. Mr. Speaker, we can defeat this rule. And defeating this rule isn't going to slow down surface transportation. Anybody who believes this bill is going anywhere is kidding themselves. This is a partisan messaging exercise. This is not legislating that we are doing here today, but we can move on to legislating. We can defeat this rule, and we can go back and--you know, just one crazy idea--we can make the Transportation Committee the partnership place it has always been. We can make infrastructure the partnership issue it has always been. We can make a difference, instead of just making a point. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I think my friend from New York is right that in the time of a healthcare pandemic that having a closed rule could have been a possibility. In fact, I have no doubt that the only reason we have any amendments at all available on the floor of the House today is because my friend from New York, and particularly my chairman from Massachusetts, fought on behalf of having a more open process. I have no doubt that there are folks all across this institution who would have loved to have shut out all the voices altogether. And had we moved this bill out of committee with my ranking member's consent on a voice vote the way we did it last time, I would have supported the majority in trying to be more expeditious on the floor, because when you move things in a bipartisan way you get bipartisan partnership to get them across the finish line. But that is not the way this bill has moved. It is a valuable thing to be the chairman of a bipartisan committee, Mr. Speaker, and I would tell you it comes with a stewardship obligation to make sure it remains so. I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Missouri (Mr. Graves), who will be the next chairman of the Transportation Committee, the current ranking member.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. My friend from New York is absolutely right. There are 17 bipartisan amendments made in order to this bill that moved through committee in a completely partisan fashion. When we did this bill last time around, the bill that passed on a voice vote because of its bipartisan nature coming out of committee, we made 34 bipartisan amendments in order to improve it further. The now chairman of the Transportation Committee, then the ranking member, said this about the rule as I was presenting it: ``Mr. Speaker, in terms of what the gentleman from Georgia just said, I appreciate the fact that we are debating so many policy amendments. This is the way the process should work, both sides of the aisle contribute, and this is great.'' Stark contrast from what you heard from our ranking member today about the process. At that time, the ranking member, now chairman, said: ``I was willing to stay here later last night and stay here later tonight so that everybody who wanted an amendment could have a chance.'' That is not the process we have this year as voices are shut out one right after another, primarily Republican voices and bipartisan voices. I yield such time as she may consume to the gentlewoman from Washington (Mrs. Rodgers), a great conservative leader in our conference who has never been afraid to reach across the aisle to get the work done, and she has done it successfully.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I encouraged my colleagues to defeat the rule so we could have a bipartisan process here, but if we defeat the previous question, I will offer an amendment to the rule to make in order H. Res. 1031. The resolution expresses a sense of the House of Representatives condemning the cyberattacks perpetrated by China and other rogue states on American institutions in an effort to disrupt our response to COVID- 19 by stealing our economic property that could be used for treatments and vaccines. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of my amendment into the Congressional Record immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, we have talked so much about bipartisanship. This is a chance to actually do something in a bipartisan way. Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. McCaul), the former chairman of the Homeland Security Committee and the current ranking member of the Foreign Affairs Committee, to discuss the amendment.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, to be fair, this bill is not about us investing in the future; it is about us borrowing money from our children to invest in the future. I will read from the current chairman of the Transportation Committee. These were his comments during our last reauthorization. He says: `` . . . the biggest and most glaring omission by the Rules Committee is of not allowing any attempt by this House to fund the bill.'' At that time, you remember, Mr. Speaker, we only provided 3 years of funding for a 6-year bill. We went back and found the remaining 3 years later. He goes on to say: ``The U.S. Chamber of Commerce supports an increase in the user fee.'' That is the gas tax. ``The American Trucking Association supports an increase in the user fee. We are virtually being begged by interest groups out there representing consumers and commercial users of the system to do something, vote on something.'' I talked about all of the differences between the way we handled the process last time and the way we handled the process this time, Mr. Speaker. I will note that there are also differences in the way that the chairman wanted to handle the process last time, which is voting to fund this bill. When we funded half of it, he wanted to fund all of it. This time we are funding none of it, Mr. Speaker. That is the heavy lifting that needs to be done, and it can only be done in a bipartisan way. I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

