McConnell’s alternative bill fails on the Senate floor

The cloture vote failed because “Democrats simply refuse to pass a bill that doesn’t add to the debt,” McConnell said.  

McConnell chided Democrats for objecting to his bill that would be paid for “with a Democrat-approved stimulus offset.” 

“If the Democrats object to extending these programs using their own stimulus offset to pay for them, then they’ll be saying loud and clear that their commitment to deficit spending trumps their desire to help the unemployed,” he said. 

Meanwhile, Democrats blamed Republicans for hurting unemployed Americans and voting ‘no’ for purely political reasons. 

Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.) said after tonight’s vote that she wouldn’t be “lectured to by the people who created the deficits” and those who refuse to help create jobs that would eventually reduce the red ink.