Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) on Thursday took goal at billionaire Elon Musk for derailing the end-of-year spending deal.
“Let’s put this into context. This was a bipartisan, agreed upon deal to move forward and keep the government open until March,” Lee stated on CNN.
“It is really very clear to me that a non-elected billionaire, Elon Musk, has weighed in now and has put forth a message on Twitter, from his phone, that it’s okay to shut the government down and to disregard the bipartisan deal,” she stated, including that permitting a billionaire like Musk to “run our government really has grave consequences on the American people.”
On Thursday night time, the Home rejected Speaker Mike Johnson’s (R-La.) plan B spending invoice after the primary one was met with scrutiny from Musk and President-elect Trump. Allies of Trump shortly adopted go well with, criticizing the persevering with decision, which led to Johnson’s plan B invoice.
Musk, who’s set to co-lead the newly made Division of Authorities Effectivity (DOGE) alongside Vivek Ramaswamy, on Wednesday flooded his social platform X with misinformation about Congress’s deal, calling on Republicans to reject the stopgap invoice.
Simply hours after the persevering with decision was unveiled Tuesday night time, Musk argued the deal “should not pass,” launched a sequence of posts and reposts, and infrequently unfold incorrect info over lawmaker pay raises to the price of a soccer stadium in Washington, D.C.
Trump on Wednesday additionally demanded {that a} debt ceiling be paired with the stopgap invoice, issuing a joint assertion with Vice President-elect Vance saying that whereas the get together needs catastrophe support and assist for farmers — points tackled within the short-term funding plan — he needs Congress to go a “streamlined spending bill” that does not give Democrats “everything they want” and has “an increase in the debt ceiling.”
Nevertheless, Trump’s demand was met with raised eyebrows from lawmakers on either side as many questioned the president-elect’s request.
