Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) had an absolutely savage response to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s latest “offer” to reopen the government — one that perfectly captured what most conservatives were thinking. Kennedy joked that if God granted him strength instead of patience after hearing Schumer’s proposal, he’d “need bail money.”
Schumer’s big idea? Democrats would graciously agree to reopen the government only if Republicans agreed to extend the ObamaCare-era COVID subsidies for another year. After that, he claimed, they could “sit down” and talk about healthcare costs — Washington-speak for “we’ll get around to it once we’ve locked in more government spending.”
“Democrats are ready to clear the way to quickly pass a government funding bill that includes health care affordability. Leader Thune just needs to add a clean one-year extension of the ACA tax credits to the CR so that we can immediately address rising health care costs. That’s not a negotiation, it’s an extension of current law…We also offer this, let’s create a bipartisan committee that will continue negotiations after the government reopens…”
Speaking to Fox News’ Martha McCallum on Friday, the host asked Kennedy his reaction to the proposal, which really wasn’t new at all.
“God, please give me patience, because if you give me strength, I’m going to need bail money,” Kennedy replied, and the host couldn’t help but laugh.
“What Senator Schumer is suggesting is that we do the dumbest thing possible that won’t work. Stupid should hurt more. [Schumer’s proposal] means we would have to take $35B of taxpayer money and give it directly to health insurance companies without any commitment of lowering premiums.”
“How’s that going to reduce healthcare costs?” he added. “How’s that going to reduce premiums? The healthcare companies are going to take $35 billion from the taxpayers and put it into their pocket.”
“I don’t know what Senator Schumer is thinking,” Kennedy continued. “I mean, Earth to Chuck… Am I going to vote for this? The short answer is no. The long answer is hell no. I think we are just going to have to get used to the fact that we’ve been in a shutdown, we’re going to be in a shutdown for a while.”
Kennedy pointed out that he had voted 14 times to lift the shutdown, and the Democrats and Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) have voted 14 times to keep the government shutdown. “We’re just going to be here for a while,” he added.
Earlier in the day, Sen. John Kennedy may have landed on the one idea that could actually put an end to all this Democratic shutdown theater — cut their congressional pay. It’s simple, brilliant, and guaranteed to get results:
“I’ve voted more than a dozen times to fund the government—but many politicians are too scared of pressure from socialists to do the right thing,” Kennedy wrote. “I think a missing paycheck would make them grow a spine.”
Like air traffic controllers and members of our military? We absolutely agree. And shame on Shutdown Schumer and his party (and Rand, too) for making them go without. Disgusting.