Three House Republicans rejected hate crimes legislation named after slain black teen Emmett Till in a Monday evening vote.
H.R. 55, dubbed the Emmett Till Antilynching Act, passed with an overwhelming 422 ‘yes’ votes in Congress’ lower chamber.
The bill aims to make lynching a federal hate crime punishable by up to 30 years in prison.
The only ‘no’ votes on the legislation belonged to Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky, Rep. Chip Roy of Texas and Rep. Andrew Clyde of Georgia.
Massie released a statement on Twitter explaining that he voted against the bill over concerns it would impede on states’ rights and ‘freedom of speech.’
‘The Constitution specifies only a handful of federal crimes, and leaves the rest to individual states to prosecute,’ Massie wrote on Monday evening. ‘This bill expands current federal “hate crime” laws. A crime is a crime, and all victims deserve equal justice. Adding enhanced penalties for “hate” tends to endanger other liberties such as freedom of speech.’
The Kentucky lawmaker added, ‘Lynching a person is already illegal in every state. Passing this legislation falsely implies that lynching someone does not already constitute criminal activity.’
Massie explained in a lengthy Twitter thread that he believed the legislation would impede on states’ rights and the first amendment
‘The bill creates another federal crime of “conspiracy,” which I’m concerned could be enforced overbroadly on people who are not perpetrators of a crime.’
Roy released a statement calling lynching an ‘unspeakably heinous crime’ but said H.R. 55 ‘doesn’t have anything to do with’ it.
‘In fact it creates no new federal offenses. It simply raises the punishment for things that are already federal crimes, including those that are unrelated to lynching — such as gender identity — in an effort to advance a woke agenda under the guise of correcting racial injustice,’ Roy said.
The Texas Republican implied lawmakers and the media were not being ‘honest’ in their portrayal of the legislation.
‘Congress and the media should be honest with the American people about what bills do and don’t do,’ he said.
‘As much as I favor harsher penalties for violent offenders, this is a matter for the states and I will not vote for legislative deception. I will also not support enhancing the power of a federal government that so often abuses it.’
It’s named after Emmett Till, who was just 14 when he was brutally killed by two white men who were acquitted by an all-white jury
Georgia Rep. Clyde has so far kept mum on his reason for voting against the antilynching bill.
DailyMail.com has reached out to his office for comment.
The Emmett Till bill was introduced in early January by longtime Illinois Democratic Rep. Bobby Rush.
Rush, who is retiring at the end of this year, is a civil rights activist, pastor and Army veteran who helped found his state’s chapter of the Black Panthers. He did it alongside his late friend and Illinois Black Panthers Chair Fred Hampton, who was killed by federal law enforcement in a pre-dawn raid while he slept in his bed.
‘By passing my Emmett Till Antilynching Act, the House has sent a resounding message that our nation is finally reckoning with one of the darkest and most horrific periods of our history, and that we are morally and legally committed to changing course,’ Rush said in a statement after the bill’s passage.
‘I was eight years old when my mother put the photograph of Emmett Till’s brutalized body that ran in Jet magazine on our living room coffee table, pointed to it, and said, “this is why I brought my boys out of Albany, Georgia.” That photograph shaped my consciousness as a Black man in America, changed the course of my life, and changed our nation.’
Emmett Till was just 14 when he was lynched in Mississippi in 1955 after being accused of flirting with a white woman.
An all white jury acquitted two men who later confessed to killing the teenager in a magazine interview. They beat and mutilated Till before shooting him in the head and dumping his body in the Tallahatchie River.
After the bill passed on Monday evening, Rush called out the three Republicans who voted against it.
The legislation overwhelmingly passed the House of Representatives on Monday night
Rep. Bobby Rush, the Illinois Democrat who introduced the bill, took aim at the three nay votes on Monday evening
‘Who were the 3 votes against the #AntilynchingAct tonight?’ Rush wrote on Twitter.
‘Andrew Clyde, GA: Called the 1/6 insurrection a “normal tourist visit”’
‘Thomas Massie, KY: Wrote a bill to allow guns in school zones
Chip Roy, TX: Called lynching an “example of justice”’
He finished: ‘All Republicans. Surprised?’
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi celebrated the legislation’s passage while mourning Till’s ‘brutal murder’ decades ago.
‘Sadly, hateful attacks are not yet a relic of the past: from the scourge of police violence to assaults on houses of worship. That is why the Democratic Congress is hard at work empowering our legal system with more tools to bring perpetrators to justice,’ Pelosi said in a statement.
‘Any act of bigoted violence is an attack on the most basic promise of American Democracy: “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” House Democrats will not rest until we guarantee these inalienable rights for every American. We now call on the Senate to take immediate action and send this bill to the President’s desk.’
