Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, the Islamic Republic is a barbaric, corrupt regime that has murdered, imprisoned, and terrorized its own people for decades.

As the daughter of Iranian immigrants who fled this regime, I know personally what its violence means. Members of my family and friends have been brutalized and murdered by the Islamic Republic. My grandfather was imprisoned by the regime, and my family member was beheaded by them. The horror stories go on.

Let me be very clear: I have spent my entire life opposing the Islamic Republic and its brutality, and I celebrate

the death of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.

At the same time, as an American Congresswoman, who swore an oath to the United States Constitution, I am deeply concerned by President Trump's decision to launch an illegal war--because it is, in fact, illegal--against Iran without congressional authorization and without presenting a clear plan to the American people.

War carries profound and deadly consequences for our troops, for the American people, and for the entire world. It is the most serious decision that a nation can make. The American people deserve debate, transparency, and accountability before that decision is made.

The Constitution is clear: the power to declare war rests with Congress. I want nothing more than a free Iran and safety and security for innocent Iranians. That requires more than force. It requires seriousness, accountability, and a real plan to support the Iranian people in determining their own future.

Donald Trump has shown at every instance that freedom for the people of Iran is not his priority. Every few hours the administration jumps to a new justification or objective for this war, but never is a democratic transition and self-determination for Iranians a part of the discussion. This was echoed last night by senior administration officials at the briefing to Members of Congress.

Ultimately, this vote is about the legitimacy of our democracy and our Constitution, and that is why I will be voting ``yes'' on the War Powers Resolution.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to recognize the incredible accomplishments of one of my district's most talented public servants and the amazing organization that she helms.

Monique Lopez was recently appointed as CEO of UMOM New Day Center. UMOM New Day Center was founded in 1964 and has grown into one of the largest and most sustained providers of services for people experiencing homelessness in the Phoenix metro area.

Every night, UMOM provides safe shelter and supportive services for nearly 800 individuals, including 155 families and 130 single women, while offering more than 900 units of affordable housing across the valley.

UMOM also provides employment and job support through readiness programs, case management to help navigate the complexities of the housing crisis, and onsite services for childcare and healthcare.

By combining shelter services with jobs, housing support, and wraparound services, UMOM helps clients not just survive crises but build sustainable and happy futures.

Monique has been an incredible leader. Under her leadership, UMOM will continue to shine in its mission to restore hope, rebuild lives, and end homelessness in Maricopa County.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today with outrage and with grief.

Yesterday, not even a full week into the new year, ICE murdered a U.S. citizen, Renee Nicole Good, after shooting her multiple times as she was seemingly attempting to drive away, blocking her from medical care, and letting her die, while a doctor stood by offering to help.

The video of this tragedy is damning. I encourage every American to watch it and make their own judgment.

A woman is dead. A child has been left without a parent. A community is shattered. The American people are left, once again, demanding answers from an agency that has shown time and time again that it operates without accountability.

Mr. Speaker, what happened to Renee Good in Minneapolis demands a full, independent, and immediate investigation.

I represent Arizona's Third Congressional District, a diverse and rich community of immigrants. For over a year now, ICE has been terrorizing my constituents. No agency is above the law. Yet ICE is now the most well-funded law enforcement agency in the United States, receiving more funding than most militaries around the world, while operating with virtually no meaningful checks and balances.

In the immediate aftermath of Renee Good's death, the Trump administration did what it does best. It lied. Kristi Noem and Stephen Miller rushed to smear a dead woman as a ``domestic terrorist,'' while Donald Trump took to Truth Social to gaslight the American people, asking them to deny their own eyes and accept his version of events instead.

This is what authoritarianism looks like. This is what happens when the leader of a nation turns a Federal agency into his personal paramilitary force against the civilian population of the United States.

Donald Trump has weaponized ICE, not to keep communities safe but to terrorize them. Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey has called for ICE to vacate his city, and I echo that call. People in our communities don't feel safe because they are not safe.

