[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 54 (Friday, March 20, 2020)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1865-S1867]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              CORONAVIRUS

  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, the coronavirus continues to challenge 
our Nation in extraordinary ways that were unimaginable a few weeks 
ago. Our public health systems are coming under enormous strain. Our 
hospitals and other medical facilities lack the necessary supplies and 
resources. As measures to isolate the public broaden, workers are 
filing for unemployment at unprecedented rates. Small businesses are on 
the brink of collapse. American families are desperately in need of 
support until they can resume their normal lives.
  I have heard from these people and the people who are isolated. I 
have heard from people who have sick loved ones in nursing homes and 
can't enter to see them. I have heard from small business people who 
struggled their whole lives to build a small business, and it finally 
looks like it is beginning to succeed, and they may be wiped out.

  The urgency of doing something now is so important. Both parties in 
Congress must work together as swiftly as possible to get something 
done that is as big and bold as possible. This is one of the worst 
crises America has faced. The American people need help fast.
  Senator McConnell has proposed what is now the third phase of 
legislation to confront the coronavirus. We are all eager to work in a 
bipartisan way to quickly get another bill to the President's desk. But 
at the moment, the McConnell bill is inadequate. Leader McConnell's 
proposal does not do nearly enough to address the public health crisis 
in terms of hospitals, medical supplies, beds, doctors, nurses, and 
measures to ensure that Americans can access and afford coronavirus 
treatment.
  The bottom line is very simple: If we don't deal with the health 
crisis, nothing we do will make the economy any better. So that is No. 
1.
  If we don't have help for our hospitals, many small ones are going to 
close. Rural ones will close. Big ones will have real trouble. We must 
do something. Yet there is nothing in Leader McConnell's bill to help 
hospitals. Now we are told we may do it later in a supplemental. Later 
is no good. We need a Marshall Plan for hospitals right now.
  Local governments that are also on the frontlines need to get dollars 
in their pockets. Many of them will go broke.
  Leader McConnell's proposal is also skewed in favor of corporations 
rather than the workers and families who urgently and much more acutely 
feel the pain of reduced hours and unemployment. Leader McConnell's 
proposal includes a few ideas that shouldn't be included at all, such 
as tax cuts for multinational corporations and restrictions on paid 
sick leave that Congress just expanded.
  This morning, Democratic ranking members of six committees met with 
the Republican chairs of corresponding committees to hear the rationale 
behind the McConnell bill and to begin a bipartisan dialogue. Democrats 
will soon respond with policies we believe must be included in the 
legislation and things that we don't think belong in this legislation.
  Our goal is twofold: Address the public health crisis now, and put 
workers first as we do it.
  Democrats want to do as much as possible to prepare our healthcare 
system for the growing storm it faces, and we want to help the working 
Americans who are most immediately affected by the economic slowdown 
and help them in real and significant ways. In that respect, Democrats 
have five important priorities that I will speak about now, among 
others. We have many other priorities as well. We are sending all of 
our priorities over to the Republicans soon enough.

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  No. 1, America needs a Marshall Plan for hospitals and our public 
health infrastructure. In a few weeks, hospitals could be overrun with 
patients, and there will still be a great shortage of gloves, masks, 
ICU beds, ventilators, and especially testing. To cite just one 
example, the two biggest hospitals in Albany--Albany Medical Center and 
St. Peter's Health Partners--announced they are suspending testing in 
order to conserve the few they have for healthcare workers and high-
risk patients. Access to tests continues to be a problem in other 
places throughout my State as well.
  There is great shortage of equipment. The story that rings in my ear 
is that certain places that have the tests don't have the swabs so they 
can undertake the tests. We are short of supplies up and down the line. 
It is masks. It is protective clothing and gear. It is beds. It is 
doctors and nurses themselves. We have to do more. We need a Marshall 
Plan right now for our healthcare system.
  Two weeks ago, 3, 4 weeks ago, many of us were talking about the 
problem that testing--the lack of good testing was about to occur. Many 
of us said 3 weeks ago, 4 weeks ago, that if we don't have these tests, 
everything is going to go down the drain. No one listened--at least no 
one in the administration--until recently. Well, we are saying now that 
in 2, 3 weeks, our hospital situation will be the same. It will be 
massive and deeply in trouble. That is why we need to act now--not 
later with a supplemental but now.
  We also need to dramatically increase unemployment insurance--what we 
are calling employment insurance. It is really unemployment insurance 
on steroids. But it helps people furloughed from their jobs, so we call 
it employment insurance. Why do we need it? Because so many workers 
have been forced home and are prevented from working regular hours. If 
you work in a restaurant and there are no customers, you are not going 
to work. The boss you worked for and worked so well with for years 
can't afford to pay you.
  To go on existing unemployment insurance won't work. It is hard to 
access. It doesn't cover a whole lot of people. Furthermore, it does 
not pay back workers the full wages they were earning. We need to 
change all three of those things so that, No. 1, every worker who is 
unemployed gets a paycheck equal to what they were earning before this 
crisis, paid for by the Federal Government. That way, the business--
small, medium, large--can put them on furlough, and then, when the 
crisis is over, they are back. There is money in their pockets. No 
workers, no family, no one should lose a paycheck or go into financial 
ruin as a result of the coronavirus. This is a very important 
provision.
  I talk to people all across my State and the country, and when they 
hear about it, they love it. It is not giving money to everybody. There 
are some people, thank God, who are still employed, but there are many, 
many people who have lost their jobs, and one check, when they may be 
out of their jobs for 3, 4, 5 months, isn't going to be enough. 
Unemployment insurance gives money the whole period of time the crisis 
exists at your present salary level and covers just about everyone. It 
makes the most sense of any program that I have heard in dealing with 
those who are losing their jobs, and it helps in terms of dealing with 
stimulating the economy because we will bring the economy back to where 
it was. All these unemployed people will be getting paid the same 
amount of money.

