Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I missed Roll Call votes No. 306 and No. 307 on December

1, 2025. Had I been present, my votes would have been: Yea on Roll Call No. 306 and Yea on Roll Call No. 307.

Mr. Speaker, thousands of girls, children, were abused by Jeffrey Epstein and his massive and powerful ring of pedophiles and protectors of pedophiles. We can't say all their names here. We don't have time. Let's at least bring a few of the courageous survivors and their names onto the House floor right here as we debate this: Haley Robson, Jena-Lisa Jones, Michelle Licata, Ashley Rubright, Annie Farmer, Marina Lacerda, and Rachel Benavidez.

These women have carried a burden that they never should have had to bear. Today, they demand, we demand, and the American people demand that we answer their clarion call to justice.

Today, despite all the giant coverup attempts by this administration and this Speaker of the House, we will vote to release all the Epstein files.

To be clear, there is no protection for pedophiles, no protection for the rich and powerful men of either party who participated, who turned a blind eye, and who winked and grinned while witnessing the horrific abuses of young children. Release all the damn files now.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to oppose this bill that allows health insurance premiums for 22 million American families to skyrocket and raises healthcare costs for everyone. Trump and his Republican cult of followers in Congress have unleashed a shameful crisis of cruelty and corruption on the American people.

First, they slash Medicaid by a trillion dollars, kicked 15 million Americans off of healthcare, set up the playboard for rural hospitals to shutter, all so that they could give $7 trillion in permanent tax breaks to their billionaire buddies.

Then they refused to negotiate with Democrats to extend the Affordable Care Act tax credits so that 22 million wouldn't have to choose between healthcare and rent. When we refused to go along with that, they caused this 45-day Republican shutdown, illegally refused to pay SNAP benefits for the hungry, and illegally canceled flights, throwing the country into chaos.

Trump and Republicans want to make Americans poorer and sicker, while Trump builds his gilded ballrooms, protects pedophiles, pardons those who buy his memecoins, and lets Americans starve. Shame on them. I am a ``hell-no'' on this bill.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong opposition to H.R. 3486.

This bill is Republicans' latest attempt to scapegoat and fearmonger about immigrants. With President Trump's poll numbers tanking on immigration due to his kidnapping and disappearing of immigrants and U.S. citizens off our streets, House Republicans are, once again, looking to turn the conversation back to immigration and the border.

I will point out the absurdity of spending this valuable floor time on a bill that has harsh and ineffective mandatory minimums for immigrants while the majority effects one of the greatest coverups of our time, covering up the horrific abuses of Jeffrey Epstein and his network of child traffickers and sexual predators.

Why not spend our time focused on justice for the incredibly brave survivors who have spoken out against the rich and powerful men who abused them?

Why fight a bipartisan discharge petition from Thomas Massie and Ro Khanna to release all of the damned files, not just the ones that the Trump's DOJ allows to be released?

Why not speak out against the cushy deal that Ghislaine Maxwell just got from Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche to move to a cushy prison instead of serving her time as one of Epstein's main co-conspirators and groomers of young girls to be abused by Epstein and his cohort of rich and powerful men?

Obviously, once again, my colleagues across the aisle want to try to distract us by returning to their tried-and-true playbook of demonizing immigrants. That is not actually what the American people want. We have seen over and over again that the American people actually support immigration, despite all of the lies that come from the other side.

This summer, a Gallup poll noted a record high, 79 percent, of U.S. adults say that immigration is a good thing for the country. A Pew poll showed 64 percent of Americans disapprove of President Trump's suspension of most asylum applications, which was ruled unlawful in Federal court.

The American people now see that the Trump administration has continually lied about what they are going to do on immigration. According to a CBS poll, a majority of Americans believe that the Trump administration is not prioritizing the removal of dangerous criminals and public safety threats, and nearly 60 percent disapprove of how the Trump administration is using immigration detention facilities.

This is not surprising in the least. As the ranking member said, ICE's own data revealed that roughly 65 percent of people in immigration detention have zero criminal convictions--zero.

It is clear that this administration is not targeting the so-called worst of the worst, as President Trump claimed on the campaign trail. Instead, they are targeting everyone that they think they may be able to deport.

