[Congressional Record Volume 168, Number 120 (Wednesday, July 20, 2022)]
[House]
[Pages H6913-H6916]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              {time}  1615
                       THEY BREAK IT, YOU BUY IT

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 4, 2021, the Chair recognizes the gentleman from Texas (Mr. 
Roy) for 30 minutes.
  Mr. ROY. Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the time here on the floor.
  I appreciate, as I said a minute ago, my friend from Louisiana, 
Representative Johnson, for his steadfast defense of the Constitution 
of the United States; his willingness to stand up for all the important 
values, from life to marriage; but importantly being a voice for this 
body, for the Republican Conference, and where we want to take this 
country; what we know the American people want us to do; and to stand 
athwart the absolutely absurd policies of a Democrat majority that 
doesn't give a whit about the people that they are rolling over in a 
quest to placate their radical leftist policies, whether it is energy 
or open borders, and I appreciate the gentleman from Louisiana and his 
efforts.
  I am here to talk about my Democratic colleagues and the extent to 
which the American people need to understand: They break it, you buy 
it. And that is the reality of what is happening.
  My Democratic colleagues are breaking--breaking this country, 
breaking up your families, breaking up our secure border, breaking up 
our military, breaking up our court system, the rule of law, breaking 
up our police, our law enforcement community.
  They are breaking up our economy, breaking the strength of the 
American dollar. They are breaking our position in the world, and they 
are breaking this body, the people's House. And it is high time it 
stopped.
  And we can only hope that in November we get a change so that we can 
stop it. And then my message to my Republican colleagues will be: We 
better stop it because what is happening in the so-called people's 
House cannot be tolerated any longer.
  They break it. This body, the leadership of this country, they break 
it. You buy it.
  In reverse, I would say, America is great. Washington is broken. They 
are breaking it every day and, as a result, they are breaking this 
great country that our forefathers fought so hard to give to us and to 
our children and our grandchildren.
  You cannot defend the policies of the Democratic majority. It is 
impossible to do. And in fact, if you set out to harm the United States 
of America, I would defy someone to demonstrate to me how you could do 
better than my Democratic colleagues are doing on a daily basis, 
ripping apart the Constitution, ripping apart the shreds of the flag, 
ripping apart the people of this country.
  Dividing us. Dividing us by race, dividing us by income, dividing us 
by our adherence to the Constitution or devotion to the border and 
devotion to the rule of law.
  That is what is happening on a daily basis, and it is purposeful. 
Let's be perfectly clear that it is purposeful.
  The reason my Democratic colleagues focus so intently on January 6 is 
they want to divide us. The reason they want to have race-based 
policies throughout our government is they want to divide us.
  The reason they want to make the border be supposedly about not 
liking Brown people is because they want to divide us. Never mind that 
south Texas is full of Brown people who are sick of wide-open borders 
empowering cartels.
  That is the reality of what is going on in this Chamber, and in the 
Senate, and at the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue.
  Just focus on the border for a minute: Broken, wide open, abused by 
cartels, exploited by terrorists, exploited by gang members, criminals 
coming into our country, killing American citizens. Fentanyl pouring 
into our communities, 107,000 dead Americans. 850,000 known got-aways 
pouring in between the ports of entry because our Border Patrol is 
overwhelmed, with not only no support from this administration, but the 
purposeful attack by the Secretary of Homeland Security lying about the 
good men and women of Border Patrol, saying that they whipped people 
that they didn't, and then hiding behind some report, while they give 
them administrative punishment.
  That is your leadership, ladies and gentlemen. They are breaking it 
and you have to buy it.
  They are leaving our border wide open, and American citizens are 
dying. Let me repeat that. They are leaving our border wide open, 
broken, and American people are dying, thousands upon thousands of 
Americans dying from fentanyl pouring into our communities, pushed by 
China, exploited by cartels, left to be able to come into our country 
because Democrats do not care about securing the border.
  And more importantly, my Democratic colleagues are perfectly fine 
purposely leaving our border wide open. It is purposeful. It is 
purposeful.
  They are breaking it and you are going to have to buy it.

