Providing for Consideration of H.R. Ozone Standards Implementation Act of Providing for Consideration of H. Con. Res. Expressing the Sense of Congress That A Carbon Tax Would Be Detrimental to the United States Economy; and Providing for Consideration of H. Con. Res. Expressing the Sense of Congress Opposing the President's Proposed Tax on Every Barrel of Oil

Floor Speech

Mr. Speaker, I am excited to be here today discussing one of these resolutions because it really means something when Members of Congress see fit--and I am talking about the Scalise resolution, H. Con. Res. 89, to say they are against a particular proposal.

Quite honestly, this is the first sign of momentum for a carbon tax cut. And you will hear me referring to it as a ``carbon tax cut'' because that is essentially what it is. It is using carbon tax revenues to cut taxes for the American people, for American businesses.

You don't see these kinds of resolutions if a concept and an idea don't have momentum.

For instance, my good friend from Georgia (Mr. Woodall) has long been a champion of a proposal to create a sales tax here in our country, a national sales tax of 19, 20 percent, and he is welcome to talk about it on his own time.

But I think the gentleman will acknowledge, much to his frustration, that that idea does not seem to be advancing. Now, were it advancing, you might very well see this kind of resolution saying it is not a good idea.

There are other Republicans who have ideas to raise the tax rates on low-income Americans or Americans that are so low-income they might not even be paying a Federal income tax yet. Again, those ideas don't generally have momentum, so you don't see this kind of resolution coming forward to try to stop it.

This is the first real chance that Congress has had to vote, in many ways, on the merits of a carbon tax cut and, frankly, I think that this discussion moves us forward, because I fully expect there will be bipartisan opposition to this resolution which opposes, presumably, any and all carbon tax cuts, because what you see is, the oil and gas lobby or, I should say, some segments of the oil and gas lobby because, quite frankly, many international oil and gas industry players actually support a carbon tax cut as a way of their, therefore, getting around this kind of regulatory uncertainty that they see, like, in fact, the ozone rules itself. They see it better to simply establish a price for carbon.

But let's say, of course, there are also those in the oil and gas industry who oppose this carbon tax cut. They are trying to run a strategy to try to lock people down, where, yes, maybe, 10, 5, 12 Republicans will vote for this, whatever it is; but they want to be able to go back and remind Republicans who vote for this now that, in the future, when we are actually moving forward with the carbon tax cut proposal, that they were already on the Record in a particular way.

That means they are worried, frankly. That is what that means in ``inside the Beltway speak'' and ``Washington speak.''

What does that mean? It means I am excited because I ran for Congress, in part, to pass a carbon tax cut.

Let me quote some of the many prominent conservatives that have caused this resolution to come forward in many ways because of the great momentum that a carbon tax cut has.

Former Secretary of State George Shultz, Secretary of State under Ronald Reagan, said: ``A carbon tax, starting small and escalating to a significant level on a legislated schedule, would do the trick. I would make it revenue-neutral, returning all net funds generated to taxpayers.''

That is Former Secretary of State George Shultz.

Jerry Taylor, of the Niskanen Center, formerly of the Cato Institute, said: ``A carbon tax at the levels presently discussed in Washington would not unduly burden the economy, and that's particularly true once we consider the non-climate environmental benefits that would follow from the tax as well as the benefits of any offsetting tax cuts.''

So in a moment you will hear me talk about the many benefits of this carbon tax cut concept. But what Jerry Taylor at the Niskanen Center has rightfully latched onto is the economic stimulus that can actually be generated by lowering taxes on American businesses, on job creators, on middle-income families as an offset from the carbon tax cut.

Peter Van Doren of the Cato Institute says: ``The obvious lesson from economics is to increase fossil fuel prices enough through taxation to account for these effects.''

My good friend, and a personal mentor of mine, Dr. Arthur Laffer, former Economic Adviser under President Reagan, said: ``When you add the national security concerns, reducing our reliance on fossil fuels becomes a no-brainer.'' And he has spoken out in support of, again, a carbon tax cut.

Greg Mankiw, the former chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers to George Bush, said: ``I will tell the American people that a higher tax on gasoline is better at encouraging conservation than are heavy- handed CAFE regulations,'' and ``I will advocate a carbon tax as the best way to control global warming.''

