| Speaker | Time | Text |
|---|---|---|
| For House Republicans, and thank God for our President, Donald J. Trump. | ||
| His vision, alongside the work of my colleagues, made today a historic day. | ||
| Behind me is what you see, a unified Republican conference with phenomenal leadership. | ||
| And this Republican conference works as a team. | ||
| This transformational legislation will provide safety and security for generations to come. | ||
| Whether it's at our borders or in our pocketbooks, Americans will be better off thanks to the one big, beautiful bill. | ||
| Our committees had difficult tasks and they delivered. | ||
| And some doubted that this was even possible. | ||
| But at the end of the day, we all came together. | ||
| House Republicans did not miss the moment. | ||
| And because of our work, we will put more money in the pockets of hardworking Americans. | ||
| We will prevent the next Lankan Riley or Rachel Moran from being murdered. | ||
| And we will save another family from the heartbreak of fentanyl poisoning. | ||
| And to think the Democrats voted against all of that. | ||
| But I am thankful for the House Republicans that they stood up for the American people. | ||
| We put them first. | ||
| This is what real leadership looks like. | ||
| This is what winning looks like. | ||
| And this is what America looks like under President Donald Trump and House Republicans' leadership. | ||
| Safe, secure, and prosperous. | ||
| And now I will turn it over to the chairman of the Transportation and Infrastructure, Mr. Sam Graves. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you. | |
| All right. | ||
| I'll be brief, but I'm proud to stand up here with my chairman colleagues, and I want to thank them for all the work that they did, the Republican leadership, and especially President Trump and his team for helping to get this across the board, across the line. | ||
| For our part, for the Transportation Infrastructure Committee's part, we exceeded our mark when it came to cuts. | ||
| And at the same time, we also made investments in our United States Coast Guard. | ||
| More importantly, we made a down payment on modernization of our air traffic control system. | ||
| And on top of that, we're going to see the first new money in the Highway Trust Fund in over 30 years. | ||
| So with that, I encourage the Senate to do their work and to get this moved as well across the board. | ||
| And I will turn it over to Chairman Rogers. | ||
| Thank you, Sam. | ||
| This one big, beautiful bill makes a generational investment in national defense. | ||
| The bill includes bipartisan legislation from the House Armed Services Committee that provides mandatory $150 billion in mandatory spending to help us start implementing President Trump's peace through strength agenda. | ||
| That $150 billion will fund key investment and initiatives in President Trump's Golden Dome, revitalize our defense industrial base, help secure our southwest border because border security is national security, deter Chinese aggression, and enhance service member quality of life. | ||
| With these investments, we will restore American deterrence and build the ready, capable, and lethal fighting force President Trump promised. | ||
| I want to thank President Trump and Speaker Johnson for prioritizing national security in the bill and commend our entire leadership team for getting this done. | ||
| And with that, I'll now lead it over, turn it over to the Iron Lady, Chairman Fox. | ||
| Thank you, and I want to thank my colleagues. | ||
| As you all know, we came in for a lot of criticism for the Rules Committee meeting at 1 a.m. in the morning, but we needed to do that in order for us to be right here this morning getting this done. | ||
| And I want to thank the Speaker for all the work that he has done. | ||
| I've told him I'm going to nominate him for sainthood because he now has done many miracles here as Speaker. | ||
| But he working together with President Trump and all of my colleagues, and I want to thank the members of the Rules Committee for their patience and their perseverance. | ||
| But this is a great morning in America. | ||
| Again, we are delivering as Republicans for the American people, and we're all going to walk very happily for the next few weeks, especially till we see the next challenge that we have. | ||
| But this has just been a primer for it, and we're ready for the next ones. | ||
| Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and thank you, President Trump. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Jim Jordan, Judiciary Chair. | |
| Thank you, Mr. Speaker. | ||
| I've said this many times before. | ||
|
unidentified
|
I think we tend to make our job too complicated. | |
| It's really pretty basic. | ||
| What did you tell the voters you were going to do when you put your name on the ballot and you ran for the job? | ||
| And if you get elected, go do what you said. | ||
| And this bill does that. | ||
|
unidentified
|
It wouldn't have happened without the leadership of the Speaker and our entire team, and it certainly wouldn't happen without the leadership of President Trump. | |
| But last fall, we told the American people, you elect us, we're going to make sure we cut your taxes, your taxes don't go up. | ||
| This bill does that. | ||
| We told them last fall, you elect us, we will secure the border. | ||
| President Trump has done that. | ||
| We allocate resources in this bill to make sure it stays secure. | ||
| We told people last fall, you elect us. | ||
| We will respect moms and dads. | ||
|
unidentified
|
We will let you have school choice ability where you can pick the school where your son or daughter is going to get the best education. | |
| And we told people last fall, you elect us. | ||
| We're going to treat you with the respect you deserve. | ||
| Able-bodied people in our welfare system will have to work if they're going to get your money. | ||
| This bill does what we said we were going to do. | ||
|
unidentified
|
That's why it's a good day for our country. | |
| Next is Mr. Guthby, the Chairman of Energy. | ||
| Thank you very much. | ||
| As one of the new chairmen here, it's just been such a privilege to work with the leadership and the chairman of the entire conference to deliver on the promises that the House Republicans and President Trump promised in the campaign. | ||
| In the Energy and Commerce Committee, we strengthen Medicaid for the most vulnerable. | ||
| Leader Jeffries, when he gave his speech on the floor, read different stories that he received on Medicaid. | ||
| Every single person that he talked about on the floor is completely covered by this bill. | ||
| We reformed Medicaid so hardworking taxpayers who provide Medicaid also have those who can work and are able to work join the hardworking taxpayers to help pay for Medicaid. | ||
| This is vital to our communities. | ||
| We deliver on energy dominance in this bill. | ||
| So I'm proud to have worked with my friends. | ||
| I'm proud to work with hopefully our members of the Senate to make sure that this bill gets passed and gets to the president's desk. | ||
| And we strengthen Medicaid and we delivered on energy dominance. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| And now I'd like to introduce my good friend, the chair of agriculture, Mr. Thompson. | ||
| Thank you so much. | ||
| Good morning, everyone. | ||
| And what a great morning it is. | ||
| I'm so proud to be a part of this team led by President Trump and our Speaker. | ||
| And really proud of the members, Republican members on the House Agriculture Committee and the hardworking staff. | ||
| We delivered as a part of this big, beautiful bill, you know, pieces of legislation that will just serve well the people who consume and the people who produce agriculture commodities in this country. | ||
| For the folks that consume, especially the most vulnerable, we've achieved something we haven't been able to do in a very long time, and that is to restore the intent of Congress, not by cutting or taking people off the roll for the nutrition programs, but restoring program integrity that makes sure they're able to get what they need. | ||
| But to do that in a way that gives them hope for a better future, restoring rungs on a ladder of opportunity. | ||
| And for the hardworking farm families that really are the producers that are in production that have been up actually, with these past couple days, I feel like a dairy farmer, you know, with these hours we're working. | ||
| But these families are up before sunlight. | ||
| They're out there working. | ||
| And we were able to deliver what I fondly refer to as Farm Bill 1.0. | ||
| We couldn't do everything that they needed, but we were able to deliver a tremendous amount in terms of risk management for hardworking farm families that are really experiencing the worst farm economy in a half a century. | ||
| And we know that we need those hardworking families to thrive, not just survive, but to thrive, because of them, we have food security, which gives us national security. | ||
| And so I'm just once again really proud to be here this morning and I'm proud to introduce one of my chairmen of committee I serve one, Chairman Wohlberg, with an education and workforce. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you. | |
| It's a great stand up here. | ||
| This is the first step of the continuing process. | ||
| And I want to give great appreciation to our speaker, our entire leadership team, and of course to the guy who is a must-do man, and that's President Donald Trump, that gave us all the purchase power to move what we needed to do. | ||
| And I want to say thank you to my committee as well as the committee staff that work significantly. | ||
| I think they all believe that without an educated workforce, we don't have a workforce that succeeds in this world. | ||
| And without a workforce, we don't have a need for education. | ||
| So put them two together, and we've got the opportunity. | ||
| And so we were given a high lift, a high challenge. | ||
| We found ultimately almost $350 billion of savings. | ||
| And that's the term because it gives us a chance to make sure that students have a better opportunity with reduced costs to go through their educational process, with incentives that make that work, but also make sure that we don't have factory workers in Michigan and ranchers in Texas paying for lawyers in Manhattan their education. | ||
| But everybody has that opportunity. | ||
| And we also give universities and colleges and community colleges and taxpaying universities the opportunity to counsel students against taking on debilitating debt that puts them back and really stops the thrust of educational process. | ||
| This is a start. | ||
| We trust that the Senate has seen the pattern now and we can work with them to achieve something that moves education and workforce forward in ways we haven't seen in a long, long time. | ||
| And it was great to be part of this leadership team, this great group of chairmen. | ||
| And it's a privilege now to introduce a guy who did yeoman work on Ways and Means, Chairman Smith. | ||
| I first just want to say thank you for the hard work that's been put in by our House leadership team and every one of my fellow chairs, but also every single Republican member of this conference. | ||
| You know, iron sharpens iron, and a lot of times we do that here, but it has made us so much stronger where we've been able to stand together and deliver real, real victories for American people. | ||
| I remember when people said President Trump's reelection wasn't possible, and then it became the greatest political comeback in history. | ||
| 77 million Americans voted to return Trump to office. | ||
| We have those Americans and President Trump to thank for the Republican majorities in the House and the Senate. | ||
| So then the doubters came back and said, there's no way, no way that House Republicans can make the Trump tax cuts permanent. | ||
| It's too hard. | ||
| They said there's no way they can deliver on his campaign promises and cut spending. | ||
| And they went even further and said there's no way that House Republicans can deliver on it as part of one big, beautiful bill. | ||
| But I was raised in a trailer in Salem, Missouri, next to my dad's auto repair shop. | ||
| I know what it's like to have everyone doubt your future. | ||
| And I said it from the start: failure is not an option. | ||
| The doubters were wrong because we just passed the one big, beautiful bill. | ||
| And as promised, it delivers for working families. | ||
| And this is how the greatest political comeback of all time has led to the greatest pro-worker, pro-family, pro-farmer, and pro-small business tax bill of all time. | ||
| No tax on tips, no tax on overtime, no tax on loans for American-made cars. | ||
| Tax relief for seniors. | ||
| Make the Trump tax cuts permanent. | ||
| We hold the woke elites accountable and no taxpayer benefits for illegal immigrants who broke the law. | ||
| We're delivering for the gig workers that stay up late to put their kid through college. | ||
| We're delivering for the restaurant workers that take another shift to help out a co-worker and put food on their table. | ||
| We're delivering for the police officers and firefighters who show up in the dead of night to keep our communities safe. | ||
| We're delivering for seniors who worked their whole lives and paid into Social Security and were promised tax relief. | ||
| We're delivering for the families who, after surviving four years of Democrats' historic inflation, struggle to afford a school that meets their needs. | ||
| We're delivering for the factory worker who needs to buy a car to drop his kids off on the way to work. | ||
| We're delivering for the Americans that expect their tax dollars to go to help other Americans and not illegal immigrants. | ||
| We're delivering for the President of the United States, Donald Trump, who made these promises and intends to keep them because the Republican Party is the party of the working class and we won't leave them behind. | ||
| Pleased to introduce the great chairman of the Financial Services Committee, Mr. Hill. | ||
| Which way are you going to raise your hand? | ||
| Good morning, everybody. | ||
| Such a pleasure to be with you. | ||
| And let me say first and foremost, thank you to Mike Johnson and our leadership team, our majority leader, Steve Scalise, working hand in glove with President Trump all of last year on what would be the priorities for House Republicans to work hand in hand with our president if we were so fortunate to be elected, to have the House in the Republican hands, to have the presidency in President Trump's capable leadership hands, and to have the Senate. | ||
| And this bill is that first step. | ||
| This is that first step that delivers on that promise. | ||
| And for my constituents in Arkansas, what a pleasure it was for me to vote that they're not going to face a 22% increase in their taxes. | ||
| That nine out of ten Arkansans can use the standard deduction and have a simpler, straightforward way to file their taxes, that they can have the benefit of a more robust child tax credit. | ||
| That's what House Republicans stand for. | ||
| And let me also say that there were doubters, and you've heard that mentioned today. | ||
| But President Trump has said frequently: why can't the Republicans stick together, like the Democrats stick together? | ||
| Well, with the leadership of Mike Johnson, Republicans have stuck together and delivered on the commitments that we've made in the campaign and in our planning in this first five months of what's going to be, as President Trump argues, a golden age for the American people and the American economy. | ||
| In the House Financial Services Committee, we were proud to have been charged by Chairman Errington with a $1 billion deficit reduction. | ||
| And by golly, like all members of the House Financial Services Committee, we under-promised and over-delivered by cutting the deficit by $5.2 billion over that period of time. | ||
| And it's the first substantive change in the Dodd-Frank Act in the past 15 years that will lead an anchor in our committee to deliver on another promise of the administration, which is to right-size regulations so that our capital providers can provide that access to capital to our small businesses, our big businesses, and make America more competitive. | ||
| So, again, congratulations to my fellow members of House leadership, our committee chairs, our staffs that worked so hard for so many months to deliver on what is a big success for our country. | ||
| And now I'm happy to welcome my fellow Arkansan, a great chair of our Natural Resources Committee, Bruce Western. | ||
| Good morning. | ||
| You know, winning feels good. | ||
| It always feels good, but it feels much better when you win as a team. | ||
| And this was a team victory. | ||
| And it's not just this team that you see standing here. | ||
| It's the team of our whole Republican conference. | ||
| It's hundreds of dedicated staff members who have worked many, many hours, who have made changes and gotten the bill text where it needs to be. | ||
| But we wouldn't be at this point without the leadership of our speaker, who just keeps winning every time something comes up. | ||
| And we don't have an option not to win. | ||
| There is no other option than to win for the American people. | ||
| And today I believe the American people win. | ||
| And as I think about the Natural Resources Committee, I can't help but think about the only quote in the House chamber by Daniel Webster that we're coming upon the 200-year anniversary of him making this speech at the dedication of the Bunker Hill Monument. | ||
| 1,000 people gathered there and 120 Revolutionary War veterans. | ||
| And the part of his speech that's in the House chamber starts off saying, let us develop the resources of our land. | ||
| America has been blessed from sea to shining sea with abundant resources. | ||
| America is also blessed with a conservation ethic to know how to use those resources in a responsible way and leave our resources in better shape for future generations. | ||
| We were able to, on the Natural Resources Committee, exceed our budget instructions by a factor of 20. 20 billion dollars in new revenue and savings over the 10-year window. | ||
| But that's just the beginning. | ||
| That's what CBO says we're going to generate by royalty rates, by lease sales, by selling timber, by selling, or by having mining. | ||
| That's just the very basic cost of selling those assets. | ||
| What that doesn't account for is when you have a billion dollars of resources, it takes billions and billions of dollars of factories, of oil rigs, of pipelines, of mines, of refineries, of sawmills, and manufacturing equipment. | ||
| And that's going to create millions of jobs across our country if we're fully able to use those resources, which is going to grow our economy. | ||
| So, this bill not only gives tremendous tax relief to hardworking Americans, it also gives hardworking Americans an opportunity to have great paying jobs and to build things right here in America again and to attack our deficit by growing our economy and producing more income for families and more income for the federal government. | ||
| And I couldn't be more proud to be part of this team today. | ||
| And it's with that, I want to introduce the chairman of the oversight committee from Kentucky, Representative Comer. | ||
| Thank you, President. | ||
| Well, today's a historic day, and today's a great day for the hardworking, taxpaying Americans. | ||
| The People's House has delivered on President Trump's America First Agenda. | ||
| Our one big, beautiful bill cuts taxes for hardworking Americans and small businesses, putting more money directly back into the pockets of those hardworking Americans. | ||
| It provides critical resources to secure our border and deport criminal illegal aliens, the same dangerous individuals that Joe Biden allowed to flood into our country every day. | ||
| It restores American energy dominance by rolling back the radical Green New Deal scam and unleashing domestic production. | ||
| And it takes direct aim at waste, fraud, and abuse in Washington, making government more efficient and more accountable for the American taxpayer. | ||
| For example, our bill tackles fraud in the Federal Employee Health Benefits Program. | ||
| A GAO report uncovered instances where federal employees illegally placed non-family members on their taxpayer-subsidized health plans. | ||
| The one big, beautiful bill ends this abuse, saving taxpayers $1.5 billion. | ||
| We're proud the House passed this legislation. | ||
| Now the Senate must do its job. | ||
| Next, it gives me great pleasure to introduce one of the heroes from start to finish of this whole process, our great budget committee chairman and my good friend Jody Eric. | ||
| I'm the chairman that made these guys' lives just a little more difficult. | ||
| The speaker told me he had two criteria for who would lead this bill. | ||
| They had to be big and they had to be beautiful. | ||
| And I just want to say what an honor. | ||
| Where did Jason go? | ||
| What a great day. | ||
| What an extraordinary team effort. | ||
| I am truly honored to serve with these folks and our conference. | ||
| I'm humbled to, to this day, nine years later, we came in together, still humbled, still pinching myself, to be able to be part of the leadership of the greatest country in human history. | ||
| I want to thank the Speaker. | ||
| I want to thank Steve Scalise and the entire leadership team for keeping all of us focused and unified and moving forward. | ||
| I want to thank my fellow chairman and all of our members for their tireless efforts and their unwavering commitment. | ||
| We said from the very beginning that this was a generational opportunity to deliver the most comprehensive and consequential set of policy reforms in modern history. | ||
| And you know what? | ||
| We achieved it in the one big beautiful bill. | ||
| The largest investment in border security and defense, the largest tax cuts for our families and small businesses, and the largest reduction in spending in U.S. history by two times. | ||
| So we've got an opportunity to take that big step, that big bold step, work with the Senate, get this bill to the President so that he can make that America First Vision a reality in the American people's lives. | ||
| And we're not going to stop. | ||
| We're not going to be satisfied until these policy reforms are a reality for the people that we serve. | ||
| So with that, God bless America. | ||
| Go West Texas and reverse the curse. | ||
| And Mr. Mark Green, our fearless leader for Homeland Security. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you, brother. | |
| No bill is perfect, but this one is big and beautiful, and I'll tell you why it's beautiful to me. | ||
| It's beautiful to me because House Republicans, under the leadership of Mike Johnson and Donald Trump, showed the American people that we will do what we promised. | ||
| And we showed the world that the borders of the United States of America are sovereign and secure. | ||
| Our team, my Committee of Homeland Security, has been poring over this for a year on how best to do this. | ||
| My staff, some of whom are here, thank you for your hard work. | ||
| We're going to construct and add to the border wall with technology, cameras, lights, access. | ||
| We're going to invest in the people who put their ass on the line to keep us safe every day. | ||
| More training, more equipment, modernized equipment, better facilities. | ||
| It's the right thing to do. | ||
| And we're going to end the threats to the people of this country from the cartels, from the gangs that have poured across our southern border in the fentanyl, and who knows what else with the terrorists that got across the border under the last administration. | ||
| It all comes to an end. | ||
| And I want to, again, thank my team and thank the leadership of this conference. | ||
| You know, 40 years, I think, we've been trying to push through border security. | ||
| I mean, all these different bills, many of which were baits and swaps. | ||
| This guy pulled us all together and got it done. | ||
| We finally secured the sovereign border of the United States. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| And I'll be followed by the Speaker. | ||
| Well, this crew behind me is exhausted, so we're going to take maybe one or two questions and call it a day. | ||
| Yes, ma'am. | ||
| Speaker Johnson, was there a pivotal moment that sort of shifted the momentum on this bill 24 hours ago, 10 years ago? | ||
| I was just standing right here saying that they needed all the seven to ten days to negotiate this piece of legislation. | ||
| What changed over the course of the last 24 hours? | ||
| You know, there were a number of pivotal moments. | ||
| We have 220 Republicans in the House Republican Conference and lots of different opinions. | ||
|
unidentified
|
They represent very different districts around the country with very different interests. | |
| But the principle and the philosophy is always the same. | ||
| Everybody's conservative. | ||
| We believe in limited government and we believe in individual freedom and the rule of law and peace through strength and fiscal responsibility and free markets and human dignity, the things that are all wrapped into this bill. | ||
|
unidentified
|
