The House has voted to censure Texas Democratic Rep. Al Green for his repeated interruptions of President Donald Trump’s speech to a joint session of Congress on Tuesday night.
The 77-year-old Green shook his cane at Trump as he shouted that the president had “no mandate to cut Medicaid.” After being told twice by Speaker Mike Johnson to sit down or be ejected, Green was escorted from the chamber by the sergeant-at-arms as Republicans cheered.
Green’s actions also rejected the guidance issued by Democratic leaders, who had told their members to attend Trump’s speech without disruptions.
The House voted to censure Green by a vote of 224 to 198. Ten Democrats voted with Republicans to censure the Texas Democrat. Two members voted present, including Green himself. Plenty of Democrats including Rep. Rashida Tlaib, who faced a censure for her comments on Israel and Gaza last Congress, went up to Green and hugged him afterward.
After Green exited the floor, Rep. Joe Wilson of South Carolina, who famously shouted “you lie” during Barack Obama’s joint address to Congress, roamed around the floor and chatted with other Republicans.
Trump attacked Green in comments to Fox News Digital on Thursday, saying that he “should be forced to pass an IQ test because he is a low IQ individual and we don’t need low IQ individuals in Congress.”
“He should be censured,” the president added, referring to Green as “a fool and a clown.”
“Nobody takes him seriously,” said Trump. “He is an embarrassment to Congress but a much bigger embarrassment to the Democrats.”
Green is a longtime Democratic congressman from the Houston, Texas, area and a member of the Congressional Black Caucus. During Trump’s first term, he pushed for the president’s impeachment.
After Trump’s speech, multiple factions of the House GOP immediately pushed to censure Green, including Texas Republicans and the House Freedom Caucus.
Green's censure comes as Democrats remain divided on how to express their dissatisfaction with Trump. Five months after Trump won re-election and Republicans won back the Senate and held the House, Democratic advocacy groups are pushing for their party's elected officials to put forward a more robust opposition to Trump.
During Trump's joint address, other Democratic elected officials expressed their dissatisfaction in other ways. Reps. Maxwell Frost of Florida, Jasmine Crockett of Texas, Maxine Dexter and Andrea Salinas of Oregon, all walked out of Trump's address.
Congresswoman Sarah McBride of Delaware told The Independent that “the Republicans would rather talk about decorum rather than the fact that they’re trying to gut health care for one in two kids in this country.”
Arizona Rep. Yassamin Ansari added that “We demonstrated a very strong opposition. The fact that you saw Democrats from every spectrum, every type of district, sit and listen to the president silently and disregard the lies that he was telling shows a very strong condemnation, of course, we chose to react in slightly different ways.”
Elected to the House in 2004 to represent the Ninth Congressional District, Green’s website describes him as a “veteran civil rights advocate” and his page on X shows a video of him being detained outside the Capitol in August 2021. He used the hashtags “#GoodTrouble” and “#NecessaryTrouble” in reference to the late civil rights leader Rep. John Lewis, who died in 2020.
Green was also detained in 2012 alongside actor George Clooney as well as other lawmakers outside Sudan’s embassy in Washington as they protested against the country’s then-president during a civil war.
Green anticipated that his actions could lead to a congressional censure. On Wednesday, he acknowledged that he “will suffer the consequences.”
“What I did was from my heart. People are suffering. And I was talking about Medicaid. I didn’t just say you don’t have a mandate. I said you don’t have a mandate to cut Medicaid,” he added.
“Last night I stood up for those who need Medicaid, Medicare, and Social Security. Democrats will never abandon the fight to make sure every American has a safe, healthy, and financially secure life. #ISaidWhatISaid,” he wrote on X on Wednesday night.
Just after 7 a.m. on Thursday morning, Green’s account stated: “During the 10:00 hour ET, Congressman Al Green will be censured this morning for standing up to President Trump.”
Born in New Orleans, Green focused his activism on civil rights, voting rights, and battling poverty. Going against Democratic leadership, Green was the first lawmaker to put forward articles of impeachment against Trump during his first term. Green subsequently voted in favor of Trump’s 2019 and 2021 impeachments.
His website states that he attended Florida A&M University, Howard University, and the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama but never received an undergraduate diploma. He subsequently earned a doctorate in 1973 from the Thurgood Marshall School of Law in Houston before opening a law firm.
In addition to the Congressional Black Caucus, Green is also a member of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus, and he held a leadership position in the NAACP for about a decade.
