Louie Gohmert

Mr. GOHMERT

Mr. GOHMERT. I think that it's worthy to note that apparently, when there was a Fox News reporter named Rosen that wanted to look into this Fast and Furious information and hopefully get the scoop, get to the bottom line of what really happened, instead of this Justice Department doing as it told the American people, as the Attorney General and all these other people said as part of this administration, ``We're going to get the people responsible for this,'' instead of being diligent and relentless in getting to the bottom of what happened--who approved these 2,000 or so guns being sold to criminals that would be in criminal hands and ultimately used to kill hundreds of Mexicans? Mexico should be outraged at what this administration has done. Instead of doing that, they go after a reporter that wants to find out what happened. They end up going after his phone records. They go after his email, from what we've learned, apparently. Possibly other family members. And they still, all these years later, haven't given us real information on who was responsible, who authorized that, who forced the sale of those guns. All we know is that this administration has tried to use Fast and Furious to demand more gun control legislation. And we have a President that goes down to Mexico in the last 2 or 3 weeks and tells them about how outrageous it is that America has been selling guns to criminals that are using them in Mexico. He should have donned his hat and said, Thank you very much, my administration did that to you, and I'm very sorry. But, oh, no, he blames America without actually saying, Please, I beg your forgiveness. This was my administration's doing. They haven't even gotten to the bottom and, instead, go after the reporter that tried to find out what happened. That's even more outrageous, and it goes to just what the gentleman was saying about people wondering how can we trust this administration when they've said that they're going to get the people responsible and they've done no such thing.

Mr. GOHMERT. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It has been an interesting week here in Washington, especially here on Capitol Hill. We found out a great deal we didn't know before. We're getting more details. It's intriguing that we have the IRS official, Ms. Lerner, who knew--found out about--the outrageous practice of targeting what were perceived to be the President's enemies--people who wanted the Constitution followed, people who felt they had been taxed enough already, the Tea Parties, constitutional groups, pro-Israel groups, conservative groups, people who could have made a difference in the last election. One reporter had asked before, Why would people even be bothering to get legal status? Why would they even apply to the IRS to get 501(c)(3) or 501(c)(4) status? The answer is: because that's the way the government has taken over people's political abilities, because you can't call people to Washington or call people to come state their opinions without normally raising money, and if you don't have a legally recognized group by the IRS, then the IRS will go after the individuals who engage in pooling money and in helping pay people's way to get them here. They'll go after the individual. We have forced people who want to make their voices heard collectively into begging the IRS for legal status, and the threats are there if you don't get their legal status recognized. Then when we see what the IRS has done as just an arm, basically, of the Democratic Party to help defeat or help prevent people from having legal status, it is absolutely incredible, especially when you find out they wouldn't even give them an answer ``yes'' or ``no''; because these people at the IRS, the higher ranking officials, they knew if they denied a request, gee, that could be appealed and they might get an answer before the election, and they weren't going to let that happen in time, at least, to make a difference in the election. So it's what most people who care about the Constitution have been afraid of for so long. I've heard some people, some friends, some Republican friends say they think Richard Nixon was a great President, but I've read transcripts of conversations. Anybody who will say one thing to one person and turn right around immediately thereafter and say exactly the opposite to another person and play them against each other, I just can't consider that to be a great President. We know that under the Nixon administration the IRS was used to target an enemies list, but now we find that under this administration it's been used and abused as a process, as a political arm in ways that Richard Nixon would never have dreamed possible. He never would have dreamed that anybody would get away with this kind of activity before an election, especially after Watergate. And so it has been. So we want to take this time to make sure, Mr. Speaker, that people are aware and the Record contains the stories of different Tea Party groups and the difficulties they've had. In that regard, I am quite proud to yield to my friend from New Mexico, Mr. Steve Pearce. Hopefully, it won't hurt his reputation for me to call him a dear friend. That's the way I figure him.

Mr. GOHMERT

Mr. GOHMERT. Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

Mr. GOHMERT

Mr. GOHMERT. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It may surprise some of my colleagues, I agree with so much of what was being said with regard to the cost of education and how we need to be very sensitive to that. I was concerned about the vote we were going to cast tomorrow that would prevent the interest rates from going up to 6.8 percent as they're going to do if this body does nothing. I was very concerned about it going up to 6.8 percent, and then I understood the proposed Republican bill that we are going to take up tomorrow will not let it go up to 6.8, but I was wondering why we didn't just leave it where it is. Let's just extend it. The Democrats set in motion, when they were in the majority, this situation where it was going to raise. And, actually, it was going to raise last year, and we voted a year ago to just extend the current rate for a year. As I've had members of my own leadership and whip team pushing me on the issue of wanting me to vote for the bill tomorrow, I've been trying to find out more and more about why is this provision in there. Why are we doing this? And it's very clear. Interest rates for student loans are going to go up to 6.8 percent if we do nothing because that's the law that was put in place. Well, I said, why can't we leave it where it is? And the explanation was given because the Democrats, in what they put together to pay for ObamaCare, actually were counting on, and they got CBO to count on, using the difference between the current rate and it going up to 6.8 percent as the Democrats were counting on it having done. So, on the one hand, my friends express the same concern that I have about the interest rates jumping up that high, going dramatically to 6.8 percent, and then, on the other hand, they were not explaining that the reason that it was going to jump up so high if we do nothing is because Democrats were counting on that as a way to help pay the massive billions of dollars that are going to be required for ObamaCare even though people are going to get less insurance, less care, and have less say about their care, it's still going to cost billions and billions more. And, in fact, CBO has indicated, you know, gee, they originally scored it, let's see, over $1 trillion; and then the President called Doug Elmendorf over from CBO and explained, apparently, said something to him in the Oval Office because then when he went back, magically they were able to lower it under a trillion, as the President said it was going to cost. And then after it passed, CBO comes back, oh, you know what? We were right the first time. It's going to be more than a trillion, and then it was going to be 1.6 trillion. Others are saying it may be 2 trillion. Who knows how much. But it's going to cost massive amounts more. There are going to be massive taxes, according to what the Supreme Court calls it. We didn't call it taxes, but that's what the Supreme Court said that the Democrats did when they passed ObamaCare without a single Republican vote. And they were counting on the increase, tremendous increase, the billions of dollars coming from increased interest on student loans rising. Now, if you go back just a little bit, well, why in the world is the government even involved in the student loan business anyway? We didn't used to be, as the Federal Government, a bank that just loaned people money on a regular basis. Well, when the Democrats were in the majority, they pushed through a bill that forced all lending institutions out of the student loan business, and the government took over the student loan business. Well, if this is going to totally cease to be a government that is of the people, by the people and for the people, and not moving toward tyrannical despotism, then we have to allow people to have private property, we have to allow the free market to reign, we have to allow individuals and banking institutions to make the loans. But oh, no, our friends across the aisle decided we're going to shove the free market out of the student loan business, and we're going to take over student loans. And we're going to set it at a low rate, but we're going to--it's going to go up, and we'll use the billions that come from that magical increase down the road to pay for ObamaCare. And that's how part of it, supposedly, was paid for. Well, one of the things I learned the hard way while our friends, the Democrats, were in the majority for 4 years, was that actually the first Congress they were in the majority, they passed a pay-as-you-go bill, or PAYGO they called it. I voted for it, and I got criticized by Republican leadership. Don't you know that they don't mean what they say? This doesn't mean--they're not really going to pay for anything. It's just a game. And I said, how would I not be for paying as we go? That's what their bill said. And then I learned the hard way on that because then I saw they really weren't serious about it because bill after bill came to the floor, and we said, but you put a rule in place it has to be paid for. Oh, but we're waiving the pay-as-you-go requirement on this bill. What about this other one? Well, we're waiving the pay-as-you-go. And so I was shocked to find out, apparently, our leadership, the folks that had been here for a longer period of time had already learned, and I learned a lesson the hard way. So the next Congress, when they came up with a pay-as-you-go bill, I said, are you kidding? You fooled me last time. I thought you were serious about it. I'm not going to vote for a bill that you have no interest in actually following through and doing what the bill says. I'm not going to vote for a bill like that. I'm not going to help participate in the charade. But when it comes to ObamaCare, they say, oh, it's paid for. And this is one of the magical ways that billions of dollars were projected by CBO to be produced. Well, they're going to do it on the backs of students. Well, we had control, the Republicans did, of the Congress in the previous 2 years; and a year ago we said, well, let's just keep it at the current rate and move it forward a year, and we'll do something a year from now. So, my Republican friends, when trying to persuade me to vote for this bill tomorrow said, look, the student loan rates will stay where they are for now, but, yeah, eventually they will go up some. But the good news is they won't go all the way up to 6.8. And I said, why do they go up at all? They said because we promised we're going to pay as we go and we meant it. But we're not going to go all the way to 6.8. So we'll actually have a shortfall we're going to have to come up with because the Democrats were counting on these billions of dollars coming off the backs of students to pay for ObamaCare. So, as all of this has become clearer and clearer to me tonight, well, earlier this, late this afternoon, this evening, I've been communicating back and forth with my staff. So we have a bill that my Democratic friends ought to be thrilled to death about, and we're going to file it first thing in the morning; and it ought to excite my friends across the aisle. And I know my own leadership has been wanting me to vote for this bill. But they say the reason the rates have to go up at all is because, under the budget previously done for ObamaCare, to pay for ObamaCare, the Democrats counted on this revenue. And so since we don't want to increase the deficit spending, we're going to have to let the rates go up a little bit, but we're not going to let them go up to 6.8 as was originally put in place by our Democratic friends. So, anyway, what my bill will do that we'll file first thing in the morning is say, you know what, we're going to keep the current rates right where they are. And I hope folks will join me in encouraging my leadership to bring this bill to the floor, my bill to the floor, instead of the one we're going to vote on tomorrow. If we have to wait 72 hours, fine. Let's do it 2 weeks from now. We've got the time. And my bill will leave the rates right where they are for a 2-year period. And since we don't want--number 1, we don't want the rates to go up for college students. We're sorry that the Democrats ever figured that in as part of the process of paying for ObamaCare. And since we don't want it to have to go up on the students, those who are having to borrow money to pay for college, then the way we keep from increasing the deficit spending in the bill I'll file first thing in the morning, we eliminate the ObamaCare slush fund, and the billions that are eliminated for the slush fund for ObamaCare will no longer have to come from the backs of young people who cannot afford to go to college without loans. That's the solution, and I hope my Democratic friends will hear and get word about this great bill, because I believe what they were saying. They're serious. Even though their party passed a bill that we refer to as ObamaCare, it's certainly not affordable care, but they passed that bill, by themselves, without any Republican votes because we knew how bad it was. We knew how much it was going to cost. We knew you wouldn't get to keep your insurance if you wanted it. We knew you weren't going to get to keep your doctor if you wanted. We saw all those terrible things that are now coming to pass. And it will prevent the ObamaCare slush fund, the money that's set aside in the ObamaCare bill. It'll just eliminate the slush fund, and say to the Democrats, you never should have had that slush fund, and you're not going to pay for it on the backs of those who can't afford to go to college without getting loans. Now, I did have to double-check with regard to this bill. I had to make sure that I wasn't going to be voting on something that affected loans that my wife and I are paying, our children's student loans, because before I ever ran for office as a judge, my wife and I had set aside enough money that was going to take care of our kids' college. But by virtue of running for office and taking a huge cut in pay, we ended up having to utilize that money for our family and for our girls and for expenses. And so my wife and I are paying our kids' student loans because I didn't want them to have to suffer with a bunch of student debt because their father felt a calling to go into public service. But it would not be appropriate for me to vote on a bill that affected the rates of loans that we're paying, and it is now quite clear that that's not the case. The student loan bill that we're going to vote on, whether it's the one tomorrow or whether it's the one that I will file tomorrow that I would prefer that we do, either way, it will not affect one iota, not at all loans that are already in place, student loans. So I'll be able to vote. And, anyway, I've been whipping with my own team, undecided, and then later today was leaning no. And the more I found out, the more it's convinced me, we really should not allow the Democrats pushing through ObamaCare and the massive trillions of dollars that's ultimately going to cost to have any part of it forcibly borne by students, by young people that just want to better themselves by getting a higher education and having to get a loan to do it. So I have taken the things my friends said to heart and I am counting on them to admit what they said, Mr. Speaker. I'm hoping they'll agree in the morning to cosponsor my bill so that they can be consistent with the things they promised. Now it does defund the ObamaCare slush fund; but since that was originally going to be borne on the backs of college students, I'm sure they don't mind that going away. With regard to taxes, let's face it, if the money costs the Federal Government an amount down here and they have an interest rate that's higher than the cost of the money that the Federal Government gets to loan to students, then the Federal Government is making money on that. And that's what the Democrats knew and that's why they counted on the higher interest rates to pay for ObamaCare. Anyway, hopefully, we can work together and get that accomplished. Let's face it, that kind of expense should not have to be borne because, really, it becomes a tax. It's new revenue for the Federal Government. And then I'm hoping before the end of the 2 years, if we would do my bill, we can do what should have been done in the first place, and that is get it back to the private sector where we become referees, again, as a Federal Government to make sure that neither lender nor borrower is cheating. That's what we're supposed to be. We're supposed to be a referee. Over the years, through both Republican and Democratic majorities, the government has continued to move from the realm of being a referee to being also a player and also the coach as well as the referee. And it's hard for anybody to ever compete against a player who's coached and refereed by the opponent. The government shouldn't be in that business of being adversaries, opponents, or competitors with the private sector. It shouldn't be. So I hope that we will get to a bill that puts all the lending back in the private sector where the Federal Government is no longer the lender. I hope we can do that with different kinds of insurance. Get it out of the Federal Government. Because, invariably, when the government controls everything, it's just what we've seen with the IRS scandals. You're going to have some abuses with people that would control all of your health care records, people that will make the decisions on what health care you get, people that can actually come in and take your home--the only people that can come in and take your home--the only people that can come in and seize assets without proper due process of the law: the IRS. It needs to be dismantled, and I hope we can do that. I hope we can get to a place where we're no longer the bureaucracy that becomes so autocratic that it could care less about people's personal feelings. Yes, people come here on the floor of the Congress and talk about people's personal feelings. But when you see the big, monolithic government that's just gotten so big, it doesn't care about people's feelings. It's hurting people right and left. Sure, the President has private sector leaders stand up and talk about how great ObamaCare was going to be. And now they have been finding out it's not going to be so great. You're not keeping your insurance; you're not keeping you're doctor. You're going to get less health care, you're going to get less insurance, it's going to cost a lot more. And with regard to the IRS scandal, we had Ms. Lerner come before our committee. I was in Judiciary. We were doing our own hearings on other matters. And I heard some of her statement about how she didn't do anything wrong and she's not guilty of anything. Well, as a judge and a chief justice who is very familiar with the Fifth Amendment, I've had to advise defendants, Now you understand if you say anything at all on your own behalf, you have waived your Fifth Amendment right and you will have to answer questions, and you will not be able to claim the Fifth Amendment. So what did Ms. Learner do today? She came in and said she didn't do anything wrong. She followed the law in all ways. Oh, she was just a paragon of virtue. Well, then she's waived her right to claim the Fifth Amendment before Congress, and she needs to be brought back up here and have that explained properly. You waived your right when you started telling us how virtuous you were. So now you're going to answer questions, because you can't have it both ways. You can't come in here and say to this Congress, I did absolutely nothing wrong. I violated no laws. I'm in no danger of having violated any laws. And then turn right around and honestly say, I'm not going to speak because what I say is going to tend to incriminate me. Well, it can't incriminate you if you didn't do anything wrong, so go ahead and testify. You started out, so go ahead and finish up. Sure, you can go out on the street and say, I didn't do anything wrong; but when you come before a court or Congress and say to that Congress, I didn't do anything wrong, or to a court, I didn't do anything wrong, you just waived your right. Now you're going to tell us what it was that you didn't do wrong so we can decide that for ourselves. So I hope she'll be brought back. We also had Mr. Douglas Shulman come in and testify. And what I was hearing as far as part of his testimony was, yeah, he knew about the illegality of what was going on, and he was trying to put a stop to it. And he knew that conservatives were being targeted. Well, let's face it, that means that this administration was using the IRS to help them win another election. Well, it worked. How far up into the administration is what we need to know. But I don't believe we're going to find out from people like Mr. Shulman, who went to the White House, he said, over a hundred times. And even though he's working for the President and even though he started out under the Bush administration--that's fine, we had people under the Bush administration that screwed up plenty of times, too--but he's working for President Obama, comes to the White House over a hundred times, knows there's wrongful conduct that's gone on at the IRS and never says a word. What did you go over a hundred times for? Well, I remember going for an egg roll. Well, guess what? If you went for an egg roll, the President was out there. He normally is for the Easter Egg Roll. You wouldn't even say something? That man should have been fired. We shouldn't have clowns that will work at the IRS know illegal activity is going on, go talk to their boss, go to the White House over a hundred times, and not even breathe a word of it so their bosses know. I wouldn't want somebody like that working for me. If there's illegal activity going on and you come see me over a hundred times, I would hope that during one of those times you would tell me this was going on. Because if you didn't, and I found out, you would be fired as soon as I found out. Ms. Lerner would have been fired as soon as we found out. But instead, what happens? Well, they plant a question so it comes out that way. So maybe the President will learn after we plant a question. Something is awry. Something is very, very wrong. Having had thousands of criminal cases come before my court, come through my court, you smell when things don't pass the smell test, and this stinks to high heaven. So in the morning, I hope I'll have a whole list of Democratic colleagues that are ready to sign on to my bill so that we will keep the interest rates for the student loans where they are so that we don't push paying for the ObamaCare slush fund onto the backs of students. And we then get time to put the student loan business back in the private sector so the Federal Government can be the referee and monitor the lending institutions and the borrowers, and be the referee. That's what we're supposed to be. As far as the IRS scandal, Mr. Speaker, I hope and pray some consciences are being bothered and hounded in the IRS and over Benghazi and over the AP scandal--the abuse of process there, the abuse of process in going after conservative reporters--that consciences will begin to be bothered and they won't be cleared until they come forward and say: I'm a whistleblower; I have got to get the truth off my chest. Let the chips fall where they may. That's what I hope and pray for. With that, Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. GOHMERT

