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Elizabeth Warren
Senate Finance Chair Says GOP Push for Medicaid Cuts Spotlights 'Real Trump Agenda'
"The votes are tallied and Trump is headed back to the White House, so his campaign trail populism is over and done with," said Sen. Ron Wyden.
Nov 19, 2024
The Democratic chairman of the Senate Finance Committee said Monday that GOP plans to target Medicaid and federal nutrition assistance to help offset the huge cost of their tax agenda encapsulates the economic agenda of the incoming Republican trifecta led by President-elect Donald Trump, who postured as a working-class champion during the 2024 race.
"You couldn't come up with a better distillation of the real Trump agenda than paying for tax breaks for the rich by gutting Medicaid and increasing child hunger," Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) said in a statement after a Washington Postreport detailed internal Republican discussions on a possible Medicaid work requirement, cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), and other potential changes to the programs that provide health insurance and food aid to tens of millions of Americans.
"Following through on this plan would cause real hardship and increase the cost of living for millions of working families, but the votes are tallied and Trump is headed back to the White House, so his campaign trail populism is over and done with," said Wyden. "Ultra-wealthy political donors want their massive tax handouts, and as far as Trump and Republicans are concerned, everybody else can go pound sand."
The Trump-led Republican Party has made clear that a new round of tax cuts is at the top of its agenda as it prepares to take control of the House, Senate, and White House in January. In recent weeks, the GOP has discussed using the filibuster-immune reconciliation process to ram tax legislation through Congress before individual provisions of the party's 2017 tax cuts expire at the end of next year.
Trump also campaigned on slashing the corporate tax rate, even as he appealed to working-class voters who aren't reaping the benefits of record corporate profits.
Such tax cuts would likely add trillions to the U.S. deficit, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, leading the GOP to seek out offsets in programs they've long demonized.
"Trump wants to strip healthcare from poor people and increase grocery bills."
Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) suggested to reporters last week that Republicans could aim to transform Medicaid's funding structure by instituting block grants—a change that analysts say would likely result in devastating cuts.
Edwin Park, research professor at Georgetown University's Center for Children and Families, wrote Monday that under a block-grant structure, states would "either have to dramatically raise taxes and drastically cut other parts of their budget including K-12 education or, as is far more likely, institute deep, damaging cuts to Medicaid eligibility, benefits, and provider and plan payment rates."
"That includes not just dropping the Medicaid expansion, which covers nearly 20 million newly eligible parents and other adults," Park wrote, "but gutting the rest of state Medicaid programs that serve tens of millions of low-income children, parents, people with disabilities, and seniors."
The Post reported that Republicans are also looking to curb SNAP benefits in the face of a nationwide hunger crisis. According to the latest federal data, 75% of households receiving SNAP benefits live at or below the poverty line and nearly 80% include either a child, an elderly person, or a person with a disability.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) wrote on social media Monday that members of her party "must unite and fight back" against the GOP's push for draconian cuts to SNAP and Medicaid.
"Trump wants to strip healthcare from poor people and increase grocery bills," Warren wrote. "Here's the new Republican plan to pass tax giveaways for Trump's billionaire backers and giant corporations on the backs of struggling Americans."
Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) added that "making it even more difficult for people to get healthcare or afford food in order to give tax cuts to the same greedy companies that are driving up healthcare and food costs is disgusting."
"We were elected to serve the American people," wrote Markey, "not feed corporate America's bottom line."
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Tlaib Demands Blinken Resign Over Failure to Hold Israel Accountable for Gaza Genocide
"No nation blocking U.S. humanitarian assistance can receive U.S. weapons," said Rep. Rashida Tlaib. "The Biden administration cannot pick and choose when they comply with our own laws."
Nov 15, 2024
Progressive Democratic Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib of Michigan on Thursday urged U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken to resign for breaking federal laws against arming human rights violators by lavishing Israel with tens of billions of dollars in American weapons used to harm Palestinians—more than 150,000 of whom have been killed or maimed in Gaza.
Speaking on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives in Washington, D.C., Tlaib—the only Palestinian American member of Congress—argued that "Secretary Blinken has continued to lie to Congress and should resign."
"U.S. law is very clear. No nation blocking U.S. humanitarian assistance can receive U.S. weapons," she stressed. "The Biden administration cannot pick and choose when they comply with our own laws."
The
Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 and Leahy Laws prohibit military aid to security forces that commit gross human rights violations, although in practice, the U.S. has sent weapons to many countries guilty of grave abuses, including the perpetrators of several genocides.
Tlaib disdainfully referred to the Biden administration's deadline for Israel to improve humanitarian conditions in Gaza or face a possible suspension of arms transfers.
"I want to talk about, quote, Biden's 30-day humanitarian deadline," she said. "The Biden administration has continued to ignore reports from its own experts, international human rights organizations, and the United Nations that the Israeli government is blocking humanitarian aid in Gaza."
