the israeli-palestinian conflict with keith ellison. , the lawsuit on president obama challenging executive actions on the affordable care act. . .

you'll hear comments from the house speaker, nancy pelosi and president obama, but we'll take your thoughts on the lawsuit, as well, and everything surrounding it. democrats. for republicans, and (202)585-3882 for independents, if you want to post on social media here is how you do on on twitter. @cspanwj. and you can send us e-mail, to journal@c-span.org. as you're calling in giving comments, write up from the newspapers, "the new york times" saying the lawsuit was mr. boehner's -- republicans would fight the president's efforts to revise laws congress passed while not going as far as many on the right would like

mr. boehner had hoped to avoid, paul broun of georgia, tomorrow as massy of kentucky and steve stock man of texas. here is a little bit of the house speaker from yesterday on the vote. >> this isn't about republicans and democrats, it's about defending the constitution that we swore an oath to uphold. and acting decisively when it may be compromised. no member of this body needs to be reminded of what the constitution states about the president's obligation to faithfully execute the laws of our nation. no member needs to be reminded of the bonds of trust that have been frayed or the damage that's already been done to our economy and to our people. are you willing to let any

president choose what laws to execute and what laws to change? are you willing to let anyone tear apart what our founders have built? think not only about the specifics of the oath you took, but think about how you took it. as one body, standing together. host: the house speaker from yesterday, the "washington times" talks about next steps of this lawsuit, saying legal andists said the biggest hurdle will be overcoming the federal court rule. institutional harm to congress is constitutional powers generally has been rejected as a sufficient reason, but some analysts said it's an open question for the supreme court. judges might be tempted to get involved in order to rebalance the two other branches of government. again, your thoughts on the lawsuit, welcome. the numbers.

(202) 585-3881 for republicans. and (202) 585-3882 for independents. we'll start this morning with willy from maryland, democrats line, go ahead. caller: how you doing? i am totally against it. i think it's ridiculous that there are other things that should be done instead of trying to sue the president for doing his job. the man was put in for two years, and for this stupid republican congress to do what they're doing, there ought to be a lawsuit against john boehner and the rest of those republicans, and that includes mitch mcconnell. host: what about the argument that the president overstepped his powers? president obama you would agree or disagree? caller: as far as being a lawsuit against him? host: the arguments that republican bring as far as him overstepping his powers. caller: he's not overstepping his powers. you go become to ronald reagan he overstepped his bounds quite

a few times. caller: crisis art. thank god for c-span. i watched the whole proceedings yesterday and i think that this is the best thing that could ever happen, us suing this low president that leads from behind. what's going on around the world is a direct result of us stepping back from whatever obligations are. host: the previous caller said this effort was a waste of time. caller: yes, i know he said it was a waste of time. he was a democrat, wasn't he. host: what are a your thoughts on what he said? caller: my thoughts on what he said did he watch the whole proceedings? did he watch the arguments? did he listen to the democrat's argument again the republicans lawsuit against obama? what's happening down on our

borders right now, our southern borders, is a direct result of his administration. he's following the -- the plan to bring our country to bankruptcy. host: you can watch the statements made by legislators on our web site, if you want to watch about the lawsuit, and issues and things that were said about it. donald from michigan, independent line, hello. caller: good morning, sir. my thoughts are my wife and i have been watching tv, and for this election thing coming up, all we hear is like a bunch of children. i am independent. i don't see any good of either party, but the nonsense i hear, the childish nonsense like these -- okay, i'll call them republicans, but their campaigns are nothing but who hates obama the most. absolutely no substance to anything. it's just who hates obama the

most. and when you have this type of thing, nothing is getting done in congress. the american people are getting hurt by all this nonsense. and even though i'm not particularly a democrat, somebody has to do something. if the president has to make some laws without the help of congress, i don't see where he has the choice. host: two tweets this morning. congress should stop wasting money and time. there's time for everything and now is not the time to sue the president. stop the madness. this is saying i think it's great. separation of powers, a must. up next is tony, pennsylvania, democrat's line. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. you know, it is absolutely ridiculous what's going on in the world today. now, for them to get up and sue

the president when they sit up there and let the world know they were going to make this president a one time president, they're doing everything they can to -- they're the ones dragging america down. they're wasting our time and our money. if anyone knows of any way we can sue this congress, the people need to get together and sue them. they are the destructive ones. and it all goes to this immorality in the world today. it's so immoral that they have a commercial on, where they have a grown man up under a cow sucking on its utters. how ridiculous is that? host: barbara from oklahoma, republican line, hi. you're on. go ahead. caller: i'm in favor of suing the president. host: why so?

caller: because in my estimation he's worthless. he lies all the time. and i want to get one thing straight about the government shut down. it was a democrats that shut it down. i'm tired of all the lies. i listen to c-span and cnn all the time. it's about time something was done about obama. i'll be glad when he's out of office. he's an embarrassment to our country. our enemies know that he's a couldered a. that's why they laugh at us. i heard that on cnn. host: here is the minority leader, nancy pelosi talking about the republican's vote to sue president obama. >> first the question comes up, using the taxpayer's time and money to sue the president. we don't have money to have early childhood education for our children. they rejected the president's universal prek, but we have money to sue the president. we don't have money to lower the

cost of student loans, according to the republicans, but we do have money to sue the president. how much money is that, nobody knows, not even the chairwoman of the house administration committee when she was asked. she doesn't know. we don't know how much it costs. we -- as i say we don't have money for our priorities, and this should not be a priority. host: two of the lawyers behind the legal framework of the lawsuit writing an op ed. the case for suing the president is the op ed and here are some of their thoughts this morning, saying congress has the exclusive authority to make law because law making requires debate and compromise. if congress cannot achieve consensus it doesn't mean congress is broken. until there is a compromise acceptable to the majority of the us quo is the only correct

path. separation of powers also guarantees political accountability. when congress makes a law and the president executes it as written, citizens will know whom to reward or punish at the next election. here is ken from florida. on the house voting to proceed with the lawsuit. he's on our independent line. good morning, ken. caller: good morning. thank you for having me on c-span as a first time caller. i just had to call because i think this is the most ridiculous thing, the gamesmanship that is being played in congress. from a eagle standpoint, this is not going to go through. they have no standing. congress includes both the house and the senate, and the senate is not going forward with wanting to sue the president. therefore this is just a republican house. and they claim to be fiscally responsible and conservative. however, we spent so much money,

$7 million trying to repeal the same law that they are going to sue the president over for not enacting. and so from this, benghazi, to all of these little conspiracy theories congress needs to get together and do the job they were elected to do, which is to take care of our economy, and our middle class. we have no money for anything else, but we are going to sit here and pay all of this taxpayer money to lawyers and it's a political stunt to get prepared, to go forward, prior to the 2016 election. host: ray from twitter says the constitution has a remedy for presidential overreach, acting contrary to oath. no lawsuit. gloria is up next, democrats line. hi. caller: hi. host: you're on. go ahead. caller: you know, i remember

every day when -- an amendment to the constitution, to separate it. to this day, who would have thought we're trying to appeal that? i listen to everything, and i'm able to put the -- and as far as -- host: what do you think specifically about this lawsuit? what about its merits? what do you think? caller: the merit of this lawsuit is zero, zero merit. host: because why? caller: because the president, first of all, a -- authority comes when you are able to

comply with checks and balances. that is already in effect. host: republican line, hi. caller: good morning. the suit will be valid. this president definitely has been overstepping his bounds. it's obvious. for all the democrats that are calling in, some of which have been implying that there's some racial tint to this, house republicans, me personally, i didn't like jimmy carter. he was white. i didn't like bill clinton. he was white. and i also don't necessarily like barack obama's policies either. it has nothing to do with race, although we hear that all the time. the last knowledge this i'll say george bush, his executive

actions mostly dealt with terrorism and military to protect america. barack obama practically all of his actions are domestic, taking money from one person to give to other persons, letting persons that are not american citizens get things from american citizens. these are the types of things that really hit people here at home. you know, you have to ask us, and just because he was elected twice doesn't mean he can do anything he feels like doing, which is what weak leadership will give you what we have, barack obama. host: independent line from alabama, this is bill. caller: hello. it's absolutely legal and has standing for him, for congress to sue president obama. he has no -- he has no constitutional authority to

change the laws he wants to enforce, to not enforce laws that he does not want to enforce. he is a pathological -- he has told so many lies to the american people, it is ridiculous. host: you think a court will actually hear this? caller: absolutely. they absolutely should. one more thing, if i may,. host: go ahead. caller: okay. i wondered, how many of the american people know that the united states government, the federal government, is paying over $7,000 to people that will take in these children and adults that are coming from central america into the united states? host: that's bill from alabama hearing from leadership on the democratic side of the house via tweet. majority of americans oppose gop lawsuit. the republicans continue to waste time, taxpayer money and

distracting from important issues. he also includes a link to that tweet. it's some of the tweets we received from leadership on this. your thoughts welcome. joe from spring, texas, democrats line, good morning. caller: good morning. it just shows america how many racist people are in america, to say that this president is not right on what he does. he tries to help the people. and all this time being in office -- host: what specifically about this lawsuit. what do you think of it? caller: it's a bunch of trash. it's nothing -- this law doesn't -- the republican side -- the law about -- host: we'll leave it there.

this is story from "the new york times" this morning, kansas city, missouri, where the president was telling a crowd of 1500 at the up ton theater that the economic strides that were starting -- that economic policies were starting to reap rewards, including putting the united states back on top with the investors. the decision we made to rescue the auto industry, rebuild the economy on a new foundation, education, all those things are starting to pay off. it was during that address in missouri which again you can see on our web site, which he did make comments, taking a look and commenting directly on the gop lawsuit. here is words from yesterday. >> but think about this. they have announced they're going to sue me for taking executive actions to help people. so, you know, they're mad because i'm doing my job.

and by the way, i told them i said i would be happy to do it with you. so the only reason i'm doing it is because you don't do anything. but if you want, let's work together. now, i mean, everybody right now is -- this is a political stunt, but it's worse than that because every vote they're taking like that means a vote they're not taking to actually help people. you know, when they take 50 votes to row peel the affordable care act, that was time that could have been spent working constructively to help you on some things. host: again, if you want to see that full speech that he made yesterday in missouri, go to our web site, journal@c-span.org, we're taking comments for the remainder of our lawsuit.

it passed 225 to 2001 at the house yesterday. the republican line, this is bill. go ahead. caller: i really think this lawsuit is on track. i think he has overstepped his bounds as far as executive orders. i can see a president, you know, doing it if it's for the good. it's not good for the people of the united states. that's all i have to say about it. host: david, georgia, independent line, hi. caller: how you doing? host: good, thanks. caller: yes, thank you for c-span and the journal, as usual. but in answer to your question that you got up, anybody is free to sue anybody in the united states. but to answer a question from one of your previous callers, the congress can be sued because there is a breach because they are not in compliance with

article one, section two, of the constitution. therein lies the breach. that is a legal term and that is how you proceed to sue the congress. thank you very much. host: steve up next from florida, democrat's line. caller: yes, good morning. let's look at what they're suing the president about. they're suing the president because he used the executive powers to delay the implementation of the affordable care act, as far as businesses and major corporations. so now, they have two things. number one, they have to prove that they've been hurt, other than their egos. they have to prove to a court that the congress itself, the house of representatives, has a body, has been somehow hurt or damaged. chances are they won't be able to do that. number two, now that they're upset that he delayed the implementation of the affordable care act for corporations, now they basically are saying we don't like the fact that you

delayed it so we want you to implement it. which basically contradicts what they've been trying to do, just the fact that for 54 times they tried to repeal the law, now they're saying okay we want you to continue to implement the law. so they're basically making themselves look foolish just like they made themselves look foolish when they shut down the government because of the affordable care act. that's all i have to say. host: mike from richmond, virginia, republican line. hi. caller: yeah, hi. i tell you, i'm kind of disappointed in boehner. i really am. this president richly deserves to be impeached, but the political reality is that he can't be impeached. this idea of suing the president, i mean you have to ask yourself, who is going to receive the damages? what damages can be asked for? what's happened is that the president of the united states

has taken the constitution, wadded it up into a ball and throne it in a trash can and said i'm going to govern the country by executive fiat. and you know, you don't get to pass laws when you're the president, you don't get to remaining laws when you're the president. the last caller does make a valid point that the republicans were against this law and now they want him to enforce it. the fact of the matter is that this is more about whether or not we think it's a good law or bad law, there's a political component to that. but it comes down to whether or not congress actually has a function or whether it doesn't. if congress is only function is to just go along with the president because he's the president, i think that's pretty much the kind of thing that happens in socialist countries and countries that are, where congress says okay, mr. president, you do what you want and we're onboard with it.