[[Page H6914]]

  How about our defense?
  Our Defense Department is being broken on a daily basis by my 
colleagues on the other side of the aisle and in the other Chamber, and 
particularly, this administration, shoving into the Department of 
Defense a radical, woke ideology, radical, woke programs, policies 
focused on diversity, and equity, and inclusion, all of the things that 
they cloak with critical race theory to destroy and break apart the 
institution of our defense. It is purposeful.
  Vaccine mandates, forcing 60,000 guardsmen to be on the chopping 
block to lose their entire career. It is purposeful. They are breaking 
it.
  They are breaking that military you love. They are breaking that 
Department of Defense that needs to be there on that wall defending us. 
They are breaking it.
  They are breaking it by tucking tail and running out of Afghanistan 
with $85 billion of equipment there and 12 or 13 dead servicemembers 
and no accountability. No accountability for the brass at the Pentagon 
and no accountability so far at the White House for tucking tail and 
running.

  They are breaking our Defense Department.
  You talk to the servicemembers who were in my office, coming in in 
tears because they are about to lose their entire career because they 
choose not to take a politicized vaccine.
  Oh, by the way, by another broken governmental agency, or agencies, 
our whole public health system being radicalized by my colleagues on 
the other side of aisle to strike fear in the hearts of the American 
people, to watch them push aside and brush under the rug gain-of-
function research and all that we see unfolding in China in the Wuhan 
Institute of Virology, all that we know about the funding, American 
funding that was tied to that.
  All that we know about the absurdity of locking down schools, 
shutting down our schools so our kids are stuck in masks, stuck in the 
corner and not able to go to school, the damage it has done to our 
kids, the mental health issues, destroying the education of our young, 
all chasing the teachers' unions.
  We have seen the mandatory--or efforts at mandatory vaccines--
thankfully, partially struck aside, but many still in place, breaking 
the back of the people's trust in their public health, breaking the 
back of the people's ability to serve in the military and defend this 
country, breaking the back of people being able to be Federal public 
servants working for Border Patrol or other Federal agencies.
  Why?
  Because of fealty to Anthony Fauci, being the great wizard of public 
health while he poses for magazine covers and throws out pitches at 
baseball games.
  Meanwhile, your defense is broken. Your public health is broken, and 
you are going to have to buy it.
  How about crime on the streets of the United States of America?
  How about the 12 Democrat-run cities that have called for defunding 
their police and have seen skyrocketing crime enveloping the cities?
  The businessowner I spoke to today in Baltimore who says he is going 
to have to shut down his franchise because of rampant crime in 
Baltimore.
  Austin, Texas, which cut its police by a third and has seen homicides 
skyrocket from 59 to 89, has seen 911 calls unanswered, drug 
trafficking increasing. Taking police off the streets in Austin, Texas.
  We have seen 50 of the biggest urban areas see a 5 percent decrease 
in their police budgets, while my colleagues on the other side of the 
aisle say they are doing no such thing.
  But my friend, Mr. Johnson, rattled off quote after quote after quote 
in the House Judiciary Committee of my colleagues on the other side of 
the aisle calling for defunding of the police. Of course, it is an 
attack on our police. They are breaking our Police Department, breaking 
the backs of our men and women in blue and leaving our streets exposed 
to lawlessness and danger, and it is purposeful.
  How about energy?
  Could you take a more ridiculous position than to take the strength 
of national security, of having abundant oil and gas, the ability to 
lead on nuclear, and, instead, chase unicorn energy policies of nothing 
but solar and wind so that on a cloudless, windless day--or cloudy, 
windless day, you sit back and watch your energy plummet and your grid 
weaken.
  What kind of a country's leadership does that to its people?
  I would say the kind that want to break it. I would say the kind that 
want to chase the fairy tales and the unicorn energy policies that this 
administration wants to pursue.
  We could have nuclear power. It doesn't create any carbon dioxide. Do 
my colleagues on the other side of aisle want to do that?
  No. Because this is about fear. This is about breaking American 
energy. This is about breaking the back of it, so you can get on your 
private plane and fly to Davos and fit in with the Western Europeans 
and how great they are, while they are now burning wood to heat their 
homes.
  We have the greatest national security asset you could possibly 
imagine, which was full and complete energy independence, and we are 
completely flushing it down the toilet, to break it and to break it 
purposely. And we don't have to do it.
  We have abundant energy, abundant, clean-burning natural gas that we 
could export to other countries, as we were doing, driving down carbon 
dioxide.
  We could be producing nuclear facilities all across this country with 
zero CO2 production. But we are not.
  Instead, we are chasing--literally, we are tilting at windmills, 
dotting the landscape with windmills.
  A couple of weeks ago in Texas, we had 8 percent of the wind capacity 
available in our grid. Absolutely astounding what we are doing to the 
energy of the United States of America.
  Inflation. I mean, I can't even get all this in, the absurd policies 
of Democrats.
  I have already covered border, could go further.
  Already talked about defense; could go further.
  Didn't even get into Ukraine and the lack of briefings and the $56 
billion we just dumped into Ukraine, with zero indication of a strategy 
of what we are actually going to do, while we expand NATO, with zero 
indication about how that is going to impact Article 5, and an 800-mile 
border and whether NATO's going to upend its end of the bargain when we 
fund the vast majority of NATO. I didn't even talk about that part of 
defense.
  I didn't talk about crime. I mean, I talked about crime, but I didn't 
get into every aspect of it.
  I didn't get into every aspect of energy.
  Now I am talking about inflation. The wisdom of this administration 
coming in and dumping $1.9 trillion--I don't even remember what the 
name of that ridiculous bill was, but it was garbage. And it is now 
driving up the cost of goods and services for you, the American people.
  They are breaking it. They are breaking your jobs. They are breaking 
your income. They are breaking your ability to buy goods and services 
and you are, literally, going to have to buy it, and you are going to 
have to pay a lot for it, because they are spending money we don't 
have.