In my district on Christmas Eve, a woman named Flor, a DACA recipient, was detained while Christmas shopping. Why is ICE spending resources to detain a DACA recipient on Christmas Eve? They claim they are going after ``real criminals.'' That, too, is a lie.

Just days ago, ICE detained two day laborers outside a Home Depot in Phoenix, briefly detaining a U.S. citizen in the process. These people are not criminals. This isn't law enforcement. This is a Federal agency operating outside of its mandate, using fear as a tactic to spread fear and chaos in our neighborhoods.

It is no coincidence because Stephen Miller is rapidly hiring tens of thousands of new ICE agents. Many are poorly trained. Many have troubling backgrounds. This is all to meet this reckless mass deportation agenda that he has set out.

We have been sounding the alarm for well over a year, and now the worst has happened. An American woman has died. That is why I am introducing legislation to rein in ICE, demand transparency, and stop the unchecked funding that enables these abuses.

I am also joining as an original cosponsor in an effort led by my colleague Congresswoman Robin Kelly to introduce Articles of Impeachment against Kristi Noem, the Secretary of

the Department of Homeland Security. I urge my colleagues, Democrat and Republican alike, to join us.

A woman has been murdered. Silence is no longer neutrality. It is complicity. We must rein in ICE. We must demand accountability. We must protect our communities from this abuse of power.

Mr. Speaker, I thank Representatives Rivas and Randall for hosting this Special Order hour.

Mr. Speaker, I represent Phoenix, Glendale, and Guadalupe, communities where families are working hard every single day to stay afloat. Across this country, including throughout Arizona, millions of families are struggling to afford basic healthcare. With costs rising on everything that they need to live, housing, food, and childcare, they have been through enough.

The ACA enhanced premium tax credits were a lifeline for these families, but Republican inaction allowed these tax credits to expire on December 31 because they don't care about regular people.

The consequences were immediate. For many families in Arizona, ACA marketplace premiums have already more than doubled as a result of Republican negligence. That means parents are skipping doctors' appointments for their babies, seniors are reconsidering prescriptions, and families are facing the very real possibility of going uninsured.

Take Cricket, for example, a constituent in my district. At 63, Cricket is self-employed and not yet eligible for Medicare. She has relied on ACA coverage for 8 years, paying $350 a month.

Last year, she suffered a head injury that required emergency care, and ACA kept her bill around $1,000 instead of $10,000, saving her from potential bankruptcy. She fears rising premiums. The ACA is her lifeline, and without it, she could lose her home and everything else that she has built.

Today, the House of Representatives finally voted to extend these enhanced premium tax credits for 3 years. Despite 17 Republicans standing up to Donald Trump and to their own leadership, I want to point out that not a single Republican from Arizona's delegation chose to put their constituents first and extend the lifesaving subsidies. That is egregious, and that is unacceptable.

There is still so much more work to do, even after today's passage in this House. We must apply pressure to the United States Senate to pass a clean 3-year extension of these ACA tax credits.

Arizonans cannot afford any more delays. Let's be clear: Extending these tax credits is necessary, but it is certainly not enough. We need to pass Medicare for All. We are the richest country in the world, and we pay more for healthcare per person than any other developed nation.

On average, we spend at least double per person as countries like the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, and Japan spend on healthcare, so we should be the healthiest. We are not. We are 48th in the world for life expectancy.

Do you know, Mr. Speaker, what most of the countries doing better and paying less than us have in common? They have universal healthcare. Americans' physical and financial health depend on us doing the same.

It is time to take real action to bring down healthcare costs for Arizonans and for people all across the United States. That means Medicare for All before more Americans lose their healthcare or go into medical debt.

Madam Speaker, only in the United States of America do we now have college students who have survived not one but two school shootings.

