Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman for yielding. H.R. 3843 is a modest yet critical first step to modernizing the antitrust laws. It generates revenue; it makes foreign adversarial interests in transactions more apparent; and it allows more streamlined antitrust enforcement by State attorneys general. On the first issue, I think there is general agreement that the fees that are involved in mergers haven't been raised in decades. This simply allows smaller mergers to pay less and larger mergers to pay more. There is no question about it--this issue came up at the Committee on Rules--this bill does not fund a single additional dollar to any agency. This is a revenue generator. There is no appropriation. The appropriations process will require that this be treated like any other revenue the Federal Government generates, in that the Appropriations Committee, in regular order, will decide how to spend the money. People should also not be concerned because, under the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2022, the DOJ Antitrust Division's use of appropriated funds is limited to ``expenses necessary for the enforcement of antitrust and kindred laws.'' There is already a limitation. It doesn't provide any additional funding. It simply generates revenues and shifts burdens to the largest transactions so that the taxpayers don't have to be responsible for their review.…”