Congressman Louie Gohmert (TX-01) released the following statement regarding the vote to confirm Justice Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court of the United States:

“Amy Coney Barrett has shown herself to be an intellectually stellar, exceedingly fair-minded, and impressively equitable judge. Her sterling and unblemished character will serve as an invaluable asset on the U.S. Supreme Court. Justice Barrett, the first working mother on the high court with school-aged children, is a glowing example of devotion to faith, family, and country.

As we have seen in her confirmation hearings, her legal knowledge and understanding is exceptionally deep-rooted. Her rock-solid foundational understanding of the Constitution will hopefully refresh the Chief Justice’s recollection on the role of the Supreme Court as well. For those who have been praying for God to bless America, yesterday we saw such a blessing occur.”

Congressman Louie Gohmert (TX-01) released the following statement today on being presented the “Guardian of Small Business Award” by the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB):

“Small and independent business owners are truly the backbone of our economy. They are vital to ensure free market success. Thankfully, there are organizations like the NFIB that work tirelessly to promote the interests of small businesses, ensuring issues such as taxes, healthcare, and regulations are addressed. Since small businesses provide a majority of the jobs in America, it is a privilege and an obligation to work to insure the federal government is a catalyst in the success of small business rather than a hindrance. That is why it is an honor to be presented the “Guardian of Small Business Award” by the NFIB.” 

The Guardian of Small Business is awarded to members of Congress who vote with small business 70 percent or more of the time on key small business issues.

NFIB 2020 Guardians of Small Business recipients are listed here: NFIB.com/GuardianAwards

Congressman Louie Gohmert (TX-01) released the following statement regarding the Justice Department’s move to file an antitrust lawsuit against Google:

"This antitrust lawsuit is highly appropriate and the first necessary step in putting an end to the oppressive grip of some big tech companies who have monopolies. Our Constitution embraces free enterprise, unless one company becomes so big it can crush or buy any competitors. Google has not only become a monopoly, but now censors and redirects traffic in a way that often hides patriotic, Christian, Republican, or anti-socialist information and communication. 

With control of over approximately 90 percent of web searches worldwide, Google’s monopoly now has more power over what Americans see than any newspaper tycoon could have ever dreamed. Their oligarchical power gives them unparalleled control over ordinary Americans’ lives – from what is read online to the information that answers Americans’ searches.

No company, regardless of political philosophy should be able to thwart all meaningful competition, which applies to Google. Unfortunately, what started out as great assistance, has morphed into a hungry and ambitious media conglomerate wanting to crush all thought that disagrees with its own, and enough power to do just that. Thankfully, the Trump Administration’s Department of Justice is treating this big tech monopoly as the serious threat to our self-determining form of government. You can’t be self-governing when the biggest source of American information is run through algorithms that insure a socialist, non-competitive point of view."

Today, Congressional Justice for Warriors Caucus Chairman Rep. Louie Gohmert (TX-01) and caucus member Rep. Bill Flores (TX-17) greeted First Sergeant John Hatley as he was released from Leavenworth Prison on parole after spending 11 years in confinement for a wrongful conviction.

The caucus members released the following statements:

“The faith of First Sergeant John Hatley makes him a tireless, unshakeable American patriot who was abandoned by his country and sentenced to life in prison without a single shred of physical evidence. After working to help get him released, it was an honor to be at Leavenworth prison to greet him as he was released on parole after he spent 11 years wrongly incarcerated.” 

“I first had the privilege of meeting John, a fellow native Texan, last year when, as Chairman of the Congressional Justice for Warriors Caucus, I traveled to Leavenworth prison with our Caucus to meet soldiers who experienced injustices at the hands of the military justice system. Even then, he carried himself as a leader with remarkable humility and optimism for a man whose life had been wrongfully destroyed by the very country he was serving.” 

“First Sergeant Hatley’s conviction is a prime example of why we need to reform the military justice system and it is one of the reasons why we are currently working to reform the Uniform Code of Military Justice through our Caucus.”

“Nothing can replace over a decade he lost as a free man, but he deserves to enjoy every moment of his new liberty. Our prayers are with him and his family as they amazingly face the future without bitterness.”

