Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2016

Floor Speech

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Mr. BLUNT. Mr. President, I want to talk about the amendment I have offered with Senator Murray and Senator Mikulski and Senator Cochran. The chairman and the ranking member of the Appropriations Committee have joined in that amendment, as have Senator Graham and Senator Leahy. The committees involved are truly looking at this, trying to find a way forward that allows us to take action. We do need to take action, as my good friend from Maryland has just so well explained.

There is no vaccine. There is no simple diagnostic test. There is no way to treat the virus once you get infected. So communities really don't have very many options right now. The limited resources they have to manage the one thing we can do something about immediately besides education--the local mosquito population--are resources that are not nearly adequate to meet the current need.

At this time, there is no way to fully prevent the infection, leaving high-risk populations at risk, especially pregnant women or women trying to get pregnant. That seems to be the population where the impact of this disease--the impact of this Zika infection--has not only the most short-term but the most long-term implications because of microcephaly and other things that are going to be impacting children born.

I am told by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that every indication now would be that once you have had Zika, you cannot get it again. It becomes the inoculation, so just because you get Zika and may at a later time become pregnant, you are not likely to have the same thing. That is one of the studies going on, to verify for sure that is the case and also to verify for sure how long after you have had Zika that pregnancy can still be a problem.

This is a growing problem. There are already 650 confirmed Zika cases in the U.S. territories, with the majority of those being in Puerto Rico. There are over 500 travel-associated cases of Zika in the United States. If they got it here, it has been through sexual transmission and not from the mosquitoes themselves because obviously it is not mosquito season yet, but that is very close.

This is a public health threat and clearly an emergency. This is not something we can plan now to deal with 2 years from now because 2 years from now would be too late to deal with this crisis. However, I want to make clear that our deliberations over the supplemental request have never been an either-or scenario. There has never been a scenario where we are either going to rubberstamp the administration's request or do nothing. That straw man will not work. That is not the situation.

We need to evaluate this request. The request has certain items the administration asks for that I think if you look at them not even very closely--and certainly when you look at them closely--you find out they are unnecessary, they are unwarranted.

This is a bill designed to address an emergency situation, not a bill designed to make the most of an emergency. For example, the administration's proposal has a request for the building and expansion of new Federal buildings; $85 million of that initial request was to build new buildings. There is no way those buildings would probably even be started during the so-called emergency timeframe or during the real emergency timeframe. Certainly they would not be of use during the timeframe. That is not a real reason to ask for money; it is just an excuse to ask for money. The Congress could, should, and I believe will say: No, we are not going to do that.

The second request I would like to point out today, the request to provide the department of health with $175 million of that $1.9 billion, was just a slush fund. It was just a fund with virtually unlimited authority to transfer that $175 million or any part of it to any purpose of any Federal Government agency.

There may be some purposes in this emergency we don't know about yet, but they are not going to be $175 million, and they are not the kind of emergency appropriations you couldn't get by other means where the Congress is clearly involved. We did not provide this kind of funding in the Ebola crisis when the Democrats were in charge of the Senate. We should not provide it today.

There is no reason for a $175 million undesignated fund to be used anywhere in the Federal Government, any more than there is a reason to take $85 million and build a new Federal building, and say ``Well, it is part of the Zika emergency'' because it clearly is not. If there is a need for a Federal building at CDC, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention can come to the Congress and make that case. That is the way that should be done.

If this amendment prevails today, that money will not be available. It is not unreasonable to ask the administration for details on what activities would be funded. What are their priorities, and when would they realistically spend these funds?

The $1.1 billion emergency fund would take us through the end of not just this fiscal year but the next fiscal year, about the same time we would hope in talking to the National Institutes of Health that a vaccine will be available. Once a vaccine is available, we will need to look at this Zika infection in a new way, and we will get to look at it in a new way.

If the administration had been a little more transparent at first, maybe we could have reached this point earlier. But to suggest that the Congress has needlessly delayed funding is both unfair and untrue.

I also think that this is the time we can move forward. The role of the Appropriations Committee is to look at this and to see that the money appropriated is going to be spent in the right way.

In the meantime, the administration has made available to the Zika crisis almost $600 million. Mr. President, $589 million is a lot of money. It is particularly a lot of money when it is basically one-third of what was being asked for. Whether what was being asked for was necessary or not, $589 million of unobligated funds that were available in other places have been brought to this cause.

The fact that the administration did that shows in a good way just how serious they are about the crisis. If this were not a real crisis, they would not be taking $589 million that in some process would be spent somewhere else and say: Listen, we need to spend this on Zika right now. But for the people we work for, it is important to understand that $589 million is being spent on this, and that is no more than what would possibly have been spent if this appropriation would have happened the day the administration asked for it.

The Appropriations Committee took the necessary time to understand the funding needs and response requirements to ensure that we protect all Americans, including taxpaying Americans. We worked in a bipartisan manner to provide the Department of Health and Human Services and the Department of State with targeted funding to respond to Zika.

Today we have that result, a bipartisan amendment worked out between the leaders of the Appropriations Committee and the Labor HHS and State and Foreign Operations Subcommittees to meet this emergency. Specifically, I worked with my ranking member on Labor HHS, Senator Murray, to reach an agreement that will provide $850 million to the Department of Health and Human Services to respond in a three-pronged strategy.

First, that Department is to provide the funds necessary to develop vaccine candidates, therapeutics, and new diagnostic tools.

Secondly, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will be able to focus responsible efforts domestically and internationally on the highest priority activities, such as vector control, emergency preparedness, and public health outreach.

Finally, the supplemental provides targeted funding to Puerto Rico, which public health experts believe will be the most at-risk area in a Zika outbreak.

Additionally, this amendment, with the work of Senator Graham and Senator Leahy, includes $248 million for the Department of State and USAID to support other affected countries' ability to implement programs to reduce the transmission of the virus.

This amendment is a targeted response providing the funding needed through 2017. It includes funding for priority initiatives focused on prevention, control, and treatment. It does not include funding for unessential requests.

I hope at the end of the day all Members find a way to meet this emergency. I believe the bipartisan amendment we are offering is the most likely of these amendments to meet the need. Certainly, in my view, it is the amendment that has taken the most focus on exactly what is needed to meet this crisis and meet it now.

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