[Pages H8061-H8071]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

TERMINATION OF NATIONAL EMERGENCY DECLARED BY THE PRESIDENT ON FEBRUARY
15, 2019

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, pursuant to House Resolution 591, I call up
the joint resolution (S.J. Res. 54) relating to a national emergency
declared by the President on February 15, 2019, and ask for its
immediate consideration.
The Clerk read the title of the joint resolution.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to House Resolution 591, the joint
resolution is considered read.
The text of the joint resolution is as follows:

S.J. Res. 54

Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the
United States of America in Congress assembled, That,
pursuant to section 202 of the National Emergencies Act (50
U.S.C. 1622), the national emergency declared by the finding
of the President on February 15, 2019, in Proclamation 9844
(84 Fed. Reg. 4949) is hereby terminated.

The SPEAKER pro tempore. The joint resolution shall be debatable for
1 hour equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority
member of the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure.
The gentleman from Oregon (Mr. DeFazio) and the gentleman from North
Carolina (Mr. Meadows) each will control 30 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Oregon.

General Leave

Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members
may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks
and insert extraneous material on S.J. Res. 54.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentleman from Oregon?
There was no objection.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, the President has declared a national emergency so that
he can divert funds from the Pentagon and other agencies to deal with
the national emergency on the border. The largest diversion of funds is
going into a wall.
The President says the emergency is mostly about the smuggling of
drugs. Interesting.
As we know from testimony when Carlos Guzman was tried and convicted
in New York, a big drug lord from Mexico, his hench-people and others
testified that the cartels don't use people with backpacks through
remote areas of the desert. That is too inefficient for a multibillion-
dollar business.
What they do is send trucks, which they have modified, semis, through
our border control points, where we only inspect 6 percent of the
trucks, so they lose one every once in a while. So what? With tens of
millions of dollars, it doesn't matter to them. It is just the cost of
doing business, kind of like taxes.
What is the President doing about the border control points? Nothing.
We are not buying the new technology we need and reconfiguring them so
that we can inspect every truck that comes across the border.
They have another way of getting the drugs in, which they are using
more and more and more. That is that they use semi-submersibles and
other boats and ships to smuggle the drugs around, on the coasts of the
United States.
The Coast Guard is our prime line of defense against this. The
retired last Commandant of the Coast Guard said that we have actionable
intelligence on 80 percent of the drug shipments coming into the United
States, but the Coast Guard only has resources to intercept 20 percent.
Just last week, the Coast Guard intercepted a semi-submersible that
had 12,000 pounds of cocaine on it. That would be a heck of a lot of
people with backpacks coming across the border, as the President
alleges--no, that is not the way they do it--worth over $165 million.
What is the President doing? He is diverting money from the Coast
Guard to the physical, land-based border and saying that somehow this
is going to help us stop the drug shipments.
Here is the Coast Guard with a prior drug shipment that they
intercepted. Now, they just intercepted another.
We have all seen the videos of them jumping onto these semi-
submersibles out in the middle of the Pacific, with 6- to 8-foot
swells, jumping on there and stopping and arresting these people.
What is the President doing? He is cutting the Coast Guard's
capability of doing this.
Back to the border. Again, there are a few things we could be doing.
Oh, look, there is something just like what the President wants, a
big, tall fence with slats. People seem to be climbing over it.
Here is the border control point. Six percent of these vehicles will
be inspected.
Here is a tunnel under it.
There is a drone over it.
Some of these people are really ingenious. They even are imitating
the Middle Ages, using catapults to throw drugs over where there is an
existing wall.
Here we are, cutting $6 billion from the Pentagon for critical needs
of the Pentagon for housing where troops are living in mold-infested
barracks, for training facilities for the National Guard, for
firefighting facilities on our military bases, and from daycare centers
for our troops' kids. And we don't pay these troops a heck of a lot of
money; they can't afford to send their kids off base to daycare.
The President says all that stuff is going to be cut because we have
to build his stupid wall, which isn't even targeting the way drugs are
really brought into the United States of America. This is just an
abysmally stupid waste of money, but he is delivering on a campaign
promise.
Oh, wait a minute. Mexico is going to pay. Who is going to pay?
Mexico. Who is going to pay? Mexico.
Then he had a phone call with the President of Mexico saying: I know
you are not going to pay it--we have this transcript, too--but you
can't say publicly you are not going to pay for it. We are going to pay
for it.
The taxpayers of the United States are going to pay for his stupid,
useless wall, cutting essential things from the Coast Guard, which does
real, dangerous work every day intercepting drugs; cutting funds from
the military, which needs these facilities for their troops, troop
morale, and the safety and security of our troops. All for a stupid
wall.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. MEADOWS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, this has nothing to do with the Coast Guard. This has
everything to do with politics.

[[Page H8062]]

Mr. Speaker, when they get up and have this faux outrage over this,
it is about this President and their opposition to a secure border.
Now, I would point out to the gentleman opposite, when President
Barack Obama requested $3.7 billion in emergency funding, there was not
a peep from the other side of the aisle, and all of a sudden, there is
this outrage. The gentleman knows all too well, Mr. Speaker, that this
is not even going to cut the funding.

I see over there that we have the chairwoman of the Appropriations
Committee. She knows that this President, under his leadership, is
funding the military and our Coast Guard at levels that we have never
seen.
For my friend opposite to suggest that this is all about the Coast
Guard, this is all about politics, making sure that there is an open
border.
When he had the chance, Mr. Speaker, to vote to make sure that we
limit any of these funds going to this, what did he do? He looked the
other way. He voted for a CR just the other day. He voted to allow this
money to continue to flow.
This is a show vote, Mr. Speaker. This has nothing to do with really
legislating.
If they want to legislate, let's figure out how we work on those
separations at the border. Let's look at the Flores decision. Let's
make sure that we are constructive.
I have had, Mr. Speaker, conversations with some on the other side of
the aisle. I am willing. But what we are seeing today is nothing more
than political theater.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as she may consume to the
gentlewoman from New York (Mrs. Lowey), the chair of the Appropriations
Committee.
Mrs. LOWEY. Mr. Speaker, the President's fake national emergency is
an end run around this Congress' power of the purse and an offense to
the Constitution.
As the Committee on Appropriations chair, I am outraged that this
President has canceled $3.6 billion in military construction projects
to pay for a wasteful wall.
I want to repeat: $3.6 billion in military construction projects to
pay for a wasteful wall.
The President chose his wall over our national security and the needs
of our servicemembers and their families.
Congressional Democrats have repeatedly made clear, including in our
appropriations bills, that we will not give this President a blank
check by backfilling these projects.
Terminating the President's fake national emergency declaration is
the only way to restore the 127 projects whose funding the President
stole. I urge a ``yes'' vote.
Mr. MEADOWS. Mr. Speaker, facts are a stubborn thing. I would like to
point out to my good friend from New York that, indeed, we are
backfilling that. These projects will get funded. She knows that; I
know that; and soon, the American people will know that.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr.
LaMalfa).
Mr. LaMALFA. Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague, Mr. Meadows, for the
opportunity here today.
Mr. Speaker, earlier this week, my Democratic colleagues passed a
measure that would install an ombudsman within DHS to monitor the
practices of our Border Patrol and detainment officers. Thankfully, the
Senate immediately tossed that idea aside.
I have some good news for my colleagues across the aisle, however,
because I can tell you that any inspection of our border facilities
would find an agency, though underfunded, standing strong, despite a
record-setting deluge of people coming at our southern border.

