Senator Hassan Highlights the Cost of Trump’s Vanity Projects During Speech on Senate Floor

WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Maggie Hassan recently delivered remarks on the floor of the U.S. Senate highlighting President Trump’s failure to fulfill his promise to lower costs for American families, while spending taxpayer dollars on projects that honor himself. Since President Trump took office, the average American household has had to spend more than $4,200 extra on goods and services because of rising costs, according to a recent Joint Economic Committee – Minority report . Meanwhile, a separate Committee report found that President Trump’s vanity projects – including construction of the new White House ballroom and the no-bid contract to paint the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, among others – are expected to cost more than $1.8 billion. Using this total, the Committee created an Interactive Cost Calculator where users can explore how this $1.8 billion could instead be spent to lower costs and help the American people. Click here to watch Senator Hassan’s full remarks, and see key quotes and a full transcript below: “Not only has the President failed to make good on his pledge to bring down costs, not only is it evident that he never even bothered to try, but it’s clear that on virtually every metric, it costs more to be an American than it did two years ago when this President was sworn in and the 119th Congress began.” “The President had nearly two years to try to lower costs, and instead families had $4200 more dollars taken out of their pockets.” “The President has been clear about his priorities: He is not interested in lowering costs for families. He would rather raise monuments to honor himself.” “The American people don’t want the President to build a golden ballroom; they want him to build homes that they can afford.” “In short, it tells us that the President seeks to rule; but he is unable to lead. He seeks to honor himself; but he is unable to honor his word.” Two years ago, the American people elected a new Congress and a new President. The American people did so based on a promise that the President and his allies in Congress would work to bring down high costs. So now, it’s worth asking a simple question, one that the American people will ask their elected representatives when they return home in a few days: Did the President and his allies in Congress make good on their pledge to bring down costs for American families? The answer is clear: No. Not only has the President failed to make good on his pledge to bring down costs, not only is it evident that he never even bothered to try, but it’s clear that on virtually every metric, it costs more to be an American than it did two years ago when this President was sworn in and the 119th Congress began. It’s worth taking a moment to go line by line, cost by cost, broken promise by broken promise, to examine the ways in which the President’s policies – including his tariffs and his war – have driven costs higher and higher. Before the President took office, he promised that he would bring gas prices down from $3 a gallon to less than $2. But under this President and his majorities in Congress, gas prices haven’t just failed to go down, they’ve instead shot up to around $4.50 a gallon, meaning gas costs 50% more now than when Donald Trump entered office. Since the President began his reckless war with Iran without a plan to win, the American people have paid an additional $93 billion on gas in less than a year. And on average, each American family has had to spend $790 more on gas since this war began. And the President failed even more catastrophically to bring down diesel prices. Diesel now costs around $3 more a gallon than it did when the President took office. Farmers and truckers are weathering the highest prices for diesel in American history, with costs at the pump exceeding $6.50 a gallon last week. Now, it’s one thing to fail on a promise to lower the price of something, it’s quite another to be responsible for the highest price of that good ever recorded in our country’s history. The President also promised to make health care “affordable again.” Of course, that is not at all what happened. Instead, the President gutted Medicaid to take away health care from millions of Americans in order to pay for tax giveaways to billionaires like himself. He also allowed health insurance premiums to surge, meaning more families now pay more for insurance every single month, even if they don’t get sick. Just before the President took office, the average monthly cost for health insurance was $468 a month. The President did not reduce those premiums by a dime. Instead, families now pay $611 a month, that is almost $150 more monthly, almost $2000 more per year. $2000 dollars…dollars that could otherwise be spent on the mortgage, the rent, repairs for the car, let alone parents just using it to do something nice for their kids. And what about the cost of groceries? The President promised repeatedly that he would bring grocery costs down. Well, let’s look at the numbers. Since the President took office, ground beef has risen to $7 a pound. And coffee has risen from about $7 a pound to more than $9. Now I don’t know if the President is right when he says that groceries are an “old fashioned word” as he often claims, but I do know that old-fashioned math tells us that $9 is more expensive than $7. And let’s say we take everything all together…all the goods and services that