So, I mean, what you have is many conservatives, free market conservatives lining up to say yes, let's cut taxes and let's do it by passing a carbon tax cut.

I have a letter, Mr. Speaker, that I will include in the Record, signed by Niskanen Center, Republican, American Enterprise Institute, R Street Institute, Evangelical Environmental Network in opposition to this resolution by Representative Scalise.

In fact, in part, this letter says, which will be available in the Record: ``The least burdensome, most straightforward, and most market- friendly means of addressing climate change is to price the risks imposed by greenhouse gas emissions via a tax.'' June 7, 2016.

Dear Representative, Later this week Congress will take up a resolution sponsored by Congressman Scalise (R-LA1) that expresses the sense of Congress that a carbon tax would be detrimental to the economy of the United States. We are concerned that this resolution offers a limited perspective on carbon taxes and is blind to the potential benefits of market-based climate policy. Legislation that incorporates a carbon tax could include regulatory and tax reforms to make the United States economy more competitive, innovative, and robust, benefiting both present and future generations.

We recognize that a carbon tax, like any tax, will impose economic costs. But climate change is also imposing economic costs. This resolution falls short by recognizing the cost of action without considering the cost of staying on our present policy course. There are, of course, uncertainties about the future cost of climate change and, likewise, the cost associated with a carbon tax (much would depend on program design and the pace and nature of technological progress). The need for action, however, is clear. A recent survey of economists who publish in leading peer-reviewed journals on these matters found that 93% believe that a meaningful policy response to climate change is warranted.

The least burdensome, most straightforward, and most market-friendly means of addressing climate change is to price the risks imposed by greenhouse gas emissions via a tax. This would harness price signals, rather than regulations, to guide market response. That is why carbon pricing has the support of free market economists, a majority of the global business community, and a large number of the largest multinational private oil and gas companies in the world (the corporate entities among the most directly affected by climate policy).

In reaching a conclusion, this resolution neglects the fact that the United States already has a multiplicity of carbon taxes. They are imposed, however, via dozens of federal and state regulations, are invisible to consumers, unevenly imposed across industrial sectors, unnecessarily costly, and growing in size and scope. The policy choice is not if we should price carbon emissions, but how.

Unfortunately, this resolution also fails to differentiate between proposals that would impose carbon taxes on top of existing regulations (chiefly the Obama Administration's Clean Power Plan), and proposals that would impose carbon taxes in place of those existing regulations. Conservatives and free market advocates should embrace the latter, regardless of how they view climate risks.

An economy-wide carbon tax that replaces existing regulatory interventions could reduce the cost of climate policy and deregulate the economy. It could also provide revenue to support pro-growth tax reform, including corporate income or payroll tax cuts, which could dramatically reduce overall costs on the economy. Revenues could be applied to compensate those who suffer the most from higher energy costs; the poor, the elderly, and individuals and families living on fixed incomes.

Unfortunately, none of those options are presently available because Members of Congress have neglected opportunities to design and debate market-friendly climate policies in legislation. Instead, they have yielded authority in climate policy design to the Executive Branch. By discouraging a long-overdue discussion about sensible carbon pricing, this resolution frustrates the development of better policy. Sincerely, Jerry Taylor,

President, Niskanen Center. Bob Inglis,

Executive Director, RepublicEn. Aparna Mathur,

Resident Scholar, American Enterprise Institute. Eli Lehrer,

President, R Street Institute. The Rev. Mitchell C. Hescox,

President, Evangelical Environmental Network. Alan Viard,

Resident Scholar, American Enterprise Institute.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. POLIS. Now, let's take this back to basic economics. The Supreme Court itself said something along the lines of: power to tax is the power to destroy. That is from an early 19th century case.

Whatever you tax, you discourage in the economy. Whatever you don't tax, you encourage. So you have to look at what you tax. It's important.

Let's take an example from corporations. We tax corporate profits. Well, it turns out corporate profits are a good thing. We tax individual income. It turns out individual income is a good thing.

As policymakers, we shouldn't seek to discourage activities that help people earn money or help companies earn money. That is exactly what we want people to do. That is exactly what we want companies to do on behalf of their shareholders and their stakeholders.

