January 30, 2019 - Issue: Vol. 165, No. 19 — Daily Edition116th Congress (2019 - 2020) - 1st Session
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ISSUES OF THE DAY; Congressional Record Vol. 165, No. 19
(House of Representatives - January 30, 2019)
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[Pages H1321-H1325] From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov] ISSUES OF THE DAY The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of January 3, 2019, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gohmert) is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader. Mr. GOHMERT. Madam Speaker, it has been an interesting day, perhaps more than most. We have heard over and over again about Republicans supposedly causing the shutdown, but in my days as a trial lawyer, judge, chief justice, it is always good to look at the evidence. And the evidence is very clear. You had Republicans in the House and Senate and the President actually pass a spending bill in the House before the end of December, and the only thing that was keeping it from getting through the Senate was that Democrats there, led by Senator Schumer, would not negotiate. They arrived at no agreement to get 60 votes so that it could go forward with debate. That wasn't the Republicans. In the position of the White House, President Trump made clear: This is negotiable, but we do need wall, we need barrier. Call it whatever you want. He moved from talking about concrete to talking about the steel barrier. And having spent time with some other Members of Congress, invited by Congressman Biggs and Congressman Gosar down to the Arizona border, we saw a lot of it. And then it would just end. And then you saw a clear path right around the end of it as people kept coming, invading this country illegally. From the border patrolmen, it was clear some were carrying big loads of drugs. Sometimes they are able to catch them, sometimes they are not. And it sounds like, from the times I spent on the border south of McAllen, southeast of McAllen, the Texas quadrant, more often than not, they don't catch the drugs coming in. It is an invasion. It is a huge problem. And I was hearing people, friends across the other side of the aisle, some Senators who are Democrats, acknowledging: Yes, we need to do something. But when it came to negotiating, there was no negotiation. So we had this bill today decrying how horrible shutdowns are. But if you look at the tactics, when the tactics of the leaders--and I say at least some of the leaders--of one party are ``we are not going to negotiate; we are not going to compromise; we are not going to do what is best for the country,'' in effect, as they have stated on prior occasions, as they have voted on prior occasions, some of them, that is what causes a shutdown. You know, we did not need this shutdown. We shouldn't have had to have this shutdown. It should have been agreed back in December by at least some of the Senators so that we could have gotten a spending bill. Of course, we had spending passed on three-fourths of the government. It was about one-fourth of the government that was not funded. So we talk about a shutdown. It wasn't a full shutdown. But, still, it did harm to those who were not getting paid. But as I would go through airports--and TSA agents would know who I was--numerous times I was told: We are hurting not getting paid, but we are all right. We are going to be a whole lot worse off if we don't get a wall or a barrier or something built and start securing the border. We heard from teachers who were saying: We love our kids, we want to teach them, but it is so unfair to the students who are already there to have people brought in and say you have got to educate these, and they don't speak English. And the teachers would say it really did damage, it does damage to those students that we are supposed to also teach. And now, all of a sudden, we have people we have to teach who don't speak English. There are some school districts that have done a great job of trying to work around that and teach English in an immersion-type setting so that we can help people not be relegated to manual labor the rest of their lives, but help them speak good English so that they can get good jobs. But we need a barrier in some places on the border where we don't have it, and that is clear. You can't just have a 20-, 30-foot barrier just proceeding along that is stopping the drugs, stopping the sex trafficking, stopping the human trafficking, and then just stop it. Because, as we saw down the Arizona border, the path goes for miles and miles, and it comes right up to the point where the barrier ends, and it goes right around. In one place, there is a little barbed wire gate that is held to the barrier. This massive barrier is held with a little, probably a quarter-inch, nylon rope. And they leave it in a slip knot so you can open the gate and the drugs can come pouring in that will kill Americans. Something had to be done. And yet what happened was the President was willing to negotiate, Kevin McCarthy and the Republicans were willing to negotiate, Senator McConnell and the Republicans in the Senate were willing to negotiate, and yet the word from our Speaker was: We are not negotiating at all on a barrier, a wall. So we continued to have people in the interim, while the government was shut down, continue to die as a result of us not securing our border. We were told by Border Patrol, every day, there are women who are pulled into sex trafficking. Every day, there are women--often young girls. We are told about one-third of the girls who are brought up to bring them into the United States illegally are raped at least once