Chairman Royce: Now President Obama Must Step Up & Outline Plan to Defeat ISIS

Statement

This afternoon, Chairman Royce joined Dick Helton and Vicky Moore on KNX 1070 Newsradio in Los Angeles to talk about next steps now that the Obama administration -- following unanimous action from Congress -- has finally declared ISIS is committing acts of genocide against Christians and other religious minorities. Audio and key excerpts included below:

On the administration's long-awaited decision:

"[F]or four months now, the administration kept saying an announcement was coming shortly. Now we have the announcement, at last, confirming what we already know, which is that Christians and Yezidis are being beheaded, crucified and enslaved in that part of the world."

On what the genocide designation means going forward:

"[N]ow, the president must step up and lay out a broad, overarching plan that's needed to actually defeat and destroy ISIS. Once you finally admit that this is genocide, then this administration's long pattern of paralysis and ineffectiveness in combating these radical Islamist terrorists becomes an issue. And it is unacceptable that [the president does] not have a strategy to take down ISIS…So now the pressure is, get the job done of getting in there and taking out ISIS."

On how to win this fight:

"We know what needs to be done here, with respect to arming the Kurdish soldiers that are doing the fighting, with respect to airpower, rules of engagement, and with respect to helping some of the Sunni tribes that are fighting ISIS… And we shouldn't have to wait, because we have been calling for this for several years now."

Source