Can know and share the fruits of your spirit, especially in this time, virtue of tolerance and reconciliation, of justice and righteousness. Watch over this house and cause your blessing to be upon each member that they might serve all the people in their home districts, those who voted for them and those who did not. May all that is done within the peoples house this day be for your greater honor and glory amen. That we all the speaker the chair has examined the journal of the last days proceedings and announces to the house his approval thereof. Pursuant to clause 1 of rule 1, the journal stands approved. For what purpose does the gentleman from arkansas rise . Mr. Speaker, pursuant to clause 1 of rule 1, i demand a vote on agreeing to the speakers approval of the journal. The speaker the question is on agreeing to the speakers approval of the journal. Those opposed, no. In the opinion of the chair, the ayes have it. The journal stands approved. The gentleman from arkansas. Mr. Womack i object to the vote on the grounds a quorum is not present and make a point of order that a quorum is not present. The speaker further proceedings on this question are postponed. The pledge of allegiance will be led by the gentlelady from new york, miss stephanie. Please join me in the pledge. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of america and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. The speaker the chair will the speaker the chair has examined the journal of the last days proceedings and announces to the house his approval thereof. Entertain up to five requests requests for one minute on each smile. For what purpose does the gentleman from arkansas rise . Mr. Womack i seek unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. The speaker without objection. Mr. Womack mr. Speaker, they say that great things come in small packages. That could not be more true of the reagan sisters of rogers, arkansas. I rise today in gratitude to them. Agnes, mary sue and betty were born and raised in northwest arkansas and attended the university of arkansas fayetteville. While agnes left arkansas to pursue a career in library science. Mary sue and betty lynn who stood about five feet tall, were giants in the classroom. Spendling a combined 94 years teaching history and government to students in the Rogers School district. Throughout their distinguished careers both were decorated with countless awards and accolades, and in 1989, the city of rogers named its newest school, reagan elementary, as a token of our appreciation for their dedication to our students and their faithful support of the community. As their former mayor, i can attest to both. Although these most respected members of our community have passed on, they wont soon be forgotten. And now their legacies will live on at the u. Of a as it was announced on monday that the sisters in a final tribute to northwest Arkansas Education designated a 1. 2 million estate gift to support the libraries of their alma mater. I can say without hesitation that the reagan sisters made northwest arkansas a better place and for that we are eternally grateful. I yield back. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman yield back. For what purpose does the gentleman from new york seek recognition . Mr. Nadler i ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. The speaker pro tempore without objection. The gentleman is recognized for one minute. Mr. Nadler madam speaker we must not display the confederate battle flag in any federal park or cemetery or building. Confederate flag represents racism, slavery, and treason. Waging war against the United States, killing american soldiers. We are told it represents the southern heritage. It does represent part of the southern of the american heritage, a shameful part. The defense of slavery of owning people body and soul, of the doctrine of racial superiority, and practice of racial oppression. Other countries and peoples have shameful parts of their heritages. Germany as a nazi heritage. The germans are properly ashamed of it. They prohibit by law the display of nazi imagery. The First Amendment wont let us go that far, but we should not honor the shameful parts of our history. As we continue the ongoing struggle to eradicate racism from american life, we must no longer honor racism and treason by allowing the Confederate Flag on any federal property. I yield back. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman yields back. For what purpose does the gentleman from pennsylvania seek recognition . Unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. Revise and extend. The speaker pro tempore without objection, the gentleman is recognized for one minute. Us go that far, but we should not honor the shameful parts of our history. As we continue the ongoing struggle to eradicate madam speaker, the 21st Century Cures Initiative has a lot of positive measures to help medical innovation reach its full potential. Id like to if he cuss on just one of the many reasons to support this legislation. I had the pleasure of meeting with the family of garrett coin, staunch advocates for cures for Rare Diseases. Garrett is a 5yearold resident of gill bertsville who 10 months ago was diagnosed with a rare degenerative disorder. Garrett was born and developed normally, but since september the disease has left him legally blind and greatly weakened his physical and mental ability. Unfortunately the disease has no treatment cure, and is not preventable. There is hope. Because of provisions in the 21st century bill that researchers will have the tools to work to developing medical advancement for batten disease. By modernizing innovation, and increasing funding, is in front of us. Im supporting the bill for many reasons but the main one is this effort to help children like 5yearold garrett and other children who are challenged daily with the struggles of a rare disease. I encourage my colleagues to join me and yield back the balance of my time. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. For what purpose does the gentlewoman from florida seek recognition . Unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. Revise and extend. The speaker pro tempore without objection, the gentlewoman is recognized for one minute. Ms. Wasserman schultz thank you, madam speaker. I rise today to condemn House Republicans secret attempt in the dead of wednesday night. Permit the display of the racist Confederate Flag in National Parks and cemeteries. In the wake of the charleston murders, our nation is moving toward the removal of the flag from public places. Later today the state of South Carolina will remove the flag from the capitol grounds. While this is happening, the republican majority has thought to associate itself and the body with the racist legacy to the flag. To add insult to injury, yesterday when House Democrats tried to bring up resolution removing any state flag displaying the battle flag from the capital except in limited circumstances, the majority turned racist their backs and ignored the cries of millions of americans who are calling for its permanent ban. The Republican Leadership ought to be ashamed for associating themselves with this symbol of racism, hatred, and intolerance. This body should move swiftly to relegate the Confederate Flag to museums andish bin of history. I yield back the balance of my time. The speaker pro tempore the gentlewoman yields back. For what purpose does the gentleman from nevada seek recognition . To address the house for one minute. Revise and extend my remarks. The speaker pro tempore without objection, the gentleman is recognized for one minute. Thank you, madam speaker. What were you doing last night at midnight . If you were like me and most americans, you were probably asleep. Last night while america was sleeping, the white house was busy. The white house was busy notifying the public that literally in the dark of the night about the president s intentions to designate more than 700,000 acres of lincoln and nye counties as the National Monuments. Madam speaker, at 2 00 p. M. This afternoon, you wont see a debate on the floor of the thank you, madam speaker. What were you doing last night at midnight . If you were like me and most americans, you house, the peoples house, on the basin range monument. There will be no vote for nevadas eleched representatives. But there will be a photoop to capture exchange for political favor favor. It will be seen as having friends in high places is more important than popular will of the people. Mr. Hardy the legacy building in the twilight of ones career shouldnt be the driver of our nations public lands. According to press reports, the cries of millions it is said when asked about the heartfelt concerns of nevadans who oppose the monument, the president responded, i dont care. I want this done. Madam speaker, i can care and i yield back. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman yields back. For what purpose does the gentleman from california seek recognition . Does the gentleman seek unanimous consent to address the house for one minute . Without objection, the gentleman is recognized for one minute. Thank you, madam speaker. I peoples am congressman ted lou from california. When it comes to the Highway Trust Fund, it feels like a movie groundhog day over and over again. Once again we are faced with an expiration of this important fund. We know from a recent department of transportation report that 54 of our roads and highways are deemed to be poor. One in four bridges are structurely deficient. We need to fund this Highway Trust Fund at its full capacity. We need to do it on a longterm basis. We cant continue to do it on a shortterm basis. Its not helpful to our state and local government. We cant get projects off the ground. I request that the republican majority put a bill on the floor that funds the Highway Trust Fund on a longterm basis. We know that this will help our nation because for every dollar we invest in infrastructure, we get over 2 back in economic output. Thank you. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman yields back. For what purpose does the gentleman from texas seek recognition . Mr. Carter to address the house for one minute. The speaker pro tempore without objection, the gentleman is recognized. Mr. Carter i rise to address the house for one minute. And i have long opposed reductions in our military and i continue to believe that our nation should maintain a robust land force. The announcement to reduce the army by 40,000 troops sends the worst possible message to our nations adversaries. Cuts that extend into heavy armored combat units go even further to weaken our National Defense and put us at risk. Im especially disappointed about the armys plan to cut so heavily from fort hood and the state of texas. The armys decision to implement a roughly 9 reduction is outrageous. I have serious concerns about the logic and analysis that went into this decision to reduce so many troops from texas. Perhaps the most sickening part of the whole matter, however, is the damage these cuts will do to the soldiers and their families who will be asked to leave the army after decades of sacrifice and time of war. In the coming days, i will be pressing the army for clarification on their analysis and justification for their decisions. This nation can do better. I yield back. The speaker pro tempore the gentlemans time has expired. For what purpose does the gentleman from new jersey seek recognition . Unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. The speaker pro tempore without objection, the gentleman is recognized for one minute. Madam speaker here we are once again and i rise to ask my colleagues to pass a longterm, a longterm reauthorization to the Highway Trust Fund. Mr. Norcross before it crashes, dead ends to the very worst that can happen to america. This is about the dysfunction of washington. Its what everybody detests, a lack of predictibility. Well just kick the can down a road a little further. This is exactly what hurts our economy. Nobody can plan for whats going to happen in the next few months let alone the next few years. This is our country. Dont shut it down. Dont put a sign that says closed due to lack of construction. This is killing our economy. This is killing jobs in america. And i ask for us to pass a longterm i know in washington longterm might seem a day or two we are just asking for six years. To give predictibility so our highways are the best that they can be. That we can have our commerce. With that i yield back the balance of my time. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman yields back. For what purpose does the gentleman from South Carolina seek recognition . Mr. Wilson unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. Revise and extend. The speaker pro tempore without objection, the gentleman is recognized for one minute. Mr. Wilson madam speaker, yesterday Foreign AffairsCommittee Chairman ed royce with Ranking Member eliot engel conducted an informative hearing on the implication of the Nuclear Agreement with iran. The witnesses who provided enlightening testimony were the hop yorble steven radamaker, dr. Michael dorian, dr. Michael michael, and dr. Kenneth pollack. Their opinions confirm my concerns as expressed in a july 6 editorial in the Washington Post. I quote, if it is reached in the coming days a nuclear deal with iran well be at best an unsatisfying and risky compromise. Irans emergence as a Threshold Nuclear Power with the ability to produce a weapon quickly are not be prevented. It will be postponed by 10 to 15 years. In exchange tehran will reap hundreds of billions of dollars in sanctions relief it can use to revive its economy and fund the wars it is waging around the middle east, end of quote. The president needs to change course and recognize the moral relativism is dangerous with opponents who promote death to america, death to israel. The president can avoid a legacy of fanatics with Nuclear Warheads on icbms targeting american families. In conclusion, god bless our troops, and may the president by his actions never forget september 11 and the global war on terrorism. The speaker pro tempore the gentlemans time has expired. For what purpose does the gentlewoman from michigan seek recognition . Madam speaker, i ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. The speaker pro tempore without objection, the gentlewoman is recognized for one minute. Mrs. Lawrence we are less than three weeks away from expiration of the national Highway Trust Fund. And once again talking about another extension. The michigan infrastructure and Transportation Association estimates that congress failure to come up with a longterm plan has cost my state, michigan taxpayers more than 350 million. We have ample time and multiple plans to fix this problem. Look, which plan do you like . We need to get to work. What about the grow america act which raises 478 billion over six years, or michigans getting beyond the gridlock plan that raises 410 billion over six years . The rrps dont want to raise taxes the republicans dont want to raise taxes. The democrats dont want to hurt the lowerincome families but we must make those choices. We must take the vote and we must keep our promise to america to fix our infrastructure. Its time to act and with that, madam speaker, i yield back my time. The speaker pro tempore the gentleladys time has expired. For what purpose does the gentleman from michigan seek recognition . Mr. Upton mr. Speaker, i ask unanimous consent that all members may have five legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material therein on h. R. 6. The speaker pro tempore without objection. Pursuant to House Resolution 350 and rule 18, the chair declares the house in the committee of the whole house on the state of the union for further consideration of h. R. 6. Will the gentlewoman from North Carolina, ms. Foxx, kindly take the chair . The chair the house is in the committee of the whole house on the state of the union for further consideration of h. R. 6, which the clerk will report by title. The clerk a bill to accelerate the discovery, development, and delivery of 21st century cures, and for other purposes. The chair when the committee of the whole rose on thursday, july 9 2015, all time for general debate had expired. Pursuant to the rule the bill shall be considered for amendment under the fiveminute rule. In lieu of the amendment in the nature of a substitute recommended by the committee of energy and commerce printed in the bill, an amendment in the nature of a substitute consisting of text of rules Committee Print 11422 is adopted. The bill, as amended, shall be considered as the original bill for the purpose of further amendment under the fiveminute rule and shall be considered as read. No further amendment to the bill, as amended, shall be in order except those printed in house report 114193. Each such further amendment may be offered only in the order printed in the report by a member designated in the report shall be considered as read shall be debatable for the time specified in the report equally divided and controlled by the proponent and an opponent, shall not be subject to amendment, shall not be subject for demand for division of the question. It is now in order to consider amendment number 1 printed in house report 114193. For what purpose does the gentleman from virginia seek recognition . Mr. Brat madam chair, i have an amendment at the desk. The chair the clerk will designate the amendment. The clerk amendment number 1 printed in house report 114193 offered by mr. Brat of virginia. The chair pursuant to House Resolution 350, the gentleman from virginia, mr. Brat, and a member opposed, each will control five minutes. The chair recognizes the gentleman from virginia. Mr. Brat madam chair, i yield myself two minutes. The chair the gentleman is recognized. Mr. Brat thank you. I rise to support my amendment against the creation of a new mandatory program. Some on the other side have called my amendment a poison pill. I consider that a compliment. A poison pill was reserved for the man who brought human reason to greece. Greece. Id like to bring reason to bear. We are currently 127 trillion light on mandatory spending at present. That means by 2027 all federal revenues will be spent on mandatory programs. That is a disaster. My children right now are 13 and 16. By the time theyre about 30 bell have zero dollars for running 30 they will have zero dollars for running government. Im for the underlying bill. Make no mistakes. In economics ration nationality say we rank our preferences in order and fund the best programs. This is one of them. There is no issue finding 2 billion out of a 3. 5 trillion budget, but currently there is no discipline up here in this city. We just Fund Everything and hand the bill to the next generation. Every mandatory Program Starts off with high hopes. But go to the trustee reports on the major mandatory programs today and you will find they are all insolvent by around 2030 as well. So today youll hear all sorts of fancy terminology about payfors and deficits. Our annual deficit is on its way to a trillion in a few years. We are off course on every front. We are handing our children another 127 trillion in mandatory programs. You want the truth . The children are the only group up here on capitol hill without a lobbyist and thats why theyre getting trashed. If you want a cure, go to a doctor. But if you want to clean up the u. S. Economy, please consult an economist or two. The numbers and the story i have given are not in dispute. The only issue is whether we have the resolve to balance our budgets and leave our children a brighter day. I urge a yes vote on the amendment. Thank you and i reserve the balance of my time. The chair the gentlemans time has expired. For what purpose does the gentleman from michigan seek recognition . Mr. Upton madam speaker, id reserve five minutes in opposition to the amendment and id yield myself one minute. The chair the gentleman is recognized for one minute. Mr. Upton madam speaker, i strongly oppose this amendment because making this funding discretionary and subject to later appropriations is critically shortsighted for two reasons. You know, we thought this might be a placebo but yes it really is a poison pill that would undermine the victories the republicans secured in 21st century cures including transformative regulatory reforms at f. D. A. And permanent, permanent entitlement savings in both medicare and medicaid. Second, supporting the amendment means voting against the critical balance we found to pay for these investments using mandatory savings in a way that reduces the deficit and working with the appropriations committee. According to the c. B. O. , this bill will reduce the deficit by some 500 millionplus over the first 10 years and we conservatively estimate that it cuts 7 billion in the second decade. Third, more than 100 organizations have joined together to oppose this amendment. They represent a crosssection of organizations including patient groups, universities medical proed advisers. I ask members to vote medical providers. I ask members to vote no on the brat amendment. The chair the gentlemans time has expired. For what purpose does the gentleman from virginia seek recognition . Mr. Brat madam chair, i yield one minute to the gentleman from california, mr. Mcclintock. The chair the gentleman from california is recognized for one minute. Mr. Mcclintock madam chairman, the greatest danger facing our country is a National Debt that now exceeds our entire economy. This year we spent 230 billion just to pay interest on that debt. The c. B. O. Warns that on ourn current trajectory, our current trajectory, it will exceed our entire Defense Budget just eight years from now. Behold the chaos in greece and consider that our nation is not far behind. Congress has labored mightily to enact a budget that will save us from this dismal future but having set that course we must stay that course. The underlying bill makes many Worthy Changes in law but it evades the discipline the budget requires to save our country from the fate of greece. Mr. Brats amendment places this bill back within the boundaries of the budget without budget gimmickry and can be easily accommodated by cutting lower priority spending. The question before us is whether we will fund our priorities responsibly or follow greece to ruin. I yield back. The chair the gentlemans time has expired. For what purpose does the gentleman from new jersey seek recognition . Mr. Pallone madam chairman, i rise in opposition to the amendment. Mr. Upton let me yield one minute to my friend, the Ranking Member of the energy and Commerce Committee mr. Pallone. The chair the gentleman from michigan yields one minute in opposition to the gentleman from new jersey. Mr. Pallone thank you, madam chair woman. If we want to speed the pace of cures, we must increase number to n. I. H. N. I. H. Has 8. 2 billion less to spend in fiscal year 2015 than it had in fiscal year 2003 when adjusted for inflation. That funding erosion has reduced the application success rate leaving research languishing. Theyve left many wondering if they can support themselves through a career of biomedical research. This provides 8. 75 billion in mandatory funding for a fiveyear period. It would ensure n. I. H. Would make critical investments in research that will help us deliver on the promise of the 21st century cures act to accelerate the pace of scientific advancement that leads to lifeimproving and lifesaving treatments and cures. Madam chair woman, without this funding stream h. R. 6 i think will be ineffective. I rise in strong opposition to the brat amendment. I yield back. The chair the gentleman yields back. The gentleman from virginia is recognized. Mr. Brat thank you madam chair. I yield one minute to the gentleman from pennsylvania, mr. Perry. The chair the gentleman from pennsylvania is recognized for one minute. Mr. Perry thank you madam speaker. I support the 21st century cures act and the underlying text and i thank the chairman. Its been masterful work. And who wouldnt . Who doesnt want to do something in congress about these horrific debilitating diseases that plague our families . We all do. Targeting additional n. I. H. Funding for cures remains critical, and so we absolutely all support it, but i dont support how were paying for it because were not. Many of us can preach about the problems associated with mandatory spending. Use the same board at my town hall meetings. People have seen it and we know where were headed. Its the biggest driver of current and future debt and were creating more mandatory spending as we speak. And were placing the burden of paying for it on people that arent even alive yet. Its incredible. I have championed the need for providing a cure for Rare Diseases and the things that plague members of our citizenry since ive been here. One thing is missing from this bill is the legalization of c. B. D. This act seems to forget about children with epilepsy and their desperate need for a cure. I ask support this amendment to shift mandatory to discretionary and make the tough decisions we are here to make and i yield back. The chair the gentlemans time has expired. The gentleman from michigan is recognized. Mr. Upton madam speaker, id yield one minute to the coauthor to the vice chair to the Ranking Member on the health subcommittee, mr. Green from texas, one minute. The chair the gentleman from texas is recognized for one minute. Mr. Green thank you madam speaker, and thank our chair of the committee for yielding to me. If you like how were doing research right now, then you need to support the brat amendment. Because were not funding it adequately, and everybody says that. Thats why theres so many supporters in the private sector but also 230 cosponsors of this bill. Now, the sponsor of the amendment called it a poison pill. I dont think theres anything more appropriate than that for this amendment because this bill is intended to save peoples lives, to make people have a better lifestyle. And when you take a poison pill you die. Thats what will happen if we do not do mandatory spending in this bill. This bill is paid for. You can grill against mandatory spending but there are cuts in other parts of the federal budget that will pay for it. Dont let anybody allude to themselves this is increased spending. Were cutting while trying to redirect it to the n. I. H. And f. D. A. To have these new therapies and also get it through the approval process and i yield back my time. The chair the gentleman yields back. The gentleman from virginia is recognized. Mr. Brat thank you, madam chair. I yield one minute to the gentleman from california, mr. Issa. The chair the gentleman from california is recognized for one minute. Mr. Issa madam chair, in this short one minute i will close by reminding people that Ronald Reagan so notably said nothing lasts longer in life than a temporary government program. This is a Permanent Program that is only paid for in offsets at one quarter what it cost and thats an estimate. If the cost goes up it will spend even more. Understand were selling the Strategic Petroleum reserves to pay for the vast majority of this fiveyear program. And then when were taking 10 years to pay for the remainder. This is a gimmick. It is not paid for. Do not be fooled. If you are a fiscal conservative, you must consider this not a permanent entitlement and vote for the brat amendment because if you dont what youre doing is adding to this debt unfairly. I would vote for this if it was paid for. Madam chair, it is not paid for. It is a fraudulent payfor by any possible means of this body. Please vote for the brat amendment because this is not a payfor entitlement. The chair members are reminded to please not traffic the well of the house when a member is speaking at the podium. For what purpose does the gentleman from michigan seek recognition . Mr. Upton i would yield for a unanimous consent request to the gentleman from pennsylvania. The chair the gentleman from pennsylvania is recognized for a unanimous consent request. Thank you. I rise for a unanimous consent request to speak in favor of the underlying bill. Mr. Fattah in opposition to this poison bill amendment. Thank you. Mr. Upton for the balance of my time i would yield to the gentlelady from indiana, no one in the committee, starting at that time let me say to the gentleman from california, it is paid for. C. B. O. Certified that all of it is paid for. With that i yield the balance of my time to the gentlelady. The chair the gentlewoman from indiana is recognized for two minutes. Madam speaker, i rise today to voice my unfavoring support for 21st century cures and vehement opposition to the amendment before us. What the authors of this specific amendment fails to grasp is the 21st century cures will advance real conservative reforms to the entitlement system that will reduce the deficit and save our nation billions of dollars. Mrs. Brooks there are real cuts in this bill. C. B. O. Has scored it and since when are we ignoring c. B. O. . These reforms didnt happen overnight . This legislation is a result of well over a year of thoughtful and purposeful negotiations. Unfortunately, the backers of this amendment cannot see the forest for the trees. Contrary to misinformation that led them to craft t. The Innovation Fund is not forever on auto pilot. It sunsets after five years. Those are five solid years where we can recruit the top nines to investigate cures that will change and save lives. Yes, the lives of our children and the next generation. I urge my colleagues to stand with me in opposition in addition to over the 100 groups who are opposed to the brat amendment. Patients groups, universities, veterans innovators, medical providers, every one of these groups urges members to vote no on the brat amendment. I urge my colleagues to do the same. With