Holding Power Accountable

Floor Speech

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Mr. JOHNSON of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, I commend Congresswoman Ramirez for conducting this Special Order hour, and I thank her for yielding me time.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today with my Congressional Progressive Caucus colleagues to express my utter horror at the way in which the Trump administration is catapulting us towards an authoritarian state.

We in Congress are one of the three branches of government, yet the President has been acting like a king since day one.

Since assuming office, Donald Trump has dismantled Federal agencies and unlawfully halted billions of dollars in congressionally appropriated Federal funding. He has undermined the delicate system of checks and balances by flagrantly ignoring court orders. He has arrested a judge and a mayor. He has threatened to arrest a sitting Governor. He has taken to the floor and handcuffed and detained a United States Senator. He has accused and caused to be indicted a United States Congresswoman for having the temerity to do her job by being at an ICE facility to conduct oversight.

He has also violated the right to due process by dispatching armed, masked, unidentifiable people, wearing plain clothes and tactical gear, onto the streets of select American cities. They pull up on people, jump out with assault weapons, force them into unmarked cars, and disappear them. Their families learn days later that their loved one has been shipped off to a foreign gulag without presenting evidence to a judge that they should be removed.

Trump has done this to legal permanent residents and talked openly about doing it to American citizens.

While unleashing terror on our streets, Trump's brazenly corrupt decision to accept a $400 million Boeing 747 jet from Qatar for his personal use is a direct violation of the Emoluments Clause of our Constitution, and it has caused a firestorm of controversy.

Yet, MAGA Republicans in control of Congress turn a blind eye to it. My Republican colleagues are afraid to hold Donald Trump accountable. The majority is afraid to investigate the serious national security, public integrity, and foreign policy implications of the President accepting an emolument from a foreign government and flying around in a Qatari jumbo jet, taking it with him as a door prize when he leaves office in January 2029--if he leaves office. This is blatant, in-your-face corruption to see how far he can go in his attempt to replace democracy with dictatorship.

Congress has the authority to introduce Articles of Impeachment against the President, but I don't expect that it is going to happen because my colleagues on the other side of the aisle are too afraid to do so. It is the ultimate exercise of congressional oversight, and it requires a simple majority vote in the House of Representatives and a two-thirds majority vote in the Senate in order to impeach and convict.

I am prepared to take any necessary action to stop Trump's reckless assault on the Federal Government and our democracy. While I believe many of Donald Trump's actions merit impeachment, I believe that the critical first step needs to be taken by this body as soon as possible.

As I said before, I don't expect it to happen because MAGA Republicans have completely abdicated their constitutional responsibility to exercise any shred of oversight on this out-of- control executive.

In fact, this Congress has acted as a rubberstamp as Trump consolidates power in and unto himself. Time and time again, Republicans continue to capitulate on their core principles in complete sycophancy of Trump's disastrous, antidemocratic agenda.

Despite being in the minority, House Democrats are working tirelessly to push back against Trump's hostile government takeover by litigating his illegal actions, introducing legislation to curb his powers, and mobilizing the public against his destructive agenda.

I have joined thousands of Georgians and millions of Americans against the Trump administration's attacks on Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and other public services, including SNAP benefits for children, infants, and seniors.

Though it is unlikely that a Republican-led House will do anything to hold this executive accountable, we are going to continue to do everything we can to demonstrate to the American people that we are not going to take this lying down. We are going to be with them. We are going to be out on the streets in peaceful protest. We are going to make sure that we preserve and protect this democracy that our forefathers and foremothers have fought so hard to guarantee to us.

I will not stop doing the job that my constituents sent me to Washington to do because a megalomaniac is trying to override the Constitution, and I hope that my colleagues on both sides of the aisle will do the same.

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