Conservatives and their allies President-elect Donald Trump is dismantling the narrative put forward by Democratic lawmakers like Sen. Elizabeth Warren that Republicans blocked funding for childhood cancer research in the spending bill, pointing to a stand-alone bill that has languished in the Democratic-controlled Senate for a year. Months.
Congress passed a reduced spending bill early Saturday morning as the government headed toward a long-term shutdown. The bill's passage came after tech billionaire Elon Musk and other Trump allies blasted the more than 1,500-page legislation earlier last week as “outrageous” and “full of excessive spending, special interest giveaways and pork barrel politics,” calling on lawmakers to return. To the negotiating table.
The Senate advanced a third version of the short-term funding bill on Saturday morning, after negotiations that narrowed the legislation to no longer include measures such as providing pay raises for lawmakers.
While the negotiations were faltering, Warren and other Democrats tried To criticize Republicans for allegedly blocking funding for childhood cancer research in the bill.
Senator Elizabeth Warren, Democrat of Massachusetts, renews her calls for a National COVID-19 Memorial Day. (Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
“We're actually now getting our first taste — this is live, live — of what it means to get this DOGE,” Warren told CNN as the government prepared to shut down on Friday evening.
Lawmakers react to stalled funding and avoid a government shutdown
DOGE, the Department of Government Efficiency, is an upcoming presidential advisory committee Which will be led by Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy to cut excessive government spending and shrink the size of government under the second Trump administration.
SpaceX and Tesla founder Elon Musk speaks during a US PAC town hall on October 26, 2024 in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. (Samuel Corum/Getty Images)
“Here's, and what will that mean. And this is where Elon Musk's fingerprints are in all of this. Because, like, what this bill says is everything, let's get rid of Funding childhood cancer research. Let's eliminate funding for early detection research into cervical and breast cancer. Let's eliminate research funding for children with Down syndrome and sickle cell anemia. She continued: “Let's get rid of these things so we can make room for tax cuts for billionaires. This is Elon Musk's idea of efficiency.”
President Biden signs stopgap funding bill into law, narrowly averting a shutdown
while Democratic Party War Room He published a press release declaring: “Trump and his MAGA cronies in Congress decided to threaten a government shutdown for political gain — and now they've stooped so far as to cut childhood cancer research.”
“Liar Liz Warren aka Pocahontas,” Musk responded in response to Warren's comments. In reference to the popular taunt of Trump vs Warren.
FILE – The Capitol building in Washington is surrounded by early morning clouds, March 19, 2024. Congress has until midnight Friday to come up with a way to fund the government, or else federal agencies will be closed. It is up to each federal agency to determine how it handles the shutdown, but there may be interruptions to many services. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File)
Other conservatives and Trump allies have criticized the narrative that the GOP has blocked funding for childhood cancer research, pointing to a standalone bill that passed the Republican-led House of Representatives last March and languished for months in the Democratic-led Senate.
The White House pressed Biden's refusal to speak publicly before the shutdown
“Elizabeth Warren repeats the lie that @elonmusk and Republicans blocked funding for childhood cancer research. A standalone bill to fund childhood cancer research passed the Republican-controlled House in March and has been held up in the Democratic-controlled Senate,” popular conservative X account Libs TikTok posted in response to Warren's interview with CNN.
“Democrats blocked funding for childhood cancer research.”
WASHINGTON, DC – APRIL 27: Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) speaks to a staffer before the start of a Senate Banking Committee hearing on oversight of credit reporting agencies, on Capitol Hill on April 27, 2023 in Washington, DC. The hearing included testimony from leaders of the three largest national credit reporting agencies. (Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images) (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)
The House passed a standalone bill on March 5, by a vote of 384-4, that would allocate millions of dollars annually to pediatric research through 2028. The bill was delivered to the Senate on March 6, but the Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer took no action on the legislation, prompting conservative condemnation months later that Democrats used research funding as a “bargaining chip.”
Trump-backed spending bill falls apart as shutdown looms
“Democrats are using children with cancer as political shields in the shutdown game to blame Republicans after using them as political shields to help defend everything Democrats wanted to include in the bill. If this funding is so important, it could pass on its own as a stand-alone bill, as You know, like the way government is supposed to work, instead of cramming hundreds of useless proposals into the same bill like funding childhood cancer research into a 1,500-page mess that no one actually did,” it reads so you can attack anyone who doesn’t He supports useless things by claiming he hates children with cancer,” explained an op-ed in the Washington Examiner.
A review of the legislation shows that on Friday evening, The Senate passed the legislation By voice vote, following condemnation targeting the Republican Party for allegedly blocking research funding.
The legislation extends $12.6 million annually in cancer research funding through 2031.
CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP
Fox News Digital reached out to Warren's office for additional comment Sunday morning, but did not immediately receive a response.
