Al Green Spoke the Truth
Some Dems walked out in protest, Dem leadership urged decorum
Mar. 5: Trump falsely claims he has a mandate from voters … Johnson ejects Green for correcting Trump but allows much more disruptive GOP chants … Johnson didn’t say shit when white Republican disrupted last year’s Democratic speech … Democratic leadership urged decorum before the speech …
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White Republicans had already disrupted Pres. Donald Trump’s address to a joint session of Congress several times last night when Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) ordered the sergeant at arms to remove Black, 77-year-old Rep. Al Green (D-TX).
Green wasn’t removed for disruption, though. He was removed for disagreement, for disabusing the nation of one of Trump’s lies.
In fact, disruption was fine when it was Johnson’s fellow Republicans a’hootin’ and a’hollerin’ “U-S-A,” a thing they know how to spell.
In more fact, disruption was also fine when it was a Democratic president being disrupted. Johnson was sitting in the same fucking chair just last year when Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor-Greene (R-GA) disrupted Pres. Joe Biden’s State of the Union speech and Johnson didn’t say shit, or even gosh golly whillikers McStuffins.
Democrats didn’t say shit, or even “Restrain yourself, good sir,” when Pres. Barack Obama’s joint address was disrupted by Republican Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC) shouting “You lie” because Wilson didn’t like the truth.
Wilson issued a written apology but refused to apologize on the House floor. Republicans sided with him and almost all of them voted against a resolution of disapproval, considerably weaker than the censure Johnson is now recommending against Green.
In fact, Wilson was lying. He was claiming that Obamacare would cover undocumented immigrants. It should have. But it didn’t.
And Greene wanted Biden to amplify the murdered student Republicans were using to demonize all undocumented immigrants. In other words, Greene disrupted the speech to make a request like Biden was a fucking DJ. And Biden actually did it.
In short, when two white Republicans disrupted presidential speeches to falsely call one Democratic president a liar and order another to play the GOP’s hits, Republicans took their side. When a Black Democrat calls out an actual lie — he’s removed from the chamber where his constituents sent him to represent them.
Green wasn’t ejected last night for disrupting. What elevated his yelling to a disruption was Republicans trying to shout him down. The same Republicans who had disrupted to show off their spelling skills.
They disrupted by shouting Green down because they didn’t like what he said.
The substance matters. Trump was lying about his election, trying to manufacture consent for his assault on government services to the needy, to create the impression that the American people support his agenda:
“The presidential election of November 5th was a mandate [sic] like has not been seen in many decades [sic]. We won all seven swing states, giving us an Electoral College victory of 312 votes. We won the popular vote by big numbers [sic].”
Green was the only Democrat to push back audibly, yelling, “Mr. President, you don’t have a mandate to cut Medicaid,” and, “You have no mandate to cut Medicaid!” (Republicans are well aware that Green is the sole Democrat to say that he is drafting articles of impeachment against Trump for announcing his intention to commit crimes against humanity by removing the population of Gaza.)
One Republican reportedly then yelled at this 77-year-old Black member of Congress: “Sit your ass down!” Vice Pres. JD Vance, who became famous for his memoir defending/attacking poor people, gestured with his thumb for Green to be removed.
Johnson himself then interrupted Trump, not to tell Republicans to stop making considerably more noise drowning out Green, but to threaten and then order Green’s expulsion:
Johnson: Mr. President. Members are directed to uphold and maintain decorum in the House and to cease any further disruptions. That's your warning. Members are engaging in willful and continuing breach of decorum and the chair is prepared to direct the sergeant at arms to restore order to the joint session. Mr. Green, take your seat. Take your seat, sir.
Green: [Inaudible] [because Republicans were disrupting].
Johnson: Take your seat. Finding that members continue to engage in willful and concerted disruption of proper decorum, the chair now directs the sergeant at arms to restore order. Remove this gentleman from the chamber. [Applause]
[The sergeant-at-arms escorts Green out.]
Johnson: Members are directed to uphold and maintain decorum in the House. Mr. President, you can continue.
Journalist Matt Laslo reported that Trump’s former “doctor,” Rep. Ronny Jackson (R-TX) yelled, “Get out, get out,” as Green was led out of the chamber. Other Republicans chanted “Nah nah nah nah, goodbye.” Weirdly, none of them were also removed for their disruptions.
Afterward, Green explained that, “This is the richest country in the world, and we have people who don't have good health care. We've got to do better and now we're about to cut Medicaid, which is for poor [people]."
Republicans have said they won’t cut Medicaid. But they also passed a budget resolution that calls for cuts that can’t be achieved without slashing Medicaid.
That resolution only passed because Trump personally lobbied for it.
Republicans have said they’ll reduce waste, fraud, and abuse of Medicaid funds — but there’s not enough of it to achieve their full levels of cuts, meaning they’ll make it harder for legitimate recipients to prove they’re legitimate, cutting them by pretending they were fraudulent. It will mean senior citizens tossed from residential care, rural hospitals closing, home-care visits ending.
