THE BERNIE BUZZ: DEVASTATING REPUBLICAN BUDGET

TAKE THE POLL: Do federal policies favor the wealthy or favor less well-off Americans?

The full Senate on Monday is set to take up a budget that will shape national priorities for the coming year. “Devastating,” is how Bernie summed up the Republicans’ proposal. They would throw millions of Americans off health insurance. Their budget would cut $4.3 trillion from programs like Medicare, food stamps and Medicaid. Education programs would be scaled back. Pell Grants for college students would be frozen. Wall Street regulations passed in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis would be scaled back. What it doesn’t do may be even worse. It doesn’t address the 11 percent real unemployment rate in the United States. It doesn’t create any jobs. It doesn’t fix crumbling roads and bridges. It doesn’t make college more affordable. It doesn’t raise the minimum wage. Despite Republicans’ professed concerns about deficits, their plan would leave in place tax loopholes that let the wealthy and big corporations avoid paying their fair share of taxes. Bernie tried to make the budget better in committee, where he is the ranking member, but his amendments all fell on party-line votes. He will try again to improve the budget when the debate moves this week to the Senate floor.

	WATCH BERNIE ON THE BUDGET ON MSNBC

REPUBLICANS VOTE 12-10 AGAINST JOBS An amendment to create millions of good-paying jobs by rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure was shot down in committee. Bernie’s amendment proposed an investment of hundreds of billions of dollars. To raise the revenue needed to pay for the badly needed repairs, he proposed closing tax loopholes that encourage corporations to ship jobs overseas and shelter profits in offshore tax havens. WATCH

REPUBLICANS VOTE 12-10 AGAINST RAISING MINIMUM WAGE Millions of Americans are working longer hours for lower wages. Believe it or not, median family income, adjusted for inflation has gone down by nearly $5,000 since 1999. A way to raise wages for millions of Americans would be to increase the $7.25 federal minimum wage to at least $10.10 an hour. To Bernie, no one in America who works full time should be living in poverty. But Republicans voted against his amendment. WATCH

REPUBLICANS VOTE 12-10 AGAINST CAMPAIGN REFORM Bernie proposed a way to undo the disastrous Supreme Court ruling in Citizens United that lets millionaires and billionaires spend unlimited sums on campaigns. Unless the disastrous ruling is changed, he told other senators on the committee, “You’re going to be paid employees of the billionaire class.” He called instead for public funding of elections. WATCH

PENTAGON AUDIT APPROVED The Department of Defense budget of $600 billion is so big that the Pentagon cannot keep track of where all the money goes. In a largely unnoticed admission the day before Sept. 11, 2001, former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said he couldn’t account for $2.3 trillion in transactions. Bernie’s amendment to require a full audit was approved on a voice vote. WATCH

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