Providing for Consideration of H.R. Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2025 and Providing for Consideration of H.R. Illegitimate Court Counteraction Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. ROY. Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from Pennsylvania for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, before I start, I will join in a bipartisan moment of agreement with my friend from Massachusetts about Kelly Dixon.

I too wish her well. I wish her all the best in her next endeavors. The gentleman is correct about her intellect and her commitment to the institution. We have debated numerous times on the floor. As a former staffer, chief of staff to a senator, it is not always easy to walk the line and intellectually engage and spar with Members of Congress, for those without the election certificate, but to do so with the proper amount of respect in going toe to toe with Members in the right way. Kelly has always done that.

She does very much believe in keeping the traditions of this institution moving forward in the right way. I am deeply appreciative of that and of her service, and we will be wishing her well going forward and will miss her.

Here we are talking about the issues before us in this rule, the MILCON-VA funding and the International Criminal Court.

Just a quick moment on MILCON-VA funding--I note that this legislation that we put forward we have done so in good faith to increase spending for veterans--yes, increase spending for veterans-- because it is higher than that which has been put forward by the President in the President's budget. It is also, in aggregate, the total amount of spending that we are spending on veterans when you factor in mandatory spending and discretionary spending, will be greater under our spending than it would be last year.

Yes, we are trying to figure out how to do this in a fiscally responsible manner. We believe we have done that, and we have put forward the policy initiatives that we believe are important to constrain the administration to ensure that we are not advancing a radical agenda through the executive branch's actions.

The President has been aggressive in disagreeing with the United States Supreme Court and Congress in advancing a radical agenda, whether it is DEI, CRT, or student loans. We believe it is our power of the purse in Congress to be able to constrain that.

The thing I want to most talk about here is the International Criminal Court. This is an issue that really shouldn't be partisan, I agree. I have had numerous conversations with my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, and they have been good conversations. They have been healthy conversations with leadership on both sides of the aisle.

At stake right now is the critically important issue of ensuring that we protect America's interests. That is what is at stake right now in the International Criminal Court. It isn't just about Israel. In fact, it is not even specifically about Israel.

This would be a permanent change, a change to the law to ensure that if the International Criminal Court targets Americans or targets our allies, that we would sanction the International Criminal Court.

Now, let's be clear. This is an unprecedented action being taken by the International Criminal Court, seeking arrest warrants for the sitting Prime Minister and Minister of Defense of Israel. Say that out loud. That is what is happening with the International Criminal Court.

Neither Israel nor the United States is a party to this organization, yet this entity, the International Criminal Court, is trying to issue a warrant against the Prime Minister of Israel.

There have been longstanding bipartisan concerns about the ICC's undermining of the United States' sovereignty. Since the founding in 2002, every U.S. administration, both parties, has refused to join the court, fearing its politicization and misuse.

On April 2, 2021, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said: ``We maintain our longstanding objection to the Court's efforts to assert jurisdiction over personnel of non-States Parties such as the United States and Israel.''

NSC spokesperson John Kirby said, on April 30: ``We don't believe the ICC has any jurisdiction here.''

Both the Biden and Trump administrations and over 330 Members of Congress from both parties have rejected ICC investigations of the United States and Israel in the past.

Last night in the Rules Committee, talking about the Democratic witness: Do you believe the ICC should be able to target American servicemen? The answer was no.

The fact here is if you allow this to happen, you are opening the door. We need to make it crystal clear to our men and women in uniform that we will not tolerate the ICC going after them or our allies for simply performing their job.

This is not unprecedented in the sense that the ICC has tried to investigate U.S. servicemembers before, as the gentleman from Pennsylvania noted, but the reality here is this is pretty simple. This bill would sanction the ICC. Yes, it has teeth. Yes, it would cause some concerns and some pain for the members of the ICC. That is intentional.

We want to make them think twice, and we modeled it after existing legislation. We used a model. This is not something new. We believe this is critically important. This country, the United States, should stand united and hold the ICC accountable.

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