[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 161 (2015), Part 14]
[House]
[Pages 20102-20107]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                        TERRORISTS AND GUN LAWS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Carter of Georgia). Under the Speaker's 
announced policy of January 6,

[[Page 20103]]

2015, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Gohmert) is recognized for 60 
minutes as the designee of the majority leader.
  Mr. GOHMERT. Mr. Speaker, we have heard a great deal this week about 
what is proposed as a commonsense fix to our Second Amendment, and that 
is, okay, surely you can agree that anyone on the no-fly list should 
not be able to walk in and buy a gun.
  We have had friends across the aisle that pointed out, like the Times 
Square bomber, he could have gone in and bought a gun. I am told now 
that that is not actually the case, that he specifically could not 
have. The guy made a bomb. He was going to blow up New York Times 
Square. He didn't need a gun. He was going to blow people up.
  A lot of us, when we first hear, ``well, shouldn't that be a no-
brainer?'' if you are on the no-fly list, you shouldn't be able to buy 
a gun. Then when you find out that the no-fly list is composed of 
names--and we can't even get a number, even a ballpark number. Is it 
47,000? Is it 470,000? Is it 700,000? Is it over a million? When you 
find out you can't actually find any specific criteria for getting on 
the no-fly list, then you realize the no-fly list is basically anybody 
this administration says needs to be harassed or looked at further.
  As I was leaving London a year ago after speaking to some groups in 
London, a man that was head of that little area of whatever their TSA 
is there in the London airport came up and said: Congressman, I know 
who you are and I am really, really sorry, but apparently your 
Department of Homeland Security indicates you need to be thoroughly 
searched personally and your bags. Really sorry.
  Anyway, for those people that say no administration would ever be 
into political revenge, you can look at some of the groups that the IRS 
went after. In fact, a huge majority of rank-and-file Federal workers 
in Homeland Security and in the IRS, they would never dream of doing 
the kind of things that Lois Lerner and her hacks did. They used the 
power of government to go after political enemies.
  Nobody will ever be able to say specifically how much it helped 
President Obama in 2012 to prevent conservative groups from getting 
their tax status cleared through the IRS. They did prevent a lot of 
groups from being able to form. If you don't have the clearance from 
the IRS, then you can't bring contributions in together to organize and 
do like many of the unions do that get Federal money. These groups were 
not going to get Federal money. They were going to get contributions.
  The more we see the abuses within this administration, the clearer it 
is. Whether it was a Democrat or Republican administration, the last 
thing you would ever want to do is tell a President and administration 
that you just list anybody on a list; there is no requirement as to the 
specifics as why. You just put anybody on a list that you have concerns 
about, and they will never be able to buy a gun. You could keep them 
from flying if you want to. You just list them on the list. You don't 
have to tell Congress. You don't have to tell anybody else. Just put 
people you are not happy with on a list and say you have concerns about 
them, and they will never be able to buy a gun.
  Before we go ripping away people's constitutional Second Amendment 
right or any other right, which should be a right to get on a plane and 
fly unless you are a threat, we do not need to have an obscure process 
where nobody can identify the specifics that gets you on the no-fly 
list or, in this case, as people are proposing, the no-gun list. Just 
let an administration list them. We have got to do a lot more soul-
searching in America.
  As we have seen, there are so many groups and individuals that were 
listed as unindicted, but coconspirators in the biggest terror 
financing trial in American history, the Holy Land Foundation trial. We 
