Joe Barton: “When I agreed to be the principal Republican sponsor of this legislation, I asked and was told that there would be a…”

“When I agreed to be the principal Republican sponsor of this legislation, I asked and was told that there would be a committee markup in the Judiciary Committee and that there would be amendments made in order. So I was a little bit surprised last week to find that this was going to be on the Suspension Calendar and expressed that surprise to Ms. Wasserman Schultz and her staff. Having said that, there have been bipartisan discussions, negotiations. There have been changes made in the bill as originally introduced. It is a good bill. And I am proud to be the senior Republican sponsor. This bill needs to be passed. I will agree with Mr. Goodlatte that it's not a perfect bill, and I'll agree that had there been a committee markup or a subcommittee markup and a bipartisan markup amendment process, some of the issues would have been addressed a little bit differently. But having said that, let's look at what's positive in the bill. And let's compare the bill to current law. There are over 3 million images of child pornography on the Internet right now. Three million.…”