Mr. GOHMERT. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I certainly appreciate and agree with the gentleman's concerns about the failure of the administration to secure the border. We are quite aware that the border did not get as secure as we would have hoped under the prior administration, but there is no excuse for not getting it done now, and especially when the claim is made that we'll secure the border when you basically give amnesty to people that were already here. That's like putting the cart in front of the horse as the cart is going off the cliff. It's a problem. There are other problems, Mr. Speaker, as you've surely noted with regard to this administration. An article that came out today, May 17, from The Daily Caller points out that the homeland security guidelines advised deference to pro-sharia Muslim supremacists. Of course, Mr. Speaker, we are familiar with the fact that Homeland Security has had reports warning their employees about the dangers of people that may be involved in such heinous activity as being classified as evangelical Christians, or as being concerned about the Constitution and that people should be following the Constitution, and concerned about people who may have Tea Party in their name. Thank goodness the IRS was not around to help the Founders when they founded the country or otherwise they probably would have shot the Boston Tea Party participants. They would have killed off over half of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, and this country would have never gotten started, if this Homeland Security would have been around to be helpful, so called, to our Founders. But in looking at the guidelines, this article says: The Department of Homeland Security, which under Janet Napolitano has shown a keen interest in monitoring and warning about outspoken conservatives, takes a very different approach in monitoring political Islamists, according to a 2011 memo on protecting the free speech rights of pro-sharia Muslim supremacists. In a checklist obtained by The Daily Caller titled, ``Countering Violent Extremism, Dos and Don'ts,'' the DHS Office of Civil Rights and Civil Liberties notifies local and national law enforcement officials that it is Obama administration policy to consider specifically Islamic criticism of the American system of government legitimate. I must insert parenthetically, it is so interesting that people who believe the Constitution means exactly what it says are deemed by our Secretary Napolitano and her Homeland Security as being threats to the country because they believe what the Founders did. How dare they. And someone who believes the teachings of Jesus Christ is somehow to be feared--wow--because they may go into all the world baptizing them, making disciples. They may end up being like Mother Teresa and helping the poor and needy. They may actually do things without the government telling them they can do that, like Mother Teresa, just going in and helping. Well, you've got to watch those evangelical Christians, if they are true Christians, if you're part of this Janet Napolitano Homeland Security Office. The article points out this policy stands in stark contrast to the DHS Office of Intelligence and Analysis 2009 memo: ``Right wing extremism, current economic and political climate fueling resurgence in radicalization and recruitment,'' which warned of the dangers posed by pro-life advocates, critics of same-sex marriage, and groups concerned with abiding by the U.S. Constitution, among others. The advice of the do's and don'ts list is far more conciliatory. Don't use training that equates radical thought, religious expression, freedom to protest, or other constitutionally protected activity, including disliking the U.S. Government without being violent, the manual's authors write in a section on training being sensitive to constitutional values. The manual, which was produced by an interagency working group from DHS and the National Counterterrorism Center advises: Trainers who equate the desire for shari'a law with criminal activity violate basic tenets of the First Amendment. And that is interesting. And it goes back to my point about how problematic it must have been for an FBI who've had their lexicon purged, where they can't really talk effectively about jihad because that might offend someone, even though it is critically important to know what someone believes about jihad. Does an individual believe, as an Islamist, that jihad is just the internal changing of one's self into being more Islamic? Or is jihad actually a violent jihad that, as the 9/11 bombers and killer believed, you kill as many innocent people, especially Americans, especially Jews, as you possibly can. But this administration is concerned that to ask about jihad may certainly offend someone. And it was intriguing to inquire of our Attorney General, the highest law enforcement officer in the country, about just what the FBI did ask of Tamerlan Tsarnaev. What did they find out that he believed about jihad? What did they find out that he supported in the way of jihad? What favorite authors did he have about jihad? And the Attorney General didn't seem to know, but by the end of his testimony, he says, I don't--obviously I've said something untrue because, all of a sudden, now, even though he testified he didn't know what they really asked, all of a sudden, apparently he felt like he did know. But here's the interesting chart to which the article was referring, very interesting. It's from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties. And it is important to know, we call it countering violent extremism, just as Ms. Napolitano calls not countering terrorism, she had this set up as the Countering Violent Extremism Working Group, even though she couldn't previously answer my question as to how many members of the Muslim Brotherhood were part of her Homeland Security Countering Violent Extremism Working Group, or even her Homeland Security Advisory Group. And I found it interesting that a publication in Egypt knows more about the Muslim Brotherhood members of this administration than our own Homeland Security Secretary knows. She didn't even know, when I asked her at a prior hearing, that there was a known member of a known terrorist group that had been allowed to go in the White House. But she did find out before she went before the Senate so she could say, oh, we vetted him three times. Well, yeah, probably about the way the FBI vetted Tamerlan and said, oh, there's nothing to see. We'll just move on here, which left him able to plot and plan to kill people, innocent people, men, women and children in Boston. But it's interesting. When you look here, it says talking about the things you should not do, don't use training with a political agenda. This is not the time to try to persuade audiences, for example, on views about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, reformation within Islam, or the proper role of Islam in majority Muslim nations. Don't use trainers who answer primarily to interest groups. For example, trainers who are self-professed Muslim reformers may further an interest group agenda instead of delivering generally accepted, unbiased information. Very interesting, you know, because if you can't inquire about what people truly believe about jihad, about radical Islam, about killing infidels, if you really can't get into the weeds on this thing, then how in the world do our officers know which Muslims will be good to have training and which ones won't be good to have training our own officers? We do know from a couple of years ago when the administration stopped a seminar that was about to take place over at the CIA because there were some people who had spent their lives studying radical Islam and were classified as experts around the country, unless perhaps you were part of the Organization of Islamic Council, who actually came up with the term ``Islamaphobe'' and pays money to major universities to have seminars and courses on Islamaphobia and characterize people that way so that they can try to scare people away from talking about radical Islam. But it's interesting though, I mean, this is our own Homeland Security. This is the kind of stuff that led one of our intelligence agents to tell me, Congressman, we are blinding our own ability to see the enemy that wants to kill and destroy us. We're blinding ourselves from our ability to see the people that want to destroy us. And if we'd be more realistic, there would be people alive in Boston that are not. When the Russian Government gives us a heads-up and says, this guy has become radicalized, that can't be normal. Man, this is a big deal. You'd better look thoroughly into it. This is an outreach from the Russians. Hey, I'm not sure you realize just how radical this guy's become. It wasn't enough clues that he and his family got asylum from a country that they were comfortable going back to. Wait a minute, if they got asylum, how in the world would any of their family be comfortable going back there? Perhaps they didn't need asylum. Well, if they didn't need asylum, why don't we send them back? Well, no, we wouldn't want to do that. Gosh, we might offend somebody that wants to kill us. Heaven help us if we were to offend somebody that wants to kill us. Don't use training that equates radical thought, religious expression, freedom to protest, or other constitutionally protected activity with criminal activity. One can have radical thoughts, ideas, including disliking the U.S. Government, without being violent. For example, trainers who equate the desire for shari'a law with criminal activity violate basic tenets of the First Amendment. Well, I would submit to whoever put together this chart, those who want to do away with our Constitution and, instead, impose shari'a law on all Americans, are acting with treasonous intent because you can't want to replace our Constitution with shari'a law and still be wanting the America where everyone has freedom to worship as they wish. What you are wanting is the kind of situation that you now find in Afghanistan, where the last public Christian church had to close, or in Egypt as the Muslim Brotherhood has taken over and Coptic Christians have been persecuted mercilessly, or in Iraq where you have radical Islamists in charge who find it is a crime to believe that Jesus is a savior, a crime worthy of going to prison. They believe sharia law is the law of the land in those countries. So anybody that wants to replace our Constitution with sharia law should be looked at by our Homeland Security as being a threat, and any plots or plans to replace our Constitution with sharia law should be looked on very carefully and not be given a pat on the back or invited in to give advice to the White House on speeches or to give advice on how to train our intelligence agents or to give advice on how to train FBI and Homeland Security agents. But this is exactly what this administration is doing. And when you blind our intelligence agencies and you blind our protectors who are willing to lay down their lives for us to be free, when you blind them to their ability to see the enemy, then people get killed, and people that wanted to prevent it are left with guilty consciences because they wonder what could we have done more--and it's not their fault. It comes from the top of Homeland Security and the top of the Justice Department. And when it comes from the White House, as it did, to stop the seminar at the CIA, it comes from the very top. And the message is clear: We don't want to offend anyone who may be a radical Islamist because, gee, that might be bad. It's okay to offend evangelical Christians. Sure, they're the only group in America it's politically correct to persecute now. It's okay to persecute anyone who believes what most of humanity has for most of mankind and particularly the Founders, the signers of the Declaration of Independence, those who represented each of the States at the Constitutional Convention. They believed marriage was between a man and a woman. However, today, according to this administration, anyone who believes in that same type of traditional marriage is to be hated, vilified, despised, persecuted and to be watched out for by our Homeland Security because they're a threat, because they want the freedom to believe in traditional marriage that was taught in the Bible, the kind of marriage that Jesus himself attended and performed, his first recorded miracle. Yet those of us who believe in that are to be vilified. It's also amazing to me--I'm not pushing my beliefs on anyone else, but it's part of who I am as a Christian--there are people whose lifestyles I believe hurt them, hurt our society and degenerate our society. But I would give my life for them. As a Christian, I love them. I have no problem embracing them. I find it interesting that people who have come to hate me, and Christians like me, they can't understand how you can disagree with a lifestyle or disagree so profoundly with a political belief and yet love them through and through as an individual. I hope and pray some day they'll understand. But in the meantime, it is important if we're going to allow the people in our Federal Government who have sworn their lives to protecting all Americans, if we're going to allow them to do their job, they must be able to have a full, total and complete discussion on radical Islam that incorporates political belief from or into their religion and vice versa. And there are radical Islamists who want to destroy us; therefore, you have 9/11 of 2001, you have 9/11 of last year, you have 9/11 of the year before. We've got to wake up. There's still time, but people have been killed needlessly. And this kind of stuff, this kind of political correctness that ends up making it okay through some of the other documents we've seen to go after evangelical Christians and to fear them and potentially persecute them, and as we've seen from the IRS, it's good to persecute Tea Parties. People at the low levels didn't make that up. They were encouraged, allowed to do the kind of things they were, otherwise it could not have gone as long and as widely as it did. But these days are very, very telling. Very telling. Now, this is a helpful comment, note, too, that not all Arabs are Muslims and not all Muslims are Arabs. Yes, for example, there are Christian Arabs who are being persecuted in Egypt, in Iran, in Iraq, in Afghanistan and in places like Libya, where we helped radicals take over and people who just want to worship God are being persecuted. It is tragic what has happened and the blindness that has occurred. It's embarrassing. It's particularly embarrassing when I embrace family members who have lost loved ones in Benghazi or 9/11 of 2001. One family member told me that Secretary Clinton advised them--what we now know is what at that time she knew very clearly, Benghazi was not about a video. She advised them, hey, we're going to get the guy that made that video, as if that was going to give them some comfort. They weren't out to kill someone. They weren't out to get somebody. But they do want justice. And it turned out, the Secretary knew at the time she said that that it wasn't about a video. It was part of confusing or attempting to confuse the issues and the mistakes that were made by this administration. So it was worth noting, though, when we look at the IRS and the problems there, this article today by Labor Union Report Diary, May 16, yesterday, and it says: Meet the partisan union behind the partisan Internal Revenue Service. Where do the anti-sequester, Federal Government workers- turned-protesters work? They work at the Internal Revenue Service--and they are unionized. And the article points out that: As the scandal involving the IRS' targeting of conservatives and Tea Party groups consumes the news cycle for the moment and Barack Obama, who, so far, has claimed ignorance of the targeting, has thrown a sacrificial lamb out to appease journalists, that IRS agents targeted certain small-government, anti-tax groups should really not come as a surprise. Beginning in 2009, Democrats and unions, including government unions, have spent the last several years demonizing Tea Party groups as well as other small government groups. On Thursday, despite the escalating scandal, Barack Obama told reporters he did not see the need for a special prosecutor, saying ``probes by Congress and the Justice Department should be able to figure out who was responsible for improperly targeting Tea Party groups when they applied for tax-exempt status.'' While that may appease reporters from CNN and the mainstream media for the moment, one must wonder why there shouldn't be a special prosecutor to look into the wrongdoings of an agency with such vast powers over the American populace. Unless, of course, there is a smoking gun that people within the administration don't want discovered. In December 2009, during the first term of his Presidency, in an effort to make the Federal Government more ``union friendly,'' President Obama issued Executive Order 13522. In short, as noted in 2011, Executive Order 13522 establishes ``labor-management forums'' between union bosses (who may or may not be Federal employees) and Federal agency management. As part of the directives under Executive Order 13522, agency heads are to engage union bosses in ``pre-decisional discussions'' before decisions are made--and those discussions are to be secret and outside the purview of the Freedom of Information Act. Pre-decisional discussions, by their nature, should be conducted confidentially among the parties to the discussions. This confidentiality is an essential ingredient in building the environment of mutual trust and respect necessary for the honest exchange of views and collaboration. That was the position of the administration. Coincidentally, among the agencies covered by Executive Order 13522 is the Internal Revenue Service, which is part of the Department of the Treasury, and whose agency employees are represented by the National Treasury Employees Union. The fact that, under Executive Order 13522, Federal agencies are being co-managed by union bosses and it appears that the perpetrators of the IRS scandal are likely to be members of the IRS union makes one wonder how coordinated the attacks were--especially as four of the alleged perpetrators are claiming their bosses made them do it. More importantly, if their bosses made them engage in potentially illegal activities, why didn't they go to their union to file a grievance? Well, apparently, under the President's Executive Order 13522, the union bosses and the agency heads are complicit in making these decisions, and making them secretly and privately while part of the most transparent administration in history--we were told it was going to be. The union bosses and the agency heads making decisions secretly beyond anything that anybody in America can get with a Freedom of Information Act request is just outrageous. We need the transparency. And especially now that we know the most powerful, the most feared agency in America--the IRS--is being co- managed by union bosses, it's time to clean house. It's time to get back to smaller government, less intrusive government, and government that is truly of, by, and for the people. With that, Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Yoho). Immigration Reform

Mr. GOHMERT

Mr. GOHMERT. Mr. Speaker, there's an article I missed that came out March 15, 2013, from Healthcare IT News--rather interesting. It talks about a lawsuit against the IRS because the IRS, it says, stole health records of some 10 million Americans, including the medical records of all California State judges. Knowing California, I bet most of them are Democrats. They took their medical records. So, the allegation, the lawsuit, is over that. Ten million Americans' records. It doesn't matter what party they are. It doesn't matter what their political beliefs are. They have a right to have their own records kept private until ObamaCare fully kicks in. I don't know why the IRS would take those medical records so prematurely, because when ObamaCare kicks in, the Federal Government has everybody's records already. It's time to repeal it.

Mr. GOHMERT

Mr. GOHMERT. Mr. Speaker, it's always an honor to come to the floor of the House of Representatives, especially when there's so much of great importance occurring in our Nation at this time. We do need health care reform, and I appreciate my friends across the aisle talking about the importance of good health care. I've continued to hear people find that they are going to lose their health insurance. I was talking to numerous employers this past week who say, I want to compete and have been notified insurance is going up higher next year. I heard from a small business employer, I'm not going to be able to carry insurance. I love my employees. I provide them good insurance. But come January, too many of my competitors have said they can't afford to keep the insurance for their employees, and so they're going to drop it and pay the $2,000 fine because $2,000 is so much cheaper than the cost of health insurance. The reason we were told for pushing through the ObamaCare bill in a very partisan way was because there were 30 million or so who did not have insurance; and as some have indicated, there may be that many who lose their insurance as a result of ObamaCare. So I'm very concerned. I, like my friends across the aisle, want to make sure not that people have insurance necessarily, but that they have affordable health care. And I'm hearing from health care providers that they're hearing from people who are no longer going to carry insurance for their employees, that it's going to be more and more expensive to provide health care since they made money off those who had insurance; and without people having the insurance they had in the past, as the President promised and has been made very clear was not true, there will be more pressure on those who are paying for their health care to pay substantially more, which means there are more people who will not be able to afford it, and it will break the system. Of course, with health insurance companies complaining that because of the things they're forced to cover, their insurance is going to necessarily have to go up. There will likely be insurance companies that will have to give up the health insurance business, and then the administration can complain that, Well, we thought we were going to be able to work with the greedy health insurance companies; but as it turns out, they've gone out of business and doctors have abandoned their practices and retired early. So it looks like the government is going to have to take over the health care business. Under ObamaCare, the Federal Government is already going to have everybody's health records. Their most private and personal secrets between them and their health care provider will then be available to the Federal Government and, as I understand it, to General Electric, who this administration, because of their great support of General Electric in this administration and their cozy working relationship, they'll have the contract to take care of everybody's health care records. So that will be just delightful. The tragic thing, just as the one lady asked during the town hall that the President had at the White House when she asked about her elderly mother getting a pacemaker, though she was of late years--I believe 95--and that she's had the pacemaker for 10 or 11 years, would the panel that decided who would get what treatment, would they consider the quality of life of an individual in determining whether or not they get a pacemaker or such things, and the answer the President ultimately gave is, Well, let's face it. Maybe we're better off telling your mother that instead of a pacemaker you get a pain pill. So it's very clear that as we approach the day when ObamaCare kicks in fully, there will be more and more seniors, whatever age this panel--it's not really a death panel--but it will decide who gets pacemakers and who is perhaps too old or maybe has lived a good life but now is beyond being worthy of, in this administration's opinion, getting a new knee or a new hip or back surgery, those kinds of things. You'll have bureaucrats that are deciding those issues all in the name of helping people with their health care. Because as anyone who seriously looks deeply into socialized medicine finds out, the only way for socialized medicine to stay afloat is if you have people dying while they're waiting on a list to get their particular procedures. I mentioned on the floor, I believe last year, about a report from England that they're hoping to reduce the length of time that patients have to wait for their procedures, whether therapeutic or diagnostic, surgery, therapy, whatever it is, reduce that wait from the time it's prescribed until the time it's obtained down to 10 months. Well, there are a lot of people that we know find out they have cancer, they have some problem, perhaps need a bypass, and if they don't get it immediately, then they don't make it for 10 months. So that's where we are headed and eventually people will see that, and I just hope and pray it's not too late so enough people will put pressure on their Members of Congress, and especially the Senate, to repeal ObamaCare and get us true health care reform so that people can have the health care that they want to have, they deserve to have. And for those who are truly--and only those who are truly--chronically ill or chronically poor and are not able to work or obtain affordable health care, then those people, as a caring society, we would take care of. But since ObamaCare cut $700 billion from Medicare, it's now appearing to more and more seniors that this administration effectively took money for treatment that they would get and provided that to young, healthier people who probably could, or possibly have their employer provide it if the employers were not being penalized for doing so, but whose employers will likely give up that insurance, and we'll see that as time goes on. But nonetheless, seniors, although they were told by this administration and told by some people across the aisle that they wouldn't lose their doctor, well, many have already lost their doctor. People were told, if you like your insurance, you can keep it; and we've already found that's not true. So my heart breaks for people who are going to need health care in the next few years and are simply not going to be allowed to have it because the government will stand between them and the health care they need. I do recall seeing the President on video saying some years back that he wanted single payer health care, the government taking over all health care, but we couldn't get there in one step. As you examine ObamaCare and you see it is ultimately going to bankrupt health insurance companies, it is going to drive doctors out of the profession, it is going to ultimately bring down the standard of care, we see that it has now set up the whole system to fail so that down the road the government will say, just as then Senator Obama said, we will get to government-run health care because, gee, the greedy insurance companies went bankrupt trying to be greedy and doctors got out of the business, and now it looks like the government is going to have to take it over, just like we hoped. If there was ever any aspect of life that would ensure that the Federal Government could dictate people's lives to them, it would be health care. When the government controls all health care, the government will control all people in this country because they will make the decision basically who gets what treatment, when we get to that point, and I'm hoping and praying we will repeal ObamaCare before that happens. It's going to require a new Senate, obviously. Well, another area that has had a lot of government intrusion has been in the area of the First Amendment. So many people simply do not understand and do not appreciate that the First Amendment does say, ``Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.'' So we've had so many areas in which the government has moved forward to establish a nonreligion, has forced, like in the case of the major who shot and killed 13 of our servicemembers at Fort Hood, he and his Islamic faith were forced upon people who needed counseling about having to go, Christians who had to go to the Middle East, to Iraq, to Afghanistan, to serve their country. They had to get counseling from someone who made very clear that his faith was everything, and his faith in Islam so overwhelmed him that not only must it have affected the advice he gave to Christians who were forced to see him, but it also caused him to shoot and kill even those he had not wounded with his words. But there does seem to be a war on Christianity in this country. Certainly, as the Founders anticipated, there should not be an establishment of religion, but most important was that they not prohibit the free exercise of religion. When I was in the Army for 4 years, I had so many Christian friends. I had friends that were not. But I had so many Christian friends, and it seemed that especially around east Texas, where I grew up, so many Christians, those that came from Christian backgrounds, also had instilled not only a faith in God but also a love of country because of just how blessed this country has been, and because they understood that since most of the Founders had this Christian faith and over half, about two-thirds were even ordained Christian ministers, the signers of the Declaration of Independence, they wanted freedom of religion. So you could be an atheist. You could be a Muslim. You could be a Buddhist, whatever. You could believe in the power of crystals and nothing else, whatever it was, because it was the Christian faith. If it is truly Christian, then it provides everyone with the freedom of choice, as God has given us. There are other religions that do not give freedom of choice. And we know, as the Islamic countries, where we're not allowed, even as Members of Congress, to carry in a Bible or to talk about our faith at all, they clearly prohibit the free exercise of religion. Even since this country and so many thousands of Americans laid down their lives to bring freedom to Afghanistan, this country gave Afghanistan a constitution in which shari'a law was the law of the land, and the last report I saw indicated that the last Jewish person had left Afghanistan and the last Christian, public Christian church had closed. So there's no freedom of religion there. There's no freedom of religion even in allied nations like Saudi Arabia or even in Egypt, not complete freedom of worship, even when Egypt was more of an ally than a country that elected a Muslim Brotherhood member who wanted to see the great state of America destroyed. This has been a country where anyone, any religious beliefs, would have freedom of religion. But when we get away from the Judeo-Christian faith, whose notions founded this country, then there is no protection for all religions. So it was interesting to see, especially, having been in the Army, having had friends that made careers out of the military--so many that started with me stayed in for a career--to see, last week, that and, as this headline says, ``Pentagon Confirms May Court Martial Soldiers Who Share Christian Faith.'' This May 1st article by Ken Klukowski said: The Pentagon has released a statement saying that soldiers could be prosecuted for promoting their faith: ``Religious proselytization is not permitted within the Department of Defense. Court martials and nonjudicial punishments are decided on a case-by-case basis.'' The statement, released to Fox News, follows a Breitbart News report on Obama administration Pentagon appointees meeting with anti-Christian extremist Mikey Weinstein to develop court martial procedures to punish Christians in the military who express or share their faith. (From our earlier report: Weinstein is the head of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, and says Christians-- including chaplains--sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ in the military are guilty of ``treason'' and of committing an act of ``spiritual rape'' as serious a crime as ``sexual assault.'' He also asserted that Christians sharing their faith in the military are ``enemies of the Constitution.'') Being convicted in a court martial means that a soldier has committed a crime under Federal military law. Punishment for a court martial can include imprisonment and being dishonorably discharged from the military. So President Barack Obama's civilian appointees who lead the Pentagon are confirming that the military will make it a crime--possibly resulting in imprisonment--for those in uniform to share their faith. This would include chaplains-- military officers who are ordained clergymen of their faith (mostly Christian pastors or priests or Jewish rabbis)--whose duty, since the founding of the U.S. military under George Washington, is to teach their faith and minister to the spiritual needs of troops who come to them for counsel, instruction or comfort. This regulation would severely limit expressions of faith in the military, even on a one-to-one basis between close friends. It could also effectively abolish the position of chaplain in the military, as it would not allow chaplains, or any servicemembers, for that matter, to say anything about their faith that others say led them to think they were being encouraged to make faith part of their life. It's difficult to imagine how a member of the clergy could give spiritual counseling without saying anything that might be perceived in that fashion. World magazine has an article entitled ``Religious Battle Lines,'' posted May 2, 2013. And in that article by Edward Lee Pitts, it says: In a provocative piece at The Huffington Post written before his Pentagon visit, Weinstein, who served in the U.S. Air Force said, ``We face incredibly well-funded gangs of fundamentalist Christian monsters who terrorize their fellow Americans by forcing their weaponized and twisted version of Christianity upon their helpless subordinates in our Nation's Armed Forces.'' After the meeting, a column appeared in The Washington Post, largely sourced by Weinstein, which portrayed him as heroically taking on and lecturing the Pentagon brass. That piece in the newspaper's On Faith section opened by suggesting that, while Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel has Pentagon budget concerns, ``there are much more serious issues he must deal with. Religious proselytization and sexual assault are at the top of the list.'' Well, if Secretary Hagel were talking about the type of proselytization that has gone on among our military members that has caused anyone to yell ``Allahu Akbar'' and then go about killing fellow members of the service, then I would certainly understand why Secretary Hagel would be concerned about that kind of proselytizing. But for anyone to talk about sedition and treason and Christians basically acting in an unconstitutional way by expressing or utilizing their freedom of religion, for him to promote the prohibition of the free exercise of religion, would be actually encouraging treason, and it would be so very unconstitutional. So it's quite interesting, when you find people who are educated beyond their ability such that they could read the Constitution and not understand the second clause that does not allow prohibition of the free exercise of religion. We got an explanation from DOD and the Air Force on what they really meant after people started objecting to this. And the Air Force statement said this: When on duty, or in an official capacity, Air Force members are free to express their personal religious beliefs as long as it does not make others uncomfortable. Proselytizing (inducing someone to convert to one's faith) goes over that line. Leaders must avoid the actual or apparent use of their position to promote their personal religious beliefs to their subordinates or to extend preferential treatment for any religion. As this matter from Fox News says: Lieutenant Colonel Tingley's last sentence is troubling. An Air Force officer was told he could no longer keep a Bible on his desk because it ``may'' appear that he was condoning a particular religion. Air Force officers must be allowed to live out their faith in a way that is consistent with their faith. If the Bible is important, then an Air Force officer should be able to have one on his desk. Air Force officers should be allowed to attend chapel, lead prayers, even speak in chapel or lead Bible studies if it is consistent with their faith. This statement does not help. What does ``as long as it does not make others uncomfortable'' mean? Who decides? How much of this policy did Mikey Weinstein influence? These are all good questions, because if the standard is that you may be allowed to express your religious beliefs unless it makes someone uncomfortable, then that is basically a prohibition of anybody's freedom of religion, if they are a Christian. Mr. Weinstein doesn't seem to be bothered. I haven't seen an expression of concern about anybody yelling ``Allahu Akbar'' and killing 13 other servicemembers as an expression of religion. He doesn't seem to have found that treasonous or problematic. But some of the rest of us do. So I hope that common sense and reason will win out, especially considering the historic nature of our Constitution. And those who parrot the words ``separation of church and state'' as if they are in the Constitution I find don't often know that those are not in the Constitution and are not aware that Thomas Jefferson coined that phrase in a letter to the Danbury Baptists where he also coined the phrase, ``wall of separation.'' And this is a President who, it has been confirmed by secular and even the Congressional Research folks, that Jefferson most Sundays when he was here in Washington would normally ride a horse down Pennsylvania Avenue and attend a nondenominational Christian worship service here in the Capitol just down the Hall in what we now call Statuary Hall but where they, back then, for most of the 1800s, had a Christian worship service. The first woman to address a group in the Capitol did so, a female evangelist, a Christian evangelist spoke down the hall. The first Catholic to address a group in the Capitol did so just down the Hall. The first African American to address a group in the Capitol did so down the hall. It is a very historic place just down the hall where Church was held for most of the 1800s, a Christian, nondenominational worship service. So it is rather historic. And it was a Christian chapel to which George Washington went with all the other leaders after he was sworn in in 1789 and went down the road there in New York from the Federal building where he was sworn in to the chapel that was the only building at ground zero that was completely unaffected by the horrible fall of the World Trade Centers after they were attacked by people filled with hatred, an evil people, radical Islamists, who thought that in their religion, radical Islam, that they would find virgins in paradise by killing thousands of innocent people. So, hopefully, the military will take another look at this. I hope and pray they will. For most of this country's history, Members of Congress, even still we have Members of Congress from both sides of the aisle who quote Scripture from the Bible as a resource or a confirmation for a particular bill or position that they are taking. Going back to our very inception as a country, that was considered a wise thing and not a treasonous thing as Mr. Weinstein, so unfamiliar with our history, would attempt to have people believe. It was the incredible Martin Luther King, Jr., an ordained Christian minister, that sought to apply the teachings of Jesus and the philosophy of Jesus through nonviolence to force the Constitution to be interpreted to mean exactly what it said, and that is the kind of basis from which there is legitimacy to treat all people equally. As Jefferson made clear, if people do not realize that their liberty comes from God, then they will not long keep that liberty. I think he said he trembled at such a thought. This Wednesday, we are going to have a hearing in the Oversight Committee regarding what happened at Benghazi on 9/11 of last year. I will be honored, humbled and honored, to escort the widow of Ty Woods, one of the two former Navy SEALs who was killed when help did not come, for whatever reason, whoever ordered help not to come in a timely fashion, and this hearing will hopefully shed a little more light on that. An article from Breitbart came out 5 May, 2013, by John Sexton. He says: In an appearance on ``Face the Nation'' this morning, Representative Darrell Issa revealed several new pieces of information about the Obama administration's controversial description of the 2012 terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya, casting doubt that the White House mischaracterized its cause by mere accident. ``The talking points were right and then the talking points were wrong,'' Issa explained in response to a question about reporting at the Weekly Standard. The CIA and Greg Hicks, who took over as Charge d'Affaires in Libya after the death of Ambassador Chris Stevens, both knew immediately that it was an attack, not a protest. Hicks, who did not appear on the show but whose reactions were featured based on transcripts of interviews with Issa's committee, said he was stunned by what U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice claimed on five different news shows on September 16. When she appeared on ``Face the Nation,'' she followed an interview with the President of Libya who claimed he had ``no doubt'' it was a terror attack. Moments later, Ambassador Rice contradicted him and claimed a spontaneous protest was more likely. Acting Ambassador Hicks watched the Sunday shows and said he found this contradiction shocking. ``The net impact of what has transpired is the spokesperson of the most powerful country in the world has basically said that the President of Libya is either a liar or doesn't know what he is talking about,'' he accused. Hicks added, ``My jaw hit the floor as I watched this. I have never been as embarrassed in my life, in my career as on that day.'' Hicks believes the stunning failure of diplomacy on the Sunday news shows explains why it took the FBI 3 weeks to gain access to the Benghazi site. The U.S. had effectively humiliated the Libyan President on national TV. That decision, he believed, probably compromised our ability to investigate and track down those responsible. According to Hicks, no one from the State Department contacted him about what Ambassador Rice would be saying in advance. The next morning he called Beth Jones, Acting Assistant Secretary for Near East Affairs, and asked her why Ambassador Rice had made the statements she had. Jones responded, ``I don't know.'' A report published Friday by the Weekly Standard suggests that State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland took issue with the initial talking points and, with backing from the White House, removed any evidence of al Qaeda involvement and of prior attacks on Western targets in the region. According to emails reviewed by the Weekly Standard, Nuland said her superiors were concerned about criticism from Congress. You don't have to be trained in the Diplomatic Corps to understand that if the President of Libya, where our consulate was attacked, said this was not a protest, it was an attack by extremists, that since this administration needed his administration's assistance in investigating the matter, that they may have just alienated the President of Libya and negated efforts to bring the people responsible to justice. Of course there's no real explanation as to why it would take 8 months just to put up three pictures, as has been done, to try to identify the perpetrators of what happened in Libya. Heck, when that was done regarding the perpetrators in Boston, it wasn't months that it took to identify those individuals; they precipitated bringing things to a head rather quickly. Isn't it interesting that it's only after tremendous congressional pressure to get to the bottom of what actually happened at Benghazi so that we can try to avoid it for the future that all of a sudden there is interest in actually trying to capture the people responsible. CBS News, May 6, by Sharyl Attkisson, has a headline of an article: Diplomat: U.S. Special Forces told ``you can't go'' to Benghazi during attacks: The deputy of slain U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens has told congressional investigators that a team of Special Forces prepared to fly from Tripoli to Benghazi during the September 11, 2012, attacks was forbidden from doing so by U.S. Special Operations Command South Africa. This is just shocking to think that we had people armed, equipped, able, as we know now if this is true, they should have been able to save the lives of those two heroes--Ty Woods and Glen Doherty--and also the State Department individual that had most of his right leg blown off up there with them. They could have saved all of them if they had been allowed to go protect the people who were sent there to serve by this administration. Another article, the Washington Times has a headline: ``U.S. could have halted Benghazi attack with a flyover.'' This is according to a diplomat. This article by Shaun Waterman, dated Monday, May 6, 2013, says: U.S. air power could have headed off at least part of last year's terror attack on the diplomatic post in Benghazi, but American officials never asked for overflight permission because there were no airborne tankers available to refuel, according to the House Oversight Committee's investigation. Gregory N. Hicks, who became the chief of the U.S. mission when Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens was killed in the attack, told House investigators Libya would have given the U.S. permission to do the fly-over. Democrats have accused the Republicans of running a ``one- sided investigation.'' Mr. Hicks will testify on Capitol Hill this week along with several others who will detail the conflicting stories the Obama administration told in the days after the attack, which left Stevens and three other Americans dead. Mr. Hicks was deputy chief of mission at the embassy in Tripoli when the U.S. post in Benghazi was attacked by heavily armed extremists on September 11. In interviews last month, Mr. Hicks told investigators with the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee that an overflight by a U.S. F15 or F16 might have prevented the second phase of the attack. After the diplomatic post was over-run and set ablaze that night killing Stevens and Foreign Service Officer Sean Smith, the survivors took refuge in a nearby CIA building called the annex. That building was in turn attacked at dawn on September 12, when a mortar barrage killed former SEALs Glen Doherty and Tyrone Woods. ``If we had gotten clearance from the Libyan military for an American plane to fly over Libyan air space . . . if we had been able to scramble a fighter or aircraft or two over Benghazi as quickly as possible after the attack commenced, I believe there would not have been a mortar attack on the annex in the morning because I believe the Libyans would have split,'' Hicks told House investigators. Another article from Fox News, also dated May 6, 2013, is titled: Clinton Sought End-Run Around Counterterrorism Bureau on Night of Benghazi Attack, Witness Will Say at Hearing. On the night of September 11, as the Obama administration scrambled to respond to the Benghazi terror attacks, then- Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and a key aid effectively tried to cut the Department's own Counterterrorism Bureau out of the chain of reporting and decision-making, according to a ``whistle-blower'' witness from that bureau who will soon testify to the charge before Congress, Fox News has learned. That witness is Mark I. Thompson, a former marine and now the deputy coordinator for operations in the agency's Counterterrorism Bureau. It goes on down, it says: Fox News has also learned that another official from the Counterterrorism Bureau--independently of Thompson--voiced the same complaint about Clinton and Under Secretary for Management Patrick Kennedy to trusted national security colleagues back in October. Extremists linked to al Qaeda stormed the U.S. Consulate and a nearby annex on September 11 in a heavily armed and well-coordinated 8-hour assault that killed the U.S. ambassador to Libya, Chris Stevens, and three other Americans. Thompson considers himself a whistle-blower whose account was suppressed by the official investigative panel that Clinton convened to review the episode, the Accountability Review Board. Thompson's lawyer, Joseph diGenova, a former U.S. attorney, has further alleged that his client has been subjected to threats and intimidation by as-yet-unnamed superiors at State, in advance of cooperation with Congress. Down further it says: ``You should have seen what (Clinton) tried to do to us that night,'' the second official in State's Counterterrorism Bureau told colleagues back in October. Those comments would appear to be corroborated by Thompson's forthcoming testimony. State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki called the counterterrorism officials' allegations ``100 percent false.'' A spokesman for Clinton said tersely that the charge is not true. It says: Daniel Benjamin, who ran the Department's Counterterrorism Bureau at the time, also put out a statement Monday morning strongly denying the charges. ``I ran the bureau then, and I can say now with certainty, as the former Coordinator for Counterterrorism, that this charge is simply untrue,'' he said. ``Though I was out of the country on official travel at the time of the attack . . . '' And it goes on. But that seems to be the way, when this administration wants somebody to say, as he did, a charge is simply untrue and to strongly deny charges, they seem to have to call on somebody who had no firsthand information, which is why so many people were questioning why Ambassador Susan Rice was called upon to make the Sunday morning show round and constantly tell people that apparently it was the result of a protest and was not al Qaeda related, when in fact as people knew that night at the time of the attack, this was a coordinated effort. There was no sign of protest. So the way the administration appears to have operated is to have people come forward who had no firsthand information, give them their talking points, as Susan Rice was given-- an intelligent person. She's told by people apparently she trusts, here's what you need to point out, here's what you need to know. And then those people have plausible deniability of what the real facts are because they've just been handed talking points. So it is a very serious matter when we're trying to get to the truth because it does matter. It makes the difference between whether or not we learn from mistakes that were made and correct them for the future, or whether we refuse to learn from history, refuse to learn from the mistakes that were made so that we become, as the old saying says, destined to repeat them. So it does matter, and it matters very much to Ty Woods' widow, who will be here for the hearing. She does have interest because it does matter to her. What difference does it make? It will matter to the loved ones of those who will die in the future if we don't get down to what actually occurred, what mistakes were made so we can avoid them being made in the future. It makes a lot of difference to those who don't want their loved ones to die in the service of this country. Now, there are also reports out there that, as I read already, that there was a group of Special Forces who were ordered to stand down and not go forward and help those at Benghazi. As the article from CBS News points out, there may have been a Special Forces team that was ready to go and then they were told you can't go. It is just incredible to think that someone may have given such an order and not allowed the military to go forward. There are rumors afloat that people in the military, people in the State Department, have been told not to talk to Members of Congress about what happened at Benghazi. If there is anything to those accounts, one thing that is often helpful is to go to the law itself. 18 USC, section 1505 is entitled, ``Obstruction of Proceedings Before Departments, Agencies, and Committees,'' and, in part, says: ``Whoever corruptly''--and I'm just reading what might be applicable if this were ever to arise and someone ever were to instruct members of the military or members of the State Department or any agency of the Federal Government not to communicate with Members of Congress, this bears noting. Whoever corruptly, or by threats or force, or by any threatening letter or communication influences, obstructs, or impedes or endeavors to influence, obstruct, or impede the due and proper administration of the law under which any pending proceeding is being had before any department or agency of the United States, or the due and proper exercise of the power of inquiry under which any inquiry or investigation is being had by either House, or any committee of either House or any joint committee of the Congress. It goes on to say they'll be punished. That's a rather serious matter, so hopefully nobody is out there giving such instruction or has not been out there giving such instructions, because when members of the military or the State Department or intelligence departments or Justice Departments have information and they have been asked to provide such information and anyone instructs them in any way that may impede Congress' recovery of such information, then they need to look at 18 USC. Also, 18 USC, 371: If two or more persons conspire either to commit any offense against the United States, or to defraud the United States, or any agency thereof in any manner or for any purpose, and one or more of such persons do any act to effect the object of the conspiracy, each shall be-- And then it talks about their fine and imprisonment. And then, of course, this under 18 USC, section 2: Whoever commits an offense against the United States or aids, abets, counsels, commands, induces, or procures its commission is punishable as a principal. Whoever willfully causes an act to be done which if directly performed by him or another would be an offense against the United States, is punishable as a principal. So, basically if somebody is encouraged not to be forthcoming or honest with the Congress, you run into some issues there as well. I hope people will take note of our laws, and hopefully there's no truth to the rumors afloat that such instructions had been given because, just as I was so greatly offended when the national security letter system was abused and we had an inspector general report about that, I didn't care that it was a Republican administration that was abusing people's freedom and I spoke out. And I hope that friends across the aisle, as this information continues to be forthcoming about misrepresentations that were made publicly by this administration, intentionally and knowingly, that others, friends across the aisle, will stand up, as I did, about the Bush administration, their Justice Department, and demand justice. I demanded a resignation from the FBI Director back then. We have an obligation, and it goes beyond party loyalty. When people were killed who were sent to Libya to serve this country--and we had two former SEALs who went and gave their lives to try to save, and who did save, American lives--the least people stateside can do, the least those who were reportedly told you can't go help these people, the least they can do since they were not allowed, according to the story, not allowed to go give Ty and Glen backup then, I hope and pray they'll have the courage to give them backup now so there will be no more Tys and Glens that will have to give their lives in the future because inadequate security was provided and a State Department was stumbling through relations in a tough situation and then sent people forward with statements that those who sent that person forward knew were not true, I hope that we'll have people, not just those that are now coming before the committee on Wednesday, but others, for the sake of Ty and Glen, Mr. Speaker, I hope people who are in the service or former servicemembers that may have personal information will give them the backup now that they're gone that they would have wanted if that was them who gave their lives. Mr. Speaker, with that I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. GOHMERT