that i yield back. The chair the gentlewoman yields back. The gentleman from michigans time has expired. The gentleman from virginias time has also expired. The question is on the amendment offered by the gentleman from virginia. So many as are in favor say aye. Those opposed no. In the opinion of the chair the noes have it. I request a recorded vote. The chair pursuant to clause 6 of rule 18 further proceedings on the amendment offered by the gentleman from virginia will be postponed. It is now in or order to consider amendment number 2 printed in house report 11493. For what purpose does the gentleman from indiana seek recognition . Mr. Young i have an amendment at the desk. The chair the clerk will designate the amendment. The clerk amendment number 2 printed in house report number 114193 offered by mr. Young of indiana. The chair pursuant to House Resolution 350, the gentleman from indiana, mr. Young, and a member opposed, each will control five minutes. The chair recognizes thea. Indiana. Mr. Young i want to thank mr. Upton for his work on the 21st century cures act, finally making medical breakthroughs a national priority. With this bill well extend the longevity and improve the lives of millions of americans. Now and in the future. In the process we will dramatically reduce the taxpayer money we spend to treat it sick americans. With all that in mind i want to highlight an amendment that my thoughtful and hardworking colleague dr. Harris of maryland, and i have worked on. I urge my colleagues support. This amendment would create within n. I. H. A structure for a medical Prize Program. The United States is currently spending 632 billion per year through just one program. Medicare. To cover Health Services of qualified beneficiaries. To help lower taxpayer costs, as well as improve patient outcomes, this amendment will offer modest monetary rewards to those outside of government who can develop significant medical breakthroughs. The medical Prize Program will encourage scientists and entrepreneurs, especially those that dont typically receive n. I. H. Grants, to develop cost saving, life improving cures for some of the most debilitating diseases that afflict our young and old. With those thoughts in mind, i urge your support of the amendment and i yield the floor. The chair the gentleman yields. Mr. Young i reserve the balance of my time. The chair for what purpose does the gentleman from new jersey seek recognition . Mr. Pallone i ask for time in opposition to the amendment. The chair the gentleman is recognized for five minutes. Mr. Pallone thank you. Madam speaker, while i appreciate the efforts of the amendments sponsors, can i not support the youngharris amendment. As currently drafted the amendment threatens to undermine the independent peer review process that is the bedrock of n. I. H. Funding by injecting politics into the development and implementation of the prize competition. The amendment would create an innovation prize Advisory Board to assist the n. I. H. Director in carrying out the prize competition that is composed of nine members, four of which are politically appointed t would take away resources from existing Research Grant programs and other Research Efforts at n. I. H. It would require n. I. H. To put money on reserve for the prize competition, money that will go back into the treasury instead of Funding Research if their prize is not won in a given fiscal year. While i am not opposed to the potential of setting up a prizelike system, in fact n. I. H. Already has such authority. I would prefer to work with the sponsors on the language to find a more appropriate way to accomplish their goals. And therefore i would urge my colleagues to vote no and reserve the balance of my time. Mr. Upton i would just like to say as chairman of the committee, i look forward to working with the gentleman on the language. I think this is an important bill. Im going to amendment. Im going to speak in favor of it. Mr. Youngs time in a moment. But i just want to pledge that well work with you on language that certainly we can all accept knowing that the goal is a very good one. Mr. Pallone i appreciate that. Thank you. I reserve the balance of my time. The chair the gentleman from new jersey reserves. The gentleman from indiana is recognized. Mr. Young thank you, madam chair. I would just add that the purpose of this amendment obviously well received on both sides of the aisle perhaps there are particulars we can work on, is to catalyze more innovation among the thousands, tens of thousands of entrepreneurs and innovators around this country, around the world, if we can get more minds collectively thinking about medical breakthroughs, about actually curing diseases as a preventive measure, we can save significant amounts of money in the long term. We can dramatically improve lives in the shorter term. And this is a model that opens up federal government funding as a reward for these innovations to our nations innovators entrepreneurs, our doers. And right now the n. I. H. Grant process is suboptimal for a lot of these individual. I can speak to one individual. Used to be my neighbor. Hes a thomas edisonlike figure. He used to have a workshop right next to his house. He developed medical devices on his own and sold them off to larger companies. He would not receive an n. I. H. Grant. Would never apply for one. Doesnt have time to apply for one. Would he target an medical innovation on a prize thats offered . Indeed. We consulted with him. For the people like him around the world, it can help americans, we develop this Prize Program. With that i yield an additional minute to the chairman. Mr. Upton thank you. The chair the gentleman from michigan is recognized. Mr. Upton do i rise in support of this important amendment i do rise in support of this important amendment. Mr. Young, dr. Harris would authorize the n. I. H. To conduct a prize prament program. The intent of the amendment is to incentivize Health Innovation by offering competitors the chance to win a prize for developing breakthroughs. We ought to be encouraging that. Importantly, individuals who win the prize competition would keep all of the intellectual property rights. I think thats very important. I would ask my colleagues to support the amendment. I look forward to working with both sides of the aisle to make sure that we can, in fact, perfect it as we get to the end of the cycle. And ultimately to the president s desk. And yield back to the gentleman from indiana. The chair the gentleman from new jersey is recognized. Mr. Pallone i yield back my time. The chair the gentleman yield back. Mr. Young i yield back. The chair the gentleman from indiana yields back. The question is on the amendment offered by the gentleman from indiana. So many as are in favor say aye. Those opposed, no. In the opinion of the chair, the ayes have it. The amendment is agreed to. It is now in order to consider amendment number 3 printed in house report 114193. For what purpose does the the gentlewoman from california seek recognition . Ms. Lee thank you, madam chair, i have an amendment at the desk. Amendment number 3. The chair the clerk will designate the amendment. The clerk amendment number 3 printed in house report number 114193, offered by ms. Lee of california. The chair pursuant to House Resolution 350, the gentlewoman from california, ms. Lee, and a member posed each will control five minutes. The chair recognizes the gentlewoman from california. Ms. Lee thank you. Madam chair, im very pleased to offer this amendment with my colleagues two great women, representative jan schakowsky, and representative yvette clarke. The amendment is simple. It would strike a provision in the bill that applies to any policy riders in the agricultural appropriations bill to the new National Institute of health funds and the food and Drug Administration funds including included in h. R. 6 the 21 st. Century cures act. This provision reiterates the current law restrictions on Appropriations Bills like the Hyde Amendment which is restrictive and discriminatory against lowincome women to make their own Reproductive Health care decisions. This would allow to the new fund created for the n. I. H. In this bill. Lets be clear what this is about. As yet another attempt to insert abortion restrictions and other inappropriate riders into an unrelated bill. This is a bill to increase biomedical innovative research. The 21st crepetry cures act should have been a noncontroversial bipartisan effort. But antichoice leaders could not help but add this to the bill after, mind you after it had passed out of committee on a bipartisan vote. Its really outrageous. Part of a larger effort to force the inclusion of these harmful hyde restrictions in multiple and unrelated bills. We know that these dangerous policies disproportionately affect lowincome and women of color. Our amendment is about removing these inappropriate and consistent attacks on a womans right to make her own health care decisions. I urge my colleagues to vote yes to protecting a womans right to chews choose. I reserve the balance of my time. The chair the gentlewoman from california reserves the balance of her time. The gentleman from michigan is recognized. Mr. Upton thank you madam chair. I would reserve the time in opposition and i would yield two minutes to the gentleman from pennsylvania the chairman of the health subcommittee. The chair the gentleman from pennsylvania is recognized for two minutes. Mr. Pitts thank you, madam speaker. I rise in opposition to the lee amendment. If passed, this amendment would allow the National Institutes of health to use taxpayer dollars to conduct experiments involving abortion or to hone abortion techniques. Let me be clear, the underlying bill simply applies Current Federal Health policies that have been approved by both republican and democrat majorities for decades to new funds appropriated in the cures bill. It is nothing more than the status quo applied to new funding. There is a reason why these policies are the status quo. Americans do not want their tax dollars used to destroy unborn lives. Poll conducted just january showed 68 of americans oppose taxpayer funding for abortion. H. R. 6 the 21st century cures act, is about finding cures and protecting the health and wellbeing of americans. It would be a terrible injustice if a bill designed to save lives were to become a conduit for the destruction of the most vulnerable, the voiceless unborn, who are still too young to be heard trying out for help. I urge all members to oppose this amendment. I yield back the balance of my time. The chair the gentlewoman from michigan reserves. The the gentlewoman from california is recognized. Ms. Lee i would like to yield one minute to the gentlelady from illinois, cosponsor of this amendment. Congresswoman jan schakowsky. The chair the gentlewoman from illinois is recognized for one minute. Ms. Schakowsky im proud to join congresswoman lee and congresswoman clarke in offering this amendment. Our amendment would strike the policy riders that were added to the 21st century cures act after it passed unanimously the energy and Commerce Committee 510. Most notably our amendment would remove the unnecessary addition of the Hyde Amendment. The Hyde Amendment is a discriminatory policy that denies millions of women the full range of Health Care Choices and it has no business being included in this legislation. Its time for us to stop using these bills as a way to discriminate against women and Going Forward as far as im concerned i will not support any bill that adds such language. Its time for us to stop taking away Health Services from lowincome women, from women serving in the military, from federal employees, and from every woman who relies on the federal government for her health insurance. All women, regardless of their incomes and what insurance they have, deserve to make their own health choices. This bipartisan, landmark legislation, i ask that members vote in favor of our amendment. I yield back. The chair the gentlewomans time has expired. The gentleman from michigan is recognized. Mr. Upton thank you madam speaker. At this point id yield two minutes to the vice chair of the energy and Commerce Committee, the gentlewoman from tennessee mrs. Blackburn. The chair the gentlewoman from tennessee is recognized for two minutes. Mrs. Blackburn thank you, madam chairman. And i do rise in opposition to this amendment. I think its important to realize a couple of things. The American People have spoken out on this issue. 68 of all americans oppose taxpayer dollars being used for abortion. 71 of all millennials oppose this. And what the lee amendment would do is strip away bipartisan agreements that we use in Appropriations Bills. This is not something that is new. Its not language that is new. The Hyde Amendment and the hyde language has been around for a very long time. The lee amendment would reverse important limitations to protect these taxpayer dollars. Ive mentioned the opposition to abortion. There is also prohibition for the use of public funds to advocate for gun control, limit federal grants from being awarded to tax cheats. Do we really want tax cheats being able to get federal dollars . Limit extraffic get conference spending for public extravagant conference spending for Public Employees . Do we really want them to waste these dollars . Of course not. Of course not. That is why this language is in the bill. I encourage my colleagues to vote against the lee amendment and i return the balance of my time to the chairman. The chair the gentlewoman yields back to the gentleman from michigan. The gentlewoman from california is recognized. Ms. Lee thank you. Id like to yield one minute now to the gentlelady from new york, another cosponsor of this amendment, congresswoman yvette clarke. The chair the gentlewoman is recognized for one minute. Ms. Clarke i rise in support of the leeschakowskyclarke amendment. H. R. 6, the 21st century cures act, which received unanimous support from members of the energy and Commerce Committee, demonstrates that democrats and republicans can Work Together in an effort to develop medicines treatments and cures that will save lives. Unfortunately, our bipartisan consensus has been undermined by a lastminute inclusion of an antichoice provision in this bill. This new provision which is a cynical poison bills pil, and lax germaneness pill, and lacks germaneness to the bill, fails to respect the personal dignity of women by limiting their health care options. It interferes with the private relationship between a woman and her doctor and denies women which i believe is a fundamental right to have control over their own bodies. Im deeply concerned that this new provision will only serve as confirmation for the skeptics who believe that members of congress cant work with each other in the public interest. We can vote for this amendment voting for this amendment and stripping out this provision and i yield back the balance of my time. The chair the gentlewomans time has expired. The gentleman from michigan is recognized. Mr. Upton madam speaker, could i just ask how much time is remaining on each side . I know we have one minute left. The chair the gentleman from michigan has two minutes remaining. And the gentlewoman from california has one minute remaining. Mr. Upton im the last speaker on our side so maybe ill yield myself as much time as i may consume. Let me do that. The chair the gentleman is recognized for two minutes. Mr. Upton thank you, madam speaker. Madam speaker, i do rise in opposition to the lee amendment. The lee amendment would strip dozens of important liglimentations and restrictions that would apply limitations and restrictions that would apply restrictions for the normal appropriations process. For example, this amendment would strike limitations, as been noted that would prevent taxpayer dollars from being used to destroy life and frankly they have been in place since the 1970s, going back to the henry hyde days in the house. The lee amendment would also strike other commonsense protections that normally apply to appropriated funds. This includes restrictions that prevent federal grants from being awarded to tax cheats. The lee amendment would be a vote to allow, should it pass, to allow abuse of taxpayer funds. So i would urge the house to reject this amendment. We carefully wrote provisions that the riders that are in place would apply to each of the years of the n. I. H. Funds and i think that thats appropriate that the lee amendment would undermine that so i would urge my colleagues to vote no and i yield back the balance of my time. The chair the gentleman from michigan yields back. The gentlewoman from california is recognized for one minute. Ms. Lee thank you madam chair. Id like to yield one minute to congresswoman diget the leader of this bill degette, the leader of this bill and sponsor of this amendment, one minute. The chair the gentlewoman is recognized for one minute. Ms. Degette i rise in support of the lee amendment. At best, these policy riders are immaterial provisions that have no affect on the policies and activities of the n. I. H. Or f. D. A. But many of them will research with researchers and the Scientific Understanding that can make all of us safer. The Hyde Amendment is especially offensive. The last i heard neither the n. I. H. Or the f. D. A. Ever perform abortion and so hydes restrictions remind us that even bipartisan efforts are not immune from political attacks. Women consist of more than half the patients in america, and their Health Care Needs should not be insulted and restricted by this congress. I want to thank my colleagues, congresswoman Lee Schakowsky and clarke for introducing this amendment. We should remove these policy riders and keep 21st century cures focused on the Great Potential to do more for patients. I yield back. The chair the gentlewomans time has expired. The question is on the amendment offered by the gentlewoman from california. Those in favor say aye. Those opposed, no. In the opinion of the chair, the ayes have it. The amendment is not agreed to. Ms. Lee id like to ask for a recorded vote. Mr. Upton id like to ask for a recorded vote. The chair pursuant to clause 6 of rule 18, further proceedings on the amendment offered by the gentlewoman from california will be postponed. It is now in order to consider amendment number 4 printed in house report 114193. For what purpose does the gentleman from texas seek recognition . Mr. Castro madam speaker i have an amendment at the desk. The chair the clerk will designate the amendment. The clerk amendment number 4 printed in house report 114193 offered by mr. Castro of texas. The chair pursuant to House Resolution 350, the gentleman from texas, mr. Castro, and a member opposed, each will control five minutes. The chair recognizes the gentleman from texas. Mr. Castro thank you madam speaker. First thank you, chairman upton and Ranking Member pallone and also congresswoman degette for their work on this bill. My amendment seeks to ensure that when the n. I. H. Reports on its retention of young scientists it includes data specifically related to women and other underrepresented minority populations in the scientific community. With that madam speaker i reserve the balance of my time. The chair the gentleman from texas reserves. Mr. Upton theres no is there any member wishing to claim opposition to the amendment . If not, can i claim the time on our side . The chair without objection, the gentleman from michigan is recognized for five minutes. Mr. Upton and madam speaker, we support this amendment. I think that its important. It would include underrepresented individuals in the sciences in the n. I. H. Report on efforts to retract retain and develop emerging scientists. Its important to ensure that n. I. H. Is indeed focused on including all qualified individuals dedicated to finding cures. I know no one that is opposed to this amendment. We support it and i appreciate your hard work on this and look forward to having it be part of the process as it moves forward and i yield back the balance of my time. The chair the gentleman from michigan yields back. The gentleman from texas is recognized. Mr. Castro madam speaker, id like to yield one minute to the Ranking MemberFrank Pallone from new jersey. The chair the gentleman from new jersey is recognized. Mr. Pallone thank you, madam chair woman. This amendment would require the n. I. H. To report on their specific efforts to attract more women and racial and ethnic minorities into the biomedical work force. Its clear we must reverse the harmful trend of limited participation by women and racial ethnic minorities in the biomedical work force. We must encourage the best and brightest from all populations to be part of the biomedical work force. We risk losing our position as having the best biomedical work force in the world. And so i urge my colleagues to vote yes on this amendment. I yield back. The chair the gentleman yields back. The gentleman from texas is recognized. Mr. Castro thank you, madam speaker. Id like to yield a minute to my colleague from texas, Sheila Jackson lee. The chair the gentlewoman from texas is recognized for one minute. Ms. Jackson lee i thank the gentleman very much. It gives me an opportunity to not only thank the gentleman for his very astute amendment but to thank the sponsors of this bill from mr. Pallone, mr. Green, ms. Degette mr. Upton and all the work that has been done. But having served a number of years on the house science committee, i want to thank the gentleman from texas because all we heard often and very often was the value of investing in minorities and women as a new cutting edge of scientific research. We know that this bill is expansive but were delighted with your emphasis on the recruiting of women and minorities, particularly for the young emerging scientists report and primarily because they begin to fuel the next generation of research and next generation of the solving of problems which is the american cures act. So i rise to support the gentlemans amendment and say to you that the documentation is long, that these individuals will then fill the laboratories of america and begin to do Cutting Edge Research to be able to create a better life for all of us. With that i thank the gentleman. I support his amendment and i yield back. The chair the gentlewoman yields back. The gentleman from texas is recognized. Mr. Castro thank you chairman upton, and the republicans, for your cooperation on this amendment. I yield back. The chair the gentleman yields back. The question is on the amendment offered by the gentleman from texas. Those in favor, please say aye. Those opposed say no. In the opinion of the chair, the ayes have it. The amendment is agreed to. It is now in order to consider amendment number 5 printed in house report 114193. For what purpose does the gentlewoman from new york seek recognition . Ms. Slaughter mr. Speaker, i have an amendment at the desk. The chair the clerk will designate the amendment. The clerk amendment number 5 printed in house report 114193 offered by ms. Slaughter of new york. The chair pursuant to House Resolution 350, the gentlewoman from new york, ms. Slaughter, and a member opposed, will each control five minutes. The chair recognizes the gentlewoman from new york. Ms. Slaughter thank you very much, mr. Speaker. And i rise today in support of my amendment which directs the c. D. C. , the centers for Disease Control to study whether incentivizing the use of new antibiotics which the underlying bill does, will lead to antibiotic resistance and cause these lifesaving drugs to be less effective. Section 2123 of the 21st century cures authorizes additional payments to hospitals for using newly developed antibiotics. The reason we need new antibiotics is that we have one of the greatest achievement of the 21st century by overusing the ones we have and i fear being hospitals excuse me to use a new generation of antibiotics will just repeat the cycle of overuse and develop more drug resistant superbugs. Quite simply, the taxpayers should not foot the bill for practices that are making antibiotics less effective. The amendment directs the c. D. C. To study the effect the bill will have on drugs that is part of the foundation of modern medicine. I urge my colleagues, many of whom who expressed their alarm at the rise of antibiotic resistance, to support the amendment. Im certainly not alone in my concern about the section of the bill. I know there are several members myself included, that will feel safer if section 2123 was removed entirely. A recent report from the united kingdom, a review on antibiotic resistance led by the brilliant economist, jim oneil, noted that increasing reimbursements for new antibiotics will have limited good Infection Control and stewardship practices within hospitals, end quote. The study required by this amendment will provide valuable data on the link between efforts to Incentivize Development of new antibiotics and the development of resistance to be sure we dont repeat the cycle. I want to be clear about whats at stake here. Worldwide antibioticresistant infections already kill 700,000 people every year. If we dont act now, by the year 2050, according to mr. Oneils study the annual death toll will rise to 10 million a year the costs will be 100 trillion. Without antibiotic, the modern medical advances such as joint replacements, Organ Transplants would be impossible. Even the routine procedures such as departmental work would be too risky to perform. So we have to remember our urgent need for new antibiotics is due to our widespread misuse and over use of the current antibiotics that led to the crisis of antibiotic resistance. We have to cure that before we use new antibiotics. 30 to 50 of the antibiotics proscribed to humans are unnecessary. But 80 of the antibiotics produced in the United States are used on industrial farms where they are routinely fed to healthy animals. Its an absolute recipe for creating antibiotic resistance. We cant afford to keep using such precious life save resources so thoughtlessly. So the changes in how our current antibiotic use are desperately needed. Unfortunately my amendment doesnt do what i would really like which would be to protect eight classes of antibiotics for use in human health by not allowing their use on the farm except for sick animals. Remember, as i said before, these antibiotics, 80 are fed to well animals every single day. However, the amendment will ensure that we can know whether incentives to develop new antibiotics continue the problem of resistance. Having effective antibiotics is too important not to get this right. I urge my colleagues to support the amendment and i reserve the balance of my time. The chair the gentlewoman reserves. The gentleman from michigan is recognized. Mr. Youton mr. Speaker, i would ask unanimous consent to control the time in opposition to the slaughter amendment. The chair without objection, so ordered. Mr. Upton mr. Speaker, i would yield myself 10 seconds. The chair the gentleman is recognized for 10 seconds. Mr. Upton we strongly support this amendment. Congratulate the woman for offering t i yield three minutes to the former chairman, Ranking Member subcommittee chair, and Ranking Member now chairman emeritus and former deputy whip from texas, mr. Barton, three minutes. The chair the gentleman is recognized for three minutes. Mr. Barton i thank the gentleman. I ask unanimous consent to revise and extend. The chair without objection. Mr. Barton mr. Speaker, if you look up here at the podium right behind me on the republican side, what do you see . Carved into the balancelies straud you see liberty. On the democratic side you see the word justice. If you look straight down the center aisle between them what do you see . Tolerance. Mr. Speaker, the bill thats before us today is a culmination of four years of hard work between both political parties, both leaderships of the energy and Commerce Committee on both sides of the aisle in which a lot of tolerance has been exhibited. Conservatives on the republican side havent gotten everything we want in this bill. Liberals on the democratic side havent gotten everything they want in this bill. But the work product is a culmination of an open process that chairman upton and subCommittee Chairman pitts had put together. Every member of the committee has been invited to numerous working groups probably 10 15. I dont know. And given every opportunity to have input into what they want and what they dont want. This bill will become law. It will stay law. It will become law and it will unite the medical research community. There are things in this bill that i have worked on for 10 years. That will help find cures sooner rather than later. I had a woman in my office in texas three days ago four days ago, her son has autism. Hes 11 years old. Hes her only child. They literally dont know what toe do. He speaks one word at a time. He becomes violent. Shes almost given up hope. But we are doing Amazing Research in autism. This bill will facilitate and expedite that. Im tired of telling parents of children, i dont know, i cant help you. I want to say heres what we are doing. This bill does that. Now, theres a 2 billion mandatory program for five years called the Innovation Fund. My conservative friends, oh, we cant vote for the bill because of that program. What was Medicare Part d . It was a mandatory program 40 billion that was not offset. Every republican in the house voted for that. I he might point out every democrat voted against it. That was voluntary. The people could participate or not participate, but it was mandatory that the federal government had to spend the money. Last year we voted on a program for veterans, 10 billion. Every republican in the house voted for that. It wasnt offset. Now, i would rather that we have everything discretionary. I wish the whole federal budget was discretionary except for social security. But its not. Let could i have 15 seconds . Mr. Upton the gentleman has 15 more seconds. The chair the gentleman is recognized for 15 more second. Mr. Barton mr. Speaker, lets come together. Lets vote for something we can all be proud of. That we can tell the parents of children with autism theres hope. Theres a future. Vote yes. Please vote yes. Thank you. The chair the gentlemans time has expired. The the gentlewoman from new york is recognized. Ms. Slaughter mr. Speaker, i very much want to thank mr. Upton for his graciousness in accepting this. Look forward to working with him further on this issue. And yield the balance of my time to congressman green from texas. The chair the gentleman from texas is recognized. Mr. Green i want to thank our Ranking Member on the rules committee for bringing up this amendment. I support the amendment. This bill also includes some great provisions in there for the next generation of research on antibiotics. Congressman john shimkus and i worked on it this session previously over the last two sessions. What this amendment addresses is not just a new generation, but we also need to not overuse what we have. And that is a problem in our country. And as i say i have sinus infections, but those antibiotics wont help it. We need to make sure we doesnt over use. Im glad our colleague has come up with the amendment. I support t i yield back. The chair the gentlemans time has expired. The gentleman from michigan is recognized. Mr. Upton mr. Speaker, i would yield the balance of my time, 1 35 with a few more second, to the gentleman from illinois, mr. Roskam, a member of the important ways and means committee. The chair the gentleman is recognized. Mr. Roskam thank you, mr. Speaker. Thank you, chairman upton. My disarm act is part of this h. R. 6 the cures act. I thank chairman upton and his act for including it. It is a focal point of a lot of discussion on both sides of the aisle as it relates to antibiotics, mr. Speaker. There is an Incredible Health threat that has manifested itself, interestingly and sadly, in two important ways near my constituency in the chicago area. Back in december of 2013, 44 patients at lutheran General Hospital cultured positive for c. R. E. , known as the nightmare bacteria. To put this in perspective, previously only 96 cases had been reported to the c. D. C. Before. Nearby in al conquinn, illinois, two cases of an extensively drug resistant tuberculosis were also diagnosed. 