Executive Calendar--continued

Floor Speech

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Mr. President, I am here for the third time in as many days to talk about this Nation's response to a humanitarian crisis affecting millions of Americans--the people of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands. It is similar to the situation in Florida, in the gulf coast, and, some years ago, in Connecticut and in other parts of this country when they faced a natural disaster that was almost as devastating as an attack would be by a foreign power.

Analogous but different, this category 4 Hurricane Maria caused consequences as devastating and destructive as any that man could do.

It is a natural disaster, not manmade, but it is turning into a manmade disaster.

So far, the response from our government has been underwhelming. In fact, it has been inadequate and anemic. It has been shamefully slow and undersized and should be vastly upgraded and increased.

Just moments ago, I learned that Lieutenant General Buchanan has been appointed to head the military efforts in Puerto Rico. That appointment followed a call just an hour or so ago with all of the representatives, including FEMA, the Department of Defense, other Federal agencies, and the Red Cross, during which I urged our U.S. military to be mobilized, much as we would be in responding to a natural disaster in Connecticut or Texas or Florida or other places in this country on the mainland where we have seen the same kind of storm.

The 3.4 million people in Puerto Rico are almost exactly the same number as the population of Connecticut. I hope, and I believe, the response would be better in Connecticut if we were to face the same kind of natural disaster. Yet the manmade disaster is the failure to move food, fuel, medicine, water, other necessities, and communications equipment from the ports and the airports into the interior of the country, even into the major cities, where currently apparently a lack of drivers and passable roads make it all the more difficult. Whether the supplies of food and fuel and medicine and water are adequate on the island or need to be increased on an emergency basis and whether there are sufficient shipments and airlifts going into the island, the simple fact is that Puerto Rico faces a disaster--manmade after natural.

I commend the loyal and dedicated people of FEMA and all of the National Guard, including the National Guard of Connecticut, who have performed with such heroism and dedication in the face of the most difficult circumstances imaginable, but their efforts need to be matched by many others. There are 4,500 American military personnel now in Puerto Rico. Rather than 5,000, there should be 50,000 of our National Guard, not to occupy the island, not to enforce martial law but to make sure the logistics--the transportation, the means of delivery of the lifeblood of that island in food and fuel and medicine and water and other basic necessities--are sufficient to move those basic supplies to the places they are needed. The troops who are there now are performing heroic, Herculean work, and so are many volunteers, along with FEMA officials, the Coast Guard, and others, but they need more help.

Nearly a week after this storm, Maria, more than 90 percent of the island's residents are without power, 42 percent have no water, the vast majority of the country's 69 hospitals cannot function, and only 10 percent of the cell towers are working. If those conditions existed in Connecticut, I would be on the floor 24 hours a day. Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands have no one here, and they have no elected Representatives in the House of Representatives. They are voiceless or at least voteless in this body. We need to stand for them, speak out, and fight for them. That is why I am here for the third day in a row.

We need a plan and a strategy, which has been lacking from this administration. In that phone call earlier today with FEMA officials and the Department of Defense, I asked about a plan. They are working on it. The military, U.S. Northern Command, is working on a plan. They could not tell me when it will be ready or what it will say or what the total number of troops or other logistical supplies will be nor could they commit that there would be a waiver under FEMA regulations of the C through G conditions, which apply to permanent recovery.

The only decision that has been made is A to B, which provides for debris and other emergency responses over the next 180 days, and that is part of what the island needs--a longer term plan as well as an immediate one to make sure there is a road to recovery, that there is a path that will provide hope. Not only is the well-being and health of this island threatened but so is hope, which is so important for progress to be made.

The people of Puerto Rico have been met with, at best, ambivalence and ambiguity by the President of the United States. Earlier this week, he seemed more inclined to blame the island itself and the size of the ocean than in advocating for help. I hope we can come together on a bipartisan basis. With the kind of situation that is there now--the danger of epidemic as well as immediate health threats before disease takes hold--we must act before people die. We must come to the aid of Puerto Rico. They need medical care. They need access to food and safe drinking water, and, yes, they need greater security.

The 78 mayors of Puerto Rico, along with the Governor, are doing also heroic and Herculean work, but a whole of government response is necessary from this body and from the Federal Government at a much higher magnitude. In the long term, we must have a martial plan--a strategy for rebuilding the island's roads, bridges, rail, airports, ports, and VA facility, much as we do in this country, except that, there, the need is so much more dire and immediate. Hospitals, transportation, electricity, power, communications, safety, housing all have been destroyed, and the consequences will be deadly.

My hope is that Lieutenant General Buchanan will expedite that plan. So far, it has been lacking. It should be done today. It should be integrated with the FEMA approach, and I hope they will permit visits by Members of the Congress who, so far, have been prevented from going there.

The American people deserve to have elected Representatives there because Puerto Rico has none here. The extraordinary work done by the cable TV and reporters for the print media and others who are there have given us a picture--and often a picture is worth a thousand words--of the devastation that now continues from a manmade disaster that must be avoided before it takes lives and destroys hope.

Thank you.

I yield the floor.

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