Senate Republicans take the money and run
Senator Roger Wicker of Mississippi is already touting the good things in the Democrats’ COVID-19 relief bill that passed this week. The problem is that Wicker is a Republican, and he actually voted against the legislation. Despite the relief bill’s broad popularity with the polity, including those on the right, no Senate Republicans voted for it. The GOP really is that out of touch and unconcerned with the plight of Americans, and the GOP really thinks we’re that vulnerable to its attempts at revisionist history.
Now that the popular American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 has passed without support from senators on the right, Republicans suddenly want to take credit for it. Unless one is truly disengaged, nobody is falling for this newest attempt by the QAnon party to gaslight us into thinking it actually did anything good for the country. Wicker’s sudden support and praise of the bill after he voted against it hasn’t gone unnoticed.
Speaker Pelosi summed it up well when she said of her GOP colleagues in the Senate that “it’s typical that they vote no and take the dough.” While some members of the rightist party may now be singing the praises of the American Rescue Plan Act, let’s not forget that the party still remains the party of backwardness, exclusion, whiteness, voter suppression, and manufactured evangelical grievance. The GOP is regressive and bad for the country, and the party doesn’t get to take credit for Democrats’ successes – the party of progress did it all without any help from the right. When good things happen, it’s because of the Democrats. We can’t afford to vote for Republicans at any level.