Tom Homan, the President's so-called border czar, said that arresting noncriminals is `` . . . our job.''

In Los Angeles, ICE has been racially profiling people, indiscriminately arresting and holding people, causing fear and terror in people of every legal status who simply look Latino or speak Spanish or congregate on certain corners.

Today's bill is just more of the same scapegoating and lying about immigrants. Once again, the majority implies that, somehow, we don't already have consequences for unlawful entry and reentry. That is absolutely false. Current law already includes harsh sentences and are some of the most prosecuted laws in our country every single year. This bill would add ridiculous mandatory minimum sentences, potentially going up to life, onto the crimes of unlawful entry and reentry.

Mr. Speaker, this makes no sense on multiple levels. If the administration is seeking to deport ``the worst of the worst,'' why put them into incarceration facilities? Perhaps this is just another ploy to give private, for-profit prison companies more money so that they can build more facilities, make more profit, and, ultimately, contribute more to the Republican campaign coffers.

In addition, as the ranking member said in his statement, mandatory minimums just do not work. We have actually seen this over and over again. Harsh enforcement is not the answer. I don't know why my colleagues are having such a hard time with this.

The first Trump administration actually tried to weaponize unlawful entry prosecutions by separating over 5,000 children from their parents. The entire country--Republican, Independent, and Democrat--was horrified at this, and the administration, ultimately, had to abandon their family separation policy.

Still, today, over 1,000 of these kids remain separated from their parents. Yet, despite this despicable, absurdly cruel policy, a 2018 study found zero--zero statistically significant relationship between the family separation policy and the number of apprehensions at the border.

These kinds of indiscriminate, harsh enforcement efforts are a waste of taxpayer dollars and detrimental to the kind of country that we are trying to create. The U.S. already has the highest incarceration rate of any country in the world, and it costs U.S. taxpayers about $182 billion every year, not to mention the social cost to lock up nearly 1 percent of the adult population. This bill would skyrocket that number.

Actually, it was during the first Trump term that Republicans joined Democrats in actually rolling back some mandatory minimum sentences in the First Step Act that was signed by--guess who--President Donald Trump himself in 2018. Yet, I guess all good policy is, once again, falling to the feet of the divisive political rhetoric around immigrants and crime that my colleagues across the aisle have embraced as their salvo to save them from the bleak economic picture that our country faces today: higher joblessness; Trumpflation; a host of reckless policies, including trade wars, that have cost the American people.

The Republican big, bad betrayal bill is unpopular everywhere in the country no matter how you spin it because Americans know that kicking 17 million Americans off of healthcare just so you can give a $7 trillion tax break to the wealthiest billionaire donors and giant corporations is outrageous, and the American people want us to roll it back.

Madam Speaker, in just 19 days, government funding expires. Right now, Americans across the country face rural hospitals that are closing, higher prices for back-to-school supplies, and double-digit increases in healthcare premiums. What is the Republican majority spending their time on? This terrible bill.

What a giant abdication of the huge responsibility that the American people put on us here in Congress.

Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to oppose this bill.

Mr. Speaker, I missed Roll Call votes No. 213 and No. 214 on July 21, 2025. Had I been present, my votes would have been: Nay on Roll Call No. 213, and Yea on Roll Call No. 214.

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to amend the rule to make in order the amendment at the desk that protects against any cuts to Medicaid and SNAP.

Madam Speaker, I rise in strong opposition to H.R. 875.

I, too, take DUIs extremely seriously. According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, approximately 37 people die in drunk driving incidents every day in the United States. As the ranking member has just been noting, there are many things that we can and should do to prevent driving under the influence.

Also, as the ranking member has pointed out, all of these truly horrifying and tragic stories that we are hearing about from the other side are stories that already render an immigrant deportable right now. If you kill somebody right now, you serve your time and then are deported.

We just had a hearing this morning on how the Trump administration is literally dismissing cases for people who are in a legal process for immigration just so they can deport them. They can certainly also do that for somebody who has been convicted of drunk driving and is serving out their sentence. They could take that case and deport that person immediately if they wanted to.

