National Personnel Records Center
Floor Speech
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Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, I rise at this moment to oppose the amendment that is going to be offered by my colleague and friend from Louisiana Senator Kennedy. This amendment would endanger the lives of thousands, if not millions, of innocent people and prolong this terrible coronavirus pandemic. I am sure that is the not the intention of the Senator from Louisiana, but that is what his effort would do. His amendment would gut a critical tool to help stop the spread of the pandemic globally, as well as stem the economic fallout that would hurt us here in America.
The International Monetary Fund has a fund with the ability to release money in what are called Special Drawing Rights, foreign exchange reserve assets that it maintains. This can be exchanged by member nations for hard currency in times of crisis. This is exactly what was done in 2009 amid the global economic crisis and what is being considered now amid the pandemic and related economic downturn.
The amendment, which I am going to offer, has the support of American business, labor, and global health, and poverty groups--for good reason. The Special Drawing Rights are a no cost way for Americans to help poor nations buy the vaccines they need to save lives and to stop the spread of this coronavirus. And it would also help aid in economic recovery.
Isn't that exactly what we should be doing at this moment?
This pandemic doesn't know any boundaries. This virus doesn't pick and choose good nations and bad nations. Our ability to protect the hard-fought gains against the pandemic here in the United States, after all that we have been through, ultimately depends on getting it under control around the world so variants and strains don't attack us anew.
I know what we have been through. If we ignore the reality, the fact is, this pandemic came roaring at us from a city in China that most Americans have never heard of, and now we have to decide whether we are going to take it on directly.
You don't tell the fire department to not help with the fire at your neighbor's house at a time of crisis. Sadly, that is exactly what the Kennedy amendment would do.
And the one part that he is missing that is so critical is to take it or leave it on the Special Drawing Rights. You can't pick and choose the Nations that might or might not receive the benefits to buy vaccines.
We can use other mechanisms and persuasion to achieve that goal, but I am sorry to say that Senator Kennedy's approach would cut off the Special Drawing Rights for friendly nations as well as those who are not friendly. And that to me is shortsighted.
The way the IMF Special Drawing Rights process works, we cannot dictate which countries will receive the benefits. Because of our majority position at the IMF, we either stop the Special Drawing Rights completely or let them go forward.
So the United States should stand for public health, stand for people to be spared the suffering and death of this coronavirus, and move forward with humanitarian aid that will help the world.
The Treasury Department is working with our allies to halt the ability of any rogue nation that might want to exchange Special Drawing Rights for hard currency and pushing transparency measures for how any Special Drawing Rights are spent.
As such, I am offering a substitute amendment that makes it clear that we want to make certain that nations do not misuse these funds. But unlike the Kennedy amendment, it would move forward and provide resources for countries desperately in need of vaccines to save lives.
I further support the Treasury's efforts to make sure that the SDR allocation is used to help to stem the pandemic.
I urge my colleagues to vote for my substitute amendment and to oppose the amendment being offered by the Senator from Louisiana.
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Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, do I have 1 minute?
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Mr. DURBIN. These Special Drawing Rights of the International Monetary Fund are the only way the poorest nations on Earth could have the money to buy vaccines to save their people. That is what it boils down to.
But Senator Kennedy says: Well, some of this money might get into the wrong hands.
I pray that it doesn't. I pray that they administer it properly, and I think they will. But how would you like to have on your conscience the fact that our amendment vote on the Senate floor is the end of the funds for vaccines for some of the poorest countries on Earth? I would not want that on my conscience.
Support my amendment, which makes it clear where the Americans do stand when it comes to this issue. Vote on Amendment No. 2014
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Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, there is one fundamental flaw in what you have just heard from Senator Kennedy, and let me read it to you:
The United States retains the right to refuse to purchase special drawing rights from any [country].
It is voluntary--it is up to us to do it--and we don't purchase them from a lot of countries because of that.
Let me tell you further that all we can do is stop the special drawing rights which are providing our currency to countries to buy vaccines. Why do we care whether some country far away had a vaccine? Well, how far away was Wuhan, China?
We have to be in this together to try to put an end to this pandemic crisis. Vote to defeat the Kennedy amendment. Vote on Amendment No. 1710
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