Eni Faleomavaega: “Again I cannot express enough my deepest appreciation to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Scott) and my good friend, the…”

“Again I cannot express enough my deepest appreciation to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Scott) and my good friend, the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Coble) for their management of this bill. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of H.R. 5934, a bill that I authored to stop tobacco smuggling in the territories. First, I want to thank the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Mr. Smith, and my dear friend, the ranking member, Mr. Conyers, and all the members of the committee for their strong support of this legislation. I also want to acknowledge Speaker John Boehner and House Majority Leader Cantor, and our Democratic leader, Nancy Pelosi, for their support of this bill. I thank my colleagues, the gentlelady from Guam, and also, the gentleman from the Northern Mariana Islands, Ms. Bordallo and Mr. Sablan, respectively, for their cosponsorship of this bill. Mr. Speaker, today American Samoa faces a serious problem of tobacco smuggling, as I'm sure it's the same with the other territories. According to a recent study, 2 years ago, as many as 5,792,924 cigarettes were smuggled into the territory. The study found that tobacco smuggling resulted in the loss of about $724,116 in revenues to the American Samoa Government. If continued undeterred, tobacco smuggling in the territory will lead to heavier losses in local tax revenues, especially if cigarette excise tax rates were to be increased. Mr.…”