Coast Guard Authorization Act of 2015

Floor Speech

I am pleased to be here again, at the beginning of another year, to rise to join Chairman Hunter in strong support of legislation to authorize funding for the United States Coast Guard and to advance new policy initiatives to strengthen the prospects for the U.S. flag and the U.S. maritime industry.

H.R. 4188, the Coast Guard Authorization Act of 2015, is very carefully crafted bipartisan-bicameral legislation that has been developed over the course of far too long. It should have and could have been done last year, but here we are.

I thank the Senate. I guess I should be a little more kind to the other House.

Several months of negotiation with Members of the Senate have finally concluded. This bill is deserving of robust support from Members on both sides of the aisle, and I urge its quick passage by the House today so it can be enrolled and sent to the President for his signature.

I thank Chairman Hunter for his leadership and cooperative spirit in working with me and the other Democrats to address our interests and concerns. The willingness of Chairman Hunter and of his outstanding staff on the Coast Guard and Maritime Transportation Subcommittee to collaborate and work with the minority is very, very much appreciated.

Now, the bill is not perfect. In fact, I haven't seen one in the years I have been here, and that has been a few years now; but that is the case with virtually every piece of bipartisan legislation that has been passed by Congress. On balance, the benefits of this bill really outweigh any detrimental aspects.

I am pleased this legislation will provide an increased authorized funding level for the Coast Guard for the next 2 fiscal years. Our Coast Guard has suffered over the past 3 to 4 fiscal years due to insufficient budgets. The authorized funding levels in this legislation, along with the increased appropriation in the fiscal year 2016 omnibus bill, are a marked improvement.

The importance of budget stability to the men and women of the Coast Guard cannot be overstated. Coastguardsmen and -women are pressed daily to meet the arduous demands of the service's 11 statutory missions which scatter them over seven different continents and every ocean. In fact, last week, I saw three of our cutters at the dock in Bahrain working to preserve our interests in the Persian Gulf.

The last thing our Coast Guard needs is to face recurrent budget uncertainties, a circumstance which leaves the service's leadership unable to know exactly what resources and capabilities they have available to perform vital national security functions, such as addressing port and harbor security, illegal drug and migrant interdiction, search and rescue, law enforcement and environmental response actions, and several other important activities.

This legislation will also strengthen our national security through provisions that enhance policies that govern foreign port security assignments. Others that bolster the coordination of international port inspections, conducted by the Coast Guard and our foreign partners, will help better ensure that critical maritime infrastructure does not become a liability for national security.

Additionally, language included in the bill will strengthen the Coast Guard's maritime drug enforcement authority, which should improve the Federal Government's activities in the Western Hemisphere to combat illegal drug trafficking, which has had a substantial destabilizing effect on several nations across the region.

I am also very pleased that this legislation continues to move the ball down the field in an effort to strengthen and to recapitalize a new fleet of polar class heavy icebreakers for the Coast Guard.

It is clear that we are witnessing the opening of the Arctic to maritime commerce. We have got to do something, and this bill puts us on the road to doing that. In this most challenging of maritime environments, it is vital that the service has the icebreaking capabilities it will need to operate safely and effectively; so we will figure out whether the Polar Sea can actually be refitted. Additionally, this legislation authorizes funding to allow the Coast Guard to maintain progress in finalizing requirements and in initiating preliminary designs for a new heavy icebreaker.

In moving to an end here, I am pleased that the legislation includes language to continue to preserve the remaining infrastructure at the former LORAN-C stations until such time that the administration makes a final decision on whether to build an enhanced LORAN, or E-LORAN, infrastructure as a reliable land-based, low-frequency backup navigation and timing signal for the global positioning satellite signal, which, I think, most of us know is the single point of failure for most of the American economy and for a good deal of our military. The GPS signal is fairly easy to corrupt, to degrade, or to otherwise disrupt. For this reason, we need to think seriously about a backup, and this bill sets us on the right course.

This administration needs to make a decision on this, and it should make it now. The language in this legislation ensures that we will have available in the future the remaining LORAN-C infrastructure.

I look forward to working with Chairman Shuster, with Ranking Member DeFazio, and, of course, with Chairman Hunter in advancing this initiative wherever and whenever possible.

Again, I thank Chairman Hunter and his staff for their support for the Coast Guard and the U.S. maritime industry and for their cooperation and leadership in pulling this bill together.

Of course, Congressman Shuster, who is the chairman of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, and Ranking Member DeFazio also deserve thanks for their leadership and contributions.

I thank my staff and the majority's staff for the work that they have done.

If I might just close by saying a special ``thank you'' to the chairman and his staff, to my staff--David--and to my own team on this. Also, this really was a bipartisan bill; so I thank Chairman Thune and the ranking Democrat on the committee, Bill Nelson, for their efforts in putting together this bill.

Let's get this job done.

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