Issues of the Day

Floor Speech

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Mr. KILEY. Madam Speaker, I would like to share a remarkable moment from a committee hearing this week with Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra.

Mr. Becerra began his testimony by saying that we can now manage COVID like we do the flu.

I asked Mr. Becerra: If that is true, then what about these 30 colleges and universities across the country that still have COVID-19 vaccine mandates?

That is, they require students to get a vaccine in order to enroll, and they will expel students who do not comply with that mandate.

I asked the Secretary: If it is true that we can now manage COVID like the flu, then will you call on these 30 universities that, right now in May of 2024, still have COVID vaccine mandates?

The Secretary refused to do it. He is just fine with these institutions continuing to impose these exclusionary policies.

Now, at this point in time, it is so beyond the pale to continue to have these mandates that I think it is important to specifically call out the universities that still have them. Of course, we now know there was never any public health justification for universities to have COVID vaccine mandates, and it certainly was not consistent with the values of our country or the values of higher education. Nevertheless, to still have them now is so beyond the pale and so utterly absurd that I think we should recognize each and every university that still has them.

There is Cal State University Cal Poly Humboldt, CSU Dominguez Hills, CSU San Francisco State, Harvey Mudd College, Mount Saint Mary's University, Pitzer College, Pomona College, University of San Francisco, Scripps College, Mitchell College, Trinity Washington University, Clark Atlanta University, Morehouse, Morris Brown College, Oglethorpe University, Spelman, Methodist College, Dillard University, Southern University System, Wellesley, Wayne State University, Franklin Pierce, Mount Saint Vincent, Kenyon, Oberlin, Wooster, Reed, Bryn Mawr, Haverford, and Swarthmore.

I am calling on these 30 universities to end their COVID vaccine mandates immediately and end their status as bastions of ignorance in American higher education.

Madam Speaker, 2 days ago, I rose on the floor of this House to call for the resignation of the president of Sonoma State University in California.

This institution is one of a disturbing number that has chosen to deal with this highly disruptive trend of encampments on campuses not by evenhandedly enforcing university rules and enforcing the law but, rather, by caving to the demands of this small minority of unlawful protesters, appeasing their desired changes in university policy in order to make university policy anti-Israel and anti-Semitic in nature.

What happened at Sonoma State was particularly egregious. In response to the demands of the illegal encampment, the university president agreed to divest, agreed to an academic boycott, agreed to even scrub any mention of Israel from university materials. Perhaps worst of all, he agreed to convert the unlawful encampment into a permanent advisory council with the members of the encampment responsible for picking who was part of it, and they would then have the power to enforce these anti-Israel policies going forward.

We finally have a little bit of good news in that this call was heard by the chancellor of Cal State University, and that university president is now on administrative leave. Of course, that doesn't go far enough. He has no business leading the university in our State or in this country when he is willing to institutionalize the anti-Semitic demands of those who are disrupting the university by unlawful means.

Unfortunately, Sonoma State University is not alone in California, as can be seen right here from these headlines. There are a number of other universities within the California State University system, within the University of California system, and in other institutions, public and private, across our State and across the country, where suddenly administrators have decided to negotiate with these encampments and to reach agreements with them based on what they want.

It is hard to overstate just how perverse this truly is. Let's leave aside for a moment the substance of what they are agreeing to and just consider the message that this sends, the precedent that it sets, that the way to get what you want on a university campus is not by presenting a reasoned argument or by convincing the governing body and your fellow students and other stakeholders. Rather, it is to try to use force to get your way.

These unlawful encampments, as we heard in an example from a student at Harvard in a committee hearing the other day, are refusing to leave. They are occupying public spaces. They are disrupting the function of the university.

In this particular example, they had self-appointed campus monitors who would follow Jewish students around on campus and monitor their activities.

We have seen examples of occupying buildings. We have seen students being stopped from entering the campus, entering the library, and entering other public spaces. We have seen loud disruptions that stop academic activities from proceeding.

In a number of cases, universities have responded in a way that is also unacceptable, which is by canceling classes, canceling graduation ceremonies, and thereby punishing all students.

