On the recordApril 4, 2019
I want to thank the chairman for his leadership and his entire staff's leadership for getting us to this point. Let me be very clear. If it weren't for Chairman Engel, we would not have this vote on the floor today. My motivation for this bill is very simple. I don't want to see 14 million Yemenis starve to death. That is what Martin Griffith had said at the U.N., that if the Saudis don't stop their blockade and let food and medicine in, within 6 months we will see one of the greatest humanitarian crises in the world. That should be a bipartisan issue, that this Congress speak with a moral voice that food and medicine should get to civilians. Now, as Chairman Engel knows, and others know, I am not for the BDS movement. I have supported very strongly resolutions condemning anti- Semitism. But I also don't think that these tactics should be used as weapons to prevent efforts to stop the greatest humanitarian crisis in the world. That is insulting. It is insulting. Those issues should be voted on separately, and I will proudly vote, when the time comes, against the BDS efforts. Madam Speaker, I want to, with that, thank again Chairman Engel, Representative McGovern, Speaker Pelosi, and Majority Leader Hoyer and their teams for getting us to this point.
