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Rob Portman is an American politician and attorney currently serving as the junior United States senator from Ohio, a position he has held since 2011. A member of the Republican Party, Portman previously represented Ohio's 2nd congressional district in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1993 to 2005. He also served as the U.S. Trade Representative under President George W. Bush from 2005 to 2006, where he focused on trade policy and international negotiations.
I do not see anything in the legislation that has anything to do with construction or anything beyond an affiliate status that can be worked out over time. Congress would always have the ability to come in an further fund this relationship.
This is bipartisan. This does not require any Federal funds, as the gentlemen know. It is an authorization simply for the Park Service to work with a private group that has been working with the Park Service in any case for the past couple…
Reducing drug abuse. They do not talk, frankly, about gun control, they do not talk about the death penalty, they do not talk about a lot of other issues that are ones we might naturally think would be the best way to reduce violent…
We talked about the impact of illegal drug use on violent crime, and the gentleman is right. When we ask police chiefs around the country what the best way would be to reduce violent crime, guess what they say?
I want to say briefly, because there has been some confusion in some of the discussion, that a ``no'' vote is the right vote if Members do not want to impose additional mandates on State and local government. There are also huge private…
I think it is ineffective. I think it violates the constitutional rights of the commander-in-chief.
The answer to that question, reclaiming my time, I would say that is a consideration that every President has to factor in is that it is a law on the books. It is a pressure applied to the executive branch. It is a factor when one is…
Let me be clear again. What the gentleman from Virginia [Mr. Moran] does is the foundation for this legislation which is to provide the cost information, but we need to go further than the cost information and address the very issue which…
The gentleman and I were both on the committee last year, the Committee on Government Operations, when legislation substantially similar to this legislation was passed by a vote of 35 to 4 after 3 hearings in my subcommittee and hearings…
I, for one, would be very pleased to work with the gentleman, I know the majority side would, on trying to make sense out of some of these Federal requirements. There needs to be more flexibility. That is the point of the whole debate. The…
Let me outline briefly what is in the legislation with regard to the balance that the gentleman from Minnesota [Mr. Vento] referred to. It is simply unfair to say that the benefits are not to be considered; in fact, they are required to be…
What this bill does again for the first time is it says let us be accountable. If we are going to do this, let us step up to the plate and do it in the full view of the American people, the press, and so on. That is why the Governors, the…
No. It does not. What happens then, if Congress chooses, Congress may, by a majority vote, waive that point of order. But it forces us to face the issue.
No. It is not. What this bill does is it looks prospectively. It looks to the future.
They have two choices at the local level, and it is pretty obvious, if you think about it. One is to raise taxes at the local level, and that tends to be property taxes. Talk about regressive taxes. And the second is to cut services, the…
No. That is not what the bill does. The whole premise of the bill is if something is important enough for us to mandate at the Federal level, to tell the States and localities you have got to do it our way, we ought to be able to step up…
We had a vote today of 306 to 74 on this legislation. We worked on it for 2 weeks on the floor of the House, over 30 hours of debate. That means we got about 130 Democrats to support the bill today. This is despite again a lot of…
It was truly a landmark piece of legislation. It was a historic day for the House, the first time we have ever, ever, as a Congress done anything to stop these unfunded Federal mandates. And it was bipartisan.
In section 4, there is a specific exemption for emergency situations such as the one which the gentleman stated. I would think that that would be covered by that exemption.
I would say this amendment does in fact address the problem, it does in fact force Congress to deal with the issue of public-private competition. If Congress, under its point of order requirement, which would be the discretion of Congress…
The Federal agencies are currently required, under the Executive order, to go even beyond the cost-benefit analysis provided in title II. We now have it in statute, not just in the Executive order. But it is my understanding the agencies…
I would say, in addition, that I have had direct personal conversations with CBO as recently as in the last 2 weeks with regard to this very issue. And they, in fact, would probably prefer the Senate version of the bill, which provides for…
Again, I think we have done this in a way where we end up with the kind of teeth in the legislation, H.R. 5, many of us on this side feel is necessary to make sure these requirements are carried out.
It will not come as a surprise that I rise again to oppose yet another amendment excluding whole areas of the law from the very reasonable cost analysis provided in the legislation, H.R. 5. It might be of interest to know this is the…
No, I am saying that the Senate amendment is not overly broad or more sweeping. In fact it is more narrow than this amendment.
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