[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 90 (Wednesday, June 11, 2014)]
[House]
[Pages H5313-H5317]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
TERRORIST ACTIVITY
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Massie). Under the Speaker's announced
policy of January 3, 2013, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gohmert) is
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.
Mr. GOHMERT. Mr. Speaker, a great deal has been going on in the last
24 hours--a lot of surprises--which help make life interesting.
Mr. Speaker, I want to call to attention, again, the human tragedy
that has arisen in Africa--and Nigeria specifically--as I was there at
the end of last week for a couple of days meeting with some of the
mothers of girls who were kidnapped.
There was an excellent story in The Blaze done by Sara Carter today
where she says:
Precious and Hope--two girls' names--ran for their lives
through the thick brush of the Nigerian forest. They could
feel their hearts pounding, their bare feet scraped from the
rocks, and their legs throbbing from the thorns that
penetrated their skin as they crawled low through the tangle
to avoid detection.
{time} 1915
They were running from the armed Islamist fighters who had
seized them and approximately 300 other schoolgirls from what
they had believed was the safety of their boarding school in
Chibok, Nigeria, in one of the most brazen mass kidnappings
in history. Only the night before, the two 15-year-olds had
been sleeping peacefully. It was mid-April, and many of the
girls had chosen to try to stay cool by sleeping underneath
the night sky in only their shirts and
[[Page H5314]]
undergarments while others left the windows of their
dormitories wide open to stave off the humidity. What they
didn't expect shortly after they closed their eyes was that
their world would soon be turned upside down.
This is the story of the night that Precious and Hope were
taken by Boko Haram and about their against-all-odds escape
the next day while so many of their classmates remain
missing.
I have met those girls, Mr. Speaker, and they are precious, hopeful
girls, but their hearts have been quite broken. Even though they have
escaped, they have had many nightmares when they have lain down,
because they have realized that what happened to them is happening to
their friends every day.
I did ask one of the pastors from Chibok, whom I met there--who was
trying to assist the families, the mothers and the three girls who had
escaped--what happened to the men? What happened to the fathers? I was
told that so many of them feel so helpless and that they feel so guilty
because now they don't even know where their girls are, but they know
what is happening to them every day, and they can't stand the thought
of what is happening to their daughters every day and what they know is
happening. Many of the fathers don't feel worthy to be sleeping in
their own homes, so they have gone into the bush to sleep, to be there
while their daughters are suffering at the hands of these radical
Islamists who think, somehow, they serve a god who thinks it is cute
and it is funny, as one leader was laughing, talking about the sexual
slavery of the girls and that they should be sold into sexual slavery.
It is just sheer evil.
I understand that moderate Muslims do not approve of this activity. I
met and was with some moderate Muslims in Nigeria who understand how
appalling and outrageous this activity is, but it is time moderate
Muslims around the world actually stood up to the radical Islam that is
doing so much damage in this world and is purveying so much evil. It is
time they stood up.
Counselors told me that they have had so much trouble in trying to
help these mothers because they are so distraught, and what they have
been told over and over and over again is that nobody cares; and if
America ever came up, it was made clear that nobody in America cares
and that they were certainly not going to come. So it has been very
rough for them. I got an email today from one of the principals of the
NGO unlikely heroes who is helping the families and the girls who have
been able to escape so far, and she said even just one person from
America coming has opened the doors to their having hope.
Now, if one lowly, bald-headed guy from east Texas, just by going
over and meeting with these women and children and meeting with the
pastors and counselors, could provide hope sufficient to open the doors
to so many more who have been victims--who thought it was hopeless and
nobody cared now today and in the last few days coming forward--just
think what could have happened if our beautiful First Lady had made a
trip to Nigeria or if our President had even taken actions that got
back to the families so they knew there was hope.
The United States has no business going to war in Nigeria--we should
not--but there are things that could be done without declaring war on a
country when you find out that there is such a pervasive evil as Boko
Haram, as al Qaeda, as radical Islam that wants to wipe the United
States off the map and doesn't mind killing, repeatedly raping young
girls, burning churches, burning homes, terrorizing people all because
they had this sick, perverted idea that their god thinks that is good
fun. It is time for moderate Muslims to stand up and to stand for the
god they believe in. That would give even more hope.
I took some pictures while I was there. I wasn't sure it was a good
idea, but they said this is part of providing hope that somebody will
take this to America and that others will understand, and then if they
could see pictures of its being presented in Congress, that that would
add even more hope and would help good people to rise up who have been
victims for so long.