we pay for every day and add it all up. How much, if at all, did the President and his allies in Congress, reduce costs? They failed to reduce costs at all. The American people have had to pay an additional $4,200 on goods and services since the President took office. The President had nearly two years to try to lower costs, and instead families had $4,200 more dollars taken out of their pockets. This isn’t a partisan point, this isn’t spin, this is just basic, mathematical facts — facts that make evident that the President both completely failed to lower costs and honestly didn’t even try. So, if the President failed to bring down costs, what has he been working on these last two years? Well, the President has been clear about his priorities: He is not interested in lowering costs for families. He is interested in raising monuments to honor himself. He hosted military parades in his honor. He destroyed the East Wing to build himself a golden ballroom. He’s been trying to put his name on other monuments. He is running taxpayer-funded ad campaigns praising himself. And, according to a new report from the Joint Economic Committee Minority, while the American people are paying more to keep up with high costs, the President wants to spend $1.8 billion on projects to flatter his own vanity. Now, we throw lots of numbers around in Washington, but it’s worth remembering what the American people know full well: This is real money we’re talking about. It’s the American people’s money. We owe it to them to ask: How could that same 1.8 billion dollars help them? What can $1.8 billion buy when it’s not being diverted by an apprentice dictator who, rightly fearing that no one will ever honor his presidency after he is gone, rushes to build gilded tributes to himself? $1.8 billion, it can buy a lot of things. It can pay for the electric bills for 12 million families for a month. It can fill up more than 35 million tanks of gas, even at the President’s new high prices. It can buy 600 million school lunches, fully paid for, so our children can have a good, healthy meal at school. $1.8 billion could hire around 30,000 new fire fighters to keep our communities safe. And it can pay all the medical expenses, every medical bill for more than 88,000 American veterans for an entire year. If the President insists on spending the people’s money on himself, he owes them an explanation. So, if I have one request today, it’s this: I want the President to explain why a monument to honor himself is a better use of taxpayer dollars than paying for health care for veterans? Is a ballroom to make one man feel like a King, more important than health care for a year for the heroes who fought to keep our country free? What more did America’s heroes, people who have given everything to this country, what more need to do, to deserve the $1.8 billion the President would rather spend to honor himself? And when in America did honoring service become less important than honoring one man’s ego? I know that a majority of Americans, including many of my Republican colleagues, also find the President’s vanity projects distasteful. But I think we all are doing a bit of play-acting if we forget that the President’s determination to shower himself in honors is not simply excessive, or a distraction, but is wrong, and is distinctly un-American. Consider our other Presidents. George Washington didn’t order the construction of the Washington Monument; Abraham Lincoln and Thomas Jefferson didn’t pick out sculptors to build their memorials; John F. Kennedy didn’t name the Kennedy Center; and none of them tried to put themselves on our currency. They received these honors from grateful citizens after their time in office. The current President is the only exception to this rule. George Washington was a rich man as well, but he used his wealth to support the Continental Army, he didn’t use his office to enrich himself. Nor did he have any interest in being a King. The reason why this matters is because the President’s desire to appease his own vanity and his failure to bring down costs are linked. Because it’s deeply telling that the President will go to such extravagant lengths to honor himself…he will break with American values and precedent when they stand in the way of his whims, he will use a wrecking ball to tear down buildings . He will spend great time and effort planning every detail, he will file court appeals while defying court orders, he will pilfer taxpayer funds, and even ignore the law and the Constitution…all just in his mission to leave a gilded tribute to himself…but he can’t be bothered to lift a finger to bring down costs…despite his promise to do so. What does this all reveal? It reveals that the President is uninterested in listening to what the American people want: The American people don’t want the President to build a golden ballroom; they want him to build homes that they can afford. They’re not asking for parades and car races on the National Mall; they want to pay less at the pump on their way to work. They don’t want his face on our currency; they want to keep more money in their pockets. So, in closing, what does the final accounting of the President’s broken promise tell us? Since the President took office, Americans have had to pay $4,200 more to keep up with rising costs…while the President spends $1.8 billion to keep up with his own ego. In short, it tells us that the President seeks to rule; but he is unable to lead. He seeks to honor himself; but he is unable to honor his word. ###