March 24, 2020

Ayman Mohyeldin cut right to the chase with Texas Republican Rep. Kevin Brady this morning.

"Were you satisfied with the fact that the $500 billion slated to go to corporations did not have a point person or an oversight person other than the secretary of the treasury or the White House, as the president yesterday said in his comments?"

"Yeah, absolutely not. it was fine. This is how --"

"You're fine with the Secretary of the Treasury overseeing this?"

"Absolutely."

He listed the reasons why he was okay with letting Trump's right hand man control the money.

"One, he helped working with Republicans and Democrats to craft this proposal. Secondly, he does understand those industries in a major way. They're not getting bailouts. They're getting lending and loans to keep them afloat through this. So, yeah, I think asking for extraordinary oversight really was designed just to slow that portion where you help major industries keep their workers and keep themselves afloat through this, i just think that was -- like the windmills, like the election early voting issues, like the union bailouts, it had nothing to do with this," Brady said.

"Let me understand this part if I can. Republicans were concerned that the money going to state and local governments could be used by those state and local governments for something else other than combating the coronavirus epidemic and its fallout. They wanted more oversight on state and local governments. They didn't care about the oversight when it came to the big corporations."

"I don't -- excuse me. look, we disagree on this. In fact, we were using traditional ways, community development block grants, help to state and local --"

"But you were concerned that the money -- but you were --"

"There were no additional restraints on that."

"Right. you were concerned that state and local governments were going to get a lot of money and didn't have oversight. At the same time, though, with corporations, you were fine with the Secretary of the Treasury having to do that."

"You're mischaracterizing all of that," Brady said. "The Republicans support not just help for our hospitals and our communities, but using the traditional way we do it in natural disasters to give those state and local governments the resources they need. So I disagree with the fundamental point you just made."

So you don't actually dispute it, you're just spinning it.

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