{time} 0930

Looks like today is Groundhog Day because we are voting on yet
another resolution to stop being able to legally call what is happening
on our southern border an emergency.
My colleagues justify this by calling the President's actions
unprecedented. Unprecedented is what you call it when our immigration
system is on pace to be overwhelmed by a million immigrants pleading
asylum. Maybe Democrats call this policy.
Unprecedented is what you call it when Congress refuses to fund our
national security agencies and starts threatening to abolish an agency
and fire our enforcement officers for doing their job.
The situation is unprecedented, but it is not because the President's
actions are unprecedented. It is the actions from my Democrat
colleagues.
Rather than further consider this resolution, I hope the majority
leader and Speaker immediately allow us to recognize the crisis--as
some Democrats have, inadvertently--that we are facing on the border.
Let's address the root causes of the emergency. Fund the Border
Patrol's $3 billion backlog, and install physical barriers and security
measures necessary to ensure the whole length of our southern border is
secure.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from
Maryland (Mr. Brown), a member of the committee of jurisdiction.
Mr. BROWN of Maryland. Mr. Speaker, I rise to once again oppose the
President's outrageous decision to declare a national emergency.
President Trump repeatedly promised that Mexico would pay for his
border wall, but now he is diverting money, $3.6 billion, away from our
servicemembers, military families, and their children.
Two projects were canceled in my district at Joint Base Andrews.
Joint Base Andrews is home to Air Force One. It is the cornerstone of
military security in our Nation's Capital.
President Trump canceled a much-needed new childcare facility for
families at Joint Base Andrews. We have been working on this for over a
decade.
The current childcare center, which I visited 2 weeks ago, 2 years
ago, was constructed during World War II. It is too small to serve the
children on base. There is a 200-child waiting list.
It suffers from sewage backup. That is right, classes are canceled
when the sewer backs up. The kitchen closes when the sewer backs up,
and that happens every other month.
It has got mold and rodent infestation, a leaking roof that collapsed
5 years ago, and a failing heating and air-conditioning system.
Servicemembers will be forced to use more expensive and lower quality
off-base programs. The Department of Defense studied it; they estimated
it; and it will cost military families $10,000 a year, each, money that
is coming out of their pocket. Why? To build a wall.
The families at Andrews have been waiting for years for a modern,
safe building, and now we are telling them to wait. We are telling kids
to go without so President Trump can build his wall before 2020.
Servicemembers that defend our Nation should never have to worry
about the safety and well-being of their children while they are
serving our Nation.
This isn't the only project being canceled at Andrews. The President
canceled a hazardous material cargo pad necessary to load ordnance and
munitions onto planes. The Pentagon said that, without this project,
Andrews will have ``enduring systemic weaknesses in its ability to
support required military activities.''
Think September 11, 9/11. We relied on fighter jets from Andrews, and
now we are risking their mission with this cut.
The President is also canceling dozens of essential projects that
would provide relief in Puerto Rico and in Europe against Russian
aggression. It hurts morale among the men and women who sacrifice more
and more every year.
Voting to end this national emergency is the only way to restore
funding that the President has taken from our troops and their
families. The administration should not build this ineffective,
xenophobic, vanity project on the backs of the military.
When we face critical challenges at home and abroad, this kind of
action hurts our ability to respond to real-world emergencies.
Mr. MEADOWS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, I would remind the gentleman opposite that there is not
a single delay in the plan of building those facilities at Andrews, and
the gentleman knows it. What happens is the hyperbole from the other
side doesn't match the facts.

[[Page H8063]]

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr.
Spano).
Mr. SPANO. Mr. Speaker, for the third time, we will vote to terminate
President Trump's national emergency declaration related to the crisis
on our southern border.
When are we going to get serious about solving the issue?
For the first half of the year, Democrats wouldn't even acknowledge
that there was a crisis. They ignored the reports from Border Patrol
showing record levels of illegal crossings month after month.
Mr. Speaker, I thought we had progress in June, at least in terms of
Democrats acknowledging that we have a crisis. You see, 305 Members of
the House and 84 Members of the Senate voted to provide emergency
funding in response to the humanitarian crisis. Unfortunately, we are
back to the same partisan votes we started the year with.
Today is the last day the House will meet in session in fiscal year
2019. I wish I could tell my constituents, yes, we are going to
terminate the emergency declaration because the fiscal year 2020
appropriations bill provides the money needed to secure the border, but
that could not be further from the truth.
Not a single full-year appropriations bill has been signed into law.
In fact, the House hasn't even voted on next year's Homeland Security
appropriations bill.
This brings me back to my question of when. When are Democrats going
to get serious about securing our border? It is certainly not in the
appropriations bills they have drafted.
Section 227 of their Homeland Security bill reads: ``No Federal funds
may be used for the construction of physical barriers along the
southern land border of the United States during the fiscal year
2020.''
Their Defense appropriations bill went even further. That bill
prohibits any funds from being used ``to construct a wall, fence,
border barriers, or border security infrastructure along the southern
land border of the United States.''
It is unbelievable. Not only is there no funding for physical
barriers, they specifically prohibit it.
My constituents did not elect me to stand by silently as we
transition to open borders in this country, and I will not. I call on
my colleagues across the aisle: Let's put this partisan vote behind us;
let's get serious; and let's work together to secure our border. It is
what the American people want and expect us to do.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, just in quick response to the gentleman, as I pointed
out earlier, first off, the immigrants attempting to come to the United
States seeking asylum or otherwise are walking up to border control
points. They are not sneaking across the desert. Building a wall will
do nothing.
As I pointed out earlier, drugs are not being smuggled in backpacks
through the desert. We know they are coming by sea, and we know they
are coming through our border control points; and we know we don't have
the technology nor the personnel necessary to stop them.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the gentlewoman from Florida
(Ms. Wasserman Schultz).
Ms. WASSERMAN SCHULTZ. Mr. Speaker, we are standing here today
because the President has decided that a campaign promise is more
important than the safety and security of our Nation.
Earlier this month, the President stole funds from our brave
servicemembers to pay for a costly monument to waste. Instead of owning
up to the falsehood that Mexico would pay for his border wall, Trump
has chosen to degrade our national security.
The continuation of this fake emergency declaration poses a direct
threat to both our military families and America's national security.
It steals from soldiers who must now keep sending children to
overcrowded schools. It forces servicemembers to work on bases where
hazardous materials sit in unsafe facilities.
These Trump cuts sacrifice emergency and fire rescue facilities,
flight simulation facilities, roads, clinics, and dining halls, just to
name a few. This action will make training readiness and life harder
for America's families and hurts our national security.
But don't take my word for it; take the word of a recent Air Force
report that detailed the risk to our troops and national security at
home and abroad with the diversion of these previously appropriated
funds.
``At Eielson Air Force Base in Alaska, a boiler failure at a facility
that provides all electrical power and steam heat for the base is
`imminent,''' the report says. ``With temperatures as low as 65 degrees
below zero, a failure would be devastating to facilities, and the
missions housed by them within hours. The base would be forced to
evacuate within hours and, once closed, would freeze and require
millions of dollars of repair to return to usable conditions.''
It does not sound like the border wall for a fake emergency is more
important than making sure we don't close an entire base in Alaska.
I will remind Members that this wall was rejected by a bipartisan
majority, and the fake national emergency was rejected by bipartisan
majorities, twice now, in the Republican Senate.
This is using the playbook of an authoritarian, jeopardizing our
military readiness to steal a wall after it could not be lawfully
secured. This is a dangerous precedent. I hope all of my Republican
colleagues join me in terminating this ``emergency'' declaration.
We all should agree that bypassing Congress and the Constitution and
starving the military of funding is not patriotism. It is everything
that true patriots fight against.
I urge my colleagues to vote for this resolution and send a message
to our troops that their safety and our Nation's military readiness
matter more than fulfilling a deceptive campaign promise.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, may I inquire as to the remaining time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Oregon has 17\1/2\
minutes remaining. The gentleman from North Carolina has 24\1/2\
minutes remaining.
Mr. MEADOWS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, I need to clarify, once again, another fact. The
gentleman opposite seems to think that all of the drugs and all of the
bad things come in at the ports of entry, when the facts are, since
2014, U.S. Customs and Border Protection has actually seized more drugs
between the ports of entry than at the ports of entry.
So I would like to, and if the gentleman wants to review the facts
with me, I will be glad to do it. We actually collected 6.4 million
pounds of drugs between the ports of entry versus 3.1 million at the
ports of entry.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from West Virginia
(Mrs. Miller).
Mrs. MILLER. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak in opposition to the
resolution on the floor.
Yesterday, we had one of the most important hearings in this
Congress, where we learned about innovations in energy efficiency and
carbon capture. These real solutions will allow us to provide
affordable, clean, and reliable energy to continue to give America and
the world the security and prosperity that we enjoy.
It took us 9 months to have that hearing. Unfortunately, not every
hearing we have provides solutions.

