Washington, DC -- Congressman Eliot Engel (D-NY-17) called the Republican plan on America ‘repackaged damaged goods’ that got the country in the current economic mess, when they held the presidency and both Houses of Congress.

“Their legacy of governance is simple,” he said, “an out-of-control financial industry leading to the collapse of 2008, complete negligence of America’s health care system, energy policy, and the environment, followed by a legislative policy of ‘Just say no’.”

He continued, “While Republicans held control of both Houses of Congress essentially for 12 consecutive years – six of which included control of the White House – they had ample time to show Americans what they can do.  What they did was explode the budget surplus created by President Clinton, ignore the growing problems faced by Americans in health coverage, lead America into two unpaid wars, pander to extreme factions of their party and work only for the interests of the richest Americans.

“Now they want another chance with a program that is essentially a repackaging of the damaged goods they sold when they were in the majority just four years ago.  

“Simply put, their plan would provide long-term tax cuts for the richest Americans at the cost of $4 trillion.  It would take away the Patient’s Bill of Rights – removing health coverage for millions of Americans, including the most at-risk and most in need of care.  It would increase taxes for 110 million middle-class families and small businesses.  It would once again seek to privatize Social Security – a program that has kept millions of seniors out of poverty.  It would create a regressive National Sales Tax that would result in a tax increase for everyone other than the super rich.  It would once again punish seniors by replacing Medicare with a voucher system.

“What the plan fails to do is provide any way to save American jobs or to prevent the outsourcing of jobs overseas.  But it does enable Big Oil, Big Insurance, Big Credit, and Big Banks to reclaim the power they enjoyed during the years of Republican control.  By vowing to repeal health reform, Wall Street reform, and to deny any changes in energy policy, Republicans have chosen their side.  They are backing companies such as BP and AIG, and not the people who have suffered in the wake of a corporation/Republican alliance that led to our financial meltdown.

“The Republican plan on America is spoiled milk placed back in the refrigerator.  They are hoping Americans forgot and will pour another glass.  They should be ashamed of themselves.”

Rep. Engel is an 11-term Congressman, and is the Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee’s Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere, and a senior member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee.

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