The president plans to swiftly sign the measure approved late Friday night by the Senate, following its passage by the House earlier in the day – clearing Congress largely along party lines.
"I will sign this legislation into law shortly,'' Obama said in his weekly radio and Internet address this morning, "and we'll begin making the immediate investments necessary to put people back to work doing the work America needs done.'' Although Obama had courted Republicans to support the plan, it passed the House on Friday by 246-183 without a single Republican vote, and it passed the Senate by 60-38 with the help of just three Republican senators. Republicans have denounced the president's American Recovery and Reinvestment Act as too laden with big spending and too short on tax relief. Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R- Alaska), delivering the Republican Party's radio and Internet response to the president today, said: "Republicans have been supportive of a stimulus plan all along. Yet, over the past few weeks, a serious difference of opinion has emerged over what an economic recovery plan should include. Democrats, it seems, settled on a random dollar amount in the neighborhood of $1 trillion and then set out to fill the bucket.'' The votes capped a week in which Obama had traveled through four states in the promotion of his plan – from Elkhart, Ind., where unemployment has passed 15 percent, to Fort Myers, Fla, where the economy has taken a tough toll on the housing market, to Springfield, Va., where work is underway on a new parkway serving a national security facility, and to East Peoria, Ill., where the Caterpillar company has laid off workers but hopes to rehire them with federal help.
Full Story: Obama calls stimulus 'a major milestone' - Los Angeles Times
"I will sign this legislation into law shortly,'' Obama said in his weekly radio and Internet address this morning, "and we'll begin making the immediate investments necessary to put people back to work doing the work America needs done.'' Although Obama had courted Republicans to support the plan, it passed the House on Friday by 246-183 without a single Republican vote, and it passed the Senate by 60-38 with the help of just three Republican senators. Republicans have denounced the president's American Recovery and Reinvestment Act as too laden with big spending and too short on tax relief. Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R- Alaska), delivering the Republican Party's radio and Internet response to the president today, said: "Republicans have been supportive of a stimulus plan all along. Yet, over the past few weeks, a serious difference of opinion has emerged over what an economic recovery plan should include. Democrats, it seems, settled on a random dollar amount in the neighborhood of $1 trillion and then set out to fill the bucket.'' The votes capped a week in which Obama had traveled through four states in the promotion of his plan – from Elkhart, Ind., where unemployment has passed 15 percent, to Fort Myers, Fla, where the economy has taken a tough toll on the housing market, to Springfield, Va., where work is underway on a new parkway serving a national security facility, and to East Peoria, Ill., where the Caterpillar company has laid off workers but hopes to rehire them with federal help.
Full Story: Obama calls stimulus 'a major milestone' - Los Angeles Times
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