House to vote on H.Res.789 - Censuring Representative Paul Gosar. UPDATED Gosar to be stripped of 2 committee assignments

Additionally a potential vote to strip Gosar of a key committee assignment, is absolutely appropriate —although I would like to see Congress expel Gosar from the House Of Representatives

To be fair and as previously noted in the November 11, 2021 article —Paul Gosar eventually deleted the incredibly reckless and unseemly video which clearly depicts him slitting AOC’s throat. To date he has never apologized for posting the video. A reasonable person could conclude that video is likely incompatible with how US House of Representatives should conduct themselves…

It’s not a “fun” anime video it was an explicit & vulgar depiction of Paul Gosar “slitting” AOC’s throat…

At the time I purposefully did not focus on Gosar’s November 9th statement addressing his social media video. However in light of the expected November 17, 2021 US House of Representatives vote on House Resolution 789 I think it might be helpful to reread and scrutinize Gosar’s previous statement.

The first sentence of Rep Gosar’s statement reinforces what many of us initially thought -Gosar’s tweet proffered an important predicate; shifting the blame to “office staffers” in doing so Gosar’s intent is to blame shift. Essentially throwing his staff under the bus but as mention the opening sentence reinforces the predicate

...the gross mischaracterization…

…statement in response to the gross mischaracterization of a short anime video produced by his office…

The second paragraph of his statement goes on to not only castigate Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez but then incomprehensibly rationalizing his vulgar behavior. However embedded in Gosar’s statement is an overlooked micro aggression that is specifically tailored to marginalize Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. You would think that Rep Gosar would be keenly aware of the wide spread used of hyphenated last names. In Latino cultures the use of hyphenated last names is common. Yet as you can see Gosar only used a portion of her full last name.

Who really defunded the Police… Trump & Sessions

Moreover Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez prior statements concerning CBP and ICE. Fundamentally I disagree with some of progressives and the “defund the police” narrative. Restructuring funding would have been a much better “catch phrase” —The reality is do you know who actually defunded the police? That would be Donald Trump and Jeff Session by clawing back (or adding conditions to retroactively add conditions — contravening what Congress’ Appropriations. See July 2017 AG Session Announcement and the July 2017 Memorandum this punitive action has been litigated in various federal district courts and several US Circuit Court of Appeals…

With respect to Gosar’s invocation of AOC’s previous “rogue agencies that act to inflict harm on our communities”…separate from the disastrous and unlawful misuse of appropriations beyond what Congress intended was the “emergency appropriations”

• July 2020 —U.S. Government Accountability Office report confirms what several Federal District Courts and Two US Court of Appeals rulings that the Department of Homeland Security's Customs and Border Protection agency: "CBP Needs to Increase Oversight of Funds, Medical Care, and Reporting of Deaths."

• June 2020 — the GAO issued a legal opinion B-331888 -which stated in part; that the administration’s use of emergency funding to buy items other than the "consumables and medical care" for which it was meant —CBP clearly violated what is known as the "purpose statute."

• The GAO further opined; CBP that if it does not find money elsewhere to offset those unauthorized purchases, "it should report a violation of the Antideficiency Act as required by law."

The closing paragraph of Gosar’s statement is textbook subterfuge. And dare I say one of the most racist statements I’ve read in a while. Gosar throws around certain buzzwords and makes specious claims, such as: “2.3 million lawbreakers” sans any documentation to support his claim. What is more troubling is Gosar’s “othering” and amplification of “the brown menace at our Southern Boarder”

—the reality is America’s greatness is derivative of our diversity and inclusion. Yet for Rep Gosar “the brown menace” is a plague of illegal immigration. The naked racism here should not be overlooked nor accepted. Rep Gosar’s immigration views are antithetical to actual American values.

Perhaps Gosar, MTG and their ilk should just go ahead and create the “White Supremacy Caucus” —in fact just ask former representative Steve King how that worked out for him, spoiler he’s no longer serving in Congress. The fundamental lack of leadership from @GOPLeader and the # 2 House Republican @SteveScalise gives the tacit approval for the more radical and extremists views held by these members of Congress. It is unacceptable and the House Republican Leadership’s silence can not stand. Think about it - if Reps like Gosar are free to make these kind of vulgar & reckless statements to their fellow members of Congress —exactly how do you think they treat/speak to average Americans.

The US House of Representatives is hallowed ground. Current member of Congress walk the same halls as;

• Giants of civil rights.

