[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 69 (Friday, April 27, 2018)]
[House]
[Pages H3738-H3740]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  1330
                           ISSUES OF THE DAY

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Faso). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of January 3, 2017, the Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Texas (Mr. Gohmert) for 30 minutes.
  Mr. GOHMERT. Mr. Speaker, it is always an honor to speak here, and 
especially to follow friends--very dear friends--hear  Steve King talk 
about the importance of life.
  I know there is historical accounts in the Old Testament when it 
talked about different kings and what went on while they were there. It 
normally says something like: ``and he did evil in the eyes of the 
Lord,'' or ``he did right in the eyes of the Lord.''
  And every now and then, there is an addition to emphasize just how 
evil the people were. A society was under a particular king in Israel, 
and that addition was whenever--now and then, it would mention that 
mothers and fathers were sacrificing their babies on the altar of some 
idol.
  And only if you believe the Old Testament, like the majority of 
Americans have for all our history, that ought to be quite an awakening 
when you realize that we have killed over 60 million babies.
  I have talked to so many women who are brokenhearted, and they have 
got to learn to give it up and move on, but it eats away at them, the 
thought that they allowed a precious life to be taken that nature had 
entrusted them with. So, anyway, I just hate to see any women eaten up 
with guilt.
  And it is not because there is a pro-life movement. It was there long 
before a pro-life movement. I hope that we can get the Heartbeat bill 
that my friend  Steve King was advocating, I hope we could get that 
passed and get it to the Supreme Court.
  Some of the rulings over the years have had to do with the ambiguity, 
the vagaries in at what point an abortion was no longer allowed. But 
any of us, if you see someone hurt and you want to find out if they are 
alive, you run up and you check. And if you find a heartbeat, then you 
call an ambulance--you call 911 and ask for an ambulance. If there is 
no heartbeat, then you report a dead body, and there is no lifesaving 
effort at all made if there is no heartbeat.
  So I thought it was brilliant to have an approach like that. There 
are still some vagaries as to when a child first starts feeling pain in 
the womb, but there is no question, if you have on videotape evidence 
of the heartbeat, you see it, you hear it, then that is not so obscure 
that even some of the dense heads at the Supreme Court would be able to 
realize, yup, that is proof positive, that is hard, objective proof 
that there is a life and being worth protecting.
  So I really applaud and join in with my friend  Steve King's efforts, 
and we hope that even the last holdout pro-life groups, the National 
Right to Life, would get onboard. Most of us here that are pro-life, if 
we hear that there is any bill that will save innocent lives, we get 
onboard; count me in; I want to be part of it; I want to support it. So 
it is really intriguing when we have a bill that will save lives, even 
more than bills that that person or that group is already sponsoring.
  And if anybody holds back, I don't know--there is not a good reason 
for holding back, and hopefully, it is not just for selfish reasons. 
Because the real pro-life folks, we support anybody's bill. We don't 
care. If one of my Democrat friends bring it, it doesn't matter. If it 
is a good bill, we want to be there for it.
  I have just finished filing, just moments ago, a new bill, and it has 
come over a long period of time--agonizing. Especially having been a 
felony judge, handled major civil litigation as well, and then having 
been briefly a chief justice of a court of appeals, when I see judges 
that are so immoral and outrageously unconstitutional that they become 
monarchs in their own little kingdoms, and they refuse to follow the 
Constitution like I did--I wanted to legislate. I disagreed with laws 
that existed, and especially some Federal laws that existed, so when my 
term was up, I didn't--the Governor offered to appoint me to another 
appeals position, and I said: ``No, I want to legislate.''
  And to legislate, I have to run for office to do that as a 
legislator. So I ran for Congress, and it was--it required financial 
sacrifice of basically everything my wife and I had, except our home 
and our cars, but, hopefully, before long, we will finish paying off 
our kids' college loans. They shouldn't have to pay them because, 
before I went on the bench, we had money set aside to deal with that.
  But in the major financial adjustment from what I was making to what 
I made on the bench as a judge, that was part of the sacrifice, and I 
didn't want my kids to have to suffer--my wife and I didn't--because I 
chose to be a public servant.
  But coming to legislature, here is the way you legislate. And we have 
too many judges that have not only been legislating, but on the issues 
of immigration, asylum, naturalization, DACA, we have had judges become 
all three branches. To me, that means they need to be removed from 
office--just removed. They need to be impeached and removed from the 
bench.

