Rob Woodall

Mr. WOODALL

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on H. Res. 134.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, while we talk about agreements here on the floor, I think sometimes folks back home are concerned that we are agreeing on the little things, things that don't matter, that we are talking about renaming a post office. While that is important to that community and while that is important to the man or woman being honored, I would argue it doesn't necessarily advance the cause of freedom and democracy. I can't tell you with a straight face that what we are doing on passenger rail today is going to advance the cause of freedom and democracy. If you want to advance the cause of freedom and democracy, you needed to be here 2 hours ago when the Prime Minister came to deliver his message to the United States Congress. Freedom and democracy lived there. What we are advancing on this passenger rail bill, Mr. Speaker, is just common sense. It is just common sense. I don't want to get in the weeds of all the exciting things that go on in there, Mr. Speaker. I serve on the Transportation Committee. Of course it is exciting to me. Of course I am going to be involved in the minutia. I don't know that my other colleagues are quite as enthusiastic about that. I would encourage folks to go to transportation.house.gov, Mr. Speaker. The Transportation Committee, like all committees on Capitol Hill, has a Web page, and on that Web page you can get deep into the weeds. If you are a policy wonk like I am and you want to dig down into the minutia and find out what subparagraph (f) says about clause 2, you can absolutely do it. But there are some top line numbers there, too. And again, I want folks to have something to celebrate here. I want folks to be able to be enthusiastic about their representative body. I would argue, as the Prime Minister argued, that the greatest deliberative body, the greatest bastion of freedom on the planet, if you want to know what is going on, go to that Transportation Committee Web site. You are going to find--well, you are going to find all sorts of information. You will find something like this one-pager right here, whether you are a high school student who cares about passenger rail or whether you are a transportation engineer leading your local Department of Transportation, all of those details can be found there. I will give you one example. Could you believe--you come from a constituency much like I do, Mr. Speaker, but can you believe that in the United States of America today, in the era of sequester--in the era of sequester--that not one Member of this body would say isn't having an impact on our social safety net, where not one Member of this body wouldn't say isn't having an impact on our national security, in this era of sequester, Amtrak subsidizes food and beverage service--subsidizes food and beverage service. It is a loss-leading part of the transportation funding on Amtrak. I will just tell you, I have ridden Amtrak to New York a time or two. I didn't have any beverage service. It is not like my friends on Delta who will bring me a Coca-Cola product on my flight to Washington, D.C., here. You have to go down to the beverage car. Now, if you would like to bring your own lunch on Amtrak, you absolutely can. If your husband or wife wants to make you a sack at home, you can bring it on in and eat it right there on the train. Yet the American taxpayer, as we sit here right now--this isn't prospective. This is as we sit here right now. The American taxpayer is funding--subsidizing--food service for those men and women who happen to ride Amtrak every day. Again, for your and my constituencies, Mr. Speaker, that is worth nothing. That is worth nothing. But even for those constituencies that ride Amtrak to work every single day, don't you think in this time of budget cutting, of trying to end the $18 trillion of borrowing from our children and grandchildren, this time of trying to balance our national security needs with our social safety net needs, don't you think that one of the things we could agree on is we don't need to subsidize snack food for train riders? The truth is, Mr. Speaker, I say that like it is a rhetorical question, that I am going to start to get out my sharp stick and poke the other side. I am not. It happens to be one of the things that we agree on. How many years have you and I been in Congress, Mr. Speaker, trying to get rid of silly stuff that the Federal Government does? Well, for you and me, the answer is 4. For 4 years we have been working on trying to get rid of silly stuff that the Federal Government does; subsidizing Twinkies, part of that silly stuff. I am not picking on Twinkies. I have great respect for Twinkie eaters. But I don't want my tax dollars subsidizing that habit. Unanimously, on the Transportation Committee, Mr. Speaker, we have come together to say: I don't know why we didn't do this a long time ago, I don't know why the other previous Congress hadn't gotten it done, but the buck stops here. We are going to work together and do that. Where are those dollars going to go instead, Mr. Speaker? They are going to go to improving quality of service. Find me that constituent back home; find him in Atlanta; find him in Mississippi; find those constituents back home who wouldn't make that trade with their tax dollars every day of the week. We are doing it. We are doing it together, and we are doing it in a way I hope the Senate will act on it. If they can't take wisdom as we have defined it, I welcome a conference, and I hope we will be able to get this bill on the President's desk. All of these great ideas that we have come together, that we have done in a collaborative way, Republicans and Democrats on the committee, Republicans and Democrats here on the floor of the House, the seven amendments that we are going to be considering today, all of these things we have done collaboratively, Mr. Speaker, mean nothing--mean nothing--if they don't go to the President's desk for his signature. This is but a first step, but it is a proud first step. With that, Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, while I appreciate the accolades of my friend from Massachusetts, the truth is I am not an expert on this bill. The Transportation Committee is staffed with those experts at a staff level and at an elected Member level. At this time, Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Denham), who has been a leader on the Transportation Committee, not looking for Republican solutions and not looking for Democratic solutions, but looking for commonsense solutions and then selling those to his colleagues on both sides.