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Despite Republican Resistance, U.S. House Votes to Restore Federal Unemployment Insurance

(Washington, D.C.) – Through an amendment to an unrelated piece of legislation (H. R. 3030, The Community Services Block Grant Act), House Democrats forced Republicans to vote on extending federal unemployment insurance.

"For weeks, the President has been silent and Republican Leaders have refused to allow the consideration of an extension to the federal Temporary Extended Unemployment Compensation (TEUC) program, said Rep. Sander Levin. "Last week, Tom Delay said glibly that 218 is a majority...well now 227 Members have voted in favor of extending unemployment insurance."

"Mr. Delay might view the vote as a ‘clever ploy,’ but I hope the Republicans who voted in support of extending federal unemployment insurance program are not being clever with their vote," said Rep. Levin. "This vote demonstrates that an extension could happen immediately with bipartisan support."

"I would encourage my five Michigan Republican colleagues who voted in support – Reps. Miller, Rogers, Camp, Upton and McCotter – to now sign the discharge petition and demand immediate action to extend federal unemployment insurance," said Rep. Levin.

"This extension is critical given that 8.4 million Americans are now unemployed – 365,500 in Michigan – where the 7.2% unemployment rate is the second highest in the nation," said Rep. Levin.

"Again, today we heard Republicans make the outrageous claim that unemployment insurance just prolongs unemployment because workers won’t look seriously for a job. I would invite anyone who believes this to come with me to Michigan. Come to the local electricians hall where I was told recently, ‘I don’t care about going to the moon, I just want a job.’ These are individuals who have worked hard their whole lives - some out of work for the first time – they are skilled and they want to work. The federal unemployment trust fund (which currently has a balance of nearly $20 billion) is supposed to be there for these workers and their families during this difficult time – until the economy improves and they return to work."

House Democrats have fought for months to bring this issue to a vote in the House, in the face of resistance from the Republican leadership. The federal unemployment program expired at the end of the year, denying assistance to approximately 80,000-90,000 people nationwide each week since December 21 and leaving those who ran out of state unemployment benefits over the holidays and are still out of work without any federal help.

A record high 375,000 unemployed individuals exhausted their regular unemployment benefits in January without qualifying for any further assistance, or finding work. Furthermore, based on the latest data, nearly two million unemployed workers (88,328 in Michigan) are expected to be in this situation during the first six months of 2004.

The job picture remains just as difficult. There are nearly five people in need of work for every job opening. Nationally, while the job loss appears to have slowed in recent months, there would have to be well over 300,000 jobs created a month to return to the same number of jobs per worker as there were when President Bush took office. In Michigan, we have lost 225,100 jobs since January 2001, including 127,100 manufacturing jobs. Our job loss has not slowed, Michigan lost 32,900 jobs in December.

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