[[Page H3739]]

  Doing that much damage to our constitutional system of restraint, of 
checks and balances, they have blown away all the checks and balances, 
and the only check on them, they think, ought to be in a higher court.
  Unfortunately, we have people on the Supreme Court that are violating 
the Constitution, violating their oath, which, of course, would be a 
basis for removal. But they have become legislators, and anyone who can 
read, can read the Constitution and see where the power is on 
naturalization, immigration: it is in the Congress.
  And there are certain executive powers that are newer to the 
executive branch, to the President--through the President to the 
immigration authorities, and we have judges that have usurped executive 
power, congressional power. And Congress has given certain authority to 
the President that we have the power to do.
  And then to have judges come in and make national security decisions 
when they have a fraction, a tiny, tiny fraction of the information 
needed to make adequate national security decisions, that is why the 
Constitution did not put national security decisions in the hands of 
the courts.

  So under our immigration laws that Congress had full authority to 
pass and did, immigration courts were set up. Now, I had quite 
significant concerns when I realized that Eric Holder, as Attorney 
General, then Loretta Lynch, they appointed all of the immigration 
judges without any other confirmation requirement. They just could pick 
them, and they served. That was a bit alarming.
  And in previous legislation, I had assurances that my concerns would 
be fixed and we would come up with a way to confirm immigration judges. 
We still don't have a consensus on that. But nonetheless, in view of 
some of the decisions in recent days where a district judge in a small 
district in the United States, one little district in one State decides 
a national security issue for the whole country, it is outrageous.
  Putting this Nation at risk because of their constitutional 
violations, which means their violations of their oath--and I agree 
with my friends here in Congress that say it is time to start bringing 
those people--I believe my friend, Jeff Duncan, was mentioning it 
earlier today. It is time to bring judges like that before our 
Judiciary Committee and vote to impeach them for violating their oath, 
violating the Constitution. Violating an oath is, I think, quite a 
significant charge in and of itself. It is a crime. But we have got to 
do something to rein in the runaway judiciary.
  You know, the Founders, numerous of them had commented the judiciary 
will be the least threat to our checks and balances because they will 
have the least power. But somehow, all these years later, since 1789, 
when the Constitution was ratified, the judicial part of our government 
has become really the biggest threat to checks and balances, to the 
constitutional restraints on power, which means they are a threat to 
our ongoing representative form of government.
  So we obviously have to have quick decisions, quicker than have been 
made, regarding immigration status. And of course, the judges that Eric 
Holder and Loretta Lynch appointed had no problem at all saying: Okay. 
Here is your notice. We are not going to restrain you. You can go 
wherever you want, but come back in 4 years for a hearing.
  And, of course, most of them never came back. And many of them, turns 
out, they have gotten taxpayer IDs so they can file tax returns, not 
for the purpose of paying more tax, but so that they can get back more 
tax than they paid in by claiming a bunch of children.
  There have been TV stations and others that have looked into specific 
claims and found there is some places where there would be one house, 
dozens of kids would be allegedly in that house being claimed as 
dependents, and different families claiming dependents, but there is no 
telling how much.
  I am sure it is billions of dollars that have been paid out to people 
illegally in the country for claiming that they have children. Some 
have been found. Okay, they had children, but they were in Mexico or 
Central America, and yet we are paying them for being here as illegal 
aliens, and not just through earned income tax credit--or the child tax 
credit, rather, but also for all kinds of benefits that they sign up 
for and get--food stamps, right on along the line.
  But in order to stop one little district judge in one remote part of 
the country from deciding national security issues that put American 
citizens at risk, it is time to do what constitutional law professors 
have talked about for years--maybe not in some Ivy League schools where 
they don't really teach the Constitution. They teach how to avoid the 
Constitution.
  But as my constitutional law professor, David Guinn, used to say at 
Baylor Law School, there is only one Federal court, tribunal of any 
kind that owes its existence to the Constitution, that is the Supreme 
Court. Every other Federal court owes its existence and its 
jurisdiction to the United States Congress. Now, that is the 
Constitution.
  So, as some have said, Congress has the power to bring courts into 
the world, and we have the power to take them out. We have the power to 
say: This is your jurisdiction, and no more, or you will take on this 
area.

