Providing for Consideration of H.R. National Apprenticeship Act of 2020

Floor Speech

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Mr. MORELLE. Madam Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 1224 and ask for its immediate consideration.

The Clerk read the resolution, as follows: H. Res. 1224

Resolved, That upon adoption of this resolution it shall be in order to consider in the House the bill (H.R. 8294) to amend the National Apprenticeship Act and expand the national apprenticeship system to include apprenticeships, youth apprenticeships, and pre-apprenticeship registered under such Act, to promote the furtherance of labor standards necessary to safeguard the welfare of apprentices, and for other purposes. All points of order against consideration of the bill are waived. The amendment in the nature of a substitute recommended by the Committee on Education and Labor now printed in the bill, modified by the amendment printed in part A of the report of the Committee on Rules accompanying this resolution, shall be considered as adopted. The bill, as amended, shall be considered as read. All points of order against provisions in the bill, as amended, are waived. The previous question shall be considered as ordered on the bill, as amended, and on any further amendment thereto, to final passage without intervening motion except: (1) one hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on Education and Labor; (2) the further amendments described in section 2 of this resolution; (3) the amendments en bloc described in section 3 of this resolution; and (4) one motion to recommit with or without instructions.

Sec. 2. After debate pursuant to the first section of this resolution, each further amendment printed in part B of the report of the Committee on Rules not earlier considered as part of amendments en bloc pursuant to section 3 of this resolution shall be considered only in the order printed in the report, may be offered only 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debatable for the time specified in the report equally divided and controlled by the proponent and an opponent, may be withdrawn by the proponent at any time before the question is put thereon, shall not be subject to amendment, and shall not be subject to a demand for division of the question.

Sec. 3. It shall be in order at any time after debate pursuant to the first section of this resolution for the chair of the Committee on Education and Labor or his designee to offer amendments en bloc consisting of further amendments printed in part B of the report of the Committee on Rules accompanying this resolution not earlier disposed of. Amendments en bloc offered pursuant to this section shall be considered as read, shall be debatable for 20 minutes equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on Education and Labor or their respective designees, shall not be subject to amendment, and shall not be subject to a demand for division of the question.

Sec. 4. All points of order against the further amendments printed in part B of the report of the Committee on Rules or amendments en bloc described in section 3 of this resolution are waived.

Sec. 5. House Resolution 967, agreed to May 15, 2020 (as most recently amended by House Resolution 1107, agreed to September 15, 2020), is amended--

(1) in section 4, by striking ``November 20, 2020'' and inserting ``the remainder of the One Hundred Sixteenth Congress'';

(2) in section 11, by striking ``legislative day of November 20, 2020'' and inserting ``remainder of the One Hundred Sixteenth Congress''; and

(3) in section 12, by striking ``legislative day of November 20, 2020'' and inserting ``remainder of the One Hundred Sixteenth Congress''.

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Mr. MORELLE. Madam Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Woodall), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only. General Leave
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Mr. MORELLE. Madam Speaker, on Tuesday, the Rules Committee met and reported a rule, House Resolution 1224, providing for consideration of H.R. 8294, the National Apprenticeship Act of 2020, under a structured rule.

The rule provides 1 hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking member of the Committee on Education and Labor and provides one motion to recommit.

The rule self-executes a manager's amendment by Chairman Scott, makes in order 17 amendments, and provides en bloc authority.

Additionally, the rule provides one motion to recommit and extends recess instructions, same day and suspension authority through the remainder of the 116th Congress.

Before I begin my formal remarks, I would like to take a point of personal privilege to thank Mr. Woodall for his friendship during my time on the Rules Committee. We don't always agree, but even in our disagreements, he is never disagreeable. I admire his wit, his passion, his love for this institution, and his love for our country.

I wish him the very best in the future and hope this is not the end of his public career. I am always delighted to spend time, not only in our lengthy Rules Committee discussions, but also on the floor with him, so I thank Mr. Woodall so much.

Madam Speaker, the National Apprenticeship Act is critical workforce development legislation that will invest $3.5 billion to create nearly 1 million new apprenticeship opportunities over the next 5 years.

This is an historic investment in workforce training, and I am so pleased to support this effort. Amid this challenging and catastrophic pandemic, I am grateful that this body is not only addressing the needs of the American people as they grapple with the COVID-19 virus, but also looking ahead and preparing for the challenges our Nation will face as we recover economically.

Skilled workers are the backbone of our economy, and apprenticeships provide a unique opportunity to grow and expand access to this workforce. The success of apprenticeship programs is well-established. According to the Department of Labor, 94 percent of apprentices are employed after completing apprenticeship programs, earning an average starting wage of $70,000.

