WASHINGTON –Emergency unemployment insurance likely will be needed beyond November as millions of Americans are expected to still be out of work in the fall, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said on Monday.
Gibbs’s remarks come as President Barack Obama is scuffling with Republicans ahead of a key vote Tuesday to extend emergency relief to the unemployed through November. The legislation is expected to pass, but a slow economic recovery suggests jobless benefits will need to be extended again in November. The unemployment rate is 9.5% and the number of people out of work is about 14.6 million.
“I think it’s fair and safe to assume that we’re not going to wake up at the of November and find ourselves at a rate of employment that one would consider not to be still in an emergency,” Gibbs said at a White House briefing with reporters.
Obama used a Rose Garden speech Monday morning to lambast Republicans for voting three times against extending relief, saying they are holding out-of-work Americans hostage for political purposes.
Republicans counter they want to extend unemployment benefits, but are concerned about adding to the federal deficit.
“The President knows that Republicans support extending unemployment insurance, and doing it in a fiscally-responsible way by cutting spending elsewhere in the $3 trillion federal budget,” said House Republican Leader John Boehner (R., Ohio) in a statement. He added, “The American people are asking ‘where are the jobs?’ and President Obama continues to offer only disingenuous attacks, not answers.”
The bill, which is up for a vote Tuesday, would retroactively extend some federal benefits through November at a cost of about $34 billion over 10 years. Democrats estimate that since the extension expired June 2, 1.3 million long-term unemployed Americans have exhausted their benefits.
Democrats are expected to have the 60 votes necessary to pass the package after a Democratic replacement for the late Sen. Robert Byrd (D-W. Va.), Carte Goodwin, is sworn in Tuesday morning.
Republicans have suggested that money from Obama’s massive stimulus bill be used to cover the emergency relief. Gibbs said that money is already slated to be used for other programs. He also said extending relief for those out of work has historically been done through emergency appropriations.
