When Congress needed to respond to the outbreak of COVID-19, we worked together to pass four overwhelmingly bipartisan pieces of legislation that combined, have allocated $2.9 trillion in funding to initiate a comprehensive medical response, give small businesses the flexibility to care for their employees, and deliver financial relief to families, businesses, disrupted industries, individuals, state and local governments, and healthcare workers through new programs like the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), Economic Injury Disaster Loan (EIDL) funds, and the Provider Relief Fund.
The main reason Congress was so successful in carrying out an immediate and comprehensive legislative response for the American people when it comes to coronavirus can be attributed to our willingness to work collaboratively on these funding packages, a detail that is further evidenced by the fact that these four bills have a combined total of 1,967 votes from Members who support helping those impacted, versus just 62 ‘no’ votes, making the congressional support for these relief bills 97% bipartisan.
What we’ve accomplished so far is significant in terms of making sure America is on track for recovery. However, instead of figuring out the best ways to continue moving our country forward through this pandemic, the House appears to have reverted to its pre-coronavirus ways, a reminder that the political advertising geniuses are back in full force.
WASHINGTON WRAP-UP
Currently, our nation is facing unprecedented challenges that present an opportunity for the majority in the House to lead and welcome bipartisan solutions. Unfortunately, Speaker Pelosi once again failed to rise to the occasion this week, wasting time on another round of political show votes she knows will never become law. These included: A healthcare bill that will upend the progress innovators have made in developing new vaccines and therapies to combat coronavirus, a housing bill that is a misguided overreach into the mortgage and housing markets, and a financial services bill that takes an overly prescriptive approach that will decrease competition, increase litigation, and put sensitive personal information at risk. Learn more below:
H.R. 2 – THE INVEST IN AMERICA ACT
America’s infrastructure is crumbling, and during these uncertain times, focusing on our nation’s infrastructure demands could be the incentive our country needs to rebuild. When it comes to this issue, it’s important to note the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee has a decades-long tradition of crafting overwhelming bipartisan legislation, dating back to the late 1990’s. In fact, the last three surface transportation bills signed into law passed out of the House with overwhelming bipartisan support. These included: The Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act of 2005 (412-8), the Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act of 2012 (373-52), and the Fixing America's Surface Transportation (FAST) Act of 2015 (359-65).
Now, Speaker Pelosi has decided to highjack this longstanding bipartisan and effective process by bringing a $1.5 trillion wish list – disguised as an infrastructure bill – to the House Floor for a vote after just 30 minutes of consideration and without bothering to find a way to pay for it.
The Speaker’s ‘my way or the highway’ legislation focuses on everything but our nation’s core infrastructure needs. Instead, it weaves wasteful Green New Deal mandates and bureaucratic hurdles throughout its various programs and proposals, many of which will be detrimental for folks in CD-2, as the bill disproportionately favors funding for urban areas at the expense of our rural and suburban communities, reducing the flexibility of states and counties by smothering them in red tape. Essentially, unless you represent a major metropolitan area, this bill will make it increasingly difficult for states and non-federal partners to secure resources for their infrastructure needs – which are already scarce and hard to come by.
However, the most egregious part of this legislation is the move to prioritize Green New Deal initiatives over our nation’s critical transportation and infrastructure needs, a move which is especially rich considering most Americans and lawmakers – including the Speaker at one point – did not take the Green New Deal seriously, and yet we’re now advancing legislation that ends up rewarding some of the biggest offenders of our environment. Another opportunity for the majority in the House to lead…missed.
H.R. 1425 - PATIENT PROTECTION AND AFFORDABLE CARE ENHANCEMENT ACT
I voted against this legislation because not only is it purely a messaging bill that stands no chance of becoming law, but it’s extremely dangerous to even consider playing politics with medical innovation in the middle of a pandemic.
As healthcare professionals all over the world are working overtime to develop COVID-19 vaccines, therapeutics, and diagnostics, everyone should be against Washington bureaucrats setting drug prices, especially when objective analysis proves such policies would result in fewer cures and treatments. Additionally, this legislation would punish states that haven’t expanded their Medicaid programs, create an expensive new federal program, and attack free market alternatives to the Affordable Care Act (ACA) exchanges by putting an end to the Trump Administration’s new guidance for section 1332 waivers, a section of the ACA that had previously restricted the innovation states could pursue to lower people’s premiums until President Trump issued new guidance allowing states to chart a different course for their healthcare markets through expanded flexibility.
H.R. 7301- EMERGENCY HOUSING PROTECTIONS AND RELIEF ACT OF 2020
Remember the HEROES Act? Well, in case you missed it, Speaker Pelosi had the House vote on a $3 trillion wish list totaling 1,800 pages of partisan priorities back in May. This week, we voted on H.R. 7301, which is basically the HEROES Act 2.0, as it recycles the same partisan wish list of priorities that didn’t stand a chance of being signed into law just two months ago.
While my colleagues and I support efforts to protect homeowners and renters experiencing financial hardships during this pandemic, this legislation not only fails to take into account the actions Congress and the Administration have already taken to provide financial relief, but it includes burdensome new mandates that will ultimately complicate existing federal, local, and private efforts to respond to coronavirus. It’s also important to note that Governor Sisolak has not even implemented policies like this in Nevada.
As you may know, the CARES Act has already provided $12.4 billion in new Housing and Urban Development (HUD) funding to assist with low-income and vulnerable populations affected by COVID-19, eviction and foreclosure moratoriums, and flexibility for borrowers to adjust loan payment terms. Any new relief measures should include strong accountability measures and be targeted to those with the greatest need. Instead, H.R. 7301 would:
- Authorize an additional $194 billion in new spending without any reforms to existing HUD programs or accountability measures for how these funds are spent;
- Triple HUD’s Fiscal Year 20 budget for old and new programs; and
- Disproportionally benefit areas with higher median salaries where failed policies have created excessively high housing costs.
H.R. 5332 - PROTECTING YOUR CREDIT SCORE ACT OF 2019
I voted against this legislation because it takes an overly prescriptive approach that will decrease competition among credit rating agencies and the unique services they provide consumers, increase litigation, and put your sensitive personal information at risk. More specifically, this legislation would require the three nationwide credit reporting agencies to create a shared online portal for consumer credit information that would ban all advertising, marketing, and solicitation. This ban on commercial speech appears to lack a sufficiently compelling justification, which the Constitution requires. Additionally, the bill would allow credit reports to use your full nine-digit Social Security Number (SSN), without adequate cybersecurity protections, significantly jeopardizing the security of your sensitive personal information. Committee Republicans offered an amendment to increase cybersecurity supervision and reporting, and prohibit the use of SSNs in credit reports, but Democrats voted it down.
Another work week down, another week of zero bipartisan solutions that can be signed into law, and another opportunity to deliver results…missed. Our country is in serious need of meaningful reforms, Americans deserve it, and it’s obviously doable – we’ve proven that multiple times throughout this pandemic. Unfortunately, the majority in the House continues to prioritize their partisan agenda over America’s best interests.
As always, thank you for subscribing to the Amodei Report. I look forward to continuing to keep you up to date on the issues you care about most. For additional information, please visit my website at amodei.house.gov or call my Washington office: (202) 225-6155, Reno office: (775) 686-5760, or Elko office: (775) 777-7705. To receive updates on what I am doing in Washington and in Nevada’s 2nd District follow me on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube.
