[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 80 (Wednesday, May 16, 2018)]
[House]
[Pages H3981-H3982]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




          HIGHER HOPES FOR PROFESSIONALS AROUND THE PRESIDENT

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Illinois (Mr. Gutierrez) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. GUTIERREZ. Mr. Speaker, we can only imagine what the President 
and Sean Hannity talk about every night on the phone. The two TV hosts 
have a lot to discuss, I am sure.
  Maybe they talk about their mutual lawyer, Michael Cohen, and what he 
might or might not have in his files that could incriminate one or both 
of them. Or maybe they just discuss their mutual admiration for Russian 
dictator Putin.
  We can be reasonably sure that neither of them spends too much time 
discussing things they have done for which they are ashamed or things 
they have done or said for which they should apologize.
  All of that blathering this past week about whether the White House 
or the President would apologize for comments by a White House staffer 
about a gravely ill American war hero, Senator John McCain, was just 
wasted breath, if you ask me. In our President, we have someone who 
does not ever apologize or regret something he or his staff has done, 
no matter how egregious.
  This week, the White House is not alarmed that a senior staff made 
light of Senator McCain's illness and life expectancy but, rather, that 
the comment about the former prisoner of war, an American hero, was 
made public.
  Clearly, someone on the White House staff who heard the comment knew 
it was wrong--just wrong. Moreover, they recognized the comment was 
emblematic of the attitude at the White House, from the President on 
down, and thought the Nation and the world should know about it.
  But it was the leak of accurate information from inside the White 
House that raised the ire of the President, not the fact that someone 
said things really awful about a true American hero.
  We should know by now that this President and his henchmen do not 
apologize:
  Tweeting racist videos from rightwing British groups? Nah, no 
apology.
  Booting able-bodied Americans who want to serve their country out of 
the military because they are transgender? Not even.
  Bragging about sexually assaulting women by grabbing their private 
parts? Well, he came close to apologizing, but not really.
  Some speculate that being unapologetic is just the President's brand. 
He is brash, and he says mean things and doesn't back down because 
doing so would make him look weak, and revealing his weakness in public 
is clearly among the President's greatest fears.
  The President and his late night phone buddy, Sean Hannity, remember? 
They complained about the last President being too apologetic.
  But looking tough to cover up a fear of inferiority is only one 
explanation for why this President does not apologize. He often doesn't 
apologize because he thinks he was right in the first place, like when 
he said there were good people on both sides of the Nazi rally in 
Charlottesville where a woman was murdered by racist KKK extremists.
  The President is not going to apologize, and not because it would 
make him look weak in the case of Charlottesville, but because he 
believes what he said was true: Nazis and the rest of Americans, the 
same.
  He will never apologize for his founding campaign sin: calling 
immigrants rapists and criminals. In fact, he is basing a broad anti-
immigration and anti-immigrant policy agenda on the bedrock belief that 
crime and the skin color of a person are synonymous.
  This puts everyone around the President in a difficult position. Do 
they point out the emperor's nudity or do they praise his new suit? His 
chief of staff, remember, was dispatched to tell a Black Member of 
Congress that she was lying about how the President treated a soldier 
killed in action until the chief of staff was shown to be lying, 
himself, about what the Congresswoman said.
  In the end, the American people knew what they were getting with this 
President, and a minority--not the majority of Americans, but a 
minority--still elected him to the White House

[[Page H3982]]

anyway. But the American people are learning important lessons about 
the President's enablers at the three most important branches of the 
Republican Party: at the White House, in the Congress, and at FOX News.
  We know the President doesn't lose sleep wrestling with the moral 
implications of his behavior, but all of us had higher hopes for the 
professionals around the President--expectations which were apparently 
too high, indeed.
  One thing is sure: this country owes a great debt to Senator John 
McCain, and our thoughts and prayers are with him, even if the 
President's thoughts are somewhere else.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Members are reminded to refrain from 
engaging in personalities toward the President.

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