Providing for Consideration of H.R. Israel Security Supplemental Appropriations Act, Providing for Consideration of H.R. Ukraine Security Supplemental Appropriations Act, Providing for Consideration of H.R. Indo-Pacific Security Supplemental Appropriations Act, Providing for Consideration of H.R. 21st Century Peace Through Strength Act; and Providing for Concurrence By the House in the Senate Amendment to H.R. with An Amendment

Floor Speech

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Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Texas for yielding me the customary 30 minutes, and I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Speaker, the world is watching. It is time for Congress to act, and act we must.

America's allies have been waiting for this Republican majority to get their act together.

People are dying in Ukraine. Democracy is on the line in Ukraine, and this Republican majority has been twiddling their thumbs.

I am glad my friends have finally come to realize the gravity of the situation and the urgency of getting this aid to our allies.

What have Republicans done? Nothing. No action to help our allies. It is all delay, distract, deny, and blame Joe Biden.

Ukrainians are fighting for democracy--theirs and ours--and they have been set back as a result of Republican extremism. They have suffered because of Republican inaction.

I will remind my friends that Ukrainians didn't choose this war. It chose them.

Two years ago, when Putin illegally crossed the border and invaded, he was banking on the United States and our allies growing weary. He was hoping we would give up. He was hoping we would do nothing. He was betting we would abandon our friends and our internal divisions would leave us in disarray, at odds with one another.

I hope Putin is wrong, Mr. Speaker, because after 2 years of unrelenting war, Ukrainians are still willing to hold the line.

I visited Ukraine with former Speaker Pelosi shortly after Putin attacked them, and we learned about the particularly cruel nature in which Putin has been fighting this war. If you care about human rights, you have to care about what is happening in Ukraine. That is what this is all about.

Ukrainians are still ready to defend their democracy, but they cannot continue to do so without our support.

I won't sugarcoat it here. Ukraine's defense of democracy has suffered because there is a faction here in this House, a MAGA minority, that doesn't want to compromise. They don't want to take this vote because they are afraid of what the outcome might be--not that it will fail, but that it will succeed.

That argument might hold sway in the Kremlin, Mr. Speaker, but this is the United States. We are the people's House, an institution designed to reflect the will of the majority.

Today, the majority's voice is being heard here on the House floor-- not a majority of one State, one party, or one faction, but a majority that wants to help Ukraine hold the line, a majority that says bring these bills to the floor for an up-or-down vote.

Democrats are providing the votes necessary to advance this legislation to the floor because, at the end of the day, so much more is at stake here than petty partisan brinkmanship.

Putin is looking to rebuild the Soviet Union, and mark my words, he will not stop at Ukraine. Anybody who thinks that is delusional.

If the world doesn't help them defend their democracy, this war will not end. It will grow.

Mr. Speaker, I don't agree with everything in this package. I have deep, deep problems about the unconditional aid to Israel. I was among the first calling for a cease-fire, and I still call for a cease-fire. I have demanded more humanitarian aid for civilians in Gaza, and I will continue to do so. I have called for a two-state solution. I believe Prime Minister Netanyahu is putting Israel on a path that, quite frankly, undermines his own country's security. I am outraged by his cruelty and inhumanity toward the people of Gaza and the West Bank.

There is no justification for that. There is none. Israel has a right to defend itself--nobody questions that--but what is happening now, I believe, is outrageous and unconscionable.

We will have separate debates, and we will have separate votes on all of these bills, and people can decide where they want to be.

Quite frankly, some Republicans wanted a different path. They wanted to extort this rule for a campaign ad on border security for Donald Trump. We almost had no Ukraine aid because that is what some of my Republican friends wanted and advocated for. They advocated for a bill with no humanitarian aid for anybody who is suffering--not just in Gaza, but also in Ukraine and other parts of the world--and they wanted all this kind of ugly border security language attached to this measure.

There is a lot at stake at this moment, and we are all supposed to be grownups. We should act like it. Let's proceed in a way that allows everyone to vote their conscience.
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Mr. McGOVERN. Leger Fernandez), a valued member of the Rules Committee.

