Sheila Jackson Lee: “As a senior member of the Judiciary, Committee, I rise in strong support of H.R. 8235, the ``Open Courts Act of 2020,''…”

“As a senior member of the Judiciary, Committee, I rise in strong support of H.R. 8235, the ``Open Courts Act of 2020,'' which would centralize and modernize the federal judiciary's court records systems (called CM/ECF) and would eliminate the paywall (called PACER) that currently forces the public to pay to access these records. The new system will provide a centralized, easily searchable site to file and read court records and monitor docket activity, and equally important, make all public court records on the site available free of charge. Every year, the public pays the federal judiciary more than $100 million in fees so they can read the motions, briefs, orders, exhibits, calendar entries, and other court filings that make up the overwhelming majority of federal litigation and bankruptcy practice. These fees are used to maintain and operate the judiciary's electronic court records systems (called ``case management and electronic court filing systems'' or ``CM/ECF'') that judges, court employees, and the parties before the court use to file documents, issue decisions, and generally manage proceedings. Although many parties before the court pay a fee to initiate a proceeding or otherwise file a document (generally called ``filing fees''), these fees do not support the electronic courts records systems they rely on. Instead, those systems are subsidized by the public.…”