[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 126 (Thursday, July 26, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Page S5394]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                            ECONOMIC GROWTH

  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, on another matter, later today Vice 
President Pence will visit Wheeling, WV, to discuss Republicans' pro-
growth agenda. For the better part of a decade, the people of West 
Virginia heard a lot of talk from Washington.
  During the 2008 Presidential campaign, then-Senator Biden told a 
crowd in Charleston, WV, that he supported the coal industry and that 
the Democrats' policies would help West Virginia's economy. ``This is 
about jobs,'' he said.
  But the Obama-Biden administration turned out to be a crash course in 
the difference between rhetoric and results. Across the entire private 
sector, fewer Virginians were employed the day President Obama left 
office than on the day he was sworn in. According to the Bureau of 
Labor Statistics, the State's manufacturing workforce shrunk by more 
than 13 percent from 2009 through 2016, and its mining and logging 
workforce collapsed by 37 percent.
  Let's be clear. Public policy is not the only factor at work in our 
economy, but there is no denying that Washington can make life harder 
for job creators or make it easier. The Obama economy was a tough pill 
to swallow--tax hikes and burdensome regulations. Their policies cut 
against the rhetoric, and the outcome was disappointing.
  That was then. This is now. When Vice President Pence lands in West 
Virginia today, he will be able to share a different story. He will be 
able to say that, thanks in part to regulatory relief and generational 
tax reform, the number of Americans saying that now is a good time to 
find a quality job hit a 17-year high just 2 months ago.
  He will be able to say that West Virginia's unemployment rate has 
been lower in every month of this unified Republican government than it 
was during any month of the Obama Presidency.
  It is the American people who are achieving all of this. Republicans 
are just happy that our policies are helping to create conditions for 
workers and job creators to thrive.

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