Mr. GOHMERT. Thank you for that worthy tribute. Well, I want to reference a part of a Special Order address that was delivered here on this floor February 16, 2012, by me, and in that I had before me a transcript of a hearing where the FBI Director testified, and I pointed out--well, I just read the transcript, as I will do now, part of it. I pointed out before reading that I don't have a problem with the FBI having an outreach program to communities, but I said: Why would the FBI see the need to make positive outreach into any community of a specific nature? So after Director Mueller had indicated, yes, we have this wonderful outreach program with the Muslim communities, and those communities are exactly like every other community, I said: You had mentioned earlier and it's in your written statement that the FBI developed an extensive outreach to Muslim communities, and in answer to an earlier question I understood you to say that Muslim communities were like all other communities. So I'm curious. As a result of the extensive outreach program the FBI has had to the Muslim community, how has your outreach program gone with the Baptists and the Catholics? Director Mueller said: I'm not certain of necessarily the thrust of that question. I would say that our outreach to all segments of a particular city or country or society are good. I said: Well, do you have a particular program of outreach to Hindus, Buddhists, Jewish community, agnostics, or is it just an extensive outreach program to---- He interrupted and said: We have outreach to every one of those communities. I asked how he did that, and then he started to filibuster. And I said: I have looked extensively, and I haven't seen anywhere in any one of the FBI's letters information that there's been an extensive outreach program to any other community trying to develop trust and this kind of a relationship, and it makes me wonder if there is an issue of trust or some problem like that that the FBI has seen in that particular community. And just so there's no mistaking, let me just read directly from the judge's opinion in the Holy Land Foundation case in response to the effort by ISNA, the Islamic Society of North America, CAIR, Council on American Islamic Relations, NAIT, the Holy Land Foundation and others. And I read this: The judge said: The government has produced ample evidence the associations of CAIR, ISNA, NAIT and the Holy Land Foundation, the Islamic Association for Palestine, and Hamas. While the Court recognizes that the evidence produced by the government largely predates the Holy Land Foundation designation date, the evidence is nonetheless sufficient to show the association of these entities with the Holy Land Foundation, the Islamic Association for Palestine and Hamas. There was plenty of evidence to support that, according to the judge. That was affirmed by the Fifth Circuit. It's important to note that, out of concern for the FBI's outreach program, and the State Department and the White House for reaching out, bringing in people who courts have said supported terrorism, and these people are being brought in, in the military we say brought inside the wire, in this case, brought inside the State Department, brought inside the White House on a regular basis, brought inside the Justice Department, my friend, Frank Wolf had this language added to the continuing resolution that was passed, that President Obama signed into law. This is language in the law, and my friend, Mr. Wolf included it to reference the FBI's policy. It says, and this is the language in the law: Conferees support the FBI's policy prohibiting any formal non-investigative cooperation with unindicted co-conspirators in terrorism cases. The conferees expect the FBI to insist on full compliance with this policy by FBI field offices, and to report to the Committee on Appropriations regarding any violation of the policy. Well, guess what? We didn't get this from the FBI. We had to get it from the Islamic Society of North America's own Web site. They reported that on Wednesday, February 8--that was last year, 2012--that the American Arab Anti-discrimination Committee, the Arab American Institute, the Interfaith Alliance, the Islamic Society of North America, ISNA, which has been pronounced by the Fifth Circuit as having plenty of evidence to support that they fund terrorism, and have, and then it mentions other groups, including the Shoulder-to-Shoulder Campaign. But they, it says: They had an opportunity to discuss the matter with the Public Affairs Office of the FBI. Director Robert Mueller joined the meeting to discuss these matters with representatives from the organizations. The conversation with Director Mueller centered on material used by the agency that depicts falsehoods and negative connotations of the Muslim American community. The use of the material was first uncovered by Wired magazine. And that was uncovered by an organization that seems to be right in there with those who were unindicted but named co-conspirators in funding terrorism. From ISNA, they say: Director Mueller informed the participants that the FBI took the review of the training material very seriously, and he pursued the matter with urgency to ensure that this does not occur again in the future. ISNA President, Imam Magid, who's a frequent visitor to the White House, who the White House consults on speeches, or has, and welcomed to the inner sanctum of the State Department, other departments here in Washington, Magid stated: The discovery of FBI training materials that discriminated against Muslims did damage to the trust that was built between dedicated FBI officials and the American Muslim community. We welcome and appreciate Director Mueller's commitment to take positive steps toward eradicating such materials and rebuilding trust in an open dialogue. The Director also informed participants that, to date, nearly all related FBI training materials, including more than 160,000 pages of documents, were reviewed by subject matter experts multiple times. Consequently, more than 700 documents, 300 presentations of material, have been deemed unusable by the Bureau and pulled from the training curriculum. Material was pulled from the curriculum if even one component was deemed to include factual errors or be in poor taste or be stereotypical or lack precision. I guess stereotypical would mean if they point out that terrorists have one thing in common, that would be stereotypical. ISNA also reports: It was clear to all meeting participants that the issue of trust between community Members and the FBI needs to be taken seriously by all our Nation's decisionmakers. It was evident the Bureau must strengthen its efforts to build trust. How about trust from the other side? How about condemnation of terrorist acts? How about coming out and making clear all ties have been severed with Hamas and Hezbollah and those who would seek to make terror on innocent people? Anyway, ISNA's rejoicing because they got the FBI to actually go through and cull material that has words like ``jihad,'' words like ``extremist,'' words that have been purged from the FBI lexicon. Now, I was one who was allowed, in a classified setting, which I felt was totally unnecessary, to see the names of the so-called subject matter experts. I was allowed to go through material and see what it was. And it's time, Mr. Speaker, that our FBI agents and intelligence be allowed to remove the blindfolds and see who the enemy is when they do interrogations and questioning. With that, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. GOHMERT. I appreciate my friend from Wisconsin so much in giving voice to those who have no voice. We hear so often on this floor from people who mean what they say as they say: We have an obligation to help the most vulnerable amongst us, to help those who cannot help themselves. And having held my first-born child in both hands--I could have held her in one, but I didn't want to take a chance--I held a child that was smaller than some of these in this tale of horror of abortions, to think that someone could take scissors and cut the back of the neck and cut the spine and literally kill a child, it's virtually too much to take in. I hope others will see the wisdom of what Sean Duffy was talking about. But it does seem people have been desensitized to so many things they need to be re-sensitized to. Every country, no matter what its strength, how strong, including this country that has become the strongest country in the history of the world, which is already the most free country in the history of the world, more freedom, more opportunity than anyplace, including the great Israel under Solomon as king-- we are told that there's never been a king wiser than Solomon--but the way this country was founded, the way it was molded, the way we gave credit to the Creator, to divine providence, to the Lord, as referenced in the date of our Constitution itself--and it's dated in the year of our Lord 1787--they knew, and they pointed out repeatedly, that our rights, our liberties, will not last beyond this country's recognition that all rights, all freedoms, all gifts, all liberties come from a source. George Washington referred to the Divine Author of our blessed religion in one of his writings. It is actually the prayer that he included in his resignation as commanding general of the Revolutionary forces. And I know that in this Nation we accept everyone, all religions, all people, no matter what their religious convictions are, including no religious convictions whatsoever. But it is critically important that we know where we come from in order to have any idea where we're going. And it is the nature of man, it is the nature of humanity, that as a Nation reaches a peak--some in my history classes in college would refer to the cycle that countries go through, some referencing back to the ancient Greece government--that there was a cycle of its rise and fall. I felt like it was more of a bell-shaped curve that once you reach the peak, then people take their freedoms, take their opportunities for granted, they stop believing that there's a threat to those. And as they get less and less sensitive to the fact that all glory, all liberty, is fleeting, then they would lose them. Whether it's the cycle of rise and fall or a bell-shaped curve, it depends on us. Tom Brokaw had described the Greatest Generation as those who recognized the danger of fascism and the oppression that existed in the 1940s and rose up and fought against it. Unfortunately, the guy that knows our history so well, that could write a great book on the Greatest Generation, could turn around and a few short years later be completely desensitized and show himself to be part of anything but a great generation because he could not even recognize a threat to this civilization's existence. So, hopefully, people, situated as is he, will begin to recognize there are people that want to destroy our freedoms, they want to take what has been made into the greatest country, that's been blessed more than any country in history, and they want to act like there's no such thing as a threat to our security, to our freedom, to our own lives, to our lives and fortunes. Whether there's a threat to our sacred honor has been completely up to us. As the signers of the Declaration of Independence pledged, Our lives, our fortunes, our sacred honor. So the question arises: Is there any honor in trying to buy off your enemies, make them love you with cash, make them love you with tanks, make them love you by sending them F-16s, make them love you by sending tear gas to use against those they don't like? Is there any honor in that? We have Muslim Brotherhood, a group in Egypt, the Freedom and Justice Party in Egypt. They helped overthrow Mubarak as this administration here in America turned our back on an ally. And we got Muslim Brotherhood. I continue to have people approach me, say they're from Egypt, and they get so frustrated; they cannot believe we're supporting the wrong people in Egypt, just as those I've met with in Afghanistan have begged us to stop trying to buy a friend in the Taliban, especially those in the Northern Alliance who lost family and friends trying to fight the Taliban--and successfully defeating them on our behalf by early 2002. Then we took back the weapons that we provided and said, we got it from here. Now, 11 years later, we are turning our backs on our allies--the moderate Muslims who fought the Taliban for us--and are now trying to buy off the Taliban, who still want to destroy us. They still want to end our freedom, make us suffer because they consider us so decadent. From what I'm told in Afghanistan--and it has been reported widely in the news--this administration has offered to buy them first-class offices in Qatar so that they'll have a world presence and have instant respectability around the world. This administration has offered to release some of their murdering thugs who have spilled the blood of American patriots in the most cowardly and conniving ways. So they have no respect for us. I wondered if, perhaps, President Obama were going to be right. Perhaps he will be right. Maybe it will help America with countries that have shown hatred for this country. President Obama said it was going to basically be a game-changer that Muslim countries would have far more respect for us since we had a President, as President Obama said, who grew up in a Muslim country, with admiration for the practices and teachings of Muslims, a President who loved the call for prayer, who loved hearing that. It has been over 4 years now, and we've seen the polling that, in Muslim countries around the world, this United States' favorability rating has fallen far below what it was under George Bush, who did not grow up in a Muslim country. So we found that that didn't work despite 4 years under this administration of trying to pander to those who want to destroy our way of life, who want to force a caliphate over America as they now are trying to do in Egypt, in Libya, and are trying to do in other Middle Eastern countries. But our Constitution is what those of us who serve here took an oath to support and defend. That's where we are supposed to stand--in full defense of our Constitution, not the United Nations Charter, not sharia law. We took an oath to support and defend the Constitution of the United States. It has been determined in this country by the courts that people have a First Amendment right to burn, destroy a United States flag--the same flag that has draped countless coffins--bodies--of Americans who, as Lincoln said, gave their last full measure of devotion for our freedom. People have a First Amendment right to destroy that flag--that symbol of freedom and liberty. They've said there is a First Amendment right to destroy Bibles regardless of how holy those books are held to be by so many in America. A story is written and told of Thomas Jefferson's taking one of his many trips down Pennsylvania Avenue toward the Capitol, on a Sunday morning with a big Bible under his arm. Someone said, ``Mr. President, where are you going?'' He said, ``Well, I'm going to church up in the Capitol. Well, Mr. President, you don't believe everything they do there.'' He said, ``Sir, I am the highest elected magistrate in this country. It is imperative that I set the proper example.'' Jefferson felt he was setting the proper example by going to a nondenominational Christian church here in the Capitol, which was held down the Hall in what was then the House of Representatives Chamber, now called Statuary Hall. I have a bill that would require a plaque be put up to inform people of the amazing history. Thomas Jefferson, who coined the phrase ``separation of church and State,'' said there needs to be a wall of separation between church and State. He saw it as more of a one-sided wall where the State would not interfere in religion. Certainly, for this country to be at its greatest, people would bring their religious convictions to the State and make it stronger and better. That man who coined the phrase ``separation of church and State,'' not found in the Constitution, even felt it was appropriate to often have the Marine Band come and play hymns down the Hall for those who were at the Christian worship service. I'm not advocating we go back to that--there is no need--as we have churches all over this place now, but it is not appropriate to act as if those parts of our history are not true. They are true, they are part of our history; and it was the church that was so strong in the abolitionist movement to try to bring about equal treatment. It was the church--not all churches, because there was prejudice and bias and bigotry in some churches, but those who truly understood the teachings of Christ stood so firmly and strongly against slavery. Then 100 years later, an ordained Christian minister named Martin Luther King, Jr., fought for civil rights; but he did so as a complete pacifist, not advocating violence, and his efforts succeeded. He freed up young, little White boys, like me, who were Christians to treat brothers and sisters of any race, any color, any creed as brothers and sisters. It's all part of our history--the good parts, the bad parts. We shouldn't try to rewrite history. You've got to know where you came from. In the wake of the horrors of Boston, people were there, excited to see the finish of the race, of the world-famous Boston Marathon. So many friends of mine have dreamed of qualifying to run in the Boston Marathon. I have a number of friends who have. There is a lot of excitement even in their exhaustion as they near the finish line. That's where cold-hearted, calloused individuals filled with hate could set down bombs knowing they were going to kill very innocent people. How do you see a little 8-year-old child knowing that child is going to be killed by what you put together and set down? How do you do that? How do you have such evil in your heart that you can do that? How do you have such evil in your heart you set a bomb down knowing that people who are still around it, as you walk away as a coward, are going to have their legs blown out from under them and never walk again? How do you do that? You have to be so full of hate or evil or some sick religious convictions that somehow you believe that there is someone or something--some deity--that smiles upon that and thinks it's wonderful when you kill or maim innocent people and that somehow you'll be glorified by killing and maiming innocent people. It's very tragic. But we know for some time that the FBI, the State Department, the Intelligence Department, a number of departments have been trying to soften the language that they've used, that they've used to train so that they don't offend people who want to kill us already. I mean, I didn't know anybody back in the eighties that talked about radical Islam, yet 79 people were killed, hostages were taken, an Embassy was taken over, hostages held for over a year. In 1983, people were killed, marines waylaid as our Marine barracks in Beirut was blown up. We didn't really talk about radical Islam. Yet over time, instead of recognizing the danger to this country, we have people in authority in this administration who've decided that we must not use the terms that accurately describe what our killers believe, our want-to-be killers believe. We can't use those words. They might be offended. For heaven's sake, 9/11 of 2001 was plotted while Bill Clinton was President. And no one who has any fairness at all about them could ever accuse President Bill Clinton of demonstrating bias or prejudice against Islam. He sent troops to protect Muslims in Eastern Europe. Whether we agree or disagree that it was appropriate use of American troops and American lives, he sent American lives that were lost to help Muslims. And all the while President Bill Clinton, as Commander in Chief, was trying to help Muslims, there were radical Islamists who were plotting and planning an incredibly egregious and heinous act and attack against the United States of America. And that was before anybody ever used the words ``jihad,'' ``radical Islam,'' or ``al Qaeda.'' There's an article that my staff called to my attention last night in the Washington Examiner, an editorial, posted April 25 at 9 p.m. The title of their op-ed is, ``How the FBI Was Blinded By Political Correctness.'' It says: As the initial elation over the swift identification and ending of the brothers Tsarnaev manhunt fades, a steady stream of facts are emerging that strongly suggest the need for a more sober assessment of the FBI's performance in the 2 years prior to the Boston Marathon bombing. FBI counterterrorism agents interviewed Tamerlan Tsarnaev, the older of the brothers, in January 2011 after receiving a tip from Russian intelligence. Since the interviewing agents thought they heard nothing to indicate Tsarnaev was a terrorist, little else was done and the case was closed 2 months later. A few months after that, Tsarnaev went to Russia and encountered somebody or experienced something that apparently prompted him to become quite open about his devotion to a radical vision of Islamic jihad. The FBI visited him a second time after he returned to the United States, but again concluded that Tsarnaev was not a threat. It is speculation now, of course, but it's difficult to believe the Tsarnaevs would have been able to carry out the bombing had they been under active surveillance before the 2013 Boston Marathon. The editorial from the Washington Examiner goes on and says: Whatever else may yet be discovered about what the FBI missed, there is no excuse for the agency not grasping the significance of the radical Islamist video Tamerlan posted on his Facebook page, entitled, ``The Emergence of Prophecy: The Black Flags from Khorasan.'' The video explains and glorifies the prophecy of a mighty jihadist army rising from the Iranian region of the near east to conquer the world and establish an enduring Muslim empire. The Khorasan connection is a staple of al Qaeda ideology, and the video's presence on Tsarnaev's Facebook page was a red flag that should have alerted agents to a very real potential danger. It is quite possible, though, the FBI agents who interviewed Tsarnaev on both occasions failed to understand what they saw and heard because that's what they were trained to do. As the Washington Examiner's Mark Flatten reported last year, FBI training manuals were systematically purged in 2011 of all references to Islam that were judged offensive by a specially created five-member panel. Three of the panel members were Muslim advocates from outside the FBI, which still refuses to make public their identities. Nearly 900 pages were removed from the manuals as a result of that review. Several Congressmen were allowed to review the removed materials in 2012 on condition that they not disclose what they read to their staffs, the media, or the general public. With the recent proliferation of revelations about FBI blindness on the brothers Tsarnaev, a comment made last year by Representative Louie Gohmert, Republican of Texas, to Flatten now has a tragic resonance: ``We've got material being removed more because of political correctness than in the interest of truth and properly educated justice officials. We are blinding our enforcement officers from the ability to see who the enemy actually is.'' The Boston bombing showed the tragic consequences of that blindness. This is an op-ed from yesterday by the Washington Examiner quoting me from over a year ago. In fact, on February 16, 2012, I gave a speech from right here on the House floor that was recorded where I talked about this very issue, and something of assistance was a poster. This poster points out the terminology that was used in the 9/11 Commission report because in that 9/11 Commission report, before this administration took over and implemented political correctness, the 9/ 11 Commission didn't know they had to be politically correct in the terminology they use, according to the new standards by the FBI, so they referred to ``violent extremism'' three times. They referred to the ``enemy'' 39 times. They referred to ``jihad'' 126 times. They used the word ``Muslim'' 145 times. They referred to ``Islam'' 322 times. They referred to ``takfir'' one time. They referred to the ``Muslim Brotherhood'' five times. They referred to ``religious'' 65 times. They referred to ``Hamas'' four times, ``Hezbollah'' two times, ``al Qaeda'' 36 times, ``caliphate'' seven times, and ``sharia'' twice. And then it's easy to see that when it comes to ``enemy,'' neither the National Intelligence Strategy of 2009 under this administration, nor the FBI counterterrorism lexicon, the words that are allowed to be used by FBI agents in their terminology, apparently it is okay to talk about violent extremism, which is why Homeland Security Secretary Napolitano, she created a Countering Violent Extremism Working Group. Although she could not tell me how many members of the Muslim Brotherhood were part of that working group, we knew that there were some. She also could not tell me how many members of the Muslim Brotherhood who would like to see a giant caliphate in which the United States was included, how many she had in her Homeland Security Advisory Council that she gave secret clearances to. There's no way they could've been properly vetted and still gotten secret security clearances. But we see with the new FBI terminology and the new intelligence terminology, they can't talk about the enemy. They can't talk about jihad. They can't talk about Muslim. They can't talk about Islam. They can't talk about the Muslim Brotherhood. They can refer to religion; but as we know from the Homeland Security reports that they've yielded, the thing they're worried about really is more people who believe in the Constitution and veterans and Christians who are evangelical Christians. They'll talk about religious there; but, obviously, not in terms of radical Islam. They won't talk about Hamas. They won't talk about Hezbollah. The FBI counterterrorism lexicon doesn't even include reference to al Qaeda or sharia, nor does the Intelligence Strategy. So the question comes to my mind about that interview, the interviews back in 2011, because I know so many FBI agents that are incredible Americans, real patriots, smart, a lot of wisdom and judgment, but they follow orders like I did when I was in the Army. You do what you're ordered to do, and they do. But what kind of interview must that have been of the guy who was going to blow off arms and legs and kill a child and who had dreams of killing so many more? What kind of interview must that have been when you can't use the word ``jihad''? You can't talk about his Muslim faith. Did they even bring up Tamerlan's Muslim faith in that interview? I mean, they're not supposed to talk about it. And I do not believe in using religion to discriminate against anybody; but when you find out that there is a radical sect, not like the vast, incredibly vast majority of Muslims who don't want to kill people, and don't want to maim, and don't think it's right to cause that kind of human suffering, but there is a sect, a radical Islamist sect, and they can't talk about it. What kind of interview was that? Is it any wonder that the FBI came away from their interviews and said, we don't find any problems. Well, I guess not. If you can't talk in detail about Islamic faith to find out whether someone is a radical, whether his beliefs have now embraced the book ``The Milestone'' that Qutb of Egypt embraced, that some in this country, some that our own Homeland Security Secretary think are wonderful people, they've embraced the same writings that Osama bin Laden said helped radicalize him, if you can't know about those things, how in the world can you do a legitimate interview and find out is this a peace-loving Muslim or is this a radical who wants to kill people? And if I don't get this conversation right, 2 years from now there will be people dead in Boston. How silly must we be as a Nation to blindfold our law enforcement and not let them see an enemy that wants to destroy us. Now, I've talked to enough intelligence officers, Justice Department officials, people that love this country, Homeland Security, and they are so frustrated with the shackles that they have to wear, figuratively speaking, while they try to protect this country, where you can't talk about the beliefs of people who want to destroy this blessed country. What kind of interviews must those have been when you can't use the terms that let you get to the bottom of what may be a plot to kill people down the road? There's no problem in the Justice Department. There is a problem with leadership that will not let them do their job, and it needs to change. I'm blessed to be joined by a colleague, and I yield to Mr. Bentivolio. Remembering Howard Phillips

