Senator Murray: “This budget deal is a strong first step toward delivering the most consequential federal investment in our families and communities in decades… American families in Washington state and across the country are counting on us to help them in a real, meaningful way—so make no mistake, Senate Democrats are going to get this done to build back fairer and stronger for everyone.”
Washington, D.C. – Today U.S. Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), a senior member of the Senate Budget Committee, issued the following statement on the newly announced budget deal, following a meeting between President Joe Biden and Senate Democrats.
“This budget deal is a strong first step toward delivering the most consequential federal investment in our families and communities in decades. At a critical moment in our nation’s history, this plan would make an incredible difference in the lives of people in Washington state and across the country—including on challenges I’ve been focused on for a long time. We are going to make child care affordable for working families, help ensure every kid is ready for kindergarten by providing universal pre-k, create a national paid leave program for the first time ever, and we are going to make a landmark investment in climate action that will help us create millions of good paying union jobs at the same time.
“I’m glad this budget plan also allows us to move forward on other major priorities like health care, affordable housing, free community college, and workforce training—and I also want to ensure that we are looking at every possible avenue to make progress on immigration reform.
“There’s a lot of work ahead of us to hammer out a final bill, but American families in Washington state and across the country are counting on us to help them in a real, meaningful way—so make no mistake, Senate Democrats are going to get this done to build back fairer and stronger for everyone.”
Senator Murray, a former preschool teacher who now serves as Chair of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, has led the fight for child care reform since she first was elected to the Senate. Senator Murray recently reintroduced her Child Care for Working Families Act, which the American Families Plan is modeled after. Murray’s legislation would finally establish a child care infrastructure, ensure access to high-quality, affordable child care for working families and improve wages for child care workers.
One of the first votes Senator Murray took in the U.S. Senate was in favor of the Family and Medical Leave Act, and she’s kept up the fight since then to ensure every worker has access to paid family and medical leave. Senator Murray is a strong supporter and cosponsor of Senator Gillibrand’s FAMILY Act, which the American Families Plan is modeled after, to provide 12 weeks of paid family and medical leave to all workers.
Senator Murray recently penned an op-ed in the Seattle Times calling for a landmark investment in climate action, and reiterated her determination to secure major provisions to address the climate crisis in upcoming infrastructure legislation. Pointing to the recent heat wave in the Pacific Northwest as the latest irrefutable evidence of the climate crisis, Murray emphasized that for any climate action to be successful it must utilize the strength of the federal government to enact systemic change, center communities that currently bear the brunt of the climate crisis, and create good paying, union jobs.
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