Irving, TX – As we conclude National Police Week, I want to take a moment to recognize and thank our North Texas police officers who make tremendous sacrifices to keep our community safe.

While in Washington this week, I voted for the Protect Our Law Enforcement with Immigration Control and Enforcement Act of 2023 (POLICE Act of 2023), which makes assaulting a police officer a deportable offense. Particularly at a time of massive illegal immigration, when our law enforcement agents are on the front lines and working to keep our community safe, we must hold accountable those who seek to harm our police. 

I joined my Ways and Means Committee colleagues for a hearing on Tuesday focused on health care price transparency. The Biden Administration has failed to fully enforce Trump-era hospital price transparency rules, which allows hospitals to leave patients in the dark on the true cost of their care. As we highlighted in the hearing, an estimated 75% of hospitals are not in compliance with CMS's hospital price transparency rules.

On Wednesday, I spoke with Jim Hrncir of Las Colinas Pharmacy and joined his colleagues from the Professional Compounding Centers of America to discuss my work to protect patients access to customized treatments.

Later in the day, I met with anesthesiologists from North Texas to hear more about the regulatory challenges they're facing.

I also reconnected with a few folks from Heidelberg Materials, which is headquartered in Las Colinas, who visited D.C. to discuss issues facing the cement manufacturing industry.

As we work to address our nation's homelessness crisis, we must focus on graduating people out of poverty and out of entitlement programs. I was grateful to join a few of my colleagues for a press conference on curbing homelessness. We were joined by several inspiring individuals who have overcome homelessness and the local leaders who helped them.

Later, I stood up for American taxpayers and entrepreneurs at our Small Business Committee hearing this week. Based on the SBA's record of failure, it is clear that the agency is in no position to take on additional responsibilities. You can watch my line of questioning here.

I'm working to ensure that students can pursue higher education without getting taken advantage of by predatory lenders.

This week, I reintroduced the Combating Predatory Lending in Higher Education Act, which will increase transparency and help students and their families spot predatory loans.

This week’s Texas-24 Hometown Hero is Oliver Burke, who who recently led his fellow Boy Scouts in a community wildflower seed building service project to help preserve the Blackland Prairie.

I want to thank Oliver for his dedication to bettering our North Texas community. It was also great having him on our Congressional Youth Advisory Council this past year, and as a participant in our Congressional Art Competition!

Do you know someone who goes above and beyond for our community? Nominate a Texas-24 Hometown Hero here.

Thank you for the opportunity to serve as your voice in Washington. To stay up to date on what's happening each week, follow me on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, GETTR, Parler, Rumble, and YouTube. 

Please do not hesitate to contact our office if we can ever be of service to you. 

Sincerely,

Congresswoman Beth Van Duyne (TX-24)