[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 11]
[House]
[Page 15497]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                         LET'S MAKE D.C. LISTEN

  (Mr. HIMES asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. HIMES. Mr. Speaker, when Senator Cruz took to the Senate floor 
for 21 hours to explain to the American public why the Congress had to 
shut down the government and breach the debt ceiling in order to repeal 
the Affordable Care Act, I listened carefully. One of the themes was, 
make D.C. listen. Make D.C. listen.
  We know, from polling, that 70 percent of Americans oppose shutting 
down the government to repeal the Affordable Care Act.
  But I went, on Monday, to listen to a couple of my constituents, 
Tamika Younger and Carla Carey, of Bridgeport. These are two young 
mothers who drop their children at Head Start in Bridgeport every 
single day so that they can go off to their jobs to make the money to 
give those children some quality of life.
  Thanks to the Republican government shutdown, there is no Head Start 
in Bridgeport now, and they are scrambling and putting their jobs at 
risk to find something to do with those children they love.
  So, Mr. Speaker, let's make D.C. listen to 70 percent of Americans 
and to Tamika and to Carla, who have very real problems today.

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