The message this sends is that we are going to give those who are engaging in these unlawful activities, many of them not students, by the way, and with a lot of funding coming from the outside, what they want. We are going to reward those tactics. What exactly does that encourage in the future? Of course, what it does is encourage these tactics to be repeated.

The reason that these tactics are being resorted to is because those who are behind the encampments know that their argument is completely morally bankrupt and bigoted and would never prevail in a reasoned dialogue, which is why it is such a farce that some of these university leaders have patted themselves on the back and said that dialogue is the answer, negotiations are the answer.

The problem is they are only giving voice to those who are creating the disruption. When these so-called negotiations are going on, it is only those who are responsible for the problem that are being listened to. We are not seeing any evidence that they are bringing in representatives from Jewish student groups or, for that matter, the broader law-abiding student body to come and have their voices heard. Rather, they are elevating this small, disruptive minority and privileging their despicable points of view.

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Mr. KILEY. This is to President Drake, the president of the University of California, and Chancellor Garcia, who is the chancellor of California State University. I will read a few excerpts here. We are sending them this letter today, and I am hoping that it will put a stop to this incredibly disturbing trend.

``Over the past month, campuses in both the UC and CSU systems have been disrupted by illegal encampments. These encampments violate university rules, violate the law, and have given rise to other disruptive activities posing a threat to the safety, civil rights, and learning of students.

``Some UC and CSU campuses have responded by rewarding the perpetrators and incorporating their anti-Semitic demands into university policy. Specifically, a number have agreed to boycott, divest, and sanction (BDS) programs relating to Israel. Just this week, we saw Sonoma State's president agree to end all study-abroad programs in Israel and divest from companies associated with Israel. President Lee even went so far as to promise to scrub university materials of references to Israel and to convert the illegal encampment into a permanent `advisory council' charged with enforcing the new anti-Israel policies.''

The letter then goes on to list several other examples within the UC and CSU systems at UC Riverside, UC Berkeley, CSU Sacramento, and CSU San Francisco.

The letter continues: ``Irrespective of the merits of these policy changes--which, to be clear, are altogether unmeritorious, bigoted, and quite possibly illegal under California's anti-BDS law--allowing a small minority to get their way through force is no way to run a campus. It is not clear what efforts, if any, these campus leaders made to consult with Jewish student groups or the broader law-abiding student body before capitulating to the demands of encampment participants.

``There is an urgent need for systemwide action in both the UC and CSU systems to restore order on campus, stop the adoption of BDS policies, and, where appropriate, appoint new campus leadership.''

I am a member of the Education and the Workforce Committee and chair of the Workforce Protections Subcommittee, and I am actively involved in the House of Representatives' ongoing investigations of anti- Semitism and higher education. I tell these university system leaders that I would like a timely response as to what steps they are taking to avoid further damage to California's universities, which have long been a tremendous asset to our State and country.

I will, of course, share with the public the response that I receive from these university officials. Moreover, this next week, we have the leader of one campus, UCLA, who will be appearing before our Committee on Education and the Workforce to be held to account for the horrifying events that unfolded on that campus, thanks to the university's failure to take action to protect students. Questions for the CDC

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Mr. KILEY. Madam Speaker, I call the House's attention to an extremely concerning statement made by the Secretary of Health and Human Services, Xavier Becerra, at a hearing this week.

I asked Secretary Becerra about the illegal Chinese biolab that had been discovered in California with very close ties to the Chinese Communist Party.

This lab was discovered in Reedley, outside of Fresno, early last year and was discovered to have many dangerous pathogens. Some were labeled in Mandarin, and some were labeled in some code that was not decipherable.

There were 32 refrigerators and freezers containing pathogens like E. coli, hepatitis B, hepatitis C, HIV, malaria. There were about a thousand mice, some of them dead by the time they were discovered, that were, by some reports, genetically engineered to carry the COVID-19 virus.