Scapegoating immigrants is what this bill does. It scapegoats immigrants by making a single misdemeanor DUI subject to the extremely serious punishment of deportation. It is simply not an appropriate response.

The bill also applies to all immigrants, including lawful permanent residents, people who Republican colleagues across the aisle have claimed to like, the ones that they said came here the right way. It gives no recognition whatsoever to the patchwork of differences and overbroad statutes of what actually constitutes a DUI across the country in different States.

It is important to recognize first that serious public safety threats are already deportable offenses. We have been talking about this, but it is important to say it again. Again, the cases that are being brought up are cases where those people are already deportable under current immigration law.

Many serious DUI crimes are considered what is called a crime involving moral turpitude and, therefore, already make someone removable or inadmissible. This bill does not recognize how widely DUI laws differ across the country and the extremely low bar that is set to receive a DUI conviction in some States.

For example, in Arizona, the DUI statute allows people to be charged with a DUI if they are intoxicated and have ``physical control'' of their vehicle. This issue came to a head in the Ninth Circuit, which, in reviewing an appeal of a removal case for a noncitizen who was charged under this law, found that the physical control language meant that under this statute: ``One may be convicted under it for sitting in one's own car in one's own driveway with the key in the ignition and a bottle of beer in one's hand.''

While the person in this case had been ordered deported because his conviction under Arizona law constituted a crime involving moral turpitude, the Ninth Circuit overturned that ruling because the actions covered by the law could not all reasonably be seen as crimes involving moral turpitude.

As the court put it: ``Drunken driving is despicable. Having physical control of a car while drinking is not.''

Madam Speaker, if this bill had been law at the time, the case would have never reached the Ninth Circuit because no judge would have had the discretion to rule whether this so-called crime merited deportation. This bill would prevent judges from being able to decide if the punishment fits the crime.

In my home State of Washington, we have a similar law where someone can be convicted of a misdemeanor DUI without actually driving a vehicle. While Republicans might wave away our concerns by saying that prosecutors have the discretion to not bring charges under these circumstances, we know about this case precisely because prosecutors chose to file charges and it went to court.

This bill does not recognize under these overbroad DUI statutes the individuals who have made a conscious choice not to drive. They have gone to a party. They have had a couple of beers. They realize they should not drive. They go and sit in their car to sleep it off.

Under this bill, those people who have made that conscious choice not to drive impaired may be charged with DUIs simply for sleeping in their car.

I ask my Republican colleagues: How many of them have constituents or friends or neighbors who have sat in their cars after leaving the bar to stay warm? We know how cold Midwest winters get. Should we really criminalize people for staying warm in their cars and sleeping off a hangover? Under this bill, people would now be subjected to deportation.

During markup and at the Committee on Rules, I submitted an amendment.

During markup and at the Committee on Rules, I submitted an amendment to ensure that immigration judges have the discretion to decide if a DUI conviction actually merits deportation for green card holders and others here lawfully.

It would have allowed judges to merely consider mitigating factors, such as if anyone was harmed or the length of time since they were convicted of a DUI. This is a commonsense amendment that would have made the bill substantially fairer. Unfortunately, the amendment was rejected.

There are Members and former Members of this body right here in Congress who have been arrested and convicted of a DUI, and I would just ask that the charity and the grace that we extend for second chances to those people would extend also to those green card holders, including those who have been here for decades. Let's just give a judge the chance to determine whether their conviction merited deportation, let alone that second chance.

Madam Speaker, this bill does nothing but scapegoat immigrants for so-called DUIs, and I urge my colleagues to reject the bill.

Mr. Speaker, this rescissions package is all about going back on the agreements that Republicans just made in March. It is about the fact that Congress had approved this funding before Elon Musk took a literal chain saw, an illegal chain saw, to foreign aid and public broadcasting and a whole bunch of other things that Americans care about. Then guess what? The courts said no.

Now, Trump has ordered his minions here in this House to go back on their own agreements and undermine their own authority to appropriate money, all so that they can legitimize his sometimes shadow president, Elon Musk.

