Glenn Grothman

Mr. GROTHMAN

Mr. GROTHMAN. Mr. Speaker, I would like to address the current situation in what used to be called the Gaza Strip. I believe looking at American polls prior to the invasion that took place in October, there were too many segments of the American population who--insofar as there were disagreements between, I guess, what we will call Gaza and the State of Israel or Palestinians in the State of Israel--sided with the Palestinians. They felt somehow Israel was doing something wrong. I still run into some of these people when I go back to my office across from the Capitol building because sometimes they are out there protesting or making some sort of a case. I believe that all Americans should realize that--until what they did to themselves about a month and a half ago--that the people in the Gaza strip were fortunate to belong in an area right adjacent to Israel proper. First of all, in that part of the world, there is probably nowhere where you would want to live more than Israel. As far as basic freedoms, which we take for granted in the United States, those freedoms are available to people living in Israel, and the freedoms, to a large extent, came from a Western culture which was brought to that part of the world as Jews moved there from other areas around the Middle East and from Europe beginning before World War II. Indeed, that land was largely a wasteland. It is interesting to read Mark Twain's comments when he toured that part of the world. It was largely a wasteland until the great Jewish migration. At that time, it not only eventually benefited the Jewish people who came to Israel from Europe, but it benefited the Arabs, as well. Indeed, between about the year 1900 and right prior to World War II, as the number of Jewish people in that area went up from about 100,000 to 600,000, the number of Arabs in that area moved up from 600,000 to 1.3 million people. In other words, Arabs from the other areas around Israel, as more people moved there from Europe, they moved there as well to take advantage of the economic opportunity that became available as more Westernized people moved in there, and that continues to this day. I don't think it is reported enough in the press that many people from Gaza who were working worked in Israel, and the economic opportunities in Israel were far greater than the economic opportunities in Gaza. Indeed, I believe something like a person who left Gaza to work in Israel may be making four times as much than if they tried to stay in Gaza and work for the employers in Gaza. Again, they are very fortunate that Israel was right next door. Now, why is Gaza not well off in other ways? Because they are getting huge amounts of aid from around the world, and particularly aid from European countries. Well, the problem is that the people they have elected, Hamas, grabs that money. There are people who are billionaires, not because they have done anything worthwhile or thought of a new way of doing something or opened a chain of hotels or whatever, the people who are connected with Hamas have become billionaires, taking money off the top that comes from the very poor people who are living in the Gaza Strip. Indeed, they not only take the money and skim the money off the top, but they then don't recycle the money in the Gaza Strip. They live in Qatar, or maybe they live in Turkiye. This is what Hamas does to the local people. By the way, I think if you look around the globe, the biggest difference between the prosperous countries and the not prosperous countries, is are the people that are running the not prosperous countries, are they siphoning off the money themselves? In other words, we have a crooked government. Nobody could not say that when left to their own devices, the Gazans have elected themselves, Hamas, I guess I would say, a very crooked government, which insofar as they don't have as much money as they would like, it is caused by who they have elected themselves. Remember, I think there is some feeling out there that Hamas is this fringe group that happens to be running Gaza. Hamas was elected overwhelmingly by the Gazans. Now, we can feel sorry for people that make such a stupid choice but we also have to say that you are guilty, to a certain extent, by electing such people. Another indication of how lucky you would think people should be for being in that part of the world, in a region on the beautiful Mediterranean Sea, is that the people from all around the globe are coming not just to be next to Israel, but to be right in Israel. One of the things that surprised me, as you read about what is going on, is that apparently some of the hostages were from Thailand. I thought, why in the world are hostages from Thailand being grabbed by these horrible Hamas militants? Well, I looked into it. People, particularly from Thailand or Philippines but sometimes from other places as well, are coming from halfway around the globe to live in Israel. Now, ask yourself that. I assume that these people from Thailand or Philippines are not Jewish, but, nevertheless, things are so good in Israel that people come from halfway around the globe, from Philippines and Thailand, to work and live in Israel. If you know anybody who says how horrible it is and how the Israelis are picking on these people, ask them: If it is so bad there, why do these people come from all over the globe to work there? Another point to be made, Gaza is not the freest country in the world, but they live next to Israel, which probably has as many freedoms as anywhere else in the world, as far as freedom of speech, freedom of religion; things are about as open as they can be, which is another benefit. They have an example of a modern western state right next door. The next thing I think the public should consider as far as these poor people on the Gaza Strip, is apparently no one else in that part of the world will take them. I mean, there are all sorts of people who feign interest in them, who feign sympathy toward them. How many of these people are being invited into, say, Qatar, a Muslim country, in that part of the world that presumably needs people to do work. I have a feeling there are a lot of people in Qatar from Asia as well doing the work. Why don't the Qataris say, oh, you are wonderful people. Why don't you come to our country? What do the Egyptians think? The Egyptians are right next door. If this is such a sympathetic group of people, why don't the Egyptians say: Come here, we can easily take another 1 to 1.5 million people in Egypt. We can even take over that part of the world. You don't hear that from the Egyptians or from any of the other Muslim countries in the region. You don't hear Turkiye saying we want these people. You don't hear Syria saying we want these people. You don't hear Iran, who is funneling some of the money toward this terrorism, you don't hear them saying we want these people. So before you have too much sympathy for this group--and I guess we can have sympathy for all human beings--you have to ask yourselves, why do none of these other Arab-Muslim countries in that part of the world, or in the case of Iran, a Muslim country, why aren't they taking them? Mr. Speaker, I ask the American people who are out there, the demonstrators and such, before saying how horrible things are for the people in Gaza, look at the history. Look and see the benefits that these people are getting from living next to Israel. Look and see the number of Arabs who moved to what is today the Gaza Strip, or Israel as a whole, moved there from other parts of the Middle East after--not before--but after the big Jewish migration that took place in the first half of the last century. Illegal Immigration Across Our Southern Border

