Transcript of Speaker Pelosi’s Remarks at Weekly Press Conference

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Washington, D.C. – Speaker Nancy Pelosi held her weekly press conference today in the Capitol Visitor Center. Below are the Speaker's remarks:

Speaker Pelosi. There's no point in saying ‘good morning' because it certainly is not one. This morning, the radical Supreme Court is eviscerating Americans' rights and endangering their health and safety. But the Congress will continue to act to overcome this extremism and protect the American people. Today, the Republican‑controlled Supreme Court has achieved their dark, extreme goal of ripping away a woman's right to make their own reproductive health decisions. Because of Donald Trump, Mitch McConnell and the Republican Party – their supermajority on the Supreme Court – American women today have less freedom than their mothers. With Roe and their attempt to destroy it, radical Republicans are charging ahead with their crusade to criminalize health freedom.

In the Congress – be aware of this – the Republicans are plotting a nationwide abortion ban. They cannot be allowed to have a majority in the Congress to do that. But that's their goal. And if you read – and, again, we're all studying all this – but if you read what is very clear – one of the Justices had his own statement: it's about contraception, in vitro fertilization, family planning. That is all what will spring from their decision that they made today.

Such a contradiction: yesterday, to say the states cannot make laws governing the Constitutional right to bear arms. And today, they are saying the exact reverse: that the states can overturn a Constitutional right – for 50 years a Constitutional right – for a woman having the right to choose. The hypocrisy is raging, but the harm is endless. What this means to women is such an insult. It's a slap in the face to women about using their own judgment to make their own decisions about their reproductive freedom. And again, it goes – well, I always have said the termination of a pregnancy is just their opening act. It's just their front game. But behind it – and for years, I have seen in this Congress opposition to any family planning, domestic or global, when we have had those discussions and those debates and those votes on the Floor of the House.

This is deadly serious. But we are not going to let this pass. A woman's right to choose – reproductive freedom – is on the ballot in November. We cannot allow them to take charge so that they can institute their goal, which is to criminalize reproductive freedom, to criminalize it. Right now, they are saying in states they can arrest doctors and all the rest. What is happening here? What is happening here? A woman's fundamental health decisions are her own to make in consultation with her doctor, her faith, her family – not some right‑wing politicians that Donald Trump and Mitch McConnell packed the Court with. While Republicans seek to punish and control women, Democrats will keep fighting ferociously to enshrine Roe v. Wade into the law of the land. This cruel ruling is outrageous and heart‑wrenching. But make no mistake, again, it's all on the ballot in November.

The Supreme Court has ended a Constitutional right. This is – 50 years proclaimed a Constitutional right. What happened today was historic in many respects. Historic in that it had not granted, recognized a Constitutional right and then reversed it. This is a first and – again, just before, it imposed a Constitutional right to allow for concealed weapons. How about those Justices coming before the Senators and saying that they respected stare decisis, the precedent of the Court, that they respected the right of privacy in the Constitution of the United States? Did you hear that? Were they not telling the truth then?

Again – just getting to the gun issue, because really in preparation for this morning, I was really in an exalted state about what happened in the United States Senate yesterday. Counterpoint to the dangerous decision of this Trumpian Supreme Court that they made yesterday – but a way to take us to, as the bill is called, community safety, the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act. Right now – and I'm going to have to leave momentarily, because we just finished voting on the rule. We will be debating the bill on the Floor, and we expect a good bipartisan vote on it in the House.

We congratulate the Senate on the work that they have done and the timeliness of it to be passed in the Senate in a strong bipartisan way on a day when the Court made such a dangerous, dangerous decision. We will – many of our House Democrat proposals that are – included in this package are: keep deadly weapons out of dangerous hands by encouraging states to establish Extreme Risk Protection Order laws, ERPO, otherwise known as red flag laws; help put an end to straw purchases; close the ‘boyfriend loophole.' So many good things are in there. And it is not everything that we wanted. We must keep moving toward background checks, but – universal background checks, which will save the most lives. But this will save lives.

And to listen to Lucy McBath and other family members of those who have lost their loved ones. This is a giant step forward. Maybe not so much a giant, but a strong step forward. And if it's good enough for them, then we rejoice in passing it.

As I say to Members all the time with legislation, ‘Do not judge it for what isn't in it, but respect it for what is.' And there is much to be respected in this legislation.

