Over 30 years ago, Airbus was founded by a European consortium of French, German, and later Spanish and British companies to compete in the large commercial aircraft industry with U.S. companies.
What I did was sit down with the Washington State officials, with the historic preservation people, with the tribe, the local community, the port of Port Angeles, and we worked this thing out, and we protected the tribe's interest.
During the past 30 years, European governments have provided more than $15 billion in the form of low- and no-cost loans to Airbus for the specific purpose of developing new aircraft lines.
For all of us who have been involved in the recovery efforts to bring back and strengthen wild salmon runs, we fear that this change in policy could lead to further declines in these wild stocks.
In fact, at Olympic National Park in my district, they 3 years ago had 130 summer employees they brought in for temporary work. This summer they have 25 because they cannot afford more.
Last year, Congress gave the Department of Defense the authority to design a new civilian personnel system for its employees as part of the defense authorization bill.
We are also working on the restoration of salmon runs, and we are doing a new process of mass marking with these fish so we can tell the wild fish from the hatchery fish.
So when people go to the park this summer, they are not going to have the same quality of a visit. There is not going to be a ranger out on the trail to tell them about the important cultural and historic areas within the Olympic National Park.
The American people are going to judge the majority party here today. If they go out here and vote for this rule that allows this provision to be stricken, they are voting against the men and women in the military of our country.
