Keeping Our Constitutional Republic

Floor Speech

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Mrs. SPARTZ. Madam Speaker, I rise today to highlight an ongoing problem with our institution, which starts reminding one of a theater full of actors, a circus, or a dog-and-pony show with a lot of messaging, grandstanding, demagoguing, talking points, but no real results badly needed for the American people.

When Benjamin Franklin was leaving the Constitutional Convention in 1787 and was asked what kind of government the delegates had created, he replied: ``A republic, if you can keep it.''

It has been over 200 years since that time, but do we really appreciate what it means to have a constitutional republic, the rule of law, presumption of innocence, and proper due process?

As someone who grew up under a dictatorship in the Soviet Union, I cherish these freedoms tremendously, and I understand how hard it is to get them back when you lose them and how many people have died for them.

Therefore, regardless of politics, I will vigorously defend our Constitution and our rights for all Americans. Congress is not a kangaroo court and has proper committees, like Ethics or Judiciary, to provide proper due process to all individuals, whether it is President Trump and Representative Greene or President Biden and Representative Omar.

I adamantly argued last Congress as a member of the Judiciary Committee to provide this due process, so I am not planning to become a hypocrite now and lose this credibility. We have to become the adults in the room and stop the bread and circuses in Congress.

No one is above the law, but no one is below the law.

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