For the past 9 months, instead of prioritizing our Nation's
infrastructure, solving the opioid epidemic, or ending the crisis--yes,
crisis--on our southern border, my colleagues across the aisle have
spent countless hours exploiting important committee meetings,
searching for something, anything, that would impugn our duly-elected
President.
We need to stop wasting time on these political games. The President
has already vetoed this ridiculous resolution, and he has promised to
veto it again.
We must secure our southern border. The President has taken action,
while this House has tried to undermine his efforts at every step.
We must put aside our political differences to save the thousands of
lives we lose every year to fentanyl and the opioid epidemic and to
save the lives of the young boys and girls who are being trafficked
across the border against their will.
I was sent to Congress to create jobs, fix our infrastructure, and
innovate the energy industry, not to bicker over

[[Page H8064]]

partisan squabbles. I strongly oppose this legislation, and I urge my
colleagues to do the same.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, just in quick response to my colleague from North
Carolina, a member of the committee of jurisdiction, the Coast Guard
has interdicted more drugs than all of the other Federal agencies
combined, yet they say they are only acting on 20 percent of them. So
that is a pretty big hole.
But the second thing is, she is right. We are not interdicting very
many drugs at the points of entry because we only inspect 6 percent of
the semis with high technology. And Guzman's buddies said: That is how
we bring it in. We put fake floors in the semis, and we are bringing
tons of drugs across.
He is right. We are not intercepting them because we don't have the
personnel and we don't have the technology.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr.
Castro).
Mr. CASTRO of Texas. Mr. Speaker, in February, I authored a
resolution to reject the President's emergency declaration at the
border. Both Chambers of Congress, a Democratic House and a Republican
Senate, rejected that sham declaration by passing the resolution.
Today, we consider a similar resolution to terminate the President's
emergency declaration.
A border wall does nothing to make us safer or address the real
humanitarian crisis at our border. This time around, the President is
raiding actual national security priorities to build his wall. He is
stealing millions of dollars reserved for important projects that range
from training sites for our servicemembers to the schools for their
children, to our military readiness projects.

{time} 0945

It is shameful that our servicemen and -women are collateral damage
in his quest to build this racist wall. It is a disgrace that money is
being stolen from over two dozen States and territories, ensuring that
American taxpayers--not Mexico, as the President repeatedly promised--
are actually paying for the wall.
For example, in my district alone, we are losing out on $18.5 million
in military construction funds. In the State of Texas, that number is
$38.5 million. The total impact for the entire country is over $1
billion.
This should be shameful to all of my colleagues that this
administration would leave our military families out to dry. I ask all
of my colleagues to vote their conscience and to vote their district.
I would also add that the heavy burden of this wall will be felt by
the people in the Rio Grande Valley and in south Texas. Miles and miles
of private property, Texans' land, will be taken to build Donald
Trump's wall.
There have been stories about how people's property will be split;
some of it in front of the wall, some of it behind the wall. Some
people, there will be the wall in front of them, and they will have to
drive and use a clicker to open the wall to come into what would be
considered the United States. Those are American citizens who are
literally going to be behind the wall in Texas because of Donald Trump.
This is a shame. This was a simple campaign promise. This doesn't do
anything to keep us safer. I hope, as we did last time, that this House
of Representatives, Republicans and Democrats, will vote overwhelmingly
to terminate the President's emergency declaration.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Members are reminded to refrain from
engaging in personalities toward the President.
Mr. MEADOWS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, the gentleman opposite was just talking about the fact
that one particular person might have to use a clicker. What about the
millions of Americans who go down to our border right now and they
can't even go on U.S. territory because the cartel controls it.
The gentleman knows all too well that the border on our southern
border is controlled in areas by a cartel. But far be it from me to be
the expert. We have the expert here on that particular subject.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Alabama (Mr.
Rogers), my good friend, the ranking member of the Homeland Security
Committee.
Mr. ROGERS of Alabama. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for
yielding.
In the last year, nearly 1 million illegal immigrants attempted to
cross our southwest border. Let me put that into perspective for you.
One million is more than the population of Delaware, or South Dakota
or North Dakota or Alaska or Vermont or Wyoming. One million is
approximately the population of Austin, Texas; San Jose, California; or
Jacksonville, Florida.
For months, migrant families and children arrived at the border in
droves thanks to sophisticated smuggling operations. Coyotes told
vulnerable populations that a child was their ticket into the United
States--whether or not it was their child. The massive groups of
migrants overwhelmed our border patrol facilities, leading to
overcrowding and unacceptable conditions for migrants and law
enforcement alike.
At the high-water mark of this crisis, more than 50 percent of the
border patrol agents were pulled off the front lines to process,
transport, and care for the record numbers of migrant children and
families. The men and women of CBP have worked hard to manage this
crisis while Democrats in this House were busy talking about a fake
emergency at our border.
The administration has taken extraordinary steps like the migrant
protection protocols, DNA testing to catch child smugglers, and
interpreted new rules to reduce abuse of our asylum laws.
While the President is doing everything in his power to manage the
crisis, House Democrats have done nothing. They steadfastly refuse to
do anything to fix our broken immigration system, to protect vulnerable
families and children from human smugglers, to reduce the asylum
backlog, or expand migrant processing and long-term housing. Now they
want to take away the President's authority to respond to this crisis
and prevent another one from happening. It is disgraceful.
Mr. Speaker, I urge a ``no'' vote on this resolution.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from
California (Ms. Brownley).
Ms. BROWNLEY of California. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of S.J.
Res. 54. The President's declaring a national emergency in order to
deliver on a failed campaign promise is a gross misuse of power and
sets a dangerous precedent.
Not only is the President's fake national emergency unconstitutional,
but he is choosing to undermine actual military readiness by diverting
construction funding to the border wall.
For instance, President Trump is targeting critical military
projects, including a California Air National Guard flight simulator,
which is intended to train C-130J pilots who put their lives on the
line every day fighting wildfires, among many other missions.
Based in Ventura County in my district with over 1,200 highly trained
and talented National Guard personnel, the 146th Airlift Wing has been
called up to respond to many of our Nation's true--true--true--national
emergencies, including the Mendocino Complex fire and the Thomas fire,
the largest fires ever recorded in California's history. The 146th
Airlift Wing also responded to the Camp fire, one of the deadliest and
most destructive wildfires in U.S. history.
Across the country, the 146th Airlift Wing has been a critical
component of Federal disaster response and humanitarian relief efforts,
including in Puerto Rico in response to Hurricane Maria, in Florida in
response to Hurricane Irma, and in Texas in response to Hurricane
Harvey. Stealing the funds for this critical flight simulator will harm
readiness and delay necessary training for our Air National Guard
members who risk their lives to save the lives of others.
The fact that President Trump is willing to undermine military
readiness, California's firefighting capabilities, and our Nation's
emergency response efforts is unconscionable. We are talking about
potential lives lost.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote for S.J. Res. 54 and end
this made-

[[Page H8065]]

up crisis and fake emergency. What I am talking about here today is a
real emergency.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I would like to again inquire as to the
time remaining.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Oregon has 13\1/2\
minutes remaining.
Mr. MEADOWS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
I would like to say that I have a solution for all of this.
The gentlewoman was just talking about an emergency. The chairman of
the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee is talking about the
Coast Guard. I will join both of them in making sure that we fund it,
if they will join me in appropriating $3.7 billion to secure our
southern border. If it is an emergency, then let's get together and
work in a bipartisan fashion.
But do you know what?
This is not about an emergency. This is about talking points, this is
about politics, and it is about wanting an open border; and they know
it.
But I am willing to work with them. I see the gentleman from
California. I am willing to work with him on the Coast Guard. It is his
passion. Let's fund the Coast Guard, and let's fund the border. We will
get together.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr.
McClintock).
Mr. McCLINTOCK. Mr. Speaker, for 43 years the President of the United
States has had the statutory authority granted by this Congress to
declare a national emergency and to reprogram unobligated military
construction funds to meet that emergency. Fifty-eight times previous
Presidents have invoked this authority to address such matters as civil
unrest in Sierra Leone and Burma.
Only when this President invokes his authority for the 59th time to
address the most serious national security crisis in our lifetime--the
collapse of our southern border--only then do we hear protests from the
left and its disciples in Congress.
Under our Constitution, the Congress appropriates money but cannot
spend it, and the President spends money but cannot appropriate it. He
spends it according to laws given to him by this Congress. In this
case, Congress appropriated funds and delegated to the President
precisely the authority to spend those funds that he is now exercising.
Whether Congress should have delegated this authority is a separate
question that no one has raised in 43 years. But while that authority
exists, the President has both a right and a duty to use it to defend
our country.
We also hear protests that the President's act will divert money from
other construction projects. I ask them: What is more important to our
Nation's defense than the defense of our own borders? A childcare
center in Maryland? Really?
Our Nation is going to have to have a serious discussion over whether
we wish to continue as a sovereign nation with the uniquely American
principles and customs that have made us, in Lincoln's words, the last
best hope of mankind on this Earth, or whether we will allow the
Democrats to render our borders meaningless and reduce our once great
nation into nothing more than a vast international territory between
Canada and Mexico.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I just would comment, the gentleman just
said it is insignificant--or whatever--because he just demeaned a
childcare center for the troops at Andrews, and he heard about the
conditions that those children are living under: sewage, mold, and
collapsed roof, but he doesn't think that is necessary for the troops
or the troops' kids.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentlewoman from California (Ms.
Pelosi).
Ms. PELOSI. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding, and I
thank the chairman for making that very important point about the
quality of life of the families of our men and women in uniform, which
appears to have been demeaned by our colleagues.
Mr. Speaker, Members of Congress take a sacred oath to support and
defend the Constitution and to protect the American people. Today the
House honors that oath with this resolution to defend our national
security and our Constitution's system of checks and balances: the
guardrails created by our Founders to safeguard our Republic.
The President's decision to cancel $3.6 billion for military
construction to pay for his wasteful wall makes America less safe. The
administration is stealing funds from 127 initiatives in 21 countries,
23 States, and three territories, stooping so low as to steal from a
middle school at Fort Campbell in Kentucky.
A recent U.S. Air Force report shows that canceling these projects
hurts our national security worldwide, including in Europe where the
President is canceling construction for the European defense initiative
which deters Russian aggression. The President is canceling a project
which deters Russian aggression. That makes the Russians very happy.
In the Middle East he is canceling maintenance at a key base to
protect our troops from--in the words of this Air Force report--hostile
penetration in the midst of contingency operations and an increased
terrorist threat.
In the Pacific he is canceling construction on storage facilities in
Guam for more than $1 billion in munitions, the largest stockpile in
the region; and in North America he is canceling repairs which are
based in Alaska which are needed to prevent an explosion that would
cause a full evacuation and require millions of dollars of repair.

