[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 152 (Wednesday, September 12, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Page S6121]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                   Recognition of the Minority Leader

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Democratic leader is recognized.


                        Remembering September 11

  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, yesterday was the 17th anniversary of the 
9/11 attacks--an event that changed my city and our country forever. I 
spent the morning at the 9/11 Memorial in Lower Manhattan. Two deep 
scars in the Earth remind us where mighty towers once stood.
  I will never forget that day, nor the next: the phones--when they 
worked--ringing endlessly; the smell of death; the lines of hundreds of 
people holding homemade signs--I will never forget that--as I walked 
there. President Bush sent a plane, and we went to Ground Zero the day 
after. Hundreds of people were lined up asking: ``Have you seen my 
father Joe?'' ``Have you seen my daughter Mary?'' The towers had 
crashed, but no one knew how many people had survived. It was awful.
  Mr. President, 3,000 souls were lost in one day--one of the bloodiest 
days on American soil since the Civil War--people I knew: a guy I 
played basketball with in high school, a businessman who helped me on 
my way up, a firefighter with whom I went around the city to ask people 
to donate blood.
  Seventeen years ago today, September 12, 2001, I called on Americans 
to wear the flag in remembrance of those who were lost, the brave men 
and women who rushed to find those who might still be alive. I have 
worn that flag every single day since. I will wear it every day of my 
life for the rest of my life in remembrance of those who were lost.
  This year, I want to turn everyone's attention to a harrowing 
statistic. By the end of 2018, we expect that more people will have 
died from exposure to toxic chemicals on 9/11 than were killed on that 
day itself. Last year, 23 current or former members of the New York 
Police Department died of 9/11-related diseases--the same number who 
died on September 11. A new tablet was recently installed at the Hall 
of Heroes at One Police Plaza to commemorate all the new deaths of 
members of the FDNY. There is now an American living with a 9/11-
related illness in every one of the 50 States and 429 of the 436 
congressional districts. I guess they have 436 counting the District of 
Columbia.
  Just as we will never forget the bravery so many fallen Americans 
showed that terrible day, let us never forget those first responders 
who did survive, only to contract cancer or a respiratory illness from 
breathing in a toxic cocktail of dust and ash at Ground Zero.
  Nearly a decade ago, I was proud, along with my colleague from New 
York, to pass the Zadroga Act to provide healthcare for our first 
responders and a victim compensation fund to help survivors who get 
sick and the families who lost a loved one to illness. Three years ago, 
I was proud to work across the aisle to make the healthcare component 
of the Zadroga Act virtually permanent.

  Next year, however, Congress must reauthorize the September 11th 
Victim Compensation Fund because the administrator of the fund now 
predicts that the funding will not last until 2020, as we had 
previously hoped. So many new claims are being filed because so many of 
these deadly cancers are now showing up. As the death tally from 9/11 
continues to grow, we have to make sure the fund is capitalized with 
enough money to provide an ever longer list of 9/11 victims. So I want 
to remind my colleagues that soon we have to come together once again 
to do what is right for the families of the first responders and the 
surviving first responders themselves who, without hesitation, risked 
their lives to save other lives 17 years ago yesterday.