[House Hearing, 117 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]


                                    

                          [H.A.S.C. No. 117-2]

                      UPDATE ON THE DEPARTMENT OF

                        DEFENSE'S EVOLVING ROLES

                       AND MISSION IN RESPONSE TO

                         THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC

                               __________

                      COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES

                        HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                    ONE HUNDRED SEVENTEENTH CONGRESS

                             FIRST SESSION

                               __________

                              HEARING HELD

                           FEBRUARY 17, 2021

                                     
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT] 

                              __________

                    U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE                    
44-982                      WASHINGTON : 2021                     
                
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                      COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
                    One Hundred Seventeenth Congress

                    ADAM SMITH, Washington, Chairman

JAMES R. LANGEVIN, Rhode Island      MIKE ROGERS, Alabama
RICK LARSEN, Washington              JOE WILSON, South Carolina
JIM COOPER, Tennessee                MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio
JOE COURTNEY, Connecticut            DOUG LAMBORN, Colorado
JOHN GARAMENDI, California           ROBERT J. WITTMAN, Virginia
JACKIE SPEIER, California            VICKY HARTZLER, Missouri
DONALD NORCROSS, New Jersey          AUSTIN SCOTT, Georgia
RUBEN GALLEGO, Arizona               MO BROOKS, Alabama
SETH MOULTON, Massachusetts          SAM GRAVES, Missouri
SALUD O. CARBAJAL, California        ELISE M. STEFANIK, New York
ANTHONY G. BROWN, Maryland,          SCOTT DesJARLAIS, Tennessee
RO KHANNA, California                TRENT KELLY, Mississippi
WILLIAM R. KEATING, Massachusetts    MIKE GALLAGHER, Wisconsin
FILEMON VELA, Texas                  MATT GAETZ, Florida
ANDY KIM, New Jersey                 DON BACON, Nebraska
CHRISSY HOULAHAN, Pennsylvania       JIM BANKS, Indiana
JASON CROW, Colorado                 LIZ CHENEY, Wyoming
ELISSA SLOTKIN, Michigan             JACK BERGMAN, Michigan
MIKIE SHERRILL, New Jersey           MICHAEL WALTZ, Florida
VERONICA ESCOBAR, Texas              MIKE JOHNSON, Louisiana
JARED F. GOLDEN, Maine               MARK E. GREEN, Tennessee
ELAINE G. LURIA, Virginia, Vice      STEPHANIE I. BICE, Oklahoma
    Chair                            C. SCOTT FRANKLIN, Florida
JOSEPH D. MORELLE, New York          LISA C. McCLAIN, Michigan
SARA JACOBS, California              RONNY JACKSON, Texas
KAIALI'I KAHELE, Hawaii              JERRY L. CARL, Alabama
MARILYN STRICKLAND, Washington       BLAKE D. MOORE, Utah
MARC A. VEASEY, Texas                PAT FALLON, Texas
JIMMY PANETTA, California
STEPHANIE N. MURPHY, Florida
Vacancy

                     Paul Arcangeli, Staff Director
                Will Johnson, Professional Staff Member
                 Kyle Noyes, Professional Staff Member
                          Emma Morrison, Clerk
                            
                            C O N T E N T S

                              ----------                              
                                                                   Page

              STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY MEMBERS OF CONGRESS

Rogers, Hon. Mike, a Representative from Alabama, Ranking Member, 
  Committee on Armed Services....................................     3
Smith, Hon. Adam, a Representative from Washington, Chairman, 
  Committee on Armed Services....................................     1

                               WITNESSES

Nordhaus, Maj Gen Steven S., USAF, Director of Operations, 
  National Guard Bureau..........................................     7
Salesses, Robert G., Performing the Duties of Assistant Secretary 
  of Defense for Homeland Defense and Global Security, Office of 
  the Secretary of Defense.......................................     4
Taliaferro, Maj Gen Jeffrey B., USAF, Vice Director of 
  Operations, Joint Chiefs of Staff..............................     6

                                APPENDIX

Prepared Statements:

    Salesses, Robert G., joint with Maj Gen Jeffrey B. Taliaferro 
      and Maj Gen Steven S. Nordhaus.............................    53

Documents Submitted for the Record:

    DOD Diagnostics & Testing Update Charts......................    75

Witness Responses to Questions Asked During the Hearing:

    Mr. Langevin.................................................    79
    Mr. Scott....................................................    79
    Mr. Waltz....................................................    79

Questions Submitted by Members Post Hearing:

    Mr. Brown....................................................    84
    Mr. Kahele...................................................    83
    Mr. Morelle..................................................    83
                 
                 
                 UPDATE ON THE DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE'S
    EVOLVING ROLES AND MISSION IN RESPONSE TO THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC

                              ----------                              

                          House of Representatives,
                               Committee on Armed Services,
                      Washington, DC, Wednesday, February 17, 2021.
    The committee met, pursuant to call, at 11:02 a.m., in room 
2118, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Adam Smith (chairman 
of the committee) presiding.

  OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. ADAM SMITH, A REPRESENTATIVE FROM 
       WASHINGTON, CHAIRMAN, COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES

    The Chairman. Good morning. We will call the meeting to 
order.
    We welcome our witnesses, members, and staff. This hearing 
will be hybrid. There are a few members here in committee, and 
most members are participating remotely. So I have a script 
that I must read to explain how all of that will play out.
    Members who are joining remotely must be visible on screen 
for the purposes of identity verification, establishing and 
maintaining a quorum, participating in the proceeding, and 
voting. Those members must continue to use the software 
platform's video function while in attendance, unless they 
experience connectivity issues or other technical problems that 
render them unable to participate on camera.
    If a member experiences technical difficulties, they should 
contact the committee staff for assistance. Video of members' 
participation will be broadcast in the room and via the 
television/internet feed. Members participating remotely must 
seek recognition verbally, and they are asked mute their 
microphones when they are not speaking.
    Members who are participating remotely are reminded to keep 
the software platform's video function on the entire time they 
attend the proceeding. Members may leave and rejoin the 
proceeding. If members depart for a short while for reasons 
other than joining a different proceeding, they should leave 
the video function on.
    If members will be absent for a significant period or 
depart to join a different proceeding, they should exit the 
software platform entirely, and then rejoin it if they return. 
Members may use the software platform's chat feature to 
communicate with staff regarding technical or logistical 
support issues only.
    Finally, I have designated a committee staff member to, if 
necessary, mute unrecognized members' microphones to cancel any 
inadvertent background noise that may disrupt the proceedings.
    Well, thank you. We are here this morning to get an update 
from the Department of Defense on their evolving roles and 
missions in response to the COVID-19 [coronavirus disease 2019] 
pandemic. We have had a number of these hearings over the 
course of the last 9 or 10 months. I very much appreciate the 
Department's cooperation in that process.
    And this morning we have with us Dr. Robert Salesses, who 
is performing the duties of Assistant Secretary of Defense for 
Homeland Defense and Global Security; Major General Jeff 
Taliaferro, who is the Vice Director for Operations for the 
Joint Chiefs; and Major General Steven Nordhaus, who is the 
Director of Operations for the National Guard Bureau.
    I appreciate all of you being here this morning. And for 
the record, our witnesses are here in person. We have many 
members who are here virtually.
    And before we get started, I do want to thank our staff, in 
general, Doug Bush, in particular, who has done an outstanding 
job of making this process work. It hasn't been easy, but I 
think it has been very, very effective. We have been able to 
conduct the business of this committee effectively while still 
accommodating the needs to deal with the COVID pandemic. So it 
has been a lot of work, and I definitely appreciate that work.
    I also want to thank the Department for their leadership 
and efforts on the COVID pandemic. There is a number of 
different layers to this, which we will want to get into today. 
Obviously, at the top, you know, is the protection of the 
force, Active Duty, civilian, and guardsmen. How are we able to 
continue to maintain readiness, maintain performance of the 
duties, while at the same time protecting our service members 
from the pandemic and stopping the spread. There has been a lot 
that DOD [Department of Defense] has done to make that happen.
    Learning more about how it is going, how it has gone, is 
enormously helpful, because I think in many ways the Department 
of Defense has been a leader in some of that, in guiding all of 
us into how we can get our work done and still contain the 
virus. So I appreciate hearing about that.
    Also, as we know, the Guard has been called up to help 
support States and localities in a variety of different ways 
from the beginning of this pandemic. Most urgently, in some 
cases, when communities have been overrun, they have set up 
field hospitals, and they have provided staff to meet those 
needs.
    I remember in my home State of Washington which got their 
sort of first burst in March. You know, we set up a field 
hospital at a local stadium. It turned out we didn't need it, 
which was good, but we definitely needed the support staff that 
was provided, as I know many other States have as well.
    And now as we go forward, it is going to be really 
important to see how the Department of Defense can help with 
the vaccine distribution. I would really like to learn this 
morning more about how you are participating in that, how you 
are coordinating with FEMA [Federal Emergency Management 
Agency] and HHS [Department of Health and Human Services] to 
maximize the most rapid distribution of the vaccine possible.
    Also, there are the issues surrounding, you know, 
production of the vaccine as well. I am curious what DOD is 
working on in that regard.
    And then lastly, there is the industrial base. Now, the 
industrial base is enormously important for maintaining our 
national security needs. They obviously have been stressed in 
all the ways that the rest of us have in terms of maintaining 
the workforce, in terms of providing safety for their workers. 
How is that going? How do we feel about the level of production 
in making sure that we are meeting our defense needs?
    And, again, while that may start with a focus, certainly, 
from this committee and from the Department of Defense's 
perspective on, you know, how do we protect defense needs, it 
has larger implications. Many of these companies, obviously, do 
both commercial and defense work. How are they handling that? 
Are they adequately protecting their workforce? Are they able 
to meet their needs? If they are not, how are we adjusting to 
those shortfalls?
    Many questions to be covered in this conversation and 
discussion. I look forward to the testimony and to the question 
and answer.
    And with that, I will yield to the ranking member, Mr. 
Rogers, for his opening statement.

 STATEMENT OF HON. MIKE ROGERS, A REPRESENTATIVE FROM ALABAMA, 
          RANKING MEMBER, COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES

    Mr. Rogers. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate you 
having this hearing today.
    Since the earliest days of the pandemic, the U.S. military 
has been on the front lines of this response, providing 
critical support to civilian authorities at Federal, State, and 
local levels.
    They repatriated thousands of Americans; hosted dozens of 
quarantine, testing, and vaccination sites; deployed two 
hospital ships and set up military field hospitals to surge 
healthcare capacity in hard-hit areas; provided thousands of 
ventilators and millions of respirators and other PPE [personal 
protective equipment] to civilian authorities; and helped 
develop the therapeutics in vaccines under Operation Warp Speed 
that are saving lives and putting an end to this pandemic.
    For this, we are eternally grateful. And while we know--
while I know there is a desire to see DOD do more to assist 
civilian authorities, I am primarily concerned with its 
impacts--that COVID is having on our military readiness.
    Over the past year, nearly 200 Navy ships have suffered 
outbreaks, which in some cases disrupted training and 
operations. Across the services, hundreds of training exercises 
have been canceled, curtailed, or altered. This is especially 
problematic for our service members overseas who rely on 
international exercises to maintain their proficiency.
    At our shipyards and depots, and across the industrial 
base, COVID workforce reductions are cutting production 
capacity, delaying maintenance cycle, and pushing planned work 
back by months.
    While the services have done a tremendous job to mitigate 
these impacts to keep our troops on station, I remain worried 
about the cumulative impact they are having on our readiness. I 
am also very concerned with a lack of progress the DOD is 
making vaccinating our service members. It is my understanding 
that since the vaccine only received emergency use 
authorization from the FDA [Food and Drug Administration], the 
DOD is reluctant to make vaccinations mandatory at this time.
    The Department typically waits until full FDA approval 
before issuing such orders to vaccinate. However it could be 
another 2 years before these vaccines receive full FDA 
approval.
    With new variants popping up across the globe, I am not 
sure we can wait for 2 years. It is critical for our national 
security that every service member, as well as DOD civilian 
personnel and contractors, receive vaccines as soon as 
possible.
    I am interested to hear from our witnesses what percentage 
of our service members have been vaccinated, what the refusal 
rate has been, and what steps are being taken to get more shots 
into arms.
    Finally, my job is to ensure our service members have the 
resources they need to successfully carry out their mission. 
This pandemic is making that mission much harder. I hope our 
witnesses will explain what more Congress can do to help the 
services adapt and overcome.
    Thank you for being here today, and I thank you, Mr. 
Chairman. I yield back.
    The Chairman. Thank you, sir. And we will begin testimony 
now with Mr. Salesses. You may proceed.

   STATEMENT OF ROBERT G. SALESSES, PERFORMING THE DUTIES OF 
ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF DEFENSE FOR HOMELAND DEFENSE AND GLOBAL 
          SECURITY, OFFICE OF THE SECRETARY OF DEFENSE

    Mr. Salesses. Good morning, Chairman Smith, Ranking Member 
Rogers, distinguished members of the committee, thank you for 
the opportunity to testify before you today on the Department 
of Defense's response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
    The COVID-19 pandemic has posed an unprecedented challenge 
to our Nation. Since the start, DOD has protected its people, 
supported the national response, ensured the readiness of the 
force to meet its national security mission.
    To protect DOD personnel from the pandemic, DOD implemented 
measures to contain and mitigate the effects on the force, 
including forced health protection guidance, restriction of 
movement orders, social distancing, mask wearing, telework on 
an unprecedented scale, and testing and contact tracing. DOD 
has also established a tiered vaccine plan, following CDC 
[Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] guidance tailored 
to DOD's unique requirements.
    As of 16 February, DOD has administered approximately 
860,000 doses of the vaccine. DOD support to the national 
response to the COVID pandemic has evolved over the last 13 
months.
    DOD assistance began in late January 2020, supporting 
embassies and consulates around the globe to repatriate U.S. 
citizens and U.S. persons to the United States. In support of 
the State Department, USTRANSCOM [U.S. Transportation Command] 
facilitated the safe return of more than 4,500 Americans. In 
support of HHS, USNORTHCOM [U.S. Northern Command] and 
INDOPACOM [U.S. Indo-Pacific Command] and the military 
departments aided the quarantine of more than 3,000 individuals 
at 13 military installations.
    As the pandemic spread over the late winter, early spring 
of 2020, hospitalizations increased rapidly, and State and 
local demands rose for both medical facilities and medical 
providers. HHS and FEMA turned to DOD to help meet this demand. 
NORTHCOM deployed almost 15,000 DOD personnel, including nearly 
5,000 Active Duty and Reserve medical professionals to 10 
States and multiple locations within those States.
    INDOPACOM provided similar support to Hawaii, Guam, and the 
Northern Mariana Islands. The Army Corps of Engineers designed 
and constructed 38 alternate care facilities providing 
additional medical bed capacity in multiple States.
    Working with FEMA, DOD also authorized National Guard 
personnel to carry out FEMA COVID-19 mission assignments in 
title 32 status. More than 47,000 National Guard supported 
testing, emergency medical care, medical sheltering, public 
health communications, transportation, logistics, and first 
responder support.
    DOD also played a critical role in strengthening the supply 
chain for medical resources and PPE in short supply. HHS and 
FEMA leveraged DOD's acquisition logistics expertise to 
reenforce nearly all facets of the national supply chain. FEMA 
and HHS established the Supply Chain Task Force in late March 
of 2020 which was led and heavily supported by DOD experts. The 
task force accelerated acquisition, expended production by 
generating new capacity, and allocated key resources and 
supplies to priority hotspots around the Nation. USTRANSCOM 
supported Project Airbridge which also airlifted millions more 
of critical PPE and medical supplies to fill the supply chain 
gaps.
    In late March 2020, DOD also established the COVID Joint 
Acquisition Task Force to serve as the DOD's nexus for 
supporting Federal acquisition and logistics needs. The JATF 
awarded nearly $2 billion worth of contracts to restock the 
national--the Strategic National Stockpile and expanded the 
domestic industrial base for medical supplies and equipment.
    The Defense Logistics Agency also executed more than 25,000 
contract actions for medical supplies and equipment. Building 
on decades of work studying infectious disease such as Ebola 
and the coronaviruses, research and development efforts of DOD 
experts helped genetically sequence COVID-19, and established 
the first treatment protocol for the Remdesivir in March 2020.
    Furthermore, DARPA [Defense Advanced Research Projects 
Agency] funded projects helped lay the groundwork for rapid 
development of RNA COVID-19 vaccines produced by Moderna and 
AstraZeneca.
    The Joint DOD-HHS Vaccine Task Force established in May of 
2020 accelerated the development, the manufacturing, and the 
distribution of COVID-19 vaccines in record time.
    Now at approximately 60 million vaccine doses delivered, 42 
million which have been administered, and expecting 600 million 
vaccine regiments delivered by the end of July of 2021.
    As Secretary Austin made clear in Day One message to the 
Department, DOD must move further and faster to help counter 
the COVID-19 pandemic. To that end, DOD, with FEMA, has 
developed plans to support vaccine centers able to administer 
up to 6,000 vaccines a day.
    DOD has also supported our allies and partners through the 
provision of transport of lifesaving medical equipment, PPE, 
and humanitarian aid. DOD has provided more than $200 million 
in assistance to 143 countries, including testing, diagnostic 
support, infection control, PPE, and contact tracing, and more.
    Going forward, DOD is actively implementing President 
Biden's national strategy, executive orders, and national 
security policy memorandums and is committed to executing the 
President and Secretary Austin's direction to defeat the COVID-
19 pandemic and defend the force while protecting our Nation.
    Chairman Smith, Ranking Member Rogers, distinguished 
members of the committee, thank you for the opportunity to 
testify today. I appreciate the critical role and partnership 
Congress plays in ensuring the Department is prepared to face 
every challenge at home and abroad.
    [The joint prepared statement of Mr. Salesses, General 
Taliaferro, and General Nordhaus can be found in the Appendix 
on page 53.]
    The Chairman. Thank you. And I should have asked this up 
front, but are both of you gentlemen planning on offering 
opening statements as well?
    General Nordhaus. Yes, Chairman.
    General Taliaferro. Yes, Chairman.
    The Chairman. Then we will go to General Taliaferro.

