At a House Oversight Committee Hearing last week, Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-IL) spoke about ending the National Suicide Hotline for LGBTQ+ Youth prior to questioning witnesses.
00:00Let me just turn my attention to one issue, which I still, it blows my mind that in the name of DEI, we would get rid of the LGBTQ National Suicide Hotline, which receives 1.3 million calls and texts.
00:19And they're people who are specialized. And this was created during the Trump administration. This is not some kind of liberal Democrat who created this particular hotline.
00:30But in the name of DEI, we are getting rid of a hotline. And as a consequence, people are going to D.I.E. They're going to die.
00:39And LGBTQ youth are at elevated levels of risk for suicide. Four times, according to the Trump administration, CDC. This is not, again, this is not the Biden administration, this is the Trump administration.
00:56My colleagues, to their credit, Republicans Lawler and Kim, wrote a letter asking, pleading, saying, please do not end this suicide hotline.
01:13And the name of expunging DEI, we're getting rid of this hotline. That is idiocy. That's not excellence.
01:21So when we are going to talk about sacrificing excellence in the name of DEI, I respectfully disagree in the context of not only getting rid of this program, the National Suicide Hotline for LGBTQ Youth, but there are countless others.
01:39Now, let me ask a question of Dr. Harper, if we didn't have slavery, if we didn't have Jim Crow, if we didn't have discrimination of any kind,
01:56I don't think there would be necessarily a need for some of the efforts that have existed since the time of Jim Crow to address some of the issues that came about because of those prior, what I call, original sins of America.
02:15Yeah, that's right.
02:16What's your opinion on this?
02:18Yeah, that's right. But to be sure, they're not only historical, they are also contemporary.
02:24Women continue to receive unequal pay for equal work.
02:30LGBTQ people continue to be discriminated against because of who they love.
02:34People with disabilities continue to not receive the support and the accommodations that they need in the modern times.
02:41So this isn't just historical, it's also contemporary.
