[Congressional Bills 116th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Res. 731 Introduced in House (IH)]
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116th CONGRESS
1st Session
H. RES. 731
Condemning the inflammatory and racially offensive statement of the
President of the United States suggesting falsely a moral equivalence
between the domestic terrorist act of lynching and the constitutionally
provided congressional impeachment power.
_______________________________________________________________________
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
November 22, 2019
Ms. Jackson Lee submitted the following resolution; which was referred
to the Committee on the Judiciary
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RESOLUTION
Condemning the inflammatory and racially offensive statement of the
President of the United States suggesting falsely a moral equivalence
between the domestic terrorist act of lynching and the constitutionally
provided congressional impeachment power.
Whereas in February 2014, the military of the Russia Federation, without merit
or cause, invaded the eastern part of the free and independent country
of Ukraine, including the Donbass region and the Crimean Peninsula;
Whereas the United States, a strategic ally of Ukraine, reacted swiftly to the
Russian invasion, condemning the military action in strong and
bipartisan fashion, and providing military, humanitarian, and non-
military financial assistance to the determined but beleaguered nation
of Ukraine, which since 2014 has totaled approximately $1.5 billion;
Whereas in September 2019, members of the House of Representatives were alerted
to a complaint filed by a whistleblower within the Intelligence
Community alleging that on a July 25, 2019, call with the President of
Ukraine, the current President of the United States sought to withhold
$391 million in foreign military aid to Ukraine unless and until it
announced publicly that it was currently conducting corruption
investigations against one of the American president's political rivals;
Whereas, on September 25, 2019, the White House released a Memorandum of
Conversation in which the July 25, 2019, telephone conversation between
the presidents of the United States and of Ukraine was memorialized and
which corroborated in all material respects the allegations of the
whistleblower;
Whereas the Memorandum of Conversation released by the White House confirms that
the President of the United States engaged in behavior that undermines
the integrity of American elections, demeans the dignity of the office
of the President of the United States, and jeopardizes the security of
the United States;
Whereas, on September 24, 2019, the Speaker of the House announced that the
House of Representatives would commence an impeachment inquiry pursuant
to its constitutional authority under article I, section 2, clause 5 to
determine whether in connection with the July 25, 2019, telephone
conversation with the President of Ukraine, the President of the United
States has engaged in conduct constituting ``Treason, Bribery, or other
High Crimes or Misdemeanors'' as specified in article II, section 4;
Whereas, on October 22, 2019, bemoaning his fate, but not regretting his
conduct, the President of the United States tweeted that ``All
Republicans must remember what they are witnessing here--a lynching,''
thus falsely drawing a moral equivalence between the exercise of the
impeachment power expressly and solely conferred on the House of
Representatives by the Constitution and lynching, the most heinous act
of domestic terrorism and symbolic of one of the darkest and most
shameful periods in America's past;
Whereas the statement asserted in the President's tweet is false, inflammatory,
racially offensive, unbecoming the Nation's Chief Magistrate but
consistent with prior statements the President has made to stoke to
division, discord, and disharmony among the American people;
Whereas the current President of the United States burnished his political
reputation by claiming falsely for more than 5 years that his
predecessor was born in Kenya and not the United States and thus was an
illegitimate President;
Whereas the current President of the United States launched his 2016 campaign
for the Presidency said of persons from Mexico seeking to immigrate to
the United States: ``They're bringing drugs. They're bringing crime.
They're rapists.'';
Whereas the current President of the United States claimed that a Hispanic
Federal jurist could not preside over a court proceeding to which he was
a defendant accused of civil fraud because ``He's a Mexican.'';
Whereas in January 2018 the current President of the United States is reported
to have inquired of his advisors: ``Why are we having all these people
from shithole countries come here?'', referring to persons from
countries in Africa, the Caribbean, and Central and South America;
Whereas, on August 15, 2017, the current President of the United States said he
regarded as some ``very fine people,'' the neo-Nazis, White
supremacists, and Ku Klux Klansmen who descended on the peaceful
community of Charlottesville, Virginia, to advocate racism and were met
by peaceful counter-protestors;
Whereas in his continuous and determined effort to exacerbate ethnic tensions
and racial divisions in the body politic, the current President of the
United States is revealing himself to be an unwitting instrument of the
plan hatched in Moscow by Russian Federation President Vladimir Putin to
interfere in the 2016 presidential campaign to help elect his preferred
candidate and sow discord and division among the American people; and
Whereas statements and actions of the current President of the United States
demean the office he holds and falls short of the standard set by the
16th President, whose administration was devoted to unity, healing, and
ending racial division and who famously foretold in his March 4, 1861,
Inaugural Address the reasons why the efforts of the current President
of the United States are destined to fail: ``We are not enemies, but
friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained, it
must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory,
stretching from every battlefield, and patriot grave, to every living
heart and hearthstone, all over this broad land, will swell when again
touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.'':
Now, therefore, be it
Resolved, That the House of Representatives--
(1) strongly condemns the false, inflammatory, and racially
offensive tweet made by the President of the United States on
October 22, 2019, falsely drawing a moral equivalence between
the exercise of the impeachment power expressly and solely
conferred on the House of Representatives by the Constitution
and lynching, the most heinous act of domestic terrorism and
symbolic of one of the darkest and most shameful periods in
America's past; and
(2) calls upon all Americans to read, celebrate, and revere
the Constitution of the United States, fidelity to which is the
surest best means of forming a more perfect union, establishing
justice, ensuring domestic tranquility, providing for the
common defense, promoting the general welfare, and securing the
blessing of liberty to them and their posterity.
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