So why not take something that, regardless of what with you think of the science on climate change--and that is not central to this debate on a carbon tax cut. So let's even start from the assumption that you don't want to look at the science. You have turned a blind eye to it. You are not at all concerned about climate change, or you don't think it is manmade.

Let's look, again, at carbon usage in our economy and the negative consequences of it: pollution, meaning air quality--not talking climate change--air quality, increased asthma, increased cancer risk.

National security's concerns, reliant on importing it from foreign companies or, if we are producing it domestically, utilizing a resource that we know will return out in the very best-case scenario. It is a perishable resource. Once you take it out of the ground, it is gone.

So if we can find a way to say, you know what? We would rather have income. We would rather have Americans of all income levels--whether they are earning $1 million a year, or $20,000 a year--we would rather have them keep more of their hard-earned money. We would rather have companies keep more of their money to re-invest in job growth here, rather than seek elaborate tax shelters overseas, or inversions, where they move their corporate headquarters overseas because we have one of the highest corporate tax rates in the world.

The carbon tax cut presents us with the opportunity for pro-growth economic policies that make America more competitive and lets Americans keep more of their hard-earned money.

That is what excites so many free-market conservatives and centrists about the concept of a free market, of a carbon tax cut. That is, frankly, why this great momentum, coming from the American Enterprise Institute, from Cato, from R Street, all of this intellectual fuel, intellectual fuel for a carbon tax cut, that is why, sensing that, some Republicans--in this case, Mr. Scalise and his cosponsors--have brought forward as a response. This kind of thing only happens in Washington when an idea has momentum.

I couldn't have been more excited when I was back home recently to talk to several of my constituents who are strongly dedicated to a bipartisan solution on climate change.

Former Representative Bob Inglis actually came to my district and met with me, met with some of the leadership folks in my district about how we can do something to act on climate from a Republican perspective. And I am firmly of the belief that any action has to be bipartisan.

Just looking at the way our country is balanced, I mean, certainly, if the Democrats were in a position where we had 60 seats in the Senate, where we had a majority in the House, where we had the President, I would certainly encourage us to move forward and implement some kind of carbon tax cut; but, frankly, that is an unlikely scenario.

It is more likely that a solution will require support from both sides of the aisle, so we should be talking about what it takes to get that kind of support. That is the discussion, the national discussion that former Representative Bob Inglis has dedicated himself to and, frankly, it is the fear of that kind of discussion that has led this body to consider this resolution in opposition to a carbon tax cut that, I am proud to say, will likely have bipartisan opposition; meaning, there will be some Republicans, I hope, I expect, who will stand up and say, wait a minute. I don't want to go on the Record saying I am against any kind of carbon tax cut because of the great benefit that this can provide to the American economy.

As articulated by Arthur Laffer, as articulated by R Street Institute, we have the ability, with some of that revenue, to really pass pro-growth tax cuts to offset the income and the revenue from the carbon tax cut.

So the carbon tax cut can reduce the income tax for American families of all income levels. I should point out, Democrats care that lower- income families spend a higher percentage of their income on fuel, on energy. And we have, in many of the bipartisan concept proposals that are out there, tracked tax credits and tax refunds for low-income families to make sure that anything we do is not regressive. I think that is a given.

I think, obviously, in the same week that the Speaker of the House put out his agenda on poverty, I am sure that he, and many others--the last thing they would want to do is burden lower-income Americans with any kind of additional tax. So of course we want to take care of that.

The good news is that is only a small fraction of the windfall from the carbon tax cut. It also provides sufficient revenue to reduce corporate tax rates currently among the highest in the world. Of all the developed countries, a 35 percent corporate tax rate. The developed country average is somewhere in the 18, 20 percent range last time I checked. It is one of the reasons that corporations are moving overseas. They are not repatriating their earnings because they don't want to pay that American income tax.

In a global economy, you have to be competitive. It doesn't mean we have to be the lowest. That is not the value proposition of our country. We have the rule of law. We have a highly educated workforce, but we have to be competitive.

So if we can find a way to reduce that corporate tax rate to 25 percent or 20 percent--I applaud the work of Dave Camp, the former Ways and Means chair last session, who boldly proposed a 25 percent income tax rate. The President of the United States, Barack Obama, has proposed a 28 percent corporate income tax rate. So in that range. And that is, by the way, without a carbon tax cut.