America doesn't have to fight everybody's war, but they certainly
have to do more than a hashtag and a Twitter. 43 and Twitters, as we
saw, were not sufficient to stop Putin from invading the Crimea.
Hashtags and Twitters were not sufficient to keep Boko Haram leaders
from laughing at the sexual and horrible abuse of young girls who were
kidnapped from school--girls they are still holding. At least President
Clinton was willing to send a missile from time to time to try to send
a message. In this administration, we have sent hashtags instead. It
doesn't provide a whole lot of hope. They don't follow Twitter in the
jungles of Nigeria.
Mr. Speaker, these are many of the mothers of the girls who were
kidnapped by the radical Islamist group Boko Haram. They were anxious,
actually, to have a picture taken so that people could actually see and
they wouldn't be forgotten. The faces of the minor girls have been
blurred out. This woman here, Mr. Speaker, had two daughters who were
kidnapped. She had great difficulty in talking about what happened the
night they were kidnapped without falling to the floor and weeping
bitterly. Their pastor over here on the far right is a devout Christian
leader and is doing all he can to help the victims' families.
This is that mother, Mr. Speaker, and the pastor. The counselor said
just having someone come from the United States, put an arm around
them, hug, and hold a hand has changed the outlook. Imagine what would
happen if the authority of our administration did something besides
Twitter.
The pastor is a sweetheart of a man. He seemed so grateful. He said
he knew what it meant that someone came all the way from America to
show he cared.
The face is blurred, but this is one of the children. They said she
has had trouble doing a whole lot of anything but weeping and is in a
deep, deep depression for her friends.
Mr. Speaker, I do believe it is true--to whom much is given, of them
much will be required. We have been blessed like no nation in the
history of the world. Now, in one of the ways you provide hope--and it
is throughout the Book of Proverbs, throughout the Bible, itself--
government is supposed to show impartiality and take care of those
within its country.
Some wonder, Well, gee. Aren't we supposed to help our neighbors?
Neighbors could be from other countries. That is absolutely correct. As
individuals, we are supposed to help our neighbors, and our neighbors
can be from other countries, but there is a sworn obligation of
government to help protect and keep the people safe within the
country's borders.
One of the reasons that it is helpful in a government role to reach
out to people and give them hope to defeat their enemies and to stand
up to their enemies is that, as President Bush used to say, I would
much rather fight our enemies somewhere else instead of around our own
homes. I would think that, as has been done in different places around
the world, we can go to war, but you send a little help. For heaven's
sake, in Libya, when we knew there were rebels who were supported by al
Qaeda, we ended up having some kind of operation to send weapons in--
getting weapons to people we knew included al Qaeda.
I have been wondering: How many of those weapons were being bandied
about the night Chris Stevens, Sean Smith, Ty Woods, and Glen Doherty
were killed?
Yet we have nations that are friendly nations, that we know are not
evil, are not possessed by evil, but are wanting to fight evil--radical
Islam--that is a threat to people in this country. Anywhere radical
Islam exists, it exists with the belief that there should be a
worldwide caliphate and that everyone, particularly in the Great Satan
of America, should be destroyed or subjugated or, at the very best,
made to pay a tax for the right to exist in another religion within
Muslim country--if not killed or wiped out altogether.
{time} 1930
I certainly won't forget those families in Nigeria. It is startling
to think how much could be helped by doing something more than Twitter.
That is no substitute for a foreign policy.
Our moderate Muslim friends, our international atheist friends, our
Christian friends, they feel like we ought to stand up against evil
that ultimately would be a threat to us.
I think people should not forget that the Taliban was defeated within
a matter of short months in Afghanistan,
[[Page H5315]]
without a single American loss of life, up to and including that famous
ride uphill led by the Northern Alliance leader, General Dostum, whom I
have met a number of times. The Taliban was routed and defeated. No
American blood was shed to that point.
There are ways to fight evil without going to war. But if you are not
going to fight, for our soldiers, for our military members' sake, don't
leave them stranded telling them to hold what they got when it may
include IEDs.
The lesson from Vietnam should have been, we are not going to send
our military anywhere that we don't give them all of the weapons they
need to fight, to win, and come home.
We are not, never have been empire builders. Never have been. That is
why the people in France still speak French. In Germany they speak
German. In Italy they speak Italian, because we have never been about
building an empire. We have been about liberty, freedom.
We want to be left alone, but when evil raises its head, it is time
to speak up.
But the only way a nation can remain a nation very long and be
effective, without giving way to complete corruption or chaos, is if
the rule of law is observed impartially, across the board.