And so I would say there were a lot of pivotal moments. | |
| One day I might actually write a book about the last year of my life and trying to get this thing over the line. | ||
| But I'll say, look, I'm just going to say, I give glory to God. | ||
| I mean, there's a lot of prayer that brought this together. | ||
| I'm just going to be very blunt about it. | ||
| There were a few moments over the last week when it looked like the thing might fall apart. | ||
| And I went to the little chapel over here and got on my knees and prayed that these guys would have wisdom and stamina and discernment. | ||
|
unidentified
|
And that's the secret here, and teamwork and mutual respect that everybody has for one another. | |
| And I think that's what defines the Republican Party. | ||
|
unidentified
|
It's a great day to be an American. | |
| It's a great day to be a Republican. | ||
| Yeah. | ||
| This bill is going to go in the Senate. | ||
| They're likely going to change it a lot to prepare to do this again. | ||
| No, all the senators, every one of them had promised me they're not going to change anything in our bill. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Reese, no. | |
| No, I was honored to be at the Senate Republican luncheon on Tuesday. | ||
| And, you know, I encourage them to remember that we have a very delicate equilibrium that we reached on here. | ||
|
unidentified
|
A lot of work went into this to find exactly the right balance. | |
| And you all saw how perilous that was over the last week as it developed. | ||
| And I encourage our Senate colleagues to think of this as a one-team effort, as we have, and to modify this as little as possible because it will make it easier for us to get it over the line ultimately and finished and get it to the president's desk by July 4th. | ||
|
unidentified
|
And that's a big thing. | |
| The reason we were so aggressive, and I know some of y'all smiled and probably mocked me a little bit when I said early on we were going to do this by Memorial Day. | ||
| You didn't believe it. | ||
| I know you didn't, Rhys. | ||
| Most of you didn't. | ||
| But the reason we did that was not because out of pride of authorship or because we were trying to, you know, raise some banner. | ||
|
unidentified
|
We did it because we need to get this relief to the American people as soon as possible. | |
| And President Trump made these promises on the campaign trail, and we did as well. | ||
| And we wanted, as Jim Jordan likes to say, we're going to do what we said we were going to do. | ||
| And that's what this bill represents. | ||
| And so the timetable is important. | ||
| We also have the debt ceiling approaching. | ||
| We've got the relief that the people need. | ||
| And the sooner they feel that relief, the better. | ||
| So we did our job, rolled up our sleeves, got it done, and we're really proud of that effort. | ||
| One more question. | ||
| Yes? | ||
| Is there anything that the Senate might be considering in terms of changing this bill that you will not accept? | ||
| I'm not going to draw any red lines. | ||
| Look, I told them there's a lot of different opinions over there, as there is here. | ||
| They have a small margin as we do. | ||
| We had a three-vote margin. | ||
| By the way, I just want you to know for the record, we really had 217 votes this morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Andrew Garberino did not make it in time. | |
| He fell asleep in the back. | ||
| No kidding. | ||
| I know. | ||
| I'm going to just strangle him. | ||
| And then he's my dear friend. | ||
| And then David Schweikert was going to vote and slipped his card in right at the last minute. | ||
| So it looks like a razor-thin margin, 215 to 214 and one president. | ||
| It was really 217. | ||
| Okay, y'all put a footnote somewhere in history on that thing. | ||
| They're both going to go on record saying that's how they would have voted if they got the card in in time. | ||
| Thank you so much for being here. | ||
| Bless you all. | ||
| Thanks, all these guys. | ||
| Next, remarks from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Jewish members of Congress, and D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser on the killing of two Israeli embassy staffers in Washington, D.C. | ||
| And then State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce discusses that shooting and allegations of genocide in South Africa. | ||
| And later, President Trump talks about prescription drug prices during a Make America Healthy Again event at the White House. | ||
| The Department of Homeland Security has revoked Harvard University's student and exchange visitor program certification, effectively barring the school from hosting foreign students. | ||
| The move affects both new and currently enrolled students who must now transfer out of the school or risk losing their legal status. | ||
| DHS Secretary Christy Noam's statement on this reads: This administration is holding Harvard accountable for fostering violence, anti-Semitism, and coordinating with the Chinese Communist Party on its campus. | ||
| It is a privilege, not a right, for universities to enroll foreign students and benefit from their higher tuition payments to help pad their multi-billion dollar endowments. | ||
| Harvard had plenty of opportunity to do the right thing. | ||
| It refused. | ||
| Let this serve as a warning to all universities and academic institutions across the country. | ||
| The Huffington Post reports that the move comes days after the Trump administration and the National Science Foundation ended 196 grants to the university, totaling over $45 million. | ||
| In a letter to the school, the NSF noted that, quote, Harvard continues to engage in race discrimination, including in its admissions process and in other areas of student life, as well as failing to promote a research environment free of anti-Semitism and bias. | ||
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| Coming up Friday morning, Sarah Chiefo of the League of Conservation Voters on how clean energy initiatives enacted in the Biden administration could be changed if Republicans passed their 2026 budget bill. | ||
| Then the Federation for American Immigration Reform's Julie Kirchner on the GOP budget bill's provisions related to immigration and border security enforcement. | ||
| C-SPAN's Washington Journal. | ||
|
unidentified
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Join the conversation live at 7 Eastern Friday morning on C-SPAN, C-SPAN Now, our free mobile video app, or online at c-SPAN.org. | |
| In a nation divided, a rare moment of unity. | ||
| This fall, C-SPAN presents Ceasefire, where the shouting stops and the conversation begins. | ||
| In a town where partisan fighting prevails. | ||
| One table, two leaders, one goal, to find common ground. | ||
| This fall, ceasefire on the network that doesn't take sides, only on C-SPAN. | ||
| Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made a statement following the shooting deaths of two Israeli embassy staffers outside the Capitol Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C. | ||
| He also talks about the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza. | ||
| Last night in Washington, something horrific happened. | ||
| A brutal terrorist shot in cold blood a young, beautiful couple, Yaron Lushinsky and Sarah Milgram. | ||
| Yaron had just bought an engagement ring for Sarah. | ||
| He was planning to give it to her in Jerusalem next week. | ||
| They were planning to start a new and happy life together. | ||
| Well, that tragically did not happen. | ||
| Yaron and Sarah weren't the victims of a random crime. | ||
| The terrorists who cruelly gunned them down did so for one reason and one reason alone. | ||
| He wanted to kill Jews. | ||
| And as he was taken away, he chanted, Free Palestine. | ||
| This is exactly the same chant we heard on October 7th. | ||
| On that day, thousands of terrorists stormed into Israel from Gaza. | ||
| They beheaded men, they raped women, they burnt babies alive. | ||
| They butchered 1,200 innocent people and took 251 innocent people hostage to the dungeons of Gaza. | ||
| A short time afterwards, Chancellor Schultz of Germany visited Israel. | ||
| And after he saw the horrors, he said to me, these Hamas terrorists are exactly like the Nazis. | ||
| He was right. | ||
| And if they could get away with it, these Hamas terrorists would have slaughtered every last Jew on earth. | ||
| For these neo-Nazis, Free Palestine is just today's version of Heil Hitler. | ||
| They don't want a Palestinian state. | ||
| They want to destroy the Jewish state. | ||
| They want to annihilate the Jewish people who've been in the land of Israel for 3,500 years. | ||
| I could never understand how this simple truth evades the leaders of France, Britain, Canada, and others. | ||
| They're now proposing to establish a Palestinian state and reward these murderers with the ultimate prize. | ||
| Well, for 18 years, we had a de facto Palestinian state. | ||
| It's called Gaza. | ||
| And what did we get? | ||
| Peace? | ||
| No. | ||
| We got the most savage slaughter of Jews since the Holocaust. | ||
| You won't be surprised to learn that Hamas thanked President Macron and Prime Ministers Starmer and Kearney for demanding that Israel end its war in Gaza immediately. | ||
| Hamas was right to thank them, because by issuing their demand replete with a threat of sanctions against Israel, against Israel, not Hamas, these three leaders effectively said they want Hamas to remain in power. | ||
| They want Israel to stand down and accept that Hamas's army of mass murderers will survive, rebuild, and repeat the October 7th massacre again and again and again, because that's what Hamas has vowed to do. | ||
| I say to President Macron, Prime Minister Kearney, and Prime Minister Starmer, when mass murderers, rapists, baby killers, and kidnappers, thank you, you're on the wrong side of justice. | ||
| You're on the wrong side of humanity, and you're on the wrong side of history. | ||
| Now, these leaders may think that they're advancing peace. | ||
| They're not. | ||
| They're emboldening Hamas to continue fighting forever. | ||
| And they give them hope to establish a second Palestinian state from which Hamas will again seek to destroy the Jewish state. | ||
| And mind you, it's not going to be a state free of Hamas. | ||
| When you establish a Palestinian state, we've seen it. | ||
| The radicals take over. | ||
| Iran sends them in and they take over. | ||
| So don't give us this talk. | ||
| It'll be a peaceful Palestinian state. | ||
| It won't be. | ||
| But the hypocrisy doesn't stop there. | ||
| These and other leaders have bought into Hamas's propaganda that says Israel is starving Palestinian children. | ||
| And not only is Hamas putting out this lie, a few days ago, a top UN official said that 14,000 Palestinian babies would die in 48 hours. | ||
| You see, many international institutions are complicit in spreading this lie. | ||
| The press repeats it. | ||
| The mob believed it. | ||
| And a young couple is then brutally gunned down in Washington. | ||
| So here are the facts. | ||
| Since October 7th, Israel has sent 92,008 trucks into Gaza. | ||
| That's right. | ||
| 92,000 aid trucks. | ||
| That includes 1.8 million tons of aid, 1.8 million tons of aid, more than enough food to feed everyone in Gaza. | ||
| Yet as we had let the aid come in, Hamas stole it. | ||
| They took a huge chunk for themselves. | ||
| The rest they sold at exorbitant prices to the Palestinian population. | ||
| And then they used the money they stole to recruit new terrorists to continue their war against Israel. | ||
| Our goal from the start was to get food to Palestinian civilians, not to Palestinian terrorists. | ||
| So we consulted with our American allies. | ||
| What do we do to prevent Hamas from looting the aid? | ||
| Well, together we devised a mechanism to achieve this goal. | ||
| American companies will distribute the food directly to Palestinian families. | ||
| They'll do so in safe zones secured by our military. | ||
| And this will allow us to complete our goal of destroying Hamas while enabling aid to reach the civilian population. | ||
| We'll complete the construction of the first distribution zones in the coming days. | ||
| Ultimately, we intend to have large safe zones in the south of Gaza, and the Palestinian population will move there for their own safety while we conduct combat in other zones and receive humanitarian aid there without Hamas interference. | ||
| In the meantime, we authorize letting trucks enter Gaza to provide for immediate needs. | ||
| Yesterday, I think more than 100 trucks went in. | ||
| More will come in today. | ||
| I tell you this. | ||
| No army in the world has ever gone to such lengths to provide aid to the civilian population in the midst of intense combat. | ||
| And Hamas, of course, opposes this. | ||
| It shoots Palestinian civilians who want to leave for safe zones. | ||
| And it shoots Palestinian civilians who want to prevent Hamas terrorists from looting the aid trucks intended for them. | ||
| As for the hostages, we'll do every effort to secure them. | ||
| I'm ready for a temporary ceasefire to get more out. | ||
| But we demand, and you should demand, that all of our hostages be released and released immediately. | ||
| And so should every civilized country demand this. | ||
| We're in intense seven-front war that was launched against us by Iran and its proxies. | ||
| Sometimes in war, accidents happen. | ||
| One such incident happened the other day in Jenin, and thankfully no one was hurt. | ||
| Our military has expressed its regret over the event because we don't target civilians or diplomats. | ||
| We target terrorists. | ||
| Exactly the opposite of Hamas. | ||
| They target civilians, ours, and they hide behind civilians, theirs. | ||
| They use them as human shields. | ||
| That's a double war crime. | ||
| But I don't hear that coming from anyone of those countries that criticize Israel. | ||
| For those who say that Israel stands alone, I say we're not alone. | ||
| Justice stands with us. | ||
| The truth stands with us. | ||
| History stands with us. | ||
| And so do countless people around the world who could tell the difference between right and wrong, between good and evil. | ||
| I want to thank all of them. | ||
| And I especially want to thank President Trump and the American people for their forthright stand with Israel and with the Jewish people. | ||
| Together we stand, together we'll triumph, and we'll see the victory of civilization over barbarism. | ||
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we hear from Jewish members of Congress following a shooting that took place at the Capitol Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C., killing two Israeli embassy staffers. | |
| I'm Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman-Schultz. | ||
| I represent the 25th Congressional District in South Florida. | ||
| It's hard to find the words that brought us here today. | ||
| Last night, the manifestation of everything that so many of us in the Jewish community have talked about for an increasing crescendo of years now: that the hate and bile that has resulted in vicious anti-Semitism, | ||
| anti-Semitic attacks across the country, some just scrawls on street corners and buildings, others attacks on Jews who are simply walking in their communities with identifiably Jewish insignia or attire and vitriolic online anti-Semitic hate. | ||
| We have all repeatedly, and leaders across our community have, and allies of ours have repeatedly expressed that eventually, eventually, this anti-Semitic, these anti-Semitic attacks would leap out of the virtual world, leap out of the verbal world, and end up in acts of violence and terror. | ||
| Well, last night, that is what happened here at the Capitol Jewish Museum. | ||
| This was an event that was being hosted by the American Jewish Committee that brought together young diplomats and young professionals of all faiths to focus on interfaith, multicultural dialogue, and bringing people together. | ||
| When leaving that event, Sarah Milgram and Yaron Leshinsky, a couple who were Israelis, Sarah was an American that worked for the Israeli embassy, | ||
| were gunned down at point-blank range in cold blood because they were Jewish, because they were associated with the Israeli embassy because they were targets of hate. | ||
| Yaron was a devout Christian, Sarah was Jewish, and they were due to be engaged next week in Jerusalem. | ||
| As a member of Congress who and we all employ so many young professionals, this entire city would collapse without the expertise and brilliance of the young professionals that help make sure that my colleagues and I here and senior officials across this city are able to help make sure that this country can run effectively and can thrive. | ||
| We could not do our work without them. | ||
| And as a Jewish mother of young Jewish professionals, my first thought was that could easily have been any of my kids or any of my staff. | ||
| I just, the six of us wanted to come today to make sure that we could express our sorrow, our grief. | ||
| I know I want to express Zichonam Levrecha. | ||
| May the memories of Sarah and Yaron be a blessing. | ||
| And we have to make sure that we come together across all faiths, all communities, all cultures to express that this terror, this anti-Semitic hate against the Jewish community must end. | ||
| And we are a community that has consistently stood with other communities when hate is directed at them. | ||
| And we have been joined, not as often as we'd like, by other communities. | ||
| And so I know I hope so desperately that our communities can come together and continue the work that the Biden administration made with a whole-of-government approach to fighting anti-Semitism, come together to make sure that we can fight terror and make sure that our Jewish institutions and communities across this country are able to keep our people safe and secure. | ||
| Funding for nonprofit security, non-profit security grant funding has to be increased, has to be released so that the institutions that need to be able to have events like there was last night can keep the people who are participating safe. | ||
| And we all have to come together to make sure that we can stop this hate and anti-Semitic bigotry in its tracks. | ||
| Thank you so much for joining us. | ||
| And we wanted to come and really express our grief. | ||
| And now I'll introduce one of the co-chairs of the Congressional Jewish Caucus, Congressman Bradshaw and Schneider from Elijah. | ||
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unidentified
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Thanks, Debbie. | |
| I am Brad Schneider from Illinois' 10th Congressional District, and as mentioned, one of the co-chairs of the Congressional Jewish Caucus. | ||
| Debbie touched on the idea that there are so many young people in this town, driven by idealism, driven by the idea that Washington stands for something, that in our founding as a nation, all people are created equal. | ||
| Last night at this site, there was a gathering sponsored by the American Jewish Committee of young professionals, diplomatic professionals, who were dedicating their careers to the idea of building bridges, bridges between people and bridges between nations. | ||
| Jewish tradition, going back to Rabbi Hillel, famous quotation: If I am not for myself, who will be? | ||
| But if I'm only for myself, what am I? | ||
| The idea that we belong together. | ||
| As a nation, our motto, e pluribus unum from many one. | ||
| That's the ideal we all believe in and strive for every day in this city. | ||
| But there's another reality, a reality that's been true my entire life. | ||
| As a young child, I remember going to synagogue on high holidays, and there would be extra security. | ||
| There would be guards. | ||
| In the 1970s and 80s, those guards started carrying longer guns. | ||
| And in the last number of years, those guards have started appearing not just on the high holidays, but every single day. | ||
| And in the 19 months since October 7th, 2023, we have seen a rise of anti-Semitism that has been unprecedented in my lifetime. | ||
| So much so to the point that people are told, don't wear outwards display of your faith. | ||
| Wear a baseball cap instead of yarmulke. | ||
| Take your Star of David and tuck it in your shirt. | ||
| There is a real fear. | ||
| So as we gather here today, we are overwhelmed by emotions. | ||
| Emotions of grief at the loss of two beautiful young people who were prepared to make a life together, heading to Israel to become engaged, to make a promise to each other for a future, united, and to have that future cut short last night. | ||
| And instead, their families, rather than gathering under the chuppah, will be gathering beside a grave, saying a Kaddish instead of seven blessings. | ||
| We have grief We have fear. | ||
| But we're not surprised at what happened, and we are not going to back down. | ||
| The resolve of all of us standing here, the resolve of every American Jew, the resolve of Jews around the world is that we will hold on to who we are with pride and defiance. | ||
| We know our place is in this city, in this country, for us within the governing halls of the United States, and we will not let anyone tell us we don't belong. | ||
| We are overwhelmed with the grief for two beautiful souls. | ||
| But we must be inspired by their spirit and their example. | ||
| They were here last night participating in a program about reaching out. | ||
| That is who they are. | ||
| That is how they will be remembered. | ||
| We're here today to mark their murder, to express our sorrow. | ||
| But we must stand to ensure their memory is always a blessing. | ||
| We cannot let their death be in vain. | ||
| We must stand up against hate, against anti-Semitism, against efforts to divide people, and instead make sure we work to unite people. | ||
| Thank you very much. | ||
| It's now my honor to turn over to my colleague Jamie Raskin. | ||
| I'm Jamie Raskin. | ||
| I represent Maryland's 8th District, which is Montgomery County, Maryland, just next door. | ||
| We've come to express our sorrow, our horror, our shock, and our outrage At the grievous anti-Semitic murder of these two beautiful young people, we've come to express our sympathy and our solidarity with their families and their friends, with everyone who has been affected by this nightmare. | ||
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unidentified
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There is no justification ever for murder. | |
| There is no justification ever for terrorism. | ||
| And we must stand unified as a community against the horror that just took place in the capital city yesterday. | ||
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Anti-Semitism is a threat to Jewish people everywhere. | |
| It's a threat to other people everywhere. | ||
| And anti-Semitism is the gateway to destruction of pluralism and democracy all over the world. | ||
| So we must stand strong against this poison and we must stand with the victims of anti-Semitism and every other form of racism and bigotry on earth. | ||
| And I just want to thank my colleagues from out of town who have decided to stay here in order to come to make this statement as Congress adjourns. | ||
| And I want to thank Brad Schneider and Jerry Nadler for their leadership of the Jewish caucus. | ||
| Sarah Jacobs from California. | ||
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Like my colleagues, I'm horrified by the murder of Yaron and Sarah. | |
| May their memory be a blessing and a comfort to all who knew them. | ||
| And I think it's important to talk about the significance of where we're standing today, the Capitol Jewish Museum. | ||
| Because this museum serves as a hub for Jewish life, for Jewish community here in DC, for preserving and celebrating the rich history and culture and contributions of Jewish communities. | ||
| It's a space for building community, creating dialogue, and education which is so needed to address the enduring stereotypes and misconceptions about the Jewish community. | ||
| A shooting like this took lives from us. | ||
| It's also meant to scare us. | ||
| It's meant to take away the places where we should feel safe. | ||
| It's meant so that every Jewish parent, like my brother and sister-in-law, who are dropping their babies off to a Jewish preschool this morning, take a little pause. | ||
| It's meant so that every person who wears a yarmulke or a Jewish star, like I often do, wonders, should I wear this today? | ||
| Should I put this on? | ||
| It's meant so that every time we walk into a synagogue, into a community center, or just down the street, we wonder if we're safe. | ||
| But we came here today to honor Yaron and Sarah and to show that Jews will not shy away from public life. | ||
| They are trying to scare us, but we will not be scared away. | ||
| And we're going to keep working to rid the world of anti-Semitism and all forms of hatred and racism and bigotry so that Jewish people and all people can feel safe everywhere. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| my colleague Kim Schreier. | ||
| Thank you for being here. | ||
| I'm Kim Schreier. | ||
| I represent sort of the middle of Washington State. | ||
