Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I was unavoidably absent from the Chamber on Monday, July 16, 2018. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yea'' on Roll Call vote 329 and ``yea'' on Roll Call vote 330.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the vice-ranking member of the full committee, Mr. Takano, for this time to speak in favor of this bill.

As my colleague from Texas, and the chairman of the subcommittee pointed out, by the best estimate of the VA, which many believe is a conservative estimate, every single day in this country, 20 veterans will have taken their lives.

The purpose and the function and the dignity that they found as a member of the armed services, as a contributing member of their military unit, where the decisions that they made, the actions that they took, would literally save and determine the outcomes of the lives of their fellow servicemembers, to return that level of function and purpose to their lives when they come back to this country and reintegrate within our communities, that is the purpose of this legislation.

I want to thank my colleague, the chairman of the subcommittee, for his diligent work on this, by convening stakeholders, veterans service organizations, veteran student service organizations, members of the VA, the Department of Labor, other colleagues from the committee to make sure that we got this right and that we help those servicemembers transition into a life that allows them to give to their full potential once back in their home community, once back in their country.

I want to make sure that we do everything we can to ensure the success of this legislation; that we follow the outcome assessments that are provided for in the legislation; that we meet the intention and the purpose that is described here, so that it is not a boxes checked at the end of a servicemember's career, but something that is pursued with thought, so that when that servicemember reintegrates, they are ready to hit the ground running.

Lastly, I want to thank the chairman of the full committee. Some will say that without Tennessee, there would be no Texas. Without Chairman Roe, there would be no H.R. 5649. The fact that you elevated this and that you spent so much of your time personally listening to these veteran service organizations and your colleagues on the committee, I think, helped to make it a much better bill than it would have been otherwise, and for that I am grateful.

Mr. Speaker, I was unavoidably absent from the Chamber on Thursday, June 14, 2018. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yea'' on Roll Call vote 265 and ``nay'' on Roll Call vote 266.

Mr. Speaker, I was unavoidably absent from the Chamber on Friday, June 15, 2018. Had I been present, I would have voted ``nay'' on Roll Call votes 267 and 268.

Mr. Speaker, on Monday of this week, I was in McAllen, Texas, a beautiful community comprised of some incredibly courageous, strong, kindhearted people in the Rio Grande Valley in the State of Texas, connected by the Rio Grande River to Reynosa, Mexico, forming one of these extraordinary binational communities that distinguish our connection with Mexico with the State of Texas for the United States of America.

I was able to visit the Border Patrol station in McAllen, Texas, which is the busiest Border Patrol station in the country. I happened to be there during the busiest shift during that day in that busy station, and I was able to spend some time with the amazing women and men of the Border Patrol, who have one of the toughest jobs that I can imagine: keeping our country safe, protecting our communities and the families within our communities, and meeting those who are at their most desperate, most vulnerable moment in their lives, people who have fled terror and violence, death and deprivation in their countries to come to ours, to seek asylum, to seek safety, to seek refuge.

In that Border Patrol station I had the ability to meet a family, a young mother and her young child, who had fled Honduras and had traveled more

than 2,000 miles to come to this country. And because they presented themselves to Border Patrol agents, didn't try to flee from them, went to those Border Patrol agents seeking asylum in between the ports of entry and didn't do it at the international bridge, didn't do it at the port of entry, that young mother and her child were arrested. They were being held in that cell comprised of cinder blocks, sitting on a hard concrete bench with a number of other mothers and young children, had just been arrested within the last 24 hours and were about to go to the Border Patrol Processing Center. Through tears, that young mother was able to tell me about her journey.

When I asked her why she didn't choose to cross at the port of entry, where she could have lawfully petitioned for asylum, she said: ``I was scared.'' She didn't know where to cross.

And, frankly, those crossing areas in Reynosa on the Mexican side of the U.S.-Mexico border are controlled by the cartels. The cartels determined where she and her 7-year-old daughter were going to cross.

Not lost on me was the fact that her daughter was gripping her mother's hand for dear life, as I imagine she had been for the last 3 weeks when they made that 2,000-mile journey, where, if they were lucky, they made it on foot.

They also made it atop, not inside of, a train, known as La Bestia, or the Beast, and where they were fortunate enough to survive that journey and come to our front door of the United States at the Texas- Mexico border, and where she was arrested and, unbeknownst to her and to that little girl who was clutching her hand, they would, within hours, be separated and might not know when they would be joined again, if ever.

