Chairman Guthrie Delivers Opening Statement at Full Committee Markup

The committee will come to order. Before we begin, I'd like to take a moment to address our guests in the audience. Thank you for being here. We appreciate everybody being here. We think engaged citizens are welcomed, and you are a very valuable part of our process, so appreciate it. But I do want to remind our guests in the audience that the chair is obligated under the rules of the House and the rules of the committee to maintain order and preserve decorum. In the committee room, I know that we all have deep feelings on these issues, that we all may not agree on everything, but I ask that we all abide by these rules and be respectful of our audience members, our viewers, and our witnesses. The chair appreciates the audience's cooperation in maintaining order as we have a full discussion of these issues. So the chair will now recognize, I'll recognize myself for our opening statement, five minutes. As people, as a committee, and as a Congress, there are few things that are more essential than our responsibility to protect our children. Today, the harms kids face online are complex. They are immense, and they're constantly changing. In August of 2025, the ranking member and I sat down and made a commitment to try to deliver a bipartisan package to empower parents and to protect children and teens online. We both recognize the gravity of the issue. We both recognize that parents across this country are asking for action. Since that time, the bipartisan committee staff has spent more than 40 hours directly negotiating these bills and countless more working with members on this committee, stakeholders, and each other to build consensus, dozens of hours of negotiation, drafts, red lines, counter proposals, serious engagement, and good faith efforts. And I'm disappointed that despite all that work, we're ultimately unable to reach a bipartisan agreement. This committee has a long history of working across the aisle on issues affecting children and families. In the past, we have shown that when the stakes are high enough, we can put politics aside and work together. And that is why it is unfortunate the slate of bills today before us is not bipartisan. But at the end of the day, members of Congress, our responsibility is to our constituents, especially our children. Across the country, children are being targeted, groomed, harassed, and exploited online. Algorithms amplify addictive, harmful content. Predators explore anonymity. And parents are left trying to navigate a digital world that evolves faster than the safeguards they have at their disposal. Every month we delay, more families experience the kind of devastation that no parent should ever endure. We worked hard to try to make these bills bipartisan. We meant it when we said we wanted to get there. But the absence of a bipartisan consensus cannot be an excuse for inaction. We hoped to do this with our Democrat colleagues. But if we're going to do it together, we still must move forward. And the time is now. We're taking the meaningful steps forward to empower parents and protect children and teens online. We owe it to parents. We owe it to communities. Most importantly, we owe it to the kids who are counting on us to get this right. Today, we will also mark up five bills from the Energy Subcommittee, which will help ensure the physical and cyber security of one of America's greatest forms of infrastructure, our electric grid. As more and more of our lives become digital, the physical and cyber security threats to our grid grow in frequency and impact, particularly from adverse nation states. These bipartisan cyber security bills will help combat those threats by strengthening DOE's leadership when it comes to securing the energy sector, providing targeted funding and technical assistance to rural and municipal utilities, and authorizing public-private partnerships on grid security to enhance information sharing. I appreciate the willingness of Ranking Member Pallone and Ranking Member Kassler to work with us on these important bills and look forward to moving them forward together. Thank you. And I now yield to the Ranking Member of the full committee, my good friend, Mr. Pallone, the gentleman from New Jersey, recognized for five minutes for your opening statement.