With a carbon tax cut you can go lower on the corporate income tax. You could run the numbers. You could probably get down to 20 percent. Maybe you could get down to 15 percent. It depends how you allocated it. But that is one of the things that excites many of the strong free market advocates of the carbon tax cut.

You could also reduce the individual tax burden for families across all income levels, after we make darn sure that low-income families are not in any way disproportionately hit. And in no way is this regressive. In fact, Democrats' preference would prefer this to be accretive for low-income families, and maybe that is something we can come together around. Certainly something that Democrats and Republicans care about are those who live in poverty and making sure that they, too, see the benefits of the windfall from the carbon tax cut.

But, of course, we are also very open--I am, and my Democratic colleagues--to sharing the benefits of the carbon tax cut across the entire spectrum of income earners, with a focus, we hope, on the middle class, with a focus, we hope, on those in poverty.

But it does provide an opportunity for Republicans who come to the table around climate, around carbon tax cut to say, you know what? Our priorities include job creators and others which, of course, we all care about job creators, we all about care about S Corps, we all care about all those things.

It is simply a matter of priorities. You have to get the revenues to run the government from somewhere. And, separately, we have the discussion about what those appropriation levels are, how much we spend; we have that discussion.

Then we have to, somehow, get so much in taxes. It is a question of where it is from. And I believe it should be from things that, regardless of what you believe on climate, we want to discourage, rather than things that we want to encourage.

So if we can stop discouraging people from earning money and income, stop discouraging corporations from domiciling their earnings here, from growing, from expanding and, instead, discourage something that, even if you throw out the science on climate, is polluting, and runs out, and is a national security danger because it forces us to rely on other countries, that is something that we should discourage in our economy.

So, look, I join George Shultz, Jerry Taylor, Peter Van Doren, Dr. Arthur Laffer, Greg Mankiw, the American Enterprise Institute, and so many others, in saying: the time is now to have this discussion.

I applaud Representative Scalise for initiating this discussion. This is the first sign of momentum that this bill has. And the day that this body considers a bill condemning my friend from Georgia's national sales tax proposal, I will actually start worrying about it. I will actually start saying wait a minute.

I have had many discussions with him, and I have to say it does have its merits. My issues and concerns with it have been around whether or not we can make it progressive rather than regressive and, of course, the potential for black market transactions when you have that level of taxation. It's a hypothetical discussion at this point.

But the day that a resolution comes forth like H.R. 89 around the national sales tax, I will know that that discussion has become a serious one. And I couldn't be more proud and excited that the discussion around a national carbon tax cut has now become a serious one, a bipartisan one, an inevitable one, one that we will see through with the next President of the United States into law.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I don't have any other speakers, so I will be happy to close.

I yield myself the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I am going to address some of the issues in this rule and in this bill. This rule, which I oppose, and I also oppose all three underlying bills, contain a number of concepts that aren't going to move forward into law, that are put there for political reasons and, again, very excitingly, the first real discussion of a national carbon tax cut, because that idea has so much bipartisan momentum from the left and the right.

Many of these ideas are simply recycling old ideas, the same ideas that we have discussed before, that they have complained about before that if somehow they were to make it out of the Senate, the President would veto them, particularly, obviously, one that undoes what the President wants to do, so we are simply going through the motions on a lot of these bills. The most notable one is truly the resolution on a carbon tax cut because what this means is that idea has scared enough people, presumably, who oppose it that it is moving forward in some form and some discussion, which is exciting.

So let's start with discussing the proposed $10-per-barrel fee on oil. Now, this is, again, kind of a reaction to something that isn't happening. It is not going to change any current policy. There is no $10-per-barrel fee on oil. This is simply about a Chamber saying that they disapprove of something that Obama has said and wants to do.

We all agree our country has serious problems with transportation and infrastructure funding. There are many different ways that we can meet the needs to fund those. If people don't like a per-barrel fee on oil, there are plenty of other ways to do it.

The real discussion should be about how do we fund transportation?

I am a fan of our bipartisan proposal to allow a repatriation window for funds that corporations have income overseas which they have not brought back to our country because they effectively face another tax with that and a one-time window for doing that. We can create a national infrastructure bank to fund infrastructure.

There are a lot of great ideas. It is clear--and this will probably pass--the Republicans don't like a $10-per-barrel tax on oil, and that is fine.