Mr. GOHMERT. I thank my friend from Florida. At this time, I'm proud to yield to a friend from Wisconsin (Mr. Duffy). I'm proud Wisconsin and Texas are in the same country because Wisconsin has certainly produced some great Americans. Protecting Our Children

Mr. GOHMERT. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It is indeed an honor for me to yield to a friend, a man that I am delighted was elected to join us last year, my friend, Mr. Yoho from Florida, for such time as he may consume. The Second Amendment

Mr. GOHMERT

Mr. GOHMERT. Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

Mr. GOHMERT

Mr. GOHMERT. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I must say how proud I am of the Members of Congress from the class that came in 2 years ago and of those who are coming in now. It's an honor to serve with folks who care so much about the country and where we're going; but to know where we're going, it's important to know where we've been. Of course, over the last week or so, we have endured terrible heartache because it wasn't just Boston that was attacked, and it wasn't just the little town of West, Texas, that lost so many people. E pluribus unum--``out of many, one.'' When tragedy strikes, we come together as one people to mourn. That has been true in the past. That's why it's so heartbreaking when Americans note that some gloat when other Americans are killed. Thank goodness it's such a rare thing. But with the tragedies in Boston and with the horror of the explosion and fire down in West, down in Bill Flores' district, we will continue to pray for those who are enduring such suffering, for those who have lost loved ones. There is no easy way to lose a loved one. Everyone in America has either lost a loved one or will; and when it happens, it allows you to empathize and sympathize so much more easily with those who have lost loved ones. So we grieve; we mourn. An important after-tragedy aspect for those who are in government is to make sure that we figure out exactly what went wrong so that Americans are spared this tragedy in the future. A former Secretary of State once asked in the aftermath of a tragedy, which she was overseeing in the department, what difference does it make? Having had Embassies attacked before--and yet this consulate in Benghazi was not adequately protected--it raises very serious issues, and the answer should be very clear when the question is: What difference does it make? It makes a difference in not having to console those who have lost and mourned with those who have lost and consoled and help those who are trying to heal. It means all of that suffering doesn't happen if we find the mistakes and make sure they are not replicated in the future. It was difficult--and it continues to be difficult--to get information out of the State Department, out of Homeland Security in having questioned the Secretary of Homeland Security myself and finding that she couldn't even answer how many members of the Muslim Brotherhood were part of her closest advisory council, the Homeland Security Advisory Council, or what backgrounds people had that would indicate ties to the Muslim Brotherhood within her Countering Violent Extremism Working Group. It's called the Countering Violent Extremism Working Group because, heaven forbid, we should offend anyone who is trying to kill us and wants to destroy our way of life. It's also interesting as we dig into the situation--I mean, I've been hammered in the last week and accused of being an intolerant racist simply because people did not know the facts when they leveled such allegations, but I don't expect any apologies as they find out the truth that, yes, there have been radical Islamists who have been known to have changed their Islamic surnames to Hispanic-sounding names and to have falsified their identification documents so they would appear to be Hispanic and then make their way across our southern border. There is nothing racist in that. In fact, it actually can be construed as a compliment because these people knew that radical Islamists were not wanted in this country and that in this country most of us are greatly appreciative of the heritage that Hispanics bring. As I've said many times, I think something that has been a foundational part of making America great has been, generally speaking--with a hat tipped to atheists and all the other religions in America--traditionally there was a faith in God, there was a devotion to family and there was a hard work ethic. And generally speaking, that's what I see more than any other things in the Hispanic culture. I'm hoping that culture will help revive those aspects in our American culture. So it's certainly not intended as a snub, and, in fact, it is just stating a fact. This is something that's occurred. But it's always apparently a fun game for liberals to preach about tolerance and then be the most intolerant people in the country when it comes to conservatives or conservative Christians. Jesus told us 2,000 years ago, You'll suffer for my sake. I didn't suffer as a Christian growing up, but some are all too willing to oblige nowadays to make sure that Christians do suffer, that they are persecuted, that they are condemned for their religious beliefs; and they go after Christians in a way that they would never seek to condemn even radical Islamists. But I hope that out of the disaster and the heartbreak and the harm and damage that came not just to Boston, Massachusetts, but to a central heartbeat of America and Boston, which is such an important and integral part of America--we all got hit on 9/11. We got hit as Americans when our consulate was hit and four Americans were killed in Libya. We got hit when rebels took the weapons that this administration helped provide and killed Americans in Algeria. We all take a hit when there are mistakes in judgment, mistakes in judgment like helping bomb Qadhafi, even though this administration had agreements with him. He was providing intel on radical Islamic terrorists. Well, that source is gone now. And this administration, despite being warned by many of us that, Look, we know there are al Qaeda that are actually embedded in the revolutionaries; don't help until we know who we're helping, but this administration made clear it didn't need congressional approval and it did not need congressional authority. It had been asked to help by the Organization of Islamic Council and by NATO. So forget what all the elected Representatives of Texas and all 49 other States and all of the territories think, I'll just do what I want. I am proud to count Michael Mukasey as a friend. I had tremendous respect for him as a judge back when he presided over many trials, but particularly the trial of the Blind Sheik after the attempted bombing of the World Trade Center in 1993. He did a great job, and the prosecutors did great jobs. Andrew McCarthy should ever have the thanks and the acclaim he deserves instead of the condemnation he often gets. When you're around Andrew McCarthy and Michael Mukasey, no matter what your IQ is, the average is quite high. As a former attorney general, former Federal judge, Michael Mukasey said in his article that was printed April 21 by The Wall Street Journal--there are so many fantastic points that need to be brought out. These are Michael Mukasey's words. He said: If your concern about the threat posed by the Tsarnaev brothers is limited to assuring that they will never be in a position to repeat their grisly acts, rest easy. The elder, Tamerlan--apparently named for the 14th-century Muslim conqueror famous for building pyramids of his victims' skulls to commemorate his triumphs over infidels--is dead. The younger, Dzhokhar, will stand trial when his wounds heal, in a proceeding where the most likely uncertainty will be the penalty. No doubt there will be some legal swordplay over his interrogation by the FBI's High-Value Interrogation Group without receiving Miranda warnings. But the only downside for the government in that duel is that his statements may not be used against him at trial. This is not much of a risk when you consider the other available evidence, including photo images of him at the scene of the bombings and his own reported confession to the victim whose car he helped hijack during last week's terror in Boston. But if your concern is over the larger threat that inheres in who the Tsarnaev brothers were and are, what they did, and what they represent, then worry--a lot. For starters, you can worry about how the High-Value Interrogation Group, or HIG, will do its work. That unit was finally put in place by the FBI after so-called ``underwear bomber'' named Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab tried to blow up the airplane in which he was traveling as it flew over Detroit on Christmas Day in 2009 and was advised of his Miranda rights. The CIA interrogation program that might have handled the interview had by then been dismantled by President Obama. At the behest of such Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated groups as the Council on American Islamic Relations and the Islamic Society of North America and other self-proclaimed spokesmen for American Muslims, the FBI has bowdlerized its training materials to exclude references to militant Islamism. Does this delicacy infect the FBI's interrogation group as well? Will we see another performance like the Army's after- action report following Major Nidal Hasan's rampage at Fort Hood in November 2009, preceded by his shout ``allahu akhbar''--a report that spoke nothing of militant Islam but referred to the incident as ``workplace violence''? If tone is set at the top, recall that the Army chief of staff at the time said the most tragic result of Fort Hood would be if it interfered with the Army's diversity program. Presumably, the investigation into the Boston terror attack will include inquiry into not only the immediate circumstances of the crimes but also who funded Tamerlan Tsarnaev's months-long sojourn abroad in 2012 and his comfortable lifestyle. Did he have a support network? What training did he, and perhaps his younger brother, receive in the use of weapons? Where did the elder of the two learn to make the suicide vest he reportedly wore? The investigation should include, as well, a deep dive into Tamerlan's radicalization, the Islamist references in the brothers' social media communications, and the jihadist Web sites they visited. Will the investigation probe as well the FBI's own questioning of Tamerlan 2 years ago at the behest of an unspecified foreign government, presumably Russia, over his involvement with jihadist Web sites and other activities? Tamerlan Tsarnaev is the fifth person since 9/11 who has participated in terror attacks after questioning by the FBI. He was preceded by Nidal Hasan; drone casualty Anwar al- Awlaki; Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad--born Carlos Leon Bledsoe--who murdered an Army recruit in Little Rock in June 2009; and David Coleman Headley, who provided intelligence to the perpetrators of the Mumbai massacre in 2008. That doesn't count Abdulmutallab, who was the subject of warnings to the CIA that he was a potential terrorist. If the intelligence yielded by the FBI's investigation is of value, will that value be compromised when this trial is held, as it most certainly will be, in a civilian court? Dzhokhar Tsarnaev's lawyers, as they have every right to do, will seek to discover the intelligence and use it to fashion a case in mitigation if nothing else, to show that his late brother was the dominant conspirator who had access to resources and people. There is also cause for concern that this was obviously a suicide operation--not in the direct way of a bomber who kills all of his victims and himself at the same time by blowing himself up, but in the way of someone who conducts a spree, holding the stage for as long as possible, before he is cut down in a blaze of what he believes is glory. Here, think Mumbai. Until now, it has been widely accepted in law enforcement circles that such an attack in the U.S. was less likely because of the difficulty organizers would have in marshaling the spiritual support to keep the would-be suicide focused on the task. That analysis went out the window when the Tsarnaevs followed up the bombing of the marathon by murdering a police officer in his car, an act certain to precipitate the violent confrontation that followed. It has been apparent that with al Qaeda unable to mount elaborate attacks like the one it carried out on 9/11, other Islamists have stepped in with smaller and less intricate crimes, but crimes that are nonetheless meant to send a terrorist message. These include Faisal Shahzad, who failed to detonate a device in Times Square in 2010, and would-be subway bomber Najibullah Zazi and his confederates. Is this, as former CIA Director Michael Hayden put it, the new normal? There is also cause for concern in the President's reluctance, soon after the Boston bombing, even to use the ``t'' word--terrorism--in his vague musing on Friday about some unspecified agenda of the perpetrators, when by then there was no mystery: the agenda was jihad. For 5 years we have heard, principally from those who wield executive power, of a claimed need to make fundamental changes in this country, to change the world's--particularly the Muslim world's--perception of us, to press the ``reset'' button. We have heard not a word from those sources suggesting any need to understand and confront a totalitarian ideology that has existed since at least the founding of the Muslim Brotherhood in the 1920s. The ideology has regarded the United States as its principal adversary since the late 1940s, when a Brotherhood principal, Sayid Qutb, visited this country and was aghast at what he saw as its decadence. The first World Trade Center bombing in 1993, al Qaeda attacks on American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998, and on the USS Cole in 2000, the 9/11 attacks, and those in the dozen years since were all fueled by Islamist hatred for the U.S. and its values. There are Muslim organizations in this country, such as the American Islamic Forum for Democracy, headed by Dr. Zuhdi Jasser, that speak out bravely against the totalitarian ideology. They receive no shout-out at Presidential speeches; no outreach is extended to them. One of the Tsarnaev brothers is dead; the other might as well be. But if that is the limit of our concern, there will be others. Michael MuKasey is a great, patriotic American, a brilliant American. And now, we have those who have told us that we must pass gun control legislation that they, most of them, even acknowledge would not have affected the horror at Sandy Hook at all. But they say you must pass gun control legislation for the benefit, in the memory of Sandy Hook, utilizing that horrible murder spree to try to justify their political agenda. My first question is: Will the legislation you're proposing, would it have changed the outcome at Sandy Hook or Colorado or any of the mass murders? When the proponents say no, it wouldn't have changed Sandy Hook at all, then the next question is: All right, what other legislation do you have, something that might make a difference? Don't bring things that won't make a difference other than to further your political agenda. Let's do something to change what has happened in the past so it won't happen in the future. So now we're told: Oh, gee, you should not use the Boston bombing as a wake-up call to make sure that we look more closely at people coming in who might want to harm us. The FBI got a heads-up from Russia, for heaven's sake, and I understand that they would have viewed the Russians' complaint and their information with a jaundiced eye because they'd say: Well, they don't care for the Chechens anyway. But they got a heads-up. And we've already seen, and I can't go into what was classified--it shouldn't have been; it shouldn't be classified--but all of the documents that have been purged from the FBI training materials because we had heard and read and found out from people involved in the FBI that they're eliminating words. I had a chart up here that explained, under the 9/11 report, the words ``Islam'' and ``jihad'' and ``radical.'' These were words used commonly in the 9/11 report. But since then, since we had a new President and new regime and new Justice Department under Attorney General Eric Holder, and since the FBI had partnered with CAIR, one of the two known, as the Federal Court in Dallas and in the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals had said, the two largest Muslim Brotherhood front organizations, CAIR, the Council of American-Islamic Relations, and ISNA, the Islamic Society in North America, those are the two largest front organizations for Muslim Brotherhood, and this administration had embraced them and responds to them regularly and has the president of ISNA to the White House and even to the State Department and gets his input on things of importance. So we have Muslim Brotherhood front organization members leading, guiding, directing this administration. They kept telling the President apparently, from what we've seen, because certainly that's what the President and Secretary of State Clinton said, hey, they don't dislike the administration, don't watch them burn the President in effigy, no, they love him, but it's just they're mad about a video. Or they're mad about perceptions of the U.S. They love our President. Well, read the polls overseas and you'll find out that's not the case. But for those who say: Look, the lesson from Boston ought to be that we need to rush through at least 11 million--some think it may be as high as 20 million--people who are in this country legally--or illegally and make them legal as quickly as possible because that will allow us a complete and thorough report on these people, but I would only submit, if the FBI is still using the purged lexicon where they can't talk about jihad or can't talk about all of the things that were removed from their training manuals and FBI agents were told they can't use anymore, how do you go question a proponent of killing Americans, a proponent of radical murderist jihad without talking about jihad, without talking about the words that radical Islamists use? That must have been quite an interrogation of the now-deceased Tamerlan since they couldn't use the words that would have told him what he really believed in. And now, FBI agents who are so overworked they couldn't even do a proper investigation of a guy after Russia gives them a heads-up and gives them information, and now the solution, we're told, is to bring in 11 million more, rush them by the FBI, and then we'll know whether they're terrorists? You think? Or are we going to come down here and repeatedly have to express truthfully and honestly how our heart breaks for Americans that were killed because we never learned our lesson, because we had people that thought, what difference does it make? America deserves better. We have a pledge that we take to protect this country, this blessed country, from all enemies, foreign and domestic; and I hope and pray we'll begin to better live up to that oath. At the same time as I pray and mourn for those who've lost, who are suffering, it is my prayer that God Almighty will wrap His protective hands around this country, and that this country will give the Good Lord reason to do so. With that, Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. GOHMERT

