Providing for Consideration of H.R. 2262, Hardrock Mining and Reclamation Act of 2007
Floor Speech
PROVIDING FOR CONSIDERATION OF H.R. 2262, HARDROCK MINING AND RECLAMATION ACT OF 2007 -- (House of Representatives - November 01, 2007)
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Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today in opposition to this rule and to the underlying legislation which imposes an 8 percent gross tax on all new mining claims made on Federal lands and will cause a significant reduction in domestic mineral production and future mining investments in the United States of America.
I do appreciate the lip service that the Democrat majority regularly pays to making America the top-ranked nation in the world on a number of fronts. However, after managing over what will surely rank as the least effective Congress in recent memory, I am surprised that there isn't more disappointment on their side of the aisle with this legislation because this bill fails to set new global standards for the highest tax on mining on the planet; it merely matches Germany's, which already holds the world record for the highest mining tax at 8 percent of gross receipts. Once again we see the new Democrat majority trying to equal what is done in the United Kingdom and across Europe, including Germany.
In the Committee on Natural Resources hearing held on this matter on October 2, James Cress testified: ``I am only aware of a single royalty that is as high as the royalty proposed in this bill, just one in my 20 years of practice. An 8 percent royalty would really be ruinous.''
I suppose that neither Mr. Cress nor anyone watching this debate should be surprised, though. In what will surely go down as the least-productive Congress in recent history, this new Democrat majority has failed for the first time since 1987 to even send a single appropriations bill to the President for his approval by this point in the year.
This is the same Democrat majority that recently set another record of dubious distinction, a record for the most legislative ``busy work'' with the least amount to show for it. Since the beginning of this Congress, Members of this House have voted on over 1,000 roll call votes with just barely a tenth of those bills having been signed into law.
And of the 106 bills that have actually made it to the President's desk, 46 named post offices, courthouses or roads; 44 bills were noncontroversial measures sponsored by Republicans or passed with overwhelming GOP support; and 14 bills extended preexisting public laws or laws passed during the Republican-led Congress.
Mr. Speaker, I understand that with a track record as abysmal as this, the Democrat majority is eager to put just about anything on the floor in the hopes of claiming any kind of legislative victory. Unfortunately, the policies included in this legislation are quite simply wrong for America that will jeopardize the current and future domestic sourcing of minerals that are critical to our Nation's economic well-being and security.
In addition to imposing the world's highest royalty on mineral production, this legislation would also retroactively levy a 4 percent gross royalty on existing mines where business plans and investments have already been made without accounting for this after-the-fact cost. This provision, which is of doubtful legality but is doubtlessly unfair, is the legislative equivalent of one party changing the terms of a contract after it has already been signed. I believe that the Federal Government abusing its power to change the negotiated terms of these agreements is simply unfair, and I oppose it.
I also disagree with the inclusion of several provisions in this legislation that would empower political appointees to stop new mining projects even after these projects have met all applicable environmental and legal requirements.
No industry can or should be expected to operate with such regulatory uncertainty, and the net effect of all of these provisions will simply be to encourage companies to take their business overseas.
Mr. Speaker, I oppose this rule and the underlying legislation that harms the domestic American mining industry.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
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Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. Speaker, day after day we come down to the floor and we hear about all the new taxes, all the new rules and regulations, all the things that have to take place by this new Democrat majority, but I think we fail to recognize that what happens is that when you tax something, you get less of it. When you put more rules and regulations on something, less good things happen.
In this case, we are going to have an 8 percent tax on the industry; 4 percent tax on the new operations, 4 percent tax on the existing operations. The overwhelming indication that we have is that it will make us look more like Europe, and we are told that's a good thing, I guess.
The bottom line is that we spend a lot of time gnashing our teeth together trying to talk about jobs in country. Just yesterday, the Rules Committee, after we had done this bill, we had a trade adjustment assistance bill. We tried to bend over backwards, which some of it I do support, trying to make sure that those workers who have lost their jobs as a result of world competition in trade and manufacturing, that we do all we can do to help these employees who lost their job.
Yet the very next bill is this bill that literally will decimate workers' jobs in the West. I am sure what we will do is in a few years we will come back and say, oh, my gosh, we just can't compete. Let's now give them what we just did yesterday, trade adjustment assistance. It just keeps going on and on and on.
I suggested yesterday, will suggest today, let's not tax this. Let's not tax this industry for the benefit of the government. Let's let the industry be healthy. Let's let the industry compete globally. Let's let this industry provide those necessary and needed resources, precious metals and precious resources to the development and the benefit of the United States of America, including our United States military.
Let's not tax this at 8 percent so that we allow manufacturing not to have to go overseas to get those precious, hard metal products that they need to ensure that manufacturing is taken care of in this country. Let's not tax this industry to where it decimates it, to where there are no jobs in this country, to where America has to seek these precious metals and hard metals overseas.
We believe that what you have got today is a circumstance where the new Democrat majority can't wait to tax this industry at 8 percent, which will see the industry go into demise. We think that is an obvious plan that they have had. They didn't just pull this out. This is something that they have had, been working on a long time.
The Republican Party opposes this new tax. We oppose the diminishment of the industry. We oppose what will eventually happen as a result of American manufacturers having to go overseas to seek new markets, many times countries which are not close friends and allies of the United States. We see a day when we will not only lose jobs but will be held hostage for the precious minerals that we need, which will provide not only our country the things it needs but perhaps the military and our industrial complex with the things that will keep America strong.
