Providing Amounts for Further Expenses of the Committee on Energy and Commerce in the One Hundred Fourteenth Congress

Floor Speech

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Ms. DeGETTE. Madam Speaker, so this panel was supposed to be set up to investigate the alleged sale of fetal tissue, which is illegal under current law. That didn't turn out so well.

So now, as you can hear from the other side of the aisle, they are going after fetal tissue research itself, something that has been legal and used in an ethical way since the 1930s, something which has been used to find most vaccines and other cures for diseases in this country, something which a panel appointed by President Ronald Reagan, found unanimously in 1980 to be ethical.

So I want to ask, Madam Speaker, what the heck are we being asked to spend another $800,000 on?

The total funding for this witch hunt and this reckless endeavor is now more than $1.5 million. We have gone after women and punished them. We have gone after medical professionals and put their lives at risk, like what happened in my neighborhood of Colorado Springs, Colorado. We have put doctors and researchers on the line, and we have had a chilling effect on important biomedical research.

I say enough is enough. We need to disband this select committee. We need to continue to make sure that we have ethical medical research in this country because, frankly, that will lead to the cures that affect diseases that affect millions of Americans.

Mr. Speaker, from its start, the Select Panel has been nothing but a partisan witch hunt. The apparent goal of the Select Panel is to punish and intimidate women medical professionals and researchers who are following the law. Through wanton use of subpoenas, inflammatory language and release of private information--including addresses and phone numbers where those wishing to harass health care providers can find them--the Select Panel as put many, many people at risk. It has also threatened life-saving research and health care that these people provide.

Make no mistake: this threat is very real. Clinics are picketed and fire-bombed, doctors and their families are targeted at their homes, and some have even been murdered.

Furthermore, the Select Panel is trying to force universities and clinics to turn over the names of their researchers, graduate students, lab and clinic staff and doctors--for no legitimate congressional reason. Not since Joe McCarthy have we seen such abusive pressure tactics to ``name names.''

The Select Panel is acting as judge, jury, and executioner and endangering lives. It is time for Speaker Ryan to disband this panel-- rather than let it gorge even more on taxpayer funds.

Like the seventeen investigations that preceded it, the Select Panel has found no evidence of wrongdoing by Planned Parenthood, other providers, researchers or the companies that facilitate life-saving research and health care for women.

The Washington Post editorial board called on Speaker Ryan to disband the Select Committee months ago, noting that it ``has issued indiscriminate subpoenas, intimidated witnesses and relied on misleading information. It is abusing power at taxpayer expense, and Democrats are right to demand its shutdown.'' The paper added, ``There is no legitimate reason for this inquiry.''

The Select Panel is a waste of funds, an attack on women's rights, a danger to life-saving medical research and an abusive use of Congressional power for mere partisan gain.

So Mr. Speaker, I say enough with the smear campaigns, fishing expeditions and endless stream of subpoenas. Congressional bullying to frighten women out of exercising their rights, and to drive researchers and healthcare providers out of business, has to stop.

We in the minority have long called for the Select Committee to be disbanded before it does any more damage. I look forward to closing this shameful chapter in Congressional history at the end of this year.

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