Mr. GROTHMAN. Mr. Speaker, one more issue I would address so that the American public is aware, is that when we put together what I think a normal person would refer to our budget, we try to break it into 12 different parts, which we call appropriations bills. The Senate has an appropriations bill--we are trying to get them to break things up--and the House has separate appropriations bills, and then negotiations take place between the House and the Senate to see what the new law will be. Now, there are a variety of the things that the press should be paying attention to in these bills. A lot of things are details with regard to spending. We have to remember that right now we are borrowing about 22 percent of our budget. I hope all Americans are paying attention as debates are being had over every item in these appropriations bills, as to whether we are spending more or spending less. Remember, the reason we have these high interest rates, which are making it almost impossible for young people to buy a house, is because of inflation, which comes from excessive spending. That is one thing for people to look up. The thing I want to address today is that in almost every one of these bills there are efforts being made to increase the number of bureaucrats who are involved in diversity. In other words, people are going to get into these agencies, and rather than doing something productive, they are going to stick their nose in and say when we hire somebody, when we promote somebody, when we fire somebody, whether we give somebody a grant or not, one of the things to look at is that person's ethnic background. This is an incredibly divisive thing to do. These people add nothing--by the people, I mean the diversity bureaucrats--add nothing to the wealth of our country, but they do create divisiveness because they begin to cause people to view themselves not as Americans first, but they begin to say: What are you going to give me because my ancestors are from Africa? What are you going to give me because my ancestors are from Southeast Asia? What are you going to give me because my ancestors are from India? What are you going to give me because my ancestors are from Bolivia? That is a very dangerous thing to do. Also, this is something that is going to result in kind of lower standards, because rather than just saying we are going to hire the best person for the job, you begin to look at people's ancestry. There are going to have to be debates on every one of these 12 bills in which we say, are we going to let new committees into these bills? Are we going to let new bureaucrats into these bills who use their power to judge people solely by ancestry? I hope that, again, our press corps, which is sometimes missing the boat on these issues--and in there, I will even include the conservative press corps--I hope that they pay attention as each one of these bills move forward. Since now is the time of year when we appropriate money, in other words, now is the time of the year when we spend money, are we going to allow an increase or any of these diversity bureaucrats to be hired? Nowadays, you are getting college degrees and these sorts of things saying I want to spend my whole life trying to divide people and trying to cause Americans to view themselves as an ethnic group; an ethnic group from a country where not only their parents or grandparents or maybe even great-grandparents have never stepped foot in. I talked about Bolivia. Are they going to identify as Bolivian, even though they may have never seen Bolivia, their parents never saw Bolivia, their grandparents never saw Bolivia, or even though they have never spoken a word of Spanish? Maybe they think it is important that they be part of this agency so they can bring a Latin-American viewpoint to this agency or represent other Latin Americans. It is just a completely ridiculous idea. That idea is taking root. I think the only reason I would push it is if I wanted to destroy America, if I wanted Americans to turn to a fight between each other or a contest between each other, which is sure to end in the weakening of America. Again, we ask the press corps to pay attention as each one of these appropriation bills moves forward and educate the American public, which is what the press corps should be doing, educating the American public on the degree to which we are hiring more people to judge new hires, promotions, and grants or government contracting, who gets the contract based on their ancestry. Those are three new issues that I hope the press covers. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the remainder of my time.

