Van Hollen Discusses Export-Import Bank and Highway Trust Fund on the Bill Press Show

Statement

Today Maryland Congressman Chris Van Hollen discussed Republican's misguided opposition to reauthorizing the Export-Import bank and his effort to prevent the Highway Trust Fund from lapsing to protect jobs and American infrastructure. Below are excerpts from the interview, and the video is available here:

On the Export-Import Bank --

"Even though the Republican establishment candidates are winning and eking out some of these battles, the fact of the matter is that the tea party is winning the war because they're driving Republicans in the House farther and farther to the right. You saw this recently when Kevin McCarthy and I understand the Speaker have come out against the Export-Import Bank, which has been an institution to support the export of American products, American goods."

"And they've been actually making a profit. This has not been a cost to the taxpayer, but it's been a huge benefit to American workers and manufacturers because it helps export these goods, and yet they've now been targeted by the House Republican leadership."

"This just goes to show how far their absolute hatred for anything governmental is, because this is a great example of an institution -- again the Export-Import Bank… is not some high flying Wall Street bank, this is an institution designed to help American manufacturers export goods, which helps American workers."

"This is a perfect example of ideology run amok and I think the business community is getting a little bit of a wake-up call because they've been thinking that Republicans are their friends on everything, and it just turns out that ideology is trumping pragmatism."

On the Highway Trust Fund --

"What you're seeing right now is American companies using tax devices to shed their American citizenship and file papers converting to foreign ownership in order to escape their obligations to the United States and to American taxpayers. And we're proposing to prevent those kinds of tax scams, and by doing that we're able to raise enough revenue to at least fund the transportation requirements for another 18 months."

"I really hope our Republican colleagues will get on board, because I wouldn't want to explain to my constituents why I was voting against something to put an end to a tax scam where American corporations were playing these games at the expense of the American taxpayer and at the expense of our national infrastructure."

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