That’s what Green was talking about. And if you want a more visceral sense of how much industrial-grade sand it took for Green to stand his ground even after Johnson told him to sit and even after Republicans failed to shout him down, here’s a perspective you probably didn’t see on this 77-year-old thrusting his cane at the U.S. president, outnumbered by Trump’s allies, as Democrats sat silently.
Again: The point was to defend the poor and the sick. “It’s worth it to let people know that there are some of us who are going to stand up against this president,” Green said later.
Green was right. Trump had no mandate to cut Medicaid. That’s true both because Americans support Medicaid but also because Trump had no mandate at fucking all.
Here’s a PBS chart showing that Trump’s popular-vote margin was smaller than Biden’s in 2020 and Obama’s in 2008:
Here’s an even more confirmation-biasy chart comparing margins of victory. Y’know, where you’d see a mandate:
Polling just last month found that 71% of the country Trump’s own voters oppose any cuts to Medicaid.
So what did Green’s fellow Democrats do in response to this historic and unjust insult to Green? Nothing.
A handful did walk out later during Trump’s speech, without — as far as I can tell — disrupting it.
The first group reportedly included Reps. Jasmine Crockett (D-TX), Maxwell Frost (D-FL), LaMonica McIver (D-NJ), Lateefah Simon (D-CA), and Melanie Stansbury (D-NM). Rep. Sydney Kamlager-Dove (D-CA) posted that she, too, walked out. “There’s only so much bullshit a person can tolerate.”
Frost said in a statement, “no matter how hard he tries and how many Republicans in Congress bend the knee and kiss the ring: he will never be king … Tonight, the American people saw a desperate liar stand in front of a podium and spit out excuse after excuse as to why he hasn’t been able to make your life better.”
Others who left during the longest-ever such speech included Reps. Judy Chu (D-CA), Lloyd Doggett (D-TX), Veronica Escobar (D-TX), Jared Huffman (D-CA), Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), Ilhan Omar (D-MN), Mark Pocan (D-WI), Ayanna Pressley (D-MA), and Jamie Raskin (D-MD).
FUN FACT The Democrats who walked out were predominantly non-white. By my count, I see only three white guys — Pocan, Raskin, and Huffman — who together sound like the start of a bad joke: A gay guy, a Jewish guy, and a secularist walk out of a bar.
Why didn’t other Democrats walk out? It’s not just a question of white, male, Christian, cis privilege. Congressional Democratic leadership told Democrats to be polite. Polite.
CNN reports that House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) unveiled this tactic for Democratic protests last night: Not clapping a lot for Trump. Sick burn, dude.
And Democratic leaders reportedly actively squelched other, more robust forms of Democratic protest.
In a closed-door meeting before the speech, Democratic leadership briefed members on the plan for staging strategic, media-effective protests showing proper decorum.
Democratic Whip Katherine Clark (D-MA) reportedly suggested using props not using props, which many did anyway. Jeffries urged Democrats to focus on people affected by the cuts and not make the story about themselves. Anyone know how that worked out?
Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE), the Democrat most accommodating to Republican theocrats, took the side of fellow Christian Johnson against Green. “[T]here were some moments of disrespect that I think were unfortunate and unnecessary.”
Disrespect. It’s disrespectful in Coons’s eyes to refute a lie in defense of the 80 million people who rely on Medicaid. Whatever disrespect was done to Trump by Green’s remarks is roughly the equivalent of Mercury passing in front of the sun when compared to the disrespect Democratic silence displayed toward 80 million people who had no one else to defend them.
And here’s Coons viciously wrist-slapping Trump: “[F]rankly, there were also some just alarming misrepresentations by President Trump.” Someone get the senator to his fainting couch.
Was Green right morally and factually? Yeppers. How about tactically? A CNN instant poll of viewers — disproportionately Republican by 14 points — found that 80% found Green’s actions “inappropriate.”
What the poll doesn’t tell us is whether those viewers knew (a) what Green said or that (b) he was right. Which really fucking matters. And yet, much of the coverage doesn’t even address what the topic of Green’s outburst was.
And Johnson’s removal of Green was virtually, ahem, whitewashed by some media. Green was misreported as protesting — he was correcting a lie. And if you relied on coverage like this crap from CNN, you might assume that Green self-ejected himself by triggering inexorable forces of physics (emphasis added for passive tense and eliding Johnson’s agency):
Still, the incident does seem to have created some bipartisan ground. As Johnson said afterward, “If they want to make a 77-year-old heckling congressman the face of their resistance, if that’s the Democrat Party, so be it.” Amen.
Meanwhile, Actual Crime Happened
Will Republicans censure Rep. Lance Gooden (R-TX)? Because as Trump was walking in, Rep. Melanie Stansbury (D-NM) held up a sign in the same camera framing as Trump, reading “This is not normal,” and Gooden ripped it from her hands.
