Issue Position: Recognizing Genocide

Issue Position

My fellow Americans, it will be One Hundred One years since the great ethnic cleansing by the Ottoman Empire of a select group of its subjects. The Armenians, Assyrians, Greeks and many other Christian minorities who were systematically butchered, removed from their homelands and forced into massive migrations. My grandparents were part of that group that suffered severe loses around the turn of the century.

Yes, it was war and yes, the Christians sided with Christian Russia against the Islamic overlords the Ottomans. War or not, systematic decimation of indigenous populations was carried out and history is very clear of the events, yet 101 years later, we as the world's only remaining superpower have not recognized the events for what they are GENOCIDE.

So many other nations have come to terms and let their conscious make the decision, even the Russian Federation has finally recognized the Armenian Genocide, yet we remain resolute in our support for the Turkish Republic (the remnant of what was once the Ottoman Empire). We are politically tied with them and year after year place the military alliance of NATO (which Turkey is a member of) and the fact that we have military based in Turkey cloud our judgment leading to our inaction.

Today the Turkish republic which was restructured by the late Kemal Ataturk to be a secular republic is slipping back to the dark days of yesteryear. It is fast repeating the horrible crimes committed against the great Armenian, Assyrian, Greek and other Christian populations during the previous century. The United States of America and the European countries are morbidly silent! Why do we allow this to happen?

Turkey suppresses any free press and their academics who dare to point out differences with the current regime are often harassed and jailed. We must sever all strategic and military cooperation with ruthless dictators. Politicians must not be bought by or lobbied on behalf of foreign governments and they must be held accountable. We must close the US/NATO military bases in Turkey.

We, as a God fearing nation must insist that our leaders recognize the genocide of the previous century AND concurrently stop the systematic slaughter of minorities in southeast Turkey.

As your congressman I will fight relentlessly to have this atrocity to be finally recognized as GENOCIDE!

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