STATEMENT OF MAJ GEN JEFFREY B. TALIAFERRO, USAF, VICE DIRECTOR 
              OF OPERATIONS, JOINT CHIEFS OF STAFF

    General Taliaferro. Thank you, Chairman. Chairman Smith, 
Ranking Member Rogers, and distinguished members of the 
committee, thanks for the opportunity to talk about DOD 
operations in response to the pandemic today.
    The joint force has been committed to supporting the 
national COVID response effort from its beginning in early 2020 
and has responded to 374 FEMA mission assignments, 47 requests 
for assistance from other departments and agencies with many 
more expected.
    In the early days of this effort, DOD provided facilities 
to house personnel evacuated from overseas, and in March of 
2020 began providing support to the States through FEMA mission 
assignments.
    The capabilities needed by FEMA in the States evolved over 
time, but included everything from direct medical support to 
hospitals and nursing facilities, to the deployment of field 
hospitals and hospital ships, to the staffing of alternate care 
facilities, mortuary affairs, transportation, and sustainment.
    As the States and medical community learned more about 
treating the disease and responding to the pandemic, our 
primary operational headquarters, U.S. Northern Command, 
innovated and evolved its response to best meet the needs of 
our partners.
    In our initial response, we deployed traditional military 
capabilities, like field hospitals and hospital ships. But over 
time, it became clear our capabilities could be much more 
effective augmenting existing hospitals with medical personnel, 
specifically, doctors, nurses, and respiratory therapists. This 
model met the patients and hospitals where they wanted to be, 
in the treatment facilities they were used to, and enabled 
those facilities to handle the increased patient load.
    Over the past year, U.S. Northern Command has put more than 
15,000 title 10 forces in the homeland in support of COVID-19 
response efforts, including at its peak over 45,000 medical 
professionals. They have supported 63 different hospitals, 9 
alternate care facilities across the country, and today have 
over 200 personnel supporting non-hospitals in Arizona, the 
Navajo Nation, and Texas.
    U.S. Transportation Command has also moved over 900,000 
pounds of supplies, helped repatriate over 4,000 American 
citizens using military or commercially contracted aircraft.
    As the Nation's response evolves again towards the focus on 
vaccine distribution, the joint force is equally committed. 
Today, we are already supporting two vaccination distribution 
centers, one in California and one in New Jersey, and have 
ordered over 4,000 additional forces to prepare to deploy to 
support the first 25 different centers as needed.
    We are anticipating FEMA mission assignments that can come 
quickly for New York, Texas, and elsewhere, and will stay in 
lockstep with FEMA as the lead Federal agency for this effort.
    The DOD vaccination teams utilize some of the same 
capabilities from our medical facility support, but also lean 
more heavily on medics, pharmacists, and more nurses. These 
teams come in a variety of scalable sizes based on the need of 
the States.
    Just as last year, we will stay agile and continue to 
innovate and evolve this response as we learn more or the needs 
of the States change.
    Thanks for the opportunity to share experience today and 
for the work of the committee to support our efforts and our 
service members over the last year. We look forward to 
continuing to work with the committee on these important issues 
going forward. Thank you.
    The Chairman. Thank you.
    General Nordhaus.