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 134 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only. Mr. Speaker, I always enjoy hearing the Reading Clerk read the work of the Rules Committee. I always look around to see how many folks are fixated on those words because words matter, and we spend a lot of time trying to craft the rules to be just right. But as proud as I am of the work we do in the Rules Committee, I confess that coming down here to this floor just moments after the Prime Minister of Israel delivered the speech that he just delivered-- wow, you talk about words that matter. I knew I was going to learn something in that speech, Mr. Speaker. I knew I was going to feel something in that speech. And just here moments after, what I came away with was, number one, we can learn a lot from the Prime Minister about leadership, about saying what you mean and meaning what you say. When the stakes are high, when the results impact all the families that we serve, it matters. We care a lot about people in this Chamber. Sometimes we have a crisis of leadership. Sometimes we have a crisis of followership. It is tremendously meaningful to me to see the leadership that was on display here, not just for America but for the world. Number two, Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister had a lesson for us all about class. He spent the first 5 minutes of that speech talking about his affection for President Obama, talking about his respect for President Obama, talking about the relationship between the United States of America and how President Obama had played a meaningful role in keeping Israel safe. We are not always in that place down here. And oftentimes, we find politics gets under our skin. Oftentimes, when there is a big debate surrounding a serious issue, we take it as a personal affront. And sometimes when we come back down to the House floor, we don't talk to one another with the mutual respect that, I would argue, every single Member of this Chamber has earned. We don't talk to each other across the aisle, I think, in ways that would always make our constituents back home proud. It meant a lot to me, given the emotion that surrounded the invitation of the Prime Minister to be here, that he spent his first moments of that speech not talking about frustrations, not talking about who did what to whom, but talking about his deep respect for the leader of the United States of America and what President Obama had meant to the safety and the security of Israel. I value that. It kind of makes what we are going to talk about next, Mr. Speaker, seem a little small, but it is not small. We are talking about passenger rail in this bill. Mr. Speaker, this rule, H. Res. 134, allows us to bring up H.R. 749, the Passenger Rail Reform and Investment Act. They call it PRRIA. And it passed unanimously out of the Transportation Committee. I have the great pleasure, Mr. Speaker, of serving both on the Rules Committee and the Transportation Committee, and rail isn't one of those you think about as being a unanimous issue. In my great State of Georgia, Mr. Speaker--and I have taken the train from Atlanta down to New Orleans, so I know we have some great stops on Amtrak in the great State of Mississippi. But if you want to take the train from Atlanta to Columbia, South Carolina--it is about a 3-hour drive right across the way--that train is going to leave tonight, out of Atlanta at 8 o'clock, and not tomorrow but 2 days from now, that train is going to arrive in Columbia, South Carolina, having connected through the city of Washington. It makes no sense whatsoever, but that is just where the rails are. That is where the rails are. Now, you contrast that--the complete meaninglessness that rail has for me, that Amtrak has for me in the great State of Georgia, since it takes me absolutely nowhere I want to go, at a speed that I desire, at a price that I can afford--contrast that with what is going on in the Northeast corridor. My friend from Massachusetts, I wonder if he ever gets on a plane to fly back home. If I lived in New York City and worked in Washington, D.C., I wouldn't even have a Delta frequent flyer number. I would be on the train every single trip. Why? Because it provides reliable, fast, inexpensive service for the most densely populated population corridor in the United States of America. That has always confounded this body, Mr. Speaker. How do we balance the needs of that northeastern transportation corridor, where Amtrak is so meaningful, so valuable to so many people--I don't think the roads and the bridges could handle the crush of humanity in the absence of Amtrak--how would we balance that success story, the only profitable corridor on the Amtrak route, with what, I would argue, is a tremendous failure in the rest of the country, where I can fly to Jacksonville, Florida, 48 hours faster than I can ride the train there, and at a lower price? This bill is about reform, Mr. Speaker. And I am not even going to argue that we, in the Transportation Committee, got it exactly right. We worked awfully hard on it. There was a lot of leadership provided by Members on both sides of the aisle. But on the outside chance that we didn't get it exactly right, the Rules Committee came together yesterday, Mr. Speaker, and made amendments in order. One of the great parts of this process is that you don't have to be on the committee of