mr. defazio: mr. speaker, i have an amendment at the desk. the chair: the clerk will designate the amendment. the clerk: amendment number 2 printed in house report 113-563 offered by mr. defazio of oregon. the chair: pursuant to house resolution 693, the gentleman from oregon, mr. defazio, and a member opposed each will control five minutes. the chair recognizes the gentleman from oregon. mr. defazio: i thank the chairman. as i said earlier, and it was mentioned by a number of democrats on this side, we don't think the endangered species act is perfect and we could work on a bipartisan basis on modernization-type reforms to bring it into the 21st century, compliant with current science. however, that's not before us today. but i'm hopeful that this amendment, because of a very unsettling precedent by the obama administration, will get bipartisan support. now, the republicans may in this case agree with the objectives of an agency of government which has gone rowing in this case, -- rogue, in this case, which is fish and wildlife. they've been

mr. defazio: i yield the gentleman an additional minute. mr. moran: they found the state maps, the map he commissioned for garfield county showed 70% less habitat. whose map should the federal government accept as the best available science, the colorado state map or garfield county's? this bill gives equal weight to both. mr. speaker, this is a bad bill and no amendment can make it a good bill. it should be rejected. rather than addressing some of the compelling challenges that this nation is confronting, we're wasting time on a bill that may pass the house but will go nowhere in the senate and certainly not become law. i urge its defeat. thank you, mr. speaker. the chair: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman from washington is recognized. hays haste thank you, mr. chairman. -- mr. hastings: that you are, mr. chairman. i want to yield to the gentleman from michigan, mr. huizenga, two minutes. the chair: the gentleman is recognized for two minutes. mr. huizenga: i rise in support of h.r. 4315, and i appreciate my colleague from urban

mr. defazio: i have no requests for time. apparently we have done something unusual around here, created something that doesn't seem to be controversial except among a few talking heads out there. mr. shuster: i reserve. mr. defazio: i would be happy to yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the gentleman from pennsylvania is recognized. mr. shuster: i thank the gentleman for working with me and i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the question is will the house suspend the rules and pass the bill h.r. 4156. those in favor say aye. those opposed, no. in the opinion of the chair 2/3 being in the affirmative, the rules are suspended, the bill is passed and without objection, the motion to reconsider is laid n the table. the speaker pro tempore: for what purpose does the gentleman from pennsylvania seek recognition? mr. shuster: i move to suspend the rules and pass the bill h.r. 4838. the clerk: h.r. 4838 a bill to redesignate the railroad station located at 2955 market street in

mr. defazio. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized for two minutes. mr. defazio: we can pretend we care about the future of america and its transportation system, we used to be number one in the world, widely recognized, now we're rated 26th and we're moving down quick thrism system is falling apart. 140,000 bridges need repair or replacement. 40% of the pavement on the national highway system is failed to the point where you have to dig it up, not just resurface it and a $70 billion backlog in our transit systems, just to bring everything up to a state of good repair. that's not even to begin to think about building a 21st century transportation system to compete with the rest of the world. china, 9% of g.d.p. goes to transportation, they want to move people and goods more efficiently and out-compete us. brazil, 6%. india, 6%. the united states of america, 1%. now we've got to get serious about this. we're going to today do a little shuffling around of some money and say, oh, we can pretend by pension smoothing and this and that that we're creating money

mr. defazio points out one aspect of that. here, the richest country in the world, by far, undeniably doesn't act as if we have a future. one invests, one builds infrastructure and sponsors research when we believe we have a future. instead, we talk about cut, cut, cut here. it is a fundamental problem that the chairman says let's look for money. i'll show him plenty of money. we've got it. we could invest in education. we could invest in research. we could invest in infrastructure and we should because we have a future, i believe. the other general comment i wanted to make has to do with the field of geology and seismology and earthquakes. for generations, humans believed that we experienced the happenings on earth and probably the most important development of recent years is the understanding that humans have the ability to actually change the earth. to poison entire oceans, to change the very climate of our globe and, in fact, to induce earthquakes. most of us would have thought the energy involved in injecting water into

