Floor Statements

Madam Speaker, I rise to speak on a commonsense bill I introduced to promote accountability for America's opioid crisis. The opioid epidemic has taken almost as many lives as the COVID-19 crisis.

The Sackler family has amassed billions of dollars, in large part, through the sales of Purdue Pharma's OxyContin. Members of the Sackler family have been directly involved in the company's efforts to flood our communities with this dangerous painkiller and to mislead the public on the danger it poses to their health. Purdue has declared bankruptcy, and members of the Sackler family are seeking legal releases from individual lawsuits brought against them by government entities.

My bill, H.R. 2096, the SACKLER Act, ensures that individuals accused of wrongdoing by government actors, like the Sacklers, are prevented from evading responsibility through bankruptcy proceedings.

I ask my colleagues for their support in this crucial effort to ensure accountability for the harm the Sacklers have inflicted on our communities, and to promote justice for lives lost to the opioid epidemic.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of the Paycheck Fairness Act.

On average, women are paid just 82 cents for every dollar paid to men. The gap is even larger, almost double, for women of color. Compounded over a lifetime, the pay gap becomes a wealth tax, costing women thousands and thousands of dollars in lost wages.

Longstanding workplace discrimination sets women back in pay, benefits, hiring, and promotions. Closing the pay gap will provide more financial stability for women, especially those who are hardest hit by the pandemic.

At a recent Oversight and Reform Committee hearing on Equal Pay Day, soccer superstar Megan Rapinoe testified: ``One cannot simply outperform inequality.''

Combating pay discrimination requires deliberate action, and that is what the Paycheck Fairness bill does. I urge a ``yes'' vote on this important bill.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of the millions of Dreamers who call America home and contribute to the rich tapestry of our country, yet have seen their dreams of a permanent home deferred over and over again.

These Americans, in every way but on paper, deal with uncertainty each day that we fail to act. Now that the House has acted, the Senate must immediately pass the American Dream and Promise Act.

In our melting pot of a city, New Yorkers have shown again and again that it is our diversity that makes us strong and that immigrants and the American Dream are linked.

So, today, the House made clear that immigrants are welcome here and that Dreamers deserve to know their home will not be taken away. I thank all of my colleagues who voted ``yes'' to providing this commonsense pathway to citizenship, and I urge the Senate to do the same.

Madam Speaker, today, we will vote to reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act, one of the most important bills in history to protect women and girls.

This photograph is of then-Senator Joe Biden, myself, and other women leaders when we introduced this important bill in 1994. It is still important. We need to reauthorize it. There is no doubt he will sign it into law.

We live in a world where 1 in 4 women have experienced sexual violence. Reauthorizing VAWA is about creating a future where all those experiencing dating and gender-based violence feel supported to seek help, and where survivors are given the tools they need to heal. It is about ensuring a better, safer future for the next generation. I urge a ``yes'' vote by all of my colleagues.

Madam Speaker, there is no time limit on equality. The equal rights amendment passed the needed 38 States, including the great State of New York. Enough is enough. It is long past time for women to be in the Constitution.

We may not always be able to control, nor should women's rights be dependent upon who controls State governments, who is in the White House or Congress, or who sits on the Supreme Court.

Our rights shouldn't be determined by these types of things. It should be in the document, the document they interpret and that they are bound by.

It is long past time to spell out equality in our Constitution with the ERA.

Unfortunately, we are seeing the effects of gender inequality acutely during this pandemic. An estimated 1 million more women than men have lost their jobs, and a disproportionate number of those suffering are Black women and Latinas.

We need to pass it. It is urgently needed. Let's just imagine if the ERA had been ratified in the 1970s, as it should have been.

Would we have needed today a dramatic Me Too, Time's Up movement with hundreds of thousands of women having to tell their often painful personal stories in order to get justice?

Or would the Violence Against Women Act and other legislation addressing sexual assault have been passed, if it had been passed much sooner, without the risk of a Supreme Court ruling limiting a woman's right to sue? Women could sue directly if they were in the Constitution.

We have the opportunity to make equal rights under the law a reality for our mothers, our daughters, our granddaughters, and ourselves. We must recognize that there is no time limit on equality and vote to pass today's resolution now.

Mr. Speaker, I thank Mrs. Lawrence for her extraordinary leadership.

In 1921, exactly 100 years ago, just after ratifying the 19th Amendment, the suffragists set their sights on another constitutional change. The vote was not enough for them. They knew we needed to put gender equality into our Constitution.

So, these women, among them my relative Alice Paul, wrote the equal rights amendment. It was first introduced in Congress in 1923 in celebration of the 75th anniversary of the Seneca Falls Convention, the first women's rights convention in our country. It was introduced in the House by Representative Daniel Anthony, nephew of the great suffragist leader, Susan B. Anthony, to honor her work, as well as the work of many others, like the great suffrage leader Elizabeth Cady Stanton, also of New York.

