Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema nodded to his late predecessor, Sen. John McCain, with a showy thumb vote for the Senate on Friday.
The video captured in the Senate chamber showed the newly elected Sinema making the decision to reject a proposal by Senator Bernie Sanders to include a $ 15 minimum wage increase in the Senate coronavirus relief package of $ 1.9 trillion of dollars.
Sinema was joined by seven other Senate Democrats and all Republicans.
McCain voted against the Senate’s plan to repeal Obamacare in 2018 with thumbs down that eventually sank the effort.
While he supports the salary increase, Sinema said he would support the Senate MP’s ruling that the minimum wage could not be included as part of the reconciliation process, a Senate protocol that allows for approval. the coronavirus relief bill with 51 votes as opposed to the usual 60 needed to overturn a filibuster.
“Senators on both sides have shown support for raising the federal minimum wage and the Senate should hold an open debate and amendment process on raising the minimum wage separate from the focused reconciliation bill in the COVID “, He said Sinema in a statement explaining his vote.
The sentiment did not go well among many in his own party, with the progressives having a particular rage. Sanders took the floor on Saturday to urge his colleagues to ignore the MP’s ruling, firing him as an employee of the unelected Senate.
New York representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was even more forceful.
“Imagine having the knives to go home and ask the minimum wage workers to support you after you come back with your own documented stance to help crush your biggest chance at a pay rise during the longest drought of salary increases since the beginning of the law, without shame, ”she said he said in a tweet.