Reauthorize the Zadroga Act

Floor Speech

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I thank the gentlewoman for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, 13 years ago, Osama bin Laden orchestrated the deadliest terrorist attack in American history, killing almost 3,000 people immediately and wounding thousands more. The attacks also created an environmental nightmare. Hundreds of tons of contaminants poured onto the streets and canyons of Manhattan and Brooklyn and other areas, northern New Jersey, covering responders and survivors in toxic dust.

In the days following the attack, the Environmental Protection Agency of the United States Government, contrary to ample evidence, insisted that the air in lower Manhattan and Brooklyn was safe to breathe. Thousands of responders remained on the site for search, rescue, and cleanup efforts; and thousands of survivors returned to their homes, but the air was not safe to breathe. The EPA was not telling the truth.

Now, I don't get angry at the government for the first few days, maybe even a week or two, encouraging people to help with the rescue operation when we still thought it might be a rescue operation, but after that 2 weeks, when people were working at the site for weeks and months without proper respiratory protection because the Federal Government was telling them that no protection was necessary because the air was safe to breathe, that was no longer a rescue operation. It was a cleanup operation. There was no one alive to be saved at that point, and people whose lives and health were put in danger at that point were put in danger in vain because the air was not safe to breathe, despite the assurances of the EPA.

Today, more than 30,000 first responders and survivors are sick and in need of special care because of that. It was for those tens of thousands of brave, selfless, and innocent responders and survivors that Congress came together in 2010, after many years of struggle and negotiation, to pass the James Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act in order to fulfill a moral obligation to, as Lincoln said, ``care for him who shall have borne the battle.''

Today, the programs are working. Residents of all 50 States and 431 of the 435 congressional districts receive health care through the 9/11 health program. More than 7,800 individuals have been found eligible for compensation from the victim compensation fund. More than $490 million has so far been awarded, and new applications are processed every day.

But the Federal Government's duty to support those who have become ill in the aftermath of 9/11 and those whose illnesses have yet to manifest themselves--because we know that many of the illnesses and many of the cancers take years to show themselves, that duty is not done, even as the programs we authorized in 2010 are set to expire.

We must continue to provide health care coverage to the tens of thousands currently enrolled in the 9/11 health program and ensure that no eligible individuals are denied access to the victims compensation fund. Our obligation will carry us far into the future.

Thousands of individuals exposed to the toxic air on 9/11 and in the weeks and days following that--even those who are healthy today we know will face major health issues in the years to come, as latent cancers and other illnesses emerge. For that reason, I am proud to work with Representatives Maloney and King and Senators Gillibrand and Schumer to try to reauthorize these critical programs.

I urge all of our colleagues to work with us in support of a reauthorization and to move this bill through Congress and onto the President's desk as soon as possible.

Just as we stood together, as a Nation, in the days following September 11, 2001, just as we stood strong together in 2010 to create these vital programs, we must join forces again to ensure that the heroes of 9/11 are not abandoned when they need us most. We must pass a new reauthorization to sustain these programs. We must protect the heroes and survivors of 9/11.

There are really two separate moral imperatives here that we must meet. The first is that we must show that the United States takes care of its own. We take care of those who fall in our battles, who are wounded in our struggles. And the attack on 9/11 was not an attack on New York City. It was not an attack on the World Trade Center. It was not against the Port Authority of New York. It was an attack on America, an attack on the United States. The particular victims happened to be located in New York. And we must show that we do not leave people behind on the battlefield, that we take care of those who are wounded on our behalf.

The second moral imperative is that much of the injuries that continue to be felt, much of the illnesses

with which people suffer, much of the illnesses which we don't know about but which people will suffer from in the years to come are the direct fault of the Federal Government because of its assurances, contrary to known facts at the time, that the air was safe to breathe, that people should go back to work, stay working on the pile, and go back to school. We knew better. Many of us said, don't believe the EPA. Don't go back to work. Don't go back to school. This is poison. And it was clear.

And at first, when the EPA was saying this, there was no data to support their safety assurances, and they kept saying it when there was plenty of data to say that the air was not safe to breathe. So because of the false assurances by the Federal Government, many thousands of people relying on those assurances worked without the proper respiratory protection to clean up the site, worked in the area, and helped revive the economy at the expense of their health. And we must, to the extent possible, make them whole today. That is a second moral imperative.

And finally, it must never be said that the United States remembers its heroes and honors its wounded for 13 years and then forgets about them. It has been 13 years. In 2 years, the 9/11 health bill will expire. Let it not be said that we remember for 13 years and take care of people for 15, and that is it. That would be a heck of an epitaph on a moral country.

As we are involved in a war--which it is, unfortunately--against many terrorists across the world, and the President is going to address us on some aspects of that tonight, let us not abandon those who fell, who gave up their health, who continue to suffer on our behalf. It would be wrong. It would be immoral. It would not be worthy of the United States. This is a great and moral Nation. This Congress must show it by reauthorizing the 9/11 bill in a timely fashion.

It is one of the things we must do in response to 9/11. There are many other things we must do, many other things that we have done. But taking care of our own wounded is one of them and one of the attributes of a civilized today.

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