That is the reality for students at Brown University right now, students like Zoe Weissman, who was a middle schooler at the school next to Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School during the Parkland massacre. Years later, she found herself again facing an active shooter on a college campus. Mia Tretta was shot as a teenager at Saugus High School and survived, and now, she has lived through yet another school shooting at Brown.

Let that sink in: Two shootings in one lifetime, all before graduating college.

We cannot allow ourselves to become numb to this. This level of trauma is not normal. It is not inevitable. It is not acceptable.

If we are serious about protecting young people in America, Congress must act now. That means universal background checks, a ban on assault weapons designed for mass killing, cracking down on ghost guns, and investing in mental health and safe storage policies grounded in data.

I will say it again. This is not inevitable.

Mr. Speaker, had I been present, I would have voted NAY on Roll Call No. 314.

Mr. Speaker, I thank Congresswoman Ramirez for her leadership.

Mr. Speaker, the Trump regime's mass deportation agenda is not about public safety. It is part of a much bigger story of corruption, cruelty, and abuse of power that defines Trump's America.

Earlier this year, Congress authorized a massive slush fund under Trump's so-called big, beautiful bill, pouring more than $170 billion of taxpayer money into enforcement and detention center expansion without any sort of meaningful oversight.

At the heart of this system sits a vast network of privatized detention facilities run by private prison corporations, like CoreCivic and GEO Group, whose bottom lines depend on filling these beds. These companies are awarded government contracts worth billions of dollars, yet their facilities are notorious for cutting corners on healthcare, food, and safety in order to maximize shareholder profits.

I have seen this firsthand at the Eloy Detention Center in Arizona run by CoreCivic. I have talked to dozens of women who have been detained there. They shared with me their testimonies about lack of clean drinking water, lack of air conditioning during Arizona's extreme heat, racist inhumane treatment, and of course my constituent Yari, who was a green card holder who has leukemia, has been detained there and refused access to an oncologist for 6 months until direct outreach from our office and the community's input as well.

This is all, again, all about shareholder profit. CoreCivic, for example, had a revenue of $530 million during the second quarter of this year alone, an almost 10 percent increase from 2024.

Meanwhile, GEO Group's chairman said: Republicans' new slush fund for ICE would provide ``unprecedented growth opportunities.''

CoreCivic's CEO Damon Hininger stated in shareholder calls that this is a ``pivotal moment,'' and that ``business is perfectly aligned with demands of this moment.'' That is disgusting.

Donald Trump's cruelty against immigrants has transformed human misery into both a political spectacle and a business model. The more people that are detained, the more money private corporations make, and the more campaign contributions and political power flow directly back to Donald Trump and those who fund this system.

This is Trump's corruption machine turning our immigration system into a pay-to-play racket for his donors. Meanwhile, families across the country are paying the price, and parents are torn from their children, leaving households and communities economically devastated. Taxpayers in this country are footing the bill for a system not designed to keep us safe, but to funnel money into the pockets of a powerful few.

It does not have to be this way. We can invest in alternatives to detention centers that are proven to be more humane and effective. We can end blank checks for ICE and stop the privatization of immigration detention centers once and for all, and we can finally reject the lie that Trumpian cruelty is security because in America, our safety should never come second to a billion dollar corporation's profit.

Mr. Speaker, the walls are closing in on Donald Trump and his rich and powerful friends who either abused or raped children or who were enabling and complicit in these heinous crimes for decades.

This vote today matters, but here is the truth: Donald Trump could direct the Department of Justice to release the files today. He is choosing not to. Led by Oversight and Government Reform Democrats, they are already under subpoena and have refused. This is an ongoing cover- up by the Trump White House. Mike Johnson and the White House have been complicit.

Mr. Speaker, what is Trump hiding? Why not release the files today? Release the files today.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to call for empathy in the wake of fear-driven hate. Fear has become the air we breathe in America.

