Date: 2009-06-04
Speaker: LINCOLN DIAZ-BALART (republican)
Chamber: H
State: Florida

Mr. Speaker. first Id like to thank my friend. the -gentleman from Colorado for the time. And I yield myself such time as I may consume. First. Mr. Speaker. if I may. Id like to remember and ask the House to recall that today is June 4. Twenty years ago a massacre occurred in Beijing. Thousands of students and other prodemocracy activists were murdered. Subsequently. they were rounded up. those who had not been murdered. who had been in the square. and thrown in dungeons and tortured. And so its been 20 years. but we cannot forget. The regime is still in power there. They havent had much reason to regret their murders and their systematic oppression of the people. But over you. in something that distinguishes this Congress. we read the words "In God We Trust." And I do. I trust that justice will be done. and that those who committed the murders at Tiananmen Square in June of 1989 will be brought to justice. We can never forget. Mr. Speaker. With regard to the rule being brought forth today. bringing forth important legislation to the floor today. in order to protect our transportation systems after the cowardly attacks of September 11. 2001. Congress passed and President Bush signed into law on November 19. 2001. the Aviation and Transportation Security Act. That legislation created the Transportation Security Administration. TSA. improving aviation security and restoring public confidence in air travel. The underlying legislation" thats being brought forth today for consideration by the Congress. by this rule. authorizes $7.6 billion in appropriations for the TSA during the fiscal year 2010. and provides a 6 percent acrosstheboard increase for fiscal year 2011. In their report to Congress. the 9/11 Commission criticized the existing process for allocation of Federal homeland security grants. The. report recommended that. "Homeland security assistance should be based strictly on an assessment of risks and vulnerabilities." and that the distribution of the grants "should not remain a program for general revenue sharing." I have long worked to make certain that homeland security assistance follows the. recommendations of the 9/11 Commission and that funds are distributed through riskbased assessments. As such. I am pleased that this legislation requires TSA to update Congress on its implementation of a riskbased system for allocating security resources. The underlying legislation would establish an Aviation Security Advisory Committee to assist and make recommendations to the Secretary with issues pertaining to aviation security. It also establishes an Air Cargo Working Group to provide recommendations for the implementation of the cargo screening initiatives proposed by the TSA to meet the 100 percent air cargo screening mandates set forth in the "Implementing Recommendations of the 9/11 Commission Act." I am pleased there is a provision that provides for the reimbursement of airports that took the initiative and used their own funding to install explosive detection systems after the September 11 terrorist attacks. Those airports installed the systems after receiving assurances from the Federal Government that they would be reimbursed for these expensive yet very important protection systems. Unfortunately. after all these years. were still waiting for the Federal Government to provide the promised reimbursement. I congratulate our colleague. Mr. BILIRAKIs. for having this important provision included in the legislation. While I plan to support the underlying legislation. Mr. Speaker. I must express concerns that the legislation was really rushed to the floor by the majority. On such an important issue as the safety of our transportation systems. one would think the majority would want the input of the very agency affected by the legislation. And yet it decided it was more important to move forward than to wait until the administration. the new administration. had selected a TSA administrator who could provide Congress the necessary input and new ideas on how Congress can improve the agency. So the majority. it can be said. used excessive haste to rush the bill to the floor. On Thursday. May 14. the majority announced that the House would consider the Transportation Security Administration reauthorization bill the week of May 18. However. at the time of the announcement. the legislative language of the bill was nowhere to be found. The majority kept the text. as you know upon which amendments are based or can be based. hidden under lock and key until late on Monday. May 18. And just as they released the text. they set a hard and fast deadline of 5 p.m. on Wednesday. May 20. for Members to submit their amendments. What this did was give Members. in effect. one business day to read the legislation that reauthorizes the TSA and draft and submit amendments. The majority justified their short amendment deadline by saying that the Rules Committee was going to meet the next day. Thursday. to report a rule for amendments. with the idea that the bill would be on the floor on Friday. May But the House decided to leave for the Memorial Day district work period on Thursday evening. without considering the TSA bill. and rather than allowing Members more time to review the bill. the majority pushed ahead. eliminating the opportunity for Members to further review the legislation and propose amendments to improve it. I bring this up. Mr. Speaker. because it is not an anomaly on the majoritys part. but its business as usual. Since the majority took power in Congress in January 2007. Members have been given an average of one business day or less to submit amendments than we did when we were in the majority. And thats important because its important for people here representing their constituents to have time to read legislation before having to introduce amendments to try to improve the legislation. I am pleased that the majority agreed to allow an amendment that I introduced in the Rules Committee for consideration. However. there were other amendments from Members on both sides of the aisle that were blocked. For example. the majority blocked an amendment by Representative SOUDER that would require the TSA to place all of the detainees held at the Guantanamo Bay detention facility on the nofly list. an amendment that Im sure would have overwhelming support on the floor. So I would simply urge the majority to allow an open process. as it promised in its campaign. and not just on noncontroversial legislation such as this one. This is legislation. in terms of the merits of the legislation. it was brought forth in a bipartisan manner within the committee. The chairman. Mr. THOMPSON. is known to work in a very respectful and bipartisan manner with all of the members of his committee. and I think all of us are grateful for that and commend him for it. So I would urge. though. that not only on noncontroversial legislation but also on upcoming. for example. health care and climate change legislation. that openness be allowed in the House. Its important. Its. I think. required by the spirit of the democratic process. So both of these upcoming pieces of legislation. energy. health care. they will obviously have farreaching consequences for our constituents and for the economy. and so I would hope that on such important issues the majority does not block the opportunity for Members of the House to bring forth their amendments seeking to improve the legislation. I reserve the balance of my time.