'Where Are The Liberals Calling Out The Violence?': Joni Ernst Slams Pro-Palestinian Campus Protests

5 months ago

At a Senate Republican press briefing on Wednesday, Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA) slammed pro-Palestinian demonstrators on college campuses.

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Transcript

00:00 Thank you, Rick.

00:03 And thank you, Senator Cotton, for organizing today.

00:06 This is an incredibly important topic.

00:08 And what we saw on Monday, as a number of my colleagues have already discussed, this

00:15 mob that is taking over the campus in Columbia, we saw on Monday pro-Hamas protesters hold

00:27 facility workers hostage.

00:32 This is the United States of America.

00:35 That is wrong.

00:38 That is wrong.

00:40 We see these pro-Hamas protesters falling in line with Iran.

00:47 With Iran, one of our top adversaries, whose proxies are still holding Americans hostage

00:54 in Gaza.

00:56 Anti-Semitic violence shouldn't be on American soil, and yet we're seeing it at all of these

01:03 liberal colleges and universities.

01:05 We've seen over 50 encampments pop up, as Senator Cotton mentioned, little Gazas.

01:13 They're popping up.

01:14 Students are wreaking havoc, and because of that, they must be held accountable to the

01:19 fullest extent of the law.

01:22 We also know that there are college professors that are engaging in this activity.

01:26 We have outside paid people that are coming into campuses and promoting this type of nonsense

01:35 and violence.

01:37 And these college administrators are just simply poo-pooing it away.

01:42 They continue to foster and encourage these activities.

01:46 And you know what?

01:47 The Biden administration has failed to stop it.

01:51 Here are the liberals calling out the violence, calling out the no longer peaceful protests.

02:01 So I have a good friend who is a liberal Jew.

02:07 Liberal Jew.

02:08 Gives to progressives, gives to liberals.

02:12 Had never given to a conservative.

02:16 About a month ago, he came to me and he said, "You know what?

02:20 Who is standing up for the Jewish people?

02:22 Who is standing up for Israel?"

02:24 I said, "You know who it is?

02:29 It's conservative Christians.

02:31 That's who's standing up for the Israelis.

02:33 That's who's standing up for the Jewish people across the United States."

02:40 This administration refuses to call it out.

02:43 When we have college students at these liberal universities like Columbia, like UCLA, that

02:53 are promoting Hamas, let's go back to October 7th, folks, and talk about Hamas.

02:59 They are supporting Hamas, a terrorist organization that raped innocent women, that killed babies,

03:11 that drug elderly men and women into Gaza and abused them.

03:20 Where is this okay?

03:22 And why are we celebrating that on American soil?

03:26 I remember when I was working with Senator Dianne Feinstein on the Violence Against Women

03:32 Act.

03:34 Most of my Democratic friends supported that.

03:38 Violence against women is not okay.

03:42 Where are those same individuals today?

03:45 Where are the members of Congress decrying the violence that has occurred against women

03:52 by Hamas?

03:54 Instead we see them celebrating it.

03:58 Tables are turning, folks.

04:00 The tables are turning.

04:04 What these students are celebrating today and trying to incite violence against Jews

04:11 on American soil today, that's not okay.

04:14 And we need to speak out against it.

04:16 The universities need to put an end to this now.

04:20 If they don't, they should kiss their federal funding goodbye.

04:27 Just as Senator Kennedy said, we shouldn't support that as a federal government.

04:31 It goes against everything that we stand for.

04:35 We shouldn't support them with our dollars.

04:37 The donors should withdraw their funding.

04:39 And you know what?

04:40 I'm going to go a step further.

04:43 Businesses across the United States, when they see that little Harvard diploma, UCLA,

04:49 Columbia, those businesses, maybe they should hang a sign out that says, "Graduates need

04:56 not apply."

04:59 They need not apply.

05:04 So presidents, you better get a handle on what's going on on your colleges and universities

05:10 because it is absolutely unacceptable behavior.

05:15 And I think we, as elected representatives of our constituencies, need to ensure that

05:20 federal dollars are not going to these institutions.

'Where Are The Liberals Calling Out The Violence?': Joni Ernst Slams Pro-Palestinian Campus Protests

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