Dear Friend,

I want to start by acknowledging the horrifying and unprovoked terrorist attacks in Israel, carried out by Hamas. I'm praying for all of the victims, condemn the attacks in the strongest possible terms, and stand with the people of Israel while reaffirming Israel's right to self defense.

It's been another historic week in Congress, and I wanted to take some time, in this special edition of the newsletter, to tell you what has happened, where we are now, and what comes next.

Speaker of the House

You may have read that Kevin McCarthy is no longer Speaker of the House. Earlier this week, a member of Speaker McCarthy's caucus made what's known as a "Motion to Vacate." It is a legislative maneuver to remove the current Speaker of the House, and one that hadn't been used in over 100 years.

In order for that motion to succeed, a sufficient number of Republicans would have to vote to remove their own Speaker - something that had never happened in the history of the country. In the end, a more than sufficient number of Republicans voted to oust Speaker McCarthy, marking the first time in our nation's history that the chair had been vacated.

Fundamentally, this vote came down to trust - and Speaker McCarthy had broken the trust of too many members of the House and of his own party too many times. Twice in the past number of months, members of our chamber had to come together in a bipartisan way to salvage manufactured crises by the majority under the leadership of the Speaker. This vote was a recognition that this pattern was unsustainable and had done real damage to our institution and our country.

Rep. Patrick McHenry of North Carolina is now serving as the caretaker Speaker, until the Republican Conference can come together to elect their next leader. It has always been the responsibility of the majority party to select and elect their own Speaker and it's my hope that Republicans can pass this most basic test of governance quickly, for the good of our institution and our country.

I echo Leader Hakeem Jeffries' call for our Republican colleagues to walk away from extremism and join us in partnership for the good of the country.

Government funding is set to expire just before Thanksgiving, and we need a functioning majority with a reasonable Speaker so that we can come together in a bipartisan way to fund the government and honor our obligations.

We're slated to have a vote next week to elect a new Speaker - and I'll be sure to keep you posted on the results.

September Jobs Numbers

I also wanted to share some good news with you - and that was an incredibly strong jobs report from the month of September. As the former Secretary of Labor in Delaware and founder and co-chair of the Future of Work Caucus in Congress, the jobs report is something I follow very closely.

Before the report comes out each month, experts, economists, and pundits set expectations for what we might see in the report. Well this month, the numbers blew the expectations out of the water. The economy added over 300,000 new jobs - double what the experts predicted, and it was the largest gain since January.

This was the 33rd consecutive month of job growth and the unemployment rate once again remained steady - below 4%. That's the longest stretch of sustained low unemployment since the late 1960's.

I'll leave you with a quote from a leading economist in the field, who said, "This is an economy on fire." We're working to keep it that way - and even in the midst of the governance challenges we face in Washington, I hope you know I remain laser-focussed on helping our economy continue to grown and thrive.

Thank you for your time, and as always, I'll keep you updated on the latest developments.