Page 6 - Florida Sentinel 5-30-17

White House And Political News
HUD Secretary Says Poverty Is A ‘State Of Mind’
Cong. Elijah
Trump Applauds Win Of
Cummings
Montana Candidate That
Dr. Ben Carson, the head of the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), faced intense backlash on last Wednesday for calling poverty “a state of mind'.
Dr. Carson, who oversees a department that handles hous- ing for millions of low-income Americans, made the comments during a radio interview on last Tuesday.
“I think poverty to a large ex- tent is also a state of mind,” he said, according to a transcript of the interview that was released on Wednesday. “You take some- body that has the right mind- set, you can take everything from them and put them on the street, and I guarantee in a little while they’ll be right back up there.”
He added that helping people may not better their lives.
“You take somebody with the wrong mind-set, you can give them everything in the world — they’ll work their way right back down to the bottom,” he said.
The remarks caused an im- mediate uproar on Twitter.
Trump Appoints New Attor- ney For HUD
On Wednesday, President Trump announced that an- other Alabamian would be se- lected to fill a key role in his
Recovering
Body Slammed Reporter
From Heart
President Donald Trump celebrated Republi- can Greg Gianforte’s vic- tory in Montana’s special Congressional election all the way from Italy on Friday, telling reporters there that the incoming GOP lawmaker had secured a “great win in Montana.”
The president did not elab- orate any further on his re- mark, made unprompted to the pool of media members traveling with the president on his eight-day, multi-nation international trip.
Gianforte’s win keeps Montana’s lone seat in the House of Representatives under Republican control after Ryan Zinke vacated it to become Trump’s secre- tary of the interior.
The win was not without last minute drama, which ar- rived on the night before the election when Gianforte was cited for misdemeanor assault after he reportedly
Surgery
HUD Sec. Ben Carson contin- ues to make uneducated and controversial statements.
administration.
J. Paul Compton Jr., has
been chosen by Trump to serve as the General Counsel at the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). Currently, Compton serves as leader of an Alabama-based firm’s Affordable Housing and Community Development prac- tice.
As the General Counsel of HUD, Compton will work alongside Secretary Ben Car- son by providing legal opin- ions, advice, and services regarding departmental pro- grams and activities. He will also play a major role in the de- partment’s efforts to enforce the Fair Housing Act.
U.S. Rep. Elijah Cummings
Rep. Elijah Cummings,
the ranking Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, is in the hospital after undergoing heart surgery on Wednesday, his office said Thursday.
Cummings, who represents the state's 7th Congressional District, was treated at Johns Hopkins Hospital after what aides described as a minimally invasive procedure called trans arterial aortic valve replace- ment, used to correct the nar- rowing of the aortic valve.
”The congressman will remain in the hospital for a few days and will return to his normal schedule thereafter," a state- ment from his office said.
A spokeswoman said the sur- gery was previously scheduled. The House is set to leave Wash- ington for the Memorial Day re- cess next week.
Cummings, 66, the top De- mocrat on the House Oversight and Government Reform Com- mittee, was first elected to the district in 1996. An attorney and former Maryland state law- maker, Cummings has be- come an outspoken critic of the Trump administration and has been calling for more aggressive investigation into whether the Trump campaign colluded with Russian attempts to dis- rupt last year's election.
He will then “return to his normal schedule thereafter,” ac- cording to a statement.
Greg Gianforte won the con- gressional seat in Montana. The night before the election he body-slammed a reporter because he did not like the question he asked.
body-slammed a reporter asking a question about the incoming congressman’s po- sition on the House-passed legislation to repeal and re- place Obamacare.
Gianforte apologized for the incident in his victory speech Thursday night.
Obamacare Repeal Remains In Laps
Of Republican Senators And They Are Stuck
Congressional Budget Office: 23 Million Will Lose Healthcare By 2026 Under Republican Plan
Protesters outside the House of Representatives after the vote to repeal Obamacare.
A feeling of pessimismis set- tling over Senate Republicans as they head into a weeklong Me- morial Day recess with deeply uncertain prospects for their push to repeal Obamacare.
According to Politico, sena- tors reported that they’ve made little progress on how to scale back Obamacare's Medicaid ex- pansion and overall Medicaid spending. Republicans are near agreement on making tax cred- its for low-income, elderly Americans more generous.
Republicans have started writing the very basics of their repeal legislation, even though they've made few decisions
about what it will say. According to reports, frustra-
tions are rising and confidence is diminishing.
Senators privately reported being surprised by Senate Ma- jority Leader Mitch Mc- Connell’s assessment on last Wednesday that he doesn’t know how the party gets the requisite 50 of the party’s 52 members on board.
The bill that Republican U.S. Representatives pushed to pass, and did a happy dance after this month to dis- mantle the Affordable Care Act would leave 14 million more people uninsured next year than under President Barack Obama’s health law — and 23 million more in 2026, the Congressional Budget Office said Wednes- day.
Under the House bill, the number of uninsured would be slightly lower, but deficits would be somewhat higher, than the budget office esti- mated before Republican leaders made a series of
changes to win enough votes for passage.
In many states, insurance costs could soar for con- sumers who are sick or have pre-existing conditions, while premiums would fall for the healthy, the new estimate concludes.
The forecast by the nonpar- tisan Congressional Budget Office, Capitol Hill’s official scorekeeper, is another po- tential blow to efforts to undo Mr. Obama’s signature do- mestic achievement.
Republican senators have said they will make substan- tial changes to the measure passed by the House.
PAGE 6 FLORIDA SENTINEL BULLETIN PUBLISHED EVERY TUESDAY AND FRIDAY TUESDAY, MAY 30, 2017