                              {time}  1345

  So we created immigration courts. We do need them, and we have to 
have them make decisions much more quickly. That is one of the things I 
am so grateful to Jeff Sessions for. He is appointing great immigration 
judges. They are making decisions as quickly as possible, so they don't 
leave people in limbo for years, like was done in the past 8, or prior 
to the Trump administration. So he is making progress there.
  But since Congress clearly has the power to set the jurisdiction for 
every Federal court tribunal of any kind, then it is time to do what my 
new bill--and I just got the number, and I appreciate the clerk's quick 
and efficient efforts--but this now will be H.R. 5648. It says:

       To amend title 28 of the U.S. Code, to provide for Supreme 
     Court original jurisdiction over certain immigration actions, 
     and for other purposes.

  Here is what it says on page 2:

       The Supreme Court and any immigration court established 
     under the immigration laws, as such term is defined in 
     section 101 of the Immigration and Nationality Act, are the 
     only courts that shall have jurisdiction in which a claimant 
     shall have standing to raise issues of immigration, 
     naturalization, refugee status, asylum, and any other related 
     matter or case involving a claimed right to enter or remain 
     in the United States, or any case or controversy of any 
     provision of the immigration laws, or any order issued or 
     rule made pursuant thereto.

  In other words, we need to end these runaway rapscallion judges who 
got through a confirmation by hook or crook and showed their real 
colors when they got out on the bench that they want to be little 
monarchs. It is time to rein in their jurisdiction so they can do no 
further damage to this Nation to our national security, which was never 
placed in the hands of the judiciary, it was always to be in the hands 
of the President and the Congress.
  I hope we can get plenty of cosponsors and bring that to the floor. I 
really believe that, in this election year, if we can get that to the 
floor and pass it here in the House, then, in this election year, there 
could be so much pressure brought to bear on Senators down the hall.
  We ought to be able to get it passed. It may be a long shot, but it 
was a long shot that the little 13 colonies could take on the most 
powerful country in the world, the most powerful Navy, the most 
powerful Army in the world, and win their independence, but they did. 
That is the hope that springs internal in the human breast. We have to 
start somewhere, and that is a start.
  Now, it took me weeks to get it done, but I have written an article 
recently. Giving attribution, there are many other articles and sources 
I used in accumulating these 48 pages. But after standing up a number 
of times in our conference and pointing out to the Republicans in 
conference that any Republican who says they know Robert Mueller will 
be fair or come to a fair decision or a fair conclusion or be just, 
they don't know the Robert Mueller I know. Here is where you get into a 
lot of different opinions, but that is where it is helpful to look at 
things that he has done in his life.

[[Page H3740]]

