Steve Scalise

I am prepared to close, Mr. Chairman, so I would reserve and allow the gentlelady from Florida to close.

Can I inquire the balance of the time, Mr. Chairman. The Acting CHAIR. The gentleman has 1\3/4\ minutes remaining.

At this time I would like to yield 45 seconds to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Southerland).

At this point, Mr. Chairman, I would like to yield 45 seconds to the gentleman from Mississippi (Mr. Palazzo).

I would remind my colleague from Florida that this legislation actually is the only instrument available that is germane to this legislation, that does direct 80 percent of those BP fines to the Gulf Coast States, as the President's…

As we approach the 2-year anniversary of the Deepwater Horizon disaster, my amendment sets up the Gulf Coast Restoration Trust Fund and requires that 80 percent of the Clean Water Act fines will be directed to the fund for the purposes of…

The fact that over a 3-year period you feel you can get 2 billion in savings says there is tremendous waste, fraud, and abuse

The regulations and the rules coming out of Washington cost the average American family $15,586.

And so we ought to be not only having hearings but also passing legislation as we have in the House passed over 30 bills to remove some of these regulations that you have been sharing with us.

We are fighting for the livelihoods of our small businesses back home.

I think it is important when you get small business owners to take some of their time away... to come up here to Congress and share with us the concerns that you have.

It shows us what we need to keep fighting to do.

He has had 40 months. It doesn't take 40 months to review a project like this.

Canada had been trying to get this project done for over 3 years.

I think what irritates me, what irritates a lot of people that are concerned about the economy, getting the economy back on track and creating jobs is that the President made a political decision to throw away 20,000 American jobs and to…

If Bob Dole goes and gets John Smith's name because he wants to take advantage of that person, that still exists today.

It is essential that Congress work to ensure that responsible party, not the taxpayer... will foot the bill for this disaster and the cleanup.

The RESTORE Act will ensure that the lion's share of the future Clean Water Act fines assessed on the responsible parties will be dedicated to the Gulf Coast States that were directly impacted by last year's oil spill.

I do also want to correct the record. Louisiana won't even start getting revenue sharing until 2017 on offshore drilling, and it will be far below the 50 percent that was mentioned.

The RESTORE Act fixes the imbalance by creating a way to rebuild local and State economies that took such a tremendous hit from the oil spill.

This is not a handout or a backfill for local and State budgets.

The RESTORE Act is about restoring the gulf coast from the devastating--and I mean devastating--effects of the Deepwater Horizon spill in 2010.

Are you going to do the due diligence to go and find out who did that and hold them accountable?

I would hope, if any did come before you, you would absolutely not subordinate the taxpayer.

A number is all I ask for right now.