At the time that this was discovered, I called for an investigation and, eventually, the Select Committee on the Strategic Competition Between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party produced an incredibly disturbing report about how this lab had been set up by a gentleman named Jesse Zhu, who had come from China and ran several companies linked to the CCP.

He had then gone to Canada, where he started a company designed specifically to steal American IP. He was found liable in court for hundreds of millions of dollars in damages, so he eventually fled as a fugitive to the U.S., where he eventually set up this lab that was illegal, violating all sorts of laws, and had all manner of code violations.

It wasn't exactly clear at all what the lab was for because they said it was there to make test kits, such as pregnancy test kits and COVID test kits, but that is actually not what they were doing. The test kits they were selling were coming from China or being sold as counterfeits. Mr. Zhu, by the way, is now under Federal indictment.

I asked Secretary Becerra at this week's hearing if he can tell us with confidence that there are not similar such labs operating secretly and illegally throughout the United States. He said, no, that he could not say that with confidence.

This is an incredibly disturbing situation. I am authoring bipartisan legislation with Representative Costa designed to close the regulatory loophole that allowed for these dangerous pathogens to be in this lab undetected.

I also have recently sent a letter to the Director of the CDC, Mandy Cohen, which is under the jurisdiction of Secretary Becerra's Health and Human Services, because one of the truly disturbing parts of this story is that the CDC completely dropped the ball and ignored the situation long after it had been discovered.

The Select Committee on the Strategic Competition Between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party's report found that local officials in Reedley had begged the CDC to come in and investigate after they found this lab and that CDC repeatedly ignored them and even hung up on them.

I have spoken with the city manager myself, and she said that their calls for help from both the Federal Government and the State were completely ignored, and it was only after Representative Costa, who represents that area, got involved that the CDC finally came to investigate.

Even then, their investigation was completely inadequate. Incredibly, they didn't test any of the actual samples, so some of these were labeled with E. coli or hepatitis or whatever it was, and they just sort of assumed that that was accurate. Some of them were labeled in some indecipherable code. We don't know what was in there, and they didn't bother to test those. There is a refrigerator labeled Ebola that was found by officials afterward that completely escaped the CDC's notice.

I have sent a letter to Director Cohen, asking for an explanation as to how it is that the CDC ignored and then failed to sufficiently investigate this danger to public health with pathogens that the CDC itself cites as being of grave danger to human health and communities.

These are the questions that I have posed to Director Cohen:

Why were local officials ignored by the CDC?

Why were none of the unlabeled agents tested?

Why did the CDC falsely claim that it could not test unlabeled select agents when they have previously tested unlabeled select agents in many cases, such as when anthrax was sent to this building?

Why did the CDC order State officials not to test any samples themselves even though this will result in an abatement order requiring all samples found in the lab to be destroyed?

How did you miss a freezer that was labeled Ebola?

How did this lab escape detection in the first place?

What is the CDC doing to prevent future labs of the same nature from being built?

What pathogen enforcement gaps allowed the illegal importation of deadly pathogens? What efforts are being made to crack the code that was used to label various vials on site? Is there any investigation into what the Ebola samples were being used for since there is little market for Ebola tests, making a financial motive unlikely?

Indeed, there is little apparent financial motive for the activities in the lab, given that the kits that they were selling were coming directly from China.

We also know that Mr. Zhu, who ran the lab, put it there, and he is now under Federal indictment. He was receiving regular payments from China while the lab was in operation.

I would ask the director for a timely response to these questions, and I am also urging my colleagues in the House to pass my legislation with Representative Costa so we can do everything possible to get to the level where we have the confidence that Secretary Becerra--now by his own admission lacks--to say that there are no other CCP-linked, illegal biolabs operating in this country. Citing Attorney General Garland for Contempt

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Mr. KILEY. Madam Speaker, I will address an extraordinary development that happened yesterday right before a Judiciary Committee hearing in which we ultimately voted to cite the Attorney General of the United States, Merrick Garland, for contempt of Congress, for defying a congressional subpoena.