If you don't like it, what do you like? How do we want to fund infrastructure?

This proposal and this concept came from the administration's 2017 budget. Frankly, there are probably a lot of things in the President's budget that my Republican friends don't like. They could probably run a resolution every week, they could probably run 10 resolutions every week about things that they don't like in the President's budget, but that is not really a productive use of this Chamber's time. That budget didn't pass. As far as I know, I don't think that budget got a single vote.

It wasn't put up this year because Republicans haven't even put up any budgets for our body. They haven't offered a budget. The last time the Republicans put budgets forward--and I believe the last budget, if I am not mistaken, did not contain the $10-per-barrel tax on oil. That was in the President's budget for fiscal year 2017, but the prior one did not receive any votes from Democrats or Republicans.

So this vote, at best, is repetitive because already this body has rejected the President's last budget. Were the Republicans to bring forward the President's budget for 2017, they would likely--again, as has traditionally occurred, as far as I know, throughout history-- overwhelmingly reject that budget.

So, in part, let me be clear, that is because we believe, I believe as a Member of Congress, that the budget is a legislative prerogative. I don't think there has been a Presidential budget that has been passed. In fact, I and, I think, most, if not all, of my Democratic colleagues joined in opposing the President's budget because we had our own congressional Democrats' budget. Not only one, there were two or three congressional Democratic budgets, and there were several Republican budgets, but that is a matter of legislative prerogative. We, of course, want to hear ideas from the chief executive, whoever she is, but we also want to implement our own budget because it is our prerogative as the United States Congress with the power of the purse to do that.

But considering the fact that Big Oil and Gas get huge tax subsidies every year, I personally believe that this kind of modest oil fee is a reasonable way to look at and have in the mix when talking about how to fund infrastructure.

If there are other ideas--people have talked about vehicle miles driven, people have talked about a number of different ways. There is no Republican or Democratic road. We all drive on roads. We all need roads. We all need bridges. I know the Republicans in good faith, along with Democrats, know we need to fund our national infrastructure. And if you don't like a particular way of doing that, by all means, put other ideas on the table. But it isn't productive, and it doesn't move anything forward just to take one item from a President's budget that you didn't even allow to have a vote and that very few people support and say: We don't like that.

I think we knew that before you had the vote. I think we knew you didn't like the President's budget overall. You are welcome to have the vote. It isn't going anywhere. It won't pass the Senate. It isn't a matter for actual consideration.

Next, we have the sense of Congress on the carbon tax cut. Again, I couldn't be more excited. I have been feeling from my friends on the right that there has been more interest in this concept of a carbon tax cut. I really see that coming to fruition that it is actually serious enough and mainstream enough that those who don't like the concept are putting up some kind of proactive defense. So I really think it is a matter of time. I think it is going to be great for our economy that we can cut taxes for American businesses, for job creators, and for middle income. We can make sure it is progressive and doesn't additionally burden many of those in poverty. It can be a net benefit to incomes of individuals below the poverty line. I couldn't be more excited about this concept of a carbon tax cut.

Frankly, it is the first discussion on the floor of that concept, I believe, since Republicans have taken control of this body, and I think it is a harbinger of many things to come on something that can be great and, frankly, supported from across the ideological spectrum to make our country more competitive.

Finally, I want to move to what is being called the Ozone Standards Implementation. Now, this also feels like we have been here before and done that before. It feels a little bit like deja vu because this bill essentially repackages a bunch of bills attacking Ozone Standards and the Clean Air Act that we have seen here and voted on over the last several years.

Again, this bill won't pass the Senate. It certainly wouldn't be signed by the President. It is not clear why we are doing it. It seems to be filling our time, but I would hope that we have more important issues to work on on behalf of the American people. Like, for instance, the public health threat of the Zika virus is one.

How about bringing up a bipartisan constitutional amendment that will help us move towards a balanced budget? How about improving our entitlement programs to make sure they are there for the next generation of Americans? How about passing comprehensive immigration reform to restore the order of law and allow 10 million people to come out of the shadows and work legally and abide by their responsibilities under American law that we can enforce going forward?

