In a recent poll, only half of the country believes the American Dream still exists. With unemployment at 9.6% and the expiration of tax cuts looming, working hard to get ahead may seem impossible to some.
 
The American Dream isn’t an idea of yesteryear, but rather a pursuit that must be reawakened. As reaffirmed in the Declaration of Independence, we are endowed by our Creator with unalienable rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Last week I joined House Republicans in espousing “The Pledge to America”. It’s a new governing agenda, set to return our course to the principles outlined in our Constitution and back to a limited government.

The Pledge places focus on job creation, spending cuts, and government reform. It’s built on the idea that trust can and must be restored between Congress and those they are elected to represent.

“The Pledge to America” reinforces the American Dream in its preamble:

“America is the belief that any man or woman can – given economic, political, and religious liberty – advance themselves, their families and the common good.

“America is an inspiration to those who yearn to be free and have the ability and the dignity to determine their own destiny.”

I pledge to hold true to our founding principles and to advance the agenda of a limited government, based off of the Constitution. It is my wish that all people may be inspired to believe in the American Dream again.

This week, AP fact-checked the Obama Administration’s assertion that the stimulus is helping.  While the 9.5% unemployment rate and hundreds of thousands of new jobless claims show the stimulus plan has failed, AP looks at some specific initiatives, and proves the administration dead wrong.

AP: FACT CHECK: Stimulus assessments overly optimistic

WASHINGTON – The Obama administration claimed this week that $100 billion invested in innovative technologies under the economic stimulus law is "transforming the American economy" by putting the nation on track for technological breakthroughs in health care, energy and transportation.
But an examination of details in the 50-page report unveiled Tuesday by Vice President Joe Biden reveals something a bit different: a collection of rosy projections that ignore many of the challenges, pitfalls and economic realities in all those areas.