{time} 1000

That decision also disrespects military families, as our
distinguished chair, Mr. DeFazio, mentioned.
A coalition of leading education, labor, and veterans organizations
wrote to the President to express their ``profound concern,'' saying,
``Our troops and their families deserve much better for their
sacrifices.''
The President had said Mexico will pay for his wall, not military
families.
The administration's decision also dishonors the Constitution by
negating its most fundamental principle, the separation of powers, in
an assault on our power of the purse. It does great violence to our
Constitution and our democracy and strikes at the heart of our
Founder's conception of America, which demands a separation of powers.
Indeed, many White House decisions that have recently come to light
show this same disdain and disregard for the Constitution.
Today, we join the Senate--congratulations to the Senate--in a
bipartisan way to restore our system of checks and balances and
reassert Congress' constitutional responsibilities.
This issue transcends partisan politics. All Members take the oath to
protect and defend. We continue to urge House Republicans to join us to
uphold the Constitution and defend and support our national security.
Mr. MEADOWS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from
Alabama (Mr. Aderholt).
Mr. ADERHOLT. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from North Carolina
(Mr. Meadows), my friend and colleague, for yielding.
I also rise today to ask my colleagues to oppose the joint
resolution, which, obviously, as has been said will terminate the
President's proclamation, as he has declared a national emergency on
the southern border.
As I have previously stated during other debates on this issue, it is
clear that there is a national emergency that exists. The American
people understand that unchecked and unregulated immigration, which is
in violation of our Nation's laws, has created a border security and
humanitarian crisis, which allows the flow of drugs, human trafficking,
and gang members into this country, as well as causing desperate
situations that are faced by women and children who make this dangerous
journey.
Furthermore, I think it is important for this debate that we remember
and make clear that it is clearly within the authority provided by
Congress for the President to do this.
As an appropriator, I understand the importance of Congress'
responsibility for military construction funding, and I appreciate the
work my colleagues have done on the Subcommittee on Military
Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies. I had the
privilege to be a vice chair of that subcommittee several years ago.
But I also recognize that Congress has to provide the executive branch
with reprogramming authority for military construction under title 10,
U.S. Code, section 2808.

[[Page H8066]]

This is not the first time this authority has been invoked. President
George Bush invoked it, and President Obama invoked it. I think it was
a total of 18 projects between those two Presidents, between 2001 and
2014.
I think most Americans agree with President Trump that there is an
emergency at the southern border. It has gotten worse in recent years.
I ask my colleagues to vote ``no'' on this resolution and acknowledge
the seriousness of the border security and the humanitarian crises on
the border.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to oppose this joint resolution.
Mr. MEADOWS. Mr. Speaker, may I inquire as to how much time each side
has remaining.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from North Carolina has 14\1/
2\ minutes remaining. The gentleman from Oregon has 11 minutes
remaining.
Mr. MEADOWS. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentleman from
California (Mr. Garamendi).
Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Oregon (Mr.
DeFazio).
Mr. Speaker, to my good friends on the Republican side of the aisle,
this is really about the Constitution.
Madison, in the Federalist Papers, wrote that the appropriations
power--that is, the power of the purse--is the ultimate power that
Congress has to rein in excesses by the President or even by the court.
That is where we are today.
It is not that there is an emergency. We can all agree there is a
problem. Call it an emergency at the border. There are many others--
fires, floods, Houston, you name it. There are plenty of emergencies.
It is not that the President shouldn't have the authority and power
to declare an emergency and then deal with it. That is not the issue
here. The issue here is that this particular emergency declaration by
the President was specifically used to circumscribe and usurp the
authority of Congress in our power of the purse.
Keep in mind, government was shut down for 35 days because the
President wanted money for his wall. We debated it. At the end of that,
we appropriated $1.3 billion or so for border security, including some
fences and walls.
The President signed that bill and then immediately turned around and
declared an emergency shortly thereafter, used that emergency power to
rip off $3.6 billion from necessary military construction projects
around the world, of which $770 million of that--three-quarters of a
billion--was specifically designed to push Russia back, part of the
European Reassurance Initiative projects in Eastern Europe and Europe
to specifically push Putin away from NATO.
Other projects have been described here, all of them deemed to be
essentially important for the security of this Nation.
That is not all. There was another almost $3 billion that came out of
the operations of the military. Nearly $6 billion was ripped out of our
military, all of it necessary for the security of this Nation, and
repurposed for the border wall.

The fundamental issue here is not about an emergency. It is not about
the emergency powers of the President. Although, we certainly ought to
circumscribe those. This is very, very much about the way in which the
current emergency power is being used.
First, to circumvent the appropriate constitutional and necessary
power of the Congress to do appropriations, that power should not ever
reside with the President, but that is exactly what he has used this
emergency appropriation to accomplish, to grab the power of the purse,
to take that power, that essential power, as Madison said, from the
Congress, and then specifically, and most dramatically and dangerously,
harm the security of this Nation by stopping necessary construction
projects that the military says we need to protect NATO against Putin
and Russia.
We ought to pass this simply to regather the power that we must have
to be a coequal branch of government, the power of the purse.
We can debate emergencies. We can appropriate money for the border,
and we do. But to allow the President to use this power to usurp the
fundamental constitutional authority of Congress is wrong. Therefore,
we must--we must. We have no choice. If we believe in the work and our
oath, we have no choice but to pass this resolution.
Mr. MEADOWS. Mr. Speaker, it is interesting that the gentleman from
California (Mr. Garamendi) would suggest that this President ripped
this from Congress. We willingly gave it to him under section 2808.
The gentleman knows all too well that if he didn't want the money
going to the border, he could have done a limitation amendment when
they passed the funding bill--not once, but twice. The same funding
bill that the gentleman voted for, he could have put a limitation bill
on it.
This whole thing about the Constitution is actually about a section
that has been exercised not just by President Trump, but by President
Barack Obama. When President Barack Obama exercised it, there was not a
peep from the other side, not a peep.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from North Carolina
(Mr. Bishop), my colleague from the Ninth Congressional District.
Mr. BISHOP of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for
yielding.
Mr. Speaker, having taken my seat in this Congress on behalf of the
citizens of the Ninth District only last week, I am experiencing
already that the majority is prone to theater, in this case, a show
vote for which the majority lacks the two-thirds necessary to override
a promised Presidential veto.
It is the first time I have had an opportunity to vote on it, so I
will take the opportunity to declare the southern border is indeed an
emergency because Democrats have sundered and blocked effective border
protection, border security, for over 30 years.
It is not the emergency that is fake; it is this futile vote. It is
the sudden, professed concern for men and women of our armed services.
We saw it yesterday, the majority's concern for our armed services,
when it preferred electronic medical records for illegals over EMR for
our vets. Our servicemembers know who is protecting their interests and
who has their backs.
As for me, I am with the President.
Mr. MEADOWS. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from
California (Mr. Garamendi).
Mr. GARAMENDI. Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr.
Meadows), my good friend, is a true conservative. I know him. I know
him well. We have had many, many discussions. The gentleman is a true
conservative, and he really does believe in the Constitution.
The gentleman made a most interesting argument that, in the
legislation that ended the 35-day Trump shutdown, we should have put
into that legislation prohibitions on this. Yes, indeed, we should
have, had we any idea whatsoever that the President would so abuse the
emergency authority as to literally rip away from Congress our
appropriations powers.
Keep in mind that we specifically put legislation and money forward
for the border wall that solved the 35-day shutdown. The President
signed that bill and then used the emergency power that is the subject
of this debate and this resolution to usurp our appropriations power.
He did that by going into the military and taking nearly $6 billion.
And I understand he is looking for another $10 billion or so from the
same source, using the same power.
This is a direct attack on our appropriations power.
Now, we have an emergency. You want to talk about an emergency? We
are willing to work on emergencies and appropriate the necessary money.
We have done so many times. In fact, there once was an offer for some
$20-plus billion for all of this.
Mr. MEADOWS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, the gentleman, before he exits--I want to make sure I am
addressing you, Mr. Speaker, but I wanted to highlight one critical
part.
He is exactly right, that the President signed this. If the President
had not given the other side the warning that he was going to declare a
national emergency, then the gentleman would

[[Page H8067]]

have had a valid point, Mr. Speaker. But I can tell you, before the
President signed it, he said: If we do not get the money to secure our
southern border and make sure that communities are safer, I am going to
declare a national emergency.
So, he put the Democrats on notice. That is why all this outrage is
interesting. Go back and Google it. I promise you that they were on
notice. He said: I am going to declare a national emergency.
This is not about ripping constitutional power. This is about
yielding the power. And my Democratic colleagues did exactly that.

Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Arizona (Mr.
Biggs), who probably knows more about the border than anyone who has
spoken previously from our side because he has been down there over and
over again.
Mr. BIGGS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding time to
me.
I will just tell you, I spent at least a couple weeks on the border
this year alone, multiple times. I have been in every facility that I
can find, and I get down there as often as I can. I talk almost daily
to folks who live along the border.
I would get a chuckle, if it weren't so doggone serious, when I hear
people say: Oh, no, there are no drugs coming across the border. We are
getting them on the ocean.
I will tell you one thing: In the Tucson sector, 40 percent of the
drugs that come into this country from the south, they come in through
the Tucson sector. You know why? There are 75 miles of open border. You
have one port of entry. It has a fence, about a mile-and-a-half on each
side of it. Then you have single-strand barbed wire for as far as you
can see. You have four-strand barbed wire. You know what it is holding
it up to? It is coming up to the bollard fencing. It has a slipknot, in
case you need to get into the country. You can stand there and look at
the five paths that come across. They all come right to the place where
the slipknot is.
I will tell you one thing: If you have a problem with an emergency
declaration, then you just simply don't know what an emergency is.
Mr. Speaker, 1.1 million people have surrendered or have been
apprehended at the border this year.

{time} 1015

Another million or so--we don't even know--have come across. We even
let 1.2 million people come in legally this year.
And you want to tell me you don't have a border crisis? You have got
opioid addiction and overdoses killing people. You have got people
coming in unvetted.
You had 1,000 people come in from where? The Congo--the Congo--right
through the Rio Grande Valley.
I am telling you something: For you to stand there and say you don't
think this is an emergency means you just simply aren't paying
attention.
And this President has the authority--because Congress delegated that
authority to the President of the United States of America--to deal
with emergencies, and this becomes a true crisis, a true emergency.
I will just give you one thing.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The time of the gentleman has expired.
Mr. MEADOWS. Mr. Speaker, I yield the gentleman from Arizona an
additional 1 minute.
Mr. BIGGS. I was at one place, the most remote border entry we have
got in the entire country. It is only open 9 to 4.
We have three customs agents assigned there. We have got one Border
Patrol agent who actually lives there in a double-wide mobile home. I
won't say what his name is. Let's just say it is Bob.
The night before I got there, 2 a.m., 255 people, cartel-driven--
because there is no place for 30 miles, 40 miles. That is the nearest
town. So, 250 people were dropped off, and they all go up and knock on
the door of the double-wide.
They are reading from a paper. They say: ``Bob, we declare asylum.''
I talked to an agent. He tells me that he has been exposed, in the
last 6 weeks, to hepatitis A, B, and C; measles; mumps; lice; scabies;
and he said: ``Don't forget, a skin-eating bacteria that they haven't
been able to identify yet.''
That is not a border crisis? You don't want to address that? I am
telling you, it needs to be addressed. It needs to be addressed today.
I thank the President for having the courage to do it. You know what?
If you want more money, get him more money for the Coast Guard. I will
support that.
Mr. MEADOWS. Mr. Speaker, may I inquire how much time remains on both
sides.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from North Carolina has 8\1/2\
minutes remaining. The gentleman from Oregon has 6 minutes remaining.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
On his last rejoinder, my good friend and colleague said that the
President said something about declaring an emergency.
Well, the President says an awful lot of things that he doesn't do,
so I don't know how we were supposed to give credibility to that.
He said Mexico--he said, probably a hundred times, maybe more than a
hundred times: ``Mexico is going to pay for the wall.''
``Who is going to pay for the wall?''
``Mexico.''
I mean, he got cheers. He just would brighten up, this was so
wonderful.
But, of course, that is not happening.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms.
Jackson Lee).
Ms. JACKSON LEE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Oregon for
the time.
It may have been 200 times that the President said that Mexico would
pay for the wall, but here we are today.
I rise to support S.J. Res. 54.
I want the American people to know, $3.6 billion is coming out of
your United States military, the men and women, your children, your
husbands and wives that you send to faraway places and to the bases
where families live. That is what is happening.
Now, as a Texan and a Member of the Homeland Security Committee,
since the heinous act of 9/11, I probably have been to the border more
times than I can count. I have walked across. I have ridden in speed
boats. I have watched the officers deal with the issues at the border,
and I have asked and watched as they have interdicted drugs.
Drugs don't come in large numbers across the border. They come
through legal points of entry. And our men and women have been very
successful in doing that.
But let me tell you what we are facing:
A 1957 structure on the Portsmouth, Virginia, shipyard known as
Building 510 has been cited for numerous life safety violations. That
is where your young Navy personnel are--life safety violations. It has
threatened the well-being of hundreds of workers if not heavily
renovated.
The Navy warned in its budget request to Congress: The building has
been labeled a high-risk environment, largely due to fire safety
concerns.
So do you know what they have done? To compensate for the risk of
fire, the Navy has been reassigning workers to staff roving fire
watches around the clock, 7 days a week.
They have been cut out for getting their money. Childcare centers
have been cut out for the men and women in the United States military,
for getting their money, when we know that border crossings of
desperate people are down.
Mr. Speaker, I include in the Record a September 7, 2019, article
from The Washington Post.

[From the Washington Post, Sept. 7, 2019]

Projects Defunded for Trump's Border Wall Include Military Buildings
With `Life Safety Violations' and Hazmat Concerns

(By Aaron Gregg and Paul Sonne)

The U.S. Navy has been forced to stand down on construction
projects meant to fix ``life safety violations'' and fire
risks at dilapidated ship maintenance buildings and hazardous
materials warehouses in Virginia after funds were diverted to
pay for President Trump's border wall.
The pending construction projects at Norfolk Navy Shipyard
are among 127 that the Pentagon has defunded to free up $3.6
billion in funding for fences and barriers on the southern
border with Mexico using emergency powers.
One of the military facilities--a 1957 structure on the
Portsmouth, Va., shipyard known as ``Building #510''--had
been cited for numerous ``life safety violations'' that
threatened the well-being of hundreds of workers if not
heavily renovated, the Navy warned in its budget request to
Congress last year.

[[Page H8068]]

