David Schweikert: “I thank Chairman Huizenga for yielding me time. A little bit of history: this piece of legislation, the underlying idea…”

“I thank Chairman Huizenga for yielding me time. A little bit of history: this piece of legislation, the underlying idea, actually was fostered a few years ago. One of my closest friends in Arizona, Lakshmi, is freaky smart, electrical engineer, off the charts IQ. He and I were having a conversation about a company that he was really interested in that had been started by a handful of his old friends. Well, it turns out his old friends had gone through all this process, and he had just sort of been watching what they were doing. Now, Lakshmi is an absolute expert on the technology that these gentlemen are putting together, but because of a series of timing and other things, he was walled off from investing in a company that was using a technology he was an absolute expert in, because he didn't meet the accredited investor standards. He didn't have the million dollars in the bank. His argument to me was, should his knowledge on a company and its product, their risk profile, its opportunity to succeed and its potential failure in the marketplace be based on his bank account, or should it be based on his knowledge? Now, the legislation has gone through a couple generations of compromise.…”