Janice Hahn: “I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, I join my colleague and good friend from Michigan in offering…”

“I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Chairman, I join my colleague and good friend from Michigan in offering the Huizenga-Hahn amendment to the Energy and Water Appropriations bill in order to utilize the harbor maintenance trust fund at the target set forth in the recently passed Water Resources Reform and Development Act. As my colleague said, this is a very important part of what we compromised on in the WRRDA bill. As a Representative of the Nation's busiest port complex in Los Angeles, along with Long Beach, and as the cofounder of the Ports Caucus, along with Ted Poe, I have fought so hard since the first day I came to Congress to increase the funding for our Nation's ports and to fully utilize this harbor maintenance trust fund to ensure that the money that is collected at our ports goes back to our ports. {time} 2130 After working for months with my colleagues, we reached a plan to finally put the harbor maintenance trust fund to work and fully utilize it by 2025, but this bill on the floor today fails to follow the law we passed just last year with an overwhelming vote of 404-4. This bill is $36 million behind our targets. For our Nation to remain globally competitive, we need to fund our port infrastructure. According to the Army Corps of Engineers, we need to fully fund our harbor maintenance tax for 5 years to fully dredge our ports. Ports are crucial across this country.…”