For Immediate Release: 
September 29, 2010
Contact: 

Katie Grant
(202) 225 - 3130

Hoyer Remarks at "Make It In America" Press Conference

WASHINGTON, D.C. – House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer (MD-05) joined Ways and Means Committee Chairman Sander Levin (MI-12), Representatives Tim Ryan (OH-17), Bruce Braley (IA-01), Kathy Dahlkemper (PA-03), Judy Chu (CA-32) and Exxel Outdoors Chief Executive Officer Harry Kazazian today for a press conference to discuss the Democrats’ “Make It In America” agenda.  Below are his remarks as prepared for delivery: 

“Rebuilding America’s manufacturing industry is essential to creating well-paying, middle-class jobs, and to ensuring that America can be the world’s innovation leader for generations to come. That’s why Democrats have focused so much energy on the Make It In America agenda, an effort to strengthen American manufacturing. It is a plan that includes incentives for manufacturing investment, workforce training, encouraging innovation, and fighting for a fair playing field for American companies that compete abroad.
 
“Four Make It In America bills have already become law. They include a bill to make it cheaper for American companies to obtain the materials they need to manufacture goods, a bill to speed innovation by breaking the backlog of patents waiting for approval, and a bill to reduce tax loopholes that encourage companies to ship jobs overseas. The most recent Make It In America bill, which establishes a Small Business Lending Fund, provides an additional $12 billion in small business tax cuts, and promotes the export of U.S.-made goods, was signed into law on Monday. It is projected to save or create hundreds of thousands of jobs.
 
“Seven more Make It In America bills have passed the House. These bills enhance the competitiveness of clean energy firms; take steps to reduce the trade imbalance; help rural families upgrade their energy efficiency, which increases demand for American-made energy efficiency goods; build training partnerships between unions, businesses, and educators; ensure that Congress and the Department of Homeland Security buy American-made goods; and direct the president to work with business and state leaders to develop a national manufacturing strategy.
 
“We hope to add four more Make it In America bills today: to make sure that the government buys American flags made in America; to help workers get the certifications, degrees, and qualifications they need to fill the jobs that industry needs; to reinvigorate our production of rare-earth metals, which are critical to high-tech manufacturing; and to address China’s unfair currency policy, which hurts American workers by keeping Chinese goods artificially cheap. By tilting the playing field, China’s currency policy has put American manufacturers out of business. That’s why it’s important to take WTO-consistent steps that hold China accountable for subsidizing its industries through currency manipulation. We believe in free and open markets—but we also believe in markets that come with a fair set of rules.
 
“We believe that when more products are made in America, more of us will find it possible to make it in America. That’s why this agenda doesn’t end today. Rebuilding American manufacturing will be a defining challenge for a long time to come.”
###