National review
Why six Senate Republicans voted against the COVID relief bill
Congress passed a $ 900 billion coronavirus relief package on Monday evening after months of political stalemate, with the Senate voting almost unanimously in favor of the measure, save for six Republican senators. The 5,593-page bill passed House 359-53 before being approved by Senate 92-6. The six votes against the measure came from Republican Senators Marsha Blackburn (Tenn.), Rand Paul (Ky.), Rick Scott (Fla.), Ron Johnson (Wisc.), Mike Lee (Utah) and Ted Cruz (Texas) . six senators mostly criticized the financial and physical scale of the bill. Paul called the project a “spending monstrosity” saying that the “so-called conservatives” who vote for the measure would be no better than the Socialist Democrats. with free money you lose your soul and forever give up any semblance of moral or fiscal integrity, ”he said. Rather, he supported opening up the economy and reducing unnecessary spending in the budget in order to stop creating additional debt for future generations. said in a statement that the government “does not have an unlimited checking account.” “We need to spend federal dollars – the money we borrow from future generations – more carefully and put limits on what we mortgage on our children’s future.” He clarified that while he supported the great CARES law in the spring, because rapid and massive action was then necessary to “avoid an economic crisis”, that he wanted this time to adopt a more targeted approach; In September, he proposed a small $ 600 billion relief bill. Scott also pushed against the “massive omnibus spending bill that is mortgaging the future of our children and grandchildren.”> We must help Americans and small businesses in need, but we cannot continue to operate in this way. >> Again, in classic Washington style, vital programs are attached to a massive omnibus spending bill that is mortgaging the future of our children and grandchildren. Therefore, I cannot support this bill. pic.twitter.com/poShVDXzHb >> – Rick Scott (@SenRickScott) December 21, 2020 He said in a tweet that he would not support the bill, adding in a statement that “Washington doesn’t seem to understand that the news expenses today get paid by increased federal debt and result in higher taxes on families later. “The easiest path is just to go as Congress continues to hurt future generations of Americans, but I won’t be one of them,” he said. However, Johnson said that while he was “happy that a government shutdown was avoided. and this financial relief will finally reach those who really need it ”, he criticized the“ dysfunction ”of the process. past the deadline and into the current fiscal year, ”Johnson said. “This monstrosity was 5,593 pages long and only passed nine hours after the Senate first saw it. “I just couldn’t support this dysfunction so I voted no,” he said. Cruz and Lee also rejected hours to read several thousand pages of legislation, in response to a tweet from Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D., NY), in which the progressive lawmaker lamented having to vote on the Bill without having had time to consider it, Cruz agreed that the process is “absurd”. “It’s ABSURD to have a $ 2.5 trillion spending bill negotiated in secret and then – hours later – demand an up or down vote on a bill that no one ‘had time to read,’ Cruz tweeted.>. @AOC is right. >> It’s ABSURD to have a $ 2.5 trillion spending bill traded in secret and then, hours later, demand an up or down vote on a bill that no one has had time to read. CongressIsBroken https://t.co/EQp8BfRBHj >> – Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) December 21, 2020 Lee echoed these criticisms, posting a video on Twitter in which he showed how long it took just to print the invoice: three minutes for just the first 100 pages of the massive bill. “Because of the length, there’s no way anyone will have a chance to read it between now and when we vote,” Lee said in the video. “And I’m absolutely certain that was cobbled together by a very small handful of Congressmen and their staff and excluding 98% of Congressmen from both political parties in both houses. “This process, by which members of Congress are urged to blindly rely on legislation negotiated entirely in secret by four of their colleagues, which must end,” he said.> 1/4 C is the spending bill before Congress today. I received it just moments ago and will probably be asked to vote on it late tonight. It is 5,593 pages long. I know there are some good things in it. I am also convinced that it contains bad things. peak. Cruz said the bill “advances the interests of the radical left, special interests and swamp lobbyists, with funding intended to expand authority for more H-2B visas for foreign workers as a near record number of Americans remain unemployed.[.] “It also sets the stage” for Democrats to implement the “Green New Deal” by asserting the “need” to meet the demand for electricity in the United States through clean, renewable or energy sources. zero emission, ”he said. acknowledged that the legislation had a number of bright spots, including vaccine development and distribution, helping schools and helping small businesses, she said it was too expensive and included a number of measures she could not support. “I cannot support the nearly $ 2.4 trillion in spending that will make the recovery even more difficult,” she said in a statement. “I am seriously concerned about the provisions buried in the 5,593-page bill, such as expanded visas, Pell grants for prisoners and households with illegal aliens receiving economic impact payments. For these reasons, I voted no when adopting this legislation.
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