Donald Trump and Republicans in Congress shut down our government because they don’t want to lower health care costs for the American people. Afterward, Trump said that if Democrats don't bend the knee and let him take health care away, he's just going to turn around and inflict punishment by illegally firing American workers and withholding funding from states he doesn’t like.

That’s not governing. That’s a wannabe king taking hostages.

Since day one Trump has always been trying to shut down the parts of government he doesn’t like.

He gutted government agencies like the Department of Education. He fired thousands of federal workers doing essential jobs. He slashed funding for cancer, Alzheimer’s, and global vaccine research. He cancelled funding for PBS and NPR. He took funding from Medicaid and SNAP and gave it to billionaires. He’s tried to illegally erase millions of dollars for programs Congress already approved.

And now he has pushed the country into a government shutdown over his desire to make health care more expensive.

But make no mistake: Trump is still executing government functions and spending a lot of your taxpayer money during this shutdown — just not on anything that will actually help people.

During the shutdown, Trump announced that he’s sending $20 billion of American taxpayer dollars to bail out Argentina’s far-right government. As if that wasn’t enough, he just directed U.S. banks to divert ANOTHER $20 billion away from lending to American businesses, farmers, and families to prop up Milei's corrupt presidency and failing economy.

And oh — did you think that construction on Trump’s $200 million ballroom at the White House would stop because of the shutdown? No, it’s continuing uninterrupted, even as critical government services are suspended and essential employees like TSA agents and air traffic controllers aren’t getting paid.

That’s right. You might be losing your health care, and the government might be shut down, but don’t worry — Trump is hard at work sending billions of taxpayer dollars to Argentina and wining and dining the billionaire class to build his new ballroom.

And who’s paying the price? The American people, who are already fighting to stay afloat as costs skyrocket under Trump’s economy.

So much for “America First.”

Trump thinks he can write checks to his far-right friends in Argentina, give tax breaks to his billionaire buddies, bully any news outlet that’s critical of him, and take money away from communities. Put simply, he thinks he can reign like a king over Americans. But Americans don’t bow to any king (speaking of, you can find a No Kings rally near you this Saturday here).

This is the kind of stuff that petty tyrants and insecure dictators do — not the President of the United States. I won’t stand for it, and I’ll keep fighting to expose Trump’s corruption and hold him accountable for breaking the law and putting his billionaire donors and foreign right-wing leaders above the American people.

Thanks for being a part of this,

Elizabeth