• Gladiators of our Democracy

• Founding Fathers

So if current member of Congress lack the prerequisite “respect for their coworkers” how do you think they comport themselves with the general pubic? But then again Gosar has been unapologetic in his support of radical groups like the Oath Keepers -bragged that Gosar attended meetings prior to Jan 6th

Unfortunately this is also indicative of how Donald Trump made being an unrepentant racist how how okay… for the record being a racist is never okay and it’s certainly should never come from a member of Congress. In short I am saying that the House Republican leadership’s silence equates to tacit complicity and condones egregious conduct by Gosar…

H.Res.789 - Censuring Representative Paul Gosar…

If you know where and what to look for then you’d note that on November 16, 2021 the House Of Representatives Clerk added H.Res.789 to the calendar at 4:45PM (today) toggle to the bottom of the embedded link and like magic👇🏻

Items that may be considered pursuant to a rule H. Res. 789Censuring Representative Paul Gosar.[PDF] [XML]Added 11/16/2021 at 04:45 PM

On November 12, 2021 H. Res. 789 was introduced to the House but concurrently H.Res. 789 was also Referred to the House Committee on Ethics. H.Res.689 reads in part (please pay attention because this is important) -told you that the Instagram post was the nexus and highly problematic…

…Representative Gosar’s official Instagram account and used the resources of the House of Representatives to further violence against elected officials…

…Republican Party has failed to condemn Representative Gosar’s threats of violence…

…Whereas the leadership of the Republican Party has failed to condemn Representative Gosar’s threats of violence against the President of the United States and a fellow Member of Congress;

Whereas depictions of violence can foment actual violence and jeopardize the safety of elected officials, as witnessed in this chamber on January 6, 2021;

H.Res. 789 concludes with the following;

Whereas the participation of women in politics makes our government more representative and just: Now, therefore, be it Resolved, That—

1. Representative Paul Gosar of Arizona be censured;

2. Representative Paul Gosar forthwith present himself in the well of the House of Representatives for the pronouncement of censure; and

3. Representative Paul Gosar be censured with the public reading of this resolution by the Speaker.

To be clear last week I made a general observation of how Reps like Gosar consistently attacks his fellow female House of Representatives colleagues and a vast majority of them are women of color with impunity. This kind of naked racism and misogyny should never be tolerated or seemingly acceptable. It’s not.

Updated Nov 16, 2021 9:45PM

Unfortunately when I originally published this article I was at a rest stop on I95 heading back to DC and I didn’t have all the files I needed. The previous report that Gosar would be stripped from one House Committee was actually updated after I published the article - the House will vote to strip Gosar of TWO committee assignments. See Gosar’s current committee assignments, Because I really do not want to amply Gosar’s disgusting video -I decide to use the PiP feature and isolated 2 minutes of Chairman McGovern’s opening statement in this video.

You can read the two amendments added to H.Res. 786 here the committee assignments are:

• House Oversight Committee

• Committee on Natural Resources.

MANAGER’S AMENDMENT Revised:

• Removes Representative Paul Gosar from the Committee on Oversight and Reform and the Committee on Natural Resources.

Chairman McGovern is 100% correct Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez serves on the House Oversight Committee with Gosar and I agree it’s unconscionable that she should be forced to sit on the same committee with a man who decided to post that vulgar video.

Again apologies for the late update as I mentioned my work day started at 4:45AM and I literally just walked in to my home but wanted to make sure my readers had the most up to date information. I mean if I can draft, edit, highlight and source the relevant Congressional documents at a rest stop on I95 -imagine what I can do when I’m in front of my work computer…

Below are a few historical datapoints;

“Each House may determine the Rules of its Proceedings, punish its Members for disorderly Behaviour, and, with the Concurrence of two thirds, expel a Member.”
—Article 1, section 5, clause 2

• Members Who Have Been Expelled From the House of Representatives

• Members Who Have Been Censured By the House of Representatives

• Members Who Have Been Reprimanded By the House of Representatives

Again I’m going offline until November 18, 2021 but I wanted to let my readers know what will happen tomorrow. So what to expect tomorrow —once H.Res.786 hits the floor —procedurally there will be one hour of debate for both sides and then the vote will occur. Based on the calendar and how tomorrow looks the vote will likely occur sometime after 5PM tomorrow - see Office of the Clerk US House of Representatives link (below) this is where you can download the documents and watch tomorrow’s debate.

https://clerk.house.gov

At any rate I’m oddly super tired because I had to be out the door at 4:45AM to drive 2.5 hours so I could spend the day with various lawmakers at my State Capitol —but hey as long as I have Wi-Fi and a tablet apparently I can do just about anything —including researching and publishing an article that I hope is helpful to my readers. Lastly I genuinely believe that striping Gosar from his two committee assignments is incredibly lenient and a solid argument could and should be made to expel Gosar from the US House of Representatives. Period. Full Stop

-Filey