[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 127 (Monday, July 20, 2020)]
[House]
[Page H3584]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
RISING COVID-19 CASES IN TEXAS
(Ms. JACKSON LEE asked and was given permission to address the House
for 1 minute.)
Ms. JACKSON LEE. Madam Speaker, it was very difficult to come to
Washington, leaving my constituents behind, having engaged with them
for all of the moments that I have been in the district.
They are good people. The State of Texas is filled with good people.
The Nation is filled with good people.
How we got to 300,000 cases and thousands of deaths, 10,000 cases in
the last 24 hours in our jurisdictions of Harris County and Houston, is
tragic and baffling. We opened too early.
A number of Members of Congress have written our Governor and asked
him to return authority to our local communities, our county and our
city, to allow them to make determinations of a stay-at-home order--
painful, I know it is--in order to be able to do this by science and
medicine.
Let me be very clear. The headlines in my paper said today it is
difficult doing contact tracing. People are out and about. You don't
have good information. So I am asking the Governor to adhere to our
request.
But more importantly, I want my colleagues to work with me to restore
the National Guard that were stupendous in doing testing. We do not
have enough. And I look forward to working with Armed Services and
others to ensure the Texas National Guard can be back to do testing to
help save lives.
We have got to save lives, and we should not be a respecter of what
State. We are one State and one Nation.
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