  They are printing money, throwing it out in the economy, driving up 
the prices of goods, while they are, simultaneously, restricting the 
ability for us to develop energy, to have abundant energy that you can 
afford.
  You like $4.50 gasoline? Well, guess what? Your Democratic leadership 
just defended that as being great. In a Rules Committee debate this 
week, when I sat in that room debating the rules, literally, the 
Democratic Rules Committee was talking about how great it is that the 
price of oil has come down.
  They were talking about the price of copper going down. Well, I have 
spent a lot of money on copper to wire my home. It is expensive as 
heck. It is now locked up in cages. But do you know what the price of 
copper going down means? Heading into a recession. That is the reality 
of what we are facing. That is the truth.
  Our economy is getting ripped to shreds, the price of goods and 
services are going up. And it is purposeful. Spending money we don't 
have.
  How can you justify spending $2 trillion, printing that money, and 
dumping it out there to drive up the price of goods and services, while 
cutting off the production of oil and gas, not developing nuclear, 
increasing the price

[[Page H6915]]

of gasoline, increasing the price of energy in your homes?
  It could only be purposeful. They are breaking it. They want to break 
it so they can live in unicorn land.
  But you are going to have to buy it, and it is going to be expensive.
  How about the state of the rule of law?
  How about the state of the family?
  How about the state of marriage?
  Just yesterday, on this floor--just yesterday, on this floor, we 
passed a law to force recognition by one State of another State's 
marriage, but by thereby doing that, for the first time, I think this 
body, certainly Members on this side, supporting the redefinition of 
marriage, which was manufactured by the 2015 Supreme Court decision, 
manufactured and forced upon the States, a redefinition of marriage.
  Now you see the wailing and gnashing of teeth because this court 
dared to say that Roe v. Wade was bad law, and that we should defer to 
the States in the protection of life and the recognition that that is 
the appropriate law under the Constitution.

