In House floor remarks on Thursday, Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX) promoted legislation to allow former police officers to conceal-carry their firearms.
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00:00I thank the speaker. I'm proud of my Republican colleagues for bringing
00:04forward legislation in support of our law enforcement community. I'm proud of the
00:10fact that in fact this president is trying to focus resources where it'll
00:14best provide security and safety on our streets and back our law enforcement
00:19community to actually target criminals. Not fund ridiculous grants, not fund NGOs
00:26that are undermining our security. The very NGOs that are perpetuating the open
00:31borders that are putting gangs in our communities like TDA and MS-13 that lead
00:35directly to the death of Americans. The death of Americans like Jocelyn
00:38Nungere, like Laken Riley, like Rachel Morin, like Kayla Hamilton. Americans that
00:45are no longer with us because of the policies of our colleagues on the other
00:48side of the aisle. Because of wide open borders and because of tolerance of
00:52violent criminals. Because of a Democrat president who has let violent criminals
00:58out on the street and commuted their sentences. Because of radical leftist
01:02judges promoted by those that fund my colleagues on the other side of the aisle
01:07like George Soros who have funded DA's that are letting criminals out on the
01:11streets in cities like San Antonio and Austin which I represent. Like my colleagues
01:16on the other side of the aisle that have defunded the police time and time again and
01:20have defended that position. For example, one of my colleagues on the other side of
01:26the aisle said the defund the police movement is one of the reimagining the
01:29current police system to build an entity that does not violate us while
01:32relocating funds to invest in community services. Another colleague, the defund
01:38movement isn't new. Folks are just finally listening. Defund the police, a
01:43Democrat colleague. Quote, defunding the police isn't radical, it's real. A former
01:48Democrat colleague and as I said before a colleague that literally voted on the
01:53Austin City Council to strip a hundred and fifty million dollars out of the
01:58police budget leaving the Austin police stranded unable to do their job and the
02:04people of Austin unable to get the services that they deserve and pay taxes
02:07for while their streets are made more violent and while criminals are allowed to
02:11roam free under the very aforementioned Soros DA's that refused to prosecute the
02:16criminals. Everybody in America knows what's going on. Everybody in America
02:20gets the joke. They saw their cities burning in the summer of 2020. They saw
02:25the reality of what happens when you allow these radical democratic policies to
02:30take root and they want it to end. They want common sense back. They want a
02:36president that will enforce the law and an FBI that will target criminals instead of
02:39the American people. They don't want to have a federal government that is
02:42weaponized against them. They don't want them to be targeted. They want violent
02:48criminals off the streets. They want violent gangs off the streets. They want
02:51our borders to be secure. They want TDA out. They want MS-13 out. They want fentanyl
02:58off of their streets. And the only way you can do that is to actually back up the
03:04people trying to enforce the law and actually stand with them in the
03:08enforcement of the law and not turn around and let them all out back on the
03:12streets. Yet that's what my colleagues perpetually want to do. The fact of the
03:21matter is the American people understand that this president and this
03:30Republican House and this Republican Senate and Republican jurisdictions across
03:35the country stand for law enforcement. They stand for order. And that's what they
03:43want. That's what they sent us here for. Now we put together some bills this week
03:49that are focused on wishes of the people, the men and women in blue, like my
03:57grandfather who served as chief of police in Sweetwater, Texas. The many law
04:03enforcement I was proud to serve with and alongside in the office of the Attorney
04:08General and in the United States Attorney's Office. We work with them on a
04:12regular basis. But when you talk to them, they cannot do their job if the
04:20radical leftist policies of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle are
04:24allowed to continue to be perpetuated. You can't combat crime if you put the
04:32criminals back on the streets. You can't combat crime if you import criminals from
04:37dangerous prisons. You can't combat crime if your law enforcement agencies are
04:45targeting American citizens for political retribution rather than taking
04:52dangerous violent criminals off the streets. I rise in support of these bills. I
04:59rise in support of the rule. The legislation that we put forward will
05:04provide value for our men and women in uniform that they've asked for. They've
05:09asked for the ability to keep the weapons that they had in service. Now why does that
05:14matter? I'll tell you why it matters. My grandfather that I mentioned before died in
05:181949 of cancer when my dad, a seven-year-old, had polio and my grandmother was a single mom
05:25in West Texas raising him and did all the tough things, didn't ask for any handouts, took two jobs,
05:35helped my dad go on to be the first to go to college. My dad is still 82 years old. He's still alive.
05:40He's 82, still managing to walk, barely. But my dad talks about his dad as a cop and he pulls out his old .38,
05:53the .38 revolver that my grandfather had in service. And that means something to the people
06:01that serve. It means something for them to be able to carry that with them and take it with them.
06:07It's no small thing. Some of my colleagues dismiss it as being
06:11not important. But I can tell you it's important to the people that are out there serving
06:17because they devote their lives to this cause.
06:21When I take that .38 out of the safe and I can show it to my son, he's holding the .38
06:26that his great-grandfather held and carried with him when he was policing the streets.
06:31And I think that is a good thing.
06:39With that, Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time and move the previous question on the resolution.
06:43With that, the question is,
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