(April 1, 2010) — When President Barack Obama promised to recognize the Armenian Genocide during his campaign, senior Lara Kumjian knew he was just playing political games. According to The Washington Post, shortly before the 23-22 vote by the U.S. congressional committee on March 4 that sent the recognition measure to the House of Representatives, the Obama administration announced its opposition, just like the prior Bush and Clinton administrations. “It’s expected from him,” Kumjian said. “I knew it wasn’t going to work out, I knew he was just making things up to get Armenian people’s votes.” Teacher Lousik Kassakhian says it’s a question of priority between recognizing the 1.5 million slaughtered Armenians and maintaining an ally. For Kassakhian, whose grandfather lost his entire family in the genocide, the implication of another rejected measure is dangerous. “Sometimes people say ‘oh, history repeats, history repeats” but it shouldn’t,” Kassakhian said. “We’re sending a message that you won’t be punished.” According to the Post , Turkey withdrew its ambassador shortly after the vote. But Kassakhian thinks that the threat should not be taken seriously, as Turkey had taken similar measures before. “They say we need them, but they need us a lot too,” Kassakhian said. Kumjian believes that Turkey isn’t alone in the blame for the resolution’s constant failure, as Obama chooses to focus on the near future of the United States rather than the far-off prospect of future genocides. “What would he gain from accepting the Armenian Genocide?” Kumjian said. For Kassakhian, Obama’s retracted promise to support the recognition indicates the bigger picture of his presidency. “The thing is, he knows it has happened, and not recognizing it makes him, in my opinion, a weak president,” she said. “He’s not able to do that minor thing. How is he going to deliver building a just society?” The Turkish government claims that the death toll is inflated and reflects the Armenians who died in battle during World War I. Both Kassakhian and Kumjian, however, believe that the current political battle is about admitting the truth. The truth, they say, is known by both the United States and Turkey. “It was definitely not inflated because we have pictures, we have documents, we have many poets, writers, philosophers that died during that time, so it’s all fact,” Kumjian said. Kassakhian refutes the World War I claim by arguing that Armenians died well after the end of the war, citing her grandmother’s family, all of whom died in Smyrna, Turkey in 1922. “As a Muslim country, they had a policy not to tolerate the Christian minorities,” Kassakhian said. “They cannot justify that because it didn’t happen once.” Kumjian doubts that the resolution will ever be passed. But Kassakhian is more worried that the memory will die with the survivors, now at least in their 90s. Legislation, she says, will be a byproduct of remembering. “It’s about passing and it’s about remembering, and doing that each time, the whole world knows what’s going on again and again and again,” she said.