                              {time}  1630

  Lastly, I would point out when we are talking about breaking it, this 
body is the best example of my Democratic colleagues not giving a whit 
about you, the people, rolling over and destroying the people's House, 
destroying this institution.
  I have not been able to offer an amendment on the floor of this body. 
Can't do it. Got to go to Rules. Beg for crumbs.
  They drive through so-called suspension of the rules bills. We get 
them often hours before, at most, a day or two before they are on the 
floor being asked to be voice voted. If we don't have a group of us on 
the floor monitoring those bills, they will go through without a vote.
  They don't care because voting doesn't matter, as evidenced by proxy 
voting, forcing a new rule that says you can turn your voting card that 
you, the voters, gave to representatives and give that to another 
member of Congress, upending the constitutional order which requires 
presence, a quorum, physical presence, debate.
  That is what the Constitution contemplates, and it is my Democratic 
colleagues who, for the first time in history, upended our requirement 
that we be present in the body of the House of Representatives to do 
our job. Blowing apart--blowing apart--this people's House.
  I will note, as I often do, that I am not saying that everybody on 
this side of the aisle has clean hands on all of these points. A lot of 
Republicans are taking advantage of the proxy voting that my Democratic 
colleagues created for the first time in history. They should not.
  I will say that to every member. I don't care if they are Freedom 
Caucus leadership or anybody in between. I will not back away from 
saying proxy voting is not only unconstitutional, it is wrong, and it 
is destroying this body.
  Forced magnetometers in this false name of security. Masks being 
forced upon members of Congress on the floor of the House, which have 
now been brushed aside because I guess Anthony Fauci or somebody 
decreed that somehow, it is now safe to walk around without masks until 
they say it is not safe.
  I yield to my friend from Virginia here in one second. I just want to 
say in conclusion to this part, and then I want to engage with my 
friend.
  My Democratic colleagues, unfortunately with a little bit of help 
from a few of my Republican colleagues on occasion, are breaking this 
country. They are breaking this body. They are breaking our 
Constitution, and it is purposeful.
  There are no other words to say what is happening at our border but 
that it is purposeful. There are no other words to say about what is 
happening on our streets with our law enforcement but that it is 
purposeful.
  There is no other thing you can say about our energy policies but 
that it is purposeful. There is nothing you can say about the spending 
and the inflation but that it is purposeful.
  The attack on the institution of marriage, the breakdown of the 
family, the targeting and the policies against life, that it is 
purposeful.
  The fact that we are destroying this body with proxy voting, that it 
is purposeful. The fact that we are destroying the Defense Department 
and the very core values of our men and women in the military with 
their woke policies, with their vax mandates, irrespective of what that 
does to defense, driving our recruiting down to unforeseen levels, but 
that it is purposeful, and it is wrong.
  I would just challenge my Republican colleagues that we better come 
in, if the American people give us power in November, and do the right 
thing to protect this country and to stop breaking it because the 
American people are having to buy it.
  I yield to my friend from Virginia (Mr. Good).
  Mr. GOOD of Virginia. I thank the gentleman from Texas for yielding 
time.
  Mr. Speaker, I had a constituent say to me from Bedford County, just 
outside of Lynchburg where I live, nothing this President and this 
majority in Congress is doing makes sense unless they hate the country. 
Nothing they are doing makes sense unless they hate the country.
  What would you do differently over the last year and a half if it was 
your purpose, your desire, your intention to ruin the country?
  Maybe you would undermine police. Maybe you would reduce funding for 
police. Maybe you would stop arresting violent criminals. Maybe you 
would stop prosecuting violent crimes. Maybe you would allow violent 
criminals to have no cash bail. Maybe we would release violent 
criminals from our prisons.
  You know what? All of those things are happening, and the Democrats 
seem surprised that crime has gone up across the country. Violent crime 
is up some 30 percent in the last year across the country.
  American cities, unrecognizable. People don't want to go there 
anymore because of these policies. Maybe the American people don't want 
4 million illegal aliens coming into the interior of their country in 
the past year and a half.
  Maybe we have a shortage of funding to take care of Americans, to do 
the things that we would like to do, to take care of our veterans, to 
take care of those most in need, to help our farmers, to help hard-
working Americans, to maybe give them a little bit of their resources 
back, to reduce the regulations and the oppression upon them.
  Maybe we don't need to bring in 4 million illegal aliens in a year 
and a half, 10,000 a day now, the average is, give them free social 
services, free healthcare, free education, free travel, with no 
requirement to even appear in court. Maybe the American people want 
their border secured.
  Maybe the American people don't want massive inflation, 40-year 
record inflation, caused primarily by the massive spending, the 
reckless spending, and the energy policies.
  Think about where we might be if this Democrat majority had gotten 
their $6 trillion build back bankrupt bill through Congress. $20,000 
per American citizen. They like to say sometimes, oh, some of this 
stuff is popular. It polls well. People want this.

