In the News

By: Aneeta Mathur-Ashton

Since 2004, Democratic Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz has played a pivotal role in the Democratic Party on and off the Hill.

As the ranking member of the House Appropriations Committee, she has had a front-row seat in one of the most important committees responsible for funding the government. And as the former chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee, she was the head of the party and played a key role in boosting former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s bid for the White House in 2016.

Now with President Donald Trump back in office, she is turning her attention to what she calls dangerous budget cuts and calling for accountability in the wake of Signalgate.

U.S. News & World Report sat down with Wasserman Schultz to talk about the Democrats’ role in

budget negotiations, what should happen with Signalgate and how to address the debt ceiling.

The following interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Between what happened during the fight to fund the government and claims from some Democrats that Republicans have walked away from the negotiation table, how will it impact the response to whatever comes out of budget tlks?

“What the Republicans are doing is incredibly dangerous.

“We're not going to be part of that because they refuse to work with us on a reasonable approach to policy making and when it comes to our budget. So we're fighting Medicaid cuts and cuts to Social Security and the hundreds of millions of dollars they proposed in cuts to biomedical research.

“As a cancer survivor, that makes my blood boil. We probably wouldn't be sitting here talking today if I wasn't able to know that I carried the BRCA 2 mutation, which would never have been discovered without federal research.”

How do you respond to comments from some Republicans, like Rep. Tim Burchett of Tennessee, who say Medicaid won’t be cut?

“That is their smoke and mirrors garbage.

“When the reconciliation bill, which includes actual cuts, is put on the floor, the targets that they put in their budget blueprint include $880 billion in health care cuts that they've directed the Energy and Commerce Committee to propose. Every expert out there has said you cannot avoid cutting Medicaid deeply.

“The way that they are trying to cover that they are really doing this is saying that the actual cuts, rather than the plans for the cuts, are not in the bills we've passed. But the plans that are in those bills will lead to those cuts.”

If you had your way, how would you address the debt ceiling?

“Just pay our bills, this is not that hard. We should just raise the debt ceiling very straightforwardly and at an amount recommended by our economic experts and move on.

“The best analogy is always like ‘I have credit card bills and I'm not going to pay them.’ Eventually, that will catch up with every family and people get into dire financial straits when they don't pay their bills.”

What did you think of the news that senior leaders were using a Signal chat to discuss military operations?

“If they can't even be careful enough and understand what critical national security requires in a discussion, how can they keep our country safe? How can we count on them to protect our national security interests when they were that cavalier? And on top of that, someone added a reporter?

“These are people who should know better, or for the newer people like (Director of National Intelligence) Tulsi Gabbard or (Defense Secretary) Pete Hegseth, neither of whom are qualified for their positions to begin with, maybe they didn't know better. Or maybe they didn't take the instructions they were given seriously or maybe they weren't given to them at all. But that just shows you that resignations need to be flying, and if not, then firings.”

How do you respond to comments from Republican lawmakers like Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas comparing the scandal to a simple mistake?

“Those are not fair comparisons. You know when you've been added to a text chain, particularly if you've participated in it. That’s obfuscation. They are just trying to get past this as quickly as possible so the world moves on.

“I already doubted because of the lack of competence and lack of qualifications of Trump’s selections. But this proves it and will leave us more vulnerable and it also jeopardizes our relationship with other countries.

“Who's going to want to share their national intelligence information with us if they think that these are people that treat this like nothing more than a butt dial or a wayward sentence on a hot mic?”

Is the Republicans’ conflation of Signalgate with the scandal over Hillary Clinton’s emails appropriate?

“Hillary Clinton always said and proved that she was willing to come in and answer questions and she did. She was out of office by the time that conversation happened, and it was Republicans who brought her in front of the committee.

“Republicans now aren’t even acknowledging that it was a terrible mistake and that they shouldn't have done it. That's what the MAGA Trumpers always do – they just obfuscate. They push things along and try to hunker down and move past it and refuse to be held accountable or to correct it.”

And now to end on a lighter note, you've been in Congress since 2004. What have you learned to do while in office?

“One thing I've learned to do is to over-communicate. This is a legislative process and the most effective way to get things done is to make sure that you communicate as much as you can with anyone and everyone who can help you move a policy goal down the field.”

What about what you’ve learned not to do?

“I wouldn't talk about highly classified information over an unsecured unclassified text chain.”

https://www.usnews.com/news/politics/articles/2025-03-31/rep-debbie-wasserman-schultz-gop-budget-cuts-are-dangerous-signalgate-requires-firings