Obama's Speech at DCCC Fundraiser

St. Regis Hotel
New York, New York

6:59 P.M. EDT

THE PRESIDENT: Thank you, everybody! Thank you! (Applause.) Thank you so much. Everybody, please have a seat. It is good to be back in New York City! Love New York City! (Applause.)

I want to thank, first of all, Congressman Chris Van Hollen, who has one of the tougher jobs around. Let’s face it. Whenever you are the chairman of the DCCC, the demands on your time, in addition to being a member of Congress, all your committee assignments, and then you also have to go out there and help campaign for everybody -- it is a tough job. And Chris is handling it with unbelievable class. And we are so grateful to him. Thank you, Chris. (Applause.)

Congressman Steve Israel, thank you for the outstanding work that you’ve done as chair of recruiting. To all of the distinguished members of Congress, including the dean of the New York delegation, Charlie Rangel, and everybody else who is here, thank you for not only helping to organize the event tonight, but also for your incredible dedication and courage during the course of the past year and a half.

It is good to be back in New York City, and it is good to be following Nancy Pelosi. (Laughter.) New York is a tough town, but Nancy Pelosi -- that's one tough lady. (Applause.) That is one tough lady. And she’s so elegant, even as she’s ripping your heart out -- (laughter) -- if you mess with her.

You need to be tough to put up with all the criticism and griping that she deals with on a daily basis. And that’s from the Democrats. (Laughter.) But her toughness -– her extraordinary leadership -– is why she’s not just going to go down in history as the first woman Speaker; she is going to go down as one of the greatest Speakers of all time. She has been unbelievable in her leadership. (Applause.) I'm proud of her.

Now, I also want to thank all of you not just for your financial contributions, but for your time, your energy, your faith that America can move forward in the right direction. Your support has made an incredible difference -- because 16 months ago, when we took office, we knew this wouldn’t be easy. At least I hope you knew -- because I told you. (Laughter.) If you didn’t know you weren’t paying attention at my inauguration -- (laughter.) Remember that? Washington, couple million people, really cold? (Laughter.) We came in here with a whole host of challenges in our inbox -– challenges the likes of which we hadn’t seen in this country for decades.

Abroad, we were confronting a war in Iraq that needed to come to a responsible end, and a war in Afghanistan that demanded greater attention and focus, and a host of new threats and new dangers -- and new opportunities -- in a new world.

And here at home, we were facing a financial crisis that had the potential to plunge us into another Great Depression. We had a deficit crisis saddling our children with a mountain of debt, an economic crisis that was pounding families and small businesses all across the country -- a lot of families who had already endured an awful lot during the previous decade. And even though we didn’t cause these crises, we took the responsibility to end them.

That’s why we asked the American people for the chance to lead in the first place. That's why Nancy Pelosi and all the members of Congress here -- the reason they ran wasn’t to put off problems, but to solve problems. That was the reason I ran for President. And that meant we had to make some tough decisions.

Trust me, when I walked into the door of the Oval Office and found a $1.3 trillion deficit after the previous administration had inherited a surplus, the last thing I wanted to do was spend money on a recovery package, or become involved in the auto industry, or prevent the collapse of Wall Street banks -- particularly those whose irresponsibility had helped to cause this crisis. That wasn’t on my campaign to-do list. You don't remember me campaigning on those items. (Laughter.)

And they certainly weren’t popular. We knew that. You know, sometimes these folks -- I listen to these pundits and they’re saying, aw, the President has made this decision and these are unpopular decisions. I've got pollsters. (Laughter.) I know when what we're about to do is politically unpopular. (Laughter.) But what I also knew was that if we wanted to break the back of our recession and get our economy moving again, then the steps we took were absolutely necessary. And while we still have a long road ahead of us, we’re beginning to see signs of progress all across America. All across America. (Applause.)

The economy that was shrinking a year ago -- it’s growing today. The economy that was bleeding jobs at a historic pace a year ago -- 750,000 jobs a month when I came in -- now we're creating jobs again. Our economic heartbeat keeps growing stronger. These are good things, even if our friends on the other side of the aisle fall all over themselves to argue otherwise.

But here’s the thing: The steady progress we’re seeing -- it didn’t happen by accident. We're starting to see in public opinion surveys that people start thinking that the economy is getting better, but there seems to be a disconnect as to why it’s getting better. The reason the economy is getting better is because Nancy Pelosi and every Democrat here embraced the responsibility to lead. It happened because they embraced the responsibility to stand up to special interests, stand up even against the prevailing political winds, stand up for the American people’s interests. It happened because we embraced the responsibility to finally take on problems that Washington had talked about for years, sometimes decades, and put off over and over and over again. That’s what this Congress has been doing.

And it hasn’t been easy. These guys have taken more tough votes in the last 16 months than Congress had taken in the previous 16 years. (Applause.) And that's the truth.

Think about it. For years, Washington had talked about how credit card companies were ripping off American families. Well, this was the Congress that passed the Credit Card Bill of Rights. (Applause.) For years -- for years, Washington talked about protecting our kids from tobacco companies. This was the Congress that stepped up and delivered and put a stop to those practices.

For years, Washington had talked about making sure our veterans got the care and benefits that was promised them. This was the Congress that increased funding for our veterans by more than we had done in a generation, and guaranteed that it would arrive on time every year. (Applause.)

For years, Washington talked about fixing the student loan system that favored financial interests over students and families. This was the Congress that finally made it happen. Over $60 billion of funding that is now going to students to help them go to school happened because of the courageous votes that were taken by these members of Congress. Read the rest