Chris Smith

Christians have encountered genocide and the Obama administration refuses to recognize their plight.

I urge my colleagues to show their continued commitment to bringing Mr. Levinson home by unanimously supporting this resolution.

Friends don't let friends commit human rights abuses or back a bureaucrat who with impunity is misusing his authority.

The greater the Sword of Damocles that hangs over the head of an agency or a state or a country, the better.

I do write a lot of laws on human rights, and the trafficking laws, four of them now, including the Trafficking Victims Protection Act.

The only way that you can get justice for whistleblowers who have come forward and presented something important and who have suffered retaliation as a result, the only entity that can make a judgment about whether or not that has happened…

Mr. Gurry is completely immune from any Swiss criminal or civil jurisdiction.

I do believe that some sort of resolution by Congress would be extremely helpful.

Are you kidding me? U.N. Security Council sanctions don't apply to Mr. Gurry? I find that appalling.

Why hasn't the Obama administration been more aggressive in trying to--I mean North Korea, you talk about rogue states, there are few nations on Earth that are as threatening as Pyongyang to the world.

We want to hear from them and ask them honest questions and tough questions.

If you have a bad apple, you expunge the bad apple. This is hurting their reputation.

What is the United States going to do? What does the U.S. think about this?

This ought to be a demand that is backed up by punch and by a great deal of pressure just to get that report out.

Let me just begin the questioning. First, you know, to take your last point first about trying and Congress generating some pressure to release it.

We hope that we can move this quickly and get a confirmed position as head of the office.

It is critically important that that person be effective in dealing with the Under Secretary for Civilian Security, Democracy, and Human Rights.

The United States is the global leader on this issue and the world watches what we do.

It has to be our top priority.

What I can say is that we put, through the efforts of our sanctions, Iran is in a $1/2-trillion hole.

The world knows what we can do with our secondary sanctions, and I think they will follow.

I mean they are so close to Iran, they have double-dealed us and especially the Middle East, the Syrians, I don't know why we would trust them.

If Europe tries to deal with any of those that are designated human rights abusers... you will be cut off from the United States.

We continue to be very engaged in Iran's human rights abuses and its support for terrorism.

I think part of the reason that you saw the difference in what the U.N. would allow after years was the way that we had all conceived of our sanctions.