  Third, paid sick leave is a must. We need to be expanding paid sick 
leave, not restricting it, as this current proposal suggests. Senators 
Murray and Gillibrand, working in conjunction with their colleague 
Congresswoman DeLauro in the House, put together a good bill. It should 
be in this big proposal.
  Fourth, we need to put our workers first. If we are going to consider 
bailing out industries, they cannot then be allowed to turn around and 
cut jobs, cut wages, cut benefits. They cannot be allowed to use the 
money for stock buybacks. They cannot be allowed to give salary 
increases to executives. Phase 3 needs to put workers first, period. 
These are our values.
  Finally, we need to rescue small businesses. Many of them have been 
asked to close their doors for the sake of public safety. We need to 
help businesses access the necessary liquidity to pay their insurance 
bills, to pay their rent or mortgage, to pay their expenses so that 
when this crisis ends, they can rebound stronger than ever.
  Democratic ranking members are already discussing these priorities 
with their Republican counterparts. Of course, there are many other 
priorities as well. It would take too long to highlight all of them, 
but they are all in white paper we have sent to Leader McConnell and to 
the Republican chairs. In almost all these cases, Democrats already 
have prepared and drafted the legislative language on these priorities. 
We are ready to go.
  About 2 hours ago, I spoke with President Trump about these five 
priorities. I mentioned them all, and President Trump told me he was 
open to these ideas. In fact, the President explicitly told me he would 
oppose companies using bailout money on buybacks, even though such a 
prohibition is not in McConnell's bill.
  I also urged the President to immediately employ the Defense 
Production Act and harness industry to get ventilators and other 
critically needed medical equipment to those who need it. He told me he 
would do so and then said to someone who must have been in the Oval 
Office--or wherever he was--to get it done. So I think we are on the 
road, because we can't waste a day in terms of getting the DPA going. 
Congress will make available very quickly whatever resources are needed 
to the Defense Department in order to implement this act.

  More broadly, I told the President we need to come together and 
cooperate in this time of national crisis. He agreed. We need to work 
with uncommon speed and make this next bill what it needs to be. We 
need it to be workers first, with a Marshall Plan for hospitals. The 
Democrats are already at work with our Republican colleagues to get 
this done.
  Now, it has been 20 days since the first case of COVID-19 was 
detected in New York. Today, 20 days later, there are 7,000 cases--more 
than a third of the total number in our country. In a time of public 
emergency, New Yorkers have been asked to make extraordinary 
sacrifices. The Governor has just mandated that, excepting essential 
services, 100 percent of New York's workforce must stay home. The city 
that never sleeps is, for the moment, dormant.
  To all of my fellow New Yorkers, stay strong. We will beat this back, 
and on the other side, we will come back stronger.
  To the thousands of New Yorkers and more across the country who have 
volunteered to join our medical reserves to help sick patients, thank 
you. God bless you. The Nation owes you a debt for your courage and 
willingness to answer the call to serve.
  Our medical workers are already performing a herculean task, and it 
will only get more daunting in the days to come.
  Know this, workers: The country is with you. We support you; we 
respect you; we love you; and we are already working on policies that 
will ease your burden, as much as that can be achieved.
  Finally, to my Senate colleagues, what we must do in the next few 
days is unlike anything any of us has ever done in our time in 
Congress. This is a crisis without modern precedent. We are going to 
have to flex some muscles that may have atrophied. We are going to have 
to cooperate in ways that we may not be accustomed to. We are going to 
have to work across the aisle and across the span of this Capitol to 
produce momentous legislation in the span of a few days. We will do it 
because we must do it. The American people are suffering. Our 
businesses are shuttered. Our factories lay idle. Our workers are 
without work. Let us come together and do whatever is necessary to 
protect the American people in this time of historic challenge.
  I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will call the roll.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BOOKER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.

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