President Donald Trump continues to push his political ideology onto the legislative process regardless of results. This week, he took a particularly close and reality-disconnected interest in Congressional efforts to get a new disaster relief funding bill passed, pushing Republicans to vote against it because it didn’t adhere to how he thought money should be distributed. In short, he wants less for Puerto Rico, which was ravaged by Hurricane Maria, and more for other things, like bailing out farmers he’s pushed into a corner via his trade wars.
After the House passed the legislation he’d advocated against with dozens of Republicans in support, the president went on Twitter to declare a victory, because of course he did. He shared:
‘Great Republican vote today on Disaster Relief Bill. We will now work out a bipartisan solution that gets relief for our great States and Farmers. Thank you to all. Get me a Bill that I can quickly sign!’
He acts like his signatures are some sort of unavoidable acts of god. It’s the same kind of rhetoric he used surrounding the government shutdown he sparked earlier this year, acting as though it was set in age-old stone or something that he physically could not sign funding to reopen the federal government without the money he wanted for a southern border wall.
Anyway, this time around, it’s definitely questionable at best for him to be declaring some kind of victory. It makes his unifying modus operandi to seem to be just claiming everything for himself. The House package includes some $17 billion in aid for areas including Puerto Rico and other locales that have been racked by disasters including hurricanes, extreme flooding, tornadoes, and wildfires.
Trump has consistently lied that Puerto Rico has taken some $91 billion in federal disaster relief funding already, which the running implication is takes away from disaster relief efforts elsewhere, like responding to the economic crisis he himself sparked with his tariffs. In reality, the island has only had about $11 billion disbursed so far and only $41 billion or so approved, not even half the amount Trump so flippantly claims.
Check out Twitter’s response to Trump’s behavior…
Featured Image via screenshot
