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Matt Gaetz talks ‘entitlements,’ suggests work requirements for SNAP and Medicaid recipients [1]
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Date: 2023-01-27
A somewhat miffed Rivera asked Gaetz, “You’re gonna have a mother with three children at home, make her work?”
Gaetz quipped to Geraldo, “Yeah, you can meet work requirements in lots of these states by volunteering at nonprofits, by helping out at a local church.”
A clearly irritated Geraldo then asked Gaetz about Social Security. Gaetz smirked and responded with, “Let’s start with Medicaid.”
x Matt Gaetz proposes work requirements for SNAP and Medicaid pic.twitter.com/pA6V080iDo — Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) January 27, 2023
According to a report from the Government Accountability Office, 70% of adults receiving Medicaid and SNAP are working full time, Matt.
In fact, these folks are working but not making enough to live on, enough to buy sufficient food, or able to work enough hours to get health care outside of Medicaid.
So, what our Miami Vice villain look-alike congressman should be focused on is raising the minimum wage to something that’s livable.
“At a time when huge corporations like Walmart and McDonald’s are making billions in profits and giving their CEOs tens of millions of dollars a year, they’re relying on corporate welfare from the federal government by paying their workers starvation wages," Sen. Bernie Sanders said in a statement in 2020 after requesting the report. "This is morally obscene.”
Now that the Republicans are running the House like toddlers at an understaffed day care, they’ve begun putting lifesaving networks such as Medicare, Social Security, and SNAP into their sights. Their form of economic austerity is another family’s source of food and health care.
Oklahoma Republican Rep. Kevin Hern, head of the Republican Study Committee, a group of over 160 conservative lawmakers that proposed raising the retirement age last year, said, “We have no choice but to make hard decisions … Everybody has to look at everything.” Well, everything except repealing the ill-advised tax cuts they voted to give their wealthy backers in a midnight vote back in 2017. If we can’t pay the bills, it is because they made it so. Slashing services is always a feature of their tax cuts, not a bug.
Ironically, former President Donald Trump has warned the GOP against slashing Social Security and Medicare.
“Under no circumstances should Republicans vote to cut a single penny from Medicare or Social Security,” Trump said in a video message, The Washington Post reports.
Of course, Trump, in pure Trump fashion, had his own ridiculous suggestions for the GOP: cuts to foreign aid, “left-wing gender programs from our military,” and “billions being spent on climate extremism.”
It’s hard to overstate how cruel Republicans are when it comes to managing the nation’s money. Thanks to Trump’s tax cuts to the rich, the country is in debt, and now the MAGA-led House can only think of one way to adjust the shortfall: Make cuts to those who can afford it the least: seniors, poor folks, people with disabilities.
Not only are these options not good for people, but they’re also horrible for the fiscal health of the economy.
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[1] Url:
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/1/27/2149587/-Matt-Gaetz-who-has-always-been-wealthy-wants-work-requirements-for-SNAP-Medicaid-recipients
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