Dear Oklahoma friends and neighbors:
In this edition of the Lankford Letter, you’ll see:
• Work is getting done, but there is always more work to do
• My continued support for the SAVE America Act
• My line of questioning of Dr. Anthony Fauci
• What happens when a Senator goes before the House Appropriations Committee
• Information on Daylight Saving Time, the debate on NIL, and more!
I apologize in advance for a long e-newsletter this time, but there is so much going on right now! It’s also hard to believe that school is about to begin (or has already started for some students). Most of this summer, I’ve worked for us in Washington, DC, on multiple bills and issues, but on weekends and one week around July 4th (Happy 250th Birthday, America!), I travel the state to connect with Oklahomans directly in Alva, Arcadia, Calvin, Catoosa, Cherokee, Claremore, Edmond, Enid, Goodwell, Guthrie, Holdenville, Krebs, Oklahoma City, Shawnee, Tecumseh, Tulsa, and Watonga. We talked about homeland security issues, growing businesses, gas prices, regulations, election security, Iran, Ukraine, utility costs, data centers, the next season of college football, and more.
Work is Getting Done, But There Is ALWAYS More Work to Do!
The House and Senate meet 11 months of the year and set aside the month of August for Members of Congress to be in their respective states to meet with constituents and work on issues around their state. I look forward to the conversations and ideas from my Oklahoma neighbors.
The last month has been intense, with multiple serious issues. In just the past week, the Senate passed a continuing resolution to keep the government funded through this fall. When the House returns to Washington, DC, in September, they can take up that bill so we can avoid another government shutdown this year.
In the past few days, the Senate confirmed 76 of President Trump’s nominees, including Attorney General Todd Blanche. The Senate passed continued, sweeping sanctions this week on any country that purchases oil and gas from Russia, while they are at war with Ukraine. Any nation that purchases Russian energy knows that their money is going directly to buy weapons to murder Ukrainians and destabilize the world energy market. This was one of the last bills that Lindsey Graham worked on with President Trump in an effort to end the war in Ukraine. The final debate was led by Lindsey’s sister, Darline, who is now the appointed Senator from South Carolina.
The Senate also passed new sanctions on Iran to continue to put pressure on the terrorist regime to stop their nuclear weapons program and allow international ships to pass by Iran’s coast, in international waters. For five decades, the leadership of Iran has attacked Americans everywhere they could reach us. Americans do not want war with any nation, but we also know the cost to the world if the terrorist-led Iranian regime has the ability to manufacture and deliver a nuclear weapon. I look forward to a swift resolution to this conflict.
Usually, a vote to keep the government open is dramatic, but this bill had some extra drama because it included a surprise section on THC snacks and beverages. If you are not familiar with THC, here is a quick education: There are many chemicals in a marijuana (or hemp) plant, but THC is the chemical in marijuana that makes a person high. Hemp and the marijuana plants are the same species, but the difference between hemp and marijuana plants is the amount of THC in the plant. If the plant has less than 0.3% THC, it is a hemp plant, if it has more than 0.3% THC, it is a marijuana plant. Hemp does not make a person “high,” because it does not have enough THC to give the drug-induced intoxicating effect.
A year ago, the Senate voted 76-24 to limit so called “hemp drinks” to 0.3% THC, which is the legal definition of hemp. That seems like common sense to me. However, there is a new fight from some people to dramatically increase the amount THC in gummies, snacks, and beverages all over the country, not just in marijuana dispensaries, but in gas stations and every other location.
It is nationwide legalization of marijuana products in snacks and beverages.
At a time when we are actively trying to stop the massive flow of fentanyl and meth across our southern border, I strongly oppose expanding access to marijuana drinks and snacks in our gas stations and every local store. America is not safer, stronger or more productive if more families, drivers, and employees are consuming more and more marijuana throughout the day. Someone who consumes THC drinks can be high and dangerous on the highway but still pass a breathalyzer test from law enforcement because it does not include alcohol. Without question, the increased access to marijuana products will no doubt increase youth marijuana use, which every study ever conducted shows serious long-term health effects for that youth.
The issue was not resolved in the Senate this week, but a final vote has been set up for early December on nationwide legalization of marijuana products, which I will strongly oppose. Please feel free to share your thoughts with me over the next two months. By the way, this debate has nothing to do with the use or content of CBD in any product. CBD is another chemical in hemp and marijuana plants that is a treatment for inflammation, but it does not give you a high. There is no limitation on the purchase of CBD products, only THC products.
There are so many other priorities still left undone. Starting with election integrity measures, which I will discuss more in the next section. Let me just say here, we had multiple votes, just in the last week, to require voter ID across the country, but Democrats blocked every single vote.
In the next few months, we need to finish this year’s Defense Bill to make sure our men and women in uniform have the support they deserve. We need to pass this year’s Farm Bill, which was delayed in committee when every single Democrat voted against the Farm Bill because they wanted to remove the new fraud prevention tools in the SNAP program we added last summer. SNAP provides food assistance for low-income and vulnerable American families, but state leaders run the program using federal tax dollars, which means they are not always careful to prevent fraud because it is not their state’s tax money being wasted.
Last year, we added a requirement that SNAP cannot be given to someone not legally present in the country and who does not meet the income requirements for the program. Democrats want to delay or remove that requirement. I want to make sure only the people who qualify for the SNAP program actually get access to the program, which seems like common sense.