A look at how the administration's claims compare to the facts:
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EDITOR'S NOTE — An occasional look at government assertions and how well they adhere to the facts.
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Increasing renewable energy
The claim: Thanks to the stimulus, the United States is on track to "doubling U.S. renewable energy generation capacity and U.S. renewable manufacturing capacity by 2012."
The facts: While the Recovery Act has helped increase renewable energy, the fact that it is a one-time jolt makes it difficult to project that the growth will continue for the next couple of years. George Sterzinger, executive director of the Renewable Energy Policy Project, a Washington think tank that promotes renewable energy, said the Recovery Act's cash grant program for renewable energy projects "jump-started a lot of stuff. But there's nothing beyond that."
Sterzinger added that it would be a mistake to link the growth in renewable energy generation to the growth in American-made renewable energy equipment. While the U.S. could probably meet the first goal, he said, it isn't likely to meet the second because much of the equipment is made overseas.
Robert L. Nelson, a partner at the Akin Gump law firm who co-chairs its renewable energy group, said that the manufacturing claim reminded him of a story told in the old Soviet Union. A commissar, or government official, asks a farmer how good next year's crop will be. The farmer says it will be 10 times as good as last year's. The commissar thinks to himself, "Ten times zero is zero."
Nelson said, "When you're looking at where the U.S. is starting from, doubling isn't all that meaningful a statistic."
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Cutting the cost of solar power
The claim: Government stimulus money will lead to "cutting the cost of solar power in half by 2015, putting it on par with the cost of retail electricity from the grid."
The facts: That projection assumes a huge payoff from stimulus spending on technology improvements in solar energy. Nelson, who has worked in renewable energy for 25 years, called the prediction "highly unlikely," unless there is a big increase in utility-scale solar power projects.
Sterzinger said there was too much uncertainty in the world economy to make such a prediction.
"Projecting from the last few years looks at the effects of a global recession that lowers material costs and a temporary glut of module manufacturing capacity," he said. "They have influenced cost but are not based on any technology innovation."
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Quicker, cheaper genetic mapping
The claim: Stimulus funding is spurring National Institutes of Health research to make unraveling people's individual genetic codes, or genomes, easy and cheap enough that the number completed could "dwarf, by 50 times or so" the number so far finished.
The facts: NIH research kicked off the revolution in human genome sequencing and continues to play a crucial role, but it has lots of help today from universities, international research foundations and even private companies jockeying to sell better gene-scanning machines.
It cost about $3 billion and a decade of government research to come up with the first draft of a human genome in 2000. Last year, a Stanford University professor reported that he sequenced his genome in a week at a cost of $48,000, using a $1 million machine. Many specialists believe the price may drop to less than $1,000 in a few years. The more sequencing scientists do allows them to better explore variations that contribute to disease.
As promising as personal genome sequencing is, people need to understand that it's basically a first step. The bigger challenge, still in its infancy, is deciphering what the genetic variations mean and how that information might be harnessed for better care.
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High-speed rail
The claim: "With $8 billion in funding, the Recovery Act is beginning to make high-speed rail a reality across the country." Projects selected for funds represent "strategic investments" that will yield high-speed service or lay the groundwork for future service.
The facts: The largest project is one that would connect San Francisco with Los Angeles, using trains traveling up to 220 mph. But some of the projects getting stimulus money would primarily upgrade existing freight rail tracks so they could be used for faster passenger service, reaching speeds of up to 110 mph at least part of the time — well short of the speeds in other developed countries.
Not everyone shares the White House's optimism about the prospects for high-speed rail. A recent analysis by the Government Accountability Office concluded that building high-speed rail service in the U.S. "is a difficult, multiyear effort" that hinges on financing that goes "far beyond the funds provided by the Recovery Act in a time of continuing federal and state deficits."
Another challenge for some projects will be meeting the 2017 deadline to spend Recovery Act funds, the GAO said. The capacity to manufacture passenger rail cars and other high-speed equipment exists in the U.S. But it may take years to design and test new rail cars that meet U.S. crashworthiness standards, which are different than much of the rest of the world.
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Health information technology
The claim: Stimulus spending is "a significant boost" to goals of converting to electronic health records, computerized prescriptions and remote treatment of patients in hard-to-reach locations.
The facts: The effort to get doctors' offices and hospitals using electronic medical records is in its earliest stages. Economic dividends from greater efficiency and fewer costly medical mistakes could be years away.
And there's plenty of potential for glitches. People involved with the issue give the administration high marks for trying, but many do not expect Obama's goal of getting all of America's medical records computerized within five years to be met.
For one thing, about 90 percent of roughly $20 billion the stimulus legislation allocated for this purpose has yet to be spent.
Most of the stimulus money is to help doctors and hospitals defray the cost of installing computer systems, but the Health and Human Services Department only recently spelled out the capabilities that those systems will have to have in order to qualify for federal money. No systems have yet been certified as meeting the required capabilities.
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Electric vehicles
The claim: The stimulus has helped produce "significant steps toward affordable electric cars that can drive 300 miles on a single charge, powered by $10 of clean electricity instead of $50 dollars of oil. Ultimately this means consumers may have the choice among a range of vehicles from a combustion vehicle with over 50 miles per gallon or an electric-drive vehicle for the same price."
The facts: While strides are being made, this vision of the future rests on assumptions that many regard as overly optimistic. Even a White House task force on the auto industry's recovery said while General Motors' extended-range plug-in hybrid, the Volt, "holds promise, it will likely be too expensive to be commercially successful in the short term." At $41,000, the Volt is about twice the price of a conventional midsize car. The price of electric cars will drop, but automakers are years from being able to sell them at the same price as cars with internal combustion engines.
Another hurdle is fuel prices, which are relatively low and provide little incentive to consumers to spend thousands of dollars extra for a hybrid or even more for a plug-in car; it would take years for the fuel savings to outweigh the higher price.
And there are questions about whether the large lithium ion batteries needed for electric cars are durable, safe and affordable enough for widespread use.
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I predicted last year that unintended consequences could occur through enacting the Credit Card Act, and now we learn that credit card rates have risen to their highest point in nine years.