Today, during Women's History Month, we honor these women as constitution-makers. But verbal praise alone is not enough. We must also carry out their wishes. Because now, a full 100 years later, the equal rights amendment is still not part of the U.S. Constitution.

I thank Jackie Speier and all the women and like-minded men in this Congress that voted to move the equal rights amendment forward.

Eighty-five percent of U.N. member states have constitutions that explicitly guarantee equality for women and girls. These constitutional guarantees have enabled national legal reforms that eliminated discriminatory laws and helped usher in new laws protecting girls and women. Where once the U.S. was a leader on gender equality, when it comes to our Constitution, we are now far, far behind.

Today, we must fulfill the hope of our suffragist foremothers and make equality a reality in our Nation's most fundamental document.

I must say, throughout this struggle I have always said: Where are the women? When I walk around the Mall, they have museums for everything, but not women. It is hard to empower women if we don't even recognize them. So this Women's Caucus put in a bill to create a national women's museum on the mall. I thought this would be easy. It took us two decades to finally pass it last year, but it is now going to be built. It was a priority of this caucus, and we made it happen.

I just want to close by saying that our Smithsonian Women's History Museum will inspire visitors of all ages and all genders for generations to come.

I am so glad to join my colleagues for tonight's Special Order to celebrate the historical achievements of women and to look forward to creating a more equal future for all and preserving this history and the contributions of women in the new Smithsonian women's museum, which is now going to be built on the mall due to this Congress and this Women's Caucus.

I thank all of my colleagues that helped this happen and helped the passage of the ERA today.

Mr. Speaker, more than 90 percent of Americans support universal background checks for those purchasing guns. Today, I urge my colleagues to do the same by supporting H.R. 8 and H.R. 1446. These bills will keep guns out of the hands of those who aren't allowed to have them in the first place.

For years, I have introduced a bill to prevent people from skirting the background check process by purchasing guns at gun shows, and I am very glad that H.R. 8 accomplishes this. If you can't buy a gun from a licensed dealer, you shouldn't be able to buy a gun anywhere, especially at a gun show.

H.R. 1446 closes the Charleston loophole, which allows individuals to buy guns before their background check is completed. Ensuring community safety shouldn't have a 72-hour clock.

With gun deaths and gun sales surging in 2020, we must act now to close these loopholes and meaningfully combat gun violence.

Mr. Speaker, I urge a ``yes'' vote on these two votes today.

Mr. Speaker, I strongly support this bill. The Oversight Committee, which I chair, is responsible for the provisions in this package that provide funding to States, local governments, Tribes, and territories.

When we began our work, hundreds upon hundreds of community leaders reached out to us asking for help. They told us the relief in this bill would mean recovery instead of recession. Democrats answered that call, and, today, we are delivering $362 billion in dedicated aid to cities and localities across this Nation, and they need it.

1.4 million essential workers have already been laid off due to State and local budget shortfalls that threaten the very fabric of our society.

This relief means that our first responders, our teachers, transit workers, sanitation workers, other public servants, everybody who is working continue serving our children, helping our neighbors, and protecting our communities as we see the fight against the pandemic through to the end.

This bill will provide local governments dedicated support for the first time since the pandemic struck. It can be used for vaccines, increased testing, and countless jobs. Cities and States across this Nation have lost billions in expected tax revenue. This bill helps.

The Oversight Committee also delivered a provision providing emergency paid leave for Federal employees to prevent the spread of the virus, as well as critical oversight prevention to ensure transparency of this full $1.9 trillion package.

The American Rescue Plan will rebuild our pandemic-torn Nation from the ground up and stronger than ever. Everybody should vote for this bill.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of our Nation's greatest asset, our workers, our essential workers--nurses, teachers, mail carriers, transportation, sanitation, and food industry workers, among so many others--who have lifted the Nation with their sacrifice and bravery.

Just as they have supported us, we must support them by supporting unions. Attacks on unions, and a series of significant actions by the former administration, have weakened worker protections and, in turn, destroyed the middle class.

That is why I was proud to just vote to pass the Protecting the Right to Organize Act, the most significant upgrade for workers' collective bargaining rights in more than 80 years.

If we are to fully recover from this deadly pandemic and build back better, we must invest in and protect the rights of our workers to unionize. American workers and their families are depending on us.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today on behalf of New York's renters and the far-too-many families who are struggling as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.

Hardworking New Yorkers who have lost their jobs and closed their businesses, through no fault of their own, now are struggling, too, to pay their rent.

The American Rescue Plan would provide more than $20 billion in total for emergency rental and utility assistance. This is in addition to the $25 billion provided in the December package.

The House took bold action last week by passing the American Rescue Plan, and I call on the Senate to pass it immediately and get it to the President's desk.

This is the lifeline our families and businesses so desperately need. Hope and health are on the way.

Madam Speaker, Eric Garner, George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, all Black men and women who were killed by police.

