Whoa, now. This is new and different. A House Republican said it’s time to give Trump some resistance. My head fell off and was rolling around on the floor. I finally managed to get it back on. [Yes, that was a joke.] A Republican came out and said the quiet part out loud. He said it’s time to stop the stuck lips on Trump’s a$$. It’s time to be Congress, not slavering sycophants. Holy cow. With thanks to Raw Story:
A prominent House Republican in a vulnerable swing district who is retiring at the end of this term has a message for his party: stop being so subservient to President Donald Trump — not just for their own sakes, but for Trump’s sake too. Rep. Don Bacon (R-NE) made the comments to The New York Times in an article published on Friday evening. “The president would be better off if the Republican House pushed back more,” Bacon said. “I think his tariff policy would be better. I think it would be better on Ukraine. I think we could push him in a much better direction if he was open to it.” In contrast, he added, “If you feel like you have a bunch of lackeys that are going to do whatever you say, then he doesn’t feel constrained.” All of this comes after a year in which House Republicans did little to defy the president.
Heh, the Senate Republicans didn’t exactly do much, either. Look at the damn Big Ugly Bill (eff off, Joni Ernst) that screwed everyone but the gazillionaires. It screwed all of us. And the ACA subsidies could arguably be the worst part. They had a bloated bill that cut certain things to get the far, far, far right Republicans happy, and nothing much else to speak of, except *permanent* tax breaks for the uber rich. We should look into whether that can be reversed once Democrats come into power. Okay, well, there’s all the ridiculous money for ICE when we are going to need more for this stupid Venezuela thing. So there are more eff us stuff than the things the country actually *needs*. Yup, they royally screwed us. *facepalm*
“President Trump barreled ahead with scant deference to the House and Senate. He abruptly changed the statutory name of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, summarily withheld funds from congressional priorities, claimed broad tariff power that the Constitution invests in Congress, and launched military attacks off South America without authorization from the legislative branch,” noted the report. And now, facing polls that show voters angry about cost of living and leaning toward giving Democrats a majority, “Congress must decide whether to try to assert itself more and reclaim some of the power it has ceded to the president, or to continue to accept a shrinking role and diminished status.” One of the most notable exceptions to congressional deference last year was the Epstein files, where, after months of Trump’s own voters howling for more transparency, all but one Republican in Congress voted to compel the administration to release every document.
Oh hell no. When we get back into power in Congress, things are going to start changing, and Trump will *not* like it. We can almost bet either tariffs or the ACA subsidies will come first. It’s nearly a toss-up between the two most important things to fix. Then we can push harder on the Epstein files. The DoJ is ridiculous, breaking the law by releasing information a little at a time. That’s not what the *law* said. However, they’ve actually been releasing information. We just need to make sure they keep doing so.
Bacon also expressed frustration that Congress, by its structure, just isn’t equipped to respond to all the chaos that Trump has created. “He was doing so much stuff up front, whether it was tariffs, DOGE, you name it,” said Bacon. “An activist president — they are going to have the advantage. You have 435 members of Congress. We are not going to be nearly as fast as the president.”
Yes. Even with a Republican majority, work still moved slowly. There has to be a way to overcome that, to be proactive and not reactive. We’ll have a lot of work to do, and really ought to start looking at things now, rather than waiting til *we* have the majority. And we definitely need to support the Democrats running for seats in Congress (go Senator Jon Ossof!). As I’ve been screaming about for months, start your re-election work *now*. We’re running out of time.
Friends, I know everyone begs you for money. I promise, among all those asking for spare change, we are the smallest and the hardest working. We’re a group of old, disabled people, except for one writer in his mid-50s. The rest of us are in our sixties and seventies, and this is a labor of love. All we’re asking for is the chance to keep telling the truth about Trump and help ensure democracy survives. If you can help, please do. Thank you. Ursula
Great article, Susan! I’m hoping Mamdani will show Democrats the way by getting stuck into doing all the things the stick-in-the-mud pundits yammered that he couldn’t do because “it isn’t possible!” Of course, it’s possible, it’s all possible, and he has the vision, motivation and determination to get on and do it.
It’s driven me nuts how everyone keeps saying Trump can’t do this and he can’t do that, but he does it anyway. Now they say Mamdani can’t.
“You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”
Well, Mamdani can, and he’ll be doing it FOR the people, unlike Metamucilini, who does everything for himself.