and, normally, multiple times. As long as we keep our border so unsecured, that is going to continue. I mean, how much lack of compassion do you have to have to say: ``We are fine with the rape trees; we are fine with one-third of the girls coming into the United States illegally having been raped. We are fine. We just leave things like they are. That is fine, but we are not going to negotiate because. Apparently, from what we are hearing, even though many of the people who refuse to negotiate have talked about the need for barriers and talked [[Page H1322]] about the need for securing the border, they were very concerned that the President would get a political win by getting even part of a wall or barrier. So people are just going to have to keep suffering, getting raped and dying. So we didn't secure the border, there is no additional wall, so they can claim the President didn't keep his promise on the wall. That was more important than saving lives, saving rapes from happening. It is all about politics. And that is not across the aisle. I have talked to too many friends across the aisle that, if we had been left to our own resources, we could have worked something out. {time} 1500 But apparently, at the top, it was more important to keep a political win from the President than it was to do what was right for the country. I don't know anybody on our side of the aisle who loves shutdowns, but there were some claims made in the bill that went too far, so most of us voted ``no.'' We don't want a shutdown, the same way we don't want anybody in our military dying. But, if we never had any military willing to risk their lives, we wouldn't have the freedoms we have today. If we didn't have a President willing to put a stake in the sand and say: We have got to do something to secure our border. We need some barrier, wall, whatever you want to call it in some places. And I will negotiate. The amount is negotiable--he came down to about a fifth of what he had been saying and what we are told really needs to be spent, $25 billion or so. Yet there was no negotiation on the other side. I know there was one dollar mentioned, apparently in jest: Oh, I would give a dollar for a wall. But it just seems so hypocritical to have a leader, or leaders, that would not negotiate in good faith, which caused a shutdown, with one side willing to negotiate on everything except we have got to have some barriers someplace and no negotiation on the other side. Then we come in here with a bill today to condemn shutdowns that were caused by a refusal of one side to negotiate. Like I said, I know that is not the case. There is an article here from the Washington Examiner, Anna Giaritelli. It says: ``House Republicans say at least 60 Democratic lawmakers have indicated in the past few weeks that they support some type of barrier, wall, or fence at the U.S.-Mexico border, even as Democratic leaders say they won't agree to President Trump's border wall.'' It is just amazing that that ends up being the climactic bill today, condemning shutdowns, after the leadership on one side says: We are not compromising; we are not moving an inch. It causes a shutdown; we will blame that on you. We will even pass a bill. We have got a majority. We can pass a bill, you know, that condemns shutdowns. They took out the language, thankfully, that blames the Republicans. But I would like to recognize my very dear friend from Pennsylvania for his comments and observations. Madam Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Perry). Mr. PERRY. Madam Speaker, we are here today to talk a little bit about what we just saw, which is what the gentleman from Texas is talking about, this vote that we just had with the condemnation of shutdown. Let's just be clear. Nobody--nobody--in this House, whether it be Democrat, Republican, conservative, liberal, anywhere in between, or in the Senate, nobody votes for shutdown. There is no bill that says: Are you voting ``yea'' to shut down the Federal Government or are you voting ``nay''? That is not how this goes. What happens is we are trying to fund. It is an appropriations bill. And ``appropriation'' is a fancy way of just saying: We are taking your tax dollars, and this what we are spending. This is our priority. This is how we are spending it. There is a disagreement, and we can't come to an agreement. Nothing happens. That is the problem: nothing happens. So the Federal Government shuts down. Now, we had a discussion earlier on when I said: Look, we are having this vote today to condemn this horrible thing. That doesn't fix anything. It doesn't solve a thing. It is just theater. And the American people and our country have big issues at stake that we need to get to solving. This doesn't solve anything. This is just: Let's make sure we place blame where we think blame is so we can pound our chest and feel good and we can--oh, by the way-- cover for some of our Members who voted ``no'' on paying Federal employees who were working. That is what this was all about. It is in the past. It is in the past. But right now we should be talking about the negotiation which caused this whole thing in the first place. Quite honestly, you should be able to talk and chew gum at the same time, which is: Let's have a discussion about what is appropriate at the border and keep all of the Federal Government open at the same time. But, no, we can't do that because we are not interested in securing our border. That is really what this is all about. This is the Homeland Security appropriations bill. And if you are not talking about securing the border in the Homeland Security appropriations bill, I don't know where you are going to talk about it. So, again, no