-Rep. Louie Gohmert (TX-01)

“First Sergeant John Hatley is a Texas native who served almost 20 years in the Army. And as we would expect from a Texan who devoted his life to serving his nation, his military service is characterized by an exemplary record of honor, sacrifice, and valor.”

“Despite his distinguished record of service, Sergeant Hatley was convicted of killing detainees solely on testimony with no physical or forensic evidence, no identified victims, or reports of missing persons being presented at trial. To put it succinctly, our military leadership under the previous administration failed Sergeant Hatley.”

“But today marks a day of new beginnings and I am relieved to know that Sergeant Hatley will now be with his family.  After years of work, I am proud and grateful for the work of my colleagues on the Congressional Justice for Warriors Caucus to make this day a reality.  Though Sergeant Hatley has been released, we will continue to seek a full pardon so that this injustice against him will be permanently removed from his record.” 

“It is also not fair that our men and women who volunteer to serve and protect this nation do not have the same rights and protections as civilians.  We will continue to work on behalf of mistreated soldiers like Sergeant Hatley and others who should be held to the same standard as every other American.”

-Rep. Bill Flores (TX-17)

"After 11 years of unjust confinement I am happy to welcome First Sergeant John E. Hatley back to society. I had the honor of getting to know John after I was sentenced to Leavenworth prison. John was always a symbol strength and encouragement. He helped men who were recently confined develop the tools to cope with the stress of confinement, reconnect with their loved ones, and understand the dynamics of their life transition. John unknowingly helped countless people by simply being himself. Welcome home John and thank you for your service."

-Derrick Miller, Executive Director, Congressional Justice for Warriors Caucus

View photos from the release today, here. 

Earlier this summer, I introduced a resolution to ban the Democratic Party from Congress due to its racist history of supporting slavery and segregation. There were parliamentary issues raised so I withdrew the Privileged Motion and am re-introducing it today.

Since Democrats and liberals across the country are demanding we remove statues and rename every school, street, sports team, or food product to ensure that the sensibilities of virtue-signaling Leftists everywhere are not offended, surely they would like for those same rules to apply to their own party.  Democrats have embraced racial inequality in America for decades, and are the very embodiment of racial politics and have been since the Republicans split away and formed their own party, leaving their vile racism behind.

Once I recovered from the deafening silence from both Democrats and their countless allies in the media at the news of this resolution, and the dust settled, it was abundantly clear the Democrats had no intention of leaving this history of racial demagoguery behind.

Most surprising, however, was the number of people who reached out and told me they were unaware of just how depraved and morally bankrupt the Democratic Party history truly was. Many had been certain it was the Democrats who represented the party of civil rights and racial equality, yet the truth is, the degrading and inhumane historical facts outlined in my privileged resolution reveal a mere fraction of the disturbing and discriminatory past of the Democratic Party.

A quick comparison of the Republican and Democratic Party platforms of 1856 reveals everything you need to know about the vast differences between the two parties’ early attitudes towards racial equality. The GOP was founded in 1854 as an anti-slavery party in opposition to the expansion of slavery into the Kansas and Nebraska territories. The Republican Party’s 1856 platform denied the authority of Congress or any group of individuals to “give legal existence to Slavery in any Territory of the United States, while the present Constitution shall be maintained.” Meanwhile, the Democrats' 1856 platform insisted that efforts of abolitionists to “interfere with questions of slavery” have an “inevitable tendency to diminish the happiness of the people and endanger the stability and permanency of the Union.”

In 1857, the United States Supreme Court decision Dred Scott vs. Sanford determined that both free and enslaved blacks were to be considered property, not citizens. Of the nine justices on the court, all seven of the Democrats voted to deny the rights of blacks. The two dissenting justices were Republicans. Democrat Chief Justice Roger Taney (whose bust Democrats recently voted to remove from the halls of Congress) authored the decision and wrote that black Americans "had no rights which the white man was bound to respect; and that the negro might justly and lawfully be reduced to slavery for his benefit. He was bought and sold and treated as an ordinary article of merchandise and traffic, whenever profit could be made by it."

