Congressman Hank Johnson’s keynote speech at Gwinnett County Democrats Bluetopia Gala, Saturday, August 16 at Little Gardens Restaurant
It’s Always Darkest Just Before Dawn
Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. It is indeed my honor to have been called upon to deliver remarks at this auspicious gathering, which comes at a time of great disorder, turmoil, havoc, fear, anxiety and uncertainty throughout the land. Am I right about it? But before getting into the meat of my remarks, I want to say Hello, Gwinnett County Democrats! Thank you for being here tonight!
I am proud to represent parts of Gwinnett County once again in Congress. For ten years, I have missed being a part of the growth and development of Gwinnett County and its people, but with the Court ordered redistricting of 2023 in place I am again honored to have the responsibility of representing the people of Gwinnett County!
It has been my pleasure and privilege to watch the evolution of the Gwinnett Democratic Party over the past 20 years. With hard work, grit and determination, you have turned Gwinnett solidly blue. It is a testament to your tenacity and drive. You give hope that Democrats can do the same thing in other solidly red districts across Georgia, and across the country. Give yourselves a round of applause!
I want to especially thank Chair Curt Thompson and the leadership of the Gwinnett County Democratic Party for putting on tonight’s event. It is an honor to be with so many Democrats who are fired up and ready to defeat Donald Trump’s MAGA Project 2025 agenda, and each and every MAGA Republican up and down the ballot.
That starts by re-electing our senior U.S. Senator Jon Ossoff, who has been leading the fight for all Americans. Let’s make sure he gets SIX MORE YEARS!
We know that without Gwinnett County, Georgia would never have elected Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock in 2020. It can certainly be said that Gwinnett County saved the nation in 2020. And once again Gwinnett will rise to the occasion, and in 2026 we will re-elect Jon Ossoff to the United States Senate! And Gwinnett County Democrats are also gonna help elect a Democrat Governor in 2026!
Democrats must win in 2026, because brothers and sisters, a climate of fear and trepidation has descended upon the nation. The people of America are more afraid for our democracy, and for our personal freedom and safety, than ever in our lifetimes. Tonight, we are gathered together as a five-alarm fire engulfs our democracy. We are witnessing an unprecedented Category 6 hurricane as it tears through the American government, the American economy, and the very culture of what it is to be an American. So much chaos, cruelty and corruption has happened since Trump got back in power, and we are only 7 months into what promises to be an at least 48-month reign of terror. I say at least 48 months with the hope that this guy actually leaves office at the end of his term.
You see, this president has absolutely no respect for the Constitution, or for the rule of law. In fact, he thinks he is above the law, and what is so frightening, is the fact that the president is-in fact-above the law. The MAGA 6/3 majority on the United States Supreme Court established that reality when it ruled last summer that presidents are immune from criminal prosecution in the execution of official acts.
Trump did not have immunity when he staged an insurrection in an unlawful and unsuccessful attempt to stop the peaceful transfer of power to President Biden after losing the 2020 election. But now that he has immunity and stands above the law, he is free to break all of the rules with impunity as he trashes our democracy and grabs power for himself.
Since he took office, Donald Trump has behaved like a dictator, showing open contempt for our Constitution, the rule of law, and for the independence of our federal judicial system. He really sees himself as a king. And with a complicit MAGA United States Supreme Court and a rubber stamp MAGA Congress — there appear to be no checks and balances to stop him.
Using a “flood the zone” strategy to overwhelm and throw the people off balance, intending for fear, hopelessness, despair and apathy to take hold, as soon as he was sworn in Trump began his power grab — reign of terror, issuing a blizzard of executive orders, many of which were patently unconstitutional.
On that same first day, Trump illegally and without cause fired 17 of 18 independent Inspectors General, so that no one would be guarding the henhouse.
Then Trump issued mass pardons to more than 1,500 January 6 insurrectionist, including violent members of the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers. Trump sent the message that if you violate the law for me, I will set you free.
Knowing that the rule of law is the foundation of our democracy, Trump then set about putting himself over the rule of law. He appointed his former civil lawyer, Pam Bondi to be the Attorney General, and he installed his personal criminal lawyer Todd Blanch, to be her Chief Deputy. Trump’s goal was to politicize and thus destroying the independence of the Department of Justice. With a weaponized DOJ, Trump purposed it with investigating and prosecuting his political enemies, like NY AG Leticia James, US Senator Adam Schiff, and my colleague Rep. Lamonica McIver of New Jersey.
Hundreds of DOJ career prosecutors who had been involved in investigations and prosecutions of Donald Trump and the January 6 insurrectionists, have been illegally fired without cause, despite civil service protections.
