[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 103 (Wednesday, June 20, 2018)]
[House]
[Page H5349]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  1700
              WE ARE FAILING TO LIVE UP TO OUR CORE VALUES

  (Mr. MOULTON asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. MOULTON. Mr. Speaker, America is keeping kids in cages. America 
is keeping kids in cages.
  Many people across our country have risen to say that this is not who 
we are. It doesn't represent our values, our ideals, or our 
Constitution.
  But the sad reality is that today, this is who we are. You are an 
American. I am an American. It is fellow Americans who are ripping 
toddlers from their mothers and fathers and guarding them in steel 
cages.
  And in truth, we have done this before. We herded American Indians 
into reservations. We turned our backs on Jews fleeing for their lives 
from the Holocaust. We ripped children from their parents when we sold 
them as slaves.
  But we all thought we had learned our lessons, moved past those 
hateful times. We have been on a march to grow into a country with the 
courage to live up to our values and serve as a beacon of hope for the 
world, not repeat the darkest parts of our history.
  The families in these detention centers aren't fleeing to the U.S. to 
take our jobs, they are running for their lives. They are fleeing a 
world of racism, ransom, murder, where their sons are being forced into 
violent gangs, and their daughters are being stolen on their way to 
school and prostituted as sex slaves.
  A nation that fails to learn the lessons of history, that fails to 
live up to its core values, that can't abide by the rights enshrined in 
its own Constitution, is not strong, Mr. Speaker, it is weak.
  Today, we are stealing kids from their parents and we are weak.
  And although it is this administration's policy that is directly 
responsible for this disgusting practice, we are all guilty as fellow 
Americans so long as it goes on.
  Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. These are our core 
values. Let's live up to them today.

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