  $6 trillion is what they have tried to spend, and they are still 
trying to backdoor it in over these remaining months that they may have 
power.
  How would it poll, do you think, if we said, American citizen, do you 
want this so-called benefit, this so-called perk, what have you, but 
your share of the cost is $20,000. So a family of three, your share is 
$60,000. How many would vote for these policies?
  Not to mention what they are doing on energy by design, on purpose, 
the dishonest attack on the fossil fuel industry, the dishonest 
narrative that we are not the cleanest, large energy producers in the 
world; the damage that has been done to the economy; the damage that 
has been done to the way that American people live their lives.
  What are they doing? They are bragging about the pain that they are 
causing. The more pain, the better, they are saying. That is what the 
President has said. Hey, we are halfway through a transition. If we 
could just get through to the other side, it is going to be so much 
better, you know.
  As you said in candy land and unicorn land, we are going to have all 
these jobs and all this prosperity because we went through all this 
pain.

[[Page H6916]]

  But the fact is, the fossil fuel industry has been used to bring more 
prosperity to third world countries than any other development in 
industrial history.
  This assault on our freedoms, our economic freedoms, our healthcare 
freedoms, as you mentioned, whether it is the mask, whether it is the 
vaccines, our individual freedoms with the Second Amendment assault.
  This body is going to try to pass two more bills to take away and 
restrict Second Amendment rights. That is going to happen in this 
House, we are told. The continued assault on the Second Amendment 
right.
  You know, I have right here--I don't do this very often, but I have 
some quotes from the Founders as it relates to the Second Amendment 
right.
  As I was looking for quotes, you know, I couldn't find anything that 
talked about that people could keep and bear arms so they could target 
practice; that people could keep and bear arms so they could hunt; that 
people could keep and bear arms for sporting purposes.
  These quotes that I have here from the Founders explaining why they 
wrote into the Constitution the Second Amendment as they did was to 
ensure we remain free.
  Freedom has a cost. Most of the world does not live free to the 
extent that we still live free, as you often enunciate.
  Whether the majority of this Congress likes it or not, we have a 
Constitution. I happen to like it. I know you do as well. The framers, 
in their wisdom, made it possible to change the Constitution, but they 
made it difficult by design.
  They said, hey, if you want to change the Constitution, you have got 
to have super majorities of both Houses. You have got to have super 
majorities of the State legislatures in order to bring transformational 
change to the country and amend the Constitution.
  But, instead, they want to undermine the Constitution, undermine our 
freedoms, and attack the rights guaranteed to Americans in our 
Constitution.
  Mr. ROY. I ask of the Chair how much time we have remaining.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman has 5 minutes remaining.
  Mr. ROY. I would just add to my friend from Virginia a great quote 
from Thomas Jefferson--because he knows I went to the University of 
Virginia.

