Rob Portman

This is one reason that Senator Graham and Senator Cassidy have received some heat from conservatives, because it takes the funding in the Affordable Care Act and it sends it back to the States.

Your legislation will help bring justice to victims and their families and protect vulnerable women and children.

We are 100 percent confident that a Portman/Blumenthal amendment--identical to S. 1693--offered to the Communications Decency Act in 1996 would have passed the Senate overwhelmingly.

We agree that congressional action is necessary to put an end to this tragic exploitation of human beings.

This legislation will help. This Committee can act to stop criminal sex trafficking online.

It's a disgrace. And I believe history is going to judge us on how we respond to it.

This is, I think, the single best thing to do.

I think it is going to come back a lot to, as George Voinovich used to say, because he was quoted earlier by my colleague Senator Carper, I have to quote him, too, because he is from Ohio.

I think this is a great framework to be able to do that.

I think that is an important point, and that is what I was saying earlier in terms of the importance of each of you and others who are in attendance at the hearing today or watching this proceeding.

One of the best practices that has been identified is agencies jointly producing documents so that duplicative reviews do not have to be conducted by more than one agency.

I am going to continue to be impatient because I think it is so critical to get this in place and get it right.

It is hard to see how FAST-41 can be effective if FERC is not going to disclose its timelines.

I think it can work. I am not against having even more accountability in it, but this was a bipartisan process.

Well, that is encouraging to hear. If you would, please, be willing to supply to the Subcommittee an example of that communication and perhaps as a template for others as well.

We want you to keep their feet to the fire.

I assume you included that in your testimony so it is part of our testimony here today.

If I knew that there is FAST-41 and it was a two year process, I would be glad to pay some fee to help accelerate this thing.

We cannot invest in our own infrastructure.

Let me just ask a couple of follow up questions.

I think a lot of people do not realize that.

I think now that we are back on track and now that we have an Executive Order that seems consistent with the legislation.

I think that is a good point.

We are very concerned with the number of bills in both Houses of Congress that would further amend the NEPA process.

We applaud Senator Portman and Senator McCaskill's letter urging the President to quickly appoint an Executive Director.