Sen. Ernst rips the $15 minimum wage hike as 'progressive dream' that will dissolve over one million jobs

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Sen. Ernst rips $15 minimum wage hike: ‘Decision better left to states and localities’

Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, reacted to the impeachment trial of former President Donald Trump and the House of Representatives pushing ahead with the $15 minimum wage increase.

The $15 minimum wage increase is a "progressive dream that would cost over a million American jobs," Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, said on Wednesday.

"Well, this is a progressive dream," Ernst told "America's Newsroom."

A federally mandated minimum wage increase would have different implications for states in middle America than it would for a city like New York, Ernst argues.

"I love hearing folks like Chuck Schumer arguing for a 15-dollar minimum wage when he is in New York City, which is a high cost of living state and city. But what they are forgetting, these progressive liberals, is the folks in Middle America where our cost of living is much lower," Ernst said.

DEMS ON HOUSE COMMITTEE APPROVE $15 MINIMUM WAGE IN STIMULUS PACKAGE DESPITE CBO WARNING 1.4M JOBS AT RISK

Ernst's comments came after Democrats on the House Committee on Education and Labor approved a $15 federal minimum wage proposal included in President Biden's coronavirus relief package in the early hours of Wednesday morning.

"It's a wrap, $15 #MinimumWage passes the [Education and Labor] committee after more than 13 hours of debate," committee member Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., wrote on Twitter around 4:30 a.m. on Wednesday.

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Ernst pressed that raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour will put 1.4 million Americans out of work.

"We don't want to say that we don't want to kill small business. I think this is a decision that is better left up to our states and localities," she said.

Furthermore, she said that Biden's coronavirus package includes "liberal elitist pipe dreams."

"It is more than Iowans want to spend. They want to focus on COVID-19 recovery. And that's not what this bill is all about. It's about bailing out, bailing out states with bad behavior, with their budgets, and it's about raising the federal minimum wage. What we need to do is open the economy and get people back to work."