  STATEMENT OF MAJ GEN STEVEN S. NORDHAUS, USAF, DIRECTOR OF 
               OPERATIONS, NATIONAL GUARD BUREAU

    General Nordhaus. Chairman Smith, Ranking Member Rogers, 
distinguished members of the Armed Services Committee, it is 
truly an honor to testify before you today on the National 
Guard support to COVID-19 in defeating it.
    I would like to start by highlighting the historic efforts 
of our National Guard members in our 50 States, 3 territories, 
and the District of Columbia. These are the same National Guard 
men and women who spent over 10 million days in 2020 serving 
their communities and their Nation both domestically and around 
the world. Four times more than in the previous year.
    They helped battle wildfires that damaged over 9.5 million 
acres. Over 43,100 service members helped maintain order in 34 
States, territories, and the District of Columbia last summer 
when civil disturbances threatened the public's ability to 
safely protest. And they saved lives and expedited recovery 
efforts after a record-breaking hurricane season, including 12 
named storms impacting the United States.
    As you know, the National Guard's primary focus within the 
homeland has been supporting COVID-19 operations. We currently 
have over 28,400 soldiers and airmen dedicated to COVID-19 
operations across all 54 States, territories, and the District 
of Columbia, performing a wide range of missions.
    In 2020, alone, our National Guard members tested nearly 13 
million people, provided medical planning support to local 
communities, and conducted warehouse operations to support the 
distribution of personal protective equipment and medical 
equipment to hospitals and community medical centers.
    The National Guard also provided nearly 550 million meals 
to families in need, disinfected over 9,600 long-term care 
facilities, and delivered nearly 37 million masks for frontline 
workers.
    General Hokanson, Chief of the National Guard Bureau, has 
made maximum support to COVID vaccination efforts his number 
one priority. Since early January, the National Guard has grown 
from a few civilian vaccination sites to over 350 across 42 
States and territories; 33 States and territories are employing 
National Guard service members to vaccinate citizens; and 9 
States provide wraparound services and support to local vaccine 
centers.
    As I speak, Army and Air National Guard members are 
administering on average over 72,000 vaccines a day to local 
citizens. We estimate that since the beginning of our 
vaccination efforts, the National Guard has administered over 
1.2 million vaccinations to our civilian population.
    Also, vaccinating our National Guard members and their 
families, and our civilians remains a top priority. To date, 
over 71,000 have received at least their first vaccination, and 
that number continues to climb today.
    Next, I would like to highlight to the committee the 
significant use of the dual status command in efforts to fight 
the virus. In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in 2005, the 
dual status command concept gained acceptance and allowed a 
National Guard officer to command both Federal and State 
members--service members responding to a domestic emergency.
    Thanks to Congress making the dual status commander a 
matter of law in the 2012 NDAA [National Defense Authorization 
Act], Governors are enabled to provide seamless command and 
control of National Guard, Active Duty, and Reserve service 
members fighting wildfires, hurricanes, and, of course, this 
virus.
    During the peak of our response in May, we had 47,400 
service members supporting COVID operations, with 41 dual 
status commanders approved, of which 9 were activated for 
command and control of Active Duty and Reserve service members 
within their State or territory. Today, there are currently 21 
approved dual status commanders with 2 activated in California 
and Texas.
    The continued investment and the readiness of the National 
Guard has paid dividends both on the battlefield and in our 
communities. Not since World War II has our National Guard been 
called upon to serve in such numbers. Last June, we had over 
120,000 service members supporting missions in our homeland and 
overseas.
    Every day, we are reminded of the sacrifices of these brave 
and women and their families, and it is with those sacrifices 
in mind that we remember the eight National Guard members who 
died as a result of COVID-19. These soldiers and airmen, while 
not serving on the front lines of COVID operations, still gave 
their full devotion to our Nation. Their legacy of service will 
live on in our memories.
    In closing, I want to thank you for this opportunity to 
tell the National Guard story. On behalf of over 443,000 
National Guard soldiers and airmen, I want to express our 
gratitude to you for your consistent and unwavering support.
    We are especially grateful for Congress' support of the 
TRICARE Transitional Assistance Management Program, known as 
TAMP, which provides 180 days of premium-free transitional 
healthcare benefits after regular TRICARE benefits end. This 
protection is crucial to our transitioning National Guard 
warriors as they demobilize and return to civilian life.
    We will remain laser focused with our interagency partners, 
civilian and military leaders, and frontline workers to help 
vaccinate our citizens and defeat COVID-19. Every day, tens of 
thousands of National Guard members, many of whom left their 
families and jobs, serve on the front lines of this battle 
saving lives and minimizing suffering across the Nation. The 
National Guard remains always ready and always there.
    I look forward to your questions.
    The Chairman. Thank you very much. Mr. Rogers alluded to 
this in his opening statement: What is the plan for vaccinating 
the DOD workforce? And that is Active Duty, civilian, Guard, 
Reserve, how are you implementing that and particularly in 
light of the comment Mr. Rogers made about not being able to 
actually mandate it?
    Mr. Salesses. Mr. Chairman, the Department has developed--
--
    The Chairman. Could you pull the microphone just little 
closer to you there? There we go.
    Mr. Salesses. The Department has--developed a vaccine the 
material approach to the way that we will vaccinate. For 
example, in the first year, is medical professionals that are 
working----
    The Chairman. Yeah. You have to speak up.
    Okay. We are having a hard time hearing him in here as 
well. Are you sure your microphone is on?
    Mr. Salesses. Can you hear me now?
    The Chairman. Yeah. It was off.
    Mr. Salesses. That is the key to success, I guess.
    The Chairman. So, yeah, the key part--and I know the whole 
you're on a tier, you are going to do all of that.
    Mr. Salesses. Yeah.
    The Chairman. What is your estimate on when, you know, how 
soon you will get the entire force vaccinated? Are you having 
problems with members saying, ``Hey, I don't want it''? What is 
your guess on when you can get basically all of your personnel 
vaccinated?
    Mr. Salesses. So, just a little bit more perspective. This 
past week we vaccinated 170,000 members. It includes both 
military members, civilians, and contract folks, and obviously, 
beneficiaries; 170,000.
    In this tiered approach, again, we are focused on the 
frontline folks that need the vaccine to care for others, then 
we move through that process making sure that we are focused on 
specific high important mission areas, like strategic forces, 
then we move through that to the most vulnerable ages 65 and 
above, and operational forces.
    As we move through those tiers, tiers one, two, they are 
segmented in a certain way to get after everybody. The bottom 
line--your question relative to when do we think we will have 
everybody vaccinated. It will probably be sometime in late 
July, August timeframe. And we are making great progress.
    As you know, the vaccine delivery has picked up 
significantly. I mean, the vaccine delivery for the country 
this past week was 13 million doses. So it is picking up 
exponentially.
    The Chairman. Yeah, and that leads me to my second 
question, in terms of the distribution chain, and I know you 
guys are certainly focused on, you know, DOD personnel and 
those folks, but you are also involved in speeding up the 
chain. And it is simple to explain--you need to produce the 
vaccine, and then you need to get it out to people.
    Mr. Salesses. Yes.
    The Chairman. But there are, you know, a lot of details in 
that. As you are looking at the distribution chain, is there--
how to ask this question?
    So, and I have seen the report that basically once we get 
to July, that is when we are going to get there. What are the 
bottom--what is the most important thing that DOD can do to 
speed that up? Where do you think you can be helpful? Where are 
the bottlenecks here?
    Is it, just, we don't have enough of it? Is it it is not 
getting distributed to the States, once it gets to the States, 
it is not getting out fast enough? Or is it--or are we pretty 
much doing the best we can right now'?
    Mr. Salesses. My sense is that we can do better, but we are 
doing a lot to make it happen. If I can give you a bit of a 
perspective, and I can talk specifically about what the Defense 
Department is doing.
    Obviously, the Defense Department is working very closely 
with FEMA to establish these mega and large centers. That will 
be very helpful. In fact, I visited the center in Glendale, 
Arizona, about 2 weeks ago. They are providing 8,000 shots a 
day at a drive-through center out there. That is a tremendous 
amount of vaccine shots in one day in that area.
    Our mega centers that we are working with FEMA on will also 
be able to provide up to 6,000 vaccine shots. The one is just 
established in Los Angeles, we have plans to establish them in 
Texas and New York over the coming days. And that will be very 
helpful.
    But, as you know, if I could just back up, because the 
vaccine, Pfizer and Moderna, right now we expect 100 million 
doses by the end of March of each one of those. We expect 
another 100 million doses from Pfizer and Moderna by the end of 
May, and another 100 million doses by the end of July. That 
gives you some perspective of what the supply side is.
    On the distribution side, the Defense Department is 
obviously helping with these mega and large centers. At the 
same time, there is about 30,000 centers identified the across 
the Nation with State and local authorities.
    As the vaccine becomes more readily available, it will be 
coming, obviously, in greater quantities. As I just pointed 
out, yesterday we did 1.6 million doses in arms around the 
country.
    The Chairman. And that all sounds good, and I apologize. 
Other members here are going to want to get in. Just quickly, 
is there a particular chokepoint where you are like, here is 
what we need to do. This is--I have seen this. We really need 
to get after this, or is it just sort of all kind of moving 
forward as you described?
    Mr. Salesses. Sir, I believe it is all moving forward, and 
it's beginning to ramp up much faster than what we've seen. 
Again, this started December 14th when we started to take the 
first doses. I think you are going to see a great acceleration 
over the next 30, 60, 90, 120 days until we are at the end of 
July we have delivered over 600 million doses of vaccine.
    The Chairman. Thank you very much. I appreciate it.
    Mr. Rogers.
    Mr. Rogers. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. To follow up on that 
line of question with the chairman, has there been a lack of 
supply that has held up from vaccinating more members of the 
service?
    Mr. Salesses. I think, in general, yes, sir, that is 
reasonable. I mean, it had not been produced. Obviously, we 
have hundreds of millions of people to vaccinate. If we focus 
just on DOD, our increase in supply has been growing every 
week.
    Mr. Rogers. Okay. Well, I was looking at your Joint Staff 
COVID-19 Update of February 17th and I see that between first 
dose and second dose you all have administered right at 916,000 
doses. And this could be, I guess, for General Taliaferro. I 
thought I heard you testify there were 860,000. So what is the 
delta there?
    General Taliaferro. Ranking Member, I think that certain--
just the timeline between preparation of the remarks and 
products today, there are a lot happening each day. So as of 
today, 916,575.
    Mr. Rogers. Okay. Do we know how many of those are for 
service members as opposed to like depot workers, civilian 
personnel?
    General Taliaferro. The majority, Ranking Member, focus on 
the higher tiered members. Tier 1a and 1b which are primarily 
our healthcare workers, critical personnel. So more heavily 
focused in those areas.
    Mr. Rogers. Okay. My understanding, this puts us at about 
20 percent of the individuals we are trying to vaccinate. Is 
that about right? That is including civilian personnel and 
contractors, et cetera?
    Mr. Salesses. Correct.
    General Taliaferro. That is correct.
    Mr. Rogers. Okay. Do we know how many service members have 
received the vaccination of that 916,000?
    Mr. Salesses. Sir, I do have the numbers. What I show, and 
again these numbers, obviously, depending on when they were 
captured, either yesterday or today. I show 359,000 initial 
doses for service members. And then fully vaccinated, that 
means two shots, obviously, 147,000. I also have the civilian 
numbers and the contract numbers, if you would like those, sir?
    Mr. Rogers. Okay. What about concerns? Have you heard many 
concerns from service members about apprehensions in taking the 
vaccine? And if so, what are those concerns and how are you all 
managing them?
    General Taliaferro. Sir, Ranking Member, I think we believe 
that, of course, the vaccine is the right thing to do, it is 
clearly safe for service members, and we need to continue to 
educate our force and help them understand the benefits and 
ensure there is leadership involvement in the discussion of the 
benefits of the vaccine.
    Mr. Rogers. So do you have a handle, General Taliaferro, 
what percentage of the service members has declined?
    General Taliaferro. And so, Ranking Member, I think our 
initial, initial look--and this, of course, is very early data, 
is acceptance rates are somewhere in the two-thirds territory. 
And, of course, it varies by different groups.
    Mr. Rogers. Okay. What about--are they deployable? Somebody 
who is not vaccinated, is that individual deployable?
    Mr. Salesses. So, Ranking Member, we have--the services and 
the combatant commands have worked very hard over the last year 
to make sure that we can operate in a COVID environment. Before 
vaccines were available, the addition of the vaccine should 
make us more capable in that environment, but we have already 
demonstrated over the last year that we are fully capable of 
operating in a COVID environment.
    Mr. Rogers. So I take that to mean, yes, they are 
deployable even if they have not been vaccinated?
    General Taliaferro. Yes, sir.
    Mr. Rogers. Great. Finally, what is the current state of 
readiness across the services when it comes to COVID, and how 
has it been impacted by COVID?
    General Taliaferro. Sir, Ranking Member, I think that the 
services have been very adaptive and resilient. When larger 
formation exercises weren't possible, they substituted those 
with some smaller formations, smaller formations that have 
allowed them to maintain their basic proficiency and currency 
and combat readiness.
    At the same time, of course, there is some quality lost in 
those larger formation training and exercises. But I would say 
the overall C ratings or readiness ratings for all the services 
and combatant commands have stayed within historic norms, 
largely because of the adaptive and aggressive action by the 
services and the combatant commands.
    Mr. Rogers. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
    The Chairman. Thank you.
    Mr. Langevin.
    Mr. Langevin. Thank you Mr. Chairman. Am I coming across 
okay?
    The Chairman. Yeah, we got you loud and clear.
    Mr. Langevin. Very good. Thank you.
    I want to thank our witnesses for your testimony today. Let 
me begin, sort of on a follow-up to the ranking member's 
question, I am concerned about, focused on readiness as well.
    So we have seen--obviously, COVID-19 outbreaks disrupt our 
military's operations, especially Navy deployments. And while 
the Department is doing well in distributing the vaccine, it 
has a hand--last week Secretary Austin said that the Department 
does not know how many service members have declined to get 
vaccinated.
    General Nordhaus, what would be the force readiness impacts 
if fewer than 50 or 60 percent of service members accept 
vaccinations? And, just for the record, I would assume, but I 
don't want to assume, I want it to be just for the record, do 
service members have the right to refuse to get vaccinated? 
This, obviously, impacts readiness.
    So, if you could address both those aspects of the 
question.
    General Nordhaus. Congressman, thank you for the question. 
Yes, it is voluntary to receive the vaccination. As far as 
numbers that we are seeing in the National Guard, it is just 
like General Taliaferro talked about, very similar to what is 
out in the population.
    In the two-thirds to 70 percent readiness impacts, if they 
were lower than the 40 to--30 to 40 percent as you discussed, I 
can't really speak to--we have been able to operate within a 
COVID environment.
    Like Major General Taliaferro talked about, the individual 
capability of our adjutants general and how they have worked 
with flexibility and adaptable to make sure that our service 
members have, one way or another, gotten the training they need 
to be ready and to deploy. They have been very successful at 
that.
    And to this date, we are able to meet all current and 
future projected deployments for the National Guard.
    Mr. Langevin. Thank you, General.
    Mr. Salesses, the Biden administration modified the cost 
share agreement to fully fund the National Guard in title 32 
status at 100 percent and extended the authorization until 
September 31, 2021. What criteria will the Department use when 
determining whether or not to recommend any further extension 
of funding the National Guard in title 32 status after 
September 31, 2021?
    Mr. Salesses. Congressman, thank you for the question. We 
are working closely with FEMA. Obviously, the National Guard is 
filling FEMA mission requirements in support of FEMA. And so as 
we work through this together, we will make a determination as 
we get closer to the September whether the continuing efforts 
of the National Guard, obviously, is necessary. And if that is 
the case, obviously, we would be supporting 100 percent 
reimbursement going forward for that too.
    Mr. Langevin. Thank you. And I understand that the 
Department is responsible for, obviously, supporting civilian 
efforts for vaccine distribution and tracking.
    Mr. Salesses, can those responsibilities be taken over by 
large companies, like Amazon, for example, who are experienced 
in last mile delivery, what would be best in terms of actually 
function of how do we get this, get this out? Is it best in the 
National Guard, or should we be looking at the private sector 
like Amazon?
    Mr. Salesses. So, Congressman, if we are talking about 
distribution from the manufacturers, that is being done right 
now by FedEx and UPS and those kinds of organizations to the 
State level. And they are maximizing the commercial capability 
to do that. Is that helpful, Congressman?
    Mr. Langevin. So, give me a--take it from there what the 
National Guard is doing versus what the private sector is then 
doing?
    Mr. Salesses. So, once the vaccine has arrived at a 
distribution point within the State, then the State, obviously, 
the Public Health/Emergency Management State officials take 
over from there, and as far as making sure that the right 
resources at that distribution point and at that vaccination 
point are available.
    And I think that is where the National Guard has been 
tremendously helpful throughout the States with all of the 
ability to inoculate the citizens in support of their public 
health and individuals at the State level. But I will defer to 
General Nordhaus if he wants to add to how the National Guard 
is exercising that in the States----
    The Chairman. He is going to have to do that in 8 seconds. 
So why don't we take that for the record, because I think your 
time is pretty much up. But thank you. I appreciate that.
    [The information referred to can be found in the Appendix 
on page 79.]
    The Chairman. And next up is Mr. Turner, recognized for 5 
minutes.
    Mr. Turner. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to thank all of 
our witnesses today. DOD certainly has been extraordinary in 
its response in what has been an unbelievably difficult 
situation for our country, and it has been essential.
    General Nordhaus, I have a couple of questions about the 
National Guard. The Secretary mentioned that we are trying to 
prioritize the vaccine for those service members who are on the 
front lines, if you will, or performing functions which are not 
only essential but in which they might have exposure.
    Are the members of the Guard being appropriately 
prioritized, who are, as you indicated, serving their 
communities in the COVID response, such as serving in food 
banks, serving in vaccine supply, assisting their communities 
in ways in which they are backfilling as part of the COVID 
response, are they appropriately prioritized?
    General Nordhaus. Congressman, thanks for the question, and 
I do have to state that I am an Ohio guardsman. First of all, 
yes, we are in lockstep. We have been fully integrated in a DOD 
priority schema for the vaccination. We receive our allotment 
of vaccines, and then we follow right down the list from 1-A 
through 1-C.
    And in that top list of--in the 1-A, our guardsmen that are 
serving in COVID operations across the 54, and so they have the 
ability to get the vaccine. And we have been pushing it out 
weekly to the States so that they can get vaccinated.
    Mr. Turner. Excellent. General, I have one more follow-up 
with you. Since both of us have, you know, our roots in Ohio, I 
do want to say that this question is based on information I 
have actually in other States besides Ohio.
    Could you, please, tell me how is the chain of command 
working when National Guard work with community partners and 
are embedded in, for example, food banks, supply systems, or 
vaccine supply where there are community organizations that are 
actually conducting it? If a member has--a service member has 
concerns about how it is being operated, or even has 
recommendations, how does that work with respect to their 
participation--because they are not just obviously labor, they 
have great intellectual capability--how are we able to ensure 
that that is leveraged and that their thoughts or concerns are 
taken into consideration?
    General Nordhaus. Congressman, across the 54, from the 
beginning of this, we have been focused on the federally 
supported, locally managed. And that has been a great 
opportunity for our guardsmen as they are out and able to 
assist at the local level to help local communities be able to 
expedite, whether it is food banks or vaccines, to those in 
need.
    I will give you a for instance, this is a quote from the 
the Louisiana director of community outreach of testing and 
vaccination programs, and he talks about that the Louisiana 
National Guard have been very helpful in assisting them with 
logistics of all the sites within Louisiana, all the traffic 
control, and they are helping getting patients registered and 
really keeping things safe, orderly, and moving properly and 
efficiently.
    And so because our guardsmen are traditional, and they have 
civilian jobs all across the different entities, they bring 
those different perspectives and thoughts to every mission set 
that they go to.
    So, in South Carolina, Major General McCarty talks about 
how those guardsmen are able to come up with creative solutions 
to help solve complex problems. And so every State is using--is 
working with our interagency partners, whether it is FEMA, or 
whether it is the State health department, or whether it is the 
local community to make sure that we can support them as best 
as possible.
    Mr. Turner. Excellent. Thank you, General.
    Thank you, Chairman. I appreciate you holding this hearing.
    Mr. Garamendi [presiding]. Thank you, Mr. Turner.
    Mr. Courtney, are you participating? Apparently, you are 
not on, so that would be my turn.
    This will be a question to--well first, for all of you. It 
has been an extraordinary year. And clearly, the U.S. military 
all across all of the services has been a very, very important 
part of the American response to the pandemic. And I thank you.
    This morning, as I drove into the Rayburn building, I had 
the pleasure of seeing National Guardsmen here at the Capitol 
