The MAGA House GOP refuses to pass a budget, and they’re giddy to shut down the government over it — but what they’re demanding is extreme.
MAGA lawmakers just shut down a continuing resolution (CR) — a short-term budget to keep the country running — proposed by their own party, and now they’re reportedly drafting one that would go even further in cutting many of the government programs Americans rely on.
However, Trumper and professional right-wing media spotlight-seeker Matt Gaetz said it didn’t go far enough.
The previous CR was touted as cutting spending by 8%, funding anti-immigration efforts at the southern border, and denying further aid to Ukraine (a new favorite talking point for the party whose much-indicted leader has never gotten over President Volodymyr Zelensky’s refusal to manufacture allegations against his then-opponent).
Among the cuts would be supplemental funding for the WIC program, which provides nutritional foods (milk, cheese, fruits, vegetables, and baby formula) to infants and pregnant women.
That wasn’t far enough, though. The new budget will reportedly slash 27% from WIC, education, cancer and stroke research, and administration for Social Security, among other programs, according to an analysis by The Center for American Progress’ Bobby Kogan.
Remember when Republicans insisted that they would balance abortion bans with the support of pregnant women and their children?
How does that mesh with cutting nutrition programs and education, and holding government functions hostage to force those plans through?
That’s not all they’re demanding. Gaetz, in particular, is acting as Donald Trump’s Congressional mouthpiece, and openly demanded that his fellow MAGAs “hold the line” in destroying the previous CR because, in his words, “Trump opposes the Continuing Resolution.”
In fact, what he is demanding is a reprieve for the former president’s legal woes. Florida Politics reported:
“U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz, the only Florida Republican in the House who refused to support McCarthy as Speaker, said the resolution falls short. He said Congress needs to defund existing support for Ukraine and for a Special Counsel investigation of former President Donald Trump.”
Let’s put that plainly: a sitting Member of Congress, an elected Representative, is ready to shut down the government, putting government employees out of work and grinding necessary functions to a halt, in a desperate attempt to help a man who tried to overturn a U.S. election dodge legal culpability.
And his party is falling in line.
The question people must ask themselves is “How are the demands of the MAGA extremists in the Republican Party hurting me?”
Because they don’t seem to be helping anyone except Donald Trump.
