Political Quotes

“Mr. Garamendi, thank you for yielding. Mr. Speaker, today, I would like to discuss the importance of an amendment that I offered to this bill, but withdrew it because of jurisdictional concerns. In exchange for dropping this amendment, the language was supposed to be included in a manager's amendment, but, unfortunately, the suspension calendar precluded this from happening. It is my hope that, with the help of the chairman, this issue will be taken up during the conference with the Senate. Under current law, port authorities are required to develop port security plans which are then submitted to the U.S. Coast Guard for review. However, ports are not required to address cybersecurity in these plans. Without a requirement, many of our ports have not addressed this issue, creating a gap in our Nation's port security. Last July, the Brookings Institute released a report stating our Nation's port cybersecurity awareness is remarkably low. Without requiring ports to address this vulnerability, we risk exposing our Nation to a disruption that could devastate our economy and grind the flow of commerce to a halt in a matter of days. That is why I offered an amendment to this bill that would have required that ports address cybersecurity in their port security plans that they submit to the Coast Guard every 5 years. Unfortunately, this language was not included in the final bill, and it is my hope that it is put in the bill during the conference as it was intended.…”