Emerson votes with GOP against stimulus package

The $789 billion economic stimulus bill approved Friday is short on stimulus and overloaded with items of questionable value if the idea is to jolt the country out of recession, U.S. Rep. Jo Ann Emerson said to explain her vote against the measure.

Emerson remained part of the united GOP opposition to the bill, which is the centerpiece of President Obama's effort to combat rising unemployment and economic disruption caused by the collapse of credit markets. But unlike some of her Republican colleagues, Emerson agreed that a stimulus plan is needed. But too much of the plan approved Friday won't have the intended effect, she said.

"Congress needs to do everything in its power to get the economy moving again, but I disagree with the priorities set by that bill," she said.

The bill, Emerson said, should have been limited to spending on infrastructure, including roads, bridges and waterways and broadband Internet access for rural areas. Other areas where money would have had a big effect is rural development, such as water and wastewater systems and community facilities, she said.

The price tag should have been closer to $160 billion than $789 billion, Emerson said.

In a package that size, Congress would have had to jettison all of the emergency aid to the unemployed and poor, including extended unemployment benefits, an increase in food stamp allotments and direct cash payments of $250 to Social Security recipients and disabled or retired veterans. Those items cost $77.2 billion.

Other items that could not be included in a package the size Emerson wanted would be the $400 per-person tax credit that will begin putting $13 a week into paychecks beginning in June. Other tax measures that would not fit in a $160 billion package include expanded child tax credits, tax credits for college tuition, an expanded Earned Income Credit and homebuyer credit. Those tax items total $157 billion.

One tax provision, $70 billion to exempt middle-class taxpayers from the Alternative Minimum Tax, would have been enacted anyway, she said. That change will make no impact because it would have passed anyway and it is not a new exemption, Emerson said.

Overall, Emerson said the bill lacked creativity, which she attributed to the manner of its drafting. Democratic congressional leaders put much of the measure together in the weeks between the November election and Obama's inauguration, she said. During that time, the size and subject matter was decided with little GOP input.

"They 'owned' it, and a lot of times when you own something, you have missed an opportunity," Emerson said. "I pray that in spite of me voting against it, it is going to do the trick and get the economy going again."

In the days leading up to the vote, Emerson was one of about a dozen GOP House members targeted by unions for ads asking constituents to urge her to change her mind. "Tell her we can't let partisan wrangling stand in the way of creating the jobs we desperately need," said the ads, paid for by the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees and Americans United for Change.

The ads didn't sway her either way, Emerson said. Of the people who called her office and said they were responding to the ads, she said, 90 percent supported a vote against the measure.

rkeller@semissourian.com

388-3642

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