Late last night and as Rebecca reported, Congress passed a $1.5 trillion omnibus spending package. It clocked in at 2,741 pages, which lawmakers didn't have a chance to read before voting.
As usual, the bill is packed with non-essential, pet projects funded by the American taxpayer.
Just tipsy skimming through the omnibus.
— Oilfield Rando (@Oilfield_Rando) March 10, 2022
$200,000,000 for the Gender Equity and Equality Action Fund
$50,000,000 for the Women’s Leadership Fund.
We are thirty f**king trillion dollars in debt pic.twitter.com/9ZRKTFUudq
Help me understand this one....the Agriculture Quarantine and Inspection fees get hit by COVID.
— Oilfield Rando (@Oilfield_Rando) March 11, 2022
And therefore taxpayers have to give them a $250 million bailout? For not getting their inspection fees? Were they waived or something? pic.twitter.com/HdBop50Ry7
Republican Senator Cynthia Lummis is blasting the package and voted against the bill.
“The United States is over $30 trillion in debt, but instead of taking a serious look at our actions, Congress just greenlit a seven percent increase in non-defense discretionary spending,” Senator Lummis said. “Members of Congress once again found themselves between a government shutdown and a massive federal spending bill. In the future, we should end this cycle of false choices by making spending at current levels automatic unless Congress agrees to a deal that actually helps Americans. This would be a win for taxpayers in Wyoming, and would finally allow us to start clawing our way out of debt," Lummis released in a statement. “Anytime there is a spending bill this big, it includes some good things, and I am proud of the bipartisan support we are showing for the people of Ukraine in this one. But, frankly, I am disgusted that Ukraine funding is strapped to a massive, irresponsible spending package like this, because it forces us to choose between helping the Ukrainian people and further indebting our own constituents. It was a cynical ploy to buy votes."
“A spending bill this large always has serious flaws as well, and this one is no different. It continues to fund President Biden’s vaccine mandates, which I cannot support. It also contains anti-Second Amendment provisions that threaten the rights of law-abiding citizens to own firearms. Because of these and other reasons I ultimately had to vote against this bill," she continued.
Republican Senator Marsha Blackburn also piled on.
“Under the Democrats’ leadership, inflation has reached a 40-year high and gas is more expensive than it was in 2008, at the height of the financial crisis. With one vote, the left was trying to smuggle through more wasteful spending. What’s worse, they tried to hold hostage critical military resources in their bid to get it passed. Tennesseans are tired of radicals in Washington wasting our hard-earned tax dollars, which is why I voted against this reckless spending bill," Blackburn said.