An estimated 1.6 million people have exhausted their 26 weeks of regular unemployment benefits in the six months since the September 11th tragedy.  About 80,000 Americans are losing their unemployment benefits each week, and that will continue in the days and weeks ahead.  According to a recent analysis, some 2 million people are scheduled to exhaust their unemployment insurance benefits over the next several months.

While extending unemployment insurance benefits by itself will not completely address the needs of people who have lost their jobs, their wages and their health insurance, it is clearly needed.  I am glad that Republicans and Democrats in the House were finally able to come together to pass a common sense compromise to help our working families, as the Senate did weeks ago. 

We must now work to provide meaningful assistance to those displaced workers that lost their health insurance, so that they can have access to quality, affordable health care for themselves and their families.  I hope that my colleagues will continue to put partisanship aside and address this important priority.  Many of these workers are finding themselves unemployed for the first time in their lives through no fault of their own. They are simply victims of September 11th.