On a happier note, yesterday we celebrated 50 years of Title IX, which has transformed equality and opportunity in our country. Are you familiar with the words of Title IX? Yesterday, we had Billie Jean King here, once again, celebrating Title IX, unveiling a portrait of Patsy Mink, who was the author in the House, working with Birch Bayh in the Senate, to make this the law of the land. And this is what it says: ‘No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving federal financial assistance.'

Again, in honor of this anniversary, we unveiled a portrait which will hang in the halls. It's about our Firsts. The first – she's actually the first woman of color to serve in the Congress. So she's honored for her first, but also for what she accomplished. We already have a painting of Shirley Chisholm, the first African‑American woman, and for her many accomplishments here. And of course Jeannette Rankin, the first woman ever to serve in the Congress. That's our ‘Firsts' series.

So again, we're working on the COMPETES Act, and lowering cost in the COMPETES Act is part of that. Lower families' cost, energize manufacturing and strengthen America's competitiveness now and in the future. I think we're coming – we seem to be able to find our areas of agreement, where we have some negotiating to do, and some things that we may have to save for another day. The real question is: do the Republicans in the Senate really want America to be independent? Do they really want to bring back jobs, to be ‘Make It In America' and allocate the resources to make sure that happens? Especially with chips, which are so important to our manufacturing in our own country. So that is very important.

COMPETES is the pillar of our work to lower costs, but we're proud of other steps we have taken. Lowering gas prices by cracking down on Big Oil's price gouging and the Consumer Fuel Price Gouging Prevention Act. Lowering food costs and taking further action to lower gas costs with the Lower Food & Fuel Costs Act – lowers fertilizer costs for farmers, reduces meat and poultry prices for families by increasing competition there, and lowers cost at the pump with cheaper, cleaner American Unleaded 88. I'm very proud of the work of our Members who were so responsible for this. And lowering the cost of everyday goods by passing the Open Shipping Reform Act.

In every one of these categories where we have taken action, corporate America – and I don't paint them all with the same brush – but corporate America, some, have been there to exploit the consumer. Their business plan is to increase profits at the expense of the consumer. And that is part of what is contributing to inflation. Inflation is global now, but some of it is exacerbated by this. And if you see the profits from the shipping industry – and again, the supply chain issues are related to shipping issues.

So again, we're very proud of the work that we've done. We hope – we believe that some of it has a prospect in the Senate.

I just want to close – because I'm really going to have to go to the Floor – by talking about what the President talked about in the State of the Union Address. And we're so proud of the President. He has been a champion on gun violence prevention for such a long time, instrumental in the original Brady Bill in 1994, which I was happy to support. I was the Whip for that. It took a while to do. We didn't win even on the first votes on the Rule for it. But in any event, he has been a champion in that regard.

In the inaugural, in the inaugural – in the State of the Union Address, he talked about a Unity Agenda. It had four parts to it. It was about our veterans, it was about mental health, it was about cancer, and it was about opioids. And soon, we will send the President – in terms of veterans – the PACT Act to the President's desk. It's historic. It's something to be very proud of. It has bipartisan agreement in the House and in the Senate. It provides access to VA health care to [3.5] million potentially exposed veterans, exposed to the burn pits, exposed to bad, poisonous water at Camp Lejeune. It grants presumptions of exposure for veterans with rare cancers and other debilitating diseases. And it includes, as I say, the Camp Lejeune.

The cancer piece of it is addressed in the Advanced Research Projects Agency‑Health Act, ARPA‑H, Congresswoman Eshoo's legislation. The PACT Act is Mr. Takano, the Chair of the Veterans' Affairs Committee. ARPA‑H comes out of the Energy and Commerce Committee – this particular legislation, Congresswoman Eshoo's. And that accelerates the fight against cancer, supercharges the Cancer Moonshot.

And again, a number of mental health bills this week, and more to come, that address mental health concerns that we have for our veterans, for our children, for our entire community. And again, some of that legislation relates to the opioid challenge that we face. So we passed legislation, keeping the President's promise, and hopefully we can get some of this through the Senate.

I am personally overwhelmed by this decision. From time to time, I quote this poem by Ehud Manor. He's an Israeli poet. I met his wife when I've been in Israel. He says:

‘I have no other country

Even though my land is burning;

Only a word in Hebrew penetrates

My veins, my soul.

With an aching body

And with a hungry heart.

Here is my home.

