They Break It, You Buy It
Floor Speech
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Mr. ROY. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the time here on the floor.
I appreciate, as I said a minute ago, my friend from Louisiana, Representative Johnson, for his steadfast defense of the Constitution of the United States; his willingness to stand up for all the important values, from life to marriage; but importantly being a voice for this body, for the Republican Conference, and where we want to take this country; what we know the American people want us to do; and to stand athwart the absolutely absurd policies of a Democrat majority that doesn't give a whit about the people that they are rolling over in a quest to placate their radical leftist policies, whether it is energy or open borders, and I appreciate the gentleman from Louisiana and his efforts.
I am here to talk about my Democratic colleagues and the extent to which the American people need to understand: They break it, you buy it. And that is the reality of what is happening.
My Democratic colleagues are breaking--breaking this country, breaking up your families, breaking up our secure border, breaking up our military, breaking up our court system, the rule of law, breaking up our police, our law enforcement community.
They are breaking up our economy, breaking the strength of the American dollar. They are breaking our position in the world, and they are breaking this body, the people's House. And it is high time it stopped.
And we can only hope that in November we get a change so that we can stop it. And then my message to my Republican colleagues will be: We better stop it because what is happening in the so-called people's House cannot be tolerated any longer.
They break it. This body, the leadership of this country, they break it. You buy it.
In reverse, I would say, America is great. Washington is broken. They are breaking it every day and, as a result, they are breaking this great country that our forefathers fought so hard to give to us and to our children and our grandchildren.
You cannot defend the policies of the Democratic majority. It is impossible to do. And in fact, if you set out to harm the United States of America, I would defy someone to demonstrate to me how you could do better than my Democratic colleagues are doing on a daily basis, ripping apart the Constitution, ripping apart the shreds of the flag, ripping apart the people of this country.
Dividing us. Dividing us by race, dividing us by income, dividing us by our adherence to the Constitution or devotion to the border and devotion to the rule of law.
That is what is happening on a daily basis, and it is purposeful. Let's be perfectly clear that it is purposeful.
The reason my Democratic colleagues focus so intently on January 6 is they want to divide us. The reason they want to have race-based policies throughout our government is they want to divide us.
The reason they want to make the border be supposedly about not liking Brown people is because they want to divide us. Never mind that south Texas is full of Brown people who are sick of wide-open borders empowering cartels.
That is the reality of what is going on in this Chamber, and in the Senate, and at the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue.
Just focus on the border for a minute: Broken, wide open, abused by cartels, exploited by terrorists, exploited by gang members, criminals coming into our country, killing American citizens. Fentanyl pouring into our communities, 107,000 dead Americans. 850,000 known got-aways pouring in between the ports of entry because our Border Patrol is overwhelmed, with not only no support from this administration, but the purposeful attack by the Secretary of Homeland Security lying about the good men and women of Border Patrol, saying that they whipped people that they didn't, and then hiding behind some report, while they give them administrative punishment.
That is your leadership, ladies and gentlemen. They are breaking it and you have to buy it.
They are leaving our border wide open, and American citizens are dying. Let me repeat that. They are leaving our border wide open, broken, and American people are dying, thousands upon thousands of Americans dying from fentanyl pouring into our communities, pushed by China, exploited by cartels, left to be able to come into our country because Democrats do not care about securing the border.
And more importantly, my Democratic colleagues are perfectly fine purposely leaving our border wide open. It is purposeful. It is purposeful.
They are breaking it and you are going to have to buy it.
How about our defense?
Our Defense Department is being broken on a daily basis by my colleagues on the other side of the aisle and in the other Chamber, and particularly, this administration, shoving into the Department of Defense a radical, woke ideology, radical, woke programs, policies focused on diversity, and equity, and inclusion, all of the things that they cloak with critical race theory to destroy and break apart the institution of our defense. It is purposeful.
Vaccine mandates, forcing 60,000 guardsmen to be on the chopping block to lose their entire career. It is purposeful. They are breaking it.
