Left's Litany of Lies
Floor Speech
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Mr. ROY. Madam Speaker, I thank Mr. Schweikert for his dogged determination to try to shake this institution into not only recognizing but, Lord willing, addressing the looming crisis or the already existing crisis that we are dealing with. He does so eloquently, intelligently, and without fail. Virtually every time I feel like I have a Special Order, I am following the gentleman from Arizona, who is making his case to the 14 people watching on C-SPAN, but, man, those 14 people are loving it.
My voice is echoing like it often does in this Chamber for Special Orders.
Madam Speaker, I am here tonight because, while I wish it was a full Chamber, the fact is something that needs to be addressed that is shaping our public discourse is the extent to which my colleagues on the other side of the aisle and, in particular, in the administration are a little fast and loose with the facts. Maybe stated differently, the radical left, I will call it, particularly in the administrative state, the bureaucrats, the organizations out there that are the engine of the left, have entrapped the American people with a laundry list of lies.
As Thomas Jefferson once said: ``When once a republic is corrupted, there is no possibility of remedying any of the growing evils but by removing the corruption and restoring its lost principles.''
At the root of that corruption is when you are telling a constant barrage to the American people of things that simply are not true. It matters that we speak the truth. It matters that we deal with facts as objectively as possible.
To quote Jefferson again, to seek ``truth wherever it may lead.'' I am wanting to quote Jefferson as a graduate of the University of Virginia. Unfortunately, the University of Virginia is not the institution that it was founded to be, in terms of seeking truth wherever it may lead. I hope it can one day be restored to that purpose.
Take, for example, the World Health Organization, stipulated by the radical left as being a trustworthy organization worthy of the United States giving well over $100 million in American taxpayer funding every year. Yet, the WHO, the World Health Organization, is an organization that wants to undermine free speech by calling on WHO members to ``tackle false, misleading, misinformation, or disinformation,'' which we saw in full display during COVID.
It says gender exists on a ``continuum'' and is ``beyond binary;'' declares that disrupting reproductive health services is ``disempowering and dangerous'' and calls for full access to abortions in every country; has guidelines that highlight the importance of national programs establishing and providing gender-affirming care.
The fact is that it is not an objective institution. It did, in fact, tell lies and falsehoods.
In February 2020, Senator Tom Cotton went on FOX News and raised the question that it might be possible COVID-19 leaked from a Wuhan lab. Remember that it was put out that the Wuhan lab leak is a racist conspiracy theory. The New York Times and Washington Post accused Senator Cotton of being a conspiracy theorist. PolitiFact labeled the idea of a lab leak as a ``debunked conspiracy theory.''
Facts: The Department of Energy and FBI currently conclude that the virus most likely came from the Wuhan Institute of Virology lab, but that was literally months of back and forth.
How about the statement that the COVID vaccine is 100 percent safe? More than 11,000 claims of injury from the COVID-19 vaccine have been filed with the Countermeasures Injury Compensation Program. Four have already been paid out, and 23 more are eligible. The CDC has an entire web page dedicated to myocarditis and pericarditis. Pfizer's own website states: ``Myocarditis and pericarditis have occurred in some people who have received the vaccine, more commonly in adolescent males and adult males under 40 years of age than among females and older males.''
How about this one? Herd immunity means you want everyone to die. Dr. Fauci referred to herd immunity as letting it rip in an October 2020 interview with CNBC.
The fact of the matter is, people started talking about herd immunity, started talking about the recognition of immunity that you get from having had the virus. Who knew, except for every living human being with eyes who had the ability to discern how viruses actually work?
How about this one? Masks work. You remember running around the floor of the House of Representatives under the orders of House leadership. You must wear a mask or you are going to be fined. Remember that? Half of us were hiding in the back, sneaking in to vote so we could avoid the tyrannical whims of the previous Speaker because you were getting fined if you didn't wear a mask.
Well, Rochelle Walensky, on November 21: Masks reduce the chance of COVID-19 by 80 percent. Everybody needs to wear a mask.
Our schools were masked. Our children were masked. They were put in the corners with masks. They lost the ability to speak clearly. Our younger kids have speech impediments.
Fact: According to Tom Jefferson, who conducted one of the most comprehensive analyses of pandemic masking: ``There is just no evidence that [masks] make any difference, full stop.''