jurisdiction in order to have an impact on legislation. Any Member of the House can come to the Rules Committee and ask for an amendment to be made in order. This rule today makes in order seven such amendments to improve this bill. Four of those amendments come from Democratic Members. Three of those amendments come from Republican Members. Again, we were trying to maintain that collegial, bipartisan spirit that we had in the Transportation Committee on the underlying bill. We tried to continue that in the Rules Committee again last night. I don't know how those amendments are going to shake out down here today, Mr. Speaker. And I am glad that I don't know how they are going to shake out. I don't think having a predetermined destination on this floor is what our constituents sent us here to do. I don't think that is what being a representative democracy is. I think what you want are folks to be able to come down here and express their opinions. I have the great pleasure of serving on the Rules Committee, which enables that to happen. One of the great changes in this bill, Mr. Speaker, is we take those dollars that American citizens are paying to ride Amtrak on that northeastern corridor, that profitable corridor, and we leave those dollars there so that that route can expand and improve. The population continues to grow there. Transportation needs continue to expand there. And we create a partnership with States in those areas to say, Mr. Speaker, if you have a priority, as a Governor, as a State legislature, if you want to partner with the Federal Government to make your train service more effective, more efficient, we want to partner with you. But if your idea of a transportation plan is to do nothing locally but rely on the Federal Government to do it all for you, we have no money for you. That seems fair. The Federal Government is not a piggy bank that State and local communities can come to and withdraw from for their needs. What it is is a partner that, for these large transportation projects, for these projects of national significance, States and localities can partner with to make those a reality. I don't know that we will ever get the kind of Amtrak service in your or my part of the world, Mr. Speaker, that we have in the Northeast corridor. And candidly, I don't know that our constituencies will ever clamor for that service. But it is meaningful to me that even though we have different views on the issue of rail, even though we have different views on the future of rail, that we were able to come together, again, in a unanimous way to put forward a bill that will celebrate and fund those parts of the rail system that are successfully serving America and that will reform and, in some cases, eliminate those unprofitable parts of the rail system that I don't think any member of our constituency would be enthusiastic about funding with their hard-earned tax dollars. With that, Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I told a group of constituents just a moment ago--I don't know if I look a little wet up here. It is not perspiration from running back to the House floor. I feel obligated to tell my friends that. It is dripping a little bit outside, and that is the fastest way to get here from my office. But I was back in my office with constituents from AIPAC. Sixteen thousand men and women from AIPAC came into town this week to make their voice heard. Now, I couldn't find anybody who was here on paid vacation, and I couldn't find anyone else that had someone else foot the bill. What I saw was 16,000 people who put their money where their mouth is to come and petition the government, to come and try to make us better. I bring that up, Mr. Speaker, because what I told those men and women today of AIPAC was that there were grumpy faces on the floor of the House yesterday. I remember seeing a few. In fact, I might have been one. I will go ahead and confess, Mr. Speaker, I was one. We have some serious problems here, some serious challenges, and some serious disagreements. In the now almost 1 hour since the Prime Minister finished speaking, I have seen more smiles; I have seen more collegiality; and I have seen more Members enjoying each other and working together in just that 1 hour than I have seen in the entire month of February. I bring that up, Mr. Speaker, because the gentleman from Massachusetts and I have been working on rules for a long time together--a long time together--and I don't think it would offend the gentleman if I were to say that he and I often disagree about the way a rule ought to be crafted. We often disagree about the underlying legislation. Here we are on the Rules Committee, Mr. Speaker, but we may spend an hour or 2 or 3, sometimes longer, debating the merits of the underlying legislation. So to come here 1 hour after that spectacular come-together-for-things-that-matter speech the Prime Minister just gave and to find agreement with my friend on the Rules Committee--not just on the rule but, I daresay, on the underlying bill--I hope it is a sign of things to come--not just a thing to come in the regular relationship between my friend from Massachusetts and me, because that relationship is strong, but a relationship across the board. We have passed and sent to the President lots of bills this Congress, Mr. Speaker. In fact, I think we have passed something like 40 bills out of the U.S. House of Representatives. I don't know if I went home and asked my constituency that they can name two. I think they would know the XL pipeline bill, because that is something everyone has been focused on. But I don't think, as a population, they could name two. I hope this is the start of a success that the Rules Committee is going to have together over the next 18 months. I hope this is going to be the start of the kinds of agreements that we can create together, Mr. Speaker. I thank my friend from Massachusetts for being part of, again, making today a little bit better than yesterday was. With that, Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. WOODALL

