Bills Introduced – 01-24-17

With both the House and Senate leaving for an extended weekend (a proforma session for both houses on Friday) there were 152 bills introduced. Of those 9 bills may be of specific interest to readers of this blog:

HR 625 To provide for joint reports by relevant Federal agencies to Congress regarding incidents of terrorism, and for other purposes. Rep. Aguilar, Pete [D-CA-31]

HR 642 To amend the Homeland Security Act of 2002 to enhance the partnership between the Department of Homeland Security and the National Network of Fusion Centers, and for other purposes. Rep. Barletta, Lou [R-PA-11]

HR 666 To amend the Homeland Security Act of 2002 to establish the Insider Threat Program, and for other purposes. Rep. King, Peter T. [R-NY-2]

HR 677 To amend the Homeland Security Act of 2002 to establish chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear intelligence and information sharing functions of the Office of Intelligence and Analysis of the Department of Homeland Security and to require dissemination of information analyzed by the Department to entities with responsibilities relating to homeland security, and for other purposes. Rep. McSally, Martha [R-AZ-2]

HR 678 To require an assessment of fusion center personnel needs, and for other purposes. Rep. McSally, Martha [R-AZ-2]

HR 686 To ensure appropriate spectrum planning and interagency coordination to support the Internet of Things. Rep. Paulsen, Erik [R-MN-3]

HR 697 To amend the Homeland Security Act of 2002 to improve the management and administration of the security clearance processes throughout the Department of Homeland Security, and for other purposes. Rep. Thompson, Bennie G. [D-MS-2]

HR 701 To direct the Administrator of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to conduct a study to determine appropriate cybersecurity standards for motor vehicles, and for other purposes. Rep. Wilson, Joe [R-SC-2] 

S Res 23 A resolution establishing the Select Committee on Cybersecurity. Sen. Gardner, Cory [R-CO]

HR 625 will only be of interest here if it includes specific language addressing cybersecurity, chemical security, or chemical transportation security issues.

Hopefully HR 642 will also address the types of expertise needed at fusion centers.

HR 666 will probably be reintroduced to avoid the religious connotations of the bill number.

HR 677 is probably very similar to HR 2200 introduced in the last session and passed in the House by a nearly unanimous vote. Another bill that was not taken up by the Senate.

HR 678 is probably similar to HR 3503 introduced in the last session and passed by a voice vote. And yet another one.

I suspect that HR 686 is a companion bill to S 88 introduced earlier this month in the Senate.

HR 697 may be similar to HR 3505 introduced in the last session. I did not cover that bill because it did not really address the security clearance process for the private sector organizations to aid information sharing.

Hopefully HR 701 will specifically address the relationship between independent security researchers, NHTSA and auto companies.

Establishing a Select Committee on Cybersecurity sounds like a way to raise the profile of cybersecurity issues. Unfortunately, it will also make law making on the topic more difficult as it will add another committee silo through which cybersecurity related bills will have to pass. Inter-committee politics does almost as much to slow down the legislative process as does partisan politics.

HR 702 Introduced – Export of Crude Oil

As I noted earlier, Rep. Barton (R,TX) introduced HR 702, a bill to adapt to changing crude oil market conditions (for some reason no fancy name was included in the language of this bill). The bill would remove restrictions on the export of coal, petroleum products, natural gas, or petrochemical feedstocks.

Removing Export Restrictions

The bill is very short with just four sections. The first section outlines the ‘congressional findings’ that provide the reasons for the actions outlined in the bill. Those findings relate to the changing international oil market and the fact that the United States has drastically increased its domestic production of crude oil.

The second section of the bill repeals 42 USC 6212. This was passed by Congress in 1979 during the ‘second oil crisis’ and authorized the President to draft regulations to control the exports of “coal, petroleum products, natural gas, or petrochemical feedstocks” {42 USC 6212(a)(1)} as well as the supplies, equipment and technology used to “maintain or further exploration, production, refining, or transportation of energy supplies” {42 USC 6212(a)(2)}. Thus this bill would remove the authorization for any such regulations. This repeal would potentially affect much more than the export of just the crude oil mentioned in the congressional findings.

The third section of the bill would reinforce the repeal of §6212 by specifically prohibiting the action of any federal agency to “impose or enforce any restriction [emphasis added] on the export of crude oil”. This was done to insure that any export controls not based upon §6212 could not be used to control the export of crude oil.

Unintended Consequences

This §3 language reflects a general mistrust for the current administration (and perhaps government in general). Unfortunately the broad language of this section (starting with the ‘Notwithstanding any other provision of law’) could potentially be used to justify the avoidance of hazmat shipping restrictions of crude oil at various stages of the crude oil export supply chain. Given the problems seen with some of the rail the shipments of Bakken crude oil, this was probably not the intent of Rep. Barton. But, wide sweeping language frequently carries unintended consequences.

The Inevitable Study

Section four of this bill would require the Secretary of Energy to conduct a study and report to Congress on “on the appropriate size, composition, and purpose of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve”. The report would be due to Congress within 120 days of passage of the bill.

Moving Forward

Given the current world price for oil it is unlikely that there will be any urgent push for passing this bill. This bill would almost certainly be able to pass in the House given the Republican majority. Whether this bill could garner enough Democratic support to overcome a liberal filibuster in the Senate is another question entirely. Modification of the language in Section 3 might increase those chances.

NOTE: HR 666, the earlier version of this bill that was essentially ignored by its author due to the assigned bill number, has identical language. No one will touch that bill.