Making the case: GOP wants a return to failed polices of the past (Rep. Steny Hoyer)

Republicans’ agenda is captured in their “Pledge to America,” a document unveiled at a small business — just hours before House Republicans voted against tax cuts and loans to help small businesses. Republicans also ignored the Americans whose votes made preventing outsourcing of American jobs the single most popular policy on their website: Republicans have actually voted against legislation to make outsourcing American jobs more difficult five times.

Instead of those job-creating policies, Republicans are pushing the same agenda that made the Bush years a lost decade for the middle class: tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans (which were in place during a decade of declining middle-class incomes) and lax rules for corporations and banks (which helped make possible the Wall Street meltdown and the loss of millions of jobs that followed). You’d have to ignore a decade of evidence to work with Wall Street to water down financial rules, and to push for more tax cuts for the wealthy, at a cost of $700 billion more in debt — but that’s just what Republicans are doing.

Rather than debt-financed tax cuts for the wealthiest, the top item on the Democratic agenda is creating middle-class jobs, especially by reviving American manufacturing. Reclaiming our place as a nation that makes things is a goal supported by both business and labor, because it means a more competitive American economy and better-paying jobs.

We can get there by continuing to pass bills on the Make It In America agenda: an agenda that is all about investing in manufacturing innovation, strengthening training for American workers and creating an environment that helps American manufacturers grow here and compete in an open global market.

President Obama has already signed five Make It In America bills into law. They speed up innovation by helping inventors get patents faster, help veterans get private-sector job training in the expanding energy sector, make it cheaper for American manufacturers to obtain the goods they need and reduce tax loopholes that encourage companies to ship American jobs overseas. Another bill signed into law cuts small businesses’ taxes by a further $12 billion and increases lending to small businesses so they can innovate, expand and hire.

A host of other Make It In America bills have passed the House. One would hold China accountable for its currency manipulation, which harms American workers. By keeping the value of its currency low, China makes its goods sold in America artificially cheap — and that costs American jobs. Other House-passed bills help clean-energy firms become more competitive at home and abroad; build job-training partnerships between unions, businesses and educators; help American workers earn degrees and certifications tailored to the jobs that are most in demand; and help rural families upgrade their homes’ energy efficiency with products that are largely made in America.

Measures such as these are crucial to our long-term economic health, not just to create jobs today, but also to lay the groundwork for innovation tomorrow. In fields from computer chips to precision optics to photovoltaic cells to advanced batteries for electric cars, innovation has followed manufacturing overseas. Reversing that process is essential to rebuilding our economy, continuing to pioneer new technologies and creating a stronger middle class.

Each party has put its priorities forward clearly. Republicans want to return us to the failed policies of the past. Democrats want to help more of our businesses and our families Make It In America. For America’s middle class, the choice is clear.

Rep. Hoyer is the House Majority Leader.