[Congressional Record Volume 163, Number 160 (Thursday, October 5, 2017)]
[Senate]
[Pages S6337-S6339]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                      Puerto Rico Recovery Effort

  Mr. MENENDEZ. Mr. President, I rise today, as I have on so many 
occasions, to give voice to the 3.5 million Americans who call Puerto 
Rico home. Their lives have been turned upside down by Hurricane Maria, 
and now more than ever, they desperately need to be heard. I invite my 
colleagues on both sides of the aisle to join me in amplifying the 
voices of millions of Puerto Ricans calling out for help and the 
millions here on the mainland who have yet to hear from their families.
  Here on the floor with me today are aerial photos of the destruction 
caused by Hurricane Maria, the astounding damage I saw firsthand when I 
toured Puerto Rico by helicopter on Friday, pictures largely taken by 
me.
  Take this collapsed bridge in the municipality of Utuado, situated in 
the central mountains of Puerto Rico. Every day, the 30,000 Americans 
who live in Utuado depend on these bridges to cross the beautiful 
rivers that run through it, but today those 30,000 Americans are 
secluded, waiting in the dark, and wondering when help will arrive.
  Images like these have stayed with me from the moment I left Puerto 
Rico, and I share them today because the people of Puerto Rico need our 
collective voices and support to stop this humanitarian crisis from 
devolving into a full-blown American tragedy.
  This is another example of some of the devastation of a large number 
of homes in a community.
  If we hope to overcome the monumental challenges before us, we need a 
full grasp of the reality on the ground. I thought that is why 
President Trump went to Puerto Rico this week--to get a dose of 
reality. Instead, the President continued to feed on his own warped 
version of reality. The President told the people of Puerto Rico that 
they should be ``very proud'' that the death count was only ``16 versus 
literally thousands of people'' who died in ``a real catastrophe like 
Katrina''--a real catastrophe like Katrina. And certainly that was a 
catastrophe, but this is no less real for the people of Puerto Rico. 
Yet, moments later, the AP reported that fatalities in Puerto Rico have 
tragically risen to 44. And while I pray it is not the case, I fear 
that it may be even worse, because we have secluded communities that 
still have not gotten access, so we don't know what is happening there.
  In short, the situation is perilous, and we don't have a moment to 
waste.
  Like many, I had hoped that during his visit to Puerto Rico, the 
President would take the high road and set a new tone after his 
administration's woefully delayed and inadequate response to Hurricane 
Maria. Instead, the President took victim-blaming to a whole new level. 
He told emergency responders and local elected officials: ``I hate to 
tell you, Puerto Rico, but you have thrown our budget a little out of 
whack.''
  Well, Mr. President, perhaps we have to dial back the budget-
bursting, trillion-dollar tax cuts you want to give to billionaire 
families like yours, because it is going to take more than paper towels 
to help the people of Puerto Rico.
  In this country, we don't turn our backs on Americans in need. We 
don't complain about how much it costs to restore power to hospitals or 
rebuild roads in ruin that connect people to their government and 
essential services or get clean drinking water and food and medicine to 
the hungry and the frail. We are the United States of America, and we 
are there for each other, whether it is Texas after Harvey or Florida 
after Irma or New Jersey after Sandy or Puerto Rico after Maria.
  If you heard the President speak earlier this week, you would heard 
that everything is going great and that he in particular is doing the 
greatest job any President has ever done in the history of the world. 
The administration will tell us that the majority of hospitals are open 
but leave out the fact that many are running on emergency generators at 
significantly reduced capacity. They will leave out how the shortages 
of ambulances and fuel and functional roads have made getting to the 
hospitals nearly impossible. Even if you do find a way there, the 
hospitals might not have the medicine, supplies, or doctors you need.
  The administration will boast that it has set up 11 distribution 
points for food, water, and other necessities, but what good is a 
distribution center that takes hours to reach and is out of supplies 
before you get there?
  They will brag about how half of the people have access to running 
water but neglect to say that in some rural areas in the north, barely 
over 13 percent of people have access to running water.
  They will boast about all of the buildings being inspected--something 
that even the Governor of Puerto Rico questioned--but look at this 
image I took 5 days before the President landed. This is just 25 
minutes outside of San Juan. Hurricane Maria destroyed many of the 
wooden homes that populate the island and weakened many of its immense 
structures, as the picture showed that we had up before. Here is an 
example of it. So you see that all of

[[Page S6338]]

these homes are destroyed. Some of them are not made in the same way. 
Here is a cement structure that is also totally destroyed. I saw the 
same sights across Puerto Rico in communities near the capital, in the 
mountains, and along the coast.
  What does all this tell us? It tells us an unfortunate truth: that 
the administration's response to this crisis has been woefully 
inadequate from the start.
  For 2 weeks, Puerto Ricans cried out for help--help accessing clean 
water, help powering hospitals, help feeding families. Yet the 
President accused them--the victims of this historic natural disaster--
of being ingrates clamoring for handouts. He dismissed the urgency of 
their situation, and he effectively called the mayor of San Juan 
another nasty woman who should pipe down.