Just minutes before this hearing happened, we received a letter from the President's counsel, Edward Siskel, invoking executive privilege with respect to the materials that our committee has been seeking. Those materials being recordings of President Biden's interviews with Special Counsel Robert Hur.

I will take a moment to address just how absurd this invocation of executive privilege is. Indeed, I will identify the six absurdities of this invocation of executive privilege, but first a little bit of background as to how we got here.

In 2022, Attorney General Merrick Garland ordered an unprecedented raid of Mar-a-Lago, purportedly in search of classified documents. This became awkward for the administration when it was soon revealed that President Biden himself had various classified documents scattered about his personal properties. Attorney General Garland, in an attempt, I suppose, to appear even-handed, appointed a special counsel. He appointed Robert Hur special counsel to investigate President Biden's possession of classified documents.

Earlier this year, we received the report from Special Counsel Hur, and the report found considerable evidence that President Biden had willfully obtained classified documents in violation of the law. He found evidence as to each of the elements of that criminal offense. I asked Special Counsel Hur when he came to testify before our committee, I asked him a simple question: Could a reasonable juror have voted to convict the President? Special Counsel Hur answered yes.

Now, it is important to note that while some in that hearing tried to cast aspersions on Mr. Hur's integrity, when Merrick Garland appointed him, he praised him, praised his long and distinguished career as a prosecutor.

Now, despite those findings, Special Counsel Hur opted not to charge the President, citing his age and the lapses in memory that he displayed during his interviews with Hur.

The Judiciary Committee sought access to these records of those interviews, given the obvious public interest in matters pertaining to the Commander in Chief's competency or, for that matter, his potential criminality. Eventually, the Justice Department responded by producing redacted transcripts of President Biden's interviews with Special Counsel Hur. However, they continually refused to produce the actual recordings of those interviews with shifting explanations over time until the Judiciary Committee was forced to convene a hearing yesterday to cite the Attorney General for contempt because the subpoena that had been duly issued for those materials was being defied. Attorney General Garland refused to comply with it.

It was only moments before that hearing yesterday, after months of back and forth, that suddenly this letter lands from the White House that says, well, we are invoking executive privilege with respect to those recordings of President Biden's interviews with Special Counsel Hur.

Now, I will go through the six absurdities of that particular use of executive privilege.

The first is just the timing. As I have already mentioned, this had been going on for a long time and it is only right when we are about to begin a hearing that they suddenly come in and invoke this privilege.

The second absurdity is that this is not at all what executive privilege is meant for. Executive privilege is a facet of the separation of powers that is designed to protect the President's internal deliberations so that, for example, his advisers can give unvarnished advice when it comes to policy decisions and don't have to fear that anything they say, even if it is advice that the President doesn't ultimately take, will suddenly be made public. That is the purpose of an executive privilege. It is to protect these internal deliberations of the President on matters of policy.

This is an entirely different situation. It is not pertaining to the collaborative discussions involved in policymaking, rather it is the adversarial situation of an investigation of the President himself and the President's interview with his investigator. There was no decision on the part of the President that was being made; it was a decision on the part of the special counsel that was being made as to whether or not the President ought to be charged with a crime. The justification for executive privilege simply doesn't exist in this scenario.

The third absurdity is that the President had already waived the privilege. At the time that this was invoked, when we received the letter yesterday, we already had the transcripts of the interview that had been produced. So how exactly is it the case that the transcripts of the interview are not privileged, but the recordings of the interview are?

The fourth absurdity is that the justification for invoking the privilege completely contradicted the justification that the Attorney General had been giving for not complying with the subpoena in handing over the recordings. The Attorney General has maintained throughout this process that he doesn't need to hand over the recordings because they are cumulative; meaning, they are the same as what has already been produced, so they don't need to keep producing the same thing. Now we have the President's counsel coming in and saying that, no, they are actually different. They are so different, the transcripts versus the recordings, that one is not privileged and the other is.

The fifth absurdity of this letter from the President's counsel is that it explicitly cites a political motivation for invoking the privilege. The President's counsel, Edward Siskel, states a fear that the recordings will be used ``for potential political gain.''