protecting us and doing so all across the Nation.
    Yesterday, the Readiness Subcommittee did a briefing to 
learn from the five services, the impact on readiness. I will 
just not go through all of that and ask you gentlemen to go 
through it again. However, I will put it this way. The services 
have been very creative in addressing the issues, and learning 
along the way.
    If we knew today--if we knew at the beginning what we know 
today, the impacts across the military would be significantly 
less. Nevertheless, learning has taken place. There are 
concerns--and we will go into those concerns in more detail in 
the subcommittee work.
    But my question really goes to the future here. The new 
administration wants to use the military, particularly, the 
Defense Production Act.
    Mr. Salesses, if you could take this issue up. What is 
taking place with regard to the Defense Production Act? We are 
thinking PPEs here, perhaps even the issue of vaccinations 
being produced and distributed. So if you could talk, 
generally, and then perhaps, specifically, about some examples 
of where the Defense Production Act is or is not in operation?
    Mr. Salesses. Congressman, thank you. I am going to ask 
Brent Ingraham who is with A&S [Acquisition and Sustainment], 
he actually manages, oversees Defense Production Act, and he is 
going to speak to that. Brent.
    Mr. Ingraham. Good morning, Congressman.
    Mr. Garamendi. You can bring your chair up and have at it. 
Please introduce yourself for the record.
    Mr. Ingraham. Good morning. For the record, I am Mr. Brent 
Ingraham, Department of Defense, Acquisition and Sustainment.
    Mr. Garamendi. Thank you.
    Mr. Ingraham. From the Defense Production Act perspective, 
the Department has used some of our own resources, along with 
supporting both Health and Human Services and FEMA to execute a 
number of onshoring of medical resources across the--for the 
need of COVID, across both PPE, testing and diagnostics, 
pharmaceuticals, N95 masks.
    So to date, the Department has awarded about 885 million 
Defense Production Act dollars of our own that has been both 
towards medical resources in the defense industrial base. And 
then about--we have--about $1.6 billion on behalf of HHS.
    So we have seen--we have done medical investments to 
include $250 million in N95 respirator masks, $10 million in 
surgical masks to get the production of over 445 units per 
month, $22 million in glove production for over 38 million 
units a month, and over $880 million in COVID test production 
kits to get over 86 million units per month.
    Mr. Garamendi. Are you able to--does the Defense Production 
Act allow for the prioritization of both the purchases and then 
the distribution in the--in 2020, it was principally left up to 
the States to try to acquire the necessary equipment, PPEs, and 
others.
    Are you now using the Defense Production Act to coordinate 
and to acquire and then distribute necessary equipment, PPEs, 
for example?
    Mr. Ingraham. We use Defense Production Act to acquire 
material. I will say Department of Health and Human Services 
using the Strategic National Stockpile and FEMA are the ones 
that are actually distributing, that are actually distributing 
that PPE to the States and using their rating systems to be 
able to prioritize for the States.
    Mr. Garamendi. So there remains across the Nation a 
shortage of equipment. And you are relying--it is the 
Department of Health and Human Services and FEMA that are 
setting the pace, and then you administer from there?
    Mr. Ingraham. We supply them the products. Right? So we 
were doing from an assisted acquisition providing the 
contractual and acquisition support to procure the items and 
stand up the industrial base to be able to produce to their 
requirements.
    Mr. Garamendi. My time having expired, I want to go into 
this in more depth, and we will have some written questions for 
you about how the Defense Production Act works.
    I will now yield and call on Mrs. Hartzler. You are up 
next.
    Mrs. Hartzler. Thank you, Mr. Garamendi. And I appreciate 
everyone here and all that you are doing for our country. I 
wanted to just follow up on what my colleague just asked about.
    Even before the pandemic, Representative Garamendi and I 
had introduced a bill to bring back pharmaceutical production 
to America because of the vulnerabilities that we had 
discovered with China being a major source of our 
pharmaceutical ingredients.
    And I have been pleased that in January of this year, the 
Department of Defense, in coordination with HHS, awarded a 
$69.3 million contract to continue pharmaceuticals to develop a 
domestic production capability for critical active 
pharmaceutical ingredients and final dosage from medicine using 
a proprietary integrated continuous manufacturing technology. 
And last September, DOD and HHS also signed a $20 million 
contract with OnDemand Pharmaceuticals to develop a domestic 
production capability for critical active pharmaceutical 
ingredients.
    And so, my question is what capability has been provided 
here in the United States for standing up our pharmaceuticals, 
and what additional work is the Department of Defense doing to 
secure the medical supply chain for our troops through the use 
of the Defense Production Act?
    And are there any additional authorities for the Department 
of Defense that you need for Congress to help with in this 
effort? So can you kind of expand a little bit on the 
pharmaceutical production that has been stood up through the 
Defense Production Act and give us an update on that?
    Mr. Ingraham. Thank you, Congresswoman. I would like to 
take that action for the record. We provided those--both of 
those capabilities were on behalf of HHS to provide that 
capability. And so as those products are starting to be 
developed, I would like to get back to you with the results on 
how those are being--working out.
    Mrs. Hartzler. Do you know of those capabilities that are 
being developed, what percentage of those new pharmaceuticals 
we provided and set aside for our men and women in uniform 
versus just the general public?
    Mr. Ingraham. Both of those capabilities would be for HHS 
for the general public. Those have not been specific for DOD.
    Mrs. Hartzler. And are the capabilities just in general or 
are the--has this money been dedicated just to COVID-related 
medicines?
    Mr. Ingraham. Based on the continuous award, that was 
focused on COVID-19-related medicines.
    Mrs. Hartzler. Okay. So we are not using the Defense 
Production Act just to expand our general pharmaceutical 
development here in the United States. That could be helpful 
for our soldiers, so we are not depending on China. Is that 
correct?
    Mr. Ingraham. We currently have no Defense Production Act 
awards in that area.
    Mrs. Hartzler. Okay. Are you aware of any additional 
capabilities that we need here as a committee to enable you to 
help with this? Because we need to certainly address this 
pandemic. But Representative Garamendi and myself, and I 
believe our colleagues who are on this call, have a lot of 
concerns for our underlying dependence on China with our 
medicine.
    So do we need to do any more through the NDAA or 
legislation to get this production developed here so our troops 
aren't so relying on China for some of our basic medicines and 
vaccines?
    Mr. Ingraham. I would recommend that Brigadier General Paul 
Friedrichs from the Joint Staff Surgeon General talk about what 
specific additional medicines we may need to support our 
troops.
    Mrs. Hartzler. Okay.
    General Friedrichs. Congresswoman, this is Brigadier 
General Paul Friedrichs, the Joint Staff Surgeon. And first, I 
want to thank you and the members of this committee for the 
work that you have done in this area. Because this is an 
absolute concern of ours, and we are grateful for the precedent 
that you have set in relooking at this.
    We have gone back through based on the original language 
that you all had drafted and looked at those operational 
medications that we rely on in our deployed assemblages and 
identified which ones rely on ingredients from other countries. 
We are working with the FDA to obtain ingredients for those 
where we have not been able to identify the source of origin.
    And to your question about what other steps need to be 
taken, that is really the next step is to understand fully 
through the global supply chain where all of the ingredients 
come from, and ensure that pharmaceutical companies are able to 
share that information with us so that we can then identify 
what risk there is to those medications in our deployable 
assemblages. We continue to work closely with the Food and Drug 
Administration and the Department of Health and Human Services 
on this as we identify those risks and then identify 
opportunities to mitigate them.
    Ma'am, I hope that answers your question.
    Mrs. Hartzler. Thank you. It is very helpful, and I look 
forward to working with you and try to get this information as 
quickly as possible.
    But thank you for your time there, Mr. Chairman. I yield 
back.
    Mr. Garamendi. Well, thank you very much, Mrs. Hartzler. 
Thank you, General, for your response on that. In the larger 
context, we have discovered that much of what we depend upon 
for the military and for our domestic use in this pandemic and 
beyond is not produced in America. This is one example of that 
problem, and there are numerous other examples.
    The President has established a Buy America policy, and 
that is for the military as well as all other government 
purchases. And so we will be following that along closely.
    We would appreciate some more detailed information on this 
pharmaceutical issue.
    Our next witness is--excuse me, our next questioner, Mr. 
Carbajal, you are up.
    Mr. Carbajal. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    General Nordhaus, in the weeks since the National Guard 
mobilized to respond to the January 6th violent extremist 
insurrection mob and for the Presidential inauguration, there 
were reports that hundreds of Guard members on duty in DC 
tested positive for COVID-19.
    What procedures did the Guard have in place to test members 
before arriving in DC, while in DC, or before returning home? 
Did the Guard conduct contact tracing for members who tested 
positive?
    And the reason I asked is because I think it goes to the 
heart of our readiness. Do we already have the infrastructure 
and procedures and protocols in place to protect our service 
members as well as those that they are around?
    General Nordhaus. Congressman, thank you very much for the 
question. We follow all CDC guidance. And as those folks 
deployed, you know, they do testing and screening from a 
standpoint of temperature and checks to make sure that they are 
healthy, they pass questionnaires, and then they deployed into 
DC.
    I will say that the positives, once we tested somebody, 
they would go through the normal health requirements there to 
get tested. If they tested positive, the DC National Guard and 
their organization worked through the contact tracing to make 
sure that they identified members that needed to go into 
restriction of movement. And they continued that over the last, 
you know, month now.
    And I will say that from the numbers I have seen, they've 
done a really good job and they've continued to reduce that to 
be able to find where those positives are and then do the 
contact tracing, do appropriate restriction of movement to 
ensure that they can minimize any impacts to the mission.
    Mr. Carbajal. Thank you. General Taliaferro, if I heard 
correctly, one-third of our service members are refusing the 
vaccination. What is the Department doing to reach out to our 
service members to encourage them to be vaccinated? And, you 
know, when I served in the Marine Corps, I don't think I was 
ever given an option about my vaccinations. We just got in 
line, and they zapped us, and everybody got it, that was just 
the way it was. Are you saying that now we have a new approach 
to vaccinations for our service members?
    General Taliaferro. Congressman, I wouldn't say we have a 
new approach. There is still a variety of vaccinations that are 
mandatory. The fact that this is authorized under emergency use 
authorization is what puts it in the category of being a 
voluntary vaccination.
    And, you know, I think it is most effective to think about 
the numbers that have accepted. Certainly service members can 
accept or--you know, we don't precisely know why an individual 
has not received a vaccine. We think it is important that the 
Department continue to communicate to our service members the 
value of the vaccine, the safety of the vaccine, with continued 
leadership involvement to help our service members understand 
that.
    Mr. Carbajal. Thank you.
    Mr. Salesses, I appreciate the support the Department has 
provided to States throughout--providing personnel for testing 
sites, food distribution, and designating alternate care 
facilities.
    I understand the Department has announced that it will send 
Active Duty service members to support five FEMA vaccination 
sites and are currently evaluating additional requests. What 
criteria does the Department use when evaluating these 
requests?
    Mr. Salesses. Congressman, we obviously look at a number of 
factors. First of all, obviously, because of the demand for 
vaccine support, that is the priority for the Nation, and 
obviously we want to support that. We also look at the types of 
people that we are providing--medics, corpsmen, nurses--and, 
obviously, evaluate the impact on the Department.
    The Department is ready, prepared to support all of these 
vaccine centers that we have identified and are working with 
FEMA--the ones in California, as you mentioned; we have ones 
planned for New York and Texas. And we will work very closely 
with FEMA going forward, depending on the availability of 
medical people--nurses, medics, corpsmen, and those types of 
things. We weigh all of those things.
    But we understand this is a priority for the Nation, and 
the Department is ready and postured to support these vaccine 
centers.
    Mr. Carbajal. Thank you.
    Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
    Mr. Garamendi. Thank you.
    Mr. Wittman, you are up next.
    Mr. Wittman. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And I appreciate our 
witnesses' joining us today.
    I wanted to go to Mr. Salesses and ask him specifically 
what Department of Defense is doing for our critical civilian 
support structure for the military.
    And I will give you an example. Newport News Shipbuilding 
is one of our contractors that requires individuals to work in 
close quarters, and, therefore, vaccinations are critically 
important for them. Last week, they didn't receive their 
allocation of vaccines from the Virginia Department of Health. 
When that happens, that interrupts their ability, obviously, to 
build ships.
    And that is, I know, common with a number of other folks 
that provide critical support services for the United States 
military, building systems, that are required to work in close 
quarters, and vaccinations are key.
    What is the Department of Defense doing to assure that 
there is not interruption of those efforts there and making 
sure that the federally acquired vaccines are distributed to 
Federal contractors, who, again, by the very nature of their 
work are required to work in close quarters, and making sure 
that they are doing their job to support our brave men and 
women in the military?
    Mr. Salesses. So, Congressman, again, the Department has 
worked very closely to look at our beneficiaries, our military, 
our civilian, and specific contract support that is directly 
provided to the Department. For example, the Newport shipyard, 
as you indicated, that is being supported by the State 
allocation.
    And so, as we look to the future, obviously, any of these 
critical areas, we are willing to and are obviously going to 
talk to these organizations to see how and what we can do to 
assist.
    But as we see the increase in vaccination capability from 
Pfizer and Moderna, we will be able to provide more support 
collectively to these critical essential workers that have been 
identified. In each one of the States, following the CDC 
guidance, again, essential workers are identified. So I am 
optimistic that the Newport shipbuilding community will be 
receiving their vaccine in short order.
    Mr. Wittman. I just hope to follow up with not just with 
Newport News but other companies that perform critical 
functions for our military to make sure that there is no 
interruption in vaccines there. Because what it does, it is a 
workforce interruption, and that is not what we need to be 
doing.
    One other question, too, is about health protection 
condition levels. What latitude do local commanders have in 
changing health protection condition levels? In other words, 
are you giving them the flexibility to determine conditions on 
literally a day-by-day basis? Because they know best about what 
is needed to protect the health of their people under their 
command.
    Mr. Salesses. Congressman, there is that flexibility to do 
that. I will turn it over to the Joint Staff. But it is 
obviously dependent upon the positivity rate within the 
community, the hospitalization rate. And, obviously, those are 
the indicators. But the local commanders at the installation 
set the health condition levels.
    General Taliaferro. Congressman, this is General 
Taliaferro.
    We think you are exactly right, that nobody knows better 
than the local commander what is happening in that local area, 
especially connections to local leaders, whether that is 
leadership or medical facilities. And while DOD instructions 
give general guidance of things to consider, it is fully within 
the hands of local commanders to make that decision.
    Mr. Wittman. Very good. Well, listen, I appreciate that. 
That is key. I know as I have spoken to some local commanders--
--
    Mr. Garamendi. Mr. Wittman, we seem to have lost you.
    Mr. Wittman?
    We will move on. And if Mr. Wittman comes back, he is late.
    Our next witness is--excuse me--our next questioner is Mr. 
Brown.
    Mr. Brown. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    And thank you, gentlemen, for being here today.
    So we have heard during the testimony that the Department 
can mandate a vaccine if it is formally licensed by the FDA.
    Is that authority to mandate a vaccine, let's say, for 
example, influenza or when a service member deploys to an area 
where a vaccination is required, is that express authority 
granted in statute by Congress, or is that the power of the 
President as Commander in Chief?
    General Taliaferro. Congressman, I am going to defer to 
General Friedrichs, the Joint Staff surgeon.
    Mr. Brown. Okay.
    General Friedrichs. Congressman, this is Brigadier General 
Paul Friedrichs. Thank you very much.
    That is authority vested in statute. And the statute is 
written to state that those drugs which are not under an 
emergency use authorization can be mandated. Those which are 
under an emergency use authorization may not be mandated except 
in certain extraordinary circumstances laid out in the statute.
    Does that answer your----
    Mr. Brown. So which--no, no, I really appreciate that. I 
want to kind of flesh that out so that Congress, that we make 
sure that you have the tools you need.
    Is there, in the planning, in the forecasting for when it 
comes to the take-up rates of the vaccine, is there a scenario 
in which the Department might exercise the authority to mandate 
the COVID-19 vaccination under this emergency use 
authorization?
    General Friedrichs. Congressman, from a medical standpoint, 
I believe the legislation which you and your colleagues have 
written is sufficient to address the circumstances that we are 
facing today.
    And it is very clear legislation. We have worked closely 
with our Office of General Counsel to understand the intent and 
the specifics of the legislation. So we believe that you have 
given very----
    Mr. Brown. So, essentially, the Department could mandate 
that a service member receive the COVID-19 vaccination under 
the statutory authorization provided by Congress?
    General Friedrichs. No, sir. The Department could not 
mandate that. The Department could not----
    Mr. Brown. Okay. But you said under certain circumstances. 
Give us an example of what would be that circumstance where, 
even with the emergency use authorization from the FDA, which 
is not the formal license, you could mandate the COVID-19 
vaccination. What would be a circumstance?
    General Friedrichs. Sir, there are no circumstances where 
the Department of Defense has the legislative authority to do 
that. And we can provide in a written response back to you the 
specific language on that. The certain circumstances would 
require action outside the Department of Defense.
    Mr. Brown. Okay. No, I understand that. And thanks for 
clarifying that.
    Mr. Salesses. Congressman, can I add to that discussion, 
though? This is Bob Salesses.
    I do think that we are in the beginning phases of this 
vaccine. And as General Taliaferro pointed out, I do think the 
opportunity to educate, inform, and make sure that our service 
members, our civilians and contractors really understand the 
benefit of this going forward, I think, will reduce----
    Mr. Brown. Thank you.
    Mr. Salesses [continuing]. Significantly.
    Mr. Brown. Thank you.
    Are you keeping data, are you surveying the force on, by 
demographics, who is accepting the vaccine and who is not, 
either by gender, race, ethnicity, or any other relevant 
factor?
    And I ask that because there is a lower take-up rate in 
many communities around the country in communities of color. 
Are you gathering or collecting that data? Are you making those 
observations?
    General Friedrichs. Congressman, this is Brigadier General 
Friedrichs from the Joint Staff again.
    So we are collecting that data on acceptance rate. And as 
General Taliaferro and General Nordhaus mentioned, our 
experience mirrors the preliminary data that we are seeing in 
other communities.
    We are actually digging into that and continuing to collect 
more data as we administer more vaccines. As we mentioned, the 
first priorities are healthcare workers. And that is the group 
for which----
    Mr. Brown. I mean by race and ethnicity. Are you collecting 
data by race and ethnicity?
    General Friedrichs. Yes, sir, we are. And----
    Mr. Brown. Okay.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back.
    Mr. Garamendi. Thank you, Mr. Brown. Thank you for those 
questions. I think we have gone through this issue of 
vaccination and required or not required.
    Mr. Scott, you are next.
    Mr. Scott. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    And, gentlemen, thank you for being here.
    My question revolves somewhat around data as well. Mine is 
specifically geared towards the infection rates. And are the 
infection rates that we are seeing in the DOD different from 
the infection rates that we are seeing in the general public? 
If so, what are the trends that we are seeing?
    We obviously have a more controlled environment than the 
general public does. So infection rates and the trends with 
regard to those rates versus the general public, what are we 
seeing?
    General Friedrichs. Congressman, this is Brigadier General 
Friedrichs, the Joint Staff surgeon. Thank you very much.
    So we have aggressively implemented those public health 
measures that the CDC has recommended, and, as a result, we 
have seen a lower percent positive test rate in our population 
than in the general public over the last year. And that has 
been very consistent for the Active Duty force as we have gone 
forward.
    Our overall number of cases has risen and fallen as the 
number of cases across the United States has risen and fallen, 
so we have mirrored what is happening in the communities where 
our bases are located. But the percent of our force which has 
tested positive has been lower than what we have seen in other 
communities.
    In addition, we have seen a lower percent of the force who 
require hospitalization. And although we have had a few members 
of the force who have died as a result of COVID infection, that 
is a smaller number than in the general public, in part because 
we have a younger population and, in general, they are fairly 
active and healthy and able to serve.
    [Audio interruption.]
    Mr. Scott. All right. So Jim Banks is chiming in on my 
time.
    How much difference are you seeing in the ranks versus the 
general public?
    General Friedrichs. Congressman, I am sorry. Could you 
repeat the question, sir?
    Mr. Scott. Are we 10 percent better? Are we 20 percent 
better? What is the difference in the infection rate between 
DOD personnel and the general public?
    General Friedrichs. Congressman, the data that I am most 
familiar with is the percent positive rate. And we have 
