Pelosi Statement on 9/11 Resolution

Pelosi Statement on 9/11 Resolution

Contact: Brendan Daly/Jennifer Crider

House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi spoke on the House floor this evening on the Republicans' resolution on the fifth anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Below are her remarks:

"Mr. Speaker, five years ago, on the day the terrorists attacked our nation, Members of Congress gathered on the steps of this Capitol and sang ‘God Bless America.' We really did need God's blessing. We put aside partisanship to respond with one voice that we would do everything in our power to ensure our nation would become fully healed and fully safe, and the American people would know we were working hard to bring those who were responsible for 9/11 to justice.

"Today we should have embraced that same spirit of five years ago on the steps of the Capitol. The United States Senate did. This week, they passed a resolution which mourned the innocent victims of the attacks, consoled their families, praised our troops for their valor, underscored our resolve to find all of those responsible for the attacks and bring them to justice, and emphasized our commitment to stopping terrorists who would harm the American people. Democrats and Republicans alike in the Senate came together in support of that resolution. And I hoped that could have come to the floor here. Democrats were prepared to support that, but the Republican leadership refused.

"Instead, the Republican leadership gave us a resolution here this evening which is self-congratulatory. It praises Congress for some reason. Instead of having the focus on the innocent victims of 9/11, it talks about the accomplishments of this Congress. I can't even imagine why they thought that was a good idea. Since they have opened the door to what they have done, they have also opened the door to what they have not done.

"Two years ago, the bipartisan and independent 9/11 Commission concluded that the American people were failed by their government on 9/11. To prevent future similar failures, the Commission made 41 recommendations. Last December, the same independent commission issued a report card on the implementation of those recommendations. Sixteen of the grades awarded were either D's or F's, and others were incompletes. In May of this year, the commissioners reviewed the record on implementation once again. Their conclusion on the poor grades: no progress.

"Two days ago, the Commission's Chairman and Vice Chairman, Republican and Democrat, wrote about the December report card in an op-ed in The Boston Globe: ‘What we argued then is still true now: Americans are safer, but we are not yet safe,' and concluded, ‘Our sense of national urgency is lacking.'

"Mr. Speaker, we have lost focus on terrorism since the invasion of Iraq; that is one of the chief reasons the 9/11 Commission's report card reflected so poorly on the Bush Administration and the Republican Congress. Our focus should have continued to be on Afghanistan. The war in Iraq is the wrong war. No matter how many times the President wants to say it, the war in Iraq is not the war on terror. The war in Afghanistan was.

"We had the opportunity to destroy al Qaeda in Afghanistan and we missed the opportunity because we lost our focus. Instead, five years later, the Taliban is on the resurgence, violence has increased, and the opium crop is all pervasive. Think of this: Afghanistan now supplies 90 percent of the opium supplied to the world. The increase in just the last couple of years is 50 percent. They went from 4,000 metric tons to 6,100 metric tons of cultivation. This is what is happening in Afghanistan - a missed opportunity to crush al Qaeda, an increase in violence, a resurgence in the Taliban, and the increase in the poppy crop.

"Mr. Speaker, let us use the occasion that we have as we consider this flawed resolution to resolve to do better. Let us honor the memories of the innocent victims of the 9/11 attacks and their families by doing the unfinished business of the 9/11 Commission.

"Isn't it hard to believe and to know that five years after 9/11, we still do not have real-time, that means immediate, communication among police, fire, and other first responders. We paid a price for this during Hurricane Katrina. Five years later we still do not have the screening at our ports that we should have. We are at 5 percent; we should be at 100 percent of screening. That is possible; it is affordable and it is technologically available to us. Five years after 9/11, we still do not have our borders secure. We have not mandated, because this Congress and Administration refuses to do so, the private sector to protect our nuclear and chemical power plants.

"The list goes on of shortcomings. The 9/11 Commission said we should increase the pace of reform at the FBI. There are so many things that are lacking in what we are doing to protect the American people. The biggest threat to the security and safety of the American people is the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, the unsafeguarded radioactive material that is out there. For about $10 billion, about a month of the cost of the war in Iraq, we could buy up all of the known radioactive material that is out there that could fall into the hands of terrorists. It's a lot of money, but it's a small price to pay for the safety of the American people. And yet, for reasons that are hard to explain to anyone, we have refused over and over again to pass legislation that would appropriate the resources to do that.

"Mr. Speaker, it all comes down to the personal, now doesn't it? As we think back five years, we think about those families and the nearly 3,000 people who were killed that day. Two thousand children lost their parents. The emotional toll is just incalculable. And yet, as Congresswoman Maloney and Congressman Nadler of New York have pointed out, the heroes and heroines of 9/11 are not having their needs met. It is the responsibility of the government to meet the health care needs of the people who risked their lives without a thought. And now, without a thought, their needs are ignored.

"We have an opportunity to do better by them. We owe them that obligation because with all the talk we can do about initiatives and proclamations, and honoring and the rest, it all comes down to the people, to the personal, to the impact on their lives. Of course we will vote for this flawed resolution. It could be better. Just because the Republicans decided they wanted to praise themselves instead of focusing on the business at hand doesn't mean we won't support it.

"But as we vote for it, I call upon the Speaker of this House to bring to this floor before we adjourn for the elections, legislation to enact the 9/11 Commission recommendations. We have all the time in the world to do it. Nothing is more important than the safety of the American people. We have no greater responsibility as elected officials than to provide for the public safety and national security of our country. Nothing else matters if we do not protect the American people. Instead, we have ignored those needs. We are cutting the COPS program so that neighborhoods are not safer. We are making matters worse. We have the opportunity to make matters better.

"If we do pass the 9/11 Commission recommendations, only then will we truly be honoring the memory of those who died. Only then will we truly be keeping our promise to their families that we will make America as safe as we can be. I urge the Speaker, once again, to bring the 9/11 Commission recommendations to the floor, to make America safer, to bring some peace to the families of 9/11, and bring to justice those who are responsible for those heinous acts five years ago."

http://democraticleader.house.gov/press/articles.cfm?pressReleaseID=1790