By The Signal Editorial Board
The Santa Clarita Valley’s congressman, Mike Garcia, took to the House floor on Wednesday during time set aside for general speeches from members of the House, and issued his remarks on the end of the first year of the Joe Biden administration.
Garcia expressed some pretty simple requests, and they capture the wants and desires of many Americans.
And, as he simply said, they’re not much. We want to feel like the people we elect, regardless of party affiliation, are putting Americans first. That they care about public safety, and our pocketbooks, and our rights.
And, he said, the current administration, in its first year since President Joe Biden took office, has failed us all, on many of these fronts.
Garcia is right. He captured a lot of what we feel about the state of the nation, in a succinct, 540-word speech — and we couldn’t have said it any better. So, below, we present the congressman’s remarks, as delivered on the floor of Congress:
Remarks by Rep. Mike Garcia, R-Santa Clarita, Wednesday, Jan. 19:
We the people really aren’t asking for much of our elected officials. Above all things, we just want them to do what is right for our country and be on the side of Americans. This is not a party thing; this is not a Republican versus Democrat thing. Regardless of party affiliation, we just want them to do what is right for the country.
The current presidential administration and its policies have failed us in this regard, and in a frighteningly short period of time.
In just one year, this administration and its policies have eroded America’s status as the lone premiere superpower. Eroded our energy independence, making us once again beholden to OPEC, literally begging Middle Eastern nations to provide us more oil. Eroded an economy that was thriving before COVID and beginning to recover in the midst of COVID — and now we’re experiencing inflation that we have not seen in 40 years.
Eroded our nation’s security, tucking tail against a group of savages and terrorists in Afghanistan after 20 years of fighting for the right reasons. After almost two years of no American deaths in Afghanistan and relative stability in a country that was formerly a breeding ground for terrorists, this administration set an arbitrary exit date and backed that date up with absolutely no plan. This admin stranded hundreds of Americans in Afghanistan and left our allies high and dry. And the ad hoc and sloppy withdrawal led to the death of these 13 precious American service members’ lives — absolutely avoidable and absolutely the fault of this administration.
We really are not asking for much from our elected officials. We the people just want this administration to stop giving hope to the bad guys and to start taking care of our nation. Take care of our workers, our jobs, the small business owners, our children, and their education and allow parents the right to understand what our children are being taught in school. The right to make school choices for our children.
We’re asking that the administration stop calling parents terrorists and start preventing actual terrorists from infiltrating our country.
We’re asking for secure borders so that we do not see 175,000 human beings come across our border and into our nation each month without any accountability. If you care about the Dreamers, if you care about the potential DACA recipients like many of us do, then you must first end this manmade border crisis.
We just want someone to stand up and fight against the ridiculous “defund the police” movement and make our streets safe again.
We don’t want the cost of goods and supply chain issues to overcome our income.
We’re asking simply that we fairly value the time, the skills, and the experience of our workers, so that when they work harder and provide quality service, they make more and keep more money.
We don’t want higher taxes only to see the government at all levels squander our hard-earned money.
Above all things, Madam Speaker, we just want the president to be on our side. And to have the backbone to stand up for the good guys.
We are not asking for much. We just want this administration to stop giving hope to the bad guys.
