In an interesting twist, months after voting in support of raising the debt ceiling, Congressman Randy Feenstra has issued a “dire warning” about America’s national debt as it eclipsed $33 trillion for the first time this week.
Feenstra didn’t take responsibility, however. Instead, he blamed President Joe Biden.
“Thanks to President Biden’s wasteful spending policies, our national debt has surpassed $33 trillion, and our country is barreling toward a debt crisis,” he said. “I’ve repeatedly warned that injecting trillions of dollars into our economy would fuel inflation, supercharge deficits, send interest rates soaring and make life unaffordable for our families. Regrettably, my calls for fiscal responsibility have fallen on deaf ears.”
To be clear, Feenstra has received a rating of just 71.47 percent from CPAC for his votes on monetary policy, taxes, budget and spending.
He was docked for voting in support of various liberal bills:
*HR 3076: Postal “Reform” Act Without Reform — a union-backed bill that does nothing to actually reform the postal service and instead bails out the pension system that is deeply in debt. It removed the requirement that USPS prepay their pension health benefits. Ninety-two Republicans opposed the measure, but not Feenstra.
*HR 5706: New Mandates on the Transportation Industry — a bill that expanded government mandates and the regulatory power of the Department of Transportation under the guise of preventing sexual harassment. CPAC opposed the expansion of authority of the federal government over the private sector. Eighty-five Republicans opposed the bill, but not Feenstra.
*HR 1916: Health Insurance Mandates — the bill requires private health insurance plans to cover congenital anomalies and has a price contorl feature in that coverage limits and co-pays may not be more restrictive than other benefits. CPAC opposed the mandates because they drive up the cost of healthcare for everyone. There were 110 Republicans who opposed the measure (a majority), but Feenstra did not.
*H. Res 831: Giving NATO New Non-Defense Responsibilities — this resolution would establish a “Center for Democratic Resilience” within NATO and have it “monitor and identify challenges to democracy, human rights and the rule of law.” CPAC said since the majority of NATO members fail to meet their defense spending obligations, the alliance should prioritize defense rather than inventing new roles that could undermine U.S. sovereignty. Sixty-three Republicans voted against it, but not Feenstra.
*HR 7691: Spending another $40 billion overseas without proper oversight — this bill spent an additional $40 billion to assist Ukraine but did not allow for the spending to be overseen by a special inspector general. It was more than three times the amount European nations as a whole provided to Ukraine. Fifty-seven Republicans voted against it, but not Feenstra.
*HR 1437: Wasting taxpayer funds to compete with private weather prediction services — this bill required the weather service to work with the National Academy of Science to predict precipitation estimates to advise federal agencies, at a cost of $31 million. The bill was considered a further waste of taxpayer’s money. Eighty-one Republicans voted against it, but not Feenstra.
*HR 8888: Giving the failing VA new bureaucracies to manage — this bill established a new bureaucracy in the Veterans Department — the Office of Food Security — to advise veterans of nutrition assistance programs. CPAC opposed the effort because it did nothing to alleviate the huge backlog of cases in the VA. Forty-nine Republicans opposed the bill, but not Feenstra.
*RC 420: Expanding government bureaucracy via the “Oral Health Literacy and Awareness Act” — this bill grew the role of government by expanding the Public Health Service Act to include “oral health literacy and awareness” in public education campaigns. Fifty-eight Republicans opposed the bill, but not Feenstra.
Of note, in 2021, Feenstra voted against raising the debt ceiling. Back then he was “strongly opposed” to raising the debt ceiling. Feenstra was a no back then, when Republicans were not in power and the vote was relatively symbolic.
But this year, when Republicans were in control, Feenstra voted to increase the debt ceiling.
South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott voted against that same debt ceiling deal, saying he did not think it was in America’s best interest to allow Joe Biden to have an “open checkbook, no limit on the credit card until the end of his term.”
Tim Scott said something very similar at an event in Le Mars just a few weeks ago, but did not point out that Feenstra, who introduced him, voted to give Biden that “open checkbook, no limit on the credit card.”
Does Biden hold some of the responsibility for the $33 trillion debt? Yeah, he does. Does Feenstra? Yeah, he does.
United States Sen. Chuck Grassley previously said during an interview that when Republicans are in control, Republicans have to raise the debt ceiling. And when Democrats are in control, Democrats have to raise it.
What does this mean?
Well, it means the debt ceiling always gets raised.
“We want the Democrats by themselves to deal with the debt ceiling, just like in 2003, four and six, when Republicans had control of the Presidency and the two Houses, Sen. Biden took the position under those circumstances, Republicans have to increase the debt limit and we did,” Grassley said. “Democrats didn’t help us. It’s turned around now, so, politically, is a good reason for doing it.”
Grassley went on to say this, and listen closely…
“So, the Democrats want to do that, then let them increase the debt limit,” he said. “But then also there’s that political reason for doing it, because they control everything.”
It is great that Feenstra is issuing a “dire warning” about our country’s $33 trillion national debt. Maybe he should’ve issued it to himself earlier this year, before he voted to raise the country’s debt ceiling.
Even more insulting, these RINOs send out requests for campaign donations so they can stop Biden’s reckless spending.
And Gov. Reynolds pushed to get Feenstra elected…she’s just as guilty. All these RINO’s care about is padding their own pockets.
All five of our representatives voted for the last omnibus bill and our two senators are no better. If you know of a solid conservative, that we can trust, I would be interested in getting Feenstra primaried. He is totally unacceptable and needs to be removed. We actually need to get rid of all seven of our federal representatives and replace them with true conservatives that are willing to do what needs to be done. Where is Steve King when we need him? There was never any doubt how he was going to vote on every issue.