Bobby L. Rush

Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend, Louie Gohmert, for his friendship over the past years that we have served together in this Chamber.

I certainly thank him for his support of the Emmett Till Antilynching Act that was signed into law by President Biden a few months ago. I thank Representative Gohmert for his support and for his steadfastness on that bill.

Mr. Speaker, it is for the final time that I stand in this well on this floor to commemorate the memory and the legacy of Fred Hampton, my friend and comrade in the Black Panther Party.

This last Sunday marked 53 years since Chairman Fred was assassinated by a racist, corrupt Chicago Police Department, which, as a part of the FBI's COINTELPRO program, the FBI's national counterintelligence program, without legal authority and in stark violation of the U.S. Constitution, surveilled, harassed, harmed, arrested, and assassinated innocent, ordinary American citizens.

My friend, Fred Hampton, was a brilliant young man that I recruited to join the Illinois Chapter of the Black Panther Party, which I, along with Mr. Bob Brown, organized in 1968.

Fred and I fought together side by side against police brutality and police murder in Chicago specifically, but across our great Nation in general.

We set up free community health clinics, free breakfast for children programs, and a free busing to prison program to allow families to visit their loved ones who were in prison.

Mr. Speaker, we initiated free sickle cell anemia testing programs to educate this Nation and to tell Black people about this dreaded but often and largely ignored disease.

Mr. Speaker, thanks to his charismatic leadership, Fred Hampton was so powerful and so inspirational throughout the city of Chicago and the Nation at large, his charisma, his influence extended even to other countries.

Chairman Fred was a charismatic, courageous, exceptional, and highly committed leader, who, at the age of 21, was assassinated while he slept under the influence of the drug Seconal that was put in his favorite drink at that time, which was Kool-Aid. His Kool-Aid was laced with Seconal.

Why? Because Fred Hampton used every fiber of his talent, his immense talent, without hesitancy, to fight for poor people: poor Whites, poor Blacks, poor Asians, poor Hispanic people, poor people across the board.

His oratory skills exceeded almost every significant leader of his time. Indeed, Mr. Speaker, he was able to move the masses not simply and only because of his oratory but also because of his example.

To see Fred, to hear Fred, was to know Fred, to be inspired by Fred.

Mr. Speaker, Chicago, my home city, the city I love, was and still is one of the most segregated cities in America, but Chairman Fred understood how to connect across racial and geographic boundaries. He knew how to connect with aspirations and deep-seated desires of people across racial and geographic lines. He knew how to create alliances and coalitions based around common needs and common desires.

He created the original Rainbow Coalition in Chicago. This coalition was a partnership with the Young Lords, a Hispanic organization, and the Young Patriots, which was an organization of poor Appalachian Whites from the Uptown community in Chicago.

Mr. Speaker, this amazing, creative, never-seen-before coalition of poor people was comprised of working-class people in our city suffering with the same issues that we all were suffering with. Those issues were police brutality, substandard housing, mediocre education, low-quality healthcare, and low-quality food that was being sold in stores in our neighborhoods.

Mr. Speaker, these were the programs that Fred Hampton championed. This was the kind of individual that Fred Hampton was.

I stand here today, Mr. Speaker, and say that rather than be saluted for these and similar efforts, the Black Panther Party members, and particularly Chairman Fred, were seen as a threat to those in power.

J. Edgar Hoover said that the Black Panther Party was this Nation's number one threat. Why? We were feeding hungry children. We were providing free healthcare to young children, to poor people who needed it. We were taking loved ones to prison to see their loved ones who were incarcerated. We were speaking truth to power.

Is this the reason why Fred Hampton was assassinated? Is this the very reason why the Black Panther Party was being viewed by J. Edgar Hoover and the FBI as the number one threat to this Nation? It just doesn't make sense.

Mr. Speaker, J. Edgar Hoover's FBI started a file on Fred and put him on their Agitator Index, listing him as a key militant leader.

They even went so far as to hire a fellow by the name of William O'Neal, a streetwise Black criminal and operative, as an FBI informant who was assigned to infiltrate the Black Panther Party and report back to them about our every move, our every activity.

And then, Mr. Speaker, on December 4, 1969, at about 4 a.m. in the morning, the Chicago Police Department, working in conjunction with the FBI and the Cook County State's Attorney, Edward V. Hanrahan, surreptitiously entered an apartment at 2337 West Monroe where Fred Hampton lived, and where other Black Panther Party members were staying. They came with the premeditated plan to murder Fred Hampton, to murder me and any other party members that they found in that apartment.

They came armed with machine guns, high-powered pistols, and every other type of weapon, intent on killing everyone in that apartment. They came under the guise of executing a search warrant for weapons, but had every intention of murdering Fred Hampton, and others in that apartment. They killed Fred.

Mr. Speaker, let me make it real clear. Throughout American history, there has not been anyone other than

Fred Hampton that was assassinated under the authority of the U.S. Government--not one. Fred Hampton was the only politically assassinated American citizen that was assassinated on the shores of our Nation. Fred Hampton.

