Termination of National Emergency Declared By the President on February 2019

Floor Speech

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Mr. JOHNSON of Georgia. Res. 46.

President Trump's decision to declare a national emergency at the southern border to siphon funds for his border wall is an unconstitutional, grotesque abuse of power.

An emergency declaration is not a last-ditch maneuver to employ when all negotiation attempts have failed. The House of Representatives has rejected the President's border wall. The Senate has rejected the border wall. And the American people have rejected this useless wall.

The President does not get to override Congress in a raucous temper tantrum over his inability to broker a deal. The National Emergencies Act was enacted in 1976 to expedite the allocation of resources for real emergencies to save American lives and mitigate damage caused by natural disasters and acts of terror. It was not fashioned to allow a President to deny the will of Congress and the American people.

Both Democrats and Republicans alike should be very concerned about the ramifications of this unprecedented executive action. It is a direct threat to the balance of power that our country was built upon and a violation of our Nation's Constitution.

There is also no factual basis for the emergency declaration. Immigration from the southern border has significantly decreased in the last 10 years. Any attempts to characterize the border as a crisis zone are flagrant abuses of statistics, which have shown that border crossings are at the lowest they have been in 40 years.

President Trump has long proved he is not married to the truth or facts, and he has no proof to substantiate his wild claims about the status of the United States and the Mexican border.

We cannot abandon our commitment to responsible governing and the truth because President Trump is outraged at his inability to fulfill a campaign promise.

There is wide bipartisan support for this measure, and our democracy demands that we condemn this subversion of our Constitution and this misuse of Presidential power.

The American people should know that there are not any statutes that would allow a President to declare an emergency to build a border wall, not one piece of legislation would allow that.

Previous Presidents have declared emergencies, but they have never ventured into the legislative prerogative to allocate funding, and that is the difference that we have here.

We have heard a lot of cries from the administration about there being a problem on the southern border with caravans loaded with people being human trafficked, and this is just simply unsubstantiated and unfounded. There are no reports that this happening. This is a figment of the imagination of some in the administration.

Plaskett).

I am glad that the other side acknowledges that the people approaching our southern border are not men from Mexico, but they are families with children fleeing violence in Central America. That is an important distinction.

Mr. Speaker, my friends on the other side keep invoking the mantra, ``Obama, Obama.'' Even though they opposed each and every initiative that he put forward, regardless of merit, now they want to come back and cite him for what he said and what he did. But one thing he did not do was to allocate funding that he was not entitled to. He always requested from the Congress funding authority.

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Mr. JOHNSON of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I am proud to yield 1 minute to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer), the distinguished majority leader of this House of Representatives.

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Mr. JOHNSON of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, it amuses me when my friends on the other side cause the public to believe that there are people coming across our border, trying to sneak in, when the truth of the matter is the people who are presenting themselves at our southern border, primarily, are people fleeing violence in Central America, families, women, children fleeing violence in Central America, presenting themselves at lawful points of entry, not trying to jump the Rio Grande, but at lawful points of entry, and seeking to apply for asylum. That is the emergency that my friends on the other side tried to make into something that would be such that President Trump is authorized to spend moneys that have not been appropriated, and it is a farce.

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Mr. JOHNSON of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I recall that the last 2 years have been spent under the unified control of Republicans--both Houses of Congress and the President--yet there was no emergency to construct the $5 billion down payment on a border wall that is going to cost about $30 billion. They didn't do it then; they want us to do it now-- or they want Trump to actually be able to do it without the legislature.

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Mr. Speaker, I believe that most learned colleagues in this Chamber understand that under U.S. law, we have granted persons approaching our border the right to apply for asylum. That doesn't mean that asylum will be granted, but they certainly have the right to apply for it.

It is the humane thing to do in a civilized society. This is the law that America has proceeded under for centuries, and now we have a naked power grab by the chief executive of this great Nation, the President of the United States, seeking to do the job of the legislative branch, and his own job. But there is a problem. It is only the legislative branch that appropriates funding for various occurrences.

The legislative branch has not given this President what he has sought; that is, a down payment on a border wall, which is a monument to a campaign promise that he made. This legislature has not given him that authority, and so in a naked power grab, he is seeking to do it by declaring an emergency when, in fact, no emergency exists.

Norton), my friend, and a staunch advocate for the people of Washington, D.C.

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Mr. JOHNSON of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I have no further speakers, and I am prepared to close.

Mr. Speaker, in approving the joint resolution terminating President Trump's illegal power grab, the House will make clear that nothing is more fundamental to the functioning of our democracy than the separation of powers among three coequal branches of government.

The facts are clear. President Trump failed to convince a skeptical Congress to pay for an ineffective border wall.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to support this resolution, but I must ask you to ask yourself this question: Will you allow your solemn vow of loyalty to President Trump to override your oath of office and your vow of fidelity to the Constitution?

Vote to support this resolution.

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