there has to be some kind of reasoned opposition. but a lawsuit i don't see that's going to accomplish anything. host: that's mike from virginia. one of the things is the status of emergency funding for the situation going on on the border. joining us is the "national journal," a correspondent who covers these issues. good morning, miss johnson how are you? >> i'm fine, thank you. host: where do we stand as far as the house is concerned? >> it's a little unclear, but we know two things that we didn't know last night. one is that the house will vote on a $659 million emergency spending bill for the border, and if that bill passes, which is not entirely clear, then they will have another vote on a bill that will require the president to end his deferred action program for children who are undocumented who were brought here by their parents. this is something that

republicans have claimed is the reason why there is the surge at the border and they would like the president to stop it. so it's going to be a little bit of a drama today on the horse floor because the -- there are -- there is a wing of republicans in the house that don't want to pass a spending bill for the president without ending this particular program. and it's not entirely clear how many democrats will vote for it. it's looking like a lot of democrats will vote against it because the spending bill in and of itself also changes a trafficking law which they say would hurt the children who are coming across because it would effectively allow the government to turn them -- to turn them right back around and send them to these dangerous areas they're fleeing. host: stories this morning that some of the uncertainty on the house side comes because of a meeting that was held last night by senator ted cruz of texas. >> senator cruz has been asking that any of the spending that is

given, any extra money that is given to president obama must come with a mandate that he ends this particular program. and he managed to whip up a bunch of conservatives on the house side. keep in mind that there are people like steve king from high with a on the house side who said for a couple years now that there is no point in the house voting on anything involving immigration because it would just lead to a conference committee with the senate that would lead to immigration reform that he opposes. it's not like cruz had to spend a lot of time convincing these people. the only question is how many of them are there? i have heard, you know, ten, to 70 republicans who are just very upset with the president. cruz came over last night, had a meeting with these guys and the upshot of it was that the leaders who want to pass the spending bill agreed to also allow a vote on ending the deferred action program as a way of apiecing those conservatives. the only question is we don't

know whether it will actually work. host: if either of those measures don't go forward what happens with the situation on the southern border? >> i think it's a high likelihood the measure won't go forward,ish say that. essentially it will go forward as it has been. there is -- the problems at the border have to do with not enough resources being -- deal with processing these children. it's really an administrative issue. there is a whole series of procedures that have to happen once they are identified as minors who are not accompanied by an adult. and there's simply not enough, not enough beds for them, not enough people to help process them. and so what's going to happen is that the border patrol agency will have to shift money around to figure out how to deal with it. it's possible that they could go into debt, they could have overtime that they have to pay. it could be a real mess.

and it's not going to speed up the processing. but they'll continue to be acting as they are now. host: you said the senate had problems with its own version. what are they? >> so the senate has i different version, so it's a much bigger bill, a $2.7 billion bill. and the -- it was actually surprise to some of us yesterday when they moved forward on the bill. there was 11 republicans joined with democrats to say okay, we're going to allow this bill to go forward, but we have to be able to amend it. so in the 12 hours or so before everyone leaves, they're going to have to come up with a way to figure out which amendments they might allow votes on and whether or not -- if those amendments pass that could change things. it's a little up in the air about how it's going to work. again senator cruz wants an amendment on ending the deferred action program. to make matters more confusing the majority leader has suggested that they might want to vote on a comprehensive immigration reform bill, which

passed the senate last year, which would severely change the dynamics. so again, we're down to the final day in congress before they go away for five weeks, and things get nutty, so it's not entirely clear what will happen in the senate. host: is there anything else to tell the viewers about the process had a you find interesting or important to know? >> i think the viewers probably are rightly confused about what's going on in the border, and the thing that i find fascinating about this entire situation is that the house, granted it did not give -- is not offering nearly as much money as the president asked for. repair the president asked for $3.7 billion to deal with the situation. the house leaders made a genuine effort to troy and come up with something that the white house and the democrats could accept in the senas. the white house issued a veto threat against the house bill, which means that they're basically at a political standoff and the situation at the border, the surge is less

than it was a couple weeks ago, which is good news, but it's still going to be a mess down there. host: fawn johnson covers this issue for "national journal," thanks for your time. back to your calls on this vote yesterday to proceed with the lawsuit against president obama about his use of executive power. timothy, thanks for waiting, from north carolina, independent line, go ahead. caller: good morning, thank you for taking my call. they cut me off the last time i called. but this is ridiculous. you know, the biggest threat against america i think is parts of the republican house, and you know we're at war against, and this is war against obama. and how can we fight these wars when we look so divided? you know, during the bush administration this wasn't even heard of. it's really, really bad.

it's really, really bad. and everyone -- everyone that -- first of ambush passed a law to make it easy for those um i grants to come over here. but i just could not see how they can do this when we're going around telling the world to have democracies, and everything, and over here is -- host: timothy from north carolina. this is nora from new york, democrats line. caller: to use a phrase of joe biden it's a stall not to do anything, and they want to try and wait to see if they take back the senate so therefore they can proceed with impeachment. the man has not done anything. i don't know whether these people read our constitution and and it. it's high crimes and misdemeanors. what high crime has the president done? you know, what he has done is

try to do his job and all they have done is stand in the way and obstruct. they say we're -- i want to say to john boehner and the house of representatives where are the jobs? you don't want to pass anything. you don't want to help anybody. you hate everybody. you hate immigrants, you hate people of color. you hate poor people. and just totally ridiculous, and that's my opinion. host: part of the store every that he thats a look at the house version that appears in the "washington post," about specifically the term impeachment, saying the house speaker repeatedly said impeachment is not in the cards, immigration rules, the health care laws and raising wage of minimum federal contractors. if you go to the hill newspaper for those of you in the dc metro area that might get it in print form, and otherwise you'll see a

story seen also in the "washington post," along with a picture of the former president george w. bush and his father, a story this morning saying that it is the former president george bush that's writing a book about his father, saying the book will be published in november, crown publisher announced yesterday that the 43rd president has been working on the biography done out of the public's view. it will also touch on his influence on george w. bush. brian from virginia. good morning, democrat's line. caller: good morning, sir. i'm an objective person, and although i'm a democrat, go ahead and -- i think you'll have your day in court. so being an objective person, when george bush did the same thing at the time, you know, that's making do whatever they

want, i said why don't we sue them? so in the same regards i look at it if the republicans feel that president obama has -- go ahead and sue him. from then on people have to look at things objectively. i'm a soccer fan. when i see another team have an outside, it's an outside to me but when it happens -- that's how people usually do it, just looking at football. so in other words we have to change our perspective and look at it for what it is. if he's doing the wrong thing, i don't care if it's a republican or democrat, the president does not have to out step his bounds. host: "wall street journal" this morning, the headline gm victim's fund begins taking car injury claims. this is jeff bennett, the nation's largest automaker said it would pay from 20,000 to several million dollars to cover claims in certain vehicles in

which the air bag didn't deploy. lower in the piece, it quotes the gm compensation adviser, the story says about a dozen claims are expected to come in the first week. most claims will be followed by attorneys whose clients want to gauge whether the company's out of court settlement would provide. if they are satisfied with the amount, they yield the right to sue and we send them a check. if they aren't, they can go and litigate. that's in the ball street journal this morning. walter is up next from baltimore, maryland, independent line. caller: good morning, c-span and good morning america. i respect you, and i will not condemn your show with racial stupidity or are oh against but i will say this, this lawsuit is a joke. so is the republican conference and the united states capital.

there is nowhere in the world as a brother from new york was stating that you can hate everything. they have not been against -- from day one, january 2009, when they met, not far from the inachballin washington and decly were not going to let barack obama succeed at anything. when we go into the twilight of the second term they could be doing something. i want to say one thing. tip o'neill, ronald reagan, for all you race it out there, take a look at the compromise. if there's nothing -- two people could be no different than reagan and tip o'neill. but for them to continue to deny that the hatred for barack obama is because he's african-american or even partially african-american is a lie. i think the suit is going

nowhere, sir. host: that's walter. e-mails written by her, this is the "washington post" write up by josh chindrits saying she used an offensive term to describe conservatives who criticized the direction of the country according to e-mails released by house republicans wednesday. she also suggested that they could threaten the nation's future saying we don't need to worry about alien terrorists. it's our own crazies that will take us down. too many foreigns sucking, time to buy ammo and food and prepare for the end. caller: goo good morning. how you doing this morning? >> fine, thanks. caller: i agree with -- dealing

with the republicans, since the republican, which he is a clansman. host: what do you think of the suit? caller: i think it has no merit. the reason why i think it has no merit because the president as a whole executive party, which he can -- he can enforce the laws. he can't make the laws, he cannot appropriate money, but he can enforce the laws. now, congress had a chance 57 times to overcome this law. 57 times. it going to cost the taxpayer at least 70 some billion dollars, 70 something million dollars in order to overcome this lawsuit. it's ridiculous, don't make no sense. western you have a supreme court who votes 5-4 on party lines, they have -- what you expect the republicans going to do?

every time they get their tails between the legs they going to run to the supreme court. host: the house republican whip weighing in on yesterday's vote saying that tonight the house voted to uphold our oath to defend the constitution against the president's executive overreach. from judy in north carolina talking about the vote that took place yesterday, good morning on the independent line. caller: good morning. my thought on this is that if people would go back and study basic civics how the government is set up, we have three branches, and as far as i can see, this the republicans are passing laws, they're passing them and sending them to the senate. the senate is tabling them. if enough people would go and

look this up on the house web site they'll see this is has been evening. no one branch is supposed to be running the government. it is supposed to be a system of checks and balances. and i believe that with people i've talked to, the race factor is being played in. that shouldn't happen under any administration at any time. we do need to follow the rule of law. when republicans fought against the affordable care act, they kept stressing that it needed to be read. people needed to understand what was in it. and this lawsuit is a direct effect from that not happening. host: the federal reserve for the topic of the story in "newsday" saying the federal reserve will likely in a policy meeting with a lot of questions

unanswered. how it will do so, and when will the fed start reducing the investment? few hints about the answers to such issues yesterday when she testified to congress this month. that's from "newsday." there's a story in the financial times this morning, taking a look at the economy, the headline saying the economy is roaring back, its terms, with a 4% growth in the second quarter. from virginia, democrat's line. caller: good morning. god bless you this morning. i'm calling to give my opinion. the soviet president, that's wrong, that's evil, and i've never seen a congress like this that always was on vacation, more than any other time a president been in office.

to me, for them not doing the work they're supposed to be doing to help the people that's evil, as well. host: jean is from alabama, democrat's line. good morning. caller: good morning. thanks for taking my call. i voted from the -- i'm 68-years-old. the american people need to be educated somewhat, and exactly what's taking place. we need to -- out of congress, it's just gone too far. if we just look back six years ago, we'll see that hundreds of times both houses of congress passed laws. they passed laws, and over 100 times george w. bush made signing statements showing that

he wasn't going to enforce those laws, just by signing statements. and so we're suing the president for not doing what they didn't want to do? that doesn't make any sense. host: expanded story about the meeting of the federal reserve yesterday, saying the bank did vote to cut its bond buying program and left short term interest rate near zero. wall street expected the federal reserve to continue reducing the pace of its monthly bond buying program. the open market committee was not expected to move its target for short term rates. michelle is our last call this morning on this topic. new jersey, democrats line. caller: i'm so disgusted with the republicans and the suit and the whole thing. it is totally racist and the

republicans will stop at nothing. you know, flip-flopping, if somebody has an idea, that's a great idea but if president obama has an idea it's the most awful thing. that is baseless, ridiculous, and they're going to spend money we need for so many other things, i'm just so totally dust gus ted with the whole thing. host: two legislators joining us to talk about issues. you will hear first from representative keith ellison. later on, representative tom rice, republican of south carolina to discuss the activities to stop or limit president obama's activities. stories come up.

>> sunday on book tv's in-depth, former republican congressman from texas and presidential candidate ron paul, he's written more than a dozen books on politics and history. join the conversation as he takes your calls, e-mails and tweets live for three hours sunday, august 3, at noon eastern. tune in next month for mary francis berry. and in december, american enterprise institute president and noted musician arthur brooks, in-depth, on c-span-2's book tv, television for serious

readers. this weekend book tv and american history tv take you on a trip across the country. including the beauty of the point robert in washington, and the oyster industry of olympia, the history of r&d music as well as the restoration of the super saber f 100 jet fighter. hear the voices of the mormon tabernacle bier. are they're -- >> she was spout and so smart, and also so hity that she became -- she was always irresistible. i never saw even in old age, i gave her i didn't birthday party, and the washington

columnist was at the party and they sat together after dinner having coffee. she began to stroke his beard. afterwards. >> afterwards, he said heavens, i never met a 80-year-old that i wanted to leap into bed with. she had this see deck testify quality. >> on the life and career of clare booth luce. washington journal continues. host: our first guest of the morning is representative keith ellison. joining us to talk about several things. good morning. >> good morning, thanks for having me again. host: first and foremost recent piece in the "washington post," the headlines, achieve piece, what prompted this? guest: well, you know, as you know, there has been this

horrible conflict raging there in the holy land, two thirds of israelis live under fear of indiscriminate rocket fire, but people who live in gaza you seen the kids killed on the beach, we had 15 people killed when a shell hit a un shelter that had been noticed to the israeli defense force that's civilians were in there, and a power plant blown up over a thousand -- i think 1300 civilians on the palestinian side killed, about 52 israelis killed. this is a dreadful situation. i thought i needed to weigh in because i've been there two times since 2009 which is when the first cycle of conflict began. many times before, and i thought it was important to just point out one basic truth, and that is there are many, many people in gaza who have now connection to hamas at all, who do return to

the status quo as unacceptable. because gaza is completely quarantined, it's confined, you cannot leave. if you are a person from gaza and find yourself on the west bank and you're picked up by the israeli defense forces they will bring you back and the goods and services are tightly constrained, and just freedom of movement is tightly constrained. these people cannot leave the many intoing they're enduring, and that is one of the most distant populated areas in the world, which explains why you have these huge numbers of civilian casualties. almost unavoidable even if you had a very precise campaign, and, of course, there is evidence existing now that indicates that the bombing, the israeli bombing has not been particularly precise in all cases. so you know, i felt i had to weigh in, because, of course, you know, the public mind is being formed right now about how

