Politics & Power Quote by Solomon Ortiz

Ortiz is doing a quiet bit of political jujitsu here: he takes an institution popularly coded as outward-facing, almost romantic in its internationalism, and turns it inward as proof of practical patriotism. The phrasing "In addition to serving overseas" nods to what most people think the Peace Corps is for, then pivots to the real objective of the line: inoculating the program against the familiar critique that humanitarian work abroad is a luxury item, irrelevant to "real" American needs.

The key move is "their fellow Americans". It’s a deliberately intimate, community-minded frame that collapses the distance between volunteerism and national belonging. Ortiz is saying: this isn’t charity for strangers; it’s solidarity with neighbors. That matters in the late-20th/early-21st-century context when disaster response and homeland security rhetoric surged, and politicians needed to justify international engagement in domestic terms. Naming the "Crisis Corps" (a rebranding of Peace Corps Response) adds urgency and competence; "crisis" implies speed, skill, and measurable utility, not idealistic wandering.

Subtextually, the quote is also a pitch to appropriators and skeptics: fund this, expand this, respect this. Ortiz, a Democrat from Texas, is threading a needle between humanitarian identity and constituency politics. The sentence is unfinished as provided, but the intent is clear: to make global service legible as national service, and to claim the Peace Corps as part of an American civic toolkit rather than a boutique moral project.