"We've Begged, We've Pleaded": Kennedy Demands Answer From Shalanda Young On Lack Of Disaster Help

uh senator kennedy thank you mr chairman madam director how are you good i'm gonna fuss a little bit but i'm not fussing at you um i'm one of your big fans but i suspect you can get the white house on the phone quicker than i can if i make it to heaven the first question or at least one of the first questions i'm going to ask is why do bad things happen to good people but they do and as americans um when that does happen we help each other that's why we spend about a trillion dollars a year helping american citizens who are less fortunate some bad things happened to good people in southwest louisiana as you know uh they were hit uh we were hit by hurricane laura and hurricane delta in a very short period of time and if you go even today a year ago they hit it it still looks like a fantastic impression of hell we've asked president biden for uh for a block grant disaster relief and in the senate as you know the congress in the house can move on its own but in the senate we have to have a request from the white house we don't have to it's more custom than statute but many of my democratic colleagues when i lobby them on getting some assistance they say well what's the white house's position and i don't blame them if the shooter on the other foot that's what i would ask we can't get an answer from president about our request we've begged we've pleaded we've cajoled i've talked directly with the president when he honored us by coming to our state in new orleans let me choose my words carefully here i'm going i want to be candid but i don't want to be ugly look i understand politics i get that and i'm not saying that the president's decision is based on politics but we live in a political world and and i understand that president biden didn't care in louisiana in the last election i'm not saying that's dispositive of his decision or lack thereof but but a lot of people who went who really stuck their necks out for president biden have been are very supportive of this request governor john bel edwards in my state who happens to be a democrat he supported president biden enthusiastically my colleague congressman cedric richmond supported president biden enthusiastically they went way out on the limb for him and they deserve and and the people louisiana deserve an answer now obviously i hope the answer from the president is yes but we deserve an answer and i can't get one can you help me the senator ken i'm going to give you an answer and we absolutely for every democratic senator republican senator we want to see eight move to louisiana and every other state uh i believe the last time which i worked on the congressional side the last uh disaster declaration or disaster package that moved through congress took care of the front half of 2019 storms we don't earmark disaster storms because there's no room for politics and disaster response period agreed agree absolutely so we need to do something for those storms from the second half of 2019 and 2020 up to date um so do not a disagreement on strategy but you know i worked on the hill for a long time moved disaster bills we didn't get a disaster supplemental request from an administration but let me put clearly on the record we support moving aid for louisiana and every other state that's been hit by declaration since the last time we passed the supplement could you ask the president to send us a letter to that i believe um he asked me to respond and you may ask ma'am and i got your letter no disrespect but it didn't say that yeah the president asked me to call the mayor of lake charles which i did and we had a great conversation of baton rouge home city could could could you send me a letter or better or let the president send whatever you want to do it says categorically unequivocally unconditionally i support the block grant disaster relief relief for southwest west louisiana with respect to hurricanes laura and delta yep i thought we did that but i'm happy to do it in more stronger terms would you yeah we we you want me to do that you want me to draft the letter for you nope okay help is needed senator and we we we're there with director thank you so much

Channel: Forbes Breaking News

Views: 425,917

Keywords: Sen. John Kennedy, Shalanda Young, President Biden

Id: wr09Q3aujaw

Length: 5min 33sec (333 seconds)

Published: Tue Jun 08 2021