Mr. WOODALL. Madam Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

Mr. WOODALL

Mr. WOODALL. Madam Speaker, I thank my friend from Texas not just for the time, but for the work he is doing to try to fund the responsibilities of the government. I have been in this institution for 4 years, Madam Speaker, and I have grown to love this institution. I have grown to love the people who serve in this institution, and it is disappointing to me to see some of the tempers that boil over here and have that on display for the American people. The truth is those tempers boil over, Madam Speaker, because folks here care. They don't care a little; they care a lot. What I have been grappling with as we have been going through this process--and the Appropriations Committee has been working so hard--is how do we bring our passion to the President's desk in a way that can make a difference for our people back home. I look at the chairman of the Appropriations Committee here and the ranking member. For Pete's sake, they passed a bill out of committee on this issue last summer. To watch this debate, you would think that the Congress is so derelict that we put everything off until the eleventh hour. Not true, Madam Speaker. Last summer, the House passed this out of committee. Now, of course, the process broke down last summer. We passed seven bills across this floor. The Senate had yet to pass one. I am tired of figuring out who to blame here. I am in the business of trying to figure out how to solve problems. The Senate is making some progress. Golly, they have considered more amendments in the Senate so far in 2015 than they considered all of last year combined. They are making progress. We are starting to get this train back on track. What is happening here today, though it seems so controversial, is we have got a motion to instruct, Madam Speaker, conferees. Now, I disagree with the motion to instruct. The motion says: Let's just do what the Senate said we should do. I don't actually think that fulfills my constitutional obligation, but the fact that we are even in a place today to instruct conferees, it takes us back. I would argue if we took a poll outside, Madam Speaker, we could find folks all up and down Constitution Avenue, all up and down Independence Avenue, who saw that skit on ``Saturday Night Live'' with the bill tumbling down the stairs as folks tried to remember how a bill becomes a law. If we can pass this 3-week continuing resolution today, we are going to be able to demonstrate how a bill becomes a law when the House has a position and the Senate has a position and they come together to work out those differences before it goes to the President's desk. Madam Speaker, I have been here 4 years. I can count on one hand how many times I have seen that process work. These issues are too important to say: The other body took care of it, I will just defer to them. The Members of this body are too talented, they are too committed, they love this country too much. For the 435 of us to come together and say, We have nothing to add, let's just do what the Senate said--I can't count the number of colleagues I have, Madam Speaker, on the Democratic side of the aisle who love this country, care about this country on one hand. I can't count them on two hands. I can't count them on all of my fingers and toes because it is every single Member. The same thing is true on my side of the aisle. I would just ask my friends, my committed patriot friends, it is 3 weeks to have an opportunity to have our collective voice heard. The American people deserve it; the Nation needs it. Our leaders on the Appropriations Committee, Republican and Democrat alike, have given us an opportunity to do it. Let's take ``yes'' for an answer. Let's reject this motion to instruct, but let's do go to conference. Let's pass this continuing resolution, and let's restore some pride in a process that has served this country so well for so long.

Mr. WOODALL

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. WOODALL

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I have not had an opportunity to meet the gentlewoman from Michigan, but because I serve on the Rules Committee, I have had an opportunity to see all of the amendments that she has submitted for this bill. I know one of those amendments that she submitted is to make sure that all of our learning plans take special note of children in foster care and to make sure those folks are not forgotten, and I am grateful to her for her attention to that issue. Mr. Speaker, I would ask my friend from Florida if he has any further speakers remaining.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 121 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Hastings), my friend, pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only. General Leave

