May 5, 2020•Advocacy Matters
Congress: Next Steps on COVID 19
Disability Matters with Joyce Bender
May 5, 2020
#AdvocacyMatters
Congress: Next Steps on COVID 19
The U.S. Congress returns to work with the House conducting most business remotely and some Senators working remotely for hearings and legislative mark-ups.
Both chambers will conduct business through Friday, May 22, 2020 when they break for the Memorial Day recess.
What’s on the agenda for COVID 19 and people with disabilities?
It’s not clear.
The U.S. Senate has 12 committee hearings scheduled this week. Half of the hearings deal with judicial nominations or nominations to the administration of the President.
Three hearings are focused on COVID 19.
The U.S. House of Representatives has only one hearing scheduled this week. It is focused on COVID 19.
Wednesday, May 6, 2020
10:00 am
U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education and Related Agencies. Hearing on COVID 19 response.
2:00 pm
U.S. Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs. Hearings to examine COVID 19, focusing on how new information should drive policy.
Wednesday, May 6, 2020
2:30 pm
U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation. Hearing to examine the state of the aviation industry, focusing on COVID 19.
Thursday, May 7, 2020
10:00 am
U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions. Hearing to examine new tests for COVID 19.
We have links to those hearings on our #AdvocacyMatters page. You can find the material on that page when you click on today’s segment.
Behind the scenes, House, Senate and White House negotiations continue to work on the 4th stimulus package for America.
Is this enough to address the pandemic?
The number of positives continues to rise across the country.
We know there are still barriers to testing and shortages of testing in some parts of our country.
We have people with disabilities out of work.
We are fighting medical rationing and no visitor policies that fail to provide reasonable accommodations and modifications across the country.
State and local budgets face major deficits that may impact our service systems.
People with disabilities need the U.S. Congress to address multiple issues and include people with disabilities in all their discussions and hearings.
#AdvocacyMatters.
Check out the list of congressional hearings this week.
We’ll have links to the U.S. Senate and U.S. House on our website attached to this segment.
www.senate.gov/committees/hearings_meetings.htm
Be sure to contact your member of congress and let them know that people with disabilities need to be included in every conversation and hearing on COVID 19.
www.senate.gov/senators/contact
Go to www.disabilityrightspa.org and find the link for today’s show under the #AdvocacyMatters page for all of the information we talked about today.