Mr. GOHMERT. Mr. Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

Mr. GOHMERT

Mr. GOHMERT. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. With the news yesterday of the terrible explosion in West, Texas, our thoughts, hearts, prayers go out to those people so terribly harmed and adversely affected and to the loss of lives, just as we continue to remember those who have lost family, friends, loved ones, limbs in Boston. West, Texas, is often known for their West Fest in the fall of the year. They always advertise as having the best kolaches anywhere in the world. It's just a beautiful little town, a wonderful little town, but it is rocked and needs our prayers. That is, in fact, what the mayor of West, Tommy Muska, said: We need your prayers. There's a lot of people that got hurt. There's a lot of people, I'm sure, who will not be here tomorrow. They're still trying to dig out from under that devastating explosion that occurred there at the fertilizer plant, so we will continue to remember those people. It is also interesting and worthy of note that, in the news, we now find that we have confessions in the murders of the Assistant District Attorney in the neighboring county of where I live, over in Kaufman. The Assistant District Attorney, Mark Hasse, and the District Attorney, Mike McLelland, and his wife were killed back on March 30 of this year--the DA was. Mark was killed back on January 31. That was so tragic, and any of us who have ever been prosecutors or judges as I have--and my friend Ted Poe has been a judge--you suffer the death threats and the slings and arrows that come at you; and I think, in a way, it was preparation for slings and arrows verbally that would come in Congress. These were real bullets that were used to kill a prosecutor, an Assistant DA and a District Attorney, and anytime law enforcement is threatened in such a way, it's a threat to the rule of law; it's a threat to the country. Sadly, after those two heinous murders in Kaufman, the Southern Poverty Law Center came out--for which this administration has helped achieve a very special place, unfortunately, of credibility when they do not deserve credibility because of the pain and suffering that the institution has caused--and there were articles written. Here is one from ABC with the headline ``Aryan Brotherhood of Texas Among Groups Eyed in Prosecutors' Murders.'' The article from April 2 says: The Aryan Brotherhood of Texas, a white supremacist prison gang, has become one of the top focuses of authorities investigating the murders of two Texas prosecutors, sources told ABC News. Prosecutors from Kaufman County, Texas, had helped imprison dozens of Aryan Brotherhood of Texas members late last year, the sources said. In recent weeks, Kaufman County District Attorney Mike McLelland and his top assistant, Mark Hasse, were murdered in shootings that have left investigators hunting for clues. Cops are poring over hundreds of old cases that Hasse and McLelland prosecuted and following clues that involve not just the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas, but Mexican drug cartels, local drug traffickers and other violent individuals; but they are aggressively pursuing a possible Aryan Brotherhood link, sources said. It was nice of ABC to give so much weight and credibility to their sources that obviously did not have any clue whatsoever of what they were talking about because, just as was reported by people back at the time, they were concerned about the former justice of the peace's possible involvement. In the same way, the Southern Poverty Law Center began its bigoted approach toward a group like Family Research Council and all those who happen to hold religious beliefs affirmed in the Bible, constantly referred to in this Chamber and in the Chamber down the Hall, where nondenominational Christian worship services were held through most of the 1800s and where President Thomas Jefferson--who coined the phrase ``separation of church and State'' and said there should be a wall of separation--felt there was no problem with having a nondenominational Christian worship service in the United States Capitol and, in fact, at times, had the marine band come to play the hymns. I have a bill that would require a plaque be put down the Hall so people would know. We're not advocating to have church services every Sunday down there--it's completely unnecessary--but it is important for people to not have this view that is completely inappropriate by people who would attempt to rewrite history. The Family Research Council, as do so many other Christian groups, holds to the religious belief about marriage as was recognized by Jesus at his first recorded miracle at a wedding between a man and a woman, as is recorded in the Old Testament, in Genesis: that God saw man alone and felt it would be better for him to have a helpmate and then created woman. Regardless of how anyone believes everyone got here, I love the way the late Bob Murphey from Nacogdoches used to explain in his country way--though he was a brilliant intellect, he explained things in a countrified fashion--``I feel sorry for atheists. I really do. They have to believe that nobody, plus nothing, equals everything.'' Well, the people that met through most of the 1800s down the Hall, most of them hoped for the day when slavery would be gone. Many of them attended church services down the Hall, including John Quincy Adams, spent their lives fighting to end slavery in America, pushing for that day as William Wilberforce did in England; and yet because the Family Research Council held the beliefs about marriage being between a man and a woman, that most people have in recorded history, and has, although there are some people who interpret the Bible differently, if you look at the real interpretation, there is no mistake, what it says and what it means, but because people hold the values that the Pilgrims depicted down in the rotunda, having a prayer meeting with an open Bible believed, as the Family Research Council held the same views about marriage that George Washington did, who's considered the father of the country, because the Family Research Council held the same views about marriage that DeSoto, who is pictured down the Hall in the rotunda, finding the Mississippi River and being so overwhelmed that there was this incredible amount of freshwater this far inland, they commemorated the spot, as depicted in that massive mural, by digging a hole and planting a cross there to commemorate the spot. Since the Family Research Council believed that marriage was the same thing as Pocahontas and those present for her baptism depicted down the Hall in the rotunda believed, because the Family Research Council believed that marriage, as all 56 of the signers of the Declaration of Independence depicted in the rotunda, because the Family Research Council had the same religious convictions about marriage of all of those people depicted down the Hall, as I've mentioned, the Southern Poverty Law Center claimed that Family Research Council was a hate group and stirred up animosity against them that eventually played a role. As we found out later, no one wanted to jump to conclusions, but it was very clear that their branding the Family Research Council and Chick-fil-A as being hateful simply because they held religious beliefs protected by our Constitution that marriage is between a man and a woman, the Southern Poverty Law Center stirred up hate, animosity, and rage against the Family Research Council. And on the fateful day not so long ago, a gunman came to the Family Research Council with a bunch of Chick-fil-A sandwiches and a gun. And but for the valiant work of the man that stopped him and got shot in the process, there could well have been 15 dead Family Research Council employees with 15 Chick-fil-A sandwiches beside them. There is an article here written by Bryan Preston on April 15, 2013. It says: News broke Friday afternoon that an arrest has been made in the murders of three people. Those murders, of Kaufman County DA Mike McLelland; his wife, Cynthia; and prosecutor Mark Hasse, triggered national coverage. As R.S. McCain notes, MSNBC's Chris Matthews ran an 8-minute segment on the killings on April 3, detailing the widespread belief that Aryan Brotherhood white supremacist/thug groups were behind the killings. Now I live in east Texas, and the widespread beliefs in east Texas were not that the Aryan Brotherhood had been involved in this. Usually, they take actions crazy enough to indicate they're not trying to hide from anything they did. It just didn't sound like those people. Yet that's what some were stirring up, the sources at NBC. The article goes on: But if the reports out of Kaufman County are correct, the Aryan Brotherhood isn't behind the crimes. Former Kaufman Justice of the Peace Eric Williams is. And we know now, a couple of days later, his wife has also confessed to being part of it. So it was the JP and his wife. But this article says: CBS reports that Williams was arrested Friday and charged with making ``terroristic threats,'' which includes threatening county employees and issuing demands that had to be met at a ``certain time on a certain date.'' A storage shed was searched, weapons were found, and they're being tested for ballistics. Capital murder charges may come in a day or two. According to the report, Williams had a history with both McLelland and Hasse. The two had prosecuted and secured a conviction against him in 2012 for burglary and theft by a public servant. Surveillance cameras caught Williams taking computer equipment from a county building. As part of his appeal, Williams claimed that McLelland and Hasse did not like him. As the case unfolds, it is starting to look like a local vendetta, not part of a national anything by a political-crime syndicate like the Aryan Brotherhood. Where did MSNBC and other national media quickly get the idea that the Aryan Brotherhood was involved? Possibly from the Southern Poverty Law Center, which on January 31--a day after Hasse's murder--posted a lengthy piece by Mark Potok bringing up the AB link. Potok also showed up on MSNBC April 1, the day after the McLellands' murders, to once again point the finger at the Aryan Brotherhood. Other press followed up, as Stacy McCain notes, flowing from that January 31 article posted by the Southern Poverty Law Center. But if Williams is the killer, then it looks like the SPLC got the whole story wrong. Meanwhile, on the ground in Kaufman County, suspicion was already falling on Williams much earlier, according to Stacy McCain. This says: The pieces might have fallen into place earlier--Mark Hasse's murder might have been solved, and Williams arrested before McLelland was killed--if law enforcement hadn't wasted time chasing the ``white supremacist'' wild goose, when the DA himself tried to tell them who murdered Mark Hasse. Country Judge Bruce Wood said Sunday that McLelland repeatedly told him that McLelland believed Williams was behind Hasse's slaying. The first time was in the emergency room in the hours after Hasse was shot down by a mysterious gunman dressed in black. He was distraught, Wood said. He very pointedly said to me, I know who did this. I said, Well, who, Mike? He said, Well, Eric Williams. McLelland, who worked for years as a diagnostic psychologist described Williams as a ``narcissistic psychopath'' during that conversation and others. Woods said McLelland never elaborated on why he thought Williams was involved. On March 27, Woods said he met with McLelland in the county judge's office. I said, Are you still convinced that it's Eric Williams? Woods recalled he said, Absolutely. The SPLC and its ``hate watch'' and ``hate map'' fuel media and left wing speculation while helping the center generate donations, and the latter even inspired an attempt at a mass killing at the headquarters of the Family Research Council last year. This time, the SPLC might have misdirected law enforcement long enough for a man to commit murder. One Federal prosecutor quit a case on April 3, citing the danger of dealing with the Aryan Brotherhood after those original three murders. It is clear that there is hate in the heart of the Southern Poverty Law Center individuals who would stir up such hatred toward whites or toward a fantastic Christian group like the Family Research Council, and like other Christian groups of all types of races, against my black friends here in Washington who simply believe what they read in the Bible about marriage. And because they believe what they read in the Bible about marriage, you have a group in this country that is so full of hate that they can't stand the thought of someone having religious beliefs different from theirs, so they stir up hatred and animosity. I was totally against the hate crimes bill. And yet this is a group that wanted a hate crimes bill, yet they're stirring up hate. As a Christian, it is my prayer that those in the Southern Poverty Law Center that are so filled with jealousy and hate and animosity will come to know the peace that passes all understanding that will allow this Nation to heal so many wounds that will only fester with a group like that stirring up hatred. We will continue to hope and pray for such peace and the complete diminishment and dissolution of hatred of such a vile nature within the hearts of those people there, so they could come to the point of being able to hold hands and sing songs and hymns together as so many did around this country on 9/12 of 2001, as I've done with others, different races, creeds, right here in Washington, D.C., because we share a love for our Nation and a love for God. And when we do that, there's no hyphenated American. That was the one thing, with all the heartache, the anguish on 9/12 of 2001, that was so amazing. We were Americans. We were not hyphenated anything. We were Americans. We were one people. Out of many, we came together as one. And it continues to be my hope and prayer that groups that stir up hate like the Southern Poverty Law Center and brand others as hate in an attempt to disguise their own will come to know peace and will come to know love and will take the example of the man whose bust is down in the rotunda as well, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who advocated to the very end peace and the love that Jesus showed to all of us. May the Southern Poverty Law Center find such love and such grace. We also had a story here, April 17, by Helle Dale, Congressional Hearing Produces Shocker on Benghazi: Kudos to members of the House Foreign Affairs Committee for squarely placing Benghazi on the table at today's hearing with Secretary of State John Kerry. Kerry's answers were nothing less than shocking. What we learned is that State is conducting yet another internal review of Benghazi, initiated by Kerry himself immediately after taking office and allegedly due soon. This amounts to a huge indictment of the credibility of Kerry's predecessor Hillary Clinton and of the investigation by the State Department's Accountability Review Board. Clearly, even John Kerry is not confident in the Obama administration's version of events. Kerry promised the committee that he would ``clear the air,'' though he also repeatedly used the phrase that clearing the air needs to be done ``so we can move on'' to far more important issues. I am so grateful to Secretary Kerry for taking that position. We do need to get to the truth. The dead at Benghazi, the dead Americans, cry out for truth. Those who were harmed and hurt, Americans there, deserve the truth. Hopefully we will get that. Mr. Speaker, with so much suffering and anguish right now in America, it is still the greatest nation in the history of the world. May God guide the leadership in this country that we don't drop the ball and fail on our watch, that we show ourselves to be worthy recipients of the gifts of liberty given to us by prior generations, all coming, as the Founders noted, as a gift from God. With that, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. GOHMERT

Mr. GOHMERT. Madam Speaker, I move that the House do now adjourn.

Mr. GOHMERT

Mr. GOHMERT. Madam Speaker, we know that there is so much going on after the tragedy in Boston where not just Boston was attacked, but the United States was attacked by acts of sheer evil, perpetrators who did not care about innocent people and innocent lives. They thought it better to try to kill, maim, and destroy. What sick, twisted, evil human being or human beings would do that? But we saw 9/11/2001 vividly clear. There actually are people who are so radical, so mean, so evil, so twisted that they actually believe they could make for themselves a way to paradise by killing innocent people, killing children not even old enough to have really done anything wrong, and that is what they obviously felt would make their great mark in the world. I can't help but strongly believe with all my heart that, unless they repent and find grace, they are in for a very rude awakening in the next life. It is my hope, as well, that the individual or individuals who are responsible will be held to account with the death penalty that will be implemented behind closed doors, without cameras present, without an opportunity for them to yet insult or hurt anyone else. They've done enough. We'll await to see who it is that ends up being responsible. Perhaps there's an announcement tonight, perhaps not. I am glad that even though there was a person of interest, that the investigators did not rush to judgment on that, that they continue to explore every possible clue, every possible video and photograph, thoroughly doing a good job it certainly appears in law enforcement so that when the evil culprits are apprehended and they go to trial and their attorneys are trying to raise a reasonable doubt with a jury, that the investigation will have been so thorough and there will not have been an inappropriate rush to judgment such that a fair trial is had, due process is had, and then making sure that it is, indeed, the perpetrator or perpetrators and then carry out a death penalty. I hope that is the justice that ends up being carried out. In the meantime, we had a gun bill that was voted down, as I understand, 54-46 in the Senate. It did not pass. It did not have enough votes. But with all of our hearts having poured out and continuing to have prayers and sympathy and empathy for the people in Sandy Hook, in Newtown, we still had a bill that was being brought to the Senate floor that all of the people who supported the bill, as I heard, had basically admitted that bill would not have saved a single one of the precious, dear little children that were so violently gunned down in their schoolroom. It would not have saved the heroic administrator, a teacher, those who were trying to protect the children. It just seems that if people in Washington or other parts of the world, New York City or wherever, are going to manipulate and use such a tragic situation, such sympathetic victims, they ought to at least, for goodness' sake, at least put forward a bill that if it had been implemented would have ensured that at least one of the children or adults killed at Sandy Hook would not have been killed. Otherwise, let's put together laws and let's have this administration finally enforcing laws that both together will reduce violence. Pushing forward a bill that would not save any of the lives lost there or in Colorado is just inappropriate and manipulative, and the victims deserve better. I still completely understand the families of the victims, their hearts, the struggle, the difficulty. I understand, but let's not manipulate them for an individual political agenda. Now, I was on C-SPAN this morning with the host, Greta Brawner, a terrific host, as is Susan Swain. I've enjoyed being on with both of them. But we were talking about border security and a bill that the so- called ``Gang of Eight'' is putting forward. They're great people in the ``Gang of Eight,'' and I know they mean well. They want good for this country. I'm also reminded of a line that I was told back in the Soviet Union in the summer of 1973 when I got close to a Soviet college student and we had a free exchange of ideas. He never put down his country at all. Despite that, he was ordered not to talk to me anymore after we became good friends because that's what happens in a country where the government becomes too powerful: you can't even choose your friends any more. At one point we were sitting alone visiting, and he tugged on my shirt and he said, We don't have material this good for our individual citizens. We wish we did, but we recognize you have so much more and better things for your citizens in the United States than we do here in the Soviet Union. He said, But you've got to understand that here in the Soviet Union, since we were formed in 1918, we have had two major wars fought on our own soil that have kept this country just in turmoil, and we have had to spend most of our resources not on such nice clothes and good things for individuals, but in defending our country because we never had two oceans protecting us the way you have in the United States. I was able to point something out to President Bush some years back when he was President and I was a freshman here. I said, Look, for most of this Nation's history, as the young Soviet college student told me when I was a college student, you have had two oceans protecting your country, the United States. He was exactly right. For most of our history, two oceans have protected the United States. I remember having conversations in the eighties and nineties, as we would see violence in other places, whether it was Beirut or the terrible atrocities inflicted on Israelis on their own soil, the constant bombings and people being blown up just as occurred at the terrible and evil event in Boston. People have actually said the thing about America is if somebody were to decide to be a suicide bomber in America, they'd have to cross either the Atlantic or the Pacific, and they'd have such a cooling-down time, that even though they might be whipped up into a rage before they left to fly to America, all of the hours of sitting quietly on a plane or days on a ship would be enough to cause them to pause; and when they got to America, they would think, Nah, I really didn't want to blow myself up after all. That seemed to work pretty well. But then the radicalization of Muslims got to the point where they were actually able to radicalize people who could cross an ocean, who could come into America; and as the 9/11 hijackers, they could come in here and unthinkably live in America, enjoy our liberties, our freedoms, enjoy the company of neighbors, share food with their neighbors, have neighbors invite them over and share food, share things such as if they need a cup of flour or whatever it is, share and see the way Americans share and are such a friendly country. They were able to live here. And too many of them were here on visas, and the visas expired. Since neither Republican nor Democratic administration was effectively enforcing visas when they expired, these 9/11, hate-filled hijackers were able to keep on the mask that they enjoyed America, enjoyed the liberties, while all the time looking for the opportunity to kill themselves in a manner that would most effectively kill the greatest number of innocent people they could in America. It's unthinkable for American citizens. The only thing closely akin that came to mind after 9/11 was when some were talking about, Well, you know what, in World War II, the idea that someone would get in an airplane and fly it toward an American ship and crash their plane into the ship, trying to sink the ship, and kill as many as possible was foreign to Americans. We couldn't believe there was such a thing as kamikaze pilots. Who would do such a thing? Who would have that little regard for life and such hatred for other life that you would do all you could, including giving up your own life, just to kill as many people as you possibly could who just want to live free? That was foreign during World War II. It was strange. We couldn't believe it. I remember being taught about that in public schools while growing up. The teachers thought it was so strange, and we thought it was strange. Now we've seen that same type of mentality that was told to Thomas Jefferson when he went to negotiate with the Barbary pirates. In essence, he couldn't understand why these radical Muslims, the Barbary pirates, would be attacking American ships. As Jefferson and the other diplomats explained, We've never attacked your ships. We've never attacked you. We're not any threat to you. Why would you attack American ships? It was explained, In our religion, we believe that, if you die killing infidels, which you Americans are and since you don't believe what we do, then we go to paradise. Jefferson thought that so strange. He was so well read, so intelligent that he couldn't believe it. He got his own copy of the Koran, in English translation, and read it. He could not believe there was a religion that anybody believed was teaching that you would go to paradise by killing innocent people. That just seemed so strange. I am extremely grateful that most Muslims don't believe that. They don't believe they should get themselves a ticket to paradise by killing innocent people. They believe in reason and in talking and in trying to work things out. They don't want to be ruled and reigned over by radical Islamists either. Amazingly, I've had people approach me, the last in DFW airport, who have come up and indicated: Aren't you in Congress? Yes. I'm from Egypt. The last was getting ice cream there at DFW. He said, Aren't you in Congress? Yes. He said, You're helping the wrong people. He had family still in Egypt, and he said, You're helping the wrong people. You're helping the radicals. You're helping the Muslim Brotherhood. We don't want the Muslim Brotherhood running Egypt. We want freedom in Egypt. That's what we thought we were going to get, and then your government helps the wrong people. You help the radicals. You help the Muslim Brotherhood. Quit doing that. Please, tell others in Washington to quit doing that. Quit helping the radicals. I was surprised. That was not the first time, but it was the most recent time that someone turned out who was from Egypt, a Muslim. They want to live in peace. They don't want radicals ruining their lives, and they think it's wrong for radical Muslim Brotherhood members to persecute, kill, inflict pain and suffering on Coptic Christians and Jews. They don't think that's appropriate. They may not agree with them, but they want to live in peace. Yet this administration continues to help the wrong people. After I met the young man from Egypt at DFW, I find out we're sending tear gas to Egypt in order to help the radicals in the Muslim Brotherhood use it against people like Coptic Christians, like Jewish residents in Egypt, like moderate Muslims who disagree with the kind of radicalism that is being forced on them in Egypt. Then we find out this week that this administration is sending more tanks to be used to crush those who just want freedom in Egypt. They're moderate Muslims. They want to have freedom. They don't want radicals running their country. Just like our allies, the Northern Alliance--the moderate Muslims in Afghanistan who fought--many gave their lives. They lost friends and family in fighting the Taliban on our behalf, and now this administration has figuratively thrown them under the bus, and it's trying to buy friendship and peace--literally buy it with money--with the Taliban. That's not how you deal with the Taliban. The Northern Alliance knew how to deal with them. We helped them with some arms. We embedded less than 500 Special Operations people in intelligence, and within 3 or 4 months, the Northern Alliance had defeated the Taliban. Then as I learned in my first meeting with Northern Alliance leaders some years ago, we told them, Give us back the significant weapons we've given you because we're America. We will make sure you're safe now. We'll make sure Afghanistan is safe and peaceful now. So they turned in the weapons. They trusted the United States, and now they find an administration that had previously been offering to buy elegant, first-class international offices in Qatar, in the Middle East, to give the Taliban--who still wants to kill Americans and destroy our way of life--international standing, classing them up in their efforts to kill Americans and destroy our way of life. And what did the Northern Alliance get for their loyalty for defeating the Taliban initially before we allowed them to re-surge? They got betrayed. They have been betrayed. It was reported that the administration was offering to release some of the Taliban's murdering thugs and buy them elegant offices in Qatar. No preconditions. Just sit down and talk with us, and we will buy you stuff, and we will let your murdering thugs go from confinement. We've already done that. One of them was on television over a year ago, telling the Afghanistan people on the most watched television station, If you do not fully support the Taliban, then you have one chance, and that is to come apologize to us and, under sharia law, beg our forgiveness and ask for our protection. Then you will fall under our protection, and you will not be killed. They explained to the nation of Afghanistan--the leader that this administration let out of confinement and who is now back leading the Taliban against us--that everyone in the world knows that the Americans have been defeated, and so their President is pulling everyone out. They're running away; they're scared; they're cowards; they're afraid of us. So once the cowardly Americans finish running away from us, in 2014, we, the Taliban, will be back in charge. And so you've got a choice. You either come back, apologize, pledge devotion to us, ask forgiveness and protection, and under sharia law, we'll protect you. Otherwise, life may not last long once the Americans are gone. The message has been going around the world. In Egypt when we turned--this administration, at least--turned its back on our ally, Mubarak. When Qadhafi had blood on his hands since 2003, he had been an important ally of this country, giving us more information about terrorists because it was in his interest to keep terrorists at bay, giving us more information about terrorism at times than any other countries were able to give us; and that was repaid by this administration--helped bomb Qadhafi and his troops, and support the radicals. Back at the time, some of us here on the floor were explaining, we don't know who all's involved in the revolution, but we know there are al Qaeda elements of this revolution. Let's stop. This is not a good idea until we know whose side we should be on. But the world has seen this administration turns against its allies and tries to buy off its enemies. So if this administration were going to be consistent, it would seem that the thing to do, to expect for this administration to offer something, as the Clinton administration did to North Korea: hey, you know, we'll build you a nuclear plant; we'll do something if you just promise you won't develop nuclear weapons. Well, we saw how that worked. Madeleine Albright and President Clinton worked out a heck of a deal. We helped them get nuclear weapons because of the naivete of that administration, and now we're faced with a very difficult situation. Also understand, if North Korea continues on this path and Iran is not stopped, that what North Korea has Iran may have, and then no one in Israel will be safe at all. And Israel is considered in their minds, in radical Islamist minds, the Little Satan, and we're the Great Satan. I mentioned this morning on C-SPAN that we have been aware that not everyone that wants to come into this country wants to come for jobs. We know that. Most of the Hispanics are fantastic people. They want to work hard. They believe in God. They're devoted to family. And that is a bit of a generalization, but it's my hope that that Hispanic culture coming into this country will help bring a resurgence and make us the strong country we once were when it came to family values and an acknowledgement that ``In God We Trust,'' as is our national motto. Or as Ben Franklin said during the Constitutional Convention: I've lived, sir, a long time, and the longer I live the more convincing proofs I see of this truth: God governs in the affairs of men. And as Franklin said: If a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without His notice, is it possible an empire could rise without His aid? We've been assured in the sacred writing, that unless the Lord build the House, they labor in vain that build it. I firmly believe that. So I welcome people. And I've met Christian friends that I just fell in love with in West Africa. And one of them, an elderly black West African, wonderful, wonderful man, a heart as big as all outdoors, but he said, please tell others in Washington to quit getting weaker because if America grows weak, yes, we know where we go when we die, but if America grows weak, we have no chance of peace. We have no chance of a good life in this world. So please stop getting weaker. It looks like you're getting weaker. He started off by saying, We were excited when you elected your first black President, but please urge him to quit getting weaker in America. We need you to be strong. And I mentioned this morning that we even are aware that we've had al Qaeda, we've had radical Islamists try to disguise themselves as Hispanics and sneak across our southern border because Americans have never been worried about our Hispanic friends being radical and wanting to kill innocent people to go to paradise. That's not part of the Hispanic culture. And I've been amazed since then that the left wing always wants to try to distort, to create a story out of a twisted--I have to choose my words wisely because it'll be interesting to see what the twisted mind of the left does--but the ignorance was apparently only coupled by laziness by left wing media, so they go nuts trying to paint me as a bigot when obviously they are the bigots, and not only bigots but they're lazy because if they had bothered to even turn on their computer and use it for something besides mean-spirited, twisted, distorted untruths, they could have found this story from the ``American Thinker'' back on August 2, 2010. In the story by Norah Petersen, it points out, it discusses that: In 2001, the brother of a Hezbollah military chief illegally entered the United States by crossing the Mexican border. He then settled in Dearborn, Michigan, and raised money for Hezbollah. In 2002, illegal immigrants from Lebanon who were thought to have ties to Hezbollah were smuggled into the United States via the Mexican border, according to a congressional report: ``In December 2002, Salim Boughader Mucharrafille, a cafe owner in Tijuana, Mexico, was arrested for illegally smuggling more than 200 Lebanese illegally into the United States, including several believed to have terrorist ties to Hezbollah.'' The congressional report also revealed that the FBI has confirmed that persons from al Qaeda-linked nations have been known to disguise themselves as Hispanic immigrants: ``Federal Bureau of Investigation Director Robert Mueller has confirmed in testimony `that there are individuals from countries with known al Qaeda connections who are changing their Islamic surnames to Hispanic-sounding names and obtaining false Hispanic identities, learning to speak Spanish, and pretending to be Hispanic immigrants.' '' These are the kinds of things that our enemies are doing to try to bring down this Nation. I hope the administration will wise up and do something about it. With that, Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. GOHMERT

