[Congressional Record Volume 167, Number 86 (Tuesday, May 18, 2021)]
[Senate]
[Page S2571]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                     TRIBUTE TO MAJOR AIMEE A. MACK

  Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I am pleased to recognize MAJ Aimee A. 
Mack, U.S. Army, on the conclusion of her current assignment. Since May 
2020, Major Mack has served with great distinction as the legislative 
liaison for the Countermeasures Acceleration Group, which was 
previously known as Operation Warp Speed. Throughout the development, 
production, and distribution of the various coronavirus vaccines, Major 
Mack has been an outstanding source of information for my staff and me, 
helping us understand a fast-moving and game-changing program that is 
saving millions of American lives.
  I think we all need to pause and marvel at the miracle that Operation 
Warp Speed fostered. Today, based on the successful foundational work 
of Operation Warp Speed, it is extremely easy for any eligible American 
to receive a coronavirus vaccine. So it might be hard to remember just 
how far-fetched that objective seemed when Operation Warp Speed was 
launched during the height of the pandemic, approximately 1 year ago. 
At the time, many in the mainstream media doubted that a coronavirus 
vaccine could be produced so quickly. President Trump's plan to make a 
coronavirus vaccine available by the end of 2020 was repeatedly ``fact 
checked,'' and leading political and medical figures viewed the program 
as either a low-odds gamble or a political stunt.
  This was the very difficult information environment that Major Mack 
confronted when she was appointed as Operation Warp Speed's legislative 
liaison in May 2020, but she was uniquely suited for the assignment. 
Like all of the best legislative liaisons, Major Mack had the 
confidence of her commanding officer, GEN Gustave A. Perna, and was 
meticulous in her provision of precise, detailed information to 
Congress. She is also a Nurse Corps officer, and her medical knowledge 
made her an exceptional asset to Members of Congress and their staffs, 
particularly when it came to explaining the program's revolutionary 
scientific and medical testing decisions, which were vital to finding, 
testing, and receiving emergency approval for three vaccines in record 
time. In this sense, Major Mack was not merely a source of information 
but of education. Thanks to her efforts, when the first coronavirus 
vaccines were administered in December 2020, there was broad, 
bipartisan congressional confidence in the vaccines' safety and 
efficacy because she taught our staffs and us what we needed to know.
  In the months that followed, as attention shifted from the 
development of the vaccines to their production and delivery, Major 
Mack continued to provide regular and detailed updates for Members and 
staff. Again, I think we need to admire Operation Warp Speed's 
achievement here: For the first time in history, vaccines are 
effectively going from conveyor belts to arms within days. Major Mack's 
deep knowledge of the process and her outstanding work in sharing it 
with us bolstered congressional confidence in the program. To put a 
finer point on it, when our State health departments needed the latest 
information on vaccine allotments and projections, we knew who to 
call--MAJ Aimee Mack.
  Major Mack will soon depart for Command and General Staff College at 
Fort Leavenworth, KS, and she will be greatly missed. I want to thank 
her for her exceptional service and thank her family as well--her 
husband, MAJ Jamaal Mack, and her children, Daunte and Alisa. I wish 
her every success in the future and sincerely hope we get to work with 
her again soon.

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