Red-state Dem: GOP tax bill ‘one of the shittiest bills’ ever

A Democratic senator from a traditionally red state sharply criticized the GOP tax bill on Wednesday after the bill passed the Senate.

Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.) told reporters Wednesday that the Republican plan to reform America’s tax code was “one of the shittiest bills that’s ever come in front of the Senate,” and remarked that the country had seen better days.

{mosads}

“We just passed one of the shittiest bills that’s ever come in front of the Senate last night… so you know the country’s seen better days,” Tester said in comments first reported by The Washington Post’s Ben Terris.

“We just passed one of the shittiest bills that’s ever come in front of the Senate last night… so you know the country’s seen better days.”

-Sen. Jon Tester, a Democrat from a red state up for reelection.

— Ben Terris (@bterris) December 20, 2017

A request for comment on the quote from Tester’s office was not immediately returned. Montana is a traditionally Republican-held state, where President Trump won with 56 percent of the vote in November. Tester, a Democrat who last won reelection to a second term in 2012, won with 48.6 percent of the vote.

Red-state Democrats have targeted the Trump administration over the tax bill, calling tax reform a missed opportunity for President Trump and Republicans to build bipartisan support among more centrist Democrats.

On Tuesday, West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin (D) lamented that Republicans would have found more Democratic support simply by making “an effort.”

“I was an easy pick up. Very easy pick up,” Manchin told the Politico podcast Off Message.

“And I had a couple — two or three other Democrats who would have been very easy pick ups if they just made an effort,” he added.

Tester previously went after Republicans earlier this month over the speed of the bill’s passage, complaining in a now-viral video about being handed thousands of pages of legislation just hours before a crucial vote.