[Congressional Record Volume 163, Number 26 (Tuesday, February 14, 2017)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E189]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




             HONORING THE LIFE OF CONGRESSMAN ROBERT GARCIA

                                 ______
                                 

                     HON. JENNIFFER GONZALEZ-COLON

                             of puerto rico

                    in the house of representatives

                       Tuesday, February 14, 2017

  Miss GONZALEZ-COLON of Puerto Rico. Mr. Speaker, I rise today as 
Puerto Rico's sole elected representative in Congress to speak about a 
great man who gave up his voting rights in order to live and die in the 
place he loved so much, my Puerto Rico.
  Former Congressman Robert ``Bob'' Garcia devoted his life to helping 
our nation become more open and diverse. Before 1990, being Hispanic 
was not even a classification in the census. Thanks to him, from 1990 
on, Hispanics are now counted. Thanks to him, we now know that there 
are nearly 60 million Hispanics in America, over 50 million in the 50 
states and over 3.4 million in Puerto Rico and the rest of our 
territories.
  Thanks to Bob Garcia, the early divisions between African-Americans 
and Hispanics began to heal. Thanks to his solidarity, our nation now 
devotes a federal holiday to honor the most important African-American 
in our nation's history, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
  Thanks to Bob Garcia and his fellow Congressman Jack Kemp, a 
Republican, their good idea of creating Enterprise Zones, where poverty 
is fought through job creation and not through handouts, became a 
reality. Today I stand for the expansion of this program.
  Like hundreds of thousands of Puerto Ricans, Bob Garcia served in the 
United States Army, in his particular case during the Korean War as a 
radio operator with the Third Infantry Division. Yet, like his fellow 
veterans on the Island, his right to vote for the President and a full-
fledged delegation in the U.S. Congress was taken away the minute he 
moved to Puerto Rico.
  On a lighter note, every time I spoke to him, he would remind me 
that, since his first election to Congress in 1978, he had never voted 
for a Republican, that is, until he voted for me, a Republican woman, 
to represent him as a non-voting delegate in this House.
  I am honored that for three weeks, Bob was my constituent. He and his 
wife Jane moved a few years ago to Puerto Rico, knowing that in so 
doing, they, like the other 3.4 million U.S. citizens residing on the 
Island, would become disenfranchised. Last November, they couldn't vote 
for the President, U.S. senators or voting members of Congress, but 
they chose me to be Puerto Rico's sole elected voice in this chamber. 
Bob empowered me to fight to give him back his voting rights, not 
through relocation to the states, but in the Puerto Rico he chose to 
live the last days of his long, fruitful and accomplished life.
  Twelve days ago, while lying in state in the territorial Capitol 
building, Bob Garcia was honored by the people of Puerto Rico. Today, I 
join my fellow members in honoring a friend and mentor who left his 
mark in this body and in the history of a nation. May God bless 
Congressman Bob Garcia and his legacy.

                          ____________________