Here’s Exhibit A, Gooden reaching behind Trump, literally reaching across the aisle to violate a woman’s physical autonomy and her right to freedom of speech:
Exhibit B: Gooden has now grabbed the sign from Stansbury and has it in his right hand, unbeknownst to Trump and actor Paul Giamatti, left1.
Neither the presidential defender of women nor any of Gooden’s colleagues came to Stansbury’s defense. Republicans cheered and laughed.
Physically grabbing something from someone else is literally a crime. It’s a kind of assault. I’m sure Attorney General Merrick Garland would’ve arrested Gooden by now, right? RIGHT?
After all, Gooden confessed to/bragged about it afterward, and tossed in violating his constitutional oath, which obliges him to defend freedom of speech even if it hurts his fierce hot man-love for Trump: “No one will disrespect President @realdonaldtrump in front of me.”
In other words, Gooden got physical with a woman on the floor of the House. To violate her freedom of speech. Where’s the corporate-media outrage over that? What sayest thou, Senator Coons? CRY “GOLLY” AND LET SLIP THE DOGS OF TSK-TSKING!!!
Here’s Kurt Bardella’s response: “[N]o Democrat did a God damn thing to Gooden in response … no balls, no pushback, they just get bullied and never fight back. It’s why we lose over and over again. Someone should’ve smacked the shit out of him for doing that.”
While your passive-resisting TFN doesn’t endorse violence, it’s worth asking why no Democrats were moved by the passions of the moment, by the suffering of our times, to at least a momentary impulse for a physical defense of Stansbury or even just the return of her property.
THE LACK-OF-REBELLION REBELLION It’s worth noting that not only Republicans have been the subject of town-hall protests. Protesters reportedly are trailing House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) to demand a more robust Democratic response to Trump.
Indivisible has been a part of those Jeffries protests, and co-founder Ezra Levin told The Bulwark, “There’s a sense of a leadership vacuum—that the Democrats in leadership adopted a strategic silence or a ‘bipartisanship first’ frame when it came to the new administration after spending two years saying that this guy was [Benito] Mussolini.”
Some Democratic voters interrupted Rep. Stephen Lynch (D-MA) last week to tell him to ramp up opposition to Mussolini. Lynch’s response? “You want to decide that? You need to run for Congress.”
As The Bulwark noted in response, pissed-off voters are doing exactly that, with hundreds a day contacting the candidate-recruitment group Run For Something.
The Slippery Slope Democrats Helped Grease
Democratic commitment to protocol and decorum is accommodation, subordinating real, quality-of-life priorities below the imperatives of power. And though your calm-keeping, on-carrying TFN seeks to avoid alarmism, it’s worth noting some of the greasy pieces now in place for a slippery slope toward state violence against peaceful protest and even official Democratic speech.
Since Pres. Bill Clinton, Democrats have sought to look tough on crime. After 9/11, most Democrats upped the ante against, y’know, “terror.” We saw this again with Black Lives Matter, the fretting about order.
Likewise, some Democrats lamented criminal — but peaceful — protests in defense of Palestinian human rights. Entire protest movements were labeled antisemitic based on evidence that was anecdotal, non-systemic, fictional, manufactured, or non-existent.
Last night, a Black Democratic member of Congress was removed from the chamber. Last month, a U.S. attorney launched an investigation (dropped yesterday) of remarks by Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Rep. Robert Garcia (D-CA).
On Monday, Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL), who literally ran a criminal operation in Florida, advocated for the arrest of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY). Her alleged crime, which is not a crime? She’s telling people what their constitutional rights are.
More Democrats, including especially Democratic leadership, need to demonstrate that the right to peaceful assembly and protest is superior to the bullshit need for order.
TCB
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TFN creator and writer Jonathan Larsen co-created Up w/ Chris Hayes and wrote for Countdown with Keith Olbermann at MSNBC, helped launch CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360° and Air America Radio, and has also worked at The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and The Young Turks.
Not actually actor Paul Giamatti.
Bernie walked out, too. Just sayin’.
As I have said before , with little exception, the Dems are pathetic. (Go Senator GREEN)..while i couldn't endure more than 5 minutes last eve, their "acts of protest" comprised of pink attire and bite-size "lie" signs were an amazing demonstration that they should go home...despite being a life-long Dem, I am horrified that we have gotten here due to their lack of leadership......where are they??? are they out in the midwest helping the folks there understand they have been sold a bill of goods? Are they cultivating a candidate now for 2028? Are they making sure we will have an election in 2028 because I am not at all sure we will........Are they asking people how much their eggs cost now so the process of re-programming can begin now?? are they working with the fired folks to begin a new movement??????????????????????so many unanswered questions....a handful of Dems with the spine to do something cannot do it alone....