Although the deadline passed earlier this week without full Israeli compliance with any of the 19 demands made by Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, the State Department determined that Israel is not violating U.S. law, sparking global outrage.
"The Israeli government is using starvation as a weapon of war," Tlaib said.
Earlier this year, as Gazan children began dying from malnutrition and lack of medical care, the International Court of Justice in The Hague—which is weighing a South Africa-led genocide case against Israel—ordered Israeli authorities to stop blocking aid from entering Gaza. Critics accuse Israel of flouting this and two other Gaza-related ICJ orders.
Pointing to a photo of Fadi al-Zant, a 6-year-old Gaza boy who nearly starved to death, Tlaib continued: "Look at this picture. It is evident that blocking U.S. humanitarian aid... is happening, and it is a blatant violation... of the Foreign Assistance Act."
"The Israeli government is using starvation as a weapon of war."
"In a letter to the Israeli government on October 13, Secretary Blinken acknowledged that the Israeli government is violating U.S. law by blocking aid and gave them 30 days to comply," she noted. "The letter demanded that 350 trucks be allowed into Gaza per day. And guess what? According to Israel's own data and own government, only 57 trucks were allowed into Gaza per day in October."
"On November 1, top United Nations officials said, 'The entire Palestinian population in northern Gaza is at imminent risk of dying from disease, famine, and violence,'" she added. "This week... Secretary Blinken exposed his lie by announcing that there will be no change to any policy, despite admitting that the Israeli government has still failed to comply with all of their demands."
Members of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's far-right Cabinet have suggested that Blinken personally endorsed Israel's policy of bombing aid trucks.
Palestinian groups and individuals in Palestine and the U.S. unsuccessfully sued President Joe Biden, Blinken, and Austin for their failure to prevent and complicity in Israel's genocide.
Also on Thursday, U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) condemned the Biden administration's failure to take any punitive action against Israel for its assault on Gaza, which a United Nations panel that same day called "consistent with the characteristics of genocide."
"Despite [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu's failure to meet the United States' demands, the Biden administration has taken no action to restrict the flow of offensive weapons," Warren said in a statement. "The failure by the Biden administration to follow U.S. law and to suspend arms shipments is a grave mistake that undermines American credibility worldwide."
"If this administration will not act, Congress must step up to enforce U.S. law and hold the Netanyahu government accountable through a joint resolution of disapproval," Warren asserted, adding that she has endorsed resolutions led by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and others aimed at blocking a series of proposed arms sales to Israel. Sanders said Wednesday that he will soon seek a floor vote on the resolutions.
"There is no longer any doubt," Sanders said Wednesday, "that Netanyahu's extremist government is in clear violation of U.S. and international law as it wages a barbaric war against the Palestinian people in Gaza."
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'Good News': As Trump Threat Looms, Senate Confirms Ethics Czar
"It's important that we'll have a government ethics chief in place who serves the American people, not Trump's wallet," said Sen. Elizabeth Warren.
Nov 14, 2024
As the clock winds down on Democratic control of the U.S. Senate, upper chamber lawmakers on Thursday confirmed President Joe Biden's nomination of David Huitema, head of the State Department's ethics program, to lead the Office of Government Ethics for a five-year term.
Senators voted 50-46 in favor of Huitema's confirmation to head the OGE through the duration of Republican President-elect Donald Trump's tenure, averting at least temporarily a scenario in which the winner of the 2024 election—who has refused to sign required transition-related ethics agreements and whose first term saw thousands of conflicts of interest—would be empowered to fill or stonewall the post.
The OGE has been without a director for more than a year, ever since the term of Trump appointee Emory Rounds expired. In September, Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) blocked Senate Democrats' attempt to confirm Huitema via unanimous consent until after the presidential election, alleging "political weaponization of the U.S. government against Donald Trump by the Biden-Harris administration."
As the consumer advocacy group Public Citizen said ahead of Huitema's confirmation:
One of the most important roles of the Office of Government Ethics is to oversee and advise the presidential transition process. The selection and nomination of most new administration officials takes place during the transition, in which OGE's vetting of pending nominees for conflicts of interest is most critical. The office needs to be fully staffed and operational during the course of the transition period.
However, Walter Shaub, who led the OGE during the Obama administration and resigned in 2017 after months of conflict with the Trump White House, warned in a Thursday interview with Government Executive that "it might be a hollow victory for government ethics if Trump fires Huitema after the inauguration."
"Even if Trump doesn't fire Huitema, OGE won't be able to prevent Trump's top appointees from retaining conflicting financial interests if the Senate grants Trump's request that lawmakers conspire in skirting or short-shrifting the constitutional confirmation process," Shaub added.
Still, ethics advocates cheered Huitema's confirmation, with the watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington hailing what it called the "good news" and "an important step to safeguard ethics compliance ahead of a second Trump administration that threatens to be even more corrupt than the first."
As one Democratic strategist said on social media following his confirmation, "Buckle up, David Huitema."
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