I am glad that one of my amendments to the ozone bill was made in order. My colleague from Georgia mentioned that. He said he may not personally be supportive of it. I will certainly be making the case for my fourth time and hoping to gain his support, because what my amendment does is it would close an oil and gas industry loophole to the Clean Air Act's aggregation requirement, which I will be talking more about today.

Currently, under current law, the oil and gas industry doesn't have to aggregate its small air pollution sources, even though cumulatively they release large amounts of air pollutants. Again, what that means in a district like mine where there are many fracking pads, there is, of course, an emission profile to each of these, but because they are small sites, they are not aggregated. We happen to have a county, Weld County, Colorado, with over 20,000 operating wells. When you get up to that kind of number, you can no longer round down to zero. In the aggregate, those wells look a lot more like a number of large, industrial plants that otherwise would fall under the Clean Air Act than simply small sites that can be rounded down to zero.

I couldn't be more excited to have the opportunity to finally bring up my amendment and hopefully adopt it so we can improve the Clean Air Act instead of many of the other provisions of the bill which would eviscerate the Clean Air Act.

This is a serious issue. Between 1980 and 2014, emissions of six air pollutants controlled by the Clean Air Act have dropped by 63 percent. That is good news. We should be doing more, not less, to encourage clean air with the long-term savings of the health of the American people as well as a reduction of costly diseases like asthma.

A recent peer-reviewed study estimates that the Clean Air Act will save more than 230,000 lives and will prevent millions of cases of respiratory problems. But instead of strengthening that act, the provisions of the bill will delay the implementation of the updated 2015 Ozone National Ambient Air Quality Standards by States, a position that is opposed by a broad coalition of scientists and many other groups that care about public health.

The connection between air quality and asthma, of which our country has 25 million sufferers, is well established. Clean air is integral to quality of life, and the last thing we should do is tear down the protections that allow kids to play outside, and that allow adults to recreate outside and enjoy themselves while continuing to breathe clean air.

Again, I am not worried about this bill becoming law. It won't pass the Senate, and, obviously, since it undoes some of President Obama's actions somehow were it to reach his desk, I am confident that it would be vetoed.

The problems go on and on with this bill. I do hope that my amendment passes. It is the first opportunity that I have had to bring forward my BREATHE Act, which has over 50 cosponsors to actually bring it forward for a vote and a discussion. We haven't been able to get that floor time until now.

So, all in all, I think this is an encouraging week. On the one hand, we finally get to discuss a carbon tax cut--how exciting--and also, we finally realize that people are actually worried enough about this happening that they are running some kind of proactive strategy to try to lock people down. Wow. This is happening. We are going to have a carbon tax cut sometime in the next few years. This is great.

Second, I finally get the BREATHE Act, for it is an amendment to close a loophole for oil and gas in the Clean Air Act. Again, I don't expect that to pass. I hope to have good support, and, of course, I call upon my friends to reject the underlying bills.

Instead of continuing the climate-denying work of the majority that these three bills kind of double down on, we should be focusing on creating jobs, tax reform, which, again, a carbon tax cut would allow us a foray into cutting taxes for corporations, cutting taxes for individuals. And yet again, instead of focusing on the needs of middle class Americans, instead of focusing on shrinking the deficit, instead of focusing on reducing subsidies for oil and gas companies, we are furthering our reliance on legacy, dirty energy systems to power what we hope is an economy of the future. It is the wrong way to go.

I encourage Members to look in the mirror, think about the health of themselves, of their children, of their parents, the elderly, and those most at risk and ask about how those bills would impact them. The answer is obvious, and I think that, hopefully, the answer that this body gives to these bills will also be obvious.

Mr. Speaker, if we defeat the previous question, I will offer an amendment to the rule to bring up legislation that fully funds the administration's effort to mount a robust and long-term response to the growing Zika crisis.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote ``no'' and defeat the previous question so we can focus this body on Zika and the public health risk to the American people, to vote ``no'' on the rule, to vote ``no'' on the underlying bills, but, frankly, to move forward with the door having been opened for this discussion and this coalition between left and right on a carbon tax cut proposal. Let's take advantage of that door being opened a crack, and let this be the start of something really great and the start of something really special that can help launch the next decade and more of stronger, pro-growth economic policies letting American families keep more of their hard- earned income and encouraging American companies to stay put rather than move overseas.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

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

The yeas and nays were ordered.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

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

A recorded vote was ordered.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source