Rep. Mia Love, the first Black Republican woman elected to Congress in 2014 and born to Haitian parents, urged conservatives at CPAC 2016 to reject dependency culture and fear-mongering, citing $6B in reparations-like policies and media attacks (e.g., CNN) as obstacles. She tied Utah’s values—fiscal discipline, freedom, faith—to combating economic stagnation, rising taxes, and free speech erosion, framing 2016 as a generational turning point. In her 2017 University of Hartford speech, she called for civil discourse and growth through failure, warning that conservative principles face existential threats if leaders falter. [Automatically generated summary]
In honor of our nation's founding in 1776, we are sending every soldier $1,776.
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Another former lawmaker to pass away in 2025 was former Utah Republican Representative Mia Love, who died at the age of 49 due to brain cancer.
Born to Haitian parents in New York, Love was the first black Republican woman elected to Congress in 2014.
A couple of years following her first election to Congress, then-Representative Love spoke at the 2016 Conservative Political Action Conference in Maryland.
During her remarks, she spoke about the conservative movement.
Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome from the state of Utah, Representative Mia Luck.
Eleanor Roosevelt famously said, you gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face.
You must do the thing which you think you cannot do.
My fellow conservatives, strength, courage, and confidence are attributes long associated with the American dream, and they are absolutely essential to our movement.
These are not characteristics obtained easily or awarded to those who simply show up.
The only way to gain these traits is on the difficult path found on the road less traveled.
But we as conservatives, we relish the opportunity to take the tough road and prove that our principles and policies work.
They lift up the poor, strengthen the middle class, and instill courage and confidence in every single American.
Eleanor was right.
The only way to gain strength, courage, and confidence is to stop and look fear in the face.
Early this morning, CNN and their mainstream media personalities popped up on my TV screen, and I'm certain I was looking fear in the face.
And if that wasn't enough, they also served up a heavy dose of discouragement brought to you by the liberal left and their Democratic doomsday machine.
Nelson Mandela said, I've learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it.
The brave man is not the one who does not feel afraid, but who conquers that fear.
Not long ago, I met a woman in Baltimore in a place in need of courage and confidence.
This woman was no shrinking violet.
She was a single mom who I think had to look fear in the face every day.
She was desperately doing everything that she could to help her daughter see a better world, a hopeful world beyond the drug and crime-ridden place they lived.
She felt and literally was trapped by the liberal programs that promised to give her everything she needed.
Unfortunately, what Democrats never tell people is that they give you exactly what you need to stay exactly where you are.
No further.
We conservatives promote the policies that point the way to a bigger, better future, to take every citizen where they really want to go.
We need an infusion of courage in the conservative cause.
We must have elected officials who will demonstrate a readiness to fight.
We need a president who will not bend or buckle.
We need a Congress that will reclaim our constitutional rights and the power of the purse.
We need citizens who will also stand up, speak out, and even stand alone if necessary in order to defend freedom.
There has never been a greater need for courage and courageous leaders.
Let me pause for a moment to tell you what courage is not.
Courage is not playing to our fears, frustrations, angst, or anger.
Courageous leadership is never defined by insults, put-downs, or personal attacks.
Courage is not found in sweeping generalities posing as policy, nor is it seen as superficial hype or political spin.
And as conservatives, we must always expect more of our leaders.
Americans have always been the most courageous people on earth.
We will not stand and cannot join the pity parties and the it's not my job shoulder shrugging of those too timid to get in the game.
18 years ago, I found something in Utah when I moved there with my sister.
Utah was my choice and Utah is my home, where I chose to raise my family.
In Utah, I found courageous people who believe in the same things I do.
Fiscal discipline, limited government, and personal responsibility.
I found people who value freedom, family, and faith.
I found people in Utah who, like me, believe that if you are poor, if you are black, if you are female, the deck isn't stacked against you because in this country, no one is predestined to be poor, no matter what the pundits say.
I have found courageous people in Utah and across this nation like you that have proved to the world that love of freedom, free enterprise, compassion, and service comes from and are found in all colors, cultures, and genders.
What we offer this nation as conservatives does not impose burdens, but introduces opportunities for everyone to become as ordinary or as extraordinary as they choose to be.
Courage and confidence are forged and fortified as a cottage industry within strong families and heroic communities.
There has never been a point in history where conservative courage was needed more than today.
You see, our nation is looking fear in the face.
We've come to a tipping point that will have ramifications for generations to come.
We have challenges at home and abroad.
We have a government that is continually growing and expanding its power and punishing our people with crushing debt and spiraling deficits.
We have an economy that is stagnant and providing few with the opportunity to rise.
We have citizens trapped in the big government programs that are supposed to help them.
Hardworking families are getting squeezed by rising prices, higher taxes, and a burdensome regulation.
Our basic rights, freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and our Second Amendment rights are all under attack.
We must, as conservatives, muster the courage to stand.
We owe it to our cause and to our country.
A country that has looked fear in the face again and again over the past 240 years and have always responded with courage.
I am certain that decades from now, a history book will contain a chapter on the event of 2016 and the destinational decisions that was placed before us, the American people.
This is no time for conservatives to cower in a corner.
The time is now.
We need to have the courage to stand.
If we stand together and expect more of ourselves, I'm convinced we will be remembered as the generation who restored the conservative principles and the policies that have made our nation exceptional.
My hope is that when our grandchildren point to those pages in the history book, that each and every one of us here today will proudly and confidently say, I was there.
I was there.
I looked fear in the face and I stood up and with courage I did my part to create a better America.
Thank you for not leaving me in this battle alone.
God bless you and God bless our still independent United States of America.
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We collect in air like this time of night.
Cause I told you once and now I told you twice.
One year after this address in 2017, former Representative Love delivered a commencement speech at her alma mater, the University of Hartford in Connecticut.
During her remarks, she spoke about engaging in uncomfortable conversations without hostile rhetoric and not being afraid of failure.
Well, before I begin, of course, I'm going to have to recognize, I'm proud to recognize my colleague in Congress, Mr. Representative John Larson, who is here with me.