Matt wrote about this lefty "gotcha" against Texas Republicans yesterday, but there are a few updates worth considering. In the aftermath of Superstorm Sandy, nearly 180 House Republicans voted against a relief package -- a fact that lefties are throwing in their faces today, especially those who hail from the Lone Star State. But the Sandy legislation turned into a shameful vehicle for unrelated pet projects, larded up with extraneous and wastefulspending. Sen. Ted Cruz is aggressively correcting the record and explaining his opposition to the bill:
"Every Republican, including Texas Republicans, agreed that hurricane funding is an important and critical role for the federal government," Cruz said on Monday, according to CNN. Cruz added, however, that the Sandy bill was "a $50 billion bill filled with pork and unrelated spending that wasn't hurricane relief...It was simply local members of Congress spending on their pet projects and two-thirds of what was spent in that bill had little or nothing to do with Hurricane Sandy," Cruz said. His comments come amid recovery efforts in Texas in the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey, which continues to bring rain and flooding to the region.
Whether you agree with Cruz and other GOP members' decision to oppose a wider package due to this shameless earmarking, he's not wrong on the facts. A few examples, which Matt also highlighted:
President Obama’s $60.4 billion request for Hurricane Sandy relief has morphed into a huge Christmas stocking of goodies for federal agencies and even the state of Alaska, The Post has learned. The pork-barrel feast includes more than $8 million to buy cars and equipment for the Homeland Security and Justice departments. It also includes a whopping $150 million for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to dole out to fisheries in Alaska and $2 million for the Smithsonian Institution to repair museum roofs in DC. An eye-popping $13 billion would go to “mitigation” projects to prepare for future storms.
Never let a crisis go to waste, etc. But because our 'End of Discussion' political culture cannot resist the temptation to impute bad faith, it's unsurprising that members of the supposedly unbiased news media are declaring that Cruz is wrong, and that his post-Sandy vote was purely political in nature. Two prime examples stand out, both from CNN. Surprise, surprise:
This was not true. He played politics and now that it is his state hopefully he will get better cooperation than he gave https://t.co/GiszvqGQLr
— Christopher C. Cuomo (@ChrisCuomo) August 29, 2017
Correct. Pork was not the problem. It was politics. https://t.co/hgqs9dE0EV
— Jim Acosta (@Acosta) August 29, 2017
These are DNC talking points masquerading as hard news.
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