  Well, this is the mayor of San Juan, wading hip deep in water. Does 
this look like a woman who isn't taking responsibility? No. To me, it 
looks like a leader doing everything she can to save lives.
  I knew from the start that we weren't getting the full picture, and 
because the administration went out of its way not to provide support 
for a bipartisan congressional delegation to visit the island, I 
decided to go myself. After all, it will be the responsibility of 
Congress to fund disaster relief and long-term recovery on these 
islands, and we need the facts in order to produce the right 
legislation. So last Friday, I boarded an Americans Airlines flight to 
Puerto Rico.
  Now, let me be clear. I have visited the island of Puerto Rico I 
don't know how many times over the past 25 years, both in my official 
capacity as a Member of Congress and personally to vacation. It is no 
exaggeration to say that the island I saw on Friday is not the island I 
have known and loved. The lush, green, tropical landscape that comes to 
mind when we think of Puerto Rico was mostly devoid of life.
  I met with the Governor of Puerto Rico. I spoke to local law 
enforcement officials, first responders, and Federal FEMA officials. 
With the help of the Governor's office and the Puerto Rico Joint Forces 
of Rapid Action--or FURA, as they are known on the island--I saw the 
damage by helicopter. I saw debris and mudslides and fallen trees on 
the inland streets, destroyed homes sprinkled with the occasional yet 
all-too-familiar blue of FEMA tarps. A dead green hue covered the 
landscape that was such a foreign sight to me that I caught myself 
thinking I was somewhere else.
  This was an all-too-familiar scene--the scene of a strong cement 
structure of a building, on the surface impervious to the strong winds 
of a hurricane, yet now on the verge of sinking into the Earth. The 
hurricane eroded so much land that in some inner parts of the island, 
landslides have become the new norm. The people who live here may never 
be able to return. Entire generations of close-knit communities may 
never be the same.
  Despite these dire conditions, during my visit to Puerto Rico, I felt 
the spirit of community and commitments shared by so many Americans 
across the island. After Hurricane Maria, they woke to devastation, no 
communication, and the isolating affects of roads being cut off by 
fallen trees, electrical posts, and debris. As they wait and wonder 
when their government will come to their aid, they are doing everything 
they can to survive. They have taken matters into their own hands. They 
are clearing roads, sheltering relatives who lost their homes, and 
working together to care for the most vulnerable. So through it all, I 
saw the hard-working spirit alive in Puerto Rico that I see whenever I 
speak with Puerto Rican families there and across New Jersey, where so 
many of my constituents are mobilizing to send help as they anxiously 
wait to hear from their families.
  Like so many Americans, I too worried about my family on the island. 
My brother faces health challenges, and I worried about his care. 
Fortunately, we had a brief moment to meet, and I was able to give him 
some supplies--help one person. But as tough as this situation was, he 
is one of the lucky ones. He lives in a suburb of San Juan which is 
relatively better off than the more remote, rural areas.
  Let's look at a chart of our recovery status. Fifteen days after the 
storm ravaged the island, where does it stand? Well, 93 percent of our 
fellow Americans are still without power. I can tell my colleagues 
firsthand that the heat and the humidity from all of the water that 
came from Maria is stifling. It is oppressive. It is hard to breathe.
  Sixty percent of Puerto Rico has no cell phone service, meaning 
people have no way of connecting to their families on the island and 
outside of the island or calling for help if they needed it. If they 
did, we could have pinpoint accuracy of search and rescue missions.
  Day by day, fewer and fewer Puerto Ricans have access to clean, 
running water. From October 2 to October 3, the population with running 
water dropped from 29 percent to 13 percent.
  The truth is, this situation would be unacceptable in any major city 
on the U.S. mainland, but, as the people of Puerto Rico know all too 
well, they don't get the same treatment as their fellow citizens on the 
mainland. The ugly truth is that for generations, Congress has treated 
the people of Puerto Rico not as our fellow Americans, not as people 
who have fought and bled for their country, like the famous 
Borinqueneers, an all-Puerto Rican infantry division, who received, 
recently, the highest decoration Congress gives collectively--the 
Congressional Gold Medal. They haven't treated them as first-class 
citizens but as second-class citizens.
  Hurricane Maria didn't create this disparity, but it exposed the 
longstanding inequities that have hindered the island's success for 
generations. The people of Puerto Rico don't receive equal Medicaid 
funding, Medicare coverage, or access to tax credits. They aren't just 
numbers on a ledger; they are long-term care for a grandparent, 
treatment for a critically ill child, and a fair shot to make a living 
wage and raise a family.
  This didn't happen overnight. These wrongs add up over time. As 
Governor Rossello said so eloquently:

       I invite you to reflect on why Puerto Rico is in the 
     current state of disadvantage and inequality. It's not 
     something that happened just a few months or few weeks before 
     this storm. It is a condition that has happened for more than 
     a century in Puerto Rico.

  I invite you to reflect on the reality that even after the storm hit 
Puerto Rico, even when it was evident it was a disaster in the United 
States, only half of our U.S. citizens knew Puerto Ricans are U.S. 
citizens. So when Hurricanes Irma and Maria slammed into Puerto Rico, 
these disparities, these inequalities, were laid bare.
  None of this should have taken the Trump administration by surprise. 
We knew the storm was coming. We knew for days that a category 5 
hurricane was on a collision course with Puerto Rico, just as 
communities across the island were picking up the pieces after Irma. We 
have known for years about the island's aging infrastructure, like the 
downed power line pictured here.
  In short, all of us knew Hurricane Maria was a recipe for disaster 
that would leave 3.5 million Americans imperiled, disconnected, and in 
the dark. It should not have taken the administration 12 days to issue 
a disaster declaration--something I called for--for 100 percent of the 
island because, as I saw on Friday, there is no community in Puerto 
Rico untouched by this tragedy. Focused leadership would have had a 
three-star general on the ground the moment the clouds parted, not 8 
days after the storms struck.
  We needed medical evacuation vehicles and vessels, aid and relief 
delivery systems on standby, the USNS Comfort ready for immediate 
deployment--something I called for. Instead, the administration told us 
helping Puerto Rico is hard because it is an island in a big ocean--but 
it happens to be an island of 3.5 million U.S. citizens.
  We have no more time to waste. That is why it is so urgent that we 
take action now. If we could send 20,000 troops to Haiti, surely, we 
can get more boots on the ground saving American lives in Puerto Rico. 
We need more helicopters airdropping food and water to secluded 
communities. We need generators delivered and the repair of 
communication towers expedited.
  It is up to the President to mobilize every resource possible--to 
save lives, to get the lights turned on, to rebuild bridges, to reach 
secluded communities, to reconnect families. We can't

[[Page S6339]]