And you can't have a law-abiding, effective nation where there are
immigration laws that say, here is the process you must go through in
order to get into our country. Over a million people a year go through
that legal process, and more millions are standing in line to go
through that process.
All they see and hear is that America is no longer a nation of laws.
America now just lets anybody come in who comes. And we ignore the law.
We become as a temporary Third World nation, saying we are going to
ignore the laws that have helped make us the greatest nation in the
world.
I still haven't heard from this administration any explanation as to
why they might think that unaccompanied minors under 18 are flocking to
our border like never before.
As I have explained, Mr. Speaker, before, when the word spreads
through Central America, South America that if you just come to
America, we are not sending anybody home, and story after story says
that people come and they get word back home, we came, and sure enough,
they are not sending people home.
For those in the administration who are not stupid, but are ignorant
of what is going on, here is an article, translated from an El
Salvadoran newspaper dated June 7. The headline, Mr. Speaker, is: ``USA
Will Give Legal Assistance to Children Migrating Alone.''
Well, that is incentive. Wow. It is really true. The newspaper said
if you can just get your kids to the United States, the U.S. Government
will give them legal assistance.
The story is going back. It is not comfortable. Some people are lying
in large rooms together, but food is being provided. Now they are going
to provide legal assistance. Medical care, medical needs are provided
because that is who we are.
The problem is, you have to stop the humanitarian crisis by
continuing to lure people into the United States by saying the United
States law is United States law.
Each of us in the Federal Government, Congress, and the
administration, we have taken an oath to support and defend our
Constitution, which means we follow our Federal laws, which means you
have got to come into the United States legally.
Some estimate that maybe a billion, billion and a half people want to
come into the United States. That would overwhelm, destroy the United
States. We have an obligation to make sure we bring people in in a
rational, methodical way so that we don't destroy this great nation.
So it seems to be a bit hypocritical for countries that don't allow
near as many people in to their countries as we do, percentagewise or
otherwise, to complain about unfair U.S. immigration laws.
Well, there are some things that certainly need to be reformed, and
we could get that done immediately once the President ever gets around
to securing the border.
But we have got to get back to following the law, to enforcing the
law, or we are going to lose the country. With what is happening on our
southern border, with what it is happening with the lawlessness in this
city, people not only refusing to follow the law and follow their oath,
but actually coming up with ways to encourage people to come violate
our law even more by the thousands.
Here's another article from an El Salvador newspaper from June 5:
``Extension of Suspension of Student Deportation.'' So, the article
here is making clear, yes, some came into the United States illegally,
but the President is suspending enforcement of the laws he is sworn to
uphold.
He just did it by fiat. He announced it. So is it spoken, so is it
written, so shall it be.
That is what happens in a monarchy. That is not supposed to happen
here. And if our friends down the other end of the hall in the Senate
would stand with us, we could get back to observing the Constitution
and protect the constitutional powers that are afforded to Congress and
not to the other end here of Pennsylvania Avenue.
It is time to stand up. And perhaps, if people in this administration
were not so busy luring people in by their words and actions, luring
them to violating U.S. law, then maybe they would have more time to
send more than a Twitter to evil radical Islamists wreaking havoc
around the world that will ultimately end up on our doorstep because
they still consider us the Great Satan.
Here is from a Honduran newspaper: ``U.S. Military Base in California
Used to House Children.'' The article is translated from June 7. Going
through and explaining how these kids came up unaccompanied. We didn't
turn them back. We brought them in. We are taking care of them.
Here is another article, though, from Houston. ``Breitbart Announces
Border Security and Public Corruption Tip Line'':
The U.S. Border Patrol has been overwhelmed. The Federal
Government is releasing thousands of illegal immigrants per
week.
The information Washington, D.C., shares about the border
with the American people is often at odds with reality in the
region, and scores of foreign children were found to be
packed into holding cells on U.S. soil.
Breitbart News has reported a near-steady stream of Mexican
cartel activity and criminal efforts across the United
States, reported on a plethora of corrupted U.S. officials
and law enforcement along or near the U.S.-Mexico border, and
reported countless tales of human suffering due to an often
wide open and unsecured border.
Breitbart Texas is introducing a new tip line for Border
Patrol agents, Customs and Border Protection officers, other
law enforcement, and other citizens to expose the reality of
conditions along the U.S. Mexico border.
``The new tip line is for law enforcement or anyone who
wants to speak out on discrepancies between what Washington,
D.C., is saying and what is actually occurring on the
ground.''
