Hoyer Discuses Urgent Need for Congress to Send Unconditional Aid to Israel and Ukraine on "The Julie Mason Show"
“[Republicans’ handling of this aid] is a big mess and it's a bad message that America is sending to the world and particularly to [President Vladimir] Putin and to Hamas, that the help to Ukraine and the help to Israel is contingent upon issues that have been debated back and forth for over a decade and are very, very difficult to resolve. They need to be resolved. We need to pursue it. But Ukraine ought not to be paying the price, nor should Israel. And certainly, we ought not to be sending a message to Vladimir Putin, who is a war criminal and who has invaded a sovereign country for no cause that, well, maybe [...] America will help and maybe it won't if it can't solve its own domestic problems.”
“I would urge the Speaker to put both of those countries on [the] suspension calendar because I think they could get over 300 votes, which is necessary. You know, you need at least 290. I think they could pass and then send them to the Senate. The Senate has been debating this and discussing it for many, many weeks now without an ability to resolve the differences.”
“But there are no differences, in my view, in terms of a majority of the Senate, overwhelming majority of the Senate and an overwhelming majority of the House and Senate on Ukraine.”
“America is a leader in the free world, and this is a very, very weak show of leadership.”
“[Former President] Reagan would say, ‘You forgot that we are the party of freedom and democracy, that we are the party of American exceptionalism and leadership in the world.’”
“…So it's just a darn shame that the Republican Party has demonstrated now, certainly since we came back in September, but they demonstrated before that as well, they’re a deeply divided party and a divisive party and have created a dysfunctional House of Representatives. I just think it is not the America that Reagan would want to see. It is not the America that is the leader who sticks by its friends and allies and [gives] them the kind of support that they need to prevail.”
“Speaker Johnson himself said that Putin, if he wins in Ukraine, would not stop there. This is the present Speaker of the House of Representatives saying we need to help Ukraine, and we need to stop Putin. But the message he's sending to Putin is: ‘Maybe we will and maybe we won’t.’ Uncertainty is a dangerous, uncertainty, not only for Ukraine, but for us and the Western Alliance, the NATO Alliance as well.”
“So it's a it's a darn shame. And I would urge the Speaker to put a bill on the Floor as early as tomorrow. And that won't happen tomorrow, but as early as next week, because that's the last week we're going to be here until January 9th. Which means that, the rest of the world, but particularly Ukraine and Israel, will be wondering, ‘Are we going to get the help we need to prevail, to win, to protect the values of democracy and freedom?’”
“The Republicans brought a bill to the Floor which made conditional our help to Israel –conditioned on whether or not we would support deep cuts in the IRS enforcement so that people, particularly the wealthiest in America, pay their fair share of the taxes of this country. And we rejected that. The Senate didn't even consider it. And the Republicans in the House knew that was going to be the case.”
“Nevertheless, they tried to, in effect, hold Israel hostage for an issue they wanted to see passed. And that's reprehensible, in my opinion, and indefensible as well.”
“What they ought to do is put that Israel bill on the Floor and it will pass. It will pass overwhelmingly with over 400 votes and put Ukraine on the Floor, and it'll pass with over 300 votes. Rather than dissemble and try to make political deals on things that they want, this is where we have agreement. This is where we have an agreement on defending freedom here and in Ukraine and in Israel. And the Speaker ought to put those bills on the Floor in a posture which they can pass the House, the Senate, and be signed by the President of the United States – and he ought to do it now.”
“There’s a rise in antisemitism, not only here, but throughout the world. And it is almost hard to understand why when things occur that Jews are blamed so quickly and made the scapegoats for the anger that people feel.”
“But having said that, you asked the question what can we do? We can speak out. We can make sure that if we're in a group of people that we speak up not for Jews per se, but against bigotry, hate, and violence against any group because they happen to be part of a group. Antisemitism has been the most harmful and consequential act of prejudice and hate in the world. The Holocaust costing the lives of 6 million Jews and, very frankly, millions of other people as well in the process.”
“And we need to – parents need to tell their children, ‘This is not what you ought to do.’ In fact, they ought to give them the message of Martin Luther King, which was – it's the character that counts, the content of character. It's not whether you're a Catholic or a Jew or a Protestant or a Muslim or any other persuasion. It is how you act. Do you follow the law? Do you treat people well? Do you value moral values? That's what counts.”
“And we need to teach our children that and we need to make sure they know that hating people because of what they are, not who they are, […] undermines civil society. It undermines individual liberty. It undermines democracy. And I think that every one of us has that responsibility and obligation to do that – not only with our children, but with our peers, with our friends, our cohorts that we see acting in a way that is hateful and dangerous to other people because of what they are and not who they are.”