Mr. GROTHMAN

Mr. GROTHMAN. Mr. Speaker, in the last few days, a new threat to American freedom has arisen. We all know today that most people, or many people, get out their views on social media. There are positives and negatives to that, but there is no question it is true. Particularly with today's intolerance, in which people can be fired for their views, I think it is very important that people be able to voice their views anonymously. Unfortunately, Mr. Speaker, it has become apparent that some people want to bar you from expressing your views anonymously, which I think in many jobs and many occupations today could mean you are going to get fired. There is no other way to express your views other than anonymously. As I understand it, our forefathers sometimes had to put out their words or their ideas of a future government anonymously to escape detection from the British. Voicing things anonymously is a long-held American tradition. Mr. Speaker, I hope the American people are aware that, like so many other of our liberties, it is an attack by some politicians who want to make sure that your employers and your college professors have the ability to know the way you think so they can take revenge on you. The American people must keep the right to post their views anonymously.

Mr. GROTHMAN

Mr. GROTHMAN. Mr. Chair, let me point out that there are many scientists in different countries who feel overwhelmingly that vitamin D would have reduced the number of deaths. I believe, sadly, that both our research establishment and medical establishment kind of tilt toward something that will be more profitable. If they would have gotten vitamin D out there in the almost year before vaccines were available, I think it would have saved a lot of lives, and it would have probably saved lives even after vaccines became available. It is a mystery to me why the public health establishment does not get involved and, quite frankly, encourage people to take vitamin D well beyond the normal supplement level. You should probably take four or five times the amount of the supplement. In any event, it is frustrating it wasn't done. It is frustrating we wouldn't check vitamin D levels when the cost to check them is, from what I could tell, if you go through a mail order thing, like, 50 bucks to check. Nevertheless, it wasn't worthwhile for the medical establishment to do that. I don't see any harm in doing a study, and it could result in a massive benefit. Let me also point out that, disproportionately, people of color were dying from this disease, and a lot of people feel the reason they were dying far in excess of the population as a whole was because people with darker skin don't have as much vitamin D. In particular, it would have helped people of color. Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. GROTHMAN. Mr. Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. GROTHMAN. Mr. Chair, I have nothing more to say other than that I hope the amendment passes, and I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. GROTHMAN. Mr. Chair, I rise in support of my amendment, which is an increase/decrease in prioritized money for the CDC to do a study on the effectiveness of vitamin D against COVID-19. Vitamin D has long been associated with a healthy immune system, particularly when combating viral and respiratory infections. It is evident that maintaining adequate vitamin D levels can dramatically improve outcomes for patients who are infected with COVID. I was incredibly disappointed during the entire COVID scare, when over a million Americans died, that the public health establishment did very little to encourage people to take vitamin D. There are many studies out there--they vary from one to the other-- from Spain, from Harvard, from the University of Chicago. In some, they say that the chance of death can be reduced by 60 percent. In others, they say for people with adequate vitamin D levels, 2.3 percent pass away compared to 25.6 percent. In other words, you are 10 times better off with vitamin D. In any event, the public health establishment did very little to push this. In my heart--I have read a lot of this stuff--I believe we could have cut the deaths by over 80 percent had they done it, which is why I want to require some sort of study out of the CDC to show this. The other thing that should have been done during this COVID thing is if you went in for a checkup, you should have had your vitamin D checked. That should have been automatic. If you would have had levels, say, under 20, your doctor could have said that you are in much worse shape now and that you have to take vitamin D right away. They didn't do that, I think, because they couldn't make enough money on it and because, today, the medical establishment is too money driven. Hopefully, if we do a study and something like this comes back, we can put our public health establishment a little bit more on the ball. I think it was an identical thing to COVID. I think it would reduce the number of deaths by over 80 percent. Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. GROTHMAN