mr. defazio, for five minutes. mr. defazio: we have a crisis in firefighting funds here in the united states of america, and what has this congress done about it? nothing. absolutely nothing. zero. ngata. hasn't even held a hearing. right now there are 11 major fires burning in oregon, five in washington, one the largest notice history of the state. two in utah, two in idaho, one in california, one in arizona. there are forecasts for a substantial amount of new lightning storms moving through. that means more fires. our resources are about at their maximum, and the department of interior and the forest service are about to run out of funds. now, if this was predictable, the budget set by the republicans and paul ryan was totally inadequate, and there was a proposal, which is the rarest of things, a bipartisan republicans and democrats, bicamera -- bicameral, senate and house, proposal supported by the president of the united states. that was to look at what's happened over the last 10 years, the dramatic increase in the

mr. defazio: we just had a standard & poor's study, 29,000 jobs created. these are not just construction jobs. they are answering nearing jobs, technical jobs, they're manufacturing jobs for the equipment that goes into this or the steel that goes into this. these are small business jobs with the small business setaside. we're forgoing an incredible stimulus, putting thousands of americans back to work or at work building us yet again toward a world-class infrastructure. it's just shameful. it's shameful. is has been bipartisan forever. washington canals and highways. eisenhower, the national highway system. and ronald reagan put transit into the national highway program. and now we're here limping along with yet another watch that isn't adequate, that won't give us the recovery we need, won't get us the transportation infrastructure we need to be competitive in the 21st century. the very -- it's a very sad day. we should reject this proposal and get to work. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman from pennsylvania is reco

mr. defazio: you've heard the term inventing the wheel, we have some people who want to uninvent the wheel. the tea parties conservists have a new idea, devolution. we'll devolve the funding of the national transportation system to the 50 states. what a great idea. no, we tried it in the last century, it failed miserably. 1956,s the brand spanking new kansas turnpike. oklahoma said they'd build, but money.n out of but kansas built theirs. for years cars would crash through the end of the highway and into a fampler's field. we want to go back to that era? we want to compete with the world by spending less on transportation by havingless federal coordination? and passing a pathetic band-aid bill today with pretend money that will limp us through the next nine months. we need substantial investment in our national transportation system, putting millions oback to work, making us first class again and competing with the rest of the world. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expire. for what purpose does the gentleman from south carolina seek recognition? >> madam speaker, i ask un

mr. defazio. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from oregon is recognized for two minutes. mr. defazio: i thank my good friend for yielding that time. sometime in the end of july or at the latest very early august the inadequate budget forest firefighting for the departments of interior and forest service will be exhausted. that's right, exhausted. we are going to be at a point where there will be fires ranging across the west. we are looking at record drought. record fuel, dry fuels. and you will be able, probably, to smell or see the smoke across a lot of the country. and we should be doing everything we can to prepare for this and spreent this in the future. and that's the -- prevent this in the future. that's the crux of the problem. we can't stop fighting forest fires because we can't. but they will borrow and decimate every other account in their budgets. 40% of the forest service budget goes to fighting fires on an annual basis which means every year we repeat this little groundhog day thing. they have to suspend the programs that would prevent future forest fires, that i

mr. meehan and defazio asked hard questions about why a preclearance facility was being opened in abu dhabi, an airport which no u.s. flag carriers operate. since preclearance operations commenced in abu dhabi earlier this year, representatives from d.h.s., including secretary johnson, have repeatedly stated that they are looking to expand the program to other high-risk overseas airports. enactment of h.r. 3488 would ensure that before d.h.s. entered into another preclearance agreement, thoughtful consideration is given to the potential homeland security benefits of such an expansion as well as the potential impact to c.b.p. staffing at domestic ports of entry. importantly, the bill also requires d.h.s. to report to congress on the potential economic competitive and job-related impacts opening such a facility would have on an united states air carrier. during committee consideration of the bill, an amendment that i offered was accepted that would require any passenger arriving in the u.s. who is determined to be a selectee to undergo security rescreening by the transportation security admin