Liberal senator has complete meltdown on Senate floor while bashing 'authoritarian' Trump

Daily Mail​

6 days ago

Liberal senator Cory Booker suffered a complete meltdown in a theatrical outburst that even stunned members of his own party on Tuesday.
The New Jersey Democrat unleashed a fiery tirade on the Senate floor accusing fellow Democrats of bowing to President Donald Trump and calling the current administration 'authoritarian'.
His dramatic protest briefly derailed a bipartisan police funding package.
Booker's voice rose and did his fury as he turned a routine procedural vote into an emotional sermon, slamming his colleagues, the Justice Department, the president, and even television networks in a sprawling, unscripted rant.
'The Democratic Party needs a wake-up call!' Booker thundered. 'It's time for Democrats to have a backbone. It's time for us to fight. It's time for us to draw lines!'
The meltdown came in response to a unanimous consent request from Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nevada), who sought swift passage of a slate of bipartisan police bills in honor of Police Week.
But Booker blocked the motion, furiously demanding changes to the grant formulas -claiming the Trump administration had been weaponizing law enforcement grants to punish Democratic-leaning states like New Jersey, New York, and California.
'No! No! Not on my watch!' Booker declared, pacing furiously. 'We are standing at a moment where our president is eviscerating the Constitution of the United States of America!'
The theatrics drew immediate backlash, not from Republicans, but from Booker's fellow Democrats, including Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-Minnesota), who accused him of sabotaging months of work for his own political performance.
'This is the first time we're hearing about this, and he's trying to kill the whole package,' Cortez Masto said.
'I can't help it if someone couldn't change their schedule to be at the committee markup,' Klobuchar jabbed, referring to Booker's absence when the bills were debated weeks earlier.
In a sweeping tirade that seemed less like a Senate address and more like a 2024 campaign revival, he accused the Democratic Party of complicity in Trump's 'authoritarianism.'
'I see law firms bending the knee to this president. I see universities bending the knee. I see businesses taking late-night talk show hosts off the air. I see mergers requiring tribute to this president. And what are we doing here today? Passing resources that only go to states he likes!
'That is complicity within an authoritarian leader who is trashing our Constitution.'
At one point, Booker seemed to abandon legislative language entirely, speaking with apocalyptic rhetoric.
'There's too much going on in this country! Due process rights under attack! Secret police picking people up off the streets! If we don't stand as Democrats, we deserve to lose!'
Not backing down, Booker's volume rose a he shouted 'Don't question my integrity! Don't question my motives! I am standing for Jersey!'
Booker had been looking to amend police funding bills to guarantee equitable distribution of federal grants.
He argued that Trump's Department of Justice was denying funds to liberal states in retaliation for opposing his second-term policies.
'Why would we do something today that is playing into the president's politics?' Booker asked. 'When are we going to stand up for our body?'
But Booker had already supported many of the same bills in committee, according to Cortez Masto, making his last-minute protest a surprise ambush, not a principled objection.
'These bills passed unanimously out of committee. He didn't raise these issues then. Why now?' Cortez Masto said.
Klobuchar chimed in: 'One of the things I don't understand here is why we have committees if people are going to skip the meetings and then grandstand on the floor.'
Booker seemed to take her jab personally and it only served to rile him further.
'Dear God, if you want to come at me, you'll have to take it up with me, because I'm standing for what's right!' Booker cried.
'Not on my watch. I'm protecting Jersey today. I'm protecting the Constitution today.'
After nearly an hour of heated debate, Booker then withdrew his objection, allowing the legislation to pass.
'I don't need the lectures about urgency,' Booker snapped, in one of his many interjections. 'The Democratic Party needs a wake-up call.
'If we stand united, if we stand strong... we will win. We shall overcome,' he said, channeling civil rights-era hymns.
Booker's impassioned display earned plaudits from some progressive activists online, inside the Senate chamber it landed with a thud.
'Cory Booker just said what needed to be said. Silence in the face of rising authoritarianism isn't neutrality it's complicity,' wrote one supporter.
'This man is electrifying in his moral clarity and needs to be President one day,' stated another.
But plenty of other interpreted Booker's bellowing hot air.
'There's still no substance to it though. No policy platform that inspires voters and differentiates the party from corporate interests. It's empty flailing,' surmised one.
'Democrats are really good at saying words and sound bites. Do they do or actually meany anything? No. But they're really good at it,' stated another.