       The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to 
     keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect 
     themselves against tyranny in government.

  That is the purpose of the Second Amendment, and that is what we 
know.
  I would note that in this context, and I will yield another couple 
minutes to the gentleman if he wants it, when we are talking about the 
response from my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, they break 
our border purposefully, and then they want us to fix it with amnesty 
or with some policies to say that Texas has to just accept.
  I hear that the mayor of New York is all aghast that people are being 
dropped off in New York. He said, we need Federal Government help to 
deal with it. I am, like, welcome to the party, pal. This is what life 
is like in south Texas every single day.
  They break it. They break the border, and then they want you, the 
American people, to have to carry the water.
  They break the Defense Department, drive recruiting down to 40 
percent, and then they put in language to draft our daughters, all in 
the name of so-called equity and equality.
  They break our criminal justice system. They break the backs of our 
law enforcement community. Then they say, we are going to take your 
guns, your ability to defend yourself.
  They break the energy system in our country. Then they say, just go 
buy a Tesla. What is wrong with you?
  Mr. GOOD of Virginia. 70,000 bucks. Go ahead.
  Mr. ROY. What is wrong with you? Go buy a Tesla. You can plug in. You 
can drive through west Texas, 300 miles. Don't worry about it. Stop off 
in Eden, Texas, where, no doubt, they have a charging station and spend 
$70,000 for the pleasure.
  They break the back of the economy, drive up in inflation, and they 
say, suck it up, buttercup. Go buy yourself some expensive chicken and 
rice.
  They break the back of this body, this institution, and they ignore 
their colleagues when their colleagues are saying the chickens are 
going to come home to roost.
  That is the reality of what we are dealing with: A purposeful 
breaking the back of this country and a tearing apart of the threads 
that hold us together.
  I am going to just say it here on the floor. If we don't start 
respecting Federalism, the ability to agree to disagree, then this 
country is doomed. It will break apart under its own weight, and it 
will be my colleagues on the other side of the aisle that amassed the 
weight that will break the bow.

  That is where we are headed if we don't start respecting the ability 
of individuals in this country to agree to disagree, allow Texans to be 
Texans, allow Californians to be Californians.
  Unite under the flag of the United States under our core principles 
but stop shredding our ability to disagree. Stop breaking this country 
and forcing the American people to buy it.
  I yield the balance of the time to my friend Virginia (Mr. Good).
  Mr. GOOD of Virginia. Well said by the gentleman from Texas.
  Their solution, this President's solution, this majority's solution 
to the economic wreckage they have created is to spend more money.
  You just ask yourself. You're baffled. Is it malicious intent, and 
they recognize the harm that they are doing; and how they are causing 
the harm; and they are doing it by design; and they are doing it on 
purpose; or are they that economically illiterate, and they really are 
clueless and have no idea what they are doing?
  Because we have record inflation, 40-year high inflation of 9 
percent, which essentially means every American is working for 1 month 
free this year. One month out of the year they are essentially not 
getting paid with the loss of purchasing power they have experienced 
because of the inflation.
  So what is their answer to that? Well, if we could just spend more 
money, if we could just get more of our agenda passed and spend 
trillions of dollars more, then that will help the problem rather than 
make it worse.
  It is like the person who says, hey, I am trying to lose weight and 
then they would say, well, the solution is to eat more. That is the 
solution that they propose, to do more harm, and you just wonder, is it 
just that illiterate, that ignorant, or is it willful and devious and 
malicious?
  Mr. ROY. I thank the gentleman from Virginia. I think our time has 
expired. I appreciate the speaker and the staff here tonight.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Members are reminded to address their 
remarks to the Chair and not to a perceived viewing audience.

                          ____________________