| And I am here with my Jewish colleagues, also in mourning and in sympathy with the families of Yaron and Sarah, who just came to an event last night, an event that any of us could have been at, and were gunned down because of either their religion or nationality by someone who didn't know anything about them but targeted them for that reason. | ||
| And it's a reminder. | ||
| I mean, every time we start to feel safe and take a breath and feel like we're okay in this country, something happens. | ||
| Tree of Life Synagogue. | ||
| This absolute tragedy. | ||
| And I think about, well, that's the reason that my son, since preschool, has been going to a synagogue with guards at the door where you have to talk to somebody at the gate just to get into the parking lot. | ||
| And these experiences are meant to scare us, but they're also meant as a reminder that these last 50 years have been kind of a break from thousands of years of anti-Semitism, that it's not gone, that it's been reborn since October 7th, 2023, and that we're all worried. | ||
| And when it happens to one group, it means really no group is safe. | ||
| And that's an important message to get across. | ||
| We live in the United States of America. | ||
| We have the ability to disagree, to disagree openly, to express thoughts, to protest peacefully, and political violence and hate crimes are never ever the answer. | ||
| And that just adds to the grief that we're all feeling right now for Yaron and for Sarah and for their families. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
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Congresswoman Laura Friedman from California. | |
| Hi, I'm Laura Friedman and I represent parts of Los Angeles. | ||
| This is such a shocking and heartbreaking day. | ||
| And when I saw the news early this morning of what happened last night, like my colleagues, I was heartbroken, but I also unfortunately was not completely shocked because this event is one of a string of violent and despicable events that we have seen against the Jewish community for the last several years. | ||
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unidentified
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But we can't let that become the norm in this country. | |
| It shouldn't be normal or acceptable that my synagogue in Los Angeles was tagged with swastikas. | ||
| It can't be normal that my 11-year-old goes to Hebrew school on Sunday and has to have an armed guard open the door to protect a bunch of 10 and 11 year olds. | ||
| It can't be normal that after a horrific murder that everyone in this nation should be condemning, we also wake up to see online responses, thousands of people in this country, probably some of them real people, hopefully a lot of them bots, but probably some real people justifying this murder, excusing this murder, trying To minimize this murder, | ||
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that should be unacceptable to everyone in this nation. | |
| Because if, like me, if you believe that America is a place where everyone is welcome and everyone should be able to practice their religion freely, if like me you believe that everyone in this country should feel safe, regardless of their political views, their sexual orientation, their religion, or their race, If your religion commands you to welcome a stranger in a strange land, if you believe in law and order, if you're any of those things, | ||
| if those are your values, there's no way that you could justify or minimize this horrific murder or any anti-Semitic event. | ||
| And we have got to, as people who hold those values as Americans, push back on the violent rhetoric that we see on the extremes in this nation. | ||
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The extremist movements that we see that choose to take individuals and put them into groups that they feel are lesser than or are unwanted and refuse to see the humanity and the American-ness behind every single individual in this country. | |
| We all have a responsibility to push back on the conspiracy theorists among us who, in the case of anti-Semitism, choose to underlie their conspiracy theories with ancient anti-Semitic tropes about the Jews being controllers, controllers of media, controllers of capital, controllers of opinion. | ||
| And whenever those opinions creep into the discourse online or in person, all of us have a responsibility, Jew and non-Jew, to say, no, that's not who we are as Americans. | ||
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That's not who we want our nation to be. | |
| That we want a different kind of America. | ||
| Because what we are seeing now is completely unacceptable and everyone should be standing up to reclaim the soul of this country. | ||
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unidentified
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Thank you. | |
| From that, I think we'll take questions. | ||
| They've developed the platform. | ||
| They've taken concrete actions. | ||
| What, beyond slogans, platitudes, what concrete actions are Democrats proposing to deal with this rise of anti-Semitism beyond the national strategy that Mr. Mhoff put out last year? | ||
| What is the plan here? | ||
| You answered the question. | ||
| Last year, President Biden and last year, the administration, under the leadership of President Biden with second gentleman M Hoff, put out an all-of-government strategy to address anti-Semitism. | ||
| Did they do anything with it? | ||
| This is something that isn't a partisan issue. | ||
| Democrats and Republicans need to work together to stand up against anti-Semitism whenever it rises, from wherever it rises, and be clear that there is no room for hate in our country, that we will welcome all people into our country who believe in the ideals defined in our Declaration of Independence and our Constitution. | ||
| And we have been working with that. | ||
| We have a bipartisan task force fighting anti-Semitism that goes back to 2014. | ||
| So it's it's can I jump in and add. | ||
| As a senior member of the Appropriations Committee, I can run through a list for anyone who would like to know what Democrats have attempted to do. | ||
| I want to just make sure that it's understood that we're here to express grief and to express our outrage about the death of the murder of two young, incredibly beautiful people who had their whole lives ahead of them, and that this hate has to stop. | ||
| And so let's show you how we can stop anti-Semitism in its tracks. | ||
| We need to all come together to increase the funding for the Office of Civil Rights in the Department of Education. | ||
| When I offered an amendment last year during the appropriations process in committee, Democrats supported the amendment to increase that funding. | ||
| This is the office that investigates anti-Semitism in educational institutions all across the country, and unfortunately, Republicans opposed it. | ||
| We have had years and years of fighting to increase the funding for nonprofit security grants. | ||
| Nonprofit security grants is the funding for institutions like the Capitol Jewish Museum, like synagogues and mosques and other religious institutions and nonprofit organizations and JCCs across the country that sadly have to fund the security guards and the security infrastructure and architecture to keep congregants and participants in events that attend events like the one from last night that keep them safe. | ||
| But we have not always had bipartisan support to increase that funding. | ||
| We've had an administration that has for a time refused to release funding that was already appropriated. | ||
| And so making sure that we actually are fully engaged in getting resources out in these communities to keep people safe, which is what I was referencing when I opened my remarks, is critical. | ||
| But I'll just close on this question with this. | ||
| We all need to stand together to fight anti-Semitism and any form of hate and bigotry. | ||
| What we don't need is to be weaponizing anti-Semitism, to use anti-Semitism as a weapon and as an excuse to discriminate against and perpetrate hate against other people and take away other people's rights. | ||
| I just had my last two children graduate from college two weeks ago. | ||
| And thank you. | ||
| They're launched. | ||
| And I can tell you that we heard stories from my kids' friends and even on the campus that they attended and I worried every day. | ||
| Congresswoman Schreier, Congressman Schneider and I sat down last year with kids from Georgetown, George Mason, and GW when the encampment was still embedded on that campus. | ||
| And we heard their fear and the persecution that they went through, the halting and preventing of them from being able to cross the threshold of their classroom doors, being spat upon. | ||
| And we helped make sure that we could get that encampment disassembled and that we stood with students across this country to help make sure we could keep them safe. | ||
| But we're not going to allow our community and anti-Semitism to be used as a weapon that will just blow back on our community like it always does for Jews because eventually we get blamed for everything. | ||
| And so yes, we must stand against anti-Semitism. | ||
| We must use resources and we need to have the whole of government plans that the Biden administration implemented to truly ensure that we can embed the fight against anti-Semitism in every policymaking decision across this country. | ||
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unidentified
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Thank you for being here today. | |
| Thank you, Matt. | ||
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unidentified
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Yeah, and then you can call the next question. | |
| I would just like to put an even finer point on this. | ||
| I want to be really clear that what is happening right now with using anti-Semitism as an excuse specifically to crack down on institutions of higher learning, that is not acceptable to the vast majority of American Jews. | ||
| It is antithetical to our values. | ||
| We understand that these institutions are the institutions that support liberal democratic values, the values that allow Jewish people in this country to thrive and accomplish for the past 50 years. | ||
| And I just want to condemn using us as an excuse to crack down on free speech and to crack down on students and to deny funding for our universities that we all graduated from and we are so proud of. | ||
| That is my comment. | ||
| Next question. | ||
| Any other questions? | ||
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unidentified
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I apologize. | |
| Some of us have plagues, so we're going to wrap it up here and we can take individual questions as we go. | ||
| And none of us have slept it. | ||
| Yeah, right. | ||
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unidentified
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Thank you very much. | |
| We'll take questions off to the side. | ||
| Thank you so much. | ||
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unidentified
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Thanks again, Ghost. | |
| May their memories be a blessing. | ||
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Next, Attorney General Pam Bondi speaking to reporters outside the Capitol Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C. about a shooting that killed two Israeli embassy staff. | |
| Can Jews feel safe here in the United States? | ||
| I'm from Germany so far. | ||
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unidentified
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This is a very specific question. | |
| Sure, and it's not only here, it's not only in Germany, it's around the world that everyone needs to feel safe. | ||
| You have to feel safe in this country, and this hate speech has got to stop. | ||
| We have to come together as not only a community here, but as a nation and as the world. | ||
| And you being from Germany, you see that. | ||
| We have to keep everyone safe. | ||
| And that is the job right now of the Metropolitan Police, Mayor Bowser, Janine Pirro. | ||
| We were all out here all night long. | ||
| Everyone is working together as a team. | ||
| FBI, ATF, our U.S. Marshals are out here trying to protect everyone. | ||
| But our Jewish community must feel safe. | ||
| What we saw last night was disgusting. | ||
| I saw a young man's body being taken away who was about to get engaged. | ||
| He had an entire life in front of him, and that was taken away. | ||
| The hate has got to stop, and it has to stop now. | ||
| And this person will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. | ||
| You all have to understand, I can't talk about the facts. | ||
| I can't talk about anything else now. | ||
| They are working tirelessly to make sure this investigation goes proper. | ||
| It is. | ||
| Everyone is working together. | ||
| And that's what's going to happen now. | ||
| Can you talk about the threats? | ||
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unidentified
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Is there an increased threat level? | |
| Go ahead. | ||
| You spoke to Prime Minister and the Protestants. | ||
| I did. | ||
| What did you talk about? | ||
| I did. | ||
| I spoke to Prime Minister Netanyahu last night. | ||
| I was with Ambassador Leiter and Prime Minister Netanyahu called while I was with him. | ||
| I spoke to him, and of course he was devastated. | ||
| He was devastated. | ||
| And it broke my heart to talk to Bibi last night. | ||
| He was devastated. | ||
| And I assured him we were looking into this. | ||
| Of course, all of our investigators were working together. | ||
| And I also spoke to President Trump multiple times, who was just heartbroken and devastated by this. | ||
| And, you know, his first directive to us was make America safe again. | ||
| And that's what we are going to do. | ||
| There is no place for this hate in our country and in our world. | ||
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unidentified
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And has the U.S. been increased? | |
| Has the threat level been increased in Israeli missions around the country? | ||
| Yes, I can tell you that, yes. | ||
| The question was, has the threat level been increased? | ||
| I can tell you security has been increased here as of last night. | ||
| Our U.S. Marshals are working hand in hand to make sure the embassy is safe, our ambassador is safe. | ||
| And again, please know everything we know now, he acted alone. | ||
| From everything we know now, this is an ongoing investigation. | ||
| But, you know, whether you're Jewish or not, be vigilant. | ||
| You know, this is the last thing these two young people were at a religious event right around the corner from where we're standing. | ||
| A religious event with friends and with co-workers. | ||
| They walked outside to go home and were gunned down. | ||
| That cannot happen in our community. | ||
| And this is the day where we all need to come together no matter what religion we are. | ||
| And, you know, the Muslim religion actually reached out to our rabbis and offered condolences and sent a beautiful message that they just showed me. | ||
| And that's what should be happening in our world. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you. | |
| What was the security posture prior to the shooting yesterday? | ||
| How many armed security guards, police officers were on the scene? | ||
| Yeah, I don't know that. | ||
| I only got here after the shooting took place, so I'm sorry I can't answer that. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Attorney General, is this a security failure? | |
| Because we're very close to the Washington FBI's field offices. | ||
| This is typically our area with a high police concentration. | ||
| Well, I don't think anyone would have expected what happened last night. | ||
| They were in an event, a beautiful event. | ||
| People were, it was a dressy event. | ||
| They were dressed up. | ||
| They were all together and just celebrating and walked outside and they barely made it outside, as you know, when this happened. | ||
| But no, I think law enforcement were on the scene immediately because of that. | ||
| And the great men and women of the FBI are doing an incredible job, as well as Metropolitan Police. | ||
| Our ATF agents were out here. | ||
| Our U.S. Marshals were out here working hand in hand with the mayor and the police chief, who I cannot say enough good about right now. | ||
| And that's what we need to do. | ||
| Focus on the reports. | ||
|
unidentified
|
The reports of the manifesto. | |
| The reports of the manifesto out. | ||
| Yeah, I can't comment at all on the facts of the case right now. | ||
| You will get a briefing at Zion. | ||
| Thank you all. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Any sense on the motive? | |
| Law enforcement will brief you later. | ||
| Again, they're looking at all the facts and the evidence. | ||
| And, you know, the reason I'm out here this morning is I had a scheduled interview before this happened yesterday. | ||
| And then the rabbis call me and ask if I would come out and be with them. | ||
| I know a lot of these rabbis, they ask if I would come out. | ||
| There is a ritual when a Jewish person dies, and they come and they clean the blood from the scene. | ||
| And that's what, when you saw that happening over there this morning, I'm sure your cameras caught that. | ||
| They were scrubbing the floor. | ||
| That's what they do because in the Jewish tradition, they want to get all of their blood off the floor, even out of the cracks of the sidewalk. | ||
| And all of these men out there are volunteers and they're doing this. | ||
| They didn't know these young people personally. | ||
| They didn't know their families personally. | ||
| And they came out here and they're cleaning their blood. | ||
| They put it in a bag. | ||
| And then that bag will be buried with these two beautiful young people who lost their lives way too young. | ||
| So they were saying a prayer. | ||
| We were with them for that prayer. | ||
| And that's when every religion right now in America, we need to come together and do everything we can. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you. | |
| Thank you guys very much. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you. | |
| Washington, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser updated reporters on the investigation into the shooting that claimed the lives of two Israeli embassy staffers. | ||
| A 31-year-old from Chicago has been identified as the main suspect, has been charged with two counts of first-degree murder, along with several felony firearms charges. | ||
| The mayor was joined by interim U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, Janine Pirro. | ||
| Yes, ma'am. | ||
| Everybody up and rolling? | ||
| Yes? | ||
| I thought he was running this. | ||
| We got it. | ||
| All right, I think we got it. | ||
|
unidentified
|
All right, here we go. | |
| I am Janine Pirow, the United States Attorney. | ||
| Welcome. | ||
| Our community today is reeling as a result of one person's actions. | ||
| Two families now are left to grieve for dreams that will never be realized. | ||
| And as I speak right now, there is an individual who is being presented in court and charged with various crimes. | ||
| 31-year-old Elias Rodriguez of Chicago, Illinois, is now charged by complaint after his initial appearance before U.S. Magistrate Judge Matthew Sharbaugh with the following. | ||
| Murder in the first degree for the murder of 30-year-old Yaron Levzinski, a foreign official and official guest of the United States. | ||
| Mr. Leshinsky was here on official business for the state of Israel. | ||
| The defendant Rodriguez is also charged with two counts of murder in the first degree for both Yaron Leshinsky along with 26-year-old Sarah Lynn Milgram of Kansas. | ||
| In addition, there are several felony firearms charges for discharging a firearm in the middle of a violent crime and for causing the death of an individual through the use of that firearm. | ||
| Now, this investigation is continuing, and as you can see, we have most of the stakeholders here today who will be given an opportunity to speak with you. | ||
| But what I want to be clear about today, since this is the first time you're hearing from me, is that this is a horrific crime, and these crimes are not going to be tolerated by me and by this office. | ||
| A young couple at the beginning of their life's journey, about to be engaged in another country, had their bodies removed in the cold of the night in a foreign city in a body bag. | ||
| We are not going to tolerate that anymore. | ||
| And I am not unaware, based upon my own background, of the repercussions of this kind of case. | ||
| This is the kind of case that picks at old sores and old scars, because these kinds of cases remind us of what has happened in the past that we can never and must never forget. | ||
| I want to mention one thing. | ||
| The Capitol Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C., where this young couple had been at an event, was built around a brick building. | ||
| That brick building was previously a synagogue called Addas Israel. | ||
| It was one of Washington's first synagogues, a congregation that was created in 1869. | ||
| And Ulysses S. Grant, our president, actually attended the dedication of that synagogue. | ||
| And so to this day, that synagogue and that area remains a cornerstone of the Jewish community in D.C. Let me also say that violence against anyone based on their religion is an act of cowardice. | ||
| It is not an act of a hero. | ||
| It is the kind of case that we will vigorously pursue. | ||
| Anti-Semitism will not be tolerated, especially in the nation's capital. | ||
| Now, we're going to continue to investigate this as a hate crime and a crime of terrorism. | ||
| And we will add additional charges as the evidence warrants. | ||
| So this charging today is the initial charge. | ||
| Remember, we're less than 24 hours from the crime itself. | ||
| And we are working furiously and diligently with our partners behind me. | ||
| We've got massive amounts of evidence that we are vetting, we are verifying, and we are reviewing. | ||
| This is the start and not the beginning. | ||
| And finally, let me say this. | ||
| President Donald Trump appointed me to this position. | ||
| This is the nation's capital. | ||
| We should all be proud of this capital. | ||
| And the president wants D.C. safe. | ||
| And I and the partners behind me are going to do everything we can to make people proud of this city, whether they're from this city, from the country, or from other parts of the world. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| Now I'm going to call on Mayor Muriel Bowser. | ||
| Good afternoon. | ||
| I'm Muriel Bowser. | ||
| I'm Mayor of Washington, D.C. | ||
| I want to thank Judge Piro for inviting us today. | ||
| I'm joined by the Chief of the Metropolitan Police Department, Pamela A. Smith. | ||
| Metropolitan Police Department is the local D.C. police. | ||
| We are here to echo what the U.S. Attorney has said, that this crime will not be tolerated in our city. | ||
| We're grateful for the partnership with our federal partners. | ||
| MPD and the FBI have worked hand in hand on this investigation and will continue to do so. | ||
| I also want to acknowledge our families in Washington, D.C. who are suffering and who are afraid and fearful for what this act has done to their sense of safety. | ||
| But we know that feeling is represented around the globe. | ||
| Earlier today, I convened a meeting with the Mayor's Interfaith Council where we spoke with leaders of congregations and Jewish institutions across D.C., as well as D.C. council members and the Attorney General for Washington, D.C. | ||
| We heard our leaders reiterate messages of love and solidarity with the Jewish community. | ||
| Sadly, we have had practice standing together as a community to fight anti-Semitism, both in hate speech and in hateful acts. | ||
| And so in this moment, we stand shoulder to shoulder as one community, united in love, but also committed to justice for this young couple. | ||
| I also had the opportunity to speak with the Smalls family. | ||
| And Sonny Smalls is well known in Washington, D.C. | ||
| And his family has poured decades of time and love into making sure we have the Capitol Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C. | ||
| And one special aspect of that museum is that it celebrates local Jewish life. | ||
| Focuses on DC Jews and how they have been a part of our culture in building the city that we love. | ||
| So, once again, our city stands with our community, working with our institutions to make sure we have all the resources that we need to support them. | ||
| And with that, Judge, I'll turn it over to Chief Smith. | ||
| Good afternoon, everyone. | ||
| I'm Chief Pamela A. Smith, the Chief of Police of the Metropolitan Police Department. | ||
| Let me begin by reiterating my condolences to the family and friends of Yaron Lizinski and Sarah Milgram. | ||
| I also want to thank Mayor Mira Bowser, Judge Pierrow, and Director Jensen for their collaborative effort and support around this tragic incident. | ||
| What I also will say is that everyone at the Metropolitan Police Department is holding the family in their thoughts and in their prayers. | ||
