Federal Aviation Administration Extension Act of 2010

Floor Speech

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Mr. MERKLEY. Madam President, I rise today to provide a brief explanation of my absence during the vote on the motion to proceed to the Reid-McConnell Tax Relief, Unemployment Insurance Reauthorization and Job Creation Act of 2010 on December 13.

I was not in the Senate Chamber for the vote because I was traveling back from Oregon, where I had a previous commitment earlier in the day to participate in a major summit of the leading businesses and political leadership of Oregon looking at ways to revive the Oregon economy.

As I stated publicly prior to the vote, had I been present I would have voted against moving forward on the tax cut proposal under the circumstances. The package that was brought to the floor will add nearly $1 trillion to the national debt and includes major components--particularly bonus tax cuts for millionaires and billionaires--that the Congressional Budget Office has found to be one of the least effective means of creating jobs. I could not support moving to this flawed package without an opportunity to offer amendments to fix it.

I continue to strongly support tax cuts for working families and the reauthorization of unemployment benefits, and other provisions in this bill that would be useful to create jobs and help families and small businesses. But I cannot support a bill that forces those same working families and small businesses to shoulder responsibility for billions more in debt while continuing too many of the policies that drove our Nation into record deficits and caused financial distress for millions of working families.

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