[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 80 (Tuesday, April 28, 2020)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E397-E398]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




              AMERICA'S GLOBAL LEADERSHIP DURING COVID-19

                                 ______
                                 

                              HON. ED CASE

                               of hawaii

                    in the house of representatives

                        Tuesday, April 28, 2020

  Mr. CASE. Madam Speaker, as our country and world confront the 
unprecedented challenge of the COVID-19 pandemic, some say, as a reason 
or excuse, that we should turn inward away from the rest of our world 
and to our own affairs.
  But neither can nor should we disengage. Instead, I join many of my 
colleagues and our fellow citizens in stating clearly that there has 
never been a better time or greater need to embrace an across-the-board 
renewal of America's global leadership.
  United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres recently warned 
that COVID-19 poses the greatest challenge for our world since the 
Second World War. As this pandemic claims lives and cripples health 
care systems across the world, it also leaves in its wake the specter 
of a global recession without parallel in recent memory that will claim 
countless millions of jobs and livelihoods. The impacts of this 
pandemic will last years if not decades, and we will return to a world 
drastically changed.
  This comparison of our present crisis to the Second World War reminds 
us of the extraordinary sacrifices Americans made then and must make 
now. Yet, just as the greatest generation fought to liberate Europe and 
the Pacific, so too must we commit to fighting this virus wherever it 
may emerge. The successors of American factories that assembled tanks 
and planes over 75 years ago must now build ventilators and medical 
supplies, not for ourselves alone but for any nation who shares our 
fight against this pandemic.
  We are also reminded that the greatest generation, faced with a 
global economy ruined by war, chose not to celebrate victory in 
splendid isolation but did what no country had ever done before. That 
generation of Americans led the way in creating the United Nations and 
rebuilding the economies of friend and foe alike through the Marshall 
Plan, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. No one can 
deny the spirit of generosity and good will that motivated those 
actions, but it was also the practical self-interest of acknowledging 
that our own future lay in international engagement. Americans learned 
from the war that freedom, prosperity and peace go hand in hand and 
that, if we want to secure those blessings, we need to lead on the 
global stage.
  Today, those lessons still ring true. We know that a virus from one 
part of the world can swiftly spread, that a fragile state poses 
security challenges beyond its borders and that a slowdown in one 
economy can affect the entire global supply chain. So long as this 
pandemic persists in one country, we all are at risk, from a public 
health, economic, social, environmental and every other perspective.

[[Page E398]]

  That is why Congress appropriated almost two billion dollars for 
international assistance across two emergency relief measures. Our 
Department of State and USAID have pledged almost $500 million, with 
more on the way. American businesses, philanthropies and non-
governmental organizations are contributing their assistance as well 
wherever possible.
  These are important first steps, but our country can and must do more 
to lead a global effort against this pandemic. We must coordinate 
pathways for assistance from developed to developing countries to 
enhance the capacity of their health care systems to combat future 
waves of this pandemic. We must lead the way in bringing together the 
best and brightest around the world in fully understanding this virus 
and developing a vaccine. We must forge a path towards global economic 
recovery, restoring old supply chains and creating new ones, and 
leading our world economy to be stronger, more resilient and more just 
than it was before this crisis. Above all, we must lead in repairing 
the frayed fabric of global order, restoring trust in and commitment to 
our shared institutions among all countries.
  Seventy-five years after the Second World War, let us recall the 
courage and sacrifice of the greatest generation. Let us find the 
realities and opportunities in this crippling pandemic and recommit 
ourselves and the United States to global leadership and to the values 
of freedom, prosperity and peace at home and abroad. And as we do so 
and overcome this pandemic, let us, the Americans of this age, with our 
bravery, generosity and greatness of spirit, prove to be as celebrated 
an example as that greatest generation to Americans of future eras

                          ____________________