It is in their memory that I rise today in support of the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, because we cannot live up to our ideals of justice for all while BIPOC Americans are disproportionately killed by police.

We need to pass this bill to save lives, to reform qualified immunity, to ban no-knock warrants like the one that contributed to the death of Breonna Taylor, to end the use of choke holds that killed Eric Garner and George Floyd.

I urge all my colleagues to join me in voting to pass this long overdue bill, to join me in this work to make this country a safer, more just place for all Americans. I urge a ``yes'' vote.

Mr. Speaker, I strongly support H.R. 1, the For the People Act.

Included in this important legislation is the Vote by Mail Tracking Act, legislation I introduced to ensure that all ballots in Federal elections have a Postal Service barcode.

This would enable election officials and the public to track the status of a ballot from when it is put in the mail to when it is delivered, reducing anxiety, increasing accuracy, transparency, and accountability for our ballots.

After an election year with record-breaking numbers of Americans voting by mail, it has never been more critical to provide election officials and the public peace of mind that every vote matters and is counted accurately.

I urge overwhelming support for H.R. 1, which includes reforms across our Government that are critically important, and it includes this important bill, too.

Madam Speaker, I rise in strong support of this bill and of the 1.4 million first responders, teachers, transit workers, sanitation workers, and other public servants already laid off from State and local governments across this Nation. We must act before more people lose their jobs, and before more lifesaving programs are cut.

Madam Speaker, the State and local funding included in this package will provide many local governments dedicated support for the first time since this pandemic struck. It can be used to administer vaccines, increase testing, and save countless jobs by replacing lost revenue.

For New York City, which last month projected a $10.5 billion loss in expected tax revenue, this money would mean it can continue to provide vaccines and food assistance and reopen schools safely. Hundreds of local officials told us the relief in this bill will mean recovery instead of recession and cannot come fast enough. Taken together, this could be the light this-- The SPEAKER pro tempore. The time of the gentlewoman has expired.

The Chair would again remind all Members to heed the gavel.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of the Equality Act, long overdue legislation to continue the progress made under the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Fair Housing Act, the Equal Opportunity Act, and other vital laws that prohibit discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex or national origin.

These civil rights laws were passed to provide critical protections for people who unnecessarily live in fear and were unfairly persecuted simply because of who they were. They were passed because the promise of America--equal treatment under the law--was nonnegotiable. It is still nonnegotiable.

So with the Equality Act, we must take the next step to guarantee equal protection and rights under the law for all, no matter who you love or your gender identity. The Equality Act seeks to stamp out discrimination against the LGBTQIA community--something that we, unfortunately, see far too often.

Mr. Speaker, no one should face discrimination in employment, housing, education, public space, or federally funded programs because of who they are or who they love. I am proud to be an ally of the LGBTQIA community and have worked to advance these rights and protections with groups and individuals throughout my career in public service, including hiring an out, HIV positive, gay man to serve as my first Congressional chief of staff.

In 1986, while serving on the New York City Council, I introduced the first bill to legally recognize same-sex partnerships in New York State history, and I had to threaten the city of New York to even get the bill printed. City officials said the bill was unconstitutional and could not even be printed. And while we have made great progress--the bill was printed and passed since then--we still have work to do.

Mr. Speaker, I am proud that New York State recently enacted legislation to repeal the ``walking while trans'' ban, but we must ensure that the LGBTQIA community has these protections and equal rights all throughout the country. Access to equal rights should not depend on your ZIP Code.

Mr. Speaker, I urge all my colleagues to join me today in voting to pass the Equality Act so that every American, regardless of who they love has equal protection under the law.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of this Budget Resolution.

The pandemic has left millions of Americans hungry, homeless, or unable to make rent and mortgage payments. This resolution would provide critical support that is, quite literally, life or death.

It's a time to make life better for Americans who are hurting, using every tool available to us.

From extending eviction and foreclosure moratoriums, to supporting public transit like the Metropolitan Transportation Authority so my constituents can still get to work and healthcare appointments, we must act holistically.

Upon passage, the Oversight Committee will immediately get to work on one of the most important aspects of this package--providing desperately needed funding for states, local governments, tribes, and territories.

This money will allow these governments to help distribute vaccines, expand testing, keep frontline workers employed, and maintain vital services. It will also keep our economy afloat by allowing states, local governments, tribes, and territories to avoid laying off their employees en masse.

The Committee will include expanded emergency paid leave for federal employees, available for those who need to quarantine, isolate, or need to provide care due to the coronavirus.

We also will include funding for oversight and transparency efforts to ensure every taxpayer dollar included in this package is spent on its intended purpose.

The President's American Rescue plan would deal a decisive blow to this devastating pandemic, providing the resources that our families, communities, and economy need to survive.

We must do everything we can, as fast as we can, to get vaccines in arms, to get resources to struggling communities, and to get Americans back to work.