Joe Scarborough: I served in Congress. Joni Ernst's mock apology would have been unimaginable back then.
This is an adapted excerpt from the June 2 episode of 'Morning Joe.'
Republican Sen. Joni Ernst of Iowa is doubling down on her controversial comments on Medicaid cuts. On Friday, while defending the GOP's sprawling megabill to carry out Donald Trump's agenda, Ernst dismissed concerns from her constituents that the proposed cuts could cause people to lose eligibility and possibly die, telling the crowd at a town hall: 'Well, we all are going to die.'
On Saturday, the senator posted a sarcastic apology video to social media. Speaking from what appears to be a cemetery, Ernst referenced her comments from the previous day and said she 'made an incorrect assumption that everyone in the auditorium understood that, yes, we are all going to perish from this earth.'
'So I apologize, and I'm really, really glad that I did not have to bring up the subject of the tooth fairy as well,' she continued. 'But for those that would like to see eternal and everlasting life, I encourage you to embrace my Lord and savior, Jesus Christ.'
In Iowa, 40% of the people who are enrolled in Medicaid are children and 42% live in a rural area, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation. The program also covers 50% of nursing home residents in the state. And when Ernst is asked what she's going to do about the fact that these vulnerable people will be impacted by the Republicans' proposal, her response is to say, 'Well, we all are going to die anyway.' Ernst is mocking the people in her state, talking about the tooth fairy while planning to vote for a bill that's going to savage health care in Iowa.
The question is not whether we're all going to die or not. The question is whether you're going to give tax cuts to billionaires and take health care from the poorest Americans.
Talk to anybody in rural health care, they'll tell you how devastating this bill would be. Talk to pediatricians, and they will all tell you that cutting Medicaid is going to have a substantial impact.
During my time in Congress, we would have really tough fights on important issues, but it was unimaginable that a United States senator on either side would behave in this way. Republican senators are now so afraid of Trump that they're contorting themselves and making jokes about people suffering.
If Webster's Dictionary wants to use the senator's video in the future, they can put it right next to the word 'clueless,' because that's what Ernst and her fellow Republicans are right now.
This article was originally published on MSNBC.com
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Los Angeles Times
17 minutes ago
- Los Angeles Times
Voters wanted immigration enforcement, but not like this
Many voters elected President Trump to end border chaos. Illegal immigration remains low, but voters' opinions of his immigration policies as a whole have soured. The reason is that they view Trump's actions away from the border as just more chaos. Americans aren't against enforcement. But not like this. So what's the root problem — and what's the real fix? The public's perception of chaos stems from the fact that Trump's policies appear arbitrary. Under President Biden, no one knew why people were getting into the country. Now no one knows why people are getting thrown out. Under Biden, people came illegally or chaotically. Now people are being deported illegally or chaotically. The public cares about order in both directions. America shouldn't be doomed to oscillate between two types of chaos. Instead, we need to reembrace the antidote for chaos: the rule of law. In popular speech, the 'rule of law' often just means following whatever the government says. But our nation's founders meant something else entirely. For them, the rule of law was the opposite of the 'rule of men' — which leaves government dictates, and the fate of residents, to the leaders' whims in the moment. The founders saw the rule of law as general predictable rules publicly known to and applicable to all. As James Madison wrote, 'Law is defined to be a rule of action; but how can that be a rule, which is little known, and less fixed?' For Madison, the hallmark of the rule of man was 'instability' (i.e. chaos). The separation of powers provided the Madisonian cure. 