Mr. GROTHMAN. Mr. Speaker, I request the press corps one more time that sometime, perhaps tomorrow, perhaps sometime next week, to release the new numbers of people coming across our southern border, what we sometimes refer to as illegal aliens. It is a story the press should never get tired of reporting, but apparently, they are. I remind them that every month lately 230,000 people cross our border, about 11 times the number of people who were crossing the border a little over 2 years ago. Of those, 70,000 are got-aways, which means they don't even go through the perfunctory checking in that you do if you ask for asylum. About 9,000 are unaccompanied minors. It seems to me, about 5 years ago we were screaming bloody murder about families being torn apart when people were held apart from their parents who were breaking the law for just a couple weeks. Here we have 9,000 people who are permanently coming across the border without their parents, and apparently, we don't even care. Indeed, the Biden administration has stopped asking for DNA tests to sometimes see if they are related. We are told by the Border Patrol that the people coming across are more aggressive than they have been in the past. No issue is more important than this. If the press corps is on the ball in this country, we should be reporting every day, every week, the number of people coming across the border, as well as the countries they are coming across from.

Mr. GROTHMAN

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

Mr. GROTHMAN

Mr. GROTHMAN. Mr. Chair, I will just make one more point here. Assuming some of this money benefits Americans, not just the wealthy wheeler-dealers, we right now--at least if Wisconsin is any indication--have huge surpluses in our State coffers. If it is a good idea, it should be handled by the States, not by the Federal Government that is broke out of its mind. One of the reasons we are so broke is too many of my colleagues don't look at the Constitution and realize that some things are supposed to be handled by the State and local government and other things are supposed to be handled by the Federal Government. By the time you drip the money down from the Federal Government, there is a huge amount of waste there. In any event, in the interest of trying to keep our dollar the strong currency it has been throughout our lifetime, I urge adoption of this amendment and send these programs back to the States. Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. GROTHMAN. Mr. Chairman, this amendment eliminates funding for the Department of the Treasury's Community Development Financial Institutions Fund. This amendment, if passed, would save $280 million in fiscal year 2024. Let me emphasize one more time that in putting together all these appropriations bills, the goal of all Members should be to reduce the level of spending. In the year that has just wrapped up, we are borrowing 22 percent of every dollar spent. If you are borrowing 22 percent of every dollar spent, you have a big problem. Even if we stick to the numbers that we agreed to in raising the debt limit bill, next year, the amount we are borrowing will be equal to 23 percent of every dollar spent. Mr. Chair, we have a real crisis here. Things are getting worse and worse as we go through these appropriations bills, so we should be looking for fewer ways to spend money and return it to the Treasury. The CDFI Fund provides grants to community development financial institutions, community development entities, and other private financial institutions. As a result of that, this amendment not only saves money but saves money by taking away money from a fund that frequently results in public-private partnerships. I think there is nothing worse than public-private partnerships, because it means what you are doing is you wind up enriching already wealthy people at the expense of the taxpayer and allowing people in the community to become wealthier, not by necessarily doing something that is better for the community or successful in the free market. You become wealthier by schmoozing with the local elected officials. I think it is corporate welfare. I don't like corporate welfare. I think over time, more and more people are getting wealthy, not by providing something that would be winnable in the free market, but they do something by taking advantage of grants and credits offered by the government. I will quote The Heritage Foundation: ``The only rigorous empirical assessment of the NMTC to date found the program to be largely ineffective at meeting its goals of increasing community investment and development. The study found that most CDE investments were relocated investments rather than new net investments''--in other words, transferring one business to another area--``suggesting that `all NMTC investments do not likely represent new funds to low-income communities.' '' President Trump tried to eliminate this in his 2021 budget, showing that President Trump was sometimes a President who was pushing for less spending. In his budget, they noted that the CDFI fund was created to jump-start an industry at a time when CDFIs had limited access to private capital. The CDFI industry now has ready access to capital needed to extend credit and offer financial services to underserved communities, eliminating the need for such grants. In the interest of ending cronyism, saving some tax dollars, stopping government waste, and getting rid of a program that I think too frequently makes wealthy development types still wealthier, I urge a ``yes'' vote on this amendment. Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. GROTHMAN. Mr. Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

