Republican Lawmakers Celebrate After Cutting Program That Mostly Benefited Red States

Republican lawmakers are rejoicing this week after gutting a popular program that has poured millions upon millions of dollars into Red States. That program is the Inflation Reduction Act which was the hallmark legislation of the Biden Administration. And because it was a Biden achievement, Republicans won’t let it stand, even if it means starving their own districts and states of desperately needed project funding. This is all part of their “big beautiful bill” that they are working on this week. Ring of Fire’s Farron Cousins explains what’s happening.

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*This transcript was generated by a third-party transcription software company, so please excuse any typos.

Republicans may not have completely finalized their so-called big beautiful bill yet. But one thing they do know is that they're gonna make sure that the states that they come from their districts, their cities, their states are the ones who suffer the most. Basically if you voted for Republican that is currently representing you in the House of Representatives, that very representative is working around the clock. 'cause we saw them go in at like 1:00 AM this week. That person is working around the clock to screw you over. And one of the big ways they did it this week, which they actually celebrated, was to include basically the dismantling of the signature piece of legislation from the Biden administration, the Inflation Reduction Act. And they did it by including as part of their big beautiful bill, a section called Working Families over Elites. Because that's who Republicans care about.

They care about the working families. Screw the elites. Huh? Republicans want nothing to do with them. Forget for a minute that you know the entire purpose of this bill is to give those very elites tax break at the expense of robbing the poor. They've decided to label this section that undoes a program that overwhelmingly benefited red states by calling it working families over elites. A little linguistic trick there of course, because they know exactly what they're doing. Specifically they are dismantling roughly $388 billion in funding for clean energy programs and tax incentives and things like that. And three quarters of that money was gonna go to their very districts. Three quarters of that $388 billion was gonna go to red states. And these people who represent those areas killed it. Now granted the bill hasn't passed, but it's gonna, and it's gonna have this provision in it.

Let me read you this. This is from the New Republic. The main beneficiaries of Joe Biden's trademark legislative achievement have actually been Republicans. Three quarters of investments spurred on by that bill have flowed to states that voted to make Trump president. Two thirds of those funds have come from the form of, in the form, excuse me, of private sector investments incentivized by the inflation reduction Acts, tax breaks for zero carbon energy, advanced manufacturing and more. As house Republicans decide how quickly and thoroughly to dismantle the so-called green new scam, the results will signal how committed GOP politicians are to snatching from their own constituents. The original package would eliminate most of the inflation reduction Acts $7,500 tax credit to purchase certain electric vehicles at the end of this year and phase out incentives for wind, solar, nuclear, and geothermal power years ahead of schedule. Repealing the Inflation reduction Act also stands to put at risk $388 billion worth of investments in Republican controlled house districts.

If you voted for a Republican, everything in this bill is designed to screw you over. So getting rid of these clean energy investments, which is an investment in infrastructure, is going to disproportionately affect red states. The cuts to Medicaid are gonna disproportionately affect red states. The cuts to the supplemental nutritional assistance programs SNAP are going to disproportionately hurt red states. But get this, those tax cuts for the wealthy elite. Do you know where most of those wealthy elite live Blue states?