John Hoeven

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thanks to both you and the Ranking Member for holding this important hearing today.

If we find a way to make it easier to do business, companies respond. Investments are made, jobs are created.

The availability, the affordability, and the quality of our food, though often taken for granted, is a linchpin of every American's personal security.

I do think it is important for the American public to understand what is being done to ensure the safety of the food that Americans eat.

I have been working with our Chairman, Chairman Roberts, and with the Ranking Member, Senator Stabenow, on putting together bipartisan consensus legislation to address the issue of labeling of food made with genetically engineered, or GMO…

When I was in North Dakota, Sen. Hoeven and I discussed how critical affordable, reliable infrastructure is to rural America.

There is not an industry sector I talked to... that does not come in and they say they are absolutely mired in red tape and regulation and bureaucracy which adds tremendous cost and makes it more difficult to create jobs.

I asked then Secretary of Interior, Ken Salazar, to update the U.S. Geological Survey's 2000 estimate of the reserves.

Would you invest millions of dollars in order to build either a traditional or a renewable project if you might have to wait seven years to get a decision...

But it did show an impact.

Would you acknowledge that?

So why wouldn't we want to do that and in fact make ourselves less dependent on the SPR by having a more robust industry?

Wouldn't you favor certainty in terms of trying to get investors in companies to make the decisions to invest in energy infrastructure?

Isn't it very important that we allow, that we lift the oil export ban in order to reduce our dependence on the SPR

So my question to you is if somebody is going to follow all the laws, follow all the regulations and invest millions of dollars and still wait seven years for a siting decision...

The point being if we are allowed to compete in the global economy we will have a more robust oil and gas industry in this country than we will have if we are not allowed to compete.

How are you handling that in terms of your workforce? You need a lot more people certain times during the day than you do other times.

I think that outreach effort has been well received.

So that would indicate some need for part-time people, as you indicated.

Right. So it is really important that these standards are put in place and that you are testing to those standards right now.

The standards that you set, and your testing of those standards, are both vitally important.

I think some 30 percent of that workforce will time out--for mandatory retirement age--within the next 5 years.

The Coast Guard's loss is TSA's gain and we look forward to working with you in this capacity.

This month marks the 14th Anniversary since the attacks on September 11th.

You are getting a lot of questions about accountability today and not providing specific answers on accountability.