Montana Sen. Steve Daines (R-Mont.) introduced legislation Monday condemning socialism as the 2020 Democratic presidential field pulls the Democratic Party further to the left in the midst of the campaign season.
“A radical, socialist, far-left movement is growing across this country. And it has taken root as the new voice of the Democratic Party,” Daines said on the Senate floor Monday, taking aim at Democrats’ Green New Deal and “Medicare-for-All” proposals pushed by candidates on the presidential campaign trail.
The proposed resolution would make it the official position of the U.S. Senate that Marxism and socialism are “failed ideologies,” while praising capitalism as “the greatest engine for human advancement in the history of the world, bringing more people out of poverty and into prosperity than any economic model in the history of mankind.”
In his floor remarks introducing the proposal, Daines evoked the world-renowned economist Milton Friedman.
“It was renowned economist Milton Friedman who said, ‘One of the great mistakes is to judge policies and programs by their intentions rather than their results,’” Daines said. “Radical Democrats are advocating for disastrous policies that would wreck our economy under the guise of cleaning up the environment,” Daines asserted.
The Green New Deal would indeed pose significant costs to Americans. According to a preliminary analysis of the legislation from the American Action Forum, a center-right D.C.-based think tank, the environmental components of the deal would cost $52,000 – $72,000 per household between 2020 and 2029 if enacted.
Medicare for All, Democrats’ new signature proposal for a government take-over of the health-care system, would also cost taxpayers a substantial amount. The Committee for a Responsible Budget, a bipartisan non-profit in Washington D.C., estimates that the proposal would cost approximately $28-$32 trillion over ten years. Sen. Bernie Sanders, the originator of the proposal, admits it requires raising taxes on the middle class.
Daines, who is an avid defender of President Donald Trump in the Senate, is up for re-election in 2020. Read a draft of the resolution on Fox News here.