Breitbart Texas Managing Director Brandon Darby said:
``Whether you know of Mexican cartel-related corruption
occurring on U.S. soil, people or government officials
helping human trafficking, foreign children being kept in
horrible conditions or exploited, or simply feel the moral
obligation to tell Americans what is really occurring in the
region, this tip line is for you.''
``We are competent and able to handle and research these
matters,'' Darby said. ``Anyone can call in and email with
information, and we will do all we can to investigate and get
the word out.''
The tip line number, the article says, is 877-204-2033. Breitbart
Texas Managing Director Brandon Darby can be reached. Somebody is
trying to make a difference.
So then here is a story from The Washington Times by Cheryl Chumley:
``Border Agents Warn of Chicken Pox, MRSA, Staph From Illegal Child
Crossings.'' Border patrol agents who have already experienced scabies
infestation from illegal border crossers now fear that thousands of
children who are sweeping into the United States are bringing a host of
new diseases and ailments of even more serious nature.
``We are starting to see chicken pox, MRSA, staph infections. We are
starting to see different viruses,'' said Rio Grande Valley Border
Patrol Agent Chris Cabrera.
Meanwhile, agents are still fighting off the scabies, a highly
contagious skin disease that causes massive itching due to burrowing
mites.
The article goes on: ``We have an obligation to our oath to this
country, to those we are supposed to provide a
[[Page H5316]]
common defense for, and it is pretty tragic what it happening now.''
Here is a situation report from Thursday, May 29, RGV Sector Unified
Coordination Group, EOC, and it goes through numbers, UACs,
unaccompanied children, running through numbers of kids coming into the
country illegally.
Then as U.S. District Judge Andrew Hanen has reported, the Department
of Homeland Security has been engaging in human trafficking.
{time} 1945
Come into the country, we will take you to your parents, even if they
are illegally here. Leave your aunt, uncle, family. Come with human
traffickers to the United States, and we will get you to wherever your
parents will be. If you are coming and your parents are not with you,
and they are not in the United States, hey, we will find somebody to
take care of you.
That is not the message that is literally being sent out by this
administration, but that is certainly the message that is being
communicated by our actions. As a result, the number of what this human
smuggling report says cause illegal alien apprehensions by southwest
border sector shows to be skyrocketing, skyrocketing.
It is incredible the number of people that are now flooding into the
United States because they have heard nobody is following their oath
with this administration. They are not enforcing the law. They have
become like our country, basically. They are ignoring the law. It is
great. Come on now.
Here's a sitrep report from 9 June, 1600 hours, regarding
unaccompanied children, the UC influx. It reports, Mr. Speaker, for the
entire month of May, there were 5,595 children screened by the Border
Patrol, but just in the first 8 days of June, there had been 6,956
children screened by the Border Patrol. As I understand it, May was far
bigger than April, and April was bigger than March.
I mean, this is increasing because the administration has not gotten
serious about abiding by its oath, by not providing a common defense,
not enforcing our borders, not enforcing our immigration laws.
A Nation that refuses to enforce such important laws is going to find
that, when it gets around to deciding the Nation is at risk, it will
find that it is quite possibly too late.
Instead of being concerned about following an oath, enforcing
immigration laws, making sure that people have filled out the proper
documents, gotten a visa legally--properly--coming in the proper way,
we had many officials who were brought in, made aware of this Bergdahl
swap, except for the people the law required to be told--yes, the
Members of Congress--the lawlessness goes on. We have got to stand up
and say enough is enough.
This is an article under U.S. news titled, ``Officials Predicted
Detainees in Bowe Bergdahl Swap Would Rejoin Taliban,'' from Julian
Barnes, dated June 10, from Washington.
Before the U.S. transferred five Afghan Taliban detainees
to secure the freedom of Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl, American
intelligence officials predicted that two of the men would
return to senior positions with the militant group, according
to U.S. officials.
The classified assessment, a consensus of spy agencies
compiled during the prisoner-swap deliberations, said two
others of the five were likely to assume active roles within
the Taliban, while only one of the five released detainees
was considered likely to end active participation in the
group's effort to undermine the elected government of
Afghanistan.
Make no mistake--it is not here in this article--but these people do
not just believe in being hostile to the Government of Afghanistan.
They consider the United States the Great Satan.
While this is going on and we are releasing terrorists, who will
ultimately kill Americans--and mark my words, there will be Americans
who die unnecessarily because of the release of these murderous thugs.