the united states should engage this conflict. i thought i would offer my own views. host: a resolution that was brought, some of the resolution said passed by a voice vote specifically denouncing had a place's use of humans as a shield in the combat. guest: there are a number of problems with the resolution. one is there was really no mentioning of the suffering of the civilians, didn't talk about how the ordinary people who live in gaza are suffering. it denounced a un human life council investigation which has not even gun. it's not the proper role of the u.s. congress to doe announce an investigation on both sides that has not begun. not to denounce it from the outside. and i think it tends to undermine the diplomatic efforts by the administration. john kerry has been running all over the globe trying to get the

parties to stop shooting at each other and here the u.s. congress weighs in, you know, from a particular side, and i think it's not the right thing to do. host: what about the human shield argument? guest: i think that it's -- that's one of those things where the place is so densely populated that it's almost impossible to avoid hitting civilians. if there are cases where -- when i think human shield i think of a combatant putting a civilian in front of them and marching the civilian in front of them as the comwant as is carrying the gun behind them. i'm not aware of any situation like that. i will say i certainly wouldn't rule it out but i don't think the reason that we have so many civilian deaths is because -- i think the reason we have that is because of the dense population and the fact that the palestinians who live in gaza cannot leave gaza. i think that explains -- i've been there three times. i talk to people there. i was on the phone with people

in gaza just this week, so i just think that you can -- you can define human shield a number of ways. i think that israelis argue there have been bombs planted in civilian establishments, that is certainly possible. and if that happened that is absolutely deplorable and i think a human rights violation and a war crime. but i think the greater bulk of the casualty is more with the density of the population and the fact you cannot leave gaza. i think that is deplorable. we need a cease-fire, we need it now. that is one part of the resolution that i think is right. i agree with that part of it. i wasn't called upon to cast a vote because it was a voice vote. but you know, so often with these resolutions there are parts that i think are good, there are parts that i think are -- that leave something to be desired, and on the whole i thought that that resolution

needed a whole lot more work. host: just to clarify, you didn't participate in the voice vote? guest: no. there are voice votes and maybe only about ten people on the floor at the time. host: keith ellison, our guest to talk about current conflicts in israel with gaza, and specifically in gaza, taking a look at these issues and others. (202) 585-3880 for democrats. (202) 585-3881 for republicans, and (202) 585-3882 for independents. here is florida. our independent line, ken, good morning, go ahead. caller: good morning, gentlemen. i have a question and comment, referred to the un human rights organization, you know, sir, that in the history of that organization where iran and syria have been on that

particular council, and israel is denied to be on that council. they are not allowed to be on that council. they have never bought a war crime against any other country, china, libya, all of the others, they have never brought a charge against anyone other than israel. my comment is this, sir. next door in syria, 150,000 people are refugees. and iraq, isis is telling the christian population of mosul unless they convert to islam, and pay a penalty for not being islamic, they will be beheaded. they will be killed. obviously, in the history of the middle east, in jordan, in '72, killed 10,000 plo and

transferred them to lebanon. host: thank you. well, i want to thank ken for his point, because i think that much of what he says is absolutely right. the human rights situation in syria is deplorable, nothing short of war crimes, crimes against humanity. iraq what's going on in mosul, that is inexcusable assault on human dignity. and there are many others. and i think if ken were to check my record he would see that i'm very consistent. i've called out human rights violations in pakistan, in saudi arabia, in the united states. i've always been somebody who stands on the side of human rights. but i don't think that simply because there are other countries where there have been human rights abuses that we cannot simply investigate human rights abuses in this situation. in fact, israel itself investigates human rights abuses. it was an israeli inquiry, court of inquiry, that looked into the

role that was played. that is an israeli tribunal that came to the conclusion that there was neglect that happened there and this was preventible if they would have done something. i don't think we should fear an investigative death. we should insist it would be fair. we should make sure all parties have a right to participate in it. to simply say we're going to condemn it from the outset i think as imperfect as a record as the human rights council has been it's wrong to say we're not going to participate. host: next up is ken, florida, independent line. oh, i'm sorry, already took that. apologies about that. this is margaret from 11 on worth, kansas. caller: good morning, and thank god that you're speaking out about this. it's brought me to tears several times, as with pope francis and

the un people trying to help there. this is a genocide, and our name is in it. we're giving money for their protective shield in israel. and that's a country that should be progressing with its neighbors. it's more educated. they -- like they have been in the ghetto, they are doing it in gaza. we just sort of accept it around the people, like these people, palestinians, because they're arabs, somehow less -- or jesus is coming back to a certain place they believe in. so there is all this support from the u.s., which makes us around the world look horrible. we need to stop giving money for somebody doing these things, israel, and you know people try to fight back. and these people might not have any control of hamas, and we're just slaughtering them. and it's like -- it's the same as watching syria get killed and

not helping them. host: margaret, thank you. guest: i do want to say margaret is absolutely right about the people of gaza not being in control of hamas, that is so true. and that's one of the reasons why i write this op ed piece. since i've been to gaza i know that one of the things that i saw when i went to gaza the first time is a whole mess of kids. you see children everywhere. there was so many that i asked one of my guides from the united nations, what's the percentage of children in gaza and the person said at least half. and then you know there's about 6.5% senior citizens, more women than men. and then there's a lot of people who don't favor hamas and who are aligned with other people. so to say that you're going to punish gaza because of hamas is punishing people for circumstances that they had no control over, and so i think that that point is very well

taken. and i just think, though, that it's important for people to understand that israelis suffered with this situation. i've been there. and i met with israelis who don't have any animosity towards the people of gaza and yet they have to live under this rocket fire. this is a situation that calls for the international community to say the fighting must stop. the crease fire must take place now. and we need to move to end the blockade, to set up free flow of goods and services with inpensions and move back, we need to resume final status talks so that we can end this conflict for good and for all.

caller: well, it sounds like you do. this whole problem we have in the middle east between those 2 countries -- between the palestinians and the israelis -- could be solved real simple and everybody knows it. is not going along with it and that is hamas. no matter what happens, they want to take any proposals that are going to -- they don't want to take any proposals that are going to end this thing and make it right. to blame the israelis is crazy.

appreciate your right to offer that viewpoint. if you study the history of the conflict, one thing you'll find is that there are better actions each side could have taken. i'm not saying everything is the same, everything is equal. you are dealing with human beings. if you want to pass blame around, everybody can get a little bit of it. i think it is important for the united states to be an agent to bring the parties to a resolution. i want to say to the gentleman that the reason i called for an end to the blockade is that hamas charges money for transferring goods and services through the tunnels. you would deprive them of a source of revenue and control. also, through the tunnels, no one has any ability to know what is going through the tunnels.

rockets? rice? who knows? it could be either one and it is been both and many other things. if you have a checkpoint system where the only goods that cannot come in our weaponry, you will diminish the tunnel economy, you will diminish the smuggler economy, and you will make everyone safer on both sides. one of the problems with this whole conflict is if you speak up and try to make a point on behalf of israel's position, people say "oh, you are just biased for israel." if you try to speak up for the palestinians, people say, "oh, you are just for palestine." the territory that needs to be occupied is for people who want peace and security for both peoples, and that is the space i am trying to occupy right now. i know i could stay out of trouble with some people by simply staying out of this debate, but i don't think it

would bring any light to the conversation, so i've jumped into it. host: to that point, you were quoted in the daily beast -- asked about comments for democratic support for israel. given the nature of what happened -- i am alet me tell you, tremendous supporter of the professional journals and, just like any profession, politicians come away, there are some people who abuse -- politicians, whoever, there are some people who abuse the privilege they have. these are people who chase me down the hall and didn't introduce himself, didn't say who he was, and jammed a microphone in my face and said, "did israel go too far?" i said, look, i wrote an op-ed, read that because i don't know who you are, all my office -- call my office if you want to talk about this. and then i told him that i had multiple constituencies in my district who are very, very

concerned about this issue could i am going to make some off-the-cuff, out of the pocket, just because somebody is ruthie chasing me down the hall. i think the journalist was very unprofessional. but that is not reflective of the daily beast. the daily beast is an excellent institution i want to support with them and work with them. but there is always about apple in the barrel -- a bad apple in the barrel and this was one of those occasions. host: the headline is "even left-wing politicians can't quit israel." guest: it is inflammatory, not productive, and this particular individual had a particular story they wanted to write and did not want to write any of the story and tried to exploit me so that they could get clicks on their website, and i'm sorry that that happened. i want to be clear, i am happy to talk to the daily beast any time. not so happy with that particular journalist. host: independent line. this is donald. caller: i would like to ask the

congressman -- we are all struggling to find some common solution. he appears to be trying to find that middle ground. is something that is tossed around in my mind and maybe he can shoot it down. what we see in other conflicts in syria, lebanon, wherever placeds civilians being can'tger of war, why open one of the checkpoints in gaza and allow women and children to become real refugees? set up camps near the border and allow them to leave, women and children, and make the men stay behind, and maybe 17 and under to me for something -- and under can believe or something but why can't we get these children and

women out of danger? guest: let me tell you, you raised a good point. israel has a commitment to human rights, right? i know what i just said is going to inflame some people on the palestinian side. but, you know, israel is a nation that understands the importance of human rights, and i think this idea that you put out their warrants some of study, and there is a real and hamas -- and if israel and hamas have agreed to a humanitarian pause, what about a humanitarian exit for a little while so that people can at least be out of harms way? to say i adopted the idea because i haven't had a chance to think it all the way through, but i think the idea is certainly worth some study. from oklahoma, michael is up next.

democrats line. caller: good morning, sir. i've been following your career for the last couple years and i think you are an extremely well-informed individual. guest: i do, -- thank you, sir. caller: and i would like to ask -- the thing here in israel for a moment -- have you noticed that the charter for the tea party is almost a duplicate of klanharter for the ku klux in the '30s? guest: you know, i haven't had a chance to study both of those charters so i can't speak to that. -- our country has always been the land of opportunity. we believe in the american

dream, whether you are a white southerner or black northerner am a latino or asian, straight, gay, muslim, christian, jew. we believe that if you work hard you can make it in america. unfortunately, we have had a 40 years of wage stagnation and mounting debt. some people on the far political right are upset by these circumstances but they blame .ther americans what i say is that the tea party and the other folks need to have a conversation about how to reestablish the american dream for everybody. it is not about hating the government or hating obama. it is about looking very carefully at how we make sure all americans can prosper. that is why i stand for an increase in the minimum wage and having fair trade standards -- not just free trade but fair trade. we are happy that the president is signing an executive order today ending the practice of making federal contractors with a demonstrated history of wage theft -- early calling them into

account in a big way. that is why i am pleased he raised the minimum wage for federal contractors. we have got to have some real opportunity and i feel when i see the tea party folks out there that these are folks who don't have much good pay, who have a lot of problems and it would be great if we could get together and not discuss a cut or republican, left-right, but how do resellers the american dream for everyone. -- how to establish the mechanism for everyone. this says that the campaign raised a million dollars on appeal, fundraising because of this measure. guest: it is a predictable result. think about it -- if some he says we are going to sue the top of your party, wouldn't you appeal to your base and say we need help to stop them doing it? it is predictable and it is a self-defense measure, actually. it is unfortunate we have got

to waste our time this way. we have not reauthorize the not reauthorized unemployment insurance, 3.5 million people kicked off unemployment insurance since december. we are running out of money in the highway trust fund. host: what is the likelihood that will be done before break? guest: extremely low. and yet we have time to deal with these lawsuits. this is absurd, in my view. the president has been told we're not going to confirm your employees, we are not -- confirm intees, we are going to stop you at every turn, and this congress has been the least productive in history, and he says i will do what is in my purview and they say we are going to sue you? it is beyond the looking glass, man.

it is ridiculous to meet his obstructionism at its worst. if americans feel like this is ridiculous and they want to do something about it and go volunteer or support a party that is going to try to get something done, i cannot quibble with that. as far as the border is concerned, do you see changes coming to the 2008 law? guest: we all want to do something at the border but how do we do it? just militarizing the border more and reducing due process to people who are potentially victims of human trafficking is not the way to go. like the plan that president obama laid out and i think there should be more judges to process cases, more lawyers to process cases. we have to deal with these children in a humane way and any of them who have a legitimate claim for refugee status should be allowed should be given the same kind of accommodation that any refugee would get and the ones who don't have a legitimate

claim, they need to be humanely repatriated to their nation. that is what the president is advocating for and what to me seems like the right thing to do, and yet the bill that house republicans are offering, two thirds of it is militarizing the border and then it is producing did you process protections of -- reducing the due process protections of people who are victims of trafficking, which i cannot ever vote for. another disappointing situation where they don't meet the president halfway and basically just turned their back and fold their arms and we are getting ready to go out for the august recess and not much is likely to be done. host: our guest is presented of keith ellison, democrat from minnesota -- representative keith ellison, democrat from minnesota. from wisconsin, here is james. caller: thank you for taking my call. guest: good morning, james. caller: i've got a really good solution to the problem.