typically had about a 1 percent lower rate of tests which were 
positive compared to the general population. But that has 
varied from week to week as we look at it.
    I would be happy, if I may, to respond for the record with 
specific data on that. But it has been consistently at least a 
percentage point below the general population.
    [The information referred to can be found in the Appendix 
on page 79.]
    Mr. Scott. Okay. I am interested in that data, and I do 
think that it is extremely important that we keep it. We don't 
know how long these vaccines are going to work, and so we don't 
know when the second round of vaccinations is going to have to 
happen. And I think that the data, especially in the more 
controlled environment--although it is not perfectly 
controlled, it is more controlled than the general public--is 
going to be a benefit to all of us as we push forward.
    I am concerned--and I mentioned this yesterday in the 
hearing--I am concerned about our teams, for example, our ODA 
[Operational Detachment-A] teams that are out in Africa that 
work in these train-and-equip missions where they are in very 
close proximity, in order to do their job, with people from 
other countries. I would be interested in how you intend to 
handle that with regard to what I would refer to as partner 
forces.
    Are we testing those partner forces? Are we checking fevers 
before we do a training mission with them? How are we handling 
ODA missions, for example, with partner forces?
    General Taliaferro. Congressman, this is General 
Taliaferro.
    I would say, in general, the forces in those areas are 
practicing good force health protection measures of distancing, 
mask wearing, in some cases distributed operations, distributed 
training by an ODA team in an area like that, hygiene 
awareness.
    And we believe that the forces we are partnering with are 
generally following the same procedures we are, but I don't 
have the details at present on those specific ODA teams.
    Mr. Scott. Okay.
    I am almost out of time.
    General Nordhaus, Tom Carden and Tom Grabowski would want 
me to tell you hello. They have done a great job, especially 
months and months ago they were out there in our nursing homes 
with the Georgia Guard helping them kill this virus. And 
certainly appreciate all that the Guard is doing in Georgia and 
in Washington as well right now.
    Gentlemen, thank you. And my time has expired.
    The Chairman [presiding]. Thank you.
    Mr. Kim.
    Mr. Kim. Thank you, Chairman.
    Thank you, everyone, for joining here and talking with us 
about this incredibly important issue.
    I wanted to shift a little bit here in terms of the 
questioning. Many of us represent military bases and 
installations in our districts. I represent Joint Base McGuire-
Dix-Lakehurst, and that joint base is really an anchor to an 
entire community--a community not just of the service members 
but outside around it. I want to just ask two or three 
questions about this.
    I had a townhall last night, and on the townhall there was 
a veteran, a veteran who lives just outside the joint base, who 
said he is dependent upon access to the commissary for his 
food. You know, he is someone who does not have a lot of money. 
He was telling me just the struggles he has had financially 
because of this. But he has had a tremendous amount of 
difficulty getting onto the base because of COVID restrictions.
    So I guess I just wanted to ask you what work has DOD done 
to try to think about just the broader community here, how we 
are looking out for veterans in particular, many of them who 
settle down and live right around the bases where they retire 
from. Is there anything else we can be doing to help them get 
access to the commissary and other services on the base, and 
other ways we can integrate them into some of our thinking of 
COVID response from DOD?
    Maybe we can hand that over to Major General Taliaferro.
    General Taliaferro. Thanks, Congressman.
    I would say that, in the setting of the health protection 
condition measures, I think not just at the local level but 
certainly at the Department, we are aware of the dependencies 
in the community. There are a lot of linkages to the local 
community that commanders need to be aware of when they are 
going to the more extensive measures like, say, Health 
Protection Condition Delta, where some of those people would 
not be allowed access to the base.
    There are lots of linkages at those levels, whether it is 
contractors, different support that comes from off the base 
onto the base, certainly the support the base provides to 
dependents, veterans, or other beneficiaries in the area.
    So I know that our commanders are aware of that. When they 
reach circumstances that require those kinds of drastic 
measures, they take them, but I know they are conscious of 
them.
    Mr. Kim. Well, look, I appreciate that.
    And one thing I will just say here is, open communication 
and just, kind of, transparency on that front goes a long way. 
I think a lot of the problems here--I mean, I will tell you, I 
get more calls about this than almost any other issue from the 
veterans community right now. And I think just some open 
communication about, you know, the timing or the reason for the 
restrictions at my base as well as around the country I am sure 
would be helpful.
    A last question here, just kind of on a different side of 
this coin. I have talked with a number of service members in my 
district that are young parents. They have little kids, like I 
do. I have a 3-year-old and a 5-year-old. I know the struggles 
about childcare right now, and I know that a number of our 
service members have struggled with this.
    It has put an enormous burden upon them and their ability 
to do their work, as well as their spouses. And we already put 
way too much burden upon military spouses as well. As we know, 
unemployment for them is through the roof.
    I wanted to just kind of hear from you, just, what is your 
thinking about what it is that we can do to support service 
members, their families, their spouses when it comes to 
childcare and other elements for their children? Is there more 
that we can do, as I know many childcare centers have been 
closed or have big restrictions on that front?
    Over to you.
    Mr. Salesses. Congressman, this is Bob Salesses.
    So, in the Defense Department, we have over 200 child 
development centers and currently have about 180 open. 
Obviously, they are not open at full capacity, but we are 
always looking at the kind of mitigation measures that could be 
put in place to ensure that we can maximize those child 
development centers. I think the broader issue within the 
community is the same thing.
    There is a lot of good work that has been done within the 
Defense Department to come up with the procedures so that we 
can have safe and effective child development centers open. 
Certainly willing to share that kind of information with the 
community and others.
    I think that is the key to success, is working together 
both inside the community and with the installations, those 
local installations, to gain a better knowledge and 
understanding of the best practices that we could share amongst 
each other to make sure that we can maximize the childcare 
capabilities both on the DOD installations and outside the DOD 
installations.
    The Chairman. Thank you.
    The gentleman's time----
    Mr. Kim. Thank you.
    The Chairman [continuing]. Has expired.
    Mr. DesJarlais.
    Dr. DesJarlais. Good afternoon. And thanks to the panel for 
the great testimony today.
    For any of those who are at the Capitol--and I think most 
of you are--you probably experienced a much different city than 
you are used to, as you tried to enter through one-way lanes, 
through razor wires and gates.
    And so, Mr. Salesses, I wanted to reference your internal 
email dated January 20 of 2021 where you were discussing the 
National Guard's presence in DC at least through the fall of 
2021.
    First, how many guardsmen nationally are responding for the 
COVID effort right now?
    Mr. Salesses. So, Congressman, it is 23,000 or 24,000--what 
is the number right----
    General Nordhaus. For COVID?
    Mr. Salesses. For COVID.
    General Nordhaus. For COVID, it is 28,430.
    Dr. DesJarlais. Okay. Thank you.
    And so the extended role at the Capitol, would that, in 
your opinion, divert valuable personnel and resources away from 
providing further COVID-related assistance?
    Mr. Salesses. Congressman, that would depend on what level 
of National Guard was needed to support the Capitol security.
    Dr. DesJarlais. Right. And what is there, roughly, about 
6,200 still deployed?
    Mr. Salesses. Within the NCR [National Capital Region], 
that is about the right number, Congressman. We have about 
4,900 on the Capitol Grounds. We also have National Guard 
members supporting Secret Service and currently supporting MPD, 
the Metropolitan Police Department.
    Dr. DesJarlais. And we certainly appreciate their service. 
I have had the opportunity to talk to many of them, and they 
are doing an admirable job.
    Major General Nordhaus mentioned in his opening remarks 
that we have not seen National Guard called upon to serve in 
such numbers since World War II and that military officials 
have already estimated that the cost of the Capitol deployment 
will near a half a billion dollars just through mid-March.
    So now more than ever is it important to continue to devote 
these resources? Or can you share with the committee some 
credible threats that would require us continuing to have such 
a presence in the Nation's capital?
    Mr. Salesses. Go ahead.
    General Nordhaus. Sir, if that question was to Major 
General Nordhaus, sir, right now we are scheduled to end the 
National Guard on roughly 12 March. And pending any other 
information, we will work with our interagency partners like we 
always do, the Office of Secretary of Defense, to continue to 
support if things change.
    Dr. DesJarlais. Okay. So, as of now, you can't share with 
the committee any credible threats that have been identified, 
so you are planning on sending the 5,000 guardsmen home?
    Mr. Salesses. Look, Congressman, we obviously work with our 
law enforcement partners to determine that threat, and that is 
obviously continuing to evolve. At this time, I am not aware of 
a threat that is out there, but that evolves all the time, 
Congressman. So we have to work closely with our Federal law 
enforcement partners to understand that.
    Dr. DesJarlais. Here at the Capitol, which some have dubbed 
``Fort Pelosi,'' it is really discouraging to see the razor 
wire, the fencing, the image that it sends to the world. So, if 
that threat no longer exists, I would hope that we can return 
to normal and that these guardsmen, who have served so 
admirably, could possibly be utilized in other ways and help 
with the COVID effort.
    If anyone has any further response, that is great. If not, 
I yield back.
    The Chairman. Thank you.
    I do want to emphasize that point. I mean, I have some 
sympathy--other than the unnecessary shot at our Speaker, I 
have some sympathy for the concern that is being explained 
there that I hope you gentlemen will take seriously. And I have 
raised this issue with the Pentagon as well.
    As I understand the threat environment right now, it is 
very hard to justify the current security presence around the 
Capitol based on the threat environment that we now see. And my 
great fear is that this becomes permanent. Because there is 
always a threat. I mean, you know, I have been here for 24 
years and certainly bad things have happened. Certainly the 
insurrection took that to a whole other concerning level.
    And I know you guys don't make the decision on this. I just 
want to amplify Mr. DesJarlais's point. This is the United 
States Capitol. People are supposed to be able to come here and 
petition their government, all right? And I can barely get in 
at this point.
    So I just hope we balance the risk with the job it is that 
we are all supposed to be performing here, understanding that 
COVID is part of this as well. And I have had conversations 
with the Speaker about this and conversations with General 
Honore about this. I hope we think about the balance.
    If you look at it from the standpoint of, ``Well, let's 
just eliminate all risk,'' okay, if we were going to eliminate 
all risk to our individual Members, we would do everything 
remotely. We would never leave the house, okay? We cannot be 
afraid of our constituents and do our job. So I hope we will 
figure out a better balance on how to make that work.
    With that, Ms. Houlahan is recognized.
    Ms. Houlahan. Thank you, Chairman.
    And I guess my question might be a good follow-up to that, 
which is that, in an alternative world where we deploy our 
National Guard in a different way other than at our Capitol, 
some States have been successful in getting their National 
Guard to be able to support vaccine deployment efforts.
    And I was wondering if I might be able to ask Major General 
Nordhaus--I think that probably is the most appropriate person 
to ask--are there any obstacles that you are aware of to 
scaling up the use of the Guard in this way? What would that 
look like if we did that in a larger scaled effort? And has the 
DOD considered how they plan to scale up the vaccination 
efforts when and if other vaccine candidates are approved for 
use?
    General Nordhaus. Congresswoman, thank you very much for 
the question.
    I know of no impediments right now. We have seen the number 
of guardsmen on 502(f) increase over the last 3 to 4 weeks. We 
are now up to 28,430, as I discussed earlier. I believe what we 
are seeing is that increase. So we started out with just a few 
vaccination sites of our guardsmen vaccinating civilians in 
early January. And as I brief today, it is 350, and I know 
those numbers continue to climb as we are supporting those 
vaccines.
    Some States are using--like Washington I know is doing a 
great job. They have 150 service members out there. They have 
30-person teams. They have four static teams that are at 
specific locations and another mobile team that is going around 
to long-term care facilities and vaccinating those members. 
Other States are using smaller teams that are going out to very 
rural areas that are some underserved populations to make sure 
that vaccines are available out there.
    But I think we will continue to see the States will utilize 
the guardsmen to be able to get after these vaccine efforts.
    Ms. Houlahan. Would anybody else like to add to that before 
I ask my next question?
    Mr. Salesses. Congresswoman, this is Bob Salesses.
    I think it is a combination of things. What we are seeing 
is, obviously, across the country, there are roughly 30,000 
points of administration. A lot of those are community based, 
State based. As you pointed out, DOD is working very closely 
with FEMA on these mega and large centers that would provide 
tremendous throughput on vaccines.
    The other thing that is going on is obviously the work with 
the private sector, in particular with organizations like CVS 
and Walgreens and many others. That is an opportunity, again, 
to expand the vaccine administration community. And we believe 
that, moving ahead, that, along with the community based, the 
State based, the federally supported, and the private sector, 
will expand that capability to deliver the vaccine.
    This is a very positive development, with the increased 
level of vaccination that is going to be available and the 
increased number of locations that will be available. And the 
Department of Defense's role in this is, again, to support 
these mega centers and obviously to support the National Guard 
in supporting the States in what they are doing.
    Ms. Houlahan. So how are you--and I don't know which one of 
you might be the most appropriate to answer this. But you spoke 
about the different ways that we are deploying our Guard and 
the different kinds of rural areas or our mobile areas. How are 
you choosing the locations in which you offer to support the 
non-DOD efforts?
    Mr. Salesses. So, for the DOD support, we work through 
FEMA. FEMA works with the State to make the determination of 
where those vaccination centers will go.
    I will turn it over to General Nordhaus to talk about how 
the State works with the Guard to support that.
    General Nordhaus. Yes, ma'am. Major General Nordhaus here.
    With the State health departments, they really work with 
FEMA and with the National Guard and the other agencies within 
the State, and they determine the best places to make sure that 
they can get the vaccine across their State with the 
allocations that they receive.
    Ms. Houlahan. Thank you. I appreciate that.
    I have less than a minute, and I am hoping that maybe I 
could ask Mr. Salesses--I hope I am pronouncing that 
correctly--a question regarding pregnant Active Duty members.
    I understand that we have been talking a lot about our 
military and our vaccination process for the general 
population, but people who are pregnant would be in the 1a 
vaccination group. How is the DOD factoring in pregnancy status 
into vaccine prioritization across the Active and Reserve 
forces?
    Some of our colleagues have mentioned that they have 
concerns about getting vaccinated, but what guidance are we 
giving to healthcare personnel about providing information to 
women who are pregnant to make this decision about getting 
vaccinated or not?
    General Friedrichs. Congresswoman, this is Brigadier 
General Friedrichs.
    And we are very closely following the CDC recommendations 
on that and providing the same evidence-based advice that the 
Centers for Disease Control has provided on the safety of the 
vaccines across the general population and in particular for 
those who are pregnant or have other medical conditions.
    The Chairman. Thank you.
    The gentlewoman's----
    Ms. Houlahan. Thank you.
    And I yield back. I have run out of time.
    The Chairman. Thank you.
    Mr. Kelly is recognized for 5 minutes.
    Mr. Kelly. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    My first question has do with 502(f) orders for folks who 
are on COVID--or service members who are on COVID support. And 
while it is very important that we be able to respond to this, 
it is also very important that we maintain our operational 
readiness in the National Guard and Reserves, in COMPO 
[Component] 2 and COMPO 3.
    Currently, under DOD policy, when a service member is on 
COVID orders and they have an AT period, annual training 
period--we have the 155th Brigade that is getting ready to go 
to the National Training Center for a rotation--they have to 
come off 502(f) orders, which means they go back into National 
Guard status. They lose their TRICARE benefits for them and 
their families, and then 3 weeks later they go back on COVID 
orders.
    With the stroke of a pen, we can change that so that it is 
either waived and they can stay on TRICARE while they go on 
those other orders or we can just allow them to do AT status 
during that.
    Do any of you have any response, if anyone is looking at 
this? Because this is going to impact up to 3,500 members of 
the Mississippi National Guard this year, and it is affecting 
soldiers all across the Nation.
    General Nordhaus. Congressman, Major General Nordhaus here.
    I believe that has been resolved through the FEMA MAs 
[mission assignments] and that all the State needs to do is let 
them know which days that they are on military and not 
performing in support of the mission assignments from FEMA. And 
then they stay on the orders, and they just complete the 
reimbursable difference between those days.
    Mr. Kelly. That is great. Just make sure that we are 
following through and that all States understand this. Because 
I know I dealt with this, I think, last week, and that was in 
the initial stages, and I knew we sent out an RFI [request for 
information] on that.
    Second, what amount of our special operations forces have 
been vaccinated, those who are currently--we had Austin Scott 
talk about those guys downrange. What percentage of our special 
operations forces have been vaccinated at this point, or do we 
have that number?
    General Taliaferro. So, Congressman, we don't have that 
specific number with us. But each area is working through 
allocations both at the service level, the combatant command 
level, and the installation level to work down the population 
schema of priorities. So, as they reach critical national 
capabilities, those national response forces would be 
vaccinated at that time.
    Mr. Kelly. And, finally, Mr. Chairman and also the members, 
I want to ask them: The emergency use of the vaccine on service 
members and not being allowed them to be mandatory, that just 
doesn't make sense. If we are saying the process is safe, we 
need to portray that in our use on our DOD employees to set the 
standard and to set an example.
    So do you guys on the panel, do you think it would be 
helpful if we changed that in Congress so that emergency use 
vaccines, that they can be--not shall be; can be--mandatory to 
service members? Would that be helpful to you?
    General Taliaferro. Let me pass that to General Friedrichs.
    General Friedrichs. Congressman, Brigadier General 
Friedrichs. Thank you very much.
    I think that would be a discussion that we would need to 
have with the Centers for Disease Control, the Department of 
Health and Human Services, as well as the Department of 
Defense. It is going to depend on the specifics of the vaccine 
in question.
    And I very much appreciate the continued concern about this 
issue. No one is more interested, I think, than, as we know, 
you and the members of this committee are----
    Mr. Kelly. Well, let me interrupt real quickly. My point 
is, if we say it can be, it allows DOD to look at different 
diseases. Currently we can't make it mandatory. And I am not 
just talking about this pandemic but the next one and the next 
one. Would it be helpful if we said, DOD can, not shall, make 
mandatory, can make mandatory, so that we could use the science 
and the CDC as each specific disease, rather than now having 
our hands tied?
    General Friedrichs. Congressman, speaking as a physician, 
it is always helpful to partner with you and with our 
colleagues in the CDC and HHS in crafting language that allows 
us to respond to each pandemic or biological threat as it 
occurs. As you said, they will each be different. It will be 
difficult to write language that will cover everything, but we 
look forward to working with you on that, sir.
    The Chairman. Thank you.
    The gentleman's time has expired.
    Mr. Kelly. I yield back.
    The Chairman. Mr. Morelle is recognized for 5 minutes.
    Mr. Morelle, are you with us?
    Okay. I think we just lost him.
    So I think, Ms. Jacobs, are you online?
    Ms. Jacobs. I am here. And thank----
    The Chairman. All right. You are recognized for 5 minutes.
    Ms. Jacobs [continuing]. You, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.
    And thank you, everyone, for being here today on this 
critical topic.
    To follow up on Mr. Brown's questioning, I want to thank 
you for offering to provide us with the specific legal 
authority that you, in conjunction with the Office of Legal 
Counsel, are relying on to assess whether or not you can 
mandate service members to be vaccinated. And I just want to 
say that I, too, am very eager to see that specific legal 
analysis and will look forward to you sending it.
    Next, I represent a district in San Diego, which, as you 
know, is the home port of the Mercy. And while the Mercy was 
deployed to Los Angeles earlier during the pandemic, it is my 
understanding that the ship was not heavily utilized. The 
ship's mission was to treat patients other than those with 
COVID, freeing up hospitals to deal with the virus, but it 
seems as though few medical providers actually made use of the 
facilities aboard the ship.
    I was just wondering if you have any insight as to why this 
was the case. Is the Department looking at ways to make it 
easier for both the Mercy and the Comfort to better assist the 
homeland should that need rise again in the future?
    General Taliaferro. Congresswoman, it is General 
Taliaferro. I can address that.
    Most of our fielded medical capabilities are designed to 
deploy to a wartime environment and do trauma care. That does 
not make them perfectly equipped for disease control, as is 
needed during the pandemic.
    But, moreover, we found that, due to the low utilization of 
some of these traditional fielded medical capabilities, we 
found it much more effective to deploy our personnel to 
existing infrastructure, whether that be existing hospitals or 
medical centers. Because, largely, we found that those hospital 
and centers were not short on physical capacity; they were 
short on staff, the ability to staff more beds, the ability to 
utilize the equipment and capacity they had.
    And with the addition of DOD personnel, medical personnel, 
