Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. The Agriculture Foreign Investments Disclosure Act of 1978 already requires that all foreign persons and legal entities acquiring or transferring an interest in U.S. agricultural property submit a report to USDA containing the information on the transaction of the parties involved. That is present law. CFIUS can already use this data when considering potential national security risks in determining whether a transaction is covered by its jurisdiction. This bill does not change that jurisdiction. What this bill does is formally establish a referral system between USDA's current monitoring of land purchases and CFIUS in order to target our adversaries and avoid unnecessary bureaucracy. The bill singles out purchases involving the People's Republic of China, Iran, North Korea, and Russia. It is the governments of these nonfree societies that are our threats, and it is their manipulation of their people that are the threats we try to address. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Self).”