Frank Pallone

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of H.R. 1362, the National Neurological Diseases Surveillance System Act of 2010. H.R. 1362 seeks to improve our understanding of multiple sclerosis, Parkinson's disease and other neurological…

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of H.R. 2923, the Combat Methamphetamine Enhancement Act of 2010. H.R. 2923 is designed to respond to problems that the Drug Enforcement Agency has identified in the implementation of the Combat…

I want to differ strongly with the gentleman from Texas, as much as I admire him as our ranking member. I would remind the gentleman that this bill is fully paid for by eliminating tax loopholes that send jobs overseas. The fact of the…

We passed, the House Democrats, the majority, passed a comprehensive permanent fix to the SGR, and we only had one Republican vote on the other side. I heard the gentleman from California say it's not someone else's problem. That's true…

The gulf coast catastrophe underscores the need for comprehensive energy and climate reform to rein in Big Oil and reduce our reliance on dirty and foreign fuels. For too long under the Bush administration, Big Oil was able to operate with…

We need health care reform now, and failure to act is not an option. Doing nothing on health care reform doesn't mean that nothing happens. People will continue to lose coverage, to pay more in premiums, to be banned for preexisting…

You will have the Chris Christie's who will do exactly the opposite because it is in their political interest to select their friends.

If you don't step in and we don't pass some kind of legislation, you are going to have these kinds of abuses continue.

The troubling thing is that Federal prosecutors have too much discretion in appointing these corporate monitors, allowing an unelected official unfettered leverage against companies.

What led Congressman Pascrell and me to introduce legislation is because we saw all the inconsistencies and lack of proper oversight of monitors.

These are the kinds of abuses if there is unfettered discretion.

I want to thank Chairman Conyers and Chairman Cohen for allowing me to testify before this Subcommittee.

No one here, including myself, is in a position of defending corrupt corporations or arguing against their full prosecution by the law.

We must not allow deferred prosecution to become a form of deferred justice.

However, an even more essential concern has emerged through these deferred prosecution agreements and that is the lack of any checks and balances within the system.

I can not stress more strongly the need to pass this comprehensive legislation regarding deferred prosecution agreements.

I, along with my colleague Frank Pallone have introduced the Accountability in Deferred Prosecution Act of 2009, H.R. 1947.

I certainly would have signed on, and I believe I am signed on now, as a matter of fact, as a co-sponsor.

I want to commend first of all the U.S attorney for the northern district for having the courage to do that.

Chris Christie deserves, in my judgment, a medal for his achievements like these, and so do other U.S. Attorneys.

I think there needs to be an ombudsman to make sure that the corporations have an opportunity to voice their concerns and see that the fees are fair and right.

I believe there needs to be a change in the way that the monitors are chosen, an impartial, fair manner.

In the Zimmer case, it is my understanding that Mr. Ashcroft's firm was paid $52 million. To me, that is outrageous.

And there should be some type of ombudsman there for the corporation to say, 'The fees are outrageous. What they are doing is outrageous. It is unnecessary. The expenses are too great,' but they really can't do it.

The fact is when you select a monitor you ought to be selecting somebody from a panel of people who make themselves available.