Today, Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW) named Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) our May 2021 Porker of the Month for her absurd tweet that “paid leave, child care and caregiving” are all “infrastructure.”

When President Joe Biden unveiled his $2.25 trillion American Jobs Plan, it was discovered that hundreds of billions of dollars in spending unrelated to traditional infrastructure were packed into the bill. Many of the items are simply an expensive wish list of big-government and socialist priorities that the country does not need and cannot afford. But it didn’t take long for big-spending members of Congress to jump to the defense of this wasteful spending, including Sen. Gillibrand. Her tweet claiming that “paid leave, child care and caregiving” are all “infrastructure” was quickly torn down by social media. If she picked up a dictionary, she would be able to read that the definition of infrastructure is “basic systems and services, such as transportation and power supplies.”

CAGW President Tom Schatz said, “At a time when our nation has $28 trillion in debt, it is disheartening to see members of Congress defend reckless spending to fit their agenda. Instead of focusing on true infrastructure priorities like roads and bridges, Sen. Gillibrand is putting taxpayer dollars at risk by including items that are not even close. If this $2.25 trillion infrastructure package becomes law, it will be one of the largest expansions of the federal government’s size and power in American history. Sen. Gillibrand is adding fuel to the fire and giving her fellow big spenders a license to waste the taxpayers’ money on frivolous “infrastructure” projects. For that, she is an obvious choice for CAGW’s May Porker of the Month.”

Citizens Against Government Waste is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to eliminating waste, fraud, abuse, and mismanagement in government. For more than two decades, Porker of the Month is a dubious honor given to lawmakers and government officials who have shown a blatant disregard for the interests of taxpayers.

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