Chuck Schumer Defends About-Face On Supporting Trump-Backed CR To Avert Government Shutdown

2 days ago

On the Senate floor, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) defends his decision to support a CR.

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Transcript

00:00consent the quorum be dispensed with. Without objection. Well, Mr. President, as

00:05everyone knows, government funding expires at midnight tonight. As I

00:10announced yesterday, I will vote to keep the government open. I believe it is the

00:15best way to minimize the harm that the Trump administration will do to the

00:21American people. Clearly, this is a Hobson's choice. The CR is a bad bill. But

00:28as bad as the CR is, I believe allowing Donald Trump to take even much more

00:33power via a government shutdown is a far worse option. A shutdown would allow

00:41Doge to shift into overdrive. Let me repeat. A shutdown will allow Doge to

00:48shift into overdrive. It would give Donald Trump and Doge the keys to the

00:54city, state, and country. Donald Trump and Elon Musk would be free to destroy

01:01vital government services at a much faster rate than they can right now and

01:07over a much broader field of destruction that they would render. In a

01:13shutdown, Donald Trump and Doge will have the power to determine what is

01:18considered essential and what is not. And their views on what is not essential

01:23would be mean and vicious and would decimate vital services and cause

01:30unimaginable harm to the American people, making matters even worse. In a shutdown,

01:37there is no check on their determinations, Trump and Doge's

01:44determinations on what is essential and what is not. In fact, on February the 26th,

01:51OMB, led by Russell Vogt, told agencies to work with Doge to create a list of

01:58non-essential workers so that they could reduce staffing even faster in a

02:03shutdown. They're already preparing for a shutdown. Musk has told everybody he

02:08wants a shutdown because he knows it will help him achieve his horrible goal

02:16of just decimating the federal government from one end to the other. In

02:21other words, if government were to shut down, Doge has a plan in

02:28place to exploit the crisis for maximum destruction. In a shutdown, American

02:36families would be hurt in ways they almost have never been. It could disrupt

02:41regional Veterans Affairs offices, curtail mental health services,

02:44accelerate plans to slash-stash at Social Security offices. The list goes

02:50on and on and on of the damage, the severe damage they could do, virtually

02:56unchecked. And they can stay in a shutdown as long as they want. There is

03:04no off-ramp unless they decide to take that off-ramp, and they won't because

03:09this is their best tool for achieving their goal. Slash government, slash

03:14spending, and use that money for tax breaks for billionaires. So a shutdown

03:22would be the best distraction Donald Trump could ask for. So distraction from

03:28his awful agenda. Donald Trump owns the chaos in government. He owns the chaos in

03:34the stock market. He owns the damage happening to the economy. But he knows if

03:39government shuts down, and all the fighting is over which agencies should

03:44be kept and which shouldn't, and Republican senators and congressmen and

03:49just obeisance to Trump keep putting bills on the floor, to decide that, it

03:55will totally distract from the most important fight of all. Fighting

04:00Republicans for eviscerating Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, while

04:04giving trillions in tax cuts for the ultra-rich. That is the fight. That is the

04:11fight American people must know about. A shutdown will be a costly distraction

04:17from this all-important fight. Finally, I want to close by reminding everyone it

04:24was Republicans who pushed this false shutdown choice. Their inability to

04:30govern has led us to this precipice. Our caucus members have been torn between

04:36two awful alternatives, and my colleagues and I have wrestled with which

04:41alternative would be worse for the American people. Different senators come

04:46down on different sides of this question, but that does not mean that any Senate

04:51Democrat supports a shutdown. Whatever the outcome, our caucus will be united in

04:57our determination to continue the long-term fight to stop Donald Trump's

05:03dangerous war on our democracy and on America's working families. I yield the

05:08floor and note the absence of a quorum.

Chuck Schumer Defends About-Face On Supporting Trump-Backed CR To Avert Government Shutdown

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