Majority Leader Schumer Floor Remarks On The Dangerous Republican Study Committee Budget Plan Showing The American People The Republican Agenda

Washington, D.C. –  Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) today spoke on the Senate floor on the Republican Study Committee’s release of their new budget plan, which doubles down on Republican attacks on women’s rights, cuts Social Security, and more. Senator Schumer stressed that this new RSC budget plan represents the true Republican agenda. Below are Senator Schumer’s remarks, which can also be viewed here:

Earlier this week, House Republicans released a hard-right wish list masquerading as a budget plan.

The Republican Study Committee’s new budget plan can be summarized in two words: dangerous, disastrous.

This Republican Study Committee budget plan is dangerous because it doubles down on the hard-right’s war on women. It endorses a national ban on abortion with zero exceptions for rape or incest, which remains the ultimate goal of the hard right should they come to power.

Everyone is asking, what happens if the Republicans kept the House, took the Senate and the presidency? Just read this on abortion. Just read this Republican Study Committee budget: a national ban on abortion, with zero exceptions for rape and incest. That is the goal of the Republican party, should they gain power. We'll do everything we can, of course, to stop them.

The RSC budget plan also rolls back access to mifepristone, a safe, reliable, and widely available medicine that millions of Americans have used for over 20 years.

The RSC budget plan would also critically endanger access to IVF. As much as Republicans have tried recently to sound moderate on IVF, when they have to put their pen to paper and say what their proposals are, their radical agenda blows up in their faces. All you have to do is read the RSC budget plan to see they haven’t moderated one iota on women’s health, whether abortion, mifepristone, or IVF. The Republican Study Committee – which represents the vast majority of House Republicans – reads like a hard-right, radical anti-woman document.

But that’s not all. This RSC budget plan is also disastrous because it proposes a stunning $1.5 trillion in cuts to Social Security while raising the retirement age for millions of hard-working Americans.

That is crazy. Remember: the Republican Study Committee isn’t some arcane offshoot of the Republican party. It represents 80% of their members in the House, including all of their leadership. For all intents and purposes, this RSC budget plan represents the Republican agenda.

And what is the Republican agenda? Aside from cutting back dramatically on women's rights, national bans on abortion with no exceptions, it is also cutting social security and raising the retirement age.

What is the Republican agenda? It’s also repealing $35 insulin for seniors on Medicare and repealing its authority to negotiate cheaper drug prices.

What is the Republican agenda? It’s trillions of dollars in tax breaks for the ultra-wealthy and trillions of dollars in budget cuts to the Children’s Health Insurance Program and the ACA.

These are just some of the terrible things included in the RSC budget plan. It is awful. It is cruel. But amazingly, it’s what the overwhelming majority of House Republicans endorse.

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