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Bernie Sanders Grabs Attention On Senate Floor With Giant Trump Tweet Sending Meme Makers Into A Frenzy

By Inquisitr Staff
Published on: 04:16 PST, Jan 5, 2017

Bernie Sanders grabbed the attention of Congress on the Senate floor on Wednesday when he brought along a giant print-out of one of Donald Trump’s infamous tweets. Sanders used the Trump tweet, which dates all the way back to May 2015, to point out how the president-elect made a promise early on to not make cuts to Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid. The giant poster-sized Trump tweet was supposed to help Bernie Sanders make a point during a meeting in the U.S. Senate aimed at repealing Obamacare, but Us Weekly pointed out on Wednesday that the Trump tweet sent social media into a meme-making frenzy.

Mashable calls Bernie Sanders’ Trump tweet poster a “blank canvas on which to Photoshop,” which is exactly what the internet did. C-Span broadcast live the Senate meeting where Sanders unveiled his giant Trump tweet on Wednesday. The Senate resumed their debate on Thursday about how to repeal the Affordable Care Act once Donald Trump is sworn in as the 45th president of the United States on January 20. Repealing and replacing Obamacare was one of Trump’s campaign promises during the 2016 presidential election — a promise that won’t be a “clean political win” for Republicans, according to CNN on Tuesday.

Donald Trump, 70, actually tweeted early on Tuesday morning that he still believes Obamacare to be “lousy,” adding that it “just doesn’t work” and is not affordable. Just one day after Trump’s tweet, Congress met in the U.S. Senate to discuss a 2017 budget resolution and to write instructions on how to repeal President Obama’s Affordable Care Act, which was enacted nearly seven years ago as an attempt to increase health insurance coverage and affordability. According to a survey done by the CDC, Obamacare did lower the percentage of people without health insurance by over 7 percent from 2010 to 2016 by offering subsidies through government insurance exchanges and by expanding Medicaid.

However, even though President-elect Trump wants to repeal and replace Obamacare, Bernie Sanders, 75, an independent Senator from Vermont and former Democratic candidate for president, pointed out on Wednesday, in the form of a giant tweet printed on white foam board, that Trump also promised not to cut Medicaid. Trump made that promise over a year before winning the 2016 presidential election, stating that he was the “first and only” Republican presidential candidate to make that promise. NBC News reports that Bernie Sanders only wants Donald Trump to be held accountable for his campaign promise and made that very clear to not only the Senate but also the entire online community, who viewed the giant Trump tweet as a blank canvas on which to make memes.

Bernie Sanders’ own deputy communications director, Mike Casca, even said that Senator Ted Cruz “chuckled” when he walked past him carrying the giant Trump tweet poster, and online memes and jokes of the giant Trump tweet quickly went viral on Wednesday. Yahoo! reports that Sanders’ huge visual aid aimed at arguing against the repeal of Obamacare turned into Twitter users adding their own message, mocking the giant Trump tweet. One tweet by @jaydestro said that Sanders wanted to “spook the GOP,” but using the huge blow-up of Donald Trump’s tweet was “completely off the reservation.”

“Print it as large as you can and then glue it to a piece of cardboard.”

https://twitter.com/Four_Pins/status/816753120634171392

Other social media users agree that “change we need,” but the Boston Globe reports that Bernie Sanders “railed against” Trump and the Republicans during the Senate budget meeting on Wednesday for dismantling Obamacare without having a new law to replace it with. The giant Trump tweet was presented halfway through Sanders’ speech, where he told Congress that the Republicans have “no idea.”

“Their theme is to repeal, and then to delay. You don’t destroy a house without having another house.”

But, according to Yahoo! on Wednesday, Vice President-elect Mike Pence said that Donald Trump’s first priority will be to repeal the Affordable Care Act, starting with a “series of executive orders” on their first day in the White House.

Time Magazine shared a few more of the “most hilarious memes” of Bernie Sanders’ giant Trump tweet poster, along with a short video clip of Sanders speaking on the Senate floor.

[Featured Image by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images]

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