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, there is a lot going on in this rule today, a lot to be proud of. I would like to start by thanking the folks on the Parliamentarian staff and Mr. Steve Cote on the Rules Committee. Folks don't pay a lot of attention to what goes on down here sometimes, what goes on behind the scenes, in order to bring a bill to the floor. We did a little extra work this time around. I am grateful to folks for working with me to get that done. House Resolution 121 is a closed rule, but it makes in order the consideration of two bills. One is H.R. 529, a bill that passed by unanimous consent out of the Ways and Means Committee, that goes into these college savings plans and corrects some provisions that made it difficult for folks to redeposit money into those plans--again, all about trying to educate our children, to make sure they have the opportunities that we would want for them. The second provision made in order by this rule is the general debate of H.R. 5, the Student Success Act. Folks may not know the Student Success Act yet, Mr. Speaker, though they will. It will become as normalized of a term as No Child Left Behind. That was the last time we reauthorized the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, Mr. Speaker. I don't believe we will find much disagreement in this Chamber about the need to go back into that language now, 13 years later, and make some improvements in order to better serve our children. We might disagree about what those improvements are, but we know it is time to go back and get into that language and really try to make a difference for those families, students, and schools back home. H.R. 5 intends to do just that. This rule also provides suspension authority for any time through March 1 to bring up a resolution that either makes appropriations for or continues appropriations for the Department of Homeland Security. You heard a lot about it during the 1 minutes this morning, Mr. Speaker. What we have is Department of Homeland Security funding which, as you know, funds so much of the immigration services function of our government. As you know, a Federal judge has said that the plans the President has laid out cannot be completed lawfully. This House went forward and said: If it can't do those things lawfully, we are certainly not going to fund them in this bill. Now, the Senate has not even been able to bring that bill up for debate, blocked on the Senate side from any discussion whatsoever. We are going to hopefully find a resolution between now and the end of this week. I don't know when that resolution is going to come. When that resolution comes, I don't want to see this House delayed in bringing that resolution to the floor. Again, we have already done our work. My hope is the Senate can pass that bill, and we can go ahead and send it directly to the President's desk. Whatever those machinations may need to be, this rule makes bringing an additional provision in order as soon as that language becomes available. That is maximum flexibility to do what I think folks on both sides of this Chamber want to do, and that is to ensure the steady, continuous, deliberate functioning of this government. Mr. Speaker, No Child Left Behind, it was passed by a Republican House and a Republican Senate and sent to a Republican President for his signature. Today, that same Republican House is bringing forward a rewrite of that bill. As much as we all have a love and affection for children, as much as we want public education in this country to succeed, sometimes, we don't get it right. Again, I want to celebrate the bipartisanship in that. It is not everybody just looking to find somebody to blame. I think folks went into that process trying to do the very best that they could; but, in fact, we ended up with some top-down solutions that did not serve our districts as well as we would have hoped. I am very fortunate, Mr. Speaker. I come from a district with wonderful public schools, just wonderful public schools. In fact, we are the fastest growing congressional district in the State of Georgia. It is not because of any particular strong business presence, though we have a tremendously strong business presence. It is not because of our location in some pleasant area, though it is a particularly pleasant area. It is because our school systems are second to none. It is hard when we have to have these conversations about funding for local schools because the money that I spend on these children is money that I am borrowing from these children. It has to be an investment in these children. It has to be something that enables them to succeed even more tomorrow than they are today because I am borrowing it from their future. I am mortgaging their future in order to invest in them today. We all want those dollars to be used as well as they can. It would be easy to have a conversation about funding children to say: Well, if $1 is good, then $2 must be better, and if $2 is good, then $4 must be better, and if $4 is good, then $1 million must be better, and if $1 million is good, then $1 trillion must be better. I would dispute the attestation of any colleague who can find that direct correlation between dollars and performance. Dollars are critically important, and this bill provides those, but performance is tied to parents, it is tied to teachers, it is tied to principals, it is tied to communities. We cannot mandate that performance. We can only try to help those local folks succeed. I know a lot of my colleagues are concerned that unless we mandate a solution from Washington, we will allow local communities to fail. I know that concern is heartfelt. I don't come from one of those communities. The community I come from says: Washington is not getting it so right, but, trust us, we will take care of children down here because no one in Washington loves our children more than we do. Again, we see that. There is no question, Mr. Speaker, that children are going to succeed in this country, but there is an achievement gap. There is a gap, Mr. Speaker, depending on what your ZIP code is, between what success we expect to come from your family and what success you can actually attain. I come from a county, Mr. Speaker, that is widely diverse, that has all the economic challenges you can imagine and all the economic successes that you can imagine as well. We come together to make sure that no child is left behind and to make sure that no child is held back. We have both schools that are succeeding in ways that I could stand on this floor and brag about for hours, taking students from which the system expects so little and creating an opportunity for them to succeed so extraordinarily. I would like to see that replicated in school districts across the Nation. I see it back home in my school. But we also have the Gwinnett School of Mathematics, Science, and Technology, GSMST. U.S. News & World Report names it the third best high school in the United States of America. I, of course, think U.S. News & World Report got it wrong. We are the absolute best high school in the United States of America. A majority of that student body, Mr. Speaker, are minority students. A majority of that student body had an opportunity to go anywhere in the county they wanted to go, but they stood in line, hoping to win the lottery to get out of a school that was already performing well to get into this school where they could be exceptional. Mr. Speaker, there are children standing in line across this country waiting to be exceptional. This bill aims to clear that line away and allow every child in America to achieve the excellence that you and I both know they deserve. With that, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 1 minute. Just to be clear--we are down here talking about education today--I share my friend's passion for proper funding of this government. This House passed its funding bill for the Department of Homeland Security on January 14--January 14. This isn't something that has happened to us this week. January 14, the House did its business. The Senate has tried over and over and over to bring up a bill, and the Democrats haven't allowed them to even have the debate on the bill. This all being said, this is a bill that refuses to fund what a Federal Court said would be illegal to do. How in the world we have been able to define the House work product that refuses to fund what the court said it would be illegal to do as somehow the wrong bill to bring to the floor is just a testimony to the messaging machine that my friends had. I wish we had more of that machine here. With that, Mr. Speaker, I would like to get back on the topic of the day, what does matter for our children back home. I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Duncan).

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 30 seconds to say to my friend that I can feel her heart in those words. I am just tremendously proud to serve in a place where people really do care about the next generation, making sure that we are able to achieve those goals. I regret we are not finding the agreement on that today, but I am certain, as long as there are folks here who believe in achieving that goal together, as my friend does, we will get there. Mr. Speaker, I am honored to be joined today by a freshman Member from the Georgia delegation, an incredibly hardworking Member. I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Allen).

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I continue to yield for the purpose of debate only. If we can pass this rule, this rule makes in order the immediate consideration with the same-day authority of any funding bills that come before this House.

