As we battle the health and economic ramifications of a global pandemic, we should unite and lean on our nation’s revolutionary, remarkable, and exceptional shared history. However, night after night many of us have watched as statues dedicated to the individuals who forged our great history are tarnished, desecrated, and, in some cases, unceremoniously toppled.
The architects of that destruction are breaking the law and betraying the cause they claim to advance. Even more concerning has been the deafening silence of top Democrats who seem unwilling to restore law and order to their streets, let alone speak out against this chaos and destruction. In fact, speaking before reporters on the grounds of the U.S. Capitol on July 9, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi shrugged off mob violence by saying she, “doesn’t care about statues.” When pressed further by the reporter, the Speaker blithely responded, “people will do what they do.”
Beyond the obvious public safety risks involved with having enraged looters crudely use ropes to pull down massive statues, the Speaker’s apathy towards illegal memorial destruction dishonors the legacy and sacrifice of the figures they honor.
For instance, in my home state of North Carolina, a statue honoring the soldiers of Mecklenburg County who lost their lives in World War II was shamelessly desecrated. The memorial was brandished with a communist hammer and sickle while yellow paint was splattered across a plaque that dedicates the structure to heroes, “who made the supreme sacrifice that you might live in liberty, freedom, and peace.”
Across the country, statues honoring Union General and President Ulysses S. Grant, President George Washington, and famed abolitionist Fredrick Douglass all came down. In early June, a portion of St. John’s Episcopal church in Washington, D.C. was set on fire. That church has been visited by every single president since James Madison. During the hardest days of the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln would slip quietly into a pew in the back to pray for the survival of the nation.
When President Trump was slated to deliver a Fourth of July Speech at the base of Mount Rushmore, the official Twitter account of the Democratic National Committee tweeted, and then then deleted, that the president was, “holding a rally glorifying white supremacy at Mount Rushmore.” Unsurprisingly, in a speech where the president lauded and highlighted examples of the greatness of our nation’s founders and some of its most towering heroes, mainstream media pundits and Democrats made the talk show rounds, decrying the speech as dark and divisive.
The people I represent love our country, respect our history, and will not tolerate mass lawlessness. Therefore, I have worked to help introduce the Defending America’s Heritage and Culture Act. That legislation would make vandalizing memorials of U.S. presidents or Founding Fathers a federal offense punishable by up to 10 years in prison. Furthermore, I have worked with my colleagues to introduce the CHOPping Cash for CHAZ Act and the No Tolerance for Rioters Act. These two bills would strip federal funding from any city that tolerates an “autonomous zone” within their boundaries and doubles the federal penalties associated with rioting, looting, and other acts of violence against individuals or property.
It has often been said that being an American is a civil and not an ethnic identity. We are a nation made up of people who took the bold step of leaving their native land behind in the pursuit of a more prosperous and free way of life. Therefore, it is our remarkable shared institutions, civic values, and history that binds us together. Lawless attacks on that history in the pursuit of radical political goals threatens the very fabric of our country. While we should always strive to pursue liberty and justice for all, we absolutely cannot excuse blatantly lawless acts of destruction or attempts to reclassify our history as something that should be denigrated as opposed to celebrated. There’s nothing wrong with being proud to be an American, and we should never apologize for it.
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