to expand their internal capacity, it actually allowed our 
personnel to be much more effective in their response, allowed 
those hospitals to treat people where the people wanted to be 
treated. And that was an evolution that made our forces much 
more capable.
    Ms. Jacobs. Thank you for that.
    And then, just lastly, I want to reiterate what some of my 
colleagues have said. I have been hearing from service members 
on the ground just how difficult the childcare options have 
been for them during this crisis and, even potentially more 
concerning, that even the childcare facilities that remain open 
they don't feel are necessarily upholding COVID protocols and 
keeping the staff and their children safe.
    So I look forward to continuing to work with you all to 
make sure that we address that issue.
    With that, I yield back.
    The Chairman. Thank you.
    Mr. Green is recognized for 5 minutes.
    Dr. Green. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    And I would like to thank you and Ranking Member Rogers for 
the opportunity to serve together and to continue the great 
work that you guys have done caring for our brave men and women 
in uniform.
    I would also like to say to Ranking Member Rogers, I have 
gotten to know him personally while working under his 
leadership at Homeland Security. Sir, it has been great to work 
with you there, and I look forward to and am proud to serve 
with you now.
    My time as an Airborne Ranger and an Army physician 
assigned with some of our Tier 1 special forces units gave me a 
love for those who stand in defense of our freedoms. They would 
die for us, and I believe every member of this committee has a 
similar devotion and dedication to them. So it is a real honor 
for me to be here.
    And also the chance to take care of, in my district, Fort 
Campbell and the men and women who are serving from that base, 
kicking doors and taking names across the globe to defend our 
freedom, is a real, real honor.
    As an Army physician who did research both at Walter Reed 
and USAMRIID [U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of 
Infectious Diseases] during medical school and research with 
soldiers and non-soldiers in residency, I would like to put to 
bed this issue that I keep hearing about, using research 
medications on Active Duty soldiers.
    There is statute passed by Congress previously in National 
Defense Authorization Acts that prevent--because of Tuskegee 
Airmen and what happened there, legislation was passed to 
prevent the use of any experimental medication on an Active 
Duty soldier. We did research, myself, on pain management in 
residency and were not able to use anything but an FDA-approved 
drug for that. It is written into law.
    I think it is a bad idea to change it in a blanket 
statement, because--or a blanket law, because we need the full-
blown research done before we saddle our warriors with an 
experimental medication. And I can help the committee find that 
NDAA, and the witnesses find that NDAA, if it is necessary.
    I do have some questions for our witnesses, and I 
appreciate you being here.
    Can either of you kind of share, you know, the impact of 
covering the COVID requirements on training and readiness? And, 
specifically, were there any JRTC [Joint Readiness Training 
Center] rotations that were canceled? Were there NTC [National 
Training Center] cycles that were canceled? What are some of 
the specific examples of the impact? And when we make this 
training up, what is the impact going to be on OPTEMPO 
[operations tempo]?
    General Taliaferro. Congressman, this is General 
Taliaferro. I can address that.
    In the early days of the pandemic, the services did cancel 
or delay some of the large force exercises like you mentioned, 
whether that is a National Training Center rotation or a Red 
Flag or the like.
    Overseas, our joint exercises executed by the combatant 
commands, over the last year, 99 exercises have been canceled. 
That would have included about 40,000 U.S. and partner forces 
partnering with 46 different countries. And 37 exercises were 
postponed, with almost 50,000 U.S. and partners. That would 
have included 27 countries.
    And I think the overseas training and the large force 
exercise training in the United States are similar, but there 
are some key differences. The large force exercises in the 
United States provide that infrequent opportunity to have a 
very complicated, realistic training scenario that only occurs 
a few times in a service member's career, and that is the 
qualitative----
    Dr. Green. I really hate to interrupt you. Especially 
having served in the military, I don't like interrupting a two-
star general.
    But what is the time it is going to take to return to the 
level of training when we make all this up? I mean, how long is 
it going to take us to make all this up? And what is the impact 
on the OPTEMPO?
    I only have about a minute left, so that is why I jumped in 
and interrupted.
    General Taliaferro. Yes, sir. So, Congressman, in most 
cases, it won't be made up. It will be an opportunity lost for 
that large force training. And the services have done an 
outstanding job adapting and substituting small force elements 
during that space.
    Dr. Green. Okay.
    I only have 20 seconds left, so, Chairman, I will yield.
    The Chairman. Thank you.
    Mr. Kahele is recognized for 5 minutes.
    Mr. Kahele. Thank you, Chair.
    This question is for General Nordhaus. Good morning, 
General. And thank you to all the participants who are on 
today's call.
    My question specifically has to do with National Guardsmen 
who are on title 32, 502(f). I suspect this is an issue that is 
existing in the other 49 States. But, as you are well aware, 
section 733 of the most recently passed NDAA provided for 
transitional health benefits for certain members of the 
National Guard that are serving under orders in response to 
COVID-19.
    What has happened is National Guardsmen currently that are 
coming off and are eligible because they have been on title 32, 
502(f) for the last at least 30 days are unable to get TAMP, or 
the Transitional Assistance Management Program, which allows 
them to continue their TRICARE for up to 180 days, as described 
in the most recently passed NDAA.
    Now, after researching it, it seems that there is a 
disconnect between the inability for TRICARE to manually 
activate those eligible service members into TAMP. OSD [Office 
of the Secretary of Defense] has been working with DMDC 
[Defense Manpower Data Center] to actively fix it, but their 
expected implementation date is not until March 20, 2021.
    I find that unacceptable for our eligible National Guard 
soldiers and airmen and their families, who since the passage 
of the NDAA--I don't know if it was retroactive to National 
Guardsmen who have been on title 32, 502(f) since last March. 
But for the National Guardsmen that have been on 502(f) orders 
since the passage of the NDAA, who have been on orders for the 
last 30 days and have come off those orders, they should be 
transitioned right into TAMP and not have to wait until March 
20 of 2021. There should be no break in their TRICARE Prime 
healthcare benefits.
    And my questions are: What are we going to do to address 
this? Why is DMDC unable to implement this today for eligible 
service members? What is OSD currently doing to address this 
situation immediately? And why is there not a process to 
manually activate TAMP for eligible soldiers and airmen who 
have been on title 32, 502(f) orders since the passage of the 
National Defense Authorization Act until today?
    That is my question, sir.
    General Nordhaus. Congressman, first of all, I want to 
start off by thanking you for your service in COVID-19 in 
Hawaii. I know you served on State Active Duty.
    And this issue that you have just brought up to me, I will 
have to look more into it. And we will have to make sure that 
we do everything we can to follow the law that was passed to 
make sure that we can take care of our service members through 
TAMP.
    I will yield to anyone else on the panel that has further 
information than I do.
    Mr. Kahele. And we can follow up, sir, if we don't have 
those answers.
    I am just concerned, because I know at least 21 National 
Guardsmen here in Hawaii, soldiers and airmen, who have 
performed at least 30 days of title 32(f) since the NDAA has 
passed that are being told that they cannot--as you all know, 
the day you come off Active Duty orders is the day you drop out 
of DEERS [Defense Enrollment Eligibility Reporting System] and 
you are no longer eligible for TRICARE Prime for you and your 
families. And they should roll right over into TAMP, and it is 
not happening. And they are being told they need to wait for at 
least 5 weeks before that is going to happen. And that is 1 
month without these service members and their families, you 
know, being covered by TRICARE.
    So it is an immediate concern for me, because that is a 
real situation happening here in Hawaii today, and I suspect it 
is happening in every other State in the country. Like 
Congressman Kelly in Mississippi mentioned earlier, you know, 
these benefits are not transitioning to the service member who 
has earned them.
    General Nordhaus. Congressman, I will look into that today 
with our surgeon general and our J-1 [Manpower and Personnel 
Directorate] to make sure that we figure out what the issue is, 
and we will provide a response back.
    Mr. Kahele. Great. Thank you.
    And thanks for acknowledging my service. I was also on 
title 32, 502(f) orders for almost 120 days, from April to 
August. And, you know, it was a great service to the State of 
Hawaii to do that. So thank you.
    The Chairman. Thank you.
    Mr. Waltz is recognized for 5 minutes. Mr. Waltz, are you 
with us?
    Mr. Waltz. Yep. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am with you. Can 
you hear me okay?
    The Chairman. Yes. We got you. Go ahead.
    Mr. Waltz. Yeah. I just--and this is open to anyone on the 
panel. I wanted to follow up on Congressman DesJarlais's 
question, in terms of the analysis that has gone on in NGB 
[National Guard Bureau], how we got to the current number of 
guardsmen in the Capitol, the threat that then----
    The Chairman. We don't have you anymore. We are not hearing 
you, Mr. Waltz. I don't know if you accidently hit ``mute'' or 
if we just have a connection----
    Mr. Waltz. Nope. Nope. Can you hear me okay?
    The Chairman. We got you now.
    Mr. Waltz. Okay.
    The Chairman. We lost you for about 20 seconds. You might 
want to start over.
    Well, now you are completely lost.
    Oh, there we go. We have a picture.
    Mr. Waltz. Okay. How about now, Mr. Chairman? Apologies.
    The Chairman. Yeah, we hear you now. We could do this all 
day long, but one more shot. Go ahead.
    Mr. Waltz. One more shot. I hope I got it all out: the 
analysis that is driving the number on the Capitol and the 
opportunity cost of other domestic support missions. Hopefully 
I got that out.
    The Chairman. I think his question is: What aren't we doing 
because of what is happening with the Guard being used at the 
Capitol?
    General Nordhaus. Congressman, copy your question.
    From our guardsmen that have responded to the request for 
assistance by lead Federal agencies, our guardsmen, you know, 
have left their jobs and what they were doing back in their 
States to support this mission set. There is additional 
training that they could be doing, obviously. And then there 
are preparations for any COVID response that is within their 
State that they might be missing out.
    To the exact specifics for each State and each individual, 
I can't speak to exactly what they are missing out on.
    Mr. Waltz. Well, thank you.
    And thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    I am looking at what is driving the number that is there, 
the 5,000 to 7,000 number, and then what is the plan going 
forward.
    I can tell you, also serving as a guardsman, the force is 
exhausted, between COVID, ongoing overseas requirements, the 
training that is required for those requirements, natural 
disasters, particularly in States like Florida, Texas, 
California. I worry a lagging indicator is going to be 
retention.
    So, again, the opportunity cost, what is driving that 
number of 7,000, and then what is the plan for the foreseeable 
future so that we can get those men and women back to the 
States?
    Mr. Salesses. Congressman Waltz, this is Bob Salesses.
    What drives the requirement is really the agency, 
department, Federal law enforcement entity that provides the 
request to the Department. For example, Secret Service we are 
providing support right now. We are also providing support to 
the Metropolitan Police, providing to Park Police.
    Specifically to the Capitol, the Capitol Police set the 
requirement for the number. The number was based on different 
missions that the National Guard members would be supporting--a 
response force, perimeter security, those kinds of mission 
sets.
    Again, we are working with them. As you know, the current 
request ends on March 12. What we are trying to determine with 
them is what is the right level of security that they need from 
the National Guard, considering that the circumstances have 
changed.
    Again, the Defense Department, as you know too, is highly 
dependent upon Federal law enforcement to provide us the 
insight into what the threat may be, because obviously the 
Department doesn't do that domestically. So we work very 
closely with the FBI [Federal Bureau of Investigation] and the 
Secret Service and others and the Capitol Police to try to 
determine what they believe that threat is.
    And then looking at what they believe is the need for the 
National Guard or the types of mission sets that they need 
support from, we worked very closely with them to try to 
understand what that is. Obviously, 4,900 is a very large 
number here on the Capitol.
    Mr. Waltz. Thank you.
    And, Chairman, if I--just one quick follow-up.
    Look, the Air Force is probably one of the best at this. 
When it comes to requirements, it is saying, don't tell us what 
platform to use or what weapon to use; tell us what effect you 
want us to have. I know, you know, you can't permanently be in 
a position of just giving every number that you are asked for. 
There is some analysis on the Guard and on the Pentagon's end 
of what it takes to actually have that effect.
    And I would be interested, if I could ask for a response on 
the record, in what is the plan going forward past March 12.
    Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman. I yield.
    The Chairman. Thank you.
    By ``on the record,'' he means submit it in writing.
    Mr. Salesses. Correct, sir.
    [The information referred to can be found in the Appendix 
on page 79.]
    Mr. Salesses. I would just like to add one thing to 
Congressman Waltz's----
    The Chairman. Sure.
    Mr. Salesses [continuing]. Question there. Simply, we 
realize that personnel is part of this, but we also understand 
that infrastructure and technology is a large part of this that 
can potentially provide the additional security. So it is the 
combination of those things.
    And, as the Congressman rightly points out, it is that kind 
of analysis that will help us understand what the real 
personnel requirements are.
    The Chairman. Understood.
    Having piped up earlier on this subject, I do want to 
follow up on just a couple of crucial points.
    One--you said this, but I want to make it clear--you are 
responding to what the Capitol Police and the city of 
Washington, DC, and the Speaker's office and the majority 
leader's office in the Senate is asking you to do. This is not 
your independent assessment; you are responding to that 
request. So the decisions being made on this are not being 100 
percent made by you, taking Mr. Waltz's point that you do have 
to sort of figure out how to achieve that effect. It is being 
driven locally.
    And the second thing I would say is, in terms of the threat 
environment, I have looked at it, and I agree that the threat 
environment is less. But if you want to know what is driving 
the threat environment, it would be helpful if every single 
elected official and person in a position of power in this 
country publicly acknowledged that Joe Biden was the duly 
elected President in a free and fair election.
    The degree to which people are still driving that 
narrative, that narrative then gets taken and put into really 
wacky sets of arguments that motivate people to say things. And 
I am sure everyone is aware of this.
    Right now, March 4--and I love this, by the way. Sorry. I 
have a sense of humor about absolutely everything, regardless 
of the circumstances. So apparently some of these people have 
figured out that 75 years ago the President used to be 
inaugurated on March 4. Okay? Now, why that is relevant, God 
knows. But, at any rate, so now they are thinking, maybe we 
should gather again and storm the Capitol on March 4. Okay? 
That is circulating online, all right?
    You know, stuff like that circulates all the time. Does it 
mean it is going to happen? Probably not. But if you want to 
help, tell them not to do that. Tell them that the election is 
over, Joe Biden won, it was a free and fair election, and let's 
get to work. That, too, would help reduce the--well, I don't 
know--fear-slash-paranoia that people feel that requires 
everything that we are seeing around here.
    So both sides could be helpful in getting our Capitol back 
to normal, I guess is what I would say.
    All right. I think Mr. Morelle is now with us.
    Mr. Waltz. Mr. Chairman, you certainly have a commitment 
from me.
    The Chairman. All right. Thank you, I appreciate that.
    Mr. Morelle, I think we are going to give you another shot 
here. Are you with us.
    Mr. Morelle. I am, Mr. Chair.
    The Chairman. You are recognized for 5 minutes.
    Mr. Morelle. Yes, thank you, sir. I will be very brief. I 
just wanted to thank the individuals who are testifying. Thank 
you, Mr. Chairman, for a very important and enlightening 
hearing. And as I am brand new to this committee, I am going to 
stop talking, yield back, and observe my colleagues in this.
    But I do want to thank people. And I also--to the National 
Guard General Taliaferro, we lost three guardsmen in Rochester, 
New York, my hometown, when a helicopter crashed just a couple 
of weeks ago. And I wanted to express my condolences to you and 
to the members of the Guard who do extraordinary service as do 
all of our active personnel.
    With that, I yield back, Mr. Chair.
    The Chairman. Thank you. I am sorry, Mike, did you have 
something?
    Mr. Rogers. I said he has got a bright future.
    The Chairman. I am sorry, Mr. Rogers made the comment that 
Mr. Morelle has a bright future on this committee, and I 
heartily agree.
    Mr. Bice--oh, sorry, Mrs. Bice, you are recognized.
    Mrs. Bice. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. My question is really 
directed specifically as it relates to my congressional 
district. I am near Tinker Air Force Base, and there are 
approximately 3,000 military personnel that work on base, but 
there are 25,000 civilians that work on base.
    What is the process that DOD is using to make sure that 
those civilian base employees are accessing the vaccine? Is 
that being left up to the local community, or is that something 
that DOD is working actively to assist in making sure that 
those folks have access to the vaccine so that they are not 
potentially exposing the military personnel that are working on 
base?
    Mr. Salesses. Congresswoman, I will turn it over to General 
Friedrichs, but the DOD civilians are in our vaccine schema, 
and depending on what jobs they are performing and what their 
health conditions are will guide exactly when they get the 
vaccine.
    Let me turn it over to General Friedrichs, Dr. Friedrichs.
    General Friedrichs. Thank you, Congresswoman, and thank 
you. As he was saying, that is exactly right. So as we have 
been through our organization following those CDC criteria, 
with identifying those on our bases who are at increased risk, 
whether by age or reason of other medical conditions, so that 
includes those critical infrastructure personnel that you just 
mentioned who work on our bases there. So they are part of our 
schema. And as the vaccine allocations continue over the weeks 
and months ahead, we will continue to vaccinate those 
personnel.
    Mrs. Bice. To follow up, how--how much headway are you able 
to get on how much of the vaccine is being sent to a specific 
area or a specific community to be able to vaccinate those. And 
what I am trying to figure out is how long is it going to take 
you to actually offer that vaccine to the almost 30,000 
employees that work on base? Are we looking at several months 
down the road? How is the delivery process working?
    General Friedrichs. Congresswoman, this is Brigadier 
General Friedrichs again. So we work closely with the Centers 
for Disease Control. Our Defense Health Agency is the lead for 
this effort, and so they work with Operation Warp Speed and the 
Centers for Disease Control on our allocation based on the 
populations that we have identified for which we are 
responsible.
    As was mentioned earlier in this brief, based on the 
purchases that the Department--or excuse me, that the country 
has made, we anticipate having 600 million doses by the end of 
July. And so that should allow us to vaccinate all of the 
adults who wish to be vaccinated over the next several months.
    Mrs. Bice. Thank you for that. A follow-up question. There 
certainly have--in many parts of the world, we are relying on 
our allies as partners on the ground for operational support, 
intelligence sharing, other critical functions. How has the 
pandemic impacted those relationships, and what does it mean to 
mitigate the impact?
    General Taliaferro. Congresswoman, this is General 
Taliaferro, I would say our combatant commands are heavily 
focused on maintaining those critical international 
relationships, whether that is through exercises, key leader 
engagements, and they deliberately do so to maintain awareness 
of what is going on in the region, maintain access basing and 
overflight during a crisis, and so on.
    Mrs. Bice. I just want to say thank you for your service, 
thank you for taking care of our men and women in the military. 
In Oklahoma our National Guard is currently activated, not only 
for COVID relief but also for weather issues that we are 
experiencing here. So I am grateful for the men and women not 
only serving in our Air Force and Navy that are here in 
Oklahoma, but also our National Guard that play an important 
role.
    I yield back, Mr. Chairman. Thank you.
    The Chairman. Thank you.
    Mr. Panetta is recognized for 5 minutes.
    Mr. Panetta. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member 
Rogers, and all the gentlemen there, I appreciate your service 
and I appreciate your time in preparation today to be here to 
answer these questions.
    Obviously, you know, we are dealing--I agree with the 
President of the United States that we are dealing with a 
wartime effort. So I appreciate all of the involvement that the 
Department of Defense is currently undergoing with this right 
now. Especially when it comes to the National Guard.
    I agree with you, General Nordhaus, especially on my 
district, I am the central coast of California. The National 
Guard has played a huge role within the last year, dealing with 
wildfires, dealing with storms, yes, dealing with COVID. But 
then, obviously, national, dealing with the attacks on our 
democracy. But also bolstering our democracy with getting 
involved in securing many of the election sites around our 
country back in November. So thank you for that.
    Another area that was very beneficial are the food banks 
that I have in my district. I am sure throughout many of the 
members' districts on this panel. Every week I try to get out 
to a food bank, and I can tell you, the ones that have the 
National Guard members helping out are the ones that run the 
most efficiently, considering how long these lines are getting 
at our food banks. So thank you very much.
    Now, I read recently that the National Guard has 100 
National Guard teams in 29 States with the ability of 200 
additional teams for vaccine distribution--at least that was 
said by General Hokanson the other day.
    And so what I kind of want to break down here is, okay, so 
you got these FEMA national sites, those are going to have 
Active Duty members. And then you have the State and local 
government sites, those are going to be run by National Guard 
members. Am I correct in coming to that simple conclusion?
    Mr. Salesses. Congressman, this is Bob Salesses, yes--yes, 
you are.
    Mr. Panetta. Okay. Great. And so right now you have FEMA 
that has 1,100 troops--or they are asking--they have 1,100 
troops at 5 vaccination centers. The President has called for a 
