'This Is Your Post...': Robert Garcia Has Tense Exchange With Witness Over His Past Tweet

At Wednesday's House DOGE Committee hearing, Rep. Robert Garcia (D-CA) confronted witness Daniel Turner about a past tweet about Social Security

Transcript

00:00to testify today, one of our witnesses, and I think it's important to note this,

00:04Mr. Turner, you're one of our witnesses today, an expert on economics and a bunch of other things.

00:10Mr. Turner, you were invited to testify as an expert on government spending.

00:13This is your post, is this correct? Did you post this, sir?

00:16Yes, sir.

00:17Okay, you called Social Security a Ponzi scheme.

00:20100%.

00:20Which we know Elon Musk has also done. I'm glad you admitted it.

00:23Social Security is a government-sponsored Ponzi scheme, as you said.

00:28What about the second part, though, sir?

00:32I should be able to keep 100% of my money and not watch government waste it,

00:37giving $9 billion to climate groups?

00:41Madam Chairwoman, thank you. Thank you, sir.

00:43A Ponzi scheme.

00:44And so I think it's interesting, of course, that one of our Republican witnesses

00:47is calling Social Security a Ponzi scheme, and that's the person that we should be taking advice from here today.

00:53Without Social Security, 22 million people would be pushed into poverty.

00:58That includes over 16 million seniors and nearly 1 million children.

01:02And in fact, Elon Musk has also said and agreed with you, sir, that this is a Ponzi scheme.

01:06I think it's ironic that you are one of our witnesses talking about efficiency

01:11when you want to attack the single best program that we have to support people,

01:16not just out of poverty, but across this country to uplift them,

01:19to ensure they can afford a decent life.

01:21We on this committee need to work every single day, not just to protect Social Security,

01:25but to hold Republicans accountable for attacking Medicare, Medicaid,

01:30for attacking Social Security and the programs that we all depend on.

01:33With that, I yield back. Thank you.

01:34The gentleman yields. I now recognize Mr. Timmons from...