They are breaking that military you love. They are breaking that Department of Defense that needs to be there on that wall defending us. They are breaking it.
They are breaking it by tucking tail and running out of Afghanistan with $85 billion of equipment there and 12 or 13 dead servicemembers and no accountability. No accountability for the brass at the Pentagon and no accountability so far at the White House for tucking tail and running.
They are breaking our Defense Department.
You talk to the servicemembers who were in my office, coming in in tears because they are about to lose their entire career because they choose not to take a politicized vaccine.
Oh, by the way, by another broken governmental agency, or agencies, our whole public health system being radicalized by my colleagues on the other side of aisle to strike fear in the hearts of the American people, to watch them push aside and brush under the rug gain-of- function research and all that we see unfolding in China in the Wuhan Institute of Virology, all that we know about the funding, American funding that was tied to that.
All that we know about the absurdity of locking down schools, shutting down our schools so our kids are stuck in masks, stuck in the corner and not able to go to school, the damage it has done to our kids, the mental health issues, destroying the education of our young, all chasing the teachers' unions.
We have seen the mandatory--or efforts at mandatory vaccines-- thankfully, partially struck aside, but many still in place, breaking the back of the people's trust in their public health, breaking the back of the people's ability to serve in the military and defend this country, breaking the back of people being able to be Federal public servants working for Border Patrol or other Federal agencies.
Why?
Because of fealty to Anthony Fauci, being the great wizard of public health while he poses for magazine covers and throws out pitches at baseball games.
Meanwhile, your defense is broken. Your public health is broken, and you are going to have to buy it.
How about crime on the streets of the United States of America?
How about the 12 Democrat-run cities that have called for defunding their police and have seen skyrocketing crime enveloping the cities?
The businessowner I spoke to today in Baltimore who says he is going to have to shut down his franchise because of rampant crime in Baltimore.
Austin, Texas, which cut its police by a third and has seen homicides skyrocket from 59 to 89, has seen 911 calls unanswered, drug trafficking increasing. Taking police off the streets in Austin, Texas.
We have seen 50 of the biggest urban areas see a 5 percent decrease in their police budgets, while my colleagues on the other side of the aisle say they are doing no such thing.
But my friend, Mr. Johnson, rattled off quote after quote after quote in the House Judiciary Committee of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle calling for defunding of the police. Of course, it is an attack on our police. They are breaking our Police Department, breaking the backs of our men and women in blue and leaving our streets exposed to lawlessness and danger, and it is purposeful.
How about energy?
Could you take a more ridiculous position than to take the strength of national security, of having abundant oil and gas, the ability to lead on nuclear, and, instead, chase unicorn energy policies of nothing but solar and wind so that on a cloudless, windless day--or cloudy, windless day, you sit back and watch your energy plummet and your grid weaken.
What kind of a country's leadership does that to its people?
I would say the kind that want to break it. I would say the kind that want to chase the fairy tales and the unicorn energy policies that this administration wants to pursue.
We could have nuclear power. It doesn't create any carbon dioxide. Do my colleagues on the other side of aisle want to do that?
No. Because this is about fear. This is about breaking American energy. This is about breaking the back of it, so you can get on your private plane and fly to Davos and fit in with the Western Europeans and how great they are, while they are now burning wood to heat their homes.
We have the greatest national security asset you could possibly imagine, which was full and complete energy independence, and we are completely flushing it down the toilet, to break it and to break it purposely. And we don't have to do it.
We have abundant energy, abundant, clean-burning natural gas that we could export to other countries, as we were doing, driving down carbon dioxide.
We could be producing nuclear facilities all across this country with zero CO
Instead, we are chasing--literally, we are tilting at windmills, dotting the landscape with windmills.
A couple of weeks ago in Texas, we had 8 percent of the wind capacity available in our grid. Absolutely astounding what we are doing to the energy of the United States of America.
