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‘Group of Guys in a Back Room’: McCaskill Decimates Hatch for GOP Plan to Secretly Draft and Pass Obamacare Repeal

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‘We Have No Idea What’s Being Proposed. There’s a Group of Guys in a Back Room Somewhere That Are Making These Decisions.’

Democratic U.S. Senator Claire McCaskill blasted the Republican Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee Thursday, charging Republicans with working to secretly draft and pass their ObamaCare repeal bill. She decimated Senator Orrin Hatch (R-UT) for refusing to allow any Democratic input or amendments to the legislation, and for refusing to even hold any hearings before pushing it to the floor with the goal of passing it with “50 votes and the vice president.”

McCaskill, a centrist Democrat from Missouri and former prosecutor, opened by asking Chairman Hatch, “will we have a hearing on the health care proposal?”

“I think we’ve already had one,” Hatch curiously responded. 

McCaskill corrected the senior Senator from Utah, saying she was referring to the bill the Republican Senate is drafting in response to the House’s TrumpCare legislation that passed last month.

Hatch, pausing and seemingly confused, was forced to have an aide step up to the dais and whisper in his ear a response for him to share. She clearly could be heard in his microphone, and he repeated much of what she offered.

Acting as if he had not just been told what to say, Hatch, the longest-serving Republican Senator in U.S. history, told McCaskill, “I don’t know if there’s going to be another hearing but we’ve invited you to participate and give your ideas.”

That is false, and McCaskill took the opportunity to make clear just how offensive his claim is.

“No, no, that’s not true, Mr. Chairman. Let me just say, I watched carefully all of the hearings that went on on the Affordable Care Act. I was not a member of this committee at the time, although I would have liked to be,” Sen. McCaskill told the Chairman. “Senator Grassley was the ranking member. Dozens of Republican amendments were offered and accepted in that hearing process. And when you say that you’re ‘inviting us’ — and I heard you, Mr. Secretary, just say we’d love your support — for what?”

“We don’t even know! We have no idea what’s being proposed. There’s a group of guys in a back room somewhere that are making these decisions. There were no hearings in the House.”

“I mean, listen, this is hard to take,” the three-term senior Senator from Missouri continued, acknowledging Democrats “made mistakes” in working on the ObamaCare bill.

“One of the criticisms we got over and over again that the vote was partisan. Well, you couldn’t have a more partisan exercise than what you’re engaged in right now. We’re not even going to have a hearing on a bill that impacts one-sixth of our economy,” McCaskill charged. “We’re not going to have an opportunity to offer a single amendment. It is all being done with an eye to try to get it by with 50 votes and the vice president.”

“I am stunned that that’s what Leader [Mitch] McConnell would call ‘regular order,’ which he sanctimoniously said would be the order of the day when the Republicans took the Senate over. We are now so far from regular order the new members don’t even know what it looks like.”

As McCaskill ws speaking, it was clear another Senator was ignoring her, as his voice was picked up on a hot mic.

She concluded by urging the Republicans to give her an opportunity to offer amendments to the bill.

To be clear, as ThinkProgress reports, “Senate Republicans are launching an audacious plan to pass Trumpcare,” noting Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell “said he is striving to get a vote on the Republican health care bill by July 4, before Congress leaves for August recess. As ludicrous as this deadline seems, the Senate could pull it off — but it will be done without much public scrutiny.”

Sen. McConnell implemented Senate “Rule 14” Wednesday to fast-track the GOP House health bill. This rule allows the Senate to skip the committee process (goodbye full senate committee debate) and instead “fast-tracks” the bill by moving it on the senate calendar so it can be brought to a vote.

Anyone wanting to protect their health care rights should call their Senators, regardless of the party they are in, to urge them to vote no one the Republican health care bill, known as the American Health Care Act or TrumpCare. You can reach your Senators even if you don’t know their names, by calling the Capitol Hill Switchboard at (202) 224-3121.

Know that calling is the best way to register your comments. 

To comment on this article and other NCRM content, visit our Facebook page.

Thanks to Daily Kos for the transcript

 

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WHY DOES TUCKER CARLSON HATE AMERICAN FAMILIES?

Pete Buttigieg Brilliantly Destroys Tucker Carlson After Fox Host’s Homophobic Hit Job

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October 15, 2021

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U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg responded to Fox News host Tucker Carlson‘s vile, homophobic attack from Thursday night, by defending the right of every new parent to take paternity or maternity leave and spend time building bonds that will last a lifetime.

Buttigieg, known for being able to incisively carve up conservative hate, had no problem correcting Carlson’s claims.

Carlson, who regularly spreads white nationalistic, white supremacist, and fascistic rhetoric that clearly is supported by Fox News chiefs Rupert Murdoch and Lachlan Murdoch, on Thursday berated Buttigieg for taking paternity leave as he and his husband, Chasten welcome two newborn twins into their family.