one wants a shutdown. No one voted for a shutdown. But I reminded the majority party that, in December, this House, under Republican leadership, voted for a bill that would have kept the government open and, in walking and chewing gum at the same time, provided for border security that the President would have signed. The majority leader said: You guys voted on a bill after waiting for a year that you knew couldn't pass. Well, during that period of a year, the reason it couldn't pass is the reason it didn't pass in the Senate: because Senate Democrats refused to fund border security. Now, I believe they are for border security, but if it says ``the wall,'' well, that is President Trump, and we certainly can't have any of that. I would say we have got to get past that. Look, you can dislike the President all you want. That is your prerogative. But don't translate your dislike for the President into not caring for the security of the American people. And that is what has happened here. We are now in January, at the end of January. We don't know what the numbers for January are. We don't know the numbers for December yet. But Homeland Security reported in November, between the ports of entry, between the points of entry, 51,000 people were apprehended coming across our border. We don't know how many weren't apprehended. We just know we got 51,000. My friends on the other side of the aisle say: We are for border security, so we want some drones and more technology and beef up the points of entry. We are not opposed to that, but we are saying, generally, that is status quo, right? We are talking about fixing the status quo. We are not talking about doing anything in between the points of entry, which is what the discussion really is all about. And the President is willing to do things at the points of entry and in between, but some folks are not, and that is where we are having a problem. Mr. GOHMERT. The gentleman mentioned the 51,000. That is just, as I understand, those who were apprehended. Mr. PERRY. In 1 month. Mr. GOHMERT. In 1 month. That is not everybody that was coming in. My friend, being a general in the United States Army, served our country so meritoriously. We had a situation under President Woodrow Wilson where a small part of Pancho Villa's gang came across the border into the United States, killed some families, and then went back into Mexico. Devout Democrat that Woodrow Wilson was, he apparently saw that small incursion as an invasion. He sent--and I have asked the Congressional Research Service for their best numbers, and the estimate, taken from articles and information they had gotten, was probably around 75,000 of a new group called the National Guard--new back in the early 1900s. He sent them down to stand guard on the border--75,000--and sent General John Pershing down into Mexico pursuing Pancho Villa's troops. They [[Page H1323]] didn't ever get him; they got a lot of his lieutenants. But, apparently, when 75,000 people were put on the border, there was no more invasion. If you look at the U.S. Constitution, Article IV, Section 4--this is our Constitution--says: ``The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican form of government, and shall protect each of them against invasion.'' Now, 51,000 in a month is many, many times more than the folks that Pancho Villa had come in and kill Americans. Would the gentleman consider that an invasion, what we have going on on our southern border? Madam Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Perry). Mr. PERRY. Madam Speaker, I am not sure what else to call it. We are a generous people, and I, myself, am the product of legal immigration through Ellis Island. We want to remain that way. The United States is the most generous nation on the planet in that regard, I think last year admitting, legally, about 1.7 million people into our country. All we are saying is: Listen, please just knock on the door. We have a process here. We have got to do it the right way. Don't just barge in. Just ring the doorbell. But these folks are saying: Well, we don't want to ring the doorbell. You can clearly see why, if you are trafficking in little girls or young men, if you are trafficking in the 90-plus percent of heroin coming across the border and into every single town, laced with fentanyl. If you are trafficking in MS-13, you are not going to go to the point of entry and say: ``Hey, Mr. Border Patrolman, I have got this stash of drugs here. You don't mind if I bring this into your country.'' No, you are going to go where they are not. The President is saying this is where we need to secure our border as well, as well as the points of entry. Again, I don't understand why we are in this mutually exclusive position. I don't think that Democrats don't want to secure the border, but securing the border has to be more, something more than putting a drone up in the sky so that we can see them coming. The point is that they don't get across the border, not just to see them coming, but that they don't get onto our side of the border with whatever they are bringing and that we interdict them. That is the issue here. So I think we should be closer than we are, and I would urge my colleagues on the other side of the aisle to just appeal to their better angels. We don't have to side with the cartels. Republicans and Democrats can be together and siding with the American people and securing America and its people from this unsafe circumstance, whether it is gang members and gang-related violence, whether it is drugs coming into our community, or whether it is low-skilled labor that puts our low-skilled labor--there are people in America, believe it or not, who don't graduate high school, and they have a hard time finding a job because they don't have an education. Not only are they competing against the things that they have in their own circumstance--right?