This is yet another betrayal bill. It slashes U.S. USAID funding even more, and the cuts have already killed 300,000 people across the world. It will kill even more. It destroys our global leadership, and it is yet another attack on free speech in our country by slashing money for public TV and broadcasting that are many Americans' only source of news, weather, and children's programming.

Vote ``no'' on this bill. It is another betrayal.

Mr. Speaker, this bill is a massive betrayal of working people and poor people across America. It strips at least 14 million Americans of their healthcare. It slashes food for the hungry, and it cuts basic needs for Americans across the country.

Why? It is so that you can give a $5 trillion tax break to the wealthiest billionaires, like Elon Musk.

If you had a giant corporate lobby outside, you get a tax break. If you are in the top 0.1 of 1 percent of billionaires, you get a $398,000 tax break. If you are a millionaire, you get an average $83,000 tax break.

Yet, if you are a working person or a poor person, you are SOL. You get kicked off of your healthcare. You don't get the $2 a meal in SNAP benefits, and you get hungrier. You get poorer. You get sicker.

Here is the thing: If you are so proud about this bill, why are we debating it at 1 o'clock in the morning and 3 o'clock in the morning? Why are these schedules getting rigged so that people don't even get to see what we are doing here in this Chamber?

I am a ``hell no.''

Mr. Speaker, I missed Roll Call Votes No. 123 and Roll Call No. 124 on May 13, 2025. Had I been present, my votes would have been Yea on Roll Call No. 123, and Yea on Roll Call No. 124.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize and honor Dow Constantine, who is stepping down after 16 years of service as King County Executive. Throughout his tenure, Dow has been a transformative leader, driving significant progress in our region with a relentless focus on equity, sustainability, and community well-being. His leadership has made a lasting impact not only in King County, but throughout our entire region. Thanks to Dow's leadership and his commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion, Martin Luther King, Jr. County will remain a welcoming place for all to thrive.

Dow has brought significant positive change to King County. A few notable achievements including the creation of a bold climate action plan, protecting immigrant communities, expanding affordable housing, leading efforts to address homelessness, advancing mental health initiatives and promoting sustainable transportation. His administration created over

3,800 affordable housing units and acquired 1,400 supportive housing units through the Health Through Housing program. Dow supported the creation of the King County Immigrant and Refugee Commission (KCIRC), provided funding to immigrant-serving organizations and reinforced King County's commitment to being a welcoming community. He launched the Crisis Care Centers initiative, providing essential care and reducing the burden on emergency rooms and jails. Dow's commitment to environmental conservation resulted in the protection of 30,000 acres of land and the restoration of 500 acres of fish and wildlife habitat, including the successful resurgence of the Kokanee salmon population. Through his advocacy for sustainable transportation, he expanded King County Metro with the launch of eight RapidRide routes and growing the Link Light Rail network to 51 stations.

Dow's leadership has always been grounded in the values of equity, public service and collaboration. His legacy will continue to inspire future leaders to carry forward the work of building a stronger community that serves all people. As he moves on to serve as CEO of Sound Transit, I ask my colleagues to join me in celebrating Dow's accomplishments and service to our country. On behalf of Washington's 7th Congressional District, I thank Dow for making King County a more inclusive, sustainable, and just place to live.

Mr. Speaker, the Republican majority leader said: You can be what you want in America.

That is what he said, but you can't be what you want in Republicans' America. Factually, the top 1 percent of billionaires and millionaires in America are worth more than 291 million Americans, 90 percent of the country, because we are rigging the economy against them. That is what Republicans are doing.

There are 801 U.S. billionaires who have $6 trillion of wealth, and Republicans now want to give a $4.5 trillion tax cut to the wealthiest billionaires.

That is what Donald Trump said: ``You're rich as hell.'' ``We're going to give you tax cuts.'' This is on the backs of working Americans because voting ``yes'' for this resolution is voting for a minimum of $880 billion in cuts to Medicaid.

That is healthcare taken away from 72 million Americans. That is nursing homes taken away for five out of eight seniors, and that is healthcare taken away for 38 million kids. Vote ``no'' on this disastrous Republican resolution.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to H.R. 1526, a bill that would prohibit district courts from issuing nationwide injunctions.

