“They are failing to deliver for the American people. What I’m fighting for is to make sure that families can afford a place to live, and I’m working on bringing down the cost of housing and bringing down the cost of child care.”
Washington D.C. — U.S. Senator Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) joined CBS News’ Nikole Killion to discuss the Republican budget aiming to cut essential programs that help working families, Democrats’ continuous support of Americans’ priorities, and President Donald Trump’s betrayal of Ukraine.
View the full interview here.
Key Excerpts:
On Republicans turning their back on the American people to cut essential programs:
I don’t want to see a continuation of this slow death, the firings, the ignoring of Congress, the ignoring of our budgetary decisions. So no, that’s not what I want to see. Now they’re running the show, so they’ll have the say. They control the White House, the House, and the Senate. Elon Musk is talking favorably about shutting down the government, which I think would be a disaster. But Trump supported a shut down his first time as president, so we’ll have to see. But I don’t want to see this kind of death by a thousand cuts that we’re witnessing now.
[…]
If it shuts down, it will be because they want it shut down. They’re controlling everything. But yes, they should negotiate with Democrats. They should negotiate with us to both make sure we keep government open, but also that make sure the administration stops violating the law. Our most important power is our ability to control the purse. They’re ignoring that they’re laying off tens of thousands of people. They just revealed they’re going to lay off 80,000 people at the VA. That’s unlawful, that’s not authorized by Congress. So we don’t want to give them a long term permission slip to continue these illegal actions. So I want some accountability, and I hope that’s what we’re negotiating for. But at the end of the day, the buck stops with the majority, and they’re in the majority.
[…]
At the end of the day, they’re going to have to vote on something to keep the government open. That’s their responsibility as the governing party. We have enough chaos already with the tariffs that are on and then the tariffs that are off, which, frankly, just makes the president look weak and undecided and chaotic and just wreaks havoc on the economy.
On staying focused on supporting families amidst Republican chaos:
They are failing to deliver for the American people. What I’m fighting for is to make sure that families can afford a place to live, and I’m working on bringing down the cost of housing and bringing down the cost of child care. They could care less. Right now, they’re all about slashing jobs, firing veterans, firing firefighters, and for what to raise the money for a tax cut for large corporations and wealthy people who don’t need it. That’s what they’re about. That’s what I’m keeping my focus on. And watching that State of the Union, it was a lengthy address about nothing that really will meet the needs of ordinary people.
On Trump alienating U.S. allies:
I see this as really a shakedown of Ukraine for their mineral rights, which is something that all Americans should be appalled by. We should be standing up to the Kremlin, we should be defending our Ukrainian and NATO allies. And instead, we are alienating our allies. We are betraying Ukraine. Trump is coming across as a weak sycophant of Vladimir Putin. This is antithetical to our national security interest, to our history, to our legacy of supporting democracies. It is a mistake of historic proportions. And it’s going to mean that our allies around the world believe they can’t trust the United States anymore. That we’ll align with dictatorships, or we’ll just go where their money is, and we’ll try to shake our allies down if we feel we have leverage. That’s not who we are, and it’s a shameful chapter of our history.
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