Hoyer Won’t Adjourn House This Week

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer knocked down reports today that the House could shut down at the end of the week to enable members to return early to their districts to campaign for reelection.

“I don’t know where they report came from and the answer is no,” Hoyer, D-Maryland, said. “My view is we’re going to be in session next week. You know the Senate has got to take up the [Continuing Resolution] and I don’t think they’re going to take up the C.R., and if they get it to us this week, fine. But I think we’ll be in. We’re going to be in next week.” 

At a briefing with reporters this morning, Hoyer blitzed through an ambitious to-do list to tackle before adjournment, including a NASA Reauthorization bill, the Child Nutrition Bill, and the 9/11 Health and Compensation Act. The House is currently targeting adjournment for October 8, although the majority leader would not commit today to returning for the week of October 4. 

“There are very substantial pieces of legislation still under discussion,” Hoyer said. “We want to try to get our work done. There’s nobody here that doubts that our members – Republicans and Democrats – would like to be in their districts talking to their constituents. After all they have to ask them to be rehired. So they want to be back there.” 

Asked why he did not include tax cuts on his to-do list, the majority leader indicated it was an inadvertent omission and said he should have mentioned it, too. While he emphasized his personal belief that the Bush-era tax cuts for the highest tax bracket should expire, Hoyer told reporters that the he will wait for the Senate to take up the tax cuts issue before the House takes any action. 

“I want to see what the Senate can do. I think that will have a great effect on what members here believe ought to be done, or can be done,” Hoyer said. “I will reiterate, as all of you know, that the under $250,000 – we need to hold those people harmless, the working men and women of our country, from any tax increases. I don’t think [raising taxes] over that has an economic consequence and we have a huge deficit problem that we need to deal with.” 

Hoyer downplayed the apparent angst of some members and said there’s a “resurgence of Democrats across the country.”

“I’m not sounding the death knell,” Hoyer said, noting that a recent poll shows that Democrats have closed a 10-point gap in voter party preference. “That sounds like a party that’s on the move, and a public that is becoming more and more aware of the radical policies being proposed by some Republican nominees and by the assertion that they want to return to the exact same failed agenda. That’s what I thinks happening.” 

Questioned whether it’s worthwhile for members to spend time in Washington to do things like name post offices rather than adjourn and allow members return to their districts to campaign, Hoyer defended that aspect of the legislative process and blamed the Senate for holding up a number of bills. 

 “We always name post offices. It’s a worthwhile endeavor to do that and people really do appreciate it, particularly when it’s their name and it’s their community and they’re honoring somebody,” Hoyer said. “That’s not taking up any time and you know that, and I know that. One of the problems is we still have 400 bills pending in the United States Senate, 75 percent of which have more than 50 Republicans voted for them [in the House].” 

With House Republicans unveiling the GOP’s new campaign agenda Thursday morning in Sterling, VA, Hoyer predicted that voters will choose candidates November 2 based on the history of which party’s economic policies had better success. Hoyer says that “American voters have a stark comparison to make,” and Republicans are simply putting a new face on the same economic policies that caused the financial crisis. 

“If the public reflects on who succeeded and who failed, there will be no confusion,” Hoyer said. “It’s clear that one economic model had huge success, the other economic model led to…the most deeply failed economy that we’ve seen in the last 50 years.”