My colleagues on the other side of the aisle want you to believe that somehow these nationwide injunctions being issued by courts across the country against Donald Trump's illegal and unconstitutional actions are unfair. Well, here is the message. If you don't like the injunctions, don't do illegal, unconstitutional stuff. That is simple.

Nationwide injunctions play an essential role in protecting our democracy and holding the political branches accountable. Without them, thousands or millions of people could be harmed by these illegal or unconstitutional government policies.

Just look at Donald Trump's attempt to end birthright citizenship. In a lawsuit brought in my home State of Washington, a Reagan-appointed Federal judge--not a Democratic-appointed Federal judge, a Reagan- appointed Federal judge--ruled that the order was blatantly unconstitutional because the 14th Amendment plainly states that all persons born in the United States are U.S. citizens.

What is next, stripping citizenship from U.S. citizens? That is in the Trump extremist playbook, as well. So is apparently kidnapping and disappearing people, including those with legal status, without any due process, as well as getting rid of entire departments established by Congress and suppressing freedom of speech and dissent.

These are the hallmarks of an authoritarian who wants to hold all power, and the courts are doing what they are supposed to do and issuing nationwide injunctions against this kind of abuse of power.

Somehow, my colleagues never complained about nationwide injunctions when dozens were issued against former Presidents Obama and Biden, but now that it is against Donald Trump, they want to rig the rules to give the President free rein to do whatever he wants, regardless of whether it is illegal or unconstitutional.

Well, get this: We do not have kings in America.

Vote ``no'' on this bill.

Mr. Speaker, I missed Roll

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for leading this conversation about how we can stand up

for our people and unrig the economy. That is economic patriotism.

I want to be very clear. Our economy has been rigged by giant corporations and the wealthiest for way too long, and as these corporations consolidate more power, the rich get richer, and everyone else is just struggling to get by just on the basics. They need groceries, housing, healthcare, basic medications.

Private insurance companies are now buying up your local healthcare clinics and doctors' offices. In my home State of Washington, a handful of healthcare systems control 90 percent of hospital beds. What does that mean? It means that people are seeing their costs triple while the quality of care goes down all so that Big Pharma and corporate CEOs can pad their already overflowing pockets.

Mergers are pushing independent grocery stores out of business. Today, just a few supermarket chains control all of the grocery stores in the country. Albertsons and Kroger, two of the big grocery chains, actually tried to merge, and I was so proud to lead the amicus brief with other Members of Congress to actually oppose that merger. Thanks to Democrats and the FTC under Lina Khan, we were able to stop that merger because we know and we have seen that when these mergers happen, corporations shut down stores, they fire workers, and they raise prices.

Look at the housing market. When rents are sky high and there literally is not a single place in the country where someone can afford rent on minimum wage, private equity is coming in to buy up the apartments and colluding to drive up the rents so it is even more unaffordable to keep a roof over your head.

It wasn't always this way.

From World War II to the late 1970s, we actually rigorously enforced our antitrust laws to ensure that mom-and-pop businesses had a chance to compete against these megacompanies. Consumers had choices, and workers had good jobs. You know what? Our economy actually grew.

Starting with Republican President Ronald Reagan, that antitrust enforcement dwindled down, and large corporations took over. Today, income and wealth inequality are higher than they have been in a century.

Mr. Speaker, 2 months into the Trump administration, wages are still low, and prices are still high. It does not need to be this way. In the richest country in the world we do not suffer from scarcity, we suffer from greed, and we have to be willing to take that on. We must take on corporate power and corruption and make a meaningful difference in the everyday lives of working people.

We have to lower prices so that everyone can have a roof over their heads, put food on their table, send their kids for an education, and retire with dignity. We have to have living wages for every worker, and we have to tax the billionaires so that they just pay a little bit more of their fair share like everyone else is doing.

We can and have to break up the largest corporations so they can't keep screwing regular people. We have got to stand up and fight back against corruption, against greed, against consolidation, and for the American people to have that American Dream.

That is economic patriotism. That is what we are going to fight for, and I am so grateful to my colleague from Pennsylvania for making sure we put that out there.