hundred more vaccination centers. That could lead up to 10,000 
more service members is what I am reading. Do you expect all of 
those to be Active Duty members?
    Mr. Salesses. Congressman, that is the current plan is to 
use Active Duty members to source the hundred mega and large 
centers. But that will depend, based on, obviously, as we start 
to provide additional forces, the Joint Staff and the services 
will look at how best to do that. And the original or at least 
the initial look is to use Active Component forces. It could 
then lead to title 10 Reserve forces potentially to support 
those centers.
    Mr. Panetta. Understood. General Nordhaus, focusing on the 
National Guard at the State and local level, obviously, we 
understand the priority of getting more vaccinations out there, 
especially to rural sites. If you are going to have FEMA at the 
major population centers, then maybe you help the State and 
local governments use National Guard to get the vaccination out 
there to those areas that aren't in the major population areas.
    Do you see that taking away from the food banks? Are you 
able to up, as General Hokanson said, use those 200 additional 
teams for that type of vaccination--those types of vaccinations 
in those types of areas?
    General Nordhaus. Congressman, thanks for the question. I 
don't see it taking away right now within the States and 
territories due to the mission assignment from FEMA.
    Right now, we are at about 28,000, but there is room to 
grow within each of the States is a little bit different; up to 
56,000 is the authority. So each State will look at what they 
need, what their critical requirements are.
    I know everyone is prioritizing vaccine distribution and 
vaccine shots to the population. And so that will be within 
each State to make sure they have the resources, and the 
guardsmen there able to perform each of those duties and make 
sure they cover them.
    Mr. Panetta. Okay. Thank you. Completely switching gears 
right now. Obviously, unfortunately, the Roosevelt has been 
back in the news lately. Three members of the Roosevelt came 
down with the coronavirus. And I know the Roosevelt is on a 
double bump right now, basically doing a second tour.
    My question to you is, where the hell and how the hell are 
these three members contracting the coronavirus? Is that being 
investigated?
    General Taliaferro. So, Congressman, this is General 
Taliaferro. I am sure the command team is looking into the 
individual cases. I think the broader message is how much 
improvement the Navy has made over the last year and their 
procedures on their ships, the way they have identified 
preplanned responses, the way they have changed flows of 
personnel, one-way corridors, different things, sleeping 
arrangements, segregating personnel into cohorts.
    The fact that there can be 3 infected personnel on the 
Roosevelt and it stay at 3 until they are evacuated is a credit 
to the work they have done that would keep it from getting to 
1,200. Over.
    Mr. Panetta. Thank you. My time is up. I yield back. Thank 
you, Mr. Chairman.
    Mr. Garamendi [presiding]. Thank you, Mr. Panetta.
    Mr. Franklin, you are up.
    Mr. Franklin. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And thank you, 
panel. I appreciate your time that you spent here with us this 
afternoon. It has been enlightening.
    As a junior member of the committee, by the time we get to 
this point, a lot of the questions that I have had have been 
already answered, but I do appreciate that we have touched--
several folks have asked questions about the opportunity costs 
of missed training opportunities, the impact on readiness.
    As a former career naval officer, I have been on the 
receiving end of a lot of these missions that come above and 
beyond your regular OPTEMPO. My question really to follow 
along, to continue on some of the others, is just dealing with 
retention. And I am specifically curious to know if--have we 
seen any drop in retention over the buildup in the OPTEMPO over 
the last year or so? And are we taking any proactive measures 
to be on guard against that?
    Just in talking recently with senior leadership of our 
Florida Guard, I know we have concern about a lack of manning 
to begin with, and then on top of that just the tempo and the 
impact that it is going to have on our troops.
    But I guess that question will be for General Nordhaus.
    General Nordhaus. Sir, Major General Nordhaus. Right now, 
we haven't seen any dip in the retention at this point. I did 
hear numbers about our retention, our recruiting throughout the 
end of the year. And right, now we are on par to be able to 
meet our end strength numbers through our recruiting efforts 
from both the Army National Guard and the Air National Guard. 
And I yield to any--to Major General Taliaferro.
    General Taliaferro. Congressman, this is General 
Taliaferro. I would say for the Active Component, retention and 
recruiting has still been at very high levels, and as you know, 
it generally follows the economy. And so I think this will bear 
watching as the economy picks up. But right now, retention and 
recruiting are at very high levels.
    Mr. Franklin. All right. Thank you, gentlemen.
    I yield back.
    Mr. Garamendi. Thank you, Mr. Franklin.
    Mr. Veasey, you are up.
    Mr. Veasey. Thank you very much.
    I wanted to ask General Nordhaus a question. In my district 
here in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, there was an announcement 
that there were going to be two openings of COVID vaccine 
sites. One was going to be at AT&T Stadium, Dallas Cowboys 
stadium which is in my district, and then another one in Fair 
Park which is near my district with the capacity to perhaps 
serve up to about 10,000 people a day. And I know that the 
Guard was supposed to be assisting in that effort.
    As you know, right now, in this part of the world, we are 
having record low temperatures. Our grid has been, just, you 
know, not completely incapacitated, but has been downgraded 
severely. We have people just literally blocks away from me 
that have had power sometimes, and other times, they haven't.
    Is this going to affect the Guard's effort to be able to 
mobilize and help in these efforts, because I would imagine 
that there are guardsmen that are also affected by these 
storms?
    Will you still be able to help in this mission as soon as 
we are able to get past this, or do you see there being some 
problems?
    General Nordhaus. Congressman, thanks for question. I will 
pass it over to Major General Taliaferro. I will say that 
across the States that are receiving the weather right now, our 
Guard is helping with, you know, incidents within weather, but 
then they are right back as fast as possible to supporting the 
vaccination efforts.
    And the Dallas area, I believe that is one of the title 10 
efforts, and I will turn that over to Major General Taliaferro.
    General Taliaferro. Thanks, General.
    Mr. Veasey. Thank you.
    General Taliaferro. Congressman, those two sites in the 
Dallas area, one at AT&T stadium and then one at the Cotton 
Bowl, we both expect to be operational a week from today. 
Although, I just discussed this with Northern Command this 
morning, it is not yet clear whether the weather will create 
any delays, but they are working through that with FEMA and the 
State.
    Mr. Veasey. Okay. Okay. Good. What sort of delays might--
what would happen--what would make it harder for you to 
mobilize and be able to have your guys and women ready at those 
particular sites? Like what would be some of the issues that 
might come up?
    General Taliaferro. So, Congressman, I don't believe it 
would be the issues with our force. It would be issues 
surrounding the facility, access to the facility, and all the 
other supporting agencies. Our forces will move and be there in 
time. Over.
    Mr. Veasey. Okay. Well, no, thank you very much. That is 
very important to know, because obviously as soon as we get 
past the storms, I know that people are going to really be 
anxious to get back and start receiving their vaccines again.
    So I appreciate your time and answering those questions. I 
will yield back the balance of my time. Thank you.
    Mr. Garamendi. Thank you, Mr. Veasey.
    Mrs. McClain.
    Mrs. McClain. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. As we all know, 
China has become an ever-increasing threat, not only to the 
Pacific region, but globally. They've built up their armed 
forces to threaten our allies in the Pacific, used their Belt 
and Road Initiatives to bring poorer nations under their thumb, 
and now released viral epidemic upon the world.
    My question is for Major General Taliaferro, is has our 
ability to deter aggressive actions by China related to the 
construction of the islands in the Pacific region, has it been 
reduced because of the necessity to protect our forces during 
this pandemic?
    General Taliaferro. So, Congresswoman, I would say 
absolutely has not been reduced. Our forces are very active in 
the Pacific, in that region, whether conducting freedom of 
navigation operations, we have deployed bomber task force into 
region, and continued to project power into that area.
    And last spring, the combatant commands and the services 
worked very deliberately to ensure that we were able to operate 
within a COVID environment to perform our defense role. And, 
certainly, we have been active in the Pacific ever since.
    Mrs. McClain. Thank you. I yield back my time.
    Mr. Garamendi. Thank you, Mrs. McClain.
    Mrs. Murphy. Mrs. Murphy, you are up next.
    Mrs. Murphy. Thank you. And thank you all for being here 
today and for your testimony. And also thank you to all the 
service members for what they do every day to keep our country 
safe.
    You know, I represent a district in central Florida, and I 
had a chance to visit with some of the Florida National Guard 
that were deployed to DC, and also to have had some 
conversations with the Florida National Guard leadership.
    And I think a few things stand out to me. One, it is clear 
that the multiple deployments and the high OPTEMPO has had an 
effect on morale and, you know, possibly on retention. And some 
of the previous questioners talked a bit about that. And I 
think it may be too early to have the data to say exactly what 
impact that will have, but I think that is something that we 
should watch for.
    But, you know, we have to understand these are citizen 
soldiers who have been repeatedly called away from their 
families and their jobs and put in fairly stressful situations.
    And I think in Florida this strain has been really 
amplified, because despite having one of the largest States, we 
have a relatively smaller Guard. We are number 53 of 54 in 
guardsmen to citizens ratio. And during a pandemic, it is not 
really feasible to borrow guardsmen from other States, as we 
would normally do in responding to a geographically focused 
natural disaster.
    And I think on top of this, for Florida, the pandemic has 
disproportionately impacted us because we have one of the 
highest percentages of more mature Americans as a part of our 
State population. And those are the Americans who are more 
vulnerable to the negative impact of COVID and most in need of 
vaccinations, along with our frontline and essential workers.
    And then in the nature of being a superlative, we are also 
one of the States with one of the greatest incidence of natural 
disasters.
    So I look at all of this, and I see a lot of risk here 
going into this coming year and into the summer when hurricane 
season starts for us. I am really worried about the ability to 
respond to the requirements, and then the impact on the men and 
women who serve in our Guard.
    So, General Nordhaus, two questions for you. In the near 
term as we look out on this year and Florida's natural disaster 
season, it is going to put additional operational pressures on 
our National Guard force.
    How is this going to be balanced with the increased 
vaccination pace this summer, and then in the long term, what 
efforts are under way to study the proportion of guardsmen to 
citizens to ensure that we have sufficient forces to support 
the whole range of needs from disaster response to emerging 
challenges like COVID support?
    General Nordhaus. Congresswoman, thank you for the 
question. On the first side, as we get to the summer, hopefully 
with the number of vaccinations that will be available by June 
and July, that we get really close to having all of our service 
members vaccinated, and that will help as we go into that 
season.
    Every year we do get together and we have workshops that 
bring all 54 together for domestic operations, and we look at 
the EMACs, Emergency Management Assistance Compacts, between 
States to help assist in things like hurricane that Florida 
might be undergoing from other States nearby. As you know, 
Florida has helped out in other States through hurricanes over 
the last couple of years.
    As far as the force structure per civilian ratio within the 
State, Major General Eifert, The Adjutant General, will work 
that through the Army National Guard and the force structure 
committees to, you know, push that forward and then have any 
decisions through the service.
    Mrs. Murphy. Well, as he does that, he has the support--my 
support for sure for us to take another look at making sure 
that our Guard is appropriately scaled for the size of our 
State.
    Just pivoting to another question, a little unrelated, 
what--I know that DOD has been looking at the impact of right-
wing extremist ideologies on the ability of DOD to carry out 
its duties. Has there been a similar effort within the Guard 
and how have some of these early analyses come out?
    General Nordhaus. Congresswoman, we fall right underneath 
the Secretary of Defense's new thing that he had just pushed 
out. It is not tolerated across the National Guard or anywhere 
within our organization. It goes against our fundamental 
principle of the oath that we take. And so it can't be 
tolerated.
    And we are working through our services, both the Air 
National Guard and the Army National Guard through the service 
programs that come down from the Secretary of Defense and the 
standdown within the next 60 days, and we will implement those 
all going forward.
    Mrs. Murphy. Thank you, and I yield back.
    Mr. Garamendi. Thank you.
    Mr. Jackson, you are next.
    Dr. Jackson. Thank you, Chairman. Thank you, Ranking Member 
Rogers. And thank you to our witnesses who are here today. I 
want to start by telling the witnesses I appreciate your 
service to our country. Thank you for everything that you have 
done.
    And I just want to start by saying that, you know, ever 
since COVID-19 has started, this pandemic has affected our 
military in a variety of ways. And I do believe that the 
response from the Department of Defense has not only saved 
countless civilian lives but has also been really good in 
regards to ensuring that we have been safe all over the globe 
from threats elsewhere simultaneously. So thank you for 
everything you have done.
    I want to just state a few facts, and then I want to ask 
you a question that I have received on several occasions that I 
don't feel like I have a good answer for. And I will just start 
by saying that I think with regards to DOD, the response to 
coronavirus began almost immediately. DOD provided 
approximately 200 beds at March Air Force Base for State 
Department officials who were evacuating from Asia, and 
TRANSCOM worked to bring home nearly 4,000 U.S. citizens who 
were stranded overseas at the start of the pandemic.
    This incredible response continued as the hospital ship 
Comfort and the hospital ship Mercy provided humanitarian aid 
in New York and Los Angeles as cases began to surge.
    Later we faced critical shortfalls in PPE. DOD once again 
answered the call by providing over 2,000 ventilators, 5 
million N95 masks, and other critical PPE.
    And another well-known aspect that I would like to ask 
about with regards to DOD was Operation Warp Speed. DOD played 
an absolute critical role in developing the COVID-19 response 
as it relates to Operation Warp Speed. These efforts continue. 
They continue with these types of efforts.
    President Biden has now released a 200-page National 
Strategy for COVID-19 Response and Pandemic Preparedness. 
However, I think this plan to me looks familiar to what I have 
seen prior to the Biden administration. The Biden plan aims to 
fill supply shortfalls by invoking the Defense Production Act, 
which we have talked briefly here, and I believe that is 
something that President Trump had already done as well.
    The Biden plan says that DOD will bring logistical 
expertise and staff to support the COVID-19 response, which I 
think is also something that President Trump was quick to do.
    The Biden plan says the DOD will support States' efforts to 
provide DOD resources and personnel. And, once again, I believe 
that is something that I heard the President say early on that 
was enacted quickly by President Trump as well.
    President Biden has rolled out his groundbreaking plan. He 
rolled this out on his first full day in office. But with 
reference to DOD, once again, it sounded to me like President 
Biden's plan was building on a lot of the great work that 
happened during the Trump administration.
    I think that good work should be acknowledged. I think it 
has become clear that President Trump and his administration 
responded effectively and decisively in the face of this 
pandemic. And I am glad to see the Biden administration, in my 
mind, is building on the successes of the Trump administration 
with regard to DOD's approach to this.
    The question I have for you is I would like to ask each of 
you, and we can start with Mr. Salesses, if you would like, I 
would like to know, with regards to DOD, how are the 
operations, in the Department of Defense, how have they shifted 
under the Biden administration? And could you outline what 
actions are now being taken that were not being taken before, 
specifically, with regard to DOD under the Trump 
administration? Thank you.
    Mr. Salesses. Congressman, thanks for the question. The 
Department obviously has a long history of supporting civil 
authorities. We continue to do that. A number of the 
initiatives under President Biden to include the initiative to 
establish the mega and large vaccine centers, to make sure that 
we are out, the Department as we have already discussed today 
there is community-based support that is being provided by the 
Guard. But the new mega and large centers will produce a lot of 
vaccine shots at the community level.
    We have also got initiatives under way with the new 
administration to make sure that all the mitigation measures, 
the mask wearing, the workforce protections, and those types of 
activities are being implemented effectively.
    Dr. Jackson. Thank you, sir. I don't know if any of the 
other witnesses have anything to add to that. If not, I will 
close up here.
    Well, I close then. I will just say, I do want to thank you 
all for what you have done. I do think that the Department of 
Defense has done an outstanding job in supporting the COVID 
efforts across the country since the very beginning of this. I 
have full confidence that you will continue to do an 
outstanding job for our country and take care of us all. I 
appreciate everything you have done.
    And with that, Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
    Mr. Garamendi. Thank you, Mr. Jackson.
    Mr. Moore.
    Mr. Moore. Thank you, Chairman. Many of the--many of the 
questions I have are related to training, and it has largely 
been addressed. So I will just briefly say thank you to the 
Department of Defense.
    Yesterday, I had the opportunity to do an immersion tour in 
my district at Hill Air Force Base. COVID-19 response was their 
top item that they briefed me on, and I just had an incredible 
experience seeing the breadth of what goes on there.
    As we explored and discussed the COVID-19 response and 
where things are at now, I will just say that I am hopeful 
that, you know, we can have a really strong focus on getting 
back to training and making sure that we make up for lost time 
that was required during the pandemic to build on that.
    It is a crucial part. It helps with morale and so many 
different factors, especially interacting with our foreign 
partners as well. And so that is the piece that I would--I 
would just want to highlight, but also just comment on, you 
know, how well they responded.
    Our depot work, they were essential workers, they powered 
through, and they kept operations going. I know that wasn't the 
case everywhere in being able to do it. And I was just really 
proud of Hill Air Force Base for being able to do it and across 
the Department did an exceptional job in handling COVID.
    So thank you for all your good work and to the committee. 
And with that, I will yield back.
    Mr. Garamendi. Thank you very much, Mr. Moore. Thank you, 
Mr. Moore.
    Mr. Fallon, your turn.
    Mr. Fallon. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. When we get down to 
this level, all the good questions have been asked and 
answered. I want to thank the witnesses for their testimony.
    I do have to say and echo what Admiral Jackson said, Ronny 
Jackson said. I really do believe the legacy of the Trump 
administration, their finest hour will be Warp Speed. I think 
this will get us through this pandemic and be stronger as a 
Nation because of it. And sometimes you just have to give 
credit where credit is due regardless of whether or not you 
agree or disagree with certain administration's policy. I think 
President Trump's administration did a fantastic job.
    I do have one quick question, and it was touched upon, but 
I just want to get a more specific answer. How was their 
[inaudible] and/or the cancellations of some of the exercises 
we would have had with our foreign powers or allies, or our 
foreign partners and friends, rather, have affected our efforts 
to strengthen the alliances and build our readiness both 
between--and really our efficacy and synergy with our allies?
    And I just wanted to ask the witnesses how the pandemic has 
affected this?
    General Taliaferro. Thanks, Congressman. This is General 
Taliaferro. In the overseas exercises, the Joint Force Exercise 
Program, we talked about the exercises that had been cancelled 
or delayed. And in those opportunities, those training 
opportunities, we can further develop our partners, we can 
facilitate interoperability. And we can grow and strengthen 
relationships with our partners that, as we mentioned, have a 
wide variety of advantages.
    So we need to stay engaged with our partners going forward 
and strengthen those relationships through a variety of 
mechanisms.
    Mr. Moore. Thank you.
    Mr. Salesses. Congressman, this is Bob Salesses. I would 
just like to point out, although the physical engagement with 
our partners has been limited, a lot of activity continues with 
our international partners through our combatant commands, 
through the OSD staff with the allies and partners on a daily 
basis. So that contact is always there working together in that 
regard. So that is still very strong commitment from one 
another.
    General Nordhaus. Congressman, Major General Nordhaus. I 
would also like to comment. The State Partnership Program which 
has our 54 States partnered up with other nations throughout 
the last year, those nations have reached out to State--to 
country and talked COVID and learned from each other. So that 
has been very productive as well.
    Mr. Fallon. Would it be fair to say that once we have our 
troops vaccinated, it looks like from testimony that would be 
around July, that come the fall we are going to be back up to 
pre-COVID levels as far as training, and will this largely be 
in the rearview mirror in your professional opinion?
    General Taliaferro. Congressman, this is General 
Taliaferro. I would say certainly here in the United States, 
the services have already adapted and have returned to large 
training venues. Right now today, there is 3,000 Marines 
training together down at Twentynine Palms. Large force 
exercises and training is happening in the United States.
    Our overseas exercises frequently are dependent on the 
participation of our partners and whether they are able to 
attend, whether they are able to participate. But even in 
opportunities where they are not, our forces will continue to 
train and take advantage as best we can of those opportunities.
    Mr. Fallon. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
    The Chairman. Thank you. There are, as I understand it, no 
further requests for time. I know we--and also, we went past 
the 1:30 hard stop a little bit that some of you gentlemen had.
    So with that, I want to say thank you to the witnesses, 
thanks for the questions. I look forward to continuing this 
discussion. And I appreciate you being here, and we are 
adjourned.
    [Whereupon, at 1:37 p.m., the committee was adjourned.]
      
