Mr. Speaker, I thank my sister Cori Bush for yielding. Mr. Speaker, I want to start by sending peace and love to this Chamber, peace and love to the American people, and, most importantly, peace and love to my family and to the incredible…
Mr. Speaker, I thank my sister Cori Bush for yielding.
Mr. Speaker, I want to start by sending peace and love to this Chamber, peace and love to the American people, and, most importantly, peace and love to my family and to the incredible people of New York- 16.
I have to send a special shout-out to my lovely wife, Melissa Oppenheimer Bowman. Thank you for supporting me, loving me, and putting up with me over the last 4 years. Thank you for taking care of our beautiful children back home, Jelani, Marcel, and Maya.
It is hard for someone to be working class in this Chamber, and I know every time I came to Washington, you became a single mom, getting up very early in the morning, getting our kids ready for school, dropping them off at the bus stop, and then going to serve the people of the Bronx as a third grade teacher.
You would teach all day, get off of work, pick our kids up from school, bring them home, start cooking dinner, help them with their homework, plan your lessons for the next day for your kids, and then put our kids to bed.
Then, when I was here trying to do the job of the district and when I didn't go straight home after work, you made sure I heard about it. When I didn't call you when I got back home, you made sure I heard about that, too.
I love you. Thank you, Melissa, for all you have done.
I also thank my constituents, each of them, for trusting me to be their voice and allowing me to fight for them every single day in Congress.
Though I will be leaving Congress formally, I plan to continue to fight for the people in New York-16, particularly in the areas of Port Chester, Greenburgh, Yonkers, Mount Vernon, New Rochelle, and, of course, the Bronx.
If it weren't for the people in these particular communities, especially the Bronx, where I served as an educator for 17 of the 20 years of my career, I would not have been prepared to come to Congress and serve the people.
Of course, I need to thank my team, both in New York and here in D.C., who worked every single day to do everything in their power to meet the needs of the people of New York-16.
Our case closure was exemplary. We brought tens of millions of dollars back to the district, and we did everything in our power to deal with the issues of affordability, gun violence, education, and so many other issues. I thank my staff and my team so much, and I thank them for their service.
In 2020, I became the first African American elected in the 16th District of New York in U.S. history. When I was running, I didn't even know that stat, which is pretty interesting.
As such, I stand on the shoulders of the giants who have come before me. My ancestors fought and died for me to have the opportunity to be here, and I am humbled by the immense honor and responsibility.
My ancestors built this place and built the strongest economy in the world as enslaved Africans in this country, and though we didn't pass any legislation related to reparations, we will continue to fight for reparations for Black people in this country.
I cannot go further without giving honor to my late mother, Ms. Pauline Bowman. My mother raised me and my three sisters alone. She was a civil servant in the post office for 33 years. She worked 6 days, sometimes 7 days a week and all the overtime she could muster to make sure that I was the first person in our family to go to college.
When I was very young, she told me--and I remember this story very clearly. We were coloring in a coloring book at the dining room table, and I could not color in between the lines. She could, and I thought it was like magic that she could.
I started crying. I was pretty upset. My mother looked me in the eye and told me I can be whatever I wanted to be.
It was that love and that confidence that she instilled in me that guided me and propelled me to win a historic election. She got to see me run. She got to see me win. She got to see me on her favorite news programs, CNN and MSNBC.
I would like to think that I made her proud before my sisters and I lost her to COVID on Valentine's Day in 2021.
Mom, Pauline Bowman, I love you. I thank you, and please continue to guide and watch over me.
It is a challenging world we live in, and I want to be the best example for my children and the people who I will continue to serve outside of this Chamber.
Mom, I love you. I always will love you. This place is better because of you and because of what you raised me to be.
Prior to being elected to Congress, I worked in education for 20 years as a
teacher, counselor, and middle school principal. My mission was to do everything in my power to unlock the unlimited potential of our kids.
My mission in Congress was to unlock the unlimited potential of a district that had been left behind for so long. I am proud of the transformational legislation we introduced and fought for that would uplift hardworking families across the country, particularly the most marginalized. From lowering costs to revolutionizing public education as we know it, the bills we introduced will be life-changing, and I am going to name a few.
