Senate Minority Chief Chuck Schumer is going through the largest revolt from Democrats in years, however in a conversation with The Interview after his essential vote supporting a Republican federal spending invoice this previous week, he tried to brush off questions on whether or not he ought to step apart. Democratic officers appeared shocked when Schumer did an about-face on the spending invoice, arguing that the selection was the lesser of two evils. Schumer defended his choice within the second a part of our wide-ranging interview, at the same time as questions over his management by senior get together officers continued.
Listed here are three takeaways from the shutdown portion of our conversation.
Schumer defined that he forged his vote to stop additional decimation of the federal government by DOGE and Trump.
Schumer mentioned that he made a “very, very troublesome” choice to help the Republican invoice to be able to avert a authorities shutdown that, he mentioned, President Trump and Elon Musk wished. He referred to as Trump and Musk “anti-government fanatics” and “nihilists.”
They need to shutter “company after company,” he mentioned, which might create a state of affairs far worse than the Republican invoice. He continued:
Two days from now in a shutdown, they might say, effectively, meals stamps for youths isn’t important. It’s gone. All veterans workplaces in rural areas are gone. Social Safety, Medicare, Medicaid. They’re not important. We’re slicing them again. So it’d be horrible. The harm they will do underneath a shutdown is way worse than another harm that they might do.
Isn’t this simply — Wait, let me simply end, Lulu. It will possibly final without end. There isn’t a off ramp. One of many Republican senators advised us: We go to a shutdown, it’s going to be there for six months, 9 months, a 12 months. And by then, their purpose of destroying the federal authorities could be gone. And eventually, one closing level right here, and that’s that proper now underneath the C.R., you’ll be able to go to courtroom and contest an govt order to close one thing down. Below a shutdown, the chief department has sole energy.
He acknowledged that he and Hakeem Jeffries haven’t spoken because the vote.
Whereas he accepted that there have been “divisions” inside his get together round his vote, he insisted that he and his fellow Democrats have a respect for one another and that they’re united of their combat towards Trump.
Schumer reluctantly acknowledged that he and the Home minority chief, Hakeem Jeffries, who speak typically, haven’t spoken since Schumer’s shocking vote, suggesting that there’s a rupture between the 2 most senior Democrats in Congress.