The building has been labeled a ``high risk environment,''
largely due to fire safety concerns. As of last year it had
no sprinkler protection, inadequate fire alarm systems and
not enough exits. Excessive heat and humidity inside have
caused equipment problems despite a 60-ton portable HVAC
system brought in to clear the air, according to Navy budget
documents.
To compensate for the risk of fire, the Navy had been
reassigning workers to staff ``roving fire watches'' around
the clock, seven days a week. The budget request sought to
revamp the building, including relocating personnel
overseeing nuclear containment and repairing Navy life rafts
from an even more dangerous building.
If the building isn't replaced, the Navy wrote in its 2018
request, ``approximately 330 personnel, working more than
256,000 manhours annually will remain in a high risk
environment, with continuing significant rework, high stress,
and additional operating costs due to inadequate working
environment.'' The Navy received $26 million from Congress
for a construction project that would have upgraded the
building, only to see that funding taken away to pay for
Trump's border wall project.
The project is one of eight military construction projects
in Maryland and Virginia that will lose $155 million in
funding being diverted to construct fencing and barriers
along the southern border.
The episode highlights how long-neglected military
facilities that suffered under the sequestration-induced
budget restrictions are now being buffeted by a different
political head wind.
The defunded projects include a Maryland child-care
facility for soldiers' children, Virginia warehouses designed
to hold hazardous materials and a secure facility for
classified cyberwarfare operations. They are among 127
military construction projects across 23 states, three U.S.
territories and 20 countries that have been sidelined to pay
for fencing and barriers on the border with Mexico. Shooting
ranges, airfields, drone facilities, schools, a missile field
and a treatment center for working dogs are among the
projects that have seen their funding rescinded.
Members of Congress representing Maryland and Virginia said
the diversion of funds will hurt U.S. national security.
``I'm deeply concerned about President Trump's plan to pull
funding from critical national security projects--including
millions of dollars from important projects in Virginia--so
he can build his border wall,'' Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) said
in a statement. His state will lose an estimated $89 million
in funded projects to pay for the wall effort, making it one
of the most affected.
Trump declared a national emergency in mid-February after
Congress refused to give him the sum he wanted for border
barrier construction. An obscure U.S. Code section governing
the military allows the defense secretary, in the event of a
national emergency requiring the use of the armed forces, to
carry out construction projects in support of those troops
without approval from Congress. The statute permits the
defense secretary to take money that Congress has given the
Pentagon for other military projects that have yet to start
contracting.
Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper on Tuesday determined that
11 border barrier projects proposed by the Department of
Homeland Security would support troops deployed to the
border, and authorized the Pentagon to divert $3.6 billion
from 127 military projects to finance them. On the campaign
trail, Trump regularly said Mexico would pay for his planned
wall along the southern border.
For the defunded projects to proceed, Congress must once
again appropriate funds for them. Republican lawmakers on
Capitol Hill broadly support ``backfilling'' the $3.6 billion
worth of projects, and the Republican-led Senate has included
a provision to do so in its version of the annual defense
policy bill. Democrats, however, have balked at the
suggestion, saying Trump's action flies in the face of
Congress's constitutionally mandated power of the purse.
Democratic lawmakers, including Kaine, have argued that
``backfilling'' the projects would set a precedent allowing
any future president to do an end run around Congress when
confronted with funding he or she deems insufficient.
Top Pentagon officials say they are committed to making
sure the defunded projects are still completed, and say they
will work with Congress to ensure that the funding for the
projects is replenished. Still, they have admitted there is
no guarantee the funding will be forthcoming.
The Portsmouth ship repair facility is part of the Norfolk
Navy Shipyard, the U.S. Navy's oldest shipyard, where workers
repair and build naval vessels ranging from submarines to
aircraft carriers. Among other activities, federal workers
and contractors there are responsible for maintaining
nuclear-powered aircraft carriers and submarines, as well as
disposing of the radioactive waste they generate. The
shipyard processed approximately 8,000 cubic feet of
radioactive solid waste from nuclear submarines between 2013
and 2017, according to a recent report from the Energy
Department.
But the infrastructure supporting the U.S. military's
nuclear waste disposal efforts has crumbled in recent decades
under successive waves of budget restrictions. In some cases,
that work has been carried out using antiquated 40-year-old
pipes, valves and tanks, according to a 2011 budget document.
Other projects that have been sidelined in favor of the
border wall include $41 million for a pair of
``noncombustible hazardous materials warehouses'' at the
Norfolk shipyard. One of the warehouses was to include a new
storage shed for gas cylinders; according to Navy budget
documents, the existing one is too small and doesn't have the
necessary fire safety systems.
The Norfolk warehouses currently being used to store
hazardous materials ``are World War II-era structures that
are inefficient and not designed for HAZMAT warehouse
operations,'' Navy officials wrote.
``If this project is not provided, [the Defense Department]
will continue storing hazardous materials in nonconforming
storage facilities that do not meet current life safety /fire
safety code requirements,'' Defense officials told members of
Congress in 2018.

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Mr. Speaker, we recognize that this border wall,
over and over again, has been said to be designated as an action of the
sovereign nation of Mexico. Why, then, are the people of the United
States, the taxpayers, voting for something that was promised by
someone else?
Vote for this resolution and help the men and women in the United
States military. Stand with them. Stand with them.
Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of our Constitution and in
defense of our republic and urge all members to join me in voting for
S.J. Res. 54, which terminates the phony declaration of emergency
issued by the President on February 15, 2019.
The reason this resolution is before us today is because of the
petulant intransigence of a single person, the current President of the
United States.
As a senior member of the Committee on the Judiciary and the
Committee on Homeland Security, I visited the southern border on
numerous occasions several times and can state confidently that there
is no national emergency or national security crisis that justified the
President's reckless and unconstitutional decision or compels the
Congress to abdicate its responsibilities under Article I to check and
balance the Executive Branch.
The President only pursued this tactic of declaring a national
emergency after realizing that Speaker Nancy Pelosi was absolutely
correct when she informed him that he did not have the support in
Congress to require the taxpayers to pay for his broken promise that
``Mexico would pay for the wall, 100 percent!''
In fact, according to public opinion polling, Americans
overwhelmingly disapprove of the President's national emergency
declaration by a 61%-36% margin.
The President's decision is opposed by both men and women in every
region of the country, by every income group and education category; it
is opposed by veterans organizations, education associations like the
NEA and AFT, and organized labor.
National security experts across the political spectrum are unanimous
in their assessment that the situation on the southern border does not
constitute a national emergency, an assessment echoed by leading former
Republican senators and Members of Congress.
They understand that after failing to convince the American people or
Congress to pay for his ineffective, wasteful, and immoral multibillion
dollar concrete wall, the President now embarked on a course of conduct
that is deeply corrosive of the constitutional system of checks and
balances wisely established by the Framers and which has served this
Nation and the world so well for nearly 250 years.
Having failed miserably to achieve his objective in the
constitutional legislative process, the President resorted to a
desperate 11th hour end-run around Congress with an unlawful emergency
declaration that contravenes the will of the American people and
negates the awesome power of the purse vested exclusively in the
Congress of the United States.
The Congress will not tolerate this.
Despite being repeatedly admonished and in the face of overwhelming
evidence to the contrary, the President continues to propagate false
information regarding the state of our southern border.
Mr. Speaker, these are the facts.

NET UNAUTHORIZED MIGRATION FROM MEXICO HAS FALLEN To ZERO

Net migration from Mexico is now zero or slightly below (more people
leaving than coming) because of a growing Mexican economy, an aging
population and dropping fertility rates that have led to a dramatic
decrease in unauthorized migration from Mexico.

TOTAL APPREHENSIONS ARE Low AND MANAGEABLE

Migrant apprehensions continue to be near an all-time low with only a
slight increase from 2017.
The combined 521,090 apprehensions for Border Patrol and Customs
agents in fiscal year 2018 were 32,288 apprehensions fewer than the
553,378 apprehensions in 2016.
To put this in perspective, on average, each of the 19,437 Border
Patrol agents nationwide apprehended a total of only 19 migrants in
2018, which amounts to fewer than 2 apprehensions per month.
In the last few years, an increased proportion of apprehensions are
parents seeking to

[[Page H8069]]

protect their children from the violence and extreme poverty in
Honduras, El Salvador, and Guatemala.
But even with more Central Americans arriving to our southern border
seeking protection, total apprehension rates are still at their lowest
since the 1970s.
The absence of a massive wall on the southern border will not solve
the drug smuggling problem because, as all law enforcement experts
agree, the major source of drugs coming into the United States are
smuggled through legal ports of entry.

BORDER COMMUNITIES ARE SAFE

The southern border region is home to about 15 million people living
in border counties in California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas.
These communities, which include cities such as San Diego, Douglas,
Las Cruces, and El Paso, are among the safest in the country.

