[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 89 (Tuesday, May 12, 2020)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2357-S2358]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              CORONAVIRUS

  Mr. McCONNELL. Madam President, our healthcare sector continues to 
battle the coronavirus at every level. Doctors, nurses, hospital 
workers, researchers, and public health leaders are working constantly 
to protect Americans and fight this invader.
  Unfortunately, the last 2 months' stoppage of much of our national 
life was never going to permanently extinguish the virus. That task 
will be ongoing. The stated purpose of this effort was to prevent a 
rapid spike that could have completely overwhelmed the medical 
capacities of many areas. The patriotic sacrifices of the American 
people have worked. We have bought our healthcare system that breathing 
room we needed.
  As we cautiously move forward, major precautions will remain in 
place. Some routines will not go back to normal for a long time. But as 
a nation, we will need to regroup and find a more sustainable middle 
ground between total lockdown and total normalcy. Let me say that 
again. We need to find a middle ground between total lockdown and total 
normalcy.
  While we keep battling the virus through testing, tracing, isolation, 
treatment, and hopefully soon, a vaccine, we need to smartly and safely 
begin to reopen our country. If Americans want to go back to work and 
back to school in the fall, we will need to reopen the country. No 
doubt, there will be many discussions here in Congress about more ways 
we can help make that happen.
  Already, we are hearing that House Democrats are cobbling together 
another big laundry list of pet priorities. Even the media is 
describing it as a partisan wish list with no chance of becoming law. 
That is exactly the wrong approach. It is the wrong approach when a 
senior Democrat calls this pandemic ``a tremendous opportunity to 
restructure things to fit our vision.'' It is the wrong approach when 
former Vice President Biden calls this tragedy an ``incredible 
opportunity . . . to fundamentally transform the country.''
  The American people don't need a far-left transformation. They just 
need a path back to the historically prosperous and optimistic moment 
that they had built for themselves until about 12 weeks ago. The 
American people don't need a far-left transformation. They just need a 
path back to the historically prosperous and optimistic moment they had 
built for themselves until about 12 weeks ago.
  American workers don't need Washington to inflict some far-left, 
extreme

[[Page S2358]]

makeover on our country. They need us to get rid of obstacles that 
might stand in their way. One such obstacle is becoming obvious.
  A second epidemic of frivolous lawsuits could follow the actual 
pandemic and crush our recovery before it begins. Already, more than 
two-thirds of independent business owners say they are specifically 
worried about a legal liability minefield getting in the way of 
reopening.
  Already, lawyers have begun filing hundreds of COVID-related 
complaints in courts all across our country. This is exactly the kind 
of hostile environment that could take our reopening and recovery from 
challenging to downright impossible. So the Senate is going to act. 
Senate Republicans are preparing a major package of COVID-related 
liability reforms to foster our economic recovery. This package, which 
Senator Cornyn and I are spearheading, will extend significant new 
protections to the people who have been on the frontlines of this 
response and those who will be on the frontlines of our reopening.
  First and foremost, we are going to protect the healthcare workers 
who have been locked in combat with this mysterious new disease. We are 
not going to let healthcare heroes emerge from this crisis facing a 
tidal wave of medical malpractice lawsuits so that trial lawyers can 
line their pockets.
  We aren't going to federalize the entirety of medical malpractice 
law, but we are going to raise the liability threshold for COVID-
related malpractice lawsuits. This will give our doctors, nurses, and 
other healthcare providers a lot more security as they clock in every 
day and risk themselves to take care of strangers.
  Second, we are including new legal protections for the businesses, 
nonprofits, and government agencies that have kept serving throughout 
the crisis and for those that will need to lead the reopening.
  We are facing the worst layoffs since the Great Depression and a 
storm of uncertainty for Main Street businesses. Americans want to get 
back to work, and we need to do everything in our power to help that 
happen.
  Also, K-12 schools, colleges, and universities right now are 
completely uncertain about the fall. If we want schools to reopen this 
fall, we will have to create the conditions to make that possible. If 
we want schools to reopen this fall, we have to create the conditions 
to make that possible.
  If we want even an outside shot at the kind of brisk rehiring that 
American workers deserve, we have to make sure opportunistic trial 
lawyers are not lurking on the sidewalk outside every small business in 
America, waiting to slap them with a lawsuit the instant they turn the 
lights back on.
  Our legislation is going to create a legal safe harbor--safe harbor--
for businesses, nonprofits, governments, and workers and schools that 
are following public health guidelines to the best of their ability. To 
be clear now, we are not talking about immunity from lawsuits. There 
will be accountability for actual gross negligence and intentional 
misconduct. That will continue. We aren't going to provide immunity, 
but we are going to provide some certainty. If we want American workers 
to clock back in, we need employers to know that if they follow the 
guidelines, they will not be left to drown in opportunistic litigation. 
We are going to make sure it is the trial lawyers and not struggling 
job creators who will need to clear a very high legal burden.
  In addition, I hope our bill will find ways to expand existing 
protections for the manufacturers of therapeutics, diagnostics, and 
potential vaccines--things we are urging the private sector to produce 
as fast as possible. And I hope we will be able to create new 
protections for other medical equipment manufacturers, as well, like 
the policies we put in the CARES Act to increase the supply of masks.
  So it is all well and good to give rhetorical tributes here on the 
floor to healthcare professionals, essential workers, key industries, 
small businesses, charities, and nonprofits. Rhetoric is well and good. 
Words matter, but actions matter more. Americans on the frontlines do 
not just need Senators to talk about how important they are. They need 
action. They need us to provide the same kinds of commonsense legal 
protections that Congress has enacted a number of times previously in 
difficult or unusual periods.
  American taxpayers deserve these protections as well. The men and 
women of this country just saw Congress commit historic amounts of 
their own money to sweeping recovery legislation so that we could help 
healthcare facilities and small businesses survive the crisis. We are 
not going to stand idly by while a small group of wealthy lawyers 
vacuum up this relief money and redirect it into their own pockets.
  Strong legal protections are the right move for doctors, nurses, 
hospitals, schools, and universities; for workers who want their jobs 
back, for small business owners who are struggling to stay open, and 
for nonprofits that have helped the vulnerable; and for taxpayers, who 
want their money to finance a real national rescue and not the biggest 
trial lawyer bonanza in American history.
  Senate Republicans are going to continue to develop this legislation. 
It is going to be a redline for us in any future coronavirus 
legislation. The administration has already stated its support for 
action on this issue as well.
  American heroes across our country deserve these basic protections. 
This Senate majority will make sure they get them.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. SCHUMER. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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