found out that a group that called itself charitable and got clearance 
from the IRS and they don't really say where their money comes from, 
when the FBI drilled down and found out, saw where it was going, they 
were able to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the five principals 
in the Holy Land Foundation trial were guilty of financing terrorism. 
There were many people, many groups listed as coconspirators.
  Some, like this Islamic Society of North America of which Imam Magid 
is past president, ISNA was trying--one of those groups, CAIR, they 
wanted their names off the unindicted list. If there were no evidence 
of any ties to the Holy Land Foundation's terrorist funding, then they 
should have gotten a judge. The judge would have signed the order.
  Both the district judge and the Fifth Circuit Federal Court of 
Appeals looked at the evidence and said there is plenty of evidence 
here to show that these groups, like the Islamic Society of North 
America, principals in these groups, they are affiliated with--there is 
evidence to show they are coconspirators with these terrorist financing 
people. So they would not allow their names to be removed from the 
pleadings. They remained in the pleadings.
  Unfortunately, for those of us who want justice in America, for those 
who would destroy our government, Eric Holder became Attorney General 
immediately after the conviction by the Bush administration in very 
late 2008. Under his guidance, they never pursued those people that the 
Federal district court and the Court of Appeals said there is plenty of 
evidence to support that these people are part of the terror financing 
network. They never pursued them.
  In fact, Imam Magid out at the All Dulles Area Muslim Society--ADAMS, 
they called themselves. The Secretary of Homeland Security was just out 
there last week and applauding their efforts and thanking Imam Magid as 
the White House has thanked Imam Magid. He has helped the President, we 
know, with at least one speech. That was the one the President 
delivered while Netanyahu was on the way over here and wrongly said 
that everybody involved, including Israel, had agreed to the pre-'67 
borders.
  Since that was so factually wrong when the President stated it 
publicly, you can't help but feel like, since Imam Magid advised him on 
the speech, was there in the inner sanctum of the State Department, in 
that extremely secure setting when the President delivered his speech--
he was even asked for an interview about the speech immediately 
afterwards--you know that there were people with ties to people this 
administration shouldn't use as their advisers that this administration 
is using as advisers.
  Anyway, there is a reason that America has become extremely skeptical 
about what they are told. When this administration and my friends 
across the aisle start saying, ``Hey, we can trust this administration. 
Just let them list anybody they want to as they currently can on the 
no-fly list and they will never be able to buy a gun and that will stop 
terrorism,'' well, it wouldn't have stopped the pipe bombs that Farook 
and his fiancee--wife, whatever she was, terrorist, female companion--
had built and put together.
  Also, the President keeps pushing for better background checks. There 
was a great article from Dr. John R. Lott, Jr., December 3. Dr. Lott 
has had positions with the University of Chicago, Yale University, 
Stanford, UCLA, Wharton, and Rice. He was the chief economist at the 
United States Sentencing Commission during '88 and '89. This guy is an 
expert when it comes to guns and gun laws.
  Dr. Lott had an article that made clear--it is dated December 3; 
there is a national review online--that there is nothing at all that 
President Obama or Loretta Lynch had proposed that would have stopped 
the 14 people being killed and 21 injured out in San Bernardino. In 
fact, there is nothing that this President proposed in the light of 
violence in Colorado that would have changed the shooting in Colorado.
  In fact, if you go back to the prior shooting in Colorado, we know 
that the gunman went by at least a couple of theaters that were closer 
to him because those were not gun-free zones and there were likely 
people in the theater who had guns who would have