How about gender? Men can compete in women's sports, and it is still fair. Lia Thomas, a biological male swimmer for the University of Pennsylvania--and let's be very clear: If you have eyes, Lia Thomas is, in fact, a dude. That is just a simple, obvious truth. Everybody knows it. Literally everybody knows it to be true.
Lia Thomas won a 2022 NCAA Division I championship in the 500-yard freestyle instead of a woman. Thomas soared from a mid-500s ranking competing as male to one of the top-ranked swimmers in women's competition.
Transgender women are the same as biological women, we are told. Biological males have larger hearts, larger lungs, and a 12 percent higher hemoglobin, which helps transport oxygen to the blood. Grown biological males have approximately 36 percent greater muscle mass than grown females, yet transgender women are the same as biological women.
We couldn't even get our colleagues on the other side of the aisle to fully defend Title IX in the Rules Committee a few weeks ago. Title IX was the holy grail. It was the holy grail of equal protection. Now, it doesn't fit the narrative because transgender men, Lia Thomas, is apparently able to compete against women like Riley Gaines, and that is perfectly fine.
You just ignore your eyes. Don't you understand, they tell you it is so. Lia Thomas is a woman now, they say. Oh, really.
Parents cannot be trusted with their children's education. President Biden said it: ``There is no such thing as someone else's child. No such thing as someone else's child. Our Nation's children are all our children.''
Let me be perfectly clear. My children are my children. They are no one else's children. Be dang careful in trying to claim otherwise.
Parents who speak up for their children are domestic terrorists. One alleged ``terrorist'' cited by the National School Board Association was my friend Scott Smith from Loudoun County. He is a domestic terrorist, they say.
How about border crisis lies?
The southern border is secure, and things are better than you all expected, says the President of the United States. Well, since Biden took office we have seen 6 million encounters, the release of approximately 2 million migrants, and 1.5 million got-aways.
When title 42 was lifted last week, the President said that it is much better than you all expected. We still have 3,000 or 4,000 a day. We still have thousands of got-aways. We still have thousands of pounds of fentanyl.
Oh, by the way, the Texas Department of Public Safety is having to stand on the border with razor wire and not doing their job to secure the people in Texas because they are making up for an administration that lies.
My State is the one holding the bag. Tell that to the DPS agents, Mr. President. Get your happy rear end out of Japan and go to south Texas. Better than you all expected.
The President of the United States doesn't have the courage to go to south Texas. That is the simple truth.
According to the New York Post, migrants are being released in the interior with court dates that are as far out as 2035. Yet, the President and his mouthpiece at the White House are trying to tell the American people, using every channel of communication, that the border is secure. It is ``better than you all expected.''
I would note that, thankfully, States are coming to the aid of Texas, who are spending billions of dollars putting our personnel in harm's way, undermining our own security to deal with the job that the Federal Government is supposed to do.
By the way, we passed H.R. 2 that would secure the border. We did our job as House Republicans. I would say, just as a point for consideration, at the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue, and frankly, throughout this building, including this side of the aisle: Why would I vote for anything at all--debt ceiling, government funding, anything, until we pass H.R. 2 and sign it into law?
Why? Why would I do that?
I might be able to be convinced, but you better bring me a really good bill. If you want me to ignore the need for us to pass H.R. 2, sign it into law. I don't care that the Democrats control the Senate. I don't care that President Biden doesn't want to sign a bill.
I care about my country. I care about my State. I care about the kids in my county dying from fentanyl. I care about the migrants dying in the false name of compassion. I care that the Secretary of Homeland Security looked me in the eye in the House Judiciary Committee and lied under oath that we had operational control of the border. That happened.
The Secretary of Homeland Security also lied when he said, unapologetically, that Border Patrol agents who report to him whipped Haitian migrants on the Rio Grande. It is just simply not true. He knew it wasn't true. He had a memo given to him that said it wasn't true. He has now acknowledged it is an untruth.
Has he apologized? Has he apologized to the Border Patrol agents? Has he apologized to Americans? Has he apologized to Congress?
Of course not.
With all due respect to my colleagues in this Chamber, what do we ever do about it?
