‘We have rules': Pa. Democrat Houlahan explains why she voted to censure Al Green

A suburban Philadelphia representative is explaining being among a handful of Democrats who joined all their Republican colleagues Thursday as the U.S. House of Representatives voted to censure Texas Democratic Al Green for his cane-waving outburst during President Donald Trump’s congressional address earlier in the week.

“It was a really, really, really hard vote for me,” Rep. Chrissy Houlahan, D-PA, told the Philadelphia Inquirer.

“I believe we need to recognize that we have rules in the House of Representatives and we have standards of decorum that we all presumably agree to, and we all need to agree to those standards so we can get the work for the people done and so we can not be a banana republic,” Houlahan said to the paper.

Houlahan — a fourth-term Democrat representing Pennsylvania’s 6 Congressional District, which covers all of Chester County along with parts of southeastern Berks County — shared the Inquirer article on Facebook saying it “captures my thoughts during the vote and how we move forward,” while understanding her vote “angered many of you.”

The March 6, 2025, vote was 224 yeas, 198 nays, 2 members present and eight not voting. Only nine other Democrats besides Houlahan joined the Republicans in backing the censure.

After the vote, as the resolution required, Green stood in the well of the House chamber while Speaker Mike Johnson, a Louisiana Republican, read the censure resolution to him. 

Dozens of Democrats, including many fellow members of the Congressional Black Caucus, surrounded Green in the well and sang “We Shall Overcome” in a show of solidarity as the speaker repeatedly told them to stop and clear the well.

The House of Representatives voted Thursday to censure  Rep. Al Green, D-Texas, for disrupting President Donald Trump’s address to Congress. The Republican-controlled body voted 224-198, including 10 Democrats in favor of approving the resolution.

A Censure is a “formal statement of disapproval in the form of a resolution that is adopted by majority vote,” according to the U.S. Senate website. Basically, the Congress is saying it disapproves of the member’s action, but that action doesn’t meet the standard for expulsion.

Houlahan told the Inquirer’s Julia Terruso about the double standard she felt was at play and that he vote was done out of duty, rather than politics:

“After the vote I pulled Speaker [Johnson] to the side and had a very‚ very strong conversation with him where I explained I voted in favor but I am not OK with arbitrary and capricious applications of the same rule. There was no censure or sanction of U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (D., Ga.). He said, ‘Well, she just wore a hat.’ She also yelled at the president of the United States [Biden in 2024], and I don’t believe it’s OK that she did not have same treatment.

“And I think it’s absolute hypocrisy that people after the vote were standing there yelling at Mr. Green when their own colleagues have done very, very similar things, not wearing masks when it was mandated, wearing MAGA hats when there are literally no hats allowed on the floor. We had to make a special exception for wearing hijabs. It’s insane. … We need to behave like grown-ups and stop the madness.”