Chutzpah synonyms: audacity, effrontery, temerity….and Chuck Schumer
Chuck Schumer is the current – outgoing – Senate Majority Leader. For the last four years – the entire Biden/Harris administration – he has been the Senate Majority Leader.
In those four years, can you show me all the instances that he has demonstrated any capacity for bipartisanship? Any of them? I doubt you can.
But now? Now that, suddenly, Donald Trump is in the seat of power with a Republican Senate majority? Now Schumer has a sudden urge for that very same bipartisanship. Amazing, isn’t it?
From Byron York’s article for the Washington Examiner, is the real Chuck Schumer:
SCHUMER TO REPUBLICANS: PLEASE DON’T DO TO US WHAT WE WERE GOING TO DO TO YOU. When the Democratic convention took place in August, with new nominee Kamala Harris rising in the polls, Democrats were giddy with a sense of impending victory. In Chicago for the convention, Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-NY) visited with party officials and reporters to outline his plans for a glorious new age in Washington with Democrats in control of the White House, Senate, and House of Representatives.
Schumer’s top priority in the new Harris administration would have been to eliminate the legislative filibuster that has long protected minority rights in the Senate. That way, even if the Senate were tied between 50 Democrats and 50 Republicans, those 50 Democrats, with the tiebreaking vote of Vice President Tim Walz, could enact far-reaching legislation without any input at all from Republicans. Washington would have true one-party rule, and the minority party would have no say in things whatsoever.
Schumer believed 2024 would be the year Democrats could finally erase any Republican power in the Senate. Manchin and Sinema were both leaving the Senate, Schumer explained at his talk in Chicago. Manchin’s seat would be won by a Republican, so it still would be unavailable for Democrats. But Sinema’s seat would be won by Democrat Ruben Gallego, Schumer said, and Gallego would go along with the party on the filibuster. That would give Democrats the 50 votes they needed, provided there was a Vice President Walz to break the tie.
But it didn’t happen. The Democrats lost votes in the election. Republicans will have a 53-to-47 majority in the Senate. Schumer is headed toward being the minority leader. And there will be no Vice President Walz. None of Schumer’s dreams came true.
So this week, Schumer went to the well of the Senate and addressed some remarks to his Republican colleagues. “Another closely contested election now comes to an end,” he said. “To my Republican colleagues, I offer a word of caution in good faith: Take care not to misread the will of the people, and do not abandon the need for bipartisanship. After winning an election, the temptation may be to go to the extreme. We’ve seen that happen over the decades, and it has consistently backfired on the party in power. So, instead of going to the extremes, I remind my colleagues that this body is most effective when it’s bipartisan. If we want the next four years in the Senate to be as productive as the last four, the only way that will happen is through bipartisan cooperation.”
The short version of that is: Please don’t do to us what we were going to do to you.
Bottom line: Chuck Schumer was about as willing to be bipartisan as hamas was to peacefully coexist with Israel…until it benefited him and his party. Now he’s a champion of bipartisanship. Just ask him.
You want a definition of chutzpah? There it is.
