Motion to Instruct Conferees on H.R. 3630, Middle Class Tax Relief and Job Creation Act of 2011

Floor Speech

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Mr. LABRADOR. Mr. Speaker, I want the American people to understand something very clearly: This debate today is not about policy; it is only about politics. It has always been about politics.

Number one, there is no Senate bill. Our friends on the other side keep talking about a Senate bill. There has never been a Senate bill. There was only a Republican House bill. That's the only thing that we had.

The Republican House bill was passed with a bipartisan majority. It passed this House and it went to the other House, and the Senate decided to amend it. When they amended it, they took out everything that we wanted here in the House to extend this payroll tax cut. And we decided today to reject the amendment.

One of the gentlemen from the other side said some of us did not campaign on going to conference. You know what? We did campaign on one thing. We campaigned on following the Constitution and doing the things that the Constitution requires us to do.

If you go back to your civics classes, it's very simple. The House passes a bill; the Senate passes something different; we go to conference. That's what the American people understand. You ask any third-grader about civics lessons, and they will tell you that's the way it's supposed to work.

The reason they are objecting to it today is because that's never the way they have done it. Because their idea of compromising is making sure that our ideas are off the table and their ideas are the only ones that stay on the table. That's not compromise, that's capitulation, and that's what we are unwilling to do. And you're upset. You're upset because you're unwilling to work for the American people during this week and during the next week.

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We just voted on the Senate amendments. We turned them down. It's really important for the American people to understand that we have turned down the Senate amendments.

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Mr. LABRADOR. The Democrats only want to have a political tool to keep hitting us over the head again and again and again. They want to spend the next 2 months debating this issue.

If the middle class does not get this tax cut, they will only have one party to blame, Mr. Speaker, and that party is the Democrats.

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