Despite some arguments to the contrary, there is an undeniable link between racism, the Ku Klux Klan and the Democratic Party. The 1868 Democratic National Convention slogan stated: “This is a White Man’s Country; Let White Men Rule” (A stark contrast, by the way, to the Republican campaign slogan that year: “Let Us Have Peace”). As the American Spectator’s Jeffrey Lord aptly points out, the 1868 DNC convention was attended by delegate Nathan Bedford Forrest—one of the founders of the Ku Klux Klan and a Confederate veteran.

In fact, the Klan was so embedded within the Democratic Party that Columbia University historian Eric Foner called the group “a military force serving the interests of the Democratic Party, the planter class, and all those who desired the restoration of white supremacy.” University of North Carolina historian Allen Trelease drew a similar conclusion, writing that the KKK was the “terrorist arm of the Democratic Party.”

The 20th century ushered in decades more racism on behalf of the Democratic Party with perhaps one of the most glaring examples being President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s appointment of a former Ku Klux Klan member to the Supreme Court. You read that correctly: FDR—the Left’s progressive poster boy—willingly and knowingly appointed a former KKK member to the highest court in the land.

Bruce Bartlett points out in his book, "Wrong on Race: The Democratic Party’s Buried Past," that Roosevelt appointed Alabama Senator Hugo Black to the Supreme Court in 1937. Black became a member of the Klan in 1923 and began marching in parades, speaking at Klan meetings, and donning Klan attire. According to Bartlett in his well-documented book, Black’s Klan membership was widely known among Washington insiders, but his nomination was “rammed through the Senate so quickly that there was no time to investigate or publicize the matter.” About a month after he was sworn-in to the Supreme Court, news broke of Black’s Klan ties and Democratic politicians began to rally behind him and support him. Roosevelt claimed he was unaware of Black’s membership in the Ku Klux Klan, however, in a 1968 memo, the Supreme Court Justice admitted the president knew of his associations with the group, writing, “President Roosevelt…told me there was no reason for my worrying about my having been a member of the Ku Klux Klan. He said that some of his best friends and supporters he had in the state of Georgia were strong members of that organization.”

Perhaps if our schools focused less on Marxist indoctrination and more on actual education, the facts would be more widely known. The propaganda that has been fed to American children for decades is precisely why we are currently seeing so many of our “educated” youth wreaking havoc in our cities and rioting under the guise of “social justice.” There is no such thing as social justice in a free society. There is justice and there is injustice-- no modifier is required for a self-governing people. The history of the Democratic Party is most decidedly a first-tier example of injustice.

The examples of racism are plentiful and the Democrats’ willingness to turn a blind eye to its past atrocities whilst calling upon the rest of the country to adhere to their politically correct authoritarian agenda reeks of the worst kind of hypocrisy. If Democrats wish to truly repent for the sins of their party’s past, they surely have to know that removing a couple statues of their leaders from the halls of the U.S. Capitol could not possibly be enough. It is time for Democrats to accept responsibility for their conduct, and if they are truly serious about reparation payments, they should have those payments coming from the political party that so egregiously destroyed black communities by their actions and prejudice.

Read the opinion piece on Townhall.com, here. 

Rep. Louie Gohmert has reintroduced his privileged resolution calling on Speaker Nancy Pelosi to remove from the House wing of the U.S. Capitol or any House office building any item that names, symbolizes or mentions any political party that supported slavery or the Confederacy.

The resolution highlights additional examples of racism in the Democratic party, including FDR’s segregation of White House staff and his continuance of the White House Correspondent’s Association’s ban on credentialing black journalists. It also addresses former Democrat House Rules Committee Chairman Congressman Howard Smith’s war against civil rights initiatives.

“While Democrats continue to denounce our country ad nauseam over ‘systemic racism,’ they somehow always fail to take responsibility for their own party’s abhorrent historical views and policies which promulgated racism in our nation for decades.” said Gohmert.

“The policies of the Democratic Party have caused a great deal of destruction to the nuclear family, significantly impacting minority homes. Studies repeatedly show that a child has a much better chance for success both physically and fiscally when the nuclear family is intact.