CONGRESS HAs INVESTED BILLIONS IN BORDER ENFORCEMENT

Congress has devoted more U.S. taxpayer dollars to immigration
enforcement agencies (more than $21 billion now) than all other
enforcement agencies combined, including the FBI, DEA, ATF, US
Marshals, and Secret Service.
The bulk of this money goes to U.S. Customs and Border Protection
(CBP), with a budget of $14.4 billion in fiscal year 2018 and more than
59,000 personnel.
CBP is the largest law enforcement agency in the country, and more
than 85 percent of the agency's Border Patrol agents (i.e., 16,605 of
19,437) are concentrated on the southern border.
Expanded deployment of the military to the border to include active
duty troops could cost between $200 and $300 million in addition to the
estimated $182 million for the earlier deployment by the President of
National Guard to the border.
Mr. Speaker, having been soundly defeated legislatively by Congress,
a co-equal branch of government, the President wants to finance border
wall vanity project by diverting funds that the Congress has
appropriated for disaster recovery and military construction.
The funds the President wants to steal were appropriated by Congress
to help Americans devastated by natural disasters, like Hurricanes
Harvey, Irma and Maria, or for other purposes like military
construction.
Congress did not, has not, and will not, approve of any diversion of
these funds to construct a border wall that the President repeatedly
and derisively boasted that Mexico would pay for.
In fact, the President has admitted he ``didn't have to do this,''
but has opted do so because ``I want to see it built faster.''
Mr. Speaker, a bipartisan group of nearly 60 national security
officials including former secretaries of state, defense secretaries,
CIA directors, and ambassadors to the UN issued a statement declaring
that ``there is no factual basis'' justifying the President's emergency
declaration.
Instead of protecting our national security, the President's
declaration makes America less safe.
The President is stealing billions from high-priority military
construction projects that ensure our troops have the essential
training, readiness and quality of life necessary to keep the American
people safe, directly undermining America's national security.
Mr. Speaker, on September 4, 2019, citing his emergency declaration,
the President announced 127 military construction projects being
canceled to pay for construction of the wall.
These 127 projects are critical to protecting our national security
and improving the quality of life of our servicemembers and their
families.
President Trump's cancellation of these projects makes America less
safe, disrespects military families, and dishonors the Constitution.
A recent U.S. Air Force report also highlighted the security risks
posed from the President's cancellation of various Air Force military
construction projects, including:
1. Cancelling military construction for the European Defense
Initiative, preventing our work to deter Russian aggression.
2. Cancelling maintenance at a key base in the Middle East to fix
weaknesses that leave us open ``to hostile penetration in the midst of
contingency operations and an increased terrorist threat.''
3. Cancelling planned upgrades of airfields across Europe, leaving
them unable to support U.S. and NATO planes.
Mr. Speaker, the President's declaration clearly violates the
Congress's exclusive power of the purse, and, if unchecked, would
fundamentally alter the balance of powers, violating our Founders'
vision for America.
Opposing the President's reckless and anti-American decision
transcends partisan politics and partisanship; it is about patriotism,
constitutional fidelity, and putting country first.
To quote Thomas Paine's Common Sense: ``In absolute governments, the
King is law; so in free countries, the law ought to be King.''
Mr. Speaker, I urge all Members to uphold the rule of law and the
Constitution and reject the President's power grab; I urge a resounding
``yes'' vote on S.J. Res. 54.
Mr. MEADOWS. Mr. Speaker, only in Washington, D.C., is spending $160
billion more on defense a cut. The gentlewoman from Texas is talking
like we have cut the defense. We are spending $160 billion more over a
2-year period.
Ask the military men and women if they are better funded today than
they were under the 8 years of the Barack Obama administration, and,
almost to the person, they will say yes. This President is standing
with the military men and women of this great country.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr.
Jordan).
Mr. JORDAN. Mr. Speaker, this is just one more example of the
Democrats attacking the President instead of trying to solve the
problem.
We all know how serious the problem was. We have known it for months
and months and months. For months, we said there was a crisis on the
southern border, and the Democrats said: No, no, no, not really a
crisis. It is manufactured. It is not real.
Even though there were 144 apprehensions in the month of May alone,
they said: Oh, no, no--manufactured.
Finally, the real crisis got so extreme, even the Democrats had to
say: You know what? That money the President is asking for, we are
going to have to give him a little money. We are going to have to do
something here.
They put all kinds of strings on it, but they finally admitted there
was a real crisis on the border. But they limited what the President
could do.
In the broader context, never forget what they have said. They said:
Abolish ICE. Members of the United States Congress: Abolish ICE.
We had a Member from the majority say to abolish the whole
Department. We had the Speaker of the House, even though she has a wall
in her own State, say walls are immoral.
The majority says they are okay with noncitizens voting. This is the
perspective they offer, and now they bring this bill?
Of course we should vote against this thing. Of course we should vote
against this thing.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I believe I have the right to close. I have
no further speakers, and I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. MEADOWS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from
North Carolina (Mr. Murphy), the gentleman from the Third Congressional
District of North Carolina, one who has actually been a strong advocate
for the hurricane relief that has hit his particular district, the new
Member and my good friend.
Mr. MURPHY of North Carolina. Mr. Speaker, I speak this morning on
our Nation's security.
Over 200-plus years ago, brave men and women literally sacrificed
their lives to create a nation that was based upon freedom. That has
now continued, and we have today a nation of laws. And now we have that
nation of laws and the sanctity of that country threatened.
If you look back on the last several Republican and Democratic
Presidents of the United States who, right from that very seat, spoke
about our border crisis, they spoke about what they needed to do to
keep the sanctity of our borders, yet nothing was ever done.
The American people have complained incessantly on how this Congress
does not act. It is a stalemate. Now we have a President, bold as he
is, who is finally acting on this crisis. We are literally overrun by
folks from the southern border.
Yes, there are drugs. I heard that was mentioned by the gentleman
earlier. There are drugs that are coming in.
But we also talk about human trafficking, that is, the trafficking of
young men and women into this country into, essentially, slavery. We
now want to open the borders up and have this country, what was
previously a nation of laws, now become overrun and say that laws are
no longer sanctified in this country.
Ladies and gentlemen, we have a President who is bold, who has
recognized what has not been recognized by previous Presidents, that we
do have an emergency, that we do have the need for a physical structure
to prevent a physical object from moving from point A to point B.

[[Page H8070]]

We need a sanctified and a secure border, and I wish the Republicans
and Democrats would get together and recognize that we do need this for
our country and it is truly an emergency.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, as I said earlier, I have the right to
close. I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. MEADOWS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
If the gentleman opposite has no more speakers and is prepared to
close, I will go ahead and give my final remarks.
Mr. Speaker, I think it would be appropriate for me to recognize our
fine staff that is here. All those who have prepared the work have done
a great job, day in and day out. Many times, our staff is looked at and
overlooked, and I didn't want this day to go by without recognizing
their fine work on this particular subject.
Mr. Speaker, it should come as no surprise to the American people or
to this body why we are here today. Every single day, Mr. Speaker, it
becomes clearer and clearer and clearer that the majority is just
blindly objecting to anything that this President does, even if those
efforts are to serve this Nation.
The fact is that there is a real crisis at our southern border,
something that even the Speaker, as recently as June, has recognized.
So, Mr. Speaker, I think it is important that we come together and we
do secure our communities, we do provide the funding.
I am willing to work with my friends opposite. If we are looking at
our Coast Guard, wanting to make sure that they have the proper funds,
I am willing to work with them on that.
I am also willing to look at what we need to do to make sure that we
not only build a secure southern border, but that we apprehend those
cartels and those human traffickers that my good friend from North
Carolina talked about.
There is a cost of not doing something each and every day. My friend
opposite wanted to talk about how the President really says things and
doesn't do it.

I can tell you, this President is very serious about building a wall
on our southern border to secure it. In fact, it is being built right
now.
This President was very serious about moving the Embassy to
Jerusalem. In fact, the Embassy is in Jerusalem.
This President was very serious about lowering taxes. In fact, we
lowered taxes.
This President was very serious about making sure that our economy
hums so that unemployment would reach historic lows, and, indeed, he
has done that.
This is not about a campaign promise to build a wall. This is about a
campaign promise to secure our communities. In fact, this President has
done it.
I am going to stand with him. I ask my friends opposite to work with
us on giving the proper funding to make sure that we do exactly that.
Mr. Speaker, it is high time that we put the interests of the
American citizens first, and, with that, I yield back the balance of my
time.
Mr. DeFAZIO. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the remainder of my time.
Well, again, in response to my good friend, the President said
hundreds of times: Mexico is going to pay for the wall. They are not.
We have the transcript of the phone call where he called the new
President of Mexico and said: Look, I know you are not going to pay for
the wall, but you can't say that. We are going to pay for it.
So, that is one thing.
Also, he talked about moving the Embassy to Jerusalem. The President
was going to deliver a peace plan for the Middle East. Where is it?
There are a lot of things this President said he was going to do that
haven't happened.
Getting close to the President is sort of like being in the orbit of
a black hole, which sucks in everything. And that sucked in a lot of
things and a lot of people who have been, then, blown back out at some
point by the President.

