Democrat demands to reopen the government include $3.9 million for LGBTQI+ democracy grants in the Western Balkans, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) revealed on Tuesday on the 14th day of the Democrat government shutdown.
“Welcome to day 14 of the Democrat government shutdown. It‘s two weeks … of Democrats in Congress inflicting untold pain on the American people for nothing other than pure politics, as we’ve explained at this podium every day of the shutdown,” Johnson said.
Johnson has repeatedly explained that Republicans put forth a clean continuing resolution (CR) to effectively “keep the lights on,” but Democrats have rejected it several times, despite being in favor of it in the past. Democrats are using the shutdown to force a fight on healthcare — something Johnson has made clear is a separate issue not tied to the CR — as Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) is desperate to appease his Marxist base.
For greater perspective, Johnson walked through some of the demands in the Democrats’ counter proposal, highlighting the sheer absurdity of the $1.5 trillion dollars in new spending funded by taxpayers.
“They would send a half a billion dollars to liberal news outlets by refunding the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. It would also restore up to $5 billion of American taxpayer funds for wasteful spending for international projects,” he said, providing specific examples.
“Here’s a couple of examples. This is in their legislation, their counter proposal on the CR to keep the lights open, this is what they want to do. They want to spend 24.6 million of your hard-earned dollars as a taxpayer for climate resilience in Honduras,” Johnson revealed.
“They want to spend 13.4 million for civic engagement in Zimbabwe. They want to send 3.9 million for LGBTQI+ democracy grants [in] the Western Balkans. They want to spend 2.9 million of your dollars for desert locust risk reduction in the Horn of Africa and two million for, quote, ‘organizing for feminist democratic principles in Africa,’” he said.
“We are not doing that,” Johnson made clear.
Johnson said their proposal would also “reverse common sense reforms that Republicans made in the Working Families Tax Cut [Act] that keep illegal aliens off taxpayer funded-health care. This is a fact. … They would add the illegal aliens, non-citizens, back to taxpayer-funded benefits. It would cost taxpayers nearly $200 billion. They would also remove a very reasonable — reasonable and moderate — modest work requirement that we put on able-bodied young men with no dependents,” he said, noting it would also make COVID-era Obamacare subsidies permanent “without any income caps or any other reforms at all.”
WATCH the full presser below:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LFHW8RueWYI
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