One hundred percent of the young women and men who travel with those young children in between our ports of entry are arrested, are detained, imprisoned, jailed in those Border Patrol stations, where they next go to the next place that I went to in McAllen, which was the Border Patrol processing center, a gigantic warehouse, where I saw the children who had just been separated from their moms and dads behind cyclone fencing, sleeping on polished concrete floors with a mattress 5 or 6 inches thick directly on the ground, Mylar blankets keeping them warm, again, with Border Patrol agents who were as humane and professional as possible, given the circumstances and the conditions.

Men separated in other holding pods, women behind cyclone fences in other holding pods. There was another cyclone-fenced area open for public view where you went to the bathroom and where we had to be able to see your head or your feet. Those are the processes and procedures and the laws under which those people are being held.

After that, I went to the international bridge at Reynosa and, on the Mexican side, was able to talk to three different people who were seeking asylum. Two of them had made the trip from Guatemala. When they got to Reynosa, they were kidnapped by cartels, held for 12 days, without clothes, without access to the outside world, with the exception of being able to make calls to family members who could cough up the $7,500 that would purchase their freedom, allow them to leave captivity and make their way to the international bridge, literally 10 feet away from the international line and the United States of America, where, if they could step foot on our soil, they would be able to lawfully petition for asylum.

But standing there were four officers of Customs and Border Protection who would not let them pass, who told them we do not have capacity within our country and, therefore, they could not lawfully petition for asylum, therefore, perversely providing the incentive for them to try to cross in between the ports of entry illegally, where they will be arrested, criminally prosecuted, and sent back to countries from which they are fleeing certain death.

After that, I went to a detention center run by a private prison corporation, where I met a man who had left his home country with his 12-year-old daughter, whom he has not seen for the last 5 days. And in between 4-inch-thick Plexiglass, behind which I could barely hear what he was saying, he told me about the horrific journey that he had endured.

He took off his shirt and showed me the bullet wounds that he had suffered that had caused him to make the desperate decision to leave his family, his home country, his language, whatever he knew in life, and take that 12-year-old girl and try to bring her to safety.

Again, just as with that mother, he was arrested. He now was in criminal proceedings. He would now be moved to Immigration and Customs Enforcement's Enforcement Removal Operations, ERO facility, where he would be sent back to his country of origin; and he had no clue where that 12-year-old girl that he had risked everything for was at that moment.

Thank God for Rochelle Garza, his pro bono attorney, next to whom I was sitting, who was doing everything in her power to provide him the strength, reminding him to keep his faith and saying that she was going to do everything in her effort, in her power to track down that 12- year-old girl.

Mr. Speaker, who are we to be doing this right now?

I know that every single one of us, to a person, if we were standing here in this Chamber in 1939 when this country was sending back the St. Louis, which had set sail on May 13, 1939, from Hamburg, Germany, with more than 900 German Jewish refugees, including children, that all of us, to a person, would like to say, if I were here, I would have made the case to accept the St. Louis and those 900 passengers and make sure that they could find refuge and asylum in this country. Instead, this country chose not to, and we sent that ship back to Europe, where more than 250 of those 900 passengers would be slaughtered in the Holocaust.

This is our opportunity to do the right thing. We will be judged by our conscience, by our children, and by history. This is our moment of truth.

So I join my friend from California, with every Member in this Chamber, Republican and Democrat, in calling upon ourselves, our country, to do the right thing at the moment that we still have the chance to do the right thing.

Tomorrow, legislation will be introduced to end the practice of family separation. As an original cosponsor of this bill, I am calling on my colleagues to rush the decision, the debate, and to pass this overwhelmingly so that we can send it to the Senate and, ultimately, to the President's desk for his signature and do the right thing while we still have the chance to do that.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor Representative Barbara Lee, a native of El Paso, Texas, who this year is celebrating her 20th year as a Member of Congress. On June 10, her milestone will be honored with a portrait dedication ceremony at the McCall Neighborhood Center in our mutual hometown, and I rise today to note her achievements and congratulate her on a distinguished career thus far.

Representative Lee was born in El Paso, Texas, where she attended St. Joseph's Catholic School. During her childhood, El Paso remained a segregated community. For instance, Representative Lee and other African American citizens were not able to enter landmark buildings in El Paso such as the Plaza Theatre due to segregation laws. Despite this adversity, her family achieved milestones for racial equality in El Paso: her mother was one of the first African Americans to graduate from Texas Western College (now the University of Texas at El Paso) and her father was the first African American mail carrier in El Paso.

Her upbringing and experiences in the diverse community of El Paso inspired in her a passion for justice and equality, a quality that endured when she moved away from El Paso to California when she was 13 years old. Following high school, she not only raised two sons as a single mother and worked to create a better life for her family, but also attended Mills College, served as president of the school's Black Student Union and later received her master's degree from the University of California at Berkeley.

