Announcement By the Acting Chair

Floor Speech

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Mr. RYAN. Mr. Chair, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

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Mr. RYAN. Mr. Chair, there are a lot of buzz words, complicated sub- working groups and weaponization and all of this sort of language that may hide what is happening here, but I want to be crystal clear about what this amendment does.

As someone who served in uniform proudly in two combat deployments, this weakens our military. It weakens our national security because it essentially tries to sweep back under the rug what is a growing, more dramatic problem of extremism of many kinds within our Department of Defense, something that has had bipartisan agreement.

Rather than keeping that bipartisan, sober tenor to the debate, this amendment hypocritically, in my opinion, actually politicizes it by referring it to, unfortunately, a subcommittee that is, I think, broadly known to operate in that way.

Let's be clear about what is happening in our Department of Defense. Bias, discrimination, hate, and extremism threaten the safety of all communities and institutions, and our military is no exception.

I think we can all agree that one extremist in the ranks is one too many. The U.S. intelligence community's annual threat assessment once again concluded transnational racially and ethnically motivated violent extremists continue to pose the most lethal threat to U.S. persons and interests and a significant threat to a number of U.S. allies and partners.

The Countering Extremism Working Group has functioned exactly as intended. It should continue its work to ensure that extremism has no place in our military. They are doing good, necessary work.

We must continue to, as Members of Congress and Americans, hold the principle that this work should be nonpartisan. It should not be under the sort of heated politicized rhetoric that I fear this amendment would put it under.

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Mr. RYAN. Mr. Chair, this is not a Democrat or Republican thing. This is about the American people having pride in and sending the message to all members, the millions of members in the Department of Defense, that we are proud of them, we support them, we support the work that our Department of Defense is doing, and we are not intending to politicize it in the way that this amendment does.

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Mr. RYAN. Mr. Chair, what is clear when you see how this weaponization of the Federal Government subcommittee has operated, sadly, to me as someone who loves our country, it has become a deeply partisan body. With all due respect to my colleague, I don't agree with her characterization in any way.

The other piece here that is not being spoken about, anti-Semitism and violent White nationalism are on the rise in the Department of Defense, and this working group is directly focused on countering that.

Politicizing that work undercuts that important work, puts our troops at risk, and puts our national security at risk.

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Mr. RYAN. Mr. Chair, I am prepared to close and wrap this up.

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Mr. RYAN. Mr. Chair, in brief, while I understand the spirit of what my colleague is saying, there has to be reasonable lines at which we cannot say there is unlimited resources to dedicate to unlimited oversight of every conspiracy theory that may be out there.

I would reassert in closing, dealing with extremism cannot be about political or ideological litmus tests but practical threats to the operations and values of our military.

Mr. Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

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Mr. RYAN. Mr. Chair, I demand a recorded vote.

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Mr. RYAN. Mr. Chair, I rise in opposition to this amendment.

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Mr. RYAN. Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Meeks), the ranking member of our Foreign Affairs Committee.

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Mr. RYAN. Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Washington State (Mr. Larsen).

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Mr. RYAN. Mr. Chair, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman, with respect to my colleague and alum of a United States military academy, I respectfully disagree. I think at this moment when our allies and our entire alliance is engaged in direct hot war is a moment where we have to have our allies' backs, where we have to lead by assuming some risk and hoping and pushing and nudging our allies to follow.

I do respect the spirit of what my colleague is saying, but in the heat of battle is not the time to question our allies or to back away from our allies. In fact, as my colleagues have said, it is the moment to lean in and strengthen our alliance, bolster our alliance, bolster innovation, and bring to bear the resources of the DIANA effort.

Mr. Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

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Mr. RYAN. Mr. Chair, I demand a recorded vote.

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Mr. RYAN. Mr. Chair, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

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Mr. RYAN. Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Meeks).

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Mr. RYAN. Mr. Chair, I yield an additional 1 minute to the gentleman from New York.

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Mr. RYAN. Mr. Chair, I remind my colleagues that the word, as my colleague from New York has said, the word ``denounces'' is a strong word especially to use in the heat of battle and the heat of an unprecedented and unjust war.

I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from New York (Mr. Meeks).

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Mr. RYAN. Mr. Chair, again, in closing, I reiterate the points of Mr. Meeks. At the moment when NATO is headed in the right direction, when we are seeing the greatest strength, unity, cohesion, results, and success, back to the founding charter of the organization, now is not the time to take steps backwards and denounce our allies.

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time.

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Mr. RYAN. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

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Mr. RYAN. Mr. Chair, I rise in opposition to the amendment.

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Mr. RYAN. Mr. Chairman, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from California (Mr. Huffman).

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Mr. RYAN. Mr. Chair, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Beyer).

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Mr. RYAN. Mr. Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

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Mr. RYAN. Mr. Chair, I demand a recorded vote.

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