Pelosi Floor Speech Supporting Congressional Gold Medal to Honor Montford Point Marines

Contact: Nadeam Elshami/Drew Hammill, 202-226-7616

Washington, D.C. – Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi spoke on the House floor today on H.R. 2447, which grants the Congressional Gold Medal to the Montford Point Marines. Below are the Leader’s remarks.

“I thank the gentleman for yielding and thank you, Mr. Speaker, for recognition. And I’m pleased to join my colleagues: Congresswoman Corrine Brown, who has been relentless in calling for this day, our colleague from Missouri, Mr. Clay, thank you for your leadership on all of this as well. To our colleagues on the other side, the Ranking Member on the Banking Committee and then Mr. Pearce as well who spoke about this. We come together in a bipartisan way for a very patriotic occasion for our country.

“What a thrill it will be when we can tell our constituents we were there to vote for this important resolution, which will, as we all know, call for the striking of a gold coin, directing the Treasury Secretary to strike a single gold medal of appropriate design in honor of the Montford Point Marines. How exciting.

“I know that many of those Marines or their families are here on Capitol Hill today. We look forward to welcoming them to a ceremony where these medals will be bestowed. I only wish that all of the Marines who ever served, sacrificed, that were willing to sacrifice their lives for our country—some of them did, some of them have left us, have passed since then, all of them are the subject of the respect and honor that we pay.

“It’s just another example of some of the inequality that has existed in our country earlier on. Long overdue time for us to address some of that, we’ve had occasion in the rotunda over the last few years to recognize the work of President Truman when he called for the desegregation of the military. General, Secretary, National Security Advisor—he has many titles—Powell was here with us that day.

“We’ve had occasion to honor our Tuskegee Airmen on another occasion, so it is long overdue to, again, take this other step to recognize the important work that all Americans have played in that most important responsibility to protect and defend.

“I will say this to all the Marines who approached me about this legislation outside the Congress, that every time they did I said ‘Corrine Brown has already gotten to us. Lacy Clay has already gotten to us.’

“Corrine was absolutely relentless on this and we are all here because of her leadership and all of the work the members of our Congressional Black Caucus and the bipartisan support that we have and, of course, we wouldn’t be on the floor without the leadership of our Speaker who enabled this bill to come to the floor.

“But it’s a proud day for the Congress. We’ll look forward to an even prouder day when these medals will be bestowed. With that, Mr. Speaker, I yield back.”

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