Not only do apprenticeship programs provide pathways to meaningful and sustainable careers, they are critical to expanding our Nation's skilled workforce.

When I meet with local business leaders in my district of Rochester, New York, I regularly hear that their greatest challenge is finding skilled labor to fill positions and keep their businesses thriving. Apprenticeships provide an invaluable pathway to engage workers, establish connections with high-demand industries, and set workers on a path to a rewarding and sustainable career.

I am proud that a bill I introduced with my colleague, Congresswoman Trahan, H.R. 8317, has been included in the text of the National Apprenticeship Act. Our bill helps scale up participation among populations not typically engaged in apprenticeships, particularly small- and medium-sized businesses. Together, we can create new opportunities in high-demand industries.

This critical piece of legislation will bolster our Nation's apprenticeship programs, build up a much-needed labor force, and open doors for businesses and workers alike.

Through my position on the Education and Labor Committee, I have seen the months and years of bipartisanship that has led us to this day. While we don't agree on every aspect of the bill, I believe the legislation before us is the best course of action to support apprenticeship programs that have proven the most successful for both working families and employers. Now, more than ever, these programs are critical to grapple with the long-term economic impacts of COVID-19.

I applaud my colleague, Congresswoman Davis, for her work on the National Apprenticeship Act. This comprehensive legislation is a testament to her leadership as chair of the Higher Education and Workforce Investment Subcommittee, and she will be sorely missed in the days and weeks and years ahead as she leaves us at the end of this term.

I urge all of my colleagues to support this rule and the underlying bill.

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Mr. MORELLE. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

There are just a couple of points that I would make. First of all, with regard to amendments, I do note that there were substantial amendments made in order that were offered by Republicans. I do know that some amendments offered by Republicans where withdrawn because they are essentially part of the large amendment in the substitute bill which will be on the floor. So there will be, I think to Mr. Woodall's point--and I appreciate his sentiments here--I think there will be an opportunity, given the way we structured this rule and given the latitude that I think the majority gave, in making certain that there will be an adequate opportunity for a real debate about some of the distinctions between the minority's and the majority's perspective on this particular bill.

So I actually think this was an opportunity and will be an opportunity for Chairman Scott and Mrs. Davis who is the chair of the subcommittee and I suspect will be debating the bill and amendments in just short order. So I think there will be that fullness and that richness of debate that my good friend from Georgia has talked about.

I do want to just make a point, though, about the process over the last several years plus. I think in the last year and a half there were four different hearings held by the Higher Education and Workforce Investment Subcommittee which Mrs. Davis heads, there were months of intensive negotiations. There was a bipartisan Member-level roundtable, there were at least four hearings on the subject, and there was a real effort and I believe even an opportunity for us to reach bipartisan compromise to expand access to these high quality apprenticeship programs.

Unfortunately, I think, at what I would describe as nearly the eleventh hour, the White House made clear it would not support the bill unless the Department of Labor and the White House were granted a much broader opportunity to approve apprenticeship programs in ways that we don't believe safeguard the interests of businesses or the people who would apply for those apprentice programs.

It brings to mind an experience I had--I think I have shared it on this floor, and certainly with Mr. Woodall in Rules Committee meetings--my experience previous to this in the State legislature. One of my responsibilities during my career there was to chair the committee on insurance, and I often would find myself in the position-- even though I had a friendly Democratic administration--where the legislation would have, sort of at the end of it, sort of a blanket ability for at the time the superintendent of insurance to do whatever he or she felt was appropriate and give wide latitude. I would always strike that from the bills before passage saying that I thought it was the responsibility of the legislature to set policy to enact legislation.

So what I believe we ought to be doing here--and I think Mr. Woodall would generally agree with me--relative to our Article I responsibilities of legislation being passed by both Houses of the Congress that giving, in my view, too wide a latitude to the Department of Labor, whether it is in the current outgoing administration or the incoming, makes little sense, that it is the rule and the responsibility and the duty of the Congress to make sure that those standards are set in law, in statute, not in rule, not in regulation, and not at the whim of the Department of Labor or any other agency of the government.

So I think what we seek to do is not only to promote and expand apprenticeship opportunities, because--for all the reasons my distinguished colleague from Georgia and friend mentioned, the ability for apprentices to make more during their career, the quality of those programs--we believe standards need to be continued, that they need to be strengthened, that we can expand these programs into the kinds of industries that heretofore have not really availed themselves of apprenticeship opportunities, that we can do that, meet all of those goals, still set those standards and make sure that they are delineated in statute.

