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Gingrich And Boehner Argue Stimulus Is A ‘Failure’ That Hasn’t Created ‘A Single Job’

House Republican Leader Rep. John Boehner (R-OH) has been one of the most vocal opponents of American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. After rallying every single member of his caucus to vote against it earlier this year, Boehner has stubbornly refused to acknowledge the existence of the projects it has funded. In July, Boehner claimed there hadn’t been any stimulus related infrastructure contracts signed in all of Ohio. In reality, there had been 52 at the time of Boehner’s statement.

Last Friday, Boehner continued to press his case that the stimulus has been an utter failure. On Hugh Hewitt’s radio show, Boehner claimed the stimulus “didn’t create any jobs”:

BOEHNER: Well, I think it’s the American people who are winning this debate. They’ve looked up at this program, this giant government bureaucracy that the Democrats want to create in Washington, and said enough is enough. And while most of this is about health care, it’s really about a much bigger issue, and that is just the growth and size of government. You know, after the $1 trillion dollars stimulus bill that didn’t create any jobs, and the trillion dollars deficits for as far as the eye can see […]

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Echoing Boehner’s sentiment, Newt Gingrich blasted out a fundraising appeal for the right-wing group Citizens for the Republic today, attacking the stimulus as a “failure” that “hasn’t created a single job.” View it below:

Revisiting infrastructure, Boehner’s preferred type of stimulus spending, there have been 1,138 Ohio highway construction jobs in July alone fueled by the Recovery Act. And if Boehner continues to ignore Ohio officials on jobs figures, he could simply ask his own press secretary. In a little-noticed statement, Boehner’s press office praised the Obama administration for going forward with using stimulus dollars to fund “shovel-ready projects that will create much-needed jobs.”

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The Council of Economic Advisers, in a report released earlier this month, called the Recovery Act the “boldest countercyclical fiscal stimulus in American history” and concluded that the stimulus added nearly 500,000 jobs to the economy in the second quarter of 2009 that would not have been there without it. Unfortunately, people like Boehner and Gingrich are more interested in stoking opposition to Obama rather than grounding their arguments in the truth.