Leader Schumer Floor Remarks Condemning Trump And Senate Republicans For Pushing Their Taxpayer-Funded Billion-Dollar Ballroom While Democrats Fight To Lower Costs
Washington, D.C. – Today, Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) spoke on the Senate floor attacking Donald Trump and Senate Republicans for continuing to push for Trump’s taxpayer-funded billion-dollar ballroom vanity project while Democrats fight to lower costs for the American people. Below are Senator Schumer’s remarks, which can also be viewed here:
Yesterday, Donald Trump defended his billion-dollar, gold-plated, taxpayer-funded ballroom, calling it “a gift to the United States of America.”
A gift? Let’s call Trump’s ballroom what it is: a boondoggle, a vanity project, an insult to every American – especially those struggling to make ends meet right now.
This ballroom is no gift to the American people – it’s congressional Republicans’ personal gift to Donald J. Trump. Right, it’s the senators, Republican Senators here in this chamber giving Donald Trump a personal gift of a billion-dollar ballroom.
Trump said yesterday, again, he just lies. Trump said yesterday that the ballroom “is not going to be paid for by the taxpayer.” Then why have Americans watched Republicans work around the clock on proposal after proposal to grant a billion dollars to build Trump’s ballroom, all at the taxpayer’s expense?
When Trump says it’s not going to be paid for by the taxpayer, it’s flagrant, shameless lying. He’s very good at that.
Fortunately, Democrats stopped Republicans’ first attempt to fund the ballroom through reconciliation, but rest assured the Senate GOP is still working to take money out of your paycheck to finance Trump’s palace, America.
Republicans are in such disarray as they scramble over the ballroom now, they’re slow-walking the whole process. We still don’t have a reconciliation bill on our desks.
Regardless of whether the ballroom funding makes it into the reconciliation bill – and Democrats will keep fighting to ensure that it doesn’t – Republicans have already showed America their true colors.
While Democrats are fighting to lower Americans’ costs, Republicans are fighting like hell to waste billions of dollars on things taxpayers do not want, do not need, and certainly should not be forced to pay for.
That’s true of the billion-dollar ballroom.
That’s true of the tens of billions of dollars the Republican bill would give to Trump’s masked agents who have gunned down Americans in the streets.
It’s true of the whole GOP entire agenda.
Republicans can change the price tag of the ballroom.
They tried to rewrite the text.
They even attempted to hide this boondoggle in the bill, but we caught them.
Republicans will not be able to distance themselves from this corruption. Democrats will make sure of that.
No matter what happens, we’ll make sure the American people know where Republicans stand. We will make sure Republicans have to go on the record and show what they’re really fighting for when we vote this week: Trump’s gilded palaces – not working families, not lower costs, not the American people. The American people want lower costs, they’re giving money to the ballroom. They’re giving money to the slush fund. How out of touch are they? How harmful are they to the average working family’s interests?
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