MEMBER OF CONGRESS

Robert C. "Bobby" Scott

Democrat VA 6 statements translated

Scott opposes a bill that he believes infringes on free speech rights, even if it's framed as fighting antisemitism. He calls out hypocrisy from the other side, noting their past silence on Trump's failures to condemn white supremacists and their lack of action on civil rights enforcement. While opposing the bill, Scott is careful to distinguish between individual expression and official university policies.

House of Representatives

Protect Economic and Academic Freedom Act of 2026

2026-09-03

“I want a recorded vote on this bill. The vote happened. Most voted yes. Some changed their votes. The bill passed. The vote result is recorded. Someone wanted to reconsider the vote. We will not vote again.”

“I want to say one more thing. Students and teachers can say what they want. That is not the same as the school having a policy. No school has a policy to boycott Israel. This bill is not clear. It may not stop schools from boycotting Israel. Boycotting Israel is speech. Speech is protected by the First Amendment. The government can't take away money for speech. No school is boycotting Israel anyway. We should stop anti-Semitism. But we should not stop free speech. I think you should vote no on this bill.”

Official Congressional Record

Mr. Speaker, I will close by returning to the central point: that we must distinguish between student or faculty expression in university policy. A student organization or individual faculty member supporting BDS is not the same thing as the university administration adopting BDS as policy. A faculty member expressing a political opinion is not the same thing as the institution imposing a boycott. Importantly, we have yet to see a single American college or university adopting BDS in the way the bill suggests. Furthermore, we know the bill is intended to target the BDS movement. Yet it is not clear whether a school that even joined the BDS movement would be covered by the text of the bill. The bill implicates ``nonexpressive boycotts'' as the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Castro) just pointed out. If it is expressive, it is protected by the First Amendment. BDS by its very nature is designed to express disapproval of the actions of the State of Israel. If a college or university came out and publicly said it was joining BDS, most people would agree that that announcement and any activity that flowed from it would clearly be expressive, and therefore, out of the scope of the bill. As an expressive activity, the statement would be protected under the First Amendment, and therefore, the First Amendment would protect the funding from being removed. But, again, no college or university has embraced the BDS movement anyway. We should combat anti-Semitism wherever it occurs, but we should not do so by punishing protected speech or conflating students' views with university policies. For those reasons I urge a ``no'' vote, and I yield back the balance of my time.

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“I want to put another statement in the record. This one is from a teacher's union. The union says the bill is bad. It says the bill takes away freedom. It says the bill does not protect students and teachers. It says the bill does not help education.”

“I want the last word. I put a statement in the record. The statement says this bill is bad. It says the bill takes away free speech. It says the bill punishes schools for political views. I want us to vote against it.”

“I don't want to talk about the actual bill. I brought up something from 10 years ago to change the subject. I hope that people will be distracted by talking about that instead.”

Official Congressional Record

Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, today, we find ourselves here, again, purportedly to address anti-Semitism in American higher education. While we should be able to agree that there is no place in higher education for anti- Semitism, the fact is my colleagues on the other side have been curiously quiet, or selectively quiet, about addressing anti-Semitism when it actually does occur. Recall when President Trump declared that there were fine people on both sides when a bunch of White supremacists and their Unite the Right rally marched on the University of Virginia's campus chanting: ``Jews will not replace us.'' My colleagues on the other side were also silent as numerous reports regarding chapters of the College Republicans openly promoted their hated of Jewish people among other groups. All the while this has been going on, my colleagues have not told the President to stop firing lawyers at the Office for Civil Rights of the Department of Education, the agency responsible for investigating claims of anti-Semitism in education. My colleagues on the other side of the aisle are certainly mum about how this administration is dismissing Title VI disparate impact analysis, the very tool necessary to address practices and policies that may appear facially neutral but, in fact, discriminate against protected classes under the law. I have not heard them comment on the whistleblower allegations, and many investigations into anti-Semitism on college campuses, led by the Department of Justice's Anti-Semitism Task Force, were based not on fact patterns or legal analysis but political priorities. With that said, we have the bill before us, the so-called Protect Economic and Academic Freedom Act, which would amend the Higher Education Act by imposing new conditions on colleges and universities that receive higher education funding. Under the bill, institutions receiving Title IV Federal student aid would be legally required to certify that they are not engaged in a nonexpressive commercial boycott of Israel. I will begin with an important distinction: there is a difference between actions, or views of students, or even recognized student organizations and the official policy of the colleges and universities they attend. Students have the right to express their political views, but that does not mean that their university has adopted those views, such as the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions, or BDS, movement. We have yet to see a single college or university in the United States adopt the BDS movement or institutional boycott policies contemplated in the bill. Simply put, the bill does not address any ongoing or existing higher education policy boycotting Israel. Nonetheless, this would create new Federal requirements intended to prevent institutions from adopting such policies in the future. Moreover, as we examine the bill, Members should be careful to consider how these Federal requirements would operate in practice, the potential of negative effect on institutions receiving Federal funds, and whether the bill is misusing the power that we have from the Constitution's Spending Clause to illegally sanction First Amendment- protected speech, particularly those of students. As written, the bill presents serious First Amendment problems and improperly limits academic freedom. I had hoped these problems could have been resolved before we got to the floor, but they weren't, so I will be opposing the bill. For these reasons, I ask Members to vote ``no,'' and I reserve the balance of my time.

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House of Representatives

Concurrent Resolution on the Budget for Fiscal Year 2027

2026-07-22

“You made things worse with a big ugly bill. Now you want to spend more on war. That's the wrong choice. We should spend on food, healthcare, and education instead. I want people to oppose this resolution.”

Official Congressional Record

Mr. Chairman, prices are already too high for groceries, housing, healthcare, childcare, and other everyday expenses. However, instead of focusing on lowering costs for working families, the Trump administration and my colleagues on the other side of the aisle are presenting this resolution which will continue policies which have actually made things worse. With the passage of their big, ugly bill, they cut healthcare, food assistance, and education funding all while adding $4.7 trillion to the national debt, and now they want to add another $95 billion to the debt to continue waging an endless war. We have a choice. We can invest in working families and ensure that people have access to food, Medicare, Medicaid, daycare, and education, but my colleagues instead are choosing an endless war. That is the wrong choice. Mr. Chair, we should, therefore, oppose this resolution.

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