Inflation. I mean, I can't even get all this in, the absurd policies of Democrats.
I have already covered border, could go further.
Already talked about defense; could go further.
Didn't even get into Ukraine and the lack of briefings and the $56 billion we just dumped into Ukraine, with zero indication of a strategy of what we are actually going to do, while we expand NATO, with zero indication about how that is going to impact Article 5, and an 800-mile border and whether NATO's going to upend its end of the bargain when we fund the vast majority of NATO. I didn't even talk about that part of defense.
I didn't talk about crime. I mean, I talked about crime, but I didn't get into every aspect of it.
I didn't get into every aspect of energy.
Now I am talking about inflation. The wisdom of this administration coming in and dumping $1.9 trillion--I don't even remember what the name of that ridiculous bill was, but it was garbage. And it is now driving up the cost of goods and services for you, the American people.
They are breaking it. They are breaking your jobs. They are breaking your income. They are breaking your ability to buy goods and services and you are, literally, going to have to buy it, and you are going to have to pay a lot for it, because they are spending money we don't have.
They are printing money, throwing it out in the economy, driving up the prices of goods, while they are, simultaneously, restricting the ability for us to develop energy, to have abundant energy that you can afford.
You like $4.50 gasoline? Well, guess what? Your Democratic leadership just defended that as being great. In a Rules Committee debate this week, when I sat in that room debating the rules, literally, the Democratic Rules Committee was talking about how great it is that the price of oil has come down.
They were talking about the price of copper going down. Well, I have spent a lot of money on copper to wire my home. It is expensive as heck. It is now locked up in cages. But do you know what the price of copper going down means? Heading into a recession. That is the reality of what we are facing. That is the truth.
Our economy is getting ripped to shreds, the price of goods and services are going up. And it is purposeful. Spending money we don't have.
How can you justify spending $2 trillion, printing that money, and dumping it out there to drive up the price of goods and services, while cutting off the production of oil and gas, not developing nuclear, increasing the price of gasoline, increasing the price of energy in your homes?
It could only be purposeful. They are breaking it. They want to break it so they can live in unicorn land.
But you are going to have to buy it, and it is going to be expensive.
How about the state of the rule of law?
How about the state of the family?
How about the state of marriage?
Just yesterday, on this floor--just yesterday, on this floor, we passed a law to force recognition by one State of another State's marriage, but by thereby doing that, for the first time, I think this body, certainly Members on this side, supporting the redefinition of marriage, which was manufactured by the 2015 Supreme Court decision, manufactured and forced upon the States, a redefinition of marriage.
Now you see the wailing and gnashing of teeth because this court dared to say that Roe v. Wade was bad law, and that we should defer to the States in the protection of life and the recognition that that is the appropriate law under the Constitution.
Lastly, I would point out when we are talking about breaking it, this body is the best example of my Democratic colleagues not giving a whit about you, the people, rolling over and destroying the people's House, destroying this institution.
I have not been able to offer an amendment on the floor of this body. Can't do it. Got to go to Rules. Beg for crumbs.
They drive through so-called suspension of the rules bills. We get them often hours before, at most, a day or two before they are on the floor being asked to be voice voted. If we don't have a group of us on the floor monitoring those bills, they will go through without a vote.
They don't care because voting doesn't matter, as evidenced by proxy voting, forcing a new rule that says you can turn your voting card that you, the voters, gave to representatives and give that to another member of Congress, upending the constitutional order which requires presence, a quorum, physical presence, debate.
That is what the Constitution contemplates, and it is my Democratic colleagues who, for the first time in history, upended our requirement that we be present in the body of the House of Representatives to do our job. Blowing apart--blowing apart--this people's House.
I will note, as I often do, that I am not saying that everybody on this side of the aisle has clean hands on all of these points. A lot of Republicans are taking advantage of the proxy voting that my Democratic colleagues created for the first time in history. They should not.
