Pelosi: ‘Republicans All Vote No and Take the Dough’
(CNSNews.com) – House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) accused Republicans of voting no on spending bills crafted by Democrats like the latest COVID relief bill yet touting some of the initiatives of the bill to their constituents back home.
“The Republicans all vote no and take the dough. They don't mind going home and bragging about some of the initiatives that were in our rescue package. That’s what they usually do. They don't mind giving a nearly $2 trillion tax break of a cost to our national debt. Think of a $2 trillion gift to the richest people in America, 83 percent of the benefits of their tax scam in 2017 going to 83 percent – 83 percent going to the top one percent,” she told “CBS This Morning.”
“So what we're talking about here are investments. Nothing brings more money to the Treasury than the investment in education that we make - early childhood - and the president has universal pre-K, early childhood, K through 12, higher education that he talked about - lifetime learning for our workers -all a part of the plan that he is putting forth. All of that brings more money than anything back to the Treasury. So these are investments,” she said.
Pelosi said that “all of a sudden” Republicans are “deficit hawks,” but they gave away money to “the wealthiest people in our country under President Trump,” she said.
When asked whether Pelosi was prepared to pass an infrastructure bill without compromise, the speaker said, “No. We've never -- we've always had compromise on infrastructure. That has been the least partisan initiative we can take over the years. All of a sudden now, of course, they're saying, well, infrastructure is not workforce development. It is.
“If we want more women, minorities -- if we want more of our veterans and everyone else involved in these -- the construction that the president was talking about, we have to have workforce development. So again, we'll have to make the case,” she said.
“We have a responsibility to reach out in a bipartisan way, to find our common ground, and I think we will on many of the items, and we just have to -- the American people know that we need to involve women and protect children. Children learning, parents earning,” Pelosi said. “That's what we have to be thinking of.
“So how are we going to have more women and dads, actually, moms and dads in the workplace when they have responsibility for the care of their children? So it's -- it's pretty exciting. It's about community, and community has the word ‘unity’ in it. The president's speech was very unifying in the country if not in the Congress. We'll see,” she said.
Pelosi said the one-year anniversary of the murder of George Floyd was a realistic deadline to pass the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act.
“Yes, I think so. I'm very proud of Karen Bass who authored the bill in the House, now working in a bipartisan way in the House and in the Senate with Senator Tim Scott and others in the Senate. She has -- she's optimistic, and even the senator said in his response last night that he was willing to be working in a bipartisan way. We have to get this done,” the speaker said.
“Millions of people across the world and constantly in our own country came forth after last May when we saw the murder of George Floyd and said something had to be done. Justice in Policing Act came forth. The family asked that it be named for George Floyd. They asked me that, ‘Madam speaker, will you name for our brother?’ I said, ‘Only if it is worthy of his name,’ and the legislation to date has been worthy of his name,” she said.
Pelosi said that President Joe Biden’s speech to a joint session of Congress on Wednesday was “a triumph for women” in the workplace and at home.
She expressed joy that she and Vice President Kamala Harris made history as the first time a female vice president and female House speaker stood behind the president during a joint session of Congress.
“Well, it was exciting, of course, it was exciting when I was the first speaker as President Bush acknowledged that, but this was more than double. It had a synergy to it. It was something very, very special, but what made it even more important, we're there sending a message, sky's limit for girls and women,” Pelosi said.
“That’s important, but what's important is that the president's speech reflected that importance. It was a speech. It was a triumph for women, for women in the workplace, for women at home. Violence against women, he talked about. He talked about equal pay for equal work. He talked about family and medical leave,” she said.
“He talked about building back better for our country and to do so we had to have the fuller participation of women. That was throughout his speech. So I think it was a triumph for women, for families, for children, for all Americans,” the speaker added.
Host Gayle King asked Pelosi about the latest Census numbers, which she said don’t look good for the Democrats.
KING: Let's talk about the Census numbers that do not look good for the Democrats. There's a possibility that you may not be speaker during the --
PELOSI: Let's not worry about that. That's a year and a half away, and I feel very confident --
KING: You're not worried about it? A lot of people --
PELOSI: You know what, elections are always a contest. And you see what happens in them, but I feel very confident that the Democrats will hold the majority after the next election. I think that for all the huffing and puffing the Republicans are doing, these numbers were not as good for them as they had hoped.
They wanted three in Texas, two in Florida, the rest, but many of the -- much of the growth in many of these places that picked up more numbers, more members in Congress, the growth was from Hispanics, African-Americans, and the rest. So we'll see where those votes go, but this is right now. The best politics of all is to get the job done for the American people.
The blueprint that was put forth by the president last night to meet the needs of the American people. That's what we're about. We're not worry being who's going to be speaker two years from now.
No comments:
Post a Comment