The spending bill negotiated by House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana) is full of “overspending, special interest giveaways, and pork belly politics,” said Vivek, one of the leaders of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). Ramaswamy said after the announcement. of controversial measures.
“I wanted to read the entire 1,500-page bill and speak with key leaders before forming my opinion,” Ramaswamy said Wednesday after the bill was announced Tuesday evening.
“With that in mind, my view is: It's full of excessive spending, special interests, and pork belly politics. If Congress wants to get serious about government efficiency, vote no. ”, he said, providing further details.
“Keeping the government open until March 14th would cost about $380 billion by itself, but the actual cost of this omnibus CR would be much larger due to new spending. Updated for another year: ~$130 billion. Disaster relief: $100 billion. Stimulus for farmers: $10 billion. Replaces the Francis Scott Key Bridge: $8 billion,” he said, explaining that the proposal would “add at least 65 cents of new spending for every dollar of ongoing discretionary spending.” .
And he said the bill ends up only hurting the very people it claims to help.
Spending money on debt may “feel good” now, but it's like dousing an addict with cocaine: it's cruel, not compassionate. As taxes inevitably rise to meet our obligations, farmers will be forced to sell more land to foreign buyers. Our children will be saddled with crippling debt. Interest payments are the largest item in the national budget.
Congress has known about this deadline since it set it in late September. There's no reason why the standard process couldn't have been followed instead of rushing to a vote at the last minute when MPs wanted to go home for the holidays. Urgency is 100% created and designed to avoid serious public debate.
Ramaswamy concluded that the bill could have been contained in less than 20 pages and slammed the measures to contain “dozens of unrelated policy items crammed into this bill's 1,547 pages.”
There is no good reason for it to be passed as a package deal by a lame duck Congress. 72 pages worth of “pandemic preparedness and response” policy. Renewal of the much-criticized Center for Global Engagement, the centerpiece of the federal censorship state. 17 different commercial laws. Paving the way for a new football stadium in Washington, DC. Raise salaries for members of Congress and the Senate and make them eligible for federal employee health insurance. Pushing these measures through at the last minute without discussion is indefensible.
The former presidential candidate added that he was grateful that DOGE was a very welcomed concept on Capitol Hill. However, he said, “Actions speak louder than words.”
“This is an early test,” he cautioned. “This bill should be rejected.”
Elon Musk also condemned the measure.
“The more we learn, the more it becomes clear that this spending bill is a crime,” Musk said. “Includes funding of the worst illegal censorship operations in the entire government (GEC)!!”
Lawmakers could be forced to vote on the bill as early as Wednesday afternoon, defying the standard 72-hour expectation.