Madam Speaker, I appreciate his comments, and I reserve the balance of my time.

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Mr. MORELLE. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Speaker, I do want to note that we are here to discuss the National Apprenticeship Act, and that is the subject of the discussion in front of the House.

But I would note, parenthetically, however, the irony in the subject that was brought up by my dear friend from Texas. The President of the United States has not met with his own coronavirus task force in 6 months and has barely spoken in the last 2 weeks while this Nation is engulfed with the virus' spread throughout the Midwest. We have now surpassed 250,000 Americans dead of the coronavirus. One-quarter of one million Americans have lost their lives, and yet there is no discussion out of the White House.

I would encourage perhaps my colleagues to ask the President if he might meet with Dr. Fauci and the leaders in this country who are on the front lines of fighting this illness.

I do also note, also parenthetically, that 7 months ago this House passed the $3.4 trillion Heroes Act to address contact tracing, testing, and support for our frontline workers, hospital systems, and State and local governments. We had no action from the United States Senate.

We came back and, about 6 weeks ago, took up the updated Heroes Act-- $2.2 trillion--again, to try to address the suffering of millions of Americans. Yet, no action from the United States Senate. So I think we have more than stepped up to address the concerns of the American people as it relates to the issue not before the House right now.

I do understand that the good people of Georgia, my dear friend, will go home in a few weeks, and the great folks in the State of Georgia will perhaps have something to say about the direction of the United States Senate going forward. But I do note that I think this House's record has been exemplary in addressing this. I now get back to the issue at hand.

Madam Speaker, for the purpose of further discussion, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Danny K. Davis).

Mr. DANNY K. DAVIS of Illinois. Madam Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Madam Speaker, I rise in strong support of the rule and in strong support of the act. As I listened to the discussion relative to the coronavirus, the pandemic, I am very optimistic now with the advent and the announcement of vaccines that may very well prove to be effective. It means that as we gain control of the pandemic, as we gain control of the virus, we are going to need a well-trained, skilled workforce ready and available to work if we are going to rebuild and redevelop our economic status. Having this workforce available, increasing apprenticeship training and opportunities is one of the best possible things that we could do.

Madam Speaker, I commend Representative Scott and the Committee on Education and Labor for their work on this bill. I urge strong support for it and I will vote to pass it, and I can hardly wait to do so.
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Mr. MORELLE. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Speaker, I just want to note that I feel a little bit like Alice in ``Alice through the Looking Glass,'' where in is out and up is down. I just reiterate that this House has addressed in a significant way reform for policing. We have, indeed, in this House, addressed on two separate occasions the impact of COVID on healthcare workers and State and local governments and the millions of Americans who struggle to put food on the table and face unemployment.

So all of the things that my friends on the other side of the aisle have just discussed are things that this House has done. And it is really the recalcitrance of the United States Senate and their unwillingness not only to not adopt our measures, but adopt their own that would allow us to then settle into a conversation or discussion about the differences that separate us and to try to reach that bipartisan/bicameral compromise that I know Mr. Woodall very much believes in.

Madam Speaker, I also want to make one other point, if I might, which is the Apprenticeship Act that we have before us, if you had dropped in from somewhere and saw on our program that we were discussing the National Apprenticeship Program and listened to my friends on the other side of the aisle, you would be confused why they weren't on the subject. But I do want to get to the subject, which is that this is, in part, a response--not certainly totally a response to, because we were working on this for some time before COVID, but this has, at its heart, a response to the economic fallout of the virus and is entirely on point because the economic impacts will be felt for years.

Some economists are saying this country will feel the impacts of COVID for another 3 or 4 years. The apprenticeship programs and the reason we are here having this conversation is to be able to expand them dramatically and give people who are either in transition from other careers or getting into careers will give them the opportunity to earn not only a living wage, but to advance, get career opportunities on a career ladder, particularly to those industries that have really not been involved in the apprenticeship program in the past.

Madam Speaker, again, I reiterate what we are doing here, the importance of what we are doing, how critical this is. Obviously, we always want to seek a bipartisan compromise, because, as my dear friend from Georgia rightly points out, it is not about what we pass in this House, it is what we pass in the Congress and send to the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue, hopefully, for signature.

So it is very much the conversation here, and I hope that not only my colleagues here, but our friends across the floor and in the Senate will take up this much-needed legislation before we are done, in a lameduck session, the session in front of us, and that the President can be persuaded to act on it. That is the work before us and it is critical and important work, indeed.

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Mr. MORELLE. Madam Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.

Just to take a moment to wax philosophical on bipartisanship, I think I agree with almost everything my distinguished friend had to say.