[[Page 20104]]

stopped the shooter before he killed and shot as many people as he did.
  When it comes to Oregon, they have very strict gun control laws. 
There is nothing the President or the Justice Department proposed that 
would have prevented the shooting at the community college in Oregon. 
Those are places where the gun laws are already as strict or stricter 
than what the President is asking be applied everywhere else.
  So it just seems disingenuous for anyone to say we need gun control 
laws like in California so that we can stop the violence when it didn't 
stop the very violence they are using as an excuse to take away 
people's Second Amendment rights. I would commend that great article by 
John Lott.
  When it comes to the Syrian refugees, most people in America have 
figured out this has to be stopped because we don't know who is coming 
in. I have mentioned it here on the floor before, Mr. Speaker, last 
week and previously, that we had information--I had information that 
ISIS had probably taken over areas where there were printing facilities 
so they could probably print passports that we would not be able to 
know were they legitimate or not.

                              {time}  1345

  As this administration keeps saying, we need to bomb Assad out of 
existence, or at least try to take him out. Well, Assad is not very 
favorable toward giving this administration all of his criminal records 
and passport records about the people of Syria. We have no idea who 
these people are. God bless the Director of the FBI, Comey. He comes in 
more than once and says: Yes, we will vet them, but you have to 
understand, even though we will do the best vetting we possibly can, we 
have nothing to go on.
  With Iraqis, as he explained, we had fingerprints. We had 
fingerprints from IEDs. We had all kinds of information. We had the 
official records of the Iraqi Government that could help tell us 
whether somebody coming from Iraq was the person they said they were, 
or whether they were not. Were they a threat? Were they a danger?
  Even with all of that, we find out a couple of guys get to Kentucky 
and have been there a couple of years. One of them was certainly a 
terrorist whose fingerprints were on an IED that had been exploded in 
Iraq, and they didn't catch his fingerprints, even though they had 
them. If you can't catch a terrorist that you let into Kentucky, and 
you had his fingerprints and compared them, and it didn't show up 
initially, then how much worse will it be? How many more terrorists 
will you let into America from within the Syrian refugees?
  Then it has also been disclosed this week what many of us in America 
knew already. It was only common sense that people who have sworn they 
want to destroy our country, kill as many Americans and Jews and 
Israelis as possible, that they would use this refugee crisis not to 
get into Israel--because they are very protective, thank God--but to 
get into Western Europe and to get into the United States. Now we know 
those are the facts.
  Most Americans that I have talked to--I think in my telephone 
townhall, there was about 90 percent of the people in east Texas, of 
the thousands on the call, they indicated about 90 percent were 
concerned that we couldn't properly vet the Syrian refugees good 
enough, and that we needed to pause and hold up and wait until we had 
more information. That is just common sense.
  Then we also, there was an article from Mark Krikorian November 16. 
He pointed out, and I will quote from his article:
  ``The 5-year cost to American taxpayers of resettling a single Middle 
Eastern refugee in the United States is conservatively estimated to be 
more than $64,000 compared with U.N. figures that indicate it costs 
about $5,300 to provide for that same refugee for 5 years'' if he or 
she is in their native region.
  So for every person we arrogantly think, gee, we should bring that 
person into America, as Mark Krikorian points out, actually that is a 
bit immoral, because if we weren't so arrogant to think we need to get 
them into America, we could save 12 of them in their native region.
  They say, 3 to 4 million people coming out of Syria, out of that 
area, gee, they need to come to the United States, and yet Saudi Arabia 
has accommodations for 3 million. So many people have seen a photograph 
of the massive tent area there for 5 days out of 365. That is during 
the Hajj, the pilgrimage to Mecca, kitchen facilities, bathroom 
facilities. It just seems like if they would help take care of the 3 
million, make those available, we could work something out to take care 
of the people that come in for 5 days in the Hajj, that that would be a 
better solution than this administration forcing Syrian refugees that 
could not be properly vetted into this country.
  Then I was told last night that actually the female terrorist in San 
Bernardino was using a name that certainly would not have been given to 
her at birth, and that if we had people that were allowed to study 
radical Islam, the tenets of its belief, as this one person said, she 
had a name that is actually a guy's name, and for anyone who has spent 
their adult life studying radical Islam, like this administration for 7 
years, has not allowed the FBI, the intelligence agency, State 
Department, Justice Department. They purged their records of anything 
that offended terror and unindicted coconspirator to finance terrorism. 
So when this unindicted co-conspirator CAIR complained about anything, 
it was purged from this administration's training records.
  As this individual, this friend pointed out, when you spend so many 
of your years of your adulthood studying this, for her to have proper 
screening by somebody that had studied radical Islam, you would ask the 
question: When did you get this name? This clearly was not given to you 
at birth. He said it would be like an American going into Europe and 
someone there saying: Now, come on, your name is not George Washington. 
It wasn't given to you at birth. Where did you get it?
  When you start inquiring, then you find out the madrassas she had 
been to, the places she had been to, but you have to get to secondary 
screening, further questioning, which there should be red flags all 
over somebody's record like that. We have the information available 
that this administration didn't prevent it from being used to properly 
screen radical Islamists. But before you can properly screen radical 
Islamists, you have to admit that there is a thing called radical 
Islam.
  Carolyn Glick writes for the Jerusalem Post. She is a brilliant lady. 
She pointed out one of the problems with my friend, President George W. 
Bush's position that we are not at war with Islam, and then this 
administration's taking that and running with it to extremes, they fail 
to acknowledge that there is pluralism within Islam. Saying that ``If 
it is bad, it could not possibly be part of Islam,'' is ridiculous. 
What that does to moderate Muslims, who don't want radical Islamists 
governing them and cutting their hands off, horsewhipping them, 
whatever, stoning them to death, they would like to live in peace 
without worrying about a tyrannical, radical Islamist leader.
  We do them a disservice by not pointing out that radical Islam is an 
element of Islam, and it is a fact. Therefore, moderates are left to 
say nothing because if they say this is an element of Islam we have got 
to stand up against, then they come against the wrongheaded positions 
of the Obama administration.
  We actually can help moderate Muslims stand up, as some are starting 
to do, a few have been doing for a long time, stand up against radical 
Islam, and say--God blessing President al-Sisi in Egypt, as he stood 
and talked to a group of imams, said we have got to get control of our 
religious beliefs, our Islam back from the radicals. We have got to 
stand up against them. We help them. The al-Sisi regime administration 
over in Egypt, I have talked to some of them. I don't know if I am 
still the only Member of Congress that has met with their director of 
intelligence. We had a very informative meeting for a couple of hours.

