House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries spoke for eight hours and 44 minutes on the House floor on Thursday, in a marathon speech delaying the passage of = Donald Trump’s Medicaid-and-food-assistance slashing, tax-gift-for-the-wealthy abomination of a reconciliation bill. The speech breaks the record for longest ever delivered on the House floor, previously held by former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy.
Jeffries spent much of his hours-long “magic minute” speech reading statements, letters, and stories from individuals who have benefited from Medicaid and other programs, or have written in opposition to the legislation’s cuts to the federal health care program for the disabled and poor.
“Donald Trump’s deadline may be Independence Day. That ain’t my deadline,” Jeffries said of the president’s demand that the bill be sent to his desk for signature by the Fourth of July. “We don’t work for Donald Trump. We work for the American people. That’s why we’re right here now, on the floor of the House of Representatives, standing up for the American people.”
The people are being set up to suffer, as Jeffries highlighted. “People will die. Tens of thousands, perhaps year after year after year, as a result of the Republican assault on the healthcare of the American people,” he said. “I’m sad. I never thought that I’d be on the House floor saying this is a crime scene. And House Democrats want no part of it.”
Republicans dismissed the stalling tactic, which will only delay the House’s final passage of the bill through Congress. “The sooner we get this done, the better,” House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said Thursday. “If Hakeem Jeffries would stop talking, we could deliver relief for the American people.”
“It’s an utter waste of everyone’s time, but you know, that’s part of the system here,” Johnson told reporters. “We’ll land this plane before July Fourth.”
While Jefferies is making the GOP wait to take their victory lap, the majority of the delays related to the bill’s passage have stemmed from disagreements within Johnson’s own party. On Wednesday night, another record was broken in the House when Republicans forced the longest vote in the history of the lower chamber, holding a rule vote open for seven hours while they attempted to browbeat the party’s deficit hawks into submission.
While Johnson may consider a lengthy speech a waste of his time, the over 11 million American who may lose health care as a result of the bill’s Medicaid cuts would hope that their elected representatives delay passage as long as possible. Unfortunately for those affected, delay was all Jeffries’ speech did, and the Democratic Party’s accomplishments in the early months of Trump’s second term haven’t amounted to much more than symbolic theatrics.
Daniel D`Amico for SANREMO.FM
