Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, the ranking member on the Senate Homeland Security panel, is being ridiculed online for abruptly walking out of a committee markup Wednesday morning after clashing with the panel’s chairman, Sen. Gary Peters (D-Mich.), over amendments.
The Republican senator vented his frustration over Peters’s use of procedural tactics to effectively shield Democrats on the committee from voting on Republican amendments to the Fire Grants and Safety Act.
Peters offered second-degree amendments to the Republican-sponsored amendments that completely gutted their content.
At one point, Paul suggested that all the Republican members walk out of the committee meeting.
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“If this is the way you’re going to run the committee, I would suggest that Republicans leave. I don’t see why we should stick around if you’re going to make up the rules,” Paul said hotly.
The atmosphere in the room got so tense that Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (Ariz.), who left the Democratic Party to become an Independent in December, suggested that “we all take a couple minutes, lower the temperature, just figure out the procedure.”
“There’s no need for us to turn this committee hearing into a partisan, ugly place like we’ve seen in other committees,” she pleaded.
Sens. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) and James Lankford (R-Okla.) stayed in the room to vote against the amendments modified by Democrats after Paul walked out.
The acrimonious scene was a departure from how the Homeland Security Committee operated in 2021 and 2022, when Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) served as the panel’s ranking member.
In the recent past, Democrats on the committee have sometimes sat on the Republican side of the dais and vice versa to promote a sense of bipartisan camaraderie.
But things have gone awry ever since Paul took over as the top-ranking Republican on the panel after Portman retired in early January.
Watch the heated exchange and some of the reactions below:
Watch Dems stymie my amendment to forbid grants to fire departments that fired the unvaxxed. pic.twitter.com/2e0Kg1lk77
— Senator Rand Paul (@SenRandPaul) March 16, 2023
Poor little bitter scrotumhead you.
— JakkoLantern (@JakkoLantern13) March 16, 2023
— drauger12 ☀️ 🌻 🌻 (@RealDrAug) March 16, 2023
you work for Putin
— Estimated Profit 🐀 (@ERevandy) March 16, 2023
Your neighbor had the right idea 🤡
— Horatio Seymour (@HoratioSeymour) March 16, 2023
— Lucy Bowen (@Nanny_lucy) March 16, 2023
‘
You’re a puppet for Vlad and pic.twitter.com/8N4Pwa4F8K
— Mary Ellen Hill (@yasmin5235) March 16, 2023
— 10thingsIthinkIthink (@10thingsIthink) March 16, 2023