Her ensuing career in politics further demonstrates her resiliency and determination: she rose through Congressman Ron Dellums' congressional office over the course of 11 years, beginning as an intern and eventually earning the title of Chief of Staff. Similarly, she was elected a California State Assembly member in 1990, a California State Senator in 1996, and a Congresswoman for California in 1998.

During her time as a state representative and the 20 years she has served as a Member of Congress, she has made it a priority to represent some of the most underserved Americans by fighting for justice, equality, and peace. Through that desire, she helped found the Out of Poverty Caucus and the Congressional HIV/AIDS Caucus. She also began serving as chair of the Democratic Whip Task Force on Poverty, Income Inequality and Opportunity in 2013.

Furthermore, she has consistently been a leader in opposing our involvement in endless war, even when it was not politically popular to do so. She was the only member of the House to vote against the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force, which demonstrated her foresight on the open-ended authorization. To recognize her work on these issues, she was nominated, as part of a group of 1000 women around the world, for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2003 to recognize her dedication to peace and human welfare.

Please join me in recognizing Congresswoman Lee's successful and distinguished career and her roots in El Paso, Texas.

Mr. Speaker, I was unavoidably absent from the Chamber on Tuesday, June 5, 2018. Had I been present, I would have voted yea on Roll Call votes 231, 232, and 233.

Mr. Speaker, I was unavoidably absent from the Chamber on Tuesday, May 15, 2018. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yea'' on Roll Call votes 181, 182, and 183.

Mr. Speaker, I was unavoidably absent from the Chamber on Monday May 21, 2018. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yea'' on Roll Call votes 207, 208, and 209.

Mr. Speaker, I was unavoidably absent from the Chamber on Tuesday, May 22, 2018. Had I been present, I would have voted ``nay'' on Roll Call votes 210 and 211, and ``yea'' on Roll Call vote 212.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor El Paso Community Development Week, held by the Community and Human Development Department (DCHD) of El Paso from April 2 to April 6, 2018. El Paso has celebrated Community Development Week for 42 years to commemorate the success of the Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) and the HOME programs in creating safe, affordable housing opportunities for the El Paso community. Since 1975, these programs have brought nearly $500 million in grant money and private and public funds to the city of El Paso, which provide essential public services, economic opportunities, street and drainage improvements, public facility and infrastructure improvements and other quality of life improvements to low- and moderate-income neighborhoods. These successes are thanks to public and private partners, community volunteers and neighborhood associations who work to support continued funding for the programs.

Even after Community Development Week comes to a close, the work of El Paso DCHD will continue to ensure the city of El Paso can respond to current and emerging community development needs, including job creation, development of affordable housing, improvement of existing housing stock, the delivery of vital services, and the development of important infrastructure improvements.

Please join me in recognizing the employees and volunteers that make El Paso Community Development Week a success.

Mr. Speaker, I was unavoidably absent from the Chamber on Tuesday, February 13. Had I been present, I would have voted ``yea'' on rollcall votes 70 and 71.

Mr. Speaker, I was unavoidably absent from the Chamber on Monday, February 5. Had I been present, I would have voted yea on Roll Call votes 51 and 52.

Mr. Speaker, I was unavoidably absent from the Chamber on Monday, December 18. Had I been present, I would have voted ``no'' on rollcall vote 685 and ``yea'' on rollcall votes 686 and 687.

Mr. Speaker, I am honored to congratulate my friend, Dr. Robert Gunn, for being awarded a National Endowment for the Humanities Award for Faculty for his work on American Horologics. Literature, Timekeeping, and the Production of Space in Early Western North America.

Though it will be above my level of comprehension, given Dr. Gunn's past work and the success it has achieved, I am confident that this will be an important addition to the study of North America and the indigenous cultures of the American West.

Dr. Gunn's work at the University of Texas at El Paso has helped to distinguish UTEP and the larger El Paso-Juarez community. It has helped to deepen and expand our insight of the people of North America, and it has contributed to a richer understanding of America and the American West.

I am extraordinarily fortunate to represent Dr. Gunn in Congress and to have the opportunity to congratulate him for this high achievement. Even better, I have the pleasure of calling him a friend and personally bearing witness to his kindness, wit, wisdom and the inspiration he takes from, and love he gives to, his beautiful children, Frances and Henry, and his wife Jonna, incredibly accomplished in her own right as the Director of the English Education Program at UTEP.

We are lucky to have Dr. Gunn in El Paso, lucky to count him and his family as friends, lucky that he has contributed his outsized talent and drive to a better understanding of who we are.

Congratulations Robert.