Mr. WOODALL. Then I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. I have lots of agreement with my friend from Florida. I always do. I am always a little surprised by how much I agree with him when he comes down here to talk, but we do need to unstick this place. We are talking about two issues today. One is H.R. 5, the Student Success Act, where every Member in this room wants to see our children succeed. Every Member in this room wants to see the achievement gap closed, and yet we grapple with how to achieve that goal together. We have also in this rule, Mr. Speaker, H.R. 529. That measure passed unanimously out of the Ways and Means Committee. We found a problem, and we found a solution that we could agree on together to move it forward. It is moving forward. And in the tradition of being unstuck, I am told that just in the last few minutes the Senate has found a pathway to move forward on a DHS funding bill. Again, we passed that bill back on January 14. The Senate has been struggling to find a pathway forward. I don't mean a pathway to pass it. I mean a pathway to even debate it. Apparently, we have seen that wall be broken down here in the last few minutes, and I am glad to hear that. There is a role to be played, Mr. Speaker. There is a role for this House to play in our constitutional Republic. There is a role for the Senate to play and there is a role for the White House to play. That is true when we are talking about Federal education policy. It is true when we are talking about Homeland Security policy. It is true when we are talking about immigration policy. I am not always satisfied with how well we in the House defend that constitutional prerogative. Again, we are here today to talk about H.R. 5, which is going to fix a bill passed by an entirely Republican infrastructure here in Congress that today Republicans disavow as being a terrible mistake. They wish we could have done better. I am glad we are striving to do better. It is not a Republican issue, it is not a Democratic issue. It is an American issue. And what could be more American than trying to help our public schools succeed? You hear a lot of worry in this Chamber, Mr. Speaker. You hear folks worried that if we change this provision or if we change that provision, what will be the impact on those children who right now are threatened by a substantial achievement gap in this country? But in the same moment, Mr. Speaker, someone will stand up on the other side of the aisle talking about those very same children and say: If we do not change these provisions today, we will sentence these children to a lifetime of underperformance, of not being able to meet their full potential. I don't question anyone's motive on this floor. In fact, I am grateful for the passion that folks have on this floor. This rule is only step one of H.R. 5, Mr. Speaker, and I am glad for that. When my colleague from Florida spoke earlier about the closed nature of the process and how much better and brighter this institution is when the process is opened, he is exactly right. He is right every time he says it, and I am right every time I say it. It is absolutely true. It is not fast. It is not efficient. Arguably, sometimes it even borders on dysfunctional. But it is the right thing to do to in order to end up with the best product that we can at the end of the day. And to the degree that we are able to do that, Mr. Speaker, I believe we will continue to strive to do that. This bill today is an example of that. This rule, Mr. Speaker, just so folks know what they are coming to vote on, doesn't deal with the amendments to the Student Success Act. We are planning on going back to the Rules Committee this afternoon for a completely new hearing in order to make as many amendments as we can available to the underlying bill. This rule is only to have general debate on H.R. 5 before the amendment process begins and to have debate on H.R. 529, that bill that passed unanimously out of the Ways and Means Committee hearing. So often we come down here and we are talking about divisive issues, Mr. Speaker. I am glad to be down here today talking about something on which we can agree: a good bipartisan bill coming out of Ways and Means, an opportunity to open up the process and have voices be heard on H.R. 5 today and tomorrow. The gentleman from Florida had it right, Mr. Speaker. I am blessed to be from a part of the country where folks understand that education isn't just something. It is everything. Don't talk to me about loving opportunity in this country if you don't have a commitment to education. Don't talk to me about lifting folks up from this rung of the ladder to this rung of the economic ladder if you don't have a commitment to education. And don't talk to me about taking somebody else's dollars and spending them on education and thinking that alone is going to create better outcomes for that child. You need money, absolutely you do, but you need that commitment locally. You need the commitment of teachers, you need the commitment of principals, you need the commitment of mothers and fathers. You need the commitment of communities. And we have yet to figure out how to mandate that commitment from Washington, D.C. I am grateful that I live in a community where we figured out how to grow it from within. You can walk into the worst school in my district, Mr. Speaker, and you will find folks headed off to Stanford on scholarships--first-generation Americans; you will find folks headed off to the University of Chicago on full scholarships-- folks who come from generational poverty; you will find folks headed off, of course, to the University of Georgia, the finest institution in the United States, because they want to be close to their family and they want to invest in the community that has been so good to them. Hope lives there. Opportunity lives there. I am grateful to Chairman Kline and the folks on the Education Committee for doing what they can. It is not all that I would like to see, but to do what they can to get out of the way of those innovators in my community, to do what they can to allow folks to experiment with some things and find out what works, as we have, and then take those local ideas and spread those ideas locally, do what they can to prevent the Federal Government from saying: We know best how to educate children, and instead turning the Federal Government just into a funding stream, where we can, to say: You know how to educate children. We trust you. So often we conflate issues in this body, Mr. Speaker. The issue is not that children can't learn. They can. The issue is not that public schools can't teach. They can and they do. But there is an issue with generational poverty. There is an issue with an achievement gap. I am not sure that H.R. 5, no matter who crafted it and how long we work to do it, I am not sure that we can solve that problem with H.R. 5. In fact, I don't believe that we could--not with any Elementary and Secondary Education Act bill. We are doing what we can today, and I hope we will be back in this institution tomorrow to do more. Goodness knows, we do a lot of things in this town that disadvantage that next generation of Americans. I am proud today to be working on at least one bill that will do something to advantage those young people and their future.

Mr. WOODALL. With that, Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the resolution.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I am prepared to yield back my time when my friend is. As soon as we pass this resolution, it will be in order to bring up any additional funding bills that come before the House today, but I cannot yield during this debate.

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, if I understood my friend, he is asking that we bring up a bill that will fund what it is the court said would be illegal to fund. I cannot yield for that kind of request.

