Cheney Voices Opposition to Democrats Agenda While on Wyoming Talk Shows
Speaking on two different talk shows, Wyoming News Now and Good Morning Wyoming, Representative Liz Cheney talked about how harmful she believes Democrat's recent infrastructure and reconciliation bills would be to Wyoming and the country.
On Wyoming News Now, Cheney said she has issues with the $3.5 trillion reconciliation bill, which costs $350 billion a year over 10 years, a little more than half the U.S. annual defense budget, and the $1.5 trillion infrastructure bill, because they would be bad for Wyoming.
"We're in a position now where we have this $3.5 trillion reconciliation bill, then there's another about $1.5 trillion infrastructure bill, and all of that is new spending and it is all spending -- there's some things in the infrastructure bill that are good, that could have broad bipartisan support, but, unfortunately, there's an awful lot in there that would impose new regulations on Wyoming businesses, it would hurt our energy industry, our ag industry, so I don't support the infrastructure bill or the reconciliation bill...I would hope that it would cause some reflection for people to say, “We can't afford this level of spending.” And it's not good for the country, and it's not good for our freedoms. It's not good for our constitutional rights to have the federal government play such an expansive role in terms of this massive overreach that these bills will entail."
While Republicans have voiced their opposition to the bills, both have decent support across the country, though mostly among Democrats and independents.
Both bills Cheney takes issue with are facing their own challenges in each chamber.
The infrastructure bill, which passed the Senate 69 to 30 in August, has run into trouble in the House due to progressive Democrats not willing to vote on the bill until the bigger reconciliation bill passes the Senate.
That bill is also running into trouble, because although it can pass the Senate with a simple majority, bypassing the filibuster through reconciliation, two conservative Democrats, Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona, have voiced their opposition to the bill's price tag.
As far as specific issues with either bill, Cheney said on Good Morning Wyoming that she opposes measures in the reconciliation bill which currently includes an estate tax increase, by sunsetting an exemption sooner than the original 2026 date, and attempts to phase out fossil fuels, which involve transitioning towards more renewable energy.
"But I think that, you know, you're certainly going to see tax increases, you certainly could see stepped up basis, and new policies that really affect things like estate tax, the death tax that is so devastating for our family-owned, family-operated ranches, for example. You're going to see provisions that really are focused on trying to phase out fossil fuels, that are very Green New Deal focused, which again, bad for Wyoming, bad for the country...And so, I think the debt limit’s got to be raised within the next two weeks in order to be able to borrow the money they need to fund all these new spending programs, and it's really just an irresponsible way to do business and really bad policy as well."
While it seems likely that the infrastructure bill will pass in its current form, the reconciliation bill will almost certainly get cut in a variety of ways, as Democrats need both Manchin and Sinema in order to pass the bill.
On the one hand Sinema has rested some of her opposition to the plan with attempts to lower prescription drug prices, and on the other Manchin has talked about lowering the total to around $1.5 trillion and adding more means testing to help decrease costs, both changes which may face opposition from other Democrats in the House and Senate.