As credit card companies adjust to new portions of the sweeping law which took affect last weekend, they are passing higher borrowing rates on to many of the 381 million U.S. credit card accounts. Given the fragile state of our economy, Congress should help consumers instead of enacting burdensome rules that ultimately hurt the American public.

Ruth Simon of the Wall Street Journal predicts average rates will continue to climb even higher:

“New credit-card rules that took effect Sunday limit banks' ability to charge penalty fees. They come on top of rule changes earlier this year restricting issuers' ability to adjust rates on the fly. Issuers responded by pushing card rates to their highest level in nine years.

“In the second quarter, the average interest rate on existing cards reached 14.7%, up from 13.1% a year earlier, according to research firm Synovate, a unit of Aegis Group PLC. That was the highest level since 2001.

“Those figures look especially stark when measuring the gap between the prime rate—the benchmark against which card rates are set—and average credit-card rates. The current difference of 11.45 percentage points is the largest in at least 22 years, Synovate estimates.

“By comparison, the spread between 10-year Treasurys and a standard 30-year fixed-rate mortgage is just 1.93 percentage points, near historical averages, according to mortgage-data provider HSH Associates.”

The Credit Card Act is just another example of the Democrats in Congress forcing their will on the American people regardless of its negative effects on our struggling economy.

Monday and Tuesday brought two decisive blows to Senate Majority leader Harry Reid and his Democratic allies who support financial regulatory reform by instituting permanent Wall Street bailouts.

Two attempts to open debate on the Democrats’ bill were defeated, with all Republicans voting against the measure, along with Democratic Senator Bill Nelson from Nebraska.

Senator Reid is determined to keep the pressure on, thinking that one or two Republicans will eventually cave. We may see another vote on Wednesday, then Thursday, and so on until he gets his way.

Despite the spin Washington Democrats are trying to put on it, here’s the bottom line: Republicans oppose this bill because it institutionalizes a “too big to fail” mentality and makes bailouts permanent while conveniently ignoring the principal cause of the mortgage market meltdown that led to the financial market collapse -- Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Republicans have offered comprehensive financial regulatory reform legislation – the Consumer Protection and Regulatory Enhancement Act (H.R. 3310) – designed to (1) stop the Democrats’ permanent bailouts for their Wall Street allies; (2) protect taxpayers and create jobs; (3) address Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac reform, the root causes of the housing meltdown & financial crisis; and (4) rein in the out of control Federal Reserve & end “too big to fail.”

For more information on the House Republican plan, click HERE.

If the 2.7 millions jobs that have been lost since the so-called stimulus was signed into the law did not convince you that government spending does not correlate into economic growth, take a look at this story from the Associated Press: Stimulus Cash Doesn't Create Local Jobs:

“A federal spending surge of more than $20 billion for roads and bridges in President Obama's first stimulus has had NO EFFECT on local unemployment rates, raising questions about his argument for billions more to address an ‘urgent need to accelerate job growth.’ An Associated Press analysis of stimulus spending found that it didn't matter if a lot of money was spent on highways or none at all: Local unemployment rates rose and fell regardless. And the stimulus spending only barely helped the beleaguered construction industry, the analysis showed.”

Yet, President Obama wants to pass a second stimulus calling for billions of dollars of more spending. When will the President and Democrat leadership learn that spending money we don’t have isn’t always the remedy to fix whatever problem confronts us? When will they get the hint? Republicans have put forth a better way to give our families the relief they need that will turn our economy around.

The President’s economic “stimulus” package appears to be working so marvelously that it’s even creating nonexistent jobs in nonexistent locations. While the evidence continues to pile up that the President’s stimulus package has been a failure with unemployment rising to over 10%, Americans continue to ask: Where are the jobs? Visiting the federal government’s stimulus tracking website sure won’t help anyone find them. You can try, but your search will lead you in all sorts of different directions.

