Senator Kennedy Torches Washington’s Elite Idiocy [WATCH]

Sen. John Kennedy discussed a newly signed bill aimed at stopping federal payments from being sent to deceased individuals, describing the issue as widespread fraud involving various government checks.

Kennedy explained that the problem extended beyond Social Security benefits.

“The idea that we send billions of dollars to dead people and they get cash, the checks get cashed. It’s obviously a lot of fraud. And we’re talking about Social Security checks. No, we’re talking about all kind of checks, all kinds of checks,” Kennedy said.

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He described how the Social Security Administration maintains a list of deceased individuals but had not been sharing that information with other agencies.

“When you die, Katie, your name, not that you’re going to die anytime soon, but when you die, your name goes to the Social Security Department. They have a list of dead people, and but they wouldn’t share it with anybody else. They wouldn’t share it with the Department of Treasury, for example,” Kennedy said.

Kennedy said he approached the agency directly to ask why the information was not being shared.

“And I went to them, and I said, why won’t you tell Treasury who the dead people are? And Social Security said, well, we don’t have the legal authority. And I said, Sure, you do. And they said, No, we don’t. So I knew I wasn’t going to get anywhere with them. So I had to go pass a bill,” he said.

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The Louisiana senator said the legislative effort took four years and faced resistance before ultimately being approved and signed into law.

“Took four years to pass the bill. I had, believe it or not, I had opposition, but we finally got it passed, and the President signed it yesterday. And so far as I can tell, dead people can still vote, but they can’t cash checks, because we’re not going to be sending them to them anymore, and it’s going to save billions and billions and billions of dollars,” Kennedy said.

Kennedy also addressed cooperation from state officials, saying that responses varied.

“Well, every state is different. Some state governors cooperate. Some of them don’t. Governor Walz didn’t cooperate. He knew about this fraud. He knew all about it. No, you know, and he got about it. I’m sorry, no offense to the governor, but he learned to lie before he learned to talk,” Kennedy said.

During the discussion, Kennedy referenced his book, explaining that it uses storytelling to illustrate policy points.

“This book, I think the reason it’s done okay is because it’s not a policy book, per se. It’s a storybook. I use real stories to make to make my points about policy, and some of the stories will make you laugh. Some of them are very bizarre. All of them are true. I hope the book will make people think. I can say it’s all true, and they make you want to day drink, because some of it’s not pretty,” he said.

Katie Pavlich posed a question about Washington’s political climate.

“Why is it that Washington will never test negative for stupid?” Pavlich asked.

Kennedy responded by criticizing what he described as a culture of misplaced priorities in the nation’s capital.

“Well, I don’t know. Maybe it’s something in the water. There are a lot of of intelligent people in Washington, but I call them high IQ stupid people. They’ve got a lot of education, but no sense this, this place is, some days it’s like the game room of a mental hospital up here,” Kennedy said.

He added that dysfunction is not limited to one chamber of Congress.

“I’ve got a lot of friends in the house, and Mike Johnson is a good friend of mine, and Steve Scalise, Jim Jordan, and many others, but, and I shouldn’t say this, but they’re not any better or worse than the Senate, both chambers sometimes are like a circus without a tent,” Kennedy said.

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