Ms. LEGER FERNANDEZ. Mr. Speaker, today, after months of delay that cost the loss of the Ukrainian military advantage, that cost children's lives and access to food and aid, that allowed China to threaten the Indo-Pacific, Congress will finally vote. Congress is finally going to vote to fund the fight against the tyranny of Russia, Iran, and China, the fight for democracy and peace.

Why did it take us this long?

Yesterday in Rules, the Republican chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee noted that every Republican President since the Soviet Union era has stood on the right side of history and stood up to Russia. Presidents from Eisenhower to Reagan, George Bush, Sr., and George Bush, Jr., they all knew that Russia's desire to reassert its empire by bombing and invading its neighbor also harms America and American interests--every Republican President, that is, until Donald Trump.

In contrast to every President before him, Trump praised Putin, tried to do business in Russia, allowed Putin to gain the upper hand, and eventually denied Ukraine military aid that Congress had approved unless Ukraine gave him dirt on Biden. Donald Trump became the pied piper for Putin.

Some of Trump's most ardent followers in this House became Putin- protecting Republicans and denied the Members of Congress this vote until now.

Now is the moment history has its eyes on this Chamber as Democrats and Republicans stand up and stand together for what we love-- democracy. Democracy is the very reason we get to sit here together today and debate in the people's House. Democracy is the best answer to tyranny, aggression, and depravity.

It is our shared bipartisan love for democracy that best unites us with our allies around the world, allies that are once again united in our fight against the war in China and Russia thanks to the leadership of President Biden, who repaired the damage Trump inflicted on our international relationships.

I hope that shared love of a world where democracy is defended will also unite us in this Chamber. I remind my colleagues, Republicans and Democrats, that bipartisanship is a good thing. It is how America expects us to govern, and it is how we move one step closer to defeating the cruel regimes that seek to take the world backward.

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Mr. McGOVERN. Wow, Mr. Speaker, I guess the gentleman from Texas is unaware of the fact that there was a bipartisan border security deal that was agreed to that, unfortunately, House Republicans and Trump decided to kill.
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Mr. McGOVERN. Mr. Speaker, I am prepared to close, and I yield myself the balance of my time to do so.

Mr. Speaker, the Democrats have had to make some tough decisions about how to vote on this rule, and let me tell you why I voted to support it last night. I have disagreements with many aspects of the various pieces of legislation that will come before us, and there are some of these pieces that I will vote against.

Again, there will be separate votes, and there will be separate debates, but as we learned last night in the Rules Committee, the alternative that some of my Republican friends were pushing to this approach was an Israel-only package with no humanitarian aid, not just for the people of Gaza, but for any suffering people that the aid would benefit and some really ugly border provisions, which I found unconscionable and some other bad stuff as well.

Democrats, once again, will be the adults in the room, and I am so glad Republicans finally realized the gravity of the situation and the urgency with which we must act. But guess what, Mr. Speaker? You don't get an award around here for simply doing your damn job. President Biden told us last year, 6 months ago--over 6 months ago--that this was urgent and important, that Ukraine needed us, that Putin was not going to stop, that the war against Ukrainians was particularly vicious. Every major human rights organization in the world has told us the impact of Russia's attack against Ukraine.

The Senate voted months ago. The Senate can barely agree on what to have for lunch, and they voted months ago. What did the House do? What did my House Republican friends do? They did nothing. There was no action to help our allies. It is all delay, distract, deny and blame Joe Biden. I would just say to my colleagues, look at what MAGA extremism has gotten you; nothing. It has gotten you nothing, not a damn thing.

In fact, it has empowered Democrats. At every critical juncture in this Congress, it has been Democrats who have been the ones to stand up for our country and do the right thing for the American people. Democrats ensured the U.S. didn't default on its debt last year in case anybody forgot. Democrats supplied votes to keep the government running in September of last year, in November of last year, and in March of this year. Democrats supplied the votes to pass the National Defense Authorization Act. Democrats supplied the votes for the tax relief bill that passed earlier this year. Democrats have done the job that Republicans have refused to do.