  I had hoped that, because he seemed clearly to be a person who should 
never have accepted the job of special counsel, that he was recusable. 
He was not qualified to be the special counsel on anything involving 
Russia, and certainly not the Trump campaign and Russia. Yet Rod 
Rosenstein, as the deputy AG, who had been involved in the Russia 
illegal attempts to gain control of U.S. uranium--and they knew that 
Russia was committing crimes to try to get our uranium--and Mueller was 
the head of the FBI, and he was the lead law enforcement person 
overseeing the operation, there was an informant within the system that 
was providing information to the Justice Department to Rosenstein and 
Mueller. Yet they put the kibosh on the investigation and the crimes 
that were being committed to get U.S. uranium. If they had not, then 
the sale of U.S. uranium that would end up in the hands of Russia would 
never have been allowed to go through.
  CFIUS that approves sales that are sensitive to our security, they 
surely could never have approved the sale if Rosenstein and Mueller had 
just been honest and open that there is an investigation to Russia's 
illegal attempts to get our uranium. But, if they had spoken up about 
that, I don't think there is any question that the Clinton Foundation 
would never have gotten $145 million in contributions from people 
involved with the uranium sale. And it is quite likely that Bill 
Clinton would not have gotten $500,000 to speak for 20 minutes from 
Russia.
  But I have written an article, 48 pages, entitled: ``Robert Mueller: 
Unmasked.'' You can go to my website. You can go to Sean Hannity's 
website, or others. I wouldn't do it on Google because of their 
dishonesty when it comes to conservatives. But DuckDuckGo. Bing is not 
as bad as Google. But look up ``Robert Mueller: Unmasked'' and download 
this article, read it, and arrive at your own opinion.
  This week, I found an article I had not seen before, by Eren Moreno, 
back in January of this year, entitled ``Mueller, Rosenstein, and 
McCabe Exposed Covering Hillary's Uranium One Scandal.'' At the end of 
the article, they reference a succinct recitation of things that have 
occurred. We don't know who this person is. He has used an anonymous 
name. But here is the thread. He says: ``As we now know, the DOJ have 
indicted a Mark Lambert on 11 counts related to his role in a bribery, 
money laundering, and kickback scheme.''
  Involving the sale of our uranium that would end up in Russian hands.
  So they finally indicted somebody over this. There have been others 
who have been quietly handled, and they are referenced here.
  And they reference an article here from the New York Post. It says: 
``Exec charged with bribing Russian official in uranium deal. There's 
an indictment in the FBI probe of the Uranium One scandal, in which the 
Obama administration cleared a business deal that gave a Russian 
company control of 20 percent of the U.S. uranium.''
  ``Background and reminder: from at least 2008, Robert Mueller's FBI 
were investigating Tenam, the U.S.-based subsidiary of Tenex, a 
subsidiary of Rosatom, the Kremlin's (Putin's) energy company. The same 
Rosatom that purchased Uranium One.''
  ``Tenam was importing Russian uranium into the U.S. Between 2004-
2014, the local manager, Mikerin, engaged with U.S. companies Transport 
Logistics (TL) and NexGen Security in a racketeering, wire fraud, 
bribery, and money laundering scheme.''
  ``When a TL insider, William Campbell, blew the whistle on what he 
was seeing, Mueller's FBI started an investigation that led to at least 
four indictments by Holder's DOJ.''
  ``Remember--the Tenam investigation is related to the Uranium One 
(U1) sale. That's because the Tenam investigation was hidden from 
Congress and CFIUS''--the group that analyzes and approves or 
disapproves foreign investments in the U.S.--``who approved the U1 sale 
in October 2010. If either had known about it, it's highly unlikely the 
U1 sale would have been approved.''
  ``And the more you analyze the Tenam investigation, the more it 
appears that the Obama administration and/or Clintons deliberately 
wanted it hidden. Consider.''
  ``William Campbell--the whistleblower. . . . `'
  He is the one who was providing information to Mueller's FBI about 
the illegal acts of Russia.
  Now, there are times that the witness wants witness protection, wants 
to be anonymous, and doesn't want anybody to know who he was, or who 
she was, and so for those reasons of the informant's safety it is not 
given. But that was not the case.
  Mueller at the FBI, the DOJ took a very unusual step. Instead of 
preventing others from knowing who this person was, they went after 
William Campbell and made him sign--under threat that they would come 
after and prosecute him--made him sign a nondisclosure agreement. 
Incredible.
  They didn't want--Rosenstein, who is the U.S. attorney over the 
investigation--they didn't want Campbell out telling about all of the 
crimes committed in Russia's acquisition of U.S. uranium. They have 
their own informant sign a nondisclosure agreement under threat so he 
wouldn't let anybody know about all the criminality surrounding 
Russia's efforts to get our uranium. That doesn't make sense, unless 
you know how much money came into the Clinton Foundation after the deal 
was approved.
  This goes on. It says: ``Now consider this--none of the four 
indictments ever saw the light of day.''
  Actually, that is not quite accurate. They just handled it very 
quietly. It says: ``Every one was either quietly settled under plea 
agreements, or dropped entirely, as follows.''
  ``Mikerin, the Tenam manager, was sentenced to 48 months under a plea 
deal, for crimes that had 20-plus year sentences.''
  That was in: ``United States of America v. Vadim Mikerin--Original 
Indictment 11/12/14. Conspiracy to Interfere with Interstate Commerce 
by Extortion . . . Forfeiture.''
  Darren Condrey had a plea agreement regarding his violations of 
antibribery and conspiracy laws.
  Carol Condrey had a plea agreement, and her case was dropped.
  Rubizhevsky from NexGen had the case settled with a plea agreement. 
That is astonishing given the charges.
  This stinks to high heaven. Mueller needs to go ahead and recuse 
himself and step down, and Rosenstein should do the same thing.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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