Corey Lewandowski, President Donald Trump’s former campaign manager, is calling for voters to hold the President accountable for the pledges he made during the election.
“Elected officials need to be held accountable,” Lewandowski said Thursday at an event at The City Club in Cleveland. “And the President is my friend but if he doesn’t fulfill those promises, if he doesn’t follow through on the things he told the American people he will do, the accountability is at the ballot box in three and a half years.”
Lewandowski listed several of Trump’s campaign promises that have yet to be realized.
“He has pledged to repeal and replace Obamacare, that is not done yet,” Lewandowski said. “He has pledged to provide the largest tax cut in American history. He has pledged to invest a trillion dollars in infrastructure spending. And he has pledged to build a wall.”
The President’s agenda has seen very few victories during his Trump’s time in office. A CNN analysis of the first six months of his tenure found that of the more than 40 pieces of legislature he signed into law, none contained “big ticket” items. One of Trump’s hallmark campaign promises, the repeal and replacement of Obamacare, was defeated last week in the Senate after months of setbacks and negotiations.
Lewandowski said that the responsibility for these setbacks does not lie solely with Trump. Like the President, Lewandowski also blamed Congress for legislative inaction that’s stymieing the administration’s agenda.
“Congress is … a tough partner,” Lewandowski remarked. “You would think they’d be ready on day one with a repeal bill of Obamacare, you’d think they’d be ready on day one with a tax cut package.”
“Congress did none of these things,” he continued. “They’ve done none of them, and that’s a problem.”
The American people “will hold people accountable at the ballot box, both in Congress, in the Senate, and ultimately in the presidency if they don’t follow through on what their commitments are,” Lewandowski added later in his remarks.
Lewandowski praised recent White House staff shakeups, saying that appointing Gen. John Kelly as his chief of staff “is exactly what this White House needs” and that he believes the change should have happened “three months ago.”
“What you need is not chaos in the White House, what you need is consistency,” he said. “What you need is the President focused on the big picture and implementing his agenda.”
“Mistake after mistake after mistake — it’s time to understand, it’s time to get to work,” he added. “That’s what the American people voted for.”