Wesley Bell Rebuffs Former HUD Sec. For ‘Disingenuous’ Labeling Of Welfare Retention Efforts As ‘Schemes’

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During a House Oversight Committee hearing last week, Rep. Wesley Bell (D-MO) slammed comments made by Ben Carson, the Former Secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Transcript

00:00Yeah, the gentleman from Missouri.

00:04Thank you, Mr. Chair and Ranking Member.

00:10With all due respect, Dr. Carson, really, I just don't understand the logic.

00:18We're talking about schemes and housing assistance and people who need these programs and labeling

00:29it as schemes is off-putting and offensive, to be perfectly frank.

00:35As someone who lived in housing projects and housing and had families, my family when we

00:43were younger had housing assistance, let me tell you about a scheme.

00:48This woman that I know, she was a single mom at the time and she took an entry-level position

00:56because that's the best position she had because she didn't have a degree at the time.

01:02She worked her way up, but in the meantime, she didn't make a lot of money and so she had

01:11a son who she worked so that he could go to undergrad, go to law school, and then eventually

01:21sit before you on this dais as a congressman.

01:26Then she went on, after she did that for her son, to get her degree and her master's degree.

01:35But without having some assistance early on, none of those things would have happened.

01:42And so when we look at the worst offender, we cherry pick a particular offender and say,

01:50oh, well, this is the rule for all of these hardworking people who are just trying to move

01:58up in life and aren't asking for handouts but just, and I'll even say this, it's not even

02:05about handouts, if the rules were fair, a lot of these folks wouldn't ask for anything, but a lot

02:16of them are starting from a position where they're handcuffed and their shoelaces are tied and then

02:23they're told to go run a race and win the race. So it just seems disingenuous when we talk about schemes,

02:35when, when we should be supporting these individuals.

02:42Um, so as a, as a, and I'll say this as a Christian, I don't believe that anything is,

02:51that anything that is man-made is going to be perfect. So you can pick any program that a Democrat or a Republican started,

03:00you'll find something that's not perfect about it. But instead of gutting the program,

03:05perhaps we could actually sit down, work together and improve those programs.

03:12And so I want to paint a picture of how, how urgent these issues are.

03:19The low and low income assistance programs we're discussing aren't just numbers on the page,

03:25their lifelines. And despite what some of my Republican colleagues may suggest,

03:30what hap, what's happening here is not isolated. It's part of a troubling pattern.

03:36And right now this administration is targeting programs like Medicaid, not to reform them,

03:42but to bankrupt them and gut them to fund for tax breaks for billionaires.

03:48Cuts, cuts to Medicaid aren't just, don't just hurt on paper, they hurt real people in every community.

03:57Medicaid funds critical mental health care from school counseling to crisis and, and addiction services.

04:04In Missouri, in my state, more than 48,000 people rely on Medicaid expansion.

04:11Without it, many would have nowhere else to turn.

04:14And yet while some Republicans claim mental health is the root of tragedy tragedies like mass shootings,

04:19they are cutting the very programs designed to help.

04:23So if mental health is truly a priority, why are we slashing Medicaid?

04:30If mental health is truly a priority, why are proven mental health programs on the chopping block?

04:36If mental health is truly a priority, why was funding just frozen for the bipartisan Safer Communities Act,

04:45which improves school safety and expands mental health care?

04:49That law, which was a bipartisan bill, has been unraveled in 100 days.

04:55And President Trump's budget would make even deeper cuts.

04:59If Republicans were serious about mental health, they wouldn't be cutting student support, slashing Medicaid,

05:05and undermining community safety.

05:09And as a prosecutor, mental health and public safety shouldn't only matter after tragedies.

05:14We need to act before lives are lost.

05:18Protecting Medicaid, SNAP housing and other vital programs is how we do that.

05:24And this is not rocket science.

05:28The choice is simple.

05:30Protect billionaires or protect communities.

05:35I have a quick question for Mr. Duda Gupta.

05:39Given that stable long term housing is essential to children's development and mental health,

05:44does it make sense to push millions of families onto the streets?

05:49Absolutely not.

05:50It's completely counterproductive.

05:51And your life experience and Mr. Krishnamurthy's is the norm that these programs substantially improve the outcomes,

06:00especially of children.

06:01Okay, we're like, we have a minute.

06:03I yield back.

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