everybody around from mexico or south america. let's take palestine and take everybody from over there who wants to come to america. why aren't we jumping on the bandwagon with that if we are so concerned about south america, $3.7 billion we are asking for. we have all the money in the world so let's just add everybody onto the list. james, for, thanks, calling, but we are not allowing everyone in. we don't have all the money in the world. so, james, thanks for bridges getting into discussions one -- thanks for participating in the discussion this morning. host: would you like the president to take action specifically on the border and what do you want to see from? guest: that is a good question. i would like a little more time to think through. what i would like to see the president do is make sure we have more judges to process cases and then i would like to

see the president appeal to all 50 states to say how can we humanely accommodate these children as we process to figure out which have a legitimate .efugee claim and which do not that is what we should do. the president also can use his executive authority to work out issues on the ground in one obama, honduras, and el salvador to say, look, what is going on in your country that is fueling the exodus of your children, how can we work with you to make sure that these children can stay with their families where they belong. that needs to be actively pursued. i think it is a regional problem and we need to be talking to the mexicans and south americans to come up with a solution that allows them to not have to leader of nation -- if we their own nation for fear of death. the progressive caucus had a wonderful hearing -- covered by c-span, thank you -- where we had 3 children who were actual refugees from these three

countries who told a hair-raising, frightful stories of how their lives were in jeopardy. there you go. host: massachusetts, independent line. jeff, go ahead. caller: thanks for taking my call. the congressman made some comments -- the house is not -- house has done a lot of bills this session and really nothing has gone on in the senate. i wonder if you would address the lack of anything going on in the senate. it seems like they are going on vacation and i don't know what they are doing, playing politics. and i heard nancy pelosi make a comment about hamas being a humanitarian organization? rockets thismany she considered to be commensurate? -- humanitarian? guest: i didn't catch the last part of the question, but as far as the additivity of the house

of representatives under john boehner, i am there every day and i know what is going on with my job just as americans know what is going on with their job come and we have nothing on the m bank, nothing on unemployment insurance, and republicans have passed bills that have no chance of getting anywhere in the senate. they are not designed to pass. they are designed to send a message but not to pass. i stand by the statistics which proved conclusively that this house of representatives is incredibly unproductive. let's take the immigration fight for a moment. the senate on a bipartisan basis passes and immigration bill. the house doesn't have to take it, but john boehner gets up and says he doesn't trust president obama so they are not going to do anything. i urge an appeal to my friends and neighbors from both sides of the aisle to look objectively at

the lack of productivity of this house majority. it is appalling to me. if you just take the example of immigration reform or the xm bank, import-export bank, the highway trust fund. -- we see political messaging but we don't see much real action to serve the interests of the american people. one more call, and as howard, leesburg, virginia, republican line. caller: ok. i really appreciate you taking my call. i am a veteran from vietnam them all the way through desert shield-desert storm. i retired in '95. i'm just -- i have so many itty-bitty little questions that i'm not quite sure what people are thinking about. do we believe israel when they say that there were tunnels made , andlebanon into israel

thatthey were trafficking way -- like they could be doing here in the states if they got organized -- do we believe that if they didn't have the weaponry to protect themselves, that israel would exist even today? and that israel sits in a melting pot of nothing but anti-israel jews. and do we think back to world war ii, what nazi germany did to the jews that we finally had to evenand save the jews, though that wasn't exactly the reason we enter the war -- host: we have to leave it there. guest: let me say, howard, first of all, i think you said do we believe that israel -- do we believe israel when they say there are tunnels into lebanon? there may or may not be tunnels into lebanon. the issue is tunnels from gaza

to israel or egypt. of course we do. i have seen the tunnels. they are there. nobody disputes the existence of the tunnels, i don't dispute israel's right to block those tunnels. number two, does israel need to be able to weaponry to defend itself? of course. every d natio -- every nation has a duty to protect its citizens. that is not the question. the question is have the civilian casualties been more excessive than they needed to be? that is a fair question to ask. yes, israel has taken steps to avoid some civilian casualties, but there are others that it is hard to explain how they happened. is in a region where there are people who are very hostile to it. that is a fact. but egypt has a peace agreement -- israel has a peace agreement with egypt, toward and has a

peace agreement with israel, the syrian border has been quiet for many, many years him and the lebanese order, the last big conflagration was 2006 and small things since then. the arab peace initiative engaged the whole arab world in which there was a peace offer with a return to '67 borders with swabs and a full exchange of diplomats. so yes, it has been a conflict zone, it does not need to stay one. the united states needs to continue to work for peace and most israelis and palestinians want it and we can be the agent to help it happen but it will take a lot of persistence, but it is doable. host: are presented of keith ellison -- representative keith ellison, democrat from minnesota, thank you. guest: thank you. host: if you are interested in this topic, at the atlantic council today, an interview with palestinian, former

prime minister. that will be live at 3:30 today and you can watch that live on c-span3. our next guest, representative tom rice, are public and from south carolina, discussing limiting president obama's authority. first, a news update from c-span radio. israeli prime minister benjamin engineer who says the military will dismantle the hamas tunnel network in the gaza strip, in his words, "with or without a cease-fire should he says he will not except any truce that will not allow israel to complete that mission. he says it has been used to carry out attacks inside israel. an update on ukraine -- after days of indifference by pro-russian separatists and fighting in eastern ukraine, an international team of investigators has reached the site where ablation jetliner crashed. -- a malaysian jetliner crashed. experts from the netherlands and australia are expected to focus efforts on retrieving bodies.

the aviationfrom by hopes -- body hopes to visit the site and hand over all relevant material they find to the dutch delegation. as congress meets to finish their work before a five-week recess, some lawmakers are starting their day at the white house. president obama has invited leaders of some committees to discuss national security and foreign affairs issues, including the ongoing military campaign by israel in gaza. congressional aides say that senate majority leader harry reid and minority leader mitch mcconnell will be in attendance, as a lot of top democratic senators from the armed services, foreign relations, and intelligence committees. those are some of the latest headlines on c-span radio. american artifacts on american history tv. national to the security archives at george washington university reveals classified documents about the

gulf of tonkin and vietnam. 50 years ago this week, congress passed the gulf of talk and resolution, giving president johnson broad powers to wage war in southeast asia. watch more american history tv next week. while congress is in recess, american history tv will be in primetime monday through friday 8:00 p.m. eastern, featuring events from watergate on its 40th anniversary. american history tv on c-span3. "washington journal" continues. host: our guest now, representative tom rice, republican from south carolina. good morning. guest: thank you for having me, pedro. it is a real honor to be here. host: tell me about the lawsuit against president obama. what do you think the merits of this lawsuit are? guest: i i think it has a lot of merit. it is something i've been working on for year. it is not something i came to congress to work on.

i came to congress to work on economic development and jobs, but when the president started making his own law in violation of the constitution, i wanted to bring balance back to the government. host: do you have your own efforts on executive power? guest: the bill that got passed yesterday is an evolution of a bill filed in december that had 120 cosponsors in the house that said the president was a violating his duties under the constitution that says he will faithfully execute the laws. 4 separate areas where he had done that clearly and one of those is the one that the house ended up passing yesterday. host: the elements of that bill are? guest: the elements -- host: what are the high points? guest: upon majority vote of the house, it house bring a lawsuit

against the president requiring him to comply with the constitution that he faithfully execute the laws of the land. host: the papers this morning take on the question of whether the court will actually take this up come if it has standing, as it is known in legal terms. do you think that is the case? guest: there is a lot of questions going back and forth about standing and there are a number of cases in the past where standing has been upheld and it turned out. most people -- upheld and turned down. most people who support this cite or group of disaffected congressmen -- not the house -- disaffected congressmen who lost a vote brought a lawsuit to protest a line item veto by president clinton. it is a group of congressmen who lost a vote. as anthe house

institution is bringing a lawsuit for basically vote nullification. if the president has the power to change the law unilaterally or to decide what parts of law he is going to enforce and what parts doesn't that she doesn't, there is no need for congress. somebody who can make the law enforced the president is not -- who can make the law and enforce the law is not a president, he is a king. host: cameron from argyle, texas, democrats line. on the lawsuit, towards the president, i just think it is not fair. they have been doing this for years and it just needs to stop. guest: well, i agree with you, it needs to stop. the constitution very clearly

sets out the roles of the executive ranch and the legislative branch. in article one, the power to make laws is reserved to the legislative branch. in article two, the power to enforce the law is reserved to the executive branch. the president has decided he is not bound by that. he has decided he can make law and he has clearly said that that he says that if congress refuses to act on my parties, were grounds of their priorities -- my priorities come regardless of their priorities, i whacked on my own that -- i will act on my own. our forefathers fought and died to break the bonds of monarchy and have freedom. our person who can't make it the law and enforce -- who can make the law and enforce the law is a king. our forefathers fought and died

for that. my friends across the aisle arguing that, gosh, we shouldn't be spending money on a lawsuit to sue the president to return our government back to what the constitution designed, but my answer to that is our forefathers paid a lot for that very freedom. they paid a lot for that very framework that protects our freedom. a lot of them paid everything they had, including their lives. host: the comments you just made are reflected in comments reflected in dana milbank's piece in "the washington post." "it is a political loser to talk impeachment so republicans use other words such as treason, monarchy, and usurpation. 'our forefathers recognized that one man who can make the law and enforce the law is not a president, yo he is king -

-'" that is you. guest: that's right. i am not trying to impeach the president. i think this is the sharpest, least damaging to a that we can tool thatst damaging we can use. all i am asking is that the judicial branch is supposed to resolve conflict. we are asking the judicial branch to decide if the president has the power to do what he's doing. these things affect people in their everyday lives. people don't realize that what the president done affects them every single day. the expansion of the environmental laws, the war on coal, that cost the average consumer $40, $50 a month on their utility bills. he didn't go through congress as he should have. he decided he should make his

own law and a cost everyday taxpayers, middle-class people, what he dollars, $50 a month -- $40, $50 a month. the expansion of the clean water act, all these things run up the cost of gasoline over the price that they would have otherwise been. the data president took office, the price of gasoline was $1.86 a gallon. now it is double that. i believe the and administration wants is off of fossil fuels and want us using alternative energy, and so do i could i think that is a great idea. the question is, what price do you pay for it. if gas is two dollars a gallon these alternative energies do not make sense. the president is unilaterally making law, and it is costing you out of your wallet every month, a couple hundred dollars a month. on the affordable care act, the president -- i don't know what

the law is today because the president hasn't told us. he changes his mind about once a week on exactly what the law is. bym a tax lawyer and cpa profession, and what got me started down this road was on the president said i am going to unilaterally delay the employer mandate. the supreme court specifically tax. that the mandate is a the president is going to say i have the power to decide when and to whom i can apply a tax. really he has no such power. -- clearly he has no such power. if he has the power, he could say i don't like the highest tax bracket so i will not apply it, or i will make it higher, or i will apply it to my enemies but not my friends. that is absolute tyranny and that is where we are. the president issued 1300

mandates, to these and this is a tax and he is saying i want to apply the tax to this group of people over here but not this group over here. he has absolutely no power to do that. that is why that is the one issue that is being put forth in this lawsuit. i am very, very anxious to see how the court rules on this. host: north carolina, democrats line. caller: hello? host: you are on. go ahead. caller: i have a problem with sending children back over the border, and on the other hand, children over there in the middle east are being slaughtered. ?nd where is our humanity where do we apply truth and justice in this world? i am very disturbed over a number of issues, and i don't want to use all the time talking about it.

how in the world do you have treason enter into this, and other things that are applied to the president? i think the president is handling the job very good. i agree withcecil, a lot of what you said could i don't agree with the last part, that the president is handling his job very well. i think it is the opposite. he has shown a startling lack of leadership. but going back to the issue of the border that you started your question with, i absolutely agree with you. my heart goes out to these children that are there. but this again is precisely why the lawsuit is necessary. this is the direct result of the president ignoring the law, making his own law, specifically making his own law in violation of the constitution that has

attracted all these children to the border. congress considered and failed to act upon the dream act years ago that would have made here as who came children, given them a pathway to citizenship. the president decided unilaterally that it is not my concern if congress acts on it or not, i am going to unilaterally change immigration law and allow these children to stay here and give them the ability to work in the united states legally. he has no power to do that. but when he does that and get on television and says i have a pen and a phone and i'm going to do it anyway, and he attracts people from all over the world, primarily central and south in poverty andve want to come to the united states regardless of what our immigration laws, this is an entirely foreseeable process.

of course these people are going to come. he is saying i don't really care what congress does, i will make my own law and if they come here as children they can stay and they can work. he created this crisis. -- iis just one more way think the people's issue with this lawsuit is they don't see how it directly affects them. directlyng you, it affects your pocketbook in the health care, it directly affects your pocketbook in fuel prices, and utility prices, and the president created this border crisis because again, he acts as a king. he doesn't act within constitutional norms. he wants to create and enforce the law and we are seeing the chaos that results. host: miami, florida. this is pablo, republican line, for representative tom rice. caller: yes, hello. there is a simple solution. the republicans hold the house.

all you have to do is have the guts to defund a couple of things and the president will cooperate with you, but if you don't have the guts to do fun things -- defund things, this will continue. host: what would you defund? caller: whatever. if the president don't like it, it until he comes to his senses. we triedll, pablo, that last october and the public didn't think much of it. is a blunt tool, it ripples through the economy, and it is very, very expensive. what we're doing here is far more targeted and far more effective. this will have no negative effects on the economy. all we want to do is we want to return the president to the constitutional framework that the founders set forth. basically, the founders set forth a fairly weak executive.

