Friday, March 14, 2025

Fury as Schumer Caves to Trump-Musk Destruction

Despite loud opposition from constituents and progressive lawmakers against such a move, Democratic Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) took to the Senate floor Thursday evening to announce he would vote to advance a Republican spending bill that critics say would "sacrifice the needs of working people at the altar of the ultra-wealthy" and greenlight further chaos and destruction by Dotard Trump and his Oligarch-in-Chief Felon Musk.

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Donald Trump and Elon Musk want a shutdown to destroy vital government services faster. It would be a disaster. And we have to alert everyone how much pain it would cause the American people. From my interview on @allinwithchris.bsky.social:

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-- Chuck Schumer (@schumer.senate.gov) March 13, 2025 at 11:15 PM

Comments

Senator Schumer is up for re-election in 2028. AIPAC donated $1.7m to his campaign; other donors listed here: www.opensecrets.org

#1 | Posted by C0RI0LANUS at 2025-03-14 04:41 AM

THIS kind of cowardly behavior is exactly why I don't send them anymore donations.

And I won't. Not until they grow a set and start standing up to and refusing to cooperate with the moron in the Oval Office and his maga minions in Congress.

At least the Supreme Court seems to be coming to its senses. Tho that is probably just a prelude to another disastrous ruling.

#2 | Posted by donnerboy at 2025-03-14 12:42 PM

I don't blame you for not sending in donations. The ones in Congress fighting the hardest against Trumpf are AOC and Bernie Sanders, our most progressive legislators. What does Schumer gain by cooperating with the GOP, when vetoing them is the only weapon he has?

#3 | Posted by C0RI0LANUS at 2025-03-14 01:32 PM

Dems are in an impossible situation. If they don't pass the spending bill, Mrump would have even more leeway to fire workers.

"A shutdown is uncharted territory when you've got an administration that, at least in some ways, probably would welcome a shutdown because that would give the president almost unlimited power in deciding who's essential, who's nonessential, holding up agencies," Sen. Angus King, I-Maine, told reporters Wednesday, calling it "a choice between two terrible alternatives."
www.forbes.com
Gotta keep in mind that, unlike pretty much every other prez in hisotry, Trump wants the economy to fail. It assists him in manipulating the stock market and profiting from shorting it.

#4 | Posted by censored at 2025-03-14 01:35 PM

Not another dime, not another vote, not another iota of effort to get any democrat re-elected.

At this point dems are complicit in what Shitler is doing.

If you are going to vote magat, you are nothing more than magat scum.

Shut the fucking government down until Shitler is impeached and removed from office.

#5 | Posted by truthhurts at 2025-03-14 01:35 PM

Shut the government down.

Magat scum will initially be thrilled, shitler and musk will cut more government workers (but guess what, they'd cut em anyway).

Let weeks and months go by without a budget. Keep the fucking government shut down.

Eventually even magat scum will feel the heat.

All the while it is the fault of the republican scum who refuse to remove the most corrupt person in our nation's history

6, 9 months is a cheap price to pay for the salvation of our democracy.

You see, having failed and failed and failed, you are left with few options.

It is either this or a king, which is it?

#6 | Posted by truthhurts at 2025-03-14 01:39 PM

I agree with TruthHurts. Dems should have shut it down rather than pass: "a bill written by the GOP that some Democrats have said gives the Trump administration broad leeway to dictate government spending, including freezing some funds, without congressional guardrails."

#7 | Posted by censored at 2025-03-14 01:44 PM

Actually, I heard Schumer on TV defend this action, and I think I agree with him. Shutting down the government will only further embolden and enable Elong and the magic incels smash and grab, as there will be nobody to monitor and report on the destruction from inside. The courts, which have been our only bulwark against the destruction of our country would also shutter. Dotard and the Reich want a shutdown, at 30 days he can declare a state of emergency and pretty much usurp all of the Article One powers. Dems have a chance to retake the House in the next two years prior to 2026 if they just win a couple of special elections, and right now things are not looking great for the MAGAt party. Plus, Faux Spews and Twittler would hang the shutdown on Dems, and unfortunately there is no bullhorn as loud as the one on the Reich. It's the best of a bad Sophie's choice.

