James Oberstar: “This procedure under which we are acting on this bill is complex and has raised some concerns both in the Rules…”

“This procedure under which we are acting on this bill is complex and has raised some concerns both in the Rules Committee and in discussion of the rule, so I just want to clarify some things. The rule states in part: to concur in the Senate amendment to the title of H.R. 1586 which deals with additional tax bonuses on TARP recipients. This is a tax bill that the House had passed and sent to the Senate. The Senate is amending that tax bill, taking everything out and substituting its version of the FAA authorization bill. We then, under the rule, concur in the Senate amendment to the text with the amendment printed in the report of the Committee on Rules which is the text of the bill that we have twice passed in this House in two Congresses. It is not something new. It is not a freestanding bill coming to the floor for the first time and should not be nor has it been subjected to an open rule which was requested in the Rules Committee and which was again debated on the House floor during consideration of the rule. This is the bill we passed first in September, on September 20, 2007, by a vote of 267-151, including four Republican and four Democratic amendments. It was not adopted in that Congress. We took it up again in 2009, passed the bill May 21 last year by an even bigger vote, 277-136, including seven Democratic and four Republican amendments.”