“Whether it be slavery or segregation and Jim Crow laws, one thing is certain: this disgraceful and inhumane stain on American history is covered in the fingerprints of the Democratic Party. Due to parliamentary issues, I am re-introducing my Privileged Resolution and urging my Democratic colleagues to rid the House wing of the U.S. Capitol of any item that names, symbolizes or mentions their own political party because of its past support for slavery and the Confederacy. Though I personally believe we need to learn from history including the good, the bad and the ugly, the Democratic Party has initiated this purging but needs assistance to avoid unparalleled hypocrisy. So, it is time for Democrats to account for, be washed of, and rid our Capitol of the sins of their party’s past. I hope they join me in voting to ensure that the U.S. Capitol building is a ‘safe space’ for all Americans under the new principles they themselves unveiled.”

Original co-sponsors include: Rep. Andy Biggs (AZ-5), Rep. Jody Hice (GA-10), Rep. Randy Weber (TX-14), Rep. Andy Harris (MD-1), Rep. Rick Crawford (AR-1) and Rep. Ralph Norman (SC-5). 

Read the text of the resolution, here. 

Rep. Louie Gohmert (TX-01) will launch a new web series titled, COVID-19 and Medical Freedom: A Congressional Inquiry. The series will be highlighted exclusively on Hannity.com and feature interviews with medical professionals and experts.

In the first episode, Rep. Gohmert teams up with Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) to interview Yale epidemiologist Dr. Harvey Risch, family physician Dr. George Fareed, and infectious disease Dr. Stephen Smith.

Dr. Risch is the author of more than 325 original research publications in medical literature. His research and analysis on hydroxychloroquine and its effectiveness in COVID-19 has been cited worldwide. Dr. Fareed and his colleagues have successfully treated over 2,000 coronavirus patients, 455 of them with a hydroxychloroquine cocktail in the hard-hit Imperial Valley of California. Dr. Smith has had great success in treating over 300 hospitalized coronavirus patients with a hydroxychloroquine cocktail in New Jersey.

Rep. Gohmert released the following statement about the series:

“The coronavirus pandemic has exposed the medical industrial complex’s grip on society and reiterated the importance of medical freedom here in this country. When making important health care decisions, one often seeks multiple opinions from medical professionals before choosing a path for treatment. The same should be expected in America in response to the coronavirus. Instead, experts who have vital research and clinical experience are being demonized by career bureaucrats who haven’t treated patients in decades, let alone anyone suffering from COVID-19. These respected experts are being vilified by the Trump-hating media and silenced through censorship by social media monopolies.  Adding insult to injury, government bureaucrats are standing in between these doctors and their patients with threats of revoking their licenses to practice medicine. This is why I have decided to speak on the record with prominent physicians and researchers to explore the state of medical freedom in our country.

The American people deserve to hear directly from those in the medical community who are collaborating with one another nationwide while treating COVID-19 patients—in both hospitalized and outpatient settings. I’d like to thank Sen. Rand Paul for his participation in this invaluable series. I’d also like to thank Sean Hannity for providing these doctors with a platform to share their information. They deserve to be heard.”

Episode one launched today, Wednesday September 23 on Hannity.com.

Click HERE to watch.

Congressman Louie Gohmert (TX-01) released the following statement remembering the Americans who lost their lives to perpetrators filled with hate for innocent people on September 11, 2001:

“Today we remember thousands of our countrymen and women who perished in the horrific terrorist attack on our country 19 years ago. These innocent, precious lives were ended all too soon by hate-filled, evil murderers who abide by no convention of rules, Geneva or otherwise. At this time particularly, it is imperative that we remember the re-connection the American people had during that tragedy with our first responders including law enforcement as well as our military, when we witnessed countless acts of heroism and courage. Many gave their lives saving others on a scale never before seen.  

We should not forget and allow a small, well-funded group of Marxists to now dishonor and tarnish the memories we had of such grand American heroes. We must not allow any improper actions by a few destroy the grand, gallant and self-sacrificing legacy of the many.

Please remember to take a moment today to say a prayer for the families, friends and loved ones who lost mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, spouses, neighbors and dear friends in the terrorist attacks at the World Trade Center in New York City, at the Pentagon building in Washington, D.C., and in the plane crash near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.

Evil men consumed with hate attempted to destroy this nation on that fateful day, and other evil men have not given up on that goal. However, we came together as Americans, not hyphenated Americans, on that next day, and we need to do that again for the good and light we bring to the world when we do. It is my prayer that we will stand united together once again and harken back to the ideals on which this country was established, and deny the forces that want to destroy the greatest free country that has ever existed.”