More on the fallout of yesterday’s House budget resolution vote: My representative, Republican Mike Lawler, put out a statement:
Rep. Mike Lawler (R-New York) said Trump has promised he would not allow Medicaid to be cut.
“The president was clear about that. I was clear about that,” Lawler said. “We will work through this, but the objective today is to begin the process.”
Trump promises a lot of things. Then he changes his mind, or finds out the promised things are really hard to accomplish, and then he un-promises them. From the same news story linked above:
GOP leaders insist Medicaid is not specifically listed in the initial 60-page budget framework, which is true; the proposal directs the House Energy and Commerce Committee, which oversees Medicaid, to cut $880 billion in spending over the next decade.
And apparently there is no way to achieve the $880 billion in spending cuts without slashing Medicaid and other programs, such as food assistance, that people really need to survive.
The more extremist elements among the House Republicans will want to hold to that $880 billion figure. Trump probably will also, because he promised rich donors that he would extend their tax cuts in exchange for their support. So that’s his priority. But then you’ve got House Republicans in swing districts — which would include Mike Lawler — who believe they will be toast in 2026 if Medicaid and other social services are cut to benefit billionaires. They know they’re handing the Democrats a talking point even the Dems can’t screw up. Maybe.
A U.S. Dem representative from a neighboring district, George Latimer, also put out a statement:
“Like many House Democrats, I am extremely concerned about the House Republican budget plan that just passed the House, and how it would affect families in my district. The cuts needed for these tax breaks will mean over 196,000 residents in my district are at risk of losing Medicaid coverage. This includes 73,000 children and 27,000 seniors. This budget plan also threatens 74,000 people who count on SNAP to put food on the table. Republicans have promised to lower costs, but this budget won’t do that at all. Instead, it will make life harder and more expensive for my constituents and Americans across the country. As the budget process moves forward in the House, Democrats are going to fight for fairness and opportunity for every American.”
A bit wordy, but informative. Latimer’s district includes parts of southern Westchester County and the Bronx. I wrote about him last year when he defeated a Democratic incumbent in the primary.
Another Dem representative, from a district just north of Westchester, is Patrick Ryan, who said,
“Every single day, I am fighting to make the Hudson Valley more affordable, more safe, and more free – this budget proposal does the exact opposite. The wealthiest 0.1% of Americans would each get a tax cut of over $300,000 and Trump wants to pay for it by gutting health care and food assistance for over 150,000 Hudson Valley residents. It’s not just the immediate harm of gutting healthcare access, but also the long-term impact of adding more than $4 trillion to the national debt. I’m doing everything I can to block these harmful cuts, protect our community, and make sure tax cuts go to the middle-class, not the ultra-wealthy.”
Better. Make sure to say why people are getting their healthcare cut.
It potentially gets worse. At The American Prospect, David Dayen writes that there are plans afoot to cut 50 percent of the workforce at Social Security. The SSA’s statutory civil rights and equal opportunity division has already been abolished. The Regime isn’t yet publicly discussing a benefit cut. But already there are reports of employees at field offices being terminated. Dayen suggests they’re trying to avoid firing a lot of people at once, which might make alarming headlines. I don’t know if Musk/Trump realize the conflagration that would follow if benefits don’t arrive in people’s bank accounts on schedule. Musk probably has no clue. Trump doesn’t seem to be entirely present any more.
There’s also continuing fallout from Musk’s weekend troll email to all federal employees. Be sure to read Josh Marshall’s backgrounder on this. And Marcy Wheeler wrote about it also. Very basically, the catch is about the Government-Wide Email System (GWES) that DOGE set up after taking over the Office of Personnel Management (OPM). As briefly as I can explain it, back in January a lawyer named Kel McClanahan filed a lawsuit on behalf of some civil servants challenging the legality of the GWES. It appeared to be in violation of several laws. In order to allow GWES to go forward, lawyers working for Musk assured the court that any emails sent out via the GWES would be entirely voluntary. Employees could read them or ignore them, respond to them or not. In other words, no one is supposed to be able to use the GWES to issue binding orders to all government employees.
But then Musk sent out his five-bullet-point list request and then tweeted that a non-response would be interpreted as a resignation. Josh Marshall:
Now let’s leave the world of lawyers and step into Elon World. On Saturday, Musk went on Twitter and said, you have to answer this or be fired. The next day, Sunday, McClanahan contacted the DOJ lawyers and told them he was filing a motion in the case to seek sanctions against them for making false representations to the court. I guess you have to give opposing counsel 21 days to respond to these things. But here’s the further filing from yesterday in which he asks for that period to be shortened. McClanahan is asking the judge to compel the lawyers to say what they knew about GWES and whether they knew these claims were false.
This probably explains why so many agency heads told their employees it was okay to ignore the email. There were also some directives from the OPM on Monday that said it was up to agency heads whether employees had to respond.
This, apparently, pissed off Elon. At a cabinet meeting today he came up with a new excuse for the emails. They were, he said, a “pulse check” to be sure there were real people doing those jobs.” The Hill:
He said the email was not a personnel review “but a pulse review” and that anyone who was not dead could answer it.
“There are fictional individuals collecting paychecks,” Musk said of the government, though he did not offer specific evidence that people are fraudulently getting paychecks. “Are they alive, and can they write an email?”
Musk seriously argued that there could be millions of dead or otherwise nonexistent people collecting government paychecks. They must also be able to receive email, note. Musk still wants the non-responders fired, and Trump backed him up on this. Raw Story:
“I’d like to add that those million people that haven’t responded, though, Elon, they are on the bubble,” the president warned. “They haven’t responded. Now, maybe they don’t exist. Maybe we’re paying people that don’t exist.”
“But those people are on the bubble, as they say,” he continued. “Maybe they’re going to be gone. Maybe they’re not around. Maybe they have other jobs. Maybe they moved, and they’re not where they’re supposed to be.”
We haven’t heard the last of this.
