With the number of House and Senate lawmakers vowing to skip Benjamin Netanyahu’s scheduled speech to a joint session of Congress next month growing, the Israeli Prime Minister took to social media Tuesday to reaffirm his intention to speak and to say he means President Barack Obama no disrespect.
Netanyahu used Twitter Tuesday to signal that Democratic anger over his invite to Capitol Hill by House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, and concerns that his speech comes as the Obama is negotiating a nuclear deal with Iran, won’t stop him from coming to Washington.
‘I am determined to speak before Congress to stop Iran. RETWEET if I have your support,’ he tweeted.
In another tweet, Netanyahu wrote ‘I am going to the United States not because I seek confrontation with the President, but to speak up for very survival of my country.’
Still another tweet linked to a statement from Netanyahu that said ‘This is not a personal disagreement between President Obama and me.’ The president and the prime minister have a chilly relationship. The White House said that Boehner breached protocol by when it invited Netanyahu to address lawmakers in the House chamber on March 3, ahead of Israel’s March 17 elections.
‘I deeply appreciate all that he has done for Israel in many fields,’ Netanyahu’s statement said. ‘I know that the president appreciates my responsibility, my foremost responsibility, to protect and defend the security of Israel.’
The Hill, a Capitol Hill publication, reported Tuesday that the number of congressional lawmakers who say they won’t attend Netanyahu’s speech has grown to a dozen.
Among the announced no-shows are Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., Rep. Luis Gutiérrez, D-Il. And Rep. Raul Grajalva, D-Ariz.
Nine members of the Congressional Black Caucus have indicated that they won’t be in the House chamber for Netanyahu’s talk. That includes Rep. James Clyburn, D-S.C., the highest-ranking African-American in Congress; Rep. G.K. Butterfield, D-N.C., the black caucus chair; and Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., a civil rights-era icon.
Rep. Frederica Wilson, D-Fla., another CBC member, said she hadn't yet decided whether to go to the speech and has not been lobbied by the White House about it.
"I'm mulling going," said Wilson, who said she doesn't always attend such addresses because of a busy schedule. But she said she has a large Jewish constituency in her district. "I'm weighing the pros and cons and I'm talking to them."
The black caucus met with Obama at the White House Tuesday afternoon. Butterfield said Netanyahu’s speech didn’t come up during the 90-minute session with the president and Vice President Joe Biden. Instead, the president and CBC members discussed trade, Historically Black Colleges and Universities, and providing aid to some of the nation’s impoverished communities.
Obama ‘expressed shared concern with the CBC regarding the unemployment rate among African Americans and reaffirmed his commitment to support and create policies that will help all hardworking families make ends meet, while boosting America’s productivity and giving workers the tools they need to secure the good jobs of the future,’ the White House said in a readout of the meeting.
Email: wdouglas@mcclatchydc.com; Twitter: @williamgdouglas.
Comments