McGOVERN ON DHS FUNDING, IRAN: “AMERICA IS LESS SAFE UNDER DONALD TRUMP.”

WASHINGTON—Today, Ranking Member Jim McGovern (D-MA) delivered the following opening remarks at a meeting of the House Rules Committee:

Madam Chair, America is less safe under Donald Trump. That is the simple truth.

The war he launched over the weekend—and it is a war, by the way; he calls it a war, Pete Hegseth calls it a war, so according to them it’s a war—this war has made America and the world less safe. 

So, I don’t want any lectures today about threats to our homeland security. Those threats have increased exponentially because this president chose to unilaterally launch a recklessly misguided regime-change war in the Middle East. Our country is less safe by the hour because of Donald Trump’s chaos and stupidity.

I’m not even going to waste my time talking about this bill, because it is the same Republican DHS funding bill we voted on a couple weeks ago. The same one that the House already passed and sent to the Senate.

So let me get this straight: we’re re-passing a bill we already passed, but we’re removing a provision we already passed, because it already passed. Is anyone able following that? What are we even doing here?

It’s the same lousy, rotten bill that does not put any guardrails or constraints on ICE or CBP after federal agents shot American citizens in the streets. So, speaking for myself, I will not give another penny to ICE or CBP. Republicans already shoveled $75 billion into ICE in their “Big Ugly Bill.” I will not vote to give them another cent. 

Not only have these agencies broken the law—but this administration’s obsession with using ICE and CBP to terrorize our communities has made us less safe by distracting from other critical functions at DHS which are now under tremendous strain. 

Let’s talk about homeland security—let’s talk about the fact that Donald Trump put a 22-year-old with no national security experience in charge of terrorism prevention for the entire country. 

Let’s talk about how just last week, Kash Patel fired a dozen members of an FBI counter-espionage team with a specialty in tracking Iranian threats in the United States.

Let’s talk about how DOGE gutted our ability to defend against cyberattacks—decimating agencies like CISA and reassigning cyber experts to do immigration enforcement.

Again, Donald Trump and his administration have made this country less safe. I have never seen America more alone or isolated than we are now. And I am deeply concerned that his reckless, illegal war will cause our allies to move even further away as this crisis deepens.

Speaker Johnson should have called Congress back on Monday. We should have held an emergency meeting in this committee to bring a war powers resolution to the floor immediately. And if you think it’s a great idea for Trump to break his promise and unilaterally start another forever war aimed at regime change, then good for you—vote for another war.

But to cancel votes today—and to hold no votes yesterday—as this Republican Majority did? That is beyond shocking. It’s pathetic. And all to delay and distract from the fact that Donald Trump broke his promise to MAGA. He said no more endless war, no more regime change, no more costly quagmires in the Middle East. And what did he do from his gilded ballroom at Mar-a-Lago—before slipping back to his million-dollar-per-plate dinner? He started a new forever war in the Middle East.

Easy for him to do. It’s not his billionaire donors who are going to get squeezed at the pump when gas skyrockets. His kids don’t have to go off and fight and die. It’s the kids from Worcester and small cities and towns in our districts—working class folks who will have to pay the price for his terrible miscalculation.

Six U.S. service members are already dead—Americans are stranded throughout the region because this Administration had no plan to keep them safe either—and Republicans are repassing a bill that they already passed a couple weeks ago.  

It’s a disgrace. Come back when you have a plan to rein in the lawlessness of ICE and CBP. Until then, we’re not going to rubber-stamp more money for agencies that defy judges and violate court orders—while this President makes America less safe by the hour with his new forever war.

With that, I yield back.

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