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

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

Mr. GROTHMAN

Mr. GROTHMAN. Madam Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. GROTHMAN. Madam Chair, let's look at the big picture here for a second. In the year that just wrapped up, the year ending September 30, the Federal Government was borrowing 22 percent of every dollar it spent. That should shock and scare people to death. We reached a neat agreement that I maybe think the Republicans should be paying a little more attention to on the debt limit increase. In that debt limit increase, there is going to be a mild cut in spending, discretionary spending. Even if we stick to that amendment, we will go from borrowing 22 percent of everything we spend in fiscal year 2023 up to 23 percent, another percentage increase in the next year. In other words, we have a pretty scary situation going on here. I think as we approach all these bills, our goal should always be to spend a little less money. It is kind of frustrating when you hear people wanting to spend more money. Madam Chair, perusing this bill, there seems to be one area that is obviously not the Federal Government's business, which is that of the Community Development Block Grant program. I cannot imagine why it would be the Federal Government's business to get involved in housing or any other sort of construction on a local level. We are broke, broke, broke out of our mind, and getting more broke every minute. Actually, some of our States are running surpluses. I know Wisconsin right now has a tremendous amount of money, so I thought we could look at the Community Block Grant Program. President Trump, or at least his finance director, tried to get rid of it altogether. Because I am so easygoing, I thought we would introduce an amendment just to reduce it by half, which would save $1.65 billion in the next fiscal year. I think one would be hard-pressed to say that these programs have been effective. Like every program that is paid for on a Federal level but administered on the local level, they have all sorts of rules involved that make things unnecessary, costly, and take a longer period of time. Insofar as it is a good program, the States and locals will be able to do it. I have a list here of things that I don't think we were anticipating when this program began: $500,000 to expand Niagara County brewing; $276,000 to fund a skateboard park in North Adams, Massachusetts; $500,000 in corporate subsidies to persuade Procter & Gamble's Natura acquisition to move to Fremont, California, probably from some other city around this country. In any event, I think this is a small effort at spending a little bit less money and weaning the local governments off the Federal Government. If they want to do their own stuff, they can. Madam Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. GROTHMAN. Madam Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. GROTHMAN. Madam Chair, this amendment would increase and decrease the Section 8 housing program to call for a U.S. Government Accountability Office study on: first, the marital demographics of HUD- administered housing program beneficiaries; Second, the existence and effects of any marriage penalties for means-tested housing benefits administered by HUD--in here, we are getting not only the Section 8 but also the 42 credits and that sort of housing-- Third, any recommendations and policy solutions for reducing marriage penalties within the HUD-administered programs. In the last 80 years in this country, we have had what I believe are means-tested programs. The practical effect is to discourage marriage and, in particular, discourage men from getting involved in their children's families. I remember touring a low-income housing project about 5 years ago, and the woman who was administering it, who was a crackerjack girl, really tremendous job, but she pointed out one of her major goals is to make sure she had no men in any of the housing units. I can believe that a lot of those men, since they weren't husbands, were maybe causing trouble, maybe doing drugs. It brought home the fact that right now an effect, and sometimes goal, of low-income housing projects is to keep men away from their families. This is, of course, only one. I am highlighting the housing programs because we are dealing with HUD right now. It is, of course, true of all sorts of other income- transfer programs as well. Food stamps, medical programs, and Pell grants all come with their marriage penalties. We want to focus on this. We want to see if this is a program that largely benefits people who are not married, largely benefits families without men in them. We know that there was a powerful group in this country, whose prescribed purpose, they said, was to get rid of the Western-prescribed nuclear family. We know under Marxism, one of the goals is to get rid of the family. The purpose here is we want to have hard statistics, a GAO study, on the degree to which we are penalizing families with both parents there. Madam Chair, we have all sorts of statistics here. My only comment is that, A, it is a little bit more difficult for a child, a little bit more of a tough row to hoe in life if they don't have a man at home. I think one of the problems we have in some of our inner cities today that not only affects the children, but it affects the parents, because I think for a lot of people the most important thing they do in their life and their motivation for life is getting involved in their children's families, and right now the low-income housing program as well as other income-transfer programs are designed to deny men a role in their children's lives. Madam Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. GROTHMAN. Madam Chair, I love my colleagues, but the States right now--at least Wisconsin big time--are running a surplus. If the State of Wisconsin feels they need more government involvement in building things, they are perfectly capable of appropriating their funds on their own. If the individual cities want to subsidize one part of town, they are perfectly capable of doing that on their own. There will be less paperwork, and it will be done quicker and at lower costs without Federal Government involvement. Again, I emphasize that we are borrowing over 22 percent of what we spend as it is. Our goal shouldn't be to look for more things for the Federal Government to do. Our goal should be to go through each and every one of these appropriations bills to look for less before the value of the dollar completely collapses. Madam Chair, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. GROTHMAN

