A Fox Business host feels a-okay about the government shutdown--because it’s hurting federal workers. The host, Stuart Varney, says he sees the shutdown as an opportunity to “punish” government employees.
Varney made the comments on AM 560's The Big John & Amy Show, as Media Matters notes. Asked by radio host John Howell about paying federal workers back-pay they missed while laboring for no pay, Varney said: “I don't think they should get their back pay, frankly, I really don't. I'm sick and tired of a massive, bloated federal bureaucracy living on our backs, and taking money out of us, a lot more money than most of us earn in the private sector, then getting a furlough, and then getting their money back at the end of it.”
Varney added, “ I want to punish these people. Sorry to say that, but that's what I want to do.”
When radio host Amy Jacobson said the shutdown was not the federal workers’ fault, Varney agreed. But he continued to rail against them.
"I'm getting screwed. Here I am, a private citizen, paying an inordinate amount of money in tax. I've got a slow economy because it's all government, all the time,” said Varney. “And these people are living on our backs, regulating us, telling us what to do, taxing us, taking our money, and living large. This is my chance to say ‘hey, I'm fed up with this and I don't miss you when you're on furlough.’"