I will say that to every member. I don't care if they are Freedom Caucus leadership or anybody in between. I will not back away from saying proxy voting is not only unconstitutional, it is wrong, and it is destroying this body.
Forced magnetometers in this false name of security. Masks being forced upon members of Congress on the floor of the House, which have now been brushed aside because I guess Anthony Fauci or somebody decreed that somehow, it is now safe to walk around without masks until they say it is not safe.
I yield to my friend from Virginia here in one second. I just want to say in conclusion to this part, and then I want to engage with my friend.
My Democratic colleagues, unfortunately with a little bit of help from a few of my Republican colleagues on occasion, are breaking this country. They are breaking this body. They are breaking our Constitution, and it is purposeful.
There are no other words to say what is happening at our border but that it is purposeful. There are no other words to say about what is happening on our streets with our law enforcement but that it is purposeful.
There is no other thing you can say about our energy policies but that it is purposeful. There is nothing you can say about the spending and the inflation but that it is purposeful.
The attack on the institution of marriage, the breakdown of the family, the targeting and the policies against life, that it is purposeful.
The fact that we are destroying this body with proxy voting, that it is purposeful. The fact that we are destroying the Defense Department and the very core values of our men and women in the military with their woke policies, with their vax mandates, irrespective of what that does to defense, driving our recruiting down to unforeseen levels, but that it is purposeful, and it is wrong.
I would just challenge my Republican colleagues that we better come in, if the American people give us power in November, and do the right thing to protect this country and to stop breaking it because the American people are having to buy it.
I yield to my friend from Virginia (Mr. Good).
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Mr. ROY. I ask of the Chair how much time we have remaining.
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Mr. ROY. I would just add to my friend from Virginia a great quote from Thomas Jefferson--because he knows I went to the University of Virginia.
The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government.
That is the purpose of the Second Amendment, and that is what we know.
I would note that in this context, and I will yield another couple minutes to the gentleman if he wants it, when we are talking about the response from my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, they break our border purposefully, and then they want us to fix it with amnesty or with some policies to say that Texas has to just accept.
I hear that the mayor of New York is all aghast that people are being dropped off in New York. He said, we need Federal Government help to deal with it. I am, like, welcome to the party, pal. This is what life is like in south Texas every single day.
They break it. They break the border, and then they want you, the American people, to have to carry the water.
They break the Defense Department, drive recruiting down to 40 percent, and then they put in language to draft our daughters, all in the name of so-called equity and equality.
They break our criminal justice system. They break the backs of our law enforcement community. Then they say, we are going to take your guns, your ability to defend yourself.
They break the energy system in our country. Then they say, just go buy a Tesla. What is wrong with you?
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Mr. ROY. What is wrong with you? Go buy a Tesla. You can plug in. You can drive through west Texas, 300 miles. Don't worry about it. Stop off in Eden, Texas, where, no doubt, they have a charging station and spend $70,000 for the pleasure.
They break the back of the economy, drive up in inflation, and they say, suck it up, buttercup. Go buy yourself some expensive chicken and rice.
They break the back of this body, this institution, and they ignore their colleagues when their colleagues are saying the chickens are going to come home to roost.
That is the reality of what we are dealing with: A purposeful breaking the back of this country and a tearing apart of the threads that hold us together.
I am going to just say it here on the floor. If we don't start respecting Federalism, the ability to agree to disagree, then this country is doomed. It will break apart under its own weight, and it will be my colleagues on the other side of the aisle that amassed the weight that will break the bow.
That is where we are headed if we don't start respecting the ability of individuals in this country to agree to disagree, allow Texans to be Texans, allow Californians to be Californians.
Unite under the flag of the United States under our core principles but stop shredding our ability to disagree. Stop breaking this country and forcing the American people to buy it.
I yield the balance of the time to my friend Virginia (Mr. Good).
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Mr. ROY. I thank the gentleman from Virginia. I think our time has expired. I appreciate the speaker and the staff here tonight.
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