23 patients according to the c. D. C. , 23,000 patients die annually from this. What the disarm act does, which is embedded in cures, h. R. 6, is it gets researchers and scientists back in the business of antibiotic research and development by modernizing how medicare treats use treatments for infections considered to be unmedical needs. It reimburses target antibiotics at cost to ensure a functioning marketplace where the right treatment is used at the right time for the right patient. Helping to reinvigorate the pipeline of drugs and development. Its a critical piece of the you Drug Resistance puzzle. I urge passage of cures h. R. 6. I thank chairman upton. I yield back. The chair the gentleman yields back. The gentlemans time has expired. All time on the question has expired. The question is now on the amendment offered by the gentlewoman from new york. So many as are in favor say aye. Those in opposition please say no. In the opinion of the chair, the ayes have it. The amendment is agreed to. Now in order to consider amendment number 6 printed in house report 114193. For what purpose does the gentleman from pennsylvania seek recognition . Mr. Fit patrick i have an amendment at the desk. The chair the clerk will designate the amendment. The clerk amendment number 6 printed in house report number 114193 offered by mr. Fitzpatrick of pennsylvania. The chair pursuant to House Resolution to reinvigorate 350 the gentleman from pennsylvania mr. Fitzpatrick, and a member posed, each will control five minutes. The chair recognizes the gentleman from pennsylvania. Mr. Fitzpatrick thank you, sir. First i want to express my deep appreciation to chairman upton and Ranking Member degette on this bill. The funding in these innovative reforms will save lives and thats something that everyone in this chamber should be proud of. There are a lot of wonderful provisions in this bill, and we should see those provisions through. Im a member, mr. Chairman, of the rare disease caucus. Like most of us here i met with constituents with incredible stories of courage, stories of their battle with diseases without treatments. It would be easy to fall victim to despair, but they dont. They remain beacons of hope, hope for a treatment. Hope for a world where no one else has to go through what they did. And they look to us to support them to fight alongside them for these treatments and lifesaving research. Im proud to stand with them and fight for them. But there is a part of this bill i believe will do more harm than good. Thats the part that deals with easing medical device safety regulations. While we bring our research and treatments into the 21st crentry, i think its equally important we bring our medical device safety regulations into the 21st century as well. As part of a 21st century approach to medical devices the f. D. A. Established a unique device Identification System to adequately identify medical devices through their distribution and use. These codes can significantly improve safety and help track down dangerous recalled products. Currently these u. D. I. S are not incorporated into all Electronic Health records, which make it difficult to fully achieve the benefits to patient safety. For example a claim form might list the procedure like a routine surgery to remove uterine fibroids, but not note the make or model of the device used. Such as the lab breaux scopic laproscopic, some manufacturesers have recalled, and some Insurance Companies have stopped covering because of the adverse effects on womens health. This is tragedy surrounding the power morsilator. Thats why i offered eight amendments to the rules committee that would strengthen our safety laws. This week i have heard from dozens of these individuals affected by complications from power morcelation. One doctor from california sent me a note about how her sister died nine months after a routine surgery. A woman from massachusetts described her battle with the cancer that was spread by one. Another constituent in new york, these constituents wrote letters to their members of congress and copied my office, she lost her sister to cancer spread by the device and described the tragedy as a routine surgery ending with a death sentence. A constituent of mine, doctor and mother of six children, who is courageously fighting an aggressive cancer spread by the blades of the device. What happened, mr. Chairman with the power morcilator should not be allowed to happen again. I think we missed an opportunity to with this bill to tackle the problem head on. In 22011 it was found the four decade old medical safety process 5010k noting it lacks the legal basis to be a reliable, premarket screen of the safety and effectiveness of moderate risk devices. I wish the bill addressed this gap that allowed the device to slip through and cause unnecessary harm to way too many families. So its time we take our medical device safety regulations into the 21st crebtry century. I ask my colleagues to join me and support thevert today which is a small and important step. Im proud to stand for patient safety. I urge my colleagues to stand with mean thousands of others who have been injured or killed by unsafe medical devices. Mr. Chairman, i reserve the balance of my time. The chair the gentleman reserves. Does any member wish to speak in opposition to the amendment . The gentleman from pennsylvania is recognized. One minute remaining sir. Mr. Fitzpatrick i yield to my colleague from pennsylvania mr. Pitts. The chair the gentleman from pennsylvania is recognized. Mr. Pitts i rise today in support of the amendment offered by representative fitzpatrick. The fitzpatrick amendment would put forward a sense of congress that our Health Care System should find ways to incorporate information from medical devices into the care of our nations patients. I believe that such information can prove a valuable tool in advancing Quality Health care in this country, but it must be done carefully to ensure that the value to patients, Health Care Providers, industry and the government is realized. So i support the amendment and reserve the balance of my time. The chair the gentleman from pennsylvania reserves. Mr. Pallone can i ask for time in opposition . The chair the gentleman is recognized for five minutes. Mr. Pallone thank you, mr. Chairman. I do want to speak in favor, though. I yield myself such time as i may consume. The chair the gentleman is recognized. Mr. Pallone mr. Chairman, the amendment offered today by congressman fitzpatrick expresses the sense of congress that unique identity fires could significantly enhance the availability of medical device data for purposes of postmarket surveillance. Ive long supported the use of u. D. I. s in the food and Drug AdministrationAmendment Act of 2007. We required f. D. A. To establish a unique device Identification System and in the food and Drug Administration safety and innovation act of to 12, we required f. D. A. To 2012, we required f. D. A. To have implementations. It would lead to improved medical devices and care across our Health Care System. It will modernize how f. D. A. Monitors the safety of medical devices after they have been approved or cleared and identify medical devices with a history of safety issues. It also will facilitate recalls and making it easier for patients to learn when their medical device, such as a knee implant, is subject to a recall. The identifier is one more tool that will help the f. D. A. And our Health Care System to improve the monitoring of the safety of medical devices, incorporating u. D. I. s into Electronic Health records will take time but its a worthy goal and one that i support and so i urge my colleagues to support the amendment offered by congressman fitzpatrick. I yield back. The chair the gentleman from new jersey reserves. Yields back. The gentleman from pennsylvania is recognized. Mr. Fitzpatrick id like to thank Ranking Member pallone and chairman pitts for their support of this amendment. This amendment will take a small step in improving medical device safety in the United States. As i said earlier in my remarks, i have seven amendments that did not make it out of rules committee. I hope to be able to work with the chairman and the Ranking Member on those issues as well. So i urge my colleagues to support the amendment and i yield back the balance of my time. The chair the gentleman from pennsylvania yield its back yields back the balance of his time. The question is on the amendment offered by the gentleman from pennsylvania. Those in favor say aye. Those opposed, no. In the opinion of the chair, the ayes have it. The amendment is agreed to. It is now in order to consider amendment number 7 printed in house report 114193. For what purpose does the gentleman from colorado seek recognition . Mr. Polis i have an amendment at the desk. The chair the clerk will designate the amendment. The clerk amendment number 7 printed in house report 114193 offered by mr. Polis of colorado. The chair pursuant to House Resolution 350, the gentleman from colorado, mr. Polis, and a member opposed, will each control five minutes. The chair recognizes the gentleman from colorado. Mr. Polis thank you. Id like to start by commending chairman upton, Ranking Member pallone ms. Degette, mr. Green and so many others and im proud to join as a cosponsor for the 21st century cures act which is really a first step to update our approval process, to help countless americans gain access to lifesaving drugs and devices. This bill will save lives. I am proud to support it and send a strong message that we need to move forward with reform. But at the same time were passing this bill, we should start thinking about what the next step is and passage of this bill should not foreclose additional opportunities in the future to improve access to lifesaving medical device products and lifesaving drugs. Most importantly, this body can move forward with the next generation and start the process to help people get access to medical technology that can help people get healthy and save money. Its in that spirit that i put forward my amendment which would look at a two tiered approval process for medical devices that would allow devices come to market once they demonstrated safety while the f. D. A. Is still reviewing them for efficacy. This solves a problem in the real world. The cost of bringing a medical device to market is 30 million to 100 million. Those are costes that are then added to consumers of the medical device. That makes it even more problems for niche medical devices because they are priced provide hibtively. In addition theres the aspect of a time line. In the european market, for instance, if someone creates a new device to prevent blood clots it reaches the market in seven to 11 months. In the u. S. Market they are looking at a time line of 2 1 2 to four years. Think how many sufferers might die because our own government is keeping that lifesaving product off the market even though its been demonstrated as safe. And additional result is some Technology Companies are bypassing the u. S. Market altogether when they develop new devices which can result in years long delays access to patients and those who view the market as expensive, market their devices in other nations. I think its important to talk about what comes next. I think both devices and drugs we need to look at the potential for a two tiered process that allows a provisional approval and access to the american market. That doesnt mean insurance will cover it. That doesnt mean they can make any Health Claims with regard to the efficacy of their product. Thats an existing law. But with regard to the safety being demonstrated, the provisional marketing of the product in america can save lives and will save lives. And i reserve the balance of my time. The chair the gentleman from colorado reserves. I claim time in opposition. The chair the gentleman is recognized for five minutes. Mr. Green thank you, mr. Speaker. I rise in the necessarily in opposition to the amendment. I want to thank the congressman for his efforts to advance medical Device Development and would like to work with him on the legislation and enhance Patient Access to therapies. However, im concerned this amendment is drafted would lower the approval standard for medical devices and suggest that patients should be exposed to products that are proven that are not proven effective. The f. D. A. Approval is a global Gold Standard for safety and effectiveness. While i support efforts to modernize and improve the standards such safety cannot be evaluated in a vacuum and patients should not be offered treatmentes that have not be studied or proven for their care. I have Great Respect to my colleague, congressman polis. Id like to work with him forward on that because he was correct in his statement. You know, this doesnt mean it will be reimbursed. So were proving devices safe but its not its not effective. And i think theres a way maybe we can still make sure it not only do we want it to be safe but we want also to solve the problem or have the cure for whatever particular illness. And with that ill reserve my time. The chair the gentleman reserves. Mr. Green id be glad to the chairman. Mr. Upton if the gentleman will yield. Id like to work with the gentleman from colorado. Its an important issue. I believe it has merit but we got to make sure its designed just the right way. I want to say its probably the lateness the timing of the amendment when it came forward. To my understanding the gentleman may withdraw the amendment. Id appreciate that. And allow us some time to really get together and see if there might be another day, and i yield back to the gentleman from texas. Mr. Green id be glad to yield to the Ranking Member. Mr. Pallone i just want to join with my other colleagues, mr. Green and also the chairman, that we do understand the purpose of the polis amendment but we do have problems with it at the same time. Wed like to have a conversation with mr. Polis about it. I understand hes going to withdraw it. Then we would follow up and have a conversation and perhaps a meeting with the f. D. A. As well. Mr. Polis i thank both the chair and the Ranking Member. And this is a very important discussion to have. Both with regards to devices and also with regards to drugs. And we know that there are treatments that are available overseas. I represent a district, by the way one of the largest veterinary hospitals in the country. I can tell you there are advanced treatments available today for animals with cancer, like horses that are not yet approved for humans and are lifesaving. If we can provide access in a shortened time frame i understand while medical devices may cost 30 million to 100 million to market, drugs may cost over 1 billion to bring to market. There are additional opportunities, by the way in making sure as part of this provisional process, at least regard to drugs, that the data can be gathered too. It will have a duo function. Complying with some of the needs or updating the needs of the f. D. A. Efficacy trials it can actually be available through a marketoriented plan where people consumers who are fully informed and of course to whom no Health Claims have been made can choose to purchase the product just as they can, by the way, but they have to buy it overseas and imported for their own personal use and i have constituents who do that. But i think we can facilitate that process and i deeply appreciate working with the chair and the Ranking Member of the committee and the subcommittee with regard to helping to bring access to lifesaving medical devices and pharmaceutical products to our shore. Im happy to yield to the gentleman. I was going to rise in opposition to the amendment. Though now its being withdrawn. I see it as an opportunity to work on medical device safety issue. Mr. Fitzpatrick i was going to object and vote against the amendment because its my concern that amendment would actually loosen medical device safety regulations and permit safe but ineffective devices to get to the market. I know this sort of claim late in the process. And i would have objected because i had seven amendments before the committee to strengthen medical device regulations. But since the amendment is being withdrawn, i would see an opportunity perhaps for us to Work Together, take a step back, look at all the f. D. A. Regulations. Mr. Polis i ask unanimous consent to withdraw my amendment. The chair without objection, the amendment is withdrawn. It is now in order to consider amendment number 8 printed in house report 114193. For what purpose does the gentlewoman from texas seek recognition . Ms. Jackson lee mr. Chairman i have an amendment at the desk. The chair the clerk will designate the amendment. The clerk amendment number 8 printed in house report 114193 offered by ms. Jackson lee of texas. The chair pursuant to House Resolution 350, the gentlewoman from texas, ms. Jackson lee, and a member opposed will each control five minutes. The chair recognizes the gentlewoman from texas. Ms. Jackson lee mr. Chairman, thank you. Again, let me add my appreciation to mr. Upton, ms. Degette, mr. Pitts mr. Pallone and mr. Green and i ask a simple question when have we had historic opportunity on the floor of the house to have such a major investment, major investment in the lives and health of americans, quality investment involving a mandatory fund that will open americas labs and put more people in labs and be able to give people relief on some of the issues that weve heard discussed today . I thank mr. Barton for raising the sadness that comes of parents who cannot find answers and many of them are my constituency who have children with sickle cell as we have been attempting to research this disease for many, many years. Or the lupus that took advantage of a very active civic leader and caused the hospitalization for months. Or this issue of triple negative Breast Cancer that many people are not aware of. So the amendment i have today is to emphasize the importance of outreach to our historically black colleges hispanicserving, indian, native american and rural colleges. And let me explain for a brief moment the importance of this particular message. Physicians are a gateway to the patient. In short, the jackson lee amendment seeks to open up the physician gateway for patients and to researchers. It is to emphasize stem education. It is to talk about the different medical illnesses and how important it is to reach out to these particular institutions to produce more medical professionals. According to the centers for Disease Control and prevention, sickle cell treat is common among africanamericans and occurs in about one in 12. Additionally race and ethnicity have been shown to affect the effectiveness of response in drugs. We need these students in these colleges to be in our labs, to be physicians, to welcome minorities into the Clinical Labs because we have evidence to show of the short numbers of individuals who volunteer for clinicals. Minorities are at the low end. So i encourage my colleagues to support the jackson lee amendment open the doors of research and patient care through doctors and open the doors of solving some of these very difficult diseases. With that i reserve my time. The chair the gentlewoman reserves. The gentleman from michigan is recognized. Mr. Upton mr. Speaker could i ask unanimous consent to control the time in opposition though i support the amendment . The chair without objection. The gentleman is recognized for five minutes. Mr. Upton i yield myself two minutes. Mr. Speaker, i appreciate this am. Its a good amendment. And it builds on what a member of our committee, bobby rush did in full committee markup. It directs the secretary of h. H. S. To perform outreach to historically black colleges and universities, hispanic serving institutions, native american colleges, and rural colleges to ensure Health Professionals from underrepresented areas are aware of Research Opportunities under this act. Its a real complement to what was done before. Mr. Rush, as i remember, grabbed me on the house floor literally during our markup process and was very supportive of a number of amendments and through the night, in fact, we worked on those amendments and included them in the managers amendment that i offered then the very next morning. They were accepted on a voice vote. So this is clearly a bipartisan amendment. It is essential that we include everyone as we find cures for all. Ms. Lee she and i have worked together on a number of Health Related issues over the years. On date rape drugs and other issues that really strike to the heart. I appreciate her value in adding this amendment, and i very strongly support it. I reserve the balance of my time. Yield to the gentleman i still have a minute. Yield to the gentleman from pennsylvania one minute of my time. Mr. Fattah this is a special day. This is a time i would be a member of the Chairmans Committee than the appropriations committee. The committee should be congratulated on the great work on this bill. Im happy to be an original cosponsor. I rise in support of the amendment. It is critically important that we have a serious outreach to all of our universities and medical centers including those in africanamerican and hispanic, native american universities. And those in our most rural parts of our country. I thank the gentleman for yielding. And i thank him and Dianne Degette and all those who worked on this great piece of legislation. I yield back. Mr. Upton reserve. The chair the gentleman from michigan reserves. Ms. Jackson lee how much time do i have . The chair the gentlewoman from texas has 2 1 2 minutes. Ms. Jackson lee i would be delighted to yield 30 seconds to the distinguished Ranking Member of the energy and Commerce Committee. Mr. Pallone thank you. The chair the gentleman is recognized. Mr. Pallone i want to urge support for this amendment. We need to make sure that emerging scientists from all population understand Congress Commitment to ensuring the fund something there to support our biomedical work force, requiring the secretary to do outreach to colleges and universities that educate large numbers of students from underrepresented groups. Will ensure that all groups know of our commitment to making sure that funding is not a barrier to a career in bio medical research. I urge my colleagues to vote yes on the Sheila Jackson lee amendment. I yield back. The chair the gentleman yields back. The gentlewoman from texas. Bio medical research. It ms. Jackson lee thank you. I thank mr. Upton. I certainly thank mr. Fattah and mr. Pallone. Again my dear friend from texas mr. Green, for his great leadership. Let me, mr. Chairman, indicate that certain medical illnesses have been known to have higher prevalence in certain demographic groups. Including type two diabetes, lupus, sickle cell anemia, and many other forms of diseases impacting our children. Ones with early birth. So i ask my colleagues again to support this because increased diversity and Research Trials can help researchers find bert, more ms. Jackson lee thank you. I thank mr. Precise ways to fight diseases that disproportionately impact certain populations and may be important for safe and effective use of therapies. I think this is a historic day. I join with mr. Upton to say we have been friends. We started with the first bill together. All of these members who have come together to put a historic mark on this nation to say that we will not take a back step to any nation on research and improving the quality of life for all of our citizens. I must say this is a historic day as well for north minorities. I thank mr. Rush for his constant service. I take note of the fact increased in this is the ability to raise the f. D. A. Loans that people might get to 50,000 which will help many minorities. I hold this chart that show minorities do not volunteer for clinicals. Im delighted to have a letter from the United Negro College fund who indicates that 25 of africanamerican graduates with degrees in science, technology, math come from historically black colleges. They are waiting in line to be part of these clincals. To be doctors and researchers. We must give them that opportunity. It is a historic day. I cannot conclude my remarks by not saying a few minutes ago by video i witnessed the flag of South Carolina, the rebel flag, being taken down. I would only say it is a unifying factor. This bill is a unifying factor. And its going to help all of us. I ask my colleagues to support the jackson lee amendment. With that i yield back. The chair the gentlewoman yields back. Mr. Upton i yield back. The chair the gentleman from michigan yields back. The question is on the amendment offered by the gentlewoman from texas. It so many as are in favor say aye. Those opposed, no. In the opinion of the chair, the ayes have it. The amendment is agreed. To pursuant to clause 6 of rule 18, proceedings will now resume on those amendments printed in house report 114193 on which further proceedings were postponed in the following order. Amendment number 1 by mr. Brat of virginia. Amendment number 3 by ms. Lee of california. The chair will reduce to two minutes the minimum time for any electronic vote after the first vote in this series. The Unfinished Business is the request for recorded vote on amendment number 1 printed in house report 114193 by the gentleman from virginia, mr. Brat on which further proceedings were postponed and on which the noes prevailed by a voice vote. The clerk will redesignate the amendment. The clerk amendment number 1, printed in house report number 114193, offered by mr. Brat of virginia. The chair a recorded vote has been requested. Those in support of the request for recorded vote will rise and be counted. A sufficient number having arisen, a recorded vote is ordered. Members will record their votes by electronic device. This will be a 15minute vote. [captioning made possible by the national captioning institute, inc. , in cooperation with the United States house of representatives. Any use of the closedcaptioned coverage of the house proceedings for political or commercial purposes is expressly prohibited by the u. S. House of representatives. ] the chair on this vote the yeas are 141. The nays are 281. The amendment is not adopted. The Unfinished Business is the request for recorded vote the house is not in order. The Unfinished Business is the request for recorded vote on amendment number 3 printed in house report 114193 by the gentleman from california, the gentlewoman from california, ms. Lee, on which further proceedings were postponed and the yeas prevailed by voice vote. The clerk will redesignate the amendment. The clerk amendment number 3 printed in house report number 114193, offered by ms. Lee of california. The chair a recorded vote has been requested. Those in support of the request for recorded vote will rise and be counted. A sufficient number having arisen, a recorded vote is ordered. Members will record their votes by electronic device. It this will be a twominute vote. [captioning made possible by the national captioning institute, inc. , in cooperation with the United States house of representatives. Any use of the closedcaptioned coverage of the house proceedings for political or commercial purposes is expressly prohibited by the u. S. House of representatives. ] the chair on this vote, the yeas are 176, the nays are 245, the amendment is not agreed. There being no further amendments, the committee rises. The speaker pro tempore mr. Chairman. The chair the committee of the whole house has had under consideration h. R. 6 and pursuant to House Resolution 350, i report it back to the house adopted in the committee of the whole. The speaker pro tempore the chair of the committee of the whole house on the state of the union has had under consideration h. R. 6 and pursuant House Resolution 350 reports the bill back to the house with further amendments adopted in the committee of the whole. Under the rule, the question is ordered. Is a separate vote demanded. If not, the question is on adoption of the amendment. Those in favor say aye. Those opposed, no. The ayes have it. Question on engrossment and third reading of the bill. Those in favor say aye. Those opposed, no. Ayes have it. Third reading. The clerk a bill to accelerate the delivery of 21st century occurs and for other purposes. The speaker pro tempore the question on passage of the bill. Those in favor say aye. Those opposed, no. In the opinion of the chair, the ayes have it. I ask for a recorded vote. The speaker pro tempore a recorded vote is requested. Those in favor say aye. Will rise. A sufficient number having arisen, a recorded vote is ordered. Pursuant to clause 8, rule 20 this is a fiveminute vote on passage followed by fiveminute vote on approval of the journal if ordered. Fiveminute vote. [captioning made possible by the national captioning institute, inc. , in cooperation with the United States house of representatives. Any use of the closedcaptioned coverage of the house proceedings for political or commercial purposes is expressly prohibited by the u. S. House of representatives. ] the speaker pro tempore on this vote the yeas are 344, the nays is 77. The bill is passed and without objection, the motion to reconsider is laid on the table. Pursuant toss clause 8, rule 20 ungin fished is question on agreeing on the speakers approval of the journal. Those in favor say aye. Those opposed, no. In the opinion of the chair the journal stands approved. The speaker pro tempore for what purpose does the gentleman from oklahoma seek recognition . I present a privileged report for printing under the rule. The speaker pro tempore the clerk will report the title. The clerk a bill making appropriations for the departments of labor, health and Human Services and education and related agencies for the fiscal year ending september 30 2016 and for other purposes. The speaker pro tempore referred to the Union Calendar and ordered printed. Pursuant to clause 1 of rule 21 points of order are reserved. The chair will now entertain requests for oneminute speeches. For what purpose does the gentlewoman from florida seek recognition . Address the house for one minute and revise my remarks. The speaker pro tempore the gentlewoman is recognized for one minute. The house is not in order. Members, please take your conversations off the floor. Without objection, the gentlewoman is recognized for one minute. Rarnte roslehtinen thank you so much. I urge my colleagues to look at the graphic display at the rayburn forum called the venezuela of yesterday, today and tomorrow. This exhibit carries the hopes and dreams of the people of venezuela who work hard to restore democracy, freedom and prosperity to their homeland, the regime has destroyed the economy of a once wealthy nation, causing widespread shortages and long lines for consumer goods. Innocent men and women who demand the protection of democratic principles are arrested with false charges tried by canga radio courts where their faiths are sealed. Join the educational democracy for a tour of this impressive clegs of photos that document that the prosperous democratic past the oppress i have future that aand which they are fighting now. Thank you madam speaker. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman is recognized for one minute. Thank you madam speaker. Today is a proud day in the state of South Carolina and it should be a proud day throughout the south of the United States of america. Mr. Cohen for the South Carolina legislature under the direction of their governor took down the Confederate Flag that flew over their capitol. It should be a proud day for all for the south its much more than the flag. The south has much to be proud of. But the flag symbolizes things that are not something the south should be proud of. Patterson hood, a member of a band called drive bye truckers wrote a song called the southern thing. He expresses why he hates hatred and sees the flag as divisive and why it should come down. Its the right thing to do. The Mississippi State flag should come down which has the rebel flag as part of its insignia and is in the halls of the congress. That flag as has been asked by representative Bennie Thompson and leader pelosi, should also come down. Signs of treason, signs of hate signs of racism have no place in the United States of americas halls and should come down. I yield back the balance of my time. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman yield. For what purpose does the gentleman from georgia seek recognition . To address the house for one minute. Revise and extend. The speaker pro tempore without objection, the gentleman is recognized for one minute. Thank you, madam speaker. I want to thank my colleagues today for passing the 21 is it century cures act to create a path forward to expedite the delivery of lifesaving and life improving cures that would change the lives of millions across this nation. I want to share the story of our artero from my district who is 7 1 2 years old and lives in athens, georgia. He was diagnosed on his 4th birthday with autism. On that day he had less than 50 words. And was considered severely affected. The doctor didnt give his family much hope for the future. Thanks to the dedication of his parents and the innovation in our medical community there today he doesnt even need speech therapy. Mr. Allen however, he still needs medications which are currently caught up in bureaucratic red tape. This bill, the 21st century cures act provides a modern Health Care Solution that gives hope to so many families passing like arteros and others across this great contry. I thank my colleagues for passing this legislation today that will improve the lives of future generations. I yield back the balance of my time. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman yields. For what purpose does the gentleman from texas seek recognition . Without objection the gentleman is recognized for one minute. Mr. Speaker, i rise today to honor the four surviving charter members of the tear rent county black historical and geologic society. Mr. Veesly those being irma, opal, frank and the reverend arthur slaughter. The black historical and ginological society began as a need for material relating to the black history that was available to terent counties universities and libraries. In 1974 the late ms. Lenore began to collect personal papers scrapbooks, clippings, photographs, and other relevant materials to create this society and also what is an incredible archive. Following its inception, ms. Hadley opal lee frank moss, and reverend slaughter continued the organizations work to educate the residents about its rich africanamerican history. They will be honored during this months black historical and ginological biannual luncheon at the fort worth botanic gardens. Today with the help of these four charter members, the society continues to collect, preserve, and enrich our community. I applaud their efforts. Madam speaker i yield back the balance of my time. The speaker pro tempore for what purpose does the gentlelady from North Carolina seek recognition . I ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. The speaker pro tempore without objection, the gentlelady is recognized for one minute. Thank you, mr. Speaker. We have all heard the phrase, if you have your health you have everything. But for many who are suffering from debilitating diseases or caring for a Family Member with one, their ability to pursue life liberty, and happiness is interrupted. Mr. Speaker, the reason entitle spending is so vast in this country is because we have diseases and conditions requiring countless dollars. Mrs. Ellmers we are america. The greatest country in the world. We have big ideas. And we want to provide the best future for our children and our grandchildren. 21st century cures is just one of those big ideas that will how numerous benefits for everyone. And for fiscal conservatives like myself, we should appreciate this bill and its passage with overwhelming support. In our Health Care System, we diagnose disease, we treat symptoms, and we have thousands of new seniors on medicare every day that we must take care of. The passage of this 21st century cures is a definitive way to take care of every american family. Today we wage war on disease. Thank you, mr. Speaker. I yield back. The speaker pro tempore for what purpose does the gentleman from minnesota seek recognition . Without objection the gentleman is recognized for one minute. Mr. Speaker, members of the house, i rise in support of the urgent need to reauthorization the eximbank. Mr. Nolan i spent the better part of my years of my life in export trading and i know what a great benefit it has been to the Small Business community and the banking community. What happens is the Small Town Bank wants to provide Financial Support for local businesspeople to export their goods and their products but they dont know if a sales contract in timbuktu or abu dhabi or wherever is a legitimate contract. So they have to rely on some kind of expertise. So thats why the local banks thats why the local Business Community supports the exim bank because they do that. They do it for a fee. Ironically enough, the exim bank has generated almost 7 billion in profits over the last couple of decades helping us with our deficit reduction and helping our small and Medium Sized Companies to export their goods and services. I ask all my colleagues to take a look at their district and see how many Small Businesses benefit from that and join me in support of that. Theres only a couple ways to generate wealth and exporting your goods is one. Thank you, mr. Speaker. The speaker pro tempore for what purpose does the gentleman from minnesota seek recognition . I ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. Revise and extend my remarks. The speaker pro tempore without objection, the gentleman is recognized for one minute. Mr. Emmer mr. Speaker, i mr. Olson i rise to congratulate the golf team on winning the championship. After finishing up as runner ups, they broke through and won the state title by three strokes. It was a wellbalanced performance by the entire team that allowed them to take the championship. While many think of golf as an individual support, it took Strong Performances from each golfer to bring home the title. The game of golf can be very humbling and it takes focus, mental toughness, and skill to compete at a high level. I commeend these student athletes on their commitment and education not only to golf but to their family obligations and studies as well. The time commitments required to be a Top High School athlete are not easy and their friends, families and communities are proud. Congratulations to the wysetta poise golf team. I yield back. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman yields back. For what purpose does the the gentlewoman from the District Of Columbia seek recognition . Ms. Norton permission to address the house for one minute. Revise and extend my remarks. The speaker pro tempore without objection. The gentlewoman is recognized for one minute. Ms. Norton mr. Speaker, as you can see by this chart the federal gas user fee at only 97 a year buys drivers 515 in costs per driver of bad roads. Just leased data shows that up to 73 of the bridges in some states are deficient. Can you think of any other necessity except the 97 gas user fee, that has not increased in 22 years . We are getting what we paid for. In hidden costs of bad roads and bridges. Congressional response has been so disproportionate to the needs of the states that we are told that another shortterm extension that would be the 34th, 12 days from now, could yield a veto. The states say that these shortterm extensions are useless. Only the next two weeks begin a longterm authorization is pushing it given the state of our bridges and roads, we have no alternative. Thank you, mr. Speaker. The speaker pro tempore for what purpose does the gentlelady from new york wish to seek recognition . I ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. The speaker pro tempore without objection, the gentlelady is recognized for one minute. Ms. Stefanik my district was the unfortunate home of a recent manhunt that captured the attention of our country. For more than three weeks two killers were made at large in our North Country community after escaping from clinton correctional facility. During this time period hundreds and hundreds of brave Law Enforcement officers worked diligently to find these escaped convicts and protect our community. Mr. Speaker, i rise today to thank these brave Law Enforcement officers who risked their safety to protect the families in our neighborhoods and i rise to thank our local communities for their patience and support during this difficult time. Going forward we must find answers as to how this prison break occurred and do what is needed to stop this from ever happening again. For now our North Country community can sleep safer knowing these two killers are no longer at large. Thank you mr. Speaker. I yield back. The speaker pro tempore the gentlewoman yields back. For what purpose does the the gentlewoman from texas seek recognition . Ms. Jackson lee i ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. The speaker pro tempore without objection, the gentlewoman is recognized for one minute. Ms. Jackson lee mr. Chairman i think its important to again note what a historic day this was. The passage of the american cures act that opens the opportunity for billions of dollars to be invested in the nations clinics and laboratories to make america healthy and make america better. This bill from the energy and Commerce Committee im very proud to be one of its cosponsors and to say back to my constituents in texas, the texas medical center, and all the research being done, heres an opportunity to work on those unique and special diseases impacting children with lupus and other diseases. That is why change is not bad. I join with the arguments in my district for changing the names of high schools that are not reflective of the nation make america today. Confederate generals who are now the names of these high schools are not reflective of a unifying america. Frankly, i believe that the school board should address this question and teach the children that that is the past history that was not a positive history. And that we should reflect positively on unifying america and carrying the American Flag. Lastly again i say on the floor what a very special day the some lemity in the way the rebel flag was put to rest and taken to a relic museum where it belongs. We can stand here under this shining American Flag saying that we, too, are americans. With that, mr. Speaker, i yield back. The speaker pro tempore the gentlewoman yields back. For what purpose does the gentleman from kentucky seek recognition . Mr. Speaker, i ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. The speaker pro tempore without objection, the gentleman Virginia Tech for one minute. Mr. Speaker, when patent trolls use u. S. Patents to game the system for illegitimate financial gain, its much today. Like counterfeiting, because these are official u. S. Documents. But what would we do if we found a counterfeiter . Would we go after the counterfeiter or devalue our currency to discourage counterfeiters . That he sounds ridiculous. That would wreck our economy just to go after counterfeiters by devaluing the currency. Thats what the innovation act, h. R. 9 does to patents. It devalues all patents. Its going to wreck our economy if we pass it. Patents are currency of invention and if you want invention to be strong in this country, you need to keep the patent system strong. I urge my colleagues to vote against h. R. 9 and i yield back. The speaker pro tempore for what purpose does the gentleman from new york seek recognition . I rise today to seek unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. The speaker pro tempore without objection. Mr. Speaker i rise today to celebrate the overwhelming passage of the 21st century cures act. Across Central New York i heard from advocates and individuals suffering from diseases like Ovarian Cancer and m. S. To name a few. I know those are diseases that have stricken those in my family. We owe it to these people to support medical research so individuals in our community can live longer healthier lives. Todays legislation allows researchers and scientists to move forward in efforts to produce lifesaving treatments, therapies and cures. It will reduce medical uncertainty and remove barriers to increase research colbation. I dream of a time in the future when i can tell my children that what we did on the house floor today saved lives and prevented them from enduring some of the diseases we had to endure in our lifetime. I yield back. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. For what purpose does the gentleman from pennsylvania seek recognition . Mr. Thompson request unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. The speaker pro tempore without objection. The gentleman is recognized for one minute. Mr. Thompson mr. Speaker, moments ago, with my support, the house of representatives passed h. R. 6. This bipartisan bill will bring our national Health Care System up to speed in the 21st century by taking the latest science and treatments for all americans. More than 10,000 known diseases and conditions and the United States only has cures and treatments for roughly 500 of them. Cancer, parkinsons and alzheimers will take the lives of 1. 8 Million People. This will help change that and is important step towards helping saving the lives of our loved ones. I applaud my colleagues on both side of the aisle for passing this legislation. I yield back. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman yields. For what purpose does the gentleman from florida seek recognition . Address the house for one minute revise and stepped my remarks. The speaker pro tempore without objection. Mr. Speaker, i want to strongly urge my colleagues to visit an exhibition happening right now in the rayburn foyer. The graphic display includes a remarkable collection of photos, venezuela, yesterday, today and tomorrow. It is a reminder of the hard work being done by the people of venezuela in their pursuit to restore democracy in a country ravaged by economic turmoil and regime filled with corrupt leaders who will persecute anyone who voices this. It is important for the United States to remain firm in our support for the people of venezuela. People are fighting for a truly democratic venezuela. Again, i encourage my colleagues to take advantage of this opportunity to join the Educational Foundation for democracy in the promotion of a Better Future for the people of venezuela and everyone in our hemisphere. I yield back. The speaker pro tempore for what purpose does the gentleman from illinois seek recognition . I ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. The speaker pro tempore without objection. Mr. Speaker, another deadline has passed. And iran continues to act like it has the leverage. Whats worse by its action, the administration seems to agree. Make no mistake about it, iran desperately needs a deal to relieve its crippling sanctions, but given the parade of u. S. Concessions over the past 19 months we are a long way from the starting point of demanding Irans Nuclear program be affirmatively dismantled. Mr. Speaker, there should be no wiggle room that allows any path to a cluke weapon. And its violations of the interim agreement have been met with solution and painful justifications by this administration. How can we trust iran to uphold any deal when it has proven untrustworthy. Why give the greatest state sponsor of terror another 150 billion which may go to Fund Terrorism against the United States israel and other democracies and our allies around the globe. Its time to walk away, reestablish our leverage and force iran back to the table on our terms. The speaker pro tempore for what purpose does the gentleman from utah seek recognition . Without objection, the gentleman is recognized for one minute. I want to take a moment to recognize phillip bur from burrville utah. He has provided electricity while working for one of my favorite companies. He has spread the passion globally and visiting bolivia and haiti. We know electricity is a critical element to improve quality of life and basic necessities. After leaving haiti im sorry learning haiti has less than 15 of the population with regular access to electricity, phillip traveled there to build a Distribution System that will provide safe, affordable and reliable power to more than 1,600 consumers. This type of service is what makes america great. Im honored to recognize him for his example of humanitarian service and to thank him for all the work he has done in his community and around the world. Mr. Burr i salute you. I yield back. The speaker pro tempore for what purpose does the gentlewoman from wyoming seek recognition . Loom loom ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. The speaker pro tempore without objection. Thank you, mr. Speaker today the great state of wyoming, the equality state is celebrating her 125th anniversary of statehood. Wyoming is a wound address the house place, boasting our nations First National park, First National forest and First National monument. Wyomings scenic treasures are second to none in the world. Our vast resources, coal, uranium timber, oil and gas, soda ash and rare earth elements all provide Critical Resources for our nation. Wyomings freedomloving hardworking people have a deep sense of place and seamlessly weave the fabric of stewardship into it inspiring the entire country and the whole world. Im proud to call wyoming americas 44th star my love, my life and my home and wish her a blessed 125th year of statehood. I yield back. The speaker pro tempore the gentlewoman yields. For what purpose does does the gentleman from mississippi seek recognition . I ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute and to revise and extend my remarks. Without objection. Mr. Speaker today i rise to celebrate my sons birthday, today july 10. He was born in 1995 and 20 today and in honor of my fathers birthday, which was yesterday, and he would have been 74. In remembrance of the future today john forest kelly, known to us as j. F. K. Will be 20 and in representation of the future i recognize him today. In honor of the past, yesterday was my fathers birthday. He was a great man and inspiration to me. He served in the Mississippi ArmyNational Guard from 1959 until he retired. Thank you, mr. Speaker. I yield back the balance of my time. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman yields. For what purpose does the gentleman from california seek recognition . Without objection. The gentleman is recognized for one minute. Thank you mr. Speaker. This last wednesday, we took time out here in the capitol to honor and remember our vietnam veterans. 50th anniversary of our first deployment in vietnam, a war that wasnt understood by the American People or appreciated. What is wrong about that, not only what our troops did for us. They did it with sacrifice and with honor. For us here in the capitol to come around to that ideal and honor them was a very good thing. And see for our vietnam troops, we do appreciate you and will do all we can to help you as you work through v. A. And agent orange. We know you arent getting enough help from the federal government or recognition. On the 50th anniversary of the first deployment, we say to our vietnam veterans, welcome home and god bless you. The speaker pro tempore for what purpose does the gentleman from texas seek recognition . Seek unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. The speaker pro tempore without objection. Mr. Speaker the tragic killing of katherine steily at the hand of a fivetime deported illegal alien should never have happened. But that is what happens when a city ignores immigration laws. The consequences of government sanction lawlessness are real. And this is another in a long line of tragic wakeup calls that cry out for deporting criminal aliens. The killer, a wanted criminal illegal alien had been in custody but then put back on the streets by San Francisco officials. The Obama Administration shares blame because they done nothing to combat sanctuary city policies. Instead, they have encouraged them. We swore an oath to protect the American People from enemies. This congress should combat sanctuary policies and make sure they are deported. I have cosponsored legislation that would do just that because its time to put the safety of american citizens first. I yield back. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. For what purpose does the gentleman from illinois seek recognition . I ask unanimous consent that when the house adjourns today it meets on monday, july 13, 2015 and convene at noon for morning hour debate and tk p. M. For legislative business. The speaker pro tempore without objection, so ordered. Without objection, the chair apoints the following additional conferees on h. R. 1735. The clerk Permanent Select Committee on intelligence for consideration of matters within the jurisdiction of that committee under clause 11 of rule 10 mr. Nunes king and schiff. For consideration of sections 571 and 573 of the house bill and sections 561 through 63 of the Senate Amendments, a modifications committed to conference mr. Rokita, bishop of michigan. From the committee on Energy Commerce for consideration of sections 314, 632 634 311 and 3119 3133 and 3141 in the house bill, 632, 3118 of the Senate Amendment and modifications committed to conference. Mr. Up ton, bart done and pallone. From the committee on Foreign Affairs for consideration of sections 1011, 1059 1090 1092, 1201, 1203 through 05 1215, 1221, 1223, 1226 1234 through 36 1253, 1257, 1263 1264, 1267, 1301, 1532 1541 1663, 1668 through 70 2802, 118 and 119 of the house bill and sections 1011, 1012, 1082 1201 through 05, 1207, 1209, 1223 1225, 1228, 1252, 1261, 1264, 12 72 1301, 1302, 1531 through 33. 