In fact, ABC News has located “several examples on the government's web site outlining hundreds of millions of dollars spent and jobs created in Congressional districts that have been misidentified.”  

Minnesota has eight Congressional districts, but the website lists 19 different districts, all of which have received stimulus funds. Taken together, the 11 mystery congressional districts posted received more than $7 million in stimulus spending, and created or saved about 50 jobs.  Who’s in charge of managing the accuracy of this website and properly distributing stimulus dollars?  The same federal government that wants to take control of your health care. Talk about a lack of fiscal responsibility and transparency. This is government accountability at its best.

We received good news this week from our nation's struggling automobile industry, as Ford reported a profit of $2.3 billion. What's more, according its CEO, Alan Mulally, as reported in the Wall Street Journal, "Ford remains on track to break even or even make money in 2011 and has sufficient liquidity to fund its turnaround plan."

I think Chrysler and GM could learn something from Ford's example.  Ford made the tough choice to restructure internally instead of taking an infusion of taxpayer bailout money and a government-run bankruptcy. They closed plants, eliminated different brands of cars, and had to cut about 40,000 employees.  And, they borrowed $23.5 billion from private lenders, " mortgaging almost everything of value in the company."  They made the tough choices, took the risks, and now they are on track to reap the rewards, branding themselves to be on track to be a vibrant, job-creating company once again.

On the other hand, we have the Chrysler and GM example.  Who knows what's next on their dance card having danced the bailout/bankruptcy two-step with the federal government.  What's more:  Who knows how these rival companies will fare against one another taking such radically different paths.  Will Ford find itself at a disadvantage for doing the right thing and living up to the American spirit of risk-taking, ingenuity, and innovation?  As the Wall Street Journal reports today, "Ford's decision to decline U.S. aid or file for bankruptcy protection may have created consumer goodwill, but rival GM was able to eliminate about $40 billion in debt.  Chrysler Group LLC similarly exited bankruptcy with lower financial obligations."

Henry Ford is responsible for the birth of the American auto industry.  It's encouraging to see that the spirit of America still lives on in Ford.

Tomorrow, just as Congress has mandated, the national minimum wage will increase 70 cents to $7.25 an hour, which on the surface, appears a positive step for those workers in this wage bracket. However, economist David Neumark of the University of California, Irvine "calculates that the 70-cent-per-hour minimum wage hike this month would kill 'about 300,000 jobs for those between the ages of 16-24.'"

The matter of increasing the minimum wage is typically contentious because, on the surface, at least, it's tough to see how workers making more money can be bad for the overall health of our economy or for those workers. But if you dig a little deeper, if employers are forced to pay all their employees more, then these same employers can't afford to hire as many workers leading to increased unemployment.  Particularly in an economy like this, the pie doesn’t get any bigger, so if you’re forced to hand-out larger slices, you’ll be handing out fewer of them.

Neumark along with William Wascher of the Federal Reserve Bank have done extensive research on the effects of minimum wage hikes on unemployment, and they have come to two conclusions:

1 - "A sizeable majority of the studies give a relatively consistent (though not always statistically significant) indication of negative employment effects.”

2 - "Studies that focus on the least-skilled groups [i.e., teens, and welfare moms] provide relatively overwhelming evidence of stronger disemployment effects."

As the Wall Street Journal points out: 

“[T]hat single mom can't collect those checks if she doesn't have a job, and the tragedy of a higher minimum wage is that it will prevent thousands of working moms striving to pull their families out of poverty from being hired in the first place.”

If raising the minimum wage leads to increased unemployment, then aren't we hurting more Americans than we're helping, especially when unemployment already sits at a staggering 9.5% and is only on the rise? One of the shortfalls of legislation that comes from Washington is that it's often too short-sighted and focused on emotion rather than logic.

Looks like the Obama Administration is also going to great lengths to oppose H.R. 2743, the "Automobile Dealer Economic Rights Restoration Act of 2009."

I've talked extensively about how on July 6th GM dealers received a letter from the General Motors National Dealer Council urging them to sign a sort of petition to Congress immediately; no later than 5:00 p.m. the very next day, saying that they opposed passage of the bill.