'The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands,' he said, 'may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny' because 'the life and liberty of the subject would be exposed to arbitrary control.' Arbitrariness is just chaos by another name. During Biden's term, much of the border chaos traces to the fact that immigrants never really knew what the rule was. On paper, it was illegal to cross between ports and legal to cross at them. In reality, at least from 2021 to 2023, ports were mostly closed, and about half of the illegal crossers were allowed to stay. Moreover, the actual determination of who got in and who got tossed was made by agents at the border, not based on asylum statutes passed by Congress or any other known rule. This was the rule of man, not the rule of law, and the chaotic results were readily apparent. Unfortunately, the chaos has not dissipated — it's only moved locations: from the border to the interior. The basic framework of Trump's interior enforcement is that it is whimsical and arbitrary. It is not about 'merit,' not about public safety threats, not even about people here illegally or about 'noncitizens,' as Trump is seeking to strip U.S. citizenship from people and remove U.S. citizenship for many U.S.-born children.. There's no articulable rule. Consider that Trump is arresting highly educated, lawful immigrant students for op-eds written long ago. Setting aside the 1st Amendment, the founders would be — or actually were — equally aghast at the 'subjecting of men to punishment for things which, when they were done, were breaches of no law, and the practice of arbitrary imprisonments.' The rule of man is back, and it's as chaotic as ever. Trump has empowered agents to strip immigrants of lawful status and immediately deport them. They are even arresting lawful immigrants based on secret criteria (like forbidden tattoos) and sending them without due process to a foreign prison. Judge. Jury. Executioner. R.I.P. Madison's definition of tyranny. All this is unnecessary. Restoring the rule of law can end the chaos. That starts with clear, consistent and predictable rules. The immigration rules were, before Trump, notoriously known as 'second only to the Internal Revenue Code in complexity.' The policies rapidly change from administration to administration and even from month to month. The U.S. needs straightforward, transparent policies on immigration. When the government accuses someone of being in violation of the law, clear rules would enable rapid implementation in accordance with due process. This enforcement would naturally channel people into legal ways to enter and live in the United States. Once someone is granted a legal way to enter, that decision should not be reopened — absent some significant new facts. America can end the immigration chaos. This vision of an immigration policy animated by the rule of law is achievable, but no one in government has focused on achieving it. David J. Bier is the director of immigration studies at the Cato Institute.
Los Angeles Times
17 minutes ago
- Los Angeles Times
Candidates for California governor face off about affordability, high cost of living in first bipartisan clash
SACRAMENTO — In a largely courteous gathering of a half dozen of California's top gubernatorial candidates, four Democrats and two Republicans agreed that despite the state boasting one of the world's largest economies, too many of its residents are suffering because of the affordability crisis in the state. Their strategies on how to improve the state's economy, however, largely embraced the divergent views of their respective political parties as they discussed housing costs, high-speed rail, tariffs, climate change and homelessness on Wednesday evening at the first bipartisan event in the 2026 governor race to replace termed-out Gov. Gavin Newsom. 'Californians are innovators. They are builders, they are designers, they are creators, and that is the reason that we have the fourth largest economy in the world,' said former Rep. Katie Porter., a Democrat from Irvine 'But businesses and workers are being held back by the same thing. It is too expensive to do things here. It is too expensive to raise a family. It is too expensive to run a business.' Conservative commentator Steve Hilton, a Republican, argued that state leaders need to end the 'stranglehold' of unions, lawyers and climate change activists on California policy. 'I've been traveling this state. Everywhere I go, it's the same story, this heartbreaking word that I get from every business I meet, every family is in such a struggle in California,' he said, with a raspy voice he explained immediately upon taking the stage was caused by a sore throat. The candidates spoke to about 800 people at a California Chamber of Commerce dinner at an 80-minute panel at the convention center in Sacramento. The chamber's decision on who to invite to the forum was based on which ones were leaders in public opinion surveys and fundraising. Making the cut were former Senate President Pro Tem Toni Atkins, Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco, Hilton, Lt. Gov. Eleni Kounalakis, Porter and former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa. The sharpest exchange of the evening was between Kounalakis, a Democrat, and Bianco, a Republican. After the candidates were asked about President Trump's erratic tariff policies, Kounalakis cited her experience working for her father's reat estate company as she criticized Bianco for arguing for a wait-and-see approach about the president's undulating plans. 