For whatever reason, the people at CBS decided to invite Republican Chris Christie on to discuss Biden’s new infrastructure bill. You can tell the conversation did not go as planned as the hosts scrambled to keep up with Christie’s points. I’m sure they intended to tout the new bill but clearly, the Republicans knew more about it than they did.
The whole thing must have been a huge embarrassment for them:
“I want us to look closely at the package. You cannot call a $400 billion plan to force unionization in states, to say that taking care of – increasing Medicaid payments in states is infrastructure,” Christie said.
Adding, “Now, language does matter. We learned that in the last four years. How you use it and what you say. And I said last week that the President’s not telling the truth, and he’s not telling the truth about the infrastructure package. This is the care economy? This is care infrastructure? It’s baloney.”
Christie also snapped at Biden’s real motives behind the heavy package, “and so, what’s going to happen is the President right now is in the first 100 days and he’s going to have that soothing persona and all the rest of it, but when people start to look at what he’s really doing, George, those moderate voters…”
George Stephanopoulos interrupted, “But even the things you just mentioned right there are popular. People would love to have Medicaid increases.”
Christie snapped back, “Here’s what’s not popular. Lying is not popular. It’s not infrastructure, George!”
Stephanopoulos rushed to defend Biden, “Do you really want to use the word lie there, though? Come on.
Christie fires back at the hypocrisy, “Let’s be fair here. If Donald Trump had come out and called a dog a cat, which is what Joe Biden is doing, we would be outraged by the fact that he’s lying. But what Joe Biden is talking about is like “Oh well, come on, it’s Joe.” No, no, no. It’s not true.”
Christie concluded, “If he wants to make the case, George, for increased Medicaid payments and connected it to those payments, mandatorily using SEIU union members, let him make that case and see if he gets it passed. I know he won’t, and the people around this table – whether they’ll say it or not – they know it won’t pass either.”
Even die-hard Rhino Liz Chaney has argued against the financial bleed of a bill saying, “If you want to talk about what is really going to help women get back to work, it’s getting schools open again. And Speaker Pelosi four times now, since January, has blocked the Reopen Schools Act from consideration on the House floor. Those are the kinds of things we ought to be focused on.”
CBS may have thought they prepared a righteous argument for the bill but in the end, all they did was prove Christie’s points. Christie was able to expose just what is in the bill to their liberal viewers. A bill, which is growing increasingly unpopular with Democrats in Washington. It will be interesting to see this bill flop especially because Democrats hold the majority in both major branches of government and their obsessive need to fulfill personal agendas could kill that power.