Congressional Record/Volume 167/Issue 4/House/Counting Electoral Votes/Pennsylvania Objection Debate/Dean Speech
Ms. Dean. Madam Speaker, this is a sad day for America—a day of shame, a day of ignominy, an attack on this Capitol, an attack on our country.
Madam Speaker, our words matter. Mobs, thugs, insurrectionists, domestic terrorists attacked our government with the aim of attacking our free and fair elections.
Make no mistake, these terrorists came armed, armed with false flags; armed with hate; armed with weapons; and, tragically, armed with lies force-fed to them by those at the highest level of government, including some from the legislative and, yes, the executive branches. Incited by the one at the highest level of government, they attacked people, property, this Capitol, this cathedral of democracy.
Words matter. In his last words to our Nation and to all of us here, our dear colleague, John Lewis, wrote last July: “Democracy is not a state. It is an act.” And each generation has an obligation to preserve its institutions.
Democracy is a series of acts, acts by you and by me, by citizens, one building upon the other and another—not acts that we have heard and seen and suffered today, words and acts to incite violence, acts that tear at the very fabric of our democracy.
Madam Speaker, yet, I have hope. We, too, are armed. We are armed with the facts. We are armed with the truth. We are armed with the love of our country. We are armed with our sworn oaths. And we are armed with our precious Constitution.
We have faced tyranny and insurrection before. We are here tonight to herald to America and to the world: We will defend our democracy, and we will endure.
Madam Speaker, when I came into work this morning, as I was preparing to come to the floor, I read Tom Friedman’s op-ed, which began with the words from the Gospel of Mark: For what shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world but lose his soul?
For what shall it profit any man.
Madam Speaker, I urge my Republican colleagues to have the courage to uphold their oath, courage like that of Congresswoman Margaret Chase Smith, a lifelong Republican and the first in her party to speak out against McCarthyism. Putting duty over fear, she said: “I do not want to see the Republican Party ride to political victory on the Four Horsemen of Calumny—Fear, Ignorance, Bigotry, and Smear. Surely, we Republicans are not that desperate for victory.”
Madam Speaker, for today, we have seen the cost of victory by such means. It shook the very walls of this building. Our colleagues know there is no truth to this challenge.
For what shall it profit a man.
Madam Speaker, it has been my solemn honor to participate in this sad day. I pray for our country.