My Green New Deal for public schools would heal and strengthen our schools and address the holistic needs of students to support healthy, safe, and high-quality learning opportunities. It is well past time that we put young people and public education at the center of our national response to the climate crisis, systemic racism, and economic inequality by passing this bill.
My Care for All Agenda would urge Federal investments to strengthen and expand the care economy, anchoring a transformation toward an economic system grounded in care for ourselves, our communities, and our planet instead of one grounded in money and power.
My Ending Corporate Greed Act would institute a windfall tax profits tax on corporations to penalize companies that use inflation as an excuse to raise prices and profit off the backs of hardworking Americans.
If we want to talk about truly transformational legislation that provides economic relief to the American people, puts money back in people's pockets, and charts a visionary path toward combating the challenges of the 21st century, then these bills are the place to start.
I hope that in the next Congress, my colleagues will have the courage to fight for these transformational pieces of legislation.
Otherwise, we have to ask ourselves, why are we here? What are we here for?
I will take a moment to talk about wealth inequality. The staggering wealth inequality we face today is not just a statistic; it is a reflection of decades of policy decisions and systemic failures that have left millions struggling while a few prosper.
Today, the two wealthiest individuals own more wealth than the bottom half of the country combined. This isn't because they worked harder than everyone else; it is the result of a system that prioritizes corporate profits over fair wages, tax cuts for the rich over investments in public goods, and financial markets over working families.
Wages for the average worker have barely risen in 40 years, while the cost of healthcare, housing, and education has skyrocketed. Meanwhile, those with generational wealth have used their influence to shape policies that protect their fortunes, while communities across America are left behind. This is not inevitable. It is a choice.
I will talk briefly about military spending for a moment. Tupac Shakur's words ring true today: ``They got money for wars but can't feed the poor.''
The U.S. spends over $886 billion annually on defense, more than the next 10 countries combined. Yet, millions of Americans struggle with poverty, housing insecurity, and access to childcare and education. Billions of dollars are wasted on over-budget weapons programs, failed projects, and unnecessary overseas military bases. We can and must reinvest our money in the American people.
Mr. Speaker, I will close with this: Never in my life did I think I would be elected to any office, let alone the United States House of Representatives. It was not on my to-do list or on my bucket list. I don't even know how I got here, quite frankly. I will say it was my work in education and my work with children and families over 20 years that helped me understand, on a visceral level, the deep, historic, systemic inequalities we have in our country that are policy decisions rooted in systemic discrimination.
To quote my sister, the great Ayanna Pressley: This body has committed policy violence toward communities of color and working-class people in our country. So my crazy butt decided I am going to run for office in 2019.
The reason why I got the confidence to do so is because I saw 4 incredible women run and win in 2018: Rashida Tlaib, Ilhan Omar, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and Ayanna Pressley. Four young women of color, a couple of them dark skinned, a couple of them Muslim, one wearing a hijab, transformed America in 2018 and they will continue to transform America for generations to come.
It is this body's responsibility to listen to them, learn from them, and follow their leadership because this country will never reach its full potential unless it follows the examples of these four women I just mentioned.
Mr. Speaker, I thank them so much for giving me a space and a platform and a footprint to be myself as I ran for office and won that historic election.
Then 2 years later, I was able to win and my sister, Cori Bush, was able to join me here in this incredible place. Then 2 years later, we got Delia Ramirez, Summer Lee, Greg Casar, and many others.
I am going to quote Ayanna Pressley again: Our squad is big, y'all, and our squad includes the entire country.
I will do everything in my power to continue to be an example for young people, working-class people, and people of color. I will do everything in my power to continue to be an example for young men, especially young Black men. We don't have to be rappers. We don't have to be athletes. We definitely don't have to be womanizers. Don't let the stereotypes drive you in that direction because we are fathers. We are husbands. We are sons. We are great people.
We will continue together to organize, mobilize, and build the movement rooted in love and humanity for ourselves, for our community, for this country, and for the world.
Mr. Speaker, I thank so much my sister, Cori, from St. Louis for allowing me a few words. I am excited for the work ahead of us. There is much more to come. Free Palestine, free the Bronx, and free all marginalized people, especially those locked up on trumped up marijuana charges. Let's also vacate the death row sentences of the 39 people on death row.
