Political Quotes

“Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the amendment. During our markup of this bill in the committee, Representative Gosar offered a similar amendment to this one, though it applied only to oil and gas, not mining. I asked if he would consider adding mining to that ban, but that was declined. I also had an amendment to this bill to include mining in this ban, which was not made in order. However, this Republican amendment, which is very similar to my own, was made in order. I am glad to see that at least some Republicans have come around to the point of including mining as part of the ban. If we don't want the Chinese Communist Party developing oil and gas leases on Federal land and water, then we shouldn't be supportive of the CCP mining our publicly owned minerals. It isn't hard to find that many foreign-owned parent companies have terrible records of human rights abuses, environmental degradation, harming indigenous communities, and destroying sacred sites. Some foreign companies, specifically several owned by the Government of China, are known to have horrible records on all of these fronts, yet they can operate freely on our Federal land, including in my home State of Arizona, through their subsidiaries. I have repeatedly heard from my colleagues that we agree that human rights and environmental abuses are wrong, but so far, they have refused to address the problem.…”