John Mica: “Thank you so much, Mr. Speaker and my colleagues, and welcome back. The Congress is back in session today, and I guess…”

“Thank you so much, Mr. Speaker and my colleagues, and welcome back. The Congress is back in session today, and I guess all people's property and welfare and everything else is now at risk. But I'm pleased to be here to help lessen some of that risk that is a threat which has been offered to the United States in the form of a European Union emissions trading scheme. The bill that I propose today is S. 1956, which replaces the bill that was passed a year ago in October of 2011, and that's H.R. 2594. That's legislation which I authored which basically does the same thing, again, giving the authority to prohibit the United States aircraft and operators of commercial aviation from participating in the European Union's emissions trading scheme. Let me take just a minute and explain what this is. Several years ago, the European Union and some of the folks that are honestly concerned about emissions that come from aviation, commercial aviation in particular, decided to come up with a scheme or a plan to impose a tax on all aircraft. Now, if this had been done within the confines of the European Union, I don't think we would be standing here. But what they did is really go beyond the borders of the European Union and say that any aircraft entering the European Union from another nation will be subject to an emissions tax--and not when it reached the borders of the European Union or their states, but from where it departed.…”