At a House Judiciary Committee hearing on Wednesday, Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-FL) tore into the GOP budget.
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00:00Thank you, Mr. Chairman. All right, judiciary after dark.
00:04So, 100 days into the administration, Mr. Chairman, the golden age.
00:09Some are saying, many perhaps, that even William Henry Harrison had a better 100 days.
00:16But I want to talk about the economy, because that will explain my amendments.
00:21Goldman Sachs is now saying the United States will have the lowest economic growth
00:25and the highest inflation of any developed country.
00:28All related to tariffs, the Dow's down 3,000 points.
00:31Consumer sentiment has fallen 32% since Trump took office, the largest decline since the 90s.
00:38And then, you know, there's this.
00:40Like, you know, Trump in January 29, 2024, after inauguration, says,
00:45this is the Trump stock market.
00:48It's his stock market.
00:50And then on April 30th, something happened.
00:53And he says, this is Biden's stock market, not Trump's.
00:57So, anyway.
01:00And then today, what he said was even more interesting.
01:03He said, and even the next quarter, that will sort of be Biden's also.
01:08Kind of telling us that it's going to get worse.
01:11So, Mr. Chairman, listen.
01:12In the spirit of doge, I present to you four amendments that have over 900 million.
01:20Some people would say that's a billion.
01:21Okay.
01:22Of savings to the American people.
01:24I decided to doge your budget.
01:27Even though the doge caucus in Congress is dead, it met twice.
01:30I know.
01:31I was there.
01:31It did nothing.
01:32It was never included.
01:34Instead, what we got was a executive branch doge program that fell 80% less, lower than their goal.
01:43They left the E out in doge.
01:45They didn't do anything that was efficient.
01:46They've not helped government become more efficient, just the dog part.
01:51And so, what I did, Mr. Chairman, is I used the exact same metric that Elon Musk used.
01:57I just made it up.
01:59So, let's just go with page 70.
02:03Okay.
02:03On page 70, you want to put $700 million into the IT budget.
02:08I propose we make that $600 million.
02:11Save the American people $100 million.
02:12$600 million for computers, Mr. Chairman, sounds like a lot of money.
02:18My next amendment in there is on page 75.
02:22You guys want to spend $1.3 billion to hire lawyers.
02:28You guys starting a law firm?
02:30I mean, didn't Trump get, like, billions of dollars of, like, pro bono work out of all of the law firms?
02:37So, what I would propose, what I propose, Mr. Chairman, is instead of $1.3 billion, we just spend a billion.
02:44How about a billion on lawyers?
02:46That sounds like a lot of money, a billion on lawyers.
02:49Oh, new cars.
02:51Homeland needs new cars.
02:53So, you guys want to spend $250 million on new cars.
02:58I propose $125 million.
03:00Feel like they could probably get away with $125 million in new cars, not $250.
03:06I know cars are more expensive because of the tariffs, but at the end of the day, I feel like $125 million is a lot of money.
03:12And then this one's my favorite.
03:13I don't know if you know this, but you guys have $858 million, again, almost a billion, okay, of money to give out bonuses to people.
03:24And so, listen, bonuses are great when people do good work, but $858 million sounds like a lot of money.
03:29That's like a $40,000 bonus to every employee in all of ICE.
03:33So, how about $500 million?
03:36How about $500 million for bonuses, okay?
03:40We can do this together.
03:41We can show the American people there's like a little bit of waste here, a little bit of waste.
03:46So, I can help you capture, Mr. Chairman, $903 million.
03:50We can save a billion together, show the American people we're serious.
03:54But will the gentleman yield for a question?
03:55Of course I will.
03:56You raise a profoundly serious point in your inimitable way, Mr. Moskowitz.
04:03The bonuses, that is a huge bonus budget.
04:07What does that work out?
04:09Have you done the math to see what that works out in terms of bonus per ICE employee?
04:14$42,000 for every employee in a bonus in addition to their salary.
04:20A $42,000 bonus?
04:21Yeah, $42,000.
04:23And because you and I sometimes are symbiotic, you're probably going to ask me, what is the
04:29average bonus for the American worker in this country?
04:33Do you know what that is?
04:33It's $2,500.
04:35Oh.
04:35That's the average Christmas bonus is $2,500?
04:38The average Christmas bonus, because Christmas is back, the average Christmas bonus is $2,500.
04:43But they want to give $42,000.
04:46And what I would suggest in my amendment is instead of $42,000, they get $25,000.
04:51That sounds like a lot of money.
04:53Well, it seems to me you've probably hit upon the one thing we really could effectuate a
04:57compromise on, although I don't know that we're going to be able to talk to them about
05:00it, but maybe they'll just vote for it.
05:01I mean, listen, if no one there wants to talk, bring in Comer.
05:05He'll definitely talk to me.
05:06Gentleman's time has expired, and I see the hands coming up.
05:18Okay.