[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 157 (2011), Part 12]
[House]
[Pages 16657-16658]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                                NO JOBS

  (Mr. PAYNE asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. PAYNE. Forty-three weeks, Mr. Speaker. For 43 weeks, my 
Republican colleagues have led the House, and they have failed to pass 
a single bill to create jobs. Our national unemployment rate has 
returned to 9.1 percent after declining earlier this year and late last 
year as a result of the Recovery Act.
  Yet my colleagues who ran on the platform of upholding a pledge to 
America to create jobs and strengthen the economy have failed to do so. 
Instead of delivering on their promise to

[[Page 16658]]

the 14 million Americans without jobs, the Republican Congress has 
decided to take off of work for themselves.
  This Republican-led Congress has only been at work for 111 days, 
leaving 105 days off for recess. With so many of our constituents out 
of work, Congress should be at work on their behalf, doing its job and 
creating jobs for Americans and improving America's economy.
  That is what my Democratic colleagues and I have tried to do. We have 
proposed commonsense legislation that would strengthen our economy and 
create jobs now. And we say that this is what we were sent to 
Washington to do. We must create jobs now.

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