| Our detectives have been working around the clock in close partnership with our federal partners, and this effort regarding this investigation has been a collaborative effort. | ||
| All of the agencies involved in this investigation have been coordinating seamlessly overnight. | ||
| Members of the Metropolitan Police Department's Office of Homeland Security Intelligence are working in partnership with the FBI to analyze the suspects' activity prior to the shooting. | ||
| Around D.C., and I want to speak specifically to the community here in the District of Columbia, around D.C., you will see an increased presence of law enforcement officers around the community. | ||
| You will find us around our faith-based organizations. | ||
| You will see an increased presence around our schools and places like the DC Jewish Community Center. | ||
| We stand shoulder to shoulder with our Jewish community. | ||
| I also met, along with Mayor Bowser, with some of our faith leaders. | ||
| I was moved by their desire to ensure that we keep our city safe and we keep our Jewish community members safe. | ||
| And we are ready to support them in any way possible as we move forward. | ||
| Most folks in this city know that I take the relationships that we have with our religious communities very seriously. | ||
| I want to again express and remind the community that if you see something, say something, please let us know. | ||
| Any information that you provide for us, we will utilize it in support of conducting this investigation. | ||
| I will now turn it over to the Assistant Director in charge of the Washington Field Office, Steve Jensen. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you, Chief. | |
| As the Chief said, I'm Steve Jensen. | ||
| I'm the Assistant Director in charge of the Washington Field Office for the FBI. | ||
| And I'd like to start by reiterating what Director Patel pushed out publicly, that the tragic murder of these two Israeli embassy employees outside of the Capitol Jewish Museum last night was both an act of terror and directed violence against the Jewish community. | ||
| And it has the full and unwavering attention of the FBI. | ||
| The FBI Washington Field Office, JTTF, has been in lockstep with MPD. | ||
| And with the assistance of FBI offices across the country, we're continuing to investigate and contact the subject's associates, his family members, and co-workers. | ||
| We are also executing search warrants for his electronic devices, reviewing his social media accounts, and all of his internet postings. | ||
| Regarding some internet postings, we are aware of some writings that are purported to have been authored by this subject. | ||
| We're actively investigating to determine both the authorship and the attribution of these writings if they belong to this subject or not. | ||
| I'd like to thank our partners in the U.S. Attorney's Office for bringing these significant federal charges in quick order within 24 hours or less than of the time of this incident. | ||
| Make no mistake, this attack was targeted anti-Semitic violence and it won't be tolerated. | ||
| These significant charges are a step towards restoring justice for the victims and their families, but our work is not done. | ||
| The FBI will continue to pursue all leads and use all available resources to investigate this attack. | ||
| We join MPD in affirming that there is no ongoing threat to this community. | ||
| And we're also seeking assistance from the public. | ||
| We do have gaps in this investigation currently. | ||
| We know the subject landed in the DC area on May 20th and that he was taken into custody on May 21st. | ||
| We're asking the public, anybody who had contact with the subject, anybody who knew his whereabouts, or where he was located during that gap of time, to contact the FBI at 1-800-CALL FBI or to submit an online tip at tips.fbi.gov. | ||
| And with that, I will turn it back over to Judge. | ||
| Thank you very much. | ||
| All right, we'll take a couple questions. | ||
| Go ahead. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, we had spoken to a witness who said that this was a private event, that it wasn't publicized. | |
| So is there any idea how he actually knew about this and showed up at this specific event? | ||
| You know, that's something that we're investigating right now. | ||
| I think that, Chief, you'd agree with me on that. | ||
| That's the kind of thing do we know? | ||
|
unidentified
|
And that's still under investigation. | |
| Yeah, we're looking at that. | ||
| There's a lot. | ||
| Everybody understand. | ||
| This is fluid. | ||
| It's happening now. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Go ahead. | |
| Madam U.S. Attorney, you mentioned terrorism. | ||
| Can you speak to any possible nexus to terrorism? | ||
| And Assistant Director Jensen, are you confident that this gunman acted alone? | ||
| Is there any indication at this point that he was inspired? | ||
| And then also curious if the chief has any concerns about coffee tad attacks. | ||
| Well, first of all, let me say that we're going to continue, as I said, to investigate this as an act of terrorism and as a hate crime. | ||
| And as we do so, we will bring additional charges whenever those charges are warranted and provable. | ||
| And I suspect as we go forward, before we get to the grand jury itself, that there will be more charges added. | ||
| Yes, sir. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Has there been any indication from the investigation so far that the subject was on the radar for the FBI or some other investigative agency around the country? | |
| Was he involved in any activism that might have put him on the radar? | ||
| And also, if you would also, on the issue of whether there were anybody, anybody else connected to him, obviously those writings were posted and the timing of that. | ||
| We're wondering whether you've indicated, you've seen any indication that someone connected to him might have been associated with posting those. | ||
| So a lot of questions. | ||
| Let me try and break it down. | ||
| Chief, I think you addressed some of this yesterday when we first initially briefed the public on this matter. | ||
| There was nothing in criminal records or in our holdings that indicated that this person was previously known to us or would have popped on our radar or MPD's radar. | ||
| We know that he originated outside of the district, came in for a conference on May 20th, and was a resident in the Chicagoland area. | ||
| That's what we know about him currently. | ||
| As far as associates, relatives, the reason we're checking associates and relatives is to put all the pieces together. | ||
| There's a lot of unknowns. | ||
| So, known contacts, known relatives, known associates, these are basic investigative steps to put a picture, composite picture together of who the subject is. | ||
| What did people know about him, and who is he closest to? | ||
| From that, we'll build out the investigation. | ||
| Aside from that, I couldn't answer more. | ||
| Okay, hi, I have a quick question. | ||
| I'm sorry, Keith Alexander, Washington Post. | ||
| Were you thinking of the death penalty? | ||
| Can you talk a little bit about that? | ||
| And also, the night of May 20th, any idea of where he stayed at all? | ||
| I think that we have an idea of that, but let me just say that the president and the attorney general have both indicated that, you know, in cases where the death penalty is warranted and seems appropriate, we will use it. | ||
| It's far too early to say whether that is the case, but this is a death penalty eligible case. | ||
| Do you want to talk about that, Chief? | ||
| No, I think it's still a part of the investigation. | ||
| Definitely still part of the investigation. | ||
| I don't want to get into the weeds. | ||
| I think that right now he's been arranged. | ||
| He's been presented, excuse me. | ||
|
unidentified
|
It's in progress. | |
| It's in progress. | ||
| Okay, yes, sir. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Can you just, Mr. Johnson, can you just clarify one thing you said? | |
| You said he was in town for a conference. | ||
| Was that a different conference than the one that the event was then? | ||
| Can you tell us more about what that particular event is and a number? | ||
| So we're still looking into the nature of the conference, we believe, associated with his work. | ||
| And we are contacting his employer and trying to figure out what the nature of his job was. | ||
| We believe the reason for his flight was related to a conference for his work. | ||
| What's the nature of that work? | ||
| I don't have it at the top of my head. | ||
| And then the other question is: he seems to have been sort of stalking, I forgot what the word was, pacing in front of this event. | ||
| And he seemed to have had pretty easy egress in and out of the place. | ||
| What does that say about the level of security? | ||
| And are you investigating that for and Mayor Bowser? | ||
| Are you considering increasing security around these sorts of events and institutions? | ||
| So, regarding the movements of the subject, obviously, still very much a part of the investigation. | ||
| Composite of collected videos, witness statements to put a full picture together before I would comment on any one particular act that he may or may not have been observed doing. | ||
| As far as security goes for a private entity, I wouldn't comment on that. | ||
| And as far as posture goes, I would defer to the mayor. | ||
| I think that the director is correct. | ||
| This was not an event that falls into our special events category where MPD and other government agencies have a stood-up posture. | ||
| This was a relatively small event at a museum, so MPD or the government agencies wouldn't stand up additional resources unless they were requested or unless we got a call for service. | ||
| More than that, I will say that we have had a local program and a federal program that have helped institutions, faith institutions, and others who have been concerned about violence, anti-Semitism, or other hateful speech and rhetoric. | ||
| And very recently, we have issued grants and we have issued grants over the last several years to those institutions to harden their security, add cameras, at additional security. | ||
| And I believe that the museum has done some of those things. | ||
|
unidentified
|
I'm going to sneak one last thing. | |
| All right, I just want to follow up with this. | ||
| We've been advised that the defendant has appeared in court. | ||
| He's had an attorney appointed. | ||
| He's been advised by the judge that he could be punished by death or by life. | ||
| And of course, we sought detention. | ||
| The defendant waived his right to a detention hearing and concedes to detention. | ||
| And right now, a preliminary hearing is set for June 18th at 1 o'clock. | ||
| So it is done. | ||
|
unidentified
|
One clarification, Mr. Kenson. | |
| You are not ruling out that this manifesto might have been written by this gentleman, right? | ||
| We don't know. | ||
|
unidentified
|
We don't know. | |
| And that's still very much a part of the investigation. | ||
| Sir. | ||
| Okay. | ||
| I'm good. | ||
| All right. | ||
| Thank you all. | ||
| Yes, sir. | ||
| One more. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes. | |
| Were any MPD officers working details at this event last night, perhaps off-duty? | ||
| And then the follow-up to that, when you say the FBI said a targeted event, do you believe the victims were targeted or simply the event was targeted? | ||
| So let me ask you your first question, Mark. | ||
| MPD was not assigned to that event. | ||
| As you know, you've heard me say last night, there were security officers assigned to the event, but not Metropolitan Police Department members. | ||
|
unidentified
|
On or off duty. | |
| On or off duty. | ||
|
unidentified
|
And then the targeting, was that the event that was targeted, or these two individuals specifically targeted? | |
| We're not saying at this time. | ||
| Yes. | ||
| Gee, one question that people are interested in is that it was announced and fairly well known that the Jewish Museum a short time ago opened a major LGBT exhibition. | ||
| And we were wondering if the investigation is looking into whether the suspects might have known something about that or whatever. | ||
| Sir, we are looking into absolutely everything. | ||
| There is so much information we're looking at. | ||
| And I must tell you, coming from New York, I've never seen the cooperation and the collaboration that I'm seeing here. | ||
| It was immediate. | ||
| It was instant. | ||
| It was coordinated. | ||
| And my hat's off to this area. | ||
| And we're going to clean it up. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| Is that you? | ||
|
unidentified
|
No. | |
| Yeah. | ||
| Thank you all. | ||
|
unidentified
|
On Friday, Vice President JD Vance gives the keynote address at the U.S. Naval Academy's graduation ceremony, continuing the tradition of having members of the presidential administration or the Defense Department speak at the event. | |
| Watch it live at 10 a.m. Eastern on C-SPAN, C-SPAN Now, our free mobile app, or online at c-span.org. | ||
| C-SPANSHOP.org is C-SPAN's online store. | ||
| Browse through our latest collection of C-SPAN products, apparel, books, home decor, and accessories. | ||
| There's something for every C-SPAN fan, and every purchase helps support our nonprofit operations. | ||
| Shop now or anytime at c-spanshop.org. | ||
| Mike said before I happened to listen to him, he was on C-SPAN 1. | ||
| That's a big upgrade, right? | ||
| But I've read about it in the history books. | ||
| I've seen the C-SPAN footage. | ||
| If it's a really good idea, present it in public view on C-SPAN. | ||
| Every single time I tuned in on TikTok or C-SPAN or YouTube or anything, there were tens, if not hundreds of thousands of people watching. | ||
|
unidentified
|
I went home after the speech and I turned on C-SPAN. | |
| I was on C-SPAN just this week. | ||
| To the American people, now is the time to tune in to C-SPAN. | ||
| They had something $2.50 a gallon. | ||
|
unidentified
|
I saw on television a little while ago in between my watching my great friends on C-SPAN. | |
| C-SPAN is televising this right now live. | ||
| So we are not just speaking to Los Angeles. | ||
| We are speaking to the country. | ||
| Next, State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce condemns the killing of two Israeli embassy staffers outside a Jewish museum in Washington, D.C. | ||
| She also responds to questions on allegations of genocide in South Africa, relations between India and the United States, and the latest developments in Gaza. | ||
| This is just over 45 minutes. | ||
| I missed you. | ||
| I did. | ||
| I missed you. | ||
| I don't know. | ||
| You could not have missed me because of Tommy Piggett. | ||
| Thank you for taking care of him, being nice the first day and not so much the next day. | ||
| But thank you, Tommy. | ||
| Great job. | ||
| I'm very, very proud and honored that you're standing up here. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| I appreciate it. | ||
| Thank you, everyone, for being here. | ||
| Welcome aboard. | ||
| Daphne's smiling. | ||
| That's a good sign. | ||
| But she's always smiling. | ||
| That might be a bad sign. | ||
| I don't know. | ||
| We do, of course, have a statement and a few announcements here. | ||
| And thank you again all for being here. | ||
| We condemn the heinous murder of two staff members from the Israeli Embassy in Washington, D.C. last night. | ||
| Every day we talk about in this room the aftermath of one of the most obscene attacks on Jews in history. | ||
| The October 7th massacre was a reminder to the world that Jew hatred and murder is the hallmark of terrorists and monsters around the world. | ||
| The envy feeding this hate is thousands of years old. | ||
| It is now the 21st century and it is time for the barbarity to end. | ||
| While this obscenity happened in Washington, D.C., we have a president and a secretary of state that recognize the importance of saying, enough is enough, and genuinely, never again. | ||
| There is a reason why we stand in solidarity with Israel. | ||
| There is a reason why we stand with our partners at the Israeli embassy. | ||
| And there is a reason why we stand with the Jewish people here in the United States and around the world. | ||
| Because America has a history of not allowing the monsters among us to destroy life, the future, and everything that matters. | ||
| The Department of State's Diplomatic Security Service is providing ongoing support to the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department and their investigation of this incident and coordinating with other federal and local law enforcement partners. | ||
| As Secretary Marco Rubio has said, make no mistake, we will track down those responsible and bring them to justice. | ||
| Our prayers go out to their loved ones. | ||
| Sarah Milgram and Yaron Leshinsky. | ||
| Sarah Milgram and Yaron Leshinsky. | ||
| May their memory be a blessing. | ||
| Now, on Capitol Hill this week, Secretary Rubio went before Congress to share how we are implementing President Trump's vision of an American first foreign policy. | ||
| He made clear that America is back and that securing our borders, making communities safer, and combating criminal cartels are once again key priorities of our foreign policy. | ||
| He also explained how the fiscal year 2026 budget request for the Department of State will enable the department to deliver on President Trump's foreign policy agenda that makes America safer, stronger, and more prosperous. | ||
| The budget request and the State Department's reorganization will ensure our ability to respond to the challenges of the 21st century on behalf of the American people. | ||
| And now finally, ahead of Memorial Day, which I know we're all looking forward to, I want to recognize and honor the Americans who gave their lives to defend our freedom. | ||
| Their bravery, service, and sacrifice represent the very best of America. | ||
| The heroes of this country would have preferred long, enjoyable, quiet lives, but instead they answered the call when we needed them the most. | ||
| Every day that we simply enjoy is due to the sacrifice of the men and women who died on the field. | ||
| We will never forget those who've given all to defend our country, our way of life, and the American people. | ||
| God bless all who have served and are serving our nation. | ||
| And now, ready for your questions? | ||
| Daphne. | ||
| Yes, ma'am. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Following the shooting last night, are U.S. embassies on any sort of special alert or thinking about any change in posture? | |
| I can't speak to security measures that are being implemented or being discussed or decided upon. | ||
| What I did note in my topper is that in fact we are working certainly with the D.C. Metropolitan Police, and the security of this building, of American diplomats, of diplomats throughout this city, is of paramount importance to the United States of America. | ||
| We act on that every single day, and certainly we're continuing to do that today and in the days that come as well. | ||
|
unidentified
|
And has Secretary Rubio had any conversations with Israeli officials or the Israeli ambassador today? | |
| I can't remark on the specifics of any conversations that have been had, but I know that, of course, you've seen his messages, the tweets, and of course, we will hear, no doubt, again soon about the nature of what's transpiring. | ||
| But I can tell you that he is, as all of us are, is heartbroken. | ||
| We're all affected by this. | ||
| It is something we deal with, in a sense, of course, every day. | ||
| This administration, the Secretary's work, the President's work, and often I don't know how they do it. | ||
| I have maybe 40, 45 minutes with you guys twice a week. | ||
| And these are issues that are existential all the time. | ||
| And I know that, again, my work is made easier because I know the people running this country care about life and about the condition of our lives. | ||
| And so that's the most I can say, separate from certainly specifics of who they're speaking with. | ||
|
unidentified
|
All right. | |
| Yes, Andrea Mitchell. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hi. | |
| Thank you very much. | ||
| A couple of questions about South Africa and also Sudan, if you don't mind. | ||
| In South Africa, the State Department is empowered legally with deciding when a genocide exists. | ||
| Has there been an investigation that supports any such contention? | ||
| Because there is no credible evidence from any authority on the ground there, in their government, in NGOs, or elsewhere, that we can find to support an allegation of genocide that white farmers are at all as disadvantaged as the crime wave there. | ||
| That is a problem against blacks in much greater numbers and proportionally even greater numbers than whites. | ||
| The fact checkers have shown that the white crosses were put up as a protest against the criminal movement and against the death of the farmers. | ||
| The crosses and the burial were all part of a protest against the criminality, not as described. | ||
| So what information was given to the White House, if any, by the State Department, by the experts in the field, to support what was described as an ambush widely around the world of a South African visitor who had a celebrated background as a leader of a biracial government and someone who was jailed with Mandela and who has been one of the civic leaders. | ||
| of a new South Africa, as troubled as their history has been and as troubled as their current situation is. | ||
| Well, I would say that, as we all knew, of course, the President has been very vocal about his concern about the violence, the nature of what's been transpiring in South Africa. | ||
| The president did not come to the United States of America unaware of the position and the posture of the president and of the Secretary of State and of his administration. | ||
| So I would argue against very much that there was some kind of an ambush. | ||
| South Africa also has been facing a dynamic where there's been regular criticism, ranging from not just the collapse in some ways when it comes to the violence in civil society, but then the referral of Israel with the ICJ for the issues of genocide while ignoring Hamas, cozying up to Iran, the general choices that they've made. | ||
| In the meantime, also of passing a law that has allowed them to take property, to possess property, of white Afrikaner farmers with no reason. | ||
| One element is equity. | ||
| And so when you're passing laws like that that target a group, ostensibly sending a message to the population that these people have a price to pay, there's something that they need to be doing, that they deserve to have their land taken, combined with the chance of kill the war, the massive rallies where encouragement of violence is prevalent and is at the core of it, | ||
| in addition to the associations South Africa and its president have chosen to make, like with Iran, and their actions against Israel, it creates a picture that is worthwhile having a conversation in the Oval Office. | ||
| And that is, I think, it is the transparency of the president. | ||
| Certainly, both leaders aware of what the concerns have been and what the arguments have been. | ||
| So I don't think President Ramiposa was somehow surprised or shocked at the fact that we have an honest man who's in the White House who's spoken and continued to speak about violence and the trajectory of South Africa. | ||
|
unidentified
|
What I'm just suggesting is that the facts matter with the credibility of the president and that the, as it was explained in the Oval Office, and it has been explained elsewhere, that is a minority party, a protest party that is legally permissible, but that the white agricultural minister said in the Oval Office, that's why we joined the coalition to make sure that they didn't get into the parliament, that they don't have power. | |
| They've been, you know, they've been in the middle of the year. | ||
| And the nature of the weeds of something like that where that individual, you saw also the larger video of the thousands and thousands of individuals in a stadium framework. | ||
| And I think that what Americans in the world and what South Africans see is a movement and an attitude that is not only not punished, but reinforced, but Andrea, reinforced with a law that says, oh, those people that you're calling to have be killed, yeah, let's take their land. | ||
| Who does that? | ||
| Who does that in the midst of that environment? | ||
| And I think that when we think about, I'm not certainly going to get ahead of the president. | ||
| President Trump is someone that the world knows, says what he thinks and acts on what he thinks. | ||
| But I think that it was very clear, and he's been clear, as has the Secretary, about the problems with South Africa, the nature of the signals that it sends, the quality or lack thereof of life, the fact that we have taken in refugees, very basic standard of looking for asylum. | ||
| They've met that standard, and it's more than just complaining. | ||
| It is about acting and finding an element where we can make a difference for those people. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Taking of the land, first of all, it's with judicial review when it has happened. | |