Suffice it to say, a fear of political fallout, a fear of adverse political consequences, is not an adequate basis for invoking executive privilege.

Now, the letter tries to couch it a little differently. The letter says: Well, what we are actually afraid of is that the recordings are only being requested for political purposes and that once they are obtained, they will be sliced and diced and used to politically damage the President. However, that amounts to saying exactly the same thing as we fear the political consequences of handing over these recordings.

There is no precedent nor will there ever be a precedent in any court or otherwise for executive privilege to be invoked explicitly for political purposes or to spare the President political embarrassment.

The final absurdity of this invocation of executive privilege by President Biden is there will be a chilling effect if he hands over the recordings; that this will make it less likely that witnesses will cooperate in future law enforcement investigations, and there are several layers of absurdity to that claim.

The first is that they have already produced the redacted transcript of the interview. So they are saying there is not going to be a chilling effect for cooperation if someone knows a transcript could be revealed, but there will be a chilling effect if the actual recording is released.

However, the problem is deeper than that because the statement I just read, the justification that was given by the Attorney General and given by the President's counsel, is that this is going to deter witnesses from participating in the future. The President is not a witness. He was the target of an investigation initiated by his own Department of Justice.

What exactly is the chilling effect here? Who does it apply to? The only possible future scenario that this could affect is if at some point in the future another President is under investigation by his own administration.

What is the fear? If we release the recordings here that that future President will not want to sit for an interview? Well, the President in that situation would have to answer for his refusal to cooperate, which would be a pretty good incentive to be cooperative in the first place.

Whichever way you look at this, there is simply no legitimate basis for invoking executive privilege in this scenario, which is why the Judiciary Committee did move ahead yesterday and pass a resolution citing Attorney General Garland for contempt.

I would encourage the President and the Attorney General to ensure that this does not have to go any further and the way to do that would simply be to hand over the requested recordings. Let the American people see them for themselves.

Truly, the President should never be in a position where he deprives the public of information of this kind, especially when it pertains to vital matters of his competency and culpability with respect to the matters being investigated.

This is a clear case of the public's right to know, and so I would encourage the administration to do the right thing here, albeit very belatedly.

Recognizing Placer County DA Investigator Brandon Olivera

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Mr. KILEY. Madam Speaker, I will now move on to recognize some truly outstanding individuals in my district.

Madam Speaker, I recognize District Attorney Investigator Lieutenant Brandon Olivera who has served as a law enforcement officer since 1996.

In his 27-year career, he has worked on patrol, in investigations, as a SWAT operator, and currently leads one of California's most successful narcotics investigation units.

Lieutenant Olivera works collaboratively with local, State, and Federal agencies to investigate drug trafficking organizations with the goal of reducing their impact on the northern California Central Valley region.

Lieutenant Olivera has led his team to remove 4,447 pounds of methamphetamine, 129 pounds of cocaine, 135 pounds of heroin, and 643 pounds of fentanyl from the streets of our communities. Those are truly staggering numbers.

In 2021 and 2022 alone, his team seized 344,465 counterfeit fentanyl tablets.

Currently in America and California, we are losing our youth to fentanyl at a truly alarming rate. In 2021, California lost 224 young people between the ages of 15 and 19 to fentanyl overdose. In America, while drug use among youth has trended down from 2019 to 2020, overdose deaths have increased 94 percent from 2019 to 2020 and 20 percent from 2020 to 2021.

In the same period, drug trafficking organizations have changed marketing tactics, creating rainbow or multicolored fentanyl tablets. These tablets look similar to candy, making them even more enticing, tragically so, to our Nation's youth.

Lieutenant Olivera has led the fight against these dangerous narcotics making it to our communities. He and his team, in fact, seized the first rainbow fentanyl trafficked in the Central Valley of California. The work done by Lieutenant Olivera has certainly saved lives, though few will ever understand how many.