A grossly unqualified Trump sycophant Kash Patel was put in as Director of the FBI, whereupon he immediately began illegally purging hundreds of career FBI agents, whose only offense was to have been assigned to investigations of Trump and his cronies.
As he has politicized the justice system, Trump and his sycophants in the legislative branch have also unleashed a reign of terror against lower court judges who have had the temerity to enforce the law by ruling against him. Trump and his cronies have called federal judges who rule against him “rogue,” and “corrupt,” suggesting that a judge supports “terrorists,” and calling rulings a “judicial coup.” MAGA Republicans in Congress have called for judges to be impeached, not because they committed a high crime or misdemeanor, but simply because they ruled against Trump. And far-right media personalities have attacked the families of judges, publicizing their personal information for millions of their riled-up followers on social media.
What I just described is nothing less than a full-scale assault on our entire judicial system, and it is putting judges, their families, and their staff’s lives at risk.
While trying to pervert the justice system by putting his clumsy thumb on the scale, Trump has also unleashed a terror campaign against some of the nation’s wealthiest and most powerful law firms, to deter lawyers from taking up causes against his policies. First you break the independence of the Department of Justice while turning the FBI into an outfit that reports to and is loyal only to you. Then you bully the independent judiciary to rule only in your favor. Finally, you finish off Lady Justice and destroy the adversary system by bullying and intimidating lawyers so that they won’t fight you in court.
Things are pretty bad and getting worse for liberty and justice in America. Without the rule of law there can be no democracy. I was on a call with Eric Holder the other day. He said that “democracy is in survival mode,” and that “it’s time for fight or flight.’ Attorney General Holder knows what he is talking about, ladies and gentlemen.
Elite universities are under attack by Donald Trump. Freedom of thought, freedom of ideas, and freedom of speech on campus are also under attack. And one elite university after the other is caving to Trump and settling by paying him money and giving him a say over what is taught, who teaches it, and what is said on campus.
Trump has also used his office to go after the Fourth Estate — the media. Because the media companies are more concerned with mergers, acquisitions and shareholder value, rather than the free marketplace of ideas or journalistic integrity, these media companies have also caved to the bully — firing talk show hosts who offend Trump, bringing pro-Trump bias into their news reporting, and paying more attention to so-called balance — rather than accurate reporting, while eliminating critical analysis.
When you get the most powerful in an industry to cave and bow down to the bully, intimidation and fear of vindictiveness and revenge sets in among the less powerful, which deters others from speaking up against injustice or overreach or voicing dissent of any kind.
As powerful institutions and industries kiss Trump’s ring, he has been busily deconstructing government by illegally and unconstitutionally shuttering agencies, firing agency employees, and refusing to spend money authorized and appropriated by Congress.
And the 6-3 MAGA majority on the U.S. Supreme Court has stood back and allowed this overreach to proceed without interruption, despite numerous lower court rulings to the contrary, which appear to be in accordance with well-settled law. The result was the erosion of the Separation of Powers Doctrine, with the Supreme Court redirecting legislative power to the so-called Unitary Executive.
Meanwhile, with what power the legislative branch has left, rubber stamp MAGA Republicans, who control both the House and the Senate, have bowed to Trump and passed his Big Ugly Bill, which is the single largest transfer of wealth in the history of this nation from working people straight into the pockets of the wealthy and the well connected.
In order to pay for another round of tax cuts for Trump and his billionaire buddies, MAGA Republicans cut almost $1 trillion from Medicaid, another $500 billion from Medicare, and $300 billion in Obamacare subsidies that make healthcare premiums more affordable. As a result, 17 million people will lose access to the healthcare system, and 50,000 people per year will die because they cannot afford to see a doctor.
To add to the cruelty, the Big Ugly Bill also cuts $300 billion from the SNAP food stamp program. Millions of infants, children, disabled, and the elderly, will go hungry, just so that greedy, billionaires and multi-millionaires and multinational corporations can get another tax cut.
Simultaneous with everything else he is doing; Trump has unleashed a reign of terror on the streets of America. No community has been as directly targeted and impacted by Trump‘s reign of terror more than the immigrant communities across America, particularly the Latino community. Trump‘s mass deportation program has three objectives: racist Trump, Stephen Miller and other racists want to ethnically cleanse America of substantial numbers of non-whites so that America can forever be a White male dominated society. Two, Trump wants to reward his billionaire buddies and multimillionaire donors with taxpayer dollars to flow through their for-profit prison industrial complex.
And last, but most ominously, Trump is using what was a crisis at the border as justification to deploy the US military, and tens of thousands of goon squad, masked ICE agents onto the streets of American cities.