| It's not, it's not. | ||
| But let me correct you right there, Andrea, and then I'm going to move on. | ||
| This particular law they tout has not even been implemented yet. | ||
| That's correct. | ||
| So it's not about judicial review. | ||
| The law, if you have a judicial review of a law that says there is no standard, well, then you'll have judicial review of no standard. | ||
| They have not changed. | ||
| And it is in part, I would argue, because of the global attention that has been placed on them because of President Donald Trump's attitude, his comments, and bringing attention to that framework in general. | ||
| That is why that hasn't been acted on. | ||
| And I will move on. | ||
| But I think I've been clear. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, Mr. Matthew, I think you have probably something to say. | |
| Andrea, four questions. | ||
| I've answered them. | ||
| You've asked in depth. | ||
| We are going to move on. | ||
| Yes, sir. | ||
| I'm sure others might have the same sort of question. | ||
| Yes, sir. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thanks, Jamie. | |
| Two, I think, should be quick ones on sanctions. | ||
| One, can you just explain the discrepancy or apparent discrepancy between what Secretary Rubio tweeted last night on Venezuela's sanctions and what the Special Envoy Grinnell said, the Secretary saying that the Chevron waiver would not be extended and Special Envoy Grinnell saying it would be. | ||
| And then just secondly, on Sudan, sorry, Syria sanctions. | ||
| Just what's the status of the relief that the President promised last week? | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| Well, I can tell you that the Secretary did put up a tweet making it clear where we stand on chevron, which is a license which is due to expire in May. | ||
| And what I will speak to is not what others have said, but certainly the people who are in charge of the nature of what we are doing, and that is Secretary Rubio, making it clear that that license is going to expire. | ||
| And so that's what I take my lead from is his remarks in that regard. | ||
| So there's no confusion. | ||
| I think many people on every issue can have a lot of opinions, but I think clearly who we look to are the people who have the power to have the impact and who make the decision. | ||
| And of course, this is at the direction of President Trump as well. | ||
| About Syria. | ||
| Yes, it was a very exciting moment. | ||
| I was in Riyadh and in the building when President Trump announced that he was lifting the sanctions on Syria. | ||
| That is something that we've discussed, and many people have wondered when that would occur. | ||
| And clearly, the President decided now was the time. | ||
| And I do know that, of course, there is a team of people who immediately started working on that, who are working on it now. | ||
| There is, of course, it's worth noting that the President has some powers in the nature of what can get done, but sanctions are administered through different departments in this country. | ||
| So it is, his was a message and certainly the order to reverse our dynamic, to remove the sanctions, which involves departments like the Treasury Department. | ||
| So it is a process that will take some time. | ||
| But as we know with the Trump administration, that they've sped up the train a bit. | ||
| And they understand the importance of getting things done quickly. | ||
| And that is the intention of getting things done quickly as they take the order from the president from that afternoon. | ||
| And we're working on it. | ||
| It's been a week. | ||
| But I do think, because of not just the urgency, but they understand the urgency, but of the recognition of this administration, the government as a whole, of how the president works, that things have to happen and should happen as quickly as possible. | ||
| So all I can say is without a specific date, it will be done quickly and certainly more quickly than we're used to. | ||
| All right. | ||
| All right. | ||
| Yes. | ||
| Yes, ma'am. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Can we go to Gaza? | |
| Sure. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Secretary Rubio said in one of his hearings on the Hill that he had met with the World Food Program in Rome. | |
| I just want to get clarity on whether this means that the current U.S. policy is for the UN's leading food program, leading food organization, is like that they will remain the main food provider for Gaza, hence his meeting with them, or whether that's a good question. | ||
| You're reading an awful lot into a meeting. | ||
|
unidentified
|
It would be good to hear more detail on it. | |
| Sure. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Given there's a lot of reporting on heated conversations between humanitarian aid organizations, discussion over this new Gaza humanitarian foundation. | |
| And I've got one more after that. | ||
| Sure. | ||
| Well, Secretary Rubio visited with Cindy McCain, who leads that program. | ||
| And he doesn't visit personally to shut something down. | ||
| It was, from what I know, a very good meeting. | ||
| I cannot share the details with you, as you might imagine. | ||
| But I think that regularly we should view the nature, and certainly after the rhetoric the Secretary has used and the actions that the State Department has implemented when it comes to our continuing commitment to life-saving aid around the world, and certainly food aid, is that I would have expected, since her office is in our embassy at the Holy See, that that is a meeting that should have taken place and did take place. | ||
| And I'm looking forward to the nature of that kind of a conversation and what can come from it. | ||
| And we'll see. | ||
| But it was that entire visit was very good. | ||
| I think very, certainly we went to the inaugural Mass with the Pope. | ||
| But overall, it was a recognition and a commitment, seeing this from the Secretary, being there as he is a practicing Catholic, but also knowing how each part of his work mattered and also was implemented on that trip. | ||
| The nature of the importance of Italy, the importance of the Vatican, the importance of faith, and the nature of his work in the process. | ||
| And of course, that meeting was part of that work. | ||
|
unidentified
|
So it's just part of looking at options. | |
| I'm not going to speculate or guess. | ||
| I'm a little psychic, but not enough for that to answer that specifically. | ||
| A little psychic, but you know. | ||
| Well, nothing you want to know. | ||
| But don't speculate on that, but I do think because of the speed in which we work, we will all see the intention of the Secretary, the nature of what's happening with the World Food Program, under certainly the leadership of Cindy McCain and what her intentions are as well. | ||
|
unidentified
|
So just quickly relate. | |
| So you had some more. | ||
| You had Sudan. | ||
|
unidentified
|
No, just one on Gaza as well. | |
| Yes, Gaza Humanitarian Foundation. | ||
| Sure. | ||
| There's reporting about private security that would be used for this new foundation. | ||
| I just want to understand if this administration is okay with private security personnel for a foundation like that, presumably of which they'll be armed, going into Gaza, and presumably some of the personnel for that private security would be American citizens. | ||
| Just want to understand that. | ||
| Watch out. | ||
|
unidentified
|
I mean, looking at other private security firms and what they do and some of the things that we're doing. | |
| Well, you know, I think that, yes, it's good that you're concerned about security. | ||
| We all are. | ||
| And that's been one of the problems we've had with Gaza: the ability to move food aid and medical aid through an arena that is not thinking as you think. | ||
| They are not concerned about safety. | ||
| It is about terrorists who've been keeping food aid and medical aid from the people of Gaza, and that has impacted our ability to move all that aid, the aid that we've wanted to move through, that we would do only when it was safe to do so. | ||
| So our concern has been constantly about safety and what we could achieve in that environment. | ||
| That's the point of ceasefires, is to have safety. | ||
| So I would, with that being a standard, that we will support having things move in if it can be safe, that having a security service is important. | ||
| I think we all would agree. | ||
| I won't get into the details of how it's being managed, because that's the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which is private and operates on its own. | ||
| But clearly, when it comes to what one of our core elements was, which is that we support all of this if it can be moved in safely and securely and without falling into the hands of terrorists and the people who are causing death and destruction in that area, It seems like they've structured something that can manage that, that is the equivalent of something that we can all agree on, and they're moving forward. | ||
| So that's the story, is that we've been able to do it, we being humanity, that it's something that all of us have wanted to see, which is a movement of aid. | ||
|
unidentified
|
So if they use private security... | |
| You need to call them. | ||
|
unidentified
|
You're in support. | |
| When we speak about private security, what I look at is the story, is that we've managed or expect to manage a security that gets food and medicine to the people who all of you have wondered about whether or not they're going to get it. | ||
| That's my story. | ||
| And that's the story of humanity and the people of the Gaza Strip. | ||
| Yes, sir. | ||
|
unidentified
|
On Iran, Mr. Witkoff is meeting with President Arakshi tomorrow in Rome. | |
| Both sides have been stressing on respective positions in the past few days regarding enrichment. | ||
| Do you see a chance to have a path forward towards compromise or not? | ||
| And if I may, a second question. | ||
| Can I answer that one so that we can, and then I will, Def, don't, I won't lose you, don't worry. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you. | |
| It's like we're on a slide. | ||
| You're hanging on. | ||
| Yes, what I can say is that we've made it clear on every project we're working on, certainly including Russia and Ukraine, that our involvement is really because we feel we can make a difference. | ||
| And that's why we do it. | ||
| This additional meeting, certainly the fifth round of the nuclear talks, would not be happening if we didn't think that there was potential for it. | ||
| And so I would say that clearly we believe that we are going to succeed. | ||
| We've also been very clear on some basic things, like they're not going to have a nuclear weapon. | ||
| They've been very clear, most of our leaders have been, who have spoken on it, that this is about no enrichment. | ||
| And the Iranians are at that table. | ||
| So they also understand what our position is and they continue to go. | ||
| So we feel something's good enough for us to continue this work. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Second question. | |
| Secretary Rubio this week at the Senate Foreign Relations Committee said that the past four meetings have been focused on enrichment only. | ||
| So other issues like Iran's support for the proxies, which is like a concern for the regional countries. | ||
| Are those issues going to be discussed later on or are they going to be part of another round of discussions? | ||
| Well, I'm not, again, part of the negotiating team. | ||
| Won't discuss what might be the plan. | ||
| But just like an issue of needing a ceasefire before you discuss what the land is going to look like and what the nations are going to be doing after the fact, there's points that you have to get to before you discuss elements that might not even be a factor if you can't get to the bright line. | ||
| that allows us to move forward. | ||
| And that bright line has been enrichment, certainly not getting a nuclear bomb. | ||
| And those things have to be addressed. | ||
| I say this because that's what I've seen them do. | ||
| And being very specific, which is fabulous, because nobody's guessing at what the goal is. | ||
| But of course, considering the generational issues involved, this is, and the President has said this about everything he's worked on. | ||
| With the generational issues involved, that these cannot be solutions that last six months or are able to be broken in 18 months or in three years, your 15-year-old is suddenly pulled into a war because now they're 18. | ||
| That these have got to be enduring, fundamentally changing arrangements that only Donald Trump can bring because of the nature of his attitude, his vision, and because of the support of the American people understanding that this was a factor. | ||
| So I would say, well, I'm not going to go on from that. | ||
| I think that'll be it. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, but yes, the U.S. sent some migrants to Djibouti, and I'm wondering, are you in negotiations with Djibouti to accept these people? | |
| Or are you still trying to get them to South Sudan who say they won't take third country nationals? | ||
| What's the State Department's role in this? | ||
| Well, we know that, of course, the Secretary has been very open about the fact that we are negotiating with a number of countries to facilitate the deportation of people who are here in this country illegally. | ||
| I can say also, as the Secretary has noted, that we remain unwavering in our commitment to end illegal and mass migration and bolster America's border security. | ||
| I won't discuss the diplomatic conversations, which clearly is part of this framework, with specific countries here. | ||
| I would also point you to Caroline Levitt's remarks the hour before my briefing here, where she noted a court order required the flight to go to Djibouti. | ||
| And I know the White House has more details on the framework involving that. | ||
| So we're currently just in the sense of handling this in an immigration posture. | ||
| Certainly, it is a reflection of our continued attitude and position. | ||
| And I don't think that this situation is certainly in the courts, which I can't remark on, but we're familiar with having to make our arguments in a variety of arenas, and this is one of those times. | ||
| But I know Caroline had more specifics. | ||
|
unidentified
|
In South Sudan, there was a dispute before with them for not taking somebody, and you guys stopped issuing visas. | |
| Has that been resolved? | ||
| Yeah, the visa situation remains the same. | ||
| Yes, we reacted in that regard because they had confirmed that this one particular person was a citizen, prepared to take him back, and then that did not happen at the last moment. | ||
| And so our response was when you're having a diplomatic negotiation with a country, you're going to respond to certain situations. | ||
| We can say that in the midst of that, in the aftermath, our posture on visas and all of that has not changed. | ||
| And we've noted, of course, regularly that we monitor their behavior, their attitudes, which, of course, continues to matter to us. | ||
| But we also are, though, are currently accepting certain diplomatic and official visa applications if eligibility is determined in that regard. | ||
| And we do that, as always, on a case-by-case basis. | ||
| So at this point, I have nothing more to report on that, except that it is still in place. | ||
| Yes? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Just as a quick follow-up on Iran, two Iranian sources told my colleague Fred Pliken, who's currently in Tehran, that they are concerned about the sincerity of the United States heading into this next round of nuclear talks. | |
| And they think Trump is steering the conversation towards deadlock. | ||
| Obviously, the administration has said that they want an Iran-nuclear deal, but is there anything you can shed light on in terms of the dialogue between the two sides that might be causing unnamed Iranian sources to tell us this? | ||
| Unnamed Iranian sources. | ||
| No, it's not, that's not, that doesn't interest me. | ||
| It's gossip at that rate. | ||
| Certainly when we have, and we've said repeatedly, to not discuss this in the media because it makes things harder. | ||
| Everybody has an interest in all of our negotiations doing well. | ||
| Some people don't have an interest in that. | ||
| And that's where you get unnamed sources from, I don't know if there's an Iranian national inquirer, maybe there is, but that's not something that I'm going to take seriously. | ||
| What is the story and what matters is that everyone is at the table in Rome. | ||
|
unidentified
|
And what is the intention of Steve Witkoff going into the talks? | |
| Well, it's very clear what I've also just said a little earlier, and we've said in multiple briefings, the goal is to end the inability for them to have a nuclear weapon, to change and end the enrichment of their nuclear program and the intentions of that nuclear program. | ||
| So it's a significant structural change in what Iran thinks it's going to be doing. | ||
| And that's the negotiations. | ||
| I think they've been very clear about what the intentions are. | ||
|
unidentified
|
And just one follow-up on a different topic, but this is just coming out now from Homeland Security. | |
| No, don't. | ||
| Not another one. | ||
| Not like last time. | ||
| Okay, good. | ||
| But Homeland Security Secretary Christy Noam says that DHS is now terminating Harvard's ability to allow any foreign students to enroll in the university, saying in a statement that the administration is holding Harvard accountable for fostering violence, anti-Semitism, and coordinating with the Chinese Communist Party. | ||
| This is obviously a program that isn't run out of the State Department, but some of these J-1 visas are issued by the State Department. | ||
| So can you shed some light on this decision by the administration? | ||
| We've seen those reports, and we're looking at them, and I can't answer that immediately, but as soon as we might have an answer, I can get it to you. | ||
| I'm sure that when we get our answer, we'll get it to everybody. | ||
| But yeah, so I've seen those reports, and I would also refer you, of course, to DHS and to Secretary Noam, who might have more details, more answers for you. | ||
| Said, nice to see you again. | ||
| I hope it's nice to see you. | ||
|
unidentified
|
I appreciate it. | |
| Really two quick follow-ups, one on Andrea on South Africa, and then one on Gaza. | ||
| Sure. | ||
|
unidentified
|
On South Africa, you said that the president was also influenced by what South Africa has done in terms of referring its role with the ICC. | |
| We all have been, yes. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, its role with the ICC. | |
| Just to clarify, that's why he was, because South Africa referred to Israel to the ICC. | ||
| Well, I did not say for a specific event that that influenced him. | ||
| I don't speak, you know. | ||
| President Trump is a very clear man. | ||
| No one has to wonder his position. | ||
| But I think for all of us who've been looking at the condition of South Africa, it's never just one thing, is it? | ||
| It's a number of things. | ||
| I'll finish. | ||
| I know you might not be liking my answer, but I'll finish. | ||
| Said, it is a series of things that point to the intention of an administration or of a regime. | ||
| And it is usually consistent. | ||
| So if you're wondering about the nature of why it matters that people are at a huge stadium shouting, kill the boar, which are the, for those at home, the Dutch descendants of the settlers of South Africa, and who are white farmers, combined then with the government that says, oh, we reject that. | ||
| They're not part of our government, but then pass a law that allows the government to take the property of those very same people simply because they're white farmers. | ||
| So that speaks to the intention of a regime, in addition to their behavior with other nations, their foreign policy, how they would view the victims of October 7th, the Jews, as those who should be referred to a criminal court versus Hamas, in addition to having a rather cozy relationship with Iran. | ||
| So you don't need to be in a seminar at Stanford to understand and to recognize the trajectory of South Africa. | ||
| That is the argument for those who are looking at that, again, beyond one issue. | ||
| And I think those issues speak quite loudly. | ||
|
unidentified
|
And very quickly on Gaza. | |
| Yes. | ||
| Now, the Israelis are saying they allowed maybe six trucks or nine trucks, we don't know. | ||
| And international agencies say no trucks were allowed in. | ||
| Could you clarify if you have the information, have any trucks been allowed in? | ||
| The number of trucks, if you know the number and so on, and what's next in terms of figures and numbers? | ||
| Well, I won't share numbers with you, but what I can tell you, and you know this, having covered the situation, that Israel has been honest about the nature of what it's been doing and why, as it fights for its security and in its own defense. | ||
| And if you're getting a report from Israel about the nature of what has moved into the region, I would suggest that you should take that report seriously. | ||
| I think that everyone knows that the eyes of the world are on that region. | ||
| And at the same time, the story is, what I would argue, is as opposed to the numbers is the fact that aid is moving in to Gaza. | ||
| And it's interesting to me, Saeed, that that is something that I've talked with you and we've even had some sort of fights about. | ||
| And that isn't something that has been recognized, but I'll do that recognizing. | ||
| And that's what the real story is. | ||
| Yes, sir, in the back. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you, Tami. | |
| English delegation led by Kyrgyz Prime Minister Masoud Barzani is in town. | ||
| They have signed two energy deals with the U.S. companies valued at $110 billion. | ||
| These two deals have been rejected by the Iraqi government. | ||
| I'm wondering if you have any comments and reaction to that. | ||
| And do you have anything to share with us about his scheduled meeting with Secretary Robio tomorrow? | ||
| Well, I can tell you that we were pleased to see Prime Minister Barzani sign massive deals with U.S. companies to expand natural gas production in the Iraqi Kurdistan region, which will help Iraq harness its own domestic resources to become energy independent, which we've, again, talked about. | ||
| It's really great. | ||
| We've talked about these things. | ||
| Often I can't give you answers. | ||
| We don't know when it's going to happen. | ||
| And then to be able to report to you that it has happened. | ||
| And that is a key administration priority. | ||
| Being energy independent is obviously a major national security issue. | ||
| And so these deals, I think it's like over $100 billion. | ||
|
unidentified
|
$100. | |
| And yes, and that's what we've all been working for. | ||
| So we support these deals and we have encouraged Baghdad and Erbil to work together to get gas production to commence as soon as possible. | ||
| At the same time, we have, of course, the declaration that these are null and void, right? | ||
| Now, this is the kind of shenanigans that can be a problem. | ||
| But we also know that, I'll give you a sense of our relationship with Kurdistan, the Kurdistan Regional Government Prime Minister and his visit to the United States signals our desire to strengthen the U.S. relationship with the Iraqi-Kurdistan region. | ||
| And as you've noted, Secretary Rubio will meet with KRG Prime Minister Barzani to discuss expanding trade and investment between the United States and the Iraqi-Kurdistan region. | ||
| He has also stated, Secretary Rubio, that we support the Kurdish autonomy and the U.S. companies doing business there and urge the government of Iraq to respect this economic lifeline that is necessary to prosper and succeed. | ||
| We believe that U.S., Iraqi, and Iraqi Kurdish interests are best served by having a strong and resilient Iraqi Kurdistan region within a sovereign and prosperous federal Iraq. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you so much. | |
| All right. | ||
| Yes, sir. | ||
| Yes. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Our issue. | |
| Well, I won't have much more, but you're welcome to. | ||
|
unidentified
|
You deferred to DHS. | |
| But in the bigger picture, presumably the United States wants to attract the best and the brightest insofar as foreigners, students, immigrants. | ||
| And these top-tier universities are one of the most prominent ways to do that. | ||
| So do you think prohibiting Harvard to enroll foreign students kind of gets in the way of that goal? | ||
| Well, again, I can't speak to Secretary Noam's plans and strategy and her decision to implement this. | ||
| What I would argue is that we have an interest as a nation, as President Trump has spoken to quite often, that we have an interest as a nation for these universities that are supposed to be the gold standard to actually deliver people who are educated and can function in society and on campuses that encourage a learning environment as opposed to one of left-wing activism, | ||