Mr. WOODALL

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the time. I would like to begin by yielding to my friend from the Georgia delegation, Mr. Loudermilk. Paying Tribute to Timothy F. Johnson

Mr. WOODALL. I thank my friend from Georgia. This is a country that is about individuals. It is about individual leadership, and it is about individual opportunity. The story you tell of Tim and the impact that he had on people's lives is going to be known long, long after he has gone to be with our Lord. I want to talk about opportunity at a much smaller level than what my friend from Georgia was talking about, Mr. Speaker. I want to talk about it in the context of the Keystone pipeline that we passed this week. At the end of the day, America is about opportunity. And if opportunity doesn't live here anymore, I am not sure what the point of America is. If freedom doesn't live here anymore, I am not sure what the point of America is. If families can't raise their children and believe that their children, if they play by the rules, if they work hard, can create a better life for themselves than their parents had, if you don't believe that anymore, the promise that is the American Dream is lost. And I think with one minor Federal regulation at a time, followed by a couple of major Federal regulations, followed by more minor regulations, we are eroding the ability of our young people to succeed and for their families to succeed. The Keystone pipeline we voted on this week, Mr. Speaker, it is about employment opportunities. It is a job-creating program. We have dozens upon dozens of pipelines across this country. Why in the world the President has chosen the Keystone pipeline to use as a political football is a mystery to me. Building pipelines is honorable work. It is hard work. It is often dangerous work. But it is important work that goes to the price of energy in every single one of our homes back home. Having passed it in the Senate, having passed it in the House, it now goes to the President's desk. He could create jobs tomorrow. It is about energy security, Mr. Speaker. It is energy from our friends in Canada, one of our most loyal partners across the globe. We need North American energy security. I don't want to rely on folks across the oceans who oftentimes wish us harm. I want to use those resources here. Creating this partnership with Canada gives us that energy security. It is enhanced safety, Mr. Speaker. You don't think about it. But if we are not moving oil through a pipeline, we are moving it on trains, we are moving it in trucks. Trains and trucks and their safety record, Mr. Speaker, are much less reliable than pipelines, not just in terms of spills but in terms of lives. I heard the gentleman from North Dakota down here earlier this week, Mr. Speaker. Of course those trucks and trains are moving through his district. He said if we put in the pipeline instead of using those trucks, lives would be saved. Traffic accidents would be avoided. Lives would be saved, not just oil spills but real human consequences. We talk about environmental protection, Mr. Speaker. This is going to be the most advanced pipeline ever constructed in the United States of America. Now that is just the environmental protection of the pipeline. We go on to talk about, where would that oil be refined if we don't do it here under U.S. safety and environmental standards? Well, the answer is we are going to ship that overseas. It is going to get shipped to China. It is going to get processed in a much less environmentally friendly way. We have an opportunity to take that step. Finally, Mr. Speaker, we are talking about an exchange with our friends in Canada. Can you imagine if we had a product we were trying to get to market, and the only way to get it there or the simplest way to get it there was to move it through Canada, and the Canadians said: No, I don't care about your economy, America; I don't care about jobs in America; I don't care about your resources; the answer is, no, we won't partner with you. If you read the comments coming out of the government in Canada, they are just flabbergasted that all they are asking is for this minor connection into the U.S. pipeline system, and the country they thought was their great friend--America--has been so resistant. For 7 years, we have been waiting on this solution, Mr. Speaker, and finally it has passed in this Congress this week. I want to talk about what is happening in this Congress because when you slow down things like the pipeline, Mr. Speaker, you are slowing down America. You are slowing down economic growth. You are slowing down job creation. I have here from Atlanta's own CNN a headline titled: ``Harry Reid: Dems won't engage in `obstruction.' '' This is from November 12, 2014. He is making the point as the former--at that time, he was the majority leader in the Senate. He is now the former majority leader in the Senate. He is making the point that America is not helped when the Senate engages in obstructionism. He says this: ``I am ready to work with'' Mitch McConnell--now the Senate majority leader--``in good faith to make this institution function for the American people.'' In good faith to make this institution function. He says: ``I saw firsthand how a strategy of obstruction was debilitating to our system. I have no desire to engage in that manner.'' I am grateful to Harry Reid for that wisdom. I think he is absolutely right about that. There is a right way and a wrong way to run this institution. He has observed the wrong way to do it. Unfortunately, that was back in November. Fast forward to this month, Mr. Speaker. Look at the headlines from across the country. Washington Post: ``Senate Democrats should be careful about their filibuster strategy.'' As you know, the filibuster is the definition of obstruction. It is in full force in the Senate as we sit here today. February 4, from The Atlantic: ``The new Democratic obstructionists.'' That is the headline of the article, Mr. Speaker. It was just 3 months ago when Majority Leader Harry Reid said: This is not the right path for America; this is bad for America. And he was right when he said it. It has taken 3 months for him to change his mind and go in the other direction. Politico: ``Democrats learn to love the filibuster; party leaders change tune now that they are in minority.'' Change tune now that they are in the minority. Mr. Speaker, America's needs are no less great today. Job creation is no less important