--of not having an education in their own country, but now they are competing against other people who don't have a high school education from another country, who are willing to work for less than they are. If we don't stand up for the least of those in our community who have the least, who have the worst disadvantage against them, our constituents, who is going to? I would say to my friends on the other side of the aisle: It is really time to stop with the theater here and the blame game. It is what it is now. Nobody votes for a shutdown. Nobody votes for a shutdown. But stop with all that, and let's get to real, live negotiations. You don't have to side with the cartels. You can side with the American citizens. You don't even have to consider it siding with the President of the United States if you find that unpalatable. You can side with the citizens in your community who don't want MS-13, who don't want heroin, who don't want fentanyl, who don't want people stealing their wages from the citizens in their community. So I would just appeal to them. I know their heart is good, so we just ask them to negotiate in good faith. The good gentleman from Texas and I will be here when they come up with their plan. We have asked--right?--for 30-some days: What is your plan? We know you don't like the President. We got that. But what is your plan? Have we seen it? I haven't seen anything yet, right? I haven't seen their proposal yet. Mr. GOHMERT. Madam Speaker, I do want to hit one point that the gentleman made about the drones. They can help. The television cameras, all of the sophistication, the technology, can help. The gentleman from Pennsylvania was not here when $8 billion, as I recall, was passed in the House and Senate, signed by the President, and given to protect our southern border for, the terminology I recall, a virtual wall. And that was not a wall but cameras, airplanes, drones, whatever they could get, whatever they needed, whether it was microphones, listening--it was whatever the Secretary of Homeland Security thought appropriate. There was a provision that was added in the Senate that became part of the law that said, if the Secretary of Homeland Security decides that money is not going to accomplish the purpose of securing the border, then she can wave that off and spend the money elsewhere. That is what Secretary Napolitano did, as I recall. She waved it off. I have been trying to find out for a number of years now: Where did that $8 billion go that was supposed to be for this technology that we are hearing from some across the aisle: That is all we need is that? Well, not one single Democrat did I ever hear say: Do you know what? Napolitano shouldn't have waved off a virtual wall. {time} 1515 They agreed that just wasn't going to do it. Secretary Napolitano said that is not going to do it. That is not going to help secure the border. That is all we hear in response to President Trump saying wall, barrier. Whatever you want to call it, it is what we need there. I yield to my friend, Mr. Perry. Mr. PERRY. Madam Speaker, I can't speak to what happened in the past, and I don't know where the money went either, but I know where we are today. I know that our communities are in peril for these issues that we have discussed already. I am sure, coming from Texas, you can name people's names. I can name people who have been murdered, who have died of overdoses. Even if you are just an average taxpaying citizen in Pennsylvania--I don't know about other States--but in Pennsylvania, we pay at least $1.3 billion annually just for illegal immigration in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and that doesn't include healthcare and social services. That is education and incarceration. And we are 2,000 miles from the border. If you are a senior citizen in Pennsylvania, where our property taxes are high, you have paid your mortgage, you are no longer working, you are on a fixed income, you are counting on your retirement and maybe your Social Security and your savings, and the price tag keeps going up because people keep coming into your community illegally. You are in peril of losing your home, you are looking to your representatives and saying: Sir, ma'am, what are you doing about this problem? We cannot accept this. We don't want to lose our home to pay for this problem that shouldn't be happening. Regardless of what happened in the past, I can't fix that. But what we are saying in this House, as Republicans, is the status quo of 51,000 people in 1 month getting caught between the entry points cannot continue. It is too much. It must be stopped. We must do something. If the other side has a better plan, God bless them. I am ready to sit down and look at it, but we have been waiting for it since December 20-something. It is now the end of January. We are prepared. The gentleman from Texas, the Representative from Texas, and I are willing to consider whatever they have, but we don't have anything so far. This President has offered, I think, four or five times things that they [[Page H1324]] have wanted and said: Let's come to the table. We can't fix it on our own. We need their involvement. We need their input. We just beseech them: Let's get past all this theater. Let's get down to brass tacks here and start saving our community. Mr. GOHMERT. Madam Speaker, I appreciate my friend from Pennsylvania so much for sharing his thoughts. It continues to be a problem every day. An article here from The Hill, by Madison Gesiotto, says: ``The Mexican Government is doing more to combat illegal immigration into the United States than the entire Democratic Party put together. While the Democrats continue to pretend the crisis on our southern border is imaginary, Mexico is heavily investing in border security in anticipation of yet another massive caravan of migrants heading for the United States.'' It goes on: ``Hundreds of Honduran migrants began their journey in hopes of seeking asylum at our southern border, a goal that proved elusive to the previous caravan. Instead of dismissing the new caravan as a `manufactured crisis' as the Democrats did after President Trump made his appeal . . . Mexican authorities sprang into action, announcing a list of strengthened requirements to address the problem. ``According to the latest reports, the Mexican Government is reinforcing all the entry points along its own southern border with additional immigration enforcement agents and is stepping up surveillance of known illegal crossing points. It also plans to enforce strict immigration protocols, such as requiring the migrants to undergo biometric scans and acquire immigration documents before they can enter the country.'' So that is Mexico. We have worked on a bill in the past that said, if you think the Mexican law is so much better than ours, why don't we just adopt the policies and the laws of Mexico, with regard to immigration? The bottom line is, if we were to do that, we wouldn't have millions of illegal immigrants in this country. I have to give the President some credit here. When we see this article from Reuters, an unlikely source, it points out: ``The United States sent the first Central American asylum seeker back to Mexico through a crossing at the border city of Tijuana on Tuesday as part of a hardened immigration policy, an official at Mexico's National Migration Institute said.'' Somebody has been doing some amazing negotiating in order to make that happen, where Mexico would agree to take back some folks who are claiming asylum. As I understand it, we may have more people going back to Mexico, pending their hearing. As we heard from Secretary Nielsen back in December before our committee, where there are walls and barriers in place, it cuts illegal immigration by 90 to 95 percent. That is something that works. Nothing is going to work 100 percent, but that is amazing at how well it works. I now yield to my good friend, Congressman Gaetz. Mr. GAETZ. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Texas for yielding. As we gather here on the floor, the gentleman from Texas and I would note that most Americans are working on a Wednesday afternoon at 3:20 eastern time. Most Americans are trying to advance their careers, their lives, their families. I am just tragically disappointed at the lack of work going on in this Congress. I think one of the reasons that we haven't been so productive is that we have not seen the Democratic majority put on this floor what their border security legislation even is. I know what the Republican view is as we head into conference. I know that because Speaker Pelosi, in the White House, told the President we could not pass a border security bill here. Directly following that challenge, we came to the floor. We prioritized our borders, our laws, the rule of law. We prioritized the wages of American families, the safety of communities throughout our country. And we passed $5.7 billion for border funding for a barrier and sent that over to the Senate. I just don't understand, Madam Speaker, why the challenge that the Democrats gave Republicans is one the majority is unwilling to meet. If Democrats have a bill, put it on the floor. Show us what the majority's ideas are. Madam Speaker, there has been a conference committee that has been appointed. It will get together, and I sure hope that conference report produces something that looks like a whole lot of border security, a whole lot of barrier and wall and fencing. I only can imagine the challenge my Republican colleagues must have, because Democrats know what Republicans want, but we don't know what Democrats want, so it is kind of hard to negotiate. We have to have a win-win to get out of this system where we seem to careen from shutdown to shutdown and crisis to crisis as a mechanism to gain leverage against one another for our respective priorities. But the right thing to do is to just put on the floor what you believe in. I know what Republicans believe in because we voted for it. That seems to be a fair challenge back to those who are currently in the majority. I thank my colleague from Texas for yielding. Mr. GOHMERT. I am very grateful to my friend, Congressman Gaetz, for that insightful comment. The gentleman is right. When you are right, you are right. I would like to comment on something else that has been in the news, and that is the longest war in which the United States has ever been engaged. For a little history, it took a few weeks for the United States to find out where the training and preparation for 9/11 came from, and that the Taliban and Osama bin Laden were behind it. They had control of Afghanistan, the Taliban did. It was an amazing bit of negotiation by President Bush, with incredible help from intelligence and special operations. The special ops people from our military were able to negotiate an agreement with tribal leaders that ended up being called the Northern Alliance. It contained some people who have become friends, people who love their country. By October, we were putting in about 300 special ops military. There is a great book called ``Horse Soldiers'' that delves into this issue, and a movie, ``12 Strong,'' although the ending wasn't quite