| where you have individuals leaving the university level in this country as our rates are declining when it comes to comprehension and reading and a whole host of other things. | ||
| It has to be more than just a label or a brand. | ||
| It has to deliver results for the families that do pay a lot of money for it. | ||
| And I think that there's a point, as you've seen, I think it's obvious from the Trump administration, with the federal money that flows into those coffers and the nature of the kind of talent, you can speak about foreign talent, let's speak about American talent. | ||
| You've got a wonderful kid who's done very, very well, and then you send them to Harvard and a kid comes home and you don't even recognize them. | ||
| And they're definitely primed to be a fabulous left-wing activist, but they're maybe not going to be able to get a job. | ||
| And so, you know, this is a recognition and movement that universities around this country are recognizing, that American families have standards. | ||
| We spend money so our children can be educated in the normal function of life. | ||
| And we get kids back who have not received the kind of education we expected. | ||
| COVID highlighted this for many of us. | ||
| But I think that this opens up a conversation, as it should, between the federal government and the universities that we rely on and have been proud of, that we deserve to be proud of them again. | ||
| And if we're going to speak about who we rely on for the best and the brightest, there's plenty of American kids who also deserve to be taken seriously. | ||
| And I believe that we can handle all of them properly. | ||
| Yes, sir. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thanks very much. | |
| My question is. | ||
| On U.S.-India relations. | ||
| Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, and President Trump both are very famous in India. | ||
| As far as U.S. policies are concerned, most Indians agree with you. | ||
| I hear you're pretty famous in India. | ||
| All right. | ||
|
unidentified
|
My question is, Madam, as far as terrorism against India recently in the state of Kashmir is concerned, innocent Indians were tourists were Mexico. | |
| Oh, yes, we all know that. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, ma'am. | |
| My question is that as far as talking with Pakistan is concerned, India's Prime Minister, Mr. Narendra Modi, and also Foreign Minister Mr. Jaashankar, we both met with the Secretary Rubio and President. | ||
| What they are saying is that, as long as terrorism is continuing against India, what they said by Pakistan supporters inside that they have training centers inside Pakistan. | ||
| Well, here's what I can, here's what I can see, and this is and I understand your point and what has been a generational concern about violence and terrorism in that region, certainly with the troubles between India and Pakistan, is that there is a ceasefire. | ||
| Obviously, we know that we're very close to full-scale war erupting and what's very exciting and heartening is that, you know, America's involvement and assistance made a difference in that stopping and a ceasefire that has continued. | ||
| But of course, within that, one expects, as the world noticed again, that that has not been resolved, that the potential of having these long-term problems resolved has returned, and it is an opportunity. | ||
| And the good news is is that, unlike some other regions, there has been a commitment to a ceasefire. | ||
| That makes oh, is that my alarm. | ||
| Thank you, I should ask you to put on your alarms. | ||
| It's like, all right, Tammy's done, all right, we're gonna have, we're gonna have. | ||
| All right, we'll have one more and the green jacket in the back. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes ma'am, thank you Tommy, make sure her. | |
| Her mic is on, just as she's in the back here. | ||
| The sound here is too quick, question too quick. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Do you have any update on the peace deal agreement between Rwanda and the Democrat Republic Of Congo? | |
| When we will see this peace deal signed? | ||
| And also, can you tell us if both President, President Ramaposov, South Africa and President Trump finally managed to overcome the difference and we will see United States and South Africa working together? | ||
| Well, I'll answer that one first. | ||
| I think the meeting with the South African president in the Oval Office speaks to President Trump's generosity and the fact that any leader feels comfortable going to meet him, even with difficult conversations and sometimes the problems that happen between two nations with different attitudes. | ||
| So the The fact that it's President Trump means, of course, there's always hope. | ||
| It means, of course, there'll always be something for the future. | ||
| And speaking of the DRC and Rwanda, another very good example of something that has been a generational issue. | ||
| That we are, again, it's a long process, but they are taking the steps that we've asked of them to take, and that's also very promising. | ||
| We can look for an update when it comes to what the new dates are and what else is expected. | ||
| But what I can tell you is that that continues. | ||
| Another great change in dynamic, sometimes though, people forget and don't continue to ask, and I appreciate that you did, because there isn't any drama, because things are changing for the better. | ||
| So it causes less news, right? | ||
| There's less interest. | ||
| But it's worth following up as we watch these particular issues resolve, as, of course, the news is taken up by other issues. | ||
| But this administration is committed across the board to peace and prosperity, and it seems the world is giving them a lot of chances to act on that. | ||
| We do one more, one more. | ||
| Yes, my Italian friend, right there. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Two more. | |
| Thank you. | ||
| Indeed, one is about Italy. | ||
| Actually, the Vatican. | ||
| I was there. | ||
| Beautiful place. | ||
|
unidentified
|
I know. | |
| You were there, and there was also some conversation with Parlin, which is the Vatican Secretary of State. | ||
| So are we seeing this conversation because we also have an American Pope that can actually better deal with our president? | ||
| And how close are we to actually the negotiation at the Vatican? | ||
| And then I have a second question on Russia. | ||
| Yes, obviously, the condition of the world existed before our new Pope Leo. | ||
| I'm not a Catholic, but I'm very moved by the nature of that faith, and it was just a beautiful experience to be there. | ||
| But I can tell you that, of course, the plans and the conversations with the Pope himself and certainly other leaders there was important. | ||
| It always would be. | ||
| If you're going to be in Italy for any reason and you're the leader of the free world, the Secretary of State of the Free World, you want to meet with these people. | ||
| This is why they're in their positions for that reason. | ||
| So I think that that's it's not because Pope Leo is an American, however, it's pretty terrific, and it's a reminder that your commitment and your faith, and it can lead you anywhere. | ||
| And so we, of course, pray for him's success as he moves forward with his duties. | ||
| And the rest of your questions? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, I have a question about Russia. | |
| I mean, I mean, not about Russia, about, I'm so sorry, about the different approach that we're seeing from this administration when it comes to diplomacy. | ||
| We saw yesterday with South Africa and then with Alex Zane. | ||
| Well, and I think you're seeing, I would go, this will be the last answer here, is that we're seeing different envoys, different styles, ambassadors, the Secretary of State, the President on the phone, because you have to do that when you're not simply setting up meetings every three, four, or six weeks. | ||
| That you're having meetings to make specific steps and have specific progress and deadlines about because you're a business person and you know what's possible or you know humanity and you know it's possible. | ||
| When he says we need to have new ideas for Gaza as an example, he really means that for everything, for how we conduct diplomacy, the Secretary, of course, is on board with that. | ||
| It's natural for him. | ||
| Traditional diplomacy, going, talking, getting deliverables, making sure the relationship is active and alive. | ||
| And that is how you bond, you make friends, and your relationships with other countries are better. | ||
| So the Secretary operates in that fashion. | ||
| But yes, there's a huge difference in that we are on, well, certainly we have now, what, three and a half years. | ||
| You have people who want to make a difference. | ||
| It's not just having fun in an office. | ||
| It's changing people's lives for an endurable period of time so that we, our generation, I'm seeing some younger people in this room, of course, always, but for our generation, my generation, that we can think we did everything we could and have had some success in making things better. | ||
| That's the Trump administration. | ||
| That will be its legacy. | ||
| And it's an honor to be here. | ||
| And thank you all very much. | ||
| I appreciate it. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| I'll see you on Thursday. | ||
| What is today? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thursday. | |
| I'll see you today. | ||
| You know, the trip. | ||
| It's like, oh my gosh. | ||
| I thought I was waking up in a hotel today, but I wasn't. | ||
| Thank you, guys. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you. | |
| Great to see you. | ||
| Appreciate it. | ||
|
unidentified
|
C-SPAN's Washington Journal, our live forum inviting you to discuss the latest issues in government, politics, and public policy from Washington to across the country. | |
| Coming up Friday morning, Sarah Chifo of the League of Conservation Voters on how clean energy initiatives enacted in the Biden administration could be changed if Republicans pass their 2026 budget bill. | ||
| Then the Federation for American Immigration Reforms Julie Kirchner on the GOP budget bill's provisions related to immigration and border security enforcement. | ||
| C-SPAN's Washington Journal. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Join the conversation live at 7 Eastern Friday morning on C-SPAN, C-SPAN Now, our free mobile video app, or online at c-span.org. | |
| Courage is being scared to death and saddling up anyway, as John Wayne said. | ||
| Y'all made it. | ||
| You climbed that mountain. | ||
| Take the risk, push yourself onto a new challenge. | ||
| Next week, watch commencement speeches from across the country featuring inspirational messages from political leaders, sports personalities, and celebrities. | ||
| Hear remarks by Veterans Affairs Secretary Doug Collins at Piedmont University, Maryland Governor Wes Moore at Lincoln University, New Hampshire Governor Kelly Ayot at Nashua Community College, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz at the University of Minnesota Law School, singer and songwriter Usher at Emory University, rapper and record producer Snoop Dogg at the University of Southern California Marshall School of Business, and former basketball star Carmelo Anthony at Syracuse University. | ||
| Watch 2025 Commencement Speeches next week starting Tuesday at 8 p.m. Eastern on C-SPAN 2 or online at cspan.org. | ||
| In a nation divided, a rare moment of unity, this fall, C-SPAN presents Ceasefire, where the shouting stops and the conversation begins in a town where partisan fighting prevails. | ||
| One table, two leaders, one goal, to find common ground. | ||
| This fall, ceasefire on the network that doesn't take sides, only on C-SPAN. | ||
| And now President Trump announces a reduction in prescription drug prices during a Make America Healthy Again commission event at the White House. | ||
| This place is something special. | ||
| You never get used to it. | ||
| It really is. | ||
| As we mark a historic milestone in our mission to make America healthy again. | ||
| You know, we started Make America Great Again, Bobby. | ||
| I'm not sure you can get away with that without having to make a major payment because, you know, this was Maha. | ||
| He goes to Maha. | ||
| But no, Maha has become hot. | ||
| Over the past few years, we've built an unstoppable coalition of moms and dads, doctors and young people, and citizens of all backgrounds who have come together to protect our children, very importantly, keep the dangerous chemicals out of our food supplies, get toxic substances out of our environment, and deliver the American people the facts as to really where we're going. | ||
| And we want to have what we deserve, and we want to be healthy. | ||
| And we want to have a lot of good things happen, and I think we're going to have that. | ||
| I think this is just the beginning. | ||
| We have some of the most brilliant people sitting on this panel, and likewise in the audience, I recognize so many. | ||
| Many of them are in the administration. | ||
| With us today is the man who fought harder than anyone I know to bring these issues to the center of American politics: our Secretary of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. | ||
| And we're also joined by Secretaries Brooke Rollins, Scott Turner, Linda McMahon, Doug Collins, Doug Burgum, Laurie Chavez de Reimer. | ||
| You're doing a very good job, Laurie. | ||
| Considering she's a Democrat, you know. | ||
| The unions say she's really good. | ||
| I did it. | ||
| You know, I took a lot of heat for doing it. | ||
| And then they were all saying what a great job we did. | ||
| Now, everybody's happy with you. | ||
| Great job. | ||
| Thank you very much. | ||
| As well as EPA Administrator Lee Zeldon, Budget Director Ruz Vaught, SBA Administrator Kelly Loeffler. | ||
| Kelly's been amazing. | ||
| She runs small business, which is actually the biggest business there is, right? | ||
| She had no idea how big. | ||
| She's doing great. | ||
| FDA Commissioner Dr. Marty McCary. | ||
| Thank you, Marty. | ||
| NIH Director Dr. Jay Bhatticheria. | ||
| Thank you very much, Jay. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you. | |
| And let's see, who do we have here? | ||
| CMS Administrator Dr. Mehmed Az, a tremendous guy, actually. | ||
| Thank you very much, Dr. A friend of mine, a really great senator, Roger Marshall. | ||
| Roger, thank you. | ||
| Governors Mike Braun, Jim Pylon, Patrick Morrissey, Representatives Vern Buchanan, former Speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich. | ||
| Newt, a very quiet man. | ||
| Nice to see you, Newt. | ||
| Four months ago, I created the Presidential Commission to Make America Healthy Again, and today the Commission officially delivers its first report on childhood health. | ||
| Here are just some of the alarming findings, and they really are alarming. | ||
| It's unbelievable, terrible. | ||
| More than 40% of American children now have at least one chronic health condition. | ||
| Since the 1970s rates of childhood cancer have soared in many cases by nearly 50 percent, 50, 50 percent. | ||
| Well, in the 1960s, less than 5 percent of the children were obese. | ||
| Now, over 20 percent are obese. | ||
| A few decades ago, one in one think of this one. | ||
| This is to me the one that gets me every time, and it seems to be getting worse. | ||
| Just a few decades ago, one in 10,000 children had autism. | ||
| Today, it's one in 31. | ||
| Last time I heard the number is one in 34, right? | ||
| Now it's one in 31. | ||
| There's something wrong, and we will not stop until we defeat the chronic disease epidemic in America. | ||
| We're going to get it done. | ||
| For the first time ever, this report examines some of the root causes that many believe are making our children sicker and our population sicker, I guess. | ||
| It just doesn't stop with the children, so our population also, such as the ultra-processed foods, over-medicalization, and over-prescription, and widespread exposure to potentially toxic chemicals. | ||
| Unlike other administrations, we will not be silenced or intimidated by the corporate lobbyists or special interests. | ||
| And I want this group to do what they have to do. | ||
| We have to spell it out. | ||
| In some cases, it won't be nice or it won't be pretty, but we have to do it. | ||
| When you hear 10,000, it was one in 10,000, and now it's 1 in 31 for autism. | ||
| I think that's just a terrible thing. | ||
| It has to be something on the outside, has to be artificially induced, has to be. | ||
| And we'll not allow our public health system to be captured by the very industries it's supposed to oversee. | ||
| So we're demanding the answers. | ||
| The public is demanding the answers, and that's why we're here. | ||
| Already we're phasing out eight of the most common artificial food dyes. | ||
| We ended the most serious conflicts of interest at the FDA. | ||
| We had a lot of conflicts over there. | ||
| Earlier this week, we approved a SNAP waiver request from Nebraska so they can stop taxpayer dollars from being used to make our children obese. | ||
| I understand requests from three more states will be approved shortly, and more are expected to come in the following weeks. | ||
| Over the next 80 days, the Commission will build on its work in this report to develop a roadmap to bold and transformative public health reforms for our consideration. | ||
| It's a consideration and we'll lay out the facts. | ||
| Let me say congratulations to the entire Maha movement. | ||
| This movement has become very hot. | ||
| People are really, I tell you, they're going crazy over Maha. | ||
| And I look forward to continuing the historic progress. | ||
| And I will say this, this whole group, this whole table, they're very, you know, I use a word that's because it's a beautiful word, actually. | ||
| The Democrats took it and they used it instead of the word liberal. | ||
| They used the word progressive. | ||
| And normally I'd say you're very progressive, meaning you're far, they're not progressive. | ||
| You are progressive. | ||
| They shouldn't be allowed to use that word. | ||
| And so therefore I'm not going to use it to describe you, but you are far-forward thinkers. | ||
| You're amazing thinkers, and we appreciate having you. | ||
| It's just tremendous talent around this table, the most respected people anywhere in the world, actually. | ||
| And you know, I've been a fan of Bobby for years. | ||
| He came up to see me 13, 14, 15 years ago, I remember, and he left. | ||
| And I made a couple of the statements that he made because I agreed with the same thing, and we both went through hell. | ||
| Do you remember that? | ||
| It was a massive. | ||
| But you know what? | ||
| We turned out to be right. | ||
| It was sort of interesting. | ||
| But I've been a friend of Bobby, and he's been a foe, too. | ||
| You know, he's tried to stop a couple of my jobs. | ||
| In one case, he did stop a job, and I was really angry. | ||
| And then about four months later, we went into like a depression, and I saved a hell of a lot of money by the fact that you stopped it. | ||
|
unidentified
|
You're welcome. | |
| So I never mind it. | ||
| I always said, thank you very much for stopping that big job I was going to do. | ||
| But he's a fantastic guy, and Bobby, we're with you all the way. | ||
| And your beautiful wife is right sitting in the front row, and she's always been right there with you. | ||
| And, you know, it was very interesting. | ||
| When Bobby came, I really wanted Bobby to join, and he was doing very well as a candidate, really well. | ||
| He was being treated very unfairly by the other side, but he was doing so well that they treated you unfairly. | ||
| They had no choice. | ||
| I think they said, in order to qualify, Newton, you had to have 80% of the vote. | ||
| Okay, do you remember that deal? | ||
| You had to have 80% of the vote in order to qualify to run against Joe Biden. | ||
| And Bobby thought that was a little unfair, and that was about it. | ||
| And he came on board, and we got very lucky, but you really helped, and I want to thank you very much, really. | ||
| So, Bobby, if you'd say, give him your thoughts, please. | ||
| Well, thank you very much, Mr. President. | ||
| I do want to say something, because I get a lot of credit for steering this administration toward the Maha movement. | ||
| But I joined the campaign in August. | ||
| I joined President Trump in August and became, you know, went from independent to his campaign. | ||
| But it was in June that he made a speech specifically on this issue. | ||
| It was a Maha speech before Maha existed. | ||
| And I took note of that speech at the time and thought there is a potential here for a common ground. | ||
| I want to thank you for your vision, for your courage, for standing up. | ||
| You know, President Trump is a populist president. | ||
| He's a president. | ||
| He's blamed for giving money to billionaires and all this stuff. | ||
| We hear about that all the time. | ||
| But he is on the side of the middle class, the working class, the poor in this country, people. | ||
| And I've been following, I've met every president since my uncle was president. | ||
| And I've never seen a president, Democrat or Republican, that is willing to stand up to industry when it's the right thing to do. | ||
| And they're willing to talk about really difficult issues and to hold his stand on those issues. | ||
| I've never seen anything like it. | ||
| And I'm very, very grateful to you. | ||
| I've sat with industry again and again in a room with him and heard him say, we can't do that. | ||
| We're going to do something different, deliver news that they didn't want to hear. | ||
| So I'm grateful to this. | ||
| This is a milestone. | ||
| There's never in American history has the federal government taken a position on public health like this. | ||
| And because of President Trump's leadership, it's not just one cabinet secretary, it's the entire government that is behind this report. | ||
| And I can say again, I talked a little bit about when I met Rachel Carson as a boy. | ||
| My uncle tried to do this, but he was killed and it never got done. | ||
| And ever since then, we've been waiting for a president who would stand up and speak on behalf of the healthy American people and say, there is no difference between good economic policy, good environmental policy, and good public health policy and good industrial policy. | ||
| We can have all of them. | ||
| We need a united candidate and we need to go forward as a single people. | ||
| I want to thank you for that, President Trump. | ||
| This report is a call to action for common sense. | ||
| We've allied too much on conflicted research, ignored common sense, or what some would call mother's intuition. | ||
| It's common sense that ultra-processed, nutrient-poor food contributes to chronic disease. | ||
| It's common sense that excessive screen time and isolation lead to anxiety and depression, especially in children. | ||
| It's common sense that exercise and healthy food should come before prescriptions and surgery. | ||
| It's common sense that not all calories are equal in nutritional value. | ||
| It's common sense that over-medicating kids is dangerous. | ||
| It's common sense that we can celebrate the innovations of modern life while also demanding fearless inquiry into ameliorating the negative effects of medication, agriculture, and environmental practices. | ||
| It's common sense that research funded by corporations deserves more scrutiny than independent studies. | ||
| I'm so proud of this cabinet and particularly Secretary Rollins and Administrators Zeldon, who, again, I'll say it a third time, work late, late nights, early into the morning to make this happen. | ||
| And all the leadership from the White House staff, beginning with Stephen Miller and Heidi Overton, Dr. Heidi Overton, with Vince Haley, in getting us to the gold line was we could not have done it without them. | ||
| They helped us grapple with weighty issues and committed this administration to solving large, complex challenges like children's health. | ||
| We're joined here by senators, advocates, governors who I have worked with, and CEOs who I know who are all ready to begin carrying out this mission. | ||
| This is the beginning of a conversation, a national conversation that we are going to have with maturity, with nuance, for the first time in history, thanks to your leadership, President Trump. | ||
| There is a reason that the Maha mom sided with you, President Trump. | ||
| It's because this administration has the bravery to tell the truth and solve problems through innovation and not any state regulation. | ||
| President Trump, I'm honored to present you the Maha Report and work with this incredible cabinet that you have brought together to make our children healthy again. | ||
| Three things. | ||
| First, on behalf of an extremely grateful nation and on behalf of a lot of extremely grateful Maha moms who are out there, Secretary Kennedy and Mr. President, thank you. | ||
| I see a Maha mom and grandma and our amazing chief of staff right there, Susie Wiles. | ||
| I see a Maha mom and Caroline Lovitt all across our cabinet. | ||
| Sir, my oldest son, Luke, is here. | ||
| Stand up, Luke. | ||
|
unidentified
|
