The Senate is considering the nomination of California Attorney
General Xavier Becerra to be Secretary of the Department of Health and Human
Services. Without question, the Senate should reject this nomination.
In the midst of this pandemic, America deserves a health secretary
who is solely focused on getting shots in arms, getting kids back to school,
and getting parents back to work. But that’s not Mr. Becerra. Over his long
career in politics, his primary passion has been ramming through a radical, far-left
agenda and using the power of his office to persecute his political enemies.
Mr. Becerra would be in charge of administering the nation’s
health programs—but he has virtually no experience or expertise in healthcare.
His only experience responding to the pandemic, as far as I can tell, has been his
enforcement of California’s excessive and traumatizing lockdowns over the last
year.
Mr. Becerra has been California’s top cop overseeing the most
draconian and unconstitutional series of lockdowns anywhere in our country. He
has shuttered churches while liquor stores and marijuana dispensaries remain
open. He has destroyed small, family-owned businesses while enriching massive
corporations. In the false name of “public health,” he has rigorously enforced
unscientific and unproductive measures that have ruined the lives of
Californians. Today, California’s unemployment rate stands at 9 percent, 45 percent
higher than the national average and nearly two times higher than our
unemployment rate in Arkansas. That’s the result of bad policy—and jobless
Californians have Xavier Becerra and Gavin Newsom to thank for their struggles.
If Mr. Becerra’s record as Attorney
General is any indication, every American should be alarmed by how this nominee
would fight the pandemic—not with science, compassion, or common sense, but with
crushing political force. Few Americans believe that California’s Lockdown
Commissar deserves a promotion. Unfortunately, the Senate may just give him
one.
Mr. Becerra is also a vocal advocate for the socialist takeover of
healthcare known euphemistically as “Medicare for All.” He supports destroying
union healthcare plans, crushing Medicare Advantage, and ultimately taking away
your health insurance on the job, which covers—I would add—158 million
Americans. This disastrous boondoggle would cost $34 trillion and would
inevitably result in the rationing of care—hurting senior citizens most of all.
“Medicare for All” would in reality result in “Medicare for None.” Last year,
President Biden acknowledged that Medicare for All would yield massive tax hikes
for middle-class families. Yet, Joe Biden selected a supporter of this
disastrous “Medicare for All” plan to be his top cabinet official on
healthcare.
And of course, Becerra wouldn’t be a Biden administration nominee
if he didn’t also support open borders. But he has gone further on open borders
than even the other Biden administration officials, saying out loud what so
many Democrats silently believe. He has openly argued for the decriminalization
of illegal immigration. He has even stated with a straight face that illegal
immigration does absolutely no harm at all—directly or indirectly—to American
citizens. If Mr. Becerra really believes that, he is hopelessly naïve and needs
to get out a little more.
He can start by talking to the millions of Americans who are out
of work, or whose wages have stagnated thanks to competition from illegal
aliens. He could also visit the graves of thousands of Americans killed by
Mexican drugs and terrorized by gangs like MS-13. If confirmed, Mr. Becerra
would oversee our nation’s response to the drug crisis and the maintenance of
many migrant detention facilities. His radical open-borders advocacy would make
matters worse on both fronts. It would also fuel the ever-growing surge of
unvetted, untested, and unvaccinated illegal aliens into our nation—spreading
the coronavirus in our communities just as it looks like we’re about to turn
the corner on this pandemic.
And finally, Mr. Becerra holds opinions on abortion that are
unacceptable, unjust, and far outside the mainstream. As a member of Congress,
he voted in favor of partial-birth abortion—a disturbing and deadly procedure
performed in the very last stages of pregnancy. And as California’s Attorney
General, he tried to destroy anyone who opposed his extreme position on this
issue. He brought 15 felony charges against pro-life undercover journalists who
exposed Planned Parenthood’s illegal and disgusting sale of baby body parts—a
move that even the liberal Los Angeles Times called “disturbingly aggressive.”
He defended an unconstitutional law that would have forced pro-life crisis
pregnancy centers to advertise for abortions, the very thing that it’s their
mission to oppose—something the Supreme Court called a “serious threat” to
freedom of speech.
He even sued to force an order of nuns, the Little Sisters of the
Poor, to purchase healthcare coverage that violated their sincerely held
religious beliefs. And when he was asked about this in the Senate, like any
bully, he tried to cover it up, denying that he sued the Little Sisters at all.
If he will sue the Little Sisters, then what will he do to you and your family?
A few of my colleagues have indicated they’ll vote for Xavier
Becerra despite disagreeing with these radical views. Perhaps they think those
are just his personal beliefs—that he won’t practice what he preaches. Perhaps
they think he won’t undermine pro-life protections like the Hyde Amendment and
use his office to persecute Catholic nuns. I’d ask those colleagues to look at Mr.
Becerra’s records, not the words he utters to get your vote—and then, to
reconsider their support.
Because any honest assessment will show that Xavier Becerra is a
partisan culture warrior who has consistently abused his office to punish his
enemies and to enact far-left policies in Congress and in California. If the
Senate confirms his nomination, they will be empowering Mr. Becerra to bring
California’s lockdowns, lawsuits, and liberal policies to all of our fifty
states, and that would be a disaster for our country.
I’ll close with a simple request for President Biden, who campaigned
on unity and ending a terrible pandemic: merely, do what you said you’d do. Send
us a nominee who will unify the country and bring consensus—not one who will
scrape by on the slimmest of majorities. Send us a nominee who is actually a
health-care expert—and the Senate will gladly consider them.
Xavier Becerra is not that nominee, and the Senate should reject
his nomination resoundingly.