Providing for Consideration of HR 4899, Lowering Gasoline Prices to Fuel an America That Works Act of 2014; Providing for Consideration of HR 4923, Energy and Water Development and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2015; And for Other Purposes

Floor Speech

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Mr. HASTINGS of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I thank the gentleman, my friend from Utah (Mr. Bishop), for yielding me the customary 30 minutes for debate.

Mr. Speaker, I join my good friends on the Energy and Water Committee, Representatives Lowey and Kaptur, in applauding the chairman's concerted effort to compose H.R. 4923 in an inclusive manner.

I appreciate the bipartisan nature of the bill and am supportive of many of the provisions contained within it. However, I am not without my concerns. All of these phrases that my friends on the other side of the aisle bandy about--``increase over this,'' ``funding above last year's levels''--sound great, but as always, we need to see what is lurking in the shadows.

For example, H.R. 4923 is completely uninspired when it comes to renewable energy. Its approach, in my view, is a myopic one--one that, if we follow it too far, leaves us trying to play catch-up with our competitors, like the Chinese and many other countries, that have turned their attention to renewable energy. As China continues its now decade-long trend of increasing investment in its renewable energy sector--a footnote here: it invested $56 billion just last year--we take the truly uninspired step of cutting funding for renewable energy by 6.4 percent.

I am aware of the studies that conclude that our Nation will be able to meet 97 percent of its energy needs through domestic production by 2035, and I consider that to be great. This Nation has spent $2.3 trillion on importing foreign oil since 2003. This is a serious national security vulnerability, and I think we can all agree that lessening this dependence is a desirable goal.

I also know that, for many in this day of Twitter and Facebook and Instagram, 2035 seems like a long way off. Those of us in this Chamber do not have the luxury of thinking that way. We have a responsibility to look past 2035, and we have a responsibility to leave our children and grandchildren with an energy portfolio that will keep them in good stead for the years after 2035. We abdicate this responsibility when we underfund research and development in the renewable energy sector. We abdicate this responsibility when we skew applied energy programs at the Department of Energy too heavily toward nuclear energy and fossil fuels. An increased investment in renewable energy makes good economic sense; it makes good environmental sense; and it makes good national security sense. The time to make this investment is now.

We need to be careful even where we see funding increases. Though these funding increases may seem impressive and prudent, we need to be reminded that all that glitters is not gold. They merely mask a continuation of the status quo for my friends from across the aisle. They would have you believe they are increasing funding for environmental protection while reducing spending on defense, but alas, in my view, this is an illusion. In reality, this bill represents business as usual for the Republican Party--slashing funding for research in renewable resources while doling out more handouts to dirty energy and environmental polluters. It seems like every other week we are voting to drill off our shores, in our parks, or on Federal lands.

To that end, H.R. 4899, the Lowering Gasoline Prices to Fuel an America That Works Act of 2014--we are the greatest naming people in the world here in Congress--is just a greatest hits record, rehashing two measures the House has already voted on, one of which itself was already cobbled together from a number of separate bills. Like all greatest hits albums, it, too, is stuck in the past. Those past attempts rightly died in the Senate, and there is no reason to expect a different result this time around. Yet here we are again, tossing legislation into the void while our country's very real problems fester.

My friends across the aisle have no ideas, evidently, for energy independence and security beyond more drilling. They would rather score political points than propose real solutions. I am sure they will go home to their districts next week for one of the biggest driving weekends of the year. Yesterday, in the Rules Committee, I commented that the oil industry manipulates us. Every year in the summer, prices go up on gasoline, and I just don't think that is coincidental when gas prices historically tend to be high. Yet they are going to point to these votes as evidence that they tried to lower gasoline prices. While it may make for a good feel-good story, that is all it is. Putting more oil out there won't move prices. Domestic production is already at a 25-year high in this country, up 60 percent since 2008. Imports are at 29-year lows.

Despite my friend's claims, onshore oil production from Federal lands has gone up 30 percent since 2008. I can never pass up an opportunity to say that I will continue to resist offshore drilling off the coast of Florida beyond the accommodations that have already been made by this body. Yet gas prices remain unchanged. The U.S. holds only 2 percent of the world's oil reserves. Even tripling current offshore drilling capabilities by the year 2030 would lower gasoline prices only 5 cents per gallon more than if we would continue at the rate we are going; or if we would increase oil production all the way to 50 percent--which is more than drilling in the Arctic, increasing public lands and offshore drilling, and the pipelines would provide--prices would decrease by only 10 percent at most.

Oil is priced on the global market, which is far more complicated than my friends let on. Record demand for fossil fuels in this country and in places like India and China and Singapore and Japan have far more impact on the price of gasoline than anything my friends here hope to do. The liquid natural gas export bill the House passed yesterday shows they understand the nature of the market. They just choose to ignore it whenever it is convenient.

