(Washington, D.C.) – Congressman Al Green released the following statement regarding a third vote on impeachment:
“I love my country. However, despite the love I have for my country, I cannot overlook a history spanning some four centuries of racism and oppression based on race, color, gender, as well as socioeconomic status. This year marks 400 years since the first documented African slaves were brought to this land. Today, even with the valiant efforts throughout our history to eradicate invidious discrimination evidenced by abolitionists, suffragists, civil rights advocates, and people of good will, America now has a Commander-in-Chief who has incited and to some extent normalized bigotry with his words, deeds, and actions. Like those brave seekers of justice who stood against the odds, we must now take a stand for liberty and justice for all a stand against bigotry, regardless of the source.
“In a great nation that extols the virtues of all persons being created equal, we must ask, how can a governor with a photo on his medical school yearbook page of a person in blackface next to a person in Ku Klux Klan attire refuse to resign and remain in office? How can an attorney general in the same state admit to previously wearing blackface and maintain his high office? The answer is to a great extent because the Trump presidency has sent a message that you can be immune to the consequences of bigotry, by daring those with the authority and power to constitutionally remove you from office. We no longer stare bigotry down; bigotry now stares us down. Further, an argument that Governor Ralph Northam and Attorney General Mark Herring should resign will subject us to accusations of political hypocrisy if we refuse to take on a bigoted president.
“We cannot allow political expediency to defeat the President at the polls to outweigh the moral imperative to impeach the President in the people’s House. We must go on record against bigotry by starting at the top. Governor Northam’s refusal to resign for his bigotry is but a symptom of a greater syndrome that currently plagues our country as a result of not acting on President Trump’s bigotry.
“The remedy must be more than talking points about a much-needed conversation concerning bigotry. Because I believe that 400 years of bigotry culminating in the Trump presidency is worthy of impeachment, I will call for a third vote on impeachment regardless of the findings of the Mueller investigation which is unrelated to bigotry. We cannot allow bigotry to go unchecked.”