They came for me, but they missed me, Mr. Speaker. Early the following morning at about 5 a.m. on December 5, they came, the Chicago Police Department tried to kill me again. They came to my apartment with a search warrant for weapons and they shot my door down, but I was not in that apartment. I moved my family out of that apartment, just hours before they came, on the preceding day.

Mr. Speaker, they tried to justify the murders of Fred Hampton and Mark Clark by saying that it was a shoot-out, placing the blame on Fred and other members of the Black Panther Party. Later, it became crystal clear that this was a clear politically motivated assassination.

The grand jury evidence showed that the police had fired 99 times--99 shots fired into that apartment. And they also said that there were only two shots that were possibly fired by the Panthers in that apartment.

Mr. Speaker, let me remind you that this was during the 1960s, a time of deep and necessary awakening in our Nation, a time of political protest, a time of cultural confrontation. A time of change in our Nation. It was a time when poor, oppressed people took a necessary step forward to end the systemic oppression that they were faced with.

African Americans, women, disabled individuals, Mexican-American farmworkers, Native Americans, anti-war protestors, environmentalists, and other activists organized to fight during this time against injustice and for equality and for equity.

Most of us view this time, some half-century later, as a turning point in American history. A time when the oppressed populations in our Nation finally had an opportunity to speak up and create positive change for themselves and by themselves.

However, Mr. Speaker, J. Edgar Hoover, didn't like what he saw. He didn't like what was going on in our Nation.

J. Edgar Hoover determined that anyone who had the audacity to stand up and challenge the oppressive status quo, that they were a threat.

To whom? We were American citizens. We loved our Nation. We were a threat to him and his consorts--him and those who wanted to oppress, for racial and other reasons, poor people.

Mr. Speaker, in 1956, J. Edgar Hoover created and designed a program within the Federal Bureau of Investigation called COINTELPRO. COINTELPRO was an acronym for the Counterintelligence Program of the

Mr. Speaker, I thank the chair of the committee, my good friend Congresswoman Maloney.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of S. 3655, the Civil Rights Cold Case Investigation Support Act of 2022. This bill is the Senate companion to my bill, H.R. 6818, and I am pleased beyond measure to support its passage on the floor today.

Four years ago, Mr. Speaker, Congress passed my bill, the Civil Rights Cold Case Records Collection Act of 2018, into law. That law created a collection of civil rights cold case records to be disclosed to the public, helping to resolve by bringing closure to the more than 100 unsolved cold cases from the civil rights era. It was designed to bring some small measure of comfort to families and communities that have waited far, far too long for answers about the loss of their loved ones so many decades ago. I hope today's passage will bring some sense of closure to these families.

A crucial part of that bill was the creation of the Civil Rights Cold Case Records Review Board, which serves as an independent oversight agency that reviews requests to delay making civil rights cold case records public.

President Biden has appointed, and the Senate has confirmed, some wonderfully qualified nominees to the board, but since the previous administration failed to appoint any members to the board, the board is about to run out of its legislative time before it can truly bring its mission to fruition.

Mr. Speaker, the bill passed in the Senate, and I see no reason why the House cannot pass the bill today. I urge passage of the bill today.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to honor Patrick and Dee Woodtor for their work in Africa International House and to celebrate the 33rd iteration of the African Festival of the Arts. The festival is back this year after taking a two-year hiatus due to COVID-19. With the return of the in-person festivities, this year's theme is ``Back to Culture. Back to Tradition.''

The African Festival of the Arts has been celebrated in Chicago for more than three decades. Each year on Labor Day weekend, the festival attracts a multi-cultural audience, offering the Black community a chance to reconnect to their roots, while also giving those outside the community the opportunity to learn more about African culture. Through poetry readings, interactive workshops, art exhibits, musical and dance performances, food tasting, arts and crafts classes, and displaying a replica of an African village, the festival illustrates the rich African culture present within the people of Chicago.

The festival also contributes immensely to the City's economy. African International House hires local residents and vendors to participate in the annual event, which generates revenue for the city and local businesses.

Patrick Woodtor founded Africa International House and the festival. Woodtor is originally from Liberia and first came to the United States in 1976 to attend Northwestern University, where he met his wife, Delores ``Dee'' Parmer. After graduating, the Woodtors briefly lived in Liberia, but soon returned to the States due to the political turmoil unraveling in the country.

A short time after returning to Chicago, the Woodtors' cultural outreach began when Dee opened a store in Hyde Park called ``Window to Africa'' that specialized in selling African artifacts, which helped the surrounding community better connect and understand their heritage. The store also served as a resource center for African immigrants transitioning into their new lives here in America.

The success and popularity of Dee's store fueled their desire to expand their efforts. Patrick started the festival, and then later Africa International House--a larger umbrella organization that offers exchange programs to Africa and more broadly bridges cultural understanding.

African International House and the Woodtors have received numerous accolades for their contributions to the cultural fabric of Chicago and service to recent immigrants, and I wanted to further cement the depth of their impact by speaking about it in the halls of the U.S. Capitol.

Madam Speaker, Chicago has a rich history of celebrating the heritage and ancestry of its residents. The Woodtors have added to that history by lifting African culture on a large scale, which only further enhances the beauty and diversity of our great city. They deserve to be honored and recognized for this work, which benefits all Chicagoans.