#8 | Posted by _Gunslinger_ at 2025-03-14 01:50 PM

I agree with TruthHurts. Dems should have shut it down rather than pass.
- censored

You and TruthNLies would be screaming at the next budget fight about the out of work government employees.

You and TruthNLies have lost any authority on this topic.

We should never shut down the government.

But you'd do to own the Cons, what stupidity.

#9 | Posted by oneironaut at 2025-03-14 02:14 PM

Sound argument from Schumer, but the more progressive elements of the Democratic Party don't agree with him. I will trust Bernie's erudition before Chuckie's: www.commondreams.org

#10 | Posted by C0RI0LANUS at 2025-03-14 02:21 PM

You and TruthNLies would be screaming at the next budget fight about the out of work government employees. You and TruthNLies have lost any authority on this topic.

Says the Russian troll. Do you know who your purported senator in California is yet? Or how illegal immigration works? Or that Baldwin Park is part of Los Angeles?

We should never shut down the government. But you'd do to own the Cons, what stupidity.
#9 | Posted by oneironaut

No, I'd do it to stop giving even more authority to Trump. It's not just a spending bill but, rather, it apparently increase Trump's power to tear our government apart.

I will note, though, that Gunslinger made some good points, especially about Mrump shutting down the courts if this bill didn't pass.

#11 | Posted by censored at 2025-03-14 02:26 PM

Most of the time, I'm in favor of doing the exact opposite of anything OnRunt says. That is all.

#12 | Posted by Whatsleft at 2025-03-14 02:30 PM

Told you. It's all theatre. All they care about is fundraising.

#13 | Posted by lee_the_agent at 2025-03-14 02:35 PM

I called Gillibrand and Schumer on Wed. and asked them to vote no on the Republican budget. I had one qualm, however: how would the shutdown affect the court cases being brought against Trump, Musk and OMP, some of which are starting to bear fruit? Two of my favorite online pundits have been weighing in on the topic: Josh Marshall and Marcy Wheeler.

Here are their latest takes, both of which are worth considering, IMO:

Looking Squarely at a Shutdown

It's hard to write clearly when you're being flooded with new information. But here goes. I've heard people arguing the "yes' on cloture" argument, essentially saying, "don't assume you can shut DOGE down, undo the damage. It's not a silver bullet." I can only speak for myself, but if anyone is thinking, based on the arguments I've made, that this is a silver bullet and if Democrats just do this we can shut this whole thing down, I haven't been clear. I will further say that while the things I've written over the last week or so make it pretty clear where I stand on this, I have several times over the last week had a hard think with myself: are you sure you're right about this? I'm not sure I'd say this is a close call. But it's a hard call, for me at least. Both options hold out possibilities of calamity and destruction I've never seriously contemplated before. That is simply where we are. I wish we weren't here. But we are here.

talkingpointsmemo.com

And:

Democrats Have to Stop Making Political Decisions with an Eye Towards 2026

I'm agnostic about whether a shutdown brings more advantage than risks.

One thing I am absolutely certain of, however, is that Democrats on both sides of this debate are framing it in terms of 2026. . . .This mindset has plagued both sides of Democratic debates for two months, with disastrous consequences.

Democracy will be preserved or lost in the next three months. And democracy will be won or lost via a nonpartisan political fight over whether enough Americans want to preserve their way of life to fight back, in a coalition that includes far more than Democrats. You win this fight by treating Trump and Elon as the villain, not by making any one Democrat a hero (or worse still, squandering week after week targeting Democratic leaders while letting Elon go ignored). . . .

I get the anger with Schumer--though I do think his concerns about the courts need to be taken very seriously.

But until Democrats stop thinking in terms of their own leadership in Congress but instead think exclusively about winning the political fight with people being hurt, not as Democrats, but as people opposed to fascism, they're going to be looking for power in the wrong places.


www.emptywheel.net

#14 | Posted by Gal_Tuesday at 2025-03-14 02:36 PM

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