We haven't impeached him yet, have we, my fellow Republicans?
We have not impeached him yet. He should be impeached.
Are we going to limit funding unless specific riders are included?
Are we going to hold funding for the Homeland Security Department unless we pass H.R. 2, forcing them to actually do their job?
Again, I want to reiterate that the Secretary of Homeland Security lied about Haitian migrants being whipped by Border Patrol agents, and then blamed it on systemic racism.
Over the last several weeks, the Biden administration has been increasingly on its heels, unable to explain why they do not want to take up our very responsible legislation. This is legislation that would increase the debt ceiling about a trillion and a half dollars in exchange for actual fiscal reforms that would save $5 trillion over 10 years and $1 trillion in year one.
It would end the unfair student loan program that would pick winners and losers. It would favor someone who took out student loans and hasn't paid them off yet over the person who has student loans and paid them. It would favor the person who took out student loans and hadn't paid them off yet over the plumber who set up a business and never took out student loans. It would favor the person who took out student loans and hadn't paid them off yet by granting them the same benefit you get if you serve your country, put yourself in harm's way, put your life on the line, get a GI bill benefit--you are treated the same.
Oh, you got your degree in gender studies from Brown, and you are sitting in your parents' basement on your freaking parents' insurance program at 26 years old while you are tweeting out leftist garbage, and you get the same benefit as the guy or gal who went overseas, sat in a foxhole serving in the United States military.
Oh, that is all the same. That is all fine. No problem.
You know what? The President is going to fight us on stopping the $550 billion that they have got set aside for student loan bailouts. I think that is unacceptable. I think we ought to shove it down their throats. I think we ought to go around the country messaging it.
If the President of the United States wants to play chicken with the economy and risk defaulting, it will be on him. It will be the President who defaults. The President is the one who will choose whether to default.
Make the President own it. We have done our job. The American people are with us.
They want fiscal reform. They don't think we ought to spend money we don't have. They don't think $32 trillion in debt is acceptable. They don't think that we ought to pick winners and losers and pay off certain student loans versus others. They don't think we ought to expand the IRS by $80 billion and hire 75,000 or 80,000 new employees at the IRS--they don't.
They recognize that you are far more likely to be audited if you are poor or a minority than if you are not, and they don't think it is a good idea to expand the IRS.
The American people don't want us to take money up to the tune of $1.2 trillion, according to Goldman Sachs. To take those dollars, hand them off to corporations--90 percent of the subsidies going to billion dollar corporations--to elite, White liberals getting money from government so they can go around and say how great they are driving their Teslas, patting themselves on the back while they get enriched.
Let me be very clear. They get enriched through government subsidies to then make power with wind and solar that can't actually sustain a grid. You can't even make this stuff up. We tell lie after lie after lie to the American people that somehow it is good to have ``green energy'' that literally doesn't work if you don't have gas or nuclear backing it up.
Yet, that is what we are going to do. Republicans passed in the debt ceiling bill measures that would reduce the so-called Inflation Reduction Act expansion of those subsidies so that we are no longer taking money from hardworking Americans, blue-collar workers, people out there trying to make it. We are either taking money from them, borrowing or printing money, and handing it off to rich, elite, White liberals who like to feel good about themselves for their corporate cronyism.
It isn't capitalism. They are literally taking government money and getting rich for it. If you are out there working hard and you are trying to get by, you are trying to put your kids in a private school so they can actually learn that this country is good. You can actually learn and talk about God. You can actually recognize--and I am going to blow your minds here--that there are men and women. Oh, gosh, censor me that there are in fact men and women.
So if you are out there as a hard-working plumber, you and your husband or wife, whoever you are, you have got multiple jobs, you are working hard, you are trying to do right for your kids, you are driving a 15-year-old car, you are trying to get by, and these radical leftists come out and say: Don't worry, we are going to subsidize Teslas.
And you are like, oh, goody, how much does that cost?
Oh, that is $95,000.
Oh, great. I will just go buy a $95,000 car.
How does that work?
Well, you plug it in.
What does that do to my electricity bill?
It triples it.
Oh, that is great. I am sure that will be affordable for me.
What do I do if I need to drive from Austin to Midland?
Well, you won a prize. You can go hang out in San Angelo for 2 hours while you charge your car.