accurate. Our American forces were never to lead an operation. They were to support Dostum in his operations, which is what they did, heroically. By the end of February 2002, apparently, there was no organized Taliban left in Afghanistan. It had done an amazing job. The heroic fighting of those in the Northern Alliance, the Afghans led by General Dostum, did an amazing job. We provided some weapons. We gave them aerial--well, there were B-52s flying, but only our special ops guys could call down bombs. The leaders could tell the Americans: Look, there is a bunker. There is a problem. They would get the coordinates, call down the bomb, take care of it. Dostum and his folks would go in and clean up. That is how, by the end of October, we had not lost a single American, and the Taliban had been defeated. Unfortunately, at that point, we became occupiers. We sent in lots of American military, and in the 7-plus years of Commander in Chief George W. Bush, we lost just over 600 precious American military lives in Afghanistan. During the 8 years of Commander in Chief Obama--I believe, personally, it was because of the tough rules of engagement, and our people not being able to defend themselves until it was sometimes too late--we lost about three times as many people under Commander in Chief Obama as we did under Commander in Chief Bush. Whatever the problem, the buck stops with the Commander in Chief, and we lost three times as many when the war was supposed to be virtually over. What happened, once we became occupiers, was then more Afghans were joining the Taliban. I have talked with an individual who was part of the inner circle that was being made at the State Department about what kind of government we would give the Afghans. That shouldn't have been our job. We defeated the Taliban, or the Northern Alliance did with our help. They should have been the ones deciding what kind of government. The people I have talked to in Afghanistan, friends I have made there, [[Page H1325]] they said: Look, there is not a much better place on Earth fitted for a federalist form of government where the power is in the states or provinces and in the localities. We don't need a big powerful dictator. We need strong states or provinces. Yet, the constitution we hoisted onto the Afghan people, led by a man who is now in the State Department once again leading efforts--as I understand it, he is the guy who said let's give them a centrist government. That is what the constitution gave Afghanistan. The President of Afghanistan appoints the governors. He appoints the mayors. He appoints the police chief. The people in Afghanistan have said: Look, this is horrendous. This is a formula for corruption. For heaven's sake, at least let us elect our governors, elect our mayors. Let us choose our own police chiefs. {time} 1530 But that is not the constitution that we gave them. But there has been an amendment movement for some time. The Obama administration would not support it because they had some of the same State Department people that said: No, let's keep this corrupt centrist--they didn't say corrupt, but that is exactly what it gave them. And the Afghan people don't like what America forced on them. The solution is, encourage them. And since we spend billions of dollars there, look, you want another dime? Amend the constitution; allow an election of governors and mayors, local selection of police chiefs. Let's return the power to the provinces. As my friend, former Minister Massoud, there has said: Look, if you will help us get that amendment done, then whenever America leaves, we have got power back in our local areas. So if the Taliban takes over one province, or tries to take over the national government, all the other provinces can rise up and come after them and kick them out like we did last time. But as long as we have got this coerced, very centralized government, all they have got to do is knock off a few people at the top; which is why we have people that shouldn't still be in the State Department who are negotiating with the Taliban, not even our friends. Our friends are going to be dead when we pull out because we are leaving all this power for easy reach of the Taliban. We ought to be negotiating with our former allies, the ones that defeated the Taliban within six months, and get them that amendment, push them to get that, help them have those first elections under the amended constitution, and then get the heck out of Afghanistan. In that regard, we have a man who is not here on the floor this week, hasn't been in January, named Walter Jones. He wanted us out of Afghanistan, and he has for a very long time. He is not going to be around to see that happen is the indication. But, Madam Speaker, I know there are many of us that love that guy, and I was sad to see him in hospice last Friday. Prayers are with his family, because Walter is going to go home and be better off. But we miss him. I was heartened to see our friend, Alcee Hastings here on the floor a while ago. He has been going through a difficult bout of pancreatic cancer; been going through chemo, and I know my friends on both sides of the aisle will continue to pray for and encourage him. We can have strong disagreements. We don't wish anybody to go through what Walter and Alcee have been going through. One other friend that I spoke to in the last week, she has been in my prayers, Anne Graham Lotz. What an incredible gift to America Billy Graham's children have been. And our prayers will continue to be for Anne, Alcee, and my friend, Walter, and his family. Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time. ____________________
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