Providing for Consideration of H.R. 2021, Jobs and Energy Permitting Act of 2011, and Providing for Consideration of H.R. 1249, America Invents Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from Florida for yielding me the customary 30 minutes, and I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, patents are one of the most critical components that drive American innovation, drive our economy, drive invention and innovation. Regrettably, for a variety of reasons, the bill that this rule makes in order fails to ensure that the Patent Office has the resources it needs to process patent applications in a timely manner.

Now, I am grateful that this rule allows discussion of a number of important amendments, including my amendment, but there are a number of underlying flaws in the manager's amendment to this bill.

Inventors, innovators, and job creation should not be on hold due to delays in patent approval. I'm an inventor of several patents, and I can tell you that the quickest one that I received took over 5 years until it was granted. By the time it was granted, I had actually sold the company and was no longer involved in the sector.

The Internet and the information economy move at a speed and a different timeframe than our current patent review process operates under. Yet, this legislation, in its current form, with the manager's amendment, might actually serve to ensure that those delays continue because of a squabble between factions on the majority side.

Rather than resolve these differences to the benefit of American inventors, instead, the baby has been split, a decision that would cause King Solomon great reticence. The bad news for any American innovator pursuing a patent, as well as for the employees that new businesses might support, is that we fail to resolve some of the most pressing issues within the patent and trademark administration through this law.

The issue is that H.R. 1249 changes what I would consider one of the most important aspects of patent reform. And while there are very legitimate and important policy discussions on the aspect of patent reform, an equally, if not more important issue is adequate funding for the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to ensure the speedy approval of applications so that they're relevant and reviewed and granted in a timeframe consistent with the needs of the private sector.

The PTO needs to be able to charge fees sufficient to recover the cost of its services and use those fees to pay for providing those services.

Now the PTO has a backlog of more than 700,000 patent applications, and it takes on average--well, my wonderful documentation from my staff says 2 to 3 years for a patent to get to be approved or rejected. I have never had one reviewed in anything close to that time. Maybe they just see my name on it and they put it under a pile of notes and they take 5 or 6 years. But if we don't increase the resources of the PTO, there is no way the PTO could expand the number of highly qualified examiners to actually reduce patent review time and put it on a timeframe consistent with the needs of the private sector, protecting innovation.

It's crucial that the fees generated are made available to the PTO so they can run in an efficient manner and protect American innovation here and abroad. The fees should not be held hostage to political squabbling here in this body every year on appropriations bills, every year on the budget debate. The price to American innovation is one that is too steep to pay to make that beholden to our very important political discussions that we have every year, but one that inventors need predictability and companies need predictability when deciding how much to invest in R&D and deciding how to pursue patents with their invention.

I understand that some on the other side might be satisfied with the current manager's amendment language, but the worry is that the Patent and Trademark Office cannot actually use the patent fees to search, examine, and grant patents where warranted. So I would ask: What's the point?

Patent reform is not traditionally--nor is it today, nor should it be--a Democratic or Republican issue. It's a nonpartisan issue. High-quality patents, as mentioned in the United States Constitution, are crucial to our economy getting back on track and moving forward.

President Obama issued a challenge in the State of the Union address to outinnovate, outbuild, and outeducate the world. And having a patent and trademark system that we can be proud of is an important part of American competitiveness and a mark that we fail to reach with this bill and the manager's amendment.

Contrary to the belief of some, America still does invent, build, and sell our goods and services throughout the world. In fact, one of America's main competitive advantages is in the information economy, the intellectual economy, the creative economy, the very types of economic innovations that we rely on patent trademark and copyright to protect. And yet, if we fail to improve the quality of our patent application system, including rapid and high-quality review, we risk losing our leadership in innovation.

I think this Congress needs to rise beyond the petty squabbling over committee jurisdiction, over trying to bind future Congresses, over budget and appropriations debates. We really need to rise beyond that and come up with a patent bill that we can all be proud of that leaves American innovation in good stead.

Now, Mr. Speaker, this rule also calls for the consideration of H.R. 2021, that is called the Jobs and Energy Permitting Act. The proponents of this bill continue to push a false narrative sprinkled with outrage based not on facts but on sound bites. They somehow want to convince the American people that President Obama is single-handedly shutting down oil drilling when, in fact, he has granted more permits than his predecessor. We've heard this broken record from my colleagues over and over again. And as simplistic and dramatic as the story is, the fact is that it's simply not true.

The American people know that prices at the pump--and that has caused difficulty for a lot of American families--have nothing to do with drilling here or now. Not only is there a lag effect in the 5- to 10-year timeframe, but, in fact, the domestic part of that equation in terms of reflecting gas prices is di minimus. The U.S. simply doesn't have enough oil to feed our addiction to oil, and gas prices are controlled by international markets and international supply and demand.

Despite the close relationship between the oil industry and the Bush administration, the Obama administration is allowing more drilling than the Bush administration did--much to the chagrin of some Members of the Democratic Caucus. The Obama administration approved more leases in 2010 than the Bush administration did in 7 out of 8 years of its Presidency.

In addition to more drilling, we are producing more oil, yet gasoline prices continue to go up--again, gasoline prices, international markets, supply and demand, separate from the long-term issues of drilling in this country.

The United States produces 9.7 million barrels of oil per day, and that's the most oil that we've produced in 20 years. We are just behind Saudi Arabia and Russia as the world's top producer. We have been raising production steadily since 2005--and that's a trend that I think we will be able to continue--and yet over this same period, oil hit a record high of $147 a barrel in 2008 during our period of production rise.

We need a real solution, not simply a solution that is focused on a 2012 election, on policy decrying President Obama's policies. We need a real solution to help end our Nation's reliance on fossil fuels and reduce our demand as well as supplement the energy supply with renewable energy sources.

Again and again, Republicans are proving that their energy platform isn't ``all of the above'' that common sense would dictate but, rather, ``oil above all,'' ``drill, baby, drill.''

Mr. Speaker, this rule and the underlying bills are bad policy. I think we need an open discussion of these issues rather than trying to split the baby in half, pleasing no one; and on the energy issue, rather than giving a sound bite approach, to really require a comprehensive national energy strategy, including ``all of the above.''

Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

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