Who the hell wants to do that?
Yet that is what we are going to do.
I listened to one of my colleagues sitting out on the steps earlier today, one of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle. A whole class, like 100 minds full of mush were sitting there just ready to be informed by the genius of my colleague on the other side of the aisle informing them about how great it was that we were passing all these laws that would stop the production of CO
They are all: Oh, my God, thank you. Oh, you are saving the world.
It is a lie. It is literally a lie, and we all just sit around going along for the ride.
We say: What bills can we get passed?
I don't know. You tell me.
We have got kids out there being told by Members of Congress that we are saving them because we are somehow limiting what cars their parents can drive to actually go achieve the American Dream which they are no longer able to achieve because we actually knocked their knees out from under them.
Then we say: Oh, don't worry. The solution for your problem is a government program. We are going to just keep giving you more money. We are going to pay you not to work. Don't worry. We will subsidize you. We will pay for your school.
Oh, don't talk about choice. We are just going to pay for those public schools because how else are you going to indoctrinate the kids with the lies?
That is what is happening.
Oh, Chip, you are a conspiracy theorist.
Am I?
What did we learn during COVID?
Parents started looking, and they said: Hey, my kid is sitting over there, and they are looking at this little class on an iPad or a laptop.
You are like: Wait. Whoa. What are they teaching them? What did they say? Wait, that was somehow we are a racist country? Oh, wait, you mean oil and gas, well, that is evil?
I thought our country was built on oil and gas.
Wait a minute. I thought China has 1,100 coal-fired plants, and they are building two a week, and yet we are going to just decimate our ability to have a functional grid so we can have brownouts while we pretend you can have power on a windless, cloudy day.
They are out there telling the kids: Don't worry. We will have windmills and solar panels everywhere, but not nuclear power.
But I thought you hated CO
Oh, no. Never mind. Don't talk about that.
That is literally the kind of garbage we are talking about. They are just constant lies.
If you eliminate every internal combustion engine--every single one of them--in America, then you dent CO
Because if you do it for the children, then everything is fine. If you do it for the animals, the children, and the puppies, then everything is okay.
We put legislation together to save $5 trillion over 10 years. My colleagues on the other side of the aisle are going around saying: You are cutting the VA benefits.
We didn't cut anything--literally nothing. We simply put a cap in place that limits the total amount of spending to $1.471 trillion. Yes, that draconian amount of $1.471 trillion that we were operating on literally 5 months ago.
My colleagues on the other side of the aisle run down to the floor and say: You are cutting cops, and you are cutting veterans.
They are all lies. It is true. They are all lies.
The fact is the American people are sick of it. They are. The American people right now understand that right now the American Dream is increasingly unattainable for them or their children.
If you are measuring the ability to achieve the American Dream by how many government dollars you are taking or what government programs you are on or how much money your business is making because you are getting grants or subsidies or tax credits from a government that is $32 trillion in debt, then even under the best circumstances under our plans, or the President's plans, we are still going to be about $50 trillion in debt in a decade, and we just act like it is not so.
Seriously, just a note for everyone listening, all 14 of you, to my colleagues on this side of the aisle: We have been going around patting ourselves on the back because we passed a really strong debt ceiling bill that we should be proud of and a really strong border security bill, H.R. 2, that we should be really proud of.
I am proud of both of those bills, but now we have to fight for them.
Don't blink. Stand together.
You can't keep doing what we are doing, and you can't go home and campaign on irresponsible spending and balancing the budget when you won't actually do it.
My friend from Arizona just walked through all the mandatory spending problems. We are not even talking about that yet in what we are doing this year. We are just trying to hold the line on discretionary spending.
Madam Speaker, may I inquire how much time do I have remaining.
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Mr. ROY. I am sure I can do something genius with the last minute.
The fact of the matter is that this country is hanging on by a very thin thread, and we all know it. Our job in this body is actually to represent the people. It is, in fact, the people's House.
To my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, where are you?
They are MIA. They are offering no plans to deal with spending and offering no plans to deal with the border.
To my colleagues on this side of the aisle: I am glad we passed a few bills, but they don't mean a thing unless we force the President and force the Senate to do something with them.
That gets hard, and it is our job.
Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
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