GOPs say they care about laid-off workers. But their actions and history show they don't

I've noticed that the GOP in both Wisconsin and Washington DC has publicly shown a lot more empathy in recent weeks when it comes to talking about those who have lost their jobs in the COVID-19 recession. It's also interesting that it seems to match up with their desire to remove Safer at Home restrictions.

On Meet the Press, Peter Navarro suggests stay at home orders correlate with “more suicides” & hence “kill many more people” than the coronavirus. That’s unproven. pic.twitter.com/6z3nj6eU0y https://t.co/qdHm5Rfh5H

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) May 17, 2020

Oh? First of all, there is little evidence that there has been a growth in suicide that is any more than we've seen in recent years, as former UW professor Don Moynihan points out. And Moynihan points out that GOPs weren't willing to do too much to fight the causes of those suicides as they grew in the 2010s, nor willing to take steps to prevent these people from getting a common weapon used to kill themselves.

The increase in suicides and deaths of despair more generally in the US have deeper causes - rising inequality and economic insecurity, limited access to health services, lack of regulation of prescription drugs - that GOP policies have worsened https://t.co/Ee7qpCHoSH

— Don Moynihan (@donmoyn) May 17, 2020

Plus, maybe we should care more about changing an economic system that puts people in such a perilous position that 6 weeks of unemployment makes them feel they have no other option but to off themselves.

Another GOP two-step is exemplified by State Rep. John Nygren, who all of a sudden seems to care a lot about people having to battle paperwork and understaffed state agencies to get their unemployment benefits.

We believe that one option DWD should explore is developing pre-approval procedures for certain UI claims that have a high likelihood of approval pending any reviews the dept. may need to conduct. Similar practices are done in Medicaid.

— John Nygren (@rep89) May 4, 2020

According to DWD’s website, call-centers are only open Monday through Friday from 7:35 AM until 3:30 PM, less than 40 hours a week. This is unacceptable. @FrostmanDWD needs to extend call center hours until the last unemployment claim is settled.

— John Nygren (@rep89) May 14, 2020

Not mentioned by Nygren is that he and all other WisGOPs in the Legislature put those barriers in place to begin with as a way to punish minorities Wisconsinites that they felt were "undeserving" of those benefits. And they had no problem with understaffing these agencies and not paying for new technologies over the last 9 years, as a pose to "shrink government" and keep taxes low for their rich and corporate campaign contributors. Funny how they changed that stance when it was their constituents dealing with the inevitable delays and problems with processing their claims caused by prior GOP barriers.

While I agree that getting aid out to laid-off individuals should be a top priority to stop the bleeding, it's worth noting that laid-off individuals that have received aid are in a much more stable situation than typical job-losers would, because of the added benefits in the CARES Act and other bills to deal with the crisis short-term.

On one side, availability of UI has expanded as states get past their bottlenecks, and the enhanced benefits in the CARES Act, which reached few people in April, are reaching many more now 3/

— Paul Krugman (@paulkrugman) May 17, 2020

This is where I remind you that John Nygren and other WisGOPs refused to remove the 1-week waiting period for unemployment benefits for several weeks, preventing Wisconsinites from getting their benefits sooner, and causing the state to unnecessarily lose $25 million in its unemployment fund. Those delays also prevented "gig economy" workers in Wisconsin from getting their unemployment benefits under the PUA program until mid-April.

Lastly, let's note that when Republicans are shedding these alligator tears about "getting people back to work", it's really a scam to force workers back into unsafe, underpaid situations. As former Obama health care official Andy Slavitt notes, what is happening in Georgia under Trumpist guv Brian Kemp and other GOP areas is motivated less by making our economy and quality of life better, but in keeping taxes lower for employers by allowing workers to be taken off of unemployment.

That’s not why Georgia is bad. Even if Kemp’s policies don’t end up causing massive spikes, they are still inhumane because they punish workers for doing what they believe is safe by eliminating unemployment compensation.

— Andy Slavitt @ 🏡 (@ASlavitt) May 16, 2020

And WisGOPs are especially disgusting when they try to claim they're just trying to help workers by re-opening the economy. They sure didn't care so much about workers when.

1. They used Act 10 and "right-to-work" laws to reduce the ability of a large swath of Wisconsin workers to organize as a group to demand better wages, benefits and working conditions.

2. They eliminated prevailing wage requirements that would make employment in the trades more worthwhile, and removed advantages to Wisconsin companies. Now these workers and companies are facing even more economic adversity due to COVID-19 shutdowns.

3. If WisGOPs are such an advocate for workers these days, maybe they can finally work to raise the minimum wage beyond the poverty level of $7.25 in this state. Or at the very least allow local communities to raise their minimum wages and work standards to fit local conditions (you know, like we have in regards to which businesses are open around the state after Safer at Home was struck down).

4. Also, shouldn't we be using federal COVID dollars to add on to the salaries of front-line health care workers that have to deal with COVID patients and are at higher risk of catching the virus? I never hear anything about that in WisGOP land, nor do I hear them mention that too many Wisconsinites are forced into jobs that pay so little and/or are so dangerous that a $600 add-on to unemployment benefits leaves people in a better spot than if they returned to work.

In fact, if/when the unemployment rates start dropping below the 14.7% we were at in April, and when they think they redirect the rage of enough Americans onto other issues, you can bet that the GOPs will say "we;ve paid enough", and start resuming their attacks on workers and benefits. Because when it comes down to it, Republicans only care about funneling money and power to their rich and corporate benefactors. And part of that strategy is to make us more desperate by removing benefits and social stabilizers, and force us to accept a declining quality of life.