Democrat Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (HI-2) is not a movement conservative or even a closet
Republican – but she sure sounds like one sometimes, and when she voted NO on the outrageous COVID “stimulus” bill and called-out the congressional leadership she said and did what all MAGA conservatives in Congress should have done.
Said Rep. Gabbard: “$600 is a slap in the face to every American struggling due to the pandemic. You deserve better. I voted against the 5,593-page spending bill that gave billions to corporate interests, the military industrial complex & other countries, leaving crumbs for you who need help most.”
Senator Rand Paul likewise stepped-up and voted NO, asking, “We are $27 trillion in debt today. How do we expect a child to have the economic opportunity when this crushing debt is their inheritance from Congress?”
“We are borrowing and worsening this debt crisis, in part, because too many governors and mayors have imposed heavy handed restrictions that crush business,” he later observed.
“The need for help is real. I hear it every day from Kentuckians and across the country. But it’s clear that government has worsened the economic damage and acted as the biggest obstacle to economic recovery,” said Dr. Paul. “The answer is not printing up and distributing ‘free money.’ It’s opening the economy,” he later added.
You can watch Dr. Paul’s remarks through this link. In the end senators voted 92-6 in favor of passing the package. In addition to Senator Paul, Senators Mike Lee R-Utah; Sen. Rick Scott, R-Florida: Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tennessee; Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wisconsin; and Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas voted NO.
The House passed the bill 359 to 53, with 50 Republicans voting NO.
Kentucky’s liberty minded Republican Rep. Thomas Massie, who voted NO, and later tweeted:
Bless your ❤️ if you think passage of a 5500+ page $trillion+ bill just randomly occurred Christmas week.
If I’ve observed one thing during my time in DC, it’s that Congress saves its biggest bill for the week Congressmen are most anxious to go home to their families.
We agree with Rep. Massie that government by budget crisis has become standard operating procedure under the Speakerships of Democrat Nancy Pelosi and Republicans Paul Ryan and John Boehner.
As the Federalist’s Sean Davis tweeted:
The “stimulus” bill is an abomination. Trump should veto it.
Congress is stealing $2,700 per American to send $600 to every American, then demanding that you thank them for the privilege of getting robbed.
But it is not just the process that was a slap in the face to American taxpayers, workers, and business owners – it was also the outrageous things that the money was being spent on.
According to an analysis posted by Turning Point USA’s Ryan Fournier, family members of illegal aliens are now able to get stimulus checks under this new bill. It’s retroactive, so they can also get the previous $1,200 given out.
Natalie Winters, writing for the National Pulse, said among the most egregious expenditures in the December 21st stimulus are the foreign aid components: $700,000,000 being directed towards the country of Sudan and $33,000,000 “shall be made available for democracy programs for Venezuela.” “Not less than” $135,000,000 will be sent to Burma, “not less than $85,500,000” will be sent to Cambodia, and “not less than $130,000,000” will be sent to Nepal. The stimulus also stipulates that in Pakistan “not less than $15,000,000 shall be made available for democracy programs and not less than $10,000,000 shall be made available for gender programs.”
Ms. Winters also identified funds to social justice-driven causes, including these: Funds to investigate “archaeological sites” related to the 1908 Springfield Race Riot and the creation of two new Smithsonian museums: the National Museum of the American Latino and a “comprehensive women’s history museum.” An additional $1,500,000 will be sent to the House Appropriations Committee’s “Office of Diversity and Inclusion” efforts.
Among the domestic pork projects we found in the bill are:
$26,400,000 for the Kennedy Center
$1,000,000,000 for the Smithsonian
$154,000,000 for the National Gallery
$167,000,000 for the National Endowments for Art & Humanities
$14,000,000 for the Woodrow Wilson Center
Rush summed-up the slap in the face to Americans and America this way:
It’s a $900 billion COVID relief bill. But that’s not what this is. This is things don’t change. Congress did not pass a massive COVID relief bill. They passed a massive giveaway to questionable socialist nations and sketchy Democrat Party constituencies...
Restaurants and bars? Places where people meet and congregate, the hardest hit of our small businesses? I mean, this division of our economy is being wiped out — almost purposefully in blue states. Restaurants got nothing in the $900 billion COVID relief bill…
So, $600 for every American would equal a $198 billion bill, yet this bill is more than $900 billion. Do the math. We’ve given away $700 billion to corrupt cronies, corrupt countries that are allies of the Democrat Party. It needs to be vetoed. Trump needs to veto it. I don’t know if he will. I don’t believe he will. But it needs to be vetoed.
Rush is right, the bill needs to be vetoed, not just because it was passed via a flawed process, but because the vast sums it spends on things unrelated to helping Americans weather the COVID-19 economy really is a slap in the face to America’s hard-pressed working families and business owners.
Stimulus
Rand Paul
Rush Limbaugh
COVID relief
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