Introduction of A Bill to Provide An Additional Appropriation for the Emergency Food and Shelter Program to Provide Humanitarian Relief for Migrants
Floor Speech
BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT
Ms. NORTON. Madam Speaker, today, I introduce a bill to amend the recently enacted fiscal year 2023 continuing resolution (CR) to provide $50 million in emergency supplemental appropriations for the Federal Emergency Management Agency's Emergency Food and Shelter Program (EFSP) for humanitarian assistance for migrants. The funding would remain available until expended.
In a cynical political stunt, the governors of Texas, Arizona and Florida have sent approximately 14,000 vulnerable people fleeing desperate and dangerous situations in their home countries to the District of Columbia, New York City, Chicago and Martha's Vineyard in the last several months.
In fiscal year 2022, Congress provided $150 million for the EFSP for humanitarian assistance for migrants. As of September 28, 2022, approximately $1 million of this funding remained available. I, along with several colleagues, sent a letter to the House Committee on Appropriations requesting that the CR provide $50 million in emergency supplemental appropriations for the EFSP for humanitarian assistance for migrants, but it was not included in the introduced version of the CR. We then filed an amendment to the CR at the Committee on Rules to provide this $50 million, but the amendment was not made in order. The enacted CR only provides funding for the EFSP at the fiscal year 2022 rate of operations. D.C., New York City, Chicago and Massachusetts have increased their requests for EFSP funding, and without additional appropriations, the EFSP may exhaust its funding.
This $50 million would ensure that D.C. and other jurisdictions, as well as non-profit groups and volunteers, have the resources they need to provide humanitarian assistance to migrants. As we continue to work to provide increased funding for the EFSP for humanitarian assistance for migrants in the regular fiscal year 2023 appropriations bill, I strongly urge my colleagues to support this bill.
BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT
Source