If you are frustrated, Mr. Woodall, imagine our frustration that, for the last 7 months, we have continued to try to engage in conversations with the other House, only to be met with silence.

We hear, as you do, when you go home, from thousands of constituents in each district, millions of Americans who struggle because they have lost their job, because they have lost their restaurant, as a small business owner that they struggle. We have heard from healthcare workers who continue to struggle to have personal protective equipment. We have talked to people who desperately need stimulus checks or some other support to put food on the table.

So we hear all of that, and I wish that the conversation that could happen between both sides of the aisle here in this Chamber would answer those questions. They can't, because we do need to have support and engagement and a dialogue with our friends in the other House. So I understand and feel your frustration.

Our frustration is even greater. I would love that we could work out the issues here in this Chamber, you and I and the members of the Rules Committee and all of the Members of the House, and have that be a settled question. I think we would be in a better place

Having said that, Madam Speaker, let me just, again, note, this is perhaps the last time I will have the great opportunity to serve on this floor and have a discussion on a rule with my distinguished friend from Georgia. Again, I want to just indicate how much I appreciate him and how much admiration and affection I have for him and wish him all the best.

Madam Speaker, I want to thank all of the colleagues who have spoken in the various committees for their words in support of H.R. 8294, the National Apprenticeship Act. I urge a ``yes'' vote on the rule and a ``yes'' vote on the previous question.

The material previously referred to by Mr. Woodall is as follows: Amendment to House Resolution 1224

At the end of the resolution, add the following:

Sec. 6. Immediately upon adoption of this resolution, the House shall resolve into the Committee of the Whole House on the state of the Union for consideration of the bill (H.R. 8086) to provide additional appropriations for the public health and social services emergency fund, and for other purposes. The first reading of the bill shall be dispensed with. All points of order against consideration of the bill are waived. Clause 2(e) of rule XXI shall not apply during consideration of the bill. General debate shall be confined to the bill and shall not exceed one hour equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on Appropriations. After general debate the bill shall be considered for amendment under the five-minute rule. All points of order against provisions in the bill are waived. When the committee rises and reports the bill back to the House with a recommendation that the bill do pass, the previous question shall be considered as ordered on the bill and amendments thereto to final passage without intervening motion except one motion to recommit with or without instructions. If the Committee of the Whole rises and reports that it has come to no resolution on the bill, then on the next legislative day the House shall, immediately after the third daily order of business under clause 1 of rule XIV, resolve into the Committee of the Whole for further consideration of the bill.

Sec. 7. Imediately after disposition of H.R. 8086, the House shall resolve into the Committee of the Whole House on the state of the Union for consideration of the bill (H.R. 8265) to amend the Small Business Act and the CARES Act to establish a program for second draw loans and make other modifications to the paycheck protection program, and for other purposes. The first reading of the bill shall be dispensed with. All points of order against consideration of the bill are waived. General debate shall be confined to the bill and shall not exceed one hour equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on Small Business. After general debate the bill shall be considered for amendment under the five-minute rule. All points of order against provisions in the bill are waived. When the committee rises and reports the bill back to the House with a recommendation that the bill do pass, the previous question shall be considered as ordered on the bill and amendments thereto to final passage without intervening motion except one motion to recommit with or without instructions. If the Committee of the Whole rises and reports that it has come to no resolution on the bill, then on the next legislative day the House shall, immediately after the third daily order of business under clause 1 of rule XIV, resolve into the Committee of the Whole for further consideration of the bill.

Sec. 8. Immediately after disposition of H.R. 8265, the House shall resolve into the Committee of the Whole House on the state of the Union for consideration of the bill (H.R. 8088) to provide funding to law enforcement agencies, and for other purposes. The first reading of the bill shall be dispensed with. All points of order against consideration of the bill are waived. General debate shall be confined to the bill and shall not exceed one hour equally divided and controlled by the chair and ranking minority member of the Committee on the Judiciary. After general debate the bill shall be considered for amendment under the five-minute rule. All points of order against provisions in the bill are waived. When the committee rises and reports the bill back to the House with a recommendation that the bill do pass, the previous question shall be considered as ordered on the bill and amendments thereto to final passage without intervening motion except one motion to recommit with or without instructions. If the Committee of the Whole rises and reports that it has come to no resolution on the bill, then on the next legislative day the House shall, immediately after the third daily order of business under clause 1 of rule XIV, resolve into the Committee of the Whole for further consideration of the bill.

Sec. 9. Clause 1(c) of rule XIX shall not apply to the consideration of H.R. 8086, H.R. 8265, and H.R. 8088.

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Mr. MORELLE. Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the resolution.

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