Tenney needs to provide much-needed check on Trump’s disastrous decisions

Editor:

Congresswoman Claudia Tenney and her Republican colleagues are choosing to turn a strong economy into a recession. President Trump and Republicans inherited an economy that was considered the “envy of the world,” according to the Economist magazine.

Inflation was falling, wages, consumer spending, and corporation profits were rising, and unemployment was low. Just three months in, office and economists from Goldman Sachs, Moody’s Analytics, Wells Fargo, and others are predicting a significant slowdown in economic activity with J.P. Morgan saying that the risk of a recession this year is at 60 percent.

Ms. Tenney and her colleagues can vote to end the emergency powers the President is using to impose recession-inducing tariffs, and the Executive Orders he is using to cut the Department of Education, U.S. Agency for International Development and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau as well as massive layoffs at Health and Human Services, Veterans Administration, Social Security Administration and other agencies.

It is her constituents that will be hurt by these policies. Farmers in her district will pay more for fertilizer, and lose markets to sell their commodities, consumers in her district will pay more for groceries; meanwhile unemployment will increase, and veteran services will be cut in Batavia and Canandaigua, both in her district.

Congress, not the President, has the authority to levy tariffs and Congress, not the President, has the power to end agencies such as the U.S.A.I.D. or the Department of Education.

It is her job to be a check and balance on the executive branch of government especially when that Executive pushes policies that are economically harming her constituents. Her constituents elected her to be their voice in Washington, to put forth their concerns. Congresswoman Claudia Tenney is abdicating her responsibilities.

William Fine

Brockport