Through his dedicated service and his dedication to protecting our community from drug trafficking organizations, Lieutenant Olivera truly has made our community and its surrounding areas a safer place to live. I thank him for his years of service and dedication. Honoring Outstanding Educator Kellen Wirth

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Mr. KILEY. Madam Speaker, I wish to take a moment to recognize an outstanding educator, Mr. Kellen Wirth, in California's Third Congressional District.

In his 8 years of instruction as a science teacher in the Loomis Union School District, Mr. Wirth has made remarkable contributions within the Ophir STEAM Academy as well as in the general Loomis School District as a whole.

Kellen's tireless efforts have resulted in significant academic achievements, as demonstrated through his 5E Lesson model, a hands-on approach to engage collaboration and critical thinking.

Moreover, Kellen's reach spans well beyond the classroom as he takes on various roles such as leading science camps and innovation programs, showcasing his true commitment in instilling a sense of wonder and passion in his students.

Alongside these achievements, Kellen is also serving on the Curriculum Team and coaching multiple sports, exemplifying his holistic dedication in serving students.

On behalf of the United States House of Representatives, I am honored to recognize educator Kellen Wirth for his years of hard work in our schools. Commending Jennifer DeBortoli

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Mr. KILEY. Madam Speaker, I would like to highlight a teacher from Dry Creek Joint Elementary School District in Roseville, Jennifer DeBortoli, who has dedicated 31 years of her career to educating the students of her community while acquiring accolades of high regard.

Jennifer DeBortoli is a distinguished educator and exceptional leader who contributes significantly to her school and district. She has a passion for writing and leads the Area 3 Writing program at her school as well as spearheading Spark the Fire Committee, fostering a love for literature with students. She also mentors new team members by offering valuable insights into lesson planning, guided reading, and GLAD strategies.

Jennifer's impact extends beyond her immediate school, as she conducts districtwide staff development and has become a sought-after resource for teachers looking to bring writing to life for their students.

I commend Mrs. DeBortoli for exuding an immense level of passion and commitment to student success, which has no doubt redounded to the benefit of many, many young people in our community. Amanda Coppa Commended as Outstanding Educator

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Mr. KILEY. Madam Speaker, I wish to take a moment to recognize Amanda Coppa, an outstanding educator in California's Third Congressional District.

As an English and history teacher, Amanda embodies the essence of going above and beyond for her students, ensuring that each student receives an exceptional education.

Amanda's tireless efforts have resulted in significant academic achievements, as demonstrated through significant improvements in CAASPP test scores for students with disabilities alongside a remarkable increase in overall scores.

Moreover, Amanda's reach spans well beyond the classroom as she takes on various leadership roles as a behavior committee member, W.E.B. leader, Safe Schools Ambassador leader, and Read-In coordinator, highlighting her true commitment in building a positive environment for her students.

Her enthusiastic dedication and unwavering connections with students enrich the lives of both her students and her peers.

Madam Speaker, on behalf of the United States House of Representatives, I am honored to recognize educator Amanda Coppa for her years of hard work in our community and the enormous difference she has made in the lives of her students. Honoring Julie Ferguson

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Mr. KILEY. Madam Speaker, I wish to take a moment to recognize an outstanding educator of California's Third Congressional District.

The communities I represent offer both outstanding public and private school education to our students, due in large part to the dedication, sacrifice, and hard work of our communities' teachers.

I would like to recognize Julie Ferguson, a dedicated third grade teacher from the Roseville City School District at Brown Elementary School. Julie began her teaching journey in 1998 and has continued to influence and better the youth of our district for the last 26 years.

Mrs. Ferguson has been a dedicated master teacher to countless student teachers. She participates in all professional development with a student-first focus, and she has written numerous grants to help obtain resources, giving her the ability to provide better experiences and opportunities for her students.

Julie Ferguson is the definition of a teacher-leader and will be serving as RTA co-president this upcoming year. I thank her for being a faithful, positive, and thoughtful educator contributing to the development of our communities' students.

Madam Speaker, it is an honor on behalf of the United States House of Representatives to recognize Julie Ferguson for her outstanding contributions as an educator in California's Third Congressional District. She is making and will continue to make, I know, an enormous difference in the lives of her students.

Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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