[Congressional Record Volume 171, Number 101 (Thursday, June 12, 2025)]
[House]
[Page H2812]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




               GOVERNMENT OF THE PEOPLE, NOT OF THE KING

  (Mrs. McCLELLAN asked and was given permission to address the House 
for 1 minute and to revise and extend her remarks.)
  Mrs. McCLELLAN. Mr. Speaker, on January 6, 2021, a crowd of people 
stormed the Capitol seeking for the second time in American history to 
take by force what they could not win at the ballot box.
  Capitol Police were beaten as they tried to protect Members of this 
body and the Vice President of the United States from harm. 
Congressional leaders begged President Trump to send in the National 
Guard. He refused. However, Virginia, the birthplace of American 
democracy, did.
  Four years later, President Trump pardoned the individuals who sought 
to harm Members of Congress and who did hurt Capitol Police who swear 
to keep us safe.
  Now, as people exercise their constitutional right to protest, 
President Trump has deployed the National Guard and the Marines, and 
now an administration that ignores the Constitution it swore to 
preserve, protect, and defend seeks to intimidate, assault, and arrest 
Members of Congress exercising their oversight duties outlined in that 
same constitution, like Representative LaMonica McIver and Senator Alex 
Padilla.
  Next year we have the opportunity to celebrate 250 years of a 
remarkable idea of power derived from the people, not from a king, but 
only if we take action now.

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