today. The American economy is no less fragile today. But the Senate Democratic leaders have changed their tune. Finally, back to CNN: ``Democrats block funding for DHS to protect Obama immigration orders.'' What that means, Mr. Speaker, is they have blocked debating the bill to fund DHS, that they are so intent on protecting the President and what he alone has done from the White House, they refuse to even allow the Senate to debate the merits of those issues. If this institution is not about debate, Mr. Speaker, I don't know what it is about. I begin with that to get us into the economy, Mr. Speaker. And I have to tell you, I have the vice chairman of the House Budget Committee down here today, the gentleman from Indiana, Todd Rokita. The Budget Committee right now is involved in the gargantuan task of trying to balance the Federal budget and present that budget to this House before April. But their task is complicated, Mr. Speaker. You can't see the chart that I have, but their task is complicated because economic growth in America is slowing. The obstructionism in the Senate, the obstructionism from the White House can't build simple things like the Keystone pipeline. Do you know, Mr. Speaker, one of the greatest public works projects in the history of our Nation, the Hoover Dam? The Hoover Dam was built in less time than it has taken the White House to consider the application for this short pipeline connecting America and Canada. We built the Hoover Dam more quickly than we can sign off on the paperwork for a pipeline. Let me show you what the impact of that is. Economic growth--in 2013, Mr. Speaker, CBO projected that GDP would be growing about 3 percent a year, 2.9 to be precise. By last year, in February, when they gave us their projections, they lowered it to 2.5 percent. Today, January 2015, they have lowered it to 2.3 percent. Mr. Speaker, that is not just 2.9 to 2.3 percent. That is trillions of dollars in economic activity. It looks small on this page, but it is giant on the Federal budget, and it is even bigger when you talk about the job creation that hasn't occurred. It is even bigger when you talk about Americans who are trapped in part-time work. It is even bigger when you talk about young people graduating from college who cannot find a job. That is the impact of obstructionism. That is the impact of inaction. That is the impact of having a former majority leader, now minority leader, in the Senate who, as the newspaper headlines say, has changed his tune. I have heard folks say--I laugh, Mr. Speaker. It is not funny. It is sad. But I have heard folks say, Well, what are you complaining about, Rob? Deficits have come down by half in President Obama's administration. They have come down by half. Well, that is true. When I showed up here 4 years ago, Mr. Speaker, deficits were at their single highest rate in the history of the Nation. And by ``single highest rate,'' I mean they were four times higher than they had ever before been. So they have dropped from being four times higher than ever before down to just higher than ever before. You can call that progress, but I don't. I have it charted here as a percentage of the size of the economy, Mr. Speaker. I go all the way back to 1965. We have had Republicans. We have had Democrats. We have had Republicans in Congress, Democrats in Congress; Republicans in the White House, Democrats in the White House. This isn't about the parties. For Pete's sake, if we look here for the only surpluses in our Nation's history, it comes at a time when we had--much like we do today--Republicans here in this institution, Republicans in the United States Senate, and Democrats leading from the White House. It was a bipartisan way we created some economic growth. But what I want you to see, Mr. Speaker, is that we come here into the current administration, deficits dramatically higher than ever before in American history, dramatically higher. Coming down to the dotted line I have on the chart, Mr. Speaker, is the historical average, from 1965 to 2014. Now it is embarrassing for the both of us that we have to talk about our Nation's finances by the historical deficit. Neither one of us came here to be involved in deficit spending. We came here to stop borrowing from our children and from our grandchildren, to start being responsible by paying the bills today, to improve opportunity in the future, not to diminish and borrow from opportunity in the future. But that has been the historical average. What you would see if you could see this chart, Mr. Speaker, is that even as the White House is preaching the good news of declining deficits, they have only declined from those record highs. They have declined to a level where they are going to continue to rise again at levels higher than the historical average. The President just sent his budget--2 weeks ago now, Mr. Speaker, he sent that budget. It arrived here on time for the first time in his administration. I applaud him for that. But it never balances--never, ever. Not this year, not next year, not 10 years from now, not 20 years from now, not 100 years from now. The idea of the United States of America and the budget that should control it, from the President's point of view, is a budget that should never, ever balance and, thus, a balance that should continue year after year to borrow from the prosperity of future generations so that we can spend it on ourselves. That is selfish in ways that I can't be a part of. What is the nature of the problem, Mr. Speaker? We are talking about this in the Budget Committee right now. Total spending in this country is about $3.5 trillion this year. The little part that Congress has control over, it is the defense and the nondefense discretionary--this little corner of the pie. We are able to control that. In fact, Mr. Rokita, the vice chairman of the Budget Committee, arrived here in 2010, as I did. Every single year since you have been here, leading at the Budget Committee, I would say to the gentleman from Indiana, we have reduced that discretionary spending every single year. It hasn't been easy. It has been hard, deliberate, bipartisan work. But you have done it because it was the right thing to do. $3.5 trillion is a lot of money. But the small part that you have had control over, you have made a difference in. It is the rest of this pot that continues to grow. I yield to my friend from Indiana.

Mr. WOODALL

Mr. WOODALL. Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.