As we approach the somber 2-year mark since the unjust imprisonment of Dr. Gubad Ibadoghlu by the government of Azerbaijan, Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ), a leading American human rights lawmaker, renewed the call for securing Ibadoghlu’s release and for the U. S. to sanction the individuals involved in the ongoing medical abuses against Ibadoghlu, a world-renowned economist, former New Jersey resident and now political prisoner. As an economist, Dr. Ibadoghlu’s scholarship has included research on t... Read more

Today, the U. S. House of Representatives unanimously passed legislation to name the new Toms River Veterans Clinic in honor of Second Lieutenant Leonard G. “Bud” Lomell, a World War II hero and longtime Toms River resident. Click here for Smith’s full remarks. H. R. 2170, “To name the Department of Veterans Affairs community-based outpatient clinic in Toms River, New Jersey, the Leonard G. 'Bud' Lomell, VA Clinic, and for other purposes,” formally recognizes and memorializes Lomell’s heroic mi... Read more

by Tommy Watters The Point Pleasant Canal will be getting a $3 million fence safety facelift. After a series of meetings with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers over two years, the agency announced plans to repair and replace old safety fencing along the entire perimeter of the Point Pleasant Canal in the borough, U.S. Rep. Chris Smith (R-4) announced on June 11. The canal first opened to navigation in 1926, and is a roughly two-mile-long, man-made channel that connects the Barnegat Bay and the M... Read more

At a widely attended human rights forum on Capitol Hill this week, Congressman Chris Smith (R-NJ), Co-chair of the Congressional-Executive Commission on China (CECC) and member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, underscored the severity and intensity of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)’s campaigns to suppress and silence the voices of dissidents and other pro-democracy advocates, including those who escaped to the United States. Click here for Smith’s full remarks. The “Safeguarding Freed... Read more

Alarming accounts of growing repression at the hands of the government of Pakistan, targeting political opposition figures, independent journalists, and the blocking of free and fair elections in Pakistan were the focuses of a bipartisan congressional hearing chaired Tuesday by Congressman Chris Smith (R-NJ), co-chairman of the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission. “Life in Pakistan today is marked by rampant government violations of basic freedoms, particularly freedom of speech and media freedom... Read more

New legislation to reauthorize the nation’s federal efforts to fight Lyme disease was announced yesterday on Capitol Hill. Known as the TICK Act, the bill authored by Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ) with lead sponsors Reps. Lloyd Doggett (D-TX), Thomas Kean, Jr. (R-NJ) and Paul Tonko (D-NY), will provide continued funding for Lyme disease research at the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). Senator Susan Collins is the author of this legislation in the US Senate. “Lyme and other tick-borne diseases are e... Read more

Excerpts of remarks by Rep. Chris Smith, Co-Chairman of the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission, at the commission's July 15, 2025 hearing in Washington, DC: Today’s hearing of the Lantos Commission focusing on Pakistan’s Ongoing Political Repression, will come to order. Welcome—and special thanks—to our very distinguished panel of experts. We look forward to your testimony and recommendations to mitigate and help end pervasive human rights abuse in Pakistan. Today we will hear about the governme... Read more

Jacob Adams During his first term, President Donald Trump hosted then-Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan in the Oval Office on July 22, 2019. Khan is now a political prisoner in Pakistan. (Mark Wilson/Getty Images) Congress’ Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission heard testimony Tuesday condemning the government of Pakistan over its treatment of Christians and other religious minorities. In his opening remarks, Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J., a co-chairman of the bipartisan commission, noted what the U.... Read more

Congressman Chris Smith (R-NJ), co-chairman of the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission, will chair a hearing on the ongoing repression of political opposition by the government of Pakistan. Accounts and evidence will be heard about the government persecuting political figures of the opposition and journalists, and controlling media communications and preventing free and fair elections in Pakistan. In its Freedom in the World 2024 report, the human rights watchdog group Freedom House noted that in... Read more

By Dan Radel - Asbury Park Press staff The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will install new fencing around the entire perimeter of the Point Pleasant Canal at a cost of $3 million, U.S. Rep. Chris Smith announced. The fencing there now is inadequate and falling into disrepair, Smith, R-N.J., said. “I alerted the Army Corps to the deteriorating conditions of the fence after hearing from residents and elected officials in Point Pleasant,” Smith said. “Safety is everyone’s number one concern, so I rea... Read more