mr. mccown, you are recognized for five minutes for your opening statement. mr. wn: thank you, chairman latta. ranking member castor, ranking member pallone, distinguished members of the subcommittee, thank you so much for the invitation to appear before you today. i am brigham mccown, a senior fellow at the hudson institute and director of the initiative on american energy security. i'm also a professor and an executive in residence at miami university in oxford, ohio. while i'm here today in my personal capacity, i've been blessed to have had a portfolio career over the last four decades during which i've worked for cabinet members of both political parties. i've served in the military, have run businesses, as well as my current work in the academic and nonprofit sectors. energy, as has been testified to today, is the glue that binds everything together. it powers our cities, our factories, our commercial buildings, our farms, and our homes. energy is the lifeblood of this nation. it enables us to both reach for the stars and travel to see family and friends. li

mr. mccown. but the means employed to do this are deeply troubling, and frankly, i'm disappointed that this committee didn't get the permitting work done in the last congress, because that is what we are here to do, that's what we need to do, and i hope we'll be able to do it in this congress. that said, the sweeping orders that president trump has signed really failed to give our energy industry the regulatory certainty it needs to succeed. it's just not what unleashing american energy looks like. with the united states producing more energy than ever before from all sources, now is not the time to halt innovation, much of which is happening in my district and my hometown, near mr. weber and not too far from mr. fluger. houston is home to 11% of us energy jobs and more than 4700 energy related firms. and the number one issue i hear about from people in the business who work in my district and beyond, many of them api members, is the need to know the rules and requirements to trust that long-term