We oppose this bill. I believe that what you have heard today is not only Members state that equivocally, but we will continue to say to the Members who are listening to this argument, please vote ``no'' on the rule, and please vote ``no'' on the bill.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
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Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. Speaker, we understand this meaningful reform that's going on, a new 8 percent tax on the industry. We get that. The Republican Party understands that there will be a loss of jobs, loss of manufacturing base in the United States of America. And we know that that's part of the meaningful reform that the new Democrat majority wants and expects. This is not a new subject: taxation, spending at record levels that are taking place by this new Congress, combined with an incredibly poor record on efficiency for the bills that will be signed into law.
That's why the President of the United States has issued his administrative policy from OMB that says they're not going to sign this bill; they're not going to sign this into law because of the loss of industry jobs, the lack of competitiveness that the United States of America will have with hard metals, and the high taxation that would be imposed that will kill the industry.
We get it. Perhaps that's meaningful reform to the Democrat Party. That's loss of jobs, lack of ability for America to be competitive with the world and high taxation. And that's not our idea of good reform.
Mr. Speaker, at this time I would like to notify the gentlewoman from California that I have no additional speakers at this time, and so I will reserve the balance of my time.
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Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate not only the debate that's taken place today, but also your demeanor in this wise consideration. I appreciate the gentleman from New York very much.
Mr. Speaker, what we're debating here today is yet another opportunity for the new Democrat majority to raise taxes in this country, to put consumers at a disadvantage, and to raise more money for their Big Government plans and programs that they have.
New taxation is not something that is new to the Democrat Party. That's their mission: grow the size of government, to tax people.
What's interesting today is the debate that has taken place about the words ``meaningful reform'' that were necessary to justify the taxation that will take place.
The Republican Party opposes this bill. The Republican Party opposes new taxation. The Republican Party recognizes again today that we know that market forces will come into play yet again today, not only to further diminish this industry, which, by and large, is located in the west of our country, which means a loss of jobs in the west, which means that it will diminish, not only the few jobs that remain, but will make America in a less competitive circumstance as related to the marketplace of the world.
But what we've heard today that has been just very interesting were remarks by the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Manzullo) where he talked about his knowledge of what the manufacturing base of this country needs, and that is, many times, the hard minerals that are directly affected by what this bill will do.
Raising taxes means that there will be less opportunity for people to go and mine these operations because the cost efficiency as it relates to the world marketplace will not be available to those companies. So what will happen is there will be a new taxation, this 8 percent tax. There will be a diminishment of the mining industry in America, and then there will be those people who utilize those raw materials, they still have a need to produce the products which they need, which many times are not only in the best interest of the United States of America, but also to produce products that will help the United States military and our infrastructure who now will have to go overseas to do business with countries that are not exactly our closest of friends and buy their products.
So once again, what we see is a philosophy that is followed by the Democrat Party, not just the new majority of the Democratic Party, but an old philosophy that, let's go and find a way to reform an industry and to tax them out of existence, to lose jobs in this country to where we have to come down to the floor and beg for further government assistance to take care of people, and then we whine and moan about the jobs that have been lost overseas and how this had something to do with trade.
Well, Mr. Speaker, yesterday in the Rules Committee, we had an opportunity, the gentleman, Mr. Dreier from California; the gentleman, Mr. Diaz-Balart from Florida; the gentleman, Mr. Hastings from Washington; and myself and we said, why don't we do something that would be proactive to keep jobs in this country. Like, let's not do things that would put us at a disadvantage. Like, let's do things like lower taxation, for instance, with depreciation policies, tax policies that would allow us to be on an even footing with other countries who we compete with.
That fell on deaf ears, Mr. Speaker. It fell on deaf ears because, really, what this is about is getting more money to run this Big Government policy that the new Democratic majority wants to put in place.
We recognize that what's happening is that at this time we have a log jam of all these bills as they try and get to the President's desk.
Mr. Speaker, I will be asking Members to oppose the previous question so that I may amend the rule to have Speaker Pelosi, in consultation with Republican Leader Boehner, immediately appoint conferees and move forward on H.R. 2642, the Military Construction and Veterans Affairs appropriations bill for 2008.
This week, a number of news publications, including the National Journal, reported that the Democrat leadership intends to play political games and to send a three-bill pile-up consisting of Labor-HHS, Defense and Veterans funding bills to President Bush so that they can try and leverage strong Republican support for the military and veterans funding to sneak a bloated Labor-HHS bill that proposes an 8 percent increase in spending over current funding past President Bush and this Congress. Once again, not just more taxation, more spending.
While the House Democrat leadership plays politics, however, our Nation's veterans are paying the price. The Senate has already done its work and appointed conferees for the Veterans appropriations bill. And for every day that House Democrats allow the veterans funding to languish without conferees for their own political advantage, our Nation's veterans lose $18.5 million that could be put to bear to help them for the intended reason why we're spending the money. That would be used for veterans housing, veterans health care, and other important veterans support activities.
The American Legion and the VFW have already made multiple requests, along with Republican Members from this House, urged Speaker Pelosi and Democrat Senate Majority Leader Reid to end their PR campaign and begin work on this conference report for veterans funding. Unfortunately, it appears as though all these commonsense requests have fallen on deaf ears and our Nation's veterans are being forced to pay the price for continued Democrat partisanship and lack of leadership on this issue.
I ask all of my colleagues to support this motion to defeat the previous question so that we can put partisanship aside and move this important legislation forward without any further games or gimmicks. I know that this is a bold idea that hasn't yet been focused directly by Democrat pollsters or agreed to by moveon.org, but I think our veterans deserve nothing less.
Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to have the text of the amendment and extraneous material appear in the Record just prior to the vote on the previous question.
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