I am a Maha mom of four. | |
| And this hits particularly close to home for every single one of us in this room. | ||
| That's the first thing. | ||
| The second thing is that you mentioned, sir, in your remarks that we are on track to sign multiples of SNAP waivers to get junk food and sugary drinks out of our food stamp system. | ||
| And I am so proud. | ||
| I am so proud to announce that on Monday I was in Nebraska with Governor Pillen where we signed the first one. | ||
| An hour ago I signed the second one for Governor Braun in Indiana. | ||
| He may not even know that. | ||
| I've got it right here, sir. | ||
| I also signed the third one, Governor Kim Reynolds of Iowa, about an hour ago, with a half a dozen more coming down the line. | ||
| And sir, that has never happened before under Republican or Democrat administrations. | ||
| We have never made that happen before. | ||
|
unidentified
|
So I am so proud and so grateful for the leadership. | |
| Who is the first one to apply from West Virginia? | ||
| I'm sure you're at the top of the pile, sir. | ||
| I apologize. | ||
| Governor Sanders has been a leader. | ||
| Governor Polis from Colorado. | ||
| It has been remarkable how these governors have stood up. | ||
| That's the second thing. | ||
| The third and final thing, sir, is we all know that at the center of making America healthy again is making American agriculture great again. | ||
| Without American agriculture, without American agriculture at the center of this discussion, we have the most robust, the safest, the best agriculture system in the world. | ||
| And in partnership with the amazing Secretary Kennedy and all of these incredible patriots sitting around this table, under the leadership of the extraordinary President Donald J. Trump, we will make America healthy again. | ||
| And what an honor it is to be a part of that. | ||
| Thank you, sir. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Mr. Polis, I mean, what do you say, sir? | |
| Big... | ||
| Big policy man here. | ||
|
unidentified
|
So much has already been said, but in your remarks, Mr. President, you made clear. | |
| This is Vince Haley, by the way. | ||
| In your remarks and in the report, it's very clear that there are no sacred cows when it comes to our children's health. | ||
| We are showing the courage to turn over every stone to figure out, to investigate what is behind the chronic childhood disease crisis, and that's what this report represents, sir. | ||
| Thank you, Vince. | ||
| Most have already spoken. | ||
| That's very good. | ||
| But the fake news wasn't here. | ||
| What's going on? | ||
| Oz, I want to thank you for your work. | ||
| Would you have anything to say to the media? | ||
| Thank you, sir. | ||
| I think it's a moral failing if we don't address this, but it's definitely a financial failing as well. | ||
| 50% of children are on Medicaid or on the CHIP program. | ||
| It is an obligation we all have to address this reality. | ||
| As you know, the cost of Medicaid has gone up 50% in five years. | ||
| I thank you very much for having the bravery to commission this report, and Secretary Kennedy, Secretary Rollins, Lise Elder, and everybody else on this panel for being able to affect what has not been done since this law for Medicare and Medicaid was written in 1965. | ||
| God bless you. | ||
| Thank you very much, Alice. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you. | |
| Amen. | ||
| So highly respected, Dr. Marty McCary. | ||
| Would you say a couple of words, please? | ||
| Thank you, Mr. President. | ||
| The United States is the best in the world when it comes to proton beam therapy, CAR T, sophisticated operations. | ||
| But when it comes to the health of the population, it's been a 50-year failure. | ||
| And we have got to change course, and it's not until you have had the courage to let us take on these giant issues, as Vince Haley said, without any sacred cows, that we've been able to change. | ||
| And I think this will transform our health care system from a reactionary system where doctors are playing whack-a-mole to a proactive system. | ||
| So thank you, Mr. President. | ||
| Thank you very much. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you very much. | |
| Highly respected member. | ||
| Jay, please say a few words. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| Thank you, Mr. President. | ||
| I said earlier already that it's shocking to me that what this report says, which is that our kids will live less long, less healthy, more unhappy lives than we will as parents. | ||
| We can't have that. | ||
| I'm so proud to be part of this moment because that doesn't have to be the future. | ||
| We can change things by doing excellent gold standard science, understanding the root causes of all these problems, reversing it. | ||
| Mr. President, this is an enormously important moment because it's from this moment forward we will reverse course, so our kids will will live longer than us, will live more healthy than us and will be happier than we have been. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you, thank you very much. | |
| Thank you, Jay. | ||
| Good question, I have to say. | ||
| We have the greatest farmers in the world and we love our farmers and we want to pay respect to our farmers and we always will, and we won the farmers by a lot in the election and all every election, all three elections, and we won by a lot and uh, I will never forget that and they are foremost in our thought and representing, I think, the farmers better than just about anybody can do, is senator Roger Marshall. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Could you say a couple of words Roger, please? | |
| Mr president, we're not tired of winning yet. | ||
| Congratulations what, what a week you've had overseas. | ||
| One win after another, one big, beautiful bill across the House floor this morning you're the best closer in the game and and this is one of the greatest days of my life, professionally speaking as well and I I just want to acknowledge my Maha mom out here as well, that my wife Lena was a MAHA nurse and a Maja mom and a Mahaw Grandma. | ||
| Now Lena, will you please stand up as well? | ||
| My wife, mr president, you know I spent 25 years delivering babies, most every day. | ||
| We saw a huge epidemic of diabetes, of pregnancy and, and this has exploded in so many different directions. | ||
| Now we have an epidemic in mental health uh, in our, in our youth obesity rates. | ||
| 20, 30 percent, 20 percent of our children on a prescription drug 60, 70 percent of adults on a prescription drug. | ||
| We can do better than this, and it does start with the farmer. | ||
| It starts with with soil health, and I just want you know that our farmers are so committed to this as well and and so many of them are already doing great things. | ||
| They're making the soyer soil healthier, they're using less pesticides, they're doing all the right things. | ||
| It's going to take a little bit more effort and time to get everybody with those practices, but the American farmer, Farmer and rancher were the original environmentalists, the original conservationists, and they'll be right here working beside us, and we appreciate your support of them as well. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you, Roger. | |
| Great. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| So I think I'll close by just saying that something happened a week ago that was very, very important, profound, but very important in so many ways. | ||
| For years, I noticed that other countries paid much less for drugs and pharmaceuticals than we did. | ||
| But I don't mean 2% less or 10%, which would be good, but I don't mean 20% or 25% or 30%. | ||
| I mean sometimes we paid 10 times more, 12 times more, 13 times more than other countries, where people from our country would be seen going into Mexico and seen going into other countries, leaving on trips and bringing their drugs home because they'd get in London, they'd be able to buy a drug for one-tenth the price of what it cost to New York City. | ||
| And I watched this and I watched it during my term and I didn't like it. | ||
| I didn't like it. | ||
| And it's a very complex system, but you know, we're smart also, maybe much smarter than they are. | ||
| And at some point, we had to figure out. | ||
| And I heard it was the middleman. | ||
| Nobody told me who the middleman was. | ||
| Nobody knew who the middleman was. | ||
| Nobody ever heard. | ||
| All I heard is the middleman. | ||
| I said, they've got to be the richest people in the world, whoever they are. | ||
| We don't even know if there is a middleman. | ||
| All I know is that the drugs were 10 times higher and sometimes more than that. | ||
| And I really got into it over the last year and I figured the whole system out. | ||
| And for various and sundry reasons, the United States of America was being screwed. | ||
| And we were being taken advantage of and being laughed at for years and years. | ||
| And I said, it's not going to happen anymore. | ||
| And I brought a great gentleman, the head of Eli Lilly, in, who's great. | ||
| He really is. | ||
| He's great. | ||
| He's done a fantastic job. | ||
| And others also of the companies. | ||
| And I'd have it out with them. | ||
| I had debates with them actually. | ||
| And pretty much it was a debate that was impossible to lose. | ||
| You had to be a real bad debater to lose that debate because they couldn't justify it. | ||
| They tried to say, well, you know, we pay for research and development and the United States has agreed to pay for 100%. | ||
| I said, why? | ||
| Why are we paying? | ||
| And by the way, that wasn't even the number because it's still way too high. | ||
| You took all the research and development, but you have other countries that are a lot more vicious than us in terms of their representatives. | ||
| And they'd set a price for a drug and they'd say, tell the United States to pay for the rest. | ||
| We were subsidizing the whole world. | ||
| And I said, we're not going to do that anymore. | ||
| We've been a laughing stock for so many years. | ||
| The last four years we've been a laughing stock. | ||
| I said it. | ||
| We're a laughing stock and now we're the most respected and we're the hottest country in the world. | ||
| We're going to remain that way. | ||
| We're going to do that with drug costs too. | ||
| And so I said, I'm going to do something that's a very unpopular thing to do with a small number of people, mainly the people that own the drug companies and others. | ||
| And I'm not even blaming them. | ||
| They were able to get away with it. | ||
| But it was really other nations that took advantage of us because the drug companies were under their thumb. | ||
| And they would say, this is what I'm going to pay. | ||
| And the European Union was right at the top of the list. | ||
| Let me tell you. | ||
| We're going to pay $20 for this and we're not going to pay anymore. | ||
| And America would pay $240 for the same thing that they're paying $20. | ||
| They said, tell America to pay for the rest. | ||
| So for years they went along aimlessly and they did it. | ||
| And I started making changes. | ||
| And I'll never forget the end of my first term, which was very successful. | ||
| We had the best stock market ever. | ||
| We had the best economy ever of any president. | ||
| We went up 88% in the stock market, as an example. | ||
| And I think 116% in one of the other indices. | ||
| And we had, we're doing well, but I never, this whole thing with the drug costs always bothered me. | ||
| And I started really studying it, and it's very complicated stuff. | ||
| And I said, you know what? | ||
| We are paying so much more. | ||
| And I demanded favored nations. | ||
| We're the biggest buyer. | ||
| We're the best buyer. | ||
| We're the most solid buyer. | ||
| We're the one that paid for all of the research and development. | ||
| And I said, we're going to do something that's earth-shattering. | ||
| So at the end of my first term, I was so proud because it's the first time in 28 years that any president reduced drug prices during the course of four years. | ||
| And you know what the number was? | ||
| One-fourth of 1%. | ||
| But it was down, one-fourth thing of it, a quarter of one percent. | ||
| Very little. | ||
| Essentially, they remained the same. | ||
| But I wanted to get it down, and I was so proud. | ||
| I thought I was the greatest guy in the world. | ||
| I took it down one quarter of a percent. | ||
| And I had news conferences. | ||
| I was bragging. | ||
| I'm the only one that did it 28 years. | ||
| And then I said, that's not very much, because we were still paying so much more. | ||
| And I decided I've got to break the system. | ||
| And it's the most powerful lobby in the world, the drug company, the most powerful they are, the most powerful. | ||
| And I'm not saying bad, good, I'm not saying anything, but they have tremendous power over the Senate, over the House, over the governors, over everybody. | ||
| And they spend more money, billions and billions of dollars. | ||
| And I said, I don't care. | ||
| I've got to do what, I have to do what's right. | ||
| And I declared a favored nations, most favored nations, where the United States from now on is going to pay the exact same price as the lowest price anywhere in the world. | ||
| In other words, if you take in other words, if you take the country that's paying, and let's say in a certain part of, you know, there may be some country out there that pays a little bit less for very good reasons because of the fact, a thing called poverty or whatever, but we take the lowest country, say European Union countries as a whole, that would be fine. | ||
| Or take individual countries within the European Union, or take various countries that nobody's even heard about. | ||
| We pay the lowest. | ||
| And what that's going to mean, and I'd like to put somebody to police it because it should start immediately. | ||
| It shouldn't start in two years, three years, five years. | ||
| They'll say, yes, it kicks in. | ||
| They always say kicks in, Marty. | ||
| It kicks in, sir, in four years, you know, and then four years they get it changed. | ||
| It should mean, so remember I told you I was happy with one quarter of 1%. | ||
| It could mean anywhere from 70% to 89% reduction in drugs and pharmaceuticals. | ||
| And I've actually had some congressmen call me and they say, sir, could we talk about this? | ||
| I said, no. | ||
| They wanted to talk because it's tremendous power against them. | ||
| And I understand that. | ||
| And every one of them was covered. | ||
| Senators were. | ||
| I see Roger smiling, and Roger probably was too. | ||
| But you know what? | ||
| He wants to do the right thing, right? | ||
| He wants to do the right thing. | ||
| And we're doing the right thing. | ||
| We're taking advantage of. | ||
| And forget the drug company. | ||
| We were taken advantage of by other countries that insisted with the drug companies that they were going to pay X dollars. | ||
| We're not paying any more, and you're not doing business here. | ||
| And they were nasty about it. | ||
|
unidentified
|
These people were almost sort of afraid of them. | |
| And we are going to now get a reduction in drug costs of up to 89% in some cases, but 50% would be a low, a bad number. | ||
| So think of that. | ||
| 50% versus one quarter of 1%. | ||
| Think of that. | ||
| 85, 89, 91, 72%. | ||
| It's going to be massive numbers. | ||
| It's going to be incredible for Medicaid, incredible for all forms of health care. | ||
| Medicare is going to be, it's going to have a huge impact, so big that nobody can calculate it. | ||
| I mean, this thing could drop by 25, 30%. | ||
| The drugs are, Oz, a very big part of it, right? | ||
| So very big part. | ||
| So it'll affect everything. | ||
| It'll affect your whole life. | ||
| The amount of money you're going to be saving is going to be incalculable. | ||
| Nobody can believe I had the courage to do it. | ||
| I don't think it's courage. | ||
| I think it would have been courage not to do it. | ||
| I tell you what, not to do it would have taken far more courage because I was tired of it. | ||
| And I was listening to these guys and they are, you know, they make a lot of money every year, millions and millions of dollars a year. | ||
| And I agree because at the beginning, because of the complexity, you'd walk out of a room, you'd hear them talking, and, you know, they almost convinced you that it's a great system. | ||
| It's a wonderful system, even though we were paying 10 times more. | ||
| That's why they make $30 million a year because they were good, but not any longer. | ||
| And one of them just threw up his hands after I was just pounding on him. | ||
| He said, I can't do it anymore. | ||
| It's the hardest thing I have to do is trying to justify this damn thing. | ||
| I can't do it anymore. | ||
| One of the biggest companies, I just can't do it anymore. | ||
| You're right. | ||
| And as soon as he said that, that was like incredible because I understood exactly. | ||
| He couldn't do it. | ||
| He said the hardest thing he had to do is trying to justify why we're paying $200 for something and somebody else is paying $12. | ||
| That is a neighboring country. | ||
| Take Canada. | ||
| I mean, people go up to Canada to shop because the prices are so much less and it's not going to happen anymore. | ||
| So we're going to take the lowest country anywhere in the world and that's what we're going to be paying. | ||
| And we'll be saving from 50 to 89 percent. | ||
| And these are big, these are tremendous numbers. | ||
| There's not going to be anything where we're paying 10 times more than somebody else. | ||
| And one thing that is very important, and it's got to be implemented, it's done. | ||
| I've done the order. | ||
| It's done. | ||
| But we have to get somebody that's got a lot of strength and a lot of power because you have to implement it because these countries are going to go down fighting. | ||
| They don't want this to happen because they're going to go up. | ||
| Now, there are many more people involved in the world than there are here. | ||
| So they'll go up a little bit, maybe 15, 20 percent, and we're going to go down 60, 70, or 80 percent. | ||
| But they will fight the drug companies. | ||
| The drug companies are very worried that they're going to fight, and that's okay. | ||
| If they fight, we'll just say, that's okay. | ||
| We are not going to let you sell any more cars into the United States, or we're not going to let you sell any more wine or liquor or alcohol or something that's actually much more important to them than the drugs. | ||
| And we're going to be able to force that issue if we need to. | ||
| They should do it. | ||
| We're basically equalizing. | ||
| They should do it. | ||
| And you know, the drug company should do just as well. | ||
| This shouldn't be a hit on their stock. | ||
| I don't think it will be. | ||
| It's basically, it's going to be the same amount of money, but it's going to be redistributed. | ||
| And it's going to be redistributed. | ||
| So they're going to pay a little bit more. | ||
| We're going to pay a lot less. | ||
| A little bit more because there's so many more. | ||
| So it's a bigger number. | ||
| And so, Barbie, I'd like to ask you and Dr. Oz and Marty, perhaps, and Jay, and maybe representing the world's politicians, I can ask Roger, who's so great with this whole subject, if you would be very, very tough and very, very powerful in a sense. | ||
| It's not easy. | ||
| You know, you're going to have to get this done. | ||
| The drug companies are going to say, well, they won't do it. | ||
| And maybe they won't. | ||
| And if they don't do it, we're going to not do business with that country or those countries. | ||
| But we're going to have to be very tough until it's totally stabilized and equalized. | ||
| And Oz, I mean, I see your eyes are gleaming because you've been talking about this for a long time, but you've never had anyone willing to do it. | ||
| But I'm willing to do it. | ||
| And I think it's going to go down as one of the most important things we've ever done because drug costs are going down. | ||
| Think of it. | ||
| Every year for 21 years, the costs have gone up. | ||
| And now they're going down maybe by 85, 80. | ||
| I'm telling you, 89% in two instances, 89% cut. | ||
| Nobody's ever seen anything like it. | ||
| So I'd like to ask Oz in particular, because you and I know each other, he's a very tough ombre, this one. | ||
| He's tough as hell. | ||
| And so if you can lead the group, and it's not going to be easy. | ||
| You're going to have to get in and you're going to have to fight. | ||
| If you do it, you can have within a period of weeks, you can have drug costs that drop like a rock, okay? | ||
| So you, as a group, I have great confidence. | ||
| And if you don't do it, I am firing every single one. | ||
| Good luck, Oz. | ||
| All right? | ||
| Can you handle it? | ||
|
unidentified
|
The companies are all coming in. | |
| And we've heard some very interesting results. | ||
| The companies are all coming in. | ||
| We've had some very promising interactions. | ||
|
unidentified
|
So we'll give you a little time to be a tough homebrew. | |
| You'll do a great job. | ||
| I have no doubt about it. | ||
| Thank you very much. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Any help? | |
| I will be there to help you, okay? | ||
| You mentioned something that has not been discussed in the past. | ||
| People have talked about drug prices in a silo and isolation. | ||
| But when you start going to the countries where they give discounts to because they're getting beaten up there and you support these companies, they see a huge upside potential, even greater than the numbers you mentioned. | ||
| They should be able to charge more than what they would historically have been tolerant of if they had the support of the U.S. government and you. | ||
| And Secretary Kennedy is aware of all these discussions. | ||
| Well, they were artificially low and artificially high. | ||
| We were artificially high. | ||
| They were artificially low. | ||
| We're not going to let that end. | ||
| I think you're going to be able to handle it pretty easily. | ||
| But speed is very important because we can do this immediately. | ||
| This doesn't take two years, three years. | ||
| It doesn't take a month. | ||
| So do the best you can. | ||
| Thank you very much. | ||
| Thank you, everybody. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you very much. | |
| Thank you very much. | ||
| Are we concluded, Bobby? | ||
| Yes. | ||
| Go ahead. | ||
| What are the next question? | ||
| Thank you, Mr. President. | ||
| Let's all give a hand for President Trump. | ||
|
unidentified
|
The Department of Homeland Security has revoked Harvard University's Student and Exchange Visitor Program certification, effectively barring the school from hosting foreign students. | |
| The move affects both new and currently enrolled students who must now transfer out of the school or risk losing their legal status. | ||
| DHS Secretary Christy Noam's statement on this reads, This administration is holding Harvard accountable for fostering violence, anti-Semitism, and coordinating with the Chinese Communist Party on its campus. | ||
| It is a privilege, not a right, for universities to enroll foreign students and benefit from their higher tuition payments to help pad their multi-billion dollar endowments. | ||
| Harvard had plenty of opportunity to do the right thing. | ||
| It refused. | ||
| Let this serve as a warning to all universities and academic institutions across the country. | ||
| The Huffington Post reports that the move comes days after the Trump administration and the National Science Foundation ended 196 grants to the university, totaling over $45 million. | ||
| In a letter to the school, the NSF noted that, quote, Harvard continues to engage in race discrimination, including in its admissions process and in other areas of student life, as well as failing to promote a research environment free of anti-Semitism and bias. | ||
| Democracy. | ||
| It isn't just an idea, it's a process, a process shaped by leaders elected to the highest offices and entrusted to a select few with guarding its basic principles. | ||
| It's where debates unfold, decisions are made, and the nation's course is charted. | ||
| Democracy in real time. | ||
| This is your government at work. | ||
| This is C-SPAN, giving you your democracy, unfiltered. | ||
| If you ever miss any of C-SPAN's coverage, you can find it anytime online at c-span.org. | ||
| Videos of key hearings, debates, and other events feature markers that guide you to interesting and newsworthy highlights. | ||
| These points of interest markers appear on the right-hand side of your screen when you hit play on select videos. | ||
| This timeline tool makes it easy to quickly get an idea of what was debated and decided in Washington. | ||
| Scroll through and spend a few minutes on C-SPAN's points of interest. | ||
| House Republican leaders spoke to the press following the passage of their budget, spending, and policy bill, saying it was a great win for Republican policy priorities and President Trump's agenda. | ||
| From Capitol Hill, this is about 40 minutes. | ||
| Thanks, everybody, for being here. | ||
| This is a big day. | ||
| We said on the House floor, it's finally morning in America again. | ||
