Covid-19 Hate Crimes Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. HOYER. Madam Speaker, I thank the chairman for yielding.

Madam Speaker, there is no place in America for hate. Well, at least there should be no place in America for hate. There should be no place in our country for exclusion, for bigotry, or racial violence.

And, frankly, I tell my friend from Texas, it is not enough just to say that we are against that. We need to do something. This bill takes a step to doing something.

Disturbingly, over the past few years, we have seen these evils emerge out of their dark hiding places. While we have always struggled as a nation to confront hatred and injustice, this past year we have been tested in ways we have not seen in some period of time.

Madam Speaker, in particular, the COVID-19 pandemic has unleashed an onslaught of hatred directed against Asian Americans, and other minorities as well. These men and women, our fellow citizens, have endured vile words and violent blows. They have been made to feel unsafe and made to feel apart.

Congress is taking action today, led by my friends Senator Hirono, Representative Meng, Representative Beyer, and Representative Chu. I am so proud to align myself with their efforts to make it clear that hate crimes against Asian Americans will be prosecuted to the fullest extent possible and that they will never be tolerated in our country, ever, as they have been tolerated too often in the past.

Representative Chu, as chairwoman of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus, has put forward a resolution condemning the deadly shootings in Atlanta in March, which killed six Asian-American women and two others. I am strongly supporting both her resolution and Senator Hirono's hate crimes legislation, which has already passed the Senate, 94-1. Mr. Hawley of Missouri was the sole exception, the Senator who gave thumbs-up to the insurrectionists.

That bill is the companion to Representative Meng's legislation, and she has instructed my office she wants to see this adopted as soon as possible. We would have brought her bill to the floor, but she said, no, let's do the Senate bill because it can move more quickly. And she deserves full credit for bringing this issue forward.

Madam Speaker, I commend her for her tireless efforts to stand up against hate targeting in the Asian-American community and in every other community--indivisible, one Nation.

Together, as the Nation's representatives, we must make it absolutely clear that racism and intolerance have no home here in America. Very frankly, the people who look at this vote will not parse it. They will interpret it as those who are against hate and those who thought this bill wasn't perfect in saying that we are against hate.

Madam Speaker, I urge my colleagues to join in sending that message with a strong bipartisan vote on both of these measures. Let us reject hate and remind our Asian-American brothers and sisters that we are one Nation indivisible, standing together and building our common future together.

We haven't always been that Nation. We haven't always been the perfect union to which we inspire. Too often, we have held others who are not like us as less than us. That has been a tragedy of mankind wherever one lived. This is a small step, but it is an important step. Let's take it.

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