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. SCHAKOWSKY. I thank the gentleman from Pennsylvania for yielding the time to me, and I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Speaker, I rise in opposition to this legislation to fund the select investigative panel, the panel that we call the select panel to attack women's health.

It really shouldn't come as any surprise that one of the very first things that the Republicans have done coming back now to Washington is to approve additional funding for this select so-called investigative panel, doubling its budget and putting it on track to spend nearly $1.6-million taxpayer funds by the end of this year.

This investigation is essentially built on a pack of lies that are perpetrated by anti-abortion extremists and has never been and has no chance of becoming a fact-based investigation. The panel Republicans have continually relied on, even today, doctored videotapes, so-called evidence, even though that evidence and those videotapes have been discredited already by three House committees, 13 States, and a Texas grand jury.

Throughout this investigation, Republicans have abused congressional authority, issuing 42 unilateral subpoenas in violation of House rules, demanding that clinics and universities name names of their doctors, students, and staff, and releasing some of these names knowing that doing so puts lives in danger, a truly McCarthyesque attack on individuals. They have compared researchers to Nazi war criminals and echoed the words of anti-abortion activists that were also used by a gunman who shot 12 people, killing 3 at a Planned Parenthood clinic in Colorado Springs.

Despite Republicans' failure to find any evidence of wrongdoing, they continue to make inflammatory, grotesque allegations to justify the panel's existence, and, by their words and actions, have put lifesaving research and women's health care at risk. The panel has already had a chilling effect on research, drying up the supply of needed tissue for research on multiple sclerosis and threatening research on other diseases from A to Z, Alzheimer's to Zika.

Fetal tissue research has historically had broad, bipartisan support. It is the basis for key vaccines that have saved, literally, millions and millions of lives, including the polio vaccine. That is why over 60 of our Nation's leading medical institutions released an open letter in support of scientific research using fetal tissue.

We cannot afford to let a set of reckless and irresponsible claims stop this vital medical research. This panel and its investigation are a disgrace to this House of Representatives. We need to end this dangerous and unjustified witch hunt, and, instead of providing more funding for this divisive and dangerous inquisition, Congress should shut down this panel and put an end to its shameful proceedings.

Madam Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

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Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Madam Speaker, I just find it so hypocritical that the majority is talking about putting peoples' private names out into the public when we have had people who have been attacked and lives threatened as a result of them putting names out there.

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Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Madam Speaker, let me just say that bogus referrals do not a conviction make, and that StemExpress had offered many times to come in with its procurement officers and answer all the questions.
They were denied that.

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Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

I just want to say a few things before yielding to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Brady).

We have heard a lot of accusations against certain businesses, et cetera, and institutions, and the Republicans have selectively and repeatedly released documents and letters, including a so-called criminal referral to the New Mexico attorney general, to the press before sending them or sharing them with Democrats. This is clearly a political move.

They have also manufactured their own misleading so-called exhibits and withheld documents and information from Democrats in violation of the House rules. They have abused their power throughout the whole time and should now not be allowed to continue to get any more money for this panel.

Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to defeat the previous question. If we defeat the previous question, I would offer an amendment to the resolution that would abolish the select panel instead of funding it. Let's be done with this once and for all.

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