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Jobs Message to Go Home With House Democrats

House Democrats will continue their focus on jobs and blast the GOP’s continuing resolution next week when Members return to their districts for the Presidents Day recess.

Democrats will assert that the Republicans’ spending bill for fiscal 2011 will ultimately prevent job growth and jeopardize public education, according to a recess packet sent to Members and obtained by Roll Call.

The Democrats’ messaging packet provides a state-by-state analysis of spending cuts in the bill to mention to constituents back home, and it emphasizes that Democrats’ “top priorities are creating jobs and reducing the deficit.”

“Members are encouraged to continue to push this message during the District Work Period and contrast it with the Republican agenda that cuts jobs and threatens economic growth,” the title page of the packet says. “Democrats will measure every effort by whether it creates jobs, strengthens the middle class and reduces the deficit.”

The House has been debating hundreds of amendments to the continuing resolution this week, and it was unclear whether a vote on passage would be held Thursday as planned. 

Democrats will also continue to blast Republicans for not pushing job-specific legislation during the party’s first weeks as the majority in the House. While Republicans have established cost-cutting measures as their method for spurring job growth, Democrats have accused them of focusing on other priorities, including the repeal of the health care overhaul law and eliminating the presidential election fund. 

“We agree with the President that we must ‘out-innovate, out-educate, and out-build the rest of the world,’” the packet says, taking a line from President Barack Obama’s State of the Union address. “The American people — and Democrats — have a message to Republicans: show us the jobs.”

House GOP leaders say they hope to complete the CR before the start of the weeklong recess. The Democrat-controlled Senate is not expected to adopt the House’s spending plan, and both chambers and both parties are bracing for fights after the break over the spending bill, the fiscal 2012 budget and the debt ceiling.

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