U.S. House Passes Resolution Condemning the “Horrors of Socialism”

The United States House of Representatives voted last week to approve a non-binding resolution broadly condemning the “horrors of socialism,” declaring the ideology incompatible with the country’s founding principles.

The House agreed to the measure, H.Con.Res. 58, on November 21 by a vote of 285–98, with no Republicans voting against it and 86 Democrats joining them in support. Two members voted present, with the remainder of both caucuses not voting. The resolution was introduced by Rep. María Elvira Salazar, a Republican from Florida, on October 24 and only reached the floor for a vote last week. A concurrent Senate resolution was later introduced by Republican Sen. Rick Scott of Florida.

“Socialism is a lie. It has never delivered justice or equality, only fear, censorship, poverty, and broken nations,” Salazar said following the resolution’s approval. “I represent thousands of families who fled their homelands because socialist regimes promised paradise and delivered prisons.”

The resolution denounces socialism “in all forms” and opposes the implementation of socialist policies in the United States. It asserts that socialist governments have in practice “collapsed into communist regimes, totalitarian rule, and brutal dictatorships” and have been associated with famine, the loss of basic freedoms, and mass murder. It further claims socialist governments have led to more than 100 million deaths worldwide.

The resolution is not Salazar’s first effort to push such a message. In 2021, she introduced H.Res. 548, also titled “Denouncing the Horrors of Socialism,” which similarly condemned historic socialist regimes. That version failed to advance to a vote.

The timing of the vote is especially notable, as it came just hours before President Trump met with New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, a self-described democratic socialist whose campaign was backed by the national Democratic Socialists of America. According to media reports following the meeting, the conversation was unexpectedly cordial, and the two men discussed shared concerns including housing affordability, the cost of living, and utility rates.