afford to waste any more time, not when lives are on the line, not when 
elderly residents in nursing homes grow frailer by the moment, not when 
hungry American children have nothing to eat, not when communities are 
without clean drinking water for days on end. We need to keep the 
pressure on the administration.
  That is why I wrote the President, urging that he activate the 
Defense Production Act of 1950 so the military could more quickly 
deliver vast private sector resources to those in need. That is why my 
colleagues and I wrote to the White House and urged FEMA to waive 
disaster relief cost sharing because, as the Governor told me: I have 
no revenue coming in. I have no revenue coming in, and the likelihood 
of revenue coming in, certainly in the short term, is not there. How do 
you acquire the 70 or 75 percent Federal assistance if you don't have 
the 25 percent to put up? That is why we have written the USDA asking 
that they use all available resources to get food to the people of 
Puerto Rico.
  This is an all-hands-on-deck situation for the Federal Government, 
but Congress also has a responsibility to act. That is why I sent a 
letter to Leader McConnell and Speaker Ryan urging that they bring 
forward an emergency supplemental aid package and fund community 
development block grants for disaster recovery. It is up to us in 
Congress to immediately authorize, not just the emergency funding 
needed to save lives in Puerto Rico but also the assistance needed for 
a full-powered recovery.
  We must give Puerto Ricans the tools to rebuild. That means making 
sure Puerto Rico's financial control board gives the Governor the 
flexibility to spearhead this recovery. Board members of that control 
board should be on the island, assessing the damage, speaking to the 
survivors, allowing Governor Rossello to create a new budget that 
reflects Puerto Rico's post-Maria reality. The damage, by some 
estimates, could be as high as $90 billion, so adjusting expectations 
and enabling flexibility is absolutely critical going forward.
  I have said it before and I will say it again. The people of Puerto 
Rico must come before Wall Street creditors. As it turns out, this is 
one area where the President and I can find common ground. Just last 
night, he called for Puerto Rico's debt to be wiped out. I hope all of 
us--the administration, my colleagues in Congress, and the fiscal 
control board--can work together to jump-start Puerto Rico's recovery. 
That must include enabling flexibility, addressing the island's 
crippling debt, and ensuring that pensions are protected and paid. 
Imagine not getting your pension--no longer working, having no income, 
and then your pension is not protected. How do you make it? All of us 
in the Senate have a responsibility to stand with Puerto Rico. How we 
respond to this crisis will have profound consequences, not just for 
the Americans who live in Puerto Rico today but for generations to 
come.
  We need to pass a disaster package that matches the astounding damage 
suffered by the island. The photos I have brought to the floor today 
give a glimpse--not anywhere near the whole picture--of the devastation 
on the ground. It is not enough to reconnect a faulty, ailing power 
grid. It is time to be proactive and rebuild Puerto Rico so it is 
prepared for the next storm and for the 21st century. It is time to fix 
the underlying disparities which have hindered Puerto Rico's success. 
Otherwise, we will simply be rebuilding a broken foundation.
  Let me close by saying, I remind my colleagues that Puerto Ricans are 
not just citizens of the United States--which, in and of itself, should 
speak to the compelling arguments we should be engaged in helping 
Puerto Rico as our fellow Americans. They have fought to defend our 
Nation from World War I to the War on Terror. Take a walk down to the 
Vietnam Memorial, and you will see Puerto Rican names engraved in that 
stone far in excess of the number of people proportionately to the 
American population. Throughout our history, Puerto Ricans have given 
their lives so they may remain part of the ``land of the free.'' To 
this day, more than 10,000 Puerto Ricans serve in every branch of the 
U.S. Armed Forces.
  Let's also remember that beyond the 3.5 million citizens living on 
the island, there are 5 million Puerto Ricans living in our States, in 
our congressional districts, and in our communities. In the aftermath 
of this unprecedented disaster, these Americans deserve the same 
rights, the same respect, and the same response from their Federal 
Government. That is what I told leaders from New Jersey's Puerto Rican 
community earlier this week--assemblymen and women, mayors, community 
leaders, and concerned citizens.
  We all remember how hard it was to secure the funding we needed to 
rebuild New Jersey in the aftermath of Superstorm Sandy. We had to 
fight tooth and nail every step of the way, and, guess what, we had two 
U.S. Senators from New Jersey and 13 Members of Congress, joined by our 
colleagues from New York--two U.S. Senators from New York and a whole 
host of congressional Members as well as from Connecticut, which was 
also affected. It was an incredible time here to try to get relief.
  Americans in Puerto Rico have no vote in the Senate, they have no 
votes in Congress, and the fight to rebuild Puerto Rico will be that 
much harder, but, as I have in the past, I intend to be their voice and 
their vote in the U.S. Senate.
  Now is not the time to pretend like recovery will be a piece of cake. 
No one--not the Governor, not the President, not any one of us--should 
sugarcoat the human catastrophe playing out in Puerto Rico. It is time 
for honesty about the conditions on the ground, the challenges we face, 
and the actions we must take.
  Yes, Puerto Rico is an island in the middle of a very big ocean, but 
we are the most powerful nation on the face of the Earth. We have the 
most advanced military capabilities ever known and the most skilled 
Armed Forces in the world. We have to be there for 3.5 million 
Americans who are in need. We are the United States of America. We do 
the impossible. Give our men and women in uniform any mission, and they 
rise to the occasion.
  If we conducted the Berlin Airlift, set up tactical operations in the 
mountains of Afghanistan, built green zones in Baghdad in the height of 
the Iraq war, then surely we can save the lives of Americans in danger, 
and surely we can save those lives and help rebuild Puerto Rico. We 
must not rest until every American is safe and the work of rebuilding 
is done.
  I yield the floor.
  (At the request of Mr. Schumer, the following statement was ordered 
to be printed in the Record.)
 Ms. CORTEZ MASTO. Mr. President, I had expected to be able to 
vote today on the motion to invoke cloture on the nomination of 
Callista L. Gingrich to be Ambassador to the Holy See. Instead, I am in 
Las Vegas meeting with victims of and first responders to the deadliest 
mass shooting in modern U.S. history.
  I support the motion to invoke cloture on the nomination of Callista 
L. Gingrich to be Ambassador to the Holy See. The U.S. relationship 
with the Holy See is an important one and is best supported with a 
confirmed ambassador leading it. Ms. Gingrich's faith and engagement 
with the Catholic community will support U.S. ties to the 
Vatican.
  Mr. MENENDEZ. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. ISAKSON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. ISAKSON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that all time be 
yielded back on both sides.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.