What Trump is putting into place is an ability to quickly and decisively put down and stifle peaceful dissent and protests. He is waiting on a civil disturbance that would justify a declaration of Martial Law and a suspension of the right to habeas corpus, so that he then could roll military tanks into America cities to put down dissent similar to the Chinese Communist Party government crackdown on the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong. That is what we are getting close to, people. And this is taking place during the run up to the 250-year anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, where the colonies declared independence from a king. How ironic it is that next July 4th we will be under the authority of a tyrant, as we are today.
I could go on and on talking about this parade of horrible things happening, but I don’t have time to delve into how cronyism and incompetent leadership in our national defense and intelligence communities are putting America at great risk for bad things to happen. I won’t talk about how our public health system is being trashed while science is thrown onto the trash heap. And I won’t talk about tariffs, and how the cost of living continues to skyrocket. And I will say nothing about mid-decade redistricting, and how that could affect control of the House of Representatives.
We are living in truly unprecedented times. And I fear we have used this word —“unprecedented”, so often lately, that it is in danger of losing its meaning. And we cannot afford for it to become trite. Because, when a word like “unprecedented” loses its significance – when disruption becomes the status quo – that means, we have given in; we have accepted the uncertain as inevitable.
During this time of unprecedented chaos and confusion, we must recommit to stand for the rule of law, because without it, there can be no democracy. How do we stand for the rule of law? We must get out into the streets in peaceful nonviolent protests, and we must exercise our sacred right to vote. In the words of my dearly beloved colleague, Congressman John Lewis, we must “vote like our lives depend on it.” We must elect Democrats to take back the House, and possibly even the Senate, if we are to have any chance of preventing this country from descending into an authoritarian monarchal kleptocracy.
I want to leave you with this: John Lewis was a one-of-a-kind public servant. I had the honor and pleasure of serving closely with him during 14 of my 19 years in Congress. During those years I learned so much from John Lewis. We all did. And I continue to learn from the writings he left for posterity. The lessons Congressman Lewis imparts in his book, “Walking with the Wind: A Memoir of the Movement”, today inspire us, and provide us with direction on the way forward during these unprecedented and deeply disturbing times in which we are living.
John tells the story “About 15…children…outside…playing in his Aunt Seneva’s dirt yard (when) The sky began clouding over, the wind started picking up, lightning flashed…, and suddenly the 15 children felt terrorized). (John’s) Aunt Seneva was the only adult around, and as the sky blackened and the wind grew stronger, she herded those 15 children inside (her small) house.
(With 16 people squeezed into that small wooden house it was surprisingly quiet as the wind howled and the house-built on cinder blocks-began to shake. They were scared. Even Aunt Seneva was scared.
And then it got worse. Now the house was beginning to sway. The wood plank flooring beneath us began to bend. And then, a corner of the room started lifting up. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. None of us could. This storm was actually pulling the house toward the sky. With us inside it.
That was when Aunt Seneva told us to clasp hands. Line up and hold hands, she said, and we did as we were told. Then she had us walk as a group toward the corner of the room that was rising. From the kitchen to the front of the house we walked, the wind screaming outside, sheets of rain beating on the tin roof. Then we walked back in the other direction, as another end of the house began to lift.
And so it went, back and forth, fifteen children walking with the wind, holding that trembling house down with the weight of our small bodies.
The 15 children in that small house with a fierce storm upon it is America we see today. Those 15 children represent Black, White, Latino and Asian people. Among them are our LGBTQ brothers and sisters. They are Democrats, Republicans, and Independents. We are diverse, we are all equal, and we find ourselves included in the same house, America, and that house, or our country, is under assault.
More than half a century has passed since that day, and it has struck me more than once over those many years that our society is not unlike the children in that house, rocked again and again by the winds of one storm or another, the walls around us seeming at times as if they might fly apart.
But the storm always passes, and the sun comes out. As Aunt Seneva said — clasp hands, walk to the corner of the house that is moving, then move to the next corner, and the next, and don’t stop until the storm blows over.
It seemed that way in the 1960s, at the height of the Civil Rights Movement, when America itself felt as if it might burst at the seams — so much tension, so many storms. But the people of conscience never left the house. They never ran away. They stayed, they came together, and they did the best they could, clasping hands and moving toward the corner of the house that was the weakest.
And then another corner would lift, and we would go there.
And eventually, inevitably, the storm would settle, and the house would still stand.
But we knew another storm would come, and we would have to do it all over again.
And we did.
And we still do, all of us. You and I.
Children holding hands, walking with the wind. . . . ”
– John Lewis
Last but not least, release the Epstein files!
###