[[Page 20105]]

  They don't understand why this administration appears to be helping 
radical Islam and standing against the moderates, like President al-
Sisi, like the 30 million of the 90 million Egyptian people that went 
to the street a couple years ago. Wow, that was such a huge deal.
  There has never been a group that big, in the history of the world, 
go to the streets of their country and demand a peaceful regime change. 
But because the constitution that we helped Egypt with when Morsi was 
elected did not contain an impeachment provision, they had no other way 
to go. There was no other way to peaceably remove a president who was 
violating their own constitution over and over than to go to the 
streets, as they did.
  The Coptic Christian Pope there in Cairo has told me more than once 
how deeply moving it was to see moderate Muslims, Christians, Jews, 
secularists go to the street as a part of that 30 million, and so many 
coming up to the Pope and saying: We are so sorry for the way you have 
been treated.
  Has this administration given any accolades whatsoever to the 
Egyptian people for passing a constitution with over 90 percent vote 
that in that constitution, a majority of the ones approving were 
Muslim, it says in the constitution that when the Muslim Brotherhood, 
radical Islam, they put Muslim Brotherhood on their terrorist watch 
list. This administration gets their advice. That administration in 
Egypt puts them on the terrorist watch list.
  They say when the Muslim Brotherhood or any other like-minded radical 
Islamist group burns down a church, we will rebuild it with government 
funds. It is incredible. The people of Egypt deserve at least an ``atta 
boy.''
  What was this administration's response? We are going to hold up 
sending you any helicopters. We sent jets and helicopters and tanks to 
the Muslim Brotherhood when they were in control under Morsi, but now 
that the Muslim Brotherhood, this terrorist organization is not in 
control, we are not going to send you things.
  As President al-Sisi once asked me, does your President not 
understand? We use the Apache helicopters to keep the Suez Canal open. 
So it was quite a slap in the face to our friends in Egypt that are 
against radical Islam, our Muslim friends there, when this President 
didn't go, as I think 47 other leaders or so went. He didn't send the 
Vice President, didn't send the Ambassador, didn't send anybody from 
Washington to say: Congratulations, Egypt.
  Since moderate Muslims have been in control in Egypt, they have done 
something earthshaking: They dug another lane, a second lane to the 
Suez Canal. Countries all over the world went, wow, Egypt, that is 
enormous.
  It was embarrassing to me last year in Egypt as people were asking: 
Was your country really excited when we got this second lane dug to the 
Suez Canal? The mainstream media hardly reported anything about it. It 
was a big deal. It was a free people standing up and doing something 
monumental. Since it wasn't done by radical Islamists, this 
administration chose not to give it any credibility.
  Then we get the report now. Just hours ago, there was an article from 
Victoria Taft:
  ``After the latest Paris terror attack, French President Hollande 
swore he'd go after radical Muslims who pulled off the mass slayings.
  ``Now we're learning what he meant by that.
  ``As HotAir reports:
  `The French have kicked in the doors on 2,235 homes and taken 232 
people into custody or placed them on house arrest.'
  In the sleepy French town of Lagny-sur-Marne just 18 miles from Paris 
. . . French police went to the local mosque where they found:
  The Salafist mosque . . . about 30 kilometers east of the French 
capital was closed down by police on the 2nd of December. In subsequent 
raids, the prefect for the Seine-and-Marne department said `7.62 
millimeter ammunition for a Kalashnikov rifle and propaganda videos' 
had been seized, AFP reported. The locations of the raids were not 
given.
  Both ISIS and al Qaeda adhere to the radical Sunni Salafist Muslim 
teachings. Radicals used some mosques and other home-based un-permitted 
mosques to stockpile weapons.''

