DPCC Co-Chair David Cicilline Discusses President Trump's Broken Promises to Middle Class Americans
WASHINGTON, DC – U.S. Congressman David Cicilline, Co-Chair of the House Democratic Policy & Communications Committee (DPCC), today joined MSNBC's Stephanie Ruhle to discuss Trump's broken promises to hard-working Americans. Below are excerpts from the interview. Click here to watch the video.
"Despite what the President just said, this [healthcare] plan gets worse and worse and worse. The Republican plan to repeal the Affordable Care Act will mean: 24 million Americans will lose their health insurance; premiums and out-of-pocket expenses will go up; [and] older Americans will face a crushing age tax because it will cost them more. The new plan will undermine the protection for preexisting conditions and [we'll see] deep cuts in Medicare and Medicaid all to finance a $600 billion tax cut for the wealthiest Americans."
"The improvement [Republicans] claimed to have made is to actually allow states a mechanism to be relieved of the requirement that insurance companies cover preexisting conditions. If that's their big improvement over a terrible plan, the American people certainly will reject it."
"The President's skinny budget...has been rejected by, obviously, the Democrats, but also many Republicans. This is a budget that makes deep cuts in education, science and research, health care, environmental protection, arts, the humanities, [in order] to fund a border wall and more border enforcement – which [Trump's] own Secretary of Homeland Security said that by itself is not enough to secure our borders."
"We have one week to keep the government open. [Republicans] ought to put aside these very, very divisive issues; be responsible in terms of their leadership responsibilities in the Congress; [and] put forth a budget that will keep the government open."
"Another problem with the current Trump Administration [is that] you have different agencies saying things different than the White House. We need some consistent messaging and consistency in our foreign policy. The State Department certified in a recent correspondence that Iran has complied with the terms and conditions of the JCPOA. And so you sort of don't know what the point of the President's saber rattling is. Maybe it's because he promised on day one he was going to rip up the Iran Deal and now the State Department said Iran is complying and we have prevented Iran from being a nuclear power, which is very important. We need to push back hard on Iran in terms of their activities and their destabilizing activities in the region, but it's much easier to push back on a country that doesn't have nuclear capability.
"It's an odd statement from the President when his own State Department confirmed in writing that Iran has complied…it's confusing to our allies, P5+1 partners that helped negotiate that deal. It's obviously very confusing to the rest of the world who tries to figure out what is the position of the United States, and I think it's just another example of where the President doesn't have a consistent policy."