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

Mr. WOODALL

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I want to thank the gentleman from Florida, not just for yielding the time, but for his friendship over these 10 years that I have had the honor of serving here. Mr. Speaker, he may not remember because he is just the kind of man that he is, but when I was assigned to the Rules Committee back in 2011, there were four Democrats on the Rules Committee and four freshman Republicans on Rules Committee. And Mr. Hastings came over to the four of us who were sitting on the Republican side of the aisle, introduced himself, and offered his advice and his counsel. He told us we were in for quite a treat, being on the Rules Committee, and he, of course, was absolutely right about that. I have made a lot of bad decisions in Congress, and I have made a lot of good decisions in Congress. Accepting Mr. Hastings' hand of friendship early on in this tenure and having been the beneficiary of his mentorship over these 10 years in Congress has been one of the best decisions that I have made. I am grateful to him for doing that. Mr. Speaker, we have six bills wrapped up in this rule today. I have the 30 minutes that the gentleman from Florida yielded me. That gives me 5 minutes to talk about racial justice, 5 minutes to talk about adding a new State to the Union, 5 minutes to talk about reassigning a half a trillion dollars in healthcare spending from one pot to another, and on and on. We are not going to be able to have that conversation today, and I understand that, because this is our first day back in the month of June. This is the first voting day the United States Congress has had in the month of June. So, we have a lot of things to do. By separating these bills up into different rules, the Members all know that means having to come back down here for another round of votes. So I don't fault the Rules Committee, as I sometimes might, for stuffing so many things into this provision. But I will say, Mr. Speaker, that I am surprised that we are back, in all the crises and concerns that the gentleman from Florida reflected on, for our first voting day in June. The bills we have before us are bills that, if they moved through committee at all, moved through with absolutely no Republican amendments accepted, and then the Rules Committee made absolutely no Republican amendments even available for consideration here on the floor. The crises the gentleman from Florida recognized are real. The solutions to those crises are generally found in partnership and consensus, and we find none of that in the underlying rule today. For that reason, I am going to ask my colleagues to defeat the rule. It is not a reflection on the merits of the underlying issues. The merits of the issues are real. But the opportunity to solve those issues comes with passing legislation, not just in the House, but also through the Senate, having the President's signature put on that, or overriding a veto here in the House. We don't have the process that allows us to build that consensus before us today. It is a shame because I know how hard all of my colleagues have been working remotely on legislation over these past weeks. I would have expected partnership and consensus bills to be the order of business today, instead of the take-it-or-leave-it bills we have before us. Mr. Speaker, I mentioned that there are six bills before us. That half-a-trillion-dollar healthcare bill I mentioned is actually a compilation of 24 separate bills that have all been rolled together into one. We are not going to put these bills on the President's desk. We are not going to have these bills considered in the Senate. We will most certainly pass these bills out of the House today. All of us who ran seeking solutions, as opposed to seeking statements, are going to be disappointed by this process. Mr. Speaker, my friend from Florida talked about things that were worthy of this institution. I recognize the efforts that have gone into crafting this legislation. From the Delegate from the District of Columbia, Eleanor Holmes Norton, and the work she has done on D.C. statehood over the years, to the leadership of Karen Bass and the Congressional Black Caucus on putting together a criminal justice police reform bill, the effort that has gone into here is unquestioned. It has been done with all the best of intentions. It is the partnership that has been lacking, and it is my great hope--because I know what we do today is not going to be the end of any of these processes; it is only going to be the beginning. We cannot reach the President's desk and a signature and the law of the land that we all seek by ignoring one another. We can only do it by engaging one another. I do believe that this process is not worthy of the institution because, by definition, it leaves out hundreds of Members and millions of Americans who want to participate in this. I am encouraged, as we talked through this in the Rules Committee, certainly, as we talked about our differences, we learned a whole lot about things that we have in common, not just on criminal justice reform, not just on D.C. statehood, not just on healthcare, but across the board, places where we can come together and make a difference for those constituents that we serve. I tell my colleagues, please vote ``no'' on the rule today because we have a chance to go back and do these in partnership right now. But should these bills pass the House today, we will still have a partnership opportunity coming forward. I hope that folks will not harden their positions today, having gone through a partisan beginning. We all seek successful conclusions. Those will only be done together. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentlewoman from Arizona (Mrs. Lesko), a Rules Committee member and a distinguished leader on the Judiciary Committee.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I yield an additional 1 minute to the gentlewoman from Arizona (Mrs. Lesko).