Bobby Scott: “I rise in support of H.R. 2740, the MEJA Expansion and Enforcement Act of 2007. I would like to commend the chairman of…”

“I rise in support of H.R. 2740, the MEJA Expansion and Enforcement Act of 2007. I would like to commend the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, Mr. Conyers, and the author of the bill, the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Price), for their hard work on this bill. We currently have a situation in which many military contractors act with impunity and no accountability because they operate outside of the jurisdiction of the United States criminal code because they are technically outside of the jurisdiction of the United States and outside of the Uniform Code of Military Justice because they are not in the military. In Iraq, our troops have been supplanted by an army of contractors, which is estimated at 180,000, an extremely high number by any account. Last month we learned of a shooting incident involving a private contracting company, Blackwater, in which contractors allegedly shot and killed 11 or more innocent Iraqi civilians. Yesterday we learned that Blackwater was involved in at least 195 shooting incidents in Iraq since 2005. According to at least one report, their employees fired the first shots in more than 80 percent of these shooting incidences. Madam Chairman, to provide much needed accountability and oversight for these contractors, the gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Price) introduced H.R. 2740, the MEJA Expansion Enforcement Act of 2007.”