Ayanna Pressley

We still want answers. And that's exactly why Representative Schakowsky of Illinois and I earlier submitted a letter.

When Johnson & Johnson asks people to trust them, the FDA should have said, show us.

I find it insulting to this committee and to the men and women across this country whose trust in Johnson & Johnson has destroyed their lives.

I think this is the very exact vehicle and forum where this sort of oversight is supposed to take place.

What is happening in Haiti is of specific and urgent import to the people that I represent, dealing with the fact that they cannot travel back to the funerals of their loved ones due to the violence; the fact that students cannot go to…

A parent is a child's first teacher. My mother did not read me nursery rhymes, but she made sure early on that I knew the words of Toussaint Louverture, 'I was born a slave, but Nature gave me the soul of a free man.'

Working families shouldn't have to wait 3 to 5 days for a check to clear.

This is important, because if we are banning flavors we must ban all flavors, which includes mint and menthol.

It is critical that we hold both Big Tobacco and Big Vaping accountable for targeting young people...

Menthol e-cigarettes are not an offramp for adult menthol smokers. They are an onramp to hooking a new generation of smokers.

47,000 black people die every year from smoking-related illness, making this the largest cause of preventable death among black Americans.

We must clamp down on the production of menthol products and not the individual possession of it, because there are real intergenerational, traumatic consequences of broken windows policing.

To not do so would be discriminatory, since menthol, in particular, has imposed a unique and deadly burden on the black community.

Our work to end the smoking epidemic is not just simply a matter of public health. This is, and always has been, an issue of racial justice.

I thank the gentleman for those words and for telling us more about those we were prematurely robbed of all that they had to contribute to this world. It is important that we continue to bring their names into this well, into this august…

I thank the gentleman for those powerful words. Like the gentleman, I agree that we cannot say those names enough. Mr. Speaker, it is now my pleasure to yield to the gentleman from the great State of Missouri (Mr. Cleaver).

I believe that your voice is the most important of all the important voices that we have heard today.

It is personally thrilling and inspiring to me to see a panel made entirely of women's voices, and America should listen to women's voices.

I still call it a war on women's health because when you look at the comprehensive nature of these cuts and the policies and the restrictions, what else is it?

Many of our Republican colleagues, they opposed teen pregnancy prevention programs. They oppose comprehensive sex education.

I just wanted to acknowledge, since there was this conversation about compassion for the innocence- earlier today I rolled out the People's Justice Guarantee, which calls for the abolishing of the death penalty.

I want to acknowledge my other sisters in service from our Pro-Choice Caucus were waived on today, Representatives Chu and Schakowsky, respectfully.

That right is a fundamental right. It is a right that is tied to your ability to have dignity in this country.

To be clear, the Hyde Amendment functioned as the original abortion ban for low-income individuals.

Current law restricts Medicaid funds from covering abortion care for women in communities across the United States.