1654 and 165 of the Senate Amendment and modifications committed to conference. Mr. Royce, engel. From the committee on Homeland Security of the Senate Amendment and modifications committed to conference. Mr. Mccaul, mrs. Miller of michigan and mr. Thompson of mississippi. From the committee on the judiciary for consideration of sections 1040, 1052, 1085, 1216, 1641 and 2862, of the house bill and sections 1032, 1034, 1090 and 1227 of the Senate Amendment and modifications committed to conference. Mr. Goodlatte, issa and conyers. Sections 2842, 2851 through 2853 and 2862 of the house bill and sections 313 601 and 602 of the Senate Amendment and modifications committed to conference. Messrs. Cook, hardy and grijalva. From the committee on government and oversight reform for consideration of sections 601, 631, 634, 838, 854 855, 856 8 1, 1069 and 1101 through 1105 of the house bill and sections and sections 592 593 631 8 6, 831 1090, 1101, 1102 1105, 1107 through 09 1111 1112, 1114 and 1115 of the Senate Amendment and modifications committed to conference, messrs. Hurd of texas, russell and cummings. For consideration of the Senate Amendment and modifications committed to conference, mr. Sessions, byrnes and ms. Slaughter. From the committee orphan science, space and technology for consideration of section 3136 of the house bill and section 1613 of the Senate Amendment and modifications committed to conference, messrs. Lucas, knight, ms. Eddie Bernice Johnson of texas. For from the committee on Small Business for consideration of sections 831 through 834, 832 through 846 871 of the house bill and sections 828 831, 882,883, and 885 of the Senate Amendment and modifications committed to conference. Messrs. Chabot hanna and ms. Velasquez. From the committee on transportation and infrastructure for consideration of sections 302, 562, 569 578 591, 1068, 1073 2811 and 3501 of the house bill and sections 601, 642, 1613 3504 and 3505 of the Senate Amendment and modifications committed to conference, messrs. Graves of louisiana, curbelo of florida and ms. Edwards. From the committee on Veterans Affairs for consideration, 565 652, 701 721 722, 1105 and 1431 of the house bill and sections 539 605 633 719, 1083rks1084 1089, 1091 and 1411 of the Senate Amendment and modifications committed to conference. Messrs. Roe of tennessee, bilirakis, and brown of florida. The speaker pro tempore the senate will be notified of adegreesal conferees. Under the speakers announced policy of january 6, 2015, the gentleman from texas, mr. Flores is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader. Mr. Flores thank you, mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, i rise today to honor one of my constituents, John David Crow, of college station, texas who passed away on june 17. To say that John David Crow is a Texas Football legend is an understatement. He was a Heisman Trophy winner fourtime nfl pro bowl selection a College Football coach and an administrator for the texas a m University Athletic department. John david was born on july 8, 1935 in marion, louisiana. When he was born, he umbilical cord was wrapped around his neck, causing nerve damage and permanently paralyzing the left half of his face. John david however, never let that hardship hold him back. As a junior at Spring Hill High School he led the Football Team to win the class 1a state football championship in 1952. As a senior he led the Basketball Team to win the class 1a state championship of 1954. After graduating from high school he married his high school sweetheart, karen, on july 2 1954. Earlier that year, he had committed to play football at texas a m university for legendary coach paul bear bryant so in fall of 1954 john david and carolyn moved to college station. During his time at a m he would play running back, defensive positions and special teams as a kick returner. He truly was the complete collegiate football package. In 1956, he led the aggies to their first ever road victory against archrival the university of texas at Memorial Stadium in austin he also led the aggies to a number one ranking in the 1957 season. Some of the accolades that john david received as an aggie included being named twice to the southwest all Conference Team in 1956 and 1957. He also received all of the following recognitions in 1957. A consensus all american. The walter Camp Memorial trophy. The southwestern of the year and amateur of the year. The chick harley award. The united press player of the year. The united press back of the year. And the Heisman Trophy. John david was texas a m universitys first Heisman Trophy winner and the only Heisman Trophy winner to ever be coached by the legendary paul bear bryant. When bear bryant retired from coaching, he was quoted as saying John David Crow was the finest player i ever coached. Watching film on him was like watching a grown man play with boys. John david would graduate from texas a m with a degree in Business Administration and was named to the scholastic all american team. He was also recognized as a whos who in american colleges and universities. John david would go ton play in the nfl after being drafted in the first round to play for the then chicago cardinals. His nfl career would span 11 years playing for the cardinals in chicago and st. Louis and playing for the San Francisco 49ers. He was named to the pro bowl four times and named the nfls to the nfls 1960 alldecade team. After retiring from the nfl, john david began his football coaching career starting as an assistant for his former coach, bear bryant, at alabama. He continued his career as an assistant coach in the nfl for the Cleveland Browns and the san diego chargers. In 1976, he was named Athletic Director and head football coach of northwest louisiana university. In 1981, john david would leave northwest louisiana to work for a private business for a couple of years. In 1983, he returned to his alma mater, texas a m university, first as associate Athletic Director, later as Athletic Director and later as director of athletic development. During this time he was at the forefront of collegiate gender equity as he helped expand womens athletics at texas a m to the power house it is today. He would retire from a m but still maintained a presence on campus and in the Brian College station community. He was a great athlete, coach and administrator. He was inducted into the texas a m hall of fame in 1968 and the louisiana hall of fame in 1976. He was named to the National FootballFoundation Hall of fame in 1976 and the texas sports hall of fame in 1982. He was named the distinguished alumnus of texas a m university in 1984 and was honored in their first season in the seesh conference as an s. E. C. Legend during the s. E. C. Championship game. While he was dedicated to his career, he was also dedicated to his wife carolyn and their family he and carolyn had three children, john jr. , anna lisa, and jeannie. They were also blessed with seven grandchildren. John david was forever thankful for everything that carolyn did for their family. He was once quoted as saying, whatever credit i get for doing anything she deserves a lot more than i do. She has been the stabilizer for our family and very, very good to me. Mr. Speaker John David Crow was a humble kind generous and all around great man. The greatness that he evoked reached far beyond the football field. He truly embodied the core values of texas a m university. Respect, integrity Leadership Excellence loyalty, and selfless service. He will be greatly missed and will long be remembered as a great athlete, coach and athletic administrator. More importantly he will be remembered as a loving husband father and grandfather and as a friend. My wife jean and i offer our deepest heartfelt condolences to carolyn and the crow family. We also lift up the family of john david in our thoughts and prayers. Also, as i close this conversation about John David Crow, i ask that all americans continue to pray for our country, for our military men and women who protect it from external threats and from our First Responders who protect us here at home. Thank you, mr. Speaker. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman from texas yields. For what purpose does the gentleman from texas seek recognition . The gentleman from texas will continue the special order. Mr. Flores mr. Speaker, i rise today to honor Jack Calvin Gill Lee of stratford, texas who passed away on may 9. As a teacher and principal for 34 years, mr. Gilley touched the lives of hundreds of people in schools throughout oklahoma and the texas up and down handle. I was fortunate enough to have mr. Gilley as a principal during my time at stratford middle school. He was born in dawson county, texas in 1924. He proudly served in the United States navy in world war ii as a torpedo man on the u. S. S. Stockdale he attended panhandle a m college on basketball and baseball scholarships. Additionally he received his masters in education from west Texas State University in 1963. In 1951, jack married donna, they were married for nearly 59 years until her passing in 2010. Donna and jack had four daughters and were blessed with one granddaughter. After retiring from teaching, jack began a secondary profession of painting houses, refinishing furniture and carpentry. He was a member of the First United Methodist Church of stratford as well as a member of the American Legion post 262. He loved hunting fez about and quail, eating breakfast and Drinking Coffee with his friends at the local cafe and all things rodeo and all things sports, especially duke basketball. Mr. Speaker jack gilley impacted many lives, including mine, as an educator and as a mentor he will be greatly missed and long remembered as a loving husband, a father, a grandfather, and a friend. My wife jean and i offer our deepest and heartfelt condolences to the gilley family and lift up the family and friends of jack gilley in our prayers. I ask that all americans continue to pray for our country, for our military men and women who protect us from external threats and from our First Responders who protect us here at home. Thank you mr. Speaker, i yield back the balance of my time. The speaker pro tempore the gentleman from texas yields. For what purpose does the gentleman from texas seek recognition . Mr. Flores i move that the house be adjourned. The speaker pro tempore the question is on the motion to adjourn. Those in favor say aye. Those opposed no. The ayes have it. The motion is adopted. Accordingly, the royce stands adjourned until noon on monday next the house stands adjourned [cheers] [chaup] [ [cheers and applause] ] [chanting u. S. A. ] [singing goodbye] [cheers and applause] [cheers and applause] that from earlier today. If you missed any of what we just showed you. We will have it on tonight in its entirety at 8 00 p. M. Eastern right here on cspan. Heres some of our featured programs for this weekend. Lees book to kill a mocking bird and publication of her new novel and reair these programs sunday evening at 6 30 eastern. Sunday night at 10 00, Hillary Clinton second run for president. Congressional commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the vietnam war. And sunday evening at 6 30, g. O. P. President ial candidate visits with New Hampshire voters. Saturday at 8 00 p. M. On lectures and history, Flagler College professor on the factors that led to the Great Depression and president roosevelts actions to help the American People and the economy. Sunday evening at 6 30, general sherman, the burning of Atlanta Georgia and South Carolina. Get our complete weekend schedule at cspan. Org. Cspan gives you the best access to congress, congressional hearings and news conferences, bringing you events that shape Public Policy and washington journal is live with elected officials, policy makers and journalists and your comments by phone, facebook and cspan created by americas public cable companies. On wednesday f. B. I. Director testified before the Senate Intelligence committee warning that Encryption Technology is making it hard to get criminals. And the f. B. I. Is unable to break this strong encrypted communication. And united and the wall street journal experienced gitches. He said there is no indication of a cyber intrusion. Richard burr is the chair of this hearing. Senator burr good afternoon, i call this hearing to order. I welcome our witness director of the federal bureau of investigation. I would note that director appeared this morning before the Senate Judiciary committee. Jim, i appreciate you appearing before us and enduring a long day of congressional testimony. I know the vice chairs had the opportunity to have a bite at you but she wanted one more. As we conduct hearings in closed session, i would like to take this opportunity to commend the director and the men and women of the f. B. I. For the outstanding efforts for keeping our country safe. It is due in no small part to f. B. I. Vigilance that our nations enjoyed peaceful and a safe Independence Day celebration. Director comey as you are well away, propaganda remain inat the present time on inflicting harm on u. S. Interests at home and abroad. Over the past year, we witnessed the Islamic State of iraq referred to isil attempt to inspire a wide range of individuals to conduct attacks against innocent civilians. Largely as a result of isils media savy, the number of u. S. Based individuals wanting to conduct attacks to join isil has joined individuals attempting these activities in 2013 and 2014. Unfortunately, the threats facing our nation are not limited to terrorist actors, foreign governments remain intent on stealing our countrys most valuable trade, intellectual property and trade secrets. The f. B. I. Is charged with confronting these threats as well and is continually challenged by the capabilities and trade craft employed by these nation state actors. In addition to these fairly unique jurisdictional issues. The f. B. I. Conducts investigations of drug trafficking, theft of Government Property child porn, robbery, extortion, murder and the list goes on and on andon. These criminals are turning to encrypted communications as a means of evading detection. These two issues that might at first glance appear unrelated are closely linked. Communications between a terrorist organizations operational commanders and field soldiers require technology. Communications of a foreign state and its spice requires enabling technology. In both cases, the Technology Used by terrorists is increasingly secure, encrypted communications. Both of these add various are taking secure communications that are employing advanced commercially available encryption. Director, as i understand the issue, even when Law Enforcement has the Legal Authority to intercept and Access Communications pursuant to a court order, you may lack the technical ability to do so. This is what youve referred to and others referred to as going dark. You have described it as one of the Biggest Challenges facing your agency and Law Enforcement germly. This challenge is on technology, law, freedom and secure. It results from the adoption of universal encryption. These applications are designed so only the user has the key to the code and contents. In these cases when the f. B. I. Or any other Law EnforcementAgency Requests access to a users communications via a lawful warrant, it is inaccessible or unreadable. It does not matter whether it is a terrorist child molestor or spy, Law Enforcement is blind and as a result were less safe. I like all americans desire privacy. As americans we are guaranteed the right to secure pursuant to the Fourth Amendment and our effects. Im concerned as my fellow members about the terrorists, crournt intelligence and other criminal threats to the very same things. I believe we must identify a solution that first protects american privacy but allows for lawful searches under valid court orders. Director comey, you said the encryption now readily available and i quote is equivalent to a closet that cant be opened or a safe that cant be cracked unquote. You will have an opportunity to speak to the committee and to the American People and to convince us that in order to keep the American People safe, you need to be able to open the closet or to crack the safe. There are no easy answers and we are embarking on what would be a robust debate that i think was initiated by you and i think thats a good thing. You wrote on monday, part of your job is to make sure the debate is informed by a reasonable understanding of the costs. I look forward to your testimony , this discussion, and i appreciate you being here. Before i turn to the vice chairman, i ask unanimous consent to enter several documents into the record. The first is the Computer Science and Artificial IntelligenceLaboratory Technical report dated july 6, 2015 entitled keys under doormat. The second letter from the American Civil LibertiesUnited States dated july 7, 2015 on the topic of this hearing. The third is a letter from the Business Software alliance dated july 8, 2015 again to this committee. And the Senate Judiciary committee on the topic of todays hearing. And the fourth is a transcript of the directors remarks to the Brookings Institute dated october 16, 2014. Without objection, those four documents will be entered into the record. I now turn to the vice chairman for my remarks she might make. Thank you, mr. Chairman for holding this hearing. There was a crowded hearing this morning in judiciary and i think the number of people here today is evidence that this is the subject of great interest. So i thank you for holding this open hearing. Director comey, welcome again back to the committee. And let me repeat what i said this morning in judiciary. I want to thank you and the men and women of the f. B. I. For really unparalleled service to protect this country and disrupt and prevent attacks. We are very grateful and i hope you will say that to your people. So thank you. For a period last month there were arrests almost every day as the bureau worked to thwart attacks around the 4th of july holiday. Counterterrorism has been the top of f. B. I. s priority list since 9 11 and never has it included so many operations and threats to our country. The assistant attorney general for National Security, john carolyn said last week in london that the United States government was running hundreds of investigations involving every United States state. In addition to the growth in the number of terrorist incidents, the nature of the threat has changed significantly. Hundreds and perhaps thousands of americans here at home are in contact with isil members and affiliates arranging from those taking direction to those who were inspired by isil messages on social media platforms. As you know, i have been particularly concerned about terrorists use of the internet to instruct, recruit and inspire terrorism inside the United States. And you have graphicically pointed that out and i hope you will this afternoon and what you said this morning. I believe the United StatesCompanies Included many founded and headquartered in my home state have an obligation to do everything they can to ensure their products and services are not allowed to be used to foment the evil that isil embodies. Last week, i read a lengthy feature in the new york times, the title was isis and the lonely american, which described in detail how isil members use twitter and other services to recruit a young woman over months to support a militant brand of islam and try to get her to marry an isil fighter and travel to syria. Quote, the Foreign Terrorists now has direct access to the United States like never before, end quote. Foreign terrorist groups as well as adversarial nation states today have greater awareness of how the United States intelligence commuent conducts its business to collect intelligence needed to protect the people of this country and to inform National Security decisions. This committee has heard from the f. B. I. , the National Security agency as late as yesterday afternoon the National Counterterrorism center how terrorist groups in particular have moved to communications that are harder or impossible for the Intelligence Community and Law Enforcement to access. The increased use of endtoend strong encryption by both new and established Communications Companies has exacerbated this trend. I understand the need to protect records and encryption is one way of doing so, especially in this area of cyber penetrations of our government and our private sector companies. Encryption is an important safeguard. That doesnt mean, however, that companies should configure their services in a way that denies them the ability to respond to a court warrant, a fisa order or a similar Legal Process from the government. This is not a theoretical issue. The f. B. I. Has briefed this committee on cases where it knows of communications involving ongoing terrorists by isil. Inside the United States but it has no way to obtain the content of those communications, even with a court order based on probable cause. It seems to me that if companies will not voluntarily comply with lawful court orders for information, then they should be required to be able to do so through legislation in a way that protects security of consumer data against unauthorized access. As director comey has said, we are not looking for a back door into american companies. We are looking to be able to use the front door. So i welcome todays hearing and look forward to the directors testimony on the ongoing threat of terrorism against the United States and the need to acquire lawfully and quickly information necessary to stop those threats from becoming real attacks. Thank you very much, mr. Chairman. Senator burr thank you, vice chairman. Four members after the directors comments, members will be recognized for five minutes based on their order of attendance today and i remind all members that we are in an open session which is unusual, therefore i ask you to be particularly careful in the questions that you ask and i trust director if you have an answer that cant be given in an open session, you just tell the vice chairman and i and well carry this over to a closed session at the appropriate time and well accommodate you. With that, i turn it to you for any of your comments that you would like to make. Thank you mr. Chairman and vice chair thank you for this opportunity. I really do like the use of the word conversation. This is a conversation we have to have as a country and this is a great opportunity to have it, to begin having it. I hear people talking about the crypto wars. I dont like that term, because i dont feel like im fighting or here to win anything. Im here to explain the ways in which the change in technology and how it affects the American People through this body. I think we all care about the same things. We care deeply about the security of our information, of our health care of our finances, of our innovation, of all the great things that travel over the internet. We all care about that and we care about Public Safety and the ability to keep the folks safe in this country. I dont see it as a war but how the intention is and what we should do about it. I felt not long after i became director which is why i started talking about this where the technology has moved to a place where encryption, which was always available over the last 20 years has become the default and that change has been accompanied by an explosion in apps that ride on the internet and offer end to end encrypted communication. Those things have put us at a point and given my responsibility with respect to counterterrorism. This committee knows from closed sessions and the American People may know less well. The terrorism threat is very, very different and changed in my almost two years as director. It is not the al qaeda of old. The al qaeda of old was interested in the multi pronged National Landmark base careful long planned attack with carefully vetted opertives. The al qaeda of old is very different of what we see today. The al qaeda of old posted pictures on magazines and found a website and read the propaganda and wanted to talk to to a terrorist sent an email into the magazine and maybe he would email you back. Heres whats change. Isil thinks about their terror in a very different way and not focused on the National Landmark, multi pronged long tail event. They want people to be killed in their name and coming to us with that message with their propaganda and entreaty to action through twitter and other parts of the social media and that is a very different thing that al qaeda ever did. They come into our country through thousands and thousands of followers of isil tweeters. They have a physical safe haven and broadcast a message which is twopronged, come to the Islamic State and join us here in our version of paradise, which is a nightmare and second, if you cant come, kill somebody where your videotape it, cut their head off and videotape. Kill Law Enforcement or military. Heres a list of names where you can kill somebody. This message is pushed and pushed and pushed. Social Media Companies are worth billions of dollars because pushing to someones pocket, whether selling shoes, cars or terror works. Isil has invested in this for the last year and 21,000 english language followers and pushing this message. Its as if someone sits on a shoulder and say kill, kill, kill and the terrorist is right there in your device. So they are reaching and calling and calling and its having an effect on troubled souls in the United States. As the vice chair said, i have hundreds of these investigations in every single state and we have disrupted just in the last few weeks very serious efforts to kill people in the United States. The challenge to us is, isil will find the live ones on twitter and we can see them say ok here is my encrypted end to end mobile messaging app, contact information, contact me there. Our task to find needles becomes complicated because the minute it becomes invisible, we cannot break strong encryption. People watch tv and think the bureau can do lots of things, we cannot break strong encryption. Even if i get a court order under the 4th amendment to intercept that communication as it travels over the wires, that needle will remain dark to me. That is a big by problem to us. And isil does something al qaeda would never imagine. They test people by tasking them. Kill somebody and well see whether you are a believer. And these people react in ways that are very difficult to predict. What you saw in boston is what the experts call flash to bang being very close. In boston, you had a guy who was in touch in an encrypted way and was bent on doing something on july 4th. He woke up june 2nd and decided he was going to kill somebody. We were able to confront and confronted our people with the knife. But thats the example of the unpredictability of this. You combine the blindness with this broad reach and that flash to bang and we face the challenge that we have not seen before. This is not your grandfathers al qaeda, this is a very new threat that we face. Now, some people say to me, you have all kinds of information you can get and live in the golden age of surveillance. I think we live in the golden age of communication. Al qaeda, Osama Bin Laden would never have dreamed that he could speak simultaneously to hundreds of americans, find them and task them in ways that american Law Enforcement could not see and do it at the speed of light. The golden age of communication is posing amazing challenges. Im not here to scare folks but to tell people there is a problem. I do not know the answer. A whole lot of good people have said, its too hard but we cant have a to accomplish Public Safety and it will fall down. My reaction to that is, im not sure that we really tried. Silicon valley is full of great people. They were standing in a garage someplace and told cant be done. Thank goodness they didnt listen. I think we have the talent to think about this in a good way. My hope from this conversation, folks realize this really matters and the oob f. B. I. Is not the source of innovation. But we have to talk about this because i see the present and the future which in many ways is more troubling. F. B. I. Is not some Occupying Force imposed on the American People from abroad. We belong to the American People. And only have the tools that they have given us through you. Im here to the tell the American People the tools you have given us are not working the way you expect them to work. I need help figuring out what to do. The companies are run by good people. They see the challenge. They want to help. We have to crack this rid will and maybe its too hard. But i think this country has never been made up of people, cant be done. We ought to talk about it more. I appreciate the opportunity to discuss it with the committee. Senator burr director thank you. And i think its safe to restate that we are at the start of the debate, even though we have had the conversations for some time privately. Weve watched encryption grow more dominant and more dominant and really, as you said, become the default. Its almost automatic now and it places a huge challenge on your ability to fulfill your mandate and our challenge is to work with you as the extension of the American People to provide you what tools america is comfortable with. And i think as we go through this debate, well figure out what that sweet spot is. I turn to the vice chairman for her questions and i would share with the members the following senators in that record. Vice chairman. Thanks very much mr. Chairman. Director comey you spoke eloquently, but can you tell us how often the f. B. I. Acting pursuant to a warrant or other lawful processing encounters encrypted information you cannot access . Thank you, senator. The answer is i really cant at this point for a couple of reasons. We are at the beginning of this and we are going to work to collect that data but its like proving a negative. When my folks see that something is encrypted. They move on and try to find some other way to assess this bad guy or potential bad guy. We have incidents, the court has cleggetted incidents that wiretaps were issued by courts, but i dont have good enough numbers yet. I think it would be helpful if the department could gather some numbers to quantify this. The next question is b. S. A. , known as the Software Alliance sent a letter to this committee and the Judiciary Committee stating it called for weakened encryption quote can create commercial disadvantages for United States companies and barriers to Market Access end quote. Id like to have your reaction to that statement. First, i think, again, im not an expert. Public safety is my thing but i take issue with the notion of weakening encryption and the issue of the whole back door notion. I think what smart people have told me is, there are a number of Companies Already out there that use strong encryption on their data that have the ability to access the data and comply with court orders and they are able to do both in a pretty robust way in all different sectors, in the i. S. P. And finance and a bunch of other places. I dont know if it is weakening encryption but a way of figuring out how do we comply with a judges order, we the company. And i dont think the government is smart enough to on impose a one size fits all solution. But you are right, they are competitive and International Implications in this. None of us want to damage the innovation of america. It is the great engine of this country. There are International Implications that have to be considered. Every country that cares about the rule of law is grappling with this right now. All of them are trying to maximize safety on the internet, make sure there is strong encryption and maximize Public Safety and do it under the rule of law. Our friend in the u. K. Are doing that right now. I agree there are implications to it internationally. Let me ask you to respond, this is another quote from this same letter, requiring technology that provides Law Enforcement access to information also risks undermining the security of all Electronic Communications and digitially stored information, end quote. Would you comment on that. As i understand it, what you would be talking about is some kind of a front door key . Again, my reaction to that comment is maybe. And if thats the case, i guess were stuck. But i dont think the great innovative people of america have actually put their mind to this. But again, i believe there are companies that provide significant portions of our Internet Activity that have strong encrypted data in motion and have the ability because its part of their Business Model to see the data and comply with court orders. Some do and some dont . They have managed to do it without the entire system crashing or their own business being vulnerable in some way. Heres how i understand, there is nothing such thing as secure. There is vulnerability in every system. The question is what can we do to maximize Public Safety that results in an acceptable level of security. Ap the answer is i dont know, but i think a lot of mart people should talk to each other to try and figure that out. Director comey, i share chairman burrs comment with respect to the