On the recordOctober 9, 2013
When Senator Cruz took to the Senate floor for 21 hours to explain to the American public why the Congress had to shut down the government and breach the debt ceiling in order to repeal the Affordable Care Act, I listened carefully. One of the themes was, make D.C. listen. Make D.C. listen. We know, from polling, that 70 percent of Americans oppose shutting down the government to repeal the Affordable Care Act. But I went, on Monday, to listen to a couple of my constituents, Tamika Younger and Carla Carey, of Bridgeport. These are two young mothers who drop their children at Head Start in Bridgeport every single day so that they can go off to their jobs to make the money to give those children some quality of life. Thanks to the Republican government shutdown, there is no Head Start in Bridgeport now, and they are scrambling and putting their jobs at risk to find something to do with those children they love. So, Mr. Speaker, let's make D.C. listen to 70 percent of Americans and to Tamika and to Carla, who have very real problems today. ____________________
