Warren: Billionaires who ‘have enough money to shoot themselves into space’ will pay for reconciliation bill

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) on Wednesday said billionaires who “have enough money to shoot themselves into space” will pay for the Democrats’ multitrillion-dollar reconciliation bill that is still being negotiated in Congress.

Warren, when asked during an interview on “The View” where the money will come from to pay for the $3.5 trillion package, pointed to billionaires and corporations, specifically mentioning Amazon after its founder Jeff Bezos took a trip to space this summer.

“The money is going to come from the billionaires who don’t pay their taxes and therefore have enough money to shoot themselves into space,” Warren said.

“It’s going to come from giant corporations like Amazon who turn around and say their shareholders and the public we made $10 billion in profits last year, and you know how much we paid in taxes, zero,” Warren continued. 

She added that Congress is “going to cut that out, that’s what’s at stake here.”

Sen. @ewarren on moving towards a deal on Biden’s agenda: “I want the folks on the other side to put on the table what they don’t want.”

“The money is going to come from the billionaires who don’t pay their taxes and therefore have enough money to shoot themselves into space.” pic.twitter.com/TEmE27E8SX

— The View (@TheView) October 13, 2021

Democrats on Capitol Hill are still hashing out the details of the massive social spending program, which will include investments in education, health care and climate change, among other areas.

The party plans to pass the bill through reconciliation, which will buck a potential GOP filibuster by only requiring a simple-majority vote for passage.

But that’s still proving difficult, as internal disagreements within the Democratic Party delay the passage of the package, which is a key part of President Biden’s agenda.

Moderate Sens. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) have taken issue with the price tag of the passage, contending that it is too high. And both of their votes are necessary to passing the bill in the Senate. 

Warren on Wednesday urged outstanding senators to “put on the table what they don’t want, what they want to cut.”

“Every time somebody says to me well I don’t like that price tag, my answer is, then tell me what you want to cut,” she said.

Warren, however, is now arguing that there is “enough money there” to fund the entire package, pointing to billionaires and corporations.

​​”Believe me, the billionaires and the giant corporations, there’s enough money there to cover the entire ticket and I believe we should pay for every single thing we’re doing, or should I say, I believe the billionaires and the giant corporations should,” she said. 

Warren’s comments about billionaires launching into space come nearly three months after Bezos launched into space in July aboard a rocket and capsule that was developed by his spaceflight company, Blue Origin.

On Wednesday, another Blue Origin rocket launched into space, this time carrying Star Trek actor William Shatner, Blue Origin’s Vice President of Mission and Flight Operations Audrey Powers and two paying customers: Chris Boshuizen and Glen de Vries.