respect we have for the men and women of the f. B. I. And we have policy differences on that matter, but were not going to respect the men and women who work for you any less. Every senator who serves on this committee understands that it is a dangerous world and the challenge is to make sure that we pursue approaches that promote security while not diminishing our liberty. Too often, we havent been able to achieve either. I think as we start this debate, i want to emphasize how exactly how we got here. Executive Branch Agencies are now dealing with a problem that they largely created. Senior officials made the choice to secretly twist the log of an illconceived secret program that vacuumed records of americans. We warned what the consequences would be, but obvious Public Confidence was dramatically diminished. That led to a very serious public backlash and in response to it, just as senator feinstein read, our hardware and Software Companies accelerated their efforts to provide customers with stronger protections. This creates real challenges for you, but i will tell you as of this morning statements are being made that do not inspire a lot of confidence. You talk about the need to strike the right balance. There hasnt been a lot of balance in the past and as of what i heard this morning, there still isnt too much balance in the socalled balance. The Deputy Attorney general seemed to suggest this morning that companies should retain a stockpile of Encryption Keys for the government to access. Making this a mandatory requirement would prevent huge problems since any stockpile would be vulnerable to compromise or abuse. In my judgment a mandate like that would be a huge gift to foreign hackers and criminals. So what i want to do with my time for questions is put this into context on a matter we all care about here, which is cybersecurity. And i have had companies in oregon hacked for economic espionage and my constituents are not alone. On the topic of encryption and cybersecurity, has the executive branch done any analysis of the impact that a requirement for u. S. Companies to build weaker encryption or stockpile these Encryption Keys would have on u. S. Cybersecurity . Not that im aware of because that forms part of our concern that we now try to impose a solution. I understood her to be saying, the end state we want is that companies, however they choose to do it, will be able to comply with judges orders and dont want to impose a one size fits all and figure out what works for you because some companies figured out how to do it. She was suggesting there would be a stockpile of these keys. Having said that youre a not aware of any study, is it fair to say that strong encryption improves cybersecurity and weaker encryption reduces cybersecurity . Yes. Strong encryption is great. Senator wyden if a stockpile of Encryption Keys was created somewhere, because i took ms. Yates comment to be not the government but she wanted it somewhere, if you had a stockpile of these keys created somewhere, would you be able to guarantee that these keys would never be stole bin a hostile foreign actor . A hypothetical stockpile of keys surely not. But again, i am not suggesting a technical solutioning i dont know what the answer is senator wyden i think youre right. Based on my 14 years of service on this committee, i dont have a lot of confidence that a stockpile of these Encryption Keys and as i say, i heard ms. Yates that there ought to be some kind of arrangement to have these Encryption Keys somewhere were going to leave this hearing and go live to todays white house briefing. Heres spokesman josh earnest. Josh this is the fifth of five briefings this week. Looking forward to completing this one. Thats an edtorial josh im sure there are some that share that view. Jim, i think this is a milestone today. It is. Josh congratulations on your many years of service. [applause] josh jim, youre a true professional man, were going to miss you. We wish you and your family the best. Thank you and your staff and to all my hardworking colleagues here, its been an honor to work with you guys. Anyway, we got news today. Josh yes, we do. Just yesterday, director arch he ta was insist archuleta was insisting she would remain in the job. What changed . Josh i can tell you that director archuleta did offer jerez ig nation today she did so of her own volition. She recognizes as the white house does that the urgent challenges currently facing the office of Personnel Management require a manager with a specialized set of skills and experiences. Thats precisely why the president has accepted jerez ig nation and assigned beth culvert to take on the responsibilities of the o. P. M. Director on an acting basis. Some of you had the opportunity to interact with ms. Culvert, shes been serving the administration for a few years, but prior to that spent three decades working as a management expert at mckenzie. She had experience working with a wide variety of public private, and nonprofit entities to make significant improvements and enhance the broad deployment of new technology. While serving at o. M. B. In the senior role as chief performance officer and Deputy Director of management at o. M. B. She led the implementation of the president s management agenda to improve how government functions. This is this involved overseeing offices of government performance, Government Procurement and financial management. The president believes she is, at least on an acting basis, the right person for the job while we search for a permanent replacement for director archuleta. Does the president think there was actual failure under director archuletas leadership . Josh i think what the president thinks is that its quite clear that new leadership with a set of skills and experiences that are unique to the urgent challenges that o. P. M. Faces are badly needed and that accounts for the acting director that the president has appointed. It certainly doesnt take away from, or diminish, director archuletas service to the office of Personnel Management. While she was there, she strengthened the use of evidencebased practices in data too drive Human Capital. She worked to allow federal employees to balance their responsibles in workplace with their responsibilities at home. The helped keep cost low and expand coverage and also understood that cybersecurity at o. P. M. Needed to be a priority. Its precisely because of some of the reform she is initiated that this particular cyber breach was detected in the first place. But given the urgent and significant challenges that are facing o. P. M. Right now, a new manager with a specialized set of skills and experiences is needed. When did the white house become aware of the 21 Million People affected by this breach . Josh as you know, the investigations into the scope of these kidse of incidents are extraordinarily complicated particularly when youre talking about data that involves tens of millions of individuals and it is only in the last couple of days that those who are responsible for leading this investigation reached this final conclusion about the scope of the intrusion. And consistent with the president s directive, as much information as possible should be shared with the public, thats why the decision was made just yesterday by the office of Personnel Management to release some more of this information. Now we also recognize that the public is due Additional Information and when i refer to the public, im talking about those individuals that were that had data that was compromised. And so there is a responsibility to o. P. M. Recognizes to follow up with those individuals and ensure theyre given advice, that theyre informed about what exactly happened and o. P. M. Has already committed to ensuring that those individuals will receive a comprehensive sweep of credit reporting and Identity Theft prevention tools. This would be on top of the suite of Services Provided to those individuals whose data was compromised in the first reported breach. Does the administration have any sense of what, whoever is responsible for this breach might be doing with this data . Is it possible they could sit on this data while these protections that youre talking about take effect and then strike later . What securities are you taking into account for the longterm . Josh i dont have an analysis to share with you in terms of what we suspect this actor, what the true intent of this actor may have been. But you know, obviously we want to make sure that those who may be affected by this breach get as much protection and support that we can offer them and thats a promise o. P. M. Is commit odd to fulfilling. Are you willing to confirm that the breach, that the chinese were responsible nor breach . Josh i dont have anything to say publicly about the attribution of this activity. What does the president think of the conclusion that 21 people were affected . Josh the conclusion was only reached in the last few days and the president was briefed shortly after the conclusion was reached. What was his reaction . Josh i wasnt there when he was briefed. I can tell you that the president believes this is significant and this needs to continue to be a priority of his administration, not just at o. P. M. But across the federal government to make sure that all the agencies in the administration are focused on this pyrity. That it is critical to their mission to safeguard their Computer Networks and safeguard their data and youll recall that i pointed out on a couple of previous occasions that the last Cabinet Meeting that the president convened a month or two ago, prior to this news about o. P. M. Having been publicly reported, that cybersecurity and the effective and prompt implementation of cybersecurity measures at Government Agencies was an item on the agenda. I think that should be an indication to you that this administration, including the president is focusing on this priority even when its not on the front page of the news pape. Would you describe him as being angry . Theres been so many different technical snafus, issues, that have come up for his administration, is he angry that josh im not sure im willing to a josh im not sure im willing to agree with the premise of the question but let me try to answer it. I think the president realizes that this needs to be a priority. Its a priority that many private sector leaders acknowledge exists as well. The private sector has experienced breaches that affected significantly more people than this significant breach here in the federal government computer network. Obviously this is something that , you know, both public and private entities are dealing with and the president is determined to ensure that all of his leaders of Government Agencies understand that this is a this needs to be a priority because it goes to the core effectiveness of each of these agent ses. Agencies. With o. P. M. Affected in the security clearances, how long will it take to fix that and how long before thats fully operational again . Josh i dont have an update on those details, i refer you to o. P. M. How do we know, yesterday during the Conference Call o. P. M. , then o. P. M. Director archuleta was going to be director. Josh as our investigators have information to share theyll share it. I dont have new information. Last week, the director of National Intelligence said china was a leading suspect in the o. P. M. Hack. Youre not going to suggest that the d. N. I. Director was, i guess, talking out of school . Josh what im going to suggest i didnt refer to id refer to his office for an explanation of his particular comments. I dont have any information on who is responsible for that information. Youre not say thats wrong josh im saying for explanation of director clappers comments, look to his office. You said on one of the briefings here that your personal data may have been swept up in the hack. Do we know if the president s personal data has been swept up in this . Is it involved in any way . Josh i dont have any information about the president s personal tai ta but even if i did im not sure id share it. Its every federal employee since 2000, that would include the president. Josh i dont have any information about the president s personal day tafment they say the federal database failed in preventing dylann roof from buying a firearm. What can you say about the state of background checks . Josh the f. B. I. Is continuing to investigate what happened when it came to the purchase of a firearm by the suspect in the charleston shooting. So i dont have any Additional Information beyond what the f. B. I. Has already shared. Im going to the cline much comment because there is an Ongoing Investigation to determine what exactly happened. I know the president tweeted about the Confederate Flag coming down in South Carolina, did he watch it . Were officials watching it . Josh i dont know if the president watched the flag come down or not but obviously his message on twitter is a pretty good indication of his reaction to it. Just to get back to o. P. M. , what do you say to these 21 Million People whose data has been potentially compromised i guess it hasnt been violated yet but they are now in this vulnerable position . Thats a lot of people. What is the white house mess abbling to those people, 21 Million People . Josh the administration feels a responsibility to communicate with them as best we can about what has happened. Thats why o. P. M. Established a website with as much information as they could compile about this particular incident. Theyre in the process of Building Structures as well as a mechanism for providing a whole suite of credit monitoring and Identity Theft protection tools. This was this would be a first step in trying to provide them the support and protection they need. Obviously we recognize the significance of this incident and protecting the data of the federal government and the federal employees is a top priority. I think thats why youve seen the office of Personnel Management take a number of concrete steps to address this. Before i let you go, Katherine Archuleta said on the Conference Call yesterday that she wanted to stay on to deal with this. Was there a subs kent subsequent conversation that changed that or did she just decide later on last night or this morning that she that she wanted to go . Im not aware of any subsequent conversation but for questions on her decision to offer jerez ig nation today, i refer you to her office. Julie. Yesterday on the call, someone said the breach occurred and it shouldnt happen when theres two forms of identification. Thats Standard Practice. How is it that thats not Standard Practice for the federal government . How long do you think that will take it will take for that to happen . Short of that, i think it could happen many times over. Some agencies have it 100 but most agencies dont. Josh there is an ongoing effort by the office of management and budget to conduct a rapid reassessment of the state of cybersecurity measures and accelerate the implementation of reforms that need to be adopted. One of those is twofactor awe thent i authentication. And there are a number of offices that have fully adopted those security measures. These are this twofactor authentication is a security measure thats becoming more and more common because of the risks that exist in cyberspace and so implementing these reforms is something that the office of management and budget is trying to accelerate all across the federal government. Theres one other aspect of this that is important and is a relevant securityrelated reform. And that is that relates to the conduct of Privileged Users. Theres some indication that once the system was breached, that by using Privileged Access thats what allowed these hackers to do exactly what they did. So one of the things our experts tell us is that its important to limit the number of Privileged Users in the Computer System and i think this is something thats becoming more common across Computer Networks both inside government and outside government. Its also important to think carefully about the capability given to those Privileged Users and if their activity or capability can be limited in some way that can often be a wise thing to do. The other thing is that its possible and important to closely monitor the activity of Privileged Users, that maintaining logs about how often or how frequently they log in and log out and what maintaining a log of their activities is also another way to try to counter or at least limit this particular vulnerability. These policies around Privileged Users is also something that the federal government across agencies is seeking to implement. Again because Privileged Users do pose a vulnerability. Do you have any estimate of how much its going to cost to provide credit monitoring and Identity Protection and any potential liability the government might bear for the loss of information . Josh i dont have those numbers in front of me, im not sure those numbers are available at this point. Once were in a position to announce more details about the suite of services that can be provided to those whose data may have been compromised, well have more information about the potential costs involved. On iran. Its been announced that theyre going to extend the joint plan of action through the weekend, through monday. To give more time for the talks. Is there any scenario where, short of a deal fwoshtors will meet . Will you give us an updid of the president s thinking . Are there very, very close or is he in the mode of however long it takes, and they could be there through the summer. Josh i think the way we described this before is an apt description of where we stand now. The United States our p5 plus one partners and iran have never been closer to an agreement. Important progress has been made other the last couple of weeks since the negotiators have been in vienna to try to complete an agreement. That said, there continue to be significant sticking points that remain. And thats the essence of the ongoing negotiation. The president has indicated to his negotiating team that they should remain in vienna and continue to negotiate as long as the talks continue to be useful. If it becomes clear that iran is not interested in engaging in a constructionive way to try to resolve the remaining sticking points the negotiators should come home. Thats essentially whats driving the timetable here. Its not the deadline, its the usefulness of ongoing negotiations. What happens is there something in place that if personal information is accessed, you said it wasnt at this point but if it is accessed what happens . Josh for those individuals whose data was compromised were offering a suite of credit protection and monitoring tools to protect them from the improper use of their personal information. This is a suite of tools thats not been provided yet but they are working hard to arrange that and contact those individuals whose data may have been compromised. But if they break into the system they may be able to break into someones information. What happens . Is there a fingerprint you can find to find who did this . Josh theres an Ongoing Investigation to learn more about precisely who may have been responsible for this breach. I dont have any information about the about those investigative tools being used. But rest assured that is something that continues to consume the time and attention of a lot of cybersecurity experts. Many people including the president , noted the significance of the Confederate Flag coming down today but sources on the hill say its not other. What happened, you talked about yesterday how republicans are still trying to make efforts to keep it on National Park grounds. Is there a concern at the white house that this could come back up . Josh i think as a general matter april, the president was pretty direct when he talked about this in charleston just two weeks ago. That hes hopeful that the debate would not stop at the Confederate Flag but would continue into a debate and discussion about policies to make our country more fair. Thats where the president hopes the debate will continue to move. There was a statement yesterday condemning republicans on the hill about trying to reverse the amendment about the National Park service. Again, theres concern on the hill from democrats that republicans are still wanting to do this an trying to make it happen. Is there concern in the white house that theyre going to do that . He spoke so eloquently and strongly yesterday on im asking today about concerns . Josh again, i think this will be a decision for republicans to make. I do think the decision they make will give the country a lot of insight into the values and priorities and agenda that that party promotes. Ohiia. Olivier. Theres a security component here too has the president ordered a special review to understand the extent of damage to American Security and hoping against hope you might give us a sense of how many current or former intelligence or military officials have been compromised. Josh i think, for obvious reasons, thats not information im willing to share here. Im not aware of any specific National Security review that is being conducted. Obviously there are assessments done all the time about the safety and security of the country and those individuals who put themselves in harms way to try to protect the country. At the same time there is an interagency 90day review the president has ordered. This is a a review by the office of management and budget. It includes the office of Personnel Management as well as the director of National Intelligence and a wide range of National Security and Law Enforcement agencies. The goal of the 90day review is to take a look at policy questions that related to cybersecurity and the defenses that are erected to protect the federal governments computer network. There obviously are significant National Security implications for doing that. That is a review thats under way and well ask for another 90 days and well it will be something that will be considered carefully for its impact on the countrys National Security. Theres a review, i dont know when it started, we can get you the start of the 90day clock if you want. I want to try this a little differently. O. P. M. And the federal government were broadly offering all these remedies, Identity Theft protection there is credit counseling being offered to people whose information was affected. Whats the price tag on that . Wouldnt we have been better off spending the money on cybersecurity before this all happened than on this remedy . Josh again, as i mentioned to julie, at this point i dont have a price tag to share with you. I will say that when it comes to the effective and judicious use of taxpayer dollar the administration has long advocated to make sure our agencies are properly funded so the priorities they have can be met. Right now there is a vigorous debate on capitol hill among republicans who want to slash government funding and slash funding for Agency Agencies that will necessarily have an impact on a wide variety of priorities that these agencies confront including basic cybersecurity. So this will be i would anticipate that this will be part of that budget debate that is already occurring up in congress right now. One last one, nowhere near the top of the agenda when it comes to the o. P. M. Hack, but under personal curiosity, i underwent a background check to get my hard pass to get into the white house, am i going to get one of those letters . Josh thats a good question. I dont know the answer to that. Obviously youll find out at some point. Susan. My question is, when will the people who had their information hacked find out . And wheny will former military, how do you locate these people . Is there a timeline on when theyll find out if their information has been breached or not . Josh theyre working very diligently. Were talking about a large number and this is a complex investigation. They are working diligently to determine whose data may have been compromised. There will be an effort after that to locate those individuals and communicate to them the risks that they face and communicate to them the kind of assistance and protection that the federal government can provide to mitigate that risk. Do you have any idea when that would occur right now . Josh at this point i dont have a deadline. Obviously were working very aggressively to meet. Let me just say it this way. There is an understanding that promptly notifying those individuals whose data may have been compromise sad top priority of the investigation. That is something theyre very focused on. Once we begin notifying people then well let you all know as well. You have been criticize for not reacting, saying it was not even say television a tragedy before referring to d. H. S. Josh i didnt catch the beginning of that. In San Francisco. Were wondering if the white house feelses that tragedy, there needs to be a call to action on this and whether there needs to be something done. You had characterized it as, at one point, reporters interpreted that you characterized it as House Republicans were just killing Immigration Reform and her death you were blaming that death on House Republicans. First of all you still think this is a tragedy that needs a call to action and is that a right characterization . Did you blame her death on House Republicans . Josh i did not. And thats not the first time my remarks have been unfairly characterized but i dont lose a lot of sleep over that. The president has spoken in compelling terms about gun violence and spoken out, i think, quite persuasively about the need for action to be taken in this country to reduce gun violence. There are some steps that can be take ton reduce gun violence and the fact is, there are some steps that congress could take right now that have strong support of the American People. That even have the strong support of gun owners in this country. But congress has resisted taking some of those steps that would not undermine the Constitutional Rights of lawabiding americans but could have the positive impact of keeping guns out of the hands of criminals or others who shouldnt be able to get their hands on them. A lot of people are saying its a call to action on immigration. Theres josh the president did act on Immigration Reform. Something that republicans didnt do. That is also a fact. An i. C. E. Official testified earlier this week that it was not just that he blamesst for lack of abiding by the laws but said their policy advice is to go after all the criminal warrants they can against Illegal Immigrants before they act to deport him or her. Im wondering is that a bureaucratic crack that can be fixed . Is that something that the administration can do something about right now . Josh i havent seen the claims of that particular i. C. E. Official. I can tell you what the policy is that the president put in place back in november. S that policy that ensures that our limited government resources, our limited Law Enforcement resources these Law Enforcement resources are even further limited because republicans failed to take action on comprehensive Immigration Reform in the congress that would have made historic investment in border security. That being said, the president s policy is to make sure were focusing our limited law ep forcement resources on criminals, those who pose a Public Safety threat, those who pose a National Security threat that those should be the priority for deportation ahead of focusing on splitting up families. But this case is there something that needs to be done in light of this case . Obviously this who is to blame for this case . Josh there are a lot of people eager to assign blame. Enge were eager to try to find some solutions. Unfortunately, those solutions will well certainly one thing that would help would be comprehensive Immigration Reform legislation. We have comprehensive Immigration Reform legislation that passed the senate it was blocked by republicans in the house for purely political reasons. And that does not represent blaming them for a tragic death that obviously occurred. But it is blaming them for putting their own political interests and ambitions ahead of the Public Safety and National Security of the United States. They do it frequently and it is appalling and offensive. What about sang ware cities . Josh again, ive said this before too but the fact is as a part of the package of executive actions that the president announced back in november, was the creation of the priority enforcement program. And this does significantly improve the ability of the federal government and federal Law Enforcement agencies to cooperate with local Law Enforcement agencies to make sure that we are focusing our investigative and Law Enforcement resources on criminals. And on those who pose a threat to communities. And again that is something that the that the president had to do because commonsense reforms were blocked by republicans in the house of representatives. So again, thats where the president s priority lies. And were going to continue to urge congress to take that commonsense step as clearly that is clearly in the best interest of our economy, it would reduce the deficit, it would have a positive impact on Public Safety. But in the minds of House Republicans, i guess their own political and personal interests trump all that. For possible bipartisanship, treasury secretary lew was talking about working with paul ryan on International Tax reform to help pay for highway funding. Are those new negotiations or have they been going on for a while . And does the white house put a timeline or any direction on those talks . Josh the white house officials and the secretary, principally, have been engaged in conversation for quite some time with House Republicans about the possibility of pursuing tax reform. The idea that the administration has focused on is that is the idea of using some element of tax reform to close