Mr. GOHMERT. Mr. Speaker, this was to be a happy and glorious day in Boston. Because of the explosions that were set off by evil people, at least two have been killed, we're told, and scores of others wounded. Our thoughts and our prayers go out for those who were wounded and injured and for the families of those who were killed. That will continue as the hurting continues, and may God help us to respond in a proper manner.

Mr. GOHMERT

Mr. GOHMERT. A lot has been going on this week and certainly worthy of discussion here at the end of the week. One of the important topics that has been discussed at both the Senate end and the House end is the issue of immigration--legal immigration and illegal immigration. Back when my friend Steve King and I were meeting with people from the British Government about their handling of immigration, they were offended by the term that Steve and I were using of ``illegal immigration.'' We were told that that's not appropriate in England. I asked what words they use, and I was told the appropriate terminology is ``irregular migrant.'' I was concerned that sounded too much like some kind of body function. I hated to use that term. Anyway, when people immigrate into a country illegally, it's illegal immigration. And it is a problem. Anyone that goes down to the end of this Hall just outside these two doors here and heads onto the Senate floor, immediately what is seen above the President of the Senate's chair are the words ``e pluribus unum,'' Latin meaning out of many, one. I have heard a colleague before say it means out of one, many. But we all get mixed up at times. But e pluribus unum means out of many, one. For those of us that attended public schools when and where I did, we were taught that it was immigration and the process of out of many people becoming one people, becoming Americans, is what made us strong. And the terminology for much of this country's history was that we were a ``melting pot.'' I believed it then, I believe it now, and I believe that that has been one of the great strengths that has made this country the greatest country in the history of mankind--greater than Solomon's Israel--with more liberties, more conveniences, more input into the government and into the way the government works. My friends on this side of the aisle and everybody I know of agrees we want immigration to continue. Our country allows more immigrants into this country than any other country in the world. No other country comes close to allowing the number of people to immigrate into this country, to come with visas into this country. Nobody comes close. We are an extraordinarily generous country. And for those who have wondered about whether they should be proud of our country in the past, one of the greatest pieces of evidence would probably be the fact that people all over the world, those who hate us, those who admire us--at least a billion, maybe 1.5 billion in estimates have been made--want to come to America. There's no other country in the world that so many people would like to come to and enjoy the freedoms we have. Unfortunately, there are many who want to come to this country to destroy the freedoms we have because they look at our country and they say, No, unless you have something like sharia law or a country in which you have a powerful, benevolent dictator, be it religious leader or be it a benevolent secular dictator, they think we would not be nearly so decadent. I prefer our government--a government, as Lincoln said, that, under God, was of the people, by the people, and for the people. There's never been one like us. Now, I have heard a guy call into the show of my friend, Sean Hannity, and he knew just enough history to be dangerous. He talked about our history being founded on the proposition e pluribus unum--out of many, one. He said there was never anything about God in our beginnings. This young man apparently showed his ignorance and the weakness of teachers in whatever school he grew up in. Because the fact is e pluribus unum was never our national motto, as this person thought. From the beginning, from the 1700s, it was part of the Great Seal. The Great Seal had two sides--and still does. It's still the Great Seal of America. And on one side we have the eagle. I like the way the eagle has differed over the years. I like the way it is now better than the skinny little eagle that was there back in the 1700s. But the eagle has a ribbon through his beak and on that ribbon has always been the Latin phrase e pluribus unum--out of many, one. That's on one side of the Great Seal. On the other side of the Great Seal is a pyramid. And that pyramid represents one of the greatest works of man. And there was a reason. Because if you read the Founders' writings, read their journals, read their letters, they believed they had within their grasp what philosophers like John Locke, Montesquieu, and so many philosophers had only dreamed about--that we might be able to govern ourselves. They viewed it as a little experiment in democracy. They believed that if we did it right, that nations around the world would want to follow our example. So it was important. They recognized that this was a great achievement of man if it was done properly. If you look on the back of a dollar bill, a one-dollar bill--if anybody still has one, Mr. Speaker--you note one side with the eagle and the e pluribus unum on the ribbon through the beak. In fact, the shield up here above the House floor doesn't have the ribbon through the beak--it's beneath the eagle--but it has those words there. But on the other side, seeing the pyramid--you know, here's a great, well-done work of man. Above that pyramid is a triangle, and in that triangle is an eye. There is a glow around that eye to represent the all-seeing eye of God looking at the work of man. Above that is a Latin phrase that's above one of the exits down at the Senate, the Latin words ``annuit coeptis.'' Taken together, it means He, God, has smiled on our undertaking. Beneath the pyramid are the Latin words ``novus ordo seclorum,'' meaning new order of things, new order of the ages--not new world order, as some tried to say. But the way the Founders looked at it, if we did this right, if we governed ourselves effectively and created the most free Nation in the history of the world, by the grace of God, God would smile on our undertaking and it would be a new order of things because of the other nations that may follow our example. And it is good. I don't try to push my religious beliefs on anyone else, but it is a part of who I am. As a matter of fact, I believe it was 36, at least-- most of the signers of the Declaration of Independence weren't just Christians, they were ordained Christian ministers. It's hard to imagine if over half of the Congress now, as the Continental Congress was in those days, was of made of ordained Christian ministers--and I'm not advocating that at all, I'm just historically making the note. That's where we came from. That's who was inspired to start this little experiment in democracy, not just Christians, but ordained Christian ministers. They knew if they did it right, this place would be blessed, and it would be a source of blessing for the world. They did like the idea ``out of many, come one nation.'' That has continued today, as most of us strongly support the idea of allowing more immigration into this country than in any other country in the world. Mexico doesn't allow near the freedom for immigrants that the United States of America does. So at times it goes down a little tough to be criticized by the leaders in Mexico who demand more rights for immigrants into the United States than they would ever consider affording United States citizens who are going into Mexico. But it's true around the world. Now, I'm told that some students are taught that we're not really a melting pot; we're more of a tossed salad, where people retain their individual natures and don't really become one people so much, we just retain individuality. Mr. Speaker, I can tell you, having studied history and continuing to study history, that is a recipe for the end of a nation. People need to come together as one people. I find from data--and my Hispanic friends, some of them have pointed out--that actually in the Hispanic community a vast majority support the idea of having English as the official language. One of my dear friends in Tyler, whose parents immigrated from Mexico, started one of the most successful restaurant businesses there, and my friend has just branched off and started another restaurant, he said that his parents were adamant: you will speak only English in our home. Now, to be sure, his parents spoke Spanish between themselves, but his father told him: you can be anything in this country, but if you're going to be everything you can possibly be, you have to speak good English, and in doing so, you can be anything. He was right. Gus has been a city councilman, a county commissioner, he is a leader in the community--a good guy, a friend. That's why it breaks my heart when I hear people--and it's normally of the liberal political persuasion--who say, no, no, no, we need to educate Hispanic immigrants in Spanish. Because when you study what happens in those cases, you are compelling children who could end up being President, if they're native-born Americans, President of the United States. They could be President of the country. But when you teach them in Spanish rather than English, you are relegating them to be manual laborers when they could be president of the company, not working out in the field for the company. So that's what conservatives believe in. We want everyone to have the sky as the limit for what can be achieved. We even want, at the White House right now, we would prefer that women be compensated on an even par with men, which is not happening right now. We want everyone to be treated with equal opportunity, not to be treated equally, but with equal opportunity. Because when you take away the incentive to work hard and do well and achieve, you again are compelling a country down a path that leads to the dust bin of history. I've related this numerous times, but in the Soviet Union, when I was an exchange student there one summer and visiting a collective farm, communist farm, a collective, socialist farm--a progressive farm, if you would prefer that, as some of my friends prefer not to be called socialists, but prefer to be called progressives--it was a progressive farm, where everyone was treated equally and everyone was paid the same number of rubles. I was shocked, having worked on farms and ranches around east Texas growing up, because I had learned, heck, if you're going to work out like that--and back then, if you were lucky enough to get to drive a tractor instead of walking through the field hauling hay or working with cattle or horses, we didn't have cabins over the tractors. We thought it was pretty terrific if you got to drive the tractor instead of walk along and working. But here I was at this progressive farm-- socialist farm, communist farm, whatever you want to call it--and most of the farmers were sitting in the shade. I had a couple of years of Russian at Texas A&M, and I spoke my best Russian at the time and asked the question, here was mid-morning, When do you work out in the field? I looked out in the field; I couldn't tell what they were working and what they hadn't. It didn't seem to be a whole lot of difference. I couldn't really tell what they were even growing out there. It looked kind of greenish brown; none of it looked too good. This was the middle of the summer. I knew from my work that you want to start early and try to finish by three or four at the latest before the sun gets its hottest, and here they were in the middle of this shady area, not working; didn't look like they'd worked all morning. The people there laughed, and I thought, oops, maybe I didn't say it properly in Russian. And one of the guys responded for the group: I make the same number of rubles if I'm here in the shade or if I'm out there in the hot sun. And he said: So I'm here. And there, in a nutshell, is why a progressive farm will not ever really work. Because when you give people the same amount of money to work and sweat and produce as you pay them to sit in the shade and not do anything but laugh and joke and cut up and have fun and eat snacks, then I don't care how dedicated you are, at some point you'll quit working out in the hot sun and you'll sit in the shade and no one will have food to eat. That's why socialists or progressive societies always fail. So how does a free enterprise system fail? Free enterprise systems always fail when they become so progressive, so socialist, that they begin to reward completely the same amount for working as they do for doing nothing. This administration has been at the head of destroying the welfare reform that was done in 1995-1996. And, yes, I'm pleased President Clinton takes credit for it now. He certainly didn't at the time. He fought the Republican majority over it over and over. He vetoed it. And when finally there were enough votes to override the veto, President Clinton signed it, and now he takes credit for it. But it was welfare reform. And what you learn from that, if you go back and do the studies--and I was surprised, knowing the liberal bent of Harvard, to be at Harvard for a seminar and have a dean have charts that said, since the Great Society legislation started in the sixties, here is a chart of single mothers' income when adjusted for inflation; and the graph showed a flat line when adjusted for inflation. Single mothers, since the sixties when the Great Society and all the giveaway programs began, the welfare system, the welfare state began here in America, single moms flatlined. When adjusted for inflation, they never improved their situation, on average. Some did, but, on average, it was flatlined. And then he said, since welfare reform where people were required to work who could work, here is what has happened to single mothers' income. That was since people were required to work who couldn't work. And then adjusted for inflation, there was a huge rise for those 10 years in the income for single moms. Well, now, I know the people that passed the Great Society welfare legislation in the sixties, they wanted to help. I know they did. I know friends on the other side of the aisle, they want to help single moms. They want to help anybody who needs help. But there is a question of how much do you help when you incentivize people to never reach their God-given potential, and how much do you help when you incentivize working and producing and becoming productive and participating in society; who helps more? I know the intentions are equal on both sides, but who actually helps more? And it's never been more graphic than when you look at the income for single moms after welfare reform and for the 30 years before welfare reform. And now this administration has taken the best thing that Newt Gingrich did as he led to a Republican majority and led in balancing the budget, but even better, he helped single moms more than anything that any Democrat had done for the 30 years preceding that majority by elevating their income and beginning to have them feel some self-worth because they could do jobs and they had value and they had worth that they did not feel when they were flatlined and just taking the doles that the government provided. The Romans learned the hard way: you provide bread and circuses, and eventually you kill off incentive. Once Caesar decided, gee, this is not good for the people not to work when they can work; let's cut off the bread and circuses, and he did. And there was so much massive rioting, like we've seen in Greece, like we've seen in other places in Europe that are broke. Once you have degraded as a society to the point that more people have been convinced to sit back and just accept what the government gave them instead of using their God-given potential, then you are not likely going to ever get back to your greatest days again; you're done. It's just a matter of how long until you hit the dustbin of history. The reason I'm still in Congress, the reason I've continued to run, is because I've still got hope. I've still got hope we can preserve, perpetuate for more generations the greatest gift that any group of people have ever been given as a secular nation, and that is the gift of this country, a country that saw its Founders coming over, Pilgrims. Right down the hall in the rotunda, there is the great painting, that massive painting, of the Pilgrims having a prayer meeting, praying for the land that they would come to. That famous prayer meeting that they had on board the Speedwell--they had two ships, the Speedwell and the Mayflower. A lot of people don't know that. But that prayer meeting was in Holland, before they left from Holland to go to England, and then from England come to America. Some think it may have been a bit like Gideon's army being whittled down to just the strongest among them. But the Speedwell, when they got ready to leave from England to come to America, began to take on water, so they had to cut their group. The Mayflower was smaller than the Speedwell. They had to cut their group down in size and get the hardiest and the most likely to be able to plant that settlement in America where Christians could have prayer meetings, where they could say what they believe, where they could say without fear of retribution that I believe marriage is between a man and a woman. They could say all of the things they had been taught in the Bible, all of those things they believed as Christians, and have a land where Christians would not be persecuted. Other groups came as Christians seeking that land that God would allow them to live in without persecution. Now, Jesus said, ``You will suffer for My sake.'' I didn't suffer for Jesus' sake growing up as a Christian, because people who were Christians didn't suffer. But now we're persecuted. And now if you point out that Jesus sanctioned marriage, he intended a marriage between a man and a woman, if you point out that in Genesis God ordained marriage, he saw a man alone and said, that's not good, so I will give you a helpmate, a wife, you start talking about those things, then as a Christian you're about the only person, the only group in America that it's politically correct to actually persecute and condemn and discriminate against and say, as my friend, Rick Santorum, was told, Gee, oh, you believe what's been the history of great societies for thousands of years that a marriage is between a man and a woman. Because biologically by nature, even if you don't believe in God, by nature, that's how a species continues is by marriage between a man and a woman. And now we're persecuted for that. We're persecuted because we say, you know, I believe a baby is a life deserving protection. ``Well, that's some Christian nonsense. You ought to be a criminal. You ought to be put behind bars, don't try to protect.'' And all the while where some of those folks are saying we need to protect the most innocent among us, is there any more innocent being in the world than a child ready to be born? They've done nothing wrong. They just want to live. We want immigration. We need immigration in this country. I want Hispanics coming to America. I want people coming from any nation where they want to come together and become one people and be part of that e pluribus unum. But I also want them not to tear down my history and act as if it never was true. Or act as if when you look to the west and you see the Washington Monument, that when that was finished over 100 years ago, after the whole nation was contributing and they finally brought it to a conclusion and finished it off, they capped it with a capstone and on that capstone there's writing on three of the four sides of that capstone that's made out of what was an extremely valuable and rare metal back at the time called aluminum. But on the side facing the Capitol, by design, they wanted two Latin words, ``laus Deo,'' meaning praise be to God. Don't tell me that that's not the case. Don't tell me that's there by mistake. Because over a hundred years ago and back to the days of John Adams and his son John Quincy Adams, and Abraham Lincoln, or going back to George Washington when he resigned from the military and his prayer was that we would be following the divine author of our blessed religion, without an humble imitation in these things we can never hope to be a happy nation. I understand things have changed, but don't tell me that is not our history. It is. Don't tell me those words are not up there. They are. And even though the Park Service for a time took the capstone that tourists could see and turned it to where you couldn't see ``laus Deo,'' it doesn't hide the fact that up there on the top of the Washington Monument, those words are there. And why are they facing the Capitol? It's certainly not because we can look out from the Capitol and read ``praise be to God'' in Latin on the top of the Washington Monument. No, it's because they knew that would be the highest point man had constructed in our Capital City, and they wanted to ensure as the first rays of God's sun illuminated anything in this town, it would be the words, praise be to God. That's why it's there. As a Christian, I'm supposed to turn the other cheek. I'm not always good at it, but that is what I'm supposed to try to do. But as a part of the government, we have an obligation to protect this country, to provide for the common defense, to make sure that whether enemies are foreign or domestic that we protect what has been entrusted to us as servants to protect, and that's not happening sufficiently right now, because there are people coming into this country that want to destroy what we have. They want to bring us down before a monarch that they want to set in place. There are some who simply want to come for benefits. I'm so grateful that most of the people that come want to come to enjoy the freedoms and to get a job, and I'm so thankful we have so many immigrants, first generation immigrants, who come wanting to work. They are of an incredibly immense help to this country still being productive, especially after 50 million abortions. We're needing people to help. But I want them to have a chance to be president of their company and, if they're born here, to be President of the country. We need to be one people, and we need to have people come legally. Since we're allowing more immigrants to come in legally than any other country in the world, why not make sure the people that are coming are going to be helpful to America and not hurt America and not end this great experiment in democracy? That's part of our job. And then we have this article from Friday, April 12, 2013. This is from radio WOAI: The debate in Washington on immigration reform has had no political impact, but the debate is having a major impact on south Texas. Officials say the number of people entering the U.S. illegally is way up and, tragically, the number of undocumented immigrants who have been found dead in the unforgiving Texas brush country is way up and is on path this year to best last year's record for the number of people found dead in the ranch country. So why are more people dying in the harsh brush country of Texas? The article goes on: Linda Vickers, who owns a branch in Brooks County which is ground zero for the immigration debate, pins the blame directly on talk of ``amnesty'' and a ``path to citizenship'' for people who entered the United States illegally. She recalls one man being arrested on her ranch not long ago. ``The Border Patrol agent was loading one man up, and he told the officer in Spanish, `Obama's gonna let me go.' '' Border Patrol agents report that immigrants are crossing the border and in some cases surrendering while asking, ``Where do I go for my amnesty?'' ``When you have amnesty waving in the wind, you're going to get an increase,'' Vickers says. ``And when you get an increase, especially with this heat, you're going to get an increase in deaths.'' She says the current increase in illegal immigrant entries began last summer, at almost exactly the same time as President Obama unilaterally announced plans to no longer deport young people who came to the U.S. as children with their illegal immigrant parents. ``Washington is directly responsible for these deaths,'' she said. Brooks County routinely has the largest number of illegal immigrant deaths each year because smugglers come up U.S. 281 from the Rio Grande Valley but kick their human cargo out of the truck before reaching the Border Patrol checkpoint in Falfurrias. ``If that individual, illegal immigrant, can't keep up, they are left behind,'' she said. ``And you are going to die out in this heat if you can't find water.'' I know none of my friends on this side of the aisle want people to die like that. I know that. I deeply care about so many, just as the Democrats do. As a Christian, I'm supposed to love all people. I don't want them to die in the Texas brush country. And if the administration or people in Congress promising amnesty is luring people out as so many are indicating in that area who appear to have firsthand knowledge, then we should not be luring them to their deaths. We need to talk about one thing right now: let's have a secured border, so when the report came out 2 or 3 weeks ago that there were over 500 people that entered illegally at one place and that not even 180 or so were actually picked up or seen by cameras by the Border Patrol, and fewer than that were picked up, and there were over 30 people bringing drugs into this Nation that would poison American children, American people, then we're not ready to talk about resolving the issue of the people who are here. Because until the border is secured--not closed, I don't want it closed, we need it open for people to come in legally--but until it's secured so we can control who comes in, we should not be talking about a pathway to anything but deportation. Let's secure the border, and then people will be amazed at how fast we have an agreement on what to do about the people who have come into this country illegally. I've got a lot of restaurants and hotels and people who have businesses who say, I need those immigrants to keep my business open. Fine. Let's secure the border, and then we can work this out. We surely can--we absolutely can--but until that's done, we're luring people to their deaths. We're learning what one article says--and this is from townhall.com--that border crossings are up two to three times what they were because of all this talk. Then there's the talk that the President has given about how we're not going to be able to secure our border because of the sequester. We're not going to cut golf trips, and we're not going to cut any of these other things, but by golly, we're not going to protect the border unless you give us amnesty for the people who are here. Well, let's secure the border. Oh, no. We're going to hold that hostage. We're not going to do our job that we took an oath to do until you grant amnesty to the people who are here. People who are here in this Congress need to understand what it does to those who did everything lawfully to come into this country, who have followed every part of the law. It is absolutely demoralizing to most of those people to have the talk of amnesty of people who didn't follow the law as they did. Once we have a secured border--not held hostage, but just do the job that the oath was taken to do. Once that's done, let's talk about a pathway to a green card or a pathway to being here as a permanent legal resident. A pathway to citizenship needs to have people who believe in the rule of law because, if that is not the case, we will become like the nations those people left because they couldn't find jobs. They didn't have adequate freedom. There was graft and corruption because they did not believe in the rule of law as a nation, so they had to leave that nation and come to our Nation. So don't destroy a Nation that, for the most part, believes in the rule of law and in following the law--and that includes me and other Members of Congress. We need to show respect for those who follow the law and for those who say, It's Christian to help all immigrants. Well, it's Christian to help all people and to love all people just as Christ did, but as a government we need to make sure this country is going to be here, and we cannot do that unless we make sure that people here--immigrants who have come in, people who are Native Americans, those who are here in America--are protected against all enemies who may come in and want to destroy us. That's part of our job. I want to make a point about gun control since cloture was voted on down the hall. I've not always been terribly complimentary of our friend Senator McConnell down the hall, but he made some very, very important points that people need to understand about what is being proposed for gun control. Under what has been proposed in the Senate for gun control--and I'm quoting from Senator McConnell--he has it right: ``An uncle giving his nephew a hunting rifle for Christmas.'' That's someone who, under the law being pushed in the Senate, will be a criminal. Someone else who would be a criminal under the law being pushed in the Senate is ``a niece giving her aunt--`` he says ``aunt,'' but it could be her grandmother even ``--a handgun for protection.'' Another criminal under the Senate proposal would be ``a cousin loaning another cousin his hunting rifle if the loan occurs just 1 day before the beginning of hunting season.'' Another criminal under the proposal would be ``one neighbor loaning another a firearm so his wife can protect herself while the husband is away.'' Senator McConnell said, ``The people I am describing are not criminals--they are neighbors, friends and family--and the scenarios,'' he says, ``I am describing are not fanciful. They happen countless times in this country.'' As he says, ``The Schumer bill would outlaw these transfers, and it would make people like these, criminals.'' Any time a bill is rushed to the floor before people have a chance to read it, examine it, amend it, discuss it, it's not going to be good for the American people in all things. Thomas Jefferson was not part of the Constitutional Convention. He was part of the Continental Congress. In fact, he did most of the drafting of the Declaration of Independence, but he wasn't there for the drafting of the Constitution, itself. He wrote this letter after the Constitution was promulgated--an incredible document. He said: If I could add one thing to the Constitution, it would be a requirement that every law had to be on file for 1 year minimum so everyone could read it, everyone could make comments on it. You'd have plenty of chances to think of amendments that might make it better and a stronger, more effective law. Have it on file for a year. That may not have been such a bad idea if it had been included. As incredibly and, I believe, divinely inspired as the Constitution was, so many of the Founders said they got their inspiration for provisions in the Constitution from the Old Testament, but as fantastic as it was, it was written down by men who make mistakes. This Congress better not put into law a gun control bill or an immigration bill or any other important bill that has not had adequate scrutiny because, if that happens, Americans will suffer just as surely as they are beginning to as ObamaCare is being implemented around the country and as people are being turned away from treatment, though they were promised: if you like your doctor, you can keep him; if you like your health insurance, you can keep it. Now they've found that was completely untrue--and Joe Wilson was right. It's not true what was said about the Affordable Care Act. People have lost their doctors, and they've lost their insurance. That will continue to occur, and we're going to destroy the best health care in the history of man. There are doctors, medical historians, who have indicated that they think it was just after the turn of 1900--maybe 1910 or so--when for the first time in human history a person had a better chance of getting well after seeing a doctor than he did of getting worse after seeing a doctor. You get your mind around that. For thousands of years of the existence of man, where we have recorded history of man, think about that: only in the last hundred years have you had a better chance of getting well after seeing a doctor than of getting worse. You think about how far we've come. Now we're radically going to change health care so people can't get the treatment they once did? We needed to reform health care--it needed reform--but it didn't need a government takeover, and it still doesn't. The reason for that is that life is important. Life has value. I'm going to read a story--I won't read the whole thing--that was in the New York Daily News from Thursday, April 11. Ashley Baldwin said she saw the puppies moving on five occasions after their spines were snipped. The doctor is charged in the deaths of these puppies and in the death of the mother. The gruesome testimony at the ``House of Horrors'' trial of Dr. Kermit Gosnell continued on Thursday, with two former employees describing scenes that strained the imagination. Ashley Baldwin, who began working at the cash-only clinic in west Philadelphia when she was just 15, said that she routinely assisted Gosnell with these procedures, on five different occasions, saw puppies moving following the procedure. In one case Baldwin, who is now 22 and a dog owner, testified that she witnessed a puppy ``screeching'' after the procedure. She said, ``They looked like regular puppies.'' When asked about a particular puppy described in court as ``puppy A,'' who the prosecution contends was nearing its birth date, Baldwin recalled how large the unborn puppy was following the procedure. ``The chest was moving,'' she testified Thursday. Gosnell trained his employees to cut the necks of the puppies to sever their spinal cords, both Baldwin and Lynda Williams, another former employee, testified on Wednesday. Williams testified that she saw her former boss snip the necks of more than 30 puppies. John McMahon, Gosnell's attorney, has argued that his client did not kill any puppies by snipping their spines and that they were already in the death throes because of the drugs he had given the mother dog. Gosnell is charged with first-degree murder in the deaths of seven puppies, as well as murder in the death of the mother undergoing its procedure. Now, the reason the mainstream media has not reported this story and continues to refuse to report this story about little innocent puppies having their necks cut and killed after they're born alive is because they are not puppies; they're human beings. They're boys and girls, and it doesn't fit the agenda of the mainstream media to report on little boys and little girls whose spinal cords are cut by a doctor. They would be sure to report if these were puppies, but they're not; they're little boys and girls. And as a father who held our first very premature child in my hands and heard her gasping for air, heard her efforts to live, and knowing that we did all we could to help her live and that she's 29 years old, I can't imagine anyone thinking not only is it not a big deal but it is not worth reporting when a doctor snips the neck of someone's little child. With that, Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. GOHMERT

