Tag Archives: Ted Cruz

Sen. Mike Lee talks budget battles, 'phony scandal'

Key Republican lawmaker on ‘Fox News Sunday‘

Chris Moody, Yahoo! News 19 hours ago

He probably didn’t mean for it to come out this way, but Utah Republican Sen. Mike Lee, a leader of an effort in Congress to use mandatory spending bills to defund Obamacare, may have handed over messaging ammunition to Democrats.

Surrounded by Republican House and Senate lawmakers at a Capitol Hill press conference Thursday, Lee and his colleagues called on Democrats to pass a bill that would fund the government but also defund the health care law. The federal government will temporarily shut down on Oct. 1 if Congress does not pass a bill extending funding.

While arguing that Democrats should accept the Republican path forward on Obamacare, however, Lee said that the law “is not worth causing a shutdown over.”

“A shutdown is too much. We don’t want a shutdown, we don’t need a shutdown. We should avoid a shutdown, and Obamacare is a law that’s going to harm people. It certainly is not a good idea to shut down the government in order to force through the implementation of Obamacare at a time when the president has said he’s not going to follow the law and he’s made substantial changes,” Lee said. “Shutdowns are bad, shutdowns are not worth it, this law is not worth causing a shutdown over.”

That last line will probably return to bite Lee and Republicans who continue to push to delay the 3-year-old law, even though he was trying to make the opposite point: That he thinks Obamacare is so bad that Democrats shouldn’t fight for it to the point of a shutdown. But it may prove difficult to convince the American people that the party seeking to fund a law that has been on the books for three years and has been found constitutional by the Supreme Court is responsible for a shutdown.

On Friday, the Republican-led House is planning to vote on a spending bill that would keep the government open but strip funding for the health care law, which will go on to the Democrat-led Senate. But Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said Thursday that the Senate would approve nothing less than a government spending bill with Obamacare funding intact and he will likely return the bill to the House with the health care funding in it.

The impasse could lead to a traditional filibuster in the Senate. Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz on Thursday said he would be open to procedural maneuvers that would aim to block the government-funding bill.

“I will do everything necessary and anything possible to defund Obamacare,” Cruz said when asked about a filibuster. “Any procedural means necessary.”

~ politics petitions pollution and pop culture

Dumb And Dumber

09/19/2013 Nativegrl77

By CAP Action War Room

The federal government is hurtling toward two critical deadlines where a failure to act will be extraordinarily damaging to the US economy. But Republicans think it’s okay to play political games even if it means sabotaging our economy.

Deadline 1: To avoid government shutdown, Congress needs to pass a spending bill to fund the federal government by September 30. Republicans have been engaged in a civil war for weeks over how best to use this deadline to manufacture a crisis. Those on the far right, led by Senators Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz, insist they shut down the government unless the budget fully defunds Obamacare, even touring the country to promote a shutdown. And now there are reports that House Republican leadership is following their lead in allowing such a bill to come to a vote.

The consequences of a government shutdown are severe: social security checks might not go out, our troops might not get paid, and the economy would take a huge hit. Indeed, some fearful Republicans have warned their constituents as much.

A majority of Americans will blame Republicans if the government shuts down. But Republicans are still unable to let go of their obsession with repealing Obamacare, and are now barreling towards shutdown. That’s just dumb.

Deadline 2: The U.S. government will default on its obligations sometime in mid-to-late October unless Congress extends its borrowing limit. This would have catastrophic consequences for not just the United States economy; it could cause a worldwide crash even worse than we faced in 2008. But House Republican leadership — that’s right, not just some of their crazier members — want to use the debt limit to force Congress to delay Obamacare for one year. Speaker John Boehner, who previously insisted he would not use the debt ceiling for political leverage, has promised “a whale of a fight.”

We’ve been down this road before. Paying our bills on time is non-negotiable. Congress needs to pay the bills Congress itself racked up. Period.

Even among those that oppose the health care law, more than half want their elected officials to make it work as well as possible. So if Republicans truly think the American people support their threats of default instead of doing the hard work of governing, well…that’s dumber.

BOTTOM LINE: Americans are tired of the fighting and of having their economic security put on the line time and time again. Harming the economy to refight old political battles won’t help middle class families.

~ politics petitions pollution and pop culture

OBAMACARE by the Numbers …

09/06/2013 Nativegrl77 3 Comments

Guess how some members of Congress are spending their August vacation:
They’re touring the country, going state by state and district by district to convince people that Obamacare isn’t working — never mind the benefits that millions of families are already feeling.
After trying and failing to repeal the law (40 times!), they’re starting to get desperate. OFA’s Truth Team is here to set the record straight.
Fight back against the cynical opponents of Obamacare by sharing some truth about how Obamacare is already helping folks all across the country — here’s a perfect graphic to get started:

~ politics petitions pollution and pop culture

84 Votes

06/13/2013 Nativegrl77

By ThinkProgress War Room

Senate Makes Major Move on Immigration Reform

Immigration reform including a pathway to earned citizenship moved one step closer to reality today as the Senate voted overwhelmingly, 84-15, to began debating and amending the bipartisan bill that passed the Judiciary Committee last month. Unsurprisingly, all of today’s no votes came from Republicans, including those leading the opposition to the bill: Sens. Jeff Sessions (AL), Mike Lee (UT), and Ted Cruz (TX).

While many of those who voted to take up the bill today are expected to oppose it in the end, today’s vote is the latest sign of strong momentum. By contrast, the vote to take up the 2007 immigration reform effort, which ultimately failed, was a much narrower 64-35.