Parents breathe it as they drop their kids at school, wondering if today will be the day they get a call that no parent should ever get. Teachers breathe it, walking into classrooms, rehearsing how they might shield their students.

Immigrant families breathe it in their own neighborhoods where ICE raids at schools and festivals turn everyday life into a source of terror. Transgender Americans breathe it just stepping outside, never knowing if they will be targeted for simply existing as themselves.

Journalists and everyday Americans breathe it for simply exercising their free speech rights. Elected leaders, including myself, breathe it after watching colleagues and public figures gunned down in front of their families.

This is the America we are living in right now, and this is not okay. We don't need to agree with someone's politics to say that their murder is a tragedy. The assassination of Charles Kirk, the murders of Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband, and the countless children lost to school shootings, are not partisan issues. These are human tragedies.

Violence against any American is violence against us all. Yet what did we hear in the immediate aftermath? We didn't have space for grace or respect for families left behind. We heard Fox News hosts declare this is a war.

Mr. Speaker, that is not what America needs right now. That instinct to weaponize tragedy betrays our humanity because political disagreements, even vast ideological differences, never justify violence.

The assassination of Charlie Kirk is a reminder of the imminent threat that having so many guns in our society poses to all of us, not just to our immediate safety, but to our freedom and our democracy. Violence cannot heal division. History teaches us that it only deepens it.

Somewhere along the way we have lost our empathy. We started debating which families deserve protection, which communities deserve safety, and which children deserve dignity. That is not who we are supposed to be.

Empathy is not weakness. Empathy is strength, and empathy is action. It is action against the epidemic of loneliness that leaves millions disconnected and vulnerable, a crisis that fuels despair and radicalization.

We need to invest in connection in this country: in schools, in civic spaces, in mental health services, and in communities where people can see one another as human beings again.

Empathy is action against the viciousness of unchecked social media. Cruelty isn't an accident of these platforms. It is their business model.

When algorithms reward division and hate, that hate doesn't stay online. It shows up in our streets, in our schools, and in our politics.

Congress cannot keep looking away while Big Tech profits from tearing our communities apart. Empathy is action against gun violence, the fear that stalks every one of us. It stalks every school, every community, and every public gathering.

Enough with the excuses. Enough is enough.

Children's lives are worth more than the profits of gun manufacturers. We need commonsense gun safety laws, and we need funding for mental health care.

We cannot weaponize tragedy to silence dissent. When hate and fear are unleashed, then nobody is safe. Today it may be immigrants; tomorrow, transgender Americans; last week, a conservative political leader. Hate corrodes the bonds of belonging for all of us.

I am asking my colleagues: Resist the temptation to harden your hearts. Choose empathy instead. Choose courage over cruelty. Choose action over indifference.

That is because our strength as a nation will never be measured by how viciously we fight one another, but how deeply we care for one another. Let this moment of grief be a call to empathy, to decency, and to action.

Mr. Speaker, this week I offered four commonsense amendments, several with bipartisan support, that would have made the fiscal year 2026 National Defense Authorization Act stronger and more responsible.

I want to specifically highlight two of these important amendments for you all in the limited time that I have.

The first amendment would have included a penalty in law for using artificial intelligence to impersonate Federal officials. This provision is identical to a bipartisan bill I introduced early this year titled: the AI Impersonation Prevention Act. I introduced this bill to safeguard national security from the clear danger of the misuse of AI to impersonate Federal officials.

There have been multiple recent incidents of AI being used to falsely impersonate Federal officials, posing a very serious threat to our national security.

Recently, an imposter using AI attempted to contact high-level U.S. security personnel pretending to be Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

AI will only continue to be more powerful and accessible, so we must act now to establish strict guardrails and accountability. That is why we need this amendment.

As AI continues to become more widely adopted and more sophisticated, measures such as this amendment will ensure that we have critical trust in the messages and content we all receive on a daily basis and that there are penalties for the abuse of this very powerful technology.

