[Congressional Record Volume 167, Number 189 (Wednesday, October 27, 2021)]
[House]
[Page H5936]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




           HONORING THE HEROISM OF ARISTIDES DE SOUSA MENDES

  (Mr. COSTA asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. COSTA. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor Aristides de Sousa 
Mendes, a Portuguese diplomat and hero who singlehandedly saved tens of 
thousands of lives of people fleeing the Nazi persecution in 1940.
  On October 19, 2021, Sousa Mendes was laid to rest in the National 
Pantheon in Lisbon, Portugal.
  He was proudly Portuguese and had a deep love of country, family, and 
the arts. He served as the Portuguese consulate general in Bordeaux, 
France, in 1940.
  When Hitler launched his invasion of France on May 10, 1940, millions 
of people suddenly found themselves in imminent danger from Nazi 
attack.
  Thousands sought visas in the consulate in Bordeaux trying to escape. 
In June of 1940, Sousa Mendes issued an estimated 30,000 visas, 
including to roughly 10,000 Jews fleeing for their lives with their 
families, despite the Salazar regime having forbidden their diplomats 
in Portugal from issuing such visas to refugees.
  The Israeli historian Yehuda Bauer cited Sousa Mendes' actions as 
perhaps the largest rescue action by a single individual during the 
Holocaust.
  As a punishment for disobeying the mandates of his country's Salazar 
regime, Sousa Mendes was stripped of his job, denied a pension, and 
pushed into poverty. His home was repossessed, and he suffered two 
strokes before passing away in 1954.
  ``I may have erred,'' he wrote, ``but if so, I did it 
unintentionally, having followed the voice of my conscience, which . . 
. never failed to guide me in the fulfillment of my duties, in full 
awareness of my responsibilities.''
  After years without recognition for his heroism, I commend the 
decision to lay Sousa Mendes to rest in the National Pantheon, 
celebrating his courage.
  Please join me in honoring Aristides de Sousa Mendes.

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