cities and counties and states across the country have the same type of framework in their constitution. and they can decide whether they want to have a strong or weak executive. the president's office was such a weak office, and over centuries, and a lot of it comes ingk to congress ced authority to the president. what we need to do is gradually -- we need to return to constitutional norms where congress makes the law and the president enforce his law. host: the president was speaking in kansas city, missouri, and spoke not only about the economy but he also addressed the law suit and what he thought of it. we will get your comments on it. guest: happy to. [video clip] , they think about this

have announced they are going to making executive actions to help people. they are mad because i'm doing my job. way, i fold them -- i have told him, i would be happy to do it with you. the only reason i'm doing it on my own is because you don't do anything. [applause] but if you want, let's work together. recognizesrybody it's a political stunt, but it's worse than that, because every vote they are taking like that is a vote they are not taking to actually help you. when they have taken 50 votes to repeal the affordable care act, that was time that could've been spent working constructively to help you on some things.

not: so, representative, only saying that it is a political stunt but that every similar vote like that takes away a vote to help the american people. your thoughts on that statement from the president? guest: i think that is a political stunt and it is a complete fabrication to say that i want to do it with you and the only reason i am doing it is because you don't do anything, is just absolute untruth. the house passes bill after bill after bill. close to 350 bills that have by the house and discovers commerce that are gathering dust on harry reid's desk right now. president and the talked weekly, daily, i don't know, and they are the ones who decide nothing is going to happen. the senate refuses to take up these bills and i think they talk on the phone and say "we're

just not going to do anything and women on house republicans." -- blame it on house republicans." it is absolute nonsense and a political stunt, complete fabrication. on thee 40-odd bills economy, there have got to be one where it we have common ground, let's talk about this. they don't want to do that or push anything forward for the american people. they want to get up and make speeches like that and say the house isn't doing anything so i have to act on my own. that is plain nonsense. host: debbie, independent line. caller: good morning. your name again, sir? i'm sorry. guest: tom rice. caller: a lot of times politicians quote polls and they say "the american people" -- i don't know who they are, either -- but i don't know any polls on

how the american people feel about this lawsuit. i mean, i don't hear you talk about it. the polls say the american people want wages increased, that people want unemployment compensation, the polls say people want jobs. the polls say that republican popularity is worse than the president of the united states. this is an about president obama for me, i don't care about any of that -- this isn't about president obama for me, i don't care about made it affect them but i've never heard him say he doesn't care. would love for you -- you just had it represented at ellison on. i would love for both of them to be on at the same time. i want to hear both sides of the argument, because this partisan stuff -- even the callers that call in, they are all partisan,

pro-o, con, whatever. i want to hear everybody. host: thank you for the suggestion. representative rice? guest: i agree with a lot of what he said on people thinking that jobs and the economy is the most important thing. this lawsuit thing is something i feel like i was forced into by the president taking me -- taking these overreaching actions that threaten the fundamental freedoms in this country, and that is what gave us our prosperity, and that has absolutely direct effects on jobs and the economy. i think what the president has done with his unilateral actions have hurt jobs and the economy right now. changing the affordable care act on a weekly basis. employers have to plan.

they are not like the government, which is working basically on six-month timelines now. sophisticated as this is our planning years in advance and they have to know what the rules are -- sophisticated business is are planning years in advance and i have to know what the rules are. they don't know what the rules are because the president changes the rules unilaterally every week. how can these businesses possibly plan for that? if you don't think this has adverse effects on the economy, you have blinders on. the affordable care act specifically, with the , thisloyer limitation incentives for people to hire, with the 30-our limitation. thingsdon't think these affect the economy, you have blinders on.

when the president drags his feet on permitting for oil toloration or pipelines transfer oil or puts new regulations on railroads and all the sets of things, that absolutely affects the supply of fuel and it drives the price of fuel up. the effective that is that it takes money out of your pocket. every year household incomes .ave declined for six years in a row, household incomes have declined. and at the same time, the president's unilateral actions, , but the to congress unilateral executive authorities he is issuing, have raised the price of wrestling, raised the price of utilities and house, have raised the price of your health care.

at the same time that his policies are driving down your income, they are increasing expenses. those are related to energy. the president wants us off of fossil fuels and he is driving up the cost of fossil fuels to forces on to alternative energy. this directly affects you. i know that it is not -- you c to d go from a to b to affect you,how it but this action is necessary. i fight every day to get our economy going and to create jobs. the house has passed over 40 bills for jobs and the economy. and the president and harry reid have a plan that they are not going to allow these things to, and then they point and say that it is a do-nothing congress. it is nonsense. host: what would you ultimately like to have the court decide? guest: whether the president's

actions are constitutional or not, and i can tell you they're not constitutional. host: if they rule in your favor, then what? thet: i presume that president -- the courts have a mechanism through their orders to enforce those old people in contempt -- and hold people in contempt. the house has been allowed standing any court has enforced house orders before, specifically with subpoenas. spano, therehazi have been subpoenas and they say i don't have to. representative tom rice with us before that house comes in at 9:00. guest: what a pleasure it is to be here. thank you for having me. host: take you for being here. south comes from the on and they talk obama, obama,

obama, and they have the poorest states in the nation so why would we listen to anything they ?ay they're not doing right, they're just thinking about things, and that is their motto thank you. guest: i don't hate the president. i would love to work with him. he talks about working with people but makes no effort whatsoever. south carolina is one of the most competitive states in the country. in a lot of states are doing what they can. if you look at places like texas amalek south carolina, like , they change the right ,nfrastructure, tort reform

they are protecting businesses from around the world. -- boeinguilding the is building the entire 787 in south carolina because of actions south carolina sticking to make themselves more business friendly. the problems these businesses have is they're competing for a declining pool of jobs because the country is not competitive. i have worked extensively with the professor from harvard who is an expert in competitive theory and a national competitiveness. he represents countries from around the world and he has things that we need to do to make our country more competitive. top of the list is tax reform. the house ways and means committee issued a proposal for tax form months ago. it up yet.en i am anxious to take it up and we will see action on that early in the next congress. i wish we could take it up right now. a lot of people say they we should not do these overarching

controversial things before the election. if we do the right thing for the country we don't have to worry about the election. that is just my opinion. host: headline in the "financial times" talks about the u.s. economy. it prompts a statement off of twitter. host: what do you do with those numbers? guest: ok, that is wonderful and i would love to see that continue and grow from there. the truth is that a 2% per traction -- you average that out and it comes out to about 1% over the last numeral two quarters. and the employment rate, everybody knows, is very misleading. record numbers of people have given up trying to look for work and are no longer in the workforce. look, we have had the worst recession we have had since the depression six years ago.

we should've had a huge snapback by now. if you look at every recession that has occurred in the last 60 years we should've had a huge snapback. we haven't. the growth has been muted by washington, d.c., it has been muted by vastly expanded regulations, it has been muted dodd-frank, the affordable care act, environmental laws. washington has muted our economy. the tax code was done 60 years ago and at that time it was competitive with the rest of the world, with the rest of the world has left us behind. we have the highest corporate tax rate in the world, we have these things called inversions come which are simply fancy words for taking more megan jobs overseas. -- american jobs overseas. the president says that these jobs are not patriotic, which is just nonsense postop if you have

a choice of whether you pay a versus 40%, you have no obligation to pay a 40% tax rate if you're acting within the law. it is like if you are going to you cano a street, decide you will live on this side of the street and paid $200 a year and decide pay $100 a year. what are you going to do? we are in a global environment. rhetoric is not going to change that. people are going to go where they can compete most effectively. if these companies don't do that, they will lose in the world, because companies that are located where they can compete most effectively will beat other companies that don't choose to do that. it is a matter of survival for them. hasan fix it, and dave camp come up with a proposal to fix it and we need cooperation from the senate and from the president. from north carolina

and he is on our republican line. caller: my name is joseph. veteran, u.s. army. why is there such an inability, now that we have a majority, why is there such an inability to get anything done, and if the president is not helping, whatever, i understand that. but i believe that since we have the majority now we should try t o do more for limited government, lower taxes, lower budget. why is there such an inability for the republicans to do --get anything done now that we have a majority? also, i really do not want you to say it is all president obama's fault. i really don't believe that. john boehner always says that but i really do not believe that. also, surpluses you are in a neighboring state, i would rush sir -- sir, since you are in a neighboring state, i would like

your opinion on the federal reserve. i personally believe it is a terrible institution that loaned our government money on interest. guest: well, with respect to the first part of your question, we are getting things done. the house is getting a lot done. bills,se has passed 350 i believe is about the number, in this congress, many dealing with an array of issues that need to be dealt with in the country. 40-plus of those bills deal with things that would promote jobs and build our economy. the fact that harry reid and president of our refuse to take it up -- president obama refused to take it up, we don't have the ability to force them to do that. we don't have an army who can say "harry reid, you have to take these bills up." that is not the way our democracy works, the way our

constitutional republic works. the framers when they designed the constitution made it difficult to pass laws. the modus operandi of harry reid and the president is a block any action the house is taken and the president takes executive action because he gets more his way that way. you can see the results of that. a lot of these crises we face in this country today with rising prices, reduced household income, the crisis of the border, are all a result of the president past unilateral actions, which are holding our economy back. that house works every single day and gets a lot done in terms of passing bills. there's nothing we can do to force harry reid harry reid and the president to take us up. caller also wanted your views on the federal reserve. guest: the federal reserve has

its place in our economy. perhaps they have exceeded authority also. i voted for a bill to audit the federal reserve, but again, that is not likely to come up anytime soon. host: claude on our independent line. caller: i have 2 subjects. number 1, 350 bills have been passed by the house. where can i read of those bills? i would like to know what those bills say, what they are concerned about. my second subject is why would you want boeing to move to south carolina? they could move overseas and save a lot of money. it seems to me that you shouldn't want them to move to south carolina, that it is a dumb thing to do. sure -- il, i am don't know exactly where you go to look to see a list of every build that the house has passed.

there is probably a website that the house maintains where you can look at every one of those. the republican congress last week pushed a list of the bill johnson that the economy and i'm confident you could go to the house republican website -- that build jobs and the economy and i am confident you could go to that verbal and website -- house republicans outside. i'm not sure i understand your question about boeing. i am very concerned if we don't make our -- the united states is always led the world in aerospace engineering. we have great companies that employ millions of americans -- mcdonnell douglas, boeing. but i promise you that if we don't work to make ourselves competitive, you will see either of these companies looking to expand production elsewhere, or you will see that if our companies are behind the eight ball because they have to pay more in taxes than the companies

, if airbus in france, china their expenses are high here it will be difficult for them to compete in the world. this is absolutely a question of the survival of american jobs. host: caller, if you want to go to our website, cspan.org, and type in "bills" we could give information there. there is a website called thomas thomas.loc.gov, and it gives you lots of information on bills that pass in the house and the senate. david, north carolina, democrats line. caller: good morning. guest: good morning. caller: one of the things i wanted to mention, when you talk about all the legislation that has been sent to the senate that harry reid and the president refused to do anything about, that goes both ways. that is the pot calling the kettle black. there is overwhelming bipartisan

support for the senate immigration bill that has been sent to the house and speaker boehner and republicans won't even bring it to the floor for a vote. that is one point. i want to know what republicans in the house are going to do when this lawsuit reaches its inevitable end, which is going to be failure. are you going to sue the justice department for not doing their job? thank you very much. guest: with respect to the second part of your question, i don't think that the lawsuit will end in failure. certainly standing is an issue. but i think we will prevail on that i think the court will take it up and very clearly what the president is doing with respect to differ world -- deferral of the tax of the employer mandate is absolutely outside his purview. he has absolutely no right to impose a tax on certain things and not on others and decide when he imposes a tax and when he is not.

the law gives him no ability to do that. it is unconstitutional. what is the first pardon? -- first part again? host: i forgot the first part but on the topic of the lawsuit -- guest: it was on the senate immigration bill. the problem with respect to the house taking that is that those republicans don't agree with the pathway to citizenship or any kind of amnesty. i aminion on that is that all about american competitiveness. re-think i do in congress -- everything i do in congress is looked at through the glass of merrick and competitiveness. most industrialized countries in the world, the bulk of innovation is based on skill set. you cannot immigrate to that country unless you have the skill set the country needs. our immigration system was designed decades ago and is and i competitive. familyrds is based on

relationships so that when people come across the border -- the president won't enforce our immigration laws -- then they bring their families over and we end up importing a lot of people who have low education, low skill set, and end up on our social safety net. it is completely and i anti-itive -- completely competitive and it runs our debt up. i want to make sure that my children and your children and grand children, when they get a job, what i want to do is make this country more competitive. when i talk about immigration reform, i'm talking about getting off this family-based relation thing -- we need to have some of that, but we need to focus more on what every other industrialized country in the world does, skill set. host: thank you for joining us. we go to the house of representatives. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2014] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute] randy hultgren to act as speaker pro tempore on this day.

