Continuing Appropriations

Floor Speech

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Madam President, let me second the very powerful and eloquent remarks just made by my colleague from Rhode Island: that we must vote, we need to have a vote in the House of Representatives to give moderate Republicans the opportunity to put the Federal Government back to work in the service of Americans and keep America--in the private as well as public sector--at work so they can meet the obligations of their families.

We have developing a situation in America where more and more the ripple effects of this shutdown will affect private employees, not just the Federal and government workers who are told to go home and told they cannot do their jobs.

As I have said repeatedly, we need to end the hostage-taking tactics by one small faction of one party in one House of this branch of government. The ripple effects of this shutdown are beginning to grow across America.

Last night, United Technologies, the largest employer in Connecticut, announced it has been forced to furlough thousands of employees, starting initially with more than 1,500 at its Sikorsky facility in Stratford, which makes Black Hawk helicopters for our Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, and Special Forces. Thousands of other jobs may be at risk at Pratt & Whitney and at defense manufacturers all cross the Nation.

This political gamesmanship and budget brinkmanship has stopped production of the Black Hawk helicopters, an iconic symbol to all our servicemembers that help is on the way. They are the ones that transport troops into combat, rescue the wounded, and deliver supplies to the most inaccessible and inhospitable parts of the Earth. Black Hawk helicopters are vital to our national defense. Why is the production line at Sikorsky being shut down? Because 45 Federal employees who work for the Defense Contract Management Agency have been sent home as a result of this shutdown--sent home by one small group of rightwing extremist ideologues in the House of Representatives, one part of this Congress, one branch of the government--and those 45 employees who work for the Defense Contract Management Agency cannot certify and inspect the work of the Sikorsky employees. So there is no way the U.S. military can take delivery of those helicopters.

My hope is this situation can be resolved quickly and that we can find a way to get these DCMA employees back doing their vital jobs that contribute so directly and importantly to the success of our military operations. They are civilian employees. They should be back at work

certifying and inspecting and making sure those helicopters are the best in the world, as they have always been, and that they can be delivered to our military; that the military can pay Sikorsky, and Sikorsky can keep its people at work rather than furlough them, and so that those Sikorsky helicopters are available to help our troops in the toughest challenges they face all across the globe. They need and deserve those helicopters.

But even if we put those Sikorsky workers back at their jobs tomorrow, the needless chaos and confusion caused by the shutdown is an outrageous and inexcusable dereliction by those small, rightwing extremists who have insisted on ideology over country and fearmongering over job creation.

The ripple effects of Sikorsky shutting down its assembly line will be felt by the suppliers who provide parts and components used in those helicopters. I have visited them, and I have seen those parts and components used on those assembly lines by those Sikorsky workers. If Sikorsky is not using those parts and components, workers in those suppliers will be furloughed as well, or worse.

We are talking about men and women who live--many of them--paycheck to paycheck. They do not have huge savings. They may well, in fact, probably will not be paid for the time they are furloughed. The ripple effect on consumer demand will be felt across Connecticut and, as a result of similar situations, across the country.

All too often, we tend to think of the Federal workforce as a nameless and faceless group, but this shutdown is bringing home what the real impact of their work is--from the NIH employees who do cancer research and provide treatment to people who need it and now will go without it; to the Head Start workers and programs across the country that provide for educational readiness to children who now will go without it; to the Social Security recipients who encounter problems with their check or payment and need someone to guide them or help them receive those checks that they need to survive and now will go without those checks; and resolving veterans' benefits, other kinds of issues all across the country. The chaos and confusion will ripple and accumulate. These effects are cumulative, and they will multiply.
The damage done by these wounds to our workforce are, tragically, self-inflicted and they dramatize how that cumulative effect will, in fact, increase exponentially.

I warned of the effects on job creation and economic growth repeatedly before and after the shutdown occurred. In addition to the vital services that are imperiled and impacted, these economic effects on job creation and recovery are irreparable. They affect people's lives. They are real consequences to real people.

I have called on this body to let compromise and cooler heads prevail and end those ripple effects, end the shutdown, end this self-inflicted wound before it becomes an economic tsunami.

I hope everyone in this body, everyone in this Congress, will use every ounce of their energy, every minute of this day and the days to come to cause this inexcusable shutdown to end, to fix the train wreck before it leads to other wrecks of other trains that may collide.

We have spent a lot of time in this body talking, and it is time we started listening. We ought to be listening to the American people, who are telling us: Get the job done. Get back to work. We ought to be listening to voices of our local communities which are seeing the harm of this shutdown.

Jim Finley, for example, the CEO of the Connecticut Conference of Municipalities, said yesterday:

Our poorest communities. They're the ones who are going to feel the hit first.

That is because the Women, Infants and Children's Program and housing vouchers for low-income families are just two of the programs that make the social safety net work and help people most in need. The WIC Program provides food assistance to more than 58,000 low-income pregnant women, mothers, and children in Connecticut.

Listen to Mayor Pedro Segarra of Hartford, who said:

After 30 days it becomes very difficult. We've already been under pressure from the feds because of sequestration to reduce expenses in several categories.

Recently, Newtown and Monroe, along with other Connecticut communities, received Federal grants to hire local police officers. So listen to Monroe First Selectman Steve Vavrek, who said he has no idea whether that money will ever arrive, and he has no way of checking on it, and, of course, he has no way of planning for future law enforcement in his community.

Students from Sandy Hook Elementary School were relocated to a school in his town of Monroe. Let's listen to those kids. Let's listen to their parents. They have no one to speak for them here, unless we listen to them.

Similar to children across the country, they need those Federal grants for their schools. If we listen to our local leaders, if we listen to America, we will put the Federal Government back to work. We will avoid that train wreck and tsunami that will result from the spreading ramifications and ripple effects of the loss of income and service that results from this shutdown.

Finally, let me just emphasize one of the very important unintended consequences of actions that we have taken or failed to take. When Congress passed the resolution to pay our troops, we intended to cover all of the men and women who wear the uniform, all who serve in our military forces, including all categories of National Guard service.

Unfortunately, some are not covered in actual practice. I am committed to ensuring that everyone in uniform is paid for their service and sacrifice. Regardless of the numerous diverse categories of service that may exist in the National Guard or in other branches of service, every man and woman who wears the uniform, every man and woman who serves in our military should be paid and paid on time now.

I am committed to making sure our Department of Defense and our government recognizes that obligation. So let's think about them. Let's keep in mind the brave men and women who are serving and sacrificing to keep us free, to make sure our democracy functions in the service of people. Let's keep faith with them as well as with the American people. Let's do our work by making sure we put the American Government back to work and make sure the country is at work. Let the House vote.

I yield the floor.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source