Schumer Calls out ‘MAGA Republicans’ for Lack of Unity Before State of the Union Address

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) speaks during a press conference held to celebrate U.S. President Joe Biden cancelling student debt on Capitol Hill in Washington on Sept. 29, 2022. Jemal Countess/Getty Images for We, The 45 Million

Democrats have shown unity in both the House and Senate, said Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), calling it “a stark contrast to what’s going on with House Republicans” in a pre-State of the Union address press conference against the backdrop of a debt ceiling fight.

“The back-and-forth between Speaker McCarthy and the MAGA Republicans–it shows lack of unity, which is very, very worrisome and troublesome,” he said.

Schumer made the comments during a Feb. 7 press conference prior to President Joe Biden’s State of the Union speech.

The longtime New York senator said that Republican lawmakers, including Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), had not done enough to specify where they might trim the budget.

The Speaker stressed in a Feb. 6 press conference that the White House must accommodate some spending cuts to reach an agreement with Republicans over the debt ceiling, saying that “finding compromise is exactly how governing in America is supposed to work.”

“He [McCarthy] says he wants cuts. Where? He hasn’t named a single place where he wants them,” Schumer said.

“Republicans are stuck. They can’t govern. They can’t agree on anything. Instead, they’re focused on political theater,” he added.

Schumer said Democrats, by contrast, wanted to “raise the debt limit ‘clean’”–in other words, increase it without reducing spending or making legislative changes.

Challenges GOP on Chinese Balloon, Student Loan Forgiveness

He went on to criticize Republicans who voiced concern over the way the Biden administration handled a Chinese surveillance balloon last week as it crossed the continental United States before being shot down off the coast of South Carolina.

The Biden administration, he said, “listened to the military experts” and “listened to the intelligence experts.”

“We need the country to come together to condemn China for what it did and have a unified front in dealing with the Chinese Communist Party,” Schumer added.

The Senate majority leader also criticized what he called “right-wing Republicans, MAGA Republicans” for their opposition to Biden’s moratorium on the payment of student loans, in a conflict that has now reached the Supreme Court.

Republican senators including Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) took aim at Biden’s student loan debt forgiveness efforts in a legal brief to the Supreme Court.

In it, they argued that the program “upends Congress’s detailed and comprehensive scheme for subsidizing higher education.”

“President Biden’s student loan schemes do not ‘forgive’ student debt, but transfer it onto Americans who chose not to go to college or worked hard to pay off their loans. These policies are a clear overreach of President Biden’s authority, and unconstitutional,” Cassidy said.

The Epoch Times has reached out to McCarthy for comment.