Democrats on Capitol Hill have dismissed the Republicans broadsides over Mamdani, and party leaders criticized the GOP-written measure ahead of Friday’s vote, saying it “selectively lists certain despotic leaders and the harms of totalitarian regimes self-labeled as ‘socialist.’”
They did not, however, formally recommend a no vote. A swath of moderate Democrats, especially from New York, are uncomfortable with Mamdani’s rise in their party.
The debate over the symbolic measure was derailed for about 10 minutes after Rep. Maria Salazar (R-Fla.) verbally attacked Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) on the floor, accusing her of being a “friend” of the late Cuban dictator Fidel Castro despite traveling to the country and seeing the abuses of his regime.
The resolution, H.Con.Res. 58 reads:
Denouncing the horrors of socialism.
Whereas socialist ideology necessitates a concentration of power that has, time and time again, collapsed into communist regimes, totalitarian rule, and brutal dictatorships;
Whereas socialism has repeatedly led to famine and mass murders, and the killing of over 100,000,000 people worldwide;
Whereas many of the greatest crimes in history were committed by socialist ideologues, including Vladimir Lenin, Joseph Stalin, Mao Zedong, Fidel Castro, Pol Pot, Kim Jong Il, Kim Jong Un, Daniel Ortega, Hugo Chavez, and Nicolás Maduro;
Whereas tens of millions died in the Bolshevik Revolution, at least 10,000,000 people were sent to the gulags in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, and millions more starved in the Terror-Famine (Holodomor) in Ukraine;
Whereas between 15,000,000 and 55,000,000 people starved to death in the wake of famine and devastation caused by the Great Leap Forward in China;
Whereas the socialist experiment in Cambodia led to the killing fields in which over a million people were gruesomely murdered;
Whereas up to 3,500,000 people have starved in North Korea, dividing a land of freedom from a land of destitution;
Whereas the Castro regime in Cuba expropriated the land of Cuban farmers and the businesses of Cuban entrepreneurs, stealing their possessions and their livelihoods, and exiling millions with nothing but the clothes on their backs;
Whereas the implementation of socialism in Venezuela has turned a once-prosperous country into a failed State with the highest rate of inflation in the world;
etc., etc. You get the idea. RepubliQans talking shit to whip their base up and take some mo back from the Dems. Vote No = you love genocide. Vote Yes = you hate socialism.
Pure bullshit, but sure. Dems bad. Fine.
Say that minds me, where’s the socialist candidates for House Rep? 11 months away! Put up or get nothin’.
My biggest beef with this isn’t that some Dems voted for it. It seems like I should criticize them because their policies are too conservative for me. But in reality, they have to politic and are constrained by same shitty rules as everybody else.
No, I’m more concerned with the idea that you can just tell a lie and have that be voted on in Congress. The fact that there are outright lies in the resolution, to me means that it shouldn’t even be allowed to come to a vote.
Those societies they mentioned were also largely authoritarian, nationalist, xenophobic, isolationist, with state-controlled media and single-party rule. Sound familiar?
What great crimes of history has Hugo Chavez committed?, feeding the poor. I’m no fan of Maduro either but putting him up there with stalin and polpot is farcicle.
guess they gotta start manufacturing consent now if they want to go to war with Venezuela before the midterms.
Did anybody read the resolution? Nah.
The resolution, H.Con.Res. 58 reads:
etc., etc. You get the idea. RepubliQans talking shit to whip their base up and take some mo back from the Dems. Vote No = you love genocide. Vote Yes = you hate socialism.
Pure bullshit, but sure. Dems bad. Fine.
Say that minds me, where’s the socialist candidates for House Rep? 11 months away! Put up or get nothin’.
My biggest beef with this isn’t that some Dems voted for it. It seems like I should criticize them because their policies are too conservative for me. But in reality, they have to politic and are constrained by same shitty rules as everybody else.
No, I’m more concerned with the idea that you can just tell a lie and have that be voted on in Congress. The fact that there are outright lies in the resolution, to me means that it shouldn’t even be allowed to come to a vote.
Where was the senate parliamentarian on this one?!
Agree.
Those societies they mentioned were also largely authoritarian, nationalist, xenophobic, isolationist, with state-controlled media and single-party rule. Sound familiar?
Indeed.
Aren’t you allowed to just vote present? Or not vote at all? I probably wouldn’t have even participated in such a stupid, performative effort.
Yep, two Dems voted present. How your constituency plays to this performative effort is the politics.
I think it’s more how your donors play to this performative bs, Jeffries is in Brooklyn and most of his district just elected a socialist for mayor.
goddamn can these boomers die already so we can replace with people less compromised by cold war red scare propaganda
Some of them are Millennials. This problem isn’t going to go away by waiting.
What great crimes of history has Hugo Chavez committed?, feeding the poor. I’m no fan of Maduro either but putting him up there with stalin and polpot is farcicle.
guess they gotta start manufacturing consent now if they want to go to war with Venezuela before the midterms.
*farcical*
And yes that’s exactly what I thought, too.