Mr. GOHMERT. Mr. Speaker, I know the intention of my friends on the other side of the aisle. We all want the country to run at maximum peak performance so that people have jobs. But it's interesting the ways we have going about trying to see that that happens. Interesting, in fact, we got the President's budget yesterday--of course it took 2 months or so beyond what the law says that the President must do. We also know that when it comes to people being in the country illegally, the President decided that he didn't like the laws that were passed by Congresses of the past, both Democrat and Republican, signed into law by Presidents, both Democrat and Republican, and so President Obama got up and did what you don't normally find in a country with representative government, he just announced: I don't like the law the way it is, so here's the new law, and basically pronounced new law into being with regard to who will be allowed to have amnesty in the country, and that program has already started. In the past, the Founders' intent was well carried out because I've been advised by people who worked here in Democratic majorities as Democratic leaders and Republican leaders of the past who said, yes, in the past, if you had a President stand up and say, I'm choosing to ignore the law that has been passed by prior Congresses, signed into being by their Presidents; I'm going to ignore those and just pronounce new law: So as I say it, so shall it be--if you had a President that acted like that, then both Democratic and Republican leaders would get together and they would head down Pennsylvania Avenue, that way. They would announce themselves and let the President know that either he would begin to comply with the law and stop doing what is solely the responsibility of Congress, or they would cut off all funding to everything he cared about. And that would take care of it. Unfortunately, these days the President, those in power in the White House and executive branch, have noted that since the Democratic Party is the majority in the Senate, then even when there are enough people in the Republican Party in the House who have the nerve to stand up and say we will no longer allow violations of the law or creations of law out of whole cloth without following the Constitution, the Senate would stop those actions because they're not going to let anything like that pass the Senate. And, therefore, we have bureaucrats who begin to announce to elected Members of this government that they really don't care what we have to say, that we're not going to stop them from doing whatever they want, because the Senate will block anything we try to do here at the House. Because this is a divided Capitol building with the Senate in the majority of Democratic hands and the House in Republican majority control, it is very important that we note what the other branch, the Presidency, is pronouncing. Under the President's proposed budget, there is an article here dated April 10 from CNS News that says: The OMB's historical tables also reveal that the White House does not expect this administration to ever run an annual deficit as low as $458.5 billion, which was the deficit the government ran in fiscal 2008, the last fiscal year completed before Obama took office. It's also important to note that in 2006, the last year Republicans were in control of the House, we were properly ridiculed by Democrats on this side of the aisle because we ran $160 billion-or-so budget spending over the amount that was coming in, that we had $160 billion in deficit spending. And the Democrats were correct: we should not have had $160 billion in deficit spending. Having no idea that the promises from the friends on this side of the aisle who said, If you will just put us in the majority, we'll cut that $160 billion deficit spending the Republicans have done and we will get a balanced budget, we won't deficit spend, who would have believed that when they took over as a majority, that within 2 years they would have tripled--basically tripled--the amount of deficit spending. So much for the promise that we're going to cut deficit spending. So the $160 billion or so went to $458.5 billion, about tripled the deficit. And then who could have possibly imagined that during President Obama's first year in office, when Democratic control was both the House and the Senate, that they would have the nerve to not run $160 billion deficit, as they said they would never do, or the $458 billion deficit, nearly three times as much as 2008, but that they would go 10 times that amount of $160 billion and hit about $1.6 trillion in deficit spending. There are several markers being laid down in this country that make it very clear that this country is on a crash course. There are no seat belts, there are no harnesses, there are no air bags. We are barreling down this road to a definite end unless we get this thing under control. And for the President to propose for the first time in American history that before he leaves office in 2017, under the President's proposed budget he will preside over the spending of $4.0898 trillion in fiscal year 2016, it's unbelievable. We've got somewhere between $2.3 trillion and $2.5 trillion that is expected to be coming in to the Treasury this year, and the President is proposing $3.8 trillion in spending. It is outrageous. And at the same time, the President has closed down tours. There's no indication that there has actually been even $18,000 or $74,000 or $78,000 in savings from not having White House tours. So you begin to wonder, now, wait a minute, you said it was to save all this money is the reason you cut out White House tours, that it wasn't just a temper tantrum to make people suffer. So, let's see, where is the savings? If there are no Secret Service being furloughed, there are no Secret Service being laid off, it would appear there's no savings. So what then could have possibly been the purpose for saying no more White House tours? Some have said, well, Congress is just mad because it complicates their job. People saying those types of things really have no clue what's going on in Washington, because the fact is a Member of Congress' life, be it Democrat or Republican, is actually less complicated when you don't have to arrange for White House tours. It's something that Members of Congress had taken on voluntarily in order to help the White House. So we would make the arrangements, people would call and come through our office, then we would have to write requests, beg the White House, can you find enough tickets for these individuals to allow them to go through the White House, and then we would get word back. There for a while it was unpleasant when the President first started, because we had trouble getting tickets for anybody the first year or so, which meant that the President got to have people furious with Members of Congress because they blamed Members of Congress for not being able to go through the White House on a tour, when actually we would just get notice and only be able to pass that on. So it actually makes Members of Congress' life far less complicated when we don't have to arrange for White House tours. But the Members of Congress I know, on both the Democratic side and the Republican side, really want to enhance visits for their constituents to Washington, D.C., and so we are willing to spend part of our budget to have somebody help arrange those tours for constituents coming to Washington. We help the White House by doing that. Even though our offices, every congressional budget has been cut about 20 percent over the last 3 years, we haven't cut out those constituent services. We have one person less in my office we just didn't replace by attrition. We've had to make adjustments. And I'm grateful to have a staff that is willing to work hard and long hours. They don't get paid overtime, but they're willing to do that because they realize this is a servant's job. I am a servant. People who work in my office are servants. We serve the public and serve at their will. Apparently, that is not something that all bureaucrats have been able to understand and take to heart. Then we also see big news today that a gun bill has cleared the Senate hurdle as the filibuster falls short. This is a FoxNews.com story that was released today. There is another story here that indicates Senator Lee says, ``Background Checks Could Allow Holder''--the attorney general--``to Create Gun Registry Using Regulations.'' In fact, ``On Wednesday,'' it says, ``Senator Mike Lee, Republican from Utah''--the fantastic Senator that he is; that's a parenthetical insertion--``took to the Senate floor and warned that universal background checks could lead to a national registry system for guns.'' A quote from my friend, Senator Lee, is: ``Some of the proposals, like, for example, universal background checks, would allow the Federal Government to surveil law-abiding citizens who exercise their constitutional rights. One of the provisions we expect to see in the bill, based on what we saw in the Judiciary Committee on which I sit, would allow the attorney general of the United States, Eric Holder, to promulgate regulations that could lead to a national registry system for guns, something my constituents in Utah are very concerned about, and understandably so.'' Lee also said that the government had no place monitoring the legal exercise of any constitutional right a citizen chooses to exercise: ``You see, the Federal Government has no business monitoring when or how often you go to church, what books and newspapers you read, who you vote for, your health conditions--'' And actually, I have to differ with Senator Lee on health conditions. ObamaCare means the government gets to monitor all your health conditions and actually will have all of your health care records, as well. Senator Lee goes on: --``what you eat for breakfast and the details of your private life, including the lawful exercise of your rights protected by the Second Amendment and other provisions of the Bill of Rights.'' Important quotes by Senator Mike Lee. With regard to the gun bill that's been rushed through the Senate, it is worth noting again that when bills are rushed through without being given proper scrutiny, we create bad laws, we make mistakes, and the country and the Constitution suffer. It's part of our oath that we will protect and defend the Constitution of the United States; and I would humbly submit we don't do that job when we rush through bills that people have not had a chance to read, to participate in. As my friends know, I have, on this very floor, read quotes from Minority Leader John Boehner who, in essence, told Major Garrett that: If we get back the majority, a Speaker John Boehner will bring bills through regular order. I'm not going to rush them to the floor like Speaker Pelosi has done. And I've had to remind my own leadership of those promises because we keep rushing through bills as Republicans that people do not have enough time to read. And I'm hoping and praying and arguing and cajoling to try to make sure we stop that process and that we return to regular order. There are some bad bills that come out of regular order to be sure; but when we have full debate at a subcommittee level over a proposed bill and any member of that subcommittee--this is called regular order--any member of that subcommittee can bring an amendment to any provision in that bill, you get some scrutiny of the bill in its entirety. Then when we have a markup at the full committee level and any member--Republican or Democrat. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter if they're on or not on any of the subcommittees. At the full committee, any member of the full committee can bring an amendment to that bill. We took most of the day today marking up a pretty simple bill, I thought, on the issue of reining in overregulation and getting Congress to take a look at the tens of thousands of pages of regulations that come out so regularly from bureaucrats that never catch the eye of elected officials. It was a pretty simple bill. It took hours and hours to go through that because there were so many proposed amendments. And each amendment that gets made has a chance for the proponent to argue for at least 5 minutes in favor of his amendment; and then under the rules, any member of the committee can spend up to 5 minutes on each amendment. It's not a pretty process, it's not pleasant to sit through, but we get better bills when we go through that process. Then it comes to the Rules Committee. And I prefer if the Rules Committee allows for a fully open debate. We have an open amendment process. It's not pretty either, but it gives people across America a chance to see who is advocating for what amendment, what language. And you have had all this time, from the subcommittee to the committee to the House floor; and every Member of the House, no matter who you are or no matter whether you're in disfavor with the leadership like some of us may be, you can bring amendments in an open process under regular order, and you have a chance to debate those and America has a chance to see who's standing for what positions. It gives them a chance at the next election to better select who they want better representing them by virtue of what positions they're taking. But when it goes through the process it just did through the Senate, there's not proper scrutiny and things come to the floor and we're not sure what the impact is. It can get so ridiculous that you can even have a Speaker of the House say, ``But we have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it.'' That's not the way we're supposed to govern. We have an obligation to do better than that. Now, we've also gotten word that from the sequester that hit here just recently--this is an article by Elizabeth Harrington, dated April 9 of this week, ``Safe from Sequester: $704,198 for Gardening at NATO Ambassador's Home.'' Well, that should be a nice garden. I like to work in the yard around our house. I don't have as much chance as I used to, nor does my wife, but I'm pretty sure that the gorgeous yard we have didn't cost $704,198 on our property. So you would have thought that perhaps if people were going to help the President that are in the President's administration, they'd go, Hey, I can make do on $200,000 for my yard work this year. So you can get another half million back right there. Gee, just think of all the White House tours that would fund, even though it doesn't look like the cutting of the tours actually saved anything. Then we have some very salient points made by Investors.com, titled, ``Six Ways Obama's Budget Is Worse Than Everyone Thinks.'' It's posted 4/10/2013: Fiscal policy: Shorn of its accounting gimmicks, the President's budget isn't a balanced plan to get the debt crisis under control. It's a monument to fiscal irresponsibility. With much fanfare and a lot of media hype, President Obama unveiled his latest budget plan--2 months late. An IBD review of Obama's budget finds that, among other things, it: Boosts spending and deficits over the next 2 years. Obama's own budget numbers show that he wants to hike spending over the next 2 years by $247 billion compared with the ``baseline,'' which even after his proposed new tax hikes would mean $157 billion in additional red ink. And it's important to understand, and I insert this parenthetically here, when we talk about a baseline--yes, the bill I've been pushing for 8 years, a zero-baseline budget where no Federal department has automatic increases, did pass the House a year ago. And I'm very grateful to Rob Woodall and Paul Ryan and to the Speaker keeping his word and bringing it to the floor. We passed it in the House. But the Senate, under Senator Reid, made clear, no, we want every department in the Federal bureaucracy having an automatic increase in their budget every year. We want their budgets going up every year. Now, Social Security, they may not get an automatic increase. Medicare, they may be cut by $700 billion as they were under ObamaCare; but when it comes to every Federal bureaucracy, Senator Reid made clear they were not going to pass a zero-baseline budget, that they were not going to do away with the automatic increases. They were going to push forward and make sure the government bloat--the government obesity as a bureaucracy--would continue and that there would be automatic increases in every single Federal budget. So, when this article points out that the President adds to the baseline, it means the President is already adding to what has been an automatic increase in their budgets for every department already. It may take another election to get people who are thinking correctly in the Senate, Democrat or Republican, who will finally stand up and say, You know what? There isn't an individual, there's not a family, there's not a charity, there's not a business anywhere in America that has an automatic increase every year in their budget, so we're stopping it for the government. If an agency or a department wants an increase, they're going to have to come in and justify it. Now, some of us wouldn't mind starting every year with a zero sum, and you'd have to justify anything that you'd get at all; but all the zero baseline does is say we are willing to start where we were last year, and if you need an increase, we'll increase. That way, when those of us conservatives who advocate for a decrease in the increase are actually still allowing for an increase, we aren't vilified for making draconian cuts, because the increases are still there. If we can get to a zero baseline, then you will actually be able to have honest and accurate criticism because, at that point, a cut would actually be a cut; it would not be a decrease in the automatic increase. But President Obama, not content with the overspending and the waste, fraud, and abuse that's going on, is adding even above the automatic increases with his budget. This article from Investors.com says: Vastly exaggerates spending cuts: The press has widely reported that Obama's budget would cut spending a total of $1.2 trillion over the next decade, but Obama's own budget shows that he actually cuts spending a mere $186 billion. (The relevant tables can be found at http:// www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/omb/budget/fy2014/ assets/tables.pdf.) Obama inflates his claimed savings by first cancelling the automatic sequester spending cuts he previously signed into law, then reclaiming them as new savings, and by adding in cuts in interest payments on the debt. I didn't realize that that went on, actually. The article says: Relies almost entirely on tax hikes: Obama's budget shows his plan would increase revenues by $1.14 trillion over the next decade. That means his budget proposes $6 in new taxes for every $1 in spending cuts. Cuts the deficit less than claimed: ``My budget will reduce our deficits by nearly another $2 trillion,'' Obama said Wednesday. But his budget shows total deficit reduction over the next decade would be just $1.4 trillion. Plus, deficits start rising again after 2018. It should be noted that CBO does not have a good grasp on reality. I've met with Director Elmendorf. I've talked to him more than once. I appreciate the job they're trying to do, but when they estimate the cost of ObamaCare at $800 billion, and then after it passes say, Whoops, maybe $1.1 trillion, and then after it's almost coming into effect say, You know what? It could be $1.6 trillion or $1.8 trillion, and then others more accurately say, You know what? It may be $2.8 trillion, that means, if they originally estimate $800 billion and it ends up being $2.8 trillion, then they've got a margin of error rate of plus or minus, not 1, 2, 3, or 4 percent, but more like 300 to 400 percent. Why are we even considering CBO projections when they're projecting costs with a margin of error of 300 to 400 percent? I think you'd have better luck just bringing somebody right out of college in here and saying, You give us your guess. Surely, your margin of error would be closer than 300 or 400 percent. Anyway, Investors.com points out that Obama's budget ``creates a new entitlement without a reliable means to pay for it.'' Obama claims he can finance a new $76 billion ``preschool for all'' program by raising tobacco taxes again; but after an initial spike, tobacco tax revenues will start trending downward year after year as more people quit smoking while the costs of this new program will keep climbing. The last time Obama hiked tobacco taxes--to pay for an expansion of Medicaid--revenues came in $2.2 billion less than expected. So, apparently, if the President wants more revenue from smoking, he's going to need to start doing a campaign to encourage people to smoke more so that he can get more taxes in and bring down the massive deficit that he is wanting to create. This report points out from Investors.com: The President boosts taxes on the middle class: Obama proposes to change the government's consumer price index in a way that will lower the official inflation rate. He's selling it as a way to cut Social Security annual cost of living adjustments, which are based on the CPI; but because his chained CPI would also apply to annual tax bracket adjustments, it will end up hiking taxes on the middle class $124 billion. The American people deserve better, and I hope and pray the Senate will wake up, come to their senses and stop trying to ram legislation through that America does not deserve. With that, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. GOHMERT

Mr. GOHMERT. Well, thank you. And I'll just take a moment because what you're talking about is so very critical. And just to reiterate the point that's been coming out in a couple of hearings, I was shocked that 34.9 percent of all prosecutions by this administration were not for drugs; they were for people reentering this country after they've been deported. They're prosecuting people for illegal entries. You don't even prosecute--this administration--people that just come across one time. And when you think about all the detention, all the prison, the jail space, the prosecutors. We pay for the defense attorneys. You think about all of the prisons around America which contain so many people who came in illegally, when this administration says it cannot afford to secure the border, then they have not taken stock of how much money that this country is having to spend on prisons, prosecutors, jails, defense attorneys, all of the costs that come with that, because they're not doing their job. And I know it goes back to the Bush administration. That is not a defense. And they need to take care of their job--and I hope and pray they will--instead of using the issue of a secure border as ransom. No, we will only secure the border if you will give us amnesty so people can vote for Democrats. That is outrageous. And Jay Leno had it right.

