Unemployment Benefits

Floor Speech

Mr. KILDEE. Mr. Speaker, today there are 2 million Americans that stand to lose everything they have worked for, through no fault of their own--2 million Americans that are working Americans that get up every day and work hard to find their next job. They are America's unemployed who have lost their extended unemployment benefits. They stand to lose everything.

Rather than taking up H.R. 4415, which I introduced right after the Senate acted on a bipartisan basis to deal with this problem of the unemployed in our country, to make sure that that unemployment compensation is there for them when they need it, rather than take that up, the House Budget Committee has sent to this floor for its consideration a budget that would slash essential programs to provide a safety net for those hardworking Americans who stand to lose everything in order to fund tax cuts--big tax cuts--for America's wealthiest people. That is policy that we just can't tolerate. Rather than taking up the needs of those 2 million, we have taken on the challenge of trying to provide more tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans.

If this had happened because of a storm, we would act overnight. We need to take up H.R. 4415 right away.

Source