Florida Parish News

House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-La.) joined Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), House Majority Whip Tom Emmer (R-Minn.), Small Business Administration Administrator Kelly Loeffler, and House Committee on Small Business Chairman Roger Williams (R-Texas) to address the impact of the ongoing government shutdown, referred to by some Republicans as the "Schumer Shutdown." The group criticized Democrats for what they described as using American families as leverage in budget negotiations.

Scalise argued that small businesses and families are struggling due to the shutdown. “Unfortunately, as Administrator Loeffler pointed out, those small businesses are struggling like millions of families all across America. Why? So that the Democrats can get leverage. Who knows who they want leverage over? They can't articulate it. They've laid out a $1.5 trillion wishlist of crazy items like giving taxpayer-funded health care to illegals. In their bill to give that taxpayer funding to illegals, they actually gut rural health care. Democrats gut $50 billion out of rural health care. They want to talk about health care? They're the ones making it harder. And of course, they don't want anybody to remember facts: Facts like when we moved the Working Families Tax Cut through this Congress, unfortunately, not a single Democrat wanted to support that because it involved preventing a tax increase. The party that's now gone all the way over full bore into socialism.”

He also highlighted concerns about federal nutrition programs running out of funds soon: “[Democrats] really told you what it's about – it's about getting leverage, showing off to their radical Marxist socialist base that they're fighting Donald Trump because they're still angry about the results of the November election. And in the meantime, real families are struggling. Every day, the number grows higher. Yesterday, Senator Gallego went on Meet the Press, and he was asked when Democrats would reopen the government. And he said, 'I'm not looking at a timetable. I'm looking at everyone's personal pocketbooks.' Now, Senator Gallego, you ought to be looking at the pocketbooks of those single moms who right now are facing losing their WIC payments, facing losing their SNAP payments. If Senator Gallego is not sure how many people that is, we've been told by the administration how many people will stand to lose real benefits — SNAP benefits, food stamps for kids – 42 million people will lose those benefits in just a few days.

“Senator Gallego, look at their pocketbooks. WIC, Women, Infants, and Children program, helps feed seven million low-income moms and infants. Senator, go look at those pocketbooks. And who knows what your real motivation is. But I'll tell you what their motivation is. Their motivation is just to put food on their table for their kids. And every Republican in the House and Senate voted, yes, to put that food on the table. And Democrats keep voting no; they keep voting to shut the government down. And it's having an impact on millions of people.”

Scalise further referenced statements from federal employee unions calling for an end to the shutdown: “Just today, the American Federation of Government Employees, a large union came out and said 'It's time to pass a clean continuing resolution and end this shutdown today. No half measures and no gamesmanship.' And the union went on to say today 'Because when the folks who serve this country are standing in line for food banks after missing a second paycheck because of this shutdown they aren't looking for partisan spin; they're looking for wages they earned... The fact that they're being cheated out of it is a national disgrace.’ And they're right..."

Steve Scalise has represented Louisiana’s 1st district in Congress since 2008 after replacing Bobby Jindal [source]. He previously served in both chambers of Louisiana’s state legislature before his current role [source]. Scalise was born in New Orleans in 1965 and lives in Jefferson [source]. He graduated with a Bachelor of Science from Louisiana State University.