BURSTThe White House on Thursday bashed a newly released Republican funding bill as a “billionaire giveaway” ahead of the vote on it on the House floor.
“Republicans are doing the bidding of their billionaire benefactors at the expense of hardworking Americans,” press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in a statement.
She accused Republicans of “breaking their word to support a bipartisan agreement” aimed to lower prescription drug costs and make it harder for companies to offshore jobs to China and said they replaced it with a bill to give tax breaks to billionaires “while cutting critical programs working families count on.”
Jean-Pierre said President Biden does not support the new Republican bill, suggesting he would veto the legislation if it reached his desk.
“President Biden supports the bipartisan agreement to keep the government open, help communities recovering from disasters, and lower costs — not this giveaway for billionaires that Republicans are proposing at the eleventh hour,” she said.
Republicans earlier Thursday announced an agreement on a plan B to avert a government shutdown ahead of Friday’s deadline. It included a three-month continuation of government funding and a two-year suspension of the debt limit, which is a provision that President-elect Trump called for Wednesday when he urged Republicans to kill the bipartisan agreement that Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) had negotiated.
Billionaire Elon Musk also put heat on the Speaker when he publicly lobbied against the bill.
The new legislation keeps some of the bipartisan provisions that Johnson negotiated but stripped out controversial measures like a pay raise for members of Congress.
House Democrats are also rallying in overwhelming opposition to the Republicans’ second stab at a government funding bill, vowing to sink it on the House floor.
The House is scheduled to vote on it Thursday evening, and debate of the bill was underway at the time of the White House statement.