While Michele Bachmann was parading around the 6th District this week trumpeting her alleged concern for job creation, less than a week earlier she voted against the job-creation efforts of one of the biggest employers in her district, Andersen Corporation of Bayport, manufacturer of Andersen Windows and Doors.
The Home Star Energy Retrofit Act of 2010 would provide homeowners with rebates to perform energy-conservation measures on their homes, including window or door replacement. The measure passed the House 246-161 on May 6, but Bachmann voted against it.
Jim Humphrey, CEO of Andersen Corporation, which employs about 5,000 people at its window and door manufacturing plant in the 6th District community of Bayport, is one of the biggest cheerleaders for the Home Star program.
“Not only is the Home Star program creating jobs for manufacturers, but the main thing is that the renovated homes will be energy efficient,” Humphrey told the Fox business channel in March when President Obama announced the program. “We know in our windows that the properly installed windows can save as much as 70% of energy costs during the winter and 40% during the summer. The payback would be extremely beneficial in a short period of time.”
Andersen Corporation helped develop Minnesota’s Project ReEnergize in 2009, which provided homeowners with rebates for energy-efficiency improvements. That program served as a model for the federal Home Star program.
Warroad, MN-base Marvin Windows, the Window and Door Manufacturers Association and many other building materials associations also vigorously support the Home Star program.
Says Janice Charletta of the American Architectural Manufacturers Association:
“Our members and certification program participants are committed to helping make the Home Star program a success. The House has demonstrated its commitment to both the environment and the economy, and to homeowners, building products manufacturers and remodeling contractors. We urge the Senate to follow the House’s leadership and pass the Home Star legislation.”
This isn’t the first time Bachmann has voted against the interests of thousands of Andersen workers in her district. Two years ago, she voted against the Energy Improvement and Extension Act of 2008, which extended tax incentives for installing energy-efficient windows and doors.
Andersen CEO Humphrey told USA Today that his company refilled 600 positions in 2009 thanks to the tax incentives that Bachmann voted against. And a St. Cloud area remodeling contractor told Bachmann at her jobs forum that the federal stimulus bill had created jobs in the construction industry due to the window replacement incentives.
Bachmann claims that Obama’s stimulus programs have been a failure, and that energy conservation tax incentives like she opposes are bad because they create artificial winners and losers. But the next time she schedules a “jobs forum” at taxpayer expense, perhaps she should hold it at the Andersen plant in Bayport, where she could explain to the workers there what a terrible idea energy conservation tax incentives are. Bashing the very programs that brought back hundreds of jobs to Minnesota window manufacturers might not go over as well as it does before a manufactured audience of Tea Partiers such as those Bachmann usually entertains.
Minnesota’s 6th District needs a representative who will vote with its citizens—not against them. Our unemployment rate is already the highest in the state. If Michele Bachmann had her way, it would be even higher.
Bachmann’s empty rhetoric is as transparent as the windows that she votes against. Her sham job forums are just the latest example.
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