Good news also came from the other side of the Capitol today, with Speaker Boehner (R-OH) predicting that the bill will become law before the end of the year. In another positive sign, Boehner also refused to rule out passing a bill through the House with mostly Democratic votes.

Finally, the president also held an event today with DREAMers and a bipartisan group of others who support reform with a pathway to earned citizenship.

The only unfortunate news on the immigration front today came from Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL), who appears to want to have it both ways once again. Rubio was reportedly asking his Republican colleagues to refrain from coming out in support of the bill so he could use the appearance of a lack support among Republicans as an excuse to drag the bill to the right. Discouraging fellow senators from supporting one’s own legislation is a relatively unheard of move.

A new poll out today shows that 81 percent of Latinos polled reject the notion of the “border-security first” approach that Rubio is inching toward. That includes 76 percent of Latinos who have voted for a GOP candidate in the past. Instead, Latinos want to see the pathway to citizenship and border security implemented concurrently, just as it is in the Gang of 8 bill Rubio himself helped author.

BOTTOM LINE: We are closer than we’ve been in a generation toward achieving real reform to our broken immigration system. Reforming our broken system will allow 11 MILLION undocumented immigrants to come out of the shadows, something that will boost our economy by a cumulative $832 BILLION over the next ten years.

Evening Brief: Important Stories That You Might’ve Missed

Google asks the government to let them reveal how many national security data requests they receive.

Bipartisan group of senators introduces legislation adding transparency to surveillance programs.

The other massive online surveillance program that no one is talking about.

Obama administration ends effort to restrict Plan B.

Nike now has a line of pro-LGBT shoes and sports fashions.

House Republicans launch new battle in war on women: unconstitutional 20-week abortion ban.

Overdraft protection actually hurts consumers, study finds.

Elizabeth Warren already has regulators considering tougher actions against the banks.

Another day, another false and misleading Republican attack on Obamacare.

~ politics petitions pollution and pop culture

Heartless

05/09/2013 Nativegrl77

| By ThinkProgress War Room

11 Awful GOP Amendments to the Immigration Bill

Tomorrow, the Senate Judiciary Committee officially kicks of the process of amending and working through what could be an historic reform of our broken immigration system.

The Republican members of the Gang of 8 — Sens. McCain (AZ), Flake (AZ), Graham (SC), and Rubio (FL) — deserve credit for their hard work and willingness to compromise on a plan that includes a pathway to earned citizenship. That said, other Republicans have offered dozens of offensive, mean-spirited, and just plain heartless amendments that serve no other purpose than to cause trouble, score cheap political points, demonize immigrants, and/or generally gum up the works for as long as possible in order to try and kill the bill.

ThinkProgress has rounded up 11 of the worst of these GOP amendments:

1. Undocumented immigrants can never become citizens. “No person who is or has previously been willfully present in the United States will [sic] not in lawful status…shall be eligible for United States citizenship.” Offered by Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX).

2. Mandatory DNA testing. Registered provisional immigrant applicants must submit a DNA sample to the Department of Justice to compare against the Combined DNA Index System (CODIS) at the FBI. Offered by Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT).

3. Zero assistance. Would prohibit undocumented immigrants who earn provisional legal status from applying for permanent residence if they qualify for state means-tested assistance, the supplemental nutrition assistance program (SNAP), the temporary assistance for needy families program (TANF), or supplemental security income benefits (SSI). Offered by Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL).

4. Bans humanitarian travel. Immigrants who are in provisional legal status but have to go back to their home countries for a humanitarian reason (to visit a sick relative, for instance) would be prohibited from re-entering the United States. Currently, the provisional legal status includes an authorization for travel.Offered by Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA).

5. Guts family re-unification. The green card distribution for some foreigners relies on a point allocation system in which a certain number of points must be accumulated before those individuals can qualify for a merit-based visa. This amendment would eliminate points for siblings of U.S. citizens and points for individuals from low-sending countries from counting towards merit-based immigrant visas. Offered by Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL).

6. In-person interviews for 11 million immigrants. Sure to slow down the process time for 11 million immigrants, an in-person interview would be required to determine one’s eligibility requirements for provisional legal status. Offered by Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL).

7. Limits visas to South Korea. In an effort to force South Koreans to buy beef from the United States again, this amendment threatens to withhold E-5 visas from South Korea immigrants until the country removes its age-based import restrictions on beef. Offered by Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA).

8. Enforces head-of-household deportation and causes family separations. Under the current bill, immigration judges have the authority to decline to deport individuals if they believe that the immigrant’s removal will result in hardship for his or her U.S. citizen child. This amendment would waive this judicial discretion and allow the deportation to occur. Offered by Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA).

9. Prevents low-income undocumented immigrants from seeking legalization. The amendment would require individuals applying for provisional legal status to maintain regular employment and a “regular income or resources” above 400 percent of the poverty line (more than $92,000for a family of four). Under the current bill, immigrants must earn at 100 percent of the poverty line or show regular employment. Offered by Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL).

10. Restricts visas for refugees. This amendment would prohibit individuals from applying for refugee and asylum status until one year after the Director of National Intelligence submits a review related to the Boston bombings to Congress. Offered by Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA).

11. Allows for racial profiling. Would allow Federal law enforcement to take into account an individual’s country of origin when allowing them into the country. Offered by Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA).

Finally, in a very Downton Abbey-esque move, Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) filed an amendment to allow undocumented immigrants to be hired, but only as domestic workers, specifically including cooks, waiters, butlers, governessess, maids, valets, gardeners, footmen, grooms, and chauffeurs.