For anyone who says, well, you know, they didn't technically stab
anybody or actually cut off their heads--they believe, they are
complicit, they support, they assist, and under every State's law, I am
aware of--and every Federal law--that makes them a principal. That
makes them guilty of the crime, itself.
I would think, under the logic of those who say, well, we don't think
they actually murdered somebody, themselves--well, under that scenario,
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed's admission that he planned 9/11/2001 and that
he glorifies Allah if he has terrorized Americans, he is not really a
murderer because he didn't actually fly the plane in that killed them
himself. He just planned it and made sure that it was carried out. That
is some pretty weak reasoning.
This is going to cost American lives, letting these five Taliban go.
There was a bill that my friend from California, Dana Rohrabacher,
filed--some of us signed onto--that would have prevented the executive
branch from taking any action to release four of these five that were
released. That is how serious we took it, but the administration seems
to think: hey, it was a good deal, we made a good deal.
Well, it wasn't a good deal. You can't release people who have
engaged in evil this serious, who have not recanted their evil, who
want to go back and commit atrocities against nonradical Islamists--
whether moderate Muslims, but especially Christians and Jews--and not
expect that to come back on you and hurt you.
This is an article from FOX News, published June 11, today, ``Hagel
admits administration mishandled aspects of Taliban swap.'' You think?
Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel arrives on Capitol Hill in
Washington, Wednesday, June 11, 2014, to testify before the
House Armed Services Committee.
Defense Secretary Hagel, on Wednesday, sought to ease
concerns about the controversial swap of five hardened
Taliban leaders for Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl, but under
pressure from lawmakers, acknowledged that the administration
mishandled the announcement.
``We didn't handle some of this right,'' Hagel admitted to
the House Armed Services Committee, toward the end of the
first public hearing on the prisoner exchange.
The hearing lasted more than 5 hours, as lawmakers from
both sides of the aisle voiced concerns about the trade--
while some also accused Republicans of exaggerating the
security threats.
It is unfortunate that names aren't mentioned as to who said
Republicans were exaggerating the security threats because, Mr.
Speaker, when Americans are killed because of this ill-advised swap, we
need to be able to come back to the floor and say: these are the people
that thought it was exaggerated to say that releasing murderous, evil
thugs who hate America was not going to come back to bite us and cost
American lives.
This other article, all of this going on at the same time, ``U.S.
Watches As Iraq Speeds Toward Disaster.''
Fighters for the al Qaeda-linked Islamic State of Iraq and
Syria took Mosul today, giving the militant group control of
Iraq's second largest city and setting the country on a path
toward chaos.
ISIS militants already control Fallujah, a city that
American Marines took in 2004 in what was the bloodiest
battle of the Iraq war. Now, with both Mosul and Fallujah
under their control, nearly half of Iraq is in the grips of a
group that is a formal affiliate of a terrorist group.
Equally troubling are the circumstances under which the
city fell. Iraqi security personnel simply abandoned their
posts, according to reports.
It sounded like the Bush administration had teed up a security forces
agreement--sometimes called SFA--with Iraq, could have gone ahead and
signed it, but thought--because this is the way George W. Bush thinks--
even though he is a Republican and a Democrat was coming in, like his
father, he feels like: I will do something nice. I will leave this teed
up. He can come in, sign it, get a lot of credit. It will help him
start off a good Presidency.
Well, guess what, it didn't work out. It turns out Bush should have
gone ahead and signed the agreement. Because of the mishandling by this
administration, now all of those precious American lives and the blood
that was shed at Mosul and Fallujah now has radical Islamists back
standing on those spots where the blood was shed.
It is time for what in east Texas is called common sense and here in
Washington is just sense because it isn't common. It is time for us to
listen to the American people, to read the law and follow it, to keep
our oaths to the American people because a failure to be vigilant costs
liberty.
I still think, Mr. Speaker, because to whom much is given--which is
the United States, given more than any nation in history--of them, much
is required.
As we allow lawlessness to continue on our borders here in Washington
[[Page H5317]]
without encouraging law-abiding, decent activity in places where evil
radical Islam is reigning supreme, we will be held accountable. This
country will suffer for its negligent and intentional neglect in
following the law that has made us so great.
To those who want to descend to Third World status, this is how you
do it: you just stop following your own laws, you start ruling by how
you feel about things, instead of what the law says.
We have an oath to do better. We have an obligation to the past
generations who have sacrificed the last full measure of devotion, as
Lincoln said, and our failure will cause future generations to rise up
and curse our names if we don't start forcing people to follow the law.
Mr. Speaker, tonight, I yield back the balance of my time with a
broken heart.
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