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Dear Friend, Vermont is under water. New Jersey is reeling. North Carolina is just starting to pick up the pieces. But Republican House Majority Leader Eric Cantor is already taking Hurricane Irene‘s victims hostage. Truly, Mr. Cantor has no shame. It’s outrageous to take advantage of the urgent needs of hurricane survivors in order to advance his radical crusade to cut Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. But that’s exactly what one of the top Republicans in Congressional leadership is doing with his refusal to allocate money to disaster relief unless Congress first offsets that money with cuts to vital government programs.1 Hurricane Irene blazed a path across the eastern seaboard causing tens of billions of dollars in damage. To make matters worse, our federal disaster fund is dangerously low in the wake of a string of recent tornadoes and other extreme weather-related natural disasters. It’s so bad that FEMA has actually had to temporarily suspend some payments to rebuilding projects in Joplin, Mo., and other states hit hard this spring by tornadoes in order to pay for urgent needs caused by Hurricane Irene.2 As if the devastation caused by Hurricane Irene weren’t enough, Republican Eric Cantor wants to hold hurricane victims hostage in order to extort more budget cuts. He’s insisting that funds needed to meet immediate human needs must first be “offset” with budget cuts elsewhere.3 Make no mistake. We won’t “offset” money spent on emergency disaster relief and rebuilding by cutting the budget for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. And Republicans won’t touch the obscene tax subsidies they have awarded to the big oil companies whose products are accelerating global warming and contributing to the extreme weather events that are the cause of intensifying natural disasters. When Cantor talks about the need to “offset” disaster funding, what he’s really saying is that we have to accede to his demands to cut Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. This is low even for someone like Rep. Eric Cantor. And because many of the states hit hardest by the hurricane and spring are led by Republican governors, there will be bipartisan pressure to fully fund disaster recovery. If enough of us call Rep. Cantor out on this reprehensible ploy to advance his crusade for cuts to Medicare, we can force him to back down. It’s cynical and wrong to capitalize on a natural disaster that has destroyed homes, wiped out bridges and pushed already struggling businesses to the brink just to advance Republicans’ radical Tea Party agenda. It’s the role of government to respond to the needs of its people in the wake of disaster. Republicans like Eric Cantor need to get out of the way and let the federal government do its job — help the states aid those in immediate danger and as quickly as possible begin the essential work of repairing the damage done. Thank you for standing up to hostage-taking Republicans. Becky Bond, Political Director 1. “ Cantor: No Disaster Relief Funding For Hurricane Irene Without Budget Cuts,” Think Progress, August 29, 2011.
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Moving Foward 