National Security Foreign Investment Reform And Strengthened Transparency Act Of 2007

Floor Speech

NATIONAL SECURITY FOREIGN INVESTMENT REFORM AND STRENGTHENED TRANSPARENCY ACT OF 2007 -- (House of Representatives - February 28, 2007)

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Mr. McCAUL of Texas. First, Mr. Chairman, I want to commend the chairman of the committee and the ranking member for their important work on this bill. As a member of the Homeland Security Committee, I certainly see the importance and value of what we are doing here today.

Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of this amendment which requires the Secretary of the Treasury to include in his reporting information the rate of taxation in the United States as compared to other countries and how that would affect the investments examined by CFIUS.

And while I support the underlying bill, this amendment improves on the oversight requirements included in it. It requires the report to include information on how taxation affects foreign investment in the United States. Congress will be better informed on how our actions make it harder or easier for foreign countries to invest in our critical infrastructure.

The report is also required in the text of the bill, and this amendment merely ensures that we, as a Congress, know all the information we need to perform effective and better oversight.

The underlying bill is about how foreign investment affects national security, and there is no way to understand why foreign investments would be made here, or what it would do to our economy, without understanding the economic factors such as taxes.

I ask my colleagues to support this amendment and support a thorough report that examines all the factors affecting foreign investments in the United States.

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Mr. McCAUL of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I rise today in support of this amendment which requires the Secretary of the Treasury to include in his reporting information on the amount of regulation in the United States, as compared to other countries, and how it affects the investments, the foreign investments, examined by CFIUS.

I support the underlying bill. This amendment simply improves on the oversight requirements. By requiring the report to include information on how burdensome regulation affects foreign investment in the United States, I believe Congress will be better informed on how our actions in the Congress can either make it harder or easier for foreign countries to invest in our critical infrastructure.

It is already required in the text of the bill. This would ensure us better oversight capability.

The underlying bill again is about foreign investment. I believe foreign investment affects national security. Issues relating to taxation and regulation certainly impact the foreign investments that are made both in this country and outside.

I ask my colleagues to support this bill.

Mr. Chairman, I would like to simply conclude that, and the chairman is certainly an expert and a leader in terms of financial security issues. Certainly he would recognize that our viability as an economic superpower is vitally important in this country as we look at countries like China and India.

So I do believe it is relevant. I believe our ability to globally compete is not just an economic issue, but really is an issue of national security.

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Mr. McCAUL of Texas. Mr. Chairman, I rise today in support of this amendment, which requires the Secretary of the Treasury to include in his report information on the net effect of foreign investment on American jobs.

While I support the underlying bill, this improves our oversight capability and gives the information to Congress that we need on how jobs will be impacted by foreign investment. Congress will be better informed on how our actions lead to the creation or outsourcing of American jobs overseas. This report is already required in the text. This amendment will ensure we have better oversight.

The underlying bill is about, again, how foreign investments affect national security. There is no way to understand why foreign investments would be made here or what it would do to our economy without information, understanding the effect on jobs that foreign investments would have. I ask my colleagues to support this amendment.

And I would like to respond, if I may, that it is hard to imagine how our taxation and regulatory process is not related to foreign investment. And when we look at taxation, regulatory policies in this country, and when we look at jobs, particularly jobs being outsourced in countries like China and India, when we talk about viability, I appreciate the chairman's arguments and the gentleman from New York and the gentlewoman from New York, but it is hard for me to differentiate and dissect how national security is not impacted by our economic security and economic viability. If we are not a global superpower anymore, if we are not economically viable in this country, if we are losing jobs in this country, if our taxation and regulatory burden is so cumbersome that we are discouraging investment, including foreign investment in this country, I would argue that we are impacting our national security.

It is hard for me to conceive why the Congress wouldn't want this kind of information in evaluating our national security policies as they relate to economics. And the chairman, again, is an expert on financial security. I don't understand why you wouldn't want this information.

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Mr. McCAUL of Texas. You correctly state the issue and the purpose of the bill, and that is a fear of discouraging foreign investments. And I would argue that our system of taxation and regulatory burden in this country has a direct impact on foreign investments.

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Mr. McCAUL of Texas. And the loss of jobs, outsourcing of jobs is a national security issue, in my view.

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