loopholes that only benefit the wealthy and well connected an generate and use the revenue generated by those loophole closings to invest in things that benefit us all. It would have a positive impact on Economic Growth and job creation that is a principle that this administration has strongly advocated for. Weve also put forward a detailed proposal for making progress in that area. Republicans have not signed on to that proposal, unsurprisingly. But there has been an indication from some republicans that at least in principle, at least the concept of closing some tax loopholes and using revenue to invest in infrastructure is something they have indicated an openness to at least considering. Thats been the foundation of conversations between democrats and republicans on capitol hill but also between Republican Leaders in congress and senior economic officials in the administration. Then youre not seeing like a breakthrough today by any stretch . Josh unfortunately, no breakthroughs to announce today. If i did, i would be doing it. Margaret. We know the iran deadline, july 13. Is there any expectation on the president s part that anything could happen between now and july 13 and how is that shaping his weekend . In other words, can you give us any readout on how hell be checking in on iran . Is he getting calls from foreign leaders or is he leaving everyone alone until something jells . Josh im not aware of any calls with foreign leaders related to this particular matter that are already on the president s schedule for the weekend. I would anticipate that over the course of the weekend, the president will continue to be regularly updated by his National Security team and possibly even directly by the team thats leading the negotiations out in vienna. But thats the way that this process has been functions functioning over the last several days and will continue into the weekend. Will he get a daily upkate or what . Josh hell require hell get at least a daily update, i dont know if it will require him stepping into the situation room or not. Is there any doubt in the president s mind that Hillary Clinton will be a strong supporter of the iran deal . Is it a situation like trade where she had the political breathing room to say nothing, or do you think because its Foreign Policy and was secretary of state that she is firmly in the public support camp and do you consider her a validator . Josh id point you to her Public Comments after the lausanne agreement was announced, when she spoke supportively of on gonge diplomatic efforts. I think like everyone else, secretary clinton will have an opportunity to evaluate a final agreement if one is reached and will make a final decision about whether or not to support it. On the National Monuments was senator harry reid the triing force behind the National Monument being named in nevada . Josh senator reid has spoken peculiarly about his affinity for this particular area of the nevada desert. Hes been an important advocate for that particular piece of property. And the president was pleased that he was able to use his executive authority to ensure that that important space could be preserved for future generations of americans to enjoy. Is there politics at play in this . Josh i recognize the instinct to conclude that everything that happens within the capital beltway is influenced by politics in one way or another but i think in this case, both senator reid and president owhat obama recognize the significance of this piece of land and recognized how important it would be to ensure it could be protected and preserved for future generations of americans to enjoy. I know you havent been able to discuss specifically how much the o. P. M. Hack will cost but when director archuleta was before the hill, she talked about the need this year for a supplemental to cover a couple of costs. New software and whatever it would take to pay for some of the things raised in this breach. To what degree did the reaction on capitol hill yesterday which included many republicans and at least one prominent democrat calling for her to be fired influence the administrations calculations about the ability to get the money youre going to need to address this problem, and director archuletas ability to get that as an advocate for the administration . Josh major i guess you raise an interesting point. I guess we can all sit here and hope that the passion and zeal onties play by some member of congress, mostly republicans, as it relates to the livelihood of the director of office of personnel and management, will be on display when it comes to protecting the identity of about 2 million americans. And if that requires additional resources, both to protect the system or to ensure that these individuals can be afforded the Identity Theft protection and credit monitoring that they should get, then well certainly look forward to the strong bipartisan support it should have. Would the president or director come to the conclusion that it would be much harder if not impossible to have those conversations if she remained at the head of the o. P. M. . Josh im not aware of discussion along those lines. The president is expected to deliver a speech on tuesday in philadelphia to the naacp. Considering the context of the moment, can you suggest to us what the president , will he have a new message in a different way in the same way . Josh the president will focus on the need to reform and improve americas criminal Justice System. At the Naacp Convention in philadelphia, hell outline the unfairness in much of our criminal Justice System, highlight bipartisan ideas for reform and lay out his ideas to make our country fairer, smarter and more cost effective. On wednesday, the president will travel to the choctaw nation of oklahoma to deliver remarks about expanding Economic Opportunity for everybody. The president will continue his focus on criminal Justice Reform on thursday by making the first visit by a sitting u. S. President to a federal prison, the el reno prison outside of oklahoma city. While there, the president will immediate mete with Law Enforcement officials and inmates and conduct an interview with vice for documentary that will air in fall about the realities of the criminal Justice System. That will be the focus of the president s Public Events next week and the speech at the naacp will be a focal point. That will be less about racial issues in the country the last two or three years and much more about the specific issue this policy issue of criminal justice . Josh criminal Justice Reform will be the focus. What are the administrations attitudes so far based on what its heard in the last 48 hours between the European Union and greece . You indicated earlier this week you thought there might be a landing spot. Whats the assessment . Josh at this point we have seen and welcomed the proposal that was put on the table by greece. It is something thats currently being considered by their creditors. We have said for quite some time now that the solution or the resolution to greeces financial challenges is a package of reforms and financing that will put greece back on the path of Economic Growth and sustainability. Doning so would allow greece to remain part of europes Currency Union and thats something we believe is or that the greeks have articulated im just trying to get your sense of what you think . Josh this will be something for greece and their creditors to evaluate. And we are just pleased to see that were that greece has take the step of putting forward a specific proposal. Its one their creditors have to evaluate. On your discussion of the president s appearance, the Washington Post is reporting on thursday the president will commute the sentences of dozens of nonviolent offenders to call attention to his desire to see those with drug convictions and others be part of criminal Justice Reform. Can you confirm hell do that on thursday and how that decision will help get the reforms out of congress that he seeks rather than his critic saysing hes doing something under his own Authority Without consulting them . Josh i dont have the Additional Information about next week to share at this point. I can say as a general matter, the president has used his executive authority previously to commute the sentences of nonviolent offenders and i certainly wouldnt rule out the possibly that he would use that kind of authority in the future. But i guess let me finish by saying that that is certainly not a replacement for the kind of broadbased criminal Justice Reform that the president believes is necessary and that enjoys some bipartisan support on capitol hill. And the president is committed to working in bipartisan fashion to make progress on legislation that would do far more to bring fairness more fairness and more justice to our criminal Justice System than the president can do on his own. Can you comment on the response to this, its been reported they have lots of details. You cant comment on this . You know the answers. Josh well, im certainly not going to make any announcements about the exercise of president ial authority prior to the president making a decision to exercise that authority. Thats never happened before . Josh i dont know if its happened before but its not going to happen in this instance. Josh, let me even on my colleagues last day you didnt really answer his question. [laughter] use me however you want. Let me try one more time. With 22 Million People who have had their identities compromised and some of the other americans who are interested in this, that the white house tell them whether or not they believe this was a failure in management. Josh jim, i think what it exposes is that there are significant challenges that are faced, not just by the federal government but by private sector entities as well. This is something that Large Organizations that maintain large Computer Networks are continually trying to address to and that is the ever evolving threat in cyberspace. This is a priority, the president has discussed this as a priority. Even on occasions when its not landing on the front page of every newspaper new york your case landing on the evening news, and thats an indication that the president recognizes how important it is and recognizes that this is not an unusual challenge. Let me follow up by trying this way. If this had not happened would she still be director of o. P. M. . Or was this a direct reaction to a fill your in failure in management. Josh it is clear that the office of Personnel Management is facing a set of urgent challenges that require a manager with a specialized set of skills and experiences, no doubt about that. At the same time, one of the first things that director arch let da to archuleta did as director of office of Personnel Management is begin a process of upgridding the cybersecurity defenses at the office of Personnel Management. Its a result of those reform she is put in place that this breach was detected in the first place. But again, given the urgent challenges that theyre facing right now, its clear that a manager with a specialized set of skills and experiences is needed. Those are conveniently enough the skills and experiences that ms. Culvert brings to the job but ultimately we need a permanent replacement and thats something well start working on today. If i could just, one more on iran. The iranians seem to be saying a lot of noise today. Josh distractions and everything. The iranians seem to be saying that, among other things, that the allies, the p5 plus one, are not united in their requests of iran. And i know that you dont want to get into details about the negotiations but can you tell us whether or not there is one message coming from this group to the iranians or is it are there different contingencies constituencies in this negotiating group . Josh i think, let me answer that in a couple of ways. The first is, obviously were talking about, when it comes to the p5 plus one, were talking about six different entities here. The European Union and several other countries. So there are these are sovereign countries with their own view. But i will point out that these negotiations would not have reached this point were there not solid unity among United States and our International Partners and the truth is, this is the kind of unity and unanimity of opinion that didnt exist when president obama took office. In early 2009, iran was on the march and making significant progress toward develop agnew clear weapon and the International Community was fractured in their response. Was flummocksed in term of how to confront this urgent challenge. And its because of the leadership of the president that International Community has been united, united in imposing sanctions against iran that compelled them to the negotiating table that halted Irans Nuclear program and in fact rolled it back in some key areas, and made significant progress in trying to reach a diplomatic agreement, a diplomatic agreement that would shut down every single pathway iran has to a Nuclear Weapon and get iran to cooperate with a set of inspections that would verify their compliance with the agreement. I think that is an indication of just how far weve come and a lot of that progress if not all of that, is attributable to the leadership of the president of the United States. Chris. If i can go become to o. P. M. For just a minute who is in charge of making sure this doesnt happen elsewhere in the federal government . Josh well, the, what i would say is there are a couple of o. M. B. Initiatives charged with doing that. The first is that what i think theyre calling their cyber sprint. This is the effort to rapidly reassess the cybersecurity at federal agencies across the administration and this is where theyre considering the twofactor awe thentity case implementation. This is where theyre considering the Privileged User thing i was talking about with julie, making sure theyre limiting the number of Privileged Users and limiting the capability of those users where appropriate, monitoring activities of those Privileged Users to prevent this kind of thing from happening again. Those kinds of commonsense steps are the kinds of things the o. M. B. Is leading a review to determine where those kinds of steps have not yet been implemented and holding agecies accountable for implementing them in short order. Theres also a broader 90day report being convened by o. M. B. Again the department the d. N. I. , direct i dont have of National Intention and the office of Personnel Management are involved in the broader, 90kay review. Theyre being aided by a range of Law Enforcement agencies to take a broader look at a range of key policy questions that relate to Information Security and cybersecurity. Again, thats an indication that this is a priority. The other indication i can give you is the fact that or one example, one illustration of how this is a priority is that at the previous Cabinet Meeting convened by the president of the United States, cybersecurity was at the top of the agenda. This is an issue that was extensively discussed where o. M. B. Talked about how they would work with d. H. S. To make sure that all the cabinet agencies were meeting their goals and were meeting deadlines when it came to, or when it comes to implementing these commonsense reforms that are critical to securing the federal, the Computer Networks of the federal government. All these things you talk about are just in process which isnt very comforting to people who work with the federal government and see what happens to these employees, so why should they be assured . Josh because i think the other thing that we have to acknowledge and the other thing that has to be recognized here is that the technology that were talking about is everevolving. It actually evolves really quickly. We need to make sure our defenses are always adaunting to those challenges. Thats why theres never going to be a time when anybody is going to come up here and stand at the podium and say our work on cybersecurity is finished. The day we do that well probably be the most vulnerable federal Government Networks would be. Because we know our adversaries are determined theyre create i, theyre innovating and capitalizing on developments to seek out and exploit new vulnerabilities. It almost sounds leek you feel we cant keep up . Josh no, what im suggesting is we have to work hard to keep up. Right now theres plenty of evidence to indicate that theres a lot more work to be done to keep up. There are a lot of proposals out there by the federal government but the region senators virginia, maryland, Eleanor Holmes norton is here are proposing far beyond what was proposed yesterday, three years of monitoring that there be a lifetime of honor of monitoring of Identity Protection, and 5 million in ikentity theft insurance. Is that something the president would get behind . Josh we have not taken a close look at that proposal as of yet. Obviously at o. P. M. They are developing the suite of Identity Theft protection and Credit Monitoring Services that could be provided to those individuals whose information may have been breached. Or compromised. But at this point, thats something theyre still working to develop. Well obviously consider the proposal that has been put forward to congress. The president of the National Federation of federal employees has expressed concern that the original breach, which was 4. 2 Million People that the government was already struggling to keep up with that and expressed his worries that how could they possibly then keep up with something thats nearly five times as big . Will there be anything that goes out officially between now and the time youre able to identify exactly who all the people are and get those letters out advising federal workers whats going on, what youre doing, how this will all unfold . Josh there is a website thats already beenest tablied. I believe its at o. P. M. At opm. Gov cybersecurity. This is where individuals who believe they may have had their data compromised, individuals who may have applied far background check. These that information about what steps they can take right now is information that o. P. M. Has made available. But there will be Additional Communications that will be shared with those individuals once we have more information at our fingertips and have more granular knowledge we can then use to determine who exactly is at risk and make sure they get the information and protection they need. Finally, given whats happened, i realize its very soon after this was announceding its only be been only been a few days the president has had this, but has there been any discussion of something beyond o. M. B. , something thats a particular person, like the buck stops here, who is in charge of federal Government Cybersecurity . Josh this has been a challenge in a lot of ways. This is the essence of another debate that is on going and not moving fast enough in congress. One of the challenges in confronting cybersecurity vulnerabilities is the seam that exists between private sector Computer Security professionals and Law Enforcement and National Security professionals in the Public Sector. One of the most important things we can do to improve cybersecurity both in the public and private sector is to streamline communication between Law Enforcement and National Security officials and leaders in the private sector. The president put forward very specific legislation to congress more than six months ago that the congress hasnt passed yet. This should not be something that gets bogged down in partisan politics. This should be a place where democrats and republicans should be able to Work Together and we havent seen congress do that yet in a way thats brought a bill to the president s desk. So thats certainly one way we could address one of the themes youve identified. The other thing the administration has sought to do is to try to benefit from the extensive capabilities and knowledge that exists in the private sector. And we have seen a number of Computer Security experts join the federal government to try to lend a hand not just to this effort thats under way at o. P. M. But also to address some of the broader policy challenges that exist across the federal government and we certainly are going to do everything we can to continue to ebb sure that those individuals have an opportunity to serve their country and serve in the federal government and help us confront this very significant challenge. Since you brought up congress, let me ask a react i question i was hoping that the o. P. M. I. I was looking at the o. P. M. I. C. Report from last month, there are a lot of things theyre develop, theyre in process of. Among the findings o. P. M. Didnt maintain a comprehensive inventory of servers. How did it get to this point . Josh i guess for an update in terms of where they are, id refer you to o. P. M. The other challenge that director archuleta acknowledged at the beginning of her service is that the office of Personnel Management had to maintain a lot of legacy systems. These in some cases were even outdated Computer Networks. And securing them against modern threats is a significant challenge. And i do think it raises questions about proper levels of funding. It raises questions about something weve discussed in this room before which is the procurement system thats in place when the government purchases information technology. That sometimes the cumbersome system of government i. T. Procurement leads to such a protected process that by the time the purchase is made the software being purchased is, if not obsolete at least out of date. And trying to reform and improve those systems and make them more efficient is something that beth culvert has been working on at o. M. B. I think that makes her a good choice to be acting direct or of director of o. P. M. But its clear there are significant challenges and despite the intense focus and expertise being leveraged to address the situation, i dont expect that this is a situation that will be resolved resolved next week or next month. These are longerterm challenges that require sustained focus and were certainly mindful of not just how big the challenge is right now but also as i was saying earlier, were mindful of how this is a threat thats continually evolving. And its going to require an adaptive process to make sure were doing everything needed to safeguard our Computer Systems. Thanks. I want to stay on o. P. M. For a second. Its apples to oranges to compare culvert and archuleta. You mentioned lacking a specialized set of skills and experiences. Did archuleta lack a specific set of skills and experiences, and if she did why was she in the job to begin with especially if culvert seems to have those skills and experiences to begin with . Josh kevin its clear there are significant and urgent challenges that requires a special set of skills and experiences like those skills and experiences that ms. Colbert has. The fact that director archuleta was an effective director of o. P. M. , because she did strengthen the use of evidencebased practices and data to drive Human Capital strategies. She Led Development of Workplace Flexibility plans. She developed and implemented targeted strategies to increase diversity and inclusion across the federal government. And even though she doesnt have a particular expertise when it comes to cybersecurity, she did commence a review of cybersecurity and the implementation of cybersecurity reforms at o. P. M. That led to the eventually detection of the intrusion that were now discussing. So, again, the president accepted director archuletas resignation today and decided that ms. Colbert is the appropriate person to lead the office of Personnel Management, but that should not in any way diminish the service of director archuleta. Kevin as the president call director archuleta . Josh she came to the white house and offered her resignation in person. Kevin is there a mechanism for kahn or a group of actors that did breach the o. P. M. . Josh well, kevin, for a long time this is a significant policy question and there were concerns that had been raised there wasnt an effective magmism for responding to these kinds of mechanism for responding these kinds of incidents. He designated authority to the secretary of treasury to impose financial sanctions against individuals or entities that either carry out nefarious cyberactivity or benefit from it and that does mean the president and the secretary of treasury do have new tools they can use to either respond to these incidents and to make clear just how seriously the United States considers these kinds of breaches. That said i dont want to i dont want to suggest theres anything in the works to prepare that kind of response to this particular situation. As weve talked about in this room as it relates to other situations, we often, for good reason, dont talk a lot in advance about the possible use of financial sanctions principally because it could allow the individuals or the entities being sanctioned to take steps that would allow them to evade that penalty. So i dont want to speculate on possible responses at this point, but it is true that the president and the secretary of the treasury now have new authorities that they can use to respond to these kinds of situations because of the executive action that the president announced back in early april. Kevin couple more. On the naacp speech, is the president thinking that restoring Voting Rights for felons is good idea . Josh this is a strong argument that some josh there is a strong argument that some have made, once an individual paid their debt to society that those Voting Rights should be restored. I know there is bipartisan support for a policy like that. Kevin and thats something the president would support . Josh kevin, i dont know if the president has spoken about this publicly but we can get you an answer. Kevin general dunford said that russia is the biggest threat to the u. S. , in his opinion. This is a man you said yesterday, obviously he spent time thinking about these issues and he has his opinion. You also said its not necessarily conclusive among the National Security team that they feel the same way. But im just curious, given his experience and given the trust the president has placed in him and the belief in his skillset, does it not make sense then that his opinion carries a great deal of weight and the president should probably consider it strongly . Josh well the president certainly will once we are hopeful that based on general dunfords decades of experience in the United States mirlts and his extensive and distinguished service to the country and his Strong Performance before congress yesterday that hell be confirmed in a bipartisan fashion by the United States senate. And once general dunford joins the team if hes confirmed im confident that his views and his opinions and his insight will factor heavily in the president s decisionmaking when it comes to National Security. But the president has some other distinguished members of his National Security team that also have opinions that are worth listening to. Kevin you do know that mitt romney agreed that russia is the number one threat to this country . Josh i may have heard Something Like that. Kevin is mitt right or the general wrong . Josh you have to ask them. The fact is i mentioned yesterday, i think im not aware of any sort of specific or comprehensive analysis thats been done by the president s National Security team that arrived at that conclusion but obviously when dealing with russia, particularly over the last couple of years since the election where we have seen russia start to ramp up their destabilizing activities, particularly in ukraine, weve been very mindful of that threat and the president has played an important leading role in presenting a united front in confronting russia for their destabilizing activities. Rebecca. Rebecca thanks, josh. Following up on kevins question about o. P. M. , when do you expect ms. What do you think ms. Colbert will accomplish in her new role . Josh she will be responsible for implementing many of the reforms that o. P. M. Has announced in the last couple of days. They can id refer you to o. P. M. For a more comprehensive set of those reforms. There is an effort under way at o. P. M. To draw on the knowledge and expertise of i. T. Experts inside the federal government but also Computer Security experts outside the federal government. And as a management expert i would expect that ms. Colbert will be wellpositioned to bring that expertise from a variety of sources together, to focus it on the significant challenges that are being faced by o. P. M. Right now. And, you know, and trying to move out quickly to implement many of the reforms that they suggest. Rebecca one said that o. P. M. Doesnt have a contractor to provide the credit monitoring protection to that they promised to give individuals whose personal information has been compromised. Have they found one yet . Josh as of the information as of this morning is the latest i have as well. Im confident once they have enter understood a contract like this theyll begin the steps of notifying individuals of the protections that are available to them and im sure well have the conversation with all of but that. Rebecca is the white house concerned they dont yet have a contractor for these 21 Million People . Josh obviously theyre going to work quickly. I think its important for them that theyre choosing the right contractor with a strong record of performance to do this job right. Lieu luis, ill give you the last one . Luis what do you believe the consequences will be if no final deal is reached at this stage . I also want to ask you, does the president have plans to continued the reopening of the Cuban Embassy in washington . Josh as it relates to the iran talks, im not going to speculate about possible outcomes at this point. One thing ill remind you is the administration has