I am a co-sponsor of H.R. 2743 along with 241 other Members of Congress.  If passed, it would essentially reinstate the economic and contract rights of dealers who were arbitrarily dropped by Chrysler and General Motors during their respective restructurings. In essence, H.R. 2473 makes these dealers whole instead of allowing their livelihoods to be taken from them with no legal recourse and no financial compensation.

According to TradingMarkets.com, the Obama Administration is urging opposition to this bill, too.  The White House has said that reversing the closings would set a "dangerous precedent, potentially raising legal concerns, to intervene into a closed judicial bankruptcy proceeding on behalf of one particular group at this point."

With all due respect:  Tell that to the retired teachers and police officers in Indiana whose pension funds were decimated when the Obama car czar leapfrogged the unsecured debts of the United Auto Workers ahead of the secured debts of these legitimate bondholders.

The deal crafted by the Obama White House to quickly move along the restructing of Chrysler and GM trampled on the rights of pension fund creditors by giving a bigger share of the pie to more junior, non-secured parties - like the UAW.  Now, that’s a very ugly precedent for future investors.
 
Apparently, the Administration observes legal precedents only if doing so moves forward their priorities and agenda.

Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve spoken with the GM and Chrysler car dealerships from my district that have been targeted for total or partial closure by President Obama’s Auto Task Force. They were given no reason, and really no recourse to challenge their closure. It is as if the Car Czar threw a dart at a dartboard to decide which dealerships would be given a pink slip. In fact, we still do not know the formula used to determine which dealers would remain open and which ones would close; which ones would lose certain brands and which would get new brands.

Now, GM is officially pitting dealers against another.  And, remember:  the government owns 60% of GM.  It has committed $50.7 billion directly to GM, plus another $12.5 to their financing arm, GMAC.  When we talk about GM, it’s hard to consider it a private entity.

GM is encouraging their "viable" dealerships to put pressure on Congress to defeat legislation aimed at protecting the hundreds of dealerships across the country slated for closure. I am a cosponsor of this legislation, the Automobile Dealer Economic Rights Restoration Act of 2009, that would honor a car company’s previous commitments to local car dealers.  GM is lobbying for its defeat.

According to the Detroit News:

"GM gave its dealers talking points - and even a telephone script to use while talking to their members of Congress to oppose the measure. Dealers also have access to a toll-free number to help them reach a member of Congress -- dubbed the Dealer Voice Hot Line -- or dealers can e-mail legislators via a company Web site: www.gmdealervoice.com."

GM maintains that "In order to build a stronger, more viable GM, it is essential to have the best performing dealers, in the right locations, aligned with GM’s brand distribution strategy to be a part of GM’s reinvention."

Yet many of the best performing dealers are the ones GM is shutting down. The government is playing politics with private enterprise, and sadly, family businesses across the country are the ones taking the hit.

Yesterday, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg rightly put a hold on the Obama Auto Task Force’s plan for selling Chrysler to Italian automaker Fiat  in order to take a closer look at the claims made by teachers and police officers that their rights as secured creditors were violated in the way this plan was put together.

As I've discussed in earlier posts, the question in all this is whether the Obama Administration had the right to violate established bankruptcy law to give unsecured lenders like the United Auto Workers priority in place of secured lenders like the Indiana pension funds who brought the case forward. According to established law, secured lenders have first priority in bankruptcy cases to recover debts owed to them.

Indiana State Treasurer Richard Mourdock also argued that the Treasury Department should not have been allowed to use money in the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) to help Chrysler and General Motors reorganize.

David Skeel, a professor of corporate law at the University of Pennsylvania, says that the pension funds have a legitimate case:

"I'm very encouraged that they did decide to at least take a closer look because the one thing that nobody has really done yet is that. Everything has been so rushed from the minute the sale was proposed. It sure looks like the sale promises [the union] a fair amount more than they would get in a normal bankruptcy."

