House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) blasted Republicans on Monday for suddenly pretending to care about the national debt again at a time when tens of millions of middle-class Americans are looking to their government for financial assistance.
During an interview on MSNBC, Chris Hayes asked Pelosi what she made of the latest GOP concern over how much it will cost to fund another round of coronavirus stimulus.
“Well, it’s interesting to see what they’re saying, now renewing their fiscal hawk positions,” she said. “When I saw them give a $2 trillion addition to the national debt in order to give 83 percent of the benefits to the top one percent, that was so irresponsible.”
Pelosi lambasted the GOP for now turning around and being opposed to benefits, like food stamps, that so many Americans are relying on during this crisis.
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Nancy Pelosi scoffs at Republicans who are pretending to care about the deficit again when it comes to providing aid to working people. #ctl #p2 pic.twitter.com/OXi8Jirn8f
— PoliticusUSA (@politicususa) May 12, 2020
Pelosi said:
Well, it’s interesting to see what they’re saying, now renewing their fiscal hawk positions. They can barely remember. I have confidence in going big with what we do. When I saw them give a $2 trillion addition to the national debt in order to give 83 percent of the benefits to the top one percent. That was so irresponsible in terms of it did nothing for the economy except heap mountains of debt on our children. So with this, what we’re saying is these are investments. All of these things are for the good of helping people in their personal lives but they also are a stimulus to the economy. Ask any — well, almost any, I don’t know who they would drum up – economist, they will tell you. Food stamps, imagine that they’re against snap, against expanding the opportunity for people to have access to food stamps at a time where the papers and the news is full of families in long lines at food banks and we have to help those food banks as well. So this is personal. It’s heartbreaking, really.
Republicans have never cared about the debt and deficit
For decades, Republicans have successfully fooled a good portion of the country into actually believing they care about the debt and deficit – that they, not Democrats, are the more fiscally responsible party.
It’s never been true, but in the Trump era, the veil was completely removed when this administration – with the approval of Republicans in Congress – forked over $2 trillion in tax cuts for the wealthiest individuals and corporations without blinking.
As Nancy Pelosi said on Monday, it has done virtually nothing to help the middle class or the economy more broadly, but it did help rich GOP donors buy back billions in stock.
Now, when Republicans have an opportunity to actually invest in working people in a meaningful way, they want to lecture the country on government spending.
Not only is this bad policy, but it shows just how little the Republican Party cares about the “forgotten men and women” for whom they claim to be fighting.
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Sean Colarossi currently resides in Cleveland, Ohio. He earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in Journalism from the University of Massachusetts Amherst and was an organizing fellow for both of President Obama’s presidential campaigns. He also worked with Planned Parenthood as an Affordable Care Act Outreach Organizer in 2014, helping northeast Ohio residents obtain health insurance coverage.