My friends across the aisle have no plans for addressing the demand for the kinds of policies that actually could help reduce energy costs, like increasing our energy efficiency, improving the fuel mileage of our cars, and developing renewable energy resources. I was visited by one of our college presidents, John Kelly, who is new at Florida Atlantic University. He visited with me today, and that university has a new grant dealing with currents, which may very well at some point add to our understanding with reference to renewable energy resources. So it won't be the American people who benefit from more drilling. It will be the bottom lines of the companies that own the wells. Hardworking Americans will be left to bear the risk.

This ''drill everywhere, all the time'' plan isn't a serious energy strategy; it is a cash grab by the fossil fuel industry. It is not a path to energy independence and security; it is a road to environmental and economic collapse. This isn't a game. The threat is real, Mr. Speaker. We haven't enacted any safety or environmental reforms in response to the BP Deepwater Horizon spill. Let me repeat that. We haven't enacted any safety or environmental reforms in response to the BP Deepwater Horizon spill. A footnote here: BP has not paid for all of the damage that they did in that area, and I defy anybody to show me how it is that they did. I ask anybody who is getting ready to eat seafood that comes out of that bay to look at the damage that was done and at the continuing sediment that continues to rise from that area that was polluted.

What happens to all of those Floridians whose livelihoods depend upon our oceans and beaches?

If you want to know, ask the oyster people what happens. Ask the shrimpers who go out into the gulf what their product looks like nowadays, including the deformed product that they are seeing from this awful disaster.

Florida's GDP from its living resources, which includes fishing, hatcheries, aquaculture, seafood processing, and seafood markets, is worth nearly $300 million. Additionally, the State's GDP from ocean-based tourism and recreation is nearly $16.5 billion. On top of that, Florida generates millions of dollars in commercial fishing, including shrimp, mackerel, blue crab, swordfish, and stone crabs, which we are finding are diminishing in numbers. We have 350,000 jobs in tourism and recreation and nearly 120,000 direct jobs in recreational and commercial fishing.

But you can't eat contaminated fish, and who wants to spend one's hard-earned dollars and vacation time lounging on a beach that is covered in tar balls?

When I lifted up on Monday in the US Air plane and looked down at the shore of Florida, I saw what amounts to about a mile-long oil slick. I saw people walking, and I knew that, in a matter of time, they would be walking on tar balls.

How bad does the next spill have to be?

Climate change is not even pending anymore. It is here, and its effects are conspicuous. Downtown Miami, for example, floods whenever it rains, and so does Hollywood, Florida, and areas that I live around. People can't get to work, businesses can't open, and historic droughts have now ravaged the West, and my friends say that there is nothing to concern ourselves about as it pertains to climate change.

The Risky Business report just released by President George W. Bush's former Treasury Secretary--Henry Paulson--and Mayor Bloomberg and Tom Steyer and other former Cabinet officers, lawmakers, corporate leaders, and scientists says climate change could cost the country billions of dollars over the next two decades.

This bill fully ignores the reality of the world we live in, but I do want to say one thing.

In yesterday's Rules Committee, my friend who is managing this rule, Mr. Bishop from Utah, did make to me a compelling argument regarding education in the State of Utah and the fact that, on some of the Federal lands in Utah, if they had an opportunity to do further oil exploration, it could have an impact on Utah's economy. I think that, in many respects, a lot of that is reasonable. I am hopeful that at some point some of his views in that regard will prevail, but I hope, for the most part, that his overall views do not prevail.

I reserve the balance of my time.

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Mr. Speaker, if we defeat the previous question, I will offer an amendment to the rule to bring up H.R. 1426, the Big Oil Welfare Repeal Act of 2013, Representative Tim Bishop's bill, to end the billions of dollars in taxpayer subsidies given to the largest, most profitable oil companies each year.

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Mr. Speaker, I am afraid that these bills just leave us spinning our wheels, while we could be making actual progress in helping hardworking Americans all across this Nation.

It is outrageous that 3 million Americans have lost their emergency unemployment insurance since it expired in December 2013. I might add that we learned yesterday that 300,000 of that 3 million are American veterans.

We have also had, along with the expiration of tax extender provisions that help individuals that have expired, they help families and small businesses invest.

Republicans and Democrats should be working together to move our Nation forward on comprehensive immigration reform, and I might add that I agree with everybody that says that the border needs to be secure, and one good way to do that is to do comprehensive immigration reform and tax reform.

We need to raise the minimum wage in this country, and we need to protect voting rights and secure equal pay.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to insert the text of my amendment in the Record, along with extraneous material, immediately prior to the vote on the previous question.

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Mr. Speaker, before I will urge my colleagues to vote ''no,'' I just want to make it very clear that the measures that we are considering today have already been voted on by the House and did not go further to become law. The likelihood of this measure reaching that same fate is very strong.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote ''no'' and defeat the previous question.

Vote ''no'' on the underlying bill, and I yield back the balance of my time.

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