'You're not a businessman, you're a government employee,' she said to Bianco. 'You've got a pension, you're going to do just fine. Small businesses are suffering from this, and it's only going to get worse, and it's driven, by the way, it is driven by Donald Trump's vindictiveness toward countries he doesn't like, countries he wants to annex, or states he doesn't like, people he doesn't like. This is hurting California, hurting our people, and it's only going to make things worse, until we can get him out of the White House.' Bianco countered that Kounalakis and the other Democrat gubernatorial candidates are directly responsible for the economic woes facing Californians because they have an 'unquenchable thirst' for money to fund their liberal agenda. 'I just feel like I'm in the Twilight Zone. I have a billionaire telling me that my 32 years of public service is okay for my retirement,' he said. 'It's taxes and regulations that are driving every single thing in California up. We pay the highest taxes, we pay the highest gas, we pay the highest housing, we pay the highest energy.' The Democrats on stage, though largely agreeing about policy, sought to differentiate themselves. The sharpest divide was about whether to raise the minimum wage. On Monday, labor advocates in Los Angeles proposed raising it in Los Angeles County Atkins reflected most of her fellow Democrats' views, saying that while she wanted to see higher wages for workers, 'now is not the time.' Villaraigosa said that while he believes in a higher minimum wage, 'we can't just keep raising the minimum wage.' Kounalakis, though, said not increasing the minimum wage would be inhumane. 'I think we should be working for that number, yes I do,' she said. 'You want to throw poor people under the bus.' California's high cost of living is a pressing concern among the state's voters, and the issue is expected to play a major role in the 2026 governor's face. Nearly half feel worse off now compared with last year, and more than half felt less hopeful about their economic well-being, according to a poll released in May by the UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies that was co-sponsored by The Times. Nearly exactly a year before the gubernatorial primary next year, the event was the first time Democratic and Republican candidates have shared a stage. It was also the first time GOP candidates Bianco and Hilton have appeared together. Although the state's leftward electoral tilt makes it challenging for a Republican to win the race – Californians last elected GOP politicians to statewide office in 2006 — Bianco and Hilton are battling to win one of the top two spots in next year's primary election. The pair expressed similar views about broadly ending liberal policies in the state, such as stopping the state's high-speed rail project and reducing environmental restrictions such as the state's climate-change efforts that they argue have increased costs while making no meaningful impact on the consumption of fossil fuels. A crucial question is whether President Trump, who both Bianco and Hilton fully support, will eventually endorse one of the Republican candidates. The gubernatorial candidates, some of whom have been running more than a year, have largely focused on fundraising since entering the race. But the contest to replace termed-out Gov. Gavin Newsom is growing more public and heated, as seen at last weekend's California Democratic Party convention. Several of the party's candidates scurried around the Anaheim convention center, trying to curry favor with the state's most liberal activists while also drawing contrasts with their rivals. But the Democratic field is partially frozen as former Vice President Kamala Harris weighs entering the race, a decision she is expected to make by the end of the summer. Harris' name did not come up during the forum. There were a handful of light moments. Porter expressed a common concern among the state's residents when they talk about the cost of living in the state. 'What really keeps me up at night, why I'm running for governor, is whether my children are going to be able to afford to live here, whether they're going to ever get off my couch and have their own home,' she said.
New York Post
17 minutes ago
- New York Post
Who won the first NYC Democratic mayoral primary debate?
