Providing for Consideration of Senate Amendment to House Amendment to Senate Amendment to H.R. 4213, Unemployment Compensation Extension Act of 2010

Floor Speech

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Mr. McGOVERN. I thank the gentleman for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of this rule and the underlying bill. Mr. Speaker, all I can say is it's about time. And to my friends on the other side of the aisle, let me say it's a shame that it has taken this long. For 7 weeks, millions of Americans who have lost their jobs through no fault of their own have worried about how they are going to pay for their groceries, pay for their rent, pay for their mortgage, or pay for their children's college tuitions. They have sat around their kitchen tables and made tough decisions about their family budgets. And through this all they have continued to apply for job after job after job.

That's what unemployed Americans have been doing during these last 7 weeks. But what have the Senate Republicans done to help them, to restore benefits to Americans who have earned them through a lifetime of work? They've done nothing. My friends on the other side of the aisle talked about the need to extend the Bush tax cuts for their wealthy friends, which they don't want to pay for.

I mean here's the deal: they don't worry about the deficit when it comes to tax cuts for millionaires, but when it comes to working people who are confronting difficult times, who are faced with an emergency, all of a sudden they got religion when it comes to the deficit. They made a lot of noise about characterizing unemployment benefits as a government handout or somehow encouraging lazy behavior. But I would challenge any of my Republican colleagues to say those things face-to-face to someone who has been out of work for a year, who has applied for job after job after job after job without getting a response.

Mr. Speaker, the facts don't lie. According to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, extending unemployment benefits is the most efficient way for the government to generate economic growth. Each $1 spent on unemployment benefits creates up to $1.90 in economic output. Extending these benefits also creates jobs and decreases the chances that we slip into a double-dip recession.

In every other economic crisis in American history, Democrats and Republicans have put aside their partisan differences and provided emergency unemployment benefits to those Americans who have lost their jobs.

Mr. Speaker, House Democrats did our job. On July 1, we passed an extension of benefits that would have restored benefits for those who lost them in early June. It would have also ensured that jobless Americans would have the peace of mind of knowing that benefits were available to them to the end of November while they continue to apply for jobs. And since then we have worked and reworked this benefits extension to try to address Republican concerns. But every time, every single time we have been stonewalled by Republican obstructionism. They would rather use unemployed Americans as political pawns instead of restoring benefits to good, decent, hardworking people who have earned them over a lifetime of work.

Mr. Speaker, enough is enough. Enough of the politics. Let us extend these benefits to the hardworking people who have lost their jobs, who are dealing with this difficult economic time. This is the right thing to do. This is the decent thing to do. We should have done it a long time ago. I urge my colleagues to support the rule and the underlying bill.

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