We can't choose to follow the law sometimes, and then sidestep it when it gets in our way. The rule of law is an important principle that should not be ignored when it is inconvenient. This case is just another example of Washington’s arrogance.  They chose to side with their political allies in the UAW over the rights of hard-working Americans.

The Chrysler and GM filings for Chapter 11 bankruptcy are all the headlines, but the sub-headings aren’t getting much notice.  Both deals are happening under the unprecedented direction of the federal government and it’s the little guys that are taking the hit.

This Saturday, I attended an event in Lake Elmo, MN where hundreds of local residents came out in support of a very successful and profitable dealership, Fury Chrysler Dodge. Fury is one of the largest employers in Lake Elmo, as well as one of the most profitable Chrysler dealerships in the metro market.  Yet Chrysler, under the direction of the Obama Auto Task Force, is calling for its closure in an attempt to reduce its inventory nationwide by 25 percent.

This simply makes no sense.  Businesses and consumers should dictate decisions like this, not federal bureaucrats with no expertise in the auto industry.

And, that’s not the only leap into Wonderland that the Obama Auto Task Force has taken.  In restructuring the auto companies, they also turned basic American legal principles upside down. For instance, let’s examine how the Car Czar leapfrogged the unsecured debts of the United Auto Workers ahead of secured debts of legitimate bondholders. Last week, teachers and police officers in Indiana filed to have their claims heard in federal district court in an attempt to protect their pension funds, which had been decimated despite their status as senior secured lenders to Chrysler.

According to Global Pensions, "The Indiana pension funds are holders of Chrysler’s secured debt. The Teachers’ pension fund holds $32.4 million in Chrysler debt and the Police pension fund holds $1.3 million."

Opposing the bizarre and questionable actions of the Obama Task Force, Indiana Treasurer Richard Mourdock rightly said:

“As fiduciaries, we can’t allow our retired police officers and teachers to be ripped off by the federal government. The Indiana state funds suffered losses when the Obama administration overturned more than 100 years of established law by redefining ‘secured creditors’ to mean something less.”

The deal crafted by the Obama White House tramples on the rights of pension fund creditors by giving a bigger share of the pie to more junior, non-secured parties - like the United Auto Workers.
 
What an ugly precedent we've set.

An opinion piece from the Wall Street Journal today does an excellent job summing up the federal government's power grab while detailing what lies ahead for the industry and its owners - you and me, now that we own 60% of GM. Give it a read: The Obama Motor Co.

"Mr. Obama likes to say he's a pragmatist who only prefers a government solution when it will work. But in resurrecting an industrial auto policy that even the French long ago abandoned, the President has made himself GM's de facto CEO. Our guess is that he'll come to regret it as much as taxpayers will."

I couldn't agree more.

Small businesses are the backbone of our nation's economy, yet the Obama Administration Auto Task Force is planning to eliminate more than 3,000 Chrysler and GM auto dealerships. Sadly, these closings are expected to put more than 150,000 people out of work, devastating many small towns.

These aren’t necessarily unprofitable dealerships.  In fact, many of them have been doing quite well even in the economic downturn, yet the Administration finds it necessary to close them down. This is unprecedented and simply astonishing, as neither the Administration nor any government official should have any authority over the management of private companies.

My staff and I have been in close contact with the National Automobile Dealers Association (NADA), which represents auto dealers’ interests in Washington.  NADA has hired a firm to represent the legal interests of those auto dealers that have been chosen by the Task Force to close.  Any such auto dealer should call 703-821-7000 for more information.  I shared that information with several Chambers of Commerce throughout the Sixth District of Minnesota so that businesses that are hurting or worried can look for concrete help.  And I urge you to get it to anyone you know that might need such assistance.


The Administration’s Car Czar has put theory above real hard-working Americans, while simultaneously standing rock-solid American legal principles on their head.  If he can throw a dart at a map and determine which car dealers don’t deserve to be open, what business is next?  Will the drive for socialized medicine mean that a “health czar” in Washington will determine which hospitals can remain open or which doctors can keep their practices?   The precedents we are setting are scary and we must consider them carefully now before the consequences gain too much momentum to stop.