signed, john a. boehner, speaker of the house of representatives. the speaker pro tempore: the prayer will be offered by the guest chaplain, reverend dr. bakersfield, california. the chaplain: let us pray. father, we thank you for your sovereignty and providence in each person's life who stands before me and more importantly before you. grant them today your guidance in their deliberations. we acknowledge that our country is facing serious challenges and our world is in crisis. give this body the courage that is necessary to lead. rather than allowing our ideology to further divide us, may you, father, unite us in our shared love for this great nation. give the members the wisdom to help the oppressed and the weakest among us as well as the courage to lead by conviction rather than by mere practicing

mat tism. -- pragmatism. we ask for your mercy and grace. give us the will to acknowledge and to repent of all wrongs. we thank you for the values upon which this country was founded and for your continued blessing through the years. but we ask today, father, for our country, that our best days would not be behind us but before us. we ask all these things in the strong name of jesus. amen. the speaker pro tempore: the chair has examined the journal of the last day's proceedings and announces to the house his approval thereof. pursuant to clause 1 of rule 1 the journal stands approved. for what purpose does the gentleman from south carolina seek recognition? will gilbert mr. speaker, -- mr. wilson: mr. speaker, pursuant to clause 1 of rule 1, i demand a vote on agreeing to the speaker's approval of the journal. the speaker pro tempore: the question is on agreeing to the speaker's approval of the journal. those in favor say aye. those opposed, no, the ayes have it. the journal stands approved.

mr. wilson: mr. speaker, i object to the vote on the grounds that a quorum is not present and i make a point of order that a quorum is not present. the speaker pro tempore: pursuant to clause 8 of rule 20, further proceedings on this question are postponed. the pledge of allegiance will be led by the gentleman from pennsylvania, mr. marino. mr. marino: i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the gentleman from california, mr. mccarthy, is recognized for one minute. mr. mccarthy: thank you, mr. speaker. i'm both honored and humbled to welcome my good friend, pastor roger spradlin, as roush guest chaplain this morning. holding a doctrine in ministry and a leader in the southern baptist community, he has served the valley baptist church in bakersfield, california, since 16983. he has a congregation that has

grown to 8,000 followers. a family that my wife and son belong to. i have watched pastor roger do many things for our community. i've watched him use his grace, his humility, his ability to bring people together. but the part that inspires me the most is i've watched him in time of need and time of tragic situations in our community, to help us heal. i've watched him officiate and bring joy to a husband and wife being married. watched him lift up those in harm's way. but most importantly, i watched him always bring the grace and inspire others. so with a great deal of joy on a special day today that i'm able to have my friend, an individual that helped change my life be a part of all our lives. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from california yields back. the chair will entertain up to

five further requests for one-minute speeches on each side of the aisle. for what purpose does the gentleman from pennsylvania eek recognition? without objection, the gentleman from pennsylvania is recognized for one minute. mr. marino: mr. speaker, i rise today to recognize the 75th anniversary of little league baseball. little league was bounded by carl in my hometown of willamsport, pennsylvania, in 1938. little league's success is because of the dedication of the volunteers, coaches, organizers and especially youth that participate in this organization around the world. for the past 75 years, little league timelessly worked to grow the sport of baseball and participation of youth in physical activity. since its inception over 35 million kids have participated in little league baseball with 2.4 million children playing in over 80 countries of the world in over 7,000 programs. this year some of these 11 and

12-year-old boys and girls will join in south willamsport, pennsylvania, to celebrate their accomplishments as they play in the 68th little league world series. i'm honored to offer my congratulations to little league baseball and i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from pennsylvania yields back the balance of his time. for what purpose does the gentleman from rhode island seek recognition? mr. cicilline: mr. speaker, i ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the gentleman from rhode island is recognized for one minute. mr. cicilline: mr. speaker, hardworking american families deserves a congress that's working hard for them. unfortunately, under republican leadership, the 113th congress is set to be the least productive congress in history. let me say that again. speaker boehner is presiding over what will be the least productive congress in history. mr. speaker, leadership comes with responsibility. rather than working with democrats to enact legislation that will strengthen the middle class and expand economic opportunity for all americans, my friends on the other side of the aisle are obstructing progress and suing the president. democrats have a different plan. instead of blocking legislation

that will grow the economy, we have a plan that will jump-start the middle class. it has concrete proposals that will bring jobs back to america, provide women equal pay for equal work, raise the minimum wage, provide emergency unemployment benefits and help millions of students afford college. mr. speaker, we have serious challenges facing our nation. let's put aside partisan differences and get to work to jump-start the middle class and create jobs. let's not adjourn. let's cancel the recess and stay here and do the work the american people expect us to do. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from rhode island yields back the balance of his time. for what purpose does the gentleman from south carolina seek recognition? mr. wilson: mr. speaker, i ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute and to revise and extend my remarks. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the gentleman from south carolina is recognized for one minute. mr. wilson: mr. speaker, the world has watched violence in the middle east escalate due to hamas rocket attacks. the bottom line is that israel under the trusted leadership of prime minister benjamin netanyahu has the absolute right to defend its citizens

from murderous attacks. hamas is a terrorist organization attacking to achieve one goal, bring death and destruction to the people of israel. the hamas threat is, quote, we love death more than you love life, end of quote. hamas continues to launch thousands of rockets into israel to -- and create a network of terror tunnels. sadly, palestinian civilians have died because hamas uses the innocent as human shields. the united states must stand by our greatest ally in the region. anything but total support of israel by the president signals weakness for future attacks on the american people. terrorist threats are increasing despite the president's denial. the president's actions to defeat terrorism are more significant than words. in conclusion, god bless our troops and we will never forget september 11 and the global war on terrorism. rest in peace, earl brown, a south carolina patriot. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from south carolina's time has expired.

for what purpose does the gentleman from new jersey seek recognition? without objection, the gentleman from new jersey is recognized for one minute. mr. sires: mr. speaker, i rise today to speak about the recent loss of sheriff ralph rolic. he was born and raised in elizabeth, new jersey. after serving over nine years in the u.s. marine corps as an infantryman and drill instructor, he joined the elizabeth police department. he worked for almost 20 years, rising up to the rank of lieutenant. in 1977 he was selected as sheriff of union county and it was in the midst of serving his 13th term. this gave him the distinction of being the longest serving sheriff in the history of new jersey. while serving as a sheriff for union county, he implemented several programs designed to make our community safer. he worked hard to establish unions regarding missing persons, domestic violence and search and rescue. i want to express my deepest condolences to all who knew and care for sheriff rolic.

and my gratitude for the years he devoted to keeping our community safe. and i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from new jersey yields back the balance of his time. for what purpose does the gentleman from new jersey seek recognition? without objection, the gentleman from new jersey is recognized for one minute. >> thank you, mr. speaker. i rise this morning to draw attention to the recent bipartisan accomplishments here in the house of representatives. mr. lance: these include passage of legislation to keep the internet tax-free, a highway bill that will keep more than 700,000 construction workers on the job, a series of education bills that will give students and their families the tools they need to help make postsecondary education more accessible and affordable and legislation that will reform the veterans administration. the house has also acted on an energy bill that would make it easier to ship our natural gas overseas and put much-needed pressure on russia as well as a tax measure that will allow u.s. companies, large and small, to innovate, create jobs

and increase wages. these are just a few of the more than 300 house-passed bills, including more than 40 jobs bills that wait for action in the senate of the united states. these bipartisan measures would benefit american families and businesses. they all deserve an up or down vote in the united states senate. mr. speaker, i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from new jersey's time has expired. for what purpose does the gentleman from washington seek recognition? without objection, the gentleman from washington is recognized for one minute. i mcdermott: mr. speaker, come today to this floor on what i believe is a very sad day for this house. there is no place left safe for children. yesterday and today, we have condoned and endorsed activities which would put children at risk. children are not safe in

mosques, in churches, in u.n. protected schools, in hospitals, in ambulances or even playing on the beach. 167 years ago my grandmother came -- my great grandmother came from ireland. 12 years old. by herself on a boat, landed in the docks of new york. if this congress had been setting then, she would have been sent back to her people, to her family where a third of the people were dying of famine, a third immigrated and a third stayed. that's what we sent her back to. without hearing, without anything, she had no rights. luckily it wasn't that way. ere is no residence for -- the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. for what purpose does the gentleman from pennsylvania seek recognition?

mr. thompson: mr. speaker, request unanimous consent to address the house for one minute and to revise and extend. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the gentleman from pennsylvania is recognized for one minute. mr. thompson: mr. speaker, i'm here to celebrate the most recent of many bills passed by his -- produced by this house, the republican-led house. this one is h.r. 3230, the veterans' access choice and accountability act. with overwhelming bipartisan support, this legislation will begin the process of reforming the veterans health administration and being the father of an army soldier and having worked for 30 years as a health care practitioner, my heart broke when i heard of the -- first heard of the disturbing revolutions of gross misconduct and dysfunction at the v.a. unfortunately with the passage -- fortunately with the passage of h.r. 3230 we have moved one step closer of restoring the trust of our veterans. this legislation will provide timely access to cost-effective care services while bringing

necessary changes to the department of veterans affairs. however, mr. speaker, this is just the first step and more needs to be done to fulfill the commitments we have made to these brave men and women. i want to thank the chairman of the house and senate veterans' affairs committee for overcoming political differences and finding common ground and i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. for what purpose does the gentleman from colorado seek recognition? >> i ask permission to address the house for one minute and to revise and extend my remarks. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the gentleman from colorado is recognized for one minute. mr. polis: over the conflict in the area of iraq, dating from the first gulf war to the second, we have had staunch allies in the kurdish people. and just as the american people had within them the desire for independence in 1776 so, too, rises the tide of self-determination among the kurdish people. and should they choose to take that path in a referendum and seek to separate themselves from the failing iraqi state, i strongly encourage america to

promptly recognize a new independent kurdistan to take its place among other important allies like israel in the region. i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from colorado yields back the balance of his time. for what purpose does the gentleman from south carolina seek recognition? without objection, the gentleman from south carolina is recognized for one minute. . >> mr. speaker, before we go home for the august work period, i think it's important for this house to reaffirm to the world our support for israel. under president obama, it would seem that america has switch sides and its historical support for israel which dates back to 1948. the president seems to want hostilities to end so bad he and his supporting cast within the mainstream media fail to remember or point out that hamas has been lobbing rockets into israel from shortly after israel's withdrawal from gaza in 2005. secretary kerry's mind, it would seem a stop to hostilities means israel must stop defending its people. there's never a mention to hamas' end to the barrage of

rockets. 22 alerts have gone off in israel today. 22 separate events. this president seems more interested in appeasing hamas which is a terrorist organization than he is at comprehending israel's desire to end this threat to its people. it's a betrayal toward a long time friend and ally in the region. israel deserves better an they deserve more, mr. president. as for me and my office and my house and my family, we'll always stand with israel. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. members are reminded to direct heir remarks to the chair. for what purpose does the gentleman from oklahoma seek recognition? mr. cole: mr. speaker, by direction of the committee on rules i call up house resolution 696 and ask for its immediate consideration. the speaker pro tempore: the clerk will report the resolution. the clerk: house calendar number 132, house resolution 696,

resolved, that upon adoption of this resolution it shall be in order to consider in the house the bill h.r. 5230, making supplemental appropriations for the fiscal year ending september 30, 2014, and for other purposes. all points of order against consideration of the bill are waived. the bill shall be considered as read. all points of order against provisions in the bill are waived. the previous question shall be considered as ordered on the bill and on any amendment thereto to final passage without intervening motion except one, one hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the committee on appropriations. and two, one motion to recommit. section 2, after passage of h.r. 5230, and on the legislative day of july 31, 2014, the house shall considered in the house the bill h.r. 5272, to prohibit certain actions with respect to deferred action for aliens not

lawfully present in the united states, and for other purposes. you-all points of order against consideration of the bill are waived. the bill shall be considered as read. all points of order against provisions in the bill are waived. the previous question shall be considered as ordered on the bill and on any amendment thereto to final passage without intervening motion except one, one hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the committee on the judiciary. and two, one motion to recommit. section 3, upon adoption of this resolution it shall be in order to take from the speaker's table the bill h.r. 5021, to provide an extension of federal-aid highway, highway safety, motor carrier safety, transit, and other programs funded out of the highway trust fund, and for other purposes, with the senate amendment thereto, and to consider in the house without intervention of any point of order a motion offered by the chair of the committee on

transportation and infrastructure or his designee that the house disagree to the senate amendment. the senate amendment and the motion shall be considered as read. the previous question shall be considered as ordered on the motion to its adoption. without intervening motion except one hour of debate equally divided an controlled -- and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the committee on transportation and infrastructure. section 4, any motion pursuant to clause 4 of rule 22 relating to h.r. 5021 may be offered only by the majority leader or his designee. section 5, it shall be in order at any time on the legislative for the ly 31, 2014, speaker to entertain motions for the house to suspend the rules as though under clause 1 of rule 15. the speaker or his designee shall consult with the minority leader or her designee on the designation of any matter for

consideration pursuant to the section. section 6, the requirement of clause 6-a of rule 13 for a 2/3 vote to consider a report from the committee on rules on the same day it is presented to the house is waived with respect to any resolution reported through the legislative day of july 31, 2014. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from oklahoma is recognized for one hour. mr. cole: mr. speaker, for the purpose of debate only i yield the customary 30 minutes to my friend, the gentleman from colorado, mr. polis, pending which i yield myself such time as i may consume. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. the gentleman is recognized. mr. cole: during consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purposes of debate only. mr. speaker, i ask unanimous consent that all members may have five legislative days to revise and extend their remarks. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, so ordered. mr. cole: mr. speaker, on wednesday, the rules committee met and reported a rule for consideration of three measures. h.r. 5235, the supplemental appropriations bill to deal with