I will not be silent

For my country has changed her face, my country has changed her face;

I shall not give up on her,

I shall remind her and sing into her ears,

Until she opens her eyes.'

Clearly, we hoped that the Supreme Court would open its eyes. But to see the Chief Justice side with this radical agenda, it's just stunning.

And again, as a woman, as a mother, as a grandmother, to see young girls now have fewer rights than their moms or even their grandmothers is something very sad for our country.

I only have time for like one or two questions.

Q. Madam Speaker?

Speaker Pelosi. Chad, and then Jake, okay.

Q. Good morning. Thank you. You talked about the exercise by Leader McConnell on the Merrick Garland nomination.

Speaker Pelosi. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Q. And then what happened with the three President Trump [nominees] here. We have a Member of your Caucus who's saying, ‘We don't care what the far-right extremist Court does.' I mean, even though you don't like the process to get these Justices onto the Court which resulted in this decision, do you respect the process and what they've come out with, even though you vehemently disagree?

Speaker Pelosi. I'm about truth and honesty. Mitch McConnell said when Justice Scalia passed away in the early month – what is it February? The beginning of February, the end of January?

Q. February.

Speaker Pelosi. That we didn't have enough time in an election year to confirm a Justice. And so Merrick Garland was not even given a hearing with eleven months to go.

And yet, when Ruth Bader Ginsburg died, before the word even was out that she had died, he had already said, ‘We're setting up hearings,' when it was only weeks until the election. The inconsistency, the hypocrisy. I don't respect that process, A.

B, that some of these Justices who came before the Senate said they respected precedent and privacy. They must have a different view of precedent from what their vote was today on Roe v. Wade.

No, I don't respect a process that criminalizes a woman's right to her reproductive freedom.

Jake?

Q. Do you have any plans for action in the House? I mean, you've already taken action.

Speaker Pelosi. Yes.

Q. Is there something that you could do further?

Speaker Pelosi. We had passed that legislation really in order to make it the law of the land. It is clear that we just have to win a majority in November. And everything is at stake. If you are a woman, if you care about women, if you respect women, you know that this is a disgraceful, disgraceful judgment that they made.

So needless to say, and you know I quote Lincoln all the time: ‘Public sentiment is everything. With it, you can accomplish almost anything – without it, practically nothing.' But in order for public sentiment to prevail, people have to know. And people do know.

Q. Speaker Pelosi?

Speaker Pelosi. Just one more.

Q. There are probably millions of Americans out there who are angered, saddened by this decision, who feel very helpless that they can't do anything about it. What's your advice to them about what they should be doing?

Speaker Pelosi. Well, I think that, again, it's always about the outside mobilization – is the most important part of any success that we can have on an issue.

I say this all the time. Every week, I have a big mobilization – a Zoom. And I say: ‘You are our VIPs, our volunteers in policy, our volunteers in politics. Inside maneuvering can only take you so far. Outside mobilization makes all the difference in the world.'

So I do think that women have to know, and those who care about women have to know, that the – their voice – to know their power, to know the power of mobilization to make their voices heard to their elected officials.

Nothing is more eloquent to a Member of Congress than the voice of his or her own constituents. And so they have to make their voices heard.

But there is a plan, and that plan is to win the election – hopefully to get two more Senators so that we can change the obstacles to passing laws for the good of our country. And the – one of the most encouraging things for me that happened right after the Inauguration of the former occupant, occasionally, of the White House, was the day after that Inauguration – that horrible speech, horrible, horrible speech – the day after the Inauguration, women around the country marched. They marched. And it wasn't politically planned. It was organic. People just came forth in large numbers all over the country. And women marched, women ran for office, women voted, and we took back the House.

We have to have something commensurate with that. But again, the organic nature of it – that it was spontaneous, that it sprang from community.

We have a plan. We have a plan. And we have a – we have a goal, and we have a plan to achieve it. So they should be – and take advantage of that opportunity.

Because, otherwise you'll have the criminalization. They're talking about trying doctors for murder who terminate a pregnancy. And it might be something that is rape, incest or anything like that as well. This is extremism to the nth degree. And I think it's – the power of women will be felt very strongly in this.

I'm going to have to go to the Floor now, because this is historic. We are so proud of this legislation. Again, we don't judge it for what it doesn't do, but respect it for what it does – and what it does are good things that can save people's lives.

Thank you so much.

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