Mr. GROTHMAN. Madam Speaker, we are beginning November here. What does November mean? It varies from city to city, but it means the Hmong New Year. Madam Speaker, I call to my colleagues' attention that some time during November or December, if you have a Hmong population close by, they will be celebrating their new year. I encourage everyone to show up and learn more about Hmong culture, their beautiful dress, great clothes, and great music. Our country always has a debt to pay to the Hmong, who fought during the Vietnam war against totalitarian atheism, the most evil form of government we have ever known. Afterward, they came to our country. Wisconsin has the third most Hmong in the country, and I have gotten to know many. I have yet to run into a Hmong family--I am sure they must exist--that was not doing very well. Everyone was getting married, having children, living the American Dream. Madam Speaker, I congratulate my Hmong friends. I look forward to celebrating separate the new year in Oshkosh and Sheboygan. I hope that anyone listening out there finds their local Hmong New Year celebration.

Mr. GROTHMAN

Mr. GROTHMAN. Mr. Chair, this amendment would increase and decrease the Office of the Chief Human Capital Officer at the Department of Housing and Urban Development to express concern regarding the inherently divisive nature of the Diversity Council and the associated race, ethnicity, gender, and sexual orientation-based Affinity or Employee Resource Groups. Right now, HUD has several different employee affinity groups for different racial, ethnic, gender, or sexual orientations. These groups include Blacks in Government, for African American HUD employees; HUD AANHPI for Asian American, Native Hawaiian, Pacific Islander; and HUD FedQ for LGBT employees. The so-called Diversity Council is reflective of this administration's drive to divide America. In other words, we should go to work every day, and Hispanic employees should be in one room and talk about what they have in common and Black people should be in another room and talk about what they have in common, and the gay people should be in another room and talk about what they have in common. On the face of it, it is a little bit ridiculous. It is divisive by its nature, as is so much of the affirmative action mania that has taken over this country. A growing volume of research demonstrates that professional development programs and other trainings in DEI are abject failures. There was a piece in The New York Times, by author Jesse Singal, that compared different DEI interventions and noted: ``Racial affinity groups, a popular intervention in which participants are temporarily separated by race so they can talk about race, have perhaps proved even more problematic. They've sparked complaints, in places like Jacksonville, Florida, where a principal was temporarily reassigned after she attempted to separate White students from students of color. . . .'' In any event, the purpose of the groups is to tell people: Because your great-grandfather or grandfather came from Cuba, we are going to put you with these other people and you are supposed to share something in common with these people. In other words, people are labeled as being different by their race or by their gender, which on the face of it is such a racist and sexist thing to do. I am not sure we should have a HUD, but if we are going to have a HUD, it should focus on its goals of providing housing or making sure we have affordable housing for the country, not setting aside groups of people who come from wildly different backgrounds and telling them because you are a Pacific Islander, or you are Hispanic, or you are Black you should think in a certain way. I talked to an employee who has to put up with one of these groups in private at a business. That is exactly what they are. They have some expert diversity person telling people that because you are Black, you should think such and such a way, or because your grandfather is from Cuba, you should think such and such a way, or because your grandmother is from Korea, you should think in such and such a way. It is just anti-American across the board. Mr. Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. GROTHMAN. Mr. Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Mr. GROTHMAN. Mr. Chair, I would comment that I think the gentleman has kind of a bizarre view of the world and I don't think is accurately analyzing what America is today. E pluribus unum, out of many, one, is the way we view America. When they define members of these groups, if you are one-quarter American Indian or one-quarter Hispanic or one-quarter Black, you are considered part of a group. To think that these people all have something in common because of where their grandparents were born, maybe grandparents who have long since died, is a little bit offensive on its face. If you look at how different groups do in this country, by the way, frequently the most economically successful group today are Asian Americans from India, then from the Philippines. Cubans do better than the average American. Like I said, they are kind of bizarre. For the purpose of identifying people or setting aside these groups, you are going to have people classified by one grandparent, supposedly of color, even though nobody under the sun even knows what their ancestry is, is divisive on its face. I believe the only reason people keep pushing this garbage is they want to divide America and they want to have people who are perfectly happy Americans walk around and being told that because your grandfather was Native American or because your grandfather was Korean, you know----

Mr. GROTHMAN

Mr. GROTHMAN. Mr. Speaker, I am going to address today a news story that has not received probably as much publicity as it should have. Nevertheless, it goes a little bit more to the wokization of all levels of government including local government, apparently including even what you would consider to be a conservative city of Nashville, Tennessee. Mr. Speaker, you will recall last March there was a Nashville shooter, Aiden Hale, who killed six people in The Covenant School in Nashville. At the time we were told that nobody knew what his motivation was, that he just had a rambling manifesto, and us little people didn't have to know anything more about it. It recently came out on the internet that this murderer of six people was a transgender who was motivated in part by Christian hatred and apparently a negative on blind hatred, too. In other words, he was a superwoke person who decided to kill six people. As scary as that is, it is just as scary that the authorities in Nashville are now investigating who leaked what motivated the shooter. In other words, our new government is scared to death of any narrative that intervenes with the overall woke agenda. Mr. Speaker, I hope in the future the press corps does not say that it is a problem when this is exposed but encourages local police to expose manifestos of multiple shooters so we know what really motivates them even if it is something like transgenderism.

Mr. GROTHMAN

Mr. GROTHMAN. Mr. Speaker, we have had an active 2 weeks in which we have been passing appropriations bills, and the Speaker should be commended on that. Unfortunately, all the activity with regard to the new Speaker and appropriations bills has caused the press to have an excuse not to pay attention to what is going on at the border. In recently released figures with regard to September, one more time we see record numbers of people coming across our southern border. Compared to a year ago, the number of what we call got-aways, which I think is the most dangerous of the immigrant groups, has shot up from 58 percent to 69 percent, almost a 20 percent increase over last year's already high figure. Last year they shot up to 49 percent. I think, as well, not only do we have a huge problem with people coming across the border that shouldn't be coming across, but we should also be paying attention to the viewpoint of the people coming across. John Adams warned that our Constitution was fit for a moral, religious people and totally unfit for any other kind. As the United States has to take sides around the world in conflicts, we should be paying particular attention to how our new wave of immigrants think.