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

Floor Speech

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Mr. DUFFY. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Mississippi for yielding.

Let's be really clear about what this is about. This is about following the law. We negotiate, we vote, we pass laws, the President signs them, and they should be enforced. That is what this conversation is about, Madam Speaker.

StemExpress has thumbed its nose against the select investigative panel and obstructed our efforts to bring light to the fetal tissue procurement industry.

Nearly a year ago, the panel requested information from StemExpress regarding where they procured their fetal tissue, whom they distributed the fetal tissue to, any communications instructing the company's employees to procure fetal tissue, and all accounting records and banking records related to fetal tissue.

StemExpress, in response to that request, has given us none--zero--no document. So to compel StemExpress to provide the panel with this information, the panel issued the company a subpoena. Instead of complying with the subpoena, StemExpress only turned over limited information to the panel, and the information that they turned over to us was so heavily redacted that it was completely useless for investigative purposes.

To date, the select panel has not received a single accounting or bank record from StemExpress. So they have failed to comply with our requests and our subpoenas in violation of the law.

If StemExpress is within the limits of the law, if nothing is illegal or immoral, then why does StemExpress refuse to turn over all the documents that our panel has requested? Opening your accounting records to a congressional panel shouldn't be that difficult.

StemExpress has had plenty of time to get their act together and provide us with the requested documents that we have asked for. Other organizations that we have reached out to and made the same requests to have turned over the documents in a pretty timely fashion.

For failure to comply with our subpoenas, this panel has recommended the House hold Cate Dyer, the CEO of StemExpress, in contempt of Congress.

Despite StemExpress' best efforts to stonewall this investigation, the panel did find out the name of StemExpress' bank which we subpoenaed. The bank provided us with StemExpress' banking records. So, again, StemExpress won't give us the records, but we got them from the bank.

We now know why StemExpress was hiding these documents. The banking records reveal that StemExpress may have been shredding documents that were directly related to this panel's investigation. The bank records show that payments were made to a shredding company--a shredding company. We looked back at all the records we sought from StemExpress back to 2012, and there is no payments to a shredding company.

But when this panel started its investigation and when we started asking for documentation, guess what? You have bank records that show they hired a shredding company. Why hire a shredding company when we were starting our investigation?

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Mr. DUFFY. Madam Speaker, there is no cause and no reason why StemExpress would allegedly shred these documents. We both know on both sides of the aisle--though we may have a disagreement on this issue-- that when this Congress sends a lawful request to an institution, they are required to provide the documents that are requested. Both sides of the aisle know that when we send a subpoena, those who are subpoenaed are required to provide those documents to us.

So if StemExpress has failed to comply with these requests and these subpoenas, and if they are willing to violate the law in regard to subpoenas to hide information, the question becomes: What laws are they willing to violate in regard to the sale of baby body parts? I think that question deserves to be answered by StemExpress, by this institution, and for the American people.

So I would ask support for this additional funding to complete this investigation and provide documentation to this country and to this House about what has been taking place in regard to the procurement and sale of fetal tissue.

1. Date of Congressional Action: August 7, 2015.
a. Event: Energy & Commerce Committee letter to StemExpress requesting a briefing.
b. Date of StemExpress Payment to Shred-It Us: August 13, 2015.

2. Date of Congressional Action: August 21, 2015.
a. Event: StemExpress briefing to Energy & Commerce Committee.
b. Date of StemExpress Payment to Shred-It Us: August 13, 2015.

3. Date of Congressional Action: September 17, 2015.
a. Event: Senate Judiciary Committee document request letter to StemExpress.
b. Date of StemExpress Payment to Shred-It Us: September 29, 2015; November 10, 2015; December 10, 2015.

4. Date of Congressional Action: December 17, 2015.
a. Event: Select Investigative Panel document request letter to StemExpress.
b. Date of StemExpress Payment to Shred-It Us: January 12, 2016.

5. Date of Congressional Action: January 15, 2016.
a. Event: StemExpress first production in response to Select Panel document request letter.
b. Date of StemExpress Payment to Shred-It Us: January 12, 2016.

6. Date of Congressional Action: February 9, 2016.
a. Event: StemExpress production in response to Select Panel document request letter.
b. Date of StemExpress Payment to Shred-It Us: January 27, 2016.

7. Date of Congressional Action: February 12, 2016.
a. Event: Select Panel Subpoena to StemExpres.
b. Date of StemExpress Payment to Shred-It Us.

8. Date of Congressional Action: March 28, 2016.
a. Event: StemExpress production in response to Panel subpoena.
b. Date of StemExpress Payment to Shred-It Us: March 21, 2016.

9. Date of Congressional Action: May 10, 2016.
a. Event: StemExpress production in response to Panel subpoena.
b. Date of StemExpress Payment to Shred-It Us: April 26, 2016.

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