James Lankford

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

We have to fix the business framework, and it has to require a solution from the private sector.

On the cybersecurity and the technology side of it, obviously it is a prime spot for hacking and gathering data.

I think it is a multibillion-dollar question to be able to be resolved.

I find it very troubling that you're now in disagreement with, certainly, what I heard Senator Feinstein and Senator Collins say.

The government ought to be able to go directly to reading the content of this American's communications based on what somebody thinks could be suspicious behavior.

I fixed that, and was a part of helping getting that resolved.

Let us keep the dialogue going as we try to work this out.

Has that happened to you all, where there has been a challenge to be able to step back and say, 'We have to fix the statute because we asked them, the regulators, to do something that will be so expensive or so onerous that we are going to…

This has been an issue that plagues us, because of the number of regulations that we have and the number of agencies that are creating them.

There is no State better than North Dakota, is what you are saying.

I would be very interested in anything else you want to contribute to the record.

So your committee has the ability--they propose the rule, go through the final language, the committee has the conversation.

The political stars have to line up so that the President is of the same party

The court, actually, for the first time, went to the President and said, no, the President does not have the constitutional authority to be able to do this.

Several years ago, the House of Representatives was frustrated with the President--and I can fill in the blanks on this--basically not applying the law as they saw that had been written and done.

The court has the responsibility in law to define what the law says. You are actually saying, no, this is what the law says and you are not following it as a regulation.

That would be very helpful.

Because one of the challenges here in the conversation is, it is no grand secret to the world that we have this very adversarial relationship at times with regulatory bodies here.

So I have to ask the question, you said the relationships have been pretty consistent. Is that consistently bad or consistently good?

Many States, like Connecticut, North Dakota, actively review State regulations to ensure they follow legislative intent.

The onus to improve the rulemaking process is not just on the regulators. As legislators, we must fulfill our responsibility to actually legislate.

Strong and effective legislative oversight does not mean stopping agencies from issuing rules and it does not mean we must have an adversarial relationship with the regulators.

I think everything we can do within this Committee to deal with the staggering statistics that all of us share...

Science that is paid for by the Federal tax dollars should not be then retained by individuals saying, 'I am going to hang onto that.'