[Congressional Record Volume 163, Number 18 (Thursday, February 2, 2017)]
[House]
[Page H883]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                   TRUMP IMMIGRATION EXECUTIVE ORDER

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentlewoman from 
California (Ms. Brownley) for 5 minutes.
  Ms. BROWNLEY of California. Mr. Speaker, last Saturday, a U.S. Army 
interpreter, who risked his life serving our country for over a decade 
in Mosul and Baghdad, was stopped at the airport and detained for 18 
hours. His name was Hameed Khalid Darweesh.
  Why was he detained?
  Because he came from a country that was singled out by President 
Trump because of the religion of its people. He did so not to increase 
safety, but to instill fear.
  When people are afraid, they tend to let their President and their 
elected leaders do anything they think will protect them, and they 
ignore just about everything else.
  When the American people are afraid, they might ignore a President's 
promise that he would ``drain the swamp.'' When they are afraid, they 
might forget that a President has treated Vladimir Putin better than he 
has treated the heads of state of our allies and trading partners. They 
might ignore his attacks on women, on minorities, on our environment, 
on our health care, on our civil rights, on our public education 
system; and they might even ignore investigations into his vast 
conflicts of interest.
  They might be willing to overlook the very principles of our 
Constitution that, indeed, make us safe. One of these principles is 
freedom of religion, because our Founding Fathers knew that despots all 
over the world have used fear of another group's religion to do 
terrible, terrible things throughout the history of man. So when the 
President singles out who can come into this country and who cannot 
based on one's religion, he is insulting and turning his back on our 
Constitution--a Constitution that keeps us safe, a Constitution that, 
by its own example, helps to keep the world safe.
  Let's be clear. When Mr. Trump bars a man like Hameed, an interpreter 
who helped protect our troops from coming into our country, because of 
his religion, he is not protecting us; he is endangering us and he is 
endangering the world. We cannot let it stand. We must resist.

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