| The media and the Democrats have consistently dismissed any possibility that House Republicans could get this done. | ||
| They did not believe that we could succeed in our mission to enact President Trump's America First Agenda. | ||
|
unidentified
|
But this is a big one, and once again, they have been proven wrong. | |
| Today, the House has passed generational, truly nation-shaping legislation to reduce spending and permanently lower taxes for families and job creators, secure the border, unleash American energy dominance, restore peace through strength, and make government work more efficiently and effectively for all Americans. | ||
|
unidentified
|
House Democrats voted against all of that. | |
| So everything that I just said, they voted the opposite. | ||
| Clearly proves they actually must want the largest tax increase in U.S. history on the American citizens. | ||
|
unidentified
|
They must want open borders. | |
| They've proven that over and over. | ||
| They must want Medicaid for illegal immigrants. | ||
| We look forward to the Senate's timely consideration of this once-in-a-generation legislation. | ||
| We stand ready to continue our work together to deliver on the one big beautiful bill, as President Trump named it himself. | ||
|
unidentified
|
We're going to send that to his desk. | |
| We're going to get it there by Independence Day on July 4th, and we are going to celebrate a new golden age in America. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you for being here. | |
| I will yield next to our leader, Steve Scalise. | ||
| Thank you, Mr. Speaker. | ||
| And as the Speaker said, it truly is morning in America again. | ||
| You know, when you think about all of the work that's gone into putting this bill together, it's one big, beautiful bill for a lot of reasons. | ||
| There are a lot of really important wins for the American people in this bill. | ||
| And we had 11 committees come together and meet in hearings. | ||
| Some went on over 24 hours. | ||
| Rules Committee went over 20 hours. | ||
| You had, you know, of course, the Budget Committee. | ||
| Chairman Arrington is the lead author of the bill. | ||
| All of the people that had to come together in our conference, and I think a lot of you know we don't all think alike, Democrats made it very clear they didn't want to have any part in helping get America back on track again, but we were never deterred. | ||
| When this bill could have failed 10 times over, we said we were going to get this done, and failure is not an option, and we meant it. | ||
| We knew we were fighting for the families who have been struggling for way too long under the failed policies of Joe Biden and all the Democrats who did have control of Washington for too long. | ||
| We watched higher interest rates and higher inflation and lower wages and a demise of the American dream that we knew should not be permanent, but was only going to turn around if we passed a bill to get America back on track. | ||
| We knew we had to prevent a massive tax increase, so we put it in the bill. | ||
| We knew we needed to secure America's border, as President Trump ran on all across this country and won the election on, and we put it in this bill. | ||
| We ran on and said we would produce more American energy, and we put it in this bill. | ||
| All the things that we knew we needed to do to root up waste, fraud, and abuse in government, focus on those families who were struggling. | ||
| All of that is in this one big, beautiful bill. | ||
| And yes, now the House has come together and passed this bill against all odds, but we're still working on the rest of the process. | ||
| It still goes to the Senate. | ||
| Senate has a lot of work to do, too. | ||
| That's why we've been talking to the Senate for a long time, but it's their turn to take this bill and move forward. | ||
| But I'll tell you, none of this would be possible without the leadership of President Trump, who every step of the way not only laid out the vision, ran a campaign on this vision, but every step of the way too said, whatever you need, let me know. | ||
| And he was there to help us. | ||
| Our great speaker, Mike Johnson, who was never deterred, probably hasn't slept in a few days, but never wavered in his commitment to get this done. | ||
| And this whole team has come together. | ||
| And our WIP has never relented and never stopped pushing to get this done. | ||
| With that, I bring up our great majority whip, Tom Emmer. | ||
| Thank you, Steve. | ||
| On November 5th, the American people rejected the failed policies of the Biden-Harris administration and overwhelmingly endorsed President Trump's America First Agenda. | ||
| Using his executive authority, President Trump hit the ground running on day one to deliver on the promises he made to the American people. | ||
| Today, House Republicans followed suit. | ||
| Our one big, beautiful bill fulfills the mandate for change we were given last November. | ||
| It allows President Trump to continue his successful border security and deportation operations by investing in more border patrol agents and ICE officers, funding the continuation of the border wall, and equipping our men and women on the front lines with the tools they need to keep us safe. | ||
| Not only will the one big beautiful bill help to make America safe again, it will also help to make America wealthy again. | ||
| America's economic revival has already begun under President Trump's leadership, but House Republicans back it up in this bill by making the 2017 Trump tax cuts permanent, eliminating tax on tips and overtime, and throwing out regulations that burden American businesses and suffocate American innovation. | ||
| From promoting the safety and security of our great nation and giving much-needed tax relief to American families, to unleashing American energy and bringing accountability to important government programs, there are wins in this bill for every corner of America. | ||
| Take this as a lesson: don't bet against the House Republicans. | ||
| We've shown time and time again that we deliver for the American people, especially when it matters most. | ||
| By taking hold of this historic opportunity, I truly believe we've unlocked the opportunities for generations to come. | ||
| With that, I turn it over to our conference chair, Lisa McLean. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you. | |
| Thank you. | ||
| Well, good morning, everybody, and a good morning it is. | ||
| We just made history and passed the one big beautiful bill, despite the Democrats' fear-mongering. | ||
| Shocker, we haven't seen that lately, have we? | ||
| And the hours that they spent stalling the votes on this entire process. | ||
| The Democrats tried to derail this bill, and guess what? | ||
| It didn't work. | ||
| They failed. | ||
| Not only did the Democrats vote against the bill, but they introduced hundreds of meaningless amendments, spewed misleading talking points, and now they have nothing to show for it except voting on the record for the historic tax increase and to kill jobs of the small and medium-class business owners in America. | ||
| Frankly, Democrats voted to put Americans last, and it's a shame. | ||
| But thank God for House Republicans and thank God for our President, Donald J. Trump. | ||
| His vision, alongside the work of my colleagues, made today a historic day. | ||
| Behind me is what you see, a unified Republican conference with phenomenal leadership. | ||
| And this Republican conference works as a team. | ||
| This transformational legislation will provide safety and security for generations to come. | ||
| Whether it's at our borders or in our pocketbooks, Americans will be better off thanks to the one big, beautiful bill. | ||
| Our committees had difficult tasks and they delivered. | ||
| And some doubted that this was even possible. | ||
| But at the end of the day, we all came together. | ||
| House Republicans did not miss the moment. | ||
| And because of our work, we will put more money in the pockets of hardworking Americans. | ||
| We will prevent the next Lankin Riley or Rachel Moran from being murdered. | ||
| And we will save another family from the heartbreak of fentanyl poisoning. | ||
| And to think the Democrats voted against all of that. | ||
| But I am thankful for the House Republicans that they stood up for the American people. | ||
| We put them first. | ||
| This is what real leadership looks like. | ||
| This is what winning looks like. | ||
| And this is what America looks like under President Donald Trump and House Republicans' leadership. | ||
| Safe, secure, and prosperous. | ||
| And now I will turn it over to the chairman of the transportation and infrastructure, Mr. Sam Graves. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thank you for that. | |
| I'll be brief. | ||
| But I'm proud to stand up here with my chairman colleagues, and I want to thank them for all the work that they did, the Republican leadership, and especially President Trump and his team for helping to get this across the board, across the line. | ||
| For our part, for the Transportation Infrastructure Committee's part, we exceeded our mark when it came to cuts. | ||
| And at the same time, we also made investments in our United States Coast Guard. | ||
| More importantly, we made a down payment on modernization of our air traffic control system. | ||
| And on top of that, we're going to see the first new money in the Highway Trust Fund in over 30 years. | ||
| So with that, I encourage the Senate to do their work and to get this moved as well across the board. | ||
| And I will turn it over to Chairman Rogers. | ||
| Thank you, Sam. | ||
| This one big, beautiful bill makes a generational investment in national defense. | ||
| The bill includes bipartisan legislation from the House Armed Services Committee that provides mandatory $150 billion in mandatory spending to help us start implementing President Trump's peace through strength agenda. | ||
| That $150 billion will fund key investment and initiatives in President Trump's Golden Dome, revitalize our defense industrial base, help secure our southwest border because border security is national security, deter Chinese aggression, and enhance service member quality of life. | ||
| With these investments, we will restore American deterrence and build the ready, capable, and lethal fighting force President Trump promised. | ||
| I want to thank President Trump and Speaker Johnson for prioritizing national security in the bill and commend our entire leadership team for getting this done. | ||
| And with that, I'll now lead it over, turn it over to the Iron Lady, Chairman Fox. | ||
| Thank you, and I want to thank my colleagues. | ||
| As you all know, we came in for a lot of criticism for the Rules Committee meeting at 1 a.m. in the morning, but we needed to do that in order for us to be right here this morning getting this done. | ||
| And I want to thank the Speaker for all the work that he has done. | ||
| I've told him I'm going to nominate him for sainthood because he now has done many miracles here as Speaker. | ||
| But he working together with President Trump and all of my colleagues, and I want to thank the members of the Rules Committee for their patience and their perseverance. | ||
| But this is a great morning in America. | ||
| Again, we are delivering as Republicans for the American people, and we're all going to walk very happily for the next few weeks, especially, till we see the next challenge that we have. | ||
| But this has just been a primer for it, and we're ready for the next ones. | ||
| Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and thank you, President Trump. | ||
|
unidentified
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Jim Jordan, Judiciary Chair. | |
| Thank you, Mr. Speaker. | ||
|
unidentified
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I've said this many times before. | |
| I think we tend to make our job too complicated. | ||
| It's really pretty basic. | ||
| What did you tell the voters you were going to do when you put your name on the ballot and you ran for the job? | ||
| And if you get elected, go do what you said. | ||
| And this bill does that. | ||
|
unidentified
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It wouldn't have happened without the leadership of the Speaker and our entire team, and it certainly wouldn't happen without the leadership of President Trump. | |
| But last fall, we told the American people, you elect us, we're going to make sure we cut your taxes. | ||
| Your taxes don't go up. | ||
|
unidentified
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This bill does that. | |
| We told them last fall, you elect us, we will secure the border. | ||
| President Trump has done that. | ||
| We allocate resources in this bill to make sure it stays secure. | ||
| We told people last fall, you elect us. | ||
| We will respect moms and dads. | ||
|
unidentified
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We will let you have school choice where you can pick the school where your son or daughter is going to get the best education. | |
| And we told people last fall, you elect us. | ||
| We're going to treat you with the respect you deserve. | ||
| Able-bodied people in our welfare system will have to work if they're going to get your money. | ||
| This bill does what we said we were going to do. | ||
|
unidentified
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That's why it's a good day for our country. | |
| Next is Mr. Guthby, the chairman of Energy. | ||
| Thank you very much. | ||
| As one of the new chairmen here, it's just been such a privilege to work with the leadership and the chairman of the entire conference to deliver on the promises that the House Republicans and President Trump promised in the campaign. | ||
| In the Energy and Commerce Committee, we strengthened Medicaid for the most vulnerable. | ||
| Leader Jeffries, when he gave his speech on the floor, read different stories that he received on Medicaid. | ||
| Every single person that he talked about on the floor is completely covered by this bill. | ||
| We reformed Medicaid so hardworking taxpayers who provide Medicaid also have those who can work and are able to work join the hardworking taxpayers to help pay for Medicaid. | ||
| This is vital to our communities. | ||
| We deliver on energy dominance in this bill. | ||
| So I'm proud to have worked with my friends. | ||
| I'm proud to work with hopefully our members of the Senate to make sure that this bill gets passed and gets to the president's desk. | ||
| We strengthen Medicaid and we delivered on energy dominance. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| And now I'd like to introduce my good friend the chair of agriculture, Mr. Thompson. | ||
| Thank you so much. | ||
| Good morning, everyone. | ||
| And what a great morning it is. | ||
| So proud to be a part of this team led by President Trump and our Speaker. | ||
| And really proud of the members, Republican members on the House Agriculture Committee and the hardworking staff. | ||
| We delivered as a part of this big, beautiful bill, you know, pieces of legislation that would just serve well the people who consume and the people who produce agriculture commodities in this country. | ||
| For the folks who consume, especially the most vulnerable, we've achieved something we haven't been able to do in a very long time, and that is to restore the intent of Congress, not by cutting or taking people off the roll for the nutrition programs, but restoring program integrity that makes sure they're able to get what they need. | ||
| But to do that in a way that gives them hope for a better future, restoring rungs on a ladder of opportunity. | ||
| And for the hardworking farm families, that really are the producers that are in production that have been up actually with these past couple days. | ||
| I feel like a dairy farmer, you know, with these hours we're working. | ||
| But these families are up before sunlight. | ||
| They're out there working. | ||
| And we were able to deliver what I fondly refer to as Farm Bill 1.0. | ||
| We couldn't do everything that they needed, but we were able to deliver a tremendous amount in terms of risk management for hardworking farm families that are really experiencing the worst farm economy in a half a century. | ||
| And we know that we need those hardworking families to thrive, not just survive, but to thrive, because of them, we have food security, which gives us national security. | ||
| And so I'm just once again really proud to be here this morning. | ||
| And I'm proud to introduce one of my chairmen of committee I serve on, Chairman Wohlberg, with an education and workforce. | ||
|
unidentified
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Thank you. | |
| It's a great stand up here. | ||
| This is the first step of the continuing process. | ||
| And I want to give great appreciation to our speaker, our entire leadership team, and of course to the guy who is a must-do man, and that's President Donald Trump, that gave us all the purchase power to move what we needed to do. | ||
| And I want to say thank you to my committee as well as the committee staff that works significantly. | ||
| I think they all believe that without an educated workforce, we don't have a workforce that succeeds in this world. | ||
| And without a workforce, we don't have a need for education. | ||
| So put them two together, and we've got the opportunity. | ||
| And so we were given a high lift, a high challenge. | ||
| We found ultimately almost $350 billion of savings. | ||
| And that's the term because it gives us a chance to make sure that students have a better opportunity with reduced costs to go through their educational process, with incentives that make that work, but also make sure that we don't have factory workers in Michigan and ranchers in Texas paying for lawyers in Manhattan their education. | ||
| But everybody has that opportunity. | ||
| And we also give universities and colleges and community colleges and taxpaying universities the opportunity to counsel students against taking on debilitating debt that puts them back and really stops the thrust of educational process. | ||
| This is a start. | ||
| We trust that the Senate has seen the pattern now and we can work with them to achieve something that moves education and workforce forward in ways we haven't seen in a long, long time. | ||
| And it was great to be part of this leadership team, this great group of chairmen. | ||
| And it's a privilege now to introduce a guy who did yeoman work on ways and means, Chairman Smith. | ||
| I first just want to say thank you for the hard work that's been put in by our House leadership team and every one of my fellow chairs, but also every single Republican member of this conference. | ||
| You know, iron sharpens iron, and a lot of times we do that here, but it has made us so much stronger where we've been able to stand together and deliver real, real victories for American people. | ||
| I remember when people said President Trump's reelection wasn't possible. | ||
| And then it became the greatest political comeback in history. | ||
| 77 million Americans voted to return Trump to office. | ||
| We have those Americans and President Trump to thank for the Republican majorities in the House and the Senate. | ||
| So then the doubters came back and said, there's no way, no way that House Republicans can make the Trump tax cuts permanent. | ||
| It's too hard. | ||
| They said there's no way they can deliver on his campaign promises and cut spending. | ||
| And they went even further and said there's no way that House Republicans can deliver on it as part of one big, beautiful bill. | ||
| But I was raised in a trailer in Salem, Missouri, next to my dad's autorepair shop. | ||
| I know what it's like to have everyone doubt your future. | ||
| And I said it from the start: failure is not an option. | ||
| The doubters were wrong because we just passed the one big, beautiful bill. | ||
| And as promised, it delivers for working families. | ||
| And this is how the greatest political comeback of all time has led to the greatest pro-worker, pro-family, pro-farmer, and pro-small business tax bill of all time. | ||
| No tax on tips, no tax on overtime, no tax on loans for American-made cars, tax relief for seniors. | ||
| Make the Trump tax cuts permanent. | ||
| We hold the woke elites accountable, and no taxpayer benefits for illegal immigrants who broke the law. | ||
| We're delivering for the gig workers that stay up late to put their kid through college. | ||
| We're delivering for the restaurant workers that take another shift to help out a co-worker and put food on their table. | ||
| We're delivering for the police officers and firefighters who show up in the dead of night to keep our communities safe. | ||
| We're delivering for seniors who worked their whole lives and paid into Social Security and were promised tax relief. | ||
| We're delivering for the families who, after surviving four years of Democrats' historic inflation, struggle to afford a school that meets their needs. | ||
| We're delivering for the factory worker who needs to buy a car to drop his kids off on the way to work. | ||
| We're delivering for the Americans that expect their tax dollars to go to help other Americans and not illegal immigrants. | ||
| We're delivering for the President of the United States, Donald Trump, who made these promises and intends to keep them because the Republican Party is the party of the working class and we won't leave them behind. | ||
| Pleased to introduce the great chairman of the Financial Services Committee, Mr. Hill. | ||
|
unidentified
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Which way you go in the project? | |
| Good morning, everybody. | ||
| Such a pleasure to be with you. | ||
| And let me say first and foremost, thank you to Mike Johnson and our leadership team, our majority leader, Steve Scalise, working hand in glove with President Trump all of last year on what would be the priorities for House Republicans to work hand in hand with our president if we were so fortunate to be elected, to have the House in the Republican hands, to have the presidency in President Trump's capable leadership hands, and to have the Senate. | ||
| And this bill is that first step. | ||
| This is that first step that delivers on that promise. | ||
| And for my constituents in Arkansas, what a pleasure it was for me to vote that they're not going to face a 22% increase in their taxes, that nine out of ten Arkansans can use the standard deduction and have a simpler, straightforward way to file their taxes, that they can have the benefit of a more robust child tax credit. | ||
| That's what House Republicans stand for. | ||
| And let me also say that there were doubters, and you've heard that mentioned today. | ||
| But President Trump has said frequently, why can't the Republicans stick together, like the Democrats stick together? | ||
| Well, with the leadership of Mike Johnson, Republicans have stuck together and delivered on the commitments that we've made in the campaign and in our planning in this first five months of what's going to be, as President Trump argues, a golden age for the American people and the American economy. | ||
| In the House Financial Services Committee, we were proud to have been charged by Chairman Arrington with a $1 billion deficit reduction. | ||
| And by golly, like all members of the House Financial Services Committee, we underpromised and over-delivered by cutting the deficit by $5.2 billion over that period of time. | ||
| And it's the first substantive change in the Dodd-Frank Act in the past 15 years that will lead an anchor in our committee to deliver on another promise of the administration, which is to right-size regulations so that our capital providers can provide that access to capital to our small businesses, our big businesses, and make America more competitive. | ||
| So, again, congratulations to my fellow members of House leadership, our committee chairs, our staffs that worked so hard for so many months to deliver on what is a big success for our country. | ||
| And now I'm happy to welcome my fellow Arkansan, a great chair of our Natural Resources Committee, Bruce Western. | ||
| Good morning. | ||
| You know, winning feels good. | ||
| It always feels good, but it feels much better when you win as a team. | ||
| And this was a team victory. | ||
| And it's not just this team that you see standing here. | ||
| It's the team of our whole Republican conference. | ||
| It's hundreds of dedicated staff members who have worked many, many hours, who have made changes and gotten the bill text where it needs to be. | ||
| But we wouldn't be at this point without the leadership of our speaker, who just keeps winning every time something comes up. | ||
| And we don't have an option not to win. | ||
| There is no other option than to win for the American people. | ||
| And today I believe the American people win. | ||
| And as I think about the Natural Resources Committee, I can't help but think about the only quote in the House chamber by Daniel Webster that we're coming upon the 200-year anniversary of him making this speech at the dedication of the Bunker Hill Monument. | ||
| 1,000 people gathered there and 120 Revolutionary War veterans. | ||
| And the part of his speech that's in the House chamber starts off saying, Let us develop the resources of our land. | ||
| America has been blessed from sea to shining sea with abundant resources. |