We also have a battle brewing in the Senate version of the Farm Bill over mandating more ethanol at our gas pumps. Ethanol is largely made from corn and soybeans, it burns hotter than gasoline and has been used for decades in lower amounts for octane or fuel.
It is a great secondary fuel source, but right now, using a law from 2007, the EPA has chosen to increase the amount of ethanol that must be purchased in America. Some in the Senate want to increase the mandate on ethanol even more. However, the problem is, if a refiner or “blender” does not use enough ethanol, they must pay a fee, which gets passed on to consumers in the form of higher fuel prices. Right now, each of us pay about $0.35 per gallon in the ethanol tax. I am not opposed to all ethanol use, but I also don’t want to pay higher gas prices just because of an arbitrary number set by the government. I will keep working to get gas prices down in every way I can.
On a side note, I am hearing from Oklahomans who are watching the eye-opening moves being made by the Democratic Socialists of America, which is just another name for the Communist Party of America. In a rising number of blue states like New York and Michigan, communism and some of its worst principles are gaining mainstream attention again, and we should not just look away and pretend it’s not happening.
Communist propaganda is already spreading on social media on the reasons they believe individuals should not be allowed to own private property in our nation and the reasons they believe the government has the right to take or control anything that’s yours. Socialism believes that we should have a powerful government that takes away money from someone they define as rich and gives it to their friends.
CLICK HERE to watch an interview on Fox News Sunday with Democratic Socialists of America co-chair Megan Romer as she confirms the radical agenda of this group.
I hope you will join me in recommitting to our deeply American values of faith, family, opportunity for all and free markets. We are a nation born from the value of liberty and the opportunity for any person to work hard and succeed. America is not perfect; we are always working to form a more perfect union. But Cuba, China, and the old Soviet Union have taught the world that freedom for people disappears when socialists run the government and our lives.
Continuing to Support the SAVE America Act
Thirty-six states already require voter ID to vote, including Oklahoma. It is required in Republican and Democratic leaning states. It’s not controversial, except in the United States Senate.
Last year I co-sponsored the SAVE Act, which later became the SAVE America Act. It focuses on the top issues to make our elections secure and trusted in every part of the country. The SAVE America Act requires states to verify US citizenship in order for individuals to register to vote and requires photo ID to vote. The bill tells states to purge non-citizens from their voter rolls and establishes federal penalties for intentionally registering non-citizens. In poll after poll, the American people say they want to make sure we have secure elections.
The Republican-led US Senate has voted six times in the past seven months on the SAVE America Act or pieces of the bill. We have forced vote after vote on the bill, but every Democratic Senator votes to block the bill. In the past week, we brought to the Senate floor a bill to just take the most popular portion of the bill, the voter ID section, for a vote. Twelve Democratic Senators have said they support voter ID, including the voter ID laws in their state, but they have voted against voter ID for the nation, every time. Ironically, last week, the new socialist mayor of New York City announced that the new government run grocery stores in New York City will require an ID to come shop, but he and other Democrats refuse to require an ID to show proof of identity to vote. Apparently, in their world view, the right to buy a pineapple is more precious than the right to vote.
The Senate will try to pass another set of election integrity measures when we pass the reconciliation bill in September. Unfortunately, the reconciliation is still being written by the budget committee, so we cannot vote on something that is not finished. It has a long way to go before it’s ready for a vote on the national defense and agriculture sections of the bill.
We also have one more way we are working to get at least voter ID passed. In a few weeks, we will vote on a bill that has two sections, the first is voter ID and the second is a ban on insider trading for members of Congress. Both ideas are very common sense to most Americans. We hope to pass both with one vote.
Questioning Dr. Fauci
Our economy, students, and health care industry are still struggling from the impacts of COVID-19, six years later. In the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee (HSGAC), we demanded Dr. Anthony Fauci appear under a subpoena so we could get require him to tell us what he knew and when he knew it during the pandemic. I pressed Dr. Anthony Fauci, former Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), on the forced closure of American churches during the COVID-19 shutdown and on China’s cover-up of all the information on the Wuhan Institute of Virology and on the research Dr. Fauci himself flagged in his private notes weeks before the first American death from the virus.
After delivering an opening statement, Dr. Fauci invoked his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination in response to each of my questions at the committee hearing. That’s not how invoking the Fifth Amendment works. If you are not going to speak, then you should not speak. You can’t have it both ways. He also refused to answer even clearly non-incriminating questions like what day of the week is it.
CLICK HERE to watch my questions to Dr. Fauci on YouTube.
Ultimately, the Republicans on the Senate Homeland Security Committee and I voted last week to hold Dr. Fauci in contempt of Congress. America still needs answers to what happened during the pandemic and how we can make sure that never happens again.
UPDATE: Prevent Government Shutdowns Act
Government shutdowns are a huge waste of taxpayer money and time. I testified recently before the House Appropriations Committee, chaired by Oklahoma Representative Tom Cole, in support of my Prevent Government Shutdowns Act. This was the Committee’s first full committee hearing since 2008. They hold what are known as “business meetings” often to consider appropriations bills and other related items, but hearings like this are very rare.
My bill would take government shutdowns off the table if there were a lapse in government funding by simply maintaining current spending levels but requiring Congress to stay in Washington until the new funding bills are done. We’re closer than ever to making this bill into law, and I will keep doing the work to get it done.
CLICK HERE to learn more about the hearing and watch my testimony in the hearing on my bill to end government shutdowns for good.
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