[Congressional Record Volume 155, Number 41 (Monday, March 9, 2009)]
[Senate]
[Page S2905]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




              PRESIDENT OBAMA'S STEM CELL EXECUTIVE ORDER

  Mr. DODD. Mr. President, I wish to highlight the Executive order 
signed today by President Obama that will bring hope to millions of 
patients and their loved ones and relief to scientists and researchers 
throughout the country.
  With this Executive order, President Obama has overturned the harmful 
restrictions on scientific discovery established by President Bush and 
his administration. And with his Presidential memorandum, President 
Obama has set our country on a path where science, not politics or 
ideology, will guide public policy and Government decisionmaking.
  Today's Executive order will help our Nation's scientists perform 
promising stem cell research that may one day provide relief to the 
more than 100 million Americans suffering from Parkinson's, diabetes, 
spinal cord injury, ALS, cancer, and many other devastating conditions 
for which there is still no cure.
  Several of my Senate colleagues, led by Senators Harkin, Specter, 
Kennedy, Hatch and Feinstein, and I, tried to allow embryonic stem cell 
research to go forward with the passage of the Stem Cell Research 
Research Enhancement Act in both the Senate and the House, but these 
efforts were consistently blocked by President Bush's veto.
  I am joining my colleagues again on this legislation because we need 
to codify the protection of embryonic stem cell research in order to 
guard against the possibility that a future President might seek to 
undo the tremendous step taken today by President Obama.
  In my own State of Connecticut, we lost a great pioneer in the global 
effort for stem cell research last month with the untimely death of Dr. 
Xiangzhong ``Jerry'' Yang. Since he came to the United States from 
China, Dr. Yang devoted his life's work to furthering science and 
working toward curing deadly and debilitating diseases.
  Dr. Yang was a brilliant and prescient reproductive biologist at the 
University of Connecticut who conducted some the world's leading work 
in the 1990's to refine the cloning of cows and bulls through the use 
of adult cells in order to improve the efficiency of cloning technology 
and improve the availability of cloned cattle for size and weight, high 
milk production, and other favorable genetic traits. Dr. Yang 
collaborated with Japanese scientists in 1998 to clone a prize bull 
with cells scratched from the animal's ear.
  While at the University of Connecticut, Dr. Yang organized 
researchers to help found the university's Center for Regenerative 
Biology in 2001. As the center's director, Dr. Yang continued his work 
toward producing tissue to be used in heart surgery, organ replacement, 
and other medical procedures.
  He was a leading force behind the Connecticut State Stem Cell 
Research Program which was signed into law in 2005. This $100 million 
initiative to support stem cell research earned Connecticut the moniker 
``Stem Cell Central'' by the New York Times. Dr. Yang will be missed, 
but with today's announcement by President Obama, the fruits of his 
persistence will inform generations of stem cell scientists to come who 
will now be able to conduct their work without the arbitrary 
restrictions put in place by President Bush.
  Today is a momentous day for patients and their loved ones as well as 
researchers and scientists throughout the country. To the thousands of 
parents in the State of Connecticut whose children live every day with 
juvenile diabetes or who watched and suffered as their loved one 
succumbed to ALS, cancer, or Parkinson's disease, today's announcement 
can't bring that loved one back or immediately provide a cure to their 
disease but it will mean that future generations of Americans may not 
have to suffer as they did. Today's announcement brings hope that not 
only can future discoveries be possible, but they are possible right 
here in the United States.
  I applaud the President for his actions today in support of science 
and hope. And I congratulate the many advocates and researchers in 
Connecticut and around the country for their persistence in making this 
hard-fought victory for science a reality.

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