                              {time}  1400

  It was reported that, just in the last 15 days, the French have 
uncovered about a third of the illegal weapons they normally recover in 
an entire year just from these mosque areas and the homes that they 
have raided.
  Now, I have serious concerns when I see homes being raided in these 
numbers. The French do not have our protections under our Bill of 
Rights. They don't have nearly the protections we do. I don't want this 
many homes busted into. I don't want mosques raided unless there is 
probable cause to believe there is a problem or that they have 
committed a crime. You get warrants for those things. The same with the 
home, the same with somebody's Internet, and the same with their bank 
records.
  Yet this administration is using the Consumer Financial Protection 
Bureau to do what nobody in American history--any administration--has 
done before, and that is to get people's bank records, whether or not 
you want them to or not. They claim: We want to be able to watch so if 
somebody gets messed around by a bank, we can go after them.
  Well, when I was a judge, if you wanted to get bank records, you had 
to have probable cause that a crime was committed and probable cause 
that the person whose records you wanted had committed it; otherwise, I 
didn't sign a warrant because the Constitution didn't allow it. If I 
did sign a warrant, it had to be specific to place and time and what 
was being seized.
  But this administration gets your bank records--all they want--
through the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. They get all your 
medical records through ObamaCare requirements. They get all kinds of 
information about individuals. They get your phone logs, as they have 
been doing. Now, there is some question whether they still are or not.
  I have this article from Michele McPhee and Brian Ross. ABC News 
reports: ``ISIS May Have Passport Printing Machine, Blank Passports.'' 
I am glad they finally caught up with the news on that.
  I want to revisit an issue.
  Senator Grassley sent a letter to Secretary Jeh Johnson, February 3, 
2014, so it will be going on 2 years in February. He included an email. 
Senator Grassley included a redacted copy of the email exchange. I have 
seen the unredacted email exchange. And even from the redacted email 
exchange, it is indicated that Secretary Napolitano had a hands-off 
list.
  Apparently, when there were indications Muslim leaders should be 
secondarily screened, pulled aside from their first stop, asked further 
questions, the indication is this guy is in a group, they say: Well, he 
is on the Secretary's hands-off list.
  Well, not only can we not get specifics of exactly why somebody is on 
the no-fly list or the terrorist watch list--just that this 
administration has a bad feeling about them--we can't find out just how 
you get on the hands-off list. That is another matter that requires 
some looking into.
  Then we find out this week that an ex-Guantanamo detainee now is an 
al Qaeda leader back in Yemen. And it talks about al Qaeda in the 
Arabian Peninsula, or AQAP, released a new video featuring former 
Guantanamo detainee Ibrahim al Qosi, whose name is also Sheikh Khubayb 
al Sudani.
  In 2010, he pled guilty to charges of conspiracy and material support 
for terrorism before a military commission. It ended up that this 
administration transferred him to his home country of Sudan. Now he is 
back where he wanted to be, helping al Qaeda. We already knew he was a 
terrorist--he pled guilty--and this administration sent him back.
  The question still out there and remains: How many Americans will be 
killed because this administration decided closing Guantanamo is more 
important than saving American lives?

[[Page 20106]]