The second amendment I want to highlight speaks to a deeply disturbing issue that we all, both Republicans and Democrats, should be horrified by. This is about the Trump administration's deportation of veterans and servicemembers, including an Iraq war veteran detained by ICE in my district, Arizona's Third.

Veterans are the best of us, our most patriotic Americans. This amendment to the NDAA would have required a study by the Defense Department and other relevant agencies on the procedures in place to assist noncitizen servicemembers with their citizenship applications.

Ultimately, this disregard for the welfare of veterans and servicemembers stems from the top. I am disappointed but not surprised that none of my important amendments were allowed to be considered on the floor by House Republicans.

Mr. Speaker, I want you to imagine for a moment that a person is going to the grocery store, grabbing coffee, or picking their child up from school.

Instead of running errands or waiting for the school bell like usual, that individual is surrounded by masked men who scream at them, shove them to the ground, threaten them with weapons, and throw them into the back of a car.

People are calling out for help, asking where that person is being taken. Authorities refuse to answer. The person has no idea where they are going, who these people are, or when or if they will ever see their family again.

Mr. Speaker, imagine if you, or worse, your child, experienced the terror, the fear, and the blind pain of being kidnapped off the street.

For many of my constituents, this is a horrific reality that they are dealing with every single day. ICE is terrorizing our communities. They are kidnapping people off of the streets, tearing families apart, and destroying futures to meet insane daily quotas enacted by Donald Trump.

Just a few weeks ago, Republicans in Congress passed a massive budget that funnels billions of new dollars to ICE. This money makes ICE the largest domestic police force in the United States with more resources than dozens of militaries around the entire world.

This funding is unprecedented, and it is a free pass for ICE to ramp up Trump's cruel and inhumane mass deportation policies.

They are already building concentration camps in Florida where they are threatening to lock up legal immigrants and Latinos from across the country. I have visited facilities like this.

On May 29, I went to the Eloy Detention Center just outside my district. I met with women who wanted to and, frankly, were desperate to share their stories with me.

One was a green card holder who had been pulled over for a traffic stop. When they learned of her status, they stripped her of her green card and threw her into ICE detention without another thought. She had been trying to reach her family for months.

Another woman told me a story about a guard taking all of the women out into the blazing Arizona heat. He forced them to march in circles for hours without water. One woman fainted and needed medical attention.

While they marched, the guard yelled at them: This is the price of the American Dream.

It should not matter who these women are. It should not matter whether they are citizens, legal residents, or undocumented people trying to make a life for themselves.

It is shameful and embarrassing for our country that we would treat any human being like this. The detention centers and the facilities in this country are atrocious. They have absolutely zero oversight mechanisms in place.

More than a month later, after formally inquiring to the Department of Homeland Security and ICE about the conditions that I saw firsthand, I have yet to receive a response.

People are being harassed. They are being dehumanized. They are being abused.

Last weekend, I tried to return to Eloy to meet with several constituents of mine who are detained there.

I wanted to meet with a woman named Yari who has chronic lymphocytic leukemia. She has been detained at Eloy since February and has lost 55 pounds while in detention. She needs help.

I also hoped to meet with a man who has been coughing up blood for weeks.

Lastly, I wanted to meet with a 35-year-old woman with a kidney infection who says her antibiotics are not working and her condition is worsening.

Even after ICE put in place new protocols to make it more difficult for us to do our job and our oversight work, we tried to follow their new rules. I gave them ample notice of my visit and a list of constituents that I hoped to meet with. They let us know that our visit was approved.

Then less than 24 hours before I was supposed to make the trip, they changed their minds and said that my meeting with my constituents was denied.

ICE is leaving families without answers and human beings without care. They are doing it, regardless of whether people are undocumented, legal residents, or even American citizens.

They are splitting up parents by sending them to different detention facilities and then making children navigate the funds for a lawyer and basic survival.

