Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar announces Crucial Communism Teaching Act (CCT)

Congresswoman Maria Elvira Salazar hosted a press conference at the House Triangle on Thursday morning to introduce the Crucial Communism Teaching Act (CCT).

She was joined by House members, non-profit leaders and a survivor of the Chinese Communist Party from the Uyghur community. 

The CCT will help educate American high school students about the dangers of communism and totalitarianism, “and how they are contrary to the founding principles of freedom and democracy in the United States.”

The program is modeled, in part, after Florida’s House Bill 5, which directs the state Department of Education to develop a curriculum that educates students about the evils of communism and totalitarian regimes like those of Venezuela and Nicaragua.

Before the conference began, Rep. Salazar spoke with ADN America exclusively, outlining the importance of her proposed bill. 

"The youth needs to learn that communism is pernicious and that it has destroyed the lives of Cubans both in Cuba and in exile abroad," she told ADN America. "It is our responsibility to protect our future generations in the United States and to teach those children that the beauty of democracy and liberty is worth much more than the promises of communism. We know that unfortunately people in this country talk about how bad the United States is, but nobody talks about how bad Stalin or Mao were."

Rep. Salazar presenta la Ley de Enseñanza del Comunismo (CCT)
Open | Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar announces Crucial Communism Teaching Act (CCT)
The CCT will help educate American high school students about the dangers of communism and totalitarianism. pic.twitter.com/GvyFNgdlyz

— ADN America (@AmericaAdn) December 2, 2021

Salazar proceeded to begin the conference by recalling her own family’s experience with communism, remembering how her parents left Cuba after Fidel Castro’s dictatorship took control of the island.

Referencing the miserable conditions of the Cuban people, Salazar said, “The regime claims it has created a system of equality with free housing, free food, free education, free everything. It’s pure propaganda. The only equality communism offers is being equally poor, equally hungry, equally oppressed and equally exiled."

Salazar went on to call communism a cancer that has not only devastated Cuba, but also Venezuela, China, Russia and countless other countries – leaving millions of victims without food, freedom and often without their lives.

But the Congresswoman warns that American youth have not been properly educated about the dangers of communism or other systems that undermine freedom and free markets and more than one third of Gen Z aged youth hold a favorable view of communism.

“We have to educate our students, our future generations, the leaders of tomorrow, about the true meaning of communism,” Salazar said. "The bill will show the principles of freedom, opportunity and democracy" because today we are seeing an alarming shift in our national consciousness.”

Salazar concluded by noting that, “history has shown that communism has no place in the US — this is an indispensable lesson.”

Ambassador Andrew Bremberg, president and CEO of the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, also spoke at the briefing and warned of the dangers of communism.

“Over the past century, communist, totalitarian regimes in some 40 nations have killed more than 100 million people and subjected countless more to exploitation, violence and untold devastation,” Bremberg noted.

“These victims were shot dead in the Bolshevik revolution, they were starved in the Holodomor Famine in Ukraine, worked to death in the Soviet gulags, exiled to Siberia in the Baltic deportations, they were executed on Cuba’s Isles of Pines, and they've been beaten to death under China’s Cultural Revolution. They drowned fleeing Vietnam and their bones litter Cambodia in the desolate killing fields. Although the Berlin Wall fell and the Soviet Union collapsed, one fifth of the world's population today is still suffering under communist regimes. In Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua the horrors of socialism and communism continue.”

Ambassador Bremberg went on to announce that his organization is planning on constructing a Victims of Communism Museum in Washington, D.C.

Rep. Daniel Crenshaw, a former U.S. Navy SEAL, was also in attendance and went on to detail how 85% of the Soviet KGB’s budget was allocated for the purpose of undermining the American political system through information warfare.

"I don't think the Soviets could have ever imagined how successful they'd be,” Crenshaw remarked. “From the Marxist infused radicalism of the 60s to the critical race theory trends of today, I don't think the Soviets could have imagined a better ally than the democratic socialists of America today, some of whom currently serve in our congress, teach our children, perform for millions on television or run major corporations.”

“It’s no wonder that the murderous Cuban and Venezuelan regimes find sympathy in the American population because our citizens have been lied to for generations about the dangers of communism and told that the American system is built on lies and racism,” he added.

The CCT currently enjoys wide support in the House and co-signers of the bill include Reps. Michael Waltz, Scott Franklin, Dan Crenshaw, Pat Fallon, Lloyd Smucker, Mariannette Miller-Meeks, Buddy Carter, Jeff Van Drew, Rick Crawford, French Hill, Glenn Grothman, Chris Jacobs, Andrew Bremberg.