Again, we have different priorities, and I think, based on what I have heard in this last Congress, different values. We don't even agree on a lot of what has come before the full House. Democrats have done the job that Republicans have refused to do. We don't want an award for it. We don't want a trophy for showing up to work. All we want is for Republicans to do their job, stop blaming Joe Biden for their own incompetence, and work with our side to find common ground. We are in a divided government. A Democrat is President, we have a Democratic controlled Senate, and we have a narrow Republican majority in the House. Nobody is going to get everything they want. We have to work together. We have to compromise.

I hope today's vote loosens the grip that MAGA extremism has on this body, and especially when it comes to supporting our allies. You know, the Rules Committee is the committee that has been known as the traffic cop of Congress. Every bill of consequence comes through the Rules Committee. I mean, we set the bills for debate on the House floor.

The last bill that the Rules Committee reported that actually became law was almost 10 months ago. All the other bills that we have sent that made it over to the White House and become law had to be brought up under different processes and procedures. I mean, let that sink in. Something is not working here. You either want to be a body that is constructive and that gets stuff done, or you just want to be a party that just obstructs everything and gets nothing done, because at the end of the day, there is nothing to show for all the yelling and screaming and finger-pointing that we see on a regular basis on this House floor.

My friends have to choose. History is going to judge them by how they answer one simple question: Are they going to work together with Democrats; in this case, stand with our allies and stand for America, or are they gonna throw in their lot with MAGA Trump and Putin? We are living in very uncertain times, Mr. Speaker, and people around the world are counting on this country to stand up and lead.

People in Ukraine, people in Taiwan, people in Gaza, people in Israel--you know, the eyes of the world are on this body. There are a lot of things in this package I disagree with. And in my opening statement, I talked about my concern about the unconcerned aid package to Israel. My concern is that Netanyahu's government is not moving in a direction that, quite frankly, is a direction that I think will lead to more security for Israel; it is exactly the opposite. I worry that what he is doing is, quite frankly, a violation of the human rights of so many innocent people in Gaza and in the West Bank.

I was hoping that they would pursue a different pathway. Instead, we now hear that he wants to go into Rafah. There is a famine happening in Gaza. People are starving to death. Aid is being frustrated from getting there, food medicine, important supplies. People are dying. Surely we should all care about that. We should be able to advocate for Israel's security but also advocate for the people of Gaza, children of Gaza, senior citizens. People are just trying to get on with their lives.

Notwithstanding the fact that we may have disagreements--and some of my Republican friends obviously disagree whether we should be helping Ukraine or not. I disagree with you, fine, but we have a process that you will be able to vote on all of these things separately, and you will be able to make your views clear. I have got to tell you, you know, you don't have to agree on everything to agree on something. We ought to agree that these issues are important enough to debate and to have up or down votes on.

The people who are advocating that we do nothing, you know, or that we--you know, that we attach things to this bill that will guarantee that it goes nowhere in the Senate, and therefore, we help nobody, I don't understand why you are even here quite frankly. We need to move this process forward.

The House has to function. As we have seen, under Republican control, that only happens when Democrats are the adults in the room. I say that not to be partisan. I say that because that is what has been happening. I gave you a list of things that needed to be done, you know, not just in terms of helping our allies, but in terms of saving our economy, that could not have been done unless Democrats stood up and behaved like adults.

Mr. Speaker, this should have been dealt with a long time ago, months ago, but here we are. Here we are.

Mr. Speaker, I hope that as we proceed, we have rational and thoughtful debate, knowing that we will have disagreements and knowing that some of us will have different ideas on how we should proceed forward.

This is the United States House of Representatives. We are supposed to debate issues. We are supposed to vote on things. Unfortunately, this has become a place where trivial issues get debated passionately and important ones not at all.

Well, these are important issues that are in this bill. Some of them I agree with; some of them I don't agree with. Let's debate them, let's vote on them, and then let's move on.

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