The brazenness of the Democratic Party these days never ceases to amaze me.
Lawmakers on the left are now openly admitting that they planned the ongoing government shutdown, and the American people are being used as leverage.
Yet, the media still blames the GOP for the closure of the federal government.
In 2021 and 2022, the Democrats used reconciliation to pass the American Rescue Plan Act and the Inflation Reduction Act.
Neither plan received input from the GOP, and Republicans rejected both spending plans. Consequently, Democrats broke the filibuster and used reconciliation to pass the legislation anyway.
This was the time when Democrats could have codified Obama’s tax subsidies for the Affordable Care Act, but they purposefully only extended them to the end of fiscal year 2025.
This was done for political leverage, and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) all but admitted that this week.
During a recent interview with Punchbowl News, Schumer was literally bragging about how great this was for Democrats, revealing that they had planned it all along.
He stated, "Every day gets better for us. It’s because we’ve thought about this long in advance, and we knew that health care would be the focal point on Sept. 30, and we prepared for it… Their whole theory was -- threaten us, bamboozle us, and we would submit in a day or two."
That was not the plan. The GOP presented a clean continuing resolution (CR), which was nearly identical to a bill that had just been passed, and it was also aligned with similar bills passed when Joe Biden was in office.
Democrats are the ones doing all the threatening here, not the GOP.
House Minority Whip Katherine Clark (D-MA) just admitted to using the American people as leverage to score political points.
While she was discussing the shutdown, she stated, “Shutdowns are terrible and, of course, there will be families that are going to suffer. We take that responsibility very seriously. But it is one of the few leverage times we have.”
A senior Republican aide hit the nail on the head, stating, “The longer this shutdown goes on, the more apparent it is that Democrats never wanted to solve a problem -- they wanted to exploit one and drag it out for political cover.” The aide continued, “There’s been no meaningful outreach to committees or leadership staff, as far as anyone can tell. If they were serious about lowering costs, wouldn’t there have been staff-level conversations at some point this year?”
We are now really on a loudly ticking clock, and I am not just talking about the shutdown. In another week, the healthcare marketplace opens up for Americans to start shopping for coverage. When that happens, the reality of the disaster that is Obamacare will become evident to all. And when you see those premiums skyrocketing, just remember that you have Obama and Democrats to thank for it.
