[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 9]
[House]
[Page 12744]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                           CANCEL THE RECESS

  (Mr. COURTNEY asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. COURTNEY. Mr. Speaker, I wrote the following letter to the Under 
Secretary of Defense a few days ago:

       Just this past Saturday, I attended a welcome home event 
     for the 1109th TASMG, the Connecticut National Guard, who 
     spent the last year in Afghanistan providing critical 
     maintenance for our helicopter fleet.
       Their joy at being home with family was undermined by the 
     reality that nearly a third of the 100 returning members are 
     dual-status technicians and, therefore, hit by furlough. 
     After serving in a war zone away from family, it was a bitter 
     pill for these patriots to lose 20 percent of their pay 
     almost immediately upon their return.

  I do believe that the Department of Defense can do a better job 
managing the furloughs. However, the real responsibility rests in this 
Chamber to turn off sequester. It has been 210 days since the governing 
Republican majority took power, and 81 legislative days that we have 
not taken up one measure to turn off sequester during that time. 
Incredibly, in 3 days, we are going on a 5-week recess, and on Friday 
we're going to vote for the 40th time to repeal the Affordable Care 
Act. I have a news flash: it's not going anywhere.
  We should cancel the recess, and we should focus on making sure that 
these patriots are not treated so shabbily. We should make sure that 
the 600,000-plus civilian DOD Federal employees have their furloughs 
turned off.
  Cancel the recess. Let's turn off sequester. Let's stand up for 
America's middle class.

                          ____________________