Joni Ernst: “So, yes, I don't want you to leave Mr. Shoemaker, or Shoemaker, without feeling you have gotten a fair shot at…”

From the fields in Iowa to the battlefields in Iraq, I have worked my entire life. Unlike most of my colleagues in the Senate, I am not a millionaire. I know what it is like to live paycheck to paycheck.

In 2024 alone, 10,100 million-dollar earners received nearly $97.4 million in unemployment compensation. That amounts to each being paid $9,650, roughly the cost of a new Rolex watch.

Because unemployment programs are funded primarily by taxing employers, this federal mandate is effectively a reverse Robin Hood tax that takes from struggling small businesses to give to the idle rich and self-sufficient.

Fraud is not a victimless crime, either.