indicated that all of the options remain on the table for ensuring that iran does not obtain a Nuclear Weapon. The president believes this is the best way for us to prevent iran from obtaining a Nuclear Weapon and thats what our negotiators are working to succeed in doing. I dont have any scheduling announcements as it relates to the president s travel. I believe that the Embassy Opening is scheduled for the third week in july, i believe, but i dont have any scheduling updates to provide at this point. Lets do the week ahead and then ill let you get started on your weekend. On monday, the president will deliver remarks at the 2015 white house conference on aging. The white house has held the conference on aging each decade since the 1960s to identify and advance actions to improve the quality of life for Older Americans. This year marks the 50th anniversary of medicare, medicaid and the Older Americans act as well as the 80th anniversary of social security. The conference is an opportunity to recognize the importance of these key programs while bringing together Older Americans caregivers, government officials, members of the public, Business Leaders and Community Leaders to discuss the issues that will help shape the landscape for Older Americans in the next decade and explore policy solutions to address them. On tuesday the president will travel to philadelphia, pennsylvania, to deliver remarks at the naacps 106th national convention. Well have some Additional Details about the president s travel in coming days. On wednesday the president will go to durant oklahoma, talking about Economic Opportunity. The president will then spend the night in oklahoma. On thursday the president will continue his focus on criminal Justice Reform by making the first visit by a sitting president to a federal prison. The ell reno federal prison. The ell Reno Federal Correctional Institution located just outside of oklahoma city. As i mentioned earlier while there the president will meet with Law Enforcement officials and inmates and conduct an interview for a vice documentary that will air in the fall about the realities of our criminal Justice System. Further details on the president s travel to oklahoma will be available in the coming days. I expect the president will return to washington on thursday night. And the president s schedule for friday is up in the air. Well get you more details on that next week. Im sorry. [inaudible] josh no, i didnt. All right, guys. Have a great weekend. This friday and saturday . I dont have anything that far ahead yet at this point. I dont have anything at this point. Thanks, guys. Have a good weekend. Take care. Congratulations. Thank you very much. [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2015] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] and wrapping up with spokesman josh earnest on this friday touching on a number of items including the resignation of the director of office of Personnel Management, Katherine Archuleta stepped down today giving pressure to resign after a massive Government Data breach during her time. She submitted her resignation to the president. According to the white house shes being replaced temporarily by the agencys Deputy Director beth colbert who takes over tomorrow. Also this from the hill newspaper, Christina Marcos and rebecca report on changes to the house debate schedule next week in light of the fight over the Confederate Flag. The house was originally slated to consider the 2016 spending bill for Financial Services but the odds are now low for it hitting the floor. Republicans are worried that democrats could try to offer more amendments related to the display of the Confederate Flag which could tie the g. O. P. Into knots. The South Carolina state flag flew for the last time today until it was permanently lowered during a brief ceremony this morning. House Speaker John Boehner had this to say about the flag in a statement he said in part, i commend governor haley, the legislative the legislative slateure and the people of South Carolina for removing the flag from state house grounds. Heres a look at that ceremony as it took place shortly after 10 00 this morning today in columbia, South Carolina. [cheers and applause] [cheers and applause] u. S. A. u. S. A. u. S. A. 12346789 u. S. A. u. S. A. u. S. A. u. S. A. u. S. A. u. S. A. u. S. A. u. S. A. u. S. A. u. S. A. u. S. A. na, na, na, na hey, hey hey goodbye na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na hey, hey hey goodbye [cheers and applause] [chanting u. S. A. ] after the ceremony at the South CarolinaState Capitol this morning, president obama tweeted South Carolina taking down the Confederate Flag, a signal of good will and healing and a meaningful step towards a Better Future. Heres some of our featured programs for this weekend on the cspan networks. With the upcoming release of harbor lees new novel, cspan2s book tv focuses on the pulitzer prizewinning novelist. We talk about the impact of lees book to kill a mockingbird, her life since the publication and the discovery and publication of her new novel. Well reair these programs sunday evening beginning at 6 30 eastern. Also at 10 00 hugh hewitt on Hillary Clintons second run for president. And 50th anniversary of the vietnam war with readings and remarks by members of congress. And sunday evening at 6 30, g. O. P. President ial candidate carley fiorina. And steve vogut on issues that led to the Great Depression and the president s actions to help the economy. Sunday morning at 6 30, jeff, the why sherman is not the villain of popular legend. Get our complete weekend schedule at cspan. Org. The senator for strategic and International Studies today hosted a discussion on the role of religion in health care. Well hear about the role of faithbased organizations and combating h. I. V. And aides and pandemics such as the ebola crisis in west africa. Thank you. My name is poly. The Deputy Director of the Global Health policy center here at csis. We promise to give you an insight on faithbased health care. I want to thank shepherd and anita smith. I also want to say thank you to katie on my team who was instrumental in pulling this together this morning. Faith is a powerful force in the lives of individuals and communities throughout the world. Faithbased organizations are an important provider of health care globally and they are resource for improving access to Health Services and support particularly at the Community Level and for hard to reach populations in some of the poorest places in the world. As rick warren noted, there may not be a Health Facility in every town, village and hamlet throughout the world but there usually is a church or a mosque or another place of worship. Engaging in leveraging the reach of faith leaders can be critical to meeting Global Health and development goals. The nexus between faith and help and the potential for better cooperation and new partnerships is an important topic for us here at csis. Weve explored the issues through a variety of lenses including active collaboration with the faith Community Around the aids 2012 and playing a role in knowledge of and access to Family Planning and reproductive Health Services. These issues will continue to be a focus of our work. As we celebrate the role faithbased health care can play in the Global Health arena, we must also acknowledge the challenges and disagreements that are sometimes associated with the Faith Communitys role, notably in discouraging or opposing the use of basic Health Services including Family Planning and immunization as well as controversies in places like uganda where discrimination in the lgbt community. And it is also essential to better understand the role and contributions of faithbased providers and improve coordination between the faith and health communities. We will hear more about all of these important topics from our panelists today. I will now turn the microphone over to bill, Senior Executive director of the lancet who will introduce our first panel. Bill thank you. Good morning. On behalf of the office, im delighted to introduce this session about the faithbased health care. This is made possible by sponsorship from capital for good. In addition to the booklets that youve received, additional material is Available Online for free and the full contents will be published in the weekly addition of the lancet next month. Faithbased organizations delivers substantial amount of health care around the world. How much and what benefit has not been welldocumented. In which collaboration between different sectors will be crucial, this series sets out to estimate the contribution of faithbased organizations that for health care, the particular strengths and weaknesses for faithbased actors and how their expertise might be best recruited in the future. By doing so the office has initiated a respectful, sciencebased dialogue about faithinspired behaviors to which we welcome the input of csis. The three panelists here were each lead authors on one of the three review papers in the series. Going from your left to right jill olivier has worked with the world bank and is now senior lecturer and Research Coordinator at the university of cape town. Shes also director of the International ReligiousHealth Assets program. Jill combines these skills as the lead author of paper one understanding roles faithbased Health Care Providers in africa. Andrew thompkins is emeritus professor of International Child health at University College london. He combines a distinguished academic career with extensive experience in the field, to present a sensitive review about the influence of religious beliefs on behavior in the second paper, controversies in faith and health. The final review towards stronger partnerships between Public Sector and faith groups for improved health was not intended as such but rather planned as a brief viewpoint. However, peer reviewers were so enthusiastic that the authors were asked to expand the manuscript into a fulllength review. Leading that effort was jean dove, head of partnership and coordinator on faith and local communities. And your far right anita smith will moderate todays session. She is president of the childrens aids fund and past cochair of the president S Advisory Council on hivaids. Ladies and gentlemen, the panel. [applause] anita thank you so much to csis for hosting this important event and to bill for the introduction. I did want to ask bill one question, if i could, before we start with the panelists. I dont you probably would need to get back to the microphone. But this entire series would not be possible without all of your support. And i just wanted to hear from you as we start this discussion what your goals are in terms of how you want to see the material thats being published used and how youd like to see outcomes based on what youre supporting through this effort. Andrew thank you anita. We set out with two purposes. To inform and to reform. Bill so the name lancet means both a surgical instrument and a narrow window, and thomas said i want to use it for both of these purposes, to cut out bad practice and to shine light on good practice. And i think that still directs the way we approach topics and health is such a vast part of our lives with so many different interfaces that this is a really large area of health which has received disproportionate attention over the years. Its a very sensitive area and i think that may have may have made it difficult for groups to explore it in the past. And i think its also very vast area with heterogeneous ebbed in space so its difficult to make firm conclusions in the way one might do for other aspects of health care. So with this issue what we want to do, however imperfect, is to set down a marker and to say this is an important topic its going to actually be more important in the future and if we are to achieve the Sustainable Development goals we need the help of all potential actors. What im hoping is this initiates a dialogue which is then taken up by other science sociology Health Journals that we move the influence of faithbased provision of health care from the margins of the debate and make it mainstream. So my metric of success would be for people to write in three, four, five years time this was great but its so terribly out of date. Id like to see things move on. And as they do move on, i hope that the lancet can be part of that. Anita thank you so much for that metric. It gives us a Perfect Foundation for the presenters this morning. Jill. Jill good morning, everybody. I am going to crane my neck a little bit because i do have a few slides. The paper im presenting for those not familiar with the area at the intersection of public health, its a diverse area with major evidence holes. I wouldnt say gaps. Theyre big black holes where we simply dont know things like how many faithbased Provider Services there are, what is the influence of faith on health behaviors. So what this paper thought to do was provide a synthesis based on a series of systematic reviews in which the authors were a part. A synthesis of primary research in which there was some substantial evidence that could actually be committed to. So what the focused ended up being on was african faithbased Health Service providers. We were presenting this at the bank and i thought i put this quote up there. There have been these quotes floating around for the last 20 years. There is a substantial provision of health in african by these Health Providers but we dont know the numbers. We really dont know whats going on. These kinds of quotes have been around for a long time but we know a little bit more now in the recent times. So what this paper is focusing on is specifically on that cluster of countries in africa where there is a particular presence of faithbased biomedical Health Service providers so were not looking at traditional healing practices here. Were not looking at faith healing. Were not looking at a variety of other of other important issues. This is really looking at the hospitals, the Family Health care centers in those regions. The evidencebased is biased towards africa towards christianity and towards english literature. Im saying that now. We did not know about the islamic facilities and other facilities. We did not know about the Northern Africa region. But there is some evidence in relation to those countries. This is a very common slide. The first column provides the national faithbased Health Network selfdeclare on the percentage of Health Service providers against the Public Service provider. So for example they normally count on hospital beds or a number of facilities and they would compare the faithbased christian normally the christian faithbased Health Services against the governments facilities. These figures are highly i wouldnt say i quoted these. What the paper tries to impact is the fact that these figures are very conscientious and what we actually argue is there a need to move away from the focus on percentages of market sharing. The argument really is basing your entire engagement on the idea of whether or not they provide 20 or 30 of the Health Services is actually less important than the issues such as, do they provide Quality Health care to the rural poor . Do they emphasize universal Health Coverage to people that dont otherwise get access . Do they provide a different kind of care that supports the system and makes the general and National Health system more resilient . And so really the argument is to say moving away from those kinds of figures of market share and look at the cost and so were pulling we were trying to pull on what it is on these other aspects which we consider to be more important. I will touch on a couple of issues. If you we presented some data which is looking at utilization which did show some slightly lower market share than we had originally assumed. However, its a different its comparing apples and oranges to the faithbased kind of comparison. So dont worry about that too much. But we did find quite a lot of evidence to the fact that a lot of in those countries a lot of people were reporting on High Satisfaction levels and this is the public facilities. There was also some evidence to show that faithbased Health Service provision is particularly important in weak in weak Health Systems and thats not just in africa but internationally and weak Health Systems is normally its a humanitarian crisis, in emergency response. That is when faithbased comes in. I wont say too much about this slide. As i mentioned earlier, there is a push away from broad generalization about faithbased Health Service providers. I would emphasize i would encourage you very strongly to not use f. B. O. s. The evidence being specific in the engagement and being specific in the implementation strategies is really important and im going to stop there. Anita thank you very much. And well go ahead and have all the presentations. Andrew. Andrew well, we had a very interesting and challenging task of looking at the controversies. As you would imagine from the title we had a rich diversity of people to inquire and include in the team. And i think the key thing we wanted to emphasize in the paper was that there are many, many people who report faith in the world. In fact, the peer forum actually says more than 84 of the worlds population report having a faith. So this slide just shows some of the major faiths and methodology looked at the differences between faiths and sometimes differences between faiths. And thats a very important thing to do. The second slide i think just shows the importance of not being too simplistic in attributing anything to faith belief alone. This slide just emphasizes in the center were talking about things like attitudes and beliefs and prestigiouses and behavior and choice of technologies, everything we think of every day. But it isnt just faith that actually influences. Sometimes its actually thousands of years of culture. Sometimes its social and economic aspects. Sometimes its issues in relation to the laws in the country which may actually conflict with faith. And obviously there are very important political dimensions. And unfortunately sometimes beliefs and behaviors are affected by extremist ideological positions. When we looked at various components, as you see in the paper, a series of health damaging behaviors which included childhood marriage, opposition to immunization, violence against women and female genital mutilation. We looked at the way that faiths actually had a viewpoint on this. And then we looked at how notwithstanding the considerable varieties, there was often a commonality and we got a lot of examples in the paper awaiting which groups, sometimes with different faith background that come to Work Together for the reduction of child marriage, for the increase in uptake of immunization. For the improvement of care for women. For the reduction of stigma and improvement in the provision and care in hivaids. There is some of the those are some of the things we looked at and this slide shows a bit of a problem. What we found was that within the faith Leadership Group there was often a limited awareness of what was going on in the world. So we actually found there was a considerable problem in faith leaders remaining within their intellectual and theological faith faculties. At the same time we found that those working in some Development Agencies and some working some Development Agencies were actually extremely unaware of what faith actually meant. And therefore, there was a tendency, particularly pour those affected by intents intense secular agendas to stay there. So we had faith faculties and secular areas. This may be a parody. I do apologize for those that object to this, but we actually saw at the bottom some remarkable opportunities of faith groups probably using the word that actually ive been told not to but faith groups working intensively with governments and local communities and we provide within the pamer some great examples of that. What are our recommendations . Well we would like to see that the Health Care Leaders become more faith active and the faith leaders become more proactive. Im not suggesting that all faith leaders join gyms or Health Leaders go to the mosque. But its obviously important that understanding are improved. Notwithstanding these issues, we did provide some evidence, and theres quite a lot of Peer Reviewed evidence showing there is remarkable opportunity for faith to be integrated within programs. We can actually see there are opportunities for programming. So what do we seek to achieve from this paper . We would hope discussion, possibly disagreement, but we see actually quite likely to be an opportunity for groups to Work Together for the improvement of care. What our goal is to move into compassionate, professional, patientsensitive, faithsensitive care, especially for the hard to reach and we dont believe that the goals of Sustainable Development will be achieved unless some of the issues that we raised in our paper are taken into action. Thank you. Jean thank you so much anita. Good morning everyone. Thanks to csis and anita for helping organize this session. Thank you, bill, and the lancet. Thank you, my fellow authors in the working group. Amazing people who collaborated over a sustained period of time to bring this unprecedented series on faithbased health care to launch. After conference on religion and Sustainable Development, which was held over the last several days at the world bank. Kay warren was a key inspiration to this series. Informed by her deep lived out experience, personal experience of how religious and faithbased organizations transforms stigma and save lives of People Living with hivaids. Our paper focuses, picks up really where andrew left off. It focuses on the question of partnership between Public Sector organizations, between governments and donors and faith groups in general. And the question of what exists by way of partnership and what might scale up and strengthen partnerships. The paper lays out a case that the time is now right in the context of Development Trends and opportunities to very substantially increase engagement with faithbased organizations. Basically part of the notion policy and policymakers seems to be moving beyond the question now of whether to engage but how to collaborate. The paper offers a couple of signs, including the recent meeting between president kim at the world bank and the holy father where they discussed their mutual approach to implementing a preferential option for the poor. At our conference over the last couple of days, a notion that was tagged in the paper of Public Sector organizations themselves becoming more activists around these issues was underscored by the very activist participation of the German Government who have newly instituted a focus within their instituted a focus within their agency. On the faith side, groups next slide, please. Sorry. Great. Thank you. Now the next slide. On the faith side, the paper reviews how existing partnerships and mechanisms are expanding collaboration. And we look at those in three groups. We look at largescale interventions, such as the australian governments extraordinarily 10year investment in papua new genie where they worked through the congregational networks of seven denomination to provide service for the poor there. We looked at cofunding for hospitals and primary care through the churches, Health Associations throughout africa. And thirdly we looked at campaigns where faith groups are involved such as the United Methodist no Malaria Campaign which raised over 66 million and is a significant donor for aids, t. B. And malaria. So very Interesting Partnership between there. The paper also references the longstanding ongoing efforts of key u. N. Agencies to facilitate partnerships. Id like to just note in terms of the cofunding the important leveraging by Public Sector of private substantial private efforts the Faith Community brings to the work of development. And to tag for your further reading a study of the revenues of u. S. Faithbased n. G. O. s which in 2013 amounted to over 6 billion of which public funding represented only a small portion. I think it was 777 million. So a small share. Next slide please. The paper reviews the paper drills down on the case for partnership by looking more specifically at contributions to the prevention of maternal and child deaths. And every woman, every child framing by unicef that looks at the accelerated behaviors that are key to determining Health Outcomes for women and children. And makes the point in a systematic way that faith communities are very wellposition to influence those key attitudes and behaviors such as breastfeeding immunization, access to care that make a difference to those Health Outcomes. We offer a variety of interesting case studies and examples from nigeria from mo zambique to sierra leone and the paper drills down on recommendations for strengthening partnerships and those recommendations are clustered in five areas and, again, time doesnt permit us to go into them. We offer them for your further consideration. They include a suggestion of new Business Models in the sense, ways in which both the Development Communities and the faith groups can reorganize themselves strengthen themselves to be more effective in partnership mechanisms. It was interesting that when this paper was conceived almost 18 months ago, the conference that took place over the last couple of days was not even intended. But it was actually fascinating i think for all of us to see how the work embodied in the lancet paper was very much grounding for the conference over the last couple of days and these recommendations that you see here from elaborated very extensively in the work of the conference which looked at ways to strengthen partnerships between Public Sector and faithbased organizations. Thank you so much. Anita well, based on these presentations, this is just a taste of what is in the document that you have that you will definitely want to read. If you arent already into it thank you, all, for your excellent presentations. Just wanted to well, youre preparing your questions in the audience, let me just ask each of you a question. Jill wanted to clarify that the faith hospitals that you were looking at, were you looking at clinics or just hospitals . How extensive was the data . Jill the data was looking at all Health Facilities down to primary care levels. Again, there are the Christian Health association they met the number of facility downs to primary care level. Anita obviously theres a lot of work to still be done to get beyond just the christian facilities. Is there work under way that youre aware of . Jill i want to stress theres complexities as well. There are Health Facilities, faithbased facilities that roned by the church but operate as a public District Hospital for example. Its not quite as clear cut. In a number of countries. Worldwide, really. Anita how many of those facilities would be kind of a partnership between government and jill they call them district state hospitals. Theres probably 20 or so big hospitals. Normally in areas where there is not a substantial presence of the public system yet. Anita ok. Great. Thank you. Andrew what an interesting paper. And look at the controversies. How did you and your team go about deciding what you were going to look at and how did the teamWork Together to come up with the outcomes in the paper . Andrew with fear, trepidation Energy Enthusiasm and objectivity. Im giving those at the top of my head. Basically as scientists we are basically looking at, what is the evidence . And we didnt have any particular ax to grind. As the readers of the paper will see there were representatives looking at all the major faiths. We came particularly from the perspective of, what are the particular needs for hardtoreach populations particularly women children in poor communities, unreached countries . We looked at some of the key risk factors for poor mortality rates, for poor nutrition rates and Poor Development of children and adults. How we did it, we basically looked at the problems and we analyzed them using traditional sacred text and we also looked at the ways those text have been interpreted in different ways. And then we moved on to see how the text actually inspired and driven Health Workers to provide services in very difficult situations. Anita very interesting. Thank you. Jean congratulations on already putting some legs to this effort in the conference. I know it was a very successful event. I think one of the questions that people have is why hasnt why have these partnerships been so difficult to bring about and why has it taken us this long to come to this place . Jean thank you. The event anita is referring to is this conference on religion and Sustainable Development effective partnerships to end extreme poverty which was held over the last couple of days at the world bank and cohosted by the u. S. Government. I look at mark in the front row. The German Government, the british government, world vision and other leading faithbased organizations. And in itself i think it represents part of the question, an extraordinary collaboration among governments, faithbased organizations and the academic Community Around these issues. Anita, i think part of what we struggle with is a cultural divide. We have diven methods and diven approaches. We definitely have a Common Ground and as framed now by the coming Sustainable Development goals and this commitment to end extreme poverty, we have very clearly Common Grounds, we have different approaches. I think whats so heartening about the discussions over the last couple of days was the spirit of collaboration. The reciprocal frame. A call for organizations for very strong evidence granting and really a challenge to the faithcommunity to step up, just the kinds of evidence that jill and her team, for example, have been presenting. As a basis f