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                            A P P E N D I X

                           February 17, 2021
      
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              PREPARED STATEMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD

                           February 17, 2021

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                   DOCUMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD

                           February 17, 2021

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              WITNESS RESPONSES TO QUESTIONS ASKED DURING

                              THE HEARING

                           February 17, 2021

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             RESPONSE TO QUESTION SUBMITTED BY MR. LANGEVIN

    General Nordhaus. Some States involved with vaccine distribution 
are employing NG members to provide turn-key operations support for 
Civilian Vaccination Centers (CVC). The operations include providing 
site security and traffic control at the CVC, in-processing civilians, 
completing CDC and state-specific paper work, administering vaccines, 
completing CDC shot records, and post-vaccine monitoring. In other 
states, the NG is also being utilized to deliver vaccines in very rural 
and isolated locations. This ``last mile'' support helps the State to 
reach citizens in remote areas.   [See page 14.]
                                 ______
                                 
              RESPONSE TO QUESTION SUBMITTED BY MR. SCOTT
    General Friedrichs. Over the past 12 weeks, the positivity rate for 
Active Duty personnel has been an average of 19.5% lower than the 
national positivity rate. Electronic Health Record data for the week of 
04 April-10 April, 2021 shows a 3.6% positivity rate for new Active 
Duty cases (including pooled testing numbers), 39% lower than the 
national positivity rate of 5.9%.   [See page 24.]
    [See charts on page 75.]
                                 ______
                                 
              RESPONSE TO QUESTION SUBMITTED BY MR. WALTZ
    Mr. Salesses. The Joint Staff works with key DOD stakeholders, such 
as the Army, the Air Force, and the National Guard Bureau, to identify 
DOD capabilities and resources that may be sourced to execute an 
approved request for assistance without adversely affecting military 
operations or preparedness.
    DOD provides support to its law enforcement partners based on their 
requests for assistance, consistent with the law and mindful of DOD's 
own mission requirements. On March 4, 2021, the U.S. Capitol Police 
Board requested the support of 2,280 National Guard personnel, through 
May 23, 2021, due to a heightened threat environment. On March 9, 2021, 
the Secretary of Defense approved the U.S. Capitol Police Board 
request. DOD is meeting weekly with the U.S. Capitol Police to develop, 
by April 9, 2021, a plan to reduce incrementally the number of National 
Guard personnel providing support to the U.S. Capitol Police.   [See 
page 37.]

     
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              QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MEMBERS POST HEARING

                           February 17, 2021

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                   QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. MORELLE

    Mr. Morelle. If title 32 mobilizations ended would there be a 
reduction in National Guard personnel supporting state COVID-19 
operations? Second, Are there any capability or capacity gaps within 
the National Guard that limit or prevent the National Guard from fully 
resourcing requests for assistance from the states or territories?
    General Nordhaus. The difference in T32 and State Active Duty (SAD) 
is funding and benefits provided to or by states. Additionally, if 
states relied on internal funding to combat the virus, they may not be 
able to sustain the level of response needed or have as robust of a 
resourcing pool as they do when federal dollars are allocated. T32 is a 
critical resource for states and any reduction could greatly impact a 
state's plan to secure its citizenry. The limitations within the 
National Guard and the Department writ large is the licensure to 
vaccinate or perform medical treatments. We are able to train non-
traditional medical personnel on specimen collection but have relied 
heavily on general labor to build and staff care facilities, conduct 
sanitation and fill other critical needs identified by states to keep 
their economies going. At this time, there are no capability or 
capacity gaps in the National Guard's ability to fully resource 
requests for assistance from the states or territories.
                                 ______
                                 
                   QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. KAHELE
    Mr. Kahele. Section 733 of the NDAA provided for Transitional 
Health Benefits for Certain Members of the National Guard Serving Under 
Orders In Response to the Coronavirus (COVID-19) The Hawaii National 
Guard has service members that are eligible for TAMP per the passage of 
the recent NDAA as described in section 733 but because of an issue 
implementing this provision in the NDAA, National Guard service members 
are not able to initiate their TAMP benefits until the end of March 
because there is no way for TRICARE to manually activate TAMP for these 
SMs. OSD was notified by DMDC that they are actively working with 
TRICARE and DHA with a system implementation date of 3/20/21. This is 
unacceptable. We currently have eligible National Guard soldiers and 
airmen and their families that are being denied at least one month of 
TRICARE through the congressionally mandated NDAA, who have served on 
COVID T-32 502F orders but are losing one month of healthcare benefits 
which they have earned.
    1. What are we urgently doing to address this?
    2. Why is the DMDC unable to implement this today for our eligible 
service members?
    3. What is OSD currently doing to address this situation 
immediately?
    4. Why is there not a process to manually activate TAMP for an 
eligible national guard service member?
    1. What are we urgently doing to address this?
    General Nordhaus. NGB has been communicating to the 54 States and 
territories about the timeframe to properly implement the automated 
solution for access to Transition Assistance Management Program (TAMP) 
healthcare benefits. The Defense Health Agency (DHA) approved NGB's 
guidance publication on ``how to avoid out-of-pocket costs'' during the 
system programming period and ``how to file for reimbursement of costs 
incurred for covered services.'' Additional guidance was issued to 
reduce initial out-of-pocket expenses for Service members and family 
members. Use of military hospitals and those within the TRICARE network 
are two options to reduce out-of-pocket expenses.
    In anticipation of the completion of the software updates, guidance 
was also proactively provided to ensure accurate reporting would be 
addressed in the anticipation of the enrollment process. Once software 
system programming is complete individuals who paid out-of-pocket costs 
for healthcare services and prescriptions, during the TAMP 
implementation delay period, may file a claim for expenses incurred 
that would have been covered under TAMP, less any applicable 
deductibles, cost-shares, and co-payments.
    2. Why is the DMDC unable to implement this today for our eligible 
service members?
    General Nordhaus. DMDC fully implemented the new benefits on 
February 27, 2021. Prior to implementation, DMDC manually updated 
records to provide retroactive TAMP benefits for National Guard 
personnel who completed their active service on/before February 27, 
2021. At this time, this benefit is fully in place for National Guard 
Service Members who were ordered to Full Time National Guard Duty 
(FTNFD) as provided in Section 733 of the Fiscal Year 2021 National 
Defense Authorization Act in support of the whole-of-government 
response to the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic.
    Implementation of the new benefit required coding changes in DMDC 
software to both add TAMP benefits for service under Section 502(f) and 
to enforce the duty release date restrictions specified in the NDAA. 
DMDC initially estimated this capability would be implemented by 20 
March 2021, but through a heightened urgency and prioritization 
implemented the changes on 27 February 2021. Manual updates were also 
run to retroactively provide TAMP benefits for eligible National Guard 
personnel who completed their active service periods before February 
27. The first updates were made on February 24, 2021 and applied TAMP 
benefits to the records of 1,561 personnel and the second set of 
updates were made on March 1, 2021 and applied TAMP to another 120 
personnel. Normal processing began March 1, 2021.
    3. What is OSD currently doing to address this situation 
immediately?
    General Nordhaus. The Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense 
issued guidance on February 8, 2021 identifying TAMP eligibility and 
the parameters. OSD authored and issued new policy and conducted 
several meetings with NGB, OSD, DMDC and DHA to assist while awaiting 
the system coding change completion and benefit implementation.
    4. Why is there not a process to manually activate TAMP for an 
eligible National Guard service member?
    General Nordhaus. The DOD benefits determination processes, is very 
complex. Even minor changes require analysis to make sure changes will 
both produce the desired result and not introduce unintended 
consequences to Service Members and their dependent's benefits and 
entitlements. This change required analysis to determine how the new 
benefit and its accompanying restrictions should be introduced in order 
to provide consistent and continuing benefits to affected Service 
Members.
    Manually activating benefits for Service Members requires making 
changes to specific sections of the individual Service Member's 
personnel records one record at a time. Such manual manipulations can 
introduce complications that affect later processing of the record, as 
well as increasing the possibility of unintentional errors, especially 
when there are restrictions on the benefit as there were in this case. 
Hence, DMDC uses manual correction as little as possible when a group 
of records is involved. Instead, DMDC develops, tests, and implements 
small program changes termed ``sweeps.'' Sweeps apply the same changes 
across the entire group of records, thus ensuring that the same rules 
are applied to generate the intended benefits. The situation was 
discussed with the Defense Health Agency to minimize the impact to 
Members and families. The sweeps also applied the benefit 
retroactively, so that TAMP benefits began as of the end of each 
Service Member's active duty period. The first sweep was conducted as 
soon as the sweep logic was tested and approved, roughly two weeks 
after receipt of the signed OSD guidance mentioned above. The automated 
implementation of the benefit changes was implemented in DMDC 
production environments three days thereafter.
                                 ______
                                 
                    QUESTIONS SUBMITTED BY MR. BROWN
    Mr. Brown. The successful rapid development of multiple vaccines to 
combat the pandemic is due in large part to the foresight of DARPA and 
other components of the Department in developing mitigation measures to 
respond to a major pandemic. How is the Department incorporating 
lessons learned from COVID-19 in its research investments and pandemic 
preparedness plans to be able to better respond to the next pandemic?
    Mr. Salesses. Throughout our nation's response to the coronavirus 
disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, DOD continues to document a range of 
critical lessons learned that, when fully evaluated and prioritized, 
will guide DOD's efforts to prepare for and respond to future pandemics 
and other national emergencies.
    DOD support of the development of vaccines and therapeutics was a 
critical enabler to our nation's response. For decades, DOD 
laboratories have studied infectious diseases of military importance, 
including HIV/AIDS, Ebola, and coronaviruses such as Middle East 
Respiratory Syndrome (MERS). In January 2020, DOD began research and 
development (R&D) on diagnostics, therapeutics, and vaccines for SARS-
COV-2, the strain of coronavirus that causes COVID-19. The U.S. Army 
Medical Directorate-Armed Forces Research Institute of Medical Sciences 
led important initiatives to sequence COVID-19 in order to find its 
genetic ``fingerprint.'' Scientists used this identification 
information to develop tests and proposed treatments as early as 
January 2020, and later to help track the transmission chain as the 
virus evolved over time.
    DOD's Advanced Development and Manufacturing capability also 
provided critical additional capacity to support the manufacture of 
COVID-19 vaccines and monoclonal antibodies as part of Operation Warp 
Speed. When companies lacked space to conduct vaccine trials, DOD 
helped to set up pop-up sites in parking lots. When testing and trials 
required a particular piece of equipment, DOD helped to acquire it. 
Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) programs funded 
projects that laid the groundwork for the development of RNA COVID-19 
vaccines produced by Moderna and AstraZeneca, and COVID-19 therapeutics 
manufactured by Eli-Lilly.
    DOD overseas laboratories and Cooperative Threat Reduction-
Biological Threat Reduction programs continue to facilitate the 
detection and reporting of diseases that could affect the armed forces 
of the United States and its allies and partners. DOD is 
institutionalizing improvements to programs under its purview. 
Improvements to a future whole-of-nation response depend on reforms 
made by other Federal departments and agencies.
    Mr. Brown. As this pandemic approaches its second year, it is clear 
that COVID-19 will continue to be a factor as it evolves and mutates. 
What is the Department's long-term strategy for force protection, to 
include long-term vaccination planning, requirements, and supplies, to 
ensure that the Department is prepared to combat a persistent presence 
of the virus at home and is ready for global deployments where we might 
see mutated strains?
    General Taliaferro. The department remains committed to supporting 
the whole of government response, both domestically and 
internationally, as tasked by the interagency leads (FEMA and DOS). We 
are fully engaged in planning for potential additional support.
    From the beginning of the pandemic, the DOD embraced and 
implemented CDC and other Federal guidance, and will continue to do so. 
Our layered approach to force protection continues to evolve as CDC 
guidance changes, including:
    1) Non-pharmaceutic public health measures (e.g., mask-wearing and 
social distancing)
    2) Testing--both when appropriate clinically to determine if 
someone is infected, as well as to identify people with asymptomatic 
infections
    3) Vaccinations to reduce the risk of becoming infected, including 
reassessing whether to keep vaccines voluntary at such a time that the 
FDA grants unrestricted approval
    Because we know this is not the last biological threat our nation 
will face, we are taking the lessons learned from the past 15 months 
and are in the process of working with USNORTHCOM to update the Global 
Campaign Plan for Pandemic Influenza and Infectious Diseases. 
Additionally, the Joint Staff is also coordinating the first-ever 
Globally Integrated Framework for Pandemic Response. Moreover, we 
continue to partner with our interagency colleagues to expand global 
surveillance for new variants and new biological threats so that we can 
identify them as quickly as possible and, if necessary, develop 
additional medical and non-medical counter-measures.
    Mr. Brown. First, let me thank you for the service of the National 
Guard in securing the Capitol during the inauguration. I understand 
that there were significant outbreaks of COVID-19 within the 
deployment. What root causes have the National Guard Bureau identified 
that led to these outbreaks and what corrective actions has the NGB 
taken to reduce the potential for them in the future?
    General Nordhaus. We determined the carriers introduced the virus 
to the environment once they arrived. It did not spread and we quickly 
worked to contain and isolate infected individuals and those in close 
contact. We reinforced CDC and DOD guidelines and worked through the 
DCNG Surgeon's office to expand sanitation. Additionally, we increased 
education to the force as they arrived to keep healthy practices fresh 
in their minds as they were employed.

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