Mr. GOHMERT

Mr. GOHMERT. Mr. Speaker, it is with enormous pride that I recognize and congratulate the White Oak Roughnecks on an outstanding basketball season in which they captured the Texas State Class 2A Basketball Championship for the second year in a row. The entire east Texas community of White Oak and all Roughneck fans have a vast storehouse of exciting memories as a result of the Roughnecks' dominating two year stretch of championship basketball. The team went undefeated in district and compiled an impressive 74-2 record over the past two seasons. Going into the championship game with an impressive 37-1 record this year as they also had in 2012, there was no doubt the White Oak Roughnecks were a powerful force in Texas and a basketball team with which to be reckoned. The all important game of 2013 saw White Oak ultimately defeat the Brock Eagles just as they had in 2012 to claim the Class 2A State crown for the second straight year. White Oak led most of the game, but Brock rallied in the second half turning up the heat and bringing the fans to their feet in a heart stopping final ten seconds through which White Oak emerged the victor, 56-54. Clearly a team does not get to the ultimate and lofty plateau of excellence without a coaching staff that knows its players. There is no doubt that each of the individual players, coaches, and supporting personnel involved with the success of the Roughnecks will benefit from having participated and witnessed the level of success that is achieved when each individual gives all they have while working together with such dedication and passion. This tribute goes out to all of the athletic staff including Superintendent Mike Gilbert, Athletic Director Gerry Stanford, High School Principal Dan Noll, and Coaches Ron Boyett, Billy Terry and Brett Cloud. The team members achieving this memorable accomplishment included Slade Sutton, Skylar Sutton, Dylan Gale, Kris Anderson, Josh Benson, Cass Carr, Tanner Sharp, Hayden Nichols, Gabe Michael, and Levi Yancy. No athletic team ever becomes a champion without unwavering support, and that is exactly what the Roughnecks experienced from the entire community of White Oak, Texas. That is why congratulations go to all who contributed in any way to the success of the Roughnecks during this championship season. May God continue to bless all of their efforts both in school and as they one day finish high school and use that same drive and determination to make this country even stronger. Congratulations to the State Basketball Champions, the White Oak Roughnecks, as their legacy is now recorded in the Congressional Record that will endure as long as there is a United States of America.

Mr. GOHMERT

Mr. GOHMERT. If the gentleman would yield, yes, actually, I used to say just exclusively ``they're printing more money''--and there are commercials that say that. Then I had a meeting over at the Fed and I found out, Oh, no, we couldn't possibly print all the money we create every day; we're just adding numbers into the system. So I am correct, though, that we're still printing a little more, but we're just adding numbers. We don't even bother to take the paper anymore.

Mr. GOHMERT. Thank you. I'm so proud of the doctors in our caucus-- yourself, Dr. Harris, Dr. Roe, Dr. Gingrey. We've got so much knowledge and wisdom when it comes to health care, and we had those resources not consulted at all but, rather, dictated to by people that didn't have a clue what they were doing. And all those promises that were made, such as you can keep your insurance, we now know millions have not, will not. You were told if you like your doctors, you can keep them. I have talked to doctors, as I know you all have, who say, because of the ObamaCare bill, they're going to go ahead and retire early. Their patients will not get to keep their doctor. ObamaCare ensures that they will not get to see the doctor that they wanted. The Obama overlay does harm to people getting to see their doctor, does harm to people having insurance, avoiding these kind of disastrous Federal intrusions, filling out all of this staff. That's one of the big problems with ObamaCare. It allows the Federal Government to have all of your medical records. They'll know all of your deepest secrets. I'm glad I don't have any. But people should have a right to privacy. All these left-wingers that are always out there--and often we side on the same side when it comes to privacy--all of a sudden where are they? They're not making noise about the violation of privacy. With all of that overlay on everything else, this happens at a time when our economy is still struggling. Yes, the report was unemployment went down one-tenth of 1 percent, but that was because a far greater number didn't even look for work, they're so depressed financially, mentally, and psychologically. And then this week we hear that Cyprus was just going to siphon off 6, 9, 10 percent of people's bank accounts, just siphon it off as a tax, taking people's money. This is like a bank robbery. They go into the banks and rob them, and the only reason they don't go to prison for robbing these bank accounts is they make the laws and say it's going to be legal for us to rob people of their bank accounts. But I've heard over and over, Could what is happening in Cyprus happen here in the United States? And I just wanted people to think, as we finish today, and understand it has been happening every day. This President's Federal Reserve Chairman helped him get reelected by printing massive amounts of money, creating massive amounts of money. They're not printing; they just add the numbers. Every day they are taking from people's bank accounts by printing more money, creating more money, devaluing the money they have in their bank account. They create 10 percent more in money by adding those numbers. They've just taken that right out of their bank accounts. They devalued their home values; they devalued their bank accounts. So as people wonder this week if what happened in Cyprus could happen here, they need to know it's already happened. What happened in Cyprus was not only the euro; they would be doing what this administration is doing, just printing money like crazy to get themselves out of debt. That allows them to keep spending, run up the cost of health care, but we're printing more money to deal with it. So on top of all of this suffering and the disastrous effect on health care, you have this financial overlay of this administration taking money out of every bank account every day.

Mr. GOHMERT

Mr. GOHMERT. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It's always an honor to be recognized here on the floor of the United States House. I want to follow up on what my dear friend Mr. Woodall was pointing out. With the amount of red ink that we've had, there is no person, there is no business, there is no charity, there is no family that could continue to spend like this government is spending. The trouble is, yes, this administration is driving this truck right toward and off the cliff. They are so fond of talking about cliffs. We've been heading for a big one. The one at the first of the year was just a bump. It was nothing compared to the overall collapse we're headed for, along the lines that the Soviet Union faced back in the late eighties. There are stories about how they were trying to borrow money, but they had continued to spend, of course, in trying to catch up with our missile defense. They knew they had to match that if they were going to remain a superpower. The great vision of Ronald Reagan had pushed that. He understood that continuing to push a doctrine of MAD, mutually assured destruction, really was mad. It was nuts. Why not develop defensive weapons so that, if there were a mistake, there would at least be a chance to stop it? The Soviet Union, the Soviet system, is where you're rewarded not by how well you work, not by how productive you are, but because you exist. It's a very noble system, a very noble idea, but it doesn't work--it always goes bankrupt--and the SDI, the missile defense, just helped push them there a whole lot faster. So they got to the point, because they had spent so much, that they couldn't borrow any more money. They owed so much that they knew there was no way they could ever print money fast enough unless they went back to the pre-World War II days when people used wheelbarrows, figuratively speaking, to get a loaf of bread. They knew that they couldn't do that. Then when there was no other way, they finally had to announce: the Soviet Union is now out of business. It's so ironic. A free market system never collapses. It only fails when people who are not well-educated enough--and they can have all kinds of degrees. They could be like the late Mrs. Milam in my hometown when I was growing up, who used to say, He may have a Ph.D., but he's a P-H-U-L fool. She probably had a third grade education, but she was absolutely brilliant. So we have a lot of people like Mrs. Milam who talk about those who have Ph.D.'s, but they're P-H-U-L fools, and they don't understand that socialism doesn't work, it won't work, it can't work in this world. So the Soviet Union went bankrupt. If people think it cannot happen here, well, I can assure everyone, Mr. Speaker, it will happen here unless we get responsible, and a pox on the Republican's House for not doing everything we possibly could to stop the Democrats in the Senate and the Democratic President from heading faster and faster toward that cliff. Fortunately, in recent days, because we have taken a great stand, we slowed this truck down. We're still heading there. Then we have people basically throwing a temper tantrum because they didn't get every dime that they wanted. Yes, government has increased 20 percent. Their entire budgets have increased 20 or so percent. Oh, they're getting more money than they've ever gotten in history, but try to, not cut them, but just slow that big rate of growth down. If we just slow it a little bit, we get a temper tantrum: Oh, yeah? So what if it's going to bankrupt us? If you're not going to give us all the money, well, we're going to let law enforcement go so they won't be there to protect you. And do you know what? Kids who need vaccinations to keep from being diseased--we're going to spend the money elsewhere, and we're going to let them go without vaccinations so they can get disease. Do you know what? For the kids that need education, we're going to prioritize money elsewhere so they don't have teachers; Now we found out that the administration official who stood up and said, Yeah, they're getting pink slips, that he didn't know what he was talking about. Unfortunately, there is far too much of that going on these days; We were also told, Well, we don't know who in this administration is responsible. This stuff just happens. Doors magically opened. Some of us believe that an act of God opened the jail during New Testament times for the Apostle Paul and Silas, but the administration has not given any indication of an act of God that opened jail cells, and they're not sure who opened them. Maybe it was an act of God, because they can't account for how all of these people who were in jail just all of a sudden got released; But isn't it interesting it just happened to coincide with the administration's threat: give us all the money or else. Disease will take over because we're not going to let people have their vaccinations. We're going to let law enforcement go so crime will take over unless you give us all the money. Not only that, criminals will magically be released. Give us all the money or else. When all of those things didn't work and when the sequestration was moving forward, Oh, yeah? Well, we told you the American people were going to hurt, so now you don't get to come through the White House anymore. How petty. Now, I did file an amendment to try to bring home the point and try to snap people at the administration out of whatever stupor they were in to think, Oh, we'll just hurt the kids, the veterans, the seniors, those who are coming, maybe, for most of them, for the only time they'll ever come to tour the White House. We'll just let them suffer. We won't let them in. Then that will make them mad, and we'll tell them it's all the Republicans' fault. They don't understand, because we haven't done a good enough job of messaging it. But here in Congress, for the last 2 years--not the Senate, as they weren't going to allow their budgets to be cut at all. But here in the House, where the Republicans have been in charge, I've been quite critical of our Speaker--I continue to be so--but it was his order, and we cut our own budgets over 2 years about 11.5 percent. I think it was a good thing to do, but it shouldn't have stopped there. We needed to use that for moral authority to make sure that every government agency did the same thing. So, in the last 2 years, the 435 people in this body--all of us, every single one of the 435 Members of the House--have lost about 11.5 percent of our budgets that we don't have to spend. So, in our case, if you lose somebody, you just don't replace him, and you just get by. I am so grateful I have staff who, at least not to me, don't seem to fuss about 50-hour, 60-hour weeks and about getting emails at all hours of the day and night. I think I stopped emailing them this morning about 4:30 or so. I don't expect them to answer my emails in the wee hours of the morning, but they're hard workers. This is a tough, very difficult, stressful environment. And in this environment where we're doing battle with the Senate to try to get them to do their job, to have a budget, to be responsible, to have a responsible budget, to do no more harm to the American economy, American rights, it's often a battle, legislative battle. And yet we have been going into the battle for the last two years as we cut our budgets about 11\1/2\ percent. And we did it. And we still provide every single constituent service that we did before the 11\1/2\ percent was cut, and we will continue to do that. That's part of our job. Because of the sequester, we're going to lose another 8 percent or so, a little over 8 percent, as I understand. So, in effect, around 20 percent over 3 years we will have lost of our budget. One night this week I had so many individuals from my district. I think it was originally going to be about 120: one group of 16, one group of 25, one group of 3, one group of 2, one group of 8, on and on. All these groups. It added up to 120, 130 people. And most of them were so brokenhearted. The big school groups, one school group of 81 people was coming up here. They were not part of that group Tuesday night, but I have another group of 81 coming up. They were so excited about getting to see the White House. So I'm doing all I can to make sure that the people from my district who have come to Washington, who are brokenhearted over the little temper tantrum, whoever had it, that decided, No more, no, you can't come to our house anymore. Yes, it's your house. Yes, you're paying for all of it, but we're not going to let you in the house you're paying for, because we're mad because we had a 2 percent cut from the billion or so dollars that we had to spend. I understand the disappointment. And one of the things that I hope when my time is done in Congress, is I will have inspired someone during one of our night tours through the Capitol to do something far greater than I could have ever done. I was inspired in high school. It didn't inspire me to want to be in Congress. But I was just so inspired by history going all over the Capitol. Back then you didn't need a Representative to take you around the Capitol. You just needed to come into the Capitol. There were no metal detectors. You just came into the Capitol and walked around. It seemed like there was more that you could read about what went on here. On Tuesday night we had a tour, and I told the group when we started we can stop at any time, I'll stop telling these historical stories about the history of this place, but they didn't want to stop. It went on and on, about a 3\1/2\ hour tour. I think we finished around 11:30, something like that. But I push to do that for folks, not because our budget hadn't been cut 20 percent as it's being cut, but because this is the people's House. Down Pennsylvania Avenue that way, that's the people's house. And they deserve to have that opportunity. Now, the reason we know that I'm not breaking the rule--I'm not saying the President had a temper tantrum because he said he's not the one that called off the tour, so we don't know who had it. Somebody did. He said that was a Secret Service decision. Well, then we find out it wasn't a Secret Service decision. They don't have the power to make that kind of call. It has to come from somebody in the White House. Mr. Speaker, I hope--it's nice to be around the President, he's a likable man, beautiful family--whoever, Mr. Speaker, is making these decisions, having their little temper tantrum, shutting off tours, things like that, whoever is doing all that, I wish they would step up over to the White House and let the President know, ``Mr. President, I'm the one who had the temper tantrum and shut down the tours; I'm the one that's making these decisions over here; I know you didn't do it, Mr. President. I wish whoever it was would step up so we can know who's making the decisions at the White House. We would like to get to the bottom of Benghazi so we can find out who's making the decisions. Secretary Clinton said the buck stopped with her; and then after a hearing, it turns out she couldn't really remember where the buck was. And it would be a comedy of error, except there are dead Americans. And it didn't stop there. It bled over into Algeria, and more Americans were killed. It continues today, and we still can't get to the bottom of what happened in Benghazi. Some like our former Secretary of State would say, What difference does it make? Well, it makes a difference to the families of those who were killed in the service of their country; it makes a difference to the families of those who will be killed in the future in the service of the United States because we can't get someone to come forward and explain exactly what happened. Now we get a story here dated March 15--that would be today--from Catherine Herridge at Fox News, who does a terrific job of digging out facts, and she reports on information that should have come out months ago, 6 months ago. But we can't get straight answers so we don't know how to go about preventing future Americans from being killed so that their families don't have to suffer. And Catherine Herridge points out that three diplomatic security agents were among the Americans injured during the terrorist attack last September on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, according to a State Department official speaking exclusively to Fox News. According to the official who confirmed Fox's reporting on the condition of anonymity, two were injured, including one seriously, at the CIA facility known as the ``annex,'' and a third suffered smoke inhalation at the Consulate where Ambassador Chris Stevens was killed. Now, somebody is reporting on the condition of anonymity, and unfortunately this ought to be reported publicly. And we've long since given up on this administration being anything but in last place when it comes to transparency. But the hope that springs internal in the human breast causes us the hope that surely at some point a light will go on and someone will say, You know, we promised for years that we would be the most transparent, just like Jimmy Carter promised. And, really, we prosecuted more people for trying to be transparent in government than any other administration. We have shut off more information. This administration has gone further than that. They turned over boxes and boxes of documents that prove and are relevant to American individuals and American groups funding terrorism; but when Members of Congress asked to see those documents, we're told we can't have them, there's a problem. And as I pointed out to the Attorney General, you gave them to the terrorists, don't you think you could give them to Members of Congress? Where does your allegiance lie? Let Members of Congress see the evidence so we can know who has been supporting terrorism. Obviously, this administration made the decision not to pursue the 200-plus named coconspirators in the Holy Land Foundation trial. But the Constitution envisioned that there would be oversight by Members of Congress, that we would come in and we'd have a chance to have hearings and demand information come forward, and when that information didn't come forward, we could just cut off funding to that department. It's called accountability, and there is not being any. And that's why you have to have someone give information to a trusted news reporter like Catherine Herridge on the condition of anonymity, because this administration has fought transparency, not been a part of making it happen. The story says: Four Americans, including the U.S. Ambassador, were killed in the attack, and the Obama administration faced intense criticism from Republicans-- Of course, the story should have said, it faced intense criticism from Americans from all parties and from all of the mainstream media, but it doesn't because they have to report accurately; it was only Republicans. --in the aftermath over security problems and apparent inconsistencies in officials explanation of what happened. Lately, however, the focus has turned to the attack's survivors, who still have not been named, 6 months later. Separately, a diplomatic security source told Fox News the State Department's diplomatic security agent who was in the most serious condition suffered a severe head injury during the second wave of the attack at the annex from mortar and rocket-propelled grenades. The story goes on, but the real story is this administration continues to stonewall, as it did and has and continues, on the American individuals and organizations that have helped support terrorism, that are working against the interests of the United States of America here in America, on our soil. This administration has even befriended many of those people who were named as coconspirators. So I'm sure they don't want all that information coming out about their contacts and ties with terrorist organizations or potentially funding terrorist activity, because then it makes the country and the world know the administration has actually been working with people who at least support those who support terrorism. More news, too. This was reported on 3/7: The chief of the U.S. Africa Command is telling Congress that thousands of shoulder-fired antiaircraft weapons from the arsenal of deposed Libyan leader Muammar Qadhafi remain unaccounted for in Africa and beyond. We've got rocket-propelled grenades that are unaccounted for, and this administration will not help us get to the bottom. I know, I realize it may be embarrassing, but Americans have shown over and over, whether it was with Eisenhower when he came forward, during the Eisenhower administration when Nixon came forward and gave the Checker the Puppy speech and apologized, and he goes up in the polls, unfortunately. After the Bay of Pigs horrible atrocity where people, in 1961, had been promised air cover by the Kennedy administration, and it was pulled within 24 hours of the attack, when it was too late to let folks know that the Kennedy administration was not going to provide air support, and so people were slaughtered there in the Bay of Pigs. But President Kennedy did a noble thing at that point, though he'd made a huge mistake. He came on national television and said, This was my fault. And the American people loved him for his honesty in taking responsibility, and he went up in the polls. It was Eisenhower who told the American people, We do not have any U- 2 planes flying over the Soviet Union, when it turned out we did. And when he was caught, Gary Powers was shot down, he came forward and said, I'm so sorry. I should have been totally honest with the American people, and I wasn't. Eisenhower went up in the polls. If Nixon had learned something from his 1950s episode of apologizing and going up in the American people's esteem, he would have gotten to the root of Watergate and may have been able to finish his term; but, instead, he tried to cover up. But in this administration, Fast and Furious continues to be covered, Benghazi continues to be covered. So many things that are going on continue to be covered up. We can't get to the bottom of things, and it does not speak well nor bode well for the future of this country. Army General Carter Ham tells the Senate Armed Services Committee some of those weapons, as well as explosives and other arms once under Qadhafi's control, have fallen into the hands of extremists in northern Mali. He says others have spread to rebel groups in Syria. The Qadhafi regime was overthrown in 2011. Of course, General Ham doesn't go on and mention that the Qadhafi administration fell because this administration, without the consent or advice of Congress, only the request from Organization of Islamic Council and some NATO countries, not in the U.S. interest, he goes and starts bombing so that these al Qaeda-supported rebels could take over from Qadhafi, leading to, ultimately, the death of Americans. Anyway, Ham said at the hearing on Thursday he could not discuss details in public, but he did say a U.S. Government effort to buy back portable antiaircraft weapons from Libya has had only modest success. Well, I hope and pray that somebody who is more effective than those who've been at work for the U.S. and Libya will be able to get those weapons before more Americans die. One other thing. The President's going to Israel, and something this administration and those advising our great President do not understand is, when you meet with terrorists, when you meet with those who support terrorism, you not only give credibility to them, you devastate the morale of those who are opposing terrorists. So when you beg the Taliban, Please, please sit down with us and talk, no preconditions; we'll buy you an office in Qatar; we'll let your bloodthirsty thugs loose from our confinement if you'll just sit down with us, when you do that, you not only encourage the terrorists, you devastate the morale of those trying to stand against them. It's happened in Iran, when people who were wanting a different, a more freedom-loving administration in Iran, Iranian people who liked the United States, wanted help. They got no encouragement from this administration, not even verbal encouragement that would have meant so much. No, they were devastated as we continue to indicate, Look, you know, we can work something out, Iran. When this administration meets with members of terrorist organizations in the White House, even though our Homeland Security Secretary was totally ignorant of what was going on as we found out in answer to my questions in our committee hearing, you devastate those in Egypt, people that we can talk to around here, and we have, who don't want these crazies in control in Egypt who hate America and want to annihilate America and Israel. You devastate those who want to be on our side and help us. And I talked to one just this week who said, What are you doing when you encourage or even talk to those people who hate you, who've made that very clear? You hurt the rest of us who really want a fair and open democratic form of government in Egypt. Mr. Speaker, it is my hope and prayer that somebody who's making the decisions at the White House learns from history so we don't keep repeating it. With that, I yield back the balance of my time.