WASHINGTON – Congressman Jeb Hensarling, Chairman of the House Republican Conference, delivered the following remarks on the House floor today in support of H.R. 1173, the Fiscal Responsibility and Retirement Act of 2011, to repeal the CLASS Act.

 

“Madam Chair, it is clear that the president’s policies have failed. One in seven now have to rely on food stamps, half of America now is either classified as low income or in poverty, and millions remain unemployed. Yesterday the Congressional Budget Office announced one more of the president’s failures, and that is he is on track to deliver his fourth—fourth—trillion-dollar deficit in a row. Somebody needs to tell the president we’ve got to quit spending money we don’t have for jobs we never get.

 

“One more failure Madam Chair, is the president’s health care program. Not a week goes by that I don’t hear from hardworking small business people in the Fifth District of Texas. I heard from a furniture businessman in Garland, Texas, who told me, ‘I could start two companies and hire multiple people but based on this administration and the lack of facts with Obamacare, I’ll continue to sit and wait.’ I heard from a gentleman who ran a music business in Palestine, Texas, ‘Our business is hampered by the uncertainty of tax policy, regulations, and Obamacare.’ I had one in Dallas, Texas, after having to lay off 24 people in the last two years, wrote to me and said, ‘You know what, we’re going to have to terminate one more in February, due almost entirely to the impact on my business of the health care reform we have. We are stymied.’

 

“There is no doubt that the president’s health care plan is killing jobs. House Republicans have repealed it in its totality. It has been blocked by the president and by Democrats, so if we can’t do it in its totality we’ll do it piecemeal. We need to start out by repealing the CLASS Act, which Secretary Sebelius said is ‘totally unsustainable;’ Democrat Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad called it a ‘ponzi scheme of the first order.’

 

“The president’s policies have failed. It’s time to enact the House Republican Plan for America’s Job Creators. It’s time to repeal the CLASS Act.”        

 

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