“Let them eat cake” are words famously attributed to Mary Antoinette but they’d be just as unsurprising coming from Lara Trump, a person who willingly married into the Trump family (via Eric) and who likely considers anyone who makes less than $5 million a year a butler.
Addressing the shutdown in an interview with Bold TV, a conservative web outlet that no one had heard of until now, Trump blamed the Democrats “for playing politics” and went on to say:
“This is so much bigger than any one person. It’s a little bit of pain but it’s going to be for the future of our country. And their children and their grandchildren and generations after them will thank them or their sacrifice right now.”
To be fair Trump amended her incredibly insulting understatement with a glimmer of sympathy, saying:
“I know it’s hard. I know people have families, they have bills to pay, they have mortgagees, they have rents that are due.”
If Lara Trump truly does know those things, it’s only in the most theoretical sense.
Because if she actually knew what it feels like to be one delayed check away from losing your car, losing your house, and losing your next meal she wouldn’t think workers should grin and bear the cost just so that our recalcitrant president can use them as bargaining chips in his never-ending quest for a border wall.
Here’s what that “little bit of pain” looks and sounds like.
In the video below a government employee, who works as a guard at the Smithsonian, implores Mitch McConnell to end the shutdown before she is evicted from her home.
My God... https://t.co/js8YpWYiCK
— Joy Reid (@JoyAnnReid) January 23, 2019
Others gathered outside the Senate to protest, conducting one minute of silence for each of the shutdown’s 32 days.
32 minutes of silence—one for each day of the shutdown—as unpaid federal workers protest in the Senate’s Hart office building. pic.twitter.com/3ildwhYzcp
— Alex Wagner (@alexwagner) January 23, 2019
Some 800,000 federal employees are directly affected by the shutdown and when you consider family members, contractors, and related industries the number is easily in the millions.
These are security guards and airport employees – real people suffering real deprivation and life-altering negative consequences like losing their homes and their ability to buy food and medicine for themselves and their families.
In the interview Lara Trump also claimed that the American people support Donald Trump in shutting down the government to get his wall which is simply not true.
Recent polling shows that the opposite is true.
Americans respond to Lara Trump argument that government shutdown is a "bit of pain" worth it for the greater good of the border wall pic.twitter.com/bUSA6NsG3A
— David Frum (@davidfrum) January 23, 2019
Most observers with functioning brain cells weren’t impressed with Trump’s painfully out-of-touch remarks.
Wow. When millionaires claim it's okay that people can't feed their kids or pay their rent because it's not them suffering.#LaraTrump on federal workers struggling without pay:
— Victoria Brownworth (@VABVOX) January 23, 2019
It is a “bit of pain,” but “this is so much bigger than any one person." https://t.co/0o9QqORwvF
TL;DR: Let them eat gluten free cake!https://t.co/4v4NuHuzmq
— Jennifer Taub (@jentaub) January 23, 2019
"It is a little bit of pain", said Lara Trump, one of the richest women in America, "kind of like when Eric blew the head off of that elephant and was bummed because he couldn't mount it." #wednesdaywisdom #wednesdaythoughts https://t.co/cnGb5gMrX3
— Holly Figueroa O'Reilly (@AynRandPaulRyan) January 23, 2019
From the #TrumpFamily today:
— Michael Thomas (@in_pubs) January 22, 2019
Draft dodger successfully blocked real patriots from donning the uniform on base of gender.
A woman who is too lazy to work, married a rich toad, and told government workers that a wall is “bigger“ than their mortgage https://t.co/AvEOPK17KV
Lara Trump reminds you a wall that won’t work, which America doesn't want or need because there is no border crisis & which her compulsively lying father-in-law said Mexico would pay for is just a little bit more important than your child’s insulin, k?https://t.co/8uaH9Kpabl
— John Fugelsang (@JohnFugelsang) January 23, 2019
Lady with lots of money (and food) tells federal workers who aren’t getting paid and can’t afford food for their families to suck it up. https://t.co/f6knkzIxGq
— Kimberley Johnson (@AuthorKimberley) January 23, 2019
Not the stupidest thing Lara Trump ever said. That would be when she stood next to Eric Trump and said, "I do." https://t.co/2B4x027yjI
— Frank Conniff (@FrankConniff) January 23, 2019
If Lara Trump would like to pay my furloughed wife’s $600/month law school loans, our $2,100/month rent, or our $1,350/month day care bill, my email address is in my bio. https://t.co/4t6dtzYEck
— Bradford Pearson (@BradfordPearson) January 23, 2019
Lara Trump wants federal workers to know that the rumbling bellies of their children sets a delightful ambience, one her & Eric enjoy banging one out to while wearing rubber suits & rolling in the money made from scamming kids with cancer. Foundation of a good Christian marriage
— ?Aiden Wolfe (@AidenWolfe) January 23, 2019
The irony is I go through ‘a Little Bit of Pain’ every time I have to hear that insipid moron speak. https://t.co/9znIqiAzmM
— Molly Jong-Fast (@MollyJongFast) January 23, 2019
People who sit in the lap of luxury need to STFU about regular working folks and "a little bit of pain."
— BrooklynDad_Defiant! (@mmpadellan) January 23, 2019
YOU HAD 2 YEARS WITH A GOP CONGRESS TO GET WALL MONEY.
NOW YOU WANT TO HOLD 800K PAYCHECKS HOSTAGE?
Fuck ALL the way off, Lara trump. https://t.co/4zvWw1EJfI