the influx of unaccompanied minors across the southern border, h.r. 5272, a bill that would prevent the at mcmorris rodgers from expanding the use of deferred action for individuals who are not legally present in the united states. and senate amendment to h.r. 5021, the highway and transportation funding act of 2014. the resolution provides a closed rule for consideration of h.r. 5235, the supplemental appropriations bill. this is consistent with the way all seven supplemental appropriations acts considered in the 110th and 111th congresses were treated when my colleagues on the other side of the aisle were in the majority. the rule provides for one hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chairman and ranking member of the committee on appropriations. and provides for one motion to recommit. in addition, the resolution also provides that after the passage of h.r. 35230, that it be in order to consider -- 5230, that

it be in order to consider bill 5272, a bill to prevent the administration from expanding use for deferred action for individuals not legally present in the united states. the resolution provides a closed rule for consideration of h.r. 5272, provides for 60 minutes of debate equally divided between the chairman and ranking member of the committee on the judiciary, and provides for a motion to recommit. in addition, the rule also provides for consideration of a motion to disagree to the senate's amendment to h.r. 5021. we can send the bill that easily passed the house on an overwhelming bipartisan vote back to the senate. finally, the rule provides for same day and suspension authority today to resolve any outstanding issues before the august recess. mr. speaker, this rule demonstrates this house's careful consideration of the president's supplemental request. earlier this month the president submitted to congress a $3.7 billion request to deal with

both the urgent crisis of unaccompanied juveniles crossing the border, and with wildfires. since then chairman rogers, chairman granger, speaker boehner, and the republican conference have thoughtfully considered what resources the president needs to address the crisis through the end of the fiscal year. the result, mr. speaker, is a significantly paired down piece of legislation -- parred down pete -- parred down piece of legislation. this supplemental sends the message that this administration has been unwilling to send, that if you come here illegally, you will be deported. and it provides the resources to effect just that. it provides $334 million for the immigration and customs enforcement for boosted enforcement efforts, accelerates judicial proceedings by providing $22 million to hire temporary immigration judges, and provide courts with video telly conferencing equipment,

and makes smart policy reforms by changing the 2008 sex trafficking law that requires that all unaccompanied minors are treated the same, among others. these important policy reforms, which the president initially asked for, are reasonable, thoughtful response to the tenfold increase of unaccompanied alien children since 2011. mr. speaker, the president's advisors warned him this crisis was coming back in 2012 and 2013. but he ignored that advice. in fact, mr. speaker, the administration has mismanaged this entire issue from the beginning. if the president's f.y. 2015 budget had become law, we would have seen a reduction of nearly 3,500 detention beds, a 2% reduction in i.c.e.'s investigative capacity, a 12% reduction in c. brnings p. d.d.c.b.p. air operations. digs, the budget request for

central american security initiative which confronts narcotics and gangs and organized crimes in that region, addresses border security deficiency and disrupts criminal infrastructure was proposed to be cut in the president's f.y. 2015 budget. the house f.y. 2015 foreign operations bill reverses those cuts and actually increases the resources to deal with these related problems. mr. speaker, at every turn the administration has failed to address the border crisis adequately. now the president wants a blank check to proceed. his aim is not to stop and reverse the blow of unaccompanied minors into this country, he merely aims to manage that influx more efficiently. the house cannot accept that. this legislation, h.r. 5235, adequately funds the shortfalls caused by this administration's policy by using existing resources. and republicans are willing to provide additional resources should they be needed in f.y.

2015 appropriations within the bipartisan budget cap set by the ryan-murray budget agreement. but we believe that this bill provides the appropriate resources at the time. in addition, mr. speaker, the bill provides for consideration of h.r. 5272, which would prevent the administration from expanding the deferred action for childhood arrivals, so-called doca program. i like many of my colleagues that it has incentivized juveniles with the hope of staying in this country permanently. executive orders like doca only serve to keep that hope alive. i believe it's important to send a strong signal this program should not be expanded. h.r. 5272 does just that. finally, mr. speaker, the rule would send back the original house passed highway bill to the senate. while i appreciate what my friends in the other body have been able to do, i believe it's important to provide members the

maximum amount of flexibility to craft a long-term highway bill. by accepting the senate amendment, which would only provide adequate funding of the highway trust fund through mid december, we would be effectively creating a new crisis in the middle of a lame duck session of congress. given the limited number of session days before the election, this does not seem like a prudent course to take. instead, the house should return to the senate its bipartisan legislation which passed this chamber by a vote of 367-55. in closing, mr. speaker, i believe it's important to move forward on these three important pieces of legislation before the august district work period. i urge support for the rule anti-underlying legislation. i reserve the balance of my time -- and the underlying legislation. i reserve the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from oklahoma reserves the balance of his time. for what purpose does the gentleman from maryland seek recognition? mr. van hollen: parliamentary inquiry. thank you, mr. speaker. i'm looking over the rule that was passed late last night and my reading of the rule indicates

that there was a change in the standing rules of the house. mr. speaker, i would like some parliamentary clarification on that provision. if you look at the resolution, section 4, it says, any motion pursuant to clause 4 of rule 22 relating to h.r. 5021, that's the transportation related bill, may be offered only by the majority leader or his designee. now, i'm looking at the standing rules of the house, mr. speaker, and the standing rules of the house provide that when the stage of disagreement has been reached on a bill or resolution with the house or senate amendments, a motion to dispose of any amendment shall be privileged. my question is, doesn't privileged mean available to any member of the house?

the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is asking the chair to interpret the resolution, and that provision will not be determined by the chair while it's under debate. mr. van hollen: mr. speaker, my understanding of a parliamentary inquiry was where the speaker was supposed to clarify questions of the rules and the parliamentary order. i'm simply asking whether or not in previous rulings by this house, and by the parliamentarian, privileged has been interpreted to mean something that's available to any member of the house not just to the majority leader or the designee of the majority leader. the speaker pro tempore: the chair will not interpret this resolution during its pendency.

mr. van hollen: parliamentary inquiry, at what point -- if the chair does not want to interpret this parliamentary inquiry at this time, at what point would it be in order to ask the parliamentarian and the chair to interpret the rules of the house? the speaker pro tempore: the chair will respond to parliamentary inquiries that are relevant to issues that are pending. mr. van hollen: parliamentary inquiry. are we -- is it not the rule passed out of the committee that is pending? is that -- that's the parliamentary inquiry. is that what is pending before the house, the rule? the speaker pro tempore: that's the matter for debate on the resolution. mr. van hollen: mr. speaker, isn't the matter pending before the house?

the rule where the designated chairman, acting chairman of the rules committee just spoke about? the speaker pro tempore: house resolution 696 is what is pending at this time. mr. van hollen: that's correct. i'm reading one of the provisions of that resolution specifically section 4 of that rule which is before the house which changes the rules of the house to say that a motion may only be made by the majority leader or his designee as opposed to the privileged motion required under the underlying rule, is that correct? the speaker pro tempore: as the chair has stated, the chair will not interpret pending -- the pending resolution. that is what is up for debate. mr. van hollen: if i could ask for one minute of time to discuss this matter. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from colorado is recognized. mr. polis: thank you. i'll further yield a minute to

the gentleman from maryland. mr. van hollen: yesterday when we were on the floor of the house, mr. speaker, and our republican colleagues passed a resolution to sue the president of the united states, waste millions of dollars of taxpayers' money to sue the president of the united states and the claim was the president has exceeded his authority. that's a specious claim, but what's incredible is the very next day our republican colleagues are here suspending democracy in the house, changing the standing rules of the house to take away from any member of the house the opportunity to offer a motion with respect to the transportation bill, which is what the standing rules of the house provide, and they want to say, no, we're going to take that right away from a member and give it exclusively to the republican leader or the republican leader's designee. you know, mr. speaker, the last time we saw this happen, on the government shutdown. our republican colleagues used the same measure to refuse to take up the senate bill which would have ended the government

shutdown. they didn't want to end it, so they kept it going. that cost the american taxpayer $24 billion. $24 billion in damage to the economy. let's not play games with the rule. this rule allows every member their rights. the speaker is not the king, and we should make sure na every member has an opportunity. -- that every member has an opportunity. mr. polis: i yield myself such time as i may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from colorado is recognized. mr. polis: thank you. i want to address the underlying rule, and i appreciate the gentleman from maryland's effort to get clarity as to what's in this rule. as you know, mr. speaker, we saw this rule for the first time late last night. we saw the bill for the first time late last night. i believe the underlying bill was dropped shortly after 8:00 p.m. rules committee convened after 10:00 p.m. we are still in the process of trying to understand what is in this rule and this bill. i know there's legitimate questions with regard to how it

changes the rules of our entire house of representatives as well as what this bill actually does. and i rise in strong opposition to both the process of the rule and the underlying bill. the bill, of course, which prohibits certain actions with respect to deferred actions for people who are already in our country. this provision was added at the last minute in the midnight hour to restrict the deferred action for childhood arrivals program, which is a form of prosecutorial discretion, which is used by all prosecutorial administrative agencies. so when you have a situation where 10 million or 11 million or 12 million people have illegal presence in our country, clearly with our limited enforcement resources we need to have prosecutorial discretion and priorities. who should we be going after and in what form given that it's not possible with the

resources, limited resources they have to address the entire issue? i would like to think that it makes perfect sense with regard to the deferred action program that we focus our limited enforcement resources on criminal aliens. those are people who in addition to having a lawful presence here have committed some kind of crime. might have been a d.u.i. it might have been an assault. we nead to focus on promptly -- we need to focus on promptly inging people down who committed a crime. who does it not make sense? i think the deferred action program is a perfect example. this bill in our understanding recognizes that. many of the people that grew up in our country, that know no other country, that came here when they were 2 or 3, that were cheerleaders and high

school football players know no country than the united states of america, they're loyal to us, of course should not be the enforcement priority of laws that are broken until we can fix our immigration system. and it makes sense that the president work -- any president, democrat or republican, identify additional groups that we can use with our prosecutorial discretion and offer some kind of deferred action so we can further focus our limited enforcement resources on those who would do us harm or represent a threat to our safety or our economy. so if there's a way, for instance, to include the parents of american children who are here unlawfully and are not violating any criminal laws of our country, it would make sense that their enforcement should come after those who have committed criminal violations in our country. that is a customary aspect of

prosecutorial discretion, ranging from any d.a. to attorney general to the president of the united states. under the language of this bill, it would further restrict the ability of the president to focus our limited enforcement resources on criminal aliens who would do us harm. reducing the security of the american people. now, we all know the real answer here is to replace our broken immigration system with one that works. the answer is not to have 10 million, 12 million, who knows how many million people here illegally and just focus on which group we can actually enforce the law on. we need to have a law that we can enforce universally. there should not be people that are here illegally here in our country. we need to secure our borders. we need to reunite american families. we need to grow our economy. later on today if we defeat the previous question, mr. garcia will offer a bipartisan bill that will do just that. but instead of even allowing amendments on these controversial bills, including amendments that are extremely common sense, we have a closed

process that as mr. van hollen pointed out, changes the very rules of the house in the name of preventing the president on focusing on deporting criminal aliens. look, republicans and democrats alike acknowledge there is a crisis on our southern border. unaccompanied minors are fleeing from el salvador, honduras, guatemala. i had the opportunity to visit the border the weekend before last along with many of my colleagues and got to speak to some of the kids as well as the customs and border patrol and h.h.s. officials and hear some of those stories firsthand. but instead of taking action -- and we had this discussion yesterday in rules committee -- action means a bill passing a bill, a bill passing the senate and the president signing it -- instead of taking action to address the crisis on our southern border, the house is considering a house-only bill that the president has said he would veto, that the senate wouldn't likely bring up and then promptly going home for a

one-month vacation. we wonder why congress has a 12% approval rating. i reserve the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from colorado reserves the balance of his time. the gentleman from oklahoma is recognized. mr. cole: mr. speaker, i yield myself such time as i may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from oklahoma is recognized. mr. cole: thank you. i want to disagree with my friend on a couple of points that he made. first, i would suggest the president actually hasn't taken action or suggested action. a month ago he told us that the 2008 sex trafficking law was responsible for his inability to return people to their country of origin, unaccompanied minors. we've been waiting for his corrective for 30 days. instead, we get an open-ended supplemental that goes from this fiscal year to the end of the next fiscal year with a lot of measures, some of which, by the way, we agree with to manage the flow but absolutely

nothing to stop and reverse the flow. we think in that absence of leadership from the executive branch, we've acted. we've actually done what a month ago at least, he suggested ought to be done. give some discretion. try to deal with the loophole in the law. in the meantime, we looked what he put in front of us and we decided, look, we can actually offset this money. we don't have to spend extra money. this is a higher priority. we'll take money from lower priority areas. get us through the end of this fiscal year and calendar year. in that interim time we'll have an opportunity to work with the administration to continue to address the problem within the limits of the ryan-murray budget agreement that we agreed to on a bipartisan bicameral basis not that long ago. now, this issue of the daca controversy that we have here, i'd like to make the following points. first, nothing in this legislation changes the current state of affairs at all. in other words, what the president has done up to this

point is left undisturbed. however, we do believe the abuse of prosecutorial discretion is actually one of the things that contributed to the current crisis that we have. not deliberately. but frankly i think the president wittingly or unknowingly sent a signal that if you get here and you get across our border, you're going to be able to stay. so we want to be very careful that doesn't happen again. in addition, the president has said, if congress doesn't do certain things by such and such date or by the august work period, then i intend during that time to use my pen and my phone to affect some changes i want. it's interesting to us, by the way. less than two years ago he said these kind of things were unconstitutional, couldn't be done by the executive branch. now he changed his view on that. we are going to fine put in place something that will prevent us in our absence once again using prosecutorial