If I cannot get answers as a U.S. Congresswoman, how is anyone else in my district supposed to? Any one of us could be next.

I will always stand with and fight for our immigrant communities. I will do everything I can to push back against Trump's authoritarian overreach.

Mr. Speaker, I was unable to attend today's vote. Had I been present, I would have voted NAY on Roll Call No. 156.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of long-overdue legislative measures to prevent Members of Congress from trading stock.

The original STOCK Act passed in 2012 bars a Member of Congress, the President, Vice President, and high-level staff from engaging in insider trading or otherwise using nonpublic information for their own benefit. The bill also included important updates to financial transparency by requiring these high-ranking government officials to quickly disclose financial transactions to the public.

In fact, it is because of this bill's provision that we know that Members of both parties are still consistently able to use nonpublic information to benefit their own stock portfolios.

Incidents like these break our trust with the American people, with our constituents. That is why I am so proud to cosponsor Congressman Magaziner's TRUST in Congress Act. This bill would require Members of Congress and their immediate family members to divest from individual stock holdings or place them into a qualified blind trust during their entire tenure in Congress.

In practice, it would ban Members of Congress from trading stocks. This is just common sense. Members of Congress should be prohibited from using nonpublic information for our own benefit.

Polling has shown that nearly 86 percent of Americans support barring Members of Congress from trading stock, so this should be easy and it should be bipartisan. The TRUST in Congress Act and bills like it would prevent corruption and restore trust in Congress.

Before I was sworn in to Federal office, I made a personal effort to sell stocks that I had and to ensure that my financial future would not and could not be dependent on information that I might become privy to as a Member of the House of Representatives.

It is about more than following a set of rules. It is about acting ethically and respecting the power of the offices we hold.

In a time where the President of the United States is expected to accept a plane worth hundreds of millions of dollars from a foreign nation, respecting a moral code and setting a strong example could not be more important. I am heartened to see my colleagues on both sides of the aisle standing in support of this issue.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to call out and condemn Donald Trump's astounding corruption.

Just last week, he signaled that he would change the name of the Persian Gulf to the Arabian Gulf. Today, he arrived in the Middle East, where he is expected to accept a luxury 747 worth $400 million from Qatar to replace Air Force One.

From attempting to rename the Persian Gulf to accepting luxury airplanes as unprecedented personal gifts, Donald Trump would rather waste time on ridiculous political stunts designed to curry favor with foreign governments and line his own pockets than address the issues affecting the American people.

Mr. Speaker, as the first Iranian-American Democrat elected to Congress, I can tell you that the Persian community in the United States and across the world is outraged at the attempt to change the historically significant name.

That is why, today, I am proud to introduce the Persian Gulf Act to prohibit any Federal funds from being used to rename the body of water and prevent government documents from referring to the Persian Gulf by anything except that name.

As Donald Trump acts only for himself, I will continue fighting against his corruption and the American people.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor local Phoenix trailblazer and community leader, Mary Rose Wilcox.

As the first Hispanic woman ever elected to the Phoenix City Council and Maricopa County Board of Supervisors, Mary Rose spent her career in public service standing up for our vibrant immigrant and Latino communities and lifting up underserved neighborhoods like south Phoenix, the west valley, and Grant Park.

Even in her retirement, she and her husband Earl continue to bring the community together, utilizing their restaurant, El Portal, as a gathering space for advocacy and organizing.

She has been a huge inspiration to me in my career. More than anything, Mary Rose shows all of us what it means to be a fighter. Despite having faced discrimination, threats, and even violence, Mary Rose stands tall as an example of the resilient spirit of Phoenix.

I was so glad to see Mary Rose recently honored with a ceremonial street sign at Second Avenue and Grant Street, now named Mary Rose Wilcox Way. This weekend, I was honored to attend the celebration for the new Mary Rose Wilcox Health Center in Grant Park.

Mr. Speaker, I thank her for her service and kindness.