Kennedy pointed to a series of foreign aid initiatives, which included millions of dollars for circumcisions and vasectomies in Zambia, and funding for transgender programs in Nepal.
During the third day of the ongoing government shutdown on Friday, Senator John Kennedy took to the Senate floor, where he criticized Democratic lawmakers for “egregious and wasteful” spending priorities, accusing them of holding the country “hostage.”
Kennedy pointed to a series of foreign aid initiatives that have raised eyebrows, which included millions of dollars for circumcisions and vasectomies in Zambia, funding for transgender programs in Nepal, and $4.2 million worth of LGBTQ initiatives in the Western Balkans and Uganda. He noted other examples, including $3.6 million in cooking classes and dance focus groups for male prostitutes in Haiti, half a million dollars for electric buses in Rwanda, $6 million for media organizations for Palestinians, and $300,000 for a pride parade in Lesotho.
Later that day, Kennedy appeared on Fox News, where he claimed Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer was not in control of his party and that far-left lawmakers were calling the shots.
"Senator Schumer is getting a lot of the blame, and Lord knows, he deserves it because he instructed all the Senate Democrats to vote to shut down government. But he is not really calling the shots,” Kennedy said. “The group calling the shots is the socialist wing, the moon wing of the Democratic Party, because they’re in control.”
“Senator Schumer is trying to ingratiate himself to the socialist wing of his party," he continued. "And I have to tell you, I don’t hate anybody. I don’t mean any disrespect, but based on her policies and beliefs, Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez is single-handedly trying to put an end to dumb blonde jokes. I mean, based on her policies, $1.5 trillion, she must be bilingual. She is speaking English and stupid. There is no way we’re going to go along with this, and that’s why we’re in a shutdown.”
The Senate on Friday failed to pass a House-approved measure that would have kept the government funded through November 21. Senate Majority Leader John Thune was unable to secure the 60 votes needed to move the seven-week funding extension forward, with the final vote count at 54–44, extending the shutdown into next week.
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