{time} 1030

His current Acting Chief of Staff--I don't know how long he has been
acting now; a year, a year and half, something like that. The President
likes them to be acting because he can get rid of them more easily, he
thinks.
When he had his own opinions, when he wasn't in the orbit of the
black hole of Donald Trump, he said about walls, Mick Mulvaney, the
President's acting Chief of Staff: ``You go under, you go around, you
go through. What they need is more manpower and more technology.''
Acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney said that August 25, 2015, when he
had his own opinions, when he worked here in the United States House of
Representatives. He can't have his own opinions anymore.
He thought a wall was stupid then and it wouldn't do anything. And he
said what we have been saying; we inspect six percent of the semi-
tractor trailers that roll across the border, and we have testimony in
the conviction of a drug lord, Joaquin Guzman, in New York, we have
testimony in that trial. They are bringing the drugs in in just
boatloads, or truckloads, boatloads--we already talked about the Coast
Guard--and truckloads across the border because we only inspect a
fraction of them.
So what if they lose a few? Hundreds of millions of dollars; that is
the cost of doing business. This is a multi-billion-dollar business,
these cartels.
And as Mick Mulvaney said in an honest moment, we need manpower. We
already heard that they have only got four people at the border
crossing in Arizona.
Why do they only have four people? We have appropriated more money
for more Border Patrol people consistently, year in, year out. But they
are way behind in their numbers. They haven't been able to hire up to
the numbers we have authorized.
And technology, which is what I am talking about, they don't have
that either.
There is also--I mean, you know, people over there are pooh-poohing
child care centers for the troops in the military and things like that.
They don't need it. Their kids don't need it. Really?
And then also the President is taking hundreds of millions of dollars
out of the European defense initiative.
I have been to Poland recently, and I have seen the Suwalki Corridor.
That is the Russian invasion route into Europe. For years it was the
Fulda Gap, but now it is the Suwalki Corridor since Germany is
reunified.
And we are going to cancel projects in countries to defend that area
and give them better capability to defend themselves against the
Russian invasion.
But since Vlad--that is Mr. Putin, whatever dictators are called in
Russia--is buddies with the President; they have secret phone calls,
secret conversations that aren't transcribed, the President is
withholding money from Ukraine to defend itself.
And now we are going to cut money for our allies, the European
defense initiative, to build a stupid, useless wall on the border.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. All time for debate has expired.
Pursuant to the rule, the previous question is ordered on the joint
resolution.
The question is on the third reading of the joint resolution.
The joint resolution was ordered to be read a third time, and was
read the third time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on passage of the joint
resolution.
The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that
the ayes appeared to have it.
Mr. MEADOWS. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.
The yeas and nays were ordered.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 9 of rule XX, this 15-
minute vote on passage of the joint resolution will be followed by 5-
minute votes on:
The motion to suspend the rules and pass H.R. 3722; and
Agreeing to the Speaker's approval of the Journal, if ordered.
The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--yeas 236,
nays 174, not voting 23, as follows:

[Roll No. 553]

YEAS--236

Adams
Aguilar
Allred
Amash
Axne
Barragan
Bass
Bera
Beyer
Bishop (GA)
Blumenauer
Blunt Rochester
Bonamici
Boyle, Brendan F.

[[Page H8071]]

Brindisi
Brown (MD)
Brownley (CA)
Bustos
Butterfield
Carbajal
Cardenas
Carson (IN)
Cartwright
Case
Casten (IL)
Castor (FL)
Castro (TX)
Chu, Judy
Cicilline
Cisneros
Clark (MA)
Clarke (NY)
Clay
Cleaver
Cohen
Connolly
Cooper
Correa
Costa
Courtney
Cox (CA)
Craig
Crist
Crow
Cuellar
Cunningham
Davids (KS)
Davis (CA)
Davis, Danny K.
Dean
DeFazio
DeGette
DeLauro
DelBene
Delgado
Demings
DeSaulnier
Deutch
Dingell
Doggett
Doyle, Michael F.
Engel
Eshoo
Espaillat
Evans
Finkenauer
Fitzpatrick
Fletcher
Foster
Frankel
Fudge
Gallego
Garamendi
Garcia (IL)
Garcia (TX)
Golden
Gomez
Gonzalez (TX)
Gottheimer
Green, Al (TX)
Grijalva
Haaland
Harder (CA)
Hastings
Hayes
Heck
Herrera Beutler
Higgins (NY)
Himes
Horn, Kendra S.
Horsford
Houlahan
Hoyer
Huffman
Jackson Lee
Jayapal
Jeffries
Johnson (GA)
Johnson (SD)
Johnson (TX)
Kaptur
Katko
Keating
Kelly (IL)
Kennedy
Khanna
Kildee
Kilmer
Kim
Kirkpatrick
Krishnamoorthi
Lamb
Langevin
Larsen (WA)
Larson (CT)
Lawson (FL)
Lee (CA)
Lee (NV)
Levin (CA)
Levin (MI)
Lewis
Lieu, Ted
Lipinski
Loebsack
Lofgren
Lowenthal
Lowey
Lujan
Luria
Lynch
Malinowski
Maloney, Carolyn B.
Maloney, Sean
Massie
Matsui
McAdams
McBath
McCollum
McGovern
McNerney
Meeks
Meng
Moore
Morelle
Moulton
Mucarsel-Powell
Murphy (FL)
Nadler
Napolitano
Neal
Neguse
Norcross
O'Halleran
Ocasio-Cortez
Omar
Pallone
Panetta
Pappas
Pascrell
Payne
Perlmutter
Peters
Peterson
Phillips
Pingree
Pocan
Porter
Pressley
Price (NC)
Quigley
Raskin
Rice (NY)
Richmond
Rodgers (WA)
Rooney (FL)
Rose (NY)
Rouda
Roybal-Allard
Ruiz
Ruppersberger
Rush
Ryan
Sanchez
Sarbanes
Scanlon
Schakowsky
Schiff
Schneider
Schrader
Schrier
Scott (VA)
Scott, David
Sensenbrenner
Serrano
Sewell (AL)
Shalala
Sherman
Sherrill
Sires
Slotkin
Smith (WA)
Soto
Spanberger
Speier
Stanton
Stefanik
Stevens
Suozzi
Swalwell (CA)
Takano
Thompson (CA)
Thompson (MS)
Titus
Tlaib
Tonko
Torres (CA)
Torres Small (NM)
Trahan
Trone
Underwood
Upton
Van Drew
Vargas
Veasey
Vela
Velazquez
Visclosky
Walden
Wasserman Schultz
Waters
Watson Coleman
Welch
Wexton
Wild
Wilson (FL)
Yarmuth

NAYS--174

Aderholt
Allen
Amodei
Armstrong
Babin
Bacon
Baird
Balderson
Banks
Barr
Bergman
Biggs
Bilirakis
Bishop (NC)
Bishop (UT)
Bost
Brady
Brooks (AL)
Brooks (IN)
Buchanan
Buck
Bucshon
Budd
Burchett
Burgess
Byrne
Calvert
Carter (GA)
Carter (TX)
Chabot
Cline
Cloud
Cole
Collins (GA)
Collins (NY)
Comer
Conaway
Cook
Crenshaw
Curtis
Davidson (OH)
Davis, Rodney
DesJarlais
Diaz-Balart
Duncan
Dunn
Emmer
Estes
Ferguson
Fleischmann
Flores
Fortenberry
Foxx (NC)
Fulcher
Gaetz
Gianforte
Gibbs
Gohmert
Gonzalez (OH)
Gooden
Gosar
Granger
Graves (GA)
Graves (LA)
Graves (MO)
Green (TN)
Griffith
Grothman
Guest
Guthrie
Hagedorn
Harris
Hartzler
Hern, Kevin
Hice (GA)
Hill (AR)
Holding
Hollingsworth
Hudson
Huizenga
Hunter
Johnson (OH)
Jordan
Joyce (OH)
Joyce (PA)
Keller
Kelly (MS)
Kelly (PA)
King (IA)
King (NY)
Kinzinger
Kustoff (TN)
LaHood
LaMalfa
Lamborn
Latta
Lesko
Long
Loudermilk
Lucas
Luetkemeyer
Marshall
Mast
McCarthy
McCaul
McClintock
McKinley
Meadows
Meuser
Miller
Mitchell
Moolenaar
Mooney (WV)
Mullin
Murphy (NC)
Newhouse
Nunes
Olson
Palazzo
Palmer
Pence
Perry
Posey
Reed
Reschenthaler
Rice (SC)
Riggleman
Roby
Roe, David P.
Rogers (AL)
Rogers (KY)
Rose, John W.
Rouzer
Roy
Rutherford
Scalise
Schweikert
Scott, Austin
Shimkus
Simpson
Smith (MO)
Smith (NE)
Smith (NJ)
Smucker
Spano
Stauber
Steil
Steube
Stewart
Stivers
Taylor
Thompson (PA)
Thornberry
Timmons
Tipton
Wagner
Walberg
Walker
Walorski
Waltz
Watkins
Weber (TX)
Webster (FL)
Wenstrup
Westerman
Williams
Wilson (SC)
Wittman
Womack
Woodall
Wright
Yoho
Young
Zeldin

NOT VOTING--23

Abraham
Arrington
Beatty
Cheney
Clyburn
Crawford
Cummings
Escobar
Gabbard
Gallagher
Higgins (LA)
Hill (CA)
Hurd (TX)
Johnson (LA)
Kind
Kuster (NH)
Lawrence
Marchant
McEachin
McHenry
Norman
Ratcliffe
Turner

{time} 1103

So the joint resolution was passed.
The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.

____________________