discretion to achieve other aims. with that i'd like to reserve the balance of my time, mr. speaker. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from oklahoma reserves the balance of his time. the gentleman from colorado is recognized. mr. polis: thank you, mr. speaker. i'd like to yield two minutes to the gentleman from massachusetts, my colleague on the rules committee, mr. mcgovern. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from massachusetts is recognized for two minutes. mr. mcgovern: mr. speaker, my house republican friends never cease to amaze me. once again house republicans have turned control of their agenda to senator, speaker ted cruz. the last time they did this the government shut down and look how well that worked out for them. some people never learn. some republicans, despite speaker boehner's promise of a more open house, they need to go further. last night after a lengthy meeting with senator-speaker cruz, house republicans caved in a desperate and partisan way and produced and extreme bill that would prevent president obama from building upon the

deferred action for childhood arrivals program. this bill was introduced last night, last night. it's never had a hearing but here it is. house republicans are victims of their own shortsightedness, and their attempts to placate the fringe elements on the far right, especially as the november elections grow closer, house republicans continue to refuse to bring up any kind of comprehensive immigration reform. of course, the senate passed comprehensive immigration reform overwhelmingly and we know that the bill would pass this house if it were brought up for a vote. mr. speaker, this process is absurd. the bills we will consider today are cruel and cheap political stunts. they would do nothing to alleviate the crisis, merely serve as political cover. and what's worse is the republicans are playing games with the lives of vulnerable children. and further, the supplemental appropriations bill is a sham. it does not even come close to addressing the humanitarian crisis on our border. it provides nothing in terms of

necessary resources for the border patrol, for h.h.s., homeland security and our immigration system to give these children, their families the attention they need. the policy is bad enough. the process absolutely stinks. the deal the republican leadership cut with the hard right is this -- if you want the opportunity to vote for a nasty bill, to block the expansion of daca, which has absolutely nothing to do with the crisis on the border, then you have to vote for this terrible supplemental. no wonder the approval rating of congress is 7%. with stunts like this i'm surprised it's that high. i know it's an election season but i plead with the republicans, let's not lose our humanity in this process. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from colorado reserves. the gentleman from oklahoma is recognized. mr. cole: thank you, mr. speaker. i yield myself such time as i may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from oklahoma is recognized. mr. cole: my friend is always a terrific and empassioned speaker and i love to hear him, i genuinely do. but what he's saying is frankly

at odds with the facts. let's look at the record. it was the president in his budget who wanted to cut border security, cut detention beds, reduce aid to central america, reduce law enforcement. ? at was the president before the crisis we corrected those mistakes in the f.y. 2015 operations budget. so in terms of who will put in place humanitarian sense, that has been the majority side of the aisle, not the minority's. frankly, our plan won't increase suffering, it will decrease it. what's going to decrease suffering is continuing to send the signal that coming here illegally is going to be rewarded. the challenge with na is number one, when -- with that is number one, when you encourage that behavior, we are destroying the society from which these people are coming. the officials of those government met with us. we would like our children

back. this is is is not a good thing. that's a terrible thing we're doing with those countries. this is well-meaning people, in most cases, trying to bring children in the united states are turning over their money to criminal enterprises and cart at the time tels. they're strengthening the very people that are destroying their society and committing crimes across the entire region, not just our country. . the children encouraged to come, mostly young people, frankly are subject to horrific and dangerous journey. and along the way they can be pressed into sex trafficking, they can be turned into drug smugglers, they can be physically abused. we don't know how many of them never make it here at all. any policy left in place that encourages that wittingly or unwittingly ought to be changed. until the signal is sent unmistakably to these societies don't spend your money, don't put your kids at risk, keep them

there, the flow will continue. the president of the united states, at least two weeks ago, said, the majority of these children are going to be returned. that's his statement, not ours. not us doing something that he said isn't going -- he said the overwhelming majority of these children will be returned. doing this quickly and humanely might keep other children from following the same route. this is a tough, tough situation. it's a situation, quite frankly, the president was warned would happen in 2012. was warned in 2013 by officials in his own administration, and ignored. you can see he ignored it in terms of the budget he actually proposed to send to the congress this year. thank goodness we didn't actually do what he asked us to do. i think if you look at this objectively, you can see the president was overtaken by a crisis. he fumbled it. and mismanaged that crisis, in my opinion. now my friends on the other side

of the aisle are trying to turn this into something that it's not. it's a border crisis debate and discussion. it's not an overall immigration debate. it's not a political stunt. we certainly didn't plan for this to happen. i doubt my -- my friends clearly didn't plan for it to happen. the president didn't plan for it to happen. he never submitted the budget he did. we are trying to respond quickly. this is not by the way a once and for all response. we are here in august. we'll be back here in august. we'll be back here after the election. we have an appropriations process, probably an omnibus bill waiting in the lame duck. we'll continue to address this. but something has to be done now. what the president requests, again, doesn't address the problem. is an open-ended check and frankly gets him off the hook until september 30 of 2015. we have to come back here again. the bill in front of us is a much more prudent, much more targeted, much more thoughtful, and much, frankly, more

efficient use of resources in the interim while we continue to work to get a handle on the situation. with that, mr. speaker, i reserve the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from oklahoma reserves the balance of his time. the gentleman from colorado is recognized. mr. polis: thank you, mr. speaker. i'd like to yield two minutes to the gentleman from texas, mr. o'rourke. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from texas is recognized for two minutes. mr. o'rourke: mr. speaker, allow me to address some of the concerns raised in the underlying bill concerning unaccompanied alien children. if our concern is with a secure border, you can talk to someone such as myself, who represents el paso, texas, the largest city in texas on the mexican border, which today is also the safest city not just in texas but in the entire united states, you can talk to other elected leaders, to the folks who actually live on the border, and you can look at the facts. apprehensions at the u.s.-mexico border are down nearly 70% over the last 15 years.

in the year 2000 we had 1.6 million apprehensions. this last year, 420,000. even with this spike of refugees from central america, we are not expected to get to half a million this year. the border by the numbers is as secure as it has ever been. if your concern is with the welfare of these children once they enter this country, then i say let's increase the amount that we are spending with health and human services, which in this current bill is a pittance against what is necessary and what should be required. if your concern is with the welfare of these children in central america and along this journey, i ask you to do what this country's proud history, what our conscience, and what the law already mandates, which is to accept their applications for asylum, to help them once they are in this country, and to work with those neighbors in central america and hemisphere to resolve the underlying problems. i urge my colleagues to reject this rule, to reject the underlying bill, and to come

back again together in september and to work on something that is rational, that is humane, as in the best interest of all concerned. with that i yield back to my colleague from colorado. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from texas yields back. the gentleman from colorado reserves. the gentleman from oklahoma is recognized. mr. cole: mr. speaker, i yield myself such time as i may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from oklahoma is recognized. mr. cole: i appreciate that. let's talk for a minute with additional money to h.h.s. that's exactly, by the way, what this does. the difference -- i think there's probably some confusion here. we are doing it for a short period of time and then we are going to probably continue to do it next year, but do it within the constraints of the ryan-murray budget deal. the president, frankly, hot wires around the congressional agreement that was made to lower the budget by extending these expenditures to the end of the next fiscal year. just to reassure my friend, nobody's more interested, i think -- actually, put it this way. i think we are both interested in making sure that when anybody is in the custody of the united

states and they are treated humanely and sufficient resource there is to do the job. so this does it in the short term. i would expect in the appropriations process -- again within the overall spending caps we both agreed to, we would continue to do that by moving resources from less important areas to more important areas. i am going to disagree with my friend on, i think, his point that most of these folks ought to remain inside the united states. frankly, i agree with the president of the united states. most of them should not. there is a process, by the way, if you want to apply for refugee status, you do that by going to an american embacy, which is actually in the countries there. they make that determination. you don't do it by breaking the laws of mexico and breaking the laws of the united states and simply arriving here. the president has said that most of these young people will be returned. and the longer they're here, the more you are going to encourage other people to come.

the more they are going to be subjected to that journey we all know is dangerous, we all know is deadly. and the more often criminal enterprises will be enriched as people give them money to transport juveniles to what they think is going to be permanent residence in the united states when the president himself says it will not be permanent. that most of them will return. better to act on this now. i would be the first to tell you i don't expect this to be the final piece of legislation. this is an emergency measure. it's timely. it's focused. and it's funded at an appropriate level. we'll be back here again in september. we'll be back here working on the appropriations process no doubt in a lame duck. and frankly at that time the appropriate additional resources will undoubtedly be made available. but they will be made available within the budget caps of the ryan-murray -- i think sometimes we compare this bill to the budget request the president

made, the supplemental request. we really are comparing apples to oranges because time frames are much different. and remember, the president's bill also includes wildfire funding. that may be appropriate. we just don't think it's appropriate in this vehicle to what ought to be a focused approach. with that, mr. speaker, i reserve the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from oklahoma reserves the balance of his time. the gentleman from colorado is recognized. mr. polis: thank you, mr. speaker. it's my privilege to yield two minutes to the gentlewoman from new york, the ranking member of the committee on rules, ms. slaughter. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman from new york is recognized for two minutes. ms. slaughter: i thank the gentleman for yielding. we spent a good time here yesterday debating voting on resolution to sue the president for doing his job, and we are up to about the same kinds of tricks today. that show yesterday, the republican obstinate wasn't enough, last night at 10:po, the majority changed the rules in the -- 10:30, the majority

changed the rules in the house to block efforts to achieve a long-term solution to our infrastructure problem. can you believe that? i want my colleagues and everyone else to know what the majority's up to. mr. speaker, we know and everybody knows that we need a long-term highway bill that would create more jobs and strengthen our infrastructure and provide more certainty for highway construction. under the rules of the house, always, any member of the house would have had the right to bring up real solutions to this problem. but not anymore. in the middle of the night, the republicans at the rules committee took that right away. and gave it to one person, only one person, out of 435, the republican leader. it seems the republicans are so fixated with my way or the highway, they are willing to change the rules of the house to block a vote. this parliamentary trick has only been used once before in the history of the house. only once. and it was during the government

shutdown we recently experienced. while they were obsessing over how to deny people health care, they changed the rules to ensure that no one could open the government back up. none of us could bring that up except one person, just one, the republican leader. and the last time they pulled this stunt with the government shutdown, it cost the economy of the united states $24 billion, that's with a b. now, we don't know what will happen this time, but what we do know is it's a dangerous ploy that will undermine economic recovery and job creation. and the interest here today is not of the people of the united states, but it is purely, absolutely political stunt after stunts yesterday. and the whole bill, what we are doing with the -- on the border issue again is simply a diversionary tactic that signifies not much.

i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman from new york yields back the balance of her time. the gentleman from colorado reserves. the gentleman from oklahoma is recognized mr. cole: mr. speaker, i yield myself such time as i may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from oklahoma vefpblgt mr. cole: let me pull back from arguing about rules and procedures to what the real essence of the conflict on the transportation bill is. 357 members, an overwhelmingly bipartisan vote, voted to send the transportation bill to the united states senate. that bill, by the way, ran through, if i recall correctly, may of next year. giving us enough time to actually then come to what i know both sides want, and that's a longer term highway bill. what the senate did was send this back -- send us back something with fewer dollars and shorter time frame that actually reaches simply into december. meaning a lame duck congress would have to deal with the transportation deal. not likely to happen

particularly when we'll also be dealing with the omnibus spending bill since the senate in its infinite wisdom has been unable to pass a single appropriations bill. so i think cluttering the calendar with the transportation fund thing -- transportation fund dispute and problem and the short time frame simply isn't wise. we think it was a political game on the part of the united states senate. regardless the position of this house expressed bipartisan vote of 357 is overwhelmingly clear. you want to expedite that and get it back to the other side. hopefully they can see that that sort of gamesmanship doesn't work, and they accede to the position that, frankly, both sides of this chamber adopted in overwhelming numbers. with that, mr. speaker, i reserve the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from oklahoma reserves the balance of his time. the gentleman from colorado is recognized. mr. polis: thank you, mr. speaker. i'd like to yield two minutes to the gentleman from texas, mr. doggett. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from texas is

recognized for two minutes. mr. doggett: sadly, mr. speaker, the do-nothing-ism of the 19th century, the anti-immigrant fervor of that time is alive and well here today in the house. republicans are overwhelmed with fear. they are fearful of immigrants, they are fearful of little children at our border, but i think most of us they are fearful of their own shadows. fearful that if they try to deal with any of the major problems that our country faces that they might suffer political losses. o it's not only no-nothingism. it's due next to nothing-ism today. even when the republicans' share of the homeland security last may obtained unanimous committee approval for a bill that he said would secure our border, republicans were afraid to have it debated on the floor of the house for fear that it might lead to real comprehensive

immigration reform, reform that was approved by the united states senate over a year ago for which they have offered us nothing but excuses. one excuse after another as to why we could not permit a majority of this house to consider the best way to reform our broken immigration system. affording full participation to our dreamers, those are people that came here as children through no fault of their own without a visa will not only benefit them as individuals to achieve their all, but it will create jobs and grow our economy. i've met with these dreamers. they have tremendous potential to give back to our country. they want to deny that opportunity. and what about these children at our border? aren't they all god's children? aren't they our children?

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