“Pete Buttigieg has been on leave from his job since August after adopting a child,” Carlson had told Fox news viewers. “Paternity leave, they call it, trying to figure out how to breastfeed – no word on how that went.”

Buttigieg struck back on Friday, telling MSNBC’s Nicolle Wallace Carlson’s “attack is coming from a guy who has yet to explain his apparent approval for the assassination of Harvey Milk.”

Related: Tucker Carlson and Naomi Wolf Blasted for Claiming No One ‘Moralized’ Against HIV/AIDS Patients in the ’80s

Carlson, in his college yearbook, reportedly wrote that he was a member of the “Dan White Society.” There is no Dan White Society, but Dan White is the man who assassinated Harvey Milk, one of America’s first openly-gay elected officials. At the same time, in 1978, he also assassinated San Francisco Mayor George Moscone.

“So, you know, obviously we know that there’s some dark places where some of these attitudes come from,” Buttigieg continued.

“But I also note that that doesn’t speak for the country,” he said of Carlson’s homophobic and anti-family remark.

“I don’t think that even speaks for most people, on the other side of the aisle from the party that I belong to. This is largely a consensus issue, not just the support for families like mine to have a right to marry and right to be treated equally, but also that families in general. Moms and dads have to be able to support their children including with paid leave.”

Buttigieg, as NCRM reported Thursday night, is correct: 86% of Americans support paid paternity leave. And seven out of 10 Americans support same-sex marriage.  Sadly, U.S. federal law does not require companies to offer it, but as Wallace noted, Tucker Carlson’s employer does.

Watch:

 

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RIGHT WING EXTREMISM

‘We Warned You’: Jenna Ellis Destroyed by Legal Expert for Comparing Herself and Giuliani to Atticus Finch

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October 15, 2021

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Former Trump personal and campaign lawyer Jenna Ellis is getting blowback from at least one top legal expert after she falsely compared herself and her colleague, Rudy Giuliani, to fictional hero attorney Atticus Finch from “To Kill a Mockingbird,” and to founding father John Adams.

“No, you are not John Adams. You are not Atticus Finch. Competent lawyers warned you to stay away from the election lawsuits,” said top national security attorney Bradley Moss. “We warned you loyalty to a conspiratorial client [doesn’t] override ethical obligations to the court. It’s on you.”

Ellis, in video posted by Right Wing Watch (below), claimed that she and Giuliani were merely “advocating” for “politically inconvenient candidates” like Trump, which is provably false.

Giuliani, according to numerous news reports, wasn’t defending Trump so much as he was traveling the world trying to dig up dirt on Joe Biden to help Trump win re-election. When that didn’t work Giuliani (and Ellis) promoted false election “fraud” narratives, which is not advocacy for a client.

“It used to be that if you represented the politically inconvenient candidates or the, the politically inconvenient, people I mean look at ‘To Kill a Mockingbird,’ you know, it was like you were you were lauded as a defense attorney, like John Adams, you know, who represented people who deserve a defense,” Ellis said.

“This has such an impact on the future of America,” Ellis continued, “because if we tell lawyers that in order to advocate for a client, that means that necessarily you have to subscribe to their position, you will be you will be liable for your bar license essentially based on not only the merit of their case but the outcome, then we won’t have advocates anymore in the United States.”

Again, that is not a reality-based response to what she and Giuliani were doing.

Moss, meanwhile, was far from the only attorney criticizing Ellis.

Former Assistant United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York (SDNY), Richard Signorelli, commented, “Jenna is lucky she wasn’t given any actual lawyerly responsibilities.”

Atlanta appellate attorney Andrew Fleischman weighed in, saying, “It’s good for people to get due process before being convicted of things. It’s bad to file dozens of frivolous, dishonest lawsuits. That’s the distinction.”

 

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RIGHT WING EXTREMISM

Trump’s MAGA Supporters Chant Profanities Within ‘Clear’ Earshot of Young Kids Biden Was Talking to Outdoors

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1 day ago

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October 15, 2021

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Trump’s MAGA supporters were out in full force Friday afternoon, chanting “F**k Biden,” waving flags with the same slogan, along with ones that falsely claim “Trump won,” as President Joe Biden spoke with young children outside a Connecticut child development center.

“Around 50 more Trump supporters,” according to the White House press pool, “gathered a street away from the center. They chanted ‘F*** Joe Biden. He’s not our president.’ They also shouted ‘traitors’ as a coda while we walked inside.”

Minutes later the press pool reported President Biden “entered the playground at 1:25, greeted by some gregarious children. One gave him a hug, as he kneeled to talk. Another, wearing an American flag t-shirt, pointed out parts of the playground.”

But then, confirmation that the Trump supporters’ profanity could be heard by the young children and the President.

“From the playground the pool could still hear protesters chanting from the curb outside. More expletives. More yelling,” the pool reports.

NBC News White House Correspondent Mike Memoli also confirms:

President Biden later made televised remarks promoting his “Build Back Better” agenda, and talking about how improvements to infrastructure will help young children.

 

 

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