The Obama Administration is certainly having its say when it comes to the U.S. auto industry.  

For instance, what kind of cars should we drive?  The Administration is announcing plans to increase the fuel efficiency of cars by 2016 to 35.5 mpg. The current CAFE standard is 27.5 mpg for cars and 24 mpg for light trucks. Current law already requires a 35 mpg standard by 2020.  But, given the Administration’s dominance in the auto board room these days, why not move the deadline up 4 years?

Automakers are strapped as it is when it comes to manufacturing and car sales, and this new standard will increase the strain on these manufacturers to meet requirements four years sooner. Furthermore, the AP reports that new fuel and emission standards for cars and trucks will increase the costs to consumers of about $1,300 per vehicle by 2016. 

Seeing as how standards were already in place to meet these fuel efficiency standards by 2020, it's interesting that the President would choose to hit the wallets of already struggling Americans yet again to advance his environmental agenda.

The President's intercession has essentially made him CEO of the American automobile industry. In fact, his Auto Task Force has called for the elimination of more than 3,000 Chrysler and General Motors automotive dealerships which would subsequently put over 150,000 employees out of work.

Arbitrarily, dealerships across the country are receiving notice that no matter how profitable they may be, they’ll be closing their doors by government fiat.  These closings will not fix the litany of problems facing the automotive sector nor make it viable once again, yet the President has chosen to destroy small businesses, hurting families and worsening the recession for communities all over America.

Given that nowhere in the U.S. Constitution is the President given the power to make such demands on businesses, the President should reconsider this plan. The government takeover of the automotive industry is unprecedented and unacceptable, and it’s families and small businesses who will bear the weight of this misguided policy.

Today, the House passed the Ledbetter Fair Pay Act and the Paycheck Fairness Act at the urging of its Democrat leadership. While these bills sound well and good by name alone, the fact of the matter is that they do nothing for the struggling American worker and go a long way in lining the pockets of a key political ally of the House majority– trial lawyers.

The truth of the matter is that there are effective and sufficient payment discrimination laws already on the books. These bills simply make it easier to file lawsuits – whether they’re frivolous or well-founded.  And, it makes it harder for employers to defend themselves.

The Ledbetter Fair Pay Act eliminates the statute of limitations on pay-discrimination claims currently set in place by a U.S. Supreme Court ruling. As a result, the number of frivolous pay-discrimination claims in future years is likely to skyrocket since older claims are more subject to faded memories, missing documents, unfound witnesses, and businesses that have changed hands or no longer exist.

The Paycheck Fairness Act expands the Equal Pay Act to provide for unlimited punitive and compensatory damages to a successful plaintiff. Worst of all, it moves the burden of proof to the employer. Instead of the employee having to prove they were discriminated against, they simply will be able to make the allegation and the employer has to prove that they acted out of “business necessity.”  Furthermore, the employer defense would be negated if an employee could show that another employment practice could have yielded a non-pay-differential result.  This removes key business decisions from employers and gives them to a judge and jury.

But that’s not all. The true intent of the bill – to generate more lawsuits and line the pockets of trial lawyers – is made most clear in its provisions expanding class action lawsuits.  These provisions are plainly designed to ensure that plaintiffs’ lawyers get the “most bang for their buck” in bringing class-action lawsuits rather than protecting the paychecks of American workers.

And the only Republican amendment allowed to be offered by the Democrat majority – a commonsense amendment that would have capped attorney’s fees at $2000 an hour in cases brought under the Paycheck Fairness Act – was rejected on a nearly party-line vote.

It's a shame that the Democrat majority found it more worthwhile to protect their political allies than the American worker desperately depending on job growth. Instead of fostering a business environment where jobs can flourish, these bills severely hamper the ability of American business to increase our nation's prosperity.