Ex-Gov. Andrew Cuomo won Wednesday night's Democratic mayoral primary debate — because his opponents' relentless attacks did more to elevate him than drag him down, a Post panel of veteran campaign strategists said. The thrice-elected Democrat took some gut punches, but there was no knockout blow or major blunder on his part, the political analysts on both sides of the aisle said. 'I tuned in to see a mayoral debate, not a debate about Andrew Cuomo,' quipped campaign strategist Ken Frydman of the nine-person debate moderated by NBC 4 NY and Politico. Advertisement 8 Democratic mayoral candidate Andrew Cuomo shakes hands with fellow candidate Zohran Mamdani behind Whitney Tilson at the beginning of the NYC Democratic mayoral primary debate on June 4, 2025. via REUTERS 'By making Andrew the debate, they elevated him,' said Frydman. Because Cuomo was constantly under fire, he got more air time to respond to each jab and by default dominated the more than two hour debate, the political experts said. Advertisement 'Everyone tried to land a punch on Andrew Cuomo, but failed,' said campaign strategist O' Brien 'OB' Murray. 'The first 20 minutes gave Cuomo the center stage, literally and figuratively,' he said, referring to the ex-gov's position in the middle of the group of candidates standing on the dais at 30 Rockefeller Center. 'He handled the attacks and was able to deflect. They actually gave him more airtime than they should have,' Murray said. 8 Former NY Gov. Andrew Cuomo speaks during his spot at the democratic debate. via REUTERS Advertisement Republican campaign strategist Bill O'Reilly said the verbal pummeling Cuomo received from most of his eight primary rivals does not alter his status as the frontrunner for the Democratic nomination. 'It was Andrew Cuomo vs. the Lilliputians, and the Lilliputians fell short. That's the bottom line,' O'Reilly said. 'Someone needed to trip up the former governor to slow his momentum, but it was clear from the jump that wouldn't happen. Cuomo hasn't lost a step since leaving Albany, and the field lacked the skill to crack him.' Cuomo also counter-attacked, taking shots at his biggest threats in the polls — 33-year-old Democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani, a state Assembly member from Queens, and City Comptroller Brad Lander. Advertisement 8 Andrew Cuomo and Adrienne Adams hug onstage after the debate. via REUTERS 8 The nine NYC Democratic mayoral candidates Adrienne Adams, Brad Lander, Jessica Ramos, Zellnor Myrie, Andrew Cuomo, Whitney Tilson, Zohran Mamdani, Michael Blake and Scott Stringer. POOL/AFP via Getty Images The former governor delivered the best line when he said' '[President] Trump would go through Mamdani like a knife through butter,' O'Reilly noted. Frydman said the candidates and moderators did force Cuomo to squirm to defend his record as governor, including his controversial nursing home policy during the COVID-19 pandemic and his approval of the unpopular 2019 bail reforms. They also tried to make him answer for the spate of sexual misconduct accusations leveled against him — that he denied, but that forced his resignation in 2021. Some of the other candidates had 'break out moments' — including former Bronx Assemblyman Michael Blake, City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams and Mamdani, said political advisor Yvette Buckner. 'That will have voters wanting to learn more about them, their policies and their candidacy,' she said. Advertisement Frydman, too, said Adams' performance 'moved the needle' for her campaign, which has been slow to gain momentum despite support from state Attorney General Letitia James. 'She introduced herself to Democratic voters well enough on substance to move up in ranked-choice voting,' he said. But Cuomo's comfortable lead over second place Mamdani in recent polls should hold, Frydman said. O'Reilly agreed, but said Mamdani remains Cuomo's 'greatest threat' for the nomination in the June 24 primary. Advertisement 8 Brad Lander and Michael Blake shake hands after participating in the debate. via REUTERS 8 Jessica Ramos is spotted leaving the NYC Democratic Mayoral Debate at NBC Studios at 30 Rockefeller Plaza in NY on June 4, 2025. Christopher Sadowski Two of the panelists agreed that Lander is competent, but his persona didn't translate on TV. 'He oozes insincerity in a car-salesman-type way,' O'Reilly said. Advertisement But he said Brooklyn state Sen. Zellnor Myrie's sincerity came across 'easily,' calling him a rising star in the Democratic Party. 8 NY Gov. Kathy Hochul leaves NBC Studios after the debate. Christopher Sadowski 8 Zellnor Myrie talks to reporters after leaving the debate stage. Christopher Sadowski Murray concurred, saying Lander has a 'stage presence for radio and a delivery for print. He confirmed why he has his wife and daughter on videos, instead of himself.' Advertisement Another candidate, former City Comptroller Scott Stringer who previously ran for mayor in 2021, didn't break through, the panelists said. 'Stringer was Stringer — flat and after a second run for mayor still didn't connect to voters,' Murray said. All but two of the Democratic contenders will debate again on June 12, save for Blake and state Sen. Jessica Ramos, who failed to meet the campaign funding threshold. Nine days of early voting will precede the primary, beginning on June 14.