They traded five murderous terrorists, coconspirators, for a guy who, 
all the indications are, deserted his American military post. I wonder 
how many American lives will be lost because of that.
  I have an article from KY3 saying that on Saturday, around 3:50 a.m., 
two men buying a large number of cell phones at Walmart in Lebanon set 
off a concern. ```Somebody went in and bought 60 cell phones from 
Walmart. That's not normal for this area,' explained Laclede County 
Sheriff Wayne Merritt.
  ``After talking with the men, officers didn't have a legal reason to 
detain them so the men were allowed to leave, according to the Lebanon 
Police Department incident report.'' That is in Missouri. ``Sheriff 
Merritt said calling law enforcement officers was the right move.''
  But, unfortunately, because of the statement of our Attorney General 
in recent days in the aftermath of the San Bernardino killings, she has 
made clear that, in the aftermath of all of those Americans being 
killed, specifically targeting Christians and Jews--apparently, there 
was a Muslim shot, but the targets were Jews and Christians, them 
telling one Jewish man before he was shot: Now you will never get to 
see Israel--targeting the Christians specifically, instead of going off 
on how clearly this was a hate crime, the Attorney General says her big 
concern is that people are not prejudiced against Muslims.
  It made it clear to people like the terrorists' neighbors that, if 
you see radical Islamists gathering and you are suspicious of--maybe 
they are making pipe bombs in the garage--and you call that in, there 
is a good chance that Attorney General Loretta Lynch is going to come 
after you for being biased and bigoted.
  What a ridiculous thing to say. Basically, she is saying, if you see 
something and say something and that something involves Muslims, then I 
am coming after you. What a ridiculous, terrible thing for the chief 
law enforcement officer of our country to say.
  Then, this article today from Liam Deacon, Breitbart News, ``Homeland 
Security Shut Down Investigation Into Farook And Malik Linked Islamist 
Group To Protect `Civil Liberties' of Potential Terrorists'':
  ``The Department of Homeland Security has been accused of deleting 
intelligence records relating to dangerous Islamists linked to 
terrorists Sayed Farook and Tashfeen Malik, because they wanted to 
protect the `civil liberties' of members of the caliphate-supporting 
network.
  ``Phil Haney, a U.S. Customs and Border Patrol analyst''--now 
retired--``says he was ordered to stop investigating Deobandi Islamist 
groups and his work on them was erased. He even says he was subjected 
to discipline when he attempted to blow the whistle.
  ``If he'd been allowed to continue his investigation, he claims 
Malik's visa application would have been flagged for greater scrutiny.
  ``He explained: `The administration was more concerned about the 
civil rights and liberties of foreign Islamic groups with terrorist 
ties than the safety and security of Americans.'
  ``Analyst Phil Haney told Fox News that he once worked as a 
researcher looking into potential terrorists in the Passenger Analysis 
Units at the Department of Homeland Security in Atlanta, as well as at 
the U.S. Customs and Border Protection's National Targeting Center.
  ``Mr. Haney says that he had been identifying and tracking members of 
the al-Huda and Tablighi Jamaat groups, offshoots of the radical 
Deobandi school of Islam, which was founded in British colonial India 
specifically to oppose western culture.
  ``Tablighi Jamaat is a Deobandi revivalist movement whose mandate is, 
according to its leading advocate Ebrahim Rangooni, to save the Muslim 
world `from the culture and civilization of the Jews and the 
Christians' . . . To this end, he has suggested cultivating `such 
hatred for their ways as human beings have to urine and excrement.'
  ``Tablighi Jamaat have been linked to 80 percent of all recent 
terrorist related crimes in France.
  ``Mr. Haney's work tracking the radical movement was considered so 
important that he says he was given an agency award for identifying 
potential terrorists, and he was asked to become part of the National 
Targeting Center, which works to connect the dots and build a bigger 
picture of terrorist activity.
  ``However, after more than six months of tracking the Deobandis, 
Homeland Security unexpectedly halted his investigation on the request 
of the State Department's Office of Civil Rights.''
  Anyway, that is what happens. Phil Haney is one of the most 
patriotic, finest people ever known. He cares so deeply about this 
country.
  By the way, Mr. Speaker, his appearance decries his intellect and 
knowledge about radical Islam. So, he has done no telling how many 
secondary screenings in his time in the Middle East, his knowledge of 
the language, the culture, the moderate Islamic culture, the radical 
Islamic culture. He knows the teachings of the radicals and who they 
are. He has been able to get massive amounts of information that I 
would never have dreamed people would admit to him.
  I have been working with him for a number of years to try to get 
information to people in the administration who would protect the 
information, and instead, when they realized how much information he 
had of what others in Homeland Security had deleted, they thought was 
gone--Janet Napolitano talked about connecting the dots. She forgot to 
mention that they had been deleting dots like crazy. I knew that Phil's 
information was so damaging to this administration that, if it were not 
handled properly, they would destroy the man.
  So what happens after he gets an award for identifying so much 
information? He used the tech system. All he did was enter data. He 
would look even at social media, and if he found that somebody under 
consideration was in a photograph with somebody we knew to be a radical 
Islamist, he would enter that information. There is a massive amount of 
information out there in social media that this administration has not 
even availed themselves of.
  Previously, when our Embassy in Yemen was surrounded by Houthis, 
radical Islamist rebels, I got a call from a constituent whose son is 
over there and is isolated in a hotel and can't get to the Embassy. In 
talking to a friend who had a friend, it ends up some guy is going 
through a training or practice session. They set aside their 
hypothetical practice scenario and took on the real-life scenario of 
getting four Americans from a hotel in the capital of Yemen to the 
Embassy and trying to get more in the Embassy out. They used social 
media. They were able to find pictures being taken by Houthi radical 
Islamists at different places where they obviously were. So they knew 
which places to avoid.

                              {time}  1415

  They were able, using people in place in Yemen, American assets, and 
using social media, were able to get those people from the hotel, get 
them to the Embassy and get them out, even though this administration 
would only pay for a commercial airline flight where they sat with some 
people who may have been part of the rebels that wanted to kill them. 
Not the best way to get people out of an Embassy, but they got out.
  I have heard again recently from my former constituent, and he is 
doing well. He is a good man. He is a patriot. He wants to help the 
country.
  So it should also be noted that although, in our country, the 
Attorney General is more concerned about prejudice against Muslims, the 
Euro Parliament president--this article by Dr. Thomas D. Williams, the 
3rd of December, points out that the Euro Parliament president says 
Christians are not safe on our continent.
  In a high-level meeting on religious persecution in Brussels, the 
president of the European Parliament said that Europe cannot afford to 
continue ignoring the faith of Christians, who are ``clearly the most 
persecuted group'' in the world.

[[Page 20107]]

  In Wednesday's meeting, EP President Martin Schulz said that the 
persecution of Christians is undervalued and does not receive enough 
attention, which also has meant that ``it hasn't been properly 
addressed.''
  I applaud the efforts of Glenn Beck trying to save Christians over in 
areas of radical Islam, because, as the European Parliament President 
says, radical Islamists' number 1 goal is not other Muslims; it's 
Christians and Jews. Yet, this administration's big focus is helping 
Muslims.
  Then we find out from the U.N. that actually they locate their 
refugee centers in urban areas where you rarely find many Christians. 
And we find out the reports, hear from people that say we are afraid to 
go into the U.N. refugee camps, because they are virtually all Muslim, 
and we are targeted, and we can't go there. We can't allow our families 
to go there.
  Yet, it is the U.N. refugee camps that this administration brings the 
refugees, and wants to bring refugees from.
  Glenn Beck, realizing that Christian refugees were being under-
appreciated, undervalued by the Obama administration, has gone over and 
tried to do something about it. I applaud his efforts.
  So, Mr. Speaker, as we close out this week, the bill we just passed 
with regard to the Customs conference report, I just want to go back to 
January 29, 1961. In about over a month, it will be the 55-year 
anniversary of President John F. Kennedy's speech. It was a message to 
commemorate Roosevelt Day for Franklin Roosevelt.
  So, in his speech, he points out that 28 years ago, Franklin 
Roosevelt assumed the leadership of a stricken and demoralized Nation. 
Poverty, distress, economic stagnation, blanketed the land.
  He goes on in the speech, recognizing Franklin Roosevelt. And I would 
just like to read John F. Kennedy's words, because they are such a 
contrast to the current President's words, as he wants to take away 
people's Second Amendment rights.
  He wants to have the ability, since he controls, completely controls 
the no-fly list, nobody in Congress gets to know who he is putting on, 
why they are putting on, what criteria he is using to put them on. He 
gets exclusive control of who he wants to put on the no-fly list, he or 
his assignees. President Obama wants to restrict those rights.
  So, Mr. Speaker, I conclude today, and this week in the House, with 
the words of John F. Kennedy. President John F. Kennedy, January 29, 
1961, part of his speech that day said:
  ``To meet these problems will require the efforts, not only of our 
leaders or of the Democratic Party, but the combined efforts of all of 
our people. No one has a right to feel that, having entrusted the task 
of government to new leaders in Washington, he can continue to pursue 
his private comforts unconcerned with America's challenges and dangers. 
For, if freedom is to survive and prosper, it will require the 
sacrifice, the effort, and the thoughtful attention of every citizen.
  ``In my own native State of Massachusetts, the battle for American 
freedom was begun by the thousands of farmers and tradesmen who made up 
the Minute Men, citizens who were ready to defend their liberty at a 
moment's notice.''
  President Kennedy goes on with these words:
  ``Today, we need a Nation of Minute Men, citizens who are not only 
prepared to take up arms, but citizens who regard preservation